Now Where Is That Line Anyway?

Have you been hearing the question: Are we at some kind of tipping point? It is like a dam breaking under excessive pressure built up from behind. Woman after woman have been telling stories of sexual harassment.

However, there is some risk here. Not to the women who have come forward. The risk is over-smplifying a complex topic. 

I went for lunch yesterday at a family restaurant. While I waited for food, I listened to the words of the music blaring in the background. And I was glad I did not have to explain the meanings of sexual innuendoes in most of the pieces to a child.

When I was growing up, Elvis Presley had burst upon the scene - at the same time our small Midwestern town first "got TV."  My parents would not let me watch him on TV because of his hip movements. They would turn off the TV or hustle me out of eyesight. What did I know of hip movements?!

Now when I watch TV, I am glad my daughters are grown and I don't have to explain male-female behavior to  a ten year old. Or set limits on what clothing is acceptable or unacceptable to wear.

No, I am not a prude or uptight about sexual imagery. I am aware of changes in acceptability over the decades - and how sexuality is interwoven in our music, our TV shows, our attire, and our humor. Further, we all have our unique cultural history and set of values.

We are priveleged to live in multi-diverse communities. Even in my small town so long ago, what was acceptable sexual behavior varied considerably. The seventy-something married doctor who treated my mother in her last years was running around with a forty year old nurse. And it was common knowledge that he was doing so all around town. Not okay by my standards, but my mother choose to overlook his behavior rather than be disloyal and see another doctor.

So the question we all face is where is that line - since my line and your line likely differ. A hug or embrace from a friend - regardless of gender? A kiss? A hand on the knee? Or more overt sexual behavior in public or outside of marriage? 

When we move beyond our community of friends and others who generally share our values, it get more complicated.  Although not sexual behavior, I remember being instructed that when I was in Thailand, sitting as to show the bottom of one's shoes was terribly insulting. While today, Minnesotans grieve the death of one of its elder statesmen - who had a habit of sitting with his feet up on his desk when his shoes often had holes in the soles. 

I would wager that we don't even have agreed-upon definitions regarding inexcusable sexual behavior, except at the extreme ends. Yes, most of us would say that rape is not acceptable - whether the recipient is female or male. Ask a varied group of people to define sexual harassment and you will get a varied set of definitions (It is not gender-based work discrimination - though in today's discussions it has sometimes times accompanied  with sexual harassment. Or saying that a person will know it is sexual harassment when it happens, goes back to where is the line? Or when does feeling disrespect cross over into sexual harassment?

Sometimes the issue is misuse of power over another person. It may occur when the person with power does not realize when the line has been crossed into harassment. Sometimes is is coupled with physical power - men generally being stronger or bigger than women. I once taught a class regarding group process in which a very handsome, tall man's goal was to learn how to not be the assumed leader the minute he walked into the room. Whereas a petite woman in the class wanted to learn how to be heard. At other times, power over another can be deliberately and intentionally misused. 

Yes, there are predatory individuals. The kind of person many women avoid being alone with. However, none of us can quickly and always identify such a person - because these persons are usually very skilled at courting someone into unacceptable behavior. 

Yes, there often are no consequences for unacceptable behavior. And women often have not been heard or taken seriously. But the reverse is equally no solution - when women are believed 100% without any evidence that unjustifiable behavior has occurred.  Nor is self-labeling sexual harassment     as victimization a healing solution. Seeing oneself as a lifelong victim is not the path to genuine self-respect.

I have heard the phrase, are we at some kind of tipping point, a number of times in our recent discussions about sexual harassment. If that means we are at a new place in the cultural treatment of women, I am whole heartedly cheering - as are many of my male friends. If it means tipping the balance to favor women over men, I have two thumbs downward. I remember too well when my graduate school advisor said: I don't know why you are here anyway. You will never get a job when you  are finished, when I was in the process of shifting into another department that was a better fit for my interests.  Certainly gender discrimination, but not sexual harassment!

I have watched woman flirt with men. And I ask myself where is the line? And I watch men who are disrespectful of women. I certainly don't want to live in a culture where everyone erases any acknowledgment of our rich and essential sexuality. What we do need is honest discussion of our personal and work relationships that move us toward a new and healthier place.

Where To Plant That Tree?

The Orkneys lie due north of Scotland, small islands scattered across the sea. It is the kind of place where neighbors look out for one another. Leaving their houses unlocked in case a neighbor needs to borrow a cup of sugar and they aren't there. 

For a time, their young people left for college and did not return. Because of connections via the internet. young adults now are returning and the population is increasing.  It is a good place to live and to raise children - with accessibility to the global world just a click of a computer key. It is like "having your cake and eating it too." 

The largest island, Mainland, is an archeologist's dream, sometimes called the Egypt of the North. The downside is the winter wind, limiting research to the summer months!  The mysterious Ring of Brodgar, a large ring of tall standing stones, is older than Stonehenge. And ruins of early dwellings indicate that the Orkneys have been continuously occupied since Neolithic times.

It is hard to determine where to plant a tree with the wind continuously scouring the rocky land. But  contemporary inhabitants have devised an ingenious method. In autumn a farmer will walk the land with a supply of sticks about a meter long and red strips of cloth. When the farmer finds a likely place, the  farmer drives a stake into the ground and ties a red flag on it.  

In the spring, the farmer will again walk the land. Some stakes will have been completely blown away and no sign of them remains. Others will have survived - a bit tattered but still there. It is these places where a tree has a chance to survive until it is large enough to challenge the wind.

There is a metaphor for all of us from these remote islands. So much needs to be done in our country and world today. One person can't do it all. Thus, we have to pick and choose where to spend our energy. We need to walk our land and plant stakes with red flags and see which ones survive the turmoil.

Is it climate change that you feel passion about? Sexual harassment? The many refugee crises? A Congress which seems incapable of constructive action? Tax reform? Care of neglected and abused senior citizens in nursing homes? Racial prejudice and bias? Dialogue among religions? Educational inequality? The proliferation of automatic weapons?

Are you free to travel to other countries? Or are you limited to your immediate community because of work or financial constraints? Do you have health issues that limit your energy?  Do you want to provide an intense effort for short periods of time - or do you want to do something at a slower and continuous pace? Or both?

Now about those stakes with red flags.

As you read this essay, are you saying to yourself that you are only one person and thus can't make any difference? Then remember the election this past week. Lots of persons turned out to vote and the result is change across the country.

Pound in your stakes. See which one's get blown away by winter wind - and which ones remain. Those are your best places to make your voice heard!

Go plant your trees!

So How Do You Know If It Is True?

National and world news was of minor importance in the small Midwestern town where I grew up. Television did not arrive until I was in junior high. Its purpose was considered entertainment - not to inform people about what was happening in the country or beyond.

We did have a weekly newspaper to tell us about engagements and weddings, deaths and funerals, hog futures, and "who poured" when the ladies got together to chat about town goings-on. They knew most of what would be in the paper before it arrived!

The Saturday movie matinee had news-briefs, but we young people could care less. We had come for the feature film. What might be happening in the rest of the country or Europe had little relevance to us or our parents. After all, soldiers had come home from WWII and, after some tension with their wives, who had been in charge during their absence, they had re-asserted their position as heads of household.

If you had asked anyone if news that did filter through was true, you would be met by a puzzled stare. What do you mean by true? What motivation would any journalist have for reporting news that was not true? Of course there were editorials, but you knew up-front that an editorial was one person's opinion and that was not news. Photographic journalism adhered to a strict code of non-altered photos - no photoshop editorializing! What you saw was exactly what happened.

Today we are awash in news. Comparing television's PBS news with Fox news (or any other network) is one way to sort out opinions from reporting of actual events. There is so much news, sometimes we  feel battered by things we do  not want to hear - over and over again. Coping skills range from ignoring most of the news to reading only summaries written by trusted journalists to making the evening news a part of life's daily ritual - or ignoring the news altogether.

It is the term fake news that is troubling. Mistrust in the media is high. Some of the current President's supporters believe that anything negative about the President is automatically untrue. As if he is a perfect person with their best interests at the center of his policy-making. Equally adamant are those who believe the President consistently lies and they see no good in anything that comes out of his mouth or his Twitter.

The result: we have no public or private arena for useful discussion of critical issues.

Our great country is in serious trouble. Fake news does exist. It twists reality beyond recognition. Patterns of once buried racism, fears about people who are "different" or have another religion, bullying and violence, a desire to exclude from our country anyone who is not like us, and deep frustration with anything political - make responsible journalism difficult.

Yet there are are many good and decent people who hold doors for each other, drive responsibly, and who do not believe a gun is the solution.

We talk about opioid addiction - a very real problem. But we live with an equally worse addiction to power.  As our country was being formed, government was created with checks and balances. Today that structure is being challenged by very smart people whose first priority is "me first." 

We have survived much as a country. Even if we are weary of questioning the validity of honest journalism, technology makes it possible to give us options never before imagined. Like kids with their cell phones, we need to be wise.

In one of the books I co-authored with my husband, there is a photograph I took high in the Peruvian Andes. In the foreground of the original photo were some very mangy sheep, as only sheep can be in the spring. These sheep detracted from the photo so I photo-shopped them out. My dear husband was aghast. "you can't do that!" I said that "yes I can and I have." The point of including the photo was not that sheep were shedding their winter wool, but the vista of distant mountains and colored clothes drying on rocks in the foreground.

Was it fake news to exile these sheep? No! If we allowed everything before us to enter into our vision, we would quietly become dysfunctional and then go mad. The human capacity to screen input is an essential quality. However, moral honesty to do so is equally essential. We need to hone our honesty with great care, not generate self-serving lies and illusions. When we were in Kenya we drove along the edge of a huge slum. To have blinded ourselves to this extreme poverty or to have made ignorant remarks about why people lived this way would have been immoral.

We need that moral honesty in what we observe. Then we can bring together our different opinions and redeem our country with much needed conversations.   

And From What Country Did Your Ancestors Immigrate?

My heart aches for those caught in the immigration ban. You see, I am the granddaughter  of Danish immigrants. My grandmother came here as a teenager with her parents. My grandfather was in his twenties and changed his last name as he passed through Ellis Island – for what reason we will never know. And I married to someone whose German grandparents fled to this country to escape religious persecution.

It is not that my personal story is special or unique. It is the very ordinary story. Shared with many many of my friends. People who came here with next to nothing to start new lives. Hardworking people willing to leave family and friends they would never see again. All of them endured a long sea journey.

We are a country of immigrants. Even native First Nation people, who claimed this land first. People who became winners of Nobel prizes. Shopkeepers and farmers.  Composers and artists and writers. Scientists, engineers, and teachers. Refugees fleeing war. All of these people have contributed in many ways to our culture and our heritage.

The Statue of Liberty is a symbol of our American dream. At her base are these words:

"Give me your tired, your poor,

your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

the wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

As a child I wondered what this golden door was. But it did not matter to me. I fervently believed these words, this motto for my country. And I still do.

Now I see streams of refugees, whose lives are far worse than anything my particular ancestors endured. Some of them die in their attempts to escape from camps that give them no promise of a future.

The solutions to their plight are complex. But to bar them from hope because of their religion is cruelty beyond imagination. In this country, along with many other countries, lie compassionate solutions – not responses of bigotry and hatred.

I love my peaceful little neighborhood. I have Muslim neighbors, family from Ethiopia, and Hmong people and others. We enrich each other’s lives. All of us yearn to “breathe free” as Lady Liberty reminds us day after day.

Read individual stories of people landing here and not granted entry – to be shipped back to their home countries. The six-year old who “might be a threat.” The elderly grandfather who came to see his grandchildren – detained 17 hours and then put on a plane for the long trip back to his country. Spouses separated from spouses already here. Graduate students unable to re-enter after a visit with family back home. The list goes on and on.

Recite the words at the base of the Statue of Liberty out loud . Sing a few verses of America and other patriotic songs. Remember your own ancestry – because we are all immigrants - the daughters and sons of people who came here to build a better life for themselves and for their children.A better life for all of us.

No More Buggy Whips

It has been said the only sure things are death and taxes. I would add a third category. Change at this time in history is a guaranteed reality!

Predicting change is another matter. It rivals crystal ball gazing in accuracy. Today change is occurring at an even faster rate. No wonder people everywhere are panicky and angry. They struggle to find political voice. Believing they then can control their future.

Where I live, we joke about weather predictions. Yes, it will snow in the winter and there will be some hot summer days. But those generalities are not too useful for planning an rain-free outdoor wedding in June or when there will be sufficient snow for cross-country skiing.

Likewise, predicting changes in the future, in terms of the employment market or technological advances, is more of an art than a science. If you can say you are paid for what you love to do, you will have a wonderful and productive life. But there if there is little or no market for what you love to do, you may end up with an unsatisfying life and mark time until retirement.

When I think of major changes occurring during my lifetime, most of them were beyond anyone’s imagination at the time. I remember the first computer I encountered. This humungous creation occupied an entire temperature and humidity-controlled room.  If you squinted your eyes, you almost could imagine approaching an ancient Greek oracle for an answer to some grave concern.

Attendants in white coats cared for this mysterious being. If a person wanted to run something on this computer, the program was handed to the attendant. Of course, the program had to be written in the computer’s language.

Today, I carry my cell phone in my pocket. When I have a question about something, the answer is immediate. Who could ever have imagined such a handy little device while standing at the doorway of that room-sized machine!

Further, my little device connects me with others all around the world. Decades ago, when I traveled out of the country, calling home was complicated and required advanced planning. Today, it doesn’t matter if I am halfway around the world -calling home only requires calculating the difference in time zones so as not to wake family or friends in the middle of the night.

When we go back in time, change occurred more slowly. Before my time, people traveled by horse and buggy. A buggy whip was an essential piece of equipment. Those buggy whips were manufactured somewhere and provided an income for some hardworking men (the women were busy keeping house and raising the children). When people begun driving the first auto-cars, buggy whips were no longer needed. And people who prided themselves with making those fine buggy whips found themselves without jobs.

The same kinds of changes are occurring today. Jobs are lost dure to technology and global production. But people want their old jobs to continue – which won’t happen. The reality is that cars could be produced via computers long distance away - rather than on assembly lines manned by people. Hence, the pain and disconcerting footing beneath them that so many people are experiencing.

Social media is such a wonderful way to connect people.  But the same media can fan anger over change, creating political unrest. Populism is seen as a solution world-wise. Until it becomes like the clamor of many people shouting in a room, so loud that you can’t hear yourself think. And the uncertainty of living in a world with so many autocratic rulers casts a additional dark shadow over all of us.

When I was young, people did not question whether the news was true or not. As if truth were some kind of objective absolute and verifiable reality. Now intentional fake news confounds our confusion. What do we dare to believe is actually accurate? I am reminded of cattle guards. You can drive into the pasture or range land. But try to back up to gain a wider perspective and your tires will be shredded.

There are many problems confronting us that need solving, making the loss of buggy whips almost laughable. Never forget there are solutions to be created for so much that we face.

There a number of constructive ways to live in all this uncertainty and unpredictability.  My suggestions are to work for constructive political changes. Travel – to other countries. Engage in conversations with people whose cultures differ from yours. Challenge yourself.  Imagine what you cannot possibly imagine.