Re: [FRIAM] witness as intervention (was Faith)
Marcus G. Daniels wrote at 09/25/2012 12:51 PM: > Consider a hypothetical female couple, well-paid, and taxpaying Stanford > and MIT PhDs, who move out to the country and home school and > telecommute. "Those boys are forced to have girly hair and their moms > vote for the communist party.." etc. Victims of that particular > majority -- it has less to distract it, so some provincial meddling > results. Precisely. The silent witness can be interpreted by the participants. My guess would be that this hypothetical couple would stand their ground on the one hand (toward the meddlers) and defend their decisions and behavior. And they'd likely, on the other hand, explain to their boys that they might be in the minority in that community and the boys should be prepared to recognize any sources of friction that may result. In my context, I would seriously _love_ for the macho dad next door to explain to me why he raises his children the way he does (something I never had explicitly laid out by my dad ... though I came to understand it anyway, I think -- whereas my sister still lives with that legacy on a daily basis). I'd also have _loved_ to see either party in the fireworks dispute to formally launch a duel of some kind to settle their differences. It could be anything from scouring the city ordinances to fisticuffs, for all I care. But this shamedly quieting down and wandering off thing struck me as evidence that both of them _knew_ they were behaving antisocially and came to regret it. Ultimately, the _nest_ comes down hard and ruthless on those living in it. -- glen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] witness as intervention (was Faith)
On 9/25/12 12:39 PM, glen wrote: That goes _directly_ back to the point that population density is probably the critical variable in discussions of how others raise their kids. Cuts both ways. One question is whether the quiet presence is representative of the community or if it represents a minority view. Consider a hypothetical female couple, well-paid, and taxpaying Stanford and MIT PhDs, who move out to the country and home school and telecommute. "Those boys are forced to have girly hair and their moms vote for the communist party.." etc. Victims of that particular majority -- it has less to distract it, so some provincial meddling results. Marcus FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
[FRIAM] witness as intervention (was Faith)
Prof David West wrote at 09/22/2012 09:00 AM: > > On Thu, Sep 20, 2012, at 10:24 AM, glen wrote: > >> >> Here's an honest and personal question to make the ethics concrete: >> Should I have intervened? >> > clearly a tough question - given the state of society, the prevalence of > guns and predisposition to use them, and the potential for alcohol or > other substance abuse - not an easy decision. The "official" response > is no, report it to someone who has the "authority" to intervene. I > would have made my silent presence as witness obvious - but would not > have actively intervened. FWIW, that's what I did. Since the old jalopy they keep covered in canvas is only ~ 10 ft from my side door, I'm fairly certain the daughter, who was hiding behind the piece of junk, saw me standing there with the door open. I have no idea if the dad saw me. I also used that trick with a "kid" who was shooting off bottle rockets in the field behind the house awhile back. (I say "kid" because he looks about 20 yrs old, but has a similarly young wife and a baby. Say what you will about hicks, at least we breed young before the probabilities for things like autism rise too high.) A beefy, bald, beer-bellied, yahoo elsewhere in the neighborhood began yelling about how this is his neighborhood and if they don't stop shooting fireworks, he was gonna come out there and break the kid's back. Yaddayaddayadda. So, I went and stood next to them without saying anything. They all gradually quieted down and dispersed. It's almost like the mere fact that there was another human (as opposed to a camera) witnessing their silliness was enough of an intervention to re-orient their behaviors. That goes _directly_ back to the point that population density is probably the critical variable in discussions of how others raise their kids. -- glen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
