What Can Replace Art?

Once upon a time, the cathedral was humbling not only because of its size and expense, but also because it contained works of art that only a talented few could create. Gather enough people for enough time and anyone could make a giant building, but only a genius could make great art. Men encountered art rarely, and, when they did, it confronted them as irrefutable proof that not all men are created equal. What could possibly replace art as proof that human genius is rare?

In the man-vs-society battle, humility is the surrender of man. When art humbles us, it teaches us to support society, so that society can support geniuses. Today, however, art is nearly as common as dirt. Powerpoint presentations, movies, glogs and prezis are assignments for elementary school students. Technology empowers them to capture real-life scenes as digital images, compose and edit soundtracks, design 3D animations, and leverage the seemingly limitless stream of art flowing through the Internet. Entertainment has become a market like never before. Classic art no longer seems impressive, and neither does any other art. 

JR, the 2011 TED Prize winner, is an artist. He is famous for taking photographs of ordinary people, printing blow-ups on ordinary paper, and pasting them like graffiti on the walls of slums. His dream is for everyone to participate in art--send him a photo, and he will send you the printed blow-up with instructions about how to glue it. It has become easy to suppose that there are no geniuses, that we really are equal to the best. But, our growing sense of individual dignity must be a delusion--far from winning the battle against society, humans become increasingly dependent, like cogs in a great machine--and delusions can be dangerous.

Love Monologue for a Gadfly

For auditions. Feel free to adjust gender, as appropriate.

Scene: In a bar. PAT has had a few drinks, and is trying to build camaraderie with the bartender.

PAT:

Of all the words in all the languages in all the world, "love" is the most...meaningless. My friends told me, "When you fall in love, then you'll understand." Well, now I understand they're full of it. Falling...on my face...doesn't help clarify anything. (receiving no sympathy) Yeah? Why don't you give it a try, huh? I'll tell you what, to make it easy, just tell me what part of speech is it. What part of speech is the word "love"? Do you think it's a noun, like "I gave her my love"? Hah! No way. It's not a noun. Nouns are persons, places and things. There's no actual thing given... A verb? "I loved her, she loved me"? No, verbs are actions--they're what love makes us do... An adjective, as in "a loving relationship"? Ah, you're sneaky--you are so sneaky! How can I prove anything isn't an adjective? When it comes down to it, every adjective is in the eye of the beholder. You say po-tah-to, I say po-tae-to. What's the difference? But adjectives are just decoration; they don't count. (beat) I wish love were so unimportant, but it can't be... "love" can't be just an adjective... it's not a noun, it's not a verb, and it's not an adjective. Do you want to know what it is? It's like the word "hello"... like "I hello you."... "Hi."... (suddenly sincere) "No, you don't understand, I really hello you." (laughing) Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain--he'll only confuse you...(calms down, then sincere again) "I really...hello... that present you gave me..." (laughing) See? Do you get it now? It's... polite...to say... something... in acknowledgement... to make some sort of... noise, some... indication... a grunt or something... yeah, that's it. That's what it is--the word "love" is a grunt with a vowel in the middle...You think I'm a nut? Well, I wish you were right, believe me, but it's no use ignoring the facts: first there was grunting, then there was speech, and there was bound to be something that wouldn't convert. Picture it--there's this neanderthal child...he's crying, because, oh, I don't know, he's scared of the dark. And his mother says, (sympathetically) "ahwwww..." which means "Don't worry, dear. Mommy loves you..." No words can describe how "ahwwww" could possibly protect anyone from giant scary monsters, but the kid shuts up anyway because...well, he thinks...he thinks this "ahwwww..." stuff must have something to it, something he could lose if he doesn't stop whining...OK, so then, the next day the kids start arguing, "Urghh!" "Arghh!" "Urghh!" "Arrghh!"...which means, "Mommy loves me more!" "No, Mommy loves me more!" "Does not!" "Does too!"... You see what she started? Then, Dad comes home. He sees them fighting, right? So, before Mom can dump the kids on him, he says, (sexy) "mmm-mm..." which means, "Hey, baby... I loooove you..." Incredible! It's meaningless noise, but she starts to worry--in the back of her mind she starts to think, "Maybe I'd better quiet those kids down, or I might miss-out on some of that 'mmm-mm', whatever it is." Well, it doesn't take long for the rest of the world to catch on. You too can win friends and influence people without actually committing yourself to anything. Grunt at your family. Grunt at your friends. The more you grunt, the better they'll treat you! Your grunting will become the pulse of their life dance. "Uhmp... uhmp... uhmp... uhmp..." Politicians deliver blather to millions! God has evangelicals to grunt on His behalf: "Ding-dong! Hi! Unga-hoona oowa-oowa!"...and don't forget that singing purple dinosaur... Well... now, of course, my girlfriend is doing it... She asked me how much I love her. How much do I unga-hoona oowa-oowa? I'm trying to evolve beyond that. I... admire her. Sometimes I wish I was her. I... trust her. I'm... committed to her... and, yeah, she really turns me on. I've told her that. I mean, I've told her all those things... but to say the words "I" "love" "you"? That's a control tactic--I can't do that to her! And then what do I get, for all my chivalrous sophistication? She says, "Huh..." Damn! It felt like she slammed a door into my face! ... "Huh..." Can you believe that!? ... (several beats, as though several times reconsidering what to say next) Well, maybe its not too bad; "Huh" means she still loves me, right?

Balance for Staying Fat

Religion is important. I've even heard that some scholars define one's "religion" as whatever is important to them (e.g. making money can be a religion). So attempting to prevent public schools from teaching about religion is odd and probably unstable.

Chris Crutcher wrote an award winning book of teen-fiction that is taught in many public schools, despite its apparent religious bias (see Cap City Liberty: Breaking News: Belleville School Board Votes Unanimously to Keep Challenged Book in English Curriculum). As a parent, I want my kids to appreciate the perspectives of people with diverse religious biases, so I like the fact that Crutcher broke the rules. However, I also see something valuable in the rules he broke, and to salvage that value, I think we need parents to write their own versions that present other biases. Here's mine (conservative evangelical).

Crutcher couldn't be expected to teach teenagers to appreciate every religious view, and we can't expect my one story to completely balance his. But wouldn't it be great if Wikipedia had links to a full range of versions of Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes? Crutcher linked his site to my story, and said he'd like to know about many more. Please start writing!

Death and Other Hardships

I've discovered a philosopher that I like: Nick Bostrom. A bunch of his ideas coincidentally appeared in science-fiction form in a play I wrote while a playright apprentice for the Theater Artists' Westport of Westport (a sort of off-Broadway Actors' Studio). I figured I should publish the play, just in case it might contain something Nick hasn't yet done better:

TED Talks

Hopefully, readers of Gadfly Dad already know about TED Talks, but I need to post the link just in case.

Each video is 18 minutes or less, and designed to change the world all by itself. The TED braintrust includes some of the most successful gadflies of our day. They have done an excellent job of soliciting and filtering world-class content. The categories have expanded from just Technology, Entertainment and Design (TED) to also include business, science and global issues. You can sort them by how often they are viewed, emailed or commented upon, and by nine different ratings.

Watch one right now in an area that interests you. If you've already seen one, go watch another. Challenge is good for you.

Pied Piper

I wrote, arranged, and produced this musical comedy before I became a dad. Good thing: thinking about kids in the middle-ages, how kids can inspire despite the worst circumstances, brings me close to tears now that I have kids of my own.

I wrote this as part of my own crusade against cults (just as idealistic as the crusade in the story). Splitting the action across a dozen leads helped keep the focus on the cult dynamics (rather than on individual characters), but readers should be warned that this makes it more difficult to track the plot (having physical actors helps). In that sense, this is an anti-story.

Growing Together

I thought of this book as my dissertation, a chance to write for the sake of learning, to advance original thought, and to establish a specialization (in my case, practical philosophy).

Each chapter offers something I want for my kids:

1. How can we become wise?
2. How can we become truly free?
3. How can we have the deepest love?
4. How can we be at peace with one another?
5. How can we gain spiritual experience?
6. How can we discover purpose in life?

The major theme is that the answers to these questions require being social, so it is written as a series of one-hour "gatherings". Testing revealed that they don't work as planned--there might be something interesting to discover from thinking about why they don't work, so I am linking to them as they were.

The questions are religious, so I tried to appeal to all faiths, including atheism; I supported every answer with both science and scripture. That might have contributed to the ineffectiveness. Feedback also suggested that people don't like to move through these ideas so quickly (maybe people slow down in interfaith situations).