Only Real Men Can Iron Clothes At 3,000 Feet
I have reached the conclusion that most of the world’s ironing is now being done by men. I say this because it’s the only explanation I have for a sport called “extreme” ironing, which is actually being lobbied as an Olympic event by “ironing enthusiasts” — a phrase referred to in the Bible as a sign of the coming apocalypse.
I have reached the conclusion that most of the world’s ironing is now being done by men. I say this because it’s the only explanation I have for a sport called “extreme” ironing, which is actually being lobbied as an Olympic event by “ironing enthusiasts” — a phrase referred to in the Bible as a sign of the coming apocalypse.
And four horsemen will come from the sky. And they will lay waste to the land, but not before having their robes pressed by ironing enthusiasts.
It’s easy to understand how extreme ironing evolved if you keep in mind a simple truth about the male species:
Given enough time, any man performing a mundane task will find a way to hurt himself.
And if you can hurt yourself doing it, then it’s practically a sport already. Sure, bowling and golf might appear to be exceptions to this rule. But ask anyone who has ever jammed their finger in the ball return, or inadvertently left a tee in their back pocket, and they’ll tell you there is plenty of danger involved.
As a man who irons, I know, firsthand, the danger that comes with pressing my daughter’s favorite clothes. Especially if I use the wrong setting and turn what was once a flowery cotton blouse into our newest hand towel. Until recently, men who ironed were looked upon as being wimpy. This was a stigma left over from an earlier time when men brought home the bacon and women cooked it.
Then cleaned the kitchen, vacuumed, washed the dishes, bathed the kids, and did all the laundry. Back then, men who refused to perform domestic chores were still called masculine things such as “The Breadwinner,” “King of the Castle,” and “Man of the House.”
Generally by other men.
Today, men who want to bring home the bacon — while avoiding any domestic chores — are called other things, such as “single” or “recently divorced.”
As a result, we men have come up with a way to demonstrate our unquestionable maleness by 1) taking a simple task and 2) making it as difficult as humanly possible. This is the general idea behind “extreme” ironing, which, according to its web site (www.extremeironing.com) “combines the excitement of an ‘extreme’ sport with the satisfaction of a well-pressed shirt.”
Being a man, I can appreciate that kind of logic.
Anyone WOMAN can iron a pair of slacks; it takes a MAN to do it while jumping out of a plane.
Because of this, I have decided to train for the 2011 Extreme Ironing World Championships, which my family has pledged its support for by providing me with as much ironing to do as possible. In fact, as a demonstration of her unselfish commitment to my goal, youngest daughter recently purchased an entire new wardrobe, none of which is “wrinkle free.”
My hope is that the experience will draw us even closer together as a family.
At least, once I can find them on the other side of this pile of ironing.
(You can write to Ned Hickson at nhickson@thesiuslawnews.com, or at the Siuslaw News at P.O. Box 10, Florence, OR. 97439)
‘Spinning Our Wheels’ With Public Education
If the State does NOT want to assume its constitutional responsibility to provide and finance a quality education to every child, then legislators need to change the law. Every two years lawmakers appear to look at doing just that.
Financing and Improving Public Education: Still An Issue Of Legal And Moral ResponsibilityIf the State does NOT want to assume its constitutional responsibility to provide and finance a quality education to every child, then legislators need to change the law. Every two years lawmakers appear to look at doing just that.
Currently the State is guilty of violating its mandated responsibility to parents and their children. Personally, I advocate a class-action lawsuit against the State by parents and educators. Unfortunately, it seems like any effort to resolve an educational issue in this state results from the judicial and not the legislative system.
Several years ago a court decision found the current financing system illegal. Interestingly enough it was the court that originally determined the current financing method, which includes the “Robin Hood” clause — forcing “wealthy” districts to provide some of their tax dollars to “poor” districts. Note that most districts these days are “poor” districts.
If legislators want to privatize education, that’s fine only if taxpayers don’t have to foot the additional bill for it. Otherwise, legislators simply are looking to cover their own butts for not providing the appropriate and adequate financing during the past decade. Case in point: It is the legislature that has created the current emergency plight of public education by forcing the court to set up a financing system that ensures educational inequality among economic classes and is doomed to fail.
Furthermore, if privatization of public education is our next step, legislators had better put into place a regulated system of tuition and finance costs. We need only observe what has occurred under the recent deregulation of higher education tuition costs to note the critical nature of this issue.
Privatization of public education brings along a whole set of other issues and problems. Ongoing legislative inept short-term thinking is incapable of determining, implementing and maintaining an entirely new educational system. In addition, operating two parallel educational systems under the state rubric, public and private, is doomed for failure. If the state cannot successfully manage and monitor one system, how is it possible for it to maintain two separate education systems?
However, if the real concern is to educate every child equally (which, of course, it isn’t), then privatization is NOT the automatic educational road to recovery. Privatizing education merely will ensure the inequality between the “haves” and the “have-nots” within our society.
What happened to improving the quality of education or providing teachers with a professional salary?
smaller class sizes = better student : teacher ratios = more successful learning environment
Three years ago, Texas Governor Rick Perry self-appointed yet another Commission on Public Education, which he named “The Texas Tax Reform Commission”. It was headed by Democrat John Sharp and a host of 23 of the governor’s major campaign contributors. There were no average parents, educators, middle-class homeowners or students on the commission. It’s hard to imagine this group of businessmen arriving at financing public education improvements that could benefit most Texas families.
Privatizing education is another misguided special interest notion the governor and legislators have selected so they don’t have to assume the constitutional responsibility they have been diverting for the past decade and to ensure the highest quality education for every child.
Isn’t it clear yet to everyone that legislators and businessmen are NOT the group needed to develop a quality functional public school system with adequate financing? During the past decade they have proven beyond a doubt that they are incapable of doing so or wanting to do it.
What we have consistently is an Endless Loop of Public Education. “Is Our Children Learning?”
In the U.S. our children remain on the back-burners for improving learning outcomes and developing successful lives. Most states remain “stuck” in their respective approaches to public education, much as the spinning wheels of a vehicle caught without any traction in 2 feet of mud after a rain storm.
Politics all too often corrupts public education.
For example, in Texas, Gov. Rick Perry recently appointed Cynthia Dunbar to head the State Board of Education (SBOE). Ms. Dunbar is not exactly known for her for her intelligent and open-minded approach to educating Texas children. A significant point of her discipline is that she wants public schools to teach the Bible and NOT to teach evolution.
Another example of politics in public education: Texas State Education Commissioner Robert Scott has decided that all high school students will take more electives and fewer required courses under a bill that lawmakers recently approved in May 2009. Fortunately, the required courses he refers to are computer technology, health and physical education, NOT required subjects like math or science.
Students will no longer be required to take two semesters of computer technology and a semester of health education, while the physical education requirement has been reduced from three semesters to two. Instead, students will consider taking 6 credits of electives. Supposedly, the reason for this is to enable students to select topics that will aid them in develop skills for entering college. Will it work? No one knows.
The ongoing changes in public education occur not only in Texas, but virtually in every state in the nation. What truly is amazing is that every few years schools are forced via legislative agendas to adapt to another “enlightened” approach to teaching public education.
Generally, these changes don’t amount “to a hill of beans” and it is the educational core requirements that children need to increase their learning outcomes. Too many children still don’t learn the basics well. Many do not read at an appropriate level, know how to spell [texting has added to that problem] or how to perform simple mathematics. Many don’t know basic living skills either, e.g., how to keep a check book and pay bills, or how to write a simple letter or a job resume. All too often our children do not have significant communication and personal skills.
What we need to do is to teach our children the basics of how to succeed in life and in business. Reading, writing and arithmetic still are the key to learning and unfortunately, teaching our children to enjoy learning is not a priority. So, are we really helping our children to improve their learning outcomes? Not really.
Here in Texas, as in other states, we continue to teach our children to pass certain exams (TAKS) as a guide to and validation of their success. Is it working? Hardly. There is a lot of pressure placed on our children and teachers, without increasing their learning outcomes.
Last year the legislature approved incentives for teachers. Much as in industrial labor, teachers were rewarded for piece-work quantity for every student who succeeded — success measured by passing standardized tests. However, the program was marked for failure because our children are NOT industrial commodities and passing standardized tests are NOT a true indicator of future success in life.
Most public education programs provide scattered curriculum and inappropriate teaching methods that on the timeline of pedagogical and learning skills remain on par with the enlightenment level of the Spanish Inquisition. Most children are not well-prepared for college, business or life; consequently, most of them fall through the cracks of the imagined success mold.
Mark Twain is credited with stating, “I never let my schooling interfere with my education.” How many American children are able to say the same?
How long will it take for lawmakers, educators, and parents to recognize that to improve learning outcomes we must reduce class sizes, promote a love of learning, and teach children that learning is the key to being successful in education, business and life? Otherwise, we merely are passing along our children through the public education system much as in the manufacturing sector where various products move through an assembly line. Mark Twain might have stated that “Products don’t get to think much going through the assembly line.”
So, if we want to help our children become successful in education, business and life we must provide several basics:
o Encourage children to love learning about all topics
o Teach more of the basics — reading, writing, mathematics
o Develop communication, business and life training skills
o Reduce class sizes to promote real learning
o While it’s nice to provide more electives as options, they are not needed to improve learning skills
o Make classes more interesting by using various methods of learning, e.g., visuals, audio, kinesthetic applications
o Eliminate state exams or don’t make them the major measure of success
o Reduce competition among children while promoting group inclusion and real learning
o Evaluate children in a more holistic manner that includes long-term teacher assessment, tests, various learning skills, overall learning outcomes
o Trim the cost of providing public education so that it is more affordable to taxpayers.
In conclusion, it is unfortunate that on the learning evolutionary timeline public educations has remained in the Dark Ages. It is time we reach the Age of Educational Enlightenment by promoting student interest and an ongoing love of learning, strengthening the basic core of learning (reading, writing, mathematics), reducing oversized classes and providing curriculum and teaching methods that will improve overall educational skills and learning outcomes of all children.
Peter Stern, a former Director of Information Services, university professor and public school administrator, is a disabled Vietnam veteran who lives in Driftwood., TX.
Psychopaths Have No Conscience
Surviving & Prospering in the New Economy
How or why would any sane person DO THAT?
He constantly asks for sympathy, takes risks, lies to you and when caught shows no remorse. It is unsettling, frightening. Somehow it is your own fault. But what or why would anyone do these things? There is an answer.
The terms, “psychopathy,” “sociopath,” “sociopath,” and others refer to individuals who look human but, in elemental ways, are not. They harbor a condition which cuts them off from us. Some of the automatic emotional reactions, foundational to limiting wrong behavior, do not seem to exist. These individuals emulate compassion, concern, affection, kindness and love – only to further their purposes. They feel no compunction about stealing, lying, or committing crimes to achieve their goals. They consistently demand sympathy, knowing perfectly well they deserve none.
They do not want or need sympathy. But they do want you to feel sorry for them, to desire to help them. It is all manipulation, emotions simulated to get what they want. They know we feel sorry for them and project the existence of emotions they never feel, just another lie.
People catching their eyes sometimes report feeling a chill of fear, as if looking into the eyes of a predator . Psychopaths are predators among us. The pain and suffering of those around them mean nothing, is pleasure to them. Their motivations seem inexplicable to the emotionally normal, who comprise the vast majority of the population .
Psychopaths have no conscience.
Where before little was written on the condition outside of professional journals, now much more is known. This is changing.
The evidence, now mounting, indicates the condition has a genetic element. There are also suggestions that adverse conditions in the life of the individual may be important in many cases of psychopathy . The last few years have taken understanding of the condition known as ‘psychopathy’ to new levels.
While only 4% of the population have the condition Martha Stout, PhD., points out in her book, The Sociopath Next Door, you are likely to have contact with psychopathic individuals on many occasions during your life time. You therefore need to understand the danger signs .
Experts in the field of psychology have been researching the problem since 1980. Much is now known .
In 1999 Robert D. Hare, Ph. D. published Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us. Today, thanks to Robert Hare, David Kosson, Ph.D , and others, the means exist to reliably diagnose the condition. The test, carried out by qualified professionals, allows us the tools needed to understand and to take steps to help victims. The test, known as the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) (and adaptations of the test for use with adolescents and for screening purposes) when used by qualified professionals provides the means to identify those with the condition.
Hare’s new book, Snakes In Suits: When Psychopaths Go To Work, written with Paul Babiak, Ph.D., and published in 2006, opens the issue of the impact of the condition on the workplace, including large corporations.
It has been estimated elsewhere that as many as 4% of those in upper management may be psychopathic . Disturbingly, this may well also be true in higher levels of government given the massive cross over which exists at the highest levels of each. Logic supports the theory.
The test originated by Robert Hare has proven to be a valuable tool both to foster research on psychopathy and, increasingly, to open the door for victims to find justice. The work of Hare and his associates may, possibly, be used to the benefit of business and politics as well.
Psychopaths can impact us from every direction. For individual victims there is also hope.
Through the Aftermath: Surviving Psychopathy website victims participate with clinicians, therapists and others to move on with understanding. The site provides a Forum for victims, clinicians, and therapists for discussion and could well become the hub needed to generalize understanding of the condition in the general public.
Reading books on the subject, such as the excellent work by Martha Stout, Ph. D., The Sociopath Next Door, provide tools and tests which you can use personally. Dr. Stout, a practicing psychologist and clinical instructor in the department of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, warns the reader to beware of those who fail the simple tests she outlines. Three lies and you’re out, is one of several simple suggestions she proposes.
In dealing with the overall problem Stout raises other questions which are profoundly on point for all of us today.
On the question of war: Should sociopaths be tolerated as useful in time of war? Are we intentionally allowing psychopaths into the military? Perhaps recruiting them?
Has our toleration and ignorance smoothed the path for ugly behavior in other parts of our culture? What would a psychopath do, if elected to office? If they were the determining factor in deciding what matters, their profit or your health?
Have we considered the dangers the unchallenged presence of psychopaths presents when combined with the tendency in most of us to defer to authority?
If winning is the only thing that matters there is nothing you will not do. Recognizing no limits, psychopaths ignore the damage to others. As any small, determined group can change the world for the good, as Margaret Mead said, so a small number of individuals could destroy it. We need, therefore to limit the access of psychopaths to power while identifying them to the public.
A short tour through the books, links, and resources on the Aftermath: Surviving Psychopathy site raises questions which may well open up new understanding of ourselves. As individuals, parents, activists, and businesspersons, as Americans, we need to know.
Thanks goes to David Kosson, Ph.D., for his help in generously providing information, sharing the intentions of the Aftermath: Surviving Psychopathy project, and for his edits.
