Stirring Emotions vs. Rational Debate

While browsing at Alternet looking for blogging fodder this morning, I glanced at the headline of one article, Gun Crazy: Firearms Proponents Want a World Where College Kids Carry Concealed Weapons by Liliana Segura.

Normally, I wouldn't have read an article on this topic, but the use of the phrase "college kids" irritated me enough to leave a comment. I did not comment on the content of the article, which I only briefly skimmed, because gun control, like abortion, tends to be a polarizing topic with both sides often arguing from emotion and refusing to even listen to what the other side is saying. Nor will I comment on the topic itself in this blog entry, as it doesn't relate to the point I'm making here.

My comment follows below:

College "Kids"?

The last time I checked, colleges and universities are attended by adults age 18 and over, not by children, i.e. "kids".

I'm guessing the use of the word "kids" in this article was meant to influence the emotions, rather than to set a tone of rational debate about the topic.

The author of this article has clearly indicated her bias in the title, simply by using the word "kids" instead of "students". It was meant to stir the emotions, rather than generate reasoned debate, which I find irresponsible. When discussing highly controversial topics that have a tendency to go downhill quickly into ad hominem territory, it's especially important to choose one's words carefully.

Thoughts?

Blogging Temperaments

Sitting here this morning, I thought of the many approaches people have toward blogging. And it dawned on me that bloggers tend roughly to follow four basic approaches to blogging. Some people blog about what they do, some blog about what they think, some blog mainly about what they feel, and some blog about what they experience. Of course, any blogger can and often does blog about all four things, but if you read a particular blog long enough, you'll begin to see a pattern and a preference for one of the four approaches.

These four approaches to blogging fit neatly into Keirsey's four temperament clusters, with each cluster broken down into four subgroups, which gives the sixteen personality types of the Myers-Briggs personality system.

The four blogging temperaments that correspond with the Keirsey system are:

• NT Rationals -- tend to blog most about what they think
• NF Idealists -- tend to blog most about what they feel
• SP Artisans -- tend to blog most about what they experience
• SJ Guardians -- tend to blog most about they do

If you don't already know your Keirsey Cluster and Myers-Briggs type, take the Keirsey test here and the Myers Briggs test here to see if your type matches your basic blogging focus. Feel free to post your results in the comment box. And for those of you who don't already know my type, feel free to guess.

Thoughts on Blogging

On my daily sweep of what Alternet had to offer today, I came upon a rather elitist article about blogging, "Is Personal Blogging Fast-Fading?". The gist of the article was:

The golden age of the digital diarist may be over. Have we realized blogging isn't as fun as it sounds? Or that we're not so interesting after all?

As a long-time, successful blogger, I had to comment:

Simplistic and Misleading Article

This article would make a person who knew nothing about blogs believe that all blogs are either badly-written accounts of people's mundane daily lives or commercially driven generic blogs for the purposes of making money.

Both types of blogs exist in spades, of course, but people blog for a wide variety of reasons.

I've been blogging successfully for four years. The original blog was started as a theme blog; a platform to discuss my decidedly alternative approach to sexual ethics. It branched out into an eclectic mix of topics added to the original theme. This blog also has an extensive list of links for those interested in various types of non-monogamous sexual orientations.

I do not often write about the mundane details of my everyday life. My blog is primarily my personal op-ed page where I give my personal take on a wide variety of topics; mainly cultural and social issues, politics, religion, rants, and sex.

My goal is to make people think; to consider things in ways they might not have considered before. Whether or not they end up agreeing with me is beside the point; if they've stepped outside the box, even if just for a moment, then I've done my job.

I know I've done my job when I get emails from people who are struggling with their own non-monogamous leanings who say that my blog has helped them make better sense of things.

I've met lots of like-minded people while blogging, while also making friends with and gaining understanding of those who have a different view of the world.

A couple of blog posts about why I blog:

Making People Think

Blogging Is Its Own Reward

Your thoughts?

Libertine's "Blogger's Grab Bag of Topics"

Anyone who has blogged for any amount of time has dealt with "blogger's block", when nothing comes readily to mind to write about. The blogger might be tired, distracted, busy with other things, or simply uninspired to write. Some people solve this problem by just not posting on such days. But others, myself included, want to write every day and feel vaguely guilty if we don't put up something each day.

Like other daily bloggers, I go through phases where I'm really on a roll; things all around me become inspirations for writing and the posts almost write themselves. Unfortunately, there are other times when my creative juices have dried up; when I'm creatively constipated and have to pull out the entries, word by word, out of myself. Presently, I've been in that mode for a couple of weeks now, but I have a good reason why -- I'm working on another writing project that is sapping some of my blogging energy away from me.

But that isn't the point of today's entry. Today, I will show the reader my "grab bag of topics" I use as sources for blogging fodder.

1. Rants/Peeves
For me, this is the richest source of blogging material -- everyone has plenty of things in their lives or in general that just piss them off. These types of entries tend to write themselves. These are "what I think" entries. I find it best to write rants with a touch of humor to them, so as not to come off as a whiner, or a "whinger" as the British prefer to say it.

2. Daily Life
Again, most people find it easy to talk about things that are going on in their lives, both good and bad. These are "what I do" entries. I'd caution not to write too many entries about mundane daily events, however, as a little goes a long way here.

3. Current Events/News
Trolling the news sources for interesting news often provides good blogging material. I tend to choose political news or odd news most often, but any sort of news that interests the blogger is good, as it gives the reader insight into the blogger's personality.

4. Reminiscing
Talking about one's memories from years ago, or those of friends and family members give the reader a chance to identify or contrast with the blogger.

5. Lists
These can be humorous or serious and can be about any topic under the sun. These types of entries also invite reader participation. They can be personal, as in "My 25 Favorite Songs" or general, "25 Celebrities Who Were Only Children", for example. This is also a good format for writing entries about trivia/useless knowledge.

6. Quotations
Quotations that resonate with the blogger can be used in two main ways, either as a list of quotes, with or without comments, or a single quotation can insire an essay entry. I've also written essays based on a single word, which have turned out well.

7. Humor
Humor can be used in many different ways. One can write about funny things that have happened to them, write about annoyances in a funny way, post a funny cartoon or photo with our without comment, post a joke you've found somewhere or gotten in an email.

8. Informational
A blogger can write informational pieces about topics they have special knowledge and/or interest in. My blogging original started in this mode, as some people I knew wanted to know about my libertine life, the hows and whys. "How-to" pieces also fall under this category, as do entries about one's hobbies.

9. Opinion Pieces
This is related to the rants/peeves and informational categories. These differ as they're not necessarily presented as something that pisses the writer off, nor are they always strictly factual. These also tend to produce good comment interaction.

10. Polls/Surveys
This is related to the opinion pieces, but is more focused on the readers' opinions more than what the blogger thinks, per se.

11. Memes/Quizzes
Ranging from the serious to the silly, memes are good for days when nothing else comes to mind. They also inspire copy-cat entries for other bloggers similarly uninspired. These are best when used sparingly.

12. People
Other people, whether it's those in our own lives or someone famous, are often a source of good blogging material.

13. Photos and Illustrations
Using photos or other types of illustrations offer versatile entry possibilities. A photo can be posted for artistic value, for humor, or for something about it that inspired the writer. They can be posted with little or no comment, they can illustrate what the blogger is talking about, or they can inspire an essay.

14. Reviews
Reviews about books, movies, TV, and music are another good category, which can be useful to readers.

15. Odds and Ends
This is a miscellaneous entry cobbled together with bits and pieces of elements that are interesting but not long enough to make entries of their own. Such entries often include items from one or more of the other categories.

I'm sure there are more categories I use, but this is all that comes to mind at the present time. Feel free to include some of the elements in your "blogger's grab bag of topics" in the comment box.

Letters to the Editor

When I was in college and for several years thereafter, I regularly wrote "letters to the editor", all of which were published. Most of these letters were in response to things I'd read in the paper that I disagreed with. In a very real sense, these letters were my precursor to keeping a blog; particularly my ranty entries.

Back then, writing a letter to the editor meant typing a hard copy letter on my typewriter, after first writing it in pen on a yellow legal pad. I never liked messing with carbon, so I either made a photocopy of the letter at the library, or saved the handwritten copy as my copy,

After mailing it, I'd wait a day or two to make sure they'd gotten it, then check the paper every day to wait for it to appear in print. When it did, I'd cut it out from the paper and save it in a scrapbook. I'd continue to watch the paper for several days, in case there were rebuttals to my letters, which happened from time to time.

All these years later, I'm amazed at my patience and how long the process took compared to now. Nowadays, I'll fire off a comment on a blog or a site like Alternet and it appears immediately. Rebuttals, similarly, can appear within a minute.

I've not written a letter to a traditional newspaper in over 20 years. The main reason for that was when I joined the police force in a relatively small community, I didn't necessarily want my employers to know my opinions on politics and other controversial matters. So, I reluctantly gave up my letters to the editor hobby.

I even remember the topic of my very first letter, written in 1977. At that time, the drinking age was 18 and my state was considering raising it to 19. As I was already 19 at the time, it wouldn't affect me, but I opposed raising the age. I pointed out that 18 year olds could be sent to war, get married, sign contracts, and so on, so it was not fair to bar them from drinking. I said that all rights and responsibilities of adulthood should be granted at the same age in order to be consistent and fair. If 18 year olds were "children" when it came to having a beer, then they ought to be considered "children" when it came to going to war. I don't remember the exact words, but that was pretty much the gist of it.

Have you ever written a letter to the editor?

Blogging Is Its Own Reward

I've belonged to Blog Catalog, a blog bookmarking site, for about a month now and I've noticed several generic-type blogs there that seem to exist for the sole purpose of making money. Such blogs have little to no content that indicates the blogger's personality or interests.

Also, I've seen a related type of blogger who seems mainly interested in statistics: hits, increasing their ranking in blog clearinghouse sites like Blog Catalog, comments, etc. They offer to read and comment on your blog in exchange for you doing the same, and don't seem to care whether their visitors have a true interest in their blog's contents, just so long as it drives up the statistics and rankings.

Don't get me wrong -- I am pleased to see a lot of visitors on my blog and I cherish the comments I get. But because I don't do much "shameless promotion" of my blog, the hits and comments I get are from people who are truly interested in what I've got to say and their interaction on my blog isn't solely motivated by a desire to increase statistics on their own blog. Indeed, I'm a bit disappointed when I encounter people on my blog who are thus motivated.

I joined Blog Catalog mainly to find other blogs that I'm truly interested in reading, hoping others would likewise find my blog interesting. Though I'll add nearly anyone to my friends list there who asks, only those blogs I'm actually interested in and/or who were my friends before I joined Blog Catalog go in my neighborhood.

I've never made a dime off any of my blogs and though I'd not ever turn down any money offered, it's not my motivation for blogging. One of my prime motivations is to make people think of things in ways they might never have considered before, particularly in the realm of sexual ethics. From the unsolicited emails I get, I see that I am doing just that and one such email means more to me than any money I could make or getting a top blogger award.

Plus, blogging is just plain fun. I've met lots of like-minded people while blogging, while also making friends with and gaining understanding of those who have a different view of the world.

How about you? Why do you blog and what do you see as your most valuable "reward" from doing so? Do you belong to any blog bookmarking sites and, if so, why?

Lack of Inspiration

I'm fatigued, distracted, and I don't have anything in particular to write about. This isn't a good combination for blog writing, needless to say.

I'm tired because I've not been getting enough sleep and have been burning the candle and both ends.

I'm distracted partially because of the fatigue. I've also set up two new blogs in the last month; one at Blogspot and, of course, the one here. I'm still in the process of transferring and categorizing entries, one by one, to Blogspot from Blog City. On EFX, I've recently gotten my blog how I want it to look, and now that I've got all my entries restored, I'm going back through old entries, re-categorizing them and setting them to allow comments and trackbacks. This is tedious work that I can only stand to do for short periods each day.

I've also joined Good Reads and I'm busily entering and rating books. I've got them categorized until basic classifications and will subdivide them into more specific categories at some time. This project will be an ongoing thing for me for some time to come.

If I had something to write about that I could just write straight off the top of my head, I could knock out an entry, no matter how tired I was. However, for topics I'd have to research first to get my facts straight and to gather as much information as possible before writing, I'm too tired to do justice to this type of entry right now. I'm too weary to summon up enough concentration to cobble together information effectively so that I could write about it coherently.

So, I'm going to knock off for now and try to get some sleep.

EFX2 vs Blogger

Since EFX crashed several days ago, quite a few bloggers have made their way to Blogger and other places to start new blogs. Most have done so with great reluctance and hesitation, approaching their new blogs as a temporary thing until EFX is revived.

Some have lamented the fact that Blogger isn't as easy to use as EFX was, and of how they miss their favorite features from their old blogs: comment tracking alerts, recent visitors track, extra pages, the community feel, and so on.

I acknowledge Blogger's shortcomings and I also miss these features from EFX. But Blogger has one very important feature that EFX did not have -- it is a stable site that is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. As far as I'm concerned that's the most important feature a blog hosting site can have. If the site isn't up and you can't access your blog or those of others, then all the fancy user-friendly features don't amount to a hill of beans.

And if Keith manages to cobble EFX back together again, I don't hold out much hope for it being any more stable in the future. Pointing this out is in no way meant as a dig to Keith. But let's face facts. Keith is just one guy who has other responsibilities in his life and can only work on EFX on a part time basis, as his schedule permits. There's only so much one person can do under the circumstances and it would be unfair to expect more out of him.

Blogger, on the other hand, has been around for eight years, and it has several people employed full time devoted to maintaining this site. We can trust Blogger to be reliable, if not the simplest site in the world to use. Upgrades have been made over the years, and this is something that will no doubt continue. And, best of all, it's free.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I have invested a lot of myself into my writing in the three years I've been blogging, and I'd hate to lose all my work. Unlike many fellow EFXers, I had another shadow blog at Blog City, so I didn't lose anything.

Despite the unexpected loss of our EFX home, those of us who have created new blogs managed to find each other fairly quickly and, as it stands now, we've all linked together in the effort to maintain the community feeling. Likewise, despite the fact that Blogger is more difficult to use, most of us have also constructed attractive looking sites in fairly short order. I set up this site about two weeks ahead of the EFX crash, with Chica-X helping me to construct an attractive template. I know that she's subsequently been of help to others in setting up their sites.

We can recreate the community feel here if we are so motivated. If the previous week has been any indication, I'd say it's already well under way. We'll get used to how Blogger works, even though it can be a challenge now and will take some patience and time.

I don't know when or if EFX will return. If it does, I'll return there along with others to post there again. But I'm not going to focus on EFX, nor pin my hopes on it. I've got a damned fine looking blog right here, that I intend to use fully, and will continue to maintain, even if EFX returns. I would hope that others here will make the best of their new blogs also, regardless of what they intend to do in the event of an EFX revival.

Thoughts?

None Too Soon

It would seem as if I opened this blog none too soon, as the EFX site may unfortunately be down for good.

I've been slowly and laboriously transferring old entries over here, one by one, and I'll be able to continue doing so, as my Blog City mirror blog is still up and running, with all my previous posts available.

I'm hoping to see more EFX refugees start new blogs here at Blogger, so that we can keep the interactivity going that we had over there. Even if EFX is able to be saved in some fashion, it's probably a smart thing to keep a "lifeboat" community over here, so that we will always have a place to blog. Blogger is a highly stable site; one that we can count on.

More Old Journal Entries

March 11, 1989
We brought in two feisty females tonight. They'd gone into a convenience store and started a fight there, knocking down product displays all over the store. One stabbed the other, then they ran across the streett to continue. We found them in the kitchen holding each other at bay with knives; with one holding a baby. Of course, they insisted upon fighting US too and had to be dragged to jail, where they naturally refused to cooperate.

March 17, 1989
The night before last we had a woman call in to report a man jerking off outside her window. JB asked the dispatcher if the complainant could describe the suspect. There was a long pause on the radio (as the dispatchers paused to laugh their asses off, no doubt), then a dispatcher snapped back, "He'll be the one with his pants around his ankles with his dick in his hand", before giving details about his race, age, height, etc. I mean, just how many men did he expect to find at 4 in the morning out there jerking off?

March 20, 1989
JW was hurt pretty bad last night. He'd seen someone that we had an armed robbery warrant on and went to arrest him. The guy resisted him and they got into a fight, fucking up JW's hand -- he almost lost his pinkie finger. While he and the suspect were rolling around on the ground, his backup arrived and pulled the guy off him, who turned out to be hopped up on drugs.

They brought both of them to the hospital at the same time. One idiot nurse made comments about police brutality and the Captain climbed all over her, pointing out that this guy had held up people at gunpoint and had hurt people and that there was a badly hurt officer in the next room.

Later on, the jailers reported that he refused to go to court, threatening to beat up anyone who came into his cell.

March 24, 1989
All the loonies are out in force tonight. We have a regular nut who comes in all the time just to see if we're all right and then proceeds to talk about all her ailments and operations. She is harmless, however, and not all that irritating, like a lot of unbalanced people can be.

March 25, 1989
One of the dispatchers had a woman call all the way from New Jersey. She wanted to know if Jessica Hahn (from the Jim Bakker scandal) worked for one of our local radio stations. She wanted to ask her who had done her nose job! She went on to say she'd even called the Playboy mansion looking for her! Every time I think I've heard everything, I hear about something like this that shows me that I haven't heard everything and probably never will. Nuts are infinite in their ways to be nutty.

April 8, 1989
Some teenager missed the curve at the lake and drove his car right into it. We didn't know a thing about it until he showed up at the ER. A good part of the night was spent at the lake with wreckers trying to get the car out of the lake.

April 12, 1989
We've been having a lot of problems with the patrol cars lately. As an example, last night AJ had one run on him. As he was chasing the suspect's car, his car stalled out and he rolled backwards into a ditch. I can just see him now, beating the steering wheel, saying "Damn, damn, damn, damn", as he sat there in the ditch watching the guy get away.

April 21, 1989
We picked up a stabbing victim at one of the movie theaters. The guy had gotten stabbed somewhere down in the hood and his friends were trying to get him to the hospital when their car died in front of the theater. They called us and we took him to the hospital and caught the one who stabbed him shortly after that.

While all this was going on, a domestic argument call was dispatched. When the two officers arrived, they heard shots coming from inside the house, prompting them to call for backup. The entire shift rushed down there with the exception of one rookie who was left to watch the stabber from the incident above. It was close to shift change and the officers about to come on duty, quickly signed on duty and headed out there as well. All of us surrounded the house.

And the hero of the day turned out to be the one female officer on the scene, who was one of the two officers originally dispatched to the call. When the gunman came out of the house, she quickly tackled, subdued, and handcuffed him, ending the standoff.

Later on, she and the other officer originally dispatched came up to a group of us, holding up a screen door full of bullet holes, saying, "See, he really DID shoot at us!"

A Page From My Journal

Here are a few more entries from the handwritten journal I kept when I was on the police force:

February 5, 1989

One day in roll call, awhile back, the shift Lt read a report that M had taken about a stolen car. The car had no seats and had to be cranked with a pair of pliers. When the Lt read this, I laughed and said that this was really M's car and he was too ashamed to claim it as one of his. (Note: M is the same officer I wrote about in previous entry, "Tightwad") Everyone laughed because they all knew this was typical of the cars M drove.

February 6, 1989

When we were on our last third shift, there was a fire down at F & S.. An old house at the back of the property burned. A dog came from near the place and looked at all the officers and then back at the house. One officer had already noticed an odd smell and when the dog came up. someone remembered that there was an old man who sometimes stayed there as a self-appointed night watchman. We checked to see if he was in there and, sure enough, he was in there face down in one of the rooms. He was burned pretty badly, so it was awhile before he was found and recognized as human remains. Most of his arms had burned off and what remained had drawn up to his shoulders. He died of smoke inhalation.

February 11, 1989

I had desk duty tonight and I had to deal with a crazy drunk woman on the phone all night long,. She was calling the Crime Stoppers line and started of the bat belligerent and abusive. She started off by saying we weren't worth a damn and didn't care about doing anything. I asked her what the hell was she calling us for then if she believed that.

I took the information she had to give, such as it was, and she cursed at me for not getting emotional about it. She hung up on me when I told her it would be referred to the Sheriff's Department, as it wasn't in our jurisdiction.

Three hours later, she called back to curse at me some more and to demand to know why we hadn't caught him yet. It seems as if all the nuts come out of the woodwork on third shift. But no matter how unbalanced they are or how tenuous of a grip they have on reality, they always remember to call us. No matter what else they're incapable of doing; they're capable of dialing our number.

This Crime Stoppers line, which was meant to be a place where people could give anonymous tips about a variety of crimes, doesn't really work as it was intended to. In reality, it is a nut hotline for people, usually of the paranoid variety, to call when there's no one else who will listen to their paranoid prattle. Sometimes there are legitimate tips, especially when a major crime has recently been committed, but, far and away, the majority of the calls are from these paranoid cranks, who think that all their neighbors are criminals. 99% of the calls are about drugs and the callers either don't realize or don't care that a careful investigation usually must be conducted before a person is arrested for selling drugs. These callers think they can call this line and we'll run right over there and arrest the person in question just on their say-so. And most of the time, they don't tell you enough to go on; not even an accurate address. Plus, the calls are never about any specific incidents; it's always "all the time".

(that same night) I had an interesting nut come in. She came running in here saying that she had been poisoned, but she refused to go to the hospital. I called upstairs and the dispatcher called the Sergeant in, to see if she'd listen to a higher-up better than she did me. While waiting for him to arrive, she kept talking and it dawned on me that she was a Looney Tunes. The clincher was when she said she thought the Black Panthers had done it to her. And she'd driven here from two counties over to tell us this. She said she did this because one of our detectives had told her to stay out of our town.

February 25, 1989

A deaf man came up to me and handed me a piece of paper with a woman's name and address on it. I figured that he wanted me to call her for him. I radioed the dispatcher, explaining what I had and asked her to call the number for him. After the dispatcher called, she relayed that he was a relative of the woman on the phone and I told the dispatcher that he wanted his relative to come pick him up. The woman was very happy and appreciative when she arrived, and it was nice to deal with someone happy for a change, who appreciated our help.

Favorite Words

As a lifelong bibliophile who also enjoys writing, I love the complexity of the English language. I have a friend whose native language is German, but who prefers writing in English because English has a larger vocabulary that allows for more precision and nuance in her writing.

Like many people, there are many words I like, sometimes for their meaning, but more often for how they sound, regardless of what they mean. Following is a list of some of my favorite words. Readers are invited to add some of their favorite words in the comment section.

execrable
ubiquitous
malevolent
sinister
mellifluous
eloquent
ersatz
paramour
taciturn
laconic
exacerbate
proclivity
bomb
surly
predilection
detritus
segue
nocturnal
reprobate
compunction
habitué
ominous
sabotage
couch
cacophony
harridan
malcontent
asinine
peripatetic
avatar
caterwaul
debauchery
hector
scuttlebutt
denizen
dilapidated
natter
impale
dilemma

and, of course

libertine

Quotes and Thoughts

"Your thorns are the best part of you."
--Marianne Moore

I've been told this many times by women. Of course, I know that is part of this is due to the "bad boy" fetish many women have.

"I'm single because I was born that way."
--Mae West

Being a free agent is natural to humans. It's marriage that's unnatural and artificial.


"We find comfort among those who agree with us; growth among those who don't."
--Frank A. Clark

This is probably the main reason why I listen to talk shows where I agree with little of what is said. It helps to sharpen my thinking much more than listening to something that is simply "preaching to the choir". Though I'm reassured by those who agree with me, I'm grateful for the challenge from those who don't.

"Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties."
--Erich Fromm

Certainty involves black and white thinking, yes/no answers, an all or nothing mindset. Mathematics involves certainty, but it is in no way creative. Creativity requires the ability to see nuances and to think in shades of grey.

Still More Old Journal Entries

Here are a few more police-related entries from an old handwritten journal of mine:

December 12, 1988

We got a funny denial from a shoplifter on Saturday. We got her stealing a pair of jeans from K Mart. She had put them on in the changing room, but had neglected to remove the heavy plastic magnetic tag from the pants. She had pulled her sweater over it to try to hide it. Of course the tag set off a buzzer when she tried to leave the store.

When we got her to the jail. she claimed that she had worn the jeans into the store and that they were not her jeans; she had borrowed them from a friend and that the friend must have stolen them. We rolled our eyes at her expecting us to believe that crap. For one thing, the buzzer would have gone off when she first entered the store. Secondly, it is too much of a coincidence that she would go into the very store where her "friend" had supposedly stolen the pants from. And, lastly, no one would put on a pair of jeans with a huge plastic tag, 4 inches long, 2 inches wide, and a half inch thick, stuck to them.

December 21, 1988

When I arrived last night, the jailer was printing one that B had got up at the mall. I said, "What're up to?" to the jailer, and the prisoner snarled, "Arresting assholes, that's what!" I laughed and said, "You said it, I didn't!"

It turned out that this guy was racing around the mall, hit a curb, took off, then hit a curb again. When B finally caught up with him and asked for his license, the idiot said, "What for??"

When the kid's father came to get him in the morning, he acted as if the kid was the injured party. Probably that's where the kid got his attitude from.

December 22, 1988

The jailer on second shift, M, had a particularly nasty prisoner to process last night. One of our regular winos came in that was so drunk that he'd pissed all over the patrol car, pissed all over the jail, and pissed all over himself. M had to wear rubber gloves to remove his property from him and had to carry him to his cell. M complained that he wasn't into golden showers. And the drunk didn't remember a thing the next morning.

December 23, 1988

J stopped a guy tonight and when he went up to the car window, the guy said, "What the hell do you want, you ugly old thing?" While this was going on the guy on the pasenger side was busily pouring out his beer onto the sidewalk. J told me that he would have pulled this SOB out of the car and taught him a thing or two if there hadn't been an old couple watching them intently from the sidewalk.

December 29, 1988

The last arrest we had last night was a real lulu. A domestic call came in and while the officers dispatched were talking to this man and his mother, the man freaked out and resisted arrest. He was so high that repeated blows with a PR-24 had no effect on him. They had to fight him to get him into custody. This is the difference between a drunk and someone hopped up on drugs. A drunk will feel blows from a PR-24, but someone on drugs may not.

January 25, 1989

On my last day out at the jail, they brought in two women and one man. They had been fighting like cats and dogs. It was so that B had to wait outside with the women while I processed the man. He was nothing compared to the women. One of them was a little feisty, just giving the minimum of cooperation. While I was booking her, the other woman, still outside, was shrieking like a banshee, which set this woman off, and effectively ended any cooperation. We put her back in the patrol car and started on the next one. I said "we" because this is what it took. She threw herself down into a mud puddle, thoroughly drenching herself. Five of us had to pick her up and carry her into the jail. I grabbed one of the pockets of her jeans, making her legs airborne. She ineffectively kicked at me, but I didn't feel much in my combat boots. When we got her inside and sat her down, she threw herself on the floor. Really classy female....not.

Making People Think

The other day, I posted an entry about my periodic bouts with writer's block. One person commented, making a reference to my "self-imposed obligation to entertain".

This response stuck in my craw as the main goal of this blog isn't to "entertain" people.

Though I write about a wide variety of topics, some of them which are indeed entertaining, this blog's raison d'etre is to make people see things in a new light; I want to make people think. As my blog's subtitle indicates, my goal is to get people to consider things in ways they might not have before -- to think outside the box, to color outside the lines.

I especially like writing about controversial topics, about supposedly inviolate sacred cows. I enjoy the lively exchange of comments that usually follows such an entry -- I know I've done my job if I've struck a nerve.

I don't expect people to always end up agreeing with me, far from it. It is enough to expose people to unconventional ways of thinking about things and to have them entertain such thoughts, regardless of the conclusions they ultimately draw.

Thoughts?

Average

The word of the day is:

AVERAGE

Average. A word to denote being in the middle, the center, what is typical, what is bland, what is common, or to indicate what is "normal". If your grades are average in school, you get a "C", which is merely adequate. You won't fail, but you've not excelled, either. You've done your job, but you've not gone above and beyond the call of duty.

Socially, many people aim for being average. They want to be "normal", to be one of the crowd. They don't want to stand out in any way, either positively or negatively. Afraid of being unique or in the slightest degree different, their goal is simply to blend into the crowd and go with the flow, to be part of the amorphous "everybody else".

Not me. As a kid, I was quite disappointed if I ever got an average grade, and now, I'd consider it an insult to be considered an average person. To be true to myself, I've always believed that one must march to the beat of one's own drummer, even if it's not the most common beat. To do something simply because "everyone else does" is not a reason to me, but an excuse.

Thoughts?

More Old Journal Entries

Following are more entries from my old journal from my police days...

August 27, 1988

This past weekend, I drew jail detail. I went in there on Saturday morning to find there were 15 people on the A side, 3 more than capacity. And half them belonged in a detox center, not jail. I ended up sending one to the hospital for the DTs (some of the winos called it the DDTs) and he was at the ER for 4 hours before they brought him back. This was nothing compared to what second shift had. An hour after I left, one of the trusty prisoners totally flipped out in DTs. The trusties were sitting on the carport getting some air and this guy suddenly started jumping through the weeds like a rabbit. They finally corralled him and took him to the hospital, but the they ended up sending him right the hell on back to us.

I came in the next day and they had him locked in a cell, totally off his rocker. The floor of his cell was completely covered in water and soggy newspapers. He had allowed the front part of his bunk to collapse and he was sitting on the tilting bed, as is. He thought he was in a big truck and wanted me to set the brake before it went out of control. He was talking to people that weren't there and was having an earnest conversation with the toilet. The hospital had sent Librium back with him, but that was like pouring a glass of water on the Chicago fire.. I was annoyed that the hospital had sent back a person so obviously in need of medical help. They do it all the time and I hate it because we are not set up to take care of sick people and we are not medically trained. The jail is in one sense a dumping ground. We end up having to take the people they won't take elsewhere. A lot of the people we get don't really belong in jail, but they can't get the help they need elsewhere, because of financial reasons. A middle class alcoholic can go to a detox center, the poor ones end up in jail.

August 28, 1988

The mall has a big problem with loud, rowdy teenagers loitering there, picking fights with each other, drag racing around the parking lot, and so on. A group of them mugged a 72 year old woman the other day. Another officer proposed a funny solution -- we bus all the winos from the viaduct to the mall and move the teenagers to the viaduct!

August 29, 1988

Last night we brought in one who was bucking for the "Asshole of the Month" award. He was very sarcastic and belligerent, verbally abusing everyone in sight. He refused to use the phone because he thought it was "bugged". When he was put in the cell, he promptly dismantled the bed and flooded the cell. When he bitched about this, I told him he had made his bed and that now he could lie in it. Later on, he started whistling for the jailer instead of calling him by voice. I don't know about the jailer, but hell could freeze over before I would come in response to a whistle. The day I respond to a whistle is the day I strap on a dog collar.

September 26, 1988

The fair is gone and not a moment too soon. It ended with a bang, as usual. Second shift had a rip-roaring drunk brought in last night. He ripped up the fingerprint cards and threw them at the jailer. When he was put in his cell, he promptly broke the toilet in there. They decided to send him to the county mental tank. They put him in the paddy wagon and he promptly did a donkey act, kicking out the back door of the van, and running into the field with handcuffs on.

October 6, 1988

Today, about a half hour before we got off, someone got shot at one of the projects. Another officer was bringing a prisoner to the jail as the call went out over the radio. When he heard that, he just shoehorned the guy out the door to the jailer and sped off. The shooter turned out to be one of our regulars and he had shot this guy in the leg in a fight over a woman. Dumbass.

October 24, 1988

Last night the Sgt. called out on the radio that he was opening the gas pumps, asking if any units needed gas. The dispatcher responded, "10-4!". The Sgt popped back, "J, I didn't think you needed any more gas!"

November 25, 1988

Tonight, a guy was arrested, caught trying to steal a pickup truck. When questioned about it, he said he was sick of walking. Yet, he had $170 in his pocket. Too cheap to call a cab, I guess. I told him he should have tried to steal a Pinto instead of a truck -- that way he would have only been charged with petit larceny!

Some Old Journal Entries

Last night, I found an old journal I'd written during my years on the police force. Following are some entries from that journal:

July 18, 1988

I had an interesting female shoplifter from the supermarket last night. I took her to the jail, where the female jailer took her to the bathroom to search her for any other shoplifted items she might have had hidden about her person.

The jailer had her to lift her skirt, which revealed some kind of bloomer type pants underneath. There was a rip about where the leg met the torso and the suspect had a package of barbecue beef wrapped like hamburger meat, half-eaten, that she'd stuffed up there. And she wasn't wearing any panties, either. At first, the jailer thought she was having her period and that the pad had slipped.

I'm surprised that I didn't smell anything in the police car because when the woman pulled the package out from between her legs, the stench almost made the jailer faint -- it would have knocked a buzzard off a carcass!

I may never eat barbecue beef ever again.

August 3, 1988

Yesterday, one of our regular winos was found dead down on the viaduct. One of the cab drivers down there called it in, saying they saw someone they thought might be dead lying on the railroad tracks. It turned out that he'd slipped and hit his head, but that isn't what killed him. It turned out when he fell, he got his head wedged between two concrete pillars and it had caved in the side of his head and probably broke his neck. He had been dead for some time as rigor had completely set in and EMS had quite a time dislodging him from the spot.

August 5, 1988

The county had a funny call the other night. They came upon a man along the side of the road, wearing nothing but a pair of briefs. He was not drunk, but he could not remember -- or so he said -- how he got there, how he happened to be in that state of undress, only that he wanted to go back to his home town 30 miles away in the next county.

It seems to me that he must have taken a header out some woman's window when her husband came home, or something of that nature.

They were planning to take him to the county line, but the next county's officers didn't want to take him without any clothes. They tried to find him some pants, but were unable to do so. The other county eventually agreed to take him as is. A strange twist to this story was when a woman called and asked about him and her husband. The two were supposed to be somewhere together on an errand. The guy in the underwear didn't have a clue about what she was talking about, however.

A screwy story all around.

August 16, 1988

I had a funny arrest the other night. I brought in two drunks from a local bar. They were both laughing and joking during the entire booking process. As I put them in their cells, one guy walked into a cell and pulled the door closed on himself, as I locked the other one in. I got a big kick out of how willingly he went into the cell.

August 22, 1988

One of our regular winos got out of jail on Friday and got right back in again on Saturday. A call came in describing a white male standing out in the middle of the road. I knew right away that it was "Tippy Toes". He was yelling and screaming by the time I got him to the jail, saying he was going to kill me. As we got out of the car, he knocked the ticket book out of my hands and sent his own glasses skittering across the pavement. Even though he was handcuffed from behind, he kept raising those chicken wings he has for arms to try to hit me. I was laughing my ass off at this pathetic spectacle, saying, "You're a real tough guy, huh?" Once I got him inside, his pants fell down to his ankles and I marched him to his cell this way.

September 2, 1988

On one call last night, a domestic call, one officer called out to another on the radio warning him that it was possible that the suspect had a gun on him. The second officer replied, "That will make two of us!"

October 5, 1988

One of the jailers did something funny last night. He counted the prisoners and kept coming up with one extra. After counting three or four times, it suddenly dawned on him that he'd been counting himself!
______________

That's it for now. I'll post more from this journal on another entry.

A Different Ending

Quite some time ago, I wrote a post about how libertines are portrayed in romance novels. I'd read a few of the novels my lovers had lying around and I'd noticed something about them. I'd found that all such novels ended with a traditional, monogamous marriage, without exception, no matter how "bad" the male lead had been in the story. I questioned why all romance novels must end this way and wondered why a subgenre featuring nonmonogamous relationships of all kinds could not be added. After posting this entry, I had input from two published romance authors in the mainstream press, Paula Reed and Kate Rothwell.

They both told me that while all sorts of situations may occur in the story, that publishers mandated a "HEA" (Happily Ever After) ending for all romance novels. And "happily ever after", according to these publishers, can only happen in one way: monogamous marriage. One size fits all. Yawn.

While this is indeed true for many or most people, it is not true for all. Nor does it follow that if one is monogamous, they will not enjoy reading about alternative happy endings, that they'd not choose for themselves. Reading fiction is, primarily, about fantasy, imagining "what if", and I, for one, enjoy reading about people in all sorts of situations, even ones I'd never think of choosing myself.. I see a requirement that all books in a particular genre have the same happy ending as a form of censorship, telling us what we should want out of a relationship. It hampers the creativity of authors and limits readers.

However, both authors suggested I check out a publisher,Ellora's Cave, who offers books that are more erotic than those from mainstream presses. I visited the EC website, paying particular attention to their submissions guidelines. Many men write romance novels under female pseudonyms, and I've idly considered doing so for quite some time. But what I found was ultimately disappointing. Ellora's Cave self identifies their books as being "romantica":

Romantica™ is the name for the line of erotic romance novels published by Ellora’s Cave Publishing. Erotic romance is defined by us as: any work of literature that is both romantic and sexually explicit in nature. Within this genre, a man and a woman develop "in love" feelings for one another that culminate in a monogamous relationship.

In other words, the same ol' thing, but written in more explicit detail. A cop out, in my view.

Several days ago, one of my lovers told me she'd found a book, a historical romance, by a publisher similar to Ellora's Cave, New Concepts Publishing, that ended in a polyamorous triad: "His Wicked Ways" by Jaide Fox. That is, it was a happily ever after ending, but with three people instead of two. I dutifully went to NCP's website and viewed their submission guidelines.

Why do readers read romance? For the experience of "seeing" two people fall desperately in love. Sex is a huge part of a relationship. Your romance should fully explore just how fantastic sex is between SOUL MATES. In the real world, would you continue dating someone that didn't excite you sexually? The most likely answer is no. Keep this in mind when writing your romance.

What we like to see in our CARNAL rated books are explicit love scenes that relate the FULL spectrum of making love/having sex between characters who are obviously meant for each other. Readers want explosive chemistry between the characters, with a heated buildup of sexual tension. What we want in all of our romances are love scenes that deliver exciting emotion once the characters come together sexually.

While it was a bit more progressive than EC, in that it didn't mandate a monogamous ending, here, too, were limits. NCP allows for polyamorous erotica, but the frankly libertine is still taboo. Nevertheless, it's a positive step in the right direction.

After seeing this, I entertained the idea of starting my own ebook/POD press. I would name it, naturally, "Libertine Press". I would include romance, erotica, and a combination of the two, told from both male and female points of view. All books would be about "alternative lifestyle" relationships, as the traditional monogamous ones are already well covered by other publishers. Included would be libertine relationships (of course!), polyamory, swinging, gay/lesbian/bi, BDSM, and the like.

If I had the business sense, experience in the publishing industry, and money, I'd seriously consider doing this. Perhaps someday, someone with all three of these things will do so.

Civilized Debate?

It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument
William G. McAdoo (1863-1941)

As a teenager and a young adult, I took great relish in debating those who had radically different opinions from me, particularly the bigoted of all stripes and extreme fundamentalists. My debating strategy was always to use the most conservative examples to prove a liberal point and the most liberal examples to prove a conservative point. That is, I knew I could get a conservative person to more readily consider a liberal viewpoint if I were quoting Barry Goldwater, for example, in favor of the issue, than if I told them what Ted Kennedy had to say on the same matter, and vice versa.

Sometimes, I had lively, worthwhile and respectful discussions, but all too often there were those with viewpoints so extreme that it was like "arguing with a signpost", to use my father's terminology. It was almost as if they'd stuck their fingers in their ears and went "lalalalalala" as I talked.

I can remember my father telling me "You can't deal with ignorance" when I'd get frustrated by such fruitless debates. As an adult, I think of this as "You can't have a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent".

As I read political sites all over the internet, both blogs and message boards, I'm struck by the lack of civilized debate among those with radically differing opinions. The usual pattern is that once someone discerns that the other person does not agree with them and continues to defend their own position, however respectfully, that their responses degenerate into emotional ad hominem attacks ("all you whiny liberals hate America", for example), which is NEVER constructive.

I don't get it. Is respect only for those with whom you agree? Does having a differing opinion on a particular subject mean that the person is worthless and has forfeited any and all considerations of common courtesy?

I think not.

So far as politics goes, I think those who takes a strong interest all want what's good for their country and the world, even if they have radically opposing ideas on how to accomplish this goal and how "good" should be defined.

Those with strong political opinions would do well to remember this and that if we can't get along with all sorts of people at the small level, how can we on the larger level? Skilled, mature debaters can abhor a person's opinion without abhorring the person holding the opinion.

Thoughts?