Since March, I’ve been writing a Gratitude Journal every day and posting it on Facebook. I’ve gotten a lot of benefit out of doing this, and I make the time no matter how busy I am, and no matter how rotten a day I’ve had. Even the worst days have things I can appreciate.
We do lead an amazing life. But rather than jealousy (and I know you’re speaking in hyperbole), think about what steps you can take to have a more amazing life. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
1) Decide, consciously, to have a happy life; this is something I did in my 20s and I always refer to it as my best decision ever. Even better than my wonderful marriage—because it made that marriage a success.
happy people leaping for joy
2) Frame things positively. This gratitude journal is an example: I had to find good things to say the day we lost a Peru vacation day when our connecting flight from Ft. Lauderdale was canceled, the day [Supreme Court nominee Brett] Kavanaugh was confirmed, and even the day Yoshi [my stepfather] was killed by a careless motorist as he crossed in the crosswalk with the flashing light engaged. Seek out the benefits of every experience.
3) Dedicate one four-hour block per month (to start) to do something amazing. Climb a mountain, go to a spa, start a movement to change something you don’t like…whatever. Everyone can find that much time to create amazingness in your own life.
4) Dedicate some small bit of time every day, even 15 or 30 minutes, to doing something you love and that feels important: read a book, get a little time outside, cook a cool new food…endless possibilities.
5) Notice and appreciate the beauty of ordinary things. I find one of the things I get out of the Gratitude Journal is I’m always on the lookout for what I’m going to write about, so I pay a lot more attention to the beauty around me, and take pictures to help me remember and share that beauty.
And here’s a sixth I should have included: have something in your life that’s bigger than you and gives you purpose. Mine is to help businesses identify, create, and market products and services that address things like hunger, poverty war, and catastrophic climate change–and make a profit. When I discovered this purpose, at age 57, I felt like I finally had an answer for “what do you want to do when you grow up?”
#WeBeleiveHer demonstration supporting Christine Blasey Ford -Northampton, MA, 9-27-18. Photo by Shel Horowitz
This month, in my newsletter, I’ll be reviewing Our Search for Belonging: How Our Need to Connect is Tearing Us Apart, by Howard J. Ross with Jonrobert Tartaglione. Ross, of course, wrote well before Brett Kavanaugh was nominated to the Supreme Court. But as I was reading, the relevance of his work to the Kavanaugh/Ford hearings stood out for me.
I am a survivor of childhood sexual assault. The attack happened when I was 10 or 11, but I didn’t tell anyone until I was 16. That didn’t make it any less real or any less painful. It was the defining trauma of my life.
The Senate hearings brought something home to me:
White, straight men with economic privilege attacked Dr. Ford for speaking out, for not speaking out right away, for not presenting enough evidence (when the Republicans refused her attempts to call witnesses or have an outside investigation). White, straight men with power were in such a great rush to vote in someone who made obvious lies under oath and may well have been a serial sexual assailant that they belittled her and lionized him. Meanwhile, white, straight men without economic privilege made death threats against her and forced her from her home. White, straight men defended the high school and college rape culture even while accepting Kavanaugh’s unconvincing explanation that he was far too pure to have participated in that oppressive culture–despite considerable evidence to the contrary on his own calendars and yearbook.
In Ross’s paradigm, those white straight men have set up an us versus them situation. They’ve turned Dr. Ford–and by extension, any survivor of sexual assault, including me–into “other”–something to marginalize, ignore, and/or discredit (my choice not to say “someone” is deliberate, because dehumanizing is a lot of what happens in these “other” situations). While both the Left and the Right engage in this kind of behavior, from my point of view, the Right uses the tactic both more viciously and more consistently).
Watching the highlight video clips, I found Ford quite credible. Watching Kavanaugh attack her, I perceived a sense of entitlement, attempts to dehumanize, and even the tired old tactic of calling the whole thing out as a partisan attack–not to mention that his testimony was crammed with false statements. It sickened me, just as watching Clarence Thomas use similar tactics to deflect similar accusations against him sickened me in 1991. To the Kavanuaghs and Thomases of the world, as a survivor of sexual assault, I will always be an outsider, even though I am male.
In Ross’s view, one key piece of identity politics is the difference in perception between members of the dominant and non-dominant groups: members of dominant groups typically don’t often think about the experience of those in non-dominant groups. Yet, a person of color or a woman or someone who identifies as another type of minority experiences daily reminders that society puts up physical, psychological, economic, and other barriers.
The Kavanaugh/Ford hearings illustrate that difference in perception really well.
I think many of us perceive ourselves or are perceived by others as outsiders in various ways. I have certainly experienced that as a Jew, as a northeastern progressive, as an activist, as someone involved in various liberation struggles. Yet, to a person of color or a Muslim, I would be perceived as part of the in-group that excludes them. That these categorizations are fluid was brought home to me when I ran for City Council in my town, in 1985. I knocked on the door of a man who said, “You’re Jewish, I’m Polish. We’re both Eastern European. We have to stick together against the Irish and Italians who run this town.” I had seen the Polish population as very much a part of the majority culture in this area, and I, as a Jew, was an outsider; he saw it differently, and that opened my eyes.
In the Kavanaugh case, the ignoring strategy no longer worked, so he moved to attempts to discredit, presenting a wide range of emotional behaviors in the process.
Back when I was representing domestic violence survivors in their family law cases, I witnessed a very high proportion of the abusive men on the other side cry in court. For a long time, I thought it was intentionally manipulative, but after a while I came to see it as genuine decompensation as they confronted for perhaps the first time their inability to control the realities they had constructed. For once, someone else — their victims, the court — was writing the script, and they simply couldn’t handle it. The mirror held up to their behavior undid them, at least temporarily; even more so, the loss of control over their little worlds.
If I had had any doubts previously about the truth of the allegations against Kavanaugh, they disappeared when I heard him sniffling his way through the small part of the hearings I listened to yesterday. The angry outbursts I read about later further sealed the deal. I found myself not just certain the assaultive behavior had occurred, but concerned about his wife and daughters — a man who would come that undone during high profile hearings is almost certainly still engaging in those behaviors, in my experience, and I’d wager he’s still a problem drinker as well.
The old white guys in the Senate, and the one in the White House, are similarly breaking down. They are grasping desperately at their control of the world, the reality they have lived for decades, and they are angrily and sometimes tearfully acting out as it is slowly but certainly removed from their collective grip.
The fall of white male supremacy really is happening right now, in painful slow motion, and it is deadly for sure: survivors of domestic violence are at the most risk when they finally decide to leave.
Now more than ever, we need to support one another, we need to make collective safety plans, and we need to keep working to leave white male supremacy behind.
As the primary author of two books in the Guerrilla Marketing series (Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World and Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green) and a speaker at the recent Guerrilla Marketing Summit, I was very interested in how the digital marketing pioneer Hubspot views the whole Guerrilla Marketing concept and brand.
In their seven examples, I was particularly thrilled that they included UNICEF’s super-successful Dirty Water campaign.
Screenshot of a still from the UNICEF “Dirty Water” video
After all, my two Guerrilla books are the ones that extend the Guerrilla Marketing concepts to the worlds of social change of environmentalism. This was a bit of a gamble for UNICEF; there were obviously significant costs in everything from developing the branding to shipping the filthy water. I hope they’re replicating the campaign in other cities, and creating strong follow-up messaging targeted specifically to those touched by this campaign, to keep them donating into the future.
My definition of Guerrilla Marketing is a lot broader than Hubspot’s. To me, Guerrilla Marketing has three main parts:
Being nimble in our thinking and actions, seizing opportunities quickly, including news tie-ins
Going outside and beyond conventional thinking patterns–disrupting the mental flow to get noticed, to move people to action, but in ways that don’t feel obnoxiously intrusive
Focusing not on how great your brand is (the mistake I see so many marketers make. I call it “we, we, we all the way home) but on the results: the benefits, the problems solved, the pain relieved, the wants and needs met or exceeded–whether for the individual customer or for the planet and the species that live on it.
Hubspot’s choice of the Bounty sculpture is a beautiful example.
Ideally, Guerrilla Marketing will be done at little cost, too. But, as the UNICEF and Grammy examples show, there are plenty of Guerrilla Marketing opportunities that aren’t necessarily cheap.
Let’s look at those two more closely, because they offer us very different lessons. It will take you exactly three minutes and 40 seconds to watch the two videos. Go ahead; I’ll wait.
UNICEF
This elaborate campaign involved creating a brand, bottling filthy brown water, and offering it on the streets of New York. The goal: to increase awareness that the clean, drinkable water we take for granted in most of the US (and the developed world generally) is unimaginable luxury for people at the margins in developing countries. Many have to drink filthy, disease-causing water, and many get very sick. The campaign encouraged people to use the money they currently spend on bottled water to provide clean water for those who don’t have it. Each dollar could supply a thirsty child for 40 days. The video documents the whole campaign, in a fast-paced three minutes.
I found this very effective. I love the way they were able to not just raise awareness, but funds. The negative branding is definitely a Guerrilla tactic, and the results are clearly positive. Bravo!
Grammy Ad
This was an expensive missed opportunity. Maybe it’s a generational thing, but this one really didn’t work for me. Great concept, but terrible execution. I want the protagonist be moved and touched by what he’s seeing, but he strolls through the talking posters, blithe and indifferent. He’s not even glancing at the posters! What’s going on in HIS head? We don’t even get a hint. Have the talking portraits of Harry Potter and the constant animations of things people didn’t animate in the past made a talking poster no-longer-special? And while my wife frequently accuses me of ADD, I found that I hadn’t even processed and recognized one song before it switched after a few seconds to something else. (And OK, I confess, this was not music I’m familiar with anyway). Some of the problem was that the songs all sounded so similar and all seemed to have the exact same beat.
I also think the choice of having multiple copies of each poster was unfortunate. Yes, I recognize that’s a common way to display posters in urban environments. It has NEVER worked for me. I’ve studied some of the advertising masters like David Ogilvy, and they taught me the importance of white space: of having one central object (or person, animal, tree…) able to stand out from what’s around it, because of that empty space around it. If I were buying billboards, instead of, say, 9 medium-sized repeated pictures, I’d use the space for one much larger version of the image. I’d use that white space and not add to the clutter.
Imagine walking down the street and seeing a 20-foot billboard suddenly start to sing with its one and only mouth! Imagine hearing snippets of three or four songs that each have a clear identity, in a true medley, each sung by one giant poster of an artist you recognize instantly. Would you be as blase as the protagonist? I doubt it!
So maybe the commercial would need a full minute instead of 39 seconds. That’s OK. In print copywriting, it’s perfectly OK to take as much time as you need to tell the story; I’ve seen emails with links to 40-page sales letters. Even in broadcast, even though airtime is expensive, we’ve seen many successful commercials that ran an hour (they’re called infomercials and they run on shopping channels). The UNICEF video was three entire minutes and I watched without multitasking, because I was interested both in their message and how they promoted it. If you can’t get it done in less than a minute, either buy more airtime, or script a commercial that CAN get it done in the time you bought.
When an American father-to-be asked Dear Abby for advice because his Indian wife wanted to use an ethnic-heritage name and he didn’t, she responded:
…Not only can foreign names be difficult to pronounce and spell, but they can also cause a child to be teased unmercifully…Why saddle a kid with a name he or she will have to explain or correct…from childhood into adulthood?
Seeing this as a social justice issue, I could not let her answer go unchallenged. Here’s what I wrote:
Abby, I’ve been reading your column since 1981, but your answer to “Making Life Easy” made me cringe! Part of what makes the US great is our habit of celebrating our cultural diversity, with festivals, ethnic cooking, and yes, our children’s names.
First, every culture will have names that are hard to pronounce and spell–but also easier ones. My own children’s names, Alana and Rafael, are both derived from Hebrew and celebrate their Jewish heritage. Honoring that culture felt all the more important because we live in a community where Jewish is exotic. We rejected names that were too hard to pronounce, like Chanoch; Recognizing that most Americans can’t pronounce the ch, I didn’t want my son to be “Hano.” “Making Life Easy”‘ and his wife will have hundreds of beautiful, pronounceable Indian names to choose from, such as Priya or Krishna.
This beautiful anti-bullying poster came from the US military’s health site, health.mil
Second, the argument about teasing is weak. Bullies will find a reason to tease. If the kids have ordinary names, bullies will pick on them for their skin color or ethnic background, for their good grades or their bad grades, for whatever point of difference they find. And bullies also tease kids about Western names (growing up as Sheldon, I speak from personal, painful experience; names like Sheldon and Norman were often chosen by American Jewish families that wanted to seem more assimilated). The way around this is not to remove any possible fuel for their bad actions–impossible anyhow–but to create a culture in the home and school that teaches respect for and acceptance of difference. This responsibility falls on both parents and educators. My own kids attended a school with zero tolerance around bullying, a school that created a welcoming and accepting culture for all types of children–and we reinforced this in the home, as my mother reinforced it for me when I was growing up.
I believe the self-acceptance I developed as the parent of self-accepting kids proud of their heritage and happy to celebrate the heritage of others helped me find my way to the work I do: working with businesses to identify/create/market profitable offerings that turn hunger and poverty into abundance, war into peace, and catastrophic climate change into planetary balance. I could not have thought so big if I hadn’t learned to feel pride in who I am and my power to make a difference.
Not ashamed to sign my real name.
Shel Horowitz, Hadley, MA
PS: whether or not you publish this letter, please share it with “Making Life Easy.” Ignoring his wife’s wishes could cause both marital discord and shame in the child’s culture of origin.
<End of my letter>.
What do you think? Please add your comment, below. And BTW, I found this list of 100 recommended but unusual boy names, which features ethnic choices such as Arian, Bodhi, Camilo, Cortez, Dimitri, Dangelo, and Enoch–in just the A through E part of the list, and just one gender.
Multilingual polling place sign, courtesy of USDOJ
Here in Western Massachusetts, four adjacent State House of Representatives seats and an overlapping State Senate seat have no incumbent. So we are challenged by a loss of continuity and institutional memory–but blessed by a plethora of great candidates in both local and state races. In some of these races, I could support as many as three candidates and it’s very tough to make a choice. But since we unfortunately don’t have Ranked Choice Voting, which allows you to pick a second and third choice, etc., we have to support someone.
I’ve spent a lot of time over the past several months attending candidate forums and house parties, reading about the candidates in the newspaper and on social media, and, having individual meetings, calls, and correspondence with some of them. So I feel I’m making informed decisions, and I’d like to share my choices with you–and why I picked these folks. For the two candidates in my own local districts, I’m including links to their websites and/or Facebook campaign pages.
The Democratic primary is September 4, just one day after Labor Day. If you’re registered to vote, please mark your calendar and exercise your rights on that day.
First, the races where I get to vote, and then the neighboring ones.
State Senate (to replace Stan Rosenberg, who resigned): Jo Comerford (write-in). Of the original six candidates, four remain, three of whom I know personally. I feel any of those three would do a good job, and probably so would the fourth. But Jo is a cut above. She has the perfect resume for a State Senator in a district full of activists. I first met her when she began running the American Friends Service Committee office in Northampton, after Frances Crowe (who started the local branch in her basement back in the 1960s) finally retired. From there, she took over from the late Greg Speeter as director of the National Priorities Project, the organization that shows cities and towns dollar for dollar what they send to the military, and how they might use that money at home instead. NPP has been a resource to academics and activists for decades, and I’m so proud that they’re based here in the Valley (along with several other wonderful national organizations). Her next job was at the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, which gave her direct experience with the issues people in our area face around hunger and poverty, as well as highly relevant experience working with local farmers. Then she went to MoveOn, where she was a national campaign director for four years, stepping down only to run for this seat. Jo is humble and clearly in the race as a way to serve. She’s also highly organized, has mobilized a veritable army of volunteers, and brought in a bunch of awesome endorsements (including progressive commentator and former US Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, who has personal connections with Northampton). Her other endorsements include Northampton Mayor David Narkewicz, former State Rep. Ellen Story, former Congressman John Olver, as well a whole host of peace and justice, environmental, and labor groups. While election officials are supposed to count votes for Jo Comerford, Northampton, it’s best if you write in Joanne Comerford, 186 Federal Street, Northampton. Visit Jo Comerford’s campaign Facebook page for more information.
State House (to replace retiring John Scibak in Hadley, South Hadley, Easthampton, part of Granby): Marie McCourt. I see Marie first off as grounded in the experience of marginalized people who learn to make the system work through painful trial and error. Between her own disabilities and her son’s special needs, she has had to be an advocate her entire adult life. I also see her as very willing to listen, to be thoughtful, to look at an issue from many sides. And I see her as a passionate representative of her constituents; she is in the race to be of service. Of the three candidates, Marie appears to have the strongest grasp of the different personalities and issues in the four communities–because she has gone out and listened to people in all of them. Marie is a protege of both long-time State Reps Ellen Story (who has endorsed her) and John Scibak (who is not publicly endorsing anyone), and received the strongest candidate endorsement I can ever remember the Daily Hampshire Gazette giving any candidate in the 36+ years I’ve been reading the paper. I didn’t know Marie before Scibak announced his retirement, but I have met with her in-depth several times, hosted a house party with her, and been part of her strategy group. That’s how impressed I am with her. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mccourt4rep/
State-Wide races: Governor (to run against Charlie Baker in the November general election): Bob Massie. Massie impressed me when I met him while he was running for statewide office many years ago, and he impresses me still. He has a terrific record on the environment, personal experience with the challenges of our health system (and also experience of the European single-payer model), and as strong a commitment to social and environmental justice issues as any gubernatorial candidate I can remember, similar to Robert Reich (who ran for governor several years ago) . He is more openly progressive and considerably more charismatic than his opponent, and I think he has a better chance of beating Baker, who is surprisingly popular. But if Gonzales is the nominee, I will have no problem supporting him in November.
Lieutenant Governor (to run against Karen Polito on a slate with the primary winner for governor in the November general election): Quentin Palfrey. Again, two fine candidates with good politics and good grasp of policy, and I will happily support the primary winner in November. My only exposure to Jimmy Tingle was at the Democratic Convention in June, while I’ve heard Palfrey two other times: once at a meeting of an activist group in Northampton, and once at an a rally against the White House policies on separating families of immigrants. To me, it’s very important that he shows up to progressive events and sees us as integral to the Democratic Party, and he knows the state extends past Route 128 and even I-495. I know he’s been out here in western Massachusetts several other times during the campaign, while I’m only aware of one Tingle appearance in the area. It also helps that I see myself in complete agreement with everything I read on Palfrey’s policy page.
Secretary of State (running against incumbent Democrat William Galvin): Josh Zakim. This is a very clear choice. The incumbent, first elected in 1994, has been good about holding corporate interests accountable to consumers, but otherwise has kept a very low profile. He is wishy-washy on a number of electoral reforms that would open up the process, while Zakim, currently a Boston City Councilor, unashamedly embraces them.
US Congress, Massachusetts 2nd District: no primary. Supporting incumbent Jim McGovern in the general election. McGovern’s been great on defending SNAP and other hunger programs, standing for meaningful action on climate change, and opposing the racist, anti-consumer white House agenda at every turn. He comes to the western part of the state frequently and maintains a district office in Northampton. I consider him one of the best people in the entire Congress and am proud to be in his district.
Adjoining districts:
To replace the late Rep. Peter Kocot (Northampton/Hatfield): Lindsay Sabadosa. Lindsay is a progressive activist who has had a high profile in the Valley, organizing the local chapter of the Women’s March and active in numerous progressive activities. She also knows her way around the Statehouse and has built progressive issue-oriented coalitions. Her opponent, who ran Kokot’s district office, seems quite decent but doesn’t seem to bring the passion and energy. I also worry that some of the people in her camp are openly hostile to a progressive agenda.
To replace retiring Rep. Solomon Goldstein-Rose (Amherst, Pelham, part of Granby): Mindy Domb. Two good candidates for this seat. I give the edge to Domb on the basis of her passion and the level of support I see in the community. When Goldstein-Rose bowed out of the race, he endorsed Domb.
To replace retiring Rep. Steve Kulik (western Hilltowns and Deerfield/Sunderland): I see three good candidates. While I have not followed this one as closely as the others, I dealt with Nataie Blais when she worked for Congressman McGovern and found her very professional. She also has Kulik’s endorsement. Thus, she edges out Francia Wisnewski and Kate Albright-Hanna for my support in this eight-way(!) race.
US Congress, Massachusetts 1st District: Tahirah Amatul-Wadud (running against incumbent Democrat Richie Neal for a seat that includes all of Hampden and Berkshire Counties and big chunks of Hampshire and Franklin). Tahirah is a fresh face in local politics, whom I met shortly after the DT inauguration and quickly became friends with. I’ve been advising her campaign and I’m very much in favor of her candidacy. I used to live in Neal’s district. He seldom came to any of the other counties besides his base in Hampden County, did little on most issues, and only got me to vote for him once–because he’d voted no on the Iraq war. It is the only vote of courage I can remember him taking. Tahirah has been getting to know the geographically vast district and its very diverse voters, listening hard to people’s concerns, doing her research, speaking with issue experts…and to me, that leadership is worth sacrificing Neal’s power through seniority, as one of the longer-serving MOCs
In November, Massachusetts voters also have three ballot questions. I recommend voting Yes on Questions 2 and 3–but after much research (and confusion) I’ve changed my mind on Question 1 and plan to vote no:
Question 1 has a laudible goal of redcuce the burden on overworked nurses, and I had been a strong supporter of Question 1–until I started educating myself. However, the bill–yes, I’ve read it–is very poorly drafted. Specifically, the definition of what constitutes a finable incident is alarmingly vague. While the intent of the bill is laudable, it is so poorly written that I am convinced it will do more harm than good. It could result in community hospitals like Northampton’s Cooley Dickinson (my nearest hospital) being forced to close. Reluctantly, I am now a no vote.
Question 2 will take the first steps to get Massachusetts, at least, out from under the thumb of big corporate money in politics and give our state at least a little bit of protection from the horrible Citizens United US Supreme Court decision of several years ago that allowed dark money in politics, pretty much without restriction–and puts the wheels in motion to create a constitutional amendment overturning Citizens United. Please vote Yes!
Question 3 protects against an attack on the rights of transgender people. A yes vote maintains the present protective law, while a no vote removes protections from a class of people who have done nothing criminal. Please vote Yes!
Some progressives have wondered, as a life-long grassroots activist, why I’m getting so involved in electoral politics. Because we need to do both. In 1975, I put a sign in my yard that said “Don’t vote. It only encourages them.” But like Obama’s position on same-sex marriage, my position has evolved. I was only 18 and didn’t see the use of a system that had little use for me as a youth, that under both LBJ (Democrat) and Nixon (Republican) was sending people just slightly older than me to fight and die in the far-away jungles of Vietnam, was despoiling the earth, and was not responsive (in my opinion at the time) to citizen needs.
But by 1983, I was of a different mind. I began to follow local politics closely that year, and since that time have been involved in many local, state, and national campaigns. I even ran for local office three times and managed a successful campaign to get a progressive insurgent on the City Council. He beat the three-term incumbent conservative by seven votes! I still do the grassroots work and see it as important. I go into electoral politics with my eyes open, knowing that no candidate will be the savior, that the pressures on elected officials to side with the powerful are immense, and increase the more you go up the ladder from municipal to county to in-state region to state to national region to president. But I also see good people all the way along the ladder. I think Obama and Carter and Kennedy were good people. They had plenty of flaws, but they had heart.
And if we have learned nothing from the horrible policies and horrible statements emanating from Washington the past two years, we know now without any doubt that our votes make a difference, that staying home or voting third-party in a swing state is not an option under the current electoral system, and that we could have beaten back this nightmare if more people had understood what was at stake.
So, Massachusetts residents, get out there and vote on September 4. So, all US citizens, get out there again to vote on November 6.
Do you have seven minutes to watch a sweet film about a dolphin rescuing a dog who is swept off a boat in shark territory? (If you don’t, you can skip some great dolphin footage and start 2 minutes, 20 seconds in, as the dog goes over the stern, and cut off at 4:45, after the animals have made their sweet farewells. Surely, you have 2 minutes and 25 seconds you can spare. And feel free to turn off the sound. It’s just music, and repetitious music at that.) Makes you feel warm and fuzzy all over, right? Personally, I love videos about interspecies friendship, and I’ve seen a bunch of them over many years.
Screenshot from the video of a dolphin rescuing a dog.
Now: do you think this is an actual event, a recreated actual event, or fiction? Why? Please share your thoughts in the comments before reading further. Then scroll down and continue to see my answer–and my reasons.
Now read my take on it:
I’m pretty sure it’s fiction. And I’m concerned that there’s no text with this film, and no credits at the end–in other words, no accountability. I have no objection to filming heartwarming works of fiction. I love that sort of thing, from Frank Capra’s “You Can’t Take it With You” to “Fried Green Tomatoes” to “Life Is Beautiful” and “Jude”. But all of these are clearly marketed as story, not fact.
In my opinion, this film is specifically designed to make most viewers believe this was a real event.
And I have trouble with that. I feel its “story-ness” should be disclosed, and we should also know who produced the film. I’ll tell you why in a moment, but first, here’s how I reached my conclusion.
Why You Can’t Necessarily Trust Your Eyes
Because I’m trained in journalism and have worked for decades in marketing, I ask hard questions about what is and isn’t real, what people’s motivations or agendas are, and how to filter information based on what’s really going on versus what the speaker or writer or photographer or filmmaker is trying to get you to think is going on.
In today’s digital world, tools like Photoshop and video editors have transformed those doable but difficult tasks into something incredibly easy, and only an expert will be able to tell. So in this era, we can never trust that a picture or a movie is accurate unless we were there when it was shot. Thus, unfortunately, we need to bring a certain amount of critical analysis when we view any video, any photograph.
And through this lens (pun intended, I confess), when I watch this video, I immediately discard any idea that we’re watching real-time true-story footage.
Why?
7 Reasons Why I Think It’s a Fake
It’s waaaay too slick. This is professionally shot and carefully edited, by a skilled camera operator using high-resolution equipment, tripods, and lighting to produce footage as good technically as anything coming out of Hollywood. In real life, this would have been shot on a cell phone, held in a hand that shook at least a little. It’s on a moving boat, after all.
Much of the footage is underwater or behind the boat the dog was riding, yet no other boats are visible.
When the dog slips off the deck into the water, no people are around. If anyone were filming an actual event, we’d see some kind of rescue attempt, and we certainly would not see the boat blithely continuing away, stranding the pet. At least the crew of the videography boat would get involved.
It’s just too convenient that cameras happened to focus on all the key places. And yes, that’s a plural. There was one camera focused on the boat deck and later on the swimming dog, and at least one other one focused underwater at the dolphin and shark.
If the shark were really close enough to attack the dog, it would have gone after the dolphin too. Giant sharks don’t care much about “collateral damage.”
It strains credulity that the boat would be waiting, unmoving, in still water, just when the dolphin deposits the dog on the tailgate, considering there are plenty of waves in the dolphin-carries-dog footage.
I’m suspicious of the site it’s on, something called TopBuzz, which I’ve never heard of. I didn’t notice at first when I clicked the link from a Facebook message that it had a monstrously complex tracking URL, too. Uh-oh! I’ve stripped those tracking codes out of the URL as here. To its credit, it doesn’t try to get me to watch all sorts of salacious videos, and a search for complaints brought up only questions about its relationships with content creators, not viewers. And I checked for viruses after having the page open for several hours while writing this, and it came up clean.
I’m also skeptical that this is a later recreation of a true event, although I’d grant that maybe a 10 percent chance. Why? Because much of the footage “documented” events with no witnesses. Unless one of the human crew is fluent in either dog or dolphin language, neither party could have told the story. And the dog might not even know about the shark threat. Certainly the humans in the boat that drove away would have no idea. Since we don’t know who produced this or how to get in touch with them, we have no way of knowing.
I posted a petition on Facebook, and someone commented, “Like this would make a difference?”
But here’s the thing: You never know what makes a difference. It was a pleasant shock to discover years later that Nixon was actually paying attention to the peace protests. I think the protests after the first Muslim ban and over the tearing of children from parents seeking asylum certainly made a difference. Amnesty International has made a demonstrable difference in the lives of thousands of political prisoners around the world. And I know that my participation in certain other actions, especially the Seabrook occupation of 1977, made a difference.
Nonviolent occupiers approach the construction site of the Seabrook nuclear plant, April 30, 1977. Unattributed photo found at https://josna.wordpress.com/tag/anti-nuclear-movement/
So we keep working and maybe sometimes we have far, far more impact than we thought we would. Who would have predicted how much traction the Arab Spring, or Tiannanmen Square, or Occupy would have gained, how much impact they had?
Who could have imagined in 1948 that all the Jim Crow segregation laws would come tumbling down, not only in the US but even in South Africa and Zimbabwe (then called Rhodesia)? Who could have predicted as recently as 2000 that same-sex marriage would be a legal right in all 50 US states and many other countries around the world? All of these victories are anchored in activism, sometimes decades of activism.
Who would have guessed that the incredible kids who survived the Parkland shooting on Valentine’s Day 2018 (toddlers when Massachusetts became the first state with marriage equality) would channel their angst into a movement that brought millions into the streets, tens of thousands to their voter registrars to register for the first time? Who knows which ones will grow up to be world leaders, and which long-time elected officials will be displaced by a wave of change?
In recent months, we’ve seen the cycle of impact quicken. Movements and memes that had been kicking around for years suddenly reach critical mass. Who would have expected the flowering of older and dormant movements such as #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter?
As an activist for more than 48 years, I remain optimistic, even in the face of so many defeats—because I also see these and many other victories. I see hope in so many people’s movements in the US, and in the complete change within two generations from a Europe ruled by power-mad fear-mongering dictators to one whose purpose actually seems to create a better world for the planet and its residents.
So yes, it makes a difference. Ordinary people can make a difference. Ordinary people make a difference constantly in fact: when I give my “Impossible is a Dare” talk, I cite examples like a seamstress (Rosa Parks) and a shipyard electrician (Lech Walesa) who changed their entire society.
What are you doing currently to make a difference? Please share in the comments.
I am one who thinks Donald Trump is the worst thing to happen to the United States of America in my lifetime, maybe in history. He has wrapped his presidency in–and pushed the country’s culture toward–bullying, bigotry, broken promises, and baksheesh (money corruption). He has no grasp of policy and seems to be governed (and governing) by whim. He takes a scary number of memes from the Nazis. He appoints people who are ruthless, openly corrupt, and bent on sabotaging all the progress of the past 80+ years. I’ve marched in the streets opposing his policies dozens of times since he was elected.
Climate marchers in front of Trump Hotel, Washington DC 4-29-17 (Clamshell Alliance’s spiritual heirs)
Yet, unlike some Democrats–it’s not just Republicans who can put building their party ahead of building their country and their planet–I publicly congratulate him for agreeing to the summit with Kim Jong Un, and I pledge to publicly congratulate him if some genuine good comes out of it. We have to talk with our enemies to make peace with them. I’d like to see a similar summit with the Iranians.
Much as I’d be thrilled if it happens, my expectations of something great occurring at this meeting are low. I’m expecting these two dangerous madmen to shout and grandstand and at best not accomplish anything, at worst, push us closer to nuclear war. Go ahead, Donald, make my day: prove me wrong!
[Postscript, June 12, 2018]. I have just seen the declaration issued by the US and North Korea following the summit. While the accord is very weak on specifics, I think it’s a strong first step. It might even be the first actual good thing of the DT presidency. As a statement of intent, it is eloquent. Now of course we have to see how it’s implemented and whether it’s more than hollow rhetoric. Anyway, I am keeping my promise and praising this agreement. It’s more than any other president has accomplished on North Korea. But it’s only the first step in a long process.
Copywriter Bob Bly, who is never afraid to be a contrarian, posted this to his Facebook page:
In his book “The Science of Getting Rich,” Wallace D. Wattles writes, “It is not possible to live a really complete or successful life unless one is rich. No person can rise to his greatest possible height in talent or soul development unless he has plenty of money.” Is the author spot on? Or is this just “Wattles twaddle”?
He’s getting lots of interesting answers, including many from people who find truth in Wattles’s statement. If you’ve read my work over the years, you won’t be surprised by my answer:
Ridiculous! Did Mother Teresa, Gandhi, and thousands of other world-changers not have a “complete or successful life”?
Mother Teresa (with Sri Chinmoy)
I personally have economic comfort but have never chased material wealth. My life is full of blessings and I don’t really care if the cars my wife and I drive are from 2004 (bought new) and 2005 (used). I have zero need to flaunt fancy possessions. I have love in my life, a beautiful place to live, a warm and vibrant circle of community that includes not only friendships but art, music, books, dancing, great food, and many other blessings. THESE are the measurements I use for personal wealth–not my bank account.
After all, beyond what I listed in my response, I live in Paradise, spend time outdoors every day, see more cultural events and travel to more places than many of my friends with much larger bank balances, can afford the occasional splurge or emergency purchase, do work that is deeply meaningful and fulfilling.
I live in an abundance mentality, and I don’t really worry about prosperity. Prosperity is simply a means to an end. Abundant blessings are that end.
My mom told me often that I taught myself to read at age 3 by sounding out stuff on cereal boxes, mayonnaise jars, etc. And to this day, I read packaging, ads, tracts…whatever is lying around. She also told me that I was extremely frustrated that I couldn’t get a New York Public Library (NYPL) card until I could write my name, which took another two years after I learned to read. She had to take books out for me on her card. I have no memory of either of these things. But I do remember that I was reading fluently by the beginning of first grade. At age 60, I’m still grateful to my first grade teacher, who sat me in the back of the room with a 4th grade geography textbook while she inflicted Sally, Dick, and Jane on the rest of the class (and I still love geography).
A child reading. Photo by Julia Freeman-Woolpert, freeimages.com
Much later, I met my wife, novelist and poet D. Dina Friedman, at a poetry reading in Greenwich Village
I was skeptical of Mom’s claims about me until we discovered when my son was 2 and some months that he could tell words like wax, fax, and max apart, visually, because my daughter had sat him down and taught him. He was not an early reader but obviously could have been if it had been a priority. He was (and still is at 25) focused on music. We started reading to our kids when they were infants. My daughter, gluten-free/vegetarian gourmet food blogger Alana Horowitz Friedman and her husband are both avid readers, too.
Mom was like that too. Once they lifted the old limit of eight books at a time, she would go to the local NYPL branch every two weeks with a SHOPPING CART, fill it with books, and wheel it the mile back to our house. She had a long commute to Manhattan via express bus and that’s where she did much of her reading.
I’m still a voracious reader. Books have opened up my mind to such incredible richness of thought and emotion. Much of my thinking on everything from nonviolent social change to green business success comes from processing and extrapolating on what I read to come up with something new. The world is a much more interesting place to me because of writers like Dave Dellinger, Gandhi, and Gene Sharp’s writings about nonviolence, and Amory Lovins, Janine Benyus, and William McDonough on the green business side.
But a few years ago, I realized that while I made time in my busy life for nonfiction, I didn’t do enough pleasure reading. I started making sure I read at least five minutes a day of a book that had nothing to do with work.
Of course, five minutes was nowhere near enough if I was into a good book. I found all sorts of nooks and crannies in my day to read. And then I decided to get a lot more exercise. Much of that is on an indoor stationary bicycle: a perfect place to read! Typically, I start my first shift of the day with a poem, then ten minutes of nonfiction and ten minutes of fiction or memoir. If I’m biking 20 minutes, that’s my whole shift. If (more typically) I’m doing 30 minutes, I often spend the remaining 10 checking Facebook from my phone, because I have to make time in my life for social media, too.
With most of it on the exercise bike, I’m actually reading more than 80 books a year!
Some vast number of people never read another book after college. They’re cheating themselves. Make time in your own life for this great pleasure!
