It strikes me that self-censorship is an impossibility. When a person feels the need to self-censor, what they are really doing is reconsidering their view in light of their audience. That's not censorship, that's decorum. Or at least, it's a situational awareness. People say what they want all over the internet with impunity, because there aren't personal relationships at stake. But all communication involves that interaction, and while I don't think a person should sacrifice one's opinions for the sake of visibility, I think that awareness of the audience is key.
I mention this because I've spent a lot of time lately debating Armenia with Turkish Nationals online. If I used the word genocide, I couldn't have a conversation. But if I dance around the word, play in the gray areas of war, war crimes, ethnic violence, civilian casualties, and unintentional consequences, I can have a meaningful debate. And that, to me, is far more important that a hard, ideological line in the sand. Discourse needs some flexibility to work, and I'm perfectly willing to not expressly attack people to make progress towards resolution.
(Ed Note: Armenia is easy for me to do this way, because I don't have a huge personal stake in it; I'm aware of the flaws in that.)
(My apologies for my absence from this blog; I've had more writing this semester than ever before in my life. But school is almost out, and I should be back to the blogosphere in no time)
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Monday, March 16, 2009
Elephant Diaries: PB & J
Last time I talked about newspapers, I talked about comics, and the contrast between webcomic content (a comic) and webcomic revenue (income from selling t-shirts). Reader Kristil expanded on that, wondering if this sort of divorcing of News Content from News Revenues could work more broadly for journalism. Here's what she has to say, in full:
I've been a while getting back to respond to you, mainly because I was trying to come up with a new business model for online journalism. Ha, kidding. Sort of.So, readers, what do you think? (FWIW I think it's a pretty clever idea, but I'm not sure it's all that different from how newspaper classifieds worked before Craigslist. Maybe the truly national papers like the NYT can do it, but I'm hesitant to say it'll save the local dailies. Awesome t-shirts, on the other hand...)
I thought it would be nice to post the link here about some things that newspapers are trying, which I originally sent you on Twitter. By the way, I so want to work for Duo someday.
It seems that The Guardian has hit on a working model of the inkling I was having after I posted here; maybe newspapers can offer another product besides the news. And so now my thought is, “Okay, but what goes with the news better than online dating?” Are dating sites and in-depth coverage truly the next PB&J? Feel free to tell me if that seems snotty.
I heard a piece on NPR recently about new nonprofit and shoestring wire services. While I am loathe to link to that link hog, NPR, I’ll do it anyway. Actually, while looking for that link, I turned up a few other good pieces and blog that I’m definitely going to start reading by Jim Romenesko. I suppose that an endowment is one way to add another news service to the mix, but it should only be one of many tools in the toolkit.
One more thing. I read an article some time last year about Chinese web design that mentioned a Chinese business practice called Quanxi. Sorry, I’ve looked for the link and can’t find it. In a nutshell, it is extensive networking with potential customers and business partners before doing business. The example that was given was an auction site in China that had no plans to charge for its service until late 2009. This reminds me of companies using blogs to contribute to online communities, which in turn brings them “inbound leads.” But if a news site is all blog and no purchase, what then? What is the income generating complement to news content? I hope it’s not advertising, or paid content, because people are resisting those, don’t you think?
Placeholders/Mental Gumbo
I've a lot of ideas that have been stewing for a while. I'd like to write posts on all of them, but I figured I'd go ahead and get the ideas out in a very raw, rough form. Here goes.
1. Youth, Technology, Civics.
I want to write a follow-up to my last post, including a lot of my understanding of Lawrence Lessig and technology as used by the young. I think that being on the internet is formative in many senses to how youth understand government, and that actions online by governments which are viewed as protecting youth or artists are interpreted as obstacles, which itself undermines the rule of law. I'd like to talk about making law relevant to youth, first through sane online policy, but also through new government interactivity.
2. Tower Defense Game as Legislative Process
I really, really wish I was good at programming so I could do this. Tower Defense Games are the kind of perpetual casual gamers' version of a strategy game, and basically consist of paths enemies travel and tiles along the path where one can put towers that shoot. I would like to make one for the UK parliamentary system, which is largely a single straight line with lots of room for towers towards the end, and contrast it was a US system, where the paths are circuitous, there are chokepoints at committees, chambers, merger committees, and a presidential veto all along the line to stop legislation from being passed. For added fun, could make it partisan with different towers being able to attack different bills. The goal could be to prevent any legislation at all from passing. Basically, it's an outgrowth of the idea that veto points are choke points, but I still think it would be fun.
3. War Narratives
Watching Clone Wars on Cartoon Network last night, it struck me that most every war story produced in America is derived solely from our narratives of WWII or Vietnam. All our history of foreign involvement (and our internal conflicts) before or since hasn't really influenced our War Fiction. Iraq stories exist as a sort of corollary to Vietnam, Korea is a hybridized "US wins freedom abroad"/"US war machine limited in power" story that straddles those two wars, especially as MASH popularized in its long run. And it applies to fiction further afield - "300" is the WWII story with Sparta as England and Thermopylae as Dunkirk. I'd guess that more major developments in new war stories have come through adding perspectives not previously considered, instead of creating new war narratives.
I'd like to write about all three of these later. If you have a preference, let me know in the comments.
1. Youth, Technology, Civics.
I want to write a follow-up to my last post, including a lot of my understanding of Lawrence Lessig and technology as used by the young. I think that being on the internet is formative in many senses to how youth understand government, and that actions online by governments which are viewed as protecting youth or artists are interpreted as obstacles, which itself undermines the rule of law. I'd like to talk about making law relevant to youth, first through sane online policy, but also through new government interactivity.
2. Tower Defense Game as Legislative Process
I really, really wish I was good at programming so I could do this. Tower Defense Games are the kind of perpetual casual gamers' version of a strategy game, and basically consist of paths enemies travel and tiles along the path where one can put towers that shoot. I would like to make one for the UK parliamentary system, which is largely a single straight line with lots of room for towers towards the end, and contrast it was a US system, where the paths are circuitous, there are chokepoints at committees, chambers, merger committees, and a presidential veto all along the line to stop legislation from being passed. For added fun, could make it partisan with different towers being able to attack different bills. The goal could be to prevent any legislation at all from passing. Basically, it's an outgrowth of the idea that veto points are choke points, but I still think it would be fun.
3. War Narratives
Watching Clone Wars on Cartoon Network last night, it struck me that most every war story produced in America is derived solely from our narratives of WWII or Vietnam. All our history of foreign involvement (and our internal conflicts) before or since hasn't really influenced our War Fiction. Iraq stories exist as a sort of corollary to Vietnam, Korea is a hybridized "US wins freedom abroad"/"US war machine limited in power" story that straddles those two wars, especially as MASH popularized in its long run. And it applies to fiction further afield - "300" is the WWII story with Sparta as England and Thermopylae as Dunkirk. I'd guess that more major developments in new war stories have come through adding perspectives not previously considered, instead of creating new war narratives.
I'd like to write about all three of these later. If you have a preference, let me know in the comments.
Friday, March 6, 2009
Remedial Civics Classes
Proposed Pulpit editorial topic, to deliver at First U of Abq this summer:
"One of my pet peeves is the lack of knowledge our citizenry has of the basic operations of our government (not UUs, of course)...do you have a take on what is needed to ensure that your generation knows such things as how many branches of government we have, their functions, what is contained in the bill of rights, what federalism is, etc., etc.? How can we hope to engender equal rights for all in all circumstances in the face of...well...ignorance concerning what "equal rights" means? Do we need to start remedial Civics classes?"
Rough shape from which the editorial will be carved:
It's fast becoming time for me to step back as the voice of youth. After all, I'm legally an adult, and I've legally been an adult for over two years now, which is half the total time one really gets to be a "youth". This is, then, almost overstepping. I hope you'll indulge me - I have just a little left to say about youth, and at least in this congregation, I've been a bit of a mouthpiece for my generation. Consider this, then, my swan song. Fittingly, it shall be a song of politics - I am nothing if not political. Perhaps more meaningfully, it is about the very edges of politics, that periphery so unfamiliar to talking heads and so prevalent for everyone else.
I'm a theory junky. I love the big picture - it's why I care about politics in the specific, and not justice as a broad category. My mind delights at the machinations across the macro level. I am, you could say, a bit of a wonk. Which is well and fine for me. But it places a tremendous amount of distance between myself and what I'm actually studying. Decisions about politics happen on the macro level, but politics is experienced every day in very personal ways. There are some easy examples of this - Raise your hand if you've ever been to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Okay, you can stop your grumbling and put your hands down. Yeah, I know, right? Awful place. But that, right there, is the end result of about a century of politics figuring out how to combine people and cars. Heck, there's even a school of thought out there which says the government can't make that decision; of course, that's taking me straight back to wonky. And this is about the very, very personal. Going to the DMV is easily one of the most benignly unpleasant experiences of a person's life, and that's the first place youth go to be confirmed in the eyes of the government as having adult competency. The policy, the deliberations, the behind-the-door decisions: "well, okay, we need to do it, but it'll be very expensive. Unless we pay poorly, and then we guarantee our public gets generally mediocre service. Still, I'd rather do that than ask them to pay more taxes - oh, let's just make it suck", that is all irrelevant to the person waiting in an interminable line to fill out lots and lots of forms.
Let's try a different one. Raise your hands if you attended public school. Now keep your hands in the air you ever broke a school rule. Okay, great - some of you are honest. Now, keep your hands in the air if, when you broke a school rule, you were escorted to the principals office by an armed police officer? Ah - so you're the post-columbine generation. Glad to see a few of you here this Sunday.
So that, that's where politics happens. I'll go ahead and say that I think armed cops in schools are a sign of a police state. And I'll make that even creepier by saying it's not all that bad, once you get used to it. I mean, I know it's wrong, but it's something bad that one outgrows. So long as adulthood is less policed than childhood, temporary injustices and inhumanities are tolerated. Of course, it's important to emphasize that "tolerated" and "accepted" aren't synonymous. People can tolerate a lot of bad, but people will accept very little of it as permanent and irreversible.
Last big question - hands up for anyone here who here as ever made something and put it online? Well, congrats yo you all. Any of you used music in a video and had it legally threatened? No? Well, I guess the RIAA is busy these days, so it might have slipped through. I'll speak for myself, then - I'm a little annoyed at all the transfers of rights that happen to me when I put my creative content online. And more than that, I'm kind of terrified at the places where government can take art and hold it up as a threat to commerce. And if you're afraid I'm getting a bit too wonky on this one, it's because the issue necessitates it.
If a youth, in regular civilian life, runs into government-created obstacles, the youth will then do one of a few things. First, circumvent it - the easiest way to interact with the government is to break rules and then be really clever about it. This works out great for the youth, but it undermines the whole "rule of law" principle upon which society is based. The other thing the youth could do is figure out how to make the law work on the periphery. My blog is creative commons licensed, which was a whole area of wonk-i-ness that I had no idea existed until I started caring about internet culture.
And that's what's fascinating about this generation. Yes, we may not inherently know everything we need about our government, but we are, in the words of an anonymous commenter online, "of a generation that values knowing where to find the answer over how to find the answer". We have all the knowledge available to understand our society at our fingertips, and as soon as it becomes useful to us, we'll make great use of it.
And right at our fingertips are where we have the remedial civics classes. No, everyone won't go out of there way to learn even the full set of basics. But on that edge of politics and daily life, that bleeding edge where the two run into each other, people will figure it out. Problems will be found, hypocrisies exposed, and laws either subverted, ignored, or challenged. Where government doesn't make sense, laws will be improvised and new social arrangements will be found until law catches up with society. There's no need for a new, sweeping re-education about what it means to be a citizen in this nation. So long as we treat people, and especially youth, as citizens, they'll figure out what rights are their's. More importantly than that, though, they'll figure out that wonderful little bit about the social contract - we are the mandate of heaven. If our government doesn't act in our best interest, we have both the power and the obligation to
change that. And, and I firmly believe this as almost an article of faith, that so long as the knowledge is out there, we will find it, and so long as we can find it, we will use it.
It is a Unitarian cliche to quote Marget mead and say "Never doubt that a small, group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." There is a lot of truth in that statement - but it overlooks the seachange made possible by an untold number of interested, casually motivated citizens, for whom politics is part of the game, but it is just a part. We are living the civics courses we need. Raised in this church, in the tradition of youth empowerment, there was never any doubt in my mind that politics was a part of life that one is allowed to partake in. Much as I love to pile praise upon this church, last summer's election campaign was the clearest indicator that we aren't the only group that takes youth empowerment and turns it directly into political action.
For all the doubt and skepticism about my generation that abounds today, we're a surprisingly capable bunch. We came of age after a national tragedy, were handed a dead-end war, witnessed the failure of apathy about politics in the form of a little thing named Katrina, and we're faced with "the great recession". And what have we done? Hard to say anything less than rise to the task. We've learned the civics lessons we need, and we are ready for an era of great reforms. I think, to understate the matter, that this bodes well for our nation. The kids today? The kids are alright.
"One of my pet peeves is the lack of knowledge our citizenry has of the basic operations of our government (not UUs, of course)...do you have a take on what is needed to ensure that your generation knows such things as how many branches of government we have, their functions, what is contained in the bill of rights, what federalism is, etc., etc.? How can we hope to engender equal rights for all in all circumstances in the face of...well...ignorance concerning what "equal rights" means? Do we need to start remedial Civics classes?"
Rough shape from which the editorial will be carved:
It's fast becoming time for me to step back as the voice of youth. After all, I'm legally an adult, and I've legally been an adult for over two years now, which is half the total time one really gets to be a "youth". This is, then, almost overstepping. I hope you'll indulge me - I have just a little left to say about youth, and at least in this congregation, I've been a bit of a mouthpiece for my generation. Consider this, then, my swan song. Fittingly, it shall be a song of politics - I am nothing if not political. Perhaps more meaningfully, it is about the very edges of politics, that periphery so unfamiliar to talking heads and so prevalent for everyone else.
I'm a theory junky. I love the big picture - it's why I care about politics in the specific, and not justice as a broad category. My mind delights at the machinations across the macro level. I am, you could say, a bit of a wonk. Which is well and fine for me. But it places a tremendous amount of distance between myself and what I'm actually studying. Decisions about politics happen on the macro level, but politics is experienced every day in very personal ways. There are some easy examples of this - Raise your hand if you've ever been to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Okay, you can stop your grumbling and put your hands down. Yeah, I know, right? Awful place. But that, right there, is the end result of about a century of politics figuring out how to combine people and cars. Heck, there's even a school of thought out there which says the government can't make that decision; of course, that's taking me straight back to wonky. And this is about the very, very personal. Going to the DMV is easily one of the most benignly unpleasant experiences of a person's life, and that's the first place youth go to be confirmed in the eyes of the government as having adult competency. The policy, the deliberations, the behind-the-door decisions: "well, okay, we need to do it, but it'll be very expensive. Unless we pay poorly, and then we guarantee our public gets generally mediocre service. Still, I'd rather do that than ask them to pay more taxes - oh, let's just make it suck", that is all irrelevant to the person waiting in an interminable line to fill out lots and lots of forms.
Let's try a different one. Raise your hands if you attended public school. Now keep your hands in the air you ever broke a school rule. Okay, great - some of you are honest. Now, keep your hands in the air if, when you broke a school rule, you were escorted to the principals office by an armed police officer? Ah - so you're the post-columbine generation. Glad to see a few of you here this Sunday.
So that, that's where politics happens. I'll go ahead and say that I think armed cops in schools are a sign of a police state. And I'll make that even creepier by saying it's not all that bad, once you get used to it. I mean, I know it's wrong, but it's something bad that one outgrows. So long as adulthood is less policed than childhood, temporary injustices and inhumanities are tolerated. Of course, it's important to emphasize that "tolerated" and "accepted" aren't synonymous. People can tolerate a lot of bad, but people will accept very little of it as permanent and irreversible.
Last big question - hands up for anyone here who here as ever made something and put it online? Well, congrats yo you all. Any of you used music in a video and had it legally threatened? No? Well, I guess the RIAA is busy these days, so it might have slipped through. I'll speak for myself, then - I'm a little annoyed at all the transfers of rights that happen to me when I put my creative content online. And more than that, I'm kind of terrified at the places where government can take art and hold it up as a threat to commerce. And if you're afraid I'm getting a bit too wonky on this one, it's because the issue necessitates it.
If a youth, in regular civilian life, runs into government-created obstacles, the youth will then do one of a few things. First, circumvent it - the easiest way to interact with the government is to break rules and then be really clever about it. This works out great for the youth, but it undermines the whole "rule of law" principle upon which society is based. The other thing the youth could do is figure out how to make the law work on the periphery. My blog is creative commons licensed, which was a whole area of wonk-i-ness that I had no idea existed until I started caring about internet culture.
And that's what's fascinating about this generation. Yes, we may not inherently know everything we need about our government, but we are, in the words of an anonymous commenter online, "of a generation that values knowing where to find the answer over how to find the answer". We have all the knowledge available to understand our society at our fingertips, and as soon as it becomes useful to us, we'll make great use of it.
And right at our fingertips are where we have the remedial civics classes. No, everyone won't go out of there way to learn even the full set of basics. But on that edge of politics and daily life, that bleeding edge where the two run into each other, people will figure it out. Problems will be found, hypocrisies exposed, and laws either subverted, ignored, or challenged. Where government doesn't make sense, laws will be improvised and new social arrangements will be found until law catches up with society. There's no need for a new, sweeping re-education about what it means to be a citizen in this nation. So long as we treat people, and especially youth, as citizens, they'll figure out what rights are their's. More importantly than that, though, they'll figure out that wonderful little bit about the social contract - we are the mandate of heaven. If our government doesn't act in our best interest, we have both the power and the obligation to
change that. And, and I firmly believe this as almost an article of faith, that so long as the knowledge is out there, we will find it, and so long as we can find it, we will use it.
It is a Unitarian cliche to quote Marget mead and say "Never doubt that a small, group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." There is a lot of truth in that statement - but it overlooks the seachange made possible by an untold number of interested, casually motivated citizens, for whom politics is part of the game, but it is just a part. We are living the civics courses we need. Raised in this church, in the tradition of youth empowerment, there was never any doubt in my mind that politics was a part of life that one is allowed to partake in. Much as I love to pile praise upon this church, last summer's election campaign was the clearest indicator that we aren't the only group that takes youth empowerment and turns it directly into political action.
For all the doubt and skepticism about my generation that abounds today, we're a surprisingly capable bunch. We came of age after a national tragedy, were handed a dead-end war, witnessed the failure of apathy about politics in the form of a little thing named Katrina, and we're faced with "the great recession". And what have we done? Hard to say anything less than rise to the task. We've learned the civics lessons we need, and we are ready for an era of great reforms. I think, to understate the matter, that this bodes well for our nation. The kids today? The kids are alright.
Friday, February 27, 2009
We are Halfway to the Future (a mediation on SB 12)
(Note - this was originally posted to my page on the Duke City Fix, but I think here may be more appropriate. Also, I owe you all some good blogginess).
Today in my dorm room in New Orleans I watched the live feed of the senate debate on SB 12 (the domestic partnership one). Being a bit of a political junkie, I found the whole thing inherently fascinating, and was especially appreciative of the New Mexico Independent's live feed, and careful moderation of their own chat box (the entirety of which can be found here). That's the future-y part.
I left the chat for class before the actual vote, but what little of the debate I saw was really, really interesting. Cisco McSorely, the sponsor of the bill, explained the mock-up of it that was sitting on everyone's desk. In light of attention to the bill and strong criticism of it as "secretly gay marriage", the bill had been revised to have complete neutral terms, describing only civil law. Words like "widow/widower", which have social role connotations, and "spouse", which has both social role and religious connotations, had been struck from the bill. It was, in my mind, a masterful use of language itself to forge a new contract - "marriage" is an established entity, with a wealth of meaning behind it in religion, family life, tax code, and civil rights. That's part of why it's so hard to legislate around - people have a very fixed schema of marriage, and while some things may be part of it (divorce is incorporated into that schema, I think), it is an existent entity. So trying to create domestic partnerships was ambitious - the language of it was government and civil, and the religious and wider social connotations of marriage were not only untouched, but were protected as separate. It was, in my mind, a very clever compromise. That's future-ish, but more a product of modern pragmatism.
The debate then began, where it was attacked for being gay marriage. The entirety of built up nuance was thrown to the wayside, and lines pulled from Prop 8 support came to the fore. I noticed a reference made earlier in a Scarantino column happen on the senate floor. Disappointing to myself, but interesting, because I tend to underestimate the influence of commentators on political process. Scarantino's article was argued against in many places, but it was the one in the paper, and the one that got used on the floor. It was an interesting play in a democratic legislature, and it allowed people to protect the practice of religion, rather than protect people from religion. I missed the rest of the debate, so I can't offer wonky commentary on that, but this part at least seems classic, normal, business as usual weighing of freedoms against freedoms.
Then there's the voting. The bill failed, with 17 votes for and 25 votes against. If you want to see the list of who voted how, I recommend here. For me at least, it's a disappointing result, but not an insurmountable setback for the future.
For others, it's huge, and to be fair, people there have far more invested in this than I do. Not that I don't sympathize, and not that I'm not upset, but I'm not surprised to find party unity faltering. In theory, with both state houses controlled by democrats, and with a democratic governor, bills labeled progressive should fly through the government and become law/policy/mandate more or less immediately. At least, that's how it works in countries with way, way fewer veto points. To even get this far, the bill had to make it through votes in two separate committees. To get further, it would have had to make it through at least two more stops. Anywhere in this process, a significant blockage can kill the bill. If we had just one choke point, party unity would be essential - with many, it's easy to trade acquiescence in a few spots for forgiven deviations elsewhere. This holds true no matter the composition of the legislative body - if the parties are close to even, unity is stressed, but hard to enforce when cross-aisle votes are sought after. If one party predominates (as was the case here), the party dynamic changes a little, but the calculus is similar. Party unity is the only thing the minority party can really trade on, so it's essential. Within the dominating party, then, you get a split like the one today, where 10 democrats sided with the minority party, and where 17 sided with the main party ideology. Groups split like this all the time. Democrats are pretty uniform in outlook when they are the opposition; is it any wonder that when they are the majority conservative and liberal divisions surface within the party? Being in the majority allows those things to happen, and it allows bills like SB 12 to even be considered. It's also what allows the bill to be destroyed by the party that sponsored it, and that's a rather bitter irony.
Still, I'm optimistic. I was able to pay close attention to the hearing on a senate bill when I'm 1,100+ miles away. There was direct video feed of the senate floor, and the viewing/blogging public was able to see the arguments brought forth on the bill, and call them out on respective flimsiness. This isn't yet the golden age of internet-aware moves by lawmakers, but the tools to change the status quo are more readily available than ever before. (And that's good, because the status is most definitely not quo.) But I'm confident it will be in the future. Alas, the future isn't tonight, but hey, at least we're halfway there.
Today in my dorm room in New Orleans I watched the live feed of the senate debate on SB 12 (the domestic partnership one). Being a bit of a political junkie, I found the whole thing inherently fascinating, and was especially appreciative of the New Mexico Independent's live feed, and careful moderation of their own chat box (the entirety of which can be found here). That's the future-y part.
I left the chat for class before the actual vote, but what little of the debate I saw was really, really interesting. Cisco McSorely, the sponsor of the bill, explained the mock-up of it that was sitting on everyone's desk. In light of attention to the bill and strong criticism of it as "secretly gay marriage", the bill had been revised to have complete neutral terms, describing only civil law. Words like "widow/widower", which have social role connotations, and "spouse", which has both social role and religious connotations, had been struck from the bill. It was, in my mind, a masterful use of language itself to forge a new contract - "marriage" is an established entity, with a wealth of meaning behind it in religion, family life, tax code, and civil rights. That's part of why it's so hard to legislate around - people have a very fixed schema of marriage, and while some things may be part of it (divorce is incorporated into that schema, I think), it is an existent entity. So trying to create domestic partnerships was ambitious - the language of it was government and civil, and the religious and wider social connotations of marriage were not only untouched, but were protected as separate. It was, in my mind, a very clever compromise. That's future-ish, but more a product of modern pragmatism.
The debate then began, where it was attacked for being gay marriage. The entirety of built up nuance was thrown to the wayside, and lines pulled from Prop 8 support came to the fore. I noticed a reference made earlier in a Scarantino column happen on the senate floor. Disappointing to myself, but interesting, because I tend to underestimate the influence of commentators on political process. Scarantino's article was argued against in many places, but it was the one in the paper, and the one that got used on the floor. It was an interesting play in a democratic legislature, and it allowed people to protect the practice of religion, rather than protect people from religion. I missed the rest of the debate, so I can't offer wonky commentary on that, but this part at least seems classic, normal, business as usual weighing of freedoms against freedoms.
Then there's the voting. The bill failed, with 17 votes for and 25 votes against. If you want to see the list of who voted how, I recommend here. For me at least, it's a disappointing result, but not an insurmountable setback for the future.
For others, it's huge, and to be fair, people there have far more invested in this than I do. Not that I don't sympathize, and not that I'm not upset, but I'm not surprised to find party unity faltering. In theory, with both state houses controlled by democrats, and with a democratic governor, bills labeled progressive should fly through the government and become law/policy/mandate more or less immediately. At least, that's how it works in countries with way, way fewer veto points. To even get this far, the bill had to make it through votes in two separate committees. To get further, it would have had to make it through at least two more stops. Anywhere in this process, a significant blockage can kill the bill. If we had just one choke point, party unity would be essential - with many, it's easy to trade acquiescence in a few spots for forgiven deviations elsewhere. This holds true no matter the composition of the legislative body - if the parties are close to even, unity is stressed, but hard to enforce when cross-aisle votes are sought after. If one party predominates (as was the case here), the party dynamic changes a little, but the calculus is similar. Party unity is the only thing the minority party can really trade on, so it's essential. Within the dominating party, then, you get a split like the one today, where 10 democrats sided with the minority party, and where 17 sided with the main party ideology. Groups split like this all the time. Democrats are pretty uniform in outlook when they are the opposition; is it any wonder that when they are the majority conservative and liberal divisions surface within the party? Being in the majority allows those things to happen, and it allows bills like SB 12 to even be considered. It's also what allows the bill to be destroyed by the party that sponsored it, and that's a rather bitter irony.
Still, I'm optimistic. I was able to pay close attention to the hearing on a senate bill when I'm 1,100+ miles away. There was direct video feed of the senate floor, and the viewing/blogging public was able to see the arguments brought forth on the bill, and call them out on respective flimsiness. This isn't yet the golden age of internet-aware moves by lawmakers, but the tools to change the status quo are more readily available than ever before. (And that's good, because the status is most definitely not quo.) But I'm confident it will be in the future. Alas, the future isn't tonight, but hey, at least we're halfway there.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Getting Humanitarian Intervention Right
Evan's smart. His latest post, culled from an essay, is about how to do humanitarian intervention. And it is really good. My favorite point?
A majority of the bad reputation that humanitarian intervention has, then, is unearned; it is not the doctrine itself (which is guided by the noble ideal of protecting human life), nor the United Nations as an organization (which is left in the unenviable position of being the impartial mediator) that causes the complaints leveled against humanitarian intervention. It is the member nations themselves who use both the organization and the ideal as an excuse and a scapegoat.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Elephant Diaries: Funny Pages
(Editor's Note: This is the third filler post I'm writing while I try and figure out my Anti-Racism Sermon post. I hope you don't mind the relatively lighter content)
"Elephant Diaries" is the term John Fleck has been using over on his blog to describe the problem facing print media - it's dying, fewer people are subscribing, and where does that leave journalists? Perhaps just as importantly, where does that leave journalism itself? He's been hitting all the big points himself, and I was certain that what would draw me to write about this was Sarkozy and the State sponsorship of newspapers in France. But no - not even that would bring me into the discussion of print. What could compel me more than french government?
Comics.
Whenever I'm given a newspaper that has them, it's the first thing I read. Childhood habit, nostalgia, early morning brain needing pictures before words, whatever it is, that's where I turn. And I am almost always disappointed. Comics today, as wonderfully satirized by The Comics Curmudgeon, are a mess of slow-progressing story, the trials and tribulations of rich white anglo saxon protestants, jokes that eight-year-olds are sick of, and the unending cancer-rama of Funky Winkerbean.
Sure, there are exceptions, but for every Get Fuzzy there are about seven strips no one would go out of their way to read. And that's the model that has sustained comics for years - hit everyone with a batch of non-offensive stuff, hope they like some of it, and then make sure you never get rid of the comic they liked when they were eight. For some people, and for some length of time, this worked out great. Jim Davis owes his very existence to nostalgia formed in childhood transforming into marketing opportunities instead of dissipating.
But for many people, that market was awful. The comics they wrote were too niche-audience, or too adult, or were mature and sophisticated while not being boring, or characters had things like opinions or politics. These comics creators went online, and if you check back at the early news posts of webcomics starting from 1997 to 2003, there is a lot of hope expressed that the comic could jump from the internet to print. Scott Kurtz of iconic PvP famously campaigned for entrance into the privileged halls of print comics. For his trouble, in 2004 he was mocked by one of the lesser mainstays of print comicdom for being "internet famous" and thus irrelevant to the real world. There's foreshadowing here.
Then, in 2007, webcomic Diesel Sweeties actually made the jump. The creator opted to create a separate print version, so as to keep his main comic and main revenue stream separate from the confines of print. Read that sentence again. This guy, who's job primarily (though certainly not exclusively) consists of making a comic and putting it online, was making more from that than he was going to make from the previous holy-grail of webcartoonists: syndication. And in late 2008, he canceled his print comic. Too much work, his primary income was suffering, he was actually losing money, and it just wasn't worth it to him. That club which Scotty had been kept out of four years prior? Totally not cool anymore.
In the space of their existence online, some webcomics (not all, and certainly not most), managed to flourish and create independent revenue streams. They could appeal to niche audiences, they could address more mature issues, they could afford to be actually interesting, and they were free to do this all without any restrictions placed upon them by a syndicate. And for those who succeeded, they created a successful business model in an environment whose challenges syndicate cartoonists are just now facing.
Jeph Jacques of the fantastic Questionable Content has a great takedown of a newspaper comic writer looking tentatively at the internet, and being afraid to take the plunge. It's fitting that the post being responded to is titled "The End of Alternative Comics" - being alternative comics is what drove webcomics into an awkward sort-of genre. Really, it's the end of comics sold as part of newsprint, and that's a death worth mourning. It overlooks, however, the whole world of comics that exists outside of print. And that world is huge, dynamic, and populated.
Which is really just to say: Print Media may be dying, but comics are going strong. It's not much, but it certainly is something.
"Elephant Diaries" is the term John Fleck has been using over on his blog to describe the problem facing print media - it's dying, fewer people are subscribing, and where does that leave journalists? Perhaps just as importantly, where does that leave journalism itself? He's been hitting all the big points himself, and I was certain that what would draw me to write about this was Sarkozy and the State sponsorship of newspapers in France. But no - not even that would bring me into the discussion of print. What could compel me more than french government?
Comics.
Whenever I'm given a newspaper that has them, it's the first thing I read. Childhood habit, nostalgia, early morning brain needing pictures before words, whatever it is, that's where I turn. And I am almost always disappointed. Comics today, as wonderfully satirized by The Comics Curmudgeon, are a mess of slow-progressing story, the trials and tribulations of rich white anglo saxon protestants, jokes that eight-year-olds are sick of, and the unending cancer-rama of Funky Winkerbean.
Sure, there are exceptions, but for every Get Fuzzy there are about seven strips no one would go out of their way to read. And that's the model that has sustained comics for years - hit everyone with a batch of non-offensive stuff, hope they like some of it, and then make sure you never get rid of the comic they liked when they were eight. For some people, and for some length of time, this worked out great. Jim Davis owes his very existence to nostalgia formed in childhood transforming into marketing opportunities instead of dissipating.
But for many people, that market was awful. The comics they wrote were too niche-audience, or too adult, or were mature and sophisticated while not being boring, or characters had things like opinions or politics. These comics creators went online, and if you check back at the early news posts of webcomics starting from 1997 to 2003, there is a lot of hope expressed that the comic could jump from the internet to print. Scott Kurtz of iconic PvP famously campaigned for entrance into the privileged halls of print comics. For his trouble, in 2004 he was mocked by one of the lesser mainstays of print comicdom for being "internet famous" and thus irrelevant to the real world. There's foreshadowing here.
Then, in 2007, webcomic Diesel Sweeties actually made the jump. The creator opted to create a separate print version, so as to keep his main comic and main revenue stream separate from the confines of print. Read that sentence again. This guy, who's job primarily (though certainly not exclusively) consists of making a comic and putting it online, was making more from that than he was going to make from the previous holy-grail of webcartoonists: syndication. And in late 2008, he canceled his print comic. Too much work, his primary income was suffering, he was actually losing money, and it just wasn't worth it to him. That club which Scotty had been kept out of four years prior? Totally not cool anymore.
In the space of their existence online, some webcomics (not all, and certainly not most), managed to flourish and create independent revenue streams. They could appeal to niche audiences, they could address more mature issues, they could afford to be actually interesting, and they were free to do this all without any restrictions placed upon them by a syndicate. And for those who succeeded, they created a successful business model in an environment whose challenges syndicate cartoonists are just now facing.
Jeph Jacques of the fantastic Questionable Content has a great takedown of a newspaper comic writer looking tentatively at the internet, and being afraid to take the plunge. It's fitting that the post being responded to is titled "The End of Alternative Comics" - being alternative comics is what drove webcomics into an awkward sort-of genre. Really, it's the end of comics sold as part of newsprint, and that's a death worth mourning. It overlooks, however, the whole world of comics that exists outside of print. And that world is huge, dynamic, and populated.
Which is really just to say: Print Media may be dying, but comics are going strong. It's not much, but it certainly is something.
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