Aaron and I have different philosophies when it comes to maintaining our respective Facebook friend lists. He keeps his trim, between 100 and 200 people; he cleans up his list every few months or so, eliminating people he doesn't interact with frequently. He also seems to be in a relatively constant state of annoyance with the whole idea of Facebook and grumbles about its very existence.
I am more of a friend hoarder: if I've had more than passing contact with you, or we were at one time friends, you're probably on my friends list. If we're related, you're there. If we went to school together, had a class together, or worked together (or if you worked with Aaron), you're there. If you're friends with one or both of my parents and have managed to figure out the Facebook, you're probably on my list. This isn't to say I have a lot of friends, or that I'm outgoing. I just don't see much harm in adding people that, for one reason or another, were part of my life at one time.
Some of my Facebook friends are people I met ONCE, at a party or through mutual friends. Others are people that I happened to sit next to in a lecture hall (Hi, Lindsay!) or met in a theory course, and I have grown to know them better in the intervening years, through Facebook, than I did while we were in the class together. And I think that's kind of awesome.
But having more Facebook friends means that there's more of Facebook to consume: more stories in your feed, more pithy quotes, more images, more links to interesting (or frightening) websites, etc. In an election year, that has the potential to ruin your entire image of a person. I find myself asking Oh my, how did I not know this about you? or Really? That's how you feel? Because I remember you being far less hateful when we were friends in sixth grade.
I've often heard that if you want to ruin a dinner party (or a friendship), bring up politics or religion. I always thought that admonition required a certain level of mistrust for the maturity level of the conversing parties, because COME ON, WE'RE ALL ADULTS HERE. But an election-year Facebook newsfeed, overflowing with the ideas of the people I have chosen to associate with, makes me reconsider.
Recently, I unfriended someone after I couldn't stand his incessant, hateful, bigotry-laden political posts on Facebook. It wasn't that I couldn't handle seeing the views of someone I disagreed with--it was more that there was active disrespect, the hands on the hips stance of "This is how I feel, and I'm right, and you're stupid if you think otherwise." I grew tired of this person calling me (and unseen others like me) a moron for disagreeing, before I even had a chance to formulate a response. Did I believe I was a moron? No. But I also felt like he wasn't interested in a conversation with someone like me, so there was no point in remaining Facebook friends with him. He can keep having his screaming match with the world somewhere else--but not on my newsfeed.
I've become more mindful of my own political posts on Facebook. While I don't want to actively disrespect people who have chosen to include me among their "friends," I'm also quite passionate about a number of subjects and I'd really like to share my ideas and start a conversation. That's the key to it--I want a conversation. I can do without the one-sided, mean-spirited bullying, the name-calling, the moral and intellectual superiority complexes that come with voting a certain way or supporting a certain party or candidate. I want to talk about actual issues and ideas, not rehash talking points or shout at each other.
Facebook doesn't always foster that, though, because it feels safe and anonymous (even though your name is attached to it). The screen adds distance, but not necessarily perspective. People (and I'm talking about grown adults, many of whom have attended college or grad school and who know how to use their critical thinking skills) don't always think of the arguments they are making about themselves by posting, sharing, or commenting on something, because a series of mouse clicks or screen taps or keystrokes makes it so easy to megaphone your ideas, unbidden, into the world. Being able to click that you "Like" something is easy; being able to rationally explain why you like it takes work.
I'm not saying I want people to censor themselves, because it would be selfish and unrealistic for me to even suggest something like that. I'm not saying I want it to stop. I also acknowledge that by logging into Facebook, I bring it upon myself. That's okay.
I also figure that most of my friends (Facebook and otherwise) already have a pretty good idea of my political leanings, either from conversations we've had or articles I've shared or comments I've made. I guess I just don't always trust myself to be above the self-righteous sniping I see on every comments section of every article I read online. So, I hesitate before sharing. I don't share 90% of the things I'd like to, and part of me feels like I'm cheating myself out of a real conversation.
The ease of using Facebook (and Twitter, which I am not part of and probably won't join unless forced) as a personal soapbox has made the world a little smaller, but also a little uglier. We all have political opinions, as well as deeply held personal values, that might seem ridiculous or offensive to other people. It's the seeming anonymity of social networking that turns what used to be an inner monologue or a face-to-face conversation into a deluge of publicly shared information.
That's what makes Facebook entertaining and addictive, but also dangerous: we are able to carve out an online self, represented through words and images, with quite a bit of power over selecting these details. It can be done with care, but I can also be come an exercise in self-congratulatory aggrandizement. Our ideas are out there, instantly, and people we know (or don't know) can interact with them. This might lead to some feelings of self-importance: My ideas are out there. My ideas matter. My opinion matters. All the time. (And yes, I realize the irony of saying this via the personal blog I have maintained since January, writing about the things that matter to me, and which I post links for on Facebook. I'm holding a mirror up to myself with this one.)
What's my point? Keep posting, keep sharing, put your ideas out there--but also be willing to talk to each other, with respect and civility. Be open to the ideas of others. Know that your way isn't the only way, it's not necessarily the right way, and even if it is, things might not turn out that way.
Monday, September 17, 2012
Saturday, September 15, 2012
Book Report 2
I know I haven't written in a long time. And that I haven't even finished my posts about India. And that I've written almost nothing about what we've done this summer. And that I haven't said how my new job is going. Those posts are coming. Eventually. But for now, I think I can manage a post about the books I've read since April's book report post.
17. The Little Friend by Donna Tartt
I first encountered Donna Tartt's work when I picked up The Secret History at (surprise!) a library book sale back when we were living in Mt. Pleasant. Since The Secret History still reigns as one of my favorite books ever, I thought I would give The Little Friend a try. The book started with so much promise: it seemed to offer insight into one family's struggles to deal with the aftermath of a horrible tragedy (the death of a child); plus, it was set in rural Mississippi in the late 1960's/early 1970's, so there was a lot of compelling cultural context available.
I felt I really got to know the main character, Harriet, and her best friend Hely; I felt like I saw what their summer was like in Mississippi. I appreciated how the plot reflected the mindset and thought processes of a moody adolescent girl desperately trying to understand the horrible thing that happened to her family. Tartt's writing was just as imaginative and captivating as I remembered it on a sentence-by-sentence level; at the same time, though, the book was bulky with detail and description that didn't do much to move the plot along.
There were some suspenseful moments that nearly shivered me out of my skin, but mostly because there were so many snakes in the book. Crates of them. Nests of them. Slithery, bitey, poisonous snakes. I had a few nightmares about snakes and drowning from this one. A book like this might be better as an audiobook on a long drive--provided you aren't driving through Mississippi.
18. Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn
Paul Schramm recommended this one to me, and I am so glad I took his suggestion. It's a clever, quick read that demonstrates the importance of having the means and freedom to communicate. The fictional government of the book outlaws the use of specific letters as they fall off the plinth of a statue, taking their falling as a divine proclamation that the letters should no longer be used. The tale is told in letters and messages between several characters, the content of which become increasingly restricted as more letters fall. It's an allegory for the kind of oppression that seems innocuous or just inconvenient at first but soon escalates beyond reason (think Patriot Act or religious dogma). I enjoyed it immensely, thanks to my resentment at government meddling as well as my love of language.
19.-21. The His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman
(The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass)
I read The Golden Compass soon after the movie was released, so my initial interpretation of the series was skewed by that. I was anticipating an adventure with realistic but supernatural characters, and I thought it would skew slightly younger in the young adult range. The books, however, are deeper and darker than the movie version suggested, which I really appreciated.
I was in middle/high school when this series was released, and I honestly don't know if I could have handled reading them at that time because of my seriously conflicted feelings towards religion. The books enact the kind of serious critique of religious dogma my teenage mind was desperately trying to articulate and sort out. Add some talking animals, witches, inter-dimensional travel, and theoretical physics, and you get a not necessarily fun but definitely compelling series.
22. The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
Yeah, sometimes I need to read predictable and formulaic pulp. I will not apologize for it. I just wish professor Robert Langdon (the Tom Hanks character) didn't like to hear himself talk so much, because seriously: dude likes to lecture. He needs to be part of Pedants Anonymous--except that will never exist, because pedants like you to acknowledge their credentials so much.
There's some suspense. There's a creepy villain. There's dismemberment. There's a secret society. There's a pretty girl with her life in danger. Ho hum. It was good bedtime reading because it doesn't take much brain power.
23. Bitter is the New Black by Jen Lancaster
This is an instance where a book's subtitle really sums up what it's about: Confessions of a Condescending, Egomaniacal, Self-Centered Smartass,Or, Why You Should Never Carry A Prada Bag to the Unemployment Office. It's a memoir. And even though this woman is supremely bitchy and unlikable, and I found myself reacting out loud every few pages to express disgust with something she had said or done, I still enjoyed it because it was that funny. Some of the humor comes from schadenfreude, it's true, but that's totally excusable in this case. I get so annoyed with ostentatious displays of wealth and people who seriously believe that their money makes them better than everyone else, so it was nice to see one of these women suffer. Although...she got a book published, so I expect things are looking up for her again.
24. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
In the library of my brain, there is a section of required reading for English majors. These shelves are crammed with so-called classics that every self-respecting book nerd or literature lover is supposed to not only have read, but read outside of a classroom setting for pleasure. When I go to this section of my brain, I see disappointment: the English-major staples that I haven't read (Tolstoy and Steinbeck and Joyce), started reading and couldn't finish (Austen), or read all the way through and hated (I've given The Great Gatsby at least five chances and I still hate it).
But To Kill a Mockingbird is on the "You should read this book more often" shelf, because it really is that good. It's rare to find a book that examines race, class, regional culture, family dynamics, and childhood so deftly, and without coming off as sanctimonious or pandering. But it does.
25. and 26. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Because sometimes, you need to re-read the Harry Potter books for the millionth time. Usually, I re-read the entire series from start to finish, and I've done that since before the fourth book was released. This means, however, that I've read the first three or four books quite a few times, and the last three only a handful. I watched the last three movies, then read the last two books again, and it actually changed how I felt about the screen version of the series--I felt less cheated by the movies than I had previously done, because I realized that there was no way they could equal what I had built up in my mind from reading the books. Basically, I finally let myself view them as a separate beast altogether.
27. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
The last time I read these books, I was in eighth or ninth grade. My memory had softened the weirdness of the books somewhat, so that in reading them again I was able to be shocked or startled by the behavior of the characters, the way they spoke to each other, and the violence of some of the plot.
28. World War Z byMax Brooks
Really, really good. It didn't focus too much on the zombies, but rather on how the world dealt with the outbreak and aftermath, which I found fascinating.The greatest success of this book was the way the author made it all seem so plausible. From the beginning, you're forced to accept the premise, and through the first-hand accounts, you see it as a global event that happened.
29. Forrest Gump by Winston Groom
One of the rare instances in which I will say the movie is much, much better than the book. Some of the basic plot elements and a few snippets of dialogue are preserved from page to screen, and for good reason: that's all that was worth taking. The Forrest of the book is an aggressive simpleton rather than a guileless one. There's no charm to the book--it's a series of wild stunts rather than an engaging plot. I think what bothered me most was how racist Forrest was, and that the author's point in doing so was totally obvious: it's somewhat okay for Forrest to hold those views because he's an idiot, but what's your excuse?
30. Pigtopia by Kitty Fitzgerald
I bought this from the Carbondale library book sale, mostly because the cover features an illustration of a young girl holding a pig. At first, I was afraid I couldn't get into the book because the narration seemed to be in a broken dialect that took great effort to decode, since I was reading before bed and my brain was already tired. Once I got through the first few chapters, I realized that the narration alternated between two characters: the subliterate pigman Jack Plum, and Holly Lock, the normal but awkward teenage girl he befriends. With some patience, I grew to love reading the Jack Plum chapters because they were almost poetic in the inventiveness of the language. I was conscious of the effort it took Fitzgerald to render Jack's voice, and she did so with unmistakeable style. Had the entire book taken place from Jack's perspective, it would have been a chore to read; Holly's chapters provided breaks but also served as a contrast to the way Jack's mind worked.
31. Stardust, 7-Eleven, Route 57, A&W, and So Forth by Patricia Lear
This was another Carbondale library book sale purchase, and I am sad to say that the title was the best part of this short story collection. The stories were absolutely boring, and not in a way that seemed intentional or for greater effect--it was just that nothing happened in them. I only finished out of stubbornness, so I could tell myself I had read it, given it a fair chance, and was disappointed not because I expected anything great but because I expected anything at all.
I'm glad I only paid 25 cents for the book. Perhaps there was one moment in one story that was worth the price.
32. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
I'm counting this as having been read, even though I listened to it as an audiobook on my Evansville commute. It's a strange book to listen to, driving alone through thick fog between Harrisburg and Eldorado and the long (and sparsely populated) stretch between route 45 and Mt. Vernon, Indiana. The book is so unapologetic, bleak, and lonely. I've long enjoyed post-apocalyptic stories because one of my frequent daydreams involves having the entire world to myself for a few days, a week, a month. What would it be like to be truly alone? Would your mind create noise to fill the absence of all that outer noise that comes from other people?
It was heartbreaking to imagine a young child having a constant awareness of his own mortality, and to imagine a father who's forced to fight for a life that holds little promise. The man and the boy remain nameless throughout the book, which hammered home the truth: that identity is so largely dependent upon belonging to a group and having a relationship with the human world. When that's gone, the self becomes an almost ridiculous idea.
The Road made me rethink my definitions of tragedy and horror. When large numbers of people are killed by disease or disaster, we think of it as a horrific event. We can count the dead and mourn them. It would seem that a global disease pandemic or large-scale environmental catastrophe or nuclear disaster would be the ultimate tragedy, but The Road proves otherwise: that the real horror could be surviving the event, left to figure out a reason for living when civilization is just a memory. The book was definitely worth the horrible nightmares I had.
33. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Before I started reading this, I knew the basics: a 14-year-old girl is murdered; one of her suburban neighbors is a suspect; it takes place in the 1970s. All this I learned from seeing the trailer for the movie adaptation of the book a few years ago. What I missed, however, was the central idea that the the victim, Susie Salmon, is telling her story from her version of "heaven." I was instantly skeptical about how much I would enjoy reading it, based on the plot and the premise, because this could have gone horribly wrong. Instead, I found myself mostly buying into it. Sure, there are some cringe-inducing moments (particularly in how Susie's presence is made known among the living at times). I'd say I was engaged with the narrative 80% of the time, for the first 80% of the book. The last bit, however, went everywhere I hoped it wouldn't and became a bit too sentimental.
I am curious about how the movie version handles some aspects of the book, though, because it seems so internal, which doesn't always translate without a voice-over (and that often seems like a cop-out).
17. The Little Friend by Donna Tartt
I first encountered Donna Tartt's work when I picked up The Secret History at (surprise!) a library book sale back when we were living in Mt. Pleasant. Since The Secret History still reigns as one of my favorite books ever, I thought I would give The Little Friend a try. The book started with so much promise: it seemed to offer insight into one family's struggles to deal with the aftermath of a horrible tragedy (the death of a child); plus, it was set in rural Mississippi in the late 1960's/early 1970's, so there was a lot of compelling cultural context available.
I felt I really got to know the main character, Harriet, and her best friend Hely; I felt like I saw what their summer was like in Mississippi. I appreciated how the plot reflected the mindset and thought processes of a moody adolescent girl desperately trying to understand the horrible thing that happened to her family. Tartt's writing was just as imaginative and captivating as I remembered it on a sentence-by-sentence level; at the same time, though, the book was bulky with detail and description that didn't do much to move the plot along.
There were some suspenseful moments that nearly shivered me out of my skin, but mostly because there were so many snakes in the book. Crates of them. Nests of them. Slithery, bitey, poisonous snakes. I had a few nightmares about snakes and drowning from this one. A book like this might be better as an audiobook on a long drive--provided you aren't driving through Mississippi.
18. Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn
Paul Schramm recommended this one to me, and I am so glad I took his suggestion. It's a clever, quick read that demonstrates the importance of having the means and freedom to communicate. The fictional government of the book outlaws the use of specific letters as they fall off the plinth of a statue, taking their falling as a divine proclamation that the letters should no longer be used. The tale is told in letters and messages between several characters, the content of which become increasingly restricted as more letters fall. It's an allegory for the kind of oppression that seems innocuous or just inconvenient at first but soon escalates beyond reason (think Patriot Act or religious dogma). I enjoyed it immensely, thanks to my resentment at government meddling as well as my love of language.
19.-21. The His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman
(The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass)
I read The Golden Compass soon after the movie was released, so my initial interpretation of the series was skewed by that. I was anticipating an adventure with realistic but supernatural characters, and I thought it would skew slightly younger in the young adult range. The books, however, are deeper and darker than the movie version suggested, which I really appreciated.
I was in middle/high school when this series was released, and I honestly don't know if I could have handled reading them at that time because of my seriously conflicted feelings towards religion. The books enact the kind of serious critique of religious dogma my teenage mind was desperately trying to articulate and sort out. Add some talking animals, witches, inter-dimensional travel, and theoretical physics, and you get a not necessarily fun but definitely compelling series.
22. The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
Yeah, sometimes I need to read predictable and formulaic pulp. I will not apologize for it. I just wish professor Robert Langdon (the Tom Hanks character) didn't like to hear himself talk so much, because seriously: dude likes to lecture. He needs to be part of Pedants Anonymous--except that will never exist, because pedants like you to acknowledge their credentials so much.
There's some suspense. There's a creepy villain. There's dismemberment. There's a secret society. There's a pretty girl with her life in danger. Ho hum. It was good bedtime reading because it doesn't take much brain power.
23. Bitter is the New Black by Jen Lancaster
This is an instance where a book's subtitle really sums up what it's about: Confessions of a Condescending, Egomaniacal, Self-Centered Smartass,Or, Why You Should Never Carry A Prada Bag to the Unemployment Office. It's a memoir. And even though this woman is supremely bitchy and unlikable, and I found myself reacting out loud every few pages to express disgust with something she had said or done, I still enjoyed it because it was that funny. Some of the humor comes from schadenfreude, it's true, but that's totally excusable in this case. I get so annoyed with ostentatious displays of wealth and people who seriously believe that their money makes them better than everyone else, so it was nice to see one of these women suffer. Although...she got a book published, so I expect things are looking up for her again.
24. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
In the library of my brain, there is a section of required reading for English majors. These shelves are crammed with so-called classics that every self-respecting book nerd or literature lover is supposed to not only have read, but read outside of a classroom setting for pleasure. When I go to this section of my brain, I see disappointment: the English-major staples that I haven't read (Tolstoy and Steinbeck and Joyce), started reading and couldn't finish (Austen), or read all the way through and hated (I've given The Great Gatsby at least five chances and I still hate it).
But To Kill a Mockingbird is on the "You should read this book more often" shelf, because it really is that good. It's rare to find a book that examines race, class, regional culture, family dynamics, and childhood so deftly, and without coming off as sanctimonious or pandering. But it does.
25. and 26. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Because sometimes, you need to re-read the Harry Potter books for the millionth time. Usually, I re-read the entire series from start to finish, and I've done that since before the fourth book was released. This means, however, that I've read the first three or four books quite a few times, and the last three only a handful. I watched the last three movies, then read the last two books again, and it actually changed how I felt about the screen version of the series--I felt less cheated by the movies than I had previously done, because I realized that there was no way they could equal what I had built up in my mind from reading the books. Basically, I finally let myself view them as a separate beast altogether.
27. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
The last time I read these books, I was in eighth or ninth grade. My memory had softened the weirdness of the books somewhat, so that in reading them again I was able to be shocked or startled by the behavior of the characters, the way they spoke to each other, and the violence of some of the plot.
28. World War Z byMax Brooks
Really, really good. It didn't focus too much on the zombies, but rather on how the world dealt with the outbreak and aftermath, which I found fascinating.The greatest success of this book was the way the author made it all seem so plausible. From the beginning, you're forced to accept the premise, and through the first-hand accounts, you see it as a global event that happened.
29. Forrest Gump by Winston Groom
One of the rare instances in which I will say the movie is much, much better than the book. Some of the basic plot elements and a few snippets of dialogue are preserved from page to screen, and for good reason: that's all that was worth taking. The Forrest of the book is an aggressive simpleton rather than a guileless one. There's no charm to the book--it's a series of wild stunts rather than an engaging plot. I think what bothered me most was how racist Forrest was, and that the author's point in doing so was totally obvious: it's somewhat okay for Forrest to hold those views because he's an idiot, but what's your excuse?
30. Pigtopia by Kitty Fitzgerald
I bought this from the Carbondale library book sale, mostly because the cover features an illustration of a young girl holding a pig. At first, I was afraid I couldn't get into the book because the narration seemed to be in a broken dialect that took great effort to decode, since I was reading before bed and my brain was already tired. Once I got through the first few chapters, I realized that the narration alternated between two characters: the subliterate pigman Jack Plum, and Holly Lock, the normal but awkward teenage girl he befriends. With some patience, I grew to love reading the Jack Plum chapters because they were almost poetic in the inventiveness of the language. I was conscious of the effort it took Fitzgerald to render Jack's voice, and she did so with unmistakeable style. Had the entire book taken place from Jack's perspective, it would have been a chore to read; Holly's chapters provided breaks but also served as a contrast to the way Jack's mind worked.
31. Stardust, 7-Eleven, Route 57, A&W, and So Forth by Patricia Lear
This was another Carbondale library book sale purchase, and I am sad to say that the title was the best part of this short story collection. The stories were absolutely boring, and not in a way that seemed intentional or for greater effect--it was just that nothing happened in them. I only finished out of stubbornness, so I could tell myself I had read it, given it a fair chance, and was disappointed not because I expected anything great but because I expected anything at all.
I'm glad I only paid 25 cents for the book. Perhaps there was one moment in one story that was worth the price.
32. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
I'm counting this as having been read, even though I listened to it as an audiobook on my Evansville commute. It's a strange book to listen to, driving alone through thick fog between Harrisburg and Eldorado and the long (and sparsely populated) stretch between route 45 and Mt. Vernon, Indiana. The book is so unapologetic, bleak, and lonely. I've long enjoyed post-apocalyptic stories because one of my frequent daydreams involves having the entire world to myself for a few days, a week, a month. What would it be like to be truly alone? Would your mind create noise to fill the absence of all that outer noise that comes from other people?
It was heartbreaking to imagine a young child having a constant awareness of his own mortality, and to imagine a father who's forced to fight for a life that holds little promise. The man and the boy remain nameless throughout the book, which hammered home the truth: that identity is so largely dependent upon belonging to a group and having a relationship with the human world. When that's gone, the self becomes an almost ridiculous idea.
The Road made me rethink my definitions of tragedy and horror. When large numbers of people are killed by disease or disaster, we think of it as a horrific event. We can count the dead and mourn them. It would seem that a global disease pandemic or large-scale environmental catastrophe or nuclear disaster would be the ultimate tragedy, but The Road proves otherwise: that the real horror could be surviving the event, left to figure out a reason for living when civilization is just a memory. The book was definitely worth the horrible nightmares I had.
33. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Before I started reading this, I knew the basics: a 14-year-old girl is murdered; one of her suburban neighbors is a suspect; it takes place in the 1970s. All this I learned from seeing the trailer for the movie adaptation of the book a few years ago. What I missed, however, was the central idea that the the victim, Susie Salmon, is telling her story from her version of "heaven." I was instantly skeptical about how much I would enjoy reading it, based on the plot and the premise, because this could have gone horribly wrong. Instead, I found myself mostly buying into it. Sure, there are some cringe-inducing moments (particularly in how Susie's presence is made known among the living at times). I'd say I was engaged with the narrative 80% of the time, for the first 80% of the book. The last bit, however, went everywhere I hoped it wouldn't and became a bit too sentimental.
I am curious about how the movie version handles some aspects of the book, though, because it seems so internal, which doesn't always translate without a voice-over (and that often seems like a cop-out).
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