Brainless politics

Here we are again, heading for an election that has some real importance in our future.  The candidates, such as they are, have clearly decided that voters will vote on the basis of which candidate can generate the most emotional environment.  In the debates and the speeches, it's clear that the goal is to emotionally activate voters, to get them excited and angry, to get them suspicious and thoughtless.

The whole operation reminds me of a basic trick in stage magic.  You get the audience to watch the wrong hand, while the unwatched hand pulls the trick off.  In politics the illusion engendered is not sleight-of-hand, it's emotional discombobulation.  Excited and angry voters don't think.  They react.  They are not weighing policies and considering outcomes, they are choosing a personal champion with whom they identify, and whom they trust to be bigger, meaner, louder and more aggressive than their opponent.

Where is the thoughtful consideration of policies?  Economic plans?  Foreign relations?  Immigration policies?  Social security assets?

Of course you know the answer.  There is none.  None at all.  The political parties have read you and the rest of us correctly.  We don't understand all these policy thingies, but we know who we like and who we hate.  Thoughtful voters are not really predictable nor are they easily controlled, if they can be controlled at all.  Emotional voters are a piece of cake, easily manipulated with colorful language and over-the-top speeches. Emotional voters can be whipped into a frenzy and have the illusion that their vote is based on good thinking and good values.

What a laugh.  We don't really care about those things.  We like to be excited, to take part in a real soap-opera battle based on bad language, racial and sexual slurs, incitement to violence and distrust of the only political process in the history of the world that has ever even briefly been successful.

Don't vote your heart.  Vote with your mind.  If you don't know the policies of a candidate, don't vote for them.  How hard is that?

Marriage and Deal-Breakers

      Marriage is a very complex concept.  We tend to think about it emotionally, which makes it difficult to conceptualize.  At least, however, it is a contract between two people which binds them as partners with mutual obligations and responsibilities.  We publicly state that this contract is "forever" and indissoluble, but we have certain unacknowledged conditions that allow the breaking of the contract.  These "deal-breakers" are almost never discussed because to discuss them would destroy the romantic fantasy of eternal love.
     We do sometimes consider what would happen if the contract is broken.  Pre-nuptial agreements are an example.  They spell out the division of goods and services between the former partners if the contract is terminated.  Although they are clearly useful, they are extremely unpopular with couples who are "in love", because they are inconsistent with the romantic fantasy that characterizes the beginnings of most marriages.
     We don't, as a rule, consider the conditions under which we consider the contract to be broken and terminated.  "Deal-breakers" are specific behaviors and conditions under which one partner is unwilling to continue the marital contract.  We like to pretend that nothing could make us unwilling to stay married, but this is clearly purely fantasy.  In fact, the majority of marriages end in divorce, so it is quite unrealistic to pretend this cannot happen.
     Therefore it is extremely important to consider exactly what "deal-breakers" are for each member of the contract.  When they are not considered they don't go away.  They are simply not discussed.  In the majority of divorces, the reasons for dissolving the marital contract are accumulated over a period of time.  They are, in fact, based on accumulating increasing negative feelings, which people typically describe as "being fed up".
     "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.  Being "fed up" requires a partner to accumulate instances of intolerable behavior, which is tolerated on the grounds that at some time in the future the other partner will change.  The amount of negative feelings carried by the first partner must accumulate until the breaking point, at which time there is typically an explosion of feelings used to stimulate the partners into breaking up, usually a very anxiety-provoking situation in itself.
     Often the partners are not clear about what they are beginning to consider "intolerable".  Frequently the transgressing partner is not aware of exactly what their partner is finding unacceptable. Often the first partner is not clearly aware of what it is they will not be able to live with.  The ambiguity and uncertainty continue until some event "the last straw" and has crossed the line.
     It is easier to cross the line when you don't know exactly where the the line is.  Neither partner may be clear as to how close they are to marital disaster until the line is crossed.  To spell out where the boundary is, is to commit yourself to an action you cannot easily imagine in advance.  Yet without knowing the boundary it is far easier to cross, and once crossed it may be irrevocable.
     "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.  Whether boundaries are easily imaginable or emotionally uncomfortable is not a good reason to ignore them.  When you are contracting for a life-long partnership, it is extremely important that you know the conditions under which your partner will no longer be willing to remain in the partnership.  To do that, each partner has to carefully consider exactly what their personal boundaries are and to what degree, if any, they are willing to act on their crossing.
     "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.  For example, a deal-breaker for Partner A might be sexual infidelity by B.  If A is willing to be clear that such behavior is unacceptable, then A is committed to divorce if B is unfaithful.  If A is not willing to be committed to divorce under such conditions, sexual fidelity is not a boundary for A.  When a boundary is set, the person setting the boundary must be willing to take action or else it is not in fact a "deal-breaker".
     Deal-breakers do not have to be mutual or "equal".  What is a deal-breaker for A may not be so for B.  What is important is that when A sets a boundary, B knows exactly what the consequences will be.  There is no boundary-testing behavior that will be acceptable.  Of course, no one in the throes of romantic love wants to commit themselves to ending their romantic relationship under specific conditions.  However, without such specification, boundary testing will more often lead to divorce.  "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.
     It's unlikely that at any given moment a person can specify in advance all the possible deal-breakers.  Conditions can arise in the future that could not be anticipated; life-changing events can occur that lead to unimaginable conditions.  People can change in unexpected ways.  A partner can become a drug-abuser or a physical or emotional bully.  However, such possibilities can be considered even if they seem absurd in the present.  They need to be considered whenever they arise.  "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.
     It would be a very difficult conversation to have, considering the deal-breakers and their consequences.  Each partner has to know something about their own boundaries and limits of their tolerance, no matter how deep their feelings for the other.  That takes more self-knowledge than most young people have, which is why it is so difficult for early marriages to endure.  Difficult or not, the attempt is an important one.  Deal-breakers should not only be discussed before marriage, they should be discussed as soon as one partner becomes aware they are an issue, and should be discussed before they are irrevocably crossed.

A note on specific deal-breakers and issues related to them will follow.

A letter to young composers

As you engage yourselves in the laborious process of learning the mechanics and structure of music, it is important that you ask yourself the following questions:  For whom are you composing?  To what end?

It's easy to get caught up in whatever the current style of music is being prompted by your teachers and your classmates.  It's easy to begin writing music that will impress your peers and be approved by your teachers.  A certain competitive element can creep in to your composition, emphasizing your desire to be known as "an original" composer.  Your audience becomes very local, and as is the case with all music written for a local and limited audience, parochial. Music in such a setting becomes more of an intellectual exercise than a creative one.  Music can become based on non-musical ideas, and as such is more self-congratulatory than satisfying. It may have been an exercise in originality but that is not enough to make it worthwhile or memorable  music.

The second question follows from your honest answer to the first:  What do you want to express in your composition?  Clearly any event and any emotion can form the basis for a piece of music. Richard Strauss is quoted as stating he could set a laundry list to muic.  But he didn't. Are all emotions worthy of expression?  Why do you think people listen to "serious" music?  Do they want to hear the chaos and wickedness and violence of our world brought into the concert hall or the living room?

Or is music ideally a reminder of a more beautiful and perfect world?  Some of the best music, modern as well as 100 years old, is based on the following elements:  melody, harmony, couterpoint, rhythm and to some degree repetition.  We like to hold it in our heads and hearts as we travel through an imperfect and frightening world.  It gives us a sense of order and beauty, words which many young composers don't seem to understand.  To be beautiful, music does not have to be happy.  It can express sorrow, grief, rage and a host of less pleasant emotions.  But for those emotions to move us as an audience, they must have the basic elements.  There must be a structure we can feel, not just understand intellectually.

Probably in modern times film and television musical scores are closer to the musical ideal.  While they can be chaotic and without apparent structure, the visual images accompanying them provide a background against which they can be at least understood.  Some of this music stays with us, and deservedly so.  Some that is more purely expressive of the visual  events (the "laundry list") disappears forever when the images are turned off.  They served a purpose, of course, but not a musical one.

If I can't hear it in my head and heart it disappears into the chaos of everyday existence.  It might as well never have been.