Righteous indignation you say?

I was trying to remember when I first became aware of this phrase and what it actually meant.  I guess I was in my mid-teens and maybe it was in one of five English classes I had in high school. Five you say! Yes, five it was. English was one of two classes I flunked in the 9^th grade. Algebra was the other and I legitimately failed it, unlike my English course. I really tried to understand algebra, but our moving all over the country had scrambled the rules of math for me.

For all the crazy stunts I pulled in my English class, I was totally cowed down in algebra and stayed confused no matter who tried to help me. I needed to start over. The funny thing is, I took it in the 10^th grade and passed it. Years later in a statistical process control seminar, I was the go to guy on most of the other fellow’s algebra. Even today I don’t understand how that was possible.

I failed English because I was the class clown, or rather the main CC. This stirred my teacher’s righteous indignation and she failed me by one point to prove her point. I decided the best course of action for me was to take a summer school English class. I’ve written about this before so I won’t repeat it, but that was a turning point in my attitude about school and made future classes so much fun.

I tell young students my story and explain that if you do your homework and actually listen in class, school is easy… and fun. In fact, if you read the next assignment, it is almost ridiculously easy. Anyway, I want to get back on point here.

Now the original meaning of the term righteous indignation, or maybe righteous anger most likely meant “it is one's right to feel that way; anger without guilt”. This emotion was based on a lifetime of social interaction, home and church teachings, an individual’s perception of law and order, or maybe some self-imposed rule.

Nowhere did it imply violence or breaking the law. What it did imply was someone did something wrong and based on our own perception of right, we feel anger. We don’t have to apologize for our feelings because we don’t act on them. Nowhere in this line of thought justifies doing something physical in retaliation.

Now in the last so many years and here recently in Washington DC and other cities we see looting and burning of cars and smashing windows of businesses as a perverted form of righteous indignation. It is clearly not that at all.  It is lawlessness and anger combined. It is a physical violation of righteousness and personal property to attempt to legitimatize someone’s idea of righting wrong doing.

The end does not justify the means and never has. Although many of the concerns of the women’s march in our Capital city were righteous in scope, the activities of some and the tons of signage that littered the ground clearly violated law and what is right. Women plastering windows with slogan filled maxi-pads are repulsive, trashy, and invasive to the shop owners they selected.

I support people demonstrating for a cause, but it has to be done according to the current laws and then they must clean up afterward. It was disgusting watching videos of the participants cursing bystanders and shooting the finger when asked to pick up their trash. It embarrassed and shamed me as an American. When one man questioned why they wouldn’t pick up their signs, it was met with open objection and ridicule by the protestors. This is shameful behavior and negates their righteous efforts.

Righteous indignation has taken on an almost criminal bent that needs to stop and be called what it really is: blatant unbridled anger. The end certainly does not justify the means, especially when it is violent, breaks the law, or is destructive of property. People have a right to orderly march when they have a legitimate issue, but doing it the wrong way has the opposite effect of their mission and social perception.

On top of everything else, throwing a hissy fit makes you look like spoiled brats who didn’t get your way. So you didn’t get what you wanted? Hey, grow up. Life is full of fences and barriers and you should do like all the righteous people do – go through the doors and gates. The term social means you have to get along. You have to stand in line and when it comes to voting for whom or what you want and you may just have to live with something you didn’t choose. Life goes on. Geeze. Get over it.

I didn’t vote for 16 years of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, but I didn’t burn the American flag or threaten to blow up the White House. I simply wrote my representatives and told them what I supported and didn’t and then at each election, I cast my vote. That is how I showed my righteous indignation.

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Mutants, Creeps, and Monsters!

 At first glance, you may think this Halloween day column is about the White House and the current administration, but it is not.  It’s not for one reason and one reason only – although there is a direct correlation, it wouldn’t be fun.  Accurate yes, fun no.

There’s nothing funny about what is coming out of Washington, not that I can tell.

Way back in 1965 when I was 13 wonderful years old, there were two genres of movies very active on the television set.  Spies and monsters.  Of course there were westerns and family shows, but these two lines of thought were emerging and possibly peaking all within a space of about 5 years.  I Spy, Get Smart, The Avengers, Mission Impossible, The Saint, Danger Man, T.H.E. Cat and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. were hugely successful and in the dark shadows of the heinous Commies, everyone wanted our spies to outsmart their spies.

Boy has that changed.

Thanks to Edward Snowden, the good ol’ USA is now an open tome for every spy agency on earth, especially those who want to destroy our country.  My friend who retired from the Air Force’s secret intel organization, with tenure in the NSA and CIA told me what Snowden did was akin to blatant treason, hurting and crippling our country irreparably.  I guess that would brand Snowden as an extreme Hollywood creep.  Maybe we could talk Jane Fonda into playing his alter ego Chelsea Manning in his life story?  Now that is funny!  I told you this week’s column would be humorous.

When I was 13, I would watch those many monster movies, shivering in my dark room, scared senseless and love/hate every second of it.  Frankenstein’s monster, the werewolf, Dracula, The creature from the black lagoon, and the Mummy to name a few.

One in particular took place in snow country where a woman scientist was taking injections of wasp venom to preserve her youth and as a 13 year old; I never saw it coming when she disappeared only to attack people looking for her, mutated as a human-size waspish insect.  Horrors!

Today’s equivalent of a real life monster  is when you have your taxes did and realize you owe $1100 or that mutant sprinkler head in your yard jumped your water bill to $452.79!  Aside from real criminals and deviants, life’s hardships are the real monsters we face.  Of course they are and like the wasp woman I experienced as a 13 year old, we never saw them coming.

Life’s hardships are the opposite of fun, funny, or anything involving a smile, unless it is Joe Biden’s glorious mug.  Old Joe can light up a dark room like a jack-o'-lantern!  His grin brings me Halloween hope in fact.

My siblings and I on Halloween night would venture out into the neighborhoods - unchaperoned mind you - carrying doubled brown paper grocery sacks, or a pillowcase and return within an hour to dump out our full sacks of ghoulish candy, only to rush out for a second go.  There were no cars on the streets because people knew kids would be dashing back and forth and back then, common sense ruled.  The real danger wasn’t pedophiles, it was cars and it still is today.

We wore homemade costumes using whatever we could come up with and it was the happiest of times.  We were monsters, mutants, creeps, pirates – or maybe a combination of all of them and ate every bit of candy we were given without parent intervention or second thought.  Sugar was cheap and many people handed out candy bars or whole handfuls of sweet deliciousness.

In today’s world of creepy ultra-phobias, it is a much wiser choice to take your kids to your local church or friends only houses for their safe Halloween fun, then run the risk of them being ran over by someone in their car worrying a pedophile is going to get their kids.  There are so many cars parked on neighborhood streets at night that they are reduced to one lane of traffic only and with kids darting back and forth, it’s a recipe for a disaster.

I would love to return to that one day in time I anxiously waited for, beat out only by Christmas, but that time has come and went.  Back then the mutants, creeps, and monsters were portrayed by Vincent Price and Bela Lugosi.  Now all I have to do is watch the news.  Happy Halloween folks and this year get out and walk with your kids.  It will do you both good.