How I Almost Talked to the Top of La Tour Eiffel: FavD in PARIS

They got to Paris from Rome via night train (15 hours in a couchette compartment, incommunicado of course) and then, instead of updating their blog to let us know they were safe and sound, they had an audacious plan to call home from the top of the Eiffel Tower and surprise us. So they stood in line for hours, eagerly anticipating our delight, until just as they got to the front on the queue about to buy their tickets to ascend . . . it rained. Sorry folks, not today.

So they called just now from their hostel instead. And it was just as sweet for me.

What La Tour Eiffel Looks lIke When It's NOT Raining

(Especially since I’ve been sitting here in suspense for hours, refreshing the site every few minutes . . .I’m really not neurotic but this is HARD!)

So now I’m amusing and distracting myself, starting with:

A French mathematics professor predicted that when the structure passed the 748-foot mark, it would inevitabl[y] collapse; another “expert” predicted that the tower’s lightning rods would kill all the fish in the Seine.

The Paris edition of the New York Herald claimed the tower was changing the weather;

More on C Street: Is It a “Shadowy Multi-National Government?”

The plot thickens?

“The bottom line here is that [Dem rep. from Michigan Bart] Stupak is either being dishonest or confessing dangerous ignorance,” [Jeff] Sharlet said.

. . .Sharlet’s book describes The Family as a kind of shadow multi-national government, operating in secret through small prayer groups called “cells” and modeled after the organization of mafia and terrorist groups. Doug Coe, the leader of the group, frequently refers to the leadership lessons of Hitler and the example of the mafia as a model for how the group operates.

How far-reaching is The Family’s influence? David Kuo, a high-ranking official in the Bush administration who oversaw the White House’s office of faith-based initiatives, wrote in a recent book: “The Fellowship’s reach into governments around the world is almost impossible to overstate or even grasp.”

See also:
Um, Holy Mackerel?

Rick Warren v. the IRS: Guess Who’s More Powerful?

It’s time to take political faith seriously. And if doing so strikes you as invasive, unseemly, and irrelevant to the job the candidates are seeking -– well, then, it’s really time to take faith seriously, including its uses and abuses in a democracy where piety and cynicism have long been comfortable companions.

Thinking About This New Bonfire of the Vanities Case

UPDATE
Overheard on cable news just now: “This could be a teachable moment, with a Gates/Crowley dialogue” — Jesse Jackson

************

Consider this an open thread around class and race, law and order, freedom and community and government in America, as electrified by professor Henry Louis “Skip” Gates being handcuffed in his own home for arguing with an armed government employee who came to his door and challenged him as a citizen to present his papers, prove his innocence of wrong-doing.

Is the citizen (or the police officer) the victim, or the offender? Are both both, or perhaps both are neither?

Is it really about race and class problems, or is this case primarily a clash between private individual rights and public government power? My own experience, in which everyone was white and everyone was wearing orange and blue, and both the police officer and myself were female, informs how I see this case — as not about race or class or color and minorities, not even testosterone, but rather the same way I’ve seen schoolfolk self-justifying their institutional job (to the point sometimes, of dismissing the reality that actual individuals are hurt rather than helped.)

All in all, it was a transformative moment for me, the quintessential teacher’s pet and media spokesperson, grievance hearing officer and pourer of oil on troubled waters. . .
Personal rage and alienation caused by social injustice was a new feeling for me, and it came literally out of the blue. I was just enjoying the day and my life, with my family and friends in a place I’d felt completely comfortable, safe and loved for my whole life, when WHAM!

And what if it were instead a CPS worker backed up by an armed sheriff’s deputy, in the south, say, at your door investigating a similarly misinformed neighbor’s complaint, coming to challenge you as a homeschooling parent in your own home, such an obviously unfounded complaint that you get outraged and say so loudly, hoping the neighbor will hear you and feel ashamed?

Now do you feel the same sympathies and concerns in the Gates case as you did before, or does your stomach suddenly flip-flop along with a 180-degree change of heart?

And please note, unlike my anonymous encounter with the police on game day, or any ordinary homeschool parent’s with the CPS, these principal characters were both well-known, mature, professional role models colliding in one of America’s most historic, educated and enlightened communities. White versus black, town versus gown, hate mail and a hot summer, a media feeding frenzy — here is Bill Cosby’s take — and one of them even knows the President of the United States personally! (Have you read Bonfire of the Vanities?)

The suspect was a black expert on racial profiling, while the white police officer who arrested him was a racial profiling trainer — if they can’t treat each other in an educated and enlightened manner, who can or will??

Some of the positions being publicly taken are

Family French, School Latin, Soap-Opera Spanish Serve Our Girls Well in ITALY

“Last Day in Rome”
Posted by Favorite Daughter (penguindust)

Yesterday’s Report: Went to the Colosseum today, seemed like a good idea, since it’s close to our hostel and is the COLOSSEUM.

We encountered a rather hapless man named Glenn, whose dearest wish in the whole wide world seemed to be that we patronize his free walking tour. Feeling a little sorry for Glenn, who had a British or possibly Australian accent, we joined the six others he’d recruited (three Aussies, one Asian, one German). Glenn first paraded us around the Colosseum, telling us useful things we hadn’t heard before (apparently it was used as a brothel for awhile after the fall of the Roman Empire).

Then we all hopped on a bus (literally hopped) and went to see the oldest temple in Rome, the famous Mouth of Truth (Roman Holiday!), a church of St.Nicolas, the bones of St. Valentine, and some ruins of temples over which the church of St. Nicolas had been built. Then Glenn recommended that we buy cakes in the Jewish district, and oddly enough, took us to a hospital to eat them.

But it was a nice hospital! There was a turtle pond and everything.

After another questionably free bus ride, Glenn delivered us safely to the Colosseum again, where he totally hooked us up with

Americans Like Science — and Scientists

Well, thank goodness! (or should we thank god for making it so?)

Cock of the snook to the Global Ethics Center for this summary of the new Pew poll.

Read even more about it here.

[S]cience and scientists are viewed positively by those who differ over evolution, global warming and other contentious issues.

On the question of evolution, for instance, 78% of those who say that humans and other living things have evolved over time because of natural selection and other natural processes say that scientists contribute a lot to the well-being of society. Those who say humans and other living things have existed in their present form since the beginning of time express a less positive view of scientists; nonetheless, 63% of them say scientists have contributed a great deal to society.

Pew poll graphic July 2009

Favorite Daughter Phones Home From ROME, Overlooking the Coliseum

I got a very excited phone call from the fifth floor balcony of a hostel overlooking Rome’s Coliseum! Then I saw this update on their blog . . .

“When in Rome…”
Posted by kiki under Italy

When in Rome…walk until you want to throw up and see everything!! Which is exactly what we did today and we loved….almost every minute of it.

We arrived by couchette this morning after a…let’s say, interesting night of travel. We dropped our bags at our awesome hostel and, armed with only a map of Rome and off the cuff Italian, set off to find the Vatican. After walking for what seemed like forever, we arrived on the Piazza del St Pietro (St. Peter’s Square). We popped into a self service bistro and had life changing tortellini and with full stomachs set off to see the Vatican.

We descended first into the bowels of St Peter’s Basilica to see the tombs of the old popes and took great pleasure in bumping into people disregarding the clearly posted NO PHOTOGRAPHS sign equipped with the standard drawing of a camera with an X through it. Then we were truly awestruck when we ascended and our eyes were greeted by nothing less than ST PETER’S BASILICA in all its glory. The sheer size of it took us aback since we’ve come to know basilicas as basically small, ornate churches.

(using my hard-earned “American Italian,” I made the sign of a camera and asked a guard, “Si?” “Si,”he agreed. – Mer)

We wandered around the basilica for a while and then bumped into MICHELANGELO’S PIETA! We resisted our urge to bust through the glass and accost the marble masterpiece. Then we decided

Is “UnCultured” Desirable or Even Possible, for Our Girls?

What’s the opposite of uncultured, I’m wondering today.
Cultured? Which antonym means natural, pure, authentic — cultured, or uncultured? So is cultured a good thing or not? Do we (collectively, as a culture) have consensus either way, have we thought to ask? Is it even a meaningful question, or is it nonsense?

Based on Wired Magazine power of story, Dana asks today just what we are teaching our girls. I saw this at the same time, which suggests that as Dana herself says, it’s not the current state of technology so much as timeless human psychology (mostly of their parents!) that shapes the culture kids will then see reflected back to them, in the most successful public messages.

Maybe youth culture is like driver’s ed as a subset of the general culture, as tweens and teens learn to operate their own psychology according to current road conditions, and affect those conditions for us all at the same time.

Favorite Daughter unschooled, unchurched, and therefore uncliqued, nevertheless identified with the Disney princesses as she danced almost daily through her tween-teen years with a small class of girls self-selected from public and private Christian school cultures. She has a lot to say about Girl Culture for Thinking Parents to consider, especially if it still looms ahead of their children. So here goes (maybe get a cuppa something, it’s long.)

Girls who stay with dance tend to be beautiful, slender, graceful girls blessed with great bone structure, aspiring ballerinas seduced to Dance as little girls by princess-pink tutus and tiaras, by handsome princes, bouquets of flowers and bows to the adoring crowd. Beautiful culture, nothing to fear?

But the world of dance is also unrealistically same-sex segregated. It’s also a culture of heavy stage make-up beyond one’s years, sensual and provocative if not downright sexy moves and costumes, investment in and obsession with appearance to the point of eating disorders, competing against peers to impress teachers and judges and earn external validation, petty dressing room gossip and elaborate in-bred social rivalries because there’s no time for any life outside that world –

At age 16 Favorite Daughter blogged:

Growing up female at the tail end of the 20th century, I hear a lot about the way the media unfairly influences my vision of myself. I can’t help but hear the news reports and studies and talk shows about yet another girl who got lost in a glossy magazine, yet another young woman whose blind ambition to be beautiful ruined a life not yet begun. . . yet I’ve survived spending almost every day with people who challenge my physical self-esteem.

Allow me to explain: I dance.

Nance then offered her a little cultural affirmation:

Lots of Europe Photos Finally Up

Click on the links:

Pictures are slowly making their way to you, and all the Brussels pictures are currently accessible.

For Brussels (Bruxelles) Click Here.

Favorite Daughter in TinTin's "Secret of the Unicorn"

Pictures from:

Mons/Boat Elevators

Kiki’s Family/Fayt-le-Franc

Bruges

Amsterdam

Lausanne

Roger Federer in Sand at Swiss Olympic Museum

UNSCHOOLING EUROPE tag

Lucifer Effect Includes Calling Other People Cockroaches

Situational psychologist Philip Zimbardo was interviewed about a book he wrote that I’ve read and blogged, The Lucifer Effect.
Powerful power of story stuff.

We can’t stop it until we can understand the mechanisms that corrupt not just individuals, but whole systems and institutions like politics or finance.

The Lucifer Effect is about bad barrels, not just bad apples.

It helps my own understanding to sharply distinguish school as institutional place, from education as personal goal/ attribute. What we compel is showing up at the place, not becoming an educated person.

. . .“place” can win over “person” through concepts like institutionalization, escalating dehumanization, stress and stereotyping, the seduction of boredom, the evil of inaction and much more. Sounds too much like what’s gone wrong between school and education — we’ve institutionalized thinking and learning and productive work, and lost the individuals we meant to inspire and empower in the process.

It all starts with “semantic distortion.”

Which leads to “moral disengagement” to detach from the human connection without really being aware of it and then finally, outright “demonization” of Other people.

Maybe words and ideas are repeatedly distorted to call the Other a cockroach, until you come to see that Other as sub-human, not your kind, literally insects to be squashed. It worked in Rwanda, telling

Bruxelles to Paris to Lausanne, Traveling Girls Make Tracks

“Two Long Travel Days…”
Posted by kiki under Switzerland

But all in all, now that we are in beautiful Lausanne, Switzerland, we could not be happier.

We won’t bore you with the details of our travels but when we finally reached Switzerland, we were amazed by just how beautiful it really is. I mean, people tell you that it’s beautiful, but it’s REALLY beautiful.

My friend Val’s parents so graciously offered to lodge us in this paradise, and Yvonne met us at the train station when we arrived, babbling about the beauty of a country surrounded by the likes of the Alps looming in the distance, their peaks shrouded in mist. We walked the short distance from the train station to their impeccable apartment with an indescribable view.

Lausanne Gare (train station)

After watching the arrivée of the Tour de France on TV we went to the golf club (Club Domaine du Brésil) of which Gérard is the president. They’d held a tournament that day and we arrived in time to watch all of the participants come into the club house and then the subsequent awards ceremony. Of course there was then an “apéro” which featured meat platters, gourmet vegetable pizza, fabulously spiced filo dough creations, and tartes raisinées.

Gérard then quickly grabbed my attention by asking if I would like to hit some golf balls

Community Colleges Are to Home Education . . .

NYT op-ed column:

“Most people in government, think tanks and the news media didn’t go to community college, and they don’t send their children to them.
It’s a blind spot in their consciousness. .. . .”

Ahem. Like home education itself?

These colleges educate students with wildly divergent interests, goals and abilities. They host students with radically different learning styles, many of whom have floundered in traditional classrooms.

Therefore, successful reform has to blow up the standard model. You can’t measure progress by how many hours a student spends with her butt in a classroom chair. You have to incorporate online tutoring, as the military does. You have to experiment with programs like Digital Bridge Academy that are tailored to individual learning styles. You have to

Don’t Box Her In: Nance Confer’s Interview

Fun! Nance’s “Homeschooling is Freedom” interview just went up. . .

Poor Nance had a hard time with my questions.

I think the format boxed her in too much. Maybe it seemed too much like a test. For whatever reason, she just wasn’t comfortable with the box I gave her so she did what any resourceful, independent homeschooling mom would do and simply punched her way out of it.

When Nance wrote back, she apologized for tearing up the box and said she would understand if I didn’t use her response. But I’m running a blog that focuses on freedom, flexibility and fun, so as long as she had fun with it, then I’m certainly flexible enough to give her the freedom to respond in her own way.

Besides, I have plenty of duct tape. . .