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PotD  /  science
Does History Care If We F*#k Up?
August 31, 2016

The very ink with which history is written is merely fluid prejudice. —Mark Twain

 

charles i.letbetter - does history care if we fuck up

Humans may very well be responsible for one of earth’s greatest calamities, but 100,000 years from now will anyone care?

Humans like to think we’re the smartest beings that have ever inhabited this planet. We may be correct. History indicates that whatever preceded us didn’t have a great deal of luck when it came to surviving what the universe threw at them. We, on the other hand, are pretty sure we’re different. We are convinced that we have everything under control and can almost certainly mitigate any natural disasters. Confident beings, we are.

However, given the choices we’re making, history may judge us no more intelligent than the dinosaurs. We gleefully ignore science. We intentionally pollute our air and water, the very things we need to survive. Our planet is over-populated beyond its ability to sustain life. Yet, we refuse to use genetically modified foods that could feed the planet. We love war. Not only that, humanity has a long history of people not getting along with their closest neighbors. Anyone looking at us in retrospect would consider our violent tendencies a negative character trait.

Humans, however, are focused on the here and now. We pay attention to us. The past is the past. Let the future worry about itself. The earth is slowly baking? Meh, it’s just a periodic thing that happens. Humanity may be in the process of committing one of the biggest fuck-ups in the history of the planet. Yet, does history actually care? Looking beyond our meager existence as a species, we are as easily forgettable as Australopithecus afarensis. The fact you don’t know whether I just made up that name proves my point.

How We Look At History

Humans are the latest, but most likely not the last, in a long evolutionary line of hominids. Our earliest bipedal ancestors existed some six- to eight-million years ago and were considerably smaller than we are now. Our best connection with this time is a single skeleton from about three million years ago. Scientists named the skeleton Lucy because she was, in a very real way, a person. Lucy’s skeleton was found in 1974 in a shallow Ethiopian stream bed. Researchers announced this week that we finally know how Lucy died. She fell, feet first, from a high distance, most likely a tree.

Studies of Lucy’s skeleton take a lot of time. She is the only one of her species we have encountered. She is the only one of her species we are likely to ever encounter. Therefore, while anthropologists study her remains at the microscopic level they try to make conclusions not only about Lucy’s life but her entire species. Did Lucy live or sleep in the trees? When she fell, why was no one around to save her? Each question answered raises a dozen more.

Inevitably, someone asks about the accuracies of these findings. We’re using the best CSI-like technology available. We’re drawing conclusions and making discoveries about Lucy’s time period that would have been unthinkable 40 years ago. Yet, we have no way of knowing exactly how accurate the findings are. No one from that period in history, nothing written, no form of communication still exists. Lucy’s life matters because it is the only glimpse we have into her species. Without her, we wouldn’t have a clue. History wouldn’t care.

How History Looks At Us

Back in 2011, geologists and other scientists who study history in large time frames declared that we have entered the Anthropocene—Age of Man. They all agreed that the impact of humans on this planet was significant enough to deserve its own epoch. In a National Geographic article on the topic, writer Elizabeth Kolbert relates an experience she had with stratigrapher Jan Zalasiewicz. As they were examining an outcropping of rock in the Scottish Highlands, Zalasiewicz pointed toward a particularly dark-colored stratum about three feet wide and said, “Bad things happened in here.”

By “bad things,” Zalasiewicz was referring to mass extinctions, a global calamity of some sort that was so severe as to change the color of the sediment left behind. Known as the end-Ordovician, this was one of the biggest earth-shaping extinction events in the last half-million years. The event is significant because, without those changes, humans might never have evolved on this planet. Even if they did, we would have been very different creatures.

Flash forward 100,000 or even a million years now, and realize that the way in which Zalasiewicz views that stratum of rock is exactly how future scientists will view the sedimentary remains of the Anthropocene. At some point all that will remain of us, of our society, of our technology, of our philosophies, our quarrels, our wars, and our politics is sediment. Our means and methods of communication might give researchers more insight into us than we have into Lucy’s time period. Ultimately, however, it’s all just a giant slab of rock underneath other giant slabs of rock.

History Isn’t Detail Oriented

I’m going to be blunt: History doesn’t give a shit about the petty details of our lives. We don’t’ give a shit about the petty details of Lucy’s life. Future inhabitants of this planet, whatever they may be, won’t give a shit about the petty details of our lives. Even if they are somehow able to access and decode this strange mess we call social media, they won’t care. They have no reason to care. What future species want to know about us  is the same thing we want to know about Lucy: How did her species affect our species?

Lucy’s Australopithecus afarensis species represents a link in an evolutionary chain. We are another link in that same chain. What matters to the ultimate course of history is whether we make that evolutionary chain stronger or weaker. We’re arrogant bastards sure that we are strengthening that chain, but our estimations may be biased. Where we stand now, we can either start paying attention to our planet and focus on preserving both it and us or we can fuck it all up and end up being the weak link in our evolutionary chain. This is how history ultimately views our species.

When you ask yourself whether your life matters, consider this context of history. Does  your life make us stronger, weaker, or indifferent? If your life is represented by a stratum of rock, do you change the color or do you blend in with those around you? If we, collectively, fuck up this evolutionary chain, history is not going to be kind in its view of us. They’ll look back and, regardless of the details of our lives, consider our whole species imbecilic.

So yeah, history cares if we fuck up. Maybe we should as well.

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Fashion  /  PotD
Luxury Shoppers Aren’t Nice People
August 30, 2016
charles i. letbetter - luxury shoppers aren't nice people

I am convinced that there can be luxury in simplicity. —Jil Sander

 

charles i. letbetter - luxury shoppers are not nice people

If you need help, don’t bother asking the person coming out of a luxury retailer

Let’s play a game this morning. You’re walking down the street with a friend, maybe doing a bit of window shopping. It’s a nice day and you’re enjoying looking at the window displays of luxury brands even though you don’t have the money to actually shop there. A young woman on crutches approaches from the opposite direction and just before she gets to you she stumbles and drops the bags she’s carrying, spilling their contents on the sidewalk. What do you do next?

Sitting at home, looking at this on your phone or tablet, it’s easy to say we would rush over and help the young woman. After all, it’s just the polite thing to do. One would have to be callous to just stand there or keep walking. Who would do such a thing?

But when Paris Descartes University and University of Southern Brittany teamed up to actually test shoppers reactions, the results were not favorable. As it turns out, just the presence of luxury brands is enough to change how people react to someone in need. Whether those people actually shop in the luxury stores doesn’t seem to make a great deal of difference. Being around retail shops for names like Prada, Chanel, and Dior causes us to be less kind, less helpful, and less charitable. Only 35% of luxury shoppers offered any kind of aid or assistance to the person in need. By contrast, when the same test was performed in an area void of luxury retailers, 77.5% of shoppers responded in a positive manner and helped.

I Gave At The Office

There are many reasons for why luxury shoppers might be shy about helping. I don’t have time to go into all of them, but one of the primary reasons is that people who have money typically manage their money, or have someone do it for them. When it comes to charity, donations are made at scheduled periods to accommodate both cash flow and tax issues. These people often give millions of dollars annually. As a result, they tend to be of the opinion that they’ve already given back to society, substantially. They don’t need to do any more.

Paired with this is the sad reality is that those who have large amounts of money are constantly being asked to donate more. They’re aware of myriad scams and con games that would quickly drain their bank accounts if given the opportunity. Those who have been stung by such fraud are justifiably cautious. Even a simple act of stooping down to help someone with their packages puts them at risk of theft or kidnapping. They are cautious for a reason.

Does this justify them not helping someone in need? In some cases, perhaps so. How does one observe such an event, especially on a busy Parisian street, and know whether or not the need is real or an act? If someone is out without a security detail, they may already feel significantly at risk. Such events are exactly the type of thing security experts warn their clients to avoid. So maybe we give some of them a little slack.

Faking The Luxury Thing

One of  the most interesting aspects of the study is that the mere presence of a luxury shop is all it took to change people’s reactions. When the super-rich reacts negatively, we’re really not all that surprised. When average non-rich people react this way, though, we’re a little more surprised. Why would their behavior change based on what they’re near?

Blame the credit card. While the number of millionaires is legitimately increasing, so are the number of people who want to act and shop as though they’re richer than they are. Their lives are fueled by an array of credit cards with floating balances. Their debt is high. These people are playing a game of public deception. They want everyone to see them as something they’re not. One most often sees them window shopping at the big-name stores, but then making their actual purchases at the outlets.

Should we expect any different behavior from these people, really? If they’re already living fictional lives based on incredible debt, then we shouldn’t be too terribly surprised when they follow through by acting more snobby in the presence of someone in need. The difference is that their behavior isn’t fueled by security concerns. They are just being assholes because they think that’s how rich people are supposed to act.

A Lack Of Empathy

Researchers theorize that the presence of luxury, reminders of conspicuous consumption, causes people to be less empathetic. Those who shop in and around luxury stores actually consider themselves better than others around them. That feeling of superiority changes how one views people in need. The assumption made is that anyone in need must be of a lower social class or otherwise they wouldn’t be in need.

That lack of empathy is something we see growing across what we would previously have considered upper middle class. As socio-economic strata flatten out, those who perceive themselves to be at the upper end of the ladder look for more visible ways to separate themselves from those they consider to be lower. These people can actually be mean in how they deal with other people, and especially those who ask them for any kind of assistance. They are completely lacking in empathy, even though they’re not all that different from the people around them.

A Little Kindness Goes A Long Way

Even in this less-than-friendly climate, there are still those who do help, who do have a touch of compassion.  People in this study were not asked for money or any kind of contribution that might put them at any actual risk. Some were asked to simply watch a person in a wheelchair while the other person retrieved packages. The young women asked some if they could borrow a cell phone to make an emergency call. When removed from the obvious presence of luxury, people responded with overwhelming kindness.

These results make for some interesting correlations. Do money and/or luxury make us worse people? Do we really think that wearing a luxury label makes us better than our fellow humans? Are we really good people at heart who are too easily swayed? Hopefully, this study opens the door for more. If luxury brands are going to affect how we interact with people to such a strong degree, we need to understand more about the causal factors and how they might be addressed. The last thing our world needs is to encourage any greater absence of empathy.

Meanwhile, if we want to shop around nice people, perhaps we’d best stick to shopping at Target.

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PotD  /  science
Be My Friend, Live Longer & Happier
August 29, 2016
charles i. letbetter - be my friend, live longer & happier

Old friends pass away, new friends appear. It is just like the days. An old day passes, a new day arrives. The important thing is to make it meaningful: a meaningful friend – or a meaningful day. —Dalai Lama

 

charles i. letbetter - be my friend, live longer & happier

The secret to both longevity and happiness, it turns out, is to have good friends and deep relationships

“How many Facebook friends do you have?” There’s only one group of people to whom that question’s answer actually matters: Marketers. They look at the number of friends as a ratio for the number of people you influence. You like something, they are more likely to like the same thing. You buy something, they may buy something similar. Marketing looks at a friend not as a relationship but as leverage for selling.

You know was well as I do that social media “friends” or “followers” aren’t actually relationships, though. Those people, or the numbers, might make us feel a little better about ourselves but they’re not going to come help you move. That sympathetic online friend isn’t likely to buy you the drink you really need. The random Twitter follower isn’t likely to lend you the money you need to fix the car. While there might be the occasional exception, most online friends typically stay that way: online. We don’t develop real relationships with them.

The people who are really our friends, though, have a bigger impact on our lives than we might have thought. Mainly, the depth of those relationships and the number of them we have, help us to live both longer and healthier lives. Being my friend, in real life, is good for you, even if I’m occasionally a pain in the ass. What’s more, there’s actual science to prove it.

Everybody Needs A Friend

I’m drawing results from the longest-running study of human wellness and development, the Harvard Grant Study. The Grant study started in 1938 with 730 men. Half were Harvard sophomores. The other half were young men from the slums of Boston. For over 75 years, researchers followed these men through their lives, through war, through marriage, through various employments, and into retirement. They looked at everything, including their health. They even did brain scans. And what was the top takeaway from all that research? Friends, good, strong relationships, keep us  healthier and help us to live longer lives.

This goes beyond just having a best friend, though that is definitely a strong factor. The larger one’s real-life friend network is, the more likely they are to live longer and be more satisfied with the content of their lives. Having friends who share experiences, who are sympathetic and supportive, and who just “hang out” are all important. These are the relationships that stay with us. A friend that is with us at age 50 is more likely to still be our friend at age 80 and beyond.

What’s important about this level of friendship is that a friend is encouraging. Friends that create and promote conflict are not helpful. Relationships that are constantly in turmoil actually do us more harm than good. Divorce can be healthier than living in a high-conflict marriage. Yet, where we have a friend on whom we can depend, a friend that makes us smile, we are more likely to be healthy.

Loneliness Kills

What is equally important to realize is that just as quality relationships prolong our lives, the absence of them shortens our lives. At any given point, on any day you choose, one in five Americans says they’re lonely. Loneliness kills. Those who are isolated from society are more likely to die sooner.  Those who do not have a friend to whom they can talk are more likely to develop terminal diseases that lead to death.

By contrast, one should note that it is not merely the presence of friends that keeps us healthy, but the depth and quality of those relationships. A line that seems to be important is the age of 50. Prior to reaching middle age, friends are more numerous but they are also more likely to come and go with some frequency. As we get older, however, the number of friends begins to solidify. The relationships that matter get deeper and have more meaning in our lives.

This does not mean that having more friends makes life easier. The Grant Study started in 1938 and right away a majority of the participants were flung into World War II. Some who were well off and privileged plunged to the depths of poverty. Some who were raised in Boston tenements rose to the top of social standing. The ranges of experience varied dramatically. What remained consistent is that those with a good friend, those with strong relationships, weathered the storms better.

Friends Protect Our Brains

I find it especially interesting  that having multiple strong relationships not only helps us live longer, but they also help protect our brains. Looking at study participants who are now in their 90s, those with a healthy dose of friends experienced the effects and diseases related to dementia at a much slower rate and later in life than those who did not have a strong friend network. Having friends keeps our brains functioning more strongly, helps our memory recall, and keeps our brains more nimble.

When we are young we collect more friends to help us feel a part of society. We surround ourselves with those who are like-minded in an effort to validate our own opinions and lifestyle. As we get older, however, we begin looking for that friend who is going to be there long-term, even if they are not physically close. The friend who we may not see every day but is there to talk with even on the boring days is invaluable. Having friends who don’t judge, with whom we can be ourselves, keep us healthy and happy.

Interestingly enough, among the 60 study participants still living, which happens to include one former US President (think about it), every last one of them has repeatedly confirmed over the years that friendships are a  dominant factor in their happiness than either money or fame. Some have done well financially, others are barely getting by, but they all agree that it is those deep, abiding relationships that make life worthwhile.

I don’t know about you, but I’m always open to more friends; the real ones. Let’s do coffee. Perhaps we’ll both live longer.

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Current Issues  /  Mythology  /  PotD
Dear World: Your Actions Are Unacceptable
August 27, 2016
charles i. letbetter - dear world your actions are unacceptable

I’m not sure I’m trying to communicate a message. I’m just trying to be part of the movement away from the unacceptable present. —Wole Soyinka

 

charles i. letbetrer - dear world you actions are unacceptable

The world gets a giant middle finger for all the nonsense it has generated as well as a shit load of unnecessary pain.

I am not a happy camper. In addition to dealing with eight tornadoes hitting the area on Wednesday and flooding in our own yard yesterday, most of the rest of the world seems to have come off its hinges with actions and events that are wholly unacceptable. Making matters worse, the biggest failures of the week are not merely unacceptable for their own anti-human deviance but are indicative and symptomatic of much larger problems that we’ve attempted to address before.

Maybe I should just stay away from the news. Reading through my feed every morning makes my blood pressure soar even before the normal frustrations have a chance to piss me off. I find that too often I’m already in a terrifying mood before I get to my second cup of coffee. That situation on its own should be unacceptable, but it is becoming a daily ritual: Drink coffee, read news, lose temper, make more coffee. I swear, if it weren’t for the coffee I might do something dangerous.

Instead of directly endangering lives, though, what I’m doing this morning is attempting to exorcise these demons of society by exposing their unacceptable behavior loudly and publicly. We’ve seen more than once this week where social media backlash can turn into genuine dissent that results in positive action. We need more of that. If yelling and screaming make a difference, then I’m ready to participate. Here are the most unacceptable issues.

Complete Ignorance

Offender: Michelle Backman. Why anyone still puts a microphone in front of this woman’s face is beyond me. The pandering crackheads over at Breitbart News (a misnomer from the beginning) are responsible for the latest tirade. The level of ignorance shown is unacceptable on its own. What’s scary is that there are millions of people who actually believe this nonsense. Here’s what she had to say this time:

“I don’t think all of the suffering of African-Americans during the period of slavery can ever equate to what’s been done to white conservative Americans in the past 8 years …”

Yes, she actually said that. She is of the opinion that giving everyone else in America what white people already had is somehow oppressing white people. You and I both know that’s a goddamn lie, but it’s one that keeps being repeated over and over and over. White people are not victims. They probably deserve to be, but they’re not. It’s time to push back against this claptrap and put an end to such unacceptable behavior.

Religious Criminality

Offender: Bishop Ken Adkins. Like so many right-wing pastors, Adkins has been very vocal against LGBT rights. He is on record as saying that Orlando PULSE victims “got what they deserved.” That right there tells you this is not a good person, despite his self-anointed title. What we found out this week, though, is that the Bishop has a thing for molesting children. The press release from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation was tweeted by a Jacksonville news outlet:


In addition to the Bishop’s actions and words being unacceptable, what gets my goat is that THIS KEEPS HAPPENING and no one is doing anything about it! How many more times are we going to endure headlines like this before we start looking more carefully at the men behind the pulpit (and yes, it is exclusively men who have been the problem)? Sure, it’s only a few bad apples, but those apples keep poisoning barrel after barrel of innocent children. While the Catholic church has its own mechanism through which such behavior is supposedly handled (though there are plenty of questions there, jackasses such as Adkins have no oversight, no one to whom they are accountable. This is unacceptable. PASTORS MUST BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR THEIR ACTIONS! We cannot allow more children to be placed at risk.

Male Domination

Offender (this time): France. France’s prohibition against women wearing the burkini on public beaches is an example of how social media can actually do some good. After more than a week of pressure, France’s Supreme Court overturned the anti-burkini laws that were in place. The problem is that the attitude behind those laws hasn’t changed. In fact, Nicolas Sarkozy announced his bid for President yesterday by insisting on a national ban on the garment.

While the attitude of male domination is unacceptable in of itself, the whole thing about men trying to tell women what to wear, and then turning around and shaming them, has gotten out of hand. We’ve been putting up with this nonsense far too long and it’s time that men, again, were called out on their behavior. I’ll be honest, women have been saying something for a long time. What we need are more men standing up and calling each other out in this shit. I find this behavior offensive and any man who has an ounce of respect for women should not tolerate it.

Editorial cartoonist Anna Telnaes of the Washington Post has been all over this issue for a while and no one has been paying attention. Yesterday, the Post published several of her cartoons on the subject to Twitter. Here are a couple that really define the problem:


Women have been saying something for over 100 years. It’s time men not only started listening but started changing.

A Preference For War

Offenders: the United States and Russia. Let’s be honest: the two super-powers started the mess in the Middle East by interfering with their politics back in the 1950s. They have done a good job of keeping that region in turmoil ever since.  This week, they had a chance to stop the nonsense. They didn’t. That is unacceptable. After all this time, leaders of both countries are afraid to do anything that might put the other in a positive light. The US belittles Russia. Russia degrades the US. They could end the violence in Syria. They could keep refugees from having to flee. But they’re not. Instead, we get quotes like this one from US Secretary of State John Kerry:

“We don’t want to have a deal for the sake of the deal. We want to have something done that is effective and that works for the people of Syria, that makes the region more stable and secure, and that brings us to the table here in Geneva to find a political solution.”

Anyone else want to call horseshit on this? They’re not interested in lives. They’re not interested in war. Instead, both countries are trying to make themselves look good to their allies. There is absolutely no concern for humanity in anything either leader has said. This is unacceptable and we need to make a LOT of noise to get the nonsense to stop.

Using Children For Terror

Offender: Daesh.  First, they sent a child to a wedding with a bomb strapped to his chest. 50 were killed, mostly other children. This week, the band of idiots released a video showing children executing hostages.  No, I’m not linking to the video. No one should. This nonsense is unacceptable at the very highest order. As unacceptable as terrorism is on any level, using children to commit their despicable acts is beyond inexcusable.

Here’s the thing: bombing Daesh back to the stone age, as some of our own right-wing radicals have suggested, doesn’t solve the problem. If we want to stop Daesh, we have to stop giving people a reason to want to join them. We have to stop marginalizing Muslims both here and around the world. Daesh is already using the rhetoric of the Republican presidential candidate in their recruiting efforts. They see the world as us against them, that we are trying to eliminate their culture and replace it with ours. They look at our 60+ years of constant interference in the region as an imperialistic power grab.

As much as we abhor their tactics, we cannot fire with fire in this instance. At least, not yet. When we bring Muslims into the Western mainstream with acceptance and inclusion, we take away Daesh’s power. When we support real Muslims, not the wannabes who strap bombs to children, we give them strength to stand up and fight against those who usurp their religion. There are enough moderate, peace-loving Muslims in the Middle East to drive out radical terrorism completely. We must support them, not just with weapons, but by welcoming to participate in the world alongside us. Until we do, more unacceptable acts will happen.

Speak Up

I’ve had my turn at yelling and screaming.   Now it’s your turn. We’ve seen that mass public pressure can have a positive effect on world events. You have to say something. Share this article. Tweet your displeasure. Make your voice heard. Your options are many. Find a way.

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Current Issues  /  Fashion
Is Fashion Week Flying Off The Rails?
August 26, 2016

You really do have the license during fashion week to wear the things that you wouldn’t necessarily wear to dinner, because it really is a fashion parade. —Brad Goreski

 

charles i. letbetter - is fashion week flying off the rails

With Fashion Week less than two weeks away, the traditions surrounding the month-long event seem to be disappearing

We’re now less than two weeks from the start of New York Fashion Week and I’m not sure at this point whether to bother consulting the schedule or not. Normally, shows would be pretty much locked down by now. We would have a good sense of the schedule and could begin preparing for where we need to be at any given moment. Not this season. At least, not yet. I suspect the calendar will straighten itself out eventually, but there are some big names still missing and some will stay that way.

Fashion week as we knew it a year ago no longer exists. Everything is in a state of flux and it is this season that is seeing a lot of the transition that is likely to become the norm for coming years. Digital media and online buying having taken over. With that comes a complete change of attitude, strategy, and availability. What we once expected from a fashion week just doesn’t happen any more. This is the season we start making that shift and it’s making more than a few people uncomfortable.

What We Know

Without going into any boring detail at this point, here are some of the changes we are aware of:

The waves of change are  all over. Even how sets are constructed and shows are structured is changing. We’re expecting far fewer traditional runway shows this season. Who gets invitations and who doesn’t, who sits where, and what is allowed into a venue is all different than it was last season. Very little of what one expects from fashion week is staying the same.

Consumers Want Current Season

Folks in Italy may have to do some backtracking on their February statements against current-season show strategies. They came our pretty strong against the concept last season and Italian designers seemed to largely agree that shows needed to stay a season ahead of retail. Consumers, however, seem to have other ideas.

A report was released this week by Verdict Retail showing exactly the opposite of what the Italian Fashion Council wants. 85.6% of shoppers say they want to shop current season and support a see-now, buy-now strategy. 85% is a scale-tipping number. Labels can either get with the program or suffer the consequences of continually declining sales.

Unpredictable weather and social media are the primary culprits behind this change in consumer expectations. When everyone around the world can see a collection the instant it walks, the demand to have that collection now increases significantly. With weather often blurring the lines between seasons, a heavy coat is appropriate for summer as much as s short shorts are part of the winter collection.

Discounters Rule

The other aspect that is spurring changes on fashion runways is the fact that luxury labels are having difficulty keeping up with discounters and outlet stores that are digging into their profits.  Large department stores such as Macy’s and Nordstrom are having to run sales 50% and even 75% off in order to compete with the likes of H&M. This leaves designers increasingly narrow margins and effects how they approach fashion week.

Even discounters, though, may soon face declining sales. A Moody’s retail analyst told Bloomberg TV this week that consumers make $80 billion in interest payments on student debt each year, leaving them with increasingly less expendable cash during that time of their lives when they should have the most money available to spend. Gen-X and older Millennial shoppers are having to adopt a more frugal spending plan. Historial studies show that once such a mindset is established, consumers typically don’t change habits even when they do have more money

This leaves luxury labels looking for new ways to entice cash- and credit-strapped shoppers. Traditional runways are not selling the clothes as effectively. Fashion week is, in some cases, too old school to hold the effectiveness it once did. Labels are actively seeking alternatives.

Hang On For A Wild Ride

We’re expecting even more shifts and changes as we get closer to the September 8 start date of the season. We’ll do our best to keep up with the most important. Stay with us.

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Advertising  /  Fashion  /  pop culture  /  PotD
The Beauty Industry Is Looking Ugly
August 26, 2016
charles i. letbetter - beauty is getting really ugly

Yeah, I know I’m ugly… I said to a bartender, ‘Make me a zombie.’ He said ‘God beat me to it.’ —Rodney Dangerfield

 

charles i. letbetter - the beauty industry is getting ugly

The beauty industry is under fire for tactics that are best described as downright ugly

Beauty is big business. Looking at revenue amounts for the billion-dollar industry don’t begin to fully embody the scope and reach of the behemoth that is Beauty. We’re surrounded by the messages, both pro, and con, on a daily basis. Regardless of one’s personal opinion, regimen, or gender, the onslaught of beauty-related messaging is downright ugly.

Consider, for example, that I can be sure that I will see a short video teasing some manner of beauty article every morning in my newsfeed. Today, it was Amanda Steele’s #GirlBoss Tricks to a Gorgeous Bold Brow on the Go published by Teen Vogue. The subject of the article, Amanda Steele, is a beauty blogger on YouTube. Beauty is one of the largest content areas on the video streaming site, rivaling gaming and music. There are teen beauty bloggers, black beauty bloggers, Latino beauty bloggers, Asian beauty bloggers, and even beauty bloggers for those who don’t like makeup. One might get the impression that people are a bit obsessed about beauty.

Then, people come along like Lena Dunham and Jemima Kirke who aim to upset the status quo by emphasizing a more natural, non-shaming approach to the subject. When this photo hit social media yesterday, the whole planet seemed to go rather berserk.


Great for them, right? It’s wonderful to have role models not afraid to be themselves, but the attention they received shows just how ugly the beauty business can get.

This Gets Personal

Not wearing makeup has become a “thing,” a movement, a trend, even a form of self-righteousness. Leading the battle, at least from a public standpoint, is singer/songwriter/grammy-winner Alicia Keys. She made her #NoMakeup campaign public last spring, but her continued refusal to wear makeup even as a judge on the television show The Voice has raised attention for the topic yet again. Yay for personal freedom! Yay for not covering up! Congratulations on being naturally beautiful enough to not be publicly condemned!

So, this really gets at all those beauty companies who make billions of dollars selling makeup, right? Think again. They simply shift tactics. Sephora even started offering “No makeup makeup” classes in some of its stores. Not wearing makeup doesn’t mean one stops taking care of their face. In fact, if one’s personal genetics leave one prone to oily skin, patchiness, or other issues, getting a no-makeup look that is as attractive as Ms. Keys might actually be more work than not wearing anything at all!

Then, there’s the whole matter of shaming in both directions. Recent studies from the University of Chicago and the University of California, Irvine, show that makeup and personal grooming are the primary factors in determining a young woman’s salary. Her skills might make her employable, but how she looks, which includes how well she wears makeup, determines at which end of the salary range she starts. What is ultimately being said that if you don’t wear makeup, you’re ugly. If you wear the wrong makeup, you’re ugly. But by all means, be yourself. How the fuck is someone supposed to make sense of that mess?

Dangerous Beauty

Whether or not one wears makeup, one still consumes beauty products and that’s where matters really get ugly. We pay a lot of attention to things that are supposedly helping our skin. Exfoliants and moisturizers, creams and lotions, and myriad other products are used by both men and women in abundance. What we too often don’t realize is that those products, not the makeup, are what cause one’s face to  break out or appear blotchy or have patches of dryness. Even more frightening is that regulation for these products is practically non-existent. Beauty companies can put just about anything they want in a cleanser or a skin cream, and they often do.

One of the biggest issues of late has been the presence of microbeads in a number of products, especially soaps, shampoos, cleansers, and toothpaste. While they are technically illegal in the US, if one is buying their beauty products online, which a lot of people do, the actual source of the product might not be disclosed. The results are about as ugly as anything you’re going to find. Not only are the microbeads bad for your skin, they’re even worse for the environment. Microbeads don’t break down and can be ingested by even the smallest of marine life.

The problem of microplastics is so ugly that Britain’s Parliament recently called for a worldwide ban on microbeads. While microbeads are a small portion of a much larger problem, they pose a most direct and immediate threat to the larger number of people because they can be ingested without the consumer even having a clue that they’re present. The long-term effects have not been studied in humans, but microplastics are even being found on the bottom of the ocean floor. There’s an environmental disaster larger than your face looming here.

The Spirit of Caveat Emptor

Beauty has always been an industry that enjoys extremely little oversight in the United States. While the EU, for example, has banned or restricted over 1,400 substances from beauty products sold there, the US only has a complete ban on eleven. Eleven. No wonder beauty companies like doing business in the US so much. Anything goes! Even worse, we are so gullible that once a company starts touting the beauty benefits of a product, consumers start flocking to it without doing any investigation. We just grab new products and start slapping them on our skin without so much as reading the ingredients list. When our skin breaks out, or dries out, or cracks open and bleeds, we might complain to our friends, but we don’t do anything to stop that product from harming others.

Back in the spring of 2015, Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) introduced bill S.1014 – Personal Care Products Safety Act. The bill, in my opinion, is mild. It says, in part:

If the FDA determines that a cosmetic has a reasonable probability of causing serious adverse health consequences, it may prohibit the cosmetic’s distribution by suspending the cosmetic ingredient statement. If other cosmetics from the same facility may be affected, the FDA may prohibit distribution from the facility by suspending the facility’s registration. 

One might have thought that the FDA already had the ability to stop dangerous cosmetic products, but it does not. Even within the definitions set down within this bill, were it to ever be passed, the FDA would only have to investigate four products a year!

Freedom To Be Stupid

Since being introduced in 2015, Bill S.1014 has gotten exactly one reading in the Senate and assigned to the committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. Heaven forbid the US Senate to have a committee structure that makes a damn bit of sense. Since arriving in that committee, absolutely nothing has happened. There have been no hearings. No one has undertaken any kind of investigation. The United States Senate has done absolutely nothing. Beyond Congress’ current attitude of complete and utter obstructionism, the prevailing “wisdom” among our elected officials is that regulation takes away a corporation’s “freedom.” Since we now consider corporations as people, they are, supposedly, free to do whatever stupid thing they wish without government interference.

So, the beauty industry is free to be as ugly as they want. They can foist any ridiculous product on the market, including no-makeup makeup, and there’s practically nothing can be done to stop them. Sure, they claim to have the consumer’s best interest at heart. A number of them even signed on in support of Bill S.1014. Senator Feinstein’s website lists the following:

  • Johnson & Johnson (brands include Neutrogena, Aveeno, Clean & Clear, Lubriderm, Johnson’s baby products)
  • Procter & Gamble (brands include Pantene, Head & Shoulders, Clairol, Herbal Essences, Secret, Dolce & Gabbana, Gucci, Ivory, Cover Girl, Olay, Sebastian Professional, Vidal Sassoon)
  • Revlon (brands include Revlon, Almay, Mitchum)
  • Estee Lauder (brands include Estée Lauder, Clinique, Origins, Tommy Hilfiger, MAC, La Mer, Bobbi Brown, Donna Karan, Aveda, Michael Kors)
  • Unilever (brands include Dove, Tresemme, Lever, St. Ives, Noxzema, Nexxus, Pond’s, Suave, Sunsilk, Vaseline, Degree)
  • L’Oreal (brands include L’Oréal Paris, Lancome, Giorgio Armani, Yves Saint Laurent, Kiehl’s, Essie, Garnier, Maybelline-New York, Vichy, La Roche-Posay, The Body Shop, Redken)

Yet, for all the talk, no one is actually doing anything to actively protect consumers. The entire beauty industry is bent on convincing us that we’re ugly, even while telling us that we’re beautiful from the inside out.

The Battle Is Yours

Fuck waiting on Congress to do anything. This battle is your own. Whether you wear makeup or don’t wear makeup is irrelevant. Everyone consumes some form of beauty product, whether it be soap or toothpaste or moisturizer. That means everyone is potentially at risk. The industry is not looking out for you. The government isn’t looking out for you. You have to look out for yourself.

Best line of defense: talk to a professional. I know Kat has a list of products she recommends as does Danelle French. Either of them will discuss the particular needs of your skin and help direct you toward products that are not likely to leave you in worse shape than when you started. Take control of the situation for yourself.

The world of beauty really is an ugly business that too often runs akin to the snake oil salesmen of the 19th century. Dangers lurk everywhere. Take care of yourself.

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Current Issues  /  PotD
Everyone Gets To Weather A Storm
August 25, 2016
charles i. letbetter - everyone gets to weather a storm

Living is strife and torment, disappointment and love and sacrifice, golden sunsets and black storm. —Laurence Olivier

 

charles i. letbetter - everyone gets to weather a storm

Indiana cowered as storms passed over, but we were not alone. Everyone gets to endure a storm.

Skies above were clear and the air was humid as I stepped out the door to take the dog on his early morning walk. The last of the rain moved out around 3:00 AM. Computer models aren’t predicting any new storms for today, but WTHR’s Chuck Lofton isn’t convinced. Conditions this morning are too similar to yesterday morning. As the dog and I make the last turn toward home, I see lightning to the North.

Yesterday wasn’t a pleasant weather day for anyone in central Indiana. The first siren sounded here shortly after 3:00 PM. By that time, a Starbucks up in Kokomo (about a 90-minute drive North) had already been flattened by an F3 tornado. I grabbed my hat and phone and headed outside. A neighbor met me on the corner and we watched one lightning strike after another.

“You don’t think that’s headed this way, do you?” he asked, the worry showing on his face. Yesterday was his birthday and he wasn’t having a good one.

“No,” I answered. “But it’s too close for comfort. That’s hitting right around 38th street. Just about where the kids’ school is.”

The lightning passed, then came the bulk of the storm. Clouds and wind shifted direction repeatedly. We never saw a funnel. We wouldn’t have in all that rain. The system moved on East and caused more trouble in the central and Eastern parts of  town. Only two twisters have been confirmed, but there were many more funnels spotted. Buildings damaged. Power out. Children scared as they hunkered down at school. Not a fun day to be in Indiana.

It’s Not Always Like This

Tornado sirens went off five different times yesterday afternoon, prompting my 18-year-old, who just moved up here, to ask whether the weather was like this all the time. This is the second time since he’s been here that sirens have sounded. This isn’t what we might consider traditional Indiana weather, especially for this time of year. Research out of Purdue University in Lafayette suggests that warmer temperatures might be pushing “tornado alley” into the state. Days like yesterday may become the new normal for Indiana.

When a storm like this hits an area, everyone is momentarily jarred. Weather is one of those areas in life over which we have absolutely no control. When the weather starts getting nasty, our senses revert to an inherent sense of fear. We instinctually recognize the danger. Our blood pressure increases to facilitate a run to cover. Our ears go on high alert, listening for the approaching storm. Eyes become more focused, even to the point of increasing our ability to see in the dark. As the storm passes, we exhale, feel a sense of relief in still being alive. We survived another one. Yay us.

Storms like yesterday are small, though.  Just ask anyone in Louisiana who is still wading through several feet of water, unable to return to their homes. No one totally escapes the storms that life throws at us. As frightening as yesterday might have been for some, those storms were light compared to what others are enduring.

A Death Toll Rises

Earthquakes hit central Italy last week, completely leveling many ancient towns. At first, the death toll seemed moderate. I think the first report I saw listed 14 casualties. When I went to bed last night, the count was at 159. This morning, the death toll sits at 247 and climbing.  Strong aftershocks continue, making rescues dangerous. The storms we endure are not always those associated with weather. They come at us from many different directions and many different forms. Compared to what is still happening in Italy, yesterday’s dance with tornadoes was a walk in the park.

In the Italian city of Amatrice, one of the worst-hit towns, a small hotel with 70 guests collapsed. Only seven bodies have been recovered so far. In Pescara del Tronto, rescuers were finally able to get to a 10-year-old girl who had lain in rubble for 17 hours. Over in Accumoli, however, two little boys, ages 8 months and 9 years, were buried along with their parents when their house fell in on them. Stories like these are repeated over and over and over across central Italy to the point one risks becoming numb to the tragedy. This storm was just as unexpected as yesterday’s tornadoes. No one could have predicted this.

Yet, to not expect storms in life is foolish. I sometimes think that we should teach storm survival skills as a course in high school. Students would learn skills to help them survive not only tornadoes, but earthquakes, floods, mudslides, volcanic activity and other forms of displacement and upheaval. Fire is an inevitability for everyone. Storms are inevitable. So, why are we not better equipped, both emotionally and tactically, to hand them?

#CantDoNothing

Since life’s storms are so inevitable, not only do we need to be prepared to handle the ones that directly affect us, but we also have a responsibility to respond to the tragedy of storms that displace others. Locally, the American Red Cross is leading efforts to assist those most directly impacted by yesterday’s storms. If you want to help, you can click here to give. Around the world, there are appropriate agencies to which one can give as to participate in providing relief to all the manners of storms that disable people around the world. Those who survive have a responsibility to humanity to step up and provide assistance.

Sometimes, though, storms are ongoing. Some of the most devastating events are not natural disasters but those initiated by the insanity of war and economic disasters. Refugees continue to pour from Syria and other war-torn countries. Their storm seems never ending. While it’s easy enough to sit here and say, “I feel sorry for those people,” what they really need is a more hands-on approach, people willing to volunteer on the ground in the places where refugees land and the places they wait.

Milana Vayntrub is probably best known to most of us as Lily from the AT&T commercials. She was vacationing in Greece earlier this year when she learned about the severity of the refugee situation there. Being a refugee herself, she felt compassion and took the steps to do something. She then used her phone to create a documentary about the situation. The portion here is 13 minutes. Please, take a moment to watch.

More Storms Coming

Some storms can be forecasted. Many others can’t. What we do know is that more storms are coming, both here in Indiana and around the world. With each storm, there are people adversely affected. We hope to not become victims ourselves. Where we don’t, however, we have an obligation to help those who are, not just here, but around the world.

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Just For Fun  /  pop culture  /  PotD
Coffee With A Happy Ending (Explicit)
August 24, 2016
charles i. letbetter - coffee with a happy ending

Once you wake up and smell the coffee, it’s hard to go back to sleep. —Fran Drescher

 

charles i. letbetter - coffee with a happy ending -explicit

Having oral sex with your coffee might sound wonderful at first, but there could be some serious problems

This was one of those rare mornings where I couldn’t really find a topic that inspired me in any way. Yes, there is plenty of important news, but it was either on topics of which I have little knowledge or wholly political which I’m just not in the mood to engage. Then, I came across a snippet that led me to an article in Maxim, which led me to an article in Playboy, which led me to a news story in The Mirror. They’re all talking about a coffee shop in Geneva, Switzerland that hasn’t even opened yet. The coffee shop is called Facegirl and if you want to go there, expect long lines (at least at first) and high prices.

A cup of coffee at Facegirl will set you back about $55.55 (based on this morning’s exchange rate). I know, that seems rather high. However, the reason for that high price is not because of the coffee but because of the “extra” service that comes with it: oral sex. At first glance, the sex addicted and adventurous among us might think that this is a great idea. I can imagine some are already checking the price of airline tickets to Geneva. If there are two things people love it is oral sex and coffee. Bringing the two together sounds like the ultimate experience.

Well, maybe. By the time I finished all the associated articles, I was beginning to have some questions. Big ones.

Contents May Be Hot

From the very outset, spillage has to be a significant concern and I see no mention in any of the articles how this danger might be offset. No one likes lukewarm coffee, so that’s not really an option. At the same time, we’ve seen numerous lawsuits against places whose hot coffee spilled on a customer. Serving coffee at just the right temperature is a delicate thing. One has to be careful in the consumption of hot beverages.

Now, mix that hot beverage with a sexual activity whose sole purpose is to create pleasure. One does not sit daintily in a chair while being brought to the point of orgasm. If such activity does not cause one to roll their eyes back and lose control of some faculties, someone’s not doing a good job. The potential for danger here is considerable. One might dump hot coffee in their own lap. Ouch. One might spill coffee on their temporary partner. Still not good. With the potential for scalding so extreme, lawsuits alone might close the cafe within weeks of its opening.

I suppose there might be some solutions here. Lids on the cups are a must. Secure cup holders are probably a good idea, too. No one wants to risk bumping a table and sending a cup of hot liquid tumbling the wrong direction. Plenty of space between seats is necessary to prevent one from accidently causing harm to a neighboring customer as well. Even with all those precautions, though, the danger for serious burns still exists. I don’t see any way to totally guard against spilling.

Just A Bit Sexist

While the term “oral sex” is preferred, other descriptions of the services offered at Facegirl make it rather clear that men are the target audience. Granted, there’s nothing saying that women can’t get the same oral service. However, all the service providers, at least those mentioned in the articles, are women. If one is lesbian or bisexual then there’s not as much of a problem. Straight women, unfortunately, seem to be out of luck.

Granted, male service providers might yet be added. The opening date for Facegirl has been kept as to a nebulous “end of the year” timeframe. That gives Facegirl’s owners (which are all male) time to consider how best to service a female clientele that might actually become a dominant part of their business. Women are certainly more unsatisfied by the lack of oral attention provided by their male partners.  Women also, generally,  are able to enjoy oral sex much more than men. Give them a place that provides quality service with a quality cappuccino and they won’t think twice about dropping $55.

A Little Privacy, Please

Interior design is a big deal in coffee shops. The wrong design can keep customers hanging out and re-ordering drinks, or can send them hurrying out the door. Companies such as Starbucks and Caribou Coffee have spent millions of dollars studying and refining their interior design. I’ve looked over all the articles and find no mention of just how Facegirl is going to approach that issue, and yes, it really does matter.

Coffee shops are generally open spaces. A sense of community is critical to building a strong customer base. Yet, not too many of us are exhibitionists. Walking into a coffee shop to the sight of half-dozen overweight old men getting blowjobs is probably not welcoming to a large number of people. Something tells me an  open floor plan isn’t going to work well.

Privacy might be the make-or-break point here. Being able to serve a high volume of people is going to be critical to profitability. How does one maximize the space while still affording the guests both comfort and privacy? Setting people in dark booths with sticky floors is less than appealing. If the setting isn’t pleasing and maintenance of the facility top-notch, this could quickly dissolve into a seedy dive that no one wants to visit.

My, What An Interesting Growth You Have There

Three words: sexually transmitted diseases. Prostitution is legal in Switzerland. Service providers have to be registered and part of that oversight involves regular testing. The likelihood of transferring a disease from provider to guest is relatively small. However, I can’t imagine that Facegirl is going to test its guests. I suppose they could do a quick pinprick that would check for the most common diseases. But any serious testing would take hours.

The disease factor is the one issue that the coffee shop is going to find the most difficult to control. In addition to STDs, other communicable diseases are likely to be easily transferred  in such an environment. Think Ebola. Facegirl is going to draw a lot of international tourists and with international tourism, no matter what the business, comes the risk of spreading communicable disease. This is how plagues get started. The service being provided, no matter how careful they are, still involves bodily fluids. Bodily fluids are one of the primary ways in which communicable diseases spread.

Walk in for a cup of coffee and walk out with a smile that might kill you.

Sharing Isn’t Always Caring

We’re all for sexual openness, having multiple partners, group sex, and all the fun that goes along with varied sexual activities. We’re also in favor of sharing coffee with intimate friends. We don’t really go for a lot of restrictions around here. However, we are very careful in vetting with whom we choose to play.

The more I think about it, an open coffee shop, where one cannot control the clientele, seems like a very dangerous place to set up any manner of sexual activity. The risks and dangers are high compared to the few minutes of pleasure one might receive. There are a lot of questions for which I’m not finding answers.

I still like the basic premise, though. Maybe we’ll give the whole coffee and blowjob thing a try … if we can keep the cats and the kids from interfering. Yeah, it’s not likely to happen.

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Personal  /  Photography
Are We Too Poor To Make A Jump
August 23, 2016
charles i. letbetter - are we too poor to jump

Sometimes, if you aren’t sure about something, you just have to jump off the bridge and grow your wings on the way down. —Danielle Steel

 

charles i. letbetter - are we too poor to make a jump

Making the jump to a new career sounds tempting, but what if you are already poor?

Kat and I were both sitting in the living room reading Sunday when I looked up and mentioned that I was having to be careful about what I read. Too many articles and books and studies pique my interests. I could jump down any number of rabbit holes and waste untold hours of time chasing a topic that has no application to anything I do. The problem is that I enjoy learning new things far too much.

“Would you like to go back to college?” she asked. The expression on her face told me she was serious. That’s Kat, though. She’s all about tackling challenges head on, embracing one’s passion and hanging on as tight as possible.

I gave her my standard set of excuses. I wouldn’t know what to study. My GPA is too low. Most importantly, I don’t see the benefit of going $60,000 or more in debt at a point in my life where I’m not likely to ever earn enough to pay it back.

We are, by government standards,  poor. No, we’re not destitute, but the last thing we have the money to pursue is some random jump into a career or field of study that may prove to be impossible. Our general situation improves only with the careful management of our limited funds.  Chasing other interests is a fantasy.

When To Jump

Earlier this month, the Huffington Post started a new section specifically aimed at people pondering some of the same questions I ponder. The description of the section sounds appealing:

When to Jump™ is a community dedicated to exploring the fundamental question we all think about: when is the right time to go do what you really want to be doing? HuffPost has partnered with When to Jump founder Mike Lewis to curate the stories and ideas of people who left something comfortable to chase a passion. Whatever your jump may be, this is the place to help inspire you to make it.

The stories have headlines that sound incredibly encouraging. This Would-Be Doctor Switched Paths To Help People In An Entirely Different Way.  How A Former Pre-Med Student Found Another Way To Build Healthy Communities. I Left My Successful Career as a Doctor to Become an Art Student.

Wait, are you noticing what I’m noticing? There’s a trend here, at least early in the community’s inception, to focus on those abandoning the medical field. Reading through these three articles, I could feel happy for each person’s story. They took the risk, made the jump, and it worked. Yay them! I couldn’t help noticing, though, that these people come from a much higher socio-economic class than I do.  Financial challenges have a much different meaning for them than it does for me. For the OB/GYN cum art student, there didn’t seem to be any severe challenge beyond her own self-doubts.

Is this whole career jumping just for the affluent? Thousands of people my age who lose their jobs to acquisitions and mergers, economic downsizing, or technological advancement are told to “make the jump” into something they love doing. But when each month is a challenge to keep the lights burning making a blind jump into something that could, at least for a moment, involve a substantial investment, that move isn’t so attractive.

Let’s All Be Astrophysicists

Over the past few years, I’ve taken quite an interest in astrophysics. Neil deGrasse Tyson has done a great job of making this incredibly complicated field of study seem relatable and even obtainable. Being an astrophysicist sounds like an incredible amount of fun, even if the amount of math is intense. I’m sure I would do better with math now than I did back in 9th grade. I think I could come to love astrophysics.

I’ve had arguments similar to this before, though. Back in 1988, I was all in turmoil over whether to go back to school and get my master’s degree in something music related or chasing this photography thing and seeing where it took me.   We know how that debate ended. Finances played a large role in that decision, too. Photography meant having a paycheck right then, even if it was small. Going back to school meant not knowing if there would ever actually be a paycheck. In the end, the decision wasn’t all that difficult. Paycheck wins.

This takes me back to the article from a couple of weeks ago, Stop Doing What You Love. I might really like astrophysics from an amateur perspective, but does it really make sense to jump into the field with any hopes of being successful? Probably not. In addition to all the cost for additional education and tutors, there’s the fact I would be well into my 60s before achieving the level of education necessary to become employable. Better I stick with what I’m good at doing.

Stuck To The Ground

Personally, I don’t even  know if I really want to jump. I still love photography. I’m not yet done taking all the pictures I want to take. As I look into the future of the profession, I cannot help but wonder if my days are numbered. Once everyone can take pictures with the contact lying on their eye my usefulness decreases considerably, Imagining a day when there are no more professional photographers isn’t terribly difficult.

But to jump requires having money. Money to go back to school. Money for equipment and books and materials. Then, there’s that matter of paying bills, feeding a family, while in the course of such a jump. When people have some kind of financial backstops, those worries are not so large. For those who have none, however, such concerns are a roadblock.  We have to take care of our families first. Making a jump may put our careers at risk, but we can’t put our families and their well-being at risk. We’re stuck.

Such is the way our country works, though. Anything is possible if you have money. If you don’t, those who do go out of their way to make you feel like a burden on society, no matter how hard one works or how hard they try to fit in. Being poor removes one ability to jump.

I don’t expect anything to change. I might investigate the choices a bit, but I’ll see a price tag and probably back off the idea of making a jump. After all, I’m not a doctor or  pre-med student. They get to jump. The rest of us just dance in place. Our feet are too poor to leave the ground.

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Advertising  /  Fashion  /  PotD
Will You Look Good When You Die
August 23, 2016
charles i. letbetter - will you look good when you die

If you don’t look good, we don’t look good. —Vidal Sassoon

 

charles i. letbetter - will you look good when you die

We can’t control when we’re going to die, so perhaps we should make sure we look good all the time.

I looked in the mirror the other day and wondered just who that person was staring back at me. Kat had just cut my hair, but my beard, which is now nothing more than a bib of gray at the bottom of my face, was still long and a bit ragged. I see that image, especially with my shoulders slightly slumped, and I don’t think I look good. Kat says I’m being preposterous but I know she’s biased. I think I look more like a retired Canadian logger in search of a plaid shirt.

I’m not the only one who wants to look good. Even when we say we don’t care, more often than not we do. The entire fashion industry exists not just because we need to get dressed, something we discussed yesterday, but we want to look good when wearing those clothes. In fact, we depend on clothes to make us look good because you’re not confident that we look good without them. As a result, we wander from retailer to retailer, searching from one label to the next, trying to find that look that makes us more attractive.

Here’s the question of the morning, though: are all our efforts to improve our appearance ultimately futile? How many people woke up this morning, put on their favorite ensemble, and are then killed on their way to work? It happens. Every day. When might it be my turn?

Can that existentialist angst be used to sell more clothes?

A Fatalistic Approach To Advertising

I was looking through new ads this morning, because I like the creativity found in them, and I discovered this piece from BBDO Dubai. Before I say anything more about it, just imagine this popping up in the middle of your favorite program:

As if the title alone shouldn’t cause some concern, the moment the ad tells us that the universe is not our mother and doesn’t really love us we’re in dangerous territory. The ad goes on to pretty much sum up how all of us feel at one point or another:  Life sucks and no one gives a shit. Then, just to end the commercial on a low note, the ad ends with the attractive young couple, apparently too bored with life to bother getting out of  the car, get plowed by a speeding train.

Oh look, the pretty young couple is dead. Does anyone want to go shopping?

No, it’s not your imagination. The whole concept is rather morose, at least in one sense. Consider who the audience is for this commercial, though. Centrepoint is a Middle Eastern retailer. They have no stores in the EU or US. Their primary customer lives with a reality that most Westerners can’t begin to comprehend: Life can be disappointingly short. They live in a world where going to a friend’s wedding can get you killed. Unexpected moments of death surround them. So, why not make sure you look good when that 14-year-old kid running through the party detonates a bomb?

Leave A Good-looking Corpse

The picture above is one of my favorite exhibition pieces. The saying is well known across Indiana: “Live fast, die young, and leave a good-looking corpse.” Folks in these parts want to attribute the saying to James Dean, but the origins actually go back much further, all the way to 1855, if one is really interested. From it’s beginning, though, the sentiment has been the same, that the younger generation was too shallow, too concerned with looking good. I had to laugh when I found an 1870 use of the phrase directed toward “electrified Americans.” That damn electricity is going to be the ruin of us all.

I had to laugh when I found an 1870 use of the phrase directed toward “electrified Americans.” That damn electricity is going to be the ruin of us all.

All the way through history, though, the phrase is directed toward the bourgeois

Dressing For Death

Still, if we’re honest, life is frighteningly uncertain no matter where one lives. I couldn’t help notice over the weekend that there were three different Interstate accidents involving more than 20 cars each. With each pile-up there were deaths. We don’t like to think about it, but almost certainly none of the victims got into their vehicles that morning with any thought that this might be their last road trip. Death happens.

Does it really matter how we look when we die?  Going back to the commercial, one has to assume that getting trashed by a train probably isn’t going to have a good effect on that well-tailored suit he was wearing. Those expensive hair styles probably wouldn’t look so wonderful when caked in blood. If one dies through unexpectedly violet means what one is wearing becomes rather irrelevant.

We like to think we look good in our final minutes, though. Even if no one sees us. Even if no one cares.

 

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Art  /  Photography
Showing Some Respect For The Photographs
August 22, 2016
charles i. letbetter - show some respect for the photographs

Respect is what we owe; love, what we give. —Philip James Bailey

 

charles i. letbetter - showing some respect to the photography

There are pictures everywhere on the Internet now but few are getting any respect

When one visits the Louvre, there are certain rules one must follow. Actually, there are a lot of rules one must follow. No smoking, drinking, eating, raising your voice, touching artworks, or running in the museum exhibition rooms. The museum houses some of the world’s most fantastic pieces of art and curators there are adamant that guests respect the art. They even put up signs to remind visitors how to act. They look like this:

charles i. letbetter - showing some respect for the photograph

Louvre mode d’emploi – Respecter les collections

There are times when I wish I could put a similar label on my photographs. I find it interesting that when a photographer puts any kind of identifying or security mark, such as a watermark, on their photographs people complain that the mark “interrupts the aesthetic value of the picture.” At the same time, though, those same people fail to show any respect for the photograph in the way it is treated and displayed. Comments are brutal and insulting without having any knowledge of  all the photographer went through to create that image.

The Internet, and especially social media, thrives on photography. Whether professional or amateur, the Internet needs photography and video or else it quickly becomes boring. Few people realize that early editions of the Internet didn’t have photographs. The first browsers had no way to display images. Everything was text. The Mosaic browser changed all that in 1993 and the Internet has never been the same. But with all those pictures out there, we’ve lost our respect for the pictures and the medium.

Respect The Process

Photographs appeared on the Internet a full decade before digital photography became a reasonable alternative to film. Before digital photography, the path from camera to Internet was long and trying. The film had to be developed, processed, finished, and then scanned into a digital format. Scanning was unreliable and often multiple scans had to be created before a usable copy was obtained. It was the fallacies of those early scans that necessarily gave rise to tools such as Photoshop.  The digital image had to receive further processing and editing to make it ready for online use. Weeks could pass before a  photograph was ready.

Today, even professional cameras come wi-fi equipped so that a photographer can instantly publish a photo to Instagram or other application if they desire. Still, that immediacy does not take away from the skill, talent, and effort the photographer put into that photo. More involved photographs, such as the ones at the top of this page, can take several hours over the course of multiple days before they are ready for public exposure. Months of planning may take place before the frame is even snapped. Nothing about a professional photograph is easy or accidental.

Respect for the process shows respect for the hours of training, the multiple specializations brought to bear, the difficulty of knowing which adjustments to make  and when a line has been crossed. Just because one can see a photo instantly after it is taken doesn’t mean that the photo is done. Raw images are seldom as perfect as they might appear on the back of a camera. A lot of hard work and creativity goes into almost every professional image.

Respect The People

One of the biggest disgraces of the Internet are those mean-spirited people we refer to as trolls. The problem has become so severe that Time magazine saw fit to devote a cover story to the topic. Writer, Joel Stein describes the problem thusly:

…if you need help improving your upload speeds the web is eager to help with technical details, but if you tell it you’re struggling with depression it will try to goad you into killing yourself. Psychologists call this the online disinhibition effect, in which factors like anonymity, invisibility, a lack of authority and not communicating in real time strip away the mores society spent millennia building.

Such overwhelming disregard and complete lack of respect for both the creators and subjects of photographs is why you are not allowed to comment publicly on my pages. I would love to hear kind thoughts and might even entertain technical questions. Unfortunately, opening up comments to allow for any intelligent conversation on a topic is an open invitation to trolls who, by their very definition, don’t know how to control the tongues.

I am especially likely  to lose my temper when someone shows a lack of respect for a model. Disparaging the physical appearance of a young woman has caused me to block more than one person. I can tolerate questions about a pose or whether a highlight is out of gamut, but insult a model and were it possible to reach through the Internet and punch someone, I would.  People who risk their self-esteem and personal identity to pose in photos don’t need anyone tell them they’re too short or their head is awkwardly shaped. Shut the fuck up.

Respect The Work

Not all that long ago I would occasionally give someone a signed print as a gift. I would carefully choose a photograph, perhaps one from a set they claimed to really like, go through the trouble of additional processing necessary to pull a print, and then sign and date them for authenticity. After all that effort, only once in the past  eleven years have I seen one of those works actually hanging anywhere. Instead, they’re put in the back of closets, forgotten and unappreciated. In one instance, I found a print torn, mangled, and shoved behind a file cabinet. The recipients of those gifts not only showed disregard for the gift, but failed to show any respect for the work.

Image theft, which has been a constant problem on the Internet, also exhibits a lack of respect for the work. Doing a google search for a photograph then copying it and using it for your own purposes, whether online or in a brochure is theft and lacks respect. Failure to credit photographer in the work is another form of theft and disrespect. Cropping out the photographer’s watermark is a sign that one fails to respect the image and its source.

I would be tempted to say you wouldn’t go into the Louvre, take a picture of the Mona Lisa and then try to pass it off as your own work, but, astonishingly, I can’ t. People have so little respect even for masterworks as to think that they can claim some right to misuse whatever they see.

Respect For Everyone

Failure to show respect for others ultimately reflects back on yourself. A lack of self-respect causes a failure of respect for others. We do not value in others what we do not value in ourselves. No one is fooled. All the mean-spiritedness does not hide the self-loathing. Trolls are more transparent than they realize. Photo thieves are merely trying to make up for their own shortcomings. No one is fooled.

I don’t blame photographers who feel acrimonious about the misuse of their photos and pull back permissions. The person who posts photos on Facebook without tagging the photographer disrespects both the photo and the person who took it.  After suffering that slight more than a few times a photographer has a right to say, “No more.”

I grow tired of seeing people who know absolutely nothing about photography disrespect my work. I know many other photographers feel the same. If you enjoy the pictures a photographer presents, please say something. If you don’t, there’s no need to say anything at all. Please, respectfully, keep your mouth shut.

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Advertising  /  Fashion  /  PotD
Why Do We Get Dressed Everyday
August 22, 2016
charles i. letbetter - why do we get dressed everyday

I always say: To be well dressed you must be well naked. —Oscar de la Renta

 

charles i. letbetter - why do we get dressed everyday

A growing fashion retailer asks why we get dressed. We think that’s a damn good question.

My alarm goes off at 4:00 AM and the first thing I do is reach for my clothes. I get dressed quietly, in the dark, one of the benefits of having a monochrome wardrobe. I don’t have to worry about whether colors or patterns match. By the time I get my shoes on, though, I’m sensing a nip in the air. Checking the weather app on my phone, I see it’s only 60°F outside. I pull on the sweater draped on the back of my office chair, attach the leash to the dog’s collar, and out we go for our morning walk. 4:00 in the morning and I’m already dressed. There’s something wrong with this picture.

Chances are, especially if you live in the Midwest, you  don’t think of not getting dressed. Even when we tell people we’re not feeling well and aren’t getting dressed today, we’re still wearing something. Running around naked always sounds fun until one actually does it. Then, we discover our skin sticks to things in uncomfortable ways. Little pointy objects we’d never noticed before reach out and grab at us. The slightest breeze makes us shiver. And those damned mosquitoes are a constant nuisance. Okay, time to put on some clothes.

Fashion retailer Uniqlo, which is just starting to make serious attempts at the US market, thought this might be a good time to ask the question: Why do we get dressed? The question is at the center of their very first global ad campaign and it smartly addresses a question with which many of us wrestle every morning. Why are we doing this?

We Have Our Reasons

Whether one believes ancient mythologies of how we were created or prefers the scientific explanation of evolution, we find that we’ve been covering ourselves pretty much from the moment we learned to walk upright. Even now, high school students are taught the five main reasons we get dressed:  protection, adornment, identification, modesty, and status. We break each of those down into subcategories based on things such as tradition, social class, occupational requirements, religious intervention, and comfort. We want to look acceptable even when we’re drenched in sweat.

Fashion is a $1.2 trillion industry built on one primary concept: we need to get dressed. Different labels offer different answers to the how, what, and how much of it all, Some take the quality route. Others go for practicality. Still others are nothing more than utilitarian in their scope. Our reasons are as many and varied as the styles of underwear found in our drawers. As much as we might complain, we actually like getting dressed and can be damned picky about it.

This careful choice of clothing is what Uniqlo is trying to tap with this campaign. Despite being one of the largest fashion retailers in the world, they’ve had trouble getting a foothold in the US market. The campaign focuses on both the diversity and quality of the clothes the store carries. Here, take a look at their new ad:

https://youtu.be/AKwd_0q7-mw

Not So Easily Defined

While quality and selection are wardrobe choices are important, they’re not the only reason we choose to wear what we wear. Color, for example, not only reflects certain styles and trends but also reflects our mood and our physical condition when we get dressed.  If you’re feeling a bit depressed, you might choose to wear something pink because it cheers you up. On days you need to tackle tough situations you might choose black or a dark navy because they give you a sense of power. Maybe you just really like a particular shade of green. We all have our reasons.

Some have expressed fear in the past that fashion styles are erasing our sense of nationalistic or cultural identity. I can see where someone might feel that way. Look at the ad and one notices that, while the two main characters are both white, everyone else is Japanese. This is Uniqlo’s way of staying true to their roots in Japan.  At the same time, though, we notice that everyone is wearing a distinctly Western style of clothing. Remove any racial identity and we might have trouble discerning whether this is a scene in Japan or Moscow or Paris or Minneapolis. Large retailers do tend to create a homogenous fashion palette that leaves all the customers with a certain sameness to their look.

Shoppers have proven, though, especially in recent years, that they want more say in how they put a look together. Advertisers might style a look one way, but everyone tends to put their own individual twist on things. How we look when we’re dressed says something about us individually. Uniformity is passè and, for many, insulting. We are not likely to wear head-to-toe Chanel but a certain coat or handbag might be the perfect touch for a look pieced together from discount stores  and second-hand shops. How we put ourselves together is a complicated matter for some people.

How You Should Get Dressed

Style experts, who seem to be getting younger every time I blink, tell us to utilize the three F’s when getting dressed: Feel, fit, and flatter. Granted, that approach seems a bit simplistic if your occupation requires something specific, whether it be a suit for the boardroom or dungarees for working with heavy equipment. Such restrictions can make the flattery element challenging but if the feel and fit are on point then the look is probably going to be flattering anyway.

Fit is probably where we fail most often. As our weight fluctuates between seasons and levels of activity, we find ourselves trying to squeeze into clothes that are too tight or trying to find creative ways to hold up something that’s a touch too large. People at either end of the spectrum, either very thin or very large, have the most difficulty finding something that both fits and flatters. Retailers like Uniqlo best serve the mainstream. Anyone with special challenges can find getting dressed more like a nightmare.

Perhaps the question of why we get dressed is one we should ask more often. Too often we pull on whatever is close and convenient with no regard to even how it feels, much less fit or flatter. We all might be happier if we considered the reasons we wear what we wear. Certainly, it would make our society more interesting and less like a homogenous blur. Express yourself in what you choose to wear.

Even if you’re only wearing underwear.

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Art  /  Photography  /  studio nudes
Learning To Enjoy The Limits Of Light
August 21, 2016
charles i. letbetter - learning to enjoy the limits

The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits. —Albert Einstein

 

charles i. letbetter - learning to enjoy the limits

Limits that are placed on us can be frustrating but sometimes, when we relax, we find those limits are actually quite beautiful

We are one year away from an incredible experience. On this date in 2017, a total solar eclipse passes over the United States on a path from Oregon to North Carolina. The premium viewing point is in Southern Illinois. Here in Indianapolis, though, we might actually see something more spectacular. Instead of a complete blackout in the middle of the day, we will be left with just the tiniest sliver of light. Granted, it will still be pretty freaking dark and you do not want to look at that thing with bare naked eyes. Optometrists don’t need the business that badly. Still, I’m anxious to see the effect of that tiny sliver of light.

Mythologies surrounding a solar eclipse are many. Several ancient cultures believed the sun was being eaten by one animal or another. Others believed a god was decapitated and obscured the sun. Ancient Greeks were all about doom and gloom and were certain that horrible, horrible things were about to happen. They were right. They would have been right without the eclipse as well. Ancient Greece was just screwed no matter what.

While we must have light, and lots of it, to live, there are benefits to using limited light, especially when it comes to creative matters. Working within those limits can be challenging, especially when what light exists comes from the wrong direction or a very weak source. Yet, when we take that challenge and bend it to our will, the limits we work within can result in wonderful creativity.

The Limits Of Sanity

My friend Keith allows me to borrow his creative space from time to time. There are some concepts that really need the tools and effects of a studio, but shooting in any indoor environment comes with some inherent limits. The lights are a different temperature than natural light. There are walls and a limit to how the light will spread. Backgrounds don’t always match the concept as well as we might like. Ceilings, ugh, are never high enough. Yet, there are benefits to working within those limits.

Where we stretch the limits of sanity, and of my camera, are when we reduce that light down as low as reasonably possible. Keith always looks at me like I’m crazy when I ask him to turn off all the lights but one. When working with such a limited light source, it doesn’t take much to generate a misfire and a photo that is unusable. Getting it right takes some experience, some precision, and no small amount of luck.

It’s one thing to employ this tactic on a still object. Doing it with a live model is even more challenging. Every time she moves risks putting her outside the light’s premium arc. We’re looking for highlights we can exploit and her range of motion is bound by the limits of where we know the light is going to hit. Not every frame is going to be usable. Am I crazy to put someone through these limits? Probably, but I’m doing it anyway.

A Little Bit Of Light

The effectiveness of such limited lights depends on the camera one is using and the settings one chooses. Both the Nikon D750 and the Canon 5DS have insanely high ISO ranges which allow for settings near 3,000 without experiencing a lot of digital noise in the image. To take the pictures below at such a setting would defeat the purpose. The highlights would be totally blown out and the rest of the image would feel off, cold, and awkward. As it turns out, though, I don’t have one of those cameras so I don’t have to make those choices.

The images below were shot at a standard ISO 100 with an aperture of f2.8. Again, more limits. At that setting, only the brightest of light is getting through. Focus is challenging as hell. Composition becomes guess work. We might have ended up with a complete mess. Yet, despite all the limits, or perhaps because of them, we came up with a collection that I like very much.

I have to admit, these photos were taken three years ago and I’m just now processing them. There were others in the collection from the same studio session that were more important. I’m not so sure but what waiting serves the best interest of the photographs. The processing method we used on these wasn’t possible back then. Sometimes waiting is worth the frustration.

Below is the end result. After all the limits came to bear, we still ended up with a set of images I really like. I hope you enjoy them as well.

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Art  /  Mythology  /  PotD  /  science
Why People Believe Stupid Sh*t
August 21, 2016
charles i. letbetter - why people believe stupid sh*t

When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. —Maya Angelou

 

charles i. letbetter - why people belive stupid sh*t

People will believe some really stupid shit. Turns out, there’s a damn good reason for that.

What if I told you that the bra shown in the picture above was the latest style from Victoria’s Secret and we got a look at it months before it is scheduled to hit stores. Would you believe me? Some of you would without question. Some might think it a bit odd but would go along with the story. A few, definitely the minority, would know that I was full of shit because you were there when we shot these images.

The truth is that the bra is the creative work of one Sasha Starz, along with both the hair and makeup (if I remember correctly). She took one of Taylor’s old, ugly bras and completely revised it so that it would be photo-worthy. Pretty good work, isn’t it? So good, many of you would have no problem believing that it came from a major lingerie retailer. Cool, huh?

We find it easy to believe a lot of things, from who made a bra to the practicality of building a defensive wall along our Southern border. We like to believe things such as walking on water, that wafers become human flesh (ICK!), and a zombie apocalypse. We’ll believe a politician’s nonsense, that Wall Street predictions come true, and that anything the Internet says is unrefutable. In fact, we’ll even believe that aliens provided NASA with special secret technology. When you stop and think about it, we’ll believe some incredibly stupid shit. Are we just brainless about some things or is there a reason we believe such nonsense?

A Little More Than Science

We were in the car yesterday when the TED Radio Hour came on our local PBS station. I enjoy the TED Radio Hour because of the way they explore a topic from many different perspectives. I always end up learning something. Yesterday, they were talking about lying and one of the segments was a conversation with Michael Shermer discussing why we believe unbelievable things. Here, take nine minutes and listen:

Shermer is a professional skeptic. In fact, he is so involved in using science to challenge what people believe that he created a quarterly magazine on the topic. One can do much worse than spend some time on their website. He has delivered TED talks twice, but it is his 2006 appearance that is most appropriate to our topic this morning. In it, he makes a statement I find quite amusing in summing up some belief systems. He says:

Anyone can talk to the dead. That’s not a problem. The problem is getting the dead to talk back.

So, why do we believe in things like people rising from the dead and seances and fortune telling? Where do we get such nonsense?

The science, Shermer explains, is that our brains are hard-wired to believe everything. Believing things that we have not experienced, things we have not seen or heard for ourselves, is largely a self-defense mechanism. He uses the example of ancient hominids who hear the grass rustle nearby and have to make a quick decision:  is it just the wind or is there a creature nearby waiting to eat them? To investigate increases the risks of becoming lunch. Therefore, they believe that the grass is hiding predators to keep safe. That belief system then spreads and might possibly become part of a larger religious system.

This Sounds Familiar

Listening to Shermer, I immediately think of the 1980 movie, The Gods Must Be Crazy. The premise revolves around a Coca-Cola bottle dropping from an airplane and hitting a bushman on the head. The bushman does not see the airplane nor does he have any concept of commercial flight. Therefore, he assumes that it is the gods who must have hit him on the head with this strangely shaped glass object. The consequences of that belief are what fill the remainder of the movie, often with humorous results. But no one from his tribe challenges his initial belief. A bottle fell from the sky. A god did it.

Since we are programmed to believe pretty much everything, we are often hesitant to challenge what we are told or what we read. Skepticism is something that has to be developed. If we grow up in an environment where we are encouraged to believe fantastic things then we are much slower to develop that skeptical need to step back and ask questions. In fact, within many belief systems, skepticism is actively discouraged. “Accept what we tell you on faith,” we are told. This early learning habit delays our ability to think critically and to apply reason to things we might not immediately understand. We create religions not based on factual information, but because we want to believe something even if there is evidence what we believe is not true.

Extrapolate that need to believe out to modern media. Why did our parents trust what Walter Cronkite told them each evening? Because in their need to know what was going on in the world they needed to believe what the man on the television was saying. When the Internet came along, we immediately applied the same need to believe and a huge problem was born.

Undermined By Our Own Biology

Since we are hard-wired to believe everything, re-wiring our brains requires some intent and intervention at an early age. When we encourage fantasy and fiction as a form of early childhood entertainment, such as fairies and Santa Claus, we discourage critical thinking, putting it off to an older age. There is little harm in believing a myth or two as toddlers perhaps but when we perpetuate mythology on top of mythology we end up with a tremendous lack of reasoning skills. As a result, people are likely to believe in the efficacy of electing someone as President whose corporate debt exceeds half a billion dollars. We might also believe that funding public education is wrong because it somehow defies freedom of choice. Someone might believe one race is inferior to another. Another might belive in rigid gender roles. The nonsense grows out of control.

At the bottom of it all, we’re not all inherently stupid, we just want to believe desperately in Santa Claus. We want to believe that everything is going to be okay. There are presents at the end of this life, aren’t there? Call it heaven, call it Nirvana, what it all comes down to is hoping there’s a giant Christmas tree on the other side of this life that is full of presents.

Maybe some people need that belief system. They need to believe that there is a reward for putting up with such a crappy shit-filled life. We believe in a Presidential candidate based on their ability to fashion the Santa Claus we want. People need to believe that life can and will be better, safer, and more comfortable. We believe in deity because we need to know that someone has a handle on all the fucking chaos.

Those Who Do Not Believe

Being skeptical is healthy. People who don’t believe, who have developed a lack of trust in the face value of any statement, don’t make the same mistakes as those who do believe. Skeptical people don’t invest with Bernie Madoff. Those who question everything are less likely to strap a bomb to their chest before attending a wedding. We live longer because people question things and are careful about what they believe.

Not that we shouldn’t believe anything. Believe in what can be proven. Vaccines work. Genetically modified foods save lives. The earth revolves around the sun. The speed of light is 299792458 meters per second. I like coffee. And scotch. And a good cigar. There is imperialistic evidence to support those claims.

But we need to not yell and scream, as I am prone to do, when a child asks “why?” for the 456,978th time this morning. We need to discourage the belief in myths that lead to unrealized expectations. There is no Santa Claus. There are no presents waiting for us after death. Person A is not better than Person B.

Don’t be just another hominid. Stop believing stupid shit. Evolve.

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Art  /  Fashion
Burberry Adapts Virginia Woolf For Fall
August 20, 2016

There is much to support the view that it is clothes that wear us, and not we, them; we may make them take the mould of arm or breast, but they mould our hearts, our brains, our tongues to their liking. —Virginia Woolf

charles i. letbetter - Burberry Adapts Virginia Woolf

Burberry blurs lines of both fashion and society with its adaption of Virginia Woolf’s Orlando

An article earlier this week in Business of Fashion discusses the changes in fashion as “Fashion’s Fourth Industrial Revolution.” Everything from how material is made to how clothes are purchased and consumed is changing in ways that a decade ago would have been impossible. What we’re experiencing is a seismic shift that redefines the most basic concepts of fashion.

Burberry and its creative director, Christopher Bailey, have put themselves at the center of that change. Earlier this year Bailey announced that the label would be combining its men’s and women’s wear runway shows, shifting to a straight-to-consumer strategy, and showing current season fashion rather than next season’s, which is traditional. Any one of those changes on its own would be significant. To bring them all to bear, with much more, at the same time changes the landscape not only for Burberry but for every other British fashion label, if not the entire industry.

What Burberry announced today is that their fall presentation is based on Virginia Woolf’s 1928 gender-fluid novel Orlando. If you’ve not heard of the work don’t feel surprised. Critics has long attempted to downplay the story of gender-fluidity as they felt it was too far out of step with society.  However, as gender-bending androgyny has become a major theme in both society and fashion, more people are giving the book another look. Additionally, Burberry is changing the time, place, and duration of its presentation.

About The Book

Bailey’s choice of inspiration may challenge the non-Oxford educated members of fashion society. When one thinks of Virginia Woolf, one typically thinks of her novel, Mrs. Dalloway. If one experienced Ms. Woolf’s writings, it was most likely in college and that only if one was truly attending a forward-thinking liberal arts institution. While Orlando is not unknown, it has only recently become more socially acceptable as attitudes toward gender fluidity, gender identity, lesbianism, and androgyny in general. Still, especially in the United States, Orlando is banned at more conservative-minded schools. If that doesn’t make you want to pick up a copy immediately I have to question your humanity.

Orlando is based on Woolf’s dear friend and frequent lover, Vita Sackville-West. Sackville-West frequently slipped between male and female identities, which was much more shocking in 1928 than we might think now. In fact, Woolf’s elegant telling of her friend’s life and exploits is so fantastic that censors of the time may not have even recognized much of the eroticism in the book. These are not characters who hold back on their feelings or desires. In a word, this book is hot.

We tend to see Orlando now as a must-read for women’s studies. Woolf champions not mere gender fluidity or bisexuality but a complete separation of gender from identity. In Orlando, we find a character that is neither male nor female, but both and either at the same time. Gender does not define personality nor characteristics. Everything is fluid and dependent upon the needs and desires of the current situation.

About The Fashion

There shall be ruffles. Lots and lots of ruffles. Orlando covers a 400-year time period, which is rather unusual for a biography. This gives Bailey plenty of room to play with the history of British fashion, however, and adapt it to serve his own needs. Will we be able to tell the difference between men’s and women’s wear? Does it really matter? Expect there to be an emphasis upon the androgynous aspects and plenty of sets that could reasonably be worn by either gender. Certainly, the gender of the model at the presentation is not indicative of for whom the garment is meant.

Burberry has already announced that they will be introducing a new bag, The Bridle, for both men and women. The bag emphasises equestrian and outdoor themes that are also likely to be found in several of the clothing styles. Equestrian themes are not uncommon among British fashion and the utilization of those characteristics is almost inherently gender neutral.

Burberry’s overcoats have long been without gender specification, at least from a practical standpoint. While there might have been some minor tailoring differences between men’s and women’s coats, they’ve always been practically insignificant and more than one chap has complained about a girlfriend absconding with his favorite Burberry trench. To a large degree, Burberry is well positioned to take on this shift in fashion and style.

About The Presentation

What may shock Burberry fans the most is that they’ve given up their afternoon showtime. This fall’s show, scheduled for September 19, doesn’t start until 7:30 PM London time (2:30 PM EDT in the US). What that time change might mean for local traffic I can only imagine. Getting to the Burberry show on time has always been a challenge with many guests arriving two or more hours in advance to avoid traffic congestion. The late time puts the show at odds with London traffic, so the typical 30-minute delay might stretch several minutes longer.

The Burberry show is also abandoning its traditional Hyde Park location for a place called Makers House in London’s Soho district. In addition to the presentation on the 19th, Markers House is open September 21-27 to showcase the works of the craftspeople involved in helping create the Burberry collection. Ceramicists; potters; leather, textile and jewelry designers; woodworkers; silversmiths, and illustrators are all part of the week-long presentation.

Then, to top everything off, the company plans to unveil a consumer app later in September to help make those instant as-you-see-them purchases easier. The impact of this development alone has the potential to send shockwaves throughout the industry if it is successful.

There is a lot going on with Burberry’s Virginia Woolf collection this fall. Perhaps this is the beginning of separating gender from fashion and fashion from seasons. Everything is different from this poinforwardrd. I’m sure this is just the beginning.

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Advertising  /  Music  /  PotD
Your Music Choices Affect How Your Food Tastes
August 20, 2016

Markets change, tastes change, so the companies and the individuals who choose to compete in those markets must change. —An Wang

 

charles i. letbetter - what you hear affects your tastes

What we hear affects how we taste. So, one beer is providing its own soundtrack

Most mornings I sit here trying to be as quiet as possible so as to not wake everyone else in the house, especially the little ones. Fortunately, everyone sleeps rather soundly, so I’m able to grind beans and make coffee without disturbing anyone other than the dog, who doesn’t mind as long as I feed him first. I enjoy sitting down with that first cup of coffee in the peace and quiet of the morning. I’ve never given any consideration as to whether music might actually change how my coffee tastes. However, I’m certainly thinking that way now.

Beer maker Stella Artois released a couple of YouTube videos this week aimed at changing how we experience their beer. Partnering with The Roots, aka the band from Jimmy Fallon’s Tonight Show on NBC, the brand is throwing some science at its customers by demonstrating how music alters how their beer tastes. No kidding. This is real science. In fact, it’s just part of a larger multi-sensory project called Le Savior. They’ve already thrown multi-sensory events in Montreal and New York where the videos take center place. Unfortunately, the rest of us just have to try and re-create the experience on our own.

Do we really care enough about the subtle tastes of a beer to change our playlists? If you drink Budweiser, you could probably care less. For Stella drinkers, though, that difference can be a huge factor in their drinking experience. Turns out, sound affects our entire culinary experience. Perhaps we should investigate.

Yes, This Is Real Science

While science has taken some hard knocks among those who refuse to believe the earth is hotter than ever, the science of auditory effects on tastes is pretty solid. Yes, we actually looked it up and did some reading. I mean, just because a beer company tells us something doesn’t mean we’re going to believe it, right? Please, tell me you don’t take these campaigns at face value. What we found is that not only is the auditory impact on food tastes a serious area of study, the volume of research on the various aspects is considerable.

At the core of all this research is how sound affects our concept of sweet and salty tastes. A 2011 study,  Effect of Background Noise on Food Perception, looked at how perceptions of food differed based upon whether diners ate in silence, quiet background noise, or loud background noise. As it turns out, noise, “diminishes gustatory food properties,” ultimately affecting the tastes we perceive from the food and drink we think we’re enjoying.

In the real world, that means we need to be eating in environments that are actually quieter, not louder, if we want to really enjoy our meals. Televisions need to be shut off. Dining al fresco at a sidewalk cafe bordering a busy street probably isn’t enhancing the tastes of the food as much as we might think. All that loud kitchen noise and clanging and overly loud conversation? That’s great if a restaurant is trying to keep you distracted from how the food actually tastes. Quieter is always better.

But Silence Drives Us Nuts

Additional research, however, shows that some sounds, specifically music, can change how we feel about certain spices and especially regarding alcoholic beverages such as wine. A 2012 study published by The British Psychological Society demonstrated that subtle background music changed how subjects responded to the same wine. Think about that. Without being told they were drinking the same wine each time, subjects rated the wine differently four different times according to changes in background music. Interestingly enough, the subjects were so concentrated on the wine, they didn’t even notice cognitively that the music had changed!

With that knowledge in hand, Stella Artois employed food scientists Bompas & Parr and then worked with The Roots to come up with two different soundtracks to emphasize either the fruity sweetness or the hoppy bitterness, depending on which one might prefer. While I’ve not seen a full menu for the four-course meal severed at the Le Savior events, I assume food choices complimented whichever soundtrack was being played.

What this raises is whether dining and/or drinking experiences can be tailored based on music choices. If a restaurant plays a brass-heavy soundtrack, for example,  are the more exotic and perhaps bitter tastes of the food going to come through more than if a lighter sound were chosen? Stop and think about it for a minute. Would knowledge of what music was playing ever impact or possibly even change your choice of where to dine?

Side A Or Side B?

Getting down to the actual videos one might find the difference between the two soundtracks almost insignificant. That theme comes up often in the comments below each video and while that source is far from being authoritative on any level we cannot ignore that we’re talking about more subtle difference that not everyone notices or appreciates. No two people approach tastes in exactly the same way. Our culinary traditions and experiences color every dish and every drink we consume. Some people care about subtle difference in flavor, some don’t. That’s cool.

Below, you’ll find both videos. Unfortunately, there’s nothing visually attractive here. The video is simply a vehicle for the soundtrack. What you’ll find, though, is that side A, which is supposed to bring out the fruitier elements of the beer has an emphasis on steel drums in the midst of the rapid-fire lyrics for which the group is known. There’s less direct melody and more percussion in this track. Side B, however, which is supposed to bring out the bitterness in the beer, is heavy on brass counter-melodies. Personally, the two tracks are obviously and completely different. However, I can see where someone not specifically tuned in on the musical elements might miss the difference. Again, one’s own tastes influence the experience.

 

Changing Minds

The question remains is whether this gimmick is enough to change anyone’s opinion about Stella Artois. For all the noise about craft and premium beers in the market, there are still a lot of people who just want something cold and alcoholic. One also has to wonder how a restaurant might serve music that meets the variety of tastes among the customers. Does every meal come with its own soundtrack? How would that even work?

Still, the test is an interesting one. Listen to the soundtracks during your next snack or drink. Who knows, they might just change your mind.

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Art  /  Fashion  /  Nature  /  Photography  /  PotD
Celebrating World Photo Day 2016
August 19, 2016
charles i. letbetter - world photo day 2016

There is nothing more miserable in the world than to arrive in paradise and look like your passport photo. —Erma Bombeck

 

charles i. letbetter - world photo day 2016

Today we celebrate the joy of taking a photo, of preserving a memory, of telling a story

Welcome to World Photo Day 2016! This is a day in which we’re going to play along nicely and pretend that the organization behind this day isn’t just trying to sell their book. We like this day because it celebrates something we feel rather passionate about: photography! I mean, who doesn’t like it when someone captures a good photo of you? Granted, for some people that is excessively more difficult than for others. I will also admit that there are times, even when the photography is good, we don’t especially like how we look. I mean, that whole passport photo quote above is way too accurate.

Still, we like to celebrate World Photo Day. Mind you, we don’t celebrate because this was the day photography was invented. The date was determined based on the Daguerreotype, which showed up in 1837. Even that wasn’t really the first photo process. The first fixed-image process was the Heliotype in 1826. What this date actually celebrates, though, is your access to photography. The French government purchased the rights to the Daguerreotype on this date in 1839 and made them open to the public. This allowed for further development of the camera so that you can take selfies with your phone.

Photography has come a long way since 1839. Photography will go a lot farther. This has never been a static industry. Change is constant as someone is continually trying to find a way to take a better, more real photo. Every time someone snaps a shutter, they capture both a moment in time and a moment in photographic history.

The Joy Of A Photo

I’ve taken hundreds of thousands of photographs over the years. From the first time until today, I still get excited when I look at the finished product and find that I have captured something special. Of course, there are times when I’m the only one who thinks a particular image is special, but many of them hold a lot of meaning.

Your pictures are the same way. Sometimes the pictures we hold most dear are those that are not technically stellar. It’s that picture of someone special, or that moment that gave you an incredible feeling, or the last time you saw the person who gave you life. Photographs tell our life’s story. They mark the moments of highs and lows. They remind us that we’re human.

So, we’ve chosen a group of photos for today that spans a range of events and emotions worth remembering for different reasons. Some pictures were chosen not because of the photo itself but because of the people involved behind the scenes. Danelle French did make up for some really great make-up on several. Some are special because of where they were taken. And several are of Kat. That’s a good excuse on its own.

We’ll take more pictures. It’s not always convenient or easy, but we keep going. Some we share. Many we don’t.  What follows is a mix of both. And if you want us to take your photos, just ask!

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Current Issues  /  Fashion  /  PotD
Terrorism Gives Fashion A Shake
August 18, 2016
charles i. letbetter - terrorism gives fashion a shake

Human rights are not only violated by terrorism, repression or assassination, but also by unfair economic structures that creates huge inequalities. —Pope Francis

 

charles i. letbetter - Terrorism give fashion a shake

Recent terrorism around the world has given the fashion industry reason to worry

Western media often turns a blind eye toward problems in the East, but as radical acts of terrorism continue to grow around the world the effect comes closer to impacting our own lives every day. For fashion, one of the most critical areas of the world is Bangladesh. Only China assembles more clothing than the many garment factories here. Over 4 million people are employed in the nation’s garment industry, making it a critical economic element. We’ve expressed concern about conditions in Bangladesh before, but now matters are more critical.

Last month, terrorists attacked a cafe in Dhaka. Twenty people were killed. Among those were two Italians with connections to the fashion industry. Seven Japanese were also killed in the attack, some of whom were there on fashion business. Almost immediately, buyers started canceling trips to the city. Retail brands began calling their staffs back home.  The ripple effect sent shivers throughout the Bangladesh garment industry.

Terrorism is not new here, nor in any of the Asian countries struggling to pull themselves from Third World status. Recent attacks, however, have given international companies reason to worry more about the safety of their employees. Employees are worrying more about the safety of simply trying to get to work of the morning. As fashion’s buyers become more reluctant to visit the impact to the fashion industry begins to grow.

Reason To Be Concerned

This time last year, terrorism was a topic whispered carefully in backrooms. While care was taken to keep presentation venues safe, no one was willing to admit that any direct efforts were made to prevent any kind of attack. Then, a Paris nightclub was hit. That act of terrorism shook one of fashion’s most important cities to its core. People wanted to know that attending fashion events would be safe. No one wants to be a victim.

Since then, another attack in Paris as well as attacks in Brussels, another city with strong fashion connections, has put the topics of terrorism and security at the front of fashion discussions. As we mentioned a couple of days ago, event organizers in all four major cities have dramatically increased their security plans for this fall’s shows. Every effort will be made to keep those security factors in the background, though. No one is planning on having armed troops standing at the doors.

For garment workers in Bangladesh, those armed troops might be a welcome sight. The rise of terrorism in that country has thrown everything into turmoil and created questions about the safety of both garment workers and retailer’s representatives in the country. Should workers begin to feel unsafe going to work, production could see a significant decrease. If buyers refuse to travel to the country, orders decline. Without retailer’s representatives keeping an eye on factories, working conditions are likely to deteriorate again. There is a lot that could be lost.

Everyone Is Affected

For those of us in the US especially, it is still very easy to dismiss terrorism when it occurs elsewhere in the world. Yes, we “Stand With Paris,” and sympathize with Brussels, but beyond the reach of social media, we don’t see those events touching  our daily lives. Our stores are still full, our prices are still low. We’re happy and completely oblivious to the dangers others face. That naivitè may be short-lived, however.

Start with the very fabrics necessary to create clothes. Much of the weaving and looming of natural fabrics is done in places where terrorism is nearly a daily occurrence, from Afghanistan to the Sudan to Third World parts of Asia. Here, terrorism threatens to disrupt the supply chain, keeping Western visitors out while preventing textile factories from being able to run at full production. As production falls, prices begin to increase.

Then, when assembly factories such as those in Bangladesh are affected, the very availability of clothes is threatened. Fast fashion retailers such as H&M are especially vulnerable to terrorism as disruptions both in ordering and supply chain threatens the regular arrival of new clothes on their store floors. Inevitable price increases threaten the already razor-thin margins that allow discount retailers to stay profitable. Another major disruption could cause holiday profits to disappear with price increases.

Responding Appropriately

Anytime terrorism raises its ugly head we face the question as to how to appropriately respond. Corporate statements carry little weight as they are carefully crafted so as to not offend anyone or commit to anything that might affect their bottom line.  Individuals assume that there’s nothing they can do beyond keeping victims “in their thoughts and prayers.” We leave it up to governments to handle the official response and assume they’ll do the right thing.

They don’t. Towns in France that ban Burkinis, Muslim swimwear that keeps a woman fully covered, are only adding to the problem, not solving it. Terrorism thrives on recruiting disaffected and marginalized people who feel betrayed by the society and government of which they long to be a part. Any time we respond in fear, any time we limit the rights of any marginalized group, we are feeding terrorism. The not-quite-under-your-breath remark made when passing someone wearing a turban helps feed terrorism. Getting Arab-looking people tossed off airplanes just because of their appearance is feeding terrorism. Supporting xenophobic politicians threatening to ban entry to the United States is feeding terrorism.

Higher prices and fewer choices are the price we will ultimately pay for terrorism against the fashion industry. With the luxury market already taking some severe hits the past two years, any additional decline could see retailers cutting back on inventory, orders dropping, labels making cuts, quality suffering, and prices jumping dramatically. What we say and how we treat people can have a much larger  effect than we realize.

Terrorism isn’t going to stop overnight. More attacks will happen. Much of what happens we cannot prevent no matter what we do. Power-mad ideological extremists don’t employ reason when determining their actions. We can keep those attacks from changing how we respond to people, though. We must care more about people now than we ever have. Fashion is good at caring. We just need to emphasize those actions a lot more.

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Just For Fun  /  PotD
A Joke And A Groan And Maybe A Smile
August 17, 2016
charles i. letbetter - a joke, a groan, and maybe a smile

If your regime is not strong enough to handle a joke, then you don’t have a regime. —Jon Stewart

 

charles i. letbetter - joke and groan and smile

Telling a joke without making everyone groan is a talent few have but at least we still smile

My late father couldn’t tell a joke well to save him. He was so bad at telling jokes, in fact, that the mention of that characteristic was part of his eulogy. Poppa had a great sense of humor and loved to laugh. He would go to various conventions and meetings and here what he thought was a decent enough joke (it made him chuckle) and would want to re-tell it to his congregation. He failed almost every time.

I’m not sure my brother or I fare much better. I tend to drag everything out into a long story rather than going straight for the punchline. That’s why I’m able to fill this space so completely every morning. I can’t remember the last time I heard my brother tell a joke. I’m sure he does, I’m just never around to hear them. He doesn’t really come off as a big comedian, though.

Telling a joke that doesn’t leave the audience groaning is tough. Many groans are based on puns and our response to puns will always be a groan. Some jokes are just bad. Still, even when a joke fails we’re often left smiling, which is an improvement over not smiling.

Yesterday was #NationalTellAJokeDay which sent everyone to Twitter in an attempt to tell a joke. As in real life, most failed. Miserably. But we’ve taken a few that made us smile, divided them into categories, and leave them for you here in hopes that it might make your day better. We all can use a smile about now, can’t we?

Business

 

School

The Internet

Sex

Okay, a couple more just because the groans make me giggle

Okay, so there’s nothing deep or meaningful about any of these jokes. There’s nothing wrong with letting yourself smile over something silly. After all, it’s only Wednesday. We need a little silly to get us through the rest of the week.

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Nature  /  Personal  /  Status
Weathering Persistent Weather
August 16, 2016

Nature is so powerful, so strong. Capturing its essence is not easy – your work becomes a dance with light and the weather. It takes you to a place within yourself. —Annie Leibovitz

 

charles i. letbetter - weathering persistent weather

weather is taking its toll and the forecast is looking grim.

Holding the dog’s leash in my hand, I check the current weather conditions one more time before we walk out the door. “High chances for tornadoes and severe storms,” the app says. I look at the dog as I put on my hat. We’ve made these early morning walks in the rain the past two days. He doesn’t seem to mind all that much.

I open the back door and we step out. The dog instantly puts his nose to the air and takes a big sniff. A cat has taken shelter under the carport during the night and he looks to see if the poor creature is still there. It’s not. We step away from the house and are met be a stronger-than-usual wind. He stops and sniffs the air again then turns and looks at me as if to say, “One of us is fucking crazy.”

“Let’s get this over with,” I tell him. He turns around and heads for the sidewalk. He knows the routine. I hardly need to hold the leash. There’s nothing falling on us this morning, but that wind is eery and brings the fragrance of storms from across the horizon. I’d like to say this weather sucks, but that would just be stating the obvious. Besides, it’s going to get worse.

Weather Has A Hold On Me

The Old Farmer’s Almanac released its winter forecast last week. That forecast is a climatological event that makes the folks at NOAA jealous. According to the Almanac, which claims an 80% accuracy rate, we’re in for a colder and wetter winter than we’ve seen in quite a while. Buy an extra snowplow if you live in the Northeast. Here in the Midwest, ya’ might want to buy an extra shovel and a lot of salt. This one could get nasty.

Of course, the Almanac’s forecast is exactly the opposite from what NOAA is saying. According to the so-called professionals, we’re looking at drier and warmer conditions than normal. Whether that weather news is positive or negative depends on what one considers normal. If the baseline is 45°F, then a degree or two warmer isn’t bad at all. Rather nice. However, if the baseline is -10°F then a couple of degrees warmer doesn’t make a lick of difference.

Yeah, I pay an inordinate amount of attention to the weather. I always have. When yesterday’s storms hit, I sent the kids and animals into the bathroom for protection. Then, I went outside and watched. I’m told that’s an Okie thing. I learned it from my father. You can’t trust the sirens. You need to see the funnel for yourself, then  you take cover. I didn’t see the funnel. The weather system stayed to our West and North.  We barely got a sprinkle.

With Weather Comes Pain

With this morning’s rain, we have now had precipitation for the past seven days straight. Fortunately, we’re not flooding like Louisiana has. Our rains have been light for the most part. While walking across the lawn feels like stepping on a wet sponge, we’re not in danger of needing to be rescued. The situation could be a lot worse.

Yet, for me, we’re nearing a breaking point. Such weather is hard on my arthritis any time it occurs. Having endured it for seven days straight now, I’m ready to scream. There’s no way to describe the amount of pain that has built up across my body. Neither is there any amount of pain killer that addresses that problem without making me lethargic and unproductive. I can either stay awake and deal with a limited range of motion, or go to bed and get absolutely nothing done. I can tell you now, no editing is getting done today.

So, I look at the two competing long-range forecasts and wonder: do I bother trying to put together a photography project for the winter? I don’t want to get people excited about a concept and then not be able to follow through. If NOAA is correct, then there’s no problem. We can probably shoot all winter long. If the Old Farmer’s  Almanac is correct, though, then I’ll hardly leave the house all winter. I know who  has the better track record. This isn’t looking good.

Weather-Driven Planning

What I need is a creative art director who can grab hold of a concept and find ways to make sure we pull it off no matter what the weather. There’s no way I’m going to be successful on my own.  I need help, but it has to be that kind of creative help that knows how to guard against Murphy’s Law. When the weather is in charge of the planning, there’s no doubt that things will go wrong. I need someone who can recruit models, find locations, handle styling, and create backups so that once we set a date we know something creative is going to happen.

I don’t have that person, though. Kat’s school schedule is too demanding for such activities. I’d offer to take applications but I’m not sure anyone’s actually interested in the position. After all, we’ve already determined I have anger issues. Bad weather doesn’t tend to put me in a good mood. Does anyone want to expose themselves to such a situation?  Not likely.

What I do know is that I’ll likely have the spend much of today in bed. I’ll take what meds I can, but they won’t do much good. I’ll try to keep complaints to a minimum, but I reserve the right to curse like a sailor every time I fall or drop something.

Tomorrow’s another day. Maybe by Thursday we will be able to mow the lawn. Life goes on, right?

Stop looking at me like I’m crazy, dog. You’re the one who keeps eating cat poop.

Oh look, it’s raining again. Damn weather.

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Fashion  /  PotD
Fashion Is Changing Its Look. Again.
August 16, 2016

Fashion doesn’t look good only on models; it can look good on different people of different ages and different body shapes. —Alber Elbaz

 

charles i. letbetter - fashion is changing its look - again

The next round of fashion weeks is just around the corner and the whole system is changing its look

We are now less than a month away from New York Fashion Week. One of the most frequent statements made back in February was, “we’ll have to wait until September.” Many of the changes that were announced early in the year com into fruition with next month’s set of shows. Not only have designers swapped seats, attitudes about the shows themselves have changed. Even more, the economy surrounding fashion has changed. What we experience through the fashion shows this season is likely to be a very different look than what we saw this time last year.

Change is a given in fashion. We wouldn’t need to do these dog-and-pony shows twice a year if fashion wasn’t always changing. We complain if we see two collections in a row that look too terribly similar. What’s important this season is the degree of change. Major wheels were set in motion back in the spring that change not only what we see now, but how we see it. The very structure of the presentations is changing and that may influence our perspective of the shows as well as our buying habits.

As I type this, schedules for New York are being finalized. There are some names we’ve come to expect that we won’t see on the roster this year. London, Milan, and Paris are getting ready as well and it’s just not the same as it was back in the Spring (if you can call February  Spring). The whole attitude is different. Let’s consider some of the changes.

Designers Swapping Seats

The number one topic at the beginning of each season is always which designers have switched to different labels. We didn’t see a tremendous amount of significant movement back in February, but we’ve certainly had some major changes since then and now all that jostling around has to prove its worth. These are going to drive changes in look for a number of labels.

  • Raf Simons has moved to Calvin Klein. You had to be hiding under a rock to miss this announcement. Everyone knew Raf was moving almost from the moment the first phone call was placed. The timing could have perhaps been a bit better. Simons works fast but it would be out of the ordinary even for him to create a full set on his own by  September 15, which is when CK is likely to show. Still, he’ll  be anxious to demonstrate the direction in which he wants to take the line. Anxiety and anticipation are very high here.
  • Peter Copping left Oscar de la Renta. What the fuck? This one almost knocked me out of my chair when the announcement was made last month. It’s been less than two years since Oscar de la Renta named Copping as his successor and then promptly died. The match looked perfect. The past two season’s shows have been well received. What the fuck happened? No one on either side is talking. Copping promptly moved back to the UK. De la Renta will run with a design team for the time being. We are very confused and very sad.
  • Bouchra Jarrar makes her debut at Lanvin. This looks to be one of the most highly anticipated shows of the season. Jarrar brings a different look, a more feminine look, back to Lanvin. That being said, shareholders are watching for a collection that resonates with buyers and increases sales. Will it work? We’ll see.
  • Anthony Vaccarello takes over at Yves Saint Laurent. The whole attitude has changed at YSL. Vaccarello comes from Versus Versace and almost certainly is going to bring some of Donatella’s influence with him. Expect a sexier, more defined, and perhaps even a little edgier look than YSL saw under Hedi Slimane.
  •  Maria Grazia Chiuri changes things up at Dior. Following Raf Simons isn’t going to be easy. Dior took its sweet time replacing the famed designer and makes a bold statement in appointing the label’s first female creative director. Chiuri makes the leap from Valentino where she was co-creative director. Pierpaolo Piccioli now has sole authority over there.

Spending this season on the sidelines, still, are Alber Elbaz and Hedi Slimane. One really has to wonder why they’ve not been snatched up.

A Little Less Fur

Fur has long been a mainstay of luxury fashion and Angora has been the go-to fur for quite a while given the endangered status of wild sources. Then, Peta, the animal rights group, took aim at the Angora industry in 2013, claiming harvesting methods were cruel. Now, it seems Peta has won. Orders for the fur dropped dramatically for this season after more than 100 major labels suspended use of fabric. Other types of fur have seen dramatic declines as well. I have to admit that I’m curious as to whether Dennis Basso is reducing his use of fur at all. Historically, he’s been unapologetic about using fur and animal skin in general.

What’s next? Wool. A recent op-ed takes aim at the ubiquitous fabric, claiming that large-scale harvesting methods are just as cruel as those used on angora rabbits.  Will this movement catch hold? The atmosphere certainly seems to be ripe for it, but the global use of wool peaks for the fall/winter season. We’re not likely to see any change until February.

What Season Is This?

We talked back in February about designers skipping the fall shows to go real-time this September.  Well, September  is here and we get to find out whether that strategy is going to work. Be sure, all eyes are watching Burberry, Tom Ford, and Rebecca Minkoff, among others, to see how they handle the straight-to-stores approach. Critical to this new look is whether consumers are confused by seeing both fall/winter looks and spring/summer looks in the same season. The seasonal look has been muted the past few years, with coats in spring and shorts in the fall almost being normal.

This change may work well, though, as designers look for alternative presentation methods. Criticism of the traditional runway approach grew rather heated back in February, but we’re not hearing much talk about the alternatives leading up to this season’s shows. Will Gloria Vanderbilt return to a runway approach or will she go with another fashion event that confuses the hell out of everyone? Talk back in the spring held that we would see more such presentations this fall, but as budgets have been trimmed to match declining profits much of that talk has disappeared.

A Little More Security

For people in Paris and London, the world feels less safe than it did back in February. Organizers in Milan and New York aren’t taking any risks, either. Whereas some designers had been flirting with the idea of open-to-the-public presentations, more care is being taken this fall to ensure the safety of everyone involved. Invitation requests are vetted with increased scrutiny and press credentials are more difficult to obtain. Guests lucky enough to attend an event will find security lines longer than ever. Restrictions on what guests can bring with them, including nail files and hair spray, are taken seriously.

Paris saw dramatically increased security last season but it didn’t seem to interfere with the overall spirit and celebration of the events. This season, though, there is a palpable difference in the tone. Multiple attacks across Europe have everyone looking over their shoulder. Supplier lists are under greater scrutiny. Location accessibility is a concern. In some cases, labels who might have traditionally sought a larger audience are scaling back a bit to reduce the risk.

Everyone wants fashion week to be fun and exciting, but the shadow of terrorism is impossible to escape.

Side Glance To Retail.

Macy’s is closing 100 stores. The announcement wasn’t a surprise. In fact, the retail conglomerate said earlier this year that store closings were coming. Yet, the impact was still like dropping a ton of bricks across the fashion industry. At the same time, China’s luxury market, which had been the one strong point in the industry, has begun a decline. No one is sure yet how much a hit global fashion brands might take but the Chinese government is making it clear they want those Yen to stay at home.

Meanwhile, both H&M and Lululemon are anticipating continued growth. Low-priced fast fashion is eating away at the luxury sector and forcing major labels to  make changes to their corporate look. As much movement as there has been among designers, there’s been even more seat swapping among fashion’s corporate CEOs. Even Burberry’s Christopher Bailey had to take a back seat in the boardroom over the summer.  No one wants to make a knee-jerk move that spooks the fragile market, but if sales don’t improve we may see even bigger shifts in the look of fashion by next February.

We Can’t Stop Watching

All that being said, interest in fashion is as high as ever. Fashion schools are experiencing prime enrollment numbers. Fashion magazines have retooled their look and enjoying higher numbers than this time last year. Instagram and Snapchat are full of fashionista-wannabes taking selfies of their latest look. Interest in fashion hasn’t waned one bit.

Everyone is being cautious, though. With so many changes hitting at the same time, this could be a very exciting season. We are hoping for a very exciting season. Strong interest in shows next month could do wonders for a slumping retail market. Don’t expect anything that looks like last year, though. This fashion look has changed dramatically. You may need to clean out your closet and start all over.

Prep your credit cards now. NYFW begins September 9.

Photo credits:

Model: Presley Stewart (LModelz)
Makeup: Danelle French
Hair: Jenise Norgaard
Styling: Nativa (Allyson Brooks and Lila Palomares)

Photography: charles i. letbetter

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Photography  /  PotD
Photography Education: What We Need To Know
August 15, 2016
charles i. letbetter - photography education: what we need to know

The aim of education is the knowledge, not of facts, but of values. —William S. Burroughs

 

charles i. letbetter - photography education: what we need to know

What is the best education for a photographer, a school or real life experience? (Photo by Polina Osherov, 2012)

This is a first. I’ve had a long-standing rule for myself that only my own pictures would accompany the articles here. Today we are making an exception for the point of education. The picture at the top was taken by Gary Watson, New Year’s Eve, 2012. The photo above was taken by Polina Osherov in June of 2012. Sometimes we have to let someone else take the pictures. That’s an important lesson. See? Education. It’s everywhere.

Well, not everywhere, exactly. Specifically, you’ll not be finding photography education at the Brooks Institute in Ventura, California anymore. The school announced late last week that they are closing. Founded on the heels of WWII by Ernie Brooks, Sr., the Brooks school was unique during the 20th century in that it put as much emphasis on the non-camera-related aspects of photo education as it did the picture-taking portions. Graduates during that period, and there were a bunch of them, were grounded, knew how to handle themselves professionally, and, for the most part, took damn good pictures. I’ve run into Brooks grads several times over the past 30 years.

Visit the school’s website today, though, and on the front page is posted the announcement:

With deep regret, Brooks announces that the school will close on October 31, will continue to offer administrative and student services support.

On the Brooks Facebook page, both current  students and incoming freshmen are pissed, and understandably so. Formal photography education isn’t what it once was.

This Specific Instance

For-profit schools have been taking a beating for a while now. Just ask anyone who has gone to or been affiliated with the Arts Institutes or ITT Tech, both of which have had to weather both investigations and fines from the federal government as well as numerous lawsuits from former students and faculties. Education and profit are not generally compatible in the first place. Throw in the temptation to defraud the federal government through the student loan program and bad things start happening quickly.

There is no indication that Brooks suffered from that particular problem, though. Instead, according to an article in the Ventura County Star, Brooks simply did not have enough students. Only 350 students were scheduled for this fall. In 2005, enrollment was 2,563. With or without federal financing issues, that’s a pretty big hit. While the article doesn’t go into particular detail, I assume that the school had already started laying off instructors and trimming administrative staff. The school had changed ownership multiple times over the past few years and its current owners,  Green Planet, were unable, or perhaps unwilling, to turn those numbers around.

In all likelihood, Green Planet is going to be hit with a class action lawsuit for defrauding students. Brooks was not part of recognized accreditation systems, so credits earned at Brooks do not transfer to other California schools. With recent administration changes, the charge that administrators knew that closing was imminent is one that is difficult to deny. What was once a well-regarded photography school has met a very sad and possibly unnecessary end.

Who Needs Photography Education?

On one level, there is a very legitimate argument that photography schools are no longer necessary, if they ever were. Think of the great photographers we’ve known: Horst, Helmut Newton, Richard Avedon, Herb Ritts. You’ll not find a photography degree among them. Avedon enrolled in Columbia University as a poetry major but dropped out. Herb went to Bard College and majored in economics.  Neither Horst nor Helmut gave the matter any consideration. Even now, I’m not immediately aware of anyone I would consider an above-standard photographer who is running around with a photography degree tucked in their belt.

From its inception, photography has been one of those skills developed outside the classroom, most typically as an assistant for another photographer. There are too many exceptions to the rules, too many instances where one has to shoot on the fly, for classroom instruction to hold a great deal of real-world value. Those who do the best are those who learned on the job and developed their own style that allowed them to stand out from the rest.

Yet, even there, Brooks was different than the rest. Talk to the few remaining photographers who came out of the 1940s and they’ll tell you they picked up photography during the war, most often while serving in the Air Force. And who was teaching pilots and others to use photography during WWII? Ernie Brooks, Sr. After the war, his first ten students were vets who wanted to transfer what they had learned in combat into a marketable skill at home and Ernie Brooks was the right person to teach them. His education system was practical, rooted in reality. Only when the school stepped away from that model did their enrollment and reputation decline.

Arguing For Specialization

As cameras have developed, especially in this digital age where everyone thinks they’re a photographer, some would argue that specialization is the key to photographic success, at least from a commercial standpoint. While I don’t think that argument holds water universally, within certain locations, such as California, it has some validity. There, formal education might not be such a bad idea.

Brooks Institute included some courses that might be difficult to find just anywhere. For example, Brooks had an in-water diving photography course. First off, getting credit for underwater photography sounds incredibly cool. However, it’s not one of those things one just picks up randomly. One benefits from not only having a professional dive instructor, but one that understands the effects of increasing pressure on their photography equipment and other underwater dangers. Brooks also had degree courses in science and technological imaging and other specialized courses.

When dealing with elements that contain a high degree of difficulty, specialized equipment, or a significant amount of danger, finding a school that teaches those skills is probably a better bet than attempting to learn them while assisting someone else, or worse yet, on your own using YouTube videos. Highly specialized aspects of photography need a highly specialized mode of education. Unfortunately, those programs are expensive and a for-profit school is likely to find the investment not worth the return.

More Than A Shutter Click

I am not likely to ever get behind the notion that a formal photography education makes one a better photographer. What makes one a better photographer is getting out there and taking pictures. Take bad pictures at first. That’s okay. Lord knows I certainly wasted more than a few rolls of film trying to figure our the whole damn process of measuring light and angles and reflectivity. With practice, most of us get better (I’ve met a few exceptions). If one is dedicated to becoming a good photographer, one will become a good photographer.

The problem with formal photography education, however, is that not everyone who takes a class is truly dedicated.  Let me reference back to last week’s article about not doing what you love. While this is true of many areas of study, photography is especially prone to the problem. Someone just loves taking pictures and their friends think they look professional. So, why not go to school and get a degree in what you love? If only what we think we love were the things we are actually good at doing. I know almost as many former photography students as I do former music students and in both groups, there is a high percentage of those who don’t remain in their field  of study. I’m one  of them (I have a music degree, remember?).

If there is an argument for being part of a formal photography education system it is the camaraderie found among fellow classmates. One of the biggest challenges to survival as a photographer is the ability to network with others. Photographers who attend schools with graphic arts departments, illustration departments, and more, build relationships across those lines that can serve them well in the real world. In fact, to some degree, the ability to build up a network of peers and professional relationships is at times more valuable than learning how to work a camera. Replicating that opportunity in the real world is almost impossible.

Learning To Change

I feel sympathetic toward the 350 Brooks Institute students who now have nowhere to learn. Many had traveled from other countries and diverse places across this one. Apartment leases were signed. Arrangements made. Money spent. They have every right to be angry with the school’s owners.

What we ultimately take away, though painfully, is that in photography as in everything else we must learn to change. What Ernie Brooks, Sr. built doesn’t fit well in the modern world of digital photography. Were he or his son still living, perhaps they could have guided the school through the change. But when the eyes are on the bottom line positive change is extremely rare. What’s good for the investors is rarely good for the school. Welcome to the real world, kids. Here’s your first lesson in adapting to sudden change.

The lesson should not be lost on the rest of us. I never thought I would need to understand computers in order to be a good photographer. If I remain in this profession another 30 years, I’m likely to have to adapt to more change, including virtual reality and 3D imaging. There is no way I can sit here and predict the severity of change that might be in our future, but I am sure it will change and we will still need to learn.

And the biggest change of all is still out there: letting go and letting someone else take the pictures. Sometimes learning is hard.

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Editorial  /  pop culture
Anger That’s Good For Body & Soul
August 14, 2016
charles i. letbetter - anger is good for body and soul

Beware of him that is slow to anger; for when it is long coming, it is the stronger when it comes, and the longer kept. Abused patience turns to fury. —Francis Quarles

 

charles i. letbetter - anger is good for body & soul

We’ve all been told that anger is a negative emotion. New research says otherwise.

Those closest to me know that I have anger issues. I always have. When I was small I would deal with the anger by hopping on my bike and riding until I was exhausted. As I grew older, I developed other coping mechanisms such as biting my tongue (literally) and counting to 100. Many times I would walk away from a situation that was making me angry. None of those methods were completely fool-proof though. There have been many times when my anger has boiled over and everyone nearby has felt the wrath.

We’ve all been told our entire lives that anger is a negative emotion, one we shouldn’t give any room or attention. Consider how our universal mindset is positioned for an anti-anger attitude:

  • In a controversy the instant we feel anger we have already ceased striving for the truth, and have begun striving for ourselves. —Buddha
  • Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one. —Benjamin Franklin
  • The greatest remedy for anger is delay. —Lucius Annaeus Seneca
  • Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured. —Mark Twain
  • Every day we have plenty of opportunities to get angry, stressed or offended. But what you’re doing when you indulge these negative emotions is giving something outside yourself power over your happiness. You can choose to not let little things upset you. —Joel Osteen

Today, I can call horseshit on all the anti-anger sentiment.

A Preponderance Of Evidence

Normally, articles such as this one stem from a single reading that branches out to various pieces of scientific research. This time, however, two very different articles showed up in my inbox at almost exactly the same time from two dramatically different sources. When I looked at the headlines sitting there together, I had to chuckle. The universe rarely gives me this kind of synchronicity. Then, I assumed the two articles likely contained different views of the same research. I was wrong. Both brought their own research to the party. By the time I read everything, I was thoroughly exhausted.

Where we start is with this article by Zaria Gorvett for the BBC. Ms. Gorvett’s writing here is extremely well researched. I would like to think that you would follow the link to her article and read the research which she references. You won’t, though, will you? Don’t worry, I’ll cover the high points for you.

The second article is from the more surprising source. The Greater Good website is the cumulative work of the Greater Good Science Center at Berkely University. Their stated purpose is:

The Greater Good Science Center studies the psychology, sociology, and neuroscience of well-being, and teaches skills that foster a thriving, resilient, and compassionate society.

Sounds all warm and fuzzy, doesn’t it? Yet, from this source comes Christine Carter’s article on Why It Doesn’t Pay To Be A People-Pleaser. When the universe delivers a double-whammy like that I’m pretty sure it means for me to pay attention.

The Soft Side Of Anger

Dr. Carter’s article takes a softer approach to the topic, not actually hitting the emotion of anger head-on but rather coming at it from the dichotomy of trying to please other people. If that doesn’t fuel some major anger and resentment I don’t know what does. She delivers three very good reasons why trying to be that super-positive Mr/Ms Happy all the time is a bad idea:

  • We don’t actually fool anyone
  • We find it harder to focus
  • You’ll become more stressed and anxious

The last subtopic was what really got my attention. Faking happy when we’re really not, shoving down our anger and frustration and trying to force the positivity is bad for us. Blood pressure goes up. Anxiety becomes more dominant. Our immune system doesn’t work as well resulting in more frequent illness. Not letting out all that anger you’re building up can kill you, and fast!

More than that, trying to push the happy when we’re obviously not happy is lying. We’re not really pulling the wool over anyone’s eyes. The people who work around you, the people who live around you, and even the kid who helps carry your groceries to the car knows your faking. Do you really want to live a lie or is it better to accept that some things totally piss you off and deal with your anger?

Dr Carter emphasises that the more we try to fake it, the more damage we do:

It’ll increase the odds that you react more aggressively to a provocation, eat more tempting snacks, engage in riskier behaviours, and—this one is pretty compelling to me—perform more poorly on tasks that require executive function, like managing your time, planning, or organizing.

See? All that fake goody-goodness isn’t doing anyone one damn bit of good.

Letting The Anger Flow

Ms. Gorvett comes at us with a strong statement that is backed by a truckload of research. Shove the positivity horseshit. Being angry accomplishes more good and is healthier at the same time.

The truth is, pondering the worst has some clear advantages. Cranks may be superior negotiators, more discerning decision-makers and cut their risk of having a heart attack. Cynics can expect more stable marriages, higher earnings and longer lives – though, of course, they’ll anticipate the opposite.

See all the links in that quote? Those lead to the research supporting her statement, and she’s just getting started. Good moods, all that happy-happy nonsense, is bad for you. I’m not just talking about emotions here. That positive attitude makes one more gullible, more selfish, and even encourages binge drinking, overeating and unsafe sex. This isn’t anecdotal. The research is right there in black and white.

Being angry, it turns out, puts us on guard, makes us more aware of a situation, and prepares us to be able to solve problems more quickly. Not surprisingly, this comes from our primal instincts and the need to protect ourselves. When our cave-dwelling ancestors lost a friend or family member to an aggressor, they got pissed off and either found a way to kill the aggressor or, if that wasn’t possible, move the fuck out of the offender’s territory.

Anger is a great motivator to help us get things done. Many times we don’t realize a problem exists until it pops up and ruins our day. We don’t like having our days ruined so we find a way to put that nonsense to an immediate end so that it doesn’t happen again. With that problem solved, we’re just a little less likely to be angry tomorrow. We’re doing well, right?

Anger Isn’t Going To Kill You

Pay attention here. Kat is constantly on me that my anger is raising my blood pressure and that I’m likely to have a heart attack while in the midst of having a nuclear meltdown over something. We’ve heard the same thing from doctors and psychologists for as long as we’ve been asking their advice. My son has taken to putting a kitten in my lap when he senses my anger reaching the boiling point. However, the research takes a different opinion.

644 people who already had coronary artery disease were followed for five to ten years. The study looked at anger, suppressed anger, and tendencies to experience stress. Guess what? The research showed that anger had NO IMPACT on one’s mortality. However, suppressing that shit increases the chances of having a heart attack nearly three-times over. You’ll just have to excuse me if I scream at someone the next time they no show on an appointment. I’m preventing a heart attack, dammit.

Furthermore, being angry the first time might prevent you from experiencing the same stressor later. If you’ve gotten angry over a situation, the next time that situation comes up your more likely to take steps to avoid what made you angry, such as making backups of your work, or packing extra clothes, or being sure the waiter explicitly understands that you’re allergic to mango. Anger saves our lives by putting us on our guard against Murphy’s Law.  When you’re expecting bad things to happen, you’re more likely to be ready.

Anger Is Good

People who are angry are more likely to have a well-established sense of fairness, are more likely to be generous with their resources, and are more likely to help people they see who are in need. They’re more prepared for life’s disasters and have the attitudes to deal with the stress. Angry people solve problems, are better negotiators, and invest more sensibly.

By contrast, people who are all positive and goody-goody all the time are more likely to be taken in by scams, are more likely to waste their money, are more likely to have failed relationships, and are more likely to become the victims of unexpected disasters. They also have shorter life spans, are more likely to fall prey to incurable disease, and need more assistance.

Which of those camps would you rather be in? For myself, I think I’ll keep hold of my anger, thank you. If you don’t want to experience it, then don’t fuck up. Do what you say you’re going to do. When you book an appointment, show the fuck up.  Pay when services are delivered.

Oh, and one more thing:  STAY THE FUCK OFF MY LAWN!

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Editorial  /  pop culture  /  PotD
Humility Is Good For Your Brain
August 14, 2016

 

Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility. —Saint Augustine

charles i. letbetter - humility is good for your brain

Humility may be counter-intuitive but is a critical part of learning

I’ve been taking pictures longer than a third of the US population has been alive. Yet, there are still aspects of photography with which I struggle. I have three adult sons about whom I generally feel positive. Knowing how to respond correctly to Kat’s little ones, though, often leaves me frustrated and confused. I like to think I am generally a smart guy, but I start reading through the journal articles to which I subscribe and it only takes a few minutes before I feel as dumb as a box of rocks. Humility reaches out and slaps me in the face on a daily basis.

We live in what has the potential to be a gilded age of knowledge. For the first time in the history of humanity, there is almost universal access to information and the combined knowledge of experts in almost every field. Yet, we’ve yet to experience anything close to a renaissance of intellectual reasoning or academic understanding. Why? How are we missing out on what should be one of the most fantastic periods of advancement in the history of the world?

The answer to that question is simple but painful to accept:  We lack any sense of academic humility. We are so confident that we already know everything we need to know that we close our minds to even looking for more knowledge and information. We let Internet memes inform our opinions. Our social media feeds become our sole source of knowledge. If a topic isn’t trending we don’t know that it exists and, even worse, we don’t care.

Why We Need Humility

From the outset, we are plagued with the misguided notion that equates humility with weakness. Popular social themes have instructed us to “fake it ’til you make it.” Pseudo-psychologists appearing on talk shows have us convinced that we need to exude self-confidence even to the point of covering up the fact that we don’t know something. Employment “experts” tell us that it is just fine to walk into a job interview and pretend to know something we don’t in order to land a job. After all, you can always look it up on the Internet later, right?

All that advice you’ve been listening to is wrong. Every last damn bit of it. Throw it all away. Push it from your mind. Do you want strength? Start with a little humility and admit that you don’t actually know nearly as much as you want people to think you know. We are all so fallible that when we are correct it comes as a surprise.

Jacob Burk, writing for aeon, lays out a strong argument that the ineffective way we obtain information has given us an over-confidence in what we think we understand. He cites recent research, which I strongly suggest you read but know you won’t, showing the “illusion of wisdom” that comes from our sloppy learning methods. As a result of that illusion, we stop looking for answers even when they’re right at our fingertips, such as the two links I’ve provided in this paragraph. I’ve expressed that frustration before and it that lack of humility that prevents you from learning. Even now, you’re likely arguing in your mind that you know enough.

Benefiting From Humility

Compare and contrast time. Confidence breed bullies. Humility breeds negotiators and problem solvers.  Confidence says, “I have the best ideas and you need to just shut up and follow me.” Humility says, “Let’s work together and find a solution that respects everyone.” Confidence says, “I am a great leader. Do what I say and everything will be okay.”  Humility says, “We do better when we work together, no matter who we are.”

Consider the words of Michele Obama from a speech made at the 2012 Democratic Convention:

We learned about gratitude and humility – that so many people had a hand in our success, from the teachers who inspired us to the janitors who kept our school clean… and we were taught to value everyone’s contribution and treat everyone with respect.

Such is the strength and power of humility. Those who are humble, especially on an academic level, don’t feel as though they have to come up with a solution to every problem on their own. People who are humble are team players. They look for the strength in others and humble leaders bring together those strengths and find solutions through the power of combined effort. Humility is, in essence, at the very heart of democracy. Our nation does not work well under the forceful demands of a tyrant. We believe, and have proven, that we are at our best when everyone contributes their voice and their vote.

Oh Lord, It’s Hard To Be Humble

The Mac Davis song from back in the 1970s is meant to be humorous. The chorus was laughably funny when the novelty song first hit the airwaves. Now, it sounds almost like it might be a campaign theme song.

Oh Lord, it’s hard to be humble
When you’re perfect in every way.
I can’t wait
To look in the mirror.
Cause I get better looking each day.
To know me is to love me.
I must be a hell of a man.
Oh Lord, It’s hard to be humble,
But I’m doing the best that I can.

I still want to smile when I hear that song. Mac’s voice takes me back to a time when I was still riding in the backseat of my father’s car and didn’t think anyone could actually be as egotistical as the guy in the song. I was naive. We are surrounded by people who think they know everything simply because they can Google an answer to a question and make themselves look more intelligent than they actually are. We see them in comments to news articles and in the trolls that proliferate on Twitter.

Such overconfidence is holding us back. Solutions are not found when we refuse to recognise the problem.  We need people with humility to successfully negotiate treaties and business agreements. Learning is not something on which we can snack while binge watching Netflix. We need the humility to realize we are letting our brains atrophy. We need real, deep knowledge to lift us out of these antique ideas based in mythologies that are thousands of years too old.

We’re not perfect. The image we think we see in the mirror is an illusion. We’re not doing the best that we can. We all need a strong dose of humility and we need it applied right now.

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Art  /  Just For Fun  /  Original Style
Saturday Deserves A Coffee Break
August 13, 2016
charles i. letbetter - Saturday needs a coffee break

Science may never come up with a better office communication system than the coffee break. —Earl Wilson

 

charles i. letbetter - saturday needs a coffee break

Saturdays are the perfect time to grab a cup of coffee and chat–about coffee

 

We’re on our third pot of coffee this morning. There was, admittedly, a cup of orange juice between the first and second pots because I’m old enough to really need the vitamins and stuff. There’s no replacement for coffee, though. Our lives would be but a shell without it. For that matter, I’m pretty sure some lives would be shorter without it. This drink makes us stop and think a moment before taking any actions. There are times when that’s the only thing preventing homicide. Coffee saves the day.

A lot of the best people I know are coffee enthusiasts. One colleague goes out of her way to explore new coffee shops and coffee drinks. Many of my best friends are rarely seen without a coffee cup in their hands. I consider a coffee stain on one’s clothes a sign of intelligence and deep thought. After all, had they not been thinking so deeply about something else, they probably wouldn’t have spilled coffee on themselves.

I’m also excited by the fact that our friends at Calvin Fletcher’s Coffee Company finally completed the installation of their bean roaster this week. Now, like any other new piece of delicate equipment, roasters take some time to calibrate and get to know. We’ll give our friends a couple of weeks to work out the kinks, but I’m looking forward to my next visit. Coffee people, real coffee people, are the best people in the world.

Obsessed With Making Coffee

Those who indulge in this dark essence of warm delight are often as obsessed with making it as they are with drinking it. I can’t wait until I’m awake enough to get Kat awake enough to drive me somewhere to place an order. I need to make my own and if I’m making my own I want it to taste good.

Like many people, I grew up with percolated coffee. Some of you children have likely never experienced such a thing. Percolators are devices where the ground coffee is placed in a basket at the top while the remained below is filled with water. Water is then brought to a boiling temperature at which point it is forced up a tube and over the grounds, exiting the basket at the bottom and mixing with the remaining water below. The whole process takes about 15 minutes for a standard home-use percolator. Percolated taste is passable, but the longer the machine percolates the more the coffee is poured back over the grounds and can make the results bitter.

Then came Mr. Coffee. A home version of the commercial Bunn machines used in restaurants, these nifty new devices heated the water, poured it over the ground beans, then deposited the filtered results into a glass carafe waiting below. Think of it as a multi-cup pour over. There were a couple of inherent dangers, though. One was that the thermostats heating the water were less than precise. As a result, one might find a carafe of lukewarm garbage barely drinkable, or something so hot it threatened to eat through the glass.  The other was that many people would leave just a tiny amount of liquid in the bottom but leave the warming plate on. Burning, horrible burning, would occur. The smell was enough to turn stomachs.

Tools Of The Trade

So, what is the best way to make sure your morning starts right? What tools does one really need to make a drink that is not only passable but worth stumbling through the house in the dark and stepping on three Lego’s? Personally, I prefer french press. We use a 20-ounce carafe. I know exactly how to grind the beans, the exact amount, and just how hot to let the water get. My method is so rote I can almost do it in my sleep.

Understandably, not everyone agrees. In fact, I was quite amused when Business Insider published an article on the six things we all should have to prepare this most necessary drink. Their list is, shall we say, a bit pretentious:

  • Chemex. That’s a very specific pour over brand. Pour overs are okay,  I suppose, but the one cup at a time limitation rather sucks, especially if one has company. There are larger versions, but at that point, they’re really not any different than a Bunn, are they?
  • A gooseneck kettle for precise pouring. Personally, I find this falls into the give-me-a-fucking-break department. The number of people who can actually tell the difference is one in about three hundred and fifty million coffee drinkers who are awake enough to be paying attention. No one whose eyes are still half shut gives this much of a fuck. Just let me have my damn drink.
  • An Aeropress. If there were no hipsters, there would be no need for this product. Again, I’ll take my french press any time over this nonsense with its filters and need for precision. This is just craziness right here. Anyone who owns one of these has probably tried brewing their own beer as well. Total pretentiousness.
  • A scale. Give me a fucking break. Unless you’re putting weed in your coffee, which I don’t recommend, this is a total waste of time. Coffee doesn’t need to be that precise.
  • A grinder. Okay, I’ll give you this one. Grinding your beans fresh is a critical part to getting a good taste. Of course, that also raises issues about how to grind, how long to grind, how much to grind, how to store what you’ve ground … you get the picture.
  • A coffee table book on coffee. Am I the only one having flashbacks of Kramer’s coffee table book on the sitcom Seinfeld? Please, tell me I’m not alone here.

Dealing With Excess

Even though we drink a lot of this stuff, there are still times we have leftovers. I hate waste, I really do, but I can’t stomach anything that’s been sitting out on the counter for the past three hours. Fortunately, the good folks at Death Wish Coffee Company have some ideas for how to deal with leftover coffee. Here, they even put it in a video for you:

Now, For A Break

This whole writing about what I’m drinking has become exhausting. I need a break, and a refill. You’re more than welcome to join me. After all, it is Saturday. And it’s raining. Do you really have anything better to do? No, you don’t. Sit down and pour yourself a cup. Enjoy.

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