The ‘Right to be Comfortable’: Sloping Toward a Stepford Society

February 3, 2015 / Julie / 8 Comments

Lately I keep coming across stories asking whether we plugged-in, 21^st-century folks can handle boredom anymore. Now that we have the internet at our fingertips 24/7, what incentive do we have to stare into space while we sit in a waiting room? What might we be losing as we fill up every spare moment of our day with ever more information, communication, and entertainment?

It’s a good question. And for someone who is as guilty of this fill ‘er up mentality as I am, it’s worth thinking on.

But the question I’ve really been thinking about lately is this: Can we plugged-in, 21^st-century folks handle discomfort anymore? Can we handle being annoyed or offended? Now that we’re able to customize our shopping orders, our viewing line-up, and our social interactions with just a few taps of the screen, what incentive do we have to allow ourselves to be exposed to ideas that make us uncomfortable?

What might we be losing as we trim away the things that annoy or offend us?

What might we be losing as we increasingly shape the world we’re presented with to fit our opinion of how it should be?

Thoughts on this topic have crossed my mind for some time, but they really gelled this past fall when I read Brendan O’Neill’s “Free speech is so last century. Today’s students want the ‘right to be comfortable’” in the UK’s The Spectator.

In the article, Mr. O’Neill describes an experience he’d recently had:

On Tuesday, I was supposed to take part in a debate about abortion at Christ Church, Oxford. I was invited by the Oxford Students for Life to put the pro-choice argument against the journalist Timothy Stanley, who is pro-life. But apparently it is forbidden for men to talk about abortion. A mob of furious feministic Oxford students, all robotically uttering the same stuff about feeling offended, set up a Facebook page littered with expletives and demands for the debate to be called off.

Believe it or not, the University actually capitulated to the protestors’ demands. As Mr. O’Neill characterized the decision:

So at one of the highest seats of learning on Earth, the democratic principle of free and open debate, of allowing differing opinions to slog it out in full view of discerning citizens, has been violated, and students have been rebranded as fragile creatures, overgrown children who need to be guarded against any idea that might prick their souls or challenge their prejudices.

On the abortion debate and on other issues, “Stepford Students,” as Mr. O’Neill calls them, have said it outright: “We have the right to feel comfortable.”

He observes:

We seem to have nurtured a new generation that believes its self-esteem is more important than everyone else’s liberty.

This is what those censorious Cambridgers meant when they kept saying they have the ‘right to be comfortable’. They weren’t talking about the freedom to lay down on a chaise longue — they meant the right never to be challenged by disturbing ideas or mind-battered by offensiveness.

You might think that in bringing up this topic, I mean to swing back to Charlie Hebdo. I don’t.

(I am indeed of the liberal – little ‘l’ – opinion that the right to free speech should be almost absolute. But in the wake of that horrible attack, I never could bring myself to proclaim, “Je suis Charlie.” I couldn’t express solidarity with a publication that routinely set out to offend. I think such a course only cheapens the notion of free speech. Offense should never be an end in itself; it should be a by-product, an unfortunate side-effect of messy, imperfect searches for the truth.)

No, I mean to swing back to vaccines.

In the few weeks since the measles began its march outward from Disneyland, the issue has surged in prominence. We’re hearing about it in the news (over 100 people have come down with the disease so far) and on social media; we’re talking about it at schools and extracurricular activities and doctors’ offices. The debate has roared back into life, tempers have flared, and feelings have been hurt.

And so we’re beginning to hear protestations akin to those of the ‘Stepford Students”: “Stop it with all the vaccine talk!” “I’ll block anyone who posts about vaccines!” “No one should be making anybody feel badly about their parenting choices!” It all boils down to the same thing: We have the right to feel comfortable.

Of course we don’t. There are as many definitions of what is comfortable as there are people on this planet. One simply can’t cater to them all. One can’t even cater to a small fraction of them without severely limiting the subjects on which it is acceptable to opine.

And anyway, freedom is more important than comfort.

On the flip side of the issue, we also don’t have the right to have our views represented in anybody else’s Facebook feed. So I’m not about to bleat that the discomfort-averse are infringing on others’ rights to free speech.

But I do (very firmly) believe that it is in the best interest of society to nurture a spirit of free and open debate. And I am made nervous by what I see as people’s increasing willingness to cut it off.

Because guess what? You and I and the people we interact with – we’re what make up society. When you and I begin to stop people from expressing ideas that we don’t like (or stop ourselves from seeing evidence that such ideas exist) – that’s when we step onto a slope that descends into a society that is not free, that does not think. That’s when we move towards becoming a ‘Stepford Society’, if you will.

So I say post about vaccines all you want. Maintain that everyone should have their children vaccinated. Protest that vaccines are unhealthy or immoral.

Talk about politics. Talk about religion. Talk about abortion and climate change and gay marriage. Support the ideas you agree with. Argue against those you disagree with. Or don’t.

Just don’t insist that no one offer those ideas in the first place.

Sometimes Mommy Wars Are Worth Fighting: Let’s Have a Healthy Debate About Vaccines

January 30, 2015January 30, 2015 / Julie / 21 Comments

Vaccines.

There, I said it: vaccines, vaccines, vaccines.

I feel like the topic of childhood vaccinations has become something that people either GET REALLY, VERY ANGRY ABOUT or avoid altogether. I tend toward the latter. I’m 100% uninterested in online shouting matches, so I steer clear of anything that seems to be devolving into one.

But I do have my (pro-vaccine) opinions on the matter and I am rather fond of sharing my opinions generally (hence the blog), so every once in a while I jump in when the jumping seems good.

A couple of days ago, I spotted just such an opportunity: a conversation was brewing in response to a Facebook friend’s post. I thought I’d answer another person’s comment with a little something calm and polite before the thread got too hot.

The commenter and I went back and forth a bit. We remained respectful. There were no fireworks. Still, she seemed a little hurt, a little defensive. She seemed to want affirmation. More than anything, she seemed to want people to be okay with her position.

I see that a lot on this topic. I don’t see many anti-vaxxers trying to convince the rest of us that they’re right. (Though maybe that’s just the crowd I run in.) I see them trying to convince us that their decision to not vaccinate should be just as acceptable as our decision to vaccinate.

In response to them, I generally see the combative pro-vaxxers SHOUT REALLY, VERY ANGRY THINGS and the peaceful pro-vaxxers come dangerously close (or completely buy in) to the “everything-is-equal” mentality. You know: We all need to make the decisions that are right for us. That kind of thing.

Last week I was one of the many thousands of women, I’m sure, who laughed and then cried at Similac’s Mother ‘Hood video. In it, different parenting factions bump up against each other at a playground: the crunchy moms, the working moms, the babywearers, the breastfeeders, the bottle feeders, etc. They’re each convinced of their own superiority and they’re itching for a fight.

Until a stroller starts rolling down a hill.

Right on cue, all the parents rush to the stroller. They stop it in time, the baby is shown to be safe, and everyone is relieved. “No matter our beliefs, we’re parents first,” the ad says.

It’s incredibly touching; I whimper like a baby every time I see it.

But we’re just shown the two extremes. We parents seem to be expected to fit into one of two molds: Mommy War Combatants or Enlightened Pacifists.

What about the middle?

What about not seeing every disagreement as a FIGHT, but also not letting ourselves fall into the intellectually lazy, PC trap that is “let’s agree to disagree”?

What about having the courage to defend our beliefs and the openness to listen to others’ opinions? What about honoring the love that parents have for their children but recognizing that sometimes people make poor choices? What about distinguishing between parenting practices that are matters of taste and those that are matters of safety?

What about accepting that, as valid as our disagreements might be, sometimes they’re worth airing and sometimes they’re not?

Personally, I’m a stay-at-home, from-scratch cooking, no-organic buying, bottle feeding, stroller pushing and Ergo-wearing, time-out using, sometimes-yelling mom. But I’m not about to say a thing to convince crunchy, breastfeeding, exclusive baby-wearing, peaceful parenting moms that they’re wrong. I may disagree with elements of their parenting styles, but I concede that these are matters of taste. What works for me and my family will not be what works for another woman and her family.

Vaccines, though, are not a matter of taste; they are a matter of safety.

It’s blessedly easy for us to forget these days, but for most of human history, it was terribly dangerous to be a child. If you survived childbirth, you had to withstand round after round of disease (not to mention dangers related to hygiene and malnutrition). And if you survived the diseases, you had to withstand whatever effects they left on you. You might be left scarred or crippled or disabled in some other way.

Just walk around any old cemetery and take a look at the headstones – you’ll get a sense of how many children lost their lives too soon.

Thank goodness, these days most of us don’t have to think much about the possibility of losing a child. A major reason for this is childhood vaccinations. They’ve been keeping us safe for generations, in some cases bringing diseases close to the point of eradication. Or, in the case of smallpox, even getting to that point.

Until other diseases get there too, we’ve simply got to keep vaccinating.

We’ve each got to do our own part, as small as it may seem, to stop the spread of disease. When I get my child vaccinated, I not only protect him, but I protect those he comes in contact with. I protect those they come in contact with. And so on.

Some will rely on my protection (and that of others) because for medical reasons they are ineligible to be vaccinated (infants, those with compromised immune systems, those with allergies to vaccine components).

Others may not seem to need my protection because they’ve been vaccinated too. But nothing in this world is perfect. Though vaccines work the vast majority of the time, sometimes immune systems don’t respond as you would hope. Sometimes vaccinated people have to rely on that beautifully-termed “herd immunity” for protection, just as infants and otherwise medically-ineligible individuals have to.

That’s why, when I make the decision to vaccinate my child, I don’t just make the decision for my own family. I make it for yours too.

And – whether you’re thinking of us or not – when you make your decision regarding vaccination for your family, you do so for mine as well.

Please decide to protect us.

I have a 9-month-old baby, not yet old enough to have been vaccinated against the measles. Please decide to protect him.

Combative pro-vaxxers: Please stop yelling. Please stop calling people names. Please stop questioning motives. Please try not to be so angry.

I know you care about this issue and you want anti-vaxxers to come to see it from your point of view, but anger rarely convinces anyone of anything. If you care enough to weigh in on an issue, you should care enough to try to be persuasive. So, persuade.

Calm down. Think about the issue from your opponents’ viewpoints and do your best to figure out how to make your points in ways that will resonate with them. Go forth and try to make a difference.

Peaceful pro-vaxxers: Please think for a moment about why you vaccinate your own children. If you’re convinced that vaccinations are necessary to keep them safe, then wouldn’t they also be necessary to keep other families’ children safe?

Please consider that maybe issues of safety are worth having a firm opinion on, even worth weighing in on – uncomfortable though they may be. I know you don’t want to hurt others’ feelings. So, don’t be hurtful.

Be brave. Think about the issue from your opponents’ viewpoints and do your best to figure out how to make your points in ways that will resonate with them. Go forth and try to make a difference.

Anti-vaxxers: Please think for a moment about why you don’t vaccinate your own children. If you’re convinced that vaccinations would be harmful to them, then wouldn’t they also be harmful to other families’ children?

If you feel confident in your decision to not vaccinate, then you should want to convince other parents to follow your example. If you feel confident in your decision to not vaccinate, then you should be able to defend your decision. Explain your rationale. Provide your evidence. Own it.

Do not seek affirmation for its own sake. Earn it by convincing others that your side is the right one.

This is an important issue. Precious little lives are at stake. Let’s do right by our discussion of it.

Let’s fight the good fight – one conducted fairly, one for a worthy cause. Let’s remember that refusing to fight fairly is a mark of doubting your own position. And that refusing to enter the fray can be a mark of doubting its importance.

Honored

January 20, 2015 / Julie / 6 Comments

Would you believe that my blog has been nominated for an award?

I know. I can’t believe it either. Crazy stuff.

But it’s true! These Walls has been nominated for the 2015 Sheenazing Awards in the “Smartest Blog” category. (Smartest blog!) Bonnie of A Knotted Life is so generous and supportive to her fellow Catholic bloggers that she’s been hosting her “Sheenazing Awards” for the past few years. In Bonnie’s words:

The Sheenazing Blogger Awards get their name from Venerable Fulton J. Sheen, who was amazing at using the newest forms of media to communicate the beauty of the Catholic Church and his love of Christ to the world. They are a fun way to celebrate the excellence of the Catholic blogosphere and honor Venerable Sheen.

There will be a winner and a runner up in each category. The winners will earn a firm virtual handshake, the pride in knowing that they’ve been named the Best of something by a fairly obscure blog, and the right to display the following on their site:

Except it will say “Winner”

Obscure or not, I’m super honored to be part of it all. Thank you for your work in coordinating the effort, Bonnie, and thank you to the kind souls (whoever you are) who nominated me!

So.

If you’d like to – ahem – cast your vote in my direction, kindly click here. Or don’t vote for me. There are lots of other terrific blogs to check out while you’re there, which are probably more worthy of your vote. Besides Smartest Blog, Sheenazing Awards categories include Funniest Blog, Most Inspiring Blog, Best Under-Appreciated Blog, Coolest Blogger, Miss Congeniality, and Best Blog By A Non-Papist. (I’m not making that up.)

In case any of you need a refresher on what my particular shtick is here at These Walls – or if you’re visiting for the first time (Hello! Welcome!) – I thought I’d give you a little summary.

Things I love – and love to write about – include my husband, my three little boys, the rest of my amazing family, my old house, my faith, politics, and good, meaty debates on controversial subjects. Stoking fires just for the fun of it isn’t my thing, but here are some things that are:

Let’s just say I take a “holistic” approach to politics – I care about the morality of an issue – not whether it’s labeled Left or Right:

I think abortion is wrong.
I think immigration is good.
I think religious freedom is important.
I think our criminal justice system needs to be re-thought.

I write about big moments in my life:

Like my experience on September 11.
And the time I was mugged.

I tend to wax sentimental on motherhood:

Sometimes I can’t believe I’ve gotten to be a mother at all.
I’m amazed by how precious children are.
My kitchen floor makes me sappy.

And sometimes I keep it really real:

I don’t treasure every moment.
I don’t think breastfeeding is always best.
I was unprepared for the emotional strain of motherhood.
I am bothered by the suggestion that boys are easier than girls.
I can give up when things fall apart.
Sometimes laundry gives me epiphanies.

Also, my boys fall asleep – all the time, all over the place. I like to share that joy with you.

Thanks again to whoever nominated me! (And also, while I’m at it, to Jenny Uebbing of Mama Needs Coffee for calling me one of her “Political Muses” the other day. That was so cool!)

I’ve got a whole list of topics I’m itching to get into this year. And even though I still have Christmas decorations to put away and boxes of ten-year-old papers lurking in my corners and closets, I’m feeling energized about digging in.

See you here soon!

Under The Wire: Christmas 2014

January 11, 2015 / Julie / 5 Comments

Happy Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord! (Otherwise known as the last day of the Christmas season, technically speaking.) This morning at mass our pastor asked for a show of hands as to how many people had already taken down their Christmas trees. When half the congregation did just that, he shouted: “Go put them back up!”

Ours is still standing – a withered, crispy version of its former self – not because I’m an ace at following the liturgical calendar, but because I do nothing early and almost nothing on time. Last year I think it was (cough, cough) March before we got all our Christmas decorations down. (I’m hiding behind my hands here. Can you tell?)

Anyway, on Facebook I promised folks a little Christmas tour of our home and I hate to break my promises – I really do. So here are some poorly-executed pictures of my incomplete Christmas decorating, just under the wire.

Well, I did finish the tree. I think it sat for at least a week before I decorated it, but decorate it I did. Lovely. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed looking at the thing every time I go up and down the stairs – droopy, crunchy, and falling apart though it is.

I took so few Christmas tree pics this year that I’m resorting to showing you one with a shower curtain sticking out from below it. (Makes for a practical tree skirt!)

(Cheating here — this is a pic from last year. But I promise it looks pretty much the same!)

Unlike our previous two Christmases, I did actually get out all of our Christmas decorations this year, and I did actually arrange things on all (four) of our first-floor mantles. (Win, right?) What I didn’t do, though, is artfully arrange fresh greens among the décor and lace them with lights. Sigh… wouldn’t that have been beautiful?

(I know, I’m being trivial. But my mother always does a great job of decorating for Christmas and for me, that greens + lights thing is what makes it. Sit me in front of one of those softly-lit Christmas-scapes with a glass of eggnog and I’m one happy camper.)

Anyway, here are our mantles, sans lighted greenery.

As to how we celebrated the season(s) itself, I feel like we took a tiny little baby step forward from last year’s Christmas, but we were still nowhere near where I’d like to be. (To be clear, I don’t aspire to have the overachiever’s dream Christmas; I long for Advent and Christmas seasons in which all of our rooms are comfortably useable, nobody’s running around stressed out, and we get to take the time to sit and enjoy the specialness of the seasons.)

This year our dining room was out of commission for the holidays because it became the dumping ground for everything I couldn’t find time to deal with. (So sad, kind of stressful.) We didn’t do that cool open-a-book-for-every-day-of-Advent thing, we didn’t get to any Christmas baking, we didn’t do any crafts, we didn’t hit the Christmas parade, we didn’t even all head out to look at Christmas lights as a family. (Boo-hoo.) We sent out our cards late.

But we did send out cards.

We did an Advent calendar and we worked on teaching the boys the Hail Mary with a daily (er, we tried to do it daily) recitation while pulling a link off the Advent chain my son made at school. We made it to the Santa breakfast and also to see Santa at the mall. We watched Christmas movies and read Christmas books. On Christmas morning, we ate a “picnic” breakfast in front of the tree and the fire. (That was particularly lovely, but a little confusing to the boys: “Why are we eating on the floor?”)

We did Christmas gifts that were simpler than some, more excessive than others: Santa brought each boy a toy, a puzzle, and a book. The boys each gave one gift to each other and we gave them each a few more. Then of course the grandparents did what grandparents do.

My own favorite gifts are shown here: a beautiful art print from my sweet husband (I love livestock) and a framed series of baby photos of my great-grandmother, grandmother, mother, and me, given to me by my grandmother.

We had a little sickness, a little rushing, a little not-getting-to-everything, but it really was a lovely Christmas here in our family. I hope yours was just as nice!

Kirby Delauter vs. The Liberal Media (Updated)

January 9, 2015January 9, 2015 / Julie / 9 Comments

Have you heard of Kirby Delauter?

Until Tuesday, the only place I’d seen his name was on political posters stuck in people’s yards. (I don’t live in Frederick County, Maryland, so I’ve had neither the opportunity to vote for/against the guy, nor the obligation to learn anything about him. I just drive through the county every so often.)

Now, however, I’ve seen the Frederick Councilman’s name (Kirby Delauter) on Facebook and Twitter, as well as the Washington Post, BBC News, NPR, and of course, The Frederick News-Post. It (the name “Kirby Delauter”) is lots of other places too. In its now-famous editorial titled “Kirby Delauter, Kirby Delauter, Kirby Delauter,” the Frederick News-Post sums up the situation:

Knowing Councilman Kirby Delauter as we do, we weren’t surprised that he threatened The Frederick News-Post with a lawsuit because we had, he says — and we’re not making this up — been putting Kirby Delauter’s name in the paper without Kirby Delauter’s authorization. Attorneys would be called, Kirby Delauter said.

In fact, we spent quite some time laughing about it. Kirby Delauter, an elected official; Kirby Delauter, a public figure? Surely, Kirby Delauter can’t be serious? Kirby Delauter’s making a joke, right?

The editorial goes on in the most hilarious fashion for a couple of paragraphs. (The 13 paragraphs in the piece, by the way, are each started with a letter that, together, spell out the forbidden name: “Kirby Delauter.”) They include great stuff like:

Maybe we should just put his initials, “KD,” with an asterisk to a footnote (KD*), or refer to him as GLAT, the acronym for his campaign: “Govern Like A Taxpayer.” We could even make it sound a little hip-hop with a well-placed hyphen: G-Lat. Speaking of, could we get away with “K-Del”?

And:

We found a great automatic online anagrammer that generated all kinds of alternatives and could make it a challenge for our readers to decode each time we have to reference the councilman: “Rebuked artily.” That was a good one. “Bakery diluter” is just silly but does have a ring about it. “Keyed rural bit” was another that caught our eye as somewhat telling, because Kirby Delauter’s pretty keyed up. We’re sure there’s a joke in “Brutelike Yard” somewhere.

The whole situation is just delightfully absurd. I giggled my way through the first half of the editorial. (Note: Kirby Delauter has now apologized.)

The second half, however, is where things get serious. It’s where the Frederick News Post counters the motivation behind Kirby Delauter’s idiotic attempt to prevent the paper from using his name:

Discernibly, though, Kirby Delauter’s ignorance of what journalism is and does is no joke, and illustrates one disturbing aspect too prevalent in conservatives’ beliefs: That the media are all-liberal stooges hell bent on pursuing some fictional leftwing agenda. Generally this “fact” is bleated when the facts on the ground differ from conservative talking points.

This, of course, is where I stopped giggling. Because I’m a conservative. As delightfully absurd as fools like Kirby Delauter can seem at first glance, it’s really not much fun when my side is represented by people like him.

Moreover, I think liberal bias in the media is a very real thing.

I’m no conspiracy theorist; I don’t think there’s some formal leftwing agenda that’s imposed on every news outlet in the country except for Fox News. I think the vast majority of reporters and editors share a similar worldview. And – surprise, surprise – I think that worldview is reflected in how they cover the news.

When I was in high school, I was involved in a competition (I’ll reveal my dorkiness by admitting it was for academic teams) that my school won. I lived in a socially divided county, however, where the poorer, blacker schools (including my own) were looked down upon by the wealthier, whiter schools. So when my team (Aberdeen) won this competition, our county newspaper reported the story not as “Aberdeen wins academic team competition,” but as “Bel Air earns second place in academic team competition.” The paper’s story was factual, but it was biased.

(You can be both, “facts on the ground” Frederick News Post – factual and biased.)

I think of that situation all the time as I listen to my beloved NPR and I read my Washington Post. There are many ways to tell a story, but I find, again and again, that most of the news outlets I follow do so in a way that reflects their liberal worldview.

What, to me, makes up “the liberal worldview?”

It’s the assumption that women are all of one mind when it comes to abortion and contraception, that women have a sacred right to those goods/services, and that those “reproductive rights” are as fundamental as the freedoms of speech or religion. (How long did it take for the media to finally, begrudgingly, begin to report on the Kermit Gosnell situation?)

It’s the disdain for those who uphold the value of traditional marriage, the intolerance of insisting that only conservatives need be tolerant of opposing views on the subject. (Seriously, take a look at the Washington Post’s coverage of gay marriage over the past few years – it’s as if it was indeed operating out of some coordinated playbook.)

It’s the characterization of conservative politicians as obstructionist troublemakers. Most in the media choose to operate from the (liberal) assumption that government is supposed to do more, while many conservatives start from the assumption that it should do less. The two sides just about speak a different language regarding what they want from government, but I tend to only hear the one language represented in the media. (I’ll note here that I actually disagree with many conservatives – certainly the tea party variety – on many such issues, but they have my sympathy for how they’re treated in the media. I can do that: I can disagree with people and still recognize that they’re portrayed unfairly.)

It’s the implication that conservatives are, as a rule, somehow less thoughtful than liberals. (Did you catch the disdain demonstrated by the Frederick News Post in that last paragraph I quoted?)

There are more issues to “the liberal worldview” than these, but I’ve opened quite enough cans of worms in this post already.

To be clear, I don’t yearn for a media that tells me exactly what I want to think. I don’t want a conservative media bias to replace the liberal one.

I want reporters to acknowledge that everyone looks at the world from a unique perspective, and that their own personal worldview can’t help but impact their reporting. I want editors to make themselves look at controversial subjects from opposing points of view, so as to bring more balance to their stories. I want reporters and editors to try to get to know those with whom they disagree. It’s hard to be impartial when you’re surrounded by people who think (and vote) the same way you do.

I would rather a media outlet be forthright about its political leanings than to pretend they don’t exist.

I pay attention to the news. (For the most part, I stick to staid news outlets like NPR/PBS/BBC/WaPo/NYT, because I’d rather roll my eyes and harrumph once in a while at their liberal bias than to suffer blood pressure spikes from sensational newsmongers like Fox News.) So I witness the liberal media bias all the time. I can’t begin to tell you the number of times I’ve shouted a re-phrased version of a biased statement back at the radio/television/computer. And I can’t begin to describe my frustration that the conventional formula of a NPR talk radio program seems to be conservative guest + liberal guest + liberal reporter + liberal radio host, which is somehow supposed to equal the balanced presentation of an issue.

(Part of me wishes that I regularly wrote down such examples, to present to you now in some sort of lengthy indictment. But honestly, my SAHM hands are far too busy changing diapers and washing dishes to be engaged in that sort of thing.)

When I worked as a lobbyist on the liberal side of things, advocating for policies and funding that helped the poor, I’d routinely strategize with colleagues from other organizations on how we could work together to, say, get X bill passed or preserve Y funding or raise Z awareness. Whenever the discussion turned to media strategies, people would start to suggest ways in which the media could help us. We’d discuss the pitches we could make to reporters, the news outlets that were most likely to run favorable stories, the editorial boards that would be most sympathetic, etc.

It never stopped shocking me.

Having come from a conservative background, it simply never occurred to me that one would go to reporters with policy proposals and ask for their help in advancing them. And I knew that the colleagues back in my own office, the ones working on pro-life or marriage issues, would not have that option. I wondered whether my liberal colleagues and their liberal media contacts ever stopped to think about how uneven the playing field was.

None of this (except the disdain thing) is meant to be a slight on the Frederick News Post. I’ve seen very little from it, so I have no opinion on the quality or fairness of its political coverage. (And I’m glad to know that it engages in political coverage at all – too few local papers do much of that these days.)

It’s just that I’m so tired of the media bleating on that there’s no such thing as bias in their work. If the media were truly balanced, truly unbiased, and I were to poll a hundred people (50 liberals and 50 conservatives), asking them whether the media is biased, what should I expect to find? I’d expect to find either (1) 100 people who think the media is unbiased or (2) 50 liberals who think the media has a conservative bias and 50 conservatives who think the media has a liberal bias.

But we all know that that’s not how it falls out in real life.

As far as I’m concerned, the very fact that so many conservatives find the media to be biased (and that liberals, largely, don’t) is proof that it is. One side is being represented at the expense of the other.

Again and again, the media tends to answer the bias allegation with a dismissive, “We’re not biased; we’re reporting the facts.” To which I can’t help but respond, “You can do both. You can report the facts and still demonstrate a bias.”

But what’s the use, really? Because by “We’re not biased; we’re reporting the facts,” what they really seem to mean is, “If you don’t see the world the way we do, you’re wrong.”

~~~

Update:

This morning as I moved around the kitchen getting my boys ready for their day, I found myself fighting tears because of what I was hearing on the radio. Again. For three mornings in a row, my empathetic soul has been focused on France and on the people who suffer in relation to the attack on Charlie Hebdo.

All of a sudden, I panicked at the thought that some could construe this morning’s post as a snub on the profession of journalism in general. Or at the very least, as insensitive given the fact that liberal journalists were so brutally targeted in France. After all, in the same paragraph of the Frederick News Post’s editorial that contains the “facts on the ground” statement that raised my hackles, the paper responds to the implication that journalists are cowards:

Cowards? Tell that to the families of the 60 journalists killed in 2014, or the 70 in 2013, or the 74 who died in 2012, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. All in pursuit of the truth, or the most reliable version of it at hand in the most dangerous regions of the world.

I in no way think journalists are cowards. I think they do a challenging, sometimes dangerous job, and that most of them do so in the best way they know how. I think journalism is essential to democracy – to civilization, even. I would be proud (if somewhat concerned for their ability to make ends meet) for any of my boys to choose journalism as a profession.

But I think journalists (like all of us, really) should always strive to improve their work – to be fairer, more thorough, and more thoughtful. I can mourn those who died at Charlie Hebdo and disagree with the “liberal media” (and even the dead themselves) on certain points. I can do both.

The Lesson They Left

January 7, 2015January 7, 2015 / Julie / 2 Comments

I went to two funerals last week.

The first was so lovely, really – it was for Mary Lenaburg’s beautiful, special Courtney, who had died the Saturday before, on the Feast of St. John the Beloved. The music at the funeral was heavenly, the homily and eulogy were warm, and though there was a real sense of mourning, the church was also full of love and hope. Courtney no longer suffers. She’s free, and in the words of her mother, “She is finally healed and whole. No more seizures. No more pain. Just all encompassing joy and love for an eternity.”

The second funeral came on much more unexpectedly. Mark Pacione, a long-time leader in youth ministry in the Archdiocese of Baltimore, died suddenly on the morning of December 29. His funeral felt more raw to me: it was beautiful, but also strong and real, not unlike Mark himself. The church was packed, filled up with person after person on whom Mark had had an impact. One needed only glance around the space to see it in others’ eyes – his was such a tremendous, personal loss.

Given their proximity on the calendar, I can’t help but think of these two funerals together. And really, it’s fitting that I should file them together in my mind. These two amazing individuals, Courtney and Mark, represent the concept of love like none I have ever known.

I’ve already written on Courtney’s love. Hers is one that shows you how to love more deeply, unconditionally, purely:

In this year of knowing Mary (and through her, Courtney), I’ve learned something about love. (An undefined, powerful kind of something that I feel in my chest, but can hardly describe except to say, “I’ve got to love more.”) I’ve learned something about loving your child, your husband, your friends, about loving God. I’ve learned something about loving through hardship, about tenacity and stretching to meet the challenges put before you.

Mark’s example shows you the beauty of loving everyone. As was said during his funeral (and probably hundreds of times in the days surrounding it), when Mark was talking to you, he made you feel like you were the only person in the room. No matter who you were, no matter how well he knew you, Mark made you feel like you counted.

Both examples put into practice what we pro-life Catholics talk about, but which some of us, perhaps, don’t always live – that is, the conviction that all human life is sacred. Each and every one of us matters. That goes for the unborn, the ill, the disabled, those at the ends of their lives, and even that awkward teenager standing against the wall in a basement church hall. It goes for those we know only in passing and for those we pass but do not know.

I once had a pastor who, while shaking hands with parishioners after Mass, never seemed to make eye contact with any of them. He’d hold out his hand and touch it briefly to yours, but he wouldn’t look at you. His eyes would simply scan the crowd, as if he viewed it – us – as nothing more than a vague glob of humanity.

How often do I do the same? How often – in my haste or my distraction – do I brush past people, or if I stop to talk for a moment, give them only the pretense of my attention?

How often do I view people in terms of their utility to me? How often do I judge them by their beauty or their popularity? How often do I dismiss those who don’t meet certain (unworthy) standards?

Far, far too often.

Though my mind and the most honest part of my heart understand that all people are precious, that each and every one of us are made in the image and likeness of God, the rest of me needs reminding. My harried, distracted brain, my snobbery, my jealousy – I need to keep them in check. I need to be present enough, aware and thoughtful and loving enough to treat the people around me like they count.

Because they do.

Thank you, Courtney and Mark, for your beautiful examples to us. Thank you for letting God’s love work through you. Thank you for showing us how to do the same.

14 From ‘14

December 30, 2014December 30, 2014 / Julie / 12 Comments

Merry Christmas to you! And a happy New Year too!

As we wrap up 2014, I thought I’d do a little recap o’ the blog to highlight some of my favorite posts from the year. (I’ll admit – it was pretty fun to scroll through them all.) And since I want to do you the favor of making it obvious as to why I chose these particular posts, I thought I’d include each in its own category. So… without further ado (since there’s plenty of it below)… here are 14 From ’14:

1. The most viewed post (and the closest to “viral” that I’ve ever gotten):

When Breast Isn’t Best

Wow. I knew this post in opposition (so to say) to Breastfeeding Awareness Week might attract a bit more attention than usual, but it went and blew “a bit more” out of the water. In the post’s first day, I received nearly ten times as many views as I usually do on post-publishing days and I more than doubled my best day ever. All told, the post has gotten more than a dozen times the views of my average post.

So let’s see… what element of the mommy wars should I tackle next?

(No, no – I’m kidding. Stoking fires just for the fun of it isn’t my thing – there are plenty of others you can go to for that.)

Doubly selfish: using formula and counting on the four-year-old to feed it to his brother.

2. The post that was hardest to write:

It Is The Same Evil

This thing was a bear to get through. (ISIS? Evil? Hmm… I wonder why?) I worked on it for weeks – weeks in which I felt like I was trudging through mud every time I sat down at the computer. It definitely felt like there was some Resistance at play. When I finished writing the post, I could barely look at the thing, I was so unhappy with it. But with a little more distance, I’ve come to think I did a decent job of it.

3. The post with the best discussion in the combox:

Yes, I Worry About Religious Freedom

This post makes me so happy. Not because I think the piece itself was any work of art, but because it generated such a great discussion in the comments section. This (despite all my mommy ramblings about exhaustion and vomit) is why I started the blog – to encourage discourse on touchy, divisive, important matters of politics and society. Polite discourse, open-minded discourse, respectful discourse. I know this one little post was just the tiniest of drops in the bucket, but it’s my drop and I’m glad to have let it fall.

4. The post with the strangest subject matter:

The Best Possible Mugging

I had a mugging story. I had to tell it!

Yet another incongruous photo. It’s not even Washington, it’s Germany. But it was taken around the same time as the events in this post.

5. The post that would make the best sitcom episode:

Epilogue (Please) To The Day Of The Snake And The Water

Snake slithering out of a basket of my sons’ toys? Jumping toilets? Brown water shooting out of a toilet’s tank and at my face? It’s my own brand of slapstick!

6. The post that most pulls on my heartstrings:

Single Lady Gets A Family

During my single twenties, I began to think I might never have a family of my own. I can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am that I was wrong.

7. The funniest (in a desperate sort of way) post:

Think Of Your Closets

“If I had to choose one piece of advice to offer young people at this very moment, it would be: Don’t be a pack-rat. And if you absolutely can’t resist the urge to be a pack-rat, make sure to be an organized one.”

8. The bossiest post:

Why You Should Vote – Even When It Feels Like It Doesn’t Make A Difference

In which I use guilt and just a little bit of elections expertise to strong-arm you into becoming a regular voter.

9. The post with the most (and maybe the best?) pictures:

Taking A Weekend For Us

Brennan and I went away for a weekend before the baby was born – without our boys. It was heavenly. I took lots of pictures.

10. The post that best showcases my boys’ narcoleptic tendencies:

Greetings From The Land Of Nod… Nod… Nodding Off

New here? My boys fall asleep all. the. time. At the table, in the car, on the sofa, in the highchair, on the floor, in the shopping cart… And when I’m pregnant, I’m almost as bad as they are.

11. The post that seems most pertinent to the events of this week:

Courtney’s Love

Courtney Lenaburg, the beloved daughter of Mary from Passionate Perseverance, passed away this past Saturday morning. Courtney’s wake will be held tonight and her funeral tomorrow. Please keep the entire Lenaburg family in prayer during this very difficult time.

12: The post written with most love for my oldest:

What Matters To Him

13: The post written with most love for my middle:

This Child

14: The most consequential post:

Announcing…

I had a baby this year! Few things are of greater consequence than that!

I’m linking this up with Dwija’s 12 Photos in 2012 link-up at House Unseen, Life Unscripted. (12? 14? Photos? Posts? Close enough, right?) Be sure to stop there for more 2014 recaps — and much more beautifully-shot photos than my own.

I hope 2014 was kind to you. The year brought me some great challenges, but even greater blessings. Thanks for coming along for the ride!

I Couldn’t Help But Cry

December 16, 2014 / Julie / 1 Comment

… this morning, when I heard this report:

Six heavily armed gunmen stormed a military school in Peshawar, Pakistan killing more than 130 people, mostly teenagers, and many the children of military officers. Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the deadly attack, possibly in retaliation for Pakistan’s military operations against it. The death toll makes this attack one of the worst in the region in decades and is a grim reminder of the ongoing political turmoil.

All those children, all those families. It’s overwhelming to think on what they must be going through right now.

Loving, of course, makes us vulnerable. And loving our children makes that vulnerability seem infinite. It’s hard to imagine a greater pain – a pain that will go on and on, perhaps overtaking us – than losing a child. To lose someone who is (in the case of a biological child) literally, physically part of you, to lose someone (in the case of any child, no matter how he or she came to be yours) into whom you have poured so much work and love, and in whom you have seen such beauty and promise… the magnitude of such a loss is difficult to comprehend.

Which is why the Taliban chose such a target. It’s why bitter, angry, attention-seeking, sometimes ill people choose, over and over again, to attack schools: They house the treasures we hold most dear – the treasures our minds and hearts go wild at the prospect of losing.

My own heart had a small scare last week as I sat in my eight-month-old’s room, listening to him wheeze, watching his torso heave as he struggled to breathe. But my fear was short-lived. Soon we were in the hospital where he was monitored and cared for; the assistance he needed was within easy reach and I was pacified. I felt badly for the discomfort he felt, but my fear was gone.

Fear rears up, though, from time to time. I love. I’m vulnerable. I fear when my children gag on their food. (They gag all the time.) I fear when I see them ride away in someone else’s car. I fear when I call for them in the back yard and they take too long to respond. Soon enough, I’ll fear when I send them off to school – real school, all-day school. I’ll fear when they’re the ones driving the cars, when they begin to claim their independence from us, when they leave home altogether.

It’s horrible, all that fear. It’s also enticing in a perverse sort of way. If I let myself, I could roll around in it, enfold myself in it. It would be in my nature: I remember convincing myself as a child, time and again, that something horrible would happen to my parents and they’d be taken from me. The fear was quick to take over. It was hard to see through.

Now, with a little more perspective, I’ve come to realize how difficult it can be to enjoy something you’re too afraid of losing. (And I’ve come to see how hard it can be to enjoy life while focusing on all that can be taken from it.)

So I try, these days, not to let the fears rule me. (I’m fortunate that I’m in a good position to do so, of course – my children are healthy and we live in a safe, stable part of the world.) I try to remember that fearing someone’s loss is a symptom of truly loving them. So there’s some beauty in the fear. It’s horrible and beautiful, all at once.

My friend Mary is currently losing her daughter Courtney. My friend Amanda continues, rightly, to mourn the stillbirth of her precious daughter Brianna, even as she has welcomed Brianna’s younger sister and brother into this world. My family remembers our little Leah, whom my aunt and uncle lost far too soon. I can’t begin to count the number of women I know who have suffered the loss of their babies through miscarriage.

Given the events in Peshawar, I can’t help but turn my mind today towards those who have lost their children. Those friends and family of mine, those parents of Peshawar, those of Sandy Hook and Beslan and Columbine, those of Syria, Iraq, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, those whose children have been taken by violence and disease.

All that grief, all that fear – the wild, the heavy, the sharp, the lingering kinds. They swirl in my mind today, they squeeze my heart.

Lord, be with these families. Bless them. Bring them your comfort.

Twenty Minutes (But Not Really)

December 15, 2014 / Julie / Leave a comment

It’s a blue-skyed, balmy 57 degrees this afternoon, so the boys are outside playing, enjoying the beautiful weather.

Let me re-phrase that: I’m enjoying the boys playing outside in the beautiful weather. They’d rather be inside watching a movie, but I told them their choices were outside play or naps in their beds. Surprise, surprise: they chose the former.

I have a million things on my to-do list, but thought I’d take a quick twenty minutes* to post a little update on the blog, because: Quiet! Ohmygosh it is never quiet around here! Boys outside, baby napping, and this the first quiet, awake, non-committed moment I’ve had in a week!

I’ve got to sit here and savor it a bit.

We’ve been very busy lately – the typical Christmas stuff, plus commitments and medical appointments and then, for the baby, a hospital stay. The poor, pathetic little thing has pneumonia. He came home on Saturday after two nights in the hospital and fortunately, he’s already most of the way back to his usual happy, peppy self. Brennan and I are slowly (slowly) recovering from all the sleep we lost during the ordeal.

But anyway, I’ve been meaning to note my relative absence from the blog over the past couple of months. And here I am, so here we go!

The thing is, I am an easily-distracted, easily-overwhelmed, easily-overstimulated kind of gal. And I’ve come to realize that I need to get a handle on the things in my life that distract and overwhelm and overstimulate me. Like, really need to – actually need to – not just acknowledge that I need to and promptly move on to something more interesting.

When I try to live my daily life (namely, when I try to mother) in the midst of those distracting, overwhelming, overstimulating things, I fail. At so much. I have too little patience, I enjoy too little time with my children, and I have far, far too many meltdowns.

A few weeks ago I told my boys that I’d be back in a minute: I just needed to take the baby upstairs to put him down for his nap. After I changed his diaper, I set the baby down on the rug with a few toys so I could wash my hands. But then I noticed some bins of clothing that I hadn’t put back in their place, so I went to move them. Then I noticed how dusty that corner of the room was, so I decided to sweep it before I put the bins away. Then I went into the laundry room for the Swiffer, where I remembered that I hadn’t yet switched over the laundry. Then I had to retrieve a laundry basket so I could get the already-dry clothes out of the dryer. Then, just as I started emptying the dryer, I heard (1) the boys erupt in a massive fight downstairs and (2) the baby screaming, tired, ready for his nap.

I ran downstairs, yelled at the boys, and ran back up, flustered. I still needed to wash my hands. I still needed to take care of the baby and the bins and the sweeping and the laundry. I’d wasted all that time, gotten nothing accomplished, and worked myself into a tizzy. This is completely typical behavior for me.

I know there has to be a better way.

So I’m trying to deal with the background noise – the unfinished chores lingering in each room, the fluid schedule, the tasks I’ve been telling myself I’ll get to for far too long, the disorganized ways in which I deal with the information and the responsibilities that come my way.

I’m nowhere near through, but I’m making progress. It’s come at the expense of blogging, spending time on social media, communicating and getting together with my friends, and pretty much any other fun thing I can think of.

For the past couple of months, I’ve tried to find something constructive to do with just about every spare moment I come across. Goodness knows that I could be in this mode for a year and not quite end up where I need to be, but my plan is to push through as well as I can ‘till the end of December. Come the New Year, I’ll try to stretch my legs a bit, to occupy this less-cluttered space (both physical and mental), and see how it works for me. I certainly can’t keep up my current pace forever.

So while you’ll hear from me a few times before then, I probably won’t get into a regular blogging routine until January. I’m hoping that by then I’ll have dealt with enough of my issues to operate on a more organized, more peaceful level.

Hoping.

Wish me luck! And in the meantime, I wish you a blessed Advent, a merry Christmas, and a happy New Year.

* Ha! Did I really think I could get away with that? It took an interrupted two hours, full of potty breaks and crying babies, smashed fingers and late naps chosen over outdoor toy clean-up. C’est la vie!

Allow Me To Interrupt This Holiday Weekend

November 30, 2014November 30, 2014 / Julie / 3 Comments

… to talk about the last one.

No, not this holiday. Rather, the last popular, commercial-hoopla kind of holiday: Halloween. Because even though my Facebook feed is filling up with Christmas tree photos, I keep thinking about the ones of my little guys in their Halloween costumes.

I simply can’t allow November to close without showing you my robots.

When I asked my boys in early October what they wanted to be for Halloween, they mentioned robots in an off-hand sort of way and I grabbed on to the idea as fast as I could. “Robots? Nothing scary? Nothing branded, nothing commercial? I can do robots!” I thought.

I like to make our Halloween costumes. For one thing, I’m just not crazy about the super commercialized character costumes on the market. I won’t be surprised if my boys want them someday, but for now, since they’re still pretty much unaware of the things, I’d rather side-step them and go for something creative.

For another, I enjoy being crafty, but crafting is just not something I make time for in my daily life. I’ve got other priorities right now. But! I love making Halloween costumes. So one time a year, I go all out: Once I made my friends and myself into “Rub-a-dub-dub, Three Men In A Tub.” Another year I made Brennan into a Wonka chocolate bar while my girlfriends and I were Ooompa-Loompas. Last year I made one of my boys into a knight and the other into a dragon.

This year my mission was robots, and boy, did I have fun with it.

I gathered my supplies from Walmart (sweat suits, “helmets”), Amazon (Mylar blankets), and Lowes (signs, reflectors, number/letter stickers, electrical fittings, etc.) I also used some felt and batting I had left-over from last year.

My thought was to use the Mylar blankets as the exterior of the costume and to use the batting to fill it out in interesting ways. However, the only easy-ish way I could think to attach the blankets was with a glue gun. And that process was more cumbersome than I expected.

In the end, my patience only held out for my three-year-old’s pants. After that I took the easy route of hot-gluing the mylar to the felt and then the felt to the sweatsuits.

I used two very thin metal “CAUTION” signs, which had rounded edges and nice, shiny silver backs as “control panels” for each big boy. I’d split all the goodies from Lowes into thirds and let each boy choose how they wanted to arrange theirs on their control panel. I also attached reflective tape to their arms and more of the hardware-store-gotten goods to the backs of the costumes. I hot-glued strips of Mylar to the control panels so that I could tie them to each boy. I also made little batting-stuffed Mylar pillows of sorts, to insert into the “helmets” (i.e. a colander, a pot, and a funnel) to keep them in place on the boys’ heads.

A few reflectors on their helmets, and we were set!

They weren’t the hardiest of my creations (bits of both control panels fell off along the way), but the boys really took to their roles. If the residents of a house we were Trick-or-treating at admired their costumes, they’d stiffen up and jerk around a bit, saying “Beep beep boop boop beep!”

I just about giggled my way down the street.

The work (which was not insignificant) was so worth it.

There! I’ve finished telling you about Halloween a mere 30 days after it happened. Maybe I’ll recap this coming Christmas season in February or something.

These Walls

Sharing stories from within the walls of my home; encouraging discourse on the wider world outside them.

Author: Julie