Much to the frustration of my US History students over the years, a lesson we did in high school has always stuck with me, and I followed it up in my own classroom back in the U.S. Oh, hey by the way. This is Jacson Lowe ... I write this blog you are currently reading. For the first 10 blogs, I basically have written about what it is like living in an international city of 4.2 million people after being raised in a small hometown of about 25,000. That's where the name comes from ... Mayberry to Malaysia. After living here for six months and really getting locked into everyday life, it's kind of hard to come up with cool, funny stories about confused taxi drivers and greedy monkeys. So, as I move into the next phase of my life in Asia, I think the blog may take a swing every once in a while and be about my feelings of the world in general, and not just Expat adventures.
Now, where was I? Oh yeah, the history lesson. So, way back when I was a high schooler at North Surry (who won that basketball game last night? Oh, that's right ... Bear Meat served raw!), Billy Joel came out with the diddy, "We Didn't Start the Fire," and found decent success through a catchy melody and a montage of historical lowlights playing in the video background on MTV -- back when MTV actually showed music videos and not trashy reality television. Joel has said when he was younger he either wanted to be a professional boxer (hence all the boxer references in the song) or a history teacher. Though I did dabble in some amateur wrestling during NSHS pep rallies with Norm, I never got into a squared circle to go 15 rounds. I did however decide to become a history teacher after a few years of sports writing left me yearning for a little bit more.
So, Mr. Joel, I see the draw of writing "We Didn't Start the Fire" even if you have said it wasn't your favorite song ever (he's actually said he wishes he hadn't written it). It provides a good lesson plan for a US History teacher these days -- you've got popular culture, Cold War, international politics, Civil Rights, SE Asia conflict, science and technology, sports, the all-important cola wars and various other references that give us a good overview of Joel's life from 1947 to 1989. The thing that my kids had the hardest time with during the lesson plan was coming up with the next 20 years. They couldn't figure out what major topics would fill the 90s and early 2000s. I guess I understand that since the Cold War ended before most of them were born -- most of my high schoolers these days were born in this millennia. They don't know the difference between the Berlin Wall and the Great Wall of China. Both are ancient history to them.
But now, heck ... I could write a whole verse in just what has happened in this world since we moved to Malaysia. Man, it's nuts what I read about every time I crack open a new can of CNN International. We certainly didn't start the fire, but it seems like a big ol' bottle of lighter fluid got thrown on it somehow in the last six months. It would be easy to just chalk it up to Armageddon, the end of the world, the Second Coming, and all that, but I think there's been worse times. No really, I do. It's just the world we live in now, the one that's always been burnin' and turnin' ... well, it's globally connected now. When people are butchered in Africa or kidnapped in the Middle East or are slaughtered by their mum in Australia -- we all know about it within about 20 minutes of it happening. Cell phone cameras are capturing not only perceived police brutality in Staten Island, but beheadings in Syria and dopey teenagers trying to Parkour from building top to building top.
I have sincerely missed being a news writer since I started this blog. I watch both my sons struggle with their writing skills and realize how blessed I am to have been given the ability to put my thoughts together in a coherent way as to express my ideas into the written form. But, as the world was spinning around 1998, Al Gore was putting the finishing touches on the Internet and the world was about to be changed forever. Suddenly, the media took a downward turn from which I don't think it or society in general will ever recover.
As the news was coming into our screens and not our morning front door steps, the new adage in the business shifted from, "Get it right, first," to, "Get it first, right?" All the President's Men's glorification of Woodward and Bernstein's desperate attempt to verify sources before ending a presidency woefully was scrubbed away like a questionable stain on a blue dress. We were told it was coming ... Harry Amana told us five years earlier that the newspaper as we knew it was about to be replaced by the computer. As we doled around complaining about having to cover traffic court and county commissioner meetings in News Reporting (JOMC 54 for those of you keeping score at home), our teacher was telling the future. The only thing Mr. Amana missed was the timeline. He said we would see it in our lifetime ... he didn't realize we would see it in our grandparents' lifetime instead.
So now the Internet is our resource to the outside world. Everything we know about the Middle East we know from Drudging through the headlines or Huffing through a six paragraph summary of Syria. How many of you read about the terrorist holding up the ISIS flag in the Australian cafe only to find out 8 hours later he had a history of mental instability and the writing on the flag that was displayed had nothing at all to do with ISIS? Then, you probably read about the slaughter of a family in Australia tied to speculation to whether or not it had something to do with the cafe. It didn't, or at least as far as I know now it didn't as the mother was arrested this morning.
I watch as a history teacher, and I watch as a former professional journalist and I see the indoctrination of the world falling in place wherever it is you point your mouse or the channel on which you land in the world of Television News Roulette. The things you see there will shape your opinion of those things you don't see in your backyard. The same thing has happened for me over here on the other side of the burnin', turnin' world. I have watched Ferguson burn from afar. I have seen LeBron wearing his "I can't breathe" shirt. I have shivered in horror at the news of Pakistani children being slaughtered this week for attending school. I have seen the coverage of the American teacher being slaughtered in Abu Dhabi, and I have done it six weeks after receiving an email from the US Embassy telling me it could possibly happen. I've seen all this, but I've experienced none of it firsthand. I have to hope that the men and women who are coming out of the J-Schools in Missouri and Chapel Hill and Syracuse and Columbia and Berkeley are upholding the ethics and standards of the profession. I hope they are from the same vein as Chuck Stone who told me to get the story right but make it readable, or Jim Shumaker who told me to cut through all the bulls**t and get to the story. I hope they are getting it right because they are shaping my view of the world.
You see, I hope this is the case because not only does the media shape my view of the world, it shapes the world's view of me. Back home, I always used to see the world as it fit the American Way. I taught my psychology students about Cultural Relativity because they needed to know how to act when they encountered non-Americans. But, what I've kind of come to realize is ... drumroll please. Here we go .... this may get me in trouble but it's true ... America isn't the center of the world. It's round, and it's burnin', and it's turnin', and we're just one part of a bigger whole. There might be something to this whole globalization thing. So, while we are starting to see the dark, dirty side of the rest of the world more and more frequently, I'm thinking the rest of the world is starting to see some of our underbelly, too. And, it shapes their opinions of us. And, some of the stuff they hear, the assume it's true about all of us. Because, like us, they usually only see the bad side of things. So, they assume that all American cops are bad, or that all Americans with guns shoot up movie theaters and schools, and they think that everyone in the South is like Honey Boo Boo's family.
Or, they get on an elevator with an American Gringo and they feel uncomfortable. Like about a month ago when I was riding up with a young couple who appeared to be from the Middle East. After introductions and pleasantries, they hesitated and said, "We are from Iran," to which I replied, "I am from the United States." After the uncomfortable pregnant pause, the elevator opened, and the woman said as I walked away, "We like Americans!" to which I turned and said, "And I like Iranians." And there you go. The pink elephant was suddenly ushered out of the elevator, and suddenly, we were just human beings talking to one another.
Because what you find when your travel internationally is this -- the news usually focuses on the bad stuff. But, it's focusing on a grain of sand, not a whole beach. When you read the horrible stories coming out of Syria, or Pakistan, or Nigeria, or Ukraine, or Australia, or Ferguson, or Sony Corp., or wherever the bad new leads to high ratings, I need you remember the words to the song. Because, the Piano Man was right. The world spins so rapidly -- one full rotation every 24 hours with a diameter of about 12,000 kilometers -- that it looks like the whole world is burnin'. But, it's not. A closer look will show that each of these horror stories is just a flickering flame that can be extinguished. The rest of the world is not burning at all. It's full of humanitarians providing aid, scientists treating disease, technicians helping the lame walk and the blind see. It's Christmas time, and those last three weren't chosen by random, folks. Amidst all the chaos, miracles are happening every day. Slow the rotation down and reduce the power of the flames.
Remain positive. See the potential in each individual and avoid assuming that, "All of 'em are like that ..." You'll find that they are not. Most of us are in this thing for the right reasons. And, I'm renewing my hope in the human race.
If you need an extra boost, check out this commercial from our friends in Great Britain -- it's from another time when the world really was burnin' and turnin' worse than any of us have ever experienced:
Merry Christmas!
JLowe
