Telling the truth, objectively and subjectively

"The media no longer tells the truth!"
"The media is biased!"
"The media leans left/leans right/whatever!"

Like many, I've been very disturbed by the difficulty in finding objective reporting.  And in the last year or two, I've been especially disturbed by the rise in "fake news".  It's gotten so that, when I'm on Facebook and an article comes up, I immediately wonder if it's true or not.

We've gotten so that we can't tell facts from opinions, and too many of us are broadcasting opinion as fact.

Well, here are a few things I've decided:

1. I will tell the truth.
2. I will have my facts straight, to the best of my ability.
3. If I write opinion, it will be labeled as opinion.
4. I will not deliberately set out to personally attack or offend people.  While truth is offensive to some, there's a difference between telling the truth and having people be offended by it and deliberately setting out to attack or offend a person.  
5. If I am wrong on a fact, I will correct it.
6. If I have attacked someone unintentionally, I will apologize.  
7. My blog, Allyn's Alley, will be a place where the writer can be trusted to tell it straight.

So, let's get started.  First, here are the definitions of "fact" and "opinion" that I will be using. Merriam-Webster online defines "fact" as "a thing done, the quality of being actual, something that has actual existence, an actual occurrence, a piece of information presented as having objective reality."

Facts, as I understand this definition, are objective.  Merriam-Webster defines "objective" as, among other things, "of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers: having reality independent of the mind . . . involving or deriving from sense perception or experience with actual objects, conditions or phenomena . . . expressing or dealing with facts or conditions as perceived without distortion by personal feelings, prejudices, or interpretations."

Merriam-Webster defines "opinion" as:  "a view, judgment, or appraisal formed in the mind about a particular matter; belief stronger than impression and less strong than positive knowledge; a generally held view; a formal expression of judgment or advice by an expert; the formal expression of the legal reasons and principles upon which a legal decision is based."

Opinion, as I understand it, is subjective.  Merriam-Webster defines "subjective" as, among other things, "characteristic of or belonging to reality as perceived rather than as independent of mind; relaiting to or being experience or knowledge as conditioned by personal mental characteristics or states; peculiar to a particular individual; modified or affected by personal views, experience, or background; arising from conditions within the brian or sense organs and not directly caused by external stimuli; arising out of or identified by means of one's perception of one's own states and processes; lacking in reality or substance."

Okay, now that all that hard work is over :-) let me give an example of fact and opinion.

On January 20, 2017, Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th president of the United States.  That is a piece of information that has objective reality.  Millions of people saw him be inaugurated.  (I was one of them.)  Therefore, this is a fact.

Donald Trump is a poor choice for president.  Or, Donald Trump is a great choice for president. Both statements are a view, judgment, or appraisal formed in the mind about a particular matter. Therefore, both statements are an opinion.

I describe myself as an imperfect follower of a perfect God.  That God is a loving, compassionate God who forgives over and over.  If I am to follow him, though, he does expect certain actions and attitudes from me.  (His Holy Spirit will give me the power to follow him and produce those actions and attitudes.)   One of those actions is to tell the truth.

My blog, Allyn's Alley, is the product of a woman who writes about anything and everything from the point of view of a Christian conservative.  One complaint about the media is that they have a "hidden agenda" or that they are "biased".  Here, when you read what I write, you will read the writings of a Christian who is a conservative morally, fiscally, and politically (admittedly, an imperfect conservative.)  That's my "agenda", or "bias", if you will.

But even with that admitted "bias" or "worldview", I will always strive to tell the truth.  I will report facts, and when I share opinions, they will be labeled as opinions.

This will be a place where I will be open with my views.

And ultimately, I want to be a writer who is trustworthy.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Mary Tyler Moore, December 29, 1936-January 25, 2017

"Who can turn the world on with her smile . . .?"

For seven seasons, between 1970 and 1977, millions of Americans tuned into CBS on Saturdays at 9 p.m. to learn the answer to that question.

Her name was Mary Tyler Moore, and when she died on Wednesday, she was rightfully hailed as "iconic".

My generation grew up knowing her as Mary Richards, single, professional newswoman, who worked at the fictional WJM-TV in Minneapolis.  We saw her spar with her boss, Lou Grant, ("I hate spunk!") and groan at the antics of Ted Baxter.  When her series ended in 1977, Mary's character said, as one of her last lines, "Thank you for being my family."  Whether that was written in the script, or she ad-libbed it, I have no doubt that she meant it--not only speaking as her character to her fellow characters, but speaking as an actress to her fellow thespians.

My parents' generation knew her as Laura Petrie from The Dick Van Dyke Show, with her signature catchphrase, "Oh, Rob!"  Last night, while watching a CBS special about Mary Tyler Moore, it was mentioned that Mary's Capri pants were groundbreaking--the network complained, "She should be in a skirt!"

I didn't realize that Mary Tyler Moore played a groundbreaking feminist who showed women that it was okay to not have a date on Saturday nights, because they could stay home and watch Mary.  No, it was just a fun show for me to watch, a fun show with a catchy title theme that you could sing along to.  (I even played the tambourine along with it one time, over my sister's protests!)

I do remember one show where Mary and her date came back to the apartment and the date started taking off his shirt.  I was young, naive, and uneducated in certain areas, and I didn't understand why he was taking his shirt off, nor did I understand why Mary got so upset with him.  I do remember her doing the math and realizing she'd been on, "2000 dates!"

When Mary Tyler Moore played Betty Rollin in "First, You Cry", a TV movie based on Rollin's memoir of her struggle with breast cancer, a reviewer noted that one thing that MTM could do was act, and that she shouldn't be ashamed of it.  I've remembered that review off and on.  MTM is underrated as a serious actress.  She, along with Carol Burnett, is one of a rare handful of actors and actresses who can do comedy and drama equally well.  In 1981, I sat in the Moore Auditorium at Florida State University and watched Ordinary People, the movie that earned MTM an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress.  Several years later, she played opposite James Garner in Heartsounds, the story of a couple's struggle after the husband suffered two severe heart attacks.

Her real-life struggles also made news.  She dealt with alcoholism.  She was married three times and divorced twice.  Her only child accidentally shot and killed himself in 1980.  She also had Type 1 diabetes, and when testifying before a Congressional committee, she described the "tyranny" that diabetes wracked on her every day of her life.

In later years, the diabetes attacked her eyes and kidneys.  In a 2014 episode of Hot In Cleveland, the five women who'd participated in the Mary Tyler Moore show -- Betty White, Cloris Leachman, Valerie Harper, Georgia Engle, and Mary herself -- came together for a reunion show.

In the scene, the first four women walked into a restaurant where another woman held a menu in front of her face.  When the menu dropped, revealing Mary Tyler Moore's face, the crowd roared, and Betty commented, "Well, looks like she made it after all!"

By that time, Mary was nearly blind.

She died with her husband, Richard Levine, at her side.

In the first season of the Mary Tyler Moore show, the question the theme song asked was not the famous, "Who can turn the world on with her smile?" Rather, it was, "How will you make it on your own?"  The lyrics addressed the premise of the series, which was that of a woman who'd just ended a relationship and was moving to the big city to start over.  The song ended with, "You might just make it after all."

When the series was picked up for a second season, the network called the songwriter, Sonny Curtis, and told him, we need new lyrics!

He focused on the personality of Mary Richards -- the woman who could turn the world on with her smile, who could take a nothing date and make it seem worthwhile -- and ended with the optimistic declaration, "You're gonna make it after all!"

She did make it after all.  She turned the world on with her smile.  We are richer for having known that smile, and poorer now that it is gone.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Feeling shamed . . .

This is a personal post.  To be honest, lately, I've been feeling shamed.

Most of this is self-shaming, I will admit.

I feel shamed, on the one hand, because I am not a CEO of a Fortune 500 company, a high-powered lawyer, or part of one of the STEM professions (science, technology, engineering, or mathematics.)
I work in a "traditionally feminine" clerical position (I proofread deposition transcripts from home), and in my life before Matthew, I was a librarian, which is also a traditionally female profession.

On the other hand, I feel shamed because I'm a Christian woman, and Christian women are "supposed" to get married, have kids, stay at home and raise them, and homeschool them all.  Or, at the very least, make sure they are not in "godless" public schools unless it's to be "salt and light".

I honestly think that we give lip service to the words, "feminism is all about giving women choices and empowering them".  That may have been the intent of feminism in the beginning.

But now?  I really think that there are people who will not be satisfied until we have a female President, Vice-President, Cabinet, and Congress; until all Fortune 500 companies are run by women, until all STEM positions are filled by women, and until secretaries, waitresses, and all other "traditionally female" jobs are filled by men . . . and until all fathers are stay-at-home dads!

I truly do not know where this message is coming from.  But it is what I read between the lines.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

2016: Goodbye and good riddance!

I was going to end this year with a list of the famous people who died this year.  But when I downloaded a list from the NBC News website and tried to format it so I could reproduce it here, it came out to be THREE PAGES long.

So, all I'm going to say to this year, the year that cost us Princess Leia and her mother, that took away Prince and his protege Vanity, that killed 49 people in Orlando, five in Dallas, and a long, long list of others, both famous and not famous:

Goodbye, and good riddance!

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Honoring a Gator . . .

I'm a graduate of FSU, so if anyone were to ask me to wear orange and blue in honor of a graduate of the University of Florida, I would have one of two reactions:  either laugh, because that request was obviously a joke, or give them a puzzled/bemused look and then ask, why in the world would you want me to do that?

Except today.

Today, I was asked to wear orange and blue in honor of a Gator, and I would have gladly done so . . . except that I had nothing orange in my wardrobe that was suitable to wear to a funeral.

Last Friday morning, two days before Christmas, radio listeners and/or TV watchers in the metro Atlanta area probably heard reports of gridlock on north I-75 in Cobb County due to a fatal traffic accident.  Gridlock is normal in the Atlanta area, and sadly, "fatal wreck" is all too common.  I heard that traffic report, but I'm afraid I paid more attention to the "gridlock" part than to the "fatality" part.
The next day, I found out that the fatality was a member of our church, Maurio Andrews, 32, father of two young children, Ava and Ian; and wife to Ashley.

I'm embarrassed to say that when I saw a mention of Maurio on someone's Facebook page, I had to ask who it was and if they knew him.  That's when I learned that he was a member of North Atlanta.

This isn't the first time that our congregation has been rocked by the results of a traffic accident.  In 2009, we lost two members, Matthew and Jeannette Prather, when their van's tire blew, causing the van to flip over.  (Ironically, this accident also happened on northbound I-75 in middle Georgia.) Counting Matthew, Jeannette, and now Maurio, we've lost five members of our congregation to traffic accidents since 2009.

Today we held Maurio's funeral.  Because Maurio was a graduate of the University of Florida, the family asked that the people who came wear orange and blue in honor of him.  It was the first time that I would have almost moved heaven and earth to find something orange that I could wear.  I have nothing orange in my wardrobe except for an orange sweatshirt and several orange T-shirts, and none of those would be appropriate for a funeral.

So I ended up wearing a blue plaid dress over a blue shirt.

Today, a sea of orange-and-blue clad mourners said good-bye to a man who was known for his intelligence, his big smile, his love for his God and his family, and his passion for the University of Florida Gators.  They said good-bye to someone who was lost too soon, whom tragedy stole from us in a cruel act of fate just two days before Christmas.  They remembered someone who served, someone who gave, and someone who left behind a legacy of love and passion.

For that reason, I would gladly wear orange and blue to honor a Gator.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Baby Rapp and Bobbie Lee

Between my birthday and Christmas money, I was able to reactivate my Ancestry.com subscription. Since then, I've been poking around and clicking on links, trying to create my family tree with new information.  

I just found a death certificate that blew my mind.  

Actually, I found two death certificates that blew my mind.  

The first one, I discovered when I was tracing my husband's line backwards.  While investigating his grandparents' family, I found a death certificate reading simply, "Baby Rapp."  

I had not known, until that moment, that the first child of my husband's grandparents was a stillborn son.  No name except "Baby Rapp."  No record except on a death certificate issued by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Department of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics, file number 44012.  Date of death, April 9, 1927; time of death, 9:30 a.m., cause of death "stillborn (at term)".  In other words, Baby Rapp was a full-term boy that was born sleeping.  He was buried two days later.  

My mother-in-law was born the next year, the first of four living children.

The other death certificate rewrote a small portion of my own family history.

You see, I'd been under the impression that my maternal grandparents had had a daughter who was stillborn or died right after birth.  I don't know if my grandmother had told me she'd died at birth or exactly how she'd told me the story, but that was how I remembered it.

This morning, while looking up my grandmother's information, I found a link to a Billie Lee Chitwood's death certificate.  I wondered if that was actually Bobbie Lee Chitwood, because this particular daughter was named for my grandmother's father, Robert Lee Thompson.

So, I clicked on the link and found a death certificate, issued by the Commonwealth of Kentucky, State Board of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics, File No. 27041, Because of the handwriting on the death certificate, "Bobbie Lee" was probably misread as "Billie Lee" when it was transcribed for the Ancestry.com site.

Her date of death was November 13, 1935, around 10:30 p.m.  Cause of death: gastro-enteritis.  Age: Three months, 12 days old.

She didn't die at birth, like I'd always thought.  Instead, she lived with her family from August 1, 1935, until November 13.  And she died of a disease that would probably be easier to treat today but that, in rural Kentucky in 1935, was probably harder to deal with.

My mother was born two years later.  Then, my uncle.  

So now I know that the second child in my grandmother's family was Bobbie Lee, and she died before my mother was even conceived.  And not only did she die, she lived for a little while.  And then, around November 5th, she got sick.  A Dr. Bailey first saw her on November 8th.  Five days later, she was dead.

How do you go on after losing a child?

I now know that my husband's grandparents, and my grandparents, faced that question.  And somehow, they went on.  Because they went on, my mother and my husband's mother were both born.

I find it fascinating how death and life intersect, how just one moment, one decision made, one unforseeable circumstance can change a person's life in ways we can never, ever forsee.

Had Baby Rapp not been born sleeping, his parents probably would not have conceived my mother-in-law.  If Bobbie Lee hadn't died when she did, it's possible that her parents wouldn't have conceived my mother.  It takes one particular egg, one sperm cell, and one particular moment in time to make a child.

So, in reading the account of Baby Rapp and Bobbie Lee, and thinking about when they were born and when they died, I find myself asking the question:  Would my mother and mother-in-law have been born if these two babies had not died?

If they hadn't . . . I probably wouldn't be here writing this.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

The ticking bomb . . .

I don't know who first came up with the illustration, but in nearly every account I've read about the First World War, the situation in Europe was described as "countries sitting on a powder keg".

The bullet fired into the body of Archduke Ferdinand on June 28, 1914 lit the match that exploded into WWI.

Lately, it seems that the world is sitting on another powder keg and it's just waiting for the right match to light the fuse.  Yesterday, Russia's ambassador to Turkey was murdered in front of a crowd by a man who shouted, "God is great!  Remember Aleppo!  Remember Syria!"  On the same day, a man drove a truck into a crowded marketplace in Berlin, killing nine people, and current reports now say that authorities aren't sure if they have the right person in custody--meaning that the driver of the truck may still be at large.  And in an incident that hasn't gotten nearly the same amount of coverage as the previous two, three worshippers at a mosque in Zurich, Switzerland were wounded by a gunman who opened fire during prayers.  Swiss police think they have found the body of the gunman.

In our own country, we've had too many shootings and other violent incidents to count in the last several years.  I think the last major one was the stabbing at Ohio State.  And the fact that I have to write "I think" says a lot.

December 14th marked the fourth anniversary of the Sandy Hook shootings.

This summer, two African-Americans were shot by police, and five officers in Dallas were shot.  And I've lost track of the number of people shot by police and the number of police shot.  Only a few days ago, two Americus, Georgia police officers--best friends to each other--were shot and killed responding to a domestic violence call.  Four other officers in the state of Georgia were shot in the same week.

Forty-nine people died this summer in a mass shooting in Orlando.

The hysteria leading up to this year's presidential election was unprecedented, and the hysteria afterwards also unprecedented.  Depending on who you listen to, Donald Trump is either the savior of the United States or the Antichrist--or at least, the False Prophet to the Beast in Revelation 13. Yesterday, this savior/antichrist was officially elected President of the United States.  Here in Georgia, protestors met the 13 electors who went to cast their votes at the state capitol building.  One of the electors has a name similar to that of a friend I attend church with.  She -- my friend -- received four letters begging her to change her vote from Donald Trump to Hillary Clinton.  And other electors around the country can share similar stories.

Although I refer to "hysteria", people do have legitimate concerns about this coming administration. A friend who received an appointment to the US Diplomatic Corps decided not to accept it because she is very concerned about the possibility of violence towards Americans overseas.  And I can't blame her.  Others worry about the possibility of actions towards Muslims and other minorities. The "alt-right" -- a term I never heard until after this election -- raised its ugly head with its "white supremacy" nonsense, and "fake news" is now a trending topic in mainstream news coverage.

In my Facebook news feed, I see posts condemning Donald Trump, and then, the very next posts praise him.  Never mind that there may be very real concerns about his attitudes/statements towards women and minority groups, at least he's going to fix the economy.  </sarc>

The divide between groups is as deep as I've ever seen it, and I don't think it's ever going to heal.

When the reality show Deadliest Catch began advertising its previous season, it used a song by Aloe Blacc with the following lyrics:

The whole world sitting on a ticking bomb
The whole world sitting on a ticking bomb
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

And it's about to explode!

Whoever picked that song may be more prescient than they realized.

I hope they're wrong.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.