I’ll get back to the regularly scheduled plane crash coverage shortly, but I heard something today that just blew my mind due to its sheer inanity. I am not upset by what I heard – it’s so silly that it would be hard to get upset – just awed at the sheer weirdness of it, and interested in the psychological and social processes that are probably behind it.
If you spend time listening to what the various public creationism advocates have to say (and yes, I actually do listen to them – I don’t reject their claims out of hand, I reject them because I have yet to hear one that actually holds water), you get accustomed to hearing them claim that every form of social ill can be placed at the feet of what they label as “Darwinism” (what the rest of us call “acceptance of reality”). These often end up as an argument that has come to be known as the reductio ad hitlerium – claiming that acceptance of evolution led to Nazism*. However, sometimes they are more subtle – the Discovery Institute is very good at making false anti-evolution claims that are subtle and clever enough to appear plausible if you don't bother to look too closely.
Anyway, I heard one today that was so bizarre that I was left just staring and thinking “where the hell did this person come up with THAT?” That was before I burst into laughter.
I was listening to a podcast of a call-in radio show. The topic had to do with religion, politics, and morality, but did not directly involve evolution/creationism. One fellow called in from Sacramento and stated that the Bible held no teachings that would be repugnant to a reasonable person. When one of the guests asked the caller about the bible’s acceptance of slavery (after all, it was written in the ancient Middle East, where slavery was very common and important to the economy of many city-states), the caller stated:
“The Bible doesn’t teach slavery. Slavery came from Charles Darwin, who claimed that all Africans were negroids and only fit to be slaves.”
I have heard people try to attribute slavery to the acceptance of evolution before, but usually in a less direct way. This guy was really in a bizarre class all his own, and I rather suspect that he’d be booed off-stage even at a creationist convention.
Okay, first off, Charles Darwin was opposed to slavery.
Second, Charles Darwin was a naturalist, not a world leader. How would he have instituted Slavery, even if he had wanted to? His ideas were hotly debated for some time after he published, so it’s not as if politicians immediately began jumping on the bandwagon
Third, slavery has been around since before recorded history. Racial slavery dates to at least the 16th century, when slave ships brought Africans to the Americas. Darwin was born in AD 1809. Origin of Species was published in 1859, at the final bow of U.S. slavery and well after it had been outlawed in England. So, what is the caller proposing? Time travel?
Fourth, there is no fourth! Look upon my fourth, oh mortal, and despair....wait a minute, I think I was channeling Ozymandius there for a moment...sorry about that.
And, of course, slavery is discussed in the Bible, sometimes with approval (provided that owners followed certain rules) and sometimes only as a fact of life in the ancient Middle East, but it is discussed nonetheless - proving that this guy not only knows nothing about history, but hasn’t even read the book he’d called to defend. Racially-based slavery as we now think of it is somewhat different from slavery in the ancient Middle East and much more recent, but it still predates ol’ Charlie by a few centuries.
And, again, as I know someone will think I’m upset, I’m not. But sometimes you just get struck by how bizarre some people’s beliefs can get, especially when they are trying to justify a claim at odds with reality such as “evolution leads to evil”. It’s actually rather fascinating.
*It is true that the Nazis did rely on a misunderstanding (possibly intentional) of evolution in some of their pro-Aryan propaganda. However, it is also true that they appealed to the religious views of much of the German population (which was largely anti-semitic) as well as the general non-scientific and non-religious patriotic attitudes of many Germans. So, if you’re going to lay blame for the Holocaust on evolution, any well-informed person will also have to give at least equal blame to patriotism and religion.
Or you could just accept reality and see it as the very deadly culmination of several centuries of German history, beginning with pogroms in the Medieval period. Ultimately, the origins of the anti-semitic sentiments lay before the origins of modern science, and whatever their initial impetus (religious or provincialism/tribalism), had very much taken on a life of their own by the 1930’s (often adopting the veneer of piety or research in order to justify pre-existing beliefs), and were exacerbated by conditions at the end of WWI and the nature of German government and society in the 1920’s. If you want a good discussion of how the extreme conditions of the post-WWI era led to the rise of radical political movements, including but not limited to the Nazis, go here.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Monday, December 15, 2008
Plane Crash - Part 2
Welcome to a series of entries on one of the most bizarre projects that I have been involved with. This is Part 2, which involves corpse-sniffing dogs and my car becoming a human remains transport. Go here for Part 1, which describes how this all began. If you've already read Part 2, go here for Part 3.
************************************
One of the first steps in executing our plan for recovering the human remains from the wreckage was bringing in trained forensics dogs and their equally trained (and very professional) handlers. These folks were really quite patient and delightful to work with. Unfortunately, lack of sleep and an abundance of stress made me not so pleasant, and I hope that I did not leave a permanently bad impression, though I suspect I may have.
Regardless, these folks claimed that the dogs could not only find relatively recent bodies, but also could find older bone. I was skeptical of this claim, and the first day was certainly inauspicious. The dogs were having a good deal of difficulty finding anything, which we later learned was due to the large amount of petroleum vapor in the air (the smell was overpowering even for those of us who don’t have sensitive noses). When the dogs returned a few days later, they pin-pointed even small pieces of bone with an almost eerie accuracy and sped us up considerably. However, on that first day, we were left with little to go on. So, we began to work out which piles of excavated soil belonged with the layer that contained the wreckage, and which belonged to the pile that contained only the over-burden.
I was also short-staffed on that first day. Our original plan had been to sort through the soil containing the materials by hand, scraping soil out of the pile with our trowels and looking for bone. We had underestimated the amount of soil that we would have to deal with, or over-estimated our soil-scraping prowess. Regardless, we moved more slowly than we had previously assumed. Luckily, we were assisted by the forensic professor from the university and her 14 year-old daughter, who proved to be quite handy with the trowel and bone identification.
Please indulge me in a bit of an aside. I remember that, when I was 14, parental bonding usually took the form of catching a movie, going for a walk, or working on some sort of craft project together. I valued these experiences, certainly, and see their value more and more the older I get. However, I have to say, I would probably have much clearer memories of these events (not to mention better stories) if I had helped my parents recover corpses. I can just see the high-school hallway discussions now:
Teen 1: “So, my dad and I went out camping this weekend. It was okay. What did you do?”
Teen 2: “I helped my mom recover a corpse from a field, and then collected specimens from the maggot population to determine time of death. We then handed them over to the coronerwith field observation notes to further determine whether the death was due to a fall, or a screwdriver sticking out of the torso.”
Teen 1: “Uuuhhhhmmm…yeah…”
…ahh, those halcyon days of youth. But I digress…
At any rate, the professor and her daughter were extremely helpful and their participation was greatly appreciated. However, I decided by the end of the day that we would return to the field on the second day with the standard archaeological screens and an additional field technician (which would, with the help of the professor and two graduate students, speed us up and increase our accuracy immensely).
During the course of the day, we also encountered numerous unfired bullets from the plane’s machine guns – this was after a military unexploded ordnance “expert” surveyed the scene and announced that there were no bullets in the area. Several people, none of them experts themselves, assured me that old bullets were harmless – but after hearing the stories of a former military police officer who had some experience with UXO, I was not inclined to take their word for it. We took each bullet and put it in a bag that was a good distance away from us, and behind a thick berm.
Early in the day, a coroner’s detective came out to the field to talk with us about proper treatment of the human remains that we anticipated encountering. At the end of the day, I called the detective, sent the rest of the crew home, and waited in the field for the detective to arrive. It was kind of nice, it was quiet, I could hear the breeze blowing over the strawberry fields, and I got my first quiet rest for the day. A short while later, I saw the Sherriff’s cruiser coming up the dirt road towards where I was working. At the wheel of the car was the detective from earlier in the day.
After the car parked, the detective got out and walked towards the wreckage. I joined him, and we spoke for a few minutes about what had occurred that day and what my plans were for the rest of the week. He had no problem with my change in approach, and was pleased with the methods that we intended to implement. After we had finished that, I showed him the boxes that contained the material that we had recovered that day, and I asked if he wanted me to put the boxes int eh car that he had brought.
“No.”
I was a bit dumbfounded. After all, human remains go to the coroner – why was the coroner telling me that he didn’t want them in the car? Was he expected some other vehicle to do the pick up? A coroner’s van? An unmarked vehicle? An airlift? A deer-drawn sleigh looking for some extra money during the off-season, perhaps? So, I asked “what would you like me to do with them?”
“Well,” the detective looked off and appeared to be somewhat annoyed, though it wasn’t clear what he was annoyed with, “you only have a small portion of what is in there” he indicated the partially-buried wreckage.
“Yes.”
“So, you will have more in the next few days.”
“True.”
“It makes more sense for us to take custody all at once than to take it in parts.”
While the detective was making sense, I wasn’t keen on transporting relatively recent body parts around. Still, I didn’t know what else to say, so I said “I see.”
“So, you should keep ahold of them until you’re finished out here. Also, that’ll give us time to work things out with the Navy. They haven’t wanted to get involved yet, and that’s pretty strange.”
And so my car – a strangely-colored Ford Escort hatchback – become a human remains transport. There are few people who have carried human remains around in their trunks, and fewer still, I’ll wager, who did so at the instructions of the coroner’s office.
The detective left, and I had to wait for another hour yet for a deputy to show up and take possession of the unfired bullets. When he arrived, he had a few other deputies with him. When they first showed up, they seemed to be going out of their way to appear macho and in charge – hips thrust forward, walking with exaggerated steps, hands on their hips, next to their guns and pepper spray (no coincidence there, I suspect). But after a few minutes out there, they all took on a demeanor more like excited schoolboys, asking questions about the plane crash, what we know the plane, of the pilot and gunner, and of the processes that resulted in the plane being buried. In all, they were pretty cool guys who just needed to remember that they don’t need to try to intimidate everyone that they encounter. Regardless, by the end of their visit, they had decided to work the crash site into the night-time patrols of the area, meaning that it would have better security.
And with that, the deputies left, and I followed. I headed back to the office to drop stuff off, then I headed home for a shower. After the shower, I headed over to a friend’s house for the evening. I sat down at the table next to another visitor – a friend named Thomas. Thomas had been on an internet chat site earlier in the day, and someone had brought up the plane crash – it was a fairly prominent local news story. In the ensuing discussion, someone had begun to comment that the plane crash “sure sounded like the work of a Japanese sleeper cell” (in fact, when one knows the facts, it sounds more like mechanical failure) and then proceeded to use this to try to produce a justification for the Japanese internment. It’s amazing how the paranoid delusions of the present can be used to justify the crimes of the past.
And so ended the first day. The rest of the week was a bit of a blur, and I should be able to cover it in one or two more entries, but the first day stands out in my memory. So, look out soon for Part 3.
************************************
One of the first steps in executing our plan for recovering the human remains from the wreckage was bringing in trained forensics dogs and their equally trained (and very professional) handlers. These folks were really quite patient and delightful to work with. Unfortunately, lack of sleep and an abundance of stress made me not so pleasant, and I hope that I did not leave a permanently bad impression, though I suspect I may have.
Regardless, these folks claimed that the dogs could not only find relatively recent bodies, but also could find older bone. I was skeptical of this claim, and the first day was certainly inauspicious. The dogs were having a good deal of difficulty finding anything, which we later learned was due to the large amount of petroleum vapor in the air (the smell was overpowering even for those of us who don’t have sensitive noses). When the dogs returned a few days later, they pin-pointed even small pieces of bone with an almost eerie accuracy and sped us up considerably. However, on that first day, we were left with little to go on. So, we began to work out which piles of excavated soil belonged with the layer that contained the wreckage, and which belonged to the pile that contained only the over-burden.
I was also short-staffed on that first day. Our original plan had been to sort through the soil containing the materials by hand, scraping soil out of the pile with our trowels and looking for bone. We had underestimated the amount of soil that we would have to deal with, or over-estimated our soil-scraping prowess. Regardless, we moved more slowly than we had previously assumed. Luckily, we were assisted by the forensic professor from the university and her 14 year-old daughter, who proved to be quite handy with the trowel and bone identification.
Please indulge me in a bit of an aside. I remember that, when I was 14, parental bonding usually took the form of catching a movie, going for a walk, or working on some sort of craft project together. I valued these experiences, certainly, and see their value more and more the older I get. However, I have to say, I would probably have much clearer memories of these events (not to mention better stories) if I had helped my parents recover corpses. I can just see the high-school hallway discussions now:
Teen 1: “So, my dad and I went out camping this weekend. It was okay. What did you do?”
Teen 2: “I helped my mom recover a corpse from a field, and then collected specimens from the maggot population to determine time of death. We then handed them over to the coronerwith field observation notes to further determine whether the death was due to a fall, or a screwdriver sticking out of the torso.”
Teen 1: “Uuuhhhhmmm…yeah…”
…ahh, those halcyon days of youth. But I digress…
At any rate, the professor and her daughter were extremely helpful and their participation was greatly appreciated. However, I decided by the end of the day that we would return to the field on the second day with the standard archaeological screens and an additional field technician (which would, with the help of the professor and two graduate students, speed us up and increase our accuracy immensely).
During the course of the day, we also encountered numerous unfired bullets from the plane’s machine guns – this was after a military unexploded ordnance “expert” surveyed the scene and announced that there were no bullets in the area. Several people, none of them experts themselves, assured me that old bullets were harmless – but after hearing the stories of a former military police officer who had some experience with UXO, I was not inclined to take their word for it. We took each bullet and put it in a bag that was a good distance away from us, and behind a thick berm.
Early in the day, a coroner’s detective came out to the field to talk with us about proper treatment of the human remains that we anticipated encountering. At the end of the day, I called the detective, sent the rest of the crew home, and waited in the field for the detective to arrive. It was kind of nice, it was quiet, I could hear the breeze blowing over the strawberry fields, and I got my first quiet rest for the day. A short while later, I saw the Sherriff’s cruiser coming up the dirt road towards where I was working. At the wheel of the car was the detective from earlier in the day.
After the car parked, the detective got out and walked towards the wreckage. I joined him, and we spoke for a few minutes about what had occurred that day and what my plans were for the rest of the week. He had no problem with my change in approach, and was pleased with the methods that we intended to implement. After we had finished that, I showed him the boxes that contained the material that we had recovered that day, and I asked if he wanted me to put the boxes int eh car that he had brought.
“No.”
I was a bit dumbfounded. After all, human remains go to the coroner – why was the coroner telling me that he didn’t want them in the car? Was he expected some other vehicle to do the pick up? A coroner’s van? An unmarked vehicle? An airlift? A deer-drawn sleigh looking for some extra money during the off-season, perhaps? So, I asked “what would you like me to do with them?”
“Well,” the detective looked off and appeared to be somewhat annoyed, though it wasn’t clear what he was annoyed with, “you only have a small portion of what is in there” he indicated the partially-buried wreckage.
“Yes.”
“So, you will have more in the next few days.”
“True.”
“It makes more sense for us to take custody all at once than to take it in parts.”
While the detective was making sense, I wasn’t keen on transporting relatively recent body parts around. Still, I didn’t know what else to say, so I said “I see.”
“So, you should keep ahold of them until you’re finished out here. Also, that’ll give us time to work things out with the Navy. They haven’t wanted to get involved yet, and that’s pretty strange.”
And so my car – a strangely-colored Ford Escort hatchback – become a human remains transport. There are few people who have carried human remains around in their trunks, and fewer still, I’ll wager, who did so at the instructions of the coroner’s office.
The detective left, and I had to wait for another hour yet for a deputy to show up and take possession of the unfired bullets. When he arrived, he had a few other deputies with him. When they first showed up, they seemed to be going out of their way to appear macho and in charge – hips thrust forward, walking with exaggerated steps, hands on their hips, next to their guns and pepper spray (no coincidence there, I suspect). But after a few minutes out there, they all took on a demeanor more like excited schoolboys, asking questions about the plane crash, what we know the plane, of the pilot and gunner, and of the processes that resulted in the plane being buried. In all, they were pretty cool guys who just needed to remember that they don’t need to try to intimidate everyone that they encounter. Regardless, by the end of their visit, they had decided to work the crash site into the night-time patrols of the area, meaning that it would have better security.
And with that, the deputies left, and I followed. I headed back to the office to drop stuff off, then I headed home for a shower. After the shower, I headed over to a friend’s house for the evening. I sat down at the table next to another visitor – a friend named Thomas. Thomas had been on an internet chat site earlier in the day, and someone had brought up the plane crash – it was a fairly prominent local news story. In the ensuing discussion, someone had begun to comment that the plane crash “sure sounded like the work of a Japanese sleeper cell” (in fact, when one knows the facts, it sounds more like mechanical failure) and then proceeded to use this to try to produce a justification for the Japanese internment. It’s amazing how the paranoid delusions of the present can be used to justify the crimes of the past.
And so ended the first day. The rest of the week was a bit of a blur, and I should be able to cover it in one or two more entries, but the first day stands out in my memory. So, look out soon for Part 3.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Plane Crash - Part 1
A little over a year ago, I ended up assigned to one of the odder, and more interesting, projects I have so far had the good fortune to work on. The project was strangely amazing, but also a circus – complete with exaggerated urban legends, corpse-sniffing dogs, a would-be intrepid reporter who was more silly than intrepid, internet commentors attempting to justify the Japanese internment, renowned forensics experts, literal grave robbers, and a strangely-colored Ford Escort used to carry human remains. Unfortunately, for professional reasons, I can’t give out all of the details, but suffice to say that the story became more interesting than what I have written here.
I should say, from the outset though, that I was uniformly impressed by the actions and attitudes of our client, the interest of most members of the community, and the work of the Sherriff’s department. As strange as this experience was, these folks routinely did quite well under very unusual circumstances.
The story began on a clear and cold morning in January, 1944. On the way back to Crows Landing Air Field after night-time training excercises, a SBD-5 Dauntless dive-bomber crashed for unknown reasons into a river floodplain on the California coast. Because the floodplain was a large mudflat at the time, it took several days for Navy personnel to reach the plane and recover what they could of the plane and the bodies of the pilot and the gunner/radioman. Soon thereafter mud from the river’s flooding covered the plane wreckage that had remained, and the plane crash faded into a vague (or, as I would soon learn, sometimes greatly exaggerated) memory, and was finally forgotten by all but those who witnessed the crash…
…until July of 2007, when a construction crew hit the plane with a backhoe. Initially, the crew thought that they had hit a buried garbage pile – a not uncommon occurrence in the largely rural area – but the smell of petroleum and the nature of the material that they had hit soon convinced them otherwise. Shortly after this, my boss was called in to have a look, and it was quickly apparent that the crew had hit a mid-20th century plane wreck, complete with bullets indicating that it was a military plane. My boss consulted with the appropriate government agencies, and then returned to the office where he and I began working out a strategy for recovering plane wreckage and possible human remains.
For the usual red-tape reasons, it was a couple of weeks before we could begin work. In the interim, a person who remains unknown to this day managed to get their hands on a backhoe, and raided the crash site. The construction crew was abuzz with claims about the reason why the thief had stopped digging when they did. Whether these claims were supposition on their part or a whether a member of the construction crew knew who the thief was, I do not know. Regardless. This incident resulted in the construction of a temporary chain-link fence around the crash site, and the fence was successful in keeping further thieves away.
The following week, my boss and I met with Alison Galloway, the professor of forensic anthropology at UC Santa Cruz in order to discuss our plan for recovering remains with her. In all, she thought our plan was decent and workable – however, she cautioned us that we should have rubber gloves on hand. You see, when human fat is buried under the right circumstances, it can saponify, preserving it and some of the tissue in or around it ( rather gruseome site - you can look it up on the internet if you want to see some examples, but my advice is that you not do so). So, Dr. Galloway was warning us that we might run into this, and as a result, we should have appropriate protective equipment – i.e. rubber gloves. Thankfully, these ultimately proved unnecessary, and the remains we did were handled with appropriate care and respect - not an easy task considering much of what was going on around us.
Needless to say, the next time I spoke with my sister, who is studying to be a mortician, I told her of the professor's advice. She then posted a recap of our discussion on her blog. A few readers contacted her asking if I was single. The moral of the story – my sister’s blog attracts some freaky people.
The next day, my boss and I headed over to the job site in order to see what there was to see and adjust our plans accordingly. While there, we observed portions of the plane, old bullets, and pieces of silk from a parachute. We also observed the representative of our client, the construction proponent, in a bit of an odd mood.
As it happens, the representative had stopped at a nearby gas station to fill up her tank when she saw someone get out of a parked car and approach her – it was a reporter for the local newspaper. Turns out he’d been sitting in the gas station, waiting to see someone that he knew was connected with the plane wreckage, and now he had someone. He began asking questions that she was not prepared to answer, not because she was being tight-lipped, but because at this stage we didn’t really know anything yet. We had an idea of where the plane had come from (having found newspaper articles about the crash), but we had not yet found anything to clearly identify the plane as the one in the articles. I don’t know what exactly passed between the two of them, but our client’s rep was clearly somewhat non-plussed when we met up with her.
Around the time that she was telling us this story, two police cruisers pulled up, and out stepped four Sherriff’s deputies. And on their heels came the reporter. The representative spoke with the reporter, while my boss and I discussed with the deputies the process of dealing with what was after all an archaeological site, though admittedly a very strange one. After we had finished, the representative came back to speak with us, and the deputies went to speak with the reporters. The deputies explained the documentation and recovery process in which we were about to engage, and the reporter diligently wrote it down.
The next day, one of my coworkers came in and handed me a newspaper. The paper had a story on the plane, and the story implied that the plan for dealing with the wreckage was the Sherriff’s idea, and that my boss had little to do with it. So it goes.
After a few more days of prep, it was time for us to begin working. I’ll start that part of the story in Part 2.
I should say, from the outset though, that I was uniformly impressed by the actions and attitudes of our client, the interest of most members of the community, and the work of the Sherriff’s department. As strange as this experience was, these folks routinely did quite well under very unusual circumstances.
The story began on a clear and cold morning in January, 1944. On the way back to Crows Landing Air Field after night-time training excercises, a SBD-5 Dauntless dive-bomber crashed for unknown reasons into a river floodplain on the California coast. Because the floodplain was a large mudflat at the time, it took several days for Navy personnel to reach the plane and recover what they could of the plane and the bodies of the pilot and the gunner/radioman. Soon thereafter mud from the river’s flooding covered the plane wreckage that had remained, and the plane crash faded into a vague (or, as I would soon learn, sometimes greatly exaggerated) memory, and was finally forgotten by all but those who witnessed the crash…
…until July of 2007, when a construction crew hit the plane with a backhoe. Initially, the crew thought that they had hit a buried garbage pile – a not uncommon occurrence in the largely rural area – but the smell of petroleum and the nature of the material that they had hit soon convinced them otherwise. Shortly after this, my boss was called in to have a look, and it was quickly apparent that the crew had hit a mid-20th century plane wreck, complete with bullets indicating that it was a military plane. My boss consulted with the appropriate government agencies, and then returned to the office where he and I began working out a strategy for recovering plane wreckage and possible human remains.
For the usual red-tape reasons, it was a couple of weeks before we could begin work. In the interim, a person who remains unknown to this day managed to get their hands on a backhoe, and raided the crash site. The construction crew was abuzz with claims about the reason why the thief had stopped digging when they did. Whether these claims were supposition on their part or a whether a member of the construction crew knew who the thief was, I do not know. Regardless. This incident resulted in the construction of a temporary chain-link fence around the crash site, and the fence was successful in keeping further thieves away.
The following week, my boss and I met with Alison Galloway, the professor of forensic anthropology at UC Santa Cruz in order to discuss our plan for recovering remains with her. In all, she thought our plan was decent and workable – however, she cautioned us that we should have rubber gloves on hand. You see, when human fat is buried under the right circumstances, it can saponify, preserving it and some of the tissue in or around it ( rather gruseome site - you can look it up on the internet if you want to see some examples, but my advice is that you not do so). So, Dr. Galloway was warning us that we might run into this, and as a result, we should have appropriate protective equipment – i.e. rubber gloves. Thankfully, these ultimately proved unnecessary, and the remains we did were handled with appropriate care and respect - not an easy task considering much of what was going on around us.
Needless to say, the next time I spoke with my sister, who is studying to be a mortician, I told her of the professor's advice. She then posted a recap of our discussion on her blog. A few readers contacted her asking if I was single. The moral of the story – my sister’s blog attracts some freaky people.
The next day, my boss and I headed over to the job site in order to see what there was to see and adjust our plans accordingly. While there, we observed portions of the plane, old bullets, and pieces of silk from a parachute. We also observed the representative of our client, the construction proponent, in a bit of an odd mood.
As it happens, the representative had stopped at a nearby gas station to fill up her tank when she saw someone get out of a parked car and approach her – it was a reporter for the local newspaper. Turns out he’d been sitting in the gas station, waiting to see someone that he knew was connected with the plane wreckage, and now he had someone. He began asking questions that she was not prepared to answer, not because she was being tight-lipped, but because at this stage we didn’t really know anything yet. We had an idea of where the plane had come from (having found newspaper articles about the crash), but we had not yet found anything to clearly identify the plane as the one in the articles. I don’t know what exactly passed between the two of them, but our client’s rep was clearly somewhat non-plussed when we met up with her.
Around the time that she was telling us this story, two police cruisers pulled up, and out stepped four Sherriff’s deputies. And on their heels came the reporter. The representative spoke with the reporter, while my boss and I discussed with the deputies the process of dealing with what was after all an archaeological site, though admittedly a very strange one. After we had finished, the representative came back to speak with us, and the deputies went to speak with the reporters. The deputies explained the documentation and recovery process in which we were about to engage, and the reporter diligently wrote it down.
The next day, one of my coworkers came in and handed me a newspaper. The paper had a story on the plane, and the story implied that the plan for dealing with the wreckage was the Sherriff’s idea, and that my boss had little to do with it. So it goes.
After a few more days of prep, it was time for us to begin working. I’ll start that part of the story in Part 2.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
S.C.A. - Part III
This is Part 3. Part 1 is here, and Part 2 is here. This part deals with a political organization that works on church/state separation issues, so if discussion of these issues leaves you inclined to attack strawmen and insult blog writers, do us both a favor and skip the damn entry.
…so far we have my father, the Society for California Archaeology, the Student Conservation Association, and the Society for Creative Anachronism. Now onto the next S.C.A. with which I have become affiliated – the Secular Coalition of America.
Interestingly, my willingness to pitch in with this S.C.A. is partially linked to my experience with a previous S.C.A. – The Student Conservation Association. As I described, my time on the Air Force Base left me feeling rather disturbed at the degree to which that particular government agency was in the hands of a particular brand of hard-right wing Christianity. This coupled with my growing unease at the Bush administration’s willingness to cater to the same group, and the realization that both members of congress from both parties seemed to want to follow suit in order to gain votes.
Now, so that the easily-offended or presumptious don't assert that I hold a position that I do not hold, I'll discuss my concern a bit more thoroughly. Beginning with the 70’s, the group that has become known as the Religious Right – a minority group within Christianity, but one that has been very active in using political rhetoric and targeted voter drives to push their particular agenda - became active as a political force. Their effectiveness is well open to debate, and they have been used by politicians at least as often as they have used politicians (and arguably, the politicians have typically gotten the better of them). However, they are tenacious, and had managed to get some traction with the Bush administration - things such as the presidents regular discussions with a particular set of religious leaders, the Office of Faith Based Initiatives (which has proven to have a rather questionable track record), and the push to have laws passed that allow medical providers to refuse care for religious reasons* all come from this rather weird alliance.
Whatever their political gains or losses, the loosely-associated group of people, churches, and political groups known as the Religious Right have been very effective in promoting the notion among much of the population that they ARE Christianity. This is, of course, bunk. As with any huge number of people, there is so much variation amongst Christians that the notion that one particular sub-set or agenda can represent all or even most of them is absurd. However, the various entities comprising the Religious Right have nonetheless been so successful in branding themselves as the “defenders of Christianity” that even some Christians who disagree with them feel that they still have to vote in a particular way in order to remain “real” Christians (I have no idea how many Christians end up feeling this way, but I do know that it is not uncommon, based on conversations I have had with a large number of Christians who have made statements to that effect). This has also had the effect of convincing many non-Christians that Christians are generally judgmental, legalistic, hypocritical, and weirdly obsessed with the sex lives of others. Needless to say, such misconceptions run counter to the interest of the majority of Christians.
Concurrent with the appearance of the religious right as a political force, secular groups also began to appear. Contrary to the claims put forth by many of the more vocal Religious Right individuals and organizations, the secular groups have generally been both reactive and one step behind their opponents.
Like many people, I had stopped believing in any religion long ago, but paid religion itself little mind until the early 2000’s. Many folks would cite the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks as the catalysts that got them to be more critical of religion. This was not, however, the case for me. While I can not claim that they had no impact, what really hit me was the reaction from many of the vocal and politically active Religious Right groups and people AFTER the attacks.
To be certain, the majority of religious groups did not engage in divisive and needlessly inflammatory behavior in the aftermath**, but many did. We saw blame placed on everyone from Muslims at large to atheists to feminists to gays, with the accusers all conveniently ignoring the very real intersection of politics with history with economics with a particular brand of religion that actually caused the events. And what I began to notice was that I was seeing many examples of prominent would-be theocrats using these events, with varying degrees of success, to try to forward their own agenda. It is fortunate, perhaps, that they usually attached themselves to tried-and-true politicians who would use their support to get elected and then not follow through on their promises, either real or implied.
This caused me to become more concerned about church/state separation. One doesn’t need to be much of a student of history to know that government establishment of religious orthodoxy, whether through force or simply favoritism, tends to cause problems not only for the non-religious, but also for the religious that do not fall within that orthodoxy. And as most religious people don’t fall within the rigid orthodoxies that governments have often demanded, it is best for government to not endorse one for the benefit of everyone (the exception being the rather weak and milquetoast national churches of modern Europe, which were themselves often quite vicious before their de-fanging in the 19th and 20th centuries – look up the history of England if you doubt that). My experiences on the Air Force Base and the concurrent proseletyzing scandal at the Air Force Academy crystalized this concern, and led to me thinking more seriously about the nature of our politicl system.
Around this time, the next S.C.A. – the Secular Coalition for America – formed. It works as an umbrella organization for church/state separation organizations, and was able to put a lobbyist (now two) on Capitol Hill. Contrary to what many pundits like to claim, the S.C.A. is not anti-religious – in fact it spends a lot of time working with overtly religious groups that are in-touch enough with reality to see the necessity of enforcing the establishment clause – but it does actively lobby against government-enforced or government-espoused religion.
Like any political group, they take positions that I disagree with from time-to-time, or they choose to fight battles that I think are silly or inconsequential. However, the majority of the time, they do what I believe to be the right thing. Also, the S.C.A.’s model of working with religious groups to achieve common ends for the common interest is one that I think other secular organizations could learn a good deal from.
So, I support this organization with donations and, more importantly, by writing to my congressional representatives when issues that I feel are important come up. The ultimate value of this is simple – when the only people speaking out on issues are from the Religious Right, that’s who the elected officials tend to support. When people, religious and non-religious alike, who oppose those views speak up, we have a good chance of preventing poor policy.
So, check out the S.C.A., and while we’re at it, here’s the lobbyist, Lori Lippman-Brown, being interviewed by Stephen Colbert – trying to tempt him into illicit sex no-less!
...and in episodes 46, 53, 59, 68, 81, 89 of Skepticality she is interviewed.
While I can not claim to be completely satisfied with the S.C.A.'s work, I do think that they are doing a good job and that they tend to be realistic in their approach. I am, overall, supportive, and whether you are religious or not, you should check them out - odds are that if you have a good grasp on history and politics, and are reasonably intelligent, you'll also appreciate their work.
*No doubt somebody is going to start telling me that medical care providers should be allowed to refuse certain procedures and treatments based on their beliefs. In most professions, I would agree, but because medical care providers are often in shorts supply AND have very specialized knowledge that is not readily available elsewhere and difficult for the layman to clearly assess AND because we as a society invest them with a good amount of authority that most other people do not have AND because the structure of our health care system is such that second opinions can be difficult to come by, well, they are something of a special case, and should not be allowed to withhold, not discuss, or manipulate treatment by anything other than scientific medical standards. This is different than most other professions – including my own – where practitioners are relatively common, the work we do accessible enough for the layman to grasp, we are invested with relatively little authority, and we don’t alter the health or lives of others – and therefore we don’t need to be held to the same standards.
**Although even those who were generally doing good still went to some default assumptions that were, in light of what had just happened, very strange. I recall seeing an interview with a Catholic priest on September 12th. He was being interviewed as he was on his way to the site of the World Trade Center to help out – and admirable activity all the way around – and he was asked why he was going. He stated “I represent the opposite of what happened here. I represent faith.”
Now, he could have said that he represents peace, or that he represents love, or that he represents compassion, and I would have agreed and been right there with him, he was going in a hard time to try to do good and that was absolutely commendable. But faith is the opposite of what happened? Whatever else can be said about the guys who rammed the plane into the building, they absolutely had faith. That faith and conviction was in the service of a murderous and evil cause, but it was, nonetheless, faith and conviction. Faith was an element of what had happened, not the opposite of what had happened.
…so far we have my father, the Society for California Archaeology, the Student Conservation Association, and the Society for Creative Anachronism. Now onto the next S.C.A. with which I have become affiliated – the Secular Coalition of America.
Interestingly, my willingness to pitch in with this S.C.A. is partially linked to my experience with a previous S.C.A. – The Student Conservation Association. As I described, my time on the Air Force Base left me feeling rather disturbed at the degree to which that particular government agency was in the hands of a particular brand of hard-right wing Christianity. This coupled with my growing unease at the Bush administration’s willingness to cater to the same group, and the realization that both members of congress from both parties seemed to want to follow suit in order to gain votes.
Now, so that the easily-offended or presumptious don't assert that I hold a position that I do not hold, I'll discuss my concern a bit more thoroughly. Beginning with the 70’s, the group that has become known as the Religious Right – a minority group within Christianity, but one that has been very active in using political rhetoric and targeted voter drives to push their particular agenda - became active as a political force. Their effectiveness is well open to debate, and they have been used by politicians at least as often as they have used politicians (and arguably, the politicians have typically gotten the better of them). However, they are tenacious, and had managed to get some traction with the Bush administration - things such as the presidents regular discussions with a particular set of religious leaders, the Office of Faith Based Initiatives (which has proven to have a rather questionable track record), and the push to have laws passed that allow medical providers to refuse care for religious reasons* all come from this rather weird alliance.
Whatever their political gains or losses, the loosely-associated group of people, churches, and political groups known as the Religious Right have been very effective in promoting the notion among much of the population that they ARE Christianity. This is, of course, bunk. As with any huge number of people, there is so much variation amongst Christians that the notion that one particular sub-set or agenda can represent all or even most of them is absurd. However, the various entities comprising the Religious Right have nonetheless been so successful in branding themselves as the “defenders of Christianity” that even some Christians who disagree with them feel that they still have to vote in a particular way in order to remain “real” Christians (I have no idea how many Christians end up feeling this way, but I do know that it is not uncommon, based on conversations I have had with a large number of Christians who have made statements to that effect). This has also had the effect of convincing many non-Christians that Christians are generally judgmental, legalistic, hypocritical, and weirdly obsessed with the sex lives of others. Needless to say, such misconceptions run counter to the interest of the majority of Christians.
Concurrent with the appearance of the religious right as a political force, secular groups also began to appear. Contrary to the claims put forth by many of the more vocal Religious Right individuals and organizations, the secular groups have generally been both reactive and one step behind their opponents.
Like many people, I had stopped believing in any religion long ago, but paid religion itself little mind until the early 2000’s. Many folks would cite the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks as the catalysts that got them to be more critical of religion. This was not, however, the case for me. While I can not claim that they had no impact, what really hit me was the reaction from many of the vocal and politically active Religious Right groups and people AFTER the attacks.
To be certain, the majority of religious groups did not engage in divisive and needlessly inflammatory behavior in the aftermath**, but many did. We saw blame placed on everyone from Muslims at large to atheists to feminists to gays, with the accusers all conveniently ignoring the very real intersection of politics with history with economics with a particular brand of religion that actually caused the events. And what I began to notice was that I was seeing many examples of prominent would-be theocrats using these events, with varying degrees of success, to try to forward their own agenda. It is fortunate, perhaps, that they usually attached themselves to tried-and-true politicians who would use their support to get elected and then not follow through on their promises, either real or implied.
This caused me to become more concerned about church/state separation. One doesn’t need to be much of a student of history to know that government establishment of religious orthodoxy, whether through force or simply favoritism, tends to cause problems not only for the non-religious, but also for the religious that do not fall within that orthodoxy. And as most religious people don’t fall within the rigid orthodoxies that governments have often demanded, it is best for government to not endorse one for the benefit of everyone (the exception being the rather weak and milquetoast national churches of modern Europe, which were themselves often quite vicious before their de-fanging in the 19th and 20th centuries – look up the history of England if you doubt that). My experiences on the Air Force Base and the concurrent proseletyzing scandal at the Air Force Academy crystalized this concern, and led to me thinking more seriously about the nature of our politicl system.
Around this time, the next S.C.A. – the Secular Coalition for America – formed. It works as an umbrella organization for church/state separation organizations, and was able to put a lobbyist (now two) on Capitol Hill. Contrary to what many pundits like to claim, the S.C.A. is not anti-religious – in fact it spends a lot of time working with overtly religious groups that are in-touch enough with reality to see the necessity of enforcing the establishment clause – but it does actively lobby against government-enforced or government-espoused religion.
Like any political group, they take positions that I disagree with from time-to-time, or they choose to fight battles that I think are silly or inconsequential. However, the majority of the time, they do what I believe to be the right thing. Also, the S.C.A.’s model of working with religious groups to achieve common ends for the common interest is one that I think other secular organizations could learn a good deal from.
So, I support this organization with donations and, more importantly, by writing to my congressional representatives when issues that I feel are important come up. The ultimate value of this is simple – when the only people speaking out on issues are from the Religious Right, that’s who the elected officials tend to support. When people, religious and non-religious alike, who oppose those views speak up, we have a good chance of preventing poor policy.
So, check out the S.C.A., and while we’re at it, here’s the lobbyist, Lori Lippman-Brown, being interviewed by Stephen Colbert – trying to tempt him into illicit sex no-less!
...and in episodes 46, 53, 59, 68, 81, 89 of Skepticality she is interviewed.
While I can not claim to be completely satisfied with the S.C.A.'s work, I do think that they are doing a good job and that they tend to be realistic in their approach. I am, overall, supportive, and whether you are religious or not, you should check them out - odds are that if you have a good grasp on history and politics, and are reasonably intelligent, you'll also appreciate their work.
*No doubt somebody is going to start telling me that medical care providers should be allowed to refuse certain procedures and treatments based on their beliefs. In most professions, I would agree, but because medical care providers are often in shorts supply AND have very specialized knowledge that is not readily available elsewhere and difficult for the layman to clearly assess AND because we as a society invest them with a good amount of authority that most other people do not have AND because the structure of our health care system is such that second opinions can be difficult to come by, well, they are something of a special case, and should not be allowed to withhold, not discuss, or manipulate treatment by anything other than scientific medical standards. This is different than most other professions – including my own – where practitioners are relatively common, the work we do accessible enough for the layman to grasp, we are invested with relatively little authority, and we don’t alter the health or lives of others – and therefore we don’t need to be held to the same standards.
**Although even those who were generally doing good still went to some default assumptions that were, in light of what had just happened, very strange. I recall seeing an interview with a Catholic priest on September 12th. He was being interviewed as he was on his way to the site of the World Trade Center to help out – and admirable activity all the way around – and he was asked why he was going. He stated “I represent the opposite of what happened here. I represent faith.”
Now, he could have said that he represents peace, or that he represents love, or that he represents compassion, and I would have agreed and been right there with him, he was going in a hard time to try to do good and that was absolutely commendable. But faith is the opposite of what happened? Whatever else can be said about the guys who rammed the plane into the building, they absolutely had faith. That faith and conviction was in the service of a murderous and evil cause, but it was, nonetheless, faith and conviction. Faith was an element of what had happened, not the opposite of what had happened.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Morning in the Mountains
So, this is Monday filler, I suppose. I recently worked in the mountains testing archaeological sites for their eligibility to the National Register of Historic Places. While out there, I woke up early one morning and got these photos from the opening of my tent. I thought I'd share.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
S.C.A. - Part II
This is Part 2. For Part 1, go here, or you can go to Part 3
Once I had moved to Lompoc, I was introduced to the next S.C.A.: The Society for Creative Anachronism.
The Society for Creative Anachronism, for those who are unaware, is an organization dedicated to pseudo-historical recreation – as members often say, they celebrate “the Medieval Period as it should have been, not as it was.” Members dress in home-made armor, beat the crap out of each other with rattan sticks weighted to feel like swords, assume the titles of nobility, and don’t tend to invite plague rats to the festivities – historical accuracy be damned in the case of the bubonic sickness. I believe that the drudgery and duties of serfdom are contracted out to Halliburton.
Many of my friends have been members of this group, and one of my closest friends had been inviting me to events for years – despite the usual response of “umm, I’m really not interested, please stop bringing it up.” Living in a more isolated location, I felt lonely and a bit depressed, in all, the perfect conditions for cult recruitment. I will leave it to you, the reader, to decide whether or not I was lucky to be approached by the historical violence crowd instead.
Seeing the need to increase my social interaction, I finally agreed to attend an event. I had been part of the renaissance fair scene in my earlier, geekier life (yes, I was once even geekier than I am now – try not to pass out at that thought), and I had been assured that the Society for Creative Anachronism was rather different from the rather cliquish and often petty ren fair crowd, and thus might be more enjoyable for me.
At first, I did have fun. I had gotten involved with a group that fenced. That is, they fought with small swords (thus resulting in lighter armor and less concussions than the rattan stick folks), they didn’t sell stolen car radios…that I am aware of. It was fun for a while, a good way to get some exercise, social interaction, and a healthy place to blow of the stress and aggressions that came with a grad student’s life. And, at first, most of the people I associated with at the regular meetings were fun, easy-going folks. This began to change, however, as the months wore on.
The Society for Creative Anachronism holds regular events, some of them known as “wars” at which members meet, engage in mock-combat, and do various courtly things, all without any lepers present. I attended a few of these events. When they were close to home, this was fine, as I could return home at the end of the day and get some rest. When they were away from home, they required camping – an activity that I loathe under normal conditions, and dislike even further when I am surrounded by loud party-goers who prevent me from getting any rest. As a result, after my first event away from my home area, I only attended those within driving distance of my apartment. This resulted in getting harassed by many of the other folks in the group, including having a long-time friend repeatedly inform me that I was “lazy” for not attending such events, and “proselytizing” when I responded to questions as to why I was not attending them (more on why this was rather ironic below).
In addition, the cliquishness and often pettiness of SCA folks was different from the Renaissance Fair people in one basic way – it was even more pronounced and much, much worse. I later asked my friend what they had meant when they told me that the SCA was different from the Ren Fair people (and they always said this in response to my complaints about the social behavior), and she said that she had meant simply that the SCA people never left costume – how this in any way addressed the concerns that it was always stated in response to is beyond me.
Then three things happened in quick succession that pretty much killed any and all interest that I ever had in this group. The first was that I didn’t attend an event because I was attending a professional conference that was scheduled for the same weekend of the event. I was harassed by several members for my decision to attend the conference instead of the SCA event. The second was that I had a party at my apartment to which I invited a few members of the group, two of whom were extremely adamant about getting other guests to come and attend some SCA events despite the guest’s stated disinterest (creating problems that I had to spend a lot of time defusing after the fact, and that I still get teased about to this day). The third was that many members (a minority, to be certain, but a rather large minority) began to routinely pester me about the fact that I had not invested as much time and effort into the organization as they saw fit – I was treating it as a hobby and not a lifestyle and they found this distressing.
As this continued on, I found that while everyone agreed that there were obnoxious zealots in their midst, the most zealous routinely failed to see their own obnoxious behavior, though they were aware of that of others (when I called one proselytizing SCAer on their rather rude behavior, they stated that they were respectful of others and didn’t try to push people who weren’t interested, unlike “some other” SCA people – a claim contradicted by the regular behavior of this individual).
So, put simply, by not making this hobby into a lifestyle, I had managed to upset a sizeable minority who made interaction with the group rather distasteful. In addition, if these folks saw me around and about while I was with my professional colleagues, they tried to turn the situation into a recruitment opportunity, thus embarrassing me and annoying my colleagues.
And then there is the most common form of advancing in the organization: fighting. For all of the talk about the importance of studying the arts, crafts, and history of the Middle Ages, the group was really organized around the mock combat. In and of itself, this is fine – but if you are going to run a sports organization, just admit that this is what you are doing. Certainly, one could gain rank by other means, and some people did, but what I saw was that most people who came to any level of reputation did so through the fighting. It was rather like being back in high school, and seeing the academically-oriented clubs take a backseat to the football team.
So, I walked away. To be fair, those people who were friends of mine before I got involved are still friends (and are, thankfully, less likely to try to recruit me now), and a few of the folks I met while involved with this SCA are still friends. Nonetheless, the behavior of something in the neighborhood of 35%-40% of the members I came into contact with turned me off for life. And I have spoken with folks who have encountered the SCA in other cities and states, and found that my experience is fairly common.
Coming soon - Part III, in which I become aligned with the people who invite Stephen Colbert to orgies.
Once I had moved to Lompoc, I was introduced to the next S.C.A.: The Society for Creative Anachronism.
The Society for Creative Anachronism, for those who are unaware, is an organization dedicated to pseudo-historical recreation – as members often say, they celebrate “the Medieval Period as it should have been, not as it was.” Members dress in home-made armor, beat the crap out of each other with rattan sticks weighted to feel like swords, assume the titles of nobility, and don’t tend to invite plague rats to the festivities – historical accuracy be damned in the case of the bubonic sickness. I believe that the drudgery and duties of serfdom are contracted out to Halliburton.
Many of my friends have been members of this group, and one of my closest friends had been inviting me to events for years – despite the usual response of “umm, I’m really not interested, please stop bringing it up.” Living in a more isolated location, I felt lonely and a bit depressed, in all, the perfect conditions for cult recruitment. I will leave it to you, the reader, to decide whether or not I was lucky to be approached by the historical violence crowd instead.
Seeing the need to increase my social interaction, I finally agreed to attend an event. I had been part of the renaissance fair scene in my earlier, geekier life (yes, I was once even geekier than I am now – try not to pass out at that thought), and I had been assured that the Society for Creative Anachronism was rather different from the rather cliquish and often petty ren fair crowd, and thus might be more enjoyable for me.
At first, I did have fun. I had gotten involved with a group that fenced. That is, they fought with small swords (thus resulting in lighter armor and less concussions than the rattan stick folks), they didn’t sell stolen car radios…that I am aware of. It was fun for a while, a good way to get some exercise, social interaction, and a healthy place to blow of the stress and aggressions that came with a grad student’s life. And, at first, most of the people I associated with at the regular meetings were fun, easy-going folks. This began to change, however, as the months wore on.
The Society for Creative Anachronism holds regular events, some of them known as “wars” at which members meet, engage in mock-combat, and do various courtly things, all without any lepers present. I attended a few of these events. When they were close to home, this was fine, as I could return home at the end of the day and get some rest. When they were away from home, they required camping – an activity that I loathe under normal conditions, and dislike even further when I am surrounded by loud party-goers who prevent me from getting any rest. As a result, after my first event away from my home area, I only attended those within driving distance of my apartment. This resulted in getting harassed by many of the other folks in the group, including having a long-time friend repeatedly inform me that I was “lazy” for not attending such events, and “proselytizing” when I responded to questions as to why I was not attending them (more on why this was rather ironic below).
In addition, the cliquishness and often pettiness of SCA folks was different from the Renaissance Fair people in one basic way – it was even more pronounced and much, much worse. I later asked my friend what they had meant when they told me that the SCA was different from the Ren Fair people (and they always said this in response to my complaints about the social behavior), and she said that she had meant simply that the SCA people never left costume – how this in any way addressed the concerns that it was always stated in response to is beyond me.
Then three things happened in quick succession that pretty much killed any and all interest that I ever had in this group. The first was that I didn’t attend an event because I was attending a professional conference that was scheduled for the same weekend of the event. I was harassed by several members for my decision to attend the conference instead of the SCA event. The second was that I had a party at my apartment to which I invited a few members of the group, two of whom were extremely adamant about getting other guests to come and attend some SCA events despite the guest’s stated disinterest (creating problems that I had to spend a lot of time defusing after the fact, and that I still get teased about to this day). The third was that many members (a minority, to be certain, but a rather large minority) began to routinely pester me about the fact that I had not invested as much time and effort into the organization as they saw fit – I was treating it as a hobby and not a lifestyle and they found this distressing.
As this continued on, I found that while everyone agreed that there were obnoxious zealots in their midst, the most zealous routinely failed to see their own obnoxious behavior, though they were aware of that of others (when I called one proselytizing SCAer on their rather rude behavior, they stated that they were respectful of others and didn’t try to push people who weren’t interested, unlike “some other” SCA people – a claim contradicted by the regular behavior of this individual).
So, put simply, by not making this hobby into a lifestyle, I had managed to upset a sizeable minority who made interaction with the group rather distasteful. In addition, if these folks saw me around and about while I was with my professional colleagues, they tried to turn the situation into a recruitment opportunity, thus embarrassing me and annoying my colleagues.
And then there is the most common form of advancing in the organization: fighting. For all of the talk about the importance of studying the arts, crafts, and history of the Middle Ages, the group was really organized around the mock combat. In and of itself, this is fine – but if you are going to run a sports organization, just admit that this is what you are doing. Certainly, one could gain rank by other means, and some people did, but what I saw was that most people who came to any level of reputation did so through the fighting. It was rather like being back in high school, and seeing the academically-oriented clubs take a backseat to the football team.
So, I walked away. To be fair, those people who were friends of mine before I got involved are still friends (and are, thankfully, less likely to try to recruit me now), and a few of the folks I met while involved with this SCA are still friends. Nonetheless, the behavior of something in the neighborhood of 35%-40% of the members I came into contact with turned me off for life. And I have spoken with folks who have encountered the SCA in other cities and states, and found that my experience is fairly common.
Coming soon - Part III, in which I become aligned with the people who invite Stephen Colbert to orgies.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
S.C.A. - Part 1
Three letters should not rule your world. Nonetheless, I should have seen this coming, after all, the initials of my father, the man from whom I received half of my DNA, are S.C.A. For most of my life, these three letters had no significance to me other than that they were my father’s initials.
And then came graduate school.
Like most archaeologists working in California, I joined the Society for California Archaeology as a graduate student. It was a simple affair – I filled out the application, sent in my membership dues, selected my interest categories, participated in the ritual blood-letting and candle-lit orgy in honor of A. L. Kroeber, and I was part of the tribe. It was another S.C.A. with which I had become associated, but that was fine – the pattern had not yet revealed itself.
The Society for California Archaeology provided me with all manner of opportunities for self-abuse and over-burdening. It was here that I began my current habit of public speaking as a professional archaeologist. I began with a paper delivered at the annual meeting, held in Sacramento in 2005. In 2006, the meeting was in Ventura, and I presented two papers. In 2007, in San Jose, I not only presented a paper, but was also co-chair of a symposium that has now turned into an upcoming book for which I have written a chapter. All in all, this S.C.A. was good for my career and bad for my blood-pressure.
My next S.C.A. experience came a year later, when I was recruited for an internship at Vandenberg Air Force Base through the Student Conservation Association. On the whole, it was a positive experience – I learned a good deal about how federal facilities and agencies handle their obligations under the National Historic Preservation Act, I had numerous opportunities to interact with elders and monitors from the Santa Ynez Chumash Reservation, and I was placed in a group that worked for (no I am not making this up) the Air Force’s Space Command (I even met a Sgt. James T. Kirk who worked for Space Command – no I’m not making that up either – I could never figure out why he hadn’t been promoted to captain).
Vandenberg has amazing cultural resources. My job was part paper-pushing (dealing with the basic bureaucracy of managing a large number of cultural resources on a large piece of land) and partially field-based (I used to spend half a day each week visiting endangered sites to see what condition they were in and whether they would need further protection or excavation to prevent the loss of archaeological information to erosion). I also monitored construction work to ensure that archaeological sites were not damaged – one time I even had to monitor construction done by a convict work gang – an odd experience by anyone’s standard.
I went to do the internship on the Air Force Base at the same time that the Air Force Academy was being investigated for aggressive and hostile proselytization of non-Evangelical Christians. The Air Force concluded that the behavior at the academy was inappropriate, but not worthy of extensive action. I cannot speak for the Air Force Academy, but if my base was any indication, then I suspect that those investigating may have been foxes sent to watch the hen house. I never had anyone actively try to recruit me, but the displeasure with non-Protestants was often made known.
For example – every meeting with military officers began with a prayer. And not just any prayer, but one that was clearly Christian, and of a born-again variety. I sat through presentations given by high-ranking officers in which they explained that “we have to tolerate ‘non-Christians’” which included Muslims, Hindus, Jews, Pagans, atheists, and so on, naturally. But the definition of “non-Christian” used by these officers bizarrely included such clearly Christian groups as Catholics, Seventh-Day Adventists, Mormons (yes, they are Christian, most of what you heard is likely distorted or urban legend), and members of the Eastern Orthodox Church. The nature of the presentations made it clear that the officers always thought that they were speaking solely to a particular brand of right-wing Protestant and nobody else, even while the statistics they gave clearly indicated that many other types of folks were always in the audience.
Also, it was official policy that politics and religion were not to be discussed in the work place. It was also well known that this policy was ignored provided that the religion being advocated was Christianity and that the politics being embraced were those of the Republican Party.
So, on the whole, the experience was valuable, but in large part valuable by shaping my views of the disturbing nature of mixing religion with government. Remember, these folks loved Book of Revelation-themed literature such as “Left Behind” and often spoke about how they looked forward to the “End of Days” – and these people have access to nuclear weapons.
Also, I moved to Lompoc to facilitate the internship. And once I had moved to Lompoc, I was introduced to the next S.C.A.: The Society for Creative Anachronism. That is a story for Part 2.
Or you can be a slacker-ass and go to .Part 3.
And then came graduate school.
Like most archaeologists working in California, I joined the Society for California Archaeology as a graduate student. It was a simple affair – I filled out the application, sent in my membership dues, selected my interest categories, participated in the ritual blood-letting and candle-lit orgy in honor of A. L. Kroeber, and I was part of the tribe. It was another S.C.A. with which I had become associated, but that was fine – the pattern had not yet revealed itself.
The Society for California Archaeology provided me with all manner of opportunities for self-abuse and over-burdening. It was here that I began my current habit of public speaking as a professional archaeologist. I began with a paper delivered at the annual meeting, held in Sacramento in 2005. In 2006, the meeting was in Ventura, and I presented two papers. In 2007, in San Jose, I not only presented a paper, but was also co-chair of a symposium that has now turned into an upcoming book for which I have written a chapter. All in all, this S.C.A. was good for my career and bad for my blood-pressure.
My next S.C.A. experience came a year later, when I was recruited for an internship at Vandenberg Air Force Base through the Student Conservation Association. On the whole, it was a positive experience – I learned a good deal about how federal facilities and agencies handle their obligations under the National Historic Preservation Act, I had numerous opportunities to interact with elders and monitors from the Santa Ynez Chumash Reservation, and I was placed in a group that worked for (no I am not making this up) the Air Force’s Space Command (I even met a Sgt. James T. Kirk who worked for Space Command – no I’m not making that up either – I could never figure out why he hadn’t been promoted to captain).
Vandenberg has amazing cultural resources. My job was part paper-pushing (dealing with the basic bureaucracy of managing a large number of cultural resources on a large piece of land) and partially field-based (I used to spend half a day each week visiting endangered sites to see what condition they were in and whether they would need further protection or excavation to prevent the loss of archaeological information to erosion). I also monitored construction work to ensure that archaeological sites were not damaged – one time I even had to monitor construction done by a convict work gang – an odd experience by anyone’s standard.
I went to do the internship on the Air Force Base at the same time that the Air Force Academy was being investigated for aggressive and hostile proselytization of non-Evangelical Christians. The Air Force concluded that the behavior at the academy was inappropriate, but not worthy of extensive action. I cannot speak for the Air Force Academy, but if my base was any indication, then I suspect that those investigating may have been foxes sent to watch the hen house. I never had anyone actively try to recruit me, but the displeasure with non-Protestants was often made known.
For example – every meeting with military officers began with a prayer. And not just any prayer, but one that was clearly Christian, and of a born-again variety. I sat through presentations given by high-ranking officers in which they explained that “we have to tolerate ‘non-Christians’” which included Muslims, Hindus, Jews, Pagans, atheists, and so on, naturally. But the definition of “non-Christian” used by these officers bizarrely included such clearly Christian groups as Catholics, Seventh-Day Adventists, Mormons (yes, they are Christian, most of what you heard is likely distorted or urban legend), and members of the Eastern Orthodox Church. The nature of the presentations made it clear that the officers always thought that they were speaking solely to a particular brand of right-wing Protestant and nobody else, even while the statistics they gave clearly indicated that many other types of folks were always in the audience.
Also, it was official policy that politics and religion were not to be discussed in the work place. It was also well known that this policy was ignored provided that the religion being advocated was Christianity and that the politics being embraced were those of the Republican Party.
So, on the whole, the experience was valuable, but in large part valuable by shaping my views of the disturbing nature of mixing religion with government. Remember, these folks loved Book of Revelation-themed literature such as “Left Behind” and often spoke about how they looked forward to the “End of Days” – and these people have access to nuclear weapons.
Also, I moved to Lompoc to facilitate the internship. And once I had moved to Lompoc, I was introduced to the next S.C.A.: The Society for Creative Anachronism. That is a story for Part 2.
Or you can be a slacker-ass and go to .Part 3.
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