The 64 Billion Dollar Question...

Are you just completely fuckin' naive, you fuckin' lovey-dovey, peacenik, aw-ain't he swo nwice, dumbass motherfucker?...

To answer that question, I'll relate a conversation I had with a Lawrence police officer, today, as I was reporting checks I had that were stolen and forged on my account...for an amount that is far greater than what I had in my account...so I had to make a police report to take care of the checks written to a creditor...

The officer I dealt with was a really great guy...Myron Grady was his name...he's this guy who's had a tough background...who shared it with me...and, who, like me, understands the need to have an attitude of no excuses responsibility to get people on the better track...

Myron thinks the folks who fucked me should "have their asses kicked" as he said...and I can't say that I disagree:):)...but it was nice talking with a police officer who has a very similar attitude to mine, in terms of actually making a difference in this kind of situation...Myron clearly cares...and that matters...and it was nice to talk with an officer who actually cares...

Folks who were involved with this thing -- we have no clue if they actually did it...but, after I had let them borrow my car, they had accessed my house and claim that others who they let into the house had taken the checks, as a part of larger check-writing scheme...others that I've met and know to be much shadier characters -- but the folks involved are people I care about...

They aren't the nicest folks in the world, that's for sure...

They're your typical crack addicts, in a lot of ways...though, to be fair...they are making genuine efforts to kick the crack...they're nice enough, some of the time, at least...they live like children...one of them has two jobs and a daughter...the other has a son and no job and occassionally shows an inclination to get a job...they live for now...and their friends live for now...for the next high...for the next lay...for whatever is happening right now...

They are also human beings...and, at some level, friends...who I care about...who also seem to be making painfully slow progress doing something more productive with their lives...it's so slow that I can hardly stand it most of the time...but they make it...slowly...

And part of my commitment as a human being...nevertheless as a teacher...and a policy scholar...and someone who, generally, wants to make a difference in this world, is that I stick by people...even the less savory folks in the world...without, as much as possible, now that I'm older and more savvy about these things, being drug down into their messes...

I am a strong son-of-a-bitch...I have, frankly, never met anyone stronger than me, emotionally...and so I can be patient with situations like this...

But...my experience with these folks, in particular, has taught me that being in and out of jail for much of their lives has not helped these folks very much...and I know I've made a difference, as small and slow as that difference seems to have been...and as much as it feels like a pretty overwhelming burden, sometimes, doing the hard work and having cynical sons-a-bitches carping at me without better solutions...

I'm not a martyr...when they fucked me, they lost privileges to my house and my car...they have to earn the trust back...and they are working on it...

I am not naive about them or others, generally, I don't think...I don't know everything you're doing...but I know, better, who is engaged in fucked up shit and who is not...

And I'm explaining to this officer...who has totally been where I'm at, right now...who has family that he cares about that he wants to make better choices...

That I just can't give up..no matter how many people do...no matter how much shit people give me...no matter what...I can't...I won't...

I am stronger than most people...and my love is more genuinely unconditional than most people...

That doesn't mean that I won't intervene...or say anything...or do anything...it just means that I will find the least aggressive means possible to encourage/move/inspire/whatever the fuck/and if I have no other option to fuckin' force your lame fuckin' ass in the better direction...

Like Officer Grady...I have come to terms with the fact that I can't force folks to stop fuckin' up...Myron worked as a parol officer for a while...and left for a reason I completely understand...because he got tired of caring about people more than they care about themselves...goddamn did I understand that one...

But it's clear that Myron still cares quite a bit, really...and so do I...and that's why I don't give up on people...no matter what...period...

Because I have become completely clear...that giving up on people...has everything to do with why the most fucked up shit in the world happens...and goddamn if I am tired of that same fuckin' stupid cycle...and I am ready for it to end...

I will give our relationship a break...I'll make my car or house or whatever off-limits, when I need to...

But I won't give up...ever...ever...ever...ever...
ever...ever...ever...ever...ever...ever...ever...

When does Mr. Sutherland give up on you, my kids might ask someday?...

Never...period...

And that is the only right answer to that question...unless you're overtly and inescapably threatening my life or the lives of others...in which case, your life will be in danger from me...but I will do everything I can to avoid the latter...

And the truth is that I've been fucked over more times by friends -- better friends and not-as-great-of-friends -- more times than I could ever count in my life...and I have fucked up plenty, too, in my life...

And my friends are all goddamn lucky (and I am, too) that I haven't/don't/won't give up on any of them...any of them...period...ever...ever...ever...

No matter how much the ungrateful shitheads they are, often, take advantage of me...

Who is the big man in these parts?...me...and why...because I am the one motherfucker that you know will never give up on you...ever...

No matter how much you fuck me or others...though there are always consequences to our actions...natural ones...that we can all learn to deal with in the meantime...

And as Officer Grady says...when you've chosen that, freely...and you know there's no turning back...as I have...and as Officer Grady clearly has...each of us has to prove ourselves every day...but some people you can just tell are more genuine in that commitment than others...Myron is one of those people...Phoenix, my friend in the army, is another one of those friends...you can just tell who the stronger people are and who the weaker people are...and these are two of the stronger people...as well as a million friends I have...Myron and Phoenix are two of my law enforcement/military friends who are of this stronger ilk...

The fact is...that for all the shit I get for just how clear I am about what unconditional love means to me and those I care about -- which is everyone, at some level -- in my life...

I am stronger than most people...by far...including and especially the stupid, dumbass macho motherfuckers I've always got trying to prove just how tough they are at my expense...and if you need me to prove that physically...I can do that too...

It was nice talking with Myron, today...to commune about what it meant to be a man...a real man...someone who wears their hearts on their sleeves...who'll kick your ass if you need it...but who only do that if they absolutely have to...because they know, better, what will help and what won't...

I don't know if my professors have figured it out yet...or if most folks over 40 have figured it out, yet...but this generation...just like theirs...just like every generation before this generation...and just like every generation after it...meaning the kids I teach...

We will be defining what it means to be a man...to be a grown-up...to be a decent human being...better than the generation, previously...

And that became so clear to me talking with Myron...

I've been reading Hobbes, again, today...he's brilliant...I'm totally caught up in my passion about his brilliance, his courage, as I'm reading him and C.B. MacPherson's introduction to the copy of Leviathan that Melissa owns aloud to Melissa...

He invents political science...civil philosophy, as he calls it...

And he totally fuckin' reinvents the entire fuckin' human race, as a consequence...

I'm telling Melissa...that I totally don't get Hobbes when I was in undergrad reading Leviathan in Dr. Ericson's Modern Political Theory class...

I was a big John Stuart Mill and John Locke and Jacques Rousseau fan, more than any of the other authors we read...

It's both ironic and appropriate that I would find him during a cynical push on the left for power in America...

For non-policy folks...

Hobbes is the theorist of security, essentially...life, according to Hobbes, is "nasty, brutish, and short"...and government's responsibility to is keep people secure from the vagaries of life...

I didn't get him in college because, like most college students, I was looking for greater and greater freedom...and kind of took my security...the work done by law enforcement and military folks...for granted...

I don't take that security for granted any more...I take it seriously...and know that it is irrevocably tied up with mine and everyone else's ever expanding freedoms...

And now I get Hobbes...

And just how important is was for this Englishman to write a tract that would define the idea of political science...as a secular study and as a study of one of the most important bodies in modern life and the life of our civilization...government...that was independent of religion...as Protestants and Catholics in his own country ravaged the nation with civil war...over the ultimately destructive and futile question of which ruling power should retain that power...manipulating the country with the question of whether Protestantism or Catholicism was the best religion to lead their country...

And as my own country is wracked by a political war by various ruling parties manipulating the country about who...liberals or conservatives...Democrats or Republicans...should lead the country...which is the right ruling party...in a country predicated on the notion of self-governance, rather than a ruling elite...

I wonder, too, what will convince my fellow countrymen and fellow citizens of the world...that self-governance is created by each of them...as citizens, primarily...and by government, only secondarily...a thesis I'm not convinced that Hobbes would agree with...but which is very much in line with his same concerns in the 16th Century...

Sitting and talking with Myron today...I was never more honored to be doing the work that I do...to be answering the questions that I am answering...to be building the kind of world that I would like to see built...

Thanks to Myron...for being such a decent cop...and reminding me of just how important that job is to all of our security...

And thanks to Thomas Hobbes...for changing the world...and to him and Myron for helping to assure my security...as I aspire to do the same...

Love,
Ben