The creep, part 4 (Halloween edition)

I realized today that I had totally underestimated the creep. Despite all of my doubts, this morning he managed to capture the true spirit of Halloween.

The goal of this delightfully ghoulish holiday is to embody the scary monster, the dark visitor, the specter of evil, the stuff of your worst nightmares. Some people go as Freddy Krueger, others as Michael Myers.

But today the creep managed to embody the scariest monster of them all — the abusive partner in an intimate relationship. That figure of horror haunts the nightmares of many of the 130 million women eligible to vote in this country.

Today the creep said he “will protect women, whether they like it or not.” That, of course, perfectly mirrors what a controlling and insecure man will say about his spouse, the day before she shows up in public with a black eye.

So hats off, credit where credit is due. In honor of this fun and spooky day, the creep managed to put on the scariest costume of them all.

Assuming, that is, it was a costume.

The creep, part 3

I like the economic proposals of Vice President Harris. I also like her compassion, and her determination to help our middle class.

But I don’t think those are her greatest assets in this election. Her greatest asset is turning out to be her opponent.

In case you missed it, the creep seems to be doing everything he can to throw this election, by alienating one large bloc of voters after another. And creeping people out with rambling hate speech turns out to be something that he’s really good at.

Until now, I thought the only thing he was really good at was managing to kill millions of older Americans by botching the pandemic response. Which is already not a great look.

Yes, I understand that it’s offensive to throw paper towels at people in Puerto Rico while they are suffering from the devastating effects of a hurricane. But arguably it’s even worse, through sheer incompetence and indifference, to kill off Grandma and Grandpa.

The creep, part 2

I am curious about the end game strategy of the creep. It seems to consist of trying to lose entire blocs of votes.

The insults to latinos and Puerto Ricans are the most obvious, but there are others as well. For example, the creep has made it clear that Jews are also on his list of “people who are not really Americans”.

Just in the last week, he attacked The Atlantic magazine by going after its editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg. His exact words describing the publication were “a failing magazine run by a guy named Goldberg.” You can practically hear the “Nudge, nudge, wink wink”.

As dog whistles go, that one was pretty darned loud. From where I sit, it seems that any Jewish person would need to be crazy to vote for a guy who promotes that kind of hatred toward Jews.

I find myself wondering whether that hat he wears actually stands for Make America Goy Again.

The creep, part 1

When I watch that man speak, all I can think is “that creep”. And I mean “creep” in precisely the sense of that feeling you get when you notice a poisonous centipede, or some other such verminous creature, crawling up your leg.

The odd thing is that anybody reading this will know, simply from the above description, exactly whom I am speaking about. And yet the people standing behind him in those videos are, for some odd reason, not visibly shuddering with horror.

And I can’t help thinking — What is wrong with those people?

The mystery of theater

What is it, exactly, about live theater? Movies are great, but they are just not the same.

When you see a live human being inhabiting a character right before your eyes, with no special effects, it brings you to a magical place. I am not sure what strange alchemy transports us to that place with such power.

But I am grateful that it does.

Creating worlds

One of the best things to me about a great movie or play or novel is the way it creates its own world. Every truly great fiction is its own universe.

If the author or playwright is doing their job properly, within a scene or two, you have entered this universe. And you have been expertly prepped for everything that follows.

And that’s half the fun right there.

Presentation software

For many years I have tried making different types of presentation software. It’s sort of a hobby of mine.

The commercial software that is out there — notably PowerPoint and Keynote — is sort of boring. It gets the job done, but there is no liveness to it, no sense of improvisatory engagement.

What I strive for is a way to go beyond the sense that audiences are seeing a canned presentation. In the visuals there should be a sense of live engagement, which matches the feeling of engagement you can get when somebody is speaking live.

After all, when you go to a live talk, you never quite know what the speaker might say. They could just read from a prepared speech (boring), or they might riff on an idea, or dwell upon a thought that seems to resonate with the audience.

Speakers should be able to capture that sort of electric energy in their visuals, so I try to make presentation tools that are capable of that. And isn’t that better than a stupid slide deck?

Teaching and storytelling

I realized a long time ago that effective teaching is not about imparting knowledge. It’s about knowing how to tell a story.

To make sense of that, it’s useful to ask yourself “Why do people like stories?” What is it about fictional people and their problems that we find so endlessly fascinating?

Clearly there is no profit motive in hearing, reading or watching a good story. It usually doesn’t advance our career, or put food on the table. We do it because there is something enormously satisfying in the process of receiving a story well told.

If you want your students to learn, place what you are teaching in the context of a good narrative.
The important thing is for your learners be motivated to ask “And then what happens?”

The rest is all detail.