For many years, I had an anger management problem. I never saw the problem even when Julie left me the first time. We reconciled a few months later. We missed each other. However, I still had not realized that my anger was affecting our marriage. I was told by the marriage counselor that we saw that I had an anger problem. However, since I never hit or physically hurt Julie or my daughter Chris, I did not accept his assessment. Not until years later did I realize how much my behaviors scared them and the fear that they lived with on a daily basis.
I would throw things. I would smash things. I would punch the walls. I once bragged that every wall in our house had a hole in it where I punched it. I did not get any help for my anger problem or even realize that I needed help until 1984 when Julie and I decided to call it quits for good.
I decided to go back to school to get a Ph.D. degree. Although I had gone to a few other shrinks over the years, the issue of my anger problem with these other counselors never came up. I would go to see them for reasons more related to my OCD and depression. I also had recurring nightmares that someone was trying to kill me. Since counseling was free for students, I decided to see a counselor who was at the University of Minnesota.
We met several times. Then one day, she looked me in the eyes and said, “You have an anger management problem.” To me that meant I could not control my temper and assaulted people. I still could not see that anger and my behaviors with my wife and daughter had been abusive. I denied it. She insisted. She said that she wanted me to go to the Domestic Violence Program Center at the Wilder Center in St. Paul for an anger assessment. We argued over this “waste” of my time, but I finally relented.
She set up an appointment with a counselor there for me to see. I was expecting a woman and instead a younger man sat across a table from me looking quite smug and self-assured. I immediately disliked him and his attitude.
He started asking me more and more personal questions. I was getting more and more pissed at his questions. He then asked the question that really set me off. “Did you ever molest your daughter sexually?” At that point, I stood up and said, “How would you like me to knock your teeth down your throat?” To my surprise, he merely laughed and said, “You have an anger management problem.” Suddenly, like a bolt out of the sky, I knew he was right.
I joined the Domestic Abuse Program, someplace, I never thought I belonged. Yes, I had many fights, but they were always with other guys who back then I labeled as assholes.
I did the 12-week program and then spent three years coming back to a weekly support group for men who had gone through the program. We had doctors, lawyers, teachers, plumbers, carpenters, truck drivers and men from many other walks of life. One guy “a lawyer” had thrown a beer can at his wife and knocked her eye out. Most of the men initially blamed their wives for causing their anger. Over time and being caringly confronted by men in the group who had gone before them, they finally saw what I had learned. It was my fault. Not my wife’s fault, or anyone else’s fault. My anger was my responsibility and no one else’s.
The program forced me to look at who I was and what I did and how I was responsible for my actions. Men in the support groups would not allow any of the new people in the group to try and bullshit their way out of responsibility. Over time, I became one of those who would challenge others when they tried the “she made me do it” line.
No one except me was to be blamed because I threw something, smashed the lights on my car, beat up a guy I thought was messing with my wife or any number of other things I did for one simple reason. I would not control my anger.
I can see now with the value of hindsight that it must have been hell living with me. Julie was a very kind and compassionate person. My daughter Chris always seemed to be afraid of something. I realize now that what she was afraid of was me. Julie did the best she could to protect me from the excesses of my own anger. Without her I know I would have ended up in jail.
My daughter was sixteen when Julie and I separated. She did not want anything to do with me for twenty years or more. I would like to have more of a father daughter relationship. I miss a relationship with her that I never had. I also recognize why she would want to keep her distance.
It hurts but the forgiveness that I long for may never come. It is the price that I pay for the anger and psychological abuse I caused both Chris and Julie.
I started off with “MY” story, because I am sure you have heard all the statistics and the warnings about domestic violence. I wanted to make this blog personal because domestic abuse and domestic violence are personal. In my case, it was a function or outcome of my anger. In many cases, domestic abuse stems from other sources like entitlement, power, jealousy or machismo.
I was going to start this blog off with statistics showing the extent of domestic violence in our nation. The people we say that we love most in the world are among the most abused and mistreated people in the country. The amount of abuse is staggering.
General domestic violence statistics
More than 1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men in the United States have experienced physical violence, sexual violence involving contact, or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetimes.
An estimated 6.7 million women and 2.8 million men experienced those forms of intimate partner violence in the twelve months preceding the survey.
Nearly 1 in 3 women and more than 1 in 5 men have experienced psychological aggression by an intimate partner, including humiliation, threats, or controlling behavior, during their lifetimes.
About 18% of women and 9% of men have experienced severe physical violence by an intimate partner during their lifetimes, such as being beaten, kicked, or subjected to choking or suffocation attempts.
The above data is from “The National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey 2023/2024” — Intimate Partner Violence Data Brief
I cannot help but think that given the amount of domestic violence, many of us lack a scale of humane values and attitudes. Too many of us say we want one thing, but our actions and attitudes get us the opposite. I am not in a position to lecture anyone on anger management, but I wanted to create a scale of tolerance which I thought we might use in dealing with not only our loved ones but everyone else. I started this idea ten years ago. Over time, I realized that tolerance was only a stop on a journey to full love for others. The love that Jesus said all people should have for others as well as strangers and people not like themselves. Working with my AI Assistant I created the following scale.
The vertical dimension indicates an increase in compassion, and merciful attitudes towards others. Each level includes examples of how that attitude can be expressed. This scale is meant to help you reflect on your actions. It is not a validated measurement tool. My belief is that attitudes without appropriate behaviors are meaningless. Years ago, I would have said that I loved my wife and daughter. My behaviors painted a different picture.
“A Hierarchy of Humane Attitudes”
Love
Affection • Care • Commitment • Generosity
Admiration
Appreciation of character • Abilities • Contributions
Respect
Dignity • Rights • Boundaries • Fair treatment
Tolerance
Acceptance of differences • Peaceful coexistence
Indifference
Ignoring suffering • Neglect • Disengagement
Discrimination
Exclusion • Unequal treatment • Denial of opportunities
Cruelty
Psychological • Physical • Sexual • Combinations
Attitude ↑
Examples of its expression ↔
One essential qualification: respect and safety are obligations; admiration and affection cannot be demanded. Someone experiencing abuse does not owe their abuser greater love or continued access to their life.
Conclusions:
Where do you put yourself on this scale? Can anyone who spends most of their time down in the cruelty and discrimination areas of this scale say they have a good relationship with others?
The damage that we do to others in words and deeds cannot always be undone. We can do our best to apologize and to ask for forgiveness, but the hurts we inflict on others may never be erased. Healing and changed behavior may make a difference for you but forgiveness and reconciliation are never guaranteed.
Speaking for myself, the realization of what I was and how I behaved can never be forgotten. Many have told me, you have to forgive yourself. It might be possible, but it has not happened yet.
If I have said anything in this blog that helps you to see that you may have an anger management problem or if you feel that you are a victim of abuse, I encourage you to call the following number.
National Domestic Violence Hotline, 800-799-7233; text START to 88788
No matter where you live in American today, you will encounter the problem that there is a physician shortage. It is easy to blame people. We can ask why more people are not interested in becoming doctors. The truth is that America does not suffer from a shortage of people who want to become doctors. It suffers from a healthcare system that systematically limits physician supply, burns out existing doctors, redirects resources toward profit-generating activities, and increasingly treats healthcare as a business rather than a public service.
This issue became more personal for me recently when my wife had three emergency room trips and three overnight stays in the hospital. One for six days, and two for two days each. Despite the fact that no definitive prognosis was found, we could not get an appointment with her pulmonologist for over thirty days after her third emergency visit. My wife was a BA/RN with a master’s degree in public health nursing for over 55 years full time before she retired. I have an undergraduate degree in Health Education. None of our credentials mattered. We were mostly treated like mushrooms. Kept in the dark and fed manure. The reasons we were given “Not enough specialty doctors in our area.”
I have written before about the problems in the American medical system. The problems have only grown worse. Here is a brief summary of where the American Medical System ranks on the five statistics that patients care most about in comparison to other countries.
1. Life Expectancy
This is perhaps the single best measure of whether a healthcare system is helping people live long lives.
U.S. life expectancy reached about 79 years in 2024.
That is roughly two years below the OECD average and among the lowest of developed nations.
Why patients should care:
If a nation spends the most on healthcare but its citizens die younger than those in comparable countries, something is wrong with the system.
2. Preventable and Treatable Deaths
These are deaths that should not occur if people receive timely and effective healthcare.
The U.S. has among the highest rates of avoidable deaths among wealthy countries.
Why patients should care:
This measures not whether doctors are talented, but whether the system gets patients the right care at the right time.
This statistic directly relates to physician shortages and delayed access.
3. Access to Primary Care
Primary care physicians are the “front door” to healthcare.
The U.S. has fewer primary care physicians per capita than many peer nations and faces projected shortages of tens of thousands of doctors in coming years.
Why patients should care:
Longer waits for appointments.
Delayed diagnosis.
Greater use of emergency rooms for routine care.
This may be the statistic most directly connected to your physician-shortage article.
4. Infant Mortality
Infant mortality is often considered one of the most sensitive indicators of a nation’s health system.
The United States continues to have a higher infant mortality rate than many other developed countries.
Why patients should care:
If a healthcare system struggles to keep infants alive during their first year of life, it raises questions about access, prenatal care, and healthcare equity.
5. Healthcare Cost
This is where the United States is number one.
The U.S. spends more per person on healthcare than any other nation.
Recent estimates place spending at nearly $15,000 per person annually, roughly double many peer countries.
Why patients should care:
Americans are paying luxury-car prices for a healthcare system that often produces middle-of-the-pack—or even worse—results than comparable medical systems in other countries. The following table shows where the USA ranks against the list of OECD countries. The OECD currently consists of thirty-eight member nations most of them high-income democracies.
Measure
United States
Healthcare Spending
Highest
Life Expectancy
Near Bottom
Preventable Deaths
Near Bottom
Primary Care Access
Near Bottom
Infant Mortality
Near Bottom
Overall Ranking Among Peer Nations
Last
To verify this data – Go to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development site at https://www.oecd.org/en.html
In the blog that follows, I am going to identify some of the major factors that are contributing to the dismal performance of our health care system.
Factor 1: The Doctor Shortage
The U.S. is projected to face a shortage of tens of thousands of physicians over the next decade. Rural communities are especially affected, but shortages are increasingly appearing in urban areas as well.
The Association of American Medical Colleges projects the United States could face a shortage of up to 86,000 physicians by 2036.
The projected shortage of primary care physicians alone is estimated at 20,200 to 40,400 doctors by 2036.
Only about 24% of U.S. physicians practice primary care, even though primary care is often the front line for prevention and early diagnosis.
Factor 2: Medical School and Residency Bottlenecks
Most people assume the problem is that too few students want to become doctors.
The reality is more complicated.
Every year thousands of qualified students are rejected from medical schools.
Even after graduation, physicians must complete residency training.
The number of residency positions has not kept pace with population growth because Medicare largely funds residency programs and funding has historically been capped.
Result:
Fewer physicians enter practice than society needs.
Existing doctors must see more patients.
Wait times increase.
Healthcare Outcomes
Patients wait longer for:
Primary care appointments
Specialists
Mental health services
Research consistently shows that delayed care leads to:
Worse disease outcomes
More emergency room visits
Higher mortality rates
Factor 3: Physician Burnout
This may be the most important factor.
Nearly half of all physicians reported burnout in 2024. One major survey found a burnout rate of 49%.
Although burnout has improved somewhat, 43.2% of physicians still reported symptoms of burnout in 2024, and 41.9% in 2025.
Primary care physicians consistently report some of the highest burnout rates in medicine.
Many physicians report spending nearly as much time on:
Documentation
Electronic medical records
Insurance approvals
Billing requirements
as they spend caring for patients.
Doctors often describe themselves as data-entry clerks with medical degrees.
The Commercialization of the Medical System plays a key role in Doctor Burnout. While it does not directly reduce the number of medical graduates. Instead, it can make physicians less willing to remain in practice.
Think of it as a retention problem.
Doctors often cite:
Loss of autonomy
Productivity quotas
Administrative burden
Corporate oversight
as reasons for burnout.
When experienced physicians retire early, the effective shortage grows.
Healthcare Outcomes
Burnout contributes to:
Earlier retirement
Reduced patient access
Medical errors
Lower patient satisfaction
The average patient often experiences this as:
Rushed appointments
Less physician attention
Difficulty obtaining follow-up care
Factor 4: Aging Population
America’s population is getting older.
Older adults consume significantly more healthcare resources.
The Baby Boom generation is moving into years where:
Cancer rates rise
Heart disease increases
Joint replacements become common
Chronic illnesses multiply
Demand is increasing faster than physician supply.
Healthcare Outcomes
More patients compete for the same physicians.
Wait times lengthen.
Primary care becomes increasingly difficult to access.
Factor 5: Geographic Maldistribution
The United States may not have a pure national shortage as much as a distribution problem.
Doctors tend to locate in:
Wealthier communities
Urban areas
Regions with better reimbursement
Rural America often struggles to attract physicians.
Arizona experiences this challenge in many communities outside Phoenix and Tucson. We live in Arizona City, and the selection of specialists is poor to non-existent here. We are fifty miles from Phoenix and fifty miles from Tucson. Depending on the time of day, it can take two to three hours to get to some areas of Phoenix and two hours to get to some areas of Tucson.
Healthcare Outcomes
Rural patients experience:
Longer travel times
Delayed diagnosis
Higher mortality rates for many conditions
Factor 6: Commercialization of Healthcare
This is where the story becomes particularly interesting.
Many Americans still imagine hospitals as community institutions.
Increasingly they are large corporate enterprises.
Over the past forty years:
Independent physician practices declined.
Corporate healthcare systems expanded.
Investor-owned hospital chains grew.
Private equity entered healthcare.
Healthcare increasingly became a business sector rather than a public service sector.
Hospital mergers and physician acquisitions frequently increase prices without corresponding improvements in quality.
Factor 7: Hospital Consolidations
The percentage of physicians employed by or affiliated with hospital systems increased from less than 30% in 2012 to at least 47% in 2024.
More than three-quarters of U.S. doctors are now employed by health systems or corporations rather than practicing independently.
Thousands of hospitals merged into large regional systems.
Proponents argued consolidation would:
Reduce costs
Improve efficiency
Improve quality
The evidence is mixed.
Many studies suggest consolidation often results in:
Higher prices
Greater market power
Increased administrative costs
Studies reviewed by the Government Accountability Office found that physician and hospital consolidation is generally associated with higher prices and spending, with limited evidence of corresponding quality improvements. Read my blog called, “When Bigger is Not Better.”
Factor 8: Administrative Growth vs Physician Growth
One of the most striking trends is that administrative staffing has grown much faster than physician staffing.
Hospitals employ:
Compliance officers
Revenue cycle managers
Coders
Contract specialists
Marketing personnel
Financial analysts
Many are necessary.
But the growth rate has greatly exceeded physician growth. According to one statistic administrators now outnumber physicians by roughly 10 to 1 in some healthcare systems.
Critics argue the system increasingly rewards administration rather than caregiving.
Healthcare Outcomes
More money flows toward administration.
Less is available for:
Physician recruitment
Nursing support
Patient services
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – DECEMBER 19: People demonstrating against the healthcare industry
Factor 9: Private Equity and Physician Practices
This is a newer development and one that many people do not know about.
Approximately 6.5% of physicians worked in private-equity-owned practices in 2024, up from 4.5% in 2022.
While still a minority of practices, the trend is moving rapidly.
Private equity firms increasingly purchase:
Physician groups
Emergency departments
Specialty practices
Their objective is generally to increase profitability and eventually sell the practice.
Critics argue this creates pressure for:
Higher patient volumes
More procedures
Cost cutting
Before concluding Part 1, lets summarize the human cost of the physician shortage in the USA and the attendant commercialism health care in America.
The Human Cost
The physician shortage ultimately affects patients through:
Longer Wait Times
Patients may wait months for specialists.
Reduced Preventive Care
Diseases are detected later.
Overcrowded Emergency Rooms
ERs become substitutes for primary care.
Physician Fatigue
Burned-out physicians are more likely to leave practice.
Health Disparities
Rural and low-income populations suffer most.
Treatment Outcomes
You may die from something that could have been treated with earlier diagnosis.
So Where Do the Profits Go:
Consider this paradox. The United States spends nearly twice as much per person on healthcare as many other high-income countries. Yet Americans generally do not live longer, have better access to doctors, or enjoy better health outcomes. If the additional money is not producing better results, where is it going?
After all this discussion about Health Care becoming a business instead of a human service, the obvious question is “Where do the profits go?” There are five main actors in this picture. I would like to call them “villains’ but Metis who is the main author of this piece refuses to let me use this terminology. Hence, here are the five major actors who share in the money pie.
Hospital CEO Compensation
Administrative Growth and Costs
Insurance Company Profits
Pharmaceutical Profits
Private Equity Returns/Profits
The easiest way to view the answer to the distribution of profits is to look at a pie chart:
Who Is the Villain? Or is there a Villain?
Whenever Americans discuss healthcare, there is a tendency to look for a villain. Some blame insurance companies. Others blame pharmaceutical firms, hospital executives, private equity investors, politicians, or even doctors themselves. While each of these groups deserves scrutiny, focusing on any single villain misses the larger truth.
The real problem is not one person, one company, or even one industry. The real problem is the system.
Edwards Deming, the quality management expert, often argued that most organizational failures are caused by systems rather than individuals. If Deming were alive today, he would tell us to stop looking for villains and start looking at incentives. Why does the American healthcare system produce higher costs, physician shortages, burnout, and poorer outcomes than many comparable nations despite spending more money than any other country on Earth?
The answer lies in the way the system is structured.
Every major participant in healthcare—hospitals, insurance companies, pharmaceutical firms, physician groups, investors, and government agencies—is responding to incentives that reward revenue growth, complexity, and market power. Over time, these incentives have created a healthcare system that increasingly behaves like a business rather than a public service.
Where does the money go? The largest portion of it disappears into administrative complexity. The United States has built one of the most complicated healthcare financing systems in the world. Hospitals and physician practices employ armies of billers, coders, compliance officers, contract specialists, lawyers, and administrators simply to navigate the rules. Physicians spend countless hours on documentation, insurance approvals, and billing requirements instead of patient care. This complexity contributes directly to physician burnout and rising costs.
Other high-income nations are not perfect, but many have simpler systems, stronger primary care networks, and greater control over prices. As a result, they often achieve comparable or better outcomes while spending far less.
My wife once had a visiting nurse from Sweden come to North Memorial Medical Center where my wife was a nurse manager. Karen was asked to take the visiting nurse and show her around the hospital for the day. She enjoyed the day with the nurse. When Karen came home that evening, she told me about the visit and some of the things that surprised her. This was back in 2005 before Karen retired the first time.
Karen took the nurse to the business center where the people were working on billing and insurance issues. North Memorial was then a 4500 employee hospital and the visiting nurse came from one of comparable size in Sweden. In North Memorial over 200 people were employed in billing and medical coding processes. Karen was shocked to find that in the visiting nurse’s hospital (ALMOST THE SAME SIZE) only three people were employed. Why? Because they had a single payer system with only one place to bill. In the United States, hospital billing can be bewilderingly complex.
A large American hospital may deal with dozens or even hundreds of insurance plans, each with its own reimbursement rules, approval requirements, referral procedures, and appeals processes. What appears to be fifty insurance companies may actually represent hundreds or even thousands of distinct billing arrangements. The result is a healthcare system that requires armies of administrators simply to get paid.
A small rural hospital might have:
20–50 major payer contracts
A medium-sized regional hospital might have:
50–100 payer contracts
A large urban hospital system may have:
100–300 payer contracts
So who is the villain?
The villain is a system that rewards complexity over simplicity, treatment over prevention, administration over caregiving, and financial performance over patient outcomes. Most of the people working within the system are trying to do their jobs well. The problem is that the system often pushes them in the wrong direction.
Until we address those underlying incentives, physician shortages, rising costs, and patient frustration will remain symptoms of a deeper disease. The challenge before us is not to find someone to blame. It is to build a healthcare system that rewards the outcomes patients actually care about: timely access to care, affordable treatment, healthier lives, and better results.
Conclusion
America spends more on healthcare than any nation in history, yet millions struggle to find timely access to a physician. The problem is not a lack of talent or technology. The problem is a system that prioritizes financial performance over system performance. As hospitals consolidate, private equity expands, and administrative complexity grows, physicians increasingly find themselves serving the business of healthcare rather than the practice of medicine. Until we address these systemic issues, doctor shortages will remain a symptom of a deeper disease within American healthcare itself.
If the United States spends more on healthcare than any nation in the world, why do so many patients struggle to find a doctor, wait months for appointments, and feel lost in the system?
If you want more data or resources on any of the subjects I have discussed above, you can find substantial data and references on the following sites. These organizations provide some of the most widely cited and respected data on healthcare spending, physician workforce trends, access to care, and international healthcare outcomes.
1. OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development)
In Part 2, we will look at what is driving the commercialization of hospitals and why they have become places of profit rather than service. We will also look at some possible antidotes to the commercialization infecting the American Medical System. Some of these solutions will address:
Expanding residency funding.
Reducing administrative burden.
Increasing primary care reimbursement.
Encouraging independent physician practices.
Scrutinizing hospital mergers more aggressively.
Increasing transparency in healthcare pricing.
Developing rural physician incentives.
Measuring healthcare success by patient outcomes rather than revenue generation.
This last week has been really stressful. Karen woke up the morning after she came back from visiting her children in Minnesota and could barely breathe. I called 911. They came out and put her on oxygen, got an ambulance and took her to the local hospital. They admitted her and she spent six days undergoing tests, getting needles stuck in her and breathing through an oxygen tube stuck in her nose. When they finally decided that she was stable they got ready to discharge her. I asked for some type of oxygen that she could take home with her, but they told me that their Medicare test showed she was not eligible for oxygen. I told them I would pay for it but it went right over their heads. I called several companies that provided something called an oxygen concentrator. They would be more than happy to either sell me one or rent me one. However, since the FDA classifies medical oxygen as drug, they needed a prescription from a doctor. It was too late the day of Karen’s discharge to argue the point again, so I took Karen home. You already can guess what happened.
We arrived home at about 4 PM. Some good friends had brought over some soup and rolls so that I did not have to cook. We ate supper. Watched “Wild West Chronicles” and “Where the Heart Is” and went to bed. All seemed good. Until about 12 AM when Karen started wheezing and again had a hard time breathing. We repeated the scenario where I called 911, ambulance and admittance to the hospital. This time I was able to stay with her in the emergency room. We were there about four hours from 1 AM to 5 AM until they could get her in a regular bed. At about 1:30 AM, a woman came in pushing a computer on a cart. She asked me if I could make the co-pay now. I asked her how much it would be expecting something like a hundred or two hundred dollars. She informed me it would be $1750 dollars. I asked a few more questions and put the charge on my VISA card.
I started to do a slow burn. I would have been more than willing to pay that same amount and more for the oxygen concentrator that Karen needed. But no, they could not give her one even with me paying for it.
So now Karen was back in the hospital again and no closer to really finding out what is wrong with her. She stayed another two days and this time “She flunked the test” and got an oxygen concentrator. She is now back home sleeping peacefully. For the past two days she has only used the oxygen at night. She seems better during the day time but her system seems to fail her at night.
I got up this morning and decided to go out for a hike in the mountains. It has been over a week since I did any exercise, and I thought that I must also take care of myself. I chose a moderately difficult mid distance hike to do. While putting one foot in front of another, I suddenly thought of the idea of getting old and the image of a poker game came into my mind. I thought “aging is like a poker game.” You sit around a table with four or five friends. You raise, you bet and finally someone calls. The first player smiles and says, “I’ve got a pair of aces.” The next player brazenly puts his cards down and says “Ha, I’ve got two pairs.” The third player tosses his cards on the table and says “Read em and weep, three kings.” “Not so fast” says the next to last player on the table, “I’ve got a full house.” Now it is my turn, I simply fold em.
“What’s poker got to do with all this?”
Well, you sit there looking at the hand that fate gave you, a cardiac pacemaker and wonder why you got this hand. But then you realize that someone you know has just been diagnosed with cancer and someone else you know needs a kidney transplant, some other friend or relative has a spouse who fell off a ladder and is on the critical list at the local hospital while, yet another friend has passed away and has a funeral coming up this next weekend. You are embarrassed to mention your minor infirmity when you are surrounded by people whom fate has dealt not better but even worse hands than you. Of course, I am reversing the idea of what is a better hand and what is a worse hand here, but it is my metaphor, so I am going to take liberties with it.
I continued my hike and my thoughts on aging and illness. The real issue I reflected was one that I have never quite conquered. It is the issue of Gratitude and Ingratitude. St. Ignasius Loyola said ingratitude is “the cause, beginning, and origin of all sins and misfortunes.” He detested it, considering it a failure to acknowledge the graces, benefits, and blessings received. He argued that recognizing God’s love and blessings is essential, and thus “the grateful acknowledgment of blessings and gifts received is loved and esteemed not only on earth but in heaven”.
Now I have hardly ever denied that I am not a pessimist. That thought led me somewhere deeper than poker or luck. It led me to an issue that I’ve wrestled with most of my life: gratitude. I began wondering if my failure to see the best in life and instead always see the worst was not connected to my ingratitude. The answer is of course yes. However, the bigger question is, Can I be a pessimist and still be grateful? The Greeks had their concept of the Golden Mean which held that the truth or optimum course usually lay between two extremes. Is this true with gratitude and pessimism? Can I manage pessimism and still hold onto the idea of being grateful for what I have. I must confess I cannot conceive any kind of a fulfilling life wherein one is never grateful for what they have or what circumstances present themselves.
The discipline of gratitude is the explicit effort to acknowledge that all I am and have is given to me as a gift of love, a gift to be celebrated with joy. — Henri Nouwen
I want to continue this blog by looking at the two extremes that are consistent with the Greek idea of finding the golden mean. Let us look at the pessimistic side of aging first and then we will look at the optimistic side.
Aging from a Pessimistic Point of View:
My pessimistic side reflects on those who claim the we age like a fine wine. To paraphrase Scrooge from the novel A Christmas Carol, “If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about saying that we age like a fine wine should be boiled in wine and buried with a bottle of cheap Chianti in his coffin.” Here are my top reasons for being pessimistic about aging. These are in no particular order:
Losing too many good friends and relatives to the Grim Reaper
The fear of dealing with the Specter of loneliness
Fading memories of good times gone by that will never happen again
Dealing with a body that is wearing out and being replaced piece by piece
Feeling sorry for myself that I never accomplished more and did not leave the world a better place
Not being able to help others as much as I would like to anymore
Memories of mistakes and cruelties that I subjected others to and never made up for
Wondering where all the flowers went this year in the Casa Grande mountains
Watching someone I love so much endure the pain of illness and not being able to do anything about it
Aging from an Optimistic Point of View:
You have my list of pessimistic views on aging. If these are forever on my mind, I know that I cannot be grateful. Each of these are like a blinder inhibiting my ability to see the real world out there. Nevertheless, each of these are part of the real world. Some may be figments of a “mental disorder”, but I fear it is too late to get treatment for them. Instead, I need to balance the scales some and find that Golden Mean. Herewith are those things that I know I should be grateful for:
I have lived a long life and been healthy for the majority of it. I am now 79 and despite needing a pacemaker I am still ambulatory.
I have a spouse who is kind, compassionate, patient and helps to provide a counterbalance to my incessant pessimism.
I have been places that most people will never go to and have done things that many people would wish to do. I have had a good life.
I can still read, write, travel and dream.
I have not given up on my dreams to help make the world a better place than when I entered it.
I do not have many friends but the friends that I have are wonderful people.
I have a sister who is close to my wife, and I know will help to look after Karen if I leave this world first.
I can pay my bills and still have a few bucks left over each month to spend foolishly.
I still look forward to getting up each day and spending time with Karen.
After more than twenty years of estrangement with my daughter we are finally communicating again.
So, there you have it. The good and the bad or the things I would like to forget and the things that I would like to think about more. Unfortunately , the reality is that life will never let us forget the bad. That seems to be a sad part of existence. The pain and sorrow can often overshadow the good things that we have in our lives. Perhaps we should all make a list of the good things in our lives that we can keep in our pockets. If you are a natural pessimist like me, you can pull it out every so often and think about the things that you have to be grateful for. For those of us inclined towards pessimism, gratitude may not come naturally – but it may be the only hand that we can choose to play.
Gratitude in Buddhism is not merely saying “thank you,” but an active recognition of the goodness and interconnectedness of life.
Bahá’u’lláh instructed, “Be generous in prosperity, and thankful in adversity,” emphasizing that gratitude should not depend on comfortable circumstances.
“Gratitude turns what we have into enough” (Native American Elder belief).
Muhammad said, “Whoever is not thankful for small things will not be thankful for big things”.
(A Musical Reflection) By Dr. Persico with help from his AI Assistant Metis
Introduction:
I wrote this over ten years ago but recently decided to revise it. My original composition did not hit the mark, and few readers thought it was memorable. My goal was to infuse my writing with the essence of good music. I love music. When I want passion in my life, I turn to music. Some writing, particularly speeches, seem to have the ability to invoke the same passion in our lives as music often does. Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address,” Douglas Mc Arthur’s “Old Soldiers Never Die” speech” and of course Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. Great writing and great music share a common rhythm. If my beloved writing coach Dr. Carolyn Wedin were still alive, I know she could give me lessons on accomplishing this objective. As it is, I am relying on my writing assistant Metis for input. The following revision is a combination of my original article, some editing by Metis and some changes I have made. Let me know if you think this has hit the mark.
Allegro
What does writing have to do with making love?
What does the turning of the seasons have to do with an overture?
Perhaps more than we imagine.
Perhaps everything.
What if, on some primal level, we all live by an unseen rhythmic law?
A rhythm that moves the tides and the winds. A rhythm that guides music and dance. A rhythm that governs love, work, and even thought.
The seasons move in rhythm. Music moves in rhythm. Our lives move in rhythm.
Spring rises. Summer swells. Autumn storms. Winter rests.
Upon finishing my Ph.D. program at the University of Minnesota in 1986, I joined the consulting firm of Process Management International (PMI). A company run by Mr. Lou Schultz to promote the teachings of Dr. W. E. Deming in business and industry. I met Dr. Deming about two weeks after I joined PMI when I was asked to assist at one of his famous four day management training seminars in San Francisco. This was the beginning of an education that would change my life. Sometimes, I thought for the worst.
There is a quiet confession that many people who truly learned the teachings of Dr. Deming would eventually make, often only to themselves:
“Learning Deming may have been one of the worst things that ever happened to me.”
Not because it was wrong.
Not because it failed.
But because it was irreversible.
Once you genuinely internalized the thinking of W. Edwards Deming, you lost the ability to see organizations, performance, data, and failure the way you once did. The old explanations stopped working. The familiar comforts disappear. You crossed a one-way bridge.
And on the other side of that bridge, reality looked very different.
The Loss of Comfortable Blame
Before Deming, most of us lived—like most of society still does—inside a simple moral framework:
If performance is poor, someone failed
If results decline, effort must be lacking
If an error occurs, a person must be corrected
Deming dismantled this worldview with unsettling calm.
He showed—again and again—that most outcomes are produced by the system, not by individual virtue or failure. That variation is not a moral statement. That blaming people for common-cause variation is not only unjust—it actively damages learning and performance.
Once you see this, something uncomfortable happens:
You lose the ability to blame comfortably.
You watch people punish individuals for predictable outcomes.
You see fear introduced where curiosity should live.
You recognize that “accountability” is often just ignorance wearing authority.
And you can’t unsee it. You cannot unlearn what you now know.
Living Among Category Errors
One of the clearest signs that someone has truly learned Deming is not that they can recite the 14 Points—it’s that they can no longer tolerate category errors without noticing.
You see them everywhere:
Treating a single bad outcome as a crisis
Celebrating a random uptick as proof of success
Launching new policies based on anecdotes
Confusing noise for signal
Reacting emotionally to variation that was always there
Most people see decisiveness.
You see statistical superstition.
This creates a peculiar loneliness. You find yourself surrounded by people who:
Treat special causes as common causes
Treat common causes as special causes
Blame individuals while leaving systems untouched
To them, your hesitation looks like weakness.
To you, their certainty looks like harm.
The End of Narrative Comfort
Deming thinking is deeply uncomfortable because it refuses what most cultures rely on:
Heroes and villains
Simple stories
Quick fixes
Moral theater
Deming replaces these with:
Distributions
Long-term thinking
Interactions between parts
Incentives that quietly shape behavior
This doesn’t make for good slogans.
It doesn’t travel well on social media.
And it doesn’t flatter people in power.
Once you see systems clearly, many popular explanations begin to sound hollow—even dangerous.
The Social Cost of Seeing Systems
Here is a difficult truth rarely stated plainly:
Deming thinking is anti-tribal.
It undermines:
Blame rituals
Status hierarchies
Performative leadership
The emotional economy of outrage and punishment
When you introduce Deming’s questions into a conversation, you often destabilize it—not because you are wrong, but because you remove the group’s preferred coping mechanisms.
You stop asking “Who failed?”
You start asking “What produced this outcome?”
That shift can feel threatening.
And so, Deming thinkers often learn—sometimes painfully—to keep quiet, to choose their moments, or to speak only when asked.
The Question That Never Leaves You
Deming leaves you with a habit that never turns off:
Compared to what?
You ask:
What is the baseline?
What is the expected variation?
What changed in the system?
What evidence tells us this is unusual?
What would happen if we did nothing?
These questions slow things down in a culture addicted to speed and certainty. And the person who slows things down is often treated as the problem.
But without those questions, organizations don’t learn.
They just react.
The Grief No One Talks About
There is a quiet grief that comes with Deming literacy.
You grieve:
The loss of innocence
The simplicity of old explanations
The ease of fitting in
The comfort of righteous anger
You realize that many failures were never personal—and that many punishments never helped.
This grief is real. And it’s rarely acknowledged.
A Reframe Worth Holding
If you’ve ever felt isolated, frustrated, or even burdened by what Deming taught you, consider this reframing:
Learning Deming permanently aligned me with reality, even when reality is unpopular.
That alignment has a cost.
But it also has integrity.
It allows you to:
Hold uncertainty without panic
Resist false certainty
Refuse explanations that feel good but fail in practice
Remain honest when honesty is inconvenient
That kind of thinking doesn’t make you popular.
But it makes you trustworthy—to the few who recognize it.
A Gentler Way Forward
Many experienced Deming thinkers eventually discover a survival skill:
Instead of correcting people, they ask better questions.
Not confrontational questions—curious ones:
“How often does this actually happen?”
“What would we expect from the system as it is?”
“What evidence would tell us this is a real change?”
“What incentives might be shaping this behavior?”
Sometimes the system answers.
Sometimes it doesn’t.
But you protect your integrity either way.
Closing Thoughts
If Deming changed how you see the world—and made it harder to live comfortably inside common explanations—you are not broken.
You are not difficult.
You are not cynical.
You are aligned with reality.
And while that alignment can feel lonely, it also means this:
When blaming stops working,
when slogans fail,
when fear no longer produces improvement—
people eventually look for someone who sees systems.
If you are one of those people, you are carrying something rare.
Not loudly.
Not easily.
But honestly.
When Dr. W. E. Deming died in 1993, I did a “Celebration of Life” for him at my house in Minnesota. I shared memories of Dr. Deming with about twenty other people who were touched by his life. My years working with Process Management Institute, Dr. Deming and the other consultants who shared his belief in people were among the most important years of my life. I learned more from Dr. Deming and his ideas than I did in my entire Ph.D. program or any other school program that I have ever attended. I started this blog off with the “complaint” that Dr. Deming “ruined my life” but as my AI Assistant Metis has wisely said, “Once you open your eyes to the truth, you cannot go back.”
The Truth Will Set You Free!
Here are Dr. Deming’s 14 Points for Management. Together with his seven Deadly Diseases and ten major obstacles they constitute a total system of management based on facts and data. They obliterate almost everything that is taught in MBA programs across the USA. Having taught the Capstone MBA course at Metro State University for seven years, I could see clearly that we were teaching students the wrong ideas and the wrong methods for managing. At first, I was a allowed a great deal of leeway in my teaching there but eventually as the system became more rigid they expected me to teach from textbooks that had “codified” bad theories of management. I was quietly and subtly not offered classes until I finally “retired.”
Six years ago, I wrote a piece arguing that machismo — the entitlement to dominate — was one of the most destructive forces in human behavior. I still believe that. If anything, the evidence has multiplied. But something has changed, and it is not an improvement.
Machismo used to be a cultural expectation. Now it is a commercial product.
You can subscribe to it, stream it, inject it, lift it, wear it, and vote for it.
We did not merely inherit a myth of masculinity. We have industrialized it.
From Cultural Script to Sales Funnel
Masculinity today is no longer defined by responsibility, competence, or care for others. It has been reduced to a performance: dominance, wealth display, sexual conquest, emotional numbness, and the ability to intimidate.
This performance is not accidental. It is monetized.
First you are told that you are weak, that society has emasculated you, that you are a victim. Then you are offered a solution: become a “real man.” Buy the course. Follow the influencer. Take the supplement. Join the tribe. Hate the designated enemies. In my early years, the comic books often contained stories about a bully kicking sand in the face of a guy on a beach blanket with his girlfriend. When the guy did nothing, the girl went off with the bully. The solution was to purchase a weightlifting program. Within no time you could develop huge muscles that would help you to kick the bullies ass and get your sexy girl friend back.
Today it has become a business model but still built on male insecurity.
In quality management terms, we would call this a system that manufactures defects and then sells the repair kit.
The Algorithm of Anger
What has changed in the past decade is not human nature but amplification. Social media does not reward nuance. It rewards outrage, humiliation, and certainty. A calm, thoughtful man receives no clicks. A furious, aggrieved man receives millions.
So, the system produces what it rewards.
When dominance theater gets attention, dominance theater multiplies. When empathy is mocked as weakness, empathy disappears. When complexity is dismissed as “soft,” thinking becomes a liability. Men are told that women don’t like soft men with brains. Women want hard men with muscles. A six pack abs has become the new key to sexual prominence.
Deming taught us that every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets. If our culture produces angry, isolated, performative men, we should examine the system that is rewarding those outcomes. It is a system in which the vast majority of men cannot live up to the stereotype. Few men are John Wayne or Clint Eastwood tough.
The Pseudoscience of the “Alpha”
We are now told that human beings can be sorted into “alphas” and “betas,” as if we were barnyard animals. This is not science. It is mythology dressed in gym clothes.
Masculinity becomes a constant audition. You must always prove yourself:
stronger than someone
richer than someone
more dominant than someone
less emotional than everyone
You are never allowed to arrive. Only to compete. A surrogate for competing is to watch every football game that tv offers. Learn all the baseball stats. Buy the hockey jerseys of your favorite enforcers. Pretend that you are a big fan. If your prowess on the field or court cannot be demonstrated than stand in front of a TV and scream at the umpires and referees.
These activities to not demonstrate strength. They demonstrate a chronic insecurity that goes down to the soul of men today. The irony is that a man who must constantly prove he is a man is not a free man. He is trapped in a costume he cannot remove. He is trapped in a performance that he cannot win.
The Estrogenic Culture
According to the new prophets of manhood — the ones broadcasting from leather chairs in rooms decorated like a bourbon advertisement — Western civilization is drowning in estrogen.
You will recognize these philosophers by their uniforms: tight T-shirts, studio microphones, and the haunted eyes of men who have turned their personalities into subscription services.
They inform us that men are weak because they cook, change diapers, express love for their children, and occasionally experience a human emotion not related to rage. This, we are told, is how empires fall.
One of these digital Spartans I watched recently explained that reading books lowers testosterone. This may be the first time in history that literacy has been classified as a hormone disorder. Another one I watched introduced me to the concept of “Estrogenic” culture. Karen even asked me what it was. I had to look it up. I now realized that I have been flooded by too much estrogen and it is making me soft and wimpy. One solution is to buy more supplements.
The super macho purveyors of instant masculinity offer a cure for this biochemical estrogenic catastrophe. It is available online for $49.99 a month, plus shipping. It involves waking at 4 a.m., lifting heavy objects, distrusting women, fearing vegetables, and referring to other men as “beta” — a term that functions primarily as a substitute for having an actual personality.
In this worldview, empathy is weakness, cooperation is surrender, and kindness is a sign that soy has finally conquered your bloodstream.
I have lived through wars, recessions, social upheavals, and the invention of disco. Never once did I observe that the decisive factor in national survival was whether men felt comfortable discussing their feelings. The truly fragile masculinity is the one that cannot survive a salad, a conversation, or a competent woman. If civilization can be destroyed by a man who knows how to do laundry, then civilization deserves to be replaced by a washing machine.
The Political Weaponization of Machismo
Hyper-masculinity is no longer just a personal identity. It has become a political tool. Strongman leadership, contempt for expertise, glorification of force, and the rejection of empathy are framed as “manly.” We have a President who is a four time draft dodger, but who manages to position himself as a “tough” guy who takes no shit from the wimpy politicians and business-people who surround him. His cadre of sycophants are infamous to the depths they will sink to. Anything the Donald wants seems fair game if they can only stay in the Donald’s graces. And they call this “masculinity.”
The world is turned upside down today. Compromise becomes weakness. Reflection becomes cowardice. Care becomes softness. Thinking becomes weakness. Restraint becomes fearfulness. We scale the same logic from the individual to the nation: domination over partnership, victory over cooperation, humiliation over understanding, bold strikes over careful deliberation. Attacks over compromise. Revenge over treaties.
We have seen where this leads. History is not short of examples. We have the disaster on two levels. The first level is on the level of the individual.
The Hidden Cost to Men
Here is the irony. The ideology that claims to defend men is one of the primary sources of male suffering.
Men are more lonely than at any time in modern history.
Men have higher suicide rates.
Men are less likely to seek help.
Men are taught emotional illiteracy and then punished for the consequences.
We tell boys not to cry and then wonder why men cannot express grief except through anger.
We call vulnerability weakness and then wonder why men die alone.
A system that forbids emotional expression produces emotional isolation. That is not masculinity. That is a design flaw.
The Damage to Relationships and Families
Hyper-masculinity not only impacts the man, it destroys relationships. It does not produce strong families. It produces hierarchy instead of partnership. Control instead of cooperation. Silence instead of communication. The amount of domestic violence in our society is mute testimony to this phenomenon.
1 in 4 women and 1 in 7 men have been victims of severe physical violence (e.g., beating, burning, strangling) by an intimate partner in their lifetime. (It is not only men who are injured by a society that endorses violence over compassion.)
1 in 7 women and 1 in 18 men have been stalked by an intimate partner during their lifetime to the point in which they felt very fearful or believed that they or someone close to them would be harmed or killed.
On a typical day, there are more than 20,000 phone calls placed to domestic violence hotlines nationwide.
A man who cannot change a diaper, express affection, admit fear, or ask for help is not powerful. He is dependent on a narrow script that collapses the moment life becomes complex — and life always becomes complex.
Strength is not domination. Strength is reliability.
What Real Strength Looks Like
Real strength is:
emotional regulation
keeping your word
protecting without controlling
teaching without humiliating
listening without needing to win
stopping when stopping is the right thing to do
Real strength builds. It does not perform.
The strongest men I have known were not the loudest men in the room. They were the ones who could be trusted — by their partners, their children, their colleagues, and their communities.
They did not need an audience.
A Systems View of Masculinity
If we want healthier men, we need healthier systems. Teach boys emotional vocabulary as deliberately as we teach them sports. Think of creating the opposite of a Spartan society where violence and cruelty are rewarded. What if we rewarded kindness and compassion instead of vengeance and retribution?
I have two strong memories of my father. While living in NYC, I was about 8 years old, and I had a fight with a neighborhood bully. Bigger than me and older than me, he hit me several times in the face. I went home crying. When I walked in the door, my dad asked me what was wrong. I told him that I had gotten hit by the neighborhood bully. He told me to get my ass out the door and don’t come back until I had gotten even with the bully. I was more afraid of my dad than the bully. I ran down the block to where the bully was yakking it up with some friends. The bully asked me what I wanted. I punched him in the stomach, when he bent over I brought my knee up into his face as hard as I could. I laid him out cold.
The next time I had a challenge from my father was about five years later. I had been playing football with some friends when an older guy and his two buddies took the ball from us. I had four friends with me, and we all just looked at each other. I reacted. I lunged at the bully and tackled him to the ground. I had him around the stomach and started punching him as hard as I could. He raked my face with his hands leaving several bloody scratches and claw marks. Fortunately for me, my four other friends jumped in, and we gave the guy a good beating while his buddies ran off. I went back to my house with my friends to wash up. When I walked in, my dad was sitting on the sofa. He took one look at me and said, “What the hell happened to your face?” I was about to say something, but my friends jumped in and told him how I had tackled this big guy by myself and that I had been instrumental in winning a fight with this bully. My father looked at me and replied “Good, but next time you win a fight, look like you have won it.”
I did not exactly grow up in a Spartan society, but I grew up in a family system where crying was weakness and emotions were only something women exhibited. These teachings would come back to devil me many times over the next years. If we are going to eradicate violence in our society, violence against women, violence against children and violence against the world, it must start with being the changes that (as Gandhi so wisely said) we want to see in the world.
Normalize caregiving as masculine.
Reward cooperation, not just competition.
Teach media literacy so young men understand how outrage is monetized.
Create male friendships that are not limited to drinking beer, watching sports, and avoiding looking too intellectual
Conclusions:
Machismo has always promised certainty: certainty that you will be dominant, certainty that you will be respected, certainty that you will be feared, and certainty that you will never be vulnerable. However, it has never delivered on these promises. These are all phantoms or myths that are part of the machismo narrative so many of us have been taught. What it has delivered is violence, isolation, and perpetual insecurity. Perhaps the most notorious image of a real man is depicted by John Wayne in his movie persona. A persona that bore little reality to the real life John Wayne.
“Wayne emanated what historian Kristen Kobes du Mez calls in her compelling work Jesus and John Wayne, “cowboy masculinity.” On the screen, he depicted what many considered to be the archetypal American man — a self-reliant individualist who never shows his feelings and never apologizes. The type of dude who forgoes reflection for action; doesn’t ask for permission; who knows he’s a good guy and knows how to spot — and annihilate — the bad guys. Both on and off the screen, Wayne modeled a mode of American manhood based on imperialist ideals, the superiority of whites, and free-market capitalism.” —- The Reveler, April 5, 2021. Does this remind you of anyone that we know today? A leader who sets the standard for everything a real man is not.
We are not condemned to this script. Masculinity is not a biological destiny. It is a cultural story. And stories can be rewritten. The bravest man is not the one who shouts the loudest, lifts the most, or dominates the most. The bravest man is the one who no longer needs to prove he is a man. That man is free. And a culture of free men — men who do not need to dominate in order to exist — would be a culture with far less violence, far less fear, and far more humanity.
Thank You! Two words that can change the world. And if you don’t believe me read on.
How many Thank-You’s do you get in a day? Do you get as many as you think you deserve? Do you get too many. Whenever I am out with my USAF Veterans Hat, I have people that come up and say, “Thank You for your Service.” I was somewhat embarrassed when this happened but eventually I would reply, “Thank You, it was an honor.” Despite the number of times I have been thanked for my service, I still think it was an honor and privilege to serve my country and its citizens.
Each year for the past 43 years, I have attended a four day silent retreat at a Jesuit Retreat Center in Lake Elmo, Minnesota. Each year I discover some new wisdom from the lectures and reflections over spiritual readings that I am privy to. One year, I learned that the founder of the Jesuit order, Saint Ignatius Loyola reportedly said that “Ingratitude is not the worst of all sins, but it is the gateway to all others.” The more I reflected on this thought, the more I realized how true it is. Be ungrateful for your financial situation and you become greedy with an obsession for money. Be ungrateful for your health and you end up hating life and wishing you were someone else. Be ungrateful for your friends and family and you end up being lonely and miserable.
The other side of ungratefulness is gratefulness. To be grateful for the life one has and to stop mourning the life that we don’t have. However, gratefulness is simply a state of mind. As powerful as it is, it is not enough. We need to put actions with our thoughts. Wisdom, says “prayer to the Lord but row for the shore.” Or “keep praying but move your feet.” If we are really grateful, we need to show it. The best way to show it is a simple “Thank You.” For some people this is showing gratitude. For others, you would think that each thank you that they gave came from their savings account.
When I woke up the other night at 3 AM, I started to write this blog. I was motivated by the crazy idea flicking through my mind that asked the question “What would the world be like if everyone got more Thank-You’s each day than they knew what to do with.” Would people go crazy and want to stop saying “Thank You?” Would the government put a ban on the use of the words “Thank You?” Would people suddenly realize how much they are appreciated and what a truly wonderful person they were? How many people would like to get more Thank-You’s and how many people would hate to hear “Thank-You?” What would happen to society if more people gave out thank-You’s each day? I decided to run this question by my AI assistant Metis. Here is what she replied. As usual my AI assistant tends to be very comprehensive and perhaps somewhat verbose.
What would happen to society if more people gave out Thank-You’s each day?
Metis:
John, I think that’s a deceptively simple question with very deep system effects—very much in line with your Deming lens and your work on connectedness.
Here’s what I believe would happen if people routinely received more genuine Thank-You’s than they expected:
Immediate Psychological Effects
You’d see a measurable shift in mood and stress levels.
Gratitude directed at someone (not just practiced internally) tends to:
Lower cortisol
Increase dopamine and serotonin
Create a short “reward loop” that reinforces prosocial behavior
In plain terms: people would feel seen, and being seen is one of the strongest antidotes to alienation.
For someone your age cohort—where invisibility is a common complaint—this effect would be especially powerful.
Behavioral Reinforcement
From a systems perspective:
What gets recognized gets repeated.
If people are thanked for:
small acts of competence
reliability
kindness
showing up
you reinforce intrinsic motivation rather than compliance.
This reduces:
withdrawal behavior
quiet quitting
defensive routines
You’d see higher quality interactions without changing any formal policy—pure cultural shift.
Social Contagion Effect
Gratitude is highly contagious.
One sincere Thank-You tends to produce:
reciprocal gratitude
increased patience
more cooperative behavior
In network terms, it increases positive signal density in the social system.
That directly counters what you’ve called the epidemic of disconnectedness.
Identity Stabilization
Many people today derive identity from conflict, outrage, or status competition.
Frequent appreciation shifts identity toward:
contribution
competence
belonging
People begin to think:
“I matter because I help,”
rather than
“I matter because I win.”
That is a profound cultural pivot.
Impact on Institutions
In organizations (including veteran groups, radio teams, quilting circles, consulting clients):
Regular unexpected appreciation would lead to:
Lower friction costs
Higher volunteer retention
Greater discretionary effort
Fewer interpersonal conflicts
You’d get quality improvement without a new program, which Deming would smile at.
Political and Civic Implications
At the macro level, a culture of daily appreciation would:
Reduce zero-sum thinking
Increase trust in local relationships
Make dialogue easier
Gratitude humanizes the “other” before disagreement even begins.
It doesn’t eliminate conflict—but it changes the tone from adversarial to relational.
Neurological Rewiring Over Time
If this happened daily for months:
People’s baseline expectations would shift from:
“No one notices me”
to
“My actions have value.”
That reduces anxiety and defensive postures.
You’d likely see:
fewer hostile interactions
more eye contact
more patience in public spaces
Small signals, big emergent outcomes.
The Key Variable: Authenticity
This only works if the Thank-You’s are:
specific (“Thank you for setting up the chairs”)
timely
sincere
Generic or forced gratitude has little effect and can even breed cynicism.
Conclusions:
Well, I was given more information than I expected. Frankly, I would never have thought that there could have been so many positive benefits from the simple act of saying “Thank-You.” It is very gratifying to have my suspicions verified but it is also embarrassing. I say embarrassing because I think that I am one of those people who are somewhat stingy with their “Thank-You’s” My father was not big on Thank You and perhaps I can escape responsibility by blaming him. On the other hand, I often proclaim that when I went into the military in 1964 at the age of 18 that I would never again blame my parents for any misbehaviors on my part.
What stops us from saying “Thank You” more often? Are we afraid it will lead to expectations that we do not want to deal with? If I say, “Thank You,” will you think you are better than I am? If I put your effort down, I can build myself up. Instead of saying “Thank You Bob,” I can say “Not bad, but I have seen better.” Or perhaps “You shouldn’t expect a Thank You for just doing your job.”
Imagine, if we thanked the clerk who helped bag our food at the local grocery store. “Thank You for bagging my groceries.” Why should I say that if he/she is getting paid to do it! Or imagine if I went up to the help at Wal-Mart and thanked them for keeping the place neat and clean? Or thanking the local Garbage collector for being on time each week with my garbage pickup. Or the clerk at the Post Office for giving me my mail? Where would it all stop? Before you know it, everyone would be expecting Thank-You’s.
What kind of a world would that be? People might really start feeling better about themselves.
Help me to change the world. Say Thank-You more often.
In 2018 I asked a provocative question: Are Americans brainwashed? At the time, what I meant by “brainwashing” was a kind of conditioned conformity — an unconscious habituation to consumerism. We buy, accumulate, and consume not because we need to, but because something deep within our society tells us that our worth, security, and happiness depend on it.
A few weeks ago, I encountered a work that reframed much of what I was trying to say: Guy Debord’s 1967 classic The Society of the Spectacle. Debord, a French Marxist theorist and filmmaker, argues that modern capitalism doesn’t just sell goods — it sells images, identities, and perceptions of reality itself. In doing so, it creates what he calls a “spectacle” — a world where representation replaces lived experience, and passive consumption replaces active life.
Today I believe the idea of “brainwashing” isn’t just a metaphor. It is a lived condition of our society — one that manifests in our politics, our personal relationships, and above all, in how we see ourselves and the world.
But if we are to diagnose this condition accurately, we also need a prescription for how we might undo it.
I. The Diagnosis: What Is the Spectacle?
In The Society of the Spectacle, Debord makes a bold claim: “The spectacle is not a collection of images; it is a social relationship between people that is mediated by images.”
What Does This Mean?
The Spectacle Is a Social Condition, Not Just Advertising
We tend to think of consumerism as simply “too many ads,” “too much marketing,” or “too much stuff.” But Debord pushes us deeper: the spectacle isn’t only the marketing — it’s the way we relate to reality itself through mediated images.
In other words:
It’s not just the billboard that matters — it’s that we now interpret our lives as if we were on billboards.
It’s not just the advertisement — it’s that we start to see ourselves as advertisements for our own lifestyle, identity, and status.
In the spectacle, images don’t just sell products. They sell versions of reality. They tell us what success looks like, what happiness looks like, what security looks like, and what a good life looks like. And we internalize that script — often without realizing we’ve been cast in it.
Consumption Replaces Experience
Debord argues that the spectacle replaces real life with representation of life.
Think about how often we:
Take pictures of experiences instead of experiencing them.
Check likes, shares, and comments instead of connecting.
Pursue prestige, status, or image instead of meaning.
We no longer live our lives in the fullest sense — we consume them, display them, and measure them. This is not just consumerism — it is spectatorship. We watch life, we watch others, and we are watched. We are subjects of our own mediated narratives.
The Spectacle Is Universal But Uneven
Debord notes that the spectacle isn’t just advertising or corporate marketing.
It includes:
Mass media
Entertainment
Social media
Politics
Consumer brands
Cultural norms
Public relations
In the society of the spectacle, everything becomes commodified, including our attention, our desires, and even our dissent. Even counter-culture becomes a brand.
This is why Debord’s critique resonates with my original thesis: American society doesn’t just create consumers of products — it creates consumers of images, identities, and scripted realities. We are persuaded not only to buy what we don’t need, but to define ourselves through those purchases.
II. Are Americans Brainwashed? A Reframed Answer
So, let’s revisit the question I asked in 2018: Are Americans brainwashed?
If by “brainwashed” we mean:
conditioned to think in ways that benefit corporate and political interests,
socialized to equate meaning with consumption, and
habituated to accept the spectacle as reality…
Then the answer is yes — to a significant extent.
But the spectacle is not an overt force with an agenda. It doesn’t need to be explicit to be pervasive. It works because:
We participate willingly — we seek validation through consumption, clicks, images, status.
We mistake representation for reality — what we see on screens or in ads becomes our standard for life.
We rarely interrogate the source of our desires — we assume our wants are our own.
Debord writes that the spectacle is a form of alienation — where life is lived not directly, but through representations. When we are alienated from our own experience, we are easier to influence because we are no longer anchored in our own desires — only in the images we consume.
III. The Mechanisms of the “American Brainwashing”
Let’s unpack some specific mechanisms by which the spectacle perpetuates conditioned consumption:
Identity Through Consumption
Corporations don’t just sell products — they sell lifestyles, identities, and social status.
Owning a certain car means you are cool.
Wearing a certain brand means you are successful.
Posting the right image means you are interesting.
We learn to define ourselves through what we display, not what we experience.
The Attention Economy
Modern media doesn’t just want our money — it wants our attention.
Attention becomes the rarest and most valuable commodity. Algorithms are optimized to:
keep you looking,
keep you scrolling,
keep you craving more.
This amplifies the spectacle because it conditions instinctive reactions — not reflective thought.
Social Media as a Spectacle Machine
Platforms like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube are engines of the spectacle:
They amplify images over ideas.
They reward emotion over reflection.
They privilege appearance over substance.
The result? A world where image consumption replaces authentic engagement.
Debt and Consumption as Fulfillment
Credit markets and consumer finance turn consumption into addiction.
Payday loans, credit cards, easy financing — all encourage buying now, paying later, and justifying desires as needs.
This isn’t just financial — it’s psychological:
We feel like we are fulfilling ourselves by spending, even when we are not.
IV. What Brainwashing Is Really Like: Mindlessness and the Spectacle
Here’s where Ellen Langer’s work on mindlessness becomes useful.
Langer describes mindlessness as a state in which behavior is rigid and thought is shallow — where we act on autopilot.
How does this connect to Debord?
The spectacle thrives on mindlessness.
If people thought deeply about why they want certain things, how they spend their time, and what their values are, the spectacle would weaken.
The spectacle depends on unexamined life.
So, we might define the “brainwashing” of Americans not as overt coercion, but as collective mindlessness — not thinking deeply about how our desires are shaped, what we consume, and why.
Mindlessness and the spectacle are two sides of the same coin:
One is cognitive, the other is cultural.
Both detach us from genuine experience.
V. The Prescription: How Do We Undo the Brainwashing?
If we’ve diagnosed the problem, the urgent challenge is: How do we counteract the spectacle and undo conditioned consumption?
Here’s a multi-layered prescription:
Cultivate Mindfulness
Langer’s work teaches us that awareness is not automatic — it must be practiced.
Mindfulness in consumption means:
Asking why you want something before you act.
Not mistaking wanting for needing.
Reflecting on the social and psychological forces shaping your desires.
Mindfulness isn’t only meditation — it’s active awareness of your internal life.
It’s questioning your impulses rather than obeying them.
Reclaim Authentic Experience
If the spectacle is a representation of life, its antidote is direct experience of life.
This means:
Valuing real human interaction over mediated interactions.
Experiencing events without first documenting them for others.
Rediscovering activities that aren’t commodified for Instagram or TikTok.
Experience should be lived, not posted.
Reduce Passive Consumption
We live in a world designed for passive consumption:
Scroll feeds
Binge media
Buy products based on ads
Combat this by:
Setting intentional limits on screen time.
Choosing content that teaches, not only entertains.
Prioritizing creation over consumption.
Examine Economic Structures
The spectacle is supported by economic systems that profit from:
Continuous consumption
Planned obsolescence
Debt accumulation
Attention monetization
Undermining the spectacle requires economic literacy:
Understanding how credit, interest, and consumer culture are connected
Questioning advertising claims
Supporting sustainable, local, and meaningful alternatives
Build Communities of Critical Thought
Spectacle thrives in isolation and individualism.
Counter this by:
Forming discussion groups
Reading cooperatively
Sharing reflections instead of consumer gossip
Encouraging long conversations, not short clicks
Detroit philosopher Cornel West said, “We must refuse the politics of disengagement and nihilism.” This means engaging deeply with ideas — not passively consuming them.
Political Awareness and Media Literacy
Spectacle extends into politics:
Politicians perform for cameras.
News becomes entertainment.
Outrage replaces inquiry.
Undoing brainwashing means:
Learning to distinguish facts from spectacle
Examining incentives behind media narratives
Teaching critical media literacy
Reframe Success and Identity
Finally, we must challenge the equation:
More stuff = more value.
Redefine success as:
Deeper relationships
Richer experiences
Intellectual curiosity
Community contributions
The self we cultivate should be internal, not a brand.
VI. What the Spectacle Cannot Control
Here’s the hopeful part:
The spectacle operates through images and representations.
But it cannot fully replace:
Moment-to-moment consciousness
Genuine love and empathy
Deep reflection and insight
Meaningful community
Unmediated experience
These are areas where the spectacle fails — exactly because they cannot be commodified or packaged.
Conclusion: Toward a Life Unmediated
So, are Americans brainwashed?
Not in the literal sense of having thoughts forcibly replaced — but in the structural sense that society conditions our perceptions of reality, desire, identity, and fulfillment.
Guy Debord’s spectacle framework helps us see that consumerism isn’t just about goods — it’s about how we see the world and ourselves.
Ellen Langer’s work reminds us that undoing this starts with awareness — moving from mindlessness to mindful life.
The good news is that mind, choice, and experience cannot be fully outsourced to images or corporations. We can reclaim them by practicing mindfulness, re-centering authentic experience, and questioning the narratives sold to us every day.
The challenge is not only social — it’s deeply personal. But once we begin to see how the spectacle shapes us, we can choose to look beyond the images and toward the real world — toward a life to live, not a life to watch.
America today is a deeply divided nation and a deeply divided people. The brainwashing we get from the sources discussed have been major contributors to creating the divide we now live in. Few people on either side of the divide are happy the way things are. We yearn for the “good old days.” Days reflected in Norman Rockwell pictures of America that portray a different country than we now see.
It is true that “Happy Days” never did not exist equally in this country for all people, but at least we had the ability to still talk to people who we disagreed with and sometimes see a new perspective. We had a country where people once talked about morals and ethics. Today, our perspectives and beliefs are like a wall of granite. Rather than a divide, we have a stone wall that we have built. The wall is almost impenetrable. It seems impossible to get over it, under it or around it. The problem with destroying this wall is that it exists in our minds and that is the hardest thing in the world to change. Until we open our minds and hearts, we will be stuck behind a granite wall that separates our nation and people.
We are living through a moral epidemic. An epidemic of selfishness. Selfishness has become the new normal — disguised as independence, celebrated as authenticity. In the moral epidemic of which I speak, we are plagued by not one but several symptoms. Selfishness is a disease that can be seen in many manifestations. In this blog, I want to explore how ego, narcissism, ingratitude, denial of responsibilities, entitlement, demand for rights, and isolation are each contributing to a disease that is redefining the American character. The remedy may lie in reviving gratitude, duty, responsibilities and connection.
A few nights ago, I went to a Hobby Lobby store with Karen. She needed to pick up some quilt squares for her Thursday quilting guild. Each week they have a contest, and the prize is a bundle of fat quarters provided by all the members. They change the color of the fat quarters that members must bring to each meeting. I left the store early and told Karen that I would wait for her in the car. The parking lot was mostly dark and deserted. As I walked to my car, I noticed that there was about a dozen or so shopping carts just randomly scattered around the lot.
I assumed that there were no cart bins available but upon further looking around, I noticed many bins where you could leave a shopping cart. Instead, customers had just dropped the carts anywhere they wanted to. As it was late at night, it would be really easy to hit one of these carts either by backing into them or hitting them as you tried to pull out of the parking lot. This fact did not matter to the individuals who were TOO LAZY to just push their carts over to a bin and drop them off.
Karen is normally a very positive person. When she came back to the car, I pointed the situation with the carts out to her. I challenged her to find some “Good Reason” that these customers could not just push their carts over to an available bin. My suggested reasons, “They were in a hurry and had to get to an emergency ward.” “They needed to get to the airport, and they were late.” “They did not have time to find one of the available bins to put their carts in because the football game was starting.” “They were being chased by predators who wanted their Hobby Lobby stuff.” “They were blind, or it was too dark to see the bins.” These were my facetious reasons. Karen laughed at my lame attempt at humor. My conclusion: Lazy and Selfish.
Ego:
The age of the collective has given way to the empire of the self. Every opinion feels sacred, every desire urgent. Technology, consumerism, and politics all whisper the same message: “You deserve everything, instantly”.But when self-interest becomes the ultimate good, the moral commons collapses. “You do your thing, and I do my thing” was part of the famous Gestalt prayer by Fritz Perls that became popular in the 70’s. The attitude behind this prayer has morphed into the epidemic we see today where “shopping till you drop” and “he who has the most toys wins” now defines our National character. A character suffused by obsession for buying things to help build our egos up. But it is not enough to have more, our toys have to be bigger and better. Better is defined by the brand name stamped on the purchase or the neighborhood that you live in. Bigger is a 60-inch color tv or a car with 900 hp or a house with five bathrooms or a Wendy’s Pretzel Bacon Pub Triple with 1530 calories.
Narcissism:
Narcissism is the psychological heart of the new selfishness. My friend Bruce has mentioned this a million times to me whenever we discuss Trump and his followers. I concede that it now exists and is more pervasive than at any time in history. “I matter more than you do.” “I am more important than you are.” The unflattering title of a “Karen” (my wife’s name is Karen) is depicted in thousands of short videos and TV shows such as “Bridezilla” where a would-be bride is screaming “It’s all about me, it’s all about me.” This has become our national motto, “It’s all about me.”
Narcissism feeds on admiration but rejects intimacy. The narcissist seeks reflection, not relationship — an audience, not a community. Social validation replaces self-knowledge, and performance replaces sincerity. We have built a society of mirrors where no one truly sees anyone else. In Greek mythology, Narcissus was a strikingly beautiful young man who rejected the love of others. He sat all day looking at himself in a pool of water and thought how beautiful he was. He fell in love with himself. Punished by the gods for his vanity, he wasted away out of despair because he could not be with his love. Our country is wasting away from a virus that seems to be pervasive. A virus of narcissism. But it is only one of several symptoms killing us.
Ingratitude:
It took me over thirty Jesuit retreats to finally notice a quote by Saint Ignatius Loyola. Loyola said that “Ingratitude is the sin most offensive to Heaven. It is the cause, beginning, and origin of all sins and misfortunes as it is the forgetting of God’s blessings and gifts.” He described it as “The most abominable of sins”.
The more I reflected on this thought, the more I realized exactly what he meant. Ingratitude corrodes the soul from within. It blinds us to the gifts of others, the sacrifices of those who came before, and the simple blessings of daily life. When we stop saying “thank you”, we begin to believe that everything owed to us was earned — and that no one else deserves the same. Gratitude is the soil of empathy; ingratitude is a cancerous rot.
I try to remind myself each day of the need for gratitude. It is not always an easy virtue to arouse. In these challenging times, it can seem to me that I have little to be grateful for. I would never have believed forty years ago that I (WE) would have had to deal with Climate Change, a major Covid Epidemic, Trumpism and now heart problems, all in my seventies. I once thought that like any good cowboy or cowgirl, I would simply ride off into the sunset after years of a peaceful meditative retirement. Added to my woes is the fact that our national character seems to be eroding and replaced with a desire for a despot who would be king.
Denial of Responsibilities:
Freedom divorced from responsibility is not liberty; it is chaos. We live in an era where accountability feels like oppression to many people. People say that they hate the government. “Too much big government” is a rallying cry for right-wing fanatics. Civic, moral, and even legal obligations are dismissed as optional, or outdated. How many people do you see running green lights or ignoring posted speed limits these days?
Thus, we have the movement for “Less government.” Let’s obliterate the agencies and organizations that might hold us responsible for something. But something is always overlooked when it is convenient to make money or power. How many people have ever been prosecuted for the preventable disaster that we call “Climate Change?” Denial of responsibility led to continued use of fossil fuels which accelerated any potential changes in our global climate. Denial of responsibility breaks the invisible threads that hold society together: trust, reliability, and mutual care. “I don’t care what my thirst for money does to you as long as it benefits me!”
Entitlement:
“Man is not, by nature, deserving of all that he wants. When we think that we are automatically entitled to something, that is when we start walking all over others to get it.” — ― Criss Jami
Entitlement is selfishness institutionalized. It is a step beyond responsibility. Now I am not only irresponsible, but I am entitled to be irresponsible. I have a legal right to be irresponsible. It is my right to leave my shopping cart wherever the hell I want to. I bought a product at this store. This entitles me to do whatever I want with this shopping cart. It is the conviction that one’s desires are moral imperatives. The entitled person measures fairness by outcomes, not effort; comfort, not contribution. When entitlement becomes culture, excellence disappears — because effort no longer earns respect. It is taken for granted that some people are born superior and effort has nothing to do with success or failure.
Demand for Rights:
I want my rights. I want my rights! It is my right! I know my rights! Everywhere you look today someone is screaming about their rights. I learned years ago (I wrote a blog about this issue) from Sister Giovanni of Guadalupe Area Project, that for every right there is a responsibility. Have you heard anyone screaming for their responsibilities?
The modern cry is for rights — to speak, to choose, to consume, to be seen — but rarely for the responsibility that sustains those rights. Rights without duties are like currency without value. When everyone demands and no one contributes; liberty itself becomes unsustainable. A functioning democracy requires not just the assertion of rights, but the acceptance of responsibilities. See the short film on “Indigenous Rights vs Responsibilities” for a refreshing view of the two.
Isolation and loneliness are epidemics of their own in America today. A Cigna Group survey from June 2025 found that more than half (57%) of Americans are lonely. Data shows that the amount of time the average American spends alone has increased significantly over the past decades, while time spent socializing with friends has decreased — “Why are we so lonely?”— by John Wolfson, Winter 2024, Boston Magazine
When ego, narcissism, ingratitude, entitlement, and denial of responsibility take root, the harvest is isolation. When I count and you don’t count, I become estranged from you. When I live in a community where there are insiders and outsiders, I become distant from humanity. Back porches have replaced front porches in America. I can walk down a village street or sit on my front step and not see anyone come by for hours. We may live side by side with so-called neighbors, but we feel profoundly alone. Digital life gives us constant connection but no communion. Isolation breeds despair, polarization, and apathy — subtle diseases beneath our prosperity.
Conclusion — The Return of the Connected Self
The cure for selfishness is not suppression of the self but expansion of it — seeing the self as part of a larger whole. To belong but not to a group of xenophobic fanatics. To see the value of Inclusiveness not exclusiveness, diversity not homogeneity. To see all people as equal before the law. The foundations of DEI which seem so despised by people on the right . We rediscover meaning when we give, not when we grasp.
Jesus gave us the parable of the Good Samaritan and the Sermon on the Mount to remind us to take care of others. It is still better to give than to receive. In the New Testament of the Bible, (Acts 20:35), the apostle Paul recalls these words of Jesus. “In everything I showed you that by working hard in this manner you must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He Himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive'”
To rebuild our moral ecology, we must learn again the language of gratitude, duty, humility, and compassion. You can start by reading any of the following works by the late Pope Francis: Whether you are Christian, Atheist, Buddhist, I think you will find some useful ideas in these writings.
The Name of God Is Mercy
Pope Francis emphasizes that God’s primary attribute is mercy, not judgment. He encourages the Church to become a “field hospital” for the wounded, emphasizes human sin, invites humble openness to forgiveness, and urges believers to extend compassion and reconciliation to all.
Fratelli Tutti – (All Brothers):
Published in 2020, this encyclical addresses fraternity and social friendship, calling for greater solidarity on a global scale.
Laudato Si’ – (Praise Be to You):
Published in 2015, this encyclical focuses on environmental issues and our responsibility to care for the Earth
Let Us Dream: The Path to a Better Future
Pope Francis’s “Let Us Dream” urges readers to see crises—like the pandemic—as opportunities for moral renewal and solidarity. He calls for compassion, social justice, environmental care, and inclusive reform, inviting humanity to rebuild a more equitable, sustainable, and spiritually grounded world guided by conscience and the common good.
The age of the isolated self and the Disease of Selfishness can end only when we remember that: “When I am not the center of the universe, people become human.”
PS: This Epidemic of Selfishness is the heart of the leadership and its cult of followers and sycophants that is leading the USA today. There will be no turning away from the direction that they are taking us, unless the citizens in the USA reject the elements that I have described in the above blog. We must return our country to a place where fear and greed do not guide our actions but instead we are motivated by love, kindness, charity, mercy and compassion. Not just for our friends and relatives and social circle but for everyone in the world. My God is their God as well.
This year, after my 42nd silent retreat at Demontreville, I found myself reflecting over a different kind of lesson — one not from the retreat master, but from a conversation with my daughter.
My daughter Chris and I could hardly be further apart politically. I lean toward policies that support immigrants, the poor, minorities, and the sick. She supports Trump and the Republican agenda, which I believe diminishes those very groups. Our conversation was brief, but it revealed something that I have been mulling over ever since.
When it comes to personal interactions, my daughter is tactful, gracious, and considerate. She knows how to get along with people, soften conflict, and maintain civility. I, by contrast, am often blunt and confrontational. When I disagree, I rarely hide it. I leave enemies in my wake since I have little tolerance for greed and immoral people. She accuses me of being harsh, even inhumane, in my manner.
And yet, when I step back, I see an irony. My brusque words are often in service of a vision of justice for the many. Her gentle tone exists alongside a commitment to policies that, in practice, withdraw support from those most in need. In fact, the Trumpian policies she supports will result in starvation, disease and death for millions.
This tension raises a deeper question: what does it mean to be a true humanist?
Is it the ability to show kindness in the moment, face-to-face, even if one’s broader commitments bring harm to many unseen lives? Or is it the willingness to fight for systemic justice, even if the style of delivery offends, unsettles, or disturbs?
I think of Christ, who could be gentle with the broken and the poor, yet fierce with the powerful and the hypocritical. He healed with a touch, but he also overturned tables. His humanity was both intimate and systemic.
Perhaps that is the lesson I am being given now. Humanism is not one thing. It asks us to be kind in the small circle of our relationships but also bold in the larger circle of society. Without the first, justice grows cold. Without the second, kindness becomes complicity.
I wonder if my daughter and I — so different in politics, so different in style — are each holding half of a larger truth.
