Majority of One

Why haven’t I written yet today? I know, it’s because I’m an idiot. I also didn’t take my walk. I put it off so long that it was already getting dark. I have to adjust my schedule to Standard Time.  Remember way back when that I had a disagreement with two New York Police Department officers in the subway over their refusal to wear a mask? I even got a picture of one of them from the train. I reported them and there was an investigation. Today the investigator called. My charges were substantiated, and they had to go to retraining. The only thing more than that I would have liked is a personal apology. I want to see the smirk of impunity off their faces. I don’t think they deserve to be fired or even fined. This is enough. It is now on their dreaded permanent record just like the time they were sent to the principal’s office for pulling a girl’s hair in second grade. If they do it again, I want a more severe punishment. I told the officer how pleased I was with the official response. I’m not unusual, I have seen the polls, and this is how most people want things resolved. Now I’m less happy as I really wanted the apology. OK, that’s how it should have been resolved.

I’m still immersed in NERFA, listening to music that was given me during the conference. It was a far smaller hall than I get at a live one. I’m a bit discouraged as last week’s show wasn’t broadcast because of a tech glitch, so the show I had scheduled for this week will air next week, and I won’t be including NERFA music until the week after that. I have started programming it. One song I heard at the conference is the foundation for an Edgar Allen Poe set. I found a website that provides free downloads for DJs, I’ve DLed a ton of music from that that I’ll be playing. I’m not going out of my way to play them but as they are primarily albums I already know I’ll be able to play them when I find an appropriate spot for a song. I’m excited that I got Wintersmith by Steeleye Span; it’s based on one of my favorite Terry Pratchett books. More artists should make albums based on books. When is someone going to stage a production of Wintersmith? I bet Neil Gaiman would help with the book and we already have the music.

I took a political typology quiz on Pew Research and got that I’m an outsider progressive. That doesn’t feel right but I know why it said it. I have been to the left of Democrats in power. The thing is that if I was in power, I wouldn’t be trying to enact many things that I like because more important than being to the left of the Democrats in power I’m to the left of the general public. My chosen policies would good policies, but they would also be antidemocratic, as in small d democratic. The job of those out of the mainstream is to convince those in the mainstream, not force things on them. Isn’t that a progressive value? And that’s the difference, I’m more certain of my values than my policy choices.

One problem is that people tend to think they are in the majority even when they aren’t. The most extreme version of that was Iraq after the fall of Hussein where the Sunnis who had been in power were convinced, they were the majority. Only about a third are Sunni. But of course, as happens here we surround ourselves with people like ourselves, so in our experience, we are the majority. Remember Nixon’s “Silent Majority?” The Leninists in Russian called themselves Bolsheviks, literally “one of the majority” even though they weren’t.

Until the Marvel conquest of the film industry my tastes in movies, TV, books, music, etc, were never in the majority or even plurality. Why should my politics be any different? Perversely that means that I don’t want the government to do everything I want it to do. I just want to get it as close as possible without the people revolting. I’m a devout atheist but it’s clear that one of the reasons the French Revolution ended with failure was its hostility towards religion while the majority supported the Catholic Church. The thing is after the bloody revolution and counter revolution eventually the strict secularism of the revolution took hold and became the majority view.

I shouldn’t be diving this deep into politics in such a short piece without preparation, but it’s been on my mind. Know what’s on my mind now? Philly cheesesteak. I am going to make dinner.