Heritable tribalism Sep 20, 2017
Tribalism, or the tendency for humans to break off into groups to which they're extremely loyal, makes sense and has been shown to be evolutionarily beneficial.  Tribalism tends to lead to pride in one's tribe.  I think it's weird when the tribe you're a part of was an accident of your birth, like race or ethnicity.  White pride?  Why are you proud of something you literally had no control over?  Proud to be an American?  Why, when you had no choice in the matter?  You haven't done anything to be proud of, aside from being born to parents of a certain race and in a specific location.  That's just genetics and geography. 

I think this matter extends a little further to religion.  Religious affiliation is largely dependent on the religious affiliation of your parents and/or your community.  Claiming pride in one's religion, or espousing its virtues above other religions, is ignoring the coincidental nature of essentially being assigned a religion at birth. 

Finally there's the topic of sports fandom.  This is almost entirely dependent on geography, and it's even memorialized in a song with the words "Root, root, root for the home team".  It's morbidly fascinating to watch people get into physical fights because they believe the team from their geographical area is superior to a team from a different geographical area. #sociology
Male expectations Aug 31, 2017
An extended family member was complaining about her husband and how he doesn't have a steady job, doesn't cook or clean up after himself, doesn't show up to family functions, and has a history of infidelity.  Just by doing something as simple as having a job or cooking a meal, I'm already way ahead of the competition.  It occurred to me that expectations for males in general are quite low. #sociology
Prohibition embarrassment May 31, 2017
I've been to a bunch of breweries, wineries, and distilleries in recent years, and one topic that always gets mentioned by the owner or tour guide is Prohibition.  I can't help but wonder at all the people who lost businesses and livelihoods because of a stupid misguided attempt to legislate morality.  Certain liquor producers were able to stay in business by selling "medicinal" alcohol or sacramental wine, which is such an obvious farce, it amazes me anyone allowed it to happen.  What's interesting is that even Scottish tour guides mention Prohibition because the global demand for Scotch whisky decreased measurably as a direct result. 

I think any sane person can admit these days that Prohibition was a resounding failure.  It not only didn't lastingly decrease demand, it created an immediate de facto black market.  It's such a stain on our country's more recent history, that I sort of feel a sense of embarrassment for it.  We allowed some religious blowhards to enact legislation to limit the rights of all citizens.  I wish I could say we collectively learned from this experience, but we didn't, e.g. drug laws and marriage equality.  Restricting other people's personal rights in the name of one group's religious beliefs is pretty much always bad. #sociology
Worthless pride May 16, 2017
One of the experiences I mentioned about the gulf coast trip was the scammers/grifters in New Orleans who would bet you they could guess where you got your shoes (answer:  on your feet).  There were a few other scams like this, and it's apparently so common, our guide book mentioned it and there are entire websites devoted to teaching you how to avoid these stupid scams.  I've been to a lot of different places on the planet, and I can't remember one that had as many worthless people doing stupid shit for tourist money.  Actually scratch that -- most of the Caribbean was probably worse.  I guess I expected a little more from a modern American city with a stable economy. 

But here's my thing:  Unless you're a homeless person with no other option (didn't appear to be the case), how does a scam artist go around all day, bilking money out of friendly unsuspecting tourists, and go home at the end of the day and feel any sense of pride or accomplishment?  "How was work today, Joe?"  "Oh pretty good, I scammed a young couple on their honeymoon out of $7."  Fan-fucking-tastic work, Joe.  You're really contributing to the world here.  You're making people enjoy their stay in your piss-soaked city.  Surely they'll go home and say to their friends, "Hey go check out New Orleans; it's full of awesome people who pretend to be friendly but then get mad when they spray something on your shoes and expect you to give them money to clean it off." #sociology
Humancare Mar 22, 2017
I (perhaps unwisely) posted on Facebook:  "birth control, abortion, health care, or education -- you must choose at least one", trying to prove a point.  All my Republican friends quickly answered "education!" thinking that was the least yucky choice, forgetting that their current Secretary of Education wants to effectively defund public education. 

The point I was getting at was that we as a modern, wealthy society have a moral obligation to care for humans.  We can either pay to prevent them from being conceived, pay to prevent them from being born, pay to educate them, or pay to take care of them on their death beds.  I'll add another option:  Or we can pay to send them to prison.  Either way, we'll pay for something.  Choosing none of the above is delusional and not an option. 

If you're against birth control and abortion, you're pro-birth, not pro-life.  You don't care about saving a life, you just want a child to be born because you think a zygote is equivalent to a human being.  That's fine in a sense, but you can't then throw your hands up in exasperation at the idea of paying for a child's education or making medical care affordable.  If you choose to reject all these options, you're left with the one that can't be avoided, which is paying to send people to prison due to the failure of all of the above. 

You must choose at least one.  My preference would be to choose all of the above. #sociology
Improper smilers Mar 8, 2017
I just realized I work with a second person who smiles improperly.  Not like bad teeth or anything, but both people generally smile slightly when they talk.  This is fine in normal situations, but they do it pretty much all the time.  Not all situations call for smiling, which is why I've been having such a hard time reading them.  My instinct is to smile with them (either because I'm a sociopath who copies facial expressions or because that's what apes do), but I find myself questioning why I'm smiling when there's clearly nothing to smile about.  I feel awkward, but it's actually them who are awkward. #sociology
Large groups and cliques Aug 8, 2016
I was hanging out with a big group of people this weekend (around 50), and several of them lamented the fact that there were cliques.  I've heard this complaint before, and it's never made any sense to me.  How are large groups of people supposed to spend time?  Sitting in a giant circle, with everyone splitting the airtime evenly between everyone's individual interests?  It makes no sense mathematically.  Large groups split into smaller groups very naturally, as people find shared interests and relatable personalities.  It's not a negative thing, as in, "You can't join our clique because you were in that other clique."  It's simple logistics:  Not everyone is identical, and time can't be split between more than say 6 or 8 people.  Any more, and one or two people will dominate the group while the rest sit around and listen.  Trust me as a quiet person, I can only listen to you for so long.  Not to mention the fact that a person like me will almost never say or do anything in front of a group of people that large.  Cliques make large groups of people operate in a realistic setting. #sociology
Extroverts are selfish Aug 4, 2016
Last week at work, a bunch of people were out of the office either on vacation or taking training.  More than one remaining person came to my desk to talk, lamenting the fact that so few people were around.  These remainders were extroverts, seeking to "recharge" by interacting with other people.  The other people they were interacting with (me) were introverts, who like to "recharge" by not interacting with other people.  I said to my extrovert wife later that extroverts are kind of selfish to force interactions with people who don't want to interact.  The extrovert in her said that introverts are selfish for wanting to keep to themselves instead of giving extroverts someone to interact with.  I guess we're all a little selfish. #sociology
Word quantity vs. quality Aug 3, 2016
I know a guy who talks a lot.  He has no internal monologue, so every idea that comes to his mind comes straight out his mouth, and every action he takes has its own play-by-play commentary. 

I, on the other hand, don't typically have much to say.  And because of my lack of abundance of words, I tend to try to make my words count.  It's almost like my friend is rich, so he doesn't mind wasting money on stupid stuff, while I'd rather spend my money wisely.  I'm not saying I'm better; it's just my observation. 

But a corollary to this is that I think word quality decreases as quantity increases.  As in, the ratio of useful to worthless words coming out of my friend's mouth is probably around 1:10, while my ratio is something more like 1:4. 

I'm reminded of the title of a book I didn't read (so I have no comment on):  Talk Less, Say More. #sociology
Black and blue lives (2) Jul 25, 2016
There's a debate currently going on in our country about whose lives are more valuable:  Black peoples' or police.  Or at least that's how the debate is framed.  Like any issue in our divisive culture, if you're not on one side you're on the other.  If you support black lives, you hate cops.  If you support all lives, you hate black people.  I think in reality most people generally sit the fence, i.e. they believe that black lives matter, and that blue lives also matter.  This is the correct answer.  Personally, I don't think this needs to be a thing.  Black lives matter; this is true.  Black people seem to get routinely killed by police, while unarmed and in plain view of video cameras.  This is a problem.  The solution, clearly, is not to kill police.  In this case, violence doesn't defeat violence, unless you honestly think you're gonna overthrow the government (good luck with that).  I don't know what the solution is, but I'm pretty sure it's not to scream louder than the people who keep getting shot for little to no reason.  As a twitter-er said "#AllLivesMatter is like I go to the Dr for a broken arm and he says "All Bones Matter" ok but right now let's take care of this broken one".  And as the infamous Rodney King said 24 years ago, "Can we all get along?" #sociology