It’s been great having the kids home. They got in on
vaccinating heifers one day and have been helping feed cows. The cattle are in
several different groups so we load two trucks and divide and conquer each day.
We made it to two Christmas productions at our lovely old theatre
in Idaho Falls and we’ve had fun playing games and digging deep into
conversations in the evening. Mark is working on a puzzle of the nativity and
is finally getting down to the fun part. I wonder if he needs my help now? We
hosted Christmas dinner with a giant 4-H ham, garlic mashed red spuds from the
garden, Becky’s famous corn casserole, and six kinds of pie.
Seth gave me a book called Beef, The Untold Story of How Milk,
Meat, and Muscle Shaped the World (more on that later) and a writer’s
dictionary of quotes. But one of the best gifts from him was an article he
forwarded to my email on the state of violence on our planet entitled The World is Not Falling Apart by Steven
Pinker and Andrew Mack. It’s on a site called Slate.com for anyone interested
in reading the entire essay. Pinker and Mack clearly make the case through
various well documented graphs and charts that violent acts are far fewer today
than in previous times. No matter how many “hell in a hand basket” discussions
we hear around the dining table, it’s just not true.
And of course each life is precious and I would never mean
to lessen the horror of any one beheading or senseless police officer homicide
or school shooting, but here’s the truth:
Homicide rates, even in countries such as Mexico and South
Africa, are sharply down. Crimes against women and children are down. The
adoption of benevolent governance continues a steady march across the globe
with most nations now operating as democracies. Even Russia and China are
notably “less repressive” than in earlier times. Genocide and other civilian
killings “point sharply downward” and armed conflicts by major powers are non-existent.
So why do we convince ourselves it’s so bad? Probably because
news is largely made by bad news, and with social media it’s all at our
fingertips. And clearly violence sucks people in.
I even think it seems worse precisely because we have it so good. Any atrocity is hard to stomach when avoiding
gluten or taking the stairs instead of the elevator are the challenges of the
day.
Heck, even climate change seems at bay since we got a solid
snow covering and frigid temps. Gotta love a white Christmas!
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| waiting for company to arrive |
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| they make even loading trucks fun |
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| nope, not a work day |
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