Alarming News: I like Morgan Freeberg. A lot.
American Digest: And I like this from "The Blog That Nobody Reads", because it is -- mostly -- about me. What can I say? I'm on an ego trip today. It won't last.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: We were following a trackback and thinking "hmmm... this is a bloody excellent post!", and then we realized that it was just part III of, well, three...Damn. I wish I'd written those.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: ...I just remembered that I found a new blog a short while ago, House of Eratosthenes, that I really like. I like his common sense approach and his curiosity when it comes to why people believe what they believe rather than just what they believe.
Brutally Honest: Morgan Freeberg is brilliant.
Dr. Melissa Clouthier: Morgan Freeberg at House of Eratosthenes (pftthats a mouthful) honors big boned women in skimpy clothing. The picture there is priceless--keep scrolling down.
Exile in Portales: Via Gerard: Morgan Freeberg, a guy with a lot to say. And he speaks The Truth...and it's fascinating stuff. Worth a read, or three. Or six.
Just Muttering: Two nice pieces at House of Eratosthenes, one about a perhaps unintended effect of the Enron mess, and one on the Gore-y environ-movie.
Mein Blogovault: Make "the Blog that No One Reads" one of your daily reads.
The Virginian: I know this post will offend some people, but the author makes some good points.
Poetic Justice: Cletus! Ah gots a laiv one fer yew...
Why Pay Attention
Here’s an interesting thing about the Jennifer Wilbanks affair. While she was missing, there was a national consensus that we should find out what’s going on with this desperate situation, and now that she’s found, there is a national consensus that it’s time to tune out. Why pay attention to old news?
Well, I would argue the direct opposite thing. While Jennifer Wilbanks was missing, she was another missing person, and I have to challenge the notion we had any reason to pay attention at all from Day One. People go missing all the time. Now that she is found, there is an abundance of reasons to follow along. I’ll list them here.
For starters: She lied in such a way, that put a great number of people into terrible situations, apparently with no second-thoughts or remorse from her, forcing them to spend vast sums of money, effort, emotional turmoil…attention. There are valuable lessons here. I’m pretty sure by the time I’m a hundred and fifty, I will not quite have figured out all the ways people can lie to me; I sure as hell don’t have a handle on it all now. Speaking for myself, I’m finding the prospect of a post-mortem pretty useful.
Secondly: Once one is done studying liars, it is useful paying attention to the behavior of those who have been lied to. The most important lesson, by far, is that when you don’t know everything you need to know, it is critically important to keep a running inventory of what exactly it is that you do not know. This really isn’t news to anyone. But keeping it in mind, and acting upon it, poses a stiff challenge.
Take a look at this monster-size, twenty-four page thread from a site called “websleuths”. The timeline involved in these posts deals mostly with the time when Jennifer’s whereabouts were unknown (someone announces Jennifer has been found near the bottom of page twenty.) The thread is chock full of people who “know” what happened to Jennifer Wilbanks. It’s very heavy on emotion, very light on thought, and in hindsight we can see most of these comments were a hundred and eighty degrees off course. I would expect that anyone who was looking at the prospective groom in a funny way during the actual disappearance, would find this glance in the rear-view mirror to be awkward, even painful. It’s a good pain.
Some notable exerpts:
I don’t want to pass judgement too quickly, but I was just watching her fiance on Greta…you’d think they were talking to someone who didn’t know her well. Not much emotion…just chatting about her routine, etc. It was just weird to me….to my husband too. He just didn’t seem upset….and as far as some of his earlier comments they are eerily similar to Mark Hackings. I hope I am wrong….just an observation.
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…the wedding is right around the corner and all of a sudden it hits him and BANG he loses it! he isnt going to be single anymore and is going to have responsibilities! what kind of a man is this fiance? (Age, profession, been married before, that type of thing?) i havent seen him yet….
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Hi guys just jumping in late here and I don’t really have to much to offer except that I have a real uneasy feeling about John Mason. He is just too nonchalant for me. I know that some folks like the secret honeymoon thing but dang, I would want to know what the climate was, did I need a passport etc. Personally I am beginning to think that there were no honeymoon plans. This whole case is giving me a sinking feeling.
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Hmmm, interesting. What else do we know about Mr. Mason? Have the police checked the house? What’s his family situation? This huge expensive wedding leads me to think it has something to do with jealousy, money, something like this. Friends in high places can also bring enemies in high places.
And I’m not trying to put anyone down with this — we’re all susceptible to this. We’re conditioned, when no action whatsoever is required of us, to think as if action is indeed required of us. And when we are committed to action, our brains are already programmed to fill in the information that is missing…with…well, oftentimes, with crap.
Third: While Jennifer has turned out to be an irresponsible nutcase, and therefore, one of a large crowd and probably not very much worth watching, her fiancee John Mason is become a subject that you’ve just gotta watch. His dismissive comment on Fox News, �Haven�t we all made mistakes?� sums up what is wrong with so much around us. The idea has been advanced that perhaps, Mason can think straight after all — he gave the “correct” answer for public-relations purposes, to appease the feel-before-thought crowd which must always be appeased, and the next step for him is to run like hell.
Perhaps. But it does not appear so.
I think the guy is committing suicide and he doesn’t know it. Sure, if and when he marries Jennifer Wilbanks, he’s got another half century on the planet, maybe more. It’s even a possibility, perhaps even a likelihood, that he’ll be able to accomplish something on par with what he would have achieved if he were a life-long bachelor. Guys with ditzy wives can do things, too. Slavery in this country, after all, was ended by the husband of a nutcase.
But having a crazy wife is one hell of a pebble in your shoe. Sure, there are a lot of people who insist such a thing is tolerable, maybe even pleasant. These people all seem very sure of themselves. Only problem is, they’re all women and single men.
The bottom line, is this:
The story has just started to affect those of us who aren’t directly involved in it. When a woman goes missing, and there’s a lot of emotion because she was about to get married — sad as it may be for those directly involved — such a story has only a minimal potential for affecting our lives. But when a man resolves to marry a woman he already knows to be a dipstick, this has an effect on everybody. It lowers the expectation of what a woman should bring to such a union; it raises the expectation of what a man should be willing to tolerate.
Additionally, it raises some questions that appear to be unanswerable. John Mason is committed to marrying somebody. Who or what would he be marrying? Marriage isn’t just “Fornication Under Consent of the King”, it is a series of mutual commitments. To simply function day-to-day in a marriage, you have to be able to do things…have certain attitudes. You have to make obligations and live up to them.
You can’t marry an irresponsible person anymore than you can make a mortgage loan to a dog. Dogs may be wonderful creatures, loyal in every way; but they don’t have mortgage loans, they don’t have bank accounts, they can’t subscribe to Netflix. You have to be a certain age to be married. That’s one of the reasons why. Your legal ability to make commitments, and accept commitments from other people, is one of the requirements for a marriage.
Fourth: We’re learning something important about ourselves — chiefly, what poor decisions most of us make in determining when we should pay attention and when we should butt out. A broad, all-encompassing syndicate of “cluck-cluckers” has emerged, intoning that what happens from here-on-out is solely the business of John Mason and Jennifer Wilbanks. The rest of us should move on to other things because “there may be something in that relationship the rest of us don’t understand.”
No shit, Sherlock.
I’d like to know where you “we don’t understand what’s going on” people were when Jennifer was missing? With an attitude like that, you might have been among the few who nailed down exactly what was happening, or at least, what was not happening. You could’ve even made some decent money.
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