Wendy Williams in context

The Wendy Williams Show

Wendy Williams is a riot!  Her show, which I stumbled onto while someone else was watching, is continuously humorous and full of celebrity trivia.  I didn't know Tom Cruise and Katy Holmes had parted company!


Her show, in a gossip filled way, satisfies our casual interest in the rich and famous, the elite society of the entertainment world.  Fashion and flops, juicy tidbits about private matters, wardrobe failures and foolish public behavior.  
 
Of one celebrity mother and young daughter, "She's not your baby girl, girl, she's grown; you don't need to be picking her up like that!"

And from a guest, "If you want to protect your daughter from the paparazzi, then get her some (sun glasses) like you wear."  Hahaha!  Right, they'll never see her if she wears sunglasses!

In context.  So if memory serves, the first time I saw the show was shortly after returning home from Africa.  My friends there live in huts made of stone and clay with roofs of palm fronds.  They work from sunrise to sunset with their little gardens, those who have them, and at whatever trade they might find.  Kids may go to school, but only if mom and dad can afford the small fees.  The kids get a meal at school, usually; it's the only food some of them get for days or weeks at a time.

So as I watched the show, I couldn't understand it.  

I didn't get why they were talking about purses and shoes.  It wasn't intelligible that somebody wore the same dress as somebody else.  I couldn't make my mind join that world; it just wouldn't make the leap.

At the moment, it seems those on the show perhaps have nothing at all in their lives or even crossing their minds in common with the real world.  Odd, isn't it?  Moving beyond the entertainment and celebrity world to Americans in general,  there's another 80% of the world that is similarly unknown to us and rarely in our thoughts.  There's little overlap between our worlds in the things that we face and do each day.  So different is it in fact that if you had to live a few of their days, you'd be undone, I would imagine.

The experience of folks who've gone to see for themselves, who've stayed long enough to begin to care about the people they meet; it is pretty much uniform.  It's a worldview changer. 

Oh, and Wendy Williams is entertaining, I suppose, and perhaps a nice, serious-minded person under the persona.  Perhaps she has well-formed values and priorities beyond the fluff; I hope for her sake that she has a life.

Some of the world's finest folks live quite different lives with little in common with us.  Go see.  They'll welcome you to their world.


"Make a career of humanity... 

    You will make a greater person of yourself, 

       a greater nation of your country, and a finer

          world to live in."

                   ~Martin Luther King, Jr. (18 April 1959, Washington, DC)

A lot of money!

... how much is 'a lot' anyway?

Americans live on about $50K per year per household.  That's the median; half have more, half have less.  More education means more.  Less education means less, generally speaking.  It works out to around $50 per day per individual, counting all workers, all kids, all singles and marrieds.  Just a ballpark figure for understanding.

$50 per person per day is middle/median America.

Most of the world (80%) lives on about $10 per person per day or less. Think about what that might be like.

The cost of common things like food and fuel and building materials are roughly the same around the world in these figures.

That $10/day figure for most of the world is much lower than the threshold for poverty in America (2012).  Much of the world lives well below that level.

Kenya, this is normal.

If there were just a hundred of us in the world and in just one town, 80 would be poor, and maybe 40+ would be poor enough to be at risk for survival.  Perhaps 18 or so would be struggling or middle-class, and the last 2 would be rich.  Most of the kids at school would be really poor.  Most of the folks on the street would be really in need.  Most folks would die early; children before age 5 and adults before 60 because of a lack of food and health care.  Most folks would live on land they didn't own and in simple huts they made from materials they could find.

Upper Middle Lower

It implies a class distinction, doesn't it. 

 

Rich folks, poor folks, and then the really poor.  It's as though some were really smart and worthy, and the rest weren't smart or worthy or maybe they didn't study hard enough or work hard enough.


True?  Yes.  Valid?  No.

And governments seem to favor the wealthy.  There always remains a percentage of citizens who are effectively disenfranchised; forgotten by the nation and its rulers.

True?  Yes.  That's how government tends over time.

Carrying water home from the river; this is normal.

Generally speaking, those hovering near the brink of survival work harder and longer than others.  If they're still alive, it's because they bounce back and try again, over and over and over.  Their communities tend to be real rather than just crowded areas of folks who don't know or care much about each other.

Generosity?  The poor are often more willing to share sacrificially, perhaps because they understand being in need.




Hospitality?  The homes of the poor are often full of extended family and friends and even strangers like you and me.




Grace, faith?  The poor are blessed.  Their faith is real when they pray, "give us this day, bread."  They can know God for real, and they can tell you about it in real terms.  The ones I've met gather for worship if they can, and they pretty much live it for real every day.  They aren't similar to rich people in any aspect.

The family garden; a source of pride ... and survival.

Most of the world lives in a manner that has almost nothing in common with the wealthy and privileged.  Almost nothing at all!

Perhaps it really is harder for a camel to get stuffed through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to have a place where he fits in the real world.

You have to wonder if there's something in all of that, something we might need to know and do.

Objectivity is rare ...

... perhaps because there's more than one side to any subject and our sources fail to provide them.

Has there ever been a time when news reporting was objective and truthful?  In trying to see the last half-century clearly, I haven't been able to find a time free from media bias and carefully constructed propaganda.

I remember when 'propaganda' was what the communists did, but we had freedom of the press!  Nothing but the truth; they can't put anything in the news that's not true.  It's been hard to look back and see the actual events.  The Vietnam era was poorly served by the news of the time, and our government was less than truthful.  Things today are perhaps not improved.

From another, more optimistic viewpoint, we're now rather well connected via social media and international communications.  It's a bit volatile, but the capabilities have served us well in spreading the word.  The Arab Spring, the death of Bin Laden, and Whitney Houston's death were occasions where social media circled the globe before the news agencies could catch up.  The public debate on gun control and assault weapons is splattered over every media.  Congressional inaction is widely criticized.

We do have to exercise a bit of caution; a percentage of 'breaking news' stories on Twitter and other media are nonsense or lies. Still, we're connected worldwide, and it's more difficult for major media and governments to get away with flagrant misrepresentation.  It could be spectacularly good for humanity.  We'll see.

Being well informed is perhaps more achievable than ever before.  We might, with a little work,  actually approach objectivity.

Power Play

"Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person…”                     
Mother Theresa

Young love ...

Lynsey Addario for The New York Times  Rafi Mohammed, 17, is held in a juvenile prison
in Herat for trying to run off with his girlfriend, Halima Mohammedi.

In Afghanistan, Rage at Young Lovers

By JACK HEALY in the New York Times Published: July 30, 2011

HERAT, Afghanistan — The two teenagers met inside an ice cream factory through darting glances before roll call, murmured hellos as supervisors looked away and, finally, a phone number folded up and tossed discreetly onto the workroom floor.

It was the beginning of an Afghan love story that flouted dominant traditions of arranged marriages and close family scrutiny, a romance between two teenagers of different ethnicities that tested a village’s tolerance for more modern whims of the heart. The results were delivered with brutal speed.

The girl's father, Kher Mohammed, with his head in his hand,
wants the government to kill her and her boyfriend.

A car burned by a crowd during a riot that took place
after the police rescued two teenagers from a group of
men who had demanded that they be hanged or stoned
for their relationship.

This month, a group of men spotted the couple riding together in a car, yanked them into the road and began to interrogate the boy and girl. Why were they together? What right had they? An angry crowd of 300 surged around them, calling them adulterers and demanding that they be stoned to death or hanged.

Read the New York Times article. It's stunning.

Understanding a culture different from your own is a challenge. As the young lady says, “We are all human. God created us from one dirt. Why can we not marry each other, or love each other?” It's a fair question.

After America, there is no place to go.

Kitty Werthmann survived Hitler.

“What I am about to tell you is something you’ve probably never heard or read in history books,” she likes to tell audiences.

“I am a witness to history.

“I cannot tell you that Hitler took Austria by tanks and guns; it would distort history.

“We voted him in.”

If you remember the plot of the Sound of Music, the Von Trapp family escaped over the Alps rather than submit to the Nazis. Kitty wasn’t so lucky. Her family chose to stay in her native Austria. She was 10 years old, but bright and aware. And she was watching.
“We elected him by a landslide – 98 percent of the vote,” she recalls.
She wasn’t old enough to vote in 1938 – approaching her 11th birthday. But she remembers.
“Everyone thinks that Hitler just rolled in with his tanks and took Austria by force.”

No so.
“In 1938, Austria was in deep Depression. Nearly one-third of our workforce was unemployed. We had 25 percent inflation and 25 percent bank loan interest rates.

Farmers and business people were declaring bankruptcy daily. Young people were going from house to house begging for food. Not that they didn’t want to work; there simply weren’t any jobs.

“My mother was a Christian woman and believed in helping people in need. Every day we cooked a big kettle of soup and baked bread to feed those poor, hungry people – about 30 daily.’

“We looked to our neighbor on the north, Germany, where Hitler had been in power since 1933.” she recalls. “We had been told that they didn’t have unemployment or crime, and they had a high standard of living.

“Nothing was ever said about persecution of any group – Jewish or otherwise. We were led to believe that everyone in Germany was happy. We wanted the same way of life in Austria. We were promised that a vote for Hitler would mean the end of unemployment and help for the family. Hitler also said that businesses would be assisted, and farmers would get their farms back.

“Ninety-eight percent of the population voted to annex Austria to Germany and have Hitler for our ruler.

“We were overjoyed,” remembers Kitty, “and for three days we danced in the streets and had candlelight parades. The new government opened up big field kitchens and everyone was fed.

“After the election, German officials were appointed, and like a miracle, we suddenly had law and order. Three or four weeks later, everyone was employed. The government made sure that a lot of work was created through the Public Work Service.

“Hitler decided we should have equal rights for women. Before this, it was a custom that married Austrian women did not work outside the home. An able-bodied husband would be looked down on if he couldn’t support his family. Many women in the teaching profession were elated that they could retain the jobs they previously had been required to give up for marriage.

“Then we lost religious education for kids."

“Our education was nationalized. I attended a very good public school.. The population was predominantly Catholic, so we had religion in our schools. The day we elected Hitler (March 13, 1938), I walked into my schoolroom to find the crucifix replaced by Hitler’s picture hanging next to a Nazi flag. Our teacher, a very devout woman, stood up and told the class we wouldn’t pray or have religion anymore. Instead, we sang ‘Deutschland, Deutschland, Uber Alles,’ and had physical education.

“Sunday became National Youth Day with compulsory attendance. Parents were not pleased about the sudden change in curriculum. They were told that if they did not send us, they would receive a stiff letter of warning the first time. The second time they would be fined the equivalent of $300, and the third time they would be subject to jail.”

And then things got worse.

“The first two hours consisted of political indoctrination. The rest of the day we had sports. As time went along, we loved it. Oh, we had so much fun and got our sports equipment free.

“We would go home and gleefully tell our parents about the wonderful time we had.

“My mother was very unhappy,” remembers Kitty. “When the next term started, she took me out of public school and put me in a convent. I told her she couldn’t do that and she told me that someday when I grew up, I would be grateful. There was a very good curriculum, but hardly any fun – no sports, and no political indoctrination.

“I hated it at first but felt I could tolerate it. Every once in a while, on holidays, I went home. I would go back to my old friends and ask what was going on and what they were doing."

“Their loose lifestyle was very alarming to me. They lived without religion. By that time, unwed mothers were glorified for having a baby for Hitler.

“It seemed strange to me that our society changed so suddenly. As time went along, I realized what a great deed my mother did so that I wasn’t exposed to that kind of humanistic philosophy."
“Then food rationing began."

“In 1939, the war started and a food bank was established. All food was rationed and could only be purchased using food stamps. At the same time, a full-employment law was passed which meant if you didn’t work, you didn’t get a ration card, and if you didn’t have a card, you starved to death. “Women who stayed home to raise their families didn’t have any marketable skills and often had to take jobs more suited for men."

“Soon after this, the draft was implemented."

Young Austrians

“It was compulsory for young people, male and female, to give one year to the labor corps,” remembers Kitty. “During the day, the girls worked on the farms, and at night they returned to their barracks for military training just like the boys.

“They were trained to be anti-aircraft gunners and participated in the signal corps. After the labor corps, they were not discharged but were used in the front lines."

“When I go back to Austria to visit my family and friends, most of these women are emotional cripples because they just were not equipped to handle the horrors of combat."

“Three months before I turned 18, I was severely injured in an air raid attack. I nearly had a leg amputated, so I was spared having to go into the labor corps and into military service."

“When the mothers had to go out into the work force, the government immediately established child care centers."

“You could take your children ages four weeks old to school age and leave them there around-the-clock, seven days a week, under the total care of the government."

“The state raised a whole generation of children. There were no motherly women to take care of the children, just people highly trained in child psychology. By this time, no one talked about equal rights. We knew we had been had.

“Before Hitler, we had very good medical care. Many American doctors trained at the University of Vienna."

 “As for healthcare, our tax rates went up to 80 percent of our income. Newlyweds immediately received a $1,000 loan from the government to establish a household. We had big programs for families."

“After Hitler, health care was socialized, free for everyone. Doctors were salaried by the government. The problem was, since it was free, the people were going to the doctors for everything."

“When the good doctor arrived at his office at 8 a.m., 40 people were already waiting and, at the same time, the hospitals were full."

“If you needed elective surgery, you had to wait a year or two for your turn. There was no money for research as it was poured into socialized medicine. Research at the medical schools literally stopped, so the best doctors left Austria and emigrated to other countries."

“All day care and education were free. High schools were taken over by the government and college tuition was subsidized. Everyone was entitled to free handouts, such as food stamps, clothing, and housing.

“We had another agency designed to monitor business. My brother-in-law owned a restaurant that had square tables.

Austrian kids loyal to Hitler

“Government officials told him he had to replace them with round tables because people might bump themselves on the corners. Then they said he had to have additional bathroom facilities. It was just a small dairy business with a snack bar. He couldn’t meet all the demands.
“Soon, he went out of business. If the government owned the large businesses and not many small ones existed, it could be in control."

“We had consumer protection, too."

“We were told how to shop and what to buy. Free enterprise was essentially abolished. We had a planning agency specially designed for farmers. The agents would go to the farms, count the live-stock, and then tell the farmers what to produce, and how to produce it."

“In 1944, I was a student teacher in a small village in the Alps. The villagers were surrounded by mountain passes which, in the winter, were closed off with snow, causing people to be isolated."

“So people intermarried and offspring were sometimes retarded. When I arrived, I was told there were 15 mentally retarded adults, but they were all useful and did good manual work."

“I knew one, named Vincent, very well. He was a janitor of the school. One day I looked out the window and saw Vincent and others getting into a van."

“I asked my superior where they were going. She said to an institution where the State Health Department would teach them a trade, and to read and write. The families were required to sign papers with a little clause that they could not visit for 6 months."

“They were told visits would interfere with the program and might cause homesickness."

“As time passed, letters started to dribble back saying these people died a natural, merciful death. The villagers were not fooled. We suspected what was happening. Those people left in excellent physical health and all died within 6 months. We called this euthanasia."

“Then they took our guns."

“Next came gun registration. People were getting injured by guns. Hitler said that the real way to catch criminals (we still had a few) was by matching serial numbers on guns. Most citizens were law abiding and dutifully marched to the police station to register their firearms. Not long afterwards, the police said that it was best for everyone to turn in their guns. The authorities already knew who had them, so it was futile not to comply voluntarily."

“No more freedom of speech. Anyone who said something against the government was taken away. We knew many people who were arrested, not only Jews, but also priests and ministers who spoke up."

“Totalitarianism didn’t come quickly, it took 5 years from 1938 until 1943, to realize full dictatorship in Austria. Had it happened overnight, my countrymen would have fought to the last breath. Instead, we had creeping gradualism. Now, our only weapons were broom handles. The whole idea sounds almost unbelievable that the state, little by little eroded our freedom.”

Kitty Werthmann

“This is my eye-witness account."

“It’s true. Those of us who sailed past the Statue of Liberty came to a country of unbelievable freedom and opportunity."

“America is truly is the greatest country in the world.
“Don’t let freedom slip away.
“After America, there is no place to go.”