We’re So Sorry, Mr. Webster

September 15, 2011

Stretch your imagination with me for a moment. Imagine that in oh, say Libya, there is a major news magazine that millions of people read each week. Imagine that this week they decided to put on the cover a full-face photo of President Obama. The cover story is an interview with the President in which he calls Moammar Kadafi a murderous dictator. Now imagine that the chief editor of this major news magazine appears on a popular Libyan morning news program to talk about the cover story. When asked about the President’s description of their leader (now former, but stick with the story), the editor says, “Well, President Obama might not define murderous dictator the same way that you and I do, but that’s okay. That’s politics.”

Back to (questionable) reality, this is pretty much what I heard this morning when I caught a few minutes of Morning Joe on MSNBC. Rick Stengel, the Managing Editor of Time Magazine was on to talk about this week’s issue of his magazine, an issue that features an exclusive interview with GOP presidential candidate, Governor Rick Perry (R, Texas). Governor Perry has made a name for himself in the race as one who isn’t afraid to speak his mind. One of these mind bits happens to be that of calling President Obama a socialist. While he’s hardly alone in this (one of the employees of the insurance company across the street from my home drives a car with a bumper sticker declaring the end of socialism will happen in 2012), he has repeated it ad nauseum, beginning well before he entered the GOP race. Carl Bernstein asked Mr. Stengel about this during the program. He asked Mr. Stengel if Governor Perry, in repeating this mantra, was either showing his ignorance or simply pandering to a particular audience. Mr. Stengel’s reply was that the Governor might not define socialism in the same way that Mr. Bernstein does, or even in the way he himself does, but that it ‘s okay because it’s all part and parcel of politics.

And here is the point when I pause and ponder…

Governor Perry majored in animal science at Texas A&M University and so maybe he never took a political science class. It’s quite obvious that Mr. Stengel was never in a position to grade papers for a political science or economics class. Perhaps not even a basic high school government class. I’m imagining again. I’m imagining, in any other setting other than politics, a person being asked to define a quite definable ideology, a quite clear political philosophy and economic system, and answering by saying, “Just look at President Obama.” It is not only ignorant, it’s absurd. And if you did it in school, you’d get a flat out “F”.

For me, this calls into question, yet again, the role of journalism in our society. It makes me wonder when and how and why we have allowed a political system to arise where candidates can make blatantly false statements not only about individuals, but about entire governments (because you know, there are real socialist leaders of real socialist countries in this world) without ever being called on it. What in the world is Mr. Stengel saying, that because an individual seeks to hold one of the most politically powerful positions in the world, the “anything goes” rule is in play? The ends justify the means, regardless? Pandering to a particular group when you good and well know that it plays to that group’s own ignorance is deplorable. Hardly the quality of a person of integrity (regardless of party, ideology, or bent) and hardly something that should go unchecked by those covering the candidates.

I’m at a loss.

Another news item mentioned during this morning’s show was that students’ reading scores on the SAT are at the lowest point in 40 years. Is it any wonder? With the definition of words so up for grabs, who can be expected to read and comprehend very well any more?

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Posted by salgore

Life is Better as a Participant Sport

September 11, 2011

I spent the weekend helping out with the charity bike ride for Phinney’s Friends. It was a 2-day, 150 mile ride from Stow, MA to Fitzwilliam, NH and back. Six riders took part along with several folks in vehicles for support, including me. Just a month ago, I was planning on participating in the ride.

Watching from Behind

I’d been riding my bike and running, training for the Chicago Marathon in October. I was logging miles and admittedly feeling poorly, but still looked forward to my fall plans. Two trips to the ER and several different and unrelated diagnoses later, I was sidelined from both.

My friends in Chicago asked if I’d still be coming out to watch the marathon. I admit that I want to be there for my friend, Jonathan, who I had been training to run with, but I knew it would be too hard to watch. I didn’t want to stand by and see the thousands of people go by, knowing that I had wanted to be with them.

I didn’t think twice about Phinney’s, though. As soon as my doctor grounded me, I told Roger, the ride coordinator that I was out for the ride but definitely in to help crew and to keep on with my fundraising efforts. I thought that helping out was important, because it was such a small group, because I’d made the commitment to do it, and a lot of friends were supporting me with donations.

It wasn’t terrible by any stretch, but riding in the SAG wagon, following the riders up and down the hills and back roads on two days that couldn’t have been better for bike riding, I couldn’t help but feel sad. I wanted to ride. I wanted to make friends the way you make friends when you share hours pedaling (or running) along together. I wanted to share the experience. I wanted to take part. I didn’t want to sit and watch.

We got back to the shopping center, car horns honking and bike bells ringing. People clapped and cheered and the volunteers from Phinney’s Friends again thanked everyone for taking part and helping their good cause. I felt kind of distant. I wanted to go home. I helped unpack the stuff from the cars. I tried to avoid having my picture taken. And I tried not to cry.

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Posted by salgore

What’s in a Name?

September 6, 2011

A few weeks back, a very nice librarian from a large university in the Midwest came to speak to a group of us in my own library who are involved in eScience. For the sake of the reader, I’ll spare the details of what eScience is and what libraries/librarians are doing in this field. Besides, it’s not necessary in order to understand the point of this post.

This very nice librarian gave a very nice presentation about some of the projects being undertaken at his library. Good stuff, interesting projects, new and relevant things, and a lot of takeaways for work we’re doing in my library. But I got stuck on the slide where he outlined the staff working on said stuff, including himself. His job title: Research Data Scientist.

And so here is my point: A research librarian is not a research scientist, even if s/he stayed in a Holiday Inn Express last night.

Calling one’s self something isn’t all that it takes to make it so. I know there’s a tendency within our media culture to repeat things over and over and over again, believing that such insidious repetition will in fact give the thing credence, but really all it does is give one a headache. And a deep desire to tune out.

So I asked the very nice librarian why his job title is “Research Data Scientist” instead of the more appropriate, “Research Data Librarian”. He referenced a text on the subject of scientific data management where the term “Research Data Scientist” was used and said that there was agreement among his library’s administration that the role described in the book for this position was exactly what librarians do, i.e. “We add value to the data.”

All well and good, and most importantly, true, but my unvoiced follow-up question is this:

If what a research data scientist does is exactly what a librarian does, then why not simply call the position research data librarian? Why is “scientist” chosen over “librarian”? The consensus wasn’t “That’s exactly what scientists do,” but “That’s exactly what librarians do.”

A parallel thought came to me over the weekend as I saw numerous ads in a magazine offering certification in becoming a Celebrant. In case you’re unfamiliar, per the Celebrant Institute, “Celebrants are people in your community who are trained to officiate at, compose and perform the highest quality personalized ceremonies for couples, individuals and organizations.” In a former career, I officiated and performed very personal ceremonies for any number of occasions from weddings to funerals to commitment ceremonies to Gay Pride events. You know what I was called?

A minister.

So is there some relationship between librarians and ministers, something that makes it so that when people decide they want to do whole or part of these vocations, they feel the need to call themselves something else? Have we done something to offend, we librarians and ministers? Are they so out of date and out of touch that we just don’t want to be associated with such labels anymore?

I don’t know, but I do wonder.

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Posted by salgore

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