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Seven Important Lessons from World Religions Everyone Should Know
It doesn't matter if you're an atheist, devout follower of your faith, an agnostic, or anywhere in between—there's wisdom to be learned from the world's religions. Here are some of the most important, universally applicable teachings from sacred texts everyone would benefit from learning.
I'm not a theologian by any means, but comparative religion has been an interest of mine for more than two decades. Reading The World's Wisdom by Philip Novak, The Enlightened Mindcompiled by Stephen Mitchell, and other such compilations of the world's religious traditions, the one thing that has struck me most is the common themes running through them all stories of community, of treating others with respect, and of finding your purpose in life.
Putting aside differing beliefs - about the afterlife, the nature of the divine, and religious rituals - we can all glean life lessons from ancient scriptures. Here are some of the most notable ones from Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism (I'm choosing the most "popular" religions here based on the number of people adhering to these faiths and my familiarity with them, but also including other religions like Judaism and Sikhism where I have more information.)
1. The Golden Rule
If there's any universal truth or common teaching across various religions, it's probably the golden rule: Treat others as you would want to be treated yourself. As TeachingValues.compoints out, this tenet is expressed in Christianity, Confuscianism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Taoism, and Zoroastriantism.
The Jewish Talmud, for example, says:
What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellowman. This is the entire Law; all the rest is commentary.
The Hindu Mahabharata declares:
This is the sum of duty; do naught onto others what you would not have them do unto you.
And from the Islamic Sunnah:
No one of you is a believer until he desires for his brother that which he desires for himself.
In the secular world, this is called empathy, one of the most important skills you can learn both for your career and social life. It's about understanding where the other person is coming from and, even more important, treating their concerns the way you would your own.
2. Work for the Happiness of Others, Especially the Poor and Unfortunate
This teaching is similar to the golden rule, but expressly asks us to look out for others less fortunate than us. Studies have found that the most successful people tend to be givers rather than takers, and religions advocate this idea of selflessness and charity.
Buddha's final instructions on "the mission" set before us, for example, is to work for the happiness of others:
Go your ways, oh monks, for the benefit of many, for the happiness of many, out of compassion for the world, for the good, benefit and happiness of gods and men.
The Bible also preaches concern for the unfortunate:
If…there is a needy person among you…do not harden your heart and shut your hand against your needy kinsman. Rather, you must open your hand and lend him sufficient for whatever he needs. For there will never cease to be needy ones in your land, which is why I command you: open your hand to the poor and needy…
Albert Einstein went so far as to declare that Judaism isn't really a religion, but a tradition that celebrates the beauty of every single life:
Judaism appears to me to be almost exclusively concerned with the moral attitude in and toward life. […] The essence of the Jewish concept of life seems to me to be the affirmation of life for all creatures. […} There remains, however, something more in the Jewish tradition, so gloriously revealed in certain of the psalms; namely a kind of drunken joy and surprise at the beauty and incomprehensible sublimity of this world, of which man can attain but a faint intimation. It is the feeling from which genuine research draws its intellectual strength, but which also seems to manifest itself in the song of birds…
Caring for the unfortunate is one of the founding tenets of Sikhism, as CNN reports:
"(Founder) Guru Nanak said that if you want to meet God, serve the poor people," Johar says.
Gurdwaras around the world variously incorporate clinics, schools, guest quarters and community centers, which Sikhs say is a sign of the religion's values of service and equality.
And, as Zeeshan Rasool shared with me, Islamic prophets also emphasize the importance of being a beacon for others (and turning the other cheek, as Jesus exemplified):
"Be like the flower that gives its fragrance to even the hand that crushes it." - Imam Ali ibn
3. Focus on the Present
As much as religions preach about the afterlife, they also emphasize making the most of the time we have available now (and isn't that the point of all our productivity hacks?).
Buddhism's emphasis on mindfulness and meditation might be the most prominent examples, but other religions also encourage us to savor the moment and sharpen our awareness.
In Vedic Hinduism (there are significant aspects in modern versions of Hinduism and Indian culture in general, but it's not as hard-and-fast as it's represented in the Vedas), there are four life stages: student, householder, retiree, renouncer. [...] These stages do not necessarily have to all be completed in a lifetime; in fact, it could take several lifetimes to work through a single stage, depending on the person. When one was acting within one's rightful stage (i.e. a householder doing their best to raise their family, work hard, and earn lots of money or a renouncer praying and meditating, having as little to do with other humans as possible), then one is actively contributing to the cosmic order. In other words, if you do what you're supposed to do according to your stage (among other things, like caste, etc.), you're helping hold the universe together.
Bottom line: Everyone's at a different place in life, with different priorities, and that's a good thing.
The Hindu Svetesvatara Upanishad recommends the "quiet retreat of Yoga":
Find a quiet retreat for the practice of Yoga, sheltered from the wind, level and clean, free from rubbish, smoldering fires, and ugliness, and where the sound of waters and the beauty of the place help thought and contemplation.
And Jesus told his followers:
Take therefore no thought for tomorrow: for tomorrow shall take thought of the things for itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
In other words, worrying is a pretty useless pasttime. The only things you'll actually regret on your deathbed are things like not expressing your feelings and sacrificing family time for work.
4. Aim for Achievements, Not Money
More money doesn't always mean more happiness—an idea most religions are happy to point out. Stop running after material things, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and Judaism agree.
Imam Ali ibn abi Talib says:
"The parable of this world is like your shadow - If you stop, it stands still. If you chase it, it distances itself from you."
Money can also distract you from the bigger picture, as Jesus said:
It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
That's not to say we have to cast off all material possessions. Buddhism teaches the joy of not being in debt and finding your career path. Still, the things that make us happiest in life are not things we can add up with a calculator.
5. Interact with the Community
Religious practice forces you out of your shell (if you're the type, like me, to have a social shell). That's a good thing, because shared religious beliefs or not, we all depend on each other to not just survive but also thrive.
A Jewish rabbi, through Tyler Lear, pointed out that community is the defining trait of Judaism:
There are many different ways to be Jewish, including atheist Jews, but the people are really what bring everything together. They share a common history and (in most ways) a common culture. [Side note: this is one of the biggest issues with people converting to Judaism; if you have to convert, you weren't part of the community to begin with, which makes sharing in that common background far harder.]
Bottom line: Life is about the people you're with, a sense of community with those around you; nothing else matters nearly as much.
Other religions also emphasize this. Islam's five daily prayer practices, for example, bring followers together throughout the day, as do other religion's formal, regular services. My favorite part of Catholic mass has always been that "peace be with you" shaking of hands with the strangers in your pew—-I bestow peace on you, you bestow it on me, and at least in that moment everything is right with the world. Being an active participant in the community might not come naturally to many of us, but at the very least, religion reminds us that we are not alone.
6. Take Responsibility for Your Actions
"What goes around, comes around." Most religions have their own interpretation of karma and warn followers that your choices and actions have consequences.
Karma yoga is perhaps the central teaching from Hinduism's Bhagavad Gita. It's not the action itself that matters, but the quality of mind behind your actions that bind you. Act for the sake of acting, without desire for the rewards (Getting started is everything.):
If one identifies with one's actions, desiring certain results, one is bound to that action-pattern and doomed to rebirth. However, if one acts earnestly but without attachment to results, performing every action as an offering to God, knowing that God alone is the only Actor, one proceeds on the path to liberation.
The core doctrine of Buddhism also teaches in the Eightfold Path that:
All beings are the owners of their deeds (karma), the heirs of their deeds; their deeds are the womb from which they sprang…Whatever deeds they do—good or evil—of such they will be the heirs.
GotQuestions.org interprets karma for Christians—essentially, you reap what you sow:
The Bible talks a lot about reaping and sowing. Job 4:8 says, "As I have observed, those who plow evil and those who sow trouble reap it."Psalm 126:5 says, "Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy." [...] In each of these instances, as well as all the other references to reaping and sowing, the act of receiving the rewards of your actions takes place in this life, not in some future life. It is a present-day activity, and the references make it clear that the fruit you reap will be commensurate with the actions you have performed. In addition, the sowing you perform in this life will affect your reward or punishment in the afterlife.
7. Know Yourself (Make Up Your Own Mind)
Many people associate religion with indoctrination, but if you study the texts from the world's major religions, they actually advocate looking within yourself to make up your own mind—and maybe find your spiritual core within yourself.
My favorite Zen story is this:
A monk asked Seon Master Un-mun, "What is Buddha?"
And also:


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To those who practise Scientology, the religion's Source and Founder L. Ron Hubbard (LRH to Scientologists) is far more than merely symbolic. His teachings and technology are a pervasive, indelible, ubiquitous and enduring legacy whose significance continues to grow and evolve with each passing tick of the calendar. Mr. Hubbard's towering spirit lives on in those around the globe who follow the profound, prescient example for living and personal enlightenment that he set into motion—and extends forevermore to the countless others his life has touched.
The sheer greatness embodied in Mr. Hubbard's words and deeds were honoured Saturday night to mark the annual LRH Birthday Celebration at the Church's Flag spiritual headquarters in Clearwater, Florida, on the occasion of the Founder's 104th birthday.
In testament to Mr. Hubbard's triumphant and eternal technological splendour, the anniversary of his birth (March 13) was marked with a raucous observance attended by a capacity crowd and presided over by Mr. David Miscavige, Chairman of the Board, Religious Technology Center and the religion's ecclesiastical leader. He opened the proceedings by placing the eternal power of LRH's creation into a palpable context.
"Never has he been more prominent," Mr. Miscavige told the gathering of Scientologists. "Never more manifestly evident. Never closer to the consciousness of seven billion people on Earth. So not to overstate it, not to stretch the point, but, the fact is, LRH is everywhere this evening."
Mr. Miscavige raised numerous milestones and honours that Mr. Hubbard and his indelible works have generated over the past 12 months, headed by an enormous tribute from the Smithsonian Institution last November in naming the Scientology Founder one of the 100 Most Significant Americans of All Time. In all, he has now received more than 5,000 individual recognitions worldwide.
The event climaxed with a presentation of Scientology's epic expansion during the past year as well as the future, including the planned opening of new Ideal Orgs in North America, South America, Asia, Africa and Europe as well as the Scientology Media Productions global communications centre in Hollywood, California.
There was also the momentous announcement of the future L. Ron Hubbard Hall in Clearwater, a magnificent auditorium designed to seat thousands with convention and banquet conversion capability, complemented by a beautifully-appointed L. Ron Hubbard Park. The sleek digital design concept for the project presented to the gathered birthday crowd a facility set to span a full city block in Downtown Clearwater.
One of the night's most hotly-anticipated elements honoured the champions who play what has come to be known as The Birthday Game, citing the Churches and Missions of Scientology that generated the greatest expansion over the past 12 months. As the story goes, the game was born long ago when Mr. Hubbard was asked what he wanted for his birthday and he quipped in reply to five times expansion. It was that expansion that became the game's catchphrase and has continued annually since.
This year's Birthday Game world champions hailed from three continents and boasted newly inaugurated Ideal quarters in every category: the Ideal Mission of Belleair, Florida; the Ideal Organisation of Sydney, Australia; the Ideal Advanced Organisation of Los Angeles; and the Ideal Continental Liaison Office of Europe in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Mr. Miscavige also presented a special award to honour a Scientology Organisation (Org) in a league of its own. The Model Ideal Organisation of Los Angeles' speed of expansion was so profound they reached the size of Old Saint Hill—the Organisation that Mr. Hubbard himself headed in East Grinstead, Sussex. In fact they obtained these heights two times over. In so doing Los Angeles, not only became a model for every other org to emulate but a standard-bearer for a Golden Age of Administration and thus was awarded the singular status of Model Ideal Saint Hill Size Org.
And no LRH Birthday event would be complete without a spirited and inspiring biographical presentation honouring the man of the hour in his own words, featuring captivating tales from a dashing life spent crisscrossing the globe and accruing wisdom. This year's adventures included stories from the Alaskan Panhandle to the shores of Japan to the wilderness of a place called New York City.
Capping the celebratory evening was a sparkling performance of "Happy Birthday Ron."

subset: commoncrawl


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Six Management Considerations for Planning IoT Subscription Models
One common monetization approach for today's IoT solutions is the subscription model. While it provides an attractive recurring revenue stream, subscription models require major investments in resources, time, capital and management commitment.
In this blog, we'll highlight six key strategic and critical considerations managers must address when planning and building IoT subscription models. These considerations will determine whether the IoT subscription service is successful or not.


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By Cara Anna
The Associated Press
BEIJING (AP) — When the police came for Liu Xiaobo on a December night nearly two years ago, they didn't tell the dissident author why he was being taken away. The line in the detention order for his "suspected crime" was left blank.
But Liu and the dozen officers who crowded into his dark Beijing apartment knew the reason. He was hours from releasing Charter 08, the China democracy movement's most comprehensive call yet for peaceful reform. The document would be viewed by the ruling Communist Party as a direct challenge to its 60-year monopoly on political power.
Liu, who over the past two decades had endured stints in prison and re-education camp, looked at the blank detention notice and lost his temper.
"At that moment, I knew the day I was expecting had finally come," his wife, Liu Xia, said recently as she recounted the night of Dec. 8, 2008. Thinking of the Beijing winter, she said she brought him a down coat and cigarettes. The police took the cigarettes away.
Liu was sentenced last Christmas Day to 11 years in prison for subversion. The 54-year old literary critic is now a favorite to win the Nobel Peace Prize — in what would be a major embarrassment to the Chinese government.
He is the best shot the country's dissident movement has had in winning the prestigious award since it began pushing for democratic change after China's authoritarian leaders launched economic, but not political, reforms three decades ago.
Last year, the prize was won by President Barack Obama. Other contenders for this year's prize include Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.
In an indication of Beijing's unease, China's deputy foreign minister has warned the Nobel Institute not to give the prize to a Chinese dissident, the director of the Norway-based institute said this week. In another sign of official disapproval, an editorial on Thursday in the state-run Global Times newspaper called Liu a radical and separatist.
Chinese police continue to threaten and question some of the more than 300 people who were the first to sign Charter 08, which was co-authored by Liu. Despite the risk, thousands more have signed it since its release.
Charter 08 is an echo of Charter 77, the famous call for human rights in then-Czechoslovakia that led to the 1989 Velvet Revolution that swept away the communist regime. The charter for China calls for more freedom and an end to the Communist Party's political dominance. "The democratization of Chinese politics can be put off no longer," it says.
Former peace prize winners Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Dalai Lama, and Charter 77 co-drafter Vaclav Havel have joined those calling for Liu to get the award. Scholars inside and outside China have mounted letter-writing campaigns on his behalf.
"If I were the Chinese Communist Party, I would free him now. Release him. Now. So you don't have the humiliation and it's good for everyone," said Jean-Philippe Beja, a China scholar at the Paris-based Center for International Studies and Research and a longtime friend of Liu.
The blunt, sometimes earthy Liu is not always liked, even by fellow activists. "He hasn't yet become the kind of inspiring person Mandela is," AIDS activist Wan Yanhai said in a Twitter post this week, referring to the former South African leader, also a Nobel laureate.
But Liu is rare among government critics in China for being well-known not just among the dissident movement but among the wider public.
"Across the spectrum, Chinese intellectuals and students have high respect for Liu Xiaobo," said Andrew Nathan, a professor at Columbia University in New York who once sponsored Liu as a visiting scholar. "The award of the prize … would be viewed by most as an act friendly to China."
It was not the same when the Tibet-born Dalai Lama was awarded the peace prize in 1989. Not just the Chinese government but some of the public were angry over the win by the exiled Buddhist leader — regarded as a traitor by officialdom for his calls for more autonomy for Tibet.
Liu first drew attention in 1986, when he criticized Chinese writers' "childish" obsession with the Nobel Prize. Two years later, he became a visiting scholar in Oslo, where the peace prize is awarded.
There, in his first time outside China, his writings became more political.
"Perhaps my personality means that I'll crash into brick walls wherever I go," Liu wrote from Oslo to Geremie Barme, a China scholar at Australian National University. "I can accept it all, even if in the end, I crack my skull open."
Liu cut short a visiting scholar stint at Columbia University months later to join the Tiananmen Square protests in Beijing in 1989. He and three older activists famously persuaded students to peacefully leave the square hours before the deadly June 4 crackdown.
"I remember clearly the difficulty and pain Liu Xiaobo and his comrades-in-arms — raised as they had been with the most radical type of an education — experienced in reaching this decision, one which only later was understood to have saved the lives of several hundred students," Xu Youyu, a professor with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, recently wrote in a public letter supporting Liu for the peace prize.
Liu went to prison after the crackdown and was released in early 1991 because he had repented and "performed major meritorious services," state media said at the time, without elaborating.
The bloody Tiananmen experience made Liu less radical, said Zhou Duo, a friend on the square.
"He used to be impetuous, but he changed a lot after June 4," Zhou said. "He became more rational and mild. He criticized the Communist Party, but he preferred having good exchanges between government and the opposition about politics and democracy."
Still, five years later, Liu was sent to a re-education camp for three years for co-writing an open letter that demanded the impeachment of then-President Jiang Zemin.
Liu emerged from that sentence in 1999 to find the Internet age. He resisted the new medium of communication at first, but eventually called the Internet "God's present to China."
Now, Liu only writes a diary and letters to his wife, which she keeps private. His family can visit him in prison, but they can't talk about his case or world events, and officials stand by taking notes.
His wife said the couple had never imagined Liu winning the peace prize.
"I can always predict when bad things are about to happen," she said. "But I can never totally believe that good things can become a reality." ♦
Associated Press writer Isolda Morillo contributed to this report.


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Victoria, Mahe (Seychelles) – February 26, 2019 (travelindex.com) – The news that Air Mauritius is facing losses was followed by a number of tourism trade messages between Mauritians and Seychellois and many were calling for more recognition of our Islanders. Mauritius has a very strong private sector tourism trade and they are seen as the saviour for the Mauritius tourism industry and for work for thousands in Mauritius. The private sector trade in Mauritius have been steady, strong and dynamic. This is why the Air Mauritius news was troubling when they have hospitality and tourism expertise right on their door mat. In Seychelles it is very much the same scenario, and the islanders who remain the backbone of their tourism industry often feel they lack the recognition and the needed support from the Government.
Both these islands have their islanders who are the pillars of their tourism industry and of their economy. They need to be more heard and they need to be respected. The news from the world news wire saying that "Air Mauritius slips back into the red' troubles the region and every islander of the region.
On North Island as it welcomes being part of The Luxury Collection of Mariott International
North Island announces that it is joining The Luxury Collection, part of Marriott International, Inc., comprised of world-renowned hotels and resorts offering unique, authentic experiences that evoke lasting, treasured memories. As one of the world's leading private islands, North Island is a unique addition to The Luxury Collection as it makes its debut in the Seychelles, one of the world's most desirable destinations. This iconic island resort is also the first hotel in the portfolio of the newly-launched A Small World Hotel Collection, who will oversee the resort's integration into The Luxury Collection brand portfolio and the operations of the business.
Ian Vernon sees the Coco de Mer imprint in Miami Airport
Seychelles has a world recognised treasure that grows in our UNESCO World Heritage Site on the island of Praslin, but the question today is if Praslin and the Praslinois are benefiting from their natural treasure as everyone else seems to be…
Ian Vernon recently posted this message on Social Media:- "Caught this fine specimen of art at the Miami Int'l Airport last month while passing thru on my way home. Bet all my Seychellois family and friends recognize this special bit of island history".
Air Seychelles to withdraw its flights to Abu Dhabi as it announces resumption of flights to Madagascar.
Seychelles is at the helm of the Indian Ocean Vanilla Islands once again, and the date when Didier Dogley, the Tourism Minister of the islands took office coincided with the announcement that Air Seychelles will be resuming direct flights to Madagascar. The Big Island of Madagascar deserves better air connectivity with its regional island nations as it remains one of the six islands of this Indian Ocean grouping. Madagascar has just had a change of Government and Joel Randriamandranto is the new Minister for Tourism. He entered office just as Madagascar was fighting a Measles outbreak that caused almost 1000 deaths and many more are left infected. The new Madagascar Minister is facing this new challenge bravely and we owe him the support and all the assistance he deserves.
But on the Seychelles front Members of the Tourism Industry and many serious Business Community members have been questioning the start of the Air Seychelles direct flights to Madagascar especially now with the Measles outbreak. The Business Community see the risks as being too great for our small islands that remain so dependant on tourism and many have said that this is not a very good idea. Seychelles is well connected to Reunion by Air Austral, a strategic partner for Air Madagascar and could be enticed to increase their flights to Seychelles with a better connection with their flights to and from Madagascar. How is Seychelles going to benefit from this .. and does any benefit if any not outweigh the risks to our already very fragile tourism industry as a small island state. Why therefore risk it for a biscuit! A very bad decision in my view and in the view of so many in Seychelles which is unnecessary.
This announcement of restarting the flight to Madagascar came just as Air Seychelles, the National Airline of the Seychelles is considering to discontinue its flights to Abu Dhabi, a tourist hub and one that is linking Seychelles to the World. From within the Airline many are confused and the tourism trade cannot understand the discontinuing of flights from a tourism source market to introduce a flight where we started and pulled out so often in the last number of years because of viability of that route. This link was a commercial one when Air Seychelles flew to Paris as it provided a pool of passengers looking for a cheaper route to Europe. Today Air Seychelles is not flying to Europe and this link is a point to point (Madagascar / Seychelles) and cannot be a sought after route over tourism source markets possible routes.
Destination Seychelles receives exposure at 'Le salon de Vacances' fair in Belgium
The Seychelles Tourism Board (STB), alongside some trade partners, represented destination Seychelles in Belgium during a holiday fair held from February 7, 2019 to February 10, 2019.
Held in the Belgian capital Brussels, over four days, the 61st edition of the 'Le salon de Vacances' saw the presence of about hundred thousand visitors, each looking for the perfect destination for their next holiday.
The delegation representing the destination at 'Le salon de Vacances' fair was headed by the Regional Director Europe Mrs. Bernadette Willemin, who was accompanied by Ms. Myra Fanchette, the STB Senior Marketing Executive in Paris.
Mr. Eddie d'Offay from Pure Seychelles Hotel and Mrs. Maryse William of Seychelles European Reservation, two representatives of trade partners joined the STB team at the Seychelles' dedicated stand.
The 350 exhibitors spread out on more than 33,000meter square in different pavilion of the Brussels Expo, gave the public a wide range of activities from different destination to choose from.
The 'Le salon de Vacances', above all famous for the information bestowed by tourism professionals from all over the world, reserves from now on new experiences for the visitors
Other than being able to reserve and plan their next trip, visitors had the opportunity to benefit from the wellness zone, and get sessions of massage and relaxation. They were also able to do diving initiation or discover unique flavors coming from the four corners of the world in the cooking theatre.
Consistent with past editions, the 'Le salon de Vacances', was a great success. The STB team noted with satisfaction that this year's edition recorded a good turnout.
The peaks of visitors was specially noted over the weekend which was marked as the most crowded and busiest days with the Belgians public coming out in full force looking for their next holiday destination.
Speaking about the STB's participation at the 'Le salon de Vacances', Mrs. Bernadette Willemin mentioned that Seychelles remains constantly visible on all European markets in order to keep the numbers in elevation.
"The STB office started the New Year on a high note, with its presence at various travel and trade fairs in the different countries under its jurisdiction and this includes the 'Salon des Vacances'. It is important for us to mark our presence on various fairs specially in Europe as we believe destination Seychelles still has lots to offer in the different market segments and for different holiday budgets," said Mrs. Willemin.
In 2019, the fair proved to be among one of the biggest national tourism show in Belgium.


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sem_destroy − destroy an unnamed semaphore
#include <semaphore.h>
int sem_destroy(sem_t *sem);
Link with −pthread.
sem_destroy() destroys the unnamed semaphore at the address pointed to by sem.
Only a semaphore that has been initialized by sem_init(3) should be destroyed using sem_destroy().
Destroying a semaphore that other processes or threads are currently blocked on (in sem_wait(3)) produces undefined behavior.
Using a semaphore that has been destroyed produces undefined results, until the semaphore has been reinitialized using sem_init(3).
sem_destroy() returns 0 on success; on error, −1 is returned, and errno is set to indicate the error.
sem is not a valid semaphore. |
(see pthreads(7))
The sem_destroy() function is thread-safe.
An unnamed semaphore should be destroyed with sem_destroy() before the memory in which it is located is deallocated. Failure to do this can result in resource leaks on some implementations.
sem_init(3), sem_post(3), sem_wait(3), sem_overview(7)
This page is part of release 3.69 of the Linux man-pages project. A description of the project, information about reporting bugs, and the latest version of this page, can be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man−pages/.
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Business Opportunity - Goldman Sachs, IBM and countless large corporations are leveraging open source to reduce costs, develop products and increase their bottom lines. Learn what these companies know about open source and how open source can give you the advantage.
Free Software provides computer programs and capabilities at no cost but more importantly, it provides the freedom to run, edit, contribute to, and share the software. The importance of free software is a matter of access, not price. Software at no cost is a benefit but ownership rights to the software and source code is far more significant.
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A Thousand Splendid Suns Illustrated Edition
by Khaled Hosseini
Hardcover : 384 pages
14 clubs reading this now
6 members have read this book
Now, in this lavishly designed edition of the novel, the narrative is enhanced by expressive photos that capture the people and culture of the region in vivid detail and reflect the book's powerful themes, so apt for our times: the passionate search for family, home, acceptance, a healthy society, and a promising future-regardless of the obstacles. Together with The Kite Runner: Illustrated Edition, the illustrated A Thousand Splendid Suns creates a beautiful matched set.
Editorial Review
It's difficult to imagine a harder first act to follow than The Kite Runner: a debut novel by an unknown writer about a country many readers knew little about that has gone on to have over four million copies in print worldwide. But when preview copies of Khaled Hosseini's second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, started circulating at Amazon.com, readers reacted with a unanimous enthusiasm that few of us could remember seeing before. As special as The Kite Runner was, those readers said, A Thousand Splendid Suns is more so, bringing Hosseini's compassionate storytelling and his sense of personal and national tragedy to a tale of two women that is weighted equally with despair and grave hope. We wanted to spread the word on the book as widely, and as soon, as we could. See below for an exclusive excerpt from A Thousand Splendid Suns and early reviews of the book from some of our top customer reviewers.--The Editors
An Exclusive Excerpt from A Thousand Splendid Suns |
We have arranged with the publisher to make an exclusive excerpt of A Thousand Splendid Suns available on Amazon.com. Click here to read a scene from the novel. It's not the opening scene, but rather one from a crucial moment later in the book when Mariam, one of the novel's two main characters, steps into a new role.
Early Buzz from Amazon.com Top Reviewers |
We queried our top 100 customer reviewers as of March 6, 2007, and asked them to read A Thousand Splendid Suns and share their thoughts. We've included these early reviews below in the order they were received. For the sake of space, we've only included a brief excerpt of each reviewer's response, but each review is available for reading in its entirety by clicking the "Read the review" link.
Joanna Daneman: "His style is deceptively simple and clear, the characters drawn deftly and swiftly, his themes elemental and huge. This is a brilliant writer and I look forward to more of his work." Read Joanna Daneman's review
Seth J. Frantzman: "Khaled Hosseini has done it again with 'A Thousand Splendid Sons', presenting a new, dashing and dark tale of two generations of women trapped in a loveless marriage, bracketed by great events." Read Seth J. Frantzman's review
Donald Mitchell: "Khaled Hosseini has succeeded in capturing many important historical and contemporary themes in a way that will make your heart ache again and again. Why will your reaction be so strong? Itâ??s because youâ??ll identify closely with the suffering of almost all the characters, a reaction thatâ??s very rare to a modern novel." Read Donald Mitchell's review
Lawrance M. Bernabo: "All things considered, following up on a successful first novel is probably harder than coming up with the original effort and Hosseini could have rested on his laurels in the manner of Harper Lee, but as "A Thousand Splendid Suns" amply proves, this native of Kabul has more stories to tell about the land of Afghanistan." Read Lawrance M. Bernabo's review
Amanda Richards: "There are parts of this book that will have grown men surreptitiously blotting the tears that are on the verge of overflowing their ducts, and by the time you get to the middle, you wonâ??t be able to put it down. Hosseini's simple but richly descriptive prose makes for an engrossing read, and in my opinion, "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is among the best I have ever read. This is definitely not one to be missed." Read Amanda Richards's review
N. Durham: "All that being said, "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is a bit more enjoyable than Hosseiniâ??s previous "The Kite Runner", and once again he manages to give we readers another glimpse of a world that we know little about but frequently condemn and discard. However, if you were one of the many that for some reason absolutely loved "The Kite Runner", chances are that you'll love this as well." Read N. Durham's review
John Kwok: "Khaled Hosseini's "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is a genuine instant literary classic, and one destined to be remembered as one of 2007's best novels. It should be compared favorably to such legendary Russian novels like "War and Peace" and "Doctor Zhivago"." Read John Kwok's review
Thomas Duff: "Normally I'm more of an action-adventure type reader when it comes to novels and recreational reading. But I was given the chance to read A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini (author of The Kite Runner), so I decided to try something out of my normal genre. I am *so* glad I did. This is a stunning and moving novel of life and love in Afghanistan over a 30 year period." Read Thomas Duff's review
Charles Ashbacher: "This book manages to simultaneously capture the history of Afghanistan over the last thirty years and how women are treated in conservative Islamic societies.... In many ways it is a sad book, your heart goes out to these two women in their hopeless struggle to have a decent life with a brutal man in an unforgiving, intolerant society." Read Charles Ashbacher's review
W. Boudville: "Hosseini presents a piognant view into the recent tortured decades of the Afghan experience. From the 1970s, under a king, to the Soviet takeover, to the years of resistance. And then the rise and fall of the Taliban. An American reader will recognise many of the main political events. But to many Americans, Afghanistan and its peoples and religion remain an opaque and troubling mystery." Read W. Boudville's review
Mark Baker: "I tend to read plot heavy books, so this character study was a definite change of pace for me. I found the first half slow going at times, mainly because I knew where the story was going. Once I got into the second half, things really picked up. The ending was very bittersweet. I couldn't think of a better way to end it." Read Mark Baker's review
Grady Harp: "Hosseini takes us behind those walls for forty some years of Afghanistan's bloody history and while he does not spare us any of the descriptions of the terror that continues to besiege that country, he does offer us a story that speaks so tenderly about the fragile beauty of love and devotion and lasting impression people make on people." Read Grady Harp's review
Robert P. Beveridge: "When I was actively reading it, the pages kept turning, and more than once I found myself foregoing food or sleep temporarily to get in just one more chapter. When I had put it down, however, I felt no particular compulsion to pick it back up again. It's a good book, and a relatively well-written one, but it's not a great book. Enjoyable without leaving a lasting impression." Read Robert P. Beveridge's review
B. Marold: "While the events in Afghanistan and the wider world create a familiar framework for the stories of these two women, it is nothing more than a framework. The warp and weft of everyday life, and the interaction of the two women and their close relatives is the heartbeat of the story." Read B. Marold's review
Daniel Jolley: "Khaled Hosseini has written a majestic, sweeping, emotionally powerful story that provides the reader with a most telling window into Afghan society over the past thirty-odd years. It's also a moving story of friendship and sacrifice, giving Western readers a rare glimpse into the suffering and mistreatment of Afghan women that began long before the Taliban came to power." Read Daniel Jolley's review
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The country of Rwanda has seen some of the worst violence and bloodshed the world has witnessed this side of the Holocaust. If ever a nation has been in need of God's grace and favor, this is it. In 1994 the nation was devastated by a genocidal civil war that pitted the Hutus against the Tutsis. In just 100 days during April to July of that year, over one million people were killed, the vast majority of them Tutsis. There were countless massacres with thousands of people dying ever day during that period of time.
When the killing finally ended, the nation was destroyed. The economy was shattered, the nation's infrastructure nearly ruined and the population decimated. And, of course, the people were traumatized, having seen former friends turn on each other, husbands kill wives and even the clergy willfully participating in the murder of thousands.
John Rucyahana is a native of Rwanda and, though he was not in the country while the violence happened, he was appointed Bishop of Rwanda shortly after it ended and has been involved in the aftermath. More than anything he has attempted to champion reconciliation between those who were alienated from each other during the conflict. The Bishop of Rwanda tells his story and at the same time tells the story of the Rwandan Genocide, the events that led to it, and the initial attempts at recovering from it.
The foreword to the book was written by none other than Rick Warren who is using Rwanda as a testing ground for his PEACE plan. In what I found to be a shockingly self-serving foreword, Warren seems to say that the value of this book is in showing how bad Rwanda's problems were so that people will soon see just how powerful his PEACE plan is. He says "The PEACE plan is a plan by the Rwandan and for Rwandans" but this is simply not the case. "When the rest of the world realizes what the church and the people of Rwanda are becoming in the 21st century," Warren writes, "they'll also want to know the foundation upon which it was built. I'm certain this book will be one of the classic texts that people turn to."
The text of the book is filled with the horrifying story of the genocide. To tell the story properly Rucyahana has to provide ghastly details, though thankfully he is as discreet as possible in doing so. The story told in the book's opening pages is the most graphic of all and is enough to turn the stomach and bring tears to the eyes. Yet it was the shocking, sick reality for millions of people. Rucyahana tells the story from within a Christian worldview. He believes that the best way to promote peace and a good future within his nation is to convert people to Jesus. And, of course, I couldn't agree more. Sadly I'm not sure that he preaches the full gospel. While he speaks often in the book about everyone's need for a Savior, I did not find a full, strong, biblical gospel message within its pages. His ecumenical beliefs, where he seems to teach that he and the Roman Catholic Church preach the same gospel, would make it seem clear that he must be taking something less than the gospel of faith alone on the basis of grace alone because of the work of Christ alone.
I was surprised to see that the book was not particularly well-written, especially considering that the co-author, James Riordan, has authored twenty-five other books and has won several awards for his work. It was almost childish at times. For example, "Several government people who helped plan the genocide actually claimed to be churchgoing Catholics or Protestants, but they could not have done what they did and had any real belief in Jesus Christ. They were more like members of religious clubs than real Christians. They may have belonged to churches, but their beliefs were more like those of Satanists." There are often short sentences and examples of almost childish self-expression. Perhaps it simply reflects the fact that English is not Rucyahana's native language.
I was pleased to see that Rucyahana did not shy away from discussing the involvement of supposed Christians in the genocide. I have heard, over the years, that the Roman Catholic Church was particularly heavily involved in the lead-up to the genocide and even in carrying it out. This book discusses some of those details and suggests that this was, indeed, the case. However, Rucyahana soon reveals his ecumenical leanings and is quick to portray this as a failure of Christianity rather than a particular fault of the Roman Catholic Church. Now, in the aftermath, he is working hand-in-hand with Catholic clergy in his efforts to make the Christianity known throughout the nation.
All-in-all, this is hardly great literature and, despite Warren's claims, is not likely to be a book with a long shelf life. However, it is still valuable in telling the story of the Rwandan tragedy from within a Christian perspective and from the point-of-view of an insider. I do hope and pray that God uses Rucyahana and other believers to bring hope and healing to this nation and to others throughout the African continent.


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This is brief introduction to the TAO Project Sea Air and Sea Surface Temperature data that's available through the KNMI Climate Explorer.
The Monthly observations webpage of the KNMI Climate Explorer includes Sea Air Temperature and Sea Surface Temperature data from the NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) Tropical Atmosphere Ocean (TAO) project. Refer to the TOA Project Home webpage. A Flash player overview of the TAO project is provided here: The TAO Story.
If you were to download the data from the KNMI Climate Explorer for the full area covered (8S-9N, 137E-95W), you'd note that data starts as early as 1980. But, like all datasets, the timing of partial and complete coverage needs to be understood. There may be TOA Project data available as far back as 1980, but it is very sparse in early years. The installation of the buoys was not completed until 1994. As an initial reference, Animation 1 shows the locations of available TOA Project sea air and sea surface temperature data for Januaries starting in 1989. It shows how sparse the coverage was of the tropical Pacific prior to 1994. So caution should be exercised when using TAO project data before 1994. And as you will note, there can be months after 1994 when data from individual buoys is not available, leaving incomplete coverage.
Animation 1
Keeping that in mind, Figure 1 compares Sea Surface and Sea Air Temperature data (not anomalies) for the NINO3.4 region (5S-5N, 170W-120W) of the central equatorial Pacific starting in 1995. As one would expect, monthly NINO3.4 SST is higher than NINO3.4 Sea Air Temperature.
Figure 1
If we subtract the NINO3.4 Sea Air Temperature from the NINO3.4 Sea Surface Temperature, Figure 2, the difference appears to be a noisy ENSO dataset. And it clearly illustrates that the monthly SST data stays above the monthly Sea Air temperature for the NINO3.4 region. The average monthly NINO3.4 Sea Surface Temperature is approximately 0.55 deg C warmer than the average Sea Air Temperature. Referring back to the animation, the sharp drop in 2008 could be caused by the loss of data in that area.
Figure 2
Smoothing the data with a 13-month running average filter to reduce the noise, the difference compares well to scaled NINO3.4 SST anomalies, Figure 3.
Figure 3
The TAO project Sea Surface and Sea Air Temperatures for the entire dataset (8S-9N, 137E-95W) are illustrated in Figure 4. SST is clearly higher then SAT on a monthly basis.
Figure 4
The difference is shown in Figure 5. Since 1995, the average monthly equatorial Pacific Sea Surface Temperature has been approximately 0.82 deg C higher than Sea Air Temperature.
Figure 5
And as one would expect, the variations in the difference between the TAO Project Sea Air and Sea Surface Temperatures is a function of ENSO. Refer to Figure 6, which compares the difference to scaled and ranged NINO3.4 SST anomalies.
Figure 6
The TAO Project data used in this post is available through the KNMI Climate Explorer:


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Breastfeeding provides a baby with many positive benefits, but it doesn't always happen easily.
When a new mom feels overwhelmed by the challenge, a lactation consultant can help, according to two breastfeeding experts from Penn State Health.
"We're here to make sure new moms can get to where they want to be with their infant -- breastfeeding with ease and confidence," said Nancy McDaniel, a self-described cheerleader for breastfeeding moms. She's a registered nurse and board-certified lactation consultant at Penn State Health Children's Hospital in Hershey, Pa.
She and other lactation consultants are trained to help new mothers establish and sustain breastfeeding -- even if they have medical conditions or are having trouble
Nurse educator Tara Schmid said getting the newborn to latch on properly is the first challenge. Schmidt, a lactation consultant at Penn State Health St. Joseph Medical Center in Reading, Pa., said lacation consultants help moms with breast positioning so baby latches on correctly.
In the first hours and days of breastfeeding, new moms often worry their baby isn't getting enough to eat. A lactation consultant can offer reassurance.
"Moms who bottle feed can say, 'I just fed my baby two ounces.' But breastfeeding moms don't have that easy measurement for reassurance," McDaniel said. "We tell them to trust nature. And for further peace of mind, we remind them that what goes in must come out, so they should watch their baby's pee and poop."
Moms can track that with a booklet provided at some hospitals or by downloading a free app, she added.
A lactation consultant's work can continue after mom and baby have left the hospital. McDaniel typically sees moms within two weeks after delivery.
"It's not always a one-and-done visit," she said. "I've followed up with some families in person five, six times and then had additional phone consultations to reassure them."
Lactation consultants can help with many common concerns, including sore, cracked or bleeding nipples, as well as clogged ducts and mastitis, an inflammation of breast tissue that requires antibiotics. Women should call their doctor if they experience symptoms such as pain, swelling, warmth or redness in the breast, or a fever.
"We see the moms who've been asking themselves, 'Am I the only person who's struggling with this?' McDaniel said. "And I keep telling them, if you were the only person with this problem, I would not have this job."
Ideally, work with a lactation consultant starts even before baby is born. Schmid talks to pregnant women about any medical issues they might have and anything that could interfere with breast feeding -- such as a previous breast augmentation or reduction, or polycystic ovarian syndrome.
"We can discuss and plan ahead so they're better prepared when they have their baby," she said.
It's not uncommon for expectant moms to be afraid of breastfeeding. Many have heard horror stories about how much it hurts.
"I explain to them that when a mom feels pain while breastfeeding, it's actually an important signal that the baby isn't latched properly," Schmid said. "We tell pregnant women that while they can expect tenderness the first week because of hormonal changes, breastfeeding shouldn't hurt."
More information
The March of Dimes offers more information on breastfeeding and lactation consultants.
SOURCE: Penn State Health, news release, Aug. 18, 2021


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As Catholic cemeteries, we recognize the need to support our families in their time of mourning. Our memorialization program can be an avenue to express the love, grief and faith of our families. Personalized products of remembrance such as monuments, markers, bronze memorials, cremation urns, flower vases and photo ceramics can say so much in loving memory and lasting tribute about a beloved who has died.
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Dead or Straight: The Conundrum of the Lesbian Coming-of-Age Story
How true, how frequent, is the "dead or straight" binary to the lesbian novel at large?
By Laura GoodeMay 2, 2012
THE STORY BEGINS LIKE SO MANY OTHERS: I was at a dinner party. As I chatted casually about my lesbian YA novel, Sister Mischief, I was met with an incisive comment on the state of lesbian literature, which I paraphrase here:
"Why is it that all lesbian novels end with one lover either dying or going straight?"
The statement stung me. Almost every lesbian novel I could think of, including my own, seemed to acquiesce to this dichotomy. I knew that there was ample work to be done in expanding the LGBTQ canon, but was it true that all lesbian stories ended tragically, and if so, had we really failed to invent more than two conclusions? I decided to investigate the issue.
Radclyffe Hall's 1928 The Well of Loneliness, called "the most depressing lesbian novel ever written" by critic Lisa Walker, initiated the tragic convention in the lesbian coming-of-age story. While considerable progress has been made in generating more hopeful narratives, the lesbian romantic tradition is nonetheless marked by fear, melodrama, and secrecy. According to literature, the Sapphic love story rarely ends well.
After 1980, the lesbian love story often interweaves with a "coming-out" story, adding what queer theorist Michael Warner calls "the special burden of disclosure" to gay characters' emotional journeys. Unlike straight characters, gay characters are charged with disclaiming their sexual preferences, further particularizing the queer bildungsroman as one moving toward, or moving past, self-disclosure. As a result, a character's self-realization as queer is seldom incidental to a story.
But how true, how frequent, is the "dead or straight" binary to the lesbian novel at large? Six books struck me as fruitful territory upon which to unleash the trope, representing a range of era, class, and cultural settings while maintaining a unity of theme. Annie on My Mind, A Love Story Starring My Dead Best Friend, and Kissing Kate are classified as young adult fiction, and illustrate a central love story. Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, The Well of Loneliness, and Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe are not considered YA, but do depict an erotic coming-of-age narrative. Be warned: As a result of reviewing the books' endings, spoilers abound.
The Well of Loneliness, Radclyffe Hall (1928)
No lesbian novel has earned a more contentious critical reception than The Well of Loneliness. Published originally in England to a Howl-scale shitstorm - London's Sunday Express launched a morality campaign against the book that led to an obscenity trial - The Well still ignites controversy. No survey of Sapphic tragedies would be complete without attending to the excellent queer theory that has underpinned their place in the canon, and critic Heather Love's work on The Well astutely emphasizes the novel's reception by lesbian readers: She calls The Well "the most famous and most widely read of lesbian novels ... also the novel most hated by lesbians themselves." In it, Stephen Gordon self-identifies not as a lesbian, but as a sexual "invert," a designation contemporary with the sexology of the era (evoked revealingly in Havelock Ellis's original introduction to the novel).
Stephen's erotic passage is repeatedly tragic: Born to aristocratic parents who desperately wanted a boy, and a father who essentially raises her as one, in early life Stephen lusts after housemaid Collins, only to be heartbroken when she finds Collins snogging a footman. Later, she engages in a brief affair with a married, bored American woman, which nets Stephen little more than being outed to her own mother.
Stephen is introduced to her great love, Mary Llewellyn, when she enlists in the Great War as an ambulance driver. Hall allows the reader to dare to hope that Mary may become Stephen's long-sought partner, only to dash those hopes on the rocks of Stephen's own investment in class privilege and social order. Stephen effects a kind of emotional suicide to "save" Mary by forcing her to marry a man who, in Stephen's view, can offer Mary all the trappings of civilized life denied to Stephen: "children, a home that the world would respect, ties of affection that the world would hold sacred, the blessed security and the peace of being released from the world's persecution."
Love describes Stephen's ultimate self-effacement, rightly underscoring her sexual martyrdom: "In a move that has deeply troubled lesbian and queer critics, Stephen seals her own lonely fate, accepting her role as martyr and tragic lover as she affirms the priority of this heterosexual union." Can we blame The Well of Loneliness for setting the tragic precedent for the 20
-century lesbian novel, for positioning the Sapphic narrator as a socially exiled outcast? Hall's literary prowess may, in fact, be eclipsed by inaugurating, to borrow another phrase from Love, the "self-hating Radclyffe Hall tradition." The Well, in its famous final plea, asks permission for acknowledgment rather than demanding it: "Give us also the right to our existence!"
Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, Fannie Flagg (1987)
Better known as the abbreviated 1991 weeper film Fried Green Tomatoes, FGTATWSC is laden with a folksy Southern kitsch that likens it more to the 1970s pulp classic Rubyfruit Jungle than the British civility of The Well or Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit. The story of Idgie Threadgoode and Ruth Jamison, co-proprietors of the titular café, is relayed through visiting-hours conversations between elderly Ninny Threadgoode and menopausal anti-heroine Evelyn Couch. Evelyn comes to rely on the support of Ninny, who points Evelyn toward hormone replacements and Mary Kay between long retellings of the ballad of Idgie and Ruth. Homosociality, if not explicit homosexuality, is echoed in these two central female relationships.
Tomboy Idgie Threadgoode, heartbroken over her brother's death, has taken to living in the woods, playing poker at wrong-side-of-the-river clubs, and communicating only with Big George, the Threadgoode family's hired man and resident magical Negro. Ruth, a family friend, arrives for the summer to exact a good Christian influence on Idgie, but the obverse is the outcome: Idgie plugs Ruth full of liquor and honey until Ruth is loathe to return home to the man she is conscripted to wed.
Especially because the Idgie-Ruth romance was significantly platonicized for the film version, FGTATWSC could be easy to miss as a lesbian novel. The honey, though, is the erotic linchpin of the story: During their summer courtship, Idgie impresses Ruth with a country picnic in which she charms a hive of bees out of a fresh chunk of honey, earning the nickname "The Bee Charmer from Alabama." Ruth is terrified as she watches Idgie retrieve the honey, then exhilarated as she tastes it; Idgie is cocksure and unafraid, confident in her ability to impress Ruth with one of her many "masculine" survival skills. The sexual underpinning of the metaphor could hardly be more traditionally Sapphic - vainglorious butch leads reluctant femme through her first foray into nature's honeypot. Idgie's self-designation as "The Bee Charmer" is reiterated, tellingly, when Idgie arrives to help Ruth leave her abusive husband, whom Idgie is later, equally tellingly, charged with murdering.
Ruth and Idgie happily run the Whistle Stop Cafe in a tacitly accepted domestic partnership, surviving the Great Depression and Idgie's murder trial. Saintly Ruth, though, is soon struck with cancer in her lady parts, and dies. Idgie goes on as a local phantom of sorts, and, in a wistful conclusion, is last seen selling honey by a country road. Overall, the novel undermines lively storytelling with a demurred reluctance to declare itself as a lesbian love story, connoting its romantic arc, sadly, as yet another shameful secret.
Annie on My Mind, Nancy Garden (1982)
Gay young adult literature hews to the coming-out narrative, often via unsuccessful love stories - which, to be fair, reflect the nature of most teenage loves. Nancy Garden's groundbreaking 1982 YA novel, Annie on My Mind, while certainly a cartography of the road toward self-disclosure and self-acceptance, distinguishes itself through the tender complexity of its central relationship. Narrator Liza meets Annie at the Met, recalling the mischievous stowaways of From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, and the two bond over a shared love of art and fantasy. An intense friendship emerges despite their class divide: Annie goes to a rough public school and her immigrant family lives in a shabby uptown walk-up, while Liza's family can afford a Brooklyn Heights brownstone and private school.
Before long, Annie and Liza are sharing furtive kisses at Coney Island, confessing their true feelings for one another, and trying to keep their burgeoning relationship a secret. "Mostly it was the closeness," Liza narrates. "It made my throat ache, wanting to speak of it." Liza becomes close to a teacher at her school whom she discovers is partnered with another female teacher, and the perfect opportunity to steal away with Annie arises when the teacher asks Liza to house-sit over spring break. The girls spend a halcyon week undisturbed in the house, playing at domesticity and having unprecedented amounts of sex, until they're caught by an administrator at Liza's school, resulting in a disciplinary hearing and the firing of the lesbian teachers.
Annie on My Mind is not unmarked by tragedy - after being outed to her entire school, Liza endures humiliating questions from classmates: "'I just wondered,' [Zelda] said smoothly, 'if you could tell me, from a scientific standpoint, of course, just what it is that two girls do in bed ...'"
The question is cringe-worthy, yet the novel's treatment of adolescent female sexuality is true and nuanced: Annie and Liza are both daunted by and fiercely interested in sex; they have it, and life goes on.
The novel concludes with hopeful ambiguity: Liza and Annie go off to separate colleges and don't speak for several months, but the novel is framed by a cross-country letter from Liza to Annie, and ends with an ecstatic phone call. Nothing is neatly resolved, but the girls' love for each other persists despite class differences, geography, and bigotry. FSG's 2007 rerelease of Annie on My Mind includes a moving interview with author Nancy Garden about the history of lesbian literature, her own autobiography, and the controversy Annie stirred in the 1980s. Neither death nor enforced straightness mars this beautiful, complex love story, securing its enduring position as a necessary and much-lauded cornerstone of the lesbian YA canon.
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, Jeanette Winterson (1985)
It's probably impossible for me to claim an objective critical stance on this text, because I love it in a way that feels deeply personal, and because, full disclosure, I lifted an epigraph from it for my own book, Sister Mischief. Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is Jeanette Winterson's 1985 masterwork of a debut novel, winner of the Whitbread Award and an explosive collision of sexual becoming, Pentecostal fervor, and the bleak landscape of Northern England.
In this reputedly autobiographical bildungsroman, we first meet pre-adolescent Jeanette listing her mother's enemies (The Devil, Next Door, Sex, Slugs) and friends (God, Auntie Madge, The Novels of Charlotte Brontë), then tells us, "I cannot recall a time when I did not know that I was special." Jeanette is an orphan who was adopted by Christian evangelists, and Oranges' parallel inquiries into sexual and spiritual identity, illumined by her lush, wry, deeply poetic diction, combust into a transcendent story that dallies with the mystical.
The initiation of Jeanette's sexuality is analogized to a walled Forbidden City: "The body that contains a spirit is the one true god. It is the nature of stone to covert bone. At one time or another there will be a choice: you or the wall." And her romance with fellow budding missionary Melanie is no less devotionally fraught: "I love you almost as much as I love the Lord," Jeanette tells Melanie. Soon after, their relationship is discovered and the women of the mission forcibly exorcise them. Melanie capitulates, renouncing Jeanette and repenting to God, and her family moves her away. After a return to the church's fold and the exposure of yet another relationship with a convert, Jeanette is excommunicated by the church and banished by her mother. "There are different kinds of treachery," Jeanette observes in a moment of characteristic incisiveness, "but betrayal is betrayal wherever you find it."
Jeanette's faith in the previous social and spiritual organization of her life is shattered, but the critical Wall has also been breached. In fact, the aforementioned epigraph from Sister Mischief arrives just as Melanie leaves, signaling the definitive end of Jeanette's innocence:
All true quests end in this garden, where the spilt fruit pours forth blood and the halved fruit is a full bowl for travellers and pilgrims. To eat of the fruit means to leave the garden because the fruit speaks of other things, other longings. So at dusk you say goodbye to the place you love, not knowing if you can ever return, knowing you can never return by the same way as this. It may be, some other day that you will open a gate by chance, and find yourself again at the other side of the wall.
Unapologetic, intricate, divinely embroiled, and true, Oranges makes a familiar outcome seem credible and inevitable. Winterson's hagiographic narrative of the sexual becoming of a brilliant young woman is the most surpassing lesbian novel of the last 30 years.
Kissing Kate, Lauren Myracle (2003)
While the lesbian narrative of unrequited love for a beautiful, charismatic straight girl undoubtedly roots itself in common experience, Kissing Kate fails to rise above the stereotypes that mark this source. When the novel opens, 16-year-old Lissa is mysteriously estranged from her predictably beautiful, popular, and boyfriend-ed best friend, Kate. Gradually, we learn that the unbridgeable gap is a passionate kiss the two shared while Kate (but not Lissa) was tipsy at a party. Lissa is curious but reluctant to discern the meaning of the kiss: "It was one thing for someone else to be gay. It was something else entirely if it was me." Kate can't handle it and clings to her boyfriend like flotsam in the wreckage, dodging Lissa's pleas to discuss the incident candidly.
Through Lissa's weekend job she meets Ariel, a free spirit who galvanizes Lissa's sluggish ascent toward Sapphic epiphany by trying to set her up with a male friend. Unfortunately, the length of time it takes Lissa to realize she's gay outlasts the reader's willingness to root for her as a protagonist. Meanwhile, Kate's refusal to confront the meaning of their kiss denies us access to the other main character. We never do learn much about quirkless Kate, except that she doesn't really love her boyfriend and doesn't want to talk to Lissa about that time they made out. Kate stays straight, and that's about all we get from the titular character.
For a book released in 2003, couldn't Kate display a more intricate, or interesting, resistance to bi-curiosity? Overall, Kissing Kate is a fairly vanilla coming-out story that spends too much time on Lissa's internal wrestling with whether it's okay to be gay and not enough on the external social machinations that might inform or complicate such a struggle.
A Love Story Starring My Dead Best Friend, Emily Horner (2010)
A luminous, funny example of why the 2000s may soon be known as YA's golden age, A Love Story Starring My Dead Best Friend features an epic multistate bike ride, a student-written musical called Totally Sweet Ninja Death Squad, a surprising love story that sprouts from junior-high bullying, and the poignant, relatable recollections of a taciturn girl who falls in closeted love with her best friend. A Love Story is a story guided not by conflict but instead by reconciliation; rather than lingering on death, it graphs a process of mourning. Horner places attention on process rather than event, a strong point of the novel.
Unlike the treatment of the same romantic conflict in Kissing Kate, Cass's friendship with beautiful, popular, boyfriend-ed best friend, Julia, is authentically, artfully constructed: "We were friends," Cass tells the reader, "not because we always had things to say to each other but because we could sit next to each other with nothing to say." In a story told half in the present and half in flashback, Cass and Julia plan a postgraduation road trip to California, Julia starts writing the aforementioned musical (my favorite number features the lyric "ninjas can divide by zero") and then is killed in a car accident, racing home to make curfew. Cass is quietly devastated, as well as alienated from Julia's theater-geek friends, who seek to put on the musical without her while Cass attempts to carry on her and Julia's planned road trip on her bike.
As the plot unfolds, an unlikely attraction crops up between Cass and Heather, a girl who bullied Cass for her burgeoning gayness in junior high. Heather is one of the most interesting antagonists I've encountered in YA literature - a closeted girl who teases out of fear - who manages to destabilize and then regain the reader's confidence. Heather also gets some of the book's best lines: "'Poems are not for explaining,' [Heather] said, her tone as bored and faintly scornful as his. 'They are for pretty girls to read aloud. Everyone knows that. Can we get back to Hawthorne now?'"
A Love Story escapes predictability at every opportunity: The beautiful, popular best friend is also a theater geek who dies; the mopey, thoughtful quiet-girl narrator is also an accomplished bike mechanic and fearless survivalist; the antagonist transforms into a new love object. The book's believable teenage dialogue, gutsy display of female courage, and deft, literate writing, qualifies A Love Story as among the best and most original gay YA of the decade.
As an analysis of these texts testifies, the tragic "dead or straight" binary of lesbian literature has hardly been extinguished. That said, contemporary authors like Garden, Horner, and Winterson, as well as a burgeoning number of others, are challenging this destructive dichotomy, treating common stories - such as the pain of falling in love with a straight girl - with the nuance, complexity, and grace they so aptly deserve. As literature continues to mirror the changing landscape of LGBTQ civil rights - which is to say, as more lesbian love stories continue happily in life - perhaps the real step forward will arrive with a lesbian novel that celebrates a durable and enduring love story. The author who chooses to tell this story will be entrusted with a massive responsibility: to model a Sapphic story of passion and commitment with the strength to endure all the slings and arrows of persistent stereotypes, and by prevailing, end them.
Keeping You a Secret, Julie Anne Peters
Rubyfruit Jungle, Rita Mae Brown
Tipping the Velvet, Sarah Waters
Ash and Huntress, Malinda Lo
The Bermudez Triangle, Maureen Johnson
Inferno, Eileen Myles
Hard Love and Love & Lies, Ellen Wittlinger
LARB Contributor
Laura Goode is the author of a collection of poems, Become a Name (Fathom Books, 2016), and a novel for young adults, Sister Mischief (Candlewick Press, 2011). She wrote (with director Meera Menon) and produced the feature film Farah Goes Bang; FGB premiered at the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival and won the inaugural Nora Ephron Prize from Tribeca and Vogue. Her nonfiction has appeared in BuzzFeed, Longreads, ELLE, Refinery29, New Republic, New York Magazine, Fusion, The Rumpus, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and Bright Ideas, where she is a contributing editor. She received her BA and MFA from Columbia University and lives in San Francisco.
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1: Introduction [and Summary] Vol. 2: The Conflict Helix
The conception of a world of understanding is then only a point of view which reason finds itself compelled to take outside the appearances in order to conceive itself as practical.
-----Kant, The Metaphysics of Morals III, "Concluding Research" |
And where is the will? Only noted in previous chapters, described cryptically as a vector, the will appears with no connection--a floating apparition above all that forms our tetradic structure. If there is any data of personal experience that is common to us all, it is consciousness of our existence, of our self, and of an exertion of will, an effort through which the self knows its power. What, then, are the self and the will, and how do they fit into the dynamic field?
These questions are not being asked just to speak to a common consciousness, however. An understanding of the self and will is a prerequisite to the all important question: Do we have free will? This is the ultimate question in this book, The Dynamic Psychological Field, for an answer determines our treatment of conflict and war and is presupposed in our solutions. For example, a determinist answer can only mean that wars, judging by historical patterns and regularities, are as inevitable as any lawful phenomenon, and that the best we can do is forestall them and try to alleviate their excesses. A libertarian (we are free) answer implies that history's invariances can be consciously broken, that wars are not inevitable and that a peaceful future lies within our creative grasp.
As my view of freedom is bent, so will my view of life, politics,1 and morality be inclined. There is no escaping this fact.2 Rather than allow this keystone question to be answered implicitly and perhaps inconsistently, I intend to treat the issue of freedom with some of the honor it deserves.
No doubt, this consideration will perplex many students of international relations (not to speak of social scientists). The question is virtually untreated in the field's literature, even though the free will versus determinist "antinomy" defines the fault line separating the literature of causes, laws, and forces from that of personalities, accidents, and events. The whole modern scientific view of international relations surely assumes nations or leaders to be in the grip of personally transcendent forces, whether it be lust for power, a need for security, geo-politico-military distances, or nationalism, and this deterministic presupposition defines the currently contending behavioral-traditional and realist-idealist splits.
So much by way of preliminaries. Here, it is sufficient to understand that I am treating a core assumption, and not simply massaging an idiosyncratic interest or mindlessly tucking in another one of those philosophical threads.
Meek young men grow up in libraries believing it their duty to accept the views which Cicero, which Locke, which Bacon, have given; forgetful that Cicero, Locke, and Bacon were only young men in libraries when they wrote these books.
----Emerson, The American Scholar, II |
Although analytically or institutionally partitioned, ontology, epistemology, ethics, and pragmatics themselves form a continuous field. Each presupposes or influences the other. Although I have tried to keep them separate here so as to illuminate successively portions of this field and gradually lead to an eventual comprehension of the totality, I have had to clearly presuppose answers to questions about truth, laws, causality, space, theory, morality, the Good, and so on, at each step. At this point, however, an understanding of my argument will so centrally involve an ethics and an epistemology, that I must make relevant assumptions clear.
Involved here is an empirical fact, an epistemological principle, and an ethical imperative. The fact, easily confirmed by scanning the relevant psychological and philosophical literature, is that there is an apparent general assembly of babble about the meaning, existence, or nature of the self, will, or the will's freedom. There is no consensus. Even whether there is a question is in dispute,3 and where it is argued that a problem exists, there is little agreement on the appropriate criteria or relevant arguments.4
How can one then strain toward the truth? Clearly, we face a crucial epistemological decision. Should we as scholars thoroughly survey all relevant ideas, compare arguments, and then cling to the most satisfying, rational, and empirical line? But where there is no consensus even on basics, where one is trying to decide among atheism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism, then obviously a preliminary and guiding faith of some sort must be presupposed. This is the old problem of raw induction on a grand scale. Belief must precede research; ontology must precede epistemology.
If there is no possibility of judicious scholarship, then why not select the most congenial views (such as that "we are determined under laws" and that "the self and will are mental stuff left over from obsolete faculty psychology") and then clarify the arguments for and against? This is the most popular course, and it is thus that we have our contemporary Humians, Kantians, and Bergsonians. But then, how do we choose the congenial positions and arguments? Must such a choice be an act of faith--in William James's sense, a will to believe? Not entirely, for if we wish to be consistent and ethical, two sets of constraints limit our choices. First, we are limited by the ontology we have already adopted on other questions. That is to say, the perspective through which we perceive ourselves and physical reality sets "degrees of freedom" to our delimitation of our self, our will, and our freedom. For example, if we view the world as Euclidean, then we will be limited to triangles whose angles sum to 180 degrees; if Newtonian, then our interpretations of reality must be consistent with an absolute time; if a Humian philosopher, then our idea of necessity in nature must be consistent with cause-effect as concurrence and not connection. The notion here is that we all work within a paradigm logically limiting our choice of any elements added to it. The best we can do is make manifest this perspective so that the rules of choice are clear to ourselves and others.
Our viewpoint on nature is our phenomenological perspective, our reality, our ontology. It provides the copula "is" to our propositions. That is a house; here is a book; our psychology is tetradic. But we are not only of an existential world. We also act within an arena of moral judgment and responsibility. Our ethical system itself comprises a perspective, one providing us with our shoulds and oughts. We should not lie. Citizens ought to participate in government. The rivers should be unpolluted. As long as we subscribe to the fundamental laws of thought (the laws of identity, noncontradiction and excluded middle), an ethical perspective also restrains our beliefs and arguments. If we judge that we should be held morally responsible for our acts, we are constrained from accepting absolute determinism. If we believe that all meaningful propositions should be intersubjectively verifiable, confirmable, or falsifiable, then the introspective self and will cannot be meaningful. And if we feel that punishment should only function to deter immorality and illegality, then determinism is possible.
The ontological and ethical restraints that comprise a person's preferred beliefs and values are like fields of balanced experiences, emotions, and thoughts. Each new belief or value must fit into this balance, be adjusted to, be reinterpreted to fit, or be rejected as inconsistent or incompatible The ontological and ethical fields are as psychic planes oblique to each other in psychological space; where they intersect is the line along which facts and values, beliefs and ethics come together. Any belief that lies potentially at this intersection must fit into both perspectives; it must suffer under dual limits.
It is thus that one desiring to be coherent and consistent in his beliefs is not free to exercise complete freedom of choice in defining self, will, or the nature and limits of freedom itself.5 For this reason one's trajectory through the confusing quarrels on these questions will be and should be bounded by these perspectives. We can only select our definitions and arguments within limits.
If we are not free to simply choose a congenial position on these questions or, as previously observed, we cannot objectively weigh the arguments for and against, why not follow William James's example6 and simply affirm our self, will, and freedom? Although an apparently satisfactory and pragmatic solution to the problem, this affirmation cannot be made without the very analysis it is meant to avoid. For the affirmation of self, will, and freedom should not be made if such a position contradicts our basic ethics and ontology, unless we are willing to reconstruct them.
I then come to this point. To deal with the self, will, and freedom requires a firm grasp of what I am about and the field perspective developed so far. It requires a constant attention to the whole framework being formed and the contribution to that whole that the self, will, and freedom will make. In sum, our selves, our will, and our freedom cannot be isolated from our perspectives and our intentions.
* Scanned from Chapter 27 in R.J. Rummel, The Dynamic Psychological Field, 1975. For full reference to the book and the list of its contents in hypertext, click book. Typographical errors have been corrected, clarifications added, and style updated.1. At its most fundamental level, radical and conservative views hinge on the free will question. Contemporary liberals generally believe that bad environment causes most of our problems. By compensating for and improving the environment, we will thereby be improved. Thus, the emphasis on welfare, penal reform, antipoverty programs, urban renewal, and most generally, central government interventions and bureaucratic regulation. As Clarence Darrow put it, is a man to be hanged for society's crimes against him? Conservatives, on the other hand, generally believe we are free to make ourselves and be responsible for our troubles. Thus, the dual conservative emphasis on freedom of opportunity and minimum government regulation and intervention (free market), and on law and order and fair but strict justice.
One cannot believe we are free and responsible and be a consistent American liberal of the 1970s; nor can one be a consistent conservative and believe in determinism.
2. My view is reflected in Arnold S. Kaufman's words on justice:
Suppose one reflectively endorses a conception of justice according to which a person deserves blame or praise, reward or punishment, and so on, only if that person's decisions or actions are not determined. Then one should define "freedom" in such a way that "P decided (acted) freely" implies "Ps decision (action) was not determined." Correspondingly, suppose one endorses a conception of justice according to which a person deserves blame, etc., only if his decisions or actions have some property which may or may not be causally determined by circumstances beyond his control. Then "freedom" ought to be defined in such a way that the meaning of "P decided (acted) freely" is consistent with determinism. It is our practical aims and interests which should govern the shape of our language, and not unreflected upon linguistic habit which should govern the shape of our moral outlook.
----"Responsibility, Moral and Legal," in Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol. 7 (1967): 188
3. For example, the philosopher Morris Schlick ("When is a Man Responsible," in B. Berofsky, ed., Free Will and Determinism, New York: Harper, 1966: 54-63) cans the question of free will a meaningless "scandal," a pseudo-question misunderstanding that we are both free and determined under descriptive laws.
4. This most fundamental disagreement among the most powerful philosophers (Aquinas, Hobbes, Locke, Hume, Kant, and Bergson) is clearly evident. The contemporary philosophical scene is even more confused with the addition of the current analytic and linguistic viewpoints. As cases in point, it may at least amuse, if not enlighten, the reader to compare the different essays in Berofsky, op. cit.; or some different treatments of the self summarized in Calvin S. Hall and Gardner Lindzey (eds.), Theories of Personality (2d ed.; New York: Wiley, 1970).
5. I am aware that these points and their verbal form already presuppose some answers to the free will question. The whole issue of choice itself would be meaningless under strong determinism or Bergsonian free will (choice is what we ascribe in retrospect to a continuous process of feeling-thinking-doing).
6. William James, "Some Metaphysical Problems Pragmatically Considered," in Pragmatism and Four Essays from the 'The Meaning of Truth' (New York: World Publishing Co., 1955); "The Dilemma of Determinism," in Essays in Pragmatism (New York: Hafner, 1969).
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The first stop was the Mitchell lagoons. To be honest, this location really sucks right now. The only bit of shorebird habitat was the narrow island. All we found were:
8 Lesser Yellowlegs
5 Least Sandpipers
1 Semipalmated Sandpiper
1 Spotted Sandpiper
a few Killdeer
The next spot was the Seaforth Sewage lagoons. I had no idea if there was even access to this place. The gate was open however so we drove right in. All the lagoons were very full, but there were a few scattered LESAs and LEYEs around the edges. The highlight for me though was a leucistic Mallard!
We continued on to the Hensall lagoons. The gate was locked and no trespassing signs were everywhere. We didn't want to be shot, so we continued to Exeter.
This was actually probably the highlight of the day. As we arrived, we saw a Vesper Sparrow flush from the road. After parking the buzzing notes of Grasshopper Sparrows were everywhere. Other sparrows seen here include Field, Chipping, Song, and Savannah.
While checking out the numerous swallows we were surprised to see an all white thing. I managed to get some shots from a very long distance with the new lens, and it appeared to be an albino or leucistic tree swallow. The day of abnormally plumaged birds continued.
leucistic Tree Swallow |
Also, check out this swallow. Unlike the nearby Cliff swallows, this one had a dark forehead, much like a Cave Swallow. However the throat pattern seemed more in line with Cliff. Can anyone provide any insight?
Petrochelidon swallow - Exeter sewage lagoons |
Petrochelidon swallow - Exeter sewage lagoons |
Petrochelidon swallow - Exeter sewage lagoons |
Water levels were high but there were still a good variety of ducks. Only a few common shorebirds were present.
The last stop was Grand Bend. Unfortunately there were not really any huge numbers of shorebirds like we expected. I saw my first Semi Plovers of the fall, and there were also a bunch of Solitary, LEYE, LESA, semi sands, etc. No Pectorals, Dowitchers, Stilt Sands, Baird's, Greater Yellowlegs etc. Quite dissapointing actually. The White-throated Sparrow was still singing strong, and we also had a bunch of Bobolinks near the entrance. A Rose-breasted Grosbeak and Eastern Phoebe rounded out the sightings. At this point the day was getting quite warm so we called it quits and headed back home.
Bobolinks - Grand Bend sewage lagoons |