1:29 a.m. - 2003-06-16
Sunday Sun
Father's Day and and a number of family birthdays meant a picnic in the park today. We met at the reservoir near the sailing school. Just west of there is one of the most environmentally sensitve and controversial areas in the city. Developers have tried every trick they know to gain the right to build on it, while the rest of the citizens of Calgary seem to constantly be fighting a rearguard action to protect it. It was the reason city council created a citizens task force that studied alternate plans for three years that would allow for adequate residential development with supporting transportation solutions without compromising the integrity of that area. I was one of the volunteers chosen for that task and it was a great learning experience.
Today it was a quiet oasis for the family. Walks along the river valley, watching the sailboats tack across the reservoir, listening to the horn blowing from the riverboat that is one of Heritage Park's features. In a few weeks the Dragonboat races will take place and they are a great summer favorite with Calgary residents. D, my friend who has the farm, competes on one team, and she loves it. She's also travelled to other cities to compete in their versions of it. I think one of her ambitions is to take part in one of the oldest and most competitive Dragonboat races that are held in Thailand, someday.
Talk was mostly light about plans for the summer and things like movies. Mel Brooks' "Blazing Saddles" had been on the evening before and discussion slid around to censorship and political correctness, as some of the group marveled at some of the script in the show. It would never be allowed in current movies because of the some racial references are now considered unacceptable. Discussion then turned to the change in standards as they pertained to comedy then and now.
I had had a conversation about this with the student who shares my phone at work last week. I was trying to explain why the Smothers Brothers were the TV censors worst nightmare for about a decade, even though they never said anything crude or racist. Political satire at its finest during a time when the government of the day feared it greatly. It was difficult, because she was an infant and didn't recall them or Laugh in, which was The comedy show of the time, of course. I was explaining that one of the reasons we watched it was to see how many jokes the Brothers could slip past the censors before they were bleeped and the fact that there was a time when there was a timed delay between their routine and its broadcast on air, so that the censors could clamp down on what they viewed as almost treasonous talk. It wasn't - it was freedom of speech, but that was a moot point at that time.
Even harder for her to absorb was that a comic could be jailed for obscenity in the '60's. I couldn't recall much about Timothy Leary, because he was before I was really conscious of such issues - all I recalled was that I was told he was bad because he said bad words. Easier to discuss were Cheech and Chong's routines and George Carlin - especially his monologue on the seven words one couldn't say on TV. We did a bit of a comparison of what was considered offensive then and what is censored now. Almost a 360 degree turnaround in some cases, with obscenity seeming to be the common place now, while jokes based on race and faith that were standards 30 years ago are now considered offensive.
Even odder is the type of censorship that now occurs around language in children's books here. One day I was at a forum on literacy and another mom and I were commenting that our favorite author as children had been Louisa May Alcott - the daughter of an American minister. The first whole book I read was handed to me by my Dad when I was just finishing grade one, with his comment that it had been his favorite book when he was little. It was "Little Men" and I loved it so much, that I devoured as many of her books as I could that summer break. The character Jo and I could have been twins in a lot of ways. The stories had a powerful impact on my view of morality and humanity - "Eight Cousins" especially.
Yet, while this other mom and I were discussing those books, a librarian nearby threw up her hands in horror and said they had pulled all the books like that off the shelves and replaced them with more appropriate material for today's kids. The other mom and I looked at each other blankly and asked what she meant by that. She said they now counted how many "foreign" words and references were contained in a book and withdrew them from the shelves because they were too hard for children to understand. Remembering that I had read and understood most of the stories when I was six, I asked what "foreign" words and concepts she was referring to. She said that words like fortnight (2 weeks) and a stone (20 pounds) along with references to classical Greek and Roman legends were unacceptable in children's literature. Hmmmm... so that means you've pulled Shakespeare, Dickens, Victor Hugo, Mark Twain etc because they used the Queen's English? Yes. Besides Shakespeare and Twain are racist. You know the portrayal of Jim in Huckleberry Finn and Joan of Arc in Henry VI? I asked her if she had checked out the Bible or the Quran lately and left it at that.
Anyway, a couple of hours out in the hot sun had us all a bit burnt around the edges, so we headed over to check out my sister's new home. It was very nice inside but I really loved the garden. The owners before them had obviously been very skilled and knowledgeable about their hobby. The front yard is a massive rock garden full of native plants, while the backyard was part vegetable garden and part English garden. I recognized a lot of herbs right away and explained how to use them for various purposes. I'll have to pull out some of my herbal books for my sister to work with for a while.
Headed back home. The boys headed off for dinner with their Dad. I had a nap and then just did my exercises. Enough excitement for one day, but a good break. Bakc to work tomorrow.
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