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Fighting the Cause vs. Fighting the Effect

We are more likely to be successful when our efforts are concentrated on what we can control than what we cannot. Spending our time focussed on blaming the consequences instead of altering the cause of them is more apt to result in failure. Just watch a hockey player argue with a ref over a hooking call.

When you drink and drive, then crash your car, what do you do? Lobby the auto industry to create vehicles that are easier to drive while intoxicated? Write to your congressman about the poor road conditions for driving while intoxicated? Complain to the auto insurance company about unfair rate hikes?

But, drinking and driving is illegal, and few would argue against that. However, even if it weren’t illegal, the repercussions would still exist. You could crash your car and hurt/kill yourself. You could kill someone else. Simply speaking, actions, whether legal or illegal, have consequences.

A 21-year-old woman goes to a frat party, gets drunk, and passes out. She realizes in the morning that she has been raped, and doesn’t know who did it. It is not illegal to go to a frat party, get drunk and pass out, so unlike drunk driving, she didn’t do anything wrong. The person to blame is the one who did the assaulting. To prevent this incident in the future, what do we do? Demand that no one sexually assaults women anymore? Increase the penalty for rape? Require that parties involving alcohol, women and frat boys have a police presence? The woman has very little, if no control over the actions of others. She has complete control over her decision to go to the party and how much she drinks. Does this mean she is to blame for what happened to her? Was she ‘asking for it’? No. She doesn’t want to be raped no more than a drunk driver wants to crash into a tree and become paralyzed from the neck down. But either way, consequences win.

A frat boy attends a party. He drinks too much. He wakes in the morning and realizes that he had sex with a woman, who also drank too much. She is still passed out, so he leaves. The frat boy eventually finds out that he is HIV positive. Must’ve been that woman at the party. Who’s fault is it? The government, for not providing free contraception? Those bible thumpers for teaching him about abstinence? Or maybe it’s Ronald Reagan’s fault for how little he did to battle HIV/AIDS back in the 80s. I think you get the point.

I’m not saying there are no injustices. There are. There’s no error in judgment in a decision to go see a movie, only to get shot at. It’s worth the time to fight the good fight and to stick up for those who are being victimized, or to show some compassion and humanity every once in a while. Note the differences.

I write this because it’s becoming more apparent to me the distinction between those who live their life in such a way that gives them a huge advantage against dire consequences, and those who spend their time complaining about those consequences and demanding what they don’t necessarily deserve. While either side may provide valid points for the issues at hand, the odds of success are less likely without self-corrective action and compromise.

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Iron Maiden and Alice Cooper: Old But Still Awesome

It’s not the 1980s anymore, but it would be hard to tell for concert-goers this summer as the hair bands of yesteryear continue touring and bringing in the crowds. At Jiffy Lube Live in Bristow, Virginia on Saturday, Iron Maiden and Alice Cooper shared a stage, because, dammit, they still play great music and we’re willing to pay money to watch them.

This year’s Maiden setlist for the “Maiden England World Tour” is heavy on Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, their seventh (duh) studio album which came out in 1988. For longtime fans, this is ear candy, but for the twenty-somethings who only discovered the band in the past dozen years as it put out four spectacular albums, these might as well be new songs.

Kicking the show off with “Moonchild” and “Can I Play With Madness,” Maiden sprinkles its Seventh theme throughout the set. The song “Seventh Son of a Seventh Son” is the climax of the theatrics, which includes a smoke, light and flame show that gives off a highly religious aura, especially when Bruce Dickinson speaks the prophecy in front of a Buddha-looking Eddie. It’s not just a concert anymore as Maiden transforms the venue a heavy metal monastery. They also play “The Clairvoyant” and “The Evil That Men Do,” but not in the order from the concept album, which would greatly confuse those trying to follow along (yes, I’m kidding, especially since they skip three less-popular songs on that album).

The Number of the Beast songs make a middle-of-the-show appearance, including that one about ‘666’ (what’s it called again? Oh, “Number of the Beast”), the rarely played “The Prisoner,” and “Run to the Hills” (a song awkwardly missing from their Final Frontier setlist two years ago). We should note that this is where the 12-foot Eddie makes an appearance, this time in the role of the white man.

Another crowd pleaser played (though hardly a sing-along) is “Phantom of the Opera,” complete with an organ and a masked dude playing it. There aren’t too many other surprises, just “Aces High,” “2 Minutes to Midnight,” “Iron Maiden,” “Wasted Years,” and the closer, “Running Free.” One glaring song missing from the set was “Hallowed Be Thy Name,” but they’ve played that to death.

Maiden does make one questionable choice: In Bristow, Dickinson gave an extended intro about the pitfalls of war as a segue into… no, not “The Trooper,” which everyone was expecting, but “Afraid to Shoot Strangers” (and yes, they played “The Trooper” afterward). The extremely slow intro was the queue for a noticeable chunk of the crowd to take a beer/bathroom break, while even longtime fans found themselves shrugging at the selection. This and the crowd chant-along song “Fear of the Dark” are the only two songs they play from the ’90s on this tour.

As for the 64-year-old Alice Cooper, his senior citizen status is hardly apparent as he plays such hits as “School’s Out,” “Feed My Frankenstein,” “No More Mr. Nice Guy,” “Hey Stoopid,” “Poison,” and “Billion Dollar Babies.” But it’s still hard not to chuckle when he’s screaming “I’m Eighteen!” No, you’re not, Mr. Furnier. He also somehow survives his own beheading.

Other older bands making the rounds this summer include Aerosmith, Def Leppard and Poison, Motley Crue and KISS, and Rush. Folks, see these bands while you still can, because any one of these decades is sure to be their last.

Here’s some video from Charlotte, North Carolina on June 21, 2012.

 

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My Interview With Bruce

When the Capitals fired head coach Bruce Boudreau back in November, I was a bit upset from the perspective of a journalist who knew he’d just lost one of the most quotable people on the team. So when I heard he was coming back to Maryland for a bit to hang out with Craig Laughlin at The Garden’s Ice House, I pulled some strings and landed an interview.

Generally when I do one-on-one interviews, I keep it short, but I knew that Boudreau is a talkative fellow so he gave me great answers and made things interesting in places where I didn’t really see a story ahead of time. I asked him about the Caps – he could’ve just said he’s stopped focussing on them and instead focussed on his new job as the coach of the Anaheim Ducks – but instead he told me he’d be crazy if he didn’t want to see them do well. That made the story.

It was also a blast just being in the same room with Boudreau and Laughlin and listening to them joke around. I then took photos of the two putting some beer league players through a rigorous practice, which also turned out to be a lot of fun even though I was just watching from the sidelines.

While it will always be a shame that Boudreau left D.C. before he could lead the team to a Stanley Cup, it was a great consolation prize that he was willing to come back and hang with the locals.

 

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More WaPo Bylines

Got a couple more articles on The Post’s website recently. Back when I visited my brother and nephew in Charleston, S.C., I attended a South Carolina Stingrays game. Afterward, I got to interview ECHL star Philipp Grubauer, a Capitals’ goalie prospect who was good enough to play in the AHL but didn’t due to their depth at goalie this season. While I was talking to him, he had a huge bag of ice on his wrist. Shortly after, he had surgery on it and missed the rest of the season. Regardless, he’ll almost certainly be playing in Hershey next season. Having this article on Capitals Insider was special for me because it’s pretty much the authority on Washington Capitals news.

I was all set to write a quirky Caps Outsider post about the Caps’ playoffs video, a pretty awesome production made each year, when I found myself having a long conversation with Caps’ director of game entertainment and TV production, Michael Wurman. After hearing his story about how a single lyric in a song almost ruined his video last year before he had a last-minute revelation, I knew I had a D.C. Sports Bog scoop.

Hoping to write more. Since it’s not really my job to write for the site (I’m in the IT department), it’s completely up to me to find the story and pitch it to them.

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The Mob Mentality and Illogical Arguments

When someone forms an opinion and presents it in such a way that instantly clicks with folks and makes them nod vigorously in agreement, there’s something to be said for the one who forms the opinion. Typically those are columnists, editorial cartoonists, religious leaders, radio or TV talk show hosts, news pundits, and sometimes even politicians. The Internet has given a voice to far more people who would have otherwise never had the opportunity to make a statement (myself included). But when the opinion itself is based on an illogical comparison or argument, and followers buy into it because a single point fits their cause, extreme ignorance wins.

The graphic above has gone viral on Facebook and a number of folks are wrongly applauding it. George Zimmerman, a self-appointed neighborhood watch vigilante who enjoys guarding his streets with a loaded gun and reporting ‘suspicious’ behavior, shot an unarmed child who was walking home. The Florida police let Zimmerman free because it was ‘self defense.’

There is no shortage of media attention on this case and it’s one that makes people want to play judge and jury with wild assumptions. And why not? Who would disagree when everyone is holding torches and pitchforks? Zimmerman is a Nazi, right? Yeah! Who’s going to deny it?

The outrage is absolutely justified over a shooting death of an unarmed child, especially when the trigger-man is allowed to walk free. I’m confident something will be done about this situation, despite those in the mob spouting irrational arguments, such as with the graphic above.

On to Michael Vick. A few years ago, he pleaded guilty to “Conspiracy to travel in interstate commerce in aid of unlawful activities and to sponsor a dog in an animal fighting venture.” So, he spent 23 months in prison. Because Vick is a big football star, people are quick to forgive, and even defend him. I’ve read a number of comments from supporters who say that it wasn’t a big deal that he ‘killed some dogs.’ Never mind that non-football stars are arrested for this and don’t get this level of support, or that Vick has pretty much admitted that what he did was wrong.

Why, exactly, are people applauding this graphic? I can only think that the point striking a chord with them is that it’s a tragedy that all U.S. authorities think it’s worse to kill dogs than humans. Right on! High-five! Maybe even: ‘Vick should’ve gotten no time and Zimmerman should get the death penalty!’ And, of course, people bring race into the equation and suddenly it’s the ‘white man who arrested Vick and let Zimmerman walk.’ Yes, I’ve seen that statement, too.

Did the people who are agreeing with this ever consider that the authorities who correctly arrested and prosecuted Vick are not the same folks who let Zimmerman walk free? Are they implying that it’s no big deal to torture animals? Are they saying that the Florida authorities should have considered the Vick verdict while deciding whether or not to press charges against Zimmerman? I’m absolutely confused how anyone who puts even a moment of thought into the comparison still finds it to make sense.

How’s this for a comparison? Vick got nearly two years for killing dogs but football player Donte Stallworth got 30 days in jail for killing a person while drunk driving. Did the graphic-making genius ever consider that for a Facebook post? Would the same folks applauding the Zimmerman/Vick graphic be moved by a Vick/Stallworth graphic?

To me, this graphic isn’t about how the U.S. judicial system is messed up. That’s a separate issue. It’s about how those in a mob mentality are quick to believe any point in the name of an otherwise logical and justified cause.