Archive for the 'shibai' Category

Primaries, Reflections From 2004

Friday, April 25th, 2008

For what its worth, I thought I’d make it a point to make more regular posts at least for my crazy finals prep week(s) It sort of allows a mental break from reading case law. I’ve been fortunate enough to have a few days advanced leave from work due to my trip going over the weekend. I usually plan to take some leave around this time of year months in advance, but it seems like more often than any extra time to prepare is welcomed.

Occasionally I browse past the archives of this journal to see what I was thinking, 6 months ago, one year ago, 4 years ago, etc. It’s pretty amazing how much I was following the primaries back in 2004, and how little I’ve written about them this year. It’s not that I haven’t been following them any less, more or less its because I think I’m a bit wiser or at least more cynical maybe about the entire process in general. I’ve already been following a candidate, for those who know me well enough, and have been watching the debates should know exactly who that person is. Back in 2004 I was following Howard Dean’s run at the Democratic nomination and was pretty disappointed when and especially how he fell behind the eventual nominee John Kerry. The fall of Dean really spoke to me about the power of the media to phrase and showcase a candidate’s strengths and flaws. I remember hearing the “Dean Scream” and not thinking much of it until it was blasted all over the TV as indicative of his un-electability.

This time around the candidate that I’m supporting speaks to a lot of beliefs and opinions that I’ve held ever since I was very young, but couldn’t quite identify them fully, mostly due to the black/white blue-state/red-state, good/evil mentality that live in today. I’d say that since 2004 I’ve had kind of a gradual revelation of sorts driven by working in the real world, some self reflection/observation and just keeping an eye on the events around the world. I also think my decision to study the law has a big thing to do with it as well. Some of the things that I’ve realized especially in this past year are illustrative to the conversations and occasional differences in philosophy I may have had with a certain student organization I was invested in college, late night debates with my fellow La Follette classmates, and more recently, employee groups at work. Even as far back as high school and grade school I think some of these beliefs were at work and I didn’t even know it.

Short disclaimer, for what its worth, I’m not endorsing a vote for any candidate for president, as far as I’m concerned you all can and should vote for however you feel is best person for the job. I do urge that you take the time to research the candidates out and make an educated choice, as hard as it is to see through the spin and sound bites and propaganda that is what we now call the main stream media, just exercise some of that free thinking ability that we all have as human beings. With the uncertainty that the country is facing in these upcoming 4-8 years, I think this last primary push and convention season leading up to November will be a very important one.

Looking back to my political compass and mindset from the last presidential election a couple things haven’t changed at all. I’m still looking for a truly anti-war candidate, pro-civil liberties, and pro-fiscal responsibility and pro-social responsibility. What has changed since 2004 is my opinion on the way to achieve populist goals, and to what extent the “noise” in the political discussion has confused us to which party or which ideology promotes the values that I believe in. Sometimes its better to keep a healthy level of skepticism whenever ideas are reduced to sound bites and one-liners. The party who speaks about limited government in actuality becomes the big government spenders, the party of civil liberties becomes the party of pro-war party, and the party of warrant-less domestic spying.

Posted in economics, law school, politics, random, shibai, wonkish policy stuff | No Comments »

Pick up the pieces and move on

Tuesday, May 8th, 2007

Got done with a Trust and Estates exam last night and just got up from my first 6 hours of sleep in about a month. I feel a lot better about this one compared to my first exam, given the amount of material I was able to review in a short amount of time. Although with any of these exams you really have no idea how you did until you get the grades. one more to go, but its a take home and is due a a few days. Just have to stay focused and theres a light at the end of the tunnel. It really has been a perfect storm these past few weeks, month even, it seems like work, school, personal life, and more and more all comes at once and you just have to deal with it. Still not pau yet, but I’m still standing I guess.

The symbolic dreams are back again. A few nights ago I had one where I was holding the door to my apartment shut with my back, because there was a constant wind blowing it open and I couldn’t get it to shut completely and stay shut. After a while of this I noticed that there was a side door/cabinet that I had never seen before. While still holding the first door shut I opened the side cabinet which revealed a bunch of pipes like an old radiator and a tiny hallway leading away from where I was standing. once I opened the cabinet the wind seemed to be somewhat diverted enough that I was able to close the door. I wondered what was down that hallway. Part of the significance is that this is one of the few dreams that I’ve had in my apartment up in DC. new sense of home, maybe, and all of the symbolism that comes with it.

Last night I had another where I was back home in Hawaii, many years in the future. I had rode the rail line that they are supposedly planning on building and I was either down in Waikiki or by Kaka’ako, down by the water in some kind of a tourist trap. There were a lot of boats in a shallow harbor and I was watching an old local man going fishing with a bunch of tourists standing around, yapping and eating lunch. For a while I was distracted with the tourist’s conversations, a few of them started talking to me. I noticed the old man caught a medium sized fish by snagging the hook on the side of the fish and pulled it up. Immediately the fish started growing bigger and bigger, with its teeth widening alongside its mouth. I noticed that the tourists were both frightened and intrigued.

As the man pulled up the fish he quietly was talking to it as he removed the hook, and then gently put it back in the water, rubbed its belly and the fish grunted back at him like a dog. Then it swam along the water on its way. the old man then jumped in the water and somehow was able to tread alongside the fish by moving his feet, gliding through the water at his ankles. They were like two old friends who hadn’t seen each other in a long time. The violence of the hook snagging the fish was necessary to restart their acquaintances and then they could go along their way. I noticed that the tourists of course were not noticing any of this. A bunch of them came and asked me which rail line to catch to manoa or someplace, and I told them that I wasn’t as familiar with exactly how the rail line works, despite being from there originally.

Jump either earlier or later in the dream I was back at an old work place, I was talking to a bunch of people I hadn’t seen in years, but they recognized me. I was going there to get a copy of a record or something, and ended up walking around the place. apparently they had remodeled and made part of it a bank.

2007_0529WashDC0524.JPG

Posted in dreams, law school, life in general, random, shibai | No Comments »

Colonial mentality, USA Today and Continuing Discussion on Hate Crimes in Hawaii

Thursday, March 22nd, 2007

I came across this article today about the sentencing hearing for one of the six crimes that occurred in Hawaii in 2006 that were classified as hate crimes. This time it involved a good intentioned bystander coming to the rescue of what he thought was animal abuse. The dreaded H-word was thrown about while the local defendant, his nephew and his son beat up the victim. It reminded me to follow up on my earlier post on the assault and battery that occurred in a Waikele parking lot back home, that was characterized as “racially motivated” by USA today article, and a continued conversation with my wingnut, self-proclaimed “conservative” friend about race relations in Hawaii. After reading what I had sent to him, I realized that it might be worth posting the gist of our exchange below. A few observations I had on this case that I forwarded to my friend along with the article:

1) “Given the limited facts presented, doesn’t this sound similar to the parking lot incident? Why is this a hate crime and the parking lot incident is not?”
2) “I still don’t think this should be a hate crime either just because of the added use of racially charged words, this is an open and shut assault and battery case.”
3) “Doesn’t this inconsistency of applying the hate crime statute highlight my earlier point about the difficulties of applying hate crimes legislation based on words alone?”
4) “Isn’t 1 year kind of short sentence for a “hate crime” that we are seem to be going out of our way in punishing?”

I found his responses to the article typically short, oversimplified, but interesting nonetheless. First he declined to address the crux of my argument that hate crimes based on words alone are very problematic to characterize, and really classify, especially in a multi-ethnic setting such as Hawaii. Then he went on to comment that only minorities gang-jump victims, and are without honor or respect, and that this epidemic of hate crimes (6 out of 8,000 nationally for 2006) back home as an example of how Hawaii needs a dose of their own “Aloha Spirit” instead of imposing their brand of multiculturalism to the mainland.

His statements overall I wasn’t too surprised with, but I think illustrate the misconceptions and downright ignorance that Americans have with Hawaii in general, especially my immediate reactions which were captured in my responses to him:

“I think it is totally elitist to associate gang jumping as somehow characteristic of minority communities only. It’s not like minorities are the only ones that roam in packs, think about all the times we’ve seen all those fights down state street at bar time. Gang-jumping is really a standard tactic used by military and law enforcement to subdue an enemy/suspect. Don’t forget the history (and definition) of lynching in America.”

“I agree with you that respect and honor seems to be lacking in our present society, but I think I disagree with you on the root cause, which I think you’re implying that minorities lack respect and honor due to their culture or values. I think your point (and general admission of holding elitist points of view) actually raises another very good question: To what extent do you think that elitism or polarization of groups that individuals identify with is contributing to the lack of respect and honor in our society?”

“do the math. 6 hate crimes is a tiny share of the national hate crime statistic even with the state with a population of 1.5M. Lets just estimate, saying that there are 260M people in the US, and 8,000 hate crimes in 2006, that would mean that a state with 1.5M should have about 46 hate crimes. 6 is a lot less than 46.”

“I’ll agree with you about the aloha spirit if you mean being more open and respectful of people of different cultures, and resolving conflicts non-violently. But again, your statement still demonstrates a limited understanding of race relations in Hawaii. A few isolated assaults where racially charged words were exchanged does not indicate a culture’s failure at race relations - take the statutory application of the hate crime, for all of 2006, Hawaii has only 6 of the 8,000+ hate crimes reported/charged nationally. I think the rest of the U.S. could use more “aloha spirit” as a whole as opposed to Hawaii. These types of crimes are being committed all the time out here, and with more extreme racial overtones and more serious outcomes. What is getting all the attention is the fact that the races of the victims are reversed - in these two cases the victims Haole, and the aggressors are “minorities” by U.S. classifications of race - usually on the mainland its the other way around.”

In trying to end on a lighter side I also shared a link to a related cartoon in the Honolulu Weekly resident cartoonist and provided this sidebar:

“This raises an important nuance abut the term “Haole” by the way the USA today article used it, a cold reader might think that it is a derogatory word, like the N-word or something. In reality it is used in the newspaper all the time, in fact most people will use the word to describe themselves in ethnic terms. Language, meaning and culture in Hawaii is especially contextual - a big guy charging down the beach yelling “F-ing Haole” is obviously a different context than someone writing a newspaper article about the governor or Captain Cook, or Father Damien.”

Linkes for 3/22/2007
VA hospitals deteriorating
Medical research on herbal treatments
Why Conservatives Can’t Govern or just aren’t cut out for it
Be on the lookout for predators in School
One incident the kid gets shot in the head
Casey Serin in a nutshell

Posted in ethnic studies, hawaii, life in hawaii, politics, shibai | 3 Comments »