Smart Ain't Stupid

I remember, albeit perhaps through rose colored glasses, when being an intellectual wasn't a liability for a politician.  Shoot, I remember when having an intellect wasn't a liability.

We live in this incredibly dumbed down era, a time when even the basest of us have been elevated to the status of genius by "opinion polls" that ask people what they "believe" in, as though it has some bearing on whether or not it exists.

My favorite such poll was one on CNN.com that queried visitors as to whether or not they "believed" in evolution.  Sadly, shockingly, and stupidly it was a split vote.

I'm going to lay some truth on the internet here:

1. Evolution is real
2. Climate change is real
3. Natural disasters don't occur because anyone is mad at you
4. It's none of your business if two people who aren't you get it on
5. We really need to stop wasting time on these subjects

I don't think it's okay to not teach our kids things out of the fear that someone might be offended by the incontrovertible truth of scientific reality.

I don't think it's okay that a large and vocal group ridicules and beats down science with one voice and then demands science saves their lives when sickness comes calling.

I don't think it's okay that news outlets offer anything other than the facts and as near an objective story as humanly possible.

I don't think it's okay to hate one's neighbor while demanding love and kindness for oneself.

A well known and well respected politician died recently here in Canada.  His passing unified people in sadness, regret, and sympathy.  Whether people agreed with his politics or not, citizens everywhere respected the man.  He left a letter to Canadians that was both heart-felt and inspiring.  His last words in his letter were:

• "My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we'll change the world." - Jack Layton

Wise words from a wise man.  Jack Layton wasn't my politician, and the NDP isn't my party, but I am certainly proud to have had my politics impacted by a man (and other men and women) who aren't afraid to be wise.

The Following Things Are Not Real . . .

Ghosts
Paranormal Activities
Reincarnation
Astrology
Gemology
Crystology
Cosmology
Any Word That Ends In "Ology" (This includes Geology)
Intelligent Design
Transmogrification
Psychics
Head Cheese
A Cool Politician
Klingons
Zombies
Vampires
Werewolves
That Hair Appointment That Girl You Like Keeps Claiming To Have Every Time You Ask Her Out
Gremlins (Even The Cars)
Most of Holland
Wrestling (With the exception of the mud variety - that's as real as it gets)
Attractive Uggs
Hipsters
An Un-Delicious Animal
A Highly Educated Religious Zealot
A "Reasonable" Amount of Botox
Michele Bachmann's Penis

Pitchin' and Bitchin'

As the New Year cracks open like a ripe cantaloupe, I am committing to my new ethos - pitch, pitch, pitch.  As a professional and largely employed actor for 23 years, what I really want to do is be a cliché.  I love directing and producing and have long felt that is the place for me as I move forth into the next couple of decades.
So, that means pitching like crazy this year.  The end goal before the 12th month of 2011 is to have sold a concept, show, or script.  It’s interesting trying to make what is essentially a lateral move.  Twenty three years of experience in a given industry is more often than not a big plus when trying to move through it, but it’s not always easy to convince those that need convincing of that.
Hopefully this year will be rife with meetings and schmoozing, wheeling and dealing.

Gaining A Year

It was my birthday this past Sunday, and I have obviously since gained another year.  As per usual, this annual festivus is cause for some introspection, some reflection, and some cake.  Having consumed the cake, humor me as I dispense with some conclusion born of said introspection and reflection.

Approaching the big day, a very good friend did as all good friends should do and gave me a hard time in regards to my impending aging (apparently it all happens at once).  He asked when I would start lying about my age?  I thought for the briefest of seconds (I find that's how I do my best work) and remarked that I never lie about my age, nor would I ever.  You see, when I was 15, I was diagnosed with a very serious medical condition called autoimmune hepatitis.  Which is, as anyone with a medical degree could easily discern from the title alone, a disease in which my immune system attacks my own body (autoimmunity), in this case my liver (hepat) and causes it to inflame (itis).  After being ill for four and a half months, and receiving a diagnosis after a fair amount of jaundice and blood-letting at the very chilly hands of various phlebotomists, I was put on medication that suppressed my immune system and saved my life - medication that I am still on to this day.  Rest assured, my intention isn't to get all droopy here, or depressive, or melodramatic, or even a hybrid combination of the three . . . droopresslodramatic.  It's too point out a simple and long held belief of mine: age is a privilege denied to so many.

I will never lie about my age for the simple fact that if it weren't for my medication and the advances of science, I wouldn't be here right now.  I'm proud of how old I am.  I'm proud of the life I've lived.  I'm proud of how much living I've been blessed to be able to cram into these 37 years.  Furthermore, I resolve to pack as much living (or more) into my next 37.  After all, life is for the living isn't it?  It's this saying I think of when I read the more . . . shall we say dramatic . . . statuses on Facebook (or is that stati?).  It's a common theme for me, I realize, but when it comes down to it I think people should focus on the good fortune that surrounds them when they tearfully lament the burning of toast, or the dropping of glass, or the whatever of whatever that makes them scrawl FML.  Honestly?  To say f--- one's life over something so trivial?  I get it - it's hyperbole, but still - I think perspective is in short supply these days.

People will often ask online how I stay upbeat.  Well, I'll tell you - it's this.  It's everything I just wrote.  I stay upbeat because I remember how lucky I am.  Not just with family or career, in which I am incredible fortunate to be sure, but because I am here.  Because I am here to spend time with my family, because I am here to have a career.  My favorite thing to say when anyone seems frazzled, angry, overwhelmed, over-dramatic, or overtaxed is: "You are not in the Darfur, and you are not currently on fire.  Almost everything else we can deal with".  I realize it's an oversimplification, but the point is there.  I wrote in an earlier post that most of what we get so wrapped up in is make believe anyway, so try not to lose yourself in it.  This isn't to say I'm not guilty of getting wrapped up in the pseudo-importance of a moment either, but I try to regain focus by thinking about how lucky I really am.  There are people in this world who are literally eating dirt.  My life is just fine.  Help the people with the dirt.

As I've also written on here before, because of my medical condition, I have come to value and prize life over everything.  Not just the life itself mind you, but also the quality of that life.  No matter what you believe spiritually, we can all agree on this - you get one life.  One tangible, seeable, proveable life (not all of those words are real).  On that count we are all of us alike.  Having said that to take someone's life, or quality of life over a belief is about the the worst thing one can do.  Right now there are a lot of young men and women taking their own lives over other people's beliefs and the bullying that comes along with it.  Telling someone that they aren't natural or right because they don't live up to your idea of what is "right" or other is more than offensive, it's tantamount to bigotry.  Unfortunately it is also becoming State sanctioned bigotry when the lawmakers hide behind the veil of Propositions and ballots.  A government's job is to administer the workings of the country and serve and protect its citizens - apparently sometimes from other citizens.  I met a young man in Tampa this year who approached me for an autograph.  He wore a shirt that read, "Not Gay, But Supportive".  He couldn't have been more that 12.  I marveled at this young man and then wrote in his program, "The World needs more kids like you" before signing it.  Indeed we do.

Well, that's it.  Another terribly earnest blog post.  It started with birthday cake and sunshine and became political.  I am beginning to think that I can't actually write anything mirthful!  In the end it boils down to this: live your life to the fullest and let others do the same - heck, try to help others live theirs if you get the chance!  I certainly appreciated all of the birthday wishes from all my friends - Facebook and IRL!  So next time you get down about gaining another year on Father Time, remember what I wrote here and look at how lucky you really are.

The Show on richardiancox.com and the Changes To Come . . . Maybe.

Honest to goodness!  I keep promising to keep up with this blog and well . . . I don't.  Don't get me wrong, I love this blog.  It's my voice to the outside.  In many ways, it's my real voice.  It's that guy beyond the humor and the (alleged) witty (or is that witless) status updates on Facebook and Twitter.  It's the guy who's up for a fight to defend what he thinks is important and criticize what he thinks isn't.

On Facebook it's a funny old thing - you want the people who follow, or rather friend, you to like you.  Perhaps more accurately you want them to like the product that is you.  Let's be honest - I don't really have 1225 friends - I have 1225 "friends".  I like them, hopefully they like me, but I don't know them, and they don't know me.  I have long been contemplating setting up a "Like" page and asking people to gravitate in that direction so that I can somewhat reclaim my Facebook page as my personal space, but I worry that such a request will smack of ego.  The truth is that there isn't much that's personal about my current page.  The people I talk to on a daily or weekly or monthly basis - you know, the friends I actually know - don't post on my wall or comment because they'll wind up with 50 emails (to be fair 49 of them are mine)!  Again, don't take this the wrong way - I love that people out there care enough about me without having met me to want to take a personal interest in my life, but it is a surreal thing to have folks posting on my wall and then chatting amongst themselves as though it's a public page.  Of course, I did bring this on myself - I did open myself up, and many people frankly don't know that this is a personal page.  The tricky bit is that I do want to share personal elements on my page with friends and family, but I don't want to open up any more to folks I don't really know - you know? :)

This blog lets me say what I really think about the world without a flame war ensuing, because somehow commenting on this seems to take more time and the format somehow asks for an opinion rather than a snippy remark quickly jotted down.  A blog is something to seek out and not just an item in a never ending news-feed to "Like" or ignore.  As a result, I have been yearning to use my voice more (my inside voice rather than my literal one).  I do post the occasional link to things I believe in or can't believe.  I suppose I do this because I think people should see what's outside their window and also because I like healthy debate.  Of course, there isn't really much that's healthy about debate on Facebook is there?  I honestly couldn't tell you why.  Perhaps because it seems so quick.  As we scroll down the news-feed, it all flies by and maybe we forget the verbal middle finger we just extended as quickly as we forget it in the car from which we flip birds of varying degrees.

I'm a feisty, scrappy little guy, and I like to tell it how I think it is.  Frankly I think it's been driving me crazy to suppress my opinions for the sake of being palatable to all.  I certainly don't think I am the alpha and the omega of opinions, and am fully aware that mine is no more valid than those on either side of me (unless they're wrong).  Yet sometimes I need to stand on that soapbox and point out what I think is hypocrisy, yadda yadda yadda . . .

So all this drivel brings me to The Show on richardiancox.com - that brilliant sophomoric podcast brought to you semi-weekly, monthly, or is that annually by the brain trust that is myself and Sharon Alexander.  I feel that The Show should have a little more spice in the veins of Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, and Kermit the Frog.  I don't always want to play nice.  I mean I am nice, but I want to stir things up a bit.  Besides, good comedy so rarely comes from "nice" don't you think?  I don't want to alienate anyone, and I hope that everyone comes along for the ride, even if just to risk opening your eyes to another world without actually going over.

I don't know when or if these changes will take place, just taking that first step of putting it out there.  I think that generally the loudest among us get the most attention.  I don't want to be loud, but sometimes I want to push back at those who are getting too loud.  There seems to be more and more hate out there these days.  It's on our news channels, on our social networks, it's out of the mouths of the ignorant.  I would like to do more to point out that ugliness and invite people to hold a mirror to it.  Maybe The Show can be my little way to disarm this nastiness by making fun of it.  If you feel like it, have a listen and laugh along.

The More Separate We Are

Well, this is certainly the longest break I've taken yet between posts. I really do want to be more up to date with these things, and I certainly want to be less "heavy" with everything I write . . . but maybe not this time. To be fair, I don't think this is going to be quite as serious as the last entry - at least I'm not going to threaten any unseen force in this post.

I was musing earlier today about the state of my industry and more specifically the state of my career within that industry. The economy has obviously been a bit flat in the last year and a bit, and my industry has been no different. Looking forward, one can't help but look back. And so it was to the early days of my career toward which I cast my gaze, the heady days of being a very minor television celebrity back when cable meant a handful of people were watching, not the millions who watch their thousands of designer channels today. I often think about a very vivid memory that I have of one particular and rare day on set when I didn't have much to do and was therefore blessed with a day spent mostly watching others work. We were filming at a thoroughbred farm outside of Vancouver. It was beautiful warm day late in the summer and I was leaning against a fence watching the crew setting up a shot on the other side of the training track. From that vantage point I was struck by the notion that we were all a bunch of grown-ups being paid to play make-believe. Grown men and women (and me) rushed about lugging equipment here and there, setting up in arbitrary places to shoot random people saying made-up words so that other people could watch our enactment of a pretend situation written by someone else they didn't know. Millions and millions of dollars are spent on this form of entertainment when really folks could just get together and make-up stuff for themselves. It's cheaper and it gets you out of the house.

I think a lot about that tiny little revelation. Someone paid us to play make-believe. There's no real rhyme or reason to it outside of the focus groups and the pitches. Once you're on set, the director points to where he or she wants people to play make-believe, and then the director of photography points lights at the place, and then they film us pretending. No hard and fast rules (well there are, but I won't get into that). Funny old thing. I know I'm not the first one to have this thought - heck, that's why everyone thinks it's so easy to do (it's not, but I won't get into that either). I would, however, caution everyone to not get too smug about my revelation - you know, about actors being just a bunch of people who get paid to make believe . . . The reality is, that we're all paid to make believe when we get right down to it.

You see in the old days, we as humans spent pretty much all of our time just focusing on staying alive. I'm not just talking about caveman days either. During our hunter/gatherer days, we spent an awful lot of time hunting, and . . . gathering. Then once we developed into an agrarian society, we still spent most of our time tending our animals, tending our crops, you know - agrarying (not a real word). We didn't have time for much else. As time crept forward however, we realized that we could divide our labor, and the first specialists arrived, followed closely by the first referrals. With this division of labor, we could focus more on one job and make more time for our families and golf. With this division also came the barter system. If you give me some of your grain, I'll give you one of my cows . . . this one here, low miles, only tipped by a little old granny on Sundays. Eventually of course, the barter system developed some snags - what if the guy you're trying to buy that car from doesn't want a cow, low miles or not? Welcome the currency based system! I'll give you X amount of this unit of currency with an agreed upon amount guaranteed non-negotiable by the ruling government, and you throw in the floor mats. Brilliant right?

Of course, now that we had all this free time because someone else was going to provide you with your food at a cost, and that other person was going to build your shelter at a cost, you'd better fill it - probably by doing something to generate currency so you could have these things. But what should you do? You have nothing that these other guys want. They already have the means to provide food and build shelter. What could you possibly offer them? I know! Ringtones! And so it was that ringtones were invented.

Outside of the truly important things like food, and shelter, and health services, all else is really secondary - but you try telling that to my accountant. As time has progressed, so has our need to not only earn money, but to fill our time. If we no longer spend all of this time finding food and making shelter, and protecting ourselves from things with really big teeth, we discover that life is really long (if we're lucky) and that we have to fill it. All the better if those things make us feel important. Most of it though is arbitrary stuff. We speak languages that have evolved over time from grunts to grunts that represent a verbalization indicating a thing, to specific words to denote variations of things to poetic words that bring us to tears. We've developed letters and a written language to record our history. We've developed mathematics, and cultures, and industry, and huge scale economies, but nothing can really separate us from the fact that the basics remain the most important - food, shelter, health. All of these great advances could have evolved differently or not existed at all and we would still be here as long as we had food, shelter, and health.

We all spend a lot of time convincing ourselves that what we do everyday is so important and integral to the survival of the human race - if the Henderson report doesn't get filed, the world is going to END! We also convince ourselves that the way we live is so important that we go to war over it. So when my accountant is adding arbitrary notational symbols to determine how much of a certain value of a currency I need to pay to an arbitrary governmental system occupying a random geographical region I will try to see her in the same light as I saw that crew years ago - as a grown-up playing make believe, albeit a very real make believe that stresses me out every April.

We as humans have very much created ourselves as a species in so many ways and have created the confines we live in when all we're really doing is occupying ourselves as we take this journey. In creating ourselves we have also separated ourselves not only from our former ancient selves, but also from each other. We are so specialized, so separate from each other that we have lost the ability to really provide for ourselves at a base level. I remember having another revelation (I'm full of them) as a young man. At 2 in the morning, I distinctly remember sitting in my bedroom in my parent's house and realizing that I didn't know how a single thing in that room worked - I mean I knew the concept behind everything, but if I suddenly found myself in the past I wouldn't be making a fortune by "inventing" it. It got to the point where I understood that there was a graphite shaft surrounded by wood making up my pencil, but I was damned if I could tell you how they put it there.

Max Weber talked about the idea of the iron cage - the idea that our divisions of labor forced us into these cages separate from those around us despite giving us the impression we were free. The current economic crunch has illustrated this perfectly. People becoming homeless, physically losing their shelter because that very specific task that they perform has been reduced. That very specific task that fed their family, put a roof over their head, and provided health, was and is for most of us an arbitrary task of our own creation that is in effect make believe despite our need for it. I think this point is apropos in light of the health care debate in the States right now. Does one really want to hinge a health care plan on the arbitrary task that we carry out to generate income if the past has proven to us how untenable that task might be?

We're only ever as strong as that weakest link, and in a society of specialists, that link might be our separation from each other and our needs, not our wants. The truth is, we're all (well most of us) playing make believe, and that's okay. It's only when we let the make believe become our only reality that we find ourselves on shaky ground. The idea that our make believe is the only make believe can do very bad things to good people. We must also remember that but for a slightly different evolution in our cultures we may be totally different people who are pretty much the exact same people we are anyway - you know what I mean?

Why Gay Rights Matter To You

Well, here we are again - it's been another three months and I'm finally sitting down to write another blog entry. Every time, I promise myself that I'm not going to leave such a big gap between posts but then life gets in the way, and . . . voila, there I am - not writing! I can't imagine anybody is racing to their computer each day to see if I've posted something scintillating, but I do enjoy hearing from the few people who pass by and take the time to leave comments. So once again, three months on and I promise to endeavour to write more routinely. Perhaps after this post I won't have the thoughts and passions that thinking about writing this essay has weighed on me the past months, and I'll be more apt to write trivial, less thought provoking and more fun topics.

As I said, I have been thinking about writing this post for a long while now, but have found myself too angry to write in my clear head about it. In fact, I can tell you right now that this will certainly not be my most eloquent entry, but I feel the need to post nonetheless. The reason for my anger is the vitriol and invective spewed as of late, in the States in particular, on the subject of Gay Rights. I am by no means an expert on this subject, but it means so much to me because I have many gay friends, as well as a few people I am honored to call friends within the transgendered community. A woman who was very influential in my young life as an actor and whom I often refer to as my second mother is in a very long term same-sex relationship. So to are many of the wonderful people who shaped what kind of actor, and by extension, what kind of person I am, growing up in the theatre. These people are very important to me and I love them all, and let me be very clear to anyone who would do them harm for the way they live their lives: you hurt the people I love, and I will hurt you!

I am straight, not that that matters, but I mention it for one reason: as a counterpoint to the idiotic voices who bleat on that gay people teaching our children or raising their own will somehow turn them gay. I started acting when I was nine years old, which means I have been taught by people who live their lives as gay men and women since I was nine. I'm now 35. This means that after 24 years of close relationships with these wonderful folks I'm still the same person I was born to be. I am married and have two children. My wife and I would like more. My children have been around my gay friends and my wife's gay friends since they were born, the same way they're around our straight friends, and you know what? They question of everyone's sexuality hasn't come up! Because it doesn't, does it? In your day to day life, unless you're ridiculously crass, your sexual life doesn't enter into how you do your job, it doesn't affect how you order coffee, it doesn't make a difference to how you breathe. You are a human being. We all are.

I truly, TRULY, believe that love is such a hard enough commodity to come by in this world that no-one should have the right to tell you who to love. Gay or straight, two grown, consenting people should be able to love whomever their heart and soul tells them to love. People who have committed to spending their lives together - their one life on this Earth - should be able to hold one another's hand when they pass. They should be able to decide who their benefits go to, who their common children are raised by. Two grown, consenting people should be treated like Adults. The irrational fear of so many is so childish that it honestly boggles my mind. I just don't get it. Pure and simple. I mean, I simply don't see how it affects anyone outside of the relationship. I understand that there is a religious component to this hateful stance, but I've got to tell you - I grew up going to church. I don't buy this argument. I've said it before and I will say it again: homosexuality is mentioned only twice in this allegorical tome. Thou shalt not kill / steal / lie / covet etc. are COMMANDMENTS and no-one is protesting lying, or mounting propositions in California to ban coveting!

Okay, so I promised to tell you why Gay Rights matter to you, and I'll tell you. These rights should matter to you simply because they are rights, human rights. Why should anyone have to march to ask people to stop hurting them? Why should people have to fight governments to be allowed to file a common tax return? Why should people have to fight for respect and freedom in this day and age, and in a country as great as the US? I will say right now that the USA is better than hate, it's better than narrow-mindedness, and it's better than Proposition 8. I cannot imagine being barred from having my wife at my side when I slip into the great beyond, or Heaven forbid - vice-versa. My wife is my life, and one of the best days of my life was becoming her husband. Why anyone would want to stand in the way of that happiness for others in a marriage that has literally zero impact on their lives escapes me. In a society where marriage numbers are dropping, I find it beautiful and reassuring that so many are willing to fight so hard to enter into the bonds of something that gives me so much strength. Far from undermining traditional marriage, I think gay marriage strengthens a time honored institution because it speaks to humans' quest for meaning and love in a world that feels so devoid of it.

As to the human rights component I ask: perhaps it's gay marriage and gay rights today, but what if it's something that affects you tomorrow? What if the pendulum continues to swing and States start introducing Propositions banning cigarettes? Probably a good thing, they cause irreparable harm and cost the tax payer millions. What about banning alcohol? Fine, I don't drink so it doesn't affect me. How about a Proposition requiring people to submit to DNA sampling? Curfews? Modest dress? It is about your rights as a human being living out your one life in a country overflowing with wealth and freedom. I go on a lot about the idea of only having one life to live and the fear of wasting it because of my own experiences, but the concept is a solid one: you have one opportunity to live to the fullest, and any missed chances stay that way, missed. There is a great line in an Anglican creed that reads: "I confess that I have sinned by what I have done, and by what I have left undone." We all deserve the chance to not miss any chances. By that same token, to stand by and do nothing as others suffer is as great a sin as inflicting the suffering itself. I see my friends suffer. Not just because they are being denied something as basic as marriage, or because of the efforts expended fighting injustice, but because they are being told daily that they aren't equal to the man or woman standing beside them. They have been told this all their lives, and not only by random, hateful people holding up signs, but sometimes by their own families and former friends. It is embarrassing as a society to see this in the mirror we hold up to it.

I don't live my life as a gay man, but I can't imagine that's it's any different that the one I live with my wife, but as such I can't speak to the intricacies with any authority. I can only write this as an interested and concerned outsider. However I can certainly hold forth on the issues of rights, and I have. I feel that you're born the way you're meant to be born. What gets you going in the bedroom doesn't define you outside of it. I'm happy to see that the people who have been fighting for so long have so much more support today, and I believe that hate and narrow-mindedness are dying out with each successive generation. Eventually we'll get to a place where we look back and are shocked by how long it took for equality to be truly bestowed on this group of people, the same way we are to look back on the Suffragette movement and the Civil Rights movement.

As I said, I have two young children and am hoping for more. I can tell you that if any of my babies tell me some day that they are gay, I will take them in my arms, hug them as tightly as I can, and tell them how proud of them I am that they want to live their life as the are made. And if anyone hurts my little ones for that, I will hurt those people back.