Reena’s Xploration Challenge- To My Granddaughters

On 03/10/202303/11/2023 By Susan St.PierreIn In my humble opinion...11 Comments

I took the image and suggested prompt below and turned it on its head. As my blog’s primary purpose is to offer my views to my granddaughters, my interest is in their futures as truly strong women who believe in themselves. I would fail them if I suggested a vantage point, that I completely disagree with that suggests they should feel aggrieved or behave like entitled ‘victims’ of imaginary forces SO some may be offended. Hey… so be it.

The picture above seeks to capture your heart,
On terms now used more often to split us apart.
Women are special in their own beautiful design.
Their different abilities from men work just fine.
Equity tells us we need the same results,
It’s our diversity and efforts that term truly insults.
Our sizes and shapes don’t need to conform.
In Nature uneven potential’s the norm.
If you lift up a frog, it won’t learn to fly
Because all his value is swimming, that’s why.
Our potential is honored by being treated the same,
Not by deciding who gets a boost in the game.
Equality tries to promote sunny days
For everyone hoping to shine their own ways
But well-meaning people take an odd pride,
Thinking working achievements require a ‘ride’.
When fudging one’s gifts or in granting a perk,
Equity values no claim to your own work.
You’re not entitled to be all the same height.
It’s your equal chance to grow that’s your right.
The big no-brainer is we aren’t all the same.
Embrace your own talents for winning your game.
Equity enforces shortcuts chosen for some they enhance.
Equality promises you’ll all get a fair chance.

https://reinventionsreena.wordpress.com/2023/03/10/i-am-confused-ich-bin-verwirrt-reenasxploration/

Reena’s Xploration Challenge #255- Sacred Ideals

On 11/03/202211/03/2022 By Susan St.PierreIn Writing Prompts6 Comments

Photo prompt.

Image credit: Noel Nichols on Unsplash

The “Crimsons” had built their civilization on a yet to be mapped chain of tropical islands and it had thrived for more than 4 centuries.
Their relative isolation from the rest of the planet produced their most striking physical trait for although their skin tones varied, their hair was universally undeniably flaming red.
As legends evolve from partial truths, they had come to recently attribute their happiness and success more or less directly to this part of their appearance and now that once infrequent explorers happened upon them and had given them their current superficial name, they were embracing it more and more.
They were, by all standards, happily and productively ‘primitive’. Their children were raised by small community ‘parental pods’ each of which shared an identical cultural pride and common ‘spirit’ but this was incrementally starting to include a subtext of worship of the perceived magical property of their red hair. They also maintained excellent health and longevity due to ritualized attention to their diets and promoted, most fervently, the values of justice, honor, and humility.
They were ruled by a priestess who was like a queen in the requirement that she needed an ancient genetic lineage connecting her to former priestesses in order to reign. All had worked well until a necessary excavation for burial purposes revealed an ancient artifact. Priestess, Avea, claimed it immediately and refused to allow any ‘commoner’ to study it.

When Avea studied the ancient ‘time capsule’ she made a most unsettling discovery. Within the almost pristinely preserved contents was a skull. On the skull six long chestnut brown hairs remained attached and an ancient text in their own language lay beneath it. The text read like an ‘owner’s manual’ about a proper diet. It also promised their cohesive long-lived prosperity if they would adhere to the three principles of justice, honor, and humility. But nowhere was hair color mentioned! This could pose a problem to the newly established reverence for their common immutable characteristic and might just cause division among their communities who were unevenly committed to that ‘modern’ idea. Avea wisely realized that she held her people’s future directly in her hands.

On the third day, the priestess revealed her impression of the contents of the sacred artifact to the people in a speech declaring a day of celebration once a proper shrine could be erected to hold its content. She repeated the text but never mentioned the startling forensic evidence.
As Avea placed the skull on a pedestal in the newly built shrine at the start of their national holiday, she plucked those chestnut hairs from it letting them fall among the chaff at her feet. Division caused by any emphasis on appearance, simply wouldn’t be good for anyone.

https://reinventionsreena.wordpress.com/2022/11/03/reenas-xploration-challenge-255/

Let’s Investigate- Just a few Thoughts

On 05/30/2021 By Susan St.PierreIn In my humble opinion...10 Comments

Correlation is a relationship between two variables; when one variable changes, the other variable also changes. Causation is when there is a real-world explanation for why this is logically happening; it implies a cause and effect. So: causation is correlation with a reason.

There you have it.
A definition for the troubles afflicting our society.

The final word ‘reason’. Is a heavy one. It’s something a person ‘does’, as well as, the decided culprit or impetus for a result.
“I reasoned that the reason/cause for my lateness to work was the heavy traffic.”

But, can anything be honestly boiled down to a single cause? Well, reasoning further, takes effort and time. We humans tend to grab the closest correlation then carry on with our busy lives.

An investigation, that is, an intellectually honest one (not the political clown shows we’ve been seeing) might come up with other correlations to the the same problem of being late for work. Sometimes there are so many that a direct ’cause’ isn’t clear. Let’s take a look…

Things the person who was late for work might ask:

Was I up later than usual last night and, therefore, moving more slowly this morning?
Did I respond to my alarm clock the first time?
Had I laid, or should I have, laid out my clothes and made my lunch last night?
Had I forgotten it was a long weekend and the traffic was predictably heavier?
Etc. Etc. Etc.

The heavy traffic may have had less to do as a ’cause’ than the person thinks?
But, certainly, blaming the heavy traffic was something tangible and easier to concluded. It was so easy that ‘being late’ could be excused and forgotten.

When it comes down to it, there are few problems that can be reduced to a single ’cause’. I can’t even imagine one off hand. But in our modern fast paced world people need answers! The simpler the better. This has reduced us to constantly grasping ‘correlations’ as ’causes’.

It would be delightful if problems had clearly defined causes. We’d adjust or eliminate the cause and “voila!”… problem solved.

“Make abortion more accessible, and we’ll have fewer struggling single mothers.”
“Trump caused middle class people to complain. Get rid of him and everyone will get along.” (Hmm… I think they mean ‘go along’?)
“Open our borders and the World’s poor will be better off.”
“Spend more money on inner city schools, and those kids will be able to compete.”

You get my drift (and my political leaning) by now. So, is there something wrong with my reasoning, or is my voting record the ’cause’ of this post?

You decide, if you’re not too busy to investigate.