Making an Atheist (Part 1)

     Once upon a time a young man and woman fell in love and decided to get married. There was no impediment to their union, but they were from two different religions. He was Roman Catholic, and she was Presbyterian. Due to the traditions and dogmatic restriction of the Catholic Church, in order for them to wed "in the church," the woman had to sign a binding contract agreeing to raise any children born to the couple as Catholic. The bride did not hesitate because marrying the man she loved was the only consideration, and besides, his family were devout and regular churchgoers. Her religion was not central in her life anyway, though she did enjoy going, whether or not she knew what, or if she believed.
     The couple married and two  years later welcomed a bouncing baby boy. A year later, a little girl was born. As promised, the two were raised Catholic. They attended catechism and learnt the beliefs and dogma of the church. They made their first confessions and "first holy communion."  They did not however, attend church on a regular basis because their father, in order to avoid the wrath of his own mother had been lying about his attendance before his marriage. He wasn't really going to mass, and really didn't buy into the dogma or creeds of the church, but rather ditched on Sundays and went to work, or out with friends instead. This man saw the church as a scam, always looking to weasel him out of ever more of his hard-earned money. He did not hold these views back from his children.
     As the two children progressed through catechism, the boy, a highly intelligent and thoughtful lad, became skeptical about what he was being taught. He recognized inconsistencies and the many illogical leaps he would have to make in order to actually accept the teachings of the nuns and priests. He raised such questions, which were not only discouraged, but were met with scorn and criticism. Though he grew to despise the entire process, and broached the issue with his parents, he ultimately did as he was told and made his confirmation along with his sister, who more readily believed what she was taught without question.
     During the time of their indoctrination, another child was born into the family. The little girl was 7 1/2 years younger than her sister and 8 1/2 years younger than her brother. She was four when she watched her older siblings don robes and make their confirmations. They both happened to be ill on the day they were confirmed. but their parents made them attend the ceremony which, by all accounts was more to please their paternal grandmother, who was the "holy roller" of the family and expected all of her grandchildren to become good Catholics.
     After the duty of seeing the eldest children confirmed, church attendance became increasingly sporadic, so the youngest was mostly exposed to mass on holidays. The little one always looked forward to those Sundays, but not because of church. No! It was because after church they went to visit two of her father's friends: the florist, and the baker. At the florist, the girls were permitted to choose corsages for themselves and their mother who stayed home, making a grand breakfast.  The boy chose boutonnieres for himself and his father. They all smelled wonderful! Once the flowers were purchased, it was off to the bakery. They always entered through the back door directly into the production room. The aromas of baking breads, cakes, cookies and pies were intoxicating. It was wonderful to simply stand in the room and breathe. While there, the father bantered with his baker friend while he chose loaves of rye bread and some pies to bring home. The children were sent up to the retail counter, and each chose their favorite cookie to eat while their father enjoyed his friend. ... and so it was that the children were raised in the church of friendship, generosity and appreciation.
     Four years later the call to duty rang again when it was the little girl's turn to begin her formal religious education. She was in second grade when she started attending catechism every Saturday morning. In preparation for this, her mother taught her to memorize some of the ritualistic prayers that were said during the mass. The little girl didn't mind learning the prayers or going to the classes at first. She found the elderly nun who taught her to be quite intimidating, and she was very curious about why the woman dressed as she did, and why she was so stern. Then, one Saturday, an assignment was given that changed everything for that little girl. That little girl was me, and the next part will relay the story of how one assignment had opened the eyes of an eight year-old, and her atheism was  born.






   

The Glorious Economics of Tipping!

     There has been a lot of rumbling over the past few years about tipping in U.S. and how it is not done in other countries. These views often come from SJWs believing that it is unconscionable for employers to pay their service staff less than minimum wage. Any server with basic math skills does not agree and it makes perfect sense why this is so.

     From the server's perspective:  To keep the numbers round and easy to work with, let's say that minimum wage is $10.00 per hour and a restaurant pays its servers $2.00/hour. Let's further state that on a random day a server rings $1,000 in sales on a five hour shift. We'll assume a 20% total tip to the server ($200) minus the 3% of sales that is required to go to the bar and/or bus staff. That leaves the server with $170.00, or $34/hour. The restaurant can not legally report any less than 12% of a servers sales as tips; that is $120.00 (that's $24 per hour of work). Because by law in this example, a server must still make the minimum wage of $10/hour, and therefore the first $40 of that $120 claimed goes towards the gap from hourly wage ($2)  up to minimum wage ($8 gap x 5 hours) which is incentive to both restaurant owner and server when taxes are due. Therefore the server gets taxed on $80 for that day's work, but actually made much more. It then follows that the higher the required minimum wage for service workers, the less those workers make.

      With this paradigm, a person could work part time and put themselves through college, afford to live in a city while they work toward their big break in show business, or as in my case take care of an aging, unwell parent by day and make enough to live on by night. So, unless the public is willing for restaurants to hike up the price of food 4 - 6 times what it is now in order to keep their servers making upwards of $30 an hour, it seems unwise to abandon the current system.

     Another consideration regarding the tipping culture is that it places servers in an entrepreneurial role. They work for themselves really. Also, earnings are directly correlated to effort, sales skills and soft skills making it more likely that the hardest workingpeople are the highest paid, which is as it should be.Take away tips and the motivation to work harder than others is removed because the reward of doing so no longer exists. 

     Now imagine that an unmarried server works for minimum wage without tips. The entire amount would be taxed and they would go home with about $7.50 per hour. This is not a living wage.  Even if doubled to $20 per hour, it would not be enough to accomplish anything a person could with the current system.

     From the restaurant's perspective: Most restaurants attempt to achieve the 30/30/30/10 percentage breakdown for their operations. That means 30% overhead, 30% cost of goods (food, alcohol, etc.), 30% labor and 10% net profit. Let's look at labor. In a restaurant, the bulk of labor costs in the current systems comes from management and the kitchen. Cooks at a modestly priced restaurant make about $12 - $15 per hour. Bartenders often have a higher basic wage, and of course benefit from tipping. Bussing staff usually make twice the hourly wage of servers plus whatever percentage of sales is set aside as their "tipout." (It is unfortunate that all bussers are tipped the same, rather than tipped at the servers' discretion. It causes the hard workers to slack and fails to incentivize the slackers to work harder. Many servers slip the better bussers extra cash when they help them out.) Restaurant hostesses make minimum wage or more.
     As a restaurant owner, if forced to increase wages of Servers, Bartenders and Bussers, how much would the prices of their food need to increase? If we take it farther along the supply chain to include a minimum wage increase for a restaurant's vendors, it would cause prices to rise even more.
     A customer visiting from a European country where tipping is not done, he explained that the business dinner he had that night cost him $80, including some alcoholic beverages, and the tip. I asked him how much it would cost back home and he said it would be closer to $200. He went on to say that the prohibitive cost of dining out in Europe means that people don't do it as often; usually going out to eat is reserved only for special occasions. He was surprised at how many restaurant choices were available in the U.S. within a small radius, no matter how populated the area. He said "I am happy to tip when visiting the United States because the competition for my business in the restaurant industry insures that I have better quality food for an even better value than is available to me in Europe."

The Ecstasy & the Agony: 2017 Total Solar Eclipse Adventure

     Long before the hype reached its fevered pitch, I was rather obsessed America's Total Solar Eclipse of August 21, 2017. Thoughts of going on an adventure for the coveted experience of being where I could experience the event in totality were tempting and although my research began months ahead, I procrastinated planning the trip. It was only a 10 hour drive to the closest area on the Path of Totality; that narrow 71 mile band of earth from Oregon to South Carolina where it would go totally dark in the middle of the day for over two minutes. This eclipse was special for a lot of reasons and visibility would only be possible from the USA. It had been a very long time since that happened. 

     About 6 weeks before the celestial event, I decided to pull the trigger and find a room on the Path of Totality. My lack of decisiveness  earlier on cost me big time because there were only three hotel rooms left within a reasonable driving distance and the prices were jacked up sky high. Money could be replaced, but lost opportunities being lost forever was my rationale for this first of several similar preparatory decisions. The room I snagged was in a no-name budget hotel but the prices were closer to the Hilton.

     In order to make this worthwhile, some investments needed to be made in photography equipment. If I was going, I was damn well going to photograph it and the right stuff was required to do so. My first purchase was a new tripod because my old one was barely usable as it didn't lock into position properly anymore. I justified this because I like to go birding and having a tripod is more than a bit helpful. I spent almost 10x more for the new one which is lightweight carbon fiber, than I did for my old clunky, heavy original 20 years prior. While I was at the store getting the tripod, I checked in to renting a lens. There were two I was interested in and I was able to test out both of them on a camera body model the same as my own. I played with them for some time before choosing which one to put on hold for rental. A week later I returned to the store and bought the 200 - 500mm f/5.6 Nikon lens so I could practice before the event. Unfortunately just the lens was not sufficient. Just like my eyes, I had to protect the sensor in my camera with at least 15 stops of light blockage. The filters to accomplish that were not cheap. Making all of these purchases significantly reduced my savings account.

      I started playing with my new lens immediately and got pretty comfortable with its weight and how it sat on the tripod. The results were spectacular! Check out the two photos below. The first is a "blood moon" lunar eclipse from several years ago with my 18 - 200 mm kit lens and the second is a waxing gibbous moon with the new lens at 500mm.

      Soon it became clear that sharing this experience would be better than going it alone, though I was more than prepared to fly solo. On a whim, I shot a text to my big brother, Chuck, who is an avid astronomy buff, "I just booked a room on the Path of Totality for the eclipse. Do you want to come along?" Within minutes he agreed and our very first adventure together was set. After that, he would regularly send me links to articles, simulations, recommended apps and safety information. 

      The day arrived and we were on the road by 6:15 AM hoping for a 4 PM arrival time. The drive took an hour longer than expected due to increased traffic: We weren't the only ones heading for totality! We also made an obligatory stop at the roadside attraction South of the Border, so we didn't arrive to the hotel until around 5:30 PM. It was called The Southern Lodge and it was small, old and dated. The women at the front desk were very warm, friendly and welcoming. They gave us a complimentary bottle of wine, and then suggested a restaurant for us to try after we got settled into the room.  

     Room 123 was ours and we drove to its door and unloaded the car. The instant the door was opened the stench of stale cigarettes wafted out. It was more than a little unpleasant and permeated the entire room. The furniture was old and worn, with a country style decor, left over from the early 1980s. There was a king sized bed and a sofa bed,  so my brother would have his own bed. The sink was outside the tiny bathroom and the tub had a line of amber burn marks along its edge where lit cigarettes were rested while smokers used the toilet. The only thing in the room that was modern was the flat screen TV. It was not a good impression, but there were no other rooms in the state that were on the path of totality so even though I paid Hilton prices, we had no choice but to stay in this hovel.

     Famished, we headed down the road to FATZ, a southern restaurant chain. We checked in with the host to learn that there was a 20 - 30 minute wait. There were no seats in the waiting area so I went around the corner to check out the bar. Two men were settling up their bill so they could move to a table with the rest of their families and I asked Chuck if he would be OK sitting at the bar to eat. He agreed, so I went to the host to take our name off the list while he went to claim the seats at the bar. I love to sit at a bar and eat, so this arrangement was more than fine with me. After we got settled in and placed our orders it didn't take long to start chatting with the people around us. 
     My brother was next to a couple from Texas who made the trip to SC just like us, to experience the totality of the eclipse. I was next to a family from U.K., a couple and their two young daughters. They lived about 70 miles north of London and were regular eclipse chasers. They had fascinating tales to tell of travel all over the world, including Australia and Turkey, to experience eclipse totality. It was their 7th total eclipse as a couple and the girls' first. The father's name was Paul and he insisted that once experienced, we would also be hooked, and find ourselves planning to see another total eclipse. We talked for quite awhile about the phenomena that occur leading up to and during totality and the awe that he felt at the process and the unexpected beauty. I didn't think it was possible, but that conversation made us even more excited for the next day's event.
     We had a lazy morning on eclipse day. We went to the free breakfast provided by the hotel and then packed up most everything. I readied my camera and tripod and we prepared to move out of the room and into the car until the long awaited celestial event. Check out time was 11 AM so we would have about 4 hours outside on a hot, sunny day. I took the key to the front desk to check out and told them that we were going to hang out in the parking lot until after the eclipse, then we'd clear out. To my utter surprise and delight the clerk told me that we could have the room until we were ready to leave. I was blown away and Chuck was very pleased about it too. Southern hospitality is a wonderful thing!
     As the time for the eclipse approached, temperatures outside  started to climb. By the time the astronomical event began, it was upwards of 90 ℉. From the moment that the disk of the moon began to overlay that of the sun, our heads were pointed skyward every few minutes, with eye protection in place, or for myself, through the protected lens of the camera. The sky remained bright and sunny throughout the moon's traverse. Even during the diamond ring phase, when there we only a bit of sunlight peering through from one side, it was full on daylight. Moments later and in an instant as the moon's perfectly aligned over the sun, it became dark. The sky turned a deep slate blue. We removed our protective eye wear and gazed in amazement as the sun's corona shone around its darkened orb. It was white and yellow and orange and red. Solar flares, like spewing volcanoes were visible.  Stars and planets that were obscured by the brightness of day appeared to our delight. Songbirds stopped singing, crickets began chirping, and streetlights came on. We looked all around us to take in the awe inspiring experience of a 360° sunset. My 65 year-old brother transformed into a gleeful child, filled with curiosity and amazement. I could not contain the joy I felt and found myself smiling widely and giggling. Even my body was responding with the energy of excitement. I wanted everyone to have this experience, and all the while I was clicking my remote shutter release, recording hundreds of images to mark my presence on the Path of Totality.
     The 3 minutes of totality sped by, and in an instant, it was once again daylight. The second diamond ring came and went. The streetlights turned off, the crickets were silenced, and the songbirds resumed their song. Still giddy from what we had just experienced, I packed up the camera gear, we gathered up the remainder of our belongings from the hotel room and shut the door behind us. We made a quick stop to the office to return our key and express our gratitude to the staff one last time. It was time to head back home. The eight hour drive took us 13 hours as the rest of the eclipse chasers took to the roads to return to their homes and lives. We were exhausted and happy as we recounted our experience several times. 
     Needless to say, I was more than a little bit eager to get home so that I could upload my images, begin the editing process, and share the fruits of my photographic labor with my friends, family, and the world. I slept soundly that night, and as soon as I awoke, I removed the SD card from my camera and popped it into the computer. I set up the upload and was utterly and completely disappointed that there was not a single shot, not one, that was good enough, or crisply focused enough. I spent hours pouring through the 400+ images in hope of finding one worthy of my time to edit. Filled with the agony of shame for my utter lack of skill, I chose a single image for my editing attempt and embarrassingly shared it on social media. Here it is:

     Hopefully there will be another chance for me. If all things go as planned, my brother and I plan to be on the Path of Totality for the next total eclipse visible from the United States. Hopefully by April 8, 2024 I will be ready. 


     
     

My Feminism

     There is much happening under the banner of feminism these days that is repugnant. Women behaving badly does not more them forward, it does the opposite. Calling for violence, bullying those who disagree, omitting women who don't fit a particular platform of ideas; none of those behaviors advance the cause of feminism. Hating men, male bashing, and false accusations of assault; those don't help either. 

     To me feminism is all about freedom and responsibility. For example:

Freedom to choose a life's path, whether it be at home rearing children or pursuing a career in corporate America.

I am tired of the career women judging the family women for their choices. Women need to stop judging one another in all areas (clothing, body type, sexual behavior, etc.), but I never understood this one. Does a woman who prioritizes child-rearing really deserve less respect than one climbing the corporate ladder?

Freedom to reproduce or not without government encroachment, including the use of all available forms of birth control and abortion (I draw the line at the first trimester.)

Having control over her own reproduction is essential. Birth control should not be an issue in this day and age, but until some churches get out of the Bronze Age, I'm afraid we'll keep hearing about it. Christopher Hitchens used to talk about the Catholic dogma on birth control by saying that the church "believes AIDS to be bad, but not as bad as condoms." 

Freedom to pursue without limit, any career of her choice, without fear of discrimination or expectation that standards be altered for her gender (if standards exist, she must meet them).

A woman should be able to follow her dream to be anything she wants to be, however, she should not expect her field of choice to make concessions of standard for her. For instance, if a firefighter needs to be able to carry a 200 lb. person for 100 feet, then that is the standard for the profession and should be applied regardless of gender.

With this, compensation for a job should begin equally and afterwards increase, or not, based on merit alone. Hiring and compensation should be gender-blind. Equal output = equal compensation.

Freedom to express her sexuality as she chooses whether it be monogamously, poly-amorously or not with the person or persons of her choice whether they be man, woman or both; that the double standard and judgement be eradicated. A world where parents hope that their daughters have fabulous sex lives just like they do their sons. 

Entire religions have been fabricated to sanction the repression of women's sexuality. Some ritually and brutally perform genital mutilation on girls to insure purity: this is despicable on every level and should never be tolerated.  Men are often unconsciously petrified of the sexual power of women. I understand that evolutionarily speaking, men want to insure that it is their seed/DNA that gets propagated to the next generation. As society developed they decided that repression was the best way to handle that issue. Now, it just seems silly. Women hold most of the sexual power. We are built to enjoy sex and so we should; whenever and however we see fit so long as all participants are consenting adults!

What a great time it will be when slut-shaming is no longer tolerated, when women can seek out as many experiences as men have historically sought; and when fathers encouraged their daughters to pursue satisfying sexual relationships instead of trying to keep their virginity intact like it is some prize. 

That all said, women should love and respect themselves enough to be very choosy as to whom they share their bodies, and to not treat themselves as a cheap commodity. Being physically intimate is special,  and should be valued, as should the participants.

Responsibility for her actions and how she treats others:

Showing respect to all men, women and children is tantamount here. This means withholding judgement of other women based on body size, wardrobe, make-up usage or lack thereof, sexual promiscuity, or abstinence, etc. It means no male bashing too. 

Responsibility for her independence:

Women should know how to, and be able to support themselves, by themselves, when necessary; not only financially, but also emotionally, psychologically and physically. Self-sufficiency is a cornerstone of equality.

Responsibility for emotional and psychological honesty in all relationships: 

If your man cheats on you with another woman, don't go after the woman; go after your man. His behavior is all that should be of concern to you if you had agreed upon fidelity. Become emotionally evolved enough to not be threatened by other women. Own your own relationships.

Be supportive of other women and encourage them to achieve. There is room enough for everyone. Jealousy and envy have no place when equality is completely embraced. 

Women need to treat other women well and stop being petty. Emotional maturity increases as reason and logic increase. 

I don't hold much hope that women can evolve to such a state of being in my lifetime. Here's an example: In order to take care of my elderly mother, I am currently working in the service industry and I hear the vitriol that women spew about each other all the time. Women gossip and cut other women down all the time. They also don't support other women very well. I have asked all the other servers at my restaurant this question: If two groups walk into the restaurant at the same time, one all men and one all women, which group would you prefer to serve if you could choose? Without fail they choose the group of men.  This is because men, as a rule, tip better and they don't spend several extra hours at their table which stalls a server's income. If they do stay longer, they pay for the time they took up by tipping at a higher percentage. A majority of women, especially when dining in a group, often tip inappropriately and rarely compensate a server for his/her time when they hold up a table. My question to women: Why? (Note: the exception to this is when one or more of the women in the group have been a server.)

Equality means equal. Equality is just. It does not mean that one gender has preference over  the other in any instance. It's a level playing field. We all have the brains and ability we need to be equal!

Everything Happens for a Reason: It's Meant to Be!

     No two phrases irk me more than "Everything happens for a reason" and "If it's meant to be (fill in the blank)"  and their combinations and permutations. What these clauses mean is insulting. If people stopped for one moment and thought about what they were saying when they uttered these empty and meaningless words either to themselves or to someone else, they would never say them again.  To say that everything happens for a reason is equivalent to saying that either all of our actions, decisions or our outcomes are preordained by some imaginary sky god or other ethereal force, that we have no real choices by which to effect outcomes in our lives, that we are indeed puppets on a stage where some unseen force or imaginary director pulls our strings; we have no say in our destiny. Of course there is no evidence of this and I would not wish to live in a universe where this kind of existence were the case. Would you?

    The truth of the matter is that our brains are wired to seek patterns so that we can become better at predicting future outcomes. Therefore, when we have an experience, either good or bad, we are looking for something onto which to tie it. Usually in hindsight we can project meaning on these experiences. For example if one had a particularly difficult break-up of a love relationship and thought or heard multiple times, "everything happens for a reason" then in the future when one found a more suitable match then it could be projected to the past that the first heartache occurred so that the subsequent happiness could be found and appreciated.  It is however, the primitive and simple pattern-seeking behavior of our most fallible brain that allows and dare I say causes us to apply, often false, meaning from our past.  
     The easiest way to say it is: Shit happens! So what? Circumstances occur most randomly and we have to deal with them. Part of dealing with them for some can be to search for meaning. Any meaning however is always a subsequent piece of information projected onto said circumstances some time after the incident. Searching for meaning can also be a way for an individual to alleviate themselves of culpability. 
     Superstitions are also created this way. It's just another instance of drawing cause and effect relations from correlational data. Just because two things happen in close temporal proximity does not mean that they had anything to do with each other.  For example, walking under a ladder and then being hit by a car does not render walking under a ladder as the cause for the accident. Another example would be having a black cat walk in front of you on your way to work and then finding the place on fire: the cat had nothing to do with your perceived bad luck. Bad things also do not happen in threes, they just happen and we voraciously look for the correct number to justify our superstitions. 
     The most hurtful, cruel and devastating use of "Everything happens for a reason"  is when the person saying it invokes religion. A woman loses her husband in a car crash: There is no reason for this, yet people will tell her that it was their god's plan. What kind of a sick, bastard god would do that to someone?  Worse yet is when a child dies and the parents are told that the reason is "God needed another angel." What a cruel thing to tell a person who is so mired in grief that they can barely think. It's a despicable thing to say, and again: What kind of egomaniacal being would rip the hearts out of "children" s/he supposedly loves?  Its unconscionable! Not to mention, that if these credulous people actually read the unholy book in which they claim to believe, because angels are separate beings according to the mythology. They were never made out of humans. Such false beliefs cannot serve a person well. It is much better to work through the reality of a tragedy without employing such drivel. Loss sucks. Grief is excruciating work that takes over every part of a person. Let's not make it worse by saying that the unimaginable was supposed to happen for some reason. How can that possibly alleviate someones pain? It simply cannot. 
     The truth is, which the evidence supports, death is the end of one's existence, period. There is nothing that comes after. It was just like before one was born with the difference being that existence occurred, and it affects those remaining who knew the departed person. To me, this reality is far more kind because it has an end. It's the erroneous beliefs that cause false hopes that are destructive. Here's a question to ponder: If a person actually believed that they would see their loved one again after their own death, then why do people go on living when they can simply join their departed ones at any time? I submit that is because on some unconscious level, above and beyond any dogma into which one was indoctrinated, we know that death is the end and there is no reason for it other than its certainty. 
     Knowing that there is often no reason for bad things that happen, one must accept that neither is there no reason for good things that happen. The good part of all of this is that we do have choices to make along the way to help the odds be in our favor. We can choose safety over recklessness, activity over sloth, altruism over greed, love over apathy, to name a few. We also have choice when it comes to how we react to the randomness in our lives, both positive and negative. I see gratitude as the key for helping navigate through. If one is grateful for what one has, then no matter what comes, striving for a return to health or the betterment of oneself in the face of adversity is always possible. 
    I am not a puppet with strings to a celestial being and neither are you. I am a free person who makes her own choices and is personally responsible for them and how they both effect my future and impact those around me.

Live free, but first, do no harm.

     

Black Mass - Movie Review

Black Mass

Biography - Crime Drama

Directed by: Scott Cooper

Screenplay by: Mark Mallouk & Jez Butterworth

Starring: Johnny Depp, Joel Edgerton, Benedict Cumberbatch, Kevin Bacon, Corey Stoll

    This is a biopic of the life of South Boston criminal James Whitey Bulger (Depp), his Winter Hill Gang and his childhood friend FBI special agent, John Connolly (Edgerton). Set in South Boston and spanning two decades from the mid 1970's to mid 1990's the film chronicles Bulger's rise and fall from a two-bit criminal losing ground and business to the Italian Mafia on the city's north side to that of an Irish mob kingpin with his hand in everything - from drugs, bookmaking and extortion to arms trafficking and murder - to his eventual take down. Bulger's success was due in large part to his "alliance" with FBI agent John Connolly who protected him from scrutiny in exchange for information to bring down the Mafia. His brother Billy Bulger (Cumberbatch), former President of the Massachusetts senate was well aware of the arrangement and turned a blind eye. As long as he had protection, Whitey expanded his interests with impunity using his childhood friend's position with the Feds as a shield. 

    Depp was transformed into an ugly, balding, big-headed thug who killed easily and without emotion. He wisely chose to play this big character in and understated yet powerful way. Edgerton portrayed the opportunistic, in-way-over-his-head FBI agent beautifully; balancing on the knife's edge between loyal Southie neighborhood kid and rising Federal agent, his nerves always underscoring an oft forced bravado. 

    Beyond the performances of Depp and Edgerton, the movie was rather ordinary, often moving too slowly and without much character depth. The director seemed to enjoy jumping from murder to murder without much storytelling in between. It would have been more interesting if the film delved into Bulger's psyche a bit more than simply showing he had feelings for his son and mother. If the story started earlier with him in Alcatraz taking part in LSD experiments to earn time off his sentence we could have understood the making of this criminal. Instead we were left with a play-by-play of crimes with some law enforcement deflections along the way. There was simply no good story to bite into here, despite the potential.

     Seeing the movie for Depp's transformation and Edgerton's performance is worth the time, but wait until it's on cable. It has nothing remotely close to the impact of The Departed, and it is not necessary to experience Black Mass on a big screen. 

This armchair critic gives this film a C+

     

Outrageous!

    A Zimbabwe lion named Cecil (above) was killed by an American sport-hunting dentist and the world goes into a tailspin of fury and calls for death and torture of the hunter. What? This is the most gratuitous piece of non-news and is most definitely not outrage worthy. When humans give an animal a name they begin a never ending cycle of ,anthropomorphism imbuing the animal with human-like qualities and emotions. In this case, the practice has created a maelstrom of fervor. 
     Lions and other wild game are legally hunted for sport in Zimbabwe all the time and those who can pay the $55,000 fee for the experience bring much needed revenue into the economy of the impoverished country; But people are more outraged by the loss of the lion with a name than the poverty, systematic violation of human rights or the impact HIV/AIDS in the country. These conditions are more tragic and more deserving of outrage than the killing of one lion that happened to have a name and have a tracking device.
     Conservation is important and necessary throughout the world and as sentient beings we have a responsibility to protect the populations of wildlife and biodiversity. Lions are beautiful animals which most of us would never even think of killing for sport. I love visiting the big cats at the zoo.  Let's remember that they are wild animals and are deadly, sometimes to humans like the man-eating lions of Tsavo. Was the world outraged when those lions were killed? No! The world had its priorities straight then.
     There are far more important, and heinous issues about which to be outraged long before going ballistic over the death of a lion and once we get a few of those taken care of, I'll be happy to join the fervor. Here are some issues actually worthy of outrage:

•      Female genital mutilation 
• Imagine a weeks-old infant or a girl of 9 or 10 being held down by her mother and other women in the community while her grandmother takes a sharpened piece of glass and cuts out her clitoris and labia then sews the wound shut leaving just enough of an opening for urine and menstrual blood to pass causing the skin to grow together, only to be pridefully ripped open by her husband's erection on her wedding night. 
• Done in many cultures and religions to curb female sexuality due to the belief that women are evil and are the cause of men's loss of control (sin). 
• Part of a patriarchal system to subjugate women
•      The continual erosion of the Bill of Rights and personal liberty in the United States
• Warrantless surveylance
• Being treated like a criminal without charge (TSA, among other things)
• The Patriot Act (what an oxymoron!)
•      Boko Haram
• Kidnapped 256 school girls many of whom were forced into marriages against their will to satisfy the men in the organization
• Recruits and indoctrinates young boys to become killers
• Promotes world domination through the reinstatement of the caliphate
• Suicide bombings
•      Genocide in Darfur and other areas of the world.
•      The worldwide systematic rape & torture of children by the Catholic Church
•      Increasing prevalence of heroin abuse right here in America
•     Corruption and abuse by the government
•     Citizens United giving corporations the political rights of the individual further diminishing the voice of the People

     I could find hundreds more examples of crises and issues that do not get the attention or outrage they warrant. These are the issues about which I become outraged. How about you?