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GRAMMAR SLAMMER
I read with empathy Robert Wilder's musing about his unvacation summer vacation [Summer Guide 2006, June 7:
]. I, too, am a school-employed unvacationing summer vacationer. Perhaps, however, Mr. Wilder would benefit from an unvacation in summer school, reviewing a bit of grammar. An English teacher who would write, "The stuttering of the motor as it chokes up an oil ball, then the revving of the engine as it springs to toothy life," is obviously in the throes of an attack of sentence fragment ungrammar. Then, again, if the ungrammarian is a Reporter editor, I recommend he or she take a vacation.
Ellen Goldberg
Santa Fe
SAVE THE PIG
When I saw Total Pig [May 24:
], I couldn't help but gag, because to me, eating a pig is like chowing down on a human toddler or the family dog. In fact, pigs have been found to be much smarter than dogs, a beloved pet that most Americans would never consider cooking for dinner. Pigs are among the most talented of animals. They're great at joystick-style video games, even better than some primates. Pigs can focus intensely, and they form complex social units and exhibit sophisticated social competitive behavior. Pigs have a very long memory. They remember the location and identity of objects years later. Pigs can communicate with each other using a variety of sounds. Pigs can learn to turn on the heat in a cold barn, or the water from a faucet. Pigs have a superior cognitive ability to dogs and 3-year-old humans. Newborn piglets learn their mother's voice, and their mother sings to them while nursing. Piglets learn their names by 3 weeks of age and respond to them. Pigs have a good sense of direction and can find their way home. Pigs will not "pig out" when given access to unlimited supplies of food, unlike dogs and humans. Pigs have been known to save the lives of humans and nonhumans, just like dogs. Pigs don't "sweat like a pig," because they lack sweat glands. And, given enough space, they are very clean animals and prefer water to mud. Pigs have even exhibited virtues like forgiveness.
If readers stopped taking offense at sexual truth-telling in columns like "Savage Love" and started recognizing that celebrating the killing and eating of animals like pigs is far more ethically offensive, our planet would be a more peaceful place.
Ardeth Baxter
Santa Fe
HOLLYWON'T?
I sympathize with both Michael Dellheim [SFR Talk, May 17:
] and letter writer Mike Daigle [Letters, May 31:
]. The movie boom can only be a good thing for us-and better us than North Carolina!
But there's another possible film industry here besides the Hollywood kind: locally written, locally produced feature films. We have all the needed components-writers with viable scripts (like myself and probably 75 others), varied locations, experienced crew and people for whom an investment of $250,000 (one ONE HUNDREDTH the cost of a modestly budgeted Hollywood feature) would be no big deal.
Hell,
The Blair Witch Project
was shot for $25,000 and made $248 million, and I've got better ideas than that-and in fact better than a lot of the Hollywood-produced, state-subsidized films that have been shot here! I'll even put your wife, daughter, girlfriend or boyfriend in the film, and make 'em SHINE!
So how about it? Unload some of that Wal-Mart stock and let's make some movies!
Jim Terr
Santa Fe
ABBEY ROAD
Thanks for exposing the blasphemous misuse of Edward Abbey's words to sell Las Campanas [Zane's World, May 17:
]. For those who are not familiar with Edward Abbey, using him to sell Las Campanas is like using Ghandi to sell the war in Iraq. I am sure that if the good folks who are selling Las Campanas don't voluntarily remove any use of Abbey's work immediately, they'll be hearing from Abbey's estate lawyers very soon. That's if they're lucky. If they're unlucky, they might be hearing from or seeing some of his rather excitable and devoted followers. So the question that Las Campanas has to ask themselves is, "Well, do you feel lucky, punk?" Well, do you?
Nicholas Lerek
Santa Fe
WORDS TO THE WISE
Zane is right [Zane's World, June 7:
]. There were two obvious "quirks" at the Lannan reading by Eduardo Galeano. The sighs, and the applause after each Spanish reading were confounding, and made me think. So here are my thoughts.
Zane is young-at least compared to Lannan's audience that night. Nearly everyone present probably took advantage of the senior discount, which reduces the astronomically unaffordable charge of $6 to $2 for some of the most privileged members of our community. That Lannan would offer such a discount, and that even middle-class seniors would accept it, rather than supporting progressive fora, is, to me, disturbing. And perhaps, getting to the point.
Despite the privilege in that auditorium, there was a desperation brought on by desperate times. Those who went to hear him already "get it" (hence the sighs). Another valuable audience might be younger (though I imagine you GET IT too), less affluent, and alienated by the usual complexities of political deceits.
Galeano wants us to pay attention. He understands that it is possible to live in an age full of information and also one of deep ignorance. Seemingly trapped by false choices, we are accustomed to stopgap thinking, never reaching beyond the agenda set by those in power.
Change relies on regaining confidence in our right to ask more profound yet basic questions. Current economics and politics reflect a generation of thinking that desperately needs to be challenged. The solutions are not simple, but we have been polarized and distracted from common sense, intuition and compassion.
Experience teaches us that when the most comprehensive solutions seem out of reach, the question becomes: What are the steps from here to there? No single model from the past will suffice. Yet, there is a rich history of progressive movements, and a current convergence of ideas and coalition-building that provide hope and signposts along the route.
Some words to the young: We need you. We need your energy and ideas. We need you to remind us we are sighing and applauding at inappropriate moments.
Some words to the old: Do more than hang in there. The growing retired generation is a potentially valuable social asset. It is time we reclaim our radicalism of the 1960s and 1970s, tempered by experience and wisdom. We are a potentially enormous workforce for change.
Some words to everyone: People have enormous unrealized talents. Amongst all the finite resources which need conservation, our human intellect and imagination are infinitely renewable. This is no time for inertia. Our vision for the future and our actions challenge what it means to be human.
Jane Cook
Santa Fe
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