Locks

I unlocked my front door’s deadbolt this morning, hit the auto-unlock on my little car, and heard the satisfying click of the thumb latch as the front door snapped shut behind me. I ate breakfast with a friend in a restaurant that never closes and doesn’t have a lock on their front door–they throw a chain and padlock across the crash bars in case they have to close unexpectedly.

My friend tells me that on mornings when we eat together, he runs ahead of schedule and is the first at his office. On those mornings, he unlocks their front door and punches in the code to deactivate their security system. Each morning, he logs into his corporate server with a personal password, accessing client and personnel files until calling it a day.

My debit card doesn’t work unless you punch in "3VOM." I’ve linked my PayPal account to Overstock, iTunes, Amazon, and eBay in order to make online shopping convenient, but only after typing in the mystery pin phrase that prevents online phishing programs from accessing my online data. Hopefully, this makes it a little tougher for people out to steal Scott Wheeling’s identity and protects me from hacking.

Before turning fairly ridiculous, movies like Eagle Eye and Minority Report raise a not-too-subtle voice to the issue of being watched, self protection, and privacy. But when we leave the house to visit the silver screen, why do we lock the door behind us? Why does the school janitor carry a belt loop full of keys? Why is the keycard at your average hotel (yuck, bedbugs) only coded to your door?

After 20 years, my friend’s father installed a lock on the front door to their split level home in rural New York. A troubled niece had moved back into town, and they hoped to avoid returning home one night to find she’d pawned their valuables to pay for a nagging maple sugar habit she’d acquired at college. Their neighbors had found numerous small tools, a GPS, and sunglasses missing the previous week, and credited an unlocked side door as the likely point of entry for the opportunistic borrower.

Toward the end of Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 classic "The Shining," Jack Nicholson’s character reminds us that locked doors only prevent honest people from getting inside a locked room. His maniacal smile tells us that if someone wants to get in badly enough, a locked door is really just a formality. Hopefully, few of us will ever have to face such an unwelcome intrusion, but the nagging question remains: when I walk away from my locked door for the day, whose hand might jiggle the handle to see if they could conveniently slip inside?

One key behind locking our doors is that we distrust. It may be our oddball neighbor, or the thought of a late night visitor with an eye on our canned goods, but fear of the unknown is a strong motivator. Why else are we so intimidated by the giant shark in Jaws, even though we don’t get a good look at the beast until the movie is nearly over?  Beyond trust is the proven poor track record of humanity–given the chance, we’ll steal from, cripple, and even eat one another–if the door’s unlocked and it’s convenient enough. Now I just need to be careful to watch who has access to my keys.

A Serious Man: A film by the Coen brothers

Joel and Ethan Coen’s 2009 release, A Serious Man, is the epitome of a film more valuable for its sub-text than for its entertainment value. In many ways, the film is difficult to watch, but oddly compelling. It is engrossing in its themes of struggle, inaction, and masculinity.

As the suburban Gopnik family approaches their son’s bar mitzvah, both father (Larry) and son (Danny) engage in intense struggles within their respective worlds. Their hardships are appropriately told within the context of the Jewish community, a people known throughout history to have experienced their share of suffering and conflict.

The film seems to make two substantial claims about life’s struggles, from daily irritations to more seasonal storms. First, life’s struggles amount to nothing, because we will all most certainly die in the end. Second, none of life’s struggles will be solved by an adherence to religion, though the traditions and social norms associated with religious expression will carry considerable weight in moving one through a personal crisis. Though the film does not seem to discount the personal value of religion, it does challenge the validity of religion beyond tradition alone. The traditions associated with religion may help one through a crisis, but the institute itself may prove inadequate.

The Coen brothers give special attention to the role of religious leaders and their perceived ability to provide grounding and calm within life’s storms. Throughout the film, three rabbis (Scott, Nachter, and Marshak) are called upon to offer guidance and counseling. Within the community, the eldest rabbi is held in high esteem, the middle-aged rabbi’s opinion is given moderate weight, and the youngest is merely viewed as an office holder with very little credibility–after all, what life experiences has he to share?

Interestingly, the young rabbi Scott, discounted by the community and culture as naive, offers the most honest and insightful view into Larry Gopnik’s turmoil. Against any expectations, and overlooked by Gopnik, Scott’s response is honest and clear. Nachter, the second eldest rabbi, regales Gopnik with stories and anecdotes, but offers nothing substantial. Marshak, the eldest, and viewed as the wisest spiritual leader, is completely inaccessible to Larry, but meets with the younger Gopnik after his bar mitzvah ceremony. It is during this exchange that we realize the elusive and highly regarded eldest rabbi is merely a purveyor of reconstituted pop culture.

He is an empty office holder, and has his community fooled to believe he is wise. Marshak tells Danny, "go, be a good boy," and quotes from Jefferson Airplane. But is he the only religious leader to be credited with great wisdom, perhaps more wisdom than is due?

A friend recently shared an experience in his congregation, where a part time minister joined his congregation on an interim basis. Among stories of past adventures, personal anecdotes, and irrelevant political musings shared from the pulpit, this part timer had gained a loyal and revered following; reportedly the most powerful speaker many in the congregation had heard in years. My friend didn’t agree, and critically wondered about the role professional religious leaders played in the lives of his surrounding congregants. When the professional’s paycheck stemmed from the congregants, what is the responsibility to the congregants? Is it to entertain and make them feel good, or to interpret their spiritual doctrines in a manner consistent with the traditions of their faith?

From their earliest directorial and screen writing work in the mid 80's until today, Joel and Ethan Coen have represented storytelling in an entertaining, often unsettling, yet thoughtful manner. A Serious Man continues this creative run of films, posing thoughtful observations on those who are professionally called to be spiritual guides. Among other things, the film challenges us to look closely at those hired to be our "spiritual guides." We are cautioned not to look at age, or life experience, or the ability to offer the answer we’re secretly hoping to find. In Jewish tradition, the Old Testament king Solomon says, "with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief." We may find that understanding their truest intentions may cause us to be serious, indeed.

Under the Dome, Part Three

In this final installment focusing on Stephen King’s 2009 novel Under the Dome, we find that the story reveals an individual and collective ability to justify one’s actions in the name of piety and collective good. The very person callously responsible for instigating unrest is the person deflecting the blame and absorbing the credit, the very opposite of the window and mirror maturity exhibited by truly gifted leaders.


Under the Dome, as in our American culture, a central theme is justice versus injustice. We despise Big Jim’s character, not because he is a "conservative Christian" in name but not action, not because he is a used car salesman, not even because he is selfish in so many ways. To despise him for this might be to admit shortcomings within our own person.


We despise him because in King’s narrative storytelling, we’re given a chance to see behind the scenes to the actual events, and see injustice being served. Big Jim is the face of every abusive father, every mean-spirited teacher, every child that grows up torturing his pets, and every elected official who loses track of the "servant" part of "public servant." He is an unjust man, and King appeals to our inherent desire to see the bad guy lose in the end.

Throughout the final chapters, King repeatedly focuses on an unsettling proposition: at some point in our lives, we have all either been the person giving or receiving abuse. His narrative portrays a picture of the helplessness that a victim feels, a picture of the helplessness to stop the abuse and of the regret and shame which accompanies it.

Surprisingly, King contends, this is a feeling shared by both the offended and the offender, and he seems to argue that the actions of the offender will eventually return to haunt him. The manner in which each character accepts this proposition seems to correlate with their demise or survival. Those who accept responsibility for their actions seem to be at peace with themselves even into death. Those who will not admit their guilt it seem to leave this world suffering, either at their own hand or at the hands of others.

Without surprise, a lot of King’s characters die during this story, victims of their own and others’ decisions. Once the book closes, he leaves his audience challenged to take stock of their own lives, and reflectively ask themselves how they have abused or been abused, and how they’ve come to terms with their part in the events of their own lives. Peace, it would seem, may come in the form of our individual acceptance of our faults.

Under the Dome, Part Two

As Stephen King’s latest work progresses, the thin veil of fiction over his commentary on American policies in the war on terror is cast aside.

Like a skilled conductor before an orchestra, town selectman Jim Rennie directs his constituents into a symphony of paranoia and fear-driven decision making.  During the tumult, Rennie’s character disappears into the background, content to allow the mayhem to run freely until he can surface and provide direction.  He has methodically concocted a fear-based culture in which he alone is blameless, and “God help anyone who does not stand on ‘our side’.”

The ensuing town mentality reveals a population eager to surrender due process and individual liberties for the common good.  Supplanting due process is trial by association.  When several citizens are found guilty in the court of public opinion, Rennie wins an easy victory, using the town’s fear as the district judge.  The town quickly begins to fracture into two time honored camps:  “us,” and “them.” 

In the black and white conservative world inhabited by Becks and Palins, it’s hip to target moderate or rational people as radicals responsible for the nation’s fall from God’s favor.  The far left offers little help, painting ultra-conservatives with an anti-intellectual stigma usually reserved for children.  As Americans, we may recall recent headlines, wherein those who did not support the war in Iraq did not support the deployed American troops.  If one didn’t support the Patriot Act, one wasn’t a true red-blooded American.  King’s story alludes to all of these recent memories in his fictional town of Chester’s Mill.

King’s ability to find the voice of his characters on both sides of the aisle is remarkable.  Equally poignant is the polarizing effect upon interpersonal relationships.  People who have lived in proximity for years find themselves, in the face of adversity and human fear, aligning along two factions:  those on the side of control, and those on the side of freedom.  There is little room for discussion between sides—automatically, townspeople believe they know what is right or wrong based solely on appearance.  There is little room for self reflection, objective thought, or evidence.  If a man appears guilty, he is.

King’s veil of fiction lifts entirely as he poses the following question:  Societally, once we have demonized, polarized, and labeled, what freedoms will we willfully and joyfully give up to preserve safety and order?  Will the cultural mindset continue to be one of paranoia and distrust, or will there remain a small population which continues to value reason?

Finally, King reveals an savvy understanding of American media’s ability to sway public opinion.  Both “sides” make an effort to propagandize and energize their causes, but neither side is faultless.  This week, Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder responsible for releasing thousands of classified military documents against the federal government’s warnings, has been arrested after being charged with two counts of rape by Interpol.  Following weeks of Wikileaks-related headlines, many have already tried, judged, and sentenced Assange—but are these fair assumptions? 

Under the Dome’s storyline allows the cynical segment of society to question the timing and validity of these allegations.  Are they real, or a form of political retribution for airing information in the face of an administration’s warnings?  When viewed through the lens of King’s warnings, it may be better to reserve judgment.

It’s our American right to hold an opinion.  We may be well cautioned by King’s story to understand these opinions are limited by our human fallibility, our knowledge of only part of the story, and our own mental acuity.  The wisest citizens recognize the line between opinion and fact.

In the next and final installment of Stephen King’s Under the Dome:  The issues of justice and abuse.  Until then….