It was my last day at work.
For almost a year, I had been a temporary employee. At an assignment that was only supposed to last a couple of months. The company, one of America's largest medical supply conglomerates, with a massive distribution center here in north Texas, had provided me some remarkable experiences during my tenure. But after I had received several extensions to my contract, time had run out.
At the beginning, I re-organized all of their safety files, a project which in itself had morphed from updating training records to helping my manager overhaul the distribution center's campus safety system.
Being a high-profile player in the nation's medical supply industry, constant training in safety procedures was a way of life at this company, both for the warehouse employees, and the managers in our upstairs offices. Why such an emphasis on safety? At one point, just before I arrived, this facility secretly held every drop of flu vaccine in the United States. In addition, some of the chemicals stored in its specially-designed haz-mat room could, if exposed to the right elements, have sent parts of our building into a nearby residential neighborhood.
Oops - should I have said that on the Internet?
I Remember Where I Was
Well, it doesn't matter much today - my time there started before 9/11, before safety considerations forced people to think about everything with a haz-mat label as a potential terrorist tool.
Indeed, after that fateful day, lots of changes took place at the warehouse, not only because of the chemicals stored there, but because all of the products shipped from this location. From surgical gloves to medicines to sensitive operating instruments, just about everything in the warehouse would be needed by first responders and medical personnel in the event of a disaster. Sure, before 9/11, we all had an intellectual appreciation of that fact, but afterwards, society's perspective shifted from "if" to "when." And in today's just-in-time world, being on backorder is practically a sin. Some industries, like healthcare, have to be prepared for anything.
Because, sadly, "anything" is now possible. Dumbfounded, I watched on live television in the first-floor breakroom as Tower Two fell that awful morning. I was sitting next to an inventory control clerks who received the call from our upstate New York warehouse for thousands of body bags (which, you'll recall, weren't needed after all).
The parent company's warehouses along the East Coast were scouring their nationwide inventory for emergency supplies to respond to crisis locales in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, DC. Hospitals from Chicago to Los Angeles were proactively stockpiling supplies for fear of still more attacks. Suddenly, the medical industry had become intensely essential, no matter the cost; not the ephemeral money-hog it's been portrayed as being in the debate over Obamacare.
Perhaps the saddest reality in the office that day, and the days that followed, was that none of those body bags and other emergency supplies were needed after all at Ground Zero or Shanksville, Pennsylvania. All of those victims; their bodies literally erased from existence in the pulverization of the Twin Towers and the obliteration of Flight 93. No survivors pulled from the wreckage to bandage and suture. After being on stand-by for hours on end, yet with no demand for supplies, our inventory personnel somberly stood down.
You're Paying for This
Since my temp work was in the facilities department, I was assigned tasks which sent me into every corner of the building. Such access took me from the special section where the explosive chemicals were stored, to the executive offices, to the picking stations of the hulking German-built computerized inventory machine.
I had never seen such an enormous, intricate contraption in my life. Towering probably 40 feet above thin rail tracks and spanning five or six of those tracks, lined with hundreds of little baskets, this machine was state-of-the-art, at least for 2001. Each of those little baskets held small pieces of equipment and supplies needed by hospitals and doctors, and fast-moving robots would whiz along the tracks, programmed by inventory clerks in real time, plucking the requested items from their baskets and conveying them to human beings at one end of the machine.
The only people to handle the items, these employees would take what the automated pickers delivered to them, match it to a corresponding print-out label, and ship it out. Hour after hour. The computerized robots would be picking all sorts of items used in healthcare that had been requested through the company's online inventory system. The process was so complex that we regularly had engineering experts from its manufacturer's headquarters in Germany on-site to troubleshoot mechanical and software glitches.
As regular readers of my blog well know, few things significantly impress me: this picker was one of those things. It ran constantly, 24/7, both pulling inventory and stocking it. The next time you gasp at your hospital bill, remember that at least part of it probably is going to pay for machines like this that help stock the supplies needed for your surgery.
Getting to Know You
I'm still not sure why, but I managed to strike up affable acquaintanceships in departments all over the building. They were like most office relationships - not quite friendships, but you got to know these people well enough that you didn't just nod at each other in passing. You learned who their spouses were, where they lived, what their politics were, and what they thought of everybody else in the building.
The workers who staffed the amazing picking machine would yell greetings to me above the contraption's mechanical humming, the senior executive secretary upstairs would whisper confidentially to me in a corner of her cubicle. My boss's secretary would blab out loud about anything to me, while my boss would mutter warily, constantly glancing over his shoulder to see who was nearby, even if what he was saying was absolutely harmless.
One older, gentle-featured lady who prided herself on owning a weekend farm could yell obscenities into the phone just like the truck drivers her boss managed. A cute, hyper young girl and the office's token gay guy, who I actually knew from high school, provided most of the workday entertainment. And then there were all of the middle-aged clerks across the other side of our wide-open cubicle farm who spent their days doing work on their computers but gabbing on their phones to spouses and fellow co-workers upstairs.
As my days there dwindled down, I unsuccessfully applied for a low-level position with management potential in a department headed by one of the few executives in the office who never really liked me. I later learned that the vice president in charge of our facility was pressuring his mid-level managers to either find a position for me or get rid of me, because having a temp worker on his books for so long was making him look bad to the suits at corporate. So whatever her reason for not hiring me - whether bristling at some perceived pressure by her own boss or simply thinking I wasn't qualified - my days at the company were suddenly finite after months of establishing my presence there.
Perhaps it's just as well I didn't get the job, which after all, was with a huge corporation with a big-business culture and a high-pressure advancement system. My immediate boss - who didn't have a college degree - was expected to work 50 hours a week, and all of the career-tracker management trainees hired straight out of college were told 60 hours was the minimum. And a lot of those hours were spend doing far more manual labor than these sorority and fraternity-type business majors had expected.
Being a temp whose workload was a fuzzy mixture of clerical and administrative, with some significant responsibilities, I didn't fit the corporate mold. I had a college degree, but was on first-names basis with the janitors. If any of this was some sort of threat to the local management, then the reason eluded me. Which probably helps explain why, on my last day, I was so embarrassed.
Actually, It's Not All About You
It was like any typical Friday, walking in from the parking lot, through the security doors, taking a shortcut through the break room, and on into the long room housing the cubicle farm. As I continued to my own cubicle, I saw a long row of tables set up with food piled on them. And co-workers from all across the first floor gathering beside it with big smiles on their faces. It was a going-away party for me!
"We've never had a going-away party for a temp before," one of the secretaries explained, "but we had to give you one!"
I was stunned!
"We've never had a temp like you before," I remember someone else clarifying.
But before my ego could get too big, someone else sidled up next to me and put it all in context.
"Well, we're not really doing this just for you," she explained, a look of consternation on her face. "We're also trying to make a point in front of Mary Jones!" And by the way, Mary Jones is a pseudonym for the woman who didn't want to hire me.
Apparently, Mary had arrived at this facility with an attitude already in place and a chip on her shoulder. Few people liked her, and she liked even fewer people - all of them managers, of course. She towed the company line harder than some of her own superiors, and shocked everybody on 9/11 when she actually complained that the FAA had grounded all airplanes. Her husband was scheduled to fly somewhere for a meeting, and his flight couldn't depart. I was never sure if she was mad because her husband couldn't leave town, or make his meeting. At any rate, I remember her coming out of her office, announcing her disgust to nobody in particular, and the rest of us - already reeling from everything that was taking place on the East Coast - dumbfounded by her narcissism.
So when Mary didn't hire me, the office took it upon themselves to make some sort of statement. Which was made that much more emphatic when the office's second-in-command was the first to express his disappointment at my leaving, and then helped himself to the first plate of food.
Eventually, that afternoon, Mary did come by my cubicle and say she was sorry things didn't work out. And from an employment standpoint, I was too. From a philosophical standpoint, however, I wasn't.
All Things Come to an End
I've never regretted not staying on at that company. Working sixty hours a week for a 40-hour-a-week salary doesn't particularly thrill me. Surviving the rigors of management trainee boot camp so I can earn a six-figure income with even more hours on the clock doesn't excite me, either. Not that I've become independently wealthy writing blogs. But certain experiences in life help you hone down the things at which you excel from those at which you don't. And what you think is worthwhile.
The gay co-worker at the office who I'd known from high school committed suicide several months after I left. At his funeral, as I commiserated with all of our fellow co-workers who packed the small, fundamentalist Baptist church his parents attended, we expressed our grief at how somebody so young - remember, he was my age - could give up on life so soon.
I have my suspicions for his reasoning, but they have nothing to do with that company we worked for. At the same time, his job obviously didn't meet him where he needed to be met most. Any job is too inadequate to do that.
At least two of our former co-workers got divorced not long after his suicide. Not because of it, however. Several others were laid off during a merger with an affiliated company.
There were so many bad endings associated with this company. At least I got a party.
Even if it wasn't all about me.
_____
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Christ our Passover
(Scroll down for a video link)
You know, I used to idolize traditional corporate worship.
Yeah, yeah: Chalk up yet another weird obsession for this different-drumbeat blogger - who, speaking of drums, still isn't crazy about them in church!
Well, with the exception of timpani. But more about that in a minute.
Back when I was a kid, corporate worship was merely something your parents made you attend. It wasn't important or unimportant, fun or awful, traditional or contemporary, or anything else. It just was. Every Sunday. Even on vacation.
It Used to be Called the City of Churches
Then, after college, I moved to the borough of Brooklyn in New York City. In the 1990's, young unmarried adults had yet to flock over to Brooklyn from Manhattan (once again, I was before my time). And in Brooklyn's rough Sunset Park neighborhood, as in much of the borough, many of the singles my age either had kids, were in and out of jail, or both. For them, church was where people had funerals.
So... I found myself unable to find a solid, Bible-believing church with a decent singles ministry in all of Brooklyn, and becoming profoundly aware of the void being without a community of faith can create. Although today, I'm no longer convinced single adults must prioritize singles ministries when they church-shop, back then, even though there was a Gospel-oriented Baptist church only two blocks away, I dismissed it because it was mostly families and senior citizens.
Back in Texas, my family had been suggesting I try the venerable Calvary Baptist in midtown Manhattan, but they understood my hesitancy because of the commute; on weekends, with sporadic subway service, it was at least an hour one-way. But finally, practically in desperation, I took the plunge and checked out Calvary.
When I walked through Calvary's thick, wood doors off of 57th Street, I felt immediately at home, even though I didn't know a soul there. Wow. I've never experienced anything like it. During a previous visit years ago, I learned their worship format was traditional, but that really didn't mean much to me at the time. The church from which I had come in Texas had a mild contemporary mix, but back then, I was naive to the brewing contemporary/traditional controversy. All I knew when I walked into the foyer at Calvary that Sunday was that I'd found my church home in the big, bad city.
It didn't take long for me to fall in love - with the worship format at Calvary. Majestic and robust, this was doing church like I'd never seen it done before. We recited psalms. The choir would sing a plaintive response to pastoral prayers. The congregation would erupt into mighty hymns, the organ in full vibrato causing the wood floor to quake under our feet. And from the sanctuary's main level, I'd look up into the horseshoe-shaped balcony, packed with people of ethnicities from across the globe, and marvel - sometimes with tears in my eyes - at how it all must be a foretaste of glory divine.
If you haven't really experienced a Biblical, God-focused, traditional service born of an orthodox desire to worship our Creator instead of the created, then you likely have no clue as to what you're missing. Yes, a lot of Americans today immediately protest comments like mine with accusations of preferences, desires for keeping up with the culture, and a lot of other populist rationalizations for why designing a corporate worship service for God instead of us doesn't make sense.
Substance SHOULD be the Style
And for a while, back in Texas, I dove into this controversy with gusto, first as a conscientious objector, trying to tolerate contemporary styles. Then as a refugee from the seeker/contemporary movement, ultimately landing at my current Presbyterian church. And then reveling in its worship style so obnoxiously that it took the Holy Spirit to convict me for attending church not for the sermon or even the fellowship, but the style.
The same reason a lot of contemporary aficionados attend rock-and-roll churches, and think I'm a blithering idiot.
Bummer.
It's taken a while, and even though I'm still convinced traditional, classical worship glorifies God best, you're not a heretic in my book if you don't take my side. Well, not completely, anyway. But that doesn't mean I'm going to give up trying to explain my point of view.
Now, before you click off this blog in disgust, please hear me out! I've even got a video for you visualists out there.
This past Sunday where I worship, our Chancel Choir sang Christ Our Passover, composed by Robert MacFarlane in 1906. It's one of my favorite pieces in my church choir's repertoire, combining all of the elements necessary for Christ-centric worship music: scripture set to a score exemplifying the best practices of composition and performed on acoustic instruments. In other words, music with objective integrity.
So you'll understand my giddy desire to share this glorious Eastertide anthem with you, even if you have to stretch to the depths of your patience to indulge me.
And by the way, about the timpani: several years ago, the former choir director where I worship commissioned an accompaniment with brass and timpani for this piece from Sterling Procter, whose arrangement you'll hear in just a moment. Who says classical music has to be boring?
Below, I've provided the text for the piece, which is 100% solid scripture. Use it for your reference along with a YouTube video of the work sung on Resurrection Sunday this year at St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church on New York City's Park Avenue. Although the video is not of the best quality, it does convey the wonderful spirit of this anthem which celebrates Christ, Who was indeed sacrificed for us:
Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us: therefore let us keep the feast; not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. (1 Corinthians 5:7-8)
Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more: death hath no more dominion over Him. For in that He died, He died unto sin once: but in that He liveth, He liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord! (Romans 6:9-11)
Christ is risen from the dead, and become the first-fruits of them that slept! For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive! (1 Corinthians 15:20-22)
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: World without end. Amen!
I'm telling you: if this doesn't call you out of your mortality for at least a brief moment and fill your mind with awe for what God has done for you, you probably don't need to be reading my blog right now.
Instead, you need to be re-reading the incredible scriptures I referenced above!
_____
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Holy Talk
He calls God "Sir" when he prays.
Patrick Lafferty, one of the young pastors where I worship, gives erudite prayers brimming with theology and doctrine. Which makes them worthwhile in and of themselves. But although most of his prayers are spoken in modern vernacular, whenever he addresses our God directly, he humbly switches from a pastoral familiarity to a stark subservience.
And like a servant addressing his Master, Lafferty boldly yet respectfully calls God "Sir."
It's so cool, and many people I know in church think it's a great reminder to us that, while at the same time we acknowledge God as our Father, and our Intercessor as our Brother, we shouldn't forget that the Trinity gives us our very life and breath. And It is holy.
A number of years ago at the same church, the late Rev. Dr. Robert Nielson would pray from the pulpit in such a conversationalist way that it seemed as if he was literally standing alongside God, sharing an intimate time of confession, supplication, and rejoicing with Him. It wasn't until after Nielson passed away peacefully in his sleep that I met his widow, Lois, during one of our worship service's weekly greetings of peace (where we all stand up and greet those sitting around us). When I learned that Dr. Nielson was Lois's husband, I exclaimed, "Oh, I so miss his prayers! When he prayed, it was like he..."
And Lois cut me off with a smile, "was having a conversation with God, right?"
Apparently, over the years, many people had seen what I saw in Dr. Nielson's prayer life. What a testimony, right?
Prayer Can Be Better
Today is the National Day of Prayer, and I have to confess that I didn't know it until I saw the New York Times make mention of it on their website this morning. President Obama had gone to Ground Zero to commemorate both the NDP and the death of Osama bin Laden this past Sunday. A little irony there, huh?
At any rate, I'm not going to harangue on why prayer seems to get short shrift in our culture these days, or why we people of faith usually seem to struggle with it. Most of us know it's crucial to our relationship with Christ, yet the more we try to develop a consistent and legitimate prayer life, the more elusive it can become.
To my shame, I'm not a prayer warrior or hero. There are many times when I spend as much time trying to recover from mental rabbit trails as I do actually talking with God. Prayer is indeed a discipline, and like most disciplines, I don't find that always comes easily. About the only times I can pray without distraction are when I really, really want or need something right away. But how genuine is that?
Over the years, I have developed some tools and processes which have helped me better honor God when I talk with Him. The main consideration I try to remember is that prayer really is a conversation between myself and God. He's invited me to talk to and with Him, and since He's as real as any mortal to whom I talk on our planet, I need to begin with at least the same propriety and decorum that would be expected of me were I having a socially-acceptable conversation with anybody else.
I had a Bible study leader one time tell our group that it is OK to fall asleep while talking to God, because He wants us to rest. But how rude is that?! Yes, God invites us to rest, but how appropriate is it for us to doze off when somebody else is talking to us?
Instead, I believe that for honest communication to take place - not only me communicating to God, but Him communicating to me - I need to maintain my attention, concentrate my focus, and value the sacrifice God made on my behalf so we could have these times together. No matter how long or formal they are. Not that I'm always successful, but with the help of these tools I'd like to share with you, I think that my prayer life is getting richer.
So if, like me, you struggle with maintaining purpose and perspective when you pray, consider trying some of these ideas:
1. Incorporate snippets of Bible verses that you've memorized into relevant parts of your prayer.
2. When praying for individual people, mentally post an image of that person in your brain for the duration of your supplication on behalf of that person. This helps break up lists of people for whom you might be praying, and also may keep your attention from wandering off.
3. If you usually follow a structure or formula for your prayers, from time to time, allow your prayers to flow organically, perhaps from topic to topic, or by interspersing your petitions with praises.
4. If you catch your mind wandering, check yourself for a brief moment and scan your brain: are you thinking about this topic because maybe there's something in it God wants you to address in prayer? It could be that what you think is a lack of attention is actually God trying to get your attention about something that may seem to be a distraction.
5. Diversify the way you end your prayers; I try using hymns that relate to a main theme in the prayer, or a particular aspect of God that I need to appreciate more myself. I even own two hymnals for this purpose.
6. I usually pray one "formal" or "official" prayer in the mornings with my devotional, and then follow-up throughout the day with more informal, short, "Twitter"-type prayers of petition and even thanksgiving. I also try to remember to close-out my day with a short prayer before I go to bed at night, but I've yet to make that a habit.
I'm not saying that we need to copy what other people do in prayer or how other people pray. Personally, I don't call God "Sir," and nobody has ever said my public prayers sound conversational.
But I do think I communicate better with God these days. And I know that gives Him glory.
Which is what our prayers should do, no matter our style. Amen?
_____
Patrick Lafferty, one of the young pastors where I worship, gives erudite prayers brimming with theology and doctrine. Which makes them worthwhile in and of themselves. But although most of his prayers are spoken in modern vernacular, whenever he addresses our God directly, he humbly switches from a pastoral familiarity to a stark subservience.
And like a servant addressing his Master, Lafferty boldly yet respectfully calls God "Sir."
It's so cool, and many people I know in church think it's a great reminder to us that, while at the same time we acknowledge God as our Father, and our Intercessor as our Brother, we shouldn't forget that the Trinity gives us our very life and breath. And It is holy.
A number of years ago at the same church, the late Rev. Dr. Robert Nielson would pray from the pulpit in such a conversationalist way that it seemed as if he was literally standing alongside God, sharing an intimate time of confession, supplication, and rejoicing with Him. It wasn't until after Nielson passed away peacefully in his sleep that I met his widow, Lois, during one of our worship service's weekly greetings of peace (where we all stand up and greet those sitting around us). When I learned that Dr. Nielson was Lois's husband, I exclaimed, "Oh, I so miss his prayers! When he prayed, it was like he..."
And Lois cut me off with a smile, "was having a conversation with God, right?"
Apparently, over the years, many people had seen what I saw in Dr. Nielson's prayer life. What a testimony, right?
Prayer Can Be Better
Today is the National Day of Prayer, and I have to confess that I didn't know it until I saw the New York Times make mention of it on their website this morning. President Obama had gone to Ground Zero to commemorate both the NDP and the death of Osama bin Laden this past Sunday. A little irony there, huh?
At any rate, I'm not going to harangue on why prayer seems to get short shrift in our culture these days, or why we people of faith usually seem to struggle with it. Most of us know it's crucial to our relationship with Christ, yet the more we try to develop a consistent and legitimate prayer life, the more elusive it can become.
To my shame, I'm not a prayer warrior or hero. There are many times when I spend as much time trying to recover from mental rabbit trails as I do actually talking with God. Prayer is indeed a discipline, and like most disciplines, I don't find that always comes easily. About the only times I can pray without distraction are when I really, really want or need something right away. But how genuine is that?
Over the years, I have developed some tools and processes which have helped me better honor God when I talk with Him. The main consideration I try to remember is that prayer really is a conversation between myself and God. He's invited me to talk to and with Him, and since He's as real as any mortal to whom I talk on our planet, I need to begin with at least the same propriety and decorum that would be expected of me were I having a socially-acceptable conversation with anybody else.
I had a Bible study leader one time tell our group that it is OK to fall asleep while talking to God, because He wants us to rest. But how rude is that?! Yes, God invites us to rest, but how appropriate is it for us to doze off when somebody else is talking to us?
Instead, I believe that for honest communication to take place - not only me communicating to God, but Him communicating to me - I need to maintain my attention, concentrate my focus, and value the sacrifice God made on my behalf so we could have these times together. No matter how long or formal they are. Not that I'm always successful, but with the help of these tools I'd like to share with you, I think that my prayer life is getting richer.
So if, like me, you struggle with maintaining purpose and perspective when you pray, consider trying some of these ideas:
1. Incorporate snippets of Bible verses that you've memorized into relevant parts of your prayer.
2. When praying for individual people, mentally post an image of that person in your brain for the duration of your supplication on behalf of that person. This helps break up lists of people for whom you might be praying, and also may keep your attention from wandering off.
3. If you usually follow a structure or formula for your prayers, from time to time, allow your prayers to flow organically, perhaps from topic to topic, or by interspersing your petitions with praises.
4. If you catch your mind wandering, check yourself for a brief moment and scan your brain: are you thinking about this topic because maybe there's something in it God wants you to address in prayer? It could be that what you think is a lack of attention is actually God trying to get your attention about something that may seem to be a distraction.
5. Diversify the way you end your prayers; I try using hymns that relate to a main theme in the prayer, or a particular aspect of God that I need to appreciate more myself. I even own two hymnals for this purpose.
6. I usually pray one "formal" or "official" prayer in the mornings with my devotional, and then follow-up throughout the day with more informal, short, "Twitter"-type prayers of petition and even thanksgiving. I also try to remember to close-out my day with a short prayer before I go to bed at night, but I've yet to make that a habit.
I'm not saying that we need to copy what other people do in prayer or how other people pray. Personally, I don't call God "Sir," and nobody has ever said my public prayers sound conversational.
But I do think I communicate better with God these days. And I know that gives Him glory.
Which is what our prayers should do, no matter our style. Amen?
_____
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Beating Life out of SEALs?
Their own families may not know.
And if they do, it's against the law for them to tell anybody.
Twelve members of the Navy SEAL's Team 6 unit supposedly killed Osama bin Laden this past Sunday in Pakistan. I say "supposedly" because officially, Team 6 doesn't exist.
You think you have secrets? You've never worked for the United States military!
Of Frogmen and Seals
Ever since Sunday night's surprise announcement of bin Laden's death, the American public has been infatuated with the details surrounding this stunning event. Yet of all that we've learned about it, we'll never know the names of the guys who actually dropped into bin Laden's Abbottabad compound and did the deed. We'll probably all be dead and buried before our government removes the top-secret clearance on this operation and allows these men to be publicly awarded some medals for heroism. Posthumously, of course.
About all we'll know is their gender - the SEALs don't accept women.
Obviously, there are national security reasons for why the SEAL's Team 6 program remains shrouded in mystery. We do know that qualifying for acceptance is so rigorous, nearly 80% of its already-accomplished candidates drop out half-way through. Indeed, even saying you had to drop out of Team 6 qualifiers can earn you bragging rights.
Those men who do complete the program spend the rest of their career training for operations like the one to capture bin Laden. And experts tell us that after the special operations agents were de-briefed back in Washington, they have most likely been sent back out into the field by now, training for their next assignment. Or maybe they've already completed their next assignment already, unbeknownst to us. Their world is that secret.
Training the Humanity Out of Them
What isn't secret is how comprehensive the training is that these elite frogmen undergo, and what's expected of them. Both physically, and mentally.
Repeatedly, we hear that SEALs are expected to exceed even the heroic demands of extraordinary military might. They're trained to prepare for an exceptionally challenging mission, execute it, and then move on to the next exceptionally challenging mission. Normal physical and mental instincts are drilled, drowned, scared, frozen, and stretched out of them in training. Exceeding physical and mental limits is the only way to succeed. They'll get no grand accolades when they triumph, and they'll get no soft shoulder to cry on if they fail. They focus on the mechanics of their mission, and like a finely-tuned engine, without emotion or conscience, they get turned on and off depending on where their superiors tell them to go and what they tell them to do.
Which is all well and good, when you're talking in generalities about rescuing hostages, like SEALs did recently aboard a captured vessel near Somalia. Or helping find caches of weaponry, like they've been doing in Afghanistan and Iraq. And even when they're finding and killing somebody as universally notorious as bin Laden.
But is stripping so much humanity out of a soldier really ethical?
Nobody is forced into becoming a SEAL. Indeed, all the experts say it's impossible to complete its fantastically rigorous demands if you don't have a burning desire to. Even though we don't know details about specific operations, we all know what's expected, including recruits. So it's not like the government is coercing any SEAL candidate to do something against his will.
(I've gotta interject - it feels quite odd being able to use only male pronouns in this essay!)
We also need to recognize that in times of officially-sanctioned war, the taking of human life happens. It's impossible to argue from a Biblical standpoint that war, in and of itself, is sinful. Our conventional soldiers are taught how to deploy various types of weaponry with the expectation that human beings will be killed as a result. And in bin Laden's case, multiple world governments have certifiable proof that he is a mass murderer, so his assassination would have been justified had it taken place soon after 9/11, or this past weekend.
But what are the mechanics of ethics which allow the training of human beings to kill like autotrons? The immediate - albeit inaccurate - correlation is Mafia hit men, who are trained to go out and knock off somebody for the good of the family. There's usually little remorse or much contemplation about mortality. It's a job that's gotta be done; badda bing, badda boom. Is it similar with SEALs?
One expert on the radio this morning, a retired SEAL, scoffed when an anchorwoman asked him what kind of counseling the Team 6 members would have received after successfully completing their mission this past Sunday. Basically, he snorted, "you don't give counseling to SEALs."
They're trained to treat death and killing as part of the job. Period. Part of the punchlist. A line item on the scope-of-work spreadsheet. Something that needs to take place for the benefit of civilization. I guess kinda like the guys who used to operate guillotines, or decapitate criminals in the village square. But at least those guys didn't have their own humanity rigorously disemboweled like SEALs have.
No Ill Will to Kill?
Couldn't we have simply cluster-bombed this compound in Abbottabad on Sunday, since nobody really expected bin Laden to surrender? After all, the taking of bin Laden's life, and the lives of whomever else was in the compound with him, isn't what I'm questioning. Is democracy really riding on the life-defying prowess of the 2,500 super-warriors we call SEALs? What might God be thinking about our ability to defy the natural limits He's set for our bodies, and our minds?
I've tried to think about how different Bible passages might be applicable to the question of whether we're going too far in stripping select human beings of the very characteristics which make them human. After all, these guys spend over 300 days a year on assignment, away from whatever family they may have. They're trained to suppress all of the natural instincts and innate defense mechanisms we're born with. And life - and that which sustains it - becomes more of a nuisance than something to be cherished.
Granted, people of faith should "die to self" during the process of sanctification, but that process involves our refusal to give in to our sin nature. We're to give up our emotional and physical attachments to family, possessions, and status if we're going to follow Christ. And in the case of martyrdom, believers have actually endured tremendous torture and death for the sake of the Gospel.
But nowhere in scripture does God expect His people to deny their humanity. Christ Himself acknowledges that we maintain a link of responsibility, compassion, and accountability to people and things entrusted into our care. And we are to mourn with those who mourn, laugh with those who laugh, and weep with those who weep. Sounds pretty emotional and sympathetic to me.
Sure, our special operations force was able to take out bin Laden for us. But are elite killers the best way to accomplish such perilous actions?
Might we be losing a bit of our own humanity by asking our secret warriors to relinquish theirs for us?
_____
And if they do, it's against the law for them to tell anybody.
Twelve members of the Navy SEAL's Team 6 unit supposedly killed Osama bin Laden this past Sunday in Pakistan. I say "supposedly" because officially, Team 6 doesn't exist.
You think you have secrets? You've never worked for the United States military!
Of Frogmen and Seals
Ever since Sunday night's surprise announcement of bin Laden's death, the American public has been infatuated with the details surrounding this stunning event. Yet of all that we've learned about it, we'll never know the names of the guys who actually dropped into bin Laden's Abbottabad compound and did the deed. We'll probably all be dead and buried before our government removes the top-secret clearance on this operation and allows these men to be publicly awarded some medals for heroism. Posthumously, of course.
About all we'll know is their gender - the SEALs don't accept women.
Obviously, there are national security reasons for why the SEAL's Team 6 program remains shrouded in mystery. We do know that qualifying for acceptance is so rigorous, nearly 80% of its already-accomplished candidates drop out half-way through. Indeed, even saying you had to drop out of Team 6 qualifiers can earn you bragging rights.
Those men who do complete the program spend the rest of their career training for operations like the one to capture bin Laden. And experts tell us that after the special operations agents were de-briefed back in Washington, they have most likely been sent back out into the field by now, training for their next assignment. Or maybe they've already completed their next assignment already, unbeknownst to us. Their world is that secret.
Training the Humanity Out of Them
What isn't secret is how comprehensive the training is that these elite frogmen undergo, and what's expected of them. Both physically, and mentally.
Repeatedly, we hear that SEALs are expected to exceed even the heroic demands of extraordinary military might. They're trained to prepare for an exceptionally challenging mission, execute it, and then move on to the next exceptionally challenging mission. Normal physical and mental instincts are drilled, drowned, scared, frozen, and stretched out of them in training. Exceeding physical and mental limits is the only way to succeed. They'll get no grand accolades when they triumph, and they'll get no soft shoulder to cry on if they fail. They focus on the mechanics of their mission, and like a finely-tuned engine, without emotion or conscience, they get turned on and off depending on where their superiors tell them to go and what they tell them to do.
Which is all well and good, when you're talking in generalities about rescuing hostages, like SEALs did recently aboard a captured vessel near Somalia. Or helping find caches of weaponry, like they've been doing in Afghanistan and Iraq. And even when they're finding and killing somebody as universally notorious as bin Laden.
But is stripping so much humanity out of a soldier really ethical?
Nobody is forced into becoming a SEAL. Indeed, all the experts say it's impossible to complete its fantastically rigorous demands if you don't have a burning desire to. Even though we don't know details about specific operations, we all know what's expected, including recruits. So it's not like the government is coercing any SEAL candidate to do something against his will.
(I've gotta interject - it feels quite odd being able to use only male pronouns in this essay!)
We also need to recognize that in times of officially-sanctioned war, the taking of human life happens. It's impossible to argue from a Biblical standpoint that war, in and of itself, is sinful. Our conventional soldiers are taught how to deploy various types of weaponry with the expectation that human beings will be killed as a result. And in bin Laden's case, multiple world governments have certifiable proof that he is a mass murderer, so his assassination would have been justified had it taken place soon after 9/11, or this past weekend.
But what are the mechanics of ethics which allow the training of human beings to kill like autotrons? The immediate - albeit inaccurate - correlation is Mafia hit men, who are trained to go out and knock off somebody for the good of the family. There's usually little remorse or much contemplation about mortality. It's a job that's gotta be done; badda bing, badda boom. Is it similar with SEALs?
One expert on the radio this morning, a retired SEAL, scoffed when an anchorwoman asked him what kind of counseling the Team 6 members would have received after successfully completing their mission this past Sunday. Basically, he snorted, "you don't give counseling to SEALs."
They're trained to treat death and killing as part of the job. Period. Part of the punchlist. A line item on the scope-of-work spreadsheet. Something that needs to take place for the benefit of civilization. I guess kinda like the guys who used to operate guillotines, or decapitate criminals in the village square. But at least those guys didn't have their own humanity rigorously disemboweled like SEALs have.
No Ill Will to Kill?
Couldn't we have simply cluster-bombed this compound in Abbottabad on Sunday, since nobody really expected bin Laden to surrender? After all, the taking of bin Laden's life, and the lives of whomever else was in the compound with him, isn't what I'm questioning. Is democracy really riding on the life-defying prowess of the 2,500 super-warriors we call SEALs? What might God be thinking about our ability to defy the natural limits He's set for our bodies, and our minds?
I've tried to think about how different Bible passages might be applicable to the question of whether we're going too far in stripping select human beings of the very characteristics which make them human. After all, these guys spend over 300 days a year on assignment, away from whatever family they may have. They're trained to suppress all of the natural instincts and innate defense mechanisms we're born with. And life - and that which sustains it - becomes more of a nuisance than something to be cherished.
Granted, people of faith should "die to self" during the process of sanctification, but that process involves our refusal to give in to our sin nature. We're to give up our emotional and physical attachments to family, possessions, and status if we're going to follow Christ. And in the case of martyrdom, believers have actually endured tremendous torture and death for the sake of the Gospel.
But nowhere in scripture does God expect His people to deny their humanity. Christ Himself acknowledges that we maintain a link of responsibility, compassion, and accountability to people and things entrusted into our care. And we are to mourn with those who mourn, laugh with those who laugh, and weep with those who weep. Sounds pretty emotional and sympathetic to me.
Sure, our special operations force was able to take out bin Laden for us. But are elite killers the best way to accomplish such perilous actions?
Might we be losing a bit of our own humanity by asking our secret warriors to relinquish theirs for us?
_____
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Parsing Suburbia
It occurs to me that some of you, having read my recent diatribes about urban centers, suburbanization, and even exurbanization, might think that I'm one of those anti-suburban elitists.
Perhaps you've heard of them: urbanists who think humanity best serves the environment by cramming ourselves into high-rise apartment blocks to minimize our geographical footprint. Ecologists who claim suburbanization's car culture bloats our carbon footprint. And therapists who say suburbanization has fueled the unraveling of the very things it was supposed to preserve: family unity, civic involvement, and even personal well being. Since, as a suburbanized nation, we vote less, we attend church less, and we're less content.
Lots of folks living in suburbia probably don't realize they're sitting in the middle of a grand academic and political debate over the merits of their lifestyle. But as exurbanization pushes the reaches of costly infrastructure development ever farther out, gas prices continue to rise, and Gen-X'ers fuel a migration back to inner cities with singles, homeschoolers, and empty-nesters, suburbanization may have started to lose some of its economic clout. Particularly those first-ring suburbs that now show their age, and in which younger generations have expressed ambivalence about staying.
Whether suburban Americans want to admit it or not, change has begun to take place all around them. Even though more Americans now live in suburbs than rural and urban areas combined, the promise of the good life in suburbia has begun to either elude or fail to impress homebuyers who don't need the highly-rated public schools that have remained one of suburbia's biggest draws.
Nobody except fringe liberals are predicting the death of the suburb. But since the suburbs are where most of America's conservatives, Republicans, and people of faith live, some right-wingers have become uncomfortable with what they perceive as an urban bias in the current presidential administration. A bias which could lead to spending for big city programs suburbanites fear won't benefit them.
Reverse Migration to the Cities
Oddly enough, however, the renewed interest in city life has actually been coming from the well-educated, relatively affluent suburbs themselves.
Look, for example, at the surprising levels of interest across the country in renovating forgotten inner-city neighborhoods. Here in Dallas, one of the most acrimonious disputes isn't about white flight, but professionals moving back into town, tearing down old frame houses, and constructing gaudy McMansions. In Fort Worth, a dreary industrial neighborhood just west of downtown is being re-made into a trendy collection of high-priced low-rise condominium complexes.
Even poor, minority neighborhoods are being rediscovered, by none other than America's retailers. A seedy stretch of impoverished west Dallas has recently been flooded with big-box stores and chain restaurants. I'm no fan of Wal-Mart, but I have to give them credit for being the only company willing to build full-service grocery stores in some of Fort Worth's most beleaguered areas. It seems companies can make money in the inner city after all, where individual household incomes may be low, but the population density means more people are nearby needing fresh food, toothpaste, and even lumber.
And you've already read about the surge in young whites moving into Manhattan and even Brooklyn, sparking surprising demographic shifts in what has become a minority-majority metropolis. If even preachers are now trying to claim a piece of the urban action, you know the trend back to the cities is for real.
Against this heady backdrop of progressive urbanization, then, it might sound as though I'm one of the suburban-bashers. But, guess what: I'm not. I still live in a suburb, and have no plans of leaving anytime soon.
Not that suburbia is utopia. It's just that urban America isn't utopia, either. And the debate over urban/suburban living, like many debates, has degenerated into yet another politicized and propagandized war over preferences. Generally, conservative Republican pundits want to preserve the idyllic family-friendly ethos of the idealized suburban model, and liberal Democrats want to deconstruct conventional American society by forcing all of us into a dense coexistence.
I think accepting reality would make most of us a lot happier.
Suburbanization for Better or Worse
Who can say suburbanization has been entirely good, or entirely bad? Of the factors which coalesced to create the phenomenon, some were benign trends, while others were overt fallacies.
To a certain degree, suburbanization evolved as a logical extension of urbanization to accommodate the Baby Boom generation after the Second World War. The sheer population dynamics of this vast cohort of people testify to that. Where would all those kids have fit in the cities of 1955?
Then there were the developers who built the Levittowns of suburbia, and the industrialists who built the cars and the freeways to get there. America's grand consumer marketplace quickly became the world's most dynamic innovation engine after World War II, and furnishing all of these new homes and deploying mass-market cars instead of mass-transit commuter lines played significant roles in our country's economic development.
What bothers me most about suburbanization is an irony, because one of the big motivators getting whites out of inner cities was veiled - or sometimes, blatant - racism. Although some conservatives bristle at the notion, "white fight" has been proven to be one of the key phenomena which fueled the growth of our suburbs.
The irony comes when I acknowledge, much to the chagrin of my liberal urban theory professors from college, that in a capitalist democracy, I don't necessarily think we should expect everybody to live together in high densities. Particularly in the United States, we are not as homogeneous a society as academics like to think we are, and there is a benefit to having some space between ourselves for everybody's shared sanity. Let's face it: many of us like the privacy, space, and individuality that you simply can't get living on top of each other.
Think about it: it's hard to work up a riot in suburbia. Even in poor suburbs. Not hearing the upstairs neighbors fighting all the time is a good thing. Even Chicago's towering 1950's-era public housing project, Cabrini Green, has been replaced with low-density apartments, and some of those are in the suburbs. Obviously, a mix of urban and suburban can be beneficial in a society which supposedly values differences.
From a purely logistical standpoint, some version of suburbanization would have happened anyway, as populations bubbled over city lines like soup in a boiling pot. Either cities would have annexed the little towns ringing their boundaries - which sometimes happened anyway - or the little towns would have, over time, grown into good-sized cities in their own right from the spillover effect, much as Arlington, Texas, where I live, has done. We've grown not only as a suburb, but as population has spilled over from Fort Worth, with whom we share a city line. Surely urbanists can't have expected to keep the country's burgeoning population growth within the confines of existing city boundaries? Sprawl of some sort was inevitable.
One key characteristic differentiating most suburbs from their nearby urban cores is population density. And if you're going to argue from a purely ecological standpoint, then no, suburbia and its inherent sprawl characteristics aren't the most environmentally-friendly invention mankind has ever come up with. A lot of land is wasted on yards homeowners never use, acres of parking lots sit empty every day, and mass transit becomes inefficient since everything is so much further apart.
But how environmentally-sustainable are high-density urban centers? It could be argued that suburbia actually dilutes some forms of pollution, whereas cities concentrate some forms of pollution. For example, due to the abundance of concrete surfaces, cities become heat islands which can increase the amount of electricity necessary to keep people cool. Congestion on city streets can also be more significant than in suburbia, contributing to vehicle emissions from stalled traffic.
And how about that traffic? Liberals love to tout mass transit functionality in urban centers, but incessant budget cuts - largely triggered by irresponsibly high unionized wages - have whittled mass transit service down to bare-bones operations in most cities, which has driven many city dwellers to private vehicles for reliable mobility. Sure, I think most people - even conservatives - would be willing to park their car and use mass transit if it was frequent, safe, convenient, and affordable. But our post-modern lives don't seem to be slow enough for the not-for-profit systems we have.
Suburbs in Transition
Personally, I think the greatest threat to the conservative suburban ideal is the same American trait that spawned them to begin with: that desire for something new and different. Sure, post-war Americans could have stayed in larger numbers in their urban hometowns to raise their kids, but they wanted their own space with their own grass for their kids. Today, suburbanites could stay in the 'burbs, but not only does the excitement and intrigue of the inner city beckon, but developers have invented the next big thing in family mobility: the exurb.
Exurbs have been popping up along the fringes of major metropolitan areas for the past decade, characterized by more brand-new home construction in an even deeper rural setting. Which takes no imagination, since many of these exurbs are being built on pastures which were farmland when suburbs were being invented 60 years ago.
Meanwhile, our current suburbs will continue to age, our own little suburban cores turning unattractive as new styles and fads from the exurbs - and renewal projects in the city - make them appear dated. Eventually, suburban towns will evolve into towns with remarkably similar problems as have plagued our urban centers for decades. Only on a smaller scale.
Not that suburbs will cease to exist. Sooner or later, hip Gen-X'ers will be able to find some redeeming qualities to the suburban environments in which they were raised, and maybe even spark some sort of split-level subdivision renaissance.
After all, how 'ya gonna keep 'em down on the farm after they've seen Naperville?
_____
Perhaps you've heard of them: urbanists who think humanity best serves the environment by cramming ourselves into high-rise apartment blocks to minimize our geographical footprint. Ecologists who claim suburbanization's car culture bloats our carbon footprint. And therapists who say suburbanization has fueled the unraveling of the very things it was supposed to preserve: family unity, civic involvement, and even personal well being. Since, as a suburbanized nation, we vote less, we attend church less, and we're less content.
Lots of folks living in suburbia probably don't realize they're sitting in the middle of a grand academic and political debate over the merits of their lifestyle. But as exurbanization pushes the reaches of costly infrastructure development ever farther out, gas prices continue to rise, and Gen-X'ers fuel a migration back to inner cities with singles, homeschoolers, and empty-nesters, suburbanization may have started to lose some of its economic clout. Particularly those first-ring suburbs that now show their age, and in which younger generations have expressed ambivalence about staying.
Whether suburban Americans want to admit it or not, change has begun to take place all around them. Even though more Americans now live in suburbs than rural and urban areas combined, the promise of the good life in suburbia has begun to either elude or fail to impress homebuyers who don't need the highly-rated public schools that have remained one of suburbia's biggest draws.
Nobody except fringe liberals are predicting the death of the suburb. But since the suburbs are where most of America's conservatives, Republicans, and people of faith live, some right-wingers have become uncomfortable with what they perceive as an urban bias in the current presidential administration. A bias which could lead to spending for big city programs suburbanites fear won't benefit them.
Reverse Migration to the Cities
Oddly enough, however, the renewed interest in city life has actually been coming from the well-educated, relatively affluent suburbs themselves.
Look, for example, at the surprising levels of interest across the country in renovating forgotten inner-city neighborhoods. Here in Dallas, one of the most acrimonious disputes isn't about white flight, but professionals moving back into town, tearing down old frame houses, and constructing gaudy McMansions. In Fort Worth, a dreary industrial neighborhood just west of downtown is being re-made into a trendy collection of high-priced low-rise condominium complexes.
Even poor, minority neighborhoods are being rediscovered, by none other than America's retailers. A seedy stretch of impoverished west Dallas has recently been flooded with big-box stores and chain restaurants. I'm no fan of Wal-Mart, but I have to give them credit for being the only company willing to build full-service grocery stores in some of Fort Worth's most beleaguered areas. It seems companies can make money in the inner city after all, where individual household incomes may be low, but the population density means more people are nearby needing fresh food, toothpaste, and even lumber.
And you've already read about the surge in young whites moving into Manhattan and even Brooklyn, sparking surprising demographic shifts in what has become a minority-majority metropolis. If even preachers are now trying to claim a piece of the urban action, you know the trend back to the cities is for real.
Against this heady backdrop of progressive urbanization, then, it might sound as though I'm one of the suburban-bashers. But, guess what: I'm not. I still live in a suburb, and have no plans of leaving anytime soon.
Not that suburbia is utopia. It's just that urban America isn't utopia, either. And the debate over urban/suburban living, like many debates, has degenerated into yet another politicized and propagandized war over preferences. Generally, conservative Republican pundits want to preserve the idyllic family-friendly ethos of the idealized suburban model, and liberal Democrats want to deconstruct conventional American society by forcing all of us into a dense coexistence.
I think accepting reality would make most of us a lot happier.
Suburbanization for Better or Worse
Who can say suburbanization has been entirely good, or entirely bad? Of the factors which coalesced to create the phenomenon, some were benign trends, while others were overt fallacies.
To a certain degree, suburbanization evolved as a logical extension of urbanization to accommodate the Baby Boom generation after the Second World War. The sheer population dynamics of this vast cohort of people testify to that. Where would all those kids have fit in the cities of 1955?
Then there were the developers who built the Levittowns of suburbia, and the industrialists who built the cars and the freeways to get there. America's grand consumer marketplace quickly became the world's most dynamic innovation engine after World War II, and furnishing all of these new homes and deploying mass-market cars instead of mass-transit commuter lines played significant roles in our country's economic development.
What bothers me most about suburbanization is an irony, because one of the big motivators getting whites out of inner cities was veiled - or sometimes, blatant - racism. Although some conservatives bristle at the notion, "white fight" has been proven to be one of the key phenomena which fueled the growth of our suburbs.
The irony comes when I acknowledge, much to the chagrin of my liberal urban theory professors from college, that in a capitalist democracy, I don't necessarily think we should expect everybody to live together in high densities. Particularly in the United States, we are not as homogeneous a society as academics like to think we are, and there is a benefit to having some space between ourselves for everybody's shared sanity. Let's face it: many of us like the privacy, space, and individuality that you simply can't get living on top of each other.
Think about it: it's hard to work up a riot in suburbia. Even in poor suburbs. Not hearing the upstairs neighbors fighting all the time is a good thing. Even Chicago's towering 1950's-era public housing project, Cabrini Green, has been replaced with low-density apartments, and some of those are in the suburbs. Obviously, a mix of urban and suburban can be beneficial in a society which supposedly values differences.
From a purely logistical standpoint, some version of suburbanization would have happened anyway, as populations bubbled over city lines like soup in a boiling pot. Either cities would have annexed the little towns ringing their boundaries - which sometimes happened anyway - or the little towns would have, over time, grown into good-sized cities in their own right from the spillover effect, much as Arlington, Texas, where I live, has done. We've grown not only as a suburb, but as population has spilled over from Fort Worth, with whom we share a city line. Surely urbanists can't have expected to keep the country's burgeoning population growth within the confines of existing city boundaries? Sprawl of some sort was inevitable.
One key characteristic differentiating most suburbs from their nearby urban cores is population density. And if you're going to argue from a purely ecological standpoint, then no, suburbia and its inherent sprawl characteristics aren't the most environmentally-friendly invention mankind has ever come up with. A lot of land is wasted on yards homeowners never use, acres of parking lots sit empty every day, and mass transit becomes inefficient since everything is so much further apart.
But how environmentally-sustainable are high-density urban centers? It could be argued that suburbia actually dilutes some forms of pollution, whereas cities concentrate some forms of pollution. For example, due to the abundance of concrete surfaces, cities become heat islands which can increase the amount of electricity necessary to keep people cool. Congestion on city streets can also be more significant than in suburbia, contributing to vehicle emissions from stalled traffic.
And how about that traffic? Liberals love to tout mass transit functionality in urban centers, but incessant budget cuts - largely triggered by irresponsibly high unionized wages - have whittled mass transit service down to bare-bones operations in most cities, which has driven many city dwellers to private vehicles for reliable mobility. Sure, I think most people - even conservatives - would be willing to park their car and use mass transit if it was frequent, safe, convenient, and affordable. But our post-modern lives don't seem to be slow enough for the not-for-profit systems we have.
Suburbs in Transition
Personally, I think the greatest threat to the conservative suburban ideal is the same American trait that spawned them to begin with: that desire for something new and different. Sure, post-war Americans could have stayed in larger numbers in their urban hometowns to raise their kids, but they wanted their own space with their own grass for their kids. Today, suburbanites could stay in the 'burbs, but not only does the excitement and intrigue of the inner city beckon, but developers have invented the next big thing in family mobility: the exurb.
Exurbs have been popping up along the fringes of major metropolitan areas for the past decade, characterized by more brand-new home construction in an even deeper rural setting. Which takes no imagination, since many of these exurbs are being built on pastures which were farmland when suburbs were being invented 60 years ago.
Meanwhile, our current suburbs will continue to age, our own little suburban cores turning unattractive as new styles and fads from the exurbs - and renewal projects in the city - make them appear dated. Eventually, suburban towns will evolve into towns with remarkably similar problems as have plagued our urban centers for decades. Only on a smaller scale.
Not that suburbs will cease to exist. Sooner or later, hip Gen-X'ers will be able to find some redeeming qualities to the suburban environments in which they were raised, and maybe even spark some sort of split-level subdivision renaissance.
After all, how 'ya gonna keep 'em down on the farm after they've seen Naperville?
_____
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