Eating Chocolate and Generosity

Giving makes you feel good

In fact, when researchers looked at the MRIs of people who gave to various charities, they found that generosity stimulates the reward center in the brain and releases endorphins. –live generously.com

Neuroscience has demonstrated that giving is a powerful pathway for creating more personal joy and improving overall health. While the brain is remarkably complex, the neurochemical drivers of happiness are quite easy to identify. Dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin make up the Happiness Trifecta. - Psychology Today

 It’s the same feeling you get when you eat chocolate.

Chocolate contains a variety of chemicals some of which make us feel good by boosting our endorphins (those feel good hormones). Chocolate may also boost serotonin levels that help us to feel relaxed. Some forms contain caffeine, which give a boost of energy along with the calming effect. -sharecare.com

Now imagine what it would be like to live generously and eat chocolate.

Mass Shootings

There's been another mass shooting over the weekend. A gunman or gunmen opened fire at a backyard party in Fresno. At least four are dead. (As I write this, there is a second shooting in Oklahoma at a Walmart!)

Deadly Backyard Shooting

As tragic as these shootings are, it's only the tip of the iceberg in this country. According to statistics from bradyunited.org, 310 people are shot in the United States every day. The effects are much broader than the glaring headlines created when there is a mass shooting.

• 100 people are shot and killed
• 210 survive gun injuries
• 95 are injured in an attack
• 61 die from suicide
• 10 survive a suicide attempt
• 1 is killed unintentionally
• 90 are shot unintentionally
• 1 is killed by legal intervention
• 4 are shot by legal intervention
• 1 died but the intent was unknown
• 12 are shot but the intent was unknown

DAILY GUN VIOLENCE IMPACTING CHILDREN AND TEENS (1-17)

Every day, 21 children and teens (1-17) are shot in the United States. Among those:

• 4 die from gun violence
• 2 are murdered
• 17 children and teens survive gun injuries
• 8 are injured in an attack
• 2 children and teens either die from suicide or survive a suicide attempt
• 8 children and teens are shot instances of family fire — a shooting involving an improperly stored or misused gun found in the home resulting in injury or death

Over 113,000 are shot every year. I would think gun owners want to be a part of the solution. Yet, nothing gets accomplished. Congress and the President are doing nothing, shielding themselves in the second amendment. There is something bigger than this. It is a guiding principle in the Declaration of Independence. Our founding fathers thought it so important they put "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness toward the top of the Declaration. None of this make sense if we're all afraid of what our neighbor may do with his or here second amendment rights. 

John Lewis offers a perspective on Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

 There is no motive available at this time for the shooting in Fresno, but maybe Americans are not mature enough to bear arms without some limits put on that ownership. Those limits may not end violence, but this is not a zero sum game. Reducing the violence should be a the goal.

Public Radio stations are offering perspective on guns and gun violence. My station, Connecticut Public Radio, is a part of this collaborative.Guns and America over the course of two years, Reporting Fellows at 10 partner public media stations, representing a diverse range of communities all over the country, will report on gun issues, from the cultural significance of hunting and gun ownership to the role guns play in suicide, homicide, mass shootings and beyond.

Getting to the point

Encouraging Signs

About halfway through my local NPR station's fundraiser, they shifted message points. They started talking about local coverage. They've done this before, but this time the message was much more that lip service. The messages focused on the type of coverage and the quality of the coverage, and how that coverage gives the broader perspective of events globally. The message was more about the unique value proposition of what they offer rather than, "We have local news!" The message made the fundrive easier for me to listen to.

They still mention the premiums, but the point of the drive is so much more than sox and mugs and wreaths. For a long time, this station relied heavily on premiums, but you gotta ask yourself, is that really why people listen? IMHO...it's the wrong path. It was chosen long ago by Public Television. Public TV is at a point, now, where they cannot raise funds around regular programming. Their fundrives are about pitching a product.

There's a lot at stake.

I was reading an article by Jim Wallis, "THE TRUTH QUESTION: HOW TO SEEK TRUTH WHEN THE PRESIDENT NORMALIZES LIES." Wallis points out that the president has lied over 13,000 times in 1,000 days. That's over 13 lies a day. His tactic is a common tactic.

AUTOCRATS AND STRONGMEN ALL OVER THE WORLD ATTACK THE FREE PRESS AND THE IDEA OF OBJECTIVE TRUTH BECAUSE THEY WANT YOU ONLY TO BE ABLE TO LISTEN TO THEIR TRUTH. (Sojourners)

The free press still exists, but it is under constant attack. Even here, where a free press is supposed to be guaranteed by The Constitution. There is no guarantee that it will be there for us without vigilance and active support. 

BTW- That's a call to action.

Misleading Ads on Facebook

It's okay, right?

Facebook allows misleading political advertising to be posted. 

Doesn't this make you in the least bit uneasy? 

"The language in Facebook's stated Advertising Policy has recently changed. While the guideline used to say that ads "must not contain deceptive, false, or misleading content," the rule now prohibits ads "that include claims debunked by third-party fact checkers" or, in some circumstances, by third-party organizations "with particular expertise" in the matter."


Facebook seems to be saying they will not allow false advertising if it was previously debunked. Does this mean new false and misleading material can be posted until it can be proved by fact checkers to be false? It seems so.


Take a look at these two stories. The first is from ars technica. Standards for paid advertising are different on Facebook. The second is from Politico. Elizabeth Warren's campaign deliberately posted false advertising to prove a point. “We intentionally made a Facebook ad with false claims and submitted it to Facebook’s ad platform to see if it’d be approved. It got approved quickly and the ad is now running on Facebook,” she wrote. “They’ve decided to let political figures lie to you—even about Facebook itself—while their executives and their investors get even richer off the ads containing these lies.”

By the time Facebook gets around to pulling a post, they've already left the barn door open. 

Political ads can lie if they want

Warren escalates war with Zuckerberg

hashtag

#socialmediaadvertising

Journalism's Risks

Controlling the Message

It Surely Won't Stand the Light of Day (CSN)

The tendency of this administration is to want to shoot the messenger. Trump continually threatens violence against journalists, calling them enemies of the state for doing their jobs. There is an imbedded defiance in what we do.

"You cannot kill the truth. You cannot kill justice. You cannot kill what we are fighting for."
- Jean Dominique

Does this seem defiant? I hope so. It is defiance in the face of the darkness that guides those who abuse their power.
Jean Léopold Dominique was a Haitian journalist and pro-democracy activist. His station, Radio Haiti-Inter, was the first to broadcast news, investigative reporting, and political analysis in Haitian Creole, the language spoken by all Haitian people.

He was assassinated. In 2014, A judge concluded the investigation into one of Haiti’s most notorious political assassinations on Friday, accusing nine people - including several close associates of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide - of having a hand in the killing of radio journalist Jean Dominique.

Jean Dominique was silenced for his reporting and his pro-democracy stance. According to the New Republic 34 journalists were killed in retaliation for their work in 2018, nearly doubling last year's number. (2017)

If we scratch beneath the surface of social media, we'll find that The Truth Is Getting Fierce (Murray Head). Reporting on the truth will have its risks. Are the people in our newsrooms up to the task? What about management? What about the board. It is not a question that should be dismissed lightly.

Paradigm Shift

The night before some really heavy thunderstorms rolled through. It delayed my flight to Baltimore four hours. I was annoyed. All that was forgotten the next morning. The skies were clear, bright blue, as the sun rose. I checked into the meeting for program directors and ten minutes later, everything changed. In an ironic twist we were discussing paradigm shifts when the first plane hit. Everytime I see a late summer sky like that one eighteen years ago, I'm reminded of that day and how fragile this all is.

Viral Posts Mislead

Social media is having a huge impact on information we share. Does it make journalism obsolete? I hope not.

Remember the song "What you See is What You Get" by The Dramatics? Not anymore. Technology, combined with social media, is going to present a huge problem for the 2020 election. The footage was shared hundreds of thousands times on Instagram. The power of social media to mislead is immense. According to Pew research, most Americans continue to get news on social media, even though many have concerns about its accuracy.

Fake video taken at face value

The video was share hundreds of thousands of times. If it is this easy to fool users, imagine the effect of fake news shared on social media. We got a taste of this in 2016. The same tactics are being intensified for 2020.

Below are four fake stories being spread on social media. The four stories were highlighted as false by Factcheck.org.

September 6, 2019

A 1978 photo of a Somalian army recruit has been misidentified on social media as Rep. Ilhan Omar, who wasn’t born until 1982.

September 6, 2019

Viral posts on social media make the baseless claim that the shooter in Odessa, Texas, had a sticker on his car for Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke. The Texas Department of Public Safety said there was no sticker on the car he was driving during the attack.

September 5, 2019

Viral social media posts wrongly suggest that President Donald Trump’s three eldest children are citizens only because of birthright citizenship.

September 5, 2019

A fake tweet circulating online attributes a made-up statement about hurricane preparation to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Hold tight. This is only going to get worse. Our defense? Check our sources. Seek out credible news sources.