Housing Crisis, Ukraine Crisis, Climate Crisis – Should I Laugh or Cry?

Housing Crisis, Ukraine Crisis, Climate Crisis – Should I Laugh or Cry?

[member of French resistance being executed during WWII- he’s laughing]

They say that laughter is best medicine. They also say that the brave laugh in the face of death. So, I wish I could laugh. So, I will try to laugh. But, I must admit, that I after I laugh I also cry – just like the corny lines of an Irish fiddler in a Rom-com: “In life every joy has a matching sorrow”. So what’s today’s topic? On the surface my tears are for those suffering because of the suffering caused by housing crisis in Canada, the destruction caused by the climate crisis worldwide and the needless brutality of the crisis in the Ukraine . However, deeper down, my laughter & my tears are my response to death, but only the forms of death that we create and are thus avoidable.  As I am currently teaching an English class the first image that came to my mind was the laughter of the gravediggers in Hamlet who are digging mad Ophelia’s grave.

First Gravedigger     Hear me out first. Here lies the water – good. Here stands the man –good. If the man goes to the water and drowns himself, willingly or not, he goes. Do you follow that? But if the water comes to him, and drowns him, then he doesn’t drown himself. Therefore, he that is not guilty of his own death doesn’t shorten his own life.

Second Gravedigger     But is that the law?

First Gravedigger      Yes, it is. It’s the coroner’s law.

Second Gravedigger       If you want to know the truth of the matter, if this hadn’t been a woman of noble birth, she wouldn’t be getting a Christian burial.

First Gravedigger        You’re right. It’s a pity that powerful folks have more freedom to drown or hang themselves than the rest of us. Give me my spade.

 

OK, I admit, this does not seem funny when you read it out of context but if you watch the play it is hilarious – because it is totally absurd. Put another way, the absurdity and strangeness of life is hilarious.  You’re not ready to laugh yet at as you watch the daily news show you event and event of avoidable pain, death and suffering? You just think that laughing will make you seems as mad as Ophelia, whom the gravediggers quoted above are burying? You just want heaven to descend to Earth and peace and love and joy and harmony to reign supreme? Well, I want that too – that is why I laugh!

Climate scientists are desperate: we’re crying, begging and getting arrested   by Peter Kalmus

I was arrested for locking myself onto an entrance to the JP Morgan Chase building in downtown LA.

I can’t stand by – and nor should you

Once again I will refer to a book I read; The Name of the Rose by Umberto Ecco, an Italian professor who was an expert in medieval history. This fun to read murder mystery rotates around a newly discovered text written by Aristotle which claims that the best way and surest way to get close to God’s heaven is through laughter. Here is the scene from the book where two monks are arguing about the challenges that laughter presents to all of us.

Jorge: I trust my words didn’t offend you brother William, but I heard the persons laughing at laughable things. You, Franciscans, however, belong to an Order where merriment is viewed with indulgence.

William: Yes, it’s true. Saint Francis was much disposed to laughter.

Jorge: Laughter is a devilish wind which deforms the lineaments of the face and makes men look like monkeys.

William: Monkeys do not laugh. Laughter is particular to man.

Jorge: As is sin. Christ never laughed.

William: Can we be so sure?

Jorge: There is nothing in the Scriptures to say that He did.

William: And there’s nothing there to say that He did not. Even the saints have been known to employ comedy to ridicule the enemies of the faith. For example, when the pagans plunged Saint Maurus into the boiling water, he complained that his bath was cold. The Sultan put his hand in and scalded himself.

Jorge: A saint immersed in boiling water does not play childish tricks. He restrains his cries and suffers for the truth.

William: And yet, Aristotle devoted his second book of poetics to comedy as an instrument of truth.

William: Venerable brother, there are many books that speak of comedy. Why does this one fill you with such fear?

Jorge: Because it’s by Aristotle.

William: But what is so alarming about laughter?

Jorge: Laughter kills fear and without fear there can’t be any faith. Because without fear of the devil there is no more need of God.

William: But you will not eliminate laughter by eliminating that book.

Jorge: No, to be sure. Laughter will remain the common man’s recreation but what would happen if, because of this book learned men work to pronounce it permissible to laugh at everything? Can we laugh at God? The world would relapse into chaos.

Now, being that I am a Franciscan, I naturally take the side of the Franciscan monk William who see laughter as a stairway to heaven & God and not to hell & Satan.  However, I must admit that most of us, religious or not, see laughter as dangerous and dubious. I could explore the dangers of fanatical Islam who view any humour about Mohammed and the Koran as worthy of death, but that is too easy. There are fanatics like that everywhere. What is harder is to see that well meaning, Liberal, supposedly open minded and educated people also fall prey to the mistake [well, I think it’s a mistake] of seeing humour and laughter as a threat.

Steve Harvey Slams “Cancel Culture”: “Political Correctness Has Killed Comedy”

The actor and comedian claims he can’t release another comedy special without ending his career: “Every joke now, it hurts somebody’s feelings.”

I am talking about political correctness. I am talking about our inability to discuss “sensitive” topics because we are afraid of “offending” somebody. Well, guess what, a good joke is always offensive, in a certain way, IF you take it that way. Like all good thing, like laughter – it is a double edged sword that can either hurt or heal. It is all in how you respond to it. Do you take a joke as a threat? Do you take it totally personally? If so – that is YOUR choice.

Our scorching housing market poses an existential threat to millions of young Canadians

By Max Fawcett | Opinion | May 20th 2021

So, what you can do about the many Canadians suffering economic hardship because they are spending more and more on simply having a roof over their heads? You can cry – which I too have done. But then I recommend that you laugh. Your laughter will drive away your fears and bond you with those around with whom you sure that laughter. It will allow us to build the heaven on Earth that we all so desperately want and banish the shadows from your soul. Desperate times call for desperate measures: laughter IS the best medicine after all.  Below is part of a poem from the Ukrainian poet Kateryna Kalytko as she confronts the evil of the Russian invasion. Follow her advice and all will be well.

To love in a time of war is to wear earrings – in spite of and because of everything…