Fun and/or Interesting

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If Gender Is Not in Our Private Parts, Is It in Our Brains?

Here’s a TED Talk about transgenderism that is worth a look. It’s given by a transgender woman who is also a neurobiologist with very impressive credentials. In her presentation, which she is obviously uncomfortable giving, she presents a very interesting case for a “natural” explanation for transgenderism. In a nutshell, her theory is  that gender is determined in the uterus in two stages. First, the genitals are developed. Then, about a month later, the brain goes through the changes that make it male or female. A transgender person, according to her theory, is someone whose physiognomy is one gender and whose brain is another.

Putting aside the political problem of suggesting that there is, in fact, a difference in the brain structures of males and females, it’s a fascinating idea. And it may be true. Among other things, it would explain why transgender people say they “felt” like they were one sex or the other from an early age.

Unfortunately, her talk doesn’t fulfill its early promise. After introducing the theory with some intriguing charts and data, she pivots to make a pitch toward compassion and understanding by bringing up the oft-quoted datum that 40% of transgender people contemplate suicide. This, of course, suggests a point that is verboten to even contemplate: that transgenderism is, fundamentally, a mental problem, even if it is biologically rooted.

So, this TED Talk is ultimately disappointing. But the theory may be right. It deserves further study. And another TED talk. I’ll be looking out for it.

Click here… and let me know what you think. 

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Worth Watching

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France

Directed by Bruno Dumont

Starring Léa Seydoux, Blanche Gardin, and Benjamin Biolay

Released in theaters Dec. 10, 2021

Available to rent or buy on various streaming services, including Amazon Prime

K and I like to spend an hour or so in the evening watching TV shows and movies together. By together, I mean we are next to one another. Each on our own iPad.

I’d like to spend more time watching the same shows with K so we can talk about them. But the current protocol is for me to suggest a movie from my list and for her to respond, yes or no. The problem: My list doesn’t often overlap with hers. And if the movie I suggest isn’t already on her list, her answer is usually no.

Last night, we chose a movie from her list. And we watched it together.

France is a French movie about a TV journalist. I thought it was good, although nothing about it was entirely comprehensible. It has a point of view. I think. And it has a very charismatic lead actor. But the direction is both too retro-artsy and too avant-garde for my comfort zone. It’s a film that gets you thinking the next day, which is great. But mostly by raising such questions as, “Why didn’t her husband say a single thing to her about the front-page tabloid report on her indiscretion?”

I recommend France, but with a caveat. It may leave you with the same level of confusion as it left us. And it was panned by several critics who saw it as a Black Comedy, which it is not.

Still, it was serious and interesting and engaging. I’d give it 3.75 out of 5 stars.

The Plot: 

Léa Seydoux stars as France de Meurs, a seemingly unflappable superstar TV journalist whose career, home life, and psychological stability are turned upside-down after she carelessly drives into a young delivery man on a busy street. This triggers a series of self-reckonings as well as a strange romance that proves impossible to shake. As France attempts to slow down and retreat into a simpler, anonymous life, her fame continues to pursue her.

What I Liked About It: 

All the things it didn’t do, including make clear the auteur’s view of French media and its darlings. I also very much liked the face of Léa Seydoux, who plays the lead, and the banter between her and Blanche Gardin, who plays Lou, her producer/agent/friend and booster.

What I Didn’t Like So Much: 

Several of the “scenic” shots that lasted 10 to 15 seconds longer than I felt they should have, and some close-ups that were three to four seconds too long.

Critical Reception 

* “Something here feels lost in translation. France is like trying to complete a puzzle when one of the pieces is missing.” (Adam Graham, Detroit News)

* “Even when it’s outlining its own ideas more through rhetoric than character, France keeps us on our toes regarding what’s around the corner.” (Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune)

* “In part because of the depth of Seydoux’s performance, the film becomes less an allegory of a nation and more a gripping character study, a portrait of a mask of personal and professional regard slowly slipping away.” (Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times)

* “For those willing to take it seriously, there’s a lot here to unpack. The rest will probably just reach for the remote.” (Peter Debruge, Variety)

You can watch the trailer here.

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Arts & Letters

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Congratulations to the Lionesses, England’s women’s soccer team, for making history Monday night! 

Their win over Germany in the European Championship final – after a 56-year title drought for the UK – would have amazed the man who wrote this letter to the editor of the Pall Mall Gazette in 1895:

“[A woman] is physically incapable of stretching her legs sufficiently to take the stride masculine… the smaller a woman’s foot is the prouder she is of it, and very naturally. I dearly love to see her feet come peeping in and out of her skirts, as the poet says ‘like little mice’ (delicious simile!).

“I don’t think lady-footballers will ever be able to ‘shoot’ goals. In order to score a ‘point’ they will find it necessary, I fear, to charge the enemy’s goal en masse and simply hustle the ball through… Sir, I have seen two women fight and never wish to witness a like scene again, and I think that the aspect of two lovely girls, flushed and mud-bespattered, causing their rounded shoulders to collide ever and anon with brutal force, would be a most deplorable one. The whole thing is so foreign to the poetry of life – if poetry can be said to exist when an educated and refined lady urges her sisters to don men’s attire and play men’s games.

“Women may boat, women may ride – they can do both gracefully – but women may not, with an advantage to themselves, ride a bicycle or kick a football. These pastimes are beyond them… Let women ‘keep’ books, write books, paint pictures, ride horses and row boats, but for the love of heaven stay them from making sights of themselves on the football field, or objects of ridicule on the bicycle saddle.”

(Source: Girls With Balls, by Tim Tate)

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Fun and/or Interesting

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Do I Really Have to Sell My Florida Beach House?

We’ve all been told that global warming will raise ocean water levels dramatically along coastal areas everywhere because of the melting of the polar ice caps. Right? That’s what I was told, and for many years, I had no reason to disbelieve it. But then I had this thought: When the ice melts in my glass of Diet Coke, the level of the Coke doesn’t rise. Even if the drink is 80% ice to begin with. So how will melting polar ice caps raise the water level of the ocean? I looked into it. Turns out the term “polar ice cap” refers to the ice that sits on top of land, not in the water. DOH!

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A Word to the Wise

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An auteur (oh-TUR) – French for “originator” – is a filmmaker whose personal influence and artistic control are so great that he/she is regarded as the movie’s author. As I used it in my review of France, above: “[I liked all the things the movie didn’t do], including make clear the auteur’s view of French media and its darlings.”

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Readers Write

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Re “Understanding Gravity in Five Lessons” in the July 22 issue: 

“I love your research. The YouTube on Gravity was fascinating. Something I have been interested in for 50 years.” – MF

 

Another testimonial for our book, Central American Modernism:

“It’s great to get an insight into Salvadoran Modernism in art which is just so hard to find good writings about in this country. I showed the book to my parents, who were impressed since they had no idea there was art created in El Salvador and that museums and collectors collected them outside the country.

“I will continue reading more this weekend and start from the beginning and read about every country since it’s all connected in one way or another. Thank you.”

WR

Consignment Director

Urban & Contemporary Art

HERITAGE AUCTIONS

 

Someone talking about me… 

Todd Brown, one of the brightest young marketers in the industry these days, sent this in:

“Thought you’d maybe enjoying seeing this little clip of me talking about you during a live interview.”

Watch it here.

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Postscript

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In business and Jiu Jitsu, strength helps, but without technique it is often a net negative. Apparently, the same is true for bull riding.

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Tuesday, August 2, 2022, Baltimore, Maryland


The Economy & Investing

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The Recession of 2022: How Bad and Long Will It Get

It’s official. The US is in a recession. According to a report issued last week by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the real GDP (gross domestic product) decreased in the second quarter of the year by 0.9%. It decreased in the first quarter by 1.6%. (The Bureau of Economic Analysis, an agency of the US Department of Commerce, has been the government’s official tracker of GDP and other economic indicators since 1972.)

You can read the report here.

Biden officials and most of the mainstream economic experts, including Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, have been telling us for six months that there wasn’t going to be a recession, and that the spike of inflation we saw earlier this year was only temporary. They were wrong. But they were also wrong about the Great Recession that followed the 2007/2008 real estate meltdown. And every other economic downturn, big and small, for the last 50 years.

This should not surprise you. High profile and highly paid economists, whether they work for the mainstream media, Wall Street, Big Tech, or big government, are essentially paid to ignore or deny bad economic news – to promote optimism and push federal spending, in hopes of pumping up the economy and thus keeping incumbents in office and encouraging business borrowing, consumer and business spending, and sales.

Right now, in a desperate attempt to keep the American working- and middle-classes from despairing our country’s economic future, they are denying the fact that we are in a recession by redefining the term.

Until now, economists agreed on a simple criterion. Two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth = a recession. And that, as I said above, is what we have had this year. I won’t bother you with their argument. It’s laughably wrong. And it’s not fooling anybody – at least not anyone that has noticed the rising cost of milk, bread, dishwashers, cars, diapers, and gasoline. Or anyone that works in manufacturing, housing, or construction that has noticed that iron and steel and shingles and plywood are more expensive than they’ve ever been. They are fooling only the portion of the population that is too wealthy to be affected by these 10% to 30% price increases. Including the mainstream media pundits that repeat their talking points. (And also including RF, my brother-in-law, who has bet me that the recession will be over in a matter of months.)

I’m going with the Bureau of Economic Analysis’s 50-year-old definition of recession. And my prediction is that it will get worse, and stay worse, for at least the next few years.

One reason I feel that way is based on my personal experience in my current business. That business – publishing information and advice about investing – has traditionally been a bellwether of economic trends. Months before folks pull back on buying cars and TVs because of economic uncertainty, they pull back on buying investment advice. This has happened prior to every recession, big and small, since I’ve been in this business. That’s 40 years. And something like 16 quarterly downturns and a half dozen serious recessions.

About 18 months ago, we began to see a slowdown in our industry. Prospective customers and even existing customers were reluctant to buy more investment services. Since the beginning of the year, our sales are down by more than a third. That means cutbacks and layoffs and, most importantly, reduced spending on recruiting new readers and subscribers.

The principal talking point of those that are predicting a quick return to positive growth has been the unemployment statistics, which were at all-time lows a few months ago. You couldn’t find a restaurant or grocery store that didn’t have a help-wanted sign in their window. But if our industry is once again indicative of the future economy, we’ll be seeing unemployment surging in the next six to 12 months.

It will happen because of the “wage-price spiral” I mentioned in Saturday’s issue. The higher wages that companies are paying now will become more difficult to support as inflation ratchets up every other cost of business. That means thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of businesses, large and small, will be laying off employees and, in some cases, shutting down.

So, that’s what I’m going to be looking at in the coming months. In the meantime, I’m recommending significant cutbacks to the companies I own and/or consult with. Fewer products, simpler systems, and fewer (but better) employees.

I’m also making a few changes in my investment portfolio. (More on that in a coming issue.)

 

This Doesn’t Bode Well for My Brother-in-Law 

The Bureau of Economic Analysis’s bad news about the GDP (above) came a day after the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 0.75 percentage points, the fourth raise this year. The goal, of course, is to try to stop any further inflation, which is, at 9.1%, at a 40-year high. (You can check out our annual inflation rate here.)

What does this mean? It means that it will cost businesses and consumers more to borrow more. There will be deflation in some areas of the economy – industries that sell optional products for middle- and working-class people. But inflation for everything else. And “everything else” is the lion’s share of the economy. That’s not good.

 

And It’s Not Just Here… 

I’ve been reporting on America’s economic troubles regularly. Inflation, runaway government spending, and the Cold War with Russia have significantly curtailed US GDP and made middle-class Americans poorer. But things are just as bad for China and Russia and most of our European allies. It’s no surprise, then, that the International Monetary Fund lowered its growth projections for the world economy to 3.2% for this year and going down to 2.9% next year.

Click here.

 

Need a Low Paying Job? Walmart Wants You!

Because of the particular nature of the economy today, the general rise in unemployment that I’m predicting is likely to hit hardest among the higher paying jobs. But if you are willing to work for minimum-wage (or thereabouts), there will be opportunities. Walmart, for example, is looking to hire. Click here.

 

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Notes From My Journal

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A Short History of the Devolution of Air Travel 

Air travel today is considerably worse than it was before the pandemic, when I was on a plane at least once every six weeks. I did that for 30 years. And a third of it was international travel – i.e., flights of 8 and 12 and 18 hours.

Back then, flights departed and arrived on schedule. And when there were delays, it was usually an hour or three. Cancellations were rare. So rare that I cannot remember one in those 30 years.

These days, delays are de rigueur and cancellations are to be expected. Now, whenever I travel by air, Gio makes two or three consecutive reservations for me. And I am frequently forced to take advantage of this extra precaution.

The problems extend to virtually everything to do with air travel. That’s odd, because it is a relatively modern technology. You’d think that, like air conditioners, heart surgery, and car travel, for that matter, it would have gradually improved.

But it has gotten demonstrably worse.

Back in the 1950s, before any of those reading this were alive or, if so, could afford to travel by plane, the experience was first class, with free booze and cigar smoking and long-legged flight attendants. (I think they had a different name back then.)

In the 1980s, when deregulation took place, air travel became a vehicle for the average bobo, and a new class of flying – they called it coach – was invented. Coach got you to your destination in the same amount of time, but with considerably less dignity. Your seating space was more limited. The seats themselves were fabric, not leather. And the meals were hospital-level cuisine served on plastic plates with paper napkins.

Then the airlines unionized, and they were forced to economize. That led to economy class, which consisted of seating so restricted you had to practically pry yourself into an upright position, your knees pressing against the seat of the traveler in front of you. Smoking became a criminal offense and the flight attendants aged rapidly, almost from flight to flight.

Most domestic airlines converted first class to business class, and some offered only economy seating. As the price wars continued, service got even worse – even in business class. Free cognac in crystal goblets was replaced by pay-for alcohol in plastic cups. And meals became little packages of stale chips or pretzels thrown at you by linebacker-sized attendants as they rolled their clanking carts by.

Comfortable, commodious seating? Gone. Leg space? Gone. Assistance with your luggage? Gone. Deferential service of any kind was replaced by prison guards that would be happy to have you dragged off and put behind bars if you violated any of a hundred new rules of traveler decorum.

And this is to say nothing about the frustration of waiting hours online to book a flight or the endless lines within the airport and the humiliation of going through security, etc.

To be fair, there are still a few exceptions. Mint class in JetBlue for domestic flights, for example, and almost any of the Asian airlines for international travel. But to travel with them, you must be willing to pay five to 10 times the rate of the economy traveler. And you still must put up with the screaming brat that is sitting two rows behind you.

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