Like many in our readership area, I was appalled and outraged by the vandalism spree in Manalapan last week, when red swastikas and hateful words toward Jews were spray-painted in various locations around the Monmouth Heights residential development on public and private property. As of this writing, no arrests have been made, although a determined investigation is under way, and there’s no way of knowing whether the vandals were young or old.
In Mark Rosman’s coverage of the hate crimes for Greater Media Newspapers, however, the words of Jeffrey I. Salkin, New Jersey community director for the Anti-Defamation League, hit home. “The defacement of public and private property in Manalapan with red swastikas and (messages of hate) represents an attack on the entire community,” he said. And he is correct. While Monmouth Heights was obviously targeted because of the high concentration of Jewish residents in that community, it was indeed a hateful attack on nearly every American living in this state.
It was an attack on those of us whose family members fought, and died, to defeat the murderous Nazi regime in World War II. It was an attack on every member of the armed forces who has served since the end of that war, fulfilling a patriotic duty to protect what this nation stands for, with their lives if necessary. It was an attack on every parent who tries to teach his or her child about love, and tolerance, and responsibility, and the joy of living in a diverse society.
It was an attack on every child who sees photographs of those despicable symbols and will go to bed that night knowing that the perpetrators, and others like them, are still loose in the world. It was an attack on every immigrant who has embraced our country and its ideals in order to gain citizenship. It was an attack on their families, and the generations that came after. It was, in other words, an attack on us all, and we must — as Salkin exhorted us to do — stand together, and speak in one voice to denounce it.
I got a kick out of the news that after his song “We Take Care of Our Own” was played at the end of President Barack Obama’s speech at the Democratic convention, sales of Bruce Springsteen’s anthem jumped 409 percent — at least when it comes to downloads. It’s not that The Boss, who grew up just down the road in Freehold and lives in Colts Neck, needs the extra cash, but you’ve got to believe he’s pretty pleased.
Although he hasn’t been as active campaigning for Obama in this election as he was in the last one, at least the Democrats understand his music and use it in the proper context. We all remember when Ronald Reagan — who obviously hadn’t listened to the words of the song — completely misappropriated “Born in the U.S.A” during his 1984 campaign, calling it “a message of hope.” The Democrats reclaimed that song in this campaign, and put the first track of Springsteen’s “Wrecking Ball” album to such good use that it spurred over 2,000 paid downloads of “We Take Care of Our Own,” the best sales figure for the song since March. Maybe they attended one of the Bruce Springsteen symposiums at Monmouth University in Long Branch, so they’d have a better understanding of his music in order to use it properly. The first Bruce Springsteen symposium — a two-day extravaganza dedicated to academic research and thought based on the musician’s life and work — was held in 2005, and again in 2009.
This year, it was held Sept. 14-16 and was expected to draw between 200 and 300 participants. I found out about it too late to attend “Glory Days, A Bruce Springsteen Symposium,” but it sounded like a real humdinger.
According to a recent story in advance of the gathering, “Breakout sessions will cover the relationship between academic topics and Springsteen’s work, such as pedagogy, international perspectives, work and class, diversity, religion and spirituality, and politics and activism. Participants will explore topics like ‘Freedom Son’s a Dirty Shirt: Bruce Springsteen and the Nobility of Work on Wrecking Ball,’ ‘Bruce Springsteen and Transformative Grief,’ and ‘Springsteen and American Roots Traditions.’”
I don’t know about you, but every time I queue up “Live in New York City” on my iPod, late at night, with the lights out and a couple glasses of wine under my belt, and hear Max Weinberg’s driving drums on the intro to “My Love Will Not Let You Down,” the first thought in my brain is always, “Man, I dig this dude’s pedagogy!” (I think I need a better class of wine, i.e., not in a box.)
Who knew I could have explored that notion further in a college setting, if I’d only been paying better attention and not listening to so much late-night rock ’n’ roll? No date yet on when the next symposium is scheduled, but I can’t wait to sign up. No, seriously.
File this one under “You’ll Know ‘Em by Their Birkenstocks”: A recent article in the Journal of Research in Personality reported on a University of Kansas study that found most people were able to correctly judge a stranger’s age, gender, income, political affiliation, and important personality traits just by looking at their shoes.
A lot of the findings, of course, were predictable. But there were also some surprises. For example, more aggressive types often wear ankle boots, and calm people often wear uncomfortable looking shoes. People with “attachment anxiety” who fret about their relationships generally wear brand-new shoes because they worry about what people think of them. Liberals tend to wear shabbier and less expensive shoes. No word on what conservatives generally wear, although the study did find that people who wear boring shoes — like the black lace-ups worn by nearly every man at the Republican convention — find it hard to form relationships and are often “aloof and repressive” in their emotions. Then again, those shoes were ubiquitous at the Democratic convention as well. Even the women wore them (I’m pretty sure). Question for discussion: What could we have learned about Sarah Palin by looking at her shoes?