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Opinions/Editorials Title: Oh, the (Lack of) Humanity Slipped a homeless guy a buck the other day. After he mumbled off down the street, my companion sniffed her disapproval: "It only encourages them, you know. And he'll just use it for drugs or alcohol." I had looked him squarely in his gimlet eye. I could smell his breath. Safe to say she was right. "Who the hell cares what he uses it for?" I said. "If it kills the pain for a few hours, I'm happy to help." The do-gooders call this "enabling" and in their simple, black-and-white world this can do the poor street addict nothing but harm. I'll agree it does him little good. But in the moment it took me to fish a dollar from my pocket, press it into his dirty hand and wish him luck, I connected with him, one human being to another. I'd suggest that's more helpful than stepping over the guy like he's a piece of garbage, or lecturing him about the importance of personal responsibility when he asks for spare change. But never mind. This isn't about clinics or shelters or 12-step programs. All that stuff comes after the fact, after the horse (quite literally, in some cases) is out of the barn. Sometimes they help straighten someone out, and sometimes they don't. Life's a crapshoot with no guarantees. I don't know what this guy's particular problems were or why he landed on the street. Maybe he's a psychological train wreck. Maybe he inherited his addictions, or created his own. Maybe he's a war veteran who never readjusted to civilian life. Maybe his dot-com stock options weren't worth the paper they were printed on and he was dumb enough to think that they would be. Or maybe he's one of a growing number of people who simply dropped out, unable to cope with the insane pressures of modern life. That last one should not be overlooked as a contributing factor to what is an increasingly dysfunctional society. A lot of people are feeling the effects of a world that simply moves too damned fast. Most of us deal with the pressure and ignore the vague sense that life could be better than it is; a few Type A's even thrive on the chaos. But a lot of folks can't handle it. Or don't want to. I've touched on this subject in previous columns and as long as the Luddite is spared, I'll continue thumping the tub. Human beings aren't hard-wired to run in fifth gear all the time. Obviously, there's no returning to those kinder, gentler days of yesteryear. The Pandora's box of technology is open and can't be closed. So this isn't a pointless anti-technology screed. This is a plea-for-humanity screed. We need to set aside our way-cool toys just long enough to reclaim the ability to relate to each other. One to one. I've lived in San Francisco all my life, a city that has, over the years, been justifiably proud of its live-and-let-live attitude. But things have changed in the old town in the past decade or so. I can't remember a time when the place was less tolerant -- of the down and out, of the different, of just each other. Saying that we mirror society at large is cold comfort. Tolerance (I mean real tolerance, not the half-baked, politically correct BS that passes for tolerance these days) has eroded as the money has come to town and the pressures of life have increased. The phony dot-com green that rolled in during the late '90s nearly killed San Francisco. Rents soared, the working class nearly vanished and the city threatened to morph into a Disneyland for affluent teenagers. We survived, thanks to the bubble bursting, but barely. But a lot of self-involved yuppies are still around, still wrinkling their noses in disgust at every down-and-outer they pass. Unless, of course, they simply ignore the poor bastard. It's unseemly behavior in the city of St. Francis. But it's equally unattractive in any place that values the importance of a single human being. So the next time a bum tries to cadge a buck out of you, at least have the courtesy to pull the earbuds out and engage him as a fellow human being. Don't give him any money if you don't want to. But acknowledge him. He's not a blot on your aesthetic little world. If he is, well, your problems are bigger than his. - - - Hell may hath no fury like a woman scorned, but pissing off a bunch of comic-book aficionados runs a pretty close second. In the last Luddite, I took issue with the idea of a graphic novel being nominated alongside conventionally written novels for a National Book Award. I want to thank all of you who wrote in to set me straight, especially the guy who called me a "douchebag" -- it always helps to elevate the dialogue. (Do take the time to read Gene Yang's riposte to my original column. He's the author whose graphic novel, American Born Chinese, was nominated for the NBA. You can do that here.) One of my colleagues presented me with a copy of the Hugo Award-winning graphic novel, Watchmen, and suggested that I read it. I promised him I would and this past weekend, I did. I loved it. The artwork was terrific (although no better, in my view, than the Stan Lee comics of yore, Spider-Man being a particular favorite of mine) and the apocalyptic story line, while simple enough, held my interest in the way any well-plotted story does. That said, I still don't think the two forms should compete in the same category for any literary prize. Graphic novels are indeed apples to the conventional novel's oranges. Each should stand on its own merit. For one thing, the novel is a work of imagination executed solely by the author. Graphic novels are usually collaborative works: Watchmen, for example, employed a writer, an illustrator and even a colorist. More importantly, different parts of the reader's brain are at work here, depending on the form. Because a novel conveys plot, setting and character using only the author's own descriptive power, the reader is asked to do a lot of the imaginative heavy lifting. How many times have you read a novel, then seen it dramatized as a movie and said, "How could they have cast Brad Pitt as the protagonist? He's nothing like him at all." Watchmen, on the other hand, asked nothing more of me but to keep on reading. It was, in some ways, analogous to watching television because the pictures were there to spell it out. I didn't have to conjure a character's appearance in my mind, or imagine a scene. It was all there, on the page. That's not a value judgment, merely an observation. They're different forms. Period. So let's do this: Let's establish a separate literary category for graphic novels and judge them against their actual peers. That should satisfy everybody.
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