jail
-
On Brett Wagner’s “Apocalypse Blaze.”
Nuclear fallout is a killer. But my friend was felled by the apocalypse that’s already upon us.
addiction, alcohol, Apocalypse Blaze, apocalyptic fiction, Bird Town TN, Bloomington, Brett Wagner, drinking, exposure, futurism, handgrith, hangrith, homelessness, incarceration, jail, jail poetry, meth, methamphetamine, nuclear apocalypse, nuclear fallout, poetry in jail, post-apocalyptic fiction, prison, prison poetry, sobriety, teaching in jail, teaching poetry in jail, unfinished novels, writing in jail
-
On storytelling and social justice.
By telling powerful stories with integrity, we might inspire people to help change the world.
activism, addiction, Bloomington, consciousness as storytelling, Dave Eggers, death in jail, emotions, emotions to compel action, framing your own story, Frans de Waal, free will, incarceration, Indiana, jail, jail poetry, Lindsey Badger, mass incarceration, Max Smith, Michelle Brekke, narrative consciousness, neuroscience of consciousness, neuroscience of free will, New Leaf, New Leaf New Life, overcoming trauma, poetry in jail, prison poetry, rationality, restorative justice, storytelling, storytelling and incarceration, teaching kids to be activists, The Bloomingtonian, The Dimension Mill, the neuroscience of storytelling, The Parade, trauma, writing and incarceration, writing and social justice, writing in prison
-
On empathy.
To write from another’s perspective, an author must empathize deeply with that character. And we need that sort of empathy to help us change the world.
authorial distance, autism, autism spectrum disorder, corrections, empathizing with characters, empathy, In Defense of Cultural Appropriation, incarceration, jail, jail poetry, juvenile delinquents, juvenile detention, Kenan Malik, Lost in Place, Lying Awake, Mark Salzman, mass incarceration, novelists, prison, school to prison pipeline, teaching creative writing, teaching in a corrections center, teaching in jail, teaching poetry, The Curious Indicent of the Dog in the Night Time, The Reason I Jump, True Notebooks, writing practice
-
On consent.
To make a better world, we’ll need to get over our potential embarrassment and make sure that somebody’s “yes” means what we think it does.
affirmative consent, Alarming Rise of Rape Culture, album of the month clubs, ask first, Asking For It, assault, consent, elastic definitions of consent, Eve Rickert, Fatimah Asghar, Franklin Veaux, gender violence, gendered violence, incarceration, jail, jail poetry, justification, Kate Harding, masculinity, morality, More Than Two, no means no, Peggy Orenstein, poetry about gender violence, poetry in jail, positive consent, prearrange consent, rape, rape culture, rationalization, rationalizing rape, reading poetry in jail, sex while sleeping, sexual assault, sexual behavior of college students, sleeping sex, teaching poetry in jail, toxic masculinity, unwanted sex, Veaux and Rickert, violation, violative assault, When Refusing to Twerk Is a Radical Form of Self Love, When Tip Drill Comes on at the Frat Party, why do men rape, why don’t men ask first, yes means yes
-
On the value of religious misinterpretation.
We’re liable to misinterpret old stories when we look at them with modern eyes … but it’s worth knowing what myths might mean in a better world.
Abraham, anachronism, anachronistic crtique, Ants Among Elephants, Bible, can God save us, caste, caste system, Christ, Christian theology, colonialism, conquest, covenant, creation in Genesis, dalit, David Kishik, DK, Dravidar Kazhagam, forgiveness, forgiving god, Genesis, God, God saw that it was good, God’s insecurity, Goldman, grammar, hebrew, Hinduism, human sacrifice, human sacrifice for good harvest, imperialism, incarceration, incarceration crisis, incarceration in the U.S., incarceration in the United States, jail, Jesus, Jesus’s sacrifice, Job, John-Michael Bloomquist, mass incarceration, merciful god, mercy, Noah, Old Testament, oppression, poetry, poetry in jail, rainbow, Rama, Rama threatening ocean, Ravana, Ravana worship, religion, Rudyard Kipling, sacrifice, sacrifice of Jesus, suffering, Sujatha Gidla, Tamil, teaching in jail, teaching poetry in jail, textual analysis, The Book of Shem, The Flood, The Iliad, The Prodigal’s Return, theology, Translation, untouchable, why did Christ have to die, why did Jesus suffer, why does Rama threaten the ocean, why is God jealous, Yahweh
-
On attentiveness and names.
Some kids are exceptionally attentive to their environment … but we tell them they have an attention deficit.
abuse, ADD, adderall, addiction, ADHD, amphetamine, attention deficit, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, chemical dependence, chemistry, childhood abuse, childhood development, childhood trauma, crystal meth, crystal structure, deficit, developmental biology, dirty drop, dirty urine, disease names, diversity, doctors, drug chemistry, drug test, drug testing, evolution, Fruitless, Fruity, gene names, genetics, hedgehog, human evolution, hyperawareness, hypervigilance, incarceration, jail, jail poetry, mass incarceration, medicine, methamphetamine, names, naming genes, neurodiversity, parole, Percy Jackson, pharmacology, poetry in jail, probation, protein structure, reading, self-medication, sensitivity, sensitivity to environment, SHH, Sonic Hedgehog, Sonic Hedgehog mutation, stimulants, teaching in jail, teaching poetry in jail, The Lightning Thief, trauma, urine screen, War on Drugs
-
On power and dignity in defeat.
Winning is pretty easy. It takes effort to get there, but once we’ve done it, most people can act with grace. It reveals more about a person’s character to see how they handle defeat. In the Christian bible, Jesus is a more compelling character than Yahweh. Jesus faces adversity, which sometimes he accepts calmly –…
Americans love a winner, anti-racism, Aryan, Aryan supremacy, ban the box, books to prison, books to prisoners, Christianity, Deadpool, death of Thor, defeat, dignity in defeat, education, equality, equity, felony, George Patton, gods die, growth, heroes, incarceration, Independently Blue, inequality, inequity, jail, jail poetry, Jesus, Jesus losing his temper, Julien Poirier, Laughing Shall I Die, learning, loser, losing, mass incarceration, Midwest Pages to Prisoners, MWPP, mythology, myths, Norse, Norse myths, Odin, odinism, pagan, paganism, Pages to Prisoners, patriotism, personal growth, poetry, poetry in jail, poverty, prison, prison education, racism, racist, Ragnarok, redemption, Reginald Dwayne Betts, suffering, superheros, teaching in jail, Tom Shippey, trials, Viking myths, Vikings, white supremacy, winning, Yahweh
-
On the water-fueled car.
Sometimes our fear of spooky, covert conspiracies makes us overlook the people blatantly conspiring to destroy us.
Ashes, automobiles, Berenstain Bears, Berenstain Bears conspiracy, Berenstein Bears, brancing points, carbon, carbon economy, carbon emissions, carbon tax, chemistry, choice of universe, climate change, cold fusion, combustion, comic, common mistakes, conspiracy, conspiracy theories, conspiracy theory, consumerism, decoherence, energy conversion, Evil Dave versus Regular Dave, false memory, fuel, fuel efficiency, gasoline, global warming, Hugh Everett, jail, Mandela Effect, mass incarceration, octane, oil companies, Old Hat New Hate, pollution, power, prison, prophecy, quantum collapse, quantum mechanics, reaction diagrams, Second Law of Thermodynamics jail poetry, teaching in jail, teaching poetry in jail, thermodynamics, water cars, water-fueled car, wavefunction, webcomic
-
On neural plasticity.
What would it take to convince yourself that you are worthy of love?
addiction, biofeedback, brain development, brain growth, CBT, chemical dependence, cocaine, cognitive behavioral therapy, counseling, criminal justice, day by day, depression, dopamine, dopamine receptor levels, dopamine receptors, drug addiction, drug counseling, drug use, e-meter, free will, getting over addiction, happiness, healing, incarceration, jail, lie detector test, mass incarceration, mental health, methamphetamine, mind control, neural development, neural plasticity, plasticity, poetry, poetry class, polygraph, redemption, rehab, rehabilitation, reshaping thought, Scientology, sobriety, substance abuse, teaching in jail, teaching poetry in jail, therapy
-
On mind control versus body control
In jail last week, we found ourselves discussing mind control. Ants that haul infected comrades away from the colony – otherwise, the zombie will climb above the colony before a Cordyceps fruiting body bursts from its spine, raining spores down onto everyone below, causing them all to die. Several parasites, including Toxoplasma gondii, are known…
body control, brain, consciousness, free will, infection, jail, magnetic pulse, mass incarceration, mind control, neurobiology, parasites, parasitic mind control, perception of free will, phantom limb, teaching in jail, toxoplasma, toxoplasmosis, transcranial magnetic stimulation, zombi, zombie, zombie ants, zombies
Frank Brown Cloud 