THE NUMBERS GAME

Numbers do not lie. We have been so informed and so we are told until we believe its premise. However, it is a false statement, for numbers, statistical data, can be manipulated and in fact are, very often. Why? To prove or disprove a point. To gain sympathy or increase enmity. Whatever the purpose, numbers can be made to tell different stories, even the same numbers can be interpreted at odds. 

Multiple times a day we are reminded of the deaths in Gaza. We are told to weep for the dead, for they are apparently all 'innocents", caught in the brutal crosshairs of Israeli fighters. Yes. there are thousands of casualties in Gaza, but what do those numbers actually mean? No breakdown is provided, merely an implied understanding that the casualties are mainly noncombatants. women and children. So where are the men? Fighting for Hamas. Battling the Israeli army and incurring casualties. Their dead and wounded are presented to the public as innocents. Never mind their gleeful bloody participation in the. October 7 massacres. Never mind the slaughter. Ignore the captives, children, infants, elderly and terrified cadets, men protecting their families. Now either dead and/or dying or remaining in brutal captivity in airless tunnels or private homes. Perhaps only 51 remaining alive -and for how long? But never mind those numbers, or the sum of 395 days in captivity. No end in sight. Much of the same in Lebanon with Hezbollah.

Numbers indeed. Truth? Not so much. 

Numbers also fall into categories. Who and what determines the categories and interpretations of them and their numbers? Beats me. In fact, it appears to be that anyone can decide, a free for all, and is a 'never mind' state of mind. Even if the claims are absolutely ridiculous, based on absurdities or even nothing at all. And all the while, new words and accusatory phrased are ginned up, new idiotic categories of offense conveniently given life when they should have been stillborn. 

Here is the latest brouhaha and be sure to shake your head in sympathetic commiseration with the aggrieved. I kid you not on this one. At a time of blatant overt physical and oral vicious events and attacks reeking, dripping, of in-your-face antisemitism are claimed to be needful of investigation as to whether they are indeed hate crimes, where is a balance when an actor in a Broadway play claimed to be highly offended and suffering from " “bullying” and “racially microaggressive”   language. What exactly was that powerful word capable of inducing this awful feeling? Warning: possible trigger word. (Yet another stupidity of modern times.) A statement made by Patti Lupone that the music of the play was "too loud”. Please note that this is not an unusual statement or complaint made by playgoers   particularly when the play is about modern. music. "Micro aggressive!!!" Give me a break.    Now remember, if we were to use the applicable numbers here, that of the decibels of the music being played, Lupone would most probably have been proven correct. However, this is a time when numbers were deemed not as important, far less important than the ridiculous attention-grabbing claim of "microaggression".

The media gives us every day, sometimes on an hourly basis, new 'breathtaking" accounts of such egregious incidents, 'aggressions' of implied racial bias, even though most cannot see it, but hesitate to say so in this rather toxic area of modern society. We have reached a point where we denied the obvious. We refused to address actual important topics and instead direct our words, thoughts and efforts to trifles and no-account trivialities. We ignore planks and concentrate on splinters. We are blind to violations of decency and humanity and expend our energies and attention upon concerns of nitpicking value.  Bottom line, we will get nowhere fast. In fact, we will probably go backwards at a much faster rate. Check the numbers on that and see how the numbers of haters have grown - along with the streams of money.

Obviously, we need new mathematicians. We need new interpreters of data. We need to check our eyesight and our hearing. We need to clean up the clots in our brains and the spiderwebs of our minds. We need to decalcify our hearts and find room within for others. We need to see ourselves in others and others in ourselves. We need to play the music of life at proper decibels. We need to make room for truths over falsehoods. We need to have the courage of quixotic attempts to right wrongs, to not only dream the impossible dream, but in fact and effort, help to make it possible. 

These are hard, difficult charges made upon us. Some are perhaps out of reach at present, but we cannot give up. We cannot cede victory to the negative, to the haters, to the deniers of humanity. 

We simply cannot do that. We cannot give up. That is the cost of life, the numbers game of our existence upon this planet. The rent is due, even overdue.