School for Fascists

Well, speaking of cosmic events happening on your own street . . .

I told someone recently that I never thought I'd look back and think of the last apartment I lived in as "The Golden Age," but compared with where I am now, it's starting to look like that. When I moved here, I was ready for a change, and I've mostly been happy with the apartment itself. It has amenities that the other place lacked, and until a few years ago, I would have said that the move coincided with a new and more satisfying phase of life. The process of having my HVAC unit replaced the other day underscored some of the reasons why this is no longer true.

Because of some unsettling incidents in and around the building in recent years, I wasn't happy about having strangers in my apartment, but since I wanted air conditioning, I responded to necessity by resorting to, of all things: research! I decided the least I could do was to check out the contractor's credentials, and one thing led to another, and I was soon looking at information about the actual owners of this building. Business filings with the Secretary of State are standard forms and not terribly exciting, but as I learned as a law librarian, they can reveal interesting facts. In this case, I learned that that there is a second owner I hadn't heard about who actually has a couple of points of intersection with me. One is that his business address is the same suite that used to be the main office of the law firm I worked for. The other is that he is on the board of a local Christian college attended by a couple of people I know, including the son of my former supervisor.

It certainly is a small world, as every day proves anew, and these types of coincidences happen, but the information also fits in with some recent experiences I've had. I recalled someone mentioning that some of the part-time staff employed here for odd jobs belong to a Christian youth group. That probably doesn't sound like particularly bad news, but I can tell you that the atmosphere here has changed in recent years from what you might expect of a place with some students in residence (i.e., occasional rowdiness) to something akin to, oh, I don't know, let's say The Stepford Wives. It's as if everyone has drunk some strange Kool-Aid.

I often encounter people who seem to arrive as if by magic at the same time I do while entering or exiting the building, or who arrive in the parking lot just as I drive in. I am frequently regaled by loud conversations that seem, by some invisible edict, to be required to take place right below my window. Of course, there's going to be chatter, but does it have to be so loud and so close? In the old days, there was an instance when residents gathered on the other side of the parking lot were having a 2 a.m. conversation that was keeping me awake. I got up and closed the window, and not long after that, they dispersed, seeming to take the hint (these days, I wouldn't even think of leaving my window open at night). If not for my sound spa, which provides just enough white noise to drown out words if not voices, I would never be free of intrusive conversations. If you try to ignore these people, they seem to get louder.

I was speaking last week about light pollution in the neighborhood, but this sound pollution is an even worse problem. I now have a word to describe what it reminds me of: proselytizing. It's as if people are somehow so convinced of the importance of being heard that they've lost all sense of proportion and common courtesy. I'm not saying that everyone here is a tele-evangelist, but most of them seem to have been influenced by that communication style. It's as if they've all been coached on how to pitch their voices so that you can't help hearing them. They also tend to use a highly theatrical delivery, as if they're all on stage. And you can't get away from them, because they're your neighbors.

From what I've been able to find out, there's controversy about the methods of the youth group that seems to be influencing some of these kids. I can see why. Some people think it's actually a cult, as its methods reportedly run to manipulation and outright deception. This includes such practices as using college students who appear to be the same age as younger kids as contacts to form relationships with them; attempting to circumvent or replace parental authority; and bullying or ostracism once emotional control has been established. It sounds like mind control to me (though many people who've been involved in the group say they haven't experienced this, others strongly disagree).

Evidently, group meetings are big on skits and theatricals. I have to say that living here in some way resembles living in a compound, and I feel I'm constantly witnessing one drama after another. I remember noticing one night that there were five white cars in a row lined up on one side of the parking lot, and while I've got to say that there's nothing really wrong with that, it looked a little peculiar. I didn't know that many people here even had white cars. Some kind of code for "Bible Study tonight in apartment 5?" (I'm being facetious, but only a little.) It's also true that making it clear you don't want to mix with these people does nothing to put a damper on the antics.

In between all the amateur theatricals, on one hand, and all the vehicles with skulls or skull insignia parked on the local streets (including one right outside my door), it's a rather odd mix of neighbors. It's like being the only hippie at a convention of charismatics mixed in with Nazis. I'm not actually sure there's much of a difference between them. That occasion not long ago when I heard some extremely loud bass music in the middle of the night? My impression was that it came from the direction of the building that some of these young guys live in. What happened to all the normal people? Invasion of the Body Snatchers?

To get back to the HVAC that precipitated this essay, it turned out that once it was installed, I noticed a flickering in my lights. Concerned that it might be a sign of an overloaded circuit (and having lived through one serious fire in the building already), I sent an email to the property manager. I didn't get a response, and since I've had a few instances of people telling me they didn't receive my emails, I also left a voice mail. I still didn't get a response. I'm not unduly concerned when I don't get an immediate reply to a service request about a slow drain, but in the matter of something that could be dangerous, I think it's reasonable to expect a confirmation that someone's looking into it (though, I have to say that when I reported a recent car break-in, I never even got so much as an acknowledgment).

There being a lot of activity in the basement beneath me that day (where the circuit box is), I looked out to see who was there and saw a neighbor who is also a part-time odd jobs person. I wanted not only to find out what was going on in regard to my service request but also to meet the person who is so frequently in and out of the basement underneath my apartment. I had to flag the two young men down, since they were already leaving by the time I got outside. When I did, I encountered not one, but two smirking faces.

I would have been willing to suffer through yet another polite but unsatisfying encounter with a management surrogate, but being a bit too self-respecting so take arrogance from a youngster, I told the young man that I had never seen a bigger smirk. I'm peaceable by nature, but I don't mind calling things as I see them. What followed on his part was a denial that he uses an excessively loud voice in the basement, an attempt to place the blame for it on someone else, and even more smirking. I told him I didn't mind waiting if he wanted to look up some of the words I was using. It was sarcastic, I admit, but what are you going to do when someone's main conversational gambit seems to involve repeating everything you say?

When I mentioned that the point of the conversation was to let them know that I needed to reach someone about a possible overloaded circuit, they said they wouldn't do it because they didn't like my attitude. When I pointed out that it was their job whether they liked someone's attitude or not, they still demurred. I confirmed later that one of these guys does in fact belong to the Christian group in question. I wouldn't have said that cockiness, denial, blaming someone else, and shirking responsibility are particularly traits of people who claim to be "Christian," but they are consistent with other behavior I've seen around here.

The kicker was that when I finally did reach the property manager, his idea of a solution was that I ought to know someone better before making a judgment on him. (No, thank you.) He also didn't seem to blame the young man for not wanting to carry a message but instead blamed me for not giving him a chance to respond. I gather that I'm supposed to be living in the best of all possible worlds here and that while arrogance and dishonesty are acceptable, telling the truth to the best of your ability is not.

There is, in my mind, a larger significance to this story. If you read this blog regularly, you probably know that I've talked before about instances of pushy and intrusive public behavior that I encounter regularly in the park, the coffeehouse, and other places in and around the neighborhood (even the grocery store and the bank). As a matter of fact, I've recently overheard several intense and loudly pitched conversations about Christianity in the coffeehouse that were notable for being louder than anything else in the room. It is not a condemnation of religion to say that being sure of your beliefs is no license to intrude on the rights of others, nor is it a sign that you are better in any way.

My personal feeling is that it's wise to question your own beliefs and assumptions (I question mine all the time). Questions are healthy. Being too sure of yourself, not a lack of zealousness, is the real sin. There are many, many, many Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, followers of Native American traditions, and others, including many who profess no faith at all, who are much kinder, more considerate, thoughtful, and aware than many of these so-called Christians I keep encountering. I also know many Christians who are fine people, and you can generally spot them by their live-and-let-live attitude.

All of this is important because we're living in a democracy, which requires thoughtful, informed people who can form their own opinions. Being a citizen is no Sunday picnic. If my neighbors are anything to judge by, this Christian youth group encourages people to behave in ways they wouldn't think of on their own. They seem to turn into automatons, which is dangerous, not only for democracy but also for them personally. I read a comment from someone online who responded to a parent concerned about the influence of this group on their child by saying, "What, you're worried about your kid spending time with nice people as opposed to some of the other wackos who are out there?" The perceptive reply to that was that "niceness" in itself is OK but can be the tool of people with a hidden agenda. Beware the hidden agenda and the motivation behind the smile. Be sure it's a genuine smile you're seeing and not a mask.

If I had kids, I wouldn't want them within 500 yards of these people. Why? Because you should never, ever, ever, give up your right to think for yourself--to anyone. If there was ever a time and a place to question authority, it's here and now, in 2016 America. And if this youth group is any sample of the direction our nation is heading in, I'm extremely concerned. There's something troubling about their behavior.

The upshot of the situation here seems to be: I alerted management to what I thought might be a hazard, feeling that it would be irresponsible not to. That opens me to ridicule. I'm not supposed to make independent judgments, based on my own perceptions, about someone else's character, though that is an essential part of taking care of yourself. (When's the last time an apartment manager said that to you?) I'm a middle-aged adult with a PhD, but I don't know how to use logic. Au contraire! Cogito, ergo sum! (It's unseemly to flaunt credentials, but just this once, I'll make an exception.) And management here has always been responsive to my concerns--I just didn't know it because I don't hear from them.

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. (I didn't make that up.)