fit for a duchess

 A pretty face is an asset, even on a beer.  It's a nice Flemish sort of face too, makes you feel like you have good taste.

A pretty chestnut brown with a mild fruity smell, and foamy but light head.  The flavor is tart, apply, gives a nice little bite on the tongue.  A sweetness kind of collects as drinking continues, leaning more to candy apple than anything else.  It's reminiscent of an Irish cider, but with a little cleaner taste than what I normally find.  Something like olives or mild pickles sets off the taste quite well.

Is Democracy Obsolete?

The topic was suggested and chosen coincidentally right around the time of a change of head of state in Spain.  That in itself is a bit of a sticking point for citizens of the country, but not really the focus of the discussion beyond some minor digressions.  The Source was inspired some time ago by the Eurovision contest, in which she witnessed the style of voting that went on and decided that this kind of "democracy" is not only undemocratic, but a sign that what we consider to be a fair and open manner of governing ourselves is anything but.

There are two ways of interpreting the focus of the term, political and social.  Socially, democracy can be understood as the people participating actively in their own governance, not only by voting but also by running for elected positions and assuming positions of authority and responsibility in the community.  When we call something "obsolete", we are relegating it to the past, and this type of participation in our own governance is really a thing of the past.  Why?  For two reasons.  First, development and advancement of communications is such that we have created a truly global community.  We can speak to almost anybody, almost anywhere, almost anytime.  Sure, there are a few populations out of the range of cell towers and internet access, but they are exceptions these days.  Even if we do not speak directly to people, we trade information through television, radio, and print media still today, with news traveling much faster than it did even half a century ago.  Second, as technology has advanced, so have the number of discoveries and amount of data related to previous knowledge.  It is simply impossible today to know a great deal about everything.  We can, of course, know something about a large number of topics, but this knowledge is superficial and sometimes even trivial.  To be an expert, one must invest a large amount of time and effort.  Community leaders must be experts in something, or at least have a support group of experts directing their decisions, a group which must be chosen by the community it serves to be democratic under the strict definition.  The global community encompasses numbers of people so large that this style of democratic governance is not feasible.  We are aware that the activities of one community have effects in surrounding communities, and even communities geographically separated by great distances.  Everybody has a stake in everything.  Trying to participate actively in all such governance as affects our lives is impossible.  The representative democracy, on the other hand, is more manageable.  We vote for levels of representatives to promote our interests while we focus our attention on other things, mostly the living of our lives and, hopefully, enjoying the fruits of our representatives' labor.  This understanding of "democracy" does not seem to be completely obsolete, although some might argue that modern and future connectivity should give us more options in participation and less need for physical representatives.

The resident Generalist began by saying democracy is, in fact, subjective.  There are many models and methods of applying the theory, for different peoples and times.  The problems he sees inherent in the idea are that the capacity each person has for understanding the world and passing judgement on it is weak and limited, and also the homogeneity of the system is "unnatural".  Although we like the idea of everyone being equal, in many cases we do not care to believe it in practice.  Looking at the history of his country, he wondered if the Spanish people really understood democracy, since their attempts at republics had been disasters.  The parliamentary monarchy in place today is still young and experiencing its first transition, so time has yet to tell how resistant it is.

The Thinker postulated that democracy cannot be obsolete, simply because it has never existed in the real world.  It is a collection of ideals and values which modern societies often pay homage to, but just as often do not put into practice in reality.  Even in the most representative of governments, he argued, there is always a group with the real power of decision that is not beholden to the people, a cabal that runs things from the shadows to escape scrutiny and responsibility for their actions.

The Organizer, as a good Englishman, made a number of references to the Magna Carta as an important point for defining democracy.  In response to the Thinker, he admitted that democracy as it has existed has always been in a distinctly non-ideal form.  His opinion on modern democracy, even as a "bad" attempt at implementation, was that the separation of powers is a necessity, as introduced in the aforementioned Magna Carta; no one person or body can have all the power or the majority of the power in a democratic system.  He also insisted that modern political parties are in fact the opposite of the democratic ideal, in that they promote the collection of power into an elite group and remove it from the individual, who then has to join the party to enjoy any share of social and political power and influence.  Later on he spoke of economic freedom as being the real need in today's modern societies, and the great enabler of democratic institutions.  People who are not disadvantaged economically are free to participate in society and government to the same extent as any "elite".  While there are obviously problems of application of the system, for the Organizer it is obviously the best system available today, considering that even dictators copy elements of democracy to give themselves legitimacy.

The Generalist then gave his repeated view that as much as we discover, we know nothing.  He believes people in democratic societies live better, but even then we are under strict control by governments, if not some other authority.  Information on everything is available, but facts are difficult to come by because of control and corruption of information.  What does this mean for the democratically minded?  It highlights the difficulty of implementing true democracy.  As the Writer said before, there is always a group or an elite doing its best to limit the power of the society at large and augment its own.  In this age of information, it is simple enough to feed tainted information to the public and allow them to make their own decisions, which the authority hopes will work in its own favor.  We feel like we are freer today, but the sheer amount of information can be seen as a stronger cage than ever.

While the discussion was for the most part focused and only occasionally bogged down in side issues like monarchy and police presence at demonstrations, I found one participant to be bothersome.  He has had trouble in the past with keeping his speeches to a reasonable amount of time, and when told by other members of his failing, reacted with troubling anger and immaturity, specifically insisting that he was the most interesting person in the room and was always bored by everybody else.  In other meetings there have been whiny and ragey outbursts, which do nothing to make him appear any more respectable.  This time, fortunately, the problem was just the matter of several 20 minute "contributions" made in a droning, barely intelligible English, and followed by a snide and transparently false "apology".  The unfortunate fact in a free society is that we can only encourage him to be more careful about the length of his presentations and put more effort into making his points with clarity, but we cannot rely on a (non-existent) protector of the meeting to force or demand that he, and everyone, meet the expectations of the other participants.  Even if the majority did voice disapproval of his use of time, he seems to be the type to make even longer speeches just out of spite.  If only he could be voted off the island.

take a shot

Something I've noticed about craft beers and their brewers is that they show a great willingness to collaborate.  It's nice to see such a thirst (ha!) for experimentation and blending different perspectives and traditions, or maybe just creating new traditions.  The label on this bottle is in Danish, but the other brewery on it is Italian.  Something interesting.  After so many recent dark beers, it seemed like time to seek out something light for a change.  Could Cream Ale be the alcoholic equivalent of cream soda?  That would be different.  The label is a little threatening, though...

Wheat in one gun and hops in the other (but the bottle isn't wide enough to show both)

It's a very pale color with as beery a head as anyone could ask for.  The ale smell is faint, but promising.  The bitter comes first, spreading over the tongue, with a very smooth and mild base, that brings sort of an afterthought of sweetness.  There is something rather like a cream soda in it, bubbly and smooth with a vaguely dairy feeling background, but pleasantly unsweetened.

Dreams

In my opinion, there's not much in the way of philosophy in this topic, but the psychological, linguistic and cultural aspects were thought to give enough to talk about.  The Source was adamant that dreams are useful tools for analyzing and improving our lives, saying this is mentioned in great literature from ancient philosophers to Renaissance poets to the Bible.  In these sources, dreams are often considered to be prophetic; we just need to know how to interpret them to reveal their prophecies.

The Dedicated Writer was not convinced at all.  He stated that there is nothing supernatural at all about dreams, rather they are depositories of unfulfilled desires and in sleep we have access to that unconscious realm.  He mentioned the birth of psychoanalysis and its early use of dream analysis as interesting, but not necessarily very useful or helpful in general because of the highly personal nature of night dreams.

Our Doctor noted the lack of distinction in Spanish between "sleep" and "dream", both being "sueño".  It could be there is a wider meaning in "El sueño de la razón produce monstruos" than in its standard English translation of "The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters", although there is no clear pun or loss of meaning in keeping close to the wording of the original title.  He also briefly spoke of psychoanalysis and its attempts to reach the secrets we keep even from ourselves.  In his opinion, night dreams are something clinical, without particular meaning.  The Source countered that night dreams were more real than daydreams, precisely because they are not under our conscious control.  Night dreams are our real thoughts, but daydreams are pure fantasy.

The Organizer set about differentiating in his preliminary essay and in his first contribution between dream as a sleep phenomenon and its use as a synonym for desire or ambition.  This occupied his thinking for the majority of his participation.  He first hastened to make clear that dreams might be used to refer to ambitions or can stimulate them, but they are decidedly not the same thing.  Later he mentioned the term pipe-dream and the phrase "the American Dream", also discussed in his essay, and wondered why we dream at all.  Surely, there is some evolutionary benefit to the activity or it would have disappeared from animal brains.  Studies and observation have shown the necessity of sleep, although there is still some question about what actually happens during that down time, and also the necessity of having the level of sleep that allows dreaming.  Without that, we break down.  The Organizer lamented the lack of problem solving that goes on in dreams, saying that the connection with the sub- and unconscious should give us an obvious benefit, but we do not frequently dream of solutions to our problems, at least not real or workable ones.

A New Participant said that night dreams are, in fact, as fantastical as daydreams, but they are based on repressed wishes.  The use of dream diaries in therapy is to gain perspective on oneself and one's desires.  She also commented later that goals that are excessively difficult to reach are a sort of strategy to avoid disappointment; either they are not taken seriously from the beginning, or the focus on reaching those impossible goals removes attention from other problems.

Our Doctor returned to the fray, using that without dreams, a person is dead.  Because of the physical need for sleep and dream time, this statement is both metaphorical and literal.  He told us that dreams cannot predict the future because there are always factors we do not know yet and new discoveries to be made, and continued by cautioning us against dreaming too much and neglecting our present realities.  We should dream just enough to see where we want to go.

The Organizer could not convince the group of the necessary difference, to his mind, between night dreaming, fantasy and ambition, but his final word was to insist that dreams are by their nature impossible desires.  If they were not impossible, they would be plans.

summing up

Poorly lit, sadly

Domus is a fine craft brewery out of Toledo, previously featured here too.  This one I haven't tried yet, and there's something that tickles me about "the sum of all beers".

There it is...

We know it's dark going in, chocolatey brown, but not quite the consistency of a stout.  Beige, poofy head, maybe poofier than necessary.  It emits a scent of apple at first, with the honey trailing behind a bit.  The headliner for the taste is also the sweetness, although it's not as cloying as the smell might suggest.  The honey comes out first, with a little sour, maybe something like a tart apple, spreading over the tongue next.  Finally just a touch of bitter pings the back of the tongue.  With some time a more cider taste appears, although no fruit at all is listed in the ingredients.  I'm pleased it avoids the citrus, which is refreshing, but its prevalence in my beer choices of late make its absence more noteworthy.

the tale with a stone ends

One day the young man returned home and Hidda asked, "Where did you get that stone in the chimney?  It's miraculous.  The soot never covers it."

It was true.  The stone with the colored stripe was as bright and clean as the day he had cemented it in place.  The young man had forgotten about the stone and the voice and being reminded of them made him uneasy.  "Oh yes, it's special.  From the Sea of Ice, I was told."  Then he kissed his wife, bending her back until she squealed and told him laughing that he shouldn't tease mothers-to-be; her belly was already round after less than a year in the woods.

The time passed; the family grew; the bag wilted.  The young man was sure he could gather materials to put a new room on his house for when even more children came, but they were still comfortable as it was with only one little one.  It wasn't a pressing problem.  More pressing was the situation of their food.  The young man spent more time gathering fallen branches than wild fruits and Hidda was not able to walk very far by herself with the child on her back.  That child was sucking her dry, and not getting much good from it herself.  Their daughter had gained little weight in the months since her birth and her color remained pale.  Her voice was whimpery and reedy, not bothersome, but worrying.  Hidda was growing thin herself, worn out by constant care, refusing to sleep until her daughter swallowed a little more milk, and then a little more...  The young man was beside himself.  Aunt Demeter had not deigned to visit herself, but had sent her personal pharmacist to try her hand, but with no changes.  Winter has on the horizon.  A weak baby had little chance and a dead baby might kill its mother with grief.  The young man felt his soul chill more every day.

One night, one early frosty night, the young man was sitting in front of the low fire while Hidda and the baby slept, exhausted from hours of struggling to fill the tiny stomach.  His brow was knotted, his hands clasped, his cheeks prickly from lack of time for shaving.

"Maybe you are ready for advice now, boy," hissed a familiar voice with unfamiliar menace.

"I thought you said you didn't care whether I took your advice or not?  Why this offense?"

"Well, damn my soft heart, I have taken a liking to you.  So clever, so quick.  It pains me to see you suffer."  The young man turned to see the black wolf shadow on the door, eyes and teeth glowing in an infinite darkness.

"What would you have me do?"

"What do you desire?"

"It's obvious!  My child must be cured!  My family must stay together!"

The glowing white of the teeth lengthened and the burning yellow of the eye narrowed and the voice slithered out of the black, oozing slimy compassion.  "The wood is hardly a place for an ill babe.  Go to Auntie Demeter.  Once you have settled in, calm yourself in the eastern fields.  Gold and silver will guide you."

"I don't know if Auntie will take us in," mumbled the young man, near tears of frustration.

"Just tell her Uncle sends his regards.  Oh, and show her this-" and something heavy and vaguely white fell from the ceiling and hit the floor with a clunk.  The young man picked it up and discovered it was a tooth, long, smooth, and pointed.  He couldn't tell what animal it had come from; it was much too large for any beast he knew.  He slipped it into his pocket and returned to brooding before the fire.

In the morning he went off to see Aunt Demeter, determined to pull her blessing for their stay in her house from her.  He waited in the dark front hall for many anxious minutes while the servant girl occasionally scurried past.  Finally, he was led to the lady's writing room, where she was sitting at her enormous desk, wrapped in a heavy, dull red shawl.  She sat like a block of ice while he made his case and when she made no move to answer him, the young man said, "And Uncle sends his regards," dropping the tooth with a dark sounding whump on the pile of papers in the center of the desk.  He saw Aunt Demeter's eyes widen, although she didn't change her expression otherwise.

A few seconds of silence followed, but in the end she said, "Well, I can hardly turn my dear step-neice away with winter so close.  I'll send the carriage to collect her and the child this afternoon.  If you have things to prepare for bringing with you, set to them."

The young man left the house with a lighter heart than he had had in many days.

Sure enough, the carriage came and carted off the young family and their few belongings, taking them from their little house to Aunt Demeter's mansion.  The mother and child were placed in a snug room with an overlarge, well-pillowed bed.  Seeing his wife and daughter tucked into it, looking like a child and her doll, left the young man with a terrible ache in his throat.  He took to the streets to escape it.

He went to the eastern fields the next day quite by coincidence, as worry had buried the voice's advice.  He only remembered when he saw the pigeon perched on a dry, golden stalk.  It was what many in the area called a moon-bird; chicks were dark, gradually turning silver-gray as maturity took them, and going black again in their old age.  This one was in its prime, practically glowing in the thin sunlight, a small crest of feathers standing proudly on its head and neck.  Its orange eye stared coldly at the young man as he came closer, and as he came abreast its regal wings opened and took the bird effortlessly across the path and a few feet ahead.  This happened several times, with the silvery creature always peering over its shoulder to watch the young man come up behind it before swooping on.  Then, in the middle of a swoop it suddenly rose up and sailed over the field, high enough over the remaining crops that the young man could keep sight of it from the path, and finally dived down into the stalks.  The young man hesitated.  There might be a nest hidden in the field, and although one moon-bird was not particularly dangerous or aggressive, there were usually others in the flock nearby and a crowd of moon-birds had the reputation for being fearless and territorial.  He waited, listening for their coos and flapping wings, but heard nothing besides the brittle rustle of the plants, sucked dry by the fall.  After a few attentive minutes he walked into the field.  The tall grasses came up to just over his head and he hoped he was walking straight to where the bird had disappeared from view.  Indeed, soon he heard it warbling softly.  He parted the stalks with care, but even so the bird exploded from its perch on thunderous wings and sped upwards to join its namesake, just beginning to glow in the purpling sky.  The startled young man froze in place until he was sure no other birds were nearby.  Cautiously he pushed forward and found a small open space on the ground where a low vine was tangled up.  Its color was dark green and its stem was thick and rubbery looking, and it was covered in tiny, pink, cup-shaped flowers.  The few leaves it had were round and leathery.  "Gold and silver led me," muttered the young man, but he was at a loss as to what part of the plant would be useful.  In the end he pulled the whole thing out of the ground and hurried back into town under the first chilly stars of the night.

The plant was kept in the kitchen overnight and the next day the pharmacist was fetched to the house.  She was amazed to see the plant and skeptical of the young man's story of coming across it by chance in the fields.  "This vine has never been seen north of Big Trout Creek," she marveled, "Even plants that have been brought here have never grown half so well as this.  They certainly don't grow on their own in the fields."  By coincidence, the pharmacist had just been reading some old treatises that spoke of the powers of this vine, and after sharing her knowledge of botanical geography, she chopped and mashed the stem and boiled the mush in water with mint.  Strained, the bluish water was given to Hidda.  "She will pass it to the child from her breast," assured the pharmacist.  Hidda took a small cup of the brew in the morning and before bed for several days before its effects began to make themselves known.  First, her appetite increased enormously and color returned to her cheeks, then she began to leave the bed and bustle about the house like she did when she was a servant.  The baby's recovery came two days after the mother's, but come it did.  And the whole household rejoiced; even Aunt Demeter smiled when the baby made a mighty fuss at the dinner table, demonstrating her new-found energy.  The young man was bursting with joy and relief, but Aunt Demeter caught his shoulder that night as they left the dining room with a ring encrusted hand and growled, "You had best take care now, boy.  The wolf helps no one if he isn't sure of receiving in return."  The young man was troubled by her words, although he tried to remind himself of the voice's assurances that its aid was merely by uninterested suggestion, not bargaining or trade for favors.

Once assured that his young family was sleeping in peace, he returned to the cold street to clear his head of worry.  The darkness was a comfortable cloak, and soon he was moving easily without any tension in his body.  The crisp air roused him and he took deep, invigorating breaths.  Most of the townsfolk had already shut their doors to the night and breeze, preferring their hearths and evening broths, so the streets were quiet and wide to his steps.  Perhaps an hour passed, and the young man was ready to join his wife for the night, peaceful and carefree in dreams.  When he rounded the corner of the street where Aunt Demeter's house stood waiting, he was startled to hear voices piercing the silence.

"It's a bad business, I tell you.  The boy would never have stolen those stones.  I would stand for him, for I know him well."

"Yes, it does seem an odd affair.  I understand Steffen blaming him, as he is the only one who knew where they were hidden, it seems.  But the boy is a dullard.  I doubt he could have hidden his crime, even as he was in the middle of it."

"What if he took them only to look upon in his lonely nights?  Was his room well searched?"

"Yes, and nothing found.  That's why the constable decided he must have sold them, although there was no money, nor new goods about either.  Poor Steffen.  He thought he was doing the boy a favor by taking him on for some honest labor, and it brought nothing but the noose in the end."

"I've said it before, Erico, the constable is an ass.  There was no evidence of any wrong-doing, which is as good as evidence of right-doing, as any honest town dweller will tell you.  He had the boy executed out of spite."

"I cannot argue with you.  They say too, though, that he had something to do with the disappearance of one of Armengol's goats some time back.  But that was probably a bit of mischief by some neighbor children.  You know they like to tease the poor animals."

The young man was frozen in place listening to them.  He had taken the miller's stones!  He had killed the goat!  And only now was a culprit sought?  But what could he do?  They were all gone now, and the poor, dull boy had already been hanged.  It made no sense to say anything now, he told himself.  The other men had moved on, chatting gravely about the character of the sacrificed boy, and the young man hurried to Aunt Demeter's door, anxious to lay his head to pillow.

The house had gone dark in his absence and cold as well.  With no light at hand, the young man stumbled through the rooms and halls and tried not to trip up the stairs.  Once in the chamber where his wife was sleeping with their child, he let himself relax, but a rustling sound behind him made his blood turn to ice and freeze his soul.  He turned slowly, hoping to see some thief of a cat stealing about the corners of the room and disturbing the heavy curtains, but no.  It was an indistinct lump behind a tapestry that moved and crinkled the dirty old threads together.  The lump moved to the left, towards the edge of the tapestry, and in the most casual way the source of the shape became visible.  First came the pointed snout with shining teeth, the fiery eyes and sharp ended ears, then the heavy black claws clicking on the wooden floor, then the whole, heavy body and tail, raised and waving whimsically, as if in a wind felt by itself alone.  The great gray wolf stood before him, large as a horse and happy as a gambler with a winning hand.

"So good to be here at last, my boy," came the rich, growling voice from across the room, "Now we can have some real fun."

"I don't want to have fun with you, I want to see my baby healthy." The young man was amazed at his own brazenness in the face of the unnaturally sized beast.  The wolf chuckled and oozed further into the room, moonlight bouncing off his hide like useless arrows.

"But you can see she is well on her way, and I'm sure I can convince you to continue our relationship," he purred in a burbly, syrupy voice.  His body moved effortlessly to the side of the bed, and his lantern eyes centered on the sleeping baby, a sly smile splitting his pointed snout from end to end.  The young man could almost see drool collecting behind those smooth, white spikes of teeth, ready to slide between them and over the thin lips to drip to the floor in all its slimy glory.  He launched himself towards the monstrous creature and before he knew it, he found himself pinned against the tapestry and the wolf laughing in his face.

"It's time to stop this, Vulk," yelled Aunt Demeter from the doorway.  She was holding the tooth in one hand and a hammer in the other, and although she was in her nightdress, didn't appear to have been awakened by the noises in the bedroom.

"You know what it means if you do what you're thinking," scoffed the wolf, "You haven't the nerve to pay that price."

"Haven't I?" and Aunt Demeter set the tooth to the wall and smashed it with the hammer.   They heard a surprised and angry yelp as the wolf vanished in a puff of sour smelling smoke.

The whole room immediately felt lighter, and Hidda shot up from the bed as the baby let out a hearty wail.  "What happened?" she exclaimed.

Aunt Demeter was leaning against the door-frame, looking weak and tired, but still proud.  "I should have known he wouldn't forget about us, even after so long without sticking his nose into our business.  Tomorrow we shall talk of preparations to be made.  We won't be able to stay here much longer.  You rest as well as you can."  Aunt Demeter turned and left, closing the door behind her, while her step-neice comforted her baby and stared at her husband, the couple realizing together what the woman had meant and what it would mean for the future.

Intent is Magic

When used in its natural context, internet forums and message boards, the phrase tends to be negative: "Intent isn't magic!" sometimes with "asshole" thrown in for good measure.  This is understandable when one knows why it comes up at all.  The phrase is used to chastise commenters who have, perhaps inadvertently, offended or insulted others.  They then explain that they did not mean to cause offense, that was not their intent at all.  But, just because somebody does not mean to be insulting, that does not mean that their choice of words was not crude or thoughtless.  That is the idea behind the phrase: you cannot erase another person's experience just so you do not have to think carefully about the way you choose to communicate.

The importance for relating to other people through communication is more in the reaction to the phrase than what inspired it.  When alerted to the fact that one has offended others, one can apologize and move on, or one can take offense at the expression of offense.  For many people, the ultimate insult seems to be that others do not give them the benefit of the doubt in every possible moment.  They are angered that others might think they are careless with their words when they accidentally offend, and just as angered that others might think they are actively trying to cause harm.  In many cases, the whole misunderstanding is a one time thing, either being resolved with apologies and care in the future, or with the departure of one or another of the commenters.  Sometimes, however, especially on websites specializing in controversial issues, non-magical intent is invoked time after time, with the same commenters.  This makes others think that, less than careless, they are participating in bad faith.

Our Doctor began by saying the topic has a distinct non-Latin feel, and that he was unsatisfied by searching for definitions of "intention" and "intent" because dictionaries do not agree.  Finally, he had to say that intent is neurological.  It comes from within our physical selves, and even in face-to-face communication we do not always see true intent.  On the internet, it is even more complicated, as we lack intonation, facial expression, and gestures to convey the real meaning of what we say.  Internet communication is black and white, therefore easy to misinterpret.  The words themselves are emotionless, but the reader feels an emotional reaction, sometimes a very powerful one.  As a person involved in theater and poetry, he is also very aware of the importance of word choice and delivery.  The actor on stage has all the tools to present the desired ideas, but the writer has only the words and to some extent, context.  Writers communicate almost with their hands tied behind their backs.

The Real Philosopher did not look kindly upon the phrase, saying that the connection of intent and magic is highly dependent on the real intent of the speaker.  Many people profess false intent, either to lull the audience into listening or to placate an agitated, or offended, audience.  It is impossible to know real intent, since we can say anything, and sometimes we ourselves have unconscious motivations that inform our intentions.  However, the point of the Philosopher was that there is a certain magic in deception, so being able to hide one's real intentions, especially when they are malicious or at least lacking seriousness, is a kind of illusion or magic trick on the audience.

One participant did muse over the underlying question: how much responsibility do speaker and listener have respectively with regard to message?  Words can hurt, but so can acts, and in most cases we do not hold a grudge against someone who accidentally steps on our toes, but an unintentional insult can create hard feelings lasting years.  She also remarked on the culture of victimhood that we seem to be developing, in which some people claim a right to be offended at anything.  Curiously, I'd say those people are the same ones, in most cases, who will speak thoughtlessly and then be deeply "hurt" when their words are "misinterpreted".  Later, she was more sure that good intentions do not absolve people of negative consequences.  Although anyone can have a bad day and a bad reaction, the responsibility lies with the speaker/agent to consider the outcome of the planned speech/action.

Our Leader made the point that actions speak louder than words, so the best way to divine intent is to observe actions over time.  On the internet, there is a level of difficulty not present in meatspace, given the supposed anonymity and use of pseudonyms for commenting.  This is often exploited by internet trolls, who exist simply to generate conflict and leave bad feelings wherever they go.  The benefit of the doubt is generally given for the first "misunderstanding", and sometimes for many after that.  Eventually, other commenters will be fed up and either demand action be taken or take their participation to another site.  The use of the phrase implies an honest or lazy mistake on the part of the commenter, but a mistake nonetheless.  Trolls do not make that mistake but exploit the willingness to forgive and foster smooth communication between participants through deception.  For the Leader as well, the real "magic" is in convincing other people of something that does not exist, in this case the good will of the troll poster.

In another contribution, the Doctor pondered intent as a result of our interpretation of reality.  We think we are responsible for our own actions, but we do not always know the reasons we do what we do, any more than we know the reasons others do what they do.  We should be humble about our interpretations of others, because we cannot know them completely, hence the only source we have for their intentions are the others themselves.  Although they might try to deceive us, we should be careful about making negative judgements without precedent to base them on.

There was one participant who completely misunderstood the meaning of the topic, confusing "intent" with Spanish "intento".  Even after several contributions to the discussion, she remained unaware that her interpretation was erroneous.  I guess there is a curious consistency in her opinion that trying things is like magic and her trying to participate in a discussion which she was completely confused about.

The topic was my idea.  I am well aware of the danger of confusion and misunderstanding, but that is, in fact, my intent.  I often choose wordings for topics that are not perfectly clear, and that people have to consider before tossing out opinions.  Or at least, they ought to consider.  Some might say I'm not being fair or kind to non-native speakers, but I say at least I'm not devious about it at all.  I only hope to promote the magic of vocabulary and intellectual expansion, and I'm completely open, if a little arrogant, about it.

it's becoming a habit

Keeping my ears open for the next Craft Beer Fair, I heard the rumors that it would be the first days of June.  And it was!

So much fun on Monday the poster's still up on Tuesday

Sunday afternoon was well-trafficked, but near the door was something new: Gruit.  The specialty of this brewery is the lack of hops; there is a small amount used in the brewing, but they rely on a combination of other herbs for flavoring their beers.  The result is a product distinctly lacking in bitterness and hoppy punch, but with complex and interesting taste.  I tried the Blond, which comes out with a dirty yellow color, like many an unfiltered beer, and a barely perceptible odor.  It's disarmingly sweet, honeyed, with just a touch of floweriness.  The brewer mentioned it was a good "starter beer", and I can imagine my 20-year-old self drinking it exclusively.  The sweetness builds on the tongue after a while, but the beer remains very smooth and easy to drink.

Before serious note taking begins

Looking for something snappier to continue with, I found Akelarre from Brux around the corner.  It's a strong bitter from the brewery in Valladolid, but made with Cibeles' equipment, so it's kind of local.  As a bitter, the color is darker and the taste stronger.  The bitterness is apparent immediately, but it has a clean flavor with hardly any aftertaste.  I enjoyed the shift from sweet to bitter in my two first beers, but Akelarre does in fact have a mellow sweetness that pauses on the back of the tongue as it goes down.  It was a nice progression between the two beers.

After that, I was given a taste of the stout - Corvus.  It's an enticing chocolate brown color and the taste is strict stout with the mouth-filling bitter and a touch of smoke.  Perfectly classic, and a fine beer to have with some sausage, very pub-like drinking.

In the quieter back room, I found Keltius with several light beers on tap.  I decided on their 2.0, an APA, for some contrast after the stout.  It was indeed a contrast, a bit surprising in fact, but quite pleasant.  2.0 is lemonade colored and even the taste has traces of fizzy lemonade.  It's a very light and fresh flavor with that citrusy combination of bittersweet-sour to make a fine summertime drink.  The bitter part overwhelms the other more delicate flavors after a bit, but never becomes too much to take.

While I was there, I decided to check out Medina's stock this time around.  They're fair regulars, usually with ales.  This year they had a witbier, called Blanca, naturally.  It has a little more watery color than the 2.0, and the taste is even sweeter and fruitier in spite of having both orange peel and wheat.  Something in it also made me think of vanilla.  The aftertaste comes out with a hint of banana, much like other wits I've had.  I tend to hesitate before choosing witbiers, maybe because of their Belgian associations, but every time I've tried them I've been pleased.

Also, snacks

Moving back towards the door, I caught sight of La Quince, which had given a tasting in one of the beer stores about a week before.  Circumstances prevented my going, but their stout had sounded mouth-watering so I went to have a taste here.  Unfortunately, the stout was not yet on tap.  They had IPA and Imperial IPA for the moment; Llipa I had tried before from the bottle, so Kince Imperial IPA it was.  Very hoppy, with that sharp bitter taste, just what anyone would expect in an IPA.  Both their ales are delicious, but I can't say there's anything extraordinary about them.

Dark beers were a little hard to come by in this fair.  I wandered back towards the turn and was prompted to try Sevebrau's lager.  The rep described it as a helles, and it is as much like a German beer as you can expect, something I haven't come across much with Spanish brews.  It has a balanced taste and good color, clear and enticing.  The rep was quite happy with my comparison of his product to German beers, but also shared his opinion that the best beers aren't the beers themselves, but the ones you share in good times with good friends.  Very philosophical, Seve.

I finished the first day with a Black Bock from La Pirata.  The color might fool you into thinking it a bitter stout, but the first sip will disabuse you of that idea immediately.  Although tasty, it has nothing to do with the bitter smokiness of a stout; instead, you get a tangy sourness, fruity, I kept thinking of plums and tart apples.  There is a little sweet mixed in, but it's just a hint.  Rather than some mere thirst-quencher, this is a beer that keeps your attention while you're drinking.

Accidental selfie!

I went back for day 2 intent on getting that stout from La Quince, so I pounced on the stand as soon as I walked in the door.  As promised, Vanilla Black Velvet Stout was there, ready to be tried.  Perfect black, strong stout at first, but after swallowing, the sweet vanilla comes out.  Also apparent is the velvet.  The rep says it's thanks to the foam, dark beige and slightly bitter.  The bottle has an interesting animal pair on the front: an owl and slightly military looking fox.  The owl shows up on all the bottles but the fox is only on the stout.  The details keep coming out with this beer, it even has a little spiciness, but all the way down it's pudding smooth.  I would avoid strong flavored foods with this one since it deserves all the attention of the drinker, but it does seem like a nice dessert beer.  Excellent beginning to part 2.

Don't forget that bottle, you'll want some later...

Attending in the afternoon on Monday gives you a chance to see the beers on the tables better, what with a much smaller crowd than on the weekend.  I saw a very pretty beer on my way to the back, a warm ruby red color, and had to stop and ask about it.  It's actually a brown ale, Lluna's Bruna.  A good all-year sort, not as heavy as some browns, refreshing and balanced flavor without any intrusive bitter or sourness.  Lluna, based in Valencia, is a small brewery producing ecologically conscious beers, and are just now starting to sell through the beer stores besides organic groceries.  They have some nice photos of happy and energetic drinkers on their website, promoting a young and energetic product.

Only slightly jewel-like in sunlight

Next was Bier Cerveza Artesana with a wheat based red ale.  The rep pointed out the use of German hops for this brew, and said that a small amount of whole wheat was part of the process.  The flavor is sharply wheaty, although not overwhelming.  On the sour side, but it's a good, natural sort of taste.  The sharpness that comes through the hops is invigorating, a nice pick-me-up.

I was in the right place to be treated to a Belgian lambic with some beer professionals, but I didn't catch the name of the brewery.  It's a very dark red color but with a white head.  The smell is sour and vinegary, reminding us of ketchup, but the flavor was more of a tart, unsweetened cherry.  Before succumbing to the tide of IPA and hoppy craft beers, I definitely leaned towards the sweet and malty.  But malty is by no means a description here.  While certainly interesting, the lambics aren't quite my style.

My finale was with Zeta Brewing Company and their lager.  It's a pretty yellow and very bubbly, with good white foam.  Something of a relief after the lambic, the taste is very clean and subtle.  In the mouth it's a respectable beer, but once swallowed it's gone, leaving very little behind.  It's a conversation companion, keeping talk fluid but not interrupting or otherwise distracting.

The rep lends a hand

While Medina and Cibeles were present, I noticed Domus, Sagra and La Real del Duero did not make an appearance at this fair.  This time there was an importer in one corner too, representing Anchor Steam, Big Bad Dog and Better Beer Company with the tagline "Las mejores cervezas del mundo (The best beers in the world)".  I wonder if Carlsberg would have the nerve to complain.  Also new for me was the amount of young children.  I'm not a big fan of kids, but I think it says something about the atmosphere at these fairs: while there's a large amount of beer and drinking around, people don't show up just to drink.  We go to discover new breweries and styles, meet other beer fans, and learn a little about this beverage we enjoy.  I hope this thing goes on forever.

And breweries start making deliveries with beer-bikes

Controlling Information to Protect Us (From Ourselves)

As this was my suggestion, I have to work up some sort of examination of the topic.  It didn't make it into the reminder/introduction e-mail, but as long as it's somewhere, I guess.

There were two angles on my mind when I suggested the topic: one was censorship, really, simply not allowing certain data to reach the public because of the risk of misinterpretation and unpleasant consequences; the other was more like manipulation, in which information is available but presented in ways that make the audience take it with a grain of salt, or at least consider before accepting it.  There are cases in which it makes sense not to provide information without caution or context.  Teaching children about the negative experiences of life is one example.  Also worth mentioning are criminal cases in which all the facts have not been examined or revealed and when releasing the names of parties involved could encourage vigilantes to mete out their own sort of justice.  The problem becomes, who can we trust to make these decisions?  When is it acceptable to be treated essentially like children?  When information is kept secret by authority, it is generally to protect the authority rather than those under authority.  There is also the strategy of disseminating information, but in such a pile of trivia or garbage that nobody who does not suffer from some sort of obsession will be able to extract anything useful.  Some consider the availability of information through modern technology to be this very move.

Another complaint made about modern connectivity is that it allows people with unpopular and dangerous ideas to find each other.  Sometimes this refers to sexual predators, other times to hate groups, and still other times to followers of political ideologies that are a threat to the status quo.  When crimes that target certain groups are committed, there is often a clash between the ideas that the perpetrator felt alone and isolated and that there was a community and support for the act.  This is especially true with hate crimes, since overt prejudice and discrimination is no longer acceptable in most of Western society, but the effects of the past remain.

The Artist took a somewhat negative stance on this issue, saying we live in a state of war over access to and control of information, also noting that the ease of acquiring data through modern communications means that physical spies are no longer necessary.  It also means, in his opinion, that freedom as disappeared.  I disagree slightly; actual people for spying may be less necessary, but sometimes a pair of hands is needed to do things microchips cannot.  I also am not of the opinion that it is freedom that has disappeared, rather it is privacy.  As the Artist himself mentioned, one use of controlling information for the greater protection of all is tracking disease.  In the past, unless one presented obvious symptoms, there was no real way to protect the population from possible infection, especially if the carrier or host was not aware of the danger, e.g. Typhoid Mary.  In these cases, information is often limited for public access in an attempt to prevent panic, although there tend to be leaks and rumors accepted as truth, that is the "real" truth.  Later, the Artist lamented the loss of value in expert opinions due to the volume of ideas made available: information is nothing because it is infinite; access is free; anybody can say anything, even if they know nothing.  On the topic of knowing, he stated that what we know is mere moments of consciousness, which we try to record in various ways but they often lose their relevance when the moment has passed.  In spite of that, others can easily steal our thoughts with cut and paste, even more easily than in the past when the words had to actually be copied letter by letter.  For the Artist, control of intellectual property is a necessary thing, not only for the rights of the creators, but for the accurate presentation of the creations.  If taken from their context, the true meaning can be lost.  One might argue that meaning being subjective anyway, it is natural for things to be transplanted and used to represent a different interpretation.  So, the respect for the creator seems to be the most pressing need here.  Despite the danger of having one's work pirated and plagiarized, the Artist is aware of the necessity of internet presence.  "If you're not on the internet, you don't exist."

The Writer echoed the sentiment of information overload, and also referenced our natural tendency to look for stability and control, but with more confidence in our own abilities to decide what is necessary for everyone's protection than anyone else's.  He admitted the government's right to control classified information, but we still might wonder what criteria are used to classify it in the first place.  A person's private thoughts are just that - private; a government, on the other hand, is not an individual but a collective body meant to oversee the interactions of individuals under its authority, among other things, and therefore without the natural right to privacy.  The Writer doubted the danger from plagiarism, saying the same technology that makes it easy to copy/paste makes it easy to track by searching exact phrases.  Finally, he referred to the control that comes from excess of information, leading us to pay attention only to the easiest or most entertaining bits.  When he posts serious things on his social media page, there are but few positive responses; trivial matters, on the other hand, receive huge amounts of positivity.

The Organizer also admitted the need for control on certain types of information, when it has to do with national security for example.  When the danger is so large and difficult to control, like epidemics or meteor strikes, why not prevent panic?  He centered on the use of information and blocking some of it as a means of creating fear in the population, especially the type of fear that leaves people unable to act decisively.  This is a tactic used by both governments and companies to bend the public to their will.  In that light, they both hide their mistakes from public knowledge, which is really the sort of information that should be public so that those mistakes can be avoided in the future.  Organizations sometimes appear to have a very human embarrassment about their failings.  To close, he fretted about the apathy people have with regards to available information, saying few people are interested in making sure what they are told is accurate.  With few independent watchdogs, information distributors have little incentive to be open or objective and can easily work for the benefit of government or business rather than the population as a whole. 

The problem is multi-layered, having aspects of public safety, voyeurism, and distraction.  We like to find out secrets, both about other people and organizations.  For this reason gossip media flourishes.  However, most of those secrets are trivial and more superficially embarrassing than truly important, and allowed into the public sphere for the purpose of keeping people entertained.  If we have our ears full of gossip we might not devote the time and effort to discovering the important and deeply embarrassing facts that might motivate us to demand real changes in our lives.