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February 2nd, 2010

Hemingway cats

I had the good fortune to enjoy a vacation in the Caribbean this past week, on which the first stop was Key West.  Though the weather drove me away from the beach, I was able to tour the Ernest Hemingway House and take in the considerable population of semi-domestic cats who have free reign of the property.  The 50 or so cats are descendants of Hemingway’s own pets, many of them polydactyl – meaning they had extra toes, not that they were flying dinosaurs.  The house is pretty famous for the cats.

A diversity of personalities are represented, as any cat lover would expect, but most seem acclimated to the tourists who often try to make friends.  In general they were appreciative, or at least tolerant of being pet – with one notable exception.  My right wrist now bears three parallel scars inflicted by a chubby gray-and-white fellow who offered no other warning that my hand was unwelcome.  I figure as a writer myself I should wear the scar with pride.  My scars will be a lifelong memento of my visit to the Hemingway House.

I didn’t get a photo of the culprit, but I was able to get some great photos of a few other cats.  That first guy is my favorite, but here are a few more:

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February 1st, 2010

Sexting, and what it means to be a girl

This post originally appeared on the ACLU’s Blog of Rights and the ACLU of Pennsylvania’s blog, Speaking Freely, on January 20.

On January 15, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit heard arguments in Miller, et al. v. Skumanick, a child pornography case that, oddly, involves no child pornography. The case goes back to 2006, when two girls aged 12 were photographed by another friend on her digital camera. The two girls were depicted from the waist up, wearing bras. In a separate situation, our third client was photographed as she emerged from the shower, with a towel wrapped around her waist and the upper body exposed. Neither of the photos depicted genitalia or any sexual activity or context. In 2008 the girls’ school district learned that these and other photos were circulating, confiscated several students’ cell phones, and turned the photos in question over to the Wyoming County district attorney, George Skumanick, Jr.

Skumanick sent a letter to the girls and their parents, offering an ultimatum. They could attend a five-week re-education program of his own design, which included topics like “what it means to be a girl in today’s society” and “non-traditional societal and job roles.” They would also be placed on probation, subjected to random drug testing, and required to write essays explaining how their actions were wrong. If the girls refused the program, the letter explained, the girls would be charged with felony child pornography, a charge that carries a possible 10-year prison sentence.

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January 11th, 2010

Film Review: The Road

The Road

I finally got to see John Hillcoat and Joe Penhall’s film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road this weekend, and I was not disappointed.  McCarthy’s bleak post-apocalyptic father-and-son story is one of my favorite books.  The film is extremely faithful, though sadly it leaves out the baby-eating, one of the most memorable scenes from the book.  Not that we needed baby-eating.  Laid out on the screen, the depravity and desperation of humans without a society are horrifying enough.  My friend Alex, who had not read the book, cringed visibly throughout.

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December 21st, 2009

The end of another year approaches

Haven’t posted much recently, sorry about that.  Just got home from a trip to NYC to visit friends and family – family got cut out because of the blizzard, but I got to hole up with a friend and watch movies for hours on end, and that ranks in my book as a pretty great weekend.  Granted, the 7 hour trip back from NYC to Philly (thanks to trains delayed by snow) was unexpected, as was the pink eye I’m now apparently suffering from, but such is life.  At least it’s almost Christmas!

2009 was the year I turned 30, and the year I really, really, for real finished and attempted to market my first novel.  I end the year with almost 30 more rejection letters than I began it with.  I won’t lie, that’s a huge disappointment considering how great I felt about my last rewrite, but it’s part of the process.  As so many publishing blogs remind us, it frequently takes 3 or more finished novels before an agent bites.  Selling novels is like fly fishing, if it took one to five years to tie each fly.

It’s now time to put Volve in a drawer somewhere and focus on another book.  I’ve got at least five more in my head, two of which I’ve got at least partial first drafts for, and I think it’s time to finish and revise something fresh rather than attempt yet another rewrite on the same novel I’ve been writing and rewriting for ten years.  I’ll probably revisit it in the future – the story is too dear to me to be lost entirely – and I’ll still send out queries when I come across new agents who might be interested, but at the moment it doesn’t appear to be the first novel I’ll sell.  Oh well.

Here’s hoping that 2010 will be the year I finish my second novel – and perhaps 2011 will be the year I finally sell something.

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November 17th, 2009

An omnivore’s dilemma

My open letter to Hatfield Quality Meats, a response to this horrifying video and the first time I’ve ever referred to Faux News by their chosen spelling:

Dear Sirs:

By now I am sure you are aware of the undercover video of Country View Family Farms aired on Fox News on November 16, 2009, and made available on YouTube and several other sites.  I came across the video in question mere moments ago, and I am writing to express my absolute horror at what I saw, and to demand as a customer that you take real action to rectify and prevent the sort of abuses this video depicts.  If, by some chance, you have not yet seen the video in question, it is available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDiSR0LGry8

Let me be very clear: I am not a vegetarian, nor an “animal rights” advocate, nor a PETA supporter.  The first seven years of my professional career were spent at zoos, where I learned that keeping captive animals is a challenging, sensitive subject, and I saw first-hand the kind of unethical dirty tricks PETA and their supporters will pull to try and convince others to support their agenda.  I am not writing to convince you that eating meat is morally wrong.  I eat meat.  Lots of meat.  Much of it from Hatfield.  In fact I have a pork tenderloin from Hatfield thawing in my refrigerator as I write.

That said, I consider myself an animal lover, and a firm believer in animal welfare.  I do not believe that it is immoral to eat meat.  Human beings are biological omnivores, and animal products are useful, nutritious, and enjoyable.  I am a very firm believer, however, that if we as a culture are going to raise an animal for the purpose of being eaten, we have a heavy responsibility to see that the animal is treated humanely throughout its life, and that its death be brought about with minimal suffering.  These are not mere products, these are living creatures capable of experiencing fear and pain and torment.  If we cannot meet our responsibility, if we subjuect these animals to torment and suffering, then it is irresponsible to raise them.

I have lived in the Philadelphai region for more than fifteen years.  I cannot count the number of times I have passed trucks loaded with pigs on their way to Hatfield.  It’s always a little distressing to see them jammed into a truck, their snouts poking out as the road passes by, but I have always been able to reassure myself that the USDA requires humane living conditions, and humane methods of dispatching these animals.  That belief may have been naïve.  Watching this undercover video certainly shattered my illusions.

I am at a loss to express to you my abject horror, my feeling of betrayal, and the feeling of personal shame, guilt, and responsibility I felt watching this video.  As a consumer of your products, I am faced with the knowledge that I am paying for what I saw.  I don’t just support the industry, but my actual dollars go directly to the company depicted in the video.  It is beyond sickening, and more than once I was moved to tears.

I’m now torn as to what power I have to remedy what I’ve seen.  I could go vegetarian, but it’s the last thing I want to do.  I can try to seek out “free range” or “organic” meats, but as I’m sure you know those labels don’t carry any definitive guarantee that the animal has been raised any differently than they would be on so-called “factory farms.”  I can stop eating pork products, but then where do I draw the line?  The video in question showed pigs, but why should I then assume that other animals are treated any differently?  Cows?  Chickens?

One thing I can do is reach out to your company, and hope that you share at least some of my outrage.  I realize that when people work around these animals day in and day out, they can become desensitized.  Handling pigs all day, they become merchandise.  To some extent, seeing them as products rather than living things may help farm employees to avoid whatever empathy they feel for the animals.  All of these things are natural human responses – but that is all the more reason that you, as a corporation, have a responsibility to oversee the employees and the way they treat the animals.

Worse, however, is that the suffering depicted in these videos is not limited to the actions of employees.  Elements of life for these pigs appear to be matters of company policies.  Again, I understand that you are a corporation and that you are in business to make money, and that certain methods of raising animals humanely are expensive.  As I said before, however, it is my view that as a company raising animals, your greatest responsibility is to see that those animals are raised in a humane environment, and that you have a responsibility to minimize their suffering.  As a consumer, this is what I expect.

And so, as a consumer, I am requesting – in truth, demanding – that Hatfield take action to improve the lives of the animals raised at Country View Family Farms and all of its suppliers.  I can only assume there will be some action from the USDA prompted by the national exposure these videos have received, but punitive measures alone will not satisfy me.

Let me be very clear: if the animals being raised by Hatfield and its suppliers are not raised and killed in humane conditions that keep their suffering to an absolute minimum, I will not purchase Hatfield products.  Furthermore, I will do my best to see that other people come to the same conclusion.

You are in business to sell pork, not to torture pigs.

I would appreciate some response to indicate what action Hatfield will be taking to rectify the abuses brought to light by these videos.  The more detailed, the better.

Thank you for your time and attention.

Yours,

Christopher Keelty

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