thenation--2020-04-24--Vietnam May Have the Most Effective Response to Covid-19

Since the earliest days of the Covid-19 pandemic , three Asian countries have been singled out for praise for their effective response .
First , it was South Korea .
The country has a population of 52 million , and as of April 22 it has 10,702 cases and 240 deaths .
Taiwan has drawn a lot of media attention because of its spiky relationship with the World Health Organization , and , with 24 million people , its numbers are much better than South Korea ’ s : 427 cases and only six deaths .
Singapore , finally , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has 11,178 cases and 12 fatalities , and was held up as a model until last week , which brought a new surge that appears to have begun in a hostel for South Asian migrant workers .
The glaring omission from this list is Vietnam .
Almost three months since its first case was detected on January 23 , the number of recorded infections has inched up to only 268 , and so far no one has died .
The population of Vietnam is 95 million—more than South Korea , Taiwan , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ very little attention in the American press .
If we take The New York Times as a yardstick , other than brief pickups of shorts from Reuters , the only substantial story was a piece—six weeks ago—about the impact of Covid-19 on the fashion industry .
This was centered on a 27-year-old socialite named Nga Nguyen , who attended a Gucci fashion show in Milan and a St. Laurent event in Paris in late February , then lied about her travel itinerary on the mandatory health reporting form when she returned to Vietnam @ @ @ @ @ @ @ early March , having infected her sister and seven other passengers on her flight .
The daughter of a steel magnate , she has been reviled in Vietnam ever since as a symbol of the country ’ s arrogant and over-entitled nouveaux riches .
The painstaking April 11 analysis by the Times of what the Trump administration knew about the novel coronavirus and when it knew it , what expert advice it received and ignored , and when it finally acted once the horse was out of the barn , is a useful @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Vietnam has responded .
The Workers on the Front Lines of the Philippines ’ Fight Against Coronavirus Like many Asian countries , it had a psychological head start .
Vietnam had one of the first cases of SARS in 2003 , and was praised for its quick and successful handling of the outbreak .
The region was traumatized by SARS , and mask-wearing became commonplace in many countries .
I vividly remember my consternation when I checked into a hotel in Taipei some years ago to find that all of the receptionists lined @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
In the case of Covid-19 , Vietnam was also predictably on higher alert than most other countries because of its land border with China and the large amount of travel between the two countries , both business- and tourist-related .
Vietnam ’ s approach was never based on mass testing , which has been the panicky and inadequate response of the United States and most other Western countries .
And this was not because its resources were limited ; it was a deliberate preemptive strategy to minimize infections .
The gross number @ @ @ @ @ @ @ yardstick to use .
What is significant is the ratio of tests to confirmed cases , and that ratio in Vietnam is almost five times greater than in any other country .
Testing was followed by strict contact tracing ( including secondary contacts ) for anyone known to be infected , immediate isolation followed by quarantining , and the prompt creation of a real-time database and two mobile apps by which people could record their health status and symptoms .
All this was backed up by the mass mobilization of the country ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the health care system , and public employees , and an energetic and creative public education campaign that included TV cartoons , social media , and posters that draw on the traditional iconography of official propaganda but replaced heroic workers and peasants with heroic doctors in face masks .
On January 11 , with the first death in Wuhan , Vietnam tightened its border and airport controls .
Four days later , when there were still only 27 cases in China ’ s Hubei Province , Vietnamese officials met with the World Health @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Disease Control , and the WHO praised Vietnam for its rapid risk assessment and issuing of protective guidelines .
The first cases in Vietnam were detected in three airplane passengers returning from Wuhan in January .
Twenty-one of their contacts were traced and isolated .
By January 31 , the government had formed a National Steering Committee for Covid-19 Prevention and Control , headed by Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam ( the US equivalent , under Vice President Mike Pence , was not set up until February 28 ) .
By the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ only 61 confirmed cases .
Patient 61 was a Muslim returning from a mass religious festival in Malaysia .
The government immediately shuttered the mosque he had visited in Ho Chi Minh City and ordered a lockdown of his home province of Ninh Thuan .
At this point anyone who had come into contact with a known case was put into immediate quarantine , and secondary contacts were ordered into self-isolation .
Passengers arriving at international airports were quarantined for 14 days in camps run by the military—benignly , by all accounts—and on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ canceled , and most domestic flights and trains were canceled soon thereafter .
Anyone leaving Hanoi , where most new cases were being detected , was quarantined when entering another province .
The epicenter of the outbreak in Hanoi turned out to be Bach Mai Hospital , which is famous for being badly damaged during Richard Nixon ’ s 1972 bombing campaign .
It was traced to a man who had visited the hospital on March 12 ; his home commune of 11,000 people was immediately closed off from the outside world .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , where the caseload had now risen to 45 , was locked down .
All visitors to a hospital anywhere in the country now had to be tested .
Three days later , the government imposed mandatory social distancing nationwide for two weeks—again a preemptive action , not one taken , as in some but not all US states , to minimize deaths from an infection already spiraling out of control .
By April 9 , more than 1,000 health care workers at Bach Mai and 14,400 visitors to the hospital had been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ manner of questions , of course .
The US Navy has ascribed the cases of infection aboard the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt to a port call in Da Nang , Vietnam ’ s third-largest city , and conspiracy theorists immediately jumped on this to say that it pointed to concealment of an outbreak there .
In fact , the most plausible explanation appears to be that two British tourists , also later found to be infected , had stayed in the same hotel as crew members from the ship .
All 40 of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ found negative .
Da Nang , a city of more than a million people , has had precisely six confirmed cases .
A more common argument is that Vietnam is an authoritarian one-party state , so its numbers can ’ t be trusted .
One fiercely anti-communist Viet Khieu—an “ overseas Vietnamese ” —told me that the numbers are a lie to avoid losses to the huge tourist industry .
That makes no sense , since tourism has already been wiped out by the cancellation of all air travel .
In neighboring Cambodia @ @ @ @ @ @ @ justification for doubting official statistics .
In both countries , the health care system is rudimentary ( when I visited the main hospital in Vientiane , the Lao capital , last year , I was told that there is just one MRI machine in the whole country ) .
And remembering the enthusiasm with which Hun Sen , the Cambodian premier , allowed cruise ship passengers to disembark freely in Sihanoukville in February hardly breeds confidence .
However , says Todd Pollack , a professor at Harvard Medical School who directs the Partnership @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , “ I see no reason to mistrust the information coming out of the government at this time .
Vietnam ’ s response was swift and decisive .
If the epidemic were much larger than is being officially reported , we would see the evidence in increased emergency room visits and hospital admissions—and we ’ re not seeing it.
” There ’ s no question that Vietnam is an authoritarian state , and its human rights record is poor , including severe restrictions on freedom of expression and the control of information .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ been strikingly transparent .
It also has an enormous capacity for mass mobilization ( not to mention a long history of it ) .
It ’ s no coincidence that the government calls its campaign against Covid-19 the Spring General Offensive of 2020—an obvious echo of the General Offensive , General Uprising of 1968—the Tet Offensive .
So what comes next ?
Remarkably , as I write , Vietnam has had no new cases since April 16 .
That may not last , of course .
Sooner or later Vietnam will have to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ massively dependent on the country ’ s place in the global supply chain , including many factories that were previously based in China .
Mandatory social distancing was extended for a week , but now applied to only 12 provinces that were considered to be at risk , and on April 22 it was suspended altogether except for parts of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City and two other provinces .
The airports will inevitably have to reopen .
And an epidemiologist might argue that the low number of infections has equipped few @ @ @ @ @ @ @ second wave of the pandemic .
Nonetheless , what Vietnam has accomplished in these first three months is to buy precious time , and it has used it well .
It has shipped 450,000 hazmat suits , bought and paid for , to the United States from a local DuPont plant .
It has had enough excess capacity to send 550,000 surgical masks to the worst-affected countries in Europe , and another 730,000 to its neighbors , Laos and Cambodia .
With the apparel industry one of the mainstays of its economy , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ production capacity to 7 million new fabric masks and 5.72 million surgical masks a day , and Vietnam ’ s biggest publicly traded corporation , Vingroup , has retooled automotive and smartphone factories with a promise to produce 55,000 ventilators a month .
In preparation for a second wave of infections , the head of the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Vietnam notes that a spanking new 300-bed hospital has just been opened near Ho Chi Minh City—with 10 “ negative pressure rooms ” equipped with special air filters—to prepare for new @ @ @ @ @ @ @ imported another 200,000 rapid-test kits from South Korea to further improve its readiness .
So when the second wave comes , as it surely will , Vietnam has a fighting chance of controlling it as well as it controlled the first .
There are many lessons to be learned from its extraordinary success , although sadly it is much too late now for the United States to learn them .

EDITOR’S NOTE: The Nation believes that helping readers stay informed about the impact of the coronavirus crisis is a form of public service. For that reason, this article, and all of our coronavirus coverage, is now free. Please subscribe to support our writers and staff, and stay healthy.
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Since the earliest days of the Covid-19 pandemic, three Asian countries have been singled out for praise for their effective response. First, it was South Korea. The country has a population of 52 million, and as of April 22 it has 10,702 cases and 240 deaths. Taiwan has drawn a lot of media attention because of its spiky relationship with the World Health Organization, and, with 24 million people, its numbers are much better than South Korea’s: 427 cases and only six deaths. Singapore, finally, with a population of 5.5 million, has 11,178 cases and 12 fatalities, and was held up as a model until last week, which brought a new surge that appears to have begun in a hostel for South Asian migrant workers.
The glaring omission from this list is Vietnam. Almost three months since its first case was detected on January 23, the number of recorded infections has inched up to only 268, and so far no one has died. The population of Vietnam is 95 million—more than South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore combined.
Yet Vietnam has received very little attention in the American press. If we take The New York Times as a yardstick, other than brief pickups of shorts from Reuters, the only substantial story was a piece—six weeks ago—about the impact of Covid-19 on the fashion industry. This was centered on a 27-year-old socialite named Nga Nguyen, who attended a Gucci fashion show in Milan and a St. Laurent event in Paris in late February, then lied about her travel itinerary on the mandatory health reporting form when she returned to Vietnam. She received a positive diagnosis in early March, having infected her sister and seven other passengers on her flight. The daughter of a steel magnate, she has been reviled in Vietnam ever since as a symbol of the country’s arrogant and over-entitled nouveaux riches.
The painstaking April 11 analysis by the Times of what the Trump administration knew about the novel coronavirus and when it knew it, what expert advice it received and ignored, and when it finally acted once the horse was out of the barn, is a useful template for reconstructing a chronology of how Vietnam has responded. Related Articles The Workers on the Front Lines of the Philippines’ Fight Against Coronavirus Xyza Cruz Bacani Lessons From Wuhan Mike Davis
Like many Asian countries, it had a psychological head start. Vietnam had one of the first cases of SARS in 2003, and was praised for its quick and successful handling of the outbreak. The region was traumatized by SARS, which accelerated the habit of wearing masks in public, something that people in many Asian countries were already doing as a health precaution. I vividly remember my consternation when I checked into a hotel in Taipei some years ago to find that all of the receptionists lined up behind the reception desk were masked. In the case of Covid-19, Vietnam was also predictably on higher alert than most other countries because of its land border with China and the large amount of travel between the two countries, both business- and tourist-related.
Vietnam’s approach was never based on mass testing, which has been the panicky and inadequate response of the United States and most other Western countries. And this was not because its resources were limited; it was a deliberate preemptive strategy to minimize infections. The gross number of tests—about 175,000 so far—is the wrong yardstick to use. What is significant is the ratio of tests to confirmed cases, and that ratio in Vietnam is almost five times greater than in any other country. Testing was followed by strict contact tracing (including secondary contacts) for anyone known to be infected, immediate isolation followed by quarantining, and the prompt creation of a real-time database and two mobile apps by which people could record their health status and symptoms. All this was backed up by the mass mobilization of the country’s military, public security forces, the health care system, and public employees, and an energetic and creative public education campaign that included TV cartoons, social media, and posters that draw on the traditional iconography of official propaganda but replaced heroic workers and peasants with heroic doctors in face masks. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
On January 11, with the first death in Wuhan, Vietnam tightened its border and airport controls. Four days later, when there were still only 27 cases in China’s Hubei Province, Vietnamese officials met with the World Health Organization and counterparts from the Centers for Disease Control, and the WHO praised Vietnam for its rapid risk assessment and issuing of protective guidelines. Current Issue View our current issue
The first cases in Vietnam were detected in three airplane passengers returning from Wuhan in January. Twenty-one of their contacts were traced and isolated. By January 31, the government had formed a National Steering Committee for Covid-19 Prevention and Control, headed by Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam (the US equivalent, under Vice President Mike Pence, was not set up until February 28).
By the middle of March, Vietnam still had only 61 confirmed cases. Patient 61 was a Muslim returning from a mass religious festival in Malaysia. The government immediately shuttered the mosque he had visited in Ho Chi Minh City and ordered a lockdown of his home province of Ninh Thuan. At this point anyone who had come into contact with a known case was put into immediate quarantine, and secondary contacts were ordered into self-isolation. Passengers arriving at international airports were quarantined for 14 days in camps run by the military—benignly, by all accounts—and on March 21 all inbound international flights were canceled, and most domestic flights and trains were canceled soon thereafter. Anyone leaving Hanoi, where most new cases were being detected, was quarantined when entering another province.
The epicenter of the outbreak in Hanoi turned out to be Bach Mai Hospital, which is famous for being badly damaged during Richard Nixon’s 1972 bombing campaign. It was traced to a man who had visited the hospital on March 12; his home commune of 11,000 people was immediately closed off from the outside world. On March 29, the hospital itself, where the caseload had now risen to 45, was locked down. All visitors to a hospital anywhere in the country now had to be tested. Three days later, the government imposed mandatory social distancing nationwide for two weeks—again a preemptive action, not one taken, as in some but not all US states, to minimize deaths from an infection already spiraling out of control. By April 9, more than 1,000 health care workers at Bach Mai and 14,400 visitors to the hospital had been tested.
The skeptic might pose all manner of questions, of course. The US Navy has ascribed the cases of infection aboard the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt to a port call in Da Nang, Vietnam’s third-largest city, and conspiracy theorists immediately jumped on this to say that it pointed to concealment of an outbreak there. In fact, the most plausible explanation appears to be that two British tourists, also later found to be infected, had stayed in the same hotel as crew members from the ship. All 40 of their known contacts were then tested and found negative. Da Nang, a city of more than a million people, has had precisely six confirmed cases.
A more common argument is that Vietnam is an authoritarian one-party state, so its numbers can’t be trusted. One fiercely anti-communist Viet Khieu—an “overseas Vietnamese”—told me that the numbers are a lie to avoid losses to the huge tourist industry. That makes no sense, since tourism has already been wiped out by the cancellation of all air travel. In neighboring Cambodia and Laos, there may be some justification for doubting official statistics. In both countries, the health care system is rudimentary (when I visited the main hospital in Vientiane, the Lao capital, last year, I was told that there is just one MRI machine in the whole country). And remembering the enthusiasm with which Hun Sen, the Cambodian premier, allowed cruise ship passengers to disembark freely in Sihanoukville in February hardly breeds confidence. However, says Todd Pollack, a professor at Harvard Medical School who directs the Partnership for Health Advancement in Vietnam in Hanoi, “I see no reason to mistrust the information coming out of the government at this time. Vietnam’s response was swift and decisive. If the epidemic were much larger than is being officially reported, we would see the evidence in increased emergency room visits and hospital admissions—and we’re not seeing it.”
There’s no question that Vietnam is an authoritarian state, and its human rights record is poor, including severe restrictions on freedom of expression and the control of information. Yet its handling of the pandemic has been strikingly transparent. It also has an enormous capacity for mass mobilization (not to mention a long history of it). It’s no coincidence that the government calls its campaign against Covid-19 the Spring General Offensive of 2020—an obvious echo of the General Offensive, General Uprising of 1968—the Tet Offensive.
So what comes next? Remarkably, as I write, Vietnam has had no new cases since April 16. That may not last, of course. Sooner or later Vietnam will have to open up its economy, which is massively dependent on the country’s place in the global supply chain, including many factories that were previously based in China. Mandatory social distancing was extended for a week, but now applied to only 12 provinces that were considered to be at risk, and on April 22 it was suspended altogether except for parts of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City and two other provinces. The airports will inevitably have to reopen. And an epidemiologist might argue that the low number of infections has equipped few people with the antibodies to resist a second wave of the pandemic.
Nonetheless, what Vietnam has accomplished in these first three months is to buy precious time, and it has used it well. It has shipped 450,000 hazmat suits, bought and paid for, to the United States from a local DuPont plant. It has had enough excess capacity to send 550,000 surgical masks to the worst-affected countries in Europe, and another 730,000 to its neighbors, Laos and Cambodia. With the apparel industry one of the mainstays of its economy, Vietnam has now geared up its domestic production capacity to 7 million new fabric masks and 5.72 million surgical masks a day, and Vietnam’s biggest publicly traded corporation, Vingroup, has retooled automotive and smartphone factories with a promise to produce 55,000 ventilators a month. In preparation for a second wave of infections, the head of the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Vietnam notes that a spanking new 300-bed hospital has just been opened near Ho Chi Minh City—with 10 “negative pressure rooms” equipped with special air filters—to prepare for new cases. In late March, Vietnam imported another 200,000 rapid-test kits from South Korea to further improve its readiness.
So when the second wave comes, as it surely will, Vietnam has a fighting chance of controlling it as well as it controlled the first. There are many lessons to be learned from its extraordinary success, although sadly it is much too late now for the United States to learn them.
Clarification: A sentence referring to SARS was adjusted to reflect the fact that wearing masks in public was common in Asian countries even before SARS.


thenation--2020-04-24--The Coronavirus Has Imposed a Fermata on the Music World

In music , a fermata is a symbol that means “ a pause of unspecified length on a note or rest.
” The length of that fermata is totally at the discretion of the conductor or bandleader .
It is important for us to understand that Mother Nature has always been the conductor .
We have found ourselves in a position that , perhaps , had we been following her baton in the first place , we could have avoided ; maybe we ’ d still be hugging our friends , visiting our loved ones , hanging out listening to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ movie theater , going to a public park—you know , those things that we ’ ve always taken for granted .
Well , Mother Nature ’ s baton is up , and only she can decide when she will release her hold and start keeping time again .
You might think it ’ s a politician who makes that call , but that call comes only when the Earth says , “ It ’ s safe now.
” As a musician trained in both American and European classical musics , I ’ ve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
As a bassist in either a jazz or r & b group , the goal always is to support the lead instrument .
My foremost job is always to support .
Maybe the world now realizes that we ’ re all bass players—or at least we need to be .
Since mid-March , America has pretty much been on a lockdown .
We ’ ve seen a steady course of drastic social actions to stop the spread of this living nightmare known as Covid-19 , the disease caused by the novel coronavirus @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , there have been over 2.6 million confirmed cases , with over 185,000 deaths worldwide .
I remember being in Europe on September 11 , 2001 , rehearsing for a concert with Sting .
After we were summoned to immediately stop our rehearsal , we watched the horror unfold on television .
Sting called a band meeting .
The question was asked , “ What do we do now ?
Do we cancel the concert ?
Do we play anyway ?
What do we do ?
” We were all numb with shock @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on television , so none of us were able to answer with a clear mind .
We somehow pulled our collective emotions together and decided that as artists , it is we who can help the healing process—not only for ourselves but for everyone who would be in attendance that night .
Our music would be the grief counselor .
But the circumstances of this new disease have drastically changed those options .
That evening , people came to hear us .
No one can come to hear us now .
That evening @ @ @ @ @ @ @ crying in each other ’ s arms .
We can not do that anymore , either .
After the audience left , we sat around eating and drinking ourselves back to pseudo-sanity .
We can not do that , either .
A few days later , we all got back on a plane and flew back to the USA .
It ’ s been warned that we should not do that , either .
What can we do now ?
Musicians all over the world have turned their homes into virtual venues .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Only there ’ s little to no money exchanged in this transaction .
Many jazz musicians and cultural institutions that are nonprofit entities have lost a significant bulk of income .
But how do we , in good conscience , ask people for money , when currently over 26 million Americans have filed for unemployment ?
The Burden of Dangerous Work Must Be Shared By All Vietnam May Have the Most Effective Response to Covid-19 Once Again , Trump Shreds US Immigration Law More in this series Well , first things first @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
I find it somewhat relieving and inspiring that so many musicians , from beginners to legends , are finding ways to share their music via livestreams , myself included .
Some are creating specifically designed content ; some are just logging on and literally practicing in front of people .
It ’ s a whole new sequestered , quarantined world .
My dear friend the drummer Antonio Sanchez and his vocalist wife , Thana Alexa , were instrumental in creating a livestreamed music festival , which my wife , Melissa , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ done numerous talks and workshops online since mid-March with various institutions and organizations , along with hosting two weekly online chat series for Jazz House Kids and the Newport Jazz Festival .
I find this new indoor-based world , personally speaking , both relaxing and creatively riveting .
I now have more time to read , write , and practice .
My life up until March 14 , like that of many musicians , was a head-spinning daily routine of playing , showering , briefly sleeping , hopefully eating , and traveling to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of how traumatizing this has been for me and Melissa personally , as we ’ ve lost quite a large number of friends in this nightmare , but what we choose to do is to think of “ us ” as a collective .
There are some people who don ’ t have the benefit of having a house large enough to have a safe distance of separation or money to buy groceries , or who have an elderly loved one that they can not visit .
We musicians play for them , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hope to wash away some level of pain , grief , or anxiety .
That ’ s what music does .
We don ’ t know how or when this will end .
Maybe one day soon , I will be able to play both Lincoln Center and the Village Vanguard again… or get on a plane and fly to London to play in a venue that seats anywhere between 200 and 2,000… or play at a festival with 20,000 people mashed together having the time of their lives .
But until that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to pay attention to Mother Nature ’ s baton .
This should not be a political issue .
This is the planet Earth slapping us upside the head , making us slow down and take a look at ourselves .
You can continue playing while the baton is up .
Just make sure you ’ re doing it at home !

EDITOR’S NOTE: The Nation believes that helping readers stay informed about the impact of the coronavirus crisis is a form of public service. For that reason, this article, and all of our coronavirus coverage, is now free. Please subscribe to support our writers and staff, and stay healthy.
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In music, a fermata is a symbol that means “a pause of unspecified length on a note or rest.” The length of that fermata is totally at the discretion of the conductor or bandleader.
It is important for us to understand that Mother Nature has always been the conductor. We have found ourselves in a position that, perhaps, had we been following her baton in the first place, we could have avoided; maybe we’d still be hugging our friends, visiting our loved ones, hanging out listening to our favorite ensemble, going to a movie theater, going to a public park—you know, those things that we’ve always taken for granted. Well, Mother Nature’s baton is up, and only she can decide when she will release her hold and start keeping time again. You might think it’s a politician who makes that call, but that call comes only when the Earth says, “It’s safe now.”
As a musician trained in both American and European classical musics, I’ve always been required to watch the conductor. As a bassist in either a jazz or r&b group, the goal always is to support the lead instrument. My foremost job is always to support. Maybe the world now realizes that we’re all bass players—or at least we need to be.
Since mid-March, America has pretty much been on a lockdown. We’ve seen a steady course of drastic social actions to stop the spread of this living nightmare known as Covid-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus. At the time of this writing, there have been over 2.6 million confirmed cases, with over 185,000 deaths worldwide. Current Issue View our current issue
I remember being in Europe on September 11, 2001, rehearsing for a concert with Sting. After we were summoned to immediately stop our rehearsal, we watched the horror unfold on television. Sting called a band meeting. The question was asked, “What do we do now? Do we cancel the concert? Do we play anyway? What do we do?” We were all numb with shock after what we’d just seen on television, so none of us were able to answer with a clear mind. We somehow pulled our collective emotions together and decided that as artists, it is we who can help the healing process—not only for ourselves but for everyone who would be in attendance that night. Our music would be the grief counselor.
But the circumstances of this new disease have drastically changed those options.
That evening, people came to hear us. No one can come to hear us now.
That evening, we fraternized with the audience, crying in each other’s arms. We cannot do that anymore, either. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann
After the audience left, we sat around eating and drinking ourselves back to pseudo-sanity. We cannot do that, either.
A few days later, we all got back on a plane and flew back to the USA. It’s been warned that we should not do that, either.
What can we do now?
Musicians all over the world have turned their homes into virtual venues. Social media has been the concert promoter. Only there’s little to no money exchanged in this transaction. Many jazz musicians and cultural institutions that are nonprofit entities have lost a significant bulk of income. But how do we, in good conscience, ask people for money, when currently over 26 million Americans have filed for unemployment? Coronavirus Amid Partisan Politicking, Revelations on a Covid Origins Article Jimmy Tobias It’s Not “Unreasonable” to Want to Change Our Rotten Health Care System Gregg Gonsalves Covid Has Left Deep Wounds in America’s Rural Communities Anne N. Sosin
Well, first things first. Technology can be a good thing. I find it somewhat relieving and inspiring that so many musicians, from beginners to legends, are finding ways to share their music via livestreams, myself included. Some are creating specifically designed content; some are just logging on and literally practicing in front of people. It’s a whole new sequestered, quarantined world. My dear friend the drummer Antonio Sanchez and his vocalist wife, Thana Alexa, were instrumental in creating a livestreamed music festival, which my wife, Melissa, and I participated in. I’ve done numerous talks and workshops online since mid-March with various institutions and organizations, along with hosting two weekly online chat series for Jazz House Kids and the Newport Jazz Festival.
I find this new indoor-based world, personally speaking, both relaxing and creatively riveting. I now have more time to read, write, and practice. My life up until March 14, like that of many musicians, was a head-spinning daily routine of playing, showering, briefly sleeping, hopefully eating, and traveling to the next city. I can think of how traumatizing this has been for me and Melissa personally, as we’ve lost quite a large number of friends in this nightmare, but what we choose to do is to think of “us” as a collective. There are some people who don’t have the benefit of having a house large enough to have a safe distance of separation or money to buy groceries, or who have an elderly loved one that they cannot visit. We musicians play for them, for us, for everyone. We hope to wash away some level of pain, grief, or anxiety. That’s what music does.
We don’t know how or when this will end. Maybe one day soon, I will be able to play both Lincoln Center and the Village Vanguard again… or get on a plane and fly to London to play in a venue that seats anywhere between 200 and 2,000… or play at a festival with 20,000 people mashed together having the time of their lives. But until that day comes back, I will continue to pay attention to Mother Nature’s baton. This should not be a political issue. This is the planet Earth slapping us upside the head, making us slow down and take a look at ourselves. You can continue playing while the baton is up. Just make sure you’re doing it at home!


thenation--2020-04-24--The Burden of Dangerous Work Must Be Shared by All

On Wednesday night , Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman gave an astonishing interview on CNN where she advocated an immediate end to the lockdown and the reopening of her city as a gambling mecca .
“ I ’ d love everything open because I think we ’ ve had viruses for years that have been here , ” Goodman told Anderson Cooper .
“ We ’ ve never closed down the United States .
We ’ ve never closed down Nevada .
We ’ ve never closed down Las Vegas because that ’ s our job.
” Goodman said she @ @ @ @ @ @ @ owners , whom she described as “ very sensitive people.
” Cooper pressed the point by asking “ If casinos re-open , are you going to be inside those casinos every single night putting your life on the line ?
” Goodman tried to dodge the question and then responded , “ First of all , I have a family.
” Fortunately , Goodman doesn ’ t actually have the power to end the lockdown in her city .
But her comments typify a very loud and reckless faction of the political class @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to efforts to contain the Covid-19 pandemic .
As Cooper accurately noted , Goodman ’ s remarks are all the more remarkable because there is no indication that she ’ s put into place any of the infrastructure of testing and contact tracing that would make ending the lockdown safe .
Thanks to Covid-19 , Neoliberal Globalization Is Unraveling Nor is Goodman alone in her foolhardy advocacy .
On Thursday night , conservative pundit David Frum noted that the Trump administration was laggard in all the policy steps needed for a safe reopening @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the strategy of Trump and the Republicans going forward would be to ram through a reopening even without the safeguard of a proper testing and tracing regime .
“ What the Trump administration plainly yearns to do—and ditto FL , GA , TN , and other GOP governors—is to reopen , let the disease rip , take casualties , hope for rapid onset of sufficient immunity , ” Frum argued .
“ Trump and his governors are working to ensure there won ’ t be any other choice.
” He went on to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get lucky .
Maybe the virus will mutate into harmlessness .
Maybe a vaccine will be devised .
But we can ’ t stay locked down forever , and there isn ’ t going to be testing and tracing anytime soon .
Meanwhile , those with clout in the GOP are pushing for ‘ take the punch.
’ ” Trump ’ s continued touting of miracle cures is part of this strategy .
Although his previous wonder drug hydroxychloroquine hasn ’ t panned out , Trump continues to advocate for bizarre panaceas .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ speculated that cures could include irradiating patients with an ultraviolet light or possibly injecting them with disinfectants .
If Trump and the GOP push for a premature end to the lockdown , one that will only lead to a new surge in illness and death , then it ’ s worth asking them the same question that Anderson Cooper posed to Carolyn Goodman : Are they willing to spend their days in the workplaces where Covid-19 is likely to spread fastest ?
The Darwinian callousness of the “ take the punch ” approach @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of American society .
Goodman and the owners of the Las Vegas casinos , Trump and his Mar-A-Lago cronies , the plutocrats funding protests against the lockdown , Rupert Murdoch and the Fox News pundits : All of them inhabit a bubble of wealth that protects them from the consequences of the pandemic .
They can happily contemplate a system where they will continue to work from home and benefit from an economy in which the risks of Covid-19 are overwhelmingly borne by the working class .
In his 1983 book Spheres of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the case for a more equal society where the burden of doing dirty and dangerous work is shared : In a society of equals , who will do the dirty work ?
And the necessary answer is that , at least in some partial and symbolic sense , we all should do it .
Then we will have an end to dukes , if not yet to dustmen .
This is what Gandhi was getting at when he required his followers—himself , too—to clean the latrines of their ashram .
Here was a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ untouchability , but it also made a practical point : People should clean dirt .
Otherwise , the men and women who do it not only for themselves but for everyone else , too , will never be equal members of the political community .
As an example of what he had in mind , Walzer suggests , “ the cleaning of city streets , say , or of national parks should be the ( part-time ) work of the citizens.
” Aside from Gandhi , Walzer cited other advocates of equality such @ @ @ @ @ @ @ promoting the virtues of communal grunt work .
He could also have mentioned the science fiction novelist Ursula K. Le Guin , whose novel The Dispossessed features a society where everyone had to devote one day a week to “ kleggich ” ( drudgery ) .
Students Across the Country Are Going on Strike Coronavirus at the Bottom of the Supply Chain More in this series These ideas are guided by the ethical imperatives of egalitarianism , but could also have a practical benefit .
As Walzer notes , “ There would probably @ @ @ @ @ @ @ everyone knew in advance of making it that he couldn ’ t leave the cleaning to someone else.
” The chief value of this type of utopian speculation is that it makes more apparent the deficiency of the real world .
In the case of Covid-19 , advocating a Walzer-style sharing of dirty work makes visible the brutal class reality that undergirds current policy .
Imagine a world where Carolyn Goodman had to spend her evenings cleaning up a casino , where Georgia Governor Brian Kemp had to do part-time labor in an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to work one day a week as a hospital orderly .
In such a world , we wouldn ’ t have a rush to reopen the economy .
Instead , we ’ d have a massive investment in the health care system , including in testing and tracing infrastructure .
We have to demand a wider sharing of the burdens of the pandemic .
The ruling elite have to be forced to choose : Either they can start spending on the scale the problem needs , or they ’ ll be conscripted into @ @ @ @ @ @

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On Wednesday night, Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman gave an astonishing interview on CNN where she advocated an immediate end to the lockdown and the reopening of her city as a gambling mecca.
“I’d love everything open because I think we’ve had viruses for years that have been here,” Goodman told Anderson Cooper. “We’ve never closed down the United States. We’ve never closed down Nevada. We’ve never closed down Las Vegas because that’s our job.” Goodman said she was motivated by her talks with casino owners, whom she described as “very sensitive people.”
Cooper pressed the point by asking “If casinos re-open, are you going to be inside those casinos every single night putting your life on the line?” Goodman tried to dodge the question and then responded, “First of all, I have a family.”
Fortunately, Goodman doesn’t actually have the power to end the lockdown in her city. But her comments typify a very loud and reckless faction of the political class that is pushing for a premature end to efforts to contain the Covid-19 pandemic. As Cooper accurately noted, Goodman’s remarks are all the more remarkable because there is no indication that she’s put into place any of the infrastructure of testing and contact tracing that would make ending the lockdown safe. More From Jeet Heer The Indigenous Roots of Robbie Robertson’s Rock and Roll Revolution August 14, 2023 Why Does This Racist Keep Getting Silicon Valley Money? August 11, 2023 When Phallocrats Go Limp August 4, 2023
Nor is Goodman alone in her foolhardy advocacy. On Thursday night, conservative pundit David Frum noted that the Trump administration was laggard in all the policy steps needed for a safe reopening of the economy. Frum argued that the strategy of Trump and the Republicans going forward would be to ram through a reopening even without the safeguard of a proper testing and tracing regime.
“What the Trump administration plainly yearns to do—and ditto FL, GA, TN, and other GOP governors—is to reopen, let the disease rip, take casualties, hope for rapid onset of sufficient immunity,” Frum argued. “Trump and his governors are working to ensure there won’t be any other choice.” He went on to note, “Maybe we’ll get lucky. Maybe the virus will mutate into harmlessness. Maybe a vaccine will be devised. But we can’t stay locked down forever, and there isn’t going to be testing and tracing anytime soon. Meanwhile, those with clout in the GOP are pushing for ‘take the punch.’”
Trump’s continued touting of miracle cures is part of this strategy. Although his previous wonder drug hydroxychloroquine hasn’t panned out, Trump continues to advocate for bizarre panaceas. During a Thursday press briefing, Trump speculated that cures could include irradiating patients with an ultraviolet light or possibly injecting them with disinfectants. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Current Issue View our current issue
If Trump and the GOP push for a premature end to the lockdown, one that will only lead to a new surge in illness and death, then it’s worth asking them the same question that Anderson Cooper posed to Carolyn Goodman: Are they willing to spend their days in the workplaces where Covid-19 is likely to spread fastest?
The Darwinian callousness of the “take the punch” approach is a product of the extreme inequality of American society. Goodman and the owners of the Las Vegas casinos, Trump and his Mar-A-Lago cronies, the plutocrats funding protests against the lockdown, Rupert Murdoch and the Fox News pundits: All of them inhabit a bubble of wealth that protects them from the consequences of the pandemic. They can happily contemplate a system where they will continue to work from home and benefit from an economy in which the risks of Covid-19 are overwhelmingly borne by the working class.
In his 1983 book Spheres of Justice, political theorist Michael Walzer made the case for a more equal society where the burden of doing dirty and dangerous work is shared:
In a society of equals, who will do the dirty work? And the necessary answer is that, at least in some partial and symbolic sense, we all should do it. Then we will have an end to dukes, if not yet to dustmen. This is what Gandhi was getting at when he required his followers—himself, too—to clean the latrines of their ashram. Here was a symbolic way of purging Hindu society of untouchability, but it also made a practical point: People should clean dirt. Otherwise, the men and women who do it not only for themselves but for everyone else, too, will never be equal members of the political community.
As an example of what he had in mind, Walzer suggests, “the cleaning of city streets, say, or of national parks should be the (part-time) work of the citizens.”
Aside from Gandhi, Walzer cited other advocates of equality such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Walt Whitman as promoting the virtues of communal grunt work. He could also have mentioned the science fiction novelist Ursula K. Le Guin, whose novel The Dispossessed features a society where everyone had to devote one day a week to “kleggich” (drudgery). Working Conditions NIH Fellows Win Recognition as Workers With the Right to Join a Union Peter Lucas The New Law to Protect Pregnant Workers Is Already Changing Lives Bryce Covert Why Does This Racist Keep Getting Silicon Valley Money? Jeet Heer
These ideas are guided by the ethical imperatives of egalitarianism, but could also have a practical benefit. As Walzer notes, “There would probably be less dirt to clean up if everyone knew in advance of making it that he couldn’t leave the cleaning to someone else.”
The chief value of this type of utopian speculation is that it makes more apparent the deficiency of the real world. In the case of Covid-19, advocating a Walzer-style sharing of dirty work makes visible the brutal class reality that undergirds current policy.
Imagine a world where Carolyn Goodman had to spend her evenings cleaning up a casino, where Georgia Governor Brian Kemp had to do part-time labor in an Amazon warehouse, where Donald Trump had to work one day a week as a hospital orderly. In such a world, we wouldn’t have a rush to reopen the economy. Instead, we’d have a massive investment in the health care system, including in testing and tracing infrastructure.
We have to demand a wider sharing of the burdens of the pandemic. The ruling elite have to be forced to choose: Either they can start spending on the scale the problem needs, or they’ll be conscripted into the army of essential laborers.


thenation--2020-04-27--Coronavirus Quotes, Part 2

Coronavirus Quotes, Part 2

“ This is impeachment all over again.
” —Trish Regan , Fox Business “ This virus is the common cold.
@ @ @ @ @ Networks “ Maybe we ’ d be just better off if we gave it to @ @ @ @ @ CNBC

“This is impeachment all over again.” —Trish Regan, Fox Business
“This virus is the common cold.” —Rush Limbaugh, Premiere Networks
“Maybe we’d be just better off if we gave it to everybody.” —Rick Santelli, CNBC


thenation--2020-04-27--At the Limits of Fiction and Grief

At the Limits of Fiction and Grief

Over the course of an hour , different images flash across the theater screen : a donkey , a dog , the purple light of grief-stricken evenings .
A mother clutching her daughter in the locker room of a swimming pool , like a modern-day Pietà .
And then , halfway through I Was at Home , But… , the latest movie from the German director Angela Schanelec , something of a manifesto is voiced by Astrid , the film ’ s central character , as she strolls down a Berlin sidewalk with an acquaintance , a film director , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at the grocery store .
“ I find it odd , ” Astrid says , her voice rising as she gestures pointedly with her grocery-laden hands , “ to place a terminally ill person who knows , who really knows , they ’ re going to die soon , to place that person opposite an actor.
” An agitated look plays across her face .
“ The gravity that ’ s seized the ill person , the undeniable truth plain to see on their person , contrasts so starkly with the actor , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ master liar with every fiber of their being… I mean , in that encounter between them , you see how hollow and empty acting is.
” Beside her , the director ( played by the real-life director Dane Komljen ) walks placidly along .
It ’ s his film she ’ s criticizing , a film that we ’ ve watched her storm out of earlier in the movie .
He nods and offers a bit of self-defense : “ Maybe you have to watch the entire film.
” This exchange—with its slips @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Schanelec ’ s work .
Born in 1962 in Aalen , Germany , she has long been associated with the Berlin School of the late 1990s and early 2000s , but her films ( eight features total , along with numerous shorts ) remain underappreciated in the United States .
Then again , her movies are not even your typical art house fare .
Time moves strangely in Schanelec ’ s films ; characters pop in and out , their relationships to one another never quite fully explained ; scenes change abruptly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up over and over again .
I Was at Home , But… maintains all of these familiar elements , but this time it recombines them into a full-throated meditation on loss—and the morality behind even attempting to portray it in art .
Astrid , played by Maren Eggert ( a frequent collaborator with Schanelec ) , is a middle-aged mother of two in Berlin who , a couple of years prior , lost her husband , a theater director , to an unspecified illness .
The film , which opens with a few @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a donkey and a dog wandering through an abandoned house , ostensibly explores the emotional fallout that follows the return of Astrid ’ s adolescent runaway son , Philip .
Yet this supposedly central part of the story is told obliquely : All we see is Philip walking out of the woods and then , the next morning , Astrid collecting him from the apartment of one of his teachers .
Schanelec already seems to be suggesting with her elliptical introduction that to look for answers might be a waste of time .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ is part of what makes her films so alluring : She is a director who more often says no to her audience than yes .
“ When I make films , ” Schanelec said in an interview with the Berlin-based film zine fireflies , “ I always try to give enough so that the viewers can also just watch , as long as they don ’ t get annoyed when they don ’ t understand something .
My goodness , then they don ’ t understand something , so what ?
” Misunderstandings @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the heart of Schanelec ’ s creative project , from the first words spoken in her debut feature ( “ I don ’ t know , ” in 1995 ’ s My Sister ’ s Good Fortune ) on .
In I Was at Home , But… , these concerns are fully realized : If art can be understood simply as an elaborate lie , then what authority does the artist really have ?
The film grapples with this lack of authority by digging further in ; Schanelec litters it with references to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ though to remind her audience that this is not a documentary .
The title is a reference to the 1932 film I Was Born , But… , by the Japanese director Yasujiro Ozu .
There are scenes from Hamlet played out by Philip ’ s class that depict the dramatized death of Hamlet ’ s father , and then there are the scenes literally set inside an art museum , which feature not only Astrid but also a subplot involving two teachers at Philip ’ s school and the impasse they ’ ve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ children , she does not ) .
And all the while , there turns out to be a subtle autobiographical undercurrent : “ My children ’ s dad , ” Astrid reveals halfway through the film , during her sidewalk stroll , “ was a theater director.
” And so , too , was Schanelec ’ s husband , who died in 2009 and with whom she published several translations of Shakespeare .
But to read this as art imitating life would be too easy .
With these scenes , Schanelec seems to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ grief but if a movie is equipped to accurately represent it , or if any work of art is up to that task .
These are the questions that Schanelec circles back to , again and again .
Art might be a lie—as Astrid suggests , acting itself might be the literal embodiment of dishonesty .
Establishing this inherent dishonesty , though , even with regard to what is happening right in front of our eyes , actually ends up freeing Schanelec from the strictures of realism : We see the possibilities implicit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ itself from conventional narrative and time .
It is interesting to watch a work of fiction do this during a cultural moment that is crowded with so many questions about the place of autofiction , memoir , documentary , and the like .
( As the British author Rachel Cusk put it , fiction is “ fake and embarrassing.
” ) While autofiction scratches away at the veneer of fiction almost apologetically , acknowledging its failures by whittling away until it merges with autobiography , Schanelec wrestles with this failure by constructing an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the precisely opposite direction , admitting that art is dishonest from the get-go .
And in doing so , she frees herself to capture reality by moving deeper into fiction .
“ It ’ s not metaphoric , and I think that this is very essential : that there are no metaphors [ in this film ] , ” Schanelec said in a 2020 interview conducted following the New York release of I Was at Home , But… .
“ And the problem is often that metaphors are expected… .
I understood that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tragic , a tragic moment , and the actor is crying strongly enough or something , he takes it from the viewer—this weight .
If I have the same tragic situation and the actor does not cry , but the same situation is told , it ’ s the viewer who has to feel it .
This is the opposite of what the viewer wants .
The viewer wants the other person to be seen crying.
” Again , this element of refusal—a line in the sand .
This is a no to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ closing door that makes the viewer work a little harder .
But why is that a bad thing ?
While it can leave the viewer wanting or confused , this feeling of only half-understanding what ’ s going on works both to unsettle and to comfort .
Instead of giving us what we expect—or what we want to expect—Schanelec forces us to let our minds wander , merging our own time into her films .
But confronting this expectation doesn ’ t come easy , and maybe it is this willingness to say @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the United States .
Multiple moviegoers walked out of the same New York screening of I Was at Home , But… that I attended , and there ’ s something about Schanelec ’ s films that seems to either energize or irritate people ; there ’ s no in-between .
It brings to mind another sort-of manifesto , this time uttered by Nadine , a writer played by Schanelec herself in her 1993 graduate thesis , I Stayed in Berlin All Summer .
It ’ s the movie ’ s last scene , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tell her why he doesn ’ t like her fiction .
She ’ s too concerned with style , he complains ; she doesn ’ t care if her characters are believable , or if anyone even understands her at all .
No , Nadine tells him , he ’ s missing the point .
She wants her fiction to be understood , but she also doesn ’ t want it to be immediately , easily disassembled .
Rather , she wants her work to function like a piece of music : You @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the memory it evokes , the shape of it , even if you can ’ t recall the exact lyrics .

Over the course of an hour, different images flash across the theater screen: a donkey, a dog, the purple light of grief-stricken evenings. A mother clutching her daughter in the locker room of a swimming pool, like a modern-day Pietà. And then, halfway through I Was at Home, But…, the latest movie from the German director Angela Schanelec, something of a manifesto is voiced by Astrid, the film’s central character, as she strolls down a Berlin sidewalk with an acquaintance, a film director, whom she’s just bumped into at the grocery store.
“I find it odd,” Astrid says, her voice rising as she gestures pointedly with her grocery-laden hands, “to place a terminally ill person who knows, who really knows, they’re going to die soon, to place that person opposite an actor.” An agitated look plays across her face. “The gravity that’s seized the ill person, the undeniable truth plain to see on their person, contrasts so starkly with the actor, who only pretends, who is a master liar with every fiber of their being… I mean, in that encounter between them, you see how hollow and empty acting is.” Beside her, the director (played by the real-life director Dane Komljen) walks placidly along. It’s his film she’s criticizing, a film that we’ve watched her storm out of earlier in the movie. He nods and offers a bit of self-defense: “Maybe you have to watch the entire film.”
This exchange—with its slips and slides, its aesthetic rigor—is typical of Schanelec’s work. Born in 1962 in Aalen, Germany, she has long been associated with the Berlin School of the late 1990s and early 2000s, but her films (eight features total, along with numerous shorts) remain underappreciated in the United States. Then again, her movies are not even your typical art house fare. Time moves strangely in Schanelec’s films; characters pop in and out, their relationships to one another never quite fully explained; scenes change abruptly; the subject of the theater pops up over and over again. I Was at Home, But… maintains all of these familiar elements, but this time it recombines them into a full-throated meditation on loss—and the morality behind even attempting to portray it in art.
Astrid, played by Maren Eggert (a frequent collaborator with Schanelec), is a middle-aged mother of two in Berlin who, a couple of years prior, lost her husband, a theater director, to an unspecified illness. The film, which opens with a few brief, seemingly inexplicable pastoral scenes involving a donkey and a dog wandering through an abandoned house, ostensibly explores the emotional fallout that follows the return of Astrid’s adolescent runaway son, Philip. Yet this supposedly central part of the story is told obliquely: All we see is Philip walking out of the woods and then, the next morning, Astrid collecting him from the apartment of one of his teachers. Schanelec already seems to be suggesting with her elliptical introduction that to look for answers might be a waste of time. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection How the “Brooks Brothers Riot” Set the Stage for Insurrection Chris Lehmann
This sense of refusal, though, is part of what makes her films so alluring: She is a director who more often says no to her audience than yes. “When I make films,” Schanelec said in an interview with the Berlin-based film zine fireflies, “I always try to give enough so that the viewers can also just watch, as long as they don’t get annoyed when they don’t understand something. My goodness, then they don’t understand something, so what?” Misunderstandings and the absence of knowing are at the heart of Schanelec’s creative project, from the first words spoken in her debut feature (“I don’t know,” in 1995’s My Sister’s Good Fortune) on. In I Was at Home, But…, these concerns are fully realized: If art can be understood simply as an elaborate lie, then what authority does the artist really have?
The film grapples with this lack of authority by digging further in; Schanelec litters it with references to other famous works of art, as though to remind her audience that this is not a documentary. The title is a reference to the 1932 film I Was Born, But…, by the Japanese director Yasujiro Ozu. There are scenes from Hamlet played out by Philip’s class that depict the dramatized death of Hamlet’s father, and then there are the scenes literally set inside an art museum, which feature not only Astrid but also a subplot involving two teachers at Philip’s school and the impasse they’ve reached in their relationship (he wants children, she does not). And all the while, there turns out to be a subtle autobiographical undercurrent: “My children’s dad,” Astrid reveals halfway through the film, during her sidewalk stroll, “was a theater director.” And so, too, was Schanelec’s husband, who died in 2009 and with whom she published several translations of Shakespeare. But to read this as art imitating life would be too easy.
With these scenes, Schanelec seems to be asking not just how one handles grief but if a movie is equipped to accurately represent it, or if any work of art is up to that task. These are the questions that Schanelec circles back to, again and again. Art might be a lie—as Astrid suggests, acting itself might be the literal embodiment of dishonesty. Establishing this inherent dishonesty, though, even with regard to what is happening right in front of our eyes, actually ends up freeing Schanelec from the strictures of realism: We see the possibilities implicit in a work of art that untethers itself from conventional narrative and time. Related Article The Beautiful, Baffling Mysteries of Paolo Sorrentino’s Vatican Erin Schwartz
It is interesting to watch a work of fiction do this during a cultural moment that is crowded with so many questions about the place of autofiction, memoir, documentary, and the like. (As the British author Rachel Cusk put it, fiction is “fake and embarrassing.”) While autofiction scratches away at the veneer of fiction almost apologetically, acknowledging its failures by whittling away until it merges with autobiography, Schanelec wrestles with this failure by constructing an entirely different edifice. She moves in the precisely opposite direction, admitting that art is dishonest from the get-go. And in doing so, she frees herself to capture reality by moving deeper into fiction.
“It’s not metaphoric, and I think that this is very essential: that there are no metaphors [in this film],” Schanelec said in a 2020 interview conducted following the New York release of I Was at Home, But…. “And the problem is often that metaphors are expected…. I understood that if I have a scene which is tragic, a tragic moment, and the actor is crying strongly enough or something, he takes it from the viewer—this weight. If I have the same tragic situation and the actor does not cry, but the same situation is told, it’s the viewer who has to feel it. This is the opposite of what the viewer wants. The viewer wants the other person to be seen crying.”
Again, this element of refusal—a line in the sand. This is a no to the question of easy catharsis, a closing door that makes the viewer work a little harder. But why is that a bad thing? While it can leave the viewer wanting or confused, this feeling of only half-understanding what’s going on works both to unsettle and to comfort. Instead of giving us what we expect—or what we want to expect—Schanelec forces us to let our minds wander, merging our own time into her films.
But confronting this expectation doesn’t come easy, and maybe it is this willingness to say no that makes Schanelec so little-known in the United States. Multiple moviegoers walked out of the same New York screening of I Was at Home, But… that I attended, and there’s something about Schanelec’s films that seems to either energize or irritate people; there’s no in-between.
It brings to mind another sort-of manifesto, this time uttered by Nadine, a writer played by Schanelec herself in her 1993 graduate thesis, I Stayed in Berlin All Summer. It’s the movie’s last scene, in which Nadine listens to an editor tell her why he doesn’t like her fiction. She’s too concerned with style, he complains; she doesn’t care if her characters are believable, or if anyone even understands her at all. No, Nadine tells him, he’s missing the point. She wants her fiction to be understood, but she also doesn’t want it to be immediately, easily disassembled. Rather, she wants her work to function like a piece of music: You might remember it and feel pleased by the memory it evokes, the shape of it, even if you can’t recall the exact lyrics.


thenation--2020-04-27--The NCAA Is Poised to Allow Players to Benefit From Their Labor

No one should expect college football to come roaring back this fall .
If classes aren ’ t back in session , football players won ’ t be taking the field .
This isn ’ t because the optics of “ student athletes ” putting their health at risk while being unable to matriculate as students would be horrific .
The NCAA has never given a solitary damn about optics , being as shameless as Laura Ingraham after going on a bender of bleach .
Instead , there won ’ t be college football in autumn because the NCAA ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whose billions are tied to their broadcast deals—comes overwhelmingly from ticket sales , and there is no way 100,000 people will be gathering in close proximity at the Horseshoe by August .
It is fitting , however , that right when it is clear that no football will played , the NCAA looks poised to finally , at long last , allow players to sell their name , image , and likeness as soon as next year .
This will allow athletes to be paid as sponsors for products , previously a verboten @ @ @ @ @ @ @ amateur ” model .
If these rules are adopted , “ student athletes ” will finally be free to operate in the commercial world like the rest of us .
That means that if they want to be able to hold a paid quarterback clinic for kids , they can do that .
If they are asked to shill for a local car dealership , they are free to shill away .
Critics of this plan have said that it will allow a small group of powerful schools to hook high school players @ @ @ @ @ @ @ totally throwing the competitive balance of college football out of whack .
This is an absurd argument .
In the first round of Thursday night ’ s NFL draft , almost half the players picked , 14 out of the 32 top picks , either attended Alabama , Clemson , LSU , or Ohio State .
In other words , there already is no competitive balance .
The arguments sound strikingly familiar to what people said about free agency in professional sports in decades past : that it would wreck the competitive balance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ opposite .
It produced more parity and less of a system where dynasties dominated and most teams were left without a shred of hope .
The NCAA , of course , is doing all of this because California passed and signed legislation last year giving athletes the right to profit off of their name , image , and likeness .
Other states looked to be following suit , and there was talk of federal intervention as well .
NCAA President Mark Emmert and his army of lawyers saw the writing on the wall @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ahead on this so they could pass their own guidelines and requirements .
For example , no athletes , according to sources , could enter an agreement with a company that is in competition with an official sponsor of the college .
No Adidas deals if you go to a Nike school .
Also , according to a source who spoke to the Associated Press , no school apparel could be branded with an ad for a company not in partnership with the college .
Athletes would also have to disclose all deals @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the NCAA can at least keep some modicum of power over the earning potential of its athletes .
It is also able to hold back the argument that strikes to the heart of its power : the idea that athletes should not only be able to profit off of their name , image , and likeness , but also should be able to receive a cut of the billions of dollars in revenue that their blood , sweat , and tears produce .
But as cynical as this process has been , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ athletes and it strikes a blow at the NCAA .
Mark Emmert and his cartel is ceding the argument that these young people are a critical reason people go to the games and buy the merch .
They deserve to be able to profit off of their exploits as students , just like any other student on campus .
It will be important to keep the pressure up , so it ’ s not only the stars that are able to benefit but every athlete who produces revenue .
For too long , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for the benefit of coaches and administrators .
That imbalance still needs to be corrected , but this is a step toward a measure of justice and freedom , where before none existed .

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No one should expect college football to come roaring back this fall. If classes aren’t back in session, football players won’t be taking the field. This isn’t because the optics of “student athletes” putting their health at risk while being unable to matriculate as students would be horrific. The NCAA has never given a solitary damn about optics, being as shameless as Laura Ingraham after going on a bender of bleach. Instead, there won’t be college football in autumn because the NCAA’s revenue—unlike the NFL’s, whose billions are tied to their broadcast deals—comes overwhelmingly from ticket sales, and there is no way 100,000 people will be gathering in close proximity at the Horseshoe by August.
It is fitting, however, that right when it is clear that no football will played, the NCAA looks poised to finally, at long last, allow players to sell their name, image, and likeness as soon as next year. This will allow athletes to be paid as sponsors for products, previously a verboten concept decried as sacrilege to the “amateur” model. If these rules are adopted, “student athletes” will finally be free to operate in the commercial world like the rest of us. That means that if they want to be able to hold a paid quarterback clinic for kids, they can do that. If they are asked to shill for a local car dealership, they are free to shill away.
Critics of this plan have said that it will allow a small group of powerful schools to hook high school players up with the best side deals, totally throwing the competitive balance of college football out of whack. This is an absurd argument. In the first round of Thursday night’s NFL draft, almost half the players picked, 14 out of the 32 top picks, either attended Alabama, Clemson, LSU, or Ohio State. In other words, there already is no competitive balance. The arguments sound strikingly familiar to what people said about free agency in professional sports in decades past: that it would wreck the competitive balance. In reality, it did the opposite. It produced more parity and less of a system where dynasties dominated and most teams were left without a shred of hope.
The NCAA, of course, is doing all of this because California passed and signed legislation last year giving athletes the right to profit off of their name, image, and likeness. Other states looked to be following suit, and there was talk of federal intervention as well. NCAA President Mark Emmert and his army of lawyers saw the writing on the wall and have since been trying to get ahead on this so they could pass their own guidelines and requirements. For example, no athletes, according to sources, could enter an agreement with a company that is in competition with an official sponsor of the college. No Adidas deals if you go to a Nike school.
Also, according to a source who spoke to the Associated Press, no school apparel could be branded with an ad for a company not in partnership with the college. Athletes would also have to disclose all deals to their athletic departments. This way, the NCAA can at least keep some modicum of power over the earning potential of its athletes. It is also able to hold back the argument that strikes to the heart of its power: the idea that athletes should not only be able to profit off of their name, image, and likeness, but also should be able to receive a cut of the billions of dollars in revenue that their blood, sweat, and tears produce.
But as cynical as this process has been, it’s a win for the athletes and it strikes a blow at the NCAA. Mark Emmert and his cartel is ceding the argument that these young people are a critical reason people go to the games and buy the merch. They deserve to be able to profit off of their exploits as students, just like any other student on campus.
It will be important to keep the pressure up, so it’s not only the stars that are able to benefit but every athlete who produces revenue. For too long, the NCAA has stolen predominantly black wealth for the benefit of coaches and administrators. That imbalance still needs to be corrected, but this is a step toward a measure of justice and freedom, where before none existed.