Thursday, May 2, 2019

"The New Normal" Hurts My Head

So, I'm driving along the other day and I see this billboard for one of the now ubiquitous Cannabis sellers.  There you are.  "Welcome to the New Normal", I am commanded.


West Hollywood has gone cannabis crazy. Well, California too. And Colorado. And wherever else. I  don't get it. Tobacco was bad for your health and the health of those near and dear. So cigarettes with the highly addictive nicotine was banned.  And vaping, without nicotine or tobacco even, is banned. But I can't walk a block without the skunky second hand smoke of weed. This is better how? To be fully transparent, I attach a link to an expression by this company on why it is, normal. 

https://medmen.com/newnormal

I watched it. Very nice. No down side.  I admit it, though, I had visions of "The Stepford Wives".

Then I start thinking, what does it mean, "The New Normal", not just when it comes to weed, but to everything out there, anything out there?

So I hie myself to Google,which I am suspecting will itself fall into the category of "The New Normal". Well it does seem to be a term adapted from technology, from my reading of the English Language  and Usage Stack Exchange. Agile Development (AD) and Service Oriented Architectures (SOD) represent the "new normal". Or the new standard. Ok, I am leaving IT speak.  Then it morphed. Everything morphs. And it becomes in Wikipedia speak to "imply that something which was previously abnormal has become commonplace."

Here's one from the Urban Dictionary.

TOP DEFINITION
New normal
The current state of being after some dramatic change has transpired. What replaces the expected, usual, typical state after an event occurs. The new normal encourages one to deal with current situations rather than lamenting what could have been.
Housing costs plummeting is the new normal.

Having less discretionary income after the stock market crash is the new normal.
She expected to be saddened by his departure and accepted her feelings as the new normal.
Spending less on entertainment is the new normal during economic downturns.
Now that the baby was born, having less free time was the new normal for the new parents.
#paradigm#change#expected#modified#atypical
by earlysnowdrop September 22, 2009

You get caught in a veritable whirlwind when you look up the New Normal, or the New Normal and Ethics, and the New Normal and Morality. 

So, here are a couple of headlines:  "Trump's Approval Rating Is Incredibly Steady. Is that Weird or the New Normal" in FiveThirtyEight, by Geoffrey Skelly from March 2019.

Or this. Are Polyamourous Relationships The New Normal? in Thrivetalk, February 2019

And, "AI is the new normal: Recap of 2018" in azure.microsoft.com.

Here's an article I ran across on a hot button topic. 


April 8, 2018 Minister Ulla Tørnæs

A new normal for women of the world

SEXUAL & REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH & RIGHTSGENDER EQUALITYCONTRACEPTIONSAFE ABORTION
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My vision – as a Minister for Development Cooperation, as a SheDecides champion, and not least as a mother of three young daughters – is to help create a “New Normal” for all women and girls around the world. A new normal means a world, where women and girls have the power over their own bodies. Their own lives. Their own futures. Without question. Across the globe, we have witnessed several setbacks for the sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) of women and girls over the last years. Most prominently was the re-instatement of an expanded version of the Global Gag Rule by the Trump administration. Moreover, conservative and religious movements in many parts of the world have been causing us to worry about the current normal.
The current normal is that almost 225 million women and girls globally have unmet needs for contraception. The current normal is that two million girls under the age of 15 become mothers every year. Around 22 million unsafe abortions are carried out with life as a risk. Every day more than 800 women and girls die from preventable causes related to pregnancy or childbirth. This is the normal for millions of the most vulnerable women around the world. I want to contribute to changing that normal. Therefore, women and girls’ full and equal enjoyment of all human rights and their access to modern contraception and comprehensive sexuality education is a key priority for me personally and for Danish development cooperation. I believe that countries like Denmark have to stand up and fight for those millions of girls and women who do not enjoy the same fundamental human rights as we do. I believe it is my obligation as a minister - with the voice, platform and seat at relevant tables that it comes with - to try to speak for the many women and girls, who cannot be there themselves.
It is my firm conviction that a woman has the right to choose with whom she wants to start a family, when, and if, she wants to have children and how many children she wants. We know that women and girls with access to education, information and health services tend to marry later in life, have fewer and healthier children and to become active citizens, who contribute to their societies.

When women’s potential as economic agents is unleashed, women’s rights take leaps ahead and it creates a ripple effect for societies. Investing in women is therefore not only the right thing to do. We also know that it is the smart thing to do. When we invest in women, everybody wins.

At the SheDecides conference in South Africa in March, we stood shoulder by shoulder - governments, parliamentarians, youth representatives, and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) showcasing the broad international support to create a new normal for all women and girls. We need to rally support from North and South – from individuals to states. From the poorest villages in Africa to the highest political levels in the UN. Everyone can do his or her part. And governments can play a key role. Governments can act to create a new normal.
The three pillars of the SheDecides movement are Stand Up and Speak Out, Change the Rules, and Unlock the Resources. Governments can do all three. The way to move forward may differ greatly from country to country. In some cases, there will be a need to adopt new policies, revise legislation or ensure better implementation of existing laws. In other cases, there is a need to change perceptions, behaviours and cultures. And in some to improve service provision. Governments have a role to play in all those cases, but governments cannot do it alone. We must work in strong partnerships with parliamentarians, civil society, private sector and youth-led movements.
In Denmark, most pregnancies are fortunately happy circumstances. Women and girls largely have the power over their own bodies and life. Denmark has come a long way towards gender equality. People often say that this is because Denmark is a rich country. I argue the opposite: It is because of gender equality that Denmark is a prosperous country. As an example, Danish women and men are almost equally available for the labour market - 72 percent of women, 76 percent of men. This is good for our democracy and good for our economy.

Globally, we cannot achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, if women are not an active part of the development of their countries. For this to happen, women must have control over their own bodies.

My vision is therefore a new normal. A new normal where all women and girls have the ability to enjoy their rights, fulfil their potential, and make their own choices in life. The message is as important as it is simple: She decides!


That was one of my questions about "The New Normal" in any arena. Who decides? Well in the case above, "she" does. But what if not every she agrees that whatever it is, is well, normal. That brings me to the definition of normal. 

One dictionary. 
nor·mal
/ˈnôrməl/
adjective
  1. 1.
    conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected.
    "it's quite normal for puppies to bolt their food"
    synonyms:usual, standard, typical, stock, common, ordinary, customary, conventional, habitual, accustomed, expected, wonted, everyday, regular, routine, day-to-day, daily, established, settled, set, fixed, traditional, quotidian, prevailing More
  2. 2.
    TECHNICAL
    (of a line, ray, or other linear feature) intersecting a given line or surface at right angles.
noun
  1. 1.
    the usual, average, or typical state or condition.
    "her temperature was above normal"
  2. 2.
    TECHNICAL
    a line at right angles to a given line or surface.

Here's another Urban Dictionary Top Definition

TOP DEFINITION
normal
A word made up by this corrupt society so they could single out and attack those who are different
Normal is nothing but a word made up by society
#conformists#worker bees#in crowd#followers#mindless
by Bill October 06, 2005
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Well, I gotta tell you, my head hurts. Is society ever without coruption? If a majority decides, what about the minority? If the minority decides, what about the majority? If we bring morality into the equation, well, leave it to the God Botherers to do that. 

If though, the definition involves that which was abnormal becoming normal, then we really are in for a howling tough period. Is there a line? I am sure each of us has one. But what right have we to that line? Right now, a 30 year old teacher having sex with a 17 year old student is a criminal offense. I agree. It ought to be. But what if the 17 year old is especially bright, and is in love (that did happen in more than one case); what if there are a bunch of 17 year olds like that?  Will that ever be The New Normal? I sure hope not, but I don't see how it can be stopped given the evolution of that which is "The New Normal". What about polygamy? Doesn't work for me, but we might evolve as a society, right?

Now, as to the Cannabis billboard that started my reverie. Here's a short article from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Is marijuana a gateway drug?

Some research suggests that marijuana use is likely to precede use of other licit and illicit substances46 and the development of addiction to other substances. For instance, a study using longitudinal data from the National Epidemiological Study of Alcohol Use and Related Disorders found that adults who reported marijuana use during the first wave of the survey were more likely than adults who did not use marijuana to develop an alcohol use disorder within 3 years; people who used marijuana and already had an alcohol use disorder at the outset were at greater risk of their alcohol use disorder worsening.47 Marijuana use is also linked to other substance use disorders including nicotine addiction.
Early exposure to cannabinoids in adolescent rodents decreases the reactivity of brain dopamine reward centers later in adulthood.48 To the extent that these findings generalize to humans, this could help explain the increased vulnerability for addiction to other substances of misuse later in life that most epidemiological studies have reported for people who begin marijuana use early in life.49 It is also consistent with animal experiments showing THC’s ability to "prime" the brain for enhanced responses to other drugs.50 For example, rats previously administered THC show heightened behavioral response not only when further exposed to THC but also when exposed to other drugs such as morphine—a phenomenon called cross-sensitization.51
These findings are consistent with the idea of marijuana as a "gateway drug." However, the majority of people who use marijuana do not go on to use other, "harder" substances. Also, cross-sensitization is not unique to marijuana. Alcohol and nicotine also prime the brain for a heightened response to other drugs52 and are, like marijuana, also typically used before a person progresses to other, more harmful substances.
It is important to note that other factors besides biological mechanisms, such as a person’s social environment, are also critical in a person’s risk for drug use. An alternative to the gateway-drug hypothesis is that people who are more vulnerable to drug-taking are simply more likely to start with readily available substances such as marijuana, tobacco, or alcohol, and their subsequent social interactions with others who use drugs increases their chances of trying other drugs. Further research is needed to explore this question.


This page was last updated June 2018

So, what's going to happen in a few years, I am wondering when this new normal becomes, which I predict a nightmare?























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