Malcom Gladwell had a short piece recently about the stupidity of zero-tolerance policies. Though it's not the main point of this entry, I can't help commenting on several aspects of the article. The attention-getter that bookends the piece is the story of a young man who tried to poison his tutor at Cambridge, was given what seems today like a light punishment of probation by the University, and grew up to be...Robert Oppenheimer! Now it's a messy argument to get into whether or not it's a good thing for the world that this gentle punishment allowed him to become the father of the atomic bomb, and I'm not going to argue either way. But the images brought to mind by his name, for me at least, take away from the intended effect of thinking 'wow, it's a good thing they let him off!'

Then there's this part:

A Tennessee study found that after zero-tolerance programs were adopted by the state's public schools the frequency of targeted offenses soared: the firm and unambiguous punishments weren't deterring bad behavior at all. Is that really a surprise? If you're a teen-ager, the announcement that an act will be sternly punished doesn't always sink in, and it isn't always obvious when you're doing the thing you aren't supposed to be doing. Why? Because you're a teen-ager.

That doesn't explain why the frequency of offenses rose under the policy. It sounds more like they were rebelling against the policy than ignoring it, though it's hard to know without more details.

But my main point will take fewer words: it's funny to me that 'tolerance' and 'zero tolerance' are simultaneously watchwords in our culture. Everyone agrees that tolerance is a good thing, except when someone has done something wrong, and then zero tolerance is appropriate, because clearly tolerance is not what we need. It's not necessarily a contradiction, but it's surprising that advocates of zero tolerance didn't choose a more inviting name for the approach, like 'Zero Problems' or 'Lots of Justice.'

An example of none-too-careful comma usage in the first paragraph of the Times Magazine's upcoming article on Guantanamo:

"He figured it would mean spending at least a year away from his family, managing the petty insurgencies of hundreds of angry, accused terrorists."

This makes it sound like the prisoners there are terrorists who are both angry and accused, rather than accused terrorists who are angry.

I'm in California on a business trip, and unusually I've had a weekend-long lull with no car and little to do but appreciate the surroundings.

The work is in Menlo Park, but I'm staying two towns to the north, in Redwood City. In both towns, there seems to have been an abundance of time, money and effort to spend on urban design. Curbs, intersections, dividers and roundabouts all appear to have been exquisitely planned. And yet there are very few pedestrians anywhere, and it's clear that the designers were in some ways very aware of pedestrian issues, and in other ways utterly clueless. The buttons that one is supposed to press to cross the street not only work, but issue audio signals and speech for the blind ("The walk sign is on for crossing Alma Street.") And yet, at many four-way intersections only three sides are crosswalks, meaning that you are supposed to cross the street three times instead of once if you happen to want to cross a certain way.

The taxis in this town are total amateurs. Having to call ahead I expect. But though the driver had a CB radio receiver, he kept getting calls from the dispatcher on his cell phone, and seemed unpleasantly surprised every time it rang. While on the calls he said things like "I don't want to do that, I'm tired" and "I don't want to deal with traffic."

I know that Cold Stone Creamery doesn't serve the best ice cream. But there's something about the name that just draws me in. Creamery. Cold Stone. It's a great name.

Just now I was riding back to my hotel on a public bus. When I got on, a homeless man behind me asked for change, and I couldn't very well say no with a big cup of Cold Stone Creamery in my hand. He got off at the same stop as me, and walked behind me toward my hotel. When he called out to me, I tried to balance my fear with respect for the homeless, which I had seen advertised on TV earlier in the day ("Whether you say yes or no, look them in the eye when you do it"). I decided to see what he had to say. As he approached he counted out change, and then handed back to me an amount that appeared at least close to what I had given him, saying "I just needed some change." Confused, I said "so...you don't want it?" He said "Nah." Judging by the sounds I heard as I headed to my room, he then went over to use the ice machine.