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ablogthatishenceforthmine · 4 years ago

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Zeke Character Profile

Physical

Zeke is a very physical person, in a multitude of ways. He is tough. He loves and is good at physical activities. He is obsessed with wrestling; he does it all the time and can’t seem to stop doing it. It seems also to be an emotional thing, as he often wrestles people when he is overcome with emotion or affection.

In group tasks or environments, he often occupies roles that demand physicality. At the makeshift gambling joint the Belcher kids run in their basement in “The Kids Run the Restaraunt,” he is the doorman and bouncer. In “Few ‘Gurt Men,” his role in the mock trial is the baliff. In the heist in "The Taking of Funtime One Two Three,” his physical strength is emphasized and used to win an arcade game.

He is not just physically tough, but also physically affectionate. He is physically affectionate with most people, but is especially so with Jimmy Jr., his best friend. Zeke has no shame, embarrassment, or self-consciousness in hugging, holding, or throwing his arm around Jimmy Jr. and other boys his age. It’s really refreshing to see a male character that so thoroughly enjoys showing physical affection to his male friends without any “no homo” posturing or thoughts. To give Jimmy Jr. credit too, he likewise has no problem with the physical affection Zeke shows him or giving Zeke physical affection.

Good Friend

Zeke cares a lot about about his friendship with Jimmy Jr. He values it above all else. He and Jimmy Jr. are inseparable. Zeke is a great friend to him. He always encourages and supports Jimmy Jr., showers him with compliments, and comforts him when Jimmy Jr. needs it. The only time he is disloyal to Jimmy Jr. is in the “Oeder games,” and that’s only after Jimmy Jr. turns on him first.

Supportive and Encouraging

Zeke is extremely encouraging and supportive of other people. He’s a cheerleader: not actually, but in spirit. He is constantly cheering on and complimenting people’s ideas and accomplishments. He just really believes in people and lets them know. Even when he is being critical, he does it in a positive when. In “The Land Ship,” when everyone is bashing Tina for being bland or boring, Zeke included, he at least does it in a somewhat motivational way, telling her “get some spice into you girl!”

Kind

Zeke is incredibly kind. He really cares about other people. There are many instances of Zeke being extraordinary kind. Because there are so many instances, I will just pick out a few examples that really stuck out to me. In “Broadcast Wagstaff News,” Zeke tells Tina that after a while, he continued to be the mad pooper for Tina. It’s a surprisingly sweet and touching thing. Even Tina, who is not partial to Zeke, thinks so. In “Midday Run.” he steals the mascot costume from Wagstaff for his grandma. She is going into surgery, and he knows that him prancing around in the mascot costume in front of her would comfort her and cheer her up. Once he is caught, he is desperate to get away, not to get out of trouble, but so that he can be there for his grandma. In “The Silence of the Louise,” Zeke falsely confesses to destroying Mr. Frond’s therapy dolls so that Jimmy Jr. and the other kids can go to the waterpark. It’s a completely selfless act, putting others above himself even when he doesn’t have to.

People Person

Zeke is a people person; he loves people and loves to be around them. He is very affectionate with people and often gives them nicknames; for example, he sometimes calls Tina “T-bird.” He also loves giving compliments, which he does all the time.

And people also really like Zeke. The best example of this is “A Fish Called Tina.” At different points, he is Rudy’s and Kaylee’s big fish (their mentor). He gets along with them so well. They really like him. Rudy even starts to think that Zeke could be his soulmate. After their first fish meeting, Rudy tells Zeke “I love you so much man.” Zeke replies in kind and they hug. Zeke loves people and they love him. Zeke just gets along with others so naturally and effortlessly. He is likeable, which in his case, is an actual skill. It’s no surprise he is such a great Big Fish. Zeke is able to bond with people who are completely different from him. He likes them even though they are nothing alike. Zeke is loud, outgoing, and energetic. While Rudy and Kaylee are quiet, bookish, and meek. But he doesn’t care about this, he doesn’t look down on them or think their weird or that they’re loses. Zeke likes and appreciates them, and people in general, for who they are. It’s also telling that such quiet and reserved people are able to care about Zeke so quickly rather than finding him obnoxious or draining.

Empathetic

Zeke is extremely empathetic, and always tries to understand the reasons for others’ behavior. In "Bob Actually,” when Tina run’s away from Jimmy Jr.’s jumping kiss, Zeke empathizes wither her, telling her “feelings are scary girl.” He’s wrong about why she’s running away (it’s diarrhea), but it’s telling that he takes a guess at why she is running away, and emphasizes with it. In “The Hawkening: Look Who’s Hawking Now,” Zeke is emotional and distraught over Rudy having a broken arm and he brings up the idea of a party to celebrate Rudy getting his cast off.

In "Sit Me Baby One More Time,” Zeke’s immediate empathy for Kendra is really incredible. He almost immediately zeroes in on the fact that her behavior stems from the difficulties of being the new kid in school. He intuits that Kendra is bullying others in a preemptive strike against rejection. He says that “she rejects them in their crouch before they reject her in their heart.” He offers this girl empathy and understanding, even though the few seconds he’s interacted with her involved her attacking him unprovoked. It’s really an outstanding moment of empathy, as well as showing that Zeke has an incredible ability to understand others.

Honest and Open

Zeke may lie about the trouble he gets into, but he is completely honest and open about his thoughts and feelings. He has no trouble showing or announcing how he feels. In fact, he almost constantly does so. The audience and the other characters in the show never have to guess what he is thinking or feeling.

He has no problem showing his emotions, which is quite refreshing to see in a teenage boy character, especially one as typically boyish as Zeke. He loves to express affection for people, verbal and physical. In “The Gene and Courtney Show,” he openly cries in class at Gene’s love announcement. He informs the whole class that he is crying. He also cries and gets emotional at the puppet show in “If You Love it so Much, Why Don’t You Marrionate?” In “The Trouble with Doubles,” He openly admits to being scared by the movie. He says it without being asked.

Below Average Intelligence

Zeke is not the most intelligent kid. He doesn’t have the smartest ideas or the best critical thinking skills. He doesn’t do well in school. He is in the Home Economics class that Mr. Frond describes as “for dummies.” Part of his problem with school, seems to be his short attention span, and he probably has ADHD, but he’s also just not book smart.

Zeke is aware of his lack of intelligence. In "Ex Mach Tina,” Zeke tells Tammy and Jocelyn that they’re making him feel smart, showing that he is aware that he isn’t smart. In “Bob and Deliver,” his whole plotline revolves around this idea. Zeke says he doesn’t need cooking, and that he’s not going to college. He doesn’t seem to believe he has a bright future, and has accepted that. Bob has to badger Zeke into trying to cook. Zeke repeatedly says that he can’t do it. When Bob goes to taste it the dish Zeke made, Zeke tells Bob that he probably wrecked it. It’s clear that he doesn’t believe in himself, at least when it comes to his intelligence and general abilities. This plotline is about Zeke gaining faith in himself, and learning he can do more than he thinks he can. He learns that he is more than what he has been told he is. Once he finds a teacher who believes in him, he is able to flourish.

High Emotional Intelligence

While Zeke may struggle with some forms of intelligence, he has incredible emotional intelligence and maturity. He may be the most emotionally intelligent character, and not just out of the kid characters, but all the characters. He accepts and expresses his own emotions. He is not ashamed or afraid of them.

He approaches people with empathy and is genuinely interested in their point of view. In “Midday,” Zeke honestly asks Tina why she likes being a hall monitor, and challenges her on what the job does/means. He is genuinely trying to challenge, understand, and help her, rather than just calling her out or antagonizing her. ”

Because of his empathy and sincere interest in people, he is incredibly insightful and smart when it comes to people, their feelings, and their motivations. In "Ex Mach Tina,” he has rather insightful things to say about one of Jimmy Jr.’s songs, the one about Jimmy Jr.’s father throwing the ball too hard for Jimmy Jr. to catch when they play catch. Zeke analyses the song, telling the group it’s about parents putting too much expectations on their kids.

In “Sit Me Baby, One More Time,” Zeke displays extraordinary emotional intelligence in his ability to understand Kendra. As described above, he only meets for her a few seconds, and during those seconds, she was trying to attack him. He hears secondhand from Tina that she is new in school and that she is bullying other kids. From just this information, he is gain accurate and incredible insight into her behavior and mindset. With this example, you get the feeling that Zeke really sees people, in all their complexities, masks, and flaws. In the same episode, when Jimmy Jr. tells Zeke’s he’s scared, Zeke responds “I know buddy, that’s what makes us human.” Again insightful and empathetic. He has a great attitude toward emotions. Better yet, he doesn’t mock JJ’s fear, the way that so many boys are taught to do. He doesn’t think that fear makes someone weak, or is unmanly. He just accepts fear, and offers empathy to Jimmy Jr.

Big Picture Thinker/Philosophical

Despite his below average traditional intelligence, Zeke things about big things and issues. He is also occasionally philosophical.

In "Tina and the Real Ghost,” Zeke reveals that he doesn’t believe in ghosts or the afterlife. It says a lot that he’s thought enough about death and the afterlife to have a strong opinion on it and to not believe in it. Zeke thinks about big picture things: some pretty serious, weighty stuff. When he does start to believe in ghosts, he says very seriously, and kinda in a sort of despair, that “this changes a lot for me. A LOT.” He has a world view, and nd there is some melancholy and despair under his cheeriness. When the fraud of the ghost Jeff is revealed, Zeke says he wanted to believe that there was more than this life. This is a much more serious and philosophical desire than the other characters desires: to have a boyfriend, to hop on the bandwagon, or to win in a rivalry.

There are some other examples of Zeke thinking about big issues. In “Ex Mach Tina,” he is excited about getting philosophical about growing up. In “The Quirk-ducers,” it is revealed that Zeke co-founded a “women’s issues” club. He is also aware enough to know that no women signing up for the club is a problem. In “UFO No You Didn’t,” Zeke is concerned about the bees dying, and becomes the topic of his and Tammy’s science project. And it’s actually a good one idea, showing that Zeke can apply himself when he cares about what he’s doing.

Loud and Excitable

Zeke is very loud and excitable. He has has a sense of wonder about the world, and gets excited about the tiniest things. He is extremely enthusiastic. He uses colorful, creative, and evocative language. Zeke also loves to entertain others. He loves the attention, and making other people laugh.

Juvenile Sense of Humor

Zeke has a juvenile sense of humor. He loves gross out and sexual humor, as best indicated by his mad pooper stunt. He also has a lot of traits that are typically associated with teenage boys, such as his obsession with boobs.

Impulsive

Zeke is very impulsive, often acting without thinking. This can be both good and bad. It can be good because it means he is a doer; he takes action. This can be seen in "The Belchies,” when he, Tina Jimmy Jr, and Gene are stuck in the elevator. While Gene, Jimmy Jr., and Tina are just sitting in the elevator, accepting that they are stuck, Zeke is the one that gets them out by lifting the elevator door thing on an impulse. But his lack of impulse control also causes serious problems. It leads him to make bad decisions, and it gets him in trouble a lot at school. Zeke gets detention A LOT. However, he is aware of his impulse control issues. In “Thelma and Louise Except Linda is Thelma,” he explains that his many detentions is because he has a problem with impulse control.

Rule-breaker

Due partly to his poor impulse control, Zeke is bad at following rules. He also is just a rebellious person who enjoys causing trouble sometimes. He likes pranks, and often acts out.

But sometimes, his rule-breaking has nothing to due with this poor impulse control or love of pranks. Zeke follows his heart and his own moral code. He knows that rules aren’t always moral or right. He does what he thinks is right, even if its against the rules. This is best evidenced in “Midday Run,” when he steals the mascot costume in order to cheer up his grandma before her surgery. By the end of the episode, Zeke ended up teaching Tina that rules aren’t always right, and she shouldn’t always just obediently follow and enforce them without question.

Troubled Home Life

The show repeatedly hints that Zeke has a troubled home life; it’s a running joke of the series. In the opening of "The Runway Club,” in a homage to the film “The Breakfast Club,” Zeke plays the Bender role, further connecting him to a troubled home life.

Most of what’s mentioned or alluded to isn’t too serious or concerning. But Zeke seems to have a more adult, messy, and complicated home life than the other kid characters. His family moves around a lot, his birth mom had him when she was in high school, he has a 44 year-old brother, a clown at 7th birthday part later become famous for murdering someone. These are just some examples of things mentioned.

In “Boyz for Now,” Zeke also tells Tina and Louise that his step-mother is an alcoholic and a shopaholic. Although, during the play, when they are talking about how great moms are, Zeke makes a point to include step moms, and gives his step mom a shout out. So, he clearly has a good relationship with her. So again, nothing too dark, but still a bit troubled.

Conclusion

Zeke is a deceptive character. By which I mean, at first glance, and when he was first introduced, he seems simple. He’s a loud, gross, not very smart, impulsive teenage boy with a juvenile sense of humor. But underneath these qualities, he has a lot of depth. He is philosophical, highly emotionally intelligent, and extremely kind.

And just like viewers may at first have written him off, Wagstaff and Mr. Frond have too. Zeke is the type of kid whom schools, at least American schools, routinely fail because they have such a rigid and limited idea of what a good student is. They value a specific set of qualities, and fail to value or even see others that lay outside of that set. Unfortunately for Zeke, he lacks the qualities schools value and excels in the ones they ignore and devalue.

Zeke is labeled a bad, below-average kid. But the thing is, he is actually an extraordinary and talented kid. His level of emotional intelligence at his age is incredible, and really, rarer than the book-smarts that the “good kids” possess. He is really great with people, at dealing with them, and understanding them. That’s a real gift. But Wagstaff doesn’t value or even acknowledge these skills and qualities.

These abilities and personality traits should be acknowledged, valued, encouraged, and nourished. It is possible to create a school environment where Zeke, and kids like Zeke, can thrive. Instead of endlessly punishing Zeke and telling him that he’s a bad kid not worth very much, the school and Mr. Frond should acknowledge and cater Zeke’s school experience to his considerable gifts

For example, Zeke has a lot of qualities that make a great leader, such as his people-oriented nature and big picture thinking. Obviously, he lacks some necessarily qualities for leadership, so Zeke works best as a co-leader or leading with a group. He needs a partner/co-leader that has the leadership skills he lacks: critical thinking, attention to detail, and long-term thinking.

In “Prank You For Being a Friend,” Zeke is put in the club ‘the Thinkgineers” as a punishment. Imagine if he was encouraged or put in extracurricular activities that actually suited his skills and interests. The Thinkginners is the absolute worst club to put Zeke in. The Thinkginners is a club about inventing. It involves critical thinking, problem solving, math, and minute details. If the goal was to punish Zeke, then Mr. Frond succeeded, but wouldn’t it be better to help help. Mr. Frond should have put Zeke a club where he can actually thrive and find purpose, like with his time as a Big Fish. So maybe a mentorship club? Or a club that interacts with a lot or helps people? Or even something with leadership? These types of “punishment” would be much more helpful to Zeke than any of the other punishments he is given. Isn’t his behavior improving more important than the act of punishing?

I imagine Zeke would me more motivated and be better able to work on his weaknesses, if his strengths were recognized and encouraged in school. If he believes that his is a capable and worthy person, he might believe in himself more and work harder on his weaknesses. He might enjoy school more, which could only be a good thing.

#bob's burgers #zeke #bob's burgers zeke #my posts #ablogthatishenceforthmine

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theconservativebrief · 7 years ago

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This piece was originally published in September 2017. It has been lightly updated.

I did an event with environmental journalist (and personal hero) Elizabeth Kolbert in September 2017, in which we discussed various matters related to journalism and climate change. Subsequently, one of the attendees wrote and asked why I hadn’t talked about population. Isn’t overpopulation the real root of our environmental ills?

Anyone who’s ever given a talk on an environmental subject knows that the population question is a near-inevitability (second only to the nuclear question). I used to get asked about it constantly when I wrote for Grist — less now, but still fairly regularly.

I thought I would explain, once and for all, why I hardly ever talk about population, and why I’m unlikely to in the future.

(Worldometers)

Human impact on the natural environment is summed up in a simple formula:

Impact = Population x Affluence x Technology

All are rising. (Bill Gates has a slightly more complicated formula related to carbon dioxide, but P is a variable in his too.)

The current global population has crossed 7.5 billion and is heading upward. The latest UN projections have it hitting 8.6 billion by 2030, 9.8 billion by 2050, and 11.2 billion by 2100. Average fertility rate will decrease, but that effect will be overwhelmed by the absolute numbers. (There are many arguments out there that UN is overestimating population growth, but let’s stick with their numbers for this post.)

The UN expects over half the growth out to 2100 to be concentrated in just nine countries, listed here in order of their expected contribution:

India, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Pakistan, Ethiopia, the United Republic of Tanzania, the United States of America, Uganda, and Indonesia.

Most of those people will be fairly poor (by Western standards, though hopefully less so than their forbearers), which means their per-capita consumption of resources will be fairly low. Nonetheless, cumulatively, adding 2.3 billion people by 2050 amounts to enormous additional resource use and pollution (including greenhouse gases).

Mitigating some substantial percentage of that population growth would be one way to better environmental conditions in 2050. It would also have more impact than virtually any other climate policy. (More on that later.)

However. That human numbers are, axiomatically, part of the story of human impact does not mean that human numbers have to take center stage. Talking about population growth is morally and politically fraught, but the best ways of tackling it (like, say, educating girls) don’t necessitate talking about it at all.

Tackling population growth can be done without the enormous, unnecessary risks involved in talking about population growth.

When political movements or leaders adopt population control as a central concern … let’s just say it never goes well. In practice, where you find concern over “population,” you very often find racism, xenophobia, or eugenics lurking in the wings. It’s almost always, ahem, particular populations that need reducing.

Eugenical Sterilization Map of the US, 1935 (PBS)

History is replete with examples, but perhaps the most germane recent episode was less than 20 years ago, at the Sierra Club, which was riven by divisions over immigration. A group of grassroots members, with some help from powerful funders, attempted to take over the national organization.

These members advocated sharply restricting immigration, saying the US should be reducing rather than increasing its population. Their contention is that the country’s open immigration policies are hurting the environment by bringing in poor immigrants and making them richer, thus increasing their environmental impact. Of course, they swore up and down that xenophobia had nothing to do with it.

The Sierra Club won that fight, and the “green anti-immigrant” movement has mostly been driven to the fringes, but conservative media is still getting ratings out of it. If you can stomach it, watch this entire segment with Tucker Carlson of Fox News — it hits all the usual notes, culminating in an interview with some professor who wrote a book about reducing immigration for environmental reasons.

[embedded content]

I don’t doubt that it’s possible to be concerned about the environmental stresses population brings without any racism or xenophobia — I’ve met many people who fit that description, and there were well-meaning (if quite mistaken) population-focused groups in the ’70s and ’80s — but in terms of public discussion and advocacy, anyone explicitly expressing that concern starts out behind the eight ball. The mere mention of “population” raises all sorts of ugly historical associations.

Public health groups have largely cottoned to this. Even the ones that have “population” in the name focus on family planning rather than population as such. They’ve figured out something important — something not all greens have figured out — which is that the best ways to address population don’t necessarily involve talking about it at all.

So what are those ways?

There are two ways of looking at the problem of growing population on a finite planet. Depending on which you think is most important, there are different ways to address it, none of which require discussing population.

The first way to look at population is as a pure numbers game. More people means more consumers and more emitters, so the thing to do is slow the rise of population. Specifically, since most of the new people are going to come from poor or developing countries, the question is specifically how to slow population growth there.

Luckily, we know the answer. It is family planning that enables women to have only children they want and choose, and education of girls, giving them access to income opportunities outside the home. We know that women, given the resources and the choice, will opt for smaller families.

Those are the two most powerful levers to bend the population curve. They are also, in and of themselves, an enormously powerful climate policy. When Paul Hawken and his team investigated and ranked carbon-reduction solutions for their Drawdown project, they found that the combination of the two (call it the female-empowerment package) carried the most potential to reduce greenhouse gases later this century, out of any solution. (Together they could prevent 120 gigatons of GHGs by 2050 — more than on- and offshore wind combined.)

Family planning: fewer, better cared for. (Drawdown)

So if you are concerned about the growth in population, make yourself a champion of female empowerment in the developing world. You will be contributing to the most effective solution to the problem without any of the moral baggage.

And next time you’re at an environmental event, maybe instead of asking the population question, ask the female empowerment question. Why aren’t climate hawks talking about it more? They should be!

If your concern is the creation of new consumers and emitters, your gaze should be drawn to those who will consume and emit the most, i.e., the wealthy.

(Oxfam)

One way to prevent the creation of new high-consumers would be to persuade the wealthy to have fewer babies and to close off the borders of wealthy countries, preventing low-consumers from immigrating and becoming high-consumers. You could try, in short, to engineer population decline in wealthy countries.

That seems … fraught.

For one thing, fertility tends to decline with wealth anyway. For another, any targeted attempt to engineer population decline is going to run into an unholy thicket of moral and political resistance.

Another way to approach the problem would be, rather than prevent the birth of extremely wealthy people, prevent the creation of extremely wealthy people. In other words, prevent the accumulation of massive wealth. You could do that by, for instance, taxing the shit out of wealthy people.

If you approached the problem that way, under the banner of reducing global income inequality, you would find many allies. Income inequality is a top-line concern of people and organizations all over the world, even some conservatives these days.

Reducing high-end consumption could have an enormous short-term impact on carbon emissions, as climate scientist Kevin Anderson is always saying. Shifting wealth within populations — reducing the number of very wealthy and the number in poverty — can have as much carbon impact as reducing overall population.

So maybe, at the next environmental event, you could ask the income inequality question rather than the population question.

So that, for the record, is why I hardly ever talk or write about population. (I will now send all future askers of the population question to this post.) It is high risk — very, very easy to step on moral landmines in that territory — with little reward.

And where talk of population control is rarely popular (for good reason), female empowerment and greater equality are a) goals shared by powerful preexisting coalitions, b) replete with ancillary benefits beyond the environmental, and c) unquestionably righteous.

So why focus on the former when the latter gets you all the same advantages with none of the blowback? That’s how I figure it anyway.

Original Source -> I’m an environmental journalist, but I never write about overpopulation. Here’s why.

via The Conservative Brief

#IFTTT #The Conservative Brief

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