Hosted by unctuousness.
(That is Chef Aarón Sánchez, a regular judge on Chopped. He says "unctuous" a lot.)
Open Thread
Hosted by unctuousness.
(That is Chef Aarón Sánchez, a regular judge on Chopped. He says "unctuous" a lot.)
The Virtual Pub Is Open
[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]
TFIF, Shakers!
Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!
FYI
[Content Note: Misogynoir; lookism.]
[Davis' new show, How to Get Away with Murder,] premiered September 25 to 14 million viewers, following an essay by New York Times television critic Alessandra Stanley in which she called [creator Shonda Rhimes] an "angry black woman" whose grand achievement is flooding network television with characters wrought in her own image. (Though Stanley, who claimed that her argument was misunderstood, does seem to like the show.) The Times' public editor declared the piece "astonishingly tone deaf and out of touch," while Rhimes and cast members from her other hit shows, Grey's Anatomy and Scandal, blasted it on Twitter.Brilliant and brave the end.
Davis says she finds the term "angry" as a descriptor for African-American women to be "very offensive, as is 'sassy,' as is 'soulful.' We've used them enough. It's time to bury them in the racial-history graveyard," she says, chuckling. "My feeling about the article is it's a reflection of how we view women of color, what adjectives we use to describe them—as scary, as angry, as unattractive. I think that people are tired of it."
As for the part of the article that praised Rhimes for casting Davis, despite her being "older, darker-skinned and less classically beautiful" than Scandal star Kerry Washington, Davis says, "there is no one who would compare Glenn Close to Julianna Margulies, Zooey Deschanel to Lena Dunham. They just wouldn't. They do that with me and Kerry because we're both African-Americans and we're both in Shonda Rhimes shows. But they wouldn't compare me to [Grey's Anatomy's] Ellen Pompeo," she says, laughing again. "Because Ellen Pompeo is white."
I watched the premiere episode of How to Get Away with Murder, although I haven't had a chance to watch last night's episode yet, and I quite liked it. Viola Davis is terrific in it, and I already can't wait to see what happens next!
Also: [minor spoilers] A scene of oral sex being performed on a woman and gay men having sex in the first episode of a primetime network television series? Rock the fuck on.
The Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by swirls...
Recommended Reading:
Abigail: Victoria Chang Wins California Book Award and 2014 PEN Center USA Literary Award
Kristin: [Content Note: Misogynoir; violence] Not All of the Black Freedom Fighters Are Men: An Interview with Black Women on the Front Line in Ferguson
George: Ebola Vaccine Delay May Be Due to An Intellectual Property Dispute
Prison Culture: [CN: Carcerality; racism; classism] #NoSchoolPushout: Defining the School-to-Prison Pipeline
BYP: [CN: Racism; slurs; bullying] Teacher Fired for Defending 9-Year-Old Who Was Victim of Racist Bullying
Bina: [CN: Domestic violence; misogyny] On Marriage and the Ideal Spouse
Ragen: [CN: Fat hatred] Fuck the Animal Rights Group Which Shall Not Be Named
Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!
Daily Dose of Cute
Video Description: Matilda the Blue-Eyed Sealpoint Fuzzy Cat lies on a pillow on the couch beside me. I scratch her head, and then her paw, and she nuzzles my hand. She purrs. I take my hand away and she sits up, looking at me like WTF? She reaches out with her paw and gently touches my hand. I pet her head again. She purrs and curls her paws. I withdraw my hand, and she looks at me then turns her head away sadly. I reach out a single wiggling finger, and she bumps her head against it. I scratch her head. She purrs.
Tilsy. ♥
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
Recommended Reading
[Content Note: War on agency; misogyny; classism.]
I started out thinking I was going to pull an excerpt out of this piece for a Quote of the Day, but it really just needs to be read in its entirety: Andrea Grimes' "No Undue Burden? What Texas' HB 2 Means for Maria," in which the absurdity of the "no undue burden" threshold is examined via the circumstances of a fictional but representative woman, whose situation is entirely typical of many women.
Please go read the whole thing.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: War on agency; misogyny] Andrea Grimes: "Overnight, Majority of Legal Abortion Facilities in Texas to Close Following Fifth Circuit Ruling." Last night, a three-judge panel on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals lifted the injunction against HB2, the omnibus abortion bill famously filibustered by Wendy Davis, meaning that Texas can now enforce the horrendously restrictive legislation. "According to findings from the Texas Policy Evaluation Project at the University of Texas, today's ruling will mean that more than one million potential abortion-seeking Texans will live greater than 150 miles from a legal abortion facility." The entire state of Texas will have 8 abortion clinics serving its entire population of 26.5 million people.
Do you bank at JP Morgan Chase? Then you might want to pay attention to this news: "JP Morgan Chase, one of the largest banks in the US, said on Thursday that a massive computer hack affected the accounts of 76 million households and about seven million small businesses, making it one of the largest of its kind ever discovered. ...The bank said financial information was not compromised and that there had been no breach of login information such as account or social security numbers, passwords or dates of birth. However, names, email addresses, phone numbers, and addresses of account holders were captured by hackers." Terrific.
The latest employment numbers: "A surprisingly powerful surge in hiring pushed unemployment to a six-year low of 5.9 percent in September as the U.S. labor market showed renewed vigor. The 248,000 gain in payrolls last month followed a 180,000 increase in August that was bigger than previously estimated, the Labor Department reported in Washington. The median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg survey called for a 215,000 advance. The jobless rate fell to the lowest level since July 2008, from 6.1 percent." Which is still a deceptive number, because it does not account for the job seekers who have stopped looking, or the graduates who have not yet been able to find a job, etc.
[CN: Racism; violence] In Ferguson, voter registration has jumped 30% since August 9, the day Michael Brown was fatally shot by Officer Darren Wilson. Which is great, but only if these new voters have candidates worth voting for. Anyway: "Recent voter registration is due, in large part, to community efforts to boost civic engagement. Organizations like the NAACP and League of Women Voters, in addition to sororities and fraternities, are actively involved in registering the city's residents. Other community members are handing out registration cards for voters to mail them in. But some are not pleased with the surge of registered voters. In August, Matt Wills, the executive director of Missouri's Republican Party, denounced protesters' voter registration efforts, saying, 'If that's not fanning the political flames, I don't know what is. I think it's not only disgusting but completely inappropriate... Injecting race into this conversation and into this tragedy, not only is not helpful, but it doesn't help a continued conversation of justice and peace.'" LOLOLOLOLOL FUCK YOU.
[CN: Racism] Speaking of racism and dangerous cops: Lt. Shawn Williams, of the Charleston, West Virginia, Police Department, has been put on paid administrative leave while he is investigated after recordings were found on his computer of his "young daughter dressed in what appear to be articles of a police uniform and dancing to an anthem of the Ku Klux Klan. ...On the videos, a man alleged to be Williams can be heard asking the girl questions. Derogatory racial language can be heard, sources said." Good fucking grief. He should lose his job and be charged with child abuse.
[CN: Homophobia; bullying; assault] Unbelievable: A teenage boy "who spent nine days in the hospital after fighting back against his anti-gay bullies at high school is now being charged with assault." So, schools abdicate responsibility for prevention of bullying; refuse to intervene in bullying and harassment; and then punish bullied kids when they fight back to try to stop bullying. Just fucking perfect.
[CN: Misogynist slur] Vice President Joe Biden told a ha-ha funny joke about how being Vice President is "a bitch." Dude. Considering that the presumed next Democratic presidential candidate is a woman, the person people most want to challenge her is a woman, and you ran against a ticket that included a female vice-presidential nominee, maybe CAN IT with the misogynist slurs, all right? Asshole.
[CN: Antisemitism; racism; homophobia] Author Nicholas Sparks, who is not only a writer of terrible books and screenwriter of terrible movies, is also apparently the founder of a Christian academy called the Epiphany School (of course he is), and a former employee is alleging that the school is rampant with nasty bias and hostility to diversity. Gee, and Sparks always seemed so nice with his books about beautiful straight white Christian patriots falling in beautiful straight white Christian patriotic love!
And finally! Do you need some underwater puppies? You probably need some underwater puppies.
A Story About Bootstraps
[Content Note: Privilege.]
Politicians love stories about people who "came from nothing" and Made It Big in America. It doesn't matter if it's the Republican National Convention or a Democratic gubernatorial debate or any venue at all where a politician can name some Average American zie met on the Campaign Trail who has the Greatest Story about Achieving the American Dream.
We hear these stories in US politics all the time.
The inner city kid who grew up to be a war hero. The single teen mom who now runs her own successful business. The immigrant who came here with nothing and now owns the restaurant where he started as a busboy.
We love movies about people who "overcame." We love stories about Exceptional People who "rose above" their meager circumstances.
And people—especially people who have a vested interest in the fairy tale of the American Dream, particularly as it is used to deny the existence of privilege—love to tell these sorts of stories about themselves. Created narratives, carefully edited narratives, about how they Made It without any help from anyone.
It's that carefully edited thing that's always the kicker.
And I'm not even talking about failing to mention that it matters if you were the beneficiary of government programs that made sure you had electricity, or mail, or passable roads, or clean drinking water, or food, or shelter, or healthcare, or a loan.
We all tend to leave that stuff out, even though we shouldn't.
I'm talking about leaving out details that aren't just details. To shape your struggle into a narrative of bootstraps, when maybe it wasn't exactly so.
Recently, Iain and I were joking about what his personal narrative would be if he ran for office in the US. [These details shared with his permission.] It would be an inspiring tale of a poor, homeless, unemployed immigrant who arrived in America with $50 to his name, one suitcase, and the clothes on his back; who never took a hand-out from anyone.
"And now, just 12 years later, here I stand before you as a homeowner, a successful businessman, and YOUR CANDIDATE FOR THE UNITED STATES SENATE!" Wild cheers and applause!
What a success! It's truly the American Dream! If he can do it, anyone can!
And the thing is? It's technically true.
Iain really did arrive in the States with $50 to his name, one suitcase, and the clothes on his back. He was poor and homeless and unemployed. He never "took a hand-out." That is all 100% true.
But here are a few other relevant details:
He's male; he's white; he's straight; he's cisgender; he has no visible disabilities; he is well educated.
He immigrated from Scotland, a country where English was his first language and which makes him, in the prejudiced language of immigrant-ranking, an "ex-pat" rather than an "immigrant."
He had more "stuff," but he couldn't be bothered to ship it, so he just left it behind.
He came to the US on a fiancee visa.
He was guaranteed to get a work visa as soon as we were married and he was eligible to apply for one.
He was only "homeless" because I'd sold my home before moving to Scotland for a short time, but we had people with whom to stay in the States until we got a new place. He had a built-in support network of people willing to be there for him, because he was my partner, in his new country.
I was able to quit my job and move there because my parents volunteered to sponsor him. (That is, they promised to the government to cover his expenses if necessary, so he would not take US welfare.) They didn't ultimately have to pay his living expenses, but the fact that they were willing to commit to the possibility indicates how much support he had moving here.
Because I'd sold my home, I had money to use to cover our expenses until we both found work. (And he found work before I did.)
In a tough job market, his brogue made him memorable and interesting to potential employers. He stood out from the crowd as an immigrant, in the best possible way.
Et cetera.
Pointing these things out, of course, is not to take anything away from the fact that Iain is an ambitious, hard-working, talented person. And he has not led a charmed life. It's merely to acknowledge that he has many privileges that other ambitious, hard-working, talented people who have also struggled don't have.
You know, all the details that get left out of stories about bootstrapping one's way to the American Dream.
White USians (particularly, though not exclusively and not universally) subscribe fully and uncritically to the narrative of bootstraps and the promise of the American Dream and the myth of opportunity. Anyone (except oneself, naturally) who fails to achieve, including other whites who had the terrible sense to be born poor, with disabilities, to abusive parents, and/or in some other potentially success trajectory-fucking circumstance, is personally blamed for their lot and—even in spite of obvious innate incompatibilities with the unjust, inflexible, kyriarchal, privilege-rewarding system by which we're meant to achieve "success" as if it's a level playing field—is suspected, and frequently openly accused, of simply failing to work hard enough.
If there is one person born to poverty, one person with disabilities, one person who has survived profound abuse, who can be held up as an example of achievement, then everyone else is failing to thrive. Even as we devour barfinating narratives of triumph over tragic circumstances, we pretend that terrible beginnings don't really matter, except insomuch as they make great first acts for Sandra Bullock Oscar vehicles.
This intractable belief in bootstraps manifests the bias detailed above because it encourages the lie that history doesn't matter. And neither does present bias. It encourages the lie that every life happens in a fucking void.
Except, of course, when it suits us to judge an individual by our prejudices about an entire class to which they belong.
When you're a non-privileged person, you're as bad as the worst conceivable member of a shared demographic, and only as good as your own personal achievement.
That is the gross underbelly of American Individualism. Its story only really works for privileged people, among whose privileges include being seen as an individual, whether they fail or succeed.
And that is why the American Dream, and all its narratives of bootstraps and hard work and equal opportunity, is conservative horseshit: The American Dream is not, and has never been, that we collectively eradicate poverty, achieve meaningful and lasting social justice, and celebrate our shared success, but that each of us as individuals would achieve some sort of perfect destiny of wealth, health, and security.
And fuck everyone who doesn't. They're just lazy.
All of this, all of it, is underwritten by curated narratives about success, about the people who succeed within a very specific model. Tales told by the victors.
Victors who want—and need—to claim that they never had any help from anyone. Because, if they had, their admonishments to people without their privileges to pull themselves up by their bootstraps would be readily seen for the vile cruelty it is.
We should view with suspicion stories of personal success via bootstraps. We should view critically their lack of detail. They exist in service to an agenda.
Gruesomely, to an agenda explicitly designed to make the individual success being exalted a virtual impossibility for anyone who's truly got nothing but their bootstraps.
Hungry. For Change, Sure, But Also Just Hungry.
[Content Note: Food insecurity; poverty; class warfare.]
Yesterday, President Obama gave an address on the state of the US economy at Northwestern University, just outside Chicago. Leading into the midterm elections, clearly his focus was to highlight the gains the economy has made and optimism that the work yet to be done is underway. And that's certainly the tone he struck, with the usual emphasis on the need for a thriving middle class:
So it is indisputable that our economy is stronger today than when I took office. By every economic measure, we are better off now than we were when I took office. At the same time, it's also indisputable that millions of Americans don't yet feel enough of the benefits of a growing economy where it matters most — and that's in their own lives.Lots of good stuff there, and also lots of the usual bootstraps bullshit that imagines it's possible for people in poverty to move into the middle class if only they really want to and try hard enough, which justifies policy that's really wealth redistribution upwards but pitched as maintaining the middle class, rather than policy centered on lifting people out of poverty.
And these truths aren't incompatible. Our broader economy in the aggregate has come a long way, but the gains of recovery are not yet broadly shared — or at least not broadly shared enough. We can see that homes in our communities are selling for more money, and that the stock market has doubled, and maybe the neighbors have new health care or a car fresh off an American assembly line. And these are all good things. But the stress that families feel — that's real, too. It's still harder than it should be to pay the bills and to put away some money. Even when you're working your tail off, it's harder than it should be to get ahead.
And this isn't just a hangover from the Great Recession. I've always said that recovering from the crisis of 2008 was our first order of business, but I also said that our economy wouldn't be truly healthy until we reverse the much longer and profound erosion of middle-class jobs and incomes.
So here's our challenge. We're creating more jobs at a steady pace. We've got a recovering housing market, a revitalized manufacturing sector — two things that are critical to middle-class success. We've also begun to see some modest wage growth in recent months. All of that has gotten the economy rolling again, despite the fact that the economies of many other countries around the world are softening. But as Americans, we measure our success by something more than our GDP, or a jobs report. We measure it by whether our jobs provide meaningful work that give people a sense of purpose, and whether it allows folks to take care of their families. And too many families still work too many hours with too little to show for it. Job growth could be so much faster and wages could be going up faster if we made some better decisions going forward with the help of Congress. So our task now is to harness the momentum that is real, that does exist, and make sure that we accelerate that momentum, that the economy grows and jobs grow and wages grow. That's our challenge.
When the typical family isn't bringing home any more than it did in 1997, then that means it's harder for middle-class Americans to climb the ladder of success. It means that it's harder for poor Americans to grab hold of the ladder into the middle class. That's not what America is supposed to be about. It offends the very essence of who we are. Because if being an American means anything, it means we believe that even if we're born with nothing — regardless of our circumstances, a last name, whether we were wealthy, whether our parents were advantaged — no matter what our circumstances, with hard work we can change our lives, and then our kids can too.
And that's about more than just fairness. It's more than just the idea of what America is about. When middle-class families can't afford to buy the goods or services our businesses sell, it actually makes it harder for our economy to grow. Our economy cannot truly succeed if we're stuck in a winner-take-all system where a shrinking few do very well while a growing many are struggling to get by. Historically, our economic greatness rests on a simple principle: When the middle class thrives, and when people can work hard to get into the middle class, then America thrives. And when it doesn't, America doesn't.
This is going to be a central challenge of our times. We have to make our economy work for every working American. And every policy I pursue as President is aimed at answering that challenge.
The President gives lip service to the idea that the recovery isn't broad enough, but doesn't say flatly that the recovery has "bypassed the majority of American households" and that "future growth is likely to be lopsided, because the foundation for broad prosperity is arguably the weakest it has been since World War II." That is the conversation we refuse to have—because neither party is truly interested in a bottom-up economic policy.
We'll still "debate" the efficacy of trickle-down economics as though it hasn't been resoundingly discredited, but we won't even whisper the suggestion that what we truly need is trickle-up economics.
Because fates forfend the most privileged people in the country just be expected to maintain while we focus for a minute on people who have nothing.
Anyway.
On the same day the President gave this address, the findings of a new study by Feeding Indiana's Hungry and Feeding America were published. Just over the state border in Indiana from where the President was speaking, "1 in 6 Hoosiers, or an estimated 1.1 million people in Indiana, turn to food pantries and meal service programs to feed themselves and their families."
1 in 6.
And, contrary to conservative narratives about lazy moochers who don't want to work: A majority of the households (61%) in Indiana served by Indiana agencies and programs "have at least one member who has been employed in the past year," and among all served households where someone is employed, "the person with the longest employment duration is more likely to be employed full-time."
In fact, 59% of households with an employed person using social services include at least one full-time worker. And they still cannot make ends meet.
"The results of this study show us that the face of hunger is one we would recognize in every Hoosier community," said Emily Weikert Bryant, Executive Director of Feeding Indiana's Hungry. "Many of our neighbors who are seeking food assistance have jobs, raise families, work toward education and struggle with health problems, like all of us. Too often, our clients also have to make unimaginable choices to get enough food for their families."Here are some statistics about those choices:
* 85% of households report purchasing inexpensive, unhealthy [for them] food because they could not afford healthier [for them] options.
* 64% households have a member with high blood pressure.
* 34% of households include a member with diabetes.
* 77% of households report having to choose between paying for food and paying for medicine or medical care.
* 45% of these households are making that choice every month.
* 77% report choosing between paying for food and paying for utilities.
* 39% of these households are making that choice every month.
* 78% report making choices between paying for food and paying for transportation.
* 44% of these households are making that choice every month.
* 63% report choosing between paying for food and paying for housing.
* 31% of these households are making that choice every month.
* 40% report choosing between paying for food and paying for education expenses.
* 19% of these households are making that choice every month.
* 60% of households reported using three or more coping strategies for getting enough food in the past 12 months, including but not limited to: Eating food past the expiration date (62%); purchasing inexpensive, unhealthy food (85%); pawning or selling personal property (43%); watering down food or drinks (35%).
The truth is, we can talk in civil tones about abstract policy positions, and we can debate tax cuts vs. tax increases, and we can use anodyne language to talk about "the recovery," and we blather on endlessly about various ideas to strengthen the economy, but, at a certain point, we've just got to start feeding people.
We are the wealthiest nation on the planet, and we aren't feeding people.
I say, loudly and often, that Republicans think people aren't entitled to food, and they don't. I'm not sure Democrats do, either. Not really. Because our Democratic president is still talking about how America gives everyone an opportunity to succeed, while there are millions of people watering down food to survive.
Good Morning! Or Whatever!
Please enjoy this video of a very spoiled (but not so spoiled that he doesn't listen) Great Dane named Dinky throw a hilarious tantrum because his dad is giving Ro-Ro lovies and not him.
Video Description: A middle-aged white man sits in a comfy chair beside a couch. In front of him, sitting with his back to him, is a harlequin Great Dane named Ro-Ro, whom the man is petting. Next to him, half on and half off the couch, is a black with white hightlights Great Dane named Dinky, who is grumpily complaining in low vocalizations that he is not being pet.
Dinky growls and yowls pitifully as the man tells him: "Lay down, I can love Ro-Ro. No. You get up there and lay down and let Ro have a turn. You get up there and lay down..." Rowr rowr rowr rowr. "You let Ro-Ro have a turn!" Dinky leans forward kisses his face. "Get back up on that couch!" Dinky backs up onto the couch.
"You get on that couch." Grrrrrrmph. Dinky looks at his mom, behind the camera. "Don't look at Mom." Mom laughs. "She's..." Rowr rowr rowr rowr. "You just lay down. I can give Ro-Ro lovies, too." Dinky circles on the couch and lays down with a grumping harrumph. "You're just tired and crabby."
This goes on for another minute, until Dinky's grumbling reaches a fevered pitch and he dramatically flops back onto the couch petulantly. His mom and dad laugh. Dinky grumbles, wagging his tail. Dinky is proud of himself now and being silly. Ro-Ro rolls over on his back. Fun times for everyone!
Question of the Day
When is the last time you treated yourself, in a big or small way, and what did you do?
Define "treat yourself" however you like. For some of us, it could be buying ourselves something we don't really need; for others, a massage; for others, giving oneself permission to leave the dirty dishes 'til morning.
It Is Time for a Flula Break!
Flula, a young, thin, white man speaking in German-accented English directly to the camera while lying in what looks like a daybed with a frilly cover: I need pants. Yesterday I did have an accident with my pants. It— Not like a [gestures downward with his hand] bowel, bowel move; no liquid accident. It was a dancing— I was dancing, and then [makes an upward motion with his hand] rrrrip! Whoop! Down in the place that is, you know, needing not rips? [meaningful look]Then some hours later: Squirrels. Oh my god. LOL FOREVERRRRRRRRRRR.
So I'm purchase new pants today; I go a stores—I visit, ahh, the Gap, I did go. I see pants; they are nice, but ahh, they are nice, but the reißverschluss, the zippy [makes zipping motion with hand] was broken.
And so I did say to the Gap, the Gap woman... I said, "Hello. I like your pants here; however, the zippy is broken. May I receive discount for, you know, for this?" And she looked me like [makes disgusted face] like a what? And she say, "What—you want to have your cake and eat it, too?" And then she continue folding sweaters.
[makes confused face] What? [confused noise] What? Have a cake and eat it, too? Who is caring of cake? This is my moment of needing pants! I'm not in a moment of needing desserts.
Cake? Who— You want to have a cake and eat it, too? Well, first here this purposes of cake is the eating! Why shall I else have the cake? This is why I would like a cake. If I like a cake, I would like to eat it!
What do you do with cake? What do you do with cake, Gap Lady? You bake a cake... "Finished! Frosting!" [mimes frosting a cake] "Oh, no eating!" Open window and voppitabop! [mimes tossing cake out open window] Hello to street! And cars and beep beep splat splat! Then some hours later: Squirrels.
What? No, this is not how cake is working! This is not how my pants is working! I would like to have this pants.
I would like— I do not want to have the cake and eat it, too; I would like to have the pants and wear them, too. As this is purpose of pants. This is why pants are existing. So please sell to me. I will fix the zippy. It's not hard.
Quote of the Day
[Content Note: Misogyny; harassment.]
"There is widespread acknowledgement of the rampant sexism in the [tech and venture capital industries], but even wider-scale abdication of responsibility for it. The structure and cadence of the culture remains accepting of sexist attitudes. When these attitudes materialize into sexual harassment and assault, the target is left unprotected, and eventually ostracized. She becomes responsible both for defending herself against the advances of the offending party and against the mob that rises to protect their aligned interests. She is given the choice to suffer the indignities of being treated as a sexual object amongst peers and colleagues, or to be persecuted for objecting to it. If she fiercely asserts her rights to be there, her boundaries in doing so, her very fierceness is critiqued and used as a crowbar, evidence that she's—wait for it—not tough enough to handle the culture."—Bardot Smith, in "Silicon Valley's Cult of Male Ego."
Which I, coincidentally, just had happened to read after the interview with Barbara Annis.
I'm sure you can all imagine and appreciate the abundant cascade of mirthless laughter that accompanied the delightful juxtaposition.
New Memo to Women
[Content Note: Misogyny.]
All you need to do to succeed in business is be yourself. And don't worry—it will totally work because: "I don't see men resisting female leadership. I mean, sure, do we have the odd dinosaur, yes. But for the most part, I see men being very interested and willing when it comes to including women, and they see it as a benefit."
So says Barbara Annis, a gender intelligence expert and the Chair Emeritus of the Women's Leadership Board at Harvard Kennedy School.
Just lean in and be yourself! That's all it takes! Men are very interested and willing to include you! So if you are not a wild success, it's definitely your fault!
Have a nice day.
Nope
I know, I know—I promise I will shut up about it after this—but is anyone else super creeped out by the fact that reviewers are recommending Gone Girl as "a perfect date night movie," or some variation thereof? WHAT THE SHIT?
Daily Dose of Cute
There is never a shortage of kitties available for cuddling at Shakes Manor.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Racism; guns; death] Goddammit: "The Justice Department is not expected to bring civil rights charges against George Zimmerman in the 2012 shooting death of Trayvon Martin, according to three law enforcement officials, despite allegations that the killing was racially motivated. The federal investigation of Zimmerman was opened two years ago by the department's civil rights division, but officials said there is insufficient evidence to bring federal charges. The investigation technically remains open, but it is all but certain the department will close it." What is most infuriating about this to me is that the threshold for "evidence" for something that is manifestly obvious is absurd. Of course it mattered that Trayvon Martin was black. Of course it did.
[CN: Illness; death] People in the US are extremely concerned about a single case of Ebola, and that is understandable, but also there are five people being infected every hour in Sierra Leone, and we really need to be sending more resources to help address the epidemic there. Also: Nearly 4,000 children in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone have been orphaned by the epidemic, and UNICEF "fears the number of orphans could double this month."
[CN: Animal imperilment] An estimated 35,000 walruses have crowded onto a single Alaskan beach because there is not enough sea ice to sustain them. "The extraordinary sighting—the biggest known exodus of walruses to dry land ever observed in the Arctic under US control—arrived as the summer sea ice fell to its sixth lowest in the satellite record last month. 'Those animals have essentially run out of offshore sea ice, and have no other choice but to come ashore,' said Chadwick Jay, a research ecologist in Alaska with the US Geological Survey." There is a further risk to the population if the walruses are spooked and stampede. This is so fucking sad.
In good news: "A program that offered long-acting no-cost contraception to U.S. girls and women age 15 to 19 reduced the teenage pregnancy rate by 79 percent over five years and cut the abortion rate by 77 percent, according to the results of a new study. ...The new study comes from the Contraceptive CHOICE Project conducted in the St. Louis area. It was designed to see if teen pregnancy rates could be brought down by aggressively providing information on contraceptives and offering contraception for free." Huh! Who woulda thunk that education about and access to contraception made a difference in pregnancy and abortion rates? OH ONLY EVERYONE WHO IS PRO-CHOICE EVER? Welp!
Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner is reportedly trying to convince Jeb Bush to run for president, because Boehner "sees Bush as undeniably the strongest, most viable candidate who could pull the party together after a bruising primary and take on a formidable Hillary Clinton." (Who hasn't announced a candidacy.) Also: George W. Bush thinks his little bro totes wants to be prez. Well, I guess that settles it!
These two restaurateurs are opening a restaurant where they will pay their waitstaff a liveable wage, offer healthcare benefits, and give them some paid vacation days and sick time. That sounds good! They will also ban tipping. Really? Hmm. I think as a customer I'd prefer a "you're not obliged to tip, but you certainly can if you like" model. I dunno. It's not like there aren't plenty of other service professions where people get tipped, even if they're already making a liveable wage.
Here is Gillian Anderson talking about sexism in the entertainment industry. For the record, I would not talk to her about either The X-Files or Jamie Dornan. I would talk to her about how she says brave things about sexism in the entertainment industry.
This may be a useful starting point for you if you've got stray and/or feral cats in your area and want to figure out a way to help.
And finally! This is an amazing and moving video of workers with Animal Aid Unlimited India helping a dog who'd fallen into a pool of tar that had hardened, leaving him stuck to the ground. Dogs are incredibly resilient! (If you can't view the video, there is a story here.)
Privilege Gives Us Bad Instincts, By Design
[Content Note: Privilege; auditing.]
Here is something that has never happened to me: I've said or written something about some piece of misogyny, either directed at me or elsewhere, had a man tell me, "I don't see it," been 'splained at by that man about how I'm wrong, and then changed my mind because I am so wowed by his insight.
That has never happened. I don't believe it ever will.
And yet, on a nearly daily basis, I am confronted by men who are keen to tell me that they don't view something as misogyny, that there is some other explanation, that I am mistaken. They talk to me like I am very stupid, and very naive, and they will Occam's Big Paisley Tie at me with reason after absurd reason why something isn't misogyny. Why I am wrong.
Many times, these men purport to be my ally.
And the men who purport to be my ally will readily concede they have male privilege, even as they fail utterly to understand or examine how that privilege acts on them, and how much work it really takes to work through it; how much vigilance not wielding it demands.
We cannot merely be aware of having privilege; we have to understand how it works, and what it does to our humanity.
Resocializing ourselves out of the toxic oppressions with which we were indoctrinated is work. It doesn't happen by magic, and it sure doesn't happen merely by declaring ourselves aware of our privilege.
Human beings are designed to be sponges, and we sponges are socialized every day of our entire lives by a bombardment of messaging exhorting us to privilege some people and treat others as less than. It is absurd to imagine that we can overcome this aggressive socialization without serious effort.
A socialization that tells people of privilege: You are superior. You are worth more than the people who lack your privilege. You are a better person.
It's not true. In every way, privilege erodes our ability to connect to other people. It subverts our empathy, and diminishes our humanity.
Privilege gives us bad instincts, by design.
It tells us lies. So many lies.
And the most harmful lie it tells us is that we are objective, by virtue of our privilege.
What I mean is: It assures us that our perception of the world is right. That we understand how the world works, and why things happen, better than marginalized people, who naturally benefit from our insightful explanations. Ahem.
Every time you hear a white person explain at a black woman that some other white person didn't touch her hair because of racist entitlement, but because of innocent curiosity; every time you hear a straight person explain at a gay person that some other straight person didn't mean gay like that, heavens no; every time you hear a man defend another man to a woman by proclaiming he's no misogynist, for god's sake, he loves women! (which means: "he loves fucking women"); every time you hear a cis person tell a trans* person that they weren't overlooked for a promotion for the third time in a row because of transphobia, they couldnt' have been, it must've been something else, there's got to be some other explanation...
Every time you hear these tortured explanations, that's privilege. Privilege telling us that we have the right—and the responsibility!—to audit marginalized people's reports of harm and tell them that they're wrong.
Privilege tells us the lie that being oppressed by prejudice makes a person an unreliable witness to hir own life, but benefiting from prejudice makes a person an objective observer of that life.
That's a nifty little trick, isn't it? Being victimized compromises you. Only people in a position to victimize can be trusted to define what constitutes harm.
As if people in a position to victimize don't have a vested interest in explaining away harm.
When I talk publicly about my lived experiences as a fat woman—the harassment, the body shaming, the food policing, the armchair diagnosing, the hostility of healthcare providers, the jokes, the sneers, the looks, the shouts from passing cars—there are always thin people who will jump in to tell me that this or that didn't happen because I am fat, but because…insert here any other rationale, no matter how ludicrous.
And a thin person's voice, auditing my lived experience, telling me that my oppression is not what I think it is, is valued more highly than my own. A lifetime of living in a fat body, experiencing the world as a fat person, learning—by necessity—the patterns and practices of systemic fat hatred, still does not qualify me to be an expert on my own life.
That's how privilege works. That is the lie that it tells—I can't know my own life as well as any thin person who decides they want to comment on it.
This happens to people from all marginalized classes. Every woman can probably think of countless examples of having reported some instance of sexism, only to have a man try to explain it away. Every person of color can think of examples of white people trying to explain racism away. Every person with a disability can think of examples of able-bodied people (or people with a different disability) trying to explain disablism away as some other reason one just didn't see.
Or perhaps by simply saying: "I don't see it."
"I don't see it" is a favorite rhetorical flourish of privileged people, relying on the objectivity and authority that privilege assures us we have. On the right we believe we have to haughtily sniff at another human being who's been harmed by prejudice, "I don't see it." With an implied, "Then it can't be so."
And this is only one manner in which privileged people act as arbiters on the lives and choices of marginalized people. We deny marginalized people the right of authority on even their own lives in any number of even crueler ways.
Like accusing someone of being too sensitive, instead of examining how privilege erodes our capacity to be sensitive enough.
Privilege tells us the lie that we know other people's lives better than they know their own, that they couldn't possibly understand their own lives without the benefit of our superior objectivity. Privilege assures us that our role is to audit; rather than to empathize.
Privilege tells us the lie that everyone else is just like us, or should be. That universalizing our own experiences—and preferences and needs and choices—is not only okay, but the "Golden Rule." That kindness is projecting one's own perspective onto everyone else, rather than listening to individual people about how they would like to be treated, and then treating them that way.
Privilege tells us the lie that we shouldn't challenge this sort of conventional wisdom—or challenge anything, really, instead endeavoring to maintain the status quo. That we should not bother to challenge the way things are, because this is the natural order of things and thus the way they will ever be. That we should not expect more—of the world, of one another, of ourselves. That expecting more is an unreasonable expectation.
Privilege lulls us into easy complacency, and entrains us to behave in ways that burn bridges, rather than build them.
A crucial part of understanding how privilege works is understanding that privileged voices are louder, carry further, can drown out other voices. The presence of a privileged person can change the dynamic in a room, or an online space, otherwise filled with people who don't share that privilege.
We need to just be okay with the radical notion, contrary to everything that privilege teaches us, that sometimes we have nothing to add.
We have to just get okay with the radical idea, contrary to everything that privilege teaches us, that sometimes the only thing we have of value to offer to marginalized people is LISTENING, VALIDATING, and BELIEVING.
Sometimes, there just isn't anything we can do except mitigate harm. Which is not a small thing.
Sometimes, the only thing we can offer is just not behaving like every other white person, or man, or cis person, or any other person of privilege, who has failed to LISTEN, VALIDATE, and BELIEVE.
Sometimes, the best thing you can do is just shut the fuck up.
Privilege gives us bad instincts. One of those instincts is to talk and talk and talk. To explain at marginalized people about their own lives. To "educate" them.
That is not helpful. That is harmful. Just shut the fuck up.
I promise you: If you stop acting like you have nothing to learn from marginalized people, you will start "seeing it."
Welp
[Content Note: Threats to the President's safety.]
Following reports of several severe security lapses, Julia Pierson, Director of the US Secret Service, has resigned.
Pierson stepped down just 18 months after President Barack Obama selected her to take over a law enforcement agency that already had been tarnished by misconduct by agents."Tarnished by misconduct of agents" is a polite way of putting it. Pierson came aboard amid a series of scandals, that included racism, sexism, allegations of sexual harassment, and dereliction of duty.
"I think it's in the best interest of the Secret Service and the American public if I step down," Pierson said in an interview with Bloomberg News after her resignation was announced by the Department of Homeland Security. "Congress has lost confidence in my ability to run the agency. The media has made it clear that this is what they expected."
Pierson was the first woman to serve as director of the Secret Service, and she was essentially set up to fail: Brought in to be a female face for an agency getting a notorious reputation for being a boys-will-be-boys' club, but not given the resources to actually implement meaningful changes.
Reasonable people can disagree about whether, ultimately, she deserved to lose her job or whether anyone in charge during such an incident would have to resign. But it's probably not pure chance that Pierson, who held that position for just a year-and-a-half, was a woman. Time and again, women are put in charge only when there's a mess, and if they can't engineer a quick cleanup, they're shoved out the door. The academics Michelle Ryan and Alex Haslam even coined a term for this phenomenon: They call it getting pushed over the glass cliff.Women are the cleaning crew. And they fail to magically clean up a mess while not being given any cleaning products, well, that just goes to show you how women aren't up to the task.
Pierson was, in fact, explicitly brought in to clean up a mess. When President Obama nominated her last year, it was on the heels of news that Secret Service employees hired prostitutes in Cartagena, Colombia ahead of the president's arrival. Pierson was meant to be a breath of fresh feminine air to clear out the macho cobwebs still dogging the agency...
That wasn't the only thing hobbling the agency before Pierson's arrival, though. It has been perpetually underfunded and understaffed. In his book on the secret service, Ronald Kessler describes how agents are stretched so thin that the agency grapples with high turnover. ...This is the first year since 2010 that the agency isn't operating with a budget below what it requested [from Congress]. And since that year, personnel levels have seen a severe decline.
...As with Pierson, women are often put in these positions because rough patches make people think they need to shake things up and try something new – like putting a woman in charge. When it's smooth sailing, on the other hand, men get to maintain control of the steering wheel. Women are also thought to have qualities associated with cleaning up messes.
This sort of misogyny has repercussions bigger than individual insult, of course: Pierson will take the fall, the grave breaches chalked up to her incompetency (her womanhood), and the real, profound, comprehensive reasons for these failures will go unaddressed.
Or, perhaps, Congress will actually listen to her male successor, when he says he needs better resources to make the necessary changes.
And then he will get plaudits for his industrious leadership and refreshing competency, all for the "skill" of having a voice to which people were willing to listen.
Of Course
[Content Note: Police brutality; racism.]
Because justice in Ferguson for the killing of Michael Brown is apparently as elusive (and mythical) as Bigfoot, the St. Louis County prosecutor's office is now investigating alleged misconduct among members of the grand jury hearing the case against Officer Darren Wilson.
Shaun King, who has also documented the lies of the Ferguson police force regarding the scene of the killing, tweeted a screen cap of a tweet by someone named Susan M Nichols, who has previously tweeted support for Wilson, which reads: "I know someone sitting on the grand jury of this case. There isn't enough at this point to warrant an arrest. #Ferguson"
Members of the grand jury are not allowed to discuss the case while the grand jury is convened. If the confidentiality has been broken, "the prosecutor's office may have to start over with a newly empaneled group."
The attorney for Brown's family, Ben Crump, said the potential breach must be fully investigated.What an absolute clusterfuck. I feel so sad and angry for Michael Brown's family, and everyone in that community who feels like there may never be anything that looks even a little bit like justice.
"If this allegation is true and there is a member of the grand jury who is discussing the case with a Darren Wilson supporters the appropriate thing for the prosecutor to do is impanel a new grand jury," Crump said in an interview Wednesday night. "If this person is discussing the case outside of the grand jury it is wholly inappropriate. It's an issue of fairness for Michael Brown's family."
Reached on Wednesday evening, King told The Post that the potential link was further evidence that the current legal proceedings may be flawed.
"At a time where so many people in Ferguson already don't believe that Prosecutor Bob McCulloch will take this case seriously, this potential leak is a disaster," King said. "If it's found to be true and the Grand Jury has to be dismantled, McCulloch should be taken off of the case immediately and replaced with a special prosecutor."
The Wednesday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by colored markers.
Recommended Reading:
Trudy: [Content Note: Validity Prism; kyriarchy] I Am Tired of "Status"
Anne: [CN: Misogyny; harassment] No, I Don't Want to Learn How to Love Criticism, Thanks
Ragen: [CN: Fat hatred; eliminationism] Living a Normal Life
Danielle: [CN: Misogynoir; looksism] Viola Davis Is Classically Beautiful Although It's Not Her Job to Be
Rosie: [CN: Misogyny] When Bad Allies Get "Good Guy" Awards
BYP: [CN: Racism] Boston Herald Cartoon Mocks Obama Intruder Situation; Has Intruder Asking President about Watermelon
Jim: [CN: Homophobia; Christian Supremacy] Mexican Bishop Says Marriage Equality Will Lead to Man-Dog Weddings
blackskeptics: Brave New Face of Humanism: A Gathering of Atheists, Freethinkers, & Humanists of Color
Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!
Quote of the Day
[Content Note: Guns; racism. Disablist language in headline at link.]
"Surely these open carry people, however well intentioned, should realize that nice white men and women openly carrying firearms on the street aren't being gunned down on sight by police officers. The worst thing that happens to them is they are forced to show their ID. It's unarmed black men (and unarmed mentally ill people of all races) who are being gunned down on sight by police officers. ...The problem isn't that people don't have enough guns. The problem is that police are too often using the guns they have. That won't be solved by a bunch of average suburban white people wandering around public spaces with their rifles slung over their backs. Those aren't the people most likely to be shot by police—whether they're armed or not. They're missing the point entirely."—Digby, in a terrific piece on gun advocates' taking up John Crawford's case as a cause, for utterly the wrong reasons.
Something That Looks a Little Like Justice
[Content Note: Guns; racism; violence.]
Michael Dunn, the 47-year-old white man who shot and killed 17-year-old unarmed black teen Jordan Davis after Dunn asked the car full of teens in which Davis was a passenger to turn down their music in a public parking lot and they refused, has been found guilty of first-degree murder, following a hung jury on the charge in February.
GOOD. Good.
It Continues to Be a Real Mystery Why Republicans Aren't Connecting with a Majority of Female Voters
[Content Note: Misogyny; heterocentrism.]
A week after I wrote about this piece of shit ad in which it's implied women pick candidates like boyfriends, now I'm obliged to write about this piece of shit ad in which women choose candidates like wedding dresses: "The College Republican National Committee launched on Wednesday a nearly $1 million digital ad campaign across 16 states, aiming to draw young voters to the GOP with what the group's chief calls 'culturally relevant' ad campaigns. The first ad, launched Wednesday morning in Florida, is modeled after TLC's Say Yes to the Dress, where brides-to-be look for wedding dresses."
A young thin blonde white woman appears in a series of wedding dresses as she spins, a la the credits to Say Yes to the Dress, followed by text onscreen reading: "Say Yes to the Candidate."Wait—is she marrying Rick Scott, or voting for him? If she's just voting for him, why does she have a maid of honor? This metaphor is bullshit.
The bride appears in a talking head segment, again in the style of Say Yes to the Dress. She is identified as: "Brittany, Undecided Voter." She says: "Budget is a big deal for me now that I just graduated from college." Cut to video of her looking through dresses on a rack, then admiring herself in a mirror after she's tried on one. "The Rick Scott is perfect!" she tells a thin middle-aged white woman, who is her dress consultant.
"The Rick Scott" (Rick Scott is the Republican Governor of Florida) is a simple, elegant gown. As the bride models the dress for her friends and mother, she says in voiceover, "Rick Scott is becoming a trusted brand. He has new ideas that don't break your budget."
As her mother, a red-haired middle-aged woman in a black and white polka-dot dress, makes a revolted face, a male voiceover says: "But Mom has other ideas." Cut to Mom in a talking head segment. "Gloria, Bride's Mother." She says, "I like the Charlie Crist."
Cut to the bride with her dress consultant, trying on a fussier gown that does not flatter her shape as well. She looks horrified. (Charlie Crist is the former Republican Governor of Florida and current Democratic candidate for Governor of Florida.) In voiceover, Mom says, "It's expensive and a little outdated, but I know best!"
As the bride models the dress for her friends (who hate it) and Mom (who loves it), the dress consultant says: "And don't forget—the Charlie Crist comes with additional costs. There's over two billion dollars in taxes, three-point-six billion dollars in debt, and fifteen percent tuition increases." Mom cheers.
The bride is now buried in an oversized veil and yards of fabric. "But I'll be paying this off for the rest of my life!" the bride exclaims, looking miserable.
Her friend, a young black woman ("Tiffani, Maid of Honor"), in a talking head segment, says: "We could not let her walk out of the voting booth like that!"
"Mom," says the bride, "this is my decision! And I see a better future with Rick Scott." Triumphant music as she once again models the Rick Scott gown.
"Sometimes it's hard to let go of old styles," says the male voiceover, as Mom looks disappointed. "But it all worked out in the end, because Brittany said yes to Rick Scott!" Champagne and cheers.
You know what else is bullshit? That Republicans evidently cannot think of a way to appeal to female voters without casting us as relationship-seeking girls.
(Which, you know, maybe wouldn't be so tempting if the Republican Party ran more female candidates. As an aside.)
Honestly, the only thing more insulting than the implication I would choose a candidate based on the same criteria I use to choose an intimate partner is the belief that I could conceivably be persuaded to choose a candidate based on an ad this fucking stupid.
Yes, it's a real mystery why young women aren't flocking to the Republican Party en masse, when the best strategies they've devised to appeal to young women are: 1. Take away their reproductive rights; 2. Insult them!
Keep up the fine work, dipshits.
[Note: There are versions for Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, too.]
Daily Dose of Cute
Zelly, subtly hinting she would like some belly rubs, please. LOL.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
Fat Fashion
This is your semi-regular thread in which fat women can share pix, make recommendations for clothes they love, ask questions of other fat women about where to locate certain plus-size items, share info about sales, talk about what jeans cut at what retailer best fits their body shapes, discuss how to accessorize neutral colored suits, share stories of going bare-armed for the first time, brag about a cool fashion moment, whatever.
* * *
As a lot of discussions about Fat Fashion, for very good reasons, center around what we can't get—things in our size, things that work for our body shapes, things that are fashionable—so today's suggested topic is: Things That We Covet. That is, neat things we've found that we want to buy, as soon as we can afford to buy them, or things we will never be able to afford but love to drool over anyway, or things we adore but don't have the bravado yet to wear, or whatever.
Basically, share the plus-size items you've found that you do love!
I've been mooning over this Joe Brown "From Russia with Love" coat ever since I first saw it at SimplyBe:
WANT!
At a price of $199, I will never own it, lol, but I love looking at it. It's a really beautiful coat, and certainly not typical of the stuff that's usually available for fat ladies.
Anyway! As always, all subjects related to fat fashion are on topic. You don't need to stick to this one! If you've had a great fashion moment lately, want to solicit advice on where to find a particular item, or whatever, go for it.
* * *
Have at it in comments! Please remember to make fat women of all sizes, especially women who find themselves regularly sizing out of standard plus-size lines, welcome in this conversation, and pass no judgment on fat women who want to and/or feel obliged, for any reason, to conform to beauty standards. And please make sure if you're soliciting advice, you make it clear you're seeking suggestions—and please be considerate not to offer unsolicited advice. Sometimes people just need to complain and want solidarity, not solutions.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Guns] What in the everloving shit is wrong with the Secret Service?! "A security contractor with a gun and three convictions for assault and battery was allowed on an elevator with President Obama during a Sept. 16 trip to Atlanta, violating Secret Service protocols, according to three people familiar with the incident." Whoooooooooops. Get it together, assholes!
[CN: Class warfare] Yet another Republican-appointed judge has ruled that "much of the Affordable Care Act must be defunded and millions of Americans must lose their health insurance. ...To date, nine federal judges have considered this question of whether much of the law should be defunded. Only three—all of whom are Republicans—have agreed that it should be. ...If [Judge Ronald A. White's opinion] is reviewed by a panel of judges interested in neutrally applying the law, White will be reversed." Fingers crossed.
[CN: Death penalty; torture] After a series of botched executions across the US, Oklahoma has decided that instead of getting rid of the death penalty, it will simply increase the amount of sedative given to inmates by five times the current dosage and reduce the number of media witnesses allowed. Fucking hell.
[CN: Carcerality] Corrections Corporation of America, the US' biggest for-profit prison company, wants to get in on the halfway house business. Sure. If your business model depends on high rates of recidivism, what better way to ensure increasing profits than making sure there's no rehabilitation access for anyone? Reprehensible human misery profiteers.
Big Pharma is basically running our for-profit healthcare system: "US doctors and teaching hospitals received $3.5 billion from pharmaceutical companies and medical device makers in the last five months of 2013, according to the most extensive data trove on such payments ever made public. The payments, disclosed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) on Tuesday, include consulting and speaking fees, travel, meals, entertainment, and research grants." Swell!
[CN: Drones; surveillance] Hey, since police forces all over the US are getting other kinds of military equipment, why not surveillance drones? What could possibly go wrong?
I like this habit that married actors Felicity Huffman and William H. Macy have for facilitating active listening as part of their communication: "I'm loathe to talk about this [and] give advice because I happened to luck out in marriage, but once a week we do sit down and make sure we take half an hour, each person gets 15 minutes, just to talk with no crosstalk. I talk, then you talk. ...You kind of just deeply check in with the other person. When you have 15 minutes to talk, which is endless, by the way, and if you want to sit there in silence you can but when you have 15 minutes to talk, you kind of actually see what's going on with the other person without any talk-back."
A Tetris movie is being made, because of course it is. "It's a very big, epic sci-fi movie," Threshold's CEO Larry Kasanoff says. "This isn't a movie with a bunch of lines running around the page. We're not giving feet to the geometric shapes. ...Brands are the new stars of Hollywood. We have a story behind 'Tetris' which makes it a much more imaginative thing… What you [will] see in 'Tetris' is the teeny tip of an iceberg that has intergalactic significance." Sounds perfect!
And finally! Here is a great story about two stray dogs who are BFFs, who were rescued together, and are now looking for a forever home together. ♥
NOT Good2Go
by Shaker masculine_lady
[Content Note: Sexual assault; hostility to consent.]
Good2Go, reviewed by Amanda Hess in the Ladies Area at Slate, is a new app that is ostensibly supposed to aid in the oh-so-awkward communication about sex that happens in so-called hook up culture. It is also supposed to somehow reduce sexual assault because it makes sure consent is present.
Here's how it works: After deciding that you would like to have sex with someone, launch the Good2Go app (free on iTunes and Google Play), hand the phone off to your potential partner, and allow him or her to navigate the process to determine if he or she is ready and willing. "Are We Good2Go?" the first screen asks, prompting the partner to answer "No, Thanks," "Yes, but … we need to talk," or "I'm Good2Go." If the partner chooses door No. 1, a black screen pops up that reads "Remember! No means No! Only Yes means Yes, BUT can be changed to NO at anytime!" If he or she opts instead to have a conversation before deciding—imagine, verbally communicating with someone with whom you may imminently engage in sexual intercourse—the app pauses to allow both parties to discuss.There are approximately 8 million things wrong with this, and it's even worse than the rape "prevention" nail polish that came out a few weeks ago. At least the nail polish didn't actually give rapists a method to manufacture a record of consent.
If the partner—let's assume for the purposes of this blog post, partner is a she—indicates that she is "Good2Go," she's sent to a second screen that asks if she is "Sober," "Mildly Intoxicated," "Intoxicated but Good2Go," or "Pretty Wasted." If she chooses "Pretty Wasted," the app informs her that she "cannot consent" and she's instructed to return the phone back to its owner (and presumably, not have sex under any circumstances, young lady). All other choices lead to a third screen, which asks the partner if she is an existing Good2Go user or a new one. If she's a new user, she's prompted to enter her phone number and a password, confirm that she is 18 years old, and press submit. (Minors are out of luck—the app is only for consenting adults.) Then, she'll fill out a fourth prompt, which asks her to input a six-digit code that's just been texted to her own cellphone to verify her identity with that app. (Previous users can just type in their phone number—which serves as their Good2Go username—and password.) Once that level is complete, she returns the phone to its owner, who can view a message explaining the terms of the partner's consent. (For example, the "Partner is intoxicated but is Good2Go.") Then, the instigator presses a button marked "Ok," which reminds him again that yes can be changed to "NO at anytime!"
Good2Go guides users through a somewhat arduous process (I mean, if I was "totally wasted," I couldn't follow it) to determine if everyone is game for sexytimes and is more sober than drunk. If everyone is good to go, then they proceed to the sexytimes WITH A PERMANENT DATA POINT ABOUT THE CONSENT CREATED.
Rape isn't a misunderstanding about consent. Rapists don't rape because they aren't clear if their chosen victim wants to have sex or not. They don't actually care about consent. They want to dominate and control another person explicitly without consent. They don't forget to get consent, they don't misread the signals, etc. All of those excuses are made in the rape culture in which we live, and inherent to all of them is the belief that rape is about sexual desire and/or rapists are really nice guys who make mistakes.
Rapists who rape women do so because they want to rape women. Rapists who rape men do so because they want to rape men. Consent is irrelevant, until the rapist is in front of a judge... "Per the data from the kind folks at Good2Go, we can see that the witness consented to sexual intercourse at 6:47 PM on August 23rd. The defense rests."
Consent is a process, and isn't ever a done deal. Consent at 7 PM isn't consent at 11 PM. Consent for a kiss isn't consent for oral sex. Consent for one sex act isn't consent for another. This app structures consent as a contract, without options or process. Good2Go is like the worst sort of rape joke. It will embolden rapists and isolate and blame survivors.
The app we need is one that builds respect for women and girls as human beings and fosters empathy for survivors.
First Case of Ebola Diagnosed in US
[Content Note: Illness.]
Yesterday, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed that a man in Texas, currently a patient at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, has the Ebola virus, making his the first diagnosed Ebola case in the United States.
Officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Texas Department of State Health Services, Presbyterian Hospital and Dallas County Health and Human Services all participated in a Tuesday afternoon press conference. CDC Director Thomas Frieden related the information that the individual who tested positive had traveled to Liberia.So, two things to note: He did not contract the virus in the United States, and he was not symptomatic when traveling, so it is extremely unlikely he infected anyone else during his travels. Ebola is not airborne, nor is it passed via water supplies; one must come in contact with an infected person's body fluids in order to contract the virus.
The person left Liberia on September 19 and arrived in the United States on September 20 with no virus symptoms. Frieden said that it was four or five days later that the patient, who is believed to be male, began developing symptoms and was ultimately admitted to Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas on Sunday, September 28.
(Here is the CDC's Q&A page on Ebola.)
Because there is a possibility the man's family members may have contracted the virus, they will be monitored for symptoms for the next three weeks. Frieden says he has "no doubt that we'll stop this in its tracks in the US." Let's hope so.
The one concerning thing is that the man "first sought medical help on Friday, and was treated and sent home. Ebola was not recognized."
Frieden said the early symptoms of Ebola, like fever and nausea, can easily be mistaken for other illnesses. But he added that public health experts have for months been urging doctors and nurses to take a travel history on anyone who shows up with such symptoms and to be on the alert for Ebola in anyone who has been to Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone.I hope that this case will underscore to healthcare providers the importance of documenting patients' travel histories.
With worsening symptoms, the man sought care again on Sunday, and was then admitted to the hospital in Dallas and placed in isolation.
No Rules
[Content Note: War; terrorism; drones; death.]
Last year, President Obama announced new rules governing the use of drone strikes, which included a prohibition on the use of drone strikes unless there is a "near certainty" that the strike will result in zero civilian casualties. At the time, President Obama said it was "the highest standard we can meet."
And now that standard is being tossed out like so much garbage, because it's too difficult a standard to meet in our not-war with IS.
The White House has acknowledged for the first time that strict standards President Obama imposed last year to prevent civilian deaths from U.S. drone strikes will not apply to U.S. military operations in Syria and Iraq.Emphasis mine.
A White House statement to Yahoo News confirming the looser policy came in response to questions about reports that as many as a dozen civilians, including women and young children, were killed when a Tomahawk missile struck the village of Kafr Daryan in Syria's Idlib province on the morning of Sept. 23.
...[Caitlin Hayden, a spokesperson for the National Security Council] said that a much-publicized White House policy that President Obama announced last year barring U.S. drone strikes unless there is a "near certainty" there will be no civilian casualties — "the highest standard we can meet," he said at the time — does not cover the current U.S. airstrikes in Syria and Iraq.
The "near certainty" standard was intended to apply "only when we take direct action 'outside areas of active hostilities,' as we noted at the time," Hayden said in an email. "That description — outside areas of active hostilities — simply does not fit what we are seeing on the ground in Iraq and Syria right now."
Hayden added that U.S. military operations against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or ISIL) in Syria, "like all U.S. military operations, are being conducted consistently with the laws of armed conflict, proportionality and distinction."
Yesterday, after Britain's Royal Air Force delivered its first airstrikes against IS targets in Iraq, US Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes tweeted:
Is that more representative of proportionality or distinction, do you think?
This is what is happening: We have lifted guidelines that protect civilians, and we're publicly high-fiving other nations who are dropping bombs that may or may not kill civilians, under the auspices of making us safer, despite the fact that every single thing we know about drone campaigns demonstrably indicates that they make us less safe by serving as compelling recruitment tools for enemies of the US.
Which is to say nothing of the fact that we are claiming a right to make ourselves safe at a grave expense to the safety of other people.
President Obama's drone program and policy are shamefully cruel. And the Republican opposition, who reflexively and vehemently hate literally every single other thing this president does, are completely silent on this issue—because they're quite content to support warmongering.
The issue arose during last week's briefing for two House Foreign Affairs Committee members and two staffers when rebel leaders associated with factions of the Free Syria Army, including Abu Abdo Salabman, complained about the civilian deaths — and the fact that the targets were in territory controlled by the Nusra Front, a sometimes ally of the U.S.-backed rebels in its war with the Islamic State and the Syrian regime.Shrug. Proportionality. Distinction.
But at least one of the House members present, Rep. Adam Kinzinger, an Illinois Republican who supports stronger U.S. action in Syria, said he was not overly concerned. "I did hear them say there were civilian casualties, but I didn't get details," Kinzinger said in an interview with Yahoo News. "But nothing is perfect," and whatever civilian deaths resulted from the U.S. strikes are "much less than the brutality of the Assad regime."
Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker RachelB: "Is there a road not taken in your life that you think about, and what does it look like?"
Yikes Corner: "Gone Girl"
[Content Note: Antifeminist tropes; misogyny. This thread will contain major plot spoilers for the book, and possibly the film, Gone Girl.]
Does anyone want to discuss with me how much I hated this vile book? LOL. Because I hated it a whole bunch.
Anyone else?
There was a lot—A LOT—I hated about it, but what I hated most is its mockery of people who believe victims of abuse. That mockery is in every thread of its fabric, built right into its structure.
The author, Gillian Flynn, says feminism should allow for female villains (and I agree), but a female villain doesn't have to look like an MRA caricature of women.
Flynn says she's "grown quite weary of the spunky heroines [and] brave rape victims...that stock so many books." (Ahem.) And I understand what she's saying: Recognizing women's full humanity, even as fictional characters, means allowing them to be "wicked," too, but it's possible to write "wicked" female characters who aren't "wicked" in ways that play into existing antifeminist narratives.
As but one of many examples from the book: The female protagonist falsely accuses three different men of rape. Three.
The book has been called satire, or a dark comedic take on misogyny and/or patriarchy—or marriage (!!!)—but I'm not convinced it works as a commentary on these things, because it's entirely possible to read it "straight." That is, without any feminist critique, reading the female protagonist as the ultimate "psycho bitch" (actual words from the book) that many misogynists imagine every woman to be.
If a man who hated women, one of the men who harbors dark prejudices about the sinister motives of women to ensnare, to trap, to manipulate, to harm, to play the victim, to manipulate, to conquer, can read a story and close the cover on the last page with a grin of smug satisfaction that his every suspicion about what women are really like has been confirmed, I'm not sure that story has a reasonable claim to effective commentary.
Here is the trailer for the film version, now in theaters.
Nope
Matthew Yglesias: "7 reasons Indiana Governor Mike Pence will be the GOP nominee in 2016."
Melissa McEwan: 7 reasons Indiana Governor Mike Pence should not be the GOP nominee in 2016...
1. Nope. No. No to the hell to the no. No, no, no. I mean it. Really. No way. No how. Hell no. No. Nope. Nuh-uh. Nah. No the noth power. www.no.com. #nofuckingway. Not even the tiniest, infinitesimal, unfathomable modicum. Nopey nopey nope. Negatory. Nein. Nyet. Non. Nei. Naheen. Hell fuckin' no.
2.
"NOOOOOOO! God! No! God please no! No! No! NOOOOOOOOOO!"
3.
WTF?! NO!
4.
"No no no no no no no no no no no no no no."
5.
"Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"
6.
"What the fuck are you talking about?" NO.
7. No.
I rest my case, your honor.
Quote of the Day
[Content Note: Classism; racism.]
"I just wish city officials would go after racism with the same manic intensity as they are going after blight."—Peter Hammer, professor of law and director of the Damon J Keith Center for Civil Rights at Wayne State University, on Detroit's $1 billion blight removal project, which is demolishing abandoned buildings "at a speed of at least 200 houses a week."
Hammer's not suggesting that there is not a need for policy that includes blight removal, but that blight removal alone is not the comprehensive solution the city needs: "Racism is what got us into this mess, yet there is nothing in this blight removal report that deals with issues of race, or segregation, or discrimination, or white flight, which is the absolute root cause of why we have the issues of abandoned buildings and blight in Detroit in the first place."
I highly recommend reading the entire piece. It's really worth your time.
[H/T to my pals Ellen and Kathryn.]
Daily Dose of Cute
Pictures of Deeky's handsome cats, taken while I was visiting last weekend (and shared with Deeks' permission):
Potter
Jack
They are the sweetest boys, and I love them both to pieces. I don't know how it is that there are people who insist cats have no individual personalities. Potter and Jack are so different, and no one would mistake either of them for any of my girls. Although I am certain that Jack and Olivia, both so talkative and both such persistent wee beggars, are distant cousins, each of whom made their way to us by presenting themselves in the road.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
I Am from the No-Gun Culture and I Don't Speak Your Language
[Content Note: Guns.]
Via Atrios, I read this story about a restaurant in Louisiana that is offering a 10% discount to patrons who come in with their guns.
"I just need to see a weapon. I need you to be carrying a gun," says Bergeron's owner Kevin Cox.The first thing I think is the thing I have written before: I did not grow up in the gun culture, I am not comfortable in the gun culture, I do not feel safe around a lot of people with guns, and I really don't want to be in public spaces where there are a lot of guns. And yet I am constantly admonished to be tolerant of the gun culture, with zero reciprocal expectation that people who love guns respect that I don't share their enthusiasm.
That's right. The restaurant began offering a 10% discount a couple of weeks ago, for bringing in both your appetite and your gun.
"As long as everybody has a gun we're all the same size," says Cox.
And the second thing that I think is that Kevin Cox does not understand what it is like to be a marginalized person who lives under a persistent threat of real harm. Because if he did—if he really understood by way of lived experience what it is like to live in justifiable fear of likely harm, as opposed to living in conjured fear of inventing boogeymen to rationalize arming oneself as if weapons can stop the erosion of unearned privilege—he would know that being "all the same size" isn't really the issue.
Those of the words of a very privileged person whose closest experience to being obliged to sit with fear is having a bigger kid steal his lunch money.
If he'd lived a different kind of life, maybe he'd understand that the solution to real violence, to genuine existential threats, is not the capacity to commit more violence, but an urgency to diminish the things underwriting violence in the first place. Fear, hatred, need. Things to which guns are not an answer, and never will be.
