Monday, October 09, 2006
Get your Standard Internet Argument Form: here.
It's so easy! Just add ideologies and stir!
Person A: This is what demographic blahblah is like/says/does. And I have a problem with this, because blah blah blah.
Person B: I am a member of demographic blahblah, and i'm nothing like that, and neither are a lot of the people i know, and even wrt the ones you're closer to actually describing you're still not really getting it, have you talked to __? Have you read __?
Person A: (continues as though Person B hasn't spoken)
Person B: Um, hi. Standing right here?
Person A, or more likely sycophant of A: (wheels around and snaps): Stop trying to derail! You're (intellectually dishonest, really not who you say you are, trolling, missing A's point totally, totally offensive and way too sensitive and HELP HELP WE'RE BEING OPPRESSED hosts could you please ban).
Person B: (if sie hasn't already blown up and/or stalked off) Okay! Once more (deep breath) This is how it is -in my experience- --
Person A: (Argues with a point that Person B hasn't made at all)
Person B: Say wha?
Persons C, D, E, (perhaps just now tuning in, making up in enthusiasm what they lack in actual reading ability apparently), Well, A does have a point, because (something totally irrelevant)
Person B: No. NO. You're not HEARING me.
Person D: Well, I don't really agree with C about irrelevant thing, but say! i really like vanilla! Hey, what about that angle?
(enthusiastic murmurings)
Person B: AAAAARRRGHHH!!
A's Sycophant: See? SEE? Didn't I tell you all along?
Person B: Fuck OFF.
Person A: Well really: I bend over backward trying to be fair to you and this is how you respond? What're you mad at ME for? (rings down curtain on thread, continues, perhaps, in another):
Person A: And so we learn, dear readers, from the example of Person B, that (argument B didn't make) is incorrect because (something fatuous) and therefore, i was RIGHT about (demographic to which B belongs).
(enthusiastic approval from the peanut gallery)
(in the background, somewhere, Person B: :headdesk: :headdesk: :take the tablets, Tiger buddy:, more screaming, numbness, blackout).
Sunday, October 08, 2006
Your one-stop shop for Lesbian Herstory Re-Enactment
I have fallen in love. I need to go live here. Yes, live, I say. So what if it's completely imaginary? How is that different from any other nostalgia trip, hm? For that matter: what IS real?...oh, fuck that, it's far too late for that sort of existentialist crap (does this place have a Simone de Beauvoir exhibit? oh, right, John-Paul would probably keep her out of the 70's section at least).
ANYWAY:
SHIRLEY, NJ - With a mission to resurrect the days before lesbian chic, Curve magazine and The L Word, reenactment village, Ol’ Tyme Herstoryville, opened its gates last weekend to “teach these ‘grrrls,’ as they’re called, what it was like back in the day,” according to director, curator and property owner, Josephine Kinney.
Tourists at Ol’ Tyme Herstoryville’s 40 acre park, located in bucolic South Jersey, walked through various exhibits where costumed actors reenact the lives of lesbians of yesteryear.
A Radical Feminist Pot Luck is served at 11am and 3pm daily in a mock up of a 1960s New York City apartment. “We tried to schedule four shows a day, but the ‘men as oppressors’ discussion during the meal runs so damn long, we’re only doing two right now,” explained herstorian and associate curator, Vivian Vagin.
At the reenactment of a women’s collective, circa 1972, visitors are encouraged to interact with the unshaven cast by learning sandal-making and enjoying samples dishes in the communal kitchen, such as curry legume surprise, lentils over more lentils, and tempeh with tofu sauce.
Down a side street on the edge of the village, in the basement of a non-descript building, is a reconstructed women’s bar from the 1950s. Bulldykes dance to the strains of Connie Frances with dates decked out in authentic poodle skirts or crinoline dresses. “Maps to this exhibit are recommended and available at the main entrance,” said Vagin. “It’s really hard to find, if you don’t know where it is.” Police raids on the bar occur every hour, on the half hour...
...On the other side of the park, Kansas native Susan Hailey was less impressed by the authentic period dress at the “Lesbians of the Dustbowl” reenactment. “Maybe I don’t get it,” she said pointing to an actor in overalls and a flannel shirt, “I wore that yesterday.”
Tip o'th'cutlass to me hearty, Cap'n Dyke. Arr!
THANK YOU, Tekanji
...for finally putting the boot to the incredibly annoying term "choice feminism."
What I did not know: Linda Hirschman apparently coined the term:
Now, as for “choice feminism” let’s first look at the origins. Linda Hirshman — who I have criticized for her anti-feminist rhetoric — coined the term specifically to create this pretend group of feminists who she could then attack.
So, parallels to the term “feminazi”. Created with the intention of discrediting certain feminists? Check. Is a term that no feminist self-identifies as, but rather is designed to create a strawfeminist that can be used to attack anyone who disagrees? Check. The popularization of it is contributing to the bad rap that feminists get? Well, no hard evidence on that one, but I personally think so.
Not to mention that the terminology tars with a rather large brush — to those unfamiliar with the nuances of the word, it is all too likely that they’d assume that any feminist advocating free choice as a driving factor of feminism is part of this crazy “choice feminism” that so many feminists have been ragging on.
The bottom line is that we don’t need any more terms used to attack feminists by creating these imaginary groups that don’t really exist. We don’t need to give our opponents more fodder, or give non-feminists yet another reason to distance themselves from us. And we most certainly don’t need any more divisive tactics.
So, I’ll say it again, if you’re a feminist who uses “choice feminism” please drop it from your lexicon. You’ll be doing us all a big favor.
(n.b. I never used to much favor the term "anti-feminist" either, thinking it had a vaguely silly "Kryptonite" sort of sound, and could be--is, sometimes, i think--used to play "more feministier than thou" way too easily. still, after learning that people like Ann Bartow and even MICHELLE MALKIN are apparently considered "feminists" in some circles, i have reconsidered this stance).
Anyway, back to the topic at hand:
Like I say, I’d had no idea Hirschman coined it; i just always thought it was bloody stupid. What does this -mean?- I-feminism? Then call it that. Libertarian feminism? Call it that. Existentialist feminism? A who?
-crickets-
…yeah.
Or is it: “Feminism in which women not only make personal choices which i don’t approve of and/or make me uncomfortable for whatever reason, but apparently refuse to heap or even accept ‘bad feminist’ ashes and sackcloth on their heads for it! Maybe even freely cop to LIKING what they do! WITHOUT guilt, even!”
I mean, more seriously: if your argument is -truly- that there IS no such thing as choice, why even bother?
And if your argument is that there ARE choices but some choices are better than others, just frigging come right out and say it, you know? At least that way there’s something to work with.
What I did not know: Linda Hirschman apparently coined the term:
Now, as for “choice feminism” let’s first look at the origins. Linda Hirshman — who I have criticized for her anti-feminist rhetoric — coined the term specifically to create this pretend group of feminists who she could then attack.
So, parallels to the term “feminazi”. Created with the intention of discrediting certain feminists? Check. Is a term that no feminist self-identifies as, but rather is designed to create a strawfeminist that can be used to attack anyone who disagrees? Check. The popularization of it is contributing to the bad rap that feminists get? Well, no hard evidence on that one, but I personally think so.
Not to mention that the terminology tars with a rather large brush — to those unfamiliar with the nuances of the word, it is all too likely that they’d assume that any feminist advocating free choice as a driving factor of feminism is part of this crazy “choice feminism” that so many feminists have been ragging on.
The bottom line is that we don’t need any more terms used to attack feminists by creating these imaginary groups that don’t really exist. We don’t need to give our opponents more fodder, or give non-feminists yet another reason to distance themselves from us. And we most certainly don’t need any more divisive tactics.
So, I’ll say it again, if you’re a feminist who uses “choice feminism” please drop it from your lexicon. You’ll be doing us all a big favor.
(n.b. I never used to much favor the term "anti-feminist" either, thinking it had a vaguely silly "Kryptonite" sort of sound, and could be--is, sometimes, i think--used to play "more feministier than thou" way too easily. still, after learning that people like Ann Bartow and even MICHELLE MALKIN are apparently considered "feminists" in some circles, i have reconsidered this stance).
Anyway, back to the topic at hand:
Like I say, I’d had no idea Hirschman coined it; i just always thought it was bloody stupid. What does this -mean?- I-feminism? Then call it that. Libertarian feminism? Call it that. Existentialist feminism? A who?
-crickets-
…yeah.
Or is it: “Feminism in which women not only make personal choices which i don’t approve of and/or make me uncomfortable for whatever reason, but apparently refuse to heap or even accept ‘bad feminist’ ashes and sackcloth on their heads for it! Maybe even freely cop to LIKING what they do! WITHOUT guilt, even!”
I mean, more seriously: if your argument is -truly- that there IS no such thing as choice, why even bother?
And if your argument is that there ARE choices but some choices are better than others, just frigging come right out and say it, you know? At least that way there’s something to work with.
An observation.
Whole-wheat dessert muffins? Even in the guise of double-chocolate chip? Not a good idea.
Just sayin'.
An afterthought: These muffins? Also probably not a good idea.
But more fun.
Just sayin'.
An afterthought: These muffins? Also probably not a good idea.
But more fun.
Iranian women sentenced to death by stoning: take a stand
Via Eteraz.
Quick actions: sign two online petitions.
( On or about June 29, 2006, a court in the northwestern Iranian city of Urmia sentenced Malak Ghorbany, an Iranian woman, to death by public stoning after finding her guilty of the crime of “adultery.†Under Iran's Penal Code, the term "adultery" is used to describe any intimate or sexual act between a man and a girl or a woman outside of marriage. The crime of adultery is also used in cases where a girl is deemed to have committed "acts incompatible with chastity," which includes instances of rape. In Iran, the punishment for "adultery" is death. In Ms. Ghorbany’s case, the particular method of execution mandated – death by stoning -- is one of the most inhumane and gruesome acts of torture and violence.
On the day of her punishment, the Ms. Ghorbany’s hands will be tied behind her back as she becomes covered from head to toe in winding sheets and is placed seated in a pit. The pit is then filled up to her chest with dirt and the dirt is tamped down. At that point, members of the community are invited to murder her by hurling rocks at her. To ensure that the person condemned to stoning receives the absolute maximum amount of pain and torture, the Iranian government has even mandated the size of the stones that are to be used in this barbaric act of public execution. By law, no stone should be thrown that would kill Ms. Ghorbany with the first or second blow, or so small as a pebble to do no injury to her body...)
Further information on the case of Malak Ghorbany and the general practice here.
Go to Eteraz for the rest.
Quick actions: sign two online petitions.
( On or about June 29, 2006, a court in the northwestern Iranian city of Urmia sentenced Malak Ghorbany, an Iranian woman, to death by public stoning after finding her guilty of the crime of “adultery.†Under Iran's Penal Code, the term "adultery" is used to describe any intimate or sexual act between a man and a girl or a woman outside of marriage. The crime of adultery is also used in cases where a girl is deemed to have committed "acts incompatible with chastity," which includes instances of rape. In Iran, the punishment for "adultery" is death. In Ms. Ghorbany’s case, the particular method of execution mandated – death by stoning -- is one of the most inhumane and gruesome acts of torture and violence.
On the day of her punishment, the Ms. Ghorbany’s hands will be tied behind her back as she becomes covered from head to toe in winding sheets and is placed seated in a pit. The pit is then filled up to her chest with dirt and the dirt is tamped down. At that point, members of the community are invited to murder her by hurling rocks at her. To ensure that the person condemned to stoning receives the absolute maximum amount of pain and torture, the Iranian government has even mandated the size of the stones that are to be used in this barbaric act of public execution. By law, no stone should be thrown that would kill Ms. Ghorbany with the first or second blow, or so small as a pebble to do no injury to her body...)
Further information on the case of Malak Ghorbany and the general practice here.
Go to Eteraz for the rest.
Saturday, October 07, 2006
Quote of the day: 10/7/06
I was angry with my friend:
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.
And I watered it in fears
Night and morning with my tears,
And I sunned it with smiles
And with soft deceitful wiles.
And it grew both day and night,
Till it bore an apple bright,
And my foe beheld it shine,
And he knew that it was mine -
And into my garden stole
When the night had veiled the pole;
In the morning, glad, I see
My foe outstretched beneath the tree.
--William Blake
"Why Blacks & Whites Don't Dialog"
A couple of postings from about a month and a half ago, not particularly feminist-related, that feel apropos here.
First, the titular post from Michael David Cobb Bowen, writing "from the perspective of a moderate conservative Republican representing the 'Old School' of African American culture and values."
From the black side there is a very powerful disincentive, or taboo against, confiding in whitefolks about the presence of racism.
...There is a perception that people are going to be more white than people, 'when push comes to shove'. I don't think so, but our social intercourse has not matured in the mainstream these 50 years of integration, to the level at which black/other intimacy is generally tight enough to share these revelations. Whitefolks don't ever give up the front and fantasy that they could be 'the man'... Whitefolks don't ever admit their trash backgrounds and humble themselves around blackfolks. Blackfolks don't ever let their guard down and simply trust whitefolks in a carefree and easy way. And of course blacks are constantly reminded of how many people just don't get it. The risk, I think for most blackfolks is too great. I don't excuse it. It's something that we must get over and I know a lot of people are trying...now I'm hearing Mike's voice take over in my head about the kind of civility that we have to show each other,*constantly*. I think it's a little bit more than that on a personal level, it is a refusal to retreat. It's demonstrating somehow that an individual is never going to withdraw into their racial safety zone and ignore the 'others'. Is there too much racial injustice in America for each of us to make that promise? Perhaps. Is the ethos of colorblindness wrecking havoc with this potential intimacy? Absolutely. Is 'diversity & multiculturalism' a sort of retrenchment into the personal politics of difference? I think so.
So there are many barriers to overcome that mitigate against the potential for a sustained interracial conversation which settles terms and can focus political energy. But if I may use a jewish analogy, blackfolks want a divine kingdom on earth. We want the laws and the powers to defeat our enemies. We developed ourselves on our own and we want to be left alone. We don't believe this intimacy and friendship is the way to go. It's tedious, it's slow, and every friend is not a fellow warrior. Who knows that better than blacks who are not 100% African blooded but still disconnected from a certain half of their family? This is why the jewish provocation works, we understand the point of view of a jewish warrior. It's not so much a friendship as an alliance, and we don't have to keep investing in intimacy to know that the battle will still be engaged. I percieve that's where the friendship thing goes between blacks and whites. The whole drama over a racial incident and the black & white person look at each other with their mouths open "I thought you were my friend" says the white person. "I guess all I am to you is a friend" says the black. That's why blackfolks consistently say they'd rather deal with a redneck bigot, because at least he's honest and they always know where he's coming from.
[n.b. i snipped this part,
I think the notable exception to this is when Jews start the conversation in a particular way. If a nominally white person outs himself as a Jew, unprompted to a black person and talks about racism, I think a strong bridge is built.
because, well, curious. as a Jew, I'm intrigued by this; i wonder how many other people see it this way. it seems to me that this particular poster feels a certain affinity with the Jews; i have mixed feelings about this, because on the one hand, i tend to agree that there is, or can be/has been a historical connection there; and yet at the same time, there's often a profound disconnect, ime. at any rate i've certainly been disheartened by racism coming from My People on a number of occasions. That, and, well, i'm not entirely sure how much I relate to
"want a divine kingdom on earth. We want the laws and the powers to defeat our enemies. We developed ourselves on our own and we want to be left alone."
...i tend to suspect that this is perhaps more a certain kind of conservative ethos, possible with religious undertones, than anything else. but...anyway. onward:]
Temple3 responds
(from the bio: I sit at many crossroads today…between the OldSchool and the Nu; between Africa and America; and, between life and death (always). This walk is about Choice as much as it’s about Roots. )
“a very powerful disincentive…”
And what is that “powerful disincentive”? Well, James Baldwin edict still stands…to whom can you reveal your ‘constant state of rage’? Baldwin remarked that to be black and conscious in America is to be in a constant state of rage. (I haven’t been able to track down the specific source for the quote. Work for another time and place.)
And what is that constant state of rage about? What is it’s genesis and resolution? When you have no answers and are ill-equipped, you can take the path that Ms. McClain took in Chicago. You can take the path that Tookie Williams chose in LA. You can take the path of despair and hopelessness. Still…these choices are fundamentally the same in that each reflects a SUBMISSION to a dynamic that precedes and supercedes the power of individuals to transform.
Making a different set of choices and stepping out on faith is a two-way street. When black people are willing to confess two things: our constant stage of rage and our collective contingency (ie, relative powerlessness) the dialogue cannot ensue until white folks make a parallel confession - fear of reprisals (Thomas Jefferson said it three centuries ago) and knowledge of culpability (give up the “my ancestors did this” game because it’s as fake as a $3 bill). It’s one thing to dismiss slavery as ancient history…it’s quite another to dismiss your father’s union job in an all-white union which paid for your suburban home and public school and Berkeley/Stanford education. It’s absolutely different to ignore the many intergenerational non-compete agreements authored by white labor from 1865 through 1965. How did you come to have what you have? Do you want to know? Have you ever asked? Somethings may be better left unsaid. The truth shall make you free - or something like that.
These confessions, by the way are not forthcoming on the personal level because human beings would rather skirt the conflict of revelation and relate at a superficial level. If Americans are really honest with themselves, they’ll see this society really doesn’t have that capacity for self-reflection. I don’t know (through experience) of a nation that does - but the US does not.
American institutions (schools, media, government, businesses, etc.) have never dealt with the ugly truths in a systematic way. Compare the US treatment of slavery with the Post WWII treatment of the Nazi era in Germany. There is no comparison. The US continues to harbor, finance and sustain intellectuals, artists, ideologues and others who harbor sentiments directly derived from the outdated racialist doctrines. Many of these people are in influential policy circles and they operate with little scrutiny and tactical immunity.
With respect to our missed conversations, we say that we don’t have time for anything else. And the paradox is that people are spending more and more time having cell phone conversations about absolutely nothing. Real conversation comes with a price…intimacy, vulnerability and choice…after we disclose - we get to choose what new type of relationship we will have. And that won’t be easy either.
First, the titular post from Michael David Cobb Bowen, writing "from the perspective of a moderate conservative Republican representing the 'Old School' of African American culture and values."
From the black side there is a very powerful disincentive, or taboo against, confiding in whitefolks about the presence of racism.
...There is a perception that people are going to be more white than people, 'when push comes to shove'. I don't think so, but our social intercourse has not matured in the mainstream these 50 years of integration, to the level at which black/other intimacy is generally tight enough to share these revelations. Whitefolks don't ever give up the front and fantasy that they could be 'the man'... Whitefolks don't ever admit their trash backgrounds and humble themselves around blackfolks. Blackfolks don't ever let their guard down and simply trust whitefolks in a carefree and easy way. And of course blacks are constantly reminded of how many people just don't get it. The risk, I think for most blackfolks is too great. I don't excuse it. It's something that we must get over and I know a lot of people are trying...now I'm hearing Mike's voice take over in my head about the kind of civility that we have to show each other,*constantly*. I think it's a little bit more than that on a personal level, it is a refusal to retreat. It's demonstrating somehow that an individual is never going to withdraw into their racial safety zone and ignore the 'others'. Is there too much racial injustice in America for each of us to make that promise? Perhaps. Is the ethos of colorblindness wrecking havoc with this potential intimacy? Absolutely. Is 'diversity & multiculturalism' a sort of retrenchment into the personal politics of difference? I think so.
So there are many barriers to overcome that mitigate against the potential for a sustained interracial conversation which settles terms and can focus political energy. But if I may use a jewish analogy, blackfolks want a divine kingdom on earth. We want the laws and the powers to defeat our enemies. We developed ourselves on our own and we want to be left alone. We don't believe this intimacy and friendship is the way to go. It's tedious, it's slow, and every friend is not a fellow warrior. Who knows that better than blacks who are not 100% African blooded but still disconnected from a certain half of their family? This is why the jewish provocation works, we understand the point of view of a jewish warrior. It's not so much a friendship as an alliance, and we don't have to keep investing in intimacy to know that the battle will still be engaged. I percieve that's where the friendship thing goes between blacks and whites. The whole drama over a racial incident and the black & white person look at each other with their mouths open "I thought you were my friend" says the white person. "I guess all I am to you is a friend" says the black. That's why blackfolks consistently say they'd rather deal with a redneck bigot, because at least he's honest and they always know where he's coming from.
[n.b. i snipped this part,
I think the notable exception to this is when Jews start the conversation in a particular way. If a nominally white person outs himself as a Jew, unprompted to a black person and talks about racism, I think a strong bridge is built.
because, well, curious. as a Jew, I'm intrigued by this; i wonder how many other people see it this way. it seems to me that this particular poster feels a certain affinity with the Jews; i have mixed feelings about this, because on the one hand, i tend to agree that there is, or can be/has been a historical connection there; and yet at the same time, there's often a profound disconnect, ime. at any rate i've certainly been disheartened by racism coming from My People on a number of occasions. That, and, well, i'm not entirely sure how much I relate to
"want a divine kingdom on earth. We want the laws and the powers to defeat our enemies. We developed ourselves on our own and we want to be left alone."
...i tend to suspect that this is perhaps more a certain kind of conservative ethos, possible with religious undertones, than anything else. but...anyway. onward:]
Temple3 responds
(from the bio: I sit at many crossroads today…between the OldSchool and the Nu; between Africa and America; and, between life and death (always). This walk is about Choice as much as it’s about Roots. )
“a very powerful disincentive…”
And what is that “powerful disincentive”? Well, James Baldwin edict still stands…to whom can you reveal your ‘constant state of rage’? Baldwin remarked that to be black and conscious in America is to be in a constant state of rage. (I haven’t been able to track down the specific source for the quote. Work for another time and place.)
And what is that constant state of rage about? What is it’s genesis and resolution? When you have no answers and are ill-equipped, you can take the path that Ms. McClain took in Chicago. You can take the path that Tookie Williams chose in LA. You can take the path of despair and hopelessness. Still…these choices are fundamentally the same in that each reflects a SUBMISSION to a dynamic that precedes and supercedes the power of individuals to transform.
Making a different set of choices and stepping out on faith is a two-way street. When black people are willing to confess two things: our constant stage of rage and our collective contingency (ie, relative powerlessness) the dialogue cannot ensue until white folks make a parallel confession - fear of reprisals (Thomas Jefferson said it three centuries ago) and knowledge of culpability (give up the “my ancestors did this” game because it’s as fake as a $3 bill). It’s one thing to dismiss slavery as ancient history…it’s quite another to dismiss your father’s union job in an all-white union which paid for your suburban home and public school and Berkeley/Stanford education. It’s absolutely different to ignore the many intergenerational non-compete agreements authored by white labor from 1865 through 1965. How did you come to have what you have? Do you want to know? Have you ever asked? Somethings may be better left unsaid. The truth shall make you free - or something like that.
These confessions, by the way are not forthcoming on the personal level because human beings would rather skirt the conflict of revelation and relate at a superficial level. If Americans are really honest with themselves, they’ll see this society really doesn’t have that capacity for self-reflection. I don’t know (through experience) of a nation that does - but the US does not.
American institutions (schools, media, government, businesses, etc.) have never dealt with the ugly truths in a systematic way. Compare the US treatment of slavery with the Post WWII treatment of the Nazi era in Germany. There is no comparison. The US continues to harbor, finance and sustain intellectuals, artists, ideologues and others who harbor sentiments directly derived from the outdated racialist doctrines. Many of these people are in influential policy circles and they operate with little scrutiny and tactical immunity.
With respect to our missed conversations, we say that we don’t have time for anything else. And the paradox is that people are spending more and more time having cell phone conversations about absolutely nothing. Real conversation comes with a price…intimacy, vulnerability and choice…after we disclose - we get to choose what new type of relationship we will have. And that won’t be easy either.
A riff on the general theme of "what IS going through Some Peoples' heads, here?", among other things
Specifically in relation to what is rapidly becoming an overt theme (probably about time): frustration on the part of POC at "the silence of our [white, 'liberal/progressive'] friends."
I admit that the following may turn out to be an overly generous take, after alll; but i thought it was worth at least elucidating.
As I'm seeing it: well, yes, there is massive defensiveness going on (hello), and certainly it is related to hitherto unexamined white privilege (whatever you think of the term "privilege," okay; there is shit going on that a lot of people haven't really considered before, because they hadn't had to, is the gist, and it stings when other people point this out).
So why the defensiveness? Well, one answer is that people don't want to give up their privilege. And I'm not saying that that isn't going on. My question is: well, what does that really mean wrt yer average bleeding-heart liberal gone suddenly defensive? What's the privilege being asked to be given up, really; or what do people think is meant by this? And my tentative answer, in part, at least, was this:
(n.b. to a certain extent i think that this is also roughly applicable to, for example, "male privilege" in feminist discussions, "straight privilege" in liberal/progressive het-dominated discussions about gay rights, and a few other things. as always, it depends on context and what's actually being said. and class, i think, the following may not translate as well, as in that instance material privileges are very much on peoples' minds, the privileged that is, arguably more so than in the other instances. Anyway, without further ado):
(gah: italicized inserts are Donna's remarks, which i am responding to. NOW, without further ado):
******
As I've said elsewhere, I think the problem, or part of it, is that for way too many white people the understanding of "racism" begins and ends with something like this:
A.
1) Racists are terrible awful people who do not have blood running through their veins like you and I, but a sticky black ichor...
2) I am a Good Person
3) Therefore, I cannot be a racist.
4) Lather, rinse, repeat.
Corollary:
B.
1) There is no distinction between "that there statement/action was racist" and "the author of said statement/whatever IS racist"
2) Once tarred with the epithet "racist," one is forever Doomed To Badness
3) This includes "hey, when you say such and so, that has racist connotations, did you know? (see #1)
4) See A: Lather, rinse, repeat.
How one convinces people otherwise is of course another question. It seems like careful and clear explanations in Earthspeak don't make much of a dent, although of course it is sometimes hard to tell when dealing with large GROUPS of people as in these blog discussions (hence added frustration).
>I believe that some are willfully blind to white privilege, because the way to fight institutional racism means that whites must give up some of their advantages, affirmative action is one of these, hiring more minorities means there are less openings for whites.>
Ironically, as a side note, a lot of the same (white) women who make very similar sounding statements wrt defensive men (i.e. you just don't want to give up male privilege) just don't see this at all when it comes to the possibility of THEMSELVES being in the "oppressive majority" seat.
I have a slightly different take on the whole thing, although I certainly don't rule out the possibility of what you're saying wrt being reluctant to give up privilege. of course, if this is true, then it suggests a certain...consciousness of what one is saying and doing; i.e. deliberate disingenuousness. as i see it. just saying. again: in some cases it may well be true.
but: here's another possibility. (consider this "in addition to," not "instead of:")
When you say:
>A substantial subset of the white liberal audience simply does not want to listen to or deal with POC.>
...actually, I think an overwhelming majority of liberal folks--hell, people in general--don't want to hear anything they don't already know. Particularly if it means having to rearrange comfortable thought patterns. It may be as concrete as "fuck, then I might not get as good a job," but it doesn't have to be. And in fact, as I'm observing it, a lot of the most stridently defensive white liberals are probably FOR affirmative action (for example) (i would have to really do a more thorough study to confirm that hypothesis, i admit). But: there's no question that a lot of folks are terribly terribly anxious to not be -thought- racist.
When it comes to high-profile political climbers like Hamsher, I think it's probably safe to say that at least some of this supposed desire to be friendly toward "minorities" is pretty cynically calculated: yesyes, make the gestures toward "tolerance" and then get back to what's important, i.e. Winning as much goodie for Our Team as possible. and while Our Team might be able to make way for the occasional representative of color, frankly there just are only so many slots available, and, well, "we' need the rest of them. iow: not a terrifically democratic impulse, this, at best.
But for Joe Schmo on the Internets, well, yeah, there's a lot of confused defensiveness as the newfound liberal "thou shalt nots" struggle for dominance over long-ingrained habits of culturally & parentally ingested racism (among other things); but probably the reason Joe S. turned to liberalism in the first place was that Joe S. wanted to be "good." Did NOT want to be part of the greedy power-grabbing motherfuckers; count me out. Thus: diversity, tolerance, yadda: it may be a shallow understanding, but in many cases i do believe it's not just calculated lip service: it's just all they understand.
Here's the problem, though. Because of a number of factors which are probably too complex to really explore here (and i confess i really don't have the answers myself, although i think about this shit a lot lately), the way forward, the "consciousness raising," if you will, is largely understood to be a process of guilt-tripping, pretty much. That is, what is perhaps an inevitable byproduct ("oh, fuck, i belong to such and such a demographic; look what 'we've' done; goddam, we suck, and me too by extension") becomes elevated to the only possible way to go about...whatever it is, being a "good liberal," being an "ally," being whatever.
Trouble with that is, as much as people will tell themselves and each other that in fact a generous helping of guilt is GOOD for you, just suck it up, this is the way forward; truth is, nobody -really- likes feeling guilty/shamed. And the people who are the most strident proponents of "feel bad! this is the way forward!" are, ime, people who are, perhaps not consciously, of the opinion that in fact their work is pretty much finished. Iow: yeah, the consciousness raising was unpleasant, but thank God, it's over. Now my job is to help enlighten the rest of you unconscious folks.
So of course when someone comes along and goes, "um, actually? Not so fast there, bucko: you've never even considered THIS, have you?" then of COURSE they're gonna get hyper-defensive: fuck, i have to go through all that unpleasantness AGAIN?? i'm STILL a bad person instead of a bad person who made some amends? fuck that noise. no, the problem is YOU, clearly!
also of course: ego blow. "What do you MEAN there's shit I didn't already know or even consider? I am the very model of a well-enlightened liberal!"
particularly if it's coming from a source that isn't already trusted: many such folks will consider criticism of this sort more carefully if it comes from someone they already know don't think they're Bad People.
unfortunately, such people are likely to be the ones in their inner circle; the folks in their inner circle are quite likely to NOT be (for example) people of color, in large part because of the very structural/unconscious racism we are talking about (Bird of a Feather Flock Together); therefore, the criticism which comes from the POC "outsider" is gonna be treated as an ATTACK ATTACK ATTACK.
Later, rinse, repeat.
The way out of this, I maintain, is to maybe just let the fuck go of some of the endless self-flagellation, fun as it is for the whole family; and just cultivate more basic curiousity.
Because imo that is the OTHER root of the problem here: not nearly enough people are terribly -interested- in the people whose rights they supposedly want to protect. They may not wish them any ill; they may MEAN well; but, well, again: a lot of people don't want to know what they don't already know.
Because that is sort of existentially uncomfortable-making.
It's one thing to give up one's (concrete) privileges; some may be more defensive about that than others, sure. But it's yet something else to be willing to rearrange one's whole worldview; that experience is, well, profoundly unsettling, and most people don't care for it. and the people, as I've said, who are pretty well convinced that they've ALREADY DONE THAT (and particularly with the extra-unpleasant experience of "fuck, i just suck, then" added on), are probably gonna be even -less- likely to want to do this.
But, well, that's what has to be done, as a continual process; or nothing's gonna really change.
'Fraid so.
and the good news is, it -doesn't have to be so upsetting.-
It can actually be, well, kind of fun and exciting. Look! Something I had no idea about! Wow! New people! New ideas! New ways of doing shit! Oh, wow!
And while that basic curiousity is probably not enough in and of itself, it is, i would say, necessary, if not sufficient for genuine empathy; which in turn is necessary (if not sufficient) for genuine coalition-building, ally work, what you will; which in -its- turn is necessary-if-not-sufficient for, in Kevin of Slant Truth's words, "transformative politics."
That, to me, would be real "consciousness raising."
And is ultimately the goal of not just genuinely "progressive," (liberal, what you will) politics, but of, well, life. Frankly.
I admit that the following may turn out to be an overly generous take, after alll; but i thought it was worth at least elucidating.
As I'm seeing it: well, yes, there is massive defensiveness going on (hello), and certainly it is related to hitherto unexamined white privilege (whatever you think of the term "privilege," okay; there is shit going on that a lot of people haven't really considered before, because they hadn't had to, is the gist, and it stings when other people point this out).
So why the defensiveness? Well, one answer is that people don't want to give up their privilege. And I'm not saying that that isn't going on. My question is: well, what does that really mean wrt yer average bleeding-heart liberal gone suddenly defensive? What's the privilege being asked to be given up, really; or what do people think is meant by this? And my tentative answer, in part, at least, was this:
(n.b. to a certain extent i think that this is also roughly applicable to, for example, "male privilege" in feminist discussions, "straight privilege" in liberal/progressive het-dominated discussions about gay rights, and a few other things. as always, it depends on context and what's actually being said. and class, i think, the following may not translate as well, as in that instance material privileges are very much on peoples' minds, the privileged that is, arguably more so than in the other instances. Anyway, without further ado):
(gah: italicized inserts are Donna's remarks, which i am responding to. NOW, without further ado):
******
As I've said elsewhere, I think the problem, or part of it, is that for way too many white people the understanding of "racism" begins and ends with something like this:
A.
1) Racists are terrible awful people who do not have blood running through their veins like you and I, but a sticky black ichor...
2) I am a Good Person
3) Therefore, I cannot be a racist.
4) Lather, rinse, repeat.
Corollary:
B.
1) There is no distinction between "that there statement/action was racist" and "the author of said statement/whatever IS racist"
2) Once tarred with the epithet "racist," one is forever Doomed To Badness
3) This includes "hey, when you say such and so, that has racist connotations, did you know? (see #1)
4) See A: Lather, rinse, repeat.
How one convinces people otherwise is of course another question. It seems like careful and clear explanations in Earthspeak don't make much of a dent, although of course it is sometimes hard to tell when dealing with large GROUPS of people as in these blog discussions (hence added frustration).
>I believe that some are willfully blind to white privilege, because the way to fight institutional racism means that whites must give up some of their advantages, affirmative action is one of these, hiring more minorities means there are less openings for whites.>
Ironically, as a side note, a lot of the same (white) women who make very similar sounding statements wrt defensive men (i.e. you just don't want to give up male privilege) just don't see this at all when it comes to the possibility of THEMSELVES being in the "oppressive majority" seat.
I have a slightly different take on the whole thing, although I certainly don't rule out the possibility of what you're saying wrt being reluctant to give up privilege. of course, if this is true, then it suggests a certain...consciousness of what one is saying and doing; i.e. deliberate disingenuousness. as i see it. just saying. again: in some cases it may well be true.
but: here's another possibility. (consider this "in addition to," not "instead of:")
When you say:
>A substantial subset of the white liberal audience simply does not want to listen to or deal with POC.>
...actually, I think an overwhelming majority of liberal folks--hell, people in general--don't want to hear anything they don't already know. Particularly if it means having to rearrange comfortable thought patterns. It may be as concrete as "fuck, then I might not get as good a job," but it doesn't have to be. And in fact, as I'm observing it, a lot of the most stridently defensive white liberals are probably FOR affirmative action (for example) (i would have to really do a more thorough study to confirm that hypothesis, i admit). But: there's no question that a lot of folks are terribly terribly anxious to not be -thought- racist.
When it comes to high-profile political climbers like Hamsher, I think it's probably safe to say that at least some of this supposed desire to be friendly toward "minorities" is pretty cynically calculated: yesyes, make the gestures toward "tolerance" and then get back to what's important, i.e. Winning as much goodie for Our Team as possible. and while Our Team might be able to make way for the occasional representative of color, frankly there just are only so many slots available, and, well, "we' need the rest of them. iow: not a terrifically democratic impulse, this, at best.
But for Joe Schmo on the Internets, well, yeah, there's a lot of confused defensiveness as the newfound liberal "thou shalt nots" struggle for dominance over long-ingrained habits of culturally & parentally ingested racism (among other things); but probably the reason Joe S. turned to liberalism in the first place was that Joe S. wanted to be "good." Did NOT want to be part of the greedy power-grabbing motherfuckers; count me out. Thus: diversity, tolerance, yadda: it may be a shallow understanding, but in many cases i do believe it's not just calculated lip service: it's just all they understand.
Here's the problem, though. Because of a number of factors which are probably too complex to really explore here (and i confess i really don't have the answers myself, although i think about this shit a lot lately), the way forward, the "consciousness raising," if you will, is largely understood to be a process of guilt-tripping, pretty much. That is, what is perhaps an inevitable byproduct ("oh, fuck, i belong to such and such a demographic; look what 'we've' done; goddam, we suck, and me too by extension") becomes elevated to the only possible way to go about...whatever it is, being a "good liberal," being an "ally," being whatever.
Trouble with that is, as much as people will tell themselves and each other that in fact a generous helping of guilt is GOOD for you, just suck it up, this is the way forward; truth is, nobody -really- likes feeling guilty/shamed. And the people who are the most strident proponents of "feel bad! this is the way forward!" are, ime, people who are, perhaps not consciously, of the opinion that in fact their work is pretty much finished. Iow: yeah, the consciousness raising was unpleasant, but thank God, it's over. Now my job is to help enlighten the rest of you unconscious folks.
So of course when someone comes along and goes, "um, actually? Not so fast there, bucko: you've never even considered THIS, have you?" then of COURSE they're gonna get hyper-defensive: fuck, i have to go through all that unpleasantness AGAIN?? i'm STILL a bad person instead of a bad person who made some amends? fuck that noise. no, the problem is YOU, clearly!
also of course: ego blow. "What do you MEAN there's shit I didn't already know or even consider? I am the very model of a well-enlightened liberal!"
particularly if it's coming from a source that isn't already trusted: many such folks will consider criticism of this sort more carefully if it comes from someone they already know don't think they're Bad People.
unfortunately, such people are likely to be the ones in their inner circle; the folks in their inner circle are quite likely to NOT be (for example) people of color, in large part because of the very structural/unconscious racism we are talking about (Bird of a Feather Flock Together); therefore, the criticism which comes from the POC "outsider" is gonna be treated as an ATTACK ATTACK ATTACK.
Later, rinse, repeat.
The way out of this, I maintain, is to maybe just let the fuck go of some of the endless self-flagellation, fun as it is for the whole family; and just cultivate more basic curiousity.
Because imo that is the OTHER root of the problem here: not nearly enough people are terribly -interested- in the people whose rights they supposedly want to protect. They may not wish them any ill; they may MEAN well; but, well, again: a lot of people don't want to know what they don't already know.
Because that is sort of existentially uncomfortable-making.
It's one thing to give up one's (concrete) privileges; some may be more defensive about that than others, sure. But it's yet something else to be willing to rearrange one's whole worldview; that experience is, well, profoundly unsettling, and most people don't care for it. and the people, as I've said, who are pretty well convinced that they've ALREADY DONE THAT (and particularly with the extra-unpleasant experience of "fuck, i just suck, then" added on), are probably gonna be even -less- likely to want to do this.
But, well, that's what has to be done, as a continual process; or nothing's gonna really change.
'Fraid so.
and the good news is, it -doesn't have to be so upsetting.-
It can actually be, well, kind of fun and exciting. Look! Something I had no idea about! Wow! New people! New ideas! New ways of doing shit! Oh, wow!
And while that basic curiousity is probably not enough in and of itself, it is, i would say, necessary, if not sufficient for genuine empathy; which in turn is necessary (if not sufficient) for genuine coalition-building, ally work, what you will; which in -its- turn is necessary-if-not-sufficient for, in Kevin of Slant Truth's words, "transformative politics."
That, to me, would be real "consciousness raising."
And is ultimately the goal of not just genuinely "progressive," (liberal, what you will) politics, but of, well, life. Frankly.
Friday, October 06, 2006
"Sexual Violence and American Manhood"
...is the title of a recent library check-out, which i was motivated to crack open and start citing by a recent thread at Punkass Blog ("Rape spam leads to secret patriarchy handbook") gist of the original thread: "rape porn" on the Internets found, discovered, considered horrifying by most folks. some taking it a bit more literally than others, it would seem. This was part of my own attempt to maybe dig a bit deeper than "oh my god, that's just awful." The book's probably worth a more in-depth fisking, so: reposting here, perhaps will continue in later posts.
“A company of sociologists and psychologists–including Gary Brooks, Ronald Levant, David Lisak, Joseph Pleck, and William Pollack–analyze manhood as a socially conditioned role that possess built-in liabilities. Their work has shown that the traditional male role is traumatic for boys entering the process of socialization and entails humiliation and perplexity throughout a man’s life.
Boy babies, it turns out, are more emotionally expressive than girls; they show delight and irritation more readily, and they cry more. But boys are trained through systematic shaming and rebuffs to bottle up their distresses and joys, and by the age of six they are far more inhibited than their more emotionally confident sisters. The early attack on the emotional vitality of boys bequeaths a familiar set of troubles. Adult men find their intimate relationships blighted by emotional dilemmas they can scarcely discern in themselves. Afflicted by a craving for emotional comfort that is crosscut by resentment, they demand compensation in the here and now for the traumas of boyhood. (Levant, “Nonrelational,” 16,21)”
****
So to answer this comment at the original thread:
So how did nookie, beer, and flattery come to be considered “birthrights” in the first place? Did that happen by chance, or was it magic? Why do men who don’t feel oppressed feel entitled to women’s attention just as well? Your point that thwarted entitlement leads to feelings of powerlessness is well-taken, but where did that entitlement come from in the first place? [--junk science]
...“here and now” includes beer, babes, trampolines, and whatever else the culture wants to market, to market. On the whole we’re pretty good at selling “instant gratification;” and I don’t have to reiterate here how the male-directed marketing is influenced by sexism, misogyny, and alienation all toxically wrapped up with, yes, a sense of entitlement. (A good sociological-type example to flash back on: that stupid Burger King commercial “I Am Man” from not long ago. yep, lame, mocking the feminist movement, insulting to pretty much everyone…and at the end of the day it’s also just one damn more example of how “Have It Your Way” has been substituted in a lot of peoples’ minds for “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” without much fanfare or conscious registering of the bait and switch).
Herbert continues:
“The classic pattern of traditional manhood demands an impossible performance of self-reliance and self-command. Men test their manly mettle against other men, in which there are always more losers than winners; and even winners are subject to the uncontrollable mischances of living. American men are not exempted from the the tragic limitations and vulnerabilities of human experience generally, yet the code of masculine toughness requires denying their reality. It is impossible to maintain stoic compsure–to “take it like a man”–when distress is overwhelming, so that a compulsively self-reliant man refuses to believe that overwhelming distress can ever befall him. He cannot afford to acknowledge what everyman suffers: the contingencies of his economic fate, his need for intimate companionship, his exposure to illness, to emotional tumult, to accident and misfortunre. However strenuously banished from consciousness, these realities continue to exert pressure onhis psychic life.
…Sexual desire is among the subversive experiences that disconcert masculine self-command and thus menace masculine self-respect. Sexual yearnings place a man at another person’s disposal, subject to that person’s impulses and decisions. Michael Warner has noted that gay men become targets of phobic hatred not only because they desire other men but because they *desire*; same-sex preference calls attention to a disquieting fact, namely that they are sexual men. The politics of sexual shame trap heterosexual men as well, especially if their lives suggest a sexuality not wholly under voluntary command. (”Trouble,” 17-40)…Sexual intercourse also poses the prospect of interpersonal closeness, which…men perceive as a danger to their autonomy.
Students of contemporary masculinity have noted the prevalence of a “nonrelational” sexuality in which sexual intimacy is divorced from emotional intimacy. The “centerfold syndrome” is an example of this: men caught up in a persistent fantasy life that feeds on images of women with whom they will never exchange a word, while they feel sexually awkward with actual women who love them. Traditional manhood encourages men to be aggressive, moreover, and to funnel emotions of vulnerability and neediness into anger, and this syndrome can generate a sexuality in which coercion is routine (Brooks, “Centerfold,” Levant, “Nonrelational.”) Gary Brooks and L.. Silverstein argue that the “dark side of masculinity–including violence against women in the family, rape and sexual assault, sexual harassment in the workplace–is not a problem of aberrant men who have somehow failed to fulfill the conventional role. On the contrary, such pathologies represent hypermasculinity, the accentuation of traits entailed by manhood as traditionally defined.”
****
[In other words: not news to most people here, I expect, that last bit; and yet, slightly different framing.
Continuing:]
”The dominant American tradition of manhood visualizes a lone figure against a vast horizon, on horseback in the Wild West version [hello, Brokeback Mountain, anyone?], a myth that denies the interactive dramas that make us who we are and sustain us in the selfhoods by which we know each other and ourselves.
Groups in power take roles that require the disempowered to assume…subordinate postures that acknowledge and bolster the position of their superiors. **Yet the powerful are also required to sustain the existence that their place demands** [emphasis mine]. “Why can’t they live like white people?” a racist white woman once asked me about her white next-door neighbors, whose house and yard were unkempt. Men face similar imperatives to “be a man,” behind which lies a gender bigotry enforced against women [and gay folk, and other “deviants”].
…Pornographic fascination is not provoked exclusively by images in movies and magazines; it is widely accepted as a romantic ideal, and it gives form to living relationships. Code manhood produces pornographic marriages, Terrence Real notes, in which the woman’s compliance–whether voluntary or coerced–performs the man’s need…
[again, this bit: not news]
…Men who chronically batter and rape their wives further illustrate the syndrome in which men project the maladies of their own manhood into women. An abused wife is most acutely at risk when she seeks to terminate her relationship with the abuser, because this awakens the man’s deep-lying dread of abandonment. But, as Donald Dutton asserts, “the men need never frame the abandonment in terms of needing the woman and depending on her emotional support.” In order to preserve the illusion of their masculine self-sufficiency, such men **project their self-loathing onto their mates** [emphasis mine]. Dutton describes the resultant diatribe as “playing the bitch tape,” which invariably contains the same four words: bitch, cunt, whore, slut. The man’s stereotyped but unconscious self-hatred sets this tape running in his head, and it then comes to consciousness as a torrent of abuse aimed at his spouse. Unaware of his dependency on her because he is ashamed of it, and unaware of hating himself for his neediness, the man projects on her the “bitch, cunt, whore, slut” that he feels himself to be. Like Captain Ahab in his demoniac hatred of the white whale, the abusive husband believes that his hateful inner womanhood is visibly embodied and made tangibly assailable in his wife.”
–”Sexual Violence and American Manhood,” T. Walter Herbert
“A company of sociologists and psychologists–including Gary Brooks, Ronald Levant, David Lisak, Joseph Pleck, and William Pollack–analyze manhood as a socially conditioned role that possess built-in liabilities. Their work has shown that the traditional male role is traumatic for boys entering the process of socialization and entails humiliation and perplexity throughout a man’s life.
Boy babies, it turns out, are more emotionally expressive than girls; they show delight and irritation more readily, and they cry more. But boys are trained through systematic shaming and rebuffs to bottle up their distresses and joys, and by the age of six they are far more inhibited than their more emotionally confident sisters. The early attack on the emotional vitality of boys bequeaths a familiar set of troubles. Adult men find their intimate relationships blighted by emotional dilemmas they can scarcely discern in themselves. Afflicted by a craving for emotional comfort that is crosscut by resentment, they demand compensation in the here and now for the traumas of boyhood. (Levant, “Nonrelational,” 16,21)”
****
So to answer this comment at the original thread:
So how did nookie, beer, and flattery come to be considered “birthrights” in the first place? Did that happen by chance, or was it magic? Why do men who don’t feel oppressed feel entitled to women’s attention just as well? Your point that thwarted entitlement leads to feelings of powerlessness is well-taken, but where did that entitlement come from in the first place? [--junk science]
...“here and now” includes beer, babes, trampolines, and whatever else the culture wants to market, to market. On the whole we’re pretty good at selling “instant gratification;” and I don’t have to reiterate here how the male-directed marketing is influenced by sexism, misogyny, and alienation all toxically wrapped up with, yes, a sense of entitlement. (A good sociological-type example to flash back on: that stupid Burger King commercial “I Am Man” from not long ago. yep, lame, mocking the feminist movement, insulting to pretty much everyone…and at the end of the day it’s also just one damn more example of how “Have It Your Way” has been substituted in a lot of peoples’ minds for “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” without much fanfare or conscious registering of the bait and switch).
Herbert continues:
“The classic pattern of traditional manhood demands an impossible performance of self-reliance and self-command. Men test their manly mettle against other men, in which there are always more losers than winners; and even winners are subject to the uncontrollable mischances of living. American men are not exempted from the the tragic limitations and vulnerabilities of human experience generally, yet the code of masculine toughness requires denying their reality. It is impossible to maintain stoic compsure–to “take it like a man”–when distress is overwhelming, so that a compulsively self-reliant man refuses to believe that overwhelming distress can ever befall him. He cannot afford to acknowledge what everyman suffers: the contingencies of his economic fate, his need for intimate companionship, his exposure to illness, to emotional tumult, to accident and misfortunre. However strenuously banished from consciousness, these realities continue to exert pressure onhis psychic life.
…Sexual desire is among the subversive experiences that disconcert masculine self-command and thus menace masculine self-respect. Sexual yearnings place a man at another person’s disposal, subject to that person’s impulses and decisions. Michael Warner has noted that gay men become targets of phobic hatred not only because they desire other men but because they *desire*; same-sex preference calls attention to a disquieting fact, namely that they are sexual men. The politics of sexual shame trap heterosexual men as well, especially if their lives suggest a sexuality not wholly under voluntary command. (”Trouble,” 17-40)…Sexual intercourse also poses the prospect of interpersonal closeness, which…men perceive as a danger to their autonomy.
Students of contemporary masculinity have noted the prevalence of a “nonrelational” sexuality in which sexual intimacy is divorced from emotional intimacy. The “centerfold syndrome” is an example of this: men caught up in a persistent fantasy life that feeds on images of women with whom they will never exchange a word, while they feel sexually awkward with actual women who love them. Traditional manhood encourages men to be aggressive, moreover, and to funnel emotions of vulnerability and neediness into anger, and this syndrome can generate a sexuality in which coercion is routine (Brooks, “Centerfold,” Levant, “Nonrelational.”) Gary Brooks and L.. Silverstein argue that the “dark side of masculinity–including violence against women in the family, rape and sexual assault, sexual harassment in the workplace–is not a problem of aberrant men who have somehow failed to fulfill the conventional role. On the contrary, such pathologies represent hypermasculinity, the accentuation of traits entailed by manhood as traditionally defined.”
****
[In other words: not news to most people here, I expect, that last bit; and yet, slightly different framing.
Continuing:]
”The dominant American tradition of manhood visualizes a lone figure against a vast horizon, on horseback in the Wild West version [hello, Brokeback Mountain, anyone?], a myth that denies the interactive dramas that make us who we are and sustain us in the selfhoods by which we know each other and ourselves.
Groups in power take roles that require the disempowered to assume…subordinate postures that acknowledge and bolster the position of their superiors. **Yet the powerful are also required to sustain the existence that their place demands** [emphasis mine]. “Why can’t they live like white people?” a racist white woman once asked me about her white next-door neighbors, whose house and yard were unkempt. Men face similar imperatives to “be a man,” behind which lies a gender bigotry enforced against women [and gay folk, and other “deviants”].
…Pornographic fascination is not provoked exclusively by images in movies and magazines; it is widely accepted as a romantic ideal, and it gives form to living relationships. Code manhood produces pornographic marriages, Terrence Real notes, in which the woman’s compliance–whether voluntary or coerced–performs the man’s need…
[again, this bit: not news]
…Men who chronically batter and rape their wives further illustrate the syndrome in which men project the maladies of their own manhood into women. An abused wife is most acutely at risk when she seeks to terminate her relationship with the abuser, because this awakens the man’s deep-lying dread of abandonment. But, as Donald Dutton asserts, “the men need never frame the abandonment in terms of needing the woman and depending on her emotional support.” In order to preserve the illusion of their masculine self-sufficiency, such men **project their self-loathing onto their mates** [emphasis mine]. Dutton describes the resultant diatribe as “playing the bitch tape,” which invariably contains the same four words: bitch, cunt, whore, slut. The man’s stereotyped but unconscious self-hatred sets this tape running in his head, and it then comes to consciousness as a torrent of abuse aimed at his spouse. Unaware of his dependency on her because he is ashamed of it, and unaware of hating himself for his neediness, the man projects on her the “bitch, cunt, whore, slut” that he feels himself to be. Like Captain Ahab in his demoniac hatred of the white whale, the abusive husband believes that his hateful inner womanhood is visibly embodied and made tangibly assailable in his wife.”
–”Sexual Violence and American Manhood,” T. Walter Herbert
Five from feminism
...via Feministe
(thanks, zuzu)
1) Unlike my mother, I was not subjected to "When your baby's crying, it won't matter whether you got A's or B's."
2) I can at least openly talk about and express my erotic attraction to women (yes, thank Gay Rights for this too, but to me they are inextricably interconnected)
3) Voting is a good thing too, yes, much as too many of us (wimmin and otherwise) -and- our supposed representatives have been taking that right far too much for granted lately.
4) I don't have to wear layers and layers of cumbersome, heavy, floor-length skirts, no matter what the weather.
5) Although I don't personally make use of it, I know that birth control is readily available to me. (and I keep in mind that that is something to not take for granted even, especially now).
I tag:
Bitch Lab (ooh, you just love me for this), Jean of You Are Here, antiprincess of I Shame the Matriarchy, Aishwarya of Kaleidoglide, Nappy As I Want To Be, petitpoussin, dykotomy, The Angry Black Woman, Winter of Desperate Kingdoms, Badgerbag, Jack at Angry Brown Butch, prospheros, Dan at Otter Ponderings, Whitters at Polyester Bride, zwrk at Placeholder, scenius of Sexual Ambiguities, Red Frique of Getting My Frique On, Sarah at Diary of Barbie's Worst Enemy, White Bear of Is There No Sin In It? the fine folks at Stroppyblog, zan of Butterfly Cauldron, evil fizz, the women of Medusa Coils,, Midwestern Transport, Rab of Brown Rab Girl Fish, EL of My Amusement Park, Damion of Queering the Apparatus, Noli Irritare Leones and Lady Aster.
...and anyone else I've missed and/or who has a mind to.
i am: decisively indecisive this morning.
(thanks, zuzu)
1) Unlike my mother, I was not subjected to "When your baby's crying, it won't matter whether you got A's or B's."
2) I can at least openly talk about and express my erotic attraction to women (yes, thank Gay Rights for this too, but to me they are inextricably interconnected)
3) Voting is a good thing too, yes, much as too many of us (wimmin and otherwise) -and- our supposed representatives have been taking that right far too much for granted lately.
4) I don't have to wear layers and layers of cumbersome, heavy, floor-length skirts, no matter what the weather.
5) Although I don't personally make use of it, I know that birth control is readily available to me. (and I keep in mind that that is something to not take for granted even, especially now).
I tag:
Bitch Lab (ooh, you just love me for this), Jean of You Are Here, antiprincess of I Shame the Matriarchy, Aishwarya of Kaleidoglide, Nappy As I Want To Be, petitpoussin, dykotomy, The Angry Black Woman, Winter of Desperate Kingdoms, Badgerbag, Jack at Angry Brown Butch, prospheros, Dan at Otter Ponderings, Whitters at Polyester Bride, zwrk at Placeholder, scenius of Sexual Ambiguities, Red Frique of Getting My Frique On, Sarah at Diary of Barbie's Worst Enemy, White Bear of Is There No Sin In It? the fine folks at Stroppyblog, zan of Butterfly Cauldron, evil fizz, the women of Medusa Coils,, Midwestern Transport, Rab of Brown Rab Girl Fish, EL of My Amusement Park, Damion of Queering the Apparatus, Noli Irritare Leones and Lady Aster.
...and anyone else I've missed and/or who has a mind to.
i am: decisively indecisive this morning.
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Quote of the day, 10/6/06
BELIZE: (Has had enough; very fierce) Watch. Yourself.
You don't talk to me that way when I'm holding something this sharp. Or I might slip and stick it in your heart. If you have a heart.
ROY: Oh I do. Tough little muscle. Never bleeds.
BELIZE: I'll bet.
Now I've been doing drips a long time. I can slip this in so easy you'll think you were born with it. Or I can make it feel like I just hooked you up to a bag of Liquid Drano. So you be nice to me or you're going to be one sorry asshole come morning.
--Tony Kushner, "Angels in America: Perestroika"
You don't talk to me that way when I'm holding something this sharp. Or I might slip and stick it in your heart. If you have a heart.
ROY: Oh I do. Tough little muscle. Never bleeds.
BELIZE: I'll bet.
Now I've been doing drips a long time. I can slip this in so easy you'll think you were born with it. Or I can make it feel like I just hooked you up to a bag of Liquid Drano. So you be nice to me or you're going to be one sorry asshole come morning.
--Tony Kushner, "Angels in America: Perestroika"
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Open Letter to Democrats in Congress
I was going to write my own, but Bloggers Against Torture actually said it all much better and more succinctly and frankly with a lot less swearing than I would have. As of this reposting, not the original one, it's a week late and a dollar short, but that's hardly BAT's fault. No, it's the Democrats, and pretty much everyone else, who are late, and short. And still don't get it.
Anyway, without further ado, here is the letter that the minority of D's who voted to support "Torture, yay! Constitution -and- 800-year Rule of Law, boo! (or, at best, 'huh?')" AND all of the Republicans (as in, all but one and a half, pretty much) who voted for it and still call themselves "Americans," AND the Democrats who did not vote for it but have promptly gone right back into, "gee, that sucks, well, nothing more we can do right now, send money! did we mention send money? we can't beat them unless you send us money! And as you know BEATING THEM is the number one priority! we can do it! we're almost there! we really really mean it this time! ooh, look, shiny Republican sex scandal!" AND the media that's going, "journalistic responsibility? what's that? look, shiny sex scandal! look, shiny celebrity 'scandal!'" AND the high-profile bloggers who are doing a fine job of recreating the "sellout, Republican Lite" milieu they claim to have set themselves up in opposition to, AND the vast majority of people who simply have no idea that any of this is going on: THIS IS WHAT YOU NEEDED TO HAVE READ, OKAY, AND THIS IS WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW NOW:
Open Letter
Dear Democrats,
This is going to be the most important week of your careers. You, and you alone carry the burden of determining whether or not our country retains its moral authority. The Republicans have already cast their lot with legislation that will allow several methods of torture that, although they violate Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, will be permitted by the current administration.
Our nation was founded on the premise that there's "liberty and justice for all." The United States I grew up in stands for the protection of human rights. This legislation will not only allow torture, but in the future could put our armed forces at risk. How would you feel if a country that held our troops as prisoners of war used our new guidelines as a basis to use torture methods against them? I hope you think about that because that is what you're also voting for this week.
It is not enough for you to vote no on this legislation. Now is the time to take a public stance on this issue. Your constituents will judge you by what you do this week. If you choose to filibuster this measure and/or tell the American public that the Bush administration is steering the country away from its moral compass, we will see that Barbara Boxer isn't the only Democrat with a backbone. If you continue to hide behind John McCain's pant leg like a timid four-year-old and allow him to speak for you, then you will be seen as weak, incompetent and complicit in the war crimes the Bush administration and its subordinates have already committed in our country's name in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guantanamo Bay.
So before cat killer Bill Frist or another high-ranking member of the GOP drags you down a Capitol Hill stairwell by your hair, throws you into a darkened meeting room and waterboards you until you either drown or give them your vote, do the right thing and say no to torture.
Sincerely,
El Mas Chingón
******
Well, all still true except for the grammar tense. It's now not "going to be;" it's "already happened."
And all week, what have I been getting in my email in-box from you lot? Outrage about this, what many are calling the effective end of our democracy as we know it? Much less god forbid some intimation that something might possibly be DONE to even BEGIN to address this gross violation of everything we supposedly stand for, this possible introduction to the END OF THE WHOLE SORRY POLITICAL PROCESS AS WE KNOW IT, INCLUDING YOU AND YOUR CRAPTASTIC CAMPAIGN EFFORTS? Hell no. "Send more money." "Sign the petition" about this isolated issue or that. Many having to do with Foley and the intern, ooh, goodie goodie, now we can REALLY let them have it. HELLO. Yes, that's really gross and in another time I'd be all over your being all over their ass for that, trumped up outrage and all, I'm as cynical as the next political junkie, but HELLO, can we focus here for just a minute? Do you understand what you just let happen? Yeah, I said LET HAPPEN. YOU. Goddamit. What the fuck is WRONG with you? Jesus Hannah Christ on a jumped-up pogo stick, what does it TAKE??
...oh, right. MORE MONEY. MORE SUPPORT. MORE ACTIVISM on behalf of the PARTY. MORE just grinning and bearing it and doing our best to pretend that "we" (what do you mean "we," white man? as Tonto said to the Lone Ranger) have a mandate or even can organize "our" way out of a grease-proof paper bag. There's nothing you can do until you're back in the majority. And the election's less than four weeks away: eyes on the prize, people! Eyes on the prize!! It'll be different this time, we swear!
O.K. Well, I sure hope so. I'll be over here, okay.
Because you know what, I bought it, more or less, back in '00 and '02 and '04. And all the times in between: the Ashcroft nomination, which you didn't stop. The war in Iraq, which you didn't stop. The Patriot Act, which passed through your chambers like a handful of Olestra potato chips. But particularly '04. I'm still kind of recovering from that one, tell you the truth.
But yeah, you've got us over a barrel, pretty much. You're the lesser of two fucking evils; you've got your style down and by God you're working it. "Vote for us; we're marginally less likely to fuck you over, at least of our own volition. And sometimes we're sorry about it after we do fuck you over."
Terrific.
I mean, I simply can't understand why some of your base is responding with tepidness and cynicism. Can you?
and oh, yeah, the "third party" options, such as they are, are sort of like you only magnified to the 50th power, in terms of ineffectuality and corruption and infighting and overall lameness. Thank God.
Well, here's the deal. I'll probably still be voting for your sorry asses come November. Sure. But if I were you?
I wouldn't count on it. And I certainly wouldn't count on as many people as y'all seem to be taking for granted.
Because we can't count on you, see.
And by God, if i get ONE more solicitation for money...
You know what: I can't help you. I just can't. I'm a bit concerned about my own dwindling resources, see, and I can't say I'm exactly bursting with confidence over the economy any more than, well, any goddam thing else.
and besides, honestly? I can't buy you a spine. Not if I had Bill Gates' money. You kind of have to grow that yourself.
and if you're one of the ones who sold your soul: guess what, sugar, if all you got for it was a mess of pottage, well, don't look at ME to make up the difference; it's not MY fault you didn't get market value.
Or maybe you did, at that.
Eh. I'm tired.
Anyway, without further ado, here is the letter that the minority of D's who voted to support "Torture, yay! Constitution -and- 800-year Rule of Law, boo! (or, at best, 'huh?')" AND all of the Republicans (as in, all but one and a half, pretty much) who voted for it and still call themselves "Americans," AND the Democrats who did not vote for it but have promptly gone right back into, "gee, that sucks, well, nothing more we can do right now, send money! did we mention send money? we can't beat them unless you send us money! And as you know BEATING THEM is the number one priority! we can do it! we're almost there! we really really mean it this time! ooh, look, shiny Republican sex scandal!" AND the media that's going, "journalistic responsibility? what's that? look, shiny sex scandal! look, shiny celebrity 'scandal!'" AND the high-profile bloggers who are doing a fine job of recreating the "sellout, Republican Lite" milieu they claim to have set themselves up in opposition to, AND the vast majority of people who simply have no idea that any of this is going on: THIS IS WHAT YOU NEEDED TO HAVE READ, OKAY, AND THIS IS WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW NOW:
Open Letter
Dear Democrats,
This is going to be the most important week of your careers. You, and you alone carry the burden of determining whether or not our country retains its moral authority. The Republicans have already cast their lot with legislation that will allow several methods of torture that, although they violate Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, will be permitted by the current administration.
Our nation was founded on the premise that there's "liberty and justice for all." The United States I grew up in stands for the protection of human rights. This legislation will not only allow torture, but in the future could put our armed forces at risk. How would you feel if a country that held our troops as prisoners of war used our new guidelines as a basis to use torture methods against them? I hope you think about that because that is what you're also voting for this week.
It is not enough for you to vote no on this legislation. Now is the time to take a public stance on this issue. Your constituents will judge you by what you do this week. If you choose to filibuster this measure and/or tell the American public that the Bush administration is steering the country away from its moral compass, we will see that Barbara Boxer isn't the only Democrat with a backbone. If you continue to hide behind John McCain's pant leg like a timid four-year-old and allow him to speak for you, then you will be seen as weak, incompetent and complicit in the war crimes the Bush administration and its subordinates have already committed in our country's name in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guantanamo Bay.
So before cat killer Bill Frist or another high-ranking member of the GOP drags you down a Capitol Hill stairwell by your hair, throws you into a darkened meeting room and waterboards you until you either drown or give them your vote, do the right thing and say no to torture.
Sincerely,
El Mas Chingón
******
Well, all still true except for the grammar tense. It's now not "going to be;" it's "already happened."
And all week, what have I been getting in my email in-box from you lot? Outrage about this, what many are calling the effective end of our democracy as we know it? Much less god forbid some intimation that something might possibly be DONE to even BEGIN to address this gross violation of everything we supposedly stand for, this possible introduction to the END OF THE WHOLE SORRY POLITICAL PROCESS AS WE KNOW IT, INCLUDING YOU AND YOUR CRAPTASTIC CAMPAIGN EFFORTS? Hell no. "Send more money." "Sign the petition" about this isolated issue or that. Many having to do with Foley and the intern, ooh, goodie goodie, now we can REALLY let them have it. HELLO. Yes, that's really gross and in another time I'd be all over your being all over their ass for that, trumped up outrage and all, I'm as cynical as the next political junkie, but HELLO, can we focus here for just a minute? Do you understand what you just let happen? Yeah, I said LET HAPPEN. YOU. Goddamit. What the fuck is WRONG with you? Jesus Hannah Christ on a jumped-up pogo stick, what does it TAKE??
...oh, right. MORE MONEY. MORE SUPPORT. MORE ACTIVISM on behalf of the PARTY. MORE just grinning and bearing it and doing our best to pretend that "we" (what do you mean "we," white man? as Tonto said to the Lone Ranger) have a mandate or even can organize "our" way out of a grease-proof paper bag. There's nothing you can do until you're back in the majority. And the election's less than four weeks away: eyes on the prize, people! Eyes on the prize!! It'll be different this time, we swear!
O.K. Well, I sure hope so. I'll be over here, okay.
Because you know what, I bought it, more or less, back in '00 and '02 and '04. And all the times in between: the Ashcroft nomination, which you didn't stop. The war in Iraq, which you didn't stop. The Patriot Act, which passed through your chambers like a handful of Olestra potato chips. But particularly '04. I'm still kind of recovering from that one, tell you the truth.
But yeah, you've got us over a barrel, pretty much. You're the lesser of two fucking evils; you've got your style down and by God you're working it. "Vote for us; we're marginally less likely to fuck you over, at least of our own volition. And sometimes we're sorry about it after we do fuck you over."
Terrific.
I mean, I simply can't understand why some of your base is responding with tepidness and cynicism. Can you?
and oh, yeah, the "third party" options, such as they are, are sort of like you only magnified to the 50th power, in terms of ineffectuality and corruption and infighting and overall lameness. Thank God.
Well, here's the deal. I'll probably still be voting for your sorry asses come November. Sure. But if I were you?
I wouldn't count on it. And I certainly wouldn't count on as many people as y'all seem to be taking for granted.
Because we can't count on you, see.
And by God, if i get ONE more solicitation for money...
You know what: I can't help you. I just can't. I'm a bit concerned about my own dwindling resources, see, and I can't say I'm exactly bursting with confidence over the economy any more than, well, any goddam thing else.
and besides, honestly? I can't buy you a spine. Not if I had Bill Gates' money. You kind of have to grow that yourself.
and if you're one of the ones who sold your soul: guess what, sugar, if all you got for it was a mess of pottage, well, don't look at ME to make up the difference; it's not MY fault you didn't get market value.
Or maybe you did, at that.
Eh. I'm tired.
O SWEET JESUS MARY AND JOSEPH THE CARPENTER FROM BROOKLYN HEIGHTS
Why, God?
Cat poking around behind my (open! it was OPEN!!!) briefcase sitting on the floor, where it's been collecting dust, in a corner. "Aw, kitty, whatcha got, huh--"
What, indeed.
Speaking of Kill it! KILL IT!!!!
BIGGEST GODDAM MOTHERFUCKING ROACH I HAVE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE
certainly the biggest one i have ever seen indoors
in MY apartment.
which has had mice at one point but thank fuck, i had thanked fuck, never seemed to get any but the occasional baby-to-medium sized roach.
AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
I had to drop a bag of books on it, and the goddam antenna were STILL twitching, and and then...of COURSE i'm out of paper towels and have to resort to KLEENEX, and...
i'm still traumatized
help me please
Cat poking around behind my (open! it was OPEN!!!) briefcase sitting on the floor, where it's been collecting dust, in a corner. "Aw, kitty, whatcha got, huh--"
What, indeed.
Speaking of Kill it! KILL IT!!!!
BIGGEST GODDAM MOTHERFUCKING ROACH I HAVE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE
certainly the biggest one i have ever seen indoors
in MY apartment.
which has had mice at one point but thank fuck, i had thanked fuck, never seemed to get any but the occasional baby-to-medium sized roach.
AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
I had to drop a bag of books on it, and the goddam antenna were STILL twitching, and and then...of COURSE i'm out of paper towels and have to resort to KLEENEX, and...
i'm still traumatized
help me please
Quote of the day, 10/3/06
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
--Margaret Mead
--Margaret Mead
(B)right on.
Susie Bright connects the Foley pedo-scandal to the much less sexy but oh-so-much-more-damaging to so many more over the long haul evisceration of habeas corpus (who? what? huh? RULE OF LAW, clowns). Sum result: big wide deep disgust. Surprise.
I fully expect that men like Foley, who scream about the pornographic dangers of the Web, are likely the most narcissistic predators in town. Foley wouldn't know a moral code if it fell on top of him. He's part of a very select club.
But here's my NEW unexpected reaction:
All things considered, I don't give a shit about this.
I'm rather devastated on another front. Our Congress passed bills this past week that dismantle habeas corpus, that legalize torture and free-for-all wiretapping. The emperor's new edicts target anyone, including citizens, who might have a bad hair day in the President's almighty estimation.
This is that same club-- with their teeth bared, instead of their drawers down. As blogger Ian MacLeod puts it, "The Rule of Law is dead in America."
Yet this new regime is apparently a big yawn with the American public. Snooze on, Victoria. Everyone who watches TV knows all about Foley's boxer shorts, but the loss of one's right to privacy, or a jury trial, doesn't seem to make anyone's dick hard.
That odd select few, the voting crew who put this club in office, are so precious that they don't believe that tewworist-related nastiness will ever happen to them. George Bush wouldn't dare waterboard anyone in YOUR family! Terrorists are easy to spot because they incite hysterical racist feelings you can't control!
...Foley is gross, and resignation is too good for him-- but the reason he disgusts is his politics, his ethical vacuum. It's not that he's gay, or thinks hard-bodied young athletes are hot. I'd love to Gitmo him and any of his brethren at dawn, but don't give me this pedo-titillation crap like that's what I'm supposed to care about.
Some activists are pressing hard on the "Foley Child Molestor" talking points because they believe this kind of salacious description is what it will take to win points in the next election.
Turning red to blue is going to save the day, right? A slight adjustment will be all it takes, and then all those Dems who voted for the homeland-uber-alles, leave-no-child-unmolested crap are going to get on their knees and beg for forgiveness and democracy, right?
That pinned hope is more self-deluded than Mark Foley ever was.
I fully expect that men like Foley, who scream about the pornographic dangers of the Web, are likely the most narcissistic predators in town. Foley wouldn't know a moral code if it fell on top of him. He's part of a very select club.
But here's my NEW unexpected reaction:
All things considered, I don't give a shit about this.
I'm rather devastated on another front. Our Congress passed bills this past week that dismantle habeas corpus, that legalize torture and free-for-all wiretapping. The emperor's new edicts target anyone, including citizens, who might have a bad hair day in the President's almighty estimation.
This is that same club-- with their teeth bared, instead of their drawers down. As blogger Ian MacLeod puts it, "The Rule of Law is dead in America."
Yet this new regime is apparently a big yawn with the American public. Snooze on, Victoria. Everyone who watches TV knows all about Foley's boxer shorts, but the loss of one's right to privacy, or a jury trial, doesn't seem to make anyone's dick hard.
That odd select few, the voting crew who put this club in office, are so precious that they don't believe that tewworist-related nastiness will ever happen to them. George Bush wouldn't dare waterboard anyone in YOUR family! Terrorists are easy to spot because they incite hysterical racist feelings you can't control!
...Foley is gross, and resignation is too good for him-- but the reason he disgusts is his politics, his ethical vacuum. It's not that he's gay, or thinks hard-bodied young athletes are hot. I'd love to Gitmo him and any of his brethren at dawn, but don't give me this pedo-titillation crap like that's what I'm supposed to care about.
Some activists are pressing hard on the "Foley Child Molestor" talking points because they believe this kind of salacious description is what it will take to win points in the next election.
Turning red to blue is going to save the day, right? A slight adjustment will be all it takes, and then all those Dems who voted for the homeland-uber-alles, leave-no-child-unmolested crap are going to get on their knees and beg for forgiveness and democracy, right?
That pinned hope is more self-deluded than Mark Foley ever was.
Monday, October 02, 2006
Thanks, I needed that.
Via a comment at I Shame the Matriarchy: thanks, Kristin.
As a mom, I get it. Truly, I hear you. Having seen other parts of the world that are in better or worse shape than we are, I hear you. And being fed the fuck up, sad, sorry and disillusioned, I still hear you. But there is no way on God's green earth I am ever going to give up on the people I see here. We have come too far. We have managed more since this country's inception than almost any other country on the globe by way of revolution, reform, advance and political change. Very little of this was at the hands of the government. It came from the demands and persistence of the people to see these bills enacted, to change the way we are regarded, to get something better for ourselves. You are exactly the kind of person that's needed because you're willing to say FUCK NO. Give that to your daughter. It's applicable in a lot more situations than citizenship. I won't be bullied out. God help me, but I believe in 'We the People'. I've had this classic punk song stuck in my head for the longest time. Only now am I realizing that I'm scoring the political climate, putting music to what I read and see and think about what's going on in this country.
When they kick out your front door
How you gonna come?
With your hands on your head
Or on the trigger of your gun
You can crush us
You can bruise us
But you'll have to answer to
Oh- the guns of Brixton
So maybe the Clash isn't the most articulate way to discuss the intricacies of polisci and the realities it presents: Don't fucking care. I am at leisure to say whatever I please, whenever I please. My country gave me that and I'm giving it right back to them - both barrels.
***
On a related note, if you scroll down along the blogroll, you may notice I've added a section entitled "Civil Rights/Civil Liberties." It's a bit sparse as of now, but I'm really looking for more on that right now. Besides the usual organizational suspects (PFAW, ACLU), this morning I figured: you know what, what with all the handwringing I've been hearing about how no one in the U.S. seems to be educated in Civics 101 anymore, much less basic history. And I am all about the history. So here's one I found and just started looking at: nice 'n' straightforward. "BillofRights.com."
and, may as well take advantage of the free info on the Internets: if'n you need a refresher (and I know I did): Primary Documents in American History, via the Library of Congress online.
I'd like to make this a project--self-education American civics class, and hope you'll join me. Because I think there are some people out there who could really, really use a reminder. Some of them, sadly enough, may be "representing" you right now.
So, if it's gonna be back to basics, then let's make it a positive thing. Right back to the beginning. What are we fighting for, again? Let's be absolutely clear on that, at least. We owe ourselves that much.
As a mom, I get it. Truly, I hear you. Having seen other parts of the world that are in better or worse shape than we are, I hear you. And being fed the fuck up, sad, sorry and disillusioned, I still hear you. But there is no way on God's green earth I am ever going to give up on the people I see here. We have come too far. We have managed more since this country's inception than almost any other country on the globe by way of revolution, reform, advance and political change. Very little of this was at the hands of the government. It came from the demands and persistence of the people to see these bills enacted, to change the way we are regarded, to get something better for ourselves. You are exactly the kind of person that's needed because you're willing to say FUCK NO. Give that to your daughter. It's applicable in a lot more situations than citizenship. I won't be bullied out. God help me, but I believe in 'We the People'. I've had this classic punk song stuck in my head for the longest time. Only now am I realizing that I'm scoring the political climate, putting music to what I read and see and think about what's going on in this country.
When they kick out your front door
How you gonna come?
With your hands on your head
Or on the trigger of your gun
You can crush us
You can bruise us
But you'll have to answer to
Oh- the guns of Brixton
So maybe the Clash isn't the most articulate way to discuss the intricacies of polisci and the realities it presents: Don't fucking care. I am at leisure to say whatever I please, whenever I please. My country gave me that and I'm giving it right back to them - both barrels.
***
On a related note, if you scroll down along the blogroll, you may notice I've added a section entitled "Civil Rights/Civil Liberties." It's a bit sparse as of now, but I'm really looking for more on that right now. Besides the usual organizational suspects (PFAW, ACLU), this morning I figured: you know what, what with all the handwringing I've been hearing about how no one in the U.S. seems to be educated in Civics 101 anymore, much less basic history. And I am all about the history. So here's one I found and just started looking at: nice 'n' straightforward. "BillofRights.com."
and, may as well take advantage of the free info on the Internets: if'n you need a refresher (and I know I did): Primary Documents in American History, via the Library of Congress online.
I'd like to make this a project--self-education American civics class, and hope you'll join me. Because I think there are some people out there who could really, really use a reminder. Some of them, sadly enough, may be "representing" you right now.
So, if it's gonna be back to basics, then let's make it a positive thing. Right back to the beginning. What are we fighting for, again? Let's be absolutely clear on that, at least. We owe ourselves that much.
"Should I use blackface on my blog?"
A handy-dandy little flowchart/guide. Sheer genius.
"I dunno. Let me ask you a few questions."
STOP<--Who?<--Are you Bert Williams?-->Yes-->Liar. He's dead since 1922
(go to the link and keep reading. trust me. I can't do it justice here)
"I dunno. Let me ask you a few questions."
STOP<--Who?<--Are you Bert Williams?-->Yes-->Liar. He's dead since 1922
(go to the link and keep reading. trust me. I can't do it justice here)
Sunday, October 01, 2006
My all-time favorite Onion article, I think:
Denver Optometrist Not Sure Why He Has Gay Cult Following
"It's very nice of them, and I have nothing against anyone, but I just don't feel comfortable being the focus of all this attention," Podrewski said. "I don't mean to snub people, but I have my own life. Between my career and family obligations, I'm extremely busy. I'm sure John Galliano is a very talented designer, but I have a church potluck to attend the day of his runway show."
Podrewski may be mystified by the attention, but Rod Martinez is not. The author of two unauthorized biographies of Podrewski, Gene!: The Eyes Have It and Gene!: The Eyes STILL Have It, Martinez said he has a keen grasp of Podrewski's cult appeal among gays.
"It's difficult to explain to straight people," said Martinez, seated in his San Francisco apartment below an oversized, wildly colored silkscreen print of Podrewski's face. "Gene is adorable, sure, but it's not really sexual. It's more because that man has been to hell and back. He's no saint, and he has a lot of self-destructive impulses, but he's dealt with his personal demons with courage and a wicked sense of humor. He's a survivor in the truest sense and an inspiration to the gay community, which has seen its own share of pain, misunderstanding, and heartbreak."
Martinez was alluding to the many tragedies and heartaches to have befallen Podrewski over the course of his life. At age 6, it was discovered that Podrewski was allergic to penicillin. When he was 12, his family relocated from Estes Park, CO, to nearby Glen Haven, a move that traumatized the boy for several weeks. In 1981, he received a graduate degree in optometry, but that triumph was tainted by a broken engagement with radiologist Kathy Hearn and a recurring sinus infection...
For the past two years, Fagatha Christie, a Los Angeles-based lounge singer and drag queen, has honed his Podrewski impression, which he performs along with those of Barbra Streisand and Liza Minnelli. Christie said impersonating Podrewski is harder than it looks.
"A lot of Podrewski impersonators mean well and have a lot of enthusiasm," Christie said, "but doing Gene just doesn't work unless you have the right props onstage. You absolutely need a T-type applanation tonometer. Period. That's the kind Gene uses at work. And what's with the cheesy 1940s-era doctor forehead reflectors some of these queens use? Gene has never, ever worn one. Hel-lo?"
One of the joys of blogging
Meeting and hanging out with truly excellent people. As per: yesterday. Kristin, Robin, antiprincess.
I'm gonna do a post about the Museum of Sex later, i think; but first just wanted to repeat: so happy we could do this! Yay! Damn, that was a nice day.
I'm gonna do a post about the Museum of Sex later, i think; but first just wanted to repeat: so happy we could do this! Yay! Damn, that was a nice day.
Now, -this- is serious critique
Zuky takes on the Lieberman blackface flap of several weeks ago, addressing it on the terms by which the creator(s) wanted it to be addressed. And still finds that it fails. It is an artistic critique as much as a serious political one. This is the level of engagement that people should be doing a lot more of. ("Radicals" and other "examiners," I'm talking to you).
Go there to read the whole thing. I just want to highlight a bit that I particularly like, here:
In fairness to the PC-haters and other erstwhile champions of controversial imagery, I should note that on one level they're right: cultural expression should not be policed in any way. I don't mean to suggest that offensive imagery should be censored. As far as I'm concerned, you should say and publish any damn thing you choose. And then I'll say and publish any damn thing I choose about what you said. Don't blame me if your own foolishness sticks to you. Free speech means freedom to speak like an idiot, I suppose. Free speech isn't at issue in this discussion; the substantive meaning and value of a specific image is.
I also like this, from a follow-up post:
I'm not saying that anyone should remain silent in the face of swift-boat attacks. I'm just saying, come correct, with proper perspective and proportional angst — and an understanding of the points you claim to be addressing rather than stereotype-laden cliches. I'm saying, part of what makes us progressive is an open mind and a good heart. Lashing out with gleeful vitriol against every critic is ridiculous. Wielding the pixel-packet volume of FDL's megaphone for the sole purpose of trying to humiliate and heap derision on an African-American woman whose causes you self-righteously claim to defend is beyond ridiculous. And it's a step backward on the difficult path to the America that many of us hope to live in.
And while obviously I agree with Kai wrt the specific issue of FDL and Liza, you can remove that sentence and have that passage apply to just a lot of similar issues that keep cropping up in various contexts as I have observed it, at least; again and again and again.
I'm saying, part of what makes us progressive is an open mind and a good heart.
Yes. Thank you. And it is possible to cultivate these things and not become, as I suspect is the fear of many such folks on the newly re-energized left, wussy sellouts, ready to cave to The Enemy at the slightest breeze, terrified of genuine, legitimate anger, unable or unwilling to do what it takes to WIN, dammit. Lord knows there's plenty of that about as well; I sympathize with the fire-breathers to a great extent. Obviously.
And yet, and yet. It isn't enough. Claiming your anger is necessary but not sufficient. For one thing, the hardcore right does the "ruthless people" act better and always will; for another, more important, after a certain point it starts to undercut everything you supposedly stand for. As a progressive, liberal, humanist, "decent person," what you will. Finally: sooner or later you're gonna flame out. If you need to stoke that much fire in the belly just to get to your goal, well, you might get your goal; but chances are good that before you do--maybe, if you're "lucky," after--you'll burn up from the inside out. Maybe including politically. Maybe not. But what does it profit a persyn to gain the whole world if sie loseth hir only soul? More pragmatically: ulcers and heart attacks: Not Good. Making more enemies than friends: doubleplus ungood. And neither is the profound mistrust of humanity it takes to maintain that position of defensiveness all the time. When that happens, you really start to see where, indeed, the personal is political: that cynical, misanthropic attitude tends to reflect itself in one's ideology and, even more so, in one's policies.
In which case: and we're supporting/voting for you, why, again?
There are different routes to strength and power. I think what zuky is saying here is that there is a better one than the one FDL (for example) seems to be grasping for. Anyway, that's what I'm saying.
On edit: Another relevant passage from Gloria Anzaldua, via Slant Truth:
But it is not enough to stand on the opposite river bank, shouting questions, challenging patriarchal, white conventions. A counterstance locks one into a duel of oppressor and oppressed; locked in mortal combat, like the cop and the criminal, both are reduced to a common denominator of violence. The counterstance refutes the dominant culture’s views and beliefs, and, for this, it is proudly defiant. All reaction is limited by, and dependent on, what it is reacting against. Because the counterstance stems from a problem with authority–outer as well as inner–it’s a step towards liberation from cultural domination. But it is not a way of life. At some point, on our way to a new consciousness, we will have to leave the opposite bank, the split between the two mortal combatants somehow healed so that we are on both shores at once and, at once, see through serpent and eagle eyes. or perhaps we will decide to disengage from the dominant culture, write it off altogether as a lost cause, and cross the border into a wholly new and seperate territory. Or we might go another route. The possibilities are numerous once we decide to act and not react.
Go there to read the whole thing. I just want to highlight a bit that I particularly like, here:
In fairness to the PC-haters and other erstwhile champions of controversial imagery, I should note that on one level they're right: cultural expression should not be policed in any way. I don't mean to suggest that offensive imagery should be censored. As far as I'm concerned, you should say and publish any damn thing you choose. And then I'll say and publish any damn thing I choose about what you said. Don't blame me if your own foolishness sticks to you. Free speech means freedom to speak like an idiot, I suppose. Free speech isn't at issue in this discussion; the substantive meaning and value of a specific image is.
I also like this, from a follow-up post:
I'm not saying that anyone should remain silent in the face of swift-boat attacks. I'm just saying, come correct, with proper perspective and proportional angst — and an understanding of the points you claim to be addressing rather than stereotype-laden cliches. I'm saying, part of what makes us progressive is an open mind and a good heart. Lashing out with gleeful vitriol against every critic is ridiculous. Wielding the pixel-packet volume of FDL's megaphone for the sole purpose of trying to humiliate and heap derision on an African-American woman whose causes you self-righteously claim to defend is beyond ridiculous. And it's a step backward on the difficult path to the America that many of us hope to live in.
And while obviously I agree with Kai wrt the specific issue of FDL and Liza, you can remove that sentence and have that passage apply to just a lot of similar issues that keep cropping up in various contexts as I have observed it, at least; again and again and again.
I'm saying, part of what makes us progressive is an open mind and a good heart.
Yes. Thank you. And it is possible to cultivate these things and not become, as I suspect is the fear of many such folks on the newly re-energized left, wussy sellouts, ready to cave to The Enemy at the slightest breeze, terrified of genuine, legitimate anger, unable or unwilling to do what it takes to WIN, dammit. Lord knows there's plenty of that about as well; I sympathize with the fire-breathers to a great extent. Obviously.
And yet, and yet. It isn't enough. Claiming your anger is necessary but not sufficient. For one thing, the hardcore right does the "ruthless people" act better and always will; for another, more important, after a certain point it starts to undercut everything you supposedly stand for. As a progressive, liberal, humanist, "decent person," what you will. Finally: sooner or later you're gonna flame out. If you need to stoke that much fire in the belly just to get to your goal, well, you might get your goal; but chances are good that before you do--maybe, if you're "lucky," after--you'll burn up from the inside out. Maybe including politically. Maybe not. But what does it profit a persyn to gain the whole world if sie loseth hir only soul? More pragmatically: ulcers and heart attacks: Not Good. Making more enemies than friends: doubleplus ungood. And neither is the profound mistrust of humanity it takes to maintain that position of defensiveness all the time. When that happens, you really start to see where, indeed, the personal is political: that cynical, misanthropic attitude tends to reflect itself in one's ideology and, even more so, in one's policies.
In which case: and we're supporting/voting for you, why, again?
There are different routes to strength and power. I think what zuky is saying here is that there is a better one than the one FDL (for example) seems to be grasping for. Anyway, that's what I'm saying.
On edit: Another relevant passage from Gloria Anzaldua, via Slant Truth:
But it is not enough to stand on the opposite river bank, shouting questions, challenging patriarchal, white conventions. A counterstance locks one into a duel of oppressor and oppressed; locked in mortal combat, like the cop and the criminal, both are reduced to a common denominator of violence. The counterstance refutes the dominant culture’s views and beliefs, and, for this, it is proudly defiant. All reaction is limited by, and dependent on, what it is reacting against. Because the counterstance stems from a problem with authority–outer as well as inner–it’s a step towards liberation from cultural domination. But it is not a way of life. At some point, on our way to a new consciousness, we will have to leave the opposite bank, the split between the two mortal combatants somehow healed so that we are on both shores at once and, at once, see through serpent and eagle eyes. or perhaps we will decide to disengage from the dominant culture, write it off altogether as a lost cause, and cross the border into a wholly new and seperate territory. Or we might go another route. The possibilities are numerous once we decide to act and not react.
Habeas corpus: a review.
Definition and brief history:
Known as the "Great Writ", the writ of habeas corpus ad subjiciendum is a legal proceeding in which an individual held in custody can challenge the propriety of that custody under the law. The prisoner, or some other person on his behalf (for example, where the prisoner is being held incommunicado), may petition the court or an individual judge for a writ of habeas corpus.
Although the form of the writ of habeas corpus implies that the prisoner is brought to the court in order for the legality of the imprisonment to be examined, modern practice is to have a hearing with both parties present on whether the writ should issue, rather than issuing the writ immediately and waiting for the return of the writ by the addressee before the legality of the detention is examined. The prisoner can then be released or *bailed* by order of the court without having to be produced before it.
The right of habeas corpus—or rather, the right to petition for the writ—has long been celebrated as the most efficient safeguard of the liberty of the subject. Dicey wrote that the Habeas Corpus Acts "declare no principle and define no rights, but they are for practical purposes worth a hundred constitutional articles guaranteeing individual liberty". In most countries, however, the procedure of habeas corpus can be suspended in time of national emergency.
...This procedure, part of English common law, was considered important enough to be specifically mentioned in the United States Constitution, which says, "The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it." (Article One, section nine).
Which, yes, that has happened in the U.S. before this administration. Specifically:
Habeas corpus was suspended on April 27, 1861, during the American Civil War by President Lincoln in Maryland and parts of midwestern states, including southern Indiana. He did so in response to riots, local militia actions and the threat that the Southern slave state of Maryland would secede from the Union leaving the nation's capital, Washington, D.C., in the south. He was also motivated by requests by generals to set up military courts to rein in "Copperheads" or Peace Democrats, and those in the Union who supported the Confederate cause. His action was challenged in court and overturned by the U.S. Circuit Court in Maryland (led by Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B. Taney) in Ex Parte Merryman, 17 F. Cas. 144 (C.C.D. Md. 1861). Lincoln ignored Taney's order. In the Confederacy, Jefferson Davis also suspended habeas corpus and imposed martial law. This was in part to maintain order and spur industrial growth in the South to compensate for the economic loss inflicted by its secession.
In 1864, Lambdin P. Milligan and four others were accused of planning to steal Union weapons and invade Union prisoner-of-war camps and were sentenced to hang by a military court. However, their execution was not set until May 1865, so they were able to argue the case after the Civil War. In Ex Parte Milligan 71 U.S. 2 1866 the Supreme Court of the United States decided that the suspension of the writ did not empower the President to try and convict citizens before military tribunals. The trial of civilians by military tribunals is allowed only if civilian courts are closed. This was one of the key Supreme Court Cases of the American Civil War that dealt with wartime civil liberties and martial law.
In the early 1870s, President Grant suspended habeas corpus in nine counties in South Carolina, as part of federal civil rights action against the Ku Klux Klan under the 1870 Force Act and 1871 Ku Klux Klan Act.
And after that particular very specific injunction back in the 1870's, we leap to:
The November 13, 2001 Presidential Military Order gives the President of the United States the power to detain certain non-citizens suspected of connection to terrorists or terrorism as enemy combatants. As such, that person can be held indefinitely, without charges being filed against him or her, without a court hearing, and without entitlement to a legal consultant.
Many legal and constitutional scholars contend that these provisions are in direct opposition to habeas corpus, and the United States Bill of Rights. Specifically, American citizens declared enemy combatants by the President may be denied their constitutional rights as set forth in Amendments 4, 5, 6 and 8. One recent example is the José Padilla case. In the case of Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, argued before the United States Supreme Court in March 2006, Salim Ahmed Hamdan petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus, challenging the lawfulness of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's plan to try him for alleged war crimes before a military commission convened under special orders issued by the President of the United States, rather than before a court-martial convened under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. On June 29, 2006, in a 5-3 ruling the Supreme Court of the United States rejected Congress's attempts to strip the court of jurisdiction over habeas corpus appeals by detainees at Guantánamo Bay, although Congress had previously passed the Detainee Treatment Act (DTA), which took effect on December 30, 2005:
"[N]o court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba." §1005(e)(1), 119 Stat. 2742.
That was then. This is now: (as of this past Friday, to be precise):
After 800 years, habeas corpus is compromised.
But from the ballyhooed prisoner "compromise" negotiated with a few rebel Republican senators, the change is actually bigger than that: It's a different world since 1215. Not satisfied with cutting up the Constitution, the administration is now mangling the Magna Carta.
The compromise bill takes away from federal courts the right to hear habeas corpus suits from "unlawful enemy combatants" — such as the 400-plus now held at Guantanamo. In other words, although being held in U.S. custody on U.S. territory, prisoners would have no right to argue in court that there was no reason to hold them.
...
"And it is emblazoned in the Constitution specifically that it can be suspended only in time of insurrection or invasion — rebellion or invasion. And we don't have either of those present now."
...
The administration has a priority of limiting court oversight of its treatment of prisoners because it keeps embarrassingly losing cases. Most recently, the Hamdan case, filed by a Guantanamo prisoner, led to the Supreme Court striking down the proposed rules for military tribunals, on the grounds that the tribunals had no congressional authority and the administration was just making things up as it went along. Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, the Navy lawyer who represented Hamdan, explained, "The legislation introduced by the president will see to it that no one else will be able to do what I did."
There's a 1297 edition of the Magna Carta in the National Archives. There's even a replica, printed in gold, right in the middle of the Capitol. Senators could send an intern down to read it.
And the details get worse. The great triumph of the compromise is supposed to be a ban on the use of torture on prisoners — although the White House says that it will interpret just where the lines are. But without access to courts, it's not going to be easy to enforce that.
And according to Tuesday's Washington Post, the original compromise has now been further compromised, allowing for indefinite detention, without access to courts, of anyone who "has engaged in hostilities or has purposefully and materially supported hostilities against the United States." Writes the Post's R. Jeffrey Smith, "The definition applies to foreigners living inside or outside the United States and does not rule out the possibility of designating a U.S. citizen as an unlawful combatant."
So, the new compromise not only excludes unlawful combatants from habeas corpus but considerably expands the people who could qualify as unlawful combatants — and be subject to imprisonment at the pleasure of the president.
Questions? Comments?
Two by Dorothy Allison
“The worst thing done to us in the nam of a civilized society is to label the truth of our lives material outside the legitimate subject matter of serious writers. We are not supposed to talk about our sexuality, not in any more than the most general and debased terms, our passions reduced to addictions or the subject of poorly thought out theories of deviance and compulsion, our legendary loving relationships rewritten as the bland interactions of best friends or interlocking systems of dependence and necessary economic solutions.
I need you to do more than survive. As writers, as revolutionaries, tell the truth, your truth in your own way. Do not buy into their systems of censorship, imagining that if you drop this character or hide this emotion, you can slide through their blockades. Do not eat your own heart in the hope of pleasing them. The only hope you have, the only hope any of us has, is the remade life. It is the only way we will survive, and trading any of us for some of us is no compromise. It is the way we will lose our lives, all our lives.”
***
and
“I found the words in the books my stepfather hid between the mattress and the box springs. The words were there with the pictures and the terror. Dykes, queers, sex. They’d beat me up and leave me, fuck me up and hate me. I’d wind up in a mental hospital, never get a job, have to be supported by the family for the rest of time, and anyway, never, never amount to anything. I wanted to grow up to be smart, rich, educated, and independent. I wanted to go as far away as possible from the bare dirt that marked the front yard of every house we ever lived in. Mama nodded, encouraged me, and somehow along the way, sex and bare dirty yards got confused. Mortally confused.
…Sex was dangerous, a trap, trashy as drinking whiskey in a paper cup or telling dirty stories in a loud whisper. Sex was a sure sign of nothing better to hope for. ‘You’re different,’ my mama said, her hand on the back of my head squeezing love into my brain, but her voiec was sad enough to break my heart…
I did not let myself for a year. Cold, dry, not touching. When I woke up sweating and aching, I made myself lie rigid, staring into the darkness until balls of light moved across the ceiling. I read more than ever, developed what my mama called a smart mouth, as well as insomnia. If I couldn’t sleep without it then I would not sleep.
That was the year Granny told me how someone had killed my wild aunt. They had found her truck run off the road and her in the ditch without her overalls. …She had been raped…If you didn’t do it with boys, they might do that to you, something so terrible grown men would hesitate to repeat the details.
Not just trashy then, evil. I was evil, dangerous to myself and the world. So I collected evil women, stories, books, history. I fell in love with Elizabeth I who burned her enemies, the dark queen of France who poisoned hers, the Gypsy girl in the story of the Snow Queen who carried a knife and knew how to use it, and a rough-mouthed cousin who had a line of scars down both arms. Witches, black pools of darkness, endurance. In the fantasy story, Apache girls went out in the desert to lie with their vulvas facing the moon. I opened all the windows, lay down on the hardwood floor where my sisters couldn’t see, not really caring if they did. I felt as if I hadn’t slept in a year. A fever was rising inside me, heat coming up my throat. The moon pulsed into the room. Looking at it, I could make out the pattern of a face, a lily in the bright burning disk. I reached down and cupped my sex, fingers moving where they had not touched in so long, a tiny cry of grief sounding low in my belly.
Sex, then, no matter how dangerous. Sex, then, no matter what the cost. Never again, I promised, would I allow anyone persuade me to rob myself. I rolled over so my hips could press against the grain of the wood, my knuckles grate and press, my mouth breathe earth and wood heat…”
--Dorothy Allison, Skin: Talking About Sex, Class, and Literature
I need you to do more than survive. As writers, as revolutionaries, tell the truth, your truth in your own way. Do not buy into their systems of censorship, imagining that if you drop this character or hide this emotion, you can slide through their blockades. Do not eat your own heart in the hope of pleasing them. The only hope you have, the only hope any of us has, is the remade life. It is the only way we will survive, and trading any of us for some of us is no compromise. It is the way we will lose our lives, all our lives.”
***
and
“I found the words in the books my stepfather hid between the mattress and the box springs. The words were there with the pictures and the terror. Dykes, queers, sex. They’d beat me up and leave me, fuck me up and hate me. I’d wind up in a mental hospital, never get a job, have to be supported by the family for the rest of time, and anyway, never, never amount to anything. I wanted to grow up to be smart, rich, educated, and independent. I wanted to go as far away as possible from the bare dirt that marked the front yard of every house we ever lived in. Mama nodded, encouraged me, and somehow along the way, sex and bare dirty yards got confused. Mortally confused.
…Sex was dangerous, a trap, trashy as drinking whiskey in a paper cup or telling dirty stories in a loud whisper. Sex was a sure sign of nothing better to hope for. ‘You’re different,’ my mama said, her hand on the back of my head squeezing love into my brain, but her voiec was sad enough to break my heart…
I did not let myself for a year. Cold, dry, not touching. When I woke up sweating and aching, I made myself lie rigid, staring into the darkness until balls of light moved across the ceiling. I read more than ever, developed what my mama called a smart mouth, as well as insomnia. If I couldn’t sleep without it then I would not sleep.
That was the year Granny told me how someone had killed my wild aunt. They had found her truck run off the road and her in the ditch without her overalls. …She had been raped…If you didn’t do it with boys, they might do that to you, something so terrible grown men would hesitate to repeat the details.
Not just trashy then, evil. I was evil, dangerous to myself and the world. So I collected evil women, stories, books, history. I fell in love with Elizabeth I who burned her enemies, the dark queen of France who poisoned hers, the Gypsy girl in the story of the Snow Queen who carried a knife and knew how to use it, and a rough-mouthed cousin who had a line of scars down both arms. Witches, black pools of darkness, endurance. In the fantasy story, Apache girls went out in the desert to lie with their vulvas facing the moon. I opened all the windows, lay down on the hardwood floor where my sisters couldn’t see, not really caring if they did. I felt as if I hadn’t slept in a year. A fever was rising inside me, heat coming up my throat. The moon pulsed into the room. Looking at it, I could make out the pattern of a face, a lily in the bright burning disk. I reached down and cupped my sex, fingers moving where they had not touched in so long, a tiny cry of grief sounding low in my belly.
Sex, then, no matter how dangerous. Sex, then, no matter what the cost. Never again, I promised, would I allow anyone persuade me to rob myself. I rolled over so my hips could press against the grain of the wood, my knuckles grate and press, my mouth breathe earth and wood heat…”
--Dorothy Allison, Skin: Talking About Sex, Class, and Literature
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