Hey Shakers! Join us in a Sunday Brunch Skype Chat -- Right Here.
If you have any trouble getting in, leave a comment in this thread and we'll try to help you out -- and don't forget to change your Skype profile if you don't want your real name showing in the chat.
Gotta run -- the timer just dinged on my virtual lemon poppy-seed bundt cake. If you get to the brunch soon, it'll still be virtually warm enough to melt your virtual butter.
Shakesville Sunday Brunch (Skype Chat)
Quote of the Day
"The Republican Party is in very deep trouble right now."—Former Republican Representative (and current Libertarian Party member) Bob Barr, in an interview with CNN yesterday. Barr also said "it's hard to 'overestimate the damage' that's been inflicted on the Republican Party—not only with this week's defection of Sen. Arlen Specter, but also the 'lack of any coherent philosophy, vision or leadership'."
I Never Thought I'd See Rodney King Invoked Like This...
To my beloved friends of color (well, except other black folk--do I have a surprise for y'all!)*,
I don't mean to leave you behind as I march forward toward a racially utopian U.S., but I'm sorry; I have got to get to the Red House!!!!
Where black people and white people by furniture!
I'm so looking forward to going where black and white folk can "just get along."
A white person might hug me. Or shake my hand!
And I can get credit and possibly a chance to rock in a nice rocking chair!
Seriously, mrs. o tipped me to this commercial:
Now, we didn't know what to make of it. I'm not going to lie like we didn't laugh until we cried, but we were debating:
"Were they serious?"
"Girl, I hope they were being funny"
"That can't be real!"
"Friend, I'm telling you... it's real."
(Hysterical laughing)
"Girl, that cannot be serious."
"But they look so sincere!"
(ROTFL)
"Look at the hand gestures!"
"Big Head know he pumps about as much iron as I do!"
"Do you hear them singing like they're in church?"
"Did you know white people and black people used to need different kinds of couches and beds?"
(At this point, I screamed)
So, yeah, no real commentary here. I keep thinking I'm going to here this was a huge joke, southern satire or something.
________________________________________
* Nevermind! They threw in a blanket "Hispanics and all people!" at the end. Whew!
RIP Jack Kemp
GOP Congressman, GHW Bush cabinet member, one-time veep candidate ('96), supply-sider, and anti-tax crusader Jack Kemp has died.
Kemp was one of the first and most prominent proponents of the idea that tax cuts stimulate the economy. He was the primary architect of Reaganomics; the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 is also known as the Kemp-Roth Tax Cut. It's not an understatement to say we owe him a huge debt for modern-day Republican economic policy. Pun intended.
In other ways, Kemp's advocacy didn't look much like the modern GOP. Although he opposed legal abortion (of course), he supported immigration reform that included guest-worker programs, he was a proponent of racial equality, and believed government had a role to play in lifting people from poverty. But, a Republican is always a Republican (unless zie's Arlen Specter), and Kemp helped raise money for Scooter Libby's defense when he was charged with perjury and obstruction in the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame.
Kemp was also a former NFL footballer who rather famously said soccer sucks.
If I am wrong and Mr. Kemp was right and there is an afterlife, may he be greeted to it with precisely as much compassion as he showed others during his lifetime.
Radio Shakesville
Saturday Random Open Thread
Hosted by Sophie, who is currently sitting on the cats' office chair, watching her dadsy mowing the lawn through the office window and wondering how he can so bravely get so close to something that makes such a scary noise.
Um, Thanks?
Vespa's new ad campaign claims its new GTS300 is "the most powerful Vespa ever"--"powerful" enough, they claim, to haul even the most rotund, porcine fatties to beaches, bars, and grocery stores (and we all know how much fatties love grocery stores!). The 300 refers to the engine size: It's a little bigger than the standard 250-cc engine, which, we can now safely assume, is only powerful enough to transport skinny hipsters.
Via Copyranter.
It's Not "Sex." It's Rape.
[Trigger warning].
A judge just sentenced a Seattle man to 23 years in prison for coercing a 12-year-old girl into prostitution, raping her repeatedly, and attempting to tamper with witnesses. The man, 25, was convicted of two counts of second-degree child rape and a single count of promoting commercial sexual abuse of a minor.
The guy sounds like a real charmer, and there's definitely some question in my mind about whether that sentence (the longest allowed by law) is long enough. (In his testimony, he said the real tragedy was that his family won't benefit from his presence while he's in prison. Gah.) However, what struck me most about the stories on his conviction and sentencing is that they consistently refer to what he did as "having sex" with the girl, not raping her. To wit:
"Over several days, he had sex with the girl..."
"Leonard was paid by a man who had sex with the girl...."
".. he had sex with her several times and gave her advice on how to solicit money for sex. He took most of the money she received for a sexual act..."
"...a man paid the 12-year-old for sex..."
And on and on and on.
Although most of the stories mention the fact that Leonard was sentenced for the crime of child rape, the writers take pains to consistently describe what he did as "sex," not rape. (One even refers to the child as a "teen," which she was not.) Words matter. A 25-year-old man cannot "have sex" with a 12-year-old girl. Describing what happened this way negates her perspective--and makes his crime seem less horrible, maybe even excusable, in the process.
Friday Blogaround: BADD to the Bone Edition
This BADD Blogaround is brought to you by Shaxco, makers of Auntie SKM's Self-Folding T-Shirts!
Annaham: Chronic Illness Bingo Cards 1 & 2
Lauredhel: Can I Have A Seat?
Anna: BADD: How The Non-Disabled Person Can Particpate (from one non-disabled person to another)
The Black Telephone :Siobhan, the Soundbeam, and Disablism
JadeLennox: Workplace Gadflies
Dechant: Equal work, sure...
Memo To Self: Blogging Against Disablism: A Photo Essay
The Hand Mirror: Lose the language. Now.
Feministe: Disability and Class
The Pursuit of Harpyness: Pain-Free is a Privilege
And there is much, much more at Diary of a Goldfish's BADD 2009 page.
Leave your links, BADD or otherwise, in comments.
Diversity Makes Me Poop My Pants!
In yet another round of Your Lack of Equality Doesn't Make Me Mad, But Attempts to Rectify the Situation Do, Time blogger Mark Halperin front-pages the link to his take on the impending SCOTUS nomination, owing to Justice Souter's impending retirement, with a stock photo image of a white man and the headline "White Men Need Not Apply."
Har har! See, because our stupid black liberal president is probably going to get all P.C. and shit by nominating a brown-skinned broad as part of an attempt to remedy the hundreds of years of almost exclusively white men deciding important national legal precedent for the whole nation. And that's totally something to make fun of because, err, because—POLITICAL CORRECTNESS IS TEH STOOPID!
Let's do this again, shall we?
It shouldn't matter, in terms of having every American citizen's needs and issues fairly addressed, what the percentage of women and/or people of color and/or LGBTQIs and/or people with disabilities in government positions is, but it does. It even makes a difference whether male legislators have daughters. It always matters, because, unfortunately, we live in a very lopsided and still largely segregated culture, where a white person, for example, can go their entire lives never having to know a person of color on a personal level. That situation inevitably begets ignorance, which can manifest in overtly malicious expressions of bigtory or unintentional (but not innocuous) offense.
Diversity benefits not just the marginalized, but also people of privilege, by providing them with opportunities to expand their understanding of others. When considering legislation to fund women-centered medical research, a Congressman who sits beside a colleague who is a breast cancer survivor every day, and has heard her firsthand accounts of her treatment options (and, perhaps, lack of options), is more likely to have a personal investment in pushing through the bill than a Congressman who only regards breast cancer as "bad" in an abstract way. An appellate court judge whose colleague is openly gay is more likely to reject gay panic defenses. That's just the way humans work.
There is an understandable knee-jerk negative reaction among some straight, white men to the complaint about any group being primarily straight, white, and male. I've known men who were bitter about what they perceived as the "guilt" they were expected to feel, or were angry that such complaints (or celebrations of increased participation of women, minorities, gays) somehow assailed their intrinsic characteristics. And I get that—I really do. But that's not the point. There's nothing intrinsically wrong with being white, or straight, or male. What's wrong is the cultural preference that has conferred privilege upon those characteristics—a privilege from which anyone who falls into any of those categories benefits.
When having been charged with hiring employees at previous jobs, I never discriminated on the basis of race (or anything else), but when I have applied for jobs, and been hired, I might have benefited, even unbeknownst to me, from being white. That's what privilege is really about—not just what you choose to do with it, but what others choose to do with it, and how their decisions might work in your favor.
And against other, non-privileged people's interests.
It's not enough to just "not be racist" oneself, because one may still benefit from the racism of others so long as it's endemic to our society. So, the argument for the breaking of a straight, white male tradition in any venue is not born of hostility to straight people, or whites, or males, nor of "self-loathing" or "liberal guilt" or "political correctness run amok," but of hostility toward undeserved privilege and of the knowledge that people are naturally self-interested, and likely to remain so unless they are forcibly exposed to people who are different than they are.
Finding a problem with disproportionately white male representation doesn't make women man-haters or men self-loathing; it doesn't make people of color racists or whites self-loathing; it's simply a recognition that most white men, because of our culture, aren't compelled to familiarize themselves with many of the issues that women and/or people of color face. Privilege is, in its rawest form, the ability to live one's life without ever having to interact in a myriad of meaningful ways with The Other.
The flipside of that imbalance is that, just by virtue of its dominance, the issues and experiences and language and culture of any privileged group are well-known to the non-privileged, because that culture is inescapable. We live in it, too—we just experience it from a place of denial rather than access.
Charges of political correctness are little more than an attempt to mask precisely this reality: If women move in a male-dominated world, and people of color move in a white dominated world, and queers move in a straight, binary-sexed, cisgender world, and straight, white men move in that world, too, and rarely venture into the sub-cultures or explore the intersectionalities of the marginalized without external pressure or guidance, how can it possibly be that straight, white men are de facto the best prepared to represent us all?
The one thing privilege doesn't freely give a person is insight.
Keep that idea close. As Dana says over at TAPPED: "[Despite so many eminently qualified women of all races], we should expect a whole lot more of this as the nomination process gets underway." Put on your seatbelts, Shakers. Here we go.
Oh, Entertainment News: How You Do So Love the Misogyny!
Under the subject line "Why do I read the daily mail?" Shaker InfamousQBert emails (which I am publishing with her permission):
the brilliant irony of this set of stories, all being listed under the "Femail" section is just amazing, and, i'm sure, lost on the editors of the paper.Meanwhile, I just saw the headline and sub-head: "Nicole Kidman attacks Tom Cruise: Nicole Kidman has launched a strange and rather bitter attack against ex-husband Tom Cruise, accusing him of wanting her to be 'seen and not heard'," a story based entirely on this (emphasis original):
• kirstie alley continues the yo-yo
• Susan Boyle, younger, slimmer, and less hairy
• Liz Hurley, skinnier than she used to be
AND, for the grand finale:
• 7 year old obsessed with weight
"I felt I became a star only by association," she complained to Easy Living magazine. "We would go to the Oscars and I would think, 'I'm here to support him.' I felt it was my job to put on a beautiful dress and be seen and not heard."First of all, interesting that's categorized as a "complaint," as opposed to, say, an "observation." Secondly, is that really an attack on her ex-husband (no less a "strange and rather bitter attack"), or is it a legitimate commentary on how she was treated by a demonstrably sexist industry? Tom Cruise was already a huge star when he and Kidman got married, and the press treated her like the newest accessory he'd acquired, i.e. not there in her own right but there "to support him…[to] be seen and not heard." (Recall Hugh Jackman talking about how his "less famous (in America)" wife Deborra-Lee Furness is "literally … knocked out of the way" by people trying to get to him.)
Gee, maybe the reason the "attack" seems so strange is because it wasn't an "attack" at all, but a perfectly valid observation about a cultural impulse to treat women as their husband's props.
Note the irony that framing Kidman's feminist observation as a "strange, bitter, complaining" attack on her ex-husband is, in effect, an anti-feminist attack on her.
lolsob
Does This Laptop Make Me Look Gay?
by Shaker Caitiecat, a 42-year-old translator, writer, mother, and grandmother, who lives in Soviet Canuckistan, not far from The Centre of the Universe (sometimes known as Toronto). This is her first guest post at Shakesville.
I ran across an article yesterday, and as I'm sure hundreds of Shakers do every day, quickly dashed off an e-mail to the QcoFM with a virtual shake of the head. Her response was, "Well, want to do a guest post about it?" When I came back to my senses, I heard this awful keening noise, and realised only slowly that it was me, making a sort of high-pitched "squeeeeeeee" sound. So, yeah, here I am. Thanks, Liss.
So let's get deconstructing, shall we?
The article is titled "Laptop gender wars: What your netbook (or Toughbook) says about you," and, in case you haven't already guessed, its main ingredient is a metric ton of variously phobic generalizations.
It'd be the easy route, here, to just take the hapless journalist to task, for Cluelessness in the First Degree. But I'm inclined to cut him some slack, because he does actually ask one of those first questions people ask when they're drifting toward progressiveness:
You may have noticed that my initial curiosity, about how someone's computer threatened his masculinity, led me to a number of discussions about marketing to women, not men. My initial queries were about "gender" in marketing, and so I was very struck that people came back to talk to me about women in particular. But ChristieLyn Diller, an adjunct professor of women's studies at Towson University, says that shouldn't come as a surprise. "From my educated opinion, this is rooted in the fact that our society, in all spheres, is rooted in the masculine generic, a byproduct of our patriarchal structure. Think of how we refer to everyone as 'guys' or 'mankind', etc. So when gender issues come up, it makes us think of the 'other' category, in this case women, without reference to the dominant group, men, which requires no explanation. Lesser groups require qualifiers to let us know that we are not referring to the dominant group."And kudos to Mr. Fruhlinger, he asked that question, and even had the sense to approach a women's studies prof to get an answer. So my angle here is going to be more gentle than I might otherwise be, because it's clear that we have someone who's at least trying to question automatic sexism. We like that, here at Shakesville.
And this is good, because without that redeeming paragraph, this'd be a bit of a misogyfest.
For a start, we have an article based on a complaint by some dude who's worried his stylish and cute laptop might be giving women the wrong impression: Women *wink-wink* "think [he has] a different presence than [he] actually want[s] to portray." In case you missed the crucial subtext here, His Laptop Isn't Getting Him Any More Vajayjay Than He Was Getting Before He Got It, and Women Think He Might Be, Y'know, One of Those. Because, of course, one should be buying one's tech based on whether it gets one laid more, or gets one labeled the right kind of cute (but totally not that gay kind). Argh.
But, to be fair, our columnist is not saying these things, he's just reporting them. Secondhand sexism – is it more or less dangerous than secondhand smoke? Guess it depends who's breathing it in.
The first paragraph after laying out the problem goes well, as he speaks to a couple of experts—notably women, as throughout the article, which is good, but speaks to the subtlety of sexism, too: a) He wants the legitimacy of having a woman attached to the quotes; and b) It's not as easy to find men who do gender studies stuff. The experts give really good analysis, on the first page, anyway, with Learned On Women's Andrea Learned giving solid advice about how not to do it: Ditch the pink and balloons and stuff, and treat women like adults, able to make reasoned decisions. And be prepared for a backlash if you don't follow that wise advice.
But we're starting to see the unconscious sexism drifting in, here. Mr. Fruhlinger perceives his audience as men:
You may be surprised to hear that this approach was not well-regarded by most of the consultants I spoke to.Well, no, Mr. Fruhlinger, most women wouldn't be surprised at all. Maybe a lot of men would be surprised. Not all, though.
Then we come to the second page, and things slide a bit. Ms. Yohn gives more good analysis:
Companies should take care not to over-emphasize the gender orientation of their products. To capture the widest appeal and to avoid reinforcing stereotypes that alienate, they should pursue specific styles and aesthetics that resonate with both men and women.See what she does there? She makes the crazy-ass point that maybe women and men are looking for the same things, or making decisions from subsets of the same criteria: Price, reliability, functionality, not "does this laptop make me look gay?"
Then things go downhill, quickly. Mandy Minor, of J Allan Studios, says she never takes her B2B IT marketing to a level that is "football manly":
"I keep my clients' messaging in the 'smart and in-the-know guy' territory."Urk. Sexism: You're soaking in it. The blanket assumptions that: a) It's only men in IT; and b) Men, naturally, still need masculine (if not "football manly") messages, or they won't pay attention. And to prove it, we have an ad for the Toughbook, the Manly Laptop for Manly Men Who Do Manly Things in a Masculine Way. As we all know, women have no need of a laptop which is waterproof, shockproof, or any of that stuff. Why, they'd be breaking nails all over the place!
Next, it's back on-message: Don't overdo it, guys, 'cause the ladeez don't like it. They clearly forgot to include the "This article is intended for the male reader. Female readers are directed to our new sections on Easy Weight Loss and How to Please Your Husband" warning.
Oh, Mr. Fruhlinger, that final paragraph:
But what about our Slashdot reader, wracked with anxiety over what his tiny, effeminate netbook said about him?Oh dear. "Tiny, effeminate netbook"? Way to play right into the sexism thing, there, dude. You wrote this article to examine an assumption, and finish by replaying the assumption in a new, more sexist form? Before, you were mocking him for worrying about whether his laptop would get him more sex, now you're agreeing with him that having a small laptop makes him effeminate. And OMG, as we all know, Civilization Will End if we don't mock men for being effeminate: I mean, who would want to be thought of as like some sort of icky girl? And by the way, I was talking to Janice in history and she totally likes you, dude.
And then we close, with a page from the "any attention from women could lead to sex with women, and is therefore inherently good" playbook:
"Women are talking to you because of your laptop, and you're complaining?" It seems that most of us, men and women, are OK using a cute laptop.Indeed. Because the purpose of a laptop is for men to attract women.
Anyway, I'm off. I've got to take my laptop back to the store. I can't find where they put the genitalia, and I don't want to have the wrong kind. Men might not want me if I do.
BADD: Out of My Closet
It's BADD! Click the logo on the left to visit the BADD homepage at Diary of a Goldfish and read all the BADD posts as they come rolling in.
This is the story I've been telling myself for almost nineteen years: I am not disabled.
Okay, sure—I have panic attacks, sometimes severe ones, and bouts of borderline agoraphobia, during which I find excuses just to avoid walking out to get the mail, and I've got some unusual habits, like trichotillomania, yes. And, all right, yeah—overwhelming anxiety can provoke self-mutilation, while I'm asleep and sometimes when I'm awake, though in some sort of fugue, scratching at my skin with my fingernails, or whatever else I grab, scratching down through layer after layer, the pain actually soothing, because it's somehow worse and yet more tolerable than the emotional pain, the anxiety, consuming me. And, okay, sometimes that means I don't want to see anyone because of the gashes I've left all over myself, or I have to find a way to cover them. Long sleeves in summer isn't that weird.
That doesn't make me disabled.
This, Shakers, is disablism in a nutshell: I'd rather call myself "fucked up" than disabled. And I've been doing exactly that for most of my life.
I have post-traumatic stress disorder as the result of a series of sexual assaults which began when I was 16, committed across several years by someone who started out as my boyfriend.
It is disabling. It's it a disability. I am disabled.
I am not "fucked up." I have a chronic mental illness, but it has only been in reading disability bloggers the past few years that I've been able to start pushing open the door on my closet. Even writing this today is hard, harder than I expected. Ugh, the dread. It is like a corset being drawstrung too tightly around my sternum, stealing my ability to breathe. I let the tears run down my cheeks, and I take deep breaths, and I occasionally have a wee laugh at the irony that writing about having PTSD actually risks triggering it.
[The author takes a break to watch Eddie Izzard talk about the Death Star canteen.]
The longer I live with this thing, the better I am at managing it. Good triggers have become an invaluable part of avoiding falling into the abyss, and so I have a trove of good triggers that can just as certainly restore equilibrium as moderating a heinous rape thread can throw everything off kilter.
But sometimes my PTSD isn't dragging me toward the edge, giving me the chance to dig in my heels and wrench myself from its grasp; sometimes it just sneaks up behind me and shoves, hard and without warning. So sometimes I still fall into the abyss.
scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch it's hurting now the numbing comes scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch it's bleeding now and still i'm scratching scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch it hurts it hurts it hurts it feels good scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch scratch…
I see myself in the mirror, later, and I feel ashamed. I'm so fucked up. No, you've got a chronic mental illness. I'm so fucking weak. No, you're sick. I'm a piece of shit. No, you're a survivor.
Then how come I don't feel like one?
And standing there, in front of a mirror, looking at the long, red stripes of radiating pain I've given myself on my arms or chest or face or legs, I really don't feel like a survivor. I feel like a huge mess who will one day be consumed by self-loathing or fury, possibly both.
Then I walk away, and five minutes later, the mere will to survive has lifted me from the abyss.
You don't actually have to feel like a survivor to be one, you see. Funny, that.
[The author takes a break to listen to Cat Stevens sing "Trouble."]
I've read amazing pieces by people with disabilities about how their disabilities affect their partners. I cannot write one of those amazing pieces, because I am not yet able to talk about the subject with any sort of perspective, with a lack of guilt.
This is what I know: Iain is not unaffected by being married to a woman who was sexually assaulted. When he wakes up in the middle of the night because I'm having a nightmare, or when we're just goofing around with each other and he tickles me or squeezes me in a way he has dozens of times before but this time it triggers me and I burst into tears, or when my PTSD gets the better of me in the middle of an argument, just some stupid old dumbass argument that any couple could have, and he feels like the PTSD emergence is his fault (which it isn't)... All of those things are him getting victimized, too, by the people who victimized me. Which I say now, lucidly, because I'm not in the middle of it. But when it happens, I feel like a terrible, broken person who is ruining his life.
I have also read amazing pieces by people with disabilities about how their disabilities shape and frequently define people's perceptions of them. I cannot write one of those amazing pieces, either, because I have the privilege of an unseen disability—unless I tell someone about my PTSD, it is unlikely zie will ever know. And I have additional incentive not to tell, because it inevitably brings up the genesis of the disorder, and there is no way to speak casually about being repeatedly sexually assaulted. Merely coming out about my PTSD risks having to suppress a demonstration of how it manifests.
This is what I know: I am scared shitless about talking about it, because I don't want to be seen as weak. (And why, why, do I see myself as weak for having PTSD when I would never see anyone else that way?) I am scared to talk about it because I don't want it to undermine my credibility as a victim's advocate, because I know that there are people who will try to use it against me. I am scared to talk about it because I am afraid of undermining what tenuous feelings of safety I have, because I am afraid to be told to get into this kind of therapy or take that kind of drug or exhorted to investigate any kind of treatment, all of which makes me desperately anxious. I am scared to talk about it because I don't want to be thought of differently.
[The author blubs like a big blubby thing with lots of little blubby bits all over it. And then she walks out of her closet and shuts the door behind her.]
I have post-traumatic stress disorder. It is a chronic mental illness. I am disabled.
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Please Note: While all of us understand the urge to share recommendations and personal experiences, "helpful suggestions" can sometimes be counterproductive and inadvertently imply that a chronically ill or disabled person has not educated themselves about their own condition. They can also effectively diminish the seriousness of a condition, if you draw comparisons between temporary conditions (taking Aspirin for a headache) and long-term or permanent conditions (giving oneself insulin shots for diabetes management). We request that any comments sharing something that has worked for you or someone you know be framed very carefully as "This has what has worked for me," not only because nothing works for everybody, but also because framing it as a personal experience story takes away any implicit exhortation that "you, too, should do this," which may create anxiety for people reading along and/or the author. Thank you for your consideration and happy commenting!
Domestic Work is Real Work
Hey all, it's BADD! Click the logo on the left to visit the BADD homepage at Diary of a Goldfish and read all the BADD posts as they come rolling in.
Yesterday morning I awoke to find that my partner had filled and run the dishwasher as I slept. There was nothing unusual in that. Sadly, my response was not unusual either: I felt simultaneously surprised that he had thought to do the dishes and guilty that I had not done them myself. Like most of us, I have internalized the sexist and ableist convictions that domestic labor is both mine to do, and yet does not count as “real work”. The daily struggle to overcome these beliefs is a much greater challenge than I could have anticipated when I became chronically ill.
My partner and I divide domestic chores. We also verbally acknowledge that household work is real work by giving due appreciation: “what a nice clean kitchen”, he’ll say. Or I will say, “Hey—the kitchen looks great!” But I don’t say, “Thank you for cleaning the kitchen”, because it’s just too close to what I still feel—“Thank you for cleaning the kitchen for me”.
Now that I live with chronic illness, I can feel the cost of domestic labor; it’s taken out of my hide, as my grandmother would have put it. I studied my spoon theory (PDF) first-hand. I should be way ahead of those whose understanding is limited by chronic wellness. But sometimes I still find myself surrounded by homemade food and freshly washed clothes and lamenting, “I haven’t done anything today!”
In addition to being BADD, today is also International Workers’ Day. It is fitting, therefore, to think not only about the work we do, but also about who gets the privilege of being counted as a worker and why.
As Melissa pointed out recently, work coded as “women’s” is devalued, often to the point of being unpaid, no matter who is doing it. Our entire economic system depends not only on domestic labor, but also upon its devaluation and exclusion from the realm of “productive” work. To paraphrase Maria Mies, women’s unpaid household work subsidizes not only the male wage but also capital accumulation (Patriarchy And Accumulation On A World Scale, p. ix).
Unpaid domestic work takes just as much energy as wage work, yet because it is not considered productive labor, we can’t “count” it towards our status as productive individuals. So those who are too ill to work outside the home for a paycheck are unproductive by definition, regardless of how much they get done. Furthermore, the self-care that is so essential to managing chronic conditions is valued even less than the ongoing care of others*. Our most vital work is society's least esteemed.
The work we do to support the wellbeing of ourselves, our families, and our dwellings is real work. Asserting that truth is not only a feminist act, but an anti-disablist one as well. It is an ongoing struggle for me; one which I don't have the privilege of ignoring.
N.B.: Like many chronic illness narratives, this story has no nice tidy bow on the end (“and that’s how I learned to value my work and take care of myself—see how illness turns out to be a blessing?”). So many voices are silenced because they don’t fit into the framework of struggle and redemption that we’re comfortable with. Telling our stories as they are, ragged edges and all, is in itself a radical act.
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*And the problem is compounded for those who require help even for self-care.
BADD commenting note from the QCoFM herself: While all of us understand the urge to share recommendations and personal experiences, "helpful suggestions" can sometimes be counterproductive and inadvertently imply that a chronically ill or disabled person has not educated themselves about their own condition. It can also effectively diminish the seriousness of a condition if you draw comparisons between temporary conditions (taking Aspirin for a headache) and long-term or permanent conditions (giving oneself insulin shots for diabetes management). We request that any comments sharing something that has worked for you or someone you know be framed very carefully as "This has what has worked for me," not only because nothing works for everybody, but also because framing it as a personal experience story takes away any implicit exhortation that "you, too, should do this," which may create anxiety for people reading along and/or the author. Thank you for your consideration and happy commenting!
Let's Get Ready to Rumble
Supreme Court Justice David Souter has announced that he will be retiring in June. Souter, despite having been appointed in 1990 by George H. W. Bush, is typically one of the court's liberal foursome, so an Obama appointment will likely not change the ideological composition of the Supreme Court.
The departure will open the first seat for a Democratic president to fill in 15 years and could prove a test of Mr. Obama's plans for reshaping the nation's judiciary. Confirmation battles for the Supreme Court in recent years have proved to be intensely partisan and divisive moments in Washington, but Mr. Obama has more leeway than his predecessors because his party holds such a strong majority in the Senate.But, as Steve notes:
As far back as November, literally just a few days after the election, Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl (R) the second-ranking Republican in the Senate, threatened to filibuster any of Obama's Supreme Court nominees he considered insufficiently conservative. That was 11 weeks before Obama was even inaugurated.As ever, we can look to the party of Great American Patriots to bring the country to its fucking knees so they can engage in ideological warfare exponentially more protracted and melodramatic than what they claimed was virtually treasonous, when the Dems merely asked tough questions of Bush's nominees (Roberts and Alito) and then confirmed them with less fuss than was probably even deserved.
With this in mind, and given the GOP freak-out over uncontroversial cabinet nominees like Kathleen Sebelius, a severe Republican temper tantrum is likely, no matter who the president nominates. If for no other reason, the minority party will see some value in working the base into a frenzy of hot-button cultural issues.
Just when it seemed the political world couldn't get any more interesting, one more huge task is added to the president's to-do list.
In good news, it is not unlikely that we could see the first woman of color appointed to the Supreme Court. Woot!
Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime
I'm pretty sure the most important thing about Daniel Boone is that he was a man.
Question of the Day
Given my answer to last night's QotD, and this sassy nerdery, the obvious question is: What is your favorite television theme song?
Putting both the Golden Girls and Laverne & Shirley themes in a league of their own, and noting that Deeky is, as per usual, full of shit, I will declare a three-way tie between Good Times, The Greatest American Hero, and Hill Street Blues, the last two of which were composed by Mike Post, whose résumé pretty much reads like a list of the Greatest TV Themes Evah.
From the Mailbag
Shaker Marked Hoosier sends on this article, which he aptly describes as a CNN anchor concern trolling about Plan B being made available to 17-year-olds. He does a hell of a lot of hand-wringing over the idea of a 17-year-old managing her own reproduction for someone who never mentions that the age of consent is 17 or younger in all but 8 states, even as he whines: "In most states, minors can't get a tattoo, body piercings or go to a tanning salon without a parent's permission, but we are going to leave them alone to take Plan B."
Shaker Hillevi sends this article with the note: "I don't know whether to weep that giving up sex for a week is described as 'the ultimate sacrifice' or whether to celebrate women organizing in a country where they are grossly marginalized." As for me, I just can't get beyond my angst that sex is still the best bargaining chip most women have.
Shaker InfamousQBert forwards this post about the Australian Harper's Bazaar featuring "plus-sized" model Crystal Renn. The images are really amazing, just for the sheer fact that it's revolutionary to see a woman of her size in fashion photos. (One note of warning: There's some "real woman" stuff in comments there.)
Shaker David sends this interesting op-ed from the Boston Globe positing that women's involvement in the legislature is behind the (incomplete) progressive agenda there.
Shaker ksfeminist emails: "I was listening to NPR on my way to work today and 'The Walt Bodine Show' had Lily Ledbetter as their guest. If any Shakers are interested in hearing the interview, the audio should be posted tomorrow here."
And Shaker Siobhan sends along this article (with a trigger warning) about Tyra Banks testifying against a stalker and headlined: "Supermodel and Her Admirer Meet, Face to Face in Court." Notes Siobhan dryly: "Because, as we all know, stalking is a compliment." Sigh.
