Shakesville

The Lost-a-Thon Continues: Check Dis Shit Out

Hey, Shakers, it's Kenny Blogginz! Even NEWBORN BABIES know that I'm a huge LOST fan! (Thanks, Liss!) Anyway, I thought my fellow Lost-ites would appreciate this easter egg that Cory Doctorow* just shared with me (we're totally BFFs):

"For LOST fans: Search kayak.com for Sydney to LAX one-way non-stop on 9/22/2010."

[It is the information for a flight leaving Sydney at 2:55pm and arriving in Los Angeles at 8:03am, at a cost of $4839, on Oceanic Airlines.]

------------------

* Actually BoingBoing guestblogger Jessamyn West. I just like using every opportunity I can to claim that Cory Doctorow and I are BFFs.

Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"

Strips One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104. In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman and a biracial queerbait telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.

RIP Howard Zinn

Howard Zinn, historian, author, educator, and activist, has died at age 87.

Howard Zinn, the Boston University historian and political activist who was an early opponent of US involvement in Vietnam and whose books, such as "A People's History of the United States," inspired young and old to rethink the way textbooks present the American experience, died [yesterday] in Santa Monica, Calif, where he was traveling. ... His daughter, Myla Kabat-Zinn of Lexington, said he suffered a heart attack.

...For Dr. Zinn, activism was a natural extension of the revisionist brand of history he taught. "A People’s History of the United States" (1980), his best-known book, had for its heroes not the Founding Fathers -- many of them slaveholders and deeply attached to the status quo, as Dr. Zinn was quick to point out -- but rather the farmers of Shays' Rebellion and union organizers of the 1930s.

As he wrote in his autobiography, "You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train" (1994), "From the start, my teaching was infused with my own history. I would try to be fair to other points of view, but I wanted more than 'objectivity'; I wanted students to leave my classes not just better informed, but more prepared to relinquish the safety of silence, more prepared to speak up, to act against injustice wherever they saw it. This, of course, was a recipe for trouble."

...In addition to his daughter, Dr. Zinn leaves a son, Jeff of Wellfleet; three granddaughters; and two grandsons.

Lost Facts!

Top five fake-ass wigs on Lost (in descending order):

4. Faraday

8. Benry

15. Jack's beardwig

16. Naomi

23-42. Roger Workman

(See also here, here, here and here, and here.)

[Cross-posted.]

Breaking News

Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, professional fat-hater, is a superdouche: Whole Foods has a new program in which it "will offer steeper employee discounts to people with lower BMIs." Charming.

[Click to embiggen.]
If you can't see the image, it's a letter from Mackey explaining the program, and it might as well be a picture of a steaming load of actual bullshit for all its value and sensitivity. With my apologies to bullshit.

[H/Ts to Shakers Lena and MistressSparkleToes.]

Watch Your Mouth - Part 2: Reappropriation and Cooption

(See Part 1 for Context)

I find idiomatic speech and shared lexicon endlessly fascinating -- never more so than when I study a sub-culture of which I am a proud member: The Gay.

I can't tell you the number of times I've stumbled on some online conversation where homophobes are moaning about how we nasty Queers have "hijacked" a perfectly nice word that used to mean "happy, merry" (happy, Mary?), and "why can't they just be called what they are -- homosexuals!".

Which is very amusing to me, because the term "homosexual" was coined in the late 1800s, and first used in an English text in 1897 -- at around the same time that queers were reclaiming the word "gay" in reference to themselves ("gay" was originally used idiomatically to indicate anything "immoral", but especially in terms of sexuality and promiscuity -- for example: a "gay house" was a brothel). Gay was used commonly within the community of self-identified homosexuals by the 1920s, and there's evidence that it was used as early as the late 1860s.

So which came first, Teh Homo or Teh Gay?

Doesn't matter, AFAIC -- what matters to me is how people being identified with a word want to be identified. Me? I prefer "queer" as a general term for the community I consider myself a part of, but I've had friends and lovers who hated this term -- they preferred "gay", or "LGBTQ" as a descriptor. My very best friend (my Beloved), doesn't like any of them, and doesn't want her sexuality labeled at all.

*Ahem* I shall henceforth trot myself back over to the focus of this post.

I think it's clear that by now, the word Gay has been reclaimed successfully by the queer community -- so much so, in fact, that it's unlikely that an author writing in English would use it without being aware that various layers of meaning might be read into it.

On the downside, it's been so successfully claimed that it can once again be used as a pejorative by virtue of being associated with queers ("That's so gay.") *sigh*

"Dyke" is another word that's been reclaimed (see Dyke, sub-category Portly), as is "queer", although the re-appropriation of these terms carries a certain level of controversy that is similar to (but, perhaps, milder than) the split in feminist communities over the word "bitch".

I know a number of lesbians who would be absolutely offended if I called them a dyke -- even in private, or in the exclusive company of other lesbians. I also know lesbians who would be offended if I referred to them as "gay women", and gay women who would be put off if I called them lesbians.

So what's a dyke to do?

Well, for one thing, comprehend and respect this fact: It is vitally important that oppressed persons retain the agency to identify themselves.

Labeling a minority, or any oppressed class, is big tool in the oppressor's tool-kit. That's why there is such a vast array of slurs applied to people who are disenfranchised based on their sex, gender, color, race, creed, orientation, disability, national origin, etc..

When a member of a privileged class uses these terms, they are saying, in essence: "I own the culture, and I get to define you." It is an attempt to exercise power, whether conscious or unconscious.

When a member of a non-privileged class re-appropriates the term, they are saying: "No, you do not define me."

Tends to piss them right off (the privileged label-makers, that is).

Here's a true-story example: I was walking down the street holding hands with my girlfriend, and the guy we'd just passed said (just loud enough for us to hear): "Fucking dykes."

I turned around and said, in my cheeriest voice: "Congratulations, Sir! -- you have correctly identified the dykes -- but I will have to remove points from you for mis-identifying our current activity."

He was absolutely aghast.

I had not only refused to passively accept his right to label me pejoratively -- I had had the audacity to actually confront him for attempting to "power-over" me.

In his mind, the way this was supposed to work was that I would get scared, or drop my girlfriend's hand, or feel ashamed, or Maude knows what -- however he thought it was going to play out, clearly it did not include me engaging him directly and proudly claiming the term he sought to denigrate me with.

So, what does all this have to do with Part 1 of this series?

Let's say a person of privilege uses a term or idiom (perhaps with no intent to offend at all) and a member of the non-privileged class says that it is offensive to them, and the privileged speaker responds with something like: "That term has come into common use and isn't offensive anymore".

I believe that they are enforcing their privilege.

I believe that they are reiterating the following message (usually, completely unconsciously):

"I have the power. I own the language. Your experience does not count, and the fact that you are offended is of no consequence, because you have no power."

Which is fine, if you aspire to be a privilege-wielding butt-hole.

Reproductive Coercion

[Trigger warning.]

Anti-rape and domestic violence advocates have long known that a significant feature of many abusive straight relationships is unwanted pregnancy as the result of male sabotage of birth control—or, in some cases, disallowing their partners to use birth control altogether. Our culture is rife with narratives about women who "trap" men by "getting themselves pregnant," but rarely discussed are the stories of abusive men who poke holes in condoms, flush their partners' birth control pills down the toilet, monitor their partners' periods to ensure they're not using birth control, and in other ways try to control their partners' reproduction, because a child will keep them connected for life.

But earlier this month, Elizabeth Miller (whose name may be familiar), an assistant professor of pediatrics at University of California, Davis, published a new study in the journal Contraception addressing "reproductive coercion."

[Reproductive coercion] is when the male partner pressures the other, through verbal threats, physical aggression, or birth-control sabotage, to become pregnant. According to Miller's research, about a third of women reporting partner violence experienced reproductive coercion, as did 15 percent of women who had never reported violence.

Overall, rates of reproductive coercion among family-planning-clinic patients are surprisingly high: about one in five women report their partner having attempted to coerce them into pregnancy. "What we're seeing is that, in the larger scheme of violence against women and girls, it is another way to maintain control," says Miller, who studied 1,300 female patients culled from five family-planning clinics in Northern California. "You have guys telling their partners, 'I can do this because I'm in control' or 'I want to know that I can have you forever.' " This may help explain previous findings of higher rates of unintended pregnancies in relationships with partner violence.

The women in Miller's study were between 16 to 29; Miller will publish a study later in 2010 that finds similar numbers in demographics of older women. That said, younger women may have a more difficult time dealing with reproductive coercion: they have less experience in relationships, and, if they are minors, less access to doctors' appointments and emergency contraception. Particularly for teenagers in relationships with older men, the age difference "may have profound implications for perceived and actual reproductive choices for young adult women," Miller wrote in a 2007 paper on the same subject. "Such factors may also lead to fewer adolescents reporting such reproductive control as abusive, forced, or coercive." Put another way, teenage girls are at greater risk of not recognizing reproductive coercion as problematic, and allowing it to continue.

Younger women are also, of course, less likely to be making a living wage on which they can support themselves, particularly if they have already become pregnant. Abusive partners aren't seeking to create a baby; they're seeking to create a dependency in their partners.

Which is why there exists a "men's reproductive rights movement" that seeks to wrest control of reproductive decisions from women.

It is also almost certainly, in part, why murder is the leading cause of death for pregnant women in America, many of whom are actively trying to leave the men who murder them when they are slain.

[H/T to Shaker Broce.]

SOTU Open Thread

Here's an open thread to discuss last night's State of the Union address (full text here; and the Republican response can be found here), in case anyone missed the Virtual Pub.

My overall assessment in a word: Meh.

Lots of proposals, many of which I didn't like (tax credits), and some I did (repealing DADT), but none of it means shit without the kind of action—and leadership—that Obama hasn't really shown himself to have so far. And, indeed, he spent way too much of the address IMO talking about partisan divisions and exhorting the GOP to engage in good faith, which they are simply never going to do. It was tiresome to watch.

Obama still doesn't seem to have realized that you can't simultaneously pander to your opponent and rally your troops. He missed a big rallying opportunity last night. And I fear it's really going to cost him.

Neo-Con Bullshit Is Still With Us

Self-referential paper is self-referential.

If the reports are to be believed, Women's Studies programs are disappearing at many Canadian universities. Forgive us for being skeptical. We would wave good-bye without shedding a tear, but we are pretty sure these angry, divisive and dubious programs are simply being renamed to make them appear less controversial.

(CC's note: I have condensed the middle several paragraphs, to save your eyes* some strain:

MRA BULLSHIT, MRA BULLSHIT, MRA BULLSHIT; ALSO, BTW, MRA BULLSHIT, DID YOU KNOW? AND THEN MRA BULLSHIT. NO, REALLY. ALSO, WHAT ABOUT THE MENZ? NO, REALLY!)

While we'd like to cheer and say "Good riddance," we're certain such celebration would be premature.

Also, pestilential, inconsequential, sewer-sedimential.

It occurred to me while writing this that simply taking the article and search-and-replacing every occurrence of "Women's Studies departments" with "neo-con birdcage liner", and "(radical) feminism" with "morally bankrupt neofascist marketworship" would turn it into a pretty good piece, although the latter cries out for a good hearty acronymming.

Tip of the CaitieCap to Shaker Sara.

* My apologies for this. I'm leaving it in because I don't like erasing my mistakes, and as an example of how even those of us who do this on the public stage get it wrong sometimes, but I shouldn't have said this. It would be better as:

"...to save you some time."

Why? Because I othered visually-impaired people there. Not everyone peruses Shakesville with their eyes. Some probably use readers, or other assistive tech, to get their daily dose.

So, my apologies to those Shakers whom I othered, and I'll try to do better in future.

Open Thread

Hosted by Mister Softee.

Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

Jeannie C. Riley: "Harper Valley P.T.A."

It Looks Like We're Going to Have a Mansplainer Thread After All

Links relevant to this post:

--Rebecca Solnit's L.A. Times essay, "Men who explain things".
--Zuska, You May Be A Mansplainer If...
--Jennifer Ouellette links to her post "Let Me Explain" in Zuska's thread. It's good reading.
--Zuska's follow-up thread, Men Who Cannot Follow Clear Directions From Women

On Monday morning, Zuska of Thus Spake Zuska opened a thread for her readers to discuss and mock the phenomenon of mansplaining. Zuska quotes Karen Healy’s definition of a mansplainer:

Mansplaining isn't just the act of explaining while male, of course; many men manage to explain things every day without in the least insulting their listeners.

Mansplaining is when a dude tells you, a woman, how to do something you already know how to do, or how you are wrong about something you are actually right about, or miscellaneous and inaccurate "facts" about something you know a hell of a lot more about than he does.

Bonus points if he is explaining how you are wrong about something being sexist!

Think about the men you know. Do any of them display that delightful mixture of privilege and ignorance that leads to condescending, inaccurate explanations, delivered with the rock-solid conviction of rightness and that slimy certainty that of course he is right, because he is the man in this conversation?

That dude is a mansplainer.

The thread is entitled “You May Be a Mansplainer If...”, and the space is supposed to be for sharing hallmark mansplainer behaviors that readers have witnessed, experienced, or even displayed.

Here is a great example of the phenomenon from mightydoll, reproduced with permission:

my ex used to do this:

ex: something's wrong with my computer.

me: Oh, looks like there's a phrenicle in the stubert zone

ex: something's wrong with my computer

me: Why not check the stubert zone for phrenicles?

ex: something's wrong with my computer - - I'll ask Dick at work about it.

A WEEK PASSES IN WHICH I MENTION THE STUBERT PHRENICLES A FEW MORE TIMES

ex: Hey, I spoke to Dick at work about my computer. Turns out, (begins speaking really slowly) there are these things called phrenicles which SPEAK ... TO... the molydimes. The molydimes can reside in the jiminy zone, or they can reside in the stubert zone, but WHEN they reside in the stubert zone, sometimes there's a problem with them communicating with the loovarths, so it's best to keep phrenicles out of the stubert zone. All I have to do is move these phrenicles back to the jiminy zone and it's solved. Isn't Dick at work a computer god?

me: ...

Predictably, the thread is littered with arguments and hurt feelings, most of which stem from a failure to understand the original post. (Hint: nobody claimed that all men mansplain, or that women are never tiresome know-it-alls.) And of course, people showed up to laugh at the comments that so aptly prove the post’s point.

I wanted to write a post in response, but foundered almost immediately. I couldn't decide exactly what to say beyond providing my own examples, which I did in Zuska's thread. My inchoate thoughts on the matter included the following:

1) I understand the pressure, at least in the United States, to avoid admitting ignorance. Especially in science and tech fields, everyone competes for the title of Most Knowledgeable, even though admitting ignorance and asking questions is crucial to gaining knowledge. Both genders feel this pressure. But men's opinions and ideas are privileged over women's, and men often receive positive feedback for holding forth, while women tend to be punished for doing the same. Anyone who has been chastised by a supervisor for being "too aggressive" while male coworkers were praised as "go-getters" for similar behavior knows what I'm talking about.

2) Gender-neutral words for "mansplanation"-type behavior include great terms like "rule-crapping" and "info-dumping" (see Zuska's comment thread). As much as I like these concepts, though, they remove reference to the male privilege that makes mansplaining what it is. Mansplaining is not just holding forth; it's holding forth by someone who has the force of society behind him. A girl or woman can be a tiresome know-it-all, but she won't be praised and supported in her efforts while those around her are discouraged from showing her up.

3) I sympathize. Really, I do. Boys grow up hearing that the worst thing they can be is wrong, or weak, or like a girl--indeed, all of these horrible things are lumped together. Gentlemen, those times that you were called a sissy, or a girl, or berated for getting beaten by a girl on a math test, I was there too. I got the same message: girls are less than. Yes, it's hard to prove yourself. Now, prove yourself and try to make up for not being a son at the same time.

4) So, all the sympathy in the world won't make me let mansplaining (or whatever you choose to call it) slide.

I couldn't think of any way to express all of these inchoate thoughts, so I put it off and just included the link in today's blogaround. But comments in that thread convinced me that there is real interest in a similar though broader discussion here, so I'm opening one. Unlike Zuska's thread, this one is not limited to mocking the phenomenon, although examples are welcome. Discussion of social forces behind the phenomenon of Men Who Explain Things is on-topic, as are techniques for dealing with such Explanations. The different ways in which society responds to any and all genders of "rule-crappers" would also be on-topic. Comments about what it’s like to grow up afraid of getting scooped by a girl, or to grow up being that girl, and effects this has had on your communication skills are welcome. Debates over whether mansplaining exists, or is truly gendered behavior, or comments claiming that men are not privileged and/or calling us sexist, will be deleted, because we don't argue with cranks. Feel free to write about those topics on your own blog, but please stay on-topic here.

Finally, if you find that your comment boils down to "I've got hurt feelings", please refrain from posting it, and enjoy instead this lovely video:

Flight of the Conchords, "Hurt Feelings". Season 2, Episode 3, "Tough Brets"

The State of the Union Pub Is Open

Drink up, Shakers. It's gonna be a long night.

Late in the day, CNN reported that Obama will ask Congress tonight to repeal "Don't Ask Don't Tell." Paul Campos captures the perfect tone of cynicism on this one:

Of course "asking" could mean everything from making this a legislative priority to engaging in a largely empty symbolic gesture. Given that Obama almost certainly has the authority to stop discharges based on sexual orientation by issuing an executive order, it will be interesting to see how seriously he pursues what up to now has been perhaps his most egregiously broken campaign promise.

As ever, I expect the worst and hope for the best! Bottoms up! Glug glug glug.

[If you're searching for an online broadcast, C-SPAN will be streaming it.]

Question of the Day

What's your favorite political movie?

(By which I mean, a movie specifically about politics, as opposed to a movie that generally makes a political statement.)

There are a lot of political movies I like: The Girl in the Café, The Constant Gardener, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Milk, The Man, Dave, The American President, My Fellow Americans...

But my absolute favorite is one which was recommended to me last time we did this question (in 2007): The Contender. If you haven't seen it, do.

Clinton on Her Future

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tells Tavis Smiley in an interview airing tonight that she doesn't envision being a two-term cabinet member:

TAVIS SMILEY: Finally, there's already speculation about whether or not Secretary Clinton is going to do this for the full first term, and whether or not she has any interest if asked to stay on to do it for eight years? You see how tough the job is, can you imagine yourself doing all four years and, if asked, doing it for another four years?

HILLARY CLINTON: No, I really can't. I mean, it is just…

TAVIS SMILEY: No to what? All four or eight?

HILLARY CLINTON: The whole, the whole eight, I mean, that that would be very challenging. But I, you know, I don't wanna make any predictions sitting here, I'm honored to serve, I serve at the pleasure of the President, but it's a, it's a 24/7 job, and I think at some point, I will be very happy to [LAUGHS] pass it on to someone else.

TAVIS SMILEY: That opens the door for the obvious question, what would Hillary Clinton want to do when she is no longer Secretary of State?

HILLARY CLINTON: Oh, I, there's so many things I'm interested in, I mean, really going back to private life and spending time reading, and writing, and maybe teaching, doing some personal travel, not the kind of travel where you bring along a couple of hundred people with you. Just focusing on, on issues of women, girls, families, the kind of intersection between what's considered 'real politique' and real life politics, which has always fascinated me.

TAVIS SMILEY: And finally, just for the record, you have said before, emphatically, in fact, that you are not interested in running again for President of the United States, I’m taking your answer now to mean that that's still the same?

HILLARY CLINTON: Absolutely not interested.

I get the feeling that most of the people who ask her that question are relieved when the answer is still no.

Elizabeth and John Edwards Separate

According to The Guardian:

[A] source close to Elizabeth Edwards told ABC News that she and John are now legally separated. Under North Carolina law they can't get divorced until at least a year later.

Discuss. Or not. I don't really care.

Daily Kitteh

"We Have a Large Cat" Edition

It's frequently commented upon that Olivia is Big McLargehuge, not merely fat but long and tall, though the actual breadth of her enormity is rarely cast into such stark perspective as in this pic I snapped of her cuddling with Iain Sunday night. This is not a trick of the camera, nor is it Photoshopped, and Iain is not a small fella. (He's 6'1, broad-shouldered, and barrel-chested.) She is really just. that. big.

Another one with Iain. And here she is with Sophs, who is ridiculously titchy, but still.

Olivia is a lady of remarkable substance.

Watch Your Mouth - Part 1: Explain Yourself

(Part 1 of An Ongoing Series)

Recently, I participated in a conversation about certain words and phrases and when they do (or whether they can) become used as common vernacular to the extent that they lose any derogatory or degrading meaning inherent in their origins.

It isn't particularly important what the exact phrase being discussed was at this point, but it is a subject I see come up frequently, especially on blogs where people are making an effort to use language responsibly, inclusively, and non-oppressively.

So, I'm going to offer up what I use as my general guideline (aka "rule of thumb" -- see more about that in part 3 of this series, arriving in a few days) when thinking about what language I will use when communicating with others, especially on the internet.

I'll start with a wee story: A number of years ago, when I was first studying Hebrew, I would occasionally send an email in Ivrit to a friend in Israel. I was learning formal Hebrew, so to him, I'm sure my emails read as if I was a real stuffed shirt (fortunately, he knows me better than that). He would tease me a bit about my proper language and was infinitely good-natured and supportive when he corrected some of my word choices to a better reflection of day-to-day speech.

One day, though, I sent him an email about Halloween, and I indicated that many children had come to my door "begging for candy". He wrote back and warned me with uncharacteristic sternness that the word I had chosen for "begging" would be offensive to many native Hebrew speakers in this context, even if I was just being hyperbolic about the Trick or Treat traditional threat/demand chant of costumed children on a pagan-esque holiday.

I asked him to explain this to me, and he said that the word would imply, in Israeli culture, a certain level of poverty and powerlessness so abject that it would not be a joking matter, especially when referring to children.

He went on to talk about the complexity of attitudes re: begging and charity in Jewish and Israeli culture, and how using such a word in this context might even subtly indict the community referred to of failing in their responsibility to care for their children.

This experience was very enlightening to me. My friend's explanation took some time -- he had to provide me with history and context in order for me to fully comprehend, as someone outside both the culture and the language, why one word next to "Beg" in my Hebrew dictionary implied wretchedness and cultural failure, and another simply meant "asking emphatically".

Since then, I've used this as a tool for determining whether a commonly-used idiom can be successfully detached from any oppressive history or present-day offensiveness.

This is how I use the tool:

(Note: In this example, I'm going to use a fairly innocuous phrase, rather than something as highly-charged as "that's so gay", or "shuck and jive" or "bitch", but this technique can be applied to pretty much any phrase that some people receive as offensive because it's racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, ablist, etc., while other people argue that commonality of use has rendered inert any roots in racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, ablism, etc..)

I'm going to use the phrase "Pardon My French".

Let's imagine that I am conversing with a person who is just learning English, has a fairly good word-by-word vocabulary, but who knows nothing about France except that it's a country, and nothing much about the culture of any country in which this idiom is used.

I say: "Damn this fucking pickle jar lid! -- Oh, pardon my French."

And they say, "Hmmm. Why are you wishing to send to hell the lid of a jar? And what do the French have to do with it?"

First of all, I would have to explain to this person what I mean by "damn this ___" (that what I really mean is definition 5 in the OED -- an expression of frustration).

If they ask (and why wouldn't they?) how a word whose first meaning is "be condemned by God to eternal punishment in hell" came to mean that I'm annoyed, there might be conversation about Judeo-Christian attitudes, and why some words which are considered "bad" come into use only in moments of great frustration. I might also need to relate this to any words considered to be "cussing" in the speaker's own language (which might involve the etymology of the word "cuss").

However, let's assume, for the moment, that the listener understands the concept of cursing, but is scrambling to comprehend the Gallic influence on my U.S. potty-mouth.

I would need to explain to this person a least a little bit my culture's historical attitudes and stereotypes about residents of the country of France, who are assumed to be libertine from birth, and why some members of other countries attempt to excuse their "salty" language by claiming that they are just speaking French (and then, of course, I'd have to explain why "salty" language has nothing to do with sodium chloride), and I'd probably need to put in some stuff about why some people in our culture think that using the word "damn" in any context is bad/wrong, and I'd probably touch on why they are likely to hear the word damn on broadcast television at some hours, but never the word "fuck", even though they are both "cussing". Phew!

The point is -- I consider that if I can't explain an idiom without also describing a system of bias or discrimination or oppression that gave rise to it -- the term is fundamentally discriminatory and/or oppressive.

And this is "just" Pardon my French! -- something I doubt most people think of as demonstrating bias (although I think it does) -- and the residents of France are not really all that disenfranchised as a group. Think about how the energy of oppression in these casually-expressed idioms are amplified when they involve groups and individuals who are more deeply other-ized.

You may be breathing an exasperated sigh at this moment and saying to yourself: "Oh PortlyDyke, do I have to always be thinking about every single word and phrase I use?"

No. You don't have to do anything.

However, in the text-saturated environment of the blogosphere, words and phrases are often the only tools we have -- and ostensibly, we are here to use those words and phrases to communicate to, and connect with, other people.

So, if there are words and phrases that I use, but haven't actually thought about -- idioms that may be so common that I don't have a clue about their etymology, but which I find are undeniably rooted in discrimination and oppression when I use the "explain it to a non-native speaker" exercise above (such as the phrase: "I got gypped" -- a slur against Romani people that I'm often surprised people don't know about) -- if I continue to use these words and people are offended by them and I say: "Hey, it's common usage! I didn't mean it like that" . . .

Well, if I do that, I think that what I'm really saying is:

"I want to use these phrases because they are an easy short-hand for me, and/or they make me sound hep, or edgy, or current -- and I want that more than I want to effectively communicate and connect with you."

Which, when I put it like that, sounds really shitty of me.

Quote of the Day

"I haven't donated to the Haitian relief effort for the same reason that I don't give money to homeless men on the street. Based on past experiences, I don't think the guy with the sign that reads 'Need You're Help' is going to do anything constructive with the dollar I might give him. If I use history as my guide, I don't think the people of Haiti will do much with my money either."—Former NBA player and huge privileged asshole Paul Shirley, who also penned an open letter to the people of Haiti which is even more execrable. [H/T to Shaker Nicole.]

Coincidentally, my dad and I were just talking about this exact attitude two nights ago. Now, my dad, who is a very devout and fairly conservative fella, and I disagree about a lot of stuff. But one thing on which we passionately agree is the importance of volunteering and charitable giving.

Both of us have heard variations on the old "I won't give money to a homeless man because he might spend it on booze" chestnut from people during discussions of Haiti relief. I said, "When I give money to someone who's homeless, I don't give a flying fuck what zie spends it on, whether it's a bottle of booze or a hit of weed or a sandwich or a paperback, because I respect hir autonomy." And my dad said [I'm paraphrasing], "Ditto."

Respecting the right of humans to make decisions for themselves isn't—or shouldn't be—an exclusively conservative or progressive principle. (And disrespecting people's right of self-determination is found in varying degrees on both the Right [anti-choicers] and the Left [paternalism, or nanny-statism].) It's something we all ought to be able to handle.

As is navigating the obvious distinction between giving money to a person (or people), whose choices are none of your business, and an organization, whose charter delineates how contributions will be spent and is thus answerable if they are misspent.

Shirley, and not a few other privileged folks, are willfully blurring that distinction in a shameless attempt to justify their despicable victim-blaming, which isn't justifiable by any measure, anyway. It's one thing to not be sure which charity is the most effective (although accessing information on vetted charities is easier than ever—thanks, Al Gore!); it's quite another to lay the blame at the feet of aid recipients, belligerently dismissing them as intrinsically unhelpable, because they haven't demonstrated sufficient ability to overcome centuries of privileged exploitation and institutional neglect to satisfy your pithy, ignorant expectations.

No one (especially people struggling themselves) is obliged to contribute to relief efforts. But anyone who has the means and doesn't want to give ought to at least have the integrity to be honest about why they're not giving, to say, with unapologetic avarice: "It's not you; it's me."

[Contributions are still needed. Donate to CARE here. Donate to Habitat for Humanity here. Donate to Doctors Without Borders here. Donate to Hope for Haiti Now, which benefits a variety of organizations (who can be found at the link), here.]

Vloggin' with Blogginz, Episode 11

[Episodes One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten.]

A poem. An ode. A tribute. With dancing.

[Also available at Daily Motion. Full transcript below.]

Title Card: Vloggin' with Blogginz

KBlogz: Hey, all you Shakers out there on the internet! It's me, Kenny Blogginz, again—and boy, do I have a heck of a poem to read to you guys! Uh, you know, everyone knows I'm a huge Whitney Houston fan—

[cut to scene of KBlogz dancing to "I Wanna Dance With Somebody"]

KBlogz: —I wrote a poem that was inspired by her 1986 smash hit single, "The Greatest Love of All."

[cut to shot of the cover of "The Greatest Love of All" single]

KBlogz: So sit back and enjoy this poem, you guys! [looks down; begins reading from paper]

I believe the children are the future
Flying around with tiny jetpacks
Wearing their futuristic hover slacks
And eating their freeze-dried fruit snacks.

They shake hands with the alien explorers
Because their minds are free of prejudice.
The children of the future will wear
No-nonsense, durable, and inexpensive jumpsuits.
Schools and playgrounds will be the same
Except that they hover two feet off the ground!

I believe the children are the future
Minimum wage will be eighty million dollars.
Adjusted for inflation, however, it's not very much.
[makes face at camera and shakes head]

I believe the children are the future
They will get jobs as laser repairmen
But they won't get jobs as jet pack salesmen
Because jetpacks sell themselves.
Yeah. Thank you.

[cut to image of KBlogz flying around with a jetpack saying "Gleep glorp!"; text on the image reads: "The future is…now??!!"]

[cut to video of KBlogz grooving to "Greatest Love of All"; he mouths some of the lyrics, then sings along out loud with Whitney on "dignity!" clenching his fists]

Title Card: The End!!!