Hosted by a Mother Goose house.
The Virtual Pub Is Open
[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]
TFIF, Shakers!
Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!
Quote of the Day
[Trigger warning for violence.]
"I was treated like a criminal, like a complaining woman."—Katie Tagle, whose son Wyatt was killed by his father, Stephen Garcia, after San Bernardino County Superior Judge Robert Lemkau ignored "three motions for an order of protection against Garcia" filed by Tagle and "chose to believe her former boyfriend's denials rather than the evidence she supplied of Garcia's threats―including e-mails, text messages and voice messages. Although no extenuating circumstances were raised in court transcripts of the case, the judge simply accused Tagle of lying, and ordered that she turn Wyatt over to his father—with fatal results."
I encourage you to read the whole article, which also addresses how family courts across the country have "been affected by the rise of the Fathers Rights movement" and notes the conundrum "that efforts to give fathers more rights in custody cases have increased the odds against victimized mothers and children."
[Via Sadie.]
Daily Dose o' Cute
"What? I totally fit in here!"
So, after a week with Dudley now, I cannot begin to convey how much I love this guy. If I'd had the chance to custom-order a dog out of a catalog of awesome dogitude, I don't know that I could have come up with a specimen as tremendous as he is.
Dudz is slowly coming out of his shell, getting more playful with us, and he's starting to trust me more very quickly. (We're already on Day 3 of no submissive piddling—touch wood!) He's still showing no interest, besides a general curiosity, in the cats, with whom he's happy to share food and water and treats; he's great with other dogs and with kids; we're currently having a massive thunderstorm, and he hasn't so much as flinched during the crashing and booming thunder.
So, basically, he's a GOOD BOY! But more than that, he's just such a gentle, empathic, sweet soul. I know every dog owner in the world says this (so welcome me to the ginormous club), but there's something really special about this pup.
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[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.]
Save My School, Privileged Messiah Billionaire!
by Shaker TC
I loved Melissa's "Skinny Jesus Chef" series (see here and here on Jaime Oliver's inane TV show and was reminded of them when I heard a This American Life segment on California gubernatorial candidate Steve Poizner and his semester teaching high school at an "inner city" school. (A pdf of the transcript is here.) It reeks of the same messianic dynamic where a clueless, privileged man who doesn't know anything about a community makes douchebag assumptions and gets everything completely wrong.
Poizner wrote a book about how SCAAARY the neighborhood and high school is:
Steve Poizner: [reading] I passed nearby my neighborhood French bakery and the local Ferrari dealership.Turns out that Privileged Messiah Billionaire has a skewed worldview that he can't admit is skewed.
Ira Glass: This is Steve Poizner, reading from the book he wrote about this.
Steve Poizner: [reading] Several miles and a couple of highways later I took the Capital Expressway exit and drove into what felt like another planet. Signs advertising janitorial supply stores and taquerÃas. Exhaust hung over 10 lanes of inner city traffic; yellowing, weedy gardens fronted many of the homes, as did driveways marred by large oil spots or broken down cars.
Ira Glass: Driving around the neighborhood, it is hard to disagree with the teachers who say it's a perfectly nice middle class and working class area. Occasionally you'll see a house in bad shape, but overwhelmingly it's neatly tended yards, garages, decent cars and SUVs in the driveways. It's suburban. I was surprised to learn that when Poizner taught here in 2003 there was a golf course just a few blocks from the school - there's still a lake and the Raging Waters water park. He doesn't mention those in the book. We called a half dozen local real estate agents who confirmed what teachers told us - that the neighborhood looks the same today as it did back in 2003. If anything, they said, with the recession it's gotten a little worse – the average house price in 2003 near the school was $457,000. Today it's $317,000.It's not just the neighborhood; it's the students as well. Poizner characterizes the students he teaches for a semester as sullen and unresponsive but This American Life astutely points out that the lack of responsiveness could be the result of Poizner being a bad speaker.
But here was the strange thing: the conclusion Poizner comes to - again and again during these scenes - isn't that he's doing anything wrong or has anything to learn as a teacher. Instead, he blames the kids. They're tough, they're unmotivated, they lack ambition, they're wired differently. The students, meanwhile, in every scene in the book (I read the whole book), seem utterly lovely. Polite, they don't interrupt, they don't talk back, they just seem a little bored. His very worst student is a graduating senior who's hoping to go into the Marines.Like any good Privileged Messiah Billionaire, Poizner is completely adamantly that HIS perception and HIS reality is clearly everyone's reality, facts be damned.
Ira Glass: Are you overplaying the desperate poverty of this neighborhood?It's really fascinating how similar these narratives are in terms of how wrong both Jamie Oliver and Steve Poizner got it working with their respective communities. Neither can see beyond the blinders of their privilege to actually get a complete picture of the communities they are trying to "save."
Steve Poizner: No, I don't think so. I mean, it's definitely not like some inner city areas. And I don't know, what you described doesn't strike me as the neighborhood I was at. I mean, at least in 2002 and 2003, the neighborhood is rough-and-tumble. In that there's definitely a lot of crime, and no question lower income. And there's a lot of, you know, signs that people were struggling economically. That's why the crime statistics for surrounding the school – you know you can get those from the San Jose Police Department, like I did – and we definitely documented that not only did it appear to be a rough up and coming area, but the police will tell you that too.
Ira Glass: So we went to the police, and they informed us that no, the neighborhood around Mt. Pleasant high school is NOT especially dangerous or crime ridden. It's average for San Jose. And while San Jose might have a reputation in the richer suburbs around it for being sketchy, and definitely was more dangerous in the ‘70s and ‘80s, a police spokesman told us that view is out of date, an urban myth. According to FBI statistics, San Jose is one of the safest cities in the country. There were 371 violent crimes per 100,000 people in San Jose in 2003, the year Poizner was there. You'd be more likely to be a victim of violent crime in Austin, Texas, or Seattle or Phoenix or Columbus, Ohio or San Francisco. When it came to property crime that year, you were more than twice as likely to have something stolen from you in Honolulu, Denver, Seattle, San Francisco or nearly any big city you can name.
The scary thing is that Jaime Oliver and Steve Poizner are on TV shows and writing books on how to "fix" things – obesity and education. Based on how wrong both of them get in terms of assessing their environments, they shouldn't be given the authority to fix a cuckoo clock.
And yet they're being touted as experts.
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by Shaxco, makers of Deeky-n-Liss Brand Tweezers, for all your explosive eyebrow needs.
Recommended Reading:
Susie: The Senate Hearts Big Banking! They Voted To Protect Behemoth Banks, 61-33. We Won't Forget.
Echidne: WaPo Puts Its Left Shoe Forwards!
Shark-fu: A Terminator Situation
Andy: Lesbian Cannot Be Dean, Says Marquette University
Resistance: The Non-Apology Apology
Seraph: Proud to Be a New Yorker
Leave your links in comments...
More
[It has been about a year since this was originally posted, and there's been a lot of concern trolling in threads lately, so I suspect it may be time to post it again, and recommit ourselves to expecting more.]
This, you may have noticed, is a blog about teaspoons.
It is a blog about increments of measurement so infinitesimally tiny they haven't been given names, about glitches in the Matrix so swift and subtle that they are more easily missed than noticed, about tangible particles of a thing called progress not visible to the naked eye.
It is a blog about hope—not the kind that's packaged and sold in anti-aging creams, soda pop cans, or even political campaigns—but the real thing: A hopefulness that radiates like whoa from the pores of indefatigably optimistic dreamers, who close their eyes and tilt their faces up toward the sun and imagine a future where equality and freedom are not aspirational concepts, but defining features of every human life.
It is a blog about connection, and the realization that we are all in this thing together, and the resolve to be all in, because we make a difference in this world, for good or ill, because we know there is no neutral; there is no moral ambiguity in staying silent; there is only standing up and saying no to the indignities one human visits upon another, or saying yes.
It is a blog of wildly unreasonable expectations, because unreasonable expectations are the seeds of progress.
One of the greatest American advocates for progress, a gentleman you may have heard of named Dr. King, is not remembered for giving a speech about his resignation to the status quo. He is remembered because he admonished us not to wallow in the valley of despair and exhorted us to envision big things and told us to never be satisfied with less. He said to the world, "I have a dream," and that dream was what many people might have called in its time an unreasonable expectation.
Eradicating any kind of bigotry is, by definition, an unreasonable expectation—because institutional bigotry is deeply entrenched. Prejudice is ancient. Only a fool would imagine it can be overcome.
Except, of course, that it can be. Bit by bit. Particle by particle. Teaspoon by teaspoon. Person by person. Prejudice is ancient, but it dies with its every carrier and must be taught again. And it can be unlearned. Bit by bit. Particle by particle. Teaspoon by teaspoon. Person by person.
Patience, it takes, and determined sanguinity, to create people filled with expansive love and intractable respect for one another in a culture that casts us as enemies.
And it takes unreasonable expectations, the seeds of progress.
Thus, every time someone asks me, greets my bellicose display of unreasonable expectations with, the exceedingly un-progressive question, "What do you expect?" I will answer the same as I always do: I expect more.
Of course the Republican Party is racist. What do you expect?
I expect more.
Of course lots of male bloggers are misogynists. What do you expect?
I expect more.
Of course some television show is homophobic. What do you expect?
I expect more.
Of course some feminists are transphobic. What do you expect?
I expect more.
Of course there are ablest jokes in sitcoms. What do you expect?
I expect more.
Of course there are fat-hating jokes in advertisements. What do you expect?
I expect more.
You can't expect people to mess with iconic cultural images just to give a nod to diversity. It will upset people.
The fuck I can't. I expect more.
I'm not ironically detached, I'm not apathetic, I'm not resigned, and I'm not contemptuous of bleeding hearts. I am a greedy bitch with voracious expectations, and I dream long and lustfully of a better world that is both my muse and objective. I want it like the cracked earth of the desert wants rain, and I will neither apologize for nor amend my desire because of its remove from the here and now; its distance encourages my reach.
Don't bother asking me what I expect.
You already know the answer.
PSA FAIL
(Trigger warning for dehumanization)
The Illinois Department of Public Health has begun running new PSA ads in the Chicago area (and perhaps elsewhere) in a new anti-HIV, or should I say, anti-people-with-HIV campaign. Their clever little tagline is "He's the 1." (I suppose using a number instead of the word makes it more "hip.") The image is below the fold, but for those of you who are unable to see the image, it basically consists of four cutout sections of male faces of differing races and skin tones, connected together to form a monstrous single "face." The text states "He's the 1 that could infect you."*
So, where to begin?
1. The combined facial expressions of each person making up this combined image are certainly threatening. Add to that the "he's the one that could infect you" text, and the IDPH more or less casts men with HIV in the role of predators. As if the majority of men with HIV are out there, intentionally spreading the virus, and you're next.
2. Note the use of "that" instead of "who." Add that to this threatening, monstrous face (the fact that one eye is placed significantly lower than the other is not, I believe, unintentional, invoking historical depictions of Igor, Quasimodo, and other "deformed" characters whose appearance is meant to be menacing), and the dehumanization of people with HIV is complete.
3. As Melissa pointed out when I sent her the link to the ad, this campaign completely ignores HIV reinfection, concentrating solely on first-time infections. Reinfection is incredibly fucking serious, and this ad completely erases the threat for those already infected with HIV.
4. Way to erase women, IDPH! Have we forgotten so quickly that women, and women of color in particular, are the group with the highest number of new infections?
5. ADAP (AIDS drug assistance program) funds are in serious jeopardy in Illinois; recipients are now being re-evaluated every six months rather than every year, and we may have to go to a waiting list. So... cut money for life-saving medications, but I wonder how much of this money must have gone into this campaign; if they paid for the design, and if they paid to buy full-page ads in every gay paper in the city, as well as street poster advertisements.
6. This is exactly the kind of stigmatizing bullshit that keeps people from going to get tested for HIV in the first place.
7. Fearmongering campaigns don't work.
8. By running this ad in all of the gay publications, as well as posters in gay neighborhoods, this was certainly an excellent way to make HIV a "gay disease" again! Bravo.
I'm sure I could come up with eight more things that are wrong with this, but I'm too pissed off right now. Wait, one more... I can't believe they raffled off a fucking iPad in conjunction with this steaming pile of FAIL. I'm hearing that many HIV agencies and LGBTQI organizations in the Chicago area are already voicing their outrage over these ads. Good. If you'd like to contact the IDPH and let them know you don't appreciate this ad campaign, their contact information is here.
* The text at the very bottom of the poster proudly announces "Paid for by the Illinois Department of Public Health." I hope they're ready to own this huge lapse in judgement, compassion and taste.
I Am Not a Bunsen Burner
In March, I wrote about an Emory University study that found "intestinal bacteria may contribute to obesity and metabolic syndrome." Now, another study at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center has similarly found "that people with gut bacteria that causes a high amount of methane gas tend to have higher body mass index."
It's well known that there is great individual variation in bacteria in the gut. Genetics, foods, antibiotics and other factors can cause change in that bacteria. Bacteria help to break down food and produce various types of gas, such as hydrogen, carbon dioxide and methane. Different people will produce different types of gas.This is, quite obviously, terrible news for sanctimonious fat-shaming thin people, as it potentially deals a terrible blow to their precarious conviction of moral superiority which is carefully maintained almost exclusively via a reliance on shouting "CALORIES IN! CALORIES OUT!" at fatties.
Dr. Mark Pimentel and his colleagues at Cedars gave 58 people a breath test to measure methane gas. About 20% of the participants tested positive for methane. Those people also had a body mass index up to 7 points higher than patients who did not show the presence of methane. It's possible that methane from methane-producing gut bacteria can slow down digestion and increase the uptake of calories, the authors said. The study was presented Wednesday at the Digestive Disease Week annual meeting in New Orleans.
Other studies are hinting at this connection too. An interesting story in Thursday's issue of MIT Technology Review, "You are your bacteria," discusses the role of gut bacteria variation among individuals and how that bacteria can be altered and play a role in disease.
It is, however, good news for everyone with a passing interest in a fact-based reality.
Buh-Bye, Facebook
Facebook Glitch Brings New Privacy Worries: "On Wednesday, users discovered a glitch that gave them access to supposedly private information in the accounts of their Facebook friends, like chat conversations. ... Although Facebook quickly moved to close the security hole on Wednesday, the breach heightened a feeling among many users that it was becoming hard to trust the service to protect their personal information."
Ugh. I just...every time I read something like that, I get a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach because I can't help thinking of all the people who exploit security breaches like that to get access to people they want to hurt. I readily admit the stalking in my personal history colors my perspective, and I'm certainly not suggesting everyone (or anyone) else should share my perspective, but it's impossible for me to trust social networking media that encourages users to treat its databases as a reservoir for extremely intimate information.
I just deactivated my Facebook account (which I never look at, anyway, and which I should have done a long time ago, since its founder's a misogynist asshat). And it felt like a relief.
Hmm
[Trigger warning for domestic violence.]
So there's this asshole named Danny Dyer, a 10¢ celebrity who writes (wrote) an advice column for the British men's magazine Zoo, and he's been sacked from the gig after he advised a heartbroken ex-boyfriend who wrote seeking counsel: "I'd suggest going out on a rampage with the boys, getting on the booze and smashing anything that moves. Then, when some bird falls for you, you can turn the tables and break her heart. Of course, the other option is to cut your ex's face, and then no one will want her."
Somehow, this swell advice made it into print, via what Zoo is claiming was "an extremely regrettable production error," which I believe translates roughly into: "We had no idea that everyone would get so upset about a little disfigurement joke! Sheesh!"
Which, in some twisted way, is understandable, given that Danny Dyer's hot advice has previously included the suggestion to a correspondent who complained about his girlfriend's abundance of pubic hair: "Maybe set light to the muff hair. That stuff goes up quick, like a thatched roof."
Why, one wonders, was advising setting a woman on fire met with yawning indifference, but advising slashing her face resulted in massive blowback, Dyer's immediate dismissal, an apology and a donation to Women's Aid from the magazine, and their promise to dedicate the space where his next column would have run to awareness-raising about domestic violence…?
Don't misunderstand me: I believe the reaction to his slashing advice was spot-on. I'm just wondering why his ignition advice did not elicit the same reaction.
Maybe it was just a matter of this recent affront catching the attention of the right information maven, from whose network spread an infectious indignity. Maybe.
Or maybe not. Because it hasn't escaped my notice that the advocated cruelty which was ignored admonished a man to violently take care of a woman's unruly public hair (enforcing the Beauty Standard), whereas the advocated cruelty that sparked outrage admonished a man to violently ruin a woman's face (subverting the Beauty Standard).
It's certainly interesting, that.
Of course, it's entirely possible, ahem, that's just a coincidence.
UK Election (Not Quite) Final Results
Running off the BBC reportage, with 16 seats left to declare, the totals are:
Conservatives: 299
Labour: 254
Liberal Democrats: 54
Others: 27 (Scots and Welsh nationalists, Sinn Fein and other NI parties, and the Greens' leader)
With a total of 642 seats in play (there are 650 total, but four are taken by the traditionally neutral Speaker and deputies, and another four are held by Sinn Fein, which doesn't take up its seats in the Westminster Parliament, leaving 642), the majority number is 322.
For those who don't know, the Westminster Parliamentary system provides that the party with the most seats is invited to form a government, ideally with more than half the voting seats. No party has done this, meaning a few possible outcomes:
1) The Conservatives could try to hold a minority government, as in fact is currently the case here in Canada. This would mean they'd be the government, but they'd be a government which had to cope with the fact that they'd need to put compromises in their legislation to win support from other parties.
2) Either the Conservatives or Labour could form a partnership with the Liberal Democrats. If the Lib Dems partner with the Conservatives, their coalition would be sufficient to hold a majority, but the Lib Dems would hopefully soften the right-wing agenda of the Tories. This might also include a shift toward a more proportional system of voting, something long favoured by the smaller parties, as the First Past the Post system tends to favour the bigger, established parties. For example, Labour and the Lib Dems had roughly similar proportions of the popular vote, but the distribution of that vote means that Labour have five times the number of seats, compared to the Lib Dems.
At the moment, and possibly for the coming several days, the government will be in some chaos, as the various parties jockey and negotiate to try and come to a conclusion about what kind of government will be formed.
Traditionally and constitutionally, the incumbent party is given the first chance to form a government which will hold the confidence of Parliament, which would mean Labour (under current PM Gordon Brown) would have the first go. If they can't, then other parties will be invited to try.
The Tories, unsurprisingly, have been making a lot of self-serving noise about the "moral right" to try and form a government, but given they only received 37% of the popular vote, it's hard to see this as a mandate of any sort - nearly two-thirds of Britons voted for someone else!
It's still very tight, very tense, and will be for some time.
(Note: I won't be around to monitor this thread much; I'm off to Buffalo this morning, as my partner is visiting for the weekend and I need to pick her up from the Flugplatz.)
UK Election, Widespread Disenfranchisement
Among the many, many stories this morning in the aftermath of the UK's General Election, are a number of stories of disenfranchisement: people not allowed to vote because of poor organization at the polling stations, chaos and protests and poor decision-making all around in what will be a close and contentious election (thus magnifying the effect of disenfranchisement).
One such is here on Livejournal, from jady_lady, a woman who is blind* recounting her difficulties with poorly-trained staff making it so that her ballot was very likely spoiled.
If you have links to other stories of disenfranchisement in the UK General Election of 2010, please give links below, so that progressivists in the UK can lend their teaspoons to the cause.
* Her self-identification.
Question of the Day
Following up on yesterday's QotD: What's the last book you tried reading more than once, and just couldn't finish it?
Normally, if I try a book and can't get into it after a serious attempt, I don't pick it back up again. I think I may have read the first bit of James Joyce's Ulysses on two different occasions, and both times chucked it aside with a heaving sigh of exasperation. Just no.
UK Election Open Thread Part 2
Starting a new thread to watch this fascinatingly close election, with what are now looking to be some truly appallingly poor choices being made by staff at the polls: stations where there weren't enough ballots, stations where people were turned away because the clock had gone 10, protests, and likely legal challenges.
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[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.]
Afternoon WHUT
Here's a superweird article about Fred "God Hates Fags" Phelps, and his history as a successful civil rights attorney back in the day.
All righty then.
