Relaxed Muscle: "Billy Jack"
Same Boat; Grab a Paddle
Wendy Kaminer has a short piece in The Atlantic on "Kagan, Palin, and Lipstick Feminism," in which she examines what she imagines are the double-standards to which Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan and Sarah Palin are held, because the former isn't a renowned fashion plate and the later is considered both fashionable and beautiful—and asserts that the disparity offers "complementary cautionary tales about the continuing appeal of an ersatz, 'Sex in the City' feminism that rewards beauty and punishes plainness with all the subtlety and compassion of a Playboy centerfold."
As evidence of how women and their "ersatz lipstick feminism" are to blame for their own oppression, Kaminer describes the following scene:
Years ago, I watched an array of law students lingering in a hotel lobby, waiting to be interviewed by visiting firms. The men were completely, conventionally covered by their suits; the women seemed half naked by comparison, in fitted jackets, often showing a little cleavage, and above the knee, or shorter, skirts. Maybe they hoped to benefit from these reveals, but I suspect they were subtly disadvantaged by them. The men were free to focus on their interviews; at least some women were likely to be distracted (however, unconsciously) by concern about their looks and the need to sit and display themselves appropriately. How much skin is just enough? Stilettos, kitten heels, or flats? Hollywood or D.C? These are questions men never have to ask. Will they ever cease to matter to women?That last question is a doozy, no? Implicitly holding women responsible for caring about a Beauty Standard by which they are judged even if they don't want to be is spectacularly unfair in any context, but in the milieu of a professional cattle call for an industry with a lingering, persistent gender disparity at its top levels, the apportioning of blame in one direction rises to the level of the absurd. Is it really women to whom prospective female employees showing cleavage and calf matters?
Certainly Kaminer is right that the conservative men who facilitated Palin's rise to the veep slot on the last GOP presidential ticket would not "have responded to her quite so enthusiastically had she been homely and 30 pounds heavier." And she is also right that the disgorged proclamations of noted dipshits like Bill Bennett about feminists hating Palin 'cause she's pretty are as laughable as they are patently irrelevant. But here she is wrong:
Kagan's appearance and fashion sense are mocked or savaged, especially but not exclusively by pundits on the right, following a familiar script. Hillary Clinton and Janet Napolitano endured similar hazings. Sarah Palin, to say the least, did not.She did indeed. (That is the most recent entry in the Sarah Palin Sexism Watch, with older entries linked at its end.) And while one could argue that mocking a woman because she wears pantsuits and mocking a woman because she was a Beauty Queen are different flavors of ridicule, I daresay the distinction matters very little to the women who are marginalized in either case on the basis of their appearance.
Nor should it matter to us.
All the pedantic distinctions in the world about how Palin "brings it on herself," or arguments that the savaging is somehow justified because she trades on her appearance, or the denial that she is demeaned on the basis of her looks at all, or whatever other rationalizing contortions are made in order to extricate one flavor of belittlement from another, are just damnable subterfuge to avoid addressing the rage-making reality that there is, seemingly, no way for a women to publicly present herself that is just…acceptable.
And the discovery of that grim reality is what has turned many ersatz feminists into the genuine article.
There have long been, and long will be, sparkly fauxminist substitutes for the Real Thing which are little more than "Patriarchy for Privileged Girls—now in pink!" Going after women who subscribe to such alluring prescriptions for self-hatred with our blame and ire isn't especially productive; going after them with a meaningful alternative, on the other hand, is.
Women sometimes do convey the bars of our own cages, hoping by some sort of magical alchemy that the self-defeating service of transmitting the marginalizing narratives upon which the Patriarchy depends will someday be rewarded. But one can never be an unconstrained beneficiary of one's own oppression, no matter how devotedly complicit, no matter how tantalizing the promises of a system that sustains itself with the energy of desperate captives eternally chasing the dangled carrot of exceptionalism.
When the veneer on the alleged bargain wears thin enough through which to see, feminists/womanists must be waiting on the other side with compassion, not judgment. It's no fun realizing you've been a sucker.
[H/T to Shaker MJ.]
David Byrne v. Charlie Crist
Okay, what is it with right-wing pols using music by noted lefties in their campaign ads, without permission, and then getting sued over it? Here's some advice, stick to Ted Nugent.
This week's copyright-infringing asshole: Charlie Crist.
David Byrne filed a lawsuit Monday in federal court over Crist's unauthorized use of the Talking Heads "Road To Nowhere" in a campaign ad. "They didn't approach anybody, they didn't ask anybody, they just used it," says Byrne's lawyer.
Byrne said in a statement that he has never licensed a song for use in an advertisement.Byrne is seeking $1 million in damages. The Crist campaign could not be reached for comment.
"I'm a bit of a throwback that way, as I still believe songs occasionally mean something," Byrne said.
He added that if his audience thought he'd license a song to a political campaign, "they might not respect me as much in the morning."
Black Ops Are Totes Bipartisan
U.S. Is Said to Expand Secret Military Acts in Mideast Region: "The top American commander in the Middle East has ordered a broad expansion of clandestine military activity in an effort to disrupt militant groups or counter threats in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and other countries in the region, according to defense officials and military documents. … Officials said the order also permits reconnaissance that could pave the way for possible military strikes in Iran if tensions over its nuclear ambitions escalate."
Swell.
While the Bush administration had approved some clandestine military activities far from designated war zones, the new order is intended to make such efforts more systematic and long term, officials said. Its goals are to build networks that could "penetrate, disrupt, defeat or destroy" Al Qaeda and other militant groups, as well as to "prepare the environment" for future attacks by American or local military forces, the document said.Superb.
The directive is called the Joint Unconventional Warfare Task Force Execute Order. "Unconventional warfare." Awesome. And, naturally, this "unconventional warfare" is executed without any oversight from Congress. Terrific.
The secret order was signed last September and "may also have helped lay a foundation for the surge of American military activity in Yemen that began three months later." This is the exact same shit that then-SecDef Rumsfeld and then-president Bush were pulling during Bush's presidency.
During the last election, any hint of a suggestion that one might vote for a third party was swiftly met by an onslaught of preemptive accusations that the blood spilled in service of Republican militarism (or, during the primaries, Clinton's hawkishness) would be on your hands! But a vote for Obama was a vote for peace, and all that.
Obama had better hope that most of his voters have shorter memories or fewer principles than I do, because, in the immortal words of Mondo Fucko: "Fool me once, shame on—shame on you…? Fool me, can't get fooled again!"
DADT "Deal" Reached
This was discussed briefly in yesterday's thread, but here are the details of the DADT compromise: Craven Democrats will vote to repeal the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy, possibly as soon as this week, thus (provided the measure passes) allowing gay, lesbian, and bisexual soldiers to serve openly in the US military, but with the caveat that the change in policy does not have to be implemented until December 1 after midterm elections "the Pentagon completes a review of its readiness to deal with the changes."
And what if the Pentagon decides it's not "ready"? Who knows. But despite the supposition that the Pentagon is totally on board with this policy change, given Defense Secretary Robert Gates' purported opposition to DADT, and the whole "Pentagon review" business is a perfunctory step being used to justify pushing implementation as far back in the year as possible, the terse response here seems to belie the assumption everyone's definitely on the same page:
"Given that Congress insists on addressing the issue this week," said Geoff Morrell, a spokesman for Mr. Gates, "we are trying to gain a better understanding of the legislative proposals they will be considering."Oof.
The primary legislative proposal being considered is, according to The Advocate, one whose "language would not include a nondiscrimination policy but rather will return authority for open service by gays and lesbians to the Pentagon." That's a worrying non-commitment to codified equality, in my estimation. Certainly there's an argument to be made that a nondiscrimination policy could potentially be interpreted to tacitly discriminate against any group not explicitly protected, but, at the moment, given the polarized opinion on gay rights between the two major parties, I'm more concerned that, in the void of a concrete nondiscrimination policy, a new Republican administration would mean a new policy at the Pentagon.
I'd rather see a firm (and thus difficult-to-unwind) nondiscrimination policy guaranteeing LGB soldiers the right to serve openly, necessitating the need to add more inclusive language as is required, than allow open service in the negative space where a guarantee should be.
But that requires spine and a serious commitment to equality, obviously. Neither of which are in abundant evidence among the Democratic Party.
Question of the Day
Drawing inspiration from the news that Mark Twain's autobiography is soon to be published, today's QotD is: What is your favorite autobiography/memoir?
The first one that comes immediately to mind as a favie is Tennessee Williams' Memoirs, a short excerpt from which I once posted here.
Bonus Cute
Sophie tries to make friends with Dudz. He's still not sure he trusts this wee little furry beastie. Sophie will settle for some love from Two-Legs in the meantime, and does her darnedest to solicit attention with redonkulous cuteness. Matilda and Olivia observe the proceedings with varying degrees of disinterest. Set to "Can't Hurry Love" by Diana Ross and The Supremes.
(Also at DailyMotion here.)
Twainspotting
The recent trend for celebrities to hit the bookstores with their memoirs sixteen minutes after they've made it big -- I hear they're already lining up for Speak, Puberty by Justin Bieber -- makes this news all the more exciting.
Speculation abounds as to why Samuel Langhorne Clemens put the 100-year restriction on the release of his memoirs, ranging from avoiding the discomfort of alienating friends and family to insuring that a century later he'd still be a celebrity.Exactly a century after rumours of his death turned out to be entirely accurate, one of Mark Twain's dying wishes is at last coming true: an extensive, outspoken and revelatory autobiography which he devoted the last decade of his life to writing is finally going to be published.
The creator of Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn and some of the most frequently misquoted catchphrases in the English language left behind 5,000 unedited pages of memoirs when he died in 1910, together with handwritten notes saying that he did not want them to hit bookshops for at least a century.
That milestone has now been reached, and in November the University of California, Berkeley, where the manuscript is in a vault, will release the first volume of Mark Twain's autobiography. The eventual trilogy will run to half a million words, and shed new light on the quintessentially American novelist.
Another potential motivation for leaving the book to be posthumously published concerns Twain's legacy as a Great American. Michael Shelden, who this year published Man in White, an account of Twain's final years, says that some of his privately held views could have hurt his public image.I can't wait to read it and find out more about the man behind some of the best writing in American literature. And I'm sure that Hal Holbrook will be delighted, too; he's got a lot of new material for Mark Twain Tonight!.
"He had doubts about God, and in the autobiography, he questions the imperial mission of the US in Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines. He's also critical of [Theodore] Roosevelt, and takes the view that patriotism was the last refuge of the scoundrel. Twain also disliked sending Christian missionaries to Africa. He said they had enough business to be getting on with at home: with lynching going on in the South, he thought they should try to convert the heathens down there."
In other sections of the autobiography, Twain makes cruel observations about his supposed friends, acquaintances and one of his landladies.
HT to Liss.
This is a real thing in the world.
The Governor of Arizona using a Kermit the Frog impersonator to mock critics of Arizona's new "Papiere, bitte!" immigration law for not having read the law in full (which is not remotely unusual, either among Democratic or Republican politicians, who typically receive summaries from aides).
[Transcript below.]
So, by my calculation, Governor Jan Brewer is against "illegals stealing jobs from Americans" but all the fuck for elected officials stealing intellectual property from Americans. Got it.
Text Onscreen: OK, kids. Ready? Let's sing along!!!!
Kermit the Frog impersonator [singing]: Reading is really super swell. Reading's great, so let's all shout out loud. Reading helps you know what you're talking about. Let's see what these folks have to say about reading.
Video clip of Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) asking Attorney General Eric Holder: Have you read the Arizona law?
Holder: Uh, I have not had a chance— [clip abruptly ends]
Video clip of Fox News anchor Sean Hannity asking State Department Spokesperson PJ Crowley: Have you read the law?
Crowley: Have I read the law? No.
Video clip of Senator John McCain (R-AZ) asking Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano: Have you had a chance to review the new law that was passed in the State of Arizona?
Napolitano: I have not.
Video clip of Cantor: Not read it.
Video clip of Crowley: No.
Video clip of Napolitano: I have not.
Kermit the Frog impersonator: Seriously?
Et cetera.
Quote of the Day
[Trigger warning for violence.]
"Yeah, I thought that they—basically, in the very beginning—should stuff every member of NBC News in that hole."—World Champion Fuckdrip Bill O'Reilly, offering up a charming bit of eliminationism as a suggestion for stopping the oil leak in the Gulf.
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 (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
You Go, Grrls!
Five women tried qualifying for the Indianapolis 500 this weekend and four of them made it. Danica Patrick, Ana Beatriz of Brazil, Simona de Silvestro of Switzerland, and American Sarah Fisher will all race this year.
By my reckoning, this means auto racing will no longer be a real sport in 5... 4... 3... 2...
[H/T to Shaker Thunderbird.]
Assvertising
It is a generally accepted bit of conventional wisdom that women are more likely to: A) Seek medical care, including routine preventative tests; and B) Talk to their friends about intimate subjects like preventative tests, bonding over horror stories of embarrassing pap smears or boob-crushing mammograms. There are studies to back up this conventional wisdom: Women are more likely to do these things.
And though evo-psych fans will almost certainly provide some cis-centric, biological determinist, gender binaryriffic explanation about how that's woven into our DNA because caveladies had to hunter-gather garbanzo beans for some elaborate prehistoric cervix ritual or whatever, it's probably more likely to be attributable to the fact that most female people are socialized to be caregivers, encouraged to seek and accept help (including medical care), exhorted to express a wide spectrum of emotion, and allowed casual intimacies with other female people—which is pretty much the diametrical opposite of how most male people are socialized.
All of which I note as a preface to my insightful commentary about the below advert: This advert is a stupid, sexist mess.
[Transcript below. H/T to Copyranter.]
[Four men—two black men (Vida Blue and Rosey Grier), one white man, and a man who may be Latino, but I'm not certain, so I will refer to him as the mustachioed man—who are in their 50s or 60s are sitting in a conservatively-appointed living room, working on knitting or needlepoint projects while quiet string music plays.][Assvertising: Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Eleven, Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen, Fifteen, Sixteen, Seventeen, Eighteen, Nineteen, 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, 105, 106.]
Rosey Grier: How'd that prostate exam go today?
White Man: Very well, thank you for asking. [turns to mustachioed man] Hey, aren't you due for one pretty soon?
Mustachioed Man: I guess.
Vida Blue: Whoa, there, big guy.
Mustachioed Man: I'll get around to it sooner or later.
Grier: Sooner or later? One in six are diagnosed with prostate cancer.
[They all look at Mustachioed Man in silence.]
Mustachioed Man: All right! I'll do it!
Blue: [pats Mustachioed Man's leg] That's all we wanted to hear.
[A fifth man walks in, wearing an apron and carrying a tray with tea service and cookies.]
Fifth Man: Dessert is served.
[The men mumble appreciatively.]
Text Onscreen, done as if needlepointed: Why cant [sic] men express themselves more like women? Talk to your friends about prostate cancer. Prostate Cancer Foundation. www.pcf.org.
Monday Blogaround
This blgoaround brought to you by Shaxco, publishers of Deeky and Liss' Guide to Watching Lost, each page now also a usable tissue for use while blubbing your face off.
Recommended reading:
Audacia: In The Interest of "Equality," Malawian Woman's Identity Is Erased
Andy: Paper: 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Vote This Week 'Too Close to Call'
Resistance: What if Dora the Explorer Were "Illegal" [TW for imagery of violence.]
Macon: Stuff White People Do: Claim That the "Free Market" Could Take Care of Racial Problems
Joe.My.God.: Transfer Rumor: Hillary Clinton Considered for Secretary of Defense
Angry Asian Man: Hollywood Whitewash: Prince of Persia and The Last Airbender
Anna: The "Abortion Ad" You'd Never See on American TV
Leave your links in comments...
Blog Note
ARGH Disqus: Comments are showing as zero for new posts today in Firefox and IE, and the timestamps are way off. There are comments in the threads, but the comment link isn't updating, for reasons known only to Disqus (and frustratingly out of our control).
And individual comment links, which appeared to be working for a short time this weekend, now aren't working again. Also: I'm still getting complaints about people being repeatedly logged out.
I don't know what to say, except that I'm truly embarrassed that these problems, in addition to the minuscule text size in comments, have remained unresolved for so long, and I offer my apologies.
Meet the New Enemies; Same as the Old Enemies
Krugman uses today's column to talk about corporations' crescendoing fury at the Obama administration:
Corporate America, however, really, truly hates the current administration. Wall Street, for example, is in "a state of bitter, seething, hysterical fury" toward the president, writes John Heilemann of New York magazine. What's going on?Given the SCOTUS ruling on corporate personhood mentioned in the post below, the notion that corporations will simply buy themselves a new president who will be more sympathetic to their miserable plight of minimal sacrifice is a chilling possibility.
One answer is taxes — not so much on corporations themselves as on the people who run them. The Obama administration plans to raise tax rates on upper brackets back to Clinton-era levels. …[T]hey'll still be doing extremely well, and by and large they'll be paying little more as a percentage of their income than they did in the 1990s. Yet the fact that the tax increases they're facing are reasonable doesn't stop them from being very, very angry.
Nor are taxes the whole story.
Many Obama supporters have been disappointed by what they see as the administration's mildness on regulatory issues — its embrace of limited financial reform that doesn't break up the biggest banks, its support for offshore drilling, and so on. Yet corporate interests are balking at even modest changes from the permissiveness of the Bush era.
From the outside, this rage against regulation seems bizarre. I mean, what did they expect? The financial industry, in particular, ran wild under deregulation, eventually bringing on a crisis that has left 15 million Americans unemployed, and required large-scale taxpayer-financed bailouts to avoid an even worse outcome. Did Wall Street expect to emerge from all that without facing some new restrictions? Apparently it did.
Krugman ends his column by noting that Obama "wanted to transcend bipartisanship" but instead
finds himself very much in the position Franklin Roosevelt described in a famous 1936 speech, struggling with "the old enemies of peace—business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering."That's a swell idea—provided Obama actually has an inner FDR, a likelihood of which I've seen precious little evidence.
And that's not necessarily a bad thing. Roosevelt turned corporate opposition into a badge of honor: "I welcome their hatred," he declared. It's time for President Obama to find his inner F.D.R., and do the same.
