Channel Surfing the Apocalypse

Irresponsible Journalism

2009-06-17T16:45:52Z

The Asylum story yesterday about drink spiking is perhaps one of the worst cases of irresponsible journalism I have seen in quite some time. This is probably because I don't often read the dregs of web media, but it's still pretty bad. Citing a study of Australian "drink spiking victims", Jeremy Taylor presents a "happy hour fact to amaze your drinking buddies with!" Out of women who claim their drinks were spiked, NONE of their claims were true. Nope, they just drank themselves into a stupor and made up a story about being drugged to absolve themselves of responsibility.

The report itself is offensive enough (I want to see some credentials and more information on that report's sources), but the article's tone is also dismissive to the point of causing harm. Taylor's use of quotation marks when using the word victim, rather than taking issue with the semantics, serves to dismiss the real trauma of countless women who have been drugged. It negates the plausibility of all such claims of abuse.

There's no use arguing how damaging such dismissive rhetoric is, especially in cases of violence against women. We have a few decades, at least, of wrongfully dismissed rape cases and countless women afraid to report real crimes for fear of being called a liar or worse for proof of damage. Also, I'd be preaching to the choir. But I think it's worth getting really riled up about. And I think it's worth pointing out the last line of the article, as well: "We tried to use the 'my drink must have been spiked' excuse with a girlfriend once. No, we are no longer dating".

Taylor's use of humor, from the epitaph of the article to its closing line, makes the issue of date rape and the spiking of drinks into a punchline. Not only is this offensive, it is completely inexcusable. While the author himself deserves to be punished, the media network who allowed the article to be written and then linked to more prominent news outlets (like AOL, where i found it) should also be held accountable. While citing a vague report, presenting unsubstantiated claims is reckless and irresponsible, it is important to realize that when the issue is as important and sensitive as this, the stakes are even higher. The standards of journalism should be too.

F*** The Police!

2009-04-29T21:21:33Z

You know, ever since I grew out of my 14 year old rebellious phase, I've recognized that sometimes cops just get a bad rap. Sure, I still kind of love the NWA song, but I know that cops do a lot of good work, especially after getting to know a few. That's why it's always especially distressing when cops end up proving stereotypes right by doing something assinine. Like wailing on a teenage girl for tossing a shoe at them. Today's news, however, is unconscionable.

The NYPD were called to help escort a drunken woman home. Two male officers, Moreno and Mata, arrived, took her upstairs, then returned twice. At some point during one of those visits, Moreno, who has been on the job for 18 years and two years away from retiring with his pension, raped the semi-conscious woman while she lay face down on her bed. Mata, only part of the force for 3 years, kept lookout for his partner.

The NYPD is dually heralded as both the best and the worst police force in the world. For a police officer answering his call of duty by raping the citizen he was sent "to serve and protect" is truly one of the most dispicable acts one could commit.

Community Barter System

2009-03-02T21:47:47Z

Today NPR is talking about the barter system and how it can be useful in a depressed economy. They have been talking with people who exchange sewing work for someone to come by and give their cat a diabetic shot, exchanging electric guitars for acoustic ones, hairdressing for carpentry, and countless other exchanges. One of the ideas I liked best was the idea of some barter communities of balancing growth of their group with the importance of having a small, intimate community to trade in. I immediately thought of spiritquesting, and what a great little community of very handy people we've got here.

Unfortunately, being surrounded by crafty people has yet to rub off on me. I am terrible at sewing and still pretty iffy on bike maintenance (though I can confidently change my brakes. And tires, kinda sorta). But one thing I have taught myself in the past couple of years, out of necessity, has been gluten free baking. And I need a nice pair of jeans shortened and hemmed. I have needed this done for about six months now, but haven't gotten around to finding a shop in town to trust. And while I know a couple of people who hem, I'm not a big fan of asking for random favors. I have finally perfected the gluten free chocolate chip cookie and I have been told I have some excellent cakes, brownies, sandwich bread, and lemon loaf (which seems to be a pretty consistent favorite among test groups).

So...gluten free baked goods for tailoring?

My First Period

2009-02-26T17:08:27Z

My daily perusals of the New York Times online today led me to this, a review of "My Little Red Book", by Rachel Kauder Nalebuff. I was attracted initially by the review's title: "In the Open at Last, a Secret All Women Share". I was sure I'd find something at least marginally offensive or just plain interesting. I was right on both counts. I am certainly interested in checking this book out. It is a collection of stories from women about the experience of their first period. It has oustanding potential.

On the other hand, reviewer Abigail Zuger, MD, rubs me the wrong way. In both title and her insistence that men should go outside and "toss a ball around for awhile" rather than read the book, Zuger seems stuck in the binary view of gender, deciding for others how their genders must present themselves. She further distances herself, as well as the book, from being overtly feminist. I can't speak for the book until I've actually read it, but Zuger assures us that the editors "manage to avoid both the chirpy 'You are a woman now' song of the Tampax box and the lugubrious musings on blood, moons and fertility of the feminist academic."

Still, I am very curious about the book. I am also curious about the subject. Take my first period for example. My mother had already been telling me for a few years that I would get my period "very soon". That never happened. I probably spent a few seconds every day for two years wondering if "this will be the day?" I was terrified it was going to happen in class, or without my realizing it until someone laughed and pointed to a bloodstain on my pants. I began asking my mother and sister how I would know? What does it feel like? I was never really satisfied with my sister's "like trickling blood" explanation, but what could I do? I started going to the bathroom a lot in 8th grade, when many of my other lady friends had already started. I had to check. I often convinced myself I could feel myself bleeding during class, so I'd run off to check.

The actual moment was more lackluster than most stories. I was at home. Going to the bathroom. For real, not in a paraniod "have I started my period yet?" way. As I was, for lack of a better way to put this, "cleaning up", the tissue came away bloody. I was terrified for a few seconds until I figured it out. I screamed "MOOOOOMMM!!!!" at the top of my lungs, she came, she gave me a tampon, which I refused to use because it terrified me, she came back with pad, and that was it.

Anyone else want to share their stories?

Vibrator Play!

2009-02-19T17:16:11Z

Oh my! I really really want to see this play: "In the Next Room (or the vibrator play)" by Sarah Ruhl.

It sounds like it deals with the themes of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper, but with primitive electric vibrators! What more needs to be said? Anyone wanna sponser my trip down to Berkeley to review this?

It's That Time of Year

2009-01-28T17:16:23Z

That's right, folks, it's that time of year! No, Not the Academy Awards, but the GLAAD Awards!!! This year marks the 20th anniversary of the GLAAD (Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) Media Awards and the nominees are out! My favorite category, comics, will probably be a tight race between favorites Buffy the Vampire Slayer, by Drew Goddard, Jeph Loeb, and Joss Whedon, and Secret Six, by Gail Simone and Nicola Scott. Other nominees include The Alcoholic by Johnathan Ames, Final Crisis: Revellations by Greg Rucka, and Young Avengers Presents by Ed Brubaker, Brian Reed, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, Paul Cornell, Kevin Grevioux and Matt Fraction.

I must say, I'm not an Avengers or a Final Crisis fan. At all. I can't imagine how they got in the running for this award, but GLAAD generally has pretty good taste. I am particularly excited about the Buffy nod. There are times when it feels like Joss just really has a jones to see some lesbian action, but the follow through with the most recent story arc was great. More importantly, while Buffy's lesbian relationship certainly plays a role in the plot, it does not take center stage. The story still focuses on the Slayer's battle against "the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness" with relationships providing a backdrop and a third dimension for the character. So, while Buffy's rather sudden new relationship at first seemed like a frolick in Joss' fantasy world, it has ended up being drawn with affection, sensitivity, and even a shade of real world depiction...minus the superhero bit.

As for Secret Six, I keep meaning to pick it up but simply never have. I do not enjoy jumping into the middle of a story arc, so I have waited. Gail Simone is a fantastic story teller, evidenced by her current run on Wonder Woman, and I look forward to checking this story out.

Boy In a Dress, In Distress...

2009-01-26T22:31:50Z

Men in skirts. According to New York Times fashion bloggers, it's the new trend. Several big name fashion designers have been spotted wearing skirts for themselves, but they have also been a big hit on the runways of New York and Paris.

Addmittedly, I'm no fashion buff; but this story intrigues me nonetheless. As one commentator on the New York Times blog post points out, men in the Northwest have done the Utilikilt thing for years. I've seen it. But there is something much more striking about a man wearing a pencil skirt with graffiti tights. And a silk skirt with Mary Jane style patent leather shoes. Not only are these images striking, they may speak to a more progressive view of gender in the fashion world.

I cannot speak much to trickle down theory of fashion runways to streets. From personal experience, however, I feel fairly confident when I say the runway has never been a reflection of the real world. In terms of body type, it has certainly been a place to view our culture's "ideal form", but whether or not the prevalence of men in skirts on the runway will soon be seen on the streets of Seattle, I cannot say. I doubt it.

Regardless, the trend is incredibly interesting and I'll be curious to see how it develops. These designers, such as Marc Jacobs and Louis Vuitton, have certainly put forth an alternative to traditional gender expressions. Their models look elegant without looking like they are cross-dressing. And yet there are certainly expectations of the angry media mob to follow. Perhaps more importantly, while this could mark the beginning of new expressions of gender, the fashion industry is often far too easily dismissed as either "gay", "frivolous", "racist", "elititist", and "ridiculous". While many or all of these categorizations may be true, these images are still bound to cause a stir. And it could be productive.

Bonobo Porn!

2009-01-26T21:01:44Z

Last week over at the New York Times, writer Daniel Bergner talked about sexology in his article, What Women Want.

From Bonobo porn to the fluidity of sexual desire, Bergner discusses a variety of very interesting theories. And there's highly respected women to back them up, too, like Meredith Chivers and Lisa Diamond.

There is, however, one strike against Bergner for describing the outfits and body types of each PhD woman he interviews; but the article was still an interesting read that I highly recommend.

Rape Culture Sells Clothes/Perfume/Bags

2009-01-21T16:54:14Z

While looking around online after that last post, I found this:

I really don't think I need to say anything. Other, of course, than what the fuck? It's moments like these I'm grateful I don't read fashion magazines.

Colorado State University Police Chief Condones Rape

2009-01-21T16:37:01Z

The Colorado State University Police Chief, Dexter Yarbrough, has an awful lot of charges against him. Unfortunately, most of those charges were pressed years ago, but CSU seems to have kept them quiet. Now the situation has come to a head and an awful lot of nasty evidence is surfacing. My favorite are the tape recordings of his lectures, taken by a saavy student who knew Yarbrough was crossing lines, particularly legal ones.

There are a lot of awful quotes, but the one that really manages to stand apart from the rest is this gem: "Women want the dick, even when they say 'no'. They want the dick."

Thank you, Jessica, at feministing.com, for alerting me to another heartwarming day in the news!

Ms. Feminism: Obama? Comments, please!

2009-01-17T06:10:34Z

I guess there's an uproar about the new cover of Ms. Magazine. Obama strikes the classic Superman pose, ripping open his shirt to reveal a "THIS IS WHAT A FEMINIST LOOKS LIKE" shirt. It seems that the central argument is that women can speak for ourselves and having Obama as a prominent face of feminism is simply glorifying men and putting women in a damsel role, waiting to be saved by the shining knight of feminism.

While I see the point of this argument, it seems to me that it's high time we really allowed men a place in feminism. While making a man a poster-boy for feminism is probably a bit extreme, the Ms. cover doesn't really do that. Rather than make Obama the face of feminism, the cover merely conveyed the sense of hope that I share with many as his inauguration nears. Obama is a self-identified feminist, the first in the White House (as far as I know). He enters his presidency with a Vice-President who co-authored the Violence Against Women Act. This truly promises to be a great time for feminism.

Rather than remain entrenched in first and second (and some third) wave feminist exclusionary practices, we should embrace a more cooperative movement. Obama is about to become one of, possibly THE, most influential people in the country. I don't think a celebration of what his position could mean for women's rights is cause for outrage.

I'd like to hear what other people have to say about this, especially opposing viewpoints, so please leave your comments!

Kissing Causes Deafness

2008-12-09T19:21:40Z

That's right, boys and girls, if you kiss too much, you can go deaf. A 20 year old woman in China serves as the cautionary tale de jour: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7772902.stm

Here's the rundown: woman and man kiss. They keep kissing. Pressure in the woman's mouth is reduced and the eardrum gets pulled out. Ear is deaf. Papers go crazy cautioning people about the various dangers of kissing, saying "doctors advise people to proceed with caution".

We've been getting the don't have sex, don't kiss, don't do anything of a sexual nature lecture for years, in schools, media, and at home. But what better headline than a documented case and headline of a kiss making you deaf?

Domestic Violence Unit Cut

2008-12-09T00:32:46Z

With a Vice-President-elect like Joe Biden, the man who brought us the Violence Against Women Act, things should be looking up, right? Apparently not. By the end of the year, King County's Domestic Violence Unit will be no more. http://www.kuow.org/program.php?id=16472

Budget cuts are all over the country and they are hurting Americans where it hurts. This, however, is the most devastating cut I have seen locally. Yes, job cuts are terrible and individuals are really hurting. But this is a decision by the state that not only effects jobs (civilian personnel will be let go and detectives and officers will be transferred elsewhere in the county), but it is the complte abandonment of specialized care and protection that worries me most.

Sergeant John Urquhart (who represents the King County sheriff's office) makes an excellent point : "At least in our opinion, the first role of government is public safety, that's what they have to do first, and quite frankly they're not doing this now". Urquhart also notes that the kind of special training, protection, and expertise provided by the Domestic Violence Unit will be "lost over time". This is simply unacceptable.

Luckily, the cut is not going unnoticed. County employees, victims' rights groups, victim service provides and even the sheriff's office itself are all extremely unhappy. I won't say that being vocal will bring the unit back. I won't be that optimistic. But at least speaking out about the importance of such state-sponsered services and protection, especially in a time and area where domestic violence is on a steady rise can help raise awareness. Not only will county executives feel the anger over such cuts, but the public will be exposed to what a serious problem domestic violence is. Hopefully, victims may also find the support they need in groups that may spring up in the wake of this devastating loss.

R.I.P. Diversity

2008-12-04T05:22:31Z

The economic crunch has been tough on lots of us. I suppose that it simply never occurred to me that the comic industry was suffering as well.

http://girl-wonder.org/girlsreadcomics/?p=249

True, Birds of Prey was something I stopped reading a while ago (after Gail Simone), and Manhunter? Never really dug it. But Blue Beetle is one of my favorites! I can't really say more than Karen already has over at Girl-Wonder, but I do want to do a eulogy of my own.

Blue Beetle is one of the the DC Universe's best comic books right now. The writing/artistic team, lately Matt Sturges and Rafael Albuquerque, have been phenomenal. Sturges writes with sharp wit blended with multi-dimensional characters and a captivating story-line, no small feat in an industry inundated with shock-value thrills, big boobs, and crappy dialogue. It is not often that a writer is able to balance the action and dialogue without something being sacrificed, but Sturges has done a fantastic job. Perhaps more impressive than this balancing act is his well thought out incorporation of current political tensions in the most recent story arch, which deals with the subject of immigration and immigrant labor. The excellent writing is well paired with beautiful art, which Albuquerque consistently churns out.

The saddest part of this book's departure is that it signals a major loss to the mainstream comic industry's diversity. Blue Beetle is Jaime Reyes, a latino teenager. The core cast is almost entirely latino/a with a fairly even divide between men and women. Women in the series are not simply mothers and beautiful love interests, they are smart and willful subjects who drive the story through their actions rather than with incidents merely thrust upon them, as we see so much in pop culture and media. From the disabled Latin father, to the brainy female friend, to the powerful super-powered girlfriend, to the complex and badass woman crime boss (who is barely even a "villain"), the industry is losing some fantastic characters in Blue Beetle's termination.

On the plus, as Karen also notes, there will be a lady Black Panther, a series first. Hopefully it's good and I can still have a well-stocked subscription box at my shop.

Sexism in Nature Documentaries

2008-11-17T20:52:50Z

I love me some nature documentaries. I just got done watching a three part series from the always informative BBC on the Galapagos Islands, called Galapagos. I must say, it wasn't the BBC's best work. The information was repetative, often disjointed, and not very well presented (in terms of script, not necessarily the narrator herself). It was beautifully filmed, thank goodness, but I was a little disappointed. That disappointed turned to shock and, yes, a little bit of dismay, during the third episode. There was a fairly long and pretty awesome land iguana fight, explained as two females fighting for prime nesting turf.

I'm fairly confident we've all seen a nature documentary or two, and know that fights are almost always explained with pretty grandiose verbage. I mean, they're brawling. And these two were really going at it, lots of neck biting and thrashing around. It was very exciting. Grandiose language was more than fitting for the scene. Except that it was described as a "cat fight"...CAT FIGHT?! Never in my fairly extensive repotoire of nature films and books have I heard a vicious territorial battle, bloody and everything, described as a "catfight". Except when talking about cats fighting. Actual cats. And then it's two words: "cat fight".

The term "catfight" is defined as fighting between two women. According to wiki (yeah yeah not a scholarly resource, but they've got a reasonable pulse on colloquial terminology), a catfight typically involves "scratching, hair pulling and shirt-shredding AS OPPOSED to punching or wrestling" (emphasis my own). So if there is actual wrestling and hitting (and, I assume, pointy toothed biting), it isn't a catfight. Referring to a territorial battle as a "catfight" delegitimizes the true violence and struggle such turf wars entail.

Yes, I'm nit-picking a bit. It was one word in three hours of programming. But sitcom vernacular has no place in an otherwise intelligent program. While I didn't think the script was great, nowhere else did the language veer off from scientific, traditional nature documentary discourse. Here's what I'm really getting at: Such word choice in a nature documentary is an indication of just how deep the roots of institutionalized sexism have spread. Now, as off-the-wall as the remark sounds, and I know it's a bit ridiculous, one can't deny how bizarre and out of place the narrator's/script writer's description of the fight was.

I was a bit distracted for the rest of the documentary by these thoughts, but also by an important and potentially lucrative realization: If only someone would pay me to find the often subtle traces of sexism in just about anything, I wouldn't have to worry about the stock market taking most of my grad school fund.