Whenever I hear the words "Thomas Jefferson",

this is what comes to my mind, too:

Thomas Jefferson: The Face of a Rapist, by Renee, Feministe. Emphases mine.

Americans look at Thomas Jefferson and see the one of the authors of the Declaration of Independence, a statesman, a former president and one of the founding fathers,’ however; when I look at him, I see the face of a rapist. When Jefferson first met Sally Hemings, his slave through inheritance, she would have been no more than 15 or 16 years old. It is rumoured that when she returned from France with him, that she was already pregnant with his child.

[ . . . ]

No matter how many times Black women have angrily contested the use of the term love affair between Hemings and Jefferson, it continues to be the most common descriptor by those who believe the DNA evidence. This assumes that Hemings actually had the power to deny Jefferson sexual access, or that Jefferson had a right to Sally’s body for the purposes of sexual gratification. Both suppositions are erroneous. Due to the patriarchal nature of gender relations, many men believe that they exist with the right to access women’s bodies and that is specifically grounded in the power imbalance between the genders. If we can acknowledge in a modern context that a power imbalance exists between men and women, how much more likely is it that this same imbalance existed between Jefferson and Hemings?

Some may look back at Jefferson and simply claim that he was a man of his time and that he should not be judged outside of historical context, however; in my mind a rapist is a rapist. What he did at the time may not have been considered a violation due to current race and gender relations, however; today we can correctly name his actions. Sally did not have the power to consent to his advances even if she was so inclined; this simple fact must be affirmed not only to honour the memory of Hemings but to change the social understanding that Black women’s bodies are unrapeable. We are not naturally licentious whores who exist to fulfill the sexual fantasies of depraved racist men. We are women that must be accorded the right to control over our bodies without punishment for any decisions we make in that regard.

And yet, Mr. Jefferson has a memorial in my nation's capital. (So does his fellow slave-owner and noted tax-evader George Washington.) This is despite the fact that Meredith Simons at the controversial site Double XX does not think we in the United States live in a rape culture, mainly because she doesn't seem to know anyone who has been raped.

I have never owned anyone, assaulted anyone, or started a war with Great Britain. Yet where is my national monument?

.

I thought I'd like Drop Dead Diva,

but it is no longer appealing to me. The obvious reason is that there is no one featured on the show who is darker than a brown paper bag. No, I'm generous. None of the main characters on the show is darker that a sugar cookie. That includes the only nonwhite main character, and the most famous actor on the show--Margaret Cho--who is relegated to being the assistant of the main character, Jane. It appears that the creators of Drop Dead Diva said to themselves, "we've got one character who is all subversive with her fatness, and one character who insists upon being Asian. Make sure that every other main character on the show is white, heterosexual, thin, American, predictable and conventionally attractive. This is Lifetime, people. We think we know what the audience wants, and we keep giving it to them."

Aside from the lack of diversity, I am disappointed that the show is uninspired. Most of the characters are either shallow or lack depth, which are two different things. Regarding the depth, two of the supporting characters do not seem well thought out by the writers. Regarding the shallow, four of the characters select their potential mates based mainly on their appearance. This is despite the fact that the premise of Drop Dead Diva is supposed to be about a young, thin girl trapped in an older, fat woman's body to teach her a lesson about being a better person. But even her guardian angel Fred, whom I adored in the pilot, has now fallen in love with and stalked a woman solely based on her societally acceptable appearance. A woman who has no discernible source of income, nor a desire to get a job.

Ergo, not watching the show anymore.

Surprisingly though, on the Fox Reality Channel, I do like Househusbands of Hollywood. The first episode got funny at the end, when that one husband was so proud of the man cave he had created in his garage, and then his wife drove her car inside, almost running over his five friends.

You can watch the trailer here:

I don't know what all the pixelation is for. Yes, that is Ron Johnson and Vanessa Huxtable. No, I didn't know they were together until I heard about the show. They don't have any kids, so I don't know why he doesn't have a job. Well, aside from being a Househusband on TV.

.

I would go to a movie with both of them.

Best YouTube comment, by star0shadows:

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, you are officially invited to the party in my pants.

~ ~ ~

Meaning, I would watch a movie in a theater with each of them sitting next to me. However, I think that Mr. Wood would be more interested in Mr. G-L than he would be in me. (Yes, I did watch the Season 3 premiere of Mad Men last night. Did you?) Or maybe not. I am adorable and charming, as you readers know. :)

.

"She wants her America back? Go tell that to the Indians."

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Reform Madness - White Minority
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Spinal Tap Performance

Meaning the Native Americans, not the people from South Asia.

.

"Don't make me bring the OG Claire McCaskill out here."

"Just act right."

Funny! And poignant. Who knew the GOP and the Wu Tang Clan were actually the same people? Have you ever seen them in the same room? There you go.

.

Part of the Problem

This week I was having a conversation with one of my new friends, which went something like this:

New friend: "Let's talk about your dating life."

Me: "Let's not. It's terrible."

New friend: "Really?"

Me: "Really. Guys aren't that into me."

New friend: "That's hard to believe. You're great!"

Me: "Yeah, I know. I am great. But . . ."

And then I never know exactly what to say after that, because the friend that I am talking to is rarely another black woman. So the friend does not fully comprehend the background of racism, sexism, colorism, sizeism, and general discrimination and bigotry that is involved when dating, specifically when dating in the United States. It is difficult to explain that, for many male people my age, the person I am on the outside--and sometimes on the inside--is unacceptable. I am not what they had in mind. I am not what they grew up with. Even if my packaging is what they grew up with, the image of me, to them, remains generally inferior; it is not an image which they aspire to have as a partner.

It is hard for me to encapsulate all that pain in one sentence. It would take weeks for my friend to exit their well-constructed comfort zone and learn about gender studies and the history of institutional racism in the US. Then that friend would also have to recognize and accept that those social phenomena continue to negatively affect people like me, despite the few exceptions to the many rules. Watching Killing Us Softly 3 by Jean Kilbourne would be a start. They could also read the posts below:

Tameka Raymond's HuffPo Op-Ed on Colorism Is A Must Read, by ActsofFaithBlog, Acts of Faith In Love and Life.

"She's Pretty for a Dark-Skinned Girl...", by Tameka J. Raymond, The Huffington Post. Emphases mine.

I am a dark-skinned African American woman with features that reflect my ancestry. Debates regarding Light vs. Dark and other biases have plagued our race for years and continues to impact millions of Black women. The deeply rooted intra-racial contempt that lies beneath this inane "compliment" is the reason I've chosen to spark dialogue surrounding the topic of self-hatred in our culture. It saturates every aspect of our lives, dominating the perspectives of our generation as a whole. We culturally are so influential, at times inadvertently, that we affect all with the words we utter and the images we portray. It lends to the theory of systemic racism. I'm authoring this piece because I'm miffed by this reality and would like to share my views on these subjects.

[ . . . ]

Often dark-skinned women are considered mean, domineering and standoffish and it was these very labels that followed Michelle Obama during the campaign for her husband's presidency and which she has had to work tirelessly to combat. I was appalled when I heard a Black woman refer to Michelle Obama as unattractive. The conversation turned into why President Obama picked her as his mate. No one in the witch-hunt made reference to the possibility that Michelle Obama was smart, funny, caring, a good person, highly accomplished or brilliant. Nor did they mention that she previously was President Obama's supervisor. If she were fair skinned, petite with long straight or wavy hair, would the same opinions be linked to her? I seriously doubt it. It is believed that for the dark skinned, dreams are less obtainable.

In fact, I have read similar comments about myself that I am "dark, aggressive, bossy and bitchy." It has been stated that my husband should have been with a "younger, more beautiful" woman. Astoundingly, the majority of the remarks come from African-American women and are mimicked by others. Sadly enough, I don't know nor have I met 99% of those making these assertions. Funny, how we can judge another without having personally seen, interacted with or experienced a person's character.

[ . . . ]

Reading magazines, social media sites, watching our music videos, and television shows feed our appetites for all things 'beauty". Rarely, however do I see depictions of grace and elegance in the form of dark complexioned women.

[ . . . ]

It is my hope that our First Lady and others who share in this effort will continue to be the beacon to shine a light for those who toil on America's beauty totem pole. Now don't get me wrong or take my words out of context. I truly believe that everyone has a right to delineate what they deem is attractive, but we must not confuse perceived "attractiveness" with authentic "beauty."

.

I'm not old. Yet.

Thank goodness I have a few more years before I have to take all those pills. But what about Sally Field and her Boniva?

.

"It’s Been A Long, Been A Long Day"

Three chapters completed! An excerpt from Ch. 19:

A few hours later, we sat on the bed, paging through my senior yearbook. A Law & Order: Criminal Intent marathon played in the background.

“Things that make you smile,” He read from the Question Pages in the middle of the book.

“My nieces and my nephew.” Meaning Colby. The other nephews needed to learn how to behave. “Okay, next. If you could script the plot for your dream tonight, what would it be?”

“Me as Wolverine from X-Men. The movie.”

“The second one? Also known as, my favorite one.”

“No, the first one,” he replied with no hesistation. “Otherwise known as the best one.”

“My turn again. Things that make you go hmm . . . ”

“Duck-billed platypuses. Platypi? Mammals laying eggs.” He took a bit of the Croissant Hot Pocket in his hand, with the silver and white microwave sleeve still attached. “Now my turn. If you could have your SAT score be 1400 simply by having an ugly scar on your face, would you do so?”

“I had over a 1400, and I had scars. I think it would be 2100 now. And I still have scars.” I lean in to show him my cheek. But as I placed my finger on my face, I shrank away from him.

“What’s wrong? Are you having a flashback? You don’t really have to take another standardized test again. Sometimes I have nightmares that I have to retake the LSAT. Then I wake up shaking, all sweaty and scared.”

“I’m not Fancy Bianca.” I looked at my clean, pinkish fingertips, which had no cocoa-colored powder or concealer on them. “I’m Casual Bianca.”

“What are you talking about?”

“This morning I put on my GMAT outfit, so I would be as comfortable as possible. Then you called, and we went to Johnny Rockets. But I didn’t change my clothes, or deal with my,” I lowered my voice, “dermatological issues.”

“Okay . . . ?”

“So I’m still Casual Bianca.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“I wanted to be Fancy Bianca! I wanted to look nice.”

“You look fine. We got burgers, not filet mignon.” Mike furrowed his brow. “If I’m following what you’re saying, which is doubtful, you’d rather be fancy than casual? That doesn’t seem like you, though.”

“I like being casual. With my friends.”

“I’m not your friend?”

“You are, but,” I exhaled. “I want people to like me for who I am. So I show them Fancy Bianca first. By the time they see Casual Bianca, they already like me. So they won’t run away.”

“Why would they run—That’s insanity.”

“No, that’s LA. And the rest of American society. People judge you by an impossible standard of looks, which I could never measure up to. So I try to make the best of what I have. I try to look normal.”

He swallowed the last of the Hot Pocket. “You’re a piece of work.”

“So are you, kid.”

.

Another chapter completed!

"Cake!" 19 more chapters to go. An excerpt:

If I had to choose between a burgeoning rock star whom I had spoken with for a total of less than ten minutes, and a Senator’s entry-level assistant whose light brown eyelashes had burned a permanent image in my brain . . . Someday I would learn to pick the hot, unstable guys over the adorkable, dependable ones. But that day was not today.

.

I finished one chapter!

Only 20 more chapters to go. An excerpt:

I woke up in the morning next to him. I was surprised. One, he was still there, and two, he was still asleep. I needed to go to the bathroom. I rolled out of bed quietly to go pee pee and brush my teeth.

I returned to my room. It was almost 6:00 am, but being the end of June, the sun was shining brightly through the blinds near his feet. He was rolled up against the wall, breathing deeply. How was I going to sneak back into bed?

I eased myself onto the mattress, one body part at a time, in hopes of not jostling him. I snuggled back into my space, and posed my arms and legs into savasana, which was not the first yoga position that came to mind when I thought about him.

He turned over and wrapped his left arm around me. “Hello,” he said into my left shoulder. His eyes remained closed.

“As you can tell, this is not a Tempur-Pedic bed.”

He opened his eyes. “Does that make me a spilled glass of red wine?”

I raised the blanket and pointed at his pants. “That doesn’t look like wine in your pocket.”

He placed his hand over his crotch. “I’ll be right back.” He scooched down the bottom edge of the bed and headed for the bathroom.

When he came back, he climbed around me to get back in the bed, in the exact same position. He draped his arm across my body again. “How could you possibly think you were going to sneak out of this tiny bed?”

“I had to go to the bathroom. You were completely passed out, snoring, so there was a chance you’d stay asleep.”

“I do not snore.”

“Dude. You totally snore.”

“No, I don’t.”

I lifted my head to pull out the braids stuck behind my back. “Yes, you do. It didn’t wake me up, but I heard it. It sounded like a cartoon snore, where the tissue blows up over your nose from the air shooting out.”

.

My husband won't be doofy.

Well maybe doofy, but not functionally incompetent. And he will be cooking and cleaning, because he will be a grown adult. But if he ever forgets his own birthday, that means it is time to take him to the special doctor.

.

I'd have to see it to believe it,

Aubrey Plaza: Funny person, by Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times. Emphases mine.

"I wasn't just the love interest . . . the girl you fall in love with for no reason just because she's there," [Aubrey Plaza] said. "It wasn't like, 'All the jokes go to the men, you just stand there and look pretty.' I think allowing me to be funny and weird and on the same page as the guys hopefully made it more real."

[ . . . ]

In "Funny People," Plaza plays Daisy, an L.A. arriviste who is a neighbor to the competitive young comedians played by Rogen, Jason Schwartzman and Jonah Hill. Also an aspiring stand-up, she soon becomes enmeshed in a romantic triangle with Rogen, who just landed a job as assistant to a more established performer played by Adam Sandler, and Schwartzman, star of a cheese-ball sitcom called "Yo Teach . . . !"

[ . . . ]

"Her experience in Hollywood is supposed to be similar to Seth's character," Apatow said. "Seth wants to make it in the business, so he attaches himself to this more successful older comedian. And she just moved to town and makes the mistake of sleeping with the first semi-successful actor she meets. I wanted it be the worst, messy courtship you can imagine."

For her part, Plaza has no reservations about being "the girl" in a Judd Apatow movie, and feels she was given equal footing to her male co-stars, down to the scene in which she expresses to Rogen her second thoughts about her dalliance with Schwartzman's character.

.

Musings from a black woman: Me too!

Not looking for things to get pissed off about, by nails at skeptifem. Emphases mine.

I have been trying pretty hard to avoid finding day ruining sexism and racsim, but it just isn’t working out. I don’t have as much time these days to go venting my emotions via blogulation, though I hope I will have more next semester. Nothing is more dismissive of the experiences of women and minorities than the accusation that extreme offense only comes out of ‘looking for something to get pissed off about’. Nothing could be further from the truth. Here is a template for my days:

So, I go to work and stuff like this happens:

*patients aggresively tell me or my coworker “SMILE” because we do not display unending cheer at being in the presence of dudes

[ . . . ]

Note to readers: I despise that "Smile" one, particularly when it comes from my (female) gym class instructors towards our mostly female class. Who feels like smiling while doing lunges and squats? No one, that's who. So back up, people! I smile when I am happy. If you're not happy, you should feel no obligation to smile for the benefit of others. No wonder so many women fake orgasms. Heaven forbid women admit that they are not enjoying themselves.

*people ask my coworker if I am a lesbian, or sometimes they ask her if I am a dude if they only get a quick look at me. I can’t imagine them needing that information unless it would funadmentally change our interaction somehow.

[ . . . ]

*the breast scar capsules of women who have had their implants go horribly wrong arrive in the lab in a tub of blood and formalin. A pathologist will look into it.

*my boss asks me if I have had any ‘cat fights’ with my coworker, and tells everyone how I didn’t laugh about it and how weird is that.

*a guy who just got promoted to oversee our whole department sends out an email called “why I am afraid to exercise”, the joke is literally nothing but pictures of women who are body builders. I have to fill out some sexual harassment form thingy which is supposed to shield me from retaliation but I am not counting on it.

[ . . . ]

So I watch some tv instead, and an ad for the ugly truth comes on. It’s a movie where the writers bust out that popular template of a lady, the one with a good career and an empty life because she isn’t impregnanted or married. So, she needs help from someone to change her personality or otherwise decieve a man into loving/impregnating her. A review informs me that this movie was written by three women who have apparently internalized the message that they are worthless when not maintaining pornulational compliance. In this case gerard butler is the misogynist savior, who plays a shock jock who tells her that she needs to take off her clothes and quit having opinions before guys will like her. It works when she does it, and instead of being angry about it she accepts it as the nature of things. She eventually falls for the radio douche, who pets the dog to convince us all he is a good person (the dog in this case is his orphaned nephew, aww).

I totally did not see that fakakte ending coming. Ha! No, I did.

Horrible movies get made all the time, but this kind of shit is akin to the already offensive black cop/white cop comedies ending with the black one realizing that whitey’s advice that he uses his savage jungle nature to scare suspects into compliance really was the right way to do things, and thank goodness he found his place in the world through his oppressor. The awfully racist old style cartoons have for the most part been banned from airing on tv these days, but I can still hear a babysitter go “hehehe, math is hard” on the phone during an episode of tom and jerry. Movies like the ugly truth are being put out constantly, they make it through marketing meetings and production and people buy into it. There are tons of movies every year with outright woman hatred as the main spectacle that people just love, usually between saying that there isn't a need for feminism anymore.

Again, not just me. I don't want to complain about movies and TV shows that I expected to love. But I get disappointed because it's 2009 and writers can't conceive that rampant sexism and general bigotry is not acceptable in our media.

.

"Do you think this is a teachable fart?"

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
The Word - He Who Smelt It, Dealt It
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Tasers

Yes I do, Stephen.


~


"I can never go to the library and take out books again. No longer. Because they banned me from the library."

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Nailed 'Em - Library Crime
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Tasers

Reading is fundamental. As long as you pay your taxes in the correct district. Don't give me any excuses about being "a 7-year-old child." Books aren't free!


~


"You can't take 'fathers' out of 'founding fathers'. There's nothing more fatherly than wigs and capri pants."

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Tip/Wag - Man-Words & Movits!
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Tasers

Hee hee, Tucker Carlson. He never gets better.

.

The only reason I would see Funny People:

Raaaaaaaandy - Part 1 (Funny People) from Aziz Ansari

The video above is Not Suitable for Work, or for children, or for anyone with sensitive sensibilities.

For some reason, Aziz Ansari/Raaaaaaaandy has not been visible in any of the posters, billboards, commercials or cardboard cutouts promoting Funny People. However, before the movie premiered, he was already "set to be [the] breakout star of 'Funny People'".

I guess Mr. Ansari doesn't quite fit in with the other funny people. More precisely, he does not fit in with the homogeneous image that the rest of the cast portrays to audience that the studio hopes to attract. Or maybe his role in the movie was not big enough to warrant mentioning him in any of the promotional material. But he is funny, too!

.

I'm shocked that Kevin Federline has fans.

Was PopoZão a big hit in some country I've never heard of?

Kevin Federline Shocks Fans Over New Size, US Magazine via omg!.

Kevin Federline turned heads at a California sporting event Monday.

But it wasn't over his golfing skills; it was over his size.

At one point at Ryan Sheckler X Games Celebrity Classic, an employee on the grounds saw Federline and remarked, "Man, that's a belly on him! That's K-Fed?!?"

[ . . . ]

His ex Shar Jackson laughed off criticism.

"It's daddy weight!" she told Usmagazine.com at the time. "When you are a full time parent, sometimes you can't focus on you. If gaining a few pounds is your only problem, life's not too bad!"

Some of us have a little extra chunk, and that's okay. Yet "gaining a few pounds" is not even close to Mr. Federline's "only problem". I, for one, don't have four different kids with two different people, while displaying no discernible source of steady income.

.

Manic Pixie Dream Girl

or, more on my discontent with Summer (see what I did there?).

For the titular reference, you can read Wild things: 16 films featuring Manic Pixie Dream Girls, by Amelie Gillette, Donna Bowman, et al, at the A.V. Club.

Onto the articles about the movie:

Indie Movies Can Be Sexist, Too, by Sarah Seltzer, RH RealityCheck.

Indie Dream Girls, by Doree Shafrir, The Daily Beast.

Manic Pixie Dream Girls, the Santa Claus of romantic comedies, by Amanda Marcotte, pandagon.net.

500 Days of He's Just Not That Into You, by Willa Paskin, Double X.

Previews: "500 Days of Summer" and "Paper Heart", by Alyx Vesey, Feminist Music Geek.

(500) Days of Summer, by Marc Webb, MovieMartyr.com.

From the comment section under information addict's post:

I am so sick of things written from a guy’s perspective that don’t acknolwedge that maybe the girl has her own desires, and they don’t include being with the guy, and that doesn’t make her a bitch or unfeeling or cold. It just makes her a person.

From the comment section under An Open Letter to Zooey Deschanel’s Male Admirers, by Pilgrim Soul, The Pursuit of Harpyness:

The idolizing of the quirky girl grates on me–Zoe and her ilk seem so intentionally precious and affected–but overall it fails to ignite my howling feminist rage the way the worship cute-but-dumb girls does (Jessica Simpson, Kendra, Paris, Daisy, LC, Heidi, etc).


If dudes pick Zoe and her ilk over the dumb blondes, well, that’s the lesser of the two evils, IMO. The real problem is that our media/film culture doesn’t offer them anything better or more realistic.

See. I'm not the only one involved in the hateration. Other people let that hate (or, constructive criticism) out, too, as we all should.

.

Liked it?

I went to see 500 Days of Summer today, and I took notes during my experience. Here is a transcript:

I would like to see Whip It with Ellen Page and Eve!

Kristin Wiig is in two movies.

What American woman is average at 121 pounds?

It's convenient that Summer is so attractive to every man who sees her.

So Summer doesn't like you. And?

Does Summer have any aspirations? Tom doesn't care

This movie is written by men and for men who obsess over women without caring about what they want. It is all about them.

The men disparage women who deign not to be into them, unattainable women like Jordan Catalano.

I like the dance sequence! Bird!

Too much twee.

I've already seen these scenes in the commercials.

Tom wants to conquer new territory as Summer breaks down her walls.

Who needs labels, Tom? People in functional relationships, that's who.

Precocious kid.

French song and movie.

It's hard to write in the dark.

More hating on women and their clothes.

As if people have or use house phones.

Tom and Summer dress like they got their wardrobe out of Looking Indie for Dummies.

Self-consciously, self-referentially indie. And French.

Who does Tom think he is with those 1960s suits and those skinny ties? James Coburn in Charade?

I like the split screen.

With the bags full of Twinkies and orange juice, how can Tom process all that sugar?

Pickles!

What if that guy hadn't seen Summer reading Dorian Gray? Then another guy would have come along. Duh. This is the man-mesmerizing Summer we're talking about.

Autumn? Oy vey.

As the title of this post suggests, I liked the movie, yet I had fundamental problems with the writing, and thus with the characters. In particular, the character of Summer. I understand that the character of Tom was actually in love with love and with the idea of Summer, instead of being in love with the actual woman Summer. However, I never figured out who Summer was, and I don't think the writers bothered to figure out who she was either. Her existence in the movie was wholly defined by her past, present and future relationships. Besides the fact that she had three relationships before she connected with Tom, and one relationship after that, all I know about Summer is the following:

• She is of "average height" (5 feet, 5 inches) and "average weight" (121 pounds)
• She is from Michigan
• She likes The Smiths and Ringo Starr
• She bewitches every heterosexual male she passes and subsequently generates an economic stimulus wherever she goes (yeah, I don't know)
• She has never been in love

The entire movie, which had a white male director, and two white male writers, seemed to be based on the premise of obsessing over unattainable women. Women who, if they don't return unwanted advances by men inside or outside of the workplace, are bitches. For example, before Tom and Summer get together, Tom hears from his friend McKenzie that one of their male coworkers was hitting on Summer in the copy room. Summer declined the offer, so McKenzie calls her a bitch. As if Summer existed solely to satisfy the fantasies of her male coworkers, regardless of what she wants. Conveniently, we never discover what or who Summer wants, because the writers don't bother to tell or show us.

An equally poignant moment occurs during the opening frame, which was a black screen with the following statement in white letters:

Author's Note: The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

Especially you Jenny Beckman.

Bitch.

The movie was created by (white American heterosexual) men, for (white American heterosexual) men about (white American heterosexual) men and their misogynistic delusions about (white American) women. This is despite the fact that the movie has been marketed to pretty much everyone in the United States, and--based on my observations in the theater I was sitting in--whose audience will probably skew female. :|

After examining the evidence, I didn't like 500 Days of Summer as much as I wish I had. But the acting was all good!

.

"A writer writing a book about how writers should write books."

"Must have been a huge seller."

As some of you readers may know, I have been working on the sequel toSteve the Penguin, entitled Hot Penguin Action. Writing a 200-page novel has taken over much of my mind grapes. Hence, the slow down of posts on this blog.

For you readers, I do have an excerpt, which will probably be amended prior to the final edit. Enjoy!

"I'm having my ex-husband's baby."

There I sat, bemused by Liesl's statement. I wondered how my usually coherent best friend could sound like a guest on Maury. That show always made my life look good.

"It's Scott's. Of course. If I am actually pregnant. I'm a month late, and the test I took came out green, instead of pink or blue. I haven't told anyone else yet."

I was shocked. Liesl called her family for advice on everything. I once witnessed Liesl moderating a conference call with her mother, father, sister and brother to confirm whether her pink dress should be washed with the white laundry or with the darks.

"Then there's nothing to tell."

"I'm always on time, Bianca."

"You're only a month late. I have been late, early, long, short. Although, I'm not the one who has been engaging in unprotected sex with her husband for over a year."

"Exactly. You're not having sex."

"Yes, I know." Like I needed another voice in my head telling me my vajayjay was never going to get any action. Honestly, I could have put it storage. No one else was using it.

"You don't have to worry about getting pregnant, since you're not with anybody."

"That's nice, Liesl. You still want me to be sympathetic, right?"

"Sorry." She paced back and forth across my room. "How did this happen? I was on the pill."

"It is 95% effective. Although, with the stress of the divorce, your hormones are probably . . . "

"Whacked out? Yeah. I haven't felt normal for a while. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm not sure I want to have it."

I patted Liesl's arm. "If you want to end your pregnancy, it's your decision."

"I don't want to have an abortion. If this is really happening, I'm having the baby, and I'm keeping it. The problem is raising a baby. I never planned to be a single mother. A baby needs two parents."

"When I was growing up, half of my friends had single parents. And for the most part, they turned out great. Conversely, the people who lived with both biological parents are the ones who turned out a bit off." Case in point, Liesl: a product of a two-parent household who ended up divorced before 30, with a child on the way.

Liesl frowned. "Why couldn't this have happened to you?"

Because I don't have sexual relations with the insane?

.

Uppity colored people

For the rest of the Fresh Prince episode, "Mistaken Identity," click here, here and here.

Having Barack Obama as president doesn't make America colour-blind, by Patricia Williams, The Observer. Emphases mine.

During a major policy speech on healthcare, even President Obama found time to weigh in: "… I think it's fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry. Number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home. And number three – what I think we know separate and apart from this incident – is that there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately…" Needless to say, the next morning's papers talked about Obama calling Cambridge police "stupid".

The arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates has been officially swallowed by the larger narrative of race in America. Now I love a good racial escapade as much as the next person, but this one strikes me as uniquely unfortunate both in its timing and its capacity for becoming a flashpoint for unrelated resentments.

The facts not in dispute are straightforward. Gates came home from a trip and found his front door jammed. With the help of his driver, he tried to push the door open, unsuccessfully. He then went to the back door, opened it with his key, turned off the alarm system and called Harvard's property management company to report the sticky door. Meanwhile, a passerby called the police to report that "two black males" were breaking into a house. When the police arrived, they encountered Gates in his living room. Gates provided his driving licence and his Harvard ID.

Here the stories diverge. Gates says he asked the officer to identify himself and the officer refused. The officer says that Gates was unco-operative, called him a racist and began shouting so loudly – "Your momma!" and: "You don't know who you're messing with!" according to the police report – that the noise constituted "tumultuous behaviour" and "public disorder". Gates was handcuffed and hauled off to jail for a few hours. A day later, a judge dismissed the charges, saying both sides had acted badly. Gates demanded that the arresting officer apologise; the officer demanded that Gates apologise. The Cambridge police department demanded that President Obama apologise, which he did, quite eloquently as usual. Gates took to national television to set the record straight. Al Sharpton announced his intention to march in protest. And Michael Jackson, pushed from the front pages for a hot minute, was finally able to rest in peace.

Hee. I like how any recent news story can work in a Michael Jackson reference.

But the larger backlash has quickly moved from the individual incident itself to condemnations in the stereotyped plural, concentrating on a very tight set of recurring themes: Gates is "uppity", arrogant, pseudo-educated. He should have been grateful that the police came to his house at all. Harvard was stupid for hiring him. African-American studies, the department Gates chairs, is a non-subject, only on the curriculum to keep black students from rioting. The Ivy League is run by politically correct "wusses" who don't have the courage to get rid of "undeserving" "whiners". Who could blame police officers for refusing to come to black homes or neighbourhoods if this is what they get? "Those people" have jobs a "more qualified" white person should be holding.

(Where, oh where, our fleeting "post-racial" moment of Kumbaya?)

I mentioned that timing was also a probable factor in this brouhaha. The entire week before Gates's arrest was consumed with reports of the congressional hearings for Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Judge Sonia Sotomayor. She would be the first Hispanic and only the third woman sitting in our highest court. Hence, racial resentment had already been simmering on the shock-jock media burners. Three ultra-conservative senators in particular grilled her, day after day, using some of the most prejudiced, stereotype-laden language we've heard publicly in many a year. Despite the fact that Sotomayor graduated at the top of her class from Princeton and Yale Law School, she has been attacked as not qualified, chosen not for merit but because she's a woman or Latina. Pundits such as Pat Buchanan railed that "affirmative action is to increase diversity by discriminating against white males". Furthermore, said Buchanan, there could be nothing wrong with a court of all white men, because, after all "white men were 100% of the people who wrote the constitution, 100% of the people who signed the Declaration of Independence, 100% of the people who died at Gettysburg and Vicksburg…"

[ . . . ]

In short, the Sotomayor hearing and the New Haven firefighters case have reignited the general American debate about affirmative action. So when the extremely distinguished Harvard university professor Henry Louis Gates was carted off in handcuffs, allegedly calling out: "This is what happens to black men in America!", there was a distinct shimmer of schadenfreude in some parts of the national psyche. The reactionary themes that had been percolating during the last few weeks came bursting to the fore: minorities are taking over! Obama is only appointing non-whites! White people are the truly oppressed! People of colour, particularly ones who went to Harvard, Yale or Princeton, are reverse racists.

The arrest itself is hardly the best example of either racial profiling or police-state oppression. But the discourse that has welled up in its wake reveals a public inclination that is marred by that and more.

~

Also, an article from 2000:

How to Hide Police Brutality: Just Call It a 'Black Thing', by Margo Hammond, The New York Observer. Emphases mine again.

When police at California's John Wayne Airport identified themselves as "members of the Airport Narcotics Security or something or other" and demanded to see his ticket, Ishmael Reed, a senior lecturer at the University of California at Berkeley, complied, even though he knew he had the right to refuse. He was afraid he would be arrested and the police would plant narcotics in his briefcase so that they could make a charge. Mr. Reed explains: "Many whites believe that blacks are crazy when they accuse the police of planting evidence, yet they're the ones who are crazy, bewitched by the media, which too often serve as a kind of public relations annex for the police, creating and reinforcing the belief that American crime is black or brown, even though over 70 percent of arrests in both cities and rural areas are of whites. In fact, according to recent F.B.I. statistics, it is white adult crime that's on the increase."

[ . . . ]

Katheryn Russell puts her finger on the reason the problem of police brutality isn't a top attention-getter in this country: It's seen as a "black thing," she argues. Although more whites are arrested than blacks, there is no "white poster child of police brutality," no "white Rodney King." Most likely, she argues, that's not because there are no white victims of police assault, but rather because whites are less likely to think of an assault as a manifestation of brutality. As a result, for both blacks and whites, police brutality is considered a black problem. Even the shooting of the hammer-wielding Gidone Busch by four New York City police officers in August 1999 did not arouse much public outrage nationwide. News reports, after all, cast him as another outsider, centering on his mental illness and his religion, Orthodox Judaism, and not on his "whiteness." Minorities who complain about police abuse are treated like next-door neighbors who are having a fight, Ms. Russell believes: The rest of us don't want to get involved, and so we tell ourselves that we don't know the facts and that it's none of our business anyway. Ms. Russell argues, "These types of rationales allow us to diminish the collective harm of police brutality." Meanwhile, as Ms. Williams points out, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris-"after professing their love for Hitler, declaring their hatred for blacks, Asians and Latinos (on a public Web site no less), downloading instructions for making bombs, accumulating ingredients, assembling them under the protectively indifferent gaze (or perhaps with the assistance) of parents and neighbors, stockpiling guns and ammunition, procuring hand grenades and flak jackets, threatening the lives of classmates, killing 13 and themselves [and] wounding numerous others"-prompt a national conversation about "What went wrong?" Black males carry the stigma of "suspect," but the police are not the only ones to blame. The brutality in the term "police brutality" begins with a society willing to suspect the members of an entire race, to brand them criminals with a single look. Whereas white males are given the benefit of the doubt-victims, as Patricia Williams puts it, of "innocent profiling."

.

"I don't always feel anything. Sometimes I feel, like, numb, or something."

"Maybe you just haven't found the right person yet."

"I've tried every type of person. No big deal. You don't have to look all worried or anything."

I was reminded of this My So-Called Life clip during a conversation I had today. I was speaking with a gentleman who had recently discovered that most female sex workers in San Francisco view their professions as strictly business transactions, not as remotely enjoyable experiences. After learning this, he no longer has any latent desire to engage in this industry.

I found this to be both sad and amusing. Amusing because I figured most people, regardless of their industries, approached their jobs as work, not fun. As if baristas at Starbucks get a thrill from serving Frappuccinos for eight hours a day.

Sad because I responded, "that is also true in many relationships. Pretending to enjoy yourself for the benefit of the other person." What is worse is that clearly many spectators honestly believe the fantasy. The fantasy that women who act sexy for the benefit of the male are always enjoying themselves. Even worse is that many women define what makes them feel sexy by how attractive they are to men, not by how they inherently, naturally feel about themselves.

This also reminds me of a discussion that I had two years ago on a comment thread on a site which shall not be named, for reasons previously explained. The discussion was about Maggie Gyllenhaal's decision to be the new face of Agent Provocateur lingerie. I was against it, while other commenters were for it.

The core of my argument remains the same as my feelings today: it is disappointing that so much of women's sexuality is defined by what is appealing to the (white American heterosexual) male gaze, and that so many women and men eagerly consume and believe these unnatural ideas and ideals.

Back to Rayanne. If you are not enjoying yourself with someone, then you should not be having sex with them. Men have sex to have orgasms. Women should do the same. If you are having sex for other reasons, like you want to stay warm, then buy a blanket. It's cheaper, it will be there in the morning, and you won't catch crabs from it.

.

"How would you describe your sexual experience in terms of tomatoes?"

"Spaghetti sauce."

I wonder why there aren't any dating advice books called Think Like a Woman for men. Maybe publishers think men can't read. Like Jordan Catalano.

.

90% white people + 10% black people = 1 United States of America

Rachel Maddow: Why do you think is that of the 110 Supreme Court justices we've had in this country, 108 of them have been white?

Pat Buchanan: Well, I think white men were 100 percent of the people that wrote the Constitution, 100 percent of the people that signed the Declaration of Independence, 100 percent of people who died at Gettysburg and Vicksburg. Probably close to 100 percent of the people who died at Normandy.

This has been a country built basically by white folks in this country who are 90 percent of the entire nation-in 1960, when I was growing up, Rachel-and the other 10 percent were African-American who had been discriminated against. That's why.

That's why. Except that, if in 1960, there were only white people and black people in the United States, and nonwhite, nonblack Sonia Sotomayor was born in 1954, then where did she come from?

For further perusal, you can read "Rachel Maddow Takes On Pat Buchanan (VIDEO): "You're Playing With Fire... You're Living In The 1950s" by Jason Likins at The Huffington Post. You can also read "A history lesson for Pat Buchanan" by ttujoe at Daily Kos.

.

Stephen Colbert is an it-getter.

The Colbert Report: The Word - Neutral Man's Burden

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Jeff Goldblum

He gets it.

"In America, white is neutral. Now, for years, Band-Aids [sic] came in only one color: white person. It's standard person color. In fact, it is so standard, that when I was a kid, in Crayola boxes, it was the color called 'flesh.' Now most Americans accept this [Stephen points to the back of his white person colored hand] as neutral without thinking about it. And that is why the decisions made by all those white Justices were not affected by their experiences. Because their life experiences were neutral . . .

Now I'm sure Asians are neutral in Asia. And Africans are neutral in Africa. And Hispanics are neutral in Hispanica. But folks, it doesn't work here."

.

When they show you who they are,

believe them:

Bullying Behind GOP "Racist" Win, by John Avlon, The Daily Beast.

Young Republican Leader Audra Shay Is Crazy, Illiterate, Racist, by Pareene, Gawker.

The New Ice Age of the Young Republicans, by Michael Rowe, The Huffington Post.

The election of 38-year old Audra Shay of Louisiana to the chairmanship of the Young Republican National Federation on Saturday in Indianapolis might have gone practically unnoticed, had it not been for revelations by John Avlon, writing in The Daily Beast, that Shay had tacitly endorsed a virulently racist post about U.S. President Barack Obama on her Facebook page.

In response to one of her Facebook friends, Eric S. Piker asserting

"Obama Bin Lauden [sic] is the new terrorist...Muslim is on there [side]...need to take this country back from all these mad coons...and illegals,"

Shay posted back,

"You tell em Eric! lol."

When two of her other friends--including Sean L. Conner, chairman of the D.C. Young Republicans--complained about the racist language on Shay's Facebook thread, Shay responded, not by unfriending the author of the "mad coon" comment, but by unfriending the two who complained. [ . . . ]

That looks bad. But it gets better:

Audra Shay Responds to Race Allegations, by Gary Coats, The Conservationist. Emphases mine.

Dear Friends and Supporters,

Yesterday on Facebook, an unfortunate incident occurred. An individual posted two comments on my Facebook wall, the first comment arguing against big government and the second filled with racially charged comments. I responded supporting the individual’s first post, to continue the fight against big government spending. I was not aware of the racial comments until sometime later, when a third individual brought it to my attention. I immediately deleted the derogatory and outright disgusting comments and subsequently posted a statement on my Facebook Status stating that in no way, shape or form are the comments posted by other individuals a reflection of me or my beliefs as an American, a Veteran, a Mother or a Candidate. I do not, nor would I ever, condone that type of language or behavior.

Unfortunately, my opponents have now spun a web of misconception and untruths, desperately trying to paint me as a racist. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact, I have made it part of my Young Republican life to ensure that we did not just focus on outreach, but inclusion. Under my leadership as Chairman of the State of Louisiana’s Young Republicans, we were able to raise $90,000 for a minority outreach media campaign. Also under my leadership as Louisiana Chairman we brought the largest minority delegation to the YRNF Convention in 2007. [ . . . ]

See! Ms. Shay is not a racist. She is "an American, a Veteran" and "a Mother." She raised money for nameless minorities that one time, and she brought them to a convention. Case closed.

.

Fox News: Keeping it klassy with a KKK.

Joel McHale had no words either when he aired this on The Soup last night.

For additional perspectives:

Fox News' Kilmeade: We "marry other species," Finns "pure", by Alex Koppelman, Salon.

Brian Kilmeade Would Like Species and 'Ethnics' to Remain Pure, by Richard Lawson, Gawker.

FOX & Friends of Racism, by BackOfBusEleven, Feministing Community.

.

That's right, Colin Powell!

Powell Whacks Limbaugh And Republicans For Calling Sotomayor Racist, by Sam Stein, The Huffington Post.

Powell expressed relief that the GOP senators who sit on the Judiciary Committee, "after a few days of this kind of nonsense," decided to drop the Sotomayor-as-racist frame. But he would go on to argue that the Republican Party still had a major problem when it came to reaching out to minority voters. In the process, Powell took what seemed clear to be a jab at radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh for some of his more inflammatory rhetoric.

"If you look at the results of the election last fall, and make a judgment on the basis of how the party did with respect to the Hispanic vote and the African-American vote, realizing that President Obama, candidate Obama had a significant advantage with those constituencies, we haven't done well enough," he said. "And when you have non-elected officials, such as we have in our party, who immediately shout racism, or somebody who is quite prominent in the media says that the only basis upon which I could possibly have supported Obama was because he was black and I was black, even though I laid out my judgment on the candidates, then we still have a problem."

Now let's talk about the illegal invasion of Iraq that you got our country into . . .

.

Excitement! But not too much, because it's Daria.

Excuse me? Daria finally coming to DVD, by Annie Wu, TV Squad.

Thank the late-90s gods for the existence of Daria and praise be to the supernatural entities responsible for DVDs. For the first time ever, Daria will be available on DVD.

We feared it couldn't be done, but it's going to happen! I can hear sour-faced now-20-somethings celebrating now. Yes, they're quiet, but they're definitely excited. Keep it cool, guys, keep it cool.

MTV will soon release another highly anticipated DVD set for their sketch comedy show, The State, and it looks like one of the first things DVD owners will see is an ad for a 2010 Daria release. TVonDVD.com even has a little screencap and everything.

Hooray! I hope the music from the episodes stays in. Darn licensing laws and poor planning keeping me from my entertainment.

.

"This is sand. It represents desert."

I'm so excited about the 4th of July Twilight Zone marathon on SciFi. This year, the network (which will become SyFy on July 7) is airing episodes from the 1985 series.

Below is my favorite episode from the third Twilight Zone incarnation, "A Message from Charity", starring James Cromwell, best known by me for his work in Babe:

~

~

~

~

Squee!

.