Category Archives: Personal
If the music’s too loud…
Apparently I’m too old. I went to a dance club last night for the first time in years, and damn it was loud. I barely danced and spent most of the night out on the patio hiding from the noise.
There was a time when I went to places like that once a week. Was it not as loud, then? Or have I damaged my hearing enough to be sensitive? Or maybe I’m just getting crabby in my old age.
Anyways, I had a good time, but in the future I’ll look for someplace more quiet to socialize.
Dignity and battlefields
The other day I chanced upon a comment on a blog about re-enactments of historical battles. Someone who participated in re-enactments described the event as dignified, and that got me thinking about battles and dignity. The more I thought about it, the less they seemed to go together.
See, it seems to me that a proper historical re-enactment of a battle shouldn’t be dignified. Not even a little. It should be confusing, frightening and horrifying. There shouldn’t be people just falling over quietly to play dead, they should lie in a pool of blood screaming while they try to hold in their intestines with their one hand that still works. Spectators should have nightmares after watching it. I’ve been to re-enactments and battle pageants many times, and I don’t ever remember seeing a grown man crying for his mother right before he starts convulsing into his death throes, does that really sound historically accurate to you?
I imagine a really accurate re-enactment would be far more traumatic than entertaining.
This accelerating rate of change
When I started this blog, it was with the simple goal of forcing myself to write more often, by setting a wordcount goal and expecting myself to reach it weekly. By now it’s clear that this has failed.
In fact, it’s gone so far as to be counterproductive to that goal, as I’ve more than once skipped something because I didn’t want to post trivial stuff until I’d caught up on my requests, or because it would be a short post and it seemed such a pain to maintain the tally for small changes. I’ve now totally lost track, I don’t recall when I last updated the score, so I have no idea how many words I would owe now. I do know that I didn’t post once during the entire month of August, and worse that I’ve been putting off things I might have posted during the last week or two.
So, new rules. For the time being there are no rules. I’ll just write when I feel like it, about whatever subject I have in mind. I’ll probably work out some sort of structure to it later, I’ll certainly try to maintain the “write anything requested” idea, and I’ll update the About page with proper info just as soon as I figure out what that should be. I fully intend to catch up on the Requests someday, but that’s looking like it’s a long way off. Read the rest of this entry
To See or Not to See
Today during a discussion it was suggested that a scientific study of a subculture should not be performed because any negative aspects or perceived negative aspects such a study found would be used as weapons by those who stigmatize it. As so often happens in idle conversation the subject moved on fairly quickly, but I found myself thinking about it again and again during the evening. So, since I haven’t written anything in ages, I figure I may as well muse over this a bit.
Interestingly, I’ve realized that it doesn’t matter what subculture this is, so I’ve taken pains not to say it for both anonymity and for what I will call purity of purpose. If you’re reading this and thinking you agree with me unless it’s one specific subculture that you dislike, what does that say about you?
Anyways, the premise that I’m responding to is that a study should not be performed if the results could be used against the subjects. The short version is: I disagree on both philosophical and practical grounds, and will address them in that order. Read the rest of this entry
Two out of four ain’t bad?
The remarkable Greta Christina recently posted an article titled “Wealthy, Handsome, Strong, and with Endless Hard-Ons: Is Masculinity Impossible?.” It’s an interesting read which I recommend, and discusses how sexual stereotypes can be hurtful to men as well as women.
This was still fresh in my mind when I had the opportunity to join Google+ (expect a Social Networking Junkie post about that in the next week). Joining Google+ was very simple for me, I just had to add a few things to my Google Profile and click “Join”. One thing they wanted to know was my sex, and this was not optional.
I thought about it a bit, and realized that that’s one of the things that’s almost always required for just about any internet site you can sign up for. They not only always want to know your sex, but they usually just have a dropdown or radio buttons with the choices of “Male” or “Female”. I guess intersex people just have to knuckle down and choose which box to get squeezed into. (In fairness, Google does include an option for “Other”. Personally I’d prefer just a textbox to say whatever you damn well please in.)
But this isn’t just about recognizing the intersex or the transgender or any other person to whom the answer is not so simple as “M or F”, this irritates me on a deeper level. Why should it matter? What does Facebook care what my chromosomes are, why is it any of Google’s business what’s between my legs? Like so many other things that annoy the fuck out of me, the answer is marketing.
Advertisers want to know. Presumably they use different strategies to try to convince men to buy more shit than women, and they want data both to plan with and to target with. I’m quite sure my Google ads will be different if I edit my profile to give myself a sex change. And what interests me about this is that they aren’t merely working from sexual stereotypes, but actively contributing to them. It’s like a weird feedback loop.
It also feels very unnecessary to me, especially if the typical result is something like this Burger King sandwich in Japan that’s advertised as “suitable for women”. It seems stupid & derisive to treat people as cardboard cutouts like this, especially in a world that’s rapidly leaving gender roles behind. It may even be counterproductive, marketing to stereotypes is only going to appeal to those who feel they fit that stereotype. Anyone else is either buying it in spite of your ad campaign or shopping elsewhere.
More than anything I hate it because it tells people who they are “supposed” to be and how they should act. Men should be obsessed with sports, sex, and shiny toys. Women should be focused on clothes, cooking, and cleaning. Everybody should be as stupid as possible. Intersex people shouldn’t exist. It’s getting broader now, the repertoire of stupid stereotypes is growing, but it’s all still the same shit. And I hate it.
So, in defiance of stereotypes and in solidarity with those who don’t quite fit into the roles or the underwear society would force them into I told Google my sex was “Other”. I don’t want to be in your box, I’ll make my own.
Gay Marriage
(For more on this subject in general, and the ongoing legal battles over prop8 in particular, I recommend the excellent Prop 8 Trial Tracker)
Last weekend New York passed a bill legalizing gay marriage. I haven’t talked about it here because I kind of felt that everything had been said already, but you know what? They haven’t been said by me, and that’s already bitten me in the ass once, so here’s my say.
If this looks too long to read and you just want to know in simple terms how I feel about it so you can categorize me or something, I’m saying “Marriage bans do nothing but prevent some people from marrying the person they choose. Way to go New York, hope the remaining 44 states follow you into the 21st century soon!” If that’s all you need to know, then there’s no point in reading past the cut. Those of you who want details? Onward!
Read the rest of this entry
Walmart vs Women
Monday morning the Supreme Court decided that a sex-discrimination lawsuit against Wal-Mart cannot proceed as a class-action suit. Here is the decision in pdf. When I refer to page numbers, I’ll be talking about the pdf page for simplicity’s sake. Buckle in, folks, this is going to be a long ride.
I should start with the usual disclaimer pointing out that I am not a lawyer, nor am I trained in the minutiae of legal language. While following the Prop 8 trial I read a lot of legal briefs and had lawyers helping me to understand them which gives me at least a general feel for how these documents work, but I am not by any stretch an expert nor do I pretend to understand the nuances of legal theory. (It’s also worth mentioning that many papers concerned with Prop 8, especially Amicus Curiae briefs supporting the Defendant-Intervenors, were completely insane. Seriously.) As such I’ll mostly keep my discussion onto parts I more or less understand, more philosophy than legality. On those terms, at least, I feel that I can show that Scalia needs a new title. I propose from now on he be known as “Little Janie Q Scalia”. Read the rest of this entry
True Blood Season 1 mid-season review
I’m halfway through the first season of True Blood, and that seemed like a good place to write about it a bit. Although the show did intrigue me a bit on its own, I’ve been pretty tired of vampires the last decade so I’m blaming this entirely on Renée.
SPOILERS AHOY! If you haven’t seen this show or read any of the Sookie Stackhouse novels by Charlaine Harris, you should probably skip this post. You also may want to skip it if you don’t want to read a stream-of-consciousness brain dump of my thoughts & opinions on the show. Seriously, I go on for like 700 words. Read the rest of this entry
Writing is hard
I never learned how to write an outline. I just don’t get it somehow, something eludes me that’s so basic and fundamental that I can’t articulate it usefully, and nobody’s ever been able to help. The closest I ever got, I think, is when I wrote a lot of little synopses for a collection of short stories with a loose continuity between them. Tiny, one paragraph summaries like you might see in TV Guide telling you what to expect on Tuesday’s episode. I think maybe I had the essence of it there, perhaps I’ll try building on that concept later. Read the rest of this entry
A dream
It’s that time of year when I’m too hot under a blanket but too cold without one. When I’m too hot sleeping I often have nightmares, and last night gave me a doozy. Here’s what I can piece together from attenuated memories and the notes I scribbled just before dawn. Read the rest of this entry
Blogging about microblogging
As you may have noticed, I like Twitter. I don’t actually have many people to interact with on it, but that doesn’t stop me from merrily tweeting away whatever random nonsense wanders into my mind, or replying to the few that I follow, or annoying@RCMurphy. (It’s the secret to happiness) There’s a sort of simple joy to trying to cut ideas down to 140 characters which appeals to me somehow. It’s a bit like haiku, I suppose. Read the rest of this entry
On Death, Conspiracy Theories, and Wars on Concepts.
So Osama bin Laden is dead. When I first heard this, my reaction was “So what? Game of Thrones is on.” Clearly not everyone shared my apathy, and I really don’t understand why. Read the rest of this entry
New week, new ideas
So, it’s a new week, with a fresh quota to meet. I’ve got no great ideas for what to write for this week, so please leave suggestions or requests down in the comments. I’m also testing the Facebook settings for publicity. I think it’ll work this time. Finally, I’m going to see what happens if I click the “super awesome” checkbox. That’s about all I’ve got for this post.
So, anybody want to pull my strings and make me dance?
The Deal
The primary idea behind this blog is to force myself to write. I’ve struggled with the learning disability dysgraphia my whole life, and only in the last few years have I really felt that I’m starting to get past it. Since it was keeping a journal that got me past the handwriting part, I figure blogging is the logical activity to work on my coherence. I’ll try to improve my creativity while I’m at it. Read the rest of this entry
The Adventures of Leo Tarvi 