Humiliation or Affirmation?

This one is about to be about porn and sex. Tread carefully.

I'm liking this piece by Hugo Schwyzer right here.

Its a post on why it may be a bit presumptive to go straight to "he wants to degrade and humiliate her" as to the reason men want to give women facials (facial: ejaculating on your partner's face). A bit of background on the origins of the facial.

Glickman suggests that the AIDS crisis and the concern with safer sex was what made the facial popular. "Cum on me, not in me" was a popular sex educator slogan as far back as the late 1980s. Ejaculating on a woman's stomach, however, usually meant that the camera wouldn't let the audience see the actress' expression. But if the male actor came on her face, the viewer could see two things at once: evidence of male pleasure (symbolized by the ejaculation) and the equally important sign that a woman's reaction to that pleasure mattered. With sex now so dangerous — and HIV particularly likely to be spread through semen — facials were relatively "safe." But in the era of AIDS, they were also compelling visual evidence that a woman wasn't threatened by a man's semen. In that sense facials were, almost from the start, more about women's acceptance of men's bodies than about women's degradation.

I think this is a plausible explanation that could serve as an almost polar opposite of the "humiliation/degradation" view on facials.

I've talked about how many view male sexuality as dirty before. I wonder if the "humiliation/degradation" crowd are starting from the destructive premise that since male sexuality is dirty then giving a woman a facial is a way to "make her dirty". Just like with other sex acts the facial may be seen by such people as another way that a "pure woman" is made "dirty" by having sexual contact with men. Which may be why some people have a hard time with the idea that a woman may not care if a guy gives a facial and a really hard time with the idea that she may actually like it (there's a small anecdote in the article about a woman who experienced her first orgasm after getting a facial). But let's go a bit deeper.

It probably won't take much effort to realize that a lot of males think that their sexuality is dirty. They are sex hungry brutes that need to have sex with as many women as possible as fast as possible (its a sign that they're "real men" right?). So what if a male thought that the sight of a woman letting him ejaculate on her face and not freaking out about how "disgusting he is" was a form of acceptance? A sign that she wasn't repulsed by a part of him. Proof that she is okay with coming in contact with semen. Because let's face it (see what I did there) if a woman is letting you cum on her face then that probably means she trusts you if for no other reason than a lot of bad stuff can be transmitted through semen to skin contact.

And yes I said "letting him". This is contingent on consent. There is nothing wrong with a woman that doesn't want a guy to ejaculate on her face. She could have any number of reasons from having a traumatic experience, to she's allergic to it, to even the idea that she thinks its disgusting (and yes its entirely possible for her think semen is disgusting while not thinking the guy its coming from is disgusting) for not wanting it done but those are neither here nor there. Also more than likely a guy that's looking for affirmation, validation, and TRUST will be respectful enough to take a woman at her word when she says she doesn't want a facial.

That bit about trust will eliminate from this line of thought any guys that actually get off on doing it to her for their own pleasure whether she wants to or not and in their sick minds her not wanting it is a usually a bonus. They are in it for the lack of consent (notice that they don't even ask or do it anyway after she says no), humiliation (because there aren't many things that will generate humiliation more than having something done to you against your will), degradation (thinking that them doing it to you anyway is a sign that you are beneath them) and who knows what else. So bear this in mind.

In any case, humiliation and affirmation aren't incompatible reactions to the same act; a feeling of indignity when your partner ejaculates on your face isn't contingent on his intending to demean you.

In short the fact that you find facials to be disgusting doesn't automatically translate into "he wants to do it to humiliate me".

Personally I think that this could hold true for guys that want to ejaculate on a woman's face but don't want to do it to humiliate her, who are probably operating from the thought that if she is being humiliated (and I don't mean "she gets off on being treated that way but its consensual" I mean "she just had her boundaries violated in a serious way") then she's not going to want to be with him. What person wants to be with some that doesn't respect them?

Two things I want to add:
1. I'm not trying to pass this off as proof that no guy has ever wanted to give a woman a facial for sole purpose of humiliating her. Yes there are jerks out there like that.

2. Despite this being written in terms of man ejaculating on woman this could probably be applied to any (and I can't believe I'm about to say this) ejaculator/ejaculatee relationship. In fact I think the existence of facials in male/male porn challenges the assumptions that facials are about humiliating women, as the article notes. (unless you're one of those folks that traces everyone back to a hatred of women).

Video of the Day - Asmaa Mahfouz

Is there something wrong with me noticing a part of the work and organizing that Asmaa has done seems to include invoking the "real man" clause? I mean really we get past this "if you were a real man...." stuff?

It really ramps up at about 8:06 where she says, "If you are a real man you have to come with me to protect me and to protect our country."

Don't get me wrong I would definitely say that she is fighting for a great cause and her heart is undoubtedly in the right place. I'm just wondering if she is just trying to invoke chivalry for her own ends (and I also wonder if maybe other people aren't noticing this because they think her ends justify the use of such means).

Sound off!

Why the hostility?

So Daisy asks why I'm so hostile to feminism (Okay she didn't ask so much as wish I weren't so hostile to it and then I once again started asking myself that question).

Its a sensible question. Anyone that's ever read my posts, my comments at other blogs, seen where I both agree and disagree with feminists on a regular basis may be thinking that I'm a bit of a paradox when confronted with feminism. And that's not even counting the fact that I'm regularly contribute here, a feminist blog. How can a person who can see eye to eye with members of a movement have their hostility triggered so easily by members of that movement?

Its almost like there are two forces fighting for control of how Danny (yes I just referred to myself in the third person, love it) reacts to feminists.

On one hand I have no problem with interacting with them at places like No, Seriously What About Teh Menz ? and The Good Men Project. But on the other I can get into some pretty heated disagreements with them at those very same places (I go by "Danny" at both of those places BTW). There must be more to it.

Yes an X Factor. Something that when triggered has me fighting off the urge to dog feminists out for every bit I can with no thoughts of mercy or quarter (if it makes you feel any better this is not unique to feminism, its one of the parts of being a Scorpio that really sticks).

I have to figure what it is in order to deal with it. And on the bigger picture I know I'm not the only one with such hostility (and not just with feminists, I'm talking hostility with anyone that comes off a bit strong) and said hostility has to be confronted.

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Reverse Discrimination Amid the Cubicles

My corner of the cube farm on my birthday this year....

I'm not what people would generally classify as an Alpha Male.  I've never been one to ever "pick up chicks," been confused with what one might identify as "a player" or have ever used my gender to impose upon women.  My wife complains that I'm too nice and need to fight with her more often, so I guess I'm a jerk because I'm too nice and I can deal with that.  My point here is that I'm not an aggressive person, especially when it comes to women, but at work I've never really had any gender related issues.  In fact, one might say I thrived when I worked at a mid-west, regional bank that predominantly employed women.  I was one of maybe 30 or 40 guys out of about 150 people in our sector.  For some reason it didn't bother me, as everyone was friendly, equal minded and fair.  That's what makes my experience in a similar role, working in a suburb of Oregon that much more confusing.  One thing that is different is that I am a man working in the historically female dominated world of Temporary Employment.  Yet I've felt more gender bias at work in this position than any other I've had anywhere else.

Well, there was this one time, fresh out of High School that I worked at a pizza joint in LA where I quickly found myself to be the last male employee amid the host/wait staff and was soon replaced by a buxom beauty.  Did I feel slighted?  You're damn right I did.  Did the owners (a collection of three middle-aged Italian guys), who had no real reason to fire me, look sheepish and guilty as sin when they fired me?  You're damn right they did.

So it's not like I haven't to some degree felt this before, yet for the first time I truly felt I could make a serious sexual harassment claim or as some refer to it, reverse sexual harassment.  It feels easier to do when working in a department comprised of 6 men out 25 total (only 1 male, non-temp out of 10, making it all but impossible to be male AND hired full-time) and our supervisor is a woman.  A person who often strolls around the department, gossiping with the women, rarely taking the time to pay such courtesies to the not quite "fairer" sex.

In fact, she has gone as far as to have discussions with other women, right near me (albeit in a slightly hushed tone), talking about how her daughter's father didn't want anything to do with her before she was born, in turn generalizing about the irresponsibility of men and how it specifically effected her perception of them.  They talked about dating men and what jerks they were.  Most every group conversation, ordering of take-out for lunch and so on was kept within a tight group of women who almost never included those outside their circle. There have been a number of other instances and personalities I could portray here but it was these specific instances that I found most frustrating and inappropriate. And to be clear, there wasn't anything I ever did to individually deserve such treatment nor was anything ever directed specifically at me, yet it hasn't exactly made for a cordial, male friendly environment.

Conversely, it must also be said that I have previously worked in a predominantly female department where everyone knew each other well and there was a more collegial atmosphere where everyone was included and where if someone crossed the line, they let it be known.  My current employment is made more awkward by the fact that most everyone wears headphones almost all day long, making those unused to the environment more socially detached and less conversive, thus a temp-dominant department where everyone is less trusting of each other, in turn making temps all-the-more wary of the persons in charge.

So, I thought about filing a complaint but I knew it wouldn't augur well for my future as a temp in this female rich department, so I kept it to myself.  And of course I had to keep in mind the inherent bias that comes with being a lowly temp, such as having to park clear over on the other side of our huge campus, which takes at least 10 minutes to cross to reach my desk (it used to be worse: temps were once asked to park off campus then be shuttled to campus). Or the confusion that comes from being employed by a temp agency, then contracted by a corporation, which in the end means I'd be filing a claim against someone who technically works for a different company.  I could go on about never receiving a raise in my 13 months of a 18 month contract (something most others were afforded), but I'm not a "real temp" - those often without a college degree, who've worked at multiple sites and tend to be female... which might more specifically explain the slights I perceived to be against me, not my disposition which I had no control over.  Or maybe it's just their way to compel those they know aren't expected to be with the agency long term or complete the contract to leave, making way for those not demanding a higher wage.

What it really has made me stand up and pay attention to, aside from what I've found to be a growing and increasingly socio-economic bit of discrimination in the over use of temps in corporate America today, is the distinctly female environment found in the banking sector today.  This isn't a bad thing, in fact, I'll go as far as to say it's a great thing.  Though it does make me wonder what it is about retail banking that has drawn so many women into it's ranks.  I suppose it could be attributed to the abundance of entry level positions available to everybody, regardless of gender, at branches and call centers in our service obsessed culture.  I don't quite understand why exactly this is, so if anyone has any thoughts on this, I'd love to hear them.

Lastly and maybe even more disconcerting to me, is the lack of women in the higher-echelons of the financial/banking sector.  And those that do get there, at least in my experience, tend to be hard wired, tiger-lady personalities, often modelling themselves in a high-fashion, sexually intimidating and socially terse way.  I'm not saying that all women who've reached higher financial management positions are like this, but it's been a distinctly obvious phenomenon in the banking departments I've worked in.  Is it the attitudes or sexual bias of men that have pushed them to such extremes?  Is it purely a drive to succeed at any cost, using their youthful looks, dress and attitude to not so much advance but to keep from losing the position they've already attained to some one younger and more attractive?  Is it in anyway the same for men?

Being just a little guy in a sea of cubicles predominantly occupied by women, I've never quite been able to know the captain of the ship. The whole phenomenon is really intriguing to me and it makes me want to know who these women are, what drives them and to better understand this culture.  I doubt I'll learn anything more as I'll most likely be leaving this odd reality in a few weeks having finally found a real full-time job that doesn't reside in the banking world.  It's a liberating feeling, yet we shouldn't escape the reality that we're all curious beings with difficult questions to ask with even tougher answers to derive in light of the accusations and repercussions one might face in attempting to be heard above the din of commerce.  Believe you me, I know how that feels.

Being A Man 101: Work

Crossposted.

I live and I breath. I've been out of town the last few days and its time to get back to work. (But seriously I was shocked to see over 600 hits on my Google Reader when I got back.)

Wow has it already been over a month since I first brought this up? I've been a bit busy the last few weeks and my scheduled stuff has run out (except for the end of my 30 Day Song Challenge) so its time to get real again. To get back into the swing of things I'm bring up what will be the first of many entries in this FAQ.

I'm going straight for the jugular on this one. Work.

Now if you recall I said I was building this 101 up as a place where one can come and read up on the basics of being a man. By basics I mean to lay out the topic at hand as it relates to men, cover some of the pitfalls of that topic as they relate to men, perhaps try to throw in a few nuggets of wisdom on how to address them, and most importantly spur conversation on the subject. There's a chance you are burning up inside to talk about something. Come on in and talk. There's a chance you might have a question that you can get some beginner's insight on. Glad I can help. There's a chance you'll see something here you disagree with. By all means point it out and let's talk it out. There's a chance you may read this and think to yourself that there's nothing here you haven't seen already. Fair enough and peace be with you.

I was thinking about starting this off with sex but that's a pretty tall order to start Being A Man 101 with. So I'm gonna tap on another subject that's near and dear to the hearts of men: work.

Society teaches that a defining mark of a man is what occupation he holds.

In decades/centuries long past a man's occupation was so ingrained into his identity that he sometimes drew his very name from it. Meaning that almost quite literally a man was his job. If a man had no job then he had no identity (or at least a negative identity) and he was not a real man (or at least not a real honest man). Not only was having a job important but also what type of job a man held would hold sway over his status as a man. Not just as a man but as a person in general.

CEO of a large coporation? Then you're counted as a important man with the power to rule the world (or at least a noticable portion of it). Work at a steel factory? Then you're an unsophisticated brute that doesn't know the finer things in life. A professor at a high end college? Then you're a knowledgable man whose words should be heeded. However bear in mind that these mindsets are not universal but rather vary from person to person or culture to culture. That CEO could be seen as a greedy fiendish man that would kill his own family for a buck while making a fortune on the backs of others. That steel factory worker could be seen as a hardworking man that everyone should spire to be. And that professor could be seen as a know it who deals in theory but has little actual experience to back it up. Its mostly about how one perceives the job but at the end of the day there are people who base their assessment of a man on nothing but his job.

Now a days a man's status may not be as rigidly associated with this job as it once but the link is still there and its still strong.

How often do you hear people saying that a man that doesn't provide for his wife (yes heteromomative but we'll get back to that in the future) is a real man or try to measure a man's worth and character by his job? It still happens and because of this times have not boded well for men. In the recent economic downturn people seem to be in a state of confusion over what men are supposed to do now that what society tells us is a core part of being a man has been lost. This is the result of not just some rough patch that works itself out but rather this is a big case of a lot of those jobs simply not coming back (remember a large chunk of those jobs that were lost were in manufacturing and who makes up most of the people in those field?).

Something needs to change.

Despite things not quite being like they were a few centuries ago we still have the issue of boys being raised under the belief that they are supposed to be the provider in order to matter or to be worthy of finding a partner. This gives those boys (and men they will become) an expectation that they are unfairly expected to meet (there's a big difference between being expected to be a productive member of society and being treated like you don't count as a man, human, or potential partner unless you have a certain job or have x amount of money).

So what do you think reader? I'm not pretending that this is the absolute definitive word on the subject of men and work, its a work in progress and will probably in progress for a long time. Have something you want to share? By all means come on over and chime in. We'd be doing everyone a lot of good to talk this out.

Have I not cared about gender for that long? Truly Outrageous I tell you!

Yes that is the intro to the old 80s cartoon Jem. I noticed that reruns of it started playing on the channel HUB (294 on Directv) a few days ago. Well as I was promptly setting my tivo box to record it I realized something.

When I was a kid back in the 80s I got up every Saturday morning and watched Jem right along with GI Joe, Transformers, He Man, and all the others and I don't recall a single instance of someone telling me that I should not watch that show because its not a "boy's cartoon".

I mean come on by the script of being a boy that show breaks some pretty serious laws about being a boy. First off the coloring of the artwork. There was pink and bright lights and glitter all over the place. Next the show was about band that really didn't fight so much as battled over and with music (as I recall). I should have have my boy card ripped to pieces. But as far as I recall it wasn't. It was just a part of my Saturday morning cartoon lineup and it got watched just like the others.

So maybe people on the whole were laxing off on the whole gender script even back then.

(While looking for that clip I have at the top of the post I saw in the comment section of another video that supposedly someone has established copyrights of some new Jem characters, possibly meaning a revival. This worries me. One 80s cartoon revivals don't have that great of a track record. Two with the advent of Lady Gaga I'm very concerned that a Jem revival would end up just being a Lady Gaga cartoon.

Video of the Day - Genderless Children

A Toronto couple is keeping the sex of their third child a secret, so that the child can essentially choose for his or herself what their gender is, without being influenced by the the biased ways we are socialized to treat children based on their sex.  Keeping in mind that "gender" and "sex" mean different things, what do you think about raising a child to be as "genderless" as possible, until they are able to decide for themselves?

Personally, I think it's a great idea, although I'm sure that keeping that kind of a secret, especially when the child's young siblings know their brother's or sister's sex, will prove to be challenging.

I'm also a big fan of their older son's long braids.  This is probably terribly unsurprising, but I also think nail polish and skirts (watch the video!) need to quickly become genderless, as well, because boys should be able to join in on the fun and comfort if they so desire, without the expectation that they will be endlessly harassed for it.  Both look great on guys! (and eyeliner, too!)

SO MANY THINGS

I've truthfully been almost deliberately avoiding forming an opinion about Libya simply because I feel like my attention to current events and national politics is completely maxed out, and I just don't feel like I have the mental capacity to analyze all of the information out there, given the energy I already spend paying attention to labor movements in the Midwest, local politics, and the general ideological struggle between big business and citizens, among other things.  Oh yeah, and food, and health. But I do feel a bit reassured by the information that Obama has given here:

Also, I've been keenly aware of how few substantive posts I've been writing here lately, and I attribute this to the same problem.  It's weird, really, how stressed out I feel lately, considering the fact that my only obligations at the moment are making sure I participate in a few online discussions for a whopping two unbelievably easy online classes, and the knowledge that I start a new (and completely different than I've ever done) extremely part-time job in a week.  But even the job thing only happened as of a couple weeks ago, so, yeah.  Since quitting my shitty bank job in November, I've managed to stress myself out to the extent of minor panic attacks by merely reading news on the internet and listening to the radio, to the extent that it feels like a full-time job to even keep up with reading my Google Reader.  It's... well, I don't know.  Silly?  Annoying?  A pointless waste of time and energy?  A white whine?  Or, perhaps more optimistically, a catalyst for becoming more involved in... anything?

Mostly, I am trying desperately to fight against the whole stuck-in-the-suburbs, cold-ass Minnesota lethargy that sets in every year, that I'd been able to at least partially able to avoid when I lived in the city.  It's a lot different here, and I didn't think it would make such a difference when I moved last summer... until winter happened.  It's really difficult to live like I'm most happy living in a place where public transportation is practically non-existent, grocery stores stock for a 97% white population and as a result don't even carry Tapatio or basmati rice (it is Michelle Bachmann's district, where most of the grocery stores are; perhaps Mexican hot sauce and Indian rice are considered unpatriotic?), and the only restaurants to choose from are Applebee's and TGI Friday's.  And I can't even express how desperately I miss gridded, numbered, alphabetized streets.

That's not to say that I've had a completely bad time living here so far.  There are countless benefits to living with my immediate family, including serious financial benefits.  Rent is extraordinarily cheap, and while my husband and I still have an annoying number of monthly static expenses, the break on rent (even factoring in the price of gas, now that we have to drive absolutely everywhere we want to go, even if it's only half  a mile away) is a huge bonus when it comes to pretty much everything else.  Being students, Jesse and I were able to afford to register for Netroots Nation, which is happening in Minneapolis this June.  I was also only able to comfortably make spontaneous plans to take a road trip to attend the rally in Madison a few weeks ago because of my current living situation.

So, really, like anything, there are serious pros and cons to my current living situation.  But, man, I miss Minneapolis.  I miss being able to walk or bike anywhere I wanted to go.  I miss the walkable and bussable farmer's markets.  I miss having a wide variety of items in the local grocery store-- at the big regional chains, even.  I miss having a bar nearby that wasn't one of those sports bars where dozens of 20-something douchey turds with backwards baseball caps and large and unnecessary trucks feed bleached-blonde girls Jag shots all night to a soundtrack of Nickelback.  Not to mention that whole "social life" thing that the kids keep talking about, that ceases to exist when work schedules and a lack of desire for DWIs are factored into weekend plans. 

So, pardon my lack of posting.  I hope you watch all of the videos I manage to link to in lieu of real substance, though, because they're good.  I promise to get back to regular, substantive posting soon.  Here are some more videos:

Al Franken consistently makes up for Minnesota's 6th District's terrible choice of Bachmann.

Donald Trump (who plans to run for President in 2012, remember) is a completely ridiculous person, as expected:

About language-- specifically, how ensuring that English is the only language in which we will discuss important technological, educational, and other pressing issues, is potentially harmful in numerable ways.  I'm really bad at summarizing everything from videos to articles to anything else you can imagine.  Just watch it; you'll be happy you did.

One great thing about going to my first training at my new job (I'm a phone canvasser.  This means I call members of my organization and ask them to donate money for current legislative efforts we're focused on) is that when I went into the phone room, one of the first things I saw was a Wellstone yard sign.  These are still in people's yards around the more progressive neighborhoods of Minneapolis.  Minnesota will never forget Paul Wellstone.  His followers were, and are, some of the most dedicated and devoted progressives around.  The murder death of Paul Wellstone is still, to this day, felt and discussed all the time around progressive circles.

About Paul Wellstone, I can't claim a long support or anything toward him.  When he was killed, I was just 18, and only starting to get involved in local politics.  All I knew of Wellstone was what my mom had said of him, disparagingly: "he's such a 'bleeding-heart'!"  I didn't know what that meant at the time, but was alternatively beginning to embrace my seemingly intrinsic support for anyone willing to actually have a bleeding heart, especially out loud, like Wellstone did.  I worked in a photo lab with a very ardent Wellstone supporter at the time, and based on her frequent discussions about him and my own research, I had decided that I was going to vote for him, without question.  His death a few weeks later shocked me.

That was also the election year (the first one I was legally allowed to vote in!) that Pawlenty was running for governor, for the first time.  I remember thinking I might vote for him, and that I really liked his claim that he was from a working class St. Paul family.  I believed him.  I also based the majority of my political opinions on network television commercials.  That year, I ultimately ended up voting for Ken Pentel, the Green party candidate, rather than either of the two main party candidates, based on a lot of Dave Matthews Band listening and weed-infused Daily Show viewings that made me believe that voting for a third party was beneficial (I still do believe this; I just want us to be practical about it).  

Fuck Pawlenty, though, seriously:

If I could just be juvenile for a moment: BARF.

Courtney Martin on TED

Courtney Martin, author and writer for Feministing, on feminism, and the difference between her feminism and her mother's.

Your pets are stealing your identity.

There's this trend around the feminist blogosphere where people get writer's block and attempt curing it by writing about how everything from marriage to mousepads are tools (or remnants) of patriarchy.  Amanda Marcotte dug up an older one of these gems today from Slate's Double X: the kid-as-Mom's-Facebook-picture trend.  Says Katie Roiphe of these women: 

Many of these women work. Many of them are in book clubs. Many of them are involved in causes. But this is how they choose to represent themselves. The choice may seem trivial, but the whole idea behind Facebook is to create a social persona, an image of who you are projected into hundreds of bedrooms and cafes and offices across the country. Why would that image be of someone else, however closely bound they are to your life, genetically and otherwise? The choice seems to constitute a retreat to an older form of identity, to a time when women were called Mrs. John Smith, to a time when fresh scrubbed Vassar girls were losing their minds amidst vacuum cleaners and sandboxes. Which is not to say that I don’t understand the temptation to put a photograph of your beautiful child on Facebook, because I do. After all, it frees you of the burden of looking halfway decent for a picture, and of the whole excruciating business of being yourself. Your 3-year-old likes being in front of the camera. But still.

As a non-parent, it is difficult for me to weigh in on this trend and its perceived causes.  I also find it annoying when avowed child-free people write about the intricacies of parenthood and "what's wrong with mothers these days," but clearly, that trend isn't going anywhere anytime soon.  I know plenty of mothers who use their kids' picture as their Facebook profile picture, and I assure you, they all manage to remain fully independent, unique people-- they're just the kind of fully independent, unique people who are obsessed with how perfect and amazing their kids are.  Annoying?  To some people, sure.  Patriarchal and sexist?  Uhh... no.  Not really.  And especially not when compared to the shockingly still-ever-present practice of calling individual married women Mrs. His Name: 

Just as in the past and to an extent today, women are expected to show their love for their male partners by erasing their own identities and replacing them with his---going from Ms. My Name to Mrs. His Name---now there seems to be increasing pressure for women to “prove” they love their children through self-abasement. 

As a feminist married woman, I'm tempted to throw heavy, sharp objects at anyone who dares to refer to me as Mrs Husband's Full Name rather than Ms My Own Fucking Name.  I get upset.  I already get upset when people simply call me Mrs. His Original Last Name, because we are both Mr and Ms Our Hyphenated Last Names, dammit.  But your baby's picture?  As your main Facebook image?  As a reminder of sexist, patriarchal traditions?  Come on now.  That's a little... reaching, don't you think?  I mean, sure; for some women, their kids are their entire identities, and that's pretty depressing.  But is it really evidence of a trend?  And such a gendered and damaging one, at that?  I don't think so.  

As far as dangerous and threatening Facebook profile picture trends are concerned, I'm much more interested in the trend of using pictures of one's pets to represent them.  Just look at these friends of mine, all of whom were once completely intelligent, unique, independent men and women, before they got those attention- and identity-stealing dogs and cats.  Apparently, they have all thrown away years of education and experience by using these photos to represent who they are.

Our mom and dad used to be smart,
fun people... till we came along and
stole their identities!

I'm Delores, and I'm more important
than my dads.

Hi, this photo's prominent
 placement invalidates
my mom's math degree

You may have thought my mom was
a good photographer with a passion
for rescuing animals and
making me clothes, but UR RONG,
this picture renders her invisible!

I'm not sure what my dad does,
but it doesn't matter anymore,
because I'm his profile pic!

  

Curious, I looked through my Facebook friends' profile pics to see just how many of them actually did choose to put up picture of their children instead of themselves.  Of all 234 people, I came up with four.  Two of them are men.  Where are the articles about them losing their identities to their children's?  There are more pictures of my friends' domesticated animals in my Facebook news feed than there are of their children.  And I'm friends with a lot of parents.  A lot of parents with pets, even.  And I'm also friends with a lot of their actual pets, since they are all the type to create Facebook pages for their pets.

What represents a person on sites with avatars and user pics is clearly not only pictures of the person themselves.  It's pictures of them with their friends, family, dog, significant other, or other person, and it's also frequently other things, like cartoon images, a phrase or slogan, a baby, a dog, a cat, a building, a hamburger, or any number of other things.  If it's a part of someone's life, it can be used to represent them.  This complaint is really just snarky, more than it is insightful.

Is a biological factor really a privilege?

(I put this up a day or so ago at my place.)

I read Ta-Nehisi Coates off and on and while I usually agree with what's talking about I'm not sure about the last part of one of his posts on childbirth.

Don't get me wrong I agree with the vast majority of what he says in that post. It is certainly true that childbearing and birth is a VERY risky process for women and I'm not trying to argue that. It is also true (no need to agree with it the numbers say so) that maternity deaths among women are still a big problem even in modernized nations like here in The States. And I'm with him on this:

Its courageous work, which inspires in me a degree of admiration exceeded only by my horror at the notion of the state turning that courage, that hard labor, into a mandate.

However there is one thing I can't agree with:

But it can not obscure perhaps the most specific and nameable species of male privilege--of all the things that may one day kill me, pregnancy is not among them.

I'm sorry but (and maybe its my understanding of the concept of privilege and Coates is talking about something else) that doesn't sound like a privilege to me.

Let me explain what I'm thinking when it comes to privilege. To me (and I think this is the result of my time in blogging about various privileges and dis-privileges) privilege is something that someone has access to and someone else doesn't due to factors that are truly unrelated to the something in hand. Here's an example.

A woman and myself send in our resumes to get a job. The hiring manager pick one of us or the other based solely on our gender, thinking "Oh they're a _____ and the other one is a ______." Now with the exception of a very small list of things there is absolutely no justifying hiring a person of a certain gender just because they are that gender. If no matter what position is up for grabs there is no way to back up the claim that one of us would be the better candidate just because I'm a man and she's a woman or the other way around (despite the fact that there are folks out there that believe such sexist nonsense).

Back up to Coates post. To me a biological difference is not privilege. Its just a biological difference. My not having to face the difficulties of pregnancy is no more a privilege than a cis-woman not having to face the possibility of being diagnosed with prostate cancer.

Again I'm by no means trying to say that pregnancy is easy (how am I supposed to know?). I'm by no means trying to say that women don't face real danger during pregnancy. I'm just saying that I'm not so sure you'd call a cis-man's not facing that danger a privilege when its based on a biological impossibility.

Sheryl Sandberg on why there are so few female CEOs

Ben Parr summarized her talk:

"Women systematically underestimate their own abilities,” Sandberg stated before citing data that explained why. For example, men tend to cite themselves as the primary reason for success, while women tend to cite external factors. And 57% of men negotiate their first salary out of college, while only 7% of women do the same.

This is a frequently cited reason for why women are less successful than men in the professional world.  One thing that stood out to me about her talk was one of the first things she said: "...Let's start out by admitting that we're lucky.  We don't live in the world our mothers lived in, our grandmothers lived in, where career choices for women were so limited."

The world that our mothers lived in.  That's just one generation.  Sometimes I think in awe about the fact that my mother was alive when Kennedy was shot, when schools became desegregated, when we first landed on the moon, when abortion went from illegal to legal.  

The major civil rights victories that my generation takes for granted were only gained within the last generation.  That's not very long ago.  To think that it hasn't even been a century since people with whom I can immediately identify -- women, all women -- were not legally allowed to vote is sometimes a little overwhelming.  One of those losing-faith-in-humanity things.  And then to remember that, for many other people, there is no "gee, it's been only a generation since we were legally equal in some extra ways!"  They're still fighting.  And that makes me think that we're not as civilized as we think we are.  As long as there are still people fighting for justice, there is no real civility.  As long as we can say things like, "In, like, 30 years, we'll think of gay marriage like segregation in the 60's," we are not really civilized.  It's just proof that we still have a long way to go before we don't have to fight anymore.  And we should probably just admit it.  While we're always better off than we were, this is no place to slow down and get cozy.  

Women and Wine: A Feminist-Friendly Pairing?

by imnotme

This post is from Most Wine Is Good.

I'll answer the question first, and expound second.  Yes.  The world of wine is certainly an exemplary account of women breaking barriers and uniting for positive change.  The examples are numerous, and I'll get to some articles in a second which really flesh the issue out well, but I want to give an unusually informal mini-essay on the matter.

Firstly, I want to impress upon the reader that I am deeply concerned with social justice, and in the pursuit of a meaningless college degree I have had ample opportunity to study and analyze major issues and events which the United States has seen.  Slavery, freedom of religion/speech, capitalism (it wasn't the only option on the table), sexual equality, temperance, gay rights, etc., etc.  I've also had the honor of studying women's issues under the former National Women's Studies Association president, Judith Roy.  So the context I'm framing this whole issue from is one of historical struggles and triumphs.  (NERD ALERT: skip this post and read THIS instead... more facts)

With that said, wine was once a gentleman's club.  Actually, even that generalization is too modern.  Wine was once a disgusting, muddy, tart and somewhat rancid indulgence.  The refinement of which finally saw the courts of kings.  With financial backing from these kings, wine-makers began perfecting methods of producing more pleasurable and elegant wines.  As wine became a full blown commodity, monasteries grew eager (ctrl+F : monks ) to realize some of the profits, and began introducing wine-making as one potential life path for monks.  Since monastic life provided an abundance of time and a devoted workforce, monasteries began informing wine-making methods in general and came to produce some of the most sought after vintages.  Even though monasteries are strictly inhabited by men, this would certainly not be the peak of wine's patriarchal days.

Skipping ahead, grape vines from all over the world began traveling.  News of the greatness of a particular vine and it's geo-climate needs would spread and, with money, so would cuttings of the vine.  If successful, these traveling cuttings would yield brave new worlds in terms of blended wines and wines that could cellar longer due to increasing acidity levels and better fermentation practices.  As humankind around the globe began to clash and civilize, wine came to rule supreme (beer makes a comeback in the mid-1700's).

Colonial forces, primarily British, are somewhat to thank (though in no sense of nobility) for the further cultivation of what were becoming increasingly "fine wines".  I credit the British colonialists hesitantly as this occurs during a particularly dreadful time for the British in terms of human rights violations and all-out greed.  Their Empire ever-expanding, the British aimed to bring fine wine to any place Her Royal Army should lay base (this generously parallel's with the history of Tea and black pepper, to name a few).  This promulgation of wine across the British empire was the peak of wine's patriarchal days.

That we now have a Robinson for antiquity's Parker is clearer than a windsock indicating the feminist winds that have blown in since the dark days of male dominated wine-making.  In fact, vocal and respected female wine critics are more of a symptom than a condition.  The overall trend in wine today is that of a veritable takeover.  Some of the most important wineries in the world are run and maintained by powerful women.  Over recent decades women have become so influential in the world of wine that marketers now see that they have no choice but to bring on top paid female executives.  Women in today's wine industry can fill any role they desire with enough hard work (sure, maybe even harder work than men put in, but there's only anecdotal evidence of this), yet the wave only crests there, the full expanse of the social body of said wave is depicted very well in this article published by Food & Wine.

While it's true that women have proven to be both effective and innovative in the world of wine-making, evaluating and selling - like all other struggles women are currently engaged in, there is still a distance to travel to flat equality.  The nature of the struggle will likely vary by setting, but in each setting there will undoubtedly be a struggle.  For example, males and females in my local market are equally open to wine suggestions from either male or female retailers (exceptions exist), yet male servers (in restaurants or bars) are seen as having less culinary/wine-pairing authority as their female counterparts (exceptions exist).  Additionally, males tend to act as though price is less of a concern when choosing a wine than females.  Females are typically quick to name a price point and are usually suspicious of bottles costing more than $30, while males respond positively to higher priced wines and hesitate to name their cost-ceiling.

Those last couple of examples are fairly porous, but I trust you can see the point.  How men and women interact varies by setting, and this invariably affects the speed at which social roles change, as well as the impetuses that can cause such changes.  All things considered... make no mistake: women have an upward momentum in wine that is reaching a stronghold, and I think that's fantastic.  We've heard enough from men who declare sentiments such as, "Pinotage is as untenable as child rape (ctrl+F : pinotage)".

If I'm off on my historical lineage, citation or analysis, by all means email me at mostwineisgood@gmail.com.  I'll happily give you credit for any corrections I make, and would rather not have a public argument over it.  My take is: if your research is better, let's go with that!

Ali Carr-Chellman On Re-engaging Boys In Learning

I'll admit at first I had a pretty evil thought about this video but after letting that pass I concluded that there is some good stuff going on here and a lot that I agree with. Damn shame it doesn't get more attention.

So what do you think?

(Borrowed from Pelle Billing.)

Bitch

A lot of words are collectively agreed to be off-limits to feminists, including "bitch," "cunt," "slut," and a myriad of other words that are said to be female-specific with no male equivalent. If there is no male equivalent for an insult used primarily against women, then it is rightly argued to be sexist. It's not often that we find or discuss words or labels that work in the opposite direction (i.e., a word that insults men but for which there is no female equivalent), although some people have been doing so recently. What I'd like to talk about specifically, though, is the term "bitch."

Wikipedia defines "bitch" as follows:

The term "bitch" comes from the 1150 word bicche, which was developed from the Old English word bicce. It also may have been derived from the Old Norse word bikkja for "female dog." The Oxford English Dictionary dates the term meaning "female dog" to around 1000 A.D.

As a derogatory term for women, it has been in use since the fourteenth or fifteenth century. Its earliest slang meaning mainly referred to sexual behavior, according to the English language historian Geoffrey Hughes: The early applications were to a promiscuous or sensual woman, a metaphorical extension of the behavior of a bitch in heat. Herein lies the original point of the powerful insult son of a bitch, found as biche sone ca. 1330 in Arthur and Merlin ... while in a spirited exchange in the Chester Play (ca. 1400) a character demands: “Whom callest thou queine, skabde bitch?” (“Who are you calling a whore, you miserable bitch?”).

Modern usage of the term describes someone who is "belligerent, unreasonable, rudely intrusive or aggressive." Of course, a man can easily be belligerent, unreasonable, rudely intrusive or aggressive, but when the term is applied to a man, it "is a derogatory term for a subordinate."

So, let's break this down. A female bitch is someone who acts in a traditionally masculine manner, and a male bitch is someone who acts in a traditionally feminine manner. While the history of the usage of the word clearly shows its female-specific and misogynist roots, it was later expanded as a way to apply to everyone who acted in a manner at odds with traditional gender roles.

Although I don't use the word often (I usually only use it to jokingly decribe myself during PMS or in some other humorously self-deprecating way), I prefer the de-connotative usage, summarized (by me) to describe someone who is unnecessarily rude, hostile, or critical. But when I use it, I am much less likely to call a man a bitch for the same reason. I'm also not at all likely to call a man a "bitch" and mean it in the modern context of "subordinate." In fact, I'm just wholly unlikely to ever call a man a bitch, for any reason. Why is that? I think it is because I don't want anyone I'm talking to to misunderstand and think that I am calling a man a bitch to illustrate how I think he is acting in a traditionally feminine manner, because using a pejorative against someone for not adhering to traditional gender roles is pretty much against everything I stand for. For some reason, though, I assume people will understand that if I refer to a woman as a bitch, that I'm not calling her a canine in heat.

Another interesting phenomenon that I see happening (and that I use often, myself) is eliminating the female-specific insults from our collective vocabulary and replacing them with traditionally male insults, like "asshole," or even the milder "jerk." Since, in addition to not using gender-based insults, I also actively avoid genital-related insults like "pussy" or "dick," I have been embracing "asshole" and "jerk" as general insults, as neither implies a gender and, although traditionally reserved for men, are perfectly descriptive of what I am trying to call out in the other person.

Something, though, makes me feel uncomfortable about taking a term reserved primarily for men and using it for women and men alike, and I'm not sure why. When describing a role that remains identical whether a male or female performs it that English has unnecessarily divided into genders, like actor and actress, for example, I try to default to the "male" word. So, I'm more likely to call Jennifer Connelly an actor rather than an actress, because I see no reason to differentiate. Who cares if Jennifer Connelly is male or female, when "actor" and "actress" mean exactly the same thing?

So, why eliminate "bitch" from my vocabulary? I'm not sure that I will. But in order to be consistent, it seems that I should. But... why not just call everyone who is acting like an asshole a "bitch," instead? Whether they're male or female? Maybe it seems easier to say "asshole" or other usually male-specific terms, because we all know that they mean the same thing whether applied to men or women, and even though "bitch" arguably means exactly the same thing as "asshole," people are likely to be widely misunderstood about the intent of the insult when used against a man.

Again, though, there's a certain level of discomfort in reverting to historically male-centric language that does not reconcile well with my preference for egalitarianism (with the exception of actor/actress, as can be seen in the Wikipedia link's "terminology" section). I don't like male-as-default language, at all, so treating words that originally conjured up an image of a man as if they are for all of us, while treating words that originally conjured up an image of a female as off-limits feels quite misogynist to me. Society already insults men by calling them women; it feels as though avoiding using traditionally feminine terms to describe men is perpetuating the widespread (if not subconscious) belief that the worst thing a man can do is be like a woman.

Do you use the word "bitch"? How do you feel about gender-specific insults or descriptors?

Cohabitation and Personal Change

I was talking with a co-worker this afternoon, and she mentioned how after so much time with her S.O. she was beginning to feel that "everything you do irritates me" feeling.  I know this feeling.  Fortunately, and thanks in no small part to my wife, I also know what it's like when that feeling is conquered and begins to fade.  While my coworker and I talked, I suggested two sort-of rudimentary ways to approach the issue.  Now that I am home and have stepped away from the conversation I thought I would toss it out into the blogoshpere and see what comes back.  The two approaches I suggested were fairly polar, and I realize that can be problematic, but a lot of relationship issues do tend to lack a wealth of approaches.  I will comment on that more later, for now I'll recap:

In my opinion, she could A) Listen to her gut (meditate, force-conclusion, ego-mirror, etc) and decide whether or not the relationship she is in is one where the pressure to become a better person is not only there, but mutual.  Or, B) Pick something she does which irritates her S.O., catch a moment when she chooses NOT to engage that irritating behavior, and remark out loud about it.

In the first scenario, I am basically suggesting she decide whether or not the relationship is even worth the personal dissection.  If it is, then my second approach ought to be a good starting marker for how to recognize change in your partner.  This is really difficult without a plan of action because when you spend day in and day out with one person, you don't see the ways they are changing.  You may notice if you go to a party where a large number of people are your S.O.'s friends, many people that your S.O. hasn't seen in six months or a year may remark on how much your S.O. has matured, while you sit by scratching your head daring the old friend to go ahead and try dating your impossible S.O. for his or her self and see how they like.  This thought should be a red flag, because it indicates that you believe you are best suited to meet your damaged partner's needs.  Maybe you are... but the no-no is finding yourself in a place of moral or behavioral superiority in a relationship that should be built on mutual respect and appreciation.

My wife and I use the method I mention above.  Even though we had some epic fights and misunderstandings at the get-go, we always have and always will talk about the things we are or are not satisfied with in the relationship in non-blaming (as possible) language, and then try to vocally express when we have acted alternatively to the problem behavior so that the other person knows, at the very least, that you are still thinking about it and still care.  For example, my wife really hated it when I used to "help" in the kitchen, because what usually occurred, and I admit it now, was my domination of the whole project.  She loves to cook as much as I do, and I was condescending her by jumping in too enthusiastically with my own ideas rather than getting a bearing on where she was headed first.  This has changed, but it took time and the effort to point out small milestones for the change to be recognized.  Now I ask her if she wants help, and if she does, I ask her specifically what she'd like me to do.  Sometimes she will have me just chop some shit up, other times she will actually want my own input.

Over simplified?  Sure.  But nonetheless applicably sound.

Or, for a different scenario, let's say that one person in a committed relationship has a drinking "problem", and I put that in quotes because not everyone said to have one does.  That can be somewhat subjective.  So let's, for the sake of ease, say that one person drinks more than other.  The one who drinks less would like the other to do the same or at least work towards a middle ground (ok, fine, this is based on personal experience), so the one whose drinking is problematic in the context of the relationship should make it known EACH time they are intentionally curbing a desire for a given quantity or frequency of alcohol; mind you, not in a whining or punitive way.  And since I already admitted that I am just talking about my own life, I should also say that this approach has worked for my wife and I.  She has a much healthier relationship with day-to-day drinking than I do, and through communicating each effort to reduce my own drinking down to a level that was more acceptable, she began to see that, indeed, even though I still require some wine or what-have-you to get ready for bed, the amount has decreased more than significantly.  Of course, her insistence and my acceptance of the issue were key too, but there's just no reason I can think of to avoid such changes unless the change in question is a "deal breaker".

So as I savor my glass of wine over some blog writing tonight, I would encourage others in a similar spot to at least attempt this method, for even if it fails, you will have gained important knowledge either way: Possibly the knowledge that your connection wasn't that strong after all, possibly the knowledge that it can only get stronger.

Take care.

Unmarried men more excited about potential unplanned pregnancies than their girlfriends

It seems that men are more excited by the idea of an unplanned pregnancy than their girlfriends:



I would venture to guess that if it were men who were biologically predisposed to do the fetus-gestating for 9 months and worry about the pain of childbirth and the bodily changes that occur during and after pregnancy, the ones surveyed would feel a little less enthusiasm than they currently do. Perhaps, if this were the case, the women surveyed might find themselves a little more excited. But ultimately, given good ol' biology and the fear of parenting inequities, this really isn't terribly surprising.

And they say a man's looks don't matter...

(Okay I thought I had actually posted this. Silly me for leaving it in the drafts for so long.)

So I was reading this post over at Renee's about the Sexiest Man Alive list done by Star magazine and I came across this one part that kinda made by blood boil.

When we look at a man's physical body, it is never seen as limiting his potential...

Is it me or does it seem that some women love dictating what it is like to be a man?

As I commented over there (which BTW was modded down, I guess some people can't stand the truth) this is simply not true. Now before you start the "who has it worse" pissing match note that she did not say that a man's physical body aren't as limiting of his potential as a woman's physical body can be. No she straight up said that a man's physical body never has any bearing on his potential. I say nonsense.

Let's take actors for instance. If you look at the actors that some up on that list (she has some of them in her post and I can't find the list online) you'll see that not a one of those guys is what you would call fat. But that's not the trick to her post. Simply two paragraphs later she makes the very true point of how fat men are marginalized (and of course taking the paragraph in between to add in the obligatory "okay yeah there is something unfair that happens to men but above all else remember that they are privileged" mitigation).

So on one hand being fat doesn't limit my potential while at the same time because I'm fat I'm often automatically dismissed as not being considered sexy. Now while writing this post it hit me that maybe, just maybe when she was talking about "limiting his potential..." she was talking about his ability to succeed and trying to separate that from whether or not he thinks he is sexy. Then I realized that those two are not so easily pulled apart. Even if you eliminate careers that link directly to one's looks what a man (or woman for that matter) there is still the simple confidence factor. When you think you aren't attractive you shy away from things that might put your face out there. As much as I complain about answering phones all day I'd still rather do that than be a teller at my bank (yes there was that one woman whose firing from a bank over her attractiveness that caused a lot of noise but compared to say the modeling industry something happening like that in banking is pretty rare) and have people look at me all day.

And there's being large pretty much means you must be an athlete. Or that you're not very intelligent. Or that you don't practice good/regular hygiene. Or you're not active and must be lazy. Or that you must be lousy in bed (assuming you don't crush the poor woman right?). (And of course there's swinging the pendulum to the other side and making assumptions about small guys.)

But hey what do I know? I'm just an actual man rather than a woman trying to tell men what their lives are like. (Either that or I'm really missing something here.)

When I read that post I was reminded of an ad for that new music game Power Gig.

Notice what happens to the guy when the narrator says, "You don't need to be sexy, or good looking."

"My liberation as a man is tied to your liberation as a woman."

[ted id=1031]

What I'm reading

A very engaging and unexpectedly touching account of Aurora Levins Morales' experience "coming back to capitalism" as she enters the US after being in Cuba.

One of those book reviews that makes you feel like you actually read the book, at least a little bit, because of the excellent analysis.

The only way to shift the political culture is to start a national conversation about gender pressures on men, she said. Until we do that, we won’t see much progress for women.

Devra Renner and Aviva Pflock, authors of Mommy Guilt, will understand this book. Even though their book is about mothers, most of the work they do is about parenting. They spend a lot of time reminding others that parenting is something both mothers and fathers do.

A discussion on sex work, stripping in particular, and the difference in society's perception and treatment of men and women in the industry.

Gender Across Borders is looking for article submissions "that explore the relationship between gender roles in the workplace and at home." Both women and men are encouraged to submit. From the request:

The topic of this series is intentionally broad to capture the diverse experiences of women and men in the workplace and at home.

A broad range of materials in welcome, from personal narratives to academic essays to profiles that focus on particular people or events. Articles from around the world are strongly desired.

Some questions to consider:

-How does culture shape gender roles in the workplace and at home?
-How have gender roles changed over time because of feminist and other influences?
-How do class, race and sexuality influence gender roles in the workplace and at home?
-What does the future hold for women and men in the workplace – and at home?

Innocent Smith, in a fantastic analysis of capitalism and traditional values:

Ultimately, what capitalism has produced is two Americas: a Blue America whose prosperity depends upon the values it professes to have outgrown, and a Red America that preaches traditional values but wholeheartedly embraces the economic Darwinism that preys upon them.

A touching account (pun not intended) of a memory of the Radical Housewife's mother's touch.

Imnotme has revamped his blog, and the content is now primarily fiction work, including While Great We Are. An excerpt from the short story:

The fire was nearly half burned down and the library had taken on a somberness. The conversations had turned from philosophy to mortality. James, who had stopped challenging the other two to nine-ball championships, given his losing streak, was now sitting in the mammoth chair nearest the bar, a half empty bottle of brandy sat hesitantly on the edge of the bar above his right arm; the fire on his left cast a devilish shadow across his brooding face. His black snout glimmered.

And, last but not least, a friendly message to the Christians who, without fail, claim every year that there's a "war on Christmas," or that "Christians are oppressed in this country." Even though I'm referring to the US and this clip is referring to Great Britain, it still applies across the board:



Leave links to interesting things you've read, or written, in the comments!