Neamhspleachas

One Fish, Two Fish

“Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary.”-Kahil Gibran

I went to a poetry reading tonight. I learned a few things.

I don’t even like poetry, but shockingly, some people who read at poetry readings are really good. This girl wrote a dirty poem about cheese that rocked my socks.

Most people who read at poetry readings take themselves entirely too seriously.

Men who don’t get laid who read at poetry readings (i.e. all of them) try to rhyme “desire” with “fire” all too often. You’d have poetry about sex if you were actually having it.

Published on August 18, 2010 in Hodgepodge. 0 Comments

Sense This Makes Equals Zero

“There is no opinion so absurd that a preacher would not express it” -Bernie Katz

Sam Schulman wrote an op-ed for the Christian Science Monitor in which he criticizes the recent Prop 8 ruling in California.

Schulman claims that marriage isn’t about two people who love each other. Instead:

“Marriage is not about couples or lovers – it’s about the physical and moral integrity of women. When a woman’s sexuality is involved, human communities must deal with a malign force that an individual woman and her family cannot control or protect.”

So, I’m supposed to get married (to a man) because that man will protect my…sexuality? I find that somewhat troubling since, as a woman, I’m more likely to be assaulted by my husband than by a stranger. If, as a society, we are relying on husbands to protect the “physical and moral integrity of women,” then we’re really being let down.

He goes on to say:

“Modern marriage is only the least worst version of marriage that has emerged from all this – but it is still necessary for women. What protects women, ultimately, is that marriage laws and customs confer upon her independence something extra – dignity, protection, sacredness – that others must respect. And if this quality can be bestowed upon anyone, even those not in intersexual relationships – it reduces, even dissolves its force.”

If marriage is supposed to be about protecting me, I’m marrying my 80 pound half Rottweiler, half pit bull. He’s a heterosexual male, so Schulman ought to be pleased.

Published on August 17, 2010 in Feminazism. 0 Comments

Parenting

“There may be some doubt as to who are the best people to have children, but there can be no doubt that parents are the worst.” -Anonymous

I don’t have kids. I don’t want kids. I don’t spend a lot of time around kids. That being said, I have very strong opinions about them. Mostly, I don’t like them. Now, I’m not one to comment on anyone’s parenting abilities. From my limited experience, having kids is tough.

I spent the weekend with a family that has kids. Really, really great kids actually. The kids have really, really great parents.

The parents are atheists. (Well, an atheist and an agnostic.) After seeing a picture in a magazine about a manger scene, one of the kids mentioned she wanted one. Her (religious) grandmother explained that it was really important because that was the son of God, etc. Later, her parents took her aside and explained that not everyone believes in God, that they don’t don’t believe in God, but that Nana does.

Could you imagine the Duggars telling their kids that?

Published on August 16, 2010 in Hodgepodge. 0 Comments

More On Gentrification

“The metamorphosis of Linux from a free, hobbyist software environment to a major revenue-producing operating system is occurring with the same surety and swiftness of a neighborhood undergoing gentrification.” -Laura DiDio

I mentioned earlier that my neighborhood is in the midst of gentrification. Whenever things change, for any reason, it causes controversy. In DC, the overall black population is declining, while the total population is expanding, and that has some concerned that DC will soon no longer be the “Chocolate City.” (Editor’s note: Baltimore, however, will still be called “Brown Town”.)

Natalie Hopkinson, staff reporter for the Washington Post, wrote a piece back in 2001 about how she and her family weren’t going to “let DC lose its flavor.” The title of the piece (I Won’t Let DC Lose Its Flavor) is condescending. But there is more than that.

The author discusses how she doesn’t want DC to lose another black family to the suburbs and she’s helping to keep DC black by choosing to live in a neighborhood (mine) which is in the process of being gentrified. Respectably, she doesn’t want to be another middle class black family who moves to the ‘burbs instead of staying to help to improve an ailing (and mostly black) neighborhood. However, she seems to forget that gentrification has much less to do with the colors black and white and much more to do with the color green.

Look, if you’re middle class and you move to a poorer neighborhood, you’re gentrifying. A black family’s money raises property values as much as a white family’s does. Gentrification has a lot less to do with race and a lot more to do with socioeconomic status. The face of gentrification is white because whites typically have more resources than blacks. Increasing the cost of living is going to put out blacks (who typically have fewer resources), regardless of the face behind the increase.

Published on August 15, 2010 in Back Of The Bus and Dollars and Sense. 1 Comment

Victim Blaming?

“To err is human, to blame the next guy even more so.”

I work a few nights a week at a local bodega and while working on Wednesday night, a girl came into the store only to leave and discover her bike had been stolen. The girl hadn’t locked her bike to anything, just locked the wheels, and it appeared that someone came along on another bike, picked hers up, dumped there own, and left.

Bike theft where I live is pretty common. My bike was stolen a few months ago off of my back porch. Everyone I know has a bike theft story.

When discussing this incident with other store customers, the consensus seemed to be that the girl should have locked her bike to something. I found myself agreeing. I’ve never heard of a bike being stolen from outside of the store. This incident took place during daylight, at maybe 6:30PM, in a high traffic area.

Is this victim blaming? Is this the same thing that I chastised others for doing?

I realize bike theft and rape aren’t equatable. I also realize that there is a very real relationship between an unlocked bike and bike theft that doesn’t exist for, say, a short skirt and rape. But saying that the girl “shouldn’t have left her bike unlocked” seems eerily similar to the girl “shouldn’t have drank so much.”

Published on August 7, 2010 in Feminazism. 1 Comment

The Future Is Driving Me Insane

“I’m here to handle the job that is at hand. Who knows what the future will bring?” -Rep. Leonard Bentz

With all the big changes going on in my life, I can’t really help but wonder about the future. Trying to pack, move, and plan is driving me to drink. (Literally. I’ve strictly limited my alcohol consumption because the desire to jump into a bottle of wine and just ship myself is becoming a too often fantasy.)

The worst part is the lack of control. I can’t control anything that’s going to happen. I can’t even best plan for it, because I’m really not sure what the future may hold. Should I take this piece of furniture? Should I take that piece? OMG WHAT ABOUT COAT HANGERS?

A friend of mine linked to this piece today about thinking about the future.

Trying to solve future problems, or even come to terms with them, is a recipe for disaster.

The future often appears in our minds as a host of real problems which require immediate attention. We’re powerless against the future, because our influence can never extend beyond the present moment. We can wish, hope, rehearse excuses and confrontations, resolve to do X or Y, but no matter what thoughts you have about the problem, it can only loom unsolved until it actually happens.

Though it often feels like absolutely have to, you can’t ever deal with the future, because it doesn’t exist except as a thought in the present moment. In fact, “present moment” is a redundant term, but our human way of thinking about time is skewed so stubbornly, we can’t really drop it yet. Of course it’s the present one. There aren’t any others.

There really is no future. That’s not just a cheeky way of thinking about it, it’s the acknowledgment of a real error in the way we tend to conceptualize time.

The man makes a solid point. His advice?

The people of Maine, I’m told, are fond of saying “Oh, you can’t get there from here” when asked for directions. It’s a peculiar answer, but it’s not a dumb one.

There is certainly a “there,” but it isn’t anything until it becomes a here.Don’t deal with “there” until it gets here. Not that there’s any way you could.

Ok, ok I get the hint.

Published on August 5, 2010 in Redheaded Stepchild. 2 Comments

No H8

“We’ve got a lot of trouble in this country…in this world. Why a state should be interested in proscribing the word marriage from people who love each other, who are responsible tax-paying, productive people who have created a family?” -Judge Judy

Prop 8 was struck down today by a federal judge in San Francisco.

Judge Vaughn Walker wrote:

…Proposition 8 “fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license.”

Pretty much.

Published on August 4, 2010 in The Gentle Art of Making Enemies. 0 Comments

As It Turns Out, Not All Conservatives Are Insane

“Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when he is called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason.” -Oscar Wilde

David Frum and I don’t see eye to eye on much, policy-wise. But I bet I could sit down with him at dinner and have a friendly, intelligent discussion.

You might remember him as the guy that the American Enterprise Institute fired for writing a column on CNN about how the Republicans were defeated on health care, calling it the Republicans’ “Waterloo.”

Now that AEI has canned him, he’s free to right reasonable (if often wrong) things at his own forum, including a piece about the dangers of calling Obama a socialist. He points out, among other things, that:

“In 2009, the US health economy reached a symbolic tipping point: for the first time, more than 50% of the dollars spent on health were spent by some agency of federal or state government. Sounds like socialism, right? But this tipping point was not driven by President Obama. It was driven by the growth of Medicare – and last I heard, it was President Obama who was proposing slowdowns in Medicare spending, and it was Sarah Palin and the Tea Party activists who were denouncing reductions in Medicare as tantamount to “death panels.””

He also clearly states that:

““Socialists” did not make this mess. Every one of these distortions was championed by President George W. Bush and remains the declared policy of congressional Republicans.”

Look, people – a perfectly reasonable conservative. Shocking, I know.

Published on August 4, 2010 in The Gentle Art of Making Enemies. 0 Comments

Applying Some More Logic

“Feminism is the radical notion that women are people”

The other day I talked about a piece written about “Firefly”, calling Joss Whedon and the series anti-feminist.

The more I thought about the show, the more this bothered me. Not having watched the show in a year or so, I just mentally went through the episodes I remembered and noted each one in which Mal (or another man) is saved by a woman.

Inara rescues Mal in “The Train Job,” humiliating him in the process. She refers to him as her “kept man.”

Zoe rescues Wash in “War Stories.” She chooses to rescue Wash over Mal when forced to decide between the two, which she does without thinking. Then Zoe comes back and rescues Mal while River is the person who saves the ship.

Zoe saves Mal (and the crew) in “Out Of Gas,” specifically ignoring Mal’s orders to do so.

River says the entire remaining crew in the move “Serenity.”

Further, Kaylee, as the ship’s mechanic, repeatedly saves the day in an area which Mal is unable to help.

In defense of Mal, he punches out a guy who insults Inara in “Shindog” and tells Inara that he respects her, but not her profession. Further, Mal helps to defend an entire brothel from a psychotic man who wants one of the prostitutes to turn over his child (that she’s pregnant with.) You’d think a guy who hates women would side with the other team on that one.

As I said before, I’m not touting “Firefly” as some sort of feminist utopia. I wouldn’t even argue that this work is “feminist.” However, I think it’s a far cry to call it “misogynist.”

Ya know, unless you want to see misogyny in everything.

Published on August 1, 2010 in Feminazism. 0 Comments

When World’s Collide

“Poverty is a veil that obscures the face of greatness.” -Kahlil Gibran

I work a few hours a week at a bodega near my house that specializes in local, organic produce, meats, and dairy. The job is great, the customers are amazing, and the discount really stretches my grocery budget.

It’s a small operation – the owner, me, another part-time girl, and a guy. The owner, me, and the other girl are well-educated and from middle-class background. The guy is a high school drop-out and grew up in poverty that I can’t begin to comprehend. He’s a DC local. The rest of us are transplants.

A few days ago, we’d gotten in some new stock and the owner had left a list of the prices so someone could price them. The list looked something like this:

Angel Hair Pasta – 3.75
Spaghetti – ‘’
Rotini – 2.75
Bow Tie Pasta – ‘’

The guy did the pricing. We ended up with Angel Hair with a $3.75 price tag, Rotini with a $2.75 price tag, and Spaghetti and Bow Tie pasta with an $11 price tag. No one could figure out why this stuff was priced at $11…until the owner realized that this guy didn’t know that the two apostrophes meant “the same price” and not “$11″.

No one teaches you that in school. There isn’t a class on stuff like this. People who grow up with educated, middle class parents don’t think twice about what those two apostrophes mean. It’s one of the many, many little things that can separate the “haves” from the “have nots.”

Published on July 31, 2010 in Back Of The Bus and Dollars and Sense. 0 Comments

Neamhspleachas

" title="Neamhspleachas"> Neamhspleachas