The Times Herald-Record today is reporting a sweep for banned backpacks at Tri-Valley High School in Sullivan County last week has caused protest from parents and the student body.

According to the Record, the security guard conducting the sweep was asking female students with purses “Do you have your period?”

Students are only allowed to carry backpacks or purses if they are having their menstrual period.

In response, the Record says: “Girls have worn tampons on their clothes in protest, and purses made out of tampon boxes. Some boys wore maxi-pads stuck to their shirts in support.”

The best part of this form of protest is that it sends another message: stop making young women ashamed of menstruating! I’m so tired of the planning that has to go into a friggin bathroom trip if I’ve got my period. Once you haul your backpack/briefcase/purse to the bathroom, everyone knows you’ve got it. But both they and you have to pretend you don’t, and that’s why you can’t just take a tampon/pad out of your bag and walk through the halls with it. It’s such a stupid, Victorian taboo. And corporations are hard at work enforcing it, or rather, trying to get rid of menstruation altogether.

Of course, regardless of whether the question is embarrassing the women at this high school, it is sexual discrimination. It’s not as if they’re asking boys, “Are you wearing jeans with large pockets because you’re expecting to have a seminal discharge today?” That and the boys aren’t permitted to carry purses, of course. And finally, how the hell does a woman saying she’s got her period verify in any way that she is not carrying a handgun in her Louis Vuitton? Real smart, Sullivan County.

Anyway, have a happy period!

Not-so-new news, but I’ve failed to mention it earlier: this 27 August 2007 press release from George Mason University brings to attention a study which confirms the sad truth: married men do less housework than live-in boyfriends.

The study, published in the Journal of Family Issues, looked at over 17,000 people in 28 countries.

The issue at hand isn’t as simple as married men just not doing the work. The problem, this study suggests, is that the institution of marriage changes division of labor. Even if an egalitarian viewpoint is present in a married relationship, those men still reported doing less housework than their wives.

The study of more than 17,000 people in 28 countries found that married men report doing less housework than men who are live-in boyfriends.

According to Davis, the key finding of the study is that it suggests the institution of marriage changes the division of labor. Couples with an egalitarian view on gender—seeing men and women as equal—are more likely to divide the household chores equally. However, in married relationships, even if an egalitarian viewpoint is present, men still report doing less housework than their wives. According to Shannon Davis, one of the co-authors, “Marriage as an institution seems to have a traditionalizing effect on couples—even couples who see men and women as equal.”

The research does leave room for hope, though: the study did not follow cohabitating couples to see if the distribution of housework changed from before to after marriage. It may be that those who are most concerned with traditional ideas of gender may voluntarily choose to forgo marriage due to its role in prescribing roles and duties to the sexes (particularly in modern times).

A new winning statement from America’s favorite Fox News pundit, Bill O’Reilly!

Apparently, O’Reilly spoke on his 19 September The Radio Factor broadcast that he met Al Sharpton for dinner at Sylvia’s, the famous soul food establishment in Harlem. It seems he had an eye-opening experience of some sort, because he stated:

“I couldn’t get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia’s restaurant and any other restaurant in New York City. I mean, it was exactly the same, even though it’s run by blacks, primarily black patronship.”

He continued to praise them for their “civility” throughout the program. When engaged in a discussion about the effects of rap culture, he noted, “There wasn’t one person in Sylvia’s who was screaming, ‘M-Fer, I want more iced tea.’” He then continued on, comparing Sylvia’s atmosphere to that of an Italian restaurant in an all-white suburb, with no “craziness.” (Yes, he said “craziness”).

Clearly, O’Reilly experienced a great deal of culture shock, by the way he kept bringing it up every time he could. It almost sounds like he had a life-changing experience.

However, don’t go thinking he’s changed all that much. His understanding of black culture?

“I think black Americans are starting to think more and more for themselves. They’re getting away from the Sharptons and the [Rev. Jesse] Jacksons and the people trying to lead them into a race-based culture. They’re just trying to figure it out. ‘Look, I can make it. If I work hard and get educated, I can make it.”

My very favorite part of that statement was my recognition that he went to the oh-so-”civilized” Sylvia’s with one of the “Sharptons” (in fact, The Sharpton!) I’m not sure how he explains how someone who is so reoccupied by race could enjoy such an environment.

There’s more on http://mediamatters.org, including a recounting of O’Reilly’s past comments on race and ethnicity, and a more complete transcript of his comments from the broadcast (with the video).

M-Fer, I want more iced tea evolved understanding of racial politics by Bill O’Reilly!

It’s necessary that I comment on the whole Ahmadinejad thing, not because it matters, but because it’s taking place at my lovely Alma Mater, the Acrapolis.

Why, I’ve been wondering, does anyone care?  What are they so afraid that he’ll say?  Because if you listened to the 60 Minutes interview with Ahmadinejad (I’m starting to learn how to spell his name!) that aired yesterday, you know that this guy rocks at the intricate art of answer-evasion.  Ask him any question, any question at all, and he will invariably respond with – nothing.

“It is an established fact now that Iranian bombs and Iranian know-how are killing Americans in Iraq. You have American blood on your hands. Why?” Pelley asked.

“Well, this is what the American officials are saying. Again, American officials wherever around the world that they encounter a problem which they fail to resolve, instead of accepting that, they prefer to accuse others,” the president replied. “I’m very sorry that because of the wrong decisions taken by American officials, Iraqi people are being killed and also American soldiers. It’s very regrettable.”

…

“I asked President Bush what he would say to you if he were sitting in this chair. And he told me-quote-speaking to you, that you’ve made terrible choices for your people. You’ve isolated your nation you’ve taken a nation of proud and honorable people and made your country the pariah of the world. These are President Bush’s words to you,” Pelley said. “What’s your reply?”

“Well, President Bush is free to think as the pleases and to say what he pleases,” Ahmadinejad said. “I don’t think that President Bush has said these things. Rather I prefer to think that this is your impression of what the president said.”

This is, of course, the art that makes good Middle Eastern leaders – the ability to turn water into wine and loss into victory with a few meaningless words.  But thousands of people are up in arms just because Ahmadinejad is going to say them in New York.  So what if that meshuggener’s said some nasty things about Israel and the Holocaust.  So did Mel Gibson’s dad, but no one’s run him out of town!

What’s truly sickening is the way Fox News is hanging around the Columbia campus like hornets on a plate of pickle juice.   It’s like the Minutemen protest all over again: “Look at the liberal campus!  Bad liberal campus, bad!” The story is just about all they’re reporting at the moment, and somehow you get the impression that they don’t really give a shit about what he stands for or whether he’s building a nuclear bomb.  He’s coming to Columbia!  He’s coming in the dark of night!  We’re coming for you, liberal America!

So, in short, Ahmadinejad is coming, and the wrong people care.  And if you’re still feeling strange, or just need a bit of comfort food, go talk to Dilbert.

There’s a new president in Freetown, Sierra Leone – and he’s pulling out all the stops to celebrate.

Hours after the swearing-in ceremony, hundreds of looters descended on the headquarters of the former president’s party. They carried out desks and chairs, computer monitors and printers, posters and coat racks before police blanketed the neighborhood with tear gas.

Police also fired bullets into the air and arrested numerous people while regaining control of the area. At least one person was killed, according to footage taken by an Associated Press Television News cameraman at the scene.

Yep, free elections, bringing riots to a neighborhood near you. Not that I’m against them. I’m just skeptical of this whole ’spreading democracy’ propaganda we like to believe. It’s harder than we might think. I’m also skeptical of President Koroma’s claim that he’ll end government corruption. Are there any governments that aren’t corrupt in some way? And it’s been such a vicious cycle in Africa. Just read Ayi Kwei Armah’s The Beautiful Ones are Not Yet Born.

So, to conclude, I have no idea how to fix the world, but we need to do something different soon. That said, I wish our forefathers had thought of post-election looting. Think of the cuts in government spending!

I’m sure if you marginally follow popular culture/mainstream media, you’ve heard that Vanessa Hudgens – otherwise known to me as “that girl from yet another crappy Disney production; this one happens to be called High School Musical” has been facing the music due to a leaked photo of her standing in her all-together in her bedroom, smiling.

Reuters is reporting that Disney, vehicle for Cold-War-era anti-communist propaganda and enforcer of the status quo, is standing behind their star. As much as I hate Disney and all that it stands for, I’m happy for her that she didn’t get totally screwed by the whole thing.

What I’m not happy about is how people (ie. mostly parents who swear by Disney “wholesomeness”) are reacting.

Look at this gem of a quote, from that Reuter’s article, describing some parents’ reactions (emphasis mine):

“She’s damaged,” Renee Rollins-Greenberg, a Los Angeles mother of two, told Reuters. “She’s got this teeny-bop audience, young preteens and younger, who are admiring her and thinking she’s this wonderful, pure innocent person. Eighteen is awfully young for this kind of display.“

Last time I checked, 18 was of legal age in the U.S. to strip down in front of a camera for money (or for fun). Obviously, multiple people determined that this was an appropriate age somehow, and as arbitrary many of those age minimums can be, 18 is the legal point that you can do almost everything, besides drink, gamble, and rent a car for cheap, so it seems like a good enough age for me.

Even if you doubt whether the picture was intentionally or unintentionally leaked to the public, it wasn’t exactly from a Hustler photoshoot. Firstly, it wasn’t a highly publicized before anyone actually saw the (single!) photograph. Secondly… I’m not going to link to it here – the beauty of the internet is the ease by which one can obtain information – but suffice it to say that the most erotic part of the photograph is that she’s naked. There are many, many more titillating photographs, with people in various states of undress, to be found in the electronic medium.

The whole fuss everyone’s making angers me, because for all intents and purposes, this photo is the kind of thing that any consenting adult – yes, parents, at 18 years old she’s an adult – could be “guilty” of. With the internet and point-and-shoot digital photography, it is simpler than ever to send a visual erotic greeting to your partner, your enemy, or some girl/boy you’re creepily stalking. And fun!

What I care about and want to know isn’t why she did it. In my opinion, that’s her own personal decision; if she chose freely and willingly to do it, without coercion, then more power to her and her comfort with her sexuality.

What actually bugs me are these things:

1. Who the *(&% put it out there (assuming it wasn’t her)? Her co-star boyfriend? Some douche bag who had access to his hard drive? Hackers? A shitty publicist who decided, “Hey, let’s put a naked picture out there. Sure, it’ll cause scandal, but this way, they’ll know she’se a “woman” and it’ll boost her future career! It’s a sure-fire way to get attention outside of teeny-boppers and their parents.”?
   
   If it was all her choice… well, I doubt it was her, but I actually don’t care as much “why” if it was just her decision, because then she would have been in complete control of the situation. Well, of course, besides the possible pandering to a male desire to objectify attractive (and “barely-legal” for those males way past college-age) females in a culture that undervalues women if based solely on their accomplishments, but overvalues them instead for their “accomplishments”. See “Paris Hilton”.
2. It is almost always pictures of naked young female stars/starlets. I could be missing something, but the few times I’ve recall anyone freaking out about male stars/”starlets” (starlots? mini-stars? demi-stars? stars-in-training?) is:
   1. when those horrible pictures of Crisco Adler and his saggy junk came out (I didn’t know who he was, even, until then, and then in just seconds I knew too much), and,
   2. when Daniel Radcliffe was doing naked promotional pictures with a horse for that play he was doing, in which he was supposed to be ridin’ dirty with a girl on some poor animal for a scene.
3. As a continuation of 2, note that those pictures were made a big deal of, not just because the subject was naked, but something was horrible and grotesquely “shocking” about it: saggy junk, the faint and lingering hint of bestiality by some underage guy who is otherwise depicting a boy-wizard. Also, note also that buzz about this stuff usually doesn’t leak into the mainstream media like it does for females.

‘Scuse me while I run screaming in the streets. The idea that she could be “damaged goods” because of this alone is making me go insane.

 

 

(Note: Yes, yes, I know parents are angry about it because she’s supposed to be some “role model” for kids. 1. Refer to my “not a Hustler photoshoot” comment. 2. It wasn’t taken with the intent of showing those aforementioned kids. I don’t think anyone actually thinks she posed like that to expose their little minds to the wide, wide world of smut.)

Dear ::ahem:: “Sirs”,

Last Thursday, I was not, as they say, “asking for it” in anyway. That is to say, I was not wearing:

• a tube top
• a tank top
• anything showing an inch of my “breast-eges”
• short shorts
• hot shorts
• shorts with words on the buttocks
• low-ride anything with my thong hanging out
• low ride anything with my absence-of-underwear hanging out
• high-hemlined anything with my panties showing
• high-hemlined anything with my “va-jay-jay” showing
• a shirt that bared my shoulders
• a shirt that bared my elbows or wrists
• a bottom with any skin above the ankle, nay, even up to and including the ankle, showing

To put it simply, unless my wearing a suit with pants that flatter me and a button-down shirt underneath that doesn’t have a button at the collar (yet nonetheless showed almost no skin past my collar bone) is “asking for it”, I strongly believe that I safely skirted this categorization.

However, this did not seem to stop you.

Some of you ::ahem:: “restrained” yourselves. I could walk by in silence, with only the distinct feeling that I was being undressed with your eyes as you stopped what you were doing to watch me.

Others of you wished to make your “approval” known aurally (probably with the hopes that I would “thank” you orally). I wish it to be known that it is unnecessary to stare at the rest of my body in order to determine whether or not I am a “beautiful woman”. A look at my face will suffice, thank you.

And so, I wish it to be known at this time that, as a result, if I am stripped visually, or hear a variation on the phrase “Hey, baby” intoned in “come-hither” tones directed towards me any further, I will be even more tempted to take action.

The more I am confronted by your undesirable advances, men of New York, the more I want to do this:

• take your testicles
• allow you to be lured into a false sense of security because I’ve taken your testicles in my hand
• cut off said testicles with a swift flick of my wrist
• give them back to you

You see, men of New York, with that act I would finally feel at peace. You, my dears, would be holding your balls in your hands as I walk away. I, on the other hand, would be smirking with the knowledge that I have emasculated you, disempowering you as much as you have succeeded in doing to me because of my gender.

I bid you well.

Sincerely,
“Beautiful-woman” Mc”Hey-mami”

P.S. I don’t intend to actually slice off any portion of anyone’s genitalia, but sometimes, the thought of that kind of revenge is sweet… especially when all you are trying to do that day is go to a job interview in Midtown. ::sigh::

If you need any proof that third-wave feminism, or at least, the TV kind, is a mess, just check out this very hilarious column by Lisa de Moraes about Whoopi’s View Debut.

Shut up, Babs! Knock it off, Joy! Put a sock in it, Elisabeth!

Whoopi Goldberg, the Oscar-winning comedy queen, tried to debut on the syndicated talker “The View” this morning, but she barely got a word in edgeways, what with evil stepsisters Barbara Walters, Joy Behar and Elisabeth “LookatmeI’mpreggersagain” Hasselbeck hogging the microphone and mugging for the camera.

…

“There is nothing that you can do that is not on YouTube, MyFace,” Babs said, which is perhaps the funniest line of the whole show.

Yep, they’ve got woman power.

Sorry to pull out this bit of very old news to blog about, especially since it is once again from the New York Times (I really need to get a subscription to the Post), but y’ know what? It’s still bothering me. A lot.

I’m a woman who works in and knows mucho about technology. And lately, there are more and more of us invading. We don’t necessarily walk around covered in gadgets (unless the cell phone, the laptop, the camera, and the mp3 player count), but we know a lot about them and we don’t need a manual to use them. So when someone writes an article about how spiffy it is that companies are dumbing down electronics for women, it tends to rub us the wrong way.

The article does make one good point: “Women are busier than men.” This is a sad cultural reflection of the fact that the feminist revolution didn’t rid us of our child-growing and house-cleaning duties. But it’s the truth, and it’s why mom isn’t playing with the new scanner. Unless you make a point of it (and goodness knows that society has discouraged that one), you don’t have time to know your tech specs.

That being said, the solution is to change the situation and shake off the “gadgety girl” taboo, not make electronics that reinforce the stereotypical “computer guy.” But that’s exactly the “revolution” that this article is celebrating:

Behind this quiet revolution are engineers and designers who are bringing a more feminine sensibility to products historically shaped by masculine tastes, habits and requirements… There are more subtle touches, too, like the wider spacing of the keys on a new Sony ultraportable computer notebook that goes on sale next week. It accommodates the longer fingernails that women tend to have.

Sorry? Fingernails are handicaps on our typing ability, now? I’ve never personally seen that one. Anyone get their fingernail caught in the “r” key lately? The very scientific testing behind these products is even better:

This charger is flat, round and sold with interchangeable faceplates in silver, black and eggshell that help it blend in with kitchen appliances. Large light-emitting-diode readouts spell out what the countertop charger is doing at every phase of the charging cycle. Focus-group testing indicated that men were turned off by the Easy Charger, especially in how its readouts appeared to tell them what they thought they already knew, said Mandy Iswarienko, the brand manger for rechargeable products.

Well jeez genius, ever thought that if you call it “the Easy Charger,” men might be turned off by the implication? And you made it look like a decorative kitchen appliance? Manly men are really going for that one!

So, the lesson of the day is: it’s called gender constructs. Make women out to be family-obsessed, tech-dumb, and long-nailed, and no, they aren’t going to like gadgets or have a programming hobby. Make easy electronics out to be girly, and no, men aren’t going to buy them. And I like browsing Shiny Shiny as much as the next kitsch-deprived techie, but dude, we’ve already got crap like “Beauty and the Geek” telling us we women can’t be bookish. Do you have to take away our “unsightly” wires and “giant” digital S.L.R.’s, too?

Apparently, things have gotten even kinkier in the world’s latest pot o’ genocide.

The Times reports that now not only are Arabs assaulting non-Arabs, but they’re also fighting tribal wars with other Arabs. But don’t panic – the wali’s got it all under control.

The wali, Ali Mahamoud Mohammed, said in an interview that such clashes were “just a natural part of the life of the tribes” and something he had witnessed growing up in Darfur in the 1970s.

Ah yes, the good old days. So good to have a chance to reminisce. Of course, the government did not step in when these tribes were massacring non-Arabs. But now that everything is in “chaos” and beginning to “resemble Somalia” – well shit! Maybe they should do something!

I’m sure that “something” won’t extend to actually ending the genocide, considering the government started that “phase” of their great plan (to dye the water red, presumably?). I hope it ends all the same, considering that every day of any conflict in that country hits women and children the hardest. It’s hard getting up in the morning sometimes, realizing that in another part of the world, you’re property to be brutally and nearly always sexually conquered. The story that’s always hit me hardest about Darfur is the tale of the refugee women who can’t visit the well for water because crossing the open plain is equivalent to asking for sexual assault.

We think we’re so modern, but we live there, too.