Wrong number

File under things I do not have the power to do, number 100 and something.

No, I can't reinstate your driver's license.

I love my job. I get the best questions.

Dangerous Question...

At least for someone whose head has been and is infested with a rather Gnostic sense of reality. (And Gnostics and Manicheans are difficult to kick out of your head, which is why Western Christianity is infested with everything dysfunctional about Manicheanism, with none of the more interesting insights -- thank you, Augustine!)

"Are bodies and sexuality essential parts of being human--or are we, perhaps, merely souls inhabiting bodies?"

So that's this week's topic for the reading response journal thing we have for Feminist Theology. It's also one of my personal, philosophical hang-ups. The issue of embodiment. What does it mean to be embodied? Why am I embodied in the body I'm in? Why do people confuse the body I'm in with me? (Yes, I'm still mad that I'm barred from many monasteries.)

Incidentally, the accompanying reading is Dawne Moon's God, Sex, and Politics -- which is a fascinating and though-provoking study of two United Methodist Churches and their responses to gays and lesbians.

In related news -- sky burial is more awesome than I had previously thought.

This is what a Post-Feminist looks like

I think I'm disillusioned with feminism.

No, not in that way. Patriarchy is bad. Sledge hammers should be taken to it with gusto, preferably on a frequent basis. Castrate the idols, already!

Here's the sit.

I'm currently in a redux of Feminist Theology. Which means I'm reading roughly the same texts as I was two years ago when the class had a different number and was taught by a different professor. In some cases, the texts are just as delightful the second time around as they were the first. (Ada Maria Isasai-Diaz's Mujerista Theology remains highly recommended.) But coming back to intro-level Feminist discussions after having read Judith Butler is somewhat painful. (We're talking very intro-level here. Rhodents can apparently make it to their junior or senior year, not know the first thing about feminism, and be "concerned" about taking a feminist theology class.)

For instance, during a class discussion of creating feminist religious rituals to embrace womanhood and womanliness, I was sitting in the back corner of the room (in a gray vest and a matching gray fedora of gloriousness!) twitching a bit, and wanting to throw out the question -- does it really do any good to create feminist rituals, if the only thing you are accomplishing is reinforcing the boundaries between the constructed categories of gender? Couldn't this just be adding to the problem and continuing to force individuals into categories that are not based in their experience and so not adequately describe them? Does this lead to liberation?

I did not do this. I felt it would be rude (this was a student led discussion). Also, it would have been completely unproductive. I might have managed to engage three people out of the class of 25 or so. The rest would have been staring at me, thinking, "constructed categories of gender, buh?"

See, I wouldn't mind reading texts that I find to be outdated and essentialize the idea of some essential (non-biological) difference between the sexes, if I felt I could actually pull off getting a discussion going about possible critiques and so on and so forth. But I'm in a class that may very well suggest that Womanist and Mujerista theologies are excluding (silencing might even make an appearance, who knows?) white women. I mean, the class did decide that a feminist rereading of Genesis 2-3 was too anti-male in tone. (The exegete, Phyllis Trible, was using narrative theory and analyzing the characterization of Adam and Eve. She argued that the narrative presents Eve as far more curious than Adam, who's far more passive in the text. At no point did she suggest that this was a reflection on the male portion of the population -- her point was that traditional readings have not paid attention to the actual narrative, because they were too busy reading in the patriarchy.)

Murr.

So, I have both an example of why feminism remains a necessary movement, and an example of why I may well be post feminist at this point.

Or not.

Darned categories. If I had a hammer, I'd smash the categories. And then the patriarchy would fall into the abyss.

You Wanna Hear About My New Obsession

If I weren't already fairly convinced that Garbage was the love-child of Depeche Mode and one Seattle grunge band or another . . . this video would have convinced me.




Please, compare with the video for "Walking in My Shoes."

Bad Language! Bad, bad language!

No cookie for you, English.

Holy Fools. Fools for Christ. Holy Foolishness. Etc. Etc. and so on and so forth.

You see, I would presume, how these are not good terms. Especially for net and database searches. What with different people using different versions and making up their own and making me sad.

Russian has a nice, concise word for this amorphous-in-English concept: юродство / yurodstvo.

This proves (at least until I change my mind) that Russian is a superior language.

Shame on you, English.

And, I have reminded myself why I don't like donut holes. Oh, well, college campus -- they shan't go to waste!

How do I get out of this one?

I know! I'll use a plot device!

This Dominic Deegan strip makes me smile. I should probably print it out and hang it over my desk.

If, that is, it looks as though I will ever have time to write another word of fiction again.

I wonder if the Religious Studies department has ever had a major turn their senior paper into performance art before. But there are so many possibilities for a project on Holy Fools, and such a frustrating lack of blindingly obvious scholarly resources on the Internet.

Who knows -- should the insomnia keep up, performance art of a follyful persuasive might cease to be optional.

More on Buses

Saint Petersburg is a much safer city than Memphis.

Sure, Peter is not a perfectly safe city. But, it is much safer. I noticed that. One of my Russian professors fields phone calls from concerned parents by telling them that if their kid has navigated Memphis thus far, they'll be perfectly fine in Peter. (Granted, the extent to which Rhodents navigate Memphis is limited -- Bubble!)

I'm sure there are a number of factors involved in that distinction. Many of which wouldn't be noticeable to the untrained casual observer, wandering through the city while barely speaking the language. But there was one obvious one.

There's a lot of people in them there streets. And yeah, that whole safety in numbers things -- even if you're technically alone -- there's something to it.

Virtually everyone in Peter uses some form of public transportation, be it the bus, the metro, the marshutkas. And foot power for shorter trips, or the trip to the bus stop or metro station.

Walking home along at night is far less frightening if you are constantly passing people on the sidewalks. I do think that people's fear of being out in Memphis is 95% completely irrational. (I have had roommates who freak out from going to a thrift store on Summer Avenue -- IN BROAD DAYLIGHT!) But also think that interesting the number of people out walking and using public transportation, would do a lot to make the city feel safer, at the very least, and I highly suspect that it would make the city safer in fact.

So, perhaps encouraging people to use public transportation (start with offering a monthly pass, work on more convenient routes), would not just make Memphis a more eco-friendly city, but a safer city.