Oh, this makes me giddy and gleeful.
The AFA's ridiculous claim that the hate crimes bill in Congress would restrict freedom of religion and freedom of speech now has its very own Snopes page! I loves it, precious! And I have had too much caffiene again.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Sunday, June 17, 2007
This is madness...
No comment.
The War Inside
This is also saddening, but in a different way from the previous post.
A Sacred River Endangered by Global Warming
As a species, we are unforgivably irresponsible. As individuals, we are too willing to sit back and pretend that someone or something else will take care of it.
The War Inside
This is also saddening, but in a different way from the previous post.
A Sacred River Endangered by Global Warming
As a species, we are unforgivably irresponsible. As individuals, we are too willing to sit back and pretend that someone or something else will take care of it.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
The Cult of True Feminism
I've only had one formal class that would fall into the category of women's studies. My college offers a minor in it, but it's one I haven't bothered to get into. And my one "women's studies" class -- Feminist Theology. (Taught by an incredible professor who's now at Vandy.) Now, this wasn't a conversion experience for me. I had already moved through my initial childhood recognition that girls were treated differently from boys, through a pathetic teenage period of resentful resignation, developing into an angry young "why yes, I am a feminist, and you need to hear that word more often" type at the end of high school. But I was a self-taught feminist, and I basically still am. So my first encounter with formal feminism was, shall we say, interesting.
The first text we read was Mary Daly's Beyond God the Father. In many respects I see why it's an important book -- someone had to point out that "if god is male, then male is god." However, I personally felt that the trying to read Daly was like chewing on broken glass, and I'm very hesitant to say that just because having God as Father as the ONLY image of God is detrimental, that there is anything ontologically wrong with the image of God as Father -- it just should not be the exclusive image.
And then there was the issue of experience. It just didn't fit. Not because I had managed to sidestep the patriarchy. I most haven't. But I did miss the patriarchy specific to upper-middle class white America. Lower-middle, working class rural white America patriarchy is different enough, throw in that I was constantly moving back and forth between the patriarchy of fundamentalist Christianity and a family where, oddly enough, women are less restricted in terms of what they can do than are the men due the family patriarchy. (Thank you, Great-Aunts!) So yeah, things just didn't fit. (And often I felt like grabbing one especially talkative and WASPy chick, shaking her, and screaming -- you do not speak for me!) Then we read Ada-Marie Isasai-Diaz's Mujerista Theology, and I was a much happier little thing. Even happier when we got to Sallie McFague -- I likes the high theology. Finally, the course led around to Kwok Pui-lan and Postcolonial Theology, and I liked that even more. (There was a method to the Prof's starting us out on Daly. Chewing glass does help one cut teeth quickly, I suppose.)
At first though, it seemed to me that the Cult of True Womanhood had only been replaced by a Cult of True Feminism. Some ideal-type was in the works dictating what you were supposed to believe, how you were supposed to think, and even what type of experiences you were supposed to have under your belt. And if you didn't live up to that ideal-type, too bad, you just weren't enough of a feminist.
I discovered the Feminist Blogosphere a few months later. I found it fascinating. So many different opinions -- not even necessarily ones I agreed with all the time, but one's that certainly made me think which is why I read. And, I've somehow always managed to miss the central battles of the Feminist Blog wars -- probably because I'm not too faithful about reading comments, but it does seem to be a case from the periphery that some Cult of True Feminism is at work in some sectors deciding who is and who isn't enough of a feminist. And my response to that is the same thing I thought back in class: well, that's silly now, isn't it?
The first text we read was Mary Daly's Beyond God the Father. In many respects I see why it's an important book -- someone had to point out that "if god is male, then male is god." However, I personally felt that the trying to read Daly was like chewing on broken glass, and I'm very hesitant to say that just because having God as Father as the ONLY image of God is detrimental, that there is anything ontologically wrong with the image of God as Father -- it just should not be the exclusive image.
And then there was the issue of experience. It just didn't fit. Not because I had managed to sidestep the patriarchy. I most haven't. But I did miss the patriarchy specific to upper-middle class white America. Lower-middle, working class rural white America patriarchy is different enough, throw in that I was constantly moving back and forth between the patriarchy of fundamentalist Christianity and a family where, oddly enough, women are less restricted in terms of what they can do than are the men due the family patriarchy. (Thank you, Great-Aunts!) So yeah, things just didn't fit. (And often I felt like grabbing one especially talkative and WASPy chick, shaking her, and screaming -- you do not speak for me!) Then we read Ada-Marie Isasai-Diaz's Mujerista Theology, and I was a much happier little thing. Even happier when we got to Sallie McFague -- I likes the high theology. Finally, the course led around to Kwok Pui-lan and Postcolonial Theology, and I liked that even more. (There was a method to the Prof's starting us out on Daly. Chewing glass does help one cut teeth quickly, I suppose.)
At first though, it seemed to me that the Cult of True Womanhood had only been replaced by a Cult of True Feminism. Some ideal-type was in the works dictating what you were supposed to believe, how you were supposed to think, and even what type of experiences you were supposed to have under your belt. And if you didn't live up to that ideal-type, too bad, you just weren't enough of a feminist.
I discovered the Feminist Blogosphere a few months later. I found it fascinating. So many different opinions -- not even necessarily ones I agreed with all the time, but one's that certainly made me think which is why I read. And, I've somehow always managed to miss the central battles of the Feminist Blog wars -- probably because I'm not too faithful about reading comments, but it does seem to be a case from the periphery that some Cult of True Feminism is at work in some sectors deciding who is and who isn't enough of a feminist. And my response to that is the same thing I thought back in class: well, that's silly now, isn't it?
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
An Anniversary Post
This is be the 100th post here at Lost in the Underground. I feel like I should say something profound to mark the occasion.
That is all. You may now return to your regularly scheduled thoughts. ;)
(p.s. I drink my soymilk from Central BBQ glasses with the happy hog.)
That is all. You may now return to your regularly scheduled thoughts. ;)
(p.s. I drink my soymilk from Central BBQ glasses with the happy hog.)
An Unfortunately Visible Monster
I'm feeling pretty guilty about the amount of driving that I'm doing this summer, but their isn't much to be done about it. At least until the summer classes I'm taking are over, then I'll work on walking to the grocery. Right now, I just don't have time for round trips of at least an hour a half there and back -- according to Google maps it's about a 2 mile walk -- very doable and not an unpleasant walk thanks to tree growth in Midtown, but you need more time than I have between class and work.
My pathetic attempt at relieving guilt is this. I have forsworn the AC in my car, and I am driving around Memphis with the windows down. Yes, I will get every last mile out of that bleeding expensive gasoline.
However, I have found that driving through the city of Memphis with the windows down as an unaccompanied female is apparently an open invitation for the dregs of the Memphis populace to shout lewd comments of a sexually based nature at one. This behavior leaves me bumfuzzled and quite annoyed. It's such a nice addition to my day, to be referred to as some bit of meat, or I think the term I used in a prior post was woman-matter. And, yeah, I've been honked at and yelled at before on walks in city, but for some reason today's just was too much.
And you know, what makes me the maddest is there is very little I can do to stop random people from looking at me as some sort of object intended for their pleasure. I'm boyish already, I don't wear particularly risque clothing anyway and today I was in a regular t-shirt (not that skimpier clothing would be an excuse for street harassers), what is this? (Mind you, I shouldn't be surprised, I've also been hit on when I swear on the Bible I might as well have been in drag.) More "modest" -- in the conservative religion sense of the word -- clothing wouldn't do any good either and in fact might make the situation worse as long, full skirts and feminine tops would just more obviously mark me as someone crammed into the category of female and therefore intended, by some cosmic power, to gratify the male gaze. Perhaps, I could buy some wide Ace Bandages and tape down what little chest I have to begin with, have my hair cut into something that's traditionally masculine, continue wearing the same clothes I do now and see what happens? I could, but I won't, and I should not have to in order to drive or walk around in peace. I also just finished up Chuck Palahniuk's Invisible Monsters -- but that idea is even madder. Yet, somewhere in the back of my mind it makes sense, a radical break from categorization is what I need.
My pathetic attempt at relieving guilt is this. I have forsworn the AC in my car, and I am driving around Memphis with the windows down. Yes, I will get every last mile out of that bleeding expensive gasoline.
However, I have found that driving through the city of Memphis with the windows down as an unaccompanied female is apparently an open invitation for the dregs of the Memphis populace to shout lewd comments of a sexually based nature at one. This behavior leaves me bumfuzzled and quite annoyed. It's such a nice addition to my day, to be referred to as some bit of meat, or I think the term I used in a prior post was woman-matter. And, yeah, I've been honked at and yelled at before on walks in city, but for some reason today's just was too much.
And you know, what makes me the maddest is there is very little I can do to stop random people from looking at me as some sort of object intended for their pleasure. I'm boyish already, I don't wear particularly risque clothing anyway and today I was in a regular t-shirt (not that skimpier clothing would be an excuse for street harassers), what is this? (Mind you, I shouldn't be surprised, I've also been hit on when I swear on the Bible I might as well have been in drag.) More "modest" -- in the conservative religion sense of the word -- clothing wouldn't do any good either and in fact might make the situation worse as long, full skirts and feminine tops would just more obviously mark me as someone crammed into the category of female and therefore intended, by some cosmic power, to gratify the male gaze. Perhaps, I could buy some wide Ace Bandages and tape down what little chest I have to begin with, have my hair cut into something that's traditionally masculine, continue wearing the same clothes I do now and see what happens? I could, but I won't, and I should not have to in order to drive or walk around in peace. I also just finished up Chuck Palahniuk's Invisible Monsters -- but that idea is even madder. Yet, somewhere in the back of my mind it makes sense, a radical break from categorization is what I need.
I don't have an ornery streak.
All the summer residents at my college received a little reminder e-mail today. If we are members of a fraternity or sorority we are not to wear our letters during the lovely summer orientation programs the college is holding for which they forces us into a dorm without a kitchen for the summer. (No, I'm not bitter. I just want to be able to cook.) The first thought that popped into my head was -- hey, I could make up a sorority and wear letters just to see what would happen!
By the by, ornery is a fun word to say!
By the by, ornery is a fun word to say!
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