Just cause you don't notice doesn't mean its not there

I don't have high expectations for the internet. I really don't. So don't think that I am demanding anything from Cracked.com beside making me giggle. I'm not. I'm merely pointing out the ubiquity of this type of thing.

What type of thing, you ask?

The "Everyone can relate to masculine characters, therefore no one else is necessary" type of thing.

At this point, I'm used to the occasional misogyny, the homophobia, transphobia and US centrism of this website, but this got under my skin. For those who can't or won't follow the link, its a list of the "Top 10 Most Disastrous Saturday Morning Cartoon Adaptations." Most of them, I agree, are fairly crappy cartoons in general, and are even worse adaptations. However, was including She-Ra as an adaptation of He-Man and calling it atrocious because girls (trans and cis) can relate perfectly well to the hyper-masculine, Freudian-emasculation-fear-driven He-Man and besides, Bo is clearly gay, truly necessary?

Fucking hell. How much of a clearer picture of "cis-man/hyper-masculinity as default" do you need?

Know Your Context Before You Assume You are Helping

I debated posting pictures of Haiti post-quake here, but I decided that it was too easy for something like that to verge into pain porn, and I'm uncomfortable with the context of something like that. All too often, disasters in places like Haiti are given an uneven treatment that buys into a "3rd world tragedy" narrative that I do not wish to participate in. It is too important that we acknowledge not just this event and the effect it has had, but how it was able to happen in the first place.

With everything circling regarding Haiti and the earthquake plus drawn out aftershocks that have further hamstrung an already impoverished nation, several things must be kept in mind.

The first is that severe poverty creates exponential vulnerability to natural disasters like this. From Meloukhia:

So, we had an earthquake here on Sunday, a 6.5. It was a little bigger than the little quakes we get now and then, so it attracted some attention. Notably, no lives were lost, and the most serious injury was a broken hip.

And then, yesterday, a 7.0 in Haiti.

And, already, the headlines, all along the lines of “what happened in Haiti could happen here!”

And, here’s the thing.

No. It can’t...

...Yes, a 7.0 earthquake here would cause damage. But nothing on the level of what happened in Haiti. Nothing. And, you know, I think that’s something we should be thinking about; what happened in Haiti didn’t happen because there was an earthquake. It happened because Haiti’s infrastructure is shot.

The second thing that we must remember is that Haiti is not poor by chance, accident, "act of God" (and for the record, the only reason why I wish there was a God is so that assholes like Pat Robertson got a chance to actually meet him and get a holy fucking smack-down. If the context seems to be missing, just Google. I am not bringing poison like that into this space), or by the actions of Haitian people. They are intentionally kept poor as a punishment for being the first successful black rebellion against colonial European powers. France made them pay reparations for property lost dues to the slaves saying "Fuck this, and fuck you!" They have been hit by a debt that that is designed to keep them in perpetual servitude to more powerful countries, and the US specifically has stepped in a fucked with their politics on more than one occasion. This is not difficult information to find, but you can start here and here.

Third, because of this information, be careful how you help to make sure that you are ACTUALLY helping. Pick your charities and what you ask for carefully, considering many out there don't have good histories regarding impoverished people of color, many out there will use this tragedy as a perfect opportunity for obnoxious moralizing, or are just straight up frauds. There is also guaranteed to be a great deal of "shopping cart" activism (ex: Livestrong braclets, "Save the Ta Tas" t-shirts, etc.) I recommend Doctors Without Borders and Yele. (Thanks to meloukhia, kai_zuky and others for the links via Twitter.)

Its part of being a grownup I guess

I lost a dear friend on Friday. He had Adult Onset Still's Disease which is a form of arthritis with autoimmune complications. He had been getting extreme treatments recently to try and keep his body from killing itself. He was 23.

I met him when I was 17 and he took to my group of geeky friends like he was born to it. He was smart, and an artist. His musical talent ranged across the board, and if you follow the link above, people are posting pictures and videos all over his Facebook wall of him doing what he does best. He offered to teach me how to knit, and I never took him up on it.

He brought DJ equipment to the reunion of our group (we called ourselves the Spiders From Mars) and rick-rolled all of us when playing Nirvana. He was sweet and loving, and has left many people behind who miss him terribly.

No commentary here, just my way of telling my friend that I miss him, and shouting out his memory into the void.

This isn't the first time I've lost a friend,a dn it won't be the last, but it doesn't hurt less.

I love you Moses.

Not Forgotten.

Its been a year, and we have come to it again.
Another year, and another list of people who but for the intolerance around us every day, would still be here, still be alive, still have a future.

This year, we remember: Yasmin and Noelia of Honduras, Taysia Elzy and Michael Hunt of Indianapolis, Kátia Otacílio Vilela and Marcela Cairo Souza of Jataí, Brazil, Alexa Rojas Castro of Monterrey, Mexico, Cynthia Nicole of Comayaguela, Honduras, Aline Da Silva Ribeira of Castelfranco Veneto, Italy, Caprice Curry of San Francisco, Rovilson Teixeira of Londrina, Brazil, Minja Kochis of Belgrade, Serbia, "Víctor Manuel" Albor Camacho and "Juan Carlos" Guillén Bautista of Acámbaro, Mexico, Nicole Castillo García of Tarapoto, Perú, Cita Solorzano of Asunción Ixtaltepec, Mexico, Camila Hernández Nieto of Sincelejo, Colombia, Noor Azlan Khamis of Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia, Will Teixeira da Silva of Recife, Brazil, "Ailton" Correa Maia, Juliana Martins, Fernanda Botelho, Jenifer, Dara, and Rafaele of Curitiba, Brazil, Cristy of Guatemala-City, Guatemala, Puttalakshmi of Bangalore, India, Camila Pereira of Uberlândia, Brazil, Cris Francisco das Neves of Cabo de Santo Agostinho, Brazil, Vicky Londoño Chavarría of Ibagué, Columbia, Pequeña P of Gualeguaychú, Argentina, Miriam Nunes Lucas of Ribeirão das Neves, Brazil, Guimarães de Lima and "Wanderson Wanderley" Teixeira da Rocha of João Pessoa, Brazil, Kirsi Ubrí, Jeva Padilla, and Ramon Martinez of Santiago, Dominican Republic, "Julio" Avila Albarracín of Mar del Plata, Argentina, Ebru Soykan (aka Dilan Pirinc) and Hadise of Istanbul, Turkey, Adriana Sánchez López of Juchitan, Mexico, Eda Yildirm of Bursa, Turkey, Sasha Estefania of Caracas, Venezuela, Smail L. of Valencia, Spain, Gisela "Roni" Galante of Gualeguaychú, Argentina, Melek K and Cagla of Ankara, Turkey, Jimmy McCollough (aka Image Devereux) of Fayetteville, North Carolina, Carneiro de Sousa of Fortaleza, Brazil, dos Santos of Varzea Grande, Brazil, Diksy Jones of Wellington, New Zealand, Tigresa de Souza Reis of Feira de Santana, Brazil, Xiomaran Duras of Caracas, Venezuela, Foxy Ivy of Detroit, Papucha of La Victoria, Peru, Kelly (Frederick) Watson and Terri Benally of Albuquerque, Tanya Ardón and Catherine of San Salvador, El Salvador, Carla Regina Bento of Sao Paulo, Brazil, Anita Fajardo Ríos of El Carmen, Mexico, Luana of Maceió, Brazil, Kamilla of Volgograd, Russia, Christopher Jermaine Scott of Philadelphia, Cesar Torres of El Paso, Beyonce (Eric) Lee of New Orleans, Kanan of Setapak, Malaysia, Tyli'a Mack (aka NaNa Boo) of Washington DC, Paulina Ibarra of East Hollywood, Kristina Muça of Tirana, Albania, Andrea Waddell of Brighton, UK, Destiny Lauren of London, UK, Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado of Cayey, Puerto Rico, an unidentified victim in Gebze, Turkey, an unidentified victim in Milan, Italty, an unidentified victim in Guayaquil, Ecuador, an unidentified victim in Baltimore, an unidentified victim in Penang, Malaysia, an unidentified victim in Algeria, an unidentified victim in Honduras, nine unidentified victims in Guatemala, fourteen unidentified victims in Brazil, and eighteen unidentified victims in Venezuela, and all the other trans women and men around the world who lost their lives to transphobia this year, whose faces we never saw and names we never heard, because they were living on the margins of societies who did not respect nor want them.

And Melissa at Shakesville makes the excellent point that today we should remember all of the trans people who died not just because of violence, but because of apathetic inaction and active discrimination.

I remember all of you today, and keep your memories close to my heart. No one deserves to be forgotten.

I distinctly remember explaining this before.

Maybe I will get less shit from people if I throw this at them.

Lack of exercise not to blame for teen obesity?
Study: Physical activity levels unchanged in 20 years while kids got heavier
Most American teenagers are not as active as they should be but a lack of exercise does not seem to be to blame for the rising rates of teen obesity, according to a U.S. study.

Researchers, using government survey data from 1991 and 2007, found the amount of physical activity among U.S. teens has not in fact changed significantly over the past two decades while the population, including children, has got heavier.

Maybe the next time I have a doctor tell me that I'm lying about my exercise rate because I'm still fat, I can point this out to them.

A girl can dream, right?

This is hardly a surprise

As the title here suggests, I am not in the least bit surprised that the Republican National Committee's health insurance plan covers abortions. I am not surprised for two reasons.

Number 1, most US insurance plans cover abortions because it is part of providing comprehensive health care to cis-women. It is a needed procedure, not to mention a legal one that is part of having a right to control ones own body, which applies to so much more than just abortion.

Number 2, because throughout my time of being aware of the heated anger over debating abortion, I have noticed that a good deal of those who opposed women having the right to choose suddenly support it when it is their daughter, or themselves that need the procedure. And its because underneath all of that moralizing, it comes down to thinking that some women don't deserve to have a choice. It isn't about "teh poor widdle baybeeez" cause if it was, these same fucknecks would support social programs that allow women who couldn't afford an abortion, or who swallowed their morality hook but don't have the resources to raise a child to be able to do so. (And before anyone starts whinging about "welfare queens," try being on welfare. It enables you to eat, and if you are lucky it helps you pay for a place to live. "Welfare queens" are a racist, Regan-era myth.)


Since this story broke, the RNC has stated that they are re-assessing their current insurance plan. I find it slightly ironic that if their little Stupak bomb does what they want and kills health care reform, they are going to be limited to about 15% of the insurance companies out there who actively do not cover abortions. Because even with all of the asshole things that insurance companies do, they still recognize that abortion is an important part of cis-women's health care. When there are insurance companies with a better handle on reality than you, well, I don't need to point out what that says about you.

It still doesn't make this expectation on the "liberal"/"progressive" side that cis-women will take yet another one for the team here any better, but it does make me chuckle evilly. Because I'm a bitch like that.

I hate that I'm associated with you.

So here I was on Tumblr, minding my own business, looking at crochet posts when I came across this little jem:

Palestinian women crochet kippot for Israeli Jews

Reuters has uncovered the fact, well-known in Israel, that many kippot (skullcaps) worn by religious Israelis are crocheted by Palestinian women.

Now, this surprises me in the way of not at all, despite the fact that I was not aware of it previously. How else is a group with no option of an open economy supposed to make money but by servicing those who keep their economy limited. At this point in the article, I'm just sorta waiting to see where it is going, since the opening is fairly inconspicuous.

Almost every house in the village of 3,000 west of Ramallah makes the little caps. It's a social event as well as a helpful cash-earner. Women bring their wool and needles to each other's home to crochet and chat.

"We make qors (the Arab name for kippah translates as 'disc') while having a gossip," said Umm Ali. "We meet each other and we make money at the same time," added the mother of three, whose husband is unemployed...

So here, I start getting a little leery. "Helpful-cash earner" sounds a bit cheerful considering the alternatives. I'm not sure if its the passive language that brings to mind discussions of women's activities from a Jane Austen novel, or the slightly patronizing "what fascinating things these quaint people do!" tone that bothers me more.

Six Palestinian skullcap dealers distribute the wool, needles and the models to women in this village and 10 neighbouring villages.

The finished articles are collected each week and shipped to Israeli retailers. The skullcaps are also exported to the United States.

The women of Deir Abu Meshal, known for its traditional dress embroidery, say that to them it's merely a business.

They say they have no qualms about furnishing skullcaps for the people of the occupying power or the Jewish settler, who may be living on Palestinian land.

They say the work is convenient: they don't have to travel.

"Without this knitting business, people here would be very poor," said Nema Khamis, 50, who passed on her skills to her five daughters and daughter-in-law.

Okay, still not doing too badly. We have the admission that conditions are hard enough that without this work these women and their families would be much worse off. There still is a great deal of context that is being glossed over, but it is a short article, so to one degree we can forgive that.

Then this:

A great example of economic cooperation which benefits all sides. Most impressive: these women claim to make five kippot a day, each. Now that is speed. The only kippot I've ever made, as a teenager, took me months. It's a wonder they have any time to bring up children.....

So much here...so little patience...or bile with which to puke. "Economic cooperation"? "Benefits all sides"!? Lets get one thing straight, just because it doesn't actively make a bad situation worse, this DOES NOT make it a benefit, okay? And "cooperation" would imply that these women get something beyond bare necessities from the work they do. And what the fuck is up with this "these women claim" shit? They have been doing this out of necessity for decades. Get that? DECADES. This is in no way equivalent to your little "crafty phase" at fifteen! It took you months because you had the privilege of not having to learn how to work for a living until you were almost an adult! When these women were fifteen they had already been learning how to do this for, most likely, at least five years. I would also shitcan that condescending "its a wonder they have time to raise children" crap. You gotta feed them if there is ever a hope of raising them.

I hate this. I hate this entitled attitude that thinks itself so worldy and I hate hearing it come from people who think they understand suffering because they participate in a seder every year, or their Grandmother remembers the Holocaust. Here's a tip, your Grandmother or Great Grandmother who remembers the Holocaust? They understand. You never will, and vicarious experiences do not mean that you have any concept of what it is like to live in perpetual imposed poverty.

At best, this author is simply woefully ignorant of the reality of what poverty in a place like the West Bank means. At worst she is dealing backhanded jabs at people who are fucking being EXPLOITED. And I used that word deliberately. When your choices are "do this or watch your family starve" then you don't have much of a choice. Its exploiting their poverty, and exploiting their position after being the ones who helped create it and maintain it.

Like a breath of fresh air

I cried. I did. I have gotten so used to hearing bullshit after bullshit after bullshit about this, and hearing someone call this bullshit out for what it is just hit me right in my heart.
Rep. Alan Grayson calling out both Democrats and Republicans on the health care debate(Transcript below the video):

"Madame Speaker, I have words for Democrats and Republicans tonight."

"Let's start with the Democrats"

"We as a party have spent the last six months, the greatest minds in our party, dwelling on the question, the unbelievably consuming question of how to get Olympia Snowe to vote on health care reform. I want to remind us all that Olympia Snowe was not elected President last year. Olympia Snowe has no veto power in the Senate. Olympia Snowe represents a state with one half of one percent of America's population."

"What America wants is health care reform. America doesn't care if it gets 51 votes in the Senate or 60 votes in the Senate or 83 votes in the Senate, in fact America doesn't even care about that, it doesn't care about that at all. What America cares about is this; there are over 1 million Americans who go broke every single year trying to pay their health care bills. America cares a lot about that. America cares about the fact that there are 44,780 Americans who die every single year on account of not having health care, that's 122 every day. America sure cares a lot about that. America cares about the fact that if you have a pre-existing condition, even if you have health insurance, it's not covered. America cares about that a lot. America cares about the fact that you can get all the health care you need as long as you don't need any. America cares about that a lot. But America does not care about procedures, processes, personalities, America doesn't care about that at all."

"So we have to remember that as Democrats, we have to remember that what's at stake here is life and death, enormous amounts of money, and people are counting upon us to move ahead. America understands what's good for America. America cares about health care, America cares about jobs, America cares about education, about energy independence, America does not care about processes politicians or personalities or anything like that."

"And I have a few words for my Republican friends tonight as well. I guess I do have some Republican friends."

"Let me say this; last week I held up this report here and I pointed out that in America there are 44,789 Americans that die every year according to this Harvard report published in this peer reviewed journal because they have no health insurance. That's an extra 44,789 Americans who die who's lives could be saved, and their response was to ask me for an apology."

"To ask me for an apology?"

"That's right. To ask ME for an apology!"

"Well, I'm telling you this; I will not apologize. I will not apologize. I will not apologize for a simple reason; America doesn't care about your feelings. I violated no rules by pulling this report to America's attention, I think a lot of people didn't know about it beforehand. But America DOES care about health care in America."

"And if you're against it, then get out of the way. Just get out of the way. You can lead, you can follow or you can get out of the way. And I'm telling you now to get out of the way."
"American understands that there is one party in this country that is favor of health care reform and one party that is against it, and they know why."

"They understand that if Barack Obama were somehow able to cure hunger in the world the Republicans would blame him for overpopulation"

"They understand that if Barack Obama could somehow bring about world peace they would blame him for destroying the defense industry."

"In fact, they understand that if Barack Obama has a BLT sandwich tomorrow for lunch, they will try to ban bacon."

"But that's not what America wants, America wants solutions to it's problems and that begins with health care, and that's what I'm speaking for tonight."

"I yield back the balance of my time"

Important Thinky Thoughts

So, I have hit a bit of a wall. I have begun narrowing down my group of activists and perspectives that fit what I agree with. This has left me with a group of people who I respect and who have perspectives that I value. There is a recurring theme within this group. They are largely trans women, women of color, people with disabilities and various combinations of each.

One thing that is very common is a rejection of feminism, not for the same reasons that many antifeminists do either. This rejection comes from the fact that feminists have and continue to engage in oppressive behaviors towards these groups and ignore the intersections which affect these people the most. And when called on it, a great deal of feminists will get pissed at the person telling them "hey, you are standing on my neck!" instead of examining their praxis, or their groups ideas to see if they are truly exclusionary. Then the whole thing turns into accusations of personal attacks and nothing ever gets DONE.

I think the problem is in labeling ourselves as feminists. We end up making it a part of our identity instead of a tool to help us achieve our aims. I don't know about you, but my aim is to end oppression, and I focus on oppression based on gender. Hence why I use feminism as my major tool. That is the only way that an anti-oppression ideology can work, in my view. It must be a tool.

There is a danger in making an identity out of an ideology. It leads to fighting about identities instead of discussing actions. It prevents us from being able to critically examine our theories and praxis and revise them when necessary. It renders our ideology and our actions insufficient, impotent and infertile because we end up missing the needs of those who truly need to be helped.

I'm considering eventually dropping the identification of feminist and instead becoming someone who uses feminism as a tool. I'm not sure I want a word for that...

Fuck Godwin's, I'm Pissed

Just a note to the entire fucking world.

Lets talk about appropriation. Specifically the appropriation of suffering. More specifically the appropriation of specific events that don't affect you personally as a code word for some other considerably lesser things that has upset you.

A good example you be comparing anything that isn't rape to rape. Example: "The IRS really raped me this year." Paying your taxes=/=not rape.

The example that I would like to specifically address though, is comparing anything to Nazis, Hitler or the Holocaust that has no direct ties to any of these things. Someone saying something that you don't like or disagree with IS IN NO FUCKING WAY LIKE NAZI GERMANY. Using this a silencing tactic against those you have societal power over, that is an asshole thing to do.

How dare you take this incredible tragedy that my family and other have experienced and use it against oppressed people, or anyone for that matter, as a silencing weapon. Do you have any idea what it is like to live with the knowledge that you could not ever have existed simply because of who you are? I don't think you do. Until the day that you look at a picture of someone who looks almost exactly like you or your sibling, or your parent, and you look at the little piece of paper telling you which camp they were sent to and when they died and what number was tattooed on their fucking arm, you don't fucking know. Until you feel the weight of "that could have been me," then you don't fucking know. Until you realize that you live in a world that for the most part considers people who would rather see you dead than share oxygen with you and these same people are considered the "reasonable" side, YOU WILL NEVER FUCKING KNOW. Until you have to adjust to living your life each day knowing that this could be your last day because your very existence threatens someones fragile ego, and a jury of THEIR peers think that protection of that ego makes murdering you a reasonable reaction, YOU WILL NEVER FUCKING KNOW.

Comparing an anything to that event that is not also genocide and/or the systematic destruction of several groups of people, many of whom are still facing oppression world-wide and making this comparison as a person of privilege makes you some of the scummiest scum that ever did scum. It trivializes the suffering of millions of people for the sake of your pwecious fucking ego. And just know that this gender-queer, Jewish dyke does not approve and will verbally force you to eat your pwecious ego. Without sauce.

Caroline Ann? This is for you and your fake-ass "apology"

Get out of your own way please

Have you heard? Apparently institutional sexism, gender stereotyping, and social pressure NO LONGER MATTER! WHEEEEEEEEE! Glass ceilings only exist because we obey them! USA! HOPE! CHANGE! WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! ::spins frantically and falls down::

According to Rachel Simmons, author of a new book about how oppression is totes the fault of the oppressed, we ladies are just "pressuring ourselves" to fit the mold of "good girl." The article writer PROVE IT with her RIVETING ANECDOTES!

The book's author and the article writer almost get it, but then back right down. Girls and women face particular pressures that are contradictory, so its our fault that we don't succeed? WHAT? To a point, yes, we all have to take a certain amount of responsibility for the choices we make in our lives, but if we brush off the pressures of society and how that influences our choices and the consequences of those choices then we are not actually going to see a change in the structures that continue these situations.

There was also the delicious irony of the ads on the page while I was reading the article. Particularly the Accuquote life insurance ad:



(If you can't see/read it, the ad is a picture of a little girl, bent over a grave that says "FATHER" on it, and the copy reads: "If you died today, who would take care of your family?")

The irony is almost enough to make my head explode.

More on Health Care...now with added racism!

As lifted from Monica at Transgriot

I'm more than disgusted and tired of this vanilla flavored meme popping up in our national discourse. There are 300 plus million people who call themselves Americans and we ain't all White. We pay taxes, serve in its military, and have done more than our share to help this country grow and prosper. Get used to the fact that we voted on November 4 to take this country in a different direction. It's past time that our policy desires and priorities are pushed with our tax dollars as well and are front and center in the national discourse.

We were more than a little pissed when you people were in control and fracking the country up that we spent 8 years painstakingly cleaning up from the Reagan-Daddy Bush years. Now that President Obama is cleaning up Junior's mess you conservatives are all of a sudden 'concerned about the deficit'.

At least this man is tackling the problems you peeps refused to deal with. What's making you even more upset is that it's your worst nightmare, an intelligent Ivy league educated Black man with his summa cum laude Princeton educated wife that's succeeding.

So keep crying those crocodile tears lamenting the America you lost. Good riddance to that Jim Crow ridden America and welcome to the 21st century.

If you want to be pissed at somebody, aim it at the conservatives who look like you and bamboozled you into repeatedly voting against your own economic interests in the first place.

On Health Care

via thecurvature

katoleary:

hortenseg:

When I was 22 years old, I was very, very sick.

My insurance company, the one my father had worked for for 20+ years, mind you, refused to cover my intensive inpatient treatment for anorexia nervosa b/c they felt, after I had eaten my breakfasts for 5 days in a row, that I was cured. Never mind that my heart rate was 43bpm, or that my mind was completely gone, or that anorexia happens to be the psychiatric disorder with the highest mortality rate: they felt that I could do just fine at a half-day program which consisted of two meals and no medical care, or with a stay at the state psych ward for a week or so, which, not to get all Wurtzel on you guys, is basically a motel for crazies, where people struggling with everything from bipolar disorder to schizophrenia to suicidal ideation are thrown together in a big room to sit around, watch television, take their medication, and not kill themselves.

My parents, afraid that I was going to, you know, DIE, put me in the state hospital for medical monitoring purposes, as my vitals were quite bad, and my mental state wasn’t much better. I had a phone interview with an inpatient facility in Tulsa, Oklahoma that specialized in eating disorder treatment—one of the best in the country, for the worst cases, and halfway through my interview, a psych tech hung up the phone, saying, “It’s quiet time now.” When I cried about it in my room, another psych tech came in and told me to “stop whining.” Really top-notch care for the mentally ill in the USA.

Tulsa had a bed ready for me the next day.

Trouble with Tulsa was, my insurance company refused to cover it, on two grounds:

1. It was out-of-state, and why would I need to go to a hospital that specialized in eating disorders, the illness that was KILLING ME, when I could stay at the Cuckoo’s Nest and get yelled at by techs with no training in ED treatment (or humanity) for a few weeks?

2. They did not consider anorexia to be a “real” illness. It was, in the eyes of the insurance companies (and in the eyes of many in this country who have not experienced/do not understand mental illness) a matter of willpower: I was just another girl who wouldn’t eat her damn dinner. All she has to do is eat! She’ll be fine. And all the schizophrenic has to do is stop seeing things! And all the bipolar person has to do is stop cycling! You know! Real easy shit.

But my parents, knowing better, sent me anyway. I don’t come from money. My parents don’t come from money. I don’t know how they got it. They refuse to talk about it, still. If there is one thing that motivates me to stay in recovery (almost six years!) it’s that I know they sacrificed A LOT to get me there. I talk about my parents a lot. It is because they are my best friends. They saved my life. I believe they were helped out by family members, old friends, etc. I guess my parents should move to Russia, or something, what with accepting help from neighbors and friends to pay the damn medical bills.

At the hospital I saw women have to leave early, saw them disconnect the tubes, saw them pack their bags, sick sick sick, and walk out the door, because the insurance companies stopped paying. So to the “Leave my Aetna alone!” crazies, I’d like to say: your insurance company doesn’t give a fucking shit about you. AT ALL. You are nothing but a number on a claim form, and if you ever get sick, or if your kids get sick, and I mean SICK SICK HOSPITAL SICK, you are fucked. Because they will only care so much before they decide you are on your own. And then, I suppose, you’ll start looking around, wondering who is going to help you.

And then, I suspect, you will show up to rallies with a very different message on your signs.

Ethnicity Crisis Part 2: Make Me a Matchless Match

(read Part 1 here)

So, when we left off, my burgeoning, two-decades-in-the-making- Jewish identity was languishing in the back of my mental dresser drawer as that one piece of clothing that you never wear but can't get rid of for fear of hurting the people who gave it to you, because you know what went in to making it and just casting it away turns the guilt up to eleven, because you may want to wear it someday, but just not now, the colors are all wrong, it doesn't fit your style, what it means to wear it is a fact that you aren't ready to face.

I backlashed against this rising awareness of where I came from and what that meant in relation to my place in the global hierarchy by diving head first into pro-Palestine and anti-occupation political stances. I dove so deeply, so quickly, that for a long time, all I could do was criticize Israel. I did so relentlessly, zealously, and very, very harshly. I still do in many ways, in the same way that I criticize my own government for actions they take in my name that I don't support, though I think I was and am tougher on Israel in general. This is not to say that my criticism does not have value on its own merits. I was careful to be very academic about my critique, the problem was how I tied that critique to my own identity and my own self-worth. The critique was personal as well as political. I desperately buried my sweater under a pile of slogan bearing t-shirts and hoped no one would notice it.

I spent years doing this. Years getting into fights with family members about the occupation, years insulting Israeli politicians and arguing in university classrooms about Israeli military actions, years rejecting Israel as a part of me, as I wanted no part in the subjugation of others. Somewhere in this process, I began seeing more Antisemitism, and I stepped up my rejection and criticism of Israel as a shield from receiving that same bigotry, while quietly rankling at it. Every once in a while I would mention my sweater, the fact that I had one at least, just to keep the conversation on track. The more I mentioned it, the more it grew on me. Just its presence in my mental wardrobe (yes, I will be beating the crap out of this analogy) made aspects of this part of myself harder to ignore in the world around me. Others noticed it too. I kept encountering random people who wanted to talk about my Jewishness.

I started toying with the idea of learning Hebrew, and edging towards wanting to get to know that part of me. I had been really attracted to Islam when I first started studying the Middle East, and had come to the conclusion that conversion was not for me. I wasn't interested in the whole "God" thing...what I wanted was the community. The concept of "ummah" appealed to the part of me that fell in love with the musical "Hair" at 16 and realized that what was missing from my life was a sense of responsibility and support both to and from a community of my choosing. Even with that draw...it felt wrong. Like I was romanticizing this concept from a position of privilege. This all came down around the same time that I started helping to moderate an anti-racism livejournal community, and snapped together in a discussion of appropriation and spirituality. I had my own ethnic traditions to draw on for these things. Did I really need to co-opt someone else's? Especially if it was not the precepts of faith that I was interested in?

In this same space of time, I got married. It was a non-denominational event seeing as I'm fairly agnostic, and my spouse is fairly atheist. It was also a sudden elopement that my parents happened to be around for. My mother, upon being informed of what we were about to do, whipped off her tye-dye shawl and conscripted my family and the friends that were there, along with random passers-by (we were at a folk festival) to hold it above us as we said our vows and then gave it to us as our khuppa (canopy designed to represent that we will always have a home/roof with God...I think...I could be wrong about that interpretation.) My spouse loved it. I understood what the gesture meant to my mother, and appreciated it in my own way.

My spouse has since been drawn in fairly close to the Jewish side of my family, and has even expressed an interest in raising any children we may have with Jewish traditions.

So, basically all I'm getting to in this entirely-too-long-and-navel-related post is attempting to bring across the tension around this for me.

Eventually, something had to give.

To Be Continued...

Ethnicity Crisis Part 1: Tradition!

I have been having a bit of a crisis the last year or so. This is going to be long, so I might split it up into parts.

Some background:

My father is from a mostly Greek family. My mother is from a mostly Polish/German/French family. Dad's family is Greek Orthodox Catholic. Mom's was raised Jewish. My parents are both second generation American. As far as cultural/ethnic background, they made sure we knew where our genes were from (more than the above list, but I'll spare you the complex details of my family tree) and that was pretty much it. As far as religious training, well...both of my parents walked away from the faith of their families at fairly young ages. My dad declined his confirmation as a teen. My mother is the only child in her family to not have a Bat Mitzvah. They raised us fairly agnostically, with one caveat. We did the major Jewish holidays because my paternal grandmother made my parents promise to raise us in the Jewish faith due to how the Catholic church treated her for getting divorced when my grandfather abandoned her with six kids.

So I grew up doing Seders and lighting Channuka candles, but it was something done as an addendum to the bigger, flashier, heavily marketed holidays. We would open Easter baskets after Seder, or celebrate only one night of Channuka and combine it with a Christmas tree trimming party. The other holidays were celebrated with dinner at Grandmom's but without any context of what those holidays meant.

My mom gave me the choice between Hebrew school and dance classes as a kid. I wanted to be a ballerina, and I had no reason to learn another language, so I chose dance classes. I preferred "A Chorus Line" over "Fiddler on the Roof" even though I could sing the entire score from both.

My peers at school were aware of my Jewish heritage, but since I wasn't actively participating in the culture or the community, I couldn't bond with them over it. I couldn't bond with the non-Jew kids either. Agnostic childhood kind of leaves you floating...you aren't being swept into a community you may not want with responsibilities that you don't understand before you are of an age to reason, but at the same time you are watching your friends have milestones that you can't share. It was during my years in elementary and middle school that I experienced anti-Semitism directed at me for the first time, but I did not have the critical consciousness to name it as such. I learned to joke about my heritage without ever feeling a deep connection to it.

I dabbled in radical atheism, and in paganism. I found a spiritually comfortable midpoint that is not one or the other, though I still can't find anything that makes me comfortable with the idea of a deity.

I have gone to the Holocaust museum in DC. I have seen the paperwork, written in German, that recorded the fate of the members of my family who did not manage to make it out of Europe in time. I felt a stirring, a deep sadness, but at the same time, it was not a sadness that differed from how I felt about any of the hundreds of injustices that I fought against in my life. It saddened me, hurt me deeply that people could do this to other people, but I never associated it with my self. I never associated these events with me, no matter how many times I cried at the end of "The Devil's Arithmetic" or "Number the Stars" or how worn my copy of "All-of-a-kind Family" got.

In college I decided to study the Middle East. I was prompted by a gut feeling during the "discussion" surrounding 9/11 that all this talk, about Arabs and Islam and how "they" hate us because their culture/religion says to, was false. this led to studying Israel and Palestine, and the sudden realization that, when the Israeli gov't talks about benefiting Jews everywhere, they meant me, and when anti-Israel groups talked about the "vast Zionist conspiracy," they were also talking about me...

I started seeing a connection coming from me to that place on the other side of the planet that everyone in the US is always fretting about, but often with talking points from pundits that bear little to no resemblance to any fact I have ever seen as the basis of their fretting.

I suddenly felt my ethnic Jew-ness for the first time. It settled around me like a hand-me-down sweater that doesn't quite fit, is too heavy, has a pattern that is unpopular to the point of encouraging anger and/or ridicule and is shaped like someone else from years of wear. And I reacted in a way that anyone who has dealt with kids will be familiar with.

I stuffed the sweater into the back of my mental dresser drawer, behind my rainbow hot-pants, my boho skirts and my t-shirts with radical, liberal political slogans and symbols, and tried to pretend that it wasn't there. The problem was...its one of those big, floofy knit things that takes up three times its actual area when folded, and every time I opened the drawer, it had taken up a bit more space...

To be continued...

I liked this...

The Longest Way 1.0 - one year walk/beard grow time lapse from Christoph Rehage on Vimeo.

This made me happy enough to cry

Mama Cass Eliot, an incredibly talented woman who defines the term "musical gift" on many levels...

And all I knew about her until I was in my 20's was that she died because she was a gluttonous fatty who couldn't lay off the pork products and that this was supposedly funny, when it was probably yo-yo dieting that was responsible for her heart giving out.

I only hope I can ever be this freaking fabulous.

Broken Pedestals

My parents are kind of awesome. Not always, I mean, they are human and have flaws, but as far as humans in general go, they are fairly awesome ones.

My mom is a pilates instructor/stage manager and my dad is a musician/nurse/midwife-in-training/chef. they are fairly liberal types, who raised me pro-choice and anti-war. I went to my first peace rally in first grade. My parents book collection included anthologies on anti-racism, rape activism and civil rights. They taught me that when something is wrong, you fight to fix it, even if its bigger than you.

I thought they taught me to be who I am. (Turns out I was wrong about that, apparently I have always been like this)

In the last few years, I have been noticing that my opinions, my arguments, my perspectives, fall distinctly to the left of my parents. I found myself having to debunk basic myths about sexism, racism, homophobia, and these days transphobia with them. I haven't even tried ableism, classism, or fat-phobia, yet. I simply don't have the energy.

It started when I came out to them. My mother always claims to be creating a safe space for me to just be myself in, but as soon as that self crossed her comfort lines it became a problem. My dad was worse, in that he couldn't even joke about it with me except to sweep it under the rug or pretend it didn't exist.

It has come to a head recently, specifically surrounding my partner and hir gender identity. We decided as a couple to tell my parents that we were working towards a potential transition for hir. My mother not only refused to change pronouns (which is fine for the most part as my spouse does not currently have a preference from people who know hir as a male) but accused me of being "obsessed" with my spouse's transition because I do use female pronouns. My father only had one thing to say: "As long as he's a tripod, he's a man." And more recently, my dad sent me this video: "8 Miles Wide" (NSFW also your hilarious earworm for the day. you're welcome.) The chorus? "My vagina is 8 miles wide..." So I jokingly asked my dad if his vagina was indeed 8 miles wide. He couldn't even joke about having a vagina.

That was pretty shattering. i thought I was applying principles that they instilled in me. principles of respect, and acceptance. It was, and still is, shocking to me that my parents, the people who raised me to be an activist, would be unable to move past this essentialist block of genitalia defining your gender. It is especially shocking that the man who I credit for teaching me the principles that lead to my feminism buys into the societal desire to perform masculinity and even joking about having a vagina means he needs to assert that hes a MAN! Really! He has man parts and everything!

Ignorance really is bliss...

Hypocrisy Makes My Teeth Itch

I originally heard this story from my roomie, and I blocked it out for the most part because, really, who can spend every fucking day hearing about awful things happening to other people? Yeah, I could have come and put a post up here saying: "This was an awful, awful thing that happened, and that makes me sad/angry/tired," but there are six million posts like that every time a story like this hits the blogosphere, and lately I have been big on not speaking unless I have something to say.

It wasn't until I started seeing the ripples around the blogroll that I realized I did have something to say...

I am officially uncomfortable with the way this story is being presented. I think that with a few exceptions, its being framed problematically at best.

It starts with the police reporting that they have removed an 8yr old Liberian rape victim from her family because her family views her status as "raped" as a shame on them. Then there are the echoes of "down with victim blaming!" and "how could a family do that?" in the blogosphere, echoes which take the police accusations at face value as soon as they hear where the girl's family is from. The more diplomatic places talk about how victim blaming is bad no matter where it comes from, but there is still that assumption that the initial domino was pushed over in good faith. No second thoughts about how maybe this bears deeper investigation considering the rampant xenophobia, racism and Islamophobia in this country. Nope, the police are totes trustworthy in matters of race and cultural honesty. they would never, ever do something based completely on stereotypes!

::steps up to podium, clears throat::

ROFLMAO

::steps back::

Now, this happened in the Southwest, so some could say that it isn't exactly a bastion of liberal thought. However, the place that supposedly is this countries such bastion is centered around places like Boston and Cambridge, and look at the shit that has gone down with their law enforcement and race relations lately.

And even if she is in danger from her family because of what these boys did to her, victim blaming, shaming and mistreatment of rape victims is a global problem (not necessarily universal, but I don't have any specific examples where it is not present,) it crosses cultures, religions, races, and traditions. Acting like this case is something particularly egregious when it happens Every Damn Day is playing into the "Western World = more advanced" meme and the inherently racist "its their culture!" meme.

Its OUR culture. We are all immersed in it, and we are ALL responsible for ending it.

A thoughtful moment...

Subject: Dyeing hair while (mildly) intoxicated...

On one hand, it was fun.

On another, I seemed to have developed a blind spot for my roots and missed them all together, giving me a not-so-flattering calico look.

But in the end, making my shower look like an abattoir (because I so rarely get to use that word, like oubliette. Awesome word, oubliette, from the French verb meaning "to forget") makes the entire situation kind of a win. And I get to be a bottle ginger again for a bit.

Now if I can just con someone into buying me some red Manic Panic and helping me do my roots...