Pizza Diavola

My personal life has gone down the shitter, so I’m not going to be around much here or elsewhere for a while. I have some photos I want to post and I’ll try to keep up with that and maybe some more music (assuming the DSL ever turns on, wtf) or poetry (Sir Robin, reading a poem a day during April turned it into a habit!), but there’s not going to be much in the way of thoughtful commentary on anything else. I haven’t read the news, blogs, or much else for the past week.

I’m not sure when things will settle down, but right now I’ve got to take care of me and mine. A few extra brain cells to cope with work and laundry would also be nice, but that’s probably pushing it.

I feel so betrayed. Shocked and appalled and at this point I’m just putting one foot in front of the other, so I haven’t sorted out the melange of emotions and thoughts in my head, but possibly a little broken-hearted, too.

Completely stunned.

Photos beneath the cut. These are all taken with a cameraphone, since (a) my digital point and shoot is erratic and unreliable; (b) the Canon Eos 35mm is not exposing properly and I have to take it to a shop as soon as I get the current roll out. The cameraphone is surprisingly convenient, since I nearly always have my cell phone on me, and it’s light and fast. So I actually do take pictures with it on the go. And the ease of getting photos off of it in digital format is seductive. It still doesn’t match up to working in a dark room or shooting a person for an hour, though. There’s a whole different mentality to working with a person and concentrating on her or him, but consciously making the effort to take a photo a day is making me see things differently again, the way I did when I was taking photography in college and shooting three 36-exposure rolls a week.

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I’ve finally succumbed and subscribed to AT&T for DSL, which should turn on next week. Hopefully, my personal laptop will be fixed by then (Tuesday morning, it refused to turn on. I think there’s a short somewhere), so that I won’t be using the slow, lagging laptop I’m on in the interim, and won’t be trying to blog via iTouch. It’d be an interesting experiment, to say the least, although it might also be faster than this laptop.

In the meantime, have some fluff:

I really want to make this Soy Poached Roast Chicken (Bitten, 2008/04/30) with these Snow Peas (Bittman, 2008/04/30) this weekend. The peas have been out at the market for months and I’ve looked at them, tempted to try cooking some but not sure of how to do it.

I learned to enjoy food the first summer I was living in Rome and I learned to cook the year after, when I was living with a roommate of Italian descent. So pretty much everything I know how to cook is Italian (more specifically la cucina Romanesca) and I’m used to those tastes and methods. I have a sense of how they work and how to throw things together in the kitchen, whereas I lack that intuition and experience when it comes to Korean or any other Asian cuisine. It’s something that’ll come with experience, but I’d like a teacher or a cookbook to start with and I haven’t got either. Haven’t found a good English-language Korean cookbook, and while My Korean Kitchen is a good read and informative, it’s not hanshik the way my mom makes it. In the meantime I’m thinking of branching out into other cuisines, although it’s a bit difficult because most of the ingredients and spices I have in my kitchen right now aren’t ones that are used in Chinese or Korean cooking.

Photos below the cut. Pro-Clinton material (I like to get a heads up when I’m clicking on political content, so…fair’s fair, I guess.).

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More fluff. I’ve been withdrawing a bit–after some heated conversations, I’m thinking it’d probably be the better part of wisdom to pull back from election ‘08 conversations and try to set some boundaries for myself. I don’t do a very good job of arguing with people politely and that’s a problem for me.

How do you manage blogging (reading, commenting, and writing), work, and other aspects of real life? Lately I’ve been thinking that there just isn’t enough time in the day. There isn’t enough time to work, read the news, read online, read books, participate in comment threads, write, cook, exercise, keep up with friends, shower, and sleep. How do you apportion time and stay on top of everything? This week was unusual in that I was out four out of five nights (work on Monday, friends on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday) and events at work required frantically trying to catch up on new projects while keeping abreast of the ones I was already on. Still, I don’t expect things changing much. So how do I go about squeezing everything into one day?

Photos below the cut. I miss photography. It made me look at the world differently and spending time in the dark room was soothing. After I get my 35mm fixed, I’d like to start taking pictures and printing again. For now, though, I’m stuck with the camera on my phone. It’s surprisingly convenient, because I always have it on me and it’s much smaller and lighter than my point and shoot digital, which is unreliable and erratic these days, and the 35mm.

20 minutes later: OK, is it just me or is anyone else having a hard time posting photos in WordPress’ new template? The old layout used to be intuitive and nigh on idiot proof for uploading photos and inserting them into posts and now I’m having a hard time doing it with the new layout. It’s also stupid that there’s no way to batch upload photos or even upload them at all in the ‘manage photos’ tab on the dashboard. It makes no sense to only allow photo uploads through the ‘Add media’ link that shows up in the writing a post window.

5 minutes later: Great. Upload photos, open the ‘manage media library’ in a separate tab, click on the images to get their URLs, then insert the photos into the post using their URLs. Preview post to find out that due to the width constraints on the text column of this template, the photos get chopped in half. Briefly consider resizing all images in Photoshop and making them links to full size versions of the images. Give up and open a Flickr account.

10 minutes later: Flickr has a nifty photoblogging setup, where it takes care of all the image resizing and linking to full size images for you. However, it doesn’t look like it’s set up for posting a whole bunch of images in one blog post, which is what I want. I’d like to do a ‘week of random images’ thing rather than a photo post a day. ARGH.

5 minutes later: finally got the stupid ‘Add media’ interface to work, sort of. I think it takes care of the resizing problem because it has options to choose posting the photo as a thumbnail, medium size, or full size. It’s going to require a better internet connection than the one I have now, though, because when I try to use the interface, it freezes. I may have to give up and start paying AT&T $30/mo for DSL and dealing with the headache of a router.

You want inspirational? Here:

It was in this city that our founders declared America’s independence and our permanent mission to form a more perfect union. Neither Senator Obama nor I nor many of you were fully included in that vision, but we’ve been blessed by men and women in each generation who saw America not as it is, but as it could and should be. The abolitionists and the suffragists, the progressives and the union members, the civil rights leaders, all those who marched, protested and risked their lives because they looked into their children’s eyes and saw the promise of a better future.

Because of them, I grew up taking for granted that women could vote. Because of them, my daughter grew up taking for granted that children of all colors could attend school together. And because of them and because of you, this next generation will grow up taking for granted that a woman or an African American can be the president of the United States of America.

…

We still have a lot of work ahead of us, but if you’re ready, I’m ready. I might stumble and I might get knocked down, but as long as you’ll stand with me I will always get right back up. Because for me, in the end, the question isn’t whether we can keep America’s promise, it’s whether we will keep America’s promise.

So let me ask you tonight - will we once again be the can-do nation, the nation that defies the odds and does the impossible?

Will we break the barriers and open the doors and lift up all of our people?

Will we reach out to the world and lead by the power of our ideals again?

Will we take back the White House and take back our country?

I believe with all of my heart that together we will turn promises into action, words will become solutions, hope will become reality, so my answer to any who doubt is “yes, we will.” - Hillary Rodham Clinton’s Election Day Remarks in Philadelphia, 2008/04/23 (emphases mine)

A sense of history. A sense of what we owe our forebears, what progress we’ve made, and the work we do to make the world better for the next generation. A vision of history that encompasses the past, present, and future and each individual’s part in it.

The weekend before last, M got me hooked on Beethoven’s late string quartets. I like Shostakovich and Bartok, and late Beethoven contains same elements I like in their music–unexpected leaps from one measure to the next, discordant modulations–only about a hundred years prior to the Modern composers and a hundred times more complicated and amazing. I haven’t listened to anything else for the past week and a half and the Grosse Fuge is always playing in my head: while making dinner, at work, waking up in the morning, thinking, etc. I went to the symphony last week and usually after a concert I’ll have that music in my head for the next few days. This time, I haven’t heard anything but the string quartets. They’re intense, beautiful, challenging, frightening, and cathartic. It’s music that stirs my emotions at a subconscious level in a way I’ve rarely experienced, especially with a recording and not a live performance. It touches the same parts of my mind that photography does and it’s such a relief to give into that wordless, creative side of my brain, which has so few outlets that it’s running rampant with Beethoven now.

My favorite piece out of the late string quartets is Grosse Fuge in Bb, which was the original ending for Op. 130 but proved unbearably awesome and so Beethoven’s publisher insisted that he write a new piece to replace Grosse Fuge as the final movement. It’s an incredibly complicated, intricate double fugue; rather than the standard structure of a single fugue line with the other lines playing variations and harmony, in Grosse Fuge there are TWO fugue lines that simultaneously serve as independent melodies and as harmonies to each other. O_O;; *

My first encounter with Grosse Fuge: there I was, innocently ironing and chatting with M while listening to Beethoven. All of a sudden, the music switched over to the next track and I was knocked head over heels.

P: what would i listen to if i wanted to hear the milieu of the time? [innocently toddling along]
P: for a comparison/contrast
P: OMG GROSSE FUGUE [Stark, thundering chords introduce Grosse Fuge. *falls ass over tea kettle*]
M: there’s a real dearth during the time he [Beethoven] was composing, actually
M: hahahahaha
M:
P: ahhhhhhhhh
M: an appropriate reaction

P: what is this suddenly mellow section around 5:00?
P: who is he trying to fool?
P: and the hints of wanting to break back out into psychotic-ness
M: mmm the BEST is the coda at the end
M: when he hints as if he’s going to start the whole thing over again
P: tease!
M:

P: …this stuff sounds borderline atonal
P: or at least key shifts like mad

P: auralgasm

P: that brief pause
M: idk, that part right around 9:00 is my fav
P: is just like … i need that temporary abatement
P: to catch my breath
M: yeah … beethoven is one of the great masters of extending dissonance and giving you just what you can handle
P: i am fairly certain this is more than i can handle
P: my brain is asploding

File at megaupload: Grosse Fuge in Bb, Op. 133, recorded by the Emerson String Quartet. The Grosse Fuge is on my list of things (sensual experiences, that is) that are better than sex.

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*Beethoven anecdote and fugal structure info from M.

Dear The Economist,

I realize that your “Primary Colour” segment is all about providing sardonic captions to quotes from the campaign trail that are, as far as I can tell, completely unrelated to any significant issues. When I first skimmed it, I was annoyed that the quotes were basically about fluff. When I read

Senator Patrick Leahy has introduced a resolution declaring Mr McCain a natural-born citizen, as is required of presidents. Mr McCain was born on a naval base in Panama. Both Democratic candidates are co-sponsors. The Hill, April 10th

my first reaction was disbelief that Congress was wasting time and attention on this incredibly vital, oh so important procedural non-issue. Frankly, birth location and questions about a candidate’s citizenship proceeding therefrom are the kind of stupid hair splitting I’d expect the Republicans’ attack machine to capitalize on, not the Democrats’. Since McCain is the Republican nominee, he’s safe and there’s no reason that the Senate needs to be wasting time with this crap when it could be focusing on the melting economy or the melting ice caps.

Then I skimmed the rest of the article and saw this caption, which is not okay:

Kill Hill
“She’s talking like she’s Annie Oakley…She’s packing a six-shooter.”
Barack Obama mocks Hillary Clinton’s hunting stories. AP, April 13th

I’m not sure how this caption could be remotely amusing. I get that it’s a play off of Kill Bill, but in context of the violently sexist language in the MSM right now regarding Clinton’s campaign, it’s not just a play on words. When people are talking about the macabre Hillary Deathwatch, when there is a long history of violent threats being used to silence women who overstep the narrow roles circumscribed around them by gender norms, it’s important to watch your language and be careful that it doesn’t play into misogynist frames. “Kill Hill” is a play on a movie title, but I initially read it as Kill Hill, with Hillary as the direct object of the verb. There’s more than one way to read the caption and given the context of reality, which is full of staggering amounts of violence against women and girls and which is full of violent threats and actual violence being used to make women shut up, I’m disinclined to persuade myself to look the other way and pass this off as a joke. If it’s a joke made out of ignorance, then the writer ought to rub his or her brain cells together a bit more next time and think. If it’s a joke made while fully aware of the double violent connotations in “Kill Hill” and the long history of violence against women (i.e. history, period), then the writer ought to grow up and grow a conscience. It’s little things such as oh so clever jokes that normalize violence and misogyny by making it acceptable, little doses at a time.

The writer also ought to consider reading Melissa’s post (Shakesville) for an example of being aware of the power of words, social and historical context, and being responsible for one’s speech:

I am reluctant to use violent imagery generally, but extremely averse to using it when discussing women I don’t like. Despite the distinct unlikelihood that anyone would mistake misogyny as my motivation, even a (metaphorical) attack within a culture in which women—particularly strong, opinionated women—have historically been silenced with threatened or actual violence borrows and legitimizes misogynist strategies.

ETA: Maybe I should start a new tag: “My legislators are doing WHAT?”

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The Economist, “Primary Colour,” 2008/04/17
Melissa McEwan, Shakesville, “Take Your Boobs and Go Home Watch,” 2008/03/29
Melissa McEwan, Shakesville, “Clinton the Woman vs. Clinton the Person,” 2008/04/17

I have this thing about Greenland. Rather, my friend M has this thing about Greenland–one might even call it an obsession–and I’ve hopped aboard the tiny little bandwagon. It’s somewhere new, somewhere interesting, and other people’s passions are generally interesting to me, particularly travel passions. I can relate to the feeling of wanting so badly to be somewhere that the longing thrums in your veins and you wake up at night wanting and you can’t focus on anything else (vide Rome and me). As a fellow obsessive, I can’t help but empathize. It’s also interesting to see the obsessive behavior from the outside, since I’m usually the fixated person and I’ve never been able to see what it’s like from a third person POV.

Anyway, the landscapes around Qaanaaq (the northenmost palindrome in the world!) are fascinating and I have this dream of going there one day and having coffee while sitting on an iceberg and watching the sun come up over the ocean. I love sunrises and sunsets and wide open skies. I also like traveling alone, removed from my cell phone and work and all the concerns of day to day life. It gives me time to think, time to be inside my head without distractions, time to figure out who I am and be comfortable in my skin. Going to Greenland would probably be the furthest I’m likely to get from cell phones and work, short of going backpacking (there is internet access in Qaanaaq but none in the backcountry of Yosemite).

Via M, Christian Fuhrhop is someone who went to Greenland in 2007 and has some fabulous photos online. Looking at them, I can’t help but want to go, too. I grew up with the vast skies of suburban California; when I’m on the freeway, I can see from one end of the sky to the other and it’s like a giant celestial bowl upturned high above the world. I love the wide open sky and so looking at this, where it looks like you can see forever because the air is so clear, or this makes me think of falling into the sky. Then there’re the long, slow sunrises as the season changes in and out of winter and summer. The landscapes screw with perspective and the snow can resemble sand dunes. Same shapes and windblown looks with different materials in different places.

I want to go.

ETA: GUHH *flail*

My friend M got me hooked on Beethoven’s late string quartets last Saturday, and ever since I’ve been staying up all hours of the night listening to them. Hence the lack of posts. It’s not that I don’t have stuff percolating in my mind, it’s that I’m up late listening to the Emerson and Takacs Quartets and then I’m too tired to string words together, or I sit down to write and get distracted by music. So in lieu of a post, have some links!

Shakesville has been hitting it out of the park recently with a bunch of posts that I think of as “______ 101″ posts. That is, posts that are about things that should be obvious with a little basic thinking (hence the post title). Posts that are true and obvious and shouldn’t need to be written, but somehow still need to be. Shakesville is, IMO, the best prog blog floating around out there in the cloud, and if you’re not reading it already, you should add it to your RSS reader. Great posts and great discussions in the comments.

On Shakespeare’s Sister, Shakesville, and Rooms for Feminism

Melissa, Shakesville: Important Announcement: “Feminism is an integral part of progressivism.“

Followed by… Kate Harding, Shakesville: It’s Right There in the Name: On Virginia Woolfe, Shakespeare’s Sister, Shakesville, and the point of a feminist blog.

This is and always has been a feminist blog.

It’s also a blog about a whole lot of other things–politics, culture, LGBTQ issues, racism, ableism, sizeism, pop culture, pets, travel, relationships, clever things said with a Scottish accent, photoshopped pictures of John McCain… There are currently 23 regular contributors, all posting about whatever strikes our fancy. The blogroll is fucking epic. We cover a lot of ground.

But it is and always has been a feminist blog. Because it is and always has been a progressive blog, for starters, and because the name “Shakespeare’s Sister” has always been there, representing women’s historical and ongoing fight to be taken seriously, to be heard.

Followed up, heartbreakingly, by Kate Harding, Shakesville: Question of The Day: “Building on my rant from earlier, I’ve got a two-parter: What did/does your mom do for a living, and was/is it what she really wanted to do?” Read the comments thread.

Followed up by Melissa, Shakesville: I Am Shakespeare’s Sister:

I cannot walk away from misogyny for a moment, and so I cannot for a moment walk away from feminism, either. I cannot set it aside any more than I can set aside my womanhood. No—I will not. The choice is mine, and I choose to face the world equipped at all times with the only tool of self-defense I have against inequality. Feminism is my sword and my shield, which I carry because the world is hostile to me, not the other way around.

I fight because I have to. My obligation. My muse.

That is the context of this room. It was built by a woman. A feminist woman. Shakespeare’s Sister, carrying the weight of all of Shakespeare’s Sisters with her, as she clumsily stumbles toward making long, greedy use of the opportunity they provided her, sucking up every last drop of the chance she’s been given to do what others could not and pay forward with interest the chance to another sister of Shakespeare who may just now be warily peering into this room and thinking there’s something I like in there…

Basic Thinking & Activism

Melissa, Shakesville: Feminism 101: Feminism and Humanism: “Why feminism (where “feminism” means sex equality) cannot be subsumed by humanism (where “humanism” means equality for all humans): Because the majority of humans still don’t understand why calling Hillary Clinton a cunt and a whore is sexist.”

Space Cowboy, Scream It from the Highest Mountain: “DO SOMETHING!”: The post is specifically about Bush’s admittal that he approved the use of torture, but is also more broadly relevant as a call to arms. Activism is important and we, the People, need to reclaim our dysfunctional government.

These folks are already getting enough financial support from me when they’re in office for doing sweet F A. When I call my reps to find out what they intend to do, the staffer has no idea what the plan is; no surprise there. The reps don’t even know what the plan is, aside from waiting around for the next inauguration.

Our government is not supposed to work like this.

Melissa, Shakesville: Time to Make Some Noise [Redux]: a repost from January, 2005. In the aftermath of Gore v. Bush and the failure of democracy, some painful realizations:

What better way to quell the threat of revolt than to offer the chance to effect change once every few years, through the simple and effortless act of casting a ballot. But when those ballots have lost any remnant of power, then they have also lost all sense of purpose, and the act of democracy becomes an impotent gesture, its sole meaning to stave off acts of rebellion against an increasingly centralized and exclusionary ruling class. …

We must not give up on our right and our responsibility to vote, but voting alone will not solve the problems we face. Those of us who can look beyond our next chance to trek to the voting booth must find other ways of making our voices heard in the interim. When Ukraine’s government attempted to undermine their democratic principles, there was rioting in the streets. When will we riot in the streets? I wonder, anxiously, what it will take to shake us from our immutable belief that democracy will solve the problem of its own inevitable ruination so long as we depend exclusively on its fading potency.

Shakesville: We Write Letters: This post is an example of what allies and true progressives do and it’s an example of what makes Shakesville so awesome. This statement is the most important and often most difficult step toward becoming a genuine ally in any activist fight against systemic oppression:

We will endeavor always to be aware of our privilege, and, in moments of failure, will remain open to criticisms and suggestions, resolve to think twice before responding defensively, and apologize when we fuck up.

WKW, Shakesville: Carnival of Allies, Ending the benefits of doubt: For The Angry Black Woman’s Carnival of Allies, WKW writes,

A person who commits a racist act or makes racist comments need not be stamped forever with a Black R on their chest. But their comments or actions, regardless of subtlety, must be pointed out. Words have meanings, and words lead to actions. …

I have been and am a racist. But I am willing to look deeply at myself and try and find out why and hold myself accountable. Because the word racism does not terrify me. It emboldens me to change, and to work on my own flaws.

I am an imperfect ally. And I will undoubtedly have racist, sexist and homophobic thoughts and even make comments that show a disregard or disrespect for other cultures in the future. And when I am called out on them, I will face them head on. Because every word, action and thought matters, and adds up.

Feminism & Politics

Chet Scoville, Shakesville: Hillary Clinton and the 4th Wave: Excerpts of Amanda Fortini’s NY Mag article. There’s some good discussion in the comments. I have some bones to pick with the article’s assumptions, which I might or might not write about, but what I find most interesting is the idea that we’re living through a watershed moment in the development of the fourth wave. Living history, indeed.

Kate Harding, Shakesville: It’s Time to Get Obama-Skeptical: Obama is not a progressive. Clinton isn’t either. So stop pretending that either one of them is, and let’s hold them to higher standards. Let’s hold them to liberal ideals and do our damnedest to drag the Overton Window leftward.

I am only asking that people who have been blindly cheering him on recognize the fight ahead and become, as Zuzu brilliantly put it, “Obama-skeptical.” … I am by no means anti-Obama. I am pro-Clinton and Obama-skeptical. (I am also, for the record, Clinton-skeptical. If you’re not skeptical of the candidate you support, you’re not doing your job as a citizen, as far as I’m concerned. Hence this post.)

Obama has feet of clay, just like every other politician in history. Quit trying to pretend he doesn’t and start figuring out how to help reinforce them. Be realistic about who this candidate is, to whom he’s beholden, and how much he can reasonably accomplish, so you don’t end up under your bed sucking your thumb when the shit starts to fly.

PortlyDyke, Shakesville: What you don’t know CAN hurt you: A discussion of “privilege, and language, and unconsciousness,” prompted by Obama’s interview with The Advocate, wherein he remarked,

I actually had a professor at Occidental — now, this is embarrassing because I might screw up his last name — Lawrence Golden, I think it was. He was a wonderful guy. He was the first openly gay professor that I had ever come in contact with, or openly gay person of authority that I had come in contact with. And he was just a terrific guy. He wasn’t proselytizing all the time, but just his comfort in his own skin and the friendship we developed helped to educate me on a number of these issues. (emp. mine)

Kate Harding, Shakesville: How a President’s Faith Can Affect Us All: An analysis of some troubling statements Obama has made about sex ed, the AIDS epidemic in Africa, and rape. For what it’s worth, I think Obama’s statements stem from privilege: he’s never had to think in depth and at length about rape or reproductive rights (including, but not limited to, abortion), so he’s just clueless about how the way he talks about these issues buy straight into rightwing anti-choice and misogynist frames. I don’t think he’s malicious, just ignorant, but his statements are still deeply problematic for me, particularly the circumlocutions around rape (”when they [women] sometimes in certain situations may not be able to protect themselves from having unprotected sex”) and

there is a behavioral element to AIDS that has to be addressed. And if there is — if there’s promiscuity and we are pretending that that’s not an issue in spreading AIDS, then we’re missing part of the answer.

This vile, patronizing, rightwing-moralistic talking point crap that lacks policy options, right on the heels of the blogswarm for the Congo Rape Epidemic and the Global Day for Darfur, nearly made me vomit. I get it. I get that promiscuity is undoubtedly a factor in the AIDS epidemic in Africa. However, I doubt that it’s the most important factor, and while morality may pander to the right wing crowd, focusing on that rather than the normalized rape epidemic, poverty, lack of legal or cultural protections for women, warfare, lack of health care, lack of access to family planning education, and all the other factors that can be tackled with policy solutions, shows a distinct lack of vision to me. He should have talked about policies and solvable factors and the fact that he didn’t makes me wonder if he has a vision for what he wants to do as president. What does he want the world to look like, and how is he going to get it there?

Also, read through the comments and the debate about women who are “in certain situations may not be able to protect themselves from having unprotected sex” for an example of rape apologism in action.

Melissa, Shakesville: Feminism 101: Feminism and Humanism (2008/04/16): A clear and concise explanation of the problems with this attitude: “I’m not a feminist, I’m a humanist! Feminism is about women, and I’m interested in the equality of all people!”

My usual response is to snark, “Erasmus called. He wants his philosophy back.” Melissa’s much more productive response is

those arguing in favor of a “humanist” movement won’t say they’re arguing for men’s inclusion, instead citing what they perceive as the limitations of feminism/womanism—”But what about gay people or people of color or the disabled or the poor or…?” they ask, as if there is something intrinsic to feminism that precludes also fighting other biases. The truth is, if one is genuinely concerned with the betterment of women, one is necessarily concerned with fighting biases against any marginalized group, because, half (give or take) of all such groups are women.

…
Arguing for a “humanist” movement, because feminism/womanism is too limited, is necessarily predicated on viewing “women” as a group separate from “people of color” as a group separate from “LGBTQ” as a group separate from “disabled” as a group separate from “poor” as a group separate from “fat” as a group separate from… It’s a failure to respect both intersectionality and the breadth of experience among women, no less among all humans.

I would add that the need to say, “I’m a humanist, not a feminist!” is predicated on either well-intentioned ignorance about the realities of sexism and the feminist movement, or a knee-jerk fear of fighting for women’s equality. Feminism is about advocating for women’s rights, and to say, “I’m not just focused on women, I’m focused on everyone,” is no more and no less than an attempt to redirect attention to men.

Additionally, there is power in labels, power in words. We use identifiers (e.g. the AA formula “Hi, my name is ___ and I’m an alcoholic”) because they carry meaning. They tell us what a movement is about, what’s inside the tin. Feminism, derived from femina, the Latin word for woman, says upfront and boldly that it is about advocating for women. Women have been erased and silenced throughout history and one of the many aims of feminism is to fight back against that erasure. To claim, “I’m not a feminist, I’m a humanist,” rhetorically removes women from the spotlight and silences them once again, while simultaneously claiming to advocate for all people, including women. There is some hypocrisy and sloppy thinking there.

In short, if you’re genuinely focused on advocating for women, what’s the problem with claiming the label? I understand the concerns about how various branches of feminist thought have historically ignored intersectionality and I respect the choices of activists who choose to not to associate themselves with the feminist label for that reason. However, the people who go around talking about “humanism, not feminism” are not the people who have those objections to the word feminism. I am not trying to force identity of feminist on anyone who chooses not to claim it. I am, however, pointing out the logical fallacies behind the idea “I’m a humanist, not a feminist!” The people arguing for “humanism, not feminism” fail to recognize that women have intersectional identities; their whole argument is premised on the idea that you’re either a woman or you’re a person (man) of color, disabled person (man), GBTQ person (man), poor person (man), etc. As I said in the comments to Melissa’s post,

It’s amazing how easily most people forget that there are multiple aspects to identity. It’s not that you are only one thing or another, it’s that you’re both (or more), and all those aspects of identity interact to affect your lived experience.

And what’s with this monolithic idea of woman as white, heterosexual, wealthy, able-bodied, cisgendered, etc.? I feel that when the faux-humanist (Erasmus called, he wants his philosophy back!) people talk about how feminism leaves out all other groups, they’re assuming that women are only ever white/heterosexual/economically secure/able-bodied/cisgendered and so they’re not part of any other group. Way to erase WOC, disabled women, transgendered women, queer women, women who have some of those or all of those or more of those identity aspects–which is ironic because the faux-humanists claim they’re looking out for the groups ignored by second-wave feminism. Except they only mean men of color, disabled men, etc.

Ultimately, claims of “humanism” reveal a thought process that reverts toward focusing on men and erasing women once more, proving that “humanism” is not the same as feminism.

See also FF101: Why “feminism” and not just “humanism”? Or “equalism”? Isn’t saying you’re a feminist exclusionary?

Update: The “Contact your representatives” link at the Amnesty International link in my last post doesn’t work, so please use the form at CARE (via Melissa).

SF Chronicle: Film captures rapists and their victims in Congo (2008/04/05): a review of The Greatest Silence that discusses the film, its content, and the process of making it.

Why, Jackson wanted to know, if her rape was considered news, does the huge wave of Congolese atrocities go unreported and unacknowledged?

…

Jackson said she tried for two years without success to raise funds for “The Greatest Silence.” The subject made people uncomfortable, she found; it was easier for them to look the other way. Finally, she went last May to Kinshasa, the capital of Congo, and then to the eastern city of Bukavu.

…

The rape epidemic isn’t entirely senseless, Jackson found. “This is a resource war, pure and simple.” Congo is rich in diamonds, gold and coltan, or columbite-tantalite, a metal used in cell phones, DVD players and computers. The 10-year civil war, which has claimed 4 million lives, is a fight for access to those minerals, and the sexual violence is part of that fight. By raping and terrorizing women, the military maintains a heightened climate of instability and fear.

…

Being a rape victim, Jackson said, she had a built-in connection with the women she met and interviewed. She brought them photos of herself with family members, told them about the night she was assaulted.

In most cases, the women had never spoken publicly. Given the chance, Jackson said, “they would literally line up to talk to me until there was no light. Just to have someone listen to them without judgment.”

Jackson spent four months in the Congo altogether, spread over three visits. She went to villages where virtually all the women had been raped. She saw Panzi Hospital, which treats victims whose vaginas were brutalized and who suffer from permanent loss of bladder and bowel control.

“I wanted to find rapists who would talk to me,” she says in the film. Despite “huge apprehensions,” she and her translator drove six hours into a jungle conflict zone where men in hooded jackets held rifles and arrogantly justified their deeds.

“I rape because of a need,” one says. “After that I feel like a man.” Another speaks of rape in terms of expedience: “I have no time to negotiate. I have no time to love her.”

Jackson remembers that day: “The single most chilling moment was when I had just finished interviewing the rapists. They just melted back into the trees, and I couldn’t help thinking, ‘Who is their next victim going to be?’ There was no one there to arrest them; they were off to claim their next victim.”

…

She wants the people of Congo to see it, and is having the film translated into Lingala, the language of western Congo, and Swahili, the language of eastern Congo. “I want to do local screenings, probably with generators and hanging sheets on the sides of buildings, in the villages where I filmed.

“I feel a real responsibility to these women. So many of them said, ‘Please, take our story to the world.’ “

Via Melissa at Shakesville: SheCodes at Black Women Vote! is running a blogswarm today to raise awareness of the normalization of rape in the Congo.

Searching through the archives of the Guardian, NYT, and FT reveals a disappointing lack of coverage of the rape epidemic. The most recent articles are about Lisa Jackson’s new film, The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo, a documentary that aired on HBO last week. And what coverage that is–rather than discussing the topic of the film, which is the widespread rape of Congolese women, NYT film reviewer Ginia Bellafante (NYT 2008/04/0 chooses to focus exclusively on Jackson’s personal history as a victim of gang rape and in a bizarre twist on victim-blaming, uses it to excoriate Jackson for “her unfortunate wish to relate” to the rape victims she interviews. In a review of a documentary about rape, Bellafante includes one line about the “hundreds of thousands of Congolese women” who are raped, and focuses the rest of her article on impugning Jackson’s motive for raising awareness of human atrocities and undermining Jackson’s credibility. In other words, the only recent article about the rape epidemic in the Congo doesn’t discuss the rape epidemic at all. Instead, it attacks a rape victim for wanting to raise awareness about a rape epidemic; perhaps this is another twist on the idea that rape victims can’t be objective and need to hide their experiences so as not to make other people uncomfortable?

Looking further back in the news archives, there is silence about the rape epidemic until November 2007. The Economist has an article from November 15, A humanitarian disaster unfolds

The conflict [in Congo] has taken on another dimension of brutality too. Women have been raped on an unprecedented scale, in the thousands. According to experts, rape is being used as a weapon of war. Such are the scale and violence of the attacks in eastern Congo, claims Yakin Erturk, the UN’s special rapporteur on violence against women, that they constitute a war crime. Rape is being carried out by all sides and, worryingly, by civilians too.

On November 12, the Guardian reported, Hundreds of thousands of women raped for being on the wrong side:

“This thing of rape,” said Colonel Edmond Ngarambe … “I can’t deny that happens. We are human beings. But it’s not just us. The Mai Mai, the government soldiers who are not paid, the Rastas do the same thing. And some people sent by our enemies do it to cause anger against us.”

The colonel’s words lay bare a brutal reality about the wretched use of rape as an instrument of war in the east of the Congo. The growing numbers of women who arrive daily at hospitals as a fresh bout of fighting engulfs the region often have no idea whether their attackers were from the Mai Mai traditional militia, renegade Tutsi soldiers or a group of deserters from an array of armed groups who wear dreadlocks, call themselves the Rastas and specialise in particularly brutal treatment of their victims.

Ngarambe’s comment, “We are human beings,” sends a chill down my spine, because what he’s saying is that he sees raping women as a natural part of being a human being. A male human being, that is. Rape has been used as a genocidal tool of war by so many different sides and is so widespread that it is seen as acceptable, normal behavior toward women. It’s not about raping women who are part of a different ethnic or political group as part of war, it’s about raping women, period.

Tens of thousands of rapes have been recorded by the UN in the eastern provinces of North and South Kivu over the past year, but as only a fraction of the women assaulted make it to hospital there is little doubt that the total number of victims runs into hundreds of thousands in recent years.

In towns such as Shabunda it is estimated that seven out of 10 women have been raped. Many are gang-raped or assaulted over several years. Hospitals have treated girls as young as three. Others have been abducted by armed groups as sex slaves and held in holes in the ground or lashed to trees.

Human rights groups say it is not only the scale of the rape that is significant but the brutality that often accompanies it. Hospitals have treated women who have had guns, sticks and tin cans thrust into their vaginas after being raped. Armed men have also cut babies from the bellies of pregnant women after raping them.

No one group is responsible, and it is not only men in uniform who are committing the assaults. Médecins sans Frontières estimates that about two-thirds of rapes are carried out by combatants with armed groups from the Rwandan Hutu rebels and local Tutsi warlords, Mai Mai traditional militia and the Congolese government army. But many assaults are committed by civilian men, particularly in towns where the rule of law has broken down completely.

On October 7, the NYT reported, Rape Epidemic Raises Trauma of Congo War:

According to the United Nations, 27,000 sexual assaults were reported in 2006 in South Kivu Province alone, and that may be just a fraction of the total number across the country.

“The sexual violence in Congo is the worst in the world,” said John Holmes, the United Nations under secretary general for humanitarian affairs. “The sheer numbers, the wholesale brutality, the culture of impunity — it’s appalling.”

…

While rape has always been a weapon of war, researchers say they fear that Congo’s problem has metastasized into a wider social phenomenon.

“It’s gone beyond the conflict,” said Alexandra Bilak, who has studied various armed groups around Bukavu, on the shores of Lake Kivu. She said that the number of women abused and even killed by their husbands seemed to be going up and that brutality toward women had become “almost normal.”

So, what’s going on? Despite the silence in the news, there’s no reason to believe that the violence is decreasing or that the government and the UN are making tangible efforts to fight it. From the same Guardian article,

The largest United Nations peacekeeping force in the world of more than 17,000 troops has done little to stop it. Instead, the primary attempt to discourage sexual violence appears on hand-painted murals on walls across the region telling men that it is not manly to rape.

Murals. Hundreds of thousands of women are being raped, mutilated, tortured, and butchered, and the best the UN is doing is painting murals? This is beyond belief. We need to:

• Raise awareness. Educate yourself about what’s going on, write about it at your own blog, write to your officials in Congress, the presidential candidates, your local paper, etc. Erase the mainstream silence around the rape epidemic.
• Contact your senators and representatives and ask them to support the International Violence Against Women Act (I-VAWA) (via Washington Post, 2008/04/11):
  

  The bill lays out a powerful international agenda to combat violence against women and girls. Such violence is a critical international development issue that must be addressed in order to achieve prosperity and stability around the world. Amnesty International USA, Family Violence Prevention Fund and Women’s Edge Coalition provided advice on the drafting of the legislation with the input of 150 international and domestic experts.

Some posts with more information and links:

SheCodes: Hunters of black women: mass rape and mutilation in the Congo

Woc PhD: The Greatest Silence Premieres on HBO Tomorrow

Historiann: Rape still a powerful weapon of war

Blog in Solidarity: Congo Rape Epidemic

Jill at Feministe: Blogging for Women in the Congo

Following up on my last post, I’m curious as to how you deal with the U.S. MSM. What papers (online or hard copy) do you read? Do you read U.S. papers or foreign papers? Do you rely on blogs for your news, and if so, which ones? Do you primarily read blogs that report the news (e.g. political blogs that analyze information from a variety of articles and do their own research to report on an issue in depth) or blogs that critique the news (e.g. blogs that analyze the way the news is spun and framed)? Do you listen to news on the radio or watch it on TV?

I read the Guardian, which I fell in love with in the summer of 2006. I was living in Rome and my flatmates and I would get a copy of the Guardian from the news kiosk outside the Vatican wall, and I liked the advocacy journalism (the reporters have opinions and aren’t afraid to tell you so), the trenchant humor, and the decidedly liberal positions and issues. I also read The Economist, which I like because it’s well researched, well written, well argued, and often provides citations for studies so that it’s possible for readers to hunt down the studies and make up their own minds what they think about them (it drives me nuts to see references to studies and sources in articles that are so vague that they’re useless for this purpose). Even when I disagree with the positions its writers take, I always come away from it having thought about the issues, and usually with a better understanding of both sides. It also covers foreign politics extensively, which I like. The Financial Times is a recent add, and so far I like it, although I dislike that you need to pay for old articles. I also read a number of feminist blogs that critique the news, primarily Shakesville and The Curvature, with a dash of Feministe now and again.

I used to read the NYT: Op-Eds, section A, Food & Wine, and Thursday’s Fashion/Style/Home & Garden. A few months ago, I cut the Op-Ed section because:

• Maureen Dowd: does not make sense even at the best of times. Writing style revolves primarily around coming up with nicknames and oh-so-ironic and oh-so-hip and frankly-not-that-clever satire. With the primary season, her writing about Clinton and Obama descended into outright offensive and revolting drivel.
• David Brooks: idiot with a great big wad of class and white privilege, completely detached from reality.
• William Kristol: … Take David Brooks, add a heaping of hatred, add a heaping of neocon Republican stupidity, and blend.
• Gail Collins: has descended along the path of Maureen Dowd.
• Thomas Friedman: writes well about the environment, but I disagree with almost everything else he says, and not in the productive, informative kind of disagreement, as with the Economist’s position on Iraq.
• Nicholas Kristof: he’s done great work raising awareness about Darfur and other conflict regions, but I can get more informative, more thoughtful, and less patronizing coverage on prostitution, trafficking, and the uniquely destructive effects that war has on women and girls over at Feministe.

I also cut the Thursday F/S/H & G section a while back because they kept running sexist articles about career women needing wives, women being less happy because of feminism/freedom to work, and stupid career women who spend gobs of money on salon treatments. I’ll occasionally read Bob Herbert, Krugman, and the editorial board, but the odd thing about opinion pieces is that since they tend to focus on arguing positions, progressive blogs have filled that niche for me.

Headline news: A mainstream media outlet questions McCain’s temper! (FT, 2008/04/10) Stop the presses!

Of course, one must keep in mind that the Financial Times is a British newspaper. It hasn’t slid as far downhill as most U.S. mainstream media (MSM) outlets and can still claim to critically examine issues. However, it’s a sad state of affairs that a British paper has more honest analysis of a major U.S. presidential candidate than U.S. MSM, which generally shy away from criticizing McCain. It’s not a quality unique to the British press or the FT; a friend living in Japan tells me that last fall, major Japanese newspapers and news channels were covering the subprime mortgage crisis in detail, while the U.S. media did its best to pretend that the issue wasn’t important, and if it was, Bernanke would magically fix everything for the banks (the homeowners were rarely mentioned).

Now, as he prepares to carry the Republican banner into November’s election, critics are questioning whether his fiery temperament could be a liability as commander-in-chief.In January, Thad Cochran, a Republican senator for Mississippi, said the thought of Mr McCain as president sent a “cold chill down my spine”, describing him as “hotheaded” and “erratic”. James Dobson, the influential evangelical leader, said he could not support Mr McCain, in part because he “has a legendary temper and often uses foul and obscene language”.

On Capitol Hill, his outbursts are part of congressional folklore. One of the most recent came last year when, according to witnesses, he shouted, “Fuck you!” at John Cornyn, a Republican senator for Texas, during a heated exchange over immigration reform. A similar tirade in 1999 cost him the support of Pete Domenici, a New Mexico senator, in the 2000 presidential election.

“I decided I didn’t want this guy anywhere near a trigger,” said Mr Domenici.

A new book, called The Real McCain, claims he once physically attacked Rick Renzi, an Arizona congressman, during an argument. Speaking on Fox News this week, Mr McCain said that this and other allegations in the book were “either false or exaggerated”.

But he has acknowledged in memoirs and interviews that his temper is a source of “personal concern”.

“I wake up daily and tell myself, ‘You must do everything possible to stay cool, calm and collected today’,” he once said.

The U.S. MSM is blind when it comes to McCain. He has a reputation as a principled maverick, even though he’s turned his back on most of his positions during the course of his campaign. You wouldn’t know it, though, from reading the NYT or WSJ, let alone from watching cable news. While comparing recent MSM coverage of Obama and McCain, Wolfrum (Shakesville, 2008/04/03) quotes Chris Matthews, who declared, “Every time I look at a poll–and I expect McCain to win every one of these polls. The press loves McCain. We’re his base.” Ezra Klein (2008/02/23) and Jeff Fecke (Shakesville, 2008/02/23) posit that it’s McCain’s “tough guy” persona that appeals to his reporter fans, and Jason Zengerle (The Nation, 2008/01/07) suggested that it’s McCain’s accessibility to the media.

Whatever the reason, it is a problem when the MSM, the institutions responsible for informing the electorate, are failing to do their job. It’s difficult for me to back this statement up with concrete examples, but I see a general pattern of U.S. MSM not informing the populace. They are not reporting on the platforms and policy issues in the presidential campaigns. Instead, they focus on polls, the horse race, try to badger candidates out of the race (the virtual disappearance of Edwards in the media is a large part of what killed his campaign, IMO; and as for “Clinton should quit,” I’m not even going to touch that one), and cover speech gaffes. They are not reporting on the effects of foreclosure and homelessness when it comes to the subprime mortgage crisis, or the combination of fiscal policy and insufficient oversight that helped land the U.S. economy where it is today. They are not urgently reporting on the need for immediate, comprehensive, broad-based action addressing climate change. They are not critically reporting on Iraq. The Economist, which was advocating a long-term presence in Iraq the last time I checked, nevertheless consistently has better analysis of the situation and possible strategies than the NYT, whose reporting style is along the lines of “Petraeus said this. Bush said that. X people have died. Clinton said this. Obama said that.”

It’s not a problem that foreign newspapers are reporting in depth on U.S. affairs. The U.S. is a large, powerful country, and its policies, military actions, and leadership affect the rest of the world, so it makes sense that journalists abroad would decide that it’s necessary and important to report on the U.S. It is, however, a problem that the foreign newspapers are doing a better job than U.S. MSM, because the quality of U.S. MSM reporting stinks, quite frankly, and that results in an uninformed and ill informed populace. When people are un- or ill- informed, they aren’t equipped with the necessary tools to change society for the better, and they begin to turn away from the participatory democracy. They don’t vote. They don’t contact their elected officials. They don’t know how to influence the people and policies that will affect their lives.

The MSM is enormously influential in shaping public opinion. Their headlines, their sound bites, the words they use to frame issues, all affect how people think. Currently, it is presenting severely slanted views of some issues (McCain as principled maverick), inaccessible “these are the facts, nothing but the facts, no interpretation or explication” views on other issues (Iraq), and eliding other issues altogether (effects of subprime crisis on homeowners rather than banks). That affects us as a society–who we vote for, what we call for regarding Iraq, what social and fiscal policies we deem important. Whether out of ignorance, laziness, or corporate direction, the MSM is keeping us ignorant.

————————-

I’m not sure how long the article is available without registering, which is free. Financial Times, April 10, 2008, “McCain in battle to keep his cool.”

Last post, shorter and issue-specific version:

Hillary Rodham Clinton is not Bill Clinton. Is it so difficult to understand that she is not the same entity as her spouse, and to separate your opinions of Bill Clinton’s positions from your opinions of Hillary Clinton’s positions?

Now that we’re out of the early primary season and sexists have progressed from “He’s running for president, not her–I mean, he’s campaigning for her and everything!” to more specific, “I hate a WJC policy and so I hate HRC for it, too,” I most often see this claim made in reference to DADT and DOMA.

Newsflash: If you want to argue that you hate Hillary Rodham Clinton for DADT, you should consider that she did not pass that bill. Bill Clinton did. If you want to argue that you hate Hillary Rodham Clinton for DOMA, you should consider that she did not pass that bill (yes, I’m aware of her position on it—see below). You should also consider that she has repeatedly come out in support of GLBTQ rights:

In an interview with the Philadelphia Gay News (newspaper-style format here), she committed to improving immigration policy for same-sex couples; leveraging foreign aid in condemning countries that execute people for being gay; ending DADT; extending federal domestic-partner legislation to all LGBT citizens; improving services for GLBT youths. (See Melissa’s post at Shakesville and the comment thread for more discussion.)

On Ellen yesterday, she spoke about ending inequalities for same-sex couples in federal law, and explained how her personal experience with real people has shaped her opinions:

So, my mother, the people who were with her the whole time were the two [gay] neighbors. And, when my father did finally die, it was one of his neighbors who was there with him holding his hand. Well, fast forward. One of the men got sick, and was in the hospital, but because they had no rights, his partner was not allowed in the hospital. And the family of the man who was sick could say, “No, he’s not a member of the family.” They had been together since Vietnam. One was a doctor, one was a nurse. And, all of a sudden, the partner was a non-entity. That made such an impression on me. And I am going to do everything I can to make sure that people like you, and Portia, and other’s have a chance to have rights. To be able to go to the hospital, to inherit property, to make sure that you can list somebody as a beneficiary on an insurance policy. We just have to make this much more fair. — Interview transcript at Hillbuzz

She’s been on record since June 2007 (Planet Out, 2007/06/19) as saying that although DOMA was strategically important for defeating the Federal Marriage Amendment, she believes that “the restrictions imposed by DOMA on federal government recognition of same-sex relationships are unfair.”

She worked with the Human Rights Campaign to defeat the Federal Marriage Amendment:

While introducing the senator, HRC President Joe Solmonese mentioned at least three strategy meetings in which Clinton had convened with the Human Rights Campaign on Capitol Hill to defeat FMA.

…

“It was Senator Clinton who first summoned me to the Hill to talk about our strategy for defeating the federal marriage amendment,” he said.

He said she asked him: “How are we going to make sure the messaging is united, the Senate is united, the community is united and we are going to kill it [the federal marriage amendment] dead?”

“She brought us the Senate to brief people on how to get this done,” Solmonese recalled. “She convened the meeting and she made sure everyone was in line.”

She has spoken about the problems facing GLBTQ youth.

I have problems with some of Senator Clinton’s positions on LGBTQ issues, but in the main, she is not Bill Clinton. Do some research; stop buying into the idea that because Bill Clinton passed DADT and DOMA, she supports them, too; and find legitimate reasons to criticize Hillary Rodham Clinton for that don’t rely on the assumption that she’s an extension of her husband. That thinking is lazy, sloppy, and sexist.

Something that’s come up frequently in the comment threads at Shakesville is the conflation of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton with former President Bill Clinton. This conflation can take a number of forms:

• Bill Clinton did X policy that I hate (e.g. DADT, NAFTA), so I hate Hillary Rodham Clinton for it. Bill Clinton enacted X policy, so Hillary Rodham Clinton is (a) responsible for it; (b) also supports it; (c) will continue or further that policy once she’s in office.
• I don’t want Bill back in the Oval Office. If Hillary wins, Bill’s going to be calling the shots in the office.

A big problem with these statements is that they’re deeply sexist. They are based on the idea that a woman, once married, is no longer an independent entity with her own opinions, policies, and judgment. She is not an independent person acting according to her own judgment; indeed, she has no capacity for independent judgment, she is merely an extension of her husband. What he thinks, she thinks. What he supports, she supports. What he orders, she does. You’ll notice that it never works the other way around; the husband is never the assimilated minion of the wife.

Newsflash: Women are independent persons, even if they’re married. They’re independent persons with independent personalities, brains, and opinions, and to say that HRC is the same as Bill Clinton ignores that she is a separate person from him. Last time I checked, they each had a brain. They are not the Borg. Sure, he campaigns for her. Sure, she’ll probably bounce ideas off him and value his input. The former is because they’re married and it’s normal for spouses to campaign for each other. The latter is because he’s a former president and whip smart, so it make sense for her to talk to him. However, they’re still not the same person. To denigrate Hillary by calling her “Billary” as if they’re a chimerical, combined monster, to hate her for what he’s done, to hate her for his positions, to think that she’s just a pawn and he’ll be the power behind the presidency: all of these assume that she is nothing more than an appendage of Bill. All of these are sexist ideas reliant on a sexist assumption.

Newsflash: Married people are still individual people capable of independent thoughts–a marriage license doesn’t make one merged entity out of two persons. How many married couples do you know where the spouses vote differently? How many married couples do you know where the spouses disagree and hold different opinions on a topic? Obviously, they are capable of holding different opinions. Why is it so difficult to comprehend that just because a married woman has the intelligence, skill, and tenacity to reach high office, she doesn’t automatically lose her capacity for independent thought? Indeed, if you’re relying on non-sexist assumptions, you might think that a woman with the intelligence, skill, and tenacity to reach high office and run for the most powerful position on the planet would be particularly likely to be an independent thinker. Hillary Rodham Clinton has had to buck the trend in a misogynist society for her entire life to get to where she is now.

If you want to argue that Bill Clinton will have undue influence if Hillary Rodham Clinton wins, consider this: will Michelle Obama have undue influence if Barack Obama wins? Will Cindy McCain have undue influence if John McCain wins? If your answer to either of these questions is no, then you should acknowledge that your worries about Bill Clinton are rooted in the sexist assumption that married women are extensions of their husband. You should acknowledge that your worries are rooted in the sexist assumption that married women are pawns of their husbands. The reason that you don’t think Michelle and Cindy will be the real powers behind the Oval Office, manipulating their husbands, is that you only see the arrow of influence going one way, from man down to woman. You think that women are susceptible to manipulation by their husband, because they’re women, and so you worry about Bill Clinton but give Michelle Obama and Cindy McCain a pass. Men are strong, independent, and rational, unlikely to be altered by the advice and input of their spouses. Women are weak, subservient, and susceptible, likely to be altered by the advice and input of their spouses. Michelle and Cindy are just women, so you have no worries there.

If you can’t face Hillary Rodham Clinton as an independent person and judge her on her own merits, you’re sexist. If the best reason you can muster for why you dislike her is that you hate Bill Clinton and you worry about how much influence he’s going to have if she wins, you’re sexist. You can’t fathom a strong, independent woman and you feel the need to cut her down using time-honored misogynist drivel. You’re afraid of a woman being in a position of power and you can’t fathom that she’d be independent. You’re trying to rationalize that fear and make her groundbreaking campaign fit into your pathetic worldview by positioning Hillary Rodham Clinton as subordinate to her husband, so that everything is hunky dory and peachy and conforms to the sexist framework that makes sense to you. You are sexist. Face it and get over it.

As Brave Sir Robin notes, April is National Poetry Month. He says,

I challenge you to read at least one poem a day for the whole of April. You may find that you’ll want to continue when April is done. I also ask that you expand into Poets and styles that might be new to you.

I love poetry for the beauty of the words, the cadences of poetry written in meter, and the joyous union of sound and sense. I love thoughts spoken with allusions, communicating with hints at something older. Allusions bring new layers of meaning into a conversation. I would like to be one of those people who can make allusions to poems, but it rather takes the meaning out of it if no one else gets the reference. Peter Wimsey, Stoppard’s Housman, the Roman elegiacists, the bulk of classical Japanese poets: they all understood that by referencing other works, they were adding to the weight and substance of their own poems. Much like calling in citations in academic writing, allusions in poetry add more ideas, more images, and more meanings than a standalone poem can express within the confines of its verses.

I’ll probably never be Peter Wimsey, but more poetry has stuck in my head than I think I know. I first read Holy Sonnet XIV in British Literature in 10th grade, lo these many years ago, and “Batter my heart, three person’d God” stuck in my head. Maybe it’s the violence of the image, the forceful emotion, the despair, the profound sense of conflict between himself and God, or the difficulties of reconciling himself to God despite his desire to do so (in 10th grade, I was just beginning to lose faith). It’s so naked. At any rate, it’s stuck in my head for a long time, and the whole sonnet is great. There’s so much in it that it’s difficult to pick it apart, but the passionate emotions cause me to shiver.

Batter my heart, three person’d God; for, you
As yet but knocke, breathe, shine, and seeke to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow mee,’and bend
Your force, to breake, blow, burn and make me new.
I, like an usurpt towne, to’another due,
Labour to’admit you, but Oh, to no end,
Reason your viceroy in mee, mee should defend,
But is captiv’d, and proves weake or untrue.
Yet dearley’I love you,’and would be loved faine,
But am betroth’d unto your enemie:
Divorce mee,’untie, or breake that knot againe,
Take mee to you, imprison mee, for I
Except you’enthrall mee, never shall be free,
Nor ever chast, except you ravish mee.

–John Donne (1572-1631), Holy Sonnet XIV

Recent news coverage of protests along the torch route.

Olympic torch protesters scale Golden Gate Bridge (AP, 4/7/200

Three protesters climbed suspension cables of the Golden Gate Bridge on Monday as part of an advance protest to this week’s Olympic torch relay here and unfurled two large banners that said “One World One Dream. Free Tibet” and “Free Tibet.”

Olympic Torch Relay in Paris Halted as Protests Spread (NYT, 4/8/200

As the relay began in Paris, the French authorities had appeared determined to try to spare China — and France — the disorder that occurred in London, resorting to measures normally reserved for a visiting head of state.

Their efforts drew scorn from protesters, who angrily noted the heavy police presence. Armed officers guarded sensitive Metro exits along the 28-kilometer, or 17-mile, route.

“One would almost think oneself in Lhasa,” said Jean-Paul Ribes, leader of the Support Committee of the Tibetan People in France, who was among the thousands massed on the Trocadéro. “It snowed last night, now the sky is blue — and police are everywhere.”

Many protesters — demonstrating against China’s human rights policies in general or for a free Tibet, or simply advocating a boycott of the Olympics in Beijing — echoed a headline that was emblazoned across the front page of the leftist daily Libération, under a picture of the Olympic rings restyled as handcuffs: “Liberate the Olympic Games!”

Paris Torch Slideshow (NYT)

Thousands protest as Olympic flame carried through London (Guardian, 4/7/200 “Campaigners complained of heavy-handed police tactics during the Olympic torch relay yesterday as officers were seen pulling down Tibetan flags, barging bystanders away from the route, threatening arrest under anti-terrorist legislation and telling protesters to remove “Free Tibet” T-shirts.”

Numbers low for S.F. Human Rights Torch rally (SF Chronicle, 4/6/200

About 200 people gathered Saturday at San Francisco’s Union Square for a Human Rights Torch rally, the first of the city’s two alternative torch protests called in advance of Wednesday’s visit of the official Olympic torch in the city.

San Francisco is the only North American stop in the global Olympic torch celebration that precedes the Olympics’ Aug. 8 opening in Beijing. Critics of China in the United States and other countries are urging the world to stage protests and boycott the Summer Games to punish China for its human-rights record.

Saturday’s demonstration was part of the Human Rights Torch Relay, an international campaign organized by supporters of Falun Gong, a spiritual practice based on meditation and exercise that was banned in China in 1999. The group says its members have been persecuted and tortured in China.

Long-awaited Olympic torch route announced; city leaders condemn China in statement (SF Chronicle, 4/2/200

The Beijing Olympic torch will be carried along San Francisco’s waterfront and briefly pass through the Marina District, according to city officials who announced the specific route today.

The long-anticipated announcement about the torch’s planned route came moments before the city’s Board of Supervisors this afternoon passed a strongly worded resolution condemning China’s human rights record. The seven-page resolution also demands an international investigation into China’s record and calls for the local official who receives the torch in San Francisco to do so with “alarm and protest.”

Video of the Golden Gate Bridge climbers:

Just a quick post:

The Olympic torch is coming to SF on Wednesday, April 9, for its only stop in North America. There are protests going on tomorrow and Wednesday, condemning China’s human rights abuses.

Save Darfur:

Come to San Francisco on Wednesday, April 9, 2008 and urge China to use its influence with the Government of Sudan to end the Darfur genocide. San Francisco is the only location in North America on the torch relay route–this is a unique opportunity! 11am-4pm– or any time in between.

Meet at 11am at either of two locations:

Corner of 3rd St. and Townsend St., near AT&T Park, for the start of the relay. (Up to 2-3 miles of walking.) We’ll then follow the torch on the route!

One Maritime Plaza, on Clay St near Embarcadero Bart, to help us line the torch route. (Less walking.) We’ll also be there for the end of the relay!

SF Team Tibet:

7 P.M. Monday, 4/7

Candlelight Vigil at Downtown Berkeley BART. Also, the International Campaign for Tibet will host an interactive conversation on the situation in Tibet and other human rights considerations around Beijing’s hosting of the 2008 Olympics. The event is free and will be at the Joseph Wood Krutch Theatre on the Clark Kerr Campus of UC Berkeley, 2601 Warring Street.

Tuesday, April 8:

Tibetan Freedom Torch Ceremony, March and Rally
(Rain or shine!)

Where: United Nations Plaza, at Market & Hyde, near Civic Center BART

1000 Meet at UN Plaza
1100 Press Conference &Torch Ceremony
1200 Rally
0100 March to SF City Hall
0115 Rally at the SF City Hall
0145 March to Chinese Consulate
0215 Protest and speeches at the Chinese Consulate
0315 March back to UN Plaza
0400 End of Torch Ceremony.

Join Richard Gere, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Tibetan leaders and other special guests for a historic rally and candle light vigil in support of the Tibetan people and their struggle for basic human rights. As China prepares to host the Olympics in August, the government is conducting the worst crackdown in Tibet since the 1960s Cultural Revolution.

Come show your support for the Tibetan and Chinese people on the eve of the Beijing Olympic torch passing through San Francisco - the only stop in North America.
Where: United Nations Plaza, at Market & Hyde, near Civic Center BART

Rally & Speeches 6:00pm
Culture / Music 7:15pm
Candle Light Vigil 8:00pm

April 9

Team Tibet Mass Mobilization to Protest the Olympic Torch Relay in San Francisco San Francisco Torch Route

10a: Ferry Park (between Washington & Clay streets off of Drum. Near Embarcadero 4 of the Embarcadero Center. ) Get off the BART at Embarcadero and walk toward Justin Herman Plaza. You will not be able to miss us, really! Map of the meeting point coming soon.

Torch Route

Hope to see you out there!

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month and April 3 is A Day to End Sexual Violence. As part of that, Marcella is coordinating Blog Against Sexual Violence Day today. This year, the theme for Sexual Assault Awareness Month is Sexual Violence in the Workplace.

Throughout the month of April, I’m hoping to focus more on sexual assault, specifically resources; what you as an individual can do to prevent sexual violence, help victims of sexual violence, and change a culture that fosters sexual violence; and how sexual violence is reported (portrayed/constructed) in mainstream U.S. media. For today, however, I only have this:

I am a sexual assault victim. I am a sexual assault survivor.

It took some time before I was able to think those words. It took some time before I was able to work through the denial and stop dismissing what happened as “not really sexual assault” or “it’s not serious sexual assault.” I didn’t want to think of myself as a victim because I thought it would make me lesser. I didn’t want to acknowledge what my assailant did to me because I knew that if I did, I would lose credibility on the topic of sexual assault in the eyes of most people. I made excuses and tried to dismiss what happened to me because compared to “real” sexual assault, such as rape and murder, it seemed trivial.

In the end, however, I couldn’t shy away from the truth that all of these thoughts and coping mechanisms

• Excused my assailant for forcing himself on me…which necessarily gives him a pass on sexual assault.
• Bought into the idea that only people who’ve never experienced sexual violence can be objective on the topic…which means that the victims, the people with the most experience with sexual violence, the most motivation to stop sexual violence, and the most at stake for fighting sexual violence, will never have a place at the table and our input will never be heard.
• Bought into the idea of “real” and “legitimate” sexual violence…which necessarily means that other forms of sexual violence aren’t really sexual violence and are acceptable.
• Bought into the idea of “real” victims…which necessarily means that other victims are acceptable to attack.
• Bought into the silence around sexual violence…which only perpetuates it.

Sexual violence is pervasive. In the U.S., one out of every six women will be raped at least once. Far more will be victims of sexual assault. I know these figures now, because I’ve gone out and looked up this information. Yet, I didn’t know them for a long time, and I’ve met people who were shocked to hear that the statistics were so high. I believe that the mainstream silence around sexual violence is part of what allows it to flourish, because most people are good, and I think that if they had any idea how rampant sexual violence is, they would be up in arms. Not only feminists, not only victims, not only allies, but everyone. We would recognize all forms of sexual assault as such and not dismiss “lovers’ quarrels,” slaps, bruises, intimidation, gropes, “unwilling” or “nonconsensual” sex, or anything else. We wouldn’t make excuses for them. We wouldn’t contest the idea that individuals should never have their boundaries violated or their bodies touched against their will, and that putting up with some groping, some shouting, some hitting, some raping is not simply the price of living.

An important part of raising awareness of sexual violence is realizing that “one in six” refers not to an abstract mass of anonymous women out in the faceless crowd, but to an actual woman. Probably a woman you know. I knew that one in sex women was a rape victim, but I didn’t realize it bone-deep until close friends told me that they had been raped. This disconnect between knowing the stats and understanding the extent of the violence is why I have to say,

I am a sexual assault victim. I am a sexual assault survivor.

I am a sister, a daughter, a friend, a colleague, a student, a teammate. I am the girl next door, the girl upstairs, the girl downstairs, the woman on the bus, the woman browsing the mystery section and the spice aisle and the butcher’s display, the woman at the symphony, the woman eating at the bar, the woman in line at the post office. I write those words to ask you, how many women do you interact with in one day? How many women do you speak with? How many women do you see? One in six women will be raped at least once in her life. Think about the women you see in one day. I am a real human being and a man sexually assaulted me. We are all real human beings, each and every victim of sexual assault.

I can’t talk about the assault yet. I’ve thought over the words, strung them together inside my head, and I still can’t do it. One day, I hope I’ll be able to. But for now, I will own these words. I have a face, I have a name, I am a person you know, online or in real life, and I am a sexual assault victim. I am a sexual assault survivor. Can you understand that?