the next round

Gearing up for the next round, y'all. But more and more, the question for me, and all the other folks in similar situations, is: how long do you hold out hope of landing that thing known as a "real job," that thing with salary and benefits? That pays enough that you can actually afford to do it, and afford the corollary expenses that come along with doing it, like childcare and takeout and help with the house? With an office you don't have to share with three others who probably wouldn't appreciate staring at those pics of your kids you set up on the desk, so they get put away at the end of your scant office hours? With colleagues? With time to research and write and publish?

I'll be honest. I've thought about alternatives. There are a couple problems with that. One is, my only other marketable skill sets are waitressing and having babies. The other is, I really, really love both my subject, the art of teaching, and the act of writing. I love the classroom--undergrad, grad, philosophy, theology--all of it. And I'd like to write another book.

And let's be honest, too, that putting 7 years into a degree, and then walking away from all that it means to you, is just a difficult thing to do, in terms of your sense of self.

So. Here I am, y'all. Exhibit JTB of the adjunct problem in academia.

Waiting: an out-of-season Advent homily (reflections on World Convention)

And I stood, waiting while the circle completed itself and everyone, in turn and by name, received the Bread of Life and the Cup of Salvation. And in the waiting was a blessing equal to the blessing received in the gift.

In that attentive stillness, it struck me that I was quite simply at peace. I was not in a hurry. I was not thinking about what came next. I was not thinking of what I should do or not do, or what I should be doing while I waited or if people were looking at me while I waited or what they were thinking while they waited. I was quiet inside, an unusual thing for me, and that quiet seemed to have reached in from the outside, where we waited on each other.

In this quiet chapel was a group of people from all over the world, who had spent two days talking, thinking, praying, dreaming and planning together. They had been strangers to me, but in this moment of sharing and waiting in the ritual which brings Christians of all traditions together, I realized that I belonged here in this room.

Born and raised Church of Christ from Cradle Roll to college, there have been many times that I have felt alien in my church. Sometimes it has felt like a wound, but I have learned how to live with it. Don't put pressure on the spot; move carefully; be wise, be cautious, be diplomatic, be circumspect; make sure you take the hits that come somewhere else so they don't hurt too bad, and turn the other cheek. It's become normal, this mode of faithfulness to my church.

But in this room, I belonged. In this room, my wounds were cherished as much as my gifts. In this room I was welcome. In this room, I was waited on.

The Churches of Christ have always been a part of something larger than themselves--all churches are--even if we have worked hard to ignore it, at times. In this room full of people from all over the world, from all the branches of the Restoration movement, celebrating our unity and common history and anticipating a future together, I felt for the first time in a long time that I was glad, deeply glad, to have grown up in this particular expression of Christianity, this peculiar, rational, contentious, deeply faithful bunch of God's people.

So I cried a little bit, and that was okay.

And then it struck me: we were not simply waiting on each other, but God, too is waiting on us. We make space and time to sense it in the celebration of Communion, but it is constant. God is waiting on us--though most often we think we are waiting on God. We say to each other, "those that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint," and it is true; but God, too, waiting and watching and hoping and anticipating as we learn to embrace each other in the unity of the Spirit.

I am so grateful in this moment for the work that the World Convention (Christian-Churches of Christ-Disciples of Christ) has done in the many years since its founding, the work that we are preparing to do in the future, and the gift of belonging that I received so unexpectedly in that Communion with my sisters and brothers from around the world.

Unity is a mysterious gift, rooted in the very life of God: created in the same image, saved by same Savior, gifted with the same Spirit, we are indeed one, in ways that surpass recognition, assent, doctrinal agreement or even volition…and for this I give thanks and praise. Amen.

a letter from my daughter from three days ago

transcript (faithful to spelling and grammar):

Dear Not Mom anymore
I dispise you
go away NEVER come back
you will make me estatic if you do that. Becose
you want to make me happy
goodbye and good ridence forever
sined
Clare

I know it's a bit twisted but all I really feel in looking at this letter is a sense of bursting maternal pride at how well my 7YO expresses herself. #goClare

"NPR Listener"

I'm blessed with a commute that takes me, three times a week, out of the WNYC station range just as I enter the WHYY station range, and in the mornings they basically play the exact same schedule so I can switch from one to the other without missing a single syllable of my morning NPR. It's awesome.

Except for the weeks when they run back-to-back fundraisers. That double whammy gets really tiresome. WHYY goes first and then, just as they end, WNYC cranks up. That can make for a long commute.

This last time, I found myself getting annoyed at more than just the repetitive appeals and aggravating interruptions to programs for their plaintive pitches. Usually I even find it somewhat mesmerizing, the smooth blather and wordsmithy that goes into the whole thing by these professional talkers... But this time, over and over, I heard something that really bugged me: a crude appeal to intellectual elitism that made NPR listeners, and a fortiori the elite of the elite who donate or become members, the "us" opposed to the "them," the ignorant hoi polloi who listen to (sniff) commercial radio. Every morning for about two weeks I heard some version of this on and off for an hour and a half. "We know that you, our listeners are intelligent and want to be informed" or "just think how many times you've been at a party and started a conversation with 'I heard on NPR' and immediately became the smart person in the room" or "take those few cents a day you spend at the vending machine and feed your brain instead" or "in personals 'NPR listener' has become code for smart and cares about the world" and on and on. The longer I listened the more appalling it became.

And then one morning I found myself shouting back at my radio, "NO! I mean, shouldn't public radio be for everyone???"

Finally WHYY (which, may I add, is a great station and I generally <3 actual="" and="" blunt="" campaign="" ceased="" content="" focus="" it="" its="" message="" none="" of="" on="" p="" producing="" programs="" s="" smart="" squarely="" straightforward="" stuff="" stupid="" support.="" tactic:="" takes="" that="" the="" them="" theme="" there="" this="" time="" turn.="" us="" v.="" was="" wnyc="">
I've been a (very minor) contributor for WNYC for a few years now. I'm proud of it, and all the more because they didn't slide into that insidious message of intellectual/social elitism.

This was a few weeks ago now so I'm not exactly timely in blogging about it, but it's been simmering on the mental backburner ever since. We spend so much time lamenting the fractured, ideologically driven state of mainstream media in this country--and the way that it both reflects and furthers the epistemological divide in the public. And one of the things I heard from both stations is how public radio, because it is non-commercial and primarily listener-funded, stands apart from the rest of mainstream news media in this ideologically and commerically driven epistemological division. Except that, if you're simply recreating another split, how can you pat yourself on the back for standing apart?

So next time, let's remember: public radio is for everyone. Even, and maybe especially, for the folks don't listen to it. Yet. 

turning Clare into Daisy

There are many, many reasons to love Philip's Academy Charter School (formerly St. Philip's Academy). This month's reason--in fact, every February's reason since Clare started kindergarten there--is the way that black history month is taught and celebrated.

Last year--I may have blogged about this but I'm not sure--Clare's hero was Rosa Parks, and it was a bit of a struggle to think though how we were going to costume her as her hero. In the end I think we did great--we found a t-shirt with Rosa Parks's picture on it, with a quote, and over that we layered an old-fashioned knitted cardigan, put her hair up in a bun and gave her a pair of Brent's old glasses with the lenses popped out. She was cute as a button, was a recognizable Rosa, and felt awesome about her costume (which is the most important thing).

Every year, without fail, I learn something new that Clare comes home talking about. (Before Clare, for example, I had no idea who Madam C. J. Walker was.) This year, I'm learning about Daisy Bates, Clare's choice for African-American hero. Bates was President of the AR chapter of the NAACP, co-owner (with her husband, L.C.) and writer for Arkansas State Press, and is most famous for her role in organizing the Little Rock Nine.

This year, the 2nd graders are putting on a "living wax museum" and so Clare has been very concerned about the veracity of her Daisy Bates costume. As you can see in the picture below, she was a beautiful, glamorous woman--in addition to being, apparently, a complicated, strong and feisty woman who spoke her mind and stood her ground.

"She was not soft-spoken; she was not humble; she didn't ask, she told; it just blew people's minds. Who is this woman, sounding like this? Who does she think she is?" (from Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock)

Honestly, I can't think of a better hero for Clare, my own complicated, strong and feisty woman-to-be.

So once again we face the challenge of turning my fair-skinned flaxen-haired Clare into her chosen African-American hero. And this year she asked straight out if we could make her skin browner. My explanation of why this was not a good idea made enough sense to her that she dropped it, but it meant that the rest of the costume became even more important to her to get right.

Well, my crafty skill set is limited. But my budget is even more so, so I've spent days and days trying to figure out how to give my girl some Daisy Bates 1950's style. Daisy often dressed in professional, business-y attire, so my teal wool suit (though of course large on Clare) fits the bell well enough. Clare's school uniform shirt with the pan collar fits a sort of 1950's type look. But what we really needed was a hat, and a way to give Clare the suggestion of that cute Daisy Bates short curly hairdo.

So: an old summer sun hat lost most of its brim, and some netting from a dress-up skirt got repurposed along with a length of pink satin ribbon that's been floating around the house for awhile, a few sequins and a satin ribbon rose and then--I found some novelty eyelash yarn in my stash. So, while it may not be exactly the cute Daisy 'do, it will (I hope) at least give a suggestion of some sweet little curls underneath Clare's hat. Add a string of pretty beads--Daisy has a necklace on in every picture, almost--and, done!

I can't wait for Clare to come home and see her hat. :)

                                       

So a week or so ago this post on gendered dimorphism in Disney characters popped up in my newsfeed: "Help! My eyeball is bigger than my wrist!" (http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2013/12/17/help-my-eyeball-is-bigger-than-my-wrist-gender-dimorphism-in-frozen/)

Then a couple days ago I was cleaning the playroom, sorting and organizing (and, yes, clandestinely tossing certain items) and in the process came across mostly dismembered Barbie and other doll heads, torsos and legs. And here's what I found:

This was a truly enormous head. For comparison, here's a Barbie head side-by-side:

So when I had matched up everything else I was left with this and my first thought was, well, this can't possibly be right!

But I tried it anyway. And I thought, whoa. This isn't "help my eyeball is bigger than my wrist," this is "help my eyes are bigger than my boobs and my whole torso could fit inside my hairdo."

Again, a comparison side-by-side with a good ol'fashioned wholesome Barbie: her head is bigger than Barbie's but her whole teeny body is about the length of Barbie's torso.

Bottom line: our culture gives us such increasingly unrealistic representations of women's bodies that at this point Barbie looks relatively normal! 

following up

So, I changed my Facebook gender to "male." Since then, here are some representative ads that keep popping up in my newsfeed:

Just to remind you, this is the ad that prompted me to this radical act:

Now that I'm a "man," Facebook and its advertisers can assume I have interests in 1) traveling, 2) playing violent video games, 3) staying warm, 4) living in a house, 5) playing poker. As a woman though, my interests were: lose weight and be sexy.

I am so glad that now that I'm a (hu)man, I can be interested in (hu)man things, and not just woman things.

Oh, and, now that I'm a (hu)man, Facebook and advertisers assume that I also probably have an interest in exploiting women! Oh, funtimes, Facebook, funtimes! Thanks for making this holiday season so special in such a mainstream, accepted, sexist and misogynist way. I'll be hitting on some single ladeez (despite my married status) right after I order some luxurious Princeton University knitwear crafted especially for alumni, despite the fact that I'm not a University alum, because I went to Princeton Seminary. 

today's reminder that women are supposed to feel fat and unsexy so that we can spam you successfully

So, it's just a normal day. My Facebook feed is full of status updates about snow and babies and complaints about grading. Facebook is predictable like that. And then there was this.

Why, Facebook? What is it about me that suggested to your algorithms that I needed an ad from some outfit called "Be Sexy" that wants to let me know that someone who can't spell success wants me to click on some spammy little url because "Lisa from Oregon" lost 60 lbs?

OH RIGHT. I'm a woman.

Just today's little technomicroaggressive reminder that, since I'm female, I probably feel bad about myself because I think I'm fat and unsexy, and might even feel bad enough about it that I might click on some spammy little website that will take advantage of me in other ways.

So, you know, when I report this for being sexist spam targeted at women, it'd be nice if the response wasn't "this doesn't violate our community standards."

Yeah, I know that sexist crap doesn't violate community standards. SUGGESTION: LET'S UPDATE OUR COMMUNITY STANDARDS.

Because I'm not lowering mine.

We should all be feminists - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie at TEDxEuston

The Traditional Christmas Repost: theological reflections on "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer"

theological reflections on "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer"

One of my favorite perennial Christmas classics is that edition of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeerwhere Burl Ives narrates as Sam the Talking Snowman and sings. You know, the one where the little figurines move around jerkily but endearingly. (For some interesting info about this classic, click here.)

My favorite character in this thing is Hermey, the Elf who wants to be a dentist. Hermey reveals this sick unnatural ambition in a conversation with the Elf Boss, who lectures him threateningly:

Hermey, miserably: Not happy in my work, I guess.
Head Elf: WHAT??!
Hermey: I just don't like to make toys.
Head Elf: Oh well if that's all...WHAT??!! You don't like to make toys?!
Hermey: No.
Head Elf, to others: Hermey doen't like to make toys!
Others: (repeat it down down the line) and in chorus: Shame on you!
Head Elf: Do you mind telling me what you DO wanna do?
Hermey: Well sir, someday, I'd like to be...a dentist.
Head Elf: A DENTIST? Good grief!
Hermey: We need one up here...I've been studying it, it's fascinating, you've no idea, molars and bicuspids and incisors--
Head Elf: Now, listen, you. You're an elf, and elves make toys. Now get to work!

The ontology undergirding the Head Elf's reprimand of Hermey leaves no room for consideration of an elf who deviates from his "nature" by not liking to make toys. It's simply inconceivable. Hermey's attempt to "fit in" is stymied when, engrossed in the task of providing teeth for some dolls, he misses elf practice and suffers another confrontation with the Head Elf, which concludes with the Head Elf's vicious assertion, "You'll NEVER fit in!" Miserable, Hermey jumps out the window in self-imposed exile, his only option to be true to himself.

Rudolph's situation is parallel. Born with the disgusting congenital deformity of a red glowing nose, his parents are horrified (even his own mother can only weakly offer, "we'll have to overlook it," while his father goes so far as to actually hide it by daubing mud on his son's face.) Later, at the "reindeer games," Rudolph outshines the other reindeer in skill, but when his prosthesis falls off, everyone gasps and his erstwhile playmates mock and shun. The authority figures echo this attitude: the Coach gathers everyone up and leads them away, saying loudly, "From now on, we won't let Rudolph join in any of our reindeer games!"

Santa's role throughout most of the cartoon is to legitimize the prejudices against the misfits already evident in lesser members of the Christmastown community. When Santa visits the newly birthed Rudolph, his unthinking prejudice becomes plain when he comments that Rudoplh had better grow out of it if he ever wants to be on his team of flying reindeer. Santa's behavior at the scene of the reindeer games is even more disturbing; like his pronouncement at Rudolph's birth, he says, "What a pity; he had a nice takeoff, too." For Santa, Rudolph's skill is less important than his nose, an arbitrary physical attribute. A distant and authoritarian figure, Santa is unaware of Hermey's plight (apparently the welfare of elves is beneath his notice) and condemning of Rudolph's gall in considering himself a reindeer of the same worth and dignity as the others.

Rudolph and Hermey get together, and a few lines of their "misfit theme song" are revealing:

"We're a couple of misfits, we're a couple of misfits--
What's the matter with misfits?
That's where we fit in.

We may be different from the rest...
But who decides the test
of what is really best?"

In "Christmastown," those who decide "the test of what is really best" seem to be the tyrannical and thoughtless majority, reinforced by authoritarian sanction by Santa, the pseudo-benevolent despot. Those who question the status quo--those who are already marginalized--are mocked, punished, and driven out of the community.

Over the years it's become apparent to me that this simple children's cartoon contains some real subversive elements: Hermey's misfit-ness is the result of apparent "choice," but the kind of choice where the alternatives are to be true or false to oneself. Rudolph's misfit-ness is the result of birth rather than choice. Change "dentist" to "gay" and "red nose" to "black skin." Now the subversive message is clear: Santa is racist, the Head Elf and the elf community is homophobic, and "Christmastown" is really "Whiteytown."

Given this subtext, the change of heart on the parts of Santa and the Head Elf at the end are more than just the formulaic ending to a well-known Christmas fable. Although it takes a prodigious feat of community service on both Hermey's and Rudolph's parts (each requiring skills peculiar to their misfit-ness) to bring the authorities and the community to repentance, repentance is indeed the note sounded in the conclusion. Everyone, including Santa, apologizes to the misfits. And in the end, difference is valorized rather than exiled.

Mama's Rules for Dressing Well

#feministheels

"One might say that the measure of women's liberation is any culture is at least partly indicated by whether or not they wear shoes that allow them to walk freely!" Rosemary Radford Ruether, Sexism and God-Talk, 176.

One might, but one probably ought not to go much beyond that, and certainly shouldn't suggest that a feminist in high heels is like Dawkins in a rosary.

I have some basic rules for dress for myself and my daughters, and they go pretty much like this:

1) Anything you wear shouldn't hurt any part of your body.
2) What you wear should keep you warm (or cool) enough.
3) What you wear should let you do what you plan to do in it (that is, be functional and appropriate to the specific occasion).
4) You should feel good about what you're wearing.

These rules are a work in progress. As my bright-shining brilliant, beautiful oldest continues to, well, get older (dang it!) I keep revisiting these basic guidelines--gauging whether or not she is following them…and whether I am, too. She's great at it--as, I think, most kids would be, if we encouraged them to think of dress and clothing in these ways. Me, not so much; I have some unlearning to do, still, especially about #4. (Not too long ago, I recall, I went on a brief FB rant about the evils of pleated pants, because I wasn't #4ing very well that day.)

But I'm getting better, and it's pretty awesome to have a 7-year-old role model to learn from.

But none of these rules mean I won't be wearing my incredible hand-knitted (yes: this is me, bragging about my knitting skillz) lace stockings and vintage heels.

The last time I put on a pair of heels for a fancy dinner out, my husband teased me about it. Then Clare, hypocrisy radar bleeping, joined in: "you shouldn't be wearing ouchie shoes!"

Yes, I get it. I worked for a few years in an orthopedic shoe store and I am a proponent of comfy shoes. I tell people all the time that putting the investment in for really good shoes is worth it. And day in, day out, I still wear the shoes that I bought years ago on employee discount from my fabulous boss at the Princeton Foot Solutions store (hi Linda! muah!).

I don't put anything on that hurts. If I can't walk in it or dance in it, what's the point? You can't look fancy or feel fabulous if you're hobbling across a room wondering why the hell your table is in the farthest corner.

But most often, I wear heels for a couple hours at a time in a context where there's more sitting than walking, and when the point is to be extravagantly, flagrantly fabulous. Maybe even (gasp!) sexy…which for me, like a lot of women brought up in the kind of purity/modesty culture of American conservative Christianity, is a reclamation of our bodies and their goodness.

My anniversary comes up in a few days and you can bet I'll be rocking some #feministheels and showing my daughter that Mama can be fancy as well as sensible, sexy as well as grubby, fun as well as hardworking. And that when it comes to Dressing Well, it's about feeling good in your body, and accomplishing what you set out to accomplish--be that dazzling your students with a philosophy lecture or dazzling your spouse at an anniversary dinner.

today's new mommy song

Oooooooh,
manufactured crises are the best ones to have
that's why we make them up all the time

You lost the pencil you just had in your hand?
Well that's a manufactured crisis right there!

Cooooooooon--
gratulations because manufactured crises are the best ones to have
that's why we make them up all the time

You still need a pencil to do your homework?
Well there's lots of pencils in this house
When you manufacture problems you can make solutions too
Go look for a pencil right now!

Oooooooooh.\,
manufactured crises are the best ones to have
because we can manufacture fixes for them too.

Sexism and schism: a response to Tony Jones

Tony's recent post on Theoblogy has--as Tony's posts often do--kicked off a discussion that free ranges across denominational lines and ideologies. Links to and discussions of It's Time for a Schism appeared in multiple places in my information pipeline, expected (my twitter feed, Facebook newsfeed) and unexpected (in an online support group I participate in, on a discussion thread on a Church of Christ preacher's blog series I'm following). It's these unexpected places that prompt me to respond here because, clearly, Tony's post has contributed to furthering the conversation  about gender justice in Churches of Christ, a conversation I'm very much invested in.

My first response to Tony's post can be found here on Theoblogy, but I'll repost my comment here as well:

JTB 

• 4 days ago

• −

hi Tony,
I appreciate your passion on this. As a woman, a theologian, and life long CofCer (that's Churcha-Christer, verbalized) I want to affirm your anger and the need for justice. And, also to defend why I "stay" within a church denomination that (typically) refuses not only to allow women into leadership and (paid) ministry positions, but to allow women's voices to be heard and women's bodies to occupy space "up front" during corporate worship.

First I want to say that I don't counsel other people to do what I'm attempting to do. The "stay or go" question is vexing and complicated and there's no one size fits all answer, I think. But I don't encourage people to stay in a church environment that has become toxic to them (my husband left years ago and is now happy being an Episcopal priest).
So, since I don't counsel other people to stay put as a more righteous or effective response to this injustice, why do I? Because I can, and because at the moment I think I can do more good by staying rather than leaving. It's a unique possibility given my location and resources and education and network, and so I'm doing my best to utilize these things well. 
But I engage the work, not because I want to reform the institution or change the Church of Christ, per se. I engage in this work because I care deeply about the women sitting in the pews for whom leaving is still an unimaginable possibility, and the little girls who grow up hearing things that make them feel like, and I quote, "Jesus only died for the boys." There are so many of them. And for those who find the courage to leave, hallelujah: be free in Christ to serve and glorify God with all that you are. For those who are still stuck, I'll stick around.

For anyone who's connected with the CofC and is interested in working toward gender justice in the CofC, gal328.org is still around and thriving. :)

23  2 

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I want to be clear about what I affirm, and what I challenge, about Tony's call for schism as I understand it (and in this phrasing I acknowledge that of course I may be interpreting some things wrong, and welcome dialogue on any errors as this is always helpful). 

First, Tony's post is being heard by at least some in Churches of Christ who may be unaware that the kind of schism he calls for--a principled individual severance with an oppressive system--has been happening in our churches over this very issue over the last few decades, in increasing numbers. People have left over what we have learned to label "women's roles in the church," and are continuing to leave. Many are of course women gifted for forms of service and ministry restricted to them; many are those who leave in solidarity with those women. But typically, this schism has been a slow, diachronic, quiet one, more of an exodus of people who aren't interested in making it hard for those they leave behind, whom they love as brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers in Christ. They leave as Ursula K. LeGuin describes those who walk away from Omelas: one day, they simply go.

And so it's easy for those who aren't looking for the missing ones to continue without ever realizing who is missing. Part of what we in Churches of Christ need to realize is, then, that these of our number are missing. This is the reason gal328.org hosts a wiki named "Exodus," a collaborative project aimed at shining a spotlight on those who have left and pursued ministry elsewhere. This is a list of people who have courageously moved, like Abraham, from the familiarity of home to the unknown land of Ur on the strength of faith in God alone. They ought not be forgotten.

I believe Tony's post and the discussion around it may be calling some attention to this, and that is indeed a result for which I am grateful.

The main thing I find most helpful about Tony's posts on this is that he is issuing a call for effective action. Tony is tired of talking. And here once again I want to affirm, for I am also rather tired of talking. We've been talking a long time, we in the Churches of Christ, and precious little has changed. Talk, after all, is cheap.

So here is where I return to my first response, and aim to perhaps clarify some of my comment, and also pose a genuine question.

While validating this call to effective action, I don't think that schism, either in the classic sense or in the individual severance sense, is a strategy for effecting systemic change. 

This is tricky territory here on the "stay or go" question; it's a question I've been asked many times in friendly and unfriendly ways, and a question ever CofCer concerned with gender justice wrestles with at some point. It's tricky territory because it's hard to hear someone's explanation of the reasons they "stay" without feeling like some judgment is thereby passed on those who "leave." So I want to be clear in stating: I consider those who leave courageous. I know what kind of guts it takes to leave. Many who have "left" are among my private canon of personal saints, and you people know who you are. I praise God for your lives and witness.

So when I say, again, that leaving is not a strategy for systemic change, that is no judgment on those who have left. It is an observation that Omelas doesn't disappear when those who walk away, walk away.

So I want to construct a way of staying which is faithful to the call to effective action I hear at the heart of Tony's post, because what we disagree on here is not urgency or necessity or justice but what, in the end, effective action is. Schism leaves unjust systems intact--and untroubled.

This brings me (finally!) to my question, which is, simply, is it really schism you're calling for? Or is it that, like me, and so very many others, the call is to effective action, and the challenge is to imagine adequate models for it?

*a technical note: I am blogging via phone while sick in my hotel bed after a very full AAR and I promise to link everything properly later! Apologies in the meantime.

Overheard on the way to NWSA

First Man: "Did anyone see Stephanie get on the plane?"

Second Man: "She's not coming. I just got an email saying 'I'm counting on you.'"

First Man: "She's not COMING? ...I can't BELIEVE her."

Second Man: "I just got the email."

First Man: "She is such a FLAKE. She scheduled this meeting and now she's not even here. She is so SCATTERBRAINED. I just can't stand her."

Third Man with a pic of his toddler as his laptop wallpaper: "I don't really know her at all, so..."

First Man: "...Wants to be in charge, doesn't want to do any of the work."

unscientific survey

A few days ago, I found myself trying to adequately convey to a class of 30 undergrads what I meant by the phrase "unmarked identity" (ostensibly, we were discussing Rawls and his "original position" behind the "veil of ignorance") and why it's problematic.

So, on the spot, I tried this: "Okay. Girls. Answer this: do you ever walk into a room full of people without being consciously aware of the fact that you are a woman?" A pretty much unanimous "no." Then I asked the boys. "Do you ever enter a room full of people feeling conscious of the fact that you are a man?" Blank stares like the question didn't even make sense. No, of course not.

This, y'all. This is why "unmarked" equals "privilege."

a break

"I need a break…I need a break…I need a break…I need a break…"

As mantras go, it's not that edifying.

But these are the words that I found pouring out of me this past weekend. And not just words. I found myself crooning them, like a blues singer, in a melody I've not heard before and that I didn't plan. And it just didn't stop. All the anxiety and exhaustion and inadequacy and anger and longing and sadness flowed into this spontaneous song as I held Z in my arms and she hugged me because she could tell that whatever Mommy was singing, it was sad.

It was also peaceful and beautiful in a way I've rarely experienced. It was confession and prayer in a way that took me by surprise.

When it ended, I carried Z into the kitchen to get her the snack she had asked for, the thing that had pushed me over the edge into that surreal moment of prayerful confession, and did what I needed to. No less tired, no less lonely, no less anxious and sad, but less angry.

I don't know what it all means. But I do know that, whatever that was, it helped. It didn't solve anything and it didn't change anything, but it helped.

today

Today the internet told me,

"In Genesis, Eve wanted to become equal to God. Thus, that women want to be equal,
considered the same as men, is to be expected....So God assigning men to teach and to lead in their congregations and in their families is a way to remind women that they are
human and therefore not above instruction and correction."

TecnaMonsterFairyTaleHigh and the Future of the Female Body

In chapter 3 of Cyborg Selves I offer a detailed analysis of the way gender and human sexuality is envisioned in two distinct posthuman discourses. One, of course, is the feminist cyborg discourse begun by Donna Haraway's "Cyborg Manifesto," and the other is the analysis of gender and human sexuality offered by James Hughes and George Dvorsky in their Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies white paper entitled, "Postgenderism: Beyond the Gender Binary."

I won't recap everything here, but suffice to say, I find these two discourses on gender and sexuality to be in opposition to each other in important ways, and the contrasts between the two ultimately rest on their divergent views of the human body, and in this instance, the female body particularly. [If you want to know more, well hey, take that $100 you've got lying around just waiting to be spent and click the link on the sidebar and get yourself a copy of the book! :)]

One of the assumptions in Hughes and Dvorsky's analysis of transhumanism and gender is that technological interventions on the human body are the ultimate means of addressing the social injustices  surrounding gender. They anticipate a future where, by means of various technologies, people will be able to consciously select certain "gendered" traits, according to personal preference, thus dismantling the "gender binary" that we have (presumably) inherited from our unaltered biology. The vision is one of liberation from that restrictive binary by altering our bodies at will.

There are a lot of things here to take issue with, from my point of view, but again--read the book.

What I want to focus on here is a new wrinkle of worry about this approach to gender and biotechnology and the posthuman future, prompted by my latest brush with the rampant sexualization and body distortion and stereotyping and reduction and limitation in children's media and the toy industry.

This past week Clare asked me to please rethink my ban on Winx Club. The girls at her school play "Winx" at recess, and while she joins in, she always feels a bit lost because she doesn't watch the show and has to figure out who is who and what is happening. I get that. And she was super thoughtful about asking me to rethink, and suggested I watch an episode. And promised that if I did let her watch it she would ignore all the inappropriate stuff (oh how I wish it worked that way). Of course it also turns out that she had been illicitly bingewatching on the iPad after Netflix put temptation right in front of her face. Sigh. #parentfail.

So, I watched an episode. And it basically made my brain explode and dribble out my ears. It was beyond the horrible I had braced myself for.

Then I saw the newest toy to come down the corporate pike for my daughter: Fairy Tale High.

Great! They're like Bratz, only not Bratz because they're, like, fairy-tale-ish. They're like Monster High, only not, 'cuz they're fairy-tale-ish. They're like Winx and _____ and _____ and ______ only not, 'cuz they're fairy tale princesses in their secret life instead of fairies and _____ and ______. Wow! That's what we call OPTIONS!

Pigtail Pals member Bailey Shoemaker Richards says it:

I mean, just look at them. You literally cannot tell these things apart.

What does the above picture have to do with transhumanist aspirations to postgenderism, I bet you're wondering.

That's great, because I'm about to tell you.

First, there's the basic question that Melissa Atkins Wardy at Pigtail Pals puts to us, which is, what are our girls (and boys!) learning from these distorted representations of the female body, and limited, frivolous representations of girlhood?

Yes, that's rhetorical. We know what they're learning, and it is false, and it is harmful.

My question is, what happens when these internalized false and harmful notions of what girls and women's bodies are supposed to look like collide with the ever-more-inventive technologies we use on those bodies?

Will we get the transhumanist utopian vision of technologically mediated gender equity, and human bodies that, again via technological mediation, defy the presumed biological gender binary?

Or will we get women who seek to sculpt their bodies into the distorted representations we've been handing them as the ideal and norm ever since they were born, and men who expect that?

the smoke alarm epiphany

I was sitting in the office at home, diligently struggling along on my dissertation, when I started hearing it. A high pitched, annoying, repetitive beep that echoed along the hallway and was eerily hard to pinpoint. And it kept happening. Again. And again. And again.

Every time it happened, I was shaken out of my compositional reverie, lost focus, and had to recover my train of thought before plunging back into my text.

I told Brent about it that night and he said, yeah, the smoke alarm probably needs a battery change.

The next day: beepbeepbeep. Beepbeepbeep. Beepbeepbeep.

I was hacked. I was mad. I was righteously indignant. I yelled into the otherwise quiet empty house: why didn't he FIX this? doesn't he KNOW I'm trying to work here? Didn't I TELL him I couldn't concentrate with this godforsaken noise? WHY didn't he take care of this for me?!

Then I realized.

I can change a battery.

So I did.

dear netflix.

Dear netflix.com,

Unless you make it possible for me, as a concerned and responsible parent, to block certain suggested viewing options daughters' personal viewing profiles, I will be discontinuing the use of your service.

I was under the false impression that setting up profiles would take care of the issue of my daughters potentially encountering inappropriate viewing material.

But here is a screenshot of the current suggested items for my little girl.

My daughter loves Daniel Tiger. And Finn the Human Boy and Jake the Magic Dog. And George the monkey. And squeaky voiced Elmo. And the Powah-gulls. And Justin and Squidgy. And Mona the Vampire. And that's great, because she's 2.

But she does not need tiny-waisted sexy Bratz fairies with anorexic limbs and boyfriends in her life. Or Barbie. Frankly, none of us do. So please, dear netflix.com powers-that-be, stop suggesting to her that she ought to be watching them instead of Daniel Tiger.

mugga mugga,

Clare and Zadie's mom

***update: I've had two informative chats with the online help at netflix.com, and here's the result. You can exercise some measure of control over this, but it's not intuitive. When you set up profiles there's a box to check or uncheck that says "kids under 12." So, when Brent set up the profiles, he clicked that Clare and Z's were kid profiles by clicking that box. Because that seems easy-peasy and all. However, Netflix actually has four different age-related ratings, Little Kids, Older Kids, Teens, and Adults. You can find that when you go to your account settings, but it doesn't give age ranges and also, if you've already clicked the box on the individual profiles for "kid under 12," it doesn't let you change the parental control setting to "little kid." You have to go unclick the box on the profile, and then it will give you the option to set the profile to "little kid."

That's the good news.

The bad news is, despite having rated 100+ kids movies and clicked on "not interested" for Barbie, Winx Club, etc., they remain in full view on both my daughters' profiles in the top category of suggestions, "popular on Netflix." I can't get them to go away. So, Winx Club remains, literally, the first thing my daughter will see on her home page. Presumably it will eventually disappear because she won't be watching it, and it will get replaced with suggestions only from the "little kid" category, but I don't know when that will happen.

The bigger problem I see in all this is, as a parent, I have no surefire way to block content, and what I do have is non-intuitive and labor-intensive. At 7 Clare is aging out of little kid territory pretty soon. Parental control is not content-based, at least not directly, but age-category based, and someone other than me is making decisions about what content is appropriate for what age--and in general, what content is appropriate, period. Or worse, and more accurately, they're not making any judgments about appropriate content, because that's not really their job--which means that at, as soon as I click "older kids" for Clare, we're in Winx Club territory no matter what. So, fine, that's not actually their job--it's mine, because I'm the parent. But I need a better way to do my job. I can't blame Netflix for the larger issues of structural sexism and the early childhood sexualization of girls that is rampant in media--but given that this is a huge problem, I think a big fat red VETO button for any cartoon that will teach my daughter false and harmful things about her gender and sexuality is necessary.