One of these things is not like the others.

"We have to renew people’s faith in the promise of this country together: business & government, workers & CEOs, Democrats & Republicans."

- President Obama, via Twitter in February.

I believe that Barack Obama is an idealist. I buy that, on some level, he really, genuinely, whole-heartedly means what he says when he says shit like the tweet above. I think he thinks that all those disparate forces can really come together at a picnic table at the White House and drink beer together, or something.

I also think he's smart enough to know, on some other level, that he's totally full of horseshit. I said it before, I'll say it again: he's a Chicago politician, not some fresh-faced yokel just off the turnip truck. I think he knows what political realities are at play in Washington and elsewhere, and I think he makes the compromises he has to in order to act upon his priorities.

But in that statement above, one of those disparate forces stands out to me: workers. The rest of them - CEOs, business, government, Democrats, and Republicans - these are all powerful groups of people with deep coffers and plenty of access to decision-makers and policy-makers. All of these groups are doing just fine, making money and profit and doing each other favor after favor. CEOs and Big Business (which are really effectively the same damn thing) basically give campaign money and kickbacks and freebies to Democrats and Republicans (who pretty much are government); in exchange, government gives Big Business tax cuts and favorable legislation (health care "reform" and globalization and farm subsidies, etc.).

Workers on the other hand? Get nothing but screwed. I am starting to wonder if the president really has the good of the common person at heart....because his actions leave a lot of room for question there.

Thoughts on Making Music: The Art of Craft, and Snobbery

This is long and rambly and less cogent than I would like. But I'm tired, and I want to express my opinion, finish my late lunch, take a sleeping pill, and go to bed....so mmmmmmfuckit, I'm posting away. Like it or not, people!

I recently came across a couple unrelated pieces of commentary from sources I respect, lamenting various aspects of the State of Music Today. Technology has progressed so much that any-ol'-body with a laptop can crank out a record. Our new-thing-is-the-new-old-thing consumerist flavor-of-the-moment culture pressures musicians to make lots and lots and lots of music all the time. A new album every year! Plus bonus content! And website freebies in between! Plus live cuts! Plus design tee shirts! Plus tweet and Facebook and cross-promote and network and street team and yada yada yada.

And all of this is why we have so little truly good music, with the staying power to be listened to for decades versus days. We have quantity, but very little quality.

I mean, don't get me wrong. I know there's a lot of crap music being foisted on the unsuspecting masses. I've been making my own music for a decade, and I have seen performers who couldn't carry a tune, strum a chord, or string together a coherent lyric...and somehow still manage to assemble the nerve to get up in front of an audience and do their thing. (I will try not get into the sidebar discussions about the subjective nature of taste - I mean, I love bagpipes - or the capriciousness of musical success - which I firmly believe is 5% talent, 10% work, and 85% pure luck.)

I've also spent a fair amount of time combing through various sources in search of new music for my own listening enjoyment - particularly places like garageband.com (now defunct), Amie Street (now defunct), and the old mp3.com (also now defunct), where indie musicians could share their material without paying through the nose. I have listened to a lot of random tunes over the years, and I have found some really amazing stuff....but I've stumbled onto way more mediocre-to-awful stuff.

So, yes. Point taken that the instant nature of the internet and the relative availability of the means to produce and distribute music have made a lot more crap a lot more easily available to a lot more people on a lot shorter timeline. A profit-driven music industry has encouraged this because more new music means more money to be made, especially if the big labels aren't shilling out on the front end. Toss on top of it a music blogging scene that puts every blogger on the hunt for a fresh discovery and the ego stroke that comes of finding that ever-elusive needle in an ever-growing haystack? Well, it's not exactly an environment that rewards musicians willing to study, hone their craft, and lavish extensive time on creating music - especially not the kind of music that is universal and classic and stands the test of time (which, for purposes of this ramble, we're going to use as the definition of Great Music).

But the world of music is not so small that there isn't room for diversity in more than just genre. I mean, I think Van Gogh's Starry Night is the most beautiful painting I have ever seen with my own eyes. It stole my breath and left me in tears, and seeing it was one of the most vivid experiences of my life. In my apartment, though, I have a piece of glass artwork, carved in a damask pattern in black and silver, made by a local artisan. Is it as beautiful as Starry Night? No. Does it make me cry when I see it hanging on the wall every day? No. Does it have less value in my life? Tough call....but I know that I like it enough to display it in my home, and that has worth. There's room for lots of different types of art and beauty, and they are all valuable in their different ways....and the same is true for music.

Which is my way of saying there's room for one-hit-wonders and cheesy pop songs and mediocre bubblegum. A songwriter friend of mine used to tell herself, whenever she was feeling like her lyrics weren't meaningful or elegant enough, "She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah." I mean, even Lennon & McCartney didn't write nothing but "Yesterday." Hell, my fave songwriter of all time wrote both "Time in a Bottle" *and* "Rapid Roy, the Stock Car Boy." A songwriter's catalog is likely to be as diverse as their experience....which, you know, goes for music in general, as well. Art, life, yada yada.

There's a kind of snobbery that I see in a lot of this sort of conversation about the arts, and often it comes down to the idea that, essentially, there's "good" and "bad" art. There's art that has value (the Mona Lisa! Swan Lake! Kandinsky! Shakespeare! art house flicks! Beethoven! etc.), and art that is...disposable? Less meaningful? Lower brow? (Dogs Playing Poker, comic books, Britney Spears, stand up comedy, romance novels, boy bands, action films, etc.)

I know this snobbery exists because I fight the inclination in myself, particularly when someone mentions singing karaoke. But I recognize that that's my ego talking. I want to feel superior because I've put in time and effort in service of my art. I want to feel like I've somehow earned superiority. And that is total crap.

Art is subjective, in both the creation and consumption. There is no One True Way to make music (or any other art), any more than there is only One True Kind of music to enjoy. The beauty of this diversity lies not only in the way people can sift through the maelstrom to find the creations that speak to them in the voice they want to hear....but also in the way different processes of creation can develop. Some artists need or prefer or have the *luxury* of hiding in a cabin for two years creating their masterwork...and some take whatever demo their manager hands them and spend twenty minutes pouring it into a microphone to be Auto-Tuned and compressed into submission in the mix. Much as I'm sure my own personal biases show in the way I phrased that...I don't believe that one of these is a more valid way to make art, or yields music that is inherently more worthy than the other.

One of my least favorite aspects of this bullshit hierarchy is the concept of a guilty pleasure. You know, stuff you really like, but don't want to admit to liking because some invisible authority looks down on it for some reason. Anybody who's seen me roll my eyes at the slickly over-produced electronically-augmented "perfection" of Glee knows that I sometimes instinctively buy into that invisible authority myself....but since I have paid money for music by Hanson, the Spice Girls, Garth Brooks, Debbie Gibson, Chumbawumba, and the Black Eyed Peas, I'm not sure why I have it in for the latest incarnation of Pop Music Goodness. Obviously there are times when slick and overproduced don't bother me at all. (Say it with me: taste is subjective.)

When I play out, I tend to get a lot of positive feedback. My singing, in particular, tends to garner me a lot of compliments, and one of the things I tell people is that a lot of my vocal skill is the result of training. "Anyone could do it," I say, "if they spent ten years learning how." I really do believe that is true, but I'll tell you what I believe that is more important: I think people should feel free to sing even if they haven't studied it for ten years. I think people should feel free to make music even if they can't carry a tune, strum a chord, or string together a coherent lyric. I think making music is a birthright of the human race, and that anybody should make it if they feel like it, regardless of whether they're "good" at it, or if the music they make appeals to anyone else. I think that music, whether I actually like it or not, is just as valid and valuable and worthy as the music I make.

Furthermore, it's this bullshit hierarchy, this idea that there's "good" and "bad" art, that keeps so many people from expressing their creativity. It keeps art of all kinds from being considered as vital to education as math or science or geography or language. It keeps people from trying, from taking creative risks, from exploring the full extent of their own potential as human beings.

There is value in studying a craft and learning from what others have done. There is also value in following inspiration, regardless of precedent. Excluding either diminishes the whole.

Case in point: any asshole can write a blog.

Linkage.

La vida has been sort of weird and upsy-downsy lately. Mercury retrograde probably isn't helping, but it's also just the nature of plans changing and, you know, life happening in unexpected ways. C'est la vie! (So, lessee, that's "life" in three languages so far, eh?) Anyway, I've been spending a lot of time navel-gazing and trying to spread my intellectual recognition of how fucking lucky I am into a visceral and experiential understanding. It's not as easy as it sounds, I am finding.

Meanwhile, yesterday yielded some interesting stuff that I found by turns inspiring, motivating, and soothing. Some of it was meandering into Millennium Park for lunch, only to stumble into Serendipity, a performance troupe featuring various seniors performing (the bits I saw, anyway) some ass-kicking Motown soul music. "Stand By Me" was haunting me yesterday (which, of course, makes me want ot pull it out and whip up a version myself).

Also, last night at pottery class, I think I maybe made some stuff that doesn't suck. Though, you know, we'll see. Still has to be fired and glazed. I'll take pictures if it isn't butt ugly.

Other things that caught my eye and imagination and set my heart aflutter yesterday:

** T. Thorn Coyle, a capital-T Teacher whose work isn't mine (but whose integrity, humanity, taste, and hair I admire nonetheless), writes about...well, a lot of stuff: paganism, how sex-positivity interacts with sex education and the sacred, integrity and authority and, well, just go read it (yes, all of it!): Clay Feet, part one, Clay Feet, part two, and Clay Feet, part three.

** A link at Shakesville led me to Playing for Change, an organization that brings together musicians from all over the world to promote peace. I don't know how I have managed not to hear about this before, but I am blown away. I watched all the online episodes, and downloaded the electronic version of the CD posthaste (though I will likely also pick up the combo CD/DVD to get the documentary part). It's inspiring, but it also makes me want to write more protest songs....which, as anybody who knows me knows, I am not great at.

** This article at New York magazine (tweeted by @fingertipsmusic) talks interestingly about attention, meditation, and the idea that our experience is composed of whatever we pay attention to. Money quote: "It’s possible that we’re evolving toward a new techno-cognitive nomadism, in which restlessness will be an advantage." I should be so lucky, 'cause I pretty much find my own restlessness to be an advantage for fuck all.

** The Freak Revolution was recently launched by my friend Kyeli and her partner Pace. I like a lot of the ideas they've talked about so far....though I'm not sure that it quite fits what I'm working with in general, or where I am right now. Having said that, totally worth checking out, just as one more way to shift away from the dominant (crap) paradigm!

....and thus concludes this friendly, neighborhood linkage. Happy weekend, y'all!

Newsflash: Fat People Are Killing the Planet

Okay, so everybody and their sibling has already debunked and mocked this ridiculous bullshit, but I have to take a quick crack at the version that popped up in my feed reader this morning. The intersection of fat activism and environmentalism holds a special place in my heart, because I think the problems to which they relate can be traced to connected root causes (consumer culture and unrestrained capitalism, in case you were wondering).

So, first, the bullhockey from "HealthDay News:"

Watching your weight does more than protect your health. It also may help fight climate change.

First sentence, first bullshit assumption! Weight has fuck all to do with health. People of all sizes have health problems.

Researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine say that because food production is a major contributor to greenhouse gases, a lean population, such as in Vietnam, consumes about 20 percent less food and produces fewer greenhouse gases than a population in which 40 percent of people are obese, a rate close to that of the United States.

All right, let's just start with the name of this school: Hygiene and Tropical Medicine? I swear, that sounds like a punchline all by itself!

More to the point, though, what they're saying is that the more people eat, the more greenhouse gases produced. Um, actually, no. The more food produced by industrial means, the more greenhouse gases produced. Whether it is eaten or not is beside the point, not only from an environmental perspective, but also from the manufacturer's perspective. I mean, the interconnected parts of the industrial ag world reinforce each other - how many food additives and preservatives were invented as a way to use corn byproducts? The answer is MOST OF THEM. That doesn't happen in a vacuum, it happens within a system involving government subsidies and Big Ag corporations - all looking to make money. They don't care about food, or health, or the environment....they care about profit. Which is not related to what or how much people eat...but profit-seeking measures do tend to directly support habits that piss all over the environment.

Yes, I absolutely agree that food production is a major contributor to greenhouse gases. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: industrial food is toxic on every level imaginable. Vast monocrop farming operations using petrochemical fertilizers destroy soil fertility, pollute waterways, and lock in a cycle of needing more petrochemicals to keep up crop yields from soil that lacks nutrients and the microorganisms that keep healthy soil producing healthy crops. CAFOs are hideously inhumane to the livestock they confine - not to mention they, too, pollute the landscape and waterways, with disastrous results. Oh, and the food is not all that great, either.

But let's look a little more closely at the comparison here: Vietnam is not so much full of skinny people as it is lacking in widespread industrial agriculture. In fact, I'm guessing (since Vietnam's agriculture is only 20% of its GDP, and that's mostly cashews and rice) they probably don't have anything like the food industry we have here in the States. I'm guessing that might account for the smaller environmental footprint, more than the comparative smallness of Vietnam's collective ass.

But wait! There's more total asshattery:

"When it comes to food consumption, moving about in a heavy body is like driving around in a gas guzzler," the researchers said. "The heavier our bodies become, the harder and more unpleasant it is to move about in them, and the more dependent we become on our cars. Staying slim is good for health and for the environment."

This statement makes me so blindingly furious, I had to take a deep breath and stop myself from screaming at the office.

First of all, the meme that fat people eat more than thin people is total crap. I'm not digging up studies or stats, I'm just gonna cite some anecdata - most people know a thin person who eats twice hir weight in bon-bons at every meal...and some big fat fatty who's always eating half a lettuce leaf on the Diet of the Month. The size of a person has fuck all to do with how much or what they eat. Human beings are not all built and wired the same way, and people of identical size (if you could find two such people) might eat similar quantities of food....or they might not. There is NO WAY to know.

Second of all, though I can certainly acknowledge that there are some weights at which movement can be problematic (and with these types of disability, I smell a chicken/egg scenario), I do not find it to be true that the bigger I get, the harder it is to move around and the more dependent I become on a car. I weigh well over 300 pounds (yeah, I said it), and I don't even own a car - my primary form of transport is my feet (with a little help from the much-greener-than-a-car CTA). I also have no trouble dancing around like a maniac, or trying out all kinds of physical activity. Any issues I do have with mobility come not from my giant fat ass, but from the tailbone I broke five years ago that still bothers me sometimes (only time I find movement "unpleasant"). Which, I guess, is sort of located in the vicinity of my giant fat ass....but I think you see my point.

I don't have to point out the correlation of higher BMIs and lower income, lower income with lack of car ownership and use of mass transit, and use of mass transit with *lower* environmental impact...do I?

Also, moving around in a heavy body is NOT like driving around in a gas guzzler, actually. If we buy the idea that fat people have low metabolisms (which I don't exactly buy, and believe varies greatly from person to person), then it's more like driving around in a hybrid - because low metabolisms are *more* efficient, not less. I swear, do these alleged academics actually think about the logic of what they say before opening their mouths??

Finally, there's this:

"We need to be doing a lot more to reverse the global trend toward fatness and recognize it as a key factor in the battle to reduce emissions and slow climate change," they said.

Actually, you know what would be more effective in reducing emissions and slowing climate change? Let me bullet point this, so it's easy for researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine to understand.

• Dismantle industrial agriculture. Stop monocrop operations, petrochemical fertilizer/pesticide usage, CAFOs, etc. Encourage local farming, kitchen gardens, urban agriculture, etc.


• Create mass transit systems that work. Which means systems that actually get people where they need to go, and makes it reasonable for people to live without cars. See also: walkable neighborhoods, bike paths, and the death of far-flung car-based suburbs.


• Switch to renewable energy sources. Like hydro, geothermal, solar & wind power, that don't rely on fossil fuels or pump greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. And we're talking a meaningful switch here, not just a few token windmills. Also, nuclear doesn't count.


• End consumer culture. I struggle with this, but it's important. No more "disposable" anything. Cheap plastic crap is not an option. Planned obsolescence is out of the question. More and more "stuff" means more and more greenhouse gases created during production and manufacture, more and more land laid to waste with pollution and dried-up resources, and more and more landfills producing groundwater contamination and even more greenhouse gases.

There are lots more ways to effect environmental change on a large scale, but these are the ones I think would make the most difference in the shortest time. And not one of these things involves weight loss.

Listen, I understand how fat people are a convenient and semi-logical symbol of the excess that has led the planet to the current environmental crisis. I get how that makes sense and is easily understood shorthand. But you know what? It's fucking lazy not to find a better approach, particularly since this one isn't even grounded in reality. If every fat person in the world went on a diet (or at least the comparative few who aren't *already* dieting, anyway), what would happen? Would the air get cleaner? Would the planet stop warming up? Would the polar ice caps start growing again? NO. Diets, at least as the jagoffs who promote diet culture mean them, mean gym memberships (where exercise means a machine powered by electricity) and diet food (generally produced by - you guessed it - Industrial Ag). Setting aside the fact that they don't actually work in the long term (except inasmuch as the point is making diet companies lots of money), diets are not the cure for global warming. Diets are part of the profit-driven system that created it.

Furthermore, this whole "fat people cause global warming" idea isn't just wrong, it contributes to a culture that demeans and oppresses fat people. It's part of why, statistically, fat people (and people who think they're fat, often) have higher rates of depression, make less money, have worse chances of getting jobs and housing, receive shoddy healthcare, and can be charged as if they were two people when flying. At the end of the day, fat people are *people* and deserve the same human rights as anyone else...which they don't get when stereotypes and assumptions and pure misinformation like the drivel above are so pervasive. It's bullshit, and it's wrong.

My head hurts, on a couple levels.

So, I'm working a migraine for the past, hmm, 30 hours or so. I stayed home today, and have managed to stave off the crashing boredom of unending extreme pain that gets worse when I, say, read or watch TV or look at the internet....by working in the occasional brief round of reading (I've got the new Dresden Files to finish!) or watching DVDs (hello, Firefly, my old friend) or looking at the internet (hiya).

What can I say? I am sometimes stupid, and what's a little more pain as compared to the unbearable monotony of laying in bed with a pillow over my eyes, with only the rare dip into blissful sleep to break it up??

Meh. Anyway. During one of these breaks, I flipped on the news, where I saw a clip from the show Britain's Got Talent or whatever it's called, with the shocking revelation that a non-thin, non-sexpot-dressing, non-pop-star-looking-or-sounding person can sing the shit out of a song. And that Simon Cowell, and well, pretty much everyone else in a fucking reality TV show audience is a judgmental doucheface who associates talent with being hot. Well, lemme look around at the world of "famous" people in the past twenty years, and see if I can figure out where people might've made that fucking connection, hmmmm??

Yeah, anybody who's out there in the actual world, not the "real" world as conveyed by "reality" TV, anybody who's working in community theater or a local music scene or going to art shows or any creative endeavor that's not broadcast via mass media....is probably not surprised that a "normal" looking person is incredibly talented. Raise your hands, friends, if you can name five or ten really amazing artists or musicians or writers or actors or dancers who aren't going to show up on the cover of a fashion mag anytime soon. Fucking NO DUH.

Despite the pop culture phenomenon of pretty people getting record deals and better exposure and audience support and yada yada yada (which isn't to say that there aren't "pretty" people who make it by the sweat of their brow and not some "free" ride), talent obnoxiously insists on attaching itself to people from ALL walks of life, with all ranges of physical and mental and emotional states of being.

This reminds me of that old trope connecting madness to genius. Yeah, you know what, there are plenty of people walking the line of mental stability who also happen to make amazing art of some kind....and just as many totally stable artists cranking out interesting works. Just like anything else, there are so many independent factors that go into making each of us who we are, and into the opportunities we are offered and pursue, that to make any kind of gross generalization about any "type" of person is pretty much asking the universe to prove you wrong.

The news played this story with the angle, "Don't judge a book by its cover." Again I say, fucking no duh. How about we stretch our lobes a bit further, though, people? How about we stop telling our collectives selves the story that only pretty people are good? How about we stop deluding ourselves that the only people who can rip our hearts out when they sing songs or play roles or paint pictures or dance around....look or speak or act a certain way?

How about, instead of being shocked that someone so unexpected could be so brilliant, we consider the possibility that everyone we meet just might be brilliant somehow, if we only stopped telling them they weren't, and maybe gave them a spotlight and a microphone?

I'm going back to my dark room and the pillow over my eyes. Maybe when I get up again the world will be a less shitty place?

Ranting about language.

So, despite my best intentions to take a break from the usual stress-and-rage-fueled adrenal fatigue of my day-to-day existence, yesterday I had an episode of raw fury, sparked by a couple things I bumped into while toddling through the afternoon. I have been pondering since, and enjoying (sort of) the reminder of how important language is. And now, I must rant.

I am beyond tired of the way our language is designed to promote the norm, the average, and the assumption that people are all alike. I understand the cultural impetus to support certain standards, but among people who value social justice and are working against patriarchy and broad frameworks of power-over, I think it's critical to find ways to tell individual stories, with respect for multiplicity and an abundance of diversity - as opposed to gross generalizations that inherently deny or devalue alternate experiences. And I think examining how I speak and the language I use is a really important first step towards that goal.

When I was first learning about nonviolent communication, I felt very challenged by what seemed to me to be unnecessarily fine parsing of phrasing and pronouns. I mean, what difference is there in saying "you know how sometimes you feel like life is total shit" and "sometimes I feel like life is total shit"? As I eventually started to recognize - a fuckload of difference. I started seeing how so much of the language I encounter daily is instructive and directive - not just giving me orders, but essentially defining my experience. I think this is why I used to spend a lot of time angry, without ever knowing precisely why....now, I can see how constantly being told how I think and feel would leave me generally and vaguely upset. Particularly since I'm the kind of girl who hates taking orders.

Yeah, I'm talking about marketing and commercials and print ads and mass media....but I'm also talking about conversations with friends and acquaintances, professional interactions, everything. Since shifting my perspective on language and communication, I've pretty much got a running commentary in my head that goes, "No, I don't feel like that. That's not what I think. Nope, that's not how it works for me. No, I've never done that. I don't say that." It's kind of exhausting, actually, because I have to keep reminding myself that my story is not the story I'm being told it is.

In becoming more aware and more sensitive to social justice issues, I've found my awareness of this phenomenon expanded again and again, as I encounter more and more perspectives that are new to me. I mean, I'm an urban-dwelling, non-Christian, middle class, white, fat girl...there's only so much I can understand from where I sit, and I really value hearing other stories that are not mine. I sometimes even like hearing the stories of other urban-dwelling, non-Christian, middle class, white, fat girls, because often their stories are so very different from mine - which is a really great reminder that stereotypes are not gospel, and people vary wildly, even within comparatively narrow demographics.

I find it incredibly frustrating, though, when other people tell their story as if it is universal, or even universal for everyone within some comparatively narrow demographic. I mean, some urban-dwelling people have never milked a cow or seen the Milky Way - but I have. Some middle class people have never lived in a trailer park or eaten government cheese - but I have. There are as many backstories as there are non-Christians and fat people. Operating under the assumption that my story is anything but MY story is delusional, and does a disservice to me and anyone who hears my story.

In particular, I think it's really important to be careful about making assumptions and recommendations based on assumptions. I can't tell every poor girl from the country that if she drops out of college, she'll still wind up making a decent living and doing music on the side - because, sure, that worked for me, and I don't have regrets about it...but every individual case requires its own room to breathe and grow and develop in its own way. Everyone has to consider their choices from their own unique circumstances, and make decisions based on their own hopes and resources and boundaries and willingness to engage in challenging norms.

In short: speak for your fucking self, and stop giving me advice on how to solve problems I don't have, please and thanks. I'll do my best to return the favor.

International Transgender Day of Remembrance

Today, it's the International Transgender Day of Remembrance (click the link for a list of events around the world), and I'm thinking about Duanna Johnson and Lateisha Green and Angie Zapata. I've been thinking about gender as a social construct, and my own past gender complexities, and Prop 8, and my inability to really understand people who maintain hatred based on someone else's sex life or sex organs.

Some of my thinking was sparked by this commentary via Media Matters, from Minneapolis radio host Chris Baker. Baker said, in part (I'm only quoting this much - go to Media Matters if you want more of his drivel):

"I would say a majority of the blame does not lie with the nitwit that shot him, other than the fact that he's a nitwit and a guy who should have been in prison in my opinion, who shot him. But to me, this is the -- this is an example of how, by enabling people and trying to push this false reality, leads to horrible crimes like this."

Now, firstly, Baker is clearly a douchebag: murderers are not nitwits, they're people who have committed the ultimate act of violence, and the fact that their victims have lost their lives deserves a little fucking gravity - certainly more than the term "nitwit" encompasses. On top of this, Baker is employing a variation on the "she was asking for it" victim-blaming technique of putting the responsibility for preventing violence onto the person who suffered from it. That's plenty asstastic, but Baker's equally wankeriffic larger premise is that the media's acceptance of a person's chosen gender and its attendant pronouns...makes trans folk bold and confident enough to "go anywhere" and "walk into any party." Because walking into any party is obviously provocation enough to justify murder. Obviously, this is total bullshit.

I believe that anyone, regardless of birth sex or perceived gender presentation, should be able to go anywhere without fear of harassment or violence. Assholes like Chris Baker don't share that belief, and if nothing else illustrates the cultural divide I see in America these days, that fucking does. Here's a hint, Chris: if you're offended by the sight of someone who was born with a penis presenting as someone who doesn't have a penis, that would be YOUR problem. A trans woman getting comfy in her skin? Only bothers people who aren't comfortable in theirs. Or that's my amateur pop-psych theory, anyway.

I personally have experienced gender to be a pretty fucking fluid and slippery thing, and my own feelings and preferences and beliefs about my gender change based on circumstance and mood and a bazillion other conscious and unconscious factors. And at the end of the day, do I think it should really matter? No. Regardless of what genitalia I'm carrying around in my pants, or what I want to do with that genitalia and in whose company I want to do it, or the way I dress or think or behave....I'm still a human being worthy of respect. The fact that I do identify as a woman, and was born into a female body, is just dumb fucking luck, as I see it - and shouldn't get me any special treatment (though, hey, fair treatment I would totally love).

All the trappings of all genders ought to be accessible to anyone interested in enjoying them. Makeup and frilly dresses? Not just for chicks. Ditto for having babies, nurturing, getting emotional, and high heels. Power tools and guzzling beer? Not just for dudes. Ditto for pants and athletic prowess and math and running for President. None of the opportunities in life should be predicated on fitting into gender "norms" or even acknowledging them. The "reality" that Baker's talking about above is not one where trans people are so broadly accepted that they dare to walk around the world unafraid - I'm not trans and I know that ain't the world I'm living in.

The "real" reality I see is that gender is way more complex than human nature's need to fit everything in neat little boxes can handle. I think brains and bodies and spirits and identities come together in lots of variations, not just "male" or "female," and I think it's willfully ignorant to insist that every person sort into one of those two categories, based on how the sex hormones in their mother's womb sorted out their gonads before they were born.

So, today, I am remembering those lost to ignorance and hatred, and I am holding a bright hope for a future where all people of all genders can live peaceably in a world without fear.

Attraction is a funny thing.

Usually, physical attraction for me involves a small range of variations on a very specific body type (generally 6'2 or taller, 300 lbs. or so...I like a dude I can put through the paces without fear I'm gonna break him). There are physical traits beyond that that really flip my switch (facial hair, detached earlobes, big hands, yada yada yada), but basically any dude with that body type is going to catch my eye. My dating history includes a few guys who fell outside that, but basically I like tall chubby dudes, and the words short and thin almost never describe someone that my ovaries quiver over.

Having said that, though, there's this little dude who works in my building that I run into in the elevators not infrequently. I find him adorable, in a "wow, I kinda wanna shag him even though he's three inches shorter than me and skinny" kinda way, no doubt due to his friendly manner, nice smile, and habit of making good eye contact. However, my engine has only ever mildly revved, 'cause he's super clean-cut and conservative looking....and I tend to like dudes who are a little more rough around the edges.

Imagine my surprise when I bumped into him on a coffee run this morning, and damn near tripped over myself in lust. He's grown his hair out a little bit, and it's just slightly shaggy, and just slightly curly, and he was wearing jeans and an untucked button down shirt (apparently moving cubes, which loosens the office dress code)....and my ovaries did a backflip. If he'd been unshaven, I might have swooned, short and skinny be damned.

So, yeah, the lesson is that no matter what preconceived notions I have about "my type," I'm attracted to what I'm attracted to, and that isn't always going to be consistent. Despite the marketing industry's attempts to pigeonhole what constitutes "hot," attraction remains a mystery.

Where I am.

Lately I've been glaring into mirrors
Picking myself apart
You'd think at my age I'd thought of something better to do
Than make insecurity into a full time job
Make insecurity into an art
And I fear my life will be over
And I will have never lived unfettered
Always glaring into mirrors
Mad I don't look better

- Ani DiFranco, "Present/Infant"

I've been walking a fine line since the week of the RNC, trying to stay aware of what's going on politically as we ramp up to the fever pitch of what's potentially the most important election of my life....and also keeping my head down, so I don't crumble into an aching pit of grievous, wounded hopelessness. Or lose the handle on my rage and spontaneously combust by accidentally reading something spoken by the biggest insult to feminism the GOP ever dreamt up (and yeah, I'm talkin' about their VP pick, grrr).

Yeah, some days it's touch and go.

I have been doing a lot of checking in with myself lately, trying to figure out where I am these days. Sometimes that means big picture stuff - where am I when I put my life and my actions and choices in the context of the whole world, of the broader goals I have for my life, of what I want to do with the resources I have in this lifetime? Other times, it means more mundane conversations with myself...how am I doing at home? How's the day job sitting with me? Am I putting my everyday energies where I want them? Am I having the realtime impact I want to be having? Where do I have abundance? Where am I feeling lack? Are there changes I need or want to make? Are there things I can release with gratitude?

I'm one of those self-analytical wanks, yes. Sorry about that.

What's becoming more interesting to me lately is the place where those bigger questions merge with the more mundane stuff. How my job feeds the big picture (like giving me financial resources I can use to support my ideals, by providing for my basic survival needs so I have the luxury of time to devote to other questions, by putting me in a position to take extra steps I might not be able to do without the resources afforded me by my job, etc., etc.). How the state of my home is a reflection of the life I want to live, an act of sympathetic magic to keep my focus on the things that really matter to me and help support me in making them happen (like my plans to paint my bedroom crazy colors and hang mostly my own artwork on the walls...because hey, creativity is important in my life, and I want it to be constantly renewed). How my lack of a good open space at home has allowed me to bail on regular yoga practice (the quickie stuff I do in the bathroom at the office when I get a break most assuredly does not count)...and how making space in my home helps me make space in my life.

So, connecting the micro to the macro. The gray mushy middle where pretty much everything that exists lives, no matter how much my brain wants things to polarize into nice, clear black and white. Complication. Complexity. Paradox.

My heart is heavy a lot lately. I'm feeling powerless to help New Orleans or Galveston or Haiti or Ethiopia or Rwanda or Myanmar or China or any of the people around the globe suffering because the Earth is fighting back. I'm feeling furious at the way the world is revolving around American politics when there are so many bigger and more important things to think about...and my own reaction when I read that someone was saying America wasn't an economic superpower anymore was still defensiveness. I hear all the doomsayers predicting that the world will end if some of the richest people in the world don't get a huge fucking check yesterday...and maybe there will be difficult consequences for lots of people; tell me why we don't ameliorate those consequences then, instead of throwing good money after bad, straight into the capacious maw of a broken fucking system? I don't get how people in power can sleep at night, knowing the system that clothes and feeds and houses them in luxury and wealth...is not only doing so squarely on the necks of billions of people, but is then going to pour salt in those wounds by voting themselves a huge fucking pat on the back. I just don't understand, and it's leaving me conflicted and angry.

And, you know, on a personal level, my brother the child molester is getting out of jail sometime in the next six months, most likely. My brother the lying, cheating, stealing, two-faced, weasely son-of-a-bitch....my brother who never met a person he couldn't take advantage of....my brother who can be genuinely sweet and open-minded and rebellious and wise...my brother who fucked a thirteen year old for months (while married, of course). He's up for parole soon, and I still haven't sorted out how the fuck I feel about it. On the one hand, he's my little brother, and I love him no matter what he does. But on the other hand, he's done something I find reprehensible on every level imaginable. I am lip-curlingly disgusted when I think about it - and about how I spend months believing he didn't do it, he couldn't do it. I harangued his public defender, split the cost of an independent polygraph, sent him reams of reading material and letters to help keep him occupied while he awaited trial. And, like so many times in my life, the joke was on me, 'cause he fucking did it. He did it, and he lied to me to get what he wanted, and I bought his story and went out of my way to try to help him, and he was laughing up his sleeve the whole fucking time.

So, yeah, still sort of working through that right there. I haven't spoken to him since Christmas of last year, where he ambushed me while I was visiting family, and proceeded to make me cry, and tell me he wouldn't let me cut him out of my life. He's written me a couple times, and he talks to my family fairly regularly, and he apparently asked my mother to ask me to write him a character letter or something to help him get parole. I may someday talk to him again, but he can fucking kiss my ass if he thinks I'll write him a letter. If I write anything, it will be to recommend that he stay in the full term of his sentence.

Okay, phew. Letting go of that for real this time.

Anyway. My point (and I do have one) is that I'm in a place of supreme weirdness at the moment. My life, much like my bedroom, is in a state of confusion and indecision. Not all that surprising, considering the state of the world (and that Mercury went retrograde this week). I suspect the next month will see some resolution.

Or maybe that's just what I'm hoping for.

P.S. This essay from Starhawk is really good:

I hear arguments from some of my dear friends that voting doesn't matter, that it's not empowering or revolutionary. But for the vast majority of people in this country, elections are the only place where they interface with politics or attempt to exercise power, and if we sneer at that, we lose the chance to link together and open up broader channels for change. And for the kids I've worked with in the Bayview, who have never seen a flowing river and whose career options range from crack dealer to murder-for-hire, voting would be a big step upwards.

So, yeah, even if you're in a political funk like me...Rock The Vote (go there if you need to register) (go here if you need to check and make sure you're registered properly).

RNC Welcoming Committee Press Conference.

Just watch it.

...and part two.

...and part three.

More depressing shit from MN.

I can't bring myself to read or watch re-caps from the "official" events that went down last night at the RNC. I'm still reeling and trying to stay on top of the aftermath of the unconscionable police brutality and suppression of Constitutional rights that seems to have been the seedy underbelly of what I assume was an otherwise candy-coated political spectacle. Quite frankly, I don't care what Sarah fucking Palin or the (chuh) "Maverick" had to say (since I doubt I agreed with any of it, anyway)...unless they dressed down the agencies whose members were attacking peaceful protesters. Which is about as likely as a snowball fight between Mother Teresa and Mahatma Ghandi in Satan's backyard.

More information about what's gone and is going down in the Twin Cities:

• "Logical Consequences", a nice summation by Bob Keohler.


• Another re-cap, complete with protestations that pre-emptive arrests made for less violence once the protests actually started.


• Astonishing! Apparently the city of St. Paul made the GOP cover the professional liability insurance needed to cover police forces' potential for excessive use of force during the RNC. If (hahaha) any brutalized protesters file suit, the damages wouldn't come out of taxpayers' pockets. Smart on St. Paul's part...not so much on the GOP's part. (Although - because it's what I do for a living and all - I'm wondering if $10 million plus expenses is a high enough limit.)


• The ACLU renews their call for an investigation.


• "RNC 8" charged under the (so-called) Patriot Act.Because Food Not Bombs organizers are totally the same fucking thing as terrorists.


• HuffPo talks about how the media (and St. Paul's mayor Chris Coleman) isn't talking about the trampling of the free press.


• Accounts from the arrested Democracy Now! journalists.


• Get the latest from Twin Cities Indy Media. Demonstrations, legal efforts, and crazy crackdowns continue today.

The world is filled with violence and political oppression, I know this. I know that this sort of thing is a regular occurrence in so many parts of the world, and the illusion that America is somehow exempted from this fact is one that could certainly be dispersed to the benefit of people everywhere. I know that police beating the shit out of a man for no reason other than he was in front of them can't even begin to compare to the genocides going on around the globe every single day with just as much broad governmental support.

What makes this so bitter for me is the fact that it flies in the face not only of the high-falutin' patriotic rhetoric of an election season, but also of the actual values and ideals that underlie that rhetoric. If the "American Dream" ever had a single drop of truth, if this really ever was the "land of the free," why is this situation so fucking unremarkable that it's not being shouted from the rooftops? Is the power structure and the free press that's supposed to be the people's watchdog....is it all so bought-and-paid-for that come corporate or political puppeteer is pulling the strings and keeping the focus on the courageous cops who keep defending the Fair Citizens of St. Paul from Those Crazy Anarchists?!

Is the Bill of Rights a joke? I feel like this bullshit is a punchline, but I'm not laughing.

FUCK YOU doesn't seem to cover it today.

My thoughts today are with my comrades in the Twin Cities, who have bravely chosen to protest the RNC. They have been met with interference at every step, including "Homeland Security" and other resources purported to fight "terrorism." This video is horribly disturbing on its own merits, but is even more unsettling because the man being attacked so brutally is someone I know and have worked with.

Where the fuck is justice in this?

Where the fuck is freedom in this?

Where the fuck is there anything to be proud of?

How can anyone purport to call herself a "patriot" and think this is okay?

Where the fuck is the outrage from the RNC itself? They have the power to make this end, to stand up for true American values, to halt violence used against AMERICANS right here on our own soil...not by faceless scary brown people whose countries are sitting on top of resources we covet and whose cultures we don't really understand...but by "fellow Americans" in riot gear and using chemical weapons.

Who the fuck is the terrorist in this scenario?

Hey, John McCain (or your new puppetmaster, Karl Rove): stop this. Or FUCK YOU more than usual.

UPDATE: The ACLU is calling for an investigation into RNC shenanigans. Also, brownfemipower has an awesome entry about why this stuff matters.

UPDATE 2: Found this post through Twin Cities Indy Media, and it is awesome; it talks about the point of what's happening at the RNC, and some ideas about civil disobedience and nonviolent direct action in general.

UPDATE 3: This listing from Common Dreams outlines some of the violence and targetting of activists and journalists. CREDO Action has an action going to call out the major news networks for not screaming about this threat to a free press.

Hitting a wall.

A lot of activists seem to be hitting a wall this week for some reason. I'm feeling it, too...when I look at the enormity of the injustices in the world, how close the planet is to total oblivion, and how little many people seem to give a damn....it's overwhelming. I get frustrated with what often feels like my own inability to shed the expectations of the culture I grew up in, and engage in more authentic, more sustainable daily habits - not to mention doing stuff beyond the everyday to try make the rest of the world a more equitable place. I forget sometimes, though, just how far outside the "norm" I already am, in many ways. There are plenty of people who consider me obnoxiously radical, even though I feel like there's so much more I could be doing.

That's the context in which I read David Korten's brilliant remarks to the Seattle Green Expo. While part of me thinks the Green Expos are still too driven by commerce and consumerism, I do think they're great baby steps to help spread green ideas and information. Korten's speech, however, was a breath of fresh air - it touched on things I believe but don't always articulate very well - particularly the idea of Empire. Some excerpts:

No more throwaway stuff. No more economic growth for the rich. Our priority must be to grow our well-being rather than our consumption. Invest in peace, education, and health care rather than war. Invest in compact communities rather than suburban sprawl. Invest in local economies and environmental rejuvenation rather than in shipping toys around the world and speculating in the global financial casino. Invest in sidewalks, bicycles, bicycle paths, and public transportation rather than cars and highways. Invest in education for living rather than advertising to get us to consume more. Here is the kicker. We must eliminate exactly those forms of non-essential production and consumption that our economic and political systems are designed to promote.

We might wonder how such injustice could happen in a world governed by democratically elected governments. The answer is simple and alarming. Our world is not governed by democratically elected governments. It is ruled by global financial institutions in the service of financial speculators who exchange trillions of dollars daily in search of instance unearned profits to increase the fortunes — and the power— of the richest people on the planet. They bring down governments that displease them, and buy and sell the largest corporations like commodities. By design and law the defining priority and obligation of these governing institutions is to generate financial profits to make rich people richer, in short to increase inequality in a world in desperate need of greater equity.

Absent the discussions that encouraged the sharing of their true stories, women whose experience failed to conform to the prevailing cultural story held themselves responsible for the failure. They assumed they were simply different, and thus in some way deficient. By breaking the silence to share their stories they ended their isolation and rose above self-doubt as they came to realize that they were in the very good company of a great many other wonderful women. Many then lent their voices to a growing chorus of women engaged in changing the cultural stories by which society had long defined women and their roles.

This bit here strikes me as particularly relevant to social justice movements...it's one reason why fat activism is so important to me, why it's important to share stories that break cultural assumptions about fat bodies and what it means to live in one. Most importantly, this idea of shifting the "failure" from the individual to the cultural construct that defined that failure in privileged terms that excluded the entirely valid experiences of many people.

One of the things Korten mentions is the Earth Charter, a fairly comprehensive statement of principles related to environmental, social, and economic justice that I like a great deal (although there was a spiritual/moral bent that I would want to shift to make more open to those who follow no spiritual path). It's a little more extensive than the Reclaiming Principles of Unity, but covers a lot of the same ground (although minus the witchy framework). In looking over the people involved with creating the Charter and maintaining its propagation in the world, I see a lot of diversity, but also a lot of powerful people; I'm not entirely certain the egalitarianism I find inherent in the values is also present in the actual operation....but then again, there's a whole thing about decentralized expansion - which breaks down hierarchies....so maybe it's more like Reclaiming than not.

Ahem. Anyway.

Sometimes I worry that I am not doing enough. I have no doubt there's more I can be doing everyday to live within my values.....but I also think it's important to recognize how much I'm already doing. Sure, for every radical action (like, say, catching graywater when I'm washing dishes and using it to water the plants - or growing some of my own food in an urban environment - or daring to be fat and not hate myself), there are multiple not-so-radical, not-so-awesome actions (like dying my hair with horrible chemicals - or sometimes getting frou-frou coffee from Starbucks - or buying a new pair of shoes when I have forty pairs at home already). I work a corporate job, and don't own a car. I use laundry detergent made by Proctor & Gamble, but biodegradable dish soap.

It's a process, working towards a sustainable life. I'm not yet ready to give away everything I own, wear sack-cloth, and sleep on a straw pallet....or pull myself entirely out of the capitalist world in which I was born. I add a little bit every day. I come closer every moment. I am compassionate for the times I don't do as well as I'd like, succumbing to convenience and privilege. I try again.

In summary, from Mr. Korten:

In everything you do, share the story of our human possibility and of our right and responsibility to create for ourselves and for future generations, the world of our shared dream. Our distinctive human capacity for reflection and intentional choice carries a corresponding moral responsibility to care for our Mother Earth and for one another. We must now test the limits of the individual and collective creative potential of our species as we strive to become the change we seek.

Today's outrage.

I never really was all that hot for John Edwards as a presidential candidate (I've been a Hillary girl since, well, 1992?), but I always considered him as strong a candidate as either Obama or Clinton. And, since he's officially NOT running for veep (which totally makes me think of that truism from Lions for Lambs), I like what he's doing instead. Beefing up Head Start (of which I'm a beneficiary, by the by), Medicaid, SCHIP, and other programs that offer aid to low income families - especially children - is a great idea.

Disappointingly, though, it seems like corporate interests are running the show pretty much everywhere - first by maintaining a stranglehold on the intellectual property and patent system that keeps medicines only in the hands of those who can afford them (or profit by them) - second by destroying local food systems in favor of agribusiness that propagates GMO crops, enjoys significant government funding in the form of subsidies and grants for cleaning up their own unnecessary environmental messes, survives on the backs of underpaid and overworked labor, not to mention prioritizes profit over human life or environmental sustainability. With those powers at the wheel (and can anyone really argue that corporations aren't calling the shots here? how scary is it that drug companies are giving more to Democrats than Republicans?? REAL scary....and please note that Obama - he of the "no special interests" money position - got the largest number reported in that article...), it's a huge challenge to try and level the playing field for those living in poverty, in this country and around the globe.

In the context of my ongoing re-education about the geography and history of the planet, I found this article from The Independent really fascinating. Now, I hate bananas and don't eat them....but I know lots of people who do, and I think it would be a shame if there were no more bananas. Furthermore, I find it really fucking horrible how rich, white people seem to have swapped the cunning use of flags for equally unjust corporate takeovers, which trend this story illustrates nicely.

((Sidenote: I feel really disappointed in myself for not previously knowing the origin of the term "banana republic," which for some reason I thought was just a descriptor for countries in steamy equatorial regions that would be good for growing bananas. I had no idea it was such a blood-drenched term, and I'm furthermore very interested in following up this read with some digging about what countries currently embroiled in conflict of some sort might be suffering from this kind of corporate interference in their governments.))

I assume that most people think I'm a little crazy for thinking capitalism is evil and money is evil and corporations are evil and banks are evil and that most of the world's ills can be laid directly at the feet of one or more of those culprits. But this pattern is so clear to me, and so clearly WRONG. And killing people, and destroying the planet. Right now, I'm having trouble understanding how anyone can think money and banks and corporations and capitalism *aren't* evil.

Tuesday Ruminations.

I think it is human nature to separate the micro and the macro into nice, cozy separate boxes. I think the blurry lines between individual choices and the inextricably connected Big Picture are frightening on some insitinctual level - it challenges whatever it is in human brains (or maybe just ones bathed in capitalism and patriarchy and Western culture?) that individuates and helps us prioritize the survival of our genes over the survival of those *other* genes that are NOT ours. I think about this kind of paradox a great deal, which is why I feel like I spend a lot of time walking the razor-thin line between, er, "normal" (for lack of a better term) and some kind of Peak Experience. I see this dynamic in religion (a sort-of-like-a-human God v. the entirety of creation and uncreation being one seamless whole living being in all its diverse parts), in politics (individual freedom v. peaceful coexistence), in activism (my individual actions v. the faceless and overwhelming status quo), etc., etc., etc.

I think it's hard for one brain to comprehend the endless complications of even the most seemingly simple idea. A cup of coffee isn't just a cup of coffee - it's a product of an ancient process with millenia of history and context, with impact based on where and how it was grown and harvested and shipped and processed and transported and prepared and how I choose to drink it, not to mention the various social and cultural and economic and environmental factors for all the people involved in all those processes...and then there's the effect it has on my body when I drink it, the cultural implications of drinking coffee, how it affects my appearance and status and how the way I choose to drink that coffee reflects my personality and my lifestyle, the effects on my immediate environment and possibly the regional environment...but even holding an awareness of all those layers of complication, I have trouble not just focusing on the cup of coffee. I can only hold so much thought at one time, and I haven't yet progressed in my enlightenment enough to truly sip coffee with a full awareness of the vast network of inter-related factors tied to this two second moment of my life.

And therein lies, in my opinion, the central challenge humanity wrestles with as a species. Self. Universe. And the mushy middle between, where most of life fits.

I stumbled aboard this train of thought this morning while reading this piece. The writer talks about the idea of food activism and individual choices being a somehow more manageable alternative to massive environmental problems, like global warming or soil contamination or polluted water or deforestation or toxic chemicals in everything. It's an interesting way of looking at the environmental movement as it's become more and more mainstream over the past few years; I find it particularly interesting the way so much activism (especially the kind I hear about in the media) has shifted from nuclear protests and people chaining themselves to redwoods and laying in front of bulldozers....to more capitalist measures - conscious consumerism, as it were. That's a really noteworthy (and sort of disturbing) shift, and it brings up the idea of individual choice in a context of severely harmful systems of being.

((My inner conspiracy theorist says: How much of a shift from groups challenging systems, to individuals changing how they consume...how much of that shift is a total red herring?))

This theme popped up again for me, in reading the comments on this piece from The Guardian. As always with any story about fat people, there was a lot of "just eat less, and move more" (with various levels of courtesy or coherency) and also plenty of "get rid of your cars and bike everywhere" (not to mention "people just need to learn how to eat healthy" - which makes me wonder, what the fuck rock do people think these alleged ignorant people are living under that they don't know how to "eat healthy"? Seriously, I can't crack a newspaper, flip on a TV, listen to a radio, or surf the internet - or have a conversation with most of my friends and family - without having seventeen opinions about what "healthy eating" means shoved right down my throat! If anyone doesn't know how to eat healthy, it's because the only person they ever talk to is painted on a volleyball...) (/end rant). The premise of the article, though, was that there are systemic issues at work, not just individual choices...that food "choices" are less free than people want to think, that economic realities and various other cultural factors have an effect on fatness. Interestingly enough, the bugaboo of fatness leading to a decrease in life expectancy didn't come up in this article (via Common Dreams), which talked about how life expectancy has gone down, but mostly for poor people with little access to proper healthcare...which again begs the question: is it the individual, or is it the bigger picture? Magic Eight Ball says: Answer Not Clear.

I have said before (in answer to many, many questions) that "It's Not That Simple," and I always mean it. It's been my experience that very little in life is ever simple - and if it appears so, there's likely more to it than what's visible. The personal is political, the part affects the whole, as above - so below, all different ways of saying the same thing: what is done in this moment matters, and cannot be disconnected from what was done in the preceding moment or what will be done in the moment following. When we're talking about fighting presidential secrecy, that won't just be done by my writing to the White House and telling the President I think he's an asshole for legislating from the Oval Office and pissing on the Constitution - it will probably also take massive systemic change coming from Congress and broader, collective efforts to reestablish the checks and balances that separate a representative democracy from a fascist oligarchy. When we're talking about ending racism and sexism and sizism and ableism and looksism and other kinds of outdated (and yet, sadly, still present and active and pervasive) discrimination, it can't just be done by calling out some jerk for shitty comments at a press conference...it will probably also take a complete and total reframing of our cultural understanding of gender and race and ethnicity and all the other visible (and not visible) characteristics that mark the tremendous diversity of the human race. Saving the planet won't just happen because I buy local, organic food...it will take global reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, massive shifts in food and transportation systems, and an overhaul of what "lifestyle" means in a world on the brink of breakdown.

I recognize that I have some pretty radical ideas, in general. I sometimes want to give away everything I own and go walkabout in a veggie-powered RV, fer chrissakes (holy cows, I'm not the only one!). A lot of that has to do with wanting to distance myself from People. You know, Them. They are stupid and ignorant and different and intolerant and judgmental and whatever other adjectives apply. They are faceless and there are way more of Them than there ever are of Us. Part of my desire to go a-wand'ring is tied to my chronic boho hiraeth, but it's also part of how I manifest my own personal need to draw a line around myself and clarify that I Am Not Them. I separate myself from the Whole, because it makes it easier for me to simplify the messy chaos of life - it makes it harder for me to get hamstrung by the heartbreak that would inevitably haunt me if I really could see the impact of every moment I am alive.

But the harder I work to become more aware of my impacts on the world around me, the more I recognize that that line between me and the world around me is a creation in my head and doesn't really exist. And there has to be a way to apply this concept to all the systemic injustice and degradation in the world. I'm still working on that.

Neither afraid, nor petrified.

The other day, I read this little gem from the ever-brilliant Paul Campos, and even through the fog of ooky spring snot-fest, a little ray of sunshine landed on my brain.

One of the things that turns my stomach most about mainstream Western media is the way it shamelessly uses fear to manipulate people, again and again, with regard to just about every aspect of life. It's there in advertising using fear of social rejection or inadequacy or loneliness or whatever to sell useless shit and take people's money, and newsmedia on both local and national platforms using fear of mercury in CFLs (or drugs in tap water or LSD-laced stickers being handed out on the playground) to drum up good ratings, and our disgusting government using xenophobia and fear of the Other to invade other countries and kill people of all nationalities the world over.

Fear is a useful thing, an instinct that has evolved over millennia to protect us from danger. Recently, I faced off in my shower against a spider. Now, intellectually, I know that a spider with a two inch diameter does not pose a life-threatening risk to me. I know that, even though I am naked in a shower, this tiny creature is unlikely to really hurt me, even if it did, for some unknown reason, try to attack me instead of running away. I know that it is really a long shot that it's got the ability to do more than maybe give me a slightly scratchy bite. But tell that to my limbic system, which is convinced it is filled with deadly venom and bent on injecting it into me through every single pore. What sucked is that, instead of letting the little guy be on his merry way, in peaceful non-bug-killing coexistence, my body auto-reacted and splashed him with water until he crumbled into a ball of legs....because I knee-jerk reacted purely out of fear-based instinct.

Not what I would choose consciously to do, and yet what I did anyway. Shows the power of reacting out of fear, doesn't it?

And this is the same powerful instinct that our fucking shameless leader taps into everytime he makes veiled references to mushroom clouds over Middle America. He juxtaposes "nuc-u-ler" weapons and picket fences because that imagery incites the same kind of violent reaction I had to a spider in the shower - the kind of thing that seems perfectly natural when my heart is pumping 75,000 beats a second....but seems kinda silly once the rest of my brain comes back on line. In the grand scheme of things, the loss of a spider - while regrettable - is a much less horriffic knee-jerk reaction than a worldwide corporate-sponsored killing spree. I keep wondering when our collective consciousness will come back on line and stop letting the collective hindbrain run the show.

Over the course of my life, I have had more than enough experience with real, live, actual fear to want to take on imaginary fear just for shits and giggles. (Plus, seeing "Jaws" at age eight left me with a paralyzing fear of sharks that, to this day, wreaks havoc on my love of swimming.) I learned very young that real fear (as opposed to the manufactured kind) is a warning to be heeded - a precursor to pain or suffering of some sort. Sometimes, the pain or suffering can be endured...but recognizing fear and using it as a tool to possibly avoid the pain or suffering...yeah, that's kind of the point, isn't it? Fear is logical - it's an advanced, instinctual application of cause and effect - and it has a long memory.

I have learned how to deal with fear, how to take necessary action even when afraid....because I don't think there's a better choice. The times fear has paralyzed me, I've always regretted what happened - whether it was taking abuse instead of fighting back, staying in a crap job because I feared change, not sharing my feelings for fear of rejection, or even just staying in bed until my bladder was ready to burst because I was scared of the dark. Those kinds of experiences have taught me that not only is fear a useful motivator, but being afraid doesn't remotely prohibit taking action. In fact, taking action is often exactly the thing needed to change circumstances and relieve fears altogether.

All that said, though, I don't actually like being afraid. If I have to deal with it, sure, but I don't seek it out, and I sure as hell don't appreciate anybody trying to make me afraid. It has taken me a lifetime to learn how to put fear in its proper perspective (and by no means do I have it totally down) - i.e., something to take account of but not let rule my actions - and for someone to try to induce fear to manipulate me? To give me a false choice so I'll knee-jerk buy a load of horseshit, and give over whatever some jackass was pitching me? That pisses me off like nobody's business.

So, I say bring it on, world. Let the marketers try to tell me no one will ever love me until I buy their shit; I call bullshit, and I pick and choose what I spend my money and time on, how I represent myself to the rest of the world, and what I want to support with my energy. Let the fear-mongering governments try to tell me that militant Islamic fundamentalists are coming to blow me up in my sleep; I call bullshit, and I put my time and money and energy into creating more peace and understanding out in the world and righting some of the wrongs that sort of fear-mongering fosters. (Also, I pretty much disregard any claims made by fundamentalists of any stripe....the world is too complex for anybody to be so totally Right.) Let the media sell fear after fear after fear, trying to make me dependent on their noise machines for the latest danger to get my knickers in a twist over; I call bullshit, and I refuse to stop living joyously and boldly and openly because I might get sick or taken advantage of or maybe someday die - that will probably all happen anyway, whether or not I'm afraid of it. I choose not to fear it.

I have two completely irrational, full-body fears that I wrestle with regularly: enclosed spaces and sharks. Any other fear is a red herring, and I refuse to let red herrings run my life and make my choices.

The Gospel of Consumption & foreshadowing.

Okay, not to go all anti-capitalist conspiracy-theorist on you....but if you've ever suspected that Big Business was in bed with the government to destroy the world and turn everyone but an elite rich into an overclass that lives with their feet on the necks of everybody else (kinda like the way the world works right now, only with fewer feet and more necks involved)...or even something a little less, er, extreme: you oughtta read this.

I'm working on a bunch of juicy posts....but my immune system's idea for starting off the Month of Tari was a nasty cold that's rendered me pretty much MIA for the past week, and might possibly consider giving me back my normal attention span and coherency sometime in the next few days. Sounds ominous, doesn't it?

"America the Beautiful" Premieres in Chicago!!

Chicagoans rejoice: "America the Beautiful" premieres May 6th!!

The film premieres at 8 p.m. next Tuesday, at AMC River East theater downtown. Free tickets can be had (here). I will totally be there!!

After the premiere, the movie will be playing at the Landmark Century Center Cinema (near Clark & Diversey); movie times haven't been published yet....but the more people who can get out and see the movie the first weekend (May 9-11), the better chances for a wider release. This flick is so powerful, and contains such an important message - I want it to have a chance to get that message to as many people as possible. So, if you're not local, but know someone who is - send them this info! If you're not local, maybe take a weekend trip to Chicago and go see this flick! If you are local...well, I can't imagine any reason you wouldn't want to see this film yourself - but tell everyone you know, too!

Last Earth Day thing...

This article (by the sainted Michael Pollan!) rocks!!!!

(via commentary on my friend Jen's LJ)

ETA: Also this (heads up for a lame fat-phobic metaphor) and this and this, all via Common Dreams. Seriously, it's greentastic up in here today!

Evidence of systemic racism.

I've seen a lot of talk about race these days, between the Democratic Primary and the controversy around the feminist blogosphere. In going through the various posts rightfully calling attention to some serious bullshit, I stumbled onto Angry Black Woman's call for a Carnival of Allies. Here's my thought.

I firmly believe that widespread, systemic racism is one of the biggest hurdles global culture has to overcome in order to develop into any kind of just and fair society. I believe that even as much as my poor white trash hiney doesn't always see how I benefit from being white (and there are times I don't think of myself as white because I have long-standing class-related issues with the stereotype of "white people"), I nonetheless DO. Much as it breaks my heart, because I have busted my ass to claw myself up from my roots to get anything I have (and because half the time in my life, earning something wasn't enough to get it), I have no doubts that being white has landed me plenty of freebies. Which is bullshit, because goddammit, I want a level playing field so that everyone (including me!) gets full credit for their merits.

But, in trying to think of ways I can see this widespread systemic racism in my own experiences as a white girl, I have often struggled to find a clear, convincing argument for people I know who are disinclined to buy statistics like the racial skewing in jail populations and overall convictions, the ratio of white to non-white people holding executive positions, income disparities and educational access. Even in Chicago, where there are obvious differences in the condition of CTA service based purely on neighborhood - and where segregation by neighborhood is rampant - people still don't think race has anything to do with it.

Last night, though, I thought of something pretty damn compelling, from my own experience.

I love geography. Love it. I love maps, I love knowing what countries are where, and I like having a sense of how the cultures tied to the locations on maps have evolved and shifted over the course of history. I'm kind of a smartypants, too, and so my geography is pretty damn solid. I know the Americas and Europe solidly....I know Asia relatively well....and Africa...well, Africa I sort of know. I can do most of northern Africa and the Arabian peninsula, and I can usually pick out a few countries further south, like, well, South Africa, and um....hm.

See the pattern there?

I was talking to some girlfriends last night, and stumbled onto this. I know the countries where white people live totally by heart. I can even ramble off the states of the former Yugoslavia, and tell you a little bit about the conflict between ethnic groups there and who's living where and what drove the fighting to begin with. I have a fairly good grasp not only of the political boundaries, but also the topography and cultural background of the people living there.

But Africa? Even Asia, to a certain extent? I am much less well-versed, and the countries I do know are much more likely to have been "colonized" by white people. For example, I know lots about Egypt, ancient and modern; of course, it was colonized by both the British and the Romans. Nubian culture, which I think was probably as extensive as ancient Egyptian and I think existed at around the same time frame....I got nothing. I don't even know what I don't know!

Unlike the Yugoslavian situation, I have no idea what drives the violence in Somalia or Darfur. I vaguely know there are some tribal warlords, and I think some of them are Muslim - but I just don't have the cultural landscape locked in my memory the way I do for Europe. I don't have a good sense of the political boundaries or the cultural variety or the history or the religious evolutions or any other aspect of the myriad countries that make up the African continent.

(Which is another thing - I find myself referring to Africa all the time as if it was monolithic....when I know it is not! I know there are at least as many different cultural groups in Africa as in Europe....but I have very little idea what they might be!)

It makes me very sad that an entire continent is so absent from my knowledge base. It makes me sad that - even though I love geography and have gone out of my way over the years to keep my geographical education ongoing - I have not made space for Africa and her peoples. It drives me crazy that, when I was in school as a young person, there was a huge blank I didn't even know about. What utter bullshit.

All of this is what I call undeniable evidence of widespread systemic racism.

And now I have to go start to re-educate myself.