When you’re pretending to take a pic of your baby but really you want to check out a cute service dog.
As I type this on the seventh floor of Barts hospital in London, a bag of cyclophosphamide (a close relation of mustard gas) is being delivered straight into my heart via an arm-mounted catheter. I’m preparing for probably the biggest medical procedure I’ll ever have; a transplant of my sister’s stem cells that will hopefully cure me of an especially rare, aggressive form of lymphoma. I am at the complete mercy of the NHS. And I am entirely in support of the junior doctors’ strike.
Very often, if I start a piece I know is well-written and interesting and relevant to our interests, I will link to it and get a good pull-quote and move on without finishing it (this is endemic to online journalism, F.Y.I.) so when I literally cannot stop reading it, as was the case with this piece on Canada’s managed alcohol programmes (often known as “wet” shelters), it means I really, really hope you read all of it too:
The Oaks is a converted hotel next to a pawnshop, in Carlington, a working-class neighbourhood on the west side of Ottawa, Canada. When residents first arrive, they tend to drink the maximum, every hour, every day. Many also drink whatever they can buy or shoplift outside the building. For most, this gradually changes. They stop drinking outside, begin to ask for fewer ounces, skip pours or have a “special pour” of watered-down wine. Two residents get several hours’ worth at a time to take up to their rooms and ration out themselves. One man gave up alcohol but gets an hourly pour of grape juice, to stay part of the group.
Ten of the Oaks’ residents are mental health patients and don’t get the pour – just fewer than 50 others do. A few are women or younger men, but the majority are men in their 50s; it often takes several decades of drinking before people seek a different life and land here. Standard clothing in January was flannel pyjama bottoms and slippers with a down jacket. Many have long beards, dishevelled hair, and no front teeth – alcohol will do that. Most are sick. Years or decades of drinking have left them with liver, heart and brain damage that will never be reversed. A nurse is on site 40 hours a week. At least once a week and whenever necessary, a doctor and specialist nurses come to see patients. Young leads physical stretching groups, a book club, shopping trips and outings; Little Ray’s Reptile Zoo was a recent hit.
The pour is what makes the Oaks different from every other well-run facility of its kind. It solves the residents’ most urgent problem: where can I get a drink?
Doree Shafrir profiled Angela Flournoy, and it. is. great.
Flournoy is matter-of-fact about working within the system. “I’ve had wonderful experiences, but that doesn’t mean that it was not a host of white women. I just got the right mix of them who cared, who didn’t want to put me in a box. But if the deck had been shuffled any other way something else might have happened.”
Still, she’s pointedly critical of the ways in which white women in publishing can be ignorant of their own privilege. “It’s a lot of white women who are sort of passing the buck as far as what the issue is onto dudes who don’t exist. Yeah, they might be at the top, but they’re not reading the books. They’re excited about the books they’re telling you to get excited about…I think it’s an undue burden for the writer of color that’s just trying to get people to care about their book as much as other people’s books, to then also be the one to have the answers.”
weep:
Right before we were about to shoot him performing his new song in the episode, as he toured the set in his black shoes that lit up with a pink light when he walked, he asked my producer Erin O’Malley for a megaphone. People were called. A megaphone was found. Later, when the cameras were rolling, I stood in the back of the set and watched the song start. Right before the first notes, he pulled out the megaphone and called out: “Does anyone want to fall in love tonight?” Everyone cheered. We hadn’t asked them to. It was just a feeling. You just had to shout out. The megaphone made the song suddenly feel like a movement, like a political rally, like we were all standing there together that night in support of falling in love. It was brilliant.
This woman is a walking nightmare:
Bruner—a Republican candidate for the District 9 seat on the Texas State Board of Education, who came in just shy of the 50 percent she needed to bag the nomination on Super Tuesday—has yet to walk back her claims that President Barack Obama worked as a gay prostitute in his 20s, or that humans cohabited the earth with dinosaurs, or that sex-education classes “stimulate children to experiment with sex,” or that Islam “is not a real religion.” Bruner, bless her, has also suggested that Paul Ryan’s manly beard makes him look “like a terrorist” and that opposing the Common Core is right up there with objecting to National Socialism. (I could go on.)
I am sitting here reading this piece with my mouth hanging open at how ridiculous this country is (it’s older, but Nikki and I just read it yesterday for the first time):
Marcella qualified for Medi-Cal because she is disabled, but because Medi-Cal is for poor people, Dave and Marcella have to be poor to receive it — they have to “meet” the program’s “income test.” Counterintuitively, meeting the income test doesn’t mean having enough income (as in doing well on a test), but rather having low-enough income. The income test is actually an income limit.
Moreover, because Dave is employed, he and Marcella would be in a particular version of the program called “Share of Cost” Medi-Cal. It works this way: As a family of three with one disabled member, they are allowed to keep $2,100 of Dave’s $3,250 monthly earnings to live on. The rest of Dave’s earnings, $1,150, would go to Medi-Cal as the family’s share of cost. That is, any month in which Marcella incurred medical expenses, she and Dave must pay the first $1,150. To our surprise, if Dave earned more money, the extra amount would also go to Medi-Cal: The cost sharing is a 100 percent tax on Dave’s earnings. I figured out later that the $2,100 my brother and sister-in-law are to live on puts them at 133 percent of the federal poverty level for a family of three. Essentially, the way they meet the income test is for Medi-Cal to skim off Dave’s income until they are in fact poor. Brian noted that they are “lucky” that they are allowed to retain that much income; if Marcella weren’t disabled, the amount they’d be allowed to retain would be even lower than $2,100. And this is how things will be indefinitely. In order to get poor people’s health insurance, Dave and Marcella must stay poor, forever.
what:
Q. How to respect a vet on Memorial Day: My son has recently become friends with a boy whose father is a veteran (two tours in Afghanistan). My son’s birthday happens to be on Memorial Day weekend (Saturday, not the actual day on Monday), and when I mentioned a birthday party, the dad said his only plans that weekend were visiting graves of some of his friends, so they would be available. I immediately felt guilty for not thinking of that—like so many Americans, Memorial Day for me is a three-day weekend, and I feel heartless for not thinking of its actual meaning. Is there some way to recognize him for what he’s sacrificed and what he must be going through on that day? I should also mention that we are both (unhappily) married and we seem to be slightly mutually attracted to each other (we haven’t ever discussed it openly, and I don’t plan to and never would take action). So, while I’d like to recognize him, I don’t want to do it in a way that makes either of our spouses think something is going on. My husband does know that I would divorce him if I could afford to and am only staying to give my stepdaughter a communal home until she graduates high school next year. He also tends to be paranoid that I’m interested in every guy that I talk to, so I don’t want to give him any more reasons to be angry and feel justified in his disrespect toward me.
too excited to function:
shit people say to women who write about sports
Where was I the day I learned that Billy Joel was Jewish and not Italian? At my desk, finishing up a report and reading today’s link roundup on The Toast.
(what.)
Same here.
Ditto, although I don’t think I thought he was Italian anyway. I’m not good at Billies: it’s only in the last few years that I worked out that Billy Joel =/= Billy Bragg.
And don’t forget Billy Joel =/= Billie Joe Armstrong.
I only recently noticed that Ryan Gosling and Ryan Reynolds weren’t the same thing.
I still remember the day I noticed that Brian May and Brian Cox were different people. As a friend explained, it’s all in the commas:
Brian May: rockstar, physicist
Brian Cox: rockstar physicist
But what about Brian Cox: actor, not a physicist?
What about Ronnie Cox?
ah, but Brian Cox was also a rockstar in a previous life/decade. Just in case you weren’t confused enough already.
I’d query whether that counts as rock… 😉
hah, fair.
I love this so much.
OR ARE THEY???
Well they do look the same!
I always have to stop and think about it for a minute.
I was baffled by The Godfather because I couldn’t tell any of the men apart so I couldn’t follow the plot. There, I said it.
To be fair, while they aren’t the same person, they kind of are the same thing.
You are not alone…
I am here with you…
I am SO HERE FOR spontaneous MJ quotes, I love you, come away with me.
Though we’re far apart, you’re always in my heart. <3
Me too, but I don’t think it had ever occurred to me to assume he was either!
Same. When Nicole tweeted it last night, my first thought was that I didn’t know he was Jewish, but I had never thought he was Italian. Apparently, according to my brain, “I just thought he was… Billy Joel?” LOL.
Exactly. I don’t think of him as being in any category other than Billy Joel.
I believe you mean William Joel, thank you.
If he was William Jo-El he’d be from the planet Krypton.
I was entirely unsurprised by this; I think that it’s one of those things that Jews just know (sort of like Canadians know other Canadians).
I’m Jewish. Does this mean I am a shanda?
Nope! It just means you knew at some point but have had a strange accident which has removed the info from your brain. Have you encountered any strange super villain types or hit your head on the stairs of a synagogue recently?
But yeah, my first response was “wait, some people think he is something other than Jewish?” I think Jews are just proud of Jewish artists so a lot of Jews hear about them in a Jewish context from such a young age that it feels like knowledge we were born with.
I’ve always known, too, but I think it’s because I grew up on Long Island and am pretty much legally required to know EVERYTHING about Billy Joel. Also, the Baldwins and the Lohans…
I thought he was both!
I had always assumed he was Jewish and am surprised people thought he was Italian.
same. I do remember, however, the first time I saw a picture of him on my dad’s tape insert, and I was like “…oh.” I had built up a much more handsome Billy Joel in my head (no offense to Billy)
I honestly never really thought about it, but as an artist so closely associated with Long Island I pretty much assumed he was either Jewish or Italian! or both. 🙂
I’m Jewish. Billy Joel was my first concert, and my second concert. I once got in trouble at summer camp for wearing a Billy Joel t-shirt on Shabbat while leading services.
I found out that Billy Joel was Jewish yesterday, on Twitter.
(It seemed so obvious to me that he was Italian!)
That woman in the Memorial Day question should give a lecture titled “Burying the Lede: A Beginner’s Guide,” and then three-quarters of the way through she can segue into how the only reason she’s giving the lecture is because it’s her way of atoning for ruining people’s lives. Wow.
I have a snide comment to make that ties to the fawning “Thank you for your service!” that goes on with certain call-in radio show hosts, but it’s not coalescing for me ATM.
Still allergic to that nonsense too, but I’m realizing I only hear “Thank you for your service” in Philippa Soo’s voice now. It helps?
I’m pretty sure that’s the voice the letter-writer wants her veteran friend to hear it in, too. And then she wants her husband and his wife to say, in unison, “I’ll leave you to it!”
One week later she’s writing [a divorce attorney] nightly
Two weeks later
In the cemetery stressin’
My son’s stone-faced
While I’m trying to cheat on his father, ruin his friendship and probably lose his trust forever.
YES
oh my god, just came back to the Toast after commenting much earlier, caught up on this, it is beautiful AND Peak Toast <3 <3 <3
I have a friend who calls Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day “passive-aggressively saying YOU’RE WELCOME to strangers” day. I think it’s the best possible attitude to take, all things considered.
A friend of mine has labelled Veteran’s Day on Facebook as “Dang, Your Grandpa Was Hot!” Day, which is… extremely accurate. On Veteran’s Day I am 100% here for all the old-timey black & white photos of your grandpas in uniform.
I love how casually Mallory absolutely smacks her pretensions aside: A: Your question is, fundamentally, “Can I use the fact that the man I’m interested is a veteran as an emotional inside track?” My answer is, I’m afraid, “No.” *praise hands emoji*
That was so great. I called out Prullory recently after getting a bee in my bonnet about hitchhiking statistics, so I wanted to take this moment to say: that was great.
I am interested in hitchhiking statistics, can you explain?
Oh! haha. I think it you click my profile you can see my comments about it. I was disgruntled about the statistical analysis in a article about hitchhiking Mallory used in a Prudie.
Yeah, she’s….something. Just divorce already! Your stepdaughter will probably be relieved!
Yeah that was quite the right hand turn she took there …
Yeah. I felt like something was off and then I got to “attracted to each other” and “staying married so my stepdaughter will have a ‘communal home'” stuff and was like “!!!???!!!!”
Can I just say how great it is that we have lovely people like Prullory and friend-of-the-Toast Bear ( https://bitchmedia.org/article/ask-bear-can-my-bo… ) to give people kind, thoughtful, well-measured advice? Because if Bear’s recent correspondent had come to me, I would have said “RUN! RUN FOR THE HILLS AND DON”T LOOK BACK!”
Life experiences, man.
I’m right there with you. My response would have been three paragraphs of all caps “NOPE”.
Ok I just started reading the Ask Bear piece and I’m already fascinated with the LW for whom a child is equivalent to a cross-country move.
ETA I understand not wanting to live with your husband’s ex though, that is legit.
Weirdly, I’m not even that bothered by the ex being around. Not a choice I would personally choose, but the arrangements Bear outlines seem plausible. I am, however, completely enraged by the sheer amount of emotional and organizational labor the LW is doing. This is a guess based on some vague word choices in the letter, but it seems like it’s not only that the ex isn’t doing any of the work of house hunting, but that the BF isn’t either? Even in absence of the ex, I would not be making giant financial commitments with this dude until he proved he was capable of sharing the management of them. Run for the hills, LW, and find a nice little condo of your own there, if you can.
Yeah that’s exactly it. I’ve seen plenty of unusual housing situations work just fine (wasn’t there a Prudie letter about something similar a while back?) but housing situations in general only work when there’s equitable distribution of labor across all parties. Add into that co-parenting and ex romantic relationships and it’s even more important that everyone is pulling their weight. THAT is why I would tell that LW to run the fuck away, not because their partner wants to co-parent and co-habitate with his ex-partner. Especially once words like “resentment” and “anger” and “extreme insecurity” start entering the picture 🙁
I saw the bitch post about it on my facebook feed and just said ‘hell no’ without even going to the link.
I know that this is A Thing that people do, but man I could not do it.
Yeah, I’m with you on that! I don’t think that type of living situation is unreasonable if the parents can work it out, but I would definitely prefer my privacy.
Coming at this from the perspective of someone whose parents were divorced and remained very amicable (but living in separate homes), I definitely agree that it’s better if the parents can manage to be friendly and work together. But I think there’s also a lot of value in seeing your parents move on with their lives.
Bear is the best (and people with unusual and seemingly-awkward living/relationship/parenting structures can very much have it that way because it works best for them and it might take a lot of talking, negotiation, crying, figuring out complicated legal/financial stuff. And as someone who has had conventional such structures and now has an unconventional one, I can tell you – every single kind of living/relationship/parenting takes a lot of talking, negotiation, crying, and figuring out complicated legal/financial stuff.
So, for example, if the LW sits down with the ex and finds out that the ex has been trying to stay out of the way so as not to encroach on their new relationship, and that’s why she hasn’t seemed to be so involved – they can probably work that out. If she’s happy to live apart as long as there is a firm and strong agreement as to how much time she gets with their kid, then they can probably work that out. There’s lots of options that can be worked out, and Bear’s advice is spot-on.
Edit – sorry if this sounds preachy! I’ve just experienced a lot of weirdness, including one really traumatic incident, about my unusual circumstances, so I get really defensive!
What I’m not getting is how the LW says she’s told her “dude” that she doesn’t want to live with his ex and he understands and is supportive….yet the ex still assumes that they’ll all be living together? Isn’t there, like, a MAJOR conversation that needs to take place that “dude” hasn’t tackled?
I’m also betting that if LW says “we need to sit down with a lawyer, now” there will be pushback, which is Clue #100,000 that buying property in any way, shape or form with “dude” should not be happening right now.
Today in (Feminist) History!!
On April 27th in 1992, Betty Boothroyd was the first woman to be elected Speaker of the British House of Commons. As a young girl who briefly worked as a dancer for the London West End Theatre, she got into politics serving as a secretary to politicians, trying five times before finally being elected into Parliament. When she served first as Deputy to the Speaker’s post (prior to becoming Speaker herself), she was asked (by all those confused men) how she wished to be addressed, and told them, “Call me Madam”. She refused to wear the traditional knee breeches and wig worn by her predecessors (solid choice tbh), and was known for calling ‘Times up’ at the end of the weekly question sessions. (To understand why this is “shocking”, the source explains it was: “a cry made familiar by barmaids in public houses and bars across the country”, gasp!) She has never married or had children, took up paragliding in her 60s (amazing), and was created a life peer in 2001, taking the title of Baroness Boothroyd. (Source.)
(Also on this day in 1963, Margaret Annemarie Battavio’s single “I Will Follow Him” reached #1 on the U.S. Pop Charts. Margaret, who would come to be known as “Little Peggy March”, was barely 15 at the time, and as such became the youngest female performer to ever top the Billboard Hot 100– a title she still holds to this day. – Source.)
She was a Tiller Girl! Mass Ornament!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIZeyndTBFc
Oh wow, this one’s amazing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XQ17OZ4mwU
Oooooo. I would like to have a Today in Feminist History as a recurring feature in Link Roundups. Thank you for this one!
You’re welcome! Someone had commented on the one I posted yesterday that they would like it recurring too, so I wrote up blurbs for at least the next 5 weekdays. I figured I could post them in a comment on the Roundups every day, since I’m always on at work when they go up, haha.
(Although I would not at all be opposed to it becoming an actual Roundup feature, I love reading about ladies in history.)
That was me and I am SO EXCITED! Thank you!! 😀 (Also even if it’s not daily, it’s delightful every time.)
Betty Boothroyd was my hero when I was a wee babe. My gran used to watch the house of commons debates in the evenings (when Jerry Springer or Judge Judy wasn’t on, luh you granny) and I just internalized Betty as THE speaker. Like, it could only be her. There’s an old video of me at about … 4? Maybe? Running around in my undies and a spoon yelling “ORDER! ORDER!” at the dogs.
She’s got a (disappointingly boring) biography or autobiography out there that I read in college.
So excited to read the article about the managed-alcohol shelter program. I can’t count the number of times, when I was a nurse, that I would have this conversation with a physician:
me: So *patient* tells me that they usually drink half a liter of vodka every day. [Note it is nearly always safe to assume that people under-report the amount that they drink.]
Dr Dude (always a dude): okay?
me: So, can we order them some whiskey? Or at least some benzos?
[Yes it’s true! In the hospital we can sometimes use whiskey – idk why it’s always whiskey, and yes it’s the cheap stuff – as a medication, 15mL of whiskey will be ordered as one of your 6:00 medications and you can take it right alongside your metoprolol and your atorvastatin. But some people are prudish about giving hospitalized alcoholics actual alcohol, and so you can sort of stave off the complications of going cold-turkey by giving a regimen of benzodiazepines such as Ativan.]
Dr Dude: Um, I don’t think that’s necessary.
me: well, their last drink was X hours ago, so I can tell that by Tuesday they’re going to have a lot of problems. Remember last time we had an alcoholic patient you didn’t want to give benzos to?
Dr dude: No, it’ll be okay.
Tuesday comes, patient rapidly develops altered mental status, seizures, cardiac arrythmias, tachypnea, hypotension, etc. I call Doctor Dude. Doctor Dude says “let’s start some benzos.” I stare at Doctor Dude for a full seething minute. I say, “you know, we could have avoided all of this.”
Repeat ad nauseam.
I’d guess whiskey because it isn’t clear, and so it’s less likely to get confused with other kinds of alcohols that might be poisonous.
Wow, this whole article is astonishing. It makes so much sense, but man, the response to such a program being more broadly instituted would be so ugly. I think in the US, there’s a lot of people who would vote for “let them suffer and die” as opposed to giving them any free alcohol whatsoever. Heartbreaking.
“Let them suffer and die” is a good summation of a certain segments of the populations response to many many things.
It’s the platform of the GOP (and I guess the Christian Right, too).
Oh yes, undoubtedly. One of the things we learned from yesterday’s primary (courtesy of FiveThirtyEight) is that evangelicals have swung completely over to Trump — he carried them by 25 percentage points in three states. Thanks, guys, for no longer bothering to carry any pretenses about how shitty your priorities and world view is!
Well, supporting Cruz isn’t a great way to hide it either!
It’s ostensibly better because Cruz clothes all his shitty prejudice and policy ideas with fundamentalist Christianity. Trump doesn’t even try to do that. It’s glaringly obvious he has no familiarity with the Bible, and the evangelicals don’t give a shit.
He’s enough of a dick to overcome even complete Biblical illiteracy! Seriously, that’s the actual reason. His preferred form of masculinity is comforting to evangelicals who are worried about the “crisis of masculinity” and “loss of headship” Christian men in this country are apparently experiencing.
*gags*
I got a formerly-Evangelical friend to explain it to me. Trump speaks directly to people’s most basic fears, and that’s why he’s doing so well.
This is so baffling to me because every single Trump “position” that I’m aware of is fundamentally anti-Christian.
ETA On second thought, a lot of evangelical positions are, in my opinion anyway, fundamentally anti-Christian. So never mind.
Bingo.
No joke. To the point where MrChouffe started quoting Dickens at the opponents of a new homeless shelter in our town to illustrate the point.
I miss the days when everyone thought of Ebeneezer Scrooge as an asshole before his paranormally-expedited conversion to the cause of our common humanity, and not some a paragon of virtue. Or, I guess I should say I miss the days when I was blissfully unaware that the latter people existed, because there’s probably always been a #NotAllEbeneezers crowd.
Also guess what, and Toastfolk are unfailingly well-read, so I won’t be surprised if everyone already knows this, but guess what costs less taxpayer money than shitty homeless shelters? Giving small, safe, furnished apartments to homeless people/families. Just giving them a home. Not renting. Giving them a home. Once they have that stability, so much else falls into place. Literally into place! Somewhere to keep your food, and to keep your clothes, and to put down as your home address, and to take a shower. Once you have shelter, real shelter, you can go forth and accomplish all the other things you need to do. And it’s cheaper than the horrible system we have now.
Why don’t we just give homes to the homeless when it’s cheaper and works better is my go-to question for anyone running for any office in the land.
“Because BOOTSTRAPS.”
So frustrating trying to explain the logical steps to people who have no empathy for anyone else’s situations. It’s like trying to explain how the use of birth control actually REDUCES the occurrence of abortions. (And how it’s actually cheaper for insurance companies and therefore THE REST OF US if they pay for birth control for women instead of having to pay for childbirth.)
UGH.
Yes, and we have hard data now that shows how the whole thing works on both sides, so the lack of empathy thing is even more inexplicable.
https://pathwaystohousing.org/programs-partners/s…
“Utah has moved 91% of their chronically homeless population off the streets in the past 8 years.”
And that doesn’t even illustrate the data about savings to taxpayers w/r/t emergency services, etc. etc. etc.
Come on, people! You can stay self-interested, even! Just understand how this helps you!
Double UGH.
There was a piece on NPR today where an interviewee said something to the effect of “if you ask a small child how to solve homelessness, they’ll say, well, just give them homes. And it turns out they’re really quite right.”
Argh, that is so enraging. Why were the doctors so intransigent? (Aside from the usual male irrationality around taking advice)
My guess is because alcohol abuse is BAD, and UNHEALTHY, and we shouldn’t contribute to the patient’s problem, we are here to make them GOOD and HEALTHY.
Listen, if someone with an alcohol addiction wants to quit cold turkey, more power to them, but the time to do that is so obviously NOT at the same time they are in the hospital recovering from orthopedic surgery or whatever, with a body and a mind under considerable stress.
I work at a work comp insurer, and we had a patient very nearly die because he had major ortho surgery requiring several days hospitalization, and didn’t tell anyone he drank. I won’t repeat what the case workers said (you can guess) but it was heartbreaking to hear about. Harm reduction is literally FOR LIFE and people who do not support it are wrong.
See, going cold turkey at that point seems to me like it would significantly impede recovery.
but yeah, it’s sometimes astonishing to me how much regular medical doctors don’t understand how alcoholism works
I review medical records at work, and was rather surprised the first time I saw a prescription for a six-pack of beer. But it makes perfect sense.
I had a doctor actually prescribe Guinness to me when I was anemic in college!
I am not sure that this is standard though, that might have just been a super irresponsible doctor.
Nope, legend has it the Irish used to feed Guinness to malnourished babies because it is chalk full of delicious vitamins and minerals. 😀 (edited to add – legend = my British grandad who was also a GP, so maybe this practice was not limited to “the Irish” ).
*goes and finds a Guinness*
No, my cousin, who had a baby in New York State just a month ago, was given a list of beers to help with lactation. I would bet cash-money Guinness was on there.
Yeah, heavy stouts are actually good for lactation, and the low alcohol content means that basically none of it is passed onto the baby; my wife got the same list but still refused to drink any of them.
My homebrewer husband brewed me a stout to help with lactation.
We called it “Ann’s Milk Stout” and no one else touched it. 😀
My friend lives in a fairly Irish area of Queens, and when she went into the neighborhood pub for dinner while she was pregnant, they gave her half a pint of Guinness for free because it was good for the baby.
GIANT HEARTS.
I love this so much.
That was common advice back in the Victorian era (and probably before!)
Yes, “Guinness is good for you” used to be a popular ad slogan of theirs. I think they’ve tried to move past that though (I noticed when I did the Guinness factory tour thing in Dublin that you couldn’t find anything that referenced it, and it used to be EVERYWHERE) but I’m not sure why.
“Guinness — for Strength!”
The pub i frequented in uni had these plastered all over the walls! It in no way induced me to drink Guinness, tho. To much of a meal-in-a-glass *nods*
Dorothy L Sayers came up with it!
I believe vitamin B12 deficiency can cause iron deficiency anemia, so that may not be totally out of line. (Though nowadays they just give you vitamin B12 injections, at least in the US).
I was watching one of those historical farming programs recently, and they talked about how the switch from beer to tea in the 18 & 19th c. led to widespread nutritional deficiencies in Britain (especially B vitamins).
That is fascinating. Our culture has shifted the narrative so fully to beer being bad for you and tea being good for you (some types anyway). Health is weird.
Also, I guess if 99% of your diet is just bread and cheese, then any extra nutrients you can scrounge are pretty useful!
B12-deficiency anemia and iron-deficiency anemia are actually two different things, though it turns out you can get both at the same time. Which is why I’m getting shots and taking iron pills and they both kind of suck, honestly.
O gods, I live with chronically low iron and supplements is how I am supposed to deal with it and they make me nauseus and bunged up and _i hates them_. I take about a third of the dose my dr recommends and she gives me the side-eye, but I just _cannot_ live my life queasy and constipated, i would rather be tired.
So, just to be clear, I can define a glass of stout as a supplement for my borderline-anemic blood, yes? That’s totally a thing I can do?
Please tell me it was Genny Light.
(I love that gif so much!)
Yes to managed alcohol, supervised injection sites, pill testing kits and every single harm reduction method there is! Nothing gives lie to “fiscal conservatives” as hearing them bluster against programs that are proven to save taxpayer money.
I totally started crying about Chris Mercredi. I would like to hug him.
YES. Sniffles at my desk, thanking Maude that I have a well known dust allergy to blame them on.
Me too. The kitten he wants. The photo he talks to. That he always cooked for him. That he is receiving help, not judgment, and how much it clearly means to him.
We need something like this so badly here.
My mother works in the big ER here, and they have a lot of “frequent fliers” with substance abuse issues. They’ll come in weekly just because they have nowhere else to go. (Or to get warm in the winter, to get a sandwich, etc.)
And when they do come in with serious medical issues, I expect a lot of that could have been prevented if they’d had someone like a nurse keeping an eye on them. (And better access to primary care).
I had no idea that this program existed here, and I am pleasantly astonished that it’s the second oldest program like this in Canada. Ottawa isn’t known for progressive things like this — there’ve been proposals by I think the same organization that runs The Oaks to open a safe injection site, and they’ve not been well received by the city. The mayor is firmly anti-safe injection site (and by the sounds of it, would be against this program too) and the police chief is too, so even if they get provincial funding, they’ve not got much local political support. Insite has been studied from here to the moon, and the evidence is clear! Harm reduction reduces the harm to people! My god, this is not difficult.
The first one here in Toronto would never have happened during the (shudder) Rob Ford years. In fact, looking at the timelines, it looks like it got in just before Mel Lastman, in the halcyon days of Barbara Hall, before amalgamation. Sigh.
Yeah, it sounds like The Oaks got off the ground because no-one was paying attention to it, and it kind of snuck around the political circus. No way that’d happen now. 🙁
Sometimes it seems like there’s this regular cycle of overprescription/underprescription of various drugs; benzos seem to have gone through that cycle more than once, and we’re seeing a lot of heroin addiction from people who got hooked on Oxycontin and Vicodin by their doctors getting cut off. I know that there have been lots of people who have had lots of problems with benzos, but still.
I had a doctor point blank tell me the reason Western New York doesn’t have a huge meth problem is because everyone is on prescription pain meds or heroin. It’s getting out of control. Two of the physicians in my clinics have decided to start prescribing medical marijuana because they want to do less harm.
There was a New York Times article recently about opiate addiction and heroin overdoses, and they had a map showing the incidence in various parts of the country.
Upstate New York was actually way lower than most other places, for reasons I haven’t been able to figure out. I think there may actually be tighter controls on prescribing opiates than in many other states.
Tighter controls on prescriptions tend to drive people toward heroin and getting pills on the street, because they can’t get ’em from their doctors, so they can actually lead to more overdoses.
That’s…interesting, because I keep hearing mounting horror stories from doctors and nurses in the area about dealing with overdoses. And this: http://wivb.com/2016/04/20/bpd-shrinks-narcotics-…
I haven’t read the article yet (need to get back to work any second now), but I’m currently reading Infinite Jest with my book group and expecting it to feel very relevant to that.
Whiskey as a prescribed drug has a long history in the US, dating back at least to prohibition. I imagine whiskey was the prohibition exception in part because of the whiskey industry in KY, TN, OH, IN, etc.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/ist/?next=/history/…
My doctor recently recommended (though did not prescribe) G&Ts in response to muscle cramps.
(Before any medical types respond, Magnesium was not working for me.)
That’s probably less for the gin and more for the tonic– the quinine in tonic water helps with muscle cramps, as well as malaria symptoms. It’s not great in high dose, but in tonic water-doses it can really help.
Fucking men.
Anyone want to talk about the Hugo nominees? Full list here: http://www.tor.com/2016/04/26/2016-hugo-award-fin…
I guess the Sad/Rabid Puppies managed to get a lot of their slate on the ballot, but I also think a lot of those books would have been there anyway. Stephenson’s Seveneves was wildly popular, and I’d have been surprised if Bujold’s Penric’s Demon and Gaiman’s new Sandman story weren’t on the ballot. So I’m less upset about this than last year. Then again, a friend of mine pointed out that they pretty much dominated the shorter works and the categories that fewer people care about. And while that makes sense to me on some level (fewer people voting = easier to game), it is disappointing to know that a lot of deserving pieces were probably passed over.
What do you all think?
I actually read one of the novelettes for a change! I backed Uncanny Magazine, so I read the Folding Beijing story, which was quite lovely.
I also really hope the Jessica Jones episodes wins its category.
I was pleasantly surprised to see Jessica Jones nominated! I’m tempted to sign up to vote this year just so I can vote for it (and for Jemisin’s novel, which I actually haven’t even read yet, but I love everything else she’s written)
It is REALLY GOOD. Maybe my favorite of hers so far!
So good!! I was shocked and horrified that it ended (not how, that), even though I was reading a paper copy and could clearly see how many pages were left. I mean, I knew it was part of a series and that therefore part of the story would have to wait for another book, but I want it now.
Fourthed!!! Everyone should read The Fifth Season and it’s sequel The Obelisk Gate comes out August 16th and is available for preorder!
It was probably my favorite SFF book of last year everything about it was gorgeous and heartbreaking.
August 16! [marking my calendar]
I would have put ‘WWJD’ in instead of ‘Smile’, but still good to have it in.
Same – WWJD? is a lot more insightful, I think, and shocking in its way – but I’ll take any episode, really.
If Space Raptor Butt Invasion by Chuck Tingle doesn’t win Best Short Story then my God that’ll be a miscarriage of justice.
I can’t figure out what the puppies were thinking there. Do they even know what it’s about?
I’m pretty sure it was nominated a) to make the award look silly (thanks, guys, you’re already doing a fine job of that with Castalia House’s nominations) and b) because they’re still butthurt about Rachel Swirsky’s If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love being nominated in 2014. (See also: If You Were an Award, etc. etc.)
I’d guess that they are hoping people will vote it over the “serious” Puppy nominees — then they can feel pleasantly outraged/have good propaganda about ‘this is what the Hugos are coming to under the iron fist of the sjw brigade! Perverted gay porn wins just for being “pc”!!!111!”
(The only one of the short stories that I’ve read is “Asymmetrical Warfare” which had a few clever bits but drowned them in standard zomg-earthlings-are-so-heroic tropes. The others just don’t look that interesting at all. I also note that all of the short stories are written by men, and, as far as I can tell, they all feature men. Novelette and novella are more evenly distributed (2 women / 5 spots in each. There’s only one woman nominated in “best related work.”)
I haven’t read Space Raptor Butt Invasion but if it’s anything like another of Tingle’s stories, My Ass Is Haunted By The Gay Unicorn Colonel, then I agree.
I don’t even care that it’s because of the Puppies, I’M SO DELIGHTED.
I love Chuck Tingle and I hope he wins TBH. The Hugos are voted for by less than 3,500 people who have to pay for membership to vote. The entire system was build broken, pooped on by the puppies, and is still bad. Let’s give attention to Chuck, whatever he is doing, it is definitely under-appreciated art anyway.
3,500 voters seems like a lot to me; some major awards are determined by a jury of about three people.
I went to an opera competition recently where the judge was a single lady typing away on a laptop in the middle row.
I think “built broken” assumes that the Hugos were supposed to be some sort of… I dunno, Nobel prizes for science fiction, or something, sort of objective excellence awards? In which case, yeah, paying to vote is odd. But it was a bunch of fans running a convention in the 50s who went “you know what would be cool? If we gave an awesome rocket award to people who create stuff we love, all the fan artists and magazine editors and people! Hey, all the Worldcon attendees by definition love SFF, we can just do it right here in the barn!”, and then it snowballed and people outside congoing fans started paying attention to the words “hugo-winner”, but the fact that it was all based on members of a convention voting wasn’t a problem until a bunch of fuckers decided to throw a shit-fit about nobody paying attention to their crappy writing.
*shrug* Yeah okay fair enough. The whole thing seems very silly and it’s hard to take any of it more seriously than a high school class officer election where it’s never a surprise who wins.
NGL, Chuck Tingle’s Amazon page is a wealth of joy-inducing WTF titles: http://www.amazon.com/Chuck-Tingle/e/B00SF2MTYK
Chuck Tingle is a treasure. A treasure who just released a book called “Slammed in the Butt by my Hugo Award Nomination.”
Click the link below for a dramatic reading of Space Raptor Butt Invasion. It is just as good as you always hoped.
http://drunkandugly.com/2016/04/01/the-drunk-and-…
I think the Puppies deliberately picked some they knew would win (or at least have a strong shot) so they can claim the victory when they inevitably win. It’s annoying, but I hope the E Pluribus Hugo prevents this from being an issue next year. I have heard rumors that some of the bigger names (Gaiman is the one I hear thrown around the most) might withdraw in protest, and I know some of the smaller authors did last year, so we will have to see.
That the Puppies dominate the smaller categories really grinds my gears, though, because those are the authors that benefit the most from the attention (its not like George R.R. Martin or Stephenson are desperate for readership) and it screws them over.
I think the Puppies deliberately picked some they knew would win
Yeah, John Scalzi wrote about that particular phenomenon yesterday (here: http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-…. But he only really touches on the bigger categories.
Yeah, last year the one Puppy-slate nominee that did well was Guardians of the Galaxy, so it looks like this year they’re trying to replicate that in several categories — nominate things that would do well regardless, hope that enough people will hold their noses re. “this work’s victory will be claimed by a bunch of tedious colossal assholes” and vote for them anyway because they’re genuinely good, and then, sure enough, claim the victory and try to claim legitimacy based on it.
They’re going to claim Victory By Double-Secret Reverse Psychology no matter what happens, though, so personally I’m fine with said nose-holding. Having the Puppies take credit for something that was probably going to happen anyway just reinforces how ridiculous they really are.
Seriously. Also… I’m pretty sure none of them actually read Seveneves.
I think/hope that the Hugo people will do what they did last year, and pointedly give “no award” in those categories. I mean I’d like to also think that the Puppies will get bored/give up, but… yeah.
Ceilidhann, who I follow on twitter, wrote a good piece on it: http://bibliodaze.com/2016/04/we-have-always-been…
Thanks for the link!
Man, it’s a crazy mix this year – way more non-Puppy nominees, but the ones that got on there are terrible. (And then there’s Jim Butcher. I’m becoming increasingly disappointed in him for not saying anything about this whole fiasco – I stopped reading his books a few years ago when the Harry Dresden series just got too long and sprawling for me to care about any more, but he writes perfectly fine books! But putting him on a ballot next to N.K. Jemisin – there is no damn contest.)
It’s actually amazing how many of the nominees are from the puppy slate. I saw a comparison yesterday that I’m having trouble finding now, but there are only like 10 or 15 works on the whole list that weren’t on their slate (Jemison, Novik, Okorafor, Mad Max and a handful of others)
Also, I share your thoughts on Jim Butcher. I liked The Dresden Files for being quick, entertaining reads. But the problems recently overwhelmed me enough that I gave up. And he is basically mediocre, but he’s also popular enough that I’m not entirely surprised to see him pop up. Sanderson, too. Though I think he’s better than mediocre, I also struggle with how much I enjoy his work, and I wish he were more vocal about this.
Huh, you’re right – I was sure there were more Puppy nominees last year than this year, but I’ve actually got it backwards. Probably due to their camouflage tactics, as mentioned above, and the fact that there were a few things I felt really strongly about (Binti, The Fifth Season, Uncanny Magazine) that did make the list.
Several of the people organizing this year’s WorldCon (where the Hugos are awarded/announced) are friends of mine and the Burgomaster is the head of the jury for the Campbell Award and until last year was the organizer for the Sturgeon Award too, both of which are going to be announced at WorldCon instead of the usual June Campbell Conference. After the finalists were announced, there was a lot of this face going on.
I get the impression there’s not a small amount of feeling that the Hugos have become irrelevant, at least until this current crop of douchey Puppies get drowned out.
It’s a shame, because “Hugo-winning” has often convinced me to pick up a book I might otherwise not have. But most of those books were written in the 80s and 90s, and it really doesn’t carry the same connotations lately. I just hope it recovers.
I have definitely stopped thinking of the Hugos as relevant, and now follow them more to see how well (or poorly) the fandom handles things like award gaming/slating.
It’s interesting to see how it affects the other awards, as people are giving the Hugos less credence. The awards the Burgomaster is involved with have been happily going along for decades with adequate but mostly pleasant attention. Now the jurors are dealing with the fallout of being seen as of increasingly important and while on one hand, cool those awards are getting more cred, but man people attack them for anything and since a good number of the jurors are women… ugh.
I have a lot of affection for the Hugo awards. I first got interested in them a few years ago from reading blog posts and listening to podcasts by various people who cared about them, and then a year or two later realized how easy it is to get a Worldcon supporting membership to nominate and vote and feel involved.
I don’t get a membership every year, but I do always follow along, and I’m sad about what’s happening to them at the moment.
There are a lot of people heartbroken over this, and my sympathies go to everyone feeling the loss. It’s a rough thing to see such a respected institution get dragged though the mud.
Did you read “The Story of Moira Greyland”? Because that is…something else.
I haven’t read it, but a quick search informed that this is Marion Zimmer Bradley’s daughter, and I do remember when all that came out. I’ll have to go read it now
Is this what you’re referring to? https://askthebigot.com/2015/07/23/the-story-of-m…
Because that is … something else — is probably the best way to describe it. Dang.
yeah, that’s the one
That did not end the way I thought it would.
riiiiiiiight?
“Okay, okay I’m with you there. Yeah, yeah, that is pretty bad, yeah, that…wait….wait hold on, hold on hold on hold on…”
Luckily I was prepared for where it all would end up after reading the “What is the purpose of this blog” entry at the top of the page. But still it was… ugh.
Dang is right.
what. the. hell. that’s…yeah, that did not end up where I thought it would.
I…am…pretty stunned…
is that real? like, really? that’s not just someone pretending to be Moira Greyland?
And this is related to the Hugos?
Yep, because she comes out as anti-gay and anti-gay-marriage, whcih fits their narrative that SF/F has been taken over by lefties.
Right. Took me a while to find the nom. I just, wow. I feel really bad for her and have ever since I found out. But that is quite the extrapolation there. It seems almost unbelievable that somebody would come to a conclusion that neatly fits so many of the boxes that right-wingers tick off…almost.
I raised my eyebrows so high while I read that I think they live somewhere down my back now. W. T. actual. F.
My stomach hurts. That was appalling to read. I had the nasty sinking feeling it was going to a place I wouldn’t like when I saw how long the post was vs. how quickly she summed up her experiences.
I feel awful for her. I can’t find it in me to be angry at her, because her prejudices are so plainly the result of her having suffered in this very specific way that created them. She says as much herself, but it’s posed as, “So I’m drawing logical reactions from my experiences” and never considers taking the leap into “My experiences may be different from the next person’s, so maybe I shouldn’t decide they’re universal.”
(And she’s a really strong writer. I wish I wish I wish she was using her skills in service of something else.)
That is…definitely something. I just…wow
Um, yeah, no, just… that is a HARD right turn based on some weird counterfactuals.
“What if the problem is the gayness?”
“Surely the fact that your parents were pedophile rapist sociopaths is more pertinent than the fact that they were gay?”
“No.”
EXACTLY. Thank you, that’s what I was flailing after.
Pedophile rapist sociopaths should not raise children! It’s terribly harmful and leads to horrific abuse! The whole LGBTQ thing is only tangentially related, and only because “we must accept everyone’s special differences” was something those people deliberately twisted in order to facilitate their access to victims, and their abuse.
The hard part with Moira Greyland is that her parents were pedophile racist sociopaths who said that they were gay/bisexual and their behavior was just normal given their sexual orientation.
So, Thank God, almost all of us queer people are not pedophile racist sociopaths, and the assumption that everyone queer falls into one or more of those categories is a horrible, offensive lie with very bad consequences.
But Greyland was abused by horrible, horrible people who openly claimed to be doing just what gay people do. And now she believes that that’s just what gay people do.
I’m not angry at Moira Greyland. I feel very, very sorry for her, and I will never pick up a Marion Zimmer Bradley book again. I’m angry at “Vox Day” et al for using her to spread bigotry.
…oh dear.
My response exactly. (also, “well, shitfuck.”)
On the one hand, I don’t have much energy for outrage anymore. On the other, as someone who loves and reads a lot of sff short stories, I’m pissed at that category in particular. The four preceding categories looked like mainly decent noms, and then it turned into a shitshow that in no way reflects the fantastic, varied world of today’s short fiction markets.
I haven’t read many of the works on the list this year (I have largely been too stressed to cope with fiction), but I’m delighted to see Penric’s Demon on the list. I doubt it will win, but it was lovely.
Bujold’s other major publication this year was a novel that was (depending on your perspective) a minor revolution in science fiction, or only a technical qualification away from being straight-up fanfic. I loved it, but there was no way in hell for it to wind up nominated. (Had Gentleman Jole made the same ballot as the Moira Greyland piece, there probably would have been some kind of matter/anti-matter implosion.)
Well, there’s also some controversy over whether it was eligible for this year’s Hugo or next year’s, since only the ARCs came out before the deadline.
There’s still hope for GJatRQ to win next year, in other words!
Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen was a minor revolution? I was delighted by it, but none of it seemed out of character for the characters (or for Bujold). Did people have problems with it?
GJatRQ (IMO) was Bujold setting up kind of her classic military SF scenario, and then sauntering away from it. Whistling. Into a few different kinds of smacking people over the head and suggesting that they pay attention to biology.
Also, there’s the bit where she basically says on the page that she’s not going to write all the things that her characters did in bed together, but if you can think of it, it’s canon.
Some people do seem to have had problems with it. I was not one of them.
Wait, Bujold was on the Puppies slate???
Yeah, I have that question too. Was Bujold a puppy nom? If so, explain?
so were Gaiman and Stephenson. They wanted popular authors who might have been nominated anyways, regardless of those authors feelings/ politics.
Yes – File 770 lists the nominees alongside the Rabid & Sad Puppy lists here: http://file770.com/?p=28616
As one of their human shields. This year the Rabid Puppies picked some nominees they thought their enemies might vote for. So if those nominees lost to No Award, Vox Whatever could say, “Nyah, nyah, you didn’t pick Bujold’s novella because my evil plan worked!” And if they won, he could say, “Look, my Puppy slate includes Bujold’s winning novella.”
ughhhhhhh
Ah. Is that why puppies recced Ann Leckie this year too?
It looks like Leckie was on the Sad Puppies reading list, but not the Rabid Puppies’ slate. I believe the Sads just made a reading list by compiling recommendations people sent them this year, so someone being on their list doesn’t mean that they’re endorsed by the Sad Puppy leadership.
yeah, from what I can see the Sad Puppies did a lot more normal recommendations, not the full on slate like Rabid. Which unfortunately made Rabid more effective this year. Hopefully the rule change is approved at MidAmeriCon this year, to make slating less possible.
Bless you both for explaining this.
I had managed to convince myself that the puppies wouldn’t be so dominant this year :-(. I actually don’t have a problem with what the Sad Puppies did this time round – I would call theirs a recommendation list rather than a slate – but the Rabid Puppies/Vox Day continue to be awful.
I’m pretty happy with the novel and novelette lists, although I mostly nominated other things. Very pleased (but unsurprised) that The Fifth Season made it.
I think the shorter works and fan categories are easier to game not only because they tend to get fewer nominees, but because nominations are more spread out. There are only so many novels out in a given year, and the ones that are likely to make the ballot probably had a lot of buzz when they came out, and were discussed and reviewed in many places. Whereas there are so many different short fiction venues, and short stories don’t tend to get much buzz. So I would guess that the nominations are spread out over a much wider pool of nominees and can be easily overwhelmed by a slate, compared to novel nominees with more consensus among non-puppy voters.
Dang I read that MediCal story as well and I got to say — I work for the welfare office in Pennsylvania (I have the same job as the “MediCal guru” in the story, basically, except on the government side of the system rather than the hospital side) and American welfare benefits are fucking nightmare. How anyone can seriously believe that people are scamming the government to live in luxury off of SNAP and TANF is a mystery to me; how regular people actually manage to survive on them is equally mysterious.
I used to work on TANF/SNAP in Congress and the things Members said about these people….!!! Infuriating.
My family has been on and off Medicaid/SNAP for most of my life (thanks to my mother’s wildly fluctuating wages based on what project she’s working on, but it’s definitely never enough to be able to support a family once we cross over the threshold of making too much ANYWAYS), and my mom used to work in insurance, so she has some idea of how to navigate the system without an overwhelming number of headaches, just the normal amount. She constantly says she has no idea how anyone who doesn’t have a background in this stuff manages to do it.
sometimes people call me up with questions and I have to figure out how to sign up for it or find out what kinds of things they can qualify for, and *I* can’t do it! It’s my actual job, and if I try to go through the client end of the interface it’s almost completely baffling.
I relate to this so hard.
We have tons of lawyers, doctors, and nurses where I work (with many years of experience and education), and we still come across MANY situations where we’re completely baffled by the regulations.
I don’t know how normal people are supposed to make heads or tails of them.
I work in health care administration (also on the government side of things), and… yeah.
A big part of my job is reading through medical records for people who are “dual eligibles” (i.e., on both Medicare and Medicaid, due to age/ disability/ low income, etc.) Those folks are not living it up, to put it mildly. (Unless you think having 10 chronic diseases and going to dialysis four times a week is fun).
The problems are so overwhelming that my only suggested fix is “burn it all to the ground and start over”. (Or, you know, look at other countries, where they somehow manage to provide basic medical care and social services to everyone for a fraction of what we spend…)
Maybe too inside basebally, but I am inspired to delurk because Toast/dual eligibles is a Venn diagram I cannot resist. That situation in particular is so insanely fucked up that it is unbelievable. I’m on a work group that is designing one of those CMS dual demo projects, and “burn it all to the ground and start over” is sadly not one of the options currently on the table. I wish I could say that ANYTHING would be better than the system we have now, but I am so skeptical about ~*~*system transformation~*~* when I see insurance companies tripping over themselves to make money off of these incredibly vulnerable patients.
Yeah, the assumptions people make are ridiculous, most notably in my own life that anyone using SNAP is therefore intentionally “not working.” Oh no, I’m working, Peaches, I just get paid absolute shit for it. (Not sure why I directed that at some fictional person named Peaches, I do not consider Peaches my enemy)
I have become basically insufferable at our sort of gatherings of our middle-class acquaintances because I will not tolerate even a second of scorn towards people on welfare, I will turn this party right the fuck around and educate every last one of you if I have to.
I got a lot of frustration because of the way the welfare system limits how much help people can get, and so I take it out on anyone with the gall to tell me that it’s too much.
I’d like to invite you to my workplace for a day, because I’m definitely surrounded by some Republican bros who are convinced that “welfare queens” abound. Especially in the immigrant class.
::rolls up sleeves::
::cracks knuckles::
Let’s go.
(grabs sock full of nickels)
Are we twins. Do we share a soul? I will also turn this pleasant gathering right the fuck around with allll the facts and figures.
Through working for one of the Welfare to Work programmes in the UK, I too have become That Person.
During my SNAP period, I quit my job because it was making me suicidal (and I was delivering food on a moped, so self-harm would have been way, way too easy for me to keep working there). I didn’t think to either get a doctor’s note, or talk to my social worker first, because of the whole “suicidal depression” thing. When I came back to tell them about my further-reduced income, my case worker looked so sad to have to tell me I’d quit “without good cause” and they had to kick me off EBT benefits. I actually felt really bad for him.
Sorry, all I can think of is
Which feels especially complicated and waaaaaay off topic.
Hahaha! Well, that would go a long way toward explaining why I can never do anything but run away when people level those sorts of accusations at me. Holy cow.
Lobster tail was on major, major sale at Kroger one week, so I bought lobster tail with food stamps. Just to say that I’d done it, since it still wasn’t a great use of my EBT dollar, but imagining the bitter tears of conservatives made it all worth it.
I currently have medicaid, and have for the past 6 months – so far, I’ve been unexpectedly bumped off of it twice for no discernible reason and have had to reapply. Social services are a bitch to navigate, and if people are abusing it, I want them to teach me how, so at least I know I can keep my medical insurance!
For your early morning downer reading – BYU student gets slapped with honor code disciplinary sanctions after she reports her sexual assault. This just hurts.
What kills me is that so many of the comments are in the vein of “well don’t go to a school like that if you don’t want to follow the code” totally ignoring the fact that for many people, due to family pressure/dependency, they are ‘stuck’ going to a school like BYU if they want to get an education. I know several of people who’s conservative parents wouldn’t even fill out financial aid forms for schools they deemed too “liberal”
THIS.
But there’s always University of Phoenix…
Right!? And there are also Mormon women who want to go to BYU. Doesn’t mean they should be punished by such a regressive process.
I have a friend who works there and tries to be the change from within, but man, she has few/no allies on campus, and it is so hard. She is *livid* over this. 🙁
Not even just family pressure, but financial pressure. If you are Mormon, BYU is amazingly inexpensive, around $29000 for the entire four years. Mormons as a group have among the highest rates of college graduates; given that Mormon families tend to be larger, there’s no way that would be true if BYU wasn’t so affordable. Out of the 8 of us in my family, all went to BYU or BYUI for either their 2 or 4 year degrees. Since we all basically had to put ourselves through college, as our parents couldn’t afford to give much help; I do appreciate how affordable they have made education for the average Mormon. I still appreciate it even with how much I ABSOLUTELY hate their completely rigid policies with no mercy, the way their culture fosters an atmosphere of public shaming and tattling, and they way they don’t allow students to mature and make their own decisions (and hated all this even while I was going there–so much that I only did my 2 year at BYUI and gladly went to the more “liberal” UVU for the rest).
I can’t even read that, I just read the headline and went NOPE.
(I took a single online correspondence course at BYU because it was a cheap alternative for a requirement I needed to get my degree, and at the time I was kinda meh about BYU, but now I feel extra UGH about the school and weirdly guilty whenever I think about it, just for giving them my money? UGH.)
Ha, in high school to get out of spending a semester taking in-classroom health so I could take more art classes I took health as a correspondance course through BYU. Very interesting perspective on sex ed, the BYU health curriculum had.
And here’s a really good article by Dahlia Lithwick on Slate today. They should really should have their federal financial aid access revoked for this. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/j…
Hopefully they will. I was thinking that had to be a Title IX violation!
Though this line – Instead, her case was passed along to the Honor Code Office, and she was told that the Title IX and honor code investigations would go “hand in hand, so whatever one decided the other agreed with.” – that is chilling and sickening.
BURN. IT. DOWN.
I love this Fusion piece from yesterday (although the term bodyhacking gives me the creeps because I keep picturing the Neolutionists on Orphan Black):
“And as bodyhacking has become technology (which it wasn’t always) it’s become the realm of men.
You can see this kind of gendered separation all over the place. Men invent Soylent, and it’s considered technology. Women have been drinking SlimFast and Ensure for decades but it was just considered a weight loss aid. Quantified self is an exciting technology sector that led tech giants such as Apple to make health tracking a part of the iPhone. But though women have been keeping records of their menstrual cycles for thousands of years, Apple belatedly added period tracking to its Health Kit. Women have been dieting for centuries, but when men do it and call it “intermittent fasting,” it gets news coverage as a tech trend. Men alter their bodies with implants and it’s considered extreme bodyhacking, and cutting edge technology. Women bound their feet for thousands of years, wore corsets that altered their rib cages, got breast implants, and that was all considered shallow narcissism.” http://fusion.net/story/294770/women-body-hackers…
*series of fire emojis*
I don’t disagree with her point, but for me the difference between an IUD and an RFID chip is the communication. Once an IUD is in me, the only way to interact with it or alter it is to take it back out or cut me open. But an RFID chip interacts with the outside world and I fear that could be turned against me. I have major squick with allowing anything in my body that can then be controlled via radios or wifi or bluetooth or whatever, mostly because I absolutely do not trust that the FDA can keep ahead of malevolent hackers. And maybe that’s not entirely rational, but there it is.
Oh, 100%. I’m mildly freaked out by the location tracking on my cell phone, etc. let alone inside MY BODY. Yikes.
Besides, as everyone who’s ever watched any sci-fi esque thriller knows, when that day comes, you have to cut it out yourself with a razor blade or knife…
That one horrible episode of Black Mirror!!!!!!
They’re passive, aren’t they? They can be read by external devices, but only in the same way a camera can recognise your face. They don’t actively communicate and they aren’t write-enabled, AFAIK.
Well, yeah, but most smartphones can read RFID.
brb, trying to programme the cat with my iphone –
Also, do not want DRM inside my body. See e.g. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/04/pacemakers-…
At least they don’t have MAGGOTS crawling out of their mouths for SOME FUCKING REASON
(but yes that is also what i was reminded of)
Orphan Black! I love it so. is this the appropriate place to talk about how relieved I am that the maggot thing wasn’t aliens? At the end of last season, my wife was convinced it was aliens, and that would not have worked for me, narratively speaking.
Also, I am very pregnant right now and feeling Helena even more than usual:
I have not started season 4 so I can’t talk about pregnant Helena or whatever the maggot actually turned out to be, but I am so here to talk about anything up through season 3!
Oh dear! I’m sorry for being spoilery. I will just say that I am enjoying the new season very much, and that I hope you will, too, when you have a chance to watch it.
I think saying “not aliens” is not an especially huge spoiler 🙂
No no, there were no spoilers in revealing that it wasn’t aliens and that Helena continues to grow more pregnant, as pregnant women are wont to do. I can’t WAIT to watch it– I’m just waiting for the end of the school year, as I am a teacher and will neglect all my duties if I start watching now.
I feel like I need a plot refresher at this point, so much has happened and season one seems like ages ago but there’s stuff from it that are still relevant – I mean now we’re flashing back to before season one even and getting to know Beth!
Felix’s birth family will obviously be caught up in it somehow, yeah?
This is my favourite show, it is the most feminist ever (like, it’s literally about the ownership and reproductive rights of women’s bodies) and Tatiana should get every acting award ever invented.
See also this piece on Mormon transhumanism!
I knew there was a reason why I hated the whole “body hacking” shtick, and she just articulated it. It’s actually not that revolutionary, dudes, you just didn’t notice women doing it before.
Or you did, and told them to stop talking about all their gross body stuff.
OH and another thought I just had: gender affirmation surgery is just another form of “body-hacking.” Chew on that for a minute, tech bros.
“And when I mentioned to one of them that I considered my IUD an implant, he got visibly uncomfortable and changed the subject.”
I want to do this all day, every day. (I don’t even have an IUD so that wouldn’t work.)
They don’t have to know! White lies to make dudes uncomfortable are great IMO
It’s not like they’re gonna check.
Or I could posit it as a hypothetical. Frankly, the subcutaneous hormone releasing stuff is pretty hardcore body hacking no matter what it’s doing medically-wise speaking.
Oh-ho I just had a thought. The difference between male and female stuff is that female stuff (and medical devices) is fixing a flaw or making up a lack where as for men it’s optimizing something that works just fine anyway. Never mind that women’s health and fertility isn’t a flaw and dieting is still dieting even if you call it “optimizing” – Soylent guys I’m looking at you!
I definitely consider my Nexplanon a cool implant and definitely considered my IUD one. It’s a thing in my body that fundamentally alters the way my reproductive system works! It deactivates a major function of my body. It is amazing.
Plus I can push on my tiny tiny implantation scar and make the rod in my arm show up, which is great for grossing out people who are Uncomfortable with menstrual stuff, without taking my pants off.
Eat our dust, tech broooooos.
I was not aware of this Mary Lou Bruner person before and she seems like a legit comic book villain! My favorite part of her gay agenda rant is that she manages to also be a bit sexist about it by using GLBTQ.
HAHAHAHAHA OMG……….
I love Liz Meriwether and I love Prince (although the word love doesn’t fully describe my feelings for him). That was so beautiful. I’ve been curious about how that whole thing happened since it happened, actually. Thanks for the link, Nicole!
I don’t even want to think about medical insurance–my parents are paying mine. I’m 45.
I know I’ve been really needy lately, but the high schooler texted yesterday saying he needs a “counseling appointment soon with a counselor I’ve never talked to before”. I’m trying to arrange that but it’s also the week that my boat on the river in Egypt sinks, re: child custody.
Every year I forget that the ex gets to pick whatever he wants for the summer. So in addition to being a disney dad when I can’t even afford to take a week off with my kids, he takes a 3 week extravaganza and can choose anytime he wants and I have to let him. I manage to repress this every year until the last week in April when he declares what my summer will look like, and when he will get my kids for a month straight. I can’t afford vacation, even if I could I couldn’t schedule a vacation, my kids are growing up and I have summer without them, pity party for me, and I’m really jealous and immature about it. I lost it this morning when he sent the email declaring his plans, I may have punched AND kicked through a wall. My arm hurts and I kicked through both sides of a wall with a pocket door, so it doesn’t open all the way now…It’s taken me two hours to stop crying. And the kids were home to see mom lose it. Great. I really want to just crawl in a hole until September now.
Given the past 6 years as a guideline, I’ll get over this to a bearable stage by next week, and will manage to make plans for myself for the weeks the kids are gone, and I have to get through it so I will. But this particular time of year is so much worse than any other re: divorce shit. And I keep thinking it will get easier with time and this part doesn’t. Because there are only so many summers left (two. I have two more summers with the middle kid. My advice to others is never count how many summers you have left). I have to go pretend to function like a grown up today and it sucks.
And then I get to come home and replace drywall.
I’m so sorry to hear you are hurting so bad, friend. Your ex is a garbage person. I don’t know what else to say that hasn’t been said already. I totally sympathize with the feelings left after you punch or kick something in anger, because boy howdy have I done that. I think you are doing a superhuman amount of …. well, everything, really, and are doing the very best you can in the situation you’re in.
The following may or may not help so feel free to just skip it if you want 🙂
I know it feels like you only have two more summers with the middle kid, but I wonder if it would help to remember that after that, you have all kinds of other memories to make still. They might not be the “summer vacation from school” memories, but they’ll be awesome nonetheless.
That’s actually a very nice thing to say, it does help a little. Right now I’m really grateful I have a ton of homework to cry quietly over in my cubicle. And to distract me.
I have internet hugs for you, if you would like them. 🙁 That sounds really rough.
Hugs and sympathy. This sounds like such a painful, hard situation for you, and I so deeply admire the way you are holding it together for your kids.
Disney Dad is fun for now, but you can be very sure that they know what you do for them, and even if they don’t always appreciate it right now, it’s still the right thing to do. You are a Good Mother. Please try to find something you enjoy doing strictly for yourself during the time the kids are gone. You sound to me like a woman whose batteries are nearly drained.
Yeah, I think they know. And I, too, hope you can get a bit of a silver lining out of the time without them, even if you miss them, and have some well-deserved you-time.
I’m much better at that once the anticipation of them leaving is over and they are actually gone, if that makes sense. But this year I”m adding up all the CT scans, concussions, broken bones that happen on his watch and freaking out (which I know is not helpful behavior). I think I was angry at myself for letting it blindside me once again.
<3
Trust me, you’ll have more summers. The kids’ll come home to save on rent while they work summer jobs or in the month between the end of the semester and start of a study abroad program or for a whole year post-grad while they try to figure out what to do with their lives. I’m in college out of state and I still go back home every break.
OT STORY TIME: Went to Neuropsychologist for potential ADHD.
4 hours. I took a bunch of tests, including memory, intelligence, attention, and personality. Holy shit, my brain was completely fried last night. No diagnosis yet, I’m meeting them next week Tuesday to get the results.
I did get to take part of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Test. So, that was weird because the only context I have for it is Hannibal and Eddie Izzard’s character. It had a lot of questions about feeling various kinds of ill and the standard reliability questions (ie. I never lie).
I had to take the MMPT to get certified as a candidate for ministry. It was bizarre.
Really? I take it you passed… but what would they be looking for?
I think depression and anxiety markers, among other things.
Source: family member formerly on committee that recommended (or did not) people for ministry. FM said it’s not that depression or anxiety are disqualifiers but that they want to make sure people going into work that can be emotionally wrenching have adequate support.
Whoa, 4 hours!?! I hope it yields a helpful course of treatment for you! Do you mind sharing how you were able to get a referral to be tested for it?
I live in the UK, and have spoken to an NHS GP about it and was told they “don’t treat that kind of thing here” (which is as frustrating as you could imagine it to be!). I’d like to see if I can try with a private GP next to be checked for ADD, but I’m at a loss as to how to ask without sounding like an American who saw something on the Internet once and is trying to self diagnose because we Americans love diagnoses (also heavily implied by the shitlord GP I saw). Anyway, I just want to be taken seriously by a doctor, and would love some tips on how to approach them.
I did not get referred, to be honest. I read up on women with ADHD and thought “I resemble these remarks.” I then found a testing place in my town, explained what I was coming in for.
If you can, get referred by a counselor or therapist. I also find that if I broadly describe the typical symptoms that apply to my situation without being like “I THINK I HAVE THIS” doctors are usually willing to go along with it. I’d try a new GP and just be like “I am always super distracted and losing stuff and messy and I keep jiggling my feet and like none of my friends have the same issues. Is that weird? Seems weird, right?”
I think you need a clinical psychologist and if you’re going private you may be able to go straight to them without a GP referral. It’s probably also worth trying a different NHS GP.
I’m also in the UK and think I may have ADD, but haven’t had it checked out yet. However, I did get further than you with my GP – I went in to talk about exhaustion, overwork & stress and ask for a referral, because I think it’s partly caused/exacerbated by ADHD. I told the GP that I have private health insurance through work, and after blood testing came back without any real issues she wrote me a referral (she clearly wasn’t a believer, but said it was worth getting it checked out for my peace of mind).
Of course that was now over a year ago and I haven’t progressed any further, basically down to inaction on my side. A while after I got the referral I filled in the online form for my health insurance, which told me I don’t have psychological outpatient services on my plan (I do). I’ve got most of the way through filling in the online form to book a skype GP session through my insurance twice, but was logged out and lost the form after leaving it too long. I haven’t built up the courage to phone them yet. This week I decided to just book an appointment privately and pay for it, chose a psychologist and filled in their contact form, and got a message back saying he’s moved to Sydney. Sigh.
tl;dr it’s much easier to get a referral to a private service.
Although a warning if you do go private – as I understand it, if medication is appropriate, it’s difficult to get it on an NHS prescription based on a private dx and expensive to get an ongoing private prescription.
WHAT why is it so much work to get diagnosed??? I was seeing a psychiatrist for something else and he was like, “By the way, what about the ADHD you obviously have?” and that was all I needed. Do the tests results in some extra special ADHD status? It’s totally baffling me. OTOH, sometimes tests can be fun?
As long as they don’t put a blood pressure cuff on your genitals, you’re fine. 🙂
How would they even do that in women?
I don’t know, but I’m sure science can find a way.
A really nice, smart lady that I’m friends with on Facebook linked to an article about Lemonade this morning, and added the commentary that she feels Beyoncé is perpetuating a “sisterhood of suspicion” in which the other woman is often blamed for the cheating, while the philandering husband is not taken to task. I *certainly* disagree with the backlash against anyone the “Béyhive” suspects was involved with Jay-Z, but I find it so unsettling that anyone could watch all of Lemonade and come away with the thought, “Oh, she’s letting the cheater off the hook and not standing up for sisterhood.” ?!?! I feel like 3/4 of the album is devoted exclusive to Beyoncé telling her husband, “YOU FUCKED UP,” and the other 1/4 is all about the celebration of womanhood.
And I just got to thinking: is it the artist’s responsibility to anticipate the reaction their fans might have to their work and alter it accordingly? I have no doubt that Beyoncé knew her fan base would A) go on a witch hunt for the offending woman and B) attack, because they’re notoriously protective of her. But none of that even seemed to be the point or the message she was trying to get across in her work…
Sigh. I’m still reeling from Prince’s death and Lemonade. Don’t know if I’ll ever get over either.
Did… this person even listen to/watch the album? Because she pretty much never disses the other woman in any of the tracks, ALL the bashing and anger is at Jay Z (I mean I guess maybe the ONE line “Becky with the good hair” could be considered an insult at the other woman but that’s ONE LINE). Regardless, literally all the blame in this whole album is on Jay Z?? From the very first time I listened to it, I thought that was so stark and also a good step forward, because generally songs like that have SO much bashing about the other woman.
Well, there is the whole spoken word section about wearing the other woman’s skin. But to me that didn’t read as a revenge fantasy, but more as a “what does she have that I don’t” insecurity type of thing (which she shakes off gloriously later).
Oh that’s right; I’d forgotten about that because I’ve been listening to the album (non-stop) and that doesn’t have the spoken word bits. But I agree, even when I watched the video, I remember thinking the same as you. It wasn’t a revenge fantasy, but rather a remark on that whole insecure feeling of “what does she have that I don’t, if I become more like her will I bet enough” sort of feeling.
God I love that part. It read as insecurity to me, too.
Precisely! ONE LINE amidst all that glorious rage against the cheating husband! It is soooo disappointing that the media seems to be clinging to that line and conducting their own investigation into the identity of “Becky with the good hair” (oh man, this all sounds so ridiculous when it is typed out). But that’s not on Beyoncé, it’s on the “mainstream media,” as Sarah Palin would say.
Phew! I’m so glad I’m not the only one who feels this way.
I agree, I think even the songs about how Jay fucked up can work to empower other women in the same situation. Even though she takes him back at the end (and uh…irl) listening to Beyonce sing about how hurt she was to be cheated on universalizes her experiences. She’s taking herself down off a pedestal and saying “me too, women of the world”.
And I’m not sure I would say that she knew they would start looking for the other woman. The obsessive witch hunt for who Becky is weirdly ignorant of the fact that Becky is a purposefully generic name. I really don’t think Bey meant to leave clues as to who she is, and even if she did most of the cheating material seems focused on Jay rather than the other woman anyways. I know he isn’t on social media but it’s a little SUSPECT that all of the fan anger seems devoted to finding out who this lady is, when it’s not like Jay-Z didn’t do anything!! The reaction is so over the top!
Yeah, you’re right – she may not have been aware that the album would set off a shitstorm of angry fans… As a viewer, I just had a very distinct impression as I watched it of, “Oh shit. She’s putting her personal life on blast and people are gonna go crazy about this!” I mentioned above that the media is grossly preoccupied with discovering the identity of Becky, which, I guess, I can understand because that is some juicy gossip. But it just overshadows everything Beyoncé created in this album, and that’s fucked up. To distill such a raw, emotional work down to, “Who is Becky?” So sad.
Right? Yes. We all have our own Becky with the Good Hair- maybe for some of us it isn’t her hair, it’s her job, or how easily she had babies, or her charisma or whatever thing that it seems makes her life easier than ours. It doesn’t need to be one specific woman who then specifically has “good” hair!
“In a way, all of us has an El Guapo to face. For some, shyness might be their El Guapo. For others, a lack of education might be their El Guapo. For us, El Guapo is a big, dangerous man who wants to kill us. But as sure as my name is Lucky Day, the people of Santa Poco can conquer their own personal El Guapo, who also happens to be *the actual* El Guapo!”
I do think it’s kind of weird and invasive that the Beyhive is trying so hard to figure out who the woman is, because I don’t think that is the point of Lemonade at ALL. I think that has more to do with how we’re taught to view cheating than it does about the album or what Beyonce is trying to do with it.
It may not help, but if you want some humor that involves both, have you seen the fanfic The Lemons (part 2 is here)?
Awesomely Luvvie linked it on FB, and it is great.
PART TWO IS UP?
*closes all other tabs immediately and settles in*
Not to mention… “Becky with the good hair” is also a nod to the near-universal glorification of European hair and features, and the psychological impact that has on Black women? The idea of “good hair” dates back to slavery! It is totally in line with the themes she explores the rest of the album/movie, and only marginally relevant to the “other woman.”
Also if anyone’s interested in a really deep, scathing, empowering read of LEMONADE, this storify by Brienne of Tarth is powerful and moving: https://storify.com/femme_esq/beyonce-s-lemonade
[Snarth]
For that article about the “wet” shelters: trust a Catholic to come up with the idea of booze as a solution.
(Said as someone brought up Catholic and who didn’t realise it wasn’t normal to have a bar at a church until I was a teenager.)
With the exception of douchy frat boys, I have never seen so much alcohol in one house as when I babysat for a Hasidic rabbi. We Jews love our, ahem, celebrations too.
I know that’s not what you meant, but I couldn’t help picturing you babysitting a fully-grown rabbi while he does a keg stand and gets completely wasted.
L’chaim indeed
Wait, where is this church? It sounds like all my mom’s dreams come true.
Ahahahahahahahaaaaa I love that so much!
I had a Twitter friend question what that “shit people say to women who write about sports” video was going to accomplish. I took a stab, but he was still skeptical. My points were:
To shine a light on how horribly women – particularly women with jobs in sports in this instance – are treated, because most men probably don’t know.
To use the “innocent” men reading them as a kind of new voice to get through to men who have gone deaf to the voices of women describing the problem.
A call to action for men to speak up when they hear/see this kind of unacceptable behavior.
To put the ball in the offenders’ court, to see how horrible they are and challenge them to be better.
A lot of his concern was “why’d they have to make these decent guys feel bad?” and while I kind of rolled my eyes, I didn’t lay into that line of questioning like I saw people (rightfully) doing on Twitter. Anyway, am I way off on any of these? Did I miss a succinct point do you think?
I thought the really good bit was the guy saying, “I’m having trouble looking at you as I read this”, and I thought that really went to the heart of it. I mean, I bet most of those guys had heard or seen comments like that and mostly just buzzed over them as kind of “tut, dickheads on the internet, whatever”, but reading them out loud really laid bare the fact that real people are on the other side.
“why’d they have to make these decent guys feel bad?”
I mean – c’mon. His sympathy was for the guys who volunteered to take part in this project, not for the women who get this kind of shit on a daily basis? Like, the women were ALSO super uncomfortable having this stuff read out them. I find it fucking terrifying if all his empathy was reserved for the dudes.
Nope, this is perfect. I think the second point is the most potent one; it is up to the “decent” dudes to stand up to the “awful” dudes and be Crystal Clear that this is Not OK. Because we cannot do it, the dudes what tweet shit like that are never ever ever going to listen to any lady-presenting person telling them to STFU. But they *might* listen to another dude.
As to the questions of “why’d they have to make these decent guys feel bad”, I would ask “who are they?” The women at whom the tweets were directed? The producers of the ad? OR WAS IT THE ASSHATS WHO TWEETED THAT BOLLOCKS TO BEGIN WITH? The scales dropping from your eyes can hurt, yes, but those “decent” dudes can apologize for something that, in not calling out, they are actively fomenting, and then walk away and continue ignoring the problem. Those women do not share that luxury.
His question was about the methodology of having guys who had nothing to do with the tweets reading them. So his “they” would’ve been the producers of the PSA, I suppose. I’ll be curious to hear the actual answer (I think there’s a more in-depth podcast about the ad out now), but it really is misplaced concern.
O, for sure! But in situations like this, I like to ask the question, mostly because I like to ensure that the dude complaining about the methodology really thinks about where the culpability for the bad feels should actually lie.
I think it’s fair to assume that those guys have at some point said or thought “it’s not that bad” / “it’s just the internet, it’s not real” / “People give me a hard time constantly, and I don’t mind” / “it’s just a couple loser trolls, don’t give them the satisfaction of getting to you” etc. when they hear the words “online harassment.” They may have nothing to do with the nasty tweets, but they’re part of this culture of not believing or listening to women about how bad it gets.
” something that, in not calling out, they are actively fomenting, and then walk away and continue ignoring the problem. ”
That made me think of the Captain Awkward Creepy Dude post and all the “decent” guys who won’t step up. *That* is why the “decent” dudes need to be reading those lines. So they know what the standard they’re walking past actually is.
https://captainawkward.com/2012/08/07/322-323-my-…
Yay service dog with cute greyhound butt! That dog has the same coloring as our current greyhound, except our dog has too much enthusiasm and too few brains to be a sevice dog. She does wonders for my anxiety, though.
“too few brains”: the greyhound story. The service/therapy dog group we work with at work said the best dogs they have are greyhounds. They’re unusual, gentle, usually pretty calm, and patient with people petting them (we said ours was a slut for pets– she’d ignore people unless they petted her and then she’d lean and shed all over them and make ridiculous noises).
Yeah, ours isn’t especially calm or gentle, but our joke is that she thinks she’s a lab. (She likes to play fetch!) Very much a “bull in a china shop” sort of personality. Previous dog was very gentle, but was agoraphobic and terrified of leaving the house. Both super lovable, but in totally different ways.
It took me a year to teach ours to fetch, and even then, 50% was “chase the ball, catch the ball, wander away to stare into the middle distance”.
“too few brains” is what makes me think my dog is part greyhound.
Although to be fair I think “smart” dogs are often confused with “obedient” dogs? I mean maybe she is smart but she just doesn’t want to do what I’m telling her?
No, the smart dogs aren’t the obedient dogs. The smart dogs are the ones who listen to your command to “sit!” while making full eye contact, evaluate whether or not you actually have a treat, then slowly walk away from you when they realize that you have nothing for them. See also, dogs who jump on the table and steal cookies but only when no one’s home, dogs who know how to open just about any door, and dogs who can tell the difference between swimsuits and underwear and know which one to get excited about.
OT: what do you do when you’re up against a prevailing opinion in liberalism and everything you say from that moment forward gets dismissed as wingnuttery? To translate, y’all, I just realized in the last couple weeks I’m extremely sex- and kink-critical. Like, EXTREMELY. I’m not trying to take anyone’s orgasms away but I just think we can and should think about the cultural context of our sex lives and the meaning of sex in general in our culture. It’s just sort of crazy to me to think certain sexual practices (you know the ones, the ones that rely on a ton of violence and misogyny, or violence and misogynoir) are healthy expressions of sexuality.
I got into a debate about this yesterday and from the reaction I got you’d think I’d voted for Trump or something. Gah. I don’t know.
I think you’re totally entitled to think about the cultural context of your own sex life, and you’re very welcome to decide you don’t want to be friends or associates with people whose sex lives or sexual expression you find problematic! But I don’t think you can assume that everyone who practises kink or particular types of kink aren’t already thinking about the cultural context of their sex lives, or that they should refrain from orgasms until the cultural context of misogyny and racism and other forms of oppression is fixed.
Plus, sexual practices that don’t obviously rely on tons of violence and misogyny or misogynoir are also contextulised in cultures of oppression. If you only focus on the stigmatised ones, you might miss what’s going on in “vanilla” relationships.
Thanks for this response, msbias.
I’m thinking, as response to your question “what do you do,” is to do some reading and talking with super smart folks involved in kink relationships and communities, especially those that include BDSM. As msblas mentioned above, there are many practitioners of BDSM who are actively engaging with the context of their sex lives, including how it relates to violence, misogyny, and/or oppression. Find folks who are doing that, and have some honest conversations with them (or read their writing or whatever) about how they make sense of their kink and the world around them.
Sadly, my brain can’t come up with a good resource for you at the moment (or even a good keyword search — it’s not “bdsm writing,” I quickly discovered), but you may start with things sex educators have said about kink in the past. I’m a listener and reader of Dan Savage (I live in Seattle, his homebase) and he often refers to experts/educators about kink culture.
Enjoy your quest to better understand and appreciate the wonderful world of sex in context. 🙂
Mistress Matisse used to blog about a lot of this stuff, so did the Pervocracy.
I’m not the right person to ask about this probably, and I’m not trying to be harsh here, but initially my thought is — maybe not have these discussions with people who have had these discussions fully one million times before. There’s plenty of reading to do out there on kink-positive feminisms without making people who are kinky feminists have the same goddamn conversation yet again.
Yes. This.
Speaking for myself, I have struggled a great deal- and continue to struggle- with the idea that some of the things that get me off have problematic roots. I struggle not to feel profound shame and to remember that this is one part of the totality of who I am, and that the things I fantasize about, or consensually practice with other people, say nothing about how I would want to be treated in real life/outside of play, much less how I think anyone else should be treated. I have to remind myself that my value as a feminist is independent of the things that a lifetime of programming within our fucked-up society has conditioned me to get off to. I have to remind myself that I HAVE THE RIGHT TO GET OFF at all. And I’ve definitely spent long times unable to let go enough to enjoy my sexuality, because I felt so much shame and confusion.
I think there are many people who are 100% totally comfortable with their kinky sexualities, who STILL don’t always want to discuss this, even with well-intentioned people who are trying to understand. For me, I’m not quite at that point yet, and sometimes this type of questioning can shit on my week if I’m not prepared for it.
So yeah: echoing this. Please read things that are already available first.
I just want to jump in and say that my sexual fantasies have ALWAYS looked super-problematic and anti-feminist on the surface, and it’s something I refuse to feel guilty or ashamed of. Getting off on an idea, or in roleplay, is not the same as endorsing it actually happening in reality! (I’m talking about the illegal stuff) One can know what a healthy relationship is and also have fun fantasies that explore other realities that are safe because everyone involved KNOWS they are pretend, fictional.
I also believe it’s not incumbent on us to EVER be willing to discuss with anyone what our specific fantasies are and what gets us off. Fuck that noise.
Oh, I’m 100% with you on this. I only wish I were as good at rejecting guilt/shame for it!
Re: discussions, sometimes I feel compelled to “correct” people who think that consensual BDSM/explorations of kink in fantasy is the same thing as endorsing such behavior, or the implied dynamics, in real non-roleplay life (as in, outside of safe/sane/consensual 24/7 dynamics… basically, there are people who think getting off to something is the same as endorsing having that thing happen to non-consenting people). Also I’ve had unfortunate encounters with ignorant people in the kink space I used to frequent, and then I feel like enjoying my kinks is contributing to their erroneous perceptions and thus feeding into the shitty ways they treat women/people of color/people in general, and then I feel wretchedly guilty and shitty about having these kinks in the first place…. I don’t know.
It’s so hard to remember that I’m not responsible for people’s erroneous perceptions, much less the bad/abusive behavior they may engage in based on said erroneous perceptions. It’s so hard to remember that I don’t have to engage, and if I miss an opportunity to “educate” someone, then it’s not in fact my responsibility if they go do something bad based on their ignorance.
And I didn’t mean to imply that “rejecting guilt/shame” is a super-easy choice anyone can make! Sorry about that. I feel lots of unreasonable angst about other people’s opinions on other subjects, but I’m lucky to be free in this area (mainly because I never discuss them with anyone else, ha).
I think it’s excellent that you speak up for the BDSM/kink lifestyle and confront those misconceptions, but I fully support you drawing boundaries so you don’t feel you have to defend everything that makes up your sex life. As I’m not really part of kink communities, I haven’t run into those situations. I can imagine how difficult it would be not to struggle sometimes with my fantasies, in the cases you describe.
I would say I felt basically uncomfortable with those things, without digging too deep, and of course getting confused by stuff like the discussion around 50 Shades of Grey. I learned so much from Samantha Field’s wonderful blog. Listening to her was extremely helpful and I’d recommend it to anyone (especially anyone from a conservative religious background). She links to lots of other resources too. In the end, I can’t imagine it being for me, but listening to the thoughtful people who are there can lead to an enormous amount of respect and allowing for different experiences.
I found three posts via a quick search: http://samanthapfield.com/2014/11/07/on-being-a-k… http://samanthapfield.com/2015/02/20/kink-101-for… http://samanthapfield.com/2015/07/17/on-rape-fant…
ETA: Samantha is also a rape and abuse survivor whose writing on consent is among the best I’ve ever read. So she’s really excellent on the intersection of these issues as you’d imagine.
msbias touched on most of the things I’d want to say, although did so better than I would have.
One thing I’d add, though, is that I’d encourage you to take a step back from the discussion, and look at the meta aspects of it. Depending on the people you were debating with, depending on your tone, context, words, etc— you may have been engaged in what you thought was, say, a friendly discussion of ideas, and someone else involved may have heard what you said as a personal attack.
And especially when people are used to hearing personal attacks based on the sex they like coming from say, Trump supporters and TERFs, it may be very hard for people to engage with your ideas, regardless of your intentions, regardless of whether you’re correct on any particular point.
I think this is a good response. Moreover, I think I just need to accept that this is not a topic I can comfortably and safely discuss. I get hung up on the visuals of whatever they’re talking about and before I know it I’m flooded with adrenaline and ready to bolt out of the room.
Oh- darlin’ I’m sorry. I feel you with that. The sex positive movement has to be able to if not include then at least be understanding of not just those for whom not only is sex something they just aren’t interested in, but people for whom sex carries some serious baggage for one reason or another. If I hear one more person say “you just need to relax” or “you shouldn’t be so repressed” I’m going to scream. Just as people understand that maybe a military veteran doesn’t feel comfortable at a fireworks display, then someone might not be comfortable with discussions of some kinks.
And, on a somewhat related note, I always get the uncomfortable feeling that the sex positive movement is co-opted to be yet another way the male sex drive gets enshrined in society- a man’s chance to have sex is precious and must be defended at all costs. (see reactions to complaints against cat calling, approaching strange women in public etc. )
ooooh good self awareness/self care!!
Yes, having certain intense associations with (thing) could make it much harder to have a conversation about (thing) in a kink context! It could very easily result in you having a harder time hearing how other people experience something differently from you, or have a different viewpoint. It might be very easy for you and the person you’re talking to to get into a death spiral where you each think that the other is saying things in an increasingly personal-attack kind of way, even though it’s not something either of you really intended to do!
I don’t think there’s anything terrible about bowing out of these sorts of conversations entirely for as long as you want/need– saying they’re difficult conversations you’re not interested in having is FINE, and, frankly, kinksters are often better about hearing and respecting that sort of boundary setting than the general population.
But if you do want to revisit the issue at some point, I think that reading a variety of opinions on the topic would be a good place to start, and you’d have the option to choose exactly when is a better time for you, how fast to go, when to put it down for the day.
BDSM is the most consent-driven, feminist, sexual expression/community I have ever been involved with. and I’ll stop there, but A+ to msbias/cosetthetable’s responses.
I can add, however, to suggestions of reading you might do: I heartily endorse the work of Andrea Zanin: https://sexgeek.wordpress.com/
Yeah, I was coming here to say this–I am not involved with the kink community personally, but from everything I’ve seen of it, there is much more of an emphasis on negotiating boundaries and giving/receiving explicit consent than there is in the wider community, and I think that’s something worth considering. If you go on a “vanilla” date with someone, you might not ever get around to having a detailed conversation about each person’s comfort level, what sexual acts they do or do not want to do, etc., whereas with BDSM it is literally spelled out: “I am willing to do X, but not Y,” “please check in with me before you we do Z.”
First, you absolutely do not need to be down to fuck to be a political progressive. You do not need to discuss your sexual experiences and desires in order to be a feminist. Anyone who pressures you to participate in conversations or take public positions that make you feel uncomfortable is being shitty. I’m very private about this stuff and I’m more or less a big prude. So I often stay out of discussions that equate sexual openness with progressivism. Just change the subject.
What you don’t need to do is change anyone’s mind, or start conversations in order to show that you disagree. If you want to reassure your friends that you are not voting for Trump, there are a million billion other ways to prove your liberal cred.
Thank you. In the future if this type of conversation starts up I’m just going to leave because it’s becoming clear to me it’s unproductive to stay and talk it out. It’s kind of creepy how people won’t let me just, dislike BDSM in peace but really, really want to change my mind.
Sex and kink is so personal! And I think those in the BDSM community get so much criticism based on a core misunderstanding that sounds a lot like what you’re describing, so I can imagine why they may have an ingrained reaction to leap to their own defense and make you see why it’s not what you think it is (because getting off on misogynistic violence is appalling, and so far from what they’re doing).
So of course you never meant to attack them for engaging in kink, you’re just “disliking BDSM in peace,” but that’s not at all how they heard it.
I sympathize completely with the adrenaline reaction you had in an earlier comment, and I agree with others that suggested you just stay away from those discussions, or try the recommended reading if you want to.
OP’s original phrasing was “It’s just sort of crazy to me to think certain sexual practices…are healthy expressions of sexuality.” To me there is a difference between “I don’t like this thing on a personal level and would prefer not to discuss it” and painting anyone who does like the thing as being mentally ill or unhealthy. I think that’s the part people are responding to defensively.
Yes, I agree.
Agreed.
exactly
I think it would be reasonable to tell your friends that you don’t feel comfortable discussing certain issues. It shouldn’t be controversial to have boundaries about what kinds of conversations you’ll have with friends, especially when it comes to a sensitive subject like sex. If you frame it that way– “this is something that brings up difficult feelings for me and I would prefer to talk about something else”– you will likely be more successful than if you approach it from a critical angle (“I think you’re wrong on this”). If your friends still push it, excuse yourself from the conversation.
Yeah, I mean, that’s weird for people to do that. And they shouldn’t.
Caveat: I’m about to mention a specific, pretty vanilla sex act, and I just say that because of your comment above, and also because this discussion isn’t about sex, it’s about discussions about sex, but I think it’s illustrative.
I have a straight female friend who does not go down on men, because she finds it degrading. It would be super weird for me to argue with her, about any of that, even though personally I DON’T find it necessarily degrading, and also something being degrading does not mean it’s off the table for me sexually, quite the opposite.
But she gets to feel the way she feels about her own sexuality, and she can even feel that way about all the blow jobs that have ever been given. That’s fine! “Degrading” is an emotional experience!
I guess if she tried to legislate blow jobs away, I would be upset. But other than that, why would I argue with her?
I don’t know the details of your particular opinions, so I can’t comment on their actual substance (quite probably I don’t agree with them), and it’s always better to seek out more information to make better-informed judgments, as others are suggesting, but also…you are not actually an adult until you realize that on most topics, there is more than one defensible way to think, and that differing by a shade or two does not necessarily make the other person worthy of being cast into the fiery pits of hell. Like, when you’re a college freshman who just found out there are gay people, fine, but a little older, you need to start getting over that nonsense and working on the concepts of nuance and uncertainty. And that includes handling the situation thoughtfully when you’re in the “insufficiently ideologically pure” role: considering whether the way you’re expressing your opinion is suitable to the immediate context, resisting the urge to feel like a martyr, and striving to remain open to new information and new opinions. Otherwise the left just ends up looking like the People’s Front of Judaea bit from “Life of Brian,” nonstop.
What I was trying to say but better. This is perfect advice: “considering whether the way you’re expressing your opinion is suitable to the immediate context, resisting the urge to feel like a martyr, and striving to remain open to new information and new opinions.”
excellent reply/advice/life choices.
So everyone’s responses are extremely thoughtful and smart, but also kind of boil down to “Change your mind to the prevailing opinion.” I’m going to throw in some advice assuming you have read all the opposing arguments on this topic and still disagree:
It’s okay. You don’t have to agree on everything, and you can still be a good and thoughtful person if you come to a different conclusion than the others in your political sphere. It’s also a case of discretion at the better part of valor. There are areas where I disagree with the prevailing XYZ opinion, and I just generally keep my mouth shut because what good will registering my opinion do? Especially in areas where there’s a lot of cultural polarization and baggage and people aren’t likely to be that interested in your intentions.
Yes! You’re allowed to disagree about things. Even if those things are very personal or emotionally charged. Friendship is not about getting other people on your side. As long as nobody is making hurtful comments as a result, a difference of opinion should be no big deal. I mean shit, I know people who think that 9/11 was an inside job, or who don’t believe in voting because they think that the only legitimate political expression is all-out revolution, or who think that having to wear a motorcycle helmet is government tyranny. And it’s weird to find out that someone you are close to believes so differently than you do, but once you know, it’s just like… eh, let’s avoid that topic if we can.
I get it. I do.
And I think any time we have EXTREMELY critical views on anything, it’s worth some serious self-examination.
I was kink-critical for much of my 20’s. Most of it stemmed from when I was 21 in a new city and started going to parties held by what I thought was supposed to be a straightforward body-acceptance group, which was exciting since 15 years ago size positivity wasn’t where it is now.
When I discovered in a horrible way it was actually a front (for lack of a better word) for a swinging kink community that also made for-profit, questionably legal porn, I felt betrayed and hurt.
I felt personally betrayed by their recruiting tactics and disgusted that many men and some women seemed to be taking advantage of vulnerable women and then recording it for posterity. Vulnerable as in drunk, but also vulnerable as in being told that as fat women, they were “unfuckable” to most of society and thus should be grateful for and accepting of any sexual attention, even if it’s exploitative or makes them uncomfortable.
It was an awful, predatory environment and it took me a long time to truly believe that they were not representative of *all* kinksters.
Eventually I came to realize that, despite my exposure to that group, odds are that most healthy sexual people have thought about what they want and why and done the associated emotional work to come to terms with their desires and that kink-enthusiasts are no different. It’s not my cup of tea, but I have no reason to assume they haven’t put just as much time and thought into their sexual desires than I have, if not more, because my desires have never been frowned upon by the world at large (well, except the idea that as a large woman I even *have* desires.)
I guess it’s like any diverse community: The worst examples are always going to be the most visible.
I imagine the vast majority of kinksters are just happily getting along with it with the same amount of discretion (probably more) as everyone else, while the few outliers who still need to Work On Some Stuff are out there screaming about how unexciting and unevolved and pathetic those awful, uptight “vanilla” people are.
To be honest, I’ll probably always be a little on guard. Last year, my best friend of two decades –a 35 year-old “technical virgin” who has serious issues surrounding sex and self-worth and has only ever been attracted to emotionally abusive men (just like dad)– sent me a photo of her body the morning after she hooked up with some random guy. It looked like she’d been assaulted. Her body was covered in saucer-sized bruises, bite marks and even possibly broken skin.
She said he told her it was “hard play” and although she didn’t seem too thrilled with it, she was excited at the prospect of a man being so wild with desire for her that he couldn’t control himself.
At that point I was like “Girl. I’m not saying kink is a bad thing, but you reeeeally need to think about some stuff before you go down that road, because you could be vulnerable in a way that might cloud your better judgement and hurt you in more ways than one.” and memories of my earlier experience with that group just came flooding back.
So I guess what I’m saying is it’s a process, but recognizing your biases and discovering why you have them and take it so personally will probably get you moving in a positive direction. In the meantime when something comes up, take a moment to go “okay, I know this is a touchy, not-entirely-examined issue for me, so I’m going to be extra careful to be thoughtful in my response.”
(also, don’t argue on the internet.)
Oh man, I am so sorry you had that experience with your first “kink” community. That’s so, so messed up.
Second, “The worst examples are always going to be the most visible” is a great reminder.
Third, augh, I would’ve been so distressed to get a picture like that from a friend. I’m glad she did because she’s not 100% on board with this and she clearly needs someone to make her stop and think about this road she’s on, but if it had been my friend who had been pleased with these results and sent me that pic for a laugh or to “show off,” I’d be pretty damn upset. I dunno if “triggering” is applicable, but I have a physiological reaction to images of beaten bodies, much like Social described.
TBH, I think there was some level where she *was* bragging/showing off which I found deeply disturbing. That delicious narcotic validation of “A man finally wanted me! He wanted me so much he couldn’t control his intensity, which means I *am* a person worthy of desire!” clouded the fact that some rando with whom she had no personal relationship, context or conversation about boundaries/kind just covered 70% of her body with bruises and that maybe that wasn’t the most healthful expression of desire.
He didn’t want to see her again, and –here’s the kicker– she got so upset she’s basically been trying to replace him in a frankly kind of gross racially fetishistic way ever since. AFAIK she hasn’t been brutalized by any of those other men they way she was with him, but I honestly worry about her because I really don’t think she in the place where she can “play” (I gotta be honest, I hate that word) without putting herself in all types of danger.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhh I am so distressed
and so concerned for this friend (at 35! yikes!)
I think you said all the right things to her, but I can’t help fantasizing about pointing out to her that evidence of how he was capable of engaging in some hardcore fetish (without talking beforehand!!!) is NOT the same thing as evidence that he was “overcome with desire for her, personally.”
I don’t know what kind of intervention could be staged to make her stop seeking relationships until she works through therapy or something, sigh. I just don’t want an unhappy ending to this story, and it must be much harder to know her in person.
>> odds are that most healthy sexual people have thought about what they want and why and done the associated emotional work to come to terms with their desires and that kink-enthusiasts are no different
From what I’ve heard kinky friends saying, a looooot of kinky spaces have problems with things like creepy dominant guys and the expectation that women are submissive and/or masochistic and male entitlement and racial fetishisation and so on- so, you know, just like your usual het and queer vanilla spaces! So I think there are a ton of good reasons to criticise kink culture. But like most subcultures, the best and most authoritative critiques come from people who are part of the community, not people outside it.
I’d say that’s dependent on whether those critiques from within the community are actually happening, which is uh highly variable at least. Kinksters have a lot of the same resistance to dealing with ingroup problems as any other insular cluster of socially marginalized obsessives, and allow some really toxic behaviors to flourish and push lots of people who’d otherwise be involved to the ‘outside’, where their opinions don’t count.
There’s communities I’m emphatically not ever going to be a ‘part of’ because, say, their prevailing party line is that ‘sex positivity’ and ‘sexual assault is fiiiiiine, quit whining!’ are the same thing. I feel perfectly okay offering that as a critique and warning people about it without first shoring up my credentials as a card-carrying member in good standing with the guy who thinks surprising people with his dick is a charming quirk.
I agree and there are such issues within kink communities but that isn’t what Social was saying made them uncomfortable and that deserved criticism or analysis. I think that’s really important. Because I am DONE with feminists telling me I need to interrogate my (bad wrong harmful sexist shitty) desires and that if I did I would stop doing what I’m doing. I’ve had that conversation and I’ve done that work and saying kink communities need to be less open to creepsters is so not what we are talking about.
Yeahhhhh. I mean, there are actually quite a few self-identified feminists that are working to remove eg the patriarchy from kink – there’s a lot of feminist and some antiracist writing specifically within the context of rope bondage, for one thing.
But I’m not interested in hearing that there’s something wrong with me that I enjoy tying and being tied, among other things.
I think the general principle of “Don’t be a dick” applies to pretty much any area of debate. Given that it’s such an intensely personal topic, it’s more likely that any strident arguments might possibly be construed as personal attacks. I probably just wouldn’t engage people on the topic if I know they have some personal connection.
(As far as the substance of the argument, I don’t personally see how any sexual practices between consenting adults are “relying on violence”. To me, consent makes any such acts inherently non-violent).
This is so interesting – I guess my first reaction to your post is “but I don’t CARE what you think about my sex life it’s literally none of your business”. And my second is “what a weird conversation, where someone was debating someone else trying to get them to accept kink”, because I guess I feel like it’s SO PERSONAL.
Which is where I guess my own liberalism is centred. The word itself is based on a word for “freedom”. As far as I’m concerned you can be a sex-and-kink-critical as you want to be, as long as you don’t try to tell me what to do. And if you and I don’t agree about sex, we just never have to talk about it!
But then the whole thing reminds me of one of my law school profs who believes in banning all pornography. Which theoretically I totally disagree with. But viscerally I sort of agree with, when I see a lot of porn, because I personally get a lot of squick and horror feelings from porn about the same issues you raise.
It goes right into the heart of what we mean when we talk about a liberal society. One so liberal that we never tell anyone what to do so long as they don’t trespass on our land? Or something a little less free than that? I live in Canada, where we have hate speech laws, which I love. And are a total violation of freedom of speech.
So, I guess, I feel you. But I also want to say: feel free to feel the way you do about certain aspects of sex, and know that I feel free to do whatever I want sexually and really don’t care what you think if it, because my sex life is my own.
What are you trying to accomplish? Cause in my experience, having a meaningful conversation to work out an idea, political activism, and socializing with the kinds of virtue-signaling tribalist walking email forwards who freak out if someone disagrees with them on a single point are very separate things, done with different people in different contexts, and those circles rarely meet. Some people have well-considered positions and are willing to at least engage with coherent differing ideas, even if they powerfully disagree; some people you just aren’t gonna convince of anything yourself, and the latter don’t really deserve in-depth engagement or unrestricted access to your life or thoughts.
I don’t really go in for harsh judgement on what other people do with their free time or their boners, which makes things a little bit different IMO, but I also sure as shit ain’t discussing talking points on guns or healthcare with the coworkers.
And some people have well thought out positions but just aren’t interested in debating My Sex Life 101 with people, which is also a very valid position. Consent matters!
i’m going to give people here the minimal credit to assume this is not covertly a ‘waaah nobody wants to talk fetishes with me at the tea social’ thing until shown otherwise
I think what msbias was thinking of as the discussion, based on the OP, was more “why won’t kinksters listen to me tell them how their desires are wrong and sexist!” Which as stated above is a conversation I have had and am done with.
Yeah and what one person thinks of as “this great new critique of this stuff I just totally invented let’s talk about it like it’s all theoretical” sounds to lots of other people like “your sex life is wrong and you are wrong and also bad.” It’s not theoretical for them and it is personal and the question asker is definitely not the first person to think of it.
Yes, all of this.
I am curious about the context of the debate you had yesterday. There is a spectrum of approaches to sex positivity/kink friendliness and sometimes people don’t have the best experiences and end up feeling alienated. That alienation is especially poignant because sex is such a personal and loaded topic.
I was once part of a community where sex positivity/kink friendliness translated into imposition of intimate conversations on people who had not signed up for them and dismissive comments about people deemed vanilla. I hooked up with two different people there who apologized when announcing they weren’t into BDSM because there was a general assumption that this was the mark of prudish sex negativity. People also told me I was prudish for not wanting to discuss my sex life at the breakfast table. I felt very alienated and probably would have sustained an overall negative impression of kink communities if not for my interactions with other folks who were on much better behaviour.
I think a big point* is also to believe that people are the experts on what they do or don’t like (just as you’re the expert on what you are & aren’t comfortable with). I know there are a lot of narratives, especially around kink, that most people don’t “really” like it – they’ve been coerced or brainwashed or “damaged” in some way that makes them incapable of understanding and participating in “healthy” sex (kind of a corollary to the extreme “feminist” view that women are incapable of any kind of informed consent to sex with men, because of the patriarchal society in which they were raised).
So if someone says they like a thing, or that their relationship is healthy, or that they’re aware of the societal context of their activities, believe them unless and until you have evidence to the contrary.
*If you want to continue talking to people about this – from your adrenaline reaction, it sounds like these aren’t particularly pleasant conversations for you, so you could just leave them in the “not relevant” box for now & pick them up when/if you feel comfortable.
Yes, this. When people say that they like a thing, then I think it’s generally best- both for your own mental health and for the sake of respecting their autonomy and capacity for self-reflection- to assume that they actually like it and are getting something good and positive out of it. Even if you can’t imagine what the good/positive thing is or can’t personally imagine liking such a thing.
(I’ve had this issue before where I felt sad for people who professed to like things that I personally find degrading and/or painful in not-good ways. There are certain fetishes and sex acts that I have a visceral awful reaction to even hearing or thinking about- likely similar to the aforementioned adrenaline reaction- so it helps me to remind myself that when people say they like it, I should accept that this is true and that they aren’t being hurt.)
I rarely comment, but wanted to come out of the woodwork to tell you that I agree with you and feel similarly.
I think that just because a sexual practice is consensual does not make it ethical or healthy – in what world does it make sense that I am “kink shaming” and not sufficiently feminist or sexually liberated because I think it is harmful and appalling to sexually re-enact racist violence, pedophilia, and rape? Just because something makes you cum and it’s consensual doesn’t mean it is something that you… should do.
I am seeing in this thread, and see a lot elsewhere online, the argument that kinky people’s/BDSM-engaging folks’ practices only take place in their own bedrooms and do not effect me, so I should ignore them. I have had so many experiences that contradict this.
I see, all the time, posts from, for example, survivors of CSA that say something like “it is gross and morally repugnant to get off on the idea of having sex with children” only to be attacked and argued with endlessly by DD/LG participants who use unwanted and un-asked for graphic descriptions of their sex acts as weapons in arguments. I see posts from Black women about experiences with racism reblogged by white men, who get off on slave roleplay and using the n-slur during sex, attack her for writing on her own blog about her own experiences, again using graphic descriptions of their sex acts as weapons. I see graphic photos and descriptions of violent BDSM acts posted to tags that have little (but more often nothing at all) to do with sex acts.
It isn’t something I can avoid seeing or hearing about or thinking about, because it is all over the internet, in graphic detail, all the time.
Of course attacking and harassing people online is awful. But plenty of people with more “vanilla” sexual tastes do the exact same thing. Being a jerk isn’t confined to any particular group, and I’m extremely skeptical that people who engage in consensual roleplay or fantasy are any more likely to be jerks than the general population.
Also, things like (e.g.) rape fantasies are incredibly common, particularly among women. For some women, being in control of the fantasy and directing the scenario is a way to exert and reclaim power.
Dude.
“For some women, being in control of the fantasy and directing the scenario is a way to exert and reclaim power.”
^THANK YOU. I’ve been trying to phrase this concept to myself for a LONG time and you did it beautifully and it makes so much sense and is so crystal-clear. Thank you so much!
I think it’s part and parcel of the way that (e.g.) women are the biggest consumers of things like “Law & Order SVU”, novels that feature kidnapping/ sexual assault, serial killer biographies, etc.
Those are terrifying things that occupy a lot of our headspace, and it’s a way to psychologically deal with those fears. And (for some people) maybe to process prior experiences.
This makes a lot of sense, actually. It’s similar to something a professor told us in a writing class- that people have a psychological need to explore stories with bad endings or where bad things happen to the protagonists, because that helps people feel more prepared for life and its possibilities: taking away the element of total surprise can free a person up, in a bad situation, to think about ways to get out of it, and even if you can’t get out of it there is some comfort to the familiarity. Actually my 5 year old already displays a lot of this tendency: asking about “worst-case scenarios” and making them worse and worse, and taking comfort in the concept that there is nearly always an answer to “what would/should you do if xyz happens.”
Somehow I never really connected this to sexual fantasies though. Being able to take ownership of a fear to the point of channeling it into your sexual release… that’s hella powerful.
No useful answers, but I can empathise – I find it difficult to agree with some prevailing opinions, and it makes me worry I am just being a shit person. I want to support and respect everyone, and I am aware that I am probably just not well-informed enough on the relevant matters, but I still feel quite uncomfortable about some things I should be agreeing with.
I have just found out that Charming Tater shares his birthday with my horse, as well as two of my horse’s younger brothers. (the last one born last night!) I am sure this is a sign from the universe but I’m not sure what of.
Pretty sure the sign is, “Name the one born last night Charming Taters!!!” And then have beloved dog-friend of The Toast Charlie Potato Hashbrowns over for a visit and a photo shoot!
Yes to Fluffernutter’s suggestion, and also:
Es_Petal: Universe, what does this mean?
Universe: Clearly, my child, you are meant to be riding horses at sunset with Channing Tatum while the other horses run alongside of you, manes rippling in the wind. Enjoy.
I like that suggestion.
ALSO – I just saw that Jenna Dewan-Tatum bought Channing a horse for his birthday!
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/entertainthis/…
This is just getting creepy now…
Our new arrival is also orange!
aww, congrats!!
The best possible scenario here is that you watch CT movies with your horse. I watched White House Down on a whim this weekend and I was astonished at how much I enjoyed it, considering I went into it thinking it’d be just another dumb action movie.
I love that movie so much! I mean, it’s exactly like Die Hard only sillier and with Channing Tatum, and instead of the bad guys posing as terrorists but turning out to be burglars, they pose as terrorists but turn out to be Republicans. What could possibly be better?
That your horse needs to dance to Pony, obviously.
“The last one born last night”
PHOTOS PLEASE
Camera is charging and I am going up tonight to coo over my pony-nephew! Also hoping his arrival will have inspired the other one who was due to pop on the 18th.
How does your baby already have better selfie poses than I do!?
Also fun facts in the Disability section of the world:
Let’s imagine that when you become totally and permanently disabled, you have Federal Student Loans. Now, you can’t get rid of student loans almost no matter what, but one of the only ways around that is being very poor and permanently disabled. So… maybe you’re able to navigate that process and get everything in and it actually works and you jump through even more hoops but finally they are forgiven!
Say you had $100K of loans that the Feds forgive. They have done that, effectively, because they have determined that you have no money with which to pay those loans back now, and they expect you will never have that money.
That $100K is considered taxable income. All of it. All of it the year it’s forgiven. So you get hit with a giant tax bill too. And there are ways of getting around that too….. but if you’re so poor and disabled that you are in that situation in the first place, it’s not like it’s gonna be easy to access those services.
Oh my God. That’s unbelievably, stupidly awful.
*nonstop screaming*
Yep. It is truly awful and nonsensical.
And, if you’re not in the lucky 5% (or whatever) of people who do actually manage to get their loans legally discharged, the government can garnish your Social Security disability and/or retirement checks for the rest of your life.
Toasties, I had the best ever moment of “men explain things to me” yesterday after a Meetup book club. I’m still so annoyed I have to share it with all of you. Come roll your eyes along with me!
We read Marilynne Robinson’s _Housekeeping_, at my suggestion, and this guy kept trying to explain how it’s not an “honest” book, and how no one could possibly be happy making Ruthie’s choices, and also, I swear to you, how the author should have thought about how her book would be taken so as to prevent children from romanticizing transients. Okedoke.
So after book club, he and I and another gentleman were standing around talking books, and I tried to get him to explain what an “honest” work of fiction would be. Our man spends the entire conversation addressing the other gentleman, rather than me, even when responding to my questions. Not helping.
AND THEN. We started talking about religion in general, and he brings up the connection between religion and Greek theatre. Toasties, for background, I was a classics major. My specialization was Greek language and mythology. I spent a semester translating _The Bacchae_ and a YEAR writing a thesis about women in mythology and religion. This dude is talking about how religion allowed women and slaves to run wild, blah blah blah. I explained that I had studied this in university and tried to assert my opinion on the difference between Euripides/Nietzsche/Aristotle/other primary sources. He interrupted me to say, and I quote, “There’s a really good Wikipedia article on this that you should read.” And then waxed poetic on Euripides, and explained how he had written a play called _The Bacchae_ that explains all of this. He says this, mind, while mostly looking at the other dude and rarely even glancing at me.
What.
What??
DID YOU REALLY JUST TELL ME TO READ A WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE FOR RESEARCH?? My friend, if I want to read about _The Bacchae_, I will read my own goddamn translation, THANK YOU VERY MUCH.
I spent the entire conversation thinking about Mallory’s tweet re: women listening to men at parties being a piece of performance art, which helped quell my rage.
Ugh.
On the bright side, if you’re ever in a conversation with someone who is skeptical about mansplaining being a thing, you now have a perfect anecdote?
I’m sorry that happened, it super sucks. >_<
Also, now I really want to read your thesis!
I do too!
At your next book club bring your copies of the books he was talking about, in the original ancient Greek, and ask him to point out in them the supports for his arguments. Then, when he’s baffled to see that they were written in Greek and not English, act amazed that he can’t read Greek – like you just assumed he must be able to because he claimed to know more about it than you. Then ask how can you read Euripedes in translation, you lose so much, blah blah blah. 🙂
I. Love. This.
See, this is why I’m afraid to join book clubs, because it’s not socially acceptable to club a man unconscious with the book of the month.
It’s NOT?!?!? I would totally accept it.
*watching righteous beating nervously*
Perhaps we should spend some time next meeting on the semantics of “book club”?
AHAHAHA, I swear to God I didn’t even realize that pun/double entendre when I wrote my first comment.
Honestly, aside from the fleeting appeal of violence, I have an aversion to book clubs because experiencing a book (pretty much any book) is so extremely personal and emotional for me, and I do not think I could handle hearing someone have Extremely Wrong Opinions about the book, the author, or characters I feel deeply about. (How on earth did I get through four years of literature classes? Well, it helped that those were the works I’ve cared the least about, and the professor usually moderated stupid/nonconstructive opinions. Also, I phased out a lot, writing my own stories in notebooks.)
Restraining myself to Socially Acceptable Responses (including not yelling at them for having their own opinion) would be physically painful for me. So yeah, book clubs are not for me.
That’s hilarious because when I read that, I had the thought “That was intentional right? There’s no way that wasn’t intentional.”
As for book club, I get what you’re saying. I started one five years ago because I finished Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and had nobody to talk to about it. The thing I struggle most with is not just laying into a book I hate because I feel like the picker takes it personally. But to be honest, ours is mostly a) to force us to always be reading and b) a reason to get together with friends every month(ish).
I was about to applaud you for that wonderful play on words.
My book club is Ladies Only and also Wine & Gossip Club. We do read a book and there is discussion but it’s also ok to have not finished it and turn up for chats and time without children.
You really needed to download your library of congress citation on your phone and shove it in his face right then and there. While loudly owning it in front of everyone else so it’s clear who’s the idiot. I’m going to imagine that’s what happened and that he totally got his comeuppance.
I have been known to edit Wikipedia articles for sport (screenshot, quick, before a more responsible editor changes it back!) IT IS SO MUCH FUN.
“Gosh, actually wikipedia is pretty damning of your p.o.v. here, you should really read this”
A REALLY GOOD ARTICLE ON WIKIPEDIA
WHAT
“An email from Prince was like a message that had been beamed down from a party in space by a robot whose job it was to communicate during all space parties.”
!!! I haven’t seen a single episode of New Girl, but ahhhh that was a wonderful article. :’)
If I were you, I’d watch the Prince episode. He makes it *magic*
oh, I’m planning on it! 🙂
That baby is on to you.
OH MY GOD CAN WE TALK ABOUT THE ASK A MANAGER QUESTION PLEASE YOU KNOW THE ONE I MEAN
I am having a very serious panic reaction to it oh my god.
?????? (assuming you’re talking about the liver question?) I can’t wait for someone to leak the name of the company, it’s too nutso to be kept quiet.
The liver one?? I just read that about ten minutes ago and HOLY HELL.
YES THE LIVER QUESTIONNNNN
I can’t stop screaming inside my head I am SO very freaked out by this.
On the plus side, LW and their colleagues would have no problem with future interviewers when they said the reason for leaving their last job was “because my boss fired a bunch of us for not donating a portion of our actual liver to his son, yes this really happened.”
That is SHOCKING to the nth degree! Holy what even. (I also appreciate the note at the bottom regarding whether it’s fake or not.)
I totally believe it’s true because it’s just too bizarre to make up. Also the details and the tone of the letter etc.
Same. I just appreciate that she comes right out and shuts down the is it real/is it not real distraction action.
YES IT’S ONE OF THE SINGLE CRAZIEST THINGS I’VE EVER SEEN ON THE INTERNET.
How has no one already shopped this guy? Is that really how bad employment law in the States is, that people assume he can actually do this (though it is actually illegal, thank God)? What even are people?
they are convenient walking meat cases of things that might make your brother better which also make your company work, of course.
OH MY GOD
Holy actual shit.
A panic reaction seems reasonable, since he’s basically trying to harvest peoples’ organs. Holy fuck. I hope he gets sued forever for everything he has.
Right??? Good grief. I can’t believe none of LW’s fired colleagues have lawyered up. Surely they have? Surely this is going to be a massive lawsuit?
It really depends on what kind of industry it is and the background/education level of their employees! I mean, no CEO of a law firm would try this! But I wouldn’t be surprised if he hires mostly blue-collar workers, they’re just PERFECT for organ harvesting.
What’s the opposite of “literally lol”? “Literally shuddered”? I did that. But I bet you’re right.
I can’t believe what I just read.
I was just coming here to post this, WHAT THE FLYING SHITBALLS
OK, I was just reading through the thread thinking I would pick up the context from the comments, but “WHAT THE FLYING SHITBALLS” made me 1) actual true life laugh out loud and 2) click and read.
I really want to see a follow-up to this.
It… I don’t… I am literally praying this is fake but I totally believe this is real. I hope someone is in a position to be able to go to local media. Hell, all the media. If I were a reporter I would want that story.
Edited to not be so “you should do this!” to the OP but rather “gosh I hope someone can” which was my original intention.
THANK YOU I was coming here to scream about it. I want an update so badly/I want to read about this on Gawker before COB
That was an actual Dilbert cartoon 10-15 years ago.
working for John Cleese is a lot more stressful than I’d pictured
That letter is absolutely B-O-N-K-E-R-S, but if it helps alleviate the panic, a friend of mine got pretty far down the line towards kidney donation for another friend, and I cannot imagine this whole situation would actually go anywhere after the initial screening, even for the employees who would theoretically be medically able to donate. I mean, they’re always happy to have more people in the donor pool, but they’re gonna grill you at every step of the way on why exactly you’re there and whether you’re doing it of your own volition, especially if you’re not a relation or a SO, and your application will get thrown out the window real dang fast if there’s a whiff of something off there.
It does help, thank you 🙂
“Blink twice if you’re being coerced into donating your liver.”
FOLLOW UP–there is video confirmation that Julie Miller cut the course at Ironman Canada.
Oh man! This is satisfying that there could be closure here.
Hey everyone, sorry for the radio silence but I’ve been sending out Toast Post matches slowly but surely!! If you haven’t gotten your matches hang tight – I think I’m up to about 200 out of 270 people and there’s only so much CTL+SFT+C I can do before my left hand goes numb. I’m leaving for a big trip on May 6 so that’s my self-imposed deadline to get all the matches out!
You are AMAZING, thank you so much for organizing this! I had no idea how big it had gotten O.o
Dang! That’s a lot of toast posters!
Postmistress with the mostmistrest! What a lot of work and how wonderful of you to coordinate this for us all. I got my matches and I am resisting the urge to send too much right away!
Thank you again for organizing this! Sending lots of good vibes to your left hand!
Oh wow! I had no idea there were so many of us interested, thanks very much for organizing it! Thanks also for the update that the matches are continuing to be rolled out- I had seen people mention getting their lists and thought I had somehow missed a crucial step.
Me too!
I promise to get postcards/note cards or something today, matches! So I can write them this weekend, perhaps, and get them off to you!
whew, that is a LOT of toasties to match up! thanks so much for matching us all up!!
Thank you for doing the matches! I had so much fun selecting cards and sending them out. I just have to get the international matches out this weekend!
Thanks so much, polka_stripes!!! We appreciate all the effort you are so generously putting into this. If you want help with a future installment of Toast Post (or even this one), I would be more than willing to do whatever would help you out. It sounds like a lot of coordinating. Though I also understand confidentiality stuff with people’s addresses etc. Anyway, just in case, I wanted to offer. My email is my username at gmail dot com.
Thank you so much for organizing this and putting so much time and effort into it! You are amazing and I hope you have a wonderful trip!
I got Toast Post in the mail yesterday! I got home really late so I haven’t read it yet, I’m saving it for this evening.
Thank you for doing this! I got my matches last weekend, toast post going out this week.
Here is a lovely article about Jane Doggett, the woman who designed the Tampa International Airport 40 years ago. Her streamlined, wayfinding design was used at many other airports and public spaces…plus! she created a font! http://www.tampabay.com/things-to-do/visualarts/j…
The wave print is so lovely too! I would like that in my life.
I really liked that long-form on the wet shelters, but I think that someone could come away from it thinking that wet shelters are a Canada-only thing, or that there aren’t any in the US. That isn’t really the case. I do think that there are some real problems with widespread adoption of that approach in America; the political influence of two very large religious denominations that are against drinking, the history of Prohibition, the general American antipathy toward anything that’s seen as “enabling”, especially when it comes to substance abuse, and so on. But there are baby steps in that direction. Even as someone who’s benefited greatly from AA, I think that these are a good idea; I’d like to think that at least some of these people could eventually get sober, and I think that their lives would generally be better as a result (the article does a good job of showing just what a difficult balancing act harm reduction can be), but in the meantime I wouldn’t want them to suffer.
I haven’t read the article yet but will tonight. I visited a seniors’ home in Edmonton that was specifically for alcoholics, and they told us that some people are surprised that they don’t try to stop their residents from drinking. Not because stopping drinking would HELP them, at that point it wouldn’t, but because it’s just the Right Thing To Do. Bah!
You can be Jewish and Italian!
that is why I SPECIFICALLY SEPARATED THE TWO CONCEPTS YOU LITTLE PUNK
Indeed! I myself am a Pizza Bagel!
And of course I already knew Billy was Jewish
You can! And if you get invited to a party by a Jewish Italian, that party is going to have some of the best food you have ever eaten. And you will be forced to eat a lot of it. At least from my experiences…
Billy Joel, however, has no Italian ancestry. Whether or not the food that he serves at parties is some of the best food ever remains to be seen. *Sits waiting for her invitation to Billy Joel’s birthday party to arrive*
a headline I saw the other day: “Why does Rihanna kill so many men in her music videos?” WELL IDK LET ME TAKE A WILD GUESS
Haha I saw a tweet sharing that headline that was like “…have you met men?”
Here is an update about the triathlete cheater! http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/28/sports/julie-mi…
A few weeks old, but for all the data sciencey Austenites out there: http://juliasilge.com/blog/If-I-Loved-NLP-Less/
“data sciencey Austenites”
Is this peak niche?
“if I loved natural language processing less, I might be able to talk about it more” — my life, basically
This is really cool!
Gosh, thanks for reading!
Thank you for asking! I passed (!!), and got useful feedback on my project along the way. I'm feeling happy and relieved, and also tired. 🙂
Betty Boothroyd was my hero when I was a wee babe. My gran used to watch the house of commons debates in the evenings (when Jerry Springer or Judge Judy wasn't on, luh you granny) and I just internalized Betty as THE speaker. Like, it could only be her. There's an old video of me at about … 4? Maybe? Running around in my undies and a spoon yelling "ORDER! ORDER!" at the dogs.
She's got a (disappointingly boring) biography or autobiography out there that I read in college.
I currently have medicaid, and have for the past 6 months – so far, I've been unexpectedly bumped off of it twice for no discernible reason and have had to reapply. Social services are a bitch to navigate, and if people are abusing it, I want them to teach me how, so at least I know I can keep my medical insurance!