Tips for my hoes*

The older I get, the more I think about what it means to be a woman on this planet. I also think about all the ways I held myself back when I was younger, whether that was by not standing up for myself or simply not believing I was capable of achieving something. Now that I’m 40 (cough, cough, okay 42) I’ve come to realize that there are still lots of things women tell ourselves that simply aren’t true. Following are a few things I think women should consider:

It is okay to go someplace by yourself
I don’t know how many times in my life I’ve heard a woman say, “I want to go to X, but no one is available to go with me and I can’t go by myself.” Uh ... Yes you can. You are grown. So take your grown ass and do that shit. I’m not talking about walking through a neighborhood that’s known to be dangerous at 2 a.m. But there’s no reason you can’t go to a movie you want to see and no one else does, or to a coffee shop or to that cute new book store by your damn self. No one is judging you for being alone. People really aren’t paying that much attention to you. They’re worried about their own shit. And if they are judging you? Fuck ‘em. Who cares?

We really need to stop talking about losing weight
What we need to talk about is being healthy. That means eating better and getting regular exercise. Obsessing about a number on the scales does nothing but reinforce negative body issues.

Your style is your own. And so is hers
Being a woman, it’s almost impossible not to discuss appearance. But it’s time to change the discussion. We need to stop making appearance so uniform, and so important. We are not all skinny. We do not all have big boobs. We are not all light-skinned. Some of us can't tan. And all of that is okay. If a woman wants to rock a mohawk and hairy armpits while not wearing a bra, that is her business. If a woman wants to be all lipstick and heels and matching handbag, that is her business. We have got to stop tearing each other down and holding each other to ridiculous standards.

We need to learn to take a compliment
This is one that I need to work on, as has been pointed out to me by several friends. New research shows that as a group, women have trouble with confidence, and we’re seriously lacking when compared with men. Not only do we need to learn to take compliments, but we need to give them liberally. Giving a compliment costs you nothing and can really make another person’s day.

You have a brain. And so does your daughter
There is nothing wrong with looking presentable. But your looks are far from being the most important part of your existence. We need to start valuing our minds and abilities above all else, while teaching our daughters that their minds are their most important assets, not their appearance.

You don’t have to get married
You’re not a lesser woman or a lesser person if you’re not with someone else. Women also need to learn that we don’t have to be dependent on a man’s salary to make it in the world. Look, I’m not saying that traditional family building is a bad thing. When it works, it’s wonderful. But as a group, women need to start thinking more about ourselves autonomously than as part of a unit. Then, if the unit thing comes later, it’ll be that much better if we’ve established ourselves as independent people.

You don’t have to have kids
There are plenty of people on this planet. Trust me. I’ve seen ‘em. There’s so damn many of us that we can’t even feed and shelter everybody. If having kids is your dream, go for it. But don’t let your parents or society pressure you into having kids because that’s what you’re “supposed” to do. You are your own person. And women have a lot more to offer the world than just our uteruses.

We need to embrace “Ms” and dump all that other shit
This might seem trivial to some people, but in my opinion it’s a big deal. A dude is a “mister” no matter what, whether he’s single, married or divorced. Most of his life, he’s a mister. But in times-gone-by women were marked with either Miss, Mrs. or Ms. so that everyone knew publicly what her marital status was. And if you think that “Ms.” is only for divorced women, you are flat-out wrong. Ms. is to women as Mr. is to men. It’s for all of us. Women can change the language and get rid of Mrs. and Miss. simply by embracing the prefix “Ms.” no matter our marital status, which includes checking the “Ms.” box on any of those annoying forms you fill out. Pretty soon, they’ll start leaving those other titles off forms altogether.

Learn to change a tire
Yes, we live in the age of cellphones and Triple-A, but that does not mean that someday you might not be stuck on a remote highway somewhere with a dead phone and no charger.  Changing a tire does not have to be a “man’s job.” Tires are not that heavy. Yes, tires are kinda dirty, but that won’t kill you. Sure the lug nuts can be difficult to budge, but you can always step on the wrench to get them loosened. And if some creep pulls over to “help” who makes you uncomfortable, just remember you’ve got a big ass tire iron in your hand.

Stop reading those horrible women’s magazines
Seriously. Just stop. If we all did this, maybe they’d go away.
 
*Yes, I did call you a “ho,” but I called me a “ho” too, and it was a joke, and that shit is funny. AMIRIGHT, BEOTCHES?! Now, in the words of Maya Angelou, “Life’s a bitch. You’ve got to go out and kick ass.”

On the goodness of people

I consider myself to be a misanthrope. That is, I don’t particularly care for humanity as a whole, because I think that by and large we are a hot mess. But there are lots of specific people I like and love very much, and occasionally I find an experience to be a sweet celebration of humanness at its best. Recently I experienced one of those, of all places, at the grocery store.

I was behind an older woman in line who was having trouble checking out at the card reader. On top of that, she was on her cell phone. My impatient asshole-ness kicked in immediately. Ugh. Some old lady is wasting my time because she doesn’t understand technology and can’t take the time to get off her damn phone and just focus.

Pleasant, huh?

After watching her for a few seconds, though, I realized that the woman didn’t speak English. She wasn’t distracted by being on the phone. She was on the phone because the person on the other end was trying to remotely talk her through using the credit card reader. Yikes.

Finally, the older woman motioned to the young woman behind the checkout counter, indicating that she needed her to come around and show her which buttons to push.

“What?”

The young woman acted as though paralyzed with discomfort. I’ve seen this sooo many times before—Americans as a whole (or maybe it’s all people, but I suspect it’s us isolated Americans) are extremely uncomfortable with people who have difficulty communicating. People who don’t speak English, people who speak with a heavy accent, people with some sort of disability that prevents them from speaking clearly or speaking at all—cause many Americans to freeze up and freak out.

Not me. I don’t know why. I’m not saying that to brag or act as though I’m better than other people because I most certainly am not. I have many friends who are far more charitable and kind than me. But for whatever reason, in those situations when someone is having trouble communicating, for me, it kind of turns into that scene in the Matrix when the bullets stop whizzing at Keanau Reeves and it’s as if they’re traveling in slow motion. Time slows down, my heart rate decreases and my focus dials in to the person having trouble making their intentions known. Sometimes it takes a few tries, but I don’t think I’ve ever been unsuccessful in communicating with anyone. I’m not flustered, or embarrassed or put off by it. I became so known for this willingness to work with people that in my retail jobs that when certain regulars would come in—the guy with a tracheotomy, the girl with Down syndrome, the Chinese dude who only spoke Chinese—many of my coworkers would throw up their hands in defeat. “You deal with them, Amber,” they’d say, and walk away. If I had to claim one superpower, this might be it.

“She needs help,” I said to the young woman. 

“What?” she asked again, still paralyzed.

I moved over so that I was at the side of the older woman.   
“Push that,” I said, indicating the correct button, knowing that though she couldn’t understand me, 99% of communication can be about gestures and tone of voice.

The machine asked if she wanted cash back. I hesitated. The old woman looked at me. “No?” she asked. “No,” I said, shaking my head. She pushed NO.

And the transaction was over. I ended up not really helping at all. But the older woman smiled a smile that was infectious. “Ohhhhh!” she said, obviously expressing gratitude. Then she grabbed me, hugged me and kissed my cheek, multiple times. She had soft skin and reminded me of my grandmother. 

I grinned at her. Huge. Couldn’t help it. “Where are you from?” I asked. Instinctively I knew she’d know what I was asking. 

“Brazil!” she said proudly. Then she tapped her chest and was serious. “But I American,” she emphasized. “I too old to learn English.” And I thought about the implication of what she was telling me and why. How she'd probably experienced the ugly American who was an asshole to her simply because she didn't speak English. And you know what? That asshole would never get to experience her smile or her hugs and kisses.

I was still grinning like an idiot. “That’s okay,” I said, and I patted her shoulder.

She grabbed me again, hugging me some more, smiling a smile that radiated like a thousand suns. She was thrilled because someone made a little bit of effort. Because someone paid her a teeny bit of attention and didn’t behave as though she was invisible. As she left, she waved at me. “Ciao!” she said. “Ciao!” I said back, wishing that I spoke even a smidgen of Spanish. I’ve never had the opportunity to say “Ciao” to anybody without it being a joke. It was awesome.

As I watched her flounce out of the store, happy, it occurred to me that maybe I should’ve told her my name and asked for hers. Maybe I’d missed an opportunity to make a new friend. And I wondered about her. I wondered if she has family here. I hope she has family here. Or friends. I hope she wasn’t an old lady living in the U.S. on her own, on the phone with someone in Brazil. 

And I guess my point in all this is, for fuck’s sake, people, is that’s all it takes to make beautiful things happen. A little understanding. A little compassion. A little patience. A tiny bit of communication. You don’t even have to have very many words in common. Did you know that “okay” is almost universally known? Do you know how much you can accomplish with a smile, a nod and “okay?” Maybe you'll have to get a piece of paper and draw some pictures or let the other person draw some pictures to get the message across. So fucking what? The world just doesn’t have to be so complicated and ugly.

Successful communication, though? That is a beautiful thing.

Kansas! Gettin' back to our open-carry roots*

Dodge City, Kan., in the old west, which banned the open-
 and concealed-carry of firearms.

Thanks to the great wisdom of our state legislators, local laws and ordinances restricting our God-given right to brandish dangerous weapons have been abolished! That's right. The dream of open-carry is no longer a dream. Why, gawd-lovin’ Kansans can now openly pack heat in even the state capitol if their pea-pickin’ hearts so dee-sire. So says House Bill 2578.

YEEEEEEEE HAW! PEW PEW PEW!

Sorry about that. Got excited for a second.

Even better, the “spiritually dark” areas of the state (so deemed by our es-teemed governor Sam Brownback), like those lily-livered libtards in Lawrence, can’t pass local laws or ordinances that contradict state law. That means Kansans are now free to openly brandish knives and guns in public places even in the so-called Berkeley on the Kaw, and there’s not a damn thing those stuck-up educated egg-heads can do about it. Unfortunately, private businesses can still disallow firearms and other weapons, and for some damn reason, Kansas colleges have a four-year moratorium to figure out how their prissy asses are going to handle concealed and open carry. Pussies.

I don’t know about you, but I for one am glad to see that guns no longer have to hide in the drawers and closets of ‘Merica. Guns are now free to parade around with their owners in the unsafe streets and stores and churches of this great nation!

RAT TAT TATTA TAT!  WOOO HOOO!

Here in Kansas, we can go back to the glory days of Dodge City and Ellsworth when law-abiding citizens and drunk criminals dumb as bags ‘a’ rocks were able to settle their conflicts like MEN out in the shit-covered STREETS the way GAWD intended. 

Oh. You say that in many old west towns, including in Kansas, local gun ordinances didn't allow open carry or at minimum, asked newcomers to town to relinquish their weapons to the Sheriff until they were trusted? You say that in old Dodge City, Kan., concealed carry was made illegal and eventually, even open carry was illegal?

Well I say, fuck that! Today’s ‘Merica is an even better ‘Merica! The guns are more powerful and more free!

HELLLLL YESSS! BANG, BANG, BANG! Oops! Sorry pardner.

*In this case “roots” is pronounced “foots.” As in, “Shoot ourselves in our collective.”

On mental illness, guns and freedom

Once again another mass shooting has us debating mental illness and guns. Pessimist though I am, I had hoped that the Sandy Hook tragedy would finally be the tipping point that would force something in this country to change. Why I had that momentary lapse of reason I’m not exactly sure.

Because, you see, this is the land of the free. And when we say that, we mean it. This is honestly not going to be a political rant. I’m not going to debate the value of our freedoms. They simply are what they are, and that’s what we have to accept. Also, we very often no longer make legislation that makes sense in this country. We make legislation that adheres to a particular “idea” of what America is, and not necessarily what’s good for us.

We have the right to bear arms. It’s in the constitution, and that’s not going to change anytime soon, especially not with the money the gun lobby puts into the pockets of politicians.

Those of us who have mentally ill relatives, or who struggle with mental illness ourselves, know all too well that the mentally ill are really freakin’ free in this country. Free to wander the streets with no guarantee of shelter, no medical treatment and certainly no place for psychiatric treatment. In fact, the only tax-payer provided option for the mentally ill in this country is jail. That’s it.

When you have a mentally ill relative, people say things to you like, “Why don’t you have them committed?” as though that’s something we still do here. We haven’t done it for years. The only way a mentally ill person gets help in this country is:

1) They have to want help—and since mentally ill people often don’t recognize they’re mentally ill they often refuse treatment,

2) They (or their family) can afford it, and what mentally ill person is holding down and job and can afford treatment?

3) They hurt themselves or someone else or do something illegal (and the vast majority of mentally ill people aren’t violent) and then they’ll go not for treatment, but to jail.

Otherwise, unless and until a mentally ill person is a danger to someone else, there’s nothing anyone can do for them. If you think about it, asking the family to take on the responsibility for a mentally ill person is really an impossibility. We’re not all trained psychiatrists after all, most of us don’t have vast resources to spend helping a mentally ill relative and even if we do, we can’t force them into treatment. Even well-off families have a hard time intervening in their relatives’ lives. (Think Adam Lanza and now Elliot Rodgers.)

We can’t provide taxpayer mandated help to people in this country anymore because we decided it’s too close to “socialism,” and we hate socialism in the U.S. But we love guns. And we love freedom. We love guns and freedom so much that we are reluctant to prevent even crazy people from getting their hands on guns. Because that might be interfering with their freedom, and that makes us feel bad inside. In fact, we hate interfering with peoples’ freedoms so much that in the 1960s, we opened the doors on the mental institutions, let the mentally ill out and then closed the doors again, forever.  (A lot of people will try to tell you that it was Reagan who closed down the institutions and asylums, but it was actually Kennedy.) There was a legitimate fear of a One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest situation, so we decided that letting the mentally ill be free was preferable to locking them up and potentially being mistreated.

So that’s where we are. We are really the only developed country in the world where guns can be procured without any interference and the mentally ill are left to their own devices.

All in the name of freedom.

No pay gap my ass

A few weeks ago, on April 8 to be precise, the White House declared Equal Pay Day. The idea was to put a spotlight on the pay discrepancy between women and men in the U.S. The official declaration from the White House used the oft-cited statistic that on average, women make approximately 77 cents for every dollar that men make. Hence, the April 8th date—that’s how long women have to work into the following year to make as much as men did the previous year. (I meant to write about this when it happened, but y’know. I have a full time job and a family. Life and shit.)

This, of course, like everything that president Obama does—eating, breathing, talking—brought out the crazies and naysayers. First off, they declared the President a DIRTY STINKING LIAR for saying that women, on average, make only 77% of what men make, because their data shows that women actually make a whole 81% of what men make! AND ISN’T THAT A WHOLE LOT DIFFERENT AND BETTER? Several pundits on the right twisted themselves into philosophical pretzels to explain that THERE IS NOTHING TO SEE HERE. According to them, not only does the pay gap not exist, but women have all the equality and work flexibility we want! We can work part-time for convenient, easy-to-manage woman-sized salaries and breastfeed in the alley! Isn’t ‘Merica wonderful?

OH HAPPY DAY!

Two pundits in particular, journalist Glenn Kessler and economist Mark Perry, published commentaries that had sexist white dudes (and a few delusional white Republican women) rejoicing. You can read some of their work for yourself here and here. (I would like to point out here that both Kessler and Perry are white dudes over the age of 50, but y’know. I’m pretty sexist and racist for even mentioning that.) 

Mark Perry’s piece in particular is a smoke-and-mirrors piece of bullshit that I honestly do not understand the purpose of, and this is not because I am not an economist. Perry goes to great pains to explain to our delicate ladybrains how it’s really our personal choices that affect our pay and that it has nothing to do with gender whatsoever. Perry’s article bobs and weaves all over place to show exactly how much women are fucked over for pay at exactly which points in our lives. Women who are single, for example, are actually statistically paid almost as much as a man (95.2%-95.8%) and isn’t that Wonderful! It’s when we get hitched and start poppin’ out babies that things go all wrong for us. But since that’s our own fault shoulder shrug then that’s just too darn bad, isn’t it? 

DEAR MARK. LET ME EXPLAIN TO YOU HOW THIS IS THE DEFINITION OF DISCRIMINATION:

• First off buddy, it’s not just women who have babies. Men are part of that equation too. So why is it that when a couple chooses to have children it’s the woman who bears the full pay penalty of that decision? I know what you’re going to say, Mark. But women choose to stay home with their babies after they’re born. Only that’s a total falsehood, because staying home after you have a baby isn’t a choice. Childbirth is a rough deal physically. The body needs time to heal and rest. Moms and dads need time to bond with their newborns. The U.S. is the only first world nation that doesn’t have universal paid leave for new parents. 

• Beyond that, if a couple decides that one of them should stay home with the kids (and I’m talking about after the cessation of breastfeeding if she's decided she needs to stay home to do that, because the workplace isn't exactly accommodating) the reason that women are often the ones who stay home is not because we’re all cuddly and necessarily have fuzzier feelings for our children. It’s because we make less money. And it naturally follows that the partner making a bigger salary is the one who keeps working, especially once a kid enters the equation.

• Finally and most blatantly DUH-worthy: Should women just refuse to have babies so that we can finally achieve full pay equality? Should we just let humanity come to an end? 

Mark’s piece comes with this pretty graph so that you too can figure out where in your womanhood you literally screwed yourself out of your salary.

Both Perry and Kessler’s pieces gleefully point out that much of the pay gap between women and men is based on raw hours worked. Men work a few more hours a week so it follows that they make more money. 

From Perry’s piece: Because men work more hours on average than women, some of the raw wage gap naturally disappears just by simply controlling for the number of hours worked per week, an important factor not even mentioned by groups like the National Committee on Pay Equity. He says that—but then nothing else on the matter. Not one single mention of why women work fewer hours than men. Glenn Kessler offers one explanation: Since most school teachers are women and most school teachers don’t work summers, that accounts for some of the hours disparity.

Neither man has any sort of insight as to what might make up the rest of that disparity in hours. But stop any woman on the street and she can tell you. Obviously it's because we need extra time to lie on the couch and eat bon bons. NOT. It’s because we’re taking time off to take care of sick kids. Or we’re taking time off to take kids to the doctor. Or we’re going to parent-teacher conferences. Or we’re taking our aging parents—or even our spouses aging parents—to doctors’ appointments.

Y’know. All of those fun “choices” that women have. 

And why is it that those “choices” rest with women? There are three reasons. First off, since it’s likely her male partner who is making more money, it makes sense that his job is more valued in the relationship and needs to be protected, so it falls to the woman to take the time off. Secondly, and it pains me to say this, there are still some Neanderthals out there who think it’s the wife’s job to take time off of work to attend to children’s needs and they simply refuse to do it. This is not the case in our household, but I have friends who have some pretty sad stories to tell about how their husbands won’t take time off work for anything. Finally, there is still this lingering (though changing) idea that caretaking is “women’s work” … So men don’t want to jeopardize their jobs by asking an unsympathetic (and likely male) employer for time off for “girly” shit like watching a sick child or taking Mom to her cardiologist appointment. If women were truly being paid equally, we'd take off less time from work and men would take on more of those responsibilities.

I would also like to point out that neither Kessler nor Perry’s pieces seem to take into account or differentiate between salaried pay and clock-in-clock-out work. They also neglect to take into account all of the extra unpaid work women put in outside the workplace so that their men can do paid work virtually uninterrupted. Predictably, they both cite the fact that women “choose” careers that pay less—but they never even consider the idea that perhaps the problem is that fields traditionally dominated by women are simply not valued as much as “men’s work” is. 

Because why should they worry their big privileged man brains over those kinds of things?

And before you blast me because I'm some "libtard" who won't acknowledge that Obama's White House pays women less than men I say again, "Duh." That's what I'm talking about. And weren't you the one who was just telling me that there's no gender pay gap?

Phuck Phred

By now you’ve heard that Fred Phelps, leader of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka of ‘God Hates Fags’ fame is on his deathbed.

Lots of people have an opinion about this. They mostly fall into two camps: “I’m glad the asshole is dying and I hope he burns in hell!” or “Even Fred deserves forgiveness and peace. I wish him no ill will.”

I understand the first camp, though I don’t consider myself a member. The second camp I don’t get at all, though I respect the fact that there are people who are morally superior to me. I don’t feel guilty about being judgmental about certain folks. I didn’t give a shit when they took out Bin Laden. I know I should be a good liberal and cluck my tongue and wish that he’d received a fair trial, but the truth of the matter is that I’m just not that evolved. Hitler? If he’d been burned alive after having railroad spikes put through his eyes and a meat tenderizer shoved up his ass I wouldn’t ever give it a second thought.

When it comes to Fred, I’m ambivalent. I’m not exactly happy he’s dying, but I’m not sad either and I sure as hell don’t wish him a peaceful end. (Not that I wish him a bad end. Just whatever happens, happens.) His estranged son Nathan has written a lot about how Fred verbally, emotionally and physically assaulted his family on a regular basis. That, to me, is Fred’s real crime. People talk about how many people Fred hurt with his protests. In the case of some of the early funerals the Westboro Baptist Church protested I suppose that’s true. I can’t imagine what it would’ve been like to have been Matthew Shepard’s mother, for example, and have to put up with the Phelpses’ perverted circus of hate after her son had been tortured and left to die.

But people organized pretty quickly to counter and shield the WBC’s funeral protests, and I think Fred Phelps ended up doing a lot more to further gay rights than he did to get people on his side. Consider that many people who were on the fence about gay rights may have been pushed into the light when they saw for themselves that discrimination is nothing more than a thin veil for hate and vitriol. Fred and his “church” put an ugly, concrete face on LGBT hate. As far as anyone knows, Fred and his church never physically attacked any gay person and I honestly don’t think his shenanigans incited anyone to attack gay people. Anybody who was going to do that was going to do it with or without Fred’s blessing.

But if Nate Phelps is to be believed—and I for one believe him—then Fred terrorized his own family in ways that are the stuff of nightmares.

Here’s what I hope: I hope that with Fred’s passing comes the end of his stupid church. I hope it falls apart. I hope that more of his children and grandchildren open their eyes and their hearts and realize that Fred was full of shit.

Nathan reports that his dad was excommunicated from his own church in 2013. Wow. Why? Could it be that Fred repented? Or even better—that he came out of the closet? Just imagine what a sadly ironic end to a life gone wrong that would be. The LGBT community is too good for the likes of Fred.

Even though I'm not unhappy he’s dying, I also wouldn't bother protesting his funeral. Because he's not worth it.

You androgynous pangender queer kids get off my lawn!

While I like to think of myself as being pretty open-minded, hip and with-it, I know I am getting old because the vocabulary of self-identifications is getting, in my humble opinion, to be a little excessive. (My friend Phoebe will probably chastise me for worrying about being old when I’m not, but that’s not what my concern is. I just sort of find the different phases of life fascinating. You go from knowing you’re the shit, to being pretty sure you’re still the shit but seeing that people just behind you are going to become the shit, to growing into an age when people younger than you think you’re the shit because they think you know everything when you know damn good and well that it’s the people just in front of you who know a lot more. It’s weird.)

Speaking of “self-identify” — a term that’s being thrown around a lot as of late—while not exactly redundant, still seems a little silly to my aging ears. If one “identifies” as something doesn’t it follow that one necessarily “self-identifies?” I dunno.

In writing, I often use the acronym LGBT, which I think most people understand to stand for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender. I believe I first heard the term around 1990, and considered myself very progressive for embracing it enthusiastically. Pretty soon, people began tacking a “Q” on to the end, which stands for “Queer.” Now queer is fine, nothing wrong with that word at all—in fact I like it—but I’ve resisted using it only because it seems unnecessary. Doesn’t queer just mean gay or lesbian?

Well I looked it up, and no, that’s not necessarily what “queer” means anymore. (Say whaaaaa???) According to the wisdom of Wikipedia, queer may be used by those who reject traditional gender identities as a broader, less conformist, and deliberately ambiguous alternative to LGBT. Okay. I get that, I guess. If you wanna use “queer” amongst yourselves in the college library or at a rave and truly understand what that means, that’s fine. But are you really going to tell your grandma you’re “queer” and then correct her when she tells you she knows what “queer” means because that’s a word she’s heard her whole life and then go on to inform her you have reclaimed the word from her generation freeing it from its negative connotations because you “reject traditional gender identities?” Isn’t it just easier on grandma (and everyone else) to say you’re gay or lesbian or bisexual or in the process of changing your gender?

Facebook has jumped on the self-identification bandwagon and now offers 53 gender identities (self-identities?) for users to choose from. This I think is a good thing, because Facebook is mostly about interacting with your peer group. If you wanna be pangender amongst your friends, go for it.

Following are just a few of the “new” genders that the young people have added to the American lexicon:

Agender—Apparently agender people see themselves as not having a gender, or not willing to “self-identify” as a particular gender. Doesn’t that just mean “too cool for you?”

Androgynous—Pssssh. My generation wrote an entire book on this identity. See: David Bowie, Annie Lennox, Grace Jones, Adam Ant, Prince, Boy George, Joan Jett, etc. etc.

Bigender—someone who self identifies as two distinct genders. Could be male and female or could be queer and female or any number of combinations. I tend to think of myself as a mostly heterosexual female with less girlie tendencies than a lot of my girlfriends. Never thought about being “bigender.” I’ll have to chew on that one … Nah.

Cisgender—this means heterosexual. Do we need a new word for heterosexual? Sorry, but I call bullshit.

Gender fluid—this means someone whose identity flows to any number of genders and identities. Can’t we just say “bisexual” or “bi-curious” and be done with it? Does it really matter what a person is wearing?

Genderqueer—this is supposedly somehow different than “queer” but when I look up the definition I just don’t see any difference.

Intersex—this is a person born with some aspect of both male and female genitalia. This one makes sense to me. And it’s more precise than “hermaphrodite” which implies someone who has fully formed male and female genitalia which is rare to the point of impossibility.

Oh and also the word “transvestite” has fallen totally out of favor. Even though Eddie Izzard, a totally cool comedian of my generation who occasionally enjoys wearing women’s clothes and/or makeup still refers to himself as an “action transvestite” and not “gender variant.” C’mon, admit is. Isn’t action transvestite just more fun?

I’m not gonna list any more gender definitions. Because I’m tired now. And because I think it’s a little silly. The fact of the matter is that most people’s sexuality and gender and self-identity is fluid. That means that there could be the same number of descriptions of gender and sexual identity as there are people on the planet.  For all practical purposes I’m a hetero female. Not because I want to put myself into a box—it’s just a shortcut for quick identification.

So you kids go on with your transmasculine gender questioning. That’s okay. I’m gonna stick (mostly) to LGBT. And Grace Jones. Because Grace Jones fucking kicks ass.

I asked my good friend Michael, as a gay man, what he thinks about all the new labels. He has this to say:

You know I'm not your typical fag. I think it is silly too. The whole political correctness, gets on my nerves!! The only label that we need, is the label human being. Although that is the one that always seems to be forgotten. I don't know why we as a society feel the need to label everything. The way I look at it, is that it does more harm than good. All it does is separate us! When what we really need is to come together!

That, I think, says it all.

Madonnas and Whores

So I like True Detective. Like, a lot. Apparently so does everyone else. I honestly thought it was a show that only a few special, clued-in people were watching, but after the sixth episode this last week (there are only eight this season) suddenly everyone’s talking about it. It’s all over my Facebook feed. All over the media. The DJs on 96.5 the Buzz were even talking about it Monday night when I drove home from work.

The show is very well written and veteran actors Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey are so good at what they do it almost hurts to watch them work their craft. (I’ve read several comments about how so many people doubted McConaughey’s acting skills before this part, but I’ve always been a McConaughey fan. Mostly because of his iconic role in Dazed and Confused, but also because of this interview he once did on the Conan O’Brien show. I dare you to watch it and not love him.)

ANYWAY. There has been much discussion about the female characters in the show. There’s been controversy/criticism about how, in contrast to the fully drawn and complex male leads, the female characters seem … thin. And there’s some real analysis and discussion about this. But there’s nothing to discuss. The female characters on True Detective aren’t just uncomplicated, they can be pretty much broken down into two camps: Madonnas and Whores.

Thusly:


Presumed whore.



Whore

Daughter facing camera: Whore.
Daugher with back to camera: Madonna.

First Madonna, later Whore.



Whores, literally.

Does this make me not like the show? Not at all. Am I sure what it means? No. True Detective creator and writer Nic Pizzolatto has hinted that next season’s season might feature female leads. If so, it’ll be interesting to see how he writes women. It has been pointed out, correctly, that True Detective does what The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo does: it illustrates how some men put women in boxes (Madonna or Whore) and otherwise dismiss, belittle, demean and abuse them. But The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo also shows the women’s side of things—how and what they think as well as their complexities. True Detective doesn’t do that at all. Rust is complex to a degree that’s both fascinating and comical. Even Marty in his stereotypically male simplicity is complex—he has himself fooled into thinking he’s a great family man, when in actuality he’s a huge failure.

Whether or not the show is yet another shitty Hollywood representation of women remains to be seen.

Perhaps the most apt comment I’ve read written about all the hullabaloo surrounding the misogyny of the show came from an African American woman who added her two cents to a True Detective discussion thread:

“White people problems.”

Heh.

What do you think about the show? I'm curious.

Taking back our (local) government

Turns out Kansas doesn’t have to be so thoroughly embarrassed as the most “backward” state in the nation. Arizona has managed to take their LGBT discrimination bill one step farther than we did – theirs has passed the state house and senate and is now awaiting approval or death by governor Jan Brewer. Kansas’ steaming turd of legislation squeaked through the house and was squashed when my fellow Kansans raised holy hell, much to the surprise of our out-of-touch, so-called leaders who blinked like a possum caught in tunnel at night with a train bearing down on it. (Sorry. Sometimes I loves me some Kansas vernacular.) Even people who aren't thrilled with the idea of gay marriage recognized this law for what it was, realizing that it stunk too much of the days of Jim Crow.

For a couple of days, our legislators had the nerve to dig their heels in. So Kansans continued to show them what-for. We made phone calls. We emailed. We protested. We wrote letters-to-the-editor of our local papers. Many papers wrote stunningly sharp editorials. We screamed. Our boneheaded legislators finally got the message, if only begrudgingly. Personally, I think they owe everyone a huge apology, but since I don’t enjoy asphyxiation –  autoerotic or otherwise –  I won’t be holding my breath.

We’re seeing similar bills popping up all over the country as some states legalize gay marriage and the people against gay marriage anticipate it being proclaimed legal at the federal level. They realize it’s only a matter of time, so they’re trying to head the homos off at the pass, as it were.

I’ve seen several religious extremists online writing that people of their ilk need “protection” from lawsuits that might be brought by same-gender couples seeking their services, and that gay people should just stay away from businesses that don’t want to serve them because those darn gays are just “causing trouble” and “being difficult.”

I have two questions in regard to that concern:

A) Exactly what country do you think you’re living in? This is America. Land of the litigious. Any business can be sued at any time, by any customer or employee, for reasons legitimate and frivolous. That’s the way it is. Period. Grow up.

Secondly, should the four African-American college students who staged a sit-in at a Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina in 1960 have stayed away because the business didn’t want to serve black people? Because it sounds like you’re saying that.

And it’s not just anti-gay legislation that extremists are trying to push at local levels of government. It’s anti-women legislation, anti-poor legislation … because a certain extremist faction of the country has figured out that they’re probably not going to win the presidency any time soon. Their freak flag is just a leeetle too freaky (and not in a good way) for the rest of us to stomach.

So they’re going after the elections we Americans don’t pay much attention to: Governorships. State legislators. City Commissions. Sheriffs. School boards, even.

Now you can shake your finger at Americans for being “lazy” for not paying attention to local politics, but c’mon. Between our jobs that don’t give us much time off, our kids, the PTO, our aging parents and all that stuff – y’know, life—that we have to take care of, there aren’t too many of us who have time to keep track of what’s going on.

Except for the zealots. The zealots always make time because they’re intent on rolling back the progress of this country. That’s what makes them so effective. And dangerous. For the average American, battling this shit is exhausting. It’s like turning on the light at night and trying to step on all the cockroaches that skitter away, knowing that as soon as you turn the light off, the roaches will be back. In the meantime, they’re breeding behind the walls.

What’s so scream-at-the-walls aggravating about the extremists is they don’t seem to realize how good they have it. They already have all the rights they could ever want. They are perfectly welcome to worship how they choose. They’re perfectly welcome to remain bigots in their hearts. They even have the right to be bigots in their businesses. (We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone at any time.) It’s just that they don’t want to have to face up to the consequences of their actions. They want government to be just large enough to protect them, and just small enough to exclude everyone else.

Must be nice.

So we have to stay vigilant, my fellow Americans. At least for a time, we have to pay attention.  We have to take our country back.

Dear Kansans: wake the f*ck up

In case you haven’t heard, the Kansas House has just passed House Bill 2453 which says that anyone may refuse service to someone whose religious beliefs don’t line up with their own. Sickeningly, the authors and supporters of the bill are calling it the "religious freedom act." In theory, this bill means that anyone could refuse service to anyone else for any sort of "religious" reason, but the real goal of this law is to allow bigots who are against gay marriage to refuse service to legally married gay couples. And this isn’t just for business owners. If this bill becomes law, any employee working in any private business or government capacity may discriminate against a gay person or couple if it “offends their religious sensibilities” and the employer can’t even fire an employee for such behavior, because in Kansas, religion is a legally protected class but sexual orientation is not. (I'm not sure how this lines up with Kansas being a right to work state, but what the hell do I know? I'm no lawyer.)

I have been struggling with writing about this. It’s so demoralizing, so horribly sad, that I just don’t even know what to say. Usually I try to be a little snarky in this blog, but … This isn’t funny. Not on any level. I’m at a total loss.

I will say this:

Wake up, Kansas.

The days of automatically voting for the candidate with an “R” after his or her name are over. Kansas has a long, proud tradition of voting for moderate Republicans, but it’s time to start doing our homework.

The speculation over exactly what the ramifications of this bill might be are already being debated. It's not just about an employee who doesn't want to make a wedding cake for two women getting married. A police officer could refuse to intervene in a domestic dispute between a gay couple. Thomas Witt, Executive Director of the Kansas Equality Coalition warns:

Under HB2453, county clerks won`t have to issue you a marriage license.  Under HB2453, companies won`t have to offer you the same spousal benefits they offer other married couples.  Under HB2453, hospitals can pretend you`re not the next-of-kin to your dying spouse.  Under HB2453, your boss can deny you bereavement leave to bury the above-mentioned spouse.  Under HB2453, it`s not just individuals who get to pretend you`re not married.  It`s entire agencies of the state government.  It`s whole for-profit companies.  It`s any man, woman, child, stray dog, and random breeze that gets to pretend you`re not really married.  All they have to say is ``God told me so.``  

Not only is this law disgusting, but if it’s enacted, there’s no way that it can possibly legally stand. Which means that your tax dollars will go toward fighting a total waste of time.

This law has been proposed and endorsed by people who think of themselves as Christians. But I ask you, would Jesus have refused to wash a gay man’s feet? Would Jesus have refused to give bread and fishes to a lesbian couple and their children in need? Just where in the Bible is that passage?

House Bill 2453 still has to go to the senate. It’s not too late to contact your senator and tell them to stop this piece of legalized bigotry. If you don't know who your senator is, don't be embarrassed. You can search for your representatives at OpenKansas.org

There's a Change.org petition in protest of the bill here.

And if you're into Facebook, a group called Stop Kansas House Bill 2453 has been growing by the second. You can go to it by clicking the link.

State hobby lobby lobbies for Hobby Lobby

Oh people. You are wearing me out. I wasn't planning on blogging for a few days, but you’re forcing my hand.

Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt has just filed a brief in the U.S. Supreme Court supporting Hobby Lobby’s legal challenge to provide insurance that pays for emergency contraception, as outlined in the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare if you dig that moniker. (Personally, I do.)

And why, do you ask, would Kansas concern itself with the business of a national craft store? I’m so glad you asked! It’s because Kansans are disproportionately interested in all things artsy-fartsy. 

FACT: No Kansas child is allowed to progress from the 4^th grade to the 5^th without first mastering the ancient art of wheat weaving. FACT: During the great locust plague of 1889, Kansans were able to drive the pests to Missouri by lighting millions of handmade scented candles. FACT: In order to renew his or her driver’s license, every Kansan is required to have no fewer than two Pinterest accounts. FACT.

David Green, owner and CEO of Hobby Lobby Inc., recently published an open letter explaining his objections to Hobby Lobby being forced to provide insurance for its employees that would potentially cover emergency contraception. Here’s a particularly poignant excerpt from that letter:

A new government healthcare mandate says that our family business MUST provide what I believe are abortion-causing drugs as part of our health insurance. Being Christians, we don’t pay for drugs that might cause abortions, which means that we don’t cover emergency contraception, the morning-after pill or the week-after pill. We believe doing so might end a life after the moment of conception, something that is contrary to our most important beliefs. It goes against the Biblical principles on which we have run this company since day one.

You can read the letter in its entirety here.

There are a few problems with this letter, many of which have pointed out by people smarter than me:

1) David Green may “believe” that emergency contraception is an “abortion-causing” drug, but Princeton University has done research that shows otherwise.

2) Hobby Lobby isn’t paying for emergency contraception. Hobby Lobby is paying for insurance. How Hobby Lobby’s employees and its employees’ doctors choose to use that insurance is entirely up to them. Hobby Lobby has no business getting between its employees and its employees’ doctors. Hobby Lobby is an employer. Not a parent. Or a church.

3)The idea that the family that owns Hobby Lobby is so morally outraged about abortion is laughable. The vast majority of Hobby Lobby’s inventory comes from China, a country where abortion is government mandate. (China often denies this, but China denies pretty much everything.) And y’know. Being that China by-and-large isn’t a Christian nation, obviously David Green’s god doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the number of abortions the Chinese perform. Heck, Green’s god is probably happy that a few less Chinese will let the ‘Mericans catch up in the breeding race.

For Kansas to put even a symbolic dog in this fight (and it is one ugly muthafuckin’ dawg) is insulting. It is insulting to me as a Kansan and as a woman. I have chosen to not shop at Hobby Lobby for about a year now. For my state—a state where my ancestors settled five generations ago in order to escape religious persecution—to dare speak on my behalf about a matter so repugnant to me is a real slap in the face. Talk about infringing on rights. Also, doesn’t the Kansas AG have more important things to worry about? Like, I dunno … CRIME IN KANSAS?

Now someone might think that it’s not a big deal for Hobby Lobby to want to opt-out of paying for emergency contraception. According to Drugs.com, the Plan B pill costs approximately 50 bucks. (Notice at the bottom of this screenshot that Plan B cannot be ordered by ladies in Oklahoma. It’s not illegal there, but they have to show ID to buy it.)

Fifty bucks? You might think. Fifty bucks to prevent an unwanted pregnancy ain’t that much. But according to glassdoor.com, the average salary of a cashier at Hobby is only $8.88 per hour:

That means a Hobby Lobby cashier has to work 5.63 hours in order to pay for a one-time use of Plan B. That’s probably about equal to what a Hobby Lobby cashier would spend on food for the week.

The Kansas AG office writes:

Americans may form a corporation for profit and at the same time adhere to religious principles in their business operation. This is true whether it is the [plaintiffs in this case] operating their businesses based on their Christian principles, a Jewish-owned deli that does not sell non-kosher foods, or a Muslim-owned financial brokerage that will not lend money for interest. The idea is as American as apple pie.

Oh, Derek. Notice that in the plethora of examples you’ve given (two), it’s about what the business sells. Not how it treats its employees. Sure, I’m allowed to open a business selling riding crops and chastity belts. Under the ACA, I am not allowed to tell my employees that they must pay for their Viagra out of their own pockets because I think erections are icky. Just like I’m not allowed to discriminate against hiring anyone based on their gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, height, weight, etc. Similarly, if I am an employer who worships the Flying Spaghetti Monster, I am not allowed to tell my employees that they must consume meatballs on Thursdays.

Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt is married with two daughters. One would hope that he would ask for his daughters to be treated the same under their insurance coverage, and at work, as he has been.

You can email the Kansas Attorney General’s office here.

Thanks to my friend Jake Vail for the awesome title!

Containing the wily vagina

For many moons, men have feared the cunning vagina. Like the remote jungles of Africa and South America, they imagined it to be a dark, foreboding place. As such, women felt obligated to keep the specifics of their “womanly” matters to themselves. (Just to make things simple, the term “vagina” may be used in this blog post to mean the entirety of the female reproductive system. Even though this is scientifically inaccurate and bordering on being as stupid as some of the Neanderthals I’m about to talk about, the fact of the matter is I enjoy the word vagina. Vagina, vagina, vagina. Vagina.)

From pregnancy to periods to cysts to yeast infections to pre- and post menopause, in times past, the issues of the female reproductive system have largely been the responsibility of women ourselves. Men didn’t want to know about such things. They couldn’t have told you the difference between a fallopian tube and a clitoris, nor did they care. They didn’t want to hear about it. They just wanted to reserve the right to stick their jiggly bits in there once in a while.

This is not true for many modern men. Take my husband for instance: He’d happily talk with me about my vagina for an hour if I wanted, because that’s just the kind of caring, forward-thinking kinda dude he is. He was with me every step of the way of our pregnancy and he’s an involved father.

On the other hand, the pre-enlightened male probably can’t even tell you that the urethra and vagina are two separate openings, because that’s not how his body works, and really, why would he give a shit?

Yet it’s the pre-enlightened male who feels perfectly valid in legislating the vagina. After all, vaginas are mysterious and magical things, simultaneously the source of human life and much human pleasure. They also believe it to be the source of the downfall of men, a witchy, wantonly device used by women to undermine the heterosexual male.

So the pre-enlightened male figures that women can’t possibly be trusted with their own vaginas, because vaginas are simply too powerful. Vaginas must be legislated and kept under male control. Forget that so many old white dudes in power think that an ovum takes place during an opera and vulva might be a type of processed cheese food. This is irrelevant.

When Representative Allan Rothlisberg proclaimed that women over 50 don’t need gynecological services,* one savvy woman noted, “From this statement, I know way too much about his sex life.” And it’s true. Allan is definitely over 50 and one presumes his wife is also. Either she has stopped getting gynecological checkups (which is obviously a huge mistake), or like women of times past, she’s preserving the tradition of going and not bothering him with the details. Thus his ignorance.

This is why I’m so over male governance. Women can stand on the sidelines and stamp our little feet and scream at old dudes that we deserve to have control over our own bodies and they’re never, never going to get it. Women can know in our heart of hearts that it is UNFAIR that insurance companies treat birth control as “optional” but old dudes in power will always side with the insurance companies and never with women. Because they just don’t want to. And guess what? We’re not going to change their minds.

That’s why it’s high time that women became more political and stopped sitting on the sidelines. (On our vaginas.) We have to get out and vote. More importantly, we have to get out and govern. Only then will we truly set the wily, wonderful, misunderstood vagina free.

* While Rothlisberg’s statement was not recorded and Rothlisberg has since denied making such a statement, Senator Anthony Hensley (D-Topeka) has gone on the record saying that he was in the room when Rothlisberg said it. Says Hensley, “Wouldn’t you deny saying something so ignorant? Unfortunately, no media were present at the time and the Republican-run Kansas legislature has made a practice of not releasing committee recordings - ironically spurred by other outrageous statements that have been an embarrassment to Republican leadership. The truth is that multiple sources who were in the committee room at the time of his comment have all attested to the accuracy of my post. Nonetheless, I stand by it.”