diversity and the Academy Awards: part 2

Can you believe there's a Part 2?

Me neither.

Last year I wrote about the lack of diversity in 2014 movie releases. To my completely uneducated eye, it seems like 2015 did slightly better (Creed, Straight Outta Compton, Concussion ... there are probably more, but I haven't seen that many movies this year). But despite that, there are no POC nominated for acting Oscars this go-around either.

Again, this isn't about saying people like Rachel McAdams or Michael Fassbender don't deserve their nominations. They do!

I am simply saying (for the second year in a row, apparently) that many of the institutions that support popular culture (primarily film production companies) overwhelmingly produce stories about white men and then overwhelmingly promote stories about white men. When that happens, the field from which the "best" are selected is already stacked against reality.

(Speaking of stacking the deck against reality ... Jennifer Lawrence, I love you, but it is time you stop accepting roles that are clearly meant for a 40 year old woman. Kthxbye. Also, remember when Emma Stone played an Asian woman? Oh 2015 casting directors, you crazy.)

I have no idea when this trend is going to shift. But in the meantime, I'm going to watch Sense and Sensibility this weekend to commemorate Alan Rickman (the best), go catch Creed while it's still in theaters (and rocking a 96% positive review rate on Rotten Tomatoes), and root for Mad Max: Fury Road to win literally everything on February 28th.

diversity and the Academy Awards

So the nominees for the Academy Awards were announced today, and unsurprisingly, a lot of people are upset by the overwhelmingly white and male makeup of the contenders for the film industry's greatest honors.

Confession: I haven't seen most of these movies. It's been a busy time.

Double confession: I am not what you would call a sophisticated film watcher. I love the greats along with the Grease 2s, if you know what I am saying.

Triple confession: Nothing icks me out more than white people who want back-pats for bemoaning the lack of diversity in pop culture, which is why I generally try to avoid these sort of conversations.

That being said, I figured I'd offer up my opinions (it is the Internet, after all.)

Some background facts:

• Of the 8 films currently nominated for Best Pictures, 7 feature male leading characters.
• Of the 8 films currently nominated, 7 are about white men.
• To date, only four women have ever even been nominated for Best Director. More women have been launched into space than have been nominated for Best Director. The one movie nominated for Best Picture (Selma) that was directed by a woman did not get a Best Director nomination.
• There are no non-white people nominated for any acting awards this year. 

So what does this all mean?

Well, first of all, it doesn't mean that the nominated films, directors, actors, and actresses don't deserve their nominations. They very much do, and on top of that, there are a lot of folks who were snubbed when those nominations were announced, and some of them were also white men. (Sorry Christopher Nolan. It will happen for you someday.)

It also doesn't mean that the Academy Awards are per se racist. Cheryl Boone, the female, African-American president of the Academy, apparently doesn't think the Academy has a diversity problem. And for the purposes of this blog post, I am going to go with her on that.

So the Academy doesn't have a diversity problem, but the Academy's nominees are unarguably not at all diverse. What are we to make of these two contradictory statements?

Let me suggest what I think the real problem is:

The issue isn't that David Oyelowo (star of Selma) and Ava DuVernay (director of Selma) deserved to be nominated and were not. The issue is that 2014 featured a METRIC CRAPTON of movies about white dudes, and the one movie that did not (Selma) was nearly shut-out despite overwhelmingly good reviews.

In the grand scheme of things, it probably doesn't matter that two talented people did not get recognized for their talent like we think they should. It does matter that they are part of a greater trend.

What good movies came out this year? Turning to my beloved Rotten Tomatoes, we see that the following well-reviewed movies hit the silver screen in 2014:

Selma

The Imitation Game

Wild

Big Hero 6

The Theory of Everything

Birdman

Top Five

Foxcatcher

Gone Girl

Mr. Turner

Whiplash

The Book of Life

A Most Violent Year

Fury

St. Vincent

Nightcrawler

Guardians of the Galaxy

Force Majeure

The Babadook

Citizenfour

Two Days, One Night

The Homesman

John Wick

Beyond the Lights

Leviathan

Boyhood

Dear White People

Diplomacy

The Tale of Princess Kaguya

Under the Sea

Born To Be Wild

"Best of" lists that I found after an extensive (read: not terribly extensive) Google search include additional films like Interstellar, Snowpiercer, Grand Budapest Hotel, Under the Skin, The Lego Movie, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and Unbroken.

Based solely on my memory of various posters and trailers I saw over the last year, of the 35 movies listed above ... four feature black people in leading roles? Eight have a female main character? Three feature significant roles for Asian actors -- and I had to count two animated features for that?

I mean, I'm pretty sure two of those aforementioned movies are actually documentaries about animals, folks.

These are not good numbers. And when I say that, I am not saying American Sniper is a bad movie (I'm sure it's great!) or that Reese Witherspoon is a bad actress (I love her!) I'm saying ... these are not good numbers.

Movies, taken as a whole, should not be mostly about men and mostly about white men at that. The people who buy movie tickets are not mostly white men. And white men can be expected to understand and enjoy stories about people who are not exactly like them. I mean, the most loveable characters of 2014 were a foul-mouthed racoon and a giant tree with a limited vocabulary, so I think we are all pretty capable of being lost in a great story regardless, okay?

If there had been 20 great movies that came out this year with leading roles for women and minorities and directed by women and minorities, it would be annoying but not that annoying that David Oyelowo and Ava DuVernay were snubbed in the Oscar race. Hey, they'd be in the same boat with Jennifer Aniston and Clint Eastwood right now! (And I bet that's a SUPER fancy boat.)

But there were not 20 great movies that came out this year with leading roles for women and minorities. There were a mere handful. And somehow, I don't think it's because women and minorities just aren't writing scripts, pitching projects, attending auditions, looking for investors.

When there is one movie (Selma) featuring award-worthy acting from a black actor, and that lone black actor has to compete against ...

Steve Carell, “Foxcatcher”
Bradley Cooper, “American Sniper”
Benedict Cumberbatch, “The Imitation Game”
Michael Keaton, “Birdman”
Eddie Redmayne, “The Theory of Everything”
Jake Gyllenhall, "Nightcrawler"
Brad Pitt, "Fury"
Jack O'Connell, "Unbroken"
Ben Affleck, "Gone Girl"
Ralph Fiennes, "Grand Budapest Hotel
Bill Murray, "St. Vincent"
Christoph Waltz, "Big Eyes"
Joaquin Phoenix, "Inherent Vice"
and whoever else I am missing ...

... simple statistics tell us that chances aren't good.

But why was there only one black actor in the mix in the first place?

American cinema doesn't have a diversity problem. It has an inability to imagine a world that reflects reality problem.

No shirtless dudes here

The number two rule* of being a writer is self-promotion. Because of that, many writers (particularly self-pubbed writers) create what are called "teasers." These are advertisements for a book, usually self-made, that are designed to promote interest in said book. A photo or a graphic with text designed to hook potential readers, like a one sheet for a movie.

Now, this is a bit of a generalization, but writers of romance (and novels with a significant romantic subplot) tend to create teasers filled with objectively attractive people. And why wouldn't you? You're selling a fantasy, you might as well go full-throttle.

And yet.

I find it kind of troubling that romance writers in particular have a tendency to load up their Pinterest boards and Facebook pages with photo after photo of ripped shirtless dudes.

Now, I love a nice set of shoulders and abs as much as the next straight girl, but I must say that as a feminist, I find it kind of distasteful that as writers we're apparently pushing the "objectification of women = bad; objectification of men = totes cool" agenda.

You'll never catch me making the (fallacious) argument that men are portrayed as negatively in pop culture and media as women. They are not. By and large, our films, television shows, and books all show men in the active "doer" role, and women in the passive "supporter" position.

But just as it is gross -- and yes, I mean gross -- to write female characters who are just male wish fulfillment, it is also gross to write men who never work out but maintain a magical six-pack. Science, folks. It doesn't work that way.

So friends, countrymen, can we stop with the mini ads filled with rippling pectorals, perfect H&M model hair, and lots and lots of photoshop?

Thanks.



* The first rule is to write, obvi.

Why I am still interested in writing New Adult ... that other post notwithstanding ...

I've made my disdain for the TV show Girls clear before, but even though I don't love it, it highlights an interesting phenomenon -- twenty-somethings today face a terrible job market combined with crippling student loans. They usually can't afford afford good healthcare, but they can afford relatively small luxuries like Starbucks, iPhones, and the occasional pair of designer jeans. They were raised by parents with a 50% divorce rate and were exposed to more armchair psychology than is good for anyone.

And as one of them, I must say, it pisses me off when our entire generation is systematically dismissed as entitled whiners.

I worked hard to get where I am today, and it makes me mad that I will never achieve the same levels of success as people who simply managed to arrive where I am ... five, ten, fifteen, twenty years earlier. People who are now calling me and people like me speshul snowflakes for wanting (to someday achieve) what they already got.

I love my current day job, but I can't think too hard about it without getting sucked into a rage spiral. You see, I don't make very much -- but I work with people who do. Because they got raises when times were good, with benefits that are vested and can never be taken away. And now times are bad, and those of us on the bottom of the ladder are supposed to just be grateful for a job. Wanting more is to be labeled "entitled."

Like I said, I love my job. I love that it's interesting, I love that it's flexible. But I'm not so unrealistic to think that I will always be able to say that, when I know that the 5 attorneys at the bottom of the ladder will always have a very different (smaller) compensation package than others, despite expending very different (bigger) amounts on our degrees.

Wanting a fair shake is not "entitled." I'm not asking to make the same amount of money as an attorney with 30 years of experience. I just want to be on the same bell curve.

At my old job, I did a lot of work I didn't like. (In all fairness, post-2008 economic meltdown, a lot of people did a lot of work they didn't like.) And one day, I ran into a partner on the elevator on my way to do some of that work. He smiled awkwardly at me and said, "We've all put in our time."

The problem is, that was absolutely not true. He hadn't ever had to do what I was doing--and certainly not for an entire year of his life. "We've all put in our time" was just something we both told ourselves to feel better about the situation.

I left that job, in part because of that situation. After I left, I heard that the firm fired most of the remaining people who were supposedly just "putting in their time." Putting it in for what?

Not to sound like an Occupier*, but the fact is simply this--for the bottom 99% of us, we are all worse off financially than our corresponding 99% were ten, twenty, or thirty years ago.** And there is nothing wrong with acknowledging that, and frankly, being a little angry about it.

New Adult, as a category of fiction, is important. It's important because art ought to reflect life, and not just the lives of the lovelorn or privileged-but-sad. There are a lot of authors who use New Adult to tackle topics "too dark" for Young Adult literature -- mental illness and sexual assault being the big two. But are those issues that only affect that 20-and-over set? I don't think so.

That's not to say that those stories aren't relevant, but they aren't the only stories.

I love the idea of New Adult literature because I want to read about a helicoptered generation trying their hand at independence for the first time. I want to read about boys and girls trying to become men and women in a society that has a really warped idea of what it means to be a man or a woman. I want to read about people with 6-figures of student loan debt trying to make it happen on a $30,000 annual salary, without coming off as woefully tone-deaf about bigger problems.

I love the idea of New Adult because I loved college and if I could redo college, I absolutely would--without changing much at all. I love the idea of New Adult because the question of whether your twenties are a wasted decade or the foundation to your entire adult life is still a question people ask themselves. (See this Ted talk for an answer I think we can all agree upon.)

Despite all my gripes, I think the best of New Adult is yet to come.





* PS, who decided on "Occupier" instead of "Occupant"? Occupant would have been much better.

** For the record, I am no doomsayer decrying our times. I like 2013. I'd rather live in 2013 than any other time, because I love equality, technology, and bras that are shaped like boobs instead of cones. Now is great! I just hope it gets even better, because our collective financial situation is nothing to be happy about, and is something definitely worth trying to fix.

libertarians

I will admit that, despite my political science background, the following is an oversimplification.

But I finally realized what I don't like about libertarians.

Most of their ideas I can get behind. I like limiting the power of government. I prefer to allow markets resolve themselves, individuals to govern themselves. In the small scale.

But taken to the extreme--which is how you have to test every idea, in the end--libertarianism falls apart.

When confronted with the fact that there will always be poor that need a social safety net, always be children who are abused or neglected,* the libertarian points to the inherent goodness of people to prove that private charities will step into the void that government leaves behind. Yet the problem libertarians have with government is that people in government are corrupt. They simultaneously express boundless hope in the human condition, and no hope.

Libertarians fear those who are in power. Yet their solution is to spread the power to everyone.

The rallying cry of anti-statists is "government for the people."

They all conveniently forget that government is also "by the people."

Government is not a computer program, nor is it run by robots. Government is, from its smallest component up to its largest, just people. Some of those people should not be involved in it.

But most of those people are just trying to do their best.







* The issues critics of libertarianism point to are usually child welfare and social safety nets for the poor. But the issues are bigger than that. How does a limited government have the resources to prosecute conspiracy? White collar crimes? Mass fraud?

How does a libertarian deal with environmental problems? When 7 states and Mexico rely on water from the Colorado River, how do small governments of limited power prevent upstream users from completely decimating those downstream? (Realistic proposals only, please.) When water or air pollution effect everyone, globally, how does a limited government address that problem? 

(End rant.

This is what happens on a Friday night after two weeks of hell at work.)

privilege

Whoa, we're about to get deep up here in the blog, folks! I am prepared to lose some followers. 

(I always do.)

I am a lot more laid back than this blog would probably imply. In my real life, I don't run around lecturing people about appropriate social media behavior or feminism or the marketplace of ideas or why I hate (and secretly shame-love) True Blood so much. I care about these things, but I am mostly a live-and-let-live kind of person. I try not to do battle unless I have to.

But there is one thing that perpetually bothers me, like a ringing in your ears that won't go away, and is acceptable in the short-term but infuriating over time. And that is when people don't recognize their own privilege.

Privilege, in case you never had a pompous professor (or in this case, blogger) explain it to you, is a benefit that you have that you did not earn. Sometimes it's hard to tell what that is. What might be a privilege for one person might very well be actually earned for another.

To be clear, I don't think being privileged is a bad thing to be. We all are privileged in one way or another. Nor do I think you can't be proud of your accomplishments just because you had some help along the way -- if that were true, no one could ever stand on the precipice of his or her own achievement and think, Look what I've done. And that's something everyone ought to be able to do, once or twice in their lives.

But being unaware of your privilege is not awesome.

And if you're actually wrong about your privilege, and think you earned it? Absolutely awful.

Most of us have lives built on a foundation that is part privilege and part merit. I went to college on a full scholarship. I earned that scholarship through hard work in high school (good grades, solid extra curriculars, volunteerism), but the taxpayers of Utah paid for it. I'm also really smart, something I cultivated, but also something that I owe to genetics, the environment in which I was raised, and the good luck to be born in a good school system as opposed to a bad school system.

I don't think that devalues my achievements. I am still proud of them. But I have to acknowledge that they aren't all my own.

On an episode of Mad Men, a wealthy man described his heir by saying, "My son lives in a cloud of success, but it's my success. Perhaps when that evaporates and his face is pressed against the reality of the sidewalk, he'll be of value to someone." The issue is not whether you were born wealthy -- the issue is whether you have the good sense to realize whose wealth it really is.

I would guess that most people are able to see and acknowledge their privilege when the issue is money. But what if the privilege is not about the socioeconomic class your parents gave you, but something else entirely?

What about the little societal bump you get from being a man? You don't have to pretend to talk on the phone as you're walking to your car at night. You don't have to worry in job interviews whether a potential employer is wondering if you'll just get pregnant in a few years and therefore not worth the training. When you go to the movies, the characters (even the minor ones) will almost certainly resemble you. When you are assigned to read "the classics" in high school, they will be written about people like you, by people like you. If you are assaulted, no one will ask you what you were wearing at the time. Your life, by and large, is (at least) a little bit easier because you were born with an XY chromosome pair instead of XX.

What if you're white? If you haven't read Peggy McIntosh's essay Unpacking the Invisible Backpack, I'd recommend it, but a few of the highlights -- if you're white, you don't have to worry about your race being a problem if you get into legal trouble. You can put on a band-aid or "nude"-toned makeup or shoes and they will match your skin. If you're having a bad day and you are rude or poorly dressed out in public, no one will attribute your rudeness or slovenliness to your race. You can easily find toys and books for your kids that will resemble them.

What if you're straight?

What if you are not disabled?

The list goes on.

The fact is, some groups (and if you don't know who those groups are, the chances are good you're one of them) in society start out with a better shake than others simply because they were born one way and not another. They did not earn that. It's a privilege. And it's a problem if you can't see that.

I'm not writing this because I want everyone to sit around feeling bad about the fact that they were born one way and not another. I don't feel guilty about being white any more than I feel ripped off about being a woman. I like who I am and I wouldn't change it. But I would like society to be a little more fair (for me, for people less privileged than me).

I don't have any sympathy for people who feel like the straight, white male is under attack in our society. I just don't. First of all, it isn't true. Straight white men run this country. They fill Congress and our courts and legislatures and head up our major industries and companies. They make a dollar for every $0.80 a woman makes. And people (particularly Fox news) will try to tell you that is because women generally choose jobs that make less money and that women don't ask for raises. (Girls wanna be teachers! Boys wanna be doctors! Girls are nice! Boys are demanding!)

Except that isn't true. Men fresh out of an MBA program are offered substantially higher starting salaries than women out of an MBA program. The same is true for doctors, and the gap grows over time.

And if a straight, white male feels like something has been unfairly taken from him (reverse discrimination!), it is usually just because he felt entitled to it in the first place. (Entitlements are only wrong if you're a minority, you see.)

I say "straight, white male" here, but the fact is, anyone can be ignorant of their own privilege. Look at Abigail Fisher, a woman who was rejected from the University of Texas and sued, taking her case all the way to the Supreme Court because she believes less qualified students were accepted due to their race.

It looks unfair, until you realize that the University of Texas accepts every student in Texas who graduates in the top 10% of his or her high school class. So if she wasn't automatically accepted, that means Abigail Fisher was a borderline student in the first place. She's just mad that another borderline student got picked instead of her, that in her case the weird societal bump (which is unearned, no matter who is getting it) went in a different direction. She had to settle for going to an equally excellent school that was not her first choice.

And I don't say this to defend Affirmative Action as a policy in higher education. I have mixed feelings about Affirmative Action and whether it's accomplishing what society had hoped it would. My point is simply that I'm not sure you can show actual harm to people like Abigail Fisher, who might be an excellent human being in real life, but who was never entitled a spot at UT to begin with, and who would have been admitted to UT if her grades had been better.

I don't want to imply that everything for women and minorities and poor people and disabled people and gay people sucks, and we should overthrow The Man. (Though between the women and the gay men, can't you imagine what a fabulous revolution it would be?) Things (generally) don't suck. And in fact, things are better. I am better off than women 20 years ago, and I am grateful for that.

But I think I will always be troubled by people who think society is moving in a bad direction.

Whenever someone waxes nostalgic about the past (and is it just me, or does that seem to be happening more frequently these days?), I want to shake them. Because the past wasn't better for anyone. When things get better for one group of people (the poor, racial minorities, women), they get better for all of us. Life in 2013 is better than life was in 1950, no matter how many episodes of Leave it to Beaver you've watched recently. And that includes the straight, white men. Their power differential might be different, but it's better to be Phil Dunphy than Ward Cleaver, hands down.

Does that mean we have no problems? Certainly not. But we should be hopeful about the future, because things (usually, eventually) get better, not worse.

And one good way help things along the path of progress is to realize, "It's not wrong for anyone to want what I've already got."

the internet community

Sometimes I get frustrated that my job requires me to keep a lot of things to myself. Not just lawyer-style secrets, but thoughts and opinions that I normally wouldn't think twice about sharing.

Intellectually, I know that my job is worth it. Not just financially (because for reals, the finances do not even factor in, given my sad little paycheck), but because I love my job. And part of my job involves remaining a cypher on certain issues in person and on social media -- a fact which I understand and accept.

But every once in awhile, I would like to have a grand freakout (or celebration, as the case may be) with the rest of you.

On to other topics --

1. Have any of you seen the series premiere of Under the Dome? I think it looks pretty solid, but I give the side eye to anyone who was ever involved with Lost, so I guess the jury is still out.

2. If I were to do another giveaway, what types of prizes would you all most prefer? Gift cards? Books? Critiques? I mean, that's all I've really got for ideas, so any thoughts you could share would be greatly appreciated.

3. Super excited to see Much Ado About Nothing.

4. I might be a little too wired this morning. Red Bull!

I meant what I said, and I said what I meant

My friend Sandy, who is awesome, wrote a blog post for Feminist Mormon Housewives today. You can read it here. (Her regular blog here.)

Now, if you've read that, you may want to just skip what I have to say. Because it won't make you feel any better or worse about your position, if any, whatever it is.

Prepare for a long-winded, indecisive rant, friendos.

When some friends of mine online suggested that Mormon Feminists start doing some stuff to remind people that, much like those Whos of Whoville, we are here, I was all about it. As much as certain things about the LDS Church bug me sometimes, I suspect that if more people knew about them, more people would say, "Hey, that bugs me too! Let's fix that." PROGRESS FOR EVERYONE!

Then one of them suggested, "Hey, why don't we all wear pants to church one Sunday?" and my enthusiasm plummeted.

I know, I know. Why wouldn't I be supportive?

Do I think women should be "allowed" to wear pants to church? Of course. I'm not the fashion police -- and what's more, the LDS Church has said since the 1970s that there's no official church dress code for the ladies. Go forth and wear pants, friends!

Do I think that, given the standard of "Sunday best," I own dress pants that are nicer than some of the dresses and skirts I own? Absolutely. My job can sometimes require a fairly formal dress code, and I wear suits and dresses pretty interchangeably. I don't think that one outfit is particularly better than another just because the structures are different. I also think anyone who insists that an informal dress (or jersey maxi skirt, boots, and a Northface pullover, you know who you are ...) is more appropriate for church than a pair of nice wool slacks on the basis of "Well, it's a dress!" is just kidding themselves.

Part of it is just that I don't want to wear pants to church. Period. It's not social conditioning or peer pressure (at age 28, I'm sort of past that sort of thing). I just ... don't want to. The tomboy Ru of my childhood would probably be like, "YES! Pants to church!"

But adult Ru is like, "Well, I would be warmer ... but I just like a good reason to wear a dress. Sue me." I don't feel more or less reverent, more or less respectful, in a dress. I just like dresses. And by the end of a regular work week, a lot of times I am just kind of sick of slacks. And that seems like a good enough reason to wear a dress.

But that isn't the reason I feel squeamish. The real reason was simple: a big part of me just knew, "This is going to get misconstrued. By a lot of people."

Because I don't care about pants. And I can't stand that people still confuse concepts of "sameness" and "equality." Every enemy of feminism ever has attempted to equate the demand for equal rights to  the imaginary demand for breastfeeding men and women who can pee standing up. (STRAWMAN ARGUMENT ALERT.)

I don't want to be a man. I like being a woman. I just wanted to get treated as well as a man because there is no justifiable reason why I shouldn't be.

I want women to have equal say about church finances. I want the Young Women's program to be as well-funded as the Young Men's. I want non-priesthood church positions to be filled equally by men and women. I want to see a woman pray in General Conference. And heck, why not have a woman speaker at Priesthood session of conference? Men speak in the Relief Society general, and some of the men in the audience could probably use the reminder that sometimes women have authority, too. 

Newsflash: I don't even want the priesthood. I mean, it's cool if you do, but the things I want (women who have children at home to be eligible to be seminary teachers -- maybe we'd have a few less creepster seminary teachers out there, amiright?!) have more to do with the institutional structure of the church than anything.

I want so many things to be better about the LDS Church. Things that I think most people would agree with, if they weren't so convinced that feminists want to kidnap pregnant women off the street and force them to have abortions.

And people are going to see the word "pants" and think all I want are different genitals. Because let's be honest -- our society is not big on the "critical thought" thing.

So even though I supported the basic idea presented, I thought I wasn't going to participate. I didn't want to take away from the event, so I was just going to keep silent, but I didn't want to offer my support, either.

But then.

The "decline" responses to the facebook invitation started pouring in. The anti-pants crowd is, in a word, insane. I knew there would be some misunderstanding of the motives of the group, but seriously. Heaven forbid you ask an LDS woman to wear nice slacks and pearls instead of a frumpster denim jumper this Sunday, because she will throw down. Sweet spirits? Ha.

And then on the "accept" side, I saw so many things that I thought couldn't possibly be happening. One gentleman shared that an usher in a ward in Arizona actually TURNED HIS GRANDMOTHER AWAY because she wore a pantsuit after hip surgery on Easter Sunday.

(Let's all just pause for a moment to consider that. Grandmother ... hip surgery ... Easter. NO CHURCH FOR YOU, PANTSY.)

So what am I going to wear to church on Sunday? Beats me, honestly. On one hand, I want to support a group and a cause I care a lot about. On the other, I think this is not the best way to raise awareness of our concerns. Back to the other hand, I can't quite believe the level of cray that surrounding this whole thing, and the obstinate lawyer in me wants to jump to the side of the down-trodden.

AND I DON'T EVEN WANT TO WEAR PANTS TO CHURCH.

But I love Horton Hears A Who!

In short, I am muddled, friends. So any thoughts you might able to offer, I would really appreciate.

Keeping in mind, of course, that in the end I might choose to declare this Sunday a mental health day and just stay home.

Yay feminism!

And yay (maybe) pants!

It's not the size of the election that matters

So remember that one time when I said a valid choice in a presidential race is to not vote?

I stand by that.

However, it only applies to PRESIDENTIAL races. If you find both choices equally unpalatable and can't find a single thing to distinguish them, don't say you're an undecided voter. Just decline to vote for president.

But no one will know that you declined to vote for president if you don't bother voting for anything.*

Here is why you should still vote, even if you don't want to vote for president:

 1. It does make a statement if 5,000 ballots are cast, but then the numbers voting for president only add up to 4,999. It does not make a statement if you decide to spend the day at home eating Coco Puffs.

Call it silent dissent in a broken system all you want, it's actually just laziness.

2. There are these other races for things called "not being president." Like members of Congress and your local legislature. Judges. School board. Governor. Attorney general. Treasurers and auditors, mayor and city councilors. And they are all PEOPLE, just like you and me.

Here in Salt Lake, there is a proposition about open trails and and two potential amendments to the Utah Constitution dealing with property tax and members of the military, and severance tax investment.

If you think that by not caring about ANY of that, you're making a statement about our "divisive" system, let me tell you -- you are just as divisive as anyone else, because you REFUSE TO find out that there are a lot of local or nonpartisan issues out there that could really use some support or criticism. Because even just showing up to say, "Yes, I support Leslie Knope for city council and I support Ron Swanson for auditor,"** and leaving everything else BLANK is more meaningful than doing nothing.

So if you really aren't going to vote today, enjoy those Coco Puffs.

I hope they taste like apathy and sadness.




* Not true, clearly, because you will most likely brag about your enlightened choice on the twitterbooks.

** Umm, clearly this is a nonpartisan blog, because not only are those fictional characters, but they are on the opposite ends of the political spectrum.

And now I rip on undecided voters

I know, right? First Taylor Swift and now our beloved undecided voters? I'm really on a roll this week.

Have you seen the recent SNL video lampooning undecided voters? I think it sums up our current situation well. I won't embed it here, since I don't want to get sued, but let me give you a few examples of the undecided's "tough" questions:

"When is the election?"

"What are the names of the two people running? And be specific."

"How long is a president's term of office?"

"What happens if the president dies? Has anyone thought about that?"

Undecided voters, what is your deal? I saw it suggested on the facebooks yesterday that those who are undecided aren't stupid, they're merely waiting to be presented with a "viable" candidate.

Pardon my French, but ... whuthf? (That's the sound I think WTF would make it you sounded it out instead of saying all the letters.)

There are two viable candidates to vote for. Two! And a few never-gonna-wins for good measure! And I hate to break it to you, undecideds, but even those of us who HAVE made up our minds are rarely 100% confident in their choice. This go around, I am roughly 62% confident, to be honest, but guess what? That will have to be good enough.

Because your choices are not to wait indefinitely for the candidate that gives you both the warm fuzzies and the naughty tingles. You are not shopping for a wedding dress or trying to decide what to watch on cable, there will not be infinite choices. There will be two choices, and after November 6th, there will be none.

Your choice is the same as the rest of us: pick the candidate that seems like he's the better fit for what you want. Not the ideal fit or the perfect fit or even the best fit -- just the better of two options. And as we all learned from Sesame Street and law school, "better" is a subjective term and it does not especially have to equate to "good." It just has to be more-good or less-bad than any other option.

Is that not enough choice for you? Well, here's your third choice (and despite what MTV might tell you, it is perfectly viable):

Don't vote.

Yup. If you want to hold out for the perfect candidate, just feel free to not vote. Remove the shackles of the "undecided voter" label, and proudly announce that you are a non-voter. There is nothing wrong with refusing to participate in an institution if you genuinely believe the institution itself is irredeemably flawed.

Don't let people trick you into thinking that you have now shirked your civic duty. If your conscience says you can support neither Kang nor Kodos, then do not lend them your support at all. Be a silent, conscientious objector.

Just don't, for the love, continue to call yourself an undecided voter. You've had more than a year to make this decision. If you can't make it, or at the very least stand on principle and refuse to make it, that doesn't make you wiser or more independent or more discerning than the rest of us.

It just makes you more impractical.

Freedom of the (Student) Press

There are always a few sides to a controversy.

Fair warning, though: this controversy is about boobs. More importantly, it's about free speech.

A few weeks ago, a professor at American University brought her baby to class. She's a single mom and her daughter had a fever, which meant daycare was a no-go. During her lecture, the baby got fussy, the professor breastfed the baby, and then class ended.

At least one student found the incident unprofessional, and word of what had happened in the class eventually reached The Eagle, the student newspaper for American University. One of the The Eagle's reporters reached out to the professor so the other side of the story could be heard.

Most of the news coverage of this event has focused pretty exclusively on whether or not it is appropriate to breastfeed in class. (Pull out your pitchforks, lacto-army, because I am of the opinion it's not all that appropriate. If you breastfeed in a restaurant or the library or on a bus, and people who may be uncomfortable -- which is their right -- have the option of looking away. No harm, no foul. Breastfeeding in front of a class of 40 students who are supposed to be following your every word, who won't be able to casually bow out without making a spectacle of themselves? Not the same scenario.)

But regardless of how you feel about public breastfeeding -- and in particular, public breastfeeding in front of a captive audience -- that is not really the issue.

The professor in question has written a long, rambling, defensive blog post about how the real controversy is the fact that a breastfeeding is just as normal as menstruating (true) and therefore the fact that a professor did it in front of her class, thereby discomfiting at least one student enough to drop the class, is presumptively not news (not true).

The professor in question described the student reporter who contacted her by (professional) email as a "budding reporter." Because if someone is just learning and practicing journalism, they are to be taken less seriously than a seasoned reporter.

The professor becomes incensed when when the reporter doesn't simply acquiesce to her request to drop the story.

To borrow a page from the internet:

The professor is annoyed that the student reporter has the audacity to show up at her class and then ask if she'd have time to answer some questions (ignoring, apparently, the fact that she could have simply said, "No, I don't have time" or "No comment").

She describes the student reporter as "chirping" instead of "speaking," because apparently you only have to treat women as serious humans when they're breastfeeding and giving lectures on feminism, and not when they're in college and trying to build their resume.

She explains that during the interview, she had to slap her forehead with frustration and roll her eyes at the "naive" and "sophomoric" student reporter, who works for a newspaper the professor deems "third-rate," by which I can only assume she means, "less deserving of freedom of the press." She explains that the newspaper has a "solidly anti-woman slant" and points to a 2010 column by an opinion writer (who may or may not be graduated by now) as her evidence.

* Pardon my interruption of my own recitation of the controversy, but as a former opinion columnist, I must say that if my entire student paper, and every student who wrote for it, was judged by the contents of the opinion page, we'd all have quite the schizophrenic reputation.*

The professor decries the "hostile" environment this student reporter is causing, ignoring the fact that her own actions also could be described as "hostile" by the student who was uncomfortable enough to drop the class -- which is why this is news, and why the reporter is looking into the situation. What's more, calling something "hostile" does not automatically make it so, and that goes double when the scenario involves the power imbalance between a professor and a student.

And finally, the professor apparently finds it incredibly unprofessional that a reporter might not immediately and personally respond to an email demanding that a story not run, and instead refer the matter up the chain to her editor.

Do you know what I find troubling and unprofessional? That this professor, who apparently feels like she is being made out to be "tabloid fodder" (despite posting the entire story herself online, with the names of herself, the reporter, and her daughter) over what is (in her mind) a "non-issue," feels no compunction about attempting to bully a student reporter into not reporting a story. The professor openly admits going to her department chair and other professors, asking them to lean on the student newspaper staff to kill the piece -- without a hint of irony that perhaps this, like breastfeeding your crying child while lecturing students on their first day of class, is not the most appropriate behavior for a professor.

Is it possible this story wasn't completely newsworthy? Entirely.

That is not the point, however much this professor wishes it were.

The point is that deciding that something is not newsworthy, without reading the story, and then exercising your influence as a professor  to censor student journalism, is the very definition of inappropriate in the academic setting.

Which is why I wish this story had involved anything but breasts, because if it had been about any other topic, I think we'd be able to see the forest for the voluptuous, lactating trees.

An update from work

As an fyi -- if anyone tried to give you a breakdown of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the Affordable Care Act in less than 24 hours after the opinion was released, don't believe a word they said.

193 pages is not that easily digestible.

Wish me luck while I try to summarize it into one (accurate) page ...

Math. It's a helluva concept.

So according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the average cost of having and raising a kid is around a quarter million dollars, give or take ten thousand dollars.

To cut to the chase, I find this number less-than-credible. Why? Aside from the fact that it just so happens to trigger my B.S. meter, I know for a fact that my parents did not shell out a million dollars raising four kids, let alone a quarter million. (Yes, I am aware of economies of scale. The people who came up the 234K number, however, are not.)

Let's take a look at these numbers, shall we?

The average, middle-income American family spends $234,900 per kid. Make over $100,000 a year? You can expect to shall out $389,670. Less than $60,000? $169,080.

"But wait!" you say. "Those numbers are all different. Do you mean to tell me that children of richer parents are more expensive?"

"Why no," says I. "But apparently everyone who has reported on this figures doesn't understand the difference between COST and SPEND. Because rich people SPEND more money raising their children--it does not COST that much. And presumably, it therefore does not COST a quarter million to raise a middle class kid, or even $170,000 to raise a lower income kid. This study, as it so happens, tells us VERY LITTLE about the cost of raising kids, and a lot about how much people tend to SPEND raising their kids."

Let's look at some other numbers, shall we?

The estimated "cost" of housing a kid for 18 years is $70,000.

"But wait!" you say. "Don't most people also have homes if they provide homes for their children?"

Indeed. In fact, you might even say that somewhere upwards of 99% of people who choose to procreate do so in a non-homeless state. So if people choose to "upgrade" their house or apartment upon having a kid, well, is that really a "cost" of having a kid?

The reports also show that 24 percent of the "cost" of raising a kid goes to feeding that kid. Again, I'd suggest it's likely lower, since most people who feed their kids probably would have also fed themselves, and what's the price difference between buying yourself some lettuce and chicken (already a necessity), buying your partner some lettuce and chicken (likely a necessity), and then buying a little more lettuce and chicken for a pre-adult who will probably not eat much of it anyway and then demand a cookie (the actual "cost" of feeding a kid)?

It's not huge, as you might suspect, even extrapolated over 18 years while (you guessed it) you were also continuing to feed yourself.

Then there's the puzzling 16 percent of the "cost" spent on things "used" on food for the child. I can only assume this means plates, spoons, Kitchenaids, spatulas, mixing bowls, pasta presses, and soda streams -- again, all things you probably bought FOR YOURSELF.  (Or if you were really lucky, received as a wedding gift. Cha-ching!) The only TRUE cost of "stuff used to feed a kid" is bottles and sippy cups -- things you bought for the sole purpose of feeding the kid for a few years because you would never buy yourself a sippy cup. (We hope.)
  
What is my point? It's simply this:

Kids cost a boatload. But if you choose to spend a whopping $14,000 a year on your kid, don't pretend that was the "cost" of having your kid.

We will now resume our regular programming.   

political mini-rant? don't mind if I do

To all the "real" "contributors" out there (you know who you are, you've got an Ayn Rand bumper sticker to prove your individualist cred) thinking of actually engaging in John Galt's strike and abandoning the rest of us shmoes to our fates ...

Please.

Just do it already.

Thanks.

***

(In case you didn't know, in Atlas Shrugged a character named John Galt tells everyone who really matters--industrialists, inventors, innovators, and anyone who is not one of those things but fortunately happens to be a raging douche--to abandon society to its own devices and go live in a commune. Because, clearly, only then will they really be FREE.

It's sort of an interesting idea in a book that's just a teensy bit rapey, and a laughable idea in this world I like to call "Grown Up Land." 

Good luck on your commune, ladies and gents. Hope you figured out how to can peaches and suture wounds before you left. We'll just be here, enjoying our mediocrity and tax obligations, along with our restaurants, indoor plumbing, college football and DisneyWorld. In case you ever want to come back.

Which we sincerely hope you don't.)

R is for red herring

But you already know what that is, don't you?  So I don't think I'll talk about them.

(In a way, this blog post's titles is, itself, a red herring.  GASP!)

As I was preparing my taxes a few weeks ago, a thought occurred to me. When we refer to the federal government, we say "Uncle Sam." So when I paid my federal taxes, I say, "Uncle Sam really screwed me over this year."

But when I pay my state taxes, shouldn't I shake my fist and mutter something like, "Damn you, Uncle Brigham"?  (Yes, shocking I know. "New Denver" is in Utah somewhere. Minds blown.)

I shared this theory with the roomies, along with my suggestions for other states. (Nevada = Uncle Kit. Massachusetts = Uncle Massasoit. Rhode Island = Auntie Anne. Hawaii = Aunt Liliuokalani. And so forth.) 

Hannah responded sadly that Uncle Sam hadn't been so bad, but Uncle Brigham had really taken things out on her this year. (References were made to Khal Drogo, if you know what I mean.)

All joking aside, I really think that we should all try to make this happen. I mean, once upon a time in New York, people decided to start abbreviating all their neighborhoods, and that eventually became a thing. (Last night as I helped him prep for trial, Diego kept referring to a town called "West Jordan" as "WeJo." I think we can all agree this would be a big improvement for the residents of WeJo. It just sounds way cooler.) If they could do it, why can't we?

What do you think the patron aunts and uncles of the 50 states should be? Or at the very least, will you commit to referring to West Jordan as "WeJo"?

M is for mothers

By now I'm sure you've heard of the Ann "Stay At Home Mother" Romney controversy. (PS, are you shocked that this is my second blog post referencing Ann Romney? Because I am.)

In short, a Democratic advisor said on CNN that Ann Romney was not a credible voice on women and the economy because she had "never worked a day in her life." Boos and hissing ensued. The President and First Lady went to bat for Ann Romney and candidates' families in general.

And while it took a little while, the original critic eventually apologized, saying that her real point was that Ann Romney was privileged enough to marry a man capable of supporting their family on his paycheck alone, entitling Ann the option of staying home if she chose, and therefore she cannot relate to other women who are less privileged.

Which I still think is a bullshit opinion.

Here's the thing--I don't believe that staying at home with your kids is a job. (Boo! Hiss!) And honestly, I suspect everyone who doesn't want their cars egged secretly agrees.

But it just isn't. A job is something you do for money, and stay at home parents don't get paid. If they were, they'd be called nannies and babysitters.

I really dislike studies that argue a stay at home parent would earn X amount of money if all their duties were outsourced because it perpetuates the idea that something must have an economic value to have societal value. (Also, it's just baloney. Calculating how much it would cost to have someone else buy your groceries and cook your meals? I have to do that anyway to live and I don't have a kid, so why does the same activity suddenly have monetary value when a parent does it? End tangent.)

There are many things I do that have no economic value. I shovel my walk in the winter. I vote. I do volunteer work. These things are not additional "jobs" to my actual job--these are the duties of a good citizen. The responsibilities of an adult. 

Someone who has a child and then cares for that child is not doing a job. I don't know why society insists on pretending otherwise.

Back to Ann Romney.

Ann Romney raised the five kids she had. She did volunteer work. She battled cancer and MS. But she didn't have a job.

Since when does that, and that alone, mean she can't relate to those who do have jobs?

What if I were to argue that as a woman, Callista Gingrich is not capable of relating to men? Or as a black person, Michelle Obama is not capable of relating to white people? Clearly both of those statements rely on a thousand incorrect assumptions, the biggest of which is that a person must endure every circumstance personally before being capable of relating to others.  

But that's clearly not true.

Now, it very well may be that Ann Romney cannot relate to the problems of a poor mother who works two jobs and still has to take food stamps for her kids. But please offer some evidence for that other than the mere fact that Ann Romney has never needed food stamps herself.

Sometimes it feels like the whole country is infected with a case of the Ricki Lake guest "You don't knooooooow me"s with a serious dose of "And you neva can!"s. And it's time to come down with a case of the FDR "Maybe I'm super rich and my legs don't work, but I can still see why coal mining would be a rough gig"s.

So from now on, let's all start from the presumption that President Obama, Michelle Obama, Mitt Romney, and Ann Romney can all relate to all of us until you have evidence (not speculation) to prove otherwise.


 

F is for feminism

1. This is what feminism means:

Men and women deserve equal political, legal, economic, and social rights.

and

Women and men benefit from a reduction of societal inequality.

2. This is not what feminism means:

Women should be treated better than men.

or

Men and women are the same. (Equality does not mean "sameness." I know it's really hard to understand without a fourth grade grasp of vocabulary, but trust me on this one. If it's hard, pretend I said "white people and black people" or "old people and young people" or "Christian people and Jewish people" or "poor people and rich people" instead of "men and women" when I say that they deserve equal political, legal, economic, and social rights despite not being the "same." Not so hard to tell the difference then, is it?)

3. If you are still unclear about the meaning of feminism, please re-read points 1 and 2.

4. If you think you are not a feminist after reading points 1 and 2, please go away.

Ru's talking about feminism. It's a Monday.

Once upon a time I wrote that a fundamental level, real feminists support the legal and social equality of men and women -- and this means supporting women who want the freedom to stay at home with their kids as well as the ones who want to work.  (Oh, SAHM v. all-other-kinds-of-moms ... will you all ever lay down your arms?)

Anyway, since I'm persnickety (don't you think it would be cuter if it were spelled "persnikity"?), I now have a caveat. Allow me to illustrate ...

Random lady: I know the feminists won't like it, but I love cooking.

Me: Um, feminists can like cooking.


Random lady: Oh, and I love babies. Don't tell the feminists!


Me: What are you talking about? To my knowledge, "the feminists," as you're calling them, have never taken a baby-hating position.

(etc. etc. etc.)

So here's the new caveat.

If you think you know what feminists think, and you're just delighted with yourself for screwing with us ("Squee! The feminists will hate this!"), then fine. I officially no longer give a crap about your legal or social equality. Kthxbye.

My nominee for the dumbest argument ever

"As a free agent, it can do what it wants."

Invariably when you get into a tricky situation like the Susan G. Komen v. Planned Parenthood debacle last week, some really "smart" person will point out that the Susan G. Komen foundation is a "free agent," and "free agents" can do what they want.

I just want to know who out there is so stupid that they don't already understand that.

There is no need to talk down to people. I understand that Tyson and KFC and other chicken companies are "free agents," and they can stuff 20 chickens into a cage and throw chicks into dumpsters if they want. I also understand that I am a free agent (thanks for the heads up, political commentator, but I've understood that concept since the first grade) and I can choose to only buy free range meat if I want.

So when people yammer on about how Susan G. Komen is a "free agent," and other "free agents" can choose to support or not support them, I seriously have to wonder if that person just needed to fill airtime or column space.

Everyone understands that.

There is no one who does not understand that.

Can we please get a Universal Taboo Buzzer we can press whenever someone starts down the tired old "they're a free agent" line of thought?  OBJECTION, SILLY ARGUMENT.

In fact, because everyone understands that so acutely, and because of the power of social media, Susan G. Komen did a 170 (it wasn't quite a 180, I think we can all agree) on Friday and restored breast cancer screening funds to Planned Parenthood. Because breast cancer is still awful, even when a group that uses 3% of its time and resources to perform abortions is the group helping underprivileged women avoid it.

Because it's a free agent, and free agents can choose to fund breast cancer screenings (while giving their top executives $400,000 annual salaries) or not.  And free agents can choose to provide contraceptives, and advice on infertility, and STD screenings, and abortions, and referrals for mammograms (all in the same building!) if they want.

And free agents can choose to donate, or not, to the aforementioned groups.

Churches are free agents.

Companies are free agents.

Individuals are free agents.

Sports teams are free agents, and very often come courting other free agents.

Basically everyone is a free agent except a government entity. 

So from now on, whether we're talking about a theater banning a movie, or a chain restaurant supporting a political cause we disagree with, STOP POINTING OUT THAT IT'S A FREE AGENT. Because no one is sitting around thinking, "You know, here I am, all this time thinking I had personal control over PETA/the Catholic Church/The New York Times/the San Francisco 49ers--you mean to tell me that I don't?  What a world!"

a hodgepodge of information

1. Hobo With A Shotgun is just as awesome (if not even more awesome) than I had previously suspected.  However, if you're feeling at all emotionally imbalanced, save it for another time. 

I think all those exploding body parts would not have been quite so hilarious, or the injustice of the hobo not being able to buy his beloved lawn mower quite so tragic, but for my sleep-deprived and moody state.

2. Remember ye olde writing conference I attended last weekend?  Well, I got two pretty solid pieces of advice.  I am working on implementing the first one now, and will update you all upon completion. (Assuming there's anyone out there in BlogLand who is interested, and I suspect most of you come here for the cute puppy pics.  Which is fine, that's why I come here, too.)

3. I know everyone laments the state of math and science education in our schools, but could we get a shout-out for civics and English while we're at it?  If I see one more person woefully misstate basic principles of governance that I had mastered in the FIFTH GRADE, I'm going to make like a hobo and eff this place up.  (Not really.) 

If oh-so-many people are oh-so-very passionate about politics these days, I'd just really appreciate it if they would give the following a skimmaroo before spouting off any opinions.

Three branches of government, people.  Three.

Also, commas, people.  Commas.

4. Somewhat related to number 3 ... have you ever noticed that when someone begins a sentence with, "Liberals ..." or "Conservatives ...", whatever comes next is almost certainly going to be really stupid?

And now I leave you with a fun postcard.