This recent New York Times op-ed, by Maureen Dowd, has caused quite a stir. Dowd’s premise is that “The more women achieve, the less desirable they are” to men.

After some analysis of recent movie plots (quite interesting as an indication of what the culture is thinking about, but it doesn’t really tell us anything about what people are doing), Dowd summed up two recent studies:

A new study by psychology researchers at the University of Michigan, using college undergraduates, suggests that men going for long-term relationships would rather marry women in subordinate jobs than women who are supervisors.

Well, she’s gotten the details wrong (it amazes me how often writers for major newspapers do that), but on the whole that’s a fair summary.

A few things to remember when thinking about this study.

1. This study asked undergraduates who among their hypothetical co-workers they’d prefer for a hypothetical long-term relationship: a boss, a peer, or an assistant. Most undergrads are 19 or 20, while the average age of first marriage for a US man is 29. Isn’t it likely that many of the 19-year-olds surveyed here are going to grow up a lot, and alter their preferences, in the next ten years?
2. There was a high degree of overlap in this study. On average, men ranked the assistant a 6.4 out of 9, while ranking equal peer woman only 4.9 out of 9. But (if I’m reading the data correctly) some of the men ranked the peer as high as 7.1, and some ranked the assistant as low as 4.3.
3. The data reported in the study doesn’t support the conclusion that “a majority of men preferred the assistant.” The study only reported averages. While clearly more men preferred the assistant than preferred any single other option, it’s quite possible that the combined number of men who preferred the boss, the peer, or who had no preference outnumbered men who preferred the assistant. I’m not assuming this is the case; but I’m not assuming the opposite, either. My point is, neither assumption is justified from the data the researchers published.
4. The researchers were expecting to find that women preferred dominant men. They found, instead, that women didn’t have any notable preference for dominant men (or for peers, or for underlings).

Dowd cited another study, this one from Britain:

A second study, which was by researchers at four British universities and reported last week, suggested that smart men with demanding jobs would rather have old-fashioned wives, like their mums, than equals. The study found that a high I.Q. hampers a woman’s chance to get married, while it is a plus for men. The prospect for marriage increased by 35 percent for guys for each 16-point increase in I.Q.; for women, there is a 40 percent drop for each 16-point rise.

As far as I know, this study has not yet been officially published. This article in the UK’s Sunday Times seems to be the primary source of information about this study. Curiously, the Times writer suggests an explanation for the findings that Dowd ignores: Perhaps smarter women are less likely to want to be married.

From the blogger Ann Althouse:

It may well be that some or all of these things are true: 1. women have less to gain from marriage once they are able to provide for themselves economically, 2. women with a higher IQ are more likely to be able to support themselves well, 3. more intelligent persons are better able to form preferences by analyzing real world factors and less likely to adopt established conventions, and 4. not marrying is the more rational choice for an intelligent woman. If some or all of these things are at least partially true, a high IQ in women might be a hindrance for the institution of marriage, but not for the woman herself.

Anecdotally, the “men prefer to marry stupider women” implication that some have read into this study totally contradicts what I’ve seen in my friends group and family; men I know are not looking for stupid women to wed. (Or anyhow, if that’s what they’re looking for, they’re not finding ‘em).

More importantly, the numbers reported for this study - “the prospect for marriage drops 40 percent for each 16-point rise in IQ” - is, without context, completely meaningless. What we should be asking is, 40 percent of what? What’s the scale?

Most people who read this statistic assume it’s an expression of real-life odds of being married (i.e., if a woman with an IQ of 120 has a 50% chance of getting married, than a woman with a IQ of 136 must have a 10% chance of getting married). But that’s obviously not what the study found. At that rate, it would take only a 40-IQ-point-rise to move from 100% of women being married to absolutely no women being married. If real odds fell and rose that steeply with IQ, then none of us would have ever met a brilliant married woman, or a stupid single woman.

The same researchers confirmed their findings by doing a similar analysis of income and marriage odds. But the Sunday Times reported these results with statistics that are considerably more meaningful, because they’re given in terms of real-life odds of being married:

They found 88% of 40-year-old men in the top socioeconomic class were married, compared with 80% in the lowest class. Among women aged 40 the trend is reversed. The researchers found that 82% of the top class were wed, compared with 86% in the lowest class.

So according to this, being successful lowers women’s odds of being married - from 86% to 82%. That’s not exactly a big deal, is it? It’s not a statistic which will get a lot of play in the press (or in the blogosphere). Yet the researchers apparently felt this finding confirmed, rather than contradicted, their findings on IQ and marriage. There’s no way to know for sure without seeing the actual research - but I suspect this means that the IQ differences, expressed in real-life terms, are probably not huge either.

Page 24 is up!

My plan (and we’ll see how well it goes) is to make up for missing last week by posting page 25 on Monday. Then, on Thursday, I’ll be back on schedule posting page 26. (That is, back on schedule if you ignore all the many, many other weeks I’ve missed - which I’m sure you will, you cooperative thing you!).

As for the current page, I feel kind of guilty about it. You see, I don’t really write in terms of “week by week.” I write assuming that readers will (eventually) be able to read the whole story in one sitting. So, in that context, the end of page 23 wouldn’t be a cliffhanger; it would just be, you know, a page.

But taken week-by-week, page 23 could seem like a cliffhanger. And if you think of it that way, then the way page 24 resolves the cliffhanger is horribly lame. So please, take my word for it: I didn’t intend it as a cliffhanger. I’m not that lame.

As for the page itself, right now I like it, but probably I’ll come to hate it in a week or two. Drawing the big scream panel was peculiar - this will sound ridiculous, but after spending enough time working on it, I began to feel remorse for giving Mirka such a bad nightmare. (Then I felt guilty in the last three panels for drawing her in a dress she loathes.)

This is twisted. From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

Ohio’s quarter-century-old domestic-violence law gives special criminal status to an assault by a family or household member and establishes unique protections for the victim. Courts also have consistently applied it to homosexual couples.

It is one of only two criminal offenses - along with menacing by stalking - that automatically gives the victim access to a protective order to keep the defendant away, and police are obligated to enforce it. Further, a violation of the protective order, or any second offense, “accelerates” misdemeanor domestic-violence charges to a felony.

The law treats anyone “living as a spouse” the same as a spouse when it comes to domestic violence: It defines domestic violence as an attack, or attempted or threatened attack, against a household member, and includes unmarried couples - so-called cohabitants.

Therein lies the rub, the public defender’s office motions contend. The new amendment forbids any state or local law that would “create or recognize a legal status for relationships of unmarried individuals that intends to approximate the design . . . of marriage.”

Yet, that is exactly what the domestic-violence law does for unmarried couples living together, says Lazarus, a third-year law student who drew up the boilerplate motion to dismiss. The law, he wrote, “clearly creates a legal relationship between unmarried individuals.”

So, that’s twisted.

And this is even more twisted: Lazarus is doing this because he’s a gay rights activist.

Yet the public defender’s tactic gives hope for opponents of Issue 1, which Ohio voters approved in November. Some lawyers who oppose the amendment say if a judge sides with the public defender’s reasoning, the court could declare the amendment a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment guarantee of equal protection under the law. Specifically, a married victim of domestic violence would have more protection than an unmarried neighbor beaten by a live-in lover, and married and unmarried defendants would be treated differently as well.

Alexandria Ruden, a Legal Aid Society domestic-violence lawyer and battered-women’s advocate, said she hopes that instead of having the unintended consequence of undermining part of the domestic-violence law, Issue 1’s unintended consequence will be its own self-destruction.

“Hopefully, instead of the [domestic-violence] statute, it will blow out the constitutional amendment,” said Ruden, who co-authored a leading legal text on Ohio’s domestic-violence law.

That, Lazarus acknowledged, is exactly why he concocted the public defender’s line of attack.

“Personally, when I was brainstorming this, it was with an eye toward, ‘How could we make this amendment look not so good?’ ” he said Wednesday.

There’s very few actions I won’t support in favor of full equality for lesbians and gays. And I guess that Lazarus could claim that he’s not attacking victims of DV, he’s just making it explicit that measure 1 attacks victims of DV. I don’t want to rush to judgment about a plan that Ms Ruden, who sounds like a very substantive advocate of DV victims, doesn’t sound hell-bent against. Maybe learning more will make me change my mind on this one.

But that all tastes sourly of rationalization. Full marriage equality is an important goal, but it’s not the only important goal. Nor is this strategy the only way of fighting measure 1.

Domestic violence victims are not tools to be used instrumentally to advance other people’s rights, but that’s how Lazarus is treating them. To attack the legal rights of domestic violence victims for political purposes is disgusting, no matter what your political purpose is.

I probably won’t post anything further today, since we’ve set today aside for watching The Lord of The Rings, extended DVD version, which as I understand it is something like 11 or 12 hours long. (Geeky? Us? What makes you say that?)

(I should clarify that “we” means me and several of my housemates, but not Bean, who finds the whole project somewhat bewildering. At best.)

In the meanwhile, how did I not have Stone Court on my blogroll? What’s wrong with me? It’s a fucking fantastic feminist blog, especially if you like an empirical/social sciencey approach to issues; go check it out is my advice.

I’ll say this for Sydney Quinn - she sure enjoys her Baileys!

Chug, Sydney, chug!

Ugh… not smooth.

I’m trying to add comment previews. This version of comment previews is “live” - that is, instead of hitting a “preview” button to create a preview, the preview automatically appears at the bottom of the page as you type.

If this works, then I owe thanks to Fernando, who explained how to install this plugin in terms I could understand.

Considering the ever increasing popularity of meetup.com, I’m sure that I don’t have to spend much time explaining it. But, for those who are not aware of it, essentially it is a website where you can find groups to join in your city on just about any subject one could possibly think of. Like the Amelia Peabody books and live in Orlando? Join the Orlando area Amelia Peabody Meetup. Tired of dealing with bad customer service? Want to vent to like-minded people? Live in Dilli, India? No problem!! Join the Dilli Bad Customer Service Meetup Group.

So, that’s what meetup.com is all about. With that said, I’d like to invite any Portland area feminists to tonight’s feminist meetup which will be held at In Other Words bookstore (3734 SE Hawthorne) from 7 - 9 pm.

It would be best to sign up on meetup.com and RSVP. But, if you don’t want to or are unable to, don’t worry about it — just show up.

(This is the third of three posts on “equity feminism” and “gender feminism.”) (Part one) Part two)

Ironically, although self-dubbed “equity feminists” often say they’re continuing the traditions of first-wave feminism, it’s doubtful any first wave feminists would have signed on to an ideology so extreme in its pretense that feminism has nothing to say beyond formal legal equality that it believes that rape has nothing to do with misogyny or gender bias.

After Hoff-Sommers, the person who has done the most to popularize the concept of “gender feminism” is libertarian, “ifeminist” and Foxnews columnist Wendy McElroy. In Roderick Long and Charles Johnson’s essay on libertarian feminism, they consider Wendy McElroy’s use of “gender feminist.” (Long and Johnson are rare libertarian feminists whose feminism is distinguishable from anti-feminism.) At one time, they say, McElroy used “gender feminist” to refer mainly to radical feminism, but her definition has expanded over the years:

McElroy now clearly lumps liberal and radical feminists together as “gender feminists,” and opposes libertarian feminism (individualist feminism, ifeminism) to this aggregation. … “liberal feminism,” “left-of-center feminism,” and “gender feminism” are all apparently being treated as equivalent.

The implicit suggestion is that to regard something as a legitimate object of feminist concern is ipso facto to regard it as an appropriate object of legislation. On this view, those feminists who see lots of issues as meriting feminist attention will naturally favour lots of legislation, while those feminists who prefer minimal legislation will be led to suppose that relatively few issues merit feminist attention. But without the conceptual confusions that all too often accompany the authoritarian theory of politics, it’s hard to see any reason for accepting the shared premise. Certainly McElroy’s 19th-century libertarian feminist predecessors did not accept it.

…McElroy’s career has been a steady stream of books and articles documenting, and urging a return to, the ideas of the 19th-century libertarian feminists. Yet we know ““ and it is largely owing to McElroy’s own efforts that we know ““ that if there are any “gender feminists” lurking out there, the 19th century individualists, while libertarian, would certainly be found among their ranks.

* * *

One odd effect of Hoff Sommers’ formulation - in which “equity feminists” do not perceive any social problem of anti-woman beliefs (a position very at odds with first-wave feminist thought, by the way), and who additionally think feminism’s only legitimate goal is formal equality under the law - is that the category of feminists who can be considered “equity feminists” is astonishingly narrow. It consists of a handful of Republican activists and think-tankers, like Hoff Sommers herself and the IWF; and also some libertarians whose primary connection to feminism is opposing it, such as Wendy McElroy (who earns a living writing an anti-feminist column for Foxnews) and Cathy Young.

The way “equity” feminists like Hoff Sommers and McElroy discuss feminism is entirely binary; they don’t acknowlege that there are any feminists who don’t fit into the gender/equity dichotomy, nor do they suggest that any overlap between the catagories exist. Therefore, when “equity feminism” is drawn so narrowly, “gender feminism” becomes correspondingly broad. Virtually all feminists, apart from a handful of Republican and libertarian activists, are in practice derided as “gender feminists” by Hoff Sommers, McElroy and their fellow travelers.

In a comment on a HNN thread, Charles Johnson writes:

The popularity, in some libertarian circles, of Christina Hoff Sommers’ distinction between “equity feminism” and “gender feminism,” a pair of opposed categories that–so far as I can tell–actually track no historical tendency of thought and no shared premise whatsoever. (I don’t know what “gender feminism” is supposed to actually be, but I do know that if you put Kim Gandy, Andrea Dworkin, and Mary Daly into the same political boat, you are surely misunderstanding something.)

He’s got a point.

It can be useful, for the purpose of a particular article or thought experiment, to create a classification system from scratch. In her essay “Marooned on Gilligan’s Island” - one of my favorite pieces of intra-feminist criticism - Katha Pollitt makes up a category called “difference feminism,” which she contrasts unflatteringly with “equality feminism.”

But Pollitt’s category doesn’t have the effect of encouraging ignorance; although she posits a new category, “difference feminism,” she didn’t go on to make the difference/equality dichotomy her only lens for viewing feminism for decades on end. Since her difference/equality dichotomy wasn’t her sole and only approach to understanding feminism, her analysis doesn’t force her to lump together feminists whose intellectual traditions are actually strongly opposed. For Pollitt, “difference feminism” was an analytic tool, but not the only tool in the toolbox.

In contrast, most conservatives use the terms “gender feminist” and “equity feminist” less as a tool than as crutches; the simplistic duality between a handful of marginal libertarian and Republican feminists, and all other feminists, is their only means of understanding feminism. This means, of course, that they cannot understand feminism at all.

It’s as if someone divided all of cinema into two categories, “Arnold Schwarzenegger films” and “everything else,” and then remained committed to using this classification system, and no other, for decades. Is it really useful to have, as one’s exclusive classification system, an approach that pretends that the cinematic traditions that produced Fanny and Alexander, Mureal’s Wedding, Hero, and Monsters, Inc do not have any noteworthy distinctions?

An approach to feminism that divides feminists into “Hoff Sommers, McElroy and their allies” versus “all other feminists” is not useful to anyone who hasn’t already decided to hold the “all other feminists” catagory in contempt. Such an approach promotes lazy, stereotypical thinking, in which someone can read Mary Daly and conclude that he’s read all he needs to know about Katha Pollitt, Catherine MacKinnon or Martha Nussbaum, since they’re all from a single intellectual approach.

I can see why this approach is idealogically attractive to conservatives and anti-feminists; what I can’t see is how such an approach can be anything but intellectually vapid.

(This is the second of three posts on “equity feminism” and “gender feminism.” Part one is here; part three is here).

How far do “equity feminists” go in denying that there’s any widespread problem of sexism for feminism to address in the US? Here’s Hoff Sommers describing the “equity feminist” view of rape. First, she points out that in prison - which is to say, in an environment where men have absolutely no access to women - male rape is common. The she says:

Equity feminists find it reasonable to approach the problem of violence against women by addressing the root causes of the general rise in violence and the decline in civility. To view rape as a crime of gender bias… is perversely to miss its true nature. Rape is perpetrated by criminals, which is to say, it is perpetrated by people who are wont to gratify themselves in criminal ways and who care very little about the suffering they inflict on others.

Hoff-Sommers acknowledges that most violent criminals are male, but dismisses this as uninteresting: “That most violence is male isn’t news. But very little of it appears to be misogynist.”

And that is the “equity feminist” view on rape, according to the woman who invented the term.

What’s interesting to me is how, in bending over backwards to deny that rape has anything to do with gender bias, Hoff Sommers winds up not talking about rape at all, whinging on about “criminal violence” instead.

Yes, male-on-male rape is a serious problem (and a statistically huge problem in prison); but it’s not possible to seriously discuss causes and prevention of rape if we’re not willing to admit that - outside of environments where men are locked away from all access to women - rape is overwhelmingly perpetuated by men against women. And although all rapists are, by definition, criminals, the typical rapist isn’t a career criminal, but an acquaintance, boyfriend or husband of the victim. That’s the reality.

But since dealing with reality would conflict with “equity feminist” ideology, Hoff Sommers chooses not to deal in reality. Instead, according to “equity feminism,” rape has to be understood as a subcategory of gender-neutral “violence” and a “decline in civility,” and therefore has nothing to do with women being attacked at all.

(This is the second of three posts on “equity feminism” and “gender feminism.” Part one is here; part three is here).

So f0r the last three hours, drawing on Hereville page 24 was going well. I mean, quite well. Well enough so I was totally absorbed in drawing. So totally absorbed that I forgot to save.

Then the house’s cruddy electric system combined with a housemate’s blow dryer… you can see where this story is going.

Aaaargh.

Aaargh.

I mean, freakin’ fucking aaaargh!

So how’s your night going?

Also, if anyone knows of any plugin or function to make Photoshop automatically save now and again, I’d appreciate the info.

About a year ago, I blogged about the deluge of right-wing hate mail received by Margaret Cho, “mostly criticizing Cho for being fat, Asian and female, traits that are considered grievous flaws by some right-wingers.”

I stand by that post. But I can’t stand by an assumption I made while I wrote it. At some level, I smugly assumed such an outpouring of blatant racist misogyny would only come from the right. I didn’t think about it (if I had thought, I would have realized I was being ridiculous), but I thoughtlessly assumed it.

I am reminded of this today because Michelle Malkin, an Asian-American, right-wing pundit, has put quotes from some of her hate mail online. (Link via comments at LTF). A few samples:

I don’t want to make this “all about me.” The main issue here is obviously the racism and sexism that still exists and boils up with what I can only call stunning assholishness when a woman of color who speaks her mind is combined with the ease and facelessness of email.

But it’s also important that lefties (and especially the feminist, anti-racist left) be aware of stuff like this, lest we fall into smug, easy assumptions, as I did a year ago. There’s no shortage of vile, racist, woman-hating assholes on the left.

White Wolf Games has a new game out - “Ghetto!”

The idea is, you role-play a Nazi in the Warsaw ghetto of 1942. Your goal is to slap down the Jews, or “Kikes,” and pick out the agitators and leaders to be shipped to the Treblinka mass-murder camp. What fun! You also earn points by picking out the pretty Jewesses to force them to be your whores to survive, and then beating the hell out of them if they don’t cooperate. It’s really cool!

Oh, and remember: if you like being politically correct & never laughing, don’t buy this game. Remember, just saying “this isn’t for you if you’re PC” automatically makes all criticisms of racism and woman-hating moot. We don’t have to think about the moral implications of our actions and publications at all; we just have to say that anyone who criticizes us lacks humor.

(Thanks to “Alas” reader Karpad for the pointer.)

UPDATE: I’d better make it clear - this post is a parody. To see what it’s a parody of, you have to follow the link.

I really enjoyed The Incredibles, because it was beautifully animated, decently written and had great action sequences. (So shoot me, sometimes my mind likes candy.) But at the same time, I thought its politics were pretty regressive, and vaguely thought I’d write a post on it. I didn’t, but thankfully I don’t have to, because Sally of Prednisone Nation did such a great job.

Here’s my fave bit:

…Fundamentally, this is a movie about the social role of talented people. I read a review today that said that it was a polemic against mediocrity, but I don’t think that’s right at all. The movie’s real target is not mediocrity but equality. Some people, according to The Incredibles, are just born better than the rest of us. This superiority is innate and inherited: superheroes make up a kind of master race. The movie doesn’t just suggest that it’s destructive to stifle talented people; it also derides the notion that everyone has talents that should be celebrated, and it raises and dismisses the idea that ordinary people could make their way into the elect. You don’t choose to be a superhero; you can’t earn it through ingenuity or hard work. You’re either born super or you’re not.

An unstated but necessary corollary to the idea of an innately superior group of superheroes is the notion that they will always use this power for the common good. Otherwise, we might have to confront the pesky notion that powerful elites might use their strength to oppress others. It’s not that it’s impossible for ordinary people to become super-talented: with the help of his inventions, the villain becomes an equal match for any member of the Incredible family. The problem seems to be that it’s unnatural to elevate people who are destined to be ordinary; it messes with the proper order of things. When given extraordinary power, normal people will be corrupted. Only those born superheroes can be trusted to use their powers for good. This movie says that powerful, hereditary elites are good for society not because they’re more talented but because they’re more moral. It’s a nineteenth or even eighteenth-century version of how society should be ordered: it’s a celebration of natural aristocracy and the concept of knowing your place.

Another unstated but clear assumption is that real, important powers are physical, not mental. The Incredibles’ powers all reside in the body: they can lift, throw, contort, run, or disappear. There’s no thinking involved. In fact, Mrs. Incredible tells Violet that in case of an emergency, she should not think. Thinking just trips Violet up, and she’s more effective when she shuts her brain off and just acts. The villain of the piece, on the other hand, is depicted as that comic-book cliche, a genius inventor. His powers reside in his mind, and he is capable of creating machines that could give everyone extraordinary powers. This mental prowess, however, is not a super power. His ability to design and create makes him an imposter, not a superhero. His intelligence is a destructive force, while the Incredibles’ bodily strength is a force for good. The movie suggests that the whole society should mirror the social hierarchy of your typical high school: the football players should lord it over the losers in the chess club.

Read the whole thing.

(This is the first of three posts on “equity feminism” and “gender feminism.” Part two is here; part three is here).

As folks have been discussing a bit in this “Alas” thread, conservatives tend to divide feminists into two categories: “gender feminists” and “equity feminists.”

These terms were coined by Christina Hoff Sommers, in her anti-feminist classic Who Stole Feminism?. Here’s how Hoff Sommers introduced the term “gender feminists”:

The gender feminists (as I shall call them) believe that all our institutions, from the state to the family to the grade schools, perpetuate male dominance. … Gender feminists are constantly on the lookout for the smoking gun, the telling fact that will drive home to the public how profoundly the system is rigged against women. To rally women to their cause, it is not enough to remind us that many brutal and selfish men harm women. They must persuade us that the system itself sanctions male brutality. They must convince us that the oppression of women, sustained from generation to generation, is a structural feature of our society.

In contrast, equity feminists are those who (in Hoff Sommer’s view) derive their feminism from the suffragettes. Here’s Hoff Sommers’ first mention of “equity” feminism:

The traditional, classically liberal, humanistic feminism that was initiated more than 150 years ago was very different. It has a specific agenda, demanding for women the same rights before the law that men enjoyed. The suffrage had to be won, and the laws regarding property, marriage, divorce, and child custody had to be made equitable. More recently, abortion rights had to be protected. The old mainstream feminism concentrated on legal reforms. …

Most American women subscribe philosophically to that older “First Wave” kind of feminism whose main goal is equity, especially in politics and education. A First Wave, “mainstream,” or “equity” feminist wants for women what she wants for everyone: fair treatment, without discrimination.

Note that the definitions are already a bit incoherent; although Hoff Sommers is trying to create two opposed categories, her definitions leave a lot of room for overlap. There is no contradiction, for example, between believing that “system is profoundly rigged against women” (gender feminists) and wanting “fair treatment, without discrimination, for everyone” (equity feminists).

Ignoring the incoherence for a while, the two key differences in Hoff Sommers formulation seem to be that “gender feminists” believe that sexism against women is a widespread problem, found in virtually all our society’s institutions. In contrast, “equity feminists” apparently think that feminism’s only proper concern is legal equality - a goal that has been, to a significant extent, achieved in the USA - and there is absolutely no cultural or systemic bias against women.

(Note, by the way, that the dictionary definition of feminism - which I’d phrase as “the movement organized around belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes” - is closer to “gender” than “equity” feminism, since its conception of equality is far broader than simple legal equality.)

(This is the first of three posts on “equity feminism” and “gender feminism.” Part two is here; part three is here).

As a cartoonist, I was intrigued and excited to read on World Net Daily (a right-wing news site) that “The government of Mexico is raising eyebrows with a new comic book offering advice on how to cross the border into the U.S. illegally.” (Hat tip: Animate Matters).

Imagine my disappointment when I did a little searching and discovered that the comic book in question is really more of a prose pamphlet with comic-book-style illustrations. Doesn’t World Net Daily realize that to be a true comic book, the pamphlet would have to feature images in deliberate sequence forming a narrative?

Scroll to the bottom of this page to read the pamphlet (translations are included). To my eye, the illustrations seem to have a strong Neal Adams influence, with touches of Al Williamson as well (look at the folds on the Dad’s blue shirt in the page on domestic violence, for example). A bit too much superhero influence - look at how overly buff the shirtless guys crossing the river are, for example, or the woman’s ridiculously tight dress on the “you have rights!” page.

Still, a good first effort. I hope the Mexican government expands into publishing full-fledged comics in the future.

What with one thing and another, I’ve been too busy to check out the Koufax awards, which are once again being administrated by “too much work, too little reward is our game” Wampum.

I just did, and I’m flattered to say that “Alas” has been nominated (at least in this round) for Best Indie Blog, Best Group Blog, Best Single Issue Blog, and in addition I’ve been nominated for Best Writing. So, yay us.

(If you think “Alas” deserves it, please do follow the above links and vote for us!)

Keep watching - they still haven’t gotten to the “best post” and “funniest post” nominations, which are always a lot of fun just as a guide to good posts to read.

I’ve spent the last 24 hours trying like hell to figure out why some of the posts here will say they have “29 comments” but you can only read 24 of them. I couldn’t find the missing comments in my e-mail or anywhere else. It was very confusing.

Well, I finally figured it out…I think. It turns out that some of the comments sit there until they are “approved” (while others are automatically approved). I have no idea why this is happening, and Amp isn’t around right now for me to ask. It seems that in some cases, this is a good thing (a couple of the unapproved ones were spam). In other cases, however, they were legitimate posts. One was by a frequent Alas commenter (although, this may be the first time she commented since the move to WordPress). Others were by someone who had been commenting in that thread already. So, I have no idea why they weren’t approved.

So, anyway, I will make more of a point to check out the threads to see if there are any “unapproved” messages and go ahead and approve them. But, if you notice that your comment has not shown up, go ahead and e-mail me to let me know.

Well, things are looking up since my last post.

1. Dylan Thurston pointed out that I could rescue several recent posts by going to Google’s catche. Thanks, Dylan! (Google didn’t catche the comments, alas. Which is sad, because a couple of those discussions were really good.)

2. I got the sidebar to look okay in IE.

3. At RaynDragon’s suggestion, I made the top graphic (the screaming “Alas” dude) into a link back to the front of the blog. Thanks, Rayn!

4. JennHi told me how to get rid of the horrible annoying horizontal scroll! Huzzah! Thanks, JennHi!

5. I got the brick-red at the top of the blog to bleed all the way to the margins in Opera (although not in IE or Firefox). Since Opera is what I use to read “Alas,” and I doubt anyone other than me cares, I can live with that. (What worked was removing all the padding from the “body” attribute).

6. Stephen Bounds explained to me that ” ‘padding’ adds space within the current layout box, while ‘margin’ adds space outside that box,” which is probably the single most useful thing anyone’s ever told me about laying out in CSS. Knowing that made playing around with how the sidebar and main text are laid out much easier. Thanks, Stephen.

7. The “sidebar overlap” problem rather mysteriously fixed itself, at least in the three browsers I’m using on a Windows machine.

I still have a lot to do on the blogroll, and all the little bighead drawings need to be restored, but in the meanwhile we seem to have a fully functioning, acceptable-looking “Alas.”

Three questions. First of all, does “Alas” look wrong or awful (more so than usual, I mean) to any readers out there? I know not everyone is using IE, Opera or Firefox on a Widows machine. (Although, really, I can’ t recommend Opera highly enough.)

Second, apparently the RSS feed isn’t working. Since I don’t know a thing about RSS, I haven’t a clue how to fix it, but I’ll try to work on it. But if anyone knows what’s wrong, please give me a shout-out.

And third, what do you folks think of the “most recent by…” feature added to the “recent comments” list on the sidebar? It’s kinda neat to know who the most recent poster was, but on the other hand the “recent posts” list isn’t as tidy looking as it was and take up twice as much space. Anyone have a preference?

In the meanwhile, suggestions are quite welcome - about RSS, and also about any CSS or layout tweaking.

The worst problem: All posts and comments posted to “Alas” after December 30th have been utterly lost, and there’s nothing that can be done about it. Many apologies to everyone who wrote a post or a comment during that period.

The good news: It’s still rough around the edges, but “Alas” is back online and working. That’s good, isn’t it?

Once I learn the system, having switched to Wordpress should give me a lot more spam-blocking options. Also, the “it takes two minutes to post a comment” problem appears to have been fixed by the change.

The continuing frustrations: Have I mentioned how much I loathe working with CSS? I know it can do wonderful things, but html was so much easier to work with.

Anyhow, I’m going to continue poking at the CSS and index file, and playing with WordPress, and maybe someday the blog will look right again. I’ll restore the blogroll sometime in the next several days.

In the meanwhile, my experience is that “Alas” readers (collectively) usually know a lot more than me. (Not that it’s difficult to know more than me.) I’ll be very grateful if you have any suggestions regarding:

1. Why does the sidebar look okay in Opera and Mozilla but horrible in IE?
2. How can I get the brick-red color at the top to extend all the way to the top and left side?
3. Why is the blog always slightly wider than the window, regardless of how wide the window is?
4. Why does the sidebar overlap the top banner in Mozilla and IE, no matter what I set the “#menu” “top” setting to? (Opera seems to be the only browser that pays any attention to that setting at all; I have it set to 260px currently).
5. Is there any advantage to me in using WordPress’s built-in “sidebar links” function, rather than just putting raw html in the index file?
6. Is there any way I as admin can edit who authored a post in WordPress? Although WordPress successfully imported all old MT blog entries - which is more than MT can say - it didn’t correctly guess the author on all of them.
7. Got any tweaking suggestions?

Any advice would be appreciated. If you like, you can view a .txt document of the css file here, and of the index file here.