I posted this a while back on Ambling Along the Aqueduct, and Amp linked to it in one of his link farms, but given my tendency to post about political narrative, I thought it might be good to have this post around for people to refer to if they’re wondering about my positions.

Collective Unconscious

My anthropological theory of literature, basically, is that through reading a large sampling of a culture’s literature, it’s possible to deduce some of the basic concerns and narratives running through that culture’s subconscious. This is especially true when a subject becomes trendy in science fiction.

For instance, the way that we (as science fiction writers) explore virtual reality as a social space reflects our anxieties about social spaces in the “meat” world. Depictions of virtual reality tend to cleave to older cultural dialogues about cities. They’re seen as freeing, a place for people to move beyond mundane concerns — much as the theorist Simmel saw cities — or they’re seen as oppressive places where human interaction is traded for fetishization — much as the theorist Durkheim saw cities.

I see art as our culture’s roiling subconscious. Our beliefs and anxieties bubble to the surface. Especially in the fiction of ideas.

Narrative and Society

I think that one of the strongest effects of culture on the human psyche is to shape the narratives that we use to dissect the world. These narratives give me a lens for interpreting what happens to me. I, as a western woman, am likely to interpret my choices from an individualistic perspective. I decide things. I make them happen. In Invitations to Love: Literacy, Love Letters, and Social Change in Nepal, Laura Ahearn discusses the ways in which Nepali women will talk around the concept of agency; saying, for instance, that they were forced to make a love match because of a magic spell, rather than that they chose to make a love match.

Narratives obviously shape our interpretations of gender as well. The ways we view the actions of men, and the ways in which we view the actions of women, are subtly but importantly different. This is one of the major reasons, I believe, why people are so disturbed by gender ambiguity. When presented with an individual who does not visually present as male or female, people have trouble figuring out what narratives to apply to that person, and thus how to interpret or interact with hir.

Cultural narratives are shaped in manifold ways, of course. Nevertheless, I think it’s important to look at novels and short stories (and plays and television shows) as direct ways in which we shape our narratives. When The Simpsons presents an image of a boorish, stupid husband who is too stupid to be trusted with simple tasks, and his competent housewife who is content to be his helpmeet — they are tapping into those narratives. At times, they manage to use the narratives to mock themselves, in a complex weave of upholding and subverting the paradigm.

Roseanne, on the other hand, presenting complex individuals who do not so easily fit into the standard narratives of male and female, breaks the paradigm for a moment. It pries open our narrative space just long enough to give us a framework for talking about fat, bossy, but extraordinary women, and men who are both involved in manly work and not always in control. (Hat tip to Myca at Alas, a Blog for those examples.)

In literature, we see this with something like Delany’s Trouble on Triton, which poses some alternate methods for categorizing sexuality. Rather than gay and straight exclusively, we see people categorized by whether they prefer younger or older partners, their inclination toward sadomasochism, and so on.
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A reader (Sekou) at Rachel’s Tavern sent me a link to this fascinating article about a Black single mother who had to file a law suit several years ago to adopt a white child.  I have said before that I don’t personally know of any cases of white kids being adopted into black families.  That obviously doesn’t mean that it does not happen, but it is indeed rare.  The article from the Detroit News says between 2001-05 78 white kids in the state of Michigan were adopted by blacks, compared to 677 black kids adopted by whites.  So white kids raised by black parents are there, but they are uncommon.

There is one glaring problem with the article, and this is a common problem as I have noted in the past.  The article cites that National Association of Black Social Workers as a source of opposition to transracial adoption, but that really is not relevant here.  I can just about guarantee that the NABSW doesn’t have a problem with this case.  Their concern was about a black children being aopted by white parents in large numbers, while prospective black adoptive parents faced numerous hurdles. The article fails to cite one real life white person who was opposed to this adoption on racial grounds. (They do cite some stares by random white people at the end.) 

However, the article does a good job highlighting several other issues.  What is also interesting is that part of the reason the adoptive mother want to adopt this child was to keep her with her sister, who is biracial (black/white I’m assuming).  The adoption of the biracial sister appeared to be a non-issue with opponents.  Now this my friends points out the utter absurdity of conflating race and culture, which I have also addressed before. (Lyonside also helped me put the smackdown on a troll in the comments. It’s worth reading.)  How can you have two siblings being raised by the same biological mother, and people have decided that they somehow have a different culture?  Their difference is race, not culture.  If this was a cross cultural or international adoption, that discussion would be more relevant.  I also think it could be more relevant if this black mother knew absolutely nothing about white people in America, which would mean she didn’t watch any TV, read any magazines, get a job with whites, etc.  Do you realize how difficult that would be? 

What is even more interesting is the part where the black adoptive mother was asked–what kinds of (white) foods she would cook for the daughter.  The mother replied that all the kids eat hot dogs and hamburgers.

I also found the part about people asking her “why she talked black” to be quite fascinating.

Go read the entire article from the Detroit news; it’s really a good story.

(cross posted at Ambling Along the Aqueduct*).

Awhile back there was a thread at I Blame the Patriarchy about feminist science fiction. Here’s an incredibly incomplete list of some feminist-minded science fiction that I love. The stories and novels won’t be shockingly new to most people who are well-versed in fantasy & science fiction, but I think they’re newish to people who don’t really watch the genre. I’m also going to skip some of the more obvious feminist canon, such as Tiptree, Butler, Delany, Russ, LeGuin, Atwood, and Piercy. If you haven’t read them, go out and read them!

With those provisos in mind, I’m confining myself to three short story recommendations, and three novel recommendations, so please don’t take this list as representative of anything except the first few wonderful things that occurred to me. I’ll probably revisit the topic later. :)

SHORT STORIES:

	Knapsack Poems by Eleanor Arnason “Knapsack Poems” by Eleanor Arnason is what I’ve been calling my favorite short story since I ran across it in an anthology last year. It’s about some convincingly alien aliens whose physical presence involves a radical reinterpretation of gender and body. Since it’s online, I’m not going to say more. Go read. :)
	Love’s Body, Dancing in Time by L. Timmel Duchamp Love’s Body, Dancing in Time is a short story collection by L. Timmel Duchamp, the editor of the feminist publisher Aqueduct Press. In this collection, she explores gender, sexuality, and self-definition, through interesting characters, worlds, and extraordinarily beautiful imagery. All of the stories reflect a deep engagement with feminist ideas, rendered striking and moving through Timmi’s unique interpretations. Timmi’s work has an academic cast which the pedant in me really enjoys; one of the stories in this collection is an alternate history examination of Abelard and Heloise, written as an academic paper. My favorite story in the collection is “The Gift,” the story of a woman from a world with a binary gender system who travels to another world and falls in love with a man who is a member of a third gender.
	With Her Body by Nicola Griffith The stories in this collection are striking and dark, with strange, beautiful imagery. My favorite story in the collection is “Yaguara,” the last story, which carried me away — past writer brain, past self reading the book. In the afterword, L. Timmel Duchamp writes a fascinating analysis of Griffith’s stories; she discusses Griffith’s exclusive use of women as sexual creatures which creates a world where women are not othered in response to men’s sexuality. She also talks about the constructs our culture has built around feminine versus masculine fiction — for instance, how universality is constructed as masculine, so that feminine characters are seen as ‘limited’ and ‘embodied.’ While Nicola’s stories were so beautiful as to carry me past the intellectual interpretation of the work while I was reading, I was pleased to have the concepts brought to my attention by Timmi’s afterword when I was done.

NOVELS:

	Salt Roads by Nalo Hopkinson This book weaves through the consciousnesses of three black women in different places and historical periods: a slave in the Carribean; a dance hall girl who was the lover of Charles Baudelaire; and an Egyptian slave girl who worked in a brothel, and later became a saint. I found this book utterly seductive. Reading it was a profoundly moving experience, for me. The prose is gorgoeus, and there’s a kind of fiery, driving strength that propels the tension through disparate places and events. The reader gets to know each character intimately, and Nalo’s deft, insightful, poetic prose allows each storyline to carry the weight of untold and unwritten histories. Unsurprisingly, it’s really smart about the intersections of race, gender, sexuality, spirtuality, history, and the tension between colonized and pre-contact reality. For more good reading, check out Nalo Hopkinson’s blog.
	The Slave and the Free by Susie McKee Charnas The Slave and the Free seems to be a rerelease, compiling the books Walk to the End of the World and Motherlines which were originally released separately. I wasn’t sure whether or not to include these books, because they seem to me to be just as much feminist classics as Tiptree or Delany, but I don’t think I’ve met many non-science-fiction-oriented people who’ve read them. And that’s sad. These books postulate a post-apocalyptic dystopian future in which women’s oppression has become literal slavery, homosexuality has been naturalized, and the men interact according to the hierarchical guidelines of age cohorts. A female slave escapes the dystopian society at the same time as it begins to collapse. Leaving the boundaries of the country where she was born, she joins the Freewomen who live outside. Among them, she finds not utopia, but an ambiguous society. The novels raise sophisticated questions about what utopia and dystopia are or should be, always choosing the complicated answer over the simplistic one.
	China Mountain Zhang by Maureen McHugh I wasn’t sure whether or not it was fair to call this book explicitly feminist — not that it doesn’t reflect feminist ideas, but feminism doesn’t seem to me to be one of its projects. And then, as I was poking around on the internet, I saw that it’s a recipient of the James Tiptree, Jr. Award — which is given to science fiction work that plays with gender. The characters in this novel are indeed portrayed with deep characterization that doesn’t abide by gender roles, but I imagine that the Tiptree committee may have been drawn by this book’s portrayal of a world in which homosexuality has been heavily stigmatized (in America) and made illegal (in China). In this novel, China is the major power, and America is a colonial backwater, which has significantly altered the political and cultural landscape of the world. The novel is told in episodic bursts. The main character has three or four chapters, but the people who wind through his life get to tell their own stories, often in ways that don’t relate directly to the main character’s plot. I was drawn in by the book’s simple imagery and prose, and by the effortless way in which it drew deep characters and a startling world. The prose is both deceptively light and emotionally evocative. Each turn on world politics, race relations, and gender, feels effortlessly smooth and accurately drawn.

–
*Two of the books mentioned on this list were released by Aqueduct Press, a press I have obvious ties to. I bought a slough of their books last year and I’m still working my way through them. The work is at the front of my mind. :)

I’d like to comment on this recent cartoon from the webcomic xkcd.

This cartoon was brought up on a message board that I read and participate in, at the end of a long conversation about politics (although the point of the message board is non-political, the board does deal with politics sometimes). The conversation was about “tolerance,” and I voiced my opinion that I’m very suspicious when people bring up the topic of “tolerance” as an abstract, because in my experience, people who are talking about tolerance in that context often want to coopt the language of civil rights in order to draw false equivalence between non-equivalent statements. “I support rights for gay people” and “gay people are immoral” are not equivalent statements.

While I like and respect the two people who posted this cartoon, the effect* of introducing the cartoon into the conversation is to minimize anyone who is passionate about politics by saying that their opinions are based not on clear thinking, or passion, or reaction to oppression, but on “rationalization.”

There is a legitimate point being made in this cartoon, as any teacher well knows. Teaching in front of a classroom is a tricky business. It’s difficult to be endowed with so much trust, and I appreciate that people struggle with that.

Outside of math, there are rarely objective and concrete facts that can be pointed to with absolute certainty, by anyone, from any place. 2 + 2 = 4 is not, or at least should not be, a controversial statement.

But the simple fact that someone can argue with me when I say “I support gay rights” is not an indication that I am simply “rationalizing” my position. To suggest it is so is to dismiss the concerns and oppression of gay people.

To say that caring about and debating politics is all about “smart people rationalizing” is the epitome of a priveleged statement. People who are fighting for their rights and survival do not have the privelege to say “oh, well, it all doesn’t really matter” or “I guess this is just a difference of opinion.”

In this country, black women have been sterilized for the color of their skin. I strongly doubt that my interlocutors in that discussion would have agreed that it was acceptable behavior. For me to argue against it — for black women to argue against it — would they call this an exercise in rationalization? I certainly hope not.

People suffer. Queer people suffer. Women suffer. Poor people suffer. People of color suffer. Our suffering is not a cheap political point, to be argued away by saying that our justifiable anger is merely an example of “smart people rationalizing.”

But I don’t really want to pick on the people who posted this cartoon. They’re nice; they’re smart; and I don’t think either one of them intended to offend me. On a personal level, I’m not upset with them. But politically, I want to address the message behind that maneuver, and behind this cartoon, because it’s larger than a single exchange in a debate.
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Curtsy: Objectify This.

Last semester, I was privileged to take a fiction workshop with Marilynne Robinson, the author of Housekeeping and Gilead. In one of our later class sessions, we were looking at a beautiful story by one of my favorite writers in the workshop, Jill Wohlgemuth. The story was in the form of an informal essay about kissing, written by a thirteen-year-old girl who wandered away from her academic thesis to meditate on her own impressions of love and desire, framed around her burgeoning sexual attraction to a boy named Theo who she described several times as being incredibly smart — which is ironic, because of course any thirteen-year-old girl who could write an essay as beautiful as this story was would have to be a prodigy herself.

Marilynne watched patiently as we students gave our opinions of and reactions to the piece. Then she sat back and said, “I’ve noticed a problem in the writing of young women.”

Instead of giving character traits to their female characters, Marilynne argued, young women writers give those traits to male secondary characters — in this case, repeatedly describing Theo as intelligent when it was the narrator who was brilliant.

I’ve been thinking about that comment a lot lately.

Now, I don’t think that the particular story we were looking at was actually a black and white case of this happening. There are a lot of reasons why a particularly smart thirteen-year-old girl would fixate on describing the object of her affection as “so smart” — I did that a lot as a kid, particularly with boys I had crushes on, because I had swallowed some line that men needed to be smarter than their female partners. Still, I think that Marilynne’s observation is keen and insightful. Looking at broader media trends, it’s definitely possible to uncover cases where a female character’s personality is rendered through male characters, or not rendered at all.

Girl Detective talks about one such case in her review of Jonathan Lethem’s latest novel, You Don’t Love Me Yet. The plot of the novel literally revolves around the female main character, Lucinda. She acts as a middleman, conveying McGuffins (sought-after objects) and witnessing plot points. However, the story is happening to other people. Her characterization — personality and praxis — are deferred onto male characters.

Girl Detective writes, “Although Lucinda’s consciousness is what binds the novel together, her actual place in the story is minimal; her only motivation is superficial attachment and lust, and she spends the entire story either having sex, wanting sex, or masturbating while wanting sex. All the male characters in the story have traits, interests, and personalities… Lucinda, however, is completely devoid of any desires, aspirations, thoughts, or goals that don’t involve finding a penis to put into her vagina.”

“What’s really sad,” Girl Detective continues, “is that our culture is so ignorant of women’s inner lives (50% of the population, people! Seriously!) that this substitution of sex for psychology still very often passes for legitimate characterization in even the highest ranks of literature.”

And now that I’ve discussed a high brow example, you know what this reminds me of? Lost.

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Hey y’all,

This is Mandolin. Amp has invited me to guest blog for a month or two. In real life, my name is Rachel Swirsky. I’m a fiction writer and I just finished up the first year of my master’s degree at the Iowa Writers Workshop.

I write literary fiction sometimes, but I’m very interested in how narratives that include the non-real (science fiction, magical realism, fabulism, slipstream) can create a heightened sense of reality and social commentary. I’m fairly active in the science fiction community. I used to describe my work as trying to write like surrealists paint, although I’ve been publishing more mundane stuff as I learn.

You can read more about my writing at my needs-to-be-revamped website. I’m also a poster at a new blog on feminism and science fiction called Ambling Along the Aqueduct, and I even have my own personal blog where I post memes, rant incoherently about politics, and whine about writing. My first published short story is online in Subterranean Magazine #4 which was edited by John Scalzi of the Whatever; it’s a meta-fictional piece considering the embedded class and gender assumptions in dystopic novels.

And that should be about it, in terms of introduction. :) I’ll throw up the post I’m working on as soon as it’s done.

On Rachel’s thread about ‘tween girls and shopping, Mandolin and Joe had this exchange:

Mandolin: We’re talking about a society-wide pattern of representation, wherein shopping and materialism have, yes, been condensed as part of a larger narrative wherein women are portrayed as frivolous (interested in unimportant things) and unable to handle money. Check out a few episodes of I Love Lucy.¹

Joe: I think the simpsons/everbody loves raymond/king of queens/life according to jim/whatever have done a decent job of spreading that stereotype across gender lines. Fat dumb lazy guy married to thin pushy competent woman has become a staple.

It’s conventional for both feminists and (more frequently) MRAs² to construct playing the frivolous, lazy and incompetent character in sitcoms as a sign of oppression; that is, feminists say the incompetence of the Lucy character (are her need to always be rescued by level-headed Ricky) is a sign of how women are denigrated in society, while MRAs point to the incompetence of Homer Simpson or Raymond (and their need to always be rescued by level-headed wives) as a sign of how men are denigrated in society.

Although in this instance a feminist, Mandolin, brought it up first, in my experience MRAs bring this argument up more often than feminists, presumably because the male-idiot-spouse is much more common on TV nowadays than the female-idiot-spouse. As “Mens’ Rights Online puts it, “Turn on your TV and you will see the sitcoms and advertisements that portray dads as speechless dolts in the face of the superior wisdom of their wives and 11-year-old children.”

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1. I disagree with Mandolin here; I think that I Love Lucy, which portrayed women as constantly constrained by an enforced housewife role, was actually quite subversive and feminist for its time. I far prefer Lucy, who was constantly fighting against the constraints of her life, to the “happy to be secondary” housewife character found in many older family sitcoms. (back)
2. MRA = Men’s Rights Advocate. I’m not assuming that Joe is an MRA, or that he’d necessarily disagree with anything I say in this post; his exchange with Mandolin just brought this stuff to my mind. (back)

I read this in the New York Times yesterday, and it didn’t sit well with me. Here is a quote:

But on this day I’ve come not to bury Abercrombie. I am here to observe my daughter and her two friends make their way around a suburban mall to help me understand why shopping seems to have become an acceptable hobby, even an obsession, among some young girls. And to see how stores like Abercrombie and American Eagle Outfitters, as well as luxury brands, successfully court these young girls and turn them into customers.

This is why it bothered me:

1) It seems to be promoting the idea that girls are materialistic and superficial, and I don’t know that young girls are any more materialistic than boys.

2) These kids who don’t have a job or any money are getting designer clothes. Why would any parent pay for a 10 year old to have “Juicy Couture”? Why?

3) It is the most class biased piece of writing I have seen in a long time, and the author seems utterly unwilling to acknowledge that.

There are other things that I just can’t put my finger on since my brain is toast (always happens at the end of the semester). BTW, I love Juliet Schor, the sociologist mentioned in the article. Here is a really good article I have the students in my mass media class read on the politics of consumerism.

Go read it and tell me what you think.

From Reuters, under the headline “Catholic politicians must oppose gay marriage: Pope”:

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The Church’s opposition to gay marriage is “non-negotiable” and Catholic politicians have a moral duty to oppose it, as well as laws on abortion and euthanasia, Pope Benedict said in a document issued on Tuesday.

In a 140-page booklet on the workings of a synod that took place at the Vatican in 2005 on the theme of the Eucharist, the 79-year-old German Pope also re-affirmed the Catholic rule of celibacy for priests.

In the “Apostolic Exhortation” Benedict says all believers had to defend what he calls fundamental values but that the duty was “especially incumbent” for those in positions of power.

He said these included “respect for human life, its defense from conception to natural death, the family built on marriage between a man and a woman, the freedom to educate one’s children and the promotion of the common good in all its forms.”

“These values are not negotiable,” he said.

There are hundreds of similar articles in the mainstream media today, mostly focusing on the Pope’s “not negotiable” opposition to same-sex marriage. ¹ I’ve also seen some mentioning his opposition to abortion, and one mentioning his opposition to divorce. But defending human life until “natural death” is pretty clearly an anti-death-penalty statement, and this too is (according to the Pope) “not negotiable.” Yet I’ve been searching in vain for a single news story pointing out that the Pope called opposition to the death penalty “not negotiable.”

This confirms to a general rule the mainstream media follows: Events that highlight a split between Catholic teaching and liberal policies are news, and are reported on prominently. In contrast, events that highlight a split between Catholic teaching and conservative policies are not reported on at all.

Then again, maybe the media silence is more truthful than the Pope’s statement. Despite what the Pope said, opposition to the death penalty is negotiable. Has there been a single case of a Bishop refusing communion to a politician — or to local activists — to object to their public support of the death penalty? Will the Church leadership criticize pro-death-penalty Catholic politicians with one-tenth the passion that they’ll devote to fighting same-sex marriage? Of course not. For the Pope — and for most right-wing Catholics — supporting discrimination against queers is much more important than opposing the death penalty.

There’s also a very notable omission from the Pope’s 140-page discussion; he doesn’t call on politicians to oppose torture, nor does he call for the Eurochrist Eucharist to be withheld from politicians who support torture, even though he must know that many prominent politicians have been pressing for laws to accommodate and support torture. In fact, Benedict didn’t mention torture at all. It’s not surprising that the Pope is such a moral coward when it comes to standing up to the right wing, but it is disappointing.²

So maybe the media has it right after all.

1. Why are so many reporters using the phrase “non negotiable,” when the official text of the statement says “not negotiable”? It’s a mystery. Anyhow, here’s the relevant paragraph, quoted from the Vatican’s website:

   Here it is important to consider what the Synod Fathers described as eucharistic consistency, a quality which our lives are objectively called to embody. Worship pleasing to God can never be a purely private matter, without consequences for our relationships with others: it demands a public witness to our faith. Evidently, this is true for all the baptized, yet it is especially incumbent upon those who, by virtue of their social or political position, must make decisions regarding fundamental values, such as respect for human life, its defence from conception to natural death, the family built upon marriage between a man and a woman, the freedom to educate one’s children and the promotion of the common good in all its forms (230). These values are not negotiable. Consequently, Catholic politicians and legislators, conscious of their grave responsibility before society, must feel particularly bound, on the basis of a properly formed conscience, to introduce and support laws inspired by values grounded in human nature (231). There is an objective connection here with the Eucharist (cf. 1 Cor 11:27-29). Bishops are bound to reaffirm constantly these values as part of their responsibility to the flock entrusted to them (232).

   (back)

2. Contrast Benedict’s silence on torture this week to the words of the Second Vatican Council:

   Whatever is opposed to life itself, such as any type of murder, genocide, abortion, euthanasia, or wilful self-destruction, whatever violates the integrity of the human person, such as mutilation, torments inflicted on body or mind, attempts to coerce the will itself; whatever insults human dignity, such as subhuman living conditions, arbitrary imprisonment, deportation, slavery, prostitution, the selling of women and children; as well as disgraceful working conditions, where people are treated as mere instruments of gain rather than as free and responsible persons; all these things and others like them are infamies indeed. They poison human society, and they do more harm to those who practise them than to those who suffer from the injury. Moreover, they are a supreme dishonour to the Creator.

   (back)

April sent me a link to this CNN article titled “Is black America Ready to Embrace Obama?” I just wanted to point out the absurdity of the “story highlights” listed at the top of the page. There seems to be an assumption that black people should like Obama and vote for him because he’s black–as if his other policies don’t matter at all.

The article starts with highlights:

• In a new poll, Obama leads Clinton 44 to 33 percent among black voters

• Some blacks doubt that Obama understands their experience

• Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, is the Senate’s only black member

• Polls say blacks are less likely to believe America is ready for a black president

Are you missing the irony here? The title seems to imply that Black Americans are skeptical of Obama, but then points out that 44% of Blacks favor Obama, in a race where there are a bazillion candidates. He leads everyone else, but people are questioning whether or not Blacks are loyal to Obama? The doubt angle is reiterated in the second “highlight,” and then the last highlight seems to reinforce Black Americans’ doubt in Obama, which is expanded in the text:

Blacks, in part, may be slow to warm to the candidacy of Obama because, a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll suggests, they are less likely than whites to believe that America is ready for a black president.

The poll, conducted December 5-7, 2006, found that 65 percent of whites thought America was ready, compared with 54 percent of blacks. The poll’s margin of error was plus-or-minus 5 percentage points.

I think they are missing the point here; just because people may think the US is not ready for a Black candidate, doesn’t mean that they are not willing to vote for a Black candidate. My perception is that the vast majority of Black Americans are ready for a black President, but most Black Americans believe that many White Americans are not ready for a black President. (I tend to agree.) So I think reporters are confusing skepticism about whites willingness to accept a black President with skepticism about Obama himself.

The article goes on to suggest that Black Americans are skeptical of Obama because:

Part of Obama’s problem with black voters is that he is viewed by whites as the first black candidate with a legitimate shot at the White House.

“When white America has embraced a candidate — as they have with Barack Obama — there is a certain amount of distrust that goes with this among a number of African Americans,” Wilson said.

In an interview with National Public Radio, Obama acknowledged the dynamic:

“In the history of African-American politics in this country there has always been some tension between speaking in universal terms and speaking in very race-specific terms about the plight of the African-American community,” Obama said. “By virtue of my background, I am more likely to speak in universal terms.”

I am sure that there are a few blacks who feel this way, but I think this is an over-generalization that has been perpetuated by many media outlets.

This is the same problem we see time and time again with the media coverage of Obama and Black voters. Many people seem to be perplexed as to why black voters are not flocking to Obama in droves, and then they are shocked that black voters are deliberative, taking time to analyze Obama’s positions.

Imagine the tables were turned, and we were talking about John Edwards or Hillary Clinton. I personally would hope that we would see the same “highlights:”

• In a new poll, Edwards/Clinton leads Obama 44 to 33 percent among black voters

• Some blacks doubt that Edwards/Clinton understands their experience

Why am I not seeing those stories, particularly for Edwards and the other white male candidates (and to a lesser extent Clinton)? Maybe that’s because people are surprised that Barack Obama isn’t automatically getting Black support (although as Black voters learn more about Obama, he is garnering more support), but the recent statewide elections in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Maryland should have shown that black voters don’t just run willy nilly to the first Black candidate that comes along. Maybe these reporters believe only whites have to prove themselves to black voters. Would we ask similar questions to white voters–why are you skeptical of John Edwards; do you feel he’s not white enough? Why are you voting for Obama when there are several other white candidates? Either way the assumption is really unfair, and it reveals some unfortunate racial double standards.

I wish the mainstream media could just accept the fact black voters don’t automatically vote for Black candidates. Perhaps black voters care more about policies than they do about a candidate’s racial identity. Now isn’t that a novel idea, voting on policy.

Sometimes its hard not to laugh at these headlines because they are so obvious.  I guess it is nice to have some research to back up the obvious–hence this report from the American Psychological Association on the negative effects of media sexualization on women and girls.  First, they operationalize sexualization:

The provocative research included a study of published research on the content and effects of virtually every form of media, including television, music videos, music lyrics, magazines, movies, video games and the Internet. Researchers also examined recent advertising campaigns and merchandising of products aimed toward girls.

Sexualization was defined by the APA Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls as occurring when a person’s value comes only from her/his sexual appeal or behavior, to the exclusion of other characteristics, and when a person is sexually objectified, e.g., made into a thing for another’s sexual use.

Then later they lay out the negative effects:

• Cognitive and Emotional Consequences: Sexualization and objectification undermine a person’s confidence in and comfort with her own body, leading to emotional and self-image problems, such as shame and anxiety.
• Mental and Physical Health: Research links sexualization with three of the most common mental health problems diagnosed in girls and women—eating disorders, low self-esteem, and depression or depressed mood.
• Sexual Development: Research suggests that the sexualization of girls has negative consequences on girls’ ability to develop a healthy sexual self-image.

The report also suggests families and health professionals take an active role in countering this trend.  They even suggest media literacy classes.  What is missing, unfortunately, is any direct accountability for media outlets.  The report does not suggest that media stop doing this; rather they suggest that we teach girls and young women how to cope with it. 

What do you think?  If we really wanted to take on patriarchal media capitalism, would it work, or should we focus more on teaching girls/women how to cope?  What kinds of actions could people use to get media outlets to change?  What about the good old fashioned boycott?  Is that dead?  What do you think?

Here is the link to the APA study.

In another great example of college students being totally insensitive, a student at Central Connecticut State University decided that it would be funny to satirize rape. He titled his editorial “Rape Only Hurts If You Fight It.” He claims to be making the point that only sensational stories get headlines, so he decided to make his own sensation.

Well the students and staff didn’t find the editorial to be funny, and the writer John Petroski was called to the carpet in a town hall forum at the school:

Petroski took the podium before a hushed, tense audience — his first public appearance since the publication of a controversial article he wrote last week in the student newspaper describing rape as a “magical experience.”

The article, meant to be a satire of media sensationalism, had missed its mark, incurring the wrath of hundreds of students over its depiction of rape as a boon to civilization and to “ugly women” who otherwise would not be able to get men to have sex with them.

Many in the audience felt Petroski had a lot to answer for, especially those who were familiar with some of the articles and comic strips he had previously written for the paper poking fun at sensitive topics such as abortion and affirmative action.

He had been up since 3 a.m. writing the speech. He hoped it would heal the wounds he had reopened and convince the audience that he was truly sorry — although later he would assert that the overwhelming response to his story proved his initial point.

Apparently, the condemnation of students did have some impact because the student was forced to resign, and it sounds like the paper’s editor was even getting a little reflective by the end of the forum. Here’s an excerpt that starts with Petroski and ends with the editor of the paper.

“I apologize sincerely,” he said to the group of women who, in the days since the article was published, had publicly identified themselves as rape victims in a show of protest against the article and the paper.

One student, Nicki LaPorte, had won a rousing ovation from the audience after tearfully condemning the article earlier during the forum.

“I am not a victim of rape, I am a survivor of rape,” LaPorte said.

Several other students were also critical of the article, saying it crossed the boundaries of journalistic responsibility. Besides demanding Petroski’s resignation, several students also called for the resignation of the paper’s editor, Mark Rowan, as well as the paper’s faculty advisors.

Students said that over the last year, the paper had become increasingly hostile to women and gays and other minority groups.

“Where are the advisors in all of this?” asked one student.

The controversy over the article prompted The Recorder’s editorial board to vote to remove Petroski as the opinion editor over the weekend. Yet Petroski will be allowed to continue writing on a limited basis, according to Rowan, who also said he has no plans to step down.

Petroski and Rowan said they were both deeply moved by the dozens of letters they had received concerning the article over the last few days, especially those written by rape victims who described their attacks in harrowing detail.

“It’s definitely going to make me more sensitive to this issue,” said Rowan, a 21-year-old senior who hopes to pursue a career in journalism after he graduates. “Up until now, I had always seen the world from the narrow vantage point of a 21-year-old white male, but now I see that it needs to be broadened.”

Rowan said the paper intends to appoint a woman to replace Petroski as opinion editor soon. The paper would then have an editorial board consisting of seven men and five women, he said.

Nevertheless, this case seems to be alarmingly similar to the blackface cases we have been seeing. Students claim that they didn’t know their behavior was offensive or inappropriate.

This also case strikes me as a real male privilege moment because rape is no joke to women especially for college women who have a very high rate of rape victimization. I think many men don’t realize how the threat of rape affects all women. We do things like get our keys ready well before we get into our cars. We check the backseat before we get into our car. We rarely go to parties alone. We stay in our homes late at night, and this applies to almost all women whether we have been sexually assaulted or not. The fear of rape is pervasive and unfortunately so normalized that many women (myself included) take it for granted. I suggest that men who want to learn about how rape affects women’s lives read this essay by Tim Beneke. It is an excerpt from his book Men on Rape: What They Have to Say About Sexual Violence. The article demonstrates how pervasive and powerful the fear of rape is.

I wish John Petroski and Mark Rowan would have read the Beneke article. Maybe then they would realize why this essay wasn’t the least bit funny. Satire implies that you “get it.” (Didn’t I say this a couple days ago!) Mr. Petroski and Mr. Rowan simply don’t get it. By his own admission, Mr. Rowan says he’s being viewing the world only through his young white male vantage point, and I suppose that’s what college is for getting students to see not only their vantage points but the vantage points of others. If Petroski and Rowan could see the world through my eyes (and the eyes of billions of other women), would know that rape is no laughing matter; they would understand the paralysis and fear that rape causes for women, and they would have never written such an editorial.

Thanks to Carmen for the heads up on this!

The top three paragraphs from a story in today’s NY Times:

One of four Army infantrymen charged with raping a 14-year-old girl in Iraq last March and then killing her and her family pleaded guilty today to all charges in a military court at Fort Campbell, Ky.

The plea came on a day when a marine is scheduled to be sentenced at Camp Pendleton, Calif., for his part in the kidnapping and killing of an Iraqi man in a town to the west of Baghdad.

The legal actions are part of the fallout of the fighting in Iraq, where insurgent fighters blend in with the civilian population, frustrating soldiers who are subject to roadside bombing and other attacks.

Holy fucking shit!

So when four infantrymen decide to rape a 14-year-old girl and kill her and her whole family, that’s “fallout” from the frustration soldiers feel because “insurgent fighters blend?”

Yes, I’m sure the soldiers thought that the 14-year-old they raped and murdered - not to mention her 7-year-old sister, who they also murdered - were insurgents blending with civilians. In no way was this a problem of a culture of entitlement, racism and misogyny, combined with giving green soldiers absolute authority over civilians that some of them think of as subhuman.

Heck no! It’s the fault of those damn blending insurgent Iraqis!

(The soldier, by the way, plead guilty in order to take the death penalty off the table. The Times says he’ll probably get sentenced to life, but could be out in 20 years.)

It’s besides the point of this post, but I feel obliged to point out that the other case the Times mentioned involves soldiers who planned to kidnap and murder an alleged insurgent, but grabbed and killed the wrong man. That’s a genuine example of a death resulting from “insurgents blending with civilians,” I guess; but it’s mainly an example of the inevitable result of believing that war justifies punishing alleged “insurgents” without trial or defense. George Bush and conservatives have been fighting hard to erode the right of trial and defense, and their thinking may have influenced the murderers in this case.

[Comments on this post at "Alas" are open to feminists and feminist-friendly posters only. Crossposted at Creative Destruction.]

One of the hot topics in the recent US election was immigration. Pundits, like Lou Dobbs, are on a mission to “fix our broken borders” by cracking down on illegal immigration. They argue that immigrants are taking jobs from American citizens, refusing to assimilate, changing American cultural values, and engaging in criminal activities. As I listen to these arguments, I am always reminded of my class lecture on European American immigration patters. The rhetoric of contemporary nativist activists like Lou Dobbs and Pat Buchanan is nothing new. In fact, it follows almost exactly the same rhetoric of earlier anti-immigrant backlashes. While Latinos are the primary targets of contemporary nativists, in the early years it was the Irish, the Germans, the Italians, the Jews, and the Chinese, and the “problems” were the same.

Before we can understand the significance of anti-immigration backlashes, it is also important to explore the variation waves of immigration and how they are shaped by policy and economic conditions. The earliest European immigrants were primarily English, and since the English became the dominant group, they were also able to set policies and social norms for other immigrants.¹ One of the primary social norms that British set was the norm of Anglo-conformity, which was proposed by Milton Gordon² Under the system of Anglo-conformity immigrants were expected to model the English American customs and language to the point that they became indistinguishable.

During the earliest years, the US had a fairly open immigration policy. European immigrants were welcomed and encouraged to come to the US, and there were few laws or policies that limited immigration. Most immigrants in the earliest years came from England, Germany, and Ireland (along with a small contingent of Scandinavian immigrants). The German and Irish immigrants were very much vilified, as this quote from a recent Washington Post article highlights:

Still, European immigrants found plenty of backlash. Nativist sentiments ran strong, and white Protestant reformers championed English-language instruction and temperance, the latter reflecting the Establishment’s disdain for hard-drinking immigrants. The Germans set up 121 breweries in Brooklyn and Manhattan alone.

From the 1700s to the late 1800s immigration was open for these immigrants. Very few immigrants were turned away and there were few laws limiting immigration. As the Washington Post article states:

Until 1918, the United States did not require passports; the term “illegal immigrant” had no meaning. New arrivals were required only to prove their identity and find a relative or friend who could vouch for them.

Customs agents kept an eye out for lunatics and the infirm (and after 1905, for anarchists). Ninety-eight percent of the immigrants who arrived at Ellis Island were admitted to the United States, and 78 percent spent less than eight hours on the island. (The Mexico-United States border then was unguarded and freely crossed in either direction.) “Shipping companies did the health inspections in Europe because they didn’t want to be stuck taking someone back,” said Nancy Foner, a sociology professor at Hunter College and author of “From Ellis Island to JFK: New York’s Two Great Waves of Immigration.” “Eventually they introduced a literacy test,” she added, “but it was in the immigrant’s own language, not English.”

In the later half of the 1800s the first major restrictions against immigrants were imposed. The Chinese were primary the targets of these laws, and the Naturalization Act of 1870 made Chinese ineligible for citizenship. This act also targeted the wives of Chinese laborers, and all people born in African or of African descent were made eligible for citizenship. Then in 1882 Chinese were banned entirely from entering the country.³ The backlash against Chinese often stemmed from fear that they were taking away jobs.

During the late 1800s and early 1900s immigration from southern and eastern Europe skyrocketed, and there was also a backlash against these immigrants, which lead to much greater restrictions. In 1917, the restrictions against expanded to include an “Asiatic Barred Zone,” which extend over Asian and the Pacific Rim; moreover, immigrants were required to take literacy tests, and “anarchists” and other radical were also barred. This was one of several laws that lead to the National Origins Act of 1924. According to History Matters,

In response to growing public opinion against the flow of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe in the years following World War I, Congress passed first the Quota Act of 1921 then the even more restrictive Immigration Act of 1924 (the Johnson-Reed Act). Initially, the 1924 law imposed a total quota on immigration of 165,000—less than 20 percent of the pre-World War I average. It based ceilings on the number of immigrants from any particular nation on the percentage of each nationality recorded in the 1890 census—a blatant effort to limit immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe, which mostly occurred after that date. In the first decade of the 20th century, an average of 200,000 Italians had entered the United States each year. With the 1924 Act, the annual quota for Italians was set at less than 4,000.

This act radically changed immigration by setting quotas that gave preferences to groups that were already represented in the US. While there were other immigration restrictions imposed during this period, this law had the greatest impact. From the 1920s until 1965, the number of immigrants entering the US dropped dramatically and at it’s low point in the 1970s the percentage of the population that was foreign born was only 4.7%.

So the first major wave of immigration, which ended in the late 1800s, included immigrants mostly from western Europe, and these immigrants faced very few restrictions. The restrictions in this era were based on race and mental health, but complex immigration processing or laws did not exist at this time. It was until the second wave of immigration from the late 1800s-1924 that much greater restrictions were put on immigration. These restrictions were explicitly racialized and directed at Chinese and Eastern European immigrants. Over both of these waves of immigration similar concerns were expressed about the fitness of immigrants. Nativist believed that immigrants threatened the American way of life, and the arguments used are remarkably similar to those of the contemporary nativists like Lou Dobbs or Pat Buchanan.

Next in this series I’ll discuss the Immigration Act of 1965 and it’s effects on our current population.

1. Of course, I haven’t forgotten about the indigenous people of North America or the involuntary African immigrants, but the focus here will be on voluntary migrants. (back)
2. Gordon, Milton. 1964. Assimilation in American Life. New York: Oxford University Press. (back)
3. This ban on Chinese laborers was not lifted until the 1940s. (back)

As if the Source hasn’t had enough problems, now beleaguered Source owners Raymond “Benzino” Scott and David Mays have lost a major lawsuit brought by for Source editor Kimberly Osorio. There is some dispute over the amount of the damages, and it was a little unclear from initial reports exactly what charges the defendants were guilty of. The New York Newsday said the suit did not award Osorio damages for sex discrimination, but they did find that she was fired in retaliation for making sex discrimination claims. Here is a quote from Newsday:

The jury rejected Osorio’s claims that she was subjected to sexual discrimination when she worked at the magazine from 2000 until 2005, becoming the magazine’s first female editor-in-chief.

But it concluded she was fired in retaliation after she made her sexual discrimination claims, complaining of a workplace in which pictures of G-string-clad women hung on the walls and an X-rated movie was shown in the mail room.

On Tuesday afternoon, Osorio expressed satisfaction with what she believed was a $15.5 million verdict, and her lawyers painted it as affirmation that sexual discrimination should not be tolerated at any workplace, despite the jury’s rejection of that claim.

“I definitely hope this has an impact on the attitude of hip-hop toward women,” said Osorio in a news conference. “It was very hard for me emotionally. There was a lot of harm to my reputation.”

I’m waiting for the final outcome, but I think this is a landmark case that sends a signal to some of Hip Hop’s head misogynists. Many women love Hip Hop, but we don’t have to take this sort of brazen anti-woman bigotry. Moreover, the two former owners continue to tarnish their own reputations.

Editor’s Note: Of course, this case is not just about Hip Hop. Sex discrimination is pervasive in many workplaces, but this is one of the first big cases in the Hip Hop industry.

UPDATE: The Lancet Study can be downloaded here (pdf link). A companion paper, which provides some additional details, can be downloaded here (pdf link).

The New York Times coverage of the new Lancet study of Iraqi deaths, while maintaining an objective tone, is heavily slanted against the study; many of the painfully bad right-wing arguments against the earlier survey are repeated by the Times, usually without rebuttal. For example:

Violent deaths have soared since the American invasion, but the rise is in part a matter of spotty statistical history. Under Saddam Hussein, the state had a monopoly on killing, and the deaths of thousands of Iraqi Shiites and Kurds that it caused were never counted.

The implication is that perhaps these new numbers underestimate pre-invasion deaths due to “spotty statistical history.” But the Lancet study does not draw on the counts of Hussein’s government for it’s pre-war mortality estimates, so this is irrelevant.

Gilbert Burnham, the principle author of the study, said the figures showed an increase of deaths over time that was similar to that of another civilian casualty project, Iraq Body Count, which collates deaths reported in the news media, and even to that of the military. But even Iraq Body Count puts the maximum number of deaths at just short of 49,000.

The Iraq Body Count tallies only those deaths which are reported by at least two reputable news organizations. No one associated with the Iraq Body Count claims that their results represent “the maximum number of deaths.” From the Iraq Body Count website:

Our maximum therefore refers to reported deaths - which can only be a sample of true deaths unless one assumes that every civilian death has been reported. It is likely that many if not most civilian casualties will go unreported by the media.

Back to the Times coverage:

Robert Blendon, director of the Harvard Program on Public Opinion and Health and Social Policy, said interviewing urban dwellers chosen at random was “the best of what you can expect in a war zone.”

But he said the number of deaths in the families interviewed — 547 in the post-invasion period versus 82 in a similar period before the invasion — was too few to extrapolate up to more than 600,000 deaths across the country.

But as this example from The Roper Center’s “polling 101″ illustrates, it’s accepted statistical methodology to extrapolate from small to large numbers - in their example, from 30 purple jelly beans in their sample to the conclusion that there are approximately 20 million purple jelly beans in the huge jelly bean jar.

The new Lancet survey is based on interviews with over 1000 Iraqis. The Times - and all major news organizations - routinely report numbers extrapolated from surveys which interview 1000, or sometimes just 500, people. Mainstream newspaper FAQs about polling methodology (example 1, example 2) suggest that a sample of just 500 is sufficient for surveys representing all Americans.

Of course, the Lancet survey - due to methodological issues having to do with collecting data in a war zone - has a wider confidence interval than most surveys. But that doesn’t mean that the study is unreliable, or its methods incorrect; it just means that the results have a wide confidence interval. We can be reasonably certain there have been between 426,369 and 793,663 excess Iraqi deaths since our invasion. That’s extraordinary, and appalling. If the occupation is intended to protect Iraqis, it is a dismal failure.

Curtsy: Deltoid

[Crossposted at Creative Destruction. If your comments aren’t being approved here, try there.]

Looking back at the disability press and its coverage of the FDR Memorial and Chris Reeve’s post-injury politics, there’s clearly a different perspective of these famous disabled men than the mainstream media presents. The topic of stereotypical representation of disability by the media and newly-disabled celebrities themselves rather than news about disability rights ignites activists to raise their voices. Each of the following links (save, perhaps, the last one) are worth reading in their entirety.

FDR

After the FDR Memorial in Washington, D.C., had been unveiled, there was an outcry from disability organizations that the wheelchair Roosevelt used daily all through his presidency was nowhere visible. A 1997 article in