CL Minou

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I’m An Idiot, But Wikipedia Is Still Sexist

Categories: failings, media tool kit, privilege stories, the patriarchy: you can't live with it....that is all

Well, okay, so ducks, I’m a bit of a silly goose.

As a very helpful commenter pointed out, I’m an idiot without any fact-checking ability because I ran with the front-page article on the English custom of wife selling as if it were a hoax. And it ain’t, more to my chagrin–although I should point out, that when I got off my ass and finally did do the fact-checking, there’s not a whole lot of very credible evidence for it on the free net–a lot of 19th century newspaper articles, and of course the Hardy novel; but one should really not put much credence in 19th century news articles. (It should also be noted that the edit history of the article shows it was written today My mistake, didn’t dig deep enough into the edit history.)

Be that as it may. I won’t even point out that if I got fooled, so did substantial chunks of the internet, most of whom ran with the story as if it were a hoax as well. (It seems that the Wiki tradition is to put slightly misleading headlines on the front page which link to totally legitimate articles. I was not aware; my main experience of April Fool’s day hoaxing are Google’s patently false ones.)

So anyway, I took the post down for a while. Not because I want to run away from being stupid, but because I had some freelance to do today for a tiny amount of money and really didn’t need to get a bunch of emails about how stupid I was. Thanks, got that the first time. And I wanted to fix what I wrote.

And it’s not as if I still don’t have a feminist bone or two to pick with Wikipedia.

Because here’s the deal: of all the articles they could have posted prominently, they posted this one. Now, maybe it says great things about us as a people that we think the concept of selling your wife so outrageous that it could only be a prank. That would be nice to think.

But how much more likely that the folks who organized today’s front page instead thought it would be totes harharhar to lead with an article about how women were property. With fun echoes of how other people were once considered property. And excuse me for being a paranoid lefty, but in today’s climate–when we’re seeing a tremendous backlash against women’s rights (just look at all the anti-abortion laws being passed, the Stupak amendment, the return of an anorexic beauty ideal, etc. etc. etc.) coupled with the steady drumbeat of racism on the rightwing fringe (examples too obvious and numerous to get into)–well, yeah, this whole fiasco troubles me. Quite a bit.

Don’t believe me? Take a look at this:

Would I like to see “wife selling” legalized in America? Nope … it seems like slavery (one person owning another). But I would like to see the modern practice of taking hubby to the cleaners in divorce court ended.

That also seems to be a lot like slavery … or at least it’s like indentured servitude. There’s no moral reason why a hubby should be forced to buy his freedom, any more than there is any moral reason why a hubby should be permitted to sell his soon-to-be ex-wife’s freedom.

Or how it’s the first post in this Straight Dope thread titled “April Fool’s articles I wish were real.”

So yeah: lulz. We’ll drag up one of the most misogynistic things we can find in our database (and yeah, I know all about how it was a way around restrictive divorce laws, and how the women were supposed to not mind–which goes to show you just how low the English opinion of women was back then, and how desperate they could be under the law, not that this was some kind of good thing) and make it our lead post on a day it is guaranteed to be picked up everywhere! And for the true deep lulz, it will actually be true! Hahahaha! Stupid internet! Stupid ladybloggers! (Well, ladyblogger. I seem to be the only one dumb enough to write about it as if it were true.)

I mean, the rest of the articles are all mostly harmless (though somewhat guy oriented, or rather doood oriented: mentioning James Brown–no, not that one, fighter jets, video games, crime, and the hy-larious idea of the city of Halifax having sex with multiple partners. And a monkey.) But the main, featured, excerpted article is about selling women as property.

Okay, fine. I see sexism everywhere. I even flew off the handle about a non-hoax. But you want to know something? There are only two mentions of women on the front page: the wife-selling article…and this ad:

Fat ladies! Is that hilarious or what?

Sheesh.

(Yes, I’ve taken down the original. Yes, it’s in the time machine, I think; it’s probably also on the Facebook page. I’ve got enough going on in my life that I don’t need to have EVERY monument to my foolishness on the homepage of my blog.)

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David Brooks: What Price Happiness? (Hint: Ladies, Keep Your Man!)

Categories: (un)popular entertainment, double bound, i heart oppression, internuts, kyriarchy, media tool kit, privilege stories, the patriarchy: you can't live with it....that is all

I haven’t played kick the can–where can means the New York Times–for a while, mostly because it’s too easy: the stolid Grey Lady’s inability to cover issues beyond it’s narrow frame of all the news white, middle-class, male America finds worthy to think about is a cliche at this point. I mean, for goodness sake, their lead writer on women’s rights is a dude! (Not to knock Nick Kristoff–keep up the good work!–but still.)

Truth be told, I only scan the headlines and drop in to read Krugman and Rich when they’re up. I don’t usually bother to read the rest of the columnists, and certainly not perpetual anal-cranial inversion artist Ross Douthat or David “Bobo” Brooks, master of somehow finding the tone your clueless, warm-n-fuzzy conservative uncle might strike–somewhere between concern trolling and reminding you that if you just wore lipstick more often, you’d find a nice fella.

But every now and then, I drop in on what he says, either because I’ve been referred there or because for some reason the headline writer is earning her or his pay this week by getting me to read something I ordinarily wouldn’t. Take today’s headline: The Bullock Trade. (It actually is “The Sandra Bullock Trade,” but it was truncated in the little upper-righthand corner area the Times puts it’s op-ed links.) Now, I was intrigued, both by the possibility that Brooks was branching out–bullocks could mean anything from modern Hindu religion to the sacrifices of the ancient Minoans–or by seeing what behavior by Ms. Bullock Brooks was disapproving of.

Because I’ve read him before, and I knew that there was no way he’d be in favor of her doing anything except marrying a Republican Senator.

But whoo boy, was this a piece of work:

Continue reading →

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Justice Department to Gender-Nonconforming Kids: You Exist

Categories: beating them at their own game, kyriarchy, milestones

This is kind of huge, given how Title IX has generally been interpreted pretty narrowly against trans and gender non-conforming people:

Federal prosecutors have used a novel interpretation of the Title IX statue, which prohibits discrimination against students on the basis of gender, to help broker a settlement in a lawsuit brought by a gay teen against his upstate New York school district, NPR’s Ari Shapiro tells us.

The lawsuit involved a boy who was bullied for being effeminate.

This is the first time since the Clinton Administration that the Justice Department has claimed that Title IX applies to discrimination based gender presentation, beyond simple discrimination based on sex.

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If It’s Wednesday…

Categories: below the belt, i get around

…well, every other Wednesday.

We interrupt your obsessive Nestor Carbonell marathon for a new post on Below the Belt:

One of the more difficult aspects of talking about transness is how many facets it can encompass. Because transness is more than just an internal sense of rightness or wrongness with your body: it catches up so much else in a whirlwind of confusion.

Take, for example, sexual identity. It is now a commonplace in queer communities–well, most queer communities–that a transgendered identity is separate from a gay or lesbian identity; that is, trans women are not “gay men who can’t deal” any more than gay men want to be women. And yet: it is the rare trans person who has not had to confront issues of sexual identity as part of understanding their trans identity. A MTF trans person often has to confront the fact that many of the things that are markers of femaleness–high heels, makeup, skirts–are also markers of straight sexuality, and exactly what adopting those markers might mean for them when out in the world and attracting the attention of men. So, too, do many FTM trans people have to deal with the complicated issues of butchness in the lesbian community, and where, if anywhere, the the line between boi and boy lies.

However, an even more complicated relationship exists between the transgendered and drag worlds.

Sashay over!

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Welcome to the New Digs!

Categories: relaunching

Howdy, ducks! Welcome to the relaunch of The Second Awakening! I hope you enjoy the place.

I’ve wanted the blog to look something like this for a while, and it became clear to me that I wouldn’t be able to do that with Blogger. Also, I wanted to move to WordPress. And finally, I wanted my own domain name! And now here we all are.

The main image, by the way, is from Eugène Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People, one of my favorite paintings and, I think, somewhat appropriate for the subject of the blog.

So settle in! I am told that there are goodies like threaded comments and the like. And who knows what else? I’m figuring this out as I go along too!

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Mass Resistance Made Me Mad Enough To Vomit

Categories: i get around, shakesville rocks, the transsexual empire strikes back, transphobia: now in blog format, Your RDA of Outrage

In the spirit of spring training, I am apparently having an Away week, as all most posts so far have originated elsewhere!

Today’s offering appears at Shakesville:

First Event is an annual conference held in January by the Tiffany Club of New England, a transgender support group. Like any conference, it consists of workshops, cocktail parties, and banquets with awards ceremonies and occasionally pompous keynote addresses. About the only difference between it and, say, a Linux convention is that there will be slightly more trans people at First Event. (There may also be more computer engineers, for that matter.)

But that’s not all. According to Southern Poverty Law Center-certified hate group Mass Resistance, First Event is what America will look like in the horrifying post-Homosexual Agenda™ world soon to be imposed upon the honest, godfearing citizens of These United.

And to prove their point, they made a video….

 Fight the power!

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All I Ever Needed to Know* I Learned From "Sex in the City"

Categories: it...came...from...TUMBLR, silly blather

* for the set {being a woman, being a writer, living in New York, things that are totally inaccurate}

  1. It is possible to rent a large one-bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side as a writer whose only paid gig is a column for a newspaper that is a) free b) more annoying than the free morning paper they hand out in subway stations and c) couldn’t beat the Village Voice’s circulation even when you had to pay for the Voice.
  2. In addition, you will be able to afford a closet full of designer dresses and shoes.
  3. And also only take cabs to places, because real New Yorkers don’t ride the subway.
  4. The worst thing that will happen to you in a mugging is that the mugger will take your shoes.
  5. Writers only take their inspiration from the messed up lives of their friends.
  6. The most likely person for a highly-motivated, highly-overworked, and highly-educated lawyer to end up with is a bartender.
  7. Who will make her move to Brooklyn.
  8. And be the primary caretaker of his ailing mother.
  9. Every woman needs a gay friend to have a truly complete life.
  10. Gay friends come in two flavors: nebbishly queeny, and outrageously queeny.
  11. There’s a third type, the incredibly hot underwear model, but within a few years that character type will be straight anyway.
  12. Female friendships are all-consuming, have no boundaries of time, subject, or privacy, and absolutely necessary for life because your girlfriends will support you no matter what.
  13. They will also, however, mock your grooming habits and sexual partners.
  14. Women need to be strong, self-actualized, and firm in their knowledge of who they are.
  15. However, they should also change their lives completely for a man. Such changes include but are not limited to: changing your boro of residence, changing your city of residence, changing your religion.
  16. You will start out by declaring your sexual freedom from the past. You will plan to enact this by having the same soul-less, commitment-less relationships of the douchiest of guys.
  17. You will then spend the next several years doing completely the opposite.
  18. A gentle, caring man who is a committed artist, interested in you and your career, and supportive of your friends and life-choices will enter your life. You must reject this person.
  19. A man who alternates between a creepy sexual obsession with you and treating you like an afterthought to his social calendar will enter your life. He will specialize in sending mixed signals. He will ignore your needs and career. He will break up with you, get married, and only then declare his love for you. He will enter and exit your life with a total disregard for your feelings, and refuse to ever discuss any of these points and how they relate to your relationship. He will, in short, treat you as an amusing accessory. You must cling to this man like a drowning sailor to a life preserver.
  20. There will be a television show about four female friends who engage in frank discussions about their sex lives. Often these discussions will take place during a meal. A frequent subject will be the difficulties of dating at their age. In the 1980s that age will be the late 50s. A decade later, the age will be the mid-30s. This will be considered progress.

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In Reality

Categories: below the belt, i get around

Oh, yeah, you know what time it is…time for REALITY TELEVISION:

OK, I’m dense: but “I Want to Work For Diddy” wasn’t on my radar two years ago, and anyway, having a trans person on a reality show isn’t that big a deal anymore; we’re like the gay folks in the “Real World” reruns from the ’90s, only with a lot less flannel shirts and Hole albums in the background.

So I don’t know much about Ms. Cox, except I admire her for her success and for turning her 15 minutes of fame into a full half-hour. Kudos, ma’am, kudos.

But: is it good for teh Tranz?

You go, person of any gender!

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