... were amazing, proudly artsy and pretty dirty, too. (I'm so glad Tipper Gore and the fabled PMRC wasn't around to police us in the 70s.) Did the powers-that-be know about these album covers?
Although pioneering-funk band The Ohio Players (whom I was wildly fortunate to have seen live in 75, rocking the proverbial house!) had #1 hits, these eye-popping album covers seemed to stay under the radar. I remember seeing one of them in a very conservative, old-school Midwestern drug store, another at a truck stop that sold lots of coffee mugs with Bible verses on them. You just had to wonder.
At left, the cover of PAIN, which when opened up, looked like THIS. Coupled with PAIN was, of course, PLEASURE. Finally (and what did you expect?) there was both ECSTACY and ORGASM. That last one, with the metal (is it metal?) dildo popping out of the guy's back, blew my little mind.
Enjoy the linkage-gallery of nostalgic, nasty images; beware questionable taste, probably NSFW.
~*~
And now we go to the video!
Although we are given to believe "skin tight" refers to a woman's jeans, I don't think it does... or rather, I don't think that is the only thing he is talking about. Just a lucky guess!
I remember an interminable ride on the Interstate, primarily saved by these fabulous jams. For this reason, I prefer the long version of this funk masterpiece, which I play in heavy traffic or late at night. Therefore I insist on foisting the original long-ass version on all of you. This is what funk is supposed to sound like! (Yes, you really should listen to all eight-and-a-half minutes for the full 70s experience.)
PS: The guy making this video can't resist showing us the album cover, LOL.
...people who live in apartments and insist upon owning gigantic dogs that can't be exercised on a damn patio, so they bark all day long from boredom.
...southerners who claim various pot-luck offerings are vegetarian, but when pressed, admit said vegetable was fried in bacon grease.
...people who say the radiation in Japan is waaaay over there, so don't you worry yourself over it. The earth doesn't turn and the air never blows and water all stays in one place, so there's no way radiation can spread... oh, wait.
...de-clawing kitties. DON'T DO THAT. And I have the torn-up couches to prove that I don't believe in it. But I can also attest that torn-up couches are a small price to pay for well-mannered, happy felines.
...the way Farmville is always trying to separate you from your credit card, to purchase much-ballyhooed "Farm Cash"--with which you can buy cartoon lakes and donkeys and other dopey shit you don't need... hey, it's just like REAL LIFE!
...And finally...(((drum roll))
Male "enhancement" ads, like the endless infomercial I am listening to right now, wherein a dynamite sex-supplement promises to make you BIGGER and BETTER. It's probably just L-Arginine, an amino acid that can be taken by itself in large doses; up to 3 grams safely. (Works on women too! :D ) And it's lots cheaper than these TV-boosted supplements, which likely include Yohimbe, something that can adversely affect men with hypertension. (The difference between simple L-Arginine and these hotshot supplements can be as much as 100 bucks, so buyer beware.) I also hate the Viagra commercials for using the legendary and fabulous song "Spoonful" in the ads. The not-so-subtle racism of using a well-known black blues song directed at suburban white men with nice cars (not to mention the comprehensive medical insurance that covers these pricey Rx drugs; some insurers don't) seems a little obvious: If you take Viagra/Cialis/etc, you will be as sexy as black men, seems to be the significance of the blues-man message. And then there is the additional subtlety of the title and concept: you only need a spoonful of Viagra.
But even without music, all the winky-winky stuff in the ads (any moment can turn into a Cialis moment!) is offensive and junior high school. Yes, we all know how we get horny just by hammering nails (think about the Freudian implications of that for a second) and hanging out with the mister, as he does his manly household tasks. And then, a knowing look is exchanged, pecks on the mouth, and they leave the room together, arm in arm. We all know that our sexual experiences are EXACTLY like that, now don't we? (((rolls eyes)))
I do appreciate that the women in the ads are the same age as the men. In fact, these ads might be the only place on TV that this is true! Mostly, hot new actresses are paired with older, non-hotties. (Think about LAW AND ORDER and the age disparities.. gray hair and such are standard, but the women are all young.) This is true in movies as well. What can we surmise from this?: That BigPharma is aware they should try to be realistic in these ads--no Lolitas anywhere. And besides, maybe that is intimidating to older men? Or do they (as I suspect) just find the idea silly? (All they want is some familiar intimacy with the wife, not the babysitter.)
The CARS in the ads, and the fact that Viagra now sponsors NASCAR, well, that shouldn't be surprising. PERFORMANCE is a big word in all advertising related to men: Stereos, cell phones, cars, musical instruments, razor blades, athletic shoes, all promise various wonderful levels of PERFORMANCE, a word you rarely hear in commercials for women's products.
Yes folks, I am bringing my considerable old-cinema-geekery here to share with all of you.
I have written here before about how I often feel guilty for watching politically-incorrect old movies... and I decided it was time to talk about the vintage films that blazed trails for women, however flawed these movies might be.
The problem with labeling an old movie "feminist": Invariably, something about it won't be feminist at all, and may even be anti-feminist. Revolution takes a long time. A movie that might be revolutionary in one sense, can be incredibly backward and oppressive in another.
Thus, I offer the following series with strong caveats. These are OLD movies. However, feminists will discover that in most cases, once you start watching these, you will be unable to stop.
I have seen this movie dozens of times. Dozens. And I have some issues with it, but it is nonetheless the finest (only?) example of a movie that dared to discuss the constraints on white middle-class female sexuality and present them as overall negatives. Being a lady SUCKS, and William Inge and Elia Kazan actually illustrated it for us in no uncertain terms. The movie takes a stand.
The setting is the late 1920s in Kansas. High school kids Natalie Wood (Deanie) and Warren Beatty (Bud) (*also together in real life during the making of the film; one reason the chemistry just crackles) are all hot and bothered, but of course, not allowed to have sex. And that's it. That's the whole story--but what a story it is. What happens when kids are not allowed to have sex? This is the answer to "true love waits" and needs to be shown right alongside the fundamentalist propaganda.
Football star Bud gets restless; he is, after all, Warren Beatty (one of those instances wherein an actor's real-life reputation is useful for the narrative). Bud wants a girl, he even feels bloody ENTITLED to a girl, but alas, Deanie is far too nice to put out. He therefore takes up with the school's "bad" girl... and as a direct result, our sweet Deanie starts to crack up.
It is to Natalie Wood's credit that she is able to gaze in a starry-eyed fashion at the numerous, hot football-photos of Beatty that wallpaper her bedroom, and somehow communicate to us her sexual desire without saying a word... this isn't some teenybopper merely sighing at pin-ups. This is serious stuff; she WANTS him. And when he disses her, there is an amazing scene of Natalie taking a bath--one of the veritable triumphs of Wood's career. Director Elia Kazan made her put her hands over her face, exposing her wrist, which had been deformed as a child; it was broken and never set properly. She was extremely self-conscious about her wrist, and always wore very expensive, clunky bracelets to hide it. (Good lord, did anyone bother to look at gorgeous Natalie's WRIST? HELLO?!?! Amazing what beautiful people worry about! But note even in the movie poster above, the clunky bracelet. Go back through Natalie's life, and just look at all the bracelets. She was never without one.)
Natalie, a child star, had been hanging with method actors like James Dean, and felt inferior to them. She wanted to break through, but was frightened too. She knew what that meant. Kazan challenged her with the scene. In his biography, Kazan wrote that Wood was supposed to be naked and vulnerable and showing her wrist was the equivalent of that for her. He pressed her until she agreed to do it.
Of course, who notices her wrist? I have run it back, and only then do I notice, but only because I am looking for it and I know about her self-consciousness. But it is when she covers her face that her acting takes off; Kazan knew his job very well. While Deanie is in the bathtub, carrying on about losing Bud, her mother suddenly catches on, more or less. (Deanie's mother was played by fabulous character actress Audrey Christie).
And her mother asks, with lowered voice and obvious trepidation: "Did Bud... spoil you?"
Natalie flips out, covers her face, jumps out of the bathtub and becomes hysterical: Did he SPOIL me, Mama?! No, mom! I'm not spoiled! I'm not spoiled, mom! I'm just as fresh and virginal like the day I was born, mom!
It's a great moment and a great scene. Likewise, when Natalie tarts herself up like the "bad" girl, Bud is jarred and confused instead of becoming attracted: "But Deanie, you're a nice girl!" he protests, shocked when she puts the moves on him. Natalie replies, "I'm not! I'm not a nice girl," and Bud responds by asking her where her pride is.
Natalie loses it again: "My pride?! My pride?! I don't have any pride!"
Yes, we know what she means. Suddenly, the untenable position of the "nice" girl who felt sexual feelings and dared to act on them, is laid completely bare.
And Natalie/Deanie completely cracks up, swimming out to a waterfall and nearly drowning (which is pretty creepy in retrospect, since Wood hated water, couldn't swim, and her actual cause-of-death was drowning). There is an extended psychiatric interlude for Deanie, while Bud's dad jumps out a window after the stock market crash. There is some excellent class-awareness in this movie, as we might expect from a famous almost-blacklisted director. And then, a very nice ending, which I won't spoil for you, but one you MUST SEE.
Many people feel the movie did not make as much money as it could have, if the ending had been different. Suffice to say, the ending is not a typical Hollywood happy ending... but is poetic, real, and beautiful.
It's been awhile since I served up the links... and you all have my deepest and sincerest apologies for not sharing.
I've been somewhat overwhelmed lately, and have mostly taken refuge in goofiness like old movies and playing FarmVille, she admitted, embarrassed. Mr Daisy has offered the unsolicited opinion that FarmVille should feature floods and tornadoes and periodically wipe out our crops, just like in real life. He doesn't seem to understand that real life is what we are ESCAPING FROM. Yeesh!
Anyway, fasten your seat belts, sports fans, and get ready for some fun reads!
~*~
Big shocker: Sarah Palin has a gig on Fox News now! As SouthernFemaleLawyer humorously puts it, What a Non-Surprise:
While I obviously am not a Palin fan, I don’t think that anyone can deny that the idea of Palin has become almost metaphysical. And not just to her supporters. “Palin” now represents, in a strange way, the ultimate expression of democracy. The sticking point there being, of course, that we are not a democracy. But the idea that anyone (yes, even YOU) could control the shots, combined with the idea that anyone (yes, even YOU) can override the current party system and define the country, pretty much has resulted in Palin-the-Idea.
However you look at it, it is a pretty empowering concept, which is why I don’t think that there is anything Palin (the person) could do to damage Palin (the idea). And that applies to both a pro-Palin sentiment AND an anti-Palin sentiment. Because what the meta-Palin represents to me is the fact that the conservative use of a social pyramid scheme (‘we the powerful will convince the powerless masses to support us against their better interests by pretending that they could one day be us’) has gone terribly awry. And, given, history, it was only a matter of time.
SouthernFemaleLawyer is one of my new favorite pit-stops in Blogdonia; centered, logical and insightful, don't miss her blog! And her observations about Palin are right on the money.
~*~
Jessamyn Smythalways rocks my Facebook feed with some great stuff. This week, her contributions have been particularly noteworthy:
Why do people still go to grad school in the liberal arts?
My generation had an excuse; we were told that a great wave of retirements was imminent, after which jobs would spring from the ground like mushrooms. In other words, we were lied to.
But the adjunct trend is so well-established at this point, and the economic irrationality of grad school so screamingly obvious, that it's fair to wonder why many departments are actually experiencing record applications.
Love and Death in Indiana is about the murder of Don Belton, gay assistant professor at Indiana University:
It is easy to speculate about what may have happened. In fact we do not know. But the circumstances track with a familiar pattern -- one common enough to have a name: “the ‘gay panic’ defense.” This rests on the idea that the wave of disgust created in a heterosexual person at exposure to gay sexuality can create a state of temporary psychosis. The panic-stricken victim loses responsibility for his (for some reason, it always turns out to be “his”) actions.
This is an idea that should be retired to the Museum of Deranged Rationalization as soon as possible. But it seems far-fetched to imagine that Griffin and his counsel will get through trial without invoking it. (Despite his confession, Griffin has pleaded not guilty to murder.)
On the other hand, the “panic” defense touches on an issue that was of vital interest to Belton himself. He wrote the introduction to a book edited by the late Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick. Her work on queer theory includes a sustained inquiry into the complicated and damaging way certain institutions have forged intense bonds among men while also obliging them to police one another for the slightest trace of homosexuality. This contradictory demand makes for paranoia and volatility.
An excellent, if very sombering, read.
DEAD AIR sends our deepest and most heartfelt sympathies to Don Belton's family, and novenas are currently ascending to heaven for his immortal soul.
~*~
Pat Robertson has once again opened his big, dumb mouth... this time about the tragedy in Haiti--undoubtedly you have heard this one already.
PAT ROBERTSON: And, you know, Kristi, something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it. They were under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon III and whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, "We will serve you if you will get us free from the French." True story. And so, the devil said, "OK, it's a deal."
See, remember back in the Middle Ages, when the Catholic Church wouldn't allow just anybody to freely pontificate (root word: pontiff) about the ways of God?
Well, that is the kinda thing they were worried would happen.
I am #10 on the local library's list for the fabulously scandal-mongering GAME CHANGE... I am afraid I may have to break down and actually buy it before all the fuss is over! I promise, sports fans, I will review the book here if I ever get my grubby little hands on it.
Already, my feminist antennae are up, as the women in the narrative (Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Edwards, Sarah Palin) are getting the Lady Macbeth media-treatment. Those of you who saw 60 Minutes last Sunday know that Sarah Palin remarked that her choice as VP nominee was "God's will"... which is hardly the worst thing I can think of. (Is that supposed to be some big deal? Religious believers of all stripes regularly make this statement.) Much more alarming was the fact (later disputed by Palin, of course) that she didn't know why there was a North and South Korea. OMG.
People use mental formulas that they've learned from TV. Even in ordinary conversation, if you're talking to the mechanic at the garage about whether you need new tires for your car, you and he probably talk in a way that his equivalent thirty years ago would never have done. You use--not catch phrases, but verbal formulas. Suddenly you realize you're hearing echoes of some public-information, accident-prevention commercial. It's uncanny.
[...] What's interesting [about Reality TV shows like Big Brother] is that almost nothing happens. There's a certain amount of bitching and gossip and sitting around the supper table talking in a sort of half-hearted way, but there's no drama. Nonetheless, the audiences are riveted. And they're riveted by very similar programs where TV producers put people on desert islands and see how they survive; a series called Survivor did just that. I think this reflects a tremendous hunger among people for "reality"--for ordinary reality. It's very difficult to find the "real," because the environment is totally manufactured.
Even one's own home is a kind of anthology of advertisers, manufacturers, motifs, and presentation techniques. There's nothing "natural" about one's home these days. The furnishings, the fabrics, the furniture, the appliances, the TV, and all the electronic equipment--we're living inside commercials. I think people realize this, and they're desperate for reality, which partly explains the surge in popularity of "adventure" holidays. People think that by living on some mountainside in a tent and being frozen to death by freezing rain, they're somehow discovering reality, but of course that's just another fiction dreamed up by a TV producer. And there's no escape.
Holidays like Halloween and Christmas are spectacles that people engage in, because they are on TV. Working retail, I consider a certain type of existential-shopping (wherein people don't really know what they are "looking" for) part of this Ballardian phenomenon.
There are so many fabulous quotes in this book, I will be blogging lots of them. For instance, about the disparity between rich and poor:
In England [this conversation was recorded in 2003], we're getting unprecedented disparities of wealth. The people who run our biggest corporations have begun to affect life in London primarily by buying up property, and the old middle class (doctors, civil servants, teachers, salaried professionals) can no longer afford to live in central London. Now there are whole areas of central London given over to the rich. I've often thought that in due course all these very rich financiers are going to leave very large sums of money to their children. Then you'll get a sort of New Leisure Class who never work, but have huge spending power--like the ancien regime in France. Supposedly, the same thing is happening in Manhattan: the middle class has been forced out...
V. Vale replies that the same thing is happening in San Francisco; New York and San Francisco are the two most expensive cities in the USA. I would add that it's even true in lil ole Greenville; the 'centers' of towns/cities are now priced out of range for the actual natives of those towns/cities. Most of the people moving into the new high-priced condos in downtown Greenville, for instance, come from someplace else, often from Europe or the coasts. The rich colonizing the cities and leaving the outlying suburbs to the poor and the rabble, is the exact reverse of what happened in the 60s, when the rich moved to the suburbs and left the inner-cities to rot. Now that they crave authenticity, they have moved back to cities in droves. However, they still aren't getting the authenticity they crave, since the only people who can afford to live in cities are rich, affluent people who are all just like them.
In the cities, a bizarre new class-based uniformity has taken hold, while in my suburban apartment building, every race and age and nationality and economic status is well-represented.
Authenticity has been priced out of the market.
Speaking of which, here is Ballard on the future of sex:
[The] time is going to come when no young woman will regard penetrative penis-and-vagina sex as real sex, because it isn't deviant enough to be considered "real sex." These days, magazines for teenagers sold openly on newsstands have headlines like, "Interested in S&M sex? Junior Cosmo explains all you need to know." And this is a magazine that's going to be bought and read by 14-year-olds. The period of conventional, penetrative, penis/vagina sex will be over by the time you're about 15, and then you'll move into the area of conceptualized sex, S&M, and whatever--and that's what will be regarded as real sex. To me, this seems like a daunting thought.
Ballard on the future of reading:
People don't use libraries as much as they used to. One thing I miss terribly--I don't know if the same thing applied in America, but over here in the Forties and Fifties when I first came to England, what I loved were the second-hand bookshops. Every small town had a second-hand bookshop, which was constantly being stocked up... when someone died, the family took their books to the second-hand bookshop and got sixpence each for them. There were a lot of unserious materials, popular novels and the like...but there were a lot of very serious books. You know, one serious collector in a lifetime could produce enough books to keep a second-hand bookstore open for a year.
I did most of my reading in second-hand bookshops. I remember when I was living in London somewhere I used a local one. Also, serendipity came into it [...] You made accidental discoveries all the time. And this sort of refreshed one. You were constantly being surprised, constantly making discoveries. All this is gone now, of course. There can't be more than a half a dozen used bookshops in the whole of West London, if any.
What we've got now is a new kind of literacy. We've got people who are expert at reading the labels on products, expert at reading instructional manuals that come with a new kind of vacuum cleaner, or a computer or what have you. They're expert at that kind of reading, but not at anything else. Not with a more traditional book.
I don't know if the internet has affected that. I have very high hopes for the internet, which I think could be the sort of--if we're entering a New Dark Age, the internet could help to keep the lights on!
I'll be revisiting these Conversations often, which Ballard would be pleased to know, I found by browsing bookstores in the serendipitous manner he has described so well.
I miss you, man.
~*~
Ballard would have understood this song/video, which is where we get today's blog-post title. Caution, may trigger, may offend, watch out, yada yada.
(Not for the faint of heart or the oversensitive. Really.)
Vicarious - Tool
Note: Well, damn, there is some argument over exactly the lyrics I was going to quote. I always heard:
We all feed on tragedy
It's the virtue of empire
Other listeners report: "It's the virtual vampire," and still others, "like blood to a vampire." (Does anyone know the official lyrics?)
I guess you can still understand the concept, though.
Mary Ems, photo by Malinda Hartong of the Cincinnati Enquirer.
Hmm, would they permit a male sex offender to teach at an all-girl Christian school? Well, they might, now that I think of it. (After this long week of nonstop Polanski-defenses, I guess anything is possible.)
Ems originally was arrested for sexual battery, a felony that requires convicts to register as sex offenders.
But because the student refused to cooperate with officials, prosecutors struck a plea deal to ensure a conviction. They allowed Ems to plead guilty to unlawful sexual conduct with a minor – even though the victim was 18 – in exchange for her surrendering her teaching license. Ems benefited from the plea deal because the misdemeanor conviction means she isn’t a convicted felon and she doesn’t have to register as a sex offender.
Not sure how I feel about that. The following story says "pleaded guilty to sex with a minor"--without properly disclosing that he was in fact 18 years old.
An all-boys Christian school is employing a teacher who was fired from a previous teaching job for having sex with a student and who pleaded guilty last month to a sex crime with a minor.
Mary Ems, 44, of Springfield Township, is working at the Union Christian Post Graduate Academy, an uncertified school for males at least age 17.
[...]
[Hamilton County's] plea deal also required Ems to give up her certificate to teach in Ohio.
Despite that, Ems is working as a teacher at the all-boys school.
"We will certainly bring that to the court's attention at the time of sentencing," said Julie Wilson, spokesman for the Hamilton County Prosecutor.
"We wanted to make sure she didn't have her teaching certificate because of that (conviction)."
The school is not certified by the Ohio Department of Education because it accepts students who are college age and isn't a public high school.
The school identifies itself on its Web site as having "outstanding faculty and staff, prides itself in developing young men into 'Champions in Christ.'"
The Web site doesn't list a street address for the school, noting only that it is "located in suburban Cincinnati."
"The Union Christian Academy staff believes that its primary purpose is to educate each student to the highest possible level of academic achievement by providing a challenging curriculum in a safe, Christian environment," its Web site notes.
It requires each student to have "personal and institutional accountability, which is characterized by honesty, openness, spiritual and shared ethical standards" and that students "will be taught that making sound choices now will positively impact their future."
It appears to be a boarding school where students can go to improve their grades or athletic abilities - perhaps in hope of earning a college athletic scholarship - before attending college. Its tuition is $4,500 from January through May. Its first day of school this year was Sept. 9.
"Union Christian's Postgraduate football program is a very successful option for most young men. Our goal is to send numerous Postgraduate players to the ranks of many college programs every year," its Web site notes.
The school's Web site is registered to Wilson and a company named Ultimate Preps, both in Missouri City, Texas. Wilson also didn't respond to e-mails.
Ems is to be sentenced Oct. 29 before Hamilton County Common Pleas Court Judge Melba Marsh. She faces up to six months in jail but the judge indicated she'd impose probation.
No address on the website? Sounds like one of those boot-camp type boarding schools, where they send boys with "discipline problems" ...we have a parcel of them in the south. In fact, one of my daughter's friends was sent to one.
Or it could be what it sounds like: a prolonged Christian football camp. Should a female sex offender be teaching there?
Purple and red angelonia, and other purty plants at the South Carolina Farmer's market. (from my Flickr page)
I am one of those lifelong weirdo-hippies that enjoys talking to strangers, and so the article titled Happinomics in Adbusters totally vindicates me. I do think I am happier when I exchange pleasantries with other people, and I enjoy the warm fuzzy feeling of connection/communion that results from it...it's not (only) because I am a nosyparker! Random social exchanges are good for our well-being! And now I have this hotshot happiness-researcher to back me up in my random babbling in restrooms and checkout lines. Alright!
I have long noticed that friendly chit-chat increases the possibility of sales in a retail environment, just as familiar, fast-paced music does.
~*~
I am about to get banned, at long last, from FEMINIST CRITICS, the argumentative blog dedicated to criticizing feminism. I am already on the "watch list"--even though one guy who throws around the word "skanks" (and authoritatively announced that the Southern USA is a "shithole") is on no such watch list. I guess it depends on who you know and who you blow, as the expression goes.
In any event, the version of women's lives propagated at FC is a sharp contrast to the version offered at No Longer Quivering, a blog started by ex-Quiverfull women that I have been visiting regularly. On FEMINIST CRITICS, feminism is presented as a blight, blunting the happiness of our society, making people (read: men) totally miserable and altering the course of natural desire, blah blah blah. On NLQ, I see what our world would be WITHOUT feminism, and I feel like getting down on my knees before Almighty God and giving thanks for being born into a world that has finally been given the possibility of WOMEN'S FULL HUMANITY. Hallelujah and praise GOD for FEMINISM!
The guys at FEMINIST CRITICS (along with their trusty anti-feminist female mascot/hench(wo)man, TyphonBlue), would be totally at home in the Quiverfull movement... in fact, I don't understand why these anti-feminist malcontents aren't jumping on the bandwagon to find them a proper Quiverfull wife who will shut up and not argue.
Then, of course, it dawns on me: they'd have to support all those kids! LOL--obedience comes at a high price, dudes.
Meanwhile, TyphonBlue continues her complaint that her husband has been greatly harmed by the loss of his Bodily Integrity (FC lingo = circumcision) and resultant male sex-Godhood, or she'd be in the secular-Quiverfull movement for sure. [Caution: second link contains ableist language, the term "crippled sexuality"--which is horrendously gross, but I linked it to make a point. And TyphonBlue wonders why hubby has issues? I certainly don't.]
And you know, that's the thing...Quiverfull is a religious movement. IS there a secular equivalent? Absolutely.
The constant, worshipful fetishizing of the large family (Jon & Kate Plus 8, Nadia Suleman) is everywhere in our culture. It's been going on since the Osmonds, the Jacksons, The Brady Bunch and The King Family. And in these enlightened times (cough) you don't need religion to be radically natalist. In fact, I found the Quiverfull blog when one of their readers linked my Surfwise review to their message board, offering the wise observation that it sounded the same as the Quiverfull life, only no surfing.
The Quiverfull women are awesome in their self-analysis and truth-telling, one speaking openly about what it was like when her husband no longer desired her. (And what happens to these wives then? Are they simply supposed to ACCEPT loveless marriages? Apparently.) These women ain't a bit shy regarding the use of that much-maligned word PATRIARCHY; in fact, they are very clear about the usage. Unlike some of us, they don't throw the word around in a meaningless mish-mash of theory, they are quite specific: a patriarchal household is one in which the husband/father rules. After all, patriarchy is literally defined as "rule of the fathers"--and that is the life they have escaped from, the life they are warning us about. They know what patriarchy is.
PATRIARCHY is that which would exist, if feminism had not challenged it, if feminism did not continue to challenge it throughout the world.
PATRIARCHY is that state of affairs championed on FEMINIST CRITICS. And the Quiverfull women come forward to say, very plainly, NO. NO. NO.
I am now addicted to the blog, and the eye-opening spiritual witness of powerhouse-survivors Vyckie and Laura, also very descriptive and talented writers. God bless you strong womyn, and I love you. I am waiting for the special moment, here in Bob Jones University-land, to give your website-address to women who truly NEED it. I meet Quiverfull wives every day, I know it will happen eventually, so stay tuned. (((blows copious kisses)))
~*~
And speaking of patriarchy, dig THIS! It made me somewhat dizzy, but you know how cognitive dissonance is. Lord have mercy!
The truth of the Masters-Johnson partnership, however, was far more sordid. By Johnson’s own account, and that of friends and colleagues, Masters hired the divorced mother of two under the implicit understanding that she would become his sexual partner — for the purposes of research, Masters claimed. “Sex for Virginia Johnson would become part of her job,” Maier writes matter-of-factly. And indeed, Johnson told Maier herself in an interview, “No — I was not comfortable with it, particularly. I didn’t want him at all, and had no interest in him.” Johnson engaged in sex with Masters, she claimed decades later, because as a single-mother, “I had a job and I wanted it.”
Of course, when Masters hired Johnson in 1957, Catharine MacKinnon was still in grade school. No one had dreamed up a name for sexual harassment, though it occurred commonly, and women certainly knew it was wrong when they experienced it. And yes, sexual harassment is the right word for what Masters imposed on Johnson. She very clearly states that she had no interest in him. She was living a hardscrabble life as a single mother, and her other options appeared worse.
This is the couple whose work overturned the oppressive Freudian conceit of the vaginal orgasm as essential to mature femininity. They proved that clitoral and vaginal orgasms didn’t differ, physiologically. How ironic that this liberatory insight flowed from a partnership that began as sexual exploitation.
As I said over on her blog, all you can say is WOW.
I am really quite stunned.
~*~
At left: Close-up of red and purple angelonia. (I love them!)
I'm always glad to hear that there are more feminists in South Carolina (this rates another strong hallelujah! from me)... and Moody Springs is Rachel's relatively new blog. She writes about Ellen DeGeneres' new 'funny' commercial in which Ellen announces 'ironically' (and watch out for that free-floating irony, folks!), "Inner beauty is important, but not nearly as important as outer beauty.":
It's funny, I guess. Or...supposed to be. See, because she is a comedienne, and she makes jokes. And she uses verbal irony here...everyone knows that inner beauty actually is more important than outer beauty, but it doesn't hurt to enhance one's outer beauty. But instead of saying that, she says the opposite of what we all know to be true....
Or do we?
Actually, what she is saying is very "true." Outer beauty is more important than inner beauty. Or rather, that one must do everything she* can to hide her outer ugliness. Or in other words, her wrinkles; the fact she is old...or the fact that she didn't die young and is still alive. Oh, the situational irony is just as rich as the verbal irony...the fact that you have the vitality in you to live long, and that you have been blessed for many years with the good luck to not have been involved in some circumstance that resulted in your death, makes you ugly. So if you use this makeup, it will lie flat over those wrinkles. Hide them. Your potent life force that led you to be wrinkled will be your secret.
Rachel, may your new blog live long and prosper, girlfriend! Welcome to wacky Blogdonia.
And BTW: YES!--as several have asked, I did coin the word Blogdonia, with considerable help from Groucho Marx. Unfortuntely, the graphic in that link, featuring the mercurial Rufus T. Firefly, has now evaporated into the cyber-ether. (My advice to new bloggers regarding images is: always copy and download your own, because other people's stuff comes and goes like summer sitcoms, and frequently does not even last out the week.)
Mr Daisy has deserted me on this sultry, sauna-like day, to go to HeroesCon in Charlotte. I assigned him Dead Air photography duties, so let's hope he returns with some proper Superhero photos to celebrate the Solstice!
And now, signing off to sizzle...
~*~
Estimated Prophet - Grateful Dead (jump to 1:31; they diddle with chords for a whole minute and a half!)
Like an angel
Standing in a shaft of light
Rising up to paradise
I know I'm gonna shine
Interesting that this illustration gives Dorian a big heart and I didn't see him that way at all.
I just saw Surfwise (2007), a documentary about Dorian Paskowitz, who raised 9 children in decidedly gonzo fashion, traveling around the coasts of the Western Hemisphere and constantly surfing, surfing, surfing. Even the littlest babies surfed. They did not attend school. They lived on the barest essentials. I was amazed. From the New York Times review:
There are many different ways to drop off the grid, but few dropped off with such style and urgency as Dorian Paskowitz, the paterfamilias of what is lovingly and at times enviably described as the first family of surfing. It was an intensity in part born of his passionately felt engagement with history as a Jew, which took him from Stanford Medical School in the 1940s to button-down respectability in the 1950s and, thereafter, on the road and into the blue yonder with a devoted wife, nine children, a succession of battered campers and the surfboards that were by turns the family’s cradles, playpens, lifelines and shields.
The button-down 50s did not suit Dorian, and he rebelled with a fury. The term bohemian barely covers the incredible Paskowitz family lifestyle:
Once Doc’s origin story has been told (the movie says he introduced surfing to Israel), the story moves into its most fascinating phase, namely that stretch in the 1960s and ’70s when he and his wife, Juliette, a Mexican-American looker with an apparently sturdy constitution, raised, with next to no money, eight boys and one girl — David, Jonathan, Abraham, Israel, Moses, Adam, Salvador Daniel, Navah and Joshua — in a 24-foot camper. A few family members repeat the number 24 as if they still can’t believe it; I’m more wowed by the number 9.
Doc, one of his sons explains with a mirthless laugh, was trying to repopulate the world with Jews. Certainly Doc’s sense of himself as a Jew who had escaped the Holocaust only by an accident of birth, by growing up in Southern California, hit him hard and kept hitting him. After two unhappy marriages and an unsatisfying professional stint in Hawaii, where he had settled after Stanford, Doc shed his worldly belongings and old ways, discovered the joys of sex (he’s hilariously ribald on the specifics of that joy) and dedicated himself to uncompromised, uncompromising freedom, embracing the road like Jack Kerouac, one difference being that this dharma bum had a ready-made commune. He fled the greater world, creating a smaller, manageable one in its place.
For a time, the world Doc made fit neatly into that 24-foot camper. Nut brown and slender, the Paskowitz children were beautiful, ideal subjects for an exhilarating, persuasively liberating experiment. But they were also somewhat like lab rats, given to little nips that, in time, as childish energy morphed into adolescent aggression, evolved into violence bordering on the pathological. “I loved supporting the Reich,” says David, the eldest son, who became the captain in an increasingly authoritarian regime. David’s choice of words is pretty startling, particularly given that this is an observant Jewish family.
Indeed, Dorian ruled the family with an iron hand, and it is fairly obvious that no dissent was permitted. His treatment of Juliette enraged me. Like many hippies of the day, Dorian would drive and drive and drive until a locale "felt right"--Juliette's input was not sought or required. She was pregnant and/or breastfeeding, she said, for 10 solid years. "I've blocked a lot of it out," she reports. I would imagine so.
Juliette was not an active part of the surfing fun, the whole raison d'être for the family lifestyle. Instead, she kept the whole enterprise going; the cooking, the cleaning, the continuous and non-stop settling of endless squabbling in a family of 8 boys (all intensely competitive for the attention of Dorian) and 1 girl... all huddled into the now-legendary 24-foot camper.
The children slept, apparently, stacked like cordwood. Their father and mother had sex every night and the kids saw everything (one remarks "and they weren't quiet!") Early in the movie, Dorian tells us straight-faced that his life changed when he learned how to eat pussy. He then went scouting for a woman to match his high sexual appetites, grading them as in a final exam. Juliette registered an admirable 93% and he told her, you will be the mother of my seven sons.
The kids lived on gruel, as in OLIVER TWIST, but they were mostly in excellent health, which was sheer luck. There was one nasty surfing accident that befell one son and his recovery took a whole year. (It isn't very clear from the film, but I think he was left behind while the others moved on.) And there were countless other surfing-related scrapes and nasty-knocks-on-the-head, but the kids quickly adapted and learned to roll with it.
I came away from the movie remembering various rural communes and back-to-the-land experiments I visited in my youth... always upset because it seemed to me that their much-coveted, newly found "freedom" always belonged to men, and women were more enslaved that ever before. (Washing machines, after all, helped women, not men.) Consequently, whenever I hear about men deciding to jettison 'modern conveniences'--I reach for my gun.
It's interesting that a vehicle is never one of those things they choose to do without... and they will invariably be the one driving it, too.
Check out the movie for an interesting look at a fascinating family.
The horrific Saxby Chambliss TV ads are running every 5 minutes in the Atlanta metro area. Over the holidays, thought I would end up slitting my wrists.
Georgia voters head to the polls Tuesday to determine whether the Democratic dream of a filibuster-resistant Senate is still alive.
They’ll be voting in the closely watched Senate race between Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss and Democrat Jim Martin, which could give Democrats their 59th Senate seat. The Minnesota Senate race, between Republican Sen. Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken, has not yet been decided.
Chambliss won 49.8 percent of the vote to Martin’s 46.8 percent on Election Day, but he fell about 8,000 votes short of the majority needed to prevent a runoff.
Chambliss has framed the race as a firewall to prevent unchecked Democratic power, while Martin has closely associated himself with President-elect Barack Obama in hopes of rallying Democrats to the polls in an election that will hinge on which side can turn out its core supporters.
On Monday, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin became the latest high-wattage politician to campaign in Georgia as she traveled the state with Chambliss.
“The eyes of the nation are on you,” Palin told several thousand supporters at a rally in Augusta. “We all have Georgia on our mind.”
The Mormons were successfully forced into accepting the government's domestic rules for their religion. I have always thought this was wrong. If they wanted polygamy, that was their business. I find it shameful that a government founded on the separation of Church and State, would actively interfere with the establishment of (any) church belief.
The doctrine of the church basically believed that there were countless number of souls waiting to begin an earthly life. The human soul was united with the body at birth which grew and matured, and eventually created new families which led to more births and more souls beginning an earthly existence. Procreation was therefore a very important part of the Mormon religious doctrine because spiritual souls could be granted earthly bodies. Polygamy or the system of “plural marriages” first appeared in the church in 1841 and by 1870 there were an increasing number of plural marriage families in the Utah Territory.
Thus, the Mormons have now morphed into the oppressor, and seek to bring the power of the government into other people's domestic choices. Apparently, they were the primary financial sponsors behind California's PROPOSITION 8, which passed.
The church's effort against gay marriage is its most vigorous since 1970s
By Peggy Fletcher Stack
The Salt Lake Tribune
10/26/08
The thought of going to church in her southern California LDS ward makes Carol Oldham cry. She can't face one more sermon against same-sex marriage. She can't tolerate the glares at the rainbow pin on her lapel.
Oldham, a lifelong Mormon, is troubled by her church's zeal in supporting a California ballot initiative that would define marriage as between one man and one woman. She feels the church is bringing politics into her sanctuary.
It has tainted everything for me," Oldham said, choking up during a telephone interview. "I am afraid to go there and hear people say mean things about gay people. I am in mourning. I don't know how long I can last."
The LDS Church's campaign to pass Proposition 8 represents its most vigorous and widespread political involvement since the late 1970s, when it helped defeat the Equal Rights Amendment. It even departs from earlier efforts on behalf of traditional marriage, in which members felt more free to decide their level of involvement.
This time, LDS leaders have tapped every resource, including the church's built-in phone trees, e-mail lists and members' willingness to volunteer and donate money. Many California members consider it a directive from God and have pressured others to participate. Some leaders and members see it as a test of faith and loyalty.
Those who disagree with the campaign say they feel unwelcome in wards that have divided along political lines. Some are avoiding services until after the election; others have reluctantly resigned. Even some who favor the ballot measure are troubled by their church's zeal in the matter.
"I do expect the church to face a high cost - both externally and internally - for its prominent part in the campaign," said LDS sociologist and Proposition 8 supporter Armand Mauss of Irvine, Calif. He believes church leaders feel a "prophetic imperative" to speak out against gay marriage.
"The internal cost will consist of ruptured relationships between and among LDS members of opposing positions, sometimes by friends of long standing and equally strong records of church activity," Mauss said. "In some cases, it will result in disaffection and disaffiliation from the church because of the ways in which their dissent has been handled by local leaders."
Robert Rees, a former LDS bishop in California, says he has not witnessed this much divisiveness in the church over a political issue in the last 50 years.
Whatever the vote's outcome, Rees says, "it will take considerable humility, charity and forgiveness to heal the wounds caused by this initiative."
Talk about prophecy! Now that the Proposition has passed, outlawing gay marriage, the heat is ON.
(CBS/ AP) A group of protesters plans to rally in front of the headquarters of the Mormon church over the faith's support for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage in California.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints encouraged its members to work to pass Proposition 8 by volunteering their time and money for the campaign. California voters approved the measure Tuesday.
The Friday evening protest comes a day after people demonstrated outside a Mormon temple in Los Angeles. About 1,000 gay-marriage supporters waved signs and brought afternoon traffic to a halt.
On Thursday, outside the gates of a Mormon temple his father helped build, Kai Cross joined more than 2,000 gay-rights advocates in a chorus of criticism of the church's role in the likely passage of a statewide ban on same-sex marriage.
Once a devout Mormon who graduated from Brigham Young University, the 41-year-old Cross was disowned by his family and his church after he was outed as a gay man in 2001.
"They are on the losing side of history," Cross said Thursday of the church's opposition to gay marriage. Cross and other protesters blame leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for encouraging Mormons to funnel millions of dollars into television ads and mailings in favor of Proposition 8.
The ballot measure was sponsored by a coalition of religious and social conservative groups, would amend the California Constitution to define marriage as a heterosexual act. It would override a state Supreme Court ruling that briefly gave same-sex couples the right to wed.
There is disappointment that the African-American community, which just saw the election of the first black president, voted overwhelmingly against same-sex marriage, reports CBS Early Show correspondent Hattie Kauffman.
The protest came amid questions about whether attempts to overturn the prohibition can succeed and whether the 18,000 same-sex marriages performed in California over the past four months are in any danger.
For Cody Krebs, 27, four months was not enough time to fulfill his "intense hope" to marry one day; he and his boyfriend have been together for little more than a year, so they aren't ready to wed.
On Thursday, Krebs dodged eggs hurled at protesters from an apartment building. He said he'd seen worse growing up in Salt Lake City.
"It's important to come out like this because it gets the gay community into the public eye," Krebs said. "I feel like this has started a lot of conversations that had to get started."
The demonstration began outside the temple in the Westwood section of Los Angeles and noisily spilled through the western side of the city, with chants of "Separate church and state" and "What do we want? Equal rights." Some protesters waved signs saying "No on H8" or "I didn't vote against your marriage," and many equated the issue with the civil rights struggle.
Two people were arrested after a confrontation between the crowd and an occupant of a pickup truck that had a banner supporting Proposition 8. One demonstrator ended up with a bloody nose in the fracas. Seven arrests occurred during Los Angeles-area street marches late Wednesday.
The temple protest was organized by the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center. Its chief executive, Lorri Jean, announced a Web-based effort dubbed InvalidateProp8.org to raise money to fight the constitutional amendment.
Gay-marriage proponents filed three court challenges Wednesday against the ban. The lawsuits raise a rare legal argument: that the ballot measure was actually a dramatic revision of the California Constitution rather than a simple amendment. A constitutional revision must first pass the Legislature before going to the voters.
Andrew Pugno, attorney for the groups that sponsored the amendment, called the lawsuits "frivolous and regrettable."
"It is time that the opponents of traditional marriage respect the voters' decision," he said.
The high court has not said when it will act. State officials said the ban on gay marriage took effect the morning after the election.
"We don't consider it a `Hail Mary' at all," said Kate Kendell, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights. "You simply can't so something like this - take away a fundamental right at the ballot."
With many gay newlyweds worried about what the amendment does to their vows, California Attorney General Jerry Brown said he believes those marriages are still valid. But he is also preparing to defend that position in court.
The amendment does not explicitly say whether it applies to those already married. Legal experts said unless there is explicit language, laws are not normally applied retroactively.
"Otherwise a Pandora's Box of chaos is opened," said Stanford University law school professor Jane Schacter. Still, Schacter cautioned that the question of retroactivity "is not a slam dunk."
An employer, for instance, could deny medical benefits to an employee's same-sex spouse. The worker could then sue the employer, giving rise to a case that could determine the validity of the 18,000 marriages.
Supporters of the ban said they will not seek to invalidate the marriages already performed and will leave any legal challenges to others.
A 2003 California law already gives gays registered as domestic partners nearly all the state rights and responsibilities of married couples when it comes to such things as taxes, estate planning and medical decisions. That law is still in effect.
Regarding the statement that "a majority of blacks voted for Prop 8"--that particular proclamation isn't going over too well in various parts of Blogdonia.
For more on that, and other excellent fulminating on the topic, please check out:
Prop. K would allow sex workers to organize for their rights and safety. It would enable them to report abuse in the industry without fear of prosecution. It would improve their chances of maintaining their health by lessening the stigma that prevents many from seeking the health care services they need. And it would do all this while still allowing law enforcement officials to investigate and prosecute human traffickers.
Photo chosen (from my Flickr-for-cheapskates account) to go with Legends of Blues, a newbie blog just added to my blogroll. David provides Howlin Wolf, Lightnin Hopkins, John Lee Hooker and other great music on a regular basis. Whenever you're feeling the need to hear some blues, drop by and have a listen!
Also new to my list of fabulous blogs, Scrutiny Hooligans of Asheville. (Major points for the great blog name!) And don't forget: Stop Parkside!
How come [Governor Palin's daughter, Bristol Palin] gets to make a decision but the rest of the girls and women in America don’t! You won’t even let me learn in school about all the decisions I might need to make!
Governor Palin, when I had my first boyfriend, my brother talked to me and to him about why we shouldn’t have sex. Actually, we had to sit down in my boyfriend’s living room with his parents and my brother and hear all about STD’s and love and all the reasons we were too young for sex. AND they told us about condoms and other ways of preventing pregnancy even though we promised to keep all hands above the waist until at least 16.
Did you have a talk like that with Bristol and her boyfriend? Did anyone show him how to use a condom? These are fair questions because of the policies you advocate for.
I am glad that Bristol decided to have her baby. Will she and her boyfriend raise it? Will they give it up for adoption? Who is going to pay for her to give birth? And for all the other doctor visits?
If you want your family life to stay private, the please don’t bring your family on stage with you when you campaign, and please stop being a hypocrite.
You go girl! I said much the same thing, in my piece on Palin for Feministe. I was surprised that some people didn't get it, but Cassie has phrased it far better than I did!
Of course, the Republican Jewish operatives never believed Obama was hostile to Israel. What they were -- and are -- counting on is that Jews won't vote for Obama because he is African-American. They are having some success with that approach. The race issue is all they have but it's something.
A must read!
~*~
Currently watching an old Steve McQueen movie, Nevada Smith, written by Harold Robbins, of all people. Nosing around on the net, I learn that Harold Robbins was an advanced, senior-citizen cokehead, which makes sense since most of the characters in his later novels were strung out all the time. I ingested countless of Robbins' dirty, nasty novels in one sitting as a teenager, and embarrassingly, well into my 20s. I actually believed that story about his Chinese exotic dancer wife dying from a bite from a diseased parrot... turns out it's all made up.
Damn, it was just like one of his books, and it FELT true...(((sigh))) I'm just one of them gals who prefers legends and myth to reality...
