The day I revived this blog, or why grad school is like a rigorous swimming race run by pirates.

Hello! I apologize for my long absence. At the beginning of the summer, I had this quaint notion that I would keep up this blog while writing my MRP (Major Research Project, required for the completion of my MA). I remember reading somewhere that it's good to just be writing, regardless of what it is--the more you write, the more you write! So I thought that keeping up this blog would inspire me to write my MRP. That, clearly, did not work out this time. I have faith in future me--I think she will eventually figure out this whole working from home/coffee shops and writing and revising endlessly without the brain exploding thing. I have faith in her. I really do. But current me struggled a bit.

A lot of people seem to be under the impression that grad school is a lovely little stepping stone between undergrad and the "real world." (Granted, these people aren't usually grad students.) They think that it's a place for the undecided, those who aren't ready to leave the "student life" (read: binge drinking and watching full seasons of Mad Men in one sitting), those who aren't ready to grow up and accept responsibility for themselves. Well, if those are your reasons for doing a master's degree, you will be thoroughly disappointed. Grad student is no entry-level position. It's sink or swim, baby. I've learned that it's not so hard to deviate from your rigorous swimming, to stop for a moment to tread water and look around only to end up drifting away...slowly at first, so you don't even really notice, but eventually you get lost in the abyss and no helping hands or ropes appear to pull you back on track.

There are support networks, of course there are. There are your fellow students and your supervisor and  other faculty members. And they tell you what you need to do. Hand in your proposals by this day, present your ideas to your peers this day, have a first draft done this day, try and schedule in some time to have between 1-5 mental breakdowns. And for someone who likes deadlines (I really like deadlines...), this seems great. Until you realize that apparently academics are all a bunch of bloody pirates and the "code" you thought you were following is really just a bunch of guidelines and no one is actually penalized for missing deadlines and so you start to just not follow them and no one cares and you start to drift farther and farther away from your goals...

But as much as I'm learning that grad school is not a nice, refreshing, relaxing, safe dip in the kiddie pool before diving into the deep end of "real life," but instead is some sort of rigorous swimming race run by pirates (I think this metaphor got away from me...)*, I'm also learning that I'm learning a lot from it. I finished my MRP, and it passed, but I didn't love the finished product, and that's okay. I did what I could in the time that I had, and I got some really great stuff out of it--stuff I want to come back to later, once I've taken a break from that particular piece of writing and gotten a bit of perspective. I tried to do too much at once and I couldn't see the forest for the trees. The kernels of really good stuff, like my exploration of the homosocial relationship between Nick Carter and Brian Littrell of the Backstreet Boys or my reading of the Backstreet Boys' "Everybody (Backstreet's Back)" video alongside Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video, got lost in my attempt to weed through way too much theory that I was unfamiliar with. But I really learned a lot from that experience, and I'm excited to continue to work with that material.

And now that I've started my final year of coursework (!!!), I'm really starting to see how much I've learned in the past year, and how much I've unlearned. Doing readings for my first week of classes was SO MUCH EASIER this year than it was last year. When I started reading the articles for my first term courses last year, I was completely and utterly overwhelmed. I grasped maybe half of the readings--and I only grasped them, I couldn't make any sort of complex argument about them. I didn't know how to respond except to say, "Yes, I understand this one," or, "No, I have no idea what the fuck is going on." And by no means am I an expert this year, but at least I feel competent. I don't feel so lost. And that's an absolutely wonderful feeling. I've also "unlearned" quite a bit too, and I think I'm still in the process of letting go of some things. I'm unlearning some of my perfectionism--ideas do not need to be fully formed and perfect before you speak up in class or you share your writing with others. In a lot of cases, it's almost better that these ideas aren't perfect, so we can have the opportunity to help each other out. But that's something that the pirate-run swimming race can ruin a bit. It's hard on us, so we're hard on each other. Someone once crushed our spirits, so it's our turn to crush someone else's. And complaining about the harshness of academic culture just invites criticisms about "my generation" and how we're too  "soft" and we've been "coddled" and told we can be whatever we want and are never criticized and were hugged too much as children or something. I'm sorry, but if you are of an older generation, it was YOU who coddled us and told us we could do anything and hugged us, so stop whining about how soft we are. And also, what is so terrible about being nice to one another and expecting kindness in return?!?! Seriously, I thought the idea was that I was supposed to be holding onto my youthful optimism as long as possible before becoming jaded and bitter. I'm only 23. Give me a break and let me be idealistic for a little while longer.

I've gone off on a tangent here. I think the moral of this story is: "Just keep swimming."

Kinda puts things in perspective, doesn't it?

* I tried Google imaging "pirate swimming race" to see if I could find a silly picture to include. The first three images were of women's butts. I don't understand.

The day I declare all women beautiful AGAIN, or why I will not EVER back down.

An open letter to those who think sexism is dead and the darn feminists need to stop being so angry:

I haven't been blogging much lately, so when I noticed that I was getting a lot of page views, and a few really angry comments, I was curious. The majority were from a web site called Single Dude Travel, which seemed odd, since I'm not single, nor a dude, nor do I write about travel. Turns out, they had just linked to me because I'm a "retarded feminist." They said I was too much of a silly idiot woman to take on directly, but they linked to an article that did. I will not link to them here, because they don't deserve the attention. But basically their response to my argument against fat-shaming was that I'm a fat lesbian, so OF COURSE I feel that way. From there, I found a link to an article that argued that women are not fit to participate in the public sphere (seriously!!!), and they used my blog post as a prime example--apparently, I'm too emotional to tell people they're ugly or obese, so I make up pseudo-arguments to make myself feel better. I shouldn't quote this guy, because he does not deserve the attention, but I have to, because I cannot make this shit up (Grey is the guy who called me a fat lesbian, and when the author refers to Feministing, he's talking about my post, not the whole site):

Grey’s argument was perfectly sound, but in a sense his engagement with Feministing is pointless. The author of the original post is a woman. Of course she’s going to say absurd things in order to ensure that no one feels bad. We should accept that. Often we ought to praise women for their sensitivities while ignoring their so-called arguments.

It's the ovaries. They give me the crazies. (Also, I love that he tries to make that seem like a compliment...?) Oh, but the problem with this logic is that I AM cool with making some people feel bad...like people who think I'm too emotional to participate in the public sphere... However, if he STILL feels that I am "hysterical," he could always send me a vibrator--I hear they used to use those to cure the "womb crazies" and stuff--I would gladly accept such, uh, medication for my "problem."

But my point is, people say these things. Maybe not to your face, because you said nothing to provoke them. Or maybe because they're scared. Or maybe you thought what they said was a joke. But it's not. As much as I laughed at what these guys said about me, this is not a joke. This is serious. PEOPLE STILL THINK WOMEN SHOULD NOT PARTICIPATE IN THE PUBLIC SPHERE. THIS IS REAL. It's extreme, I know. Most of you will be like, "But I support women working!" But, just as problematically, PEOPLE STILL USE FAT LESBIAN AS AN INSULT. And that's a mainstream opinion.

On the one hand, I kind of feel like I earned a badge of honour. I mean, you hear of feminists being accused of being lesbians all the time--you know, the whole we're-too-ugly-to-actually-get-a-guy thing, the we're-bitter-angry-ugly-lesbians thing--but no one had ever said that to me! I was feeling kind of left out. Now I can join the club. Interestingly, I actually find it highly problematic that I've never been called a lesbian before. Because that says a lot more about what a lesbian can't be than it does about me. I don't get called a lesbian because most people that I've engaged with in arguments about feminism have seen what I look like. I'm thin. I have long dirty blonde hair. I wear a bra and girly tops and tight jeans or short shorts or skirts and I have a lot of pretty, impractical shoes. I put on mascara and lip gloss daily. I have long nails and I shave my legs. I'm young and white and conventionally attractive. By not calling me a lesbian, people are essentially saying that the only women who are lesbians are those who do not fit into heteronormative beauty standards. They are saying that if you're deemed "fuckable" by men, then there's no way you could refuse the penis! But all these guys online know is that I'm "getting all emotional" about the "fat chicks" and their "feelings" so I must be a lesbian. A fat one, too. Sorry, sweethearts, I'm actually not a lesbian--I don't refuse all penis, just yours, you misogynistic fuckwads. (Come on, call me a slut now--I dare you.)

But, on the other hand, telling me (or, no, sorry, telling men behind my back) that my voice does not belong in the public sphere? You better be prepared for what you've started. I have never been more motivated to put my voice out there. Oh, and I'm a PhD student, too, or I will be in a few months, so you better believe that I have the avenues to do so. I will stir shit up. I'm only just getting started. You think that one blog post was something? I wrote that rant in twenty minutes. I never expected it to go viral; I was writing it for the hundred-odd friends and family that usually read my blog. You just wait and see what I can do when I actually put my mind to it. You will not break me.

Sincerely,

The thin white straight girl who STILL believes that ALL WOMEN ARE BEAUTIFUL

This is what a feminist looks like.

The day I was behind the times in the blogosphere, or why you should only date guys that like your creepy clay figurines. Or guys that are Jared Padalecki.

I knew this was going to happen when I started blogging. I would get excited about it for a few months, and then I'd get distracted and go weeks and weeks without writing anything, and then people would lose interest and no one would read it anymore and I'd get sad and panic about what exciting topic I'd need to write about to get people's attention again and then I'd never be able to think of anything cool enough because there would be too much pressure and oh dear god what should I write about?!?! I feel like I'm always a week or so behind on online trends and pop culture news or political news so I can't write about anything contemporary because everyone's already weighed in on those issues. The most recent movies I've seen that are worth commenting on are The Hunger Games, which everyone and their mother has blogged about, and What's Your Number?, which I watched last night but every other feminist blogger worth her salt has already talked about because it deals so explicitly with the politics of female promiscuity and includes the douche-bag-man-whore-misogynist-is-actually-a-nice-guy-once-you-get-past-his-emotional-baggage trope which I am very tired of because pretty much all of the douche-bag-man-whore-misogynists I've ever met are actually douche-bag-man-whore-misogynists and there is no way in hell I would put in the time and effort to teach them Feminism 101 every single fucking time they said something douche-y or misogynistic because I AM NOT YOUR FUCKING TEACHER (unless I am, in which case I will teach you Feminism 101 over and over again because they pay me to). That being said, What's Your Number? is actually a hilarious movie and is nice in a find-a-man-that-accepts-you-and-your-promiscuity-and-your-creepy-clay-figurines-as-you/they-are kind of way. Which, I think, is a very important message. Particularly the creepy clay figurines part. Because, lord knows, you should never date a guy that doesn't love your creepy clay figurines. That should be a rule in whatever the straight-girl opposite of the Bro Code is.

Anyway, aside from that, I've been watching Gilmore Girls and Buffy, and I feel like pretty much everything that needs to be said about both of those has already been said, especially Buffy. I went to the Popular Culture Association of Canada conference in Niagara Falls this past weekend and THERE WERE NO PANELS ON BUFFY. It's like all the scholars in Canada were just like FUCK IT, WE'VE SAID IT ALL. I don't know if that's true. But I certainly have nothing new to contribute to that discussion. Although I read an article on After Elton this morning about the five gayest episodes of Buffy and they seemed kind of arbitrary to me. Like...Willow is openly gay for the last few seasons. So pretty much all of the episodes about her in the last few seasons are gay, aren't they? Or I am misunderstanding what makes an episode gay? Their reasoning seemed all over the place... "lots of naked boys!" and "gay actor as central character!" and "Willow's gayness is hinted at vaguely long before she comes out!" seemed to all be valid reasons. Anyway, my point is, I feel like that list could have been a lot longer than five. Or it should have had more specific criteria. Do they mean the episode features queer characters? Do they mean there's a lot of eye candy for queer men? I DON'T KNOW. So I guess I had something to contribute to the discussion about the discussion of Buffy. We're into meta-discussions now. My head hurts. I also watch Weeds and Supernatural, but I'm not up-to-date on either of those, so my comments would be behind the times. But watching the first and second seasons of Gilmore Girls at the same time as watching Supernatural is WEIRD. (Not at EXACTLY the same time--I can't multitask like that...obviously...) Jared Padalecki goes from being tall, skinny cute boy to SUPER MEGA HOTTIE MAN. Also, the wrong person is named Dean in Supernatural. Very confusing. I refer to the two main characters in Supernatural as Dean and Sam-Dean. It's weird because I've had friends who have changed their names and I adjusted to that very easily but I can't adjust to a character on a TV show changing his name when he's on another TV show. And neither of those names are actually his name. His name is Jared. Which is a stupid name, if you ask me. It does not fully describe his hotness. Jared is not a hot name.

Well, for someone who has nothing to say, I've certainly managed to say a lot. I think that's why I decided to start blogging in the first place. It's style over substance. It doesn't matter what I say, as long as it's somewhat entertaining. It's an nice shift from academic writing, where I'm trying to write something substantial about the Backstreet Boys which is like an oxymoron or something. Also, I'm finding it super weird to write about how they were marketed. I mean, it's one thing to analyze their songs or their music videos, because that was the "art" that they put out there to be consumed and talked about. But when I'm talking about how their personalities and relationships were marketed, it feels weird. I forget I'm talking about real people. Like Nick Carter exists, in the real world, as a person, and I have no idea how much of what was written about him in the 1990s was actually him, and how much was manipulated and fabricated to create a certain image. I'm having an ethical and existential crisis here.

Maybe staring at a picture of Jared Padalecki will solve my crisis...

You'll always be Dean in my heart.

The day the nervous energy took hold, or why I'm telling my term papers to BRING IT.

In a couple of my classes over the past few weeks, we've been discussing the idea of "happiness" as something that cannot be understood as a neutral, obvious "good." Happiness is inevitably tied up in ideas of what it means to be the "right kind" of happy, the "right kind" of person. We've been discussing how unhappiness, melancholia, stress and fear can be productive feelings, and perhaps not always so "bad" that they must be done away with as soon as possible and replaced with happiness. Sometimes that is not possible. Sometimes that is not desirable. Sometimes that involves forgetting "bad" things that should not be forgotten. Sometimes that involves anaesthetizing one's self, checking out from a situation or a life that needs to be paid attention to.

This morning I took a good, hard look at my calendar. Today is April 10. Between now and April 25, there are three term paper due dates written in bright blue marker. Despite the fact that I hadn't had my coffee yet, I felt a little more awake and my heart started to beat a little faster. I went online and read my professor's feedback on an essay proposal I submitted last week. She suggested about nine thousand other amazing sources I should look up. This essay, at approximately 20 pages, will be the longest essay I've ever written. I want to make it good enough that it will also be the first essay I ever try and submit to a journal. My heart started thumping... I could feel the blood moving through my veins, warming up my limbs. I felt the adrenaline. Suddenly I felt the urge to do something, anything, to be productive and get 'er done.

Am I relaxed? Hell no. Am I at peace, am I smiling, am I displaying all those usual signs of happiness? Not at all. Will the faint wrinkles that are developing under my eyes and between my eyebrows be a little bit deeper by April 25? You bet. (Side note: The media would have you believe that there are a good ten years or so between acne and wrinkles. NOT TRUE. Apparently there's this lovely period in your early- to mid-twenties--and perhaps beyond, I haven't gotten there yet--when you notice you have both pimples and little wrinkles. Oh joy.) But is this a "bad" feeling? Do I want to trade in this stress and fear and nervous energy for a life of no worries and eternal "good feelings"? Fuck no! As I said in my last post, my life is fucking awesome--stress, fear and all.

Term papers, BRING IT ON.

Time for an academic smackdown, Courtney and Whitney stylez.

The day it was "that time of year," or why life is awesome and I love you all.

I apologize for being MIA for the past month. I would say, "It's that time of year," but isn't that always the excuse academics give for, well, everything? And I mean, seriously, what exactly is "that time of year"? Yes, March was hectic, it always is--courses are really in full swing, there are presentations and response papers to do, term paper proposals to do, major research project proposals to hand in, marking to do, etc., etc., etc. But April is bad too--marking to finish up and term papers to write. And then there's a conference in May, and research to do for my MRP, and then there's my MRP to write and I'm moving in June (a two bedroom!! My computer won't have to be in the living room! And we get a washing machine!! And a deck!!) and I want to spend some time at the cottage and visit friends and maybe go to Halifax in August and then I start coursework for my PhD in September (I got in!! Yay!)... And September's always hectic, because there's so much to organize and you have to settle in, and then October is busy because you're getting into the swing of things and things start to be due and if you're applying for OGS and SSHRC your applications are due and you probably have your first batch of marking and November is just like March and December is like April and January comes much too soon and it's kind of like September except Christmas break was way too short and way too busy with family and friends and in February you are so ready for a break but reading week is way too short and there's marking to be done and....so it goes.

So yeah. It's that time of year! It's always that time of year. So no excuses. I just had other things I was doing and this fell to the side. But that's okay. I'm tired of complaining about how busy things are at "this time of year" or in "this day and age"--yes, it's true, life is stressful and there is tons going on and we never get a break because we're always plugged in and there's no jobs so we have to stay plugged in or fall behind. But I find it hard to believe that this is the first time in the history of the world that people have been stressed and things haven't been absolutely relaxed and perfect and easy. So I've decided to refuse to embrace the negativity. Too many of my conversations with my friends and colleagues end up being about how busy and stressed and sleep-deprived we are--never about how excited we are about something, or about anything positive or fun. We're breeding anxiety and negativity and it's bumming me out!

But you know what? I think things are going pretty fucking wonderfully. I'm in the process of building a life right now, and I'm pretty pleased with the way things are turning out. I've built a home with Jimmifer, a man I love very, very much (mostly because he lets me call him Jimmifer), and we're upgrading to a home where I hopefully will not get attacked by the soap dish, and we live close enough to our families that we get to see them on a regular basis, which is important to me. I have wonderful old friends that I still keep in touch with, and I've made wonderful new friends this year and I'm excited to spend the summer hanging out with them. I'm almost finished my master's coursework, and I feel like I've developed a strong theoretical foundation, which makes me confident that I can pull off this whole PhD thing. I'm finishing up TAing for the first time, and as much as marking is painful, it is awesome to see how much my students have grown over the year. And my students were just absolutely lovely, and I got wonderful feedback from them, and it feels SO GOOD. I get to spend my summer writing about queer theory and boy bands, which is awesome, and it turns out that apparently boy bands are making a comeback, so hopefully someone will find my work relevant and I can get published. I'm going to my first conference in May. I'm staring my DOCTORATE, which is pretty much all I've ever dreamed of since I started my undergrad. And I'm going to get a kitty at the end of the summer, which is pretty much all I've ever dreamed of since I was four. So yeah. Life is fucking AWESOME.

Like this awesome. For realz.

The day I wrote about bodies again, or why our bodies are not the enemies of our "authentic," inner selves.

As I'm sure many of you have as well (depending on what demographic your computer thinks you belong to, I suppose...), I have seen this ad pop up on various web sites I've visited over the last little while:

Usually the image is accompanied by a flashing line of text proclaiming: "53-year-old woman looks 18!" or something along those lines. Obviously it's ridiculous. Obviously no anti-aging cream is going to be able to scrape your age off and show the inner 18-year-old that was hiding underneath. Obviously this is just one of those absurd ads that pop up when you visit web sites to illegally stream TV shows...at least this is better than the fake Facebook chats with the teenage girls with giant boobs, amiright?

But this image got under my skin. (No pun intended...heh.) The message it conveys is not only that being--or, more specifically, looking like--an aging woman is inappropriate or gross or something that needs to be fixed, but also that underneath our inappropriate, gross bodies is an "ideal" person, a person we can identify with, that's just waiting for us to take control of our unruly bodies and let her out! A divide is created between the body and the person within.

Advertisements and images like these employ the rhetoric of celebrating inner beauty and people's "real," admirable identities, but they paradoxically are still focused solely on physical appearance, and on modifying your physical appearance to match your "authentic self." Old people are told to reveal their inner 20-year-olds, fat people are told to let their inner thin person out, as if their grotesque bodies were hiding their authentic, ideal, heterosexually desirable and properly "controlled" selves somewhere under the soft, deep wrinkles and rolls of fat. This is not teaching us to celebrate our inner selves. This is teaching us to hate our bodies, to fear our desires and appetites and our need to consume, to expand, to expel, to decay and to rot.

We need to talk about what it means to live in a body in a culture that tells us we can rise above our bodies and leave them behind, that we are somehow "better" than our bodies, that if we try hard enough we can modify our bodies to look 20 when we're 53 or to be a 36-24-36 no matter what size we started out at. We need to have this conversation because we can't do these things. And we will fail, our bodies will fail, over and over again.

This is not a post to tell you that you need to come to terms with your body in its "natural" state, that you need to love your body and accept your body as it is and everything will be sunshine and rainbows and we'll all live happily ever after. I was criticized by a few people about my previous post on "body image" and "real" women because they felt that I was suggesting that everyone should find all bodies beautiful all the time. Although I can see where those people were coming from (particularly if they were not differentiating between "finding someone beautiful" and "being sexually attracted to someone," which is a whole other discussion to be had), I am not that idealistic, nor am I against body modification, which is what that interpretation of my argument seems to suggest.  Rather, I think we need to have a more nuanced conversation about body modification, one that finds a middle ground between "do it to let your inner self out!" (or the super individualistic "do it because you want to and no one can tell you your choices are wrong!") and "never ever do it or you'll be a slave to the patriarchy!" We need to open up the floor for a more complex discussion regarding what it means to have a body, to live in a body, to be a body, to find pleasure in a body, in this culture. We are past a point of being able to be wholly "natural," but that doesn't mean we should employ every technology possible to force our bodies into some sort of cultural "ideal." These "ideal selves" are not our ideal bodies; becoming these ideals, or looking like these ideals, if it is even possible, will not make us better, happier human beings. We need to create a space where we can be at home in our bodies, where we can find pleasure in our bodies, where we can be our bodies and not be divided from them. This, in my mind, is not antithetical to body modification, although it does require a new language for talking about body modification, one that isn't centred on "perfecting" the body or disciplining the body to reveal your authentic self. Feminist philosopher Cressida Heyes (whose work gave me the framework to articulate how I was feeling about the image at the beginning of this post) argues in her book Self-Transformations: Foucault, Ethics, and Normalized Bodies that we need an "alternative language for interpreting one’s own body" that doesn't place our "identities" in opposition or competition with our bodies. She advocates for embodied pleasure, for "a way of being in the world that requires active cultivation, against forces that would domesticate and normalize any possibility of experience that deviates from practices usually considered to be the proper sources of happiness or joy," and I am so with her on that.

The day I wrote about boy bands, or why grad school is hard and kittens and celebrities are fun.

As I sit here attempting to write my major research project proposal (it's like a proposal for my master's thesis, but it's called a research project because it's shorter than a thesis...it's just semantics), I keep catching myself devaluing my own research topic, and I feel like that's really detrimental to this process. You see, I'm writing about boy bands. And that's usually how I present my research interests to people: "I write about boy bands!" And then I wonder why people don't take cultural studies seriously, when clearly I don't. I don't bother to tell anyone the context in which I'm researching boy bands, nor do I even explain WHY I'm researching boy bands. I suppose you could call it's self-preservation... If I don't admit that my research is actually grounded in anything serious, then no one expects anything of me. Set the bar low, then you can't fail, right? Plus then I don't have to actually try and "talk smart"--I don't have to talk about critical theory out loud, I can just hide in my apartment with stacks of books around me and write about theory there and never tell anyone. Because if I don't tell anyone, no one can judge me.

But now I have to write this proposal...which has to explain to other people why the hell I'm doing this. And I find myself doing the opposite of what I was doing before. I know, deep down, that I'm not doing this for silly reasons. But I keep making these bizarre qualifications, like that "the queer potential of boy bands is not an excuse to celebrate them" or something along those lines. Which, I mean, is a fair point, I suppose--I'm not arguing that everyone needs to love boy bands immediately because they're the best thing ever. But is that ever anyone's argument in an academic context? People writing about Judith Butler or Derrida or, I don't know, George Orwell are sitting there thinking OMG HOW CAN I MAKE SURE PEOPLE KNOW THAT I'M NOT JUST SOME HUGE FAN AND THAT I ACTUALLY HAVE SOMETHING IMPORTANT TO SAY. Because like seriously? Do people ever write about things they don't enjoy? C'mon, you know y'all are fans of Judith Butler. I am. (Okay, I've never said "y'all" before in my life. I'm from Ontario, not Texas.) And the nature of writing about anything you like in an academic context is, sure, you praise it when it deserves it, but you deconstruct it. You critique it when it deserves it, too. Obviously I am not just writing: "Boy bands are cool because gay boys and straight girls love them and everything gay boys and straight girls do on their own is awesome because they're both marginalized in a sexist, homophobic society. Yay!"

 If you'll allow me to analyze my own behaviour for a moment (not that I'm really asking--I'll write this whether you want me to or not! Muahaha...and they said the Internet would be a democratic space...), I think the reasons behind my attempts to defend (or avoid speaking about) my research are twofold. First of all, despite all of the changes in academia within the past few decades, particularly with the rise of cultural studies, popular culture is still not "serious" enough. For all the talk about not condemning people for having "mainstream" tastes, academics sure like to talk about how obscure and artsy their tastes are and how informed they are about things taking place outside the mainstream. Sure, that's a huge generalization, but as Carl Wilson argues in his book Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste (it's about his allergic reaction to Celine Dion), people's cultural capital nowadays depends on their ability to be a cultural omnivore. You need to be able to discuss Buffy or Dr. Who or Lost or Community as well as independent films and documentaries and local bands and also have a working knowledge of classic literature and classical music and Renaissance painting. And if you can only discuss the first bit...the "pop culture" stuff...well, you might just be "mainstream." Now I feel like I'm critiquing hipsters, not academics. But I feel like in both categories, similar feelings manifest themselves in somewhat different ways.

And here's the big catch, that leads to my second point: Never should you discuss Gossip Girl or Justin Bieber or Friends with Benefits or Confessions of a Shopaholic. (Disclaimer: I love GG, I like Justin Bieber, I saw Friends with Benefits and I read Shopaholic but it made me want to shoot someone. Not that that means you can't like it.) Regardless of what other shows you watch or bands you know, this is cultural suicide. And yeah, boy bands fit into this category. And you wanna know why? I'm sure there's a long, complex answer I could give, but the gist of it is this: Because that stuff's for girls. And by girls, I specifically mean girls, not women (despite the fact that our culture seems to think it's totally appropriate to call any woman, regardless of her age, a girl--that's not infantilizing at all, is it?). As Diane Railton argues in her essay "The gendered carnival of pop," pop music

is temporally bounded, seen only as a fitting taste for very young women. The pleasures of 'pop' are something that we must learn to grow out of.... [And it] is not only the music that must be left behind, but the physical, the sexual, in the music. The feminine in music must be abandoned as women grow up. It is only permissible for girls and young women. (2001: 330)

And this is why, Railton argues, pop music is not a threat to "real" music, and therefore will never be considered "serious," as a pastime or as an academic subject:

The carnivaleque of pop can provide no real challenge to the masculine world of popular music [meaning rock music or rap or anything popular that is marketed to and enjoyed by men] until it becomes acceptable not to grow out of 'pop pap music,' but to carry its pleasures with us into adult life. (2001: 330)

So this is what I'm up against, y'all. (There, I said it again. I DON'T TALK LIKE THIS IN REAL LIFE. The voice in my head is apparently some sort of combination of a Southern girl and a Valley girl.) And then there's the whole feminist argument that the third-wave tendency to praise anything that's girly just to elevate "girly" to the same status as "boy-y" (or, you know, masculine) is kind of useless because it's not critiquing the "girly," it's just putting it on a pedestal. Which is totally a fair point. So, it's a struggle. And I mean, really...I do understand, to a certain degree, why people might balk when they hear I'm researching people who dressed like this:

Like, seriously, Justin? This makes the fedora obsession look normal.

Anyway, if you are having similar struggles to me, know you're not alone! Here are two other posts I've come across from women experiencing some of the same issues: Maria Bustillos on romance fiction and Chloe Angyal on romantic comedies.

Also, I've found that looking at pictures of cats up for adoption in local shelters is very therapeutic. If you're in my area, look! and look! I want one but Jimmifer says I can't have one until we move into a bigger place. Which is probably a good idea because I don't want to have a litter box in my kitchen. And my kitchen is sort of in my office/living room. *Sigh*

Also, another exciting distraction is Suri's Burn Book (a Tumblr dedicated to all of the celebrity children who "disappoint" Suri Cruise) because it's awful and mean and vapid and who does not love a five-year-old that can pull off this much attitude:

this much poise:

and these shoes:

The girl is a force to be reckoned with.

Reading week needs to end. I cannot be left alone in this apartment to do work any longer.

The day I declare all women BEAUTIFUL, or why YOU are beautiful, full stop.

So here's the thing. This picture that's been circulating around Facebook...

...is BULLSHIT. (When did this become a blog about shitty pictures that get spread around Facebook? Oh well. I'll roll with it.) I know that not everyone who has posted this has been all "OMG THIS IS SO EFFING TRUE LOVE YOUR BODY <33333333" and that many people have used it as a jumping-off point for more critical discussion about fat shaming and such, so if you did post this, please don't think that I'm personally criticizing you. I just felt the need to jump in on this discussion. Because I get that SOME PARTS of this message need to get out there. I understand that Western society needs to understand that the average woman is a size 16, not between a size 4 and 12, and it is absolutely absurd that the fashion industry continues to dismiss the majority of women by employing "plus-size" models that are, in actuality, smaller than the average woman, and relegating women's clothing over a size 12 to speciality "plus-size" stores, meaning that most women cannot shop in "regular" stores. And that is absolute bullshit.

However, other parts of the message promoted by this image are EXTREMELY problematic. First of all, it kind of seems to be promoting the idea to women that it's okay to be a little bit bigger than your "ideal" size because men are okay with it. I'm sorry, did I miss the meeting where we decided that men get a say in how women feel about their bodies? 'Cause I'm not on board. My confidence in my body will NOT depend on whether on not the majority of dudes think I'm fuckable.

Second, putting aside the  dress sizes of these women for a moment, all three of these women fit conventional Western beauty norms. Long hair (windblown, too!), clear skin, no body hair, no cellulite, no wrinkles...and it appears as if all of their breast-waist-hip ratios fit the so-called ideal. Note that on the size 16 model, her waist is noticeably narrower than her hips, and her breasts stick out much more than her stomach. As one Facebook commenter astutely pointed out: "I actually think they're all beautiful - and I don't think that EVERYONE's beautiful." My point exactly. What if the "national average" woman had smaller breasts? What if she carried her weight more in her stomach area than in her breasts, hips and butt? What if you could see cellulite on her thighs? What if she hadn't shaved her legs or pubic area? What if she shaved her head? What if she had a unibrow? What if she had visible scarring? What if she had acne? What if the skin on her arms sagged, what if her breasts sagged, what if she was wrinkled? What if she was over thirty? What if her skin was darker? Would you still fill the comments section under this photo on Facebook with "OMG SHE'S NOT FAT SHE'S SO BEAUTIFUL!" She's beautiful because her appearance fits our cultural understanding of beautiful--and that does not include being fat, hence the tendency to say, "she's not fat, she beautiful," as if the two were antithetical. Hey, guess what--saying, "she's not fat, she's beautiful," is STILL FAT SHAMING because you're saying that if she were fat, she would NO LONGER BE BEAUTIFUL.

This leads me to my third point: the largest woman in this picture is only the (American, I'm assuming) NATIONAL AVERAGE. Which means that a large percentage of the population is bigger than the woman on the right. What about those women? They're not "ideal" nor "average" and therefore they are left out of the conversation? There are beautiful size 18, size 20, size 24 and beyond women. But we cannot talk about that because then we'd be forced to admit that women CAN be beautiful AND fat. Because, guess what--some women ARE fat. And that's fine. And that's beautiful. But this photo, like most of our conversations about body image and body acceptance, refuses to go there. And that's a problem.

My fourth and final point is that while this photo does open up the discussion around "average"/"plus-size" women's beauty, it also opens up a space to critique the bodies of women who fall into the size-8-and-below category. One commenter explicitly said, "I would NOT want to look like the chick on the left." That's totally fine--I don't want to look like someone that's not me either--but the implication is that she looks sickly, she's unattractive, she's anorexic, she's not a "real" woman because "real women have curves" or whatever. I am not trying to suggest here that the positive body image movement (or whatever you want to call it) is like "reverse fat shaming" or anything ridiculous like that. That would be like claiming that because I'm a Hanson fan I understand what it's like to be the victim of homophobia because when I "come out" to people as a Hanson fan I am usually openly criticized for my preferences and asked a bunch of idiotic questions about why I like them and whether or not I'm sure I like them and that it's not just some side effect of a childhood trauma that has made me incapable of maturing past Hanson fandom. (I have to admit, I went to a Hanson concert last night--but creative analogy, right?) Queer-identified people are faced with systemic oppression and homophobia, whereas Hanson fans are ridiculed but it has no lasting impact on their lives nor does it inhibit their access to any aspect of daily life. Similarly, fat women are faced with a lovely combination of fat-shaming and misogyny, whereas thin women have a lot of thin privilege, and when other women criticize them or call them "anorexic" or tell them to "eat a burger," it may hurt, but it does not limit their access to, well, anything, really. Being too small to shop in "plus-size" stores is not a systemic issue. However, it is still problematic to open up a space where insulting thin women for being thin is acceptable and it is highly problematic to suggest that any woman is not a "real" woman. For more on this topic, go here and read Kate Bartolotta's take on this (she actually looks at another hugely problematic photo that's been circulating around Facebook lately and that more explicitly insults skinny women). And I'm serious. Go read it. I just spent like 15 minutes looking through my browser history to find that link. Anyway, this photo should NOT be used as an excuse to tell any woman that she is not real or that her body is somehow offending those attempting to cultivate positive body image. A woman's confidence in her own body should not come about comparatively--whether it's comparing her body to the national average, to what men deem fuckable, or to what other women's bodies look like. And keep in mind what I said earlier--all of the women in this photo fit OTHER standards of beauty. The woman on the left is conventionally attractive in ways that other skinny/thin women are not. Also, she is quite tall, so she is much thinner than most women who fit into the size 4 to 8 category (I doubt this was an accident--the taller she is, the skinnier and more "sickly" a size 4 to 8 looks). Not that I am suggesting that this is a problem--she is beautiful. The message is not.

The day I defended our grammatical right to choose, or why people need to stop arguing about the Oxford comma.

You know what I am SUPER sick of? THIS PICTURE:

I appreciate its humour. I really do. The bottom picture? HILAIR. (Okay, I've never said "hilair" before in my life. It felt weird.)

WAIT. WAIT. Do you want to know what I just did? I was seriously IN THE MIDDLE of writing a works cited page for a response paper I was working on...like all it says right now is:

Works Cited  

Freeman, Elizabeth. Time Binds

That's not even the full title!! And I have the book open on my lap as if I'm going to get the rest of the information out of it but I HAVEN'T DONE IT. How did I end up here writing about strippers and Oxford commas? Let's try this again.

Okay. Works cited done. Back to the commas and the strippers. I am not sick of this picture because it's not funny. And I'm sick of it only partially because it's been circulating for like a year or so now and it still pops up in my news feed every once in a while and people are all like "LOLOLOLOLOL punctuation is funny" and I'm all like SERIOUSLY AM I THE ONLY ONE WHO HAS SEEN THIS 900 TIMES? STOP LAUGHING. AND ALSO I'VE BEEN TRYING TO CONVINCE PEOPLE TO PAY ATTENTION TO PUNCTUATION MY ENTIRE LIFE AND THIS IS WHAT IT TOOK TO GET YOU TO PAY ATTENTION? DEAD WORLD LEADERS IN LINGERIE?

The real reason I'm sick of this picture is because people use it as an excuse to get into a Facebook photo comments debate about the Oxford comma. First of all, debates should just not take place there. Too many people get too many notifications they don't want and inevitably the conversation turns into one person saying "I CAN'T TRUST YOU BECAUSE YOU SPELLED SOMETHING WRONG" and the other person responding "ONLY PRETENSHUS DOUCHEBAGS CORRECT SPELLING ON FACEBOOK," which is hilarious in this instance because the entire argument was about a comma in the first place and also they spelled "pretentious" wrong because only pretentious people know how to spell that. Second of all, THIS DEBATE IS STUPID. Yes, there are instances where the Oxford comma clears up possible misunderstandings, like when you're inviting the strippers, JFK and Stalin somewhere, or when you're having eggs, toast and orange juice for breakfast. (Is the orange juice on the toast or alongside it?!?! What?!?! How can I tell?!?! THINK ABOUT IT, YOU KNOB!) But you know what? Sometimes the Oxford comma is the CAUSE of these misunderstandings. What if I write: "We invited JFK, the stripper, and Stalin"? OMG THAT SOUNDS LIKE JFK IS A STRIPPER. I'm so funny.

So here's the deal. Sometimes using the Oxford comma can cause problems, and sometimes not using the Oxford comma can cause problems. And sometimes these problems are funny! And we should totally giggle about them! But using the Oxford comma (or not) is a stylistic choice. Neither way is right or wrong. If you're following a specific style guide, check with that style guide to see if they use it or not and then do what the style guide says. As Jeff Deck and Benjamin D. Henson point out in The Great Typo Hunt, the Associated Press style guide eliminates "anything deemed unnecessary for communicating an idea," including the Oxford (or serial) comma (81). (LOOK. I cited it. That's how professional I'm being about this.) From what I remember about copy editing for my undergraduate student newspaper, the Canadian Press style guide doesn't use the Oxford comma either. I have just consulted my copy of the seventh edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers and apparently MLA uses the Oxford comma (67), although I don't. Here is what Lynne Truss has to say about it in her book Eats, Shoot and Leaves:

See that comma-shaped shark fin ominously slicing through the waves in this direction? Hear that staccato cello? Well, start waving and yelling, because it is the so-called Oxford comma (also known as the serial comma) and it is a lot more dangerous than its exclusive, ivory-tower moniker might suggest. There are people who embrace the Oxford comma and people who don't, and I'll just say this: never get between these people when drink has been taken. Oh, the Oxford comma..... In Britain, where standard usage is to leave it out, there are those who put it in--including, interestingly, Fowler's Modern English Usage. In America, conversely, where standard usage is to leave it in, there are those who make a point of removing it (especially journalists).... My own feeling is that one shouldn't be too rigid about the Oxford comma. Sometimes the sentence is improved by including it; sometimes it isn't. (84-85)

The woman, who calls herself a stickler and was berated by many (including Deck and Henson) for being too strict with the rules, says it doesn't matter.

So I don't care what you have to say about it. I refuse to argue with you about it. You can use it, or you can leave it out. It's a stylistic choice. And I believe in your right to choose to make your sentences as clear or as opaque as you like. If you want people to think your mother is a pirate, go ahead and write, "I invited my mother, a pirate, and my high school English teacher." (Regardless of whether or not your mother is the pirate, this sounds like a fascinating get-together.) Please respect others' right to make this choice.

The (soon-to-be) Master has spoken. Get over it.

In other news, this video is HILAIR. No strippers. No commas! Just one word.

The day I finally wrote about blogging and resistance, or why (despite how bleak things seem) all hope is not lost.

So I promised in my last post that I would talk about blogging and resistance. And I will. Right now. This is a terrible introduction and I'm not sure how to transition to my point now. I'm just going to do it.

This term, the mandatory cultural studies and critical theory course is focused on the theme of resistance. And, consequently, I've been thinking a lot about the practicalities of resistance--how can we productively resist? Are there forms of productive resistance that do not involve putting my life and body in danger? If I'm not putting my life as I know it in danger, then am I using my privilege as a crutch? Am I not resisting my own privilege...and if not, how can I productively resist anything? And then, of course, there's the other side of that--if I am in a place where I do not have the privilege to put my life on the line (and by life I mean literal life, as in beating heart and breathing and all that, but also my lifestyle and the realities of my day-to-day life), am I denied the privilege to resist? And should I then be focusing on resisting a system that does not allow equal access to resistance? But what does "resistance" even mean? Is all resistance created equal? Is resistance to gay marriage equal to the resistance to capitalism and neoliberalism demonstrated by the Occupy Wall Street protesters? And how useful is it for me to be sitting here contemplating resistance and the different forms of resistance when I could be out there (wherever there is...I have a feeling it's in that pesky "real world" that I keep having trouble locating...) resisting something? But why should I resist something just for the sake of resisting something?

"Resist" doesn't look like a word anymore.

There's this idea that the Internet represents this open, democratic space--perfect for resistance of all kinds! (No, I'm not going to cite my sources on that one. This is a blog, not an academic paper, and I'm going to milk that for all it's worth. So no citations! HA! You're just going to have to trust me that this idea exists.) And while to some extent I agree with this, because, as this blog proves, anyone can pretty much publish anything they want for free on the Internet, there's still a problem of access. And I don't just mean that there are people who don't have computers or wi-fi or whatever (while that is true). I mean that not all web pages can be found. I mean that powerful companies can purchase "space" on the Internet--not literal space, but highly visible spots on Google's search results and things like that. You can buy visibility online--with money and/or time. I say time because I know there are a lot of really popular blogs and personal sites out there that barely cost any money, but they require a ton of dedication, and most people (myself included) do not have that kind of time.

Sure, with my little blog I have a bit of influence--the 100 or so people who read it are subjected to my opinions and maybe take something from them. But that's an incredibly small portion of the population, and I won't really be able to raise that number unless I dedicate my time to increasing my online visibility. And even then, only certain people, people who are "predisposed" to my kind of thinking, will be the ones that read it. Last week in class, a fellow student showed the following video as part of a presentation. It's a TED talk by Eli Pariser about how Google and Facebook and others are tailoring what you see online--and while they're giving you what you supposedly want, they're also filtering out the other side of the story.

Thanks for this, Shaun!

So things are looking pretty bleak. Maybe blogging is not the be-all end-all of resistance it was once thought to be. (Again, I'm not citing that. I've just decided that's what it was once thought to be. Deal with it.) But then I start thinking about three of the blogs I read for fun, which are incredibly popular and widely read. These are blogs that aren't political by any means--they're funny and entertaining, focused mostly on the ridiculousness of everyday life. And yet, there is a resistant element to all of these blogs. At one time or another, the women who write these three blogs that I'm talking about have spoken out about, and resisted the stigma against, mental illness.

via Hyperbole and a Half

On Hyperbole and a Half, Allie openly discusses her adventures with depression. On The Bloggess, Jenny writes about her personal battle with depression and self-harm. (And Jenny started the silver ribbon campaign to raise awareness about self-harm that took over Twitter a few weeks ago!) On Nicole is Better, Nicole Antoinette talks about depression and her time "in the hole" eating candy canes in the dark--and her support system that pulled her back out. And I think this is incredibly powerful. The visibility that these women have in the blogosphere is incredible, and, I would argue, widespread--they're not stuck with a particular political audience, because these are personal blogs. They're resisting the idea that real, personal lives aren't affected by mental illness and ableism. And the fact that they are willing to speak out, to resist, is mindblowing. Kudos, ladies! You help me keep believing :)

The day I didn't shower but posted pictures of myself anyway, or why I feel qualified to give Lorelai Gilmore parenting advice.

So I intended to post something new over the weekend, but clearly that did not happen. I had a whole plan! On Saturday I was going to get a ton of school work done and then Sunday I would write a blog post and then relax. But then I got sick. It was like a cold on steroids. There were the regular cold symptoms and then there was this pressure in my sinuses and this shooting pain behind my eyes that made doing pretty much anything besides drinking echinacea tea and watching Gilmore Girls incredibly painful and dizzy-ing. But I'm feeling much better now! Apparently echinacea tea and Gilmore Girls is the miracle cure. I'm thinking it had more to do with the Gilmore Girls, though...

Seriously, though, I have a question for all the hardcore Gilmore Girls fans out there. How pissed does the beginning of the sixth season make you?!?! I try so hard to be happy for Luke and Lorelai because they're engaged and everything but I can't help fixating on the fact that Lorelai is supposed to be the coolest mom ever and she TOTALLY BLEW IT. I know that it's incredibly annoying when people who don't have children start criticizing other people's parenting skills, but Lorelai is not real, so I feel like this should be considered an exception to the rule. So for those of you not in the loop (and for some reason still reading...), Lorelai's daughter Rory gets torn apart by her boyfriend's family (not literally), then hired as an intern at her boyfriend's father's newspaper, then torn apart for her performance there (again, not literally) which is terribly depressing because all Rory ever wanted in life was to be a journalist, then she (literally) steals a yacht with her boyfriend and gets arrested and then she decides to take some time off from school. Now, after all of that, Lorelai decides to REFUSE TO SPEAK TO HER DAUGHTER because...wait for it......................she's taking time off of school. No, not because SHE STOLE A YACHT, but because she's taking time off of school. And apparently really smart people like Rory never take time off or question what they want to do with their lives or anything silly like that. And then Rory's grandfather realizes that Rory is throwing her life away because she's working for the DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) while she's out of school which, again, is completely ridiculous, because the girl is 20 and she's organizing huge charity events and stuff and that shit is really hard and really what boggled my mind more was the fact that politically progressive Rory decided to raise money for the soldiers in Iraq and didn't, you know, mention the fact that she likely does not support the war in Iraq. I mean, I'm sure she supports the individual soldiers, but donating mass amounts of money to the war in Iraq doesn't really seem like a Rory thing to do. Well, except for the fact that unlike her mother, who I usually adore, Rory is a total pushover. Except at the very end of the series. Did you know she goes off and follows OBAMA'S PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN? The first one, not this one. The show's over. Anyway, that's how awesome she is. And ANYWAY, I think it's really shitty parenting when you refuse to support your child when he/she takes a path that is only slightly different from the one you intended for her. Also, seriously, don't live vicariously through your child. Just because you, Lorelai Gilmore, didn't get to graduate from high school and go to college does not mean you should force your daughter to push her way through the education system at top speed if she doesn't want to. And keep in mind that I'm a grad student--one that's never taken ANY time off from school since I started kindergarten--and I'm saying that it's totally cool and normal and probably a good idea to take time off if you feel like you need it. I think that open-minded-ness on my part cancels out the whole unsolicited-parenting-advice-from-someone-with-no-kids thing.

Okay, Gilmore Girls rant over. And yes, for those of you who were wondering, I am aware that these people are fictional, okay? Don't judge me. I don't judge all you people when you rant for HOURS about Harry Potter. Okay, I do. But there's a lot more of you than there are of me!

Anyway, Thursday is my birthday (yay! I love birthdays!) and my parents came to visit me on Sunday night to celebrate. And they brought me one of my most awesome-est SWAGmas presents that I accidentally left behind.

Check it out:

Okay, so I haven't showered today. NO JUDGING. We've been through this already. Stop judging me. Anyway, it's a SWAGmas mug!!! Look at all the SWAG!!!!! And it's like nine kinds of offensive and I get that but I think swag by nature is offensive and I don't really care right now because I don't feel like caring and it's my birthday so again: don't judge me.

I actually did get a birthday present too, but it was underwear and I'm totally not posting pictures of my underwear online. Although I did open the present at a restaurant and I have to say that despite my general open-minded-ness about underclothing and other things, underwear does not belong on the dinner table. It's weird.

Anyway, I had every intention of talking about something smart today and I DO have something intelligent to say about blogging and resistance but honestly I don't have time because I was sick with the cold on steroids and now I'm really behind on my readings and I have to lead a seminar discussion on Friday and go to a professionalization seminar on academic publishing tomorrow and I want to actually have time to celebrate my birthday on Thursday because I effing love birthdays and I love mine even more this year because I'm not old! I realize that sounds counterintuitive but for YEARS I was one of the oldest out of my friends...not only am I a January baby, but Jimmifer is a year and a half younger than me and for some reason he made friends with a bunch of people even younger than him so now a bunch of my really good friends are more than two years younger than me which makes me feel OLD but due to the whole trend of people taking time off from school (see, Lorelai? It's totally normal and acceptable!), a lot of people in grad school are older than me. Especially the PhD students, because barring any child-genius thing, they have to be older than me. Anyway, now 23 doesn't seem so old. And I'm excited. And I need to go read. Ta-ta for now!

The day of family bonding, or why looking like Jimand isn't the only reason I should spend time with him.

So I had one of those experiences over the holidays where I became a REAL BLOGGER. Something happened when I was with my family, and Jimand said, "You're going to blog about this, aren't you?" And I was like MUAHAHAHA YES I AM. I AM A BLOGGER AND WILL UNABASHEDLY USE YOUR REAL LIFE AS STORY FODDER. (Sidenote: you know what's great? The word "fodder." Fodder fodder fodder.) Anyway, back to the story. For Christmas, my aunt made this slideshow of family Christmas photos--kind of like the ghost of Christmas past, except happy. Anyway, I spent Christmas Day with Jimmifer's family, so I didn't see the slideshow with the rest of my family. So one evening my mom (Mad) decided to show it to Jimmifer and me, despite the fact that Jimand said we wouldn't want to see it (foreshadowing! FORESHADOWING!) So we're watching the slideshow and it's a cute and funny trip down memory lane...and then. And then. And then there appears this picture of Jimand and his siblings sitting around their Christmas tree as children. Jimand, the oldest, is about fifteen or so and has this long hair, probably just longer than shoulder-length. Kind of the same length my hair is now. And holy shit. HOLY SHIT. People have told me my entire life that I looked like Jimand. I'm sure most of you have been told you look like someone in your family before, but you never really see it for yourself, right? But this picture...I looked at Jimand, and I saw me. I got slapped in the face with a good ol' dose of HOLY FUCK I LOOK LIKE MY DAD.

Jimand seems to think I was completely traumatized by this event, which I'm fairly certain he takes as an insult (okay, who wouldn't?), and Mad seems to think that now I'm going to grow up and look like a man. Thanks, mommy dearest.

Anyway, this event, and the spirit of the holiday season in general, got me thinking a lot about family, and what family is and what it means and if there is even a remotely easy answer to these questions that doesn't devolve into some abstract nature versus nurture debate that I am so not equipped to deal with. Anyway, for a lot of us, the past few weeks were a time for "family." But what does that mean? Clearly not all of us spend this family time in the same way. In fact, I spent my "family time" with four different variations of "family" over the holidays. Maybe you could make an argument for five. Or actually six. And that doesn't even cover everyone that is a close blood relative of mine, and that does cover a number of people I am not *technically* related to.

There has been so much talk in North American politics in recent years--and pretty much ever since feminist backlash and gay rights backlash and *insert progressive movement here* backlash has existed, which is like FOREVER--about preserving the "family" and doing what good for the "family" and making sure "families" can be economically self-sufficient, but I'm still unsure what this "family" looks like. I mean, I assume we're talking "traditional" families here--you know, heterosexual couple with two and three-quarters kids or whatever that live in a suburban home all by themselves, just the 4.75 of them. And this preservation of "tradition" is complete bullshit to me and I have so much I could say about how this is clearly homophobic and also classist and racist and sexist (I mean, it's not NECESSARILY sexist but this preservation of the "traditional family" usually requires a mom that stays at home for at least a few years or at the very least expects the family to follow certain traditional gender roles and it's cool if that's what you WANT to do but it's kind of forced on people sooo yeah...sexist) and ableist and pretty much everything else. I admit I spent a considerable amount of time on Saturday night ranting about how the NHL's practice of inviting the team's fathers to go on a trip with the team to an away game is just reinforcing the idea that if your family doesn't fit the traditional idea of what a family is then you're not "normal" and you have to "come out" about why your family isn't the way it "should be." There may have been red wine and ouzo involved in this rant, but still. (NOT mixed together!!! Ew. Ew ew ew.)

However, this isn't specifically what I wanted to talk about. What I've been thinking about is how "family" doesn't even mean what we're told it means WITHIN these so-called traditional families. And about how we try to figure out what our own roles are within our families. Because I've noticed a lot of stuff. I can't speak from experience on what it's like to have a family that doesn't look "normal." (I know pretty much all of my relatives just burst out laughing right now, but I don't mean normal in THAT way--trust me, I've noticed the lack of normalcy--I mean STRUCTURALLY normal. I'm not so maladjusted that I don't recognize batshit crazy when I see it.) My family, particularly my immediate family, is more or less traditional in structure. Jimand and Mad are a cisgendered, heterosexual couple and they were officially married in a church and they bought a home in the suburbs and then had a kid (ME!) and Jimand continued to work full time and Mad stayed home with me for about 10 years before going back to work. And both Jimand and Mad came from fairly similar family structures, with some variations and also quite a few more children. And our little three-person family is awesome. And we see each other a lot, because we're buddies like that (even when Jimand retroactively causes childhood trauma), but that isn't all our family is--we're not some sort of self-sufficient unit. Over the past six years, we've expanded our family and let Jimmifer in, to the point where Jimand mentioned Jimmifer in his retirement speech and my parents get Christmas cards addressed to the four of us and Jimand even buys Jimmifer groceries when we come home to visit...and, come to think of it, he has routinely bought Jimmifer iced tea and orange juice and forgot to buy ME anything...most people aren't aware that when you're an only child, you're still not always the favourite. BEWARE, ONLY CHILDREN. Your partner may replace you in your parents' eyes.

What I understand to be my "family" has entered a sort of grey area. Are Jimmifer and I "family"? Technically, we're not married. But we live together and go to pretty much every family event together and have for years. So is his extended family my family now too? Is your family defined by who you spend the holidays and special occasions with? Like I mentioned previously, that means I have six different families. I think a lot of people would agree that Jimand and Mad and my aunts and uncles and cousins are definitely my family, and Jimmifer's family probably is too at this point. But what about my super awesome friend whom I see only a few times a year (due to geographical and financial issues) but whom I saw nearly every day over the holidays? (Did I use "whom" properly? I always have issues with "who" and "whom"...) I helped her family decorate their Christmas tree and spent the night of Christmas Day with them too. Is she my family? And what about Jimmifer's very tight-nit group of friends from back home? I would argue that they are loyal like a family, they argue like a family and they welcome Jimmifer and I back home every time we visit just like a family would (or should, I suppose). Are they our family? And what about Jimand's best friend and his family? I've known them my entire life and have probably actually spent more time with them than with my *real* family. I realize that's only five. I was separating Jimand's relatives from Mad's relatives because we saw them at different times.

But I think a lot people would still argue that our blood relatives (and those blood relatives we inherit through marriage and other committed partnerships) should still be privileged over friends who we choose as our family. And I don't one hundred per cent disagree, but I'm still not sure. Now here's my nature/nurture confusion. Do we spend time with our families because we're actually genetically connected in some way? How much are we REALLY like our families? Sure, clearly I look a lot like Jimand, and it's funny when I hug my cousin on Mad's side because we have pretty much the EXACT same bodies, so it's like hugging ourselves, but does that mean we're REALLY alike? Or just physically alike? A lot of the time, I find various members of my family grasping at straws, attempting to find things we have in common. Sometimes, I think they probably have a point. Other times...well, let's just say that I'm not so sure that a fondness for salami and dijon mustard sandwiches is something that was passed down from Jimand's ancestors. It MAY have something to do with the fact that everyone on that side of the family grew up eating it together... And sometimes, we end up finding out that things "the family" has in common cross those blood lines. What about when Jimand has something in common with Mad's brother's kids? Or when I have something in common with Jimand's sister's husband? We all look kind of stumped when that happens. Flabbergasted, even! (Okay, no we don't, I just wanted to say "flabbergasted.") But really, do we NEED to validate our relationships with our various family members with some sort of genetic connection? Do we NEED to create some sort of "family obligation" out of these blood ties in order to still see one another?

Instead, let's say:

Hey, I want to continue spending holidays and other occasions with you, because you have been an important part of my life, and you were there as I grew up (or maybe I was there as you grew up), and I want to continue to know you and be there for you. And we have a lot of overlapping memories and stories--even if we weren't actually, we've all heard the same stories about 'back in the day.' But you know what, due to geographical or generational or whatever issues, it's not realistic that we're going to spend ALL our time together, so a handful of times a year is good, and I also want to expand my 'family' to include other people I love and want to share my life experiences with, even if we have no genetic connection. Sure, as a *real* family, we may all like the same movies or sandwiches or beer, but I also have this habit of buying the same clothes as one of my best friends, despite the fact that we live really far away from each and never really shop together. So I don't know which is 'nature' and which is 'nurture,' and I don't care. We have important, and less important, stuff in common. And I love that. I need that.

I love my family, in all its various forms, and I love spending time with them. ALL of them. The ones I picked, and the ones I didn't.

Either way...I LOOK LIKE JIMAND. WTF. (The picture isn't Jimand. I just included it because it was relevant to the theme of this post and Jimand quotes that song. Don't worry.)

UPDATED! (January 12, 2012)

Here is the photo I was talking about, provided by my lovely aunt:

So that's Jimand, by the Christmas tree. And here's me, looking like a Christmas tree:

DO YOU SEE WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT. YES. Yes you do. Because it's impossible to miss.

The day I was feminist enough, or why refreshing, rethinking and redefining feminism can be a disaster or it can be AWESOME.

So I was going to write a post about family and the holidays and all that stuff as my first post back from vacation but then last night I stumbled upon this website and I decided to write about it instead.

The website is called "I'm Feminist Enough..." and it currently features three videos of women finishing that sentence. Like "I'm feminist enough not to judge other women" or "I'm feminist enough to  paint my nails before I go camping." Shannon Washington, the creator of the site, was inspired (or provoked) by Beyonce's comment in an interview sometime in 2011. When asked if she was a feminist, Beyonce said:

I don’t really feel that it’s necessary to define it. It’s just something that’s kind of natural for me, and I feel like…you know…it’s, like, what I live for.... I need to find a catchy new word for feminism, right? Like Bootylicious.

Washington found this rather troubling. What's wrong with feminism? But Washington says that for "many women of color, especially young women, the word 'feminist' provokes an image that is antiquated, overtly-aggressive, anti-male and white." (You have NO IDEA how much it pains me to write "color" instead of "colour" when I'm quoting someone American.) But, uh, to me, "bootylicious" provokes a highly sexualized image of women. Something new and different! (That was sarcasm...) So Washington decided that it was time to rethink and refresh feminism, specifically for women of colour. (HA. Spelled it my way. Paraphrasing is super cool.) And thus "I'm Feminist Enough..." was born! Washington writes:

Using video and still imagery, the 'I’m Feminist Enough…' project seeks to visualize the fresh face of feminism and demonstrate to our young sisters (and brothers) the value of feminist thought in our daily lives in a manner that is simple, sexy, modern and easy. Yes, you can be a feminist but get a kick out having the door held open for you. These actions don’t define your place as a woman, you do.

Awesome. But this isn't just a post advertising this site (although it kind of is...). I have some thoughts about it.

Obviously, I am not a woman of colour (well, actually I suppose that wasn't obvious until right now since you can't see me...), and I want to start by saying that in no way am I attempting to speak on behalf of anyone else. Feminism has not always been kind of women of colour, and it still isn't (remember some of the incidents at Slutwalk?), and I acknowledge that and in no way want to excuse that. However, I do want to think about what feminism means and what movements like this one that "refresh" feminism are doing. This website sparked ideas that I've been thinking about for a long time, so I'm taking my ideas and running with them, but I do not mean to erase the really fucking important shit that Washington is addressing when she talks about redefining feminism for women of colour. 

So I think I could look at this "I'm Feminist Enough..." movement one of two ways. First of all, the cynical way. I could say that these videos are promoting the idea that as long as a woman (or man or anyone else) calls herself a "feminist," then everything she does, from shaving her head to paying her own bills to running a company to painting her nails before going on a camping trip, is a feminist or radical act. And I have a problem with that. Because unless you discover some radical, transgressive way to paint your nails, painting them is not really a feminist act in the sense that it is furthering the cause of feminism. It may be a feminist act in the literal sense that a feminist is doing it. But painting your nails is conforming to the patriarchal definition of femininity. (I don't really know where it started, but my guess is women weren't just born with this natural urge to have pink nails.) BUT. BUT. NO. Don't yell at me and tell me that you are not brainwashed just because you paint your nails. I KNOW THIS. I paint my nails too. (Sometimes. I have really long hard nails and therefore I use them as tools to open things and stuff so they chip really fast and it's annoying. But I paint my toenails a lot.) So yeah. I have a problem when people say that everything a woman does is a feminist act just because she's a woman so obviously she believes in her own equality so if she wants to get breast implants THEY'RE FEMINIST BREAST IMPLANTS BECAUSE NO MAN PHYSICALLY MADE HER DO IT. Uhhh...riiiiiiight. Because in no way are we taught from birth that breasts are purely sex toys for men. That's not something we grew up hearing AT ALL. That's why breastfeeding in public is not an issue at all! Because we haven't overly sexualized breasts! They're totally neutral vessels of baby food! And risking your life to make them bigger and likely also completely ineffective as vessels of baby food has NOTHING TO DO WITH MEN OR SEXISM AT ALL. (Sidenote: I am not saying that all women need to use their breasts as vessels of baby food and that if you don't procreate and breastfeed you fail as a woman. I am also not saying that all women who have breast implants are brainwashed by the patriarchy. I just got a bit carried away with my sarcasm. However, we live in a patriarchal society. And you can't just decide you're outside that and have that be the end of it.)

See? Ryan gets it.

However, I'm not convinced that is the message of "I'm Feminist Enough..." (Although it is the message of A LOT of things which is why I wanted to talk about it. For another totally awesome post on this subject by Meghan Murphy, look here. I totally quoted it in an essay I wrote. It's fun using blog posts as sources in essays. You get to swear and use caps lock a lot.) I want to look at "I'm Feminist Enough..." from another angle, an angle that a like I lot more. I think these videos promote the idea that a woman can be a feminist without having to make her every move a radical one so long as she is aware that many of her actions are not radical or even feminist. And the videos promote the idea that feminists do not have to feel guilty every time they do something slightly "unfeminist," like paint their nails. And sometimes, the "unfeminist" thing to do is the logical one. And sometimes even though it seems "unfeminist," it actually kind of isn't. One woman in the videos said that she's feminist enough to be the chef in her heterosexual relationship because she's the good cook and she's not going to eat her fiance's shitty food to prove a point. She's feminist enough to understand that feminists ARE PEOPLE. (WHOA! What a novel concept!) Feminism is not reversing gender roles. Feminism is not giving up things that make you happy. And feminism cannot be achieved by an individual. Because we're all going to mess up. Not one of us individually can be the perfect feminist. I fuck up. A lot. I like to use the word "bitch." I try not to do it in public too often. But it's fun to say! And no, it's not feminist when I do it. I am not reinventing the meaning of the word "bitch" when I use it as an insult. And sometimes I assume that most straight men think with their penises and that I can get what I want if I dress a certain way or behave a certain way. And that the men won't mind. That's really not feminist. That's manipulative and cruel.

But together, maybe feminists can get more done. We live in a culture that praises people for being individuals, for accomplishing things alone, but can't we get more done together? One of the women in the videos said that she's feminist enough not to judge other women. So if women (and men and everyone else) stop judging one another for their individual little fuck ups and instead focus on collectively working towards a goal (and also focus on LISTENING to one another WITHOUT GETTING DEFENSIVE when we kindly remind each other that maybe calling someone a pussy isn't exactly a feminist action...), maybe feminism still has a shot.

If I was making a video for "I'm Feminist Enough..." I would say, "I'm feminist enough to know that not every move I make is radical or even feminist. And I'm okay with my fuck ups. Because I'm human. But I'm also feminist enough to keep trying to fuck up less."

What would you say? As Shannon Washington said, "There is no right or wrong, just truth." If you want to get involved with the actual movement, and not just my discussion of it, you can find contact info on the "I'm Feminist Enough..." website.