Oh No She Didn't

I was just reading some of Bryce's many recent (good!) posts and thinking about how both of us have sort of drifted into the same section of the blogosphere. For example, we are both big Andrew/Matthew/Ezra/Josh fans (too lazy to link, figure that one out fo yoself). As a result I often find myself reading something on a blog, thinking about commenting on it/linking to it/freaking out about it, and then...not doing any thing at all. Why? Many times I am thinking to myself that Bryce will probably end up doing it. Which is sort of one part laziness and one part competitiveness. Weird, I know.

I have also been thinking about needing to clean up the old blog roll as well, since I don't visit some of the stuff I have listed, while at the same time religiously visiting things that I don't even have linked. I'll do that later. More laziness.

These two thoughts sort of coalesced in my mind last night as I caught thirty seconds of Glenn Beck during a commercial break for the totally fantastic "Sex and the City" (funny "Sex and the City" story: when I first saw it many, many years ago with Maile in a hotel room I believed it to be a disturbing HBO show about high priced prostitutes). But I digress. My thought, as I watched Glenn in all his awkward "small business owner" glory, was "thank God for the internet." Because on the internet, unlike on my couch, there are many other people who find Glenn heinous and feel like discussing it at length. Usually while listening to good music! Watching Bryce evolve as a blogger and reflecting on how much I love blogs made me very thankful that I ever discovered blogs in the first place.

Like many of my best discoveries, the discovery of blogs was actually the result of my complex, intense, and sometimes sleazy relationship with radical feminism. In celebration of feminism, the internet, and feminist blogs, I give you my favorites:

1. Pandagon. Amanda is probably best known for her work with, and eventual dismissal from, the John Edwards campaign. What can I say, she has been known to swear like a sailor. And take on the Christian church. In an endearing sort of way. It's a shame that this is what made her (semi)famous. The truth is, she's probably the best at what she does. I haven't seen any stats, but I'd be surprised if this wasn't the largest feminist blog on the web. And rightfully so. Even when you disagree with her, Amanda always dishes out some of the best feminism has to offer: intellectual curiosity, a bs detector you can set your watch too, and a willingness to take on the hard stuff. Friend crush? You bet.

2. I Blame The Patriarchy. You just have too love Twisty. If Feministing is building a big tent, Twisty is undoubtedly the much more entertaining and dangerous sideshow. Twisty is feminism at its sharpest and most difficult. This stuff will change your life, unless it totally turns you off of the movement and you end up hating feminism forever. She scares me in a good way.

3. Feministing. Jessica and crew get points for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is her appearance on Stephen Colbert. Feministing, like Pandagon, is a big player. IMHO it has done a really good job of being both a mainstream feminist site and a multinational feminist site, which can be a tough line to walk. A good read.

4. Faux Real Tho. Lauren is possibly the mother of feminist blogging. Since leaving Feministe she has set up house over at Faux Real Tho. In feminism, the politcal is always personal. Unless the personal is political. Actually, we'll have to fight about that and get back to you. Lauren, better than any other person, weaves feminism into the narrative of her life. Blogging is much more an art than a science. It is part essay writing, part journalism, part diary, and part comics page. Like a good album, a blog must be balanced and engaging. Too much depth and it becomes inpenetrable, too much fluff and it's wasting your time. Lauren walks the line better than anyone else. And like many other young feminists, Lauren helped me to find my voice.

5. Feministe. It's just not the same since Lauren left. But Jill, Zuzu and company do a good job holding the place down. They have, without a doubt, one of the best graphics ever as their header. A little girl with a shotgun? I'm pretty sure that's how the define feminism in the Oxford. I'd like to see someone with a little more time step in over there, but it's still worth the read. Jill is going to make a great lawyer.

So there you have it. Let me know if you find something that makes you mad or catches your interest. And remember: play nice.

Feist- 1234. It's everywhere, I know. But it's proof that women can sell music without selling sex. And it's fantastic. And it makes me smile.
RIYL- Stars, Broken Social Scene, dream pop

What might have been lost?

I tend to forget that I am one of the few people I know who is obsessive/compulsive about blogging. This may come as a shock to many of you since I also tend to be pretty sketchy when it comes to, you know, writing on my own blog. I often miss a few days, a week, even a month 'round these parts and consider that no big deal, but I'll be damned if I miss a Matthew Yglesias post when there is the internetz to be had.

The reason that I bring this up is that I was enjoying a new post over at one of the best blogs ever today when I realized that most of you probably don't even know that it exists. Mostly because many of you have lives, but whatev. The point is that as long as I am going to be ocd and not have a life, you might as well reap some of those benefits.

So without further ado I present to you Stuff White People Like. If you are white, know someone who is white, or see white people on the street sometimes, I can't recommend this blog highly enough. It is so hard to pick a favorite entry, so I suggest that you just read them all. I do have to confess that I myself am massively white. If this was a medical condition and not just a blog then I would have terminal whiteness. Organic whole grain pizza crust white. Vintage t-shirts wearing, corporation hating, sushi eating, indie rock listening, Barack Obama supporting white. White white white. Which of course makes me like the blog even more.

I hope you enjoy. I intend to share good finds more often. I kindly request that you do the same.

You know what? I'll start with Bon Iver:

Bon Iver- Skinny Love
RIYL- TV On the Radio acoustic, Iron & Wine, Dustin Kensrue with a falsetto

In addition to placing "now listening to" tags in all of my posts, I'm also committing to finding ways to make those tracks accessible to all of y'all. I will also be posting RIYL tags (rock if you like...) so that you have some idea what you're getting yourself into when you click on the link.

Yessssssss.

Andrew (<3 huge blogger crush) can always be counted on for great links.

Today is no exception.

Did you know that feminists have better romantic relationships?

It's true.

What's crazy to me is that we are actually talking about this. Of course it's true.

But it's nice to have a little proof.

So here's a blogger question: How many of you would self-identify as feminists? That is to say, how many of you agree with basic feminist beliefs? Regardless of how you identify, how do you think it impacts your views on relationships/actual relationships?

I'm genuninely curious. I hope I get some responses. I might even write up a little response of my own.

I'm scared to see stats for Douglas

Matt Yglesias posts a really fun little toy: A website that allows you to see demographic information from any zip code in the country. For all of you haters, 80501 Longmont only has 9% of the population living below the poverty line. Which is still too high, but far below what some of you would say. Have fun.

This might be the only post in the blogworld today that isn't about Don Imus.

Sorry for the prolonged absence, I have been a busy little bee this week spending all of my time hosting a great group of students from Seattle, WA.

Here's a little update on my life:

On Tuesday Meghan and I got to spend the day with a group of friends from Tucson and Phoenix (the Presbyterian Pope, some people from No More Deaths, the Catholic Worker House, John Fife) camping, eating delicious food, and running some class three rapids on inflatable kayaks. An amazing time, to say the least.

I love to be out in nature, and I love it even more when it gives me a chance to connect with such amazing people. I thought of the New Zealand crew and Galatians. "For freedom Christ has set us free."

Tomorrow we're having a bi-national border fiesta over in Naco, Sonora/Naco, Arizona. We're going to set up a stage that sits on both sides of the fence, have a potluck, and play volleyball using the international boundary as a net. Promises to be a great time.

In the afternoon I'll be heading up to Tucson to catch my flight out to Dallas. I am REALLY looking forward to next week and to Nate and Milli's wedding (and it's not just because her parents are putting us up in this hotel). Although now that I mention it, apparently the hotel has a really sweet pool on the roof. Meghan has a tendency to make obscene hand gestures when I gloat about it. Haha.

I'll also be meeting my great friend Jo's baby Junia for the first time (exciting!), and getting my first chance to reflect on my time down in Mexico in an environment outside of the borderlands (or Chiapas).

To be honest, I'm a little nervous about how I'll do with the culture shock. It's always a tough transition from one place to the next, one language to the next, and one economic reality to the next. I'm praying that I can adjust "well" and enjoy myself.

Here are a few things that caught my interest on the old www:

Brianne's post for the most recent Quarter Life.

Zach links to a great site called Kiva, an interactive online bank that lets you lend money to start small businesses in the Two-Thirds World and then stay in touch with the person who borrowed the money. I need to look for a loan that I can afford! Anyone want to split one?

Ariah writes a post about biking (something I have come to love) and links to this incredible invention: a bicycle powered washing machine. Brilliant. I want one.

I don't know how much blogging I'll be doing next week, but I expect to put up at least a few posts for you folks that I'm working on right now.

And by the way, He is risen indeed.

After all, one good turn deserves another

Yesterday I received a message on the facebook from Jen Huang, a student at one of the Claremont Colleges:

Hey! I wrote about you for my research, I know.. this is kinda creepy, but
not really! Read the blog and you'll see... you might find this interesting,
that's why I chose to send you a message instead of just posting it....
ciao!

I also received a link to her account right here on blogspot.

Her most recent entry seems to be the latest in a new series that she is writing about the facebook, or, more specifically, about the way people use the facebook to express themselves and relate to others.

See if you can guess who she's talking about here:

During my research I also tried to self-analyze a random profile
within three degrees of separation. I found a Pomona male, recently graduated
from Colorado. Declared single, liberal and heterosexual, he seemed active on
facebook and did not have many privacy settings. The first thing I noticed was
his religious view. He claimed that Jesus was Jewish, but didn't understand what
that made him. My first reaction: He was a Christian who had found out the truth
about Jesus and perhaps made the connection that all Christians were actually
Jewish.

Moving on, this man also seemed fairly active among his friends,
writing on walls, adding friends etc. He also claimed that he was currently in
Mexico, a traveller perhaps? He also had a blog on blog spot (oops, hope he
doesn't see this) and enjoys smuggling live animals and speaking spanish (ah,
now it all makes sense). In his "about me" he revealed that he was working close
to border patrol but I admit I could not tell if he was pro or con. I noticed
that he used the word "underbelly": A good word, in my opinion, a tad eccentric,
literary, and descriptive. I liked this guy! The Women's Studies major cinched
it, I had officially, without this man's knowledge added him to my mental "good
people" list.

To be quite honest I find some of her analysis more than a little baffling. At times I think it could even be called sloppy. Most of all I think it is just woefully incomplete. She didn't even talk about my quote, the content of my wall posts, or the music/books/films I like. What's with that?

Here's my real critique of her analysis:

For starters: My first reaction: He was a Christian who had found out the truth about Jesus and perhaps made the connection that all Christians were actually Jewish.

This, as a logical leap and a rhetorical nightmare, sticks out to me above all of the other faults in her analysis. If I thought that all Christians were actually Jewish, and I were a Christian, wouldn't that lead me to say that I was Jewish? How did my professed ignorance about my own religious views lead Ms. Huang to conclude that I self-identify as a Jew?

Or how about this one: In his "about me" he revealed that he was working close to border patrol but I admit I could not tell if he was pro or con.

The way she describes my "about me" section is both confusing and somewhat misleading. For those of you without keys to the magical world that is the facebook, my "about me" states:

The woman who used to have my job got arrested by the border patrol. Neato. Also, apparently they think we are smuggling people out of our office. These are the people keeping you safe from terrorists.

Now, after careful scrutiny, I can see how Ms. Huang might think that I was possibly pleased by the arrest of a former co-worker. Perhaps I received my job because she was arrested? Clearly plausible. But then, right after that, I go on to poke fun at, in a characteristically sarcastic manner, the very same Border Patrol that arrested her.

A pro-Border Patrol reading of me also doesn't really sync with some of her other findings, specifically my major. Nor, I hope, would it contribute to her conclusion that I am a "good [person]".

Ah, a "good [person]," let's end with that one: I had officially, without this man's knowledge added him to my mental "good people" list.

I must say that my first reaction to her appraisal of me was a sense of pride and worth. It is quite evident that, fleeting though it may have been, my positive response to her praise adds a great deal of legitimacy to Ms. Huang's topic of study. Clearly people relate in very real ways to little factoids expressed in binary.

I made a profile on the facebook for my enjoyment and that of my friends. When analyzed by an unknown outside researcher and declared to be "good" I was clearly pleased, although such an analysis, and her resulting approval, were never things that I had sought. Perhaps by not making my profile private she thought that, in some way, I was in fact soliciting those things. I don't know.

I will say that my profile remains open because I seek to live my life, in flesh and on the web, in a transparent manner. This stems from my "religious" beliefs. The way I have identified them on the facebook is a tongue-and-cheek representation of a very real ambiguity in my life. Jesus, to his death, was a Jew (King of the Jews, if you want to be picky). I am, any way you look at it, a gentile. So what does my belief that Jesus, the very same Jesus who lived his life as a Jew, in faith and ethnicity, walked back out of the tomb, make me? For the sake of identifying with a larger body, I guess it would be Christian. But Christian is a word that, to our knowledge, Jesus himself never used. So there you go.

After her analysis of me, Jen finishes her post this way: I suddenly went back to my profile to skim it over. Was it okay? Did it have wit? Would I come off as a good person. I couldn't tell.

Well Jen, I won't attempt to analyze you. And not just because your own profile is blocked from my view.

I will say that I find your own religious views amusing in a "where have I heard that before/feminist/"culture wars"/abstinence vs. sex-education" sort of way. If I thought really hard about them vis-a-vis your professed conservatism I'm not sure what conclusions I would draw. You might be a lovely person, but I won't try to make that call on such slight pieces of information as could be gleaned from even the most bloated of profiles. No offense, but I'd rather know you better, as a real person (albeit through the computer), or not at all. Too many anonymous faces on the internet.

Hopefully you take my critique of your analysis for what it is: the inability of a Pomona grad to let one analysis stand without another staring right back in its face. Should you continue your project I hope that you will give other people's accounts a more thoughtful scrutiny than you gave mine. And I hope you take this post of mine with more than a grain of salt. I will say that I have had several good laughs about the entire thing, been able to put off a whole morning of statistical analysis, and forget that someone in Mexico I barely know still has my credit card. Plus I got to do a little academic deconstruction. And coming from the Claremont Colleges you know that's how we like to get down.

p.s.- Do any of you guys remember this amazing website? So weird.

p.p.s.- I think it's time to update my profile.

I expected the Rocky Mountains to be a little rockier than this.

Dear Dr. Albert Mohler,

"Just when I thought you couldn't get any dumber, you go and do something like this... and totally redeem yourself!"

Love, Aaron


Well, he didn't totally redeem himself, but I respect what he said about Coulter. He didn't totally redeem himself because in the first post, speaking about homosexuality, he said that if a "biological basis is found, and if a prenatal test is then developed, and if a successful treatment to reverse the sexual orientation to heterosexual is ever developed, we would support its use as we should unapologetically support the use of any appropriate means to avoid sexual temptation and the inevitable effects of sin."

In response, I give you Jeremiah 1:5.

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations."


Albert Mohler, by the way, is the president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He's sort of a big fish you might say.

Albert's probably right though. Using chemicals on a baby seems like what Jesus would want us to do.

*I've got a gold star for the first person to get the quote right!

Slate: Stalking Is the New Flirting.

From Slate: A photo series of flirting called "How You Doin'?" Sounds like it could be kind of fun, right?

Check it out here: http://todayspictures.slate.com/howyoudo/

Anything strike you as odd?

I can't be the only one who finds it odd that MOST of those pictures aren't even of flirting. That leaves me thinking that a) someone did a pretty poor job choosing the pictures, b) someone did a pretty poor job labeling the piece, or c) someone's idea of flirting is a room full of men staring at a model, or two men on the street gawking at the legs of a woman who doesn't even know that she's being watched.

See: This picture

It's really creepy to me that so many of these pictures aren't flirting at all, but rather men caught in the act of staring at women who are wearing somewhat revealing clothing.

Is that what passes for flirting at Slate? In America?

File Under: Bad Solutions to Immigration "Problem"

Ms. Lauren Brown has a new post up (http://laurenbrown.typepad.com/weblog/2006/12/esta_gran_nacin.html) about the recent immigration raids on meat plants in several states, including one in Greeley, CO. As an extra incentive for all you Longmont folks, she even links to the Daily Times-Call!

Go read it, it's great stuff.

Qwack Qwack

Dear Cathy,

I did not fall off the edge of the earth. Well, not physically at any rate. I have pretty much neglected all of my Pomona friends however. Sorry 'bout that. I'm still working on how to make that one better. It is incredibly cold here as well and I have not finished installing my heaters. Seven blankets just doesn't compensate for no central heating and all tile flooring. Hugs and kisses.

Aaron

I went to college with a girl who did a really good impression of Mothra vs. Godzilla

Boundless Magazine is a webzine targetting college students and twentysomethings that was started by James Dobson's Focus on the Family. I read it regularly, and disagree with it more often than not, but I always find it a really enlightening glimpse into more conservative Evangelical Christianity in America. A really good way to keep my finger on the pulse, if you will.
There's a new post up over there written by Boundless regular Matt Kaufman called "Gays vs. The Garden Guy" (http://www.boundless.org/2005/articles/a0001402.cfm) I'm feeling too tired to summarize both the article and the event which sparked it, so please head over there and at least skim the post if you are going to read on.

From the start I was worried about what I would find in the article, largely because I took offense to the way that Kaufman used "Gays" in the title as a catch-all for everyone who identifies as homosexual. Really, all gays are against The Garden Guy? All? Also, did you know that Christians were in a war "vs." Gays. I didn't. Turns out we are. Actually, I thought Christians were supposed to be peacemakers, ones who would be called children of God, but apparently that's off base as well.

There are really two major problems with the way that Kaufman addresses this situation. The first is that he labels the actions of the Farbers and their company an appropriate Christian response. For a direct contradiction to this I would have him check out Matthew 9 and Jesus' relationship to a tax collector. Apparently refusing to interact or do business with people is the 21st Century version of loving your neighbors. Who knew.

The second major problem with Kaufman's assessment is that he gets all bent out of shape about the way in which "gay activists" are trying to steal freedom away from the Farbers. Now, freedon isn't a bad thing. Look at Galatians 5 (yeah Erik H.) to see Paul's very enthusiastic comments on freedom. No freedom isn't bad, but freedom isn't the be all end all for Christians either. Jesus is. So when Kaufman rails on about how the Farbers would be less free if they were forced to work for gay men, he misses the point entirely. The Farbers always had the freedom to love those two men, and they willingly gave it up. The Farbers always had the oppurtunity to love like Jesus, and they took a pass. All Christians do that far more often than we would like, but celebrating it is another matter.

Both Kaufman and the Farbers have made a tragic mistake. In an attempt to stand up for what they believe in and defend their right to do so, they have decided that love is in fact not the most important thing, but being right is. I have fallen victim to this same thinking more often than I care to admit, so let me be the first to say to both Matt and the Farbers, welcome to the club. Thankfully for them, and for me as well, forgiveness, love, and grace, are still included free of charge.

Like Chores For the Internet

I have been meaning to update my links for a few weeks now and they are finally done.
I now have some music review sites, a whole bunch of blogs (from Christian to political to feminist), and a few webzines up there. If you get some time check those out. They are pretty well organized, more or less.

Kings to you Mr. Perica

My great friend Bryce Perica has once again improved my life by pointing out to me the incredible advantages of Blogger Beta.

The big news is that I just received a whole bunch of comments I had never seen before. Apparently you could leave them and they just never showed up. So, umm, thanks. I promise to respond from now on.

Almost as exciting: I now have labels! I feel all grown up in a blogging sense.