Torture: It Worked for the Romans

You know, if I weren't already completely cynical, the fact that the Preznit and his Evil Sidekick Dick were threatening to veto a bill against torture--sponsored by a man who helped them get elected, and who was himself tortured in Vietnam--might shock me. But instead, there's just a kind of amazement at the fact that they're not even bothering to decently shroud their inhumanity in euphemistic language anymore. They're just telling the world: we torture people in secret prisons because we can, and because we can, we should, and because we should, we're gonna.

As Jesus' General points out, even the Mormons are okay with it. After all, such patriotic Jello-eating Aryans--er, Americans--can have no fear of such a practice being used on them. Jesus' General got it right: "And people wonder why we embrace torture. Well, if it's good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for a bunch of foreigners."

gender gap

Last night, after class, talking to one of my fellow grads. This is a fellow grad who often complains about The Program (yeah, I know, that doesn't narrow it down, but that's the point). He was the only male among us, resulting in a 4-1 ratio. Some standard bitching regarding grad school ensued. Long story short, I pointed out that female academics make sacrifices beyond merely financial sacrifices for grad school, namely, that it is virtually unheard of, even in these days, and even in the liberal elitist academy, for a woman to get tenure if she has children. Further, that women often feel intense pressure to delay or abandon plans to procreate in order to be a successful academic, and that men have no such pressure. Male grad student's response was twofold. First, he said, "But plenty of professors have children." Pause. One of my fellow women took up the banner and pointed out that plenty of male professor's wives have children, and that these two things are not equivalent. Let's not forget that we had just left a class which is taught by a professor who is engaged to a 24- year-old, and he is 40.

Male grad student paused, and then said, (after spending eight weeks of the semester bitching about 'mentoring failures!') "You know, you can blame everything on institutional or structural factors, but doesn't it really come down to individual initiative?"

Thanks, man. I'll keep that in mind.

Here is a parting thought, via Academic Coach:

Female Faculty More Stressed

Man_and_woman_2 A couple of weeks ago, I posted some thoughts on the IHE article that reported that Community College faculty are somewhat more satisfied with their jobs than faculty at 4 year institutions. The same survey of faculty attitudes, conducted by folks at UCLA, included comparisons of male and female responses.

The study found that a higher proportion women reported feeling stressed about a variety of different factors. Here are some of the findings highlighted in the IHE article:


Managing household responsibilities

% of Men Citing as Cause of Stress: 68.0%

% of Women Citing as Cause of Stress: 81.8%


Review/promotion process

% of Men Citing as Cause of Stress:40.3

% of Women Citing as Cause of Stress:50.8

Subtle discrimination

% of Men Citing as Cause of Stress:17.9

% of Women Citing as Cause of Stress:34.2

Teaching load

% of Men Citing as Cause of Stress:61.6

% of Women Citing as Cause of Stress:70.8

Lack of personal time

% of Men Citing as Cause of Stress:68.5

% of Women Citing as Cause of Stress:81.9


Being part of 2-career couple


% of Men Citing as Cause of Stress:31.0

% of Women Citing as Cause of Stress:41.6

Self-imposed expectations

% of Men Citing as Cause of Stress:75.0

% of Women Citing as Cause of Stress:84.4

I've said it before, I'll say it again: men attribute their success to their natural ability and hard work, and their failures to fortune, luck or other people. Women attribute their success to fortune or luck, and failure to their own, personal failings.

Cracker Run-In

Went to the Sage Francis show at Cat's Cradle on Thursday. It was a good show--his opening act, Soliloquists of Sound (no website yet, unfortunately) rocked with an outstanding DJ and female vocalist. Then a white hip-hop artist (by the name of Soul) got onstage and proceeded to rage and rage some more about the current state of everything. Apparently, this is not what certain members of the audience were expecting from a socially conscious hip-hop show (I mean you, man in Central Michigan tracksuit drinking Bud Light). As Soul paused for breath, this particular audience member took it upon himself to shout, "What do you want us to do, bitch? You want us to quit our jobs and be lazy like the minorities?" This was followed by numerous offers to "kick your ass, bitch" and so forth. Track-suit boy left (thus removing his hand from his girlfriend's ass for the first time during the evening) and left it to his girlfriend to get into it with some audience members, who she accused of being "brainwashed" and "traitors." Pretty standard, Bill O'Reilly (who is, of course, a terrorist sympathizer kind of stuff. The best part was that they stayed for the whole show. I thought that maybe Holy chanting, "The south lost the war! The south lost the war!" and getting the whole audience to say "Arrest the president" might drive them out. But no. Because, as girlfriend said, "We din't even pay to get in here, stupid."

Anyway, Sage Francis is outstanding, and if you haven't checked him out yet, do so. Meantime, enjoy the lovely, California-esque, fall weather and the harvest moon.

fun with iTunes

iTunes has a new "for you" beta which recommends, based on past purchases, albums that might be of interest to you, their valued customer. And I'll admit they got me on some. I bought Nick Drake, yes, I would probably like Iron & Wine, and vice versa. But what, WHAT on my previously purchased list could have led them to believe I would go for Chumbawumba's "Tubthumper?" Was it the Postal Service? Was it Outkast? Eels? Tell me, dammit.

On the subject though, Iron & Wine's new EP (Woman King) is excellent. Sam Beam = hirsute genius. Also: old favorites Dervish, and new interest Niyaz.

Dystopia is Contagious

I must stop reading dystopic novels. I first read The Handmaid's Tale back in high school, and I thought, meh, how paranoid. I reread it before the election last year and had nightmares. It's all so plausible, now...the environmental toxins that leave most women barren, the religious fundamentalists who dress women in burquas and say "Our big mistake was teaching them how to read." For a while now, I've been reading Christian Fundamentalist websites. And they are freaky. They are the American Taliban, and they are uncompromising, anti-Enlightenment, pro-Apocalypse and willing to do whatever it takes. God brooks no compromise, people. We have to understand: this is an entirely different way of apprehending the world. I feel that the Dark Ages exerts some indefinable pull on them all: back to when women were chattel, the husband was the uncontested head of the household, educating women was considered a waste, and so forth.

The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that religion has got to go. I took a class on Radical Islam last year and, good lefty that I am, was deeply troubled by what I read. It seems clear to me that true Islam--Islam that follows precisely the words of the Koran--is not compatible with feminism. The position, status and role of women is laid out quite clearly, and, interestingly enough, bears no small resemblance to the conception of women that Christian fundamentalists have. How nice. Perhaps if all of the male fundies get together, we will finally have world peace! After all, they may not be able to agree on the name of God, but they can agree that women should be kept in their place, properly attired and veiled.

As a matter of fact, yesterday I saw, for the first time, a fully veiled woman in Harris Teeter. Of course I have seen women wearing head scarves; I've had Muslim women in my classes. This, though, was a woman in full burqua, with her face covered, so that only her eyes and hands were visible. Women in full burquas have always disturbed me on a deep level, and it is part of the reason I've long been skeptical about the whole "it's their culture, we must respect it" line. I can't imagine a world in which women's faces are not to be seen. It makes them less than fully human. It makes them like ghosts; it makes them indistinguishable from one another, it signals fully their subordination. The part that disturbs me the most, I think, is that I fear that men would not miss women, if we were to go back; that there would be in some way relief on their part about having, once again, clearly defined roles. That on some level many men do feel superior to women, and resent their loss of status.

I've read many of the intellectual anti-Enlightenment articles, and their arguments are often fair. I'm just not sure, these days, what else we have besides a hope for reason and rationality, for discussion, debate and, yes, even science. We are taught from a very early age that religious tolerance is our duty as citizens. We are reaching the point where that will not work any further. We cannot tolerate the intolerable. We cannot have our lives dictated by beliefs that, when examined coolly, have no rational basis. I don't organize my life based on the Code of Hammurabi. Wht makes the Bible any different?