Thursday, July 29, 2010

Oh Noes! Bitches!

I don't know if you've heard about the latest Right-Wing Hissy Fit, but Amanda at Pandagon has an excellent analysis (and the comments are instructive too):  seems Obama appeared on the View.

Well, now, of course through the lens of the RW that is Evil, since anything Obama does is Evil is you are in their camp.

But why it is evil, that is what may flummox you, though only until you think it over.

It's evil not just because he's on a talk show, and that talk show is run by (ick) girls; but also, oh, also, because he could have gone to speak the Boy Scouts instead.

Well, see, that's just wrong.  Pick speaking to adult women over talking to male children?

Tsk.  Where are his priorities?

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Uneasiness With Right-Wing Writers

The kid has been re-reading Jack London again.

Specifically, Call of the Wild and White Fang.

Call of the Wild has been one of her favorites since she stumbled upon it in her school library when she was six; White Fang she scarfed up a few years later.  Just a year ago, she located a fat book at the public library which had, along with Call of the Wild, about fifteen short stories by Jack London.

Well, you know, I'm not opposed to this, exactly.  I mean, it's not like she's reading Atlas Shrugged, is it?  Or Orson Scott Card?  How much harm can a little violence porn/Social Darwinism actually do?  I read them when I was a kid and I'm (mostly) okay...

When she was six I said nothing.

When she was ten, she had to do a report on an author for school.  She had been re-reading Call of Wild at that point too, and beginning to notice London wasn't exactly accurate on wolf or dog behavior.  WTF, she asked, though not exactly in that language.  I explained a bit about what London was up to.  I explained a bit about Social Darwinism.  Racism, I said.  Politics of the time he lived in, I explained.  Eugenics movement, I explained.  Not the brightest man who ever walked the earth, I explained, although clearly....

Moo, she said, which has evolved to be our code word for when she has had enough of this particular lecture, Professor Mama, please.

So when it came time to do a report on some author, I ever so casually suggested, hey, why not do Jack London?  Then I fiendishly found a couple of excellent (leftist, or as leftist as were available in Pork Smith, Arkansas) kid's biographies for her.

Then I did my best to drop hints while she was writing the report: "Did you read this part in the book?" I would ask.  "Did you see this section?  What do you think this means?"

So she's reading the books and stories again.  And she's asking me questions.  

One of the questions she's asked twice now:  "Is it okay for me to read Jack London even though he believes racist things?  Even though he's writing about eugenics and Social Darwinism?"

"Yeah," I tell her.  "Yeah, you can read him.  You should read him, in fact.  You need to know what he's saying.  But you shouldn't forget what he's trying to do to you.  And you shouldn't forget he's wrong."

After a moment, she says, "He's wrong about wolves.  That part really bothers me.  Wolves don't act that way."

"Well, what does that tell you?  If he'll misrepresent those facts, what does that mean?"

"Maybe he thought that was how wolves acted.  Maybe they didn't know any better back then."

"Maybe.  He misrepresents how dogs act too, though, you said.  Right?"

She frowns.

"Which he's doing to make his points about Social Darwinism and Eugenics and which race is superior and how breeding between the races is doomed.  He's ignoring facts to score his points," I said.  "That's what it should tell you.  So, well.  You can read the books because they're fun.  Just don't forget they're also lies."

Which, well, that's the harm of all porn, I guess: it's based on lies, in order to promulgate some whacked theory, some alternate reality its creator wants to exist.  And if he can get enough people to believe it with him -- as the Social Darwinist/Eugenics people did for awhile, as these Teabaggers are doing now -- well, you've got trouble.

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Okay

Thanks, Heebie.

This
will make my 12-year-old very happy.

Accidental Penis.

Winners in the SIMF Contest Are Up!

The winners in the Crossed Genres Science In My Fiction short story contest have been posted.

Go here to see the results.

Saturday, July 17, 2010

More Fun With Teabaggers

I've got three or four of these people in my, ah, I guess you'd call it social circle.

And, you know, they're "not racist."  They just care about teh country!

Yeah.  

I don't argue anymore.  Way back like a year ago when this Teabagger shit started, I could give them some space to learn.  I could think maybe they were just naive, Fox-News watching toolkits who didn't know better.

But at this point?  If you're still subscribing to this filth and you still have a Sarah Palin sticker on your SUV or in your heart?

You're a hater and a racist.  Give it up.

Friday, July 16, 2010

Yikes!

Woke up at two this morning to find the entire kitchen and living room flooded.  Herr Dr. Delgar decided it was the AC leaking & shut it off (to be fair, we have had AC leaks before, though not quite to this extent) and I mopped up and we went back to bed.

Woke again at seven to find the entire kitchen and living room flooded once again.  And the garage.  And the street.  Argh.  Further investigation determined it was the pipe to the hot water heater (very near the AC in the layout of our house, designed by a fucking moron) that had the leak.

I am attempting to mop up once more, instead of working on my new short story, while HDD and the plumber discuss What Is To Be Done.

But at least teh AC is not busted.  I cannot tell you how pleased I am about that.

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Fun With Geography

This game is occupying me while I drink rum at night, even though mostly it is proving to me that I am a geographical idiot.

(Scroll down).

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Mel's Racist, Misogynistic Rant

I'm probably the last person to hear this, but yikes.

I'm not so much surprised by what he says, given what everyone except the Right-Wing Xtians already knew about Saint Mel, as I'm appalled by the comments being made on the page defending him, which are basically to the tune of bitch set him up, bitch had it coming, bitch is a money-grubber.  Yeah, you know what I blame.

WTF Sparkly What Now?

Amanda over at Pandagon has found a clue as to why the Twilight series has captivated so many!

I think she’s on to something here---feminists look at the patriarchy that Twilight serves up and we wrinkle our noses in disdain.  But it’s still absolutely a more fun and exciting form of patriarchy than the one where you don’t have awesome sex and have to cook all the time, and there’s never any exciting adventures at all.  Being the passive victim of exciting adventures is better than being the passive victim of your boring ass ordinary life. 

Hmm!  I think she might be onto something.

Read the whole thing, as they say.

Friday, July 09, 2010

Just Getting The Rules Clear

Apparently it is okay in America to shoot people, even unarmed people, even restrained people, in the back if

  • you are a police officer
  • you are scared of those people
  • you only meant to taze them*
  • they don't give you instant obedience
  • they do give you instant obedience but the situation makes you tense
  • it's a big crowd around
  • they are black people

*Can we please get rid of tasers now?  How much more abuse do we have to wait for?

Sunday, July 04, 2010

No Jobs

This article details exactly what's happening everywhere around me.  

I know so many people caught in this wrecked economy (not just me and Herr Dr. Delagar, in other words--although, yes, us:  he hasn't had a full-time work in over three years).

Saturday, July 03, 2010

Hey! Look!

My story, "Drafting Zoe", is up at The Future Fire.

Light Blogging Lately

I know!  But:

(1) My world is smashed full.  It is finals for Summer I, so I have been grading & grading; and Summer II starts on the 6th, so I have to prep for that.  (I'm teaching a full load both sessions, b/c we are even more broke than ever, as, I realize, so is everyone else in the country, except the rich motherfucker who broke the country.  They are richer than ever.  Don't get me started.  Where's my damn pitchfork?)  Besides teaching, I am at work on writing because

(2) It is nearly time for Broken Slate to begin running at Crossed Genres, so I have been working with my editor, Kay Holt, oh how I love this sentence, on the final revisions of that novel, smacking it into shape for publication; and

(3) two more book review for Strange Horizons; and

(4) I think six separate short stories currently getting revised; and

(5) an English grammar class I'm teaching in the fall I need to start prepping for; and

(6) we're going to homeschool the kid this year, so we're learning how to do that; and

(7) I think that's it, except the massive depression that overwhelms me all the time these days, due to the destruction of my beloved country and planet by these horrible people.  Who surround us.  And won't shut up.  I don't know what to do about that.  Drinking more rum is not, so far, really helping much.

Thursday, July 01, 2010

Oh Boy!

Winners are posted for the Crossed Genre Flash Fiction contest.

Watch This!

AWB posted it on her facebook.

I loves it.