Childlessness

Not my nephew.

I do not encounter many children in my day-to-day life in Chicago. I cannot believe how much I have taken that for granted. It is easy to forget why I do not want children of my own when I never see them.

As I may have mentioned, I am in Green Bay with family indefinitely and unfortunately that means lots and lots of time with my 16 month old nephew. Now don't get me wrong, I love him very much and nothing makes me happier these days than seeing his chubby smiling little face. However, OMG he is so annoying!!!

Every morning I am rudely awakened at about seven by his screaming if he is unhappy or his squealing if he is happy. Then constantly for the rest of the day it is one or the other of those two. I have been popping ibuprofen like vitamins. AND if he is not making noise he constantly needs to be watched because he can get into anything. Because he requires their undivided attention, I have not had a decent conversation with my parents since I got here.

I don't want this to just be a laundry list of complaints about the child. Again, I am his aunty and I love him but it was really great to get this reminder of why I am so dedicated to childlessness in my own life. I just do not have the patience or temperament for it. Of course, I might reconsider this decision if I could have a wife....

Green Bay Blogging

Still in Green Bay so I figured I'd do some local blogging.

The big controversy here is over a nativity scene located at the entrance of city hall. A Madison based group, the "Freedom from Religion Foundation," called the city on its blatant violation of the ideal of seperation of church and state.


Many folks around here, including my parents, think that the Madison group is making a big deal out of nothing because "no one around here cares!"
I am very glad that someone is finally calling the city on its violation. The nativity scene is a blatantly Christian symbol. Placing it outside of the courthouse suggests a religious bias toward Christianity which is not fair to the many other faiths that make up the population of Brown County.

To make ammends for this decision the city said that if any Jewish group wanted they could put up a menorah. Of course, Hanukkah has been over for a while now..... And that still does not help the myriad other religions that are not represented at this taxpayer funded city building.

Frankly, I too am more than a little shocked that this is such a big deal. It should be obvious that religious symbols have no place in front of a city building.

::sigh::

Back in Green Bay with my family on a hiatus from blogging.... and life in general.

Things are not too great for me right now so I decided to seek professional help. I don't know if it is just because I did that in Green Bay or if this is a trend but my new therapist actually looked me straight in the eye and said "what the heck is women's studies?"

Maybe I should have run right out the door as soon as the words left her mouth but my tremendous anxiety and constant nausea won out and I stayed. I will be seeing her regularly until I decide I can return to Chicago without having a total mental and emotional breakdown.

On the plus side anti-anxiety meds are pretty neat.

Hopefully I will feel up to blogging and/or reading other feminist blogs soon. Those activities used to make me very happy. When I return you can expect at least one more post about "The Office" and of course, Britney's Spears' little sister. I have things to say and hopefully will soon have the energy and presence of mind to say them.

I finally saw Waitress.

It has been a week since I last posted so I figured I should get back to it. Considering how I feel this shall be quite the undertaking. Please bear with me, my posts may not be the greatest for a while. So on that note:


I finally saw Waitress. (Spoilers ahead!!) I have wanted to see it since I heard about it long ago, especially since I had been a waitress all through high school. Anyway, Waitress was a tough film for me to stomach. I just got angrier and angrier throughout the film and kept hoping that it would redeem itself. As is crept toward the birth, I thought there would be no redemption but, alas, there was..... kind of.

The film is about a young woman who is married to a terribly emotionally and physically abusive man. While I understood the necessity of making him so horrible, his character was so awful it was actually quite unbelievable almost like a caricature of every abusive husband one could think of.

Jenna, our protagonist, finds herself pregnant after being drugged and raped by her husband. She is less than thrilled about her pregnancy but in some non-existent scene she decides to carry the pregnancy to term. Similar to Knocked-Up, abortion is never mentioned in this film, not even in the ridiculous joking manner attempted in Knocked-Up. It is just as odd in Waitress because Jenna had long been planning to leave her husband which the pregnancy naturally complicated.

So for the entire movie we watch as abusive husband gets more and more abusive as he discovers her pregnancy and her stash of running away money. At one point he even makes her promise not to love the baby more than him! I nearly vomited through a few scenes.

During all of this Jenna begins an odd affair with her married Ob-Gyn. The affair was also totally unbelievable. She just jumped on him out of the blue in front of his office. As the story progressed I became very concerned that the film was going to end with Jenna being "saved" by the kindly (if piggish) Ob-Gyn or that she was going to be trapped with baby and husband. The film did not leave me hopeful for any other outcome.

In the last fifteen minutes, Jenna gives birth to her daughter, tells abusive husband that she never wants to see him again, tells Ob-Gyn that she is not interested in ruining his marriage and causing any unnecessary pain, and falls madly in love with her daughter.

This ending was unexpected and quite relieving. However, I am concerned that the pro-forced pregnancy movement could see this as a great feminist reason to not have an abortion. "See! The baby actually saved her life!" Which, while it was relieving, it was also totally unbelievable. This is just another instance in which Hollywood gives us a taste of feminism, of empowerment, only to snatch it away. Yes she left abusive husband, yes she didn't end up with a man at the end (amazing!), yes she started her own business and lived happily ever after.

BUT

Her new found freedom came from the elderly patriarch who owned the restaurant in which she worked. Upon his death, he left Jenna with a small fortune.

So there it is. Even a somewhat empowering movie still ends with a big old backlashy slap in the face.

Dismembered Female Bodies Are NOT Funny!

Feministing frequently posts about objects that are made to look like dismembered female body parts. (Sadly that sentence could have been MUCH longer.)


I found one to add to the collection today during a random google search. The Butt Buoy floats in the water above one's anchor looking like either a murdered or seriously mangled female body. (You really need to see the site to get the full effect.) It is appallingly acceptable to symbolically annihilate female bodies for a JOKE!!! How is that funny?

Taken in the context of domestic violence, date rape, and the every day objectification that women live with this is so not funny.

"Which Animal is Most Like Having Sex With a Woman?"

My nephew's mother alerted me to the show Manswers on the oh-so-problematic Spike TV. Because I do not have cable I have not had the privilege of actually watching this horrendous show but I have been able to watch some of the clips on their website.

Spike TV is television designed especially for young men. To which I say a resounding HA!! As if ALL television were not designed by and for men. It reminds me of the argument that if there is a BET there should be a WET. Spike TV and its Manswers are just another of many anti-feminist, woman-hating, backlashy shows meant to help hetero white guys get it up.

A few of the clips that I had the pleasure of viewing include: "Are women with fake boobs hornier?" "How to make your pick up a hot lady tub," "Hooker or cop," "Which animal is most like having sex with a woman?" and the oh-so-flattering "Make a stripper your lady?"

A few gems from the show:

"Any time a girl is around another girl there's always a little bit of competition."
"If she gets bigger knockers you get more sex because chicks with fake boobs are hornier."

Shows like this are the reason that we still desperately need feminism. Enough said.