June 2010 – Page 3

Australia’s First Female Prime Minister

After a successful leadership challenge this morning, Julia Gillard is now Australia’s first female prime minister! Not only that, but Gillard is left-wing even by Australian standards, with a strong background in the trade union movement. Perhaps even more surprising to American readers used to politicians talking about their “families” in politics might be the fact that she’s neither married nor a mother.

Whilst this is amazing news, the Australian election is coming up soon. It is very late for a leadership change. Gillard certainly has a high profile as the former deputy PM, so hopefully she can connect quickly with voters more than her opponent, the odious religious conservative leader of the Liberals Tony Abbott (seriously the man is so slimey he literally oozes). The last thing Australia needs right now is a return to the paranoid, divisive Howard years.

Where Are My Keys I Lost My Phone

So this is kind of a post about ADD, ish. Ish because, I’m not an ADD expert – I’m not even a psych major – and I can’t give anyone any kind of official perspective or information about ADD. Which, normally this would never stop me, but here I’m like, a guest in the house of Feministe, so I feel like I have to wear pants, or… something.

But ADD is a thing that I sort of feel like – for obviously totally personal reasons – deserves to be talked about more than it is, and is, also, one of the few subjects on which i’ve ever written where I’ve had people not just tell me they thought my post was cool or whatever, but actually like, thank me for talking about it, so – a post about ADD, ish.

The first thing to know is: ADD is real, and fuck you for telling me otherwise. I haven’t really had a comments policy, per se? And you have all been quite lovely to me so far (& I apologize for not being around to engage more!). But yes: comments to this post informing me that ADD is made up by the pharmaceutical industry, or an excuse made up by yuppie parents of not-gifted children, or WHATEVER THE FUCK, will get deleted, no explanation given and no questions asked, because fuck you, I don’t need more of that shit than I get.

Which isn’t to say there are NO parents who “push” for an unnecessary and/or inaccurate ADD diagnosis, or that it’s never misdiagnosed – and I mean, I am super pro-diagnosis but I also sort of feel like if you are diagnosing it in the proportions that some elementary schools are doing so, you need to sit down and reevaluate whether your standards of curriculum and behavior are developmentally appropriate because like, maybe just 7-year-olds in general can’t sit still for four hours, and will naturally outgrow that, and you should let them do so, gradually. It’s just to say that I am sick of people using these situations to imply that that is, somehow, what all ADD diagnoses actually are if you in your infinite wisdom look closely enough.

Oh, and a teensy rebuttal, because it is not worth my time to go into this extensively, to the people I’ve known who are like, well EVERYONE forgets things sometimes, has trouble concentrating sometimes, is distractible sometimes: yes. Sometimes. Not every waking hour of your entire life. That feeling you get, when you’re out of it for some reason, or sleep deprived maybe – that is my brain, 100% of the time. Except when I’M sleep deprived, it’s even worse.

The other thing to know is, and maybe the main thing I would like to get across if I don’t actually manage to come up with like, a “point” to this post (will she? won’t she? STAY TUNED), is: ADD is not about “not trying.” People with ADD are trying. They are probably trying harder than any non-ADD person ever has at the very tasks at which they fail, because guess what: non-ADD people don’t have to try that hard! You can bet your fucking ass I’m trying, on a regular basis, not to misplace my wallet again, because that shit is annoying and also, given my history of losing wallets/keys/cell phones/glasses/FUCKING EVERYTHING, scary. Most people don’t understand this, because most people don’t understand how it could be so fucking hard not to lose a wallet. Just put it in the same place every time! Simple as that!

Right, so: in theory, great. In practice, it takes all of a millisecond’s distraction to completely obliterate that thought from my mind. And this is another hard thing to get across, in my experience, is like: obviously, right, in theory, I try not to forget. In practice, if you could actually not-forget through sheer dint of will, no one would forget anything ever, because the problem with forgetting is that once you’ve done it, you have also forgotten that you’ve done it. So: one distraction, and the wallet stays in the pocket of the coat I don’t wear the next day. Or in the purse I don’t use normally. Or on the kitchen counter, because I forgot to let go of it on my way to get some water, put it down, and – gone! Gone from my mind! Like it was never there.

Hotel rooms are where all the best sex happens anyways.

To everyone who’s been leaving their stories in the comments, thank you so much. They’re all so different — some are heartbreaking, some are funny, some are blase, and all are definitely worth the read.

I know a lot of you have been talking about how inaccurate the idea of virginity is, and how it not only sets up a weird idea of “purity” or that there’s something to be lost, but that it also doesn’t at all accurately describe peoples actual, often very fluid, first experiences with sex, especially if we move away from the hetero-normative way of defining it.

While this next story still deals with pretty traditional man/woman/penis/vagina sex, as I read it I couldn’t help but think of these discussions. It speaks to the idea that there is more than one way to lose your virginity, define sex, etc etc.

So when my camp friend’s neighbor declared his love for me, I went along with it. When he proposed we have sex after two weeks of dating, I shrugged and said sure. I lost my virginity on a mattress in his basement, while his mom was dealing with contractors upstairs and my friend waiting in the next room. We used a condom, it lasted maybe ten minutes. Afterwards I couldn’t say why, but I was so angry I almost cried.

I broke up with him soon after, but stayed sexually active. Skip ahead to when I was 20, sitting in my University’s women’s studies class, talking about orgasms.

Up until then I’d assumed that’s what I’d been feeling during sex, too embarrassed to even consider the possibility that during the seven years I’d been sexually active I had been missing out on the most important part. I’d had sex before I started masturbating, and as a result thought the only way women got pleasure was from penetration. But that class, and the “if you’d had one, you’d know” advice made me really start to wonder. Had I had an orgasm? Was I missing out?

I did my research, reading about the clitoris, masturbation, and everything else I could. When my flight home over winter break got delayed, I realized this was my chance. It was me and an empty hotel room for the next twelve hours, and I decided I wasn’t leaving until I too had experienced the earth-shaking in-your-toes feeling my classmates described.

Two hours and one cramped hand later, and I got it. And once I knew what I was looking for, it was almost easy to find it again – on my own and also with people I was sleeping with.

So officially, I lost my virginity in junior high. But in my heart I’d like to think it was in that hotel room, by myself, when I was 20.

PS – As I mentioned in my first post — Planned Parenthood of New York City has some great guides on how to talk to your kids about sex, and is currently running a campaign to make sure all kids in NYC are taught accurate, age-appropriate sex education.

Happy Title IX Day!

On June 23, 1972, Title IX was enacted in the United States. Title IX requires that education institutions receiving federal funds not discriminate on the basis of gender. It applies to a range of practices, but has been most controversial in college sports.

Before Title IX, few opportunities existed for female athletes. The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), which was created in 1906 to format and enforce rules in men’s football but had become the ruling body of college athletics, offered no athletic scholarships for women and held no championships for women’s teams. Furthermore, facilities, supplies and funding were lacking. As a result, in 1972 there were just 30,000 women participating in NCAA sports, as opposed to 170,000 men.

Title IX was designed to correct those imbalances. Although it did not require that women’s athletics receive the same amount of money as men’s athletics, it was designed to enforce equal access and quality. Women’s and men’s programs were required to devote the same resources to locker rooms, medical treatment, training, coaching, practice times, travel and per diem allowances, equipment, practice facilities, tutoring and recruitment. Scholarship money was to be budgeted on a commensurate basis, so that if 40 percent of a school’s athletic scholarships were awarded to women, 40 percent of the scholarship budget was also earmarked for women.

Since the enactment of Title IX, women’s participation in sports has grown exponentially. In high school, the number of girl athletes has increased from just 295,000 in 1972 to more than 2.6 million. In college, the number has grown from 30,000 to more than 150,000. In addition, Title IX is credited with decreasing the dropout rate of girls from high school and increasing the number of women who pursue higher education and complete college degrees.

It’s a common misconception that Title IX requires schools to cut men’s athletics in favor of women’s programs, or that Title IX requires schools to give women’s sports the exact same funding as men’s sports. In fact, Title IX is measured in three different ways: “participation,” “scholarships,” and “other benefits.” The participation aspect requires that opportunities for women to play sports must be equal to opportunities for men. The scholarships portion requires that athletic scholarship dollars should be proportional to the athletic participation of each gender. Other benefits, such as coaching, travel expenses, equipment, and facility quality must also be proportional. But Title IX doesn’t require that the number of female athletes be proportionate to the number of women in the school (although that’s the goal); schools just have to show that they are trying to provide equal opportunities for female athletes. And if they can’t show that, they can still be in compliance by demonstrating that they have accommodated the skills and interests of both genders.

In fact, most public schools aren’t in compliance with Title IX (although schools have obviously made terrific changes). Female undergraduates receive on average only 36 percent of athletic operating budgets and 32 percent of money spent on recruiting. But as far as I know, no school has ever lost federal funds for non-compliance. So the argument that Title IX forces cuts in men’s sports programs is pretty disingenuous.

All of that said, though? Title IX is awesome. I grew up playing sports in part because Title IX helped to make women’s athletics mainstream and valued. Playing sports as a girl didn’t just teach me about teamwork and the necessity to show up and work hard when other people depended on you, but also helped me to view my body as something powerful, and as something that didn’t exist just for other people to look at. So thanks, Title IX. And happy birthday.

Bits and Pieces

Animal Cruelty Syndrome: How abusing animals overlaps and intersects with abuse of human beings. Men who abuse women particularly do harm to animals as a way of exerting control over their human victims, and children who grow up in abusive houses may also abuse or kill animals in an effort to gain control over their tumultuous lives. Thanks, Alex, for the link.

There’s a new morning-after pill in town awaiting FDA approval. This one prevents pregnancy up to 5 days after sex, and is more effective than Plan B. Of course anti-choicers are again claiming that it’s an “abortion pill,” even though animal studies showed it to have no impact on established pregnancies.

“Conservative feminism” assumes that women are too stupid to know when other women are advocating for our rights and when they aren’t.

A beer for every remaining World Cup team.

Can men have it all? Sweden seems to think so. Their family-friendly policies help to make them one of the most gender-egalitarian places in the world.

911 is a joke: One of the most infuriating 911 call transcripts you’ll ever read, and detailed accounts of how women are routinely mocked and ignored by 911 dispatchers.

On gay pride, consumption and community-building. My favorite line: “We’re all silly, pointless animals, animals who dress up and walk on two legs and make funny buildings and (like some other animals) sometimes put chemicals in our bodies for recreation. There’s nothing actually to do at all on this planet but eat and screw and enjoy beautiful things and to spend our time in communities of people–now, more than ever, communities of people that we make ourselves.”

File this one under “can’t win.” Debrahlee Lorenzana is a beautiful woman who was fired from her job at Citibank. She is now suing, saying that she was sexually harassed during her time there and was fired because her looks were “distracting” to the men in the office. Elie Mystal at Above the Law put up a post basically saying that Lorenzana asked for it by having plastic surgery and wearing cute (but certainly not office-inappropriate) outfits. Of course, physical attractiveness correlates with better treatment and greater success in the workplace. If you’re female, you can be fired for not wearing make-up or for not presenting yourself as appropriately feminine and attractive. But try to be feminine and attractive and, if you cross whatever arbitrary line someone sets between appropriateness and attention-whoring, you’re asking for whatever bad treatment you get. Kate’s take is a nice counter to Elie’s argument.

Articles about The End of Men have been circulating lately, with pieces by Hanna Rosin in the Atlantic and New York Magazine (think she has a book coming out?). The always-insightful Ann Friedman texplains that, no, men are here to stay. But hopefully traditional gender stereotypes are on their way out.

USA! USA!

Well played, boys. America. Fuck yeah.

Your virginity is a delicate flower, and if you give it away it will wilt and die.

Let me start by saying I LOVE all the comments that these posts have been getting, and thank you to everyone that has been sharing their stories so far.

Particularly, on my last post, Kim brought up an issue with the idea of virginity itself, and just why we make it so damn precious.

And honestly? I have to say I agree. I definitely fell into the “really? that’s it? category the first time I had sex, and I know a lot of women who felt the same. Although — I’ll wonder if it’s a gendered difference. I’d gander most women having heterosexual sex for the first time don’t orgasm, as opposed to men, whose orgasm will stand in as the official end of the act (if your experience was different, please share!).

Anyways, this next story illustrates for me both how much buildup we place on whether or not we had sex, and just what “counts” as losing your virginity.

I was about nine when I first learned about sex. My mother was vacuuming in the spare room, and I approached her and said, “What’s sex?” She turned off the vacuum cleaner and said, “It’s when the man puts his penis into the woman’s vagina.” And I mean, I was floored. “That’s gross,” I said. “Someday you won’t think it’s so gross,” she said, and turned the vacuum cleaner back on. It’s funny that I remember it so word for word, but I really do. And that kicked off a million conversations that I had with my mom over the next couple of weeks (or maybe months, I can’t really remember). It’s funny when I think about it now, because my mom was always answering my questions really specifically but not expanding on anything. So I learned that she and my stepfather did it, and that he had a vasectomy, stuff like that. I was totally curious about everything and I didn’t really understand that I couldn’t always be asking about sex in the car and out on errands and at the dinner table, and at one point my mother told me to stop bringing sex up in front of my stepfather because it was embarrassing him. So then I got totally embarrassed myself and the subject was pretty much dropped. And I know my mom did her best, but I’m going to go a different route with my daughter.

PS – As I mentioned in my first post — Planned Parenthood of New York City has some great guides on how to talk to your kids about sex, and is currently running a campaign to make sure all kids in NYC are taught accurate, age-appropriate sex education.

Suffering, A Feminist Introduction

I’m a fan of the Feminist Vital Stats practice, to give an idea (not totalizing, of course, but y’know) of where my perspectives are coming from. Some of the basics of my standpoint:

Female, cis, preferred pronouns she/her
Middle-class: mom’s a Planned Parenthood lawyer; dad’s a judge
Mixed: mom’s side white Jewish; dad’s side Black
Hetero, poly
Public-school-and-Harvard-college-educated (graduated with a joint degree in Social Studies and Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality)
California-born, American citizen
Non-disabled
Spitting distance from 24 years old

And one more, seldom mentioned characteristic I’d add might be:

One who suffers.

Sounds melodramatic, I know. 🙂 But if you’ll bear with me, I think it’s an important point.

After all, concern with suffering is what brought me to feminism, even before I knew what feminism was. With a family history that included both Holocaust victims and African slaves, from a very young age I was highly attuned to, and emotionally affected by, oppression, injustice, and human suffering.

Which might explain how, one minute, I was just a studious, athletic, passably popular high school sophomore, and the next I found myself boiling into tearful fury in Mr. Wong’s history class after a relatively minor expression of homophobia in a Student Senate meeting. By week’s end I’d joined the school’s Lesbian Gay Straight Alliance (LGSA) and started spearheading their annual Acceptance and Awareness Week. We spent months passionately battling our high school principle for the right to host student-led activities. Her objection: “It’s a controversial issue.” Didn’t seem too controversial to me. My peers getting harassed, physically and verbally, based on their gender and sexuality. Becoming depressed or suicidal. Teachers who couldn’t talk about their partners in school, fearing the social and professional consequences. Needless suffering among others.

At least, that’s how it seemed at the time.

Then it changed.

On being totally ok with losing your V-card.

Once a friend of mine got her hands on a whole library of sex ed tapes from around the world, and held a viewing party at her house. There were two: the first, an abstinence-happy 1980s piece of work (featuring one of the Coreys!) that warned you were like a delicate flower, and each time you had sex it was like pulling off one of the petals until there was nothing left and you died.

The second one was an amazing video from the Netherlands that went into everything — masturbation, sexuality, attraction, changes etc, but the most controversial part was not in fact the two cartoon teenage bodies writhing together on a bed but the message that came next: that it was ok to say no. And even more controversially, that it was ok to want to have sex and still not be ready, to want to make out but not “go all the way” and to tell someone to stop and they were supposed to then listen to you.

That’s what stuck in my mind when I read the below story, a part of my “losing your virginity series” (the string of comments on the first post are amazing by the way, I highly recommend reading them). I’m not sure about the rest of you, but that “it’s ok to say no” message wasn’t one I got as a kid — you either made out and had sex, or you didn’t make out at all. There was no “waiting until you were actually ready” in-between. Anyways, enjoy:

How I learned about sex:
When I was in the third grade, I had a crush on a boy in my class. Some kids were teasing me about it and kept saying, “You want to do IT with Mike!” But no one would tell me what “it” was. I went home from school that afternoon and asked my mom to explain “it.” Little did I know that she had books prepared in her nightstand! She sat down with me and, with the help of some photo illustrations, explained how a man and woman have sex. She told me that sex was something that only married men and women did. I was so grossed out that I hoped to never have sex with anyone! (Only later did I form my own opinions about who should be having sex with whom and when.)

How I lost my virginity:
I had been dating Kevin for months. We were both virgins and had discussed becoming sexually active. He was ready, but I wasn’t. He didn’t pressure me; he was willing to wait until I was comfortable. Having been raised under the premise that I would save myself for marriage, I was torn between my own desire to share my sexuality with someone I was truly in love with and the terror of my parents finding out that I hadn’t upheld their standards. Many of my friends were having sex, and it sounded like fun. I wanted to see what all the excitement was about.

Kevin’s parents were out of town that summer before our junior year of high school. As we showered together, Kevin gently asked if I might want to have sex. I declined, and he didn’t bring it up again. After the shower, we continued fooling around, but my mind wasn’t on Kevin. What was I waiting for? If I wasn’t ready to have sex with someone I was deeply committed to, then when would I have sex? I realized that no one was going to give me permission to be sexually active; I had to grant myself that privilege. It felt right to me, and I was tired of conforming to my parents’ moral code.

I pulled away from Kevin. “Yes,” I said. “Yes, what?” he asked. I explained that I was ready, and he pulled out a condom from his nightstand. We were together for the next four years, and I have very positive feelings about losing my virginity to him.

PS – As I mentioned in my first post — Planned Parenthood of New York City has some great guides on how to talk to your kids about sex, and is currently running a campaign to make sure all kids in NYC are taught accurate, age-appropriate sex education.

Stop right there, thank you very much

Two new fronts on the immigration fight in the US:

In Nebraska, a small town called Fremont just passed a referendum today that will require tenants who are not US citizens to get an “occupancy license” from the city council in order to rent housing. Even residents of nursing homes will be required to get the license. Further, employers found to have employed “illegal” immigrants will be open to local sanctions as well as the pre-existing sanctions.

And in Nevada, new Arizona-style immigration laws are being considered. However, a coalition of the ACLU, Democrats and businessmen have filed a lawsuit attempting to block the law from going to the Legislature or voters.

What both moves suggest is the depressing fact that a good portion of the country looked at Arizona and didn’t think oh no here comes fascism, but rather, how can we can get some of that over here? I hope that Fremont is not a sign of further new ground being staked out in the move to purge certain areas of undocumented immigrants, though I’m frankly pessimistic about that. These types of laws effectively criminalise the entire Latin@ community, as well as having secondary affects of other groups whose legal status may be murky (ie trans people whose legal sex on their documents may be mismatched with their gender presentation).

Let us all hope that the Nevada lawsuit prevails, as well as the Federal government’s lawsuit against Arizona. Because the spread of these laws must be stopped.