List #13 - Things I am Not Ashamed of

Last Friday, someone from my past threatened to "expose" lies he seems to think are true about me (via a nasty email to my family and friends), along with a few things that actually are true, in an attempt to make me feel awful about myself, to intimidate me, and to get me to do something I do not want to do. This got me thinking that, even though he's wrong about a pile of things, I'm not I'm ashamed of things that I am, or things that I was, or things that I did.

How many things he's wrong about

My experiences are a part of my self, and I think I'm pretty alright. So here is a list of things I might not talk about all that often, but that I'm not ashamed of:

1. I took antidepressants. For that time that I was depressed. It's a pretty common thing, and I know lots and lots of people who've done the same. They helped me. When I was depressed, I couldn't figure out how to get past the "I can't possibly face the world" feelings long enough to even get myself to a therapist, which is kind of important for getting better. Antidepressants made that possible. They also helped me get some real sleep and quieted down some of the mean thoughts my brain was having. I didn't have the best experience stopping them (some quack told me it was fine to just stop...SO not true - that landed me in the ER with serious withdrawal symptoms), but all in all, I'd recommend that someone who is as depressed as I was in 1999 talk to their doctor, 'cause they just might help. Definitely not ashamed.

2. I had an eating disorder. You probably know about that already. I've written about it a few times. No shame - in fact, I want people to know, because the more people know about eating disorders, the easier it will be for others who have them to speak up and seek out help.

via alltreatment.com

3.  I am a feminist. (Yes, seriously, he seems to think that I won't want people to know that). I get the idea he hasn't read this blog.

4. I enjoy sex. Being the typical adult woman that I am, I'm not anti-sex. Most women like sex. Most people like sex. We are created through it, we have biological and emotional and social urges to do it. We talk about it, see it in movies and on TV, think about it, make huge decisions about who to have it with and who not to, and how to have it, and when, and where, and how often, and what should the purpose be, and how to avoid it with people we don't like, or people we used to like but don't anymore. Sex is a huge part of humanity, an important part of a healthy marriage, and I don't think that's a shameful thing at all. I think it's fascinating. When I grow up more, I want to be like SueJo. Have you ever seen her? It's amazing. She's so sex-positive and non-judgey and seems like she just has so much fun, with sex and with life aside from sex.

And she provides such a service to people! How wonderful, to know how to really enjoy such a huge part of the human experience! We are lucky that she does what she does. And that Dr. Ruth does what she does. Also, Masters and Johnson, Good Vibrations, Violet Blue, and on and on. 

These people are some of the ones who taught me that you can choose your choice. That advocating for what you like is the best thing for you (in regards to sex and to life in general). That liking one thing one time with one person IN NO WAY obligates you to like that thing again, with the same person or with a different one. They are how I know that the "nice guy syndrome" exists, and how I know why men who claim to be "nice guys" in that way really aren't.

"Perhaps you need a crash course in taking hints. Here's your first lesson: We're not actually walking somewhere together; I'm trying to leave this conversation and you're following me." via xkcd

5. I dated people before I got married. Some of those people had jobs. Maybe even jobs that not everyone would choose to do, or choose to tell people they did. But only one guy was ever really mean to me. And that had nothing to do with his job. Also, I don't have to own responsibility for the jobs that all the people in my life have had at some point or another. Don't like the job that someone I once dated had?

6. I changed colleges. I started at Cal Berkeley and then transferred to San Diego State. For reasons. Those included depression, wanting to be a teacher, and my future husband living in San Diego. A full 1/3 of students transfer, "most commonly in their second year" which is when I did. Not a big deal. Definitely not shameful. 

7. I'm clumsy. Like all the people in infomercials. I think "As Seen on TV" products were made with me in mind.

via buzzfeed

8. I startle easily. Like, really easily. I'm like this guy, except that I think it's funny. 

Seriously, yesterday I asked Ross for my toothbrush, and then got startled when he handed it to me.

9. I used to drink whiskey. I'm sure you're shocked. It was usually Jack Daniels. Now I tend to prefer Bulleit Bourbon. Oooh, or Breaking & Entering Bourbon from St. George. Or wine. Mmm, wine.

I'm sure there's more. I'm not particularly ashamed of much of anything in my life. Are there things I would do differently if given a second chance? Probably! But who wouldn't? Also, I wouldn't be the exact person I am now if these things hadn't happened, and I like me.

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I am thankful once again for my husband, who stands by my side through everything. And for my sister, who can make me laugh about even the worst things, and just that makes it all seem more manageable. And my parents...dang guys, you got put through it this week. I love you. Also I'm thankful for our new giant dog. Gertrude is awesome!

Whoops!

So it turns out I kind of stole the title of one of my more read posts from a guy named MovieBob who does videos for The Escapist. Sorry Bob! I had no idea you had the video or that you'd used the name just a few weeks before I did, and I should've Googled it before I used it (because of course something witty and smart has been thought of already!) So I'm gonna go back and fix what I can about the name, and also hopefully send some viewers your way, because your video is awesome, and does a great job of explaining things I've been trying to explain for a while!

The Escapist : The Big Picture : Pink Is Not The Problem

Letter to Target

I like Target. It might be a bit of a guilty pleasure in the super hippie, buy-local, boycott-corporations part of society that I tend to hang out in, but all the same, I like it. The clothes are comfortable (if a bit limited in color palate), the people are really nice, the stores are clean, and they usually have whatever it is I'm looking for.

But today, I really noticed for the first time just how gendered their toy aisles are. I've seen it before, but usually while rushing the kiddo past so he doesn't notice that there are piles of things he might want, like a princess outfit or a drum or a bike or cars or a doll or a new ball or any of the other fun looking stuff that's there. Today I was on my own, and perusing to see if they had a kid-proof digital camera. We're planning to give the kiddo one when his new baby cousin arrives to help him feel involved. "Take pictures, E!"

Anyways, the aisles with the "girl" stuff in them are not only filled solely with toys marketed to girls, but the shelves themselves were painted hot pink. Same thing for the boy aisles, but replace pink with blue. No dolls to be found in any gender-neutral way, no lego sets that aren't "girly" in the girl section...just a message of "These are the toys boys can like and these are the toys girls can like. The end." The only non-gendered stuff was the sports and swimming stuff, but even that has clearly been influenced - lots of black and blue and tan baseball gloves, but no pink ones. Swim stuff was available in all sorts of gender neutral colors, which means blue is an option for everyone, but pink is not. Ugh. I'm so sick of it.

So I wrote to Target Corporate. And I'm gonna Tweet them and Facebook them and hopefully, maybe, if they as cool of a company as I hope they are, they'll make some easy changes to their store setup, and not contribute anymore to making kids feel like they have to be a certain way. Cause kids definitely don't. I should have taken a picture today...I will next time I'm there.

Here's my letter. Fingers crossed.

Hello,

I'm a regular Target customer, and I really like your stores a lot. But I hate the way your toys section is set up. It's awful. The "girl" toys are in shelves that are painted pink and the "boy" toys in shelves painted blue and the things that are supposedly gendered don't have to be that way. Why are all the Legos for boys? Why is all the dress up stuff only for girls? I get that you have to market things to a target (ha!) audience, but you don't have to play into it THAT much. I would be so much happier as a supporter of your stores if you sent down a directive to remove a significant amount of the pink/blue gendering of toys. Girls like legos, and cars. My son likes horses and crowns. And bikes, and sports stuff, and basically all the toys. But soon, he'll learn from society that some of those things aren't "for him." And it would be so easy for you, as a corporation, to not be part of that stupid message that makes kids feel awkward and inferior for liking things they aren't supposed to. Thanks for your time, and I hope to hear back from you, and see some changes soon.

Lynds

Women in Sports. Ugh.

My sister brought this up to me last week, after watching a lot of the Olympics (or at least enough to be able to chat about it with clients!) and the more I thought about it, the more it frustrates me.

Did you know that this was the first year that women were allowed to participate in Ski Jumping in the Olympics? And that when a reporter interviewed Lindsay Van (who was allowed to test the jumps for the men in Utah in 2002, but not allowed to compete), they asked her about whether or not she was worried about her vagina falling out? Ugh. Just ugh.

Which got me to thinking...we segregate almost all our sports based on gender. Even the ones where it shouldn't matter one bit whether the competitor is male or female. Curling? Come on...no way it matters what sex you are in that sport. Skeet shooting? Archery? Equestrian events?

I get it when we're talking gymnastics or baseball vs softball, because there are some actual physical differences in the way men's and women's bodies are put together. But Bobsled? Women weren't allowed to participate in 2-man(!) bobsled until 2002, and still can't compete in 4-man. Why?

Is it the legacy of misogyny in sports? Women were definitely ill-received when they began marathoning...
 

Kathrine Switzer, as the race organizer shouts "Get the hell out of my race and give me those numbers." 

Is it the way the media covers sports, with vastly more time and attention paid to men's sports, even during the Olympics? And I'm not kidding about that vastly. 96% of televised sports are men's events. Women's Olympic gymnastics is one of the most watched sporting events ever, and women are much more likely to watch the Olympics, but still NBC is more likely to show only the events in which women are skimpily clothed, and devote the rest of the coverage to men's sports.

Is it the way we approach sports in general? Rick Paulaus makes an awesome point in the middle of an overall great article titled Why Women Will Never Beat Men in Sports:

Maybe think about it like this: Way back in the day, when James Naismith invented the game of basketball, what if instead of making the height of the baskets 10 feet, he decided to make them 8 feet? In this alternate reality, your favorite team's roster would be composed of entirely different players. Gone would be the crazy high jumpers or 7-foot plus monsters, because height and flight would no longer be as important of an asset. In their place would be... Well, I don't even know. No one really does. I imagine thy would be more muscular and compact athletes, like a rugby players. The fact is, the average height of an NBA player would no longer be nearly a foot higher than the average male because that kind of height wouldn't be necessary. Height would still assist, as it does in just about every competition this side of horseracing, but it wouldn't dominate the proceedings.

Now, multiply that subtle change in game construction by every little bit of difference between how male and female bodies are designed, and you'll get somewhere near our current state of affairs. 

Honestly, I don't know. There are piles more reasons why we, as a society, as a world, relegate women to second-class status in sports (as in so many other things). The solutions are much easier. Sign girls up for sports, encourage girls in sports, watch women's sports, and shut down anyone who dares to ask you about the connection between your vagina and your skiing ability. Because Fuck That Shit.

Notes

I had a pretty awesome strong-woman stand-up-for-myself moment today.  Of course, because I'm me, it came in the form of a note (I cry during in-person confrontations, which doesn't really help my cause most times).

When I was pregnant with the kiddo, I was scheduled by my OB's office to see a counselor. Apparently she checks in with people about alcohol and drug use and other stuff when pregnant. Anyways, it was an awful meeting. She wouldn't hear me at all about how an occasional glass of wine isn't harmful at all, and insisted I would be making bad choices for my child if I had a glass of champagne at my wedding. Science does not back her up, and my kiddo is great (I actually had two verrrrrrry slow flutes of delicious bubbly champagne over the course of my whole wedding day.)

But that wasn't the worst part. The first thing she handed me when I walked in there was a pamphlet about not gaining too much weight, and how to eat during your pregnancy so that it would be easier to lose the baby weight after the kid is born. I was 16 weeks pregnant at the time, and terrified about how I, as an eating disorder survivor, would react to gaining 30 pounds. I was already stressed out enough about food as it was, and I definitely didn't need a therapist type telling me to think about it more, or to worry more about not gaining weight.

Today, I got scheduled to see her again. I refused, because duh, why would I want to talk to her again? A great therapist is one of the best things ever, and conversely, a bad therapist (or a bad match) is one of the worst things. Even now, after just refusing, I'm worked up enough to be blogging about it while I wait for my OB. And I haven't talked to this lady for over 2 years!

Rather than just keep quiet about it, though, I wrote a note. Because she should know why, so other people don't have to get mind-fucked too.

So it wasn't the in-person schooling I'd imagined I would give this woman if I were ever to see her again, but that's ok. Because I said my piece both in writing and to the OB I have who I trust, my OB delivered the note to her, and now she knows. I think sometimes I get caught up in thinking that in order to stick up for myself I have to do it in a specific way...but this way is just fine. And honestly, writing is my way, so why not embrace it?

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I'm thankful today for Crash Course World History, good doctors, good therapists, good dentists, and a job that allows me to talk about real things in real ways.

Mr. Bates, You're a Jerk

I just finished watching Episodes 6 and 7 of Downton Abbey Season 4. I love the show - I'm such a geek for historical fiction, and then throw in some romance and fancy lacy outfits (plus the sassy Dowager Countess - Maggie Smith just makes everything better!) and I'm hooked.

I love so many of the characters too, particularly the women. They're portrayed as full-fledged people, with faults and interests and it's just so wonderful. Even with its Victorian ideals and setting, the show passes the Bechdel test without hardly trying, or so it appears.

I'm gonna start getting into spoilers here, so if you haven't watched as far as me, just know I'm mad at Mr. Bates and I'll see you later.

So Mr. Bates...he's supposed to be worthy of Anna, supposed to be kind, supposed to be sensitive, supposed to be good. And on the outside, he seems that way. But really, he's actually making Anna's life so much harder. His reaction to her rape, making it all about him, wanting revenge, diminishes him into someone who is just adding to the burden she's already surviving with. Her biggest concern is whether or not he'll kill her attacker, and that's not ok. A woman should be able to tell her husband anything and trust that if she asks him to, he'll keep his hands to himself, like any good kindergartener.

But no, even though she's done everything possible to keep him from knowing who attacked her, and everything possible to try to convince him that she doesn't want him to take revenge, he leaves town and shoves her rapist (who by the way, he doesn't have any proof on. Not that the guy didn't do it...but Mr. Bates doesn't know that) into oncoming traffic.

Mr. Bates has his revenge and he gets to feel just fine, relieving himself of the burden of anger. But his wife doesn't. Now she not only has the anger and fear and shame stemming from the attack to deal with, but also a betrayal by her husband, added fear that he'll be arrested, and the inability, should she ever be ready for it, to bring her own attacker to justice.

Ugh. I rarely side with Thomas on anything, but Bates, you're a jerk.

Dangit, Thomas

My kid loves Thomas the Tank Engine. So do lots of others. But it turns out even this show, which I usually tolerate just fine for my kid (aside from the incessant theme song) has a problem with pink.

A conversation I just had with my mother:

I really hope all these conversations about kids' toys, and the messages we send our children about what parts of them are valuable, and which parts are shameful, gets us somewhere, but I'm not feeling too encouraged. Amazon, a pretty good indicator of how shopping looks across America, looks like this:

"Toys" section preview - only dolls and art have any pink in them at all, even though nothing is technically gendered

"Girls" toys - all pink, all the time, except for the one thing that's white with a rainbow. The rest of the page was just as pink

"Boys" toys. No pink to be found. Boys get to have all the other colors, though, including purple.

On the upside, there are Goldiblox, which are pretty awesome. I plan to buy a bunch of sets for the kiddo when he's old enough to understand how to not chew on them. And if I ever have a daughter, I'll get even more of them for her.




Goldieblox gets it - pink isn't what makes girl's toys frustrating! These girls do all sorts of great things, and they still get to like pink! They still get to be proud of being girls, who like girly things! I love it.

PS - here's the original Goldieblox commercial, featuring a version of The Beastie Boys "Girls," which they've since had to take down from most places. I like it with both songs, but it's nice to have the lyrics, too.

Pink is NOT Just for Girls, and it's NOT the Problem!

A particular Huffington Post article has been making the rounds on my Facebook this week. It's mostly a great article, and it's been bringing a ton of attention to one of my biggest pet peeves, which is awesome. The hook is an adorable Lego ad from 1981:

The article goes on to mourn that we don't have ads like this anymore. And I so agree! I wish we treated girls, and by extension girl toys, as wholly developed things that don't have to be frilly or sparkly or pink in order to be something that girls want. And I wish marketers weren't doing this to the toys of my childhood, as they "modernize" them:

Dolls don't need to be sexier. They don't need to be made skinnier, or given bigger eyes and longer hair and more porcelain skin. Dolls and female characters can be girls without bows and boobs and makeup. I don't know why toy companies are so very insistent that young children believe that all girls want to look like this, or should look like this. I don't know why they want all children to want the same thing! It's infuriating.

Toys should be toys. For kids. Whichever kids want them. We shouldn't be allowing all the toys in our country to be divided up into boy toys and girl toys. It does our children a huge disservice, and it's going to cause problems for us all in about 15 years, when the kids who grew up in this atmosphere are young adults with no concept of gender-neutral.

But the HuffPo article made me pretty angry right off the bat with this line:

The LEGOs are not pink or "made for girls." She isn't even wearing pink.

Aaaarrrggghhh!! Pink isn't the problem! Why does it matter if she's wearing pink, or not wearing pink? Pink is not our enemy. Girls should be able to wear pink if they want to! Why do people, whenever they respond to this kind of problem (and I see it all the time) think that eliminating the pink toys is the solution?

Why is there never any outrage that pink wasn't included in the original Lego set? I dare you to find a gender-neutral toy that includes pink. Or is all pink. It's nearly impossible. I can't dress my son in pink. But I can damn sure find blue clothes and toys meant for girls. Why? Why are we so afraid of pink? Is it because it's associated with feminine, and we are scared of feminine becoming the norm?

We use feminine words as insults all the time:

"You throw like a girl"
"Don't get your panties in a twist"
"Quit being such a pussy"

And we imply that a loss of manhood is the worst thing that could happen to a man:

"Turn in your man card"
"Did someone put your balls in their purse?" 

Jessica Valenti, in Full Frontal Feminism wrote:

“What’s the worst possible thing you can call a woman? Don’t hold back, now.
You’re probably thinking of words like slut, whore, bitch, cunt (I told you not to hold back!), skank. Okay, now, what are the worst things you can call a guy? Fag, girl, bitch, pussy. I’ve even heard the term “mangina.” Notice anything? The worst thing you can call a girl is a girl. The worst thing you can call a guy is a girl. Being a woman is the ultimate insult. Now tell me that’s not royally fucked up.” 

And it's true! Even the majority of our vulgar and insulting words equate to a woman's genitalia! I won't list them, but I'm sure you can think of plenty.

In Chicago several years ago, there was a contest to pick a new color to represent the newest train line. A young girl wrote an essay advocating for the color pink. “Who does not like pink?" she asked. "It’s so bright and lively … if it’s pink people will want to ride it.” The CTA agreed with her, and The Pink Line was born. And with it came outrage on the part of many Chicagoans. From Salon:

A pink train would be humiliating to the good people of Chicago. We are the hardworking, meat-eating, bar-brawling, sports-loving, dirty-politicking, multiple heart attack-surviving hog butcher for the world! We are men, except for the slightly more than half of us who are not! And you expect us to pay good money to ride on something called the “Pink Line”? Why not just put a tutu on the Sears Tower, or fill Soldier Field with tampons, or come to my house and cut my balls off?

 And there, I think, is the real problem. It's not so much that we now offer almost exclusively pink (and purple!) toys to girls. It's that we don't offer them to boys. And by doing so, by leaving pink out of all gender-neutral items, out of all "boy" toys, we are teaching both boys and girls that pink is an other.

That only someone who is less-than will want pink. Pink has been made to represent the underlying hatred our society has for all things feminine, and that sucks. Because I like pink. And I like girly things. And that makes me no less capable than anyone else.

I just wish society would agree with me on that.

***Whoops! Turns out the original title of this blog post was used already by the excellent Bob "MovieBob" Chipman. Here's a link to his great discussion of the same concept: Pink is Not the Problem.

List #...5?

1. We have a big fat pile of art to do this weekend. Yay!

2. I graded SO. MANY. PAPERS. this week that I think my eyeballs are going to fall out of my head.

3. This week's episode of Once Upon A Time was cray. Damn you, Peter Pan. Also, Jared Gilmore is not a good enough actor to pull this off. Damn you, Casting Director!

4. This shit is crazy too. Facebook, get it together - 2 year old girls can be naked. Really. It's ok. And while we're on that topic, it shouldn't matter if the topless person is 2 or 20 or 80...if men can be naked on the top half, we should be able to also. Stupid double standard.

5. The desk chair is broken, so I'm writing this with my butt at a 45 degree angle. If anything I'm saying seems crooked, that's probably why.

6. For about 20 minutes tonight, right at bedtime, we were pretty sure we'd lost all the binkies. It was potentially tragic. But we were rescued by the fact that my sister's house is like rightthere, and she has a stash of the kiddo's stuff.

7. It's ridiculously cold. As in, real frost on my windshield. As in, wearing tights under my jeans. Not cool, California! Even Gawker noticed that we've got a "chilly apocalypse" going!