I have a new blog entry up on Comment is Free re: Jezebel. A bit late to the game but whaddyaknow, still trying to make a point.

Here’s a recipe for a good blogosphere scandal: take two sassy, trendsetter bloggers writing for one of Gawker Media’s most popular sites. Invite them to a comedy show that will be broadcast online and have them interviewed by a ruthless and nosy host eager to discuss their sex lives. Add a lot of free alcohol to the mix, and you have the perfect ingredients for the viral equivalent of a car crash. [read the rest here]

When I ask my boyfriend if he likes his body, the answer I tend to get is “of course I do. Because it’s MY body, and mine alone. It does what I want it to do”.

Another thing that Mark have told me is that he likes my legs because they are strong. And he means it: I don’t think he is just trying to tell me that he likes them in spite of them being fat, big or oversized or even in spite of them having cellulite. I initially found his compliment to be quite disturbing, because I never thought of them as strong. Except for the occasional worry which goes along the lines of “I wish I had smaller thighs” to “I can’t wear a short skirt today because I didn’t wax”, I don’t think much of my legs - they are merely limbs which bike to work everyday, and walk miles every week. But strong? I didn’t ever stop to think of it, nevermind thinking of it as a good thing.

And it’s nonsense, isn’t it? That all women tend to be at their most happy when (warning, feminism 101 coming up) they are at they smallest, thinnest and in many cases, frailest. Few of us, I dare to guess, ever stop to think “damn, look at those big bulky legs, they could carry me around the country easy” or “check out my arm muscles, I bet I can destroy scores next time we go to the amusement park“.

I was reminded of this very point this week when reading about the Wimbeldon tennis coverage in the British media (1). While the first two days of the tournament focused solely on what Maria Sharapova wore (shorts! shock, horror!), we were then bombared with pictures of Nadal/Murray flexing his fucking arm muscle/ debating his level of fitness on the majority of national newspapers’ covers. Of course, as an incitement to praise them for being so strong and masculine - crowd movers.

When was the time a woman was publicly praised for being muscular? In tennis, it was probably Amélie Moresmo - but then again she wasn’t praised, god forbid, she was mocked for being a lesbian and ‘looking like a man’.

I mean fucking hell, give a girl a break - either that or I am going to sit and re-watch Million Dollar Baby which as ghastly as it was, at least had the courage to show a woman kicking serious ass.

(1) As boring as tennis is, at least Wimbeldon now pays equal money across the board to both men and women. This was decided in 2007. Um, yay?

First things first/disclaimer: I believe that gender is partially socially constructed. I have absolutely no doubt about it, even though I am more than ready to say that women and men are biologically different ( I am just making a point in saying this since I once had a long discussion with a feminist who believed than slowly,all women were developping the same physical abilities than men).

That being said, I listened to a podcast today that truly rocked my world. I was riding my bike listening to This American Life, whose weekly show is currently about testosterone. I must admit being a bit dubious when the topic was announced (as were the women in the radio production team), but the content is riveting: the presenter interviewed men, women, and women-turned-into-men about their reaction to a lack or surplus of the big T, and the results were fascinating.

The first interview was with an anonymous guy who wrote a piece for GQ - I know, ugh- about a undiagnosed medical issue tat let him without testosterone for four months. He describes, above all the other behavioural changes that he had to face, an absolute lack of desire. The guy was catatonic, staring at a brick wall all day, eating bland food, not thinking much about the world - at least not very passionately. He would just process any information in a very linear manner: “if I saw a pigeon, I would just think “it’s a pigeon”, he explained to the presented who had a bit of trouble processing the idea himself, “nothing more, nothing less”.

But what really did my head in was the interview of a FTM transgender dude, who described himself as “an ex feminist butch” who went to an all-girl school. He would inject himself with double the amount of the testosterone which could be found in a very large man to achieve his transition, and after a while began to feel strong changes.

One of the most interesting change was the amount and quality of desire he would feel towards women - he explains that back when he was a woman, when lusting after someone the process would be wordy, brainy and quite complex ( she would, for example, think about things to say to the person in front of her, possibly using imagination and scenarios) whereas as a man, he would just think “daaaamn” and have an instant urge of lust, which made him feel like a monster.

But now to the truly fucked up parts - which made the presenter choke in embarrassment for his female listeners: when asked if he noticed any other notable behavioural non-libidinal differences, the guy said a couple of things which boggled my mind: that he noticed a new interest in maths and science (topics which he didn’t care for as a woman), and he found himself understanding physics in a way he never understood before. Furthermore, he has a very hard time crying.

I very much know that his understanding of physics and maths could have just evolved suddenly in a totally different set of circumstances that are not hormonally related, but seriously - what? Like the interviewer said, wow, you’re setting us back to a hundred years. I can already imagine some assholes thinking to themselves, this guy is proof that all women are retarded when it comes to maths:

I honestly don’t know what to think about it, except for the fact that millions of women scientists would probably want to stab themselves in the eye listening to his interview.

You can listen to the program here. Comic by xkdc of course.

If I could pick 5 Jeopardy categories, they would be:

- Prince (circa 1982-1997)

- Chocolate, in any shape or form

- Paul Auster & Brooklyn (I have never been to New York)

- The X-Files (largely due to the fact that I now own the entire 9 series. I still maintain that should I complete a Masters in Cultural Studies, this would be my prime topic of interest) [1] [2]

- Social activists/ Feminist blogs

What are yours?

[1] Oh no, people beat me to it.

[2] A paper on the X-files and sexism? Hallefuckinglujah! Quote:

The X Filesseries reveals through central character Agent Scully the contemporary shift in traditional gender roles which has enabled more women to become scientific experts. What could be considered sexist about the X Files series is the fact that once women move into the arena of science, as Agent Scully has, and men, such as protagonist Agent Mulder, start believing in the power of intuition, traditionally a feminised area of thought, suddenly the authority of science, a principal discourse since Enlightenment, is brought into question, as intuition becomes paramount. It is in this shifting gender discourse that sexism can be viewed in the X Files series once viewed through a feminist analysis.

It reminds me a bit of how I approached my dissertation during my last year of University. I figured that if I had to write so much on a single topic for a year, this was the right time to combine my favourite things, mix it up and see what I could do with it. Voilà! A hundred pages about Blogs, Generation X, my friends’ webpages and Douglas Coupland. I felt a bit like a fraud, since I spent my research time, you know, reading blogs and surfing MySpace.

Picture via.

La Chola / Brownfemipower always gives me serious, brutal and -in a very bizarre way- almost unwelcomed food for thought. I would guess that a lot of her readers agree that she pushes boundaries, opinions and ideas quite far, and in doing so allows me to pause and think hard about the truths I willingly or unwillingly avoided so far.

She published a beautiful post describing a story of love, murder and revenge this week and this quote stood out for me:

“Love is the strength that allows you to see it is the system that creates monsters out of humans that must be destroyed, not humans.”

Something to keep in mind.

(Picture via.)

I suppose I do find it incredibly insulting that afro-Americans are expected to support Obama “because he’s black”, and that everytime I mutter something along the lines of “I guess Clinton wouldn’t be that bad”, people automatically think that my support is linked to my feminist politics.  Jesus, people. Two days ago I watched an excellent coverage of the elections/super Tuesday  by the BBC, during which the journalist asked Jesse Jackson, point blank, if he supported Obama because they shared the same skin colour. I cringed.

That being said, Obama vs. Clinton is a tough choice and to be frank, I liked Edwards best.

I like Clinton’s views on health care, and appreciate her support of LGBT communities. Her crying did not bother me one bit, and well - I always had a soft spot for Bill. Obama, as pointed out elsewhere, would be better at international affairs since his state is a clean, fresh one untainted by the Clinton Years.

Blogger Susie Bright nails it as always, trying to explain her indecision between the two Democrats candidates:

“The Clintons are admitted hawks, they’re prudes, and they’re absolutely quaint on issues like continuing the embargo on Cuba. Someone needs to surgically remove the Cold War out of their ass. ”

PS: And really? This is why I think blogs are my main source of news-reading these days: for comments like these.

Life in London has been hard technology-wise: one cell phone, two ipods and two laptops -of which one was brand new- were stolen from me. But fortunately, I still have one of my most-cherished possession: my bike (and I hope I am not bringing bad luck to myself by mentionning this).

There is no question about that, purchasing a bike was definitely the best idea I have had in a year. Painful 35-40 minutes bus or tube commuting journeys magically turned into brisk 20 mns bike journeys, I discovered parts of the city I wouldn’t have seen otherwise, and my body is certainly thanking me for the exercise. And don’t even get me started on the astronomical amount of money I am saving every day.

I bought my hippy-looking rusty blue bike off Gumtree for 60 pounds. Granted, the process itself was complicated and led M. and I to travel quite far away towards East London to pick it up. On a tuesday evening we hopped in the tube towards East Ham, got lost for a good hour in the beautiful park surrounding the neighbourhood, and finally found the flat. The bike owners were weird to say the least, and spent an hour bragging about their happy financial fortunes (they were quite well off) before even letting me try to ride the damn thing. But two hours later we took the tube back home, bike in hand.

[note] There is where I decide not to write extensively about the emails that followed from the owner, asking me to take him for coffee and calling me ‘honey’ even if I went to his house accompagnied by my boyfriend. Ugh. [/note]

A couple of months later I was talking to one of my co-workers who’s a huge cycling enthusiast (she once cycled from London to Brighton and swears that once one wears lycra to bike, there’s “no way back”) when she made a very poetic remark about bikes: that what she loved most about it was the effortless work between man and machine. How simply they worked together, but how efficient it was.

Spot on, I thought. Bikes are great.

Now - my only profound aversion to cycling these days steams from the dirty looks I get from men who think that a woman wearing a (always medium-to-long, I might add, so there’s not much to see) skirt + bike= free license to wink, stare, stick their tongues out or even scream obscene comments (it did happen). And as much as I would like to refrain from writing stereotypical comments such as “well, what can you do, men can be pigs”, their attitude only allows me to do it without remorse.

Fucking let me go to work in peace, thank you and good night.

For the past week and probably to my boyfriend’s dismay* I’ve suffered a terrible case of PMS syndrom - something I have been quite happy living without for most of my teenager and adult life. Ridiculous mood swings and crying fits - you name it. Should you happen to be blessed with the wonders of a female body, you probably know what I am referring to. If not you can listen to Mary J Blige, who wrote about it (what a really strange topic for a RnB singer. I didn’t listen to anything by her ever since this duet with Method Man [if you know the song you are old school - HOLLA!] so I don’t know the song itself, but I disgress…)

This might explain why I enjoyed this post at Sivacracy, which attacks the faux-caring, paternalist and condescending tone napkin and tampon manufacturers use when adressing their customers. She quotes a letter sent to a manager of a company representative:

… As brand manager in the feminine-hygiene division, you’ve no doubt seen quite a bit of research on what exactly happens during your customers’ monthly visits from Aunt Flo. Therefore, you must know about the bloating, puffiness, and cramping we endure, and about our intense mood swings, crying jags, and out-of-control behavior. You surely realize it’s a tough time for most women. In fact, only last week, my friend Jennifer fought the violent urge to shove her boyfriend’s testicles into a George Foreman Grill just because he told her he thought Grey’s Anatomy was written by drunken chimps. Crazy! The point is, sir, you of all people must realize that America is just crawling with homicidal maniacs in capri pants. Which brings me to the reason for my letter.

Last month, while in the throes of cramping so painful I wanted to reach inside my body and yank out my uterus, I opened an Always maxi pad, and there, printed on the adhesive backing, were these words: “Have a Happy Period.”

Are you f***ing kidding me?

I should write infuriated letters like this one more often.

And don’t even get me started on the “flowery scented” pads trend, which I find revolting. Periods are a natural cycle of your body, and pushing women to feel like their body odour when menstruating is wrong really irks me. Now, while I would certainly agree that it’s a “tough time for women”, it’s also one we have to embrace, not detest.

I know some women decide to regulate their cycle by taking Depo Provera which stops mentsruation altogether, but a really interesting post I read today confirmed my fear of such drastic reproductive-options.

Now about those pads? This great company will be the place where I am going to shop next. At least they don’t treat their customers like raving chocolate-eating shopping-addicted morons. And no more chlorin-ified cotton!

*He is a very patient man. Lucky me.

• Newsflash: all American male law school students aren’t enlightenned characters. And while I’m sure the majority of them are great, capable and bright individuals, some are the exact opposite with too much time on their hands (maybe they should read a bit about sexual harrasment law instead of posting on message boards). And to think they will be lawyers soon. I’m still amazed by what people think they are entitled to do just because it’s on “a series of tubes” and they’re hiding behind their screens.

• Today is International Women’s Day. Does it mean that the 364 other days are International Men’s day? Maybe.

• Accurate sexual education for teens in the US. At last, a step in the right direction! Well that’s good news.

“After five years of making it through the House, but getting nowhere in the Senate, the sex ed bill —mandating that sex ed be medically accurate and that abstinence cannot be taught at the exclusion of contraception— passed the state Senate today, 30-19.” (via Josh Feit @ Slog)

I hope it also means that young adults won’t have to hear propaganda such as “abortion is the leading cause of breast cancer” any longer.

In light of my recent post about Yoshi’s island, Mark pointed me to this piece of news about gaming:

Mark: bet you can’t wait for this game

me: brilliant, and so spot on, after all I knit and bake bread already (1)

Mark: you’re a housewife superstar?

me: well I do have all the qualities don’t i?

A game for girls who want to become Housewives superstars? I suppose the game’s challenge is to bake perfectly little round cakes, clean the kids’ underwear and knit pretty scarves with ribbons intertwined. (I suppose that if there were working-full time housewives characters in this game they would say, hey, “I am enjoying spending an average of 10 hours more than you doing chores even if we both have a full time job and i’m still hitting the glass ceiling. Why’s that, honey?”).

Not that it’s out of the way… From what I gathered learning about games with Mark, Nintendo opened the gaming market to girls by making it accessible (and sadly, by releasing pink Nintendo DS). It also means they release games such as Bratz, which I can only describe as the gaming equivalent of reading Seventeen; Paris Hilton splattered all over the pages and oh don’t-you-wish-you-were-her.

Simple consideration: if there are “games 4 girls” and “games 4 boys”, it makes little doubt that girls are also enjoying playing boy’s games as well. After all, I really enjoy killing my pixelized enemies. And yes, I also understand that some games will be more popular with one sex than the other. But here’s the one million dollar question- why don’t I picture any little boy furiously hitting the start button of his “housewife superstar” game? Damn it, I want to see the “stay at home dad superstar” game out, and soon. Because as long as it’s not about assigning roles to gender but respecting lifestyle choices, there’s nothing wrong with liking housework, or wanting to raise your own children. But Madeleine already explained it better than I could.

(1) Mark and I did it together and to be honest, he knew way more about it than I did. That’s one of the reasons why I love the boy.