John & Belle Have A Blog

How About "The Patriarchy" Was A Big Pussy? Would That Be OK?

I almost didn't want to post anything more about this topic, but the peculiar misunderstandings involved have been getting on my nerves, so what the hell. Hey. that's what blogging's for! You see, I'm a feminist. Look, I came out and said it! And so, it follows that I have a long-standing (and true, my boys) belief that our society puts bone-crushing pressure on women to evaluate themslves, constantly, as objects of male sexual desire. If you think about this context for a nanosecond, you will see that the suggestion that women should consider whether or not they look (potentially) sexy at the moment when their infant's head is crowning as the finale of labor is positively grotesque. Does it follow from this that I am trying to dictate what men's sexual responses should be? Not exactly. Let us consider some hypotheticals.

Chalabi: Straight-Shooting Iraqi Insider Or Genius Statesman?

Jim Hoagland just noticed that insurgents in Iraq are waging an increasingly sophisticated campaign to destroy infrastrcuture and thereby public faith in the interim government. I guess they keep him in a little box in DC, normally, kind of like the Gimp.

Instead of set battles, the insurgents mount terrorist spectaculars -- coordinated bombings and attacks on civilians -- and have moved from hitting "random targets of opportunity to sophisticated planning with strategic and tactical objectives against specific high-value targets," according to a recent analysis by a private security firm in Iraq.

They've been lining his cage with really old editions of the Post they've got lying around; I think they just put some from 2004 in there. But he does have a phone. And Ahmed Chalabi's number:

"We have been able to increase production of electricity, but we can't get the increases to consumers because of sabotage," Deputy Prime Minister Ahmed Chalabi told me by telephone from Baghdad last week. "The power grid is now a primary target for the Baathists."...

Chalabi -- the target a year ago of accusations of treason and chicanery leveled in the press by anonymous U.S. officials whom he had apparently antagonized -- has survived that smear campaign and emerged as a key policymaker in Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari's government. Chalabi today works smoothly with U.S. commanders on his primary portfolio: infrastructure protection....

Chalabi landed in hot water with the American overseers of occupation in part because of his abrasive insistence that they did not understand Iraqi culture and priorities well enough to make those kinds of distinctions -- and refused to listen to Iraqis who did.

He declined to discuss the constitution when we spoke on Wednesday, and went out of his way to praise U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad for his low-key support for the drafting process. But Chalabi's original point -- that Iraqis are ready to choose their own form of government and leaders -- was unnecessarily put at risk once again by the White House.

This is just some of the most unadulterated bullshit I have ever read. Why is everyone so hot on setting up a Shiite theocracy friendly to Iran now? Is this some kind of super-secret thing all the cool kids are into? I---erg. What really occurs to me is that Chalabi must be one incredibly smooth-talking fellow. Of course, if you're locked in a box and only get to talk to one person ever, I guess he would seem pretty welcome.

Good night

Belle and I went to see Bruce Sterling talk tonight at the Singapore Writers Festival. Interesting. Belle took good notes and promises a report. Cory Doctorow was sitting just behind us but slipped away near the end of the Q&A, so we were unable to announce our nature as fans. (Either that, or some guy who looks like Doctorow slipped away, saving us all from minor social awkwardness.)

UPDATE: Oh. Looks like maybe we dodged a bullet with some Doctorow look-alike.

I'm too tired to try to summarize Sterling, so here's a picture Zoë drew of me. (So if you see this man, walk right up and talk to me!)

Original B-Dub

The greatest interview in the history of the internet has been posted. You probably think I'm just saying that because it's an interview with my brother, but you're wrong. Wrong! Who defines swass for you, baby?

Jedmunds: Well, my esteemed friend, you’ve been on the forefront to my mind of popularizing the term “swass,” in everday types of usage. Perhaps you could define it for us.

Ben Styles: I've heard swass defined as two things: 1. Some Wacked Ass Stupid Shit. I don't buy it. No one says that anyway. When was the last time you heard someone say something was some wacked ass stupid shit? 2. Sir Mix-a-Lot, on his album "Swass," uses the term in context. A famous line is "don't you wish your boyfriend was swass like me?" Which seems to suggest that he thinks any chick's boyfriend must be lamer than him, or at least not as swass. So I take it to mean super-cool, smooth, suave, and the like.

Allow me to just interject here, Ben is totally right. Is there really a controversy here? Next people will be arguing about what "bama" means; please. Also, with the insightful film criticism:

Jedmunds: Well, now that it is officially somewhere on the internet, it must be true. So, tell me, if you drew a mustache on George W. Bush, would he remind you more of Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton?

Ben Styles: Jees. Depends on the moustache -- if it was a Chaplin, he'd probably look more like Hitler. So I'll go with General Custer.

Jedmunds: Jesus Christ.  What the hell is your problem with silent movies anyway?

Ben Styles: (glares at me quietly)

Jedmunds: (uncomfortable chuckling) I mean, well, umm. What don’t you like about them?

Ben Styles: They are all quiet and stuff. And the plots are gay, all running around and over-emoting. Yeah, so they set the benchmark for movies. But so did celery soda for soft-drinks, and nobody drinks celery soda.

Did I ever mention that my brother Ben is always right about everything? Except, you know, I do like a Dr. Brown's Cel-Ray every once in a while. Still, Read the Whole Thing, fools, or you will be missing out like MAD.

She Said Pee Pee

Great post from Laura at 11d on the non-unitary nature of parental and child happiness:

While I'm with Harry on some days, I've had a tough day. Ian had four accidents (after two weeks dry), Jonah's neighborhood buddies stepped on the wet paint on the porch, the cat escaped, and I've been going since 6am without a break. Good for them that I'm home, but I could have been in a pee-pee free environment where they called me professor and where I surfed on the computer and called it work. I don't feel like a better human being after my day of child rearing. I can't say that changing wet underwear over and over was fun.

Good stuff.

Speed Freak Seminoles

God, I hate meth as much as anyone, but this is just sheer idiocy (via b0ingb0ing):

The White County sheriff says the time-consuming and methodical task of searching for arrowheads on farmland and in river beds seems to appeal to methamphetamine addicts. Sheriff Pat Garrett says that after more than 100 search warrants, he has come to expect arrowheads, many thousands of years old, when he storms the homes of suspected meth makers.

Tony Young of Velvet Ridge says the sheriff is on to something.  Young is in jail awaiting trial on a meth charge.  He says looking for arrowheads gives people wired on meth something to do.  To pay for his legal defense, Young sold his arrowhead collection to a local dealer.

Young says that many nights he found himself in fields full of fellow   arrowhead hunters and many of them were high on meth.

Arkansas State archeologist Ann Early says she's seen meth users collecting arrowheads in the Ozarks.  She says it is troubling that they have taken to collecting Indian artifacts.

Dude. Rednecks like to search for interesting historical artefacts. Sometimes they have metal detectors and are on the hunt for Civil War artefacts. Other times they are just relentlessly scanning newly turned earth for Clovis points. This doesn't have anything to do with being meth freaks. This is just something people who live in the South like to do because it's fun and interesting. I myself have spent many hours of my life searching for Indian arrowheads. The moment when I found a striated, coral-and-cream, palm-long spear-point in the sands bordering the May river was one of the high points of my life so far. I was also totally fucking stoned. Objection--relevance?!

     

Indian Food

Tonight I made alotsa tasty Indian food. Mmmm, Indian food. I don't have time to post all the recipes right now, but here is a highlight.

Spicy Mashed Eggplant

2-3 long Asian eggplant or one big regular-old eggplant
oil
2 T ghee
1 t cumin seeds
2 dried red chillies
1 onion, thinly sliced
1 T julienned ginger
6 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
3 small chillies, sliced paper-thin
2 ripe tomatoes, diced
1 t tumeric
1 1/2 t salt
1/2 c water
3 T chopped coriander leaves

1. Cut eggplants in half (or quarters if using big oval eggplant), brush with oil (or use your fingers) and roast in a 400 degree oven till soft, about 20 minutes. Let cool a bit and either chop/smash with knife (Asian eggplant) or discard peel and mash flesh (other kind).

2. Heat ghee and fry cumin seeds and dried peppers till aromatic. Add garlic, onion, ginger and chillies and sauté until golden brown.

3. Add sliced tomato, tumeric, salt and water; simmer 5 minutes over medium-low heat.

4. Add smushed eggplant and mix well; stir in cilantro and serve.

One thing I like about South Indian restaurants vs. North Indian ones is that they give you a whole set of food with the thali plate, that is to say, the selection that they think is appropriate. Often, when ordering à la carte from a North Indian restaurant, I feel I am not getting the right mix, or I don't even have enough people to order the appropriate range of dishes. Every now and again a helpful/dictatorial waitress will set you straight: "too many dry things! Must have black dahl!" Really, I think I should be having soup with every meal (this is pretty much a pan-Asian standard culinary belief), but I find it difficult to do so for some reason. John and I went to a sort of hipster Indian restaurant called Vansh last weekend, at which they helpfully offer an upgrade from any main course to a set meal with dhal, a curry, rice, and a vegetable dish. Cool idea. Also, nice location by the Kallang River, and cute presentation. Two thumbs up.

Blue Bird & Busy Ant

Zoë has an impressive talent for drawing in the style that children's illustrators use when they are trying to draw like kids. Click on Blue Bird for a closer look. Note the suggestion of motion - the bird appears to be both standing and flying. The crayon strokes, rushing up through the left wing, add to the sense of uplift.

That's the sun, in case you were wondering whether the bird is being chased by a corn nut or gold tooth. More fine art under the fold.

Would It Hurt If I Called You a Big Pussy?

I'm sure it is very unfortunate if some men are no longer attracted to their wives after seeing them give birth, but at the same time...get over it, dude.

And not every man gets over it. Several men have confessed to me that they never regained the same romantic view of their wives that they had before seeing them deliver children.

"They ended up having to cut her open to get the baby," one patient told me. "I saw it. I mean, how am I supposed to get that out of my head? Every time I look at the scar, it's like I'm seeing it again."

In the most striking cases, the symptoms that men experience come close to post-traumatic stress disorder, with its roots in the witnessing of an event that involves a threat to the physical integrity of self or others and responding with intense fear, helplessness or horror.

Boo-fucking-hoo. How do you think it feels to actually be the person getting cut open? How about having a miniature human being come out of your vagina, how are you liking that? 10 centimeters is full dilation. I know I'm not the only woman who contemplated the 10-centimeter top of a can of coffee and thought, "there is no way in hell." Maybe all these women should get vaginal plastic surgery to help ease the pain for their husbands. Hymen restoration, even!!

The fact that the subject is taboo also means that a man who is traumatized by the experience may be retraumatized again and again, with each child born to him....

I myself recall feeling as if the clinical focus on childbirth during prenatal classes, including the detailed descriptions of the placenta and the meconium, took away from the wonder of the process, rather than adding to it.

I don't know what is gained by showing the cross-sectional anatomy of a woman's torso to her lover.

Oh, I don't know...maybe an understanding of the physical processes involved in pregnancy? Most Annoying Guy Ever: "I think all that mysterious female stuff should just remain unknown, so I don't have to think about creepy womb-stuff." God, just don't go down to the bottom of the bed, no one's making you! You might have thought that of all things in life the experience of childbirth would be incontestably and solely about the woman giving birth. You'd be wrong.

Whether the father is present in the delivery room is a couple's personal decision, of course.

But it is a decision that involves potential gains and potential losses, and too few couples realize that fact or are willing to talk about it.

Women may want to consider the risks as they invite their partners to watch them bring new life into the world. For some of the passion that binds them together may leave their lives at the very same time.

Wow, so against my desire to have the guy who knocked me up actually help me out as I go through the most intense, painful experience of my life, I have to set his oddly-easily-quenched future sexual desires. Luckily for me, I didn't marry a total asshole, so I didn't have this problem.

UPDATE: welcome Slate readers! Please see my follow-up post above.

True Crime

I feel sure there's an entire mystery novel in here:

TOTOWA: AGENCY TO INVESTIGATE CHEMIST'S DEATH The Environmental Protection Agency is reviewing water plant records to see if they hold any clues to the killing of a chemist at the Passaic Valley Water Commission treatment plant in Totowa, an investigator said yesterday. The body of the chemist, Geetha Angara, who monitored drinking water quality, was found in one of the huge tanks at the plant in February.