Pandagon
This Would Never Happen If We Just Had Gay Abortion Classes Like I Said
There's a reason I've never believed that schools are hotbeds of liberalism, indoctrinating children in ungendered, hypersensitive hairshirt bubbles: they have this odd penchant for treating kids like they're in maximum security lockup.
An assistant principal, enforcing the school’s antidrug policies, suspected her of having brought prescription-strength ibuprofen pills to school. One of the pills is as strong as two Advils.
The search by two female school employees was methodical and humiliating, Ms. Redding said. After she had stripped to her underwear, “they asked me to pull out my bra and move it from side to side,” she said. “They made me open my legs and pull out my underwear.”
Ms. Redding, an honors student, had no pills. But she had a furious mother and a lawyer, and now her case has reached the Supreme Court, which will hear arguments on April 21.
(I'm not sure why they tossed the honors student part in there. If she did poorly in English class, it wouldn't have been any more okay.)
Praise be to Black Jesus, I actually agree with Ed Morrissey for the most part - it was a gross violation of her civil liberties, regardless of what kind of student she was. But reading through the comments, there's a definite undertone that this is somehow the creeping hand of the liberal state acting in loco parentis, the unfettered power of teachers' unions reaching in and giving little fiefdoms to overzealous employees. Except that this was a vice-principal, who's not a member of the teacher's union, not being a teacher and all.
What happened to this girl was totally illiberal, and I don't mean that in the typical classical liberal/hierarchical superiority way, wherein you just say that Thomas Jefferson wouldn't have done it, so there and I smell like sunflowers. I mean it in the very real 21st-century liberal/progressive way, wherein the general way that liberals run things doesn't involve assuming that 13-year-old girls are smuggling industrial-strength Advil in their panties. Conservatism has a stronger authoritarian bent than liberalism (it's the whole "daddy party" thing). While a commitment to public schooling falls heavily on the liberal side of things, the use of authority in running schools cuts both ways. There's a reason conservatives like packing school boards to get stupid things taught. There's a reason that abstinence-only classes became federal education policy.
Based on no evidence whatsoever other than anecdotal experience (read: data), school administration and boards tend to skew more conservative than they do liberal, or at least have a great penchant for ostentatious displays of terrible conservative ideology. It's why we have zero-tolerance policies in schools across the country: it's not a particularly liberal idea that a child who brings a knife to school for a project should be expelled, it's not a particularly liberal idea that we strip-search girls and subject lockers to random searches by the police. It's why teaching science in science classes is still a massive public debate, it's why schools crack down on nonexistent rainbow parties.
The myth of public schools' liberalism comes largely from the presence of unionized teachers and the belief that talking to hormonally-driven teenagers who do stupid things should involve more than sternly wagging our fingers and saying "no" as we would to a puppy chewing on a book. Much like the media, the conservative voice in public schools is far greater than they'd ever admit - it's just that it often turns out so poorly that it behooves them to pretend as if it's a myth.
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Reading and misreading Eric Holder's call to discuss race
I was on the Mike Signorile Show today and we discussed recent comments made by Attorney General Eric Holder at an event at the Justice Department in honor of Black History Month:
Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial, we have always been, and we, I believe, continue to be, in two many ways, a nation of cowards. Though race related issues continue to occupy a significant portion of our political discussion, and though there remain many unresolved racial issue in this nation, we, average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about things racial....And we, in this room, bear a special responsibility. Through its work and through its example, the Department of Justice — this Department of Justice — as long as I’m here, must and will leave the nation to the new birth of freedom so long ago promised by our greatest president. This is our duty, this is our solemn responsibility.
I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard these remarks because, as regular readers know, I frequently blog about why it's sometimes hard to speak freely and frankly about race in American society. I can't stand the seeing the term "post-racial" tossed around out there as truth, particularly when referring to the past election cycle or now that Barack Obama is president. I think we have plenty of evidence that we have a long way to go on the matter. I thought Holder was refreshingly frank; we all have fears of broaching the subject -- and the problem is not just on the right side of the aisle.
Take Maureen Dowd's reaction to Holder's comments; apparently the use of the word "coward" sent her into a paranoid tirade:
Yet Obama is oozing empathy compared with his attorney general, who last week called us “a nation of cowards” about race....We need leaders to help us through our crises, not provide us with crude evaluations of our character. And we don’t need sermons from liberal virtuecrats, anymore than from conservative virtuecrats.
...In the middle of all the Heimlich maneuvers required now — for the economy, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, health care, the environment and education — we don’t need a Jackson/Sharpton-style lecture on race. Barack Obama’s election was supposed to get us past that.
Wow, where was the lecture, where was the sermon? I take it that the "Jackson/Sharpton" reference is shorthand for "those blacks from the old school who lay a guilt trip on whitey." Talk about dog whistles. Moreover, Holder was addressing ALL of us, not just white folks. I took his statement as inclusive. We are all responsible for the silence. You see, in Dowd's mind, Holder became the Angry Black Man when he said that; it blew away the post-racial fantasy she loved clinging to. One has to wonder -- in the wake of the unbelievable New York Post cartoon -- why she didn't get a reality check last week. As I said to Mike, the truth is, she reacted viscerally, and became defensive and transmitted it through her keyboard.
So did right-winger Jonah Goldberg, who called Holder's statement "both hackneyed and reprehensible." His reaction to Holder's comments is even more absurd -- and revealing. Read it below the fold. Goldberg:
I think this is nonsense as we talk about race a great, great, great deal in this country. Endless courses in colleges and universities, chapters in high school textbooks, movies, documentaries, after-school-specials and so on are devoted to discussing race. We even have something called "Black History Month" — the occasion for Holder's remarks to begin with — when America is supposed to spend a month talking about the black experience.Second, to the extent we don't talk about race in this country the primary reason is that liberals and racial activists have an annoying habit of attacking anyone who doesn't read from a liberal script "racists" or, if they're lucky, "insensitive."
Someone please change his Pampers; that's a pantload. Leaving aside the fact that Goldberg feels oppressed because people get to learn more about black history in February, he's in such a frenzy that he misses Holder's point -- we're not talking about discussing race on an Ivory Tower panel, with eggheads debating the merits of, say, affirmative action. It's not about any studies, polls, after-school specials or class readings. The AG said:
we, average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about things racial.
He's pointing a finger at you and me -- you and your neighbor, you and your colleagues at work. We are the ones who fail to engage on the topic of race because we feel so exposed, as I told Mike, afraid of being called stupid, racist or a bigot for simply asking questions out of ignorance and desire to learn, particularly if you don't have much personal experience with people outside of your race. That's tough stuff.
How many close black friends -- and I don't mean casual acquaintances -- do you think Goldberg has? Somehow, based on that diatribe, he can't have many. OK, well maybe not if he's friends with Jesse Lee Peterson.
Human nature makes it hard to reach out; Dowd and Goldberg, who clearly came unglued at Holder's use of the word "coward" simply dismissed the sentiment and message within it, and even worse, saw affronts that didn't exist directed solely at whites. But that's why we have to talk about race. This all cuts both ways, and there's no shame in admitting there's a problem and being part of the solution begins in your personal interactions, not pontificating in a paranoid fashion in a column.
I didn't use the word "coward," but I did call the American public "lazy" about going outside racial comfort zones in a recent post -- and it's the truth.
It takes effort and desire to expand your life experience by being socially inclusive; quite frankly associating with people who are more like you than less like you is the default of the majority of us. Is it lazy? Yes, but obviously the path of least resistance is human nature. What disturbs me is the lack of curiosity I've seen in too many people; they don't see learning about and learning from people from a different culture or race on a personal level has value for them. Staying in a comfort zone of homogeneity clearly has more value.How do we own up to and fight our natural impulses in order to better ourselves -- and our country?
***
I couldn't resist sharing this one reaction to Holder's address -- Faux News talking head Megyn Kelly. Her interpretation is completely over the edge, no doubt reflecting some of the thinking on the right as they went breathless over this part of Holder's statement.
And yet, if we are to make progress in this area we must feel comfortable enough with one another, and tolerant enough of each other, to have frank conversations about the racial matters that continue to divide us. But we must do more- and we in this room bear a special responsibility. Through its work and through its example this Department of Justice, as long as I am here, must - and will - lead the nation to the "new birth of freedom" so long ago promised by our greatest President. This is our duty and our solemn obligation.
Protect your keyboards as you watch her discussion with Juan Williams...
KELLY: He said they [the department] has a special responsibility in addressing racial ills. That — that strikes fear down the spines of many conservatives in this country, because they don’t want the Justice Department taking us back to the day when they get heavily involved in things like affirmative action, and things like voter registration rights. […]
WILLIAMS: What you will see I think is more aggressive enforcement in terms of existing civil rights laws. And that was the fear that the existing civil rights laws were not being enforced by the Bush justice department.
KELLY: Well a lot of people thought that the Bush Justice Department sort of got us back to the point where we were — we were being reasonable.
I sh*t you not. The Bush record, particularly about protecting voting rights, is abominable; Holder stood up there that day and meant that the time of inaction and contempt for the rule of law is over. The LA Times reported that from 2001 to 2006, no voting discrimination cases were brought on behalf of African American or Native American voters. Hello -- remember Ohio, with Ken Blackwell's shenanigans (broken machines and not enough of them in predominantly black precincts)? And all those other states where votes "disappeared"? Please.
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Rick Santelli: Not America's New White Jesus
Rick Santelli, who you may remember from his LARP rally trading floor rant of a few days ago, is now alleging that the White House has threatened his family.
Politico has opined that Obama faces a "nation of Santellis" based on a misleading Rasmussen poll (is it just me, or has Rasmussen essentially gone full-bore GOP since Obama took office?). As Josh Marshall points out, neutral polling shows overwhelming support for Obama's mortgage plan, to the point where it seems like political folly to oppose it.
So, besides the fact that angry men with TV slots are always big news, due mainly to their utter novelty, why bother building up Santelli's otherwise pointless and off-key rant as representing a social movement? Well, it's always better to pretend there are two sides that are relatively equally wrong and right than it is to point out that one side is overwhelmingly supported, thereby removing the two main types of political analysis that are our insiders' stock and trade: the perils in every course of action for the Democratic Party, and the need for compromise from Democratic positions. A popular Democratic president pursuing popular Democratic policies is simply anathema in our media discourse, it simply can't exist.
This is the major media challenge for Obama over the next several years: Obama can't do it his way, Obama is missing the American public's yearning for bipartisan cooperation, Obama lacks the power or mandate to move the center of the country (because it's always center-right, even if Hammer and Sickle rallies are being held in Tulsa), so on and so forth. The modern political dialogue was written in the early 1980s after the tumult of the Nixon-Ford-Carter years, and Obama will not be allowed to rewrite it unless he just bites the bullet and does it.
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NAACP national calls for Prop 8 to be overturned
Perhaps this will silence some of the critics who can't let go of the zombie meme that most blacks are homophobic -- and that leadership won't step up and say something. This hits all the right notes. (via press release, no link):
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People today announced support of measures before the California legislature challenging Proposition 8, which altered the California Constitution to deny same-sex couples the freedom to marry and equal protection under the law.In a letter to legislative leaders, NAACP national board chair Julian Bond and President and CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous urged passage of House Resolution 5 and Senate Resolution 7 to put the legislature on record calling for invalidation of Prop. 8 as an improper and dangerous alteration of the California Constitution.
"The NAACP's mission is to help create a society where all Americans have equal protection and opportunity under the law," said President Jealous. "Our Mission Statement calls for the 'equality of rights of all persons.' Prop. 8 strips same-sex couples of a fundamental freedom, as defined by the California State Supreme Court. In so doing, it poses a serious threat to all Americans. Prop. 8 is a discriminatory, unprecedented change to the California Constitution that, if allowed to stand, would undermine the very purpose of a constitution and courts - assuring equal protection and opportunity for all and safeguarding minorities from the tyranny of the majority."
SR 7, sponsored by Equality California (EQCA), will be heard in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Feb. 24th and will proceed to the full Senate for a vote shortly thereafter. Its companion bill, HR 5, also sponsored by EQCA, passed the Assembly Judiciary Committee on Feb. 17th and is eligible for a vote before the full Assembly as early as today.
The California State Conference of the NAACP filed briefs with the California Supreme Court in the legal challenge against Prop. 8, arguing that the measure drastically alters the equal protection guarantee in California's Constitution and that the rights of a minority cannot be eliminated by a simple majority vote. Several other civil rights organizations, faith leaders, unions and leading corporations also filed briefs urging the invalidation of Prop. 8.
"The NAACP has long opposed any proposal that would alter the federal or state constitutions for the purpose of excluding any groups or individuals from guarantees of equal protection," said Chairman Bond. "We urge the legislature to declare that Proposition 8 did not follow the proper protective process and should be overturned as an invalid alteration that vitiated crucial constitutional safeguards and fundamental American values, threatening civil rights and all vulnerable minorities."
Needless to say, this is the message that needs to be spread throughout churches in the socially conservative black communities around the country.
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How Brown v. Board hasn't managed to conquer the prom
After reading Jesse's post about Pat Buchanan's racist ranting, I had an idea that it was super-duper mega-bad, but really, watching it, it's exponentially worse than that. It's also self-contradictory---Buchanan claims segregation is the choice of black people and then starts ranting about crime statistics, which is a tacit admission that segregation is actually his preference. So why is he washing his hands of it? (Because he's a lying son of a bitch who shouldn't be allowed on TV without explaining that he's, say, a creationist.)
The fact that Buchanan gets away with just lying through his teeth like this is maddening. As Jesse explained, the history of 20th century community growth and demographic shifting makes it clear as day where the responsibility lies. But it's not just demographic shifts, white flight, and other trends like that. In "post-racial" America, we still have plain, old, 1950s-style segregation that goes under-reported in the mainstream media for reasons I don't fully understand. Take, for instance, the continuing custom of Southern high schools with segregated proms. Bet you haven't heard about that, unless you have some geographic proximity to the problem. It's far from the only way that white Southerners have resisted desegregation in the past 54 years since Brown v. the Board of Education*, but it's one that pops up in the local news on occasion because it's got a seasonal quality to it. There's other, even more under-reported strategies like redistricting schools, using false diagnoses of learning disabilities to get many of the black students sent off to special ed, and even examples of entire neighborhoods seceding and making themselves their own town. But the prom is the example I'm focusing on now, because so much is made clear in the discourse over it.
The reason this is getting into the news now is that the Charleston, Mississippi high school with a segregated prom has been covered in a documentary called "Prom Night in Mississippi". The history of the segregated proms really exposes how fundamentally dishonest it is for people like Buchanan to foist the blame onto black people. I'm sure Buchanan would point out that there's a black prom at this high school, and that's all the evidence you need to blame black people for segregation. But the black prom was, duh, organized because if they didn't organize it, the black kids wouldn't have a prom at all. Even a cursory examination of the situation reveals that the segregated prom situation exists because white parents in Charleston insisted upon it, based on a series of vicious stereotypes.
Canadian director Paul Saltzman moved into the Mississippi Delta town to document how preparations for the dance might shake up traditions and raise fears.
"When I was doing the research and asking people 'What was the problem in having the prom together?' what whites usually said is, 'You know, blacks are into drugs; they're into violence' and on and on and on," Saltzman said.
Morgan Freeman has been offering to pay for an integrated prom for a decade now, but the school board only took him up on the offer in 2008. So while we had a black man winning the nomination for President and people were starting to crow about "post-racial" America, these kids were having the first integrated prom. But still there was a whites-only prom that was thrown for the white kids (and their parents) who couldn't stomach an integrated prom. In a beautiful stroke of irony, the integrated prom went off without a hitch and it seems everyone had fun, but the whites-only prom was marred by fighting.**
So, the kids had fun, the racist parents found that their worst fears had no grounding, and a small part of Mississippi inches slightly closer to joining the 20th century.*** They're planning to have another one next year, and the school is still going to have the white prom for the uber-racists, as well. In case the moral of the story isn't clear, it was the black prom that opened up and accepted white prom-goers to become integrated, and not the other way around. In other words, Pat Buchanan has the way this runs completely backwards, not that I expect him to change his story in the slightest.
*For people who are exhausted of the past 35 years of fighting over Roe v. Wade, it's worth meditating on the fact that there's been 54 years of fighting over Brown, but done in a way that gets ignored by the mainstream media more. This, if anything, makes it more frustrating.
**This doesn't surprise me in the slightest. Once you reduce the group to the most avid racists, you're talking a mean, sadistic group of rednecks in training. I'd be shocked if all that hostility didn't turn into a fight.
***The 21st century will take a lot more work.
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Feminist Dudes: explain this to me
I've been mildly obsessed with this story since I first read it, and sometimes the only fix for that is to blog it. It's a story by a woman who I think is extremely relatable---young, hip, urban, educated, feminist sort---who pulls the card we all dread, the unwanted pregnancy. Usually, these stories involve a lot of soul-searching, but our heroine already knows what she wants to do, which I think is commendable. If more people thought about this before it came up, and even talked about it with their partners, we'd be in a better spot. She has the abortion, and doesn't feel bad about it, nor should she. In fact, she seems to feel good about taking care of herself, as she should, even though there are powerful social stigmas employed to shame any woman who believes she deserves to be happy and healthy. (Many of the commenters at Nerve and Alternet go on absolute misogynist meltdown---some people just can't stand it when women don't hate themselves.)
But her problem since then is that her male friends, boyfriends, and dates that somehow get it out of her cannot be cool. Women are cool, generally, but men she's told have reactions ranging from assuming she's utterly torn up about it to getting super-angry with her when she doesn't pretend to be torn up about it for their benefit. (This makes the commenters even more ballistic. The only thing worse than a woman who doesn't hate herself is a woman who believes her emotions are valid and deserve respect.) Now she dreads dealing with men on this issue more than she dreaded the surgery itself. The whole thing reminded me of how Lord Saletan has proposed a "legal abortions but mandatory guilt trips" compromise---that way the anti-choicers get to punish the sluts, but women, at the end of the day, get to make the best decision for themselves. Our society has constructed women as debased to the degree that society still is uncomfortable with a woman who refuses to be debased, guilt-tripped, or depressed over something she did that was not only not wrong, but the right thing to do.
My theory is that people's discomfort with abortion correlates pretty strongly to their own sexism, and this strikes me as more evidence for that theory. A lot of liberal dudes think that because they're pro-choice, anti-rape, pro-equality, and pro-Title IX, they've got their bases covered, and they never spend time examining their own internalized sexism. And so when a woman does something that clashes with a stereotype, such as doesn't feel bad about not having a baby or about having sex, they don't know how to take it. That, plus a generalized discomfort with women's bodies that our culture encourages, and many men are ill-equipped to handle it.
But I'm not a dude, so I can't say. However, many of you are, and so I'd like to hear from you about why you think the author couldn't catch a break from all these men in her life? (To be fair, her good male friend came around, but it took him some time.)
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Bamboo Review: A Total Kick In The Balls
This week is my "spring" break from law school, where I was totally going to blog up a storm and relax and get back into my normal, non-law groove, even if just for a week.
Then I started coughing at the end of last week. And shivering. And getting terrible headaches. As it turns out, I had the flu. Emphasis on had, because I now have pneumonia. I understand what I did wrong, law school. Now, back to Contracts reading, before you smite me further.
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I'd love to put it to bed, but it's still up and walking around
Pam's piece below debunking the idea that the anti-gay lobby can be compromised with on gay marriage really got me to thinking, as did Jesse's post on Lord Saletan trying to find some brilliant compromise on abortion. I'm (shockingly) feeling 90% on Obama, which is much better than I'd hoped for at this point, but I think one effect of his campaign strategy is that the same old pundits (mostly straight and male and living in parts of the country where their friends and relatives have state protection) who think that they can put to bed the culture wars with a compromise here and a tweaking of semantics will be emboldened, because Obama somehow had the magic formula to chip off just enough socially conservative people to win an election during an economic crisis that put these issues on the back burner. But putting Rick Warren up to pray at the inauguration will not put the culture war to bed, and compromises and semantics will not appease culture warriors.
There's also a tendency to play "pox on both your houses" in these kind of articles that feels aesthetically pleasing, but unfortunately has no basis in reality. Saletan's the master of this, pretending that each side has one card it can give up, and peace will be at hand. He has to tweak the facts to get there, particularly minimizing the importance of abstinence-only education and anti-contraception activism in the "pro-life" movement. David Blankenhorn and Jonathan Rauch play this game by setting up a situation where both sides are equally motivated by goodness and purity, and that each side demonizes the other. Pam's retort says it all:
Sorry to say, our opponents are acting in bad faith. They attempt to sway positions with outright lies, such as conflating homosexuality with bestiality, thus leading to, say, man-goat nuptials, something that has nothing to do with any sane religious conviction, btw. That’s extremism and intellectually bankrupt fear-mongering. The problem with the religious right is that they don’t want any compromise, because the ultimate goal is to have government intervention and control on all matters of sex and reproductive freedom—those are issues that extend way beyond civil marriage or social security benefits for same-sex spouses.
I have never seen a "please, let's compromise and put this to bed" article coming from the anti-gay or anti-choice faction. At best, I've seen people who personally don't like abortion, but are still pro-choice. This interesting fact should tell them who is the side with all the stubborn people. I personally don't like to feel stubborn on these issues---if there was a compromise that could put the war to bed with just a few minimal tweaks, I'd probably snatch it up---but I know what Pam knows, that if we concede some ground, they'll just demand more. They're not going to rest. And so, sadly, neither can we. That was the gist of this article I wrote for RH Reality Check that was a reply to Aspen Baker. I feel it's a tad unfair including this, because Aspen is not at all pushing a centrist angle---I think she's actually striving for a radical third way instead of a compromise third way---so I want to make clear that I wasn't really disagreeing with her about her strategy's usefulness. I just think that the traditional pro-choice rights-based approach complements it, and cannot be supplanted by her strategy. I'm including it, because I made a point that I think is relevant, which is that the culture wars are long-standing and going nowhere because there is a genuine difference of values here, and values are not amendable by evidence in the same way differences of strategy might be.
The national conversation over abortion feels like war because it isn't about abortion per se. It's the most important battle in the struggle over the existence of the patriarchy. The dictionary defines patriarchy as, "a form of social organization in which the father is the supreme authority in the family, clan, or tribe and descent is reckoned in the male line, with the children belonging to the father's clan or tribe." This explains why abortion matters more than anything else--if we believe that "life" begins at conception, then the father gets all the credit for making children, and this in turn justifies male authority over women and official "ownership" of children. If we believe that "life" begins at some other point in fetal development, then the credit for new people goes to women, and patriarchal justifications dry up.
The presumption that Blankenhorn, Saletan, Rauch, and pretty much all these dudes who think there's a compromise point is that they can only make this argument by employing a false assumption, which is that since we're all Americans (yes, these battles are worldwide, but they're only speaking to Americans), we share a fundamental values system, and that the battles are about gradations of difference. Therefore we can all just move over a little and tah-dah! We all agree. That's why Saletan thinks that it will be easy enough for anti-choicers to give up their hostility to contraception and for pro-choicers to give up our belief that an embryo's value is defined strictly by the mother. And Blankenhorn and Rauch appear to think that the homobigots will be mollified by a few religious protections. And I sort of feel sorry for these dudes, because they are working under the assumption that everyone involved is arguing in good faith. By doing so, they encourage cultural conservatives to continue the strategy of lying about their motivations, because it's so effective. It's painfully obvious that the opposition to gay marriage isn't rooted in a genuine fear that there will be religious persecution in a country that has strong protections for freedom of religion and speech. Why? Because the anti-gay marriage movement also supports sodomy laws, fights against hate crimes legislation, and otherwise, as Pam said, engages in dehumanizing gay people on a routine basis. This isn't and was never about freedom of religion. It's straight-up bigotry, and the only way to get the right to stop lying about this is to scoff when they lie.
The conservative and liberal views on culture and family issues are wildly different, and we have to face this with bravery. I'd characterize the views as patriarchal and feminist, but use whatever words you wish. The conservative view is rooted in hierarchy, authority, and conformity, and the liberal view is rooted in equality, freedom, and diversity. The conservatives believe that the ideal is heterosexual, male-dominated marriage, and everyone who cannot or will not conform should be punished and shunned (which would make more people conform out of fear). Liberals believe that people are more important than institutions, and if our institutions are making people unhappy---and we consider gays and women to be people---those institutions should change. It would be nice if we all had the same values and merely disagreed about how to get there. Compromise pushers would like to believe we're all pro-people and just have a different strategy to get there. But actually, I think we're all in agreement on what the policy choices each side supports would do. We both get that abortion bans and massive restrictions on contraception would probably lower the age of marriage, force women seeking abortions to risk their lives, and make it harder for women to pursue careers and agitate for equality within their marriages. Both sides get that bans on gay marriage would reinforce homophobia and effectively punish gays for choosing relationships based on desire and not on duty. We just disagree on whether or not these are good things. Unfortunately for all of us, one side's going to have to win out before this is over.
The good news is that our side is winning. Not as fast as we'd like, no, but we are winning. Not if we give up, no, but as long as we keep fighting, there's no reason to think we won't win this one. The fact that one side has to lie about their motivations and the other can be pretty straightforward tells you who has the upper hand on the values argument. We do. Which is why it's important to refuse to play into right wing narratives about how this is about religious freedom or fetal life or whatever decoy they set up to sucker the well-meaning.
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NYT op-ed on same-sex marriage presents a compromise
Is there any way to compromise on the matter of civil marriage when it comes to the LGBT rights movement and the religious right? David Blankenhorn and Jonathan Rauch think there is and outline it in the op-ed "A Reconciliation on Gay Marriage" in the NYT. They believe we are at an impasse and both sides need to find common ground. Hear them out.
It would work like this: Congress would bestow the status of federal civil unions on same-sex marriages and civil unions granted at the state level, thereby conferring upon them most or all of the federal benefits and rights of marriage. But there would be a condition: Washington would recognize only those unions licensed in states with robust religious-conscience exceptions, which provide that religious organizations need not recognize same-sex unions against their will. The federal government would also enact religious-conscience protections of its own. All of these changes would be enacted in the same bill....Whatever our disagreements on the merits of gay marriage, we agree on two facts. First, most gay and lesbian Americans feel they need and deserve the perquisites and protections that accompany legal marriage. Second, many Americans of faith and many religious organizations have strong objections to same-sex unions. Neither of those realities is likely to change any time soon.
Further sharpening the conflict is the potential interaction of same-sex marriage with antidiscrimination laws. The First Amendment may make it unlikely that a church, say, would ever be coerced by law into performing same-sex wedding rites in its sanctuary. But religious organizations are also involved in many activities outside the sanctuary. What if a church auxiliary or charity is told it must grant spousal benefits to a secretary who marries her same-sex partner or else face legal penalties for discrimination based on sexual orientation or marital status? What if a faith-based nonprofit is told it will lose its tax-exempt status if it refuses to allow a same-sex wedding on its property?
OK. I have a problem with this already, though I see where they are trying to accomplish -- getting same-sex couples access to the rights and benefits of civil marriage and cede the word marriage to those who cannot decouple it from religious marriage in their heads. Obviously, Kate and I would take that considering we have no recognition in our state and won't unless action comes from the feds or SCOTUS, but Blankenhorn and Rauch's solution, by accommodating the "misunderstanding" about the word marriage -- rather than redefining it (something that has occurred countless times in the past), chooses to draw an institutionalized line of discrimination. Many of the same excuses for bans on interracial marriage revolved around religious objections to it, with scripture cited about the morality of race mixing. Would they have suggested an entire new federal civil institution be created to resolve the problem because the American people weren't ready?
More below the fold. It's about long and short term gain. Blankenhorn and Rauch believe the escalation of the conflict rolling out in lawsuits around the country and the patchwork of rights in the states make it a necessity to find middle ground in an expedient manner.
Cases of this sort are already arising in the courts, and religious organizations that oppose same-sex marriage are alarmed. Which brings us to what we think is another important fact: Our national conversation on this issue will be significantly less contentious if religious groups can be confident that they will not be forced to support or facilitate gay marriage...Linking federal civil unions to guarantees of religious freedom seems a natural way to give the two sides something they would greatly value while heading off a long-term, take-no-prisoners conflict. That should appeal to cooler heads on both sides, and it also ought to appeal to President Obama, who opposes same-sex marriage but has endorsed federal civil unions. A successful template already exists: laws that protect religious conscience in matters pertaining to abortion. These statutes allow Catholic hospitals to refuse to provide abortions, for example. If religious exemptions can be made to work for as vexed a moral issue as abortion, same-sex marriage should be manageable, once reasonable people of good will put their heads together.
And now, the finger-wagging:
In all sharp moral disagreements, maximalism is the constant temptation. People dig in, positions harden and we tend to convince ourselves that our opponents are not only wrong-headed but also malicious and acting in bad faith. In such conflicts, it can seem not only difficult, but also wrong, to compromise on a core belief.But clinging to extremes can also be quite dangerous. In the case of gay marriage, a scorched-earth debate, pitting what some regard as nonnegotiable religious freedom against what others regard as a nonnegotiable human right, would do great harm to our civil society. When a reasonable accommodation on a tough issue seems possible, both sides should have the courage to explore it.
Sorry to say, our opponents are acting in bad faith. They attempt to sway positions with outright lies, such as conflating homosexuality with bestiality, thus leading to, say, man-goat nuptials, something that has nothing to do with any sane religious conviction, btw. That's extremism and intellectually bankrupt fear-mongering. The problem with the religious right is that they don't want any compromise, because the ultimate goal is to have government intervention and control on all matters of sex and reproductive freedom -- those are issues that extend way beyond civil marriage or social security benefits for same-sex spouses.
If anything, the marriage equality movement has been the faction constantly forced into compromise in the form of separate and unequal domestic partnerships and civil unions. These are incremental gains that have had a positive impact on same-sex couples, but it has also created this patchwork faux equality that is causing the legal machinations we are seeing.
The flawed premise of this op-ed is that both sides of the issue have equal power; that's illogical. The side on the status quo in this case holds the power and doesn't want to cede any of it, obviously, because it sees that granting the power of civil equality is threat to its vision of the country and the existence of marriage as they understand it. The side of social change always has the uphill battle, and the law leads, not follows the people when it is a contentious issue. And even when the law extends civil rights, that doesn't mean the public is ready to or willing to accept that change. We're clearly still fighting race-based civil rights issues, and that reflects a society that has not fully matured on the matter. It will be no different as LGBTs win civil rights, one by one.
In making compromises to tamp down the conflict that make Blankenhorn and Rauch so uncomfortable, we all must go in with our eyes open that the impact of compromise may have unintended consequences that may take years to extract ourselves from by creating a separate and unequal system. Is it worth the price? In Blankenhorn's and Rauch's compromise, it brings a host of rights to couples unable to obtain them because of the laws in their states. By rejecting compromise and working incrementally, those in states with few or no rights remain second-class citizens at any level for who knows how long (before the U.S. Supreme Court ultimately decides the matter).
So, Blenders...weigh in.
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Oscars Liveblogging
<a href="https://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php?option=com_mobile&task=viewaltcast&altcast_code=f242f70cb7">Oscars 2009 - The One With Bartleby Buttons, Or Whatever</a>
Official Oscar Predictions Thread
Auguste and I will be liveblogging the event tonight, although according to CNN it should be held with all the stars wearing sackcloth and plastic bags as shoes to show solidarity with the suffering people of America, because nothing will show us Hollywood's empathy for the plight of normal people like pretending they aren't all glamorous, filthy rich people.
Anyway, my predictions below. Feel free to put yours in comments, and the most accurate person wins a free XBox 360*.
*Free XBox 360 contingent on $355.99 S&H fee, deposited in our Paypal account at left. Please wait 12-16 weeks for delivery. BEST PICTURE
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Frost/Nixon
Milk
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire
It's by far the most readily marketable Best Picture Nominee in a year where nobody saw one of the nominees (The Reader) and nobody seemed to actually care about another (Benjamin Button).
BEST ACTOR
Richard Jenkins, The Visitor
Frank Langella, Frost/Nixon
Sean Penn, Milk
Brad Pitt, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler
Will it be Rourke? Probably not. But if this wasn't the best acting performance of the year, you may kindly watch Grease II on repeat instead of the Oscars.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Josh Brolin, Milk
Robert Downey Jr., Tropic Thunder
Philip Seymour Hoffman, Doubt
Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
Michael Shannon, Revolutionary Road
You remember that year the Lakers played the 76ers in the Finals? This is like that, except Allen Iverson got in a car accident on the way to the game and fell into a pit of flesh-eating bacteria, then hugged every other person on his team. And the Lakers are all naturally immune.
BEST ACTRESS
Anne Hathaway, Rachel Getting Married
Angelina Jolie, Changeling
Melissa Leo, Frozen River
Meryl Streep, Doubt
Kate Winslet, The Reader
It's safe to pass up Streep this year, because she's going to be nominated every subsequent year until our global economic depression forces the film industry to convert its boom mics into insulation material for our shanty metropolises. By the way, how is it that DeNiro and Pacino seemed to go from being the greatest actors of our generation to twin versions of Brian Dennehy with better agents, while Streep has managed to stay quite possibly the consistently best performer in the history of movies?
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Amy Adams, Doubt
Penelope Cruz, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Viola Davis, Doubt
Taraji P. Henson, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Marisa Tomei, The Wrestler
The two nominations for Doubt cancel each other out, leaving us battling between Penelope Cruz's scene-stealing performance in Vicky Cristina, someone from the inexplicably nominated Benjamin Button, and Marisa Tomei, who has the same effective lifetime ban on receiving an Oscar as Tom Cruise.
BEST DIRECTOR
David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Ron Howard, Frost/Nixon
Gus Van Sant, Milk
Stephen Daldry, The Reader
Danny Boyle, Slumdog Millionaire
Oh, look, it's the white guy who directed the movie who made us feel like we understand another culture. Also leads to Joel Schumacher directing his magnum opus, This Movie Is About Blacks, But In A Sensitive Way.
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Frozen
Happy-Go-Lucky
In Bruges
Milk
Wall-E
I figure this will be the token nod for Milk, unless it wins all of those awards I'm iffy about.
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Eric Roth, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
John Patrick Shanley, Doubt
Peter Morgan, Frost/Nixon
David Hare, The Reader
Simon Beaufoy, Slumdog Millionaire
Same thing here for CCBB. In Soviet Russia, we give token awards to movies that were already decided to be contenders!
BEST ANIMATED FEATURE FILM
Bolt
Kung Fu Panda
Wall-E
The Best Animated Feature Film Oscar is to Pixar as the Rose Bowl is to USC. Nice, but ultimately meaningless.
BEST ART DIRECTION
Changeling
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
The Duchess
Revolutionary Road
Having only seen The Dark Knight, I'm going with the cardinal rule of art direction: pick the historical drama, and then pick the oldest one.
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Changeling
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire
Pad that resume!
BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Australia
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Duchess
Milk
Revolutionary Road
It had funny hats and big hair.
BEST DOCUMENTARY
The Betrayal
Encounters at the End of the World
The Garden
Man on Wire
Trouble the Water
The only one I've seen, and one I know is not about World War II. The winner!
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT
The Conscience of Nhem En
The Final Inch
Smile Pinki
The Witness - From the Balcony of Room 306
I stayed in a Room 306 once. It was nice.
BEST FILM EDITING
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Frost/Nixon
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
Again, a token nod for the movie that was nominated to get Heath Ledger his posthumous Oscar.
BEST FOREIGN FILM
The Baader Meinhof Complex, Germany
The Class, France
Departures, Japan
Revanche, Austria
Waltz with Bashir, Israel
So, I flipped to a random cable channel, got an episode of Naked Archaelogist, and I think France reminds me most of a naked archaelogist. A more scientific method than how this film will actually be chosen.
ACHIEVEMENT IN MAKEUP
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Hellboy II: The Golden Army
I think the best part about Benjamin Button was that if it had been made 25 years ago, half the movie would have been puppets.
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Defiance
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
WALL-E
That's a good number of Oscars for Slumdog, methinks. It'll look very nice on the DVD.
BEST SONG
Down to Earth, WALL-E
Jai Ho, Slumdog Millionaire
O Saya, Slumdog Millionaire
Even though I remember the Slumdog Millionaire songs, the WALL-E song probably had far more dramatic impact in the movie itself. Plus, it's a space movie with a song called "Down to Earth". How can you not love that?
BEST ANIMATED SHORT
La Maison en Petits Cubes
Lavatory - Lovestory
Oktapodi
Presto
This Way Up
I am assuming my selection is about octupi. If not, kiss my ass, animated-short-namer.
BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT
Auf der Strecke (On the Line)
Manon on the Asphalt
New Boy
The Pig
Spielzeugland (Toyland)
You might as well ask me "Favorite thing Phillip Seymour Hoffman at at Chili's in 1993".
BEST SOUND EDITING
The Dark Knight
Iron Man
Slumdog Millionaire
WALL-E
Wanted
I do remember the sound from the Dark Knight. So, uh, yeah.
BEST SOUND MIXING
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Slumdog Millionaire
WALL-E
Wanted
You expect a better rationale for mixing than for editing?
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Iron Man
Honestly, Iron Man was the best looking movie released this year, bar none. The Dark Knight, although epic, was far more pedestrian in its biggest effects (explosions) than was Iron Man, which featured dudes in giant suits of armor ripping things up rather convincingly. Why yes, my commentary for "Best Visual Effects" was more carefully thought out than anything else I said. My back issues of Fangoria mock you and your lack of understanding.
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Oscar Predictions From An Intermittant Movie Watcher Who Will Not Watch The Oscars
Because I'm bored and procrastinating and using this thread to entertain myself has reached its natural limit, I'm going to post on the big event that I only just now realized is happening tonight: The Oscars. I've barely seen any of the contending movies, and I don't want to see many of them ever, so I feel that I'm about as much an expert on this as any of the voters. So here's my predictions. Here's the list of nominees so I don't have to reproduce it.
Best Picture: I've only seen "Milk", so I think that should win by virtue of getting me out to see it. Nate Silver predicts that "Slumdog Millionaire", which is the only other one I actually considered seeing, mostly because the lead actor is charming as all get-out, but I'm stymied by my fear that it will, despite protests to the contrary, romanticize poverty. But I predict that it will be "The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button", because it's been a couple of years since a real stinker won the award, and it's time. If the Academy doesn't reward mediocrity and balls-out suckitude more than it rewards genuine greatness, then the universe will implode. I haven't actually seen "Forest Gump 2", but I don't need to observe what you leave in the toilet to know it stinks, either.
Best Director: Danny Boyle's got this one wrapped up, even though he's not going to get Best Picture. In fact, I bet he gets this as the boobie prize for not getting Best Picture. I think a lot of voters will also believe that a vote for an English director inspired by Bollywood is a way of acknowledging Bollywood, which is otherwise ignored by Hollywood.
Best Actor: Despite the critical raves, it won't be Mickey Rourke. People just won't be able to bring themselves to vote for him, especially since Marisa Tomei is also in "The Wrestler", and voting for her in the past made fools of the Academy. Sean Penn will probably get it as a way to acknowledge "Milk" , and he should, because it's my favorite performance I've seen of his, hands down. Brad Pitt is a dark horse contender, though, because it's a showy role like the kind lampooned in "Tropic Thunder" with the "full retard" line.
Best Actress: It's time for the Academy to acknowledge that Kate Winslet is the next Meryl Streep. But they'll think, "Why give it to the next Meryl Streep when Meryl Streep is right here?" The only thing that might change the equation is the Hollywood allergy to older women, and without having seen a single on of the movies in this category (I do want to see "Doubt", though), I know that "older" is part of the characterization of both Streep and Winslet's characters. So that might give it to Hathaway. But I'm putting my money on Streep---it'll be a quiet way to reward her for "Mamma Mia" without the voters having to admit that they totally went to see "Mamma Mia".
Best Supporting Actor: The question is not, "Who will win this?" The question is, "Who is going to accept Heath Ledger's award for him?" That's the burning question of the evening, and I suspect the Oscars will have much higher ratings than usual because people are dying to know the answer. I also predict that the #1 video search tomorrow will be for the acceptance of Ledger's Oscar by whatever friend or family member does it. I have no quarrel with Ledger winning this, even if it's motivated by sentimentality. He deserves it, and since his death was an full-blown tragedy, I don't quarrel with the sentimentality either.
Best Supporting Actress: This one usually goes to the ingenue, and so with that in mind, it's hard to imagine that Amy Adams won't get it. But as someone who hasn't seen any of the movies in the category, I think I'd go with Penelope Cruz, because she deserves some kind of prize for her long career. This is the logic I suspect drives the voting, so my money's on her. Nate Silver predicts that Taraji P. Henson will get it, and it's hard to quarrel with that, because I fear a "Benjamin Button" sweep.
Best Animated Feature Film: Why "Bolt" didn't get a Best Picture nod is beyond me, but it'll easily sweep this category. I think "Beverly Hills Chihuahua" was only excluded on a technicality, or else it would be a lock for this one.
Best Foreign Film: "Waltz With Bashir" will win, due to having the most awesome title. Voters will definitely not bother to actually watch the nominated films before voting, and so having a great title will be the kicker.
Best Original Screenplay: If Sean Penn wins for "Milk", then "Milk" won't win this one, because the Academy will feel like they gave "Milk" something. If Penn doesn't win, "Milk" will get this one. If it's not "Milk", it will be "In Bruges", because the screenwriter has spent most of his life as a playwright, and that gives "In Bruges" that extra bit of pretentious juice that will push it over the top. I have seen "Milk", "Wall E", and "In Bruges", so the others are dead to me. Just kidding! I actually have seen and want to see more of the movies in this category than any other. Only "Frozen River" is a turn-off to me. If I were a voter, I'd vote for "Happy-Go-Lucky", because Mike Leigh doesn't actually write the scripts (he writes an outline and actors improvise), and so if he won, that would be hilarious. But I suspect there are not enough pranksters in the Academy to pull this one off.
Best Adapted Screenplay: "Forest Gump 2" for a win. That movie is going to be covered in slobber before the night's over, I fear.
Best Documentary Feature: I've not seen any of these, but I've heard "Man On Wire" is amazing. And it's a lock for the win, not because it's so great, but because it's about the World Trade Center, and the sentimental value will push it way over the top. Voting for this movie makes you feel good about yourself without actually watching any of the documentaries. "Trouble The Water" is a close second, for similar reasons, but relating to Hurricane Katrina. Again, not judging the movie---I've heard that it's great---but I have no pity for the Academy voters who gave "Gladiator" and "Crash" Best Picture awards.
Best Original Score: "Wall E", because you have no choice but to pay attention to it, when there's so little dialogue.
Best Original Song: "Down To Earth" from "Wall E". I'm sure there's more Academy voters with small children who watch the movie over and over again than Academy voters who know who M.I.A. is, and so more exposure to the song from that movie than to the "Slumdog Millionaire" songs that have appeal outside of their attachment to the movie.
Best Film Editing: "The Dark Knight" should get it. But another one so that "Forest Gump 2" can tout that it won more awards than anyone else. Remember, the Earth's very existence depends on the Academy slobbering over obviously shitty movies.
Best Cinematography: Beats me. "The Reader", probably. It should get something, and this one is good enough. Only serious nerds see movies for the cinematography, and I say that as one of those nerds.
Best Costume Design and Best Make-Up: "Benjamin Button", of course. I don't think they're going to walk away with 10 Oscars or anything like that, but it has to be enough to feel like a mega-sweep. This movie cannot go away quietly. It must live on into infinity, appearing relentlessly on cable movie networks. Avoiding it should become impossible.
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