Blancanieves y los 7 enanos

Just because I couldn't remember como se llaman en español:

Doc, Feliz, Gruñón, Dormilón, Tímido, Tontín y Estornudo. ...
del sitio ProZ.

Hey, Motrin: you missed the mark

This new wave feminist, why-suffer-for-my-child, having-a-baby-is-such-a-drag, excuse for attention view of motherhood is just plain insulting, not to mention outmoded. 21st century moms are WAY beyond this prima donna shit.

Mothers don't want to be associated with selfishness, so they are not going to respond positively to an ad like this. Yes, we understand the importance of taking care of ourselves, too; but "What about me?" is not the cry of a responsible, loving adult. Motrin, back to the drawing board. You just flunked "Communicating on Moms' level 101."


Courtesy of the website Cotton Babies and my cousin, Molly. Thanks, lady!!!

¿Qué diablos quiere decir 'diagético'?

Todo aquel sonido que está en consonancia con el ambiente que se describe se llama DIEGÉTICO y lo denominamos NO DIEGÉTICO a aquel que no pertenece al ambiente que se está desarrollando en campo. A veces el sonido diagético o no diagético se utiliza para sorprender al espectador, para llamarle la atención, por alguna finalidad narrativa.

de Espai de Cinema

Fascism is not too strong a word

“If this movement were to be given a name, I think it would be most appropriate to call it Christo-Fascism, and if anyone objects to my using the word fascism, because it seems so redolent of the Axis powers, and after all we valiantly defeated fascism once, well understand this about fascism: when it arrives it never shows up in the discarded costume of some other country, and when fascism comes here, it's not going to be wearing a toothbrush mustache with a luger in his belt and go goose-stepping around the mall, because that’s Germany. And it's precisely characteristic of fascism, that it seems absolutely, totally expressive of the homeland; it seems completely familiar, it’s when 150% America puts a flag on its lapel and a cross around its neck and a real folksy way a talkin’. But just because it’s red, white and blue, doesn’t mean it’s American.”

- Mark Crispin Miller, A Patriot Act

How poetic!

From WordDictionary.com:

sidereal \sy-DEER-ee-uhl\, adjective:

measured or determined by the daily motion of the stars; of or having to do with the stars or constellations

Just effing groovy, is all.

courtesy of Luxon Blogware

Yo: interested in ideas and comfortable with complexity

Here is another great op-ed by Nicholas Kristof (again courtesy of Dad). The following is my favourite excerpt. ¡Viva la intelectualidad!

An intellectual is a person interested in ideas and comfortable with complexity. Intellectuals read the classics, even when no one is looking, because they appreciate the lessons of Sophocles and Shakespeare that the world abounds in uncertainties and contradictions, and — President Bush, lend me your ears — that leaders self-destruct when they become too rigid and too intoxicated with the fumes of moral clarity.

(Intellectuals are for real. In contrast, a pedant is a supercilious show-off who drops references to Sophocles and masks his shallowness by using words like “fulgent” and “supercilious.”)

Mr. Obama, unlike most politicians near a microphone, exults in complexity. He doesn’t condescend or oversimplify nearly as much as politicians often do, and he speaks in paragraphs rather than sound bites. Global Language Monitor, which follows linguistic issues, reports that in the final debate, Mr. Obama spoke at a ninth-grade reading level, while John McCain spoke at a seventh-grade level.

Thanks, Dad

So, my dad sent me this beautiful op-ed by Frank Rich from the latte-liberal NY Times this morning. Those crazy socialists. If you have 5 minutes, it's a great summation of why I am hopeful for the first time in my voting life; not so much because Barack Obama is black (a nice plus), but that our country (minus a few Christians who want to have Sean Hannity's babies) has finally rejected the horrible neo-con paradigm of the Republicans. I don't know why it didn't happen in 2004 (unless it did), but at least we can start picking up the pieces now. Even if you don't read the whole op-ed linked above, here is the end, and a sentiment with which I whole-heartedly concur:

The actual real America is everywhere. It is the America that has been in shell shock since the aftermath of 9/11, when our government wielded a brutal attack by terrorists as a club to ratchet up our fears, betray our deepest constitutional values and turn Americans against one another in the name of “patriotism.” What we started to remember the morning after Election Day was what we had forgotten over the past eight years, as our abusive relationship with the Bush administration and its press enablers dragged on: That’s not who we are.

So even as we celebrated our first black president, we looked around and rediscovered the nation that had elected him. “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for,” Obama said in February, and indeed millions of such Americans were here all along, waiting for a leader. This was the week that they reclaimed their country.

And to go along with that idea, here is our national anthem (or what it SHOULD be, rather):

A hundred things

Realize that you are the one responsible for cleaning up your own mess, Clare. If you have left your dirty clothes scattered on the floor and the dishes unwashed, it will be you who has to pay the consequences later on. Take responsibility for your actions. Today is an excellent day to do your laundry and clean the mess in the sink. You will feel better about yourself and your immediate environment when you accomplish your tasks of the day.

Yeah, woman. That goes for homework, too!
List of things to do today (this is more for me than for anyone reading):
- call Elizabeth
- take Thomas' car to get the tire fixed
- put away Halloween things (finally)
- clean off stuff in breezeway
- go for a bike ride
- get sources together for Medina's paper
- go grocery shopping
- maybe change the sheets...

Laugh at my boner, will you?!

This seems like it would have been a MadLibs type thing where you substitute a mundane word for something awfully hilarious like "boner." But, no--this is from an ACTUAL Batman comic from the 1960s, when apparently a 'boner' meant something veeeeery different. Feel free to click on the image to read the hilarity in all its glorious detail:



Courtesy of Comic Book Girl

Picking Oranges the Palestinian Way

This is an article by Ray Smith from Live from Lebanon. It's a realistic and depressing look into the lives of a few displaced Palestinians. And, you know, let's keep in mind that these refugees have been displaced for 2 generations now. Since 1948. The original article can be found here on the Electronic Intifada.

The sun has yet to rise at an orange plantation in the hinterland of the southern Lebanese city of Tyre. Muhammad has just transferred ten buckets of oranges into black plastic boxes at the edge of the orange grove. After carrying the empty buckets back to the other workers, he says: "After this work I return home, rest for an hour and leave for my second job as a decorator. Harvesting oranges alone doesn't feed my family."

This morning around half past five, the foreman, whom I will call "Abu G" and his dozen workers drove to the plantation in a blue minivan. One hour later, the men are busily fulfilling their specific tasks. Two balance on ladders and pluck oranges from the top of the trees while Muhammad and some others pick from the lower branches. From time to time, between six and ten buckets are being carried away at once. After sorting the oranges, they are put into boxes which are then loaded on a small truck that takes them to the north of Lebanon, and from there they are exported to other countries in the region. While his workers sweat away, the foreman lays down on a piece of cardboard. Even if the foreman-laborer power disparity is sharp, they all have one thing in common: they are Palestinian refugees living at the Burj al-Shemali refugee camp.

Burj al-Shemali is located at the edge of Tyre and was established in the early 1950s after Zionist forces expelled hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homeland. Many of Lebanon's initial refugee camps were relocated due to political pressure from the Lebanese state. Some were situated near citrus plantations in the coastal plain and others near the industrial areas of Beirut. Today some 20,000 people live in the quiet, but fenced-in Burj al-Shemali Camp. More than two-thirds of its labor force work at least part-time in agriculture.

Early in the morning, between 5 and 6am, a wave of footsteps and whispering voices can be heard in the camp's narrow alleys. Silence follows and lasts until half past seven, when hundreds of sleepy pupils walk to school. It is in the darkness of the early morning hours that hundreds of day laborers leave their homes, gather in the streets and then head to their work in the fields and plantations of the region. Among them are youth, university graduates and grandparents. Some work in the fields, but most of them harvest oranges, lemons and bananas. Before noon, most of the workers return to the camp. However, it isn't the end of their work day.

Lebanese law treats the more than 400,000 Palestinian refugees in the country as foreigners. Therefore they are not allowed to own land, they are forbidden to work in over 70 white and blue-collar jobs, they aren't guaranteed a minimum wage and they aren't integrated into the Lebanese social and medical insurance system. These various forms of exclusion make them vulnerable in many ways. Many refugees depend on the services and assistance by the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, and on remittances from their relatives abroad. Highly qualified Palestinians like doctors or engineers, who are not allowed to practice their professions in Lebanon, find themselves behind the steering wheels of taxis, in the countless small shops in the refugee camps or as day laborers in construction or agriculture.

Hajja Amne, 65 years old, says that she worked hard in agriculture throughout her whole life, but never received any benefits. Now her health problems prevent her from working. Although pleased by the wage hike that was the result of a strike by Palestinian harvest workers in the beginning of the year, she is disturbed by the fact that men still earn more than women for the same work. She also complains, "If a worker is sick and can't work, she won't get paid." However, the workers aren't only being exploited by the Lebanese landowners and employers, but sometimes also by their own foremen. They often line their pockets with an unjustified amount of the money siphoned from the wages of the laborers. While some foremen themselves participate in the harvest, others limit their activity to commanding the workers and, as in the case of Abu G., resting in the grass.

Efforts have been made towards a collective organization of the Palestinian day laborers in agriculture. The struggle for higher wages in the beginning of this year is one of several indicators. According to Hosni, a foreman who identifies as communist, ideas regarding the establishment of an autonomous insurance system by the workers were discussed. However, nothing has been implemented so far, and barriers to self-organization can be found in the fragmented political landscape in the camps. Even in the extreme case of Nahr al-Bared, the refugee camp in northern Lebanon destroyed by the Lebanese army last year in fighting a Sunni militant group that had occupied part of the camp, the Palestinian parties can hardly manage to put aside their differences to work together toward the collective interest of the refugees.

Meanwhile, Muhammad continues to leave the camp seven days a week in the early morning in order to work in the orange groves. A few years ago, he built another floor on top of his parents' house in the camp and got married. Since then, his wife gave birth to a baby girl. "As a Palestinian you don't learn an occupation and stay in the same business until the end of your life," says Muhammad. "We have different work experiences in various fields and often we work in several places at the same time in order to make money."

This Is Your Nation on White Privilege

No. Not everyone who is planning to vote for John McCain is a racist. And voting for Obama does not make racism a thing of the past.

I think what Obama's candidacy has brought to center stage, more than anything, is not the tradition of racism and dualistic thinking from which this country has suffered for a long time. We already know about this. Obama's candidacy, in other words, has not opened people's eyes to overt discrimination. That is not news in 2008, and in fact I believe the U.S. has made improvements to mitigate discrimination in its raw form since the civil rights era of the 1960s.

Rather, Senator Obama's candidacy has really raised questions about privilege--white privilege, that is: a phenomenon alive and well in this country, albeit officially undiagnosed in many parts. Recognizing that white people take certain things for granted that people of color cannot does not make you a racist; instead, recognizing white privilege makes you simply honest in your attempts to eradicate racism once and for all.

We DON'T all have to look alike; we DON'T all have to be "colorblind" (as if that were possible or desirable). But we DO have to be conscious of structural violence that embeds social inequity and injustice along racial lines throughout our society. And Tim Wise's Sept. 13th article addresses that in relation to this 2008 presidential race better than anyone else I've heard. Please take 6 minutes to read his lucid thoughts on the subject.

los swingers. wtf.

Is this how Europe views the United States? What does it mean that this article appears in Spain's main newspaper the weekend before a US presidential election?

The article starts with the lines (translated by me):

They share their love for guns, rodeos, barbeques, and big familias. They form part of Middle America (traditional/conservative America). They don't seem like Middle America--they are Middle America. A true reflection of the Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. Maybe the only diference--who knows--between these good patriots and the Alaskan governor is the passion that they express for the exchange of couples.

(El original dice: "Comparten su entusiasmo por las armas, los rodeos, las barbacoas y las familias numerosas. Forman parte de la misma América profunda. No se parecen a ella. Son como ella. Un fiel reflejo de la candidata republicana a la vicepresidencia de Estados Unidos, Sarah Palin. Quizá la única diferencia -quién sabe- entre estos buenos patriotas y la gobernadora de Alaska sea la pasión que derrochan por el intercambio de parejas.")

THAT'S RIGHT. The newspaper El País is (a) saying that "swinging" is a popular, fairly widespread thing to do in the United States, and (b) its popularity is found mainly in the conservastive, Middle American sector of the population. The article gets a lot of its info from this article printed last year in Newsweek by Gretel Kovach.

email exchange

From my friend to me:

I wanted to see how you were and ask if you are feeling the same psychic gnawing that I am regarding Nov 4. I have the WORST feeling that all frickin hell is gonna break loose, but I can't quite figure out why I am feeling this way.

I spoke to Alvin after his race, he did the 31 miler in just at 6 hours. He said it was brutal.
Later

Reply from me to my friend:

Yeah, man. I'm feeling WAY nervous. weird things have been happening around the house and neighborhood, which just adds to the spooky October-ness of it all, and to the feeling that the end times is near, fer reals.

For example: this morning at about 9 am, i was watching tv and eating breakfast when the tv turned off by itself, and then there was a loud boom outside. it seemed equally likely that a transformer had exploded that there was a roving militia in the neighborhood. i hesitated as to whether i ought to call LG&E first, or draw the blinds, collect my Yarmuth sign from the front yard, and go to the basement and hide. i am ON EDGE. and really wanting a cigarette, but as yet have avoided the temptation. go, me.

i miss you. i miss Alvin. i miss Honors. sigh. i am praying and hoping and volunteering in order for Obama to beat McCain. it's amazing to feel so uneasy given that he's ahead in the polls and way more well-funded. and yet, it does not mitigate my fear of racists and neo-cons.

Ugh.

No more food wars

So, my mom sent me this article Michael Pollan wrote in the NY Times last week. Perhaps you've already seen it--I'm just now catching up on my non-work-related email...

Anyhoo. Michael Pollan, as we all know, is THE MAN. Not like, "Damn the man; save the empire," but like, "You da MAN." I had the extreme honor of hearing him speak at UofL earlier this year and he was AWESOME. It was shortly before I took my first trip to San Francisco (where he lives and works. Well, Berkeley might as well be SF from where I live and look), when I finally understood what it truly means to be a "foodie." The farmer's markets alone are AMAZING, to say nothing of the restaurants, juice bars, and cafes that flourish throughout the city. We truly don't know how underdeveloped KY is. And we have so much potential! We have great land here, and a sense of community not found in other states of similar size.

We should use these existing benefits to GO LOCAL with our food. I mean, a LOT more than Louisville already is (or is trying to be at the whole foods stores). We should petition grocery stores to stop carrying out-of-season foods and to use KY farm products FIRST (or ONLY). Then we don't have to worry about the carbon impact of importing fruit from Honduras. Then we don't have to worry about NAFTA or CAFTA or neo-cons. Then we can improve KY's economy, even without hemp being relegalized! We won't have to worry about how much gas our fruits were given to ripen and color them once the arrive at the store. We can shorten the food chain immensely, and know the faces of the people who grow and pick our food for us. THAT is truly American: agriculture, community, honesty, simplicity, self-sufficiency.

NO MORE FAKE FOOD! NO MORE FREE TRADE!!!!!!

Racism: alive and thriving

This is a copy of an email I received yesterday. It's from the President and Provost of the University of Louisville, and was sent to everyone at the university. THIS IS SCARY SHIT:

This morning a professor at the University of Kentucky discovered an effigy of presidential candidate Barack Obama hanging from a tree on campus.

We join with UK President Lee Todd in calling this action "despicable." As Americans and as an institution of higher education, we know the importance of free speech and free thought. This type of activity, however, is not acceptable as either.

At UofL, we are committed to being a diverse and inclusive university community....

We know you join us in saying within the context of our vision statement and in keeping with our larger mission, that we do not condone hate speech or acts of intolerance that underlie forms of oppression, racism, sexism, homophobia or discrimination; and that we will commit to eradicating all forms of inequality and injustices by building a just, fair and inclusive campus community.

Let's treat each other with civility and respect.

James Ramsey Shirley Willihnganz
President Provost

UofL's diversity statement
UofL's Diversity office

As I have been saying since the beginning of the general election, this election has FINALLY created a clear choice between a moderate candidate and a neo-con candidate; they proudly tout vastly divergent worldviews and policies. While it has been exciting for me to choose from two major party candidates who are actually different (instead of more of the same "Skull vs. Bones", to quote America the Book), it has baffled me (1) that anyone has difficulty making this choice, and (2) that anyone would choose John McCain over Barack Obama. The economy, the war, the last 8 years of neo-con rape of our country and our people, should all make this the easiest, most conscience-clear election of people's lives.

And yet.

And yet racism lives on, so tenaciously. People are so blinded by the cover of the book that they don't want to even pick it up and leaf through it, let alone buy it. Leaving aside the consideration of how arbitrary and stupid it is to dislike someone because he looks different from you, racial discrimination is just self-defeating, both in this election and in life! If nothing else, it should be a matter of self-interest, right? In the case of this particular man, Barack Obama, he is the obvious best choice in this election. In a general sense, white racists should learn that “[Taking] the world as a whole, it’s an eccentricity to be white,” as George Orwell says well in Burmese Days.

So when I hear about Obama being lynched in effigy, I get really worried--for him, for us, for the world. I get worried about the election too: Democrats and Obama supporters are getting a little strident this week. Not Obama or Michelle, but their supporters, have started "measuring the drapes," as John McCain likes to say so often; it would behoove those enthusiasts to know about this incident at UK.

That is to say: the election isn't for 5 days. The inauguration isn't for 2.5 months after that. So don't count yer chickens before they hatch, you optimists. The man isn't president yet, and there are plenty of people who still look at that accomplished, intelligent, eloquent, vibrant, (half-white) lawyer, public servant, and son-of-an-anthropologist, and all they see is a n*gger they ain't votin' for.

the SLAYER

I'm not one to post on celebrities much, but I was doing my film class homework and there was a picture of Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting in the chapter I'm reading, and I just thought, "OMG. He was the Zac Efron of the boomer generation." So now you can have a side-by-side analysis in order to agree or disagree with my well-reasoned opinion, after years of careful study.

That is to say,

Unto each generation a Heartthrob is born.
HE ALONE shall stand against the weak chins, limp hair, and the forces of thin eye-browedness.
He is THE HEARTTHROB.

C For Cookie / V for Vendetta

I know there are "certain people" who think that I don't actually write enough on my blog, but I simply recycle or re-post things from the web. WELL--that might be so sometimes... but in this case, ISN'T IT SO WORTH IT?

My step-daughter spent the better part of a month a few years ago when this first came out, watching it OVER and OVER and OVER dozens of times in a row. That's autism for ya. But it's so classic, who can blame her? Easily the best use of Sesame Street ever.

For those in Louisville, this is basically mandatory

For those of you who don't already know, I did my senior thesis last year on human rights in Palestine. I examined creative nonviolent resistance to the Wall being constructed around the West Bank by Israelis to ghettoize the area and ruin Palestinians' lives, in violation of the UN Human Rights Declaration and international law.

Please please come to this if you can, as it is a topic very dear to me.

SEPARATE IS NEVER EQUAL: STORIES FROM SOUTH AFRICA AND PALESTINE
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 7:30 P.M.
UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE,CHAO AUDITORIUM in EKSTROM LIBRARY

Reverend Eddie Makue and Doctor Diana Buttu

World leaders including Nelson Mandela and Jimmy Carter have called for the world to recognize that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza has created a society strikingly similar to South Africa under apartheid. Diana Buttu will describe conditions on the West Bank and Gaza where four million Palestinians live on nonviable pieces of land, cut off from the outside world and from each other by a concrete wall and more than five hundred checkpoints. In contrast to the dire poverty of the Palestinian population, Israeli citizens consume most of the country's resources and move about freely on modern by-pass roads. Eddie Makue, from the South African Council of Churches, will describe the many parallels between the current situation on the West Bank and the former system of apartheid in South Africa ; where the majority of the population was concentrated in Bantu lands.

Diana Buttu holds a Law Degree from Queen's University in Kingston , Ontario and a Ph.D. from Stanford University. She was a legal advisor to the Palestinian Liberation Organization on negotiations with Israel.

Reverend Eddie Makue is the General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches. He has been an activist in the struggle for South African civil rights since 1982.

University of Louisville Sponsors:

Louis D. Brandeis School of Law, the Departments of Pan-African Studies, Anne Braden Institute for Social Justice Research, Women's and Gender Studies, Anthropology, Minor in Social Change, Commission on the Status of Women (COSW)--Women and Global Issues Committee, Office of Diversity and Outreach-College of Arts and Sciences, Muslim Student Association, Commission on Diversity and Racial Equality (CODRE)

Louisville Community Sponsors:

The United Nations Association, Committee for Peace in the Middle East, Fellowship of Reconciliation, Louisville Chapter, Committee for Israeli and Palestinian States, The Ramallah Club.

Los Americanos

This is hilarious. We watched it in my teaching and research methods class. Please see below for a translation and please watch it! It's so true, so true...

"Los Americanos" (por Piero)
(Translated by Clare Gervasi Kalb)

They are born old
And they get older
Across their lifetimes
The Americans

And they are born convinced
That there's nobody in the world
More important
Than The Americans

Napoleon for them
was an Italian guy
Who organized something
Without Americans

And they are more than sure
That he would not have lost
At Waterloo with the help
Of the Americans

If they know history
It's not for having read it
But for having seen it
In American movies

With grand stages
And grandiose music
In the subtle style
Of the Americans

With big jaws
From chewing so much gum
It's common to see them
The Americans

Displaying a thousand colors
Everything but black
Which they don’t consider
To be American taste

When they get older
They dress like tourists
And go around the world
The Americans

On organized tours
With romance included
Paid for in the long run
By Americans

If there is something to admire
Where one wants them to go
It’s the great elegance
Of The Americans

With typical attire
They mix with the people
And nobody realizes
That they’re Americans

And besides that
They buy valuable antiques
Recently made old
For Americans

And later in their homes
They receive friends
Who praise the good taste
Of The Americans

And in the night clubs
After a few drinks
They feel inspired
The Americans

And it’s very common to find them
Dancing ceaselessly
Brimming with the grace
Of The Americans

And so my dear friends
Enough for now
I told you what I could
About The Americans

And if you see them...
If you see them, give my most respectful greetings
To The Americans

Ambivalence

"Ambivalence: The holding, at the same time, of 2 opposing emotions, attitudes, ideas or wishes toward the same person, situation, or object. The coexistence of contradictory emotions, attitudes, ideas, or desires with respect to a particular person, object, or situation." (cita)

I have been writing a paper on the myth of Simón Bolívar for my Symbols, Myths and Legends class. Here is a supercool thing I read in a supercool (albeit old) book called Culto a Bolívar (Cult to Bolivar). It says:

Obervación. La ‹‹aflicción›› no suele ser sólo una verdad psicológica real, sincera en muchos casos; menos, o nada sincera en otros; sino también un recurso literario legítimo, a menos que se negara todo valor a la literatura, a la poesía, a la elocuencia. Pero, ¿es que esas formas de la expresión—como fenómenos humanos que son—no tienen función alguna legítima, según ocasiones, público, etc.? ¿Es que sólo existe, con legitimidad, el ‹‹discurso histórico›› científico, analítico, sin emoción, sin pathos? Yo creo que ambas formas de expresión humana conviven legítimamente. En efecto, aquí se peca a menudo tomando todo por ‹‹historiografía››, cuando hay otros géneros, también válidos... (Joaquín Gabaldón Márquez 7)

My bad translation is thus:
"Observation. The 'affliction' [referred to in the book--the 'cult' to Bolívar] isn't just a real psychological truth, sincere in many cases; less, or not at all sincere in others; but also it is a legitimate literary resource, unless it negates all validity of literature, poetry, and eloquence. But is it that those forms of expression--as human phenomena that they are--don't have some legitimate function, depending on occasion, audience, etc? It is just that only the 'historical discourse' exists legitimately, scientific, analytic, emotionless, without pathos? I believe that both forms of human expression live together legitimately. In effect, here we err sometimes taking everything as "historiography," when there are other genres, also valid..."

That is what I'm talking about. So, if that didn't work for you, don't worry--it was an anthropology book. Just look at my photoshopped picture of Bolívar for my paper instead and be amused. teehee.