Canadian in America

Of all the things in the world I have tried to learn, of all the things that someone has tried to teach me, I think women’s studies has come easiest to me. At least, the women’s studies that I know and love, has come with relative ease. It’s not that I think it’s an easy program, because it’s not, but it’s one of the only disciplines that my mind can wrap its head around without wanting to explode. The concepts can be mind boggling, especially if you don’t do the god damn readings (I’m talking to you, first year self) but by the end of the semester, I generally have a feeling that I understand them. Of course, there’s always that one topic, that one little section of a class where you’re like “what the fuck is going on?!” For me, that concept is spaces as they relate to identities.  It is worth mentioning that I never actually took the course called “Sex, Gender and Space”, but a lot of my friends did and every time they would explain the concept of space and well, anything, I was still lost. Maybe my friends weren’t the best teachers, or I wasn’t paying complete attention. Yeah, it was definitely the latter.

It’s been a few years since that course was offered, and I’m still fairly certain I don’t “get” space. A reading for popular culture class talked about the Canadian identity in American space within the show “How I Met Your Mother”, where the character in question constantly had to negotiate and challenge her identities, based largely on which country she was in. I’m hoping that my having something in common with this character will help me to understand “space”. That going to a new environment will leave me with an understanding of how I will constantly change.

3 weeks later...

So here I am in America. I’ve been here for a little over two weeks, and I can honestly say I’m no closer to understanding “space”.  Maybe I am starting to get a hold of the ideas, because I’ve noticed some things that make me uncomfortable and have lead me to question the world around me. For instance, it was revolutionary that there would be different sex dorms, even though the rules are so strict I have laughed just a little.

-The doors that lock within the building (between wings) are normally accessible to anyone with a residence key card. However, between certain hours, if you are of another sex, those doors will not open (except in case of emergency). This assumes, of course, that you are a member of one of two and only two sexes. Do we need to go into how problematic this is again? No readers, I think you’re smart enough to know the ridiculousness behind the gender binary.

-There is 100 percent no sharing a dorm/house/apartment with anyone of another gender. Which ok, that’s cool if that’s what they want as a rule. But again, the binary. And it seems suspicious that they start locking out visitors of another sex after a certain hour. I could have an orgy of women in my room without getting written up. You know, in theory. 

I do like it here, though. Some of the things do blow my mind, and I’ll be writing about them for sure. Right now I’m still very much in the introduction phase of being here, and I have to hold off judgement, obviously.  And no matter how much something might scare me for whatever reason, I’ll never be comfortable saying it’s wrong if it’s not hurting anyone. 

And now here is the obligatory, but no less sincere, proclamation of homesickness.  Nothing really overwhelming but there is kind of a quiet “I miss you” voice that speaks in my mind every once in awhile. It mostly whispers when I go for days without interacting with people, despite several attempts at doing so or when I miss the companionship of furry creatures, especially ones of the canine and feline persuasions.   

Counting

If I were the sort of person who counted things, I would say I have six working days left, 13 days left until I leave and no time left before I realize my life is fucked. Unfortunately, I am the sort of person who counts things. Obsessively. I hate math and struggle with basic skills like division and subtraction, but I count constantly; things need to be sorted and organized in my mind. Preferably in groups of three or five, please. So at any given time I will be able to tell you how many hours there are left until something, or how many days, working days, weekends and weeks there are until something happens. This practice, while irritating for everyone, makes me feel safe and secure.
At this time in two weeks, I will be in Georgia (USA). This started out as kind of a joke, to be honest, but now it's very real and happening really soon. Remember the time I failed a psych class with a 49 and as a result couldn't graduate, and that bitch essentially ruined a year of my academic life? And when I was one hundred and ten percent angry, depressed, devastated, fucking pissed, vengeful, humiliated and just "JESUS FUCKING CHRIST ON A GOD DAMN BIKE WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT?!" about the whole situation? In other words, I was a complete drama dyke (never a queen- I'm far too manly) about my academic life and how it impacted my self image and self esteem? (Hey- some people have their bodies, their hair or talents dictate how they feel and see themselves physically. I have school- I'll look like garbage, but if I got a "good" mark on an assignment, I'll feel "pretty" inside. And that's fucked up.)
Where was I? Feeling like shit. Right. So I started joking that I hated UPEI and my life enough that I obviously had to run away to the Southern US.  But then Ann was all like, "you could do an exchange. Seriously." (while she was probably thinking "this girl has to suck it up and stop bursting into tears in my office". She's much too awesome to say so, though.) After looking at the list of schools that UPEI has exchange deals with, which ones were in America and which of those had women's studies, I landed myself in Georgia. I suppose I was the right amount of pissed off, depressed and determined to make the decision that while UPEI was absolutely wonderful for four years, I'd like to go somewhere else for a little while. Several months, dollars, emails and approximately 50 tonnes of paperwork later, I'm headed there in two weeks. No idea what will happen, but I have a place to live, courses to take and four blank notebooks- that's all I need.
This post was going to be real and relevant to the blog, but I sort of got carried away with posting how this situation came about. The next post will be about feminist martians... I write that mostly for myself because I will forget in like 10 minutes.

Bathrooms, binaries and babies

So the other day I'm in a public bathroom with a few strangers, concentrating on nothing else but the all too painful need to urinate. during this time a social interaction between strangers went down, and it took awhile but gradually I came to the conclusion that I feel bad for babies. This woman was in the bathroom with a kid in a stroller and an older woman made a comment about the baby;
"Oh look at his eyes...such a handsome face. He'll break all the girls' hearts when he gets older." The woman with the kid kind of smiled and left the crowded room.
The older woman then turned to me, and said with great alarm that maybe the baby wasn't a boy. She was horrified and really embarrassed at this prospect, and I could tell she felt incredibly guilty for possibly mistaking the gender of this kid. I told her not to worry about it, because frankly I didn't care.
But then I started to feel bad for the baby, because of all the assumptions that were being made in a 20 second interaction. The older woman had pegged the child as male, masculine and heterosexual all within a couple of sentences. When she realized the baby could have been female, the older woman displayed such concern that it seems mistaking someone's gender would be the ultimate insult.
The kid doesn't know all this yet, and that's why it makes me sad; babies can't yet tell people who suck to fuck off.

You are not prepared to deal with randomness that is this post

Pet stores, especially in malls, are fucking weird and not in a good way. You're walking along in the mall, perhaps buying shoes, sweaters or books, and then there's this store that sells people animals just the same as books and pens are sold. This is fucked up.
Buying animals is unnecessary. Go adopt a puppy or a cat. Yeah, it costs money, but trust me, humane societies are not rolling in money vaults of profit. Yes, that was a Ducktales reference to Scrooge McDuck's money vault of gold coins and jewellry. Pet stores are there for the same purpose that other stores are; to make money. And that seems really weird to me. Don't capitalize off of adorable dogs and kittens because you can. I hope the dog you buy from a breeder bites you. But you'd probably have it put down.
But then there's fish and this is where I turn into a complete hypocrite. At least I'm willing to admit it. I am fascinated by pretty much anything that lives under water and could look at fish and sea life for hours, never getting bored of how intelligent and productive some of them are. And they're beautiful. How does one adopt fish, though? Are they something that can be adopted? They can be rescued from disaster and slaughter, but humane societies don't exactly have walls of aquariums, do they? I guess I'm not completely hypocritical; it's not like there is any sea life living in my house.
Octopusses or octopi (both are acceptable) are awesome. They are badass, really intelligent and can fuck you up. Some of them (can't remember which kind; too lazy to look it up) even show signs of grieving for other dead octopus. Or what someone interpreted as grief when observing how they will protect the dead. Yep, I'm going to say some octopi are more evolved than you.

I say "you", but it should be obvious by now that when I do that, I'm probably channeling someone or speaking really broadly. In this case it is both.

Slut of the Town

So I'm sitting in the soc/anth/women's studies lounge as I do most days... working on a take home exam, doing some readings and just generally being happy to be away from my apartment for a few hours. This place is a home to me; there are a lot of days when my entire day is spent here, meals and all. I like it because it's quiet enough to get work done, but I don't feel completely isolated because there are usually people floating in and out all day. Today there is a group of girls that I don't know or recognize. They don't know I'm writing about them as they sit 10 feet away from me. Times like this, I identify with Harriet the Spy... I'm in the world, but not of it. Quietly watching, taking down interesting bits of conversation and thinking about the state of humanity.
At least one of them is writing a paper about abortion for a philosophy class. (I recognized the topic as being from a second year course which is a lot harder than I thought it would be.) It's hard to weave in personal opinions and hardcore values to this course and do well. One of their arguments astounded me. They believed abortion was fine under the circumstances of rape, abuse and if the woman had been using protection. Only if she'd been using protection. If she had been using protection. Oh dear. Where to begin?
-why is it only the woman's responsibility? I believe there was a male there, too if an abortion is required.
-How the hell are you going to prove that she was or wasn't using protection?
-why does it matter? Get the fuck out of her bedroom.
-they said it wouldn't be ok to have an abortion if she'd been "the town slut". Again, shut up and get the fuck out of her bedroom. Why does the number of sexual partners matter when it comes to abortion? The results are the same...an unwanted embryo.
-I'd think that someone with such a conservative stance on abortion would say the slutty mother doesn't deserve to have that embryo in her. That there is no possible way that kid could be raised properly... that people who have multiple partners shouldn't by any means raise children.
ok, enough people watching. I'd have loved to jumped into that conversation full force, but it would have been rude (whereas posting it online is clearly not) and I wouldn't have heard the entire thing.

I'm still alive. (Not that anyone cares.*)

I'm procrastinating again. It's the end of semester and I don't want to leave this lovely province. This happens every year. I cling to the papers on my desk and the pen in my hand in an attempt to prolong the inevitable: going home. I stay until they kick me out and return home, kicking and screaming. Sometimes I feel guilty about my reluctance to leave home and start a job I hate. Guilty because I know I should be greatful for the opportunity to have a job and make enough money to pay off a fraction of my tuition. Guilty because I hate it so much for the 4 months I'm there. It's not even that I hate working... it's an ok job, but I miss school and reading and writing and class like it's never going to happen again. I get physically homesick for school. It's where I belong. If it were possible, I'd just extend my student status until the end of time...minus the debt.

Completely off-topic, but it occured to me that I never even really got started on the sex education series where I looked at different materials for children. Summer project? Ok sweet. And after I finish my paper on the social/historical construction of menstrual/"feminine hygiene" products for pop-culture class, I'll post that, too.
*Big Bang Theory reference.

Oh Shit, this still exists

Hello world. I've been ignoring you. It's not you, it's me. Trust me. We'll be parted soon enough.
So this blog... rumour has it that it's going to have a mark slapped on it sometime soon, and I'm kind of praying (to whom, I don't really know) for mercy on this one. (Regarding my last post- university grades are worth praying for.)I feel like there should be some sort of conclusion to it, even though I tell myself that I'm going to keep writing it just as a project to do. And there really is no conclusive paragraph for something this random. So I share with you a theory.
Some people (and really, I don't know names) say that sexuality, sex and porn are not actions or identities we live with. Rather they are just particular ways of looking at something, someone or an action. Does that make it entirely in the eye of the beholder? Can something become porn or sexual as soon as someone gets turned on by it? Like, do the BOGO commercials for Payless Shoes become a threesome for someone with a foot fetish (presuming they are aroused by the ad)? For someone who is completely turned off by or has no reaction to "mainstream" porn, is it still porn? Does porn just have to be something you find arousing? Can we just call whatever we find arousing (be it sexually, intellectually, emotionally, or whatever) porn? Everyone has their own Disneyland. Why can't everyone have their own pornland if they want one? This isn't really making sense... so one would think I'd research some shit before posting this. But I'm not...maybe after I finish Jenkins and Bruhm & Hurley.

PS This is my Disneyland.

Hell: I've got my ticket in hand

By now it's no secret that I watch way too much TLC...so I just thought I would throw this out there... it weirds me out how much the Dugger's say "I'll pray for you", or "I pray your *minor event/occurence* goes well". I was always under the impression that prayer was an important thing to these people, but they just toss it around so much it's lost all meaning. And you'd think they'd want to give Jesus/God a break now and then... do they really think he has time to give a shit about stupid little details for every person that prays about them? What does their use of prayer then say about them, if they're willing to just throw them out there with every other sentence? Are they actually praying? And do they put the same "effort" into praying for little things that they do for the larger things like ending rampant poverty and starvation, war and inequality?

Gender dichotomy is so last year

Oh hey, blog. Remember the time I used to write and update you much more often? Yeah, things happen and I kind of stopped doing that... but I think of you often. And there are some serious rants that need to be posted. Charlottetown has this free magazine/newspaper called "G!" or something. Flipping through it, I became flabbergasted (do people still say that?) by all the gendered articles... there was a lot of "you are a man, therefore you must/must not do this" and "women are like this". Seriously? Is this a paper/magazine written by kids in grade six? Ugh.
It's late, and I've got early class, but there will be a couple of posts in direct response to some of these rediculous articles.
PS- there will be more frequent postings. that's both a threat and a promise.

The KKK has managed to confuse me even more

Am I the only one who finds it weird that the KKK would use Cat Stevens to help make their arguments?

Hardly bedtime stories part ii: motherfucker.

Watching The Exorcist made me say “what the fuck” numerous times. But so did the article I was supposed to use to write about sex and sexualities portrayed in the film. The author and I have some fundamental disagreements about what the plot and dialogue were trying to convey to the viewer. In “Knowing Children: Desire and Interpretation in The Exorcist”, Ellis Hanson makes the argument that the film is overwrought with incestuous innuendos, acts and overtones. Wait... what? You want us to believe that Regan has sexual desires towards her mother? As a movie viewer, I just have to disagree with Hanson. It’s not that I don’t think there is sexuality in Regan’s character, but the sexuality isn’t in the girl herself.

We may have two beliefs about the possession of Regan: psychiatric/medical or religious/Catholic points of view. The psychiatric side leaves us believing that the voice and horrid personality spewing from Regan’s lips are part of an “episode”, an alternate or double personality. It’s suggested she has any number of psychiatric illnesses, or perhaps there’s something physically wrong with her brain that makes her act as she has. “Temporal lobe”, “seizure” and “brain” are words often tossed around. If we accepted the premise of psychiatric illness, in our own mind as the viewer, we are likely to believe that Regan’s problem lies in repressed memories, a tortured past involving a famous mother and absent father. Of course, the psychiatric perspective is all but entirely dismissed by the end of the film as two men of god perform an exorcism on twelve year old Regan.

Then there are the religious beliefs about the possession of the child. Let’s assume that she is possessed by Satan or another evil source. Regan, then, is completely controlled by the spirit during an “episode” (which get longer and longer). The spirit has its own voice, motions and complete control over her body. We are made perfectly aware of this from the beginning when she screams “make it stop, make it stop!” over and over again. Her body is merely a host for Satan, and being the powerful guy he is, he forces her into actions Regan would not otherwise commit. I am, of course, talking about the scene which Hanson claims to be incestuous. The infamous moment when Chris’s head is pulled into her daughter’s bleeding crotch, while a voice screams “fuck me!” and “lick me!” is claimed by Hanson to represent some kind of incestuous relationship Chris and Regan possibly have when she is not possessed by Satan. This is where we run into some fundamental disagreement in terms of plot and/or representation.  If we are working on the premise that Regan is being controlled and forced by something evil, and we should be, then there is no incestuous moment between mother and daughter, for multiple reasons. One, Regan is merely a shell; Satan is using her body as a medium. This isn’t Regan saying “fuck me” and stabbing herself in the crotch with a crucifix, this is the act of Satan. Two, if any act is taking place, it is rape of both Regan’s entire self, and the physical rape of Chris. Rape is not sex, Hanson! Your writing implies that there was choice and agency in a situation where there was none, and as a result you’ve incorrectly labelled the rape and abuse of a young girl as part of her sexuality. Being raped, possessed and controlled by Satan does not make twelve year old Regan sexualized in the manner you suggest.

Through the entire film, Regan has no control. “At least she doesn’t remember what’s occurred when she’s released from Satan’s grasp” is something I try to tell myself. But she must be fully conscience and aware of the persistent testing, poking and prodding that her body is put through. Her physical pain is most likely far greater in the moment when the doctors/nurses stick the needle in her flesh to perform a spinal tap than her altered state when she awakes from the possession by Satan. Both situations grant Regan no agency or freedom, but how much pain each incident brought the young girl is sort of irrelevant in the end. She’s tortured physically, psychologically, spiritually and in any other way one can imagine... but there is no “scale” or “measurement” to depict how much pain and torture she goes through. That’s just not how experience works.

I tried to start that last paragraph by expressing which I thought was worse... being invaded for medical and psychological answers or being invaded by Satan. I couldn’t come to a conclusion. And I think any conclusion I could reach would be entirely subjective. I’m in no position to say which kind of pain would be worse, and I don’t think any conclusion has to be reached. But for the purpose of this blog, I want to question the differences in the pain Regan goes through. Within one experience, she is fully aware that her body is being invaded and the next day, she most likely remembers that spinal tap and those x-rays. Those kinds of bodily invasion are somewhat imaginable, easily recalled and feared. So the experience and memory suck, but there is a kind of power in knowing what happened to your body, knowing you were conscience and somewhat consenting to the acts. And then with the other experience (being invaded and possessed by Satan), she has no memory.  Not remembering a situation robs one of agency. We’re left relying on physical evidence and what other people tell us; we can never be certain that what we “know” is actually true. Our reality is altered when we (inevitably) can’t trust those who remember for us.  

I guess there isn’t a conclusion for this post... it’s still a work in progress, and I’m sure there is plenty more to write about the Exorcist. There’s always more to write. But not now; now I’m going to attempt sleep without having horrible nightmares. Wish me luck, kids.

Time warp: short notes on The Exorcist

Never sleeping again. Ever.
I'm working on a post about sexuality in the 1973 film The Exorcist, but it's only in the beginning stages so this is going to be a quick post. After watching it for the second time, I have some weird questions that probably won't even be answered and have little to do with sexuality. Maybe it's one of those movies I just won't ever "get".
-what the hell happened to Captain Howdy?
-are there people who actually, genuinely, truely believe in god and/or satan? Without a shred of doubt? I'm kind of fascinated by this possibility. And scared.
-are we not supposed to notice the hierarchy of individuals that control Regan's life more than satan himself? priests, doctors, adults, men, mother. You best believe I'm coming back to this one.
-what does the stone thing and pendant have to do with anything?
-medical=sexual, satanic possession=sexual, more assault type interactions than sexual
              -due to the hierarchies in place?
              -because she was a child?
              -am I the only one who sees the needle and thinks "penis?" and "rape!!!"?
-every identity is a performance. more on that later, too.
Not entirely sure why I'm posting this, it's just notes made before any real work gets done. But it's late, I'm tired and still a little shit terrified. So here you go, internet.

Seemingly obligatory (but really, it's genuine) optimistic winter greeting

Whatever you do in January, have a good time doing it. This isn't the PC version of "Merry Christmas" "Happy Holidays" bullshit. This is more like "I hope you're happy with your set of circumstances, that you have enough of what you need to keep you going, that I hope you don't hate the weather where you're at, that you're safe from danger and hate."
So now I'm posting a list of things that make me happy in an attempt to pretend I'm optimistic. I write a lot of lists and this one has been in the works for a long time, and it's not done.
-drinking milk after eating PB
-purring cats sleeping on my shoulder
-the colour green
-pulling a piece of glass out of my foot
-the beach in the winter
-pilot g-tec-c4 pens with a .4 tip
-notebook paper. or paper in general
-scars that tell a story. preferably if that story is hilarious
-the extensive list of inside jokes my family seems to have
-body art
-doodles on the side of notes that turn into art
-the familiarity of hugging someone you know
-puppy fur. or puppies. ok fine all dogs. and cats. and most animals. narcoleptic goats.
-tomatoes
-frog solo
-coins from the year you were born
-knowing songs on the radio when you're in the car with someone who will sing along
-when i realize that a headache i had earlier is gone away
-the realization that i like a lot of animals just as much as i like a lot of people
-spider plants
-sending and getting mail
So let's pretend we're happy if just for a minute.

Jenkins: objectivisn and constructionism

“...examines the changing uses of terms like pervert, pedophile, molester, defiler, psychopath, and predator. None of these words of concepts is privileged in the sense of representing a universally accepted, objective reality, as each is rooted in the attitudes of a particular time, and each carries it ideological baggage.”

-Philip Jenkins in Moral Panic: Changing Concepts of the Child Molester in Modern America

(I like it when one quote from the introductory parts of a book nicely summarizes what the next 238 pages are going to be about.  This is the case with Jenkins’ work; in four lines he tells us his argument for the entire book. )

Think about what you think you know about sexual “predators” or “molesters”. Perhaps you’ve heard from multiple sources that molestation or sexual abuse often escalates in its level of extremity, that it can even lead to murder for certain people. You’ve probably also heard the “cycle of abuse” theory, in which the victim of sexual misuse continues the abuse; the abused becomes the abuser of later generations. Then of course there’s the rumour that predators are “sick” individuals, that they cannot be “cured” or rehabilitated into mainstream society.  These “facts” have become part of the dialogue we use to discuss sexual abuse, but it’s worth questioning how these ideas became part of the normative discourse.

A phenomenon or actions may remain unchanged through context, time and space, but how it is perceived is likely to change. It may be seen as problematic at one time but a non-event at others. When an action or phenomenon is perceived as a social problem, there are two popular responses, Jenkins argues. He outlines the differences between an objectivist and constructionist perspectives of social problems.

Objectivist perspectives accept an act or something as a problem when it harms or disturbs society. It looks for “roots” of the problem, seeking origins of the behaviour in an attempt to better understand it. With this line of thinking, there is almost always a “solution” to any problem that may arise.

Constructionist perspectives question how the set of circumstances came to be known as problematic. Why are particular issues seen as problematic in some contexts and not others? This question acknowledges that “problems” (i.e. sexual molestation) have a basis in reality, but also makes sure we question the so called objectiveness of knowledge. Constructionism asks us to question the discourses being used in discussing and dissecting sexual abuse. Are the words being used predominantly medicalized? Are they in legal jargon? Does the discourse attempt to extract fear from the society? Asking questions like these is one of the steps in not only better understanding the acts of sexual abuse but also how we have come to know about it.