My Week 266: Toys For Girls And Boys

So a couple of weeks ago, I was talking to Leslie, one of the “train gang ladies”, which makes us sound a lot more badass than we actually are, but really means that we all just take the train every day and stand around chatting about which train car attendant is the cutest, or meanest. Anyway, Leslie is really into Harry Potter and she told me that Chapters had their Harry Potter Lego Advent calendars for sale. And I was super-excited because I love Harry Potter. I don’t particularly like Lego myself, having realized a very long time ago that, while it’s great fun to put together, what the f*ck do you do with it afterwards? It just sits on a shelf collecting dust and if you try to play with it, it breaks into tiny pieces that you will inevitably step on. But the Advent calendar is a tiny spark of daily fun, and later, I can roleplay scenes from the Harry Potter movies for Titus. With the Lego figures. Obviously.

But it reminded me of the year that I forgot to order our Lego Advent Calendar. It was close to the beginning of December and all the good ones were sold out so I was getting panicky, but one night I was on our local Buy and Sell group and someone had a new Lego Advent Calendar for sale. I was immediately all over it. “But”, the woman cautioned, “it’s GIRL LEGO.”

I was like “So? What difference does it make?” and I bought it. Unfortunately, I was misled by my own naiveté, which had caused me to envision a bulldozer driven by a yellow lady Lego instead of a yellow man Lego. No, gentle reader, the difference was much bigger than that. I knew it when I saw the title on the box. It said Lego Friends; the “i” was DOTTED WITH A HEART, and I was immediately infuriated. Here’s what I bought. Two female dolls, and their little doll house. The “Lego” figures looked like Polly Pockets, or miniature Barbies, NOT those awesome Lego guys with the pointy heads you can put helmets and sh*t on. These girls apparently lived together and liked to cook in their kitchen with the pink blender and purple mixing bowl that came with the kit. They had a pink and purple couch, a pink and purple toboggan, pink presents, and a white kitty cat who was wearing a purple collar with a pink heart on it. And the worst part was that virtually nothing needed to be assembled. I could forgive the colour scheme (personally I LOVE the colour purple) and the cutesy hearts, because assembly is the great equalizer. However, Lego seemed to think that girls are too clumsy or stupid to put things together the way boys can, so almost everything was preassembled for them. Anyway, I was shocked that in the 21^st century, this kind of blatant sexism still exists, that according to Lego, all girls like hearts, the colours purple and pink exclusively, kitty cats, and cooking, and have trouble with manual dexterity. But on the box, there’s a warning that the kit isn’t suitable for children under 3—Lego claims it’s because of a choking hazard, but I think this just gives all of us a chance to make sure our little girls play with lots of regular “boy” Lego before they turn three and have to be exposed to the ridiculous world of Lego stereotypes. Then again, when I examined the scene on the box more closely, the two girls were obviously living together, cosying up on the couch to exchange pink presents, and were planning to host a dinner party with their kitty. Could Lego, in an extremely subtle and subversive way, have created the first Lego Lesbian Couple? Maybe I was wrong about Lego after all.

But then I started to do a little more investigating and realized that, unless Lego had created an entire COLONY of queer women, they were just plain old sexist. Case in point, the Lego Friends “Lighthouse Rescue Centre” where you can join Mia, Emma and their girlfriends (the only characters pictured on the box are female) as they cavort with sea lions, and holy sh*t is that a heart on the jetski?! I don’t know about you, but I’ve NEVER seen a PINK lighthouse, let alone one with a waterslide. Compare this to the Lego Helicopter Rescue kit that features four dudes (only guys are featured on the box) and a very realistic hospital, ambulance, and helicopter.

Now, I don’t mean to imply that there’s anything wrong with a girl liking pink things, or kitties, or make-up—god knows, I love ALL those things and got my hair coloured purple on Saturday—I just think children should have a choice that isn’t based on gender stereotypes forced onto them by companies like Lego. Boys can like pink lighthouses and girls can like red helicopters. And people can be whoever and whatever they want to be.

I think back to my own childhood and wonder how I managed to escape those same media stereotypes and ended up being the person I am today. (My grade 5 teacher told my parents that I was “bossy and outspoken”—you’re goddamn right I am.) I had Barbies, and a Barbie camper, but we also had the “cowboy people”, one of whom was Cowboy Jane, whose only goal in life was to f*ck with Barbie by kidnapping her baby for a hefty ransom when she was on one of her many camping trips. Finally, my brother, who has a Ph. D., and I decided to test the laws of gravity, physics, and thermodynamics all at the same time by sticking matches in the side panels of Barbie’s camper, setting it alight, and launching it into our swimming pool from my second story bedroom window (don’t tell my Mom).

Today, I’m looking after the adorable child of my brother and sister-in-law, who agrees with me that people should be able to like whatever they want—she reminded me that even though she likes pink, she also likes red and black. Right now she’s wearing a sweatshirt with a unicorn on it and she’s drawing a very realistic picture of an egg:

Me: What are you good at?
C: Um…I’m very good at drawing things.
Me: You are.
C: I’m really good at math. I’m also very good at painting. And building things.
Me: You ARE. Anything else?
C: I’m good at being kind to people and also being helpful.
Me: That’s a very important thing for everybody to be good at.
C: I’m good at paying attention. Every day at school I get a sticker for paying attention. I DO have a lot of stickers.
Me: Awesome.
C: Also, I’m going to be a veterinarian one day.
Me: Excellent.

My Week 140: Titus Shows Off at the Vet, Wonder Woman and Sexism

Saturday: Titus goes to the vet

On Friday night, Ken reminded me that Titus had his yearly vet appointment. He’s a pretty healthy dog, so he hasn’t actually seen the vet since this time last year. I had errands to do, but I agreed to go in my car and meet them there—not because I didn’t think Ken could do it on his own, but because I like to make sure we’re not getting soaked for extra tests. You know how veterinarians are always upselling procedures to make a profit. Not that there’s anything wrong with that—they need to make a living like the rest of us—but does a dog REALLY need a hearing test? If you open a bag of chips, and your dog doesn’t immediately appear next to you no matter where he is in the house, then your dog has a hearing problem, and it shouldn’t cost $200 to tell you that.

Anyway, on Saturday morning, I said to Titus, “Hey buddy, guess what? We’re going for a car ride!”

He immediately looked both intrigued and suspicious. “Where are we going?”

Me: The VET! It’s going to be awesome!
Titus: How is that ‘awesome’? The last time I went there, she stuck a needle in my ass. Wait—is that the place where they have those Liver Treats?
Me: Why, yes. Yes, it is.
Titus: Ok, cool.

So we got him into Ken’s SUV, where he insisted in sitting up front, and we both set off in separate vehicles. I got there at the same time as them, and I was all like, “Hey, buddy, did you have fun in the car?” but Titus was too concerned with smelling EVERY CORNER of the door frame, then EVERY CORNER the waiting room, straining against his collar, wheezing like an emphysemic old man, and whispering “So many messages…”. We managed to get him to sit still long enough on the scale to get his weight, which was 41.7 kilos. That sounded like a lot, and I was trying to do the conversion math in my head but failing I just looked it up—92 pounds). I was convinced that Titus had gotten a little ‘chunky’ over the last few months, but when the vet tech came in, she confirmed that his weight last year was 41.1 kilos.

Titus: Ha!! And you called me ‘chunky’. I’m svelte, baby. Cheese slices for everyone!!
Me: Well, I’m sorry, but you looked bigger.
Titus: That’s just my personality. I’m larger than life.

Then the vet tech gave us a form to fill in, because Titus is now technically a “senior dog”, having attained the age of 8 years old. There was a series of questions which we had to answer on a scale of zero to 3.

Ken: Does your pet seem listless?
Me (watching Titus run back and forth between the counter and the door): That would be zero.
Ken: Does your pet urinate outside the litter box?
Me: I’m confused. Is he supposed to HAVE a litter box? How big would it have to be?
Ken: I think this is a generic dog/cat survey, so I’m just going to say ‘Non-Applicable’. Has your pet’s appetite increased?
Me: He’s a Lab. I don’t think there’s an end to his appetite. Is the next question, ‘Has your pet’s appetite decreased?’ cuz you can say zero to that one too.
Ken: Ok. When your pet barks, does he dribble a little urine?
Titus: WHAT?! (Looking at floor)…Actually, maybe a little right then.
Me: No, that’s just drool. Stop staring at the treat jar.

Then our vet came in, and, long story short, she was VERY impressed with his health. Then she tried to extend his back legs and looked a little concerned:

Vet: He doesn’t want me to manipulate his right leg. Has he been favouring it?
Me: No, but every so often, it goes out from under him a bit.
Vet: Could be early hip dysplasia. We’ll have to keep an eye on it, and start him on joint health supplements. Of course, we could X-ray it right now…
Titus: Death Ray?! I’d rather smoke a joint.
Me: A ‘joint health supplement’ is a vitamin, not marijuana.

Then it was time for the shots, which Titus didn’t even notice because he was too busy eating Liver Treats to distract him. We also reluctantly agreed to bloodwork to test for heartworm, liver and kidney function, as well as flea and tick medication, and the dollar signs were just ringing up loud in my head. But after the blood was taken, the vet made him a special bandage with a little heart on it, so that totally made up for the incredible cost. At one point, she left, and Ken whispered. “What do you think? Like, $300?” and I was like, “No way—at least $500.” And yeah, guess who was right?

The best part though, was that when we came out, the place was packed, and everyone turned to look at Titus. I couldn’t have been prouder in that moment, as they ooh’ed and ah’ed over him. “What a gorgeous dog,” said one woman. “He’s a giant!” said another. People commented on his shiny coat, how well-behaved he was, and what a beautiful smile he had. None of this was lost on Titus, who’s nothing if not a showman.

Titus: Let’s do our routine—really give them something to remember. We’ll put that Shih Tzu over there to shame.
Me: OK—ready? Sit. Stay. Bang! You’re dead…OK, you’re just wounded…Fine, you’re alive—roll over.

Then he gave the crowd high fives, and everyone, including the snooty little Shih Tzu, was suitably impressed. So I guess the vet bill, which I put on Visa and will be paying off in installments, was totally worth it.

Women Only

So this week, I’ve been reading about how some guys are really upset because there are special “Women Only” showings of the new Wonder Woman movie. But I understand why they’re upset about this, because every time I’ve done “Women Only” things, men always complain about it:

1) Ringette

When I was 7 years old, I started playing Ringette. Ringette, at that time, was a Women Only sport. Of course, what I really wanted to play was hockey, but at the time women’s hockey teams were extremely rare, and girls weren’t allowed to play on boy’s hockey teams. I played Ringette until I was 14 and it was always an all-girls team. Of course, there was no body checking, or pucks, but it was still a pretty cool game. Then the guys started complaining that they wanted to play Ringette too, so now, of course, there are men’s ringette teams.

2) Brownies and Girl Guides

As a kid, I was really into nature and hiking in the forest, and basically just doing cool stuff, so I joined the Brownies. What I really wanted to join was the Cub Scouts, but girls weren’t allowed to join the Cub Scouts. I became a Brownie and got badges for sewing and cooking instead of making fires and killing bears and sh*t. But hey—I got to dance around a toadstool and my leaders were named after owls. Now, of course, thanks to boys wanting to join the Girl Guides, there are unisex troops, and adventure groups for both sexes.

3) Home Ec.

When I was in Grade 8, I was in a ‘girls only’ Home Economics class. Well, ALL the Home Economics classes were girls only. The boys got to take Industrial Arts where, instead of cooking and sewing and learning to apply make-up, they got to weld and do woodwork. But what I really wanted to take was Industrial Arts, and one day, my dream came true. The boys and girls switched classes for one period, and the Home Economics teacher made cookies for the boys while they watched, and the Industrial Arts teacher made us all key chains. I could have made my own f*cking key chain, but the teacher didn’t want me to burn my fingers melting the plastic in the electronic frying pan. Silly guy—I KNEW how to use an electric frying pan because I’d been taking Home Economics for almost a year. But I guess boys really like to make cookies because now all of these classes are co-ed.

My point? Well, women have lost all the bastions of their womenhood to men. Everything is co-ed now, thanks to men complaining that they’re being left out of all the cool stuff. All we want is the ability to do something without the opposite gender constantly wanting to join in and make things equal. Is that so wrong? I mean, men have been saying that for years.

Sarcasm aside, I think it’s a bit hysterical that a lot of the same men who are upset about not being able to see Wonder Woman would never have complained when women were FORCED to have Women Only things, like the Lioness Club instead of the Lion’s Club, or the Rebekah Lodge because women weren’t allowed to be Masons, or any other “women’s branch” of any fraternal organization, or sport, or activity because they weren’t ALLOWED to be a part of the men stuff. K pointed out that saying it’s ok because men did it to women for years doesn’t make it right, and I told her that I didn’t actually think it WAS right. It’s just ironic. And if it’s any consolation to the men out there, Wonder Woman is still wearing a ridiculously skimpy outfit. But of course, next thing you know, Batman is going to be complaining about why he can’t fight crime in a bustier too, and all the superheroes will be wearing lingerie. But that’s equality for you.

My Week 114: 2 AM Eternal, Christmas Toys for Girls and Boys

Friday: 2 AM Eternal

I’ve had a lot on my mind recently and, as if my brain isn’t already like a jukebox most of the time, it’s been made even worse by thoughts that are stressing me and decisions that I currently have to make. As a result, I found myself wide awake at 2 am on Friday morning, with my head in full overdrive. What I normally do under these circumstances is try to distract myself, and since it was getting close to the weekend, I tried to focus on writing, and what this week’s post would be about. Then I just let my mind drift…

I like that so many people read my blog. I mean, I love writing it, but it’s nice that people read it. Isn’t it weird though, that my most popular post is still Week 9: Jehovah’s Witnesses? I wonder why. Is there a Jehovah network out there, and they’re all reading it with plans to descend on my house en masse one day? Or do people click on it, thinking it’s some kind of rant? Have MY Jehovahs read it? They asked me once what the web address of my blog was. Could they actually have remembered it and looked it up?! That would be embarrassing, them coming to the door every week, knowing that I know that they secretly want to steal my soul in a universal battle like Batman vs. Superman, and that the empty liquor bottles and Christmas decorations on the porch are my version of Kryptonite because apparently in this scenario, I’m Batman. Not sure why. But there may be an upside—if they ARE reading my blog, this would be a great time to tell them not to come before noon. I feel really self-conscious and weird when they come at 10 and I’m still in my pajamas. Last week, I saw them coming up the walk, and I screamed down to Ken, “The Jehovahs are coming! Hide!” Eventually, they left, and then I felt guilty, so if they are reading this, you need to come later in the day, kind of in between the time when I’m not wearing clothes and haven’t started drinking yet. So let’s say, 1:30 to 2:00 pm. It’s a small window, but I DO like your weird magazines…

Why is Harry Potter Puppet Pals in my head right now? Snape, Snape, Severus Snape (Dumbledore!)

Imaginary Me: I really like your weird magazines, except for all the Bible stuff.
Imaginary JW: The Bible stuff is kind of the point, soon-to-be-convert.
Imaginary Me: You’ll never own my soul! Anyway, here’s a question. Why was the Bible written by a bunch of white guys when everything took place in the Middle East?
Imaginary JW: Why do you think they’re all white guys?
Imaginary Me: Well, they all have white guy names, except for the main character. Mark, John, Peter…I’ve never met a Middle Eastern guy called Luke.
Imaginary JW: The Bible was translated from Hebrew to English. Their names were originally less white.
Imaginary Me: You just googled that, didn’t you?
Imaginary JW: No, it’s something you remembered—this is YOUR imaginary conversation. Plus Google was invented by the devil. We only use Bing. It’s Jehovah’s True Search Engine.
Imaginary Me: OK, now you’ve gone too far. BING—I could NEVER get behind that.

Snape, Snape, Severus Snape (Dumbledore!) Ron, Ron, Ron Weasley…

…If what Google says is true (well, at least the imaginary Google in my head), then isn’t it the biggest irony of all that David Duke, former head of the Ku Klux Klan, has a Jewish first name? All those crazy anti-Semites out there, and most of them are named after Hebrew people. I wonder if they realize that. Although from the idiocy I’ve seen and read coming from the so-called “alt-right”, I highly doubt it…

Imaginary KKK rally

David Duke: All right, white guys—time to put on your silly hoods. Aaron, Adam, Ben—you guys are in charge of leading the chanting. Dan, Ethan, and Gabe—you can set the cross on fire.
All: Yeehaw! That’ll show those foreigners with their weird-ass names and strange, cultish behaviour.
David Duke: Look at me! Whee! I’m a wizard!

…the KKK confuses me. Are they supposed to be Christian? Cuz their leader is a male witch, and that sounds really magic-y to me. Plus, why do they burn crosses? These guys are just FULL of irony. Or stupidity. It’s hard to differentiate with the KKK…

Alt-right, Alt-right, Severus Snape (Harry Potter, Harry Potter, Harry Harry Potter)…

…I wonder if Kellie Leitch is a secret member of a white power group, or is she just trying to ride the Trump train? What exactly ARE Canadian values, anyway? And who gets to define them? I could do it. I’m great at running stuff…

Imaginary citizenship hearing

Judge: Do you promise not to EVER write stupid comments online? And to NEVER re-post articles without checking them out on Snopes.com first?
Immigrant: You betcha.
Judge: Will you line up in an orderly fashion, even on Black Friday, or when waiting to use the washroom at the Air Canada Centre?
Immigrant: Do I HAVE to go shopping on Black Friday?
Judge: Heck no. This is Canada.
Immigrant: Then, you betcha.
Judge: Will you be respectful and accepting of other people’s viewpoints, religions, and gender identities?
Immigrant: Obviously. That’s why I came here. Oh, do I have to care about other people’s marital relationships?
Judge: Absolutely not.
Immigrant: What a relief. Being all up in other people’s business is so tiring. And time-consuming. So, yes, I agree.
Judge: Cool. You’re in. Now go apologize to someone for something and pet a beaver.

…I could totally run this country.

Finally, I started to get sleepy. It was 4:10 in the morning, but I got a lot accomplished. And here for your viewing pleasure is a link to Harry Potter Puppet Pals, so it can be the soundtrack to YOUR insomnia too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tx1XIm6q4r4

Saturday: Toy Sexism

Yesterday, I was out shopping at a local store that has a huge Christmas display of toys. As I wandered around, looking for something for my niece, I was really disturbed. I’ve written before about toys and sexism, but I’ve never seen anything quite as blatant as the stuff from a company called Play Go. These people are seriously trying to inculcate little girls into the worst kind of stereotyped gender roles. First, I saw “My Cleaning Set”. This is a kit with a broom, dustpan, mop and bucket. On the box is a little girl in a pink t-shirt happily holding the broom, because cleaning the house is the career goal of most women. But for the really ambitious gal, they also sell “My Cleaning Trolley”, which has a vacuum as well, and is portable enough to take your skills on the road. Everything on it is pink and light purple, which are obviously the colours of success. Next was “Let’s Cook—the Complete Kitchen Set”—38 pieces of pink kitchenware, featuring a little girl in a pink t-shirt and apron, wearing a chef’s hat. What’s wrong with this picture? Obviously the chef’s hat, cuz aren’t all chefs guys? This company should be ashamed to imply that girls can grow up to be chefs just like men. But the really interesting thing is that all of the little girls on the boxes seem to be members of different ethnic groups. So is Play Go trying to be diverse, or are they secretly being racist as well as sexist? But I’m not just targeting Play Go, because what really stood out for me was the Construction Set right next to the “girl toys”. It was made by Little Tikes, another well-known company, and it featured two little boys in green and navy t-shirts, happily building things. So now I get it—girls stay home and clean and cook, and boys build sh*t. I wish I’d known that BEFORE I went to all the trouble of going to university and having a professional career. Hell, I could have just stayed home and cleaned my house. Now, this is not to say that I don’t respect women who DO choose to stay at home, raise their children, and take care of their families, because I absolutely do, if that’s their choice. Ultimately, the goal of feminism wasn’t and shouldn’t be to force all women into the workforce—it was to give them the right to CHOOSE what they wanted to do with their lives without being attacked for it either way. But toy companies shouldn’t be influencing two-year-olds to make that choice based on pretty colours and “realistic vacuum sounds”. As I was looking in dismay at the toys, a woman with a little girl around the age of 3 came over. “Look!” said the little girl pointing at the cooking set. “I can make all the food for everyone!” I was really hoping the mom would say, “Or you can build a railroad like the kids on THIS box” but she just said, “You could!” Then the grandma came over, put a Santa hat on the little girl’s head and said, “Look at you! You’re SO pretty!” Sigh.

Then later, in a strange twist of fate, Ken was reading Awake!, the magazine that the friendly local Jehovah’s Witnesses had dropped off while I was shopping (Sorry, JWs–maybe next time). One of the articles was about “respect in marriages”. It featured an imaginary conversation between a husband and wife where the husband was expressing that he didn’t feel like his wife treated him with respect because she was always talking loudly, using exaggerated facial expressions, waving her hands around, and interrupting him.

Ken: Don’t you think this is really sexist? The wife is getting all the blame. There’s nothing here about what the husband does to make the wife feel disrespected. Then there’s a bit from the Bible about how women should treat their husbands with respect.
Me: Or MAYBE it’s reverse sexism. Maybe the Jehovahs are secretly sexist against men for being such big, f*cking babies. Like “Oh, poor me, my wife is mean to me.” Maybe the hidden message is “Grow the f*ck up, imaginary lame-ass guy”. You never know with the Jehovahs.
Ken: Well, all right then…
Me: Sorry, was I disrespecting you? Get over it. I love you.
Ken: Sigh. I love you too.

Poor Ken. I’m going to cook him a really awesome dinner tonight. Because THAT’S my choice.

My Week 99: Jet Lag Grumpiness, The Tragically Hip

Jet lag makes me grumpy. I’ll be the first to admit that, or maybe the second, as Ken is well aware of the fact that I’ve been a little pissy this week. The poor guy has a bad cold and slept on the couch the other night because he was coughing and didn’t want to wake me up. My reaction?

Me: What the hell are you doing?
Ken: Um…whuh?
Me: How many times have I asked you NOT to use the couch cushions as pillows?! They’re expensive, and you’re making them all squishy!
Ken: But I—
Me: NO, Ken. You need to stop treating the couch like a flophouse. Use your own damn pillows. It’s not like you don’t have 6 of them all cluttering up the bed and sh*t.
Ken: *weak cough, sneeze* Sigh.

At any rate, I hope he forgives me for my pillow rant, although it’s true that he has like a thousand weird pillows on the bed that he just can’t sleep without—unless he’s on the couch. The fact is that I’m in a continual state of grogginess, thanks to the 6 hour time zone change, and as I get older, I find it harder to readjust my body clock. But Ken wasn’t the only one who felt my ire this week. I hope you’re prepared for this, because I’m about to vent. Here’s the list of 4 things that are REALLY grinding my gears this week:

1) Telemarketers who can’t even be bothered trying.

Twice in the last week, I’ve been the target of a completely uninspired, or blatantly bulls*t phone sales pitch. I’m not sure what’s going on—maybe it’s the brutal heat we’re experiencing in Canada, but people aren’t even TRYING. The phone rang yesterday. We don’t normally use our landline, but the caller ID said “C. Becker”, so I thought it might be, like, a normal human person. I answered the phone:

Me: Hello? HELLO? (sounds of talking in the background).
Guy: What? Oh hi. Mrs. __________? (mispronounces my last name)
Me: No, it’s _____________.
Guy: Haha. Right. Sorry. So….this is just the duct cleaning people calling.
Me: The duck cleaning people?
Guy: No, ducts. You know, like your furnace ducts and stuff. So, we’re having a promotion.
Me: Ah, sorry. We heat totally with wood.
Guy: No problem! Thanks!

“Just the duct cleaning people”. Is that seriously how a company expects to make money? And why the hell are their sales agents using their own damn phones? Anyway, I had his name and phone number on my caller ID, so the other day, I randomly called him back. Don’t worry; I blocked my number first. I didn’t get to talk to “Chris”, which is what I’m calling him, but I left this ominous message on his answering machine in my best Count Dracula voice: “Would you like your ducts cleaned?! Mwah hahahaha!!!” Then I hung up, turned around and realized that K was staring at me.

Me: The duct cleaning guy…
K: I condemn your actions.

But it still wasn’t as bad as the other day, when I answered the phone and a guy with a VERY heavy accent said, “Hello. My name is John Smith and I’m calling from Windows. There seems to be something wrong with your computer—“, and I said, “F*ck off” and hung up the phone. Then I felt terrible, because I’m usually really polite to telemarketers, but how stupid did he think I AM? Now I’m worried though, because when we were in Iceland, I wrote most of last week’s post on a netbook using Windows, and when we came back to Canada, the netbook crashed. All I could do was call up the post on Word, then retype the whole thing, which took me hours. So maybe that’s my karma for being all swear-y at John Smith, and now my Windows might really be f*cked up.

2) Olympic Sexism.

Like many people, I’m disturbed by the level of sexism in the current Olympics. There have been many articles written on the subject regarding women’s achievements being downplayed or overshadowed by constant references to what they’re wearing or who they’re married to. And while I agree with all that, I also think that there are a couple of sports in which women are their own worst enemies by not saying “Screw this.” The first one that comes to mind is Gymnastics. How can you seriously expect people NOT to make a distinction between the genders when you have such a different approach to the floor routine? The guys are all serious and badass and tumbling around, and when they finish a run, they take one weird swivel-y step to turn around. The women, on the other hand, look like they’re trying out for Little Miss Gymnastic Universe—they do their routines with perma-smiles, and shimmy their shoulders and shake their pre-pubescent-looking booties for the crowd in between THEIR tumbling runs. I don’t get it. At one point, I was like “Shouldn’t there be a pole somewhere on that mat?” These women are all INCREDIBLE athletes—why is it the expectation of their sport that they act like pageant princesses? Do they lose marks if they don’t look pretty and sexy? Dump the glitter and gyrating, and bring women’s gymnastics into the 21^st century. And don’t get me started on the seeming necessity of the women’s Beach Volleyball team wearing bikini thongs compared to what the guys wear. They claim it’s comfortable and allows them to play better—maybe having sand in your lady parts is a great incentive to win. And just for the record, I’d have absolutely no problem with any of this if the guys were similarly dressed in thongs or glitter or whatever. In fact, it might make me MORE inclined to watch men’s Beach Volleyball.

3) Kidbashing.

This one has been making me grumpy for a lot longer than a week, but hey, in for a penny, in for a pound. Is it just me, or are other people sick as f*ck of all the childbashing that seems to be de rigeur in the last little while? My social media outlets are jampacked with “50 Reasons Why Being a Parent Sucks”, or “10 Things I Hate About My Kids” or “Why Being a Mom Is Crap”. From Twitter hashtags to nasty memes, this whole cyberbullying of our children has to stop. Being a parent is AWESOME. There. I said it. I’m deeply sorry that I don’t want to cash in by appealing to the frustrated parent in you all, but I actually LIKE being a mom. My daughter didn’t drive me to drink (I did that all on my own, thank you very much). She didn’t give me gray hairs (do I have any? I’ll have to ask my hairdresser), and I would never dream of embarrassing her by openly mocking what she does on the internet. Sure, I talk about her, but it’s with affection rather than mean-spiritedness. You know what she DID give me? Laugh lines. Because kids are hilarious. But you’d never know this from some of the negativity aimed towards parenthood lately. I actually read a post by someone who described being a parent as being akin to living in a barren wasteland with an empty soul. WHAT?? All I have to say to that is “Grow the f*ck up. Did you really think that your life would stay EXACTLY the same as it was before you had children? Did you think you could still ‘party with my ladies’, have your semi-annual girls’ weekend, or continue to hit the bars on a Friday night? If so, then hire a nanny and stop complaining.” I’m not wholly unsympathetic—I understand that spending time with the wee ones can be a little overwhelming at times, and when I was raising K, there were certainly occasions (few, I have to admit) where I needed to vent. You know who I vented to? My mom. Or a good friend. Or Ken. I didn’t share my thoughts and feelings with thousands of strangers on the internet where my momentary self-doubt would be archived forever, and where my negative thoughts about childrearing could be seen by my child at a future date. The worst part is that it’s making younger women fearful of becoming parents. I read an article the other day by a journalist who was considering having children, but after reading some “mommy blogs”, she was so scared off that she was re-thinking the whole thing. The most ridiculous thing I read lately was by someone who was so unhappy about being a mother, and the worst part was that her husband got to go out working and be with adults. But then he would come home and leave his underwear on the bathroom door handle, and ON TOP OF EVERYTHING ELSE, she would have to put his underwear away. My first and only thought was, “Why the HELL are you picking up after a grown man?! Did you know that after a while, if you don’t pick up after him, he’ll have no clean underwear and will be forced to do his own laundry like an actual normal human person?” And now this poor guy feels like a dick because everyone on the internet knows he hangs his underwear on a doorknob.

Honestly, I don’t know how anyone can rightfully complain about being a parent. It really is the best gig in the world. You get to spend time with someone who is NEVER boring, and you get to teach them all the stuff they need to know. When you repeat “Can you say Mama,” over and over again, you’re creating neural pathways and networks. When you say “No, that’s hot—danger!”, you’re developing logic and reasoning. And when you say “Play nice and share,” you’re contextualizing the social construct. You’re a f*cking scientist, that’s what you are. So start embracing your inner Ph. D.—the internet, and your children, will thank you.

4) People who try to screw you over on Facebook buy and sell sites.

Ken and I are still trying to offload a lot of the furniture we had at the cottage we sold recently. The best way has been by using local Facebook buy and sell sites, but it can be frustrating at times. Most people are great—they come when they say they will, they give you the money, and they take away your stuff. Then you get the people who take two days of constant messaging and questions like “Is it in good condition?” (no, I posted it because it’s a piece of crap) to finally arrange a time to pick up an item. THEN they suddenly want to know if you’ll take half the asking price. You say No, then they come over when you’re out and try the same sh*t with your unsuspecting husband. But he’s no dummy (because you told him what the price was and he knows better that to barter on his own) so they leave empty-handed, having wasted everyone’s time. People like that are jerks. Enough said.

5) Amid all the grumbling this week, there HAVE been some good moments. Ken and I repaired the broken down antique settee that I got a garage sale and it looks great. I made risotto for the first time and it turned out almost OK. I bought groceries and it didn’t cost me a small fortune as it would have in Iceland. I saw Lisa, my Lancome lady, and she gave me a lot of free stuff. Which brings me to the thing that made me laugh my ass off this week. I saw my parents yesterday, and I gave my mom some peach-scented foot lotion, Calvin Klein body lotion, and lipstick that I got from Lisa. She called me last night:

Mom: I hope you don’t mind, but I gave the lotion to your Dad.
Me: No, that’s fine…
Mom: He’s decided to become a chick magnet so he needs soft skin.
Me: I—what?

So ladies, beware. If you see a really cool old Scottish guy who smells like peaches, you’re in trouble.

Saturday Night: The Tragically Hip

Last night was the final show of the Tragically Hip’s final concert tour. The lead singer, Gord Downie, has incurable brain cancer, and rather than fade away, he’s going out in fine Canadian style by bringing the country together. You might have seen the memes about Canada being closed for the night because our national broadcaster, the CBC, was showing the concert live across the nation for those who couldn’t get tickets to be there in person. Free. No commercial breaks. 3 hours of song. So that we could all embrace the band whose music was the soundtrack to so many of our lives. Hundreds of thousands of people watching all at the same time, some at huge parties with massive screens, some at home with the people they love, watching a man give everything he had left to the nation HE loves. It was inspiring and heartbreaking all at the same time. In a year that we lost Bowie and Prince, two other icons of our youth, it seems incredibly unfair that Gord Downie, man, machine, poem, should be lost to us as well. And when the time comes, we’ll miss him fully and completely. Just wait and you’ll see.

Here’s the link to one of my favourite Hip songs—Nautical Disaster.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8Fi46BFAF0

My Week 81: When I Was A DJ

Wednesday: I reminisce about being a DJ

For the last three weeks, I’ve been working in a very large convention centre near the airport in Toronto, which is one of the reasons I’ve been neglecting a lot of my online activities. The centre itself is like 5 miles long, and my legs and feet are KILLING me from all the walking—I would probably have lost weight at this point, except that our lunches are catered, and they are full-sized meals. The menu repeats every week—I’ve eaten more butter chicken, rice, and raita in the last 14 days than I’ve eaten in the last 5 years, and then there’s the large chunks of beef with instant mashed potatoes, the chicken wraps and baked beans, and the hamburgers/hot dog steam trays. Wednesday, though, is lasagna day, and since I can’t eat gluten, I dashed next door and brought back Swiss Chalet chicken (if you’re a true Canadian, this is better than caviar to you, mostly because caviar is fish eggs and that’s just disgusting, while Swiss Chalet chicken is delicious and comes with an amazing dipping sauce that can also be used with your fresh cut fries. And now, even though it’s 8 am, I badly want some). Anyway, we were all sitting around the banquet table, and one of my colleagues brought up the fact that she had worked for years at Swiss Chalet to put herself through university. Then we all started talking about our own part-time jobs, at which point I offered that I had been a DJ in university. I didn’t get much of a chance to elaborate, because then the bell rang, signalling the end of lunch (yes, I said “bell”, because we have almost 1500 people working for us, and if there’s no bell, it gets confusing. Just when you thought you were OUT of high school, am I right?).

But I continued to reminisce in my head about being a DJ, and what that meant in the late 80s compared to what it means now. Being a DJ now is like being a rock star; they have their own shows, and equipment that absolutely boggles my mind. One of my all-time favourites is the Canadian DJ and producer Deadmau5, who is amazing and wears this ubercool mouse helmet when he performs. (Yes, it’s called a performance now, unlike back in the day, when I was just “background to the party”).

Me, I had two turntables and a microphone, to quote Beck, and sometimes not even that. My first actual job was working at a local university radio station, a job for which I had to audition in their sound booth. I did well enough for university radio—I’d been a club kid for years and was pretty familiar with that scene–and was given a position subbing in for a friend when she was unavailable—her show was called “Your Grandma’s Tractor”, and it was alternative music featuring bands no one had ever heard of. Then I was offered my own show. This might sound amazing, but they needed to meet some kind of broadcasting regulation, and they’d just lost their Classical DJ. Yep. Classical Music. Luckily, I’d grown up on that sh*t, and my parents had enough albums to start their own store, so “Symphonic Gestures” was born. I did that gig for over a year, putting together intro notes from the backs of record covers, then just letting the music play for the next half hour. I didn’t have an audience per se—I know this, because once the radio station ran a contest for prizes (I can’t remember what they were), but the only person who “called in to win” was my Mom. God love the woman. But it was great experience, and it got my my next two jobs.

The first was at a local hotel that had a dance club on the top floor. It also had a strip club on the second floor, and I was always careful to specify WHERE I worked, which is ironic, as you will soon find out. The problem was that the building was really f*cking old, and the floors were super-bouncy. DJs today can’t relate to this—everything’s so high-tech, and they have crews and all that, but the bouncy floor was my biggest problem in an era where the “pogo” was still one of the most popular ways to express yourself on the dance floor. My stabilizers were a joke, and at least twice a night, I would have to talk over some New Order song and nicely request that everyone STOP JUMPING UP AND DOWN because they were making the record skip. They were usually too drunk to notice the gaps in the lyrics, but it pissed me off and made me feel like an amateur. Still, the money was good and the drinks were free. Well, the water was free—in order to maintain a constant flow of song, I had to start one track before the other ended, and I don’t know how they do it today, but I had to physically put my thumb on one record to slow it down if need be, and I had a knob that would speed it up otherwise, so that the beat would match to the best of my ability. My motor skills are shite even when I’m sober, so I stayed alcohol-free until the night was over.

Then I saw an ad from a DJ service called Doctor Music. They were looking for a club DJ for a bar in Waterloo, and the money was better, so I applied, auditioned, and got the job. My boss was this huge guy named Ron—I mean gigantic, like 6 foot 5, about 300 pounds, with tight curly hair that he gelled up like crazy. I was excited, but then I learned that their entire music collection, which I would have to transport back and forth with me to the club every night in a suitcase, was on MIXED CASSETTE TAPES. Skrillex would probably be screaming with laughter right now. Kristian Nairn wouldn’t, though–he would just say “Hodor” in sympathy. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to try and blend the beats between two cassette tapes? I would spend at least a couple of hours at home every night before work, cuing each song that I wanted to start with on each mixed tape, using my index finger in the circular hole to cue it back about 15 seconds (or two and a half winds) so that I could try to match things up. And how the f*ck did I do that once the tape was playing, you ask? By using my fingernail against the ridges in the reel hub to slow one of the songs down–there were no covers on the decks, so it was just slam the tape in and mess with it however you needed to. It was STRESSFUL. Because once I had exhausted my predetermined selections, I had to start cuing up new songs in a cheap-ass glass sound booth that was NOT soundproof. Even though I had the best headphones that money could buy (well, the best for the 80s anyway), I could still barely hear what I was doing over the sound system in the club. My only saving grace was Milli Vanilli, that pseudo dance duo who put out an eight minute long extended version of a song called “Girl, You Know It’s True”, so that I could either get my next set ready, or go to the bathroom. My job at the club was good for a while (aside from all the drunks requesting “Paradise By the Dashboard Light” every five minutes), and I would dance away, hyping up the crowd with my arms in the air, or shouting encouragement into the microphone–until the fateful day that the club owner, who was a young, chauvinistic d-bag, decided to have a special university night with a “Wet T-shirt Contest”, which involved young men in the audience being encouraged to spray young women’s tops with water. My job was to play “sexy music” whilst said contest was progressing. As a woman, I was unhappy about the whole thing, but then the shit hit the fan as the contestants got more and more drunk, and more and more desperate to win the $100 cash prize, which back then was a lot of money for a university student. Suddenly, one girl tore off her t-shirt and bra, and started dancing topless. I was shocked, and then relieved as the owner came over to the sound booth. I assumed he was going to call the whole thing off, but no.

Club Owner: This is awesome! Play that stripper song by Man Parrish. That’ll really get the girls going.
Me: No! This is ridiculous and probably illegal!
Club Owner: Play it or you’re fired.

So I put the song on. But then, another girl took her top off, and then another and another. There was one girl left, the men were screaming encouragement, and I realized that as she was taking her shirt and bra off, she was CRYING.

So I shut the sound system down.

Club Owner: WHAT THE F*CK ARE YOU DOING?! PLAY THE F*CKING MUSIC. THAT’S WHAT I PAY YOU FOR!
Me: Not any more–I’m a professional! You want “stripper music”? Play it your goddamn self. There’s a sh*tload of cassette tapes in there—I’m sure you can handle it.

And I walked out, the club owner screaming epithets behind me, and the men in the crowd booing. I would have thrown down my headphones, but as any good DJ knows, your headphones are your best friend, and you would never hurt your best friend. Or a naïve university girl who was pressured into doing something that made her cry.

When Doctor Music found out, he was pretty upset, but he understood when I explained that, had the police shown up, his business might have been in jeopardy also. I had no idea if that was true, but I was working on a Master’s Degree at the time, and he assumed I knew what I was talking about. At any rate, I decided that I needed to get a job that was more career-oriented (because again, DJ was not a real profession YET, at least not in Ontario), so I started working as a teaching assistant at the university. The money wasn’t as good, but there was less nudity. Sorry, I mean NO nudity.

As an addendum, the club shut down not long after I left. Poor Doctor Music met a tragic end a few years later. Apparently, he lived in a compound out in the country surrounded by a huge barbed wire fence and patrolled by five German Shepherds. When the neighbours heard the dogs howling for days, they called the police to investigate. They found him dead inside the house, wearing a long wig, eyeshadow, and a giant flowered muumuu. And although this is a humour website, I don’t have anything particularly funny to say about that, because he was a really nice guy, all in all, and I guess living a secret life was pretty hard on him.

My Week 77: Soap and Sexism, A Dead What?!

Sunday: Soapmaking and sexism

Last December, Ken and I went with some friends to a soap-making workshop. It was a lot of fun; we all experimented with different colours and scents, and ended up with about 36 bars, which in soap years will take us to retirement. But then, not long ago, the soap instructor messaged me to say that I’d won the draw for a free soap-making session. I wasn’t surprised because I hardly ever win anything, but when I do, it’s always soap-related. For example, a few months ago, my Lancôme lady Lisa called to say I won a gift basket in a draw, and I was super-excited until I got said gift basket, which was made up of dish soap and hand soap from Cuchina (an upscale kitchen store), and was NOT make-up, perfume, or fancy cream. Honestly, if Lotto Max prize was soap instead of millions of dollars, I’m pretty certain I would win the lottery every week. And instead of a giant cheque, I’d be presented with a humungous bar of soap to go with all the other soap I won. But making your own soap is actually fun, and I wanted to do it, but it was with other people I didn’t know. That was a problem because I’m really awful at making small talk with strangers. Actually, that’s not exactly true—I can MAKE the small talk, but I FEEL awful about it. Then Ken said he would go with me, or more accurately, I told him that WE had won a free-soapmaking session and that we just had to pay for him.

On Sunday, we discussed in the car what kind of soap we each wanted to make. I was going to make something with lavender flowers, and maybe something I could put away until Christmas, because everyone loves soap as a Christmas gift, am I right? Ken tossed around a few ideas, but wanted to wait until we got there to decide. Ken is very creative, and his previous batch of black and lime green “Peppermint Licorice Swirl” was a big hit with the family. We were the first to arrive, and were told we were waiting for three other women. Now before I start the rest of this story, let me say upfront that I’ve never give any real thought to “reverse sexism”. The whole notion of “what men should do/wear/like” versus what women should do/wear/like is pretty foreign to me. I grew up with a dad who was a toolmaker by trade, then a machine shop teacher, a pretty “manly”, Scotch-loving guy, but he also took me to my first symphony when I was six (I fell asleep–sorry about that, Dad, but Brahms?), and taught me the difference between Luciano Pavarotti and Placido Domingo’s opera voices, and never once in my living memory told me that I couldn’t do something because I was a girl. My father-in-law was a dairy farmer his whole life, but he’s also an avid photographer, and spends his spare time experimenting with glass-fusing—he even has his own kiln. My brother, a lawyer with a PhD, can be pretty fierce in court, but he loves his garden, sings to his son, and came with me once for a pedicure. And Ken? Ken is the most creative person I’ve ever met. He has amazing spatial perception and can build me anything I asked him to, he writes poetry, and he’s been known to spend hours taking photographs of the way the light reflects off the Christmas tree ornaments. So, long story short, it would never even occur to me that a soapmaking class is somewhere a guy SHOULDN’T be. Then the other women came in, and the first thing one of them (I’m going to call her ‘Babs’) said was, “Oh my god! How did you get your husband to come with you? MY husband would never come to something like this!”

How do you even respond to that? Of course, I didn’t get it right away. My first thought was that maybe he was allergic to soap, or had some kind of physical disability which would prevent him from participating. I was about to ask, in all sincerity, “Is there something wrong with him?”, when I realized that she was actually implying that there was something wrong with MY husband for being there. She didn’t say it in a wistful kind of way, like “I wish MY husband enjoyed hanging out with me and liked doing fun stuff like this.” No, it was more like she was being very judge-y. It pissed me off, but I didn’t know her at all, so I just looked at Ken, who was happily choosing his colours and scents for “Lemon Poppyseed Loaf” (see photograph below, the yellow-y one), smiled tightly and said, “He’s very good at soap.” Yes, I know it was a sh*tty comeback, but what was I going to say? “Your husband sounds like a dick” would have been appropriate, but then again a) maybe Babs never even asked him to come and he might have said “Yes” if she had and b) I didn’t want to get kicked out of soap class for being a sweary trouble-maker.

Then we started doing the mixing, and everyone was having fun, so I let the whole thing go. Two of the great things about our instructor are that she always mixes up the lye for you so that you don’t accidentally scorch your lungs, and that she loves to experiment and has all kinds of weird stuff that you can put in or on your bars, like coffee grounds for exfoliating, or flower petals for texture, or sparkles just to make it look interesting. Which is where Bab’s reverse sexism reared its ugly head once again. She was making a blue and green conglomeration for her sons with a scent called “Monkey Farts” (I know right? But it smells like candy, and if that’s what monkey flatulence actually smells like, then I want a monkey even more than I did before). The instructor offered her some blue sparkles, and she responded,

“They would never use soap with GLITTER on it!”

One of the other women said, “But glitter is fun. It would look great with the blue and green.”

Babs was relentless. “You don’t understand,” she insisted. “They’re REAL boys. There’s no way they’d touch it if I put glitter on it.”

I wanted to say, “They can’t be that real if they actually pay attention to the soap they’re using. If you can actually get them in the shower in the first place without a fight, who gives a sh*t about the soap?” (This might sound like a little reverse sexism of my own, but it’s based on my experiences with K when she was around the same age. And from what the mothers of other 13 year-olds have told me, apparently the girls can be just as willing as the boys to go three days without a shower, so it’s simply a phase which has nothing to do with gender. In fact, I still remember K telling me, “I don’t need a shower. My clothes are clean.”) But I was genuinely appalled by Babs’s attitude. Sure, women have had a lot to put up with through the ages, but I honestly believe that there will never be equality between the sexes until men stop being told that wearing pink makes them “girly” or that doing something creative is helping them get in touch with their “feminine side”. To me, this is just as bad as calling a girl a “tomboy” for NOT wanting to wear frilly dresses. Would you ever tell a woman that being a mechanic is helping her get in touch with her masculine side? And as for men, I mean, where would the world be today if David Bowie hadn’t liked glitter? My best advice is to let your kids wear what they want, play with whatever toys appeal to them, and give them all, boy or girl, the opportunity to get in touch with their creative side. And most of all, don’t judge them based on gender. In the end though, I kept my opinion to myself—it’s never a good idea to speak your mind when you’re working with caustic acids.

Monday: This Broken Jaw of Our Lost Kingdoms. OR What the F*ck is That?!

On Monday, right before dinner, I was in the kitchen chopping mushrooms. Ken and I have a deal—I do all the cooking, and he does all the cleaning up. This works for us, because I love cooking and hate doing dishes, and he can’t cook. OK, he can cook certain things, but I don’t want tacos or pasta every night. And he’s currently going through a phase where he’s trying different brownie recipes to see which one is the best, but he refuses to use gluten-free flour, so he’s on his own with that experiment. Anyway, I was getting dinner ready, when Ken came into the kitchen holding something very gingerly between his index finger and thumb.

Ken: Look what I just took away from Titus. He was chewing it in the yard.
Me: WHAT THE F*CK IS THAT?!
Ken: I’m not sure.
Me: Is it human?! Oh my god, call the cops!
Ken: Don’t worry. I don’t think it’s human. It’s not quite big enough.
Me: If it’s not human, then what the hell kind of animal is it? How did it get in our yard? Did you say Titus was chewing on it?! That is SO gross!
Ken: I’m going back out to see if there are any more “parts” in the yard.
Me: Don’t put it on the counter! Or at least wrap it in paper towel or something! Titus, stop jumping! You’re not getting it back.
Titus: But it’s so yummy…
Me: Oh my god, I can’t even.

What Ken had brought in the house was part of a very large jawbone, complete with teeth. On second glance, the teeth didn’t look human so I stopped googling “Canadian CSI” and started a new search. Did you know that if you google “dead animal jaw”, there are literally thousands of images of dead animal jaws available for you to look at? Who exactly is posting this stuff? Anyway, I started narrowing it down until I decided it looked the most like a deer jaw. But then the mystery deepened. Namely, how the hell did a deer jaw get into our fenced yard? I’m pretty sure I would have noticed if a deer had died out back—the vultures would have been a good tip-off, for starters. And I’m pretty sure none of our neighbours are hunters, but even if they were, we get along pretty well with them, and I can’t see any of them lobbing a deer jaw onto our property just for fun. I mean, there was an incident a few years back when the people on the corner kept letting their dog take its daily dump on our front lawn. The final straw came when we saw the man taking it for a walk, and deliberately putting it onto our grass to do its business. So Ken scooped up all the poo in a shovel, rang their doorbell, and when the woman answered, he said, “I believe this belongs to you,” and he dropped it all onto their porch. Their dog never came near our yard again. But in terms of retaliation, it’s not like we were slaughtering deer on THEIR lawn and giving them a reason to fling the bits back. So I’m still at a loss as to how it ended up in Titus’s mouth. Ken and I speculated for a while:

Ken: Maybe another animal carried it into our yard.
Me: What? Like people carry around rabbits’ feet? “What’s that you’ve got there?” “Oh, it’s my lucky dead animal jaw.” Besides, any animal big enough to carry that thing around is TOO big to get through the fence.
Ken: A bird could have dropped it…
Me: How big a bird are we talking about? I don’t think most birds outweigh that thing. And why? It’s not like you could make a nest with it.
Ken: A squirrel?
Me: Squirrels ARE assholes. Wait–maybe one of neighbours is a Satanist, and it was part of some weird ritual. Keep an eye on them.

A week later, we still haven’t discovered the origin of “this broken jaw of our lost kingdoms”. That’s from T.S. Eliot’s poem “The Hollow Men”, and every time I look at the gross thing, I think of that line, especially since now I’m afraid to go out into my “kingdom” in case there are more pieces of dead deer lying around. By the way, if you’re wondering why I said “every time” I look at it, it’s because we still have it. We figured we might need it as evidence for when the Satanic cult in our neighbourhood is exposed. Plus, it IS kind of cool in its own disgusting way. See what you think. The screwdriver is there for scale.

My Week 4 – An Open Letter To MacLean’s Magazine

Dear MacLean’s:
I recently read an article published in your magazine called “New Girl, Go Girl,” which purported to be about the “new feminism” (because apparently the old feminism, where women banded together and fought for equal rights with our male counterparts, wasn’t good enough). While there’s a lot to be said for young girls taking ownership of “cultural currency” and standing strong against “social stereotypes and a sex-saturated culture”, I take particular exception to three things in the article, and I will deal with them in order of appearance, so here they are:

3 Things I Learned From This Article
1) The best fictional teen heroines are the best by virtue of the fact that they are fat, plain, and sexual. “Fat” and “plain” are NOT my words; they belong to the author of the article, Anne Kingston. The first part of this article highlights a new teen novel, How To Build A Girl, whose heroine is described as smart, well-read, funny, but also fat and plain, among other things. Katniss Everdeen, of Hunger Games fame, according to Kingston, pales in comparison next to this new teen heroine because…well why is that, anyway? They seem to be fairly equal—I think we all agree that Katniss is smart, would have been well-read if the oppressive society she lived in allowed her to read extensively rather than fight for her freedom, and would have been hilarious if she (back to this again, sorry) hadn’t had to fight to overthrow a corrupt and oppressive government. As for her physical appearance, I can’t remember whether she was skinny or fat, pretty or not, because none of that was relevant to (sorry, once more) her fight to overthrow an oppressive, corrupt government. Kingston extolls the heroine of How To Build A Girl for the integrity of her personal quest—-to lose her virginity at age 16, which apparently she does accomplish in the novel. Good for her. Because that’s what very young girls SHOULD be reading about, not about women who want to change their worlds like Malala Yousafzai. It’s a shame that Suzanne Collins hadn’t realized that—I’m sure Hunger Games would have been even more successful if Katniss had spent the majority of her time trying to get laid. As for this being no “Cinderella story”, the heroine somehow gets a “coveted job as a music journalist, and sails into a bright future at the age of 17”, which is what happens to all girls who don’t pursue post-secondary education. In contrast, Katniss Everdeen’s Cinderella story is pretty close to the Disney version, except the mice are all forced to fight to the death, and the Fairy Godmother wants to kill her for starting a revolution.

2) Girls with “bass” run the world. Kingston cites Meghan Trainor, pop singer, and her catchy little ditty “All About That Bass” as part of the new ethic of female self-acceptance. I’m sorry, but did you actually read the lyrics of this song? There’s a neat little tool called Google that you might want to use. If you bother actually reading the words rather than just tapping your toes to the chorus, you will discover that Meghan, who for obvious reasons “refuses to be called a feminist”, is proud of her large posterior for these two reasons: a) the boys chase it, and b) her mama told her that boys like a little more booty to hold at night. In addition, she wants all the “skinny bitches” to know that she is “bringing booty back.” THIS is the voice of the new girl power? That boys like big butts and that we should make sure that our “junk” is in all the right places? I’m sorry, but how is this self-acceptance in any sense of the word? What it is, in fact, is yet another sad example of women trying to desperately justify their physicality to men, and to condemn other women for theirs. As a professional, intelligent woman, I honestly can’t remember a single time that I worried about what “the boys” thought regarding my ass, or the rest of my “junk”.

3) Feminist ideas that should have stopped being an issue are still relevant in 2014. Knight refers to Susan Douglas, who seems to be a walking anachronism, and her two contradictory statements. First, she condemns the new “sneaky form of sexism” which seems to mean “young women can do or be anything they want, as long as they conform to confining ideals about femininity and don’t want too much”. Second, she condemns “a celebration of stay-at-home moms and ‘opting out’ of the workforce”. Excuse my ignorance, feminist guru person, but haven’t we gotten past the point where we look down on our sisters who CHOOSE to be mothers? Isn’t that what the fight for equal rights got us—the option to work or stay home? Some women actually like babies and want to spend a lot of time with them; some women think they’re poop and puke machines and can’t wait to get back to work. Either way, that’s the right of every woman to decide, and to snidely suggest that there’s something wrong with celebrating stay-at-home mothers is akin to someone else snidely suggesting that there’s something wrong with supporting our sisters who want to return to the workforce. So who is it that expects women to conform to confining ideals? You can’t have it both ways, Susan Douglas.

While there were a lot of merits to this article, there were also a lot of flaws. Women need to stop worrying about their physical appearance and how men (and other women) feel about it, and start worrying about a) developing and promoting the power of our minds and self-will b) nurturing love for and promotion of other women and their choices and c) focusing on the world around us rather than the world within us. But that’s just me. Thanks for listening.