Archive for November, 2005

Thursday Short Poems: Cavafy and Or on “Barbarians”

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 10, 2005
in Poetry
. Closed

Many folks know this first poem; it’s one of the most famous of the great Greek poet C.P. Cavafy.  I offer it today as a prelude to the far less well-known second poem by contemporary Israeli poet Amir Or.  Read together, they’re very fine, and some might think they serve as a commentary on the election results.

Waiting for the Barbarians (Cavafy, 1904)

What are we waiting for, assembled in the forum?

The barbarians are to arrive today.

Why such inaction in the Senate?
Why do the Senators sit and pass no laws?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today.
What laws can the Senators pass any more?
When the barbarians come they will make the laws.

Why did our emperor wake up so early,
and sits at the greatest gate of the city,
on the throne, solemn, wearing the crown?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today.
And the emperor waits to receive
their chief. Indeed he has prepared
to give him a scroll. Therein he inscribed
many titles and names of honor.

Why have our two consuls and the praetors come out
today in their red, embroidered togas;
why do they wear amethyst-studded bracelets,
and rings with brilliant, glittering emeralds;
why are they carrying costly canes today,
wonderfully carved with silver and gold?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today,
and such things dazzle the barbarians.

Why don’t the worthy orators come as always
to make their speeches, to have their say?

Because the barbarians are to arrive today;
and they get bored with eloquence and orations.

Why all of a sudden this unrest
and confusion. (How solemn the faces have become).
Why are the streets and squares clearing quickly,
and all return to their homes, so deep in thought?

Because night is here but the barbarians have not come.
And some people arrived from the borders,
and said that there are no longer any barbarians.

And now what shall become of us without any barbarians?
Those people were some kind of solution.

In the post 9/11 world of the war on terror, Cavafy’s remark that the barbarians are a kind of solution seems most apt.

But Or suggests that maybe, the barbarians came after all

The Barbarians — Round Two (Or, 1996)

It was not in vain that we awaited the barbarians,
it was not in vain that we gathered in the city square.
It was not in vain that our great ones donned their official robes
and rehearsed their speeches for the event.
It was not in vain that we smashed our temples
and erected new ones to their gods;
as proper we burnt our books
that have nothing in them for people like that.
As the prophesy foretold the barbarians came,
and took the keys to the city from the king’s hand.
But when they came they donned the garments of the land,
and their customs were the customs of the state;
and when they commanded us in our own tongue
we no longer knew when
the barbarians had come to us.

Lovely. And ominous.

Imperial County — a second election reflection

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 9, 2005
in Politics and Race
. 3 Comments

One county that always interests me is one of the poorest in the state: Imperial County in the far southeast of California, bordering both Arizona and Mexico.  It has a very high Latino immigrant population; and overall is 72% Hispanic.  And just look at how Imperial voted!  The old truism about Hispanics being socially conservative but also fiscally liberal and pro-union is certainly alive and well!  Imperial County voted overwhelmingly in favor of parental notification (Prop 73) , on a par with the most conservative counties, but also voted overwhelmingly against all of the governor’s initiatives, following the solid union line.   Imperial also was one of the few counties in the state to pass Proposition 79, a measure bitterly opposed by big-pharma, and which would have created something closer to socialized medicine than anything we’ve ever seen before in the state.

None of the other 58 counties in the state both passed 73 and 79 by a wide margin and rejected 75 at the same time.  Given demographic trends, I think Imperial County’s results hold a warning for both left and right.  The left must realize that Latino voters,at least in inland areas, trend Republican on social issues; the right must grasp that those same voters are thoroughly Democratic on the fiscal ones.  There’s a certain Catholic consistency to this that’s quite admirable.

Election post-mortem

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 9, 2005
in Politics
. 2 Comments

I was up very late last night, and have that strange buzz that comes with lack of sleep.  I have this feeling after every election, whether "my side" has won or not.

After the huge disappointment of the 2004 presidential election, I did my best not to lash out in anger at the conservative triumph.  This morning, reviewing the news of the emphatic defeat of all of Governor Schwarzenegger’s initiatives, I’m doing my best to resist the urge to crow in triumph. As a progressive and a loyal member of the California Teachers Association, I was particularly pleased by the defeat of Proposition 75.  Frankly, I’m surprised we were able to muster 53.5% of the vote against the so-called "paycheck protection" proposition.  I’m pleased, of course, but still surprised.  (Of course, I pay close to $1000 dollars a year to my two unions, FACCC and CTA – they clearly used my money well.)

I also am pleased that locally, candidates our faculty union endorsed did well in the run for the college board (though that means my Republican friend Brandon Powers lost his first bid for public office, albeit by a narrow margin).  In the city of my birth (and home still of my father, stepmother, and sister), Santa Barbara, union-backed progressives retained control of the mayoralty and the city council.

The geographic divide in California will be much remarked upon.  The two closest initiatives were 75 and 73 (also defeated) that would have required parental notification for minors seeking abortion.  Here are the maps showing how counties voted on each; 73 here and 75.  For years now, the coastal counties have been trending more and more Democratic, with the inland counties reliably conservative.  Growing up in Carmel by-the-Sea (which was fairly liberal, even in my childhood), we used to joke that culturally speaking, the Midwest began about ten miles inland, somewhere on the way to Salinas.  (Which just voted to save its historic libraries.) We were being a bit snobby — coastal brie-eaters that we were — but these maps do seem to indicate a persistent and intriguing cultural divide.  (It’s always nice to be on the winning side of such divides).

For example, on the abortion notification initiative, Los Angeles county voted it down 57-43; my "home" county, Monterey, voted it down by the same margin; and in liberal Alameda and San Francisco counties, it was trounced 69-31 and 80-20, respectively.  On the other hand, in conservative Kern county (Bakersfield), Prop 73 won 65-35, and in even more conservative Tulare, won 68-32.    If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it’s that we have clear evidence of a total lack of consensus on social issues in this state!

But I do have mixed feelings about the defeat of the abortion notification initiative.  One more time, let me link to my post on the subject.  I know that some of my friends in the pro-life camp will be bewildered by the defeat of an initiative that they regard as "common-sense", and an important small step towards ending all abortion. As I’ve made clear, I embrace the long-term goal of consistent life, of achieving a world where all life — human and animal — is protected from conception until natural death.  But those of us who call ourselves consistent-life can have honest disagreements about how we ought to achieve those goals.  I am convinced that it is only by changing hearts and minds that we can end abortion; I am not interested in using the power of the state for this purpose. 

I know I’m inconsistent, as I have no problem using the power of the state to, say, ban fur farming in this country.  Does that mean I care more about chinchillas than the unborn?  Of course not.  It just means that I recognize that fur farmers do not have the immensely complex interrelationship with their kits that women do with the children who grow inside of them.  Legislation has its place to achieve social justice, but not on this most intimate and wrenching of issues.  Thus, I am humbly and quietly relieved that 73 failed.

But I’m also aware that we on the left have to do more than defeat conservative initiatives.  We need to start doing more than just saying "NO" very loudly, even if we succeed in getting the majority of voters to come along with us.  We need to be proactive now in proposing reforms that will help state and local government do a better job of protecting the poor, the marginalized, and our precious natural resources.  We need massive investment for new infrastructure, and we need to build that infrastructure without harming the environment.  I am confident it can be done, and I hope my fellow California progressives, energized by our fine showing yesterday, can begin to do more than simply say "NO" to Arnold.

Guess who’s up late…

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 8, 2005
in Abortion, GLBTQ and Politics
. 7 Comments

… and hitting F5 (the "refresh") key on his keyboard every few minutes to check election results?  I’m sipping tea, listening to Cake, Dar Williams, Dolly Parton and Jars of Clay on Itunes…  And though things look fairly good so far for us in the Golden State, I’m still fairly anxious — but heartened by results from the East Coast tonight, especially the gay rights victory in Maine.

So much for going to bed early to get up for an early morning run…

UPDATE:  Still up at 12:15, and the results keep looking better and better.  All of the governor’s initiatives are failing, as is the abortion notification initiative.  Turnout seemed better than anticipated.  Most of the outstanding ballots left to be counted are in liberal counties (Alameda, Los Angeles), and soon I will head to bed — cautiously optimistic.  I’ve been on the losing end of so many elections, it seems too good to be true that the left might have swept here in California tonight.

Thinking about marriage and maturity

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 8, 2005
in Age, Marriage, Men and Masculinity and Relationships
. 94 Comments

Typepad is having problems with many things, especially comments; some of your comments are appearing many times over.  I’m hopeful this will be corrected soon.  You may have to go through an extra authentication protocol.

Jonathan Dresner is devoted to the cause of finding things for me to write about, and he found me this post from Natalie at Philobiblon: The Weaknesses of Men.  In her post, she refers to this other piece at Blogcritics: "Men Who’ve Had Too Much Breast Milk."  It’s another set of musings about men not growing up (in keeping with my post yesterday.)  Natalie offers her theory about why we see this modern epidemic of adult men acting like children:

I think this goes back at least to the early post-WWII situation, when early marriage - teens or early 20s - suddenly became the norm. (Historically a very unusual situation.)

So virtual children got married. The women were, however, forced to grow up when they had children (often _very_ soon after the marriage) because caring for babies and small children demands responsibility, attention to the needs of others, self-discipline i.e. being grown up.

The men, however, without this pressure, became "extra children" in the family, never really taking responsibility (except _sometimes_ financial, which may bear no relation to personal responsibility). This was certainly the situation I saw growing up in Australian suburbia in the Seventies - it was a standing, somewhat bitter joke among my mother’s friends that they had an extra child - who took no responsibility for anything, from the trivial e.g. picking up their own dirty socks, to the deeply serious, e.g. co-operating in caring for their children and making personal sacrifices (eg giving up watching a football game for the purpose).

They’d married as emotional or actual teenagers, and they’d never grown past that self-centred condition.

Well, it wouldn’t be quite fair to say that marrying early only took place in the baby boom era; it’s not unheard of in earlier times in Western history. 

While I think Natalie makes some important points, I don’t see any evidence that contemporary single men in their twenties and thirties are more grown-up than their married peers.  As the average age at first marriage rises for men, I see no evidence of greater maturity; indeed, anecdotally, I see more and more ‘perpetually single" men prolonging their adolescence cheerfully into their twenties, thirties, and forties.  Conservatives who say that marriage is a panacea for social ills are grossly oversimplifying things.  But secular liberals who regard marriage as a cause of stunted growth and immaturity in men are also missing the boat. 

Largely, I think the "failure to grow up" has to do with a remarkably widespread failure to hold men accountable, combined with an economy which has permitted more middle-class men and women to lead solitary lives (without a partner to challenge them).  Marriage can be a vehicle for personal growth, but only if both partners see that as the primary purpose of the marriage.  Marriage can be a river that flows somewhere, or it can be a stagnant pond; both partners’ willingness to challenge one another will determine which of these it will be.

Early marriage is neither the problem, nor the solution.  The problem lies in our diminished expectations of men, and our collective refusal to believe that we can challenge them to grow and transform.

More soon…

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 8, 2005
in Blogging
. 3 Comments

It’s a busy morning.  I’ll try and have a proper post up around lunchtime; I’m busy writing tests for various classes and trying not to be too anxious about today’s California special election.  I am very grateful for the many interesting comments below the preceding post; it was a challenge for me to offer this, but I’m glad I did.

A very long and personal post about men, women, childishness, and responsibility

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 7, 2005
in Age, Favorite Posts, 2004-2006, Men and Masculinity and Relationships
. 49 Comments

Holy cow, more than 5000 hits today, the highest since the beginning of the year.  What gives?

One blog I read fairly frequently is Barb’s Lucky White Girl.  She’s got a powerful and deeply personal post up today about her own current relationship, her parents, men, women, and roles — especially the ways in which we find ourselves playing the part of the child.  Here’s an excerpt:

I don’t want to be the mother in this relationship.  Children are afraid of getting into trouble.  They hide things from their parents.  I don’t want to be the feared dictator, the enforcer of rules.

I don’t want to be the child.  Children are dependent.  I’ve lived my own life for so long, I’m good at taking care of myself.  I don’t want to, don’t need to go backwards.

I want us to be two independent, mature adults.

What I don’t know is this:

Is it possible to consciously mold this relationship into something different from what it is now?  Or are these things hidden too deep within the psyche to change?  If the old adage about not trying to change other people is true, is it fair/right/reasonable of me to expect or attempt such change within a relationship in which I am only a part?

I don’t blog about relationships much, but this is a topic painfully near and dear to my heart.  In my past marriages and relationships, I found myself– like so many men — taking on the part of the "naughty boy" and the "helpless child."   Time and again, I turned wives and girlfriends into mother-figures, and the result was inevitably disastrous.

I’m not going to pretend to have all the answers as to why we do what we do, or even why I did what I did. I do know that I’m not the only man who found "courtship" easier than "relationship."  Over and over again, I devoted time and energy to "getting the girl", and when I succeeded, soon felt vaguely let down and confused about my role.  It was all too easy for me to become increasingly childlike.  I figured out that most of partners were students of my emotions, and most of them were eager to make the relationship work.  So they were the ones who took over the "feeling work" of the relationship.  They were the ones who brought up when something wasn’t working, they were the ones who took on the primary role of keeping what we had "oiled and running", as it were.

When I lived with wives and girlfriends past, I’d quickly cede control over our living arrangements.  What went where, and what got done when were decisions I wanted my partner to make.  I thought I was being accommodating, telling myself and her "You know, honey, you care more about this (the color of the sheets, what kind of plants to have outside, what we have for dinner) than I do; why don’t you decide?"  And my wife or girlfriend would make a decision, and whether I liked the decision or not, I didn’t have much to say about it either way.  When pressed for my opinion, my favorite response was "Whatever you want, darling."  Of course, I liked having everything done for me — my wife or girlfriend maintained the relationship, kept things running, and in the cases where we lived together, made the major decisions about the house.  I said loving things, bought flowers occasionally, and did my best to be faithful.  That, I figured, was my part.

Now, as the son of a feminist mom, I was always very big on doing my share of the housework. I was a loyal washer of dishes, a frequent doer of laundry (I actually LIKE doing laundry), and a good grocery shopper.  But I thought of what I was doing as "doing chores", in much the same way I did chores as a child.  I did not take responsibility for making decisions about the household, even as I seemed to be — to the outside world — an equal partner in the running of the home.  I was very good at avoiding conflict. When conflict did arise, I had two tactics in my arsenal:

1.  Get very indignant and threaten to leave the relationship.

2.  Act like a small child, launch into a pathetic list of self-recriminations (what Robert Bly calls the "I’ve always been shit" speech), and get wife or girlfriend to feel sorry for me, start soothing me, and get off my case about whatever it was that I was doing that was driving her up the wall.

Can I see a show of hands of those who know what I’m talkin’ bout?

And of course, when it came to boundaries, I famously let the women in my life set them — and then promptly resented them for having done so.    A partner would say something fairly reasonable like "Hugo, I don’t feel comfortable when you go out with your ex-girlfriends without me." Realizing that these friendships with exes were usually tinged with something threatening to my current relationship, I’d quickly agree to my partner’s request to stop seeing so-and -so.  Soon enough, however, I would resent my current partner for putting boundaries in place, and I’d either start sneaking around behind her back or let the hostility build up inside of me.  Instead of being an equal partner in setting boundaries, I made my wife or girlfriend the arbiter of what was appropriate behavior.

One of my friends once told me:  "Hugo, relationships are like stoplights at an intersection.  In order for the traffic to flow, both sets of lights have to work.  Sometimes the light for the east and west bound traffic has to be red; sometimes the north-south.  There’s got to be partnership in setting limits; each set has to take responsibility for yellow, red, and green — or there’s chaos."  In my past, like a child, my basic approach to everything was "green".  In every area of my life, I waited for my partner to flash the yellow or the red light  She was the one who would decide how far we went.  We would always both end up resenting the hell out of each other for the other’s role.  I would always end up seeing my wives and girlfriends as controlling, mothering, and judgmental; they would always see me as irresponsible, dishonest, and childlike.

I know damned well that I’m not telling a unique story here.  Anyone identify with me — or my exes?

One of the things that I’ve been committed to in recent years has been the notion that transformation and change is a never-ending opportunity, and an unavoidable responsibility.  The battle-cry of my teens and twenties in relationship was "Accept me as I am!  This is my nature!"  The marital mantra of my late thirties is "Push me, and I’ll push you!  Don’t let me settle for less than I could be, and I won’t let you be less than what I believe you are capable of being."  This doesn’t mean that my wife and I sit around pointing out each other’s shortcomings.  It does mean that we know we have an opportunity to grow and transform together. Yes, my wife and I each have our "baggage"  (In my case, it’s a whole damn Louis Vuitton luggage set), but part of growing up in relationship is letting go of the idea that one’s childhood, one’s parents, or one’s previous relationships are an excuse for not doing hard spiritual and emotional work.

I’m not proud of the fact that I prolonged a sulky and mercurial adolescence for nearly two decades.  I’m not proud of the fact that I chose to spend years and years stuck in the role of the irresponsible boy who wouldn’t grow up, who both wanted women to take care of him and resented the hell out of them for doing so.  But with the help of God and a whole bunch of folks here on earth, I’ve been busy in recent years letting go of these old patterns.   I no longer believe anything is, to paraphrase Barb, hidden too deeply in the psyche to change.  When I came back to Christ, I became enchanted with the idea that we are, as C.S. Lewis writes in the Last Battle, always called "further up, further in."  I see too many of my male friends and family members stuck in patterns set years and years ago; they seem to lack the desire, the willingness, and the faith to change.   But where my faith and my pro-feminism intersect best is in my belief that my conditioning and my biology and my past excuses are not determinative of how I will live my life as a man.  There is no "nature" we have that we cannot overcome, no habits we cannot break, no baggage that we can’t finally zip up and stow away for good.

I’m not ashamed to say that it is only now, in my fourth marriage, that I feel like I’m showing up as a fully adult man.  As tempting as it sometimes is, I will not go back to playing the part of the "naughty boy"; I will not place the burden of relationship maintenance on my wife’s shoulders alone.  My mother is my mother, my wife is my wife, and never have the roles seemed as radically distinct as they do now. It has been a helluva lot of work to get here, and I’ve got miles and miles to go , but I’m on my way.

Still more on t-shirts, professional responsibility, and ways of seeing

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 7, 2005
in Sexuality, Teaching and Youth
. 32 Comments

In the comments below my "More on T-shirts" post from Friday afternoon, the conversation thread has shifted to how what young women wear on college campuses affects how their professors might see them.

"Breadfish" writes:

I see a lot of those shirts here on my university campus, usually on the sorority types. I wonder what kind of impression these girls think they’re making on their professors. Do you really think your 50-something philosophy prof is going to be inclined to take you even remotely sincere when you’ve got "Shake your Buddah" written across your bust?

And then they get upset when people accuse them of not taking their education seriously or of being stupid. Some of them even cry sexism. Well, if you have that sort of crap plastered across your chest, of course people are going to assume you have the intellectual capacity of a chimpanzee!

Creeping Jenny responds:

It’s incredibly inappropriate for a professor to assume that just because his/her student is wearing a tight top with a slogan across it, the student is dumb and intellectually unmotivated. It’s not like tight tops make your brains mysteriously vaporize.

And Andrea writes:

Yes, it’s our shared responsibility to see past exterior characteristics, including tasteless T-shirts. But this is a work in progress for the most idealistic of us, and many more don’t share this goal. So to optimize, say, a teacher-student relationship, wearing a crude T-shirt and skanky shorts is probably a tactical error. In a perfect world, professors would disregard this offensive appearance and seek to plumb the depths of every student’s intellect. But in this world, for now, the student must choose carefully what impression she (or he) cares to give, and accept that reactions will vary accordingly.

I’ve made it clear that I’m not a fan of the current wave of t-shirts described in the post.  At the same time, as a professor, it is part and parcel of my job to see my students as complete human beings worthy of time, attention, and respect, regardless of how they happen to dress themselves.  If a student’s tight t-shirt says "Girls Rule, Boys Drool" (an example I take from one of the brightest young women in my evening class), that doesn’t mean I am entitled either to drool over her or be dismissive of her intellectual potential.   Those of us who teach for a living  have a moral obligation to look past the exteriors of our students, no matter how revealing, offensive, or downright bizarre those exterior appearances may be.

I’ve heard some men and women say on this subject: "Respect has to be earned.  I’ll respect those who respect themselves, and a woman who wears a micro–miniskirt to class, or  wears a shirt that says "Slut" or "I’m too pretty to do math" isn’t respecting herself, so why should I respect her?"  I’ve never liked that line of reasoning, either on feminist or professional grounds.  As a pro-feminist, I’m adamant that respect for women is not conditional on a dress code!  Feminism has long insisted that women should not have to forfeit either their sexuality or their right to individual expression in order to be seen as complete human beings, worthy of being treated with dignity.  As I’ve written before in recent weeks, it doesn’t matter whether a woman is wearing a miniskirt or a burkah; her personhood is non-negotiable.

I’m 38 years old, twice the age of many of my students.  Many of them are at an age where they are, at last, able to make decisions for themselves about what to wear.   Most are at one stage or another of their own late adolescent development, still trying on new identities, new beliefs, and new ways of thinking about their bodies.  Some are anxious to avoid attention altogether, while others are positively desperate for it.  Most want the "right kind" of attention, the kind that makes them feel "seen" rather than stared at.   A great many of them care a great deal about what other people think, even as they carefully affect an attitude of indifference to the judgments of their parents, teachers, and peers.  They are, after all, in many ways not yet fully adult.  We who teach do well to remember that.

As a professor, particularly one who teaches gender studies, I make it very clear that my respect and attention are in no way contingent on a student’s appearance.  I owe it to my students, and frankly, I think my colleagues owe it to their students, to be immune to the kind of provocations of which so many young folks are fond.  However much skin is revealed, however offensive or inane the slogan on the t-shirt, those of us old enough to be entrusted with teaching positions must be constantly mindful of our obligation to see our students as human beings worthy of respect.    It doesn’t matter whether we think their dress is appropriate or not; when it comes to how teachers treat students, respect must be a given.  It does not have to be earned.

I wrote about this subject before, in my post on the Michael Gee case.  I talked about two very fine students, Jack and Jill.  Jack smelled bad almost all the time; Jill was young and pretty and dressed very provocatively.   I wrote then:

Both Jack and Jill had bodies that demanded attention!  With both Jack and Jill, my challenge was to be a thoughtful, attentive, loving mentor who saw them as human beings first and foremost. Jill’s exposed flesh and Jack’s stench both grabbed attention,and at times, in remarkably similar ways, I had to force myself to stay absolutely focused on what each was saying.   As with Jack, I had to give Jill what I imagine she didn’t often get from men: completely non-sexual attention.  I’m not in the business of telling young women how to dress, or telling older men to bathe.  Good teaching means dealing professionally and compassionately with the sexy and the malodorous alike! 

Short of  immediate threats to our physical safety and the safety of our students, those of us who teach must overcome any and all corporeal or sartorial provocations from those whom we serve.   No matter what, no matter what, no matter what.

Elections, churches, and the IRS

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 7, 2005
in Abortion, All Saints Pasadena, Christianity, Politics, Teaching and War
. 13 Comments

Well, it’s a November Monday, and an election eve once again.  I’ve already made my endorsements for tomorrow’s California special election here, with a special note about Proposition 73 here.

Once again, here are my recommendations:

A reflective, prayerful "NO" on Proposition 73, the parental notification law.  A strong and vehement "NO" on Props 74, 75, 76 — the first three of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s "reforms."  A more qualified and hesitant "NO" on Prop 77, the redistricting initiative, a strong "NO" on 78 and half-hearted "YES" endorsements on 79 and 80.

The election, for me, hinges on two propositions: 75 and 76.  The first would make it far more difficult for unions (such as my own California Teachers Association) to effectively challenge huge corporate interests in state government.  The second would give the governor inordinate power to slash budgets, and would likely lead to decreased spending on schools.  If Arnold wins either one of these, he and his allies can claim victory, regardless of how anything else on the ballot fares.

Though the polls show that Arnold’s initiatives are in trouble, I’m not comforted.  In my years of following elections, I’ve been on the losing side far more often than the winning one.  Last year, I had high hopes for a Kerry victory, and the memory of that disappointment continues to linger.  I remember that the polls augured good things for the Democrats, and the polls were proved wrong.  I respect the formidable power of the Republican "Get Out the Vote" machine, and with the chance to increase restrictions on abortion on the ballot, I’m confident my conservative Christian friends will have strong reasons to turn out.  Most will probably support Arnold’s propositions.   Though I hope it doesn’t come to pass, I’m  predicting that Arnold will win three out of four tomorrow (74, 75, and 77), and will narrowly lose Prop 76.   But the dreaded prospect of a clean sweep haunts me.

In other election news, the LA Times reports that an anti-war sermon at All Saints Pasadena given just before last November’s election has attracted the attention of the IRS.

The Internal Revenue Service has warned one of Southern California’s largest and most liberal churches that it is at risk of losing its tax-exempt status because of an antiwar sermon two days before the 2004 presidential election.

Rector J. Edwin Bacon of All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena told many congregants during morning services Sunday that a guest sermon by the church’s former rector, the Rev. George F. Regas, on Oct. 31, 2004, had prompted a letter from the IRS.

In his sermon, Regas, who from the pulpit opposed both the Vietnam War and 1991’s Gulf War, imagined Jesus participating in a political debate with then-candidates George W. Bush and John Kerry. Regas said that "good people of profound faith" could vote for either man, and did not tell parishioners whom to support.

But he criticized the war in Iraq, saying that Jesus would have told Bush, "Mr. President, your doctrine of preemptive war is a failed doctrine. Forcibly changing the regime of an enemy that posed no imminent threat has led to disaster."

On June 9, the church received a letter from the IRS stating that "a reasonable belief exists that you may not be tax-exempt as a church … " The federal tax code prohibits tax-exempt organizations, including churches, from intervening in political campaigns and elections.

I was in the pews for that sermon, and was critical of Regas’ remarks.   Here’s my own post on the targeted sermon from November 1, 2004 (another election eve).  I wrote that day:

It was as close to a partisan sermon as one could get without jeopardizing one’s tax-exempt status under the IRS code.

Apparently, the IRS disagrees, and thinks George Regas crossed the line.

The annoying thing is, of course, the stunning selectivity of the IRS.  Today’s paper also includes this story:  Abortion Proposition finds its Forum in the Churches.

…at some evangelical Christian churches, including the Rock in Roseville, a suburb of Sacramento, pastors made time for a two-minute DVD featuring teenage actresses promoting support for the measure.

"The essence of Prop. 73 is to protect young girls from abortion and allow parents to be part of that equation," said Senior Pastor Francis Anfuso at the Rock, where the video rolled on twin screens shown to about 900 weekend churchgoers. "There’s a wonderful simplicity to it, and it’s definitely a message we wanted to spread here."

Okay, so it’s permissible for conservative churches to show a DVD urging a "Yes" vote on Proposition 73, but not okay for a progressive church to ask "How would Jesus vote?"

As I wrote last year, I was angered by what Regas said.  I stand by my words then, words which I would direct to activists in churches across the political spectrum:

I’m stunned at the hubris of anyone, left or right, who claims certainty about how Jesus would view our modern day political landscape! I’ve never been comfortable with fundamentalisms of any sort — and what I got yesterday from the pulpit at All Saints was liberal fundamentalism at its most self-righteous.

But though I was annoyed at the former rector of my church, I am equally annoyed at the IRS for what is, apparently, an obviously selective approach to the enforcement of the rules about churches and partisan politics.  Either hold right and left equally accountable, or leave all who preach in His name — be those names Regas or Robertson — free to say what they will.

More on t-shirts

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 4, 2005
in Clothing and Fashion, Feminism and Sexuality
. 65 Comments

Three of my favorite feminist women, Jessica at Feministing, Jill at Feministe, and Amanda at Pandagon are all responding to a new batch of particularly offensive t-shirts, designed for teen girls,  from major retailers  with various slogans like "I’m too pretty to do math".  (Check Amanda’s blog for more examples.)

Immodestly, I’m going to redirect readers interested in the current t-shirt controversy to this post of mine from July 27, 2004:  Waterparks. And the T-Shirt.  I wrote the post about the "I had an abortion" t-shirts, about which I feel much the same way as the others currently up for debate.  (I suspect some of my feminist allies may seem them as quite different.)  In any event, though I’ve continued to modify my views on reproductive rights since I wrote the t-shirt post, I continue to stand by my hostile assessment of the phenomenon.  Here’s part of what I wrote back then that may still be relevant:

It was about 1997 or 1998 when I began to see the most remarkable slogans showing up on the fitted t-shirts of my female students: "Porn Star". "Juicy." "Real American Bitch." "I Just Slept with your Boyfriend" (I’ve seen gay men where these too, but I see ‘em more often on women; I’ve seen other verbs besides "slept" as well.) "Too Hot to Handle". "You Know you Wanna Touch." There are probably others (you can mention them in the comments section) but those have lingered in my memory. I associate all this with the banal and infuriating "girl power" movement; largely a creation of advertisers, it sold young women a message of empowerment through shock and sexuality. Adolescents love to upset adults; this adult initially found it difficult to know how to deal with female students whose t-shirts read "You Know you Wanna Touch". (I do a splendid job of affecting blindness in such situations nowadays.)

What I disliked about these shirts was not so much their brazenness as their rank commercialism. Nothing genuinely radical, edgy, or dangerous is sold at Abercrombie and Fitch or Urban Outfitters (two known sources of said shirts; no doubt, there are others.) Newsflash, kiddies: The fact that it horrifies your parents doesn’t make it any less a product of the very same corporate America in which your parents are investing. What these places sell is the cleverly marketed opportunity to outrage the older generation while simultaneously offering a superficially feminist message. The message is "Only a bold, strong, brave young woman who doesn’t care about conforming to stereotypes would wear a shirt like this. Thus if you wear this shirt, you bear witness to your fiery, indominatable, wild grrl soul." Please. What you bear witness to, darlin’, is nothing more than your own socially constructed insecurity, and any sensible person over 25 is abundantly aware of that.

A book recommendation, and confessions of an Ipod hater

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 4, 2005
in Books, Marriage, Music and Traveling
. 26 Comments

I think I’ve posted enough on men, feminism, and responsibility — for this week.  I’ll be back on topic on Monday.

Let me start off the morning with a book recommendation.  Though I’ve never met Sam and Bethany Torode, we’ve exchanged an e-mail or two and I’m a huge fan of Bethany’s writing and Sam’s art.   They kindly sent me a copy of their newest work, Aflame: Ancient Wisdom on Marriage.  Beautifully illustrated in hardcover (and surprisingly inexpensive), Aflame is a compilation of early Christian writing on many aspects of marriage.  For those folks who think that the ancient Church was always dismissive of marriage, preferring the greater gift of celibacy, this little book is a lovely and compelling corrective.  Pick it up, check it out, give it as a holiday present.

In other news, my stats for visitors have skyrocketed this week, as have the number of comments below my posts.  If Typepad can be trusted to tell the truth, I’m back over 3500 unique hits a day, which gets me back to where I was last spring, before a prolonged and disappointing "summer slump."  I don’t attach too much significance to the number of visitors, but I do notice when the numbers drop abruptly, as they did a few months ago.

But here’s my main thought for the day: Even though my wife and I finally have one, I don’t like Ipods.  Let me explain why.

Anyone who has ever flown Southwest Airlines knows about the "cattle call" — no assigned seats, boarding groups, etcetera.  When I travel with my wife, I’m eager to ensure we can sit together (preferably in the exit row).  But for years and years, I regularly flew alone back and forth between the Bay Area and Burbank Airport.   Even if I arrived early at the airport, I made sure I was one of the last people on the plane.  First off, I don’t like the rush to "get a good seat."  The flights are only about an hour, none of the seats are truly comfortable, so what does it matter?  I’ve often been the very last to board, and of course, I would end up in a middle seat — which suited me just fine.

I’m the sort of person some of my readers surely hate: I love meeting new people on airplanes.  Sitting in a middle seat guarantees me twice as many people to talk to, and boarding last means that the fates themselves "choose" my seat for me.  I’ve sat next to politicians and actors, journalists, FBI agents, and terrified children flying alone.   Southwest, bless ‘em, has no in-flight movies or other forms of entertainment, so the chances of a good and interesting conversation are substantially increased.  I’m very careful, of course, not to be pushy.  If someone seems determined to nap, or stick their nose in a book, I don’t persist.  I don’t want to be rude.  Hence the joy of the middle seat — the chance that one will find one person to chat with are doubled; rarely do both the aisle and window folks bring truly gripping books.

To be honest, I’ve even requested the middle seat when traveling alone on transcontinental flights on airlines where I do get to pre-select where to sit.  (Never, however, when traveling to or from a marathon.  Then, I always want an aisle seat for the chance to stretch.  That’s even more important than meeting new people.) Really long-haul flights, like to Europe, are special joys — there’s usually someone who is so excited about the trip they’re beginning or ending that they are eager to share.

However long the flight, I’m always careful in how I strike up conversations.  With women in particular, my goal is to make it clear that I’m just interested in a chat, nothing more.   In a world where so many young women are subtly and not-so-subtly harassed, I do everything I can to make clear that I’m just an overly-curious, but entirely harmless, extrovert looking to swap stories. I’ve had so many wonderful encounters (in the innocent sense of the term) over the years with so many fascinating people.  I consider the sheer randomness of these connections, these one, two, or even five and ten-hour friendships, to be one of the few joys of modern coach-class air travel.

Flying home from my high school reunion, my wife and I were in the last boarding group on to the full flight out of San Jose.  With no seats remaining together, we split up and I plunked myself down between a young college-age man and a thirty-something woman.  Once I was seated, I noticed — too late — that they both had Ipods, and had tuned out the rest of the world.  They removed them for takeoff, as required, but once we had hit 10,000 feet, the earphones went right back in.  I looked around the plane mournfully, and counted more than half a dozen other Ipods in use in the four or five rows I could see.  Other folks had hauled out their laptops (never mind that the flight is only 55 minutes), and were banging away, oblivious to their seatmates.  We were all together, sure, but in a kind of splendid isolation that I found incredibly depressing.  I had brought a copy of the Sunday New York Times Magazine, but it was small compensation for a nice chat with someone.

As I sit here at my computer, I have Itunes playing (the "Rent" soundtrack).  But I let my wife use the Ipod at the gym and at work.  There are precious few times in my life where I am in public and want to shut myself off from the rest of the world.  That’s not to say that I don’t like music, or that I want to be interrupted every time I go to lift weights.  But I am a pack animal (a dog person to my core) and I feel alienated by being surrounded by so many people off in their own private worlds with their own private soundtracks.

You’d think that teaching seven classes, being a volunteer youth leader, and a happy newlywed would leave me aching for time alone.  I do need my "time outs", which almost always come when running on the trails.  But the rest of the time, I’m eager to see students, youth groupers, colleagues, and new potential friends.  And damn it, modern technology is making it harder.

A note on vulnerability and responsibility

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 3, 2005
in Feminism, Men and Masculinity and Relationships
. 109 Comments

You did get that the post below this was a joke, right?  Right?

Do check out the great links at Carnival of the Feminists, hosted by Australia’s Suze Oz.  Hat tip to Amanda.

On a related note, I’ve been thinking about some of the implications of the discussion in the thread below the "Men Don’t Leave" post.   We’re all a bit in danger of playing the "blame game", and I confess that I do it myself from time to time.   

What I’m increasingly concerned with is the notion that anti-feminist writers tend to make over and over again: male responsibility is contingent on female vulnerability.  Kathleen Parker and her cohort suggest that if we want to demand accountability from men, we must ask women to surrender not only independence, but also the ability to protect themselves.  It’s a tired old myth that’s tough to kill: if men don’t feel needed as protectors, they must feel superfluous.  According to this troubling discourse, if women want men to stay, and to be committed to their marriages and their children, then women must be willing to adopt a real or artificial identity of fragility.   Men, it seems, can’t distinguish between being wanted as a partner and being needed as protector and provider.   It’s not enough for a woman to rely on her husband/partner/boyfriend as an equal in life; if she wants him to stay around, she must allow him to feel useful by surrendering as much of her autonomy as possible to him.

This whole male responsibility requires female vulnerability myth surfaces a lot in the debates we all like to have about the 1960s.  Social conservatives, for example, are fond of railing against the impact of the birth control pill.  Many concede that the Pill liberated women, but they hasten to argue that rather than being a blessing, the Pill has been a disaster for women.  Why?  Because the Pill made a man’s role in contraception and family planning nearly irrelevant.  Its very existence gave predatory men the excuse to put increasing pressure on women to provide out-of-wedlock sex.  Its availability allowed men to dodge responsibility for their actions to an unprecedented degree.

That’s a compelling, but ultimately false narrative.  I don’t doubt that in the last forty years, a great many men have abandoned their responsibilities towards women, and used feminism (and the Pill) as an excuse.  (Of course, as any historian will tell you, the idea that in the pre-feminist world men were always faithful and never abusive is patently absurd, but most social conservatives in the gender wars, with their compulsive tendency to glorify the past, tend to ignore the facts.)  It’s true that the Pill gave women greater control over their reproductivity, just as feminism gave women greater control over other aspects of their lives.  But to say that men began to ignore their commitments, or refuse to make them altogether, as a result of the Pill and feminism is simply wrong-headed. 

What feminism offers men is an extraordinary opportunity: to be in relationship with their mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, and female friends as true equals.  It offers men the chance to escape the strait-jacket of expectations for traditional masculine behavior; it offers men the chance to reconsider the idea that their value as men lies only in their ability to provide and protect.  Feminism doesn’t push men out the door; it asks men to stay, but to stay as equals.  It asks a man to reconsider the idea that a woman must be financially and physically dependent upon him for him to feel as if he has any value.   Feminism suggests that men are worthy of being loved not for what they can tangibly provide (money, protection) but for what they can offer in relationship (affection, true companionship, and mutual emotional support).

There’s no question that, to use a football analogy, a great many men fumbled the ball that was being handed to them by the feminist movement.  Frankly, as is clear from the comments, a great many women were — and still are — profoundly ambivalent about embracing the opportunities for greater sexual, emotional, financial, intellectual and spiritual autonomy and growth that feminism offers!  Even now, in 2005, it’s all too common for pundits to make the case that returning to traditional marriage and traditional sexual mores is the only thing that will lead men back to responsibility.  Women, it seems, have to help men reclaim their sense of manhood by reminding men that they really are needed, and needed desperately.

My wife and I love each other very much. Our love grows and deepens as we share experiences both joyous and painful.  We’ve blended our lives physically, spiritually, and financially.  We trust each other, and I’m grateful for her trust.  But what I realize is this:  what makes me feel good about myself as a husband is not her dependence upon me, it’s trust — that expectation that Hugo can and will be there, day after day, month after month.  I don’t need my wife to pretend to be fragile in order for me to feel strong. I feel strong when I live up to my commitments, when I live out our marriage vows.  Living out those vows and commitments is not contingent on my wife’s vulnerability. 

Authentic manhood — true adulthood — is about more than "feeling needed".  Feminism offers men the chance to be complete, complex, interesting human beings rather than paychecks and stalwart rocks.  The fact that so many men have been unwilling to embrace the opportunities that feminism offers is unfortunate, even tragic.  Pro-feminist men’s work is less about shaming men for being men, and more about helping males to see just how liberating feminism can be for all of us. Happily, I believe we see evidence that among some young men at least, it’s possible to blend a mature willingness to meet commitments without a simultaneous insistence that the women in their lives be vulnerable, fragile, or submissive.  Progress happens, but it sure don’t happen fast.

True confession… not.

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 3, 2005
in Blogging, Men and Masculinity and Vanity
. 2 Comments

My goodness, the comments below yesterday’s "Men Don’t Leave" post got quite heated, didn’t they?  Just a reminder, folks, try and keep things as civil as possible.  We can all enjoy some heated give and take,  but do think carefully before you hit the "submit" button.

Kendra says that she gives one "rousing cheer" for Kathleen Parker, and writes:  I read in your archives that you used to dislike men, but seeem to think you got past it. No, Doctor Schwyzer, I’m sorry, but you haven’t.

Okay, it’s one thing to suggest that I’m still a little bundle of contradictions, trapped in my self-loathing, but it’s another thing altogether to call me "Doctor Schwyzer" when I’ve asked many a time to be addressed only as "Hugo."  Allow me the pretensions of reverse snobbery, Kendra!  Sheesh.

And Otterick writes:  If you really want to get in touch with men like you say you do, Hugo, you’re really going to have to get over your stunningly arrogant self. If you can’t, I’d suggest you direct your energies in a direction where you have some chance of success.

Have you figured it out yet, Otterick?  I only claim to do "men’s work" so that I can impress women!  I’ve discovered that by claiming to reach out to men, I have a new strategy for winning the approval of the women in my life.  They’re all so impressed by my sensitive commitment to social justice, and my (obviously ersatz) courage in "confronting and challenging" men, that they all simper about my feminist bona fides and stroke my incredibly fragile ego.  Oh, and if I’m really lucky, they’ll tell me I look good too!

My commenters are so clever, they’ve seen right through me.

Thursday Short Poem: Barenblat’s “Mother Psalm” –UPDATED

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 3, 2005
in Poetry
. 8 Comments

I just recently discovered that Rachel Barenblat, the Velveteen Rabbi, is a fine poet.  With her permission, here’s my favorite of her poems.

Mother Psalm

Happy is the woman who follows her mother’s teaching
                     who knows she shouldn’t stick her hands in her pockets
                     and doesn’t mix black with brown or silver with gold.
She is like a mountain laurel planted beside streams of water,
                      bringing perfume to the air
                      successful in all her endeavors.

Not so the rebellious daughters with hairy underarms;
                    rather, they are like the weeds
                    we hire yard men to get rid of.
Therefore the rebellious will not be invited
                    to any of the right parties.
For appearance is how we show respect to others
                    and those whose nails are unkempt are sending the wrong message
                    and their way is doomed.

Sounds to me like the "mom messages" cross theological divides…

UPDATE:  Rachel has more about this poem, and her poetry, here.  Do visit!

Men Don’t Leave

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on November 2, 2005
in Marriage, Men and Masculinity and Relationships
. 68 Comments

Jill at Feministe has a good post up today in response to this Kathleen Parker offering at Townhall: Feminism’s Devolution from Hoaxers to Whores.

In discussing a recent Maureen Dowd piece, Parker trots out the usual litany of complaints about humorless, narcissistic feminists.  She and fellow Townhall commenter Mike Adams are clearly in a race to the bottom to see who can be more offensive towards women who make non-traditional sexual choices; Parker bemoans  the perverse evolution (in thirty years of feminism) of liberated women from Birkenstock-wearing intellectuals into pole-dancing sluts.  Adams already called ‘em "whores", so Parker has responded with "sluts."  It’s sad to see these folks –  who blog at a site that regularly decries the coarseness of the culture –  doing their part to make the public discourse about gender roles a little less civilized and a little more vicious.

But what really got me about Parker was this breathtaking bit:

Men haven’t turned away from smart, successful women because they’re smart and successful. More likely they’ve turned away because the feminist movement that encouraged women to be smart and successful also encouraged them to be hostile and demeaning to men.

Whatever was wrong, men did it. During the past 30 years, they’ve been variously characterized as male chauvinist pigs, deadbeat dads or knuckle-dragging abusers who beat their wives on Super Bowl Sunday. At the same time women wanted men to be wage earners, they also wanted them to act like girlfriends: to time their contractions, feed and diaper the baby, and go antiquing.

And then, when whatshisname inevitably lapsed into guy-ness, women wanted him to disappear. If children were involved, women got custody and men got an invoice. The eradication of men and fathers from children’s lives has been feminism’s most despicable accomplishment. Half of all children will sleep tonight in a home where their father does not live.

Did we really think men wouldn’t mind?

Gosh, where to start?  First off, I bristle when I see the old "boys will be boys" myth pop out.  Parker writes that men will inevitably lapse into guy-ness.  In Parker’s world, brutish insensitivity, thinly disguised aggression, and a total absence of a vocabulary for our own inner emotional terrain are "inevitable" qualities of "guy-ness."  Silly women, thinking that men had it within their power to become civilized, thoughtful, faithful creatures with the willingness and the skills necessary for real intimacy!   Nothing, nothing is more harmful to men’s work than this "myth of male weakness".  It’s by far the most successful ploy  we have for avoiding responsibility and intimacy, and some guys may have managed to convince themselves it isn’t a myth at all.   Of course, it is comforting to think that one’s shortcomings are the inevitable result of having a Y chromosome rather than character defects that can and should be transformed!

But nothing Parker wrote is more offensive than this:

The eradication of men and fathers from children’s lives has been feminism’s most despicable accomplishment. Half of all children will sleep tonight in a home where their father does not live.

In Kathleen’s universe, men never leave.  Men never abandon the children they sire.  Men never leave their wives for younger women, for porn addiction, for drugs, for workaholism. In Kathleen Parker’s world, men only leave because women have forced them out the door.   All modern men are Rip van Winkles, driven from their homes by the hen-pecking, the nagging, and the misandry of feminist ideology. 

I live in urban  Northwest Pasadena. I live in a community that has an epidemic of young men who impregnate even younger women, and then abandon them for drugs, jail, or the "thug life."  Apparently, it was feminism that drove these men away from the babies they helped conceive.  Never mind that many of these teenage moms wouldn’t know Faludi from Fifty Cent, they are shrill harpies and harridans nevertheless, and the fathers of their babies are the heartbroken victims of feminism.

Being a single parent is back-breaking work.  A few women may eagerly seek out single motherhood, but the vast majority would have dearly loved to find a way to make the relationship with the fathers of their children work.  If feminism has made one thing possible, however, it is that single mothers today have the resources to survive, if necessary, without a man.  Fewer women today have to choose between feeding their kids and putting up with abuse, infidelity, or profound emotional incompetence.   This is progress, Kathleen, real progress.

I too wish the divorce rate were lower.  I too wish more children would grow up with two loving parents in the home.  But the reason that these are only wishes and not realities is not the fault of feminism. It’s the fault of a culture that refuses to teach basic relationship skills to young couples, refuses to inculcate a strong sense of responsibility, and above all, refuses to acknowledge that men can, should, and indeed must change.