Gender Reveals

Another wild fire started by another gender reveal party has opened up the whole can of gender worms.  Not that it was ever really closed.  And no one seems to be focusing on the real issue.  So I'm dusting off the ole soap box. 

1. Any celebration can lead to injury or even disaster if the celebrants are careless. I'm sure people have been injured and even killed at birthday parties or holiday celebrations, but try telling people to ban those and see how far it gets you. Letting unqualified people handle (or build) pyrotechnics for any reason is downright foolish, and that's what causes things like wild fires and homemade pipe bombs.  

2. Social Media is no more to blame for people showing off than a skateboard or a sports car.  The people who are impressed by whatever the stunt might be are not to blame.  The person showing off chose to do it, and are therefore responsible for any damage done.   It's no different than "Billy dared me." 

3. Yes, people do care what sex someone's baby is.  Family and friends do, and for celebrities of all stripes, the fans do.  For one thing, knowing that fact makes gift shopping much easier.  If you want to complain about people being gendered before birth, refer to my next point.

4. "Gender" has also become the polite term for the biological fact, which is why Sex Reveal Parties aren't causing wild fires, and that does confuse the issue.  If I announce the child in my womb has a penis and testicles, all that means is that his biological sex is male.  Stating a biological fact is not gendering.  Dividing toy departments by the sex of the child is gendering.  Telling a male child he can't wear pink is gendering. 

5. Often the decor is quite gendered at these parties. (Imagine what these parties would look like if decor stuck to biology!)   Cakes say things like "Tiaras or trucks" and "Glitter or guns".  Pink and blue everything is everywhere.  Parents who take those stereotypes to heart are going to have more impact on the child than a party that happens before birth. Parents who are having fun with it, just for the day?  Not so much. 

6.  No one is hurting you by having, or not having, a party to announce the sex of their child.  At least not if they do it responsibly. If you feel these parties are morally wrong, don't attend.  I don't go to drunken orgies for just that reason. 

Back to the original point. People are losing their homes and lives while we bicker over sex and gendering.  If you must be negative, blame the careless, not the thing they were celebrating.

In Defense of My Hometown

The little Ohio town where I spent most of my first 40 years has been in the news a lot lately.  In light of recent events, a group of locals put together a "demonstration of solidarity".  Other locals, and some who aren't so local, decided to counter-protest.  Not sure how you counter-protest something that isn't a protest, but that's what they did.  They clearly don't understand the implied "too" in the BLM movement and a large number of them seemed to think rioting is the norm for BLM.  Oh, yeah, and the 2nd Amendment was somehow threatened by people carrying signs.

Now for some background: Bethel is 98% white, but it was founded by abolitionists.  The Grant Memorial building is one of our landmarks - yes, that Grant.  He's from that neck of the woods.   I'm not going to say there is no racism in Bethel, but I can recall only two overtly racist incidents and one of those may have been nothing but a rumor.  My family doctor was Filipino and a member of Daddy's church.  

The counterprotestors (not all of whom were locals) were convinced the BLM movement is about Black Supremacy, anti-police, and rioting.  That's what they rolled into town to stop from happening.  Then they physically attacked the peaceful demonstrators and ignored police instructions.  (Wait, what?)  That's what was all over the news.  The loud mouths and the violence.  Now the whole world seems to think Bethel, Ohio, is a hotbed of racism.  

It. Is. Not. 

Racism did not exist to me until my world grew beyond the borders of Bethel.  Not just because I'm white, but because in my world the color of people's skin was simply a difference, just like the color of their eyes of their hair.  I knew enough to think the n-word was impolite.  I do recall feeling the need to qualify thinking Billy Dee Williams was cute with "for a black guy" but honestly, that's the only way any of it touched my life until adulthood.  

My point, and I do have one, is that Bethel is a nice town populated by nice people.  Those counter-protestors were coming from a position of ignorance, not of hatred.  Most of them, anyway.  I don't live in Bethel any more, through no fault of Bethel's, but I will defend it.  

  

Private Lives of Public Figures... Again

When I was young, I was told that going to the movies meant I'm okay with the "Hollywood Lifestyle".  I wasn't quite driving age, but that logic seemed wrong and it still does.  Yes, celebrities are role models with huge areas of influence, but they are still human beings. 

Bill Cosby once scolded Eddie Murphy for profanity.  He waved around an honorary PhD as if he'd actually earned it.  I didn't like him then, for those things, and we've learned since that he was doing way worse things.  Yet I still enjoy quoting his old stand-up routines.   

Linda would have broken up The Beatles if Yoko hadn't.  Both  Paul and John wrapped their whole worlds around a woman, and Paul acted like John was in the wrong for doing it.  I don't like hypocrites.  But Paul is a fantastic musician.  His talent can't be denied.  

Johnny Depp stands accused but never convicted.  Michael Jackson stands accused but never convicted.  (Innocent until proven guilty but I digress.)  I am a fan both of the men, in their creative fields.  Depp can act circles around most of Hollywood and Jackson made amazing music. 

JK Rowling has said a lot of things, some I agree with and some I don't.  I don't think I'd enjoy having dinner with her.   I've also read the Harry Potter series repeatedly and will continue to do so.  

We've had a series of adulterers and racists in the White House.  Most of this nation's Founders were slave owners.  Yet we judge those men, at least the more historically distant ones, on the quality of the job done.  We should be judging the recent ones the same way.   

I consider the money I spend or the vote I cast to be payment for a job done well.  The amount of support I give for said job depends entirely upon how well.  The private life of payee is none of my business.  This applies equally to a celebrity and to a grocery store clerk. 

Colorblind

Yet another wave of racial unrest brings with it a lot of bewildered white folks.  I'm going to toss out a few of the things I've learned as a rural white girl living in a racially divided world.  I hope it helps someone.  I don't care what color the someone it helps might be. 

We can't be "colorblind", as so many of us would like to believe we are.  To ignore a person's race is as much a disservice as ignoring their sex or religion.  I'm a white, formerly Catholic, female.  All of those things have shaped my life and my person.  My friends and family of color are not going to understand any uniquely white facets.  My male friends and family aren't going to understand being a girl.  My friends and family of other faiths...  well, you get the idea. 

Every day brings us situations we see differently based on our race.  (Other factors, too, but we are focusing on the race thing today.)  A clerk in the store is rude, I assume it's because of my Food Stamp card, but the black man behind me is likely to assume that clerk is a racist.  Probably the clerk is having a bad day, or is just a big jerk, but that doesn't change our perceptions and we have valid reasons for our perceptions.  

Saying "get to work, slaves" to your co-workers is not a good idea if any of them are black.  Calling an adult male "boy" as a simple synonym for male?  Again, not a good idea with blacks involved.  Putting a Barbie head on your car antenna as a "here's the car" signal?  Make sure she has the same skin color you do...     All of these are things I did back in my Colorblind days.  I was hurt by the reactions.  In the case of the Barbie head, the hurt would have been physical if not for a nearby security guy!  

For my fellow white folks who want to be not-a-racist, I suggest doing what I did.  Find someone of color, someone you have mutual respect with, and talk to them.  Both parties should do his or her best to remain calm, keep in mind the end goal, and take breaks if needed.  This is not an easy project.  

Avoid those who are too angry to reason with.   

Try to put yourself in the other person's shoes.  How would I feel if women (since I'm one of those) were routinely killed for resisting arrest?  How would I feel if I couldn't walk down the street without someone screaming "Go back to Europe" at me?  This little game can work for other marginalized groups as well...  how would it be if straights were called perverts for holding hands in the supermarket?  

Anyway, being "colorblind" is not a good thing.  Color should be noted, right along with any other applicable demographics.  I'm going to overstep a bit here and suggest that all of us, no matter what color we are, should make it policy to avoid letting color anger us.  We all need to focus on the things we have in common, and on seeing our fellow humans as the individuals they are.

Tammy

I generally try to avoid using names in my blog and this one's gonna ramble.  But bear with me, please.

At the end of March, my niece was hospitalized.  Her thigh was swelling to the point of stretching the skin, maybe splitting the skin, I'm not sure.  Her recurring back pain was unbearable.  This is the last time any of the family saw her, because of COVID-19, excepting a brief visit her husband managed to talk them into allowing.  Tests were run and a diagnosis of cancer given, in the lymph nodes, a few internal organs, and her spine.  We don't have a specific prognosis.  We just have a woman in her early thirties, in hospice care.

Tammy has two children.  She has a mother, a sister, a husband, and friends coming out of the woodwork.  She has a huge extended family of aunts and uncles and cousins.  She isn't perfect, of course, being a mere human.  None of us are.

Tammy and her sister spent pretty much every weekend at my place, from the time they were in diapers until adulthood.   We rose on Saturday morning and took my grandmother to the grocery, where she would fuss over and spoil them as great-grandmothers do.  Often there was another cousin or two in our group.  Once we had Mamma back home and we failed to sneak out without her forcing gas money on us, we hit the public library and then to a cousin's house.  That was Saturday.  We aren't so close now as we were then.  As we each grew into the woman she is today, our interests diverged and we drifted apart as people do.

I'm not mad about the COVID-19 rules, even if I think they should be bent for Tammy's situation.  I understand all that "needs of the many" stuff.  I have friends and family of every stripe appealing to whatever higher power they believe in.  Barring an outright miracle, those prayers and vibes might only be giving us comfort, but I'll take it. 

Anything that can do this to a woman who just wants to feed her kids and play in the rain should not exist.  I'm so angry on her behalf and hurting on my own.  My Brown-Eyed Girl is slipping away and there's nothing I can do.  Except be there for the rest of us and that feels like so little.

It's Not That Simple

Another blog about the pandemic.  It's funny that I'm the one to say this, since I'm usually the one boiling things down to basics, but:

1."It's just another flu."  No, it isn't.  The mere fact that it has been declared a pandemic is proof of that.  Even if the symptoms and death rates are similar, there's the sheer number of patients.  The CDC and WHO know a lot more about these things than we do, whether you believe they are in on a conspiracy or not.

2. "They're taking our rights!  It's a ploy to take them forever!"  This is logical on the surface.  Yes, our right to assemble appears to be gone.  But is it?  The Non-Aggression Principle adhered to by those anarchists with brains tells us that our rights are void if they cause harm to others.  Gathering in large groups is potentially harmful to ourselves and others during any viral outbreak.

There is also no evidence to support the permanent removal of said rights.  For every Nazi Germany that started by using fear to trick citizens into compliance, there's a Spanish Flu that used these measures temporarily.  I also can't recall Hitler using an actual pandemic to start his purge.  He used nationalism.

3. "It's (insert group with initals for a name)  trying to wipe out their enemies."  Even if this thing was created in a lab, which I doubt, there is no logic to any of these groups killing large numbers of their own people.  COVID-19 isn't checking your political or religious affiliations before hopping right into your system.

4. "Any one who catches it is as good as dead."  Um, no.  Lots of people get it and recover.  Lots of people don't even feel sick when they have it.  The death rate is actually lower than some forms of influenza.  Again, the problem here is the sheer numbers of people infected.

5. "The economy" vs "Karen".  To simply reopen would create a surge in COVID-19 cases.  To remain in complete lockdown is going to create a different surge. Cabin Fever is the common term for a very real psychological  event. We're already seeing a rise in reports of suicide and domestic abuse.  If we wait COVID-19 out, we allow the ecomony to completely fail.  Unemployment and homelessness are leading triggers for suicide and domestic violence.  A pandemic in a capitalist world, populated by social creatures like humans, is a textbook example of "damned if you do, damned if you don't".

6. "Reopening in stages is stupid." The medical community has had time to prepare and the smaller waves which result from each stage can be dealt with.  Our hospitals shouldn't be overwhelmed.  Those of us with mental health issues can see an end to the torment.  Abusers can storm out of the house instead of beating their partners and children.   People can get back to work.  Death is inevitable.  We just get to choose, or try to choose, what form it might take and when it might happen. 

Also, if you don't like the steps taken by our elected officials, remember.  Come Election Day, do your civil duty.  Take your country back.  Just not with AK-47s.  That's excessive.

Stay At Home

I'm seeing a lot of news stories about how so few Americans are staying at home during this pandemic. One story is using cell phone trackers and defining compliance as staying within a five mile radius of home.  Another is unclear on how the data is gathered, but seems to be defining it as staying on your own property.  I could go on, but these two examples are sufficient to make my point.

Very few of us are able to never leave their property.  We all have essential errands.  Essential workers usually drive farther that five miles to do their jobs.  Grocery store pick-up services are becoming very popular, but those using said services still need to go (often more than five miles) pick the stuff up.

My grocery and doctor are roughly 15 miles from home.  In opposite directions.  I'm definitely in violation according to most of these reports.  I go to the store twice a month and the doctor every three to six months, depending upon my test results.  Most of my other errands are within that five mile limit and I combine errands in the same area into a single trip.  That was my usual pattern long before COVID-19.

I'd rather find my own substitute for a 45 ounce Blue Bonnet than further burden the overworked and underpaid. If  my choice to shop for myself, even with precautions like a mask and wet-naps, makes me a horrible person, then I'll own it.

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There's also the question of how your area defines the order.  A small family group was in the local park when I ran to the pharmacy.  A handful of boys on the basketball court were at least attempting to stay six feet apart, playing Horse.  A single teenager on a bicycle practiced dumb teenage stunts.  None of these people were in violation.   Yet, according to most of these news stories, every one of us is part of the problem.

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When you see a news story like this, I urge you to think for a moment.  How is the study in question defining compliance?  How are they gathering the data?  Where are all these people going, if everywhere and everything is closed?

The same is true of stories about those who are arrested for not complying.  Regardless of your feelings about the entire situation, a man who was arrested "alone in the ocean" was actually charged with trespassing on a closed public beach.  A father who was cuffed "in front of his daughter" refused to identify himself to the police.  He had a right to do so, yes, but the fact of the matter is this:  He was not charged with anything to do with Social Distancing or Stay-At-Home.

Most of us are complying to the best of our ability, according to what our areas have ruled.  Most of the police and even politicians are not going full Hitler on us.  The newspapers are just reporting what sells.  If we fail to use the critical thinking skills we either evolved or had handed to us by some deity, that's our failing.