Elayne Riggs' Journal (for Leah)

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Snowbound Blogaround

It took over an hour longer than expected to get here, but the snow's finally started and is scheduled to get heavier as the day goes on. This is one of those days when I'm glad I'm currently between jobs. The car's all covered and we've decided not to attend tonight's Friends of Lulu holiday party; it's nice being able to stay in when one doesn't have to go out. We're now going back to bed (Datsa woke us early again), but not before I wish my first husband Steve a very happy 57th birthday and close some open bookmarks:

• Although my social life has certainly picked up since leaving the New Rochelle commute behind, not yet having a Manhattan-based job means (as in today's example) I don't go into the city in inclement weather unless I'm there already. So I missed the Bourdain/Ruhlman gig at Barnes & Noble (okay, I missed that because I had to be in New Rochelle that day, but still), but I can still enjoy them taunting each other.

• The writers' strike continues and, being writers, the strikers have come up with some novel ways to maintain interest and enlist more public support. Skippy has some great snapshots taken at Star Trek Day, and Nikki Finke reports on Diversity Day (which makes me wish "diversity" translated into "black and Latino and Asian etc." rather than, apparently, just "black"). Nikki also has the scoop on who exactly created the AMPTP parody site.

• A couple of nice thought pieces from Lisa Fortuner, here and here, about the state of being a fangirl in an industry that caters to fanboys. I may sometimes lose patience with the idea of fan entitlement ("they're my characters so you can't do this and that to them even though you technically own them"), but the thing is that fangirls aren't called on that. Fan-entitlement fanboys may be told "it's just a story, don't take it so seriously," but fan-entitlement fangirls are more often advised to "stop reading the stories, they're obviously not made for your demographic and there's nothing you can do to change that." As Lisa observes, "what it all comes down to is not constantly fighting to enjoy something. What it all comes down to is fighting constantly in order to be able to express our opinions about why we didn't enjoy something we should. It's fighting to have those opinions listened to so that our natural enjoyment of the genre will not need to be interrupted again." Or as I used to put it, not wanting to constantly deal with stupid stuff (like badly-drawn anatomy and the double-standard in objectifying female and male characters) that throws me out of the story.

• Speaking of fan entitlement, Kevin Church wants his money back. I laughed out loud at this one.

• And the whole idea of three against a thousand is, as Lance observes, very much a guy thing. I've no doubt that just about every nation has its own version of this young-male-bonding game; more's the pity.

• See, there's a reason behind the "Happy Holidays" greeting. It's a sign of inclusion. It's simply good business and good manners to acknowledge that different people in a pluralistic society have different beliefs, and that, particularly in a time of peace and goodwill, there's room enough in this land to live and let live. Except a small vocal minority with way too much power in this country have decided for reasons of their own (most having to do with the unChristlike acquisition of personal power) to brainwash their followers into believing that inclusion means attack, that inviting other people into your country club of goodwill somehow implies there's no room for you any more even though you've had reserved memberships there for generations and will continue to be the most welcomed and privileged. And that's why, even though Christians have constituted the majority US population for decades and will be so for decades to come, the followers of the vocal minority keep getting so in-your-face and violently offensive (although they doubtless think of it as defensive). Bryan has the rundown on this nonsense, from the pointless House resolution stating that Christians are the majority rah rah rah (next up, sun rises in east!) to the subway attack by so-called Christians on Jews, rescued by a Muslim, to the various reactions of, well, reactionaries to non-Christian groups wanting their symbols included in annual winter holiday displays. Over at PZ Myers' place there is, of course, lively discussion about two such displays. I like the "Tree of Knowledge" idea because it is, again, inclusive; the "Imagine No Religion" one is, it seems to me, designed to incite rather than include, and that's Not Helping. As a wise man once noted, there's a difference between atheism and anti-theism, and any time you cross the line into "anti" you're all but inviting hostility rather than rationality. And it would have been so easy to do a slight alteration on the CVA's "Imagine No Religion" sign to make it actually fit with the season and thus better conform with their own description on their permit application (a "triangular stand displaying information about the winter solstice, Atheism and Human Light observance") to which they were legally bound. My choice of alteration would have been to add something like "We remember a great philosopher on the 27th anniversary of his assassination," as Lennon was killed on December 8 and that's pretty much a winter observance for many of us anyway now (for me it was one of the Days The World Changed, and not for the better). But if you're anti-theist rather than atheist, conforming to your own stated vision is apparently secondary to pissing people off. Hey, 'tis the season!

• And speaking of religion, the Rude Pundit compares Mitt Romney's head-in-the-sand version of religious freedom (where religion and freedom are shackled at the wrists and ankles) to JFK's campaign speech about the absolute separation of church (religion) and state (freedom). I think I know which one I prefer! And to come back 'round again, so does the birthday boy.

Bed calls; back later with a Silly Site!

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