GROW UP, AMERICA

It took me a while before I could watch the "I have a crush on Obama" video with the Obama "girl". I wasn't sure about what I would see. I thought it was cute, but I wasn't sure about it. Then I saw Hot for Hill, and was sickened by the fact that this group had to have another lithe model sing to the female candidate. Embracing homosexuality, my ASS. Any idiot can tell that it is just another way to look at skinny, scantily clad young women prance around. Why not have a man with a crush on Hillary? Because having crushes are for submissive members of society, and men are not submissive, not even when in contact with famous people. Why have out female icons gotten smaller and smaller over the years as women in real life have gained more power? Sut Jhally (sp) claims that it is so men still feel superior to women in some way, and I agree. Furthermore, Hot for Hill embraces homosexuality in the same way that two straight girls, goaded into making out for Girls Gone Wild does. If this group really wanted to embrace homosexuality, they would have a guy singing for Obama.

So today, I had the utter misfortune of seeing the Obama "Girls" and the Giuliani "Girls" pillow fighting in Manhattan when I was at the gym. They looked clearly disinterested, but the MSNBC commentator decided to forgo any shred of journalistic integrity he might have had [but he worked for MSNBC, so that he had any is questionable] and "panted" after showing the clip. I wanted to vomit all over the elliptical machine.

Women Friendly Porn

Before my parents got the internet, I heard that there was a lot of porn on there. Then, when I was 16, my parents signed up for a connection through the local phone company I went to look for porn right away. Ok, it took a little while, and I had to wait until I was home alone. I never got that notion that women weren't into porn - how can one not be titilated by sights and sounds?

In the last decade, I've been looking for good porn on the internet. But because porn is not made for my side of sex, I have trouble. The other day, I finally realized exactly what I need to see in porn.

As a hetero woman, I get a thrill out of my partner's reaction to sex AND imagining what those sensations must feel like. Most hetero porn shows the entire woman, but the man from, at best, the neck down. Real woman friendly porn isn't that much different from regular porn, because we all come from the same society. No, real women friendly porn recognizes that women are watching too, and they do want to see the male reaction. We also want to see some female orgasms.

So now women are half of the internet population, and a third of the porn watchers. Eventually, we'll be half of the porn watchers, and its time we started making demands, as consumers, of the industry. First things first - back the camera up a little, and show me the guys too.

If girls are so good at math, where are the female mathematicians?

Girls are good at math until they reach Junior High. Another important thing happens in Junior High. Many young girls and boys begin dating, and boys begin to sexualize girls. But it isn't just boys as the agents of change. Girls become interested in these relationships, and begin paying more attention to the people around them than abstract theories, and math, especially after a while, is rather abstract. English, social studies, and the earth sciences are more tangible, and thus see more interest from young people more focused on life around them, which is what happens in Junior High. Men mistake the disinterest for lack of ability, and do not encourage girls the same way they encourage boys. And thus, math departments in colleges become sausage fests.

I never went through this process, and I continued to focus on my studies and excelled at math. But I found that math wasn't that important. Math wasn't going to figure out the problems of the world, math wasn't going to hold my interest. The grand purpose to the study of math did not impress me at all. Math Departments and mathematicians are just as useless as any English major, or rather, English majors are as useful as mathematicians. But that is just a tangent, a hypothesis, a thought for everyone to ponder. You can unpack that idea for yourself, or you can reject it wholesale, I don't give a crap.

No, my point is this - I was never sexualized in Junior High. I was unattractive, and I didn't dress well. I was over weight and my hair was weird. Even the gross kid avoided me. But I was smart. I consistently vyed for the top spot in the class - I never even looked past the top five for my name. I tutored the so-called "cool" kids and I never wanted to be anyone but myself. I spoke to anyone, regardless of social rank. And I wasn't sexualized. Sure, it hurt to know that I couldn't get a date. Sure, I wished like hell to be skinny and pretty, but any time I wished to be someone else, I always remembered that doing that would mean giving up my brain, and I couldn't do that for the world.

I made a promise to myself as a young girl - or rather, I just made a realization. I thought that I wasn't pretty, so I may as well be smart. That one moment, at the age of 4 or 5, seemed like an embarassment for so long. I told my first counselor during one tear filled session. Later, my mother learned that I felt that way, and it hurt her that her daughter thought she wasn't pretty from such an early age. But as an adult, I wonder why I worried so much. Pretty didn't get me my Master's degree. Pretty didn't get me $70k a year with tons of room for advancement. No, pretty didn't, but that committment to being smart did. And now I know I'm not ugly, but I am still reaping the benefits of thinking I was, because it made me smart.

From the BBC: Argentine Prostitutes Fight Back

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6234620.stm

Prostitutes in the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires, have launched a campaign to raise awareness about the difficult circumstances in which they work.

On the ground by the main statue they have daubed the words "No woman is born a prostitute".

It is the title of a book published by two women, Sonia Sanchez and Maria Galindo, which looks at Argentine society and the role prostitution plays within it.

"We're taking control of the streets," said Maria.

"It's a small but important step."

Sonia said: "We're saying enough is enough. Prostitution isn't a job. It's sexual exploitation and it's big business."

Other slogans daubed, then painted over, around the square read: "The pimps rule here" and "Here they exploit the bodies of girls, and the police do nothing".