Loser lady

Moving home!!

2009-10-10T22:26:00.002+01:00

I'm moving home .. to wordpress, gradually going to take this blog down and put the wordpress one up.

My new, more proffessional looking website will be at

http://liztopia.wordpress.com/

Check it out ! It's going to eventually have poems, doodles and videos and everything...

Gig and blog changes !

2009-09-26T19:38:00.002+01:00

First of all, thankyou for everyone that came to the ladyfest comedy gig and made it as undeniably awesome as it was. I had a brilliant time performing and felt privalaged to do so.

It has inspired me to do some things.

1. Perform more, and push myself more, to stop being so moany and 'but I hate the local scene' blah blah blah, to get out more, be more confident and more like a duck in terms of letting water fall from my back.

2. To get a new blog. I have been writing this for a few years now and I reckon some of this waffley stuff can be archived and removed from the internet. I want something a bit more organised and proffessional in its approach.

3. More ladyfest comedy nights! Less shame about being a comedian, it doesn't really help matters, I just need to be realistic about things and keep checks on whether I am turning into a massive wanker.

4. Eventually to get a proper website.

But yes, I would like to keep this blog until the stats at the bottom get to 10 thousand but, just to let you know I am putting something else together at the moment

ADVERT ALERT

2009-09-14T01:51:00.003+01:00

Ladyfest flyers in all their wonderfullness !!

This one has my name on it!

Aventureland - capsule review...

2009-09-12T23:26:00.005+01:00

Sitting at home watching Aventureland, it hasn't finished yet, I shouldn't write a blog review of it until it's over - so far though, it's enjoyable, but I'm bored (if I was that gripped would I be writing this? probably not). I'm bored of gaining an insight into what it's like to be an intelligent white, sexually pent up middle class indie boy who suffers setbacks but is ultimately surrounded by beautiful mildly fucked up women, who he can feel all artistic and anguished over.

I feel like I have seen that film so many times I could play the lead role. I feel like I have seen this movie so many times throughout my teenage years and early twenties I have morphed into a weird female version of that character.

As I type there is a Cure song (I won't spoil it by telling you which one) of course there is...the fucking cure - did everyone in the eighties express their longing through Robert Smith? Genuine question, I was too young to have any longing in the 80s. I remember expressing some early longing to the supernaturals, which is definately not something you should admit on the internet.

So basically a boy wants to go around Europe, but it turns out his parents can't pay for him anymore so he has to get a crappy job, poor wee lamb. Luckily though, he manages to find a job in a kitsch place with 'characters' and indie T shirts, and a lot of hot women and other white people of his age he can bond with. In particularly a rich girl who has problems, lucky for her she is skinny and can express her anguish through mild promiscuity (as well as the Velvet Underground and a Lou Reed T shirt). Everyone gets drunk, stoned - there are sexual mishaps,unpheasable virginity and family conflicts.

The film really isn't as bad as this facetious review makes it seem. I think it hit a bum note with me, partly because I can't afford to do postgrad study after Uni (a fact that this movie reminded me of, though I'm not nearly as whiney). Also I get bored of the message that beautiful fucked up promiscuity is what intelligent teenage girls should aim for (cos that what the creative boys like, you can be a muse!!)BORING. I'm also a bit bored of the woes of the relatively affluent (male/female - good soundtrack or not)

I'm not saying rich white people shouldn't be in movies, just not every movie.

On the plus side, I heard the song 'Amadeaus' for the first time in this movie, which is referenced in the Selma marries Troy Maclure episode of the Simpsons, in the wonderful song 'Dr Zeus'.

In other non geeky news, I am doing a gig in a week and a half ! It's part of awesome DIY arts festival, Ladyfest

Here's a bit copied from the website.

Thursday 24th September

Comedy Night: Sian Bevan and Guests
Local comedy-circuit regular Sian Bevan (**** - The List) hosts your evening's entertainment, featuring Jojo Sutherland, formerly-bearded lady Liz Ely, and others.
Doors at 7pm
Edinburgh City Football Club, 7 Baxter's Place (Top of Leith Walk)
Tickets £4

So yeah, come down and see me, make you smile... Also come to other Ladyfest things - if you pay a tenner you can get into EVERYTHING saving you literally A FEW POUNDS !! Which you could buy cake or whatever with really.

BIn workers strike

2009-07-17T07:51:00.003+01:00

In Edinburgh there is the current possibility of a bin workers strike. At present refuse workers are on a 'work to rule' action - this means you do only exactly what is required, follow every bit of health and safety nonsense to the letter and intentionally slow things down.

So at the moment, bin workers are doing the bare minimum and already Edinburgh is a mess. To me this is both fantastic news and an important issue for feminists, as disparity between male and female rates of pay are part of the reason for this dispute.

Bin workers are having their bonuses scrapped to bring their wages in line with the gender equality duty, which affects other 'masculine' council jobs like grave digging. More 'feminine' jobs like teaching assistants and cleaners never received these bonuses and there has been a massive disparity in pay between genders*.

Obviously, taking money away from some of the lowest paid workers in the name of gender equality is not the answer, and we should be united in demanding more pay for all, not reduction in the wages of already low paid men.

I think part of what makes this dispute interesting is the fact that the council/press have not really emphasised the fact that this is about addressing a sexist issue. To do this would highlight the fact that the council have had a massively sexist policy for a long time, leaving them open to being sued by female workers. Thus the cuts are called 'modernisation'.

Thus we see an intersection of class and gender, whereby value is placed on more masculine jobs. Equally, when the bin workers see their pay cut, they strike immediately highlighting perhaps, the higher levels of entitlement felt by male workers. I think the bin workers are right to feel that entitlement, I just wish that more female workers would realize their potential for change through strike action. I don't blame this on the cleaners or classroom assistants who may be bringing up children on their own and can't risk losing their jobs, this has to be the role of the unions and other activists.

On another note - I was reading this guardian article about swine flu, and I got rather annoyed that the journalist felt it necessary to comment on the chief of the WHO's body and choice of shoes. Not cool. Neither is the Andrew Marr show for giving Griffin a platform to spout nonsense on sunday morning. He is not a legitimate politician and should not be treated as such. The tits behind most of the media presumably think that they can expose Griffin's racism, but by giving him a platform they take him seriously, and open up the possibility that he might be right.

yuk...

Perfect for fathers day.......

2009-06-20T12:32:00.008+01:00

Self aware disclaimer.... what I am about to propose is something that would uphold and solidify damaging gender norms, and you know, capitalism and that. As such it should be read for entertainment purposes only.....

There are a lot of things that I would do if I didn't have a soul, one of which is advertising and marketing. I think I would be good at it; it's also probably a really fun job for those bereft of a social conscience.

I came up with an idea the other day which I think could make me millions. Inspired by the patronising pinkification of items which though fairly neutral in and of themselves, have become more associated with men. Girlie gardening, pink computers, pink tools - all over the place women are encouraged to buy 'boys toys' by companies making pink versions*.

All this is obviously making someone somewhere some money.

So what-about Macho Housework? Plenty of companies are already using this approach, like Coke Zero - which claims to be a healthier diet drink, but is largely a product intended to tap the body conscious dick market.

So why not market traditionally 'women's work' to men by making it macho?

I have lots of ideas for products which would cover a broad range of household tasks....

* The Footie Machine - it's a green front-loading washing machine with a football for a door!

* For use in your Footie Machine... blokey detergent! It comes in a suave black box, with silver writing and geometric shapes. Comes in a variety of flavours - beer, bacon, and Lynx (possible joint product?)

* Action Hero Washing line - it's a retractable washing line with your favourite action hero on one end! Watch him zip line from one side of the garden to the other. Available in numerous varieties including Sly Stallone, Indiana Jones and The Terminator. Comes with pegs featuring your favourite movie characters! Available in Sci Fi or Action Movie. Pegs also come free with special packs of Blokey Detergent - can you collect the whole set?

*The radio-active Mancrowave - it's a microwave with snazzy radiation warning stickers!

* Part of the same range as the Mancrowave, is the Radio-active mop. This mop has power. This is the sort of mop that Jack Baur would use to mop up nuclear waste; or as a creative implement of torture. Available in black and green with snazzy radiation warning stickers!

*What could be more manly than knives? How about knives SHAPED LIKE GUNS! Also available as swords.

* Are you Hoovering, or are you controlling your own monster truck van, or space-ship? That's right, a hoover shaped like monster truck, van or space-ship.

In truth my intention was to come up with stupid products, but actually some of these sound quite fun, more fun than pink garden shears anyhow.....

* or chose more expensive pink versions of products they would have bought anyway which is probably more likely the case.

Hope not Hate

2009-06-08T12:12:00.002+01:00

So sad news this morning about the BNP. Hearing that racist fuckwits have been elected in a place where I am from adds despair to an otherwise pleasant monday morning.

Don't have much to say about it, just thought I would draw attention to a 'they don't represent me' petition.

Sighs..

Teach first?

2009-06-03T00:19:00.004+01:00

I've been thinking about applying to teach first but looking at the website for it makes me feel a little bit ill.

All these lame ass cartoons of smiling graduates going into rough, sorry I mean 'challenging' schools, looking serious, thoughtful, ready for action, ready for their temporary teaching mission.

Now I'm not suggesting that aren't any good intentions behind this scheme (though I am suspicious about the fact that it is business funded). The problems do seem to outweigh the positives.

Having read the FAQs on their site, I have a few of my own....

Like, doesn't it de-value teaching as a profession by suggesting that it is something you could do for 2 years before you get on with your real job?

Why do you want to attract people who hadn't considered teaching?

Aren't the best teachers the ones who think that education is the most important thing in the world, and want to do it for reasons other than a career stepping stone?

What do you mean by 'exceptional' graduates, and what experience prior to Teach First do these graduates have of 'challenging' schools?

Why are you giving the most needy schools poorly qualified teaching staff?

Why do you think these schools are challenging?

Do you think young middle class enthusiasm is the best solution to all social ills?

Are there any ethical qualms about challenging schools (or disadvantaged youth ) being used as a leadership stepping stone by those who are (relatively) privileged?

I'm not saying no good ever comes out of this program, frankly I don't know. The premise of Teach first seems worryingly ill conceived.

I did Project Trust, which was sold as a year to be proud of, and though I am proud of some things, my abiding feeling is one of massive conscience ache. When I read over these profiles of how teaching poor kids helped Henry Whatshisface-smythe come up with examples of his leadership skills to get a job at JP morgan, I can't help but feel that it's all just a bit gross.

Snog Marry Avoid?

2009-05-05T01:02:00.009+01:00

Snog marry avoid seems to regard itself as a major innovation in the mind numbing genre of ‘the make over show’. It offers its participants a ‘make-under’: a radical life changing opportunity for them to see themselves without make up . The show has one simple message; too much slap and you’re a slapper. The participants are largely female, though men are also occaisionally featured, so that when anybody dares point out that the whole thing might be a little bit sexist they can reel them out and say ‘no way, look we picked on some men too’. The participants are made to stand infront of ‘Pod’, a cheap looking computer graphic which looks like a giant mechanical talking clitoris.

Pod tells them that they look ridiculous with a lot of make up on, and the point is duly emphasised by Vox Pops men in the street, who decide whether they would 'snog' 'marry' or 'avoid'. In this weeks episode, a barbiefied EMO kid is told that her bright make up makes her look stupid, and men are encouraged to call another woman 'cheap'. The 'make unders' inevitably dress the women to fit a fairly bland ideal which impresses the men in the street. To add to the hypocrisy of the proceedings the presenter herself is caked in make up, it's not so much about going without make up, as wearing 'natural look' make up. Once again television mistakes sexist nonsense for emancipation.

Probably too long and not really enough of a review for my application form, I thought I would publish this here anyway in response to so me guardian tit writing a tenuous piece in praise of Snog Marry Avoid.

Been trying to think up some kind of male version, say...

'How much of a cock is this guy?'*

It would involve men parading about, acting agressively or like sexist gits, and then women get to rate them on a 'cock-ometer'. They would also be ridiculed by a talking camera. Hell you could even have a celebrity one, with awards for Celebrity Cock of the year, finally giving Jeremy Clarkson and John McCirirck a good reason to be on TV.

Incase you were wondering, yes, this is what you get if you type 'cockometer' into google images.

It also looks like Jeremy Clarkson has something on Top Gear called a 'cockometer', hopefully he won't get too close to it himself or it might just explode..

* Even as I type this I worry i am being too mean, proving that I have much more of a soul than anyone involved in 'snog marry avoid'

Television

2009-05-01T00:07:00.004+01:00

Settled down to watch some random bits of nonsense on the idiot-box, and remembered how much television makes me want to rip my own eyes out.

First I watched Marcus Brigstocke chat to a Tory MP on 'I've never seen Star Wars'. I usually like Marcus Brigstocke, he's kind of like a cuddly Louis Theroux, a poor girls Louis if you will - except of course, he's not. Like anyone in the media he is public schooled, and there was something galling about watching him all pally with David Davis, like - however left wing he might be, Marcus has more in common with David Davis than he does with me.

Then I decided to see what else was on iplayer. I decided against 'Kirsten's topless ambition' the first few minutes of which was like watching my soul die. I am young enough to remember Kirsten as one of the presenters of my childhood, filling the space before The Simpsons with something less annoying than whatever was on CITV. I don't want to see her 'investigate' boosting her career by going topless. I don't want her to make light of sexism from her comfortable position as a middling tv person, and I don't want her to even think about getting her boobs out.

Instead I watched snog marry avoid. I'm not sure why, maybe I hate myself today. I'm not sure how this sort of stuff gets on television. The point of it all is to make girls look less 'fake'. I know I'm pointing out the obvious here, I know all this stuff is crap but still, I mean it's there isn't it - it exists. Someone gets paid to smear this excrement into people's consciousness. Probably more than two people.

I watched it most of the way through. It can't be bothered to rant about it because it's just too obvious why it is so bad.

I never particularly wanted to be the sort of person that 'doesn't have TV' but you, television - you drove me to it.

My-Bloody-sogyny (I tried for ages to think up a punny title and this is the best I could manage)

2009-04-19T23:29:00.011+01:00

I was flicking through festival websites and I came across this advert for 'Nightmare before Xmas' , an All Tommorrow's Parties event curated by My Bloody Valentine.

For anybody not cool enough to know what is so special about ATP, it's a festival where bands get to pick the line up and it's at Butlins. It's more indie than a comic book version of Juno printed on a T shirt. Your £300 ticket gets you chalet accommodation and the knowledge you are gonna be at the frickin coolest festival in all of coolsville. It's in the name- not only are you cool enough to go to all the parties, you go to the parties of the future.

I've never been, I'm sure it's very good.

Anyway I thought I would put this ad up here to express my annoyance and invite comment at their use of a corpse like woman surrounded by twee indie creatures.

A woman floating who is looking away with her legs spread apart? WTF ATP?

Twee owls do not negate the horrendous 'rape- like images as dark and edgy' bullshit that is going on here; infact to me it seems even more horrible. Yes, let's have a smiling blob playing with a rocket over a woman who looks like she has been murdered or sexually assualted (or both). Good work.

Sinister trivialisation/objectification inherent in the image aside, the ad itself could not seem any more contrived. It's as if someone swallowed a mashed up copy of Vice magazine and a box of crayons.

'Well, let's call it nightmare before christmas - Tim Burton, he's cool and dark and all the hipsters love him, and cartoony twee things, that's very indie, got to be indie - and a woman looking as if she might have been raped, well that's really very dark and edgy. Can't have enough edge now can we. No it's not sexist, look there's a cute monster and a bird holding a wilted tulip'

Pathetic.

Hipster, 'ironic' indie sexism - still sexism.

http://www.atpfestival.com/Feedback.php if you want to complain.

Leaving your house: the fatal mistake that will cost you YOUR LIFE !!

2009-04-10T11:42:00.004+01:00

It's a good job I picked up the metro yesterday when I was on the bus, so that I could read about the conviction of the murderer and rapist who killed Moira Jones, a woman in Glasgow.

Apparrently she had an argument with her boyfriend, and went out for the night; which turned out to be the fatal mistake which cost her her life.

Yes this is how yesterdays Metro actually covered the story. Moira Jones made the mistake of going out after a row with her BF. How dare she? Don't women know if they go out at night they are likely to bump into rapists and murderers?

It is good of the Metro to warn us women to stay in with our menfolk. Good of them to shift at least some of the responsiblity on to this murdered woman. After-all, if women will get in the way of violent men what are they to expect?

I hope to see this approach used more often in other fatalaties, ie -

Boy 16, decides to cross over the street - the fatal mistake that cost him his life!

132 passengers go on holiday to greek island on a plane, the fatal mistake that cost them their lives. Sue bloggs just needed to get away from work for a little while, little did she know this would be a fatal mistake as the plane she boarded plummetted to the ground.

Well done the Metro for having the balls to tell it like it is.When bad things happen to people then they have to take responsibility.

WTF?!!

2009-04-05T14:08:00.008+01:00

A fellow feminist flagged up this advert for Wilkinson Razors.

The website it was on suggested in an aggravatingly playful tone that the racist stereotypes might 'ruffle a few feathers'. Consider this bird's feather's ruffled in a Hitchcock's The Birds, kind of way.

Of course it's racist sexist bullshit, that much should be obvious to anyone with eyes that are connected to a brain. Apart from that, who the hell shaves their Bikini line to cheer themselves up? I mean seriously? Surely not even the world's femmiest women think, ooh I 'm bored I'll get rid of some body hair. That will be fun, I will shave and it will be all bumpy and red, and then my bath will be full of pubes which I will have to then clean. Yes, really, great fun.

Even if you stick with the stupid stupid garden analogy - would you rather, spend ages gardening, or sod the gardening, invite a some people over, get drunk and have a garden party.

When you are having a garden party, do the guests really care if the garden is overgrown?

Supposing they do care, one has to ask oneself 'are these the sort of people I want to invite into my garden?'.

Do these guests ever do any gardening themselves? If they do, have you ever considered the fact that they might be boring wankers ?

Wouldn't it just be better if we just left our gardens with lots of grass and concentrated on having better parties? Interesting fun parties, where people can let themselves be who they want and relax, rather than feeling arkward and constricted by all the tidiness.

On a positive note, snaps to South Park for this episode.

Jade Goody - Why the hell do I care?

2009-03-20T11:40:00.006Z

On the whole I would say following celebs is at best a meaningless distraction from everyday life. A symptom of our rampantly individualistic society where a few people are lauded for often dubious achievements. A fundamental part of a media system, whereby that which is important and relevant to our existence as human beings is relegated beneath the irrational worship of individuals.

But.

For some reason I find myself utterly captivated by Jade Goody's living death. Every other day I trawl the internet for more details of her suffering, I want to hear her last words and teary goodbyes. I have even been on The Sun's website. I knew I shouldn't but for some reason, I cared.

Jade showed us death. A fact of life we are completely dominated by and spend most of our waking life ignoring. We may spend our more indulgent moments thinking about the moving speeches that will be given at our funeral, but we don't talk about death. Following Goody's death has forced us to face our own mortality; our obsession with her is an obsession with ourselves. It was also indicative of wider feelings of limitation and loss that we in the west are facing up to in the current economic climate. Jade Goody's whole life was one of bust boom and then bust. Perhaps it is stretching it to suggest that Jade Goody's death represents the inevitable collapse and unsustainability of freemarket economics. Then again, perhaps not.

Jade Goody also taught us that Great Britain will not be seen to tolerate racism. I do not condone Jade's actions on Big Brother;however her consequent villification served only to place the guilt of the nation onto the head of one uncouth working class woman. We had to evict Jade Goody from the Big Brother house so we can be seen to care about racism, a convenient mask for reality.

Our outrage at her outbursts demonstrated the great myth of multiculturalism; that racism is an abberrition, and exception to norms of behaivour that ought to be tackled in a brisk corrective manner.

'Some individuals are racist, this is because they are ignorant, we need to educate them to be not racist, like everyone else'.

The reality is that some racism comes from a place of hatred rather than ignorance, and that Great Britain is inherently unequal and racist. What Jade said on Big Brother was inevitable. Jade was not punished for her racism; she was punished for being too ignorant to succesfully hide her racist attitudes.Jade Goody provided an easy sacrificial lamb for the racism of a nation. The fact that she is working class and female made her demonization all the easier.

Ultimately, Jade's easy rehabilitation by the media showed how shallow the public commitment to challenging racism really was.

Some people may have found her living death morbid or strange, but in many ways her openness made perfect sense. Millions of us open up to the public online, Jade's living death was a logical extreme of the behaivour of millions. This morning her death felt like a relief, the one woman Truman Show has now finally ended. Jade's mediated omnipresence makes her death seem somehow unreal;dying in the public eye allowed Jade to clutch at the last remaining straws of immortality.

I guess time will tell whether or not it worked.

Easily the most noble use of the internet

2009-02-26T00:53:00.001Z

http://www.beedogs.com

Yes I am up at 1am looking at bee dogs. Why aren't you?

Have you seen the bearded lady?

2009-02-15T12:48:00.003Z

In order to raise money and awareness about Reclaim the night I will be wearing a fake beard for a week between the 23rd and 28th of February.

You can sponsor me to do this, and read about my adventures in arkwardness at :

http://ladybeardchallenge.blogspot.com

If you are in Edinburgh then you can also come along to the Bowery on the 18th and sponsor me in person.

All money goes to reclaim the night and women's charities in Edinburgh.

Womenarebetterthanmen.com

2009-02-10T15:10:00.005Z

If you type this into your browser it automatically redirects to menarebetterthanwomen.com. A predictabley mysoginistic wank fest for insecure whiney scuzzbuckets. I mean really mysoginistic, like ' why the fuck did that moron get a book deal and I can't believe amazon are selling it' kind of mysoginy. Probably conceived by the satanic hate child of Richard Littlejohn, Melanie Phillips and Jeremy Clarkson.

At first the re-direction irritated me, but then I realised that the existence of this vomitous website (with no female equivalent) does offer convincing evidence that women are indeed better.

Not conclusive, but convincing.

Comedy Speed Dating

2009-02-03T15:55:00.007Z

So I was flicking through the listings for the Glasgow Comedy Festival and came across this event 'comedy speed dating'. That's funny, but not ha ha funny.

The idea of spending an evening watching a bunch of medicore tits on a stage, and then having to sit there listening to dozens more trying to crack a funny within a specific time frame is enough to make me want to end my days single. Tommorrow.

Their wording is, of course, totally sexist 'We all know that the best way to a woman's heart is to make her laugh'. Yup, obviously the only people actively seeking dates are hetero men (or lesbian women but I DOUBT, to a CAPS LOCK extent that the writer had lesbians in his mind when he wrote that. At least, not in a non-sexist way)

Women, you better just sit there and smile while the hilarious men do the 'hard work' and make you laugh. Maybe that's why it costs £19.95 for women and a mere £9.95 for men.

The assumption that men are the funny ones is of course, intensley aggravating. The only justification they can have for men paying less is that fewer men speed date. Why is that? Could it be that it's much easier to get a date, as a man, than the media or popular culture suggest?

Why they think that women are prepared to pay a tenner more, in an attempt to bag a 'funny' man is beyond me...

Yup - this could be you...

Benefit frauds are women with health issues

2009-02-02T21:12:00.004Z

So I spend a bit of time in Edinburgh's working class outskirts where I keep seeing the following advert in bus shelters.

There is a website about the campaign, with the following information.

'We're closing In' is aimed at people who have just begun or are thinking about committing benefit fraud. The campaign uses the very real risk of being caught as a deterrent. Its strong visuals highlight the investigation techniques used to track down benefit cheats, bringing home the message that there is no escape for those who commit fraud. '

So, what are these investigation techniques? Going around poorer areas and seeking out shifty looking overweight women, clutching their purses? And what the hell do they mean by 'strong visuals'? A fat woman? It is indeed true that women of her size are more likely to be on buses than bus shelters. Obviously if she can afford that many pies she must be cheating the decent healthy tax payer right? Forget the fact that obesity is often a symptom of poverty. Forget the fact that the people who do cost the tax payer millions are more likely to have penises, wear suits and hire accountants to do their dirty buisness.

It does however, give me an idea for a youth work project around political participation through the selective trashing of bus shelters. It would probably be quite popular, though I'm not sure where I would get funding...

Being on't Telly

2009-01-27T18:25:00.004Z

Being on 'The Big Questions' was like having unsatisfying sex with a mediocre partner. It began with expectation which it quickly failed to deliver and ended abruptly just as you were beginning to feel something.

When we entered telford college we had to go through a security check and surrender any water. I was quite hyper from lack of sleep and the effects of the night before, I got a coffee in the cafe before an assistant informed me that I could go to the VIP room. The main difference being some free fruit and real coffee as opposed to instant for the studio audience.

In the 'VIP Room' I was introduced to Nicky Campbell; more presenter than man. He asked me for my opinions on 'bad lads' and whether or not they deserve our adulation. Honestly, I wasn't all that articulate - perhaps it was my awe in the presence of such a mighty figure in the world of day-time television.

Kokumo was there, someone I greatly admire - which made me somewhat nervous. In the show I was disappointed that Nicky didn't speak to Kokumo more. She put a spanner in his 'joke' about Rabbie Burns, which was pretty funny. Kokumo also pointed out to me that we were being used, as we weren't being paid for our appearance. Very good point, next time BBC, some free grapes just won't cut the mustard.

After a trip to the toilet, and a warning that I might not be allowed to wear my 'not for sale' T shirt because it was a logo, we were lead out to the gym which was set up as a small studio.
The audience pleasantly surprised me, being more left of centre than I had anticipated. We had a warm up debate about the BBC and Gaza, where the only people who took the side of the BBC were (unsurprisingly) those on its payroll.

The hour of debate passed pretty quickly, there wasn't really all that much debate to be had. The one comment that I did make was misinterpreted by the mostly silent Sci Fi writer, and Nicky swiftly moved away from my comment as it was 'getting off topic'.
Aah yes, talking about gender in a debate on 'bad lads' ... nothing to do with it... On the other hand the offensively conservative historian managed to suggest that Scots had an irrational loathing for Thatcher....

All in all an enjoyable, but meaningless experience. I met some nice people, and as soon as we went off air there was this feeling of 'is that it?'. I feel that's apt for losing my 'speaking on tv' virginity. Now I can just sit and wait for the call for me to replace Jonathon Ross....

On the Telly

2009-01-26T13:43:00.003Z

So I was going to write a longer post about 'what its like to be on telly', and I probably still will.

For anyone that I haven't told I was on 'The Big Questions', a show where the public and minor celebrities debate things.

You can catch it for the next week on the following link:-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00h6v3q/The_Big_Questions_Series_2_Episode_5/

I am adjusting well to a life of fame, graciously accepting compliments from strangers in the street and bearing with good humour being recognised in the local shop.

If life gives you lemons

2008-10-07T23:35:00.003+01:00

If life gives you lemons and you try to make lemonade, you will find that you have a very small amount of highly acidic sour liquid in a cup, that gives absolutely no refreshment or particular satisfaction.

There I assumed that you have a cup, if life really gives you only lemons you will have to knaw through the lemon's tough outer skin and bitter pith with your teeth , and then somehow squeeze the sticky innards into your palm, which you would then have to lick.

That is not what I call lemonade.

Thus if life gives you sugar, water, lemons, a knife, a cup and maybe a jug then maybe, you can make lemonade. You need more than just lemons to make it in the world of lemonade. If you want to sell the your soda you need even more stuff - and who can even afford to buy lemonade now that the world is collapsing. I ask you?

I have come to the conclusion that this particular saying is incredibly anti socialist.

It should be replaced by ' If life gives you lemons, open them up somehow and squeeze their juice into the eyes of the opressor'. Whilst the juice blinds him (yup, in this metaphor 'the opressor' is a rich white man, physically a hideous amalgamation of Boris Johnson and Quentin Tarrantino) we can start building a new society based on co-operation, equality and genuine freedom for all.

In this place there will be a lot of lemonade, and it will all be fresh, sweet and free.

This is what the lemonade stands will look like. We will try to keep pips to an absolute minimum.

Kevin McCloud and the Big town plan

2008-08-26T16:58:00.005+01:00

I don't know if anyone has been watching this, but it is turning me into even more of a revolutionary socialist with every episode. It is about the regeneration of a town, my town - Castleford where a bazillion generations of my family grew up. Including my good self.

DISCLAIMER (because I don't live there now, but all my family do I have tended to jump between 'we' and 'they' when talking about the place. I hope this doesn't seem hypocritical or grammatically annoying.)

Kevin McCloud ( clearly an insufferable ponce) wanders the downtown area pointing out how depressed people are, that we have nothing- no more mines and yet, nowhere to get a cappuccino.

He has a point, Castleford is not a happy place. Thing is, Castleford has always been poor and its people exploited. The difference is the relationship to the means of production. Once upon a time Cas folk fit neatly into a marxist analysis, now production has moved to a place where people are cheaper to exploit. All that is left is the consumption of cheap goods, and selling these goods. Our place in the line of production has moved on from the creation of goods, to the selling of goods.

This seems like some kind of step upwards, but it really isn't. As a worker in a shop you have few skills, are more dispensible and your job is often viewed as 'not a proper job'. When you actively produce something then there is a sense of value - or at least that there is necessity to what you do. When my grandad talks about working in Rowntrees sweet factory he has a great sense of pride about it. It never made him rich, but he got a pension that him and my gran live well on, and with my grandma working as an old people's nurse they made enough to provide for a family. His job was stable and worth something, and the workers of Rowntrees could organise socially.The company treat employees relatively well, but then they had to; workers had power, even if that power was limited.My granddad may have just sugared almonds, but it was skillful, precise and not many other people knew how to do it. Workers had some power, even if they were in a subservient role within production.

I am not suggesting that this is some kind of ideal life, but it often seems that way when compared with what has come to replace it. The jobs available now are mainly retail and call centre work- coupled with spare time spent in excessive consumption of goods produced cheaply by people who can barely afford to live. The increasing individualism of life makes people depressed, and we are a people without a clearly defined role. One thing is for sure, we are not a people empowered.

I am lucky, my granddad was a skilled worker, my mum and dad have middling jobs and I have had enough education to propell me somewhere else. Somewhere else being a place I was very quick to find - which in many respects is sad considering the hundreds of years of family history here. It's sad that moving away is the best option.

What I am trying to say is - I don't really think it is the design of our town making people feel empty.

Much as this show boils my blood on a very personal level, I have never felt as proud of my home-town as I did watching the program. My favourite part was when one woman stood firm to get a big fence around a new park in Cutsyke. Obviously the architechts wanted a friendly open park that anyone could use at any time, but they don't live in Castleford. In a world without social injustice all parks should be open all the time - but in a place which has absolutely nowhere for young people to go, and social problems which foster destructive tendencies within the young, parks need fences. Sad, but true.

This woman said to the presenter, when he was waffling on about freedom or design or something, she said 'I'll flatten you, you're not listening to me'.

This 'not listnening' was a frequent occurance ; like when the designers wanted to build a market with daft umbrella things. A market trader ( big guy, tattoos) said 'what about the wind'. They ignored his point, largely because it was made in a northern accent by a guy with tattoos.

Lo and behold the prototype failed to withstand the wind.

Yet Channel 4 know best, and think that good design will help teenagers not to destroy things. What a ludicrous conceit.

In there is one particularly bad scheme in Fryston, where they actually destroy a community centre to replace it with a ridiculous sculpture ( 3 rocks on top of each other). Leaving the local residents with no-where to play bingo. Good going.

All in all it seems that Channel 4 want the residents of Castleford to be 'regenerated' into happy middle class citizens. This is obvious in what they decide to create . Markets = good, just like the farmers market, they can buy organic food and vegetables. They can be just like us...

Community centres, bingo, brass bands = not even a consideration, why would I need a community centre all you do there is hang around with other poor people and play bingo (and not in an ironic way either...) How is that supposed to boost the economy?

Yet another example of tv (white middle class run medium that it is) encouraging us to conform to a middle class ideal. It is also a particularly good example of how top down development doesn't work. The people of Castleford are intelligent enough to decide what they want from their town, despite the fact they say it with broad accents , bad haircuts and cheap clothes. There was one point where some other ponce said 'and this woman was actually very articulate'

One wanted to take that 'actually' out of his sentence and shove it somewhere very painful. Working class people aren't thick, so stop treating Castleford like it is. Or we will flatten you.

What we should flatten is the huge new Walmart(Asda) on the edge of town. Walmart have a long history of ruining small towns in the USA, a fact conveniently omitted by this program. No wonder they don't mention it, they whole idea is to encourage new development through flimsy design concepts. The fact that big developers are one a huge factor in the destruction of the town is skirted around, and ultimately left unquestioned.

Ultimately watching the programme the people included had a good grasp of the way they were being ignored, and that they did not want to be condescended to or regenerated by the middle classes. So I guess socialism seems to still be here - but without any political force to harness it.

Another spot on the world map betrayed by new labour. Maybe I should go home and unite an army of workers to bring the country back into the hands of the people, but then where would I get a decent cappuccino?*

Ps - The Guardian really irritated me with this little piece on the program, wittering on about the pronunciation of 'cas'. Yes our accents are different. Deal with it - and stop hoping that everyone there will regenerate into people who buy your sodding newspaper. The other annoying element of this is that despite the fact that the program is about the north, all his focus is on southerners. Yet again we are othered. I know I am taking this out of proportion and it's a tiny bit that he probably wrote in 5 minutes - but sod it, the world does not revolve around the home fucking counties......

* This is a load of nonsense, there are numerous places in Castleford where you can buy a cappuccino - I was just using it as an example of middle class consumption to illustrate my point.

You could replace it with 'vegan smoothie' or even 'bookshop that sells something other than dan brown and mills and boon' if accuracy is your thing.

Class and facebook

2008-07-19T14:01:00.009+01:00

I am going to post about class, hopefully people won't get too offended, as it does contain spoilers about Kung Fu Panda.

I am fortunate enough to have friends in a wide variety of class groupings, and obviously this is also the case on facebook. I recently noticed patterns in the profiles of people in different socio economic groups. I know these are generalisations, whenever one points out a pattern there are people who say 'oh oh , but that's not true, I'm different' - to which I reply, congratulations, you are an anomaly, here - have a sticker. (if you can pronounce an anomaly you may also have a lollipop)

The main difference is middle class =a fairly detailed profile in terms of movies, films books and quotes. Working class = little or nothing about movies etc, a lot of extra applications. Obviously there are exceptions, and class boundaries being the fuzzy things that they are this is inevitable. No profile at all and no applications can mean either.

It think this says a lot about what class now means in our uber-consumptive society. The middle classes are proud of their consumption because it marks out superior status. Liking certain movies or music, the ability to travel are not viewed as class accessories or evidence of economic status, but evidence of a cultured mind, of style and taste. Hence we are eager to display our consumption to others.

The way in which the working classes are derided is through their patterns of consumption, a sneaky way to insult the less fortunate without seeming to be an arsehole.

Thus the BBC tried to suggest that the term Chav was not about class, but how people behave and what they buy (well, um what actually is class if not patterns of behaviour and consumption?) when the fabian society rightly decreed it an insulting term this week.

Yeah people, you are ok, but only if you buy what we buy, and do what do what we tell you.

This becomes complicated because certain things actually are just shit, like the Sun and big action films etc. I don't think it is in any way classist for me to say 'that's rubbish' because ultimately Coronation street, big blockbusters and everything that is targeted at a working class populace is not ultimately created by the working classes. These elements of consumption also do their bit to re-enforce gender roles, racial stereotypes and ultimately keep poor people poor. This happens in a variety of ways, from the high street clothes which are sewn for next to nothing in the developing world, to the movies that re-enforce individualism and sell unattainable dreams.

An example being Kung Fu panda. I saw this at work the other day. It was a pile of crap- but it didn't need to be. The graphics were stunning, and the concept wasn't completely appaling. Jack Black in panda form gets told that he is the dragon of destiny warrior or something, and has to battle a scary tiger, who the chief master trained and who subsequently turned to evil. So far, so Star Wars.

(SPOILER coming.. I really don't want to ruin this movie for anybody, Dreamworks have done that themselves...)

In the end Jack Panda trains hard, realises his inner potential and kills the tiger dude. Now it would have been so so much better if Panda character had just used his warmth and compassion to win tiger back into a loving relationship with his adoptive father. If he realised that there was no need to train hard to beat people up as ultimately the human spirit is more important. But no - fat Panda somehow manages to be a Kung Fu god, rather than using what he has ( in this case, humour and cooking ability) to make a difference. Ie poor person could miraculously become rich if only they tried hard enough , rather than realising this not to be the case, and making things better in their own reality. It's also significant that Fat Panda only gets glory by being violent to others, there we go - capitalism is a violent system. Kung Fu Panda proves it.

It was yet another example of the ' fat sloppy white guy gets glory anyway despite the fact that others are in a better position to succeed' sort of movie, which has the stupid 'anyone can do anything' message.

A fact which reality shows us just isn't true. I don't think that is depressing, I think it can be liberating because it is the truth. The people who go from nothing to everything are highly publicised anomolies, and because the population is big enough there are a few of them. They are not the majority - I mean look at the leaders of the political parties - Blair went to Fettes ( the Eton of Scotland ) and Cameron went to the Eton of England. Often this is glossed over ( um Tony and Dave...) and people make themselves seem more 'working' than they are. (isn't that right Bush?)

This is largely to justify their own position, which I think is why people get offended when you start talking about class. Accepting our own privelage is tough, because life is crappy for everyone at times. It's not that fun to admit that it is generally crappier for some other groups of people.

I am not sure where this is going, nor do I particularly have an answer.. other then, um 'unite and overthrow capitalism in a somehow non violent fashion'.

I guess in the day to day not making people feel shit for what they wear or buy, whilst accepting that everyone's consumptive choices are limited and dictated by capitalism itself. Also not being too up ourselves for buying the 'right' things, or defining ourselves by this consumption. I like art, and I like stuff, and obviously Gorky's Zygotic Mynci fans are a superior breed of human. I am pretty bad when it comes to falling prey to the consumption of coolness (possibly because I am so damn cool). I think defining ourselves by consumption is one way which capitalism as a system is really very advanced, as it is a way in which we trap ourselves in it.

Loss

2008-07-10T22:58:00.002+01:00

Ok so I have written a poem about my feelings. It is very raw.

It's called loss. Every word is the very essence of truth.

Loss

You're not where you are supposed to be

My head

Without you all is fuzzy

You're nowhere near my bed

We were not together long

You were strong

Plastic

You made everything clear

In the morning you were gone

I haven't seen you since

I can't really see anything at all without you

I thought I'd learned my lesson

when I stepped on that other pair

I wasn't that drunk

You should be on my desk

Or at least down the side of my bed

When I look there's nothing there

How can a pair of glasses

Disappear in just one night

And why has one whole day passed

Without my specs in sight

I have some contact lenses

Enough to see me through

But if I don't find my glasses

I don't know what I'll do

Livid

2008-07-10T00:10:00.002+01:00

I have just been in an argument with 3 meathead fucks which made me question my faith in humanity. I also now realise that the BNP threat is not some distant unimaginable possibility.

We need to be challenging this shit now.

I try to be funny in this blog - but this will not be a funny post, I am fucking livid. It's the first time I have every seriously stormed out of anywhere, and the only reason I didn't make my political exit sooner was because it was the leaving drinks for a close friend.

It started out with a discussion, with one character who attempted to keep the peace by the usual ' we all have opinions' bullshit.

Anyway yes, me vs 3 BNP voter types. Happy times. The following opinions were expressed in all seriousness:-

* Black people are behind in evolutionary terms

* Imperialism was good, and only happened because white people were more advanced

* Black Africans are all lazy drunks who can't help themselves which is why they are poor

* Rape is not a women's rights issue, and men are just as vulnerable to rape

* Men rape because they can't help it when they have a hard on, we shouldn't blame them

I'm not going to write any more of what they said. Nor am I going to explain why the above is bullshit as I credit anybody who reads this blog with ownership of at least 1 maybe 2 brain-cells ( I guess I assume you are my friends and I tend to steer clear of racist misogynists wherever possible).

Obviously I got very angry and got into a big row, the other women there who I know don't agree remained quiet, the men with whom the argument was with were actually aggressive and a bit scary, so I don't blame them. They shouted at me for getting angry and kept throwing (hurling or perhaps slinging) the names of loads of 'scholars' or racist theorists or whatever, as a particularly aggressive form of attack. Am just so so angry and disappointed in the world, and like, what the fuck.

It was one of those things whereby even though I feel shaken and annoyed, I think it is important to talk about this stuff, even if it does end in a big argument that I have to walk away from. I doubt I will have changed anyone's mind, but it's better than keeping the peace in those situations. It's better than just sitting and making banal small talk, because people actually believe this crap and it might take a lot of energy but Jesus.

In the end I had to just ignore them and talk to my friends and then leave. I know that is a bit like admitting defeat but I was seriously outnumbered and not getting anywhere. Anyway after 5 days with serious lefties this was a reality check on what probably a disturbing number of people actually think.

It might not necessarily be a sign of equality, but I wish we treat could treat our legs like men's faces

2008-06-16T14:56:00.012+01:00

A friend in the pub said to me 'we should just treat leg/pit hair like men treat their facial hair, and have real freedom of choice'.

Now I don't think that all men are completely free to have facial hair if they want, after-all Gillette markets clean shaven as the 'professional' kind of look. Having a beard is not without connotations either, people may think you are a wise, a leftie vegetarian or very religious depending on your racialised group, and what kind of shoes you wear. Nor do I think the comparison between men's facial hair and women's body hair is really a true analogy - if we were really talking about equality we would be comparing body with body, but seen as we are so far away from the freedom to be hairy, I think it is an analogy worth pursuing.

In my experience as a hetero who likes to discuss and admire the faces of men, it transpires that women tend to like a variety of levels of shaving. I know one woman who is mad for beards, and considers facial hair long enough to braid as the pinnacle of sex. I also know women for whom clean shaven is the only acceptable option, I have even met someone who thinks that handlebar moustaches are actually cool.

Personally I am down with anything up to light beard, and think that stubble ( though itchy) can be attractive in a 'rugged' kind of way, that on the right person a beard can hide a weird chin, and that not having the hormonal requirements to grow much hair can equally be very attractive.

Having said that I would suspect that someone with a handlebar moustache is either very pretentious, or very evil or both.

I think it would be fantastic if women's bodily hair could be viewed the same way, that when I am stubbly a man might go 'mmm rugged, she didn't shave for a few days, she must be a bit wild'
or 'that armpit hair looks really natural and smooth I would like to stroke it'
Or even - 'she wears her legs hairy with those square glasses, how indie...'

I know a lot of women who consider their own hairiness to be deeply unattractive, but I think that is wholly due to the fact that it is constructed to be so. I mean if every man in every film was shown clean shaven, if literally no public figures had beards, if beards were seen as repulsive by the public at large and mocked in magazines, I doubt there would be many beards.

From personal experience ( which is not completely de-constructed, and I acknowledge that I too am a product of this beastly patriarchy) the two most comfortable states of leg/pit hair are totally shaved, or 4 days growth minimum. Anything in between is really annoying - and considering option A requires shaving every day and option B requires no shaving ever - I think I know what I will be doing if we ever get post patriarchy.

At present I like to dabble with option A and option B, but I do feel wary of showing my body when I am in option B.

This is a lot like being a hairy man who lives in a world without beards. A world where everyone seems to shave every day just to look normal, where all women everywhere are apparently repulsed by facial hair. One day the hairy man says 'no, this is stupid, I can't be bothered to spend money on razors any more. This hair grows naturally on my face, I am going to let it grow. I know I am hetero, and women are supposed to be repulsed by beards, but the right woman should just like me anyway damnit.' So he doesn't shave and he feels liberated at first - but when he goes out of his house the idea that he is repulsive and weird to everyone he sees, and has no hope of ever going out with a woman, plays on his mind so much that he has to buy a balaclava*, and eventually decides to shave.

I have a list of other hair based demands for women....

twiddling armpit hair to be the same as twiddling a beard, a sign of wisdom and being deep in thought.
leg hair to be seen as quite cool if you are in a band.
leg hair to be essential if you want to make folksy music.
armpit hair growing competitions along the lines of the world beard and moustache
armpit and leg hair to be desirable necessary for the ageing academic woman.
some sort of fad centred around shaving words or patterns into our leg hair ( good for teenagers)

Alix Olson does quite a funny song on the subject, (from a queer perspective, I know plenty of lesbians shave and all, but it is slightly different for hetero women)

Anyway I know there are more pressing issues for the modern feminist, but these are my thoughts for today.

* In 'this 'world without beards' there was never any connection between the balaclava and terrorism...

The Edinburgh Dungeons- another childhood memory shattered

2008-06-11T18:30:00.005+01:00

I went to the Edinburgh dungeons today on a 'staff development outing' ( I know sounds scarily like something that actual proper grown ups do, but I mostly went for the free lunch)

I didn't know what to think about the dungeons. I had previously been a bit of a fan, I went to the York dungeons for my 10th birthday and thought it was just about the best thing ever. This was during my 'outbreak/horrible history' phase, very much into infectious diseases and gruesome things in general. I was fascinated by every disgusting symptom of the plague and found torture disconcerting but intreguing. I have since visited all the dungeon franchise in the uk, though not for quite a while.

Before today I had a vague notion that feminists don't like the dungeons, and thinking about it I can understand why. The glorification ( or perhaps gorification) of violence against women in the form of the horrific treatment of women accused of witchery/prostitution, seems like simple enough anti-feminism - but still it is part of our past, and it can be good to leave the gory bits in history if it's done properly.
Unfortuntely the Edinburgh dungeons does not manage this, mostly as a result of their heavy reliance on attention seeking twerpy students who shout a lot and make humourless lewd innuendos.

I mean most of the acting was bad, that's ok, I expect that - these are not ex RADA they are a tourist attraction; the first guy though was not just a bad actor, but a complete jerk. Now I know that his role was supposed to be that of the complete jerk, but there are ways if pretending to be a nasty judge ( he was supposed to be a nasty judge - judge mental I think was his character, hmm clever) without resorting to racism and sexual harassment.

It was the bit where you are supposed to be at a trial, and he calls a member of our group up to the dock, who happens to come from India. He says ' Where are you from' she says 'India' to which he replies 'Well that's enough for me, go home - you're guilty, go back to where you came from'.

I think that counts as racism, and I think he sort of realised as he said after 'well that would have been more funny if you had come from Glasgow'. Perhaps, it certainly would have been less racist ( though you know quite regionalist/classist - but that's a whole other minefield).

Throughout his act he made lewd sexual comments to the women in the audience, accused women of being skanks - kept saying 'you love it don't you, you love it' over and over and over to various different women and girls. He looked in my direction at one point and said 'you love it don't you' to which I replied 'love what?'. Funnily enough at that point he started picking on someone else.The one man he called to the dock he accused of being gay and made loads of intensely homophobic comments(before ending with some Wales sheep shagging hilarity), and he called up a pre-teen girl and called her ugly. Good work.

I know these things are supposed to be mean, but it would be possible to do this without being hideously offensive (yes I do realise the contradiction in demanding that someone offends people in a non offensive manner, but you know what I mean, nastiness that doesn't emphasise or reflect societal opression)

He could have stuck to the surreal - like ' you have really smelly elbows' general weirdness, or witchcraft and the supernatural:-

'You are a witch' ' you like to eat pies made out of poo' 'you have been stealing other people's flowers and shoving them up your nostrils' etc etc....

Still at least acting the part of 'unpleasant human being number 01' wasn't much of a challenge for him.

Most of the actors were like this, and they were all, with only 1 exception - white men. The only female actor lead us from the boat bit into another room, and didn't do much performing. I remember the dungeons used to have some historical content but that seems to have almost totally disappeared.
As with much history there was 100% male narration, with women only featuring as vampires or victims of violence.There was a bit in the anatomy part where a guy tried to force one of the other women in our group to kiss this heart thing (I tried to touch it, but he wouldn't let me, would have perhaps de-mystified the whole thing if everyone had found out it was just a bit of brown rubber) whilst repeating 'I bet you've had worse on a Friday night'.
To top this off the blackboard it said 'women's brains are scientifically proven to be smaller than human brains'.
Now I know the past is sexist, damnit I know the present is sexist - but this wasn't about showing how unfair the past was - it was about yet another unfunny joke. It may have been more acceptable if there were female actors but the only women there seemed to work behind the reception or in the gift shop.

Anyway the whole thing is a pile of crap, and I am sad to add it to the 'list of things that I actually quite enjoyed as a child but will unfortunately not be letting my children experience*' along with Disneyland, MacDonalds food and caravan sites in Hornsea.

* should I ever have any, that is one ridiculously grown up thing that will not be happening for a long while

Um I know you're probably not the manager here but.....

2008-05-20T14:26:00.002+01:00

So I had this T shirt on my concience for a while, it is in this shop on North Bridge called Star. I don't wear little jackts with coloured stars on, but if I did I would certainly buy them elsewhere...

It has a little swoosh and it says Pikey, Just Nick It, though I misread it, I thought it said pikey 'just kick it' The first time I saw it I was suitabley appaled at what seemed to be the incitement of violence against a racialised group, but I was late for work, ok that's a convenient enough reason to just leave it for now...

Then on it continued with the mental excuses, like when you tell yourself you are too poor to buy the big issue, or sign up to give Oxfam a fiver a week . Still the little voice inside my head which whispers things like 'you know if you don't actively oppose this, you condone it' wouldn't shut up, so I decided to cross the road ( I had taken to walking on the other side - I think ' I can't go and say something because it's on the other side of the road' is the most pitiful of mental excuses)

So I went in and there was a woman with long black hair working at the till. Now I know the people in the shop didn't make the T shirt, and they probably hate their shitty jobs - which is why I feel bad complaining to them. Hence my approach is woefully sheepish, which is stupid because I know my point to be valid and ultimately right. Also I don't see why I should be the only one to have a pricking conscience, and someone did decide to order and sell that T shirt.

'Um I know you are probably not the manager here but, you're selling this T shirt that is kind of, well it's incitement of violence against a racialised group - that one that says pikey just kick it'
It was then pointed out that it says 'Pikey just nick it' which is worse really, but it meant a change in my argument ' Well um, that's just as bad, I mean it makes out that Gypsies just steal things'

An Emo guy came along and pointed out that the police had been in, and that they had a good laugh at it.

Aaaah the police, I thought, that well known force of justice, fairness and not being racist pricks.

'Yeah, but the police are a bunch of racist pricks' - I did indeed say that, I sensed it might give me a bit of crediblity. I mean these guys had lots of piercings, that necessitates a mistrust of the 'pigs' doesn't it?

(I am aware that there are probably some fanatastic anti racist individuals in the police force, and what I said was a generalisation and I should perhaps have said ' yes well, the police force is reported to suffer from problems of racism, both institutional and personal, though no doubt some individuals have good intentions, such a position of power is particularly open to abuse, and that the victims and purpotraters of crimes are really victims of an intrinsically unjust social system which the police form an opressive part of'. Still I think the basic point is the same.)

This made them smile and I think showed them that I had a sense of humour, god forfend we British ever be accused of not having a sense of humour. I sometimes think it is our biggest concern, something that has been shown in the recent london Mayoral elections, still I digress.

'People who call themselves pikeys have been in and they thought it was funny'

Now I am 99.9998% sure that is bullshit. I try to imagine the situation 'Hello there, I am a Romany Gypsy, with a long lasting heritage and I find the term pikey really rather amusing, and in no way offensive. I also find the fact that you reduce our historic lifestyle to mere theft to be particularly funny, which is afterall much more important than the fact that it encourages people to hate and mistreat us - do you know where I could pick up a copy of the Daily Mail?'

On the offchance that gypsy travellers did happen upon the T shirt, and laughed, this obviously does not make it ok. I also wonder if the term 'pikey' is understood in Scotland, and maybe he think it just means 'Ned'.

Anyway I mutter something about Edinburgh Lothian Race Equality Council, and leave, probably having made little difference but at least I don't have to cross the street to avoid my concience. Unless of course there are big issue sellers, or Oxfam direct debit recruiters..

My Atheism is My Privalage

2008-04-30T13:03:00.001+01:00

I am an athiest, but that hasn't always been the case. I was brought up in a Salvation Army family, I played carols on my trombone for old folks at christmas and believed in a god. Specifically Mr Christian God, though Jesus Mary and all the rest of it didn't always ring true.

I regard my athiesm as a faith because I think the most logical approach to religion is agnostocism. I mean there could be a large rabbit in the sky that generates solar systems simply by wiggling its ears, our measly
galaxy have been shat out by a 10 ton parrot in another dimension - nobody really knows*.

The reason I am an atheist is partly because of feminism. Somewhere along the line it occoured that the people who suffer most in this world tend to be a combination of black, non western, women. It may seem simplistic, but I came to the conclusion that no God worth following would shit so consistently on those who aren't white male and rich.

I know there are ways in which the problem of evil can be explained, and that there are deeper philosophical arguments which I am completely ignoring. It's not that I think these arguments are irrelevant, but because I had a more important revalation today.

That my Athiesm is one of my privalages as a white western woman, and that it is vital that a discussion on faith and feminism should understand what religion means from a non western perspective.

In the white western world (and here I am specifically talking about the US and the UK though this counts for much of Europe too)
we veiw religion as a sort of personal faith. Religion is an individual thing, about what you believe more than what you actually do. This has not come out of nowhere, it is the product of hundreds of years of Protestant Christianity dominating politics and culture. No matter how secularised we feel as a nation, we live with this legacy.

This legacy dictates that we tend to veiw other religons in terms of protestant christianity. This is clearly flawed, as many non protestant religions define themselves by practice, rather than through faith alone. We cannot talk about other religions in terms of belief and ignore their important social functions.

Similarly we shouldn't misunderstand the connection between religion and identity. This is what I mean by athiesm being my privalage.

I am white and from the west, and my previous religious identity was protestant christian, therefore it is very easy for me to abandon.
I can say 'hey guess what, I'm an athiest now' and no one will say to me, 'but you're really jewish aren't you?' or 'I thought you were a sikh?'. That is one of the privalages connected to the colour of my skin and the country of my birth.

For the protestant christian, their religion need not be a part of their identity because for so many years it has been the norm. This is not the case for muslims, jews, sikhs, hindus, catholics etc. If you are born into one of these religions it is likely to be a part of your identity whether you want it to be or not. Even if you abandon all religous practice, you may still be identified with that particular religion. This is because these religions are the 'other' and protestant christianity is the norm - just as white skin and having a willy are also viewed as normative.

Abandoning your religion may not be an option, nor may it be desireable because it is so connected to an 'othered' identity. Religion may be a source of strength and community where a community is opressed,the practices of religion may serve an important social function which cannot be cast aside in the name of ideology.

This is why my athiesm is very much my privalage. I think one of the problems that could be connected to faith and feminism is the misunderstanding of religion, and of athiesm itself. It is important to understand that athiesm is actually an intrinsic part of protestant christianity.
Even though I can give up my christianity, I cannot give up my privalage which arises from that particular religion, and its history of political dominiance.

I am not saying that there are only white athiests, or that it is impossible to become an athiest if you were not previously protestant christian. Of course that is possible, but more of a previous religious identity is likely to be retained.
Nor do I wish to suggest that white protestants do not view their christianity as part of their identity. I know many that do, and I know it can be complex. The Salvation Army for example has an important social function and it does remain a part of my identity despite my lack of belief in god and copious consumption of alcohol.

Thus I guess what I am saying is that even athiests cannot seperate religion from culture, even if you abandon religion it is still a vital part of your cultural context.
This is a result of history which we cannot just ignore, but the fact that protestant christianity is so normative makes it harder to see. Particularly for the dawkins generation.

So then though I am an athiest I think this is my privalage as a resident of a protestant christian coountry. I don't think you have to be an athiest to be a feminist, (even though I think Mr Christian God, and indeed Mr Allah and any of the other male conceptions of a deity are patriachal**) because the social function of a religion may be seperate from actual belief. Nor am I saying that you can't be a feminist and believe in a god - but I think it probably makes it harder.

Phew...

* Not even Douglas Adams
** I do not wish to imply that all conceptions of the deity are masculine. Having said that if there is a female god then she is a maschocist.

A silly song/poem/distraction

2008-04-22T22:58:00.004+01:00

A song dedicated to the bad mood which is just not romantic in any way. And to the possible failing of impending exams.

Even Morrissey lets me down…….

When even Tuesday morning
Is silent and grey
And the working classes
Have got nothing good to say

When you are no-one’s fatty
Or even someone’s lass
And there’s nothing less poetic
Than being middle class

One thing I wonder
As I brood around this town
Is why continue to respire
Even Morrissey lets me down

I used to think you got me
That you really knew
But there’s more to life than books you know
And more to life than you

I tried hiding in my room
When I felt I was ignored
I did it for 10 minutes
and just got really bored

I mooched around a council block
And a factory floor
I didn’t find my muse
They were all just rather poor

I thought then I’d be celibate
You made it seem so great
But all I do is think of sex
And often masturbate ( am I doing it wrong Morissey?)

I hated my successful friends
I tried it once or twice
But that was also difficult
They’re all just really nice

I tried to hang the DJ
But they kicked me out the pub
They thought I was a mentalist
And hit me with a club

I gave up eating meat for you
I gave up eating fish
Now I’d swap my copy of ‘The queen is dead’
For a large bacon sandwich

One thing I wonder
As I brood around this town
Is why continue to respire
Even Morrissey lets me down

Asexuality

2008-04-02T00:54:00.009+01:00

One of the wonderful things about the internet is how much it facilitates learning stuff, lots of stuff, stuff you never even thought about thinking about. This week I have been learning about asexuality through a fantastic website AVEN. Asexuality seems like one of those things that it seems obvious exists, like the stock market or electricity. And like the electricity and the international markets, I have no idea how asexuality works, or at least didn't until I became fascinated by this website (it didn't tell me anything about the nasdaq but that's ok, I'm not really interested)

I am not asexual, I have known I had a sex drive for a very long time, pretty much ever since I bought Pulp's, 'Different Class' .
Not only that, but I think sex is pretty much the most interesting thing ever. How ,when, why, with whom, how what we do is connected to and/or constructed by the world in which we live. I could talk about sex until the cows come (yup there it is, the worst joke I have ever made) I appreciate that some people like to keep these things private, which is probably why it is all so interesting.

So learning that there are a whole group of people out there who just don't have sexual attraction to anybody, seemed like a bit of an alien concept to me. Hard to get to grips with, what do they do in relationships? how come they don't want to have sex, I mean that's like not wanting to eat surely?
The more I read of this site the more I realised that asexuality is a perfectly valid thing, and the fact that the world we live in is so hyper-sexual (at least our western one) explains why few people understand asexuality. Part of me was like, 'huh, lucky them - never have to worry about going ages without sex'. This is a completely stupid reaction; in a world where everybody expects sexuality being asexual could be very isolating. It must be very difficult having people think that there is something wrong with you (probably more tough than extended dry periods)
Asexuality is probably less understood than homosexuality even though it is not a particularly difficult concept. You may be attracted to men, women , (trans men trans women queers tick as many boxes as you wish) or just nobody. There are people I am attracted to and people I am not, it is perfectly logical and valid that a person just might not be attracted to anybody.

The AVEN website is fascinating because people are so open about their relationships and sex lives, I guess because they frequently encounter so much curiosity. Where I do think that it would totally be within their rights to say - 'we are asexual, deal with it, and fuck right off with your patronising curiosity' I do find it fascinating hearing so many people talk about how their relationships work in a totally non-sexual context. (Even though again, it's not very difficult to understand, I have very emotionally involved friendships with people I am not sexual with.)
Most of the relationships people speak about, do seem very deep and worthwhile and there is even something appealing about the way that they are always looking for something which to me seems 'beyond sex'. Though thinking about it, it's not really 'beyond sex' it's just without it. An absence of something that has never been there anyway. For a sexual person, the mutual understanding and emotional connection may be 'beyond sex', because we tend to measure our relationships by the act of intercourse. Sex first, other stuff later. People we sleep with, people we don't. It's romanticising asexuality to assume that their relationships are automatically 'deep and meaningful', they may or may not be, asexuals are just not oriented toward sexuality so they just won't want sex, or at least they won't have sexual attraction. They are not choosing something very deep over something shallow, they just don't want sex. It's like if a person just doesn't like chocolate so they don't eat it. They may or may not be healthy ( they might stick to fruit and veg, or they might always eat fry ups for example)
Still I find myself admiring these relationships that don't have sex at their core, and can't help thinking that maybe sexuals have something to learn from asexuals in the way we value relationships.

Then again, I also can't help fancying the pants off the main spokesperson for asexuality David Jay....

This is a trailer for a documentary on asexuality which looks quite interesting.

I guess it's good to understand other people, and there are so many things in life that make us aware of the massive multiplicity of experiences, and allow us to step outside our own.
It does make me wonder where asexuality and feminism all fits together. if you believe sexuality to be socially constructed then that goes for asexuality too. We don't want to be hetero-normative, how does asexuality fit into that? How does one avoid being 'sexual-normative'? Perhaps this is all rather individualistic and there are plenty of much more pressing issues out there above and beyond the sexuality of individuals.
Anyway that's all for now, would be interested in the thoughts of others.

Bits of inconsequential unconnected minor good stuff

2008-03-28T22:07:00.008Z

Something I have got quite into lately is pulling,( the programme, not the process of going out and acquiring a sexual partner, that's not bad either). I didn't expect it to be all that good, but turns out it's funny and honest with some good female characters. In the first episode Sharon Horgan's character is miffed because all her friends went out and had wild adventures on a night she stayed in. Definately one of those 'Damn I'm so like that' moments of TV
(the first time I ever felt that I was 10 years old and it was whilst watching an episode of the simpsons where Lisa gets pissed off because there is nothing left to protest about. Luckily as I grew up I realised there is always something to protest about)

I guess I mention this because I am in and it is half past 11 on a friday. Prime adventure having time. Tonight instead of an adventure I went to lidl, but I must have been in the adventure frame of mind as my shopping bag resembled a game of 'when I went to the supermarket I bought' played by precocious middle class children.
I always thought planning meals was for losers, but I may have to start doing it as I came home with blueberries, wine, little ranch farmyard jelly creatures, green tea and most excitingly crabs - 8 for £4 complete with shells and faces. Now I am thinking about defrosting one of them and carefully placing it in various uexpected locations within our flat. mwah haha.

I was in a good mood today for no reason, so I thought I'd blog as I generally tend to write when pissed off. It started off well, I got 2 fantastic books in the post, Black British Feminism - a reader, and Blue Pills. Read quite a bit of the feminism book, it has some really good essays in though I felt guilty for sitting about reading academic stuff which is completely not related to my impending exams. Blue Pills I read in one sitting and is just wonderful. It's a graphic novel about one man's relationship with someone he learns early on is HIV+. It is absolutely fantastic, I never thought I could love a graphic novel so much.

Blue Pills was so good my walk to work was almost joyful, and I noticed all the things about Edinburgh that make me feel happy, and strangers didn't seem like a sea of morons but interesting people with lives and stories..
my thoughts were somewhere along the lines of
'SOLIDARITY, EQUALITY , ORGANISE REVOLUTION!! Hell yes, I'm with you, when does it start? what brilliant graffitti- someone wants things to change so much they have sprayed it on the wall, look that pigeon has a tuft on it's head that looks like a mohecian, brilliant - hey look at that EMO girl wearing flares and a big black T shirt just to hang out, how fantastic, isn't youth brilliant'
and so on and so forth. Far too happy, in retrospect.

Up yours Enoch and The BBC

2008-03-19T00:02:00.004Z

I got a letter from the BBC complaints department which I thought I would re-produce here for shits and giggles. I was quite excited to get a personal email back after my complaint about their 'Enoch Powell might have been right, everybody better go out and buy the Daily Mail so they can beat a black person to death with it' - 'documentary'.
Ok , so I don't think it was called that, but the whole thing basically tried to suggest that old Enoch was right, a patriot and that his concerns were legitimate. It had a definate pro Powell bias, it's horrible and can be veiwed here ( for the next 6 days) should you wish.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/b009g794.shtml?q=enoch+powell&start=1&scope=iplayersearch&go=Find+Programmes&version_pid=b009n4mb

Naturally the idea of someone complaining to the BBC conjours up the image of some grey haired old fusspot, with too much time on their hands, whinging because someone said fuck before the watershed. All this has changed with the internet and if you are annoyed you can complain very easily.
Now this isn't a very well written complaint because it was late, and its rushed - but here it is anyway :-

"I am writing to make a complaint about the so-called examination of enoch powell's speech which was both racist and inflamatory. I found the documentary to be very oversimplifying, it completely failed to look into racist immigration legislation, the consequences of imperial history or infact the way the media was itself racist in the 60s and 70s. The programme continually asked if enoch was right, which is completely objectionable. It harked back to some kind of working class nostalgia by portraying working class white people as somehow the voice of the british.
>It made multiculturalism and immigration seem like the problem, without ever asking if it might be something to do with the fact that racism is, and always has been inherent within British society.
>Dockers were not portrayed as racist, but the students were labelled 'radical' for taking a stand against racism. Enoch's speech was called a 'prophecy', you said without any proof that communities are divided, there was large amounts of racist footage without any qualifiers, and the programme ended in a way that suggested that Powell was right
>The whole thing was objectionable and highly offensive, racist veiwing. I thought the BBC was better than that."

If you want a much more academic veiw from an actual historian, Joe Street* wrote a much better letter of complaint here:-

http://www.irr.org.uk/2008/march/ha000020.html

It has a lot of proper facts and makes the point much better than I did.

Anyway the BBC responded - however I have just noticed that the email they sent me is apparently 'confidential' and may not be republished anywhere without their permission. I am very tempted to ignore this - but instead I will paraphrase their response. If you want to see the real thing then ask me and you can read it.The BBC did not say the following...

" I can see that you thought our documentary was a racist piece of crap because that's what you said in your lettter'

" Powell was super dooper, he was a very smart man who had a lot of ideas on different policy areas (economic/identitiy which are still pretty important now" ( ideas like send home the 'pecanninnies'? Hitler was a very smart guy but you don't see documentaries waxing lyrical about his intelligence and foresight - I am not saying he was Hitler but my point remains)

" There were more anti powell than pro powell commentators" I don't think this is actually the case, but still you don't see many pro hitler comment on documentaries about him. There is a reason for that.

" We used footage of people in the 50s 60s and 70s with veiws that make us feel squirmish' exactly yes you did, without every condemning them as racist, you made that all seem ok and normal.

"Look we did try and challenge Powell's use of language and criticised his racism" ahem no, you didn't, I watched the documentary and work for an anti racist organisation. I can tell a challenge to racism when I see one, that was not it.

"Immigration is important and a real concern for loads of people, and even big important people think so, like MPs and opinion formers and even the arch bishop of cantebury, so stop moaning"

Who the fuck is an 'opinion former'- what kind of creepy thing is that? Am I an opinion former cos I write this blog, do you mean Richard Littlejohn and his satanic ilk? Is it some kind of computer telling us all what normal people think? Who are these opinion formers and what do they do? Also I never said immigration was not a worthy debate, it is one that should be examined in a non simplifyingway which considers the issue from many sides, not just the racist side of one Tory MP. Also the arch-bishop of Cantebury? Whoopdie shit, who cares!

* is it me or is that the coolest name for a historian ever?

More of the same then...

2008-03-12T15:58:00.001Z

The essay is done and I am in one of the library computing labs.

I thought I would write some more blog partly because it's so theraputic. Virginia Woolf wrote 'To the lighthouse' as some sort of therapy, I have this blog. I guess it's up to you to decide which is better.

I also need to look busy to justify being at a computer, before the guilt of watching people meander about the place who really need computers ( probably to finish typing up their PHDs on curing all cancer no doubt) kicks in, and I get the hell out of here.

I am stalling partly because I'm tired, and partly because I have misjudged time. I have to be somewhere a bit far away in 2hours 45 minutes - I could go home, I don't live too far away... I fear if I go home I won't actually be able to leave the house, ever again, ever. I'll just sit there ordering takeaways until the bank come round and demand that I pay off my overdraft,by this time I will probably be so fat that I can live off incapacity benefits, and my life will resemble a cross between one particularly funny episode of the Simpsons, and a channel 4 documentary/freak show about hyper obesity.

Anyway yes, so my options are - hand this essay in, bum around uni, bum around town- which I will probably do in a zombiefied stupor like the zombie who just realised that their existence in zombie form is really meaningless, and all anyone ever does is consume at the expense of others (hang on a minute....)

One thing that made me despair today was taking out the bin on my way here. I had finally left the house, (only about an hour after I had decided to - wow)

I decided to take out the bin bag like the concientious flatmate that I am. I am about to fling it in to the big bin when, to my horror the bin liner collapses. A moldy apple falls at my feet, the bag breaks apart and last nights takaway container drifts down the street. All I can do is stare at it with bin juice all over my hands (is there anything more gross than bin juice? I mean last night I made rice and drained it in a collindar, and there was all this white rice water which was just like semen, and it was all over the dishes in the sink.That was pretty gross - but not as gross as bin juice)
In my tired state the takeaway container looked like a metaphor for umm, I dunno 'sad'?

anyway that killed 20 minutes....

There was a happy ending, the bin bag made it into the bin,I washed my hands and this essay though crap is finished - hurrah!

Wasted Wednesday

2008-03-12T14:14:00.007Z

I am tired, so tired, the sort of tired when everything stops making sense, and the world is tinged with a kind of horror and weirdness and your whole conciousness feels like it's full of fluff. I am not yet out of the house, I will get there at some point, I do have stuff to do, I just keep having to stop and stare and remember to keep my body moving.

I stayed up doing an essay, actually that's a total lie. I stayed up until 1:30 doing my essay, inbetween writing nothingy comments on friends walls and 'oh so pithy' status updates, so that the facebook world remembers that I am a bag of hilarity. Then I gave up - but the half litre of coffee I had consumed was reluctant to quit. Luckily I found a lush song which is, like, totally about my life, so I listened to it again, and again and again. I mimed the words, i thought about putting it on compiliation cds for parties, I surfed the web.

I love coffee and I quite like the effect lots of coffee has in speeding you up (I have never taken proper drugs...is that obvious?) but not on a weekday, it's not good to have a burning desire to dance around at 3 in the morning when you are alone, with a flatmate sound asleep in the next room. Obviously you can dance, but it involves putting headphones into your computer at which point you start to feel like a tosser (or flicker lets not be phallocentric here), but hell - it's 3am and you are 21 and full of caffine!!! At points you do wonder - what if my flatmate comes in, what if I am accidentally making too much noise,this music is just in my head isn't it? I would honestly rather be caught masturbating, everybody definately does that, I am not sure that everyone abandons their totally shite essay at 1700 words in favour of miming to mid 90s britpop.

Speaking of masturbating, something similar is eating a takeaway food alone. Eating a takeaway alone makes me feel sadder than drinking alone because at least that has some pretence of glamour (if it's red wine and you are me, and you wear a beret). Luckily my flatmate came back and ate a pizza whilst I ate my satay squid and pork dumplings so I didn't dispair. I reheated them just now and am currently worried that squid and pork left overnight unrefridgerated and then reheated might be a surefire recipie for food poisioning. I feel ok so far, though in my super tired state it did dawn on me how weird it was to eat tentacles for breakfast.

Anyway I am going to go now as I am still not in the library. Sometimes I worry that this blog doesn't suit it's title -today is not one of those days.

Miserable Mondays

2008-03-10T17:59:00.003Z

I am starting to notice a pattern to my life - I don't like mondays, I'm not sure why,It's probably because I tend to read the paper inbetween lectures.Mondays do seem to be the origin of general dispair at the state of things.The generally make me want to shoot the whole week down, the rest of the month and perhaps certain political figures into the bargain.

Such as John Hutton, the labour minister for greed, who has today said that we should be congratulating people* with huge salaries. As if money and power are not enough, apparently they deserve a pat on the back for doing so darn well with their lives. Apparently we should not question the morality of money, I mean morality is for losers and poor people - who needs morality when you have a fuck off house in Surrey?

You can read the story here http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/mar/10/johnhutton.executivesalaries

He reckons we should question why this success isn't open to everyone, it amazes me that people can be so stupid.

Speaking of stupid there is the BBCs White Season which started at the weekend. I must admit I haven't watched anything so far but perhaps later, if I feel like being embarressed by an institution I will generally defend, I will have a look on iplayer.
However this advert for it makes me feel very uncomfortable.

I know for a fact that the British working classes have a raw deal, see any comments I have made about castleford below. The reason that working classes have a raw deal is because the middle classes dominate institutions like the BBC and put out stuff like this which is at worst horribly racist and at best incredibly misguided.

Watching this advertisment is like watching some kind of BNP recruitment video - I mean a brown hand writing on a male white face in black, until it disappears into black?!! Who are these brown people putting down the working class? In the main, what are the colour of the faces of those in political power, what are their gender (with one hideous exception from 79-90 - though I would question whether non human beings actually have gender)

Class is a structure of opression like race and gender, and I do think the working classes should be better represented, working classes of all racialised groups and genders -all this does is fuel race tension in an insidious fashion. The white working class doesn't have much of a say in things, I dare say they had little say in this programming. They certainly don't write articles for the sun, or for Eastenders or any of the other patronising stereotype peddling media.

Anyway I have much studying to do , Yuri Prasad expresses writes about this well here

I ate a really good sandwich today, from a new sandwich shop on the corner of buccleuch street. They use really good brie - it was really strong and flavourful - and they used lots of it. It had ham and rocket on a seedy roll.It has been the highlight of my day so far, thank goodness I made it into the middle class...

* I use 'people' but I could use 'men' here quite comfortabley - though I have too much to do to find a list of the 100 best paid in the uk to prove that most of them are men

Sporty Saturdays !

2008-03-09T13:12:00.003Z

Somewhere along the line it occoured to me that getting exercise would be positive (possibly I realised that heart disease wouldn't accept 'but I have period pain' as an excuse).

I have always hated sport, i come from a family that is genetically lazy (my dad has been known to drive to the corner shop) at school I had puppy fat that bordered on childhood obestiy, and even afer I lost this i was still the worst in the class by quite a long way. Luckily being smart, having a sense of humour and being a girl, nobody really cares.
Anyway I have decided to try and get more excersize through something that I enjoy because, well, I really would like to live a long time. I have great plans for my old age, most of which involve dyeing my hair bright blue, being cantakerous and weird and maybe even acquiring a toyboy 'ala Harold and Maude.

With all this in mind (particularly the toyboy) I think it's time to get active. Filled with enthusiasm and joined by a friend I embark on some saturday morning Badminton at the University of Edinburgh's Badminton club. Firstly getting dressed - now obviously my wardrobe is not over filled with sporty clothing.I have some red trouser things that are like a cross between joggers and skinny jeans (which I bought at connect festival because I was too stupid to bring anything warm to sleep in) I also have a baggy black Gorky's Zygotic Mynci T shirt and some maroon trainers. I think to myself - this will have to do. I look like a chubby indie geek, not someone who can really hit cock, but never mind.

First step get some badminton racquets - we find one in the Bethany shop, and then we pass this junk shop near Peckhams. I recommend everyone goes check this shop out, it's absolutely fantastic. It's run by this old guy who is misc foreign, with a lively sense of humour, and it is just piles and piles of stuff. Nothing has a price on it, he has everything- boots, bikes, accordians, badges and a lot of badminton racquets - which he gets out for me to look at. I have my eye on a very fetching retro wooden thing and I ask how much. He asks how much we paid for Amreet's, we say £2 - he then wants £6 (!) but I get it for £4 in the end, which I know is possibly too much, but it's such a fantastic shop.

Anyway we have racquets and we are now on our way to the pleasance, when it starts absolutely pissing it down. I have no other shoes just tatty old trainers and I begin to wonder if we have come to play badminton by mistake.

We eventually get there and leave our stuff in the changing room, first thing I notice is that there are a lot of people here - why are they not at home in bed? I begin to feel rather self concious as I obseve all the toned legs and proper gym wear. I usually enjoy looking a bit different, but not now - now I feel like a fraud, like it is very obvious that I do not do sport on a regular basis, and someone is about to come up to me and direct me to somewhere I would feel more at home, the nearest place that dispenses cake perhaps.

The courts are very full, and I revert to my P.E self of years gone by, and stand around making jokes with Amreet about how crap we are (I refrain from cock jokes as I am sure that these badminton people have heard them too many times before, and it may lead to some sort of social death within the badminton world). We completely fail to assert ourselves and get a court, and I feel very daft even though I can actually play badminton. It is quite conspicuous that we are outsiders and one of the friendly regulars takes us under their wing. We play a game, it was fun. My racquet was mocked by the regulars and they said I should play with one of thiers ( tsch! but it looks so cool, and it has a picture of an aeroplane on it and everything)

Anyway we play one game, and then fail to assert ourselves some more and do some kick ass standing around. After this I went to the parliament to give out abortion rights news letters. I am the pro choice majority! Actually there were 4 of us, which is quite funny - I guess the rest of the pro- choice majority didn't know about this, are asleep or perhaps out playing sport.

http://www.abortionrights.org.uk/ - for more information.

Miss Stupid Body

2008-02-20T23:50:00.003Z

So it seems that there is a beauty pagent between all the Universities in Edinburgh. It's called Miss Student Body. Does anybody here think that's not horrible and sexist? Good, we are agreed then. There is a Mr Student Body apparently coming soon - a nice tokenistic effort to give them some kind of ( particularly weak ) argument against feminists. Either that or they are just exploring other markets, as that is what the whole thing is about. It's a big advertising scheme where they get your university email in order to target advertise to you. This is why they ask you what your favourite shows/films/music are - they claim that it's about 'personality' because personality is apparently important ( which is why it's called Ms Student Personality, oh wait...). Funny then that personality is dictated by your consumption! Their last question is 'what would you spend your money on' - whatever happened to 'how would you make the world a better place?'
They even have a thing on their sponsors page about 'the next generation of brand conscious consumers'........ excuse me while I throw up.

I think this should be the focus for some entertaining action - I have had a few ideas,one of my favourites is entering with the worst possible photo of myself ( complete with suitable jokey feminist slogan - perhaps objectify this!) and seeing how many votes I can get. Now I'm quite good at looking bad by accident, but when I try to look horrific I'm amazing. My face becomes a wonderful contortion of teeth and flab, I look like I have a serious facial disability, it's quite amusing ( though I shouldn't really use it as part of my flirting repoirtie, wouldn't want anyone to think that it was my orgasm face or anything)

A FEW DAYS LATER........

I have entered and am now contestant 93 with a gurned up face, and a thing on my hand saying objectify this and a nicely contemptuous profile. As there aren't many contestants so far I am reluctant to draw attention to the thing, also you have to be a student in Edinburgh with a University email to see the profile ( you also have to give them your uni email - so I can understand if you don't want to go look at it!!)

To be honest I thought they might moderate my profile - but no, am in it. Now to see if there are any Edinburgh wide gurning contests.....

Monday in a Feminist Wasteland....

2008-01-28T17:34:00.000Z

So this post is going to be somewhat self reflective, that's ok, that's what Mondays are all about. Mondays and Live Journal but I can't keep up with 2 blogs at once...

The day started off well, I was pleased at the guardian for featuring this story as their front page lead.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianpolitics/story/0,,2247987,00.html

It's about the whiteness and maleness and richness ( or at least upper middle classness) of these high court judges. They also gave me a free mug. It was looking like it was going to be a good day.

I took my paper and got a coffee in the DHT cafeteria, putting my coat beside me on the floor. There was plenty of floor space, it was not blocking anything, nonetheless some old guy comes up and stands by me - staring at the coat.
"Is that how you treat your clothes?" he says, in the same way you might talk to a particularly immature 12 year old. I mumble something about it falling off the chair - he says " Well there is a chair there" and walks off.
I spend the rest of the time between my lecture fuming, what a jerk ! I'm 21 and have been wrecking my clothes with wild abandon for years, I buy them with money I earn(or borrow), I bear the consequences. I thought of all the things I should have said to him like ' Yes it is, is that how you think you can speak to people?' even just 'Bog Off' would have better than my wimpered submission. It put me in a cross mood for most of the morning.

Now obviously I cannot prove that this man felt as though he could talk to me like a child because I am younger than him, or because I am a woman. One of the frustrating aspects of Feminism is though some things you can prove, some of the other little opressions like old curly haired jerk (he never told me his name so it will have to be Curly - the big old jerk) are difficult because it is so easy to just reduce them to individual experiences. Take this to its natural conclusion and social problems cease to exist.

In the afternoon I had an English Literature tutorial on T.S Eliot, who I dislike (what can I say, old white dead/nearly dead men not in my good books). I dislike him because he is one of these elitist conservative old dead white men who we waste far too much time on in Literature. Bits of The Wasteland are ok, and I don't even mind the love song of J Alfred Prufrock, but I detest his essay 'Tradition and the Individual Talent'.

If you are not familiar with it I shall sum it up here - poets are a part of a glorious history of white male writers from Europe who are so much part of our heritage,that they live in the present. A good poet is not really connected to his work (women aren't poets obviously, neither are people from anywhere other than Europe) poems are these objective entities to be interpreted in themselves. Poets are cataylists who transform this glorious white male european tradition into something new/objective.

Read it if you want, I think it's dumb. As if poems aren't written with any intent, as if writers live in a vacuum. We were asked at the beginning of the tutorial what we thought and I said that I thought it was horrible crap, because it basically asserts the importance and dominance of rich white men over literature, and the whole concept of poets being seperate from poems is pathetic nonsense.

Some conservative guy stuck up for Eliot throughout, and I argued my point. When he said he thought Eliot was good I asked why. It turned out, in that instance, I had misheard, he was saying that he thought the girl who was presenting was good ( oops, me and my big mouth!). It's ok it was all realised, it wasn't too embarressing - I did not appear to be a colossal bitch. It was a pretty good tutorial really, we went into the politics of the canon, there was debate (me and the mature student agreeing Eliot to be up his own arse, two Jack Willis clad guys from the south of England thinking perhaps we haven't given him a fair go)

Anyway my main point here is that on my way out I was walking alongside the guy who I had disagreed with, and I said

'Didn't mean to come across so agressive in there'

What the?!! He jovially replied 'It was good! It's a shame we didn't get more time'
Why the hell did I say that?
'I am sorry for asserting my opinion'.
I know why I said it, he was next to me and I wanted to make some conversation because I didn't want to look like a bitch. It was then I realised how much we internalise these ideas about gender. All I had done was assert a valid point, it wasn't something I should have been apologising for.
Equally here we see the importance of language - heterosexual men don't get called bitches, and thus can assert themselves as much as thy like without thinking 'I hope they don't think I'm a bitch'.

What a loser! To top it off the German society have a poster of a woman's ample cleavage to advertise their event 'bodacious beer'. I had some stickers in my bag left over from a feminist network meeting. The best thing I could think of to write was 'This crap is why I'm a feminist' ( I thought about putting sexistisch but that might not mean what I think it does...). It felt good though.

If only I could find Curly - the big old jerk, I could put one on his back......

This is what I got when I typed 'Curly the big old jerk' into google images. Yeah ....you kiss my shoes Mr....

Wil Hodgson and others....

2008-01-21T01:02:00.000Z

I just spent a night at the stand for some , ahem 'comedy'. I had heard good things about the headline act Wil Hodgson and looked forward to seeing him. It was such a shame that watching his act necessitated sitting through the drivel that was the acts which preceded him. I was with a particularly awesome friend who had a hard time calling it shit, prefering to deem it lazy and stupid, and not her sense of humour. I am not that gracious*. It was a piece of shit. I don't admire stand up comics just for being confident any more than I would admire the confidence of a teenage boy getting his dick out on the bus. Nor am I particularly worried about hurting anyone's feelings - I think if you get on stage and say something you are accountable for it. I wouldn't judge harshly someone with poor material or poor delivery, but the world doesn't occour in a vacuum and what we say affects other people. Thus offensive stand ups deserve slating. Comedy is always political, whatever its about.

Throughout the night I sat there thinking , either I don't have a sense of humour or I am surrounded by morons.
(ok so I appreciate here that I am being horrifically elitist and of course I think the capitalist patriachal system forces people into appreciating crap)

So yes - in the spirit of pretending to be a journalist ( though not one who abides by grammatical convention - oh no.)

MY CAPSULE REVEIW!!!!

John Whale was up first. A chripy geordie lad whose jokes lacked originality, but were mostly inoffensive. He chose cliche as his topic and made some amusing observations which were tied together well. Not hilarious or smart, but didn't make me feel any hatred. hurrah.

When Martin McAlistar took to the stage my heart sank. Having seen him before at lemon custard I knew I was in for 10 minutes plus of boredom. His stories revolve around himself being a stalker.There are no jokes, just a particular slow style of delivery that might somehow delude people into thinking he is funny. He makes light of sexual harrassment, stalking and then goes on to tell an obvioulsy made up story which derives its 'humour' from the idea of a promiscuous woman. Funnily enough I don't find sexual harrassment amusing, but then I am female, and like most women I have experienced sexual harrassment**. It's never funny. The same can be said of Martin.

Dee Custance was better. Not hilarious, and she did tend towards 'dippy' comedy, but she was very likeable/ amusing in places.Has definate potential.

Gus Tawse was awful. It's hard for me to remember his exact material as I have seen his type of comedian too many times before. The audience seemed to get into it, jokes which stuck out were not wanting Madeliene McCann's mum for a babysitter ( because obviously just the mother's fault....) something about a girl not wanting to sleep with him so he shot her in the legs ( aah yes sexual violence, it's just such a larf).I can't remember the rest but it was repulsive.

Wil Hodgson was like a breath of fresh air by the time he came to the stage,and it was disappointing that his set was so short , with his material about liking 'real' women (not feminist as such, but woman friendly) taking up most of the time. You could tell that he would put on a good show given a little more time to build his persona, unfortunatley he was pushed for time and a bit lack lustre(maybe he had just sat through the acts on before him). Watching him was like getting to know a brillinat non conformist, who you know has 'lived': I was interested in what he had to say. It was a shame that he didn't talk about more than just readers wives and my little pony, but I felt like he was going to. He also said that people who read nuts ought to have their heads bashed in with a sledge hammer (solidarity brother; though lets start with the publishers shall we? Anyone know the way to the headquaters of EMAP?)

The whole thing was compered by Joe Heenan, who was very much that annoying kid at school who thinks he is funny because he can do lots of voices. He also went in for some of that 'lets offend the audience' type stuff, and he said that a woman who was 19 looked about 12, I mean he would know, that was the sort of mental age his compering was aimed at.

All in all a mediocre night, I would see Wil Hodgson again but it was tough sitting so much appaling offensive drivel.

* said friend made a very good point about this blog : when I say that I hope people like Rupert Murdoch die of cancer weakens my arguments. It probably does, I can't help it. I still think Rupert Murdoch deserves to die from a very painful cancer.

** am not trying to speak for all women BUT every woman who I have ever spoken to about this can identify an incident where they have been sexually pestered/harrassed/threatened in some way. Anecdotal perhaps, true yes.

Sex......... with Mum and Dad

2008-01-14T14:44:00.000Z

I live without TV, but I have newly discovered the BBC I player in my quest to watch Louis Theroux, a long term object of my affections.I came across a show called Sex ....with mum and dad. Naturally my curiousity was aroused, particularly owing to the fact that this was a BBC show, not some sort of channel 5 orgy of incest.
It managed to remind me why I hate TV, why the media are by enlarge evil, and why a revolution is really very long overdue.All this and I generally like documentaries about sex.

The premise is that 2 families have issues with .....SEX ( this is how the narration was, a nice BBC voice which gave dramatic pauses before forcefully emphasising the word .....sex. Really very funny)
Can a SEXologist from the Nether Region help them out with her frank and honest approach? Will chatting about wanking infront of their parents give these youngsters healthier sex lives and 'sort out their families'?

The show introduced us to a girl of 18. Cheryl is working class, she wears low cut tops, high cut skirts and is evidently in need of a dentist. She is from Essex and rows with her mum.
It goes without saying that she has a lot of sex, and the sexologist wants her to talk about it. She asks her if she has orgasms when she has sex, to which she replies 'sometimes'. The sexologist says something like 'if he cuddles you and is very loving then you do? If he is selfish not so much?'( So that's how to have orgasms every time, if only I had realised it was that simple.)

Anyway Cheryl is obviously supposed to be some fallen woman, and the main focus of her narrative within the show is the number of sexual partners she has had. Cheryl is asked if she uses contraception, she replies 'most of the time' . The narrator then repeatedly states that she often has unprotected sex, and it is supposed to be a big shock that she is free of STIs, even though she has said that she practices safe sex.
Her visit to the gynacologist also made me cringe, the doctor was male - despite the fact that most GUM clinics will let you see a female doctor ( he was white too) . It was as if she was a school child being told off for bad behaviour, and again she is reminded about contraception.

Next up is a mysoginistic boy of mixed heritage from Doncaster. His attitude to women is obviously appaling, though it is never explored where these attitudes have come from. He doesn't treat his mother with respect and his hatred for women is clear. He lost his virginity to a prostitute, and is told off by his mum for going with 'that sort of girl'. Going with a prostitute is implied to be something that makes him unclean. No mention of the number of his sexual partners is made, it is all about how he can be better to women by 'wining and dining them'. He is not taken to a GUM clinic and made to sit infront of a doctor, nor does anyone ever ask him if he uses contraception.

By the end of the show Cheryl had cried rather falsely to her mum, talked about her dad leaving and the number of people she had been with. Her mum asks her if she thinks about her reputation. She has stopped wearing such revealing clothing and now sits with her legs crossed. I guess she is now a lady.
The boy has apparently learned that women are people, though to what extent I am not sure. He has learned to be nice to his mum - and that decent women like to wait for sex.
The lesson seems to be if you are female, better not have too much sex, if you are male - don't be nasty to women, wine and dine them..

Thank goodness I am middle class so I conduct myself in whatever sexual manner I choose and more or less get away with it.

Way to go BBC, yet again the lower working classes ( young women in particular) are framed, constructed and ridiculed for the entertainment of the so called middle class majority. Also managed to get some regionalism in there too - and lets not forget race.

Worst of it is I was entertained.I was sucked in, I enjoyed watching these poor young people be humiliated untill the cogs of deconstruction in my mind started whirring. Then I felt a strange mix of fascination and guilt. I'm sorry Cheryl - maybe I will dedicate my next post to her.

Sin

2008-01-11T01:05:00.001Z

Today we rated the 7 deadly sins in order of how fun they are.

This is the order

Lust
Pride
Gluttony
Sloth
Wrath
Greed
Envy

We then did the same with the cardinal virtues. This is the order.

Justice
Fortitude
Prudence
Temperence

In order of preference this is them both together

Justice
Lust
Pride
Gluttony
Sloth
Fortitude
Wrath
Prudence
Greed
Temperence
Envy

And this is one image I found typing the word 'temperence' into google images.

Out weirding...

2008-01-08T20:51:00.000Z

Someone by the name of kisses for munches (!) just started talking to me on skype.
This was the conversation

kisses for muches 20:43

FLOWER GRAPHIC

Liz Ely 20:43
hmm

who are you?

kisses for muches 20:44

stronger

Liz Ely 20:44

than what - an ant, cos they can lift 50 times their body weight
a beaver?
an ostritch - you don't want to be on the wrong side of one of those

kisses for muches 20:47

ok

bye

.....................

I out-weirded a weirdo! Cue misplaced pride...

A short note on hats

2008-01-04T15:00:00.001Z

I like hats, I like to wear them to go out - but this comes at a price. At some point some random dickhead will inevitabley steal the hat from your head and then place it on his own head. They must think that it is amusing, a jovial way to get you to talk to them which will eventually lead to sex. Little do they know that it never ever will.
This week i decided to completely over-react to some prattish hat japery, turned round, grabbed the hat from the stripey shirted, gelled moron and shouted 'Don't ever do that!!'. He cowered, I laughed internally. It was very satisfying. It probably made me look nuts but fuck it, he might think twice about being an arsehole. I did ruin my chances there but then I do have a no sex with morons rule...

I think I might try some more amusing ways to over-react to stupid morons, if only I could fake tears.....

And now for some more well justified hate.... Phil Hilton and Hans Seeburg

2007-12-28T01:33:00.000Z

I was looking for a picture to illustrate a previous post. This comment in particular :-

'This TV channel and its advertising makes me want to surgically remove my breasts and then stitch them (without aneasthetic) to the naked chest of the current editor, before bending him over, penetrating him anally and taking a few pictures.'

I thought a picture of the man was just what I needed to bring it to life. Though I admit, I was concerned that seeing his face might make me feel some sort of guilt at the harsh nature of my above comment. I came accross this picture and now believe my words to be far too forgiving.

This is Phil Hilton - previous editor.

Some say 'don't judge a book by its cover' - but I think the sneering arrogance of this man's pathetic balding head is surely enough to put the whole book in some kind of shredder. I looked for some biographical detail but found very little. Probably he doesn't want the readership to find out which public school he went to.

This is the deputy. Hans Seeburg.

Is that not the face of someone who deserves to have every hair on his body removed with tweezers, before being forced to engage in a painful sex act with a man to whom he is not attracted, before a live audience and a camera crew? or should he be put on to a starvation diet, with daily vomiting induced by the forced insertion of a rolled up copy of Nuts magazine?

I just can't decide!

10 things I like about Castleford

2007-12-28T00:35:00.000Z

Hello there. I notice that, with the exception of adding pointless Gorky's videos, my posts often have a negative character. This is probably due the horrendous nature of the world and the pathetic existence of humanity within it. I am generally a happy person, this might not always seem obvious, but I am. To prove it I thought I would attempt to think of 10 things I like about Castleford; in no particular order of significance.

1. My family. The Elys have lived in Cas for about a million years or something, we have a lot of cool history, we have been members of the Salvation Army since it started, are brass banding folk, worked in factories ( particularly the Rowntrees factory which was bought by Nestle). Castleford is a big part of my family, and also me, even though I don't live there and hopefully never will.

2. Pronunciation of the word won't as 'waint' as in 'I'm off t't shops, ah waint be long'

3. On sundays when there is a rugby match, and whole families walk to the ground in orange and black Cas Tigers paraphanalia.

4. Yvette Cooper is our MP, and she is really rather cool.

5. Castleford will never vote Conservative.

6. cocker spadge as a term of affection.

7. The old fashioned sweet shop in the market. The pic and mix that used to be in Woolworths.

8. My junior school, a cool Victorian building which has these wooden boards which we painted with representations of ourselves when I was at school. They picture of me with my trombone and Salvation Army tambourine which is still up there more than a decade after it was painted.

9. The fact that old men like my granddad really do wear flat caps.

10. The library. It used to have a competition where you won a prize if you read 10 books in your summer holidays ( yup I won that one every time). I used to rent britpop albums there and then put them on tape( and later minidisc). Their cd section formed my music taste. the fact that there was little all else to do but read probably made me an English Lit student. It's also a fantastic building.

There you are - balance.

Worthiness

2007-12-23T23:17:00.000Z

I am heartened to learn that I have been linked in someone's blog under the heading 'worthy'.

This is the blog.

http://teaformeandteaforyouisteafortwo.blogspot.com/

Ok so I know the guy, he is a friend, not an admiring stranger - but it's a start. Anyone who wishes to link to me with the word 'worthy' or indeed higher praise is encouraged to do so.

Here are some videos about the main worthy thing, Gorky's Zygotic Mynci.

And look, a sense of humour too...

Home sweet Home

2007-12-22T22:25:00.003Z

Here I am, Castleford West Yorkshire, Cas Vegas - Cas. I was looking forward to coming home, I love my family, I enjoy spending time with my cat. It's nice to be in a relatively tidy house which has carpets.
Every time I come home I have different feelings about the place. My first visits home from University were unsettling - as if a part of me wasn't quite sure that I had left, as if somehow University might be cancelled and I would have to come home and take a job in the bank and then spend all my saturdays in B and Q before slumping brain dead in front of strictly come dancing, waiting to die.
Now I am pretty sure I have moved, to a city and a different class. I will probably wait to die with too much wine in my liver and too much blue cheese in my arteries, in front of some dvd hoping that my children ignite the revolution that I never got around to.
So now coming home is something else. There is good family stuff, (my family are hilariously wonderful, will probably write more about that some other time). There are also trips to this place.

This is a promotional picture which doesn't show off quite how much it is a box of hell. There is a cinema, a bowling alley, a ski slope and chain resteraunts. Everything you need to ignore the world outside and receive some uniform does of funtertainment. I sometimes wonder if it is snobbish of me to detest the place; which after all, is easy enough when you live in easy walking distance from art-house cinema, cute shops and cafes. Still though, by removing entertainment from the centre it sounds a death knell for evening life in Cas town. Fair enough, it's not like pre-Xscape it was thriving, but I am told there was a sense of community. Obviously it is simplistic to say that Xscape has killed 'community' in Castleford, particularly if this 'community' was founded in poverty.
Who cares, it's still a box of hell.

Within 5 minutes from my house there are 3 billboards for Nuts TV, there was a man selling playboy towels in the market - just playboy towels. I went to buy some underwear and I overheard a girl of 10 ( ish) shout 'oooh playboy !!!' which made me feel like ripping off my ears and setting them on fire (sod bras, that's not enough of a statement). I bought underwear and the saleswoman had a playboy bracelet, the other woman had a shirt which read 'golddigga'.

Nuts TV, because apparently 9pm to 1am is 'man time' - and men own sport, cars, comedy and of course girls. This TV channel and its advertising makes me want to surgically remove my breasts and then stitch them (without aneasthetic) to the naked chest of the current editor, before bending him over, penetrating him anally and taking a few pictures.

I look at people and I think why are we standing for this? Things are shit in quite a fundamental way; coming to Castleford really heightens my awareness of this. I am so cocooned in Edinburgh, I fill my life with educated people. I watch films that challenge me and ponce around thinking about the nature of life. University provides me with personal and intellectual advancement in a great variety of ways. Reality is that things are shit, unfair, bland and boring.

It has been put to me that 'people might be happy with the banal, it wouldn't do for everyone to be like you now would it'.
If people peddle bullshit to you all day long and you are surrounded by hideous crap, and the choice is 'like it or shut up' then yeah I guess people will be happy with the banal. If banal is what surrounds you, and is what you can afford then yes. I can accept that some people are just boring, or just stupid but I refuse that this is the case for the majority.

Anyway it's after 2am and I should be in bed, my mind has lost track of my thoughts somewhat. I decided to post my above comment about Nuts on their forum for shits and giggles. Am sure it won't make it up there, or do any good, but what the hell some moron will read it - even if it's just a moderator.

Apologies for any incoherence, more Castleford related thoughts are sure to follow soon.

Racism in the Times

2007-12-16T12:46:00.000Z

Was flicking around on the times website today and came accross this comment

http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2007/12/in-the-latest-i.html

The title that flashed up on the website was 'The great IQ and Race debate', and I felt angered at just how racist that title actually is.
Race is an invention by colonialists, it doesn't actually exist. Race 'science' was greated to justify domination of Black by White.
So calling a post 'A great debate' even if the word 'great' is meant ironically or quantitively is really just abhorrent. To say that there is a debate about whether intelligence could be founded in race, creates a space for 2 sides of an argument with a mythical central ground.The whole 'debate' is nonsense which completely ignores the history of race.
It is also a 'debate' which gives racism a platform under the banner of 'debate', which is played out in the comments below.Most come out in condemnation of the debate, and the post, but there are a few ( perhaps 3 or 4) which are incredibley racist. It says below that comments are 'moderated' - which means someone has to read these before putting them on the internet. Logic follows that the moderater him/herself upholds racism, by publishing these comments they make the statement that it is ok for these comments to exist.

The post itself does not condemn or mention racism, which is not an 'objective position', it is an inherently racist one.

The Times by publishing this material does not take an 'objective' position, but one which is both subjective and racist.

Then again, what are we to expect from a newspaper owned by satan himself?

(also the picture chosen for this objectionable post is 2 male students, nicely keeping men as normative, a nice illustrator of how sexism and racism go hand in hand.)

Yay Amelie and Yay Feminism

2007-12-10T23:34:00.000Z

Liz likes prawns with heads on, idealistic conversations which explore the possibility of a better world and looking up information about rabies on the internet . Liz does not like it when people use the word 'gay' to mean anything other than homosexual, or happy. She does not like to use anything other than a soup spoon for breakfast cereal.
As I write this post I kind of think I would like my world to be in a green and red colourset, or perhaps an orange and purple one.
Just spent a wonderful evening re-aqcuainting myself with an old favourite movie of mine ( and probably everyone). I must have seen Amelie dozens of times and it never fails to move me. It always breaks through whatever cynacism and disillusion I am barackaded in. It's wonderful for so many reasons which I won't go into, but tonight I realised that another reason that it is wonderful is that it wins many feminist points ( feminist points being the best kind of points you can earn, worth at least 50 of any other kind of points).
Lately have been trying to think of movies which are 'yay feminism', and it's actually quite difficult. Even films near to my heart are generally ambiguous,( or if I am completely honest a bit anti). Star Wars for example, loved this move as a child and yes Leah is quite a hero,it's shame she is the only woman in the entire universe (with the exception of the woman on the ship in Return of the Jedi - between them it's any wonder they get time to do anything if it's up to them to repopulate the galaxy)
I am sure it would be completely possible to point out numerous ways which Amelie is anti feminist, it's very white, lots of things are hetero-normative etc etc. However this is a hooray saying post so ...

Feminist points !!!
1. Central character is a woman, most interesting characters are women and narrative is almost entirely female driven.
2. Though Tatou is attractive she is not particularly sexualised toward a male gaze.
3. Amelie seeks out her man, he does not come to her - and he plays the role usually played by female love interests in movies ( ie being a relatively 2 dimensional character who fits around the more interesting central character)
4. Moves away from conventional portrayals of sexuality , very nice shot of Amelie at the end sat upright in bed as her beautiful man sleeps below her. In this shot the status is hers, he is nestled up to her, not the other way around. She occupies a dominant higher status physical position. One shot - but it's wonderful and says a lot.
5. She is brought up by her Father - atypical family, man takes on 'women's' role BUT without a big fuss being made of it. Hurrah.

Yay.

Suggestions for House

2007-12-09T23:46:00.000Z

I have written the following letter. I intend to send it to the producers of House MD tommorrow and I look forward to a response.
When I am on my deathbed* I will no doubt remember this and think ' I wish I had spent that time having sex'.

Dear Paul Attanasio,Katie Jacobs,David Shore,Bryan Singer

I would first like to say I am a MASSIVE FAN of House MD – big enough for me to press the ‘caps lock’ key on my keypad, and add multiple exclamation marks !!!!!!!
Watching episode after episode with my housemates is something I look forward to after a long day. How do you come up with such exciting and complex medical storylines? Man, they make my brain work so hard I sometimes think I might need a neurologist. L.O.L ☺

I very much enjoy the way that you use lengthy shots of Dr House in contemplation, it’s incredible the way in which you give the audience a precious glimpse into his soul. Insightful!

Have you ever thought of a storyline that could include zombies? One of my favourite episodes is the one where there is a little boy who thinks he is being abducted. What if a patient had a disease like rabies (which is my all time favourite disease!!!) that made them act like a zombie. It could be a girl, and her boyfriend could be a comic ‘nerd’ - he could think that she has become a zombie? Perhaps some shots of him watching too many zombie films at the start of the show? I think that would be very interesting.

Thank you so much for such a great show! If you need someone to help with the storylines don’t hesitate to get in touch, I have seen a lot of doctors.

Lizzie

Ps What is Gregory House’s all time favourite disease?

* Deathbed and also perhaps my actual bed

Fork It !!

2007-12-09T16:17:00.000Z

This is a spectacularly pointless post, however sometime long ago I acquired a reputation as someone who doesn't wash up.
This is our sink as of 10am this morning - shot in black and white to give it a kind of Withnail and I artistry - unfortunately we are not alcoholic out of work actors, just lazy women. Thus perhaps not cool.

This is the sink an less than an hour later.

Wow.

Daniel Kitson,Poetry Comedy and Politics

2007-11-26T18:33:00.000Z

This post isn't really about being a loser, but it is indicative of the fact that I am one. It's 1:30am on a school night, I should be in bed - but no, I am going to analyse the hell out of a comedy show. On the internet!

I have a fair bit of revision to do right now, what I should be doing is applying theories of Romanticsm, the Enlightenment and um, stuff, to poems and literature, not to stand up comedians. I should be doing my work, not making my pleasure into work. At the moment I am having a bit of a crisis of confidence in Literature along the lines of 'WHAT'S THE FUCKING POINT'. Like books and that, they are good - but what interests me about literature is the way in which art reflects and shapes culture ; how art is used to re-inforce or challenge existing power structures. I care about this in a modern context - so yeah, what I want to study is media studies, but you can't do that at 'good' universities so I am stuck with reading about a load of dead white guys, for now anyway.

Back to my topic 'Daniel Kitson Poetry Comedy and Politics'

For those who don't know Daniel Kitson is a stand up comedian. For those of you who do know, you will realise that Kitson is somewhat 'more than a comedian', he has called himself a poet, (this is not just his ego, others have called him this too). I think Kitson is a poet, but I would go further than that and say that all stand up comedians are poets. Many of them are absolute crap and perhaps do not deserve such a lofty title, but then there are crap poets too.

I think stand up is poetry for lots of reasons. It's aural and recited to groups of people, its sucess is dependent on the importance of timing. Like poetry it can have overt political messages (see Bill Hicks or Mark Thomas) or more contain more subtle evidence of some political ideology (Daniel Kitson/Josie Long). There is a great deal of importance placed on the individual, it provides one individual perspective and narrative. It also tends to be seen as a masculine domain, the most succesful stand up acts being men;just as women Romantic poets constitute one lecture in a semester of romanticsm so women comedians often constitute one act on the bill.

Wordsworth suggested that poets have a privaledged access to some fundamental truth, he elevated them to the status of demi gods (which I think may have been after he became a poet himself....) He stated that they have the truth because they observe nature and humanity, and then they reflect upon it, and present it to others.
'He is a man speaking to men : a man it is true, eluded by lively sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, a greater knowledge of human nature and a more comprehensive soul' (Wordsworth on poets)
It is fair to say I think that this is how DK sees himself, or at least how many of his more ardent fans would esteeem him.
'He has an added disposition to be affected more than other men by absent things as if they were present'
This romantic ideal can be seen in Kitson's comedy, as can be the way that he takes mundane subjects, inner feelings and thoughts sparked by a singular event, and then reflects, re-reflects and heaps on external significance creating both laughter and feeling.
I think Wordsworth was a terrible egotist, he also stole stuff from his sisters diary about daffodils, but I also think that comedians must feel this 'added disposition' to a greater or lesser extent before getting on stage.
That or perhaps they just want to get laid more easily.....

Wordsworth's poet, like Kitson's comedian is an introspective internal individual, who places huge importance upon the internal and the ordinary. Just as Wordsworth encourages us to wonder lonely as a cloud, Daniel Kitson encourages people to see the magic in the mundane. His shows centre around small personal events, which he extends to some deeper individual meaning. Wordsworth sits and reflects on his sister's feeling as she observes Tintern Abbey: Kitson contemplates the foundation of his mother's defiant greeting of other walkers in South Yorkshire.

Another important aspect is the emphasis on solitude, Wordsworth was very into this, lots of reflection and wondering around thinking about flowers (did I mention he stole that from his sister's diary - well he did, what a dick). Kitson seems to spend a lot of time internally reflecting upon his place in his world,(his smallness/its bigness,ok so he uses better words than me) and the importance of small acts of kindness.

This is where I part ways with Kitson and his politics; because it is politics. You could suggest that his shows aren't political, but all art is political. It has ideology and significance which it attempts to pass on. Whether or not this is coherent or clear there are political messages in everything we do. Every stand up comedian should understand that, and that when they make a peadophile joke ( which Kitson did tonight... shame on him) it says something about what you think,your politics and who you are. I can't abide this 'oh it's just humour' it's just a laugh , it's ironic. You are on stage, you are saying something - your aim is to make people laugh yes, but what else are you saying? ( By the way I am a super fun person to be around, know and spend time with. I do think about stuff* a lot but hell that's what brains are for right?)

Tonight Kitson said that genocide comes from the same impulses that make people think it is ok to be selfish on buses. I do not disagree - selfishness and a need for power manifests itself in different ways, there is definately a scale of twat. It's like I think, minor sexist comments and jokes and the pay gap are on the same scale too. Repeatedly using the word cunt as a derogatory term, and sexual violence are also on the same scale. Beating up a gay man, and using the word 'gay' to mean 'crap' are also related. I think Kitson begins to have a very good point here, but fails to follow it to its natural conclusion, then again he is a comedian not a social scientist.

I think that's the issue I have, that by getting people to focus in on their own lives then it can prevent them focusing out on the lives of others. Perhaps I have Kitson all wrong, but he tends to suggest that if we all do nice little things then the world will be a better place, that these little acts of kindness are heroic. Again, I do not completely disagree, we should all be nice to each other, but there is no way that small acts of kindness can change the world.

To me heroism is saying right, fuck it, the world is a mess and I am going to do the most that I can for it not to be, and really there is more that we can do than just giving £100 to the homeless, or intervening when people are in danger. These are good acts - but people have had revolutions! People can get together and do things in groups to stop really shit things that happen every day.

At the start of his show DK said that somehow we manage to live our lives despite the fact that the world is full of horror, that every second we are alive there is rape, murder and injustice. He called this a massive act of compartmentalisation - which it is. However I think that he misses the point a bit here too. Some people can't compartmentalise the horror in the world because they don't get chance, if you live through injustice every day it does not become compartmentalised. If you are lucky you can ignore it, or limit it's impact on your self, but it remains with you. This includes a lot of people in the UK but they are not perhaps a typical Kitson audience.

The other thing is, do we have to compartmentalise these things? Should we just refer to them every now and again, or is that part of the problem?

I am not trying to say 'I am a super thoughtful person who spends all her time thinking about injustice' but perhaps in order to properly challenge injustice we need to de-compartmentalise a bit? I don't think we should all spend our time weeping( I don't, did I mention that I'm really fun? good,cos I am, super fun), but then I don't think this would have to be the case. It's like if there is a room in your house which is a complete tip and keeps getting messier, you could just leave it - go into another room and watch telly. Every now and then you come back to the messy room, look at it and go 'shit it's a mess' and then go back to the room with the TV in it. I think this is what most people do, but there is another option. We could stay in the messy room and start to tidy it up a bit.. (periodically going back to the TV room obviously.) There will probably be disagreements as to how best to go about tidying up, and it will continue to get covered in other peoples crap - you might even end up making the TV room messy. It's harder, but I think it's the better option. ( my room is a tip right now - I wonder where my analogies come from....)

I think technology and the dissemination of knowledge can facilitate this decompartmentalisation. DK says that we get an inflated sense of ourselves because the world is getting smaller, I'm not sure that this is true. I think perhaps we get a feeling of 'oh well, what can I do about it?I'm just one person' but human beings all live with other humans, and if we worked together we could actually do something. Kitson said that we can never know the weight of the inner workings of the internal lives of others. This is correct, but also defeatest. What we can do is listen to the problems and observe the external experiences of others, and it is possible to change those things, and on a large scale too.

So yes Kitson ramble - I think he is an excellent comedian, very funny - but flawed. He had a good story about Denis Potter, who called his terminal cancer Rupert Murdoch. I liked that a lot, infact I think perhaps some scientists should name the next terminal illness they come across 'Rupert Murdoch syndrome'.

This is a good example though - Rupert Murdoch is an evil fucker, and he's one man controlling and fucking up so much of the world. Denis Potter's gesture was fantastic, and perhaps the only thing that he could do, but that should beg the question - we don't have cancer (apologies for assuming things about my reader, if you do have cancer then I hope you get better soon)
so what are we doing? Can we do something to Rupert Murdoch - maybe not individually but as groups?

The tube is full of adverts for cosmetic surgery which women have to see everyday, encouraging women to mutilate themselves in order to buy 'self esteem'. A group of people on facebook started stickering them with various comments/slogans. Loads of people did it and the Tube advertising person threatened legal action. To me this is so wonderful, people took risks in their everyday life to say NO - I don't want to put up with this any more. That's heroisim. One person started that group and then loads of people got on board, and I think shows a good example of people saying 'right this is a mess- lets do something'.

I guess what I am trying to say is that I think we can change the world. We can't know what other people think or feel exactly, but we can try. I like Daniel Kitson, I think he is talented, his command of words makes my vocabulary seem rather, umm crappy in comparison. I enjoy the way he deconstructs his experiences. I guess I would just like to see him think bigger, look at deconstructing the fabric of society rather than the individual. Then again I am probably taking this all too seriously, he is a mere funny man after all.

Am a big big Bill Hicks fan, again I think he was personally flawed but he was someone who really wanted to change things through his medium.

"The world is like a ride in an amusement park and when you choose to go on it you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. And the ride goes up and down and around and around and it has thrills and chills and it's very brightly coloured and it's very loud. And it's fun - for a while. Some people have been on the ride for a long time, and they begin to question; is this real? Or is this just a ride? And other people have remembered, and they come back to us, and they say, "Hey, don't worry, don't be afraid, ever, because... this is just a ride."
Bill Hicks

Man am I a deep thinker or what. I think I will go into my exam next week and be like, well no I'm not sure I do know very much about Romantic writers approach to humanism, but look at these thoughts that I just had about the world. Am obviously just so smart, you might as well give me a good mark and be done with it...

Anyway going to go study before I disappear too far up my own arse.

* some stuff, this stuff, not so much my work which I should be doing.....

Laziness vs Apathy

2007-11-15T00:26:00.000Z

I have been thinking about laziness and apathy; because I am lazy, man am I lazy. My father before me was lazy; he has been known to drive to the cornershop to buy chocolate.His mother before him was lazy;she owns one of those grabber things for picking up stuff, though on second thoughts that might be for other reasons, like being old.
It's in my genes, and unless you can change your genetic material by standing infront of a microwave waiting for your tea to be ready, it seems unlikely to change.
I am not however apathetic.

Apathy I think is the curse of our generation ( along with skinny jeans, stupid hair and the knowledge that climate change might actually affect us).
We go to massive lengths to show that we don't care. The second we care about stuff we are lame. I am at university which is plagued with examples of this, usually female wearing tracksuit bottoms, the boyfriend's rugby top, intentionally messy hair and some expensive item to indicate their class.
Though irritating, this is harmless, what is a problem is when people want to change the world and they are made to feel like dick heads for giving a shit. The sneers which people give to 'do-gooder' societies at university, the complete lack of cool associated with working hard. Now don't get me wrong, I shy away from hard work as much as the next person ( what do you think I am - not lazy?) but I care, I really care, and I don't mind saying it. The world is a horrible mess, but I want to do something about it. I know it is probably impossible for all the bad in the world to go away, but I think whilst human beings are alive they should work towards making things better for other people.
Reading back at my last sentence I think, what a loser ! It's a good job I know that I'm cool ( I write a blog right? what's not cool about that !!)
I can understand looking at the world and feeling like there is not much we can do, but going to efforts to prove that you don't care in order to be cool?
I went to a show in the fringe by Josie Long called 'trying is good' , it was very enjoyable - but it focused on small efforts people make, which are nice in their own way, but I think big efforts are better. I think we should start thinking big.
Like Micheal Moore - I like him a lot. There is a man after my own heart, he might use emotive imagary and spin but what a task, to liberalise the conservative poor of America. To take on the Republican government... There is someone who thinks big, and probably drives to the cornershop too.

Essay strife

2007-11-08T20:00:00.000Z

I warn you this is not going to be a very funny post. When I started this blog I thought it would be so that I could be amusingly a loser. Today I am just a loser.It's not funny. Don't laugh at my pain.

I am writing an essay, it's not going well. I don't know why - I have a lot of work on and lately I have been a bit stressed. It's on Frankenstein , Wieland and the supernatural. It shouldn't be that hard really, just a load of making stuff up. I only have to make up about another 800 words - but for some reason my brain has packed in and I just don't want to do anything. Like some sort of cancer it has extended beyond the immediate situation. I don't want to do anything. I just sit there, but I don't want to do that so then I stare at the page for a bit. I considered watching tv but I don't want to do that. I don't want to go to bed or stay awake. I am pretty sure that I want to be alive which is a good sign. Beyond that...

My problem is I want to get a good mark. All the other people in my tutorial are really smart, and I feel like I need to prove that I'm really smart too.
What I want to do is sit back and consider how much essays matter in the grand scheme of things.... however if that's the case I should just hand in 1097 words and be like 'in the grand scheme of things- does this matter, I mean really?'
Another problem is I want to get good marks without really doing too much work. Up until now I have more or less managed to do this.
Not any more.

Money

2007-11-07T16:28:00.002Z

I was just thinking about money and how, though I don't have any ( which is generally quite rubbish) it's probably a good job I'm not loaded because I would just fritter it away on silly things. Such as the following ;-
1. Personalised seat at the filmhouse saying Liz is amazing, or 'there is chewing gum underneath this one' (ps Liz Ely is amazing) - only £450 and a permenant source of amusement and pride
2. Obviously would become one of the Cameo 500 (£500) and then go in and demand that I get a free sackload of popcorn - I would also buy a cat and take it to the cinema with me, which as a special member I would be allowed to do
3. Dancing giant frankenstine('s monster yes I am a lit student) (£99) that is in that shop - cash converter ( classy joint that, we have one in castleford) I would put it in the hall of our flats building and then watch the bemusement of our young proffessional share tennant type people. I would probably get rid of it after a while.
4. I'd buy a cat to kill the mouse in our flat - and then pay someone to look after it for me - they would then have to bring the cat round for visits at times of my choosing. I would pay them £40 per week basic maintenence for the cat - and then £7 per hour for every visit - plus expenses. This would be a very good thing to do because I think it would be a nice part time job for any student - much better than working in Scot mid.
5.would buy the complete simpsons box sets (this is actually a very sensible thing for anyone to do) and then invite my cat sitter round and we could watch them with the cat. cost- £1000 or so maybe ? Maybe a bit less.
6. I would pay louis theroux to make a documentary on my life and the life of my flatmates ( mostly on me though) don't know exactly how much this would cost but would definately be prepared to pay in kind ....
8. would install a jukebox and a pic and mix machine in my flat - this might involve getting a bigger flat.
9. If I get a bigger flat I would put a ballpool in there - and a bouncy castle and a trampoline - but micheal jackson is not coming round to visit no matter how many times he asks

Boris the Beatboxer

2007-11-07T16:28:00.001Z

I think it's really important to do stuff that you don't normally do, it's fun and expands your horizons, makes you learn things and you get to meet new people, it also prevents boredom setting in whilst we wait for the asteroid to hit.

This was the spirit in which I went to a breakdance/beatbox/MC competition on Sunday. I don't really know much about that kind of music hip hop/break-beat whatever it's called, you know, the sort of genres that require DJs to do something other than just press play.
That's not to say I don't like it, I can definately appreciate it for it's artistic merit, but it intimidates me, most people who like this kind of music can actually dance - they can feel beats and rhythms, they don't just jump around when the stone roses come on, or drunkenly scream 'DEBASER' in their mates face whilst gesturing with mock emotion, nor do they invoke the spirit of Jarvis Cocker and mime as if the whole world will be impressed by the fact that you know all the words to common people.*

The competition was hosted by vaxhaull - and the prize was £1000 to 'pimp your motor' which I suppose is something you might have to do if you have the misfortune to actually drive a vauxhaull. There was also a £100 spot prize for use of the vauxhall logo in their 'bit' , the winner actually stripped off during a 'power move' to reveal 'it's the drive of your life' on his arse. Indeed !

I did have a great time and the physical prowess, rhythm and creativity displayed by the dancers was incredible, all male incidentally - and very male. Hip hop does have a sort of hyper masculinity about it that weedy indie boys obviously gave up on years ago. Which makes me wonder at it as a form of mating ritual - the machismo, the boasting - the display of perfectly toned and incredibley flexible bodies..........

But I am getting a little off topic now.... One of my favourite performers was called Boris, who was a beat boxer (to put this in non hip-hop terms, it means he can make his mouth into a ghetto-blaster) Now Boris was much too good looking to have the name of Boris, and could not have looked more public school if he had Harrow tattooed** on his forehead. He was fantastic - his voice was like some kind of computer, obviously he had the 'threads'***, and obviously he was very posh. This made me look around and wonder at the social make up of this subculture- as it strikes me that it does appeal to both the traditional 'street' audience and the middle classes. So in many ways a very diverse audience, and a forum for social mixing potentially - which is nice.

But staying with Boris - I begin to wonder how common this public school 'Hip hop' phase is, how many of the elite go through this - and does this mean that in the not too distant future we will be faced with GANGSTA TORIES ? is this potentially the direction in which the party is heading? David Cameron is already becoming pretty damned cool with environmentalism and cycling - in the future will we have Tories who discuss privitisation, the benefits of vegetarianism and carbon footprints by day, and display power moves on the rugs of their kensington flats by night? Will the next party leader astound party members at the conference by MCing the Tory manifesto - before encouraging the crowd to form a circle around the shadow cabinet 'crew' while they spin around on their heads ?

Or perhaps these hip hop kids wil join the labour party instead.......

Funny women

2007-11-07T16:27:00.000Z

So I'm up late as usual - not very well, so I rang up ScotMid to get tommorrow morning off, if there's one thing I hate it's ringing in sick. Don't get me wrong, skiving work is one of my favourite pasttimes -it's like being at the end of your life and then someone comes in and gives you 5 extra hours with which to do something super fun. ( I will probably get up late and then spend the morning reading the observer)

It's just doing the phoning that I hate. Possibly because last time I did it one trainee manager shouted at me, had the nerve to imply that I had a hangover ( which is the last thing you want to hear when you are hungover) . That and there is this work ethic at slave labour jobs, such as supermarkets, which dictates that nothing less than rabies or the plague is a good excuse.

Anyway here I am faffing around on the net till this painkiller caffine wears off - on www.thefword.org.uk which is a really good website full of funny/interesting feminstic articles, which mostly confirm my opinions ( you know, that all men should be put in cages and made to apologise for patriarchy at half hour intervals and bake us chocolate cakes, while we set about putting the world back together and growing our armpit hair)

and I stumble upon a slightly depressing article in the independent

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/article341715.ece

Apparently funny women just aren't hot. Despite the fact that funny men can get girls like nobody's buisness, the same is just not true for female comedians :-

"Men see being funny as a male thing," explained Dr Rod Martin
Hundreds of men and women in their twenties were questioned. Asked if they found a sense of humour to be attractive in women, most men said yes. But when they were asked if they would want to be with a woman who cracked jokes herself, the answer was a resounding no.

"When forced to choose between humour production and humour appreciation in potential partners, women valued humour production, whereas men valued receptivity to their own humour," said Dr Martin.

As someone who considers herself a humour producer ( as well as a receiver) and also a straight single woman this would seem to be bad news. Apparently Meera Syal would tone down her humour when chatting up blokes , and Oriane Messina ( of radio 4 - no I hadn't heard of her either) says she tempers her humour around attractive men, and considered lying about her job whilst speed dating ( which is probably a prerequisite of speed dating.... erm not that I'd know)

I read another article in vanity fair which suggested that women aren't funny because we have babies, having babies being a very serious matter which completely wears out the funny bones of women. This I find quite ridiculous - if you are going to push a living thing out of your private parts you need a sense of humour in my book.

So then what is to be done about this ? Frankly I have no idea - I'd like to think it isn't true, that really men all have secret crushes on Jennifer Saunders, Lucy Porter,Meera Syal. However unfortunately experience leads me to think otherwise....

Some sort of scheme perhaps, to put all men in cages and only let out the ones who will agree to fancy funny women, after they have baked me a massive cake and admired my new armpit-haircut of course.

Aquados Thoughts

2007-11-07T16:26:00.000Z

So it's midnightish and I'm eating weatabix ( or 'wheat biscuits' - they are rectangular and slightly smaller but otherwise no difference) with raisins honey and bananas and I can see a box of aquados - which are some washing up tablet type things. I like the name, it sounds like a Spanish water park.

You put them directly in your washing rather than in the little tray thing - very nice, none of this confusion about which powder goes in what tray malarky ( I have been putting a little bit in each tray lately - you can never be too careful). Sure enough on the back of the packet I can read the benefits of aquados NO SKIN CONTACT !! NO MESS ! DISSOLVES STRAIGHT AWAY - etc etc and the final most intreguing one NO POWDER INHALATION!!!

No powder inhalation? I wonder is everyone who uses good old loose powder actually putting themselves at risk from inhaling dangerous washing particles? Is this worse in the case of biological washing powder? Infact what is the difference between bio and non bio - I know it is something to do with enzymes. Then I imagine a little green enzyme with a face eating up dirt.

Then I stopped thinking for a while and continued to eat my supper,then I started to think about farmfoods. I like shopping at farmfoods - though I often wonder at what kind of farm produces large bags of chips at low low prices - a farm of the future no doubt! I wonder if that is funny or not. Probably not.

Thing about farmfoods, apart from the misrepresentative name, and the fact that everything is 50p or a pound or 5 for a pound ( which I like because it helps with maths) and the fact that it is generally filled with poor people, and you can get a snickers for 23p( or 5 for a pound)
is the fact that it somehow allows me a convenient excuse not to shop ethically. Now I believe in organic farming and fair trade and anything that helps society - I really do, and I will pay more for it - but if your only choice is tetley and you get 5 million teabags for 50p - well the choice is a tough one...

These are my thoughts. what an incredible thing they are now on a forum to be read by maybe all of 5 people. I wonder if web 2 ( which we are apparently now in - a web where users are more responsible for content/active) encourages more thought or merely encourages more introspection - people just saying more about fewer things. I think the internet is incredible. I also think I should go to bed.

I'm a loser baby !!!

2007-11-07T15:59:00.000Z

It has always struck me that there was an incredible defecit of female losers in popular culture. Comedy is awash with men who are hilriously underdeveloped, stuck in a sort of post adolescent daze. Sitting about in their underwear playing computer games, being generally pathetic. Loser men are everywhere - they form our rock bands, they are our indie singers, our slacker comedians, our comic book artists. It goes without saying that they are on the internet, they are on the internet a lot.
Wait a minute though - so am I ! I am a geek, and a loser, I buy too many dvds and watch them in my pants*, I make bad jokes, I eat and drink too much, I can be a bit daft, I AM LAZY ! I don't want to grow up ( but I want success anyway ) I am rubbish at having a love-life, I fail at getting men to notice me, I say the wrong thing and spend far too much time online, at night.
Alas, I have no penis, but all the pop culture icons I feel I can relate to do. Growing up I wanted to be Jarvis Cocker not a Spice Girl, I wanted to be Eddie Izzard, or Charlie Brooker, or a member of the supernaturals ( remember them?) I wanted to be a loveable loser, and most of the time* I feel like that's what I am.
With the notable exception of Jessica Stevenson in Spaced, and perhaps the Smack the Pony crew, our female slack icons are few and far between. I am writing a blog to address this balence.
I could analyse the reasons for this deficit, but I think people have to work it out for themselves (here's a hint, it's to do with gender inequality)
So yes, I am standing up and saying ( well more like sitting down and typing) I AM A LOSER.
I am including some of my loserish posts from facebook notes too.
Hurrah.

*most of the time.... sometimes I am grumpy,cynical and decidedly unloveable. It's ok though, in those moments I am really more Bernard Black/Edmund Blackadder. Or a complete bitch, take your pick.
* Ok so no i don't, I wear Pyjamas - pants is the dream though..... One day......