Gingerly talking gender

 

 

 

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: I’m a 53-year-old straight, white, married, Catholic male with four children – two boys, two girls, naturally -- living in Nebraska who has gym and Weight Watchers memberships I rarely use but feel too guilty to cancel and who stills turn up the volume and sings along whenever  “Takin’ Care of Business” comes on the oldies station in the car.

So, mine is a dying demographic, and I accept that. There is much about your world that frightens and confuses me; don’t even get me started.

For example, until recently I thought the term “gender fluidity” referred to the differences between men and women in how they pee, but apparently not. Which brings us to the discovery that some teachers in Lincoln Public Schools are getting advice on how to make their classrooms more inviting to students who are transgender, gender fluid or just generally not feeling the gender with which they were born.

Cue the conniptions among the local citizenry, in the form of calls to local radio talk shows and often misspelled and mispunctuated screeds on Facebook, which are all the funnier given they come in spittle-inflected cries for the purity of that old time education: The schools are out of control! Political correctness runs amok! Social engineering! Waste of tax dollars! Bring Jesus back into the classroom and he’ll kick some libtard ass!

In particular, many are taking shots at this bit of advice: Teachers should consider not dividing students by boys and girls or, for that matter, to even refer to them as “boys and girls,” lest that exclude some students who aren’t sure where they fit on the “gender spectrum.” Yeah, I know – gender spectrum?

Now, Lord knows, it’s easy to make fun of public school bureaucrats’ attempts to please all and offend none. So, what the hell, let’s, for a moment anyway: How might teachers refer to students if not as boys and girls? The handouts in question suggest dividing them into groups such as “purple penguins.” Or refer to them as “scholars.” Or say, “Hey, campers, open your textbook to page 14.” (This last strikes me as exclusive of anyone who’s not flamboyantly gay, so maybe not.)

As for me, I’d probably address them as “future cogs and drones in the heartless machine that will suck your souls dry and grind your spirits into dust until you welcome the sweet relief of death, please turn to page 14.”

So, I suppose I would be in for some school-sanctioned sensitivity training myself.

Anyway, the gist of much of the criticism is that this sort of thinking curries to a minuscule percentage of students rather than the majority.

Which it does, of course -- and to which I say: Hooray!

Although I usually come down hard in favor of simple, clear, no-BS communication – such as, yes, dividing young people into “boys” and “girls” – I cannot imagine how training teachers to be more sensitive to youngsters who are struggling with Who They Are does harm to anyone. That they are a minuscule percentage of the student body is precisely the point  -- an argument FOR, not AGAINST such sensitivity.

The notion among many opponents that such sensitivity somehow detracts from the overall educational mission or is unfair to those who do not struggle with gender identity is, of course, stuff and nonsense.

That doesn’t mean this world still doesn’t frighten and confuse me. But I’m still free to crank up “Takin’ Care of Business” and express my own gender fluidity by standing to pee.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

New exhibit from Doorly Zoo: 2014 GOP World

Exciting announcement from Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo: A new exhibit paying tribute to the 2014 Nebraska Republican primary. Built to scale and cleverly laid out so that you can move only to the right, the exhibit comprises a variety of habitats on 100 acres with plenty of interactive, you-are-there displays:

-- Take the controls of an EP-3 spy plane for a crash landing on China’s Hainan Island.

-- Head down to the Mexican border to stick your toe over the line.

-- Look in on some Washington insiders, behind closed doors, as they wield their awesome influence (Note to those in the front row: You WILL get wet.)

-- Here’s Wrigley Field where one candidate’s family has proven its sterling business and management acumen. Use buttons to choose the kind of ignominious defeat you’d like to witness.

-- Slap on virtual green eyeshade visor as you audit a state agency. Be careful now, there’s math.

-- Have a seat at a meeting of college administrators and faculty. Can it be? Yes, a PowerPoint display of new paradigms in promotion and tenure guidelines.

-- Hang out on the porch of the lake house you own with banking execs – and what’s that racket by the boat house? Why, yes, it’s a bunch of scavenging raccoons.

-- Hunker down as jackbooted federal bureaucrats threaten to regulate you, your family, your business.

-- To the floor of the Nebraska Legislature where you will show your cojones by tangling with a hologramic Ernie Chambers, then wander down the Statehouse halls to the governor’s office, where a set of lifelike gubernatorial cheeks are ripe for kissing.

-- Feel the butch thrill of strapping yourself into a fleece vest and walking into a small-town coffee shop.

-- You’re on a debate stage: See how many times can you praise Reagan and assault Obamacare.

-- Stride purposefully across a farm field, squinting manfully into the distance, then nodding earnestly as you listen to a life-like farmer next to you. Listen carefully, as you can tell by his walk, his seed cap and the cut of his haybales that he is full of common sense.

-- Stand on a stage next to a so-real-you-won’t-believe-it Sarah Palin as she endorses you, going weak-kneed at her heady fragrance of Calvin Klein’s Euphoria, rank political opportunism and demagoguery, snowmobile fuel and moose shit.

-- Finally, the firing range, with a full complement of guns with which to pose. Guard against too much excitement, lest you shoot off prematurely.

Oh, the Places You'd Better Not Go!

Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You're off to Great Places!
You're off and away!

You have brains in your head.
All agree you're a whiz,
though the longer you campaign,
the less obvious it is.

You're on your own and you know what to do.
And YOU'RE the guy who'll decide where to go.
Unless the Navy in your course has a voice,
in which case you'll find you have limited choice.
Though no matter where Uncle Sam sends you hither and yon,
he said nothing about landing your plane at Hainan.

You'll look up and down streets, look 'em over with care.
About some you should say, "I don't choose to go there."
Like K Street, or Florida, or, seriously, a Dakota?
You'll avoid them all, if sense you have one iota.

With your head full of brains and your shoes full of feet,
you're too smart to go down any not-so-good street.
Some may come back to haunt you
in a PAC ad or tweet.

And you may not find any
you'll want to go down.
In that case, of course,
you'll head straight out of town.

But why would you do that?
Leave Nebraska behind?
Turn your back on apple pie and mommy?
Are you some kinda Commie?

Sure, Washington's tempting to a man on the make.
For sure, lots of federal teat to be sucked.
But don't stay too long, nearly a decade's too much,
or one day, verily, you're f***ed.

We're glad you returned
after your grand jaunt,
though frankly, some of us wonder,
what the hell -- Fremont?

On the other hand, Florida?
Maybe that's not so wrong.
Unless a PAC's about to spring a pic
of you on South Beach in camo thong.

Then you longed for South Dakota
to the Black Hills you wanted to flock.
Well, for that sin, you SOB,
bow down before Chimney Rock.

So ...
Be your name Sasse or Osborn
or Mordecai Ali Van Rosencrans,
It's hard to believe, some of us ask,
Jesus, is it too late to keep Johanns?

Ernie: The Unicam Cat

Inspired by, and with apologies to, "Gus: The Theatre Cat" of "Cats"

He is the Cat on the Unicam floor
His name as I'm sure you have heard before
Is really Ernie, but that name takes it toll
So by Day 56, some just call him "***hole"

His T-shirt is tight
His whiskers gone gray
And he suffers indignation that makes his voice bray
He was in his youth quite the smartest of cats
But thanks to term limits, shut out of the spats
He laid low in Omaha, awaited his time
And now he is back, still a cat in his prime.

Whenever he joins colleagues out on the floor
He loves to regale them even if he's a bore
When he gets cranked up, he goes on and on
He cares not if his listeners yawn.
He served with Warner, sparred with Terrible Terry
He's at his best when he's most contrary.

"I have played in my time every possible part
And I know this chamber's rules quite by heart
I extemporize poetry
I know how to preach
And when it really matters, I'll even beseech.

"Yes, I often lose but it comes at a price
For I know how to put this place in a vise.
Shoot mountain lions? OK, but if it comes to that
I'll never stop clawing -- Ernie, the Unicam Cat."

I am Ben. Ben I am.

I am Ben.
Ben I am.

Do I like Obamacare?

I do not like Obamacare,
I do not want it here or there.

I do not like it in my state.
In fact it makes me quite irate.

I do not want it near Chimney Rock
Or near the Capitol that looks like ... well, you know.

I know that it is quite the rage
But I have read it, every page.

To destroy it is my fondest mission,
Bummer ‘bout your precondition.

In this I do agree with Mitch
Though as you know, I’m not his bitch.

It’s destroying America as we know it
Even my RV is starting to show it.

It stinks of rot, squalor, decay
Though it may be time to do laundry

Yes, it’s also hated by Shane
On a shortbus and a plane

Vote for Shane? Give him a turn?
Matter of time before crash and burn.

The right wing loves me, yes they do.
I throw them red meat, lots to chew.

I’m on their websites, talk shows, ‘zines.
Sarah loves me, no mom jeans.

They call me Obamacare’s nemesis.
Without it my campaign has no premise.

OK, yes, you got me there,
I’m nothing without Obamacare.

So maybe I love it, just a little.
My reasons, hey, this is no riddle.

Against it I’ll continue to taunt,
Hell, it’s my ticket out of Fremont.

Quite a George Will column today on why he quit sniffing glue. It starts:

"The voluntary inhalation of vapors for the purpose of altering psychological states has a long history," Edward A. Preble and Gabriel V. Laury noted in the Fall 1967 issue of the International Journal of the Addictions. "At Delphi, in the ancient Greek world, the Pythia sat on a tripod above a cleft in the rocks and inhaled cold vapors emanating from inside the earth, which induced in her an ecstatic alteration of mind. In this altered state she uttered mystical observations in the presence of the Delphi Prophet, who translated them into oracular pronouncements.

"In the ancient Judaic world, the vapors from burnt spices and aromatic gums were considered part of a pleasurable act of worship. In Proverbs (27:9), it is said that 'ointment and perfume rejoice the heart.' Perfumes were widely used in Egyptian worship. Stone altars have been unearthed in Babylon and Palestine which have been used for burning incense made of aromatic wood and spices."

While casual readers today may interpret such practices as mere satisfaction of the desire for pleasant odors, this is almost certainly an error; in many or most cases, a psychoactive drug was being inhaled.

All of this passed through my mind as I sniffed model-airplane glue off my bow tie, gloriously hallucinating that Calvin Coolidge was still president and I his speechwriter. ...