Credentialism infographic

It would be funny if it weren't so true.


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Still, education doesn't necessarily find you a job, as the recent and upcoming graduates in my MA program would tell you. But then, we didn't major in mailroom sciences...

Heterosexism on Facebook

This morning, I updated my status to ask if anyone needed a ride from my hometown to Toronto for Pride this weekend. An aquantance responded by saying

Seriously? Why would you want to go parade around advertising sex... Heterosexuals don't have a parade... wonder why?!?

At first I was quite mad and thought about just deleting the comment and "unfriending" her. But then I decided to comment back, because it is a sentiment that I have heard so many times. My response is limited to what I could type on my phone, which only allows a certain number of characters, but here it is...

Heterosexuals don't get looks while holding hands. They don't have to make sure they won't be arrested before planning a vacation. They don't have to come out to their families and friends. Have you ever been told that you could be 'cured' if you met the right man? I have. [see here] Do you worry that your daughter will be teased because you are straight? Heterosexuality doesn't have a parade, per se, but it has everything else.

Then, I got the best comment that I have received in a long time... maybe ever. A friend of mine told me that she was too angry to respond to the comment, but that she was proud of what I said and that it made her "even more proud to be out!"

I wish I could say that I was surprised that this line of thinking persisted, but I'm not. We live in a culture where we are striving for tolerance, an aim that I critique in this post. It reminds me of the idea that heterosexuality is invisible... you don't realize that so many things around you are "straight" unless you aren't. When a hetero couple holds hands, nobody notices - it isn't considered sexuality unless it is very explicit, but it is different from non-heteros who are only allowed to express any type of affection behind closed doors, otherwise they are seen as rubbing their sexuality in other people's faces.

I have deleted the people that I wrote about in the past (such as this person) because I want my wall to be a safe space... I need to start coming up with guidelines about who I keep on my facebook for the sake of my own sanity.

Trailer for every Oscar-winning movie ever

I am not a big fan of movies, as I really don't have the attention span to sit through most films (although 3 hour lectures by a decent prof are no problem at all for me somehow)... but I still found this parody to be quite funny.

I think the only plotline piece that wasn't sufficiently articulated was that when the female title character was introduced, there should have been some comment about how she had no storyline of her own, but existed merely to further the character development and plot surrounding the male lead.

Stop Harper

I wanted to write this post a few days ago, but I was at a conference, so here it is now...

There has been a lot of talk about the page who held up a Stop Harper sign during the throne speech at the senate (if you haven't heard of it, the story is here). One of the most common questions being asked is whether it was appropriate. I don't understand why this is a question.

According to the terms of her employment, of course it was not "appropriate" but then, who came up with those terms and the very position in the first place? How do I, appropriately, tell Canadians that this isn't right in a way that they will hear, much like Harper has the ability to tell Canadians about why his way is appropriate. Who decides what actions are considered appropriate and which are not?

A woman who has a political opinion expressed it in a non-violent way, and in a way that got a lot of people to take notice. Isn't that kind of the point of activism?

Those who say it is not appropriate seem to think that it is against the "rules" in the senate. But who decides the rules in the senate? Do activists have any say in it? Or is it the same government who we are protesting against that decides who can speak, when they can speak, and under what conditions? (I honestly do not know this, as I am not informed on political procedure, especially in the senate, but I am guessing that there is no way for her to have gotten this point out to a wide audience through senate by following these "rules").

I think this is also proof that it is not our process, but that of our elected government (majority with something like 24% of registered voters approval???). Wait, this is the senate, and they aren't even elected. So whose government is it, exactly? Arguably, we could have elected differently, but then I can write entire books on why that didn't happen and is not likely to in the near future... I don't want to try and summarize the thoughts on here as it would be either too simplistic to make sense or too long for most people to read.

The point I have is what else was she supposed to do? What else are we supposed to do to have our voices heard? She could get a blog (like me) and have 100 people a day read her thoughts on the matter, but she has millions of people talking. She could write to a newspaper that a few thousand people might read and get slammed by a bunch of conservatives who seem to write newspaper comments more than anyone else, usually anonymously and in ways that are so far to the right that I have largely stopped reading newspaper comment sections.

One commenter in this article wrote that her actions were inappropriate because there is a time and place to air your grievances. She expressed a political opinion in senate. I don't think this should upset anyone (except maybe Harper).

The part that concerns me most is the talk about security concerns. One of Harper's former staff members wrote something on twitter about "this time just cardboard but could have been anything". I expect this will be used as an excuse to increase security to make sure nobody else has an anti-Harper sign that could threaten national security. I mean, why would anyone want dissenting opinions in politics... and I'm pretty sure that senate page jobs will be more difficult to get for people who disagree with the status quo...

I also find it comical that employees of the senate are supposed to serve in a non-partisan manner and are supposed to be objective. Has social science research not sufficiently shown that objectivity is a myth? I can't think of a single thing that I do on any given day that is objective or unbiased.

Teaching Assistants do not 'work'

Apparently, graduate teaching assistantships are not jobs. They are not "positions". They are developmental opportunities that have been created to benefit the learning experiences of graduate students in the university. So, I guess instead of trying to get a collective agreement, we should be bowing down and kissing their feet for giving us the opportunity to develop skills.

I'm trying to think about just what the implications would be of not being considered an employee... I'm pretty sure they aren't good... Any thoughts?

On another note, I really don't like being too busy to get into detailed posting... I can't wait until things slow down next week!

Facebook anti-bullying message

I've seen this facebook status come up a few times now;

A 15 year old girl holds her 1 year old son; people call her a slut. But no one knows she was raped at 13. People call a girl fat; no one knows she has a serious disease that causes her to be overweight. People call an old man ugly; no one knows he had a serious injury to his face while serving our country in Vietnam. Re-post this if your against bullying and stereotyping!!!! I bet none of you will post this!!!

So, this meme is meant to be supportive and have the best of intentions, but it seems off to me. It is as if it is saying that it is not ok to be a slut or to be fat or ugly, but not to make fun of people for it unless you know for sure that it isn't their fault.

When I first saw this post, I responded by saying that I was a teen mom from a consensual act... does that mean it is acceptable to call me a slut?

I get that the point of this status is that the stereotypes that you first jump to in order to explain why people look or act a certain way may not actually capture their lived experience, and I think that is an important point... for example, if one happens to come across someone who is overweight, the first assumptions are usually that the person eats too much unhealthy food and does not exercise. If this status can make a few people think about other possibilities before passing judgement, then that is great. But what it doesn't do is challenge the way we think about what is desirable and what is not.

What if there were no judgements allocated to being deemed promiscuous, unattractive or overweight by a specific set of standards? Instead of trying to justify why some people might exist in a way that we deem undesirable, what if we could come up with a post that would express an anti-bullying statement that was about actual acceptance?

Roller Derby: To play or not to play...

(photo found here)

On Saturday I went to the local roller derby team's first game. I really wasn't sure what to expect. On television, half the time the women look powerful and strong, the other half of the time they look highly sexualized and objectified. I have been looking for a sport to participate in for a while now, and since I used to be a competitive figure skater, roller derby seemed like an appropriate chance to draw on those skills and do a sport that could also be powerful. That being said, I will not allow myself to be objectified by spectators.

At first, I wasn't sure what to think about it. It is a contact sport and the first thing that comes to mind is that when men play contact sports, they wear a lot of padding (think of hockey and American football, for example), whereas women in roller derby have only a helmet, mouth guard and knee and elbow pads to protect them. I wonder if the level of protective equipment would be different if it were a "male" sport. Yes, men do play roller derby, and when they do they wear the same safety equipment (with t-shirts and longer, baggy shorts), but I wonder if that has to do with not wanting to seem weaker than the women... although I could be looking way too much into this aspect of the sport.

Either way, what this suggests to me is that patriarchy is involved in some very real ways. Women are being put on display while they are kicking ass. On one hand, this bothers me because I really want to make sure I don't play into that, on the other hand, opportunities for me to have fun, stay fit, and meet other women are somewhat constrained by the time and work involved in grad school and parenting.

Although dressed in relatively revealing clothing, the Rideau Valley Girls looked powerful, not sensual (as a sidenote, using the word girls for these women also annoys me). The team members looked fit and strong and usually wore really cool tights with shorts on top. The tights were a multitude of colours and patterns and just didn't fit into the box of what I would consider sexualized clothing. They also had several women with tattoos, piercings, and non-traditional types of make up that didn't play into dominant standards of attractiveness.

Approximately half of the women on the local team seemed to wear heteronormative and much more sexualized clothing - some were wearing things like micro-mini skirts, fishnet tights with shorts so short as to make the bottom half of their bum visible, and frilly panties with garter straps hanging down. Now, I am all for enjoying being a sexual being, and I have worn mini skirts on occasion (usually dancing at the local gay bar and always with leggings), but I am somewhat annoyed that about half of the clothing warn by these women played so nicely into hegemonic norms of attractiveness. It also didn't help that the women on this team appeared much smaller, younger, and less strong than the Ottawa team. Still, the atmosphere and the way that the women acted and moved was strong and fun, not playful or sensual.

I can't help but think that if roller derby was considered a 'real' sport, there would be more men playing it. The fact that it has become a women's sport (with 'cute' costumes) tells me that it might be more about the sex than the sport. And yet, there were so many children and women at the bout (and lots of queer people) and the comments that people were yelling were about the sport and not about sex or sexualization. Despite the uniforms, in many ways, sex seemed to be downplayed and when it was there, it was mostly made fun of. I'm sure this is not the case at all roller derby games, and is definitely not the case in some of the television depictions I have seen, but it is the impression that I got from being at this one particular game.

I am going to go to the next "fresh meat" section and try roller derby out for myself (and yes, I do get the implications of calling women meat, even if it is a joke, but I am looking past that for the moment). I would like to see if I feel objectified when I am on that side of it. But I refuse to skate in anything that remotely resembles a schoolgirl uniform, nor will I look "pretty" in the glamour shots that are on the website, but then, many of the other women also seem to refuse to conform to that standard. I will definitely be posting more about roller derby as I experience it.

Now I just need a kick ass name...