Tag: the patriarchy needs to die in a fire like NOW

That’s DOCTOR bitch, to you

On By MezzoSherriIn Flagrantly Feminist, Life-Long Learning, Memoir, Politics and Policy, Pop Goes the Culture, Topics of Study1 Comment

I have—rather demonstrably—a potty mouth. I even lay claim to it in my tagline up there.

This propensity towards foul-mouthed discourse probably explains my love for T-shirts with provocatively foul–mouthed slogans.

Now, I’m actually too chicken-shit to wear anything so bold and brassy, but I continue to dream of myself as if I were braver. And there was a time, back at Penn, when I had a mildly foul-mouthed shirt that I loved.

Transcription: I'm not a bitch. I'm THE bitch. And I'm Miss Bitch to you.
I used to wear this. In public. Ah, youth!

I am, of course, musing on honorifics today on account of a truly execrable Op-Ed published in the Wall Street Journal some week-and-a-half ago. You probably know the one—I’m not linking it here—where Joseph Epstein, some retired lecturer I shall be calling “Joey” for the duration of this piece, lambasted Dr. Jill Biden for continuing to use the academic title (Dr.) relevant to her graduate degree (Ed.D.) and profession (community college professor). Since Dr. Jill Biden is not an MD-carrying medical doctor, Joey suggests, she shouldn’t put on airs by using any title beyond “First Lady.”

Honestly, I wasn’t planning to write about this. It was so obviously click-bait, something designed to provide outrage—which it quite deservedly and expectedly did, despite the follow-on article by the WSJ’s opinions editor saying how shocked (SHOCKED, I tell you!) he was about the liberal snowflakes over-reacting to the piece.

Animated gif of Jim Carrey over-expressing shock and horror.

So why give these douche-canoes more of the attention they were so obviously craving? There’d be better things to write about…

But then someone on a distant external ring of my professional circle commented in an email about how, ideologically and symbolically speaking, he and Dr. Jill Biden were equally under attack by this op-ed’s voicing of current anti-intellectual and anti-education beliefs. Him and Dr. Jill and their “fake degrees.”

And I nearly took his fucking head off. Which belatedly made me aware that I’ve been having some feelings about this all.

Animated gif of Kate Walsh making an angry face and lifting her clawed hands towards the camera.

So, time to come off hiatus and come back to the page.

Continue reading “That’s DOCTOR bitch, to you” →

The Victorious After

On By MezzoSherriIn Gratitudes and Thank Yous, Memoir, Self-Acceptance, Stuff about Stuff, The Voices in My Head1 Comment

So yes, I made good use of Patriots’ Day Weekend to get my home office/goddess room in good order. I’ll toss in one glossy “After” shot right here.

IMG_4105

For the “Before,” you can just go back to my whiny post from Friday night. However much courage it took to post that picture 4 days ago, I do not have enough extra bravery lying around to post that embarrassing picture again….

So: rather a big change. I’m a little bit proud of myself for pulling it off.

Continue reading “The Victorious After” →

A white ceramic cookie jar with a red lid. The jar is decorated with a drawing of a rooster and the words: "Kellogg's, Good Morning"

Addicted to Air

On By MezzoSherriIn Fat is Just an Adjective, Flagrantly Feminist, Health at Every Size, Memoir, Self-AcceptanceLeave a comment

I’ve talked a time or two already about how my pre-diabetes diagnosis has me looking at various ways to reduce the amount of sugars and carbs in my daily food intake. What that also means is I have stumbled across so many books and websites that play on the tired old trope of “sugar addiction.”

I’m not going to amplify any of those sources here tonight—you can find them easily enough by making your own visit to Professor Google. Besides, you don’t need to know much more than the fact that this metaphor is out there loud and strong in the culture to be able to ride along with my complicated feelings on the topic. Mostly critique, but some small resonance, as well.

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Nothing to Prove

On By MezzoSherriIn Flagrantly Feminist, Pop Goes the Culture, The Voices in My Head1 Comment

Why yes, Virginia, I did enjoy Captain Marvel yesterday.

Now, there’s no need for me to do a full-on review: there’s enough examples of that out in the wilds of the Internet. In case you need them, here’s some recommended links:

  • Peter Travers’s review in Rolling Stone
  • Owen Gleiberman’s review for Variety
  • Alex Abad-Santos’s coverage in Vox about sexist responses to the film, in the larger context of similar buffoonery around Star Wars: The Last Jedi and other genre flicks

Instead, I’m going to focus on one small moment, recounted in as spoiler-free a fashion as I can manage.

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I Never Thought I’d Live Past 20 (Well, 30)

On By MezzoSherriIn Flagrantly Feminist, Pop Goes the Culture, Self-Acceptance, The Voices in My Head3 Comments

A friend of mine and fellow blogger* has, upon occasion referred to herself as an “unfunny feminist“–riffing on and mocking the dismissive “Can’t you take a joke?” bullshit that so often erupts when we dare to read some bit of cultural quote-unquote fun through an anti-kyriarchal lens, only to observe (quelle surprise!) that said fun isn’t really fun or funny, and instead just reinscribes some horrific piece of the miasma of misogyny in which we all soak daily.

Now, I’m not gonna steal my friend’s slogan from her, but I gotta say that I am definitely feeling the “unfunny feminist” vibe today. (Maybe I’ll call my own expression of this kind of sentiment the “Humourless Hag” chronicles.)

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Of Bread and Circuses

On By MezzoSherriIn Flagrantly Feminist, Pop Goes the Culture2 Comments

As a card-carrying “geek girl,” it shouldn’t be much of a surprise that I’ve been watching Game of Thrones since it debuted on HBO back in 2011. Besides, I made this fact clear last summer when I reminisced about using the show as a touchpoint of connection between Mr. Mezzo and myself back during the late spring & early summer of 2013 when we were living apart as part of the Great Northern Relocation.*

(For the spoiler-averse, I’m going to be talking more about last night’s GoT episode, as well as plot points from previous episodes. So if you’re not caught up and don’t want to have plot surprises reveled to you, stop now rather than clicking through to after the jump. For the rest of you, who are up-to-speed or who don’t give many fucks about the series, come on in!)

Continue reading “Of Bread and Circuses” →

Acts of Courage

On By MezzoSherriIn Flagrantly Feminist, Pop Goes the Culture, Practicing in the Heart, Self-Acceptance1 Comment

And, as with other news stories in past weeks and months, I am returning to Emma Watson’s address at the UN on Saturday for another piece of discussion, through another lens of analysis.

I know that during the time I am returning again and again to this particular well, that there are many other stories I am leaving untold — it is that fact which sometimes leads me to have such vivid fantasies of winning the mega-millions and writing all the livelong day. Nevertheless, I find for myself that there is a value in looking deeply at one event from multiple lenses, rather than always popcorning to report on event after event according to the formula so brilliantly summed up by Kate Harding, back when she shuttered up Shapely Prose:

By last spring, I became increasingly aware that I was doing a lot of “Stock Intro A + Stock Feminism/Fat Acceptance Points B and C + Free-Form Outrage Interlude + Stock Conclusion D = done for the day,” and that is really not the kind of writing I want to be doing.

Rather than throwing myself over too strongly into “wind-up doll of feminist outrage mode,” I believe that by looking deeply at the multiple facets of one thing, I am sometimes better able to point to all the unconscious workings and cultural patternings that so interest me about the world and the patriarchy.

(And by “so interest me,” I mean “that I hope to name clearly in the vain hope that speaking the name of the Thing forces it to magically self-destruct like in the fairy tales.“)

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An Invitation to the Table

On By MezzoSherriIn Flagrantly Feminist, Gratitudes and Thank Yous, Pop Goes the Culture, The Voices in My Head4 Comments

Emma Watson spoke at the UN General Headquarters yesterday. In her capacity as UN Women Goodwill Ambassador — a role to which she was appointed (invited?) in July — Watson was there to launch the HeForShe campaign, which describes itself as

a solidarity movement for gender equality that brings together one half of humanity in support of the other [half?] of humanity, for the entirety of humanity.

Or, in simpler (and more idiosyncratic) phrasing: we’re in this patriarchal soup together, and together we have a better chance of getting to the next level of cultural evolution.

Continue reading “An Invitation to the Table” →