Sep 04
Well, they are, of course. It’s just that many men don’t find them funny. Which is why many stand-up clubs (those managed by men) (that is, almost all of them) actually have a rule: only so many stand-ups on any given night can be women. Too many and they kill the night.
But, of …
Aug 31
I recently spent some time at another blog (someone had linked to one of my posts and invited me to the discussion), and I discovered that several of the discussants conflated gender and sex. I was shocked. (And in fact, that possibility so didn’t occur to me that I continued the surreal discussion for some …
Aug 22
So I’m out walking today, and as I pass a neighbour tending his bird feeder, I wave.
And the guy calls out to me “I’m feeding some seed to the little birdies!”
The little birdies? What am I, twelve?
No, I’m female. (I have a hard time believing …
Aug 19
Right, that’ll work. Women should use caution.
Okay, as long as we’re putting the responsibility on the women (sigh), how about a women-only taxi service?
Anyone out there looking for a job? Someone with a BBA could prepare a business plan, someone else could prepare a Kickstarter proposal to get funding (I offer my editing …
Aug 16
When So You Think You Can Dance first started, they had one winner. In season 9, they decided to have two winners: one male and one female. I thought it was because they realized the odds were stacked in favour of male dancers since most of the viewers/voters were female (and, presumably, heterosexual) (and, presumably, …
Jul 30
http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2013/01/15/parents-furious-after-young-boys-suspended-after-playing-with-imaginary-weapon/
I’d be uncomfortable around any child who enjoyed pretending to kill–anything.
Especially if that child was going to grow up to be a man, was going to be flooded with testosterone for several years.
I’d also be uncomfortable around any adult who considered that behavior “a game”.
Jul 25
[I wrote this piece back in the early 90s when Gwen Jacobs did her thing (yay, Gwen!), but apparently it all still needs to be said. A couple years ago, I was ‘spoken to’ by a neighbour for taking my shirt off on a hot summer day …
Jul 20
To read the science journals, one would think animal life consists of nothing but predation and reproduction, both thoroughly competitive in nature. The absence of any capacity for pleasure, or at least for non-competitive pleasure, is frightening. Lining a nest with warm and soft material is not for …
Jun 22
There’s an interesting phrase. Man, woman, and child: those are my options, are they? Identifying oneself by one’s sex is a prerequisite for adulthood: if I don’t want to identify myself by my sex, as either a man or a woman, I’m left with identifying myself as a …
Jun 11
I recently watched, with horrified amusement, a tv program about short men who choose to undergo excruciatingly painful surgical procedures (which basically involve breaking their legs and then keeping the bones slightly apart while they mend) in order to become a few inches taller.
Asked why they would choose to undergo …
