It was supposed to be a golden moment in American history, and indeed it was. The realization that I was witnessing something very important happening, on so many levels, managed to cut its way past decades of cynicism born of thwarted idealism and swell my heart with pride.
I went to bed last night giddy with hope and schadenfreude, and though I still feel the warm buzz, it has since been harshed by events in California, where it looks like the ban on and possible nullification of same sex marriage has been approved.
While I was, and still am, thrilled about the symbolic and historical significance of Obama's victory, Proposition 8 is something that has a direct and immediate impact on people's lives. That some of these people are good friends of mine made it especially personal is beside the point -- it's more than a matter of seeing my friends have equal rights and protections under the law, it's a matter of basic fairness for all regardless of my personal connections to the parties involved.
I'm a pragmatic idealist. I am more than capable of bending my principles for the sake of incremental or less than perfect gain, and am willing to hold my nose and play the crooked game if it brings progress in the now, rather than staking my hopes on a millennarian sea change in some imagined future. I realize that might make me look a bit...unsound...to some of my more uncompromising comrades even if I share the same grand ideals.
I cannot, however, bring myself to bend on the subject of egalitarian principles. Everyone should be granted equal rights, responsibilities and protections under the law. That's a no brainer. It's the cornerstone of any just society. So how could anyone with any sense of fairness or justice of conscience presume to dictate something as personal as the bond between two consenting adults?
Because it's an easy target, sanctioned by social, cultural, and theological prejudices and given the opportunity to single out a perceived "other." For what? Smug satisfaction? Anticipation of some spiritual award? Simple mean-spiritedness?
That's utter bullshit. As I said back when similar nonsense was going down here in the Bay State, the only people who can "protect" or "devalue" marriage are you and your spouse. I don't conduct my personal relationship with Maura by looking over my shoulder at what other couples are doing, nor would I even deign to dictate terms of matrimony to other grownups. To think that such deeply personal matters ought to be subject to referendum is obnoxious in the extreme, leaving things in the hands of some petty-minded assholes on the other side of the state to legislate.
Look, folks, if you want to parade around in your vestments of smug righteousness, confident about your reserved place in the heavenly host, more power to you (though I suspect you might be disappointed in the end). Just keep your fucking noses out of other people's personal business, right? Don't you have some quasi-incestuous Purity Ball to plan for or something?
The Adverts - New Day Dawning (from a 1978 b-side; collected on The Punk Singles Collection, 1997) - I had been planning to repost my post-Election 2006 miniplaylist today, because it has been two years and there's no topping perfection. Events being what they are, however, I'm not up for unbridled joy, so we'll go with the most ambiguous (and sinister) selection from that day.
For the record, here's what I had on repeat last night when I was in full-on happy mode...
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
the turd in the punchbowl
Friday, October 03, 2008
Halloween Countdown: October 3 - post-feminist nightmares
The agents of the patriarchy laughed at Dr. Victoria Francistein. They belitted her research, called her "honey buns," and stared at her boobs while discussing new breakthroughs in stem cell research with her. Little did they realize that Francisteins's understanding of galvanic reanimation was far beyond anything their petty male minds could hope to understand.
Like a woman possessed, Francistein dedicated herself to her life's work. Morgues were broken into, graves were robbed, and long hours were spent slaving away in the dark catacombs beneath dread Castle Dworkin. Each purloined body part that passed through her well-manicured hands was chosen for maximum suitability for Francistein's project --
-- the creation of a race of super-women, untainted by the inherent unequality of traditional gender roles. With such allies at her disposal, Francistein hoped to wreak savage revenge on those who had wronged her and labeled her "hysterical."
So all-consuming was the Doctor's promethean hubris, however, that she failed to heed the warnings of her former mentor, Dr. Faludi, about the phenomenon known as the "Paglia Effect." Instead of embracing her creator's feminist ideology, Francistein's Monster turned out to be more interested in...
Angered by the Doctor's rejection, the creature vowed to become the enemy of reproductive rights, feminist principles, and everything else her creator held dear. She then fled north to plot her revenge and become a hockey mom.
It was in those cold and barren lands that Senator John McCain, on the lookout for a vice-presidential candidate, discovered her....and that's where the story gets really scary.
(from Madhouse #99, September 1975)
Sunday, September 28, 2008
action breeds reaction
Can you hear it, brothers and sisters?
The Revolution has begun!
Sorry, false alarm.
At least Alexandra has the support of her friends and family...
The Mo-Dettes - Foolish Girl (from The Story So Far, 1981) - The "old mind bit" is for boys!
Friday, September 12, 2008
a cowardly, superstitious lot
Forget the O'Neill/Adams run. Forget the Englehart/Rogers stories. Forget the issue when the Caped Crusader tossed a car battery at a thug. Here is the greatest Batman story ever told -- a public service announcement from late 1949:
Seriously, what the fuck happened to this country's moral conscience in the past sixty years? (That's a rhetorical question. I know the answer all too well.)
The Special AKA - Racist Friend (from In the Studio, 1984) - It's a great bit of socially aware ska, I'll grant you that, but the group lost something crucial after Terry Hall's eyebrows left to join Fun Boy Three.
Friday, August 15, 2008
Because we must
I'm going to break from my usual light-hearted fare featuring talking tigers and war atrocities to post something important by John DiBello, a good friend of mine and the Little Stuffed Bull's human sidekick, about something that bugs the shit out of me and needs to be brought to the attention of the widest audience possible. Those of you into the comics and comics convention scene have quite possibly witnessed or experienced similar bullshit in some form or another. Those of you who aren't into the comics thing can feel free to shake your heads.
Overheard at San Diego Comic-Con while I was having lunch on the balcony of the Convention Center on Sunday July 27: a bunch of guys looking at the digital photos on the camera of another, while he narrated: "These were the Ghostbusters girls. That one, I grabbed her ass, 'cause I wanted to see what her reaction was." This was only one example of several instance of harassment, stalking or
assault that I saw at San Diego this time.
1. One of my friends was working at a con booth selling books. She was stalked by a man who came to her booth several times, pestering her to get together for a date that night. One of her co-workers chased him off the final time.
2. On Friday, just before the show closed, this same woman was closing up her tables when a group of four men came to her booth, started taking photographs of her, telling her she was the "prettiest girl at the con." They they entered the booth, started hugging and kissing her and taking photographs of themselves doing so. She was confused and scared, but they left quickly after doing that.
3. Another friend of mine, a woman running her own booth: on Friday a man came to her booth and openly criticized her drawing ability and sense of design. Reports from others in the same section of the floor confirmed he'd targeted several women with the same sort of abuse and criticism.
Quite simply, this behavior has got to stop at Comic-Con. It should never be a sort of place where anyone, man or woman, feels unsafe or attacked either verbally or physically in any shape or form. There are those, sadly, who get off on this sort of behavior and assault, whether it's to professional booth models, cosplayers or costumed women, or women who are just there to work. This is not acceptable behavior under any circumstance, no matter what you look like or how you're dressed, whether you are in a Princess Leia slave girl outfit or business casual for running your booth.
On Saturday, the day after the second event I described above, I pulled out my convention book to investigate what you can do and who you can speak to after such an occurrence. On page two of the book there is a large grey box outlining "Convention Policies," which contain rules against smoking, live animals, wheeled handcarts, recording at video presentations, drawing or aiming your replica weapon, and giving your badge to others. There is nothing about attendee-to-attendee personal behavior.
Page three of the book contains a "Where Is It?" guide to specific Comic-Con events and services. There's no general information room or desk listed, nor is there a contact location for security, so I go to the Guest Relations Desk. I speak to a volunteer manning the desk; she's sympathetic to the situation but who doesn't have a clear answer to my question: "What's Comic-Con's policy and method of dealing with complaints about harassment?" She directs me to the nearest security guard, who is also sympathetic listening to my reports, but short of the women wanting to report the incidents with the names of their harassers, there's little that can be done.
"I understand that," I tell them both, "but what I'm asking is more hypothetical and informational: if there is a set Comic-Con policy on harassment and physical and verbal abuse on Con attendees and exhibitors, and if so, what's the specific procedure by which someone should report it, and specifically where should they go?" But this wasn't a question either could answer.
So, according to published con policy, there is no tolerance for smoking, drawn weapons, personal pages or selling bootleg videos on the floor, and these rules are written down in black and white in the con booklet. There is not a word in the written rules about harassment or the like. I would like to see something like "Comic-Con has zero tolerance for harassment or violence against any of our attendees or exhibitors. Please report instances to a security guard or the Con Office in room XXX."
The first step to preventing such harassment is giving its victims the knowledge that they can safely and swiftly report such instances to someone in authority. Having no published guideline, and indeed being unable to give a clear answer to questions about it, gives harassment and violence one more red-tape loophole to hide behind.
I enjoyed Comic-Con. I'm looking forward to coming back next year. So, in fact, are the two women whose experiences I've retold above. Aside from those instances, they had a good time at the show. But those instances of harassment shouldn't have happened at all, and that they did under no clear-cut instructions about what to do sadly invites the continuation of such behavior, or even worse.
I don't understand why there's no such written policy about what is not tolerated and what to do when this happens. Is there anyone at Comic-Con able to explain this? Does a similar written policy exist in the booklets for other conventions (SF, comics or otherwise) that could be used as a model? Can it be adapted or adapted, and enforced, for Comic-Con? As the leading event of the comics and pop culture world, Comic-Con should work to make everyone who attends feel comfortable and safe.
(Editor's note: Maura, a frequent con-attendee, was astonished to discover that SDCC had nothing in the literature regarding anti-harrassment policies, as such rules of conduct are clearly laid out in black and white at many other, smaller conventions.)
Saturday, July 12, 2008
role perversal
The blurb on the cover of Marvel's Savage Tales #1 (May 1971) reads:
...and the editorial explanation reads as follows:
"The result is, perhaps, something just a wee bit new under the sun. Not quite sword and sorcery -- certainly not science-fiction -- and not exactly a political polemic. Robin Morgan clobbers Buck Rogers in the 25th century! Kate Millett zaps both Flash Gordon and Ming the Merciless -- then takes Mongo over for good measure."Or, y'know, it's a hamfisted-yet-titillating look at the women's liberation movement -- by way of John Norman's Gor novels and Planet of the Apes -- crapped out by a past-his-prime Stan Lee and adequately illustrated by John Romita.
"The Fury of the Femizons" takes place in a future world run by the U.S.A. -- the United Sisterhood Alliance, that is -- a gynocracy established after the women of the world had enough of males' oppression, belligerence, and inability to put the toilet seat down after use. The women of the Sisterhood spend their days engaged in gladiatorial combat or culling the herds of feral males and spend their nights being, ahem, "entertained" by domesticated sex slaves -- all in accordance with the established principles of radical feminist theory. ("Objective #1: Overthrow the partiarchy. Objective #2: Get fitted for metal corsets that expose maximum cleavage.")
Lyra, an esteemed warrior of the Sisterhood and the in vitro sister of Queen Vega, pays lip service to the realm's guiding principles, yet feels unsatisfied with her way of life. This is not lost upon Syrani, the queen's advisor, an ambitious woman who combines the looks of Lieutenant Ilia with the political ethics of Karl Rove.
Lyra's dissatisfaction is partially due to to the fact that she has read, or rather "viewed," the forbidden headband-powered "mind tapes" which document how life had been before the feminist revolution. It is Lyra's hidden stash of those recordings that leads Mogon of the Hills, a male sleeper agent posing as a sex slave, to confront Lyra in hopes of recruiting her to his cause.
Mogon hails from a tribe of "noble" men, which unlike the feral wildmen, have learned from their gender's previous mistakes and want to establish equality between the sexes. (I can only imagine how it was done: "Mogon, come forth! For your trial into manhood, Kelpor will tell you what he did today and you must stay attentive through the entire tale!")
Lyra hesitates about helping Mogon carry out his plan to destroy the sperm banks the Sisterhood uses for replenishing its population, but comes around once she realises the other reason for her recurring sense of dissatisfaction...
...the need for a lover with both a slow hand and an easy touch. After the pair are done mutually exploring the Forbidden Zone, they ride out to a secret camp in the ruins to meet up with Mogon's compatriots to plot the raid on the baby-making factory. (No, not China, you silly infertile yuppies!)
What they discover upon arriving, however, is a trap laid by Syrani's secret police force, which are dispached in an orgy of violent innuendo...
Having killed a dozen agents of the state's security apparatus, Lyra and Mogon return to the royal palace and pretend that nothing ever happened. This incredibly cunning plan fails to work, and Lyra is brought before Queen Vega to answer to charges of treason. To spare Lyra from execution, Mogon decides to take the fall, and provokes the warrior princess into killing him in front of the royal court.
Though the exonerated Lyra puts on a brave face, even going so far as to demand some sex slaves for a threesome in order to
...she still longs for a man like the one she publicly eviscerated.
After reading this story, the whole Striperella thing makes a whole lot more sense to me now...as does the theory that Steve Ditko and Jack Kirby deserve a lion's share of the credit for the genius of Marvel's Silver Age output. As terrible as "The Fury of the Femizons" was, I still found it to be far superior to Y: The Last Man on the subject of gender politics.)
Screamin' Sirens - Your Good Girl's Gonna Go Bad (from Hell Comes to Your House, Vol, 2, 1983) - YEEE-HAW! It's cowpunk time!
Jan Panter - Put Yourself in My Place (from That's How It Goes: The Pye Anthology, 2003) - Maura's been rediscovering her love of 60's girls groups (and 50's & 60's pop in general) after discovering the oldies music channel on digital cable. Here's a favorite of mine from the UK scene, released in the musically golden year of 1966.
Friday, July 11, 2008
can't you settle for the center of attention
In his collection of Unpopular Essays, the philosopher Bertrand Russell discussed the phenomenon he called "the superior virtue of the oppressed," by which the marginalization of certain groups is justified by the attribution of certain intrinsic moral characteristics to those being oppressed. The inherent "compassion" of women, for instance, which allegedly made them ill-suited for pursuits where a degree of ruthlessness is needed, or the enduring patronization of the "noble savage" myth.
What happens, though, when those "virtues" and the concept of "oppression" are self-applied, rather dubiously, via conscious decision?
While I think that writer Chris Claremont's run of X-Men stories are, at least until 1986 or so, pretty entertaining reads, the concept behind the team -- mutant outcasts fighting for a world that hates them -- never really appealed to me. Despite the tendency in some circles to elevate the stories into some grand parable about civil rights, I suspect that the real meat and bones behind the franchise's evergreen appeal is that it speaks so clearly to the anxieties of the adolescent nerd, with protagonists who operate on the fringes of an unsympathetic society and marked for great things though genetic happenstance.
What specifically put me off of the X-Men is the characters sense of insularity. For all the lofty talk of tolerance and equality, the team seemed to revel in their outsider status: "We're X-Men. You're human, you wouldn't understand." Unlike, say, the Avengers, whose membership was open to androids, mutants, rednecks, and even Wonder Man, the X-Men were an echo chamber of melodrama less concerned with asserting their place in society than in endless navel-gazing about their special status....a status predicated on genetic superiority and exclusiveness.
In my travels through the harsh badlands of nerdity, I saw a lot of "outcast as elitist" mentality amongst my peers. It wasn't enough to find a community of like-minded souls or simply accept that one's tastes were skewed differently from the masses' baseline, there had to be a cosmic reason for it, rooted in a "us versus them" mentality. There are many valid reasons why some marginalized and persecuted groups and individuals might turn a bit insular. Growing up closeted in a ultra-homophobic environment, for example, would understandably lead to a certain sense of guardedness. The head cheerleader making fun of your Boba Fett t-shirt? Not so much. It would be one thing if it manifested as a egalitarian pan-geek celebration, but in practice the insularity has taken the form of a hierarchy of fan-tustans, judged from inside the barricades of each individual microcosm; videogame geeks look down on comic book geeks who look down on roleplayers who look down on videogamers.
When you factor in the pervasiveness of power fantasies within the scene's holy scriptures, it's shouldn't come as a surprise -- though it does for many people -- that there's a disturbing undercurrent of crypto-fascism amongst (mostly male) nerds that manifests itself in many troubling ways:
- The unironic appreciation of the anti-hero/bad ass/monster in heroic clothing. ("...and then he tortured the bad guy by slicing the dude's balls off! That's how the cops should do things in real life!")
- Celebration of violent masculinity (usually coupled with mockery of feminism or homosexuality). ("It makes no scientific sense for a female character in a fantasy game where orcs and dragons exist to have the same maximum strength score as a male!")
- An infatuation with a mythologized reactionary past, with apologias regarding totalitarian or militarist regimes and leaders. ("Hitler's mistake is that he should have dropped his hatred of the Jews and concentrated on the Soviets...")
All the above behaviors (and more) were witnessed during my stint as president of the campus sci-fi club. I took the job specifically to keep it out of the hands of those who wanted those quite pathetic vestments of authority too much, and my approach to leadership was hands-off in the extreme. Even still, I had a hard time shaking off the efforts of the rank and file who wanted to build a cult of personality around me. (Yeah, I know. It shocked the hell out of me, too. I had to sneak out of the club room when I went record shopping, lest an uninvited retinue follow me to Central Square.)
Things went south after I started dating Maura and neglected the vicarious needs of my flock, who then gravitated to a master of braggadocio (GTA IV players: Imagine a real-life Brucie). Within a matter of weeks they were reciting his bullshit sex-and-violence stories with awestruck reverence, declaring war upon his "enemies," and mimicking his leather-jacket-and-combat-boots mode of dress. I quit showing up after that, but I'm certain the party armbands were printed up not long afterwards.
Nick Lowe - Little Hitler (from Jesus of Cool, 1978) - Um, actually, this pop rock gem falls outside the established Third Reich canon. You'd know that if you read my Naziwiki page.
(The above ruminations were unabashedly inspired by the talented Dave Lartigue's far superior post featured here.)
Saturday, June 14, 2008
doesn't mean it's understood
Do you hate traffic jams? Sure, we all do!
But did you know that congested highways are just one symptom of a larger problem?
Now while some would blame overdevelopment and poor civic planning, the willingness of health care providers to boost profits at the expense of patients, and the widespread reluctance to invest in public transportation and infrastructure, others see a different cause...
Yep, overpopulation is the problem, but lest one misconstrue this as advocacy of a pro-choice, pro-contraception platform, some clarification is in order...
It's not a question of too many people, but of too many of the wrong type of people. While it would be gauche to state outright the definition of such, there's a reason the Pew Hispanic Research Center is cited in the body of the text, and not relegated to an asterisked footnote like the other data cited was.
These veiled words of caution came courtesy of the following coalition....
...consisting of various interrelated "astroturf" organizations and a publishing house (whose biggest claim to fame is releasing an English-language edition of this charming piece of psuedo-literary agitprop), most of which are linked to this bunch of fun lovin' folks.
Interestly enough, this attempt to put a more socially and environmentally palatable face on nativism and xenophobia ran in the June 23, 2008 edition of The Nation, the venerable progressive periodical which claims to be "a wholly owned subsidiary of [its] own conscience." I guess the question is "at what point does the need for advertising revenue override moral integrity?" Especially when one considers that this isn't the first time the publication has cut such a deal.
The Specials - Doesn't Make It Alright (from The Specials, 1979) - At least I can depend on these purveyors of fine two-tone not to disappoint.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
no one more red white and blue
Given the scope and nature of the crimes committed by the Third Reich and those who aided and abetted that foul regime, it was only natural that the evocation of Nazism would become a commonly used rhetorical tactic (to the point of being given a semi-formal designation). It is brute force PSYOPS in its most elegant and simple form. The power of such analogies has diminished due to (frequently hyperbolic) overuse, leading to reflexive dismissal of those who play that particular trump card in an argument.
Context and proportion, as always, is key. Citing Nazi Germany as a historical precedent for a government using paranoia and scapegoating as a means of expanding executive power and curtailing civil rights is valid. Comparing a Wal-Mart worker to a Gestapo thug for asking to see one's receipt? Not so much.
The malfeasance of the Nazis is of such a singular magnitude in both scale and infamy -- Stalin's U.S.S.R. and the Cambodian Year Zero come nowhere close to it in terms of popular awareness -- its evocation makes issues of moral relativism a snap. Not only can petty personal grievances be linked to the actions of a genocidal totalitarian regime, but one's own dubious and reprehensible behavior can be whitewashed in comparison to the same:
We do detain people without regard for habeas corpus, but we don't send them to gas chambers! Waterboarding is a mild discomfort compared to medical experimentation!
In a sane world, this facsimile of logic where "falling short of ultimate evil" somehow equals "good" would be greeted with universal shock, horror, and/or rage, but in this world, it is seen as a valid argument by a large segment of the populace.
Because people are fucking stupid, and as Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos #56 (July 1968; by Gary Friedrich, Dick Ayers, and John Severin) shows, it's a form of stupid that has been with us a while. "Gabriel, Blow Your Horn!" is not so much a story as it is a straw man formed from privileged white liberalism and patriotic platitudes and held together by Godwin's Law.
For those of you unfamiliar with Marvel's Howling Commandos, imagine the Rat Pack as a crack group of World War Two fighin' men, with Nick Fury as the Chairman of the Board, Dino Manelli as Dean Martin, Pinky Pinkerton as Peter Lawford, and "Dum Dum" Dugan as Shirley MacLaine. (The Joey Bishop role was held on a rotating basis by the other requisite polyglot archetypes that filled out the unit.)
The story begins with Gabriel "Gabe" Jones, the team's answer to Sammy Davis Jr. (only without the glass eye, Nehru jacket, and mustache) and nod toward the Great Society's sense of inclusiveness, making his escape from the German soldiers that captured him in the previous issue. He eventually hooks up with a contact in the French resistance movement, who asks for his assistance in rescuing Carla Swain, an American jazz singer held prisoner by the Nazis in occupied Paris.
Jones, a jazz trumpeter in civilian life (because diversity is fine and all, but breaking free from stock characterizations is hard), manages to land himself a gig at the club where Carla performs nightly to a packed house of German officers. (Interestingly enough, even though the officers are such hardcore Nazis that they find ways to drop lines from Mein Kampf into casual conversation, they don't seem to share the official party line regarding the "racial degeneracy" of jazz music. An insight into Nazi hypocrisy? Or the writer's ignorance of period history? You decide.)
After the performance, Jones punches and sneaks his way past the guards to gain access to Carla's room, only to find out that she has no desire to be rescued...
Despite her anachronistic Motown re-deco, it seems that Carla was intended to be an analogue to Josephine Baker, the expatriate jazz performer who relocated to France during the 1920's in part to escape the endemic racism she encountered in America. A massive sensation among both the French and the American ex-pats of the "Lost Generation," her pointed but spot-on comments about racial inequality and injustice in her native land got her labeled as a communist.
During the war, her popularity shielded her from Nazi persecution, and she assisted the French resistance as well as entertained Free French troops in North Africa, and she later participated in the American civil rights movement of the 1960's.
That was all a bit too nuanced for a shitty war comic, apparently, which instead recast the scenario as "Angry NegroTM duped by the Nazis and her own prejudices." Sure, there's lynchings and race riots and legalized discrimination in America...but we're still better than Nazis! (See how well that works? Try using it on your significant other some time: "Hon, I may have blown our life savings on magic beans, but at least I'm not a Nazi!")
"Howler Ramrod"? Oh, my.Porn name jokes aside, let's see what we've got going on here:
1. Projecting blame and fault back onto the oppressed party
2. A white writer using a black character as a mouthpiece to add credibility to his argument
3. The disingenuous and untrue dismissal of America's racial issues as the work of a "handful of white people." In any case numbers mean less than the institutionalized and (officially and unofficially) sanctioned nature of racism in both 1942 and 1968.
4. The evocation of post-racial patriotic platitudes that fail to address the existing problem
Jones rushes in to save his REAL AMERICAN teammates from the goosesteppers. In the process, Carla manages to be taken hostage by Colonel Prussian Von Grimace, but is saved when "Reb" Ralston, the token ass-backward cracker member of the Howlers, kicks Von Grimace in the head. Carla thus comes around to the
Sometimes it takes a man who chooses to identify via nickname with a failed regime of slave-owners to teach us who the real bigots are.If there one thing I've learned my life, it's that the only thing more aggravating than a white liberal who gets hyper-defensive over black rage (or even discontentment) is a white liberal who co-opts the same. I say "liberal" because conservatives don't fucking care. They just shrug it off and dream of new tax loopholes.
Now, Carla, just because you've chosen to think of yourself as a non-hyphenated American does not mean that the rest of your countrymen and women are obligated to do the same, but as long as you don't make waves there won't be a problem. And who knows? Maybe sometime in the early 21st Century, the country will nominate a black candidate for president after a long and rancorous nomination process where another supposedly "liberal" candidate will engage in race baiting! And maybe a slight majority of Americans will find both this and this to be reprehensible in the extreme!
If all else fails, though, just seek comfort in the knowledge that you're not living in the Third Reich.
Yet.
Josephine Baker - Vous Faites Partie de Moi (I've Got You Under My Skin) (from Bonsoir My Love, 1998) - That sound you're hearing is the haunting echoes of modernity.
Jello Biafra & Mojo Nixon - Love Me, I'm a Liberal (from Prairie Home Invasion, 1994) - Updating Phil Ochs for the Information Age. Necessary? Perhaps not, but I'm thrilled with the results.
Saturday, June 07, 2008
they got the talk
Sgt. Nick Fury reminisces about some of the women he and his unit of goldbricks have crossed paths with:
Yep, Sophia Loren once fought alongside the Howling Commandos. Truly a pivotal moment in the history of fan-fiction.
I don't want to jump to conclusions, but in the cases of Carla and Dr. Reiker it's hard for me not to overlook the fact that at the time this comic was published, it was a commonly held belief on the right wing of the political spectrum that the both the civil rights and anti-war movements were run by communist dupes.
Then again, we are talking about crazy mixed up dames, right, fellas?
Rodgers & Hammerstein - There Is Nothin' Like a Dame (from South Pacific: An Original Soundtrack Recording, 1958) - Eliminate all other possibilites, and the one which remains must necessarily be a dame.
Graham Parker - Local Girls (from Squeezing Out Sparks, 1979) - A shining example of the "Cranky Not-Really-That-Young Man" school of new wave.
Friday, June 06, 2008
Friday Night Fights: Girl Power!
This week's fast and furious contribution to the Battle Cosmic features Misty Knight and Colleen Wing demonstrating the chop-socky bona fides that earned this pair of private investigators the title "Daughters of the Dragon":
Lesson I learned from this story: In the 1970's, ladies' fashionwear was designed to rip and tear for maximum titillation -- but not to the point of actual nudity -- during martial arts free-for-alls with an army of thugs.
Also, said fight scenes offer ample opportunities to showcase panty shots. Ms. Knight apparently favors thongs, while Ms. Wing is more of a traditionalist.
Convenient and empowering! Tune in next time, when Ms. Wing gets hooked on smack and does naked yoga to exorcise the monkey from her back in another epic tale in the creepy Chris Claremont manner!
Alan Tew - The Detectives (from The Sound Gallery, Vol. 1, 1996) - As featured in the 1977 blue movie, Punk Rock. Pinball machines (back when they used to still make them) and adult films have always had a knack for riding the crest of the popcult trend wave.
Saturday, May 31, 2008
guys and dolls
There are few things as disappointing as having a decent concept spoiled by an iffy personal agenda. Conn and Hal Iggulden's The Dangerous Book for Boys, an attempt to enlighten the Playstation generation about the "lost" wisdom of folkways of yore, is the type of book that ought to appeal to me, yet comments made by the authors regarding the intent of the omnibus have left me loath to purchase a copy.
As a dilettante retrologist, I have a keen appreciation for efforts to preserve and present the fascinating parts of our collective cultural history that have fallen by the wayside, but it's that gender-specific qualifier, "for boys," that makes me pause. In the author's Amazon Q&A section, Conn Iggulden states, "You only have to push a boy on a swing to see how much enjoys the thrill of danger. It's hard-wired." It's a statement that smacks of biological determinism, and when placed alongside his complaints about raising a risk-adverse generation, suggests that the intent behind the book was not just about preserving vanishing folk wisdom, but an attempt to resurrect a mythicized version of traditional "rugged" masculinity, "snips and snails and puppy dog tails" versus "sugar and spice."
Which is bullshit, quite frankly. Bullshit which stems from reactionary discontent with modern liberal society and the gradual erosion of traditional gender roles. It's the same impulse that launched countless self-indulgent whines about "Daddy issues" and has created a thriving industry purposed to sell synthetic -- and quite depressing -- iterations of manliness to rubes convinced that they're missing out on something vital. I can empathize with those feeling a hunger of wholeness, but the idea that gender roles or a sense of personal identity can be purchased like a tin of shoe polish is wrongheaded for so many reasons.
While I've made an active effort to forget most of what I learned from my father on the subject of "what it is to be a man," there is one thing that has stuck with me. In reference to the manly-man gastronomic polemic Real Men Don't Eat Quiche, my father stated "Real men eat whatever the fuck they feel like." It's similar in sentiment to the Bard's "to thy own self be true," though with the additional benefit of some casual profanity, and if one changes "real men" to the gender-neutral "real individuals" it still applies in force.
You only have to push a child on a swing to see how much he or she enjoys the thrill of danger. It's hard-wired into children, period. Or not. Some kids are thrillseekers and others are cautious. It's a matter of temperament, not of sex, though the encouragement or discouragement of such traits is often shaped by the semi-transparent hand of gender role socialization (which is a damn shame). Rather than thinking that something has been lost because of the socio-cultural shifts regarding gender, it's more productive -- not to mention better for the theoretical child in question -- to embrace the wider vistas of self-expression and opportunity that have been opened.
So I think I'll pass on picking up The Dangerous Book for Boys. It would be a redundant purchase, anyhow, considering that I already have a few volumes of this, handed down to me by my mother, at my disposal:
That's the first half of the contents page for the third volume of The Book of Knowledge, 1951 edition. Part encyclopedia, part almanac, part DIY handbook -- it's the real deal, as opposed to a post-facto nostalgic recreation. Check out the range of subjects covered, all targeted toward the eight-to-twelve year olds of six decades ago. Something has been lost in the past half-century, but it has fuck all to do with presence of absence of a Y chromosome.
Mechanical Servants - Study Up! (from the Min X Match 12", 1980; collected on several bootleg minimal synth compilations) - A little bit of digging about the Mechanical Servants reveals that they were a female minimal synth duo that hailed from New York and their 1980 EP was released as a private pressing, though copies of the record can be found for quite reasonable prices (under $20) on eBay and elsewhere.
London Underground - Train of Thought (from a 1981 single; collected on the Atomic Shockwaves v. 13 compilation) - This one sounds a little like an early Killing Joke track...if said track was being broadcast by a failing automated low-power transmitter half a decade after a global thermonuclear exchange.
Yeah, I'm in a minimal synth/postpunk mood tonight. What of it?
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
reverts to pure female
In wake of the cultural and social upheavals of the 1960's, it became a common enough practice for popcult entertainments to acknowledge, if only grudgingly, the heightened awareness of egalitarian principles that permeated the era. Not surprisingly, this trend resulted in a number of stories where ostensibly laudable sentiments were presented (intentionally or not) in the most gratingly patronizing or condescending manner imaginable.
Which brings us to "The Powderpuff Run" from Hot Wheels #4 (September-October 1970). As the title suggests, the series was a licensed tie-in to Mattel's popular line of die-cast toy cars, which also spawned a short-lived Saturday morning cartoon series. "Short-lived" because it had the misfortune of airing at a time when the FCC actually had teeth in matters not directly related to "wardrobe failures" and has-been Irish rock stars uttering four letter words, and the cartoon was yanked when it ran afoul of the restrictions on advertising time. (Those restrictions would later be lifted during the Gipper's administration, thus paving the way for a flood of terrible, cheaply-produced toy cartoons and infomercials for questionable products. Yay, progress!)
The only thing that set the Hot Wheels comic apart from the mass of forgettable and forgotten kid's fare from that wild era when kids actually read non-manga comics was the participation of Alex Toth, whose outstanding powers of illustration were capable of elevating even the most pedestrian plot material. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it) Toth was not involved in crafting "The Powderpuff Run," which was a Len Wein/Ric Estrada collaborative effort. (Talented men both, and I won't fault anyone for not bringing their A-game to a short back up feature in a licensed toy comic, but I gotta call 'em as I see 'em...)
The story begins with the member of the Hot Wheels racing team puttering around the Metro City Speedway. When team member Ardeth (no relation to Bernadeth) asks why the team isn't planning to field an entrant to the women-only "Daisy Derby" event (because there is no vocation so dangerous or skill-intensive that it cannot be diminished with a girly descriptor when women are involved), tempers begin to flare...
Before Ardeth can deliver Mickey's well-deserved braining, the arrival of a mysterious driver of exceptional ability captures the attention of the team. And guess what, she's a WOMAN!
She's not just any woman, either. She's Alexandra, cousin of the Hot Wheels Team's hated rival, Dexter Carter. Carter's gloating (coupled with his disturbingly misaligned nostrils) is too much for Mickey to take, and changes his mind about Ardeth's participation in the Daisy Derby...
Supporting a colleague's dreams and career aspirations? Whatever. Winning a dick-waving contest by proxy? COUNT ME IN!
With little time to waste, the team members commence burning the midnight oil to kit out a suitable ride for Ardeth to use. Because they're aiming for performance over aesthetic appeal, the final product ends up looking a bit rough around the edges, so Ardeth and Janet, the Daphne Blake to Ardeth's Velma Dinkley, take it upon themselves to do a little impromptu customization...
Is it an attempt to subvert traditional perceptions regarding gender? Or to unironically embrace them? The text is ambiguous on this point.
Race day arrives, and Ardeth discovers that winning might be a harder proposition than she had previously anticipated. Not only is Alexandra a skilled and aggressive driver, but she has also had her car outfitted by the same firm that does automotive customization work for Matt Helm and Penelope Pitstop. Even though she is in full view of thousands of (granted, mostly shitfaced) spectators, she doesn't think twice about employing these non-street legal modifications...
As Ardeth struggles to regain the lead, Janet hatches a little scheme of her own to neutralize Alexandra's decisive advantages on the asphalt...
Other signs Janet had considered using included "Your attitude scares potential mates," "Work or family? You can't have it all," and "Your biological clock is ticking!"
Alexandra's fall to the inexorable forces of biological determinism leaves a clear path to the checkered flag for Ardeth, who nets the Daisy Derby Cup (which is just like the Metro City 500 Cup, but decorated with plastic flowers and pink ribbon and stuffed with a $25 certificate for a pedicure instead of a check for $5000) with no further complications.
Feeling empowered? I know I am. (Wait, I meant "confused and slightly queasy." I confuse those all the time.)
The Bodysnatchers - Ruder Than You (from a 1980 single; collected on The 2-Tone Collection: A Checkered Past, 1993) - We named one of the local feral cats (the mother of Lil' Baby Setz and Nubby, and therefore the grandmother of our kittens) "Rude Girl," in reference to this song and The Clash's "Rudie Can't Fail." How's that for insular personal trivia?
As for the song, it's a swell bit of all-female 2-Tone ska. Singer Rhoda Dakar later went on to work with The Specials and other members of the band eventually formed the Belle Stars.
The Dictators - (I Live for) Cars and Girls (from The Dictators Go Girl Crazy! 1975) - An admirable philosophy, I suppose, providing the car in question isn't a 1985 AMC Eagle and the girl isn't Sally Kern.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
and pay our fees
Here's another item from The Colonial Cookbook -- an advertisement for the finest feminine footwear fashions 1909 had to offer:
Remember, ladies: Only the most shameless of harlots would be so brazen as to bare their ankles to strange men. It is but the shortest of slippery slopes leading from exposed calves to the catastophic folly of universal suffrage.
(On a more serious socio-linguistic note, the use of "Patrician" for a line of Edwardian Era women's footwear is quite fascinating. The term itself describes a postion of privilege, while its etymology is rooted in the Latin word for "father," pater, from which the word "patriarchy" is also derived.)
Girls At Our Best! - Too Big for Your Boots (from Pleasure, 1981) - The treacle masks the taste of the venom.
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