Check out this weird comment that I found on an old post:
I found this page due to a link left in a different journal, I forget which one.
I like the idea, and most of the comments. However, the last one needs re-worked. I find it extremely inappropriate to list using medical cannabis (which can be inhaled, or eaten, not just smoked) along with addictive and destructive things like gambling and shooting heroin.
Medical cannibis has a *lot* of science behind it, and forms of medical cannabis are being used in enlightened countries like Great Britian and Canada.
http://www.drugdevelopment-technology.com/projects/sativex/
[...]
Access to medical cannabis is a political issue, not a health issue. Medical cannabis has been clearly scientifically proven to be an effective drug for pain control, much better than most of the drugs which the pharmaceutical want someone to use. This is a political issue based on control of the market by the big pharmaceutical companies, and your failure to recognize that does a huge discredit to your chart.
It would be far more appropriate to include a space which addresses the politics around denying people effective pain control.
Yes, because I love it when pot advocates tell ME what "discredits" MY WORK, and what is "appropriate" and not. Oh, and Big Pharma somehow gets worked in there, too. Love it.
I have had people who know next to nothing about my condition tell me that pot is "great for pain control" and that I should use it. Know why I chose to ignore them? Because a) they don't know me well enough to know that I do not want to become a pothead and b) pot can be addictive. I have a close relative who has struggled with marijuana addiction. I do not want to take that risk. That is my choice.
Assuming that one substance is a cure-all is, in a word, ridiculous. Do I tell other people with fibro that they should take Vicodin (as I do) for pain? No, because for some people it doesn't work. For some, it can be addictive. I have to keep this in mind. The pot advocates would do well to remember something similar. Pot is not a cure-all, no matter how you spin it.
If you want me to respect your opinion, please have the courtesy to respect mine in turn.
16 April, 2009
09 April, 2009
There's a Storm Gathering...A CAMEL STORM.
I don't think I have to tell you all how intensely idiotic and homophobic this PSA is:
My response can only be summed up by the following:
You said it, camels in a car.
My response can only be summed up by the following:
You said it, camels in a car.
03 April, 2009
Epic Privilege Fail
At first, I was unsure as to what I thought of this blog, in which a guy with (temporary!) underarm crutches takes photos of NYC subway riders who sit in the elderly/PWD seating instead of offering him a seat.
After reading this NY Times blog post on the site, however, I'm inclined to think that this is yet another mostly able-bodied person who claims the "social experiment" defense in order to take advantage of his own privilege, and to claim that he now somehow has insight into what it's like to live with a disability. Observe:
Wednesday morning, he was crossing 42nd Street after a long commute, accompanied by a reporter, when he was asked if he had learned any big lessons from the whole affair.
“Big lessons?” he said, pausing for a moment. “Honestly, no.”
After another moment’s thought, he added that the site and its reaction have given him a new appreciation for the lives of people with permanent disabilities.
“There’s these little struggles and battles going on every day,” he said. “You’d have to have a really good attitude to deal with it and have it not get to you.”
Yay, it's the PWDs as somehow brave and/or inspiring trope! My favorite. Also, note how being on crutches for some time apparently gives him super-special insight into what it's like to be a person with a (visible) disability! Never mind that dealing with a permanent health condition or disability is not just about getting (or not getting) a seat on the subway; there are other things that one must think about, plan around, and negotiate. Plus, there's that whole thing about disabilities that don't have any of the handy visual markers of disability that some able-bodied folks in our culture so strongly rely upon.
The comments to the article, predictably, are full of people who feel the need to share about how they, too, were once on crutches and experienced something similar, so they totally get how difficult it is to live with a physical disability.
This doesn't help.
After reading this NY Times blog post on the site, however, I'm inclined to think that this is yet another mostly able-bodied person who claims the "social experiment" defense in order to take advantage of his own privilege, and to claim that he now somehow has insight into what it's like to live with a disability. Observe:
Wednesday morning, he was crossing 42nd Street after a long commute, accompanied by a reporter, when he was asked if he had learned any big lessons from the whole affair.
“Big lessons?” he said, pausing for a moment. “Honestly, no.”
After another moment’s thought, he added that the site and its reaction have given him a new appreciation for the lives of people with permanent disabilities.
“There’s these little struggles and battles going on every day,” he said. “You’d have to have a really good attitude to deal with it and have it not get to you.”
Yay, it's the PWDs as somehow brave and/or inspiring trope! My favorite. Also, note how being on crutches for some time apparently gives him super-special insight into what it's like to be a person with a (visible) disability! Never mind that dealing with a permanent health condition or disability is not just about getting (or not getting) a seat on the subway; there are other things that one must think about, plan around, and negotiate. Plus, there's that whole thing about disabilities that don't have any of the handy visual markers of disability that some able-bodied folks in our culture so strongly rely upon.
The comments to the article, predictably, are full of people who feel the need to share about how they, too, were once on crutches and experienced something similar, so they totally get how difficult it is to live with a physical disability.
This doesn't help.
31 March, 2009
I Don't Know What to Call This
The singer Martha Wainwright has a song entitled "Bleeding All Over You" that begins with the following set of lyrics:
There are days
when the cage doesn't
seem to open very wide at all
I know it sounds negative, but some days, I can definitely relate. Maybe it's the fact that I pass fairly regularly as able-bodied--at least in public spaces--or maybe it's my failure at passing on my worst days that makes me relate. As much as I hate to rely upon the old trope of the person-with-disability as trapped by her own unruly body, it, like many tropes, has a sliver of truth to it.
When I am in public, I often fear that other people--more able-bodied people--can "spot" my disability. On a purely surface level, this makes no sense. Part of what makes passing such an interesting topic is the fact that, on some level, the individual who passes can hide something and look as if she or he is a part of another group, despite some (invisible) evidence that would suggest otherwise. I realize also that not everyone has the ability to pass--that passing, in itself, is a privilege. The ability to appear to be something that one is not (often as a member of a more privileged group) is not something that absolutely everyone has.
Today, I sat in a restaurant and ate a light lunch very, very slowly because my right hand was unable to hold the fork without considerable muscle pain in my tendons and wrist. This sort of thing happens rarely, but when it does, I get nervous. I become nervous because I think that my fellow diners, or students, or whomever, can pick up on my not-immediately-obvious physical difference(s) from something that is only slightly "off." Even using a term like "off" is problematic; it implies that there is something wrong, that the person who needs to take time to do some of the things that others may take for granted needs to be fixed, somehow; that, or she needs to "fix" herself (by minimizing/masking her pain or ability or dis-ability) so that she may fit in and continue to pass.
So, are my restrained grimaces due to pain--when I am in public spaces, that is-- restrained because I, deep down, want to continue passing? Is it because I would be embarrassed to show my pain around strangers? Is it out of rather ridiculous consideration(s) of the "comfort" level of strangers (ie: the social assumption that one should never make people uncomfortable, even if one is in pain)? Does a "stiff upper lip," so to speak, actually do anyone a favor? I'd argue that the whole "keep your pain to yourself" thing might arise from a very deep fear of individuals with disabilities, but that's probably best saved for another post.
There are days
when the cage doesn't
seem to open very wide at all
I know it sounds negative, but some days, I can definitely relate. Maybe it's the fact that I pass fairly regularly as able-bodied--at least in public spaces--or maybe it's my failure at passing on my worst days that makes me relate. As much as I hate to rely upon the old trope of the person-with-disability as trapped by her own unruly body, it, like many tropes, has a sliver of truth to it.
When I am in public, I often fear that other people--more able-bodied people--can "spot" my disability. On a purely surface level, this makes no sense. Part of what makes passing such an interesting topic is the fact that, on some level, the individual who passes can hide something and look as if she or he is a part of another group, despite some (invisible) evidence that would suggest otherwise. I realize also that not everyone has the ability to pass--that passing, in itself, is a privilege. The ability to appear to be something that one is not (often as a member of a more privileged group) is not something that absolutely everyone has.
Today, I sat in a restaurant and ate a light lunch very, very slowly because my right hand was unable to hold the fork without considerable muscle pain in my tendons and wrist. This sort of thing happens rarely, but when it does, I get nervous. I become nervous because I think that my fellow diners, or students, or whomever, can pick up on my not-immediately-obvious physical difference(s) from something that is only slightly "off." Even using a term like "off" is problematic; it implies that there is something wrong, that the person who needs to take time to do some of the things that others may take for granted needs to be fixed, somehow; that, or she needs to "fix" herself (by minimizing/masking her pain or ability or dis-ability) so that she may fit in and continue to pass.
So, are my restrained grimaces due to pain--when I am in public spaces, that is-- restrained because I, deep down, want to continue passing? Is it because I would be embarrassed to show my pain around strangers? Is it out of rather ridiculous consideration(s) of the "comfort" level of strangers (ie: the social assumption that one should never make people uncomfortable, even if one is in pain)? Does a "stiff upper lip," so to speak, actually do anyone a favor? I'd argue that the whole "keep your pain to yourself" thing might arise from a very deep fear of individuals with disabilities, but that's probably best saved for another post.
27 March, 2009
Time and Energy, Or Lack Thereof
This amazing post and its follow-up by Anna at Trouble in China have got me thinking. [In the interest of full disclosure, my Shakesville post is in there as an example of the problematic nature of inclusiveness.]
Whenever I mention this blog in, say, a contributor's or artist's bio, I nearly always include the qualifier "sporadically updated." Regular readers will know that this is partially my style--the dash of self-deprecation--but it masks something else. Namely: I very rarely have the energy to write a whole blog post, to respond to comments, or, hell, to comment on other blogs with wit and insight. This does not mean that I do not exist. It only means that I, quite simply, don't always have the mental or physical energy to contribute to a medium that is, by and large, designed in favor of the non-disabled.
Before the inevitable questions of "why don't you just quit?" arise, I keep and have kept this space for a very specific reason: I cannot just give up. Certainly, there are better writers out there than me. There are better blogs. I have blog friends who are more articulate, more stylistically clever; some of these folks who blog more, or have more readers. Yet I know that the blogosphere is a bit wicked in that one is only as good as her or his last post (to use a worn cliche). Some of us can crank out quality posts nearly every day. Many of us cannot.
I often cannot keep up with a 'sphere in which other voices--more able voices--have the luxury of time and actual emotional/physical energy to blog. The conspiracy theorist in me wants to chalk this up to the blogosphere's--and to a lesser extent, the internet's--design as yet another space where able-bodied folks can "fit," and can be "productive" in terms of number and quality of posts. For all the talk of the internet as a utopia where one is free to not be embodied, the same old shit seems to keep coming up, along with the big ol' Cthuluphant in the room: that the world is designed for able-bodied (and preferably white, straight, middle-class, and male) individuals. Productivity, fitting in, responding quickly: These are things that non-able-bodied folks may not be able to do, whether because of issues of time, energy, ease of access, or many other factors. What happens when one cannot type because of searing pain in her hands, wrists, arms? What happens when one finds that he is too brain-fogged to write a post, much less comment on an existing post that many other people have already commented upon? When one is confined to bed because of nausea or all-over pain that forces her to lie for hours, staring at the ceiling, doing nothing because it's all too much? What happens is that much-needed voices are not part of the conversation. They are lost, but not because they are not there.
This is shameful. There is no other word for it.
Do I know where to begin in pursuit of a solution? No.
Does anyone? I am not sure. I would like to hope that someone does, but I remain unsure.
We're here. You just might not know it, yet.
Whenever I mention this blog in, say, a contributor's or artist's bio, I nearly always include the qualifier "sporadically updated." Regular readers will know that this is partially my style--the dash of self-deprecation--but it masks something else. Namely: I very rarely have the energy to write a whole blog post, to respond to comments, or, hell, to comment on other blogs with wit and insight. This does not mean that I do not exist. It only means that I, quite simply, don't always have the mental or physical energy to contribute to a medium that is, by and large, designed in favor of the non-disabled.
Before the inevitable questions of "why don't you just quit?" arise, I keep and have kept this space for a very specific reason: I cannot just give up. Certainly, there are better writers out there than me. There are better blogs. I have blog friends who are more articulate, more stylistically clever; some of these folks who blog more, or have more readers. Yet I know that the blogosphere is a bit wicked in that one is only as good as her or his last post (to use a worn cliche). Some of us can crank out quality posts nearly every day. Many of us cannot.
I often cannot keep up with a 'sphere in which other voices--more able voices--have the luxury of time and actual emotional/physical energy to blog. The conspiracy theorist in me wants to chalk this up to the blogosphere's--and to a lesser extent, the internet's--design as yet another space where able-bodied folks can "fit," and can be "productive" in terms of number and quality of posts. For all the talk of the internet as a utopia where one is free to not be embodied, the same old shit seems to keep coming up, along with the big ol' Cthuluphant in the room: that the world is designed for able-bodied (and preferably white, straight, middle-class, and male) individuals. Productivity, fitting in, responding quickly: These are things that non-able-bodied folks may not be able to do, whether because of issues of time, energy, ease of access, or many other factors. What happens when one cannot type because of searing pain in her hands, wrists, arms? What happens when one finds that he is too brain-fogged to write a post, much less comment on an existing post that many other people have already commented upon? When one is confined to bed because of nausea or all-over pain that forces her to lie for hours, staring at the ceiling, doing nothing because it's all too much? What happens is that much-needed voices are not part of the conversation. They are lost, but not because they are not there.
This is shameful. There is no other word for it.
Do I know where to begin in pursuit of a solution? No.
Does anyone? I am not sure. I would like to hope that someone does, but I remain unsure.
We're here. You just might not know it, yet.
18 March, 2009
Winnie Has a Question...
Also, in less cute and/or more angry-making news, check out Lauredhel's takedown of an atrocious interview with some psychiatrist who believes that people with CFS and related illnesses are hysterics, or something. I was not able to read the whole article without wanting to chuck my computer across the room. Basically, the article is yet another go-round of "if I can't see it, then it must not be there, and the person who says they have it is totally making it up." Positively infuriating. I dare anyone who believes that people with these conditions do not face very real social consequences to read the article and still hold that sort of belief.
It sounds really, fantastically bitter and mean of me to say, but I often wish that people like Simon Wessley would one day wake up and find that they have a chronic health condition that literally changes everything for them; perhaps such an event would make them think twice before they talk out of their asses under the guise of "expertise."
07 March, 2009
I Don't Get It.
This photo is from a Vanity Fair feature on "Comedy's New Legends." It is Seth Rogen, dressed as Frida Kahlo:
Could someone explain to me precisely if and/or why this image is supposed to be funny? Frida Kahlo's work is not exactly a barrel o'laughs, and if you look at the rest of the photo set, this image doesn't quite fit in with the other photos. I could see how it makes some sense given that the rest of the photos are of new "legends" dressed as those of yesteryear, but...I'm stuck, and unsure of what this image is trying to convey. Man dressed as woman = automatically hilarious? Frida Kahlo is/was manly? I have no idea.
Also, re the cover image: Is male nudity really so offensive to various delicate sensibilities that all of the "nude" guys on the cover have to wear bodysuits? I get that it's supposed to be a takeoff on VF's ridiculous Tom Ford cover, but there is something about the bodysuits that makes it, at least in my eyes, less satirical and more shaming, as Melissa/Shakes so eloquently puts it. That said, the thing that I do like about this image is Paul Rudd's exact aping of Tom Ford--he's got it down to a t.
Could someone explain to me precisely if and/or why this image is supposed to be funny? Frida Kahlo's work is not exactly a barrel o'laughs, and if you look at the rest of the photo set, this image doesn't quite fit in with the other photos. I could see how it makes some sense given that the rest of the photos are of new "legends" dressed as those of yesteryear, but...I'm stuck, and unsure of what this image is trying to convey. Man dressed as woman = automatically hilarious? Frida Kahlo is/was manly? I have no idea.
Also, re the cover image: Is male nudity really so offensive to various delicate sensibilities that all of the "nude" guys on the cover have to wear bodysuits? I get that it's supposed to be a takeoff on VF's ridiculous Tom Ford cover, but there is something about the bodysuits that makes it, at least in my eyes, less satirical and more shaming, as Melissa/Shakes so eloquently puts it. That said, the thing that I do like about this image is Paul Rudd's exact aping of Tom Ford--he's got it down to a t.
04 March, 2009
I Am Out of Ideas Today
I posted this over at Cheese and Dog, but I'm going to post it here anyway. Click for big.
19 February, 2009
Bad Poetry Corner with Annaham
Hello, readers! I have a very spur-of-the-nanosecond piece of poetry for you, written by yours truly and inspired by recent events both in the blogosphere (a great take on it by Bfp is here and not.
for what it's worth (dust)
i have to stop spending so much time in the 'net
but will that make the knot in my stomach go away?
it might just fester, and rot into a clump of some forgotten sticky cobwebs
some of those who say "i want to understand"
or
"i am not trying to silence you"
are just looking to cover themselves
and loop back to the same points they've made, over and over and over
and
over
and
over the course of threading some damn fancy eagle scout-style knots
reconfirm the biases, the mental wheel-ruts to which they're accustomed
what they really mean is
"just shut up and listen to me
because i know what i am talking about, even if what i am talking about
happens to be your experience"
it's the same old thing:
"your post offended me. i am a [name of privileged group] and i am not like that at all"
"i'm trying to be consciously racist, therefore i am not a racist"
"he's not trying to be consciously ableist, therefore he is not ableist"
"but listen: this piece/this cartoon/my opinion/the statistic that i just pulled out of my ass was not intended to be racist, therefore i should get a pass."
they say, sounding concerned for you via bits and bytes and letters
after all: they are only trying to help!
and wouldn't you be easier to listen to if you weren't so "angry" or "militant" or "negative"
or whatever dust they can flick off of themselves and onto you?
the dust will, as dust is wont to do, settle.
and no one is safe from it.
i have to stop spending so much time in the 'net
but will that make the knot in my stomach go away?
it might just fester, and rot into a clump of some forgotten sticky cobwebs
some of those who say "i want to understand"
or
"i am not trying to silence you"
are just looking to cover themselves
and loop back to the same points they've made, over and over and over
and
over
and
over the course of threading some damn fancy eagle scout-style knots
reconfirm the biases, the mental wheel-ruts to which they're accustomed
what they really mean is
"just shut up and listen to me
because i know what i am talking about, even if what i am talking about
happens to be your experience"
it's the same old thing:
"your post offended me. i am a [name of privileged group] and i am not like that at all"
"i'm trying to be consciously racist, therefore i am not a racist"
"he's not trying to be consciously ableist, therefore he is not ableist"
"but listen: this piece/this cartoon/my opinion/the statistic that i just pulled out of my ass was not intended to be racist, therefore i should get a pass."
they say, sounding concerned for you via bits and bytes and letters
after all: they are only trying to help!
and wouldn't you be easier to listen to if you weren't so "angry" or "militant" or "negative"
or whatever dust they can flick off of themselves and onto you?
the dust will, as dust is wont to do, settle.
and no one is safe from it.
16 February, 2009
Obesity is a Person?
Via Scary Ideas come these weird PSAs from something called the Active Life Movement; the ads suggest that the Obesity Crisis is a thing that parents can keep away from their children (click for big):
THE OBESITY CRISIS, IF IT GETS THE CHANCE, WILL INFECT YOUR CHILDREN AND THEIR TOYS, PARENTS!
Visual interesting-ness aside, these seem pretty problematic. Fatness is not something that is caused only by inactivity or "laziness," and the automatic assumption here seems to be that fat automatically equals unhealthy, unattractive, and/or the worst thing that could ever happen (notice how both Barbie and the superhero are alone, thereby insinuating that fat = alone or lonely).
I do not see how stigmatizing fatness in the name of promoting "health" helps anyone.
THE OBESITY CRISIS, IF IT GETS THE CHANCE, WILL INFECT YOUR CHILDREN AND THEIR TOYS, PARENTS!
Visual interesting-ness aside, these seem pretty problematic. Fatness is not something that is caused only by inactivity or "laziness," and the automatic assumption here seems to be that fat automatically equals unhealthy, unattractive, and/or the worst thing that could ever happen (notice how both Barbie and the superhero are alone, thereby insinuating that fat = alone or lonely).
I do not see how stigmatizing fatness in the name of promoting "health" helps anyone.
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