(no subject)

A meme suggesting that if I believe progressives really want a gender-neutral or female Santa I must therefore have an IQ of 6 upset me yesterday.

It was the first I'd heard of the idea, but honestly I kind of like it. And the fact that *I* do suggests to me that at least some people are being unfairly tarred with an overly wide brush. I'm not a conservative troll, and while it's been a long time since I had an IQ test (and I'm not convinced that they are as informative as a lot of people assume anyway), I'm pretty sure mine is > 6.

I'm certainly willing to believe that this idea is being spread by some as an intentional attempt to discredit progressive ideas about gender and to enrage social conservatives. In all honesty though, whatever the motivations, the idea is kind of interesting.

Do you remember the picture of a drag queen next to a woman wearing a niqab on a New York City train that was captioned "This is the future liberals want"? I loved the progressive response to that. Hell yeah this is the future liberals want! A social environment where people are free to flaunt gender norms or outwardly express religious devotion in public spaces in ways that don't interfere with other people? Sign me up!

That's how I feel about the genderbent Santa thing too. Like any other fictional character, Santa is open to reinterpretation through new lenses. Why does Santa have to be male anyway? If I had any experience or connections in the relevant area, I'd think about trying to produce a Christmas anthology of gender-bent Santa stories. How cool would that be?

Maybe some of my reaction to that comes from the contrarian streak my therapist pointed out I have, and maybe some comes from a feeling of being attacked as a potential troll or idiot for taking such an interesting idea seriously. But seriously; why not a female or non-binary Santa?

(no subject)

I finished reading the architecture book and grabbed another one on the way out the door from the stack of interesting stuff that I took home during weeding. I read the introduction of Thomas Gieryn's "Cultural Boundaries of Science: Credibility on the Line" on the train and concluded that I can't read it right now.

This is the kind of book that was deeply important to me in my academic path. Why do people think about science the way they do? What makes it credible, or incredible, to people? How do the socially constructed elements of science affect/effect belief and, at least as importantly, policy?

But I think reading this right now is just going to make me angry and sad. I'm not up to dealing with that yet. I'm glad that I'm reading again, but maybe I should stay around the shallows for a while before jumping into the deep end of epistemology and trying to understand how people form beliefs about things that are important to me and that so many people are just wrong about.

Reading things like this hurts for numerous reasons.

So next is going to be Mario Salvadori's "Why Buildings Stand Up: the Strength of Architecture" (As well as Matthys Levy's "Why Buildings Fall Down: How Structures Fail"). I think that will be a good next step from Edward Allen on my way toward getting back to Condit's book. I'm gonna order them today!

(no subject)

Heh. I just realized that, in a way, I'm embarrassed to be reading all this stuff about architecture and engineering because it feels, in comparison to stuff on social theory and urban policy, like 'fluff.' Shouldn't I be reading things that help me make a difference instead of just satisfying my own curiosity?

I dunno. How does one exist as a part of this broken society at this point? Why is life so complicated?

(no subject)

My brain is a bit odd today. I think it's partly because I didn't manage to take my Wellbutrin and Lexapro yesterday. I'm feeling a bit flighty, scattered, and impulsive. (The last mostly in regard to food.)

(no subject)

"Hello, excuse me; can you tell me where I am?"

"In our country; goodbye looks just like hello."

"Say Hello - Laurie Anderson" (Watch on YouTube)

(no subject)

I wish I had a way to respond to memes that was better suited to creating discussion. Maybe instead of writing multiple paragraphs about Santa and gender, I should just post a picture of a woman in a red suit and nightcap with some all-caps text about how Santa has found zir true self and if you don't like it you can fight me.

Or maybe I should just enjoy that my writing is too long to get people to yell at me, and that that's a pleasant side effect of it being too long for most folks to bother engaging with.

*sighs* It's been a long day. I managed to reaggravate a muscle as I ran up the stairs to try to catch a train that wasn't even my train. I wanna go home.