Can Michael Richards Really be Redeemed? I think not, but good try Larry David, I still love you.

I want to preface this blog hailing Larry David as a genius. I love him. I love him. I love him. I admit I was a bit worried with the plantation genre and the stereotypical ending in Season Six of “Curb Your Enthusiasm”, but he managed to dodge that lingering bullet almost effortlessly in Season 7. Vivica A. Fox’s character Loretta Black  and Larry break up in the second episode of the season, “Vehicular Fellatio” and it had nothing to do with race. Larry was planning on dumping her because she got cancer. He is so unsympathetic and sympathetic you just have to love him.

So Larry’s project in Season 7 is winning his wife’s affection by letting her play the role of his actual wife in a “Seinfeld” reunion season. And everyone is on board. We get to see Julia play Elaine, Seinfeld play himself, Larry’s mirror image George Costanza, Jason Alexander ironically as Larry’s complete opposite….and there is….. Michael Richards….. as Kramer. Ehhhhhhhlllllllllllll.

the pink elephant in the room-racist richards

We know he had to be on the show to fulfill the myth of the reunion season, but there is just this bad taste in my mouth when I see him on screen. I’m sure most of you remember his infamous racial fuck-up. It was a fuck-up so bad it wasn’t even excusable. It was the fuck-up heard round the world, Lexington and Concord style.  Here’s a link to his comedy routine.

Okay I just watched it again I am pissed!!!! Arrggggh! When will it stop? Here are just a few unsettling savory bits:

“Fifty years ago we’d have you hanging upside down from a tree!”

“They’re going to arrest me for calling a black man a nigger?”

“Throw his ass out! He’s a nigger, He’s a nigger, He’s a nigger!”

oh LAWD

After a while the black man he was talking to called him a cracker, which I discuss in my earlier blog, is embedded with a notion of racial superiority on the part of the white person who is being called said name.

I’m not really sure what pissed Michael Richards off so much. But I am gonna assume it was some loud mouth Negroes, yeah I said it, talking too much during a performance which is why he told them to shut up. And yes, really my brothers and sisters, you know who you are, you need to stop talking through movies, it’s annoying. I wanted to cut a bitch the last time I was in the theater.

But there is no reason to say what Richards said. I mean come on. A good shut the fuck up would have sufficed. He didn’t need to offend everyone in the place. And he forgets, black folk actually paid to see him perform. I mean can you imagine, taking your lovely black boyfriend or girlfriend on a date to a comedy show, and thinking wow, we get to see the guy who played Kramer, I’m so excited, and while you’re sipping on your Long Island Iced Tea you get taken back to 1865 with some white dude talkin bout hanging niggers from trees. NIET KIEL DAWG.

Hence, the icky taste in my mouth. But in the last episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Larry addresses the issue of harboring a known racist on the show. He does this in three ways.

1. Michael Richards looks like crap compared to everyone else in the show. Even though everyone has aged, they still look the same. Maybe they have led healthy lives, maybe it’s the make-up job, but clearly they skipped over Richards. Additionally, the hair that made Kramer so noticeable is almost all but gone. Larry wants him to look that way. By presenting Richards as visually unattractive, his appearance clearly faltering since his racist comedy routine, Larry is reflecting on the accepted myth that sin is written on the body. (A topic heavily discussed in Oscar Wilde’s Picture of Dorian Gray and The Libertine)

if you hadn't been fucking all those whores, maybe God would have spared you leprosy

2. To reify this idea, Larry also gives Richards a life threatening illness, Groat’s disease(a fictional illness) that may cause his death. He is literally paying for the sins externally and internally that he committed when he pledged his allegiance to supremacy on that unforgettable day.

3. He cleverly has a scene with Leon and Richards, in which Richards has a valid reason to be pissed at Leon (he lied about his identity and duped him into giving $200,000). While he is screaming a crowd of people are watching Richards yell at this black man and we laugh because ironically he an actual reason to be pissed. It is really funny and makes it a bit more acceptable for Richards to be part of this season.

However, I recently read a blog, by the African American Environmentalist Association-Hollywood, and while I agree Larry made a smart move in the “The Table Read”, it really doesn’t redeem or reform Richards as a person. It only redeems Richards within the fictional world of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” that Larry himself has created. And then we have to think, well if Richards’ previous act of racism had to be addressed to us, how will it be addressed to the fictional audience that would be watching the Seinfeld reunion season? And, ignoring the fact that humor on a fictional show doesn’t excuse an act of racism in the real world, we were too busy laughing at the scene to deconstruct what it fails to address. When Richards says “if there were any word i could use to show how angry i am…,” David seems to be juxtaposing valid reasons to be pissed off (leon lying/getting 200g) against using racial slurs without a valid reason. But is there ever a valid reason to use racial slurs? And I say valid reason cuz clearly the heckling at his comedy show did not warrant “nigger,nigger, nigger”, but because Leon lies it might? And are we ignoring the real irony in this scene, that Richards could have “slipped up” again because Leon did what a white man told him, and most likely Leon had to lie because his livelihood (living in Larry’s mansion) depends on it?

Larry also depicts this representation in “The Anonymous Donor,” Season 6, when a dry-cleaner loses his baseball jersey. He then has Leon approach a man wearing the similar jersey(we don’t know if it is Larry’s or not) and from then on the white man Leon has robbed may engage in stereotyping of black men as criminals. But the crazy thing about it is that Leon himself didn’t care about the jersey, he stole the jersey because Larry, the white male, wanted him too. Is Larry making a statement, by having Leon bear the brunt of his iniquities, that blacks are unfairly stereotyped not by their own acts, but the acts that are guided by the white man. Basically, are whites are hating blacks because of whites. I mean that is why Richards gets pissed at Leon, Larry doesn’t take the rap for the incident, at least we don’t get to see it.

If so, whoa Larry, and Bravo, Bravo. I now love your show even more, can we be best friends?

Of course, it is not up to Larry David to rectify Richards fuck-up. He shouldn’t have to alter his whole season cuz Richards can’t keep his mouth shut. I think David makes amends to his avid black fans by at least addressing the issue, and I thank him for it. But Richards has a long way to go. A fictional confrontation on the issue will not redeem his racist soul. And although most black folk are forgiving, sorry Richards, you don’t get my vote.

Thoughts?

P.S.

J.B. Smoove on the scene with Michael Richards:

“I can’t see someone being so upset with it that they’d never want him to be on TV again. You can pass the blame along, or you can accept your responsibility, and he accepted his actions. Sometimes, when you get a girl pregnant, you blame the condom. His condom broke that night.”

Mad Men’s Season 3 Finale: Verdict’s In: Betty Sucks

So, my dear friend Jean and I, at a lovely dinner at the Olive Garden, while slurping up yummy parmesan noodles and finishing off dinner with a super deluxe decadant chocolate mousse cake, started talking about the season finale of Mad Men. And of course, when you’re talking about Mad Men, a huge focal point of the conversation is always gonna be, who sucks worse? Don or Betty?

don likes to tap a lot of different ass

princess for life!!!!

At first I was actually defending her, and I feel that as a woman perhaps, ignoring the extreme hotness of Don and how we wish we were Betty just so we could get him in bed, we all sympathize, some of us even empathize with her situation. We think, God, I feel so sorry for her, I wouldn’t want to be in her shoes. I mean, here she is, stuck with three kids, and when she actually has the guts to confront Don about his infidelity, she finds out she is pregnant and has to stay with him. And Don isn’t just having one affair, he is sleeping with women ALL over New York. And yes, I am aware that Betty committed adultery also, but not until she found out who Don was, and in any sense, her one indiscretion does not compare to Don’s likely hundreds.

But then I suppose the question is, is Betty really trapped in an unhappy marriage? Or was it her choice? Does her denial of Don’s numerous betrayals make her less sympathetic? Or more precisely, did Betty only become “unhappy” in her relationship when Don’s infidelity became apparent to others?

I myself, usually have a bias against women in denial. Most likely because I have been the other woman. (Sorry it is kind of fun. Oooops?) Also, if there are signs of infidelity, it could even be catching my boyfriend in a lie, I’m out. People say that ignorance is bliss, but the idea of being in a relationship, knowing that my lover is cheating on me (yet demanding that I stay faithful and I remain so), and that everyone is laughing at me behind my back is something that I cannot stomach. I have weird philosophies about relationships, but I feel like, if you are gonna be in a marriage, and you wanna fuck around, at least let your partner fuck around too, otherwise it is just selfish. So yeah the fact the Betty didn’t do anything about Don’s numerous affairs made me dislike her. And a woman knows when she’s being cheated on when she’s being cheated on the way Don cheated on her. Beside the obvious signs, not coming home, weird phone calls, inaccurate stories, there is the different sex style which Betty describes to her therapist as an indication of infidelity.

And I am sure a lot of you are thinking, well actually, she did confront Don about his adultery. However, let’s analyze the events surrounding that situation. Betty’s neighbor’s husband had an affair and Betty’s first reaction was to tell her friend not to say anything about it. In turn this was her philosophy about her marriage. We see her having anxiety attacks in the beginning of the first season, and we all attributed these attacks as a reaction to Don’s absence. But when I think about the instance in which she did confront him about his affair, it seems she did so for all the wrong reasons.

In “The Comedian” When Betty finally confronts Don, it is instigated by Jimmy Barrett. He tells her that Don and his wife have been having sex. And she knows that it is true. She probably knew it was true for a long time. But instead of asking him, what are you talking about, how do you know this, how long has this been going on, are you serious? She tells him to stop talking about it and to go away. And it is really interesting if we parallel this to when Sterling tells Don about Betty and Henry’s relationship/affair. Even though it is a masculine reaction, Don is at least inquisitive about the details of the affair and if it was based on fact. Betty seems more concerned with the fact that someone knows about it, and may shatter the image of her picture-perfect marriage. And the worst insult to Betty was that the gossip came from a comedian. Nobody likes to be laughed at, but Betty really doesn’t like it. Recall when she got pissed off at Don for not telling her that at the dinner party he predicted she would buy Heineken.

I feel as if she is more preoccupied with the exposure of her flawed image to others. This is ironic for two reasons. 1. She used to be a model, which is a business built on making things prettier than they seem, as it is in advertising. 2. The fear of her flawed image being visible to others is why she is unsympathetic to Don’s painful life story.

When you see an alpha-male like Don cry, you pay attention. I have only seen my father cry three times in my life, and they were at funerals. And likewise, this was Don’s time to mourn. It was the first time he could really be himself, reclaim his own name, mourn his brother who committed suicide, and really mourn the death of his former self. And Betty….well….. Betty listened to the story but she didn’t really care. I mean, she gave him the “there there” pat. As Jean pointed out during dessert — that chocolate really got us going “Betty left Don because he no longer was the picture perfect, upper class man who came from old money that she thought she married.” – Jean/Ledefile

wait, come again, you used to be...POOR???!!!! ICK!!!!!

Don-  “I gave you everything you wanted – EVERYTHING! And you loved it! And now I’m not good enough for some spoiled main line brat?!”

Betty- “That’s RIGHT!”

It is also interesting to note that when she broke into Don’s hidden box and found out he was married, she was more concerned with the deed than the divorce. Most women would be wondering are my children illegitimate, and Betty is jealous that Don bought his ex-wife a house and she didn’t have one of her own yet. She also asks her lawyer if what Don did, (taking on a different identity) is “something he could go to jail for.” Of course she doesn’t want to be associated with that. She ain’t gonna be visiting Don in prison. But I was even thinking, it really is a good thing that Don decided not to fight her, cuz I bet she would have blackmailed him with that information, the same way Pete did, if she didn’t have her “life raft,” aka Henry.

But then again Betty is the trophy wife. She is beautiful, and a nice person, but also self-centered and uninteresting. She doesn’t have very many complex thoughts. And in analyzing the women Don had affairs with, it seems he was using them to fill Betty’s non-stimulating void. The Jewess, Rachel Menkin was loyal, exotic, a feminist, and a true business woman. Midge was not very attractive but had a passion for music,culture art, and drugs and gave Don an escape from his monotonous life.  The comedian’s wife Bobbie Barrett was overtly masculine and business-savvy.  And although the scene near the restaurant bathroom could be interpreted in many ways, he may have penetrated her in the restaurant (when he put his hand up her dress) to establish himself as the more dominant male/the Phallus. Bobbie stops demanding extra money for her husband’s apology after that. The schoolteacher was very philosophical and her job itself demands the ability to be selfless, caring, and giving to children. Betty had none of the qualities these women possessed. I mean how many times, are we gonna have to hear Betty say, “GO PLAY IN YOUR ROOM” to her children? And her apathy toward her daughter mourning the grandfather? Atrocious. And clearly, Sally loves her father more.

So what else should Don expect? He married her for image alone, so why should he be so pissed when she wants to leave him when he presented a false image to her, and not just his identity, but the adultery as well. He doesn’t even stop after she catches him.

Well, I feel as if some characters can be redeemed if they have the ability to grow and change. And in their situation, I feel that they had already established love as possession because Betty was the trophy wife, and Betty by virtue of marriage possessed Don’s material assets. Clearly they have experienced love as an illusion as I have described in the aforementioned reasons. Yet, love between Don and Betty could not exist outside of illusion. When Don and Betty got into fights, usually to end the fight, instead of addressing the problem at hand Don would ask, “What do you want me to say?” This clearly shows that Don is aware that Betty doesn’t really want the truth, she wants his words to be a reflection of what she innately wants. However, I feel as if Don was ready to take the next step in exposing his true character, and Betty even commented on the fact that “he wouldn’t have left the box in the house unless he wanted her to find it.” Clearly, Betty is the one who is incapable of loving a person who is not a projected reflection of hew own desires. And in sum, this is why she runs into the arms of a politician, a man whose profession yet again revolves around misrepresentation.

So….I still think Betty sucks. I mean she has children, a newborn, and we see her leaving her two kids behind and flying off to Reno with a man she hardly knows. She would rather ditch the people she loves than be associated with a scandal. Not only is this exemplified by her leaving Don, but when one of her married friends admits to her that she slept with the engaged horseback rider, Betty dismisses her good friend from her life. She shows that she is oblivious to the plight of others when she says “it really isn’t the right time for Civil Rights” in front of her hardworking black maid. And the entire first season focuses on her being self-indulgent in the therapist’s office. And I am in no way saying therapy is self-indulgent, some people need it, but the way in which those specific scenes are shot, Betty lying on a chaise, not talking about anything important when she knows what the problem is (the affair) while wasting Don’s money on psychiatric help that she doesn’t need. The visits stopped after the first season. I mean it’s just sickening. So, yeah, Betty sucks.

Thoughts?

you know you want it...

P.S. I am really excited for Season 2.  Jean and I were discussing the fabulousness of the possible Don-Joan-Sterling triangle. And while the love triangle might be a cliche move…it would be HOT! Tension between Don and Sterling, Joan and Don, Joan and Sterling, Joan and her fiance, Sterling and his new wife. It would be a lot more nuanced than the tired, using a woman as an outlet for male aggression. I mean you know something is gonna happen in that tiny ass hotel room! Fingers crossed.

French Vogue does Blackface: Now Black Women are Finally Pretty

Fashion isn’t supposed to be politically correct. If it was it wouldn’t be so fun and so daring. And we know that the French especially don’t give a fuck. Which is why I love them. Just last month, my dear friend Jean, creator of the fabulous fashion blog Ledefile, alerted me to a previous issue of French Vogue with pregnant models wearing strappy high heels and smoking cigarettes.

loving the baby stuffed in the handbag

That obviously wouldn’t fly in American Vogue mostly because Americans have sticks up their ass. But I actually enjoyed the pregnancy photo spread. Sans the cigarettes , the photos alleviate the insecure feeling most women have about what pregnancy will do their bodies and how unattractive they may become because those models were HOT.

However, in the October issue of Vogue, in a photo spread, is Dutch supermodel Lara Stone,…wait for it….wait for it…in Blackface.

And a bunch of questions popped in my mind. Is this blackface or is this art? Why not just have a beautiful black supermodel on the cover? Should the French and more specifically other countries who don’t have the same kind of sadistic historical treatment of Blacks like in America, have to tiptoe around racial issues that wouldn’t offend the majority in their country? Do they have to pay for crimes that racist Americans committed? And if they should, should Americans as well be extra-sensitive to seemingly harmless stereotypical portrayals of race when that race does not have a prevalent history of victimization in our own country?

First of all, blackface itself aggrandized negative characteristics associated with blacks. It arose in the 19^th century in the US and Britian, and the characters belonged to the plantation genre. There was the mammy, the mistress, the pickaninnies, the house slave, and they were coons to be laughed at by whites at minstrel shows. The skin color was accentuated, the lips were made more red, the whites of the eyes were emphasized, and the Negro dialect was imitated.

once he puts on the black paint, he becomes an irrational buffoon

But looking at these images in French Vogue, I don’t necessarily see it in the same way I would see blackface propaganda. While even thinking about a white person covering herself in black make-up is shocking, these photos don’t have the same agenda as blackface performance. It is more artistic and beautiful than funny and coon-like. Primarily, in blackface the “ugliness” of blacks is amplified, and in this picture, the woman is beautiful. Beauty and Blackness were not correlations made to buttress racially hegemonic ideals.

But, why do we need a white woman to be in blackface for the image to be beautiful? Vogue already has a history of not putting black models on the covers, or only in the summer issues because the majority of their customers wouldn’t buy them. And in many letters to the Editor after Michelle Obama was featured on the cover, even though it was for politics, many readers were pissed that Vogue would put someone so unmodel-like and fashionless on the cover, e.g. black woman on the cover. Is the photographer saying something about art, or about masks? Is blackness only beautiful when it is false, or is blackness only beautiful when we see there is some underlying white characteristic? Hmmmmm.

Most of the reaction to these images have been shock by the fashion world and its readers. Especially in the wake of the recent reality show in Australia in which white performers sang Jackson Five songs in blackface and called themselves the Jackson Jive. Harry Connick Jr. was so pissed he gave them a zero.

Jackson Jive, just look over your shoulders honey... Oooooh!

But like Australia, France hasn’t had the same intricacies with racism towards African-Americans. France’s hegemonic power was largely enforced in North Africa, sometimes in the Caribbean, and the majority of their racism was geared toward Arabs. Additionally, America is one of the few countries that premised its’ mission of colonization on the assertion that African-Americans were sub-human. However, countries like France and Britian entertained the idea that through education and culture, the “inferior races” could be assimilated and acculturated into their society. In Macualay’s Famous Minute on Education he stated that the British wanted to have “Indians in blood and colour but European in thought and intellect.” Additionally, during the Harlem Renaissance many black writers and activists such as Richard Wright, Langston Hughes, Jessie Fauset, Josephine Baker, and James Baldwin, ex-patriates if you will, left the States for France specifically because it wasn’t racist and they felt free.

are we gonna get in a huff because the french put josephine baker in a banana skirt? is this minstrelcy or art?

So do the French and any other country without a perverse history of racism towards African-Americans really have to be held to the same politically correct standard as the racist Americans who started the whole damn thing anyway? Are we limiting freedom of speech (blackface) because the Americans fucked up?

And if you agree that no country should endorse the use of blackface for art, humour, etc. is it because it is a badge of victimization for blacks or is it because no one should be imitating a different race for humor? A couple years ago when I was teaching a class on Television and Literary Genres which focused on humor, we watched a few Dave Chappelle episodes from “Chappelle’s Show.” We specifically watched the episodes in which he performed comedy in Whiteface.

"since reparations have been paid to blacks the crime rate has fallen to zero, wait that can't be true, did the Mexicans get paid too? Ooops am i still on the air?"

When Dave is in whiteface he speaks in a stereotypically white way, is mildly racist, and is sexually repressed and impotent. After watching the episodes I asked my students if they were offended (they were all white) and they said no. And then I asked why is it that blackface is offensive and whiteface isn’t? They came up with the conclusion that it has to do with the history of victimization of blacks. When people are in blackface it connotes black inferiority, yet whiteface does not do the same because it would be historically inaccurate, because whiteness is seen as superior in America. I was even thinking about racial slurs, and even the one for whiteness, “cracker,” isn’t a term of inferiority per se because it alludes to a slavemaster who cracks the whip on the back of slave. So even the term itself is laden with dominance and power. Hmmmmm.

i am ashamed i did see the movie, but i do love my wayans! -white chicks

Why isn’t it offensive to make fun of a race, and you could even extend this to class or gender, when that race, class, or gender, in respect to its counterparts, is the most dominant, powerful, or not had a history of victimization? Thoughts?

Supremacy Performed in Blackface: U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas

“I am Sick and Tired of being a Nigga and I’m not gonna take it anymore!!!!” Man-Tan-Bamboozled

savion glover in bamboozled, bloody brilliant

“You ain’t so tough now, little nigga. I hate your black bastards, you *stink*! I hate your black skin. I hate your black pants. I hate black pepper. I hate black keys on a piano. I hate my gums, because they’re black. I hate Whoopi Goldberg’s *lips*. I hate the back of Forrest Whittaker’s neck. Most of all, I hate that black-ass Wesley Snipes.” Officer Self Hatred-Don’t be a Menace to South Central while Drinking Your Juice in the Hood

Why oh why does Clarence Thomas have to suck so hard? After reading his most recent dissenting opinion on the constitutionality of the Voting Rights Act I just had to blog. I put up with his bullshit arguments on Affirmative Action but this is where I draw the line.

Most people who aren’t law nerds might be thinking…well we do have a black justice on the Supreme Court. Isn’t that awesome?

Well, no. Not if the black justice is opposed to  assisting the progress of minorities through almost all State and federal programs.

Usually, I am opposed to any implication that a minority isn’t “performing his racial stereotype” and therefore is not a member of his own race.

For example: A black person who is educated isn’t really black. A black person who speaks English properly isn’t really black. A black person who marries outside of their race isn’t really black. A black person who is wealthy isn’t really black. And even more appalling is the unsaid joke that all black males in university settings are only there through either affimative action or a football scholarship.

These were stereotypes used as propoganda for slavery and Jim Crow, and usually whiteness was represented in the opposite. These stereotypes still exist today and we are familiar with representations that make fun of these “Oreos” and “Uncle Tom’s,” People say they are betraying their race. We all saw Dave Chappelle’s “Racial Draft” where representatives of the black community wanted to disassociate themselves from blacks in positions of power who seemed opposed to helping their own kind, e.g. Condaleesa Rice and Colin Powell.

In “How High,” the movie centers around a black dean who fits all of the above stereotypes. Dean Cain, ironically named of course as the first Biblical murderer who kills his own “brother,” does anything he can to prevent the black students played by Method Man and Red Man from continuing their education at Harvard.

"i shoulda known y'all two ghetto asses would be up in here"

Dean Cain is the Self-Loathing Negro. He hates all things that are associated with blacks and is afraid of his own mirror image. However, Dean Cain projects his own racism on targeted black students that represent the negative stereotypes of blackness. He does not harass Lauren,  who is dating one of the university’s benefactors, and the Vice President’s daughter  Jamie, because they come from privileged backgrounds.

But Clarence Thomas is a bit different. Not only does he project his racist ideologies on any black person who is subject to his judgment, but his position on the Supreme Court affects everyone, even himself, INDEFINITELY.

So who is Clarence Thomas? Well he grew up in the South. He went to Catholic private school and college. He went to Yale law school. And was appointed by granddaddy President Bush to serve on the US District Court of Appeals and was then appointed by same to be a US Supreme Court Justice. He was also involved in a sexual harassment suit and charges were dropped.

The man himself

He was appointed precisely for his conservative mindset and extremely textual interpretation of the Constitution. But blacks everywhere started to get worried. Even the NAACP opposed his appointment. Probably people were hoping against hope that Thomas was using the master’s tools to dismantle the master’s house. Feign conservatism to get on the Supreme Court and then show your true colors when you are on the stand. Because Clarence Thomas has experienced racism. He was a huge fan of the Harlem Renaissance author Richard Wright who often wrote about racism during Jim Crow. He walked out from school during an incident in which black students were getting punished more severely than whites for committing the same act. When he tried to get a job after law school none of his employers believed he was as educated as he claimed and implied that the only reason he was accepted into Yale was affirmative action. And since he grew up in the South I can bet he’s been called a nigger a few times by some racist asshole. So what Clarence, did you forget that all this shit happened to you? Or is it because you live in this little plastic bubble of power on the Supreme Court that you have become apathetic to everything that goes on under your nose?

The act of racism isn’t attributed to a color and certainly isnt confined to whiteness.  Nor is it perceived by the majority to be a white characteristic. Anyone can be a racist. There is no such thing as black person who “acts” white. But there is such a thing as a supremacist. And this is precisely what Thomas is. He is a black man that regurgitates white supremacist ideologies which in turn are legally accepted because they come from a blackface. It’s one thing to be a black Republican. It’s another thing for a black man to say racism is over and blacks need to stop blaming themselves for their own problems. Hey Thomas, why don’t we get rid of the 14^th amendment! It was enacted when the KKK existed and now they aren’t so rampant. People aren’t seeing lynchings before ever Sunday dinner, we have a black president, so blacks don’t need any protection at all. Right?

The most appalling thing is that if a white man spoke these words he would be called a racist, but somehow since Thomas has black skin, it’s coo de lah. Since his words are spoken in blackface, it’s all right. As an evil mastermind, what Bush did in appointing him was brilliant, have a black puppet who spouts supremacist ideologies and when people question his judgment he can say, oh but wait, I’m black. I just never thought a person could say the things he said. Especially when his job doesn’t depend on him being racist. He’s appointed for life.

Thomas, in three separate Supreme Court cases on affirmative action pitched forth the same argument, that pretty much stated affirmative action should no longer exist because blacks will hang onto their victimization and use it as a crutch. Guess what Thomas, affirmative action doesn’t just let blacks get into school or obtain careers for lack of diversity. It also exists because BEFORE even looking at the resume or test scores of Laquisha Johnson, Tyrone Smith, or Hakeem Jackson, recruiters pass these people over. You know, kind of like when YOU couldn’t get a job after law school, even though YOU actually did finish in the top of your class at Yale. Oh that’s right, it’s because the door was closed on you even before you had a chance to prove yourself. That is why we need Affirmative Action, and you should know this, man.

It seems as if although Thomas is black, and understands that fucked up shit happens to black folk everyday, which in turn effects the way their children are raised, he assumes that no matter where you come from, any black person should be able to lift themselves up from his bootstraps. I mean Thomas did it, now Obama did it, why haven’t you? Stop playing the victim. Stop thinking you are owed something…

EXCEPT FOR the fact that when Thomas himself was the defendant in the sexual harrasment case with, Anita Hill, he claimed that he would be “lynched, destroyed, caricatured by a committee of the U.S. Senate rather than hung from a tree” So wait, Thomas as blacks we can’t use the race card but YOU can when YOU’VE been accused of a crime.

In a recent opinion on the Voting Rights Act, a Texas district claimed that the act was unconstitutional (this act prohibits the district from using discriminatory tactics to prevent minorites from voting) because since Obama is president, and we have come so far since the days of Jim Crow and segregation, that the Act should not exist. In an 8-1 opinion, the Supreme Court, including Antonin Scalia, felt that the act was still necessary. But Thomas on the other hand, claimed that since we don’t have extreme racist acts in the massive amounts that existed before, eg “blacks aren’t lynched or tied down to railroad tracks, that the act is no longer necessary because INTENTIONAL RACISM NO LONGER EXISTS. Ummmm, excuse me what???? Wait a second, what???????

First of all, it does. It exists everywhere.

And secondly, unintentional racism is still racist. Sentimental racism is still racist. When you were passed over that legal job because of the color of your skin I am sure the bosses weren’t thinking, what I am doing is racist. I am sure when those cops arrested Henry Louis Gates for being scholarly while black they weren’t thinking, this is racist. I am sure that when the cops who were so apathetic to the missing black women in the Sowell case weren’t thinking, this is racist. I am sure that the woman who told the pool owner that one of the black kids stole something for her son which subsequently caused a Civil Rights Case, the private pool owner wasn’t thinking what I am doing is racist. Racism is a knee-jerk reaction. It is in our unconscious. It is a gangrene. It exists in different forms, in different levels of severity, it is projected onto different races, and as Thomas has exemplified, can be projected onto oneself.

So Clarence Thomas, it’s not too late to change. It’s okay you won’t get fired. Cuz I really hope you don’t get caught up in Harlem at 2 am looking for a cab that won’t stop to pick you up. I really hope you don’t get pulled over by the cops while driving your fancy car for no reason. I really hope you don’t have to stop in Martinsville, Indiana for gas. Cuz that law degree won’t help you. Some people still notice skin color first.

“And you just might get Got” – Mos Def

What’s more Appalling: Serial Killers still Exist or Cops don’t care about Black Victims?

So I have been following this Anthony Sowell case on twitter since I first heard about it. And to think this type of amorality exists is really appalling, especially since I have been to Cleveland many times. But what I find more disturbing than the black serial killer himself (we all know the majority of serial killers in America are white) I was surprised that in a society that is hyper-sensitive to death threats and maintaining the law insomuch that security guards at the airport had to check my ponytail for potential bombs and bike riders get d.u.i.’s, that the report of all of these missing women went unchecked for such a long time with so much evidence mounting on this guy.

Then I realized why.

Oh, it is because it was poor black families reporting that their black daughters were missing. Throw in the fact that a possible black rapist lives a block away and you exponentially raise the apathy. The cops just don’t care.

They have identified seven victims so far out of the 11 and ALL of them are black.

1. Tonia Carmichael

2. Telacia Fortson

3. Tishana Culver

4. Nancy Cobbs

5. Amelda Hunter

6. Chrystal Dozier

7. Michelle Mason

I assume the same process occurs when a resume of someone named Shawneequa (my mother’s name) passes an interviewer’s desk. She gets passed right over, just like Tonia, Telacia, and Tishana did.

Nevermind that the stench of rotting flesh that every one complained about is completely distinct from the smell of the sausage factory down the street. Nevermind that a known sex offender lived a block away from these women. Nevermind that people actually witnessed a naked woman being thrown from the window. Just let the niggers rot!

Are we still living in the A Time to Kill moment where for a jury to sympathize with a black victim we have to close our eyes and pretend she is white for anyone to give a flying fuck? People are pointing at the police and stating they didn’t do their job but they are forgetting to ask why they didn’t do their job…because nobody cares about those black broads, just another crack whore off the street.

imagine she is being raped-we don't care. imagine she is being beaten-we dont care. imagine she is being beaten and raped but she is WHITE. ok now i guess we care. that really *is* appalling!!!

I’m sure the detectives weren’t being told that they had by 5 pm to interview everyone associated with Tishana because she was black and hence, doesn’t matter.

This whole situation reminds me of what Eartha Kitt’s character says in Spike Lee’s Summer of Sam. For those who don’t know Summer of Sam details how the Son of Sam affected the the city of New York with his numerous murders of women. I love this film and the dystopic landscape it is set agaisnt but I digress. In the film Spike Lee as a newscaster goes to Harlem to get the “darker perspective.” Eartha Kitt states that she “thanks God that it is a white man killing all of those white girls, because if it were a black man killing all those white girls there would be the biggest race riot New York City had ever seen.”

summer of sam

And after reading about this case I am inclined to agree. I hope I don’t get kidnapped by a black serial killer, god forbid. Cuz now I know the only way anyone would do anything is if there is some white girl trapped in there with me. Sigh.

Just because I am a woman and hit on you, doesn’t mean I want to be in a relationship or get married…ego much???

-Listen, I don’t want to be in a relationship”

-Calm down, I just asked if that seat was taken! -Samantha Jones, Sex and the City

Most men think that all women want is to get married and have babies. And yeah there is some truth to that.

yes, apparently this is the only thing we EVER think about

Many women I know married their high school sweetheart. These women either found “the one” in 12^th grade or wanted to settle before having the experience of dating with different people post-18 years.

Then there are some women I know who married people they met in college. They dated a few guys, maybe they found the one, but were ready to settle before 21.

Then are some other women aka, me…who are in their mid twenties or older who refuse to settle for anything. And I mean we won’t settle for anything. Many of us have traveled the world, gone to more than one post-secondary school, attempted to penetrate very competitive careers, want to have the perfect house, and yeah, the perfect guy. This woman is here-in-after, the non-settling femme.

But just because we hit on you doesn’t mean we think you are the perfect guy, that we want to date you, hell we might not even want to see you again after that night.

So why do so many men need to verbalize their disdain for a relationship before a relationship even starts. Or better yet, why is this declaration based on the assumption that we want to be with you?

Side note “One of my friends slept with a guy who as soon as he pulled out after climax said…”you know I’m not looking for a relationship or anything” WHAT????!!!! why is that necessary?

I understand the stereotype, men go out and work and women have the babies. Except for the fact of my being, precisely that I am pursuing an extremely masculine dominated career, should illustrate the fact that maybe I don’t have time for a relationship, and probably don’t want to have babies for at least 7 more years.

Recently, I was in an embarrasing situation. Or maybe it was just confusing. I hit on a guy a thought was attractive, I didn’t really know much else about him. And the hitting on him was a bit of task since we work together. Usually I’m all about the hunt which is much easier when you’re talking to a guy in the bar, but you have to tread softly when colleagues are involved. Anyway, I pretty much asked this guy out, and I was flat out REJECTED.

This was strange to me because I have never been rejected before. Never. Well there was one time with my date to homecoming, but he didnt reject me pre-date, we actually went to homecoming, and it turned out that he was gay. And then there was another instance when I was turned down by a guy but this was because he had a girlfriend, but in the rejection was an implicit “i would fuck you if I didn’t…this really sucks.” So I have never had a straight-up hetero rejection. Not for sex, not for changing a tire, not for buying me a drink, not for stripping my floors, not for anything. And I am sure many of you all reading this are thinking…vain much? However, this is based on affirmations from friends and COMPLETE STRANGERS. So there you have it.

So I was pondering how this happened. Immediately I thought, well he must be gay. And he very well could be. Then I thought, maybe he doesn’t like black chicks with big boobs. But I figure, like the cute Asian girl, or the blonde bombshell, I at least am the prototype for a sexy fetish. Or the other most damning thought is, he rejected me because he thought I wanted to be in a relationship. Sigh.

she is beautiful, over 20, and hitting on me, it must means she wants to be in a relationship! dammit!

What is it about the non-settling femme that screams I want to be in a relationship? And how conceited for a person to automatically think that they are the type of person I would want to be in a relationship with? From the way I dress, to my Bettie Paige bangs, to my piercings, to my tattoos, even this blog site in itself, screams counter-culture. So how is it that I have become the chick who only would want to sleep with a man because she wants to get into a relationship, and then get married, and then have children???

What most men don’t know is that pretty much all attractive non-settling femmes have actually been proposed to, and either broke off an engagement or rejected the proposal because guess what, like you, we dont necessarily want to be in a relationship or get married to just anyone either. I myself have been proposed to by my high school sweetheart who was rich, And I also could have married my college boyfriend, and I didn’t. Not to mention the 5 marriage proposals I received when I was abroad. And all of my non-settling femme best friends have done the same. Diamond engagement rings sent right back to the jewelry store.

yeah im gonna need something like this, in platinum

And even if you are more than a one-night stand, or we go out on dates doesn’t mean we want a relationship either. I mean, I need at least two months of dating to see if I want to be with someone in the long run. Let’s be clear. If I am hitting on you it is simply because I am physically attracted to you, which should emphasize the physical aspect of the thing. Get it?

I mean I have certain characteristics I look for in an ideal too. And there are certain things I can’t abide by in a relationship, so maybe you just aren’t in the running. For example, I can’t be in a relationship with

-a vegan who nags me because I eat meat

-a bad kisser

-a person who is bad in bed

-a person without at least a bachelor’s degree

-a heroin or crack addict

-a person who hates dogs

-a person who doesn’t like bbq sauce

I mean the list goes on and on…

Some of my male friends have said that maybe some guys only date women when they know they want to be in a relationship. Which is a valid point. But I mean, how do you know you want to be in a relationship with someone if you haven’t had sex yet? I mean do women not have to be good in bed with a man? Or is it that no one does it anymore?

I have also been told, that of course I would never get rejected by a guy if I threw myself at him, eg, if I make it known that I only want him to hit it. But really, that is so dehumanizing, and I shouldn’t have to say it, because isn’t it implicit in the flirtation?

i dont have relationships, which is why i have great sex-samantha jones

So, I guess if I see a guy I like, even though he knows I’m a non-settling femme, when I introduce myself, I’ll just say, hi, my name is ______________, and I think you’re hot, but just so we’re clear I don’t necessarily want to be in a relationship.

I’d Rather Work for a Man: Snow White, Menopausal Mothers, and Intra-Sexism in the WorkPlace

Have you or someone you know been fired or been threatened with a firing for one of the following reasons: you are a woman and you brought your boss a turkey sandwich on wheat instead of a turkey sandwich on rye, your boss didn’t like the clothes you were wearing, you exceeded your boss’s expectations in your job, there was one typo in a 30 page memo you sent, your boss’s coffee and newspaper wasn’t waiting on their desk at 8:30 am when you are only scheduled to show up at 9 am, or your boss asks you to complete a task that even God would have trouble completing by their arbitrary deadline. If you have answered yes to any of these questions then ask yourself, is this boss a post-menopausal woman with no life beyond that of her career. And I’m guessing your answer is yes.

sorry i put three sugars in your coffee instead of two...

What is the deal with these women, typically over 45 with no significant other, no true friends, and no children, that makes them think it is perfectly ethical for them to torture us? And as women, shouldn’t they be a friendly guiding hand in our careers rather than a tormenting and dismissive one? Well the reason for their mal-treatment lies in the state of their careers. These women, aged 45-65, in extreme positions of power, such as C.E.O., senior partner, chair of a department, judge, editor-in-chief, etc. acquired their positions of power in the 60’s and 70’s; a time in history when women who strove for masculine dominated careers were often treated prejudicially, sexually harassed, shunned by others, and were forced to give up the dream of being married and having children because it just wasn’t possible back then. Women were still trying to fight for the same pay men received. They weren’t thinking about becoming the boss of a business and then leaving when they got pregnant. These women had to give up a lot of things to attain and keep the kinds of careers they have.

However, nowadays, women don’t necessarily have to give up one for the other. Feminism has evolved from the preliminary fight for women to have a right of access to jobs that men held, to one in which women are protected by law not only to have access to the same jobs men have, but cannot be displaced because they choose to have a family or a life outside of their career. “Mad Men”, a fabulous show depicting New York life in the early 60’s, gives a very accurate representation of what was expected of women in that time period. Peggy Olsen, an aspiring copy editor for an advertising agency, decides to give her child up for adoption even when she knew she could have married the then man of her dreams because she received an envious promotion. Joan Holloway, the lead secretary of the advertising agency, who rivals men with her sexual prowess and professionalism, leaves her job when she believes that she is marrying a doctor so she can prepare for a life that revolves around the both of them, only to find out she left her job prematurely because hey boyfriend was denied residency. And finally we have Betty Draper, the wife of the accomplished advertising executive, who gave up her dream of traveling the world and being a model to be a stay at home mom and have his children. Now I am not saying that choosing not to work and having children denigrates the woman’s movement. It is the fact that back then the choice was already made for you. Have a career and sacrifice your family or Have a family and sacrifice your career. It is important that in the psychoanalysis of the specific women who may be torturing you that we realize the place from which they came.

peggy olson gets what she wants

But of course we’re dealing with women here, so of course there is going to be a superficial element to the needless sadism.

The Fairy Tale of Snow White

Most of us are familiar with the story of Snow White. She was tormented by her evil stepmother because of her beauty until she she found Prince Charming, but many of us may have missed the point. In fairy tales the evil stepmother of course can just simply be the stepmother but in reality she is the monster version of a child’s actual mother, divided into two separate beings because children at a young age find it difficult to amalgam the sweet nurturing mother with the evil, abusive mother that may sometimes be necessary to teach a child values. So they separate the two, much like how many people excuse flaws in their significant other, i.e. he was an asshole last night but he’s usually such a sweet guy, sorry dear, they are the same person. Usually the stepmother takes the place of the maternal once the real mother, the nice and good one, has died. But she never really did. Snow White’s appearance in the tale is crystallized when her mother wishes for a daughter, with white skin, black hair like ebony, and red lips signified by the blood that drips from her mother’s finger. The blood imagery in this tale is a clear symbol of menstruation. After the blood flows from her finger we meet Snow White, who has just reached puberty. The mirror, also known as the queen herself, tells the mother/step-mother at this time that Snow White is the fairest in the land. Snow White wasn’t a threat to the queen when she was 6, but now that she has become a woman, that she is steadily approaching the age in which she may take the queen’s throne and rule the kingdom, the queen becomes worried and employs her hunter to kill her. She asks the hunter to bring back her heart, a symbol of the internal organs she covets, but he allows Snow White to escape. After Snow White meets the Seven Dwarves, the evil queen comes to her selling ribbons that she uses to suffocate the young queen while lacing up her corset and later with a poisonous comb. Here the queen is attempting to seduce Snow White by appealing to her aesthetic desire for beauty, which the tale didactically warns against. Finally the queen comes to Snow White with a poisonous apple, one half white and one half red. The queen eats the white part, which symbolizes her longing for the innocence she has lost through old age, and Snow White eats the red part, that symbolizes the budding sexuality that lies in her future.

that's actually sigourney weaver!

And we know what happens in the end. But this tale is relevant to the Menopausal Mother for three reasons. 1. These women may resent us because we have the capacity to take the positions they have through merit or by beauty and youth. 2. There may be an inherent jealously of our beauty and youth juxtaposed against theirs that is waning. 3. These women pretend to be maternal and pretend to be our friends, inviting us to dinner parties and the like with one hand, whilst seeking to supplant us with the other.

So yes, it’s not merely the fact that we could one day take their jobs, or that we could have a job and a family if we wanted, it is the fact that our youth and beauty are now the subject of attention of other male colleagues, we receive the whispers down the hall, while the queen, although head of state, does not get a second glance. And this in addition to everything else, bothers her.

You all may be thinking that this doesn’t make sense, and after this happened to me, and has happened to my friends we all thought the same thing. Shouldn’t women stick together and shouldn’t they want other women to succeed? Of course they do, but they are so oblivious to their own colonization they are unaware that they are treating us the same way men in positions of power treated female workers in the 50’s. Patriarchy is the reinscription and reappropriation of a male dominated society through a gendered lens. The Phallus rules, and man is at the head of the state. The binary system of stereotypes is in full force, and in a conservative patriarchy women become or as Judith Butler would argue, perform, everything a man is not supposed to be.

If he is strong we are weak, If he is rich we are poor, If he is independent we depend on him, etc. And even if we innately have more “masculine” characteristics we must pretend as if we do not possess them, so as to not upset the patriarchy.

Most of these women don’t realize they are torturing us until they are slapped with an employment discrimination lawsuit. And usually their response is, “well she is a woman, and the only reason I am so hard on her is to prepare her for how cold the real world is.” Guess what bitch, the only one in the real world torturing us is YOU. What they don’t realize is that once in their life they represented feminism by dismantling a patriarchy that prohibited women from attaining positions of power, but by making our lives miserable in the workplace they are actually reinscribing the patriarchy they once sought to displace. And that is the irony of Intra-Sexism. And it is the same with Intra-Racism as well.

But there are other reasons for women not wanting to have our back, even if the competition they have with us only exists in their head, e.g. Snow White. Chris Rock once said, “Women hate Women” and women could run the world if they didn’t hate on each other so much. He said that all women probably have one friend who they don’t trust around their boyfriend, and for most women this is probably true. Now for me, I value my friendship bonds and would never do anything with someone a friend had or is currently seeing. But this decision is not because I owe it to another woman, it is because I owe it to another friend. A lot of women think that women owe some type of solidarity to each other. They believe a woman won’t sleep with a man if they know he is married or in a relationship. And perhaps there are some who do. But most women value competition more, and see a man as more attractive when he is unattainable in this way. Often, even if it is a meaningless imaginary triumph, this can assuage a woman’s insecurities in the face of another more attractive and successful woman.

And for these reasons I have decided that I would much rather work for a man in a position of power. Is this sexist? Yes. Do I care? No. And this is why. There is one thing that may suck when a woman works for a man, and that is sexual harassment. It is annoying and it is inappropriate but it is expected.,much like the cab calls, and the baby are you single, and damn girl you are gorgeous statements are repeated numerous times a day as soon as I leave my abode in Philadelphia. I am used to it so I can deal with it. Now sexual harassment as an ultimatum for a job is something different and just illegal, but the benign slightly annoying sexual harassment a male C.E.O. might say to us when we walk in his office wearing a tight skirt is expected. The actions of an Evil Menopausal Mother are not. She smiles in your face and talks about you behind your back. She revels in trying to bring you to tears as work. She makes any minor incident more dramatic than what is, and she fires you for no reason. Interestingly, an episode of Sex and the City depicts this specific dichotomy where Carrie makes a choice between working for the Menopausal Mother or the Sexual Harassing Male Boss.

Sex and the City: Carrie and Enid

In Sex and the City A Vogue Idea Season 4, Carrie brings in a copy of an article which the editor-in-chief of Vogue magazine, our menopausal mother in this scenario, promptly dismisses and insults. Her refusal to accept the piece is not merely based on the work itself, but she attacks Carrie personally stating that Carrie herself, knows nothing about men, accessories, and that her work as a whole is basically crap. Her insults cause Carrie to run into the arms of another male editor and get drunk. This male editor seems to have as much power as Enid so Carrie works with him until she realizes his ulterior motive which is to sleep with her.

carrie gets trashed after enid destroys her sense of self

His sexual harassment however is too obvious, he approaches her in his underwear at work which leaves Carrie running back to Enid even though she is aware of her tyrannical ways. Later on in the Season when Carrie gets her book published, Enid tells Carrie that a woman with a successful career has to sacrifice certain things, she does not have a husband or children because she has a glamorous career. Finally in the episode Splat, we see Enid at her most desperate, Carrie fixes Enid up on a date for a party and Enid attempts to steal her boyfriend Aleksandr Petrovsky from her by saying she should get out or her pool. She uses the image of a wading pool to illustrate the small amount of men available to a woman over 50 with a career compared to the saying we all hear as young women that there are plenty of fish in the sea.

From the get go Enid resents Carrie’s successful career, and how it revolves around serious relationships with successful men and all of the options Enid had to forego for her illustrious career. While I feel the portrayal of the male editor may have been exaggerated, most men in positions of power do not approach women in their underwear, Enid represents the menopausal mother in three ways in three different episodes: First, she unnecessarily attacks a younger woman’s character about something unrelated to the job. Secondly, she is unable to have a life outside of her career. Thirdly, she is jealous of another woman’s youth, beauty, and sexual prowess.

The Devil Wears Prada

if anyone ever saw this movie you'll remember how insane the coat-dropping was, completely unnecessary and just like a woman

I originally watched The Devil Wears Prada for another pop culture reference for this blog. While I wasn’t entirely impressed with the film as a whole it does offer some alternative perspectives to my theories on intra-sexism. Primarily, the editor of the magazine, Miranda (the Devil) actually does have a husband and two children. She appears to be around 50 in the film which would suggest that she had her twins around 41. But her family life is in disarray, she is going through her second divorce and it seems as if she is unable to spend any time with her family. In fact the only interaction with her family that we ever see consists of her and her husband fighting amongst each other. As I predicted before, Miranda the editor gives her assistant Andi, an extremely hard time. She asks her to do things that God himself would be unable to do, like get a private jet to fly out in the middle of a hurricane or get a manuscript of a novel that hasn’t been published yet. And when Andi is unable to do these things she threatens to fire her. Interestingly, at one point during the film a love interest of Andi asks her why she doesn’t hate her and Andi replies that no one would think differently if a man treated his workers this way. But this is where she is wrong. In my experience with working with men, if they don’t like your work they tell you and that is the end of it. They don’t dehumanize you, dramatize the situation and draw it out, attack your personal character, expect you to do inhuman things, or cause you to get into car accidents while running errands for them. The interaction between Andi and Miranda is inherently female, from the disgruntled looks Andi receives when she wears non-couture clothing to requesting her to do asinine tasks for no reason.

In conclusion, If I myself have the choice to work under someone in an extreme position of power, I would choose to work under a man. While I realize in this economy most of us do not have the option to pick and choose the job we like, when we meet the person who we will be working for it would be beneficial to do some research. Try and find out if she has a history of making women cry, or is hated among her peers. Find out if she has a life outside of career. And if the answers to these questions only reify that she will turn out to be a menopausal mother, be sure to hold true to your self-dignity, respect, conviction, find allies who have an equal amount of power, and be prepared to slap a wrongful termination or breach of contract claim on a bitch. Because it isn’t you, it’s her.

Law, Culpability, and Relationships: The Perfect Triumvirate

This blog is dedicated to everyone currently in a relationship or contemplating getting into one. When most of us our having problems with a potential mate, we often turn to psychoanalysis. Now, while I think psychoanalysis and Freud is wonderful for figuring out why a person acts a certain way, it is too hard determine what action to take once you have deciphered someone’s sub-conscious. It is usually true that a person bases his or her relationship on the one that their parents had. Primarily, this is because this is the relationship a person is engrossed with everyday until they are about 18, it serves as a model for what we want our relationship to be…We either try to emulate the model set before us or reject that model and strive to do the opposite.

charlotte was shocked at how her husband and his mother interacted, but it didn't solve anything

Additionally, asking a person about their past relationships can serve as a guide, but only if you believe people never change. While I am uncertain if people ever do change past a certain age, a person may interact differently with someone from one relationship to the next, and if you believe in astrology even in the faintest, you know that this is true.

she used to carry his blood around her neck and make out with her brother, now angie is married to brad, has like 8 kids, and is trying to save the world

So what now? How does one determine if they want to continue in a relationship that is showing signs of failure, disappointment, or mediocrity, however slight, when we excuse a person’s behavior by how they grew up or how they treated their last mate?

My suggestion is to concentrate on a person’s actions. Nietzsche once alluded to the fact that the actor and the doer are the same thing. A bird of prey cannot simultaneously be a lamb. So if he or she acts like an asshole and is sweet the next day, it doesn’t change the fact that they are an asshole. But I suggest it goes deeper than that. The mental intent behind the act is also something to be deciphered, and once deciphered this is the key to realizing if a person is worth your time and your forgiveness when you feel in doubt.

In law, there are different levels of culpability or intent that is often the deciding factor in the type of punishment a criminal or wrongdoer receives. There are four levels of culpability: Negligence, Recklessness, Knowingly, and Purposefully. There is also the Plea of Insanity that can be used as a defense of guilt. Additionally, there are other types of intent that can be substituted when there is no evidence or proof. I suggest that in relationships and in matters of love, when we have been wronged, we should contemplate a person’s mental intent at the time of the action. Once culpability has been determined, we will realize whether our relationships have happiness in their future, or if we are just prolonging an inevitable demise.

1. Negligence

Negligence is the less severe of all mental intent and when your mate does something negligent usually the person can be forgiven. Negligence is when a person does something wrong that a reasonable knows or should have known was wrong. The tricky thing with negligence is the “should have known.” For example, say you are driving your car, you go to pull out a CD and you rear end someone. A reasonable person should have known to always keep his or her eye on the road but didn’t. This person didn’t mean to harm anyone, and perhaps they didn’t see the person in front of them. Or perhaps they didn’t even know that looking away for a split-second could result in an accident, maybe they have only been driving for a year. In relationships negligence may consist of not calling someone when promised, forgetting a special holiday, insulting you in an argument, not being thoughtful as they should have, or ignoring you. The thing with negligence is once the person is reprimanded, and repeats the action again, negligence can no longer be used as a defense. This is because they can not say they should have known it was important to call you back when just last week you had argument about the aforementioned wrong. Once someone knows the gravity of the actions they take, and take the same action with disregard, you can kick it up to recklessness.

we actually do get worried and pissed when you don't call us

II. Recklessness

Sometimes Recklessness should just be unforgivable. However, if the infraction is slight they may deserve another chance. Recklessness occurs when a person commits a wrong against you, they knew it was wrong, but took the risk anyway. Herein lies the selfishness because they foresaw that the action they took may upset you, but didn’t give a fuck and did it anyway. They actually foresaw in their head you getting furious about the wrong, yet continued to do it, knowing good and well when they came home at 4am without returning your phone calls you would be pissed. You can think of recklessness as a person drag racing on a major highway. They know it’s illegal, they know they could kill someone, even though they may not want to, but they do it anyway. Some examples of this include, doing something repetitively after you told them it upsets you, grinding on another person in the club right in front of you, hitting on someone else right in front you, not coming home at night or standing you up for something important, changing plans at the last minute without a real excuse, embarrassing you in public, and having an affair. The thing to realize with recklessness is that even though your mate doesn’t want to get in trouble, he or she took a risk knowing on some level it could hurt you, and didn’t give a flying fuck. When people are reckless with you it means they are taking you for granted, loud and clear. However, if they do something knowing for sure it will piss you off, then you gotta get rid of them.

sadness, that is all i have to say about this picture

III. Knowingly

When someone does something knowingly they are acting in such a way knowing that something bad is going to happen. Possibly unconsciously they are doing this in the hopes that you will leave them. And a knowing intent is serious people. It is what kicks manslaughter up to murder, a.k.a. 3-5 years in prison to the electric chair. If your mate is knowingly doing things to piss you out, often acting out, he or she wants out and you should let them go to save yourself further heartache. This could include having an affair but being very obvious about it, like bringing strangers in your bed or trying to sleep with your best friend, spreading rumors about you, picking fights for no reason, any type of mental, verbal, or physical abuse, continuously not coming home at night or standing you up for important events without an excuse, actually a person who acts knowingly usually wont even bother with an excuse for their actions. Why? Usually because they want you to end the relationship for them because they are a coward. These people also like to throw tantrums.

IV. Purposefully

If someone does something to hurt you on purpose get the FUCK OUT because they might be a sociopath and are most definitely a sadist. People who do things on purpose to hurt you revel in your humiliation, sadness, and pain. These people do not only physically, mentally, and verbally abuse you, but they have elaborate plans to hurt you. Think about what goes into a planned murder or a hiring of a hitman and you get my drift. Perhaps they have a plan in which you come at home precisely at 4pm and they are in bed with another person, or they take you on a date just to dump you in front of their friends and laugh at you, or they think of life as a game and seek to seriously hurt you because they have been slighted in some way no one would understand. Iago in Shakespeare’s “Othello” is a good example of this. We don’t really know why he hated Othello, it may have been his race of the fact that he got the job Iago wanted. But Iago broke up two relationships and pushed Othello to the point to kill his wife just because he was a sadist and liked to play mind games. They get off on it.  Key words are “on purpose” and these people are sick. While today they may be your date, they are tomorrow’s date rapists, abusers, thieves, and criminals in general. And yes they exist, I know two douchebags of this sort, thank god I detected their sadistic tendencies within the first few hours of talking to them.

V. The Insanity Plea or Baby I Was Drunk

First of all, the insanity defense can actually be proven by medical history, or if this person actually has a heart they will let you know they are prone to depression, schizophrenia, multiple personalities, or bipolarism, etc. It is up to you to decide whether you want to embark on such a journey. And yes the insanity plea is a pretty good defense to almost anything because like I said earlier, psychoanalysis is tricky and is different for every one. The insanity plea is only relevant when a person has ABSOLUTELY no concept between right and wrong. But you can get proof of it if you need it. I couldn’t make it to our date because the Phillies lost the game and I was depressed is not a good excuse! And drunkenness in law is not subsumed in an insanity plea and it usually isn’t a defense for anything. So you shouldn’t let it be a defense either. Now, you may want to excuse slightly inappropriate things uttered when someone is drunk, but if someone says they blacked out and that is their excuse for cheating on you, you may have to let that mate go. If you’re above the age of 22 you should know by know what your drinking limit is, and how you behave while intoxicated. If you choose to imbibe to the point of possibly wronging someone, you did so recklessly, and the excuse should not fly.

But if I don’t have enough proof of the wrong, only a suspicion, how do I know what to do?

VI. Res Ipsa Locquitor or Ipso Facto: The Thing Stands for Itself

The famous legal case involving Res Ipsa Locquitor was when a man went in for surgery, was unconscious during the event, and realized one of the doctors or nurses left a medical instrument in his abdomen. He was unconscious so he had no proof of whodunnit, if it was the doctors who prepped him , one of the nurses who operated on him, or one of the operating doctors. And since he could not name a specific wrongdoer, they all denied liability. However, it was held that the fact of the incident is proof that the wrong occurred, and they were all found guilty. The evidence you have is enough to prove the thing, even when you can’t link the actor to the wrong. For example, if you find strange underwear, socks, jewelry in your bedroom that isn’t yours, your mate has on lipstick or smells of some strange perfume, your mate calls you a different name in bed, your mate uses different sexual positions in bed that he or she hasn’t properly introduced, or laid the proper foundation for (lol), your mate has a girls/boys night out and specifically asks that you not go out that night, your mate doesn’t return your calls for more than 72 hours, you see your mate tagged in multiple pictures in compromising positions with people you do not know or do not know your mate was going to be with, you catch your mate in an irrelevant lie, you notice your valuables are missing and no one has broken into your house, your mate’s phone rings at 2 am and there is a code name with something like “Big Apple” that shows up, the list just goes on and on. Just because you don’t have 100% proof of a wrong doesn’t mean that wrongs aren’t happening all around you. Reasonable doubt does not exist in relationships because your mate isn’t going to prison, and you as a person, deserve some deference and respect. So, I hope this helps some of you stuck at the crossroads decide the best thing for you and your future.

QUENTIN TARANTINO’S INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS: OFFICIALLY BIGGER THAN THE SOUND

This blog is directed at the fabulousness of Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, and his attempt at suffusing racial and ethnic discrimination on a global scale.

First off, this movie was fantastic, and I would go so far as to say that the penultimate trinity of Tarantino’s films must be Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill I and II, and the film of topic Inglourious Basterds. Why do these films trump everything else he has directed (not that those are mediocre films)? Is it the way he confronts racial and ethnic discrimination? The way in which he exposes the mindsets we already possess made more fantastic and appalling on the silver screen? Yes and Yes.

AND YET YOU FIND THEM REPULSIVE….

“If a rat were to walk in here right now as I’m talking, would you treat it to a saucer of your delicious milk?”

In the very first scene in the entire film, we meet the lead detective of the Gestapo, also known as the Jew Hunter. The Jew Hunter, I would say, is the protagonist/hero of the film because he is the looming shadow over every character in the film and touches all of their lives. The Jew Hunter makes an analogy to why the Germans despise the Jews and the impetus for their hatred of them.  While he is interrogating a man who he believes to be harboring Jews, (who the detective can simply tell he is by the man’s demeanor because  he does not share his similar disdain for Jewish people) he asks him what would he do if he saw a rat? The harborer immediately responded that he would in effect meet the rat with hate because they carry diseases. The detective then tells him that a squirrel carries the entirely same diseases, yet we do not hate him as much. And this is how the German feels about the Jew. Hatred based on appearance. Hatred based on myth. Hatred based on a characteristic that we all have the potential to possess.

What a simplistic yet complex way to illustrate the history of racism and discrimination in a way that even a child could comprehend. This aspect of disease, which often manifests itself in horror films as zombies who represent the uncontrollable outbreak of sexually transmitted disease, is at the root of much discrimination, especially homophobia today. But even if we isolate disease from the equation, it is simply the difference of appearance, for the Jew Hunter even says, the rat is very similar in appearance to squirrel save for the tale. Inasmuch as this difference of appearance, say skin color, conjures up the same animosity one would feel while face to face with a rat.

And what is even more profound, is that this conversation between the Jew Hunter and the Harborer is prefaced with the comparison to Germans as hawks, or birds of prey, a Nietzschean allusion, used as a platform for German superiority which influenced Hitler. Additionally, the film is propelled in the form of a cat and mouse game between the sly and cunning Jew Hunter and his prey.

THE NIGHTMARISH FAIRYTALE

Tarantino also implements the fairy tale genre in his film, however, they end in the horrific way we would hope they wouldn’t as children. It doesn’t end happily ever after. Tarantino spends a lot of time addressing the use of nicknames and how a person’s reputation supersedes our expectations of them.  And as we are adults watching this film we realize the depravity in these fairy tales when these characters are transposed into actual human form. In this film we have five different prototypic fairy tale/monstrous characters: The Apache or the Savage, The Bear Jew, The Hunter, Little Red Riding Hood, The White Knight, and Cinderella(she is not named as such but her death in this film symbolizes this character).

THE APACHE/THE HONORABLE SAVAGE

“Each and every man under my command owes me one hundred Nazi scalps… and I want my scalps!”

The Apache played by Brad Pitt is nothing like his name, he is American as they come, impudent and resistant to incorporating other cultures and languages into his own, yet he is respectful of them. His Southern drawl masks his rational intellect. His cruel brutishness and callousness comes to light when he orders his soldiers to scalp the heads of Naazis (as he pronounces it) and to carve swastikas in the foreheads of Nazis who have surrendered. He is influenced by the Native Americans who inhabited this country before him.  He pledges his allegiance to those who respect human life and ironically we see him kill no one (himself) throughout the entire film. He is also willing to make deals with the enemy to spare their life. Traitors, however, he cannot abide, and one of the sexiest yet sadistic scenes in the film is when he penetrates the gun wound of Bridget Von Hammersmark with his finger. Yet in his mind his action was not interpreted that way, he uses violence and the threat of violence to find out which side she is on, and does not exact punishment on those who share the same beliefs as he.  The Apache is the most savage embodiment of justified retribution juxtaposed against our disdain for the more organized approach to sadism that the Nazis entertained.

THE BEAR JEW

Everyone wanted to know who or what the Bear Jew was when even Hitler is concerned with the whereabouts of this menace attacking his troops. The Bear, or the figure of the Bear in fairy tales, represents a form of the monster, the wolf also occupies this position. This characterization is very fitting because this is how Jews, or in effect, any hated minority is viewed, as some type of mythic monster that possesses characteristics the Other feels they do not. Indeed, the Bear Jew emerges out of the cave like a shackled Caliban, shouting obscenities in English, which even English speaking people wouldn’t understand, but more importantly the German he was about to kill couldn’t understand.  How else can one describe a monster, except for saying it looks different than you do, speaks in a language you don’t understand, while wielding a weapon he plans to use in your murder? Interestingly, the Bear Jew, himself, is not much to be afraid of. He seemed to be 150 pounds soaking wet. However, Tarantino reminds us that the name we give a person or an object, may imbue it with a more powerful meaning than it may possess. And to take this idea even further, once people believe a certain thing possesses a certain power contrary to their own, they will act and react accordingly. The fear of the Bear Jew and the truth of the thing exemplifies how we needlessly create hysteria, war, prejudice, and discrimination based on our apprehension and misinterpretation of a symbol.

THE HUNTER

As stated above, the Jew Hunter is the hero of this film, the fact that he is marked with a swastika at the end is merely coincidental and a form of poetic justice, and this does not diminish his awesome intellect and prowess. Yes he is marked, but at the end of the film he is awarded American citizenship, a considerable amount of land, a Congressional Medal, and fame for his serial and indiscriminate murder of Jews. He is a detective, and his being is suffused with the meaning of the word detect. He is brilliant, sophisticated, and worldly, and has a keen eye for discerning clues and exposing lies by human behavior. And we see throughout the film that he is aware that a liar is lying before they begin to speak. He revels in catching people in lies and gets pleasure from watching them squirm under his magnifying glass. Were he not a Nazi we would not cringe at the thought of him being a hero, and possibly his heroic status is reaffirmed in the fact that he renounces his association with Hitler, and indeed claims to be a co-conspirator at the end of the film. The Jew Hunter resists the archetype of the Hunter in the fairytale because he has no allegiance to anyone and will kill, murder, and maim the damsel in distress.

Little Red Riding Hood

Although she is not coined with this name throughout the film, I feel this title is a propos. First of all, she is wearing a red dress, and the act of her putting on this dress is accentuated. She believes she is in the safety of a home of someone who cares for her, but secretly she is in the wolf’s den. The first scene in which we meet her she is hiding under the floorboards, while the monster in her fairytale, the Jew Hunter, is pretending to leave the home and its inhabitants in safety. Again, as mentioned before, his use of English before he pulls the trigger makes him more monstrous because she is unaware of what her fate shall be before the attempted murder. The Hunter has the opportunity to shoot her while she is running for her life but doesn’t. It is as if he knows he will see her again, and the Hunter himself remarks on the importance of fate. Then, while she is in the Nazi restaurant she again comes face to face with the man who murdered her family, the Jew Hunter. The viewer can tell that he knows who she is by the fact that he orders her milk and forbids her to eat her pastry until they have fresh cream. We then remember that the horrific incident occurred while they were at the dairy farm, and in this act he makes it known to her that he acknowledges her identity. However,  Emmanuelle is a very strong and independent character. After experiencing the death of her family, and running for her life, she comes to own a popular cinema in France. She alone would have caused the death of the Nazi leaders even if the Americans had faltered, which it seemed may have likely happened. Emmanuelle resists the feminized social norms imposed upon her. She has a relationship with a black man in the 1940’s, she owns her own business, she resists the wiles of a brutish celebrity, and murders without a second thought. One could argue that her weakness lay in her empathy for the war hero Zoller after she shot him, but when we consider that she already sacrificed her life for Operation Kino (all the doors were locked and her lover was going to die) she regains her strength, respect, and independence.

The White Knight

This mythic figure in fairy tales usually saves women from their demise. He provides a rich and prosperous future for the woman he sets his eye upon, rescuing her from poverty and death. He is a soldier on his white horse providing an alternate and better life for the heroine. Yet, in Inglourious Basterds, Zoller is the opposite; while he may provide Emmanuelle with wealth and fame he would be delivering her precisely into the hands of the monsters she seeks to escape. He is annoying, a pest, and is rank in Emmanuelle’s eyes. He is praised by all the Germans as a war hero, yet is uncomfortable with the acts which made him who he was. And most ironically, the white knight in this tale, instead of rescuing the heroine becomes her murderer.

Cinderella

One of the best idioms used in the film to reify the power of language is when the Jew Hunter realizes that Bridget Von Hammersmark is a traitor and working with the Americans. She was shot in the leg earlier in a bar brawl and left her shoe during her escape. The detective finds her shoe, and after reviewing the numerous irregularities in her story realizes that she and her companions are planning to kill the Fuhrer. She reiterates the expression, “if the shoe fits” after he places the lost shoe on her foot. Immediately we think of the prince saving the damsel by bringing back her shoe. Unfortunately, just like the White Night analogy, this fantasy becomes a nightmare as the Jew Hunter strangles her to death.

Am I The Story of the Negro in America?

Although Spike Lee takes offense to the way Tarantino portrays blacks in his films, I as a black woman find it refreshing. He is holding nothing back and only states what is obvious. Is it wrong to state what everyone else is thinking when it is presented in an academic form that demands debate? And in the alternative, by illuminating the common mindset we all share, even blacks, it may help us all to distinguish the origins of our racial and ethnic stereotypes.

For example, while the Americans, who are disguised as Germans, along with Bridget Von Hammersmark, are playing a game in which the player has to identify the character on the card through questions, one of the soldiers receives King Kong. Immediately, everyone knew a racial reference to blacks was approaching, and if one didn’t it would be inauthentic, and even more telling is that the comparison may have been necessary to win the game. Tarantino is not saying one is the other, that a monkey is a black male, he is simply pointing attention to the fact that we automatically conjure this image in our head. Just as German propaganda at this time analogized Jews to rats, so did Americans compare rats to Asians.

I was honestly surprised the character Marcel even got his face on the camera since Tarantino comments on the way blacks were represented in films by making it a point not to show them. For example, Copperhead, aka Vernita Green (Vivica A Fox) is killed within the first 5 minutes of Kill Bill and Tarantino reorganizes time to make her die that way.

i shoulda been black mamba BITCH!

And only the back of Samuel L. Jackson’s head is shown in Kill Bill as the piano player. Interestingly enough, the Negro Marcel is one of the most important characters in the film. He is the one that sets the cinema ablaze, the Americans merely provided overkill. And no matter what the Jew Hunter did or did not do, the fire that Marcel starts would have killed them all anyway. But Tarantino wants us to realize that even though blacks may be the deciding factor in the outcome of our history they receive no credit. Before the fourth reel of Nation’s Pride, we see Emmanuelle’s face on the screen. In fact, Marcel is behind the screen so no one is aware of what he has done, and no one will ever know, because out of all of those killed in the explosion, he will be undiscernibly charred because he was in the heart of the fire. In this instance Tarantino makes a brilliant comment on who is seen as heroic in history, and the gendered, racial, and ethnic lens through which our history is filtered through. This film was a fantastic statement on the perception of race, ethnicity, and gender during World War II and it is somewhat refreshing and somewhat discomforting to realize that this type of mindset regurgitates and replenishes itself in our contemporary society.

The Y Factors

HOW A WOMAN DECIDES IF SHE WANTS TO TAKE A MAN HOME

So the other night a bunch of my dude friends and I decided to go to see a metal show in the city. I didn’t know anything about the band that was playing, i just trusted the judgment of my friends. So we get there, I’m scanning the crowd for possible eye candy or possible anything. I noticed the band and they’re pretty good but I don’t think much of it. Then, as the night goes on I notice the bassist is totally consumed by what he is playing and I think, wow this guy is pretty hot! Then in a brief intermission in the show he starts talking and has this delectable foreign accent. And as he is interacting with the crowd I can tell how intelligent he is and I think to myself, wow I want him.

Isn’t that strange though, that at first I had been watching him play for an hour, thought nothing of it, and then in the span of like 10 minutes I was completely infatuated. Now although I may be a groupie at heart, those days are pretty much over. However, there are certain rock gods I will always indulge, no matter if I am married and 40 and have kids…Hello, Beck, Josh Ohm, Andre 3000, Trent Reznor, and Mike Patton. But again I digress. Later on in the night my dude friends are asking me “what do women look for in a man they want to be sexually intimate with?” And after having this profound experience I feel pretty certain in saying, that although women can be instantly attracted to someone based on looks there are certain Y factors,  that can put you into the “I’m going home with him tonight category”

Although I belong to a certain camp of women who possess a certain set of qualities: aesthetically pleasing, ambitious, intelligent, feminist, even women who don’t belong this camp would most likely agree that this is the checklist we go through when determining if a guy is worthy of our time.

1. Face
A man with a beautiful face can cause a woman to go into ruin. She will do just about anything for him. And it is really just because a beautiful face lasts forever, moreso than the body because even if the body gets old and withered at 65 or he loses a finger in the war, we can always wake up in the morning, turn and look in those beautiful eyes and fall in love all over again. Ones who score the most high in this category have been defined as man-pretty, which means so beautiful you would be hot as a woman, so beautiful that you possess a type of androgynous quality. Ashton Kutcher, Orlando Bloom, and Brad Pitt-especially with long hair can be defined as man-pretty.

kelso's lashes go for like miles

And all you haters who think this sounds superficial and lame need to guess again. We go through the same process when we decide what art looks best, what plants to buy, what car we want someday, what we hope are children look like…so it would be inconsistent to want those things in your life but not in a partner.

2. Body
Even if you aren’t man-pretty by nature, having a nice body can get you by. You don’t need to be an uber-macho man: 5′10″ or taller with pecks without a beer belly is sufficient. And honestly, to the guys who are reading this, it is so much easier for men to attain muscle mass than women, i mean if you lift 40lb weights for just one month you’ll be fit. Again, even if we don’t drool over your face during coitus, seeing a nice ass or a defined torso whilst pelvic thrusting is all we need.

don't you wish you were in between?

3.Sex
It isn’t what you think. Most of us were probably faking it, some of us weren’t. But that isn’t what it is about. It’s not all about size either, well unless youre on the complete opposite sides of the spectrum. It is about knowing how to use it, being sexually uninhibited, It is about foreplay. It is about doing what your lover wants and being enthusiatic about. It is about some form of sex talk that appeals to you. It is about spontaneity. And it is about passion.

4. Profession
This is really important especially if you want to be more to a woman that a booty-call , fuck buddy, or a “back-up dick”. I mean after a woman has to decided to sleep with you, wouldn’t you rather have her say to girlfriend, “I just met this awesome guy, Johnny, who is totally hot and he does [insert hot profession]!” vs. “I just met this awesome guy, Johnny, who is totally hot,[sigh] but he does [insert lame profession]…” If the latter is what most women probably say about you then you need to make a change. Some men may be thinking right now, these women just want a man who has money. Well, the reply to that is yes and no and this is why.

1. Women who are still ingrained in the patriarchial society in which we live still believe that a man should be able to support a woman. This doesn’t mean he has to, but it means that if shit goes down he could.

2. Some women, obviously not in my camp, have dissatisfying jobs and would love the idea of being with a successful man where they won’t have to work anymore, they think about having kids and would rather raise them themselves then taking 5 months maternity leave just to go back to work when the baby pops out.

3. Sometimes, if you aren’t on the way to being successful or care about being successful it seems like a flaw. It may make you look like you will always be dependent on that person because you have no money, no car, you live paycheck to paycheck etc.

4. Women want men with good credit, and men who are successful on on the the road thereto usually have it.

Therefore, I will list the most attractive professions in my opinion, some of these can trump all the aesthetic qualities mentioned before. In order of relevance. Please note that these are not equivalent attractive professions for women. Some of those would be stewardess, teacher, french maid, model—professions that involved being gazed upon or serving others—interesting isn’t it?

A.  The A-list Celebrity
Men in this category have no problem finding a woman EVER. It doesn’t even matter if the celebrity is ugly, most women will drop their panties just to say they have been with you. Like what is it with the thing I have for Conan O Brien?! Most women will even put up with you having other women on tour in Japan or when you’re in New Zealand shooting that new film. You have money, fame, and talent wrapped into one shell. Plus there is a bonus in dating you for bragging rights, possible fame from a papparazzi snap of you, and going to cool parties with other celebs. Again, the superficiality of the celebrity infatuation becomes less important when you acknowledge what not all, but some celebrities have done to become famous.

be warned, anytime i can use a picture of james franco, i will!!!

B. The Medical Doctor
Med doctors will always be sexy. I mean you’re brilliant, you save people’s lives, you give them hope, you ease their suffering. Without you the world would fall apart, people would still be dying from strep throat! Seriously, doctors are gods when you think about it, E.R. doctors decide who lives and who dies. And this is what is so sexy about it. So much power and so much goodness in one altrustic being. I also think Jack from Lost brought back the hot doctor  (as if it were ever gone!) cuz when his plane crashed we all realized that without him, without doctors, we would all be screwed. Plus the white lab coat, the tape recorder, the stethescope is sooooo hot!

C. The Businessman/Lawyer
So most women don’t really know what you do. You’re an intellectual property lawyer, huh? You’re a financial consultant, ummmm ok? We don’t really care what it is that you actually do. We just know you work 9-7 every day, make 100k-500k, and we can buy anything we want. As an aspiring lawyer myself (as noted above, while this might be a sexy profession for men, it really isn’t for women) most of these people aren’t extremely intelligent but you don’t have to be. You just have to be super-motivated and confident (sometimes arrogant yes) and those are pretty good characteristics to possess.

that closing argument was awesome

we don't really know what you did to have so much money, but we know you look good in a suit and carry a briefcase

D. The Awesome Musician
Ok, this is one of my favorite professions. I when I say awesome I don’t mean you bang on an instrument a few times a day. I mean youre performing shows or concerts, you go on tour, this is how you make your living. Watching a man play beautiful music and getting all enthralled in it is awesome. And you’re actually pretty good, we think you have a shot. The best instruments in this category in my opinion are the guitar and the cello. When we see you playing vibrato in that song we think about how it would feel if you played us. Although mastering any instrument is beautiful.

beck

E. The Foreign Guy

This is pretty cool category for guys because anyone can be it, you just have to go abroad. It is the accent, the accent, the accent, we probably didn’t understand the last thing you said or what you do for living but it’s cool dude (just keep nodding). Something about encountering someone who is foreign makes us think we are encountering a foreign culture. I kiss you and I’m on the beach in Martnique or in a snowstorm in Russia. shout out to Baudelaire! It is hot!

the frenchman was so sexy in the matrix, we all know it

F. The College Professor
Is it that we know you’re smarter than us? Is it that you really deconstructed that Shakespeare poem and we know you’re deeply sensitive? Is that you picked on us for like an hour in class just to be an asshole? Is it that in the back of our mind we know that if we gave you a sexual favor you would give us an A? All of the above. The College Professor is hot and I know many grad students who, including myself, were propositioned by some poor student that couldn’t help but be mesmerized. This profession may be gender-neutral. However the downside is that you aren’t perceived to be super-masculine as an entirety, so if shit went down we may not have faith that you would protect us.

the life of david gale

G. The Bartender
You are the human form of Dionysus (god of wine/bacchanals). You control the beer, the wine, the cocktails, the shots…And you make a damn good drink. You are super attentive and we feel like we can talk about anything with you, and even if our conversation is annoying when you walk away to go to the back to carry in a keg we dont think it’s us. We feel loved when you hook us up with free drinks and make drinks entirely stronger than they should be with a wink and a smile. You decide when the party starts and when you say “LAST CALL” you decide when it ends. Plus you can make us a mean martini when we come home from work. Hot. You will have women chasing you until you’re 60.

H. The Drug Dealer/Gangster/Bad Boy
So you went to prison, you fuck with guns, you sell illegal substances. Not the most conservative choice for a woman to make but you’re hot, you have money, you think you’re above the law, and we’ve usually had too much janet to know we’re probably making a bad decision. Also you are the stereotypical bad boy.

sawyer is still hot in prison

are you cool, man?

it's like killing a unicorn with a bomb

i love ben franklin girl, i could listen to you talk about his stinkin ass all day long

I. The Starving Artist/Hipster
You are super cool. People don’t think it is possible to be so cool but you are. You know about weird stuff, you listen to obscure music and play it for us, you read, you’re really good at art, music, or some production of it. Maybe you went to college for something obscure or maybe you didn’t. If money weren’t an issue we’d wish we could be you and we’re jealous of your bohemian lifestyle. Unfortunately money is an issue. We can’t pay for everything all the time,(patriarchal mindset) and it’s not cool when you ask if we want a drink, you say I can only get you a P.B.R. and don’t tip the bartender so we have to when you walk away. The best thing for you is to be with a successful woman who isnt bound by the patriarchal regime and doesn’t mind paying for art school or that new amp for your guitar. But you’re my boys.

5. Personality
This is completely different for most women since everyone is different. Some women like really intelligent men, some will forego that for other qualities, some like sensitive guys, some like guys who are mean. But judging from the fact that most women put up with huge personaility flaws for so long in a relationship, I would say this one of the last things we evaluate, it’s important but not at the forefront of deciding whether we want you because you find out who someone is through a long period of time.

So in conclusion, for all my male friends who are single and are worried because you’re not making money yet, or don’t think you’re hot enough for a good women guess again, aim for a prototype and do it.