A cogent discussion on marriage equality

Two Pennsylvania state senators introduced opposing bills — one of favor of same-sex marriage, one opposed — and then they debated the issue on WHYY in Philadelphia.

By all means, scroll down and click on the debate and listen to yourself.

A burqa-wearing rapper

That would be Sophie Ashraf.

More here. We’ve been talking about Islam and the coverings Muslim women sometimes wear. This is another interesting take on things.

And thanks, Muslimah Media Watch, for the original link.

Retirees take revenge

That’s the accusation, anyway, that some German retirees kidnapped their financial adviser and tortured him for four days until he was rescued by the equivalent of a SWAT team.

The adviser said he tried to explain to the kidnappers that the market had taken their money, not him.

What have we said about vengeance, class? Still, this kind of story must make Bernard Madoff nervous. And do pay attention to the quote from the abductee that his purported captors — said to be in their 60s and 70s — kept running out of breath as they duct-taped him.

Should we care if grown people take steroids?

Robert Lipsyte at Tomdispatch (linked here through AlterNet) says our concern is misplaced.

And besides, don’t we love a winner?

Our iconic images

Are often violent.

Why not more photos like the one above, images of innocent images of life? Is it because what gets circulated more often is the horror? And is that the media’s fault, or the fault of the public who clamors for the moment of impact, the crumbling corpse, the blood-coated face of a beautiful young woman lying dead in a street in Tehran?

(Warning. If you click on this link, you’ll see bloodshed and violence.)

You can quibble with the choices of photos. I know that when I think of Fr. Mychal Judge, the New York City firefighter chaplain who was killed in the 9-11 attacks on New York, I think of another photo.

But that’s just quibbling. The point is we seem to have burned most onto our brains the photos that are most graphic. I have no great wisdom as to why, but it’s troublesome when our collective iconography seems heavily weighted toward the violent  and unexpected loss of life.

Kate and Jon will litigate; and the kids?

Jon and Kate Gosselin are taking a break from filming “Jon and Kate Plus 8″ to regroup, since the couple announced they were filing for divorce.

Jon has said he’s been too “passive.” Viewers of the ultra-popular show seem to be split (I know because I read the whole Internet on this) evenly between agreeing with Jon and thinking Kate has been too aggressive. Says here the show is particularly popular among women.

In a new and ugly wrinkle, might Jon’s new girlfriend join the show next season? This is getting fugly. I’m just going to sit here and think good thoughts about their eight children.

Don’t call me “wife”

I hate the word and I always have.

Maybe it’s because my early introduction to “wife” was as a budding fundamentalist Christian, and as such I got a snootful of messages about the subservient wife, the wifely wife, the wife who put her life on hold to be a wife. I sat there in the pew and thought that only a goon would be a wife, because wives appeared to take a giant step back from the world and let everyone else have all the fun.

Selfish? Perhaps. But maybe it was also a bit of self-preservation. It’s hard to say at this point.

The wives I saw on television were the patient ones, the ones to whom every one else handed their coats, the ones who winked into the camera when their husbands acted like doofuses because it was up to the wives to dispense wisdom, hold the line, hold the coats. Wives were the grown-ups in the relationship. I had every intention of being a grown-up but I also figured I’d eventually partner with a grown-up, a man who could take care of himself — including his own shopping, his laundry, the whole megillah.

I believe most men are fully capable of reaching their potential that way, and I figured if they needed me to guide them on their paths, that sounded less like “wife” and more like “Mom,” and no thanks.

I admit I could probably work through this fairly quickly if I wanted to, but in the interim, I choose not to be called wife, and just to be fair (and at the risk of confusing people and making them think I’m a lesbian) I call my husband my “partner.”

Or I call him “Frank,” which is his name.

And things like this business — “The Occasional Wife” — are part of the problem. If I knew how to take the word back (and had the energy to do so), I would. But so long as it’s considered something like the clean-up, the I’ll-do-that-so-you-won’t-have-to-honey, the let-me-pay-attention-to-mindless-crap-like-organizing, I’ll pass, thanks.

And thanks, Jezebel, for the link.

Ever worry you’ve been caught on tape being ignorant?

Because in ’73, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion with Roe v. Wade, then-Pres. Nixon went on record being precisely that.

This is from yesterday’s New York Times story, and it’s Nixon talking:

“There are times when an abortion is necessary. I know that. When you have a black and a white,” he told an aide, before adding: “Or a rape.”

Uh, O.K., then. Becuase you know how those black/white babies turn out. Sometimes, right in front of everyone, they stand up in Washington, D.C., raise their right hands, and say, “So help me God.”

More here.

A reflection on the f-word

Yes, that’s right: Feminism.

Someone was introducing me to someone else today, and she dropped her voice when she said, describing me, “She’s a feminist.”

Since I wrote a book with “feminism” on the cover, I figure I’ve already outed myself, and I’m not ashamed of that one bit. I’ve been calling myself a feminist since roughly 1984, when someone else called me that like it was a bad thing. Up to that point, I hadn’t realized I was a feminist. I hadn’t aimed in that direction, but yeah, I guess I was.

Now, I know I am, and it strikes me as funny when people tip-toe around the world.

I thought of that when I stumbled across this, which asks if feminism needs to be defined by political ideology. It’s a welcome change of discussion, because frankly, I get tired of this kind of thing, the eternal death, burial and resurrection of feminism. We are not post-feminism any more than we’re post-racial.

Instead, it’s a good question to ask: Do liberals own “feminism?” Can a conservative be a feminist? Is Hillary Clinton a feminist? Is Sarah Palin?

Iranian clerics join Iranian protesters

Although they answer to Ayatollah Ali Khameini as their supreme leader, some clerics have taken to the streets  with the protesters after last week’s disputed presidential election in Iran.

Watch a video here.

This puts a whole new face on the opposition, does it not? I wish someone steeped in Iranian culture and knowledgeable enough about the American one could tell me: Is this comparable to clergy who marched during the Civil Rights era with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.? Because plenty of clergy — of all shades and faiths – put their jobs and their lives on the line for the cause.