Fat People, Genetics, and Arbonne

Speaking of fat people - which is what I've been discussing most of the morning on my Facebook page, I have spent my entire life fighting the chub.  Most of the women in my biological family tree have also fought the battle of 20 extra pounds over large portions of their lives.  People who like to say it's not genetic to be overweight are just blind and stubborn.  My daughter, for example, takes after her father's side of the family (thank God for that mercy to her life), and has never shown any sign of tending toward chubbiness.  She is as slender and healthy as I could hope.  She eats candy from time to time.  She is allowed a soda periodically.  When we have a family dessert, which isn't every night by any stretch, she is given a portion.  Like most children in our culture and tax bracket, she is very familiar with Happy Meals, but she doesn't get one every day - or even every week.  These statements are all true for her and they were all equally true for me at her age.  I was a chubby kid by the time I was 7.  My daughter is not.

Both of my parents, both of my grandmothers, two of my four great-grandmothers, and all but one of my biologically-related aunts led periods of life struggling with weight...and a few of these relatives were just plain fat (photos of one of my great-grandmothers show a woman of at least 300 pounds).  For my daughter, only one of her parents (me) has any family history of becoming overweight.  Every single relative I've found information about on her paternal side has been slender.  In old photographs from the early 20th century, there are family groups from my husband's side at weddings that show an entire family group of 15 or more people and none of them were overweight.  Today, almost all of his relatives are living at healthy weights.  My daughter takes physically after her father.  She is shaped like him and resembles him and physically carries herself like him.  Like I said, praise God for that mercy in her life.

Sure, this is anecdote, but it's my anecdote, and it's not anywhere near unique.  Don't try to convince me that the reason I've never been a size four has nothing to do with my genes and everything to do with my fork.  It's simply obtuse and inaccurate to hold that view.

Genetics is HUGE in issues of body shape and size.  Not everyone will be slim when they are eating optimally and living a healthy life.  It's true.  The fact that our society cannot accept that is befuddling to me.  It's been true throughout the history of the world and, yet, modern man cannot grasp it.

All that being said, one does not have to accept being fat, either.  A healthy body weight is attainable for everyone, no matter the genetic handicap score.  For some of us, that healthy body weight will be harder to achieve and harder to maintain, but it's not a fantasy proposition for anyone.  I know this because I have enjoyed several years of my life at a healthy size...and I felt very healthy during those periods.

About 8 years ago, I was in the shape of my life.  I was relatively slender, had great muscle tone and strength, and I was active.  Since then, I've put on about 30 pounds.  I am not obese, but I am pretty chubby and clearly need to lose a stone or two.  This gain happened over time, and I can't point to one event or period when it all happened because it was very gradual. It would be easy to blame the weight on my pregnancy and the birth of my daughter, but it would be horribly disingenuous, too.  I lost all of my pregnancy weight less than 8 weeks after she was born.  No, becoming a mother didn't make me fat.  Chronic back pain, a short bout of depression in which I stopped exercising altogether, and constant anxiety between 2003 and 2006 during Ashley's Iraqi war deployments did the trick.  I became sedentary, I didn't eat less to compensate for that, and I occasionally ate more.  I ate more convenience food and did less cooking.  My body chemistry changed because of constant anxiety, pain, and mental lethargy.  SO here I am.  As an example for contrast, a friend of mine who has always been slim through her genetic predisposition lived through this time with me.  We ate almost all of our meals together, suffered the same anxieties and stressors, and had similar exercise-to-calories eaten ratios.  She gained about half of the weight that I did.  This didn't shock either of us because we know what all women know:  genes matter in body shape and size.

I am no longer suffering any of those things that led to my weight gain, but I still have this 8 year-old weight sitting on my body, and I want to get rid of it, now.  I am veggie.  I am reviving my regular exercise habits of old.  My back pain is neither so frequent nor so unmanageable as it once was.  My knees are starting to suffer, which is more motivation to get crackin' on this.  I also have an old, lovely, and darling friend who sells Arbonne products.  I loved the skincare stuff because it's vegan and it makes my face really soft, but then I found out they have diet supplements and shakes, too.  I used to like the whole SlimFast type of deal for kick-starting a habit of eating less, but all of those things tend to use dairy protein.  Not Arbonne!  So I bought it, and I'm in business.  If it's great stuff, I will let you know.  Even when I sit at a healthy weight, I do not look like a Barbie.  I look nice, and I have my own kind of prettiness.  I like the way I look when I'm healthy just fine, but no matter how hard I work, I will never look as good as someone with a great genetic profile can without even trying.  Them's the breaks.

For now...just remember to be grateful rather than smug if you don't have to work at being slim.  Many people with rockin' bodies work their butts off to get that way, and they have my ultimate respect.  If you're not working daily to maintain that healthy body weight, though, then you are the grand contest winner in the game of genetics.  Trust me, if you don't actively work at being slender and fit, then you didn't get that way because you just naturally eat the right amounts and types of foods unlike "those fat people."  No, you should be more thankful on a daily basis....and you should also have your cholesterol checked.  I'm just putting that out there.  My friend who gained alongside me 8 years ago has also been working to take off her extra weight.  She looks great, and I'm confident she will manage it.  She's now a mother of six, so she's got plenty to keep busy with!  Maybe I should get her the Arbonne weight loss stuff, too, and we could compare notes.  :)

The point I suppose I want to make is this:  Be nice to fat people.  They're not all fat because of what you think.  Degrading them or reviling them is beneath you and totally unhelpful in turning the obesity problem around.  Every fat person in possession of his mental faculties KNOWS that he is fat.  You don't have to point it out or smugly assume that you know how to "save" him.  The issue is far more complex than the fork...but the fork is always the best and first place to start.

What I Remember of 9/11 and Sara Low

I think it's important to remember exactly how it happened.  

I lived in Denver.  I was 26 years old.  Ashley and I were still dating, and I was working for a contractor downtown.

I was 15 minutes late for work that morning.  Because I was running behind, I skipped the news while getting ready.  Ashley drove me to work that day.  I don't remember why.  Because we were together in the car, we talked with one another and didn't listen to the radio.

We stopped at McDonald's to get breakfast.  I remember ordering a Diet Coke and a McGriddle sandwich.  It had bacon and egg and cheese on it.  When I got to work, the building was oddly quiet.   I got up to my office and set down my things.  A group of people were huddled around each other at the office next to mine.  I said my usual good mornings in the hallway.  They stared at me.  I thought they were staring because I was late.  "You haven't heard, have you?"  It was a male co-worker who said this to me.  I don't remember his name.  No.  No, I hadn't heard.

It was Ms. Hitchcock, another project coordinator there, who pulled me aside and told me that a plane hit the World Trade Center that morning.  She told me that for a while they thought it was an accident but that a 2nd plane had hit the other tower about 5 minutes ago, and now the news people were calling it terrorism.  It took me a long time before what she said actually registered.  My first thought was, "so there was a plane crash in New York.  Why is everyone this upset?"  I hadn't processed the hit the World Trade Center...building on fire...terrorism part.  All I really heard was "planes crashed more than a thousand miles from here and everyone is walking around like a zombie."  I went about my morning routine.  I got a cup of coffee and went through my inbox.  I took a bite of my sandwich.  I was chewing when I had the strangest thought.  I thought, "I wonder how many people in the World Trade Center were eating McDonald's for breakfast when they died."  That was it.  It finally landed on me what was happening.  I threw the rest of my breakfast away and I never ordered another one of those sandwiches.  For a long time afterward, I got physically sick whenever I saw a billboard or print ad for McDonald's breakfast.

I watched the reports of the following two crashes on streaming video.  Most of my co-workers did, as well.  No one talked anymore after a while.  We all sat at our desks or mechanically went about tasks.  Even those of us who smoked took the breaks without saying much.  Everyone was in shock.  Jessica Lopez saw me downstairs at around lunch time.  She hugged me.  We didn't cry.  We went back to our respective desks and kept working.  I don't remember if I ate lunch.  I called Ashley.  He worked at Radio Shack then.  They were watching several of the news channels on the TV display models there.

On the way home, no one had on loud radio music.  No one honked at anyone.  No one was speeding.  Even the rush hour commute, it seemed, was silent.

For the next week or so, I woke up every morning thinking, "I must have imagined that.  It wasn't real."  That was my very first thought upon waking every single day during those first several weeks.  I don't remember how long it was before I stopped trying to believe it hadn't happened.  I had to listen to music a lot to stop the thoughts.  Sadness for the families who lost someone...guilt for being relieved that no one close to me had died...anxiety about the possibility of having it happen again in another city...calculating the odds of Denver being that city...more guilt for "making it about me" with that sort of thinking.  Round and round it went.  Anger was not one of my reactions.  I have not been angry or enraged.  I don't know why.  That use to bother me because I thought it meant there was something wrong with me if I wasn't angry.  I think I was too sad to be angry.  I wanted justice.  That was all I felt.

I don't understand people who say we shouldn't dwell on it...that we shouldn't watch the video again or read the timeline.  I can't imagine brushing that morning to the back of my mind.  We watched radical ideologues murder 3,000 Americans live on television.  What benefit would anyone receive from forgetting that?  I don't cry about it except on the anniversaries when I read the detailed timelines.  I don't get all het up and angry about it.  I don't dwell on it or fixate or obsess.  I just remember it.  I don't want to forget it, and that's not some corny greeting card or serial email line.  I don't want to forget about it, and I don't want anyone else to, either.

 ------------

I read the timelines and remember the events of that morning on purpose every September 11th.  After I do that, I try to remember everything I ever knew about Sara Low.  She was two years older than me.  My stepbrother had a crush on her his freshman year of high school.  She was beautiful.  She was so, SO kind.  She had striking eyes that were sharp and almond shaped.  She smiled a lot.  I'm pretty sure she was in the band because I remember her in the marching band uniform.  I think she played the flute.  I'm not sure...it was a long time ago.  She ran track (so did my brother) and she was a cheerleader and she was an honor student.  That's all I can remember because we were children the last time I saw her...but I feel like the least I can do for her is remember her.  

The reports online say that she was not originally scheduled to work on flight 11.  After the hijacking began, she tried to call her parents, but she dialed the phone number they had when she was growing up instead of the current number.  She didn't reach them that morning, but she gave one of the other flight attendants her calling card.  The card was used to place five calls out with warnings before it was over.  The report said Sara's father speculates that maybe because of the stress and fear...her childhood phone number was the only one she could remember.  Every time I think about that, it makes my stomach knot.  She was too good--in every way too good--to suffer that kind of fear.  I hope she wasn't scared for a long time, and I hope someone was holding her hand.

Nothing Works

I want to live in a world where I will be able to make a list of things that I need to do and then go out and actually check off all of the items on that list.  I can't do that anymore.  It cannot be done.  No matter what I do, who I speak to, or how kindly I treat the workers I encounter in my errands, Hell will freeze over and my tush will fit into size 2 jeans before America will return to an era when good customer service is the standard rather than a rare exception.

Rude (or downright hostile) customer service, apathy, and a thorny labyrinth of red tape characterize most of my experiences in public life.  I could try to comfort myself by saying that all these things are a military issue and that those living outside our "DoD family" don't have to deal with this stuff...but that would not be true.  It's not just the military system.  The country is broken all over.

No one can make a list of tasks or errands and just go out and get it done, anymore.  Well...no one except the most wealthy among us.  Great wealth and power inspire fear, so those folks get the crap on their lists accomplished, but even that is misleading.  I'd bet that very few people tell Donald Trump, "no."  I'd also bet that he has an army of assistants who run his errands for him and that they get told, "no," just as often as you or I would.  The wealth and power doesn't get the list done better, per say.  It just insulates the wealthy and powerful from having to deal with the problems personally.  The system doesn't work any better for the influential folks. They just have more help. 

So what am I talking about with this babble about an impossible task list?  Using my own list from yesterday as an example, I will attempt to explain.  My to-do list was as follows:

·         Doctor's Appointment at 10:30a.m.  Sign in by 10:15.

·         Vet's Office for 6 months of heartworm tablets and make appointment

·         Get the A/C in the van fixed or get an appointment for it

·         Go to the Commissary (grocer)

·         Go to the PX (like a military Wal-Mart)

The Doctor's Office

I have a semi-serious health issue going on right now, and so I put on my big girl pants three days ago and began calling for an appointment.  The first call, I got forwarded by a clueless admin at the front desk to a nurse's line.  The nurse's line didn't answer, so I left a message.  The next day, the nurse's line called me back and referred me back to the front desk.  The kid at the front desk was the same one who talked to me the day before.  He tried to transfer me back to the nurse's line, but I threatened to remove one of his testicles if he so much as put me on hold, so he gave me an appointment.  Now you're caught up on the history of this thing.

At 10:15 on the button, I arrived at my doctor's office and signed in (had I signed in any later, they would've cancelled my appointment and made me reschedule, even though my appointment was not until 10:30.  I made that mistake once before).  Though morning is always a busy time of day for this office, they have never taken time or care to order sufficient seating for the number of patients waiting to be seen.  There is an abundance of open floor space, up to 30 people waiting on any given morning, and only about 15 seats.  My daughter and I stood against the wall with the other chair-less patients.  After about 15 minutes, and very near the time of my actual appointment, I was taken back for vitals.  Once done, I was returned to the waiting room to wait for my name to be called.  Twenty minutes past my appointment time, I was walked back to an exam room.  The doctor came in 10 minutes later (half hour past appointment time...and this was impressive given my past record with them).  I like this guy.  He is professional, seems sincere, and always tries to give his patients attention and appropriate diagnoses.  He examined me, referred me for an ultrasound (I watched him type the referral into the system), and sent me on my way.

Once in the car, I called to schedule my ultrasound appointment.  No one was available at the office.  Per the automated voice system's instructions, I punched a series of buttons to find the correct voice mail, left a detailed message, and asked for a call back.  This was approximately 11:30a.m.

The Vet's Office

Very near noon, I pulled up to the vet clinic.  Since I did not have an appointment and had never been asked to do so on similar errands in the past, I did not sign the patient book.  I walked straight to the counter to make my appointment and purchase the heartworm meds.  After watching 5 women with no apparent task to do saunter around talking to one another  for several minutes without acknowledging my presence or speaking to any of the other customers waiting, I was asked if I had signed in.  I smiled politely and said, "No, I'm just here to buy some heartworm preventative and make an appointment."  The lady stared at me for a long, awkward, and silent moment as if I had just slapped her in the face and she hadn't yet recovered from the blow to retaliate.  "Ma'am," she said in that tone, "You need to sign in and wait until your name is called.  We're very busy today, as you can see."  Um.  Okay.  I signed the book. 

Fully twenty minutes later, my name was called.  A different woman (her name tag said Amber) was at the counter now, and she asked what I needed.  I told her, gave her my ID and my beagle's name (it's Kioko).  She clicked some keys and then her eyes scrunched up in thought.  "Ma'am," Amber said, "We can't give you 6 months of heartworm because your dog is due for her annual heartworm test.  We can only give you one at a time until she gets a test done."  Frustration welled up, but I understand the reasons behind this rule.  Heartworm preventative given to a dog with an advanced heartworm infestation can kill the dog.  Since I knew there was a good reason for this rule, I submitted without comment or shooting anyone a dirty look (note that Amber didn't tell me why the rule existed.  I just happened to know already). 

"Okay," I said, "that's actually the other reason I'm here today.  I need to make an appointment for Kioko to get her annual vaccines and tests."  Amber's eyes brightened.  She knew the answer for this one, and she poured it out so fast that the words jumbled in my ears, and I didn't understand most of it.  I had to ask her to repeat herself...which, to her credit, she did very politely.  "Okay, Ma'am, you can come in next Monday morning any time from 8-9am when we open up appointments for the week of September 20^th."  I stopped her.  "So, I can't get an appointment until 4 weeks from now, but I can't buy heartworm for this month and September?"  Amber sighed and assembled her "patience face" before saying, "No, Ma'am, until she gets her heartworm test, you can only buy one per month."  I continued, "You said I can't get the test until September 20^th , and Kioko will need another dose of preventative before then.  I had to wait over half an hour just to buy one tab of HeartGuard from you, so you're saying I have to do that again?"  Amber was losing her patience with me, now.  "Yes, Ma'am, that's our policy."  I think she shocked herself with her own curt tone, so she softened up a bit and added, "or you can come in for an open house on any Wednesday to try and see if you win a slot for an appointment someone cancelled on."  I physically shook my head a little to clear it and this distressed poor Amber.  I could tell.  She thought she was giving me good news with that last bit.  "I'm sorry, let me see if I understand.  I can't get heartworm preventative for my beagle because she hasn't gotten her annual heartworm test, but I can't make an appointment to get her heartworm test today because you're booked solid for the next four weeks, and you won't open dates after that until Monday?"  Amber nodded.  "So in order to get an appointment, I have to drive up and see you—I can't call?"  Amber shook her head and I went on, "...during the very same time I will be dropping my daughter off at school—which means I can't make it here in that timeslot—or I can drop in on a Wednesday and see if I get lucky with a cancellation?"  "That's correct, Ma'am."  She could hear that I wasn't appreciative of how kind she'd been, and she'd just about had it with me.  "Your heartworm pill today will be $7.00, Ma'am."  "Thanks for your help," I said.

I paid and walked out.

The Rest of the Day

I was hungry.  My daughter was hungry.  We were both hot and grumpy, now, and I was on the verge of homicide.  We grabbed some nori rolls for lunch.  I tried to improve my mood for the sake of my daughter's, and with a somewhat renewed temper, we headed off to complete the rest of the list. 

We live on a tropical island.  It is August.  It's as hot as the Devil's hatred here right now, and the A/C in my van stopped blowing cold air last month.  My first trip was to the auto shop we always use.  The woman there apologized and said they had a broken gauge or something and could not help me.  I asked for a recommendation to another shop, she gave me one, and I drove there.  At the second place, I was told they didn't do that kind of work, but they knew who did.  They gave me directions, and I went to the third vendor.  "No, Ma'am, we don't fix air conditioners," was the response at place number three, and he didn't have any other advice or commentary to offer.  I drove to the gas station on base and bought some cans of Freon. 

The commissary and PX were a total success, which would've made me ecstatic on any other day.  Generally, there are a few things on my list they don't carry (we eat a lot of produce, and produce variety is not our commissary's strong suit), and I have to hit several stores to find what I need.  We're not talking about exotic plants here.  I'm talking about celery or tomatoes.  The PX is generally even worse for selection, but I only had two items to get:  toilet paper and paper towels.  Had it been something racier (like Scotch tape or socks in my daughter's size...we might have had a bit more trouble).

By 4:30pm, I had done all I could do.  I was waiting for a return call on the ultrasound appointment, completely stumped about how to handle vet care for my dog, in possession of compressed gas for my A/C with no idea how to use it, and fully-stocked on toilet paper.  Happy day.

We got home and I started dinner.  At about five minutes before closing time, I received a call back from the ultrasound people.  They could not see me for three weeks.  "I'm in pain here, and it could be serious.  Is there no way to fit me in sooner?"  "Well, Ma'am, if you start bleeding really bad or the pain gets too bad, you can go to the ER and they'll send you up here before that."  I was just done.  I practically hissed, "So, if we let it go until it becomes life-threatening, you can see me, but until then, I'm out of luck?"  I'm not even kidding you.  The lady said, "Yep," and hung up on me.

After all that work and running around, I was only able to cross off 3 out of 5 errands, and only two of those were actually completed.  I still hadn't received a diagnosis, my dog still didn't have an appointment for her annuals, my car was no closer to fixed, and an entire day of my life which I will never get back was over.  I took some aspirin, ate dinner with my daughter, and went to bed.  Do you really need someone to research why so many Americans are depressed?  Life is like this for everyone.  It's soul-sucking.  This day was neither extraordinary in my life nor typical only to me.  Most people I know deal with this every single day just to get their bills paid, their stuff maintained, and their lives managed.  It's this hard, all the time, to get anything done...for everyone.

Nothing works, anymore.

America is no longer a nation able to support a well-oiled society.  We've become too litigious, too isolated from one another, and too selfish to deal with our neighbors like civilized humans should.  This is just as present in business relationships as it is in personal ones.  Businesses in just about every industry have grown so large and so wealthy, that the way in which any individual customer gets handled is of no consequence and, therefore, of no concern.  Losing that customer's business is not important.  Satisfying that customer is not important.  Monopolizing an industry is all that matters because once you've made your company the only choice out there, you won't need the customers, anymore.  They will need you.  

Megabanks swallowed up all the smaller banks, so they no longer treat the average American account holder with any respect.  Very, very few individuals have enough wealth to threaten a bank into submission, and if an accountholder pulls all his money out of one megabank, his only alternatives are other megabanks with the same level of service.  The entire medical profession is beholden to insurance companies, and the insurance providers are just like the banks.  No individual patient is important.  No individual doctor can effectively fight against regulations that impede his ability to provide appropriate care for his patients.  Retailers may have retained their brand names on the storefront, but most of them have been swallowed up by mega-corporations.  Clothing, groceries, electronics, department stores...it's all the same.  Cable companies, phone companies, internet companies, cellular companies, and even basic utility companies have all been merged and acquired into the same mire of customer-crushing...hugeness.

What the customer wants, needs, or deserves is no longer important.  He is just a number, and that number moves further and further right of the decimal point with each passing year.

Racism vs. Prejudice

I haven't blogged here in a very long time, and I apologize. The reasons are multiple, and what it all boils down to is that I've been too busy with school and too angry about politics and the degradation of my national culture to sit down and analyze anything for the purposes of writing.

Today, however, I was compelled.

Those of you with a daily knowledge of me are all familiar with my regular indulgence in celebrity gossip. I love looking at the clothes and I really enjoy the schaudenfruede-esque satisfaction I get from watching the ever sought after combination of fame and wealth bring misery more often than happiness. So there you have it.

Anyhoodle, I frequent a particular celeb gossip website, and today they had up an article about a photoshoot with the lovely Jessica Alba. In it, she is wearing all sorts of edgy fashion pieces, and the comments on the website were varied in reaction. One commenter, we'll call her "X," chose to post a comment which made my right eyebrow twitch. The relevant portion is as follows:

"Indeed, Jessica Alba is very and absolutely beautiful. Excellent curves that many white ladies lack..."

The rabid gang-rape tendency of internet communities is no different on that website than anywhere else, and so a long list of other posters came in to annihilate this poster's character and drain her soul of any remaining will to live. A few were actually rational enough to point out the racist quality of her statement before jumping all over her, and still others attempted to make excuses for the poster. The excusers were the most interesting. Some of them examined possible childhood influences on X's racial attitudes while others simply claimed that the comment was true and/or no big deal. Then...the post which prompted me to respond went up. Another poster, who has claimed in past discussions on this site that she is a black American wrote the following:

"Oh good grief. Racism = prejudice + power. It’s pretty prejudiced (and misinformed) to say that white women don’t have curves, that’s patently ridiculous. But please, white women are the greatest beneficiaries of affirmative action, and are hardly talked poorly about (unlike darker skinned women). So, whatever on the claim of racism."

"Whatever," indeed.

I couldn't help myself after that and a flurry of keyboard clicking ensued. My response was as follows (although, I did go through it this morning and edit because it was full of the kind of content, grammar, and punctuation errors that I forgive in social forum posts...but not blogs):

Oh please. That is so tired.

Racism does NOT equal prejudice + power. That’s political psycho babble that activist groups have been spouting to stir up anger in voting pools and keep dissenting opinions out of the national discussion since the 60’s. Let’s be real about it. Stating with any seriousness that "only those in power can be racist" is just crazy ridiculous on several levels. It's denial, and it is a sad, tired crutch used by people who refuse to face their own biases or give up the scapegoats they have taken refuge in holding onto.

In fairness, a lot of people believe this drivel because they’ve been slammed with it over and over and over again in universities. The whole concept is a load of garbage, and any honest study of sociology with historical context proves me out. The reasons that otherwise good and honest people keep using this excuse are all very psych 101 and easy to understand, but it doesn't change the fact that it's decidedly untrue. It also makes the people using it look an awful lot like a big, fat pot pointing frantically across the kitchen at a kettle.

Racism is a persistent belief that one race is superior to another and/or a hatred of persons of a particular race based on race alone.

Prejudice is not racism, and it is not the same emotion from which racism springs. Prejudice is a preconceived expectation, fear, or opinion. Sometimes, prejudice is based on experience. Other times, a person might have no evidence at all for a prejudice and be totally unable to explain why s(he) holds it. Prejudice can apply to any area of life…certainly not just race or even people in general. Most prejudices can be changed or worked totally away through experiences or demonstrated evidence which offer an alternative to the prejudicial concept. Most people make these adjustments on a daily basis without even thinking about it.

Prejudice is something that every human being on earth has in some form or other. It is not evil. It is not hateful. It is normal and natural and unavoidable. Anyone who honestly believes he has no prejudice is seriously good at deluding himself...because he does.

Hatred and prejudice are not the same thing, and hatred of a race of people, with or without the power to oppress that race, is still hatred…and it’s still racism.

There is no neat absolution for those groups who don’t have or believe they don’t have power for indulging in racism. I don’t care which philosophy or PoliSci teacher told you there was. Hatred is ugly no matter who the poor bastard on the business end of it is, and powerlessness is no excuse for perpetuating the ugliest side of humanity.

X's comment was racist because the tenor of it suggests that X not only believes that white women's bodies don't have curves, but also that this lack of curves makes white women inferior in beauty to women of other races.

That’s why it’s a racist rather than a prejudiced comment…and it is racist whether white girls have great salaries and a full complement of civil rights or not.

Why I Married a Military Man

I have rarely been so angry on my husband's behalf as I was when John Kerry made a gaffe-ish slip during his presidential campaign, insinuating that the average education and understanding of most military personnel was so low that they didn't really comprehend why or how they got out there in the deserts of Iraq.

The jokes that are so popular about how stupid Marines are; the Hollywood portrayals of soldiers being violent, thoughtless walls of meat; the media's refusal to tell the truth about the varied and vital work that our military members do every single day on nearly every continent on earth to protect America and better the world...well, I just lost my tolerance for all of it after Kerry's little "misstatement."

The fact is...men and women who volunteer for military service like that young man in the video (and like my husband) tend to be some of the most socially and politically aware people I have ever met. They know their history. They know what they're doing and why. They join up for all kinds of reasons. They have all different levels of formal education. They come from all over the country. They come from every racial, religious, and socio-economic background in our diverse population, and so generalizations are hard to make. In my experience, however, there are several common threads. Among them are patriotism, interest in government policy, a general knowledge of history, and a desire to protect the United States, its people, and its Constitution.

Military men are appealing for many reasons. They're strong. They're fit. They ooze masculinity and authority. The uniforms...c'mon, enough said. In addition to all that stereotypical stuff (which became stereotypical because it's true), military men have the added charm of being passionately driven in their need to defend and represent something larger than themselves. There is nothing sexier than a man with righteous principles who would literally die to protect you.

Just LOOK at this young man.

Does he seem irrational, unhinged, lost, out of touch, or uneducated to you? He sure as hell doesn't to me.

The next time you see the media run yet another story about the latest bag of ass soldier who did something illegal, stupid, or violent...just look at this video and remember that this man is what our military really looks like, and this man is the one the media doesn't think you'll tune in to see.

A Naive Notion

Representative John Conyers, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee said last Friday:

“I love these members who get up and say, ‘read the bill.’ What good is reading the bill if it’s 1000 pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?”

Earlier in the month, Congressman Steny Hoyer actually indulged himself with a smug chuckle before expressing a similar sentiment in response to a pledge that was circulating through Congress urging legislators to commit to reading what they vote for:

“If every member pledged to not vote for [a bill] if they hadn’t read it in its entirety, I think we would have very few votes.’’

Gentlemen…We aren‘t laughing.

As I stated in the letter I wrote to Congress on July 4th of this year, the American People have an expectation that people writing and voting for legislation in this country will be familiar with that legislation before they pass it. The reigning sentiment among our government leaders seems to be that “the folks” simply don’t understand how things “are done” up in Washington. Oh, but they have that backward. We are not naïve. The problem isn’t naiveté on the part of the American People. The problem is obtuse, arrogant elected leaders who’ve gotten too big for their britches. Ladies and Gentlemen of Congress, it is you who don’t understand how things get done out here.

We know that you can’t read a 1,500 page monstrosity filled with legalese that would make Einstein himself go cross-eyed if you are only given two days.

We know that you can’t read hundreds of pages of addenda that get added to these tomes on the day before a vote.

We also know that if these bills are too complex, lengthy, and esoteric for the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and the House Majority Leader to understand, then something has got to change. It’s time to take a look at how you’re writing laws up there in D.C. instead of laughing at the people who elected you to do your jobs. It’s time for that transparency Speaker Pelosi promised us back in November.

Our expectations are simple:

1.) We want you to demand concise, honest, and effective bills.

2.) We want you to vote “no” on anything unreadable that comes to the floor.

3.) We want you to vote “no” on anything with hidden pork.

4.) We want you to vote “no” on anything with addenda attached so late that you did not have time to read them before the vote.

We want the dishonesty to stop. We want the usurpation of Congress’ authority that these monstrous bills represent to stop. How do you stop it? How do you change it? Easy. Vote “NO.”

Congressman Hoyer was wrong when he said there would be very few votes if legislators refused to pass bills without reading them. There would be more votes…more no votes. If you make it clear that you will not tolerate this corrupt form of legislation, you will begin--and quickly--to see better bills being written.

Legislation too complicated for the army of lawyers in Congress to comprehend is too complicated to be passed. Embrace that perspective or lose your seat. That’s the offer on the table.

If you cannot understand the bill, then either you are incompetent or the bill is a piece of garbage. If the first is true, then you need to get out of my capital building. If, as I suspect, the second is the truth, then you need to stand up do the right thing.

It is that simple.

The way you are doing things right now doesn’t work. Down here in the real world, we stop doing things when they stop working for us. We adapt and overcome. If you’re not up to the challenge of changing the broken system, then get the hell out our way.

The level of disdain--nay--the level of loathing that we, the American People hold for our Congress right now would be hard to overstate. Do you not understand that? Don’t you know what you look like to us? We loathe you. We’re not “irritated.” We’re not “confused.” We’re not just a mass of peasants stirring over issues we don’t understand. No. We hired you to do a job. Do it. Do it or get out.

It is not a lack of understanding that prompts the People to demand that you read the bills, Congress. If you want to dig in your heels, lift your noses, and refuse to accept the justice of what we’re asking you to do, then you better start padding your backsides because we’re gonna start tossing you out on them in 2010.