Being Amber Rhea

Closed for business

In some ways I never thought this day would come, but I’ve been feeling the need for a while now: I’m closing this blog. Not necessarily forever – because I don’t want to be one of those bloggers that makes some grand exit statement and flounces off, only to reappear back at the same URL a few months later – but for the near future, at least. Who knows, I might end up back here at some point, writing about any number of things. Or this might become another internet artifact.

I don’t have a grand exit statement, other than this blog has run its course and is no longer good for me. I’ve written here for over seven years, and now it’s time to pack up and start over. You might say that’s just a psychological thing, and yes, I’m sure it is; but I need the feeling of a fresh start.

I’m tired of feeling the breath on my neck from readers ready to latch onto any word and twist it based on their own bizarre motivations. I’m exhausted from trying to explain myself and anticipate attacks. The imperative to self-censor has become too great a feeling, and as much as I’ve tried to soldier on, I’ve realized I can’t, and it would be foolish to continue trying.

I’m not going to be ultra secretive about my new location, and if you try hard enough (it’s not even all that hard), you’ll be able to find it. I’m not keeping it a secret, I’m just not publicizing it. If you do find and choose to lurk in my new space, there can be no misunderstanding as to its purpose. It is mine to do with as I choose, and its use is at my sole discretion.

In its time, this blog has been good to me and led me to some really great things. With any luck, the new blog will do the same.

See y’all later.

Freewriting on privilege, class, inaccurate words, and frustration

Still so much I want to say about class and privilege and the feminist blogosphere… but no idea where to jump in or how to structure my thoughts.

Here’s a great post from the Feministing community area, by someone called Okra, that really illustrates the trap that the thread about Courtney was falling into. All Courtney’s critics were calling out her “privilege” but really what they meant was not privilege as we, activists, understand it. And we should know better, and be much better at avoiding falling into this trap. But apparently we’re not, because I see it all the time.

Privilege isn’t a personal failing. It’s not a character flaw. It’s not something you can renounce. It’s something granted to you by society. You don’t choose it. The term “unearned privilege,” which is used so much in these recent threads, is nonsensical, because privilege by definition is unearned. If we’re talking about something that was earned, then it’s not privilege.

Privilege is something you have to be aware of. Someone pointing it out is not a personal attack. It doesn’t make sense to take it personally when someone points out privilege.

We are all largely blind to our privilege; that’s the point. What we can do is work at becoming less blind to it. We don’t think there’s anything there at all because we don’t have to know what life is like in its absence! Example of privilege in action: a few years ago, a woman at work said, “I was dating someone [blah blah blah]…” and I replied with a question, “Did he [whatever else I said]…?” And the woman corrected me: “She.”

I wanted to kick myself – and I apologized. That was heteronormativity in action, straight privilege. Straight until proven gay… opposite sex as the assumed default partner.

I could’ve gotten bent out of shape and fallen all over myself to say I didn’t mean it… but who gives a shit? That would make me an asshole. Because it’s not about me. And intent doesn’t matter.

This is why I am consistently gobsmacked – though not really surprised, because it happens so often and is so damn predictable – when people have a conniption fit when someone says, “Hey, that was a racist remark” or “that was sexist” or “that was ableist” or whatever. And if anyone uses the P-word, they assume… well, what Okra said:

Do we have a better word than privilege? All words have multiple layers, but the potential for misunderstanding seems especially pernicious with “privilege,” which prompts a hearty “Not me!” from many members of the population. The idea of social privilege is far more subtle than its more popular meaning of pampered Rockefeller-type.

You acknowledge your privilege. You strive to be more mindful of it, and of the fact that not everyone is like you. You recognize that you’ll probably fuck up again, but you work to try not to. Because, of course, apologies are worthless if your behavior never changes.

But what’s been going down w/ Courtney isn’t, for the most part, people “pointing out privilege.” No, instead a lot of people are using that word because they know it’s loaded, they know how much of a hot button it is in the feminist blogosphere, and they probably surmise that it can be a way to say all kinds of assholish things and not be called out for being an asshole. Because, hey, they’re just calling out privilege. (Incidentally, it’s exactly this sort of thing that got me ousted from the walled garden a little over a year ago. Woe, I say!)

What’s tough is that we don’t have (or at least I don’t know of) clear language to talk about class that doesn’t at some point co-opt the word “privilege” and turn it into meaning “living a life of relative economic luxury.” There is such a thing as class privilege but I think many of us – myself definitely included – have gotten too lazy with that term, throwing it around when we can’t think of anything more appropriate.

But this goes back to what I said the other day; I’m getting more adept at it little by little, and finding Bitch|Lab a few years back was an epiphany; but I still largely lack the words to talk about my experiences with class. I firmly believe this is due in large part to Americans wanting to believe, with all our heart, that we live in a classless society, and doing whatever possible to uphold that fantasy – to the point where we can’t even talk about the reality because, well, how would we start? What are the words?

Basically, I’m sick of a lot of this shit. I’m sick of the hypocritical self-identified progressives, who cloak their own insecurities and fears in “calling out privilege” and “anti-oppression work.” I know how abusers manipulate and this looks all too familiar. I know that might seem over-the-top, but keep in mind I’m not equating stupid online drama with abuse, but saying, well, the patterns of behavior are damn familiar.

People make themselves look like idiots when they say things like, Jessica Valenti lives in a ritzy NYC apartment. What planet are they on?? Seriously, I wish somebody would explain to me on what planet freelance writers are living a life of ease and luxury, reclining on a daybed eating grapes and perhaps enjoying a mid-day mimosa. Yeah, having no health insurance is real glamourous. Having to constantly shop yourself around for one-off jobs that pay peanuts is real glamourous. Not knowing where your next paycheck is coming from or if you’ll make rent that month… the height of glamour.

I wish people would pull their heads out of their asses!

I’m sick of the constant policing of each other (which I refuse to partake in, but I’m talking about what I see others doing), of who gets to speak and who doesn’t, the hierarchy of who’s the most oppressed; yes, the Oppression Olympics. Just look how stupid it got on this thread. I have to be at work by 8:30! Oh yeah, I have to be there by 8:00! I make $15,000 a year – how low is YOUR salary, so I can make a judgment about how hard you do or don’t work??!! I bust my ass!! Oh yeah??

But I sure as hell can’t go in the other direction, because shit like this keeps happening, and if I have to read bullshit like “I don’t think I’ve ever found myself prejudiced against someone based on the colour of their skin, and I would certainly never put prejudicial thoughts into action” one more time I’m going to bang my head against a wall. It’s why I can’t read mainstream political blogs. Forget trying to call out sexism… it’s rampant… and no one does a damn thing, and if you say something, you’re a shrill militant ball-busting feminazi. Yeah, no thanks. How often have I been among mainstream political advocacy groups and felt beyond uncomfortable… where my brain was repeating, “Get out, get out, get out” because the moment you dare to present a different perspective, center gender, race, anything but white male straight cisgendered middle-class status quo, you’re ATTACKED. And issues such as sex workers’ rights and reproductive justice are certainly not discussed, because they’re not the IMPORTANT issues, like the war in Iraq and illegal wire-tapping. That’s what MATTERS, now shut up, little lady! Oh, and to the non-upper-middle-class among us: get a job, hippie!

Fuck THAT, too!

But I’m a capitalist, and as such, a lot of “activists” irritate me and I feel alienated. Certainly they are under no obligation to include me; I’m simply stating my experience. But the constant tearing down of anyone who happens to have a moment of success is getting real old. The feminist blogosphere in particular seems so intent on self-flagellating at every turn (as Apostate mentioned a while back), and including anything and everything so that we’ve diluted what truly is a feminist issue, and I just have no patience for it. Plus there are a lot of people talking out of their asses about shit they don’t know enough about, and everyone’s supposed to listen because they’re “not privileged” – even though we ALL are, in different ways, because privilege is a matrix, not a linear quantitative measuring system.

This post was just the latest last straw (yes, yes, I know!) and I’m so irritated I don’t know what to say about it specifically. Maybe I’ll come back to it later and try to make some sense. In the meantime, Octogalore has a good post.

But I know this: there’s a hell of a lot of conflation of “class” and “privilege” and “your life isn’t like mine and even though I don’t know shit about it, I’m assuming it must be way better” going on. I’ll never forget what Bitch|Lab said a while back: Class is not a sweater you take on and off. And I think that’s another thing people forget. You might be “middle class” now, in terms of income and net worth, but your background will forever color your perceptions of the world. You will understand things that people from comparatively comfortable backgrounds will not. It doesn’t make you automatically right about everything; but it means you have a way of approaching things that can’t be separated from what you know. Daisy called it class consciousness and I guess that’s it; and guess what else? Everyone’s interpretation of it will vary, too.

But some people seem to twist “class consciousness” into a persecution complex, and that, I have no time for.

Sundries

(Am I the only one who always reads “sundries” as “sun-dries,” like the plural for sun-dried tomatoes?)

Been busy w/ work and the new house. Hate saying something like that because it sounds so cliché, and also because I hate when people use “I’m busy” as a go-to excuse for everything. Hello, everyone is busy, it’s nothing special.

Anyway, here are some summaries of what’s been happening.

~*~

Monday I went to the Feminism2.0 conference in Washington, DC, with Ren. The subject matter and issues discussed were not new to me, but overall it was interesting and I’m glad I went. I liveblogged the following sessions:

• Feminism on the Move – Where we were and where are we now?
• Media and Culture: Feminists and the Media – Speaking Out
• Bloggers and Activists: An Intimate and Frank Conversation

I also posted a few photos on Flickr, many of which show the linkfluence node map thingy that was blowing everyone’s mind. I thought the top 30 list was pretty neat – and that’s all. Such things should be taken with the appropriate serving of salt. Or to put it another way, Technorati rankings are not character judgments.

Predictably, there are now conversations ensuing about who was “excluded,” and it’s driving me batty. I really try not to get all “snarky tech geek” on people, but this isn’t an issue of exclusion/inclusion. And honestly at this point it seems like there’s no pleasing some people. As I said at Renee’s, if WOC bloggers are not highly ranked by algorithms like that, it’s likely because of a lack of interlinking, which may happen because WOC bloggers feel that other feminist blogs are hostile environments and therefore don’t link to them. This is not condoning anything, it’s a straightforward explanation. Example: if you make your blog private, it’s not indexed by Google. That’s just the way the internet works.

Frankly, I’m sick of these conversations because they always seem to be Oppression Olympics and too often it seems like people who don’t understand the way SEO works are making outrageous, spurious claims. And more and more, I get a sense of people not wanting to be proactive, but rather just passively snarking about how everything is so unfair.

And I hate that saying that makes me sound (to some, perhaps) like the assholes who deny that privilege exists; the people who, when someone points out an instance of white privilege, male privilege, hetero privilege, whatever, take it as a personal attack. I can’t STAND those people! I hate that there seems to be such a dichotomy set up, though, that you can’t have a legitimate critique with being painted as identical to those people. And I’m afraid it will make people not listen to me when I raise legitimate critiques (e.g., exclusion of sex workers’ voices; myriad instances of male privilege and institutionalized sexism, especially the “unintentional” kind). -Of course, the corollary to that is, if people can’t make a distinction between a legitimate critique and passive snarking, that’s their problem; but we all know that common sense is not so common.

~*~

SoCon09 is tomorrow. I’m glad Rusty and I are going this year; we went in 2007, but missed it last year in favor of going to PodCamp Nashville. That turned out to be a mistake, because PodCamp Nashville sucked. We still had fun in Nashville and the rest of the road trip, but seeing all the tweets and liveblogs from SoCon08 made us realize we’d chosen the wrong unconference for that weekend!

I’m leading a session tomorrow called “Online Etiquette: How to Balance Your Personal and Professional Image Online.” I didn’t pick the name. The session was already named and Sherry “assigned” it to me. I would not have used the word “etiquette” in this context, because to me that belongs in a completely separate discussion, and I’m bothered by the way the two are often conflated. But, I plan to bring that up in the session! Hopefully there will be some good discussion generated (and hopefully I won’t end up with a massive headache). If it’s anything like my BlogOrlando session, I’ll be pleased.

And, I have an order in at Office Depot for 80 more Buzzword Bingo cards. Josh initially prodded me; J motivated me and offered to chip in to help pay for them! Nik offered twenty bucks, too. So I’ll give the people what they want! There won’t be a formal game or anything, but it’ll be interesting to see how many Bingos people get throughout the day. ;)

~*~

Progress is being made (how ’bout that passive voice!) on the bedroom at the new house. The first coat of paint is complete and we’ll be putting the second coat on this weekend.

I feel like we’ve been very fortunate w/ this whole home-buying process. Everyone has been very nice to us. We’ve gotten gifts, for crying out loud!

From Stacia, our agent:

She also gave us two types of birdseed, a card, and a Lowe’s gift card.

The home inspection company made postcards with a picture of the house, the address, and “Just Moved” on them; and return address labels with a picture of the house.

Last weekend, we discovered champagne and chocolates in the fridge, from the seller:

And last night, when I went over to the house there was a package on the doorstep…

It was from the listing agent. It’s a stained-glass bird!

The bird is actually their logo, but it doesn’t look like a logo. (Rusty and I have discussed how this is very smart marketing.) They gave one to the seller at the closing, and I guess after finding out that we’re “bird people” they decided to give one to us, too. It was a really nice surprise.

On a geeky note, I should mention that I uploaded some of the closing pictures to Facebook, and immediately friend requested and tagged most of the people in this group shot.

~*~

New favorite recipe: Macaroni and Cheese with Cauliflower, from Real Simple Magazine. It’s really more of a casserole. Rusty was skeptical at first, but after he made it, all the skepticism was gone. It makes enough to feed a small army. After we ate a bunch of it the first night (photo is of my first serving only), we made six individually packaged portions and put them in the freezer. We ate the last of it yesterday. Maybe we’ll make some for our eventual housewarming party.

~*~

Not sure if I ever blogged about this, but Rusty posted a really fascinating interview with his great-aunt Jane, who was working at Grady Hospital the night of the Winecoff Hotel fire in 1946. She ended up taking in almost all of the bodies at the morgue. This is the kind of priceless history that is imperative to preserve.

After watching the video a few times, I had a dream that I was in the Winecoff Hotel fire, only it was happening now, and I knew in advance what would happen, and there was a social media conference going on at the Winecoff (Tessa and other Atlanta social media people were there), and I kept trying to convince the people on the upper levels to get out now because the fire was slowly coming up the building and I knew the people on the higher levels wouldn’t be able to escape, but they were all nonchalant and ignored me.

~*~

Am I becoming old and boring because I post about things like recipes and painting the bedroom of the house my long-term partner and I just bought? Hey, at least I’m not posting photos of my kids and blogging about the cute things they did today. Stop me if I ever get to that point! (Probably moot because I don’t plan to have kids – but of course, I reserve the right to change my mind.)

Wednesday

Lots of things on my mind… I suppose I’ll just start writing and keep on until I’m too tired to type. And no proofreading!

~*~

In the “HOLY SHIT I’M AN ADULT” department, Rusty and I put an offer in on a house yesterday. It’s the first one pictured in this post. I haven’t blogged or Twittered about it much because I don’t want to jinx anything, and because I’m freaking out a little bit. Don’t get me wrong, I know this is the right decision and all that jazz; but it’s a BIG decision, and a major commitment. Signing a lease is one thing but getting a mortgage, that’s an entirely different level of “you better know what you’re getting into.” It looks like everything is going to work out w/ this house, but still, I appreciate any and all crossed fingers. The next few weeks will be a flurry of activity leading up to closing, and I intend to enjoy all of it! Then, after closing, there will be a flurry of activity leading up to moving in. Followed by a flurry of activity leading up to having the place looking decent enough for a housewarming party!

Priorities before closing: home inspection and termite inspection (duh); figuring out where the furnace is.

Priorities after closing: Security system; Orkin super-dousing because I don’t play around with roaches; personal pole studio; many bird feeders in the backyard.

A REQUEST: Please do not offer any unsolicited real estate “advice” in the comments!

~*~

I love Rachel Maddow. She and Suze Orman are two of my heroes. Initially I found Suze Orman annoying, but that was before I’d ever listened to anything she said – I just thought she was annoying because she seemed to shout so much. Then I realized the shouting is part of what makes her awesome. But, back to Rachel Maddow. How freakin’ cool is she?? However, I don’t like how in this New York Magazine article she says “I’m not very pretty.” Why the self-deprecation? No, she doesn’t conform to the general media-dictated ‘beauty standard’ for women, but so what? There’s no need to cast that as her not being pretty. It really bothers me. She is pretty, but it bugs me that there’s any discussion of it at all, honestly; when would you see a male pundit’s looks being such an issue?

~*~

I love love love this post at Shakesville, about Congress finally switching to gender neutral language. What is absolutely not surprising, of course, is the reaction to this news from a hell of a lot of people – whining that it’s “not important” and the feminists have their hair on fire again, blah blah. This is a perfect example of how privilege works. Inevitably, in every “conversation” like this, some dude will pipe up and say how there’s not some conspiracy against women and why don’t we feminists just shut up already, it’s just language, get over it. Well, first of all, I’m not fooled by anyone trying to lecture me on the way language works – I’ll bust out the learnin’ that earned me my linguistics degree any day of the week. But the main point is: no, OF COURSE there’s not a conspiracy – THAT’S THE POINT. No one is sitting in a smoke-filled room, rubbing their hands together maniacally as they devise ways to oppress women through grammatical rules. No one “means anything by it.” Everytime someone poses this as an “argument” it just makes me roll my eyes, because it’s like hello, you have just PROVEN THE POINT. The question of intent does not figure into this. The fact that it’s normalized, the default, we just accept it, nobody “means anything” by any of it – that is the problem! I can’t tell you how sick I am of people trying to argue intent against someone pointing out privilege in action. It makes me want to beat my head against a wall because they don’t seem to realize that LACK OF INTENT is the point!! If I hear one more person talk about how someone didn’t mean something maliciously, I’m just going to… well, I don’t know what. Beat my head against a brick wall?

Brief note about Old English: the commenter at the Shakesville thread who mentioned wyf and wer as the Old English words for woman and man, and man as the Old English word for human, is correct. The Old English word wyfman, which became woman, literally meant “female person.”

Also, I love the commenter who mentions how you’ll see exactly how big of a deal male-as-unmarked-case language is when you switch the genders and start using “she” as a general-purpose pronoun instead of “he.” It will blow some people’s minds, and some will get REALLY fucking hostile about it. The Regender tool is also a really interesting way of demonstrating how gender stereotypes are encoded in our language.

See also X: A Fabulous Child’s Story. Thanks to Catherine for showing me her original 1970s copy of the book; the illustrations are wonderful!

~*~

As I mentioned yesterday, Caroline has been doing a bang-up job with the UK prostitution law news. I have briefly glanced at the F-Word thread and even left a few comments at the Feministe thread, but for the most part unfortunately I haven’t had time to participate or do much blogging of my own on the issue. But from what I saw at the F-Word thread, it’s all the same bullshit “arguments” that give me a pounding headache. Kudos to Caroline, Ren, Natalia, and others for fighting the good fight; I’ll be back at it once I have some time, I promise. Even though these conversations with the antis feel SO repetitive, I believe it is extremely important to keep having them, because people’s lives are at stake, and if we don’t speak, then the people in power will continue to actively and passively commit violence against sex workers. Being uncomfortable or annoyed is not a justification for permanently disengaging from these issues. Absolutely, everyone must take breaks, because it is vitally important that we take care of ourselves. But that’s why it’s crucial to have many, many people involved in the sex workers’ rights movement, so that there’s always someone there to speak, and so that everyone can properly care for themselves.

Fundamentally, I just don’t get it, with these “arguments.” At the F-Word, for example – how much clearer could Caroline be? It’s not about whether you think sex work is right or wrong. It’s not about how it’s constructed in our society or why it exists or where it comes from. It’s not about wondering whether sex work would still be around after The Revolution. It’s not about discussions of “normalizing” prostitution, questions of whether sex workers can choose their work, debates about what exactly is being sold. IT IS ABOUT SAFETY AND HUMAN RIGHTS. This should not be a source of debate. Feminists should be united on this, completely. It should be a foregone conclusion. That the conversation always drifts back to ideology, what prostitution “means” and that kind of thing, really disgusts me and astounds me. And this constant conflating of sex work and trafficking? STOP, ALREADY!!! This is what Sex in the Public Square held a week-long forum to address, but I guess most of the antis didn’t bother to read that, now did they. The way trafficking is ALWAYS brought into these discussions, such an obvious red herring but one that always leads to derailment, just floors me.

Sigh… Ren, I’m going to need another Typical file.

~*~

To say this essay by Latoya of Racialicious is powerful would be an insulting understatement. It’s entitled “The Not Rape Epidemic” and is the original version of the essay which appears in the Yes Means Yes! anthology. She has a trigger warning on it, so be aware of that if you’ll be clicking through.

And you certainly should click through, because I think this essay is a must-read, especially for men. The essay resonated with me on a very deep level, to a degree that I feel I can’t articulate. Women experience this shit all the time and most of us don’t say anything – because we know from experience that if we do, it won’t help and will likely hurt. One time a male friend remarked that he couldn’t really see a mutual female friend the same way after learning she’d been raped; I was so bothered by his statement that I said nothing. What I was thinking was, if you truly knew how many of your female friends and acquaintances had experienced sexual assault, you wouldn’t be speaking to most of them if you have such a problem with “seeing them the same way.” Men don’t realize how prevalent this is. They might hear the 1 in 4 stat but often I don’t think it really registers on a “yes, this has happened to someone I know” level.

I want to write more about Latoya’s essay but I can’t find the words. What I want to say about it is beyond words.

~*~

Tomorrow night I’m leading the Social Media Club Atlanta meeting. The topic is “Online Identity and Buzzword Bingo.” You can RSVP on Facebook or Upcoming – or just show up! (Though RSVPing is always nice.) Here are some links I’ll be using for reference material, if you want to read up ahead of time. There won’t be a quiz but there will be a Bingo game, with an appropriately self-referential prize.

• Sarah Dopp: Why I Write About My Life On the Internet
• Nelson “Nelz” Carpentier: The Real Nelz
• Penelope Trunk: Good blogging is simple: Write good posts (and be thankful)
• AV Flox: Hiring the Information Generation
• Caroline McCarthy: What I don’t get about all this hullaballoo over personal branding

And finally this gem from Laura’s LiveJournal, which is short enough that I can just post the whole thing. When I put the link in my browser it wanted me to log in, so I don’t know if the post was friends-locked or what, so I’m not linking; but I doubt she’ll mind me sharing this chunk of wisdom…

Just an observation from Twitter

Robert Scoble is a self-promotion machine. It gets tiresome.

I’m sorry, but I am about to un-follow ever media marketing PR link-spamming mongol because I am sick of their shit. The only topic more boring is…oh, I can’t think of any topic more boring.

That is all.

Heh.

I’m excited about the meeting, but also a little nervous! Please come out and help make it an interesting discussion. (It’s all in good fun, so I hope no one gets pissy about the words on the Bingo card.) Here’s the description again:

SMC ATL: Online Identity and Buzzword Bingo

When: Thursday, January 8, 7:00pm – 8:30pm
Where: Manuel’s Tavern – North Avenue Room

Thanks to Amber Rhea for leading the conversation and bingo game! Bring your bingo dauber and POV on these identity topics!

• Is your online identity different from your IRL identity?
• What does it mean to “manage your online identity”?
• Are there any off-limits topics on blogs? Who decides?
• Rethinking the personal/professional dichotomy and tearing down the walls of compartmentalization: yea or nay?

Note: this is what a dauber is.

~*~

And that’s a wrap. I’m getting sleepy, so it’s time for bed. Rusty and I are getting up a little earlier than usual tomorrow so we can go over to our potential new house and see what the traffic on Moreland is like at the usual time when we head to work. If we have to adjust our schedule to account for it, I don’t mind; I actually like getting to the office early. We just want to be aware!

This post is going to have a million tags.

Top 10 blog topics of 2008

Inspired by Griftdrift, I decided to make a list of the top blog stories/topics/themes of 2008 ’round the parts of the blogosphere I frequent. The great thing about blogging and top 10 lists? There’s no wrong answer, because of the diversity of the communities we move in. So here they are, in (mostly) chronological order:

1. Spitzer scandal

On March 10, the story broke about New York governor Eliot Spitzer being involved in a (get your Bingo cards ready) “prostitution ring.” The pro- sex workers’ rights blogs were all over it from the beginning, especially Bound, Not Gagged, which was the #1 resource for updates as they unfolded. Sex workers’ rights groups across the country and world issued statements and press releases supporting Kristen and denouncing Spitzer’s hypocrisy. Bloggers challenged the same-old, same-old coverage put forth by mainstream media – oversimplification, titillation, and reinforcement of stereotypes – as well as MSM’s clumsy and transparently insincere attempts to “reach out” to sex workers. Behind the scenes, via email, text messages, and Twitter DMs, sex workers and their allies wasted no time in organizing a media team, and gave last-minute interviews from far-flung locations. Even though the voices of sex workers’ rights advocates were largely overshadowed by the usual rehashed “arguments” about prostitution, for the first time we began to make a dent in the coverage, thanks in large part to the greater connectivity offered by social media.

2. Atlanta tornado

On March 14, a tornado ripped through downtown Atlanta. I first heard about it on Twitter; Dave, who was at the Flatiron at the time, sent this tweet: “Tornado just came through the flat iron. We’re all fine but it was insane.” Coverage via social media and citizen journalism was almost overwhelming in its immediacy and thoroughness. People were taking photos, shooting video,Twittering, etc. Because of the coverage from the people on the ground, mainstream media reluctantly had to admit that the tornado hit parts of town other than the business district – although their coverage of the damage in places such as Vine City was still miniscule compared to citizen journalism coverage.

3. Seal Press/WAM!2008 debacle

Some bloggers who are women of color went to WAM!2008 and had some complaints about it. Blackamazon said “fuck Seal Press” and the feminist blogosphere blew up. Seal Press responded and the bloggers Apostate refers to as the noisy group didn’t like the response, and the blogosphere blew up again. Then other publications wrote (poorly and inaccurately, for the most part) about what happened and the blogosphere blew up a third time.

I stayed out of this one for the most part, because I’m pretty sure my thoughts on the matter wouldn’t have been popular with most people on either opposing “side” of the brouhaha, and I didn’t feel like dealing with drama.

4. Amanda Marcotte, Brownfemipower, and “intellectual appropriation”

On the heels of the Seal Press girlcott, there was also Amandagate (have I mentioned I hate the use of -gate as a suffix for any scandal?), wherein some bloggers accused Amanda Marcotte of having plagiarized Brownfemipower. I stayed out of this one for the most part, too.

5. New UK porn law

In May, the UK passed a new law banning so-called “extreme” porn. Bloggers on both sides of the pond covered the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill (of which the porn ban was a part) as it made its way through the Houses of Parliament. Protests were held and people of all stripes spoke out against the ban, but ultimately it passed. So you’d better be careful about what’s on your hard drive, even if you don’t live in the UK; this law sets a dangerous precedent.

6. Deborah Jeane Palfrey’s death

On May 1, the body of Deborah Jeane Palfrey (a.k.a. the DC Madam) was found at her mother’s home in Tarpon Springs, Florida, dead from an apparent suicide. I first heard the news on Twitter, from Melissa. As with the Spitzer scandal, Bound, Not Gagged was again the central location for information – and, in this case, mourning. An online memorial was created shortly after her death, and starting on the night of May 12, a 24-hour vigil of remembrance was held.

It’s hard to talk about death without slipping into what sounds like clichés and platitudes, even if they’re actually sincere, but what I want to say is: We might never know whether Palfrey actually took her own life or was murdered, but sex workers’ rights activists will keep asking the questions that need to be asked, in memory of her life which was needlessly cut short.

7. Kyle Payne

Kyle Payne is a self-professed anti-porn feminist ally, who “is particularly interested in men’s roles in confronting pornography and the rape culture” and served as a rape crisis counselor for four years. It just so happens that he was arrested for assaulting a female student at Buena Vista University. After Eleanor’s Trousers first mentioned it, the news spread like wildfire through the feminist blogosphere. In the weeks leading up to Payne’s sentencing, feminist bloggers stayed on top of the story and sparked a letter-writing campaign to the judge that would preside. Ultimately, Payne was sentenced to six months in jail. It should have been more; but feminist bloggers brought attention to a case that would have otherwise gone virtually unnoticed, and that’s a testament to the power of blogging.

8. The C-word: “Credibility”

So here’s what happened. Andre Walker, who is well-known in the Georgia blogosphere (if not necessarily well-respected), was exposed as having received money from Congressman David Scott’s campaign without having disclosed it. Because Andre wrote several favorable posts about Scott and was credentialed as a journalist by the Georgia Legislature, this is your classic conflict of interest problem. I have to admit I was nonplussed by the revelation, since I never understood why anyone would consider Andre’s blog a beacon of journalistic integrity to begin with. But although I said that with my tongue firmly in my cheek, it’s exactly those sorts of words – “integrity,” “credibility,” “ethics” – that were suddenly being tossed around by the likes of Ken Edelstein. Andre’s actions apparently served as an indictment of all bloggers (stop me if you’ve heard this one before). The debate flared for a while and then died back down, but it’s only a matter of time before the embers are stoked again. Unfortunately, the actions of a few bad apples reinforce the negative pre-conceived notions held by new media naysayers.

9. Pink slips in the pink ghetto

I know, the title for this one is cheesy. I should’ve just stuck with “Sex writers getting canned,” but somehow I couldn’t resist. All silly puns aside, though, the fact is traditional and online publications lost many important voices for positive sexuality this fall. The tanking economy and the precarious position of the media industry in particular was the inevitable explanation. Whether or not you agree that these cuts make sense from a bottom-line perspective, there’s no denying that the effect will be yet another obstacle to intelligent, nuanced discourse on sexuality. While I hate to see people I respect losing their jobs, I do think there’s an opportunity presented here, too. Since one thing that certainly won’t happen is that these people and others like them will simply shut up, I have hope that blogs and other forms of new media will continue to grow and fill the void left by traditional media institutions. Mainstream media might see smart sex content as too risky, but as advocates of positive sexuality we take risks every day.

10. Prop K

Proposition K was a San Francisco ballot initiative, but its importance was covered online regardless of geographic location. Unfortunately Prop K did not pass, but the fact that it was on the ballot at all and got 42% of the vote should be seen as positive gains. I know that doesn’t do anything to change the lives of vulnerable, criminalized sex workers facing real violence right now, and the people who voted “no” and/or vocally opposed it need to think very hard about what their “no” means. Yet this was a historical moment and hard as it is sometimes, I think it’s important for activists to remain positive (which also means taking care of ourselves). I don’t believe Prop K would have had nearly the support it did without the effects of the online community; and maybe next time those effects will be even greater.

Honorable mentions:

Steve Gower

Gower is a dangerous vigilante who terrorizes street-based sex workers – especially trans* workers and workers of color – but thinks of himself as some sort of neighborhood champion for midtown Atlanta. On the heels of the 5th International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers, Creative Loafing published a predictably slanted (and infuriating) piece about Gower. For a short time there was outrage over this asshole in the local blogosphere as well as the larger sex workers’ rights blogosphere, but sadly Gower and his MNA sidekicks (see Peggy Denby’s latest stunt of racism and homophobia) are still terrorizing some of Atlanta’s most vulnerable populations.

SpaceyG booted from Peach Pundit

Speaking of predictable… in August, SpaceyG had her front-page posting rights on Peach Pundit revoked. Coverage in the local blogosphere had a particular tone that other stories about political bloggers lacked; it didn’t take a rocket scientist (and we even have one of those!) to smell the sexism. It manifested itself not only in SpaceyG’s initial ousting from Peach Pundit by overlord Erick Erickson, but also in the manner in which it was “covered” – downplaying the significance, blaming the victim, saying “nuh-uh!” – all the usual Bingo squares. C’est la vie, right women bloggers?

Bloggers taking blogging back

To close on a happy note, I started to notice this year that one by one, bloggers are getting fed up with the little boxes into which “digital entrepreneurs” and “social media experts” have tried to shove them. You can do this, you can’t do that, play by the rules if you want to be taken seriously! We’ve reached the tipping point, and more and more bloggers aren’t having it. We’re taking blogging back from those who have tried to co-opt it. My prediction for 2009? Even more momentum of this sentiment!

Places to live, and weekend wrap-up

Back to work today. While I was glad to be able to go to Augusta and spend time with my mom, I’m happy to be back home.

I am, however, looking forward to the day when “home” means a house that we actually own, instead of an apartment that we rent. If you know me you know that for the longest time I was not at all worked up about the idea of home-ownership. In fact, I wanted nothing at all to do with it. I watched as people I knew bought houses just because it seemed like “the thing to do” and I just shook my head. Maybe it has to do with growing up with Realtor parents (well, from the late 80s on, anyway) but I think too many people get all excited about the idea of owning a home and don’t really stop and think about it. But, 3-5 years ago lenders were making loans to people who had no business qualifying and people were buying even though they weren’t really “settled.” That’s one of the biggest reasons I didn’t want to buy – I didn’t know whether I’d be staying in one city for any length of time! I didn’t want to tie myself down (mental pictures). Plus I wouldn’t be able to afford paying for all the stuff you have to pay for yourself when there’s no apartment maintenance man to call.

Now granted, sometimes the maintenance man is drunk, belligerent, and potentially violent, as happened at one apartment in Athens – the one where sewage was coming up in our sink. Sometimes the maintenance man is a nice guy but he just doesn’t have the skills to fix a particular problem. Sometimes the landlord is crazy. I am aware of all this.

But for me it was not worth it to just run off and buy a house. I always figured when the time was right, I’d know. Gotta trust my intuition. And now? I know! The time is right. I’ve enjoyed living in our loft in Decatur but it’s time to get out of there. The neighbors with their bizarre noises coming from the apartment above us; the weird smells in the hall; the people stomping through the hall at all hours; the yappy damn dogs; the Phantom Pooper; the dripping AC unit; starting off this morning with a clogged toilet and freaking out over getting germs on my hands when I couldn’t un-invert the plunger without touching it; all of this stuff, I’m over it.

And yes I know many or all of these things can happen when you own your home, depending on where you live. But that’s not my point. As I told Rusty this morning, it would be nice to live somewhere where everything works right.

Two exceptions: the ex and I never had problems (that I remember, anyway!) in our last apartment in Athens, where we lived for two years; and I loved my apartment in Texas. I was the first person who had ever lived there. It was one of the only things I liked about living in Texas!

I miss that green sofa. It was too heavy, though; I got rid of it because I was sick of nearly breaking my back every time I tried to move it anywhere. But now I kind of regret that.

Actually, how did I forget? My first apartment in Atlanta was great, too! I really enjoyed that apartment, but it wasn’t practical for me to stay after the second year – and it was probably good that I moved when I did, because it had been taken over by a new management company and was going downhill.

Maybe I just feel more annoyed now because I’m so ready to move. I don’t know. Things at our place just seem sub-par to me lately.

Anyway – after the first of the year, we will revisit the mortgage lender – assuming she still has her job, which I really hope she does, because we like her – do the pre-approval thing (we already got a pre-qualification letter back in September) and start actually going in houses with our Realtor and getting ready to make an offer. Our lease is up at the end of March so we’ll be out of the apartment by then at the latest, and hopefully a few weeks prior.

But enough about that. I want to document this process and my feelings on the matter, but when I blog too much about apartments and houses and stuff, I start to annoy myself. Yes, I know, old-school blogging FTW; but I start to get annoyed because I feel like I sound like those people who love to pontificate about real estate and how they’re going to get a deal and flip a house and blah blah blah, and think they’re big experts, but really they don’t know anything and they just sound like idiots.

So moving on.

This weekend my mom and I went to the cemetery to visit my dad’s grave. I hadn’t been since the funeral. My mom wanted to go because she wanted to see the headstone the VA put up, but she hadn’t been yet – I think she was waiting to go with me for moral support. We didn’t stay long. I think being there was a little much for my mom. I didn’t think I would get emotional but I did tear up a little – but I wonder if that was mainly out of sympathy for my mom? I don’t know. Anyway, we just stood there under an umbrella (it was raining lightly) for a few minutes, staring at the grave. We agreed that the headstone looked good; it’s very small, just a basic stone at ground level with his name, date of birth, date of death, and military rank. It’s smaller than most of the other headstones near it. My mom said, “Well, Dick, we’re just stopping by to say hello” and she got a little choked up. We stood there for a few more minutes, then she said “Well we don’t have to stay anymore” and then we left.

Also this weekend, I convinced my mom to start a blog. If she ever posts anything, I’ll link to it. It all started because there was a cover story in the Metro Spirit about the Surrey Tavern, which opened in 1978. Well it just so happens, it’s in the same location as a couple other bars where my mom worked in the late 70s. She said she’d never been to the Surrey Tavern, but she worked at Augustino’s and the Man of War, one of which was in the same location and the other was next door (and at one point they took down a wall and the two were combined). The article mentioned both those places briefly but seemed to get the chronology wrong; I showed it to my mom and she verified that it wasn’t right. The person who wrote the story is probably my age and just going off of conflicting things different people told her; but my mom has pictures from when she worked there, labeled with the dates on the back (yet another reason why it’s so important to label pictures!!), so she can say for sure. She worked at the Man of War when she was pregnant with me. I told her she should write in to the Metro Spirit with her corrections, and she said she would. Then we got to talking and I told her I thought she should start a blog and write about all the interesting/weird/funny things that happened while she was a bartender in the 70s and 80s. She could even scan some of the pictures and write about them. She got excited about that, so we went and got her set up with a blog on wordpress.com. Hopefully the motivation will stick and she’ll actually post something!

Guess I better stop for now. I’ve been writing this post off and on all day, since I’ve been so busy. Later I might write more about Augusta’s thrilling 70s nightlife! ;)

Your “crap” is my lifeline

That Geoff Livingston guy linked to me again the other day. For someone who thinks I’m silly and stupid, he sure does link to me a lot! At first I didn’t read the post, I just saw the trackback, and it included the words “defend your right to be stupid.” *eyeroll* Then, J (incidentally, the title of this post comes from something J said a while back, which is now in my header quote rotation) told me he’d read it, because the post included a link to his blog as well, and he was pissed – so I finally went and read it myself.

It wasn’t anger I felt when I read the post, just immense frustration – that same “brick wall” feeling I mentioned yesterday. The most frustrating thing about dealing with people like this is that I really feel like we’re having two different conversations. I’m saying one thing, but he’s responding to something completely different. You can understand why that can be a little maddening.

I am sure that Geoff Livingston and other “social media consultants,” “digital entrepreneurs,” whatever other buzzword-laden terminology they self-apply, truly believe that they’re teaching people the right way to blog and to implement a social media strategy. But I’m firmly in the camp with something I believe Josh Hallett said: if you use “social media” and “strategy” in the same sentence, you’re doing it wrong.

The problem as I see it is that a lot of the sites that call themselves blogs really aren’t. They should stop using the term because it just confuses things. Instead of constantly having to differentiate between different types of blogs and explain that the different varieties have different purposes, we should start using new terminology. The Gawker blogs publish several posts an hour; combine that with their writing style, funding, and a bunch of other traits, and come on, that’s not really a blog anymore. “Online magazine,” for example, would be more appropriate. And if you’re “leveraging” a blog to drive traffic to your business, then fine, but own it and call it what it is: NOT a blog. Some of these corporate blogs read as little more than press releases.

I’m not saying that such sites don’t have value. For some people, I’m sure they do. For me, not so much; but that’s the great thing about the internet and social media, we all get to decide what’s valuable to us. So that’s a big part of why the dismissive attitude from people like Geoff Livingston really gets under my skin. He seems to think blogs like mine don’t have value. But how do you define value? I’m not trying to make a buck. I’m not trying to create business opportunities. To measure blogs like mine with that sort of yardstick makes no sense.

Besides, I think personal blogs have tremendous value. 100 years from now, what will our great-grandchildren look back on? Personal blogs will be treasures. Think about it – history books are great, but when we find old letters, diaries, written records of people’s day to day lives, that is something really special, because it’s a person who lived in that time period telling their own story in their own words. No filters, no dressed-up language, no glossing over the nasty bits. We’re putting down that kind of record for future generations to find. Blogs about branding and social media strategy might be useful today, to business owners, for example; but where will they rate in 100 years? Are people going to be as interested in advice for how a 100-year-old business should engage with its customers as they are in reading how their great-grandmother felt the night Barack Obama was elected?

The other day, Rusty threw this post out on Twitter. It really rankled me. Joseph has already written a great response and I’d like to echo much of what he wrote, especially this:

The power of the platform was never that Joe Blow could become a “star” or rise to the Technorati Top 100 – it was simply the promise of an easy way for anyone (from a large corporation to a guy in his living-room) to publish on the Internet.

First of all it just irritates me when people write over-the-top posts sounding a death knell for anything. Secondly I’m pretty amused by it because this guy’s blog appears to be exactly the type of blog that he’s bemoaning for “killing” personal blogs. Self-awareness, now that is valuable.

Personal blogs are still alive and well, though I do think many of them have changed in form a bit – but that’s natural, as anything will change over time; and as more people are blogging, many of us are dealing with questions of boundaries and when our story becomes someone else’s. That’s not an indictment of the medium but a simple fact of being part of a community.

It’s really not important who’s in the Technorati Top 100. Personal blogs are about chronicling one’s life and forging a connection with others who share similar experiences. That’s still happening, and the fact that Nick Carr might not see it doesn’t make it any less true. Maybe he doesn’t visit the areas of the blogosphere where personal stories are thriving, but whose fault is that?

So, defending my right to be stupid isn’t part of the equation at all. But defending the value of being human? That’s what it’s all about.

New favorite blog

Sometimes I wish my grandmother had a blog. If she did, I think it would be a lot like this one (via Blog for Democracy).

Just the other day on the phone Gran said that people who are undecided voters are “imbeciles” and to be undecided at such a late date is a “sign of stupidity.” She also derided Sarah Palin’s hairstyle – which I would not be okay with from basically anybody else, but from her, somehow it’s hilarious. She often remarks that Republicans are “mean and hateful.” Of George W. Bush, she has said, among many other things, “I don’t understand how any man can be so stupid. He had a nice education, you know.”

“Every category,” eh?

An unsolicited, somewhat spammy-looking email I received this morning said:

Greetings!
Dust off your shelf and make room for a Chapeau Blog Award!

Be one of the first to enter the exclusive Chapeau Blog Award contest, solely dedicated to honoring the creative and inspired art of blogging.

Entering is an easy 2 step process.

Step 1
Enter one or many of the 12 industry categories.
There is a fit for each and every blog, including:

• Arts & Design
• Technology
• Marketing & Advertising
• Hobbies
• Travel & Leisure
• Entertaining
• Health & Beauty
• Parenting
• Real Estate & Development
• Finance
• News
• Web Design & Development

[rest of the email snipped for irrelevance to this post]

A fit for every blog? Really?

Personally I see a lot of things missing. Politics, anyone? Music? Food? And yet “Web Design & Development” is a separate category from “Technology.” And what does “Entertaining” mean?

And, of course, the perennially-missing-from-everything category: sexuality.

But I can’t say I’m surprised. We’ve been there before. I used to get really angry but mostly at this point I’m just sad and deflated, and frustrated at how people seem so invested in maintaining the negative compartmentalization of sexuality – and always, the ones who hurt the most are women, queer folks, trans folks, and anyone with non-traditional (whatever that means anyway!) sexuality.

I know these awards don’t matter – I mean WTF is this, anyway? – but it’s not about these particular awards. It’s about a pattern. But I’ve said that before, too.

ETA: Ren, I’m going to need a new Typical file!

Libertarians!

Libertarians, take note! Interesting thread going on at Ren’s. I’ve left two comments so far…

I’m not a Libertarian, but I know a lot of my views aren’t exactly popular in certain segments of the feminist blogosphere either. All the “you’ve gotta be anti-capitalist,” like that’s the only way to be, pisses me off and strikes of 1) a certain nasty flavor of The P-word (yes, privilege!!) and 2) projection.

Yes, I know what it’s like to feel pissed off at people who appear more financially well-off than you are. BELIEVE ME, I KNOW. But I also know that the anger and assumptions I often made about them were completely unfair and came from a place of my own insecurity, and anger at A SYSTEM, manifested as anger at A PERSON. This is why I HATE HATE HATE when people make assumptions about “so and so is well-off” or “so and so lives a comfortable middle class existence” when in reality they NO (sic) NOTHING ABOUT THEM.

See, this is making me use all caps!

and (starting w/ me quoting a comment by Daisy)…

Ren, I love the common sense attitude the libertarians have, but many here in the south lean to the right and do not count abortion rights in their libertarianism, which I think is odd. (Most DO count drugs, porn and guns)

Most of the Libertarians I know (who are involved w/ the Libertarian Party of Georgia) do support abortion rights, as long as the state does not have to pay for it.

This is one of the many problems I have with Libertarians, but that’s another story.

I went to a breakfast meet-and-greet thing the Libertarian Party of Georgia recently had for bloggers, where there were several candidates present (including those running for PSC, which is actually a very important office but no one [including me, until recently] knows WTF they do). On some issues I felt like raising my fist in solidarity with them – e.g., consumer rights – but then they would veer toward (from my perspective) “crazy” territory – e.g., abolishing the department of education – and I just couldn’t take them seriously.

I could’ve corrected the unfortunate “NO” but 1) why try to rewrite history, when a simple click-through can tell the truth? and 2) I just love any opportunity to use pretentious Latin notations. I think it just goes to show how passionate I was when I was typing. Yes, I admit it, I messed up no/know… it happens to the best of us, right?