sundries

[rm]

Last night my father sent me an email about my paper. Despite my specifically stating that I did not want this to devolve into a judgmental conversation about psychology and god, guess what's happening? And he's not even done yet. I have to respond to his letter today, which is, in many ways, incredibly kind, supportive and gracious. But I loathe "I know you asked me not to do X, but I am going to do it anyway." There's only one reason that happens, and it's not a pleasant one.¹

Am totally submitting a proposal for the academic con at Dragon*Con, just have to write in on paper instead of my head. Tried last night, did laundry and took a nap instead.

The oil spill, one month later. ONE MONTH. OIL STILL SPILLING.

Something is happening on DADT today, but what it is, no one is sure. Not only do we not know how the vote is going to go, we're not even sure what the repeal means, as one thing that's being floated is that repeal will merely transfer power to decide this issue back to the Pentagon, and in fact bring us no closer to allowing the gay men and lesbians already fighting and dying for our country to do so openly. Keep an eye on this, as it may be one of those things that gets worse before it gets better. ETA: post with language on this and analysis, in short: "we'll discuss the potential negative impact of homosexuals forever and never fix anything" seems to be a pretty good interpretation of what's up.

Mississippi school denies prom was fake.

The Warren Cup was once banned from American museums because it features explicit sex acts between men. NSFW if classical art is a problem.

Anyone possibly toying with doing scholarship on RPF (or just wants a handy thing to talk about in relation to its existence), should check out this post immediately. via brewsternorth on Twitter.

Last night on Angel and Buffy: Gunn is sort of a dick in terms of getting how to have a relationship and get your damn job done. Also, him and Fred? Paranoid much? Wesley's behaving pretty well; not perfectly, but pretty well. Also, OMG, Hamburger Drive Through Oracle! Paired with the Buffy fast food episode. LOVE. The Earthquake, Fire, Blood has just happened and Angel has made his cryptic remark about a snack and that's all we saw last night.

Meanwhile, annoying Willow plotline continues to be annoying. Seriously, how did we go from "magic is an ethically grey area that can lead to toxic adventures with dark dark things" to "spells don't really do shit other than make you feel good, it's your birthday!"

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¹When I first dyed my hair black when I was 15 and spending the summer taking classes at Yale, my father got very angry, despite the fact that black hair isn't all that different from my natural color. In the ensuing argument, I used the Angry Teen Strategy of Petulant Kids Everywhere, and said "It's my hair!" My father replied "No, it's not." I have lived every moment of my life since then understanding, rightly or wrongly, that he considers me his property.

Comments

[heron61.livejournal.com]

This article mentions that there may be problems with getting votes from "moderate" Democrats - it's sick & sad that these days "moderate" means "not quite as much of an evil bigot at the Republicans". I hope this passes and actually ends DADT (I'm especially dubious about the 2nd), but the debate about this bill also highlights how warped US politics has become - the Republicans lost big in 2008, and insane bigots still have vast amounts of power over the lives of all Americans.

[p-zeitgeist.livejournal.com]

At least according to Patrick Murphy, the votes are there in the House. (Which strikes me as probably right, given that Nancy Pelosi was indicating the votes would be there days ago.) Whether they'll be there in the Senate is the worrying part.

I agree with you about the allegedly-moderate Democrats, God knows. What I'd really like to see (short of forcing them all to live somewhere that isn't DC, and to speak to people who aren't Villagers) is some serious effort at Senate rules reform. If the filibuster rules and the requirement for unanimous consent to do anything at all could be fixed, the D-Hell delegation wouldn't be nearly the country-wrecking power that it is.