Until the work that most women actually do – care work – is recognised, they will not have social citizenship and will remain in a fundamentally inequitable position. Women, as the child-bearing gender, are structurally unable to resolve, by themselves, the intrinsically conflictive juxtaposition between, on the one hand, society’s requirement that individuals engage in income-generating work before their activity is socially recognized and rewarded with full social insurance, and on the other, the inescapable need of all individuals to receive care. The fact that everyone, young, middle-aged and old, requires material and emotional servicing, including of course the care-givers themselves, stubbornly remains a gender-blind spot unrecognized by public policy.

M. Threlfall and C. Cousins, Gendering Spanish Democracy.

Third-wave feminism has dug a hole so deep for itself that it will now never climb out of it. It now proposes that, since everybody needs to be serviced and women are traditionally the serving class, this state of affairs should be codified and promoted on the state level. Why engage in all these complicated and messy efforts to open up the public sphere to women? Let’s instead get the welfare state pay us all a stipend for servicing everybody in sight and just be done with it.

I have been striving for a very long time to find any substance to third-wave feminism. However, enough is enough. I am now forced to conclude that third-wave feminism offers absolutely nothing but an attempt to justify housewifery. Eventually, the goal is to get the welfare state to pay women just for existing under the assumption that being female automatically means that you provide care and service people emotionally by virtue of your gender. Womanhood, thus, becomes a sort of a disability that should be financed by the state by default.

Never does one’s own article look more poorly written, intellectually shallow, and overall hopeless than when one is revising the final proofs. Profound changes cannot be introduced at this point, and this is precisely when one begins to see the need for many changes.

Finally, somebody is as outraged about the China-related apologism I see everywhere as I am.

Shopping as research and cooking as writing.

“If your parents subjected you to physical violence, if, like most parents, they subjected you to emotional coercion, manipulation and blackmail when you were a child, to that extent they committed evil. I must add, and as I have already indicated, that I emphatically do not mean that you must accuse your parent(s) in person. There are many situations in which such confrontations are entirely futile and pointless; often, confrontations of that kind serve only to make a bad situation still worse. But at a minimum, in the sanctity of your own mind and soul, you must have the courage to make the accusation when it is true.” A long and brilliant post.

Among all the posts I read around the Remembrance Day, this one was absolutely the best.

“Show me an American who developed a greater respect for his country as a result of its coercive measures that prevent him from burning a flag. You can’t force people to feel the same way you do, and making them put on a show while hiding their true feelings serves no purpose except to help you live in a fantasy world, at the expense of others’ autonomy.”

A journalist from Kentucky explains why Senator McConnell needs to go and I agree with her.

“Does Quebec have short-man syndrome?” It’s an interesting post, although I have no idea why it singles out men. Everybody in Quebec is shorter and skinnier, irrespective of gender. With my 5’6”, I always felt like a giraffe, towering over everybody on Montreal buses.

Anti-choicers murder a woman. This is how “pro-life” these vile freakazoids are. Tell me once again how I’m too cruel when these anti-choice freaks come by my blog. They promote murder of women, and I get criticized for telling them they are vicious animals.

There is a lot of stupid dating advice out there but this article is too stupid for words. For those who don;t want to waste their time on it, I can summarize: “Ladies, sit there like stupid idiots and expect to be courted, pursued, begged, etc. God forbid you show any initiative in a relationship because then you will not be ladies any longer.” Barf.

Plagiarism as cross-contamination.

An interesting prognosis for China: “The next five years will evidence tight central political control, high levels of repression, increasing military threats to China’s neighbors, and slowing economic growth. The consequence may be coup d’etat or revolution come 2017.”

An amazing post on the value of being a loner: “So before you decide to enter a career as a good “corporate man” you have to ask yourself the question NOT if your mind can handle it.  But is it worth the price you have to pay knowing your brain will never fully develop and reach it’s intellectual and philosophical peak.  Because I don’t know about you, but life is too short to have boring thoughts or be that person who thinks “boycotting oil on that ONE day” is somehow deep economic or political thinking.”

And the title of the post of the week goes to: “I adore writing!  I want to marry writing, have wild sex with it, make it have my babies, wrap myself in that zone only writing can offer for hours and hours.  It’s a chronic disease, that writing desire.”

This country definitely needs a tax reform, and as January 1 approaches and attempts to restore the economy are made, I think that two types of tax credit should definitely be eliminated. I’m talking, of course, of mortgage tax credit and child credit.

I find mortgage tax credit to be egregiously offensive. I don’t understand why people who undertook mortgage obligations they could never hope to meet and tanked our entire economy in the process should be rewarded while responsible people like me who are trying to live within our means and don’t buy until we have the money to pay for the purchase should be penalized for our responsibility. Mind you, I’m not saying there should be any tax credits for people who rent instead of taking out a mortgage. These should be private choices by private individuals and it makes me uncomfortable to see the government favoring one of such choices over the rest.

The child tax credit is also something I can’t support for the simple reason that I believe in government staying out of people’s reproductive choices. You cannot support abortion rights and accessible contraception and at the same time be in favor of child credit tax. Either the government should stay out of people’s reproductive choices or it should promote the choice it finds more acceptable. But you can’t have it both ways. Of course, if Roe vs Wade were repealed, God forbid, I would support sky-high child credits.

Please note that I’m not discussing how effective these measures will be economically. Whether they have a positive or negative effect on the economy is not that important to me. I’m not a Marxist which is why I do not believe that the economy forms the basis of everything. I believe that ideas come first and the economy catches up. During the recent presidential elections, we almost saw the “legitimate rape” crowd win. Had they won, they would have done everything in their power to invade our bodies and our private lives. Religious fanaticism has not abandoned its hope to come to power once again and to continue its fight for the control of the most intimate aspects of our existences. If we demand reproductive freedom while accepting pay-offs for our reproductive choices and personal decisions, we run the risk of losing this important fight.

Reader el writes from Israel:

I live near Tel Aviv, so yesterday & today (so far, once per day) we for the 1st time experienced hearing the warning of a rocket. From Gaza rockets were sent to Jerusalem & to Tel Aviv, my favorite city. Today in the morning we heard of the additional “Iron Dome” launcher put to protect the center of the country, and already today it succeeded in preventing a rocket from falling near / in (?) Tel Aviv.

I am more worried about our soldiers, if there’ll be a land operation too. Looks as if it will be, so far.

Citizens of the South have been getting those rockets for years, in “peaceful” times, so many, I guess, don’t want the operation to stop and them being again under fire. That’s also what somebody said on TV.

Also, for some reason, Israeli channel showed Hamas propaganda movie in Hebrew, made specially for us. How we should wait for suicide bombers on our bus stops and in cafes. Why show it, instead of only saying “they encourage suicide bombing again”, as was said on TV (more than before, I guess) ?

Wanted to add that I think very anti-Israeli people don’t understand how much of Israel lives (esp. south), that we are attacked too, not only attack ourselves. That it’s really a war over a house, so to speak.

This is a very scary situation, and I have no idea how it will be resolved. El’s comment tells us a lot about how the people in Israel are feeling right now.

If anybody has any positive prognosis to share, please do so. I want to hope for the best.

Thank you for sharing, el. Stay strong, my friend!

Whenever I see that I have a new comment from Evelina Anville, I feel happy anticipation. Evelina always has something new and interesting to contribute. She never links to any blog of her own and doesn’t share many details about herself but I have a strong suspicion that Evelina is a writer. Every comment by her is like a little work of art: aesthetically pleasing and intellectually stimulating.

I don’t think I have a single reader who always agrees with me on everything. I would consider myself a failure as a blogger if all I managed to do was bring together a bunch of indifferent sycophants who would dismiss me by agreeing with every word I write. Evelina stands probably the closest to my convictions and beliefs among all my readers, yet there are still quite a few areas where we disagree. Unlike me, however, Evelina knows how to express her disagreement gracefully and elegantly and this is a skill that I would love to master.

Evelina Anville is a feminist and an intellectual who has strong political beliefs and who defends them passionately and vigorously. I never met her in person but I have no doubt that she is a wonderful human being who is worthy of every admiration.

I’m very opposed to excessively high taxes. I believe that absolutely nobody, regardless of their income, should ever have to pay more than 40% in taxes. That is the absolute maximum I can consider fair. And even that is too much. 30% is a lot more reasonable.

People keep touting Sweden as an example of everything good, but, from what I understand, I’d be expected to pay 60% in taxes there. That is daylight robbery!!! Absolutely nothing can justify this. Whatever social programs they can offer me in return, they can keep them. At this price, I’m not interested in anything any government can offer me. If you cannot run the state without requiring that people hand over a half of their earnings and more, move aside and let somebody try to handle things better.

This is why I wouldn’t have been completely happy in Quebec. I don’t, of course, dispute the right of the people of Quebec or Sweden to live any way they choose to. I’m just saying that, for me, this is unacceptable.

P.S. Of course, people who say that all taxes are evil are complete idiots. Good, reasonable taxation is key to a well-functioning society. (Once again, well-functioning according to my system of values.) I’m very happy with the way I’m taxed in the US and would not mind paying more in taxes than I do now, especially state taxes.

. . . is a crippling disease. People let others walk all over them at home, at school, at work, among friends, etc. guided by this dangerous and unproductive need.

If you suffer from this illness, I suggest the following remedies:

– realize that you cannot be liked by everybody no matter what you do and how much you sacrifice. Some people won’t like you by default. If you perceive this simple fact of objective reality as tragic or hurtful, you really need to get over yourself. Just think about all the people you don’t like. Does it look like they are suffering as a result of your dislike of them? Or are they, rather, quite happy, rosy, and plump?

– choose a small group of people whom you really want to like you. Make sure everybody in this group really matters and is worth the effort. Then – and this is the most crucial part – establish the lengths you are willing to go to in order to please them. It is useful to write this down. What are the things you are never going to sacrifice to be liked even by these crucially important people? Make a list of such things and reread it on regular occasions.

People keep telling me that my all too methodical approach to interpersonal relationships is cold and even scary. But it works and that’s what matters. Right now I’m seeing a very good person of quite an advanced age being demolished personally and professionally because he can’t get over the need to please everybody in sight. And you know what is the only payback he gets from all this? People lose respect for him and trample on him with glee. Not all people, of course, but enough to make the poor man utterly miserable.

You are not a $100 bill. You are not supposed to be liked by everybody. The only person who really needs to like you is yourself. And everybody else can just go stand outside.

Aaron Clarey is a great guy with a wonderful sense of humor who always promotes my blog on his own very popular website. I want to try to return the favor, at least to a degree, and post this very funny video Aaron made with great Christmas shopping advice.

The only question I have for Aaron is what is the brand of the cigar he holds in the video. I love big cigars (in the literal sense, you dirty-minded readers), so I’m always interested in which brands people prefer.

P.S. The video is supposed to be funny, so let’s breathe deep and dust off our sense of humor.

P.P.S. Yes, Aaron’s political beliefs are very different from mine. But if he manages to get over that and promote my blog heavily, then I can rise to the occasion, as well.

I know I have many readers who are either in high school or in college, and I want to address them in this post.

Dear younger generation, you are wonderful kids who will do great things and make the world a better place. I meet so many amazing young folks both in real life and online that it makes me proud to share a planet with you. Leah Jane, Jamie (voxcorvegis), Pen, Benoni, Miriam, Brittany Ann, Lindsay are some of the young people who amaze me with their maturity, brilliance, and sincerity. I’m an educator, so I love young people (in a totally non-creepy way) and believe in them.

I have to tell you, however, that one thing that might prevent you from achieving the greatness you deserve is not your politics, your sexuality, your life choices, the MTV, the social networks, or video games. It’s sloppiness.

Let me explain. I have really phenomenal students this semester. I grumble sometimes, but the truth is that they are great.  They all have a lot of insight and curiosity. But, God, the carelessness is killing me.

On Wednesday, I received 56 final essays from my students. I had exhorted them on numerous occasions to observe the following format requirements:

– Times New Roman 12 pt font,
– 1 inch margins on all sides,
– page numbers in the right-hand corner of the page,
– nothing should be bold-typed,
– nothing should be italicized except the title of a novel.

Can you guess how many people out of 56 managed to fulfill all of these requirements?

One. A single person.

The requirements are listed in the syllabus, I explained them in class both in English and Spanish on at least 4 occasions, I showed two PowerPoints listing them, I wrote them on the board, I prepared a handout listing them, and I gave out a check list the students could use before submitting the essay. I also explained in detail why observing this format was important and why it would be a personal courtesy to me to observe it.

I don’t think I could have done more, yet I only managed to get through to a single individual. And this is not an isolated situation. This happens all the time.

This kind of carelessness makes one come off as disrespectful and lazy even when one is neither. In my experience, people who end up winning in the competition of life are not the most brilliant ones or the ones with the best people skills. It is always the ones who have the best attention to detail and who are the most careful, punctual, and meticulous. And this works both in one’s professional and personal life.

Let’s work together to eradicate carelessness and sloppiness as the nasty pests that they are!