Fat Attitudes....

I'm taking a course this weekend - in the efforts of getting to know some fat activist so that I can make a documentary film about what they are doing. That and ridiculous amounts of homework will be keeping me busy and away....

I do like the word lemur!

You're Madagascar!

Lots of people don't really know anything about you, making you buried treasure of the rarest kind.  You love nature, and could get lost in it whenever possible.  You're remote and exotic, and the few people who know you value whatever they share with you a great deal.  For some reason, you really like the word "lemur".
Take the Country Quiz at the Blue Pyramid

Hey! I've got mail!

Wow, who'd have thunk that this blog actually has a responsive readership! Actually, we all know what brought your wandering eyes to this page (my referral logs can prove it). So, lets all consider the implications of lookism... aside from increasing the numbers of people who have visited this blog.

A reader writes: "I got to your blog from xy.com, and was intrigued by your post on lookism... I wanted to comment on the serious spin that you put on it when you stated that it's an active preference for most.  I don't necessarily think that it's an active preference only.  I definitely think that society and mass media reinforce that tendency to lean towards that unconscious preference, and it becomes a conditioned response.  Obviously, this isn't a "good" thing, but I wonder how much of a difference people that realize that this situation exists can actually make.  Take a look at gay culture.  Nowhere else is the ultra-masculine male ideal portrayed as the icon of perfectionism reflected the most.  An African-American or Korean person can fight these ideals and try to work outside of the pre-existing hierarchy, but people are still going to suscribe to lookism.  It's a sad truth." (my emphasis in bold)

Gentle reader, you've caught me out, I was trying to be a bit more serious when I referenced "active preference" towards the end of my post. First off, racism and lookism are not the same thing. One has a long history of structured and sanctioned violence in its support, while the other is a relatively recent term arising from the observed consequences experienced by people based on their appearance. Obviously, there is some overlap, especially in the types of relative negative consequences faced by those less-favored. The African-American or Korean victims of racial profiling who I would have sent undercover to investigate realtors, rental offices and landlords experience negative consequence based on their appearance. The perception of race, and the active decision by the realtor, rental offices, and landlords would have actively curtialed the places that the Korean or African-Americans would have been able to live - ghettoized housing. Thus, the plain jane woman who didn't sell as many teddy bears as the beautiful woman was not actively discriminated against. Yet relative to the beautiful woman she experienced less positive outcomes. The conditioned response, and decision based on that (irrational) response was what I was trying to point in my comment about "active preference." So, people are more likely to gravitate to the beautiful woman (or man) is present, what can we do about it? More than just throw our hands up in frustration we can - be open to responding to all people - educate one's own desire so it is not narrowly confined to idealized forms of beauty - be concerned with how you respond to the beautiful person who emails you out of the blue. Just because it is a sad truth, doesn't mean one can't do anything about it. I realize that this might be interpreted as "suck it up and deal with it," but that in not what I mean to be saying.

I think humans are very visual - people process a great deal of visual information on a daily basis. I would have to beg to differ with, "anthropologist Helen Fisher, [who in the ABC article] suggests that primitive man might have unconsciously thought that a pretty woman had a better chance of bearing healthy children." Bullshit! I think she, along with most socio-biologists, or those who wish to reduce the cause of social phenonmena to a base genetic reductionism are wrong. My man Richard Lewontin, a socio-biologist who studies evolutionary biology would back me up. Because there are so many environmental variables that affect heredity and the phenotye of an organism, that to claim that somehow a socially contingent feature (beauty) is the result of biology is bunk.

"In any case, I wanted to know if you had any other thoughts on the subject.  Thanks."
Uhhh, I've spent way too much time blogging this post. But for an interesting read about ways that people sought to define and attain beauty, check out Sander Gilman's Making the Body Beautiful: A Cultural History of Aesthetic Surgery. On the note of racism and lookism in the gay community - I think it is there - I think it is a problem - see my earlier posts and links to the topic. Whenever I see "I have a preference for _____" or "Sorry, I just don't find ______ attractive" I get really uncomfortable - because it highlights the ways that race and its perception is a potent force in our society.

"P.S.  That bunch of shit eating pictures was gross beyond belief." 
I think people's desires are educable. While I don't plan to be educated to desire of certain activities, I do think that the digust that you and I feel about what my earlier link portrayed is inked to the processes of internalized prohibitions. Check out this link (no scat, safe for work) about shit and civilization: our ambivalent relationship to ordure in the city, culture and the psyche.

Have I scared everyone off yet, with this rough, rambly, and not quite fully through post?

I stand corrected....

I claimed there was nothing as gross as full frontal doggie humping. I stand corrected - the thing emerging in this series of photos is MUCH MORE UPSETTING (scat alert, not safe for anyone, much less work). Oy vey.

Word of the Day

lookism: is discrimination or prejudice against people based on their appearance. According to
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language. ABC news goes "undercover" to discover - surprise - beautiful people get more help, are generally cut more slack, and perceive to have a whole host of positive attributes. Well duh, that's like sending black or Korean people to go and rent housing to see if they are treated differently due to their race (a job I almost got, but had to pass up because I had already accepted a position at another organization). It is chocked up to "unconscious preference" - but I'm pretty sure it's active preference for most people.

What do I do to combat "lookism" on a very local and not very effective manner? I will occasionally go to hotornot.com and mark as not hot the people I know other will mark as hot - you know the ones... and don't even get me started on the guys in their military fatigue - "yeah, invasion and occupation is so hot, not."

OK - going to go on the record as saying that - insomnia - not fun.

What would have made the party more fun...

Was at a party the other evening, a spoiled, "un-fixed" pup was having fun with all the guests' legs and arms. Which could be considered cute and all, a little dog humping away wildly at shrieking guests. But there isn't anything quite as gross as doggie cock emerging from its sheath - gross.

Not that I'm looking for a date.

But, along with an index of dating services for those with STDs, latter day saints, nudists, "metaphysically minded people" all have dating services tailored directly for them. Jewish vegans too.

I'm off coffee...

Squirrels with Coffee a group blog - i wonder if and when they'll "dish" about race and how it affects "gay boys".

I'd like to visit Montreal...

Via the northeastern states I've not yet been to...


create your own visited states map

But for affordable housing in NYC...

Been up half the night researching low income housing in Manhattan. Discovered some prime properties in the village - on la guardia place and washington square south (!). The catch, the waiting lists are so closed... I am reminded of this guys story of being on a waiting list for a government sponsored co-op since 1989 and just moving in this past November. Since I'll be looking for a rental, hopefully the waiting lists won't be more than 2-3 years long.... One interesting thing that I did discover was that an equivalent to my current in Central Harlem, goes for around the same price in the "mid-income" bracket for a similar apartment (as opposed to the $650 if you fall into the "low-income" bracket).

Queer eye for the queer guy....

A new site is up, Lurid Digs. I was reminded of the site when I took this quiz...


Ted: Food & Wine Connoisseur

Which Member from Queer Eye for the Straight Guy is your type?
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Here is one on sticky rice...

Entitled Gay to Breakers But the ending is super lame and reificatory of the whole concept of race (IMHO): "Then he got down in worship and tasted his own kind for the first time." Whatever - his own kind.

More on "race" and "sex" ...

One section of a series of six features about Gay Men and Sex, this article features three essays about Sex, Skin Color, and Stereotypes. Basically, sex is ideological, desire is too: "I try to think of the first time a white man took me to forbidden territory. It was during oral sex. We both were talking dirty, along the lines of "Oh, that dick tastes good. Yeah, you do that real good. Shit, you're gonna make me cum. Yeah, suck that dick, nasty fucker."

Then it came.

"Do it like a good house nigger."

My eyes bulged like Bernie Mac's. Rage ran through me--images of powerful slaves rebelling in the fields. Then I noticed something that shocked me.

My dick got harder.

It was fucked up."

I don't think this quiz is accurate...

-Bad- You're the exact opposite of what any guy
wants or needs, unless he happens to need a
quick lay. You're cruel. You toy with people.
You're probably a bitch, and i don't think i'd
like you if i met you. Oh go screw a random
male already.

What Kind of Girlfriend Are You?
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