A Fresh Start

Just returned from another keynote speaker/public lecture. I'm skipping workshops today because I have to work. It's a shame becuase I'd like to attend the healthy families one or the one on AIDS/HIV within a faith context. Anyway.

This morning, again, rocked. Christine Gudorf, a scholar with an unholy amount of degrees (and working on her second PhD), presented a lecture which basically was gender/biological sex 101. We got loads of statistics and crazy information thrown our way. It was rivetting, and I think even the....um, less intellectual among us, were following her every word.

First off, a comment. If God has created a world so full of diversity and change and surprise, a world where there are at least 700 different species of the Eucalyptus tree, a world containing the platypus and moles with no eyes and all those wacky deep sea fishes that look like a Geiger nightmare, then why can't we assume that God would create humanity with similar diversity? How can we even desire a dimorphic population? Man. Woman. Dull dull dull. Should we not celebrate God's creation by loving the diversity and plurality of sex (biological, but also acts)?

That being said, Prof Gudorf proceeded to tell us that there are at least 6 different sex determiners. That's 5 more than just our genitalia. Cool, huh? Her question is if the gov't passes an amendment that marriage is between only a man and a woman, how is that to be defined and enforced? In her speaking with clergy groups she has presented this dilemma: Two couples ask to be married. One couple is XY and XY, but one has had a sex change operation and passes as a woman. The other is XX and XXY and live as a lesbian couple. Which will they marry? Gudorf says that 75% will marry the first couple because they pass and fewer questions will be asked. ! How exactly are we to determine man and woman?

This is not to say, she went on, that there are no ethics to be had in a plurality of sexes. We must still maintain fidelity to the commitments we make, we must still not allow abuse or coercion of anykind to occur. But to deny God's grace and community to those that make us uncomfortable, especially when we don't understand what we're talking about, and may not for a long long time, is just not right. Amen.

Also interesting.... While I am all for the breakdown of gender expectations and all for the authenticity of chosen self-expression.... After hearing some more information about the ways in which women rock I have to say that I am proud to be a woman. Some facts: Scientists say that the Y chromosome used to carry as much as 1000 different genes, it now carrys about 80. Women can have a wealth of different sexual experiences: multiple orgasmisms, erotic stimulation even without touch, orgasmisms even from non-genital stimulation, our sexual pleasure is not directly linked to our reproductive function. Men are almost purely sexually stimulated in the genital region, orgasm and reproduction directly linked, orgasms just not as varied. Also, women and men can recognize many different facial patterns for positive emotions (contentment, pleasure, joy, etc) but women vastly out perform men at reading negative facial patterns (sadness, grief, fear, etc). In fact, the statistics for men accurately reading negative facial expressions is the same as the numbers for random chance. This is only among western men and may have to do with women still being the overwhelming majority for child rearing, where babies can only express themselves with their faces and cries.

Now, if this makes you want to write and say "But men can be great! I'm one! I know great men!" Don't bother. I'm engaged to the greatest man on earth. I also know that plenty of men who stand against discrimination and domination in its many forms. However, men can whine all they want. Poor men. You've had it good for thousands of years. I love the sweet sweet justice of cold hard science to vindicate the centuries of women who were "put in their place" because men were so superior. Someday we will move beyond the circumstances that cause me to feel this way.

I am back in Berkeley. Back where things make a little more sense to me. Back where I feel I fit (more or less), or at least can breathe. Santee and southern California are foreign places to me.

The last day I spent there we went to two malls. The first, in El Cajon, was the middle/working class mall. A Wal-mart, a JC Penny, plenty of stores called things like "Trendy!" selling cheap clothes and shiny plastic objects. I think the "nicest" store was an Abercrombie-esque place I'd never heard of before. These sorts of malls make me feel dirty. I am grossed out by the abundance of poorly made, tacky crap, and appalled that people want to buy this stuff, that this crap somehow fills a void in people's souls and makes them feel good about themselves. Then, I think I am being an elitist bitch. Am I being socially concious because Wal-mart is the devil and expoits lower class workers and most of these stores make their goods in off-shore sweatshops? I'm not so sure. I don't have enough money these days to purchase even a single item from one of these cheap stores, so it can't be that my pocket book calls me to nicer stores.

And then there are the people. Boys acting like the men they are raised to be, girls acting like the women they hope to become. An intricate but flimsy dance is enacted in these kind of malls across the country, in places that look the same. I could have been anywhere in the US; take away the dry sunshine and palmtrees and East County and I could've been anywhere. These girls in short short skirts, painted on pants, tight shirts or low-cut tanks that reveal their bodies to be tits and ass, legs that lead to pussy, blank stares and flirtatious smiles that also reveal that this is their role and they know how to play it. This is the cheap sex of youth, but these girls don't seem to know any better, they don't seem to understand the consequences of their desired, and very successful, effect. What might they have to say? It is impossible to hear their voices when their bodies are screaming so loudly. This too makes me feel stained.

The second mall we went to was one in an upscale part of San Diego, some mall with Fashion in the title. Stores like Louis Vuitton, a mac store, Sephora, Tiffany's, Banana Repubic, Bestey Johnson, etc, were here. This mall, too, made me feel dirty. The women and men were not children and all were dressed quite stylishly. Many still dressed to be looked at, but their bits remained tastefully covered. Do these women feel that their money buys their voices and therefore they don't have to communicate only through with their flesh? I'm not sure I know the answer when so many looked so similar. I felt proud to have my messy cropped haircut: no one else came even close to having hair like mine. But despite my false sense of pride, I felt like a hypocrite. I know these stores are no more noble than the ones in the first mall. Most of these clothes and wares are also made by small children in third world countries. Still, I covet the wool-blend, finely stitched slacks at Banana Republic; I know they'll last years and years and they are so "classy," whatever that word means anymore. I love the bold colors and unique designs of Betsey Johnson's dresses. I love the sleek, so fun and functional items at the Mac store. Yes, in this place I feel chastised and dirty.

We are all for sale.

And I wonder about men and women, what is being played out at places like these, in communities like these. I wonder about my own complicity. And I sit and I read the gender-neutral cutefest's term paper "Beyond Bi-genderality" (look for it soon in feminist journals near you) and wonder how we can move beyond this masculine/male-feminine/female dichotomy that is enacted everyday, how we can resist this consumerism that we allow to define ourselves in a hundred little subtle ways. Look for my continued thoughts on her paper. I must away to work.

It's 2 o'clock in the morning.... do you know where sleep is? Cuz I don't. It's hot in my room. Elliott has finally quit trying to eat me and is passed out on the floor.

one happy thing I have neglected to mention about this weekend: Justin and I got pedicures on Friday. I had my toes painted blue. Of course. And no Justin is not gay. Nor, metrosexual. But we are going to go back for both a manicure and a pedicure in a few weeks. Whee! Bonding with Justin!

I'm really excited about going home in June. I need to calm down about it. I'm setting myself up for disappointment otherwise. Some Caleb wit, some fishing trips stiff drinks and home cooking, a mountain or two, my neice, people that make me happy....

I'm done. I promise.

Talked about the soul/body in Christian anthroplogy today. Good stuff. No matter how brilliant Aquinas was he was still a misogynist ass. Despite the institutionalized Chruch's ignorant emphasis on negative body talk, there is little in actual theology to support it. And if the soul is a nongendered and highly individual entity and only our physical body takes on a sexed gender..... hmmmmm.....???? I'm thinking about the implications of this on transgendered folk. I don't know what's already out there. I'd like to see work like this come from a real scholarly, Catholic or Orthodox background, rather than the fruity hoo-ha of liberal Christianity, but my suspicion is that only us fruity liberals will tackle this sort of stuff.

On a less theological note, I had a long conversastion with C. yesterday. Talking is always always always good and always hard and thought provoking. The two o'clock hour is reserved for Carrick thoughts and prayers. I'm envious of his visit to Seattle. Our old stomping ground: he's having coffee with my fantastic friend Airen at a fantastic coffee shop, he's gonna eat some of our favorite pizza, he's going to hear live music. Ah, the Hill. Nostalgia nostalgia nostalgia

Maybe there will be more posts later. I'm looking forward to a day of grocery shopping (making vegan pizza tonight....ah, nostalgia), hanging with Angela doing reading and laundry, having movie night with the crew in 202. It's a double feature of Big Lebowski and Chasing Amy. Whee!

I've been thinking a lot about boys lately. I don't get 'em. And it's not for lack of trying. I can't begin to understand what it must be like to be so easily visually stimulated. Is it merely societal conditioning? Is it hormonal? Why are males struck incompetent in the presence of a beautiful woman? Why is what turns them on and what they want seem to be different? Maybe those of you on T can shed some light on this as your chemistry alters. I've always thought that FTMs will make better men for having been women. Perhaps we all need a little trans in our lives to make us better humans.

On a similar theme.... why are we so taken by the surface? Why is it so easy to be fooled into thinking certain things are sexy and not others? A friend is recently thinking a lot about "Thrall", the sparkly/shiny that sucks us in. It's dangerous for our souls and for our relationships with one another.

The theologian in me wants to go off and get all anthropological (theological anthropology is rockin' my world). We are created for relationship and we can't seem to get it right. At all.