throne speech day and getting used to the con-maj

Admittedly, I have turned my eye from national news since the election. It’s official: the Conservative majority has paralyzed me into political apathy. Hmph. Unfortunately I was beckoned to the National Post on Friday morning (it just had to be the NP on Throne Speech day, both of which I love to hate) as I waited for a friend sans easy reading material, and sure enough, I was reminded of why I have been in hiding.

It was journalist Terence Corcoran’s revival of the National Post’s 2010 pre-(federal)budget series: The Chopping Block that captured my gaze like a car accident. “The Post beings its year-long look at helping Ottawa find the cuts in its $120B budget: $1B spending cut? Not even close.” As Corcoran acknowledges, Harper and Flaherty would speed up the cogs of their propaganda machine Friday and Monday (okay, he didn’t ‘acknowledge’ the propaganda machine part), ‘reminding’ Canadians of the Conservative government’s “even-keeled and prudent” economic management and their ability to provide stable governance in the times of uncertainty that lie ahead.

Pre-election frustration bubbles quickly popped to surface: AHH! HOW DO THEY GET AWAY WITH THIS LIE OF A REPUTATION?!

Not looking forward to seeing where Tony Clement's make-shift team will find the upwards of 1.3% of government spending over the next several years. Cuts in transfers to the provinces and the erosion of health and wellness for our nation’s most vulnerable? Back to sports and arts news again as the budget is announced... Go Canucks! Argh.

loving + being a kid

It's a scorcher in the NCR! Between panting and running through sprinklers, I'm wrestling with a contract and alternating between three contrasting reads: Black Like Me (John Howard Griffin, 1961), Conversations with Rabbi Small (1981), and Female Masculinities (Judith Halberstam, 1999). The thematic cocktail of these, along with some deep emotionality in my personal life, has led me to a new set of musings about expression and love. Mostly, I'm sitting with a sense of wonder with regard to what we, as different people, are exposed to in life and love, by choice or circumstance (are these things even separate?)... and what this does to us.

I've been thinking about all sorts of effects on love (I wish I had my colleague Patty's romantic love expertise here) including childhood experiences with siblings and peers. I know there are lots of offshoots of Bowlby that I haven't read and I'd like to return to attachment theories one day. Along this old school stream of psychology, when I was working as an addictions counsellor, I read something on effect of sibling order on personality and behaviour. I was skeptical as I thought the theory was trying to mash functionalism with pop-psych to birth some knowledge for the addictions field, but upon scanning the descriptions under "eldest child," "middle," "youngest," my skeptical self was humbled by how well the list described the behaviours of my own siblings and me (minus the corresponding drug habits).

This came to mind a few mornings ago as I sat in a cafe window watching a dad try to wrangle his three young girls and grocery bags down the sidewalk to the car. The younger one was a toddler. She was throwing a temper tantrum and the dad was grabbing onto her arm insisting she calm down. The middle one had wandered down the sidewalk and was winding herself around a parking meter and singing to herself. The eldest (who was carrying a grocery bag) stood about 4 feet southwest of the screaming child and watched in silence how the dad dealt with her. When the toddler stopped asserting herself, the eldest grabbed her hand and they walked to the car together.

As my dad used to say when I swung way into social constructionism, "Amanda, just watch children play. Boys throw rocks up the slide, girls organize their dolls in a circle" (or something like that). Maybe some things are the way they are, in all of their crude essentialism. I'm reminded of a Tina Fey interview in which she was asked by a member of the Google audience about raising her daughter to feel empowered to cross the boundaries of typical womanhood the way she herself has done with comedy. She responded by describing her bewilderment with her daughter's obsession with Barbies (and made some joke about how she'd be in trouble if she had a son with a corresponding gun collection).

But the sibling order stuff shows how we are also shaped by our surroundings and relationships. Watching the eldest child supervise dad + sibling in the sidewalk tantrum (no doubt so she can recount to mom), I had a flash of glee as I remembered what that felt like. Memories of my brothers and I squabbling at Extra Foods, my mom pausing with the cart to hurriedly scan her list or price check as we swarmed around her, and all of us queuing up like angels at the Valley Fair Mall bakery counter for smiley face cookies rewarding our good behaviour (even though it was never good) rushed to mind.

Now I'm wondering how my eldest child syndrome affects how I love. Do I love like a big chicken unconditionally loves a spazzing chicken? Do I love like a student classroom monitor loves the kids who stay in their seats? I shudder at the thought. I might have to start a poll.

Racy Weekend

This morning I woke up to a gently throbbing temple and the sounds of cheering, live band and rain. Ottawa race weekend! Grabbed a coffee and a muffin and clapped for the athletes until my hands were puffy. Note: being on the sidelines of a marathon when you're hungover feels shameful, as does feeling the urge to complain that your hands are getting puffy. 

I have mixed feelings about whether or not I should ever attempt the marathon, but one thing is for sure; watching the race fills me with inspiration. At the risk of reproducing 'supercrip' narratives (a la Eli Clare), it moves me to see people of various physical and mental capacities giving all of their energy and celebrating the power of their bodies and minds. It's a big day!

Mush alert - as runners flashed smiles in thanks for our shouting, I felt the love of the human spirit rush all over us. I hope to carry this sentiment through to my reading of current events this week. Off to soccer in this summer storm to make some fitness magic of my own!

Frackin' vapid mayor beat out Clive Doucet and I'm still bitter.

This morning I arrived at my glebe cafe just in time to line up behind Mayor Jim Watson in his red windbreaker. 


For all of my social bounciness, quasi-celebrity local politicians and academics usually make me weak in the knees. I experienced momentary paralysis and almost peed my pants on the stairs in front of Sheila Copps, for example. But Jim Watson invited the most confident (read: defiant) eye contact I could muster. I did not feel even slightly inclined to impress him (read: flirt with him), even though this is my default behaviour around well-ish known men. Instead of smiling shyly or spilling my coffee on myself, I offered him a chair, and he sat across from me and asked me my thoughts on the Bank Street construction project, to which I responded bluntly, "I have the privilege of not being car dependent."


So then his assistant came and I sat perched on one hip with my best fake-focusing-on-my-to-do-list face while the two drank hot chocolate like school children. I eavesdropped so hard, I noticed I even closed my eyes at one point. If he weren't such an unbearable man, I would not take such pleasure in revealing his inanity:


JW: "I got into a tweet debate with a crazy socialist last night."


Assistant: "Well any crazy person can make comments online, it's not the status quo. It's not proportionate. Ridiculous."


JW: "Pff, yeah I know. I need some more hot chocolate."


My dislike intensified as I heard them scroll through the schedule for the day and strategize on how to do as little work as possible. Next time, he doesn't get my chair.

temporal musings: navel-gazing alert

Dated Wednesday, May 18th.


I'm reporting from Kensington Market on this drizzly Wednesday morning. Trying to make and race through a to-do list, mostly just to garner a small sense of health and productivity, I'm delayed by what I can only label emotional exhaustion. Tom Waits and biscotti in a jazzy cafe... I feel everything. The barista had such a warm smile, I wanted to hug her. The girl next to me was so friendly as she helped me move chairs and tables that I literally welled up with happy tears.


I think many of us would agree that we've been programmed to think of health and productivity as imbricated. Maybe there is some relationship, say, between self-actualizing and movement, but I'm talking about the more crude messages of neoliberal "responsible citizen" discourse. I'm sure critique of this kind has existed in some form at least since the dawn of capitalism, and I do intentionally resist tying my mental health to traditional notions of progress and productivity in the modernist sense, but here on this rainy Wednesday, I'm just desperately wishing for some passion or compulsion to get me to work: typical, modernist punch-your-time-card work. I acknowledge that I'm intensely privileged in this temporal sensation - I assume the majority of people on this planet are too busy trying to feed themselves and their children to dwell on "what is this grey area between leisure and labour" - but this recognition doesn't seem to help much.


As I'm already beginning to articulate the feeling of being lost (in this city, in this temporal space, in this nostalgia), I suppose I'm on my way out of it. For the last several weeks, I haven't been able to fully accept these wasteful days as necessary for "wellness" - I just feel lazy, guilty and altogether stressed out. I'm hoping that in putting these feelings into words, I'll ignite some motivation to work again, whatever that means in Ph.D. land.

lifting the cloud with my fem shovel

I suppose I've spent long enough under a rock since Black Monday (election night). It's time to come out of hiding.


The news of the Harper majority came as a shock to many of us, even though as activists, lefty professionals and scholars, we're all-too-familiar with the incredible force of the Conservative machine. What happened? Who is doing this to our country? What is going to happen to my rights? When will the foundations for the new prisons, infrastructure that will scar the Canadian landscape forever, be laid? What is going to happen to universities? In the days following the headlines, I felt numb and on the verge of tears, comforted only by friends who also confessed to feeling personally hurt and to crying into their cereal bowls on Tuesday morning.


This sunny Thursday morning, I bumped into our silver lining (Elizabeth May!) at the Bridgehead on Sparks and Metcalfe (the same Bhead, I should add, where I ran into Judith Jack Halberstam and Sheila Copps. WHY DO I EVER LEAVE THAT PLACE?!). She gracefully expressed her condolences and mutual grief and shock at the majority government and I felt a spark of love in my soul for the first time in weeks (thanks, Jeremy, for pushing me into her!!).


Following this pleasant run-in, I proceeded to the Hill with my homemade sign for the peaceful Pro-Choice Presence rally at anti-choice march ("for life"). Well, there went the love. Strong police presence, angry shouts and booing... In hindsight, it may not have been productive toward my rebuilding activist passion to attend this event (the kids and Knights of Columbus march by my window shouting "created to live"as I write this). To the east of the Hill with my "I love life, I love choice" sign, I stood with my friends and looked over a sea of children beautifully singing worship songs...


The sheer loveliness of the children's voices soaring into the sunlight was enough to move me to tears of nostalgia, but the joy and innocence of that beautiful youth choral sound was juxtaposed with old men holding professionally printed signs about butchering babies, giving men their right to fatherhood, etc. The kids held grotesque signs too, but I can hardly blame them. Afterall, I was on that side of the protest not long ago singing "Yes Lord, Si Senore" with all of my might.


It was triggering to remember a rough part of my childhood, but the toughest part of the day was how the two camps expressed hatred to one another. A line of police officers separated us. There were strollers on both sides, some women insisting their children represent the anti-choice movement, others arguing that their children are the results of choice. Honestly I think the major conflict starters were the old men on the anti-choice side who, upon seeing our pro-choice pro-condom signs, immediately shouted for their counterparts to stand in front of us. They successfully covered our frontline with a giant banner of the pope's face, so we moved east and watched from the sidelines.


I eventually left when I saw the Knights arranging a small cluster of women at the front of the march. The women wore big black signs, proclaiming "I regret my abortion" in bold yellow font. That did it. Shaming women for the brainwashing of children is where I draw the line.


My silver lining for this warm spring day: I find hope in strangers expressing their solidarity against the growing hard right. We're binding together in grief and celebration to resist these scary times...that is love. I'm also extremely proud to stand with activist Mélanie Jubinville-Stafford, who told the media that this day is about peace and explanation. She said that her social work background reminds her that anger is a healthy emotion, and with this in mind, she engages her opposition with kindness and respect. That is love.

a slam, slamming feminism in academia

I try to check out podcasts on rabble.ca as often as possible. Many carry youth activism / feminism tags... good collection of stuff.


So I came across a poetry slam by Shaunga Tagore (read by her sister, Proma Tagore), recorded at the Feminism FOR REAL (edited by the *amazing* activist, Jessica Yee) anthology launch at Rhizome Cafe in Vancouver this April 14th. The work is called "A Slam on Feminism in Academia" and it asks "why did you let me through the doors [of this ivory tower] in the first place if you were just going to turn around and force me out?" Why do we debate in high theory "while barely paid migrant workers prepare lunches for seminars, conferences, forums..."


Her points are fantastic. People with disabilities, those who survive sexual violence, people with familial historical ties to places filled with siege, indigenous students who are forced to use language that erase and colonize their own languages, those who want to learn alternatively through art, etc... Academia doesn't really want these folks. The ivory tower's ideal student doesn't need to be an activist because she's already well-read about it. And she can't talk about positionality without "referencing some article." She's white, straight, able-bodied and minded, and rich. She "luxuriously" enjoys sitting in a corner and reading 900 pages a week with her "fairtrade Starbucks coffee in hand and Lululemon trackpants on ass."


I think the author is brilliant and admirable. Fairly, she asks: your ideal student is not me(!) so why did you let me through these doors!? It's a great point. Minority students fill departmental quotas to collect and secure funding for the program, and then they are squashed by the rigidity of the system that was not made for them. This is horrible and it's about time somebody pointed it out so remarkably and artistically.


This said, parts of Shaunga's slam make me cringe, because to make her point, she describes my privilege. It's effective. I'M SITTING HERE IN YOGA TRACKPANTS WITH FAIRTRADE COFFEE RIGHT NOW. I think I'm FINALLY empathizing with some of my male friends who have been offended by my feminist positions in the past. I have always insisted that in pointing out social stratification, I am not making privileged men out to be the enemy.  I am merely drawing attention to hierarchies, and to do so, I depict privileged bodies and juxtapose these with minoritized ones. But here I sit, listening to the slam against feminism in academia (on repeat) which I want with all my soul to validate, feeling offended.


I'm sure I mostly feel offended because I'm forced to acknowledge my complicity in the rules of an institution that will ultimately serve to push me into an elite social status. If I'm being honest with myself, this is already happening as I gain access to professional and social functions that have strict gatekeeping mechanisms. It's hard, though, to fully embrace the critique because I often feel burdened by the acknowledgement that feminism in academia, even high theory, is itself minoritized by the academy and funding bodies. I'm sprinting on the hamster wheel system that is continually undoing the work I'm trying to do. It's mind-numbing, and is a perfect illustration of the (white...racist?) liberal feminist paradox.


But I think I'm also partly offended because to depict the graduate student donning lululemon pants and sipping lattes in all her glory is to erase the struggle of this. I hope I don't sound like I'm whining. Yes, I have the extreme privilege of being able to enjoy reading 900 pages per week, but this isn't all gravy. Sometimes I sit in tears because the writing makes me feel like an idiot, or the opposite: I realize that my mad love affair with theoretical writing serves to isolate me from the people I love. Further, I'm proud, after sifting through thousands of pages of dense writing per term, to cite and credit the authors I've read. Ironically, I'm resisting the urge to do this throughout this blogpost.


If anything, I think Shaunga's important slam will teach me to nuance my own harsh criticisms so that I don't erase the struggles and traumas of being human. I'm not tied to a history of colonial struggle, nor do I face the threat of my culture being wiped off the planet or the immediate threat of illness. Also, I pass as straight in every sense of the concept, so I get to parade my gender and sexuality in public all the time, and I don't even stop to think about the affect of my celebrated body and perceived orientation on my psyche. I am damn lucky for that, but... I can't help but follow this up by saying that the overwhelming guilt of privilege is unproductive.


This poetry slam was inspirational. I'm inspired to take my research on masculinities further into the trauma faced by men under hyper-masculinism. I'm also inspired to use kind words when installing my critiques into broader theoretical musings. I think this is the key to a united feminist movement, and key to academic reform.