i'm confused

so who's this guy going after?

adult men who have sex with underage girls?
or the prom king and queen who get it on under the bleachers? huh? i don't get what this guy's prosecution is supposed to stop.

and...let's say he's successful in prosecuting teenagers for having sex. what's next? hm. i can totally see some nutbag going just one step further and saying premarital sex, no matter your age, should be illegal.

wanna bet?

Trial Opens in Challenge to Law Over Teenage Sex - New York Times

sad day in munchkin land

craptastic. alito was confirmed.
what to look forward to: an out of control executive branch and a country that swerves a little bit closer to theocracy.
let's all say a collective goodbye to our uterus.

come on, God, where's that fiery meteor i've been waiting for?!?

and sad. coretta scott king died last night.

well, that was quick

i'm bored.
i'm still awake, my knees are a little achy from yoga (hope i didn't tear my acl) and am watching 'man from snowy river.'

love this movie but i'm effing bored. just a month into the new year and already i'm getting a little restless.

and you know what happens when i'm bored? nothing good.

all you needed to know about pregnancy

N C H S - Publications and Information Products - Fertility, Family Planning, and Reproductive Health of U.S. Women: Data from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth

it's not the most exciting piece of writing, but ever since i started working at National Non Profit, i've been digging studies, research papers and stats.

but in light of recent discussions about abortion and choice, let's get a good look at the whole picture: who's having babies, why and when.

2 things that stand out to me:
in 2002, 14% of births to women/girls between the age 14-44 were unwanted at time of conception (which leads me to wonder how accessible contraception was or how wanted the sex was - which leads me to the second thing...)

'younger age at first sexual intercourse was associated with higher incidence of nonvoluntary first intercourse' (in other words, 20% of women who had sex before age 15 were sexually assaulted)

the other stats are fascinating, too (the numbers about poverty, education level and use of contraceptives are telling). why bring these up now?

i like numbers.

hear, hear: no hillary for 2008

I Will Not Support Hillary Clinton for President

molly ivins' essay is *exactly* what i think about the next election. while i wouldn't mind a woman running in the race, i'll marry and have 10 babies before i give one more dollar to the dnc and hillary.

i think it's time for people of color and women in the party to stand up and say 'we're leaving your big tent because it's bullshit and you haven't listened to us in years.' without us, they lose. (and we've lived through two terms of BushCo. so i think we can survive another idiot republican president if we had to.)

where to go if not to the dems? hmm. not the GOP. there's gotta be somewhere else.

matisyahu

who's he? he's this guy.

he's hasidic and his live show at stubb's rocks. he's coming to chicago in march and i'm so so so there.

i don't know how to describe it. yeah, it's reggae but it's reggae about (i can't put it any other way) the old testament. it's apples and oranges to compare him to a christian artist (and i haven't listened to christian music since amy grant and russ taff crossed over - yuck) but it reminds me of listening to my parents' ken medema and keith green records when i was a kid.

i listened to 'king without a crown' in virgin and it was like my insides boiled.

his music feels like gospel.

how cool is this?

On Engine 22, It's Women Who Answer the Bell - New York Times

i think it's cool.

Blog for Choice: It's About Responsibility

I tried once before to outline why I'm so pro-choice, but I didn't like it. I was too wishy washy. I was too concious of the fact my dad reads this space sometimes and that, by advocating for choice because it matters to me personally, my stance marks a complete break with my fundamentalist upbringing. I was also highly conscious that making a personal argument of it, I might as well have put on a snappy little cami with a big scarlet F on it for fornicatrix.

Oh, well. Too late for that now. No more sqeamishness. I'm coming out:

1. I believe in the separation of church and state: whatever your political opinions on abortion, birth control or choice, most likely it’s colored by your faith (or even the absence thereof.) In other words being for/against abortion usually comes down to a religious argument. Our thoughts about zygotes, conception, what the egg thinks/feels, what it’s for, what women’s bodies are for – these are all faith-based arguments. But establishing civic authority over a woman's body based on religious orthodoxy is antithetical to the idea of church/state separation. Like it or not, we live in a secular country. And in this particular secular context, church and state are supposed to live in two different neighborhoods.

(And, no – I don’t believe that America was founded to be a Christian nation; if you do, then you have a wickity whack knowledge of history, dude.)

2. I believe that reproductive freedom is about more than abortion: most discussions among regular people (not policy nerds) begin and end at abortion. (It’s like most conversations about sex ed beginning and ending at abstinence or handing out condoms.) But imagine if your first choice didn’t have to be about abortion. Just as important to reproductive choice, if not more so, are issues around equal access to all methods of birth control, insurance coverage for contraception, comprehensive sex education for young people, information about sexual health and careful family planning. Wouldn’t it be nice if politicians and religious groups weren’t actually forcing someone to play the abortion end game, and let women and girls have access to what they’ll need so they won’t get pregnant?
:
3. I believe I shouldn’t be punished for having sex by being forced to give birth When conversations about choice or rights or women’s bodies crop up, there's always that smart-ass who thinks she’s scoring a philosophical or rhetorical point by sneering, “Well, you shouldn’t have had sex if you didn’t want the responsibility blah blah sneer sneer snit snit.”

Well, no shit. But it’s utterly beside the point. Better watch out - not only is your misogyny showing, you run the risk of toppling beneath the weight of your halo. Our biology automatically dictates that women assume most of the responsibility/consequences of sex. Any slip in vigilance impacts our lives immediately. It’s why the Christian Right’s recent moves against contraception must stop. If you take away my access to birth control, you take away my ability to be responsible for myself. That’s a heavy and ever present responsibility; to me, advocating for choice is ‘personal responsibility’ personified. And we carry that responsibility – why does Alito and his ilk think such responsibility should rest elsewhere?

The separation of religious and civic authority is at the heart of this fight and it’s the most important to me. It’s not that I don’t care what the bible says or what moral squeamishness other people might have; but, ultimately, your exegesis or your thoughts on your morality have nothing to do with whether a woman who’s not you should have the right to make decisions about what happens to her uterus and ovaries.

Her uterus.
Her ovaries.
Her faith.
Her moral agency.
Her responsibility.
Hers.

at National Non Profit, i've got four projects in the works this week so posting is going to be rather light - as it has been since the new year.

i don't know; since i've embraced my workaholic identity, i anticipate other things to sort of dip in and out of view.
bear with me.

i'm Making An Effort.

if you want a glimpse into my upbringing, check out this movie.

roomie and i rented it sunday and we were pleasantly surprised. not only was it better than the freaky movie about the rapture i saw back when i was twelve, it wasn't bad.

but, boy, did it put me through a few flashbacks about growing up in church: the loyal assistant pastor overlooked for promotion, the younger pastor protege who's way too ambitious for comfort, the senior pastor struggling to leave a legacy, the angry/supportive pastor's wife, the conflicted pastor's son who ran from the church but keeps coming back to it. yikes - it's totally my adolescence!

(um...and idris elba is h.o.t.)

every time i hear gospel, i realize how much i miss it. i miss singing it. i miss hearing it. i miss how i felt when i sang it - like nothing existed except me and God. that everything about my faith is true*, you know? too bad the Gray Dame doesn't have a kickass gospel lay choir. talk about a way to reach out to the community.

*[not false, but true as in 'sound.']

am i a heretic?

apparently, i am a Chalcedon compliant. i have no idea what that is, but good to know i'm not a heretic. my dad would be relieved.

from the rev gal pals here.

blog for choice

january 22 is the day a group of pro-choice bloggers are blogging for choice. it's also the anniversary of roe v. wade.

needless to say, anticipate a jeremiad. (and as soon as i can figure out how to put the button on my sidebar, i will!)

from a phone conversation with my sister the other night:

ding: i dumped b-.
sis: what, this is the 8th time?
ding: second. first was three years ago. this time, it's sticking.
sis: good for you.
ding: yeah. you know, the older i get the more i realize i'm turning into mom. i will swallow my feelings and bitterness and then resent the hell out of you for not knowing you're the cause. it's disturbing. i'm a workaholic like dad and a silent seether like mom.
sis: perfect combination for a heart attack.

so, since i don't want to have a heart attack, i'll come back to blogging over the weekend, when i've had some time to rest and imagine a social life that is apparently barren.

so.
i'm in the process of dumping the guy that i've been seeing on/off for the past 6 months. (it should be over in about 24 hours.) we've actually done this before. dumped each other. three years ago and it didn't end well. there was name calling and a cold cold silence that i studiously maintained for three years. why i decided to give him a second chance, i don't know. boredom, loneliness, impatience.

he is the first casualty of my new year's resolution: Make an Effort. sensing that we were really bad for each other i made an effort to be honest. i made an effort to share the feelings that i'd been swallowing for the past 6 months. i made an effort to respect him the way i hadn't respected him before. so i'm dumping him.

he and i were supposed to see each other over the christmas holiday to spend a few days together. but it never happened, for some reason. every plan we made fell through and then i got it: this isn't supposed to work. i suppose i should have called him then to tell him that, instead of waiting for now, but better late than never. that was before i was Making an Effort.

i can't help thinking about the premarital sex thread earlier this year (almost a year ago!) where you all talked about the spiritual model of intimacy. yeah, he and i didn't have that, so i'm not too broken up about losing this relationship. but i do feel bad about our mutual dishonesty; every time we were together we lied to each other - that this is what we wanted, that we were good for the other.

better to be honestly alone than a liar.

shut up, pat robertson: part 100

Robertson Suggests Stroke Is Divine Rebuke - New York Times

i want to be pat robertson.
i want to dress up in my robe, stand outside of my apartment and blather insanity to the worldwide media. i just want to be able to say anything, no matter how crazy, and then get it repeated everywhere, even insignificant blogs like this.

i want to be able to have a straight line into the mind of God, too. that would be neat. God and i could have lots of conversations about geopolitical current events. then, i could dress up in my robe again, go outside and tell you all about it.

that wouldn't be crazy at all.

block party: i got nothin'

the little baby jesus has just been born and now i have to think of something to write about for lent. can't we let the baby jesus hang out a little bit before we get all breathless for him to die?

i don't get lent. i mean, i 'get' it, but i'm so bad with it. i'm generally bad with the whole denial idea. (denial in the sense of 'doing without.') i grew up 'without'. i've already done that. not to say i'm a jabba the hut glutton, but i like my emollients; i do enjoy getting a manicure and having my eyebrows waxed by a detail-oriented asian woman. i miss going out to dinner every week. i sigh with longing when i see people throwing back a few cocktails in the middle of the week with abandon. i like indulgence! indulge me! pet me!

so what the frack am i supposed to say about lent and asceticism??

have you seen 'brokeback' yet?

this made me chuckle.
and i'm only posting it because there's nothing else really going on except cleaning my room.

i hate cleaning my room. hate it.

(how are y'all?)

just doing it: a resolution

this year, there's only one: *make an effort.*

i was a little lazy last year (except about work). i let all my relationships get a little sidetracked, i kind of slumped on my spritual butt. i coasted, frankly. but this year will be different. i will Make an Effort.

a broad resolution like this one is handy in practically any situation: walking to work, talking to boys, working on a project, going to church, sitting through a com'tee meeting. just imagine how much more useful we'd be if we all just Made an Effort.

rather than make a copious list of every single one of my failings, which will ultimately depress and anger me, this catch-all resolution will spur me to virtuous heights across the board, don't you think? don't you?

(cough)

my faves of 2005

over on his space, hugo listed a few of his favorite 2005 posts.

it seems almost silly, since he has scads more readers than i, but here's a list of my favorite posts this year:

the day i became a christian (feb 24)
letter to my father (feb 15)
the hardest easiest choice to make (mar 24)
'because i said so, young lady!' (mar 18 - the one about sex. tee hee.)
the 'women in ministry' posts (jun 4 & 6)
'amen' & snob (nov 10 & 17)
when the Other speaks (dec 8)

happy new year, people!