Category Archives: Musings

My crazy thoughts.

The daily barrage of insults.

Posted on January 20, 2012 by | 11 Comments

Update below.

Every day of my life — all day long — I have to ignore insults in order to partake in pop culture, general conversation, and/or intellectual pursuits.

If I am to enjoy the music on the radio, or the jokes in a movie, or a conversation among like-minded political animals, I have to close my ears and numb my senses on a regular, sometimes hourly basis. I have to pause and think: “Is that bad enough for me to have to not like this righteous beat anymore? Or can I carry on bobbing my head without being a traitor to myself, my daughter, my mother, my sister, my aunt, and about 80% of my friends?”

I know I write about this a lot, but it’s only because it makes me want to tear my hair out. Or move to a distant planet. It’s only because it really, really matters and very few people who aren’t women (and not a lot of them) seem to notice or, more to the point, care.

For instance:

Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ 11 Comments

Posted in Emily L. Hauser, Lady Bits, Musings, Personal Tales

Tagged , , ,

“Liberals,” “Conservatives,” and human nature.

Posted on January 18, 2012 by | 1 Comment

Occasionally I get to thinking. Cogitating, if you will.

And a thing about which I’ve thought quite a lot in recent years is what Americans mean when we use the words “Liberal” and “Conservative.”

For the record (and just in case you hadn’t noticed) I am the former (though I tend to use the word “Progressive”).

If I try to strip those two words of our daily politics, as well as of all the insults we embed within them, I would say that Liberals tend to be more driven by notions of mutual responsibility than do Conservatives, and Conservatives tend to be more driven by notions of individual responsibility than do Liberals. (Emphasis on the tend).

Thus there has long existed a notion of Conservatives as steely-eyed pragmatists, and Liberals as dewy-eyed idealists — you know: bleeding hearts. Hippies. Peace-and-love-and-possibly-overly-optimistic-notions-regarding-the-essential-nature-of-humanity.

But I would argue that, in fact, the opposite is true. At least with regard to the essential nature of humanity.

Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ 1 Comment

Posted in Emily L. Hauser, Musings, Political Shenanigans

Tagged , ,

Martin Luther King – not really all about me.

Posted on January 16, 2012 by | 1 Comment

Over the course of a few months in 2010, I periodically blogged about Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Strength to Love. Last MLK day, I returned to the project and wrote the following (which I have very slightly edited), in an effort to remember that he was a flesh-and-blood human who first and foremost served a flesh-and-blood community.  (The rest of the Strength to Love posts, each of which can be read independently, can be found here).

Chapter eleven – Our God is able.

Given my powerful tendency to look at the world through my It’s All About Me glasses, you will perhaps understand (though not, I hope, condone) why I was disappointed (again) upon reading this chapter.

I struggled with chapter nine so mightily that I gave up my MLK blogging for not-quite four months; I struggled with chapter ten so mightily that I then gave it up again, this time going four and a half months. And dear reader, I like chapter eleven least of all.

As a self-described “believing Jew and the wife of a deeply moral atheist,” there’s just nothing for me here. This is a chapter — a sermon — written by a member of the Christian clergy in order to reassure his Christian flock. And a very particular flock, at that:

Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ 1 Comment

Posted in Culture Critic, Emily L. Hauser, Musings, Read Me!, Respect

Tagged ,

Middle aged & still attempting to rock.

Posted on January 10, 2012 by | 14 Comments

An internet buddy expressed some surprise over my love of Sunday’s “Killing in the Name” cover, which reminded me that I’d written an entire piece for the Dallas Morning News about people being surprised by this side of me, which led me to look for it, which led me to remember that the DMN website is now so entirely changed that my old pieces are really irretrievable. So I decided: What the heck! I’ll re-key it (type it allll out again), and call that a post! And that’s what I did. BEHOLD. (Just please don’t hold me responsible for the headline).

Chris Cornell/Audioslave. God, they put on a good show. Holy jebus.

THIS 40-YEAR-OLD WOULD RATHER BE A ROCKER THAN BE IN ONE.

(c) Dallas Morning News; August 14, 2005

Here’s a list of concerts I’ve attended, or will attend, this summer: Oasis, Jet, Robert Plant, Cake, Green Day, U2. Earlier this year, I saw the Donnas, Franz Ferdinand, the Hives, the Von Bondies. I’d go to shows twice a week, if I could, but once you add baby-sitting costs to the price of tickets….

I’m 40.

To clarify: I’m 40, I have two kids (one in diapers), I carry a mortgage and a car loan, I worry about property tax increases, and more often than not, I’ve got a pacifier in my pocket.

At what point does it become pathetic to love rock n’ roll?

This is the question that’s dogged me most singularly since turning 40 last September (my husband, five years my junior, likes to remind me that I’m actually must closer to 41). When people ask me how I feel about having achieved middle age, I usually say the only thing that really bothers me is losing social relevance.

But what I mean is: At what point does it become pathetic to love rock n’ roll?

I am absolutely no less fanatical, passionate and obsessive about music than I was at 17. Indeed, as I’ve gotten older, my tastes have gotten louder, so that I never actually listen to James Taylor anymore, preferring the likes of Jet and Audioslave. And when I go to these concerts — at which most of the other 40-year-olds seem to be chaperoning preteens — I don’t just hum along! No, no, I apparently feel the need to lose all sense of propriety and dance, dance, dance my little heart away. I shudder to think what might happen the first time one of my children sees me.

All of this often comes as a surprise to people who know me professionally. Most of my writing is about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and it tends toward the earnest, not to say tortured. I think people see me more in the Tchaikovsky vein. Or — oh, I don’t know. Some tortured classical guy.

Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ 14 Comments

Posted in Emily L. Hauser, Musings, Now Hear This!, Personal Tales

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

“How to make love to a trans person.”

Posted on January 6, 2012 by | 3 Comments

I left the following as a comment in Ta-Nehisi Coates’s (near-) daily open thread today, and decided to make it into a post in its own right. There are so many ways to be human. 

Amanda Simpson, senior technical adviser in the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security, is the first known transgender person appointed to a position in the US government. She was appointed by President Obama a year ago this week.

In wandering about among some of my favorite blogs the other day, I found that my internet pal sara_l_r had linked to this lovely, lovely poem over at her place, Ends and Leavings, and I decided I wanted to share it, too:

How To Make Love to a Trans Person.

I know that we have a number of trans people in the community of commenters at Ta-Nehisi’s place, and I suspect there are more that I don’t know about, and I’ve recently been trying to come to grips with my sheer inability to grasp the reality of the lives lived by people who identify as trans.

I’ve long felt that you are who you tell me you are, and in whatever language you use, but there are places where it’s simply a greater challenge for my head to go to and hope to understand.

The fact of Dana International, an Israeli singer and trans woman, made a big difference for me, many years ago, but recently — because of the folks at Ta-Nehisi’s place and, like the rest of America, Chaz Bono — I’ve found myself realizing how far I had to come still. Reading about and watching interviews with Chaz helped (and I know some in the LGBTQ community have issues with him, not to mention women more generally having issue with what some see as his misogyny, but I’m working at a much, much more basic level here!), as did reading a wonderful, loving Boston Globe article about identical twins, one of whom is a boy and one of whom is a trans girl – and then the other day, this poem helped enormously.

Here’s a small piece of it:

Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ 3 Comments

Posted in Emily L. Hauser, LGBTQ Shenanigans, Musings, Read Me!

Tagged , , , , ,

Greenwald: A Bridge Too Far [Updated]

Posted on January 2, 2012 by | 124 Comments

[Update Below]

I’ve put off writing this post for days, and I still don’t have the words to express my disgust about the “rape analogy heard ’round  the Twitterverse.”  In case you’re not up to speed, long story short, I had a Twitter discussion with Marcy Wheeler about the NDAA; a Greenwald supporter quipped that if I saw Obama raping a nun on live TV, I would defend him for it; another supporter quipped that I would fantasize about playing the role of the raped nun; and Greenwald piled on. When asked to account for the clumsy rape metaphor, Greenwald doubled down, claiming that it wasn’t a metaphor, and that he actually believed that I and other Obama supporters would defend Obama if we were to see him raping a nun. Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ 124 Comments

Posted in Balloon Juice Cross-Posts, Musings, Our Pundits of Perpetual Disappointment, Personal Tales

Tagged , , ,

Geek is as geek does, con’t.

Posted on December 28, 2011 by | Leave a comment

Further to yesterday’s post, I am not, as I said, any kind of gamer — but I’m just a little bit in love with these Girl Gamers and the people who made the following video (also, PS: Now we know how to pronounce “pwn.” The more you know!):

Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Emily L. Hauser, Musings, Personal Tales

Tagged

Geek is as geek does.

Posted on December 27, 2011 by | 5 Comments

Available for purchase at ThinkGeek.com -- though, in my case, it really should be in the plural.

I’ve recently discovered an odd little thing about me:

I’m less a geek, than I am a geek of geek culture.

It’s true that I’ve hit a few of the geek high points all on my own: I’m a life-long fan of the original three Star Wars films, and have nothing but disdain for the latter three; I’ve been watching Trek since the original series was first in re-runs (even I was a little too young when it first hit the airwaves); I’ve been known to watch all three LOTR films on consecutive evenings (extended cuts!); and I recently become a bona-fide Browncoat (aka: stupid-big fan of Firefly). I even have genuine Dr. Horrible cred, having watched it online almost immediately upon its release. Moreover, I’m a certified egg-head, and do things like read history because I want to and get deeply into the minutiae of history that particularly grabs me. So yeah. On some levels, I really am a geek.

But on a lot of other levels, I’m a complete dilettante. I don’t game (online or with poly dice) and never have (unless you count that one game of Angry Birds & a few visits to the arcade in the 80s); I don’t watch Dr. Who; I still haven’t read the Hitchhiker’s Guide. I intend to remedy that last sooner rather than later — especially now that even the boy is quoting lines at me — but I have no interest in either of the former. I don’t have any idea who’s Marvel and who’s DC, I didn’t much enjoy the actual source material for the LOTR films (though I did finally force myself to finish reading them), and I have no intention of ever reading any George RR Martin (I already know too many unsavory spoilers – why walk into that?)

Continue reading →

TumblrShare

→ 5 Comments

Posted in Emily L. Hauser, Musings, Personal Tales

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Holiday PSA: When Your Holidays Are Not Happy

Posted on December 22, 2011 by | 24 Comments

It’s that time of year when families come together, gathering in love and laughter, joy and good will.  Loved ones gather around the twinkling tree, drinking eggnog and enjoying each other’s company – a fire blazing in the fireplace.

That’s how we grow up thinking Christmas* should be, regardless of how we actually experience it.  For those of you who experience this or something similar to it, who love the holidays and are excited about them, this post is not for you.  You can still read it, of course, but I am writing to those who dread the holidays and what they represent, who hate having to be with family, or who are alone for the holidays and would rather not be.  Hell, it’s even for people like me who choose to be alone for the holidays, prefer it that way, but still struggle with feelings of melancholy as Christmas approaches.

There is a myth – and it is a myth – that depression/suicide spikes around Christmas.  According to the link, the fact that people are surrounded by loved ones during the holidays is one reason it’s not true.  That’s fine and dandy for people who get to go home and who enjoy being with their families.  And, I can buy that there isn’t a dramatic spike of depression solely around Christmas, but I know that Seasonal Affect Disorder (SAD) hits many people at this general time of the year because of shortened days, less light, etc.**

(Click if you want more Debbie Downer)

TumblrShare

→ 24 Comments

Posted in asiangrrlMN, Musings, Personal Tales

Tagged , ,