Wednesday links

Pasadena is a madhouse today with the Rose Bowl game ("the game of the millenium") kicking off tonight at 5:00PM just a mile or so from home.  Yes, we're going.  I'll be in full Trojan regalia, my UCLA degrees notwithstanding.   Among other things, love conquers grad school allegiances.

To begin with, a couple of quick links:

Issue 6 of the Carnival of the Feminists is up today at Reappropriate.  Many good links to be found there.

A troubling story about Afro-Colombians and the drug wars.   Racial prejudice is alive and well in Colombia, and the most vulnerable targets of narco-traffickers, guerilla forces, and government troops are  indigenous groups and blacks.  According to the article, of all the world's nations, only Sudan today has more internally displaced people than Colombia.  As many of my readers know, my wife is of Afro-Colombian heritage; we've gone down to South America twice in recent years to spend time with her family in a remote and troubled region.  After much pressure from the Congressional Black Caucus, a tiny portion of US aid to Colombia is being directed to meet the needs of internally displaced Afro-Colombians -- but that portion pales in comparison to the massive amount of military aid being sent down.  Then again, my wife's family (whose exact location I won't disclose for obvious reasons) are ardent supporters of the hard-line, pro-American administration of President Alvaro Uribe, as are most folks in their small and impoverished community.

Jill has a long and powerful follow-up to yesterday's post about beauty, women bloggers, and trolls.  She kindly links to my post on the subject.

Also on the subject of looks, female bloggers, and sexuality, read this excellent offering from Barb Howe: Books, their Covers, and the Consequences.  She manages to combine both feminist analysis with writing about Colombia, so the need to link is overwhelming!

Andrea has a long and interesting post On Chivalry, with some points I'd like to respond to soon.

Comments

[alexander]

A couple of thoughts here:

If you ask why there is a backlash against feminism, it is precisely what these articles promote: the politicalization of every last act of everyday life. If a man can not compliment a woman without "oppressing" her, then we are in some sort of Stalinist society.

Simultanesouly, if all it takes to "oppress" women is complimenting one, then perhaps fundamentalists ought to stop putting women in burkhas and simply tell them that they look good today. That will send women running home in tears!

It is just very difficult for me take all this stuff about "sisterhood is strong" when women are declaring themselvews to be so weak-kneed that they can not take a compliment.

[CaptDMO]

"Andrea has a long and interesting post On Chivalry, with some points I'd like to respond to soon."

It would probably benifit all concerned if there were a distinction made between the all encompasing "Chivalry", and the subset of it's "rules" that only pertain to the behavior of men toward woman.

It may be nice to see a passing nod to Judith Martin or Lynne Truss as
modern arbitors concerning manners, civility, courtesy, respect, acknowledgement,and the value of various tacitly agreed and accepted social expections.

Neither Ms. Rubenstein, nor many of the posters on that thread, show knowlege of the full circle, or even why, that the "Chivalry is demeaning to woman" meme has taken amongst young ladies since the sixties.