If you've read Saturday and have some blogged thoughts, send me a link to them and I'll post it.
My own review will be up later today.
Karl: Saturday would ordinarily be Perowne's most contented day, but the main theme of Saturday is the ways in which events conspire against that contentment, starting with an omen in the early morning sky and drawing ever closer to Perowne as the day unfolds.
dgm: As he notes in a passage I dog-eared, "misery is more amenable to analysis: happiness is a harder nut to crack." And there you have my major complaint about most contemporary fiction and music. McEwan cracked the nut.
Zubon: I like a lot of things about Henry, which is good. Too much modern literature decides that the way to give a character depth is to make him horribly horribly flawed.
Amber: Despite how easy it would have been to contemptuously slant his portrayal of Henry and make him into some kind of materialistic bourgeois philistine, McEwan keeps every one of his characters human: fallible, but with comprehensible motivations.
Carina: It's refreshing to read a novel written from the point of view of a man who would never write a novel.
Friday, March 31, 2006
Amber on Saturday
The last time I read an Ian McEwan book, I found the ending excessively bleak. Saturday ends on a somewhat happier note, and was generally a more pleasant reading experience to boot.
Too many authors, if they were to base a novel around a day in the life of a particular person, would take the traditional advice to write what you know and make the protagonist an author. I am thoroughly sick of this unimaginative, self-obsessed wankage (amusing from a blogger, I know) and was thus thrilled to note that Henry, our hero, is a brain surgeon with little tolerance for the meandering stories that constitute most literature. This viewpoint was so refreshing that I was able to ignore the sneaky incorporation of writer-characters in the forms of Henry's daughter and father-in-law.
Likewise, I was pleased to see a character in a literary novel who understands the deep appeal of loving monogamy.
Despite how easy it would have been to contemptuously slant his portrayal of Henry and make him into some kind of materialistic bourgeois philistine, McEwan keeps every one of his characters human: fallible, but with comprehensible motivations. Even the thugs who bring chaos to Henry's otherwise pleasant and unexciting life are well-drawn, not least because Henry, being an intelligent man, tries to understand them.
The best fiction, unless we, like Henry, find it mostly useless, reveals something new about our fellow human beings. Saturday shows us people as real as those we see every day, and shows us more about them than we are likely to see. Sometimes books are better than life. This is one of those times.
Too many authors, if they were to base a novel around a day in the life of a particular person, would take the traditional advice to write what you know and make the protagonist an author. I am thoroughly sick of this unimaginative, self-obsessed wankage (amusing from a blogger, I know) and was thus thrilled to note that Henry, our hero, is a brain surgeon with little tolerance for the meandering stories that constitute most literature. This viewpoint was so refreshing that I was able to ignore the sneaky incorporation of writer-characters in the forms of Henry's daughter and father-in-law.
Likewise, I was pleased to see a character in a literary novel who understands the deep appeal of loving monogamy.
Who else could love him so knowingly, with such warmth and teasing humour, or accumulate so rich a past with him? In one lifetime it wouldn't be possible to find another woman with whom he can learn to be so free, whom he can please with such abandon and expertise.Too many books these days seem populated entirely with disconnected individuals who lack interpersonal bonds (and, in some cases, appreciation for the very concept of bonding). A family joined by love, not merely by DNA, is a glorious and complex system, and McEwan subtly and deftly shows us how having such a family affects nearly every aspect of Henry's day, and how nearly everything Henry does redounds to hearth and home.
Despite how easy it would have been to contemptuously slant his portrayal of Henry and make him into some kind of materialistic bourgeois philistine, McEwan keeps every one of his characters human: fallible, but with comprehensible motivations. Even the thugs who bring chaos to Henry's otherwise pleasant and unexciting life are well-drawn, not least because Henry, being an intelligent man, tries to understand them.
The best fiction, unless we, like Henry, find it mostly useless, reveals something new about our fellow human beings. Saturday shows us people as real as those we see every day, and shows us more about them than we are likely to see. Sometimes books are better than life. This is one of those times.
Thursday, March 30, 2006
No man's woman
These sorts of appeals really bother me.
If indeed that girl was raped, she is certainly some father's little girl, and she could be some brother's sister. If she was your sister, would you refuse to come forward with the truth to protect the "code" among your teammates? That would be a really poor choice. The fact that she isn't your sister is irrelevant to the moral implications.That's right; whether she's your sister is irrelevant. But who cares if the woman was someone else's daughter or sister? Her moral status as an individual does not depend on her relationship to another man. We don't live in some kind of tribal honor-based society where an offense against a daughter could be repaid by making restitution to her father. You do not get a free pass to rape people because they're not under male protection.
Tuesday, March 28, 2006
Why we fight
Feminism: still necessary at home and abroad.
Side note: When is this coming to the U.S. market? If it does, would insurance plans be more likely to cover it than existing pills, since it may act as a preventative for breast cancer?
Side note: When is this coming to the U.S. market? If it does, would insurance plans be more likely to cover it than existing pills, since it may act as a preventative for breast cancer?
Creating problems to solve
This is why I don't read fashion magazines. (This weekend I picked up an In Style, which you may have noticed immediately took over my brain.)
Fashion magazines teach readers to cultivate an aesthetic sense. What can one say about Star? Does it have any socially redeeming value?
A lot of the traditional women's magazines are too much work. They are full of how-to service information, and that can feel like homework. It's like how to ace a job interview, organize your desk, make a good impression on a first date, make sure he will call you back, paint your kitchen, not to look needy.
But didn't you yourself promote that how-to-do-everything-better trend at Glamour?
It can make you feel inadequate!
Monday, March 27, 2006
Of interest to Rose alumni
A jury awarded $100 million in punitive damages to the family of Gregory de Villers in order to prevent Kristen Rossum from profitably selling her story to the media. (h/t Overlawyered)
Saturday, March 25, 2006
No woman is a fashion island.
My new celebrity inspiration may be Zooey Deschanel. Seriously, how gorgeous is this dress? Or this one? These two are beautiful also.
I was toying with the idea of following what looks good on Maggie Gyllenhall, but her frequent appearances on Go Fug Yourself point out that she doesn't look great that often.
I was toying with the idea of following what looks good on Maggie Gyllenhall, but her frequent appearances on Go Fug Yourself point out that she doesn't look great that often.
Friday, March 24, 2006
Were you aware of it?
- March submissions for the PTN Book Club are due in one week. I've finished the book already, and it's better than our previous selections put together.
- Ian McEwan, author of Saturday, also wrote the screenplay for creepy Macaulay Culkin vehicle The Good Son.
- Ian McEwan, author of Saturday, also wrote the screenplay for creepy Macaulay Culkin vehicle The Good Son.
You can have my laptop when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
Like Daniel Solove, I was puzzled why the AP thought one law professor banning laptops in her class was newsworthy. Janet Halley's been doing that for years at HLS, although the policy is announced in the course description so laptop-dependent students can beware. Since this is a 1L class, the students probably had no choice about being in Entman's section, which seems unfair.
Warning to professors: if your class is boring, students will avoid eye contact by doodling.
Warning to professors: if your class is boring, students will avoid eye contact by doodling.
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Drop that hero and get with a zero!
Read this uncharacteristically lucid post from Reihan on punching above your weight romantically and why beta males with inflated egos may destroy monogamy.
Also in the relationship arena, the feminist blogosphere has been going ape about this post about "false advertising" in LTRs. Most of the reaction stems from the post's focus on weight, one of the third rails of blog discourse, but there's something to the concept, more generally. What changes in a partner would be dealbreakers for you: Religious conversions? Full-body tattooing? Hair loss? Hair gain (werewolf and non-werewolf associated)? Etc.
UPDATE: in the comments, dgm gets to the heart of the matter:
UPDATE II: L, the wife of the guy I flippantly described as a clueless jerk, says we were too hard on her hubby. She knows him better than I do, so I stand corrected, although the general point holds.
Also in the relationship arena, the feminist blogosphere has been going ape about this post about "false advertising" in LTRs. Most of the reaction stems from the post's focus on weight, one of the third rails of blog discourse, but there's something to the concept, more generally. What changes in a partner would be dealbreakers for you: Religious conversions? Full-body tattooing? Hair loss? Hair gain (werewolf and non-werewolf associated)? Etc.
UPDATE: in the comments, dgm gets to the heart of the matter:
I don't think the question is whether he (or men) "should" lose their desire, but whether they actually do and how much a spouse cares about the other one's reasons for a lack of sexual intimacy (and it goes equally for women, btw.) can the marriage be saved? not so long as one person is indifferent to and morally outraged by the other's reasons for lack of intimacy.Compromising to accommodate the preferences of your partner is not necessarily some evil manifestation of control or the triumph of the patriarchy. Sometimes it's just common sense. Altering your appearance in a manner that you know will have a serious adverse effect on your partner's sexual desire and telling the other person to "get over it, because I'm just being myself, man, and if you can't handle that then you don't really love ME" is adolescent. Part of being in a relationship is considering how your decisions affect the other person. Whether that person deserves your consideration (i.e. is not a clueless jerk) is a separate issue.
UPDATE II: L, the wife of the guy I flippantly described as a clueless jerk, says we were too hard on her hubby. She knows him better than I do, so I stand corrected, although the general point holds.
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
What's funny?
Donna asks, "What makes you laugh?" A non-exhaustive list:
- Fresh Pepper
- Wonder Showzen
- Doctor stories
- Dogs in elk
- Blackadder
- Monkey v. Robot
- Catchy public service announcements
- Reenactments of famous films with fuzzy creatures
- Beekeeper impersonations
- David Foster Wallace. David Sedaris. Augusten Burroughs.
- Music videos combining children's entertainment and naughty lyrics (at Geoffrey's suggestion)
Word to the Wise
Someday you may be offered the opportunity to order a one pound cheeseburger. Do not take it.
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
Tom Stoppard should stick to plays.
His political philosophy leaves much to be desired. In the course of attacking the right of free speech, he manages to drop in this howler:
The interests of the group is the only game in town.and to produce this stunning passage, which would be equally true if the abolition of slavery or female autonomy were substituted for free speech:
A "human right" is, by definition, timeless. It cannot adhere to some societies and not others, at some times and not at other times. But the whole parcel of liberties into which free expression fits has a history. . . . To say, therefore, that the right of free speech was always a human right which in unenlightened societies was suspended from the year dot until our enlightened times is surely beyond even our capacity for condescension.(h/t)
It's what's for dinner.
Argentines have been urged by their president to eat less beef. The strategy seems doomed to fail, though:
"What are people going to do, buy chicken?" said the skeptical 65-year-old butcher, whose shop sits across the aisle from a poultry vendor. "Chicken's no good -- it's full of water. If you eat a piece of chicken for dinner, you'll be hungry a half-hour later."Funny, I thought that was Chinese food.
Sunday, March 19, 2006
Movie Review: V for Vendetta
The new film version of V for Vendetta takes a coherent, if complex, set of narratives, and excises most of the sense but none of the style. It's a very sleekly done movie, and like many of the recent comic book adaptations borrows freely from the panels of the original work in staging scenes.
Aside from the ham-handed insertion of a conspiracy theory involving pharmaceutical companies, which disrupted the internal timeline and altered the villains' motivations,* there were some tweaks here and there that shifted one of the important themes of the graphic novel entirely out of the picture. In doing so, it betrayed the underlying work in a serious way. (Spoilers for both the graphic novel and film follow.)
In the novel, Evey is an impoverished prostitute with a day job at a munitions plant, not a middle class television employee late for a date with one of the network's stars. She has a sexual relationship with a thug after she is abandoned by V. By whitewashing Evey's character, the film makes her easier for us to relate to, but it also whitewashes the sins of the society in which she lives, and it keeps her pure for her "true love," V, who never consummates the attraction. Apparently we can be expected to identify with a terrorist girl, but not a terrorist girl who has sex. By transforming Gordon's character from rough trade to chaste homosexual, all opportunity for Evey to fall from grace is removed.
Other subplots from the comics dealing with the downward slide of a Party member's widow and the Evita-like aspirations of one of the leadership were neatly (and perhaps necessarily) excised. But that means that the seedy underbelly of Norsefire England, in which women can only rise to power or remain respectable through their men, was obliterated. Instead we have the virginal Evey, pure and deadly as Joan of Arc. Neutering Evey and deleting the other female characters meant refusing to deal with fascism's impact on women. Moore's original novel was sensitive to this issue. I cannot understand why the Wachowskis were not.
* If Norsefire only came to power after the post-St.Mary's virus riots, how did they have the authority to put homosexuals and non-whites in the camps where the virus was engineered months before?
UPDATE: PG agrees that the changes made to emphasize the Evey/V relationship were negative.
Aside from the ham-handed insertion of a conspiracy theory involving pharmaceutical companies, which disrupted the internal timeline and altered the villains' motivations,* there were some tweaks here and there that shifted one of the important themes of the graphic novel entirely out of the picture. In doing so, it betrayed the underlying work in a serious way. (Spoilers for both the graphic novel and film follow.)
In the novel, Evey is an impoverished prostitute with a day job at a munitions plant, not a middle class television employee late for a date with one of the network's stars. She has a sexual relationship with a thug after she is abandoned by V. By whitewashing Evey's character, the film makes her easier for us to relate to, but it also whitewashes the sins of the society in which she lives, and it keeps her pure for her "true love," V, who never consummates the attraction. Apparently we can be expected to identify with a terrorist girl, but not a terrorist girl who has sex. By transforming Gordon's character from rough trade to chaste homosexual, all opportunity for Evey to fall from grace is removed.
Other subplots from the comics dealing with the downward slide of a Party member's widow and the Evita-like aspirations of one of the leadership were neatly (and perhaps necessarily) excised. But that means that the seedy underbelly of Norsefire England, in which women can only rise to power or remain respectable through their men, was obliterated. Instead we have the virginal Evey, pure and deadly as Joan of Arc. Neutering Evey and deleting the other female characters meant refusing to deal with fascism's impact on women. Moore's original novel was sensitive to this issue. I cannot understand why the Wachowskis were not.
* If Norsefire only came to power after the post-St.Mary's virus riots, how did they have the authority to put homosexuals and non-whites in the camps where the virus was engineered months before?
UPDATE: PG agrees that the changes made to emphasize the Evey/V relationship were negative.
Friday, March 17, 2006
Who's down with OED? Not Supreme Court clerks, apparently.
Does Justice Stevens hire time travelers from A.D. 1750? If not, what's the deal with the use of "incredulous" in this email when any inhabitant of our century would use the more conventional "incredible"?
From the OED:
1. Unbelieving; not ready to believe; sceptical. Formerly used of religious unbelief, but no longer applicable in that sense. Const. of, rarely to.
b. Of action, etc.: Indicating or prompted by incredulity.
2. Not to be believed; = INCREDIBLE. Obs. (Last usage noted in date chart: 1750)
b. as adv. = INCREDIBLY. Obs.
(h/t to emailer Liam, who knew I'd have the chutzpah to call out someone for something this nit-picky.)
From the OED:
1. Unbelieving; not ready to believe; sceptical. Formerly used of religious unbelief, but no longer applicable in that sense. Const. of, rarely to.
b. Of action, etc.: Indicating or prompted by incredulity.
2. Not to be believed; = INCREDIBLE. Obs. (Last usage noted in date chart: 1750)
b. as adv. = INCREDIBLY. Obs.
(h/t to emailer Liam, who knew I'd have the chutzpah to call out someone for something this nit-picky.)
Take your Grey Poupon, my friend
ashok asks:
I think the biggest change in my view of the world came when I went to law school. CMC is a very middle-class college; it was founded as a result of the GI Bill, and it has a generous financial aid policy. This meant that nearly all of my classmates were kids much like those I went to high school with; comfortable, many more so than me, but not rich. I never really understood the concept of class warfare, or even class resentment.
You know how some people have life-changing experiences when they join the Peace Corps or TFA and see "how the other half lives" and have their hearts embiggened by being exposed to people who struggle with poverty? I had the opposite. Moving to Cambridge meant I was suddenly surrounded by people with IIIs after their names whose first name was not Jim-Bob. People whose families owned vacation homes and went skiing. People who went to law school not because of some interest in politics or law or desire to practice, but because they sold their dot-com for a few cool million and needed someplace to settle down and regroup for a while, or you know, when you're a liberal arts graduate with no job prospects and parents who write blank checks, a $120K degree that might be useful seems like an okay idea. That lost and found ad in the student newspaper about the gold Gucci sunglasses was not, as I first thought, a joke.
There are rich people, I realized. This is the wealthiest one percent we're always hearing about. People who regular wear clothing and accessories that cost more than my old car (admittedly, not hard to do). These people are mostly annoying. And it's contagious. After three years surrounded by this miasma of wealth, fundamentally stupid things like spending $1000+ on a purse seem reasonable. Dropping hundreds of bucks at a charity auction for a pie made by a plagiarist sounds like an amusing lark with an altruistic twist, not a sick joke.
I may not be gung-ho about Clerksville, but at least I am out of the hothouse that is the old money northeast.
How did your undergraduate education shape your view of the world, and how did that change in law school?I didn't realize when I applied to my alma mater that it was one of the more conservative liberal arts colleges in the country. The original plan, which was to study international relations, fell by the wayside and I ended up a straight-up econ major. This jibed well with my still-extant world view, which emphasizes reason, choice, and individual preferences.
I think the biggest change in my view of the world came when I went to law school. CMC is a very middle-class college; it was founded as a result of the GI Bill, and it has a generous financial aid policy. This meant that nearly all of my classmates were kids much like those I went to high school with; comfortable, many more so than me, but not rich. I never really understood the concept of class warfare, or even class resentment.
You know how some people have life-changing experiences when they join the Peace Corps or TFA and see "how the other half lives" and have their hearts embiggened by being exposed to people who struggle with poverty? I had the opposite. Moving to Cambridge meant I was suddenly surrounded by people with IIIs after their names whose first name was not Jim-Bob. People whose families owned vacation homes and went skiing. People who went to law school not because of some interest in politics or law or desire to practice, but because they sold their dot-com for a few cool million and needed someplace to settle down and regroup for a while, or you know, when you're a liberal arts graduate with no job prospects and parents who write blank checks, a $120K degree that might be useful seems like an okay idea. That lost and found ad in the student newspaper about the gold Gucci sunglasses was not, as I first thought, a joke.
There are rich people, I realized. This is the wealthiest one percent we're always hearing about. People who regular wear clothing and accessories that cost more than my old car (admittedly, not hard to do). These people are mostly annoying. And it's contagious. After three years surrounded by this miasma of wealth, fundamentally stupid things like spending $1000+ on a purse seem reasonable. Dropping hundreds of bucks at a charity auction for a pie made by a plagiarist sounds like an amusing lark with an altruistic twist, not a sick joke.
I may not be gung-ho about Clerksville, but at least I am out of the hothouse that is the old money northeast.
Thursday, March 16, 2006
More Law School Advice
CM asks:
I didn't make the law review. In retrospect, I should been more focused when I took the competition, although it's probable that this wouldn't have made a difference. Despite the occasional obvious omissions and AA, the law review seemed to do a good job of selecting the best and brightest. It may come as a shock to learn that you are not among the best or brightest in your class. Contextual mediocrity is a bitch.
Instead, I spent a lot of time on a specialty journal. My thoughts on that are here. Many of those thoughts are bitter and snarky, mostly because the average specialty journal staff member puts in very little work. This is good if you are one of those staff members, since you can get some marginally useful resume fodder in exchange for a small time commitment, but it is bad if you are in charge of those staff members. I basically burned out before our second issue even hit the presses. Being EIC of a journal was very helpful, resume-wise, but I might not have needed that help if I had spent the hours consumed by worrying about galleys, author contracts, MIA editors, and obscure Bluebook errors on classes.
If you take the law review competition, be serious. Don't move to a new city the day before you start. Don't start a new job and try to do it at night. Some people do this and still make it. You will probably feel better about the result if you clear that week of other commitments.
If you don't make law review, and you don't have a burning desire to work with legal scholarship in a field for which there is a specialty journal, just forego the journal experience entirely and focus on your grades. Many people who are not on law review get excellent clerkships and jobs. Those people almost always have really amazing grades. I did hear some anecdotal evidence of some people's GPAs declining after they made law review due to the time it demands, which essentially equals a part-time job. Being on the editorial board might compensate for less than stellar grades. Being a generic HLR person might not.
People say grades don't matter if you go to a top school. Those people are either full of crap or they already have a job lined up. Law review is great. Journals are nice. But unless you're willing to backstab your way to a top slot and are obsessed with legal scholarship, you're better off studying for exams and taking some clinicals you enjoy. Shoot for magna.
Journals versus law review, in general? Are editorial positions on journals worth it? Does it really matter on your resume whether you're the X Editor (unless maybe you're the EIC) or an article editor?(Warning: some of this applies to HLS specifically. All of it is my jaded, biased opinion.)
I didn't make the law review. In retrospect, I should been more focused when I took the competition, although it's probable that this wouldn't have made a difference. Despite the occasional obvious omissions and AA, the law review seemed to do a good job of selecting the best and brightest. It may come as a shock to learn that you are not among the best or brightest in your class. Contextual mediocrity is a bitch.
Instead, I spent a lot of time on a specialty journal. My thoughts on that are here. Many of those thoughts are bitter and snarky, mostly because the average specialty journal staff member puts in very little work. This is good if you are one of those staff members, since you can get some marginally useful resume fodder in exchange for a small time commitment, but it is bad if you are in charge of those staff members. I basically burned out before our second issue even hit the presses. Being EIC of a journal was very helpful, resume-wise, but I might not have needed that help if I had spent the hours consumed by worrying about galleys, author contracts, MIA editors, and obscure Bluebook errors on classes.
If you take the law review competition, be serious. Don't move to a new city the day before you start. Don't start a new job and try to do it at night. Some people do this and still make it. You will probably feel better about the result if you clear that week of other commitments.
If you don't make law review, and you don't have a burning desire to work with legal scholarship in a field for which there is a specialty journal, just forego the journal experience entirely and focus on your grades. Many people who are not on law review get excellent clerkships and jobs. Those people almost always have really amazing grades. I did hear some anecdotal evidence of some people's GPAs declining after they made law review due to the time it demands, which essentially equals a part-time job. Being on the editorial board might compensate for less than stellar grades. Being a generic HLR person might not.
People say grades don't matter if you go to a top school. Those people are either full of crap or they already have a job lined up. Law review is great. Journals are nice. But unless you're willing to backstab your way to a top slot and are obsessed with legal scholarship, you're better off studying for exams and taking some clinicals you enjoy. Shoot for magna.
AskMe
(No, not that one.)
I still don't have a solid justice's worth of profiles, so no Supreme Court clerk stalking this week. I'm bereft of good blogging topics in general, thanks to my continued slog through Moby-Dick, work, travel, and an undifferentiated sense of malaise. What should I blog on? Put your suggestions or questions for me to answer in the comments.
I still don't have a solid justice's worth of profiles, so no Supreme Court clerk stalking this week. I'm bereft of good blogging topics in general, thanks to my continued slog through Moby-Dick, work, travel, and an undifferentiated sense of malaise. What should I blog on? Put your suggestions or questions for me to answer in the comments.
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Flom!
Sometimes what we really need during stressful times is an outsider's perspective.
Relatedly, I will be in D.C. this weekend for a job interview. Any old friends who wish to have tearful reunions should contact me.
Relatedly, I will be in D.C. this weekend for a job interview. Any old friends who wish to have tearful reunions should contact me.
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
"Taking opportunities" from less qualified people is not unjust.
Randy Cohen, author of the New York Times's "The Ethicist," all too often gives the wrong answer to reasonable questions. This week, though, he gives the right answer to an astonishingly stupid question:
Those who disagree with me get to have the dumb but poor nurses stick them for blood.
At 55, after a satisfying career as an English teacher, I am considering nursing as a second career. The local community college offers programs leading to the R.N. degree, but these are oversubscribed. As a Yale magna with several prerequisites already satisfied, I could be a strong candidate. My family does not need the extra income. Should I worry about taking opportunity from someone who might use it to earn a living?The alleged ethical dilemma here is ridiculous in the extreme. (Where was all this hair-tearing liberal guilt about taking up scarce slots in competitive programs when I was in law school? At least this person plans to use the degree.) If you would be a superior nurse, go forth and change bedpans (although whether or not a Yale magna who probably last took chemistry in 1970 would be a better nurse than someone younger is debatable, especially since nursing can be a physically demanding job). I love how it's implied that someone's financial need might make them more worthy of a slot even if they would be a worse nurse.
Those who disagree with me get to have the dumb but poor nurses stick them for blood.
I said, "Do you speak-a my language?"
I feel more alienated when surrounded by Americans talking about sports than I do when I'm in a foreign country.
Monday, March 13, 2006
Rape and Incest
Interesting stats on rape and abortion:
- The national rape-related pregnancy rate is 5.0% per rape among victims of reproductive age.
- Among adult women, an estimated 32,101 pregnancies result from rape each year.
- Among the cases of rape-related pregnancy, the majority occurred among adolescents and resulted from assault by a known, often related perpetrator.
- Only 11.7% of these victims received immediate medical attention after the assault, and 47.1% received no medical attention related to the rape.
- A total 32.4% of these victims did not discover they were pregnant until they had already entered the second trimester; 32.2% opted to keep the infant whereas 50% underwent abortion and 5.9% placed the infant for adoption; an additional 11.8% had spontaneous abortion.
Sunday, March 12, 2006
True Confessions
I have had a crush on Thomas Jefferson ever since I saw 1776 in the seventh grade.
I save the 2005 nickels because they have a hot Jefferson (plus "Liberty") on them.
I save the 2005 nickels because they have a hot Jefferson (plus "Liberty") on them.
With friends like you who needs friends?
I've been mulling lately over what we expect of our friends. When your friend is attacked by others but in the wrong, do you close ranks and defend him, even if that means disingenuously arguing in favor of his mistaken position, or try to support him without compromising your own ideas of what's right? What do you expect your friends to do for you? Would you rather have your friends admit to you when they agree with third parties that you are in the wrong or keep their mouths shut? (Assume that this is done in the absence of said third parties and you do not attack your friend's position publicly.)
Saturday, March 11, 2006
Decline and Fall
Nearly a year and a half after I vociferously argued in favor of Christina over Britney with my journal staff, the comparison just gets funnier and funnier.
Oh, barf.
Another blogger asks for my thoughts on this NY Times article about contemporary girls' fiction. I don't know what to say, really: these crosses between Sweet Valley High and American Psycho are even more disturbing when one considers that the audience for YA fiction is typically a few years younger than the characters. This means that the girls reading these persecution and consumption manuals are probably middle schoolers and are thus at their peak stages of meanness and impressionability. I met enough of the grown-up versions of these girls in Cambridge to be thoroughly exhausted with them, from their thousand-dollar outfits to their tiny designer bags to their equally tiny designer noses; I'm sure they could have more acutely honed their superficiality had they been weaned on books like these.
Any girl mature enough to read this trash is mature enough to read real adult fiction. Some Edith Wharton might be nice, or some Fitzgerald.
Any girl mature enough to read this trash is mature enough to read real adult fiction. Some Edith Wharton might be nice, or some Fitzgerald.
SLOBO
Slobodan Milosevic is dead. I went to Belgrade in 2004 and found it to be a remarkably cosmopolitan city full of relatively friendly people and tasty cheese. The only potentially off notes were displays in the history museum, which focused on battles with non-Serbs to the exclusion of all else, and the wall-to-wall SLOBO posters in the subway exits. I wasn't able to tell if the sentiment they expressed was broadly held or if it was more of fringe position, a la "Free Mumia" in the U.S. There didn't seem to be a diplomatic way to ask anyone.
Friday, March 10, 2006
The root problem is me.
Because I am a masochist, I've been reading the Crunchy Con Blog since its inception. It keeps my blood pumping. There's always hilariously wrong stuff, like this email claiming that libertarians think moral considerations should have no impact on our economic life.
Imagine my reaction to this passage, quoted approvingly in a recent post on the family wage:
For the quick and dirty version of Crunchy Conservatism, check out the parody blog.
(Previously)
Imagine my reaction to this passage, quoted approvingly in a recent post on the family wage:
It will be absolutely necessary to see to it that female labor is kept from the labor market, something that will have to be attained by prudent and clear-sighted measures.Clearly I should be in the kitchen baking you an organic cherry pie with fruit I bought at a co-op from warmhearted Christian farmers instead of clerking!
For the quick and dirty version of Crunchy Conservatism, check out the parody blog.
(Previously)
Random lines
my words are the garment of what I shall never be
Like the tucked sleeve of a one-armed boy
Like the tucked sleeve of a one-armed boy
Thursday, March 09, 2006
Things Cats Do Not Like
1. Being brushed (Snape tries to eat the brush; Lily just hops down.)
2. Taking pills
3. Having a bath
4. Getting their nails trimmed and the remaining nails adorned with SuperGlued rubber tips (but said pedicures are so cute, and remarkably efficacious at preventing couch damage)
2. Taking pills
3. Having a bath
4. Getting their nails trimmed and the remaining nails adorned with SuperGlued rubber tips (but said pedicures are so cute, and remarkably efficacious at preventing couch damage)
Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Discount Book Club Selections
Via Karl, I note that three of the PTN Book Club's selections are also part of The Morning News's Tournament of Books. You can get a 30% discount on Saturday or Anansi Boys through the tournament sponsor, Powell's.
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
Shocker: Blockbuster Also Scum Liars
Some of you may recall that I was having problems with Netflix and decided to try Blockbuster Online. I do like the one free in-store rental per week, but even with Saturday shipping, the non-Clerksville distribution center makes Blockbuster discs arrive no faster than throttled Netflix ones.
All was relatively okay, though, until I came back from a weekend trip and noticed that Blockbuster had received a disc seven days ago but hadn't sent the next one in my queue, despite its being labeled "Available Now." This seemed a little weird, so I shot customer service an email.
The response: BBO will ship the next available disc in your queue only if it will reach you in an estimated 2-3 days. This means that if you want obscure movies like Burden of Dreams and the only available copies are in a far-off city that would take longer than that to ship from, they will just never send the disc. The only break would appear to be if someone in a slightly closer city rented the disc and then returned it to their local distribution center, allowing the flick to hopscotch across the nation until it came within the 2-3 day range. (This is confirmed by other BBO subscribers here.)
Their suggested solution was to add 40 movies to my queue, so they could dig less desirable discs out of the back and at least send me something. Since I hadn't cancelled my Netflix subscription and moved over my 200 movie queue, my BBO queue didn't have enough discs in it to mask the effect of their policy. My suggestion to them is to stop being dirty scum liars. If there's an algorithm based on my location and the location of the discs in my queue that determines whether or not those discs will be shipped to me, why not have the result of that algorithm indicated in the availability column instead of taunting me with discs that are "Available Now" in Hawaii? Jerks.
All was relatively okay, though, until I came back from a weekend trip and noticed that Blockbuster had received a disc seven days ago but hadn't sent the next one in my queue, despite its being labeled "Available Now." This seemed a little weird, so I shot customer service an email.
The response: BBO will ship the next available disc in your queue only if it will reach you in an estimated 2-3 days. This means that if you want obscure movies like Burden of Dreams and the only available copies are in a far-off city that would take longer than that to ship from, they will just never send the disc. The only break would appear to be if someone in a slightly closer city rented the disc and then returned it to their local distribution center, allowing the flick to hopscotch across the nation until it came within the 2-3 day range. (This is confirmed by other BBO subscribers here.)
Their suggested solution was to add 40 movies to my queue, so they could dig less desirable discs out of the back and at least send me something. Since I hadn't cancelled my Netflix subscription and moved over my 200 movie queue, my BBO queue didn't have enough discs in it to mask the effect of their policy. My suggestion to them is to stop being dirty scum liars. If there's an algorithm based on my location and the location of the discs in my queue that determines whether or not those discs will be shipped to me, why not have the result of that algorithm indicated in the availability column instead of taunting me with discs that are "Available Now" in Hawaii? Jerks.
A Juicy Footnote
In the grand tradition of Judge Samuel Kent, Judge Clark of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court smacks down a motion for incomprehensibility.
HOWTO: Be a feisty young journalist
DON'T: invent social outings with the subjects of your news feature.
DO: insert "fictional composites" in lieu of actual research or interviews.
(Okay, Kalin is an op-ed writer and public school teacher, not a journalist, but the parallel was too amusing to let go. Those Harvard kids: so wacky!)
DO: insert "fictional composites" in lieu of actual research or interviews.
(Okay, Kalin is an op-ed writer and public school teacher, not a journalist, but the parallel was too amusing to let go. Those Harvard kids: so wacky!)
Monday, March 06, 2006
Happy Belated Birthday
While I was mostly MIA over the weekend, this blog turned two. Happy birthday, Blog Formerly Known as Class Maledictorian.
Every day I write the book
Apparently you can turn your blog into a book with Blurb. Other people have gone the non-Blurb route, but there's only so much demand for fake stories about Biglaw, so any future volumes in that sub-genre may have to be self-published.
I could have used this when I was reading 50,000 word fanfics. Even I have trouble staring at the screen for that long.
I could have used this when I was reading 50,000 word fanfics. Even I have trouble staring at the screen for that long.
Saturday, March 04, 2006
Easy Targets
Can vegans eat chalk? The answer seems to be yes. Apparently, they also can eat chocolate (despite the use of child slave labor on African cocoa plantations) but many refuse honey (because that involves exploiting the bees, dontcha know).
Friday, March 03, 2006
PTN Book Club Continues
Thanks to those who participated in the February PTN Book Club. Our March selection is Saturday, by Ian McEwan. I hope that we like it better than the previous months' books.
Pinning Down the Clerks
An email correspondent confirms that Adam Conrad (Georgia '05/Sentelle '05-'06) will be clerking for Justice Thomas in OT 2006. The clerk list has been updated.
Know me better than I know myself
I mentioned to a friend last night that I had been underwhelmed by Battlestar Galactica and quit watching after the first few discs.
"I bet I know exactly when you started to lose interest. The part just after most of humanity is destroyed, when we zoom in on a couple and Adama says, 'They better start having babies.'"
"Not true, although I don't understand why they can't just float around in space until they die of old age. Why should the people who are still alive rearrange their own lives for the sake of people who aren't even born?"
"See, this is what I mean. The show is uninteresting to you because you don't find the central conflict compelling. You have no species preservation instinct."
"And here I thought it was just that the doctor was really annoying."
"I bet I know exactly when you started to lose interest. The part just after most of humanity is destroyed, when we zoom in on a couple and Adama says, 'They better start having babies.'"
"Not true, although I don't understand why they can't just float around in space until they die of old age. Why should the people who are still alive rearrange their own lives for the sake of people who aren't even born?"
"See, this is what I mean. The show is uninteresting to you because you don't find the central conflict compelling. You have no species preservation instinct."
"And here I thought it was just that the doctor was really annoying."
Thursday, March 02, 2006
Little Known Facts
When Anna Nicole first met her gazillionaire, she was an A-cup. The district court's opinion inexplicably left out this fact and asserted that she had to work the less lucrative day shift as a dancer because she was "big boned."
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
Crash and Burn
Much as I hate to agree with the Douthat about anything, I must concur: Crash is a terrible movie. Nice takedowns can be read here and here.
Bits & pieces
I'm still collecting information for the Supreme Court clerk profiles, but in the meantime, here are some links:
Southern California taken over by bears. They apparently enjoy swimming in backyard pools.
Radley Balko sums up some of the reasons I've been appalled by the Crunchy Con movement.
Harvard is doomed. Dooooomed!
Apropos our earlier discussion, artistic nudity is blocked by some filtering software. There is, of course, a protest movement.
Southern California taken over by bears. They apparently enjoy swimming in backyard pools.
Radley Balko sums up some of the reasons I've been appalled by the Crunchy Con movement.
Harvard is doomed. Dooooomed!
Apropos our earlier discussion, artistic nudity is blocked by some filtering software. There is, of course, a protest movement.
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