Great article about Jackson Katz, who educates men about “gender issues” that, he argues, should not be considered as such:
“As a culture, Americans first must take the step in acknowledging that violence against women is not a women’s issue, but a men’s issue,” Katz said.
. . . Katz points out a pattern that has evolved regarding how the media uses passive voice and sentences when reporting gender violence. Using a board in the front of the room, Katz helped make his point by providing the audience with a concrete exercise to illustrate the power of passive voice (see below).
John beat Mary. (active)
Mary was beaten by John. (passive)
Mary was beaten. (passive)
Mary was battered. (passive)
Mary is a battered woman. (active)
“John has left the conversation long ago, while Mary evolves into the active victim,” Katz said. “This evolution of victim-blaming is very pervasive in our society, because this is how our whole power structure is set up. We start asking why Mary put herself into a position to be beaten by John.” “If we really want to work on prevention, we need to start asking questions about John, not Mary,” Katz said. “We won’t get anything done until we start treating these issues as men’s issues and shift the paradigm at the cultural level.”
(via Feministing)
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On the other hand, sometimes blaming the victim is hilarious and satisfying (a NYC man was acquitted for physically confronting a grunter in his Equinox spinning class):
“I don’t know if there’s going to be an uprising, but the short-term message is sometimes you can get away with assaulting somebody who’s annoying,” he said.
Indeed, some of the annoyed sat on the jury.
(via tmn)
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How to win the New Yorker’s caption contest:
You are not trying to submit the funniest caption; you are trying to win The New Yorker’s caption contest.
Funny side note – not long ago, I actually met a New Yorker cartoonist (friend of a friend, who came to one of our improv shows), and what were the first words out of my mouth upon discovering his occupation?
“No kidding! I enter that caption contest every week!”
As soon as I said it, I realized: boy howdy, I bet actual cartoonists freaking hate that contest. And sure enough: “Well, that’s great,” he said. “I mean, I freaking hate that contest, but good luck to you.” (He didn’t say it in a jerky way.)
I really should have known better, because one of my pet peeves is that, when what you primarily do in life (or what you aspire to do) is creative, people who find it out will rush to explain to you how they actually do that thing, too. If you’re an actor, everybody who ever asks you what you do will be anxious to explain to you how they’re really an actor, too. If you’re a writer, you’ll be forever hearing about how your partner in conversation is really a writer, too. And I imagine that interior designers and chefs are constantly hearing about how everybody they meet is just brilliant at rearranging the furniture and cooking.
Now granted, most CPAs who declare, upon meeting an aspiring actor, that they used to act themselves in college are really every bit as much actors as whatever perpetually-not-cast “actor” they’re talking to, but my fascination with this conversational faux pas has more to do with why the CPA thinks the “actor” they’re talking to will somehow be gratified to hear that the CPA can do everything the “actor” they’ve just met can do and more, but has moved beyond it now and makes money instead. THIS IS NOT POLITE, PEOPLE!
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Also, everyone’s fat and stupid.
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