Chief Plugger Gary Brookins (probably) has better things to do than troll Google looking for unknown bloggers who insult his comic

Hey friends! Look at how unemployed I am! As you can see, I explored all the new blog templates, etc. I am at the library where I looked at academic calls for papers for a little while and now I am going to make fun of Pluggers because it is air-conditioned here and not at my apartment:

While I think this is a common impulse, we can all agree that it is a terrible, terrible idea. But whatevs, Pluggers are all going to die soon anyway.

It is no surprise to me that Pluggers enjoy two of the worst comics ever, since, you know, they read Pluggers and then submit shit to it.

Hipsters are apparently Pluggers now.

Speaking of unibrows, how did anyone ever consider this sexy? I know it's been said before, but seriously, I just watched that movie for the first time in its entirety and it is so, so gay.

My father-in-law is a Plugger.

Girls and Giftedness: A Personal Narrative AKA I am a smart lady and prefer the company of other smart ladies, so what?

To you, smart sarcastic lady friends! Making life worth living since (at least) 1994.

 

Via Jezebel, I finally made myself check out this story that's been floating around the webernets about how some people are alarmed that there are more girls in New York City schools' gifted programs these days. As in, more girls than boys. Like 12% more, according to Sharon Otterman's NYT piece. I mean, maybe it's because I went to liberal arts college where the lady population was pushing 60% or maybe because I'm a man-hating feminist, but I can't really bring myself to care. Oh no! Girls succeeding! Must be something wrong! Because, I mean, wasn't it like, not that many decades ago that these gifted programs were probably dominated by boys--if they existed at all? And don't they admit that before they put the current testing in place, gender equality required that different (easier) standards be applied to boys?* I know there are issues with standardized testing being used to measure any sort of real-life intelligence, particularly with children who haven't even started kindergarten, sure. I also really resist the idea that little girls are somehow innately more advanced verbally and better at sitting quietly, though the statistics do APPEAR to show this to be the case.** Whatever the reason, though, more girls are testing into these programs.

Maybe one day I'll have a son and care more, but I can't say that some smart little boys having to hang out with a majority of girls doesn't really sound all that detrimental to me. But see, that's what I don't get about all this Christina Hoff Sommers nonsense about wars "against" boys. I also don't really believe that teaching methods really have changed that much since the pre-feminist era. I think classroom teachers have always valued kids who sit still, pay attention, have good verbal communication skills, can work well with others, etc. The fact that girls are now surpassing boys academically in the early years probably has far more to do with not being told how stupid girls are all the time than with any radical change in approach by teachers.  Yes, I do think it is problematic that boys are more likely to be diagnosed with behavioral and/or learning disorders, to not finish school, etc. There really should be no measurable gender difference when it comes to these things, and I'm not denying that these issues deserve attention and solutions. But not at the expense of girls.

Because guess what? I was one of those well-behaved, advanced-reading little girls and not only did our school district's gifted program help make easy, easy elementary school bearable, it also put me into contact with lots of other awesome, smart, weird little girls--some of whom I'm still friends with today. That's where I learned that female friendships beyond the fourth grade could be about more than playground boyfriend dramas and more about making up crazy stuff together. Sure, there were boys at EXCEL (a once-weekly pull-out program for third through sixth-graders) but there were always at least a few more girls in each class. For the most part, the boys were pretty socially awkward. I don't remember ever having a crush on anybody from EXCEL, though I had plenty on boys from my regular school. By the later years, fifth and sixth grade, we mostly just ignored them. I started to build up a group of girl friends who were AWESOME. We spent our recesses enacting commercials for ridiculous fake products or dressing up in wigs and costumes and holding meetings of the "Grandmas' Club." Or during class, when we were all probably high off of all the rubber cement we used to put together or own newspapers, we made up elaborate stories about how I was dating Albert Einstein or we'd (mostly) good-naturedly make fun of our one friend who was still wearing patterned leggings in sixth grade. In some ways, we were just the most socially adept kids there, so we gravitated towards one another. But at an age (pubescent, I suppose) when girls at school and on the soccer team and even at church were getting meaner and meaner to each other, we found in one another a place where we could just be silly and too smart for our own good and being at the top of the EXCEL social ladder (not that there was much of one) meant that nobody would be making fun of us. (Though we may have made fun of some of them behind their backs. There were a lot of WEIRD kids, there, people.)

At the height of our EXCEL group's awesomeness, I was rejected by my former best friends back at my regular school. I had other friends, don't get me wrong, but it still hurt. I started hanging out with other nerdy smart kids from my own school in the library during recess, avoiding all the interpersonal dramz of the other kids and playing Scrabble and helping decorate the seasonal bulletin boards. Though I did morph into a big bitch during seventh grade like I'd been infected by a virus on my thirteenth birthday, I always stuck with the nerdy kids. By eighth grade, I'd embraced an unabashedly weird and nerdy persona--wearing my parents' old clothes from the basement, putting tootbrushes in my hair for decoration and pretending with my one friend that we were aliens from another planet with X-Files character nicknames. (I believe I was "Chupacabra.") Anyway, I acquired guy friends along the way (a number of whom eventually came out), though most of them didn't stick. I didn't really date until college, but in some ways I didn't really mind. Sure, I wanted a boyfriend and had crushes, etc. But I also developed a core group of wacky, smart, hilarious girl friends whose company was better than anybody else's I knew.

This is all to say that while it is unfortunate that there may be boys falling through the academic cracks, there's not actually anything wrong with there being more girls in a gifted program. Learning to develop strong female friendships that were far more focused on fun than on boys in a low-pressure social environment like EXCEL was for me (as I remember it, anyway--Julia and others may beg to differ) completely integral to my eventual feminist awakening. I long knew that I preferred the company of ladies, especially a certain type of quirky, smart lady, but it wasn't until I became a feminist that I realized a big reason we were friends was not just because of our devastatingly awesome levels of sarcasm, but because we were all girls who knew what it felt like to be the smartest person in the room, to resent other girls who sacrificed being interesting for being attractive, because we were all little proto-feminists and we didn't even know it. I've lived in a few different places in my life, and I always feel most comfortable once I've established a network of awesome lady friends. Ones who I can be relaxed around, mock movies with, and compete to be the funniest, not the sexiest. A girl-heavy gifted program experience was an early lesson that girls didn't have to all be the same, and we certainly didn't have to be, you know, "that girl."


*OMG, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION. BTW, Jarzen has feelings about "special rights" that shall be conveyed in video form very soon. As in, as soon as I get around to editing it.

**Obviously, I know girls mature faster by the time puberty hits, but I can't help but wonder that perhaps this apparent disparity of studiousness between genders at ages 4-6 could be caused by parents and caregivers encouraging certain behaviors. If a boy roughhouses and a girl wants to read a book, those activities are praised or at least tolerated. The other way around, adults start getting nervous and give off signals that the behavior is perhaps gender-inappropriate, even if they don't explicitly say so. This may turn what could be a small difference in general gender-based temperament (still skeptical on this one, but then again, I don't have kids which apparently disqualifies me from having opinions about parenting or children or the cultural representations thereof) into a very real gap by the time they start school.

I Predict Pluggers

Early in 2007, when George W. Bush's ratings hovered in the high 20-percents, I took it upon myself to equate those few patriotic holdouts with freakish denizens of my favorite terrible newspaper comic. With pencil and paper. At work: Sadly, a few months ago, I discovered that my parody of Pluggers was right on the human/animal/hybrid monstrous creature nose: I hate when sarcasm turns out to be not sarcasm because the real world is actually that ridiculous.

Slightly drunk ramblings: Can you be both a narcissist and have tragically low self-esteem?

I have chosen to discuss this with myself on my blog. I realize that a lot of shit I have posted, especially since coming to grad school, happens during drunkenness. That isn't so much because I drink that much more. I've always been a lush. Since I stopped being Mormon, like 4 years ago (when did I get so old?), anyway. It's just when I can justify not reading for class or nuzzling with that adorably bearded man I call my boyfriend, I'm usually drunk. Sometimes I'm drunk and do all these things at once. I am the best student ever, by the way. BTWs. It is interesting, if you actually sacrificed your soul and listened to the BYU podcast where I extemporated to the little sister about blogging, that one of the things I desire as a (somewhat negligent) blogger is a community. I like the idea of people rallying around things they like a lot. I also really believe in the idea of a cult of personality. Here, I will list people whose cult I have pretty much joined (sorry, Mormon Jesus, your cult didn't allow booze): 1. Conan O'Brien. BTW, congrats on the promotion. Jay Leno = not real funny. But what I love about Conan (in the 12:30 slot, anyway) is the fact that he is obviously really, really smart. He went to fucking Harvard and was the editor of the Lampoon his, like .2nd year. He is nerdy (loves Abe Lincoln), gangly, adorable, self-depricating, and amazing. His wife and kids are super-lucky. I have said since I was about 14, when I got really obsessed with Late Night, that if ever I were to be famous, that the first show I would go on would be Conan's. One day. When I write my widely popular-but-also-academic text that reveals revolutionary layers of meaning in American culture. Totes going to happen. 2. Amy Sedaris for pretty obvious comedic and lady-related reasons. Also, her bro David. What a crazy family to have grown up in. 3. Stephen Colbert. Duh. 4. Sarah Vowell. Smart. Nerdy. Awesome. Hilarious. Into history and friends with Conan. We should probs be best friends. What I'm saying is, that one of my amorphous goals for this blog and what I ultimately hope to achieve when I become a nerdy professor is to build a cult of personality. I may not give you the best impression right off the bat (I'm either shy or drunk), but I like to think that the people who like me for me are worth keeping around. And as much as I denigrate myself in my own mind and hold up the art of self-deprecation as one of the most important pieces of postmodern likability, I want people to like me. But because they think I'm awesome in the same way that I think I might maybe possibly be awesome and the same ways I think other people are awesome and try to hang out with them. And that is all. Personality. Cult. Doesn't sound so bad, eh?

Death, denial, other words that start with d: Sarcasm as an Emotional Shield, Part 2

Part one here.

Back from a blogging hiatus, to the relief of all, Twisty Faster of I Blame the Patriarchy has recently descended from the mountains to share morsels of her radical feminist blame-age with us starving little people. Now, I don't always agree with Twisty (I'm not sure my patriarchy-blaming skills are advanced enough), but her writing is always incredibly witty and awesome. But aaannnyway, Twisty's father died a while back, and her account of the whole funeral business is, well, hilarious. On the funeral home:

You wouldn’t believe this joint. It was like the set designers from Twin Peaks and Napoleon Dynamite had fused with Elvis Presley’s interior decorator and been reborn as Liberace’s angst-ridden evil twin, who then suffered a psychotic break, and bought up the world’s supply of harvest gold flocked wallpaper, brass upholstery tacks, and fake oak paneling, and ate it all with fava beans and a nice Chianti, and then puked it up all over the living room from Sartre’s No Exit.

OMG. Twisty goes on to tell us how she almost died laughing after retrieving her father's urn from a touched-by-an-angel type spotlight display. (In Irish accent: "I'm an angel sent from God, and you can only see this light shining on me when I say those magic words. Also, I may strangle this dove at any moment. P.S. Skunkhair is the best angel mentor evah!") Anyway, this outburst of inappropriate laughter reminded me of my immediate family's inability to act with proper decorum the summer two of my grandparents died. But you know what, that's how we deal. We gather together in the foyer and make jokes instead of crying and hugging. When we pulled into the church parking lot at my grandpa's funeral and the hearse was there, my mom said, "Dad's here!" Because she is crazy and because that's what we do. Like when my oldest brother broke his head trying to jump bikes in his culdesac (at age 24, mind you), and once we knew he wasn't going to die, his roommate, my mom, other brother, and I made jokes about things we could do to trick him when he woke up in the hospital. His girlfriend was crying. It didn't work out between them.

Making the jokies is such a good way to fend off the pain. Because you know what, I don't want anyone to see me that way, I like to save the tears for private depression time. And as long as you can still laugh, you can convince yourself that everything's okay. Often it is not okay, but denial is a very effective tool. However, let me tell you a little story about denial: eventually you do have to deal. It always catches up with you: Grandma's still gone, your relationship is ending, you do hate your job, those pants have never looked good on you, etc. Of course, people who are not emotionally retarded realize this. Not that I know anyone like that. Anyway, what I'm saying is, is that sarcasm is a good way to stave off real emotions while in public or until you're ready to deal with them. Luckily, nothing bad ever happens to me, so I don't really need to use sarcasm in this way. Haha.

I'm not really sure how I have friends sometimes: OR Sarcasm as an Emotional Shield, Part 1

SYLLABICATION: a·loof
ADJECTIVE: Distant physically or emotionally; reserved and remote.

Is it any wonder she's totally my new hero?

I've gotten that one. Also, "snobby." Something must be working. Besides the fact that a shield of aloofness can protect one from many (though never all) of the friendly characters/sexual predators one runs into while riding public transportation, it also functions to keep me from making an ass of myself. Or so I like to believe. (The aloofness does tend to fall away after a couple drinks. But I suppose that's also kind of the point.) By "ass" I mean someone who reveals their true desires, lets people get emotionally close to them, and can consequently be hurt by those they choose to trust. You may say, Lauren, without emotional intimacy, isn't your life a lonely, empty shell of selfishness? Depends on what you mean by "empty." I manage to fill mine with plenty of alcohol and television.

Now, don't get me wrong, I can certainly enjoy the company and emotional support of others. A select few (who make up probably 93% of this blog's readership), anyway. But appearing aloof allows me to take my time in choosing friends.* Because once I decide to trust somebody a little bit to like me the way I like them, we will still probably never talk about our feelings (soberly). Unless something particularly shitty is going on with me, my main approach to emotional relationships is "deflect all pain inwardly with sarcasm until something really bothers me and/or I become convinced I can trust this person." Laying bare real, vulnerable feelings is TERRIFYING. (Reason number 1 why therapy is not fun.) And my usual crushingly low self-esteem keeps me from believing that most people even give a fuck about how I feel. But in the form of bitter jokes, I get to express myself indirectly, and my friends are allowed to laugh in solidarity and no one has to cry or hug each other.

So, my ode to sarcasm: Thank you, dear, non-literal speech, for allowing me to express feelings in a way that creates emotional distance. And thank you, dear sarcastic friends, for exchanging insults in place of sincere tokens of affection. Let us all continue to vent our joys and frustrations through verbal irony, because as long as we're laughing, we're not crying. And if I accidentally express an earnest sentiment in your direction, just blame it on the booze.



*And even if we are friends, I probably won't ever touch you voluntarily. That's another story, however.