Figleaf Principle

The Figleaf Principle: Salaciousness Displaces Substance in Scandals

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Sat, 2008-08-09 05:06

In a piece subtitled “Why does it take a cliché to draw attention to the problem of fathers’ rights?” Dahlia Lithwick of Slate makes the vivid point that our fondness for the stereotype of the dramatically aggrieved ex-husband seeking greater custody of his children interferes with reforms of divorce and custody proceedings that really ought to be, and maybe need to be, taken up.

I recognize the allure for some men of the man-pushed-till-he-snaps narrative. My husband rents those movies, too. But for every Clark Rockefeller and Darren Mack, there are dozens of nonviolent fathers who believe that the mere fact of their divorce should not result in an arrangement in which they pay for the right to see their kids on alternating Sundays. If the family-court system is ever going to improve, we need to hear their stories, not these endless tales of kidnappings and murder. Much of what’s wrong with family law today lies in warmed-over stereotypes of men as fundamentally unsuited to caring for children. Lionizing Clark Rockefeller or other violent, lawless fathers will not promote fathers’ rights or fix the family-court system. It merely perpetuates the same outdated ideas about fatherhood and fathers that have tainted the family-law system for too long.

The rest of the article is pretty cool. You’ll find it here.

That seems about right. Of course I’m a father and I have a hard time with poorly examined stereotypes so of course I’d encourage that sort of destigmatization, where the Alex Baldwins, and Clark Rockerfellers become non-poster-boy icons of divorced fatherhood in favor of, you know, the more representative, um, majority.

But the general point seems pretty important for so-called “sex bloggers,” who — I’m pretty confident an assessment of court records would show — differ from non-bloggers only to the extent that they publish rather than don’t publish their experiences and opinions.

And yet thanks to current case law, in need of reexamination or not, bloggers in general and “sex bloggers” in particular are extraordinarily at risk of what I’d like to (arrogantly) deem the Figleaf Principle: twitting about sex obstructs discussion of substantive issues.

This can play two ways, by the way. First, upon discovery a judge officiating a custody hearing may be much more inclined to act on a motion that includes salacious allegations of sex clubs or bisexuality than on one that includes allegations of more substantive issues such as means of support or management of substance dependencies. And second, alarm over salacious allegations may distract supporters from what may be more seriously substantive ones.

Both concerns, I might add, are justified. An “otherwise” blameless divorced mom who supplements her income by anonymously reviewing sex toys in the privacy of her own home should not be at risk of losing custody. A couple involved in BDSM should not be able to wave their floggers or rope burns at each other in court. And a judge should not be swayed by the “scandalous” nature of a custodial parent’s sexuality, especially if said sexuality in no way infringes on his or her parenting. But on the other hand we shouldn’t let acceptance of a good party organizer enable his or her drinking problem. Nor should we let our admiration for this or that leather master enable his or her tendency to abuse the owl-shit out of acolytes.

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Recipe Tuesday Comes a Little Late This Week -- This Week? Gotcha Cookies

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Wed, 2008-06-18 14:51


Photo by Flickr user DarthAbraham. Used under a Creative Commons license.

Via the (Googled up at random) US Magazine, but all the buzz around the intertubes these days…

Republican presidential nominee John McCain’s wife, Cindy, and Bill Clinton have cooked up a controversy in Family Circle.

Read the quote in context here.

What. Ever.

I can’t say how much it ticks me off to have to defend anybody but seriously! Who the Sam Hill develops their own recipes for anything these days? I make pizza dough all the time, the recipe’s from Joy of Cooking. My kid’s favorite dish is (don’t ask me why) a variation of Ma Po Tofu with shitakii mushrooms and bok choy that I picked up from an obscure “Authentic Chinese” cookbook that turned out to be all vegan. A million other things I cook come from one or another Cook’s Illustrated recipes and if I usually do variations on them, well, I flat-out guarantee the variations were inspired by CI’s obsessive documentation of all the variations they try and what the results are.

Now were my partner running for office and were someone to ask me my favorite recipe for, I dunno, eggplant parmesan, I’d… ok, actually I cook that from scratch but since it’s basically breaded eggplant with tomato sauce and mozzarella, and since I make it a little different each time, I’d still probably go grab a recipe out of Joy-of, Cook’s, or maybe Moosewood because a) I’ve made all of them, b) whatever recipe I have in my head came mostly from one of those, and c) it’s a quick, easy, and probably more reliable way to do it.

The only difference though? If I was coughing up a recipe for something like, oh, Asian sesame noodles I’d almost certainly say “I got this from Martha Stewart’s 1983 Quick Cook.”

But sheesh, doesn’t anybody in gotcha journalism actually cook their own food? Because if they did they’d recognize that there’s almost no such thing as an “original” recipe anyway. And if they cooked virtually every meal prepared at home for the last ten years they’d know perfectly well that even when you do make your own variation on a theme it almost always turns up in another cookbook, magazine, tv show, or website.

Oh yeah, and that goes double for the hired help that almost 100% guaranteed does the cooking in either Bill Clinton’s or Cindy McCain’s multiple domiciles.

So! Am I making excuses for politician’s spouses? No. In fact I think they’re doubly full of it for even bothering to collude with “homemaker” publications in the first place. Instead I’m poking a finger into the doughy little not-so-cute bellies of gotcha-flogging twits (who evidently don’t know how to cook either.)

The problem with Cindy McCain and Bill Clinton isn’t that they’re inauthentic homemakers, it’s that their politician partners were using the politically-and-economically-tied-in financial clout of their partners to circumvent public-disclosure and campaign-fianance laws, in a way that masks potentially enormous conflicts of interest. So what the heck does anybody care about cookies?!?!?

- Cream standard amounts of butter and brown sugar till light – Drop in an egg and some vanilla and stir thoroughly – Sift together flour with the standard amounts of salt and baking powder – Add flour mixture to wet mixture in two or three batches, mixing well in between. – Add some combination of nuts, raisins, chocolate chips, coconut, and/or oatmeal – Spoon onto lightly greased cookie sheets (a silicon cookie-sheet pad works great but isn’t critical.) – Bake in a 325-350 degree oven until crispy on the edges and still a little soft in the middle – Remove with a wide, thin spatula and cool on a wire rack if you’ve got one. – A Kitchen Aide makes a world of difference on your forearms.

There. That’s my off-the-top-of-my-head recipe. Unless I got an ingredient wrong (I usually have to look up baking powder and I didn’t this time) it already appears, probably quite a bit more clearly, somewhere else. Would you rather follow that or something step-by-step from a reputable source? :-)

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If You'd Known You'd Have Lived That Long You'd Have More Compassion For the Elderly

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Tue, 2008-06-17 22:28


Photo by Flickr user avdgaag. Used under a Creative Commons license.

SadieStein at Jezebel says

Slate’s recent piece on the forbidden love of a couple suffering from dementia has hit a nerve. The pair (82 and 95, respectively) met at an assisted-living facility and embarked on a relationship that quickly grew passionately physical. When 95-year-old Bob’s son walked in on his father receiving oral sex from his girlfriend, Dorothy, he pitched a fit, complained to the home’s management – who separated them – and then summarily moved his father to another facility, citing concerns for Bob’s health – after which Dorothy went into steep decline.

...

The article suggests that Bob’s son’s reaction was as much “ick factor” at the thought (and sight) of his nanogenarian father’s active sex life as reasoned concern. It is certainly true that as a society we’re conditioned to think of old-folks’ sex as automatically risible and somewhat grotesque.

She said it here.

OWCH at Daily Kos says

In light of kos’ display of Barack Obama’s birth certificate, John McCain’s campaign has released a rare glimpse of the Republican candidate’s own birth certificate.

...

Thought lost for the ages, the document was found in a clay jar, in an abandoned cave, on the outskirts of Sedona, by a shepherd boy in 1947. The desert climate and the dry atmosphere in the caves kept the parchment remarkably well preserved.

OWCH said it here.

Just a word to the wise: making jokes about John McCain’s age is sort of like making jokes about Hillary Clinton’s gender. You can be a twit and focus on superficiality instead of substance if and only if you’re prepared to claim that your only problem with individual X is his age, or her gender, or his orientation, or her drunk-driving conviction. Since, at least with John McCain, if age really is your only reservation then…

Good luck getting past your kid’s “ick factors” when you’re looking for a little privacy some time after age 82. It might not sound that hot now but… I’m pretty sure it won’t seem like nearly such a bad idea when you get there yourself. M’may?

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Twit Patrol

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Fri, 2008-06-13 08:36


Screenshot via Feministing, hosted by PhotoBucket.

I first noticed the Right Wing’s decision to demonize Hillary Clinton some time in very late 1991 or early 1992. Although it must surely have begun warming up before then I associate it with the moment of their collective ZOMG-end-of-the-world flip-out over her post-election name change from “Hillary Clinton” to the scary-fezemeninist “Hillary Rodham Clinton”

And as I fretted last month they’ve wasted no time trying to smear Michelle Obama just as they would have Elizabeth Edwards, or Jill Tracey Jacobs (Joe Biden, not sure if she’s taken his last name), or Barbara Flavin (Bill Richardson, ditto), Elizabeth Kucinich or even long-shot Rita Gravel.

As I’ve said, um, a lot since at least 1992, if you want to be a twit attack someone for her gender, or race, or orientation, or whatever instead of something substantive. The right wing, intellectually as well as morally bankrupt since ketchup as a vegetable, have nothing but twit.

This has worked because, evidently, until at least 2004 the center and left have had nothing but doofus. Not so much any more.

Jessica Valenti of Feministing says

Fox’s Senior Vice President of Programming Bill Shine told the Politico that the producer responsible for labeling Michelle Obama “Obama’s baby mama” in a segment “exercised poor judgment.” Uh, yeah, I’d say so. (So much for a heartfelt apology.)

Via the newly-launched Michelle Obama Watch, created by What About Our Daughters. (Add it to your blogrolls, and get involved in keeping tabs on the media!)

I copied her entire post from here.

I’ve added the site to my blogroll. Even if you’re not a fan of the Obamas, if you’d rather they were engaged on a policy rather than personal level you might consider doing likewise. (Twittery, by the way, is not limited to ‘wingers — the left is starting to become disgracefully twittish about John McCain’s age and I’d hate for that to interfere with his enormous lapses and gaps in substance.)

[Oh yeah, and “baby momma?” Seriously? What’s worse is a lot of people are arguing “but they’re married,” and “but she’s educated,” and… and… and… yeah, and they’re playing into the FOX News frame. Instead “baby momma” is only, and entirely, and inextricably a) racist and b) sexist. No other “talking points” are necessary whether you’re talking about… well… anybody! —fl]

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The Scandalous Nature of Sex Scandals

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Tue, 2008-06-03 12:20


Photo “scandalized” by Flickr user stillthedudeabides. Used under a Creative Commons license.

Matthew Yglesias makes the (other) eternal excellent point about how twitting about sex obstructs discussion of substantive issues.

I think Bill Clinton makes some fair points in his intemperate rant against Todd Purdum. But in a lot of ways, the flaws in Purdum’s article (lots of innuendos about illicit sex) serve to obscure the valid points (we know very little about the financing of Clinton’s lifestyle and his foundation)

Read the quote in context here.

This isn’t, incidentally, a dig at Senator Hillary Clinton (although I’ve argued in the past that I have a much bigger problem with the proposals and behaviors of the men she employs than the Senator herself, whom I tend to admire.) Instead it’s a dig at the problems that arise from a chronic inability to deal like grownups with gender, sex, and sexuality.**

As Yglesias says, even if the scandalous rumors about whether Bill flies around with a billionaire fiend a private jet allegedly nicknamed “Air Fuck One” turn out to be true, the scandal still isn’t about the sex it’s potential for unexamined quid pro quo with the billionaire friends he’s been riding with. John McCain’s spouse Cindy McCain, who’s business connections are similarly unexamined, seems free from scandal and therefore her arrangements are also free from questioning for appropriateness.

It’s pretty frustrating. The scandal about Ted Haggard wasn’t his homosexuality but his rejection of homosexuality in others. The scandal about Undersecretary of State Randal Tobias wasn’t that he hired escorts prostitutes, it’s that he continued advocating for abstinence and marital fidelity even though he knew that even he couldn’t practice what he preached. The scandal about sex slavery/trafficking isn’t the sex but the slavery. The scandal about Elliot Spitzer isn’t that he had sex with Ashley Alexandra Dupre, or even that she had sex with him for compensation, it’s that he prosecuted women just like Dupre for offering services just like the ones he hired to perform.

[** Senator Clinton, by the way, may have poor hiring judgment but in everything from her statements about sex education, to comprehensive health, to human trafficking, to her daughter’s sex life, to her husband’s peccadillos to the inevitable rumors and innuendos any powerful and, especially, older woman faces about her gender preferences, she’s great. —fl]

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Sorry, Gendered Criticisms Displace Substantive Ones

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Mon, 2008-05-26 09:52

Quick follow-up on Sen. Clinton as the new Ralph Nader and why criticizing her, or anyone else, inside any kind of gendered framework reflects rather harshly on the critic and not really at all on her.

First of all, gendered criticism, even from progressives, is no small problem. Ann Bartow of Feminist Law Professors cites… more than a handful of sexist slurs from various, and nominally progressive, Democrats compiled by Erica Barnett

I’ve said it before–but because some Slog readers seem to still think I believe any attack on Clinton is a sexist attack, I’ll say it again: The misogyny from the media, from supposedly liberal blogger doodz, commenters on this blog, and just about everywhere during this campaign has been despicable. This kind of shit ought to be behind us: Hillary Clinton is a bitch. A big ol’ bitchy bitch. And a cunt. A “big fucking whore.” Fortunately, you can “call a woman anything.” She’s “Nurse Ratched.” She’ll castrate you if she gets a chance. She would like that. She’s a “She-Devil.” She’s a madam, and her daughter’s a whore. She’s frigid, and she can’t give head. She’s a “She-Devil.” A lesbian. A nag. When things get tough, she cries like a big dumb GIRL. In fact, she’s just that — a “little girl.” In FACT, she wants to “cry her way to the White House.” To be, ahem, “Crybaby-in-Chief.” That proves that she’s not tough enough. But she’s also not feminine enough. She’s “screechy.” She’s an “aging, resentful female.” She’s “Sister Frigidaire.” She really ought to quit running for President and stick to housework. She basically spent her entire times as First Lady going to tea parties. She’s a monster whojust won’t die. In fact, she really should just die. You can buy a urinal target with her face on it to express what you really think of her. OMG she’s got claws! She’s crazy. In fact, she’s a lunatic. She’s petty and vindictive and entitled. She’s a washed-up old hag. She’s “everybody’s first wifestanding outside probate court.” She’s a “scolding mother.” She’s shrill… shrill… shrill. She can’t take it when people are mean to her. She’s a “hellish housewife.” She’s Tanya Harding. She CAN’T be President, what with the mood swings and the menses.Any woman who votes for her is voting with her vagina, not her brain. Women only like Hillary because she’s a fellow Vagina-American. And because they vote with their feelings. Frankly, anyone who still thinks we need “feminine role models” should get over it and move on, already. Oh, and men who supporters are castratos in the eunuch chorus. You shouldn’t make her President because she wants it too much. She’s totally just banking on support from ugly old feminists. And she looooves to “play the victim.” She cackles! And cackles. And cackles. It’s like she’s a witch or something! She’s definitely“witchy.” And now you can buy her cackle as your ring tone. Her voice, too, is “grating”–like “fingernails on a blackboard” to “some men.” She’s hiding behind her gender. She isn’t a “convincing mom” because she’s too strident. She never did anything on her own. Her husband keeps her on a leash. She hates men. Her campaign is a “catfight.” She makes people want to kill themselves, is like a “domineering mother,” and is cold. And OMG she has boobies! All of which are reasons to hate her. (And boy, could I go on.)

Barnett said it here.

Ann Bartow adds, among other things, that gender insulting Clinton isn’t limited to Clinton!

And hey, guess what? Not being Hillary Clinton will not protect you. If Obama secures the nomination, the same sexism will soon find exclusive focus on Michelle Obama. She too is getting the Uppity Woman smack down. SheCodes at Black Women Vote discussed this in a general way...

Read the quote in context here.

Yeah, I haven’t been reading enough ‘winger opposition sources to be up on this but I think I’ve noticed opening salvos in supermarket-style tabloid venues like the front page of the National Enquirer and Mickey Kaus’s blog.

I’ll just repeat that as with all gendered aspersions they’re not just bullshit they’re distractions! For instance aren’t the almost exclusively male consultants Clinton employs and personally directs, let alone her husband, just as “castrating” as she is? Um, yeah, except men usually get called “rabid” or even just “aggressively partisan.” And isn’t it a bigger problem anyway that Clinton keeps picking such a pack of thumb-fingered, foot-shooting asshats and showboats to be her personal Karl Roves, John Yoos, Dick Cheneys and Charlie Blacks? Why yes, as a matter of fact it is.

The fact of the matter is that Hillary Clinton isn’t a bitch! She’s not “castrating.” She’s not a “cunt,” or a “whore” or “shrill”** or “witchy” or anything like it. She has a Ralph Nader-sized ego, yes. She’s got a divisive, Bush-doctrine-like 50%-plus-one approach to politics, yes. She’s got a Bush-like obsession with one-way loyalty and secrecy, yes. She’s got a (sorry Prof. Bartow) an egregiously lawyerly attitude towards what should count as evidence and what “opposing council” and “the jury” should be allowed to hear that may or may not be fine in court but kind of sucks in terms of electoral politics. But where’s the gender in any of that?

In fact the closest thing to a legitimate gender issue is that Clinton has a family member she’s using to blind the public, but not herself via conversation with her partner, “personal loans” derived from from unhealthily large “foundation” contributions. And that’s not really a gender issue at all, Senator McCain enjoys the same benefit with his partner, as would anyone else of any gender (or combination of genders) with legally recognized family privileges.

So! You want to be a twit about Senator Clinton’s gender fine but to do so is to deliberately sideline discussion of substantive issues. Conversely if you have substantive, legitimate concerns then don’t be a twit.

[** In fact one serious criticism of Senator Clinton is that, based on her campaign, she’s not “Order of the Shrill“ at all! —fl]

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Distracting Games

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Fri, 2008-04-11 16:29

Amber Rhea of Being Amber Rhea has yet another excellent reason it’s important for men to take a look at what anti-feminism is doing to them instead of worrying about feminism with this anecdote about a…

...commenter who used to come around my blog all the time until I banned him, and even though he was an intelligent person he would ALWAYS try to find ANY other explanation for an obviously sexist situation than, well, sexism. It’s like, if YOU’RE “not like that,” then why are you so fucking afraid of admitting that YES, sexism exists, and calling it out when it does??

Read the quote in context here.

It’s just an excellent point: if you’re not that way you’re not that way! So no need to panic or water down the possibility that someone else might be. And if you are that way then… why bother denying it. Unless you’re ashamed of it in which case… why bother being that way?

And this isn’t an idle deal, as Mighty Ponygirl of Feminist Gamers says

A very sad story out of York, Pennsylvania: A 2-year-old girl died after being beaten with a video game controller by her mother’s boyfriend.

Already, many gamers are getting the “omgthey’regoingtooutlawvideogamesbecauseofthis” panics.

Read the quote in context here.

Got that? A guy loses it and murders a little kid and people get bent that it might be about video gaming! Clue: it wasn’t about games, ok? No, stop, it just wasn’t. Worrying that it was is just denial about what it really is, which was some dude growing up with the anti-feminist indoctrination that if you’re a man your only options are to suck it up or lash out, period. It’s an anti-feminist indoctrination for him to cut himself off from any impulse to admire, respect, enjoy, and, sure, endure a little person who will someday grow up to take over when his gold turns to grey and his burden becomes too heavy.

And here’s the other deal, if you’re a man chances are that, all the stereotyping that’s been rammed down your throat by means far more diverse than “first-person” time-wasters notwithstanding, you’re not like that. Which makes defending, or denying, or avoiding the pocketful of men like that guy who do fulfill all those stereotypes.

And not to put too fine a point on it, but you can’t win cases like this by backing off into denial of irrelevant things. If you want to save your video games then it might be better instead to push attention onto the spongy, never-challenged anti-feminist mess where it belongs.

The point being, as Amber says, that was a sexist situation, not a gamer situation. Deal with what needs to be dealt with.

Just sayin’

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The Randall Scandal story that ought to be writing itself

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Mon, 2007-04-30 13:23

Ok, so earlier I was saying I thought it was weird that folks were getting all “gotcha” over the story that (in the statistical sense) abstractly implies that abstinence-only education works when the abrupt resignation of Randall Tobias directly implies it doesn’t even work for high-level federal directors of abstinence-only campaigns!

Tim Noah of Slate.com, who I think is a very good reporter, at least mentions it but only as an aside.

Tobias’ resignation was announced at 5 p.m. on a Friday, traditionally the hour for releasing bad news, because reporters are busy making weekend plans, and readers, at least in theory, pay less attention to news that comes out on a Saturday. The strategy seems to have worked in this instance, because neither ABC News nor the Post reported one highly relevant detail: Tobias is the Bush administration’s leading advocate of abstinence-only programs abroad!

Find more juicy but irrelevant evidence of Tobias’ talking the talk but not walking the walk here.

The rest of the article is a bit about inside baseball and a lot of really egregious quotes. (In keeping with another post from yesterday it turns out Tobias’ most recent job involved requiring foreign aid recipients to denounce prostitution.)

But I still want to get back to the main point. As Noah makes clear in his quotations, Tobias wasn’t an utterly clueless, Bush or Gonzales style empty suit. He was able to clearly articulate the adult abstinence (outside of marriage) programs his agency endorsed, and he was also able to clearly distinguish them from similar programs that put a heavier emphasis on condoms for reducing transmission of HIV.

In other words, he wasn’t just a “heck of a job, Brownie” bench-warmer. He understood the programs, he could speak persuasively about the matter, and he could deftly debate the details with outright opponents or advocates for competing programs.

Knowing all that he still couldn’t actually do it!

And get this. One can hear much twittering about Tobias-the-hypocrite who hired prostitutes even though he’s married. (As if hiring prostitutes when you’re not is ok?) Set aside those nervous adolescent chuckles, though, and an even larger issue arises. Tobias couldn’t uphold abstinence-and-fidelity principles even though he’s married and therefore could have sex at home.

How, one wonders, can we expect highly hormone-charged young people to keep their hands out of their own and their partner’s pants when a 62-year-old married man with an authoritative grasp of abstinence-only policies is unable to stick with the program?

And how, one wonders, can journalists and pundits be so distracted by “huh huh huh he had Teh Sex” that they can pass up a chance to take down a federal government policy that costs on the order of hundreds of millions of dollars and encumbers on the order of tens of millions of matching funds for the (dwindling number of) states that choose to participate?

Look. Tobias hired women from a company offering “adult fantasy services.” Chances are very good those women got his penis wet with their saliva and/or let him put his penis inside their bodies and move it around. That’s called sex. Undersecretary Tobias is an adult and that’s what adults do. Even CNN and Fox news anchors have sex (though you’d never believe it to hear them talk.) And unless he and the woman he married had an expressed understanding then he was a bit of a jerk for getting his penis wet with someone other than her. His behavior may be disgraceful in moral terms but otherwise it’s pretty routine.

The real question, then, is not how he could have forgone abstinence while advocating abstinence, or how he could have been unfaithful while advocating faithfulness, or how he could have hired prostitutes while advocating restricting prostitution. Those are upside down questions. The real question is how could he have continued to advocate public health programs intended to address problems as serious as HIV transmission in Africa when his personal experience made it clear that those policies aren’t, and perhaps can’t be effective.

There’s an integrity problem here, but it’s not about who wets his whistle.

I’m just sayin’

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