Posts tagged new york times

Dowd and Out

He can’t handle the truth.

A young computer programmer on his way to a pheasant-hunting trip last November offered a cri de coeur about government groping: Just substitute “Leave the copter, take the corpse” for “Leave the gun, take the cannoli.” Was this, I wondered, the same guy who sometimes showed up in the ’70s with mismatched shoes? Talk about your misty watercolor memories. What’s too painful to remember, we simply choose to forget.

Once upon a time, Cinderella fell out of favor. Nevertheless, Rand is blazing back as an icon of the Tea Party, which overlooks her atheism, amorality in romance and vigorous support for abortion. Our heroine, starting with a family disadvantage, faces hypocrisies, cruelties and obstacles on a perilous journey to a thrilling new world, and uses her wits and integrity to triumph. A new documentary about Cunningham offers a tonic of simplicity and a paean to women after Sheen’s excesses and contempt for women. Jerry Brown doesn’t know who Charlie Sheen is.

We’re bargaining with the shadow of a shadow. Once funeral homes began live-streaming funerals, it was probably inevitable. The antisocial nerd, surrounded by his army of slaving minions, has been holed up making something so revolutionary and magical that it turns him into a force that could conquer the world.

The doomed caribou gazed calmly across the Alaska tundra at Caribou Barbie. Hunting seems more sporting with birds — at least they have a better chance to get away. Unless the hunter is Dick Cheney, who would shoot pheasants that were pen-raised and released from a net to make slaughtering them easier. Hey, dude, you’re a politician. Act like one.

Sound familiar? That’s because all of the above is pieced together from lines out of NYTimes columnist Maureen Dowd’s columns.

*Photo credit: Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

A New York Times piece last week generated a lot of buzz (heh) with its analysis of the increasingly mainstream availability of vibrators. Despite being firm supporters of sex positivity and access to sex education, condoms, contraception, toys etc. etc., we found this article lacking. Hints of a feminist analysis appear, but never quite come to fruition; instead, readers are bombarded with product placement. Below, blogic reacts:

• Tag line: As women take ownership of their sexuality, device makers begin to make more money: Basically, “feminism’s changing the world: because women want to buy more/other things?” Please - we’ve heard that before.
  
  
• Opening line: “TOOTHPASTE? Check. Tampons? Check. Vibrator? Check!”  VOMIT, check.
  
  
• “For years, vibrators were bought quietly in sex shops, and later online, arriving in discreet unmarked packages. They were rarely discussed, other than perhaps during a late-night girl-talk session fueled by many glasses of pinot grigio.” Ugh, untrue. This author has stupid friends.
  
  
• “…it wasn’t until an episode of HBO’s “Sex and the City” —called “The Turtle and the Hare,” featuring an actual device called the Rabbit Pearl — that the vibrator truly emerged from the nightstand drawer.” Readers, remember that episode? The one that gets mentioned in every article on “female sexual liberation” because it was just that groundbreaking? Let’s refresh your memory, dear readers: Big tells Carrie he’ll never marry again, Charlotte gets a vibrator and then doesn’t want do anything else ever again, and Miranda and Samantha do other things (internet research has revealed that Samantha has a “harsh dumping” - really, HBO summary guide? Really?). The point here: can we all please agree to stop attributing the feminist movement to that show?
  
  
• Dr Laura Berman, the sex therapist from “Sexual Healing,” the short-lived but well-loved HBO show, is quoted. We have to ask, what are you doing in this article? You deserve better.
  
  
• “Jeremy, 31, a content strategist in the entertainment business who lives in New York and wanted his last name omitted for privacy, said…” Jeremy and his girlfriend Kate, hoping for anonymity, still gave their first names and job titles? Anyone with access to the internet should be able to crack that code. Poor planning, team.
  
  
• We are getting the distinct impression that the author seems to think that only straight ladies use vibrators. Newsflash: Untrue!
  
  
• “And “Hysteria,” a romantic comedy in post-production that will star Maggie Gyllenhaal and Hugh Dancy, will recount the same point in Victorian history. The plot revolves around Mr. Dancy’s character, a young earnest doctor who takes a job massaging women’s pelvises into “paroxysms.” But when the doctor develops carpal tunnel syndrome, his best friend (Rupert Everett), who is obsessed with electricity, invents a device that has impressively efficient curative powers.” Did somebody say rom com? Boy + Girl = Movie, anyone?

We’re all for both the press and mainstream public having frank, open conversations about sexuality - but let’s do it genuinely, and leave product placement out of it.

Sorry for our recent absence - we’ve been struck by a case of welstchmerz.

Definition: from the German, meaning world-pain or world-weariness, pronounced [ˈvɛltʃmɛɐ̯ts].

According to wikipedia, weltschmerz used to denote the feeling of sadness when thinking about the evils of the world. In light of the tragedy unfolding across the Pacific Ocean and the coordinated attacks on the people of Libya, we are heavily weighed down with feelings of our own inability to do much more than sit in front of our televisions or computer screens and watch people’s lives unravel. Simultaneously, the landscape of our own country - especially the political - appears increasingly bleak. All of the following might be causing weltschmerz on you too, readers, and we thought we’d air it out:

• Outrageous spending cuts proposed in the House of Representatives, including significant cuts to National Public Radio. Does anyone remember the tax cuts for the wealthy that were passed at tremendous cost last December? Anyone?
• Global warming can no longer be called a “theory” (though some GOPers seem bent on continuing to refer to it as such) - its impact on our earth has become obvious this winter, with severe and unprecedented storms sweeping the nation. Farmers in the developing world have been dealing with global warming for years, and according to the New York Times, soon oblivious Americans will not be able to ignore its impact on even something as simple as their morning coffee.
• In Wisconsin, Republican senators destroyed collective bargaining power for state employees and undermined union rights.
• James O’Keefe and his pointless and repugnant attacks on important institutions like NPR, or Planned Parenthood.
• Increasingly abominable attacks on women’s reproductive rights that are already impacting women across the country.

Are there good things happening in the world that can assuage our weltschmerz? Please comment if so. We could use it!

log·roll·ing: the exchange of support or favors, esp. by legislators for mutual political gain as by voting for each other’s bills; cronyism or mutual favoritism among writers, editors, or critics, as in the form of reciprocal flattering reviews (“back scratching”); the action of rolling logs to a particular place (duh); the action of rotating a log rapidly in the water by treading upon it, esp. as a competitive sport; birling. The NYT put it well in 1921: “Admirable is the ardor with which our young geniuses go on discovering each other.”

Logrolling in practice:

• The Stupak Amendment
• Warning: for SF Bay Area literary geeks only. Apparently, McSweeney’s “Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales” is nothing more than a giant literary logroll. The backstory includes Dave Eggers saying to his pal Michael Chabon, “If I let you guest-edit an issue of McSweeney’s, can we please stop talking about this?”
• Any event that requires wealthy, nicely dressed people to spend a few hours stroking each other’s egos on television
• Early 20th century: Ezra Pound (whose 1928 book of poetry included an intro by Eliot) and T.S. Eliot (whose most famous poems might not have been published were it not for Pound’s influence)
• blogrolls—oh, this makes so much more sense now

“But wait,” you say. “I love this word so much, I wish there was a related game.” Good thing the internet rarely disappoints. (Accepting suggestions on how to turn this into a drinking game in the comments).

The NYT’s annual “Places to Go” series never ceases to offend. From

1. Santiago, Chile
Undaunted by an earthquake, a city embraces modern culture.

to the more explicit

4. Iceland
Where a country’s hardships are a visitor’s gain.

the NYT Travel Section seems to be under the assumption that the world is its wealthy travelers’ playground, with all manner of natural or man-made disaster, civil unrest or economic crisis relevant only for their potential to turn an entire nation into a “bargain bin” for visitors.