mother-in-laws the rude awakeing, college days, vampires as stand-ins
November 30, 2008 at 5:58 pm | In culture, graphic art, movies, photoshop, sociology | Leave a CommentIn-law tensions hit women hardest
Dr Terri Apter, a psychologist and senior tutor at Newnham College, Cambridge University, who carried out the research for her new book What Do You Want From Me?, found that two-thirds of daughters-in-law believed that their husband’s mother frequently exhibited jealous, maternal love towards their sons. The behaviour ranged from that experienced by 26-year-old Jenny from north London, whose mother-in-law began emailing her two months before her wedding with messages saying, ‘What you don’t realise is that my son thinks about me every day, every minute of the day, every second of every minute of the day’, to more common behaviour, such as making demands, being critical or intrusive, sulking and eliciting pity.
A similar proportion of mothers-in-law, however, complained of being excluded and isolated. ‘My daughter-in-law is so cold towards me,’ said 64-year-old Annie from Yorkshire. ‘She begrudges any time or attention my son gives to me and takes every opportunity to minimise the importance and depth of the bond he and I have.’
First year of college someone who had noted my reading habits gave me a used paperback of Earl Thompson’s Garden of Sand. Ever since, my thoughts about over bearing possessive mothers and their feelings about their sons have been at least mildly tinted by Thompson’s dark story. I realize that Garden was the deep end; maybe it was reading it at just turning eighteen combined with entertaining the idea of being a psychologist that inflated its impact. Many of the women in Apter’s survey had something of an epiphany about macho men and their mothers. They realized that they were suddenly in a contest for affection and esteem they hadn’t signed up for.
college days. not mine by the way.
Love Bites: What Sexy Vampires Tell Us About Our Culture
This not the first time vampires in pop culture have been a perfect expression of the currents and anxieties of their time. In fact, one might argue that that is their purpose.
With immortality, a killer instinct, and a life on the fringes, Vampires are a perfect conduit for musings on the human condition. “Vampires have long served to remind us of the parts of our own psyches that seduce us,” writes Salon’s Laura Miller (in a superb analysis of the “Twilight” books). But the metaphor is often less existential than that, as the vampire bite is easy shorthand for sex. Vampirism allows consumers to take vicarious pleasure in rule-breaking couplings, while also justifying phobias about sex-because the seducers do have lethal fangs, and their condition is quite contagious.
Vampires are about sex and death, the fear of both, but also about romanticizing them – thus the appeal to and reinvention of the vampire for each new generation of teens. These are not things one can discuss in polite company as my grandfather would say – a commonly held view that adds to the forbidden zone cultural mystique and the titillation factor. Vampires and their predilection- straight, gay, and bi make great symbolic stand ins for the real thing. So low and behold a cross section of people from the open minded to modern puritans can take pleasure in seeing prurient behavior rewarded and punished, the pleasures and consequences of non-marital, non-traditional unions played out. Depending on the mental freeze frame and one’s internalizations of what they saw or read, a-Ha, vindicated.
Sarah Seltzer gets into the multiple feminists angles to vampires in pop culture in the full article.
la fille de dracula – the tag line courtesy IMDB, “On her death bed, the old woman reveals to her granddaughter the family curse: they’re all vampires.”
when he reached one thousand spankings, where wild flowers grow, let them eat cake
November 29, 2008 at 6:21 pm | In culture, economic, photography, photoshop | Leave a CommentBoy ‘killed father after 1,000 smacks’
However, according to police records reported by the Arizona Republic, the boy “is believed to have made ledgers and/or communicated in the form of writings about his intentions” if his father and stepmother continued to smack him.
According to the police records, the boy told a Child Protective Services official that “when he reached one thousand spankings . . . that would be his limit. [The boy] kept a tally of his spankings on a piece of paper.”
This is not to say that killing these killings were justified – and I use the word killings rather then the less morally ambiguous murder, because I am not sure that an eight year old is capable of the calculated decision to commit murder. If we take the child’s recordings at face value, at eight years old he has lived just over 2900 days. That would mean be was struck an average of once every 3 days. The frequent “spankings” (with questionable rationale) were intended by the parent(s) not to just inflict pain, but also instill a sense of powerlessness and humiliation. A formula that works pretty well at producing a few unhealthy emotional reactions – for some abused children its depression, the inability to concentrate or constant feelings of anxiety and sometimes hate. Children see their parents as larger then life components of their world - providers of food, shelter and protection (physical and emotional). It seems he was pushed to the point where he felt betrayed and thought he would be better off without them. Despite all of our knowledge about child behavior and rehabilitation, regardless of what happens to him by way of the criminal justice system, his life is effectively over, society will view him as having the mark of Cain.
Boing Boing’s Holiday Gift Guide part four: Comics, graphic novels and funnybooks includes Jonathan Hennessey and Aaron McConnell’s The United States Constitution: A Graphic Adaptation. An illustrated Constitution with history about vetoes and important court cases and other really really neat stuff. Still, the only people that will buy it are people that already have an appreciation for the subject.
Never leave a dog alone in a room with a steak and never let a libertarian alone with the economy. This is Lew Rockwells latest thoughts on the 3 million auto industry related jobs, The Real Ford Position on Bailouts
…the great entrepreneur Henry Ford said on February 11, 1934: “Let them fail; let everybody fail! I made my fortune when I had nothing to start with, by myself and my own ideas. Let other people do the same thing. If I lose everything in the collapse of our financial structure, I will start in at the beginning and build it up again.”
As tempting as it is to get into the history of Mr. Ford and why he should hardly be a hero to libertarians, let’’s move on to a recent post by economist Thomas Palley,
The Big Three and their auto finance associates (such as GMAC) are huge debtors whose liabilities are held throughout the financial system. If they go bankrupt, the insurance industry, which is likely a large holder of these debts may quickly enter a spiral of collapse. Pension funds will also be hit, imposing further costs on corporations and households at a time when they are already financially stressed.
But the greatest damage may come from the credit default swaps (CDS) market that brought down AIG. Huge bets have undoubtedly been placed on the bonds of GM, Ford, Chrysler, and GMAC, and bankruptcy will be a CDS triggering event requiring repayment of these bonds. Moreover, a Big Three bankruptcy will bankrupt other companies, risking a cascade of financial damage as their bonds and equities fall in value and further CDS events are triggered. This is the nightmare outcome that risks replicating the Crash of 1929.
I more then understand wanting punish the executives at the Big 3, AIG and Citigroup. The problem with that is at most they will get smaller McMansions and negotiate smaller greens fees at the country club while a few million Americans and their children head for the food stamp office.
the humanity of yeast, cold leaf, patterns in meaningless noise
November 28, 2008 at 3:57 pm | In graphic art, photography, science, sociology | Leave a Comment
the earth dies screaming. it was tempting, but i didn’t photoshop this one. pretty terrifying all on its own.
Aging Process In Yeast And Mammals Could Be Due To Similar Gene Mechanisms
Scientists in the US working with yeast and mice found that a gene that is responsible for regulating the activity of the genome is also called upon to repair damaged DNA and the more this happens the less it is able to look after genome integrity which then allows chronically unregulated genes to kick off the aging process in cells.
Humans have a lot in common with yeast….well yeasts have a membrane-bound nucleus and so do human cells. In the grand design of things that commonality would suggest a designer, or most likely evolution, since this part of the post is not science fiction, found a template that worked well enough or conversely did not see fit to start from scratch on the basic constituent of tissue and organs. The yeast protein Sir2 has a doppelganger of sorts in mammals called SIRT1. They both keep the genome in forever young mode by way of gene switches turned on and off. They both are also called on for DNA repair – like when you go to the beach without sun screen or get a dental x-ray. That presents a problem since the SIRT1 is busy with repairs it can’t devote all its time to chromatin maintenance; ill regulated gene activity leads to aging.
Patternicity: Finding Meaningful Patterns in Meaningless Noise
Why do people see faces in nature, interpret window stains as human figures, hear voices in random sounds generated by electronic devices or find conspiracies in the daily news? A proximate cause is the priming effect, in which our brain and senses are prepared to interpret stimuli according to an expected model. UFOlogists see a face on Mars. Religionists see the Virgin Mary on the side of a building. Paranormalists hear dead people speaking to them through a radio receiver. Conspiracy theorists think 9/11 was an inside job by the Bush administration. Is there a deeper ultimate cause for why people believe such weird things? There is. I call it “patternicity,” or the tendency to find meaningful patterns in meaningless noise.
I think I understand the concept of association learning and how some odd emotional wiring can be connected to what someone thinks they see. What I would like to know is why if two people see the same thing, while one of them instantly jumps to a supernatural conclusion, the other insists on not jumping to any conclusions without more substantial proof. Most scientists, philosophers and barflys are skeptical, not just by way of their vocations, but by nature.
work has a deeper purpose?, a little color, an era of clarity
November 26, 2008 at 7:03 pm | In photography, photoshop, progressive, sociology, working life | Leave a Comment
Secret to workplace happiness? Remember what you love about the job, study urges
The study focused on two groups of long-term health-care workers from two different care facilities in Canada. One group of 24 employees attended a Spirit at Work one-day workshop, followed by eight weekly booster sessions offered at shift changes. The workers were led through a variety of exercises designed to help staff create personal action plans to enhance spirit at work. They were asked to consider concepts like the deeper purpose of their work, being of service, appreciation of themselves and others, sense of community and self-care.
In a way I’m a terrible hypocrite for posting this. I’ve probably skipped out on more motivational work shops then most of this blogs readers have attended. They’re like letting an aspirin dissolve on your tongue or listening to Bill O’Reilly trying to sound smart – I can feel my brain waves nose dive into some semi-alpha state where life loses all meaning. I might be wired in some odd way, “booster sessions” triggering the opposite response they have in most people. Most people come back from them feeling a little more energized and motivated about their work. When asked, I am honest – even if you hate your job, until something better comes along try and take an interest, be as good at it as you possibly can – those work habits or thinking habits, are good one to develop and they carry over to that dream job you might get some day. But pleassseee do not become an obsequious office politician.
Obama Takes Down Media’s ‘Conventional Wisdom’: ‘The Vision For Change Comes From Me’
Obama said his personnel selections will “combine experience with fresh thinking.” But he underscored that the buck stops with him:
But understand where the vision for change comes from first and foremost. It comes from me. That’s my job — is to provide a vision in terms of where we are going and to make sure that my team is implementing it.
And, Obama: Captains of industry are ‘a little tone deaf’
“I thought maybe they’re a little tone-deaf to what’s happening in America right now,” Obama replied. He added, “This has been a chronic problem, not just for the auto industry. I mean, when people are pulling down hundred million dollar bonuses on Wall Street and taking enormous risks with other people’s money, that indicates a sense that you don’t have any perspective on what’s happening to ordinary Americans.”
From reading these two stories, with a side long glance into my crystal ball, I can see two major things happening. One is that many Americans are going to enjoy and take pride in having a president that speaks with a warmth and clarity unheard these last eight years. Not to mention one that, before he even takes office, stresses the importance of accountability. Though there will be a dark side, many Americans will resent Obama for the same reasons.
“There’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.” —Bush, Nashville, Tenn., Sept. 17, 2002
“I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully.” —Bush, Saginaw, Mich., Sept. 29, 2000
“Rarely is the questioned asked: Is our children learning?” —Bush, Florence, S.C., Jan. 11, 2000
“Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream.” —Bush, LaCrosse, Wis., Oct. 18, 2000
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