Monthly Archives: September 2004

Thursday short poem: Gary Soto’s How Things Work

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I’m trying to make sure that I put every poet associated with Cal up at least once this year for a Thursday short poem.

Gary Soto taught at Berkeley as an adjunct in the 1980s, and was wildly popular with many of my friends who were taking Chicano Studies courses. (I took a couple of those classes myself, writing a long paper on Ana Castillo, another poet whose work I need to mine soon). Soto is also a decent poet, and this is one of his more famous ones. I picked it because it had some connection to the impassioned and interesting discussions here last week about hiring housecleaners.

How Things Work

Today it’s going to cost us twenty dollars
To live. Five for a softball. Four for a book,
A handful of ones for coffee and two sweet rolls,
Bus fare, rosin for your mother’s violin.
We’re completing our task. The tip I left
For the waitress filters down
Like rain, wetting the new roots of a child
Perhaps, a belligerent cat that won’t let go
Of a balled sock until there’s chicken to eat.
As far as I can tell, daughter, it works like this:
You buy bread from a grocery, a bag of apples
From a fruit stand, and what coins
Are passed on helps others buy pencils, glue,
Tickets to a movie in which laughter
Is thrown into their faces.
If we buy goldfish, someone tries on a hat.
If we buy crayons, someone walks home with a broom.
A tip. a small purchase here and there,
And things just keep going. I guess.

The uncertainty in the last two words keeps this from being an ode to micro-capitalism. And you gotta love the imagery of “wetting the new roots of a child.” That’s good.

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Campus Crusade, menarche, marriage — a quick snapshot

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Today, the following has happened:

A student from Campus Crusade for Christ came to talk to me today. I advise the club, and he wants me to help lead some upcoming discussions on purity. We then had a nice brief chat about Lee Strobel’s The Case for Christ, which has been on my desk for weeks.

I wonder when someone from the national organization of Campus Crusade is going to question my credentials as adviser.

I downloaded some songs by Robert Earl Keen, whom I have just discovered I like. Don’t worry, I’ll buy the album.

I’ve read about 15-16 blogs.

In women’s history, we talked about menarche and culture. Nothing like a male teacher leading a discussion of menstruation in a multi-cultural, female-dominated classroom! We also talked about the age at which, statistically, girls in our society lose their virginity. (The average, supported by a variety of studies, is just under sixteen). What’s curious — and what we talked about — was that those girls who are first- or second-generation immigrants were, in general, quite surprised by that number, thinking it was too low. Girls whose families have been in America for a while were less surprised, and two of my “white All-American” girls expressed doubt about the statistic, suggesting that the number was too high. It was a fine teaching moment indeed.

What is interesting, historically, is that in the nineteenth century, menarche was at 16 and average age of first marriage 21-22; this means that even if girls were virgins on their wedding night, only five years passed between menarche and sexual intercourse. If average age of menarche today is 11, and girls lose their virginity at 16, the number is still five years. This always makes folks think.

Cheerleaders, not coaches

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Jenell continues to have terrific stuff up at her place.  She’s been posting quite a bit about reparative therapy, homosexuality, the church — and the "middle ground" position she takes is characterized by humility and compassion.  So, if you go to her blog from here, please be gracious in commenting, even if you disagree with what you read there!

Here are some excerpts from today’s post I want to touch on:

Often, by distinguishing sin from not-sin, we say that those who are sinning are in pain and need of help, and those who are not sinning are just fine. We proclaim, as individuals and congregations, that we’ve made an assessment of gays, found them to be lacking or just fine, and send them on their way with a bad diagnosis or a clean bill of health. Either way, it is we (conservatives and liberals) who do the judging, and we who set the course of action for them. Why are gays even in gay-affirming churches? Either way, they’ve been assessed and judged by others in ways that heterosexuals are not.

Jenell has a point.  If a gay man showed up at All Saints Pasadena and said he was uncomfortable being a gay man and wanted to change his sexual identity, we would not be prepared to support him in that.  Indeed, our Vestry issued a statement several years ago condemning reparative therapy in fairly strong terms, and urging the diocese not to have anything to do with organizations like Exodus and Love Won Out.  The judgment we have made at All Saints is, I think, ultimately the right one: gays and lesbians who want to change their sexual orientation are, to one degree or another, in need of reassurance that they are good and loved just as they are.  Our focus is on enabling GLBTQ folk to find self-acceptance, not transformation into heterosexuality or celibacy.

Is that wrong?  In an earlier comment on Jenell’s blog, I compared reparative therapy to plastic surgery.  If one of my teenagers at All Saints says she wants liposuction or breast implants in order to feel better about herself, what is my job?  Do I encourage her to pursue that goal, or do I work — with others, of course — towards helping her to love herself as she is now?  If she saves her money and works overtime to pay for a boob job, should we be cheerleaders, blithely saying "you go, girl!?" I don’t think so.! Theological conservatives don’t like that analogy.  Our genetic inheritance determines things like breast size, but most traditionalists are adamant that there is no significant biological factor in homosexuality.  I don’t want to get into the whole "gay gene" discussion, of course — just anticipating the easiest criticism of the cosmetic surgery analogy…

But I am haunted by the thought that we in the "affirming churches" might not be ministering to the unique needs of at least a small minority of GLBTQ people.  Jenell wrote:

We should always be humbled and chastened by other peoples’ complex lives, and just be their cheerleaders as they seek God – not be their coach.

That has a ring of truth to me.  We at All Saints castigate the reparative therapy movement for "coaching" folks to try and change their sexual identity (something we believe to be unnecessary, cruel, and fruitless.)  But we’re coaching too!  We coach self-acceptance, and encourage stable, same-sex relationships that can be blessed from the pulpit by the rector or even the bishop himself.  If a man or a woman comes to us and genuinely believes that they are called to heterosexuality despite their same-sex feelings, do we do violence to them by insisting that they accept themselves as they are?  I wonder.

In my post below, I made it clear that I was raised to see homosexuality as perfectly normal.  I’ve been around lesbians since I was a toddler.   As a teen, I participated in countless community theatre productions, and was surrounded by gay men, many of whom served as mentors to me.  I had a gay roommate in college.  None of them ever said to me, "Hugo, I’m unhappy being gay and I want to change."  The stories they told were of family rejection, of violence, of self-loathing, but, slowly, of ultimate self-acceptance.   So I’ve always assumed that that’s the "right narrative":  gay folks move through stages, slowly becoming more and more accepting of "who they are."  As a straight man, I’ve always figured it was my job to be their cheerleader in that goal.  I’ve never had someone come to me and say, "Hugo, I’m gay and I want to change.  Can you help me?" 

But what if one of my kids at youth group asked me that?  Would I give a teenage boy a referral to Exodus or to NARTH?   I can’t imagine that I would do that, anymore than I would give his sister a list of cosmetic surgeons who could help her transform into a Barbie doll.  But Jenell’s posts haunt me a bit.

When to coach?  When to cheerlead?

Sailboats, thanksgiving, and growing up loving lesbians

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I’ve been thinking about four women who formed two couples in my childhood. I’ve been thinking about Jane and Carla, Christine and Rachel. (No, not real names). I’ve been thinking about them in terms of explaining how it is that I, a hetero man, became so focused on gay and lesbian rights.

Until my parents divorced when I was six, we lived in Santa Barbara (my father taught at the university). Most of my parents’ friends were academic couples. Somehow, early on, little Hugo figured out that adults seemed to come in pairs, just like my mother and father. In my life, it was obvious that sometimes a pair could be two women. (If my parents had any good gay male friends, I don’t remember them). But I do remember Jane and Carla vividly. They had a sailboat, and one particularly happy memory from my childhood is of sailing out from Santa Barbara on a weekend afternoon, Carla guiding the boat, Jane and my parents laughing and watching my baby brother, me munching on chocolate. I felt happy and loved and safe surrounded by these grown-ups who loved us and each other.

The last Thanksgiving that we spent as a family — before the divorce — was, as I remember, a small affair. My parents invited just one couple: Christine and Rachel. I was only six or so, so my memories aren’t clear. But I remember being clear on the fact that Christine and Rachel went together the way my mom and dad went together. I had no idea what sex was, or what being a couple really entailed. I just knew that most adults paired up, and that it didn’t really matter whether men were with women or women with women. What mattered was finding another adult to be with. That seemed to be very important.

Though our early childhood memories can be deceptive, it seems to me that these four women were around at least as often as any straight couples my parents knew.

I haven’t seen any of those women for years. My parents divorced, and I moved with my brother and mother to Central California. It wasn’t until I was in early adolescence that I realized what the nature of those women’s relationships had been. I was perhaps 13 when, in the course of a serious and thoughtful discussion about homosexuality, I rather innocently asked my mother if she knew any lesbians. She laughed and explained about Jane and Carla, Christine and Rachel. I was floored, and then realized “of course!” The word “lesbian” was used as a laughing pejorative by my male friends, who discussed the graphic details of women’s sexual relationships with each other with a mix of excitement and revulsion. To be able to connect it to these four women whom I had loved and felt safe with was a profound awakening.

The very word “lesbian” to me still conjures up Carla and Jane’s sailboat (that is, when it doesn’t conjure up the residents of a Greek island in the northeastern Aegean.) I’ve got quite a few lesbian friends in my life today — as well as gay male friendships. Indeed, some of the closest relationships I’ve had with women in my adult life have been with lesbians. While the stereotype of an older generation of gay women is of folks who were deeply mistrustful of men (often with damned good reason), I note that a great many younger lesbians today are able to form enduring, affectionate, truly honest and “platonic” friendships with straight men. I don’t think we’re going to get the straight man/lesbian version of “Will and Grace” on TV anytime soon, but we may be on our way.

I’ve wandered from my topic. Really, it isn’t much of a topic at all. It’s just that when I think about same-sex marriage or other homosexual issues, I flash back to these women from my childhood. To me, who they were and how they lived seem utterly normal, healthy, and good. It goes without saying that seeing these four women with each other did not harm or undermine me in any way.

And even now, when I hear words like “unnatural” or “immoral”, I think about real people whom I loved and who I believe loved me. I think about sailboats, Thanksgiving dinners, and chocolate. And when folks start condemning or pathologizing women and men who lived and loved like Jane and Carla, Christine and Rachel, I get very, very, very angry.

Words, words, words.

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Warning: Graphic Language Coming.

I know I’ve been linking to him a lot lately, but Ampersand has a fine post up today on “gendered insults”. It seems that some folks on the blogging left (the famous Atrios the most obvious offender) have been using language that ought to be confined to our brethren on the right: the language of “real men”, “pussies”, “smack downs”. He links to someone I ought to be linking to: Des Femmes, who has these two terrific posts on the subject . Here’s a sample:

Rough language isn’t the fucking issue. Using “pussy” for “coward” is far more than rough language: it’s language that intentionally marks a class of people–women–as weak, inferior, and bad.

These “liberal” people whose posts anger me don’t use raghead, kike, nigger, chink, wop, faggot–words that might apply to men. They use words that specifically target women, and their name-calling is a standard technique of establishing psychological control. If they won’t even pretend to be nonsexist, you can kiss wage equity goodbye.

UPDATE: I was remiss in not including Lauren from Feministe; she’s got a fine post on the subject as well.

Well, amen. Let me add my two or three pennies.

When I talk to my women’s studies classes about the origin and meaning of these gender-based insults, many of them are stunned. (You’d be amazed how few understand that “suck” is derived from “cocksucker”, and thus to say something or someone “sucks” is to use anti-gay/anti-woman language. They are also stunned that “asshole” is also anti-gay, misogynistic speak; “asshole” is invariably only used for men, despite the fact that women also possess this part of the anatomy — it is used to refer to men who allow themselves to be penetrated like women.) What they want to know, of course, is when and how one can continue to use these words without perpetuating gender violence. Do we have to stop swearing altogether, they ask?

People like to cuss because it makes them feel powerful. Even for relatively articulate folks it can be difficult to find “normal” words that give the same degree of satisfaction! In our culture, there can be an almost sensual pleasure in unloosing a torrent of profanity. When I was a child of six, I marched around the house saying “fuck”, “fuck”, “fuck”, “fuck”. I had no idea what it meant, but I knew it was a bad word and it got quite a reaction. I remember that saying “fuck” made me feel big. Clearly, for some folks in the blogosphere, that desire to feel “big” is irrepressible.

So I tell my students that they will have to find their own way through this complex issue. As for me, I don’t cuss much; it wasn’t something any of my role models did when I was a child. I do think, however, that if one is going to use these words, one has to save them for “safe places.” In environments where you can be certain as to how these words will be received, I think it’s sometimes acceptable to cuss with abandon.

But different people have the right to use certain words that others don’t. I often think about this story:

My former pastor at All Saints Pasadena, Scott, was and is an avid basketball player. He played in college, and even now, in his late 40s, plays lots of pick-up games. He could often be found on courts in Northwest Pasadena, where he would frequently be the only white man around. He tells the story of the first time he was playing three on three basketball with five black men, and in the heat of the game they all referred to each other as “niggas.” At first, he was uncomfortable. Though he knew these men as well as they knew each other (a couple were All Saints parishioners!), he knew perfectly well he could never use that word himself. He understood that the “n” word, when used by black men for each other, has an infinitely different set of meanings than when used by a white man. Scott said that words like this were “in-the-family” words — they could be used freely and safely by insiders who would understand the intent of the speaker. As much as his fellow players liked and respected and trusted him, Scott knew that as a white man, he could never be so much a part of “the family” that he could use the “n” word as a term of endearment. Never.

Scott’s realization about the “n” word applies just as equally to gender-based insults. I think intent counts for only a little in life. As Amp said today:

I am saying the question we should be asking ourselves is not “am I personally pure and good of heart?” but “is what I’m doing, regardless of my good intent, contributing to the problem?”

When folks hear us speak, they hear us speak not as disembodied persons but as men and women, white and black and Asian and Latino, gay and straight and bi and rich and poor and so forth. This is evidently true in the blogosphere. Thus any man who uses the word “pussy” for another man opens himself to the charge of misogyny, regardless of his intent. Any white person who uses the “n” word opens himself or herself to the charge of bigotry, regardless again of intent. Can “insiders” use this language? Yes. When feminists publish Bitch Magazine, I honor their goal of redefining that word. But I cannot ever use that word safely.

Of course, followed logically, this means that straight white men will have fewer opportunities to cuss than other folks. Then again, we don’t know what it is to be injured by words that target our heterosexuality, our whiteness, our maleness. Resisting the temptation to use words that others can speak or write is hardly a great sacrifice — rather, it’s a small but significant way of acknowledging our profound privilege.

Six weeks of reaching out

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Our rector’s sermon yesterday at All Saints Pasadena was on friendship in a time of polarization. (If and when it gets posted, I’ll put up a link to it).

We’re 43 days away from the election. On any number of issues — Iraq, gun control, abortion, homosexuality, the respective war records of the two major candidates — it goes without saying that we are a deeply divided nation. But I’m not sure that that is necessarily anything new.

Though my expertise is not in American history, I am well aware that at other times in our past, we have been similarly divided. To imagine that the election battles of our childhoods were somehow more civil and less momentous is false recall. I remember campaigning for Jesse Jackson in 1984 (which made me an easy target of derision in my conservative high school), absolutely convinced that Ronald Reagan represented the greatest threat to civil liberties and world peace that the world had ever known. Back then, of course, the big fear was still nuclear war. We were still months away from the rise of Mikhail Gorbachev; some Democrats seriously suggested that if Reagan were re-elected, nuclear war might result. I — at 17 — was among those who thought that a very real possibility. Nothing we are coping with now seems to be of quite that level of import!

Still, there’s no question that the current political climate can put a strain on real friendship. I’ve been struggling a lot with this issue lately. On a few issues (okay, more than a few), I have passionate political opinions. On any of those issues, I have friends or relatives dear to me who hold the opposite view. With most of them, I’ve chosen to place cordiality ahead of honesty. We simply don’t talk about our political differences much, because we both know the risk it poses to our friendship. With a few, a special few, I’m willing to take that risk. These are folks with whom I share a commitment to civil language even in the face of provocation. We’ve worked out ways to go over our differences together without jeopardizing the relationship. Two things are key here: a self-deprecating sense of humor and a commitment not to take oneself too damn seriously. That doesn’t mean making light of one’s own convictions. But it does put limits on how much certainty one is going to allow oneself.

The problem with the blogosphere is that we are mostly just “cyber-friends.’ Our exchanges are purely verbal, and the words we type appear without the kind of nuance we would put in a conversation. Folks seem to feel free to say things to each other in the blogosphere that they might not say to each other’s faces. It’s also easy to be misunderstood; what was intended as humor is taken seriously and vice-versa. For serious discussion, this medium has serious limitations. (An example of this is this extremely long recent comment thread at Alas, a Blog on abortion. It wanders everywhere, and by the end, gets nasty, despite Ampersand’s pleas to maintain a civil tone. I finally opted out, acknowledging that I wasn’t being helpful myself.)

I don’t think quietism (a withdrawal from public life) is an acceptable solution, tempting as it may be. We all have an obligation to wrestle with these issues. But we need to be mindful of the hearts and minds and souls of those with whom we wrestle. For those of us who call ourselves Christian progressives, we must be mindful of the possibility that Jesus may appear to us in the guise of what we would cheerfully call a troglodytic traditionalist. We can hope and pray that our brothers and sisters in the conservative world will be equally open to the possibility that Christ is coming to them in an equally surprising guise.

So here’s what I’m pledging to do. I’m going to spend the next 43 days working and praying for Democratic victory. I might even throw in some fasting, too. I am also committing to spending time listening to my friends who support the president, and really hearing them. I’m not just talking about redoubling my WASPy politeness; I’m talking about connecting with conservatives. Where I disagree with my progressive friends (usually, only on abortion rights), I’m going to practice that same kind of active listening. In spoken and written word, I pledge not to question the intelligence, character, or good intentions of those who hold other views — despite what will be severe temptation to do so. And I want to challenge my readers:

What will you do in the next 43 days? How will you reach out across this ideological divide to connect with and show friendship to those with whom you disagree? (This can be in cyberspace as well as in “real life.”) Over what issue do you find friendships are strained most easily? (Oddly, for a straight man, I find that I have a hard time with folks who are not willing to accept same-sex marriage; that includes half my family and at least half my friends.) I’m not asking folks to lay aside their righteous anger — I’m asking them to find ways to stop that anger from causing further injury to an already wounded body politic.

Until Monday…

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…I’m experimenting with this cheery design. Does this make the blog easier, or harder to read? What questions, if any, does it raise?

On that note, I’ll be back Monday. If overwhelming opposition arises from my small but loyal (and beloved) readership, I’ll go back to the old design. If not, I’m proudly sticking with this.

Not every straight man can pull off so much pink, but frankly, I think I can.

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