Author Dusty

Mind the Gap

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Last one. The student who suggested this was definitely on the side of “The wage gap is only because men work harder and have better jobs!” That is, not because of discrimination, but because men go into STEM fields more often, and are more aggressive in seeking promotion and wage increases. But then the question becomes, “Why do men go into STEM fields more often? Why are men more aggressive in seeking promotion and wage increases?”

Here’s my answer.

 

QUESTION:  Is there a gender wage gap? What explains the gender wage gap, if there is one?

There are simple answers to these questions, but there’s a problem: these questions come at the topic from the wrong side. 

Oh – the simple answers are, respectively: “Yes;” and, “Sexism.” 

But when we focus on questioning the existence of the gap, when we try to examine the truth value of a simple truth, the only way to have the argument is to keep breaking the wage gap down into smaller and smaller pieces, because that response values the position that the truth is not true: there must be a reason why my opponent questions the existence of the wage gap. Let’s consider his argument. Is there maybe a flaw in how we describe the wage gap? How we measure it? Is it only a rumor, or propaganda? 

So then we look for explanations that could cast doubt on the existence and extent of the wage gap: is the wage gap because women work fewer hours than men? Because women are less likely to go into high-paying careers? Because men have more education? Because women leave work to have children? Because women are less assertive in demanding more money or greater pay increases? Because men are smarter than women? 

Other than the last one (which, again, has a simple answer: #NOPE), each of these can be adjusted for when examining the data; if you look only at hourly wages, it removes the difference in hours worked and resulting total salary; if you look side-by-side at only specific careers, it removes the question about men going into more highly paid careers than women, and so on. 

Two things result from this: one, with each adjustment, the wage gap goes down; but two, the wage gap never disappears. Since it goes down, however, someone with a specific bias in this argument could extrapolate from the adjusted data and say there is no real gap, or it doesn’t matter; or someone could intentionally skew the data or make unfounded claims to support a different argument.

Here’s an example, from the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington thinktank which has a left-center bias, but is highly rated for its truthiness, according to mediabiasfactcheck.com (Source: https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/economic-policy-institute/). The EPI did a meta-study of several wage gap studies, and then adjusted for different factors, and reported this:

 

Models that control for a much larger set of variables—such as occupation, industry, or work hours—are sometimes used to isolate the role of discrimination in setting wages for specific jobs and workers. The notion is that if we can control for these factors, the wage gap will shrink, and what is left can be attributed to discrimination. Think of a man and woman with identical education and years of experience working side-by-side in cubicles but who are paid different wages because of discriminatory pay-setting practices. We also run a model with more of these controls, and find that the wage gap shrinks slightly from the unadjusted measure, from 17.9 percent to 13.5 percent.9 Researchers have used more extensive datasets to examine these differences. For instance, Blau and Kahn (2016) find an unadjusted penalty of 20.7 percent, a partially adjusted penalty of 17.9 percent, and a fully adjusted penalty of 8.4 percent.

Source: https://www.epi.org/publication/what-is-the-gender-pay-gap-and-is-it-real/

 

What matters is that second fact. The wage gap doesn’t disappear. It is always there. And just as an overall analysis of all workers will have some extraneous data and some uncontrolled influences and therefore exaggerate the problem (Regionalisms, for instance. Is it likely true that in some areas women are less educated than men because a strong religious influence makes it taboo to teach women, or because the teachers are traditionally men who do a better job of teaching young men than they do teaching young women, and therefore women have fewer high-paying jobs or are paid less because they have less education? Of course it is. So these factors may make the wage gap seem larger than it might be in some other locale, while not reflecting a “true” national wage gap. This is why statisticians have margins of error and confidence indices. But I don’t even understand the sentence I just wrote, so I just use lots of words and examples.), so too will generic adjustments remove some important data (Such as a part-time worker, who was told straight up by a supervisor, “I’m paying you less because you’re a woman, and for no other reason,” but the data vanishes because we only look at full-time workers. And so on.), so the adjusted rates aren’t any more objectively true than the unadjusted rates. All of it is skewed, all of it is complicated.

But what matters is that second fact. The wage gap doesn’t disappear. It would take some genuine statistical skullduggery to actually make it disappear. Which tells us that we shouldn’t be questioning the existence of the wage gap, we should be using it as evidence. The question that matters isn’t: Does the gender wage gap exist? The question that matters is: Is our society still sexist?

And the answer is yes. As proven by countless individual anecdotal experiences, and by a hundred objective facts. Among them: the wage gap. 

There is a thing my students do when I assign them difficult essays; in fact, it is such a common thing that it shows up on rubrics as a possible reason to lower a grade: they “substitute an easier task.” Rather than analyzing the plot, they summarize the plot. Rather than evaluate the characters, they describe first one character, and then another. This is what we have done in our society: we see that sexism still exists, we see that there is a gender wage gap; and rather than deal with sexism, we substitute the easier task, and pass laws that say women can’t be paid less than men for performing the same job. The first one was passed in this country in 1963: President John Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act, which attempted to “prohibit discrimination on account of sex in the payment of wages by employers.” (Wikipedia.org) 

And that’s when the problem was solved. 

Yeah. Right. Because laws like that are the perfect way to eliminate sexism. 

It’s not that it’s a bad idea to make it illegal to discriminate on the basis of sex; there are those people who openly do it, and they shouldn’t be allowed to. But the real problem is sexism. Because even if the wage gap did disappear, even if we did find the perfect legal remedy for it, our society would still be sexist: and people would suffer in other ways. 

It’s time we dealt with the real problem, instead of substitute an easier task – and then fail to solve that one, too.

This Is Inappropriate

Dusty Leave a comment

(Okay, the title’s a little clickbait-y. This is entirely appropriate. Promise.) This was a sample I wrote from a student’s suggestion of topic.

 

Why should the school care about what students wear? 

I’ve heard students argue about dress codes for as long as I’ve been a teacher. Honestly, they have terrible arguments: but not because they’re wrong. They have terrible arguments because they’re young and inexperienced with argument, and because their emotions often tend to overwhelm their reason – they get busted for wearing clothes they like, told the clothes they like and feel comfortable in are bad or inappropriate or in poor taste (And all too often, the arguments leveled against them by adults are direct insults – “Why would you wear that? Why would you think it was a good idea to wear that to school?”); of course they get upset, and of course that makes it hard to think clearly of logical reasons why the dress code is bad. That’s without even talking about the deeply troubling message of the dress code, especially when it is enforced against young women: your clothing is incorrect because it shows your body, and your body is inappropriate. Is unacceptable. Is wrong.

Enough is enough. I have been asked to take up this argument, and though I don’t necessarily have personal insight into the dress code – I myself was never busted for a dress code violation in school, even when I wore clothes with offensive messages on them, which I did for years; I have never been told as an adult that my clothing is inappropriate (other than when my friend laughed at me for wearing a white suit, saying I looked like Colonel Sanders. She wasn’t wrong, though.) – I do have logical reasons why the dress code is wrong. The first and most important is: because it upsets the students so much that they can’t think straight. 

Because it does that. That is not to say that students being upset is reason to let them break the rules, which I know is the immediate thought of those who believe in dress codes – probably including the words “snowflake” and “safe space” and maybe some aggressively angry references to people in the past being tougher and stronger and whatnot than kids today, and maybe even a muttered “Avocado toast!” – but it is something that should be considered: because this is a school, and these children are our students. The first (ostensible) reason for a dress code is to ensure that students can focus on their education; but if students are so upset by the dress code and the methods of its enforcement that they can’t, as I’ve said, think logically enough to argue against that dress code, can those students be expected to think clearly enough to learn? And if not, what exactly is the dress code supposed to accomplish? Are those reasons enough to ruin a child’s education, even for one day? Enough to harm that child’s self-image, to teach that child that she herself is inappropriate? 

First, let’s examine the idea that a dress code reduces distraction based on sexuality. That is, when girls wear revealing clothing to school, the boys are incapable of thinking about schoolwork, because all they will be capable of doing is ogling the girls in their revealing clothing. (To a far lesser extent the argument goes both ways: but dress codes are overwhelmingly focused, both in the specific restrictions and the enforcement, on female students post-puberty, because of the distraction of male students post-puberty. LGBTQ students are twice as likely to be the victims of sexual assault or harassment, but I don’t hear that in the arguments for the dress code.) I’ve heard the argument made that revealing clothing invites harassment from teenaged boys, as well, from which girls need to be protected. By disallowing the girls from wearing revealing clothing, thus keeping them safe from boys. (Which is why, currently, 58% of high school girls experience some form of sexual harassment [That number varies by study. A Harvard school of education study found that 87% of teenage girls suffer sexual harassment. Check the link.], and over 10% say they have been forced to have sex: because the dress code is working!)

The obvious answer to this problem – and it is so obvious that it has become a meme, an online trope – is to teach the boys not to harass the girls (Again, this goes both ways, as well, but people rarely focus on sexual harassment of male students. Assume I’m including that issue, as well. I am.), and to redirect the boys to their schoolwork, to train them to overcome their urges and focus on the task at hand. If school can’t even do that, what are we even doing? And if we can’t do that because it can’t be done, if teenaged boys are so inevitably focused on sexual thoughts that no power on this Earth could stop them from staring at girls and fantasizing, why would you ever think that a loose polo shirt and ill-fitting dress pants would do the trick? I’m not going to pretend that this argument is reasonable, because I refuse to accept the underlying claim that males cannot possibly overcome our urges, that we are all rapists at heart, barely held in check by terror of punishment; but the same clichés that give this argument its power contradict the idea of a dress code: if teenaged boys are so horny, thinking about sex every seven seconds, willing to do literally anything for the chance at sexual release, if, as movies describe it, “linoleum” or “a stiff breeze” are sufficient to put teenaged boys in the mood – what clothing choice could possibly stop that?

Is it possible that, instead, we should deal with the actual issue head on? Teach students, especially male students, about consent? About rape? About sexual harassment? Teach our students the truth about their pubescent hormones and their bodies?  Stop pretending that sexual urges are bad, but teach them that unwelcome sexual advances are bad, and are not excused by clothing choices? Is it possible that we should teach young people to control themselves, and to redirect their thoughts when they become problematic? Talk about it all honestly, so that we can address actual concerns, answer their questions, rather than try to shamefully cover up? As awkward as those conversations might be, I would have that conversation a thousand times before I would tell a female student to cover up because I can see her breasts.

Once we get past the question of sex-based distraction, the second most common argument for a dress code is even sillier: not because those who create and enforce dress codes have terrible goals, but entirely because the benefits are not worth the costs. The argument is that the dress code reflects a professional work environment; students will not be allowed to wear tank tops and miniskirts (or sagged jeans and wifebeaters) to work. Which I suppose is true (Except for my former student who wore a bikini to work, because she was Miss Teen California; and let’s not pretend that none of our students become models, or strippers, or dancers, or Hooters waitresses – or simply work at home, a trend that has grown enormously as telecommuting and gig work have become more popular; and working at home means you can wear literally nothing to work, every single day. Even if you have to teleconference, nobody sees if you’re not wearing any pants.) but here’s the thing: students aren’t at work. School is not work. You can tell because we don’t pay them. I am a firm believer in the idea that students work as hard at school as most people do at their jobs, and their compensation is the education and the opportunities they gain; but nonetheless, they are not professionals, and should not be held to professional standards. Simply because any professional can quit: and students cannot. Since we compel them to attend, they should be allowed more freedom than a professional would be – and letting them wear what they want seems a reasonable concession.

In terms of preparing them for their future: how much preparation does this habit actually require? Is it hard to figure out how to dress for a professional office? If it is, then kids are in trouble: because it’s not actually how they are required to dress for school. I’ve never been required to wear a uniform polo shirt – and I work in a high school. One with a uniform code: for students. But on the other hand, I never thought it would be okay to wear booty shorts and a mesh crop-top to work, so practice not wearing booty shorts and a mesh crop-top to school doesn’t seem necessary. If someone is confused about the appropriateness of their attire, then what is required is a conversation: not years and years at a school with a dress code. If we’re going to all this effort, and causing all of this discomfort to our students, in order to spare their future supervisors from having one potentially awkward conversation, we need to straighten out our priorities. Because school staff have years of awkward conversations, which can have serious effects on the students’ self-image, in order to spare one adult conversation. It’s simply not worth it. Thinking that it is, is silly.

We can ratchet the silliness up another notch with this next one: uniforms make the student body look and feel like they belong, like they are part of a unified team. It’s difficult to believe that actually works; I’ve worn the same outfit as another person before and somehow never thought of the close bond that was thus created. I’ve never hugged the other people wearing Doc Martens just because what they have on their feet resembles what I have on my feet. (If that worked, wouldn’t we all be bonding over the simple existence of socks? WOO! SOCKS! HUG IT OUT FOR SOCKS!) Maybe it’s because I never played a lot of sports, and it’s the sports uniform that makes a team come together; but I did play some sports, and I did have a team uniform: it didn’t make me feel like I belonged. Probably because the other kids on the team made fun of me. Even though we were all wearing the same uniform. Because I was bad at sports.

Which brings us to another potential reason for a dress code, or more specifically for a uniform code: if students wear uniforms, then none of them can make fun of other students for what they are wearing. There is, I admit, some truth to that; because students do mock each other for their dress, particularly along socioeconomic class lines. But I cannot imagine that identical uniforms will overcome those class distinctions: the rich kids will still have, and will notice and comment on, their better hair and skin and makeup and accessories; even if every kid had a bag over their head, kids would still know who was rich and who was poor, and there would still be conflict.

This is what is wrong with all of the arguments for a dress code, or for a uniform code: they all treat the symptoms, and not the actual problem. If students are being distracted by sexy thoughts about their peers, the issue is the distraction and the sexy thoughts; not what the peers are wearing. If students mock each other for their clothes, the answer is not to change their clothes; it is to change their attitudes and their behavior. If we want students to feel like they are part of a team, that they are in a place where they belong, then by God let us make them feel like they are a part of the school community: let us treat them as equals, not as underlings. If we want them to feel like they belong, then please, let us treat them as if they have a right to be on the school campus, as if this is a place that they can feel comfortable: let them wear whatever they want to wear. 

Then if one of them shows up in a Speedo, we can have that one awkward conversation. 

I was going to do it anyway…

Dusty Leave a comment

Here we go: time for teaching argument again. I had my students write a sample essay, so I could see how well they argue already and what they need to learn; while they were writing, I was writing.

This one was my choice of topic.

 

Is there any value in teaching argument?

The cynical part of me says no, because my students either know how to argue or they don’t, and going through my class doesn’t seem a terribly good way to get them to understand what argument is or how to craft a good argument. I’ve taught argument for twenty years now, and still people make the same mistakes and have the same wrong conceptions of what argument is. They still yell at each other; they still try for insults, mockery, and Gotchas as a way to “win” an argument. They still think that everyone has the right to their opinion, no matter how absurd, unfounded, or even dangerous that opinion may be; and they don’t think that a person should have to support their opinion, because they don’t think people should question each others’ opinions. Mainly because they don’t want me or someone like me to question their opinion, because they can’t support their opinions: they can yell about them.

But if I judged what topics should be taught by how well my students absorb them, then honestly, I wouldn’t teach anything; because no matter what I teach, or how I teach it, some of my students don’t get it. I could give the same description, or a similar one, for any topic I present to my class, any skill I try to instill in them. Sometimes they go out knowing only as much as they knew coming in. 

But that’s not entirely true. First because the topics in English class (and probably every class, but this is the one I know) are not discrete and mutually exclusive; reading narratives and writing essays and analyzing setting and character and especially plot are all skills that will serve the students well if they ever decide to participate in a serious argument. Speaking and listening, and writing and reading, are generally useful skills, and they all encourage growth in each other; and while my students may not all master argument, they do all improve in some way in my class, and any area of improvement is at least somewhat valuable in every other area. (This is also why I don’t like standards based grading, but that’s a different argument.)

Secondly, it is impossible to say what effect I have on my students in the long term. I know for a fact, because I have been told this by former students, that my class, for any of a myriad reasons, had a significant impact on them, often in ways they did not expect and I could not predict, often years after they moved on to another teacher or another school. So do my students learn better argument from me even if they don’t show tangible improvement while we are working on the unit? I hope, and think, yes. 

So my answer would be: yes. There is value in teaching argument. The impacts may be invisible, they may be far in the future; they may even be tangential, as argument skills may be improved by some other part of the class, or other skills may be improved by the work on argument. The important factor is this: argument itself is important. People in our world need to know how to argue. They need to know how to clearly define their subject and their claim, they need to know how to find and build support for their opinions, they need to know how to listen to, analyze, question, and address alternative viewpoints. They need to know that opinions are not inherently equal in value, nor sacrosanct, just because an individual (who is equal in value to all other individuals) holds that opinion, and they need to know how to dislodge someone from a dangerous or wrong opinion, both for their own convenience and for the greater good. They need to know how to recognize when an argument is lost and should be given up. They need to know how to deal with being wrong, and having someone else prove it to you.

We need these skills in our society. I don’t know for sure that our country is falling apart, or rather being blasted apart, by partisan intransigence and rancor; but I know, for sure, that our inability to argue rationally is making everything in our democracy worse: less sure, more troubled, more irrational and therefore dangerous. And when democracy fails, then some form of tyranny is the inevitable result. And we don’t want that: not even if the tyrant is on our side.

Don’t believe me? Then let’s argue about it.

 

All Together Now: Split Up!

Dusty Leave a comment

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World War III might be coming soon. (I mean, probably not, but who can say? Who’s to say what CheetoFace the Kleptocrat will do next?)

But the meme war has already begun.

I had a class ask about the war yesterday, and about the draft, and about everything they worry about or are confused by regarding the whole mess. I helped them as much as I could, which wasn’t enough — because I can’t stop the war. One of my students made a nice point, though: someone said that memes would be turned to propaganda for one side or the other, and another student said, “All propaganda is memes.”

That’s the truth. And the corollary is probably also true: all memes are propaganda.

I have a troubled relationship with memes. I think they’re funny a lot of the time, and I’m impressed by the creativity behind them; but I loathe when they are used as arguments. Memes are inherently reductive, and more often than not, flat out wrong. I used to make it a thing to argue with anyone who used a meme to establish a position, especially a political position, especially on a genuine controversial issue.

Like this bullshit:

Image result for gun control memes

Nothing on this meme is true. The U.S. isn’t third in murder rate; we are 77th. Washington isn’t even in the “top” 30 cities in the US with the highest murder rates, and the other three are not the cities with the highest murder rates; in 2018 the total number of homicides in the U.S. was 16,214, and if we take away the 765 murders in Chicago, the 174 in New Orleans, the 304 in Detroit, and the 160 in Washington D.C., (Admittedly, this is a hell of a lot of murders) the number drops to 14,811. My math gives us a murder rate of 4.49 per 100,000 residents; lower than the U.S. rate of 5.0 murders per 100,000 population, according to the FBI, but according to this chart, that would move us down — exactly nine spaces. To between Niger and Lithuania. I’m not even going to talk about whether those four cities do in fact have the “toughest” gun laws in the United States, though I will note that the states  with the most restrictive gun laws according to this article are Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Connecticut, Maryland, California, Illinois, and New York. Soooo…. I guess Chicago might be in there. Right?

And is that woman really the Second Amendment? She seems too young.

Anyway, I’ve argued against a lot of memes over the years. It’s slowed down a bit: I stopped trying to argue with everyone and everything I disagree with, and the memes have increased exponentially in number, and increased (though not exponentially) in amusement.

But now we get to the current meme war.

Currently, the memes are showing up (from what I have seen, though my experience is certainly not comprehensive)  in two main forms: World War III is coming, and that’s fucked up and I’m scared, and therefore I’m going to use black humor to deflect from my fear. That looks like this:

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I don’t have anything to say about those memes other than: I’m sorry. I’m sorry that my generation and the ones before mine sunk this country, and this world, into this nightmare of eternal war, and now the current generations have to pay for it. I’m sorry for all that my country has done to harm other countries. I do recognize that there have been some good outcomes of American military intervention; but those outcomes do not come anywhere close to making up for the damage we have done. Not even close.

But that’s not what I wanted to write about here. I’m a pacifist, I’m anti-war; my position on American wars is not surprising.

No: what I wanted to talk about is the other class of memes. Memes like this:

Image may contain: possible text that says 'Pay attention to who gets upset when a terrorist leader is killed. PAY CLOSE ATTENTION.'

And this:

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And this lil beauty:

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So look. People can be in favor of war with Iran. I don’t agree, but they have the right to believe that it is the right thing; there’s at least some kind of argument in support of that, so it’s not insane to think it. Iran certainly does and has done terrible things, and maybe war would stop that.

But first, we here in this country need to not act as though we have the moral high ground: we do not.

The truth is that Soleimani was not all that different from any of about five dozen current and former American politicians and bureaucrats — if anything, he was considerably more restrained about the use of force. Yes, he was involved in a lot of bloody wars — but so was every American president since 2000, and besides half the wars he fought in were started or fueled by the United States. It’s just another instance of America’s gigantic hypocrisy when it comes to war.

— America is guilty of everything we accuse Iran of doing

Second, whether you are for war with Iran (or war in general) or not, your position does not in any way have any implications about your citizenship, your rights, or how you feel about this country. You can love America and hate the war; you can hate America and love the war; and everything else in between — and the one does not at all imply the other.

I’m not sure how to explain or argue for that idea other than just to state it. To state clearly that one of the foundations of this country is freedom of thought and opinion, and the freedom of speech that allows us to express those opinions in a public forum. There is not any requirement to support the government, the war effort, or even the troops; there are reasons not to support all of those institutions, and therefore someone could reasonably have that opinion, and still think the U.S. is a good country and want to be a part of it. And of course, an American can think that the U.S. is a terrible country, and hate every little thing about it — and still be an American citizen. No less of an American citizen than the most flag-kissin’, woo-hootin’, ‘Murrican-chaps-wearin’ yahoo out there. And if you don’t understand that, the problem is you, not the person who disagrees with the rising tensions in the Middle East. Not someone who sympathizes with Soleimani: because you can think a man is a bad man, and still not want him dead, or be sad that he died — and again, even if you think Iran is a fine country and Soleimani was an Iranian patriot hero, you will still be an American citizen. Because citizenship, moral or legal, is not predicated on one’s opinions. Ever. Actions can change one’s legal or moral right to citizenship; if you try to harm America, one can argue that you lose some right to call yourself an American (Though personally I would say you need to actively alter your legal status, intentionally [And thus President Obama’s killing of Anwar Al-Awlaki was murder and not an act of war] ; and to me, morality has nothing whatsoever to do with citizenship: good Americans and bad Americans are Americans alike.), but saying you want to harm America is only words, only an opinion. It would be far more harmful to America to try to strip someone’s citizenship for an opinion or a statement thereof, because that is a violation of that foundational freedom of opinion and of speech.

And refusing to support a war, a war that will most certainly harm America — and thus should be opposed by those who want to do what is right for this country — is in no way something that changes one’s right to be an American. Doesn’t even make you a bad American. Though I guess someone could have the right to flip me off for that opinion, so I shouldn’t put that last meme into my display of objectionable memes. (Though also, isn’t that desecration of the flag? Just sayin’.)

It’s bad enough that we have to deal with jingoist nationalists trying to murder people around the world. Please don’t also make me have to defend my right to inclusion in my own native country. Please understand the country you claim to love, at least as well as it’s understood by those you say don’t love it enough.

Try to understand the war as well as this guy: (The first Tweet makes the point, but go read the whole thread.)

I do love my country. I do. I hate war. And so I refuse to allow those two things to be seen as the same thing. Even by my countrymen: whose right to be wrong I will defend to my last breath. So please do the same for me.

Understand that we can disagree, but when we fight each other over our disagreements, when our different opinions make you consider me inhuman, or undeserving of inclusion in your group, then we become divided in a way that is incredibly difficult to put back together. And that division hurts us. Not the difference in our opinions: if I think stopping the war is best for America, and you think fighting the war is best for America, then we disagree, but we are not divided: we want the same thing. We stand on common ground. We can discuss it, because we can both start our arguments with, “I want what’s best for our country, just like you do, but…”

But if you think I am not deserving of the title “American” because I don’t share your opinion, then we can’t even talk: I say, “I want what’s best for America,” and you say, “No you don’t, you’re not even a real American.” Now we are arguing about me, not about our country and how to help it.

That is what benefits the enemies of this country, and what harms this country: if we cannot see each other as equals, who happen to disagree.

There’s been far too much of that lately. We should stop doing it. All of us. Right now. Especially as we consider going to war, again. Because if we have to fight each other, we can’t also fight our enemies — and please understand that, although I do not want war, and I do not want violence, I do want to fight my country’s enemies. Enemies like ignorance, and bigotry, and dehumanizing hatred. That is what I will fight. That is what I do my utmost to protect my country, and my countrymen, from.

Because I love my country, and I want what’s best for us all. All of us. That’s what matters to me.

Remember what matters most to you.

Remember: united we stand.

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I HAVE FOUND THE PERFECT RUBRIC!

Dusty Leave a comment

I don’t want to ask you to go to Twitter — but if you could go there and Like and maybe Retweet this, that would be swell.

Because this? This is the best thing in education. Ever.

 

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I’m now officially done with grading, forever. Thank you, Typical EduCelebrity!

Invisible People

Dusty Leave a comment

I don’t think about trans people.

That’s a confession, and it’s not a comfortable one. Because I should think about trans people; I should consider them, and try to understand them; and because I want to be an ally, I should do better at remembering them and their needs when I write about topics that touch on gender.

I’m hoping that writing this now, and posting it, will help me to keep trans people in my thoughts, will remind me to look over what I write about gender and sexism and men and women with a thoughtful eye; because shame is a powerful motivator. Considering what trans people have to go through in our society, I think the least I can do is feel shame about my past behavior and mindset.

I don’t have too much shame: I’ve never mocked a cis male for being feminine or a cis female for being masculine (For those of you who do not know — and I’m adding this because I was confused when I first encountered the term — “cis” is short for “cissexual” or “cisgender,” and it means someone whose gender identity matches the sex they were assigned at birth. It’s the opposite of transsexual or transgender. Read this.), never used “sissy” or “tomboy” as any kind of insult, never confused transvestites for transsexuals — never really thought that men in drag were funny, and so I didn’t laugh at bros in high school when they put on wigs and skirts and fake breasts for Halloween or pep rallies. I have never intentionally misused pronouns, nor thought that trans people were perverts, nor argued that anyone should use any specific bathroom (My ideal bathroom situation is and always has been single-occupancy bathrooms. I do not understand why it has to be one room with many people sharing a private function, when it could be a row of cubicles, each with their own toilet and sink and mirror and locking door.). I feel shame because I want two things: I want to give people who are transgender the respect they deserve as my fellow human beings, and because they are also an oppressed minority, I want to be an ally and fight for their equal rights and just treatment. I am always willing to do the second one, though I will also confess I am sometimes awkward or uncomfortable in the actual process of it; but because I don’t do the first well enough, I’m not good enough at the second.

Let me explain.

I know transgender people. Of course I do: so do you. Estimates of trans prevalence vary wildly, mostly because of the stigma attached to being trans, which keeps people from being open about who they are, and complicates the process of data collection as well; but this study shows that somewhere around 1 in 11,000 people seek either surgical or hormonal therapy; in surveys of self-assessed gender identity, the prevalence of transgender was around 1 in 300. That’s a huge difference, and just looking at the Wikipedia page shows that the prevalence of trans people has varied wildly over time and in different places — and Wikipedia only reports a half-dozen surveys in four countries. My point is both that being transgender is not uncommon, and also that our society has made it so complicated that everything about being trans is incredibly opaque: who is trans, what it means to be trans, how we should talk about (or if we should talk about) gender identity — everything.

The solution to this, of course, is to talk about it. And while there’s obviously a certain irony and disingenuousness in me, as a straight white cis male, opening up the conversation (Because what the fuck do I know about being trans?), it’s equally obvious that I risk nothing in so doing: I’m not going to be judged, not going to suffer bigotry, not going to lose my job or friends or family, or my life, by talking about this; and that means it is incumbent on me to do it, on whatever scale and with whatever platform I have available to use for that conversation. So here we are.

Why is it incumbent on me? Why is this any of my business? Because this is my world, this is my society, as much as it is anyone else’s; and the purpose of society is to enable the members of that society to live in the world. That’s why people are social animals: because grouping together and cooperating improves our survival. We need other people, not only to survive, but also for our well-being as individuals. Society enables us to do that, to cooperate with and socialize with other people, and for it to work, all of us need to contribute to that, to help accomplish that purpose. Think of it like this: when someone doesn’t fit into society, there is friction; that friction affects not just the person who doesn’t fit, but everyone they come into contact with — and that means it is in all of our best interests to try to smooth the way for everyone in our society, to reduce the friction. For everyone. Since the friction goes both ways, the solution, the conversation, can start from either side, and it’s easier for it to start with me; thus, for society’s sake, as well as for my own, I should be the one to do it.

And, of course, because I have empathy, and because trans people have to struggle and suffer; and I would like to make that struggle easier and that suffering less, just because they are people. That’s enough reason to try. Even if it is awkward.

I don’t want to come off as a savior: I do not think I have very much to contribute to this discussion. I don’t know very much. But as a teacher, my job is (ideally) just to start conversations; I see my job as a blogger the same way. When I can get a group of students to read a story and start talking about it, I don’t need to know very much about the story: the students, in talking about it, will find their way to the best answer they could possibly have — one they create themselves. My job then is only to make sure that their answer comes from the story, from the source, and not from something someone made up or brought from outside; and to ensure that everyone has a chance to offer their input and hear everyone else’s ideas.  I see this the same way, and so I’m going to treat this conversation the same way I treat a subject in my class: I will talk about what I know, what little that is, and try to express the value and importance of the topic; and then I will open it up to discussion. (I recognize that this blog is not a terribly great place to discuss anything, as the comment function is awkward; I’m fine with the conversation continuing between people away from this website, or even just inside someone’s head. But if you have anything you want to say here, you are invited to do so.)

So here’s what I know. I know that being transgender (And also being genderqueer and genderfluid, which are terms that attempt to encapsulate the middle ground in between cis and trans) in today’s society is hard. It’s hard to get people to treat you the way you wish to be treated. It’s hard to get people to understand who you are and the way you wish to be treated, not least because you have to be the one to explain, over and over and over again, to literally every person you interact with, how you want to be treated. Imagine that: imagine if every single time you introduced yourself, the other person disagreed with you. Thought you were wrong. Was confused and wanted an explanation, or even an argument. “Why do you have a boy’s name? You’re a girl.” “No, I’m trans.” Imagine having that or a similar exchange every single time you met someone. Imagine having to justify something as simple as your name. To justify it: imagine someone who just met you telling you your name is wrong. It may be hard to imagine this — though people who use nicknames or names other than their legal names have some inkling of it — because most of us don’t have to argue for the way we want to be treated in terms of common courtesy; I don’t have to fight to get people to call me what I want to be called.

Imagine if, every time you met someone or talked to them, they started thinking about your genitalia. You know? You tell them that your name is X, when they think your name should be Y because of your voice or your size or your body shape, and they frown and look down at your pelvis, or your chest. And they look hard. And they think about it. Maybe they ask you about it. Even if they’re trying to be understanding, and they ask you about what you have, or what your plans are for what you have. You know how many people have asked me directly about my genitalia? As if they have a right to know the answer? As if this is a conversation that anyone can have in casual polite company? You know how many: almost certainly the same number of people who have asked you about yours. Zero.

And when there’s stigma attached, all of this is infinitely worse. Like the bullshit about gender identity and perverts in bathrooms. Look: being transgender is hard. It’s dangerous. People judge and hate and mistreat and attack you for it. The idea that someone would claim to be transgender for the express purpose of finding victims to rape or molest is so far beyond absurd that it should not even have a place in this conversation. Why does anyone even think this? Do you imagine it’s hard for rapists to find victims? Do you think that child molesters can’t find children to molest? Do you think that grown adult men need to go into women’s restrooms in order to rape or molest someone? Are you insane? Women get raped and children get molested every day, and not by trans people in bathrooms.

But because people still talk about being transgender like it’s a pathway to easier sexual assault, it makes it that much harder to be trans, because now not only do you have to argue for your name and your basic courtesy, you have to convince people that you’re not a rapist or a child molester. Imagine having to basically announce, out loud, that you are not a rapist every time you walk into a public bathroom. White cis men like me get all pissy when someone accuses us of being rapists, claiming that the mere accusation smears all men (#NotAllMen); but first, not only do we not have to prove to people around us that we aren’t rapists on a regular basis — we are also the freaking rapists. Straight cis men are far more likely to be sexual predators than are trans people. Orders of magnitude more likely. Yet we can walk into public restrooms without people raising an eyebrow.

I’m not even going to talk about the jokes and memes, generally from conservatives, about people “choosing” to “identify” as absurd things in order to get preferential treatment. All I’m going to say is: try it. You think people would identify as trans, or as anything other than what people see them as, just to receive special treatment? Try it. Try something easy: walk into your church and identify as Muslim, or atheist. Walk into your sports bar and claim to like a different team, or even just a different sport. Tell your family you’re going to change your name. See how much special treatment you get. See how freaking easy it is to disagree with what society thinks you should be. See what it’s like to have to argue just to be yourself.

That’s my experience. I know someone who is both transgender, and gay; his love life is therefore complicated. And I thought, when I learned this about him, “Man, it would be so much easier for him if he could just give up being trans, because then he (as a cis woman, which he is not) would have a much easier time finding guys to date.” And of course it would be easier. He wouldn’t have to convince everyone to use the name and pronouns he prefers; they’d just do it, just act as if his name is a given, an assumed truth, rather than a source of argument. He wouldn’t get strange looks, and awkward questions, and accusations and arguments, whenever he wants to use a restroom. He wouldn’t have to dread introducing himself  — or hearing his name called on the roll at school, remember that? Remember the kid with the unpronounceable name, who had to either deal with the substitute/first day teacher struggling with their name, or had to predict where in the roll their name would appear and just shout out “Present!” when the teacher frowned and squinted at the list? Imagine the shit you would get if your name was easy to pronounce, but was associated with a different gender? Or if your name on the roll, on your driver’s license, on your legal documentation, was not the name you wanted to use, and the name you wanted to use would start an argument? He has conservative family members, too, who give him unending shit about his gender identity, and he would be able to dispose of all of that, if he were cis. And sure, if it matters, he would be able to date more guys, because there are more straight men than homosexual men, and so the pool would be larger if he were a straight cis woman.

And that is what showed me that I’m an idiot, and so is everyone else who thinks that being trans is a choice. There is no situation where it would be easier to be transgender. None. There is nothing about being transgender that is easy.

That’s how you know it isn’t a choice.

And that’s why we, as a society, need to recognize and ease the struggle that transgender people deal with every day. Because they, as people, have every single struggle that all people already have (Money/bills/job/housing/health/family/age/fulfillment/trauma), and they have another one, a constant, trying, sometimes brutal fight with themselves, with the world, with everything. And they have no easy choice in the matter: they can deny who they are, or they can fight to have everyone else stop denying who they are. Neither one is easy, and neither one is harmless.

Think about that.

Now discuss.

The Year Of Women (Which Should Be Every Year)

Dusty Leave a comment

I was having an argument on Twitter the other night.

Okay. It was New Year’s Eve. Okay? That’s right. I spent part of my Greatest Party Night of the Year arguing with trollbots on the biggest dumpster fire in all of social media.

Maybe your New Year’s resolution should be to STOP JUDGING ME!

(I’m probably being a little sensitive. It’s fine. Everything’s fine.)

The argument was mainly about how there should be more women in politics; it started with this Tweet:

I went through this thread, started by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand saying that 2020 should see more women elected into office, and I replied to every shmuck I saw who felt the need to say, “Voting for women just because they’re women? That’s sexist! You should support the best candidate whoever it is.”

Like this dude:

And this one:

And, of course, from the Trump Camp:

Each of these replies led to a mini-argument, because both I and my interlocutors are men: we feel the need to always get the last word. (See, that was sexist. Trying to offer helpful illustrations here.) Several of these little tiffs followed the same course. I replied:

Let me be clear about this, so that if anyone reading this blog finds themselves in a similar pit full of vipers, you have something handy to throw at them (Sorry it’s not a brick.). The argument that every single attempt to focus on sex is by definition sexism — like this, which I got several times:

— is a false equivalency. Sexism is not “by definition” any attempt to consider sex as a fact, and as an important fact; sexism is an attempt to oppress or denigrate someone on the basis of sex. When you’re using sex as an important consideration in how you relate to or deal with a person, that is only sexist if your consideration does harm and if your consideration is based on stereotyping or prejudice. If I were considering whether I wanted to date a person, I would consider their sex as an important factor in their dateability as I am a heterosexual male and thus would prefer to date women (A much more important factor is that I am ecstatically and joyfully married to the greatest woman alive, but this is just a f’rinstance); this is not a sexist consideration. If I were an OBGYN, I would certainly consider sex as an important factor in determining which patient I would take on, and how to treat them; this also is not a sexist consideration, even if it means I refuse to treat a man solely on the basis of his sex.

It’s not sexist because it isn’t doing harm: my refusing to date a man doesn’t hurt him (Believe me: he’s better off. I am not a catch. Look at how I spent New Year’s.), and an OBGYN refusing to take on a male patient is a recognition of specialized knowledge on the part of the doctor, and a lack of need of that knowledge on the part of the patient; that would be saving harm, or at least inefficiency as the OBGYN wastes their valuable time trying to help a patient who could just as easily be treated by a general practitioner, thus taking time away from someone who could only be treated by that OBGYN. Now, if it was a medical emergency and the OBGYN was the only doctor available, then it would be more questionable if the doctor refused to treat the man, but it would depend on what the reason was. If it was prejudice or stereotyping– that is, that doctor has already made a determination of the worth or character of this man because he is a man (pre-judging him), or if the doctor refuses because this man is like all other men and all men are scum because of their mannishness (stereotyping) —  and the refusal to treat did harm, then that would be sexist.

Let me also note here that transgendered people negate this example I’m giving here: because there are trans men who do, in fact, need the specialized services of an OBGYN since they are men with uteruses; and of course there are many women who have no particular need for an OBGYN because they are women without uteruses (There are other reasons to see an OBGYN. Forgive my reductionism; I think it necessary.). I do not mean to ignore trans people, who should not be simply considered an addendum, an asterisk, a qualification to the usual or norm or standard; but on the other hand, it is impossible to have a discussion of sexism in this society without talking about men and women, and since I’m advocating for building equity, I can’t talk about moving away from gender entirely, which would also solve this problem. I’m going to write a full post about trans people tomorrow, but I want to finish the point I’m making now, today.

I realize I’m overexplaining; it’s not because I think my readers — who, I have no doubt, are people of taste and discrimination and brilliant erudition — need to be taught the meaning of prejudice or stereotyping, or even sexism; it’s because these words are being misused, usually intentionally, and I think the best way to combat that is with absolute pedantic clarity: i.e., overexplaining. Mansplaining. Which, when you do it to fellow men, is just kinda funny.

Which is what I did with my fellow Twits.

All right, I was also sarcastic there with the “more than one thought at a time” comment. But at this point I was realizing that I was arguing with at least a couple of bots or trolls, and ideally those shouldn’t be engaged with — certainly not in an incendiary way, as that will only piss off the people who agree with the bot’s statements, and I believe quite strongly that, while we should stand up for what is right and argue our points clearly, we also should not try to anger our opponents; good argument leads more often to compromise, but angry diatriabes lead to division and more conflict. So I shouldn’t have said this, but hey, I’m on Twitter too: so I’m either trash or fire. Or both.

The main point is my last sentence there. Seeking equity is not sexist. I typed that half a dozen times in response to half a dozen accusations of sexism. (I would have typed out this entire blog, instead, but there’s a 280 character limit. Sometimes I find Twitter very frustrating. But I consider it my penance: mortification of the verbosity.) That’s the real point I want to make here.

Here’s the deal: when men have created a situation where we inherently, by nature of our sex, have an easier time running for and winning elected office — and we have done that, starting most clearly in this country with a Constitution which did not recognize a woman’s right to vote or hold office but only white men’s — then the best way to combat that is to write laws that specifically include women as equal to men, and eliminate laws that make women unequal to men. In both cases, women will benefit more than men, because in the first case women will gain more than men will, and in the second, men will lose a perquisite they have had up until now. But this is not harming men: it is taking away something we have no right to, unequal privileges, in order to create equity, and justice. It is returning what was stolen. It is balancing the scales.

And while it is entirely true that male elected officials are capable of doing that, and historically some have done so, this is also true:

Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.

–Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”

That means the best way to address the institutional inequalities and injustices in our society is not to beg those in power to do the right thing; it is to empower those who have something to gain from doing the right thing. That way we all gain justice and equality, and, quite simply, a better society.

And that means electing more women.

Let’s make it happen in 2020.

 

I mean, it’s kinda new.

Dusty Leave a comment

New Year, New Me. Right?

Not really, though.

Nothing much changed for me in 2019. I’m still married to the same perfect woman, who still enchants me with every breath and every glance; I’m still pet-parent to the same two dogs, the same tortoise, and the same (occasionally obnoxious) cockatiel; I’m still teaching at the same school — which means I have many of the same students — and still writing, still working on the same time-traveling Irish pirate story, still not writing enough and still mad at myself about it.

I’m still upset about the state of the world, still ambivalent about what I should be doing about it beyond what I already do.

And of course, I still hate Trump.

There are some changes. My wife has made big changes, which of course affect me, mainly by making me proud: I am enormously, heart-shakingly proud of her strength, I am proud of her incredible talent and imagination, I am proud of the world that it has continued to become more aware of how amazing my wife is — and it is finally starting to reward her for her never-ceasing efforts.

We moved into a new house, which is smaller and cheaper than the last; it’s been nice to ease the financial burden, and it’s showed us how much room we actually need (More than this place, less than the last), and that, after seven residences in the last six years, we would really like to set down roots and own a home again. Though I am wary of the potential coming economic crash: last time, we bought a house just before the economy burst into flames; I’d like to be a little more careful and intentional this time. So maybe that’s new.

I did manage to sell my books, though still not to a publisher nor an agent; I sold them directly, at the Tucson Festival of Books. Not the vision of authorial success I once had, but nonetheless: standing behind a table and talking to people about my book, and watching them agree to buy it and hand over money, was an extraordinary feeling, one I hope to repeat this year. And I did start sending out queries again, because my wife has shown me, as she always does, that artists don’t give up. Ever.

I was a better friend this past year than I have been in a long time; I grew closer to the people whose company I enjoy and whose support I rely on, and I’m happy about that.

And, of course, I’m one year closer to dying, whenever that may happen; but I still don’t care. Death comes for all of us, and I see no reason to spend any time watching it come. I hope, and I try to behave so that I will welcome it when it comes and pass away with no regrets; but if that doesn’t happen, if it comes too quickly or I have done the wrong things, still I would rather have lived than not have lived at all; still I am happy and grateful for the time I have had, the memories I have created (and even the ones I have forgotten), the people I have known, and the deeds I have done.

 

I don’t have wisdom to share: if anything, this year has taught me more than most years about how naive and ignorant I still am. I am writing this on a whim, and trying to decide if I should continue whimming on this blog for this coming year. I dunno. It’s good for me to write, but I have to write the third book in my pirate trilogy, and I want to get it done ASAP, because I have several more ideas I want to pursue — but first, I have to finish a story, something I still struggle with. I have no idea if this blog is good for people to read. I  hope so. I hope this is a good thing. I intend to continue doing the same good things into this next year, hopefully make some good changes, hopefully continue to learn and grow.

One thing is for damn sure: I’m going to put in time and effort to make sure that Donald Trump is voted out of office in November. So I warn you now, this blog will likely become much more political over the coming eleven months. It will probably get agitating to those who read this regularly, but I don’t care (No, I do care: and I’m sorry. But also, I’m going to do it anyway.). We all need to be agitated, because the alternative is complacent: and that’s how we got into this mess in the first place.

 

I wish you all, and myself, a wonderful new year, full of hopes and fulfillments. Let’s make this one a good one.

All My Life

Dusty 1 Comment

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Twenty-five years ago, I went out for dinner with this woman for the first time.

We had sushi, at Pink Godzilla in Capitola. She paid (Her grandmother had sent her money to have fun with, and she apparently thought I was fun.), and she drove (In a 1964 VW bug, painted bright purple). And she took my heart.

She’s had it ever since. She will have it for all of my life.

I love you, Toni, my wife, my inspiration, my everything. Forever.

Book Review: GlowGems for Profit

Dusty Leave a comment

GlowGems for Profit

by Bruce Davis

 

Okay, it’s kind of a funky title. Sounds like one of those get-rich-quick seminars you see signs for on the side of the road. Thing is, there’s a pun in there that you don’t recognize: the Profit is actually the name of the spaceship that carries our hero through the solar system; Davis is creating a series of adventures about the Profit and her crew and this is only the first – all of them (presumably) will have Profit in the title. So that’s part of the reason: and also, of course, the question of profit is one that runs through the book. The idea of a get-rich-quick scheme, especially one that isn’t really what it seems, is exactly what this book is about, and greed warring with caution is another theme that runs through the book.

And this book runs. That’s the first thing you should know: this is action from start to finish. Davis spends the first two chapters giving us enough exposition to understand who these characters are – and then starting with Chapter Three, the guns start blazing and the blood starts flowing, and it doesn’t really stop until the end. It’s got everything: hand to hand combat, gun battles, chase scenes, ship-to-ship space combat, locked door murder mysteries, betrayal, secrets – everything; and all of it is wonderfully well-done. I don’t know if it was hard to put down because I never really tried: I didn’t want to put it down, I wanted to keep reading, wanted to get to the next scene, the next fight, the next sticky situation, to see how the heroes could fight their way out of it.

That’s the next thing you should know: these are great heroes. Davis has created a fantastic hard-boiled sci-fi hero in Zack Mbele. He’s got a complicated past, remarkable abilities, good friends for whom he has fierce loyalty, a deep cynicism and an inability to trust strangers, and a lone wolf streak a mile wide: he’s Sam Spade and Harry Dresden and Simon Green’s John Taylor and all the rest of those kinds of guys. But he’s also thoroughly himself: I had no feeling at all that this was an imitation of any other author’s work; this world and this hero are entirely original.

In addition to the main character (I admit I didn’t like the other characters as much, apart from Deuce, who’s awesome – but then, I’m not supposed to.) and the action-packed plot, the intricacies of both the world Davis built and the intrigues that the characters get involved with were remarkable. Mbele is a disillusioned former revolutionary, and the way his past keeps rearing its head no matter how hard he tries to escape it was fascinating. And the characters and their complex, difficult motivations, all of them deciphered over the course of the novel by Mbele’s dogged investigating, was perfectly human and completely fascinating to me. You have no idea who’s telling the truth or why people are doing what they’re doing until Zack knows the truth, and you learn it along with him – it was excellent.

This was great stuff, an excellent sci-fi thriller/mystery – the sci-fi, too, by the way, was well done, just enough advanced tech to make the story complex and interesting, not so much that you get confused – and I highly recommend it.