Bummer

I am disappointed with Quirk Classics' next choice for a book. Is that based on a classic? I thought Dawn of the Dead was a movie. (Does anyone know if it was a book first?)

Also, I wish they wouldn't return to Pride and Prejudice. They knocked the first one out of the park. This will only be a let down considering it's not even based on Austen's work.

I guess Wuthering Heights and Vampires was too much to hope for. It would probably be too easy. Doesn't Heathcliff dig up Cathy's coffin at one point? Haha. (Or was that only in the movie version I watched? Hmm...)

Depressing

What happens when the only thing that gives you self-confidence is taken away?

I guess I'll find out.

STFU Atheists?

I enjoy this website, STFU Believers. It's really annoying to see people shove their religion and spirituality in your face(book) on a daily basis. However, maybe there should also be a STFU Atheists, too. I don't really appreciate someone shoving their lack of religion in my face all the time, either.

I get it. You don't believe in God and you think everyone who does is not as enlightened as you. I don't need constant reminders, and you are not going to change anyone's opinion through Facebook. In my view, this is as equally annoying as the super-enthusiastic Christians.

I know I write a lot about Facebook, but I find it so fascinating. Recently I have been making a concerted effort to scale back on what I post. I got pretty carried away during the last presidential election, and now I look back and think, "What was I doing? Did I really think I was going to change anyone's mind?" I'm sure a good part of it is motivated by a desire for attention, but generally I am not someone who craves attention.

Sites like STFU Parents and STFU Marrieds have really helped me think twice about what I put out there. But Facebook is a fickle mistress, man. Recently STFU Parents featured a submission from a woman who complained about her husband not doing chores around the house. And oh my God, did they rip her a new one in the comments. I personally thought the reaction was kind of extreme. It is really easy to use Facebook as a sounding board for your gripes. And if you do the opposite and talk about how great your life is, etc, that pisses people off and they'll attack you for that, too.

So I've taken to trying to tow the line between those extremes. No major complaining and no "my life is awesome." Just stupid/goofy or informative updates. Occasionally I'll let my political opinions be known, but not as much as I did before. It's so easy to get carried away on Facebook, you have to be careful. I've caught myself being way too revealing about my various neuroses and then I wish I could take it back. But you can't! Everything you put on the Internet is there forever! (I had a professor in law school who liked to talk about how Google stored everything on servers in some giant warehouse.) I'm screwed if I ever run for president and someone accesses the archives of my Facebook and this blog.

Language

I've been impressed with my foreign classmates from the start because there is no way I could hack it in an academic program taught in my non-native language. (Of course, I'm a dumb American who can barely speak English, let alone a foreign language.)

But I really feel for them now that we are studying trademarks. How hard must it be to learn a very language-oriented area of law in a non-native language! Also, trademarks is heavily influenced by American culture and advertising. I really hope they are able to stay afloat during this section of the class. But I'm sure they will prove to be more than capable.

Isn't it funny how we often associate broken or heavily accented English with a lack of intelligence? It is the one thing I dislike most about being American. We are so isolated here in North America. Our neighbors to the north primarily speak English (save in Quebec), and our neighbors to the south are so separated by culture and wealth that cross-language facilitation is impeded. (Although most Americans by far know more Spanish than any other foreign language, I'd guess.) I really envy the Europeans for that. When I was in France this summer, I was amazed by how many non-French people there were, speaking their language. Living in such close proximity (geographically, economically, and socially) to other languages has to make it easier to pick up a second language.

Creepy or Not Creepy?

So there is this guy in one of my non-law school classes. He's older (50s), in a different LL.M program, and appears to be a nice and pleasant guy.

Today I was talking to him and he mentioned his "bride." Now, he has made these references before but I always thought I had misheard him. Nope, he's saying bride, which I'm assuming means his wife.

I'm probably overreacting, but I think that is so weird! And a little creepy. To me, a bride is something that exists between engagement and wedding (basically limited to a wedding and wedding planning). Once you're married, she's your WIFE. When he keeps saying "bride" it conjures up images of a mail-older bride, some young, desperate girl from eastern Europe or southeast Asia. That's why I say it is kind of creepy.

Even if it's not creepy per se, I'm right about it being weird though, right?

More Ramblings About Gender

I was reading an article on People.com about Tim McGraw. In case you’re not familiar with Tim McGraw, he and his wife Faith Hill have three daughters. In this article McGraw said something about how fathering girls is a tough a job because there “so much that can go wrong.” (I might be paraphrasing a bit, I can’t remember the exact quote, but you get the picture.)

So this morning I was talking with a male classmate (who happens to be the father of a little girl) about another topic. I told him how I missed my bus stop last night because I was looking at something on my iPhone, etc. He mentioned how the firm he worked for represented a college kid who was charged when he stole an iPhone from someone at a bus stop. Apparently this kid was a scholarship student, too. I said something along the lines of, “I just don’t understand why boys seem to do those punkish things more than girls. What is it about boys that would cause them to risk a scholarship?” etc. My classmate said something about a father’s influence, etc. I talked about all the punk-ass kids we represented at my old job. (Mostly boys/men.)

So that led me to bring up the Tim McGraw article because, to me, it seems totally backwards. So much can go wrong with girls? I think there is much more that can go wrong with boys, as most of the criminals and general asshats I’ve encountered have been male. The numbers are not even close. My classmate totally disagreed. He said that with boys you can say, “Don’t do this or I’ll take your car away,” basically implying that it is a lot easier to father boys. But with girls, he said, there’s so much more to worry about because as a father you know how boys think. He actually said that he’d rather deal with four delinquent sons than one beautiful, attractive daughter. He held his ground on that opinion, even after I argued that the associated harms are not anywhere on the same scale, i.e., sex with a boy versus prison time and the lifelong stigma of a criminal conviction.

I’m still flabbergasted by that, but it got me thinking. And let me just put in a disclaimer here that everything I say from here on out are just my own thoughts. I don’t necessarily believe what I’m positing, but I am considering it.

Could it be that girls turn out better (in the criminal sense) because they are viewed by their fathers as the ones to watch out for merely because of societal views about female purity? To put it differently, do girls turn out better because their fathers put more effort into parenting them based on the mistaken notion that it’s worse for a daughter to have sex than for a son to be arrested? If that’s the case, then it’s really no surprise that boys do get into more trouble because, apparently, their fathers think they don’t have to put much effort into parenting them.

I know that I’m basing this on one person’s opinion, but I bet my classmate is not alone in his thinking. But it just seems so completely, ridiculously ass-backwards to me. In my experience as a woman and a criminal defense attorney, a son’s criminality is exponentially more disruptive to a family than a daughter’s sexual experience. A criminal record will haunt you a hell of a lot more than a bad boyfriend will.

Get With The Program SNL

Saturday Night Live really needs to just hire a black actress already. I love Kenan Thompson, I do. I think he’s hilarious. But it’s just downright wrong that he impersonates so many black female celebrities. This weekend he did Whoopi Goldberg for a spoof of “The View” and then Jennifer Hudson. Now, the Whoopi impersonation I understand to some extent because she does dress in masculine clothing, but Jennifer Hudson was just way out of line. Breaking it down a bit, here’s what bothers me about it:

What kind of message does it send about black women that men are the ones that have to impersonate them? Think about it. Every white female celebrity gets a thin, attractive female cast member to impersonate her. But if you’re a black woman you get Kenan Thompson. Yeah, just think about that one.

Also, there’s no excuse for a show like SNL not to have a black actress on its cast given how many prominent black female celebrities we have in this country. Jennifer Hudson, Whoopi Goldberg, Oprah Winfrey, Gwen Ifill, Condoleeza Rice, Michelle Obama, Sherri Shepherd, etc, etc. Speaking of Sherri Shepherd, have you noticed how she’s never represented on SNL spoofs of “The View”? No surprise there given that that would require TWO black people to be in a skit together! And not only two black people, but two black women! Gasp!

I’m not the first person to voice complaints about this, but it really hit home watching Kenan Thompson impersonate Jennifer Hudson. I accept the comedy aspect of SNL not to get all worked up about a man playing Whoopi Goldberg, but what an insult to a beautiful, feminine woman like J. Hud. Urg.