Feline Warrior

There are those low-hangin’ pants and shorts. The rubber slip-on sandals worn with socks. The hunched over-head-down posture. All this prison-inspired stuff. But don’t call yet! I have discovered Prison Issue sneakers from Vans.

Their full name is Prison Issue #23 and are available in a wide range of colors and sizes. You may purchase these snappy little dog-warmers from the official Vans web site for $45 (+ s&h) or from Urban Outfitters for $48 (+ s&h).

On the Urban Outfitters page, it says, Made for real-live prisoners in California prisons, Vans created these as laceless wonders with Velcro straps instead - because with all that time on lockdown, there’s no telling what kind of trouble you could get yourself into with a set of shoelaces. Rubber-capped toes, canvas uppers, triple-closures and classic Vans style at the crisscross soles. Logo tag at the ankle and heel, because a number just seems so impersonal.

Now, let’s pause for a moment here. In fact, I encourage you to take a breath, look about your surroundings, and think about the last time you were on lockdown. (And in case you have been on lockdown, I am not making fun of it - read on.) You haven’t ever been on lockdown, you say? Perhaps you are a parent and are thinking something like, “Why in the hell would my kids need shoes that are perfect for lockdown?!” or, “Why in the hell would my kids need shoes that were made for prisoners?!” The answer is simple: They shouldn’t.

I did a quick Google search on prison clothes popular with youth and came up with a few articles, and will share a snippet of one with you here. This is from Znet: Youth Watch, World news involving youth. Youth Watch is just one of many sections of Znet, A community of people committed to social change.

The article of note, Zero Tolerance: Youth and the politics of domestic materialization, by Henry A. Giroux, points to a New York Times article by Guy Trebay that focuses on “jailhouse chic” as the latest in youth fashion. Surrendering any attempt at socially responsible analysis, Trebay reports that the reason so many teens are turning prison garb into a fashion statement is that an unprecedented number of youths are incarcerated in the United States. When they get released, “they take part of that culture with them.”

This makes sense a bit, but then you look at who wears this stuff, and you realize there are no cultural boundaries to prison chic. Ah, finally, the youth of America have come together: rich kids, poor kids, white kids, kids of color, boys, girls, straight, gay, bisexual, and on and on… this stuff is being worn by kids in all of these categories. I do think that it began with kids at the lower end of the economic scale, and of those, kids of color - one need only look to national statistics to find out to which communities jailed youth were being released. Add to that the popularity of rap, which has also reached across once uncrossable zones, and you have prison fashions for everyone. Yay.

When I pose the question, Why are kids who aren’t in prison and who have never been in prison wearing prison garb? I am not resting my gaze upon the rich white kids, or the rich black kids, or any kids in particular. Truly, I am looking across the vast horizon of all youth, and wondering what the hell is going on.

I’ll admit it, in case it hasn’t become fairly obvious along the way: I’m no spring kitten. Perhaps my choice to not have children has given me an opportunity to maintain more of my own childlike qualities (because I didn’t have to get all grown up and such in order to make another dinky person suitable for society) - but this is just a theory and isn’t really the topic at hand. I digress…

The point here is that when I was a youth, say 12-18, there were different fashions that adults didn’t get. My mom was pretty strict, so I didn’t even get to wear most of them until she moved out when I was around 16. (And then the dams broke, oh, yes indeed!) But I was part of that punk era, when mohawks really were alarming, as were bright colors of hair (blue, stop-sign red, purple, etc.). Safety pins took the place of earrings and leather jackets were metal-studded; some wore that creepy face-paling white makeup and dark, heavy black eye makeup. And I participated in that, to one degree or another.

So today I am going to think about that time, the punk era, and compare it with today’s time, the prison chic era, and try to see if I have become one of those adults who just don’t get it. Because honestly, right now, I am thinking that while we all looked really weird and admittedly (and intentionally) scary, we weren’t emulating penitentiary inmates.

Here’s the part where I (try to) make it clear that I am not making light of being on lockdown, or in a prison (past, present, or future): Maybe for some folks, prison feels somehow safer than the outside world. My life has not been such that I can really understand that, or even try to paint a picture of it. But for some, it’s home, there is structure, they can be a big fish in a relatively little pond - something. Yet life in prison is nothing to sneeze at - it’s not for the faint-hearted.

I speak from second-hand experience. Way back when, there was a beau who was in California State Prison, LA, and while he and I did not get to speak by phone often, there was a man who phoned on the boyfriend’s behalf: Michael said to say he love you. Bring cigarettes next time. Please. So that boyfriend told me what it was like, and frankly, it sounded like he got a good deal when he made friends with that guy, who was, apparently, quite a bit larger than my not-so-big boyfriend.

Prison isn’t cool. That’s the damn point. Committing crimes isn’t cool. Being a gangsta thug isn’t cool. I mean, the style might be cool, but the lifestyle is not.

Is wearing a pair of Prison Issue #23 Vans indicative of anything more than participating in a fad? Maybe not. But at the very least, it concerns me when anything about prison is cool - because doing whatever one might do to get there is not cool.

If you see smoke coming from over here, it’s my brain working hard on this one.

Sorority Under Fire For Giving “Blackest Member” Award

Favorite quote: …a white member accepted the award.

A group of black students met Thursday with sorority members, who said the award was meant as a joke and was the idea of just a few students, including the black date of the recipient.

He said his date received the award because she was motherly and nurturing.

apophenia: growing up in a culture of fear: from Columbine to banning of MySpace

Old but well written and insightful.

Here’s another of those forwards that I keep getting. In this one, the man is the one who ends up being pushed into a mold:

A man was sitting on the edge of the bed, observing his wife, looking at herself in the mirror! Since her birthday was not far off he asked what she’d like to have for her Birthday. “I’d like to be six again”, she replied, still looking in the mirror.

On the morning of her Birthday [sic], he arose early, made her a nice big bowl of Lucky Charms, and then took her to Six Flags theme park. What a day! He put her on every ride in the park; [sic] the Death Slide, the Wall of Fear, the Screaming Monster Roller Coaster, everything there was.

Five hours later they staggered out of the theme park. Her head was reeling and her stomach felt upside down. He then took her to a McDonald’s where he ordered her a Happy Meal with extra fries and a chocolate shake. Then it was off to a movie, popcorn, a soda pop, and her favorite candy, M&M’s. What a fabulous adventure!

Finally she wobbled home with her husband and collapsed into bed exhausted. He leaned over his wife with a big smile and lovingly asked, “Well Dear, what was it like being six again??” Her eyes slowly opened and her expression suddenly changed. “I meant my dress size, you fool!”

The moral of the story: Even when a man is listening, he is gonna get it wrong.

SEND THIS TO SMART WOMEN WHO NEED A LAUGH AND TO MEN YOU THINK CAN HANDLE IT.

There are so many issues to discuss, which to begin with? Let’s start at the bottom, as that’s where it all really goes bad, IMHO. The moral of the story is really irritating. Men, even when listening will get it wrong. Why is that? Is it because they’re just too stOOpid to get it? Because they’re from Mars and women are from Venus? Is that it?

That last line, the one that suggests to whom one ought to forward this tidbit, is ridiculous. Let’s dissect it, shall we?

On the list of recipients are smart women. Why the women must be smart is beyond me. The story is pretty basic, and even a not particularly smart woman would know that a person referring to clothing size would usually say, I’d like to be a size six… or at least I’d like to be a six…not I’d like to be six… The latter does in fact lead one to believe that the speaker wishes to be the age of six again. (And frankly, it makes more sense as a statement in relation to an upcoming birthday.)

But then that last group who ought to receive this silliness: Men you think can handle it. - that’s about as irritating as it can get. What’s to handle, exactly? That only certain men -strong men? and if so, in what way?- will be able to handle this story? Or only men who can handle the moral of the story (that even when they’re listening, men are gonna get it wrong)? I think that men are used to being told this message. The book to which I referred (the planetary reference) made millions by making the assumption that men and women are so different that we simply do not understand one another.

I am not going to aver that males and females do not reach adulthood without having been taught a great many ways to be separate from one another. Most certainly we are brought up in western culture to believe a great many things about ourselves and each other that taint our communications. However, to assert that a man must be able to handle this story, or at least its moral, is just plain ridiculous.

Add to that slap the notion that presumably the email was forwarded to a woman - that is, that the reader is a female, and so she will be determining which men can handle this horrific truth. If a woman is the recipient of the mail, then she is smart, because the directions clearly state to send it to smart women. So a smart woman is to determine which of the men she knows will be able to handle it. And I ask again, handle what?

It’s just annoying, all of it. A smart woman is not going to buy into the myth that men, even when listening, just don’t get it. And if she’s really smart, she’ll know better than to forward it to anyone else, male or female.

pfft!

A friend forwarded the image below to me. The text that accompanied it read:

Check out the new mirror I’m selling - taking orders now!

—– My Reply—-

We already have this mirror - only it works in reverse and is often called “anorexia.”

::::::::::::::::::::::::

Am I being oversensitive? See, here’s the thing: I “get it,” I do. But I can’t help focusing on the fact that females send stuff like this to their female friends. Sure, everyone laughs, BUT, does anyone stop to wonder why we’re supposed to want this mirror? Yes, I know it doesn’t really exist, yet to me it is symbolic of the messages we (females) receive that, under the guise of humor, deliver pretty strong messages about how we ought to look.

And going from a pudgy, soft-cheeked woman to one with a more socially acceptable body isn’t easy. It takes a hell lot more than a magic mirror; no doubt, if such mirrors existed, many American women would have bodies like this. Why? Because we’re supposed to. It’s in the overt and covert messages we receive from the time we are tiny girls throughout our lives. But really, such a change would require not just a change in diet (perhaps), not just a change in exercise (perhaps), but also a change of mindset - a new set of goals. And for what? What is the goal? To look like a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model? To feel less old, to fit in, so that males of all ages will find us attractive?

And why do we care what all those nameless, faceless men think of us, anyway?

Maybe we don’t. Maybe I just see images such as this and wonder why we do it to ourselves. Yes, funny, the mirror shows YOU (not an audience, just you!) a completely different body than the one you have. Why would we want a mirror that lies to us? Hell, why would we want to lie to ourselves? What this tells me is that it is better to have a magic mirror that lies to me about my body than it is for me to love myself - flaws and all.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Hmph.

pfft!

Senior Republican to Bush say “exactly what happened?”

Favorite quote: Sen. Arlen Specter (news, bio, voting record), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said on Fox News Sunday that “there’s been enough of a showing here with what’s been filed of record in court that the president of the United States owes a specific explanation to the American people.

Laughing through his final days

Oh, man, what a great testimonial. Spend your life making people laugh and go out the same way. Art Buchwald, showing us the way.

Favorite quote: Waiting for the end, Buchwald said people shouldn’t be too concerned about where they will end up in death. What they should really be asking, he said, is “Why was I here in the first place?”

Why does Buchwald think he’s here?

“Apparently to make people laugh,” he said, “which is as good a reason as any.”

You can peruse Buchwald’s columns here at the Washington Post site.

My fabulous ex-pat friend Bruce sent this via email and I am adopting it as my own:

“It’s not that I think stupidity should be punishable by death. I just think we should take the warning labels off of everything and let the problem take care of itself.”

Isn’t that brilliant?

So… can we? Huh? Please???

Hands Off Jill Carroll

By Rory O’Connor, AlterNet. Posted April 3, 2006.

This article about some folks in the media who have been bashing now-freed journalist/hostage Jill Carroll just steams me! STEAMS!

Would these guys have been happier if Carroll had refused her captors’ orders, resulting in yet another a taped murder? Is that a brave American legacy? Does that make a better American hostage?

Favorite quote: …former hostage, U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona, a prisoner of war during the Vietnam War. McCain said on Meet the Press that Carroll’s comments in the video should not be taken seriously. “This was a young woman who found herself in a terrible, terrible position. And we’re glad she’s home,” McCain told NBC’s Tim Russert. “We understand when you’re held a captive in that kind of situation, that you do things under duress.”

Steamed, I say, steamed!

NASA Manager’s Office Searched for Porn - Yahoo News

So this bigwig at NASA got nabbed not only for having porn on his work computer, but it was kiddie porn. And he was sending kiddie porn flicks to an undercover postal office spy or something.

All of that stuff is bad - shame on James R. Robinson, in-space propulsion technology program executive, if it’s all true.

Puzzling, though, is the disclosure that Robinson was caught by a filter on NASA’s computer system that searches for flesh-colored tones. It was this filter that alerted technicians who found 189 images of underage child sexual activity on Robinson’s work computer.

Flesh-colored tones? Really? Think for a moment: NASA. Space, the final frontier, all that stuff. Those galaxies are made up of all sorts of colors, some of which I think could fall into the flesh-colored category. But this filter caught flesh colors that turned out, apparently, to be the naked bodies of very young people.

Isn’t that kind of wild? Since they’ve released Robinson’s name, one presumes that this story is true, that he did indeed have kiddie porn on his computer, and used it to share kiddie porn flicks. What if he’d been looking at more NASA-like images that just happened to be made up of flesh colors?
This filter… it freaks me out.

U.S. Reporter Released by Captors in Iraq - Yahoo! News

I honestly did not think we would see this day.  I’ve followed quite a few of the kidnappings that have taken place in Iraq and not all have turned out this well.  It’s amazing.  Wow.

Slain Minister’s Wife Faces Murder Charges - Yahoo! News

Yes, it’s hideous, the minister is dead. Horrible crime. But there’s another crime here and I am about to point it out to you:

Does this Slain Minister’s Wife Faces Murder Charges mean that
(a) The minister’s wife, who has been slain, is facing charges of murder?
or
(b) The wife of the slain minister is facing murder charges?

After reading the article, I believe it is the second choice (the wife of the slain minister is facing murder charges).

Let’s compare two versions of this headline - one, the original, which I believe to be unclear, and another that I have created, which is clear. We will compare clarity and amount of space taken by each.

Slain Minister’s Wife Faces Murder Charges

Wife of Slain Minster Faces Murder Charges

Aah, so much better! Thank you for playing my game.