Visual Sociology

Via Unequally Yoked, here is a fun bit of sociology. (Yes, this came from my file of "cool, I should blog this" bookmarks... and about 5 months ago.)  The map shows where "Missed Connections" happen, broken down by state.  It also has some numbers about age differences and who is seeking whom.  Before you look below, can you guess which state has the highest percentage of women seeking women?  (And what that number might be?)

Updates and a Game Plan

I have had a variety of happenings to keep my life interesting and keep me away from the blog lately: wedding planning (yes, that's happening), moving back home, starting a new job (yay!), health issues (prayers please!), and generally other people in my life.  So I am coming up with a new plan of attack.  Here are the rules for the next stage of Beth's Blog:

1) One post a week.  It end up happening Sunday evening, but maybe not all the time.
2) No life updates.  I have a lot that is not internet-appropriate, especially considering my No Emotions rule.
3) I can't promise posts will be on new occurrences.  I have a folder of old but interesting links that I might work my way through on Sunday evenings.
4) Keep reading!  The posts will still be interesting!
5) Find me in real life if you want to know anything about me.  Electronic communications of any kind are kind of running away from me right now.

Rape Culture and the Christian Perspective

As a woman who is Catholic and identifies as a feminist, I reach some awkward discords at times, and one of the most glaring is simply that people use different languages.  When Catholics write about things, they write with a Catholic vocabulary and assume their readers share a knowledge base and a world-view that many people simply do not.  For example, I was listening to a speaker on Monday who based a "secular" claim on the fact that "what we do with our bodies means something."  He was going for something as simple as "sex means 'I love you,'" but even that cannot be taken for granted in dialogue.  

The same thing happens from the other perspective.  I find wonderful articles that use language I don't want to share, or terms such as "het/cis," which can be off-putting to a more conservative religious crowd.  I try to bridge the gap at times, but other people are better thinkers and more articulate writers than I am, so I really want to share their thoughts.

Then, every now and then, something like this appears.  It brings together issues like rape culture, feminism, porn, purity, sin, misogyny, and solutions -- but from a Christian perspective.  Take a read and let me know what you think.

In Case I Needed More Reason...

... to be madly in love with Stephen Colbert, this came up on Facebook lately.  His mother passed away last week, and he did a tribute to her on the show.  Watch this and you will cry.  I did.

The Colbert Report
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A Parable of Apples

Before I end up on another feminist rant (I just found a Christian article about rape culture that will make it here soon), I want to take a moment to speak to a problem with feminist rants that a friend brought to my attention.  Hopefully, this is not a problem for men in my life, but it's important, so I am going to tell a story.   I may have told this story before, but this time, it's an allegory.

Last fall, I went apple picking with a group of grad students.  One of the kids with us reminded me of a character in a book I was reading, which was really awkward because I kept wanting to call him Sonny, which was not his name, and then I'd have to explain to him, "Oh, it's just that you remind me of a fictional character," making a great first impression. 

Sonny (not his real name) was from New York and didn't like apples.  (I promise, these two facts are related.)  He came for the pumpkin patch and the hay ride.  However, as we wandered through the apple orchard, he caught some enthusiasm from the rest of us and tried an apple.  And exclaimed, "I didn't know apples could taste like this!"  Having only ever eaten mushy, flavorless store-apples, he didn't know what an apple really was.  But when he found a real one, he liked it.

There is a danger in feminist rants to identify men with the mushy, flavorless store-apples and see the orchard-picked variety as the outliers, who are an exception to what men really are.  To define men and generalize masculinity by the negative choices that lead to the problems we see.  This approach leads us to devalue the honorable masculinity with which some men live their lives.  

No matter which is more common in our lives, the fact is that orchard apples are more truly apples than mushy, flavorless store-apples.  Men who live noble masculinity live it more truly than those who live the stunted version of masculinity (if it even can be called such) that leads to things like rape culture.  We as women need to make sure that as often as we attack the latter, we affirm the former and let the men we love know that they show us what it means to be a man.

Day-Maker #81

Take a look at this video of the Pope talking to a group of children.  Spoiler Alert: they give him a sheep.