Monthly Archive for April, 2007

Choice and responsibility

Published on April 25, 2007 in blogging, cooking, cooperative living, economics, ethics, feminism, health, patriarchy, politics and vegan. 3 Comments

Today I found my friend Emilie’s amazing blog, The Conscious Kitchen. Seriously, amazing. Everything looks delicious, and lots of fun stories about food experiences.


One of Emilie’s creations. Is this even legal in the state of Massachussettes?

Her post from Monday, Simple Pleasures and Guilt, really resonated with my recent food experiences. She talks about reconciling her punk ethos with her passion for, if I may use the term “the finer things.” It got me thinking about my ethics and how they interact with my diet.

We’ve got all these choices, right? We choose vegan. We choose Arkansas Black apples and Lindt chocolate. We choose saffron.

But most Americans aren’t even at liberty to choose vegetarian because they don’t have any cultural support for that choice. You can’t become vegetarian without a big chunk of knowledge, a decent amount of free time, and a healthy helping of confidence or social support. Many American’s don’t have time to spend with their children, let alone time to spend making seitan from scratch.

And so I’m starting to think that when I’m choosing between squash gnocchi and provencal tomatoes stuffed with herbed rice, maybe there’s a third choice, which is choosing to devote my energy to giving some of these choices to people who don’t have them.

But I’m not entirely sure what that means. I’ve been thinking about trying to implement dinner coop in such a way that it can benefit people with fewer resources, instead of just us rich college kids. And in my dietary changes, I’m always thinking “how can I make this cheaper?” and “how can I make this easier?” with the hope that maybe someday I can write a book that will help people eat healthier and more ethically, even if they have no money and no time.

And this mirrors my experiences as a feminist man. I can choose to go for a run alone after midnight. I can choose to look disheveled every day. I can choose to be outspoken without fearing that I’ll lose respect. I can choose to be sexualized, and I can choose not to be. And in many scenarios, many women don’t have those choices.

Does that create an obligation? I kind of feel like it does.

Cooking

Published on April 25, 2007 in cooking, cooperative living and vegan. 0 Comments

As mentioned, I uploaded a bunch of photos of the vegan concoctions we’ve been cooking up at dinner coop and elsewhere. A bunch of these have recipes that are now in the coop wiki, and I want to share those with all of you, but…

If I link to the wiki, it’s going to be inundated with spam. And I just don’t have the time to deal with that right now. So, recipes coming soon. Some of my favorite photos are below, but check out the whole set.


Dogfood, bootstraps, and working code

Published on April 24, 2007 in Favorites, computing, forkolator, free software, geekery, language, pi, school and screenshots. 0 Comments

This is version 0.2 of ForkCode, the web-based IDE that I’m working on. IDE is an acronym that means “software for making software”.

There are a bunch of fun geeky turns of phrase that apply to what I’m doing right now. First, ForkCode can “bootstrap” itself which means I’m using ForkCode to create ForkCode. You know, like “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps!”

The second thing I’m doing is “dogfooding”. That means I’m using the software I’m writing. The term refers to eating your own dogfood, which is, ostensibly, what the head chef at a dogfood factory must do to ensure a quality product.

Lately I’ve been feeling like I should be moving forward, faster on things that’ll lead to my 2nd year project. But I’m not raring to go on those things, for better or for worse. So I decided: Erik, just do the project that you’re dying to do. And right now, it’s this. And maybe I’ll fall behind, but it’s better to do something than nothing.

And honestly, truly… I love this project right now.

Preciousness

Published on April 23, 2007 in children, cooking, feminism and vegan. 2 Comments

I really wanted to post some pictures today of all the delicious vegan things we’ve been cooking lately (mushroom-seitan tacos! sun-dried tomato roasted red pepper artichoke heart dip!) but I think I left my camera at Kensy’s.  Alas.

Instead, I couldn’t resist posting a link to this letter Naomi Wolf wrote to her daughter.  It’s probably the most precious thing I’ve read in weeks, and it makes me want to raise kids.

But hey, I need a partner for that, right?

[via Feministe]

I’m a loser, baby

Published on April 21, 2007 in feminism, global empire, patriarchy, politics and war. 0 Comments

Pro-war folks often say that pulling out of Iraq would be defeat. That the terrorists would win and we can’t let them win. My response was always of the form “no way… we’ll still win because of X,” where X was more international support, the strength of the Iraqi police force, the removal of big hairy targets (US troops) from Iraq, etc.

But today I had the thought: What’s wrong with defeat? Why are we so obsessed with winning? Why not accept defeat, bring our troops home, and let Iraq try to heal itself? Why not voluntarily be the losers?

And there are good answers to those questions like, “if we lose, we’ll have created a haven for terrorists.” But I don’t think most Americans are thinking that far into this. I think they’re thinking “Defeat? Heck no! We’re America!”.

That was certainly a component of my thinking. I think it’s a component of a lot of men’s thinking, and it’s one of the channels through which the patriarchy influences American politics. I should be more mindful of my competetive nature and how it clouds my ability to see things clearly.

The patriarchy and Economic Slavery

Published on April 21, 2007 in economics, feminism, global empire, history, patriarchy, politics and united states. 0 Comments

There is a great post over on Women’s Space/The Margins (which is fast becoming one of my favorite blogs about women’s issues) about Seung-hui Cho’s family. I just posted a somewhat tangential comment over there about US global construction/reconstruction efforts and the patriarchy* and I wanted to repost here:

Thank you for doing this journalism… this post was an eye opening, provocative read for me.

I just wanted to comment that I don’t think “reconstruction” is a good thing. The US government and contractors like McNeil are a loosely connected but carefully aligned operation. They have two strategies:

1) Saddle countries with loans (from the World Bank) for building infrastructure that countries don’t need. Make sure the loans are too big for them to repay. and make sure the contracts specify that they have to use US contractors like McNeil. After all that money gets pumped back into the US economy, and the recipient country inevitably defaults on the loans, force the countries to make political concessions. This is how US companies got drilling rights in Ecuador against the will of the people.

2) Bomb the shit out of them. Send in US contractors and “protect” their “reconstruction” rights with US troops. Build all kinds of infrastructure that they don’t need. Saddle the new government you create with the debt, or just add the tab to the trillions of debt the federal government already holds.

I read most of this in John Perkins’ Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. The prologue is online, and is a great read. I heartily recommend the whole book, it really changed my perspective.

And I never thought about it this way until now, but maybe it’s really about how the patriarchy works on an international level, where entire countries are being subjugated, instead of gender/sex/ethnic/cultural groups.

* I’m still a little uneasy about the term patriarchy, but for now I defer to the wisdom of the feminist community. They’ve been thinking about/using the term longer than I have.

Awesome Things To Do In Life #1: Hang up your clothes

Published on April 17, 2007 in action, awesomeness, environment, sustainability and tips. 8 Comments

Clothesline

Here’s an awesome person: Kathleen Hughes hangs her laundry instead of using the dryer. Saves money and energy, gets you out of the house, reminds you that you’re alive, goddamnit.

Check out more Awesome Things To Do In Life.

Hike

Published on April 16, 2007 in hiking, outdoors and photos. 0 Comments

I posted some photos from Cowles Mountain yesterday. The full album is here.

Comic

Published on April 16, 2007 in Comics, childhood and travel. 1 Comment


Doodle from Twigs yesterday, originally uploaded by erikp.

 

A gender thang?

Published on April 16, 2007 in feminism, masculinism and politics. 11 Comments

My response to Wendy’s comment today got me fired up about men’s advocacy, so I wrote out off the top of my head the top men’s issues I think aren’t being adequately addressed.  I starred the issues that are also women’s issues.

Father’s Rights ** – advocacy for men in custody disputes, equal custody rights.  Advocacy for fathers who want equal access to child-rearing responsibilities.  Fighting stereotypes of fathers as non-carers-of-children.

Cooperation/Nurturing/Physical Intimacy Education ** – Providing role models and educational opportunities that encourage boys to ask for help, to cooperate, and to nurture each other.  Breaking down the cultural barriers to men being physically intimate with one another and with women in a non-sexual way.

Queer support ** – Providing support for men and boys of all different sexual orientations.  Fighting stereotypes of gay AND straight men.  Providing networking and dating opportunities to queer men and boys, providing safe spaces where they feel valued, wanted, and normal.

Domestic Violence ** – Providing safe places for men who are victims of domestic abuse.  Advocating for fathers who want to take sole custody out from under violent spouses.  Educating battered men about their rights.

Reproductive Rights ** – Developing contraception for men, educating people about it, and increasing access.

Prisoner Rights ** – Advocating for the disproportionate number of men in prisons.

Anti-crime/Military enrollment ** – Providing young men with alternatives to a life of crime or military life.

And hey, look… all of these issues are cross-gender issues.  This is why I wonder if we don’t need to de-gender a lot of causes that have been traditionally women’s issues.  These are human issues.