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I’m going to go with a huge resounding no, but some people seem to think that feminism has convinced women that their careers are more important than children, and that women are losing out on motherhood because of it. I’m more inclined to believe this is people blaming feminism for their poor decision making skills. Rebecca Walker, child of Alice Walker, wrote the most god awful article I’ve ever seen, where she effectively blames feminism for her bad relationship with her mother, and for all the problems women are having when they try to conceive later in life:

Then I meet women in their 40s who are devastated because they spent two decades working on a PhD or becoming a partner in a law firm, and they missed out on having a family. Thanks to the feminist movement, they discounted their biological clocks. They’ve missed the opportunity and they’re bereft.

Feminism has betrayed an entire generation of women into childlessness. It is devastating.

But far from taking responsibility for any of this, the leaders of the women’s movement close ranks against anyone who dares to question them - as I have learned to my cost. I believe feminism is an experiment, and all experiments need to be assessed on their results. Then, when you see huge mistakes have been paid, you need to make alterations.

Now, see, this is what bothers me. Feminism has not told women to forgo having babies in favor of their careers. It has suggested that they take their careers into consideration when planning a family - and this is not a suggestion they have made only to women, they have made their suggestion to everyone. As with many other movements, the ideal is not necessarily executed properly when practiced by the masses.

In the end, it really does come down to make a choice: taking the time off to have a baby in the middle of your career and risking the loss of promotions, etc, or waiting until you’ve reached your goal and then taking the time off, risking that you won’t be able to have a baby. No matter how equal our society becomes, this will still be an issue for women that isn’t necessarily one for men. Feminism hasn’t forced women to wait until they are 40 to have children, it has simply made them realize that children do not have to come first. Their marriage, career, or other aspect of their life can come before children, as long as they have had the common sense to plan it out ahead of time.

Of course, that’s a totally different situation than deciding to have a child at 42 when you never wanted one before.

Via Feministe.

I guess today is the day for humor! As I’m sure everyone knows, the Vatican has just recently released new sins. Yes, much like a summer blockbuster or a new fashion line, the Vatican decided to get hip with the times and tell everyone that there are more things they need to not do in order to get into heaven.

Of course, the hilarious part is the sins are totally and completely political. Some, quite ironically, are liberal… but the majority, in true Catholic fashion, are conservative and completely irrelevant to your level of innocence and sin free-ness.

The new sins also are seven in number, and as far as I can tell, have not been advertised with quite the “deadly” fervor of the original sins, even though they are (apparently) also considered deadly. The Catholic Church divides sins into venial, or less serious, sins and mortal sins, which threaten the soul with eternal damnation unless absolved before death through confession and penitence. Guess what kind the new sins are? Yup! Mortal! Mmm death by hellfire!

Side note: this is going to be confusing, now there are original sins and new sins - as opposed to original sin, which is one particular type of act. Damn Catholicism and their sins.

For the record, the original seven deadly sins are:

1. Pride
2. Envy
3. Gluttony
4. Lust
5. Anger
6. Greed
7. Sloth

While I can understand the root in the original seven deadly sins, I don’t really understand how some of the new sins are, well, deadly. Unless, of course, you’re a Democrat, in which case there is also a nice cozy chair made of nails and thumb tacks for you right next to Satan and Bill Clinton. The new sins are decidedly political in nature, and somewhat amusing, especially since they don’t contain pedophilia, which is kind of a huge hello, DUH.

1. Bioethical violations: birth control seems to be the big example everyone is using. So, apparently, it is now a sin punishable by death and eternal hellfire to wrap it up or pop a pill that prevents pregnancy. Courteous of Mark Morford: “Speaking of babies, here’s a terrific new statistic: 25-40 percent of American teenage girls have a sexually transmitted disease. Isn’t that wonderful? Abstinence education has been a blessing and a joy.” I’m thinking adding “bioethical violations” to the list of deadly sins isn’t going to help that problem.
   
2. “Morally dubious” experiments such as stem cell research. You know the Catholic church had to squeeze something in there related to abortion, they just had to. And, of course, the only way the Catholic church sees stem cell research is as a close cousin, or hell, maybe sibling, to abortion.
3. Drug abuse: duh, but somehow I think their definition of drug abuse is vastly different from mine or the legal and psychological definitions.
4. Polluting the environment: a shockingly liberal point of view, if they mean saving the trees and oceans and fluffy baby penguins. However, they could also mean polluting the environment by talking about sex, drugs, and alcohol, so maybe not.
5. Contributing to widening divide between rich and poor: so, basically, you can’t be a Republican. How sad!
6. Excessive wealth: this one just makes me giggle. I mean, the Catholic church saying excessive wealth is a sin? Are you serious? Again, thank you Mark Morford for writing what I was thinking: “I also enjoyed the new sin of excessive wealth, given how the Vatican is one of the most — if not the most — gluttonously wealthy organizations on the planet, oozing with real estate and massive stock portfolios, dripping with cash, billions of dollars in hoarded treasure and unknown gems, icons, art, the solid gold vaginas of 1,000 pagan goddesses locked up in its vaults. The hypocrisy is positively comical. Epic.”
7. Creating poverty: …

I AM SO GOING TO HELL.

Is it just me, or are sins #5-7 all related to wealth? Couldn’t they have just combined that all into one happy sin? Apparently not. I guess the whole point was to not have excessive wealth by donating to the Catholic church so they could use some of that to stop poverty.And because I always find a way to tie everything back to women, feminism, and reproductive health:

Note to the Vatican: You want true sin? Here you go: Lying to women is a sin. Pathological hypocrisy is a sin. Half a billion dollars in pedophilia lawsuit payouts is a sin. Homophobia is a sin. Hiding those golden vaginas is a sin. And creating new sins in a strange attempt to stay relevant as your church withers and struggles and falters in the new and spiritually hungry but religiously mistrustful world, that’s surely a sin.

No, wait. Check that. That’s not a sin at all. It’s actually just a sad, inexcusable joke.

See! I don’t hate the Catholic church. I just find them absolutely hilarious and moderately (to severely, depending on the day) annoying.

[Image via Getty]

I am not a fan of the Boston Globe. On top of their already biased reporting in terms of the 2008 presidential election, they printed an article titled “Want to have a baby? Now’s the time women eager to have children need to direct career drive toward mating.”

For an extremely short article, it is riddled with tons of sexist “facts” from various fields of research. The author of the article advocates getting pregnant before you’re 30 (especially if you want to have 3 kids!), because the quality of a woman’s eggs takes a “notable nose dive” in quality after the age of 35. While it has been scientifically proven that the older a woman is when she gives birth, the more likely it will be that the baby will have certain problems, it hasn’t been proven why these problems exist. Theories out there that blame aging eggs are very popular, but they are just that: theories. These can range from risky pregnancy, to still birth, to Down’s Syndrome. However, these same risks exist for any woman who gets pregnant, they are not limited to women over the age of 40.

For many young women today, they aren’t even beginning their careers until they are in their late 20s or early 30s. More women are attending medical school than ever, which is only 4 years in the classroom, but does include a lengthy residency period where you are still technically a student immediately following graduation from medical school. I myself am planning on obtaining a PhD, and if I receive that before I’m 30, it’ll be a miracle.

No generation of women has had more trouble with fertility than this generation, who received the terrible baby boomer advice, “Wait. You have time. Focus on your career first.”

But in fact, you have your whole life to get a career. Obviously, that’s not true of having a baby. If you are past your early twenties, and you’re single and want to have children, you need to find a partner now. Take that career drive and direct it toward mating - your ovaries will not last longer than your career.

The good news is that psychology research shows you will gain more happiness anyway by finding a partner than by having a good job. While you should not have to choose between a satisfying marriage or a good job, your biological clock does not care. You can control where you spend your time and energy, and you should search for your mate if you don’t want to face fertility problems.

Stephanie Trunk, the author, also says that “it’s recommended that you breast feed” your children, without offering any explanation of who is doing this recommending and based on what information. Last time I checked, breast feeding can be beneficial to the baby, but in some situations it is better for the mother to not breast feed her child. Which, again, runs you into the rhetoric of “who is more important, mother or baby?”

Of course, there is no mention of men rushing to have children in this article - the burden is placed completely upon women in their mid-to-late twenties to start reproducing. She includes two “alternatives” to having children early, one of which is good luck, hope your kid doesn’t have Down’s syndrome, and the other of which is a very judgmental spiel about freezing your eggs. Not once does she mention surrogacy or adoption.

The article is clearly targeted at women who are in my age range - just about to hit their mid-twenties - who are at my particular stage in life. She advocates for women my age to “focus on finding a partner”, but here’s the thing… if we’re so quick to find a partner just because we want to reproduce, what are the odds that we’ll actually find at a partner (when we’re 25…) that we want to be with until we’re 90? I’m going with slim.

While her ridiculously biased piece focuses on women’s careers, she completely neglects any other life experiences - including travel, experiencing different relationships, personal growth, your education, etc. Many of those things either can’t be done when you have children, or are extremely difficult.

My advice? Have a kid when you want to, not when some trumped up writer wants you to.

[Image from Getty]

Last weekend the boyfriend and I settled in for a nice and dull evening at my house. We curled up with the cats in my bed and popped a movie into my fabulous iMac as we eagerly awaited the beginning of the movie. I had just gotten 3:10 to Yuma from Netflix and the boyfriend really wanted to see it, even though he didn’t particularly care for westerns. I thought it looked decent, and I’d heard some okay things about it, so I didn’t have many objections.

It was one of those movies that was good, but terrible at the same time. I couldn’t really put my finger on what bothered me about the movie. From my perspective, it was a movie about people and their complex morals and personalities and all that… except, when you finished the movie, you didn’t feel like you knew much about anyone who was in it. It was a movie about character development that didn’t really spend much time on character development. And I thought about it some more, and the only thing my brain kept saying was “damn westerns”, and I blamed masculinity for the movie’s pathetic failure in my mind.

I spent a lot of time during my last quarter in college watching war movies, the Vietnam War and WWII in one class, and various wars in Latin America for another. I didn’t really understand what I had done to deserve so many war movies in one quarter, but I dealt with it best I could. Some were documentary style, and others were traditional movie-goer films. After that quarter, I never wanted to watch another war movie. In a less than one month period, we had watched the following:

Full Metal Jacket
Rambo
Green Berets
Platoon
Heaven and Earth

The scary part is the list of movies she wanted us to watch was twice as long, but we had to prioritize what we watched so the other TEN MOVIES were dropped off the list. The movies all had something in common: huge, raging, testosterone fueled MEN. Big, scary, hard, masculine, AMERICAN MEN fighting teeny, tiny, puny, worthless, impotent, Vietcong. Whether the American men failed at their masculinity or not, all of these war movies focused on the fact that yes, they are men, and yes, war is hard, but we can still be masculine, even if we lose. Heaven and Earth went so far as to show that when a man’s masculinity is taken away from him by the teeny, tiny, impotent Vietcong he suffers extreme psychological trauma, beats his wife, and subsequently kills himself in the nude in his hippie van. If that doesn’t warn men of the consequences of losing their masculinity then I don’t know what is.

It’s not just war movies, westerns are the same. Men riding around the unsettled west with big guns and stolen horses, doing dirty things to women and either being the best villain ever or taking out the best villain ever. Either way, westerns and war movies rely on one basic trait from which they grow from: masculinity. Now, the same can be said of femininity and romantic comedies, but I’d rather have the particular trait that is associated with my gender be used as an excuse for bad humor and tender moments than war, rape, domestic violence, suicide, murder, mayhem, and many other violent acts.

But the bottom line is, I’m calling a moratorium on war movies and westerns in my movie obsessed life. I just can’t handle it anymore, it’s too much, it’s too violent. The men are always fighting to prove one thing: that they are better than the other guy. And even if the director, screenwriter, whoever, claims that this is not what their protagonist is doing, it still looks like to me, the raging feminist. I embrace breaking stereotypes whenever possible, but I don’t think the movie industry will be doing that any time soon with westerns or war movies. I’m just glad that westerns have fallen out of popularity over the past decade or so.

It took me a little longer than Cate, but I was finally able to articulate in a coherent manner why I can’t support Barack Obama.

I’ve been feeling a lot of unwarranted political pressure in my office and my life lately. Everyone but myself in the office supports Barack Obama, and while a few people are supportive of my advocacy for Hillary Clinton, the majority of them are not. It is the same with my friends - most of them support Barack and are not afraid to be crude and insulting towards my candidate of choice. I try to maintain a level of respect with it comes to the upcoming Presidential election simply because, well, my opinion isn’t hateful, rude, or insulting.

I have several reasons why I have chosen Hillary over Barack, and most of them have to do with her policies on key issues, her experience, and my belief in her ability to do the job. I cannot support Barack because he has been consistently vague about his policies during his campaign, he has almost no experience, and I do not believe he can do the job as well as I believe Hillary can. I do not feel comfortable having someone who was a Senator for one term (regardless of their potentially shady past, all politicians are dirty) running the country I live in. We would not want someone who has only been a doctor for three years inventing experimental treatments and executing them with no supervision whatsoever.

Take it from me and Gloria Steinem, if Barack was a woman, his lack of experience would be a huge issue. People are used to men running the country, and they are willing to elect the far less experienced candidate because they want to keep things the way they are. And, personally, I couldn’t agree more with her. I am not a fan of saying “what if he were a woman…” in situations like this, but I think it’s time we take it a bit more seriously when it comes to Obama:

The woman in question became a lawyer after some years as a community organizer, married a corporate lawyer and is the mother of two little girls, ages 9 and 6. Herself the daughter of a white American mother and a black African father — in this race-conscious country, she is considered black — she served as a state legislator for eight years, and became an inspirational voice for national unity.

[…] I’m supporting Senator Clinton because like Senator Obama she has community organizing experience, but she also has more years in the Senate, an unprecedented eight years of on-the-job training in the White House, no masculinity to prove, the potential to tap a huge reservoir of this country’s talent by her example, and now even the courage to break the no-tears rule. I’m not opposing Mr. Obama; if he’s the nominee, I’ll volunteer. Indeed, if you look at votes during their two-year overlap in the Senate, they were the same more than 90 percent of the time. Besides, to clean up the mess left by President Bush, we may need two terms of President Clinton and two of President Obama.

Yes, Obama is an appealing candidate because of more than just his sex or race. But still, he is severely lacking in experience. Severely. While I prefer Hillary’s health care plan to Barack’s, there are still other issues with his campaign. Very rarely have I heard him state any concrete policies - except for the fact that he objected to Iraq from day one, something he mentions in every speech I’ve seen or read - other than his opinion on health care and the war. While these are two very important issues for me, I don’t like his policies. As far as my other pet issues, I know where Hillary stands without looking at her voting record or browsing through various websites containing political information. I know almost nothing about Barack’s issues from his campaign. While I have done the background research and looked at his voting record thoroughly, I learned nothing from his campaign regarding his plans. Other than, of course, that he wants to make change happen.

I am more than happy to get behind change. I am 100% about change. However, I am not happy to get behind change when I don’t know what will be changing. Barack isn’t a person running for President: he has changed his campaign and carefully shaped it so that he is a movement running for President.

I think Barack would make a wonderful President - someday. Not now, no way. His experience isn’t enough to be running the country. While I like both Democratic candidates, I feel that the President should be elected because of myriad factors, not just because he has ran a compelling campaign that people have fallen for. I think Barack needs the experience of being Vice President or at least another Senate term before I can comfortably get behind him as a Presidential candidate.
Of course, if it comes down to it, I will vote for any Democrat to keep McCain and Huckabee out of the White House. It’ll be a reluctant half-hearted vote, though, and that’s not the way I like to vote.

But no matter which candidate secures the Democratic nomination, I will still be disappointed in my political party. No candidate running, including those who have dropped out, supported all my issues. Federal funding for abortion, proper sex education, VAWA, LGBT marriage and adoption rights, the ERA, allowing polygamy (not in the creepy extremist Mormon way that involves brainwashing 12 year olds), health care, stopping the war, enhancing education and funding for college, repairing social security, rethinking and reorganizing the welfare system, fixing tax cuts for the upper class, and many other issues that no one seems to pay attention to or think are important. Which, hey, I wasn’t expecting. I doubt my dream candidate would ever run. I’m too liberal to have a dream candidate in the White House.

Two years ago at about this time of year, I wrote a brief essay on why I don’t celebrate Christmas*. I actually don’t celebrate any religious holiday, although I do observe some secular holidays. I feel the need to elaborate on my previous opinion and provide my readers with a little more information.

My favorite thing to say when people ask me why I don’t celebrate Christmas is: “I have integrity.” I admit, it is snarky and tends to rub my beliefs in people’s faces. It makes me sound like I think I’m better than them. Well, for some people… this is true, for other people it’s not. Regardless of my snakr, my integrity truly is the reason I don’t celebrate Christmas.

Christmas infuriates me.

People say “Christmas is about family!” or “Christmas is about giving!” Except, really, it’s not.

Christmas is supposed to be about Jesus’s birthday. It’s a religious holiday. I’m not religious, ergo I don’t celebrate. This is where my integrity comes in. I’m not going to throw my religious beliefs down the toilet because someone wants to buy me a gift to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. Last time I checked, Jesus was a pretty low key guy - he was fairly unmaterialistic. I’d think religious conservatives would be a little offended that th ebirth of their god’s son has been turned into the most disastrous and stressful holiday of the year. You’d think they’d be outraged that his celebration is associated with mountains of credit card debt, shopping, and bitchy people waiting in line to buy the latest Coach purse or the new iPod for their teenager. But they’re not. And if they are, they aren’t doing anything about it (except for Rev. Billy). Why aren’t they doing anything about it? Because not celebrating Christmas is tantamount to terrorism: you are unAmerican if you don’t celebrate Christmas.

Here’s another thought for the religious bunch: Jesus wasn’t born in December 25th, Luke suggests that he was born in the spring or summer. You’d think religious folk would be outraged at the misrepresentation of this most sacred day, and that they’d boycott Christmas because of it. You’d think that they would form new traditions during the time of year that Jesus really was born. But they don’t. Why?

Continuing with this, you’d think liberals and non-religious folk would be outraged at the association of Christianity and its many tenets with Christmas. You’d also think that political liberals would be outraged at the credit card debt, economic struggle, and environmental hazards associated with Christmas. But they’re not either.

So why aren’t people mad about Christmas? Probably because people love getting gifts. I’d hate to break down a potentially complicated situation into something so simple, but that’s the only solution I’m left with. If conservatives aren’t sticking to the holiday’s traditional roots and liberals and non-religious people aren’t protesting the obvious problems with the holiday, then there has to be something so simple, so small, so obvious getting in the way. Sure, it could be the time you spend with your family… but if you need a quasi-religious holiday to make up a reason to spend time with your family, you should probably rethink your family structure.

I guess the most difficult part for me about not celebrating Christmas is that my view isn’t respected. If I didn’t celebrate Christmas because I was Jewish, people would nod, smile, and say “Happy Holidays”. But when I tell people that I don’t celebrate any holidays in the month of December because I’m not religious, they get confused and ask why. When I complain that my right to not be Christian is being violated because employers play Christmas carols, I get laughed at by the people I complain to. Actually, at one job, I was given disciplinary action because I didn’t play the Christmas carols CD during the shift I was supervising. They tell me that Christmas isn’t a religious holiday and that I shouldn’t be offended. They tell me I should stop being such a Grinch and just celebrate like everyone else does. People don’t even try to comprehend the reasons why I choose not to celebrate Christmas: they are so confused by it that they mock it instead of trying to understand.

The ridiculous thing is, it’s just assumed that you celebrate Christmas. I guarantee you when I go grocery shopping a week before Christmas, someone is going to tell me “Merry Christmas” - or “Happy Holidays” if they’re trying to be politically correct. While I could smile, shrug it off, and say “you, too”, I don’t think that’s very fair. I shouldn’t have to fall prey to the fact that it’s assumed I’m ignorant of the holiday’s meaning. When people tell me “Merry Christmas”, I tell them “oh, thanks, but I don’t celebrate the holidays”. Most people just smile and leave it at that, but others ask why. “I’m not religious” is usually my answer, but that tends to prompt more questions. So I’m kind of stuck in a Catch-22: I want people to respect my beliefs and my decision to not celebrate Christmas, but I don’t want to spend 3 hours trying to explain to them that it’s a religious holiday and that’s why I don’t celebrate it.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not just about religion: it’s about all the ridiculous notions included in with the celebration of Christmas. For example, “tradition” denotes that you should celebrate the holiday by giving gifts to those you care about. But we are not allowed to ask people directly what they want because it’s supposed to be a surprise. They’re left to return, discard, or re-gift the item that was given to them. In addition to this, you always have your list of “obligation gifts”: the people you give gifts to because you have to, not because you want to. These people can include anyone from your boss to someone you hardly know, but it is socially required that you give them gifts.

I guess, really, the only thing I can do is encourage people to BUY HANDMADE (from me!) this year, instead of going to your local mall and buying something heartless and made without love that is probably going to be returned, regifted, or discarded. At least when you buy handmade you know you’re supporting the artist and the loving detail, attention, and skill they put into their products.

Edit: I can’t believe people are actually criticizing Madonna and calling her a scrooge for this.
* Source for statistics, quotes, etc.

Apparently, we have returned to the classic stereotype that if a heterosexual man has an affair, it is his female partner’s fault. I am just as aghast at the comments to this article as I am with the actual text. Summary: Emily is a busy lawyer with a husband and two year old son. She hasn’t had sex with her husband for months. He had an affair. It’s her fault because she didn’t want to have sex. Feminism is to blame!

Except, the author of the article doesn’t mention that Emily asked to have a separate bedroom from her husband until you’re about halfway through the article. I highly doubt Emily not wanting to have sex was the reason the relationship deteriorated. And, in typical male fashion, her husband didn’t talk to her about the problem. What did he do? He went and stuck his dick in something else that was warmer and loving. I highly doubt sex was what drove this relationship apart.

The author also has the gall to compare sex with chores. The entire article is based on the assumption that because women are finally “allowed” to say “no” to sex with their partners (thanks, feminism!) they are alienating their partners and ruining their relationships. If the only problem in the relationship is the woman doesn’t want to have sex, you’d think the man would up and say something instead of having an affair or ending the relationship. Don’t you think it would be much easier to say “honey, I’d like to have a talk about our sex life”? It takes two people to make a relationship work. When my boyfriend and I experienced the same thing (hey, in my defense, the transition from college to a 40 hour work week is not an easy one… especially when he still works odd hours) he spoke with me about it. I realized what was happening, and it was probably the funnest I’ve ever had solving a problem in my relationship. The thing is, I didn’t realize I was doing it. I doubt these women realize what they are “doing” to their husbands.
Apparently, it’s not. It’s just easier to blame feminism, because feminism is an easy scapegoat. People don’t like feminism because of how it has been represented because of ridiculous articles like this. They get mad because they think feminists are out to destroy men and take away their higher pay, role as breadwinners and rightful place in the patriarchy. While some feminists aspire to do many of those things, this is not the feminism that has allowed women to say “no” to their husbands.

The feminism that allowed women to say “no” to their husbands is responsible for the Supreme Court ruling that yes spousal rape does exist. There was a time before feminism when women could say no: it just didn’t mean anything. It meant you were going to have sex whether you liked it or not. It meant your husband, the partner who you were supposed to love with all your heart and be with for the rest of your life, was going to rape you because he wanted to and you didn’t. Are we returning to this? Is this really what we’ve come back to? If a woman doesn’t want to have sex with her partner, it would probably be more logical to examine the situation closely rather than to just make a snap judgment and blame feminism. I highly doubt the same thing is happening in every relationship where a woman is saying “no” to her partner.

Blaming women for their husband’s affairs, regardless of the excuse (feminism, bad wife, etc), is an outdated idea that returns to the Biblical notion of women as the ones who are dirty and sinful. Men can do no wrong! It’s not their fault their wife is bad in bed! She should know exactly what he wants, at all times, without asking! It’s like in Mona Lisa Smile when Betty’s husband has an affair and she wants a divorce: she gets blamed by her mother for the downfall of the marriage. Betty’s marriage didn’t fall apart because she was frigid and didn’t have sex with her husband: her marriage fell apart because she wasn’t even 21 and had no idea what she wanted from life, let alone a life partner.

I will be the first person to admit that sex is important in my relationships. It is not, however, important in every relationship. These women and their partners may not hold the same views on the importance of sex in their relationship. Perhaps the problem was they had different expectations for their sex lives that they had not discussed with each other. There is one thing more important than sex in all relationships, and that is communication. If you can’t communicate what you do and don’t want from your partner, then it is your own fault when your expectations are not met and you are unhappy. It’s not feminism’s fault. It’s your own.

The Feminist Wetblanket is back (a day late and a dollar short - what does that mean, anyways?) with an article on plastic surgery and what exactly we’re losing when we go under the knife.

Beauty and youth are perhaps the two most valued attributes in US society. While one could argue that money, fame, power, kindness, etc, are more valued that beauty or youth, it is difficult to argue against the facts and figures. The cosmetics industry alone spends about $18 billion a year in the United States alone marketing and creating products. Compare this with the statistic from the American Society of Plastic Surgeons: in 2006, almost 11 million cosmetic plastic surgeries were performed in the United States.

Whether it be a fear of growing old, losing a significant other, or not being valued anymore, tons of Americans are lining up outside of Dr. 90210’s office to get their labia reduced, breasts and butts augmented, and noses chipped away. It may not even be fear, it may simply be the desire to be “beautiful”. But with all this plastic surgery, what are we losing?

Of course, in Hollywood, cosmetic procedures are “necessary” to maintain that young and “fresh” look. But even with all of these procedures, older actresses are not getting main movie roles. Save few exceptions in Helen Mirren and others, there are almost no “older” (read: 40-something) women in Hollywood gaining lead movie roles. So really… the plastic surgery isn’t saving their careers as much as it’s proving just how undesirable women like Demi Moore would later feel when they suddenly found themselves out of work. While Hollywood may not be the best play to draw inferences from, it is important to ask how does this influence those living outside of Tinsel Town?

Models, actresses, singers, and other entertainers are looked to as trend setters for what’s hot and what’s not. The ongoing debate over who brought leggings back - was it the Olsen twins or Lindsay Lohan? - is just one example of how something so frivolous as legwear can cause the fashion community to ignite. But what about when it comes to more important - and potentially dangerous - trends like botox, breast augmentations, tummy tucks, and face lifts? What message are these trend setters sending?

It’s highly unlikely that any person attempting to peruse the magazine section of their local bookstore can find a glossy without a section devoted to plastic surgery. Whether it be a “then and now” comparison of celebrities and their plastic surgery denials or an article weighing the benefits and consequences of the latest liposuction technique, it’s guaranteed to be there. It’s in our faces and we can’t hide from it.

Now don’t get me wrong, plastic surgery can have its benefits - it can save burn victims or be used to remove big scary scars. But when plastic surgery is used to remove that extra bit of fat from your ass and implant it into your cheeks or lips I’m pretty sure the only justifiable reason for that is vanity. You’re doing more than just distributing fat when you’re under that knife: you’re telling yourself just how much you dislike your physical appearance. Who can blame you, of course, with all the pressure from advertisements and the media pushing slim bodies and large breasts onto you from an early age?

I’m not a fan of plastic surgery and would never dream of getting a procedure done because I’m grateful for the body I have and I love all the woobly bits and its squishy-ness. I can understand the desire to remove scars or a birth defect (which some may consider unsightly, while others consider it a part of themselves) or even undergo a breast reduction for health reasons, but I can’t understand going from a B cup to a D cup, or getting a new nose. But for the women who go in to have their noses reshaped or their chins adjusted, can they really say they love their body? There’s a huge difference between being concerned about your appearance and getting the occasional fake tan or working out and making an appointment to have your breasts redone or your tummy tucked in.

As a feminist, I can accept that there are different kinds of beauty of there and not all of them may be culturally acceptable. While there may be some feminists going under the knife to get a bigger x or a smaller y, they probably have a different prespective on things than I do. In reality, this is all about perspective: whether or not you truly love your body and yourself or whether or not you can withstand the pressure of the full-frontal assault of the media and entertainment industries. When we go under the knife, we’re not just solving those little physical imperfections, we’re losing self respect.

[image from getty]

Over the past few years, I haven’t been Christmas’s biggest fan. I hate that people celebrate the holiday without embracing its religious backgound (not that I do, but still). Christmas is, clearly, a religious holiday… yet almost every person in America feels the need to go into credit card debt every year, failing to realize that they are supposed to be celebrating the birth of Jesus - NOT THE BIRTH OF PLASTIC. A person I agree with very strongly once said:

The reasons I’ve rejected Christmas are economic, environmental, social and religious. The fact is, Christmas today has become a thoroughly illiberal event, at odds with everything that liberals stand for.

I can totally understand the point of Christmas if you are a Christian and go to church on a regular basis. It makes sense to celebrate the birth of Jesus. What I never understood was how Christmas got transformed from Jesus’s birthday to the one day a year where we have to buy every single person we know a fucking gift. I don’t know Jesus, nor do I celebrate his life, so I don’t feel the need to participate in Christmas. Including almost all shopping between the day after Thanksgiving and New Years.

I feel that holidays should have a bit of integrity. When I was little, I believed in Santa and that was the sole reason for celebrating Christmas. As I got older and it became clearer to me that Santa did not exist, I started wondering what the hell Christmas was about. The minute I found out that I was supposed to be celebrating the birth of JESUS (the son of a God that I don’t worship or believe in) I stopped participating in the holiday. Which is why it angers me so much to see white trash such as Britney Spears pimping out her son’s nursery for his first Christmas (which he will never remember). I highly doubt she attends church, or believes in God. If she did, she wouldn’t have married K Fed (more to the point, if there was a God, people like K Fed and George Bush would not exist).

For most Americans, Christmas is about spending money and getting presents. The spiritual (or childhood) meaning of the holiday is lost on them. All they care about is getting a good parking spot at the mall and grabbing that last sweater in their daughter’s size so she can look just like Paris Hilton… except about 8 sizes larger.

To be honest, I could write a novel on why I hate Christmas. The shoppers, the soccer moms, the food, and probably about 10,000 more things. But I think I’ll stop here so you don’t think I’m the devil more than you already do.

I wonder when Americans will wake up and realize that the Christmas they’ve been celebrating for decades - centuries - is a gross misrepresentation of the holiday’s true meaning and religious background.