xarkGirl

Popcorn brain

I'm such a mix this morning. Exuberance. Creativity. Sloth. Depression.

ConvergeSouth, as always, was a heady brew of possibility and new connections. I am excited and energized. It was good to connect with old friends and meet people I hope will be in that category.

I had to miss an afternoon session on Friday, partly because my shift to the night schedule at work has my biorhythms completely screwed up, but also because my brain was on overdrive. So many new tools and ideas and ways to do things. Kyte. Qik. Ning. Green screens and podcasts with Skype. Twitter tags and Friendfeed.

Anil Dash's comforting advice not to worry about adapting and adopting every new thing. Robert Scoble's good-natured embracing of cutting-edge ... everything. Jinni Hoggard's warm hospitality. Sue Polinsky's ability to work and play hard. Wayne Sutton. Chris Rabb. Ed Cone. Dave Slusher. Thomas and Brandon from Politics 4 All. Lenslinger. Reggie Greene. Bora. Linda. Kirk Ross. Don Sutton. John who stayed to the hard-core end on Saturday. Ross Meyer (did I spell that right?!) I can't name everyone I met so I won't even try. I have yet to get out the biz cards and cement names to faces. I have to try harder these days to accomplish that, damn it.

But there's always the letdown when workshops and dinners and late-night conversations over coffee and cheesecake segue into suitcases to unpack and schedules to resume. It's all the harder when what pays the bills is miles away from what you would do if the lottery gods smiled upon you. I am so sinfully envious of those who can immerse themselves in things they love and get paid for it.

I'm still trying to synthesize how these experiences have contradicted or supported my world view. Where I can go from here. I know this though: The world is changing and we are changing it. We are changing ourselves. For the better. In my humble opinion.

Declaring war on fashion. long live style.

I don't really even know what fashion is. The modern woman, at least, has more choices. In my day (yes, a long time ago), my mother had to have a purse to match every pair of shoes. Red/red. Navy/Navy. And so on.

No self-respecting woman carried a black purse whilst wearing brown shoes. Or, worse, a conflicting belt. Skirt lengths were the same for everyone. Imagine the joys of a 5'2" young woman wearing skirts that hit her in the no-man's-land of below-knee and mid-calf. I looked like I was playing dress-up. As a nun.

In middle school, Levi's were the pants of choice. Lee would not do. God forbid your mother made you wear Wranglers. The miseries of a curvaceous 14-year-old desperately trying to fit into student-cut cords were epic. If they fit over my ass, the waist gaped a mile. I learned early to wish for a different body.

Different hair. Straight and long, not wild and curly and a sight to behold in the drenching humidity of Columbia, S.C.

Journalism and mea culpa

Jeff Jarvis at Buzz Machine has a brilliant post on the attempt of newspaper leaders -- and I use the term loosely -- to deny responsibility for the current situation of print journalism. Could it be, is it, OMG! The failure to understand New Media?!

The internet does not just present a few glittery toys. It presents the circumstances to change our relationship with the public, to work collaboratively in networks, to find new efficiencies thanks to the link, to rethink how we cover and present news. No, the essence of the problem is that we thought the internet represented just a new gadget and not a fundamental change in society, the economy, and thus journalism.

In a shameless plug for xarkGirl, this is what I said last week on xark in "The Revolution is Here."

"Getting the message out" whether that's in politics or advertising or any kind of propaganda has always relied heavily on the Big Channels, pre-cut, mapped grooves to use in sending information downhill. Open the sluice gate, down it goes. Close the gate, dry it up . Newspapers, radio, television just increased the volume and reach. It didn't change the underlying structure: One-way, filtered, packaged and timed.

The Digital Revolution is the dynamite that blows that model to kingdom come. Information is now trickling, pouring, cascading through the hundreds of channels like nothing we've ever known. There is no map.  The flow has radically changed and it is no longer controllable. Big Sources can't trot out the same memes for the MSM to float for the masses and expect uncritical acceptance.

The thin line

To be a good leader or pursue justice through hell and high water, a person has to have some sense that he is right. A confidence that she has the skills and tools to achieve her goal. The ability to weather short-term setbacks for a long-term goal.

These themes are tightly woven into our elections. In Sarah Palin's bid. In Obama's sense that he is the right man for the time. In McCain's belief that he has earned the presidency. Those who seek public office must believe they have what it takes, that they are better than their opponent.

We in America have a curious relationship with people's high opinions of themselves. We admire belief in one's ability but we draw a fine (and often shifting) line between confidence and arrogance. Hubris.

And hubris is the word for the current times. People pressed ahead with their own agendas without hesitation. Without the burden of mature reflection or, apparently, listening to a dissenting opinion. Blinded -- intentionally or not -- to the possibility of failure by their certainty they were right.

Sexism and Sarah

With a Southern, Catholic mother who work for the anti-ERA movement while at the same time telling me over and over that there were no limits but my own on what I could accomplish, I have a paradoxical relationship with feminism.

My mother, like many women of her time, was worried about the ramifications of "equal = same" legislation.But it was not a fall-in-line, unthinking position. She's no shrinking violet. She made some courageous stands in the '70s South. She allowed me to be absolutely color-blind in my choice of friends and refused to attend functions -- even ones I know she really wanted to go to -- at the country club where blacks were not allowed memberships.

I have always struggled with that same equation. If "equal" does not mean "identical," why does it feel that way so often? That getting ahead somehow requires being less of a girl or that being a girl meant accepting a subordinate role?

I am becoming increasingly belligerent in my disgust for the residual work-place sexism that relegates women to being lieutenants [PDF] and cake-bringers. In my neck of the woods, the glass ceiling is 2-inch thick Plexiglass.  

I favored Obama, but, as a woman, I was absolutely appalled at the double standard in the treatment of Hillary Clinton.  My gawd, the beating she  took over a moment of honest emotion. The ludicrous, insulting obsession with her personal appearance. Her defeat sparked a new wave of discussion about women and sexism. On the heels of hordes of disenchanted women voters, in walks Sarah Palin.

Same coin, different sides

For those unfamiliar with my background, I was a conservative for a lot longer than I've been a progressive. I voted Republican for years, but gradually became disenchanted with the GOP's departure from what I believed they stood for.

I fervently believe in a two-party system (two at a minimum). I confess a little discomfort with the idea of any party controlling it all. We need healthy differences, discussions and perspectives. I don't believe the shrillest voices of the Right represent the majority of the party. I hope cooler heads will prevail and purge the extremists, or at least stop courting them.

I am not alone in this. Author Deanie Mills, a reader at TPM, writes about her conservative friend, Robby, who has had enough as well.

"We have plenty of principles on our side that we should be able to stand on proudly.  We shouldn't HAVE to get into this bullshit about Obama being Muslim or hanging out with domestic terrorists or whatever crap it is.  Most of us know that stuff's not true.  We're better than this."

Absolutely.

It's too easy to drift to extremes when there is no thoughtful dissent. The Democrats will not be anymore immune to this than Republicans. It is important to this country, the very idea of America, to have diverse voices.  Stirring up anger, demonizing opponents and moving past the ability to work together is not the way to do it.

Take a stand, Robby. It feels great.

False equivalency

I was all riled up yesterday by the ridiculous attempts of the MSM to equate McCain's attempt to portray Obama as a terrorist because of his tenuous association with Bill Ayers with Obama's linking of McCain to the Keating Five. One is fiction, one is fact.

I was all set to post on it, but luckily for you, Glenn Greenwald has already taken journalism to task for its contortionism in the attempt to be "balanced." I do believe that real journalistic integrity has been compromised by the (pretty much futile) attempt of media outlets to be seen as "fair."

Greenwald links to this speech by John Walcott, Washington bureau chief for McClatchy Newspapers, given on Oct. 7 when he accepted the prestigious I.F. Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence, but it's worth another plug. for good stuff like this:

"Instead of being members of the Fourth Estate, too many Washington reporters have been itching to move up an estate or two, to become part of the Establishment or share in the good times."

Izzy Stone, a renowned rebel journalist, is sometimes called the "Patron Saint of Bloggers." My favorite quote is this:

"To be regarded as nonrespectable, to be a pariah, to be an outsider, this is really the way to do it. To sit in your tub and not want anything. As soon as you want something, they've got you!"

Amen.

Hilarious

A poem from John Cleese (yes, THAT one) via Talking Points Memo:

Ode to Sean Hannity

by John Cleese

Aping urbanity
Oozing with vanity
Plump as a manatee
Faking humanity
Journalistic calamity
Intellectual inanity
Fox Noise insanity
You’re a profanity
Hannity

The revolution is here, Part 2

I've made a brilliant realization. Aside from understanding that the perks of having a relatively unread blog is that I can call my realizations brilliant without dispute.

Here is another way the digital age is changing the human experience:

The old way of thinking is fairly rigid. This or that. Black or white. Right or wrong. Clear-cut boundaries are so comforting. It's much easier to navigate the world with a map that shows clear direction. The not-knowing is disturbing, stressful. True dilemmas suck.

But computers change all that. They change the way we make choices. They expand us beyond the a or b choices into the less certain, but more empowering.

Sexism, Rant 1

My current personal situation has made me  hyper aware, now, of the memes about women that pop culture and the MSM cling to and spread. Tired stereotypes are just recycled. Sweeping generalities are stated as if they are God's own truth.

My Scots-Irish is up over this comment in the wake of the debate:

As the front-runner Obama needed to hold the line tonight, and he did. He likely won favor with undecided voters and women because of his ability to motivate through emotion and tap into the emotional component of viewers’ personal values.  He earned extra credit for his cool, confident demeanor.

-Andrea Tantaros, Fox News

Women in general are more emotional than men. I have no problem with that. Our brains are wired for it. In fact, there are some very nice perks that come from our emotional intelligence. One study shows that emotional imprinting means better recall.

But in MSM and pop culture, it's portrayed, often subtly I'll grant you that, as a negative. Here, the subtext is that women like Obama because we are  "motivate[d] through emotion." Not because of issues like, gee, health care? Equal pay? Keeping our homes? We just like him 'cause he's adorable! And who doesn't need a big, strong man to make decisions for her?

Well, maybe, they have a point. Because I hate this kind of glib talking point.