All The Men Are Stupid

A couple of weeks ago I finally got to watch Crazy Stupid Love. No, there were no ladies in attendance. I actually wanted to watch the movie.

Shut up.

I generally stay away from "romantic comedies" because, well they are exercises in extreme fantasy that are faker than the flying kicks in your average kung-fu flicks. But somehow I still manage to watch those....but I digress. I simply don't identify at all with most of them hence their non-appeal.

My exceptions to date have been The Ugly Truth..which did in fact have a lot of ugly truths; and Hitch, one of my all time favorites.

Bite me.

No really, Hitch is like Cinderella for men. The fat nerd gets the princess. I mean what average shmuck would not root for this dude? And if you can't identify with the fat nerd, you can identify with the cool black guy lady killer. I'm not telling who I identified with, but I will say that I'm not teaching ANY guy how to "come in" 9/10ths of the way with MY mouth. OK?

Right then.

So this brings us to the topic du jour. I understand that Crazy Stupid Love is a comedy but the overtones of "the men are stupid" theme was just too much for me to bear. If feminists can bitch and complain about the portrayal of women in movies, then dammit I gotta stick up for the men.

Dammit.


So in the very beginning the tone is set when Steve Carell's wife decides to tell him that she slept with a co-worker and wants a divorce. All in one sitting. Steve being the "I have no balls" man as his character is, doesn't shout, scream or you know, leave her ass in the restaurant. No, he gets driven home by The Hussy...I mean, wife...who insists on continuing the conversation over Steve's objections. Does he tell her to "shut the fuck up?"like you know...any self respecting man who's been faithful would do? Noooooo...he calmly says "I really don't want to hear this" and then bails out of the moving car. Yes, the moving car.

Yes, I did laugh.


But seriously Steve? Your wife announces, in public, that she's fucking her coworker AND wants a divorce and YOU bail out the car?

From that point on I knew this was going to be a "the men are all stupid" kind of movie.


To add insult to injury, who gets thrown out the house? The cheating hussy? No, Steve the honest cubicle office man who's been crying in the bathroom where everybody can hear and who's been faithfully providing for his family.

What. The. Fuck?

I thought for SURE that there was some baby involved here. Some kind of rational explanation as to why The Hussy ought to have remained in the marriage home. Nope, the kids are way old enough to know mom is a ho and had to go. But I suppose the target market, clearly not me, would not have enjoyed watching the rest of the movie if The Hussy had to spend the rest of the movie trying to get back with Steve.

Anyway.

So Steve, now paying mortgage and rent I suppose, does the "loser in the bar" bit. I admit, I did the "loser in the bar bit" thing once. It's kind of hard to pull off when you don't actually drink alcohol, but....anyway, where was I? right..So he's at the bar where "The playboy" resides.


Of course The Playboy (tm) is the superficial "misogynist" who's entire life's goal is to bed as many women as possible, seeing how he's "won" the gender war. And of course he needs to meet the "right" woman who will make him see the errors of his ways and become more like Steve "I have no balls" Carell's character.

This guy informs Steve that his wife is fucking the co-worker because Steve has lost "it". Yes folks it is Steve's fault why his wife was fucking around. He was too boring. Remember that fellas. If you get boring you deserve what's coming to you.

*eye roll*

Then there is the neighbor. The father of the girl who babysits for Steve. He finds Steve at the bar where he whispers, WHISPERS that his wife has told him he can't socialize with Steve anymore.

What?

So to recap.. Steve's wife fucked the co-worker and announced it in a public place and asked for a divorce and Steve is the one to be shunned?

The fuck out of here.


So Steve's character, after a wardrobe change and a hefty bar bill (Side note: you folks actually spend THAT much on alcohol?), finally gets laid and proceeds to bed about 9 women. Remember this is a man...and I use the term lightly, who was just informed that his wife has been boinking the co-worker and wants a divorce. At a PTA meeting it comes out that he's had a few women and what does The Hussy do? She gets mad.

Excuse me?

How does the "I fucked the co-worker and now I want a divorce" wife have ANY say on who Steve fucked after getting that kind of news? How does she even have the RIGHT to be mad? Exactly HOW does that work?

Does Steve say "fuck you Mrs 'I fucked my co-worker'? Noooooooo...He's trying to apologize and shit.

What is this? Is this what women are watching on Lifetime TV? Are they actually thinking that this type of shit is acceptable? Is this the "new man" shit that's being promoted?

Fuck all that in it's entirety.

Do I need to even discuss the boy with the unhealthy fixation on the flat ass, flat chested babysitter? Do I? For the entire movie I was saying to myself...but she's not even THAT cute kid.

Back to The Hussy. After Steve has got his testicles off, the Hussy starts to "date" the co-worker she was fucking? Really? And invites him over? Really? Really? And during this "get together" the father of the "crush object" runs in on the assumption that Steve has been molesting his daughter. This because his wife, the one who apparently runs things in that house, presented him with a card with a "compromising" photo of the daughter and addressed to Steve.

Now you'd think that he'd first and foremost ask his daughter what the hell this is. Nope. Steve must be a molester.

*all kinds of sigh*

So the men don't think. They are two faced ('cause playboy is good for everything but your daughter), prone to violence and don't stand up for themselves. I guess this is what passes for good romantic comedies these days.

So there we have it. All the men are stupid.

Dear Babyface

Dear Babyface

a long time ago you released an album called "Tender Lover". It was 1989, I was either in high school or college. Didn't matter. I wasn't a lover, yet, so all those songs were fantasy to me. Anyway back then I thought "Soon As I get Home" was The Shit (tm). I don't know why. Well the music was the bomb. Still is. Those lyrics? That's a whole other story.

Back when I was 17 and stupid I thought that whole "Soon as I get home from work" was like an instruction manual. No lie. Not having a father around to set you straight on these things can do that to a youngster. That whole provide for your woman thing was something I vaguely identified with so that concept made sense. Besides, the last song I recall talking about the rent, went something like "nothing goin' on but..". However; since my only concern at the time was room, board, classes and why my then very long distance girlfriend was never home when I called. I didn't quite understand the gravity of the lyrics in your song. I'm older now and listening to this track causes me all kinds of head shaking. Let me explain.

Let's go over these lyrics.

Hey, come here for a second
I don't like the way he treats you
He doesn't deserve you
He really don't

I suppose this line works for you. I think LL did that in his "Loungin'" track

Anyway it's not that it's bad, but cliche. Really.

What kind of man
Would leave you standing in the cold
Must've been a silly one
To sacrifice a pot of gold
You're the kind of woman
That needs a man that's always there
It's not that you require a lot
Just need some tender love and care

Hmmm...Perhaps they had an argument. I dunno. Didn't I hear LL do this one too? Anyway I want to focus on this "Pot of gold" thing because sir, we will need to revisit this line.

I give good love
I'll buy your clothes
I'll cook your dinner too
Soon as I get home from work

You swing good dick. Ok. I think every brother has used this line. But that's not the really offending line.

"I'll buy your clothes?"

What?

What?

Not that you'll buy her *some* clothes. You just said you'll buy her clothes period. Negro please. Don't you know that folk don't value what they don't earn?

"I'll cook your dinner too
Soon as I get home from work?

What kind of role reversal nonsense is this? Since apparently YOU are the one going to work; 'cause I didn't see anything about what employment she came from, YOU are going to come home after working all day and cook her food? Excuse me sir, exactly WHAT was this lazy heffa doing all day while you were out buying her clothes and working?

I'll pay your rent
Your faithful lover
Soon as I get home, soon as I get home from work

You'll do what?

Please explain to me how you're coming home from work, with clothes you just bought, all ready to cook dinner and it's not your place.

Explain that one to me?

Why the fuck are you doing all that shit AND paying the rent on a place you don't live in? So after all that shopping, cooking and rent paying you're supposed to go home to somewhere else? Explain this to me.

For all that it's worth
I give good love (good love, good love, good love, good love)

And after ALL that you still have to claim to throw a good dick? I do not understand. Really.

You're the kind of woman
That needs a man with lots of cash
With a stack of major credit cards
And with me you don't have to ask

Do this "pot of gold" apparently needs a man with a lot of gold. I'm dying with laughter here.

Babyface. Look. With all that you wrote here it should be clear why some man left her "out in the cold." Clearly it was a trap for a sucker like you to up and find so you could do everything for this "pot of gold". See, you asked in the opener "What kind of man..." and stated that "he must have been a silly one." Let me suggest that If you don't see that your working all day, come home and cook, buy her clothes, pay her rent and throw the dick, to some lazy heffa who's entire day consists of taking the credit card stack at will for God only knows what. Then you sir are the silly one, not the supposedly now broke and bad credit having fool that left her out at the bus stop (or wherever you saw her).

Anyway. Now that I have revisited this song I just want you to know that it's been removed from my favorite slow jams playlist. I see why it was so popular back then. Pandering is always a good way to move units but damn...this is some low shit. Even for 1989.

The Sanduski Sam I Am Defense

I am not a pedophile
Sam I am
I do not like boys
in that way Sam I am.

I did not touch them in my car
Sam I am
you take this too far

I did not touch them here or there
I did not touch them
not even their hair

I did not touch them in my home
everybody knows
in order to touch them
you must be alone

I did not wrestle them on the ground
I tell you again
we were horsing around

I did not put his penis in my mouth
I did not touch him on the couch
I did not touch him in the locker
I did not touch him in the shower

They are lying
Sam I am
I said it on the radio
I'm not that kind of man
now leave me be
Sam I am
I must go eat
my green eggs and ham.

The Boolshit

So we find Herman Cain being officially accused of sexual harassment. Some are taking Bialek's account to be that of a case of sexual assault. However; her story doesn't pass the sniff test, the hear test or most tests that you throw at it. Mind you it's not that I get any pleasure from defending Herman "Let me Upgrade ya" Cain but the "assault" angle has me disturbed and perturbed and needs to be dealt with.

Let us understand that legally assault is any physical contact that does not have consent of the touched. The key point being consent. Sexual assault is clearly assault of a sexual nature. In each case establishing consent is key to whether there is an assault or not. When we look at the events as relayed by Bialek we find that using the term assault is unfounded. Let me explain.

There is this Simpsons episode where college Marge was infatuated with a college professor who was trying to score co-ed booty. They were in his office where he declares that he would like to hug Marge and if she was OK with that. Then he went on to verbally ask permission to kiss her. The entire scene is an example of the ridiculous lengths the "consent" argument can go. In real life consent is not always explicitly verbal but is situational and implied through actions and counter actions. For example in the movie Hitch, Hitch advises his client about the 'jingly keys" phenomenon. In effect Hitch tells his client that if a woman is standing at her door and jingling her keys then it is a delay tactic meant to signal that she wants a kiss. Never mind that she hasn't said so, Hitch's client needs to "be a man" and pucker up and move "9-10ths" of the way in.

Really.

Now think about that for a minute. Imagine that upon following this advice (or seeing this film) a man gets a woman to her door and she's jingling the keys because she has a lot of them and perhaps can't make out the right one but because he's been told that such jingling is a "universal unspoken invite" to a kiss, he leans in and goes for it. Now imagine said woman being of the mind that she doesn't want a kiss and says "whoah buster...not!" Has he assaulted her? He *thought* he had consent because he was going by what he perceived were consenting cues that it was OK. The fact is that people in the course of normal human interaction read and misread cues all the time.

So let's take this to Cain. According to Bialek, she met Cain at some company event while she was an employee of the company. If I recall correctly she said that they talked regularly for the 2 day event. She made no mention of Cain making any inappropriate remarks or doing anything 'inappropriate" at that time. Later she is fired from the company. Later while seeking employment she cold calls Cain. Herman Cain who apparently had a sexual interest in this woman seizes the moment. This is not unusual in the least bit. a former employee is fair sexual game. We're going to ignore the fact that he is married for the duration of this piece.

Let's make it clear. If a person is going to refer one for a job the only thing he or she is going to need to see is your resume. Then perhaps have a formal interview, likely at the place of future employment, perhaps a business lunch followed by a yea or nay. Keep that in mind.

Herman Cain, as far as Bialek's account goes, does not ask for a resume or anything of the like that would be required by a human resources department. He immediately invites her to DC. When she arrives in DC she finds that her hotel suite has been upgraded. This is what we call a "red flag". Once Bialek determined that it was Cain and not her "boyfriend" who had upgraded her room she should have known that Cain's interest was not professional. The upgrade was "an offer", a sexual advance. Grown women should know this and know how to act accordingly.

Next Herman Cain takes Bialek to dinner. Really? This is red flag number two in my book. Again I don't see the professional reason to have dinner with Mr. Cain. I see having a business lunch but not a dinner. This was another "sexual advance". Mr. Cain is laying out the "typical" "wine and dine..then fuck" scenario. A scenario I'm sure he's done or has seen done many many times.

At this point Ms. Bialek knowing what time it was should have done the "Oh it's getting late and I need to go." Or maybe the "Oh wow...I'm not feeling so well." Or any of the other myriad excuses that women have used for years to brush off a man who is clearly in want of "dessert".

What does Bialek do? After dinner she accepts an offer by Cain to go see the location.

Really?

Why not go there the next morning?

Right.

So Bialek says that Herman Cain, after parking some distance from said building reaches over to put his hand up her skirt while pulling her head to his crotch.


BOOOOOOLSHIT.

As a commenter on Facebook pointed out, how exactly does that work?
Now we don't know what kind of car Herman Cain was driving. Did it have bucket seats or a bench seat? Do yourself a favor and attempt to reach up a leg that is next to you with your LEFT hand while taking your RIGHT hand to push a head towards your crotch.

Not easy right?

Now try that with a center console, found in many upscale cars, between the seats.

I'll wait.

Right.

So clearly Cain could not have physically done what was described *as* described. Now he could have done a double move. That is he could have first put his hands on Bialek's leg and motioned up towards her genitals. But here's the problem: Bialek said that she said "Oh I have a boyfriend."

Really?

A man has just put his hands up your skirt and your FIRST response is "I have a boyfriend"? You had a boyfriend when your room got upgraded. You had a boyfriend when you got taken out to dinner rather than a professional lunch. Didn't seem to be a problem then.

Now that sounds foul but it is what it is, when you start taking gifts that are clearly predicated on future sexual behavior that man is going to follow through because he takes the acceptance of these things as implied consent. And yes, implied consent is a legally recognized concept. For example, when you sign on the dotted line for one of those smart electric meters you have given implied consent to have your electricity use monitored and reported to law enforcement. Driving down a public street gives the police implied consent to observe anything you do in your vehicle that is in clear view. We give implied consent all the time. THIS is why describing the events as related by Bialek as assault is incorrect.

But back to the car. Anyone who has had an affair or knows of persons who have had affairs knows the "I have a wife" and "I have a husband" comment. It is generally speaking not a "no." but a "I'm kinda conflicted but I'd like to fuck" comment. Generally speaking that kind of comment becomes "oh fuck it...". Sometimes it doesn't. In Bialek's case, it became a "no".

What did Herman Cain do when he was told no? After giving his dickhead response of "you want a job right?" he stopped. Exactly what he was supposed to do when told "no". This is a clear cut case of a man who thought he had "consent" finding out that he did not and immediately reversing course. Had Cain not been a dick by trying to get sex for a job offer, he would be THE poster child of how a man is supposed to act when he is told "no".

This is an example of honoring the "no means no" regardless of how much you spent or where you took her to eat.

But was it harassment?

From what I read, Bialek was not an employee of Mr. Cain or the company he worked for. Nor was she in the process of a formal job interview. Bialek was someone who "lucked up" on a douche of a man while seeking employment who ignored all the red flags indicating that there was only one kind of "job" being offered. Cain was not some random guy on the street who made a sly brush of her buttocks. He wasn't a random guy on the street who yelled out sexual commentary to a woman he does not know and therefore has no reason to think he has consent.

Was Cain aggressive? Certainly. Personally I operate on the hands off rule. I don't touch, hug or otherwise make contact with women who have not either first done so with me or have given me explicit invite or I have a previous understanding with. But I am very much aware that this rule does not apply to everyone. I am very aware that there are some women who like and "appreciate" an aggressive man. There are even those who deem that unless a man is aggressive he is not in fact being a man. I'm not going to judge these people. What I will say is that given these varied attitudes towards sexual aggression it is unfair to project those onto other people and then judge them by our own personal value system.

Does this mean that Cain did not assault or otherwise harass women that he worked with? Of course not. When those stories come out they should be evaluated on their own merits, but this one? Booooolshit.

Feminism At Its Most Thoughtless

Saw this article in The Atlantic regarding recent allegations of sexual harassment by Herman Cain. It contained this gem:

Feminism, at its most thoughtless, engendered an overbroad and unduly subjective definition of sexual harassment that includes speech and behaviors ranging from offensive remarks to actual assaults. Feminism, at its most thoughtless, equated every trivial discussion of sexual relations with political discourse and framed every allegation of sexual misconduct as presumptively true.

I'm glad that was written because I've been making this argument for years. Every time I try to have a specific, fact based discussion on the topic all kinds of "automated responses" are given by the so-called feminist whom apparently are convinced of their own infalibility on the subject. They should take the comment by this individual to shape up their game.

The Future Apple

With the passing of Steve Jobs many are going to have their concerns regarding Apple's future move to the forefront of their minds. Anyone who was paying attention knew this was coming once the first treatment for pancreatic cancer, which has a high mortality rate, did not leave us with a Jobs that was "fuller". But this isn't about that, this is about Apple.

I saw a headline for David Pogue's NY Times piece entitled "Often Imitated Never Duplicated". I haven't read the piece but anyone with Apple Inc. on the brain has to think that this means as much within Apple as it does without. I'm not one of those people who proclaim stuff like "We would still be using DOS" or "we wouldn't have chat" or other such nonsense. I've been around long enough to see ideas I came up with as a child (and older) be implemented by someone else. No, the ideas will still flow but what is unique with Jobs and other visionary men and women is the ability and willingness to execute. Apple Inc. has been able to execute and lead but those of us who were around during the "dark days" knows that Apple Inc. has been very much an extension of Jobs. We saw what happened when other people took over the company.

I'm not saying that Apple has to go in that direction. I understand that Jobs and co has done a great deal of work of educating it's leadership and other employees on the Apple Way (tm). I'm also sure that the reason for Apple U, as I hear it's called, was created with the "dark days" foremost in the mind.

I watched the iPhone 4s video yesterday and I was saying to myself that Tim Cook is not Steve Jobs. Not that his presentation was bad. It simply wasn't "Jobsian". I've gotten used to seeing Phil Schiller et-al go and make announcements about products and personally I think Phil is more the stage manager than Cook. This underscores my concern. Whereas Jobs could command an Apple show by himself if he liked, there is already a split in the leadership. Again, I'm not saying that this is necessarily bad but it does reflect a fundamental shift at Apple. Jobs, while still in the flesh should be assumed to be the glue that held the top talent together with him gone, that mediating presence is gone and as with any organization that loses it's founding head those left often have a fraction (how ever large) of the...What shall I call it? Talent.

Some may say that I'm putting too much emphasis on Jobs. They will point out that Cook and others have been running the show for quite some time now. They will say that Apple has plenty of product in the pipeline. I agree. In the short term Apple Inc. will be the Apple we've known since the return of Steve, which is not the Apple I knew in 1989. Which is not a bad thing. The long term question is the one posed by David Pogue. Will Apple become an imitation of itself once the "Jobs products" and "Jobs ideas" have been flushed out the system?

I suppose we'll all know the answer to this question when the first non-Jobs product is announced.

Dealing with Stress

I don't usually post health related stuff here but I thought this item from Psychology Today was something to bring to people's attention:

Animals don't think something is wrong with the world, despite their survival challenges. Reptiles have thousands of offspring and most are eaten by predators. Lions fail to catch their prey 95% of the time and often go hungry. Male mammals don't get to have sex unless they fight their way up the status hierarchy, and female mammals are dominated by older females their whole lives. Of course animals don't conceptualize their stress, or project it into the future. They release it in the moment. But the next moment they confront a new stressor. They never give up, however. They just keep trying.

As long as you keep trying, your cortisol doesn't get the better of you. You evolved for action.

A lot of times we hear about "living in the moment" and many write it off as some kind of new ageism (or whatever) but here it is, the science. It is our ability to project our fears to the future that do the most damage to us.

Humans have one kind of stress that animals don't have: awareness of our own mortality. Your brain reacts to this awareness as if it were a clear and present danger. Animals don't have enough neurons to terrify themselves with their own mental constructions. You can't escape from the knowledge that the world will spin merrily along without you some day. The thought triggers so much anxiety that people try to avoid it. They project the anxiety onto other things, like health care and finances. No amount of health care and finances will keep you alive forever, so you are better off accepting the fact that you are a vulnerable bit of protoplasm.

I've read this before in other venues and it is true. We set ourselves up failure mentally by creating anxiety about the future (near or long term). It is this fear that stops us from reaching our potential. It is our fixation on "the enemy" that also causes stress. There are a lot of people who assume that because I am "pro-black" that I spend my time worrying and thinking about what white people are doing, saying or have done or have said. I can honestly say that I don't spend the majority of my time thinking about them because I understand that which we focus on is that which we gravitate to. Better to think on and focus on where I wish to be, who I wish to be and the situation I want to have created, than to focus on those who I deem are stopping me from reaching these things.

Toll Hike Letter

Dear ____________

By now you should have heard that the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey have decided to increase the tolls on the Hudson River crossings to $12. In light of this event I regret to inform you that I can no longer by your "boo across the bridge" as you are now in the category of "geographically unsuitable".

Don't take this personally. It's not you it' me. Actually no, it's the Port Authority. If by chance you decide to move to this side of the Hudson I may be persuaded to continue our relationship. However; until or unless that happens I will need to find a more toll suitable partner.

Sincerely yours

_____________

PS: If you do find yourself on this side of the Hudson, I'd still hit it.

About Dominique Strauss-Kahn

[updated 5-16-2011]

I wasn't there for the event but the story as related via the media has me very curious. The story, as I understand it, is that Kahn was taking a shower when a maid entered his room. Kahn then came out of the shower completely naked and sexually assaulted the maid. Does this sound strange to anyone else?

I'm not saying that it is not possible that this Kahn fellow believed his own hype so much that he thought he could just randomly attempt to rape a maid in a high end hotel in his room where he is known to be staying. Most criminals try to have some kind of alibi or excuse. A person in his position knowing full well he does not have diplomatic immunity and is not on his home turf makes me think the story just putting himself out there legally is a bit off to me.

I believe that Kahn was expecting a prostitute, a high end one at that. I suppose that he usually requests role playing in which she is supposed to be "shocked" at his naked appearance, show some level of resistance and then succumb to his "manly ways and 'charm'" and end up fucking; in the bathroom makes sense. I will suppose that it is usual for these women to be "let in" by some staff (perhaps even given a key). I think he came out and did his usual 'oh well...hello madamoiselle....". I suppose she did what any actual uninterested maid would do by rebuffing his advances but keeping it "professional". Kahn, not realizing this isn't the prostitute, become more aggressive (and turned on) and when it was too late realized that this was not the prostitute and he was now on the hook for at least sexual assault and probably attempted rape (it will probably get plead down to sexual assault). Realizing the legal issue at hand he hastily dressed and grabbed his particulars and made a rush to the airport before police could arrive and did not expect that he would be unable to get out of the country.

Again, I could be wrong and he could just be the type to think he could just grab up a random maid in a high end hotel, but I know that men of his position use prostitutes on the regular and those prostitutes usually provide men like him with certain fantasies that are not likely to be had at home. The maid scenario makes sense given the apparent power dynamic involved.

Update-

Having recently reviewed the news in regards to earlier history I'm going to put the odds at 60-40 for prostitute expectations to "believing his own hype" I say that for a couple of reasons:

1) The young woman in France said that when Kahn planned on assaulting her he invited her to an empty apartment that only had a bed and a camera. So it is CLEAR that this fellow not only wanted to have sex with that woman but expected to film it. Perhaps then he has a stash somewhere with his previous "exploits".

Furthermore that assault makes sense for someone who knows what he has in mind is illegal. An apartment where there is no chance of people traffic. A place easy to remove evidence. A place where he is not known and, depending on the arrangement, one he could 'deny" being. None of which applies at the Sofitel.

The second thing that is here that underscores my earlier scenario was how the woman said his aggression came in stages, which I am all but certain happened at the Sofitel.

2)UN "Peacekeepers" and other international bodies are known to have been raping African women with impunity. The maid in question is an African (by what I heard this AM) and if this guy believes his own hype could certainly think that "poor African women" are easy prey.

3) It was said this morning that if Kahn had been on IMF business then he would have had diplomatic immunity. That changes things a bit since:

a) he could have believed himself to be on IMF business or like other business people could make it look like he was on IMF business. However the latter is unlikely given the IMF's response to this matter. It could be the case that he forgot he was not under diplomatic immunity when he caught the 'unholy spirit".

b) What then was he doing in NY at a 3k a night hotel without his wife? I understand that she has her own life and business matters, but it goes to underscore what I believe to be normal for men of his position. Was he in NY at a high dollar hotel expecting the services of a high dollar prostitute expected to role play? Does this guy have an MO of soliciting hotel maids?

His lawyer is saying that is client will plead not guilty which is completely expected. Only dumb asses without lawyers plead guilty. The experts are saying that he may either deny the charges or claim it was consensual. The former is unlikely to fly, the latter plays into the "I thought she was a prostitute" angle. Assuming they actually use that as a defense to get from rape to sexual assault. Of course he would have to admit in public that he uses the services of high dollar prostitutes when away on IMF business (or non-business). I'm not clear that he's willing to go there. Then again these charges have already ended his career and political future so aside from his wife (and the possible financial fall out from a divorce) I don't see why he shouldn't admit to that to avoid jail time.

Why So Defensive?

"The dog de cry out
is deh dog weh you lick"

-Jamaican proverb

The recent article by Brienne Walsh entitled "An Open Letter to the Women Who Are Telling Me It's My Fault I'm Not Married made the above proverb come to mind. Her article was a response to a previous piece posted to the Huffington Post by Tracy McMillan entitled "Why You're Not Married"

Ms. Walsh's major point was this:

I know it's my fault I'm not married. I know that in the future, if I don't get married, it will be my fault as well. And thanks to the advancements made by the women in the generation above me, it's my decision to make.

If she had left it at that this post would not have been written because the above is the same thing I tell women, and men. If you're not married it is your "fault" (I prefer "choice"). I would add that the reasons for her current ability to chose such a lifestyle isn't only due to the advances made by women but by technology created by men. It's all symbiotic really. But that is a minor quibble. The major quibbles start here:

Because staying in a bad relationship just because it is heading towards marriage is like putting a plastic bag over your head, and just letting in enough air that you can stay alive.

Notice the quick, fast and in a hurry jump from "I'm not married" to "bad relationship". This is typical of far too many women (and men) who assume that if a relationship isn't "perfect" (whatever that may be) then it must be god awful and metaphorically stifling. I don't know what article this woman read, but McMillan's piece did not advise anyone to stay in a 'bad relationship". It did however bring up the unrealistic and completely selfish definitions that a lot of people have of "good relationship". So yeah, that sound you're hearing? That would be the dog crying out.

But Ms. Walsh wasn't finished. Instead of dissecting McMillan's piece and her 8 points, which I would have done, Walsh decides to cut to this part:

Because ultimately, marriage is not about getting something -- it's about giving it. Strangely, men understand this more than we do. Probably because for them marriage involves sacrificing their most treasured possession -- a free-agent penis -- and for us, it's the culmination of a princess fantasy so universal, it built Disneyland.

This is by and large true and the level of "Free agent penis" is directly related to a male's status. This "free agent penis" concept is particularly true in this current "monogamy as normal" social organization. I'm not going to get into the ins and outs of human sexuality but I'll say this: Monogamy is an artificial block on a male's ability to reproduce. Biologically speaking it serves him very little benefit to stay attached to a single female for his entire reproductive life. Females on the other hand naturally benefit from keeping a male around and to not have him create other children that "steal" resources away from her own. Keep this in mind because it is going to be relevant in a few.

Walsh goes into her objection to McMillan's "getting something" statement culminating in:

And so we learned how to expect literally nothing from a man. And do you know what happened because of that? We learned to let men treat us like crap. We came to believe that men were doing us a favor by settling down -- because otherwise they would be out spraying the world of willing women with their abundant seed. We were taught to be grateful if a man showed interest in us, and we became fearful at all times that he would leave us once he did. Women of my generation are still the second-class citizens of
fairy tales: only now, we don't even have the chivalry or the ever-blooming roses to comfort us in our eternal boredom.

"We learned how to expect literally nothing from a man" We? We who? And WHO taught girls this? I suggest that her problem in this regards lies with those who, while rightfully fighting for legal "first class citizenship" for women, also had the idea that they'd fuck around with certain social conventions that forced men to become responsible and marriageable. Besides, from what I've heard men were treating women like crap before women were mysteriously taught to expect "literally nothing from a man". I'm so confused.

The rest though, particularly "spraying willing women" is exactly correct though. Seriously. If you're not willing, there are others who are. And ummm that is the entire point of "the game". Catch your man (or woman) before someone else does. Apparently some women haven't come to terms with the fact that "independence" doesn't give them much of a leg up in the finding a life mate game. Don't blame me though. Blame your genes.

Besides, there she goes again with the negativity. "Boredom"? "Eternal boredom"? I do say, I think this woman really has unresolved relationship issues.

There's that dog makin' noise again.

But Walsh continues to show us just how clueless she is by giving us The Story:

A few weeks ago, I was interviewing a woman who is at the top of her chosen profession. She's a single mother to her teenage daughter. She is enormously successful, well-educated, beautiful -- and never married.

Our conversation eventually -- and inevitably -- led us to the topic of why she never married, and to illustrate the point, she told me a story. "When I was younger," she said, "I was dating a man who told me: 'You're extraordinarily smart, and you're extraordinarily beautiful. You need a man who is either so strong that he can stand up to you, or so weak that you can walk all over him. I'm just a normal man. I'm not the man for you.'"
[20 years later, they met again, and she asked him why he had married his wife. "She made good sandwiches," he said.]

So let's review this. Some presumably drop dead gorgeous woman took all her time gaining status and thought that such status would get her a man. Apparently this "extremely bright" woman never thought to evaluate the fact that in the sexual realm of humans Males display status to attract females. Males display such status in order to convey the ability to protect and provide and that they have good survival genes to pass on to offspring. Not the other way around. Furthermore; generally speaking, males who go after "high status" females, generally use said females resources to attract and impress other lesser status females. Think the guy who drives his girlfriends Benz to the club to pick up women. I cannot tell you the number of times I have heard "high status" women complain about men they "upgraded" who turned around and used that "upgrade" to get "lower status" women.

Furthermore; in this story the "high status" female apparently found some guy "hot enough" to lay with and have a child with. It doesn't surprise me at all because she's "beautiful". And "beauty" ranks no. 1 on every straight male's priority list for females. And please do not listen to these lying men who claim otherwise. Any man who claims otherwise who is not involved with a straight 0 on a 1-10 scale has proven my point.

Now in regards to the comment made by the "high status" woman's male friend in regards to the two types of men she would have to choose from. He is generally correct. I hate to say this, really I do, but I have run into so many well educated women who are downright nasty. They are generally condescending to anyone who they believe has a lesser education than they do, work a lower status job than they do or have lesser income than they do. They have nasty things to say about things that men generally like or like to do be it the music they listen to, games they play (or that they even do so), etc. I'm not saying that these women represent most or even a large percentage of "high status" women, but they are out there and they generally have one of the types of men mentioned in the quote. They either snag a man as high status or higher than she is who is very strong willed and who'll tell her to "shut the fuck up" when she gets "out of pocket". Or she gets a man whom she can manipulate and hen peck. He'll take it 'cause he knows he can't do better. This last part will probably come to a surprise to Ms. Walsh but yeah, men compromise too. Shocking I know...I know some of us actually get past the fantasies of hour glass shaped sex slaves. Shocking I know.

*eye roll*

What I'm sure Ms Walsh and Ms. High Status missed though was the real meaning behind the "sandwiches" comment. I'm going to assume that Walsh and company thought that a sandwich sealed the deal. No it did not. I would put down crispy green cash that rather than having an attitude that he owes her something, this guy's wife actually, gulp, catered to this man. She was probably the first woman who he really liked, to have went out of her way to make the sandwich where previously his girlfriends were on some "What do I look like?" or "what's wrong with your hands" shit. She probably made that sandwich with care and attention. I'll bet she was humming a tune happily too. Probably asked him if he wanted a drink to go with it. She put that joint on a clean tray and gave him a kiss on the cheek. And while he was biting into that sandwich and that feeling of satiation flowed over his body he thought of all the times she treated him well, All the women before her that gave him shit when he asked for a sandwich and perhaps one that got away who did do it for him but he was too dumb to see what he had. He thought about his friends who had been telling him he had struck gold and better "do the right thing" and he said to himself: "you know what I need to tie this up."

But I'm sure this scenario is too hard for Ms. Walsh to understand. So they'll be wondering if it was the Mayo.

Lest you think I'm being to harsh look at Ms. Walsh's next commentary:

So when you say to me, Tracy McMillan, that I have to work around a "man's fear and insecurity in order to get married," I say to you, why aren't you telling me that I should be going out to look for the men who wants a woman like me? (They do exist; some of them are my friends.) Instead of being told I need to medicate my "craziness" to pander to a man's itty-bitty oh-so-witty ego, I want a man who is every bit my match, and is not scared off by that.

Mind you I didn't quite dig McMillan (and others) constant chatter about male "insecurity" because this isn't about security as much as it is about biology. There are certainly "insecure" people out there, but there is a difference between "insecure/ social phobia" and "insecure/ biological drive". However; Walsh has a point. Why doesn't she go for men who are into women like her? Note that she doesn't answer the question. Why not? Why does Ms. Walsh have so many male "friends" who by her accounts are "into her" and is still not married? By her own account they are "secure". So what's the problem? The problem is the same biological human sexuality issue that spans "status". She is probably not attracted to them "like that" and she is probably holding onto some fantasy man that none of those men qualify for. What's that? Yes the dog making noise again. She's all ME-I-ME-I-ME-I.

E-I E-I oooooooooh.

I believe McMillan had a point on that.


The last point that Walsh makes, really pissed me off though. Really:

When are women going to start telling women not to be afraid of raising children by themselves?

It might not be easy for us to be single mothers, but it would surely be workable, just another way of doing things that would have the same balance of happiness, sadness, and hardship as any other life I may choose to live.

I don't do running the man out the family unit. I don't. In African-America, there is, unfortunately a pandemic of children living with one parent. I'm not cool with it. It is not a good thing to have males disconnected from family and child rearing. In the end, such an idea that children should be had without a man is to turn men into simply sperm factories. It is no less objectification than what many feminist speak about in regards to women. What's even worse is that rampant single motherhood contributes to the idea that Walsh began with: not expecting anything from men. What's worse though, is that in reference to my discussion on monogamy, a woman who decides to have a child on her own, immediately drops many potential mates from her pool as a good number of men are unwilling to provide for another man's children. And it is entirely within their right to make such a decision. Of course Walsh does not care about that because it's all about her.

Overall though Walsh missed the entire point of McMillan's piece:

All that I'm trying to say, ladies, is stop trying to frighten me; make me feel empowered. Speak to me like I can make my own decisions, and don't demean the difficulties I may be having finding a guy who I think is worth my time and energy.

The entire point of McMillan's piece was to help people like Ms. Walsh make their own decisions by showing the fucked up thinking processes that are preventing some women who claim to want to be married from doing so. McMillan's piece highlights that some of the difficulties that some women are facing are of their own making. Any mature person would actually understand that. Immature people, and I think Walsh qualifies as one, are always looking to blame other people.

Those men are insecure.
Those men are intimidated by x y or z.
I want a b or c and if I can't have it then I'll take my dildo and go home.
I won't do A B or C in order to get him and it's his fault for expecting that.

Everything for them is the fault of someone or something "out there" instead of focusing on what they have to do to get what they claim they want. If a woman doesn't want to be married that's her business. And really she ought not indulge in "why you're not married" articles because they are not for her. And when someone asks here why she isn't married she should say like I do:

It's a result of choices I have made. And until I make new and different choices my status will likely stay the same. No one else is to blame.

I'll close with a Yoruba proverb that many of us "single and old" people need to take to heart:

Don't let best become the enemy of good.

How Nokia Lost It

The recent news of the new CEO at Nokia deciding that Nokia would need to go in a different direction and jump off the "burning platform" did not surprise me at all. As a consumer of their Internet Tablet product I completely understand why Nokia is in the bind that it is in. Let me explain.

Nokia had the jump on touchscreen and wifi enabled devices when it released the Internet Tablet 770. I did not have one of these largely because I had never heard of it. Don't be surprised if you had never heard of it either. Nokia did a shit job of marketing the device. The excuse given for this "nit marketing" was that it was an "experimental device" and some sort of step one in five or so steps.

Seriously.

When the buzz about the upcoming IPhone was around Nokia released the N800 Internet tablet as an update to the 770. I bought one of these and still use it. Like the 770 it had a touchscreen, full web browsing featuring flash lite but also had a swiveling camera and an upgraded processor. It did not have a cell radio nor built in GPS but it could tether to a phone via DUN and to a GPS receiver via Bluetooth. Believe me when I say that the tablet was at its best when connected to the net at all times. It was arguably technically superior to the iPhone in many ways. However; the problem was this: Every time someone saw the Tablet the first question they asked was "what kind of phone is that?" and once I said that it was not a phone, all interest was lost. If you have to explain what your product is and more than one sentence, it's likely to fail. With the IPhone entering the market this was especially true for Nokia. But it gets worse.

Nokia still insisted that the n800 was stage 2 of whatever and not for "consumers". This line of "thinking" was very prominent in discussion boards such as Internet Tablet Talk (now talk.maemo.org) where many of the board members dismissed the IPhone as a toy for people who were suckers to the Jobs Reality Distortion Field. Many of these persons have since left for Android devices.

Ahem.

Many of these individuals would discuss the finer points of phone data plans for tethering. Which GPS receiver was best. What other OS's they could install, installing replacement browsers, e-mail clients and the REAL problem: What OS bug they found (and there were plenty).

Many bugs simply went unfixed by Nokia. The phrase we learned was "fixed in Freemantle" meaning the current OS at the time, Diablo, was not going to get any more updates and that device we had was now obsolete. As a matter of fact there was a group of members who created an update to deal with many known issues. Nice of them but really, that should have come from Nokia.

Thanks.

Of course the owners of the IT 770 knew that planned quick obsolescence was coming because their device had been abandoned by Nokia son after the N800 was released. So we knew it was coming. Having customers who know their stuff is going to be dumped soon is also a shit move. Many were in denial and merely did not want to believe this would happen to us so soon. Oh and did I mention that any OS update required complete wipe of the OS and applications? Oh fun. To Nokia's credit they fixed that particularly bad process...right before abandoning the platform and moving to the N900.

The N900 was an actual phone. Of course they shrunk the screen. Older developers soon dropped app compatibility with the previous systems. New ones would say they didn't have the time to code their
Product for the obsolete N8xx series or wimpy had no interest.

Small note I skipped the n810 which is was merely a cosmetic update to e n800 with the major changes being a slide out keyboard, onboard GPS and a better screen. They did remove the full SD slot for a micro SD slot rendering many of our SD cards....you know. It you had an 800 the incentive to upgrade depended largely on whether you wanted onboard GPS and/or the keyboard.

Sucks to be us.

The N900 was released about a year ago and was actually a tempting buy aside from it's tendency to eject it's USB port which also serves as the power port. It too was under marketed by Nokia. sorry I was too generous. not marketed at all in the US. Why?

1) It was step3 or 4 of step whatever.
2) not a consumer device.

And my favorite:
3) obsolete 'cause Meego was going to eat Maemo and well, see what happened to the N8xx series.

Oh did I mention that it only worked on T-mobile's 3G band? Seriously. I am not making this up. Six bills and 2G throughput for non t-mobile customers, which would be most of us in the US.

So in essence the whole Internet Tablet thing that Nokia was doing was adjust a bunch of "history repeating". Where we the so called geek consumer was asked to pay $400 to $600 to beta test their product which should have been their future but were just steps of some process. To nowhere apparently.

So what really doomed Nokia?

1) they treated their Internet tablets like some back lot paper airplane experiment which it charged it's customers for.

2) No US advertising to speak of. If I hadn't seen a report about the N800 in Arstechnica.com I would have never even known the thing existed. I still have not seen a single advertisement for the current IT. Of course that is due to item 1 above.

3) listening to it's geek base internal and/or external who said they would not want. Cell radio in it. Tech savvy geek are not the mass market. If you're seeking mass market appeal, they are the wrong demographic to listen to. Had I been able to say "yes this is a phone" there is no number of sales that I think I could have made of my current device.

4) lack of OS updates and applications. Nothing says "we don't give a damn" more than a lack of fixes and improvements on a regular basis for a product. That the mail app hangs regularly and chews battery in the process is something that ought to have been fixed. The fact that the browser Daemon will sit and chew battery after the browser quits ought to have been fixed. The fact that the swivel camera would not re-orientate whe the camera was facing away from the user ought go have been fixed. I should not have to shell out 4 to 6 hundred bucks for basic fixes to software.

So yeah, Nokia's on a burning platform and they're the one that set fire to it, fed it fuel and air while creating "bubble notifications" for Symbian.

Nokia is going to have to do that thing called advertising. You know, print, web and TV adverts. Their geek base is gone with a move to Windows phone OS deal with it. Whatever Nokia puts out it needs to be supported and targeted at consumers which means regular OS updates to fix issues and create more value as the product ages. Abandoning a product a year or less after it comes to market is simply not acceptable for a product that runs 600 bucks. Nokia needs to learn from the dumb stuff it did with what should have been a successful product, the Internet Tablet, and not repeat those errors.


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