It's not just the look of the blog that's new for the New Year: We've also got an updated Commenting Policy, so please make sure to check it out! Otherwise, the Shakesville Commenticorn will get a case of the sads.
Blog Note
Slàinte mhor a h-uile là a chi 's nach fhaic!
Thank you for another great year, Shakers.
Many of the contributors and mods are already on their journeys and/or are going to be traveling next week, so we're all taking the week off. We'll be back Tuesday, January 3, at which time we will resume your regularly scheduled abundance of incisive feminist commentary, political snark, pop culture deconstruction, cute things, and farts.
See you sooooooooooooooooon!
Great News!
If we remember the year 2011 for nothing else, let us remember that it was the year we first heard about the MTV casting call for a show that's "like Jersey Shore, but with nerds." Because: A) That is obviously going to be a very good show; and B) We're all going to be on it!
(No it isn't. No we're not.)
The Deezen Shore
Heard
Last night, some douchestew who hosts a show on MTV featuring internet clips of people falling on their faces and nutsacks: "This show has lots of good old-fashioned laughter."
Sold!
Remember when laughter when out of fashion? That was sad!
I'm so glad it's back.
Daily Dose of Cute
When I got home from work yesterday, I noticed something interesting in the mailbox. It was a USPS priority flat rate envelope that was holding something a bit larger than documents. And, it was addressed to Alfie.
I asked Alfie if it was ok that I open it on his behalf, to which he responded with a fart (I took that as a "yes"). Upon opening, I saw that Alfie got a lovely new toy from his Aunt Liss and Uncle Iain!! It's not just any old dog toy... It's a Chanukah bear with his own yarmulke (aka kippah aka skullcap):
I was very pleased to see his Lordship take to the toy with reckless abandon, working on it much longer than his favorite hedgehog. Eventually, he decided it was break time, and Space Cowgirl thought that a picture was necessary with his new treasure. Looking regal as usual, Lord Alfred managed to pose magnificently for posterity:
And with that, everyone at Chez Cowboy would like to wish all Shakers a marvelous holiday season. :)
It's Delightful, It's Delicious, It's De-Lovely...
...it's De-lurk Day! It's a slow news day, and we haven't had one of these since March (!), so all you Shaker lurkers who rarely or never pipe up, don't be shy; say hi!
Cheeky devils!
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by sunshine.
Recommended Reading:
TDW: Historical Homecoming Kiss of the Day
Fannie: [TW for Christian Supremacy] 'Tis the Season for "Crimes Against Christmas"
Pam: Iowa Town Bans Retired Cop's Service Dog—Because It's a Pit Mix
Mark: New Agreement Between the United States and Europe Will Compromise the Privacy Rights of International Travelers
Resistance: [TW for cross-racial adoption; racism; Christian Supremacy] Dear Jon Huntsman
Andy: Michele Bachmann Confronted by Gay Robot in Iowa City
Blue Milk: Why You Will Want to Love The Mountain Goats Even More
Michelle: [TW for discussion of eating and dieting] Putting Food in Its Place (This is part five in Michelle's series on Learning to Eat, the first four of which have also been linked in blogarounds.)
Leave your links and recommendations in comments...
Primarily Gross
Here's the latest from Bore Trek 3: The Search for Zombie Reagan aka the Republican Primary...
Newt Gingrich has some great new campaign ideas! Don't worry—being a better candidate is not among them! He is going to "launch a 'Pets with Newt' site aimed at Gingrich's love for animals, intended to show a 'lighter side' of the candidate." Which is PERFECT, because he doesn't have any pets. "Gingrich doesn't have any pets at this time, but he told ABC News today he and his wife Callista want a dog in the White House." Do you hear that, America? There is a dog who will probably never have a home unless we elect Newt Gingrich! You know what that means: We'd better petition President Obama to adopt that dog when he's reelected.
The other great new campaign idea? "The campaign also plans to release a music education video starring Callista, who is a classically trained musician and signer [sic]." Perfect. In other news, Gingrich is trying to lower expectations about how he'll fare in the March 6 Virginia primary. That's probably a good idea.
Speaking of Virginia, candidates Michele Bachmann, Jon Huntsman, and Rick Santorum aren't even on the Virginia ballot. None of them submitted the requisite paperwork in time to qualify. Whoooooooooops.
Jon Huntsman is truly running for vice president at this point. Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum think they're running for vice president, but they are not. They are running for Ha Ha Nope and Yiiiiiiiikes, respectively. Good luck to them! They have very good chances of winning!
In other veep news, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is "open" to being selected as the eventual nominee's running mate, if that nominee is Mitt Romney, whom Christie endorsed. I'm guessing anyone else would not be interested. Although, if nominated, Ron Paul should really think about it. He and Christie would have a nice Laurel & Hardy quality to them.
Speaking of Ron Paul, his grunge-era newsletters continue to be a very racist and homophobic and ablist thorn in his side [TW]: "A direct-mail solicitation for Ron Paul's political and investment newsletters two decades ago warned of a 'coming race war in our big cities' and of a 'federal-homosexual cover-up' to play down the impact of AIDS. ... Among other things, the articles called the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. a 'world-class philanderer,' criticized the U.S. holiday bearing King's name as 'Hate Whitey Day,' and said that AIDS sufferers 'enjoy the attention and pity that comes with being sick'."
Relatedly, Paul's Iowa campaign chair Drew Ivers said: "It is ridiculous to imply that Ron Paul is a bigot, racist, or unethical." I agree! It is ridiculous to imply that! It should be said outright!
Rick Perry is still definitely in the race! He has not dropped out yet. He also does not "have a problem with" drugs-testing people who get federal assistance, like unemployment, food stamps, and housing aid. Of course he doesn't. Because he is flesh tower of privilege with crumpled-up paper towels where his brains should be.
Mitt Romney, who is still very rich and will only get richer, won't release his tax returns. EVER! Well, that certainly bodes well for the transparency of a hypothetical Romney administration. I guess once a guy gets an endorsement from Bush I, he thinks he's hot shit!
Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.
Open Thread
This week's open threads have been brought to you by bobbleheads.
Question of the Day
Originally suggested by Shaker Annepersand: "What is your favorite fictional character's name? Not the name of your favorite character, mind you, but your favorite name that belongs to a fictional character, either because it's really amazingly apt or sounds funny or you just love the way the sounds work together."
Mine is totes Uriah Heep (from Dickens' David Copperfield).
Top Chef Texas: Open Thread
Did you enjoy last night's elimination? I know I did! Goodbye to the Person Who Got Eliminated! I will not miss you. You were a bully and a jerk.
Other things I enjoyed: Healthy Choice sponsoring the bacon challenge. Patti LaBelle! Watching approximately 3/4 of the cheftestants masking their apathy about Patti LaBelle's presence with a thin (the thinnest!) veil of awkwardly feigned enthusiasm. She is a national treasure, you assholes! Chris J's buttcrack! Chris C dissing his mom's cooking on teevee. "My mom totally couldn't cook...and she was frankly kind of a slut." Tom Colicchio telling Heather, "Well, BEV used the pressure cooker." Oh SNAP! Ed telling Ty-Lör Boring that he's going to "show his balls" by doing a vegetarian dish. 1. No you're not. 2. No one wants to see your balls, Ed! Keep your balls away from the food!
Exactly.
Daily Dose of Cute
Owing to the below thread, here is an extra heaping dose of cute for anyone who needs it—and for anyone who doesn't, too! Because there is no such thing as too much cute, obviously.
First, dueling videos of Zelda and Matilda, who, because of their tendency to sit one on either side of me every night, are collectively known as Mazelda. They're like the Brangelina of Shakes Manor.
Video Description: Zelda sits on the couch in a stream of sunlight, snapping at particles of dust thrown into the air during weekend cleaning. Then she yawns dramatically, showing off her beautiful blue-mottled tongue.
Video Description: Matilda scoops up water from the dogs' bowl with her fuzzy wee paws, then licks it off, because she's too much of a lady to stick her face in there. In the process, she drips water all over the place.
Next, still images of all the fuzzy residents of Shakes Manor, in alphabetical order...
Dudley
Matilda
Olivia
Sophie
Zelda
Discussion Thread: Holiday Dread
[Trigger warning for the entirety of the thread, as much of the contributions here will certainly be about abusive behaviors, dysfunctional family dynamics, and privilege.]
Does your family look like this? Mine, neither.
It's the most wonderful time of the year. Except for when it's not. And if you aren't happily preparing to celebrate the most perfect Christmas with your perfect family, it can feel pretty lonely—mostly because there aren't a whole lot of places where it's acceptable to talk about your holiday anxiety, or sadness, or contempt, without disguising it as some kind of joke. There aren't a whole lot of places where it's okay to have a grown-up conversation about how genuinely hard the holidays can be.
So, here's a thread to do that. Whether you're facing time with a dysfunctional family of origin, facing time alone you'd prefer to be sharing with someone else, exhausted even contemplating the travel ahead, sad because you can't afford a gift you'd really like to get your kid, pissed off because you don't celebrate Christmas and OMFG enough with the Christmas shit, dreading the comments about your body, your ideology, your choice of partner, dreading your dad's sexist jokes or your mom's racist jokes, dreading seeing that uncle who should be in jail, dreading having your parenting skills audited, dreading coming out which you are totally doing this year, or just generally fed up with the holidays, go for it.
(If you are having urgent thoughts of self-harm, do not leave a comment; please contact emergency services immediately.)
And if you are undilutedly joyful about the holiday season, can't wait to see your family, and are walking on a cloud of sparking white snowflakes, enjoy the absolute fuck out of it. That's not snark; I mean it. That is a rare and precious gift, worth lingering moments of conscious appreciation.
[Image via.]
Film Corner!
Below, the trailer for the upcoming HBO film Game Change, about John McCain's fateful decision (lulz) to choose Sarah Palin as his running mate.
Ominous string music. Shots of crowds cheering for Obama. A dude says in voiceover: "Obama just changed the entire dynamic." String music. Text onscreen: The 2008 Election. Woody Harrelson says: "It is a change year, sir. We need to create a dynamic moment in this campaign." Cut to Ed Harris as John McCain looking concerned. (Did you find Ed Harris attractive? Well, you don't anymore!) Text onscreen: A Time for Change. String music. Harrelson says: "Or we're dead."
Harris is at the Republican convention, smiling. Text onscreen: From the Writer & Director of Recount. Harris is at the convention, grimacing. A news broadcast reports that McCain is "reshuffling his most senior campaign staff." Text onscreen: Julianne Moore. A lady's high heel-clad foot steps out of a limo. That grizzly mom silhouette sure looks familiar as the lady walks into the convention...!
Harrlson says: "We desperately need a game-changing pick." Text onscreen: Woody Harrelson. "None of these middle-aged white guys are game-changers." Harrlson watches a room stand and applaud for the lady who is still seen just from behind. Darn it all, I know I've seen that hockey mom up-do somewhere before...!
Text onscreen: Ed Harris. Ed Harris as John McCain (oh Maude that is disturbing!) says: "So find me a woman." DUNH-DUNH.
The ominous music bottoms out, as it is revealed that John McCain, political genius, super-maverick, and definitely not an opportunistic fucko, has made the SHOCKING decision to cynically ask A FEMALE HUMAN BEING to be his running mate, in order to compete with the historic candidacy of Barack Obama.
Cut to people chanting "Sarah! Sarah! Sarah!" at the Republican convention as the mystery lady walks onstage. At long last, we see the face of Julianne Moore as Tina Fey: "I will be honored to accept your nomination for vice president of the United States." Cheers and applause. Yay!!! Nothing can go wrong now! From here, it's straight to the White House!
Text onscreen: From the Bestselling Book Game Change. Coming in March to an HBO near you.
This is so the worst thing you're going to read all day.
[Trigger warning for fat hatred, body policing, and bullying.]
BBC: Tell loved ones they are overweight this Christmas.
LOL FOREVER! Yes, please do that. Please everyone tell me that I am fat this Christmas, because I DON'T KNOW. There is no gift like the gift of treating me like I am totally fucking stupid.
(Btw, you'd think a vast international news organization like the BBC might have heard the news that not everyone celebrates Christmas, but APPARENTLY NOT.)
Leaving aside all the myriad problems with this approach—that it's heinously cruel, that shaming doesn't work even if it weren't heinously cruel, that one cannot know another person's health simply by looking at them, that it presumes gluttony and ignores systemic and all other individual causes of fat, including disability and disease—I just want to quickly note that the narrative of every story like this one is that not-fat people should assume their fat friends and family members are all psychologically damaged wrecks who need someone to tell them to care about themselves.
Now, some fat people are indeed fat as the result of disordered eating resulting from emotional trauma of one description or another, but that is not a safe or fair or reasonable conclusion to axiomatically draw about anyone.
And, further, if a fat person is indeed fat as the result of disordered eating, the last goddamn thing they need to hear is how fat they are and why don't they take care of themselves and blah blah blah, especially from the people who may very well be the source of emotional eating in the first place.
I will never stop being amazed by how we are encouraged to regard all fatties as people overeating to fill an emotional void, then interact with them in abusive ways that create emotional voids.
If I were concerned that another fatty whom I love was eating to fill a void, I would seek to fill that void full up with love, not deepen it with sanctimonious codswallop. Fuck.
[H/T to Shaker Emily.]
Photo of the Day
Kiefer Sutherland tweeted this picture the other day, which is basically the greatest thing I've ever seen. It is, of course, a reference to my favorite YouTube video of all time:
Transcript:Thanks very much to Shaker Tobes, who saw it on E!.
Voice Off-Camera: Hey, Kiefer. You're a pirate, man.
Kiefer: That would explain everything. [jumps into Christmas tree]
Primarily Terrible
Here's the latest from The Douchestewian Candidates aka the Republican Primary...
Newt Gingrich has a great new website: NewtGingrich.com. Click on it. Click on it again. Now click on it three more times. LOL! Whooooooooooooooops Newt Gingrich you forgot to buy your own name domain! Less time "courting voters with judicial rants" and more time in your remedial Internetz 101 class!
Mitt Romney has reversed his position on Iraq: Where he once supported the invasion even though Saddam Hussein had no WMDs, now he says it was "obviously" a bad idea to invade knowing what we know now. I'm really shocked by this total reversal. If there's one thing I thought to be true about Mitt Romney, it's that he's a consistent, principled candidate who doesn't just change his positions willy-nilly depending on which way the wind is blowing. Ha ha just kidding. Everyone knows that Willard has the consistency and principles of a horny teenage boy trying to get laid: "You like the Twilight movies? I LOVE the Twilight movies!"
Ron Paul is testy about the racist newsletters that bore his name and made him shit-tons of money. "I didn't write them, didn't read them at the time, and I disavow them. This is the answer." He then walked out of the interview with CNN's Gloria Borger. That is not a very satisfactory answer, Ron Paul!
I mean, apart from the fact that you just seem pissed-off at being held accountable for hurtful actions, rather than deeply remorseful that ugly racist swill was circulated under your name (hey, is that by any chance because you're not remorseful about that at all?), that you allegedly didn't read or know about ugly racist swill distributed under your name does not speak well to your ability to function competently in the leadership role of a complex organization, where you have to balance hiring trustworthy people to whom you can delegate tasks integral to executing your vision and getting personally involved to provide necessary oversight and guidance. How can you be president if you can't even make sure people who work for/with you aren't sending out The Ron Paul Racist Weekly under your nose?
Also, Ron Paul, I believe you are lying! Because I'm pretty sure no one would have gotten away with sending out pro-choice feminist theory under your name. Just saying!
Rick Perry is still definitely in the race! He has not dropped out yet.
Michele Bachmann has a favorite gun: "My favorite gun is the AR15 and I'm a really good shot." The AR15 is the civilian version of the M16 assault rifle used by the US military. Um, good job? I don't know anything about guns, and I am kind of creeped out by having favorite guns, but if you're going to have a favorite gun, the AR15 seems like a great one. It is definitely a very impressive murder machine! (Yiiiiiiiiiiiiiikes.)
Here are five things you probably don't know about Jon Huntsman. They are also five things you probably don't care about. Then again, maybe knowing that Jon Huntsman dropped out of high school in 1978 to play keyboards in the rock band Wizard will make you reconsider whether he should be President of the United States of America, so.
Who thinks Rick Santorum's answers to Wolf Blitzer in this interview are just very, very good—a real model of coherent proficiency on the important issues of the day?
Well, that makes sense.
Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.
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