mary.berry: 2015

Last night, I had a dream that I was married to Dean Winchester. Not the actor who plays him (Jensen Ackles) but the character himself. I went to a Christmas party with friends and was mad at Dean for something so I decided I was going to cheat on him. I went to a website on my phone where you could "buy" an Italian guy who was in prison. I ordered one and waited for him to be delivered. I told one of the other girls at the party that I would only keep him if he were cute. Turned out he was cute (tall, dark curly hair) and really young. I can't remember his name, but he only spoke a little English. He came with a note stating what was wrong with him (he had something wrong with his brain that messed up his balance or something) and, unbeknownst to me, developed a crush on another girl at the party. Somehow, Dean found out about all this and said he was swinging by. I panicked and told everyone to say that the Italian guy was the new dishwasher I hired. Dean came and was making his rounds at the party and guilt overwhelmed me. I ran up to him while he was talking, put my hands on his waist, and said, "Dean, can I talk to you for a moment?" He said yeah and we walked away from the party. I started crying and hugging him, the realization that I was married to freakin' Dean Winchester finally sinking in, and apologized for my stupid moment.

Editor's note: I don't normally blog about anything really political, but this was weighing on me this past week.

I saw a post on Pinterest that was actually a screen grab from Tumblr, which is 90% of what you find on Pinterest now anyway. I’m somewhat thankful for this as I don’t like logging on to Tumblr; I feel the same way about it as I do Twitter. It’s a waste of time and any website where ISIS is able to have an account deserves to be shut down. Not to mention, Tumblr especially seems to be a breeding ground for young Liberals-in-the-making.

I read the other day this user’s account of one of their college professors explaining privilege. He put a trash can at the front of the class room and told everyone to crumple a piece of paper into a ball. Whoever made a basket with their ball would automatically get an A…or something like that. Immediately, there was outrage. What about the people sitting in the back? They were at a disadvantage. They couldn’t possibly make the trashcan from back there. The professor continued stating that’s what privilege is: being in the front of the class room.

::Taking a deep breath:: This bothered me on many levels. One, for the fact that this is what college professors are teaching to our future leaders. Two, this is clearly implementing circular reasoning which Wikipedia even states is a “logical fallacy.” In circular reasoning, something is assumed to be true. In the case of this professor’s example, the assumption is that everyone deserves an A. Anyone who’s ever been to any kind of school knows that not everyone deserves an A. For instance, I was forced to take a “spiritual” class since I attended a Catholic college. I, admittedly, half-assed my way through learning about Saint Francis and got a C. Frankly, I feel like I deserved to fail for as little effort I put into the class, but volunteering was a big chunk and that bumped me up to a C.

We find circular reasoning other places, too. For instance, carbon dating. Scientist and the like use carbon dating to “prove” evolution, but they’re assuming that their reference data is in fact true, when there’s no way they could be absolutely certain because evolution and the Big Bang (and Creation) are theories not facts…and they weren’t alive back then!

So, going back to the privilege analogy: the very concept of privilege is circular reasoning because it assumes everyone deserves –fill in the blank--. Lots of money, a big house, a nice car, etc. That’s called entitlement, not privilege, which is going to be the bigger problem with our nation’s youth. The only privilege we Americans have is being born in America.

I’m sure if people in third world countries could log on to Tumblr and read the teen-angst filled posts about no gender neutral characters in Harry Potter and how “un-privileged” they are because their parents don’t own their own private jet, they’d want to stab themselves in the eye with the one piece of cutlery they (possibly) own. I’m sure it’ll warm their hearts to read complaints of (gasp) having to wear hand-me-downs or second-hand clothes. Do you know what kids in third world countries wear? I’ll tell you.

The Superbowl has been going on for years; not sure of the specific number because I hate football, but you get the drift. Every year, thousands, possibly millions, of t-shirts, hats, and other memorabilia are stamped out (probably from a factor in China). Half with one team as the champ, the other half with the other team. So, when the one team wins, their stuff gets passed out, but what happens to the other half? The one with the losing team? It gets shipped to people in impoverished nations, who probably don’t even know what football is, let alone the Superbowl.

It also bothers me how much hate I see on Tumblr towards America. There’s a lot of America bashing; some of it towards our language, of all things. Here’s the gist of the many posts on Tumblr: “The English language beats up other languages in dark alleys, then rifles through their pockets for loose grammar and spare vocabulary.” There’s also another post floating around that asks the question when we lost our British accents. Someone replies with the idea that British people took on their accent as a symbol of a higher class; meaning, the American accent is of lower class.

Is any of that true? I don’t know. I don’t have the kind of time it would take to research that. I wish I did. I wish my brain was an encyclopedia of world history so I could go on Tumblr and tear these kids a new one, but, alas, I have to work. Because normal people realize nothing in life is guaranteed, even life itself, and so one must work for a living.

America is the best country to live in, especially for a woman, so I get really mad when I see feminist groups on Tumblr complaining about cat calls or not casting a girl in a Legos ad. At least we’re not being forcibly circumcised and/or have our vaginas sewed shut. Yeah, that really happens. I’m not sure if this is still a thing, but in China, a family was only allowed to have one daughter. If you had another one, that baby is either aborted or killed after birth (which is NOT a woman’s reproductive “right,” but that’s for another blog post). China is feeling the repercussions now as there are way more Chinese men than women; 30 million more was the figure stated in one article I read. That’s a lot of bachelor pads.

I went to a private school, and before you bring up any kind of privilege argument with that, know this: my mother taught there and we were allowed to go for free. That’s the only way we were able to go, otherwise, I would’ve been in public school (where I had gone up until 3^rd grade.) Every year around Christmas we, as a school, took a shoebox and filled it with necessities for kids in third world countries. While kids in America were making their Christmas lists for iPods and new Nikes, we were buying things like socks, toothbrushes, and underwear for these poor kids. I always made sure I included pens, pencils, and paper for my little girl. I wanted her to be able to write, if she could. And if not, then draw. Maybe it would take her mind off the fact she was in need of fresh water.

It pains me almost physically to think of the natives of impoverished countries and if they ever even glimpsed at how much we as a society complain about things in America. We’ve all seen at least one Indian woman in the news who was victim to an acid attack for one stupid reason or another. There’s pictures online of a girl who escaped from North Korea talking about how she witnessed her mother being raped and believed the government could read her thoughts. But, no. Go on, Tumblr users, and please complain more about how J K Rowling should’ve made George “gender fluid” (I still have yet to comprehend what that entails) and post more pictures of your nipples because, heaven forbid, whipping your boobs out in public is frowned upon. (Something has to be left to the imagination.)

I’m not saying this makes any slight to women ok. I’m not saying that because it’s better here that nothing’s wrong. So, what am I saying? In the case of the America bashing and outrage against cis people (you may have to look that word up) and the new nipple exposure movement, I’m saying (literally, in the latter case) calm your tits. You’re alive, you (obviously) have a computer, you’re getting some kind of an education, and all of that puts you way ahead and way more privileged than people in Nicaragua, who most likely are wearing 80’s sweater dresses. Not because they’re back in style, but because that’s what the missionaries bring over: the crap that no one else wants.