AND THE WINNER IS ...

I'm admitting it. My guilty pleasure is America's Next Top Model. For the record, I am not a regular viewer or reality TV. But my best friend, who I lived with throughout my college years, got me hooked on Top Model. I don't know what it is about the show ... the unintended hilarity, the fun of making snarky comments throughout, the eye-roll inducing drama ... I can't help loving it. Recently I canceled my cable subscription due to Charter's ridiculously high rates and also due to the fact that I am rarely home to watch TV. But my love affair with ANTM continued when I went to visit my former roommate in the Twin Cities and proceeded to watch nearly all of Cycle 10 (the newest season) on her DVR. And last night she called me to inform me that for the first time in Top Model history, the winner was a plus-sized model! Congratulation to Whitney for making ANTM history!



Whitney wasn't my favorite contestant. I liked awkward, punk-rock contestant Lauren because, well, I always like the unique ones.


But Lauren was cut right after the girls' arrival in Rome, and once it got down to the final two it was between Whitney and Hawaiian surfer-girl Anya (Who I swear to God I thought was originally from another country because of her unusual accent). Anya is gorgeous and had some great photos, even though I thought that the platinum blonde hair that they gave her sucked. (For that reason, posted picture is pre-ANTM)

But according to my friend who actually watched the finale, Whitney rocked the runway show and I was ecstatic to hear that she was the winner. People have long said that ANTM doesn't really produce "top models" and that is definitely true. (How often have you seen former winners actually in magazines or in commercials -- besides those done to promote the show?) But this is still awesome nonetheless. There have been plus-sized contestants on the show in the past, but they have never made it very far. In Cycle 3 Toccara Jones made it to the final seven. Cycle 8 was actually the first and only season to feature two plus-sized models. Diana Zalewski was cut in Episode 6 and Whitney Cunningham lasted only slightly longer, making it to the final seven. In Cycle 9 Sarah Hartshorne was cut in Episode 8 amid criticisms that she had lost weight and was losing her plus-size status (but of course wasn't thin enough to be a "regular" model).

By the time this cycle rolled around, I was starting to think that it was a mean joke to even put plus-size models on the show, since it seemed obvious that they were never going to really win. Amazingly I have been proven wrong! Some conspiracy-theorists have been saying that this cycle was rigged and that it was decided from the beginning that this would be the year for a plus-sized girl to win. Whether or not that is true doesn't really matter, although saying that does seem unfair to Whitney -- who actually did a good job in photoshoots and runway. Other rumors are flying around the internet as well after some alleged pre-ANTM photos of Whitney surfaced.


The circulating rumor is that Whitney was previously a size 2-4 when she was approached by ANTM casting agents. Supposedly she was told that she could be on the show if she gained 20 pounds and modeled as a plus-sized contestant. This rumor undermines comments made by Whitney throughout the season about how hard it was to grow up heavy and be made fun of, etc. In my opinion, this whole rumor seems far-fetched. Why on earth would the show ask someone to gain weight when there are plenty of beautiful, already plus-sized girls out there (as indicated by previous seasons)? The more likely explanation is that, like many women out there, Whitney has struggled with her weight and may have fluctuated in sizes over the years. I personally have gone back and forth between sizes 4 and 10 over the years and I know that just because you are able to shed 15 or 20 pounds doesn't mean that you will definitely keep that weight off.

Whether Whitney has gone from a size 4 to a size 8 or 10 doesn't make her story any less inspiring. In fact, in a way it makes it more inspiring that she "made it" now rather than before, when she was thinner. And here is something else that Whitney's story might make us think about: according to Wikipedia's page on Cycle 10, Whitney is 5'10" and 159 pounds. According to medical recommendations for someone of Whitney's height, age and gender, a healthy weight range is between 132 and 174 pounds. Whitney falls right in the middle, making her a very healthy and average weight. But when you put her next to girls who are 5'10 and 115 pounds, she looks like a big heifer. It is an extremely sad world when women like Whitney, of average weight, are labeled as plus-sized. If you go to this ideal weight body calculator, you can enter in information regarding weight, height, age and gender to find medical recommendations on weight as well as a category called "People's Choice Ideal Weight". This category shows what people think is the ideal weight for someone of a particular height, weight, age and gender. It is interesting to see that this number is typically unrealistically low, which is no big surprise considering our culture's views on body image. Last June I wrote about ad campaigns that targeted body image, and I also wrote about how overall our society has a dysfunctional concept of healthy bodies. On the one hand it is progress to see someone like Whitney win America's Next Top Model, but on the other hand it seems less progressive to see women of healthy weights being called heavy.

Perhaps someday "plus-size" will really mean overweight. Right now, that seems unlikely.

MASON JENNINGS ROCKS MY WORLD

From time to time I like to give shout outs to some of my favorite music artists, but I noticed that I have written mostly about female musicians, with the exception of Rilo Kiley (which is fronted by a woman, Jenny Lewis, but also has male band members). I'm not sexist, I just happen to listen to female artists more frequently than males. But as it so happens, one of my favorite musicians of all time is a fellow by the name of Mason Jennings ...

Mason is a Minnesota based artist and began his career right in good ole' Minneapolis! He produced his debut album in 1997 and has released five other albums since them, with his seventh album In the Ever releasing this month! While at one time his greatest following was in the Twin Cities (I was first introduced to him nearly five years ago by my roommate who was from Minneapolis), his popularity is slowly growing across the nation. In 2007 he toured with Guster and that same year he sang two of the Bob Dylan songs for the soundtrack of the film I'm Not There. This year he is touring with Australian artist Missy Higgins and later with Jack Johnson.

His music apparently falls into the genre of "pop-folk." His lyrics are often very intimate -- frequently connected very closely with his own life. The song "Which Way Your Heart Will Go" was based on his experiences with fatherhood. He also is known for writing songs with literary and historical themes. For example, one of my favorite songs of his "Adrian" was inspired by the novel Beloved by Toni Morrison. Another beautiful song of his, "The Ballad of Paul and Sheila" was written in memory of Minnesota's beloved Senator Paul Wellstone and his wife Sheila who were killed in a plane crash 2002. A crowd favorite, "Keepin' It Real" was written specifically for the hit movie Shrek but producers ended up using Counting Crows' "Accidentally in Love" instead. More information on his music and the songwriting, recording process can be found in an awesome interview from last year done by a woman in Colorado.

Going to a Mason concert is a truly wonderful experience. He is a warm, intelligent and talented man who completely draws the audience in. I have seen him three times -- once in Madison and twice in Minneapolis. Seeing him perform in the Cities is a great thing because he has such a huge and loyal fan base. When I saw him play last December, right after Christmas, it was his "Hometown show" and he brought his wife up on stage to sing with him, then later his father joined him and his brother. It was really cool!

Here are some clips of him playing in concert (unfortunately live bootleg clips were all I could find online ... guess he's not too commercial yet!). The sound quality is really good, however.

The first is a performance of the song "Jackson Square" from his album Boneclouds (2006).



Next is Mason performing the song "Sorry Signs on Cash Machines" from his 2002 album Century Spring.



Finally a very short clip of him performing the song "Adrian", also from 2002's Century Spring.



So go, check him out if you haven't already! Because he's not just a great musician, he's also one rad person! (I giggle every time I use the word "rad" by the way, but my California friend seems to have made it a permanent part of my lexicon). You can visit his website to get tour information, song lyrics, view videos (including an acoustic version of the aforementioned "The Ballad of Paul and Sheila"), and pre-order his new album!

A WORD ON THE GASOLINE CRISIS

Yes, the sky-high gasoline prices are getting me down just as much as the next person. I try to be an environmentally conscious individual and erase my "carbon footprint" as much as possible, but I just can't get around that pesky need to have a car. I live in downtown Madison, a calculated move on my part because it puts me close to pretty much everything. I walk to get groceries, to go to the bank, to go to the library, to go to coffee shops, restaurants, bars, etc. But I can't walk to work. I can't even take the damn, complicated bus to work. And even if I could take the bus, I need a car once I get to work. I'm a nanny, so I spend a large portion of the day driving children around. And no matter what I do -- even though I rarely ever use my car outside of work -- I have to fill up once a week. And it sucks. A lot. Not just because it costs me a lot of my hard earned money that I could be putting towards graduate school, but because I know the environmental impact of so much driving.

But yet, even with the ridiculously high gas prices, for me driving is still cheaper than taking mass transit. To that I say, what the hell?! This past weekend I went to the Twin Cities to visit my former roommate/best friend. I took the Greyhound because I was sick of driving. From Madison to St. Paul, a trip on the Greyhound takes about 5 hours and 20 minutes and costs $95 for a round-trip ticket. Driving myself, the trip is pretty much exactly four hours and uses up about a full tank of gas on my Jetta (with current gas prices, that means it costs me a little under $80). And it isn't just the Greyhound that costs more than driving ...

This coming weekend I am planning a trip to my parents' house right outside of Milwaukee. Before I had a car, I always took the Badger Bus between Milwaukee and Madison. Let's compare the cost efficiency of taking the Badger Bus. A ride on the BB takes an hour and a half (not including the extra fifteen minutes required on each side of the journey to get to/from the bus stops) and costs $34 round-trip. Driving from right outside my apartment to right outside my parents' house takes an hour and fifteen minutes and uses a little under a quarter a tank of gas (so round-trip we'll figure about $20). Once more, it is noticeably cheaper and more efficient to just drive myself.

Here is my point: Many of the politicians (ahem, Hillary Clinton and John McCain) are talking about this gas tax vacation as a way of relieving the gas costs. Here's an idea: why don't we actually look at some ways that we can lower gas prices as well as gas usage. I don't know, maybe we could encourage mass transportation? In a country as developed as the U.S., our overall public transportation sucks and is really expensive. Some cities are much better than others. The D.C. area has the Metro System, Chicago has the El, New York has the subways, but there are so many huge cities that have nothing close to good public transportation. And intra-city travel is horrendously expensive, as I have just pointed out. Instead of easing the gas tax, thereby encouraging folks to just go on using as much gas as ever, how about subsidizing public transportation? How about making it so that it is cheaper to take the bus from Madison to St. Paul than it is to drive just yourself?

If it suddenly becomes much less expensive to take the bus or the train or whatnot, more people would want to do it and the bus companies might add more routes and more daily departures. Of course taking the bus or the train still uses gasoline, so we definitely still need to look towards using alternative fuel sources. And granted, a large Greyhound bus is less fuel-efficient than other vehicles. But even so, think how much gas is saved when you load fifty people onto one bus versus those fifty people each driving him or herself.

Naturally, there are many other things that can be done as well. But I find it absurd that in all this talk, the government hasn't tried creating incentives for people to use public transportation more often. No, instead the government talks about how to let people use just as much gas as normal. As Sen. Obama said on the issue, cutting the gas tax would save consumers little, while taking money away from needed things like road improvements. For those who don't know, the gas tax goes into the Highway Trust Fund. As with all tax money, those funds don't just magically disappear. They go towards things that we actually need. I have several friends who live in the Twin Cities and I will never forget that night last summer when the I-35W bridge collapsed during rush hour. We have already diverted enough money away from our basic infrastructure, and I am happy to pay my outrageously high gas tax if that means I will never have to live through a night of worry like that again. Temporarily cutting the gas tax will give short-term gains to consumers in terms of how much money they actually spend on gas, but we need to realize that the $30 we save is going to equal millions of dollars taken away from our infrastructure.

As Sen. Obama also said, a summer gas-tax holiday ignores the long-term issues. We need to move out of the current frame of thinking -- i.e., how to lower gas prices. That line of thinking will not sustain us. We need to start thinking about how we can make fundamental changes in the way that we live our lives. Few people want to do that because it requires energy and sacrifices on the individual level. I know that it just sucks to give up that big SUV in favor of a fuel-efficient car and it is probably a HUGE hassle to walk four blocks to get your morning latte rather than drive and an extra hour tacked onto a long trip is downright annoying, but these are sacrifices that we can live through. These are sacrifices that the government should start asking people to make. If Bush can stand up and say that it is patriotic to support an unjust and horrible war, then government officials can stand up and say that it is patriotic to support the survival of the planet.

So that was a sort of random, stream of consciousness on the issue (dammit, I said I wasn't going to do those!) I apologize and promise that I will try to be more coherent the next time I write. Maybe I'll stay away from political issues for a while, they bring out the "ranter" in me :)

ARE DEMOCRATS TRYING TO SELF-DESTRUCT?

The other day when I was listening to Air America (or, actually, Madison's local version -- The Mic 92.1) I heard a staggering statistic: apparently more than a quarter of Hillary Clinton supporters say that if Barack Obama is the Democratic nominee, they will not vote for him. The number of Obama supporters that allegedly will not vote for Clinton is a bit smaller. But still, the fact remains that a huge percentage of people are so stubbornly committed to their candidate of choice that they would apparently rather see another four years of Republican rule than concede defeat. What the hell is the matter with these people??

Do Hillary Clinton supporters really think that John McCain would be a better choice for president than Barack Obama (and vice-versa)? If that's true then they are completely deluded. Because McCain is the darling of the media, he has wrongfully been painted as some type of maverick, Independent when the reality is that in the past year his Senate votes supported the Bush Administration nearly 90% of the time. The same is true for his voting record since he took office. On most of the key issues that Democrats care about he is consistently conservative. He supports the repeal of Roe v. Wade (he was given a 0% rating by NARAL -- National Abortion & Reproductive Rights Action League), he has a strong anti-union voting record (he has a score of only 15% by the AFL-CIO), he has voted to continue the Patriot Act, to repeal habeas corpus for Guantanamo Bay detainees, he has no type of universal health care plan, he opposes restrictions on assault weapons, he supports NAFTA and all types of free-trade agreements that essentially support shipping American jobs overseas, he does not support the Kyoto Protocol and thinks we should re-invest oil profits in nuclear power, his solution to public education problems is more charter schools, homeschooling and school vouchers, he thinks that we need more of the death penalty and more prisons and believes in prosecuting youth as adults, he thinks the solution for keeping jobs in America is to further cut corporate income taxes yet he voted against repealing a tax subsidy for corporations that move jobs overseas, he voted against adding sexual orientation to the definition of hate crimes, he was given a rating of 0% by the ACLU (ZERO PERCENT!), 33% by the Human Rights Campaign, and 7% by the NAACP, he voted against outlawing job discrimination based on sexual orientation and finally he believes that the Ten Commandments would bring "virtue to our schools." Not to mention there are many other things generally wrong with him (like that he doesn't seem to really understand that Al-Qaeda is Sunni and not Shiite).

Do I need to say more to convince people that John McCain is not a friend to the Democrats??! Look, I voted for Barack Obama in the Wisconsin primary. It was a really difficult decision, as I have been a huge Hillary Clinton fan for years and years. (In fact, if only I had a scanner available I would post a picture of me gleefully standing outside her Senate office on my senior AP Government trip to D.C.!) However, I found myself feeling disgusted by some of her campaign strategies, such as the 3 AM phone call ad which I felt essentially said, "If you vote for Obama, terrorists will kill you." Some people think that Obama's lack of negativity shows weakness on his part, and maybe he should fight back sometimes and that the "I'm a lover, not a fighter" thing won't do us any good in the general election. But for some reason I am really turned off by negativity, and so in the end it was Obama's positive energy that brought me to his side. That and the years he spent working as a community organizer. As someone with a degree in social work, I got really excited by that. But despite my current support of Obama, if Hillary Clinton is the nominee, I will vote for her. If it ends up that she gets the nomination through some type of back room deal with the super delegates, I may have to hold my breath as I mark her name on my ballot, but I will still do it. Why? Because I am not interested in another four years of the Bush legacy.

So even if you are an Independent that has gone Democrat this year because you like Obama or you like Clinton, let me remind you that these two candidates are much more alike than they are different. If you are willing to support Obama's policies, then remember that Clinton's policies are not so different from his. McCain's on the other hand are a world away. If you are a Democrat and think you would be better off voting Republican than voting for the Democrat that you didn't support: SHAME ON YOU. You will be responsible for the Democrats losing what should have been a guaranteed victory in November. And when you discover that the next four years are just as bad as the past eight, you will have no right to complain.

PROPAGANDA SUCKS!

When I was reading through my initial entry on this topic, I realized that I desperately need to work on being more concise. So rather than regale you with my description of a lovely spring day at the Dane County Farmers' Market, I will jump right to the point. When I was at the Market on the Capitol Square this past Sunday, I noticed a large rally on the Capitol steps. Using my excellent detective skills, I determined that it was a Human Rights Torch Relay rally. There were hundreds of individuals there, many of them Tibetan refugees and Tibetan-Americans, protesting China's human rights abuses and occupation of Tibet. Speeches were given and statements by people such as Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin and Senator Russ Feingold were read. Some Tibetan children performed a dance.

There were also protests organized by the local Chinese embassy and Chinese student groups. One of these Chinese protesters gave me a pamphlet, which upon reading turned out to be straight-up propaganda about Tibet. A protester standing next to her was holding a board with photos, captioned "Smiles of Tibetans." According to the pamphlet I received, Tibet has flourished under Chinese occupation. Basically, Tibetans should be really grateful to the Chinese for bringing them into the 21st century. The last page shows a photo of a Tibetan protester attacking the torch bearer of the Olympic relay in Paris. Across the page it states, "Violence is NEVER a solution."

I don't even want to get into the laughable hypocrisy involved in that statement, but I can't help from noting a few points. First of all, human rights organizations around the world and the U.S. Department of State have condemned China's human rights record. In a measure by the U.S. House of Representatives, it was cited that China has killed, tortured, imprisoned, raped and savagely beaten thousands of individuals for their spiritual practices. China has no right to claim the moral high ground on issues of non-violence, especially when the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibet, strongly opposes all forms of violence and has spoken out publicly against any violence perpetrated by Tibetan protesters.

To claim that China's occupation of Tibet is acceptable because the country has been modernized is ludicrous. Who's to say that the country couldn't have modernized on its own? The propaganda sheet that I received invited foreigners to come and see for themselves the "real truth" about Tibet by visiting the country. Well, unfortunately that is currently impossible since China has banned tourism to Tibet -- including entry by foreign journalists. But as a matter of fact, I happen to know some people who have visited Tibet and they left the country with an intense hatred for what the Chinese have done. According to them (and this has been corroborated by real news sources), the number of ethnic Tibetans will soon be smaller than the numbers of Han Chinese who have infiltrated the country. The Chinese have moved millions of their own citizens into Tibet, and the basic infrastructure of the country has slowly been changed to cater to the Chinese. The woman that I know who visited the country said that she won't be surprised if pretty soon signs written in Tibetan will be removed, leaving up only the ones in Chinese. Tibetans are not allowed to openly practice their religion -- even photographs of the Dalai Lama are banned in Tibet. Most recently, China has ordered Tibetans to undergo "patriotic education" (i.e. brainwashing) in regards to the Dalai Lama an the Tibetan community in exile.

"Genocide" might seem like a heavy word for what China has done in Tibet, but it is accurate. According to the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, genocide is, "any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group." Genocide does not have to involve actual killing (although thousands of Tibetans have lost their lives thanks to the Chinese), it is simply the systematic destruction of a culture. China has without a doubt spent the past fifty years trying to wipe out Tibetan culture and replace it with its own.

And people within China don't see anything wrong with it, because as far as they are concerned nothing bad is going on in Tibet. Thanks to the Chinese government's fabulous propaganda campaign. My best friend's cousin was in China and he did an internet search of the keyword "Tibet" and all that came up were government websites spewing propaganda. Many of us in the U.S. (myself included) complain about the Bush administration and the propaganda on the Iraq war, etc. But we really have no idea what it is like to live in a country where the press is truly censored; where citizens only have access to what the government decides is appropriate; where the types of rallies and open demonstrations and dialogue that we engage in all the time in the United States would land us in jail in China.

I know people who are Chinese. When I was living in Portugal, some of my fellow foreign students were from China and they were some of the nicest people imaginable. I have nothing against the people of China. It's not their fault that they have grown up in a country where the government tells them what to think about things like Tibet. When they come to the United States and to other countries, I can understand why they have a hard time accepting what we have to say about it. They have been told something else for their whole lives.

And that is why propaganda sucks!

And that is also why I will not be watching the Olympics this year.

THE ETHICS OF OUTING

On a recent episode of The L Word, the character Alice outs a [fictional] NBA star after he appears on TV spouting some homophobic drivel. She posts on her website some secretly taken footage of said star and his boyfriend, and before she knows it the footage has gone viral. Shortly afterwards she is invited to appear on a news show where viewers are essentially posed the question: when, if ever, is it acceptable to "out" someone?

There are some who believe that celebrities or other influential individuals that are lesbian or gay have a responsibility to be open about their sexual orientation in order to set an example and increase acceptance. Gossip bloggers such as Perez Hilton have made a career out of speculating on the private lives of the famous. He is said to be responsible for the rumors that led to the eventual outings of both Grey's Anatomy star T.R. Knight and former Doogie Howser celeb Neil Patrick Harris. Many of these gossip bloggers, especially those that are also gay, seem to feel that stars who choose to remain closeted are living a lie and feeding into the homophobia that exists in both Hollywood and the larger society. Others have rightly pointed out the problems that a no-longer-closeted star faces.

For someone like Ellen Degeneres, for example, being out has ultimately not hindered her career. But for a younger celebrity, whose career has been built on sex appeal, coming out of the closet just might be the kiss of death. Another recent L Word episode explores this, when Alice sort of outs another character: the sexy young actress Niki Stevens. Tina, who is producing Les Girls, the new film Niki is starring in, is furious. She says to Alice, "We want this movie to reach a large, mainstream audience, all right? And if everyone thinks the lead of our movie is gay, then that makes it a small, little niche film." Niki's agents are equally nervous about her being outed, saying that no guys are going to want to watch her on screen if they think that she's only interested in women. Applying it to real life, would all the young girls go crazy over tween sensations like Zac Efron or the Jonas Brothers if they thought that they were gay?

But beyond the issue of potential career damage, there is the matter of personal choice and integrity. Celebrities are human beings, not products owned by the public domain. It's true that being famous means being in the public eye and being scrutinized to a higher degree than the average person. But there comes a point when a line is crossed. Everyone, after all, deserves a degree of privacy, especially when it comes to family and loved ones. Do we really want to force someone out of the closet who is not ready? Doesn't that diminish both the importance of the act and the courage that is required to take that step? Ellen Degeneres is praised both for coming out at a time when not a lot of gay celebrities were openly revealing their sexuality and for the integrity surrounding her decision. Doesn't everyone deserve to have that kind of integrity surrounding what is likely to be the most difficult revelation of their life? Recently out former NBA-player John Amaechi says, "I wanted to [come out] in a way that I could control to make sure that the message was confluent and coherent and that I was mentally, physically and emotionally resilient." Should not every person have that amount of control over something so important?

Then there is the matter of those individuals, such as Jodie Foster, who have already had long and successful careers, and who have been long-rumored to be gay. Many think that they should just come out already because they don't really have anything to lose at this point. This is a tough issue because, on the one hand, it certainly can be infuriating to lesbians and gays who are desperate for increased visibility. For them, it seems that someone who refuses to come out after so many successful years in the industry is only perpetuating the idea that homosexuality is something shameful that should remain a secret. But then again, does a person's age or the length of their career mean that they should have any less right to their privacy? Just because they have "nothing to lose" doesn't mean that they are necessarily ready to admit their sexuality to a still largely homophobic society -- that they are ready to be "out and proud" or be spokespeople for LGBT rights. It's unfortunate, of course it's unfortunate. And at times it might feel like a slap in the face to the many individuals who took tremendous risks and suffered huge losses by being open about their sexuality. But does the lesbian and gay community truly want to be represented by those who are uncomfortable with being out? A better and more honorable goal might be working towards ending the attitudes and the other reasons that are keeping celebrities and others in the closet. Or perhaps supporting and getting into the mainstream performers who have been out from the start, such as actors Leisha Hailey, Jill Bennett, and Michelle Paradise, comedian Bridget McManus, or musicians Tegan and Sara (among many, many others).

Finally, we come back to the initial question, which asked when, if ever, it is okay to out someone. Although I have touched upon some gray areas, I think mostly I have given scenarios where it is probably better to leave the outing up to the person who is coming out. But I still haven't explored Alice's situation -- namely, is it alright -- maybe even imperative -- to out those who are perpetuating homophobic hatred? On The L Word Alice thought so. When she made her appearance on the news show Hardline, the interviewer attacked her for destroying a man's family and career and for violating his privacy. Alice says:

"No, I'm talking. I'm not finished. Listen. Gay people are bashed and harassed and killed every day. And then you've got this guy who's gay himself, and he's saying this garbage? It's disgusting! I totally respect someone's choice to stay in the closet. I do. If that's what they want to do, I get it. But I don't think it's OK to kiss your boyfriend one day and then go out and trash gay people the next. Especially if you're a public figure and you have people looking up to you. No, I don't feel bad. I do not feel bad about what I did."

Hmmm ... now here is where we come to perhaps the most ethically ambiguous area of the "outing" debate. Alice, while a fictional character, holds an opinion that is probably shared by many people. Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank, for example, holds that it is acceptable to "out" gay politicians who act in homophobic ways. He says, "The fact is, yes, the Republicans do think [homosexuality] should be a crime. And I think there’s a right to privacy. But the right to privacy should not be a right to hypocrisy...people who want to demonize other people shouldn’t then be able to go home and close the door, and do it themselves," Still, others believe that even homophobic actions do not justify outing any individual because it implies that there is something wrong with being gay and because it is probably going to be harmful to that person's family. A 2005 article from Tacoma, WA's News Tribune explores this issue in further depth.

So is outing a homophobic individual justified? My opinion? I just don't know the answer. I definitely feel a certain level of satisfaction in seeing a bigoted individual get his or her comeuppance, but at the same time I would like to see less negative press surrounding homosexuality. Perhaps it is much better to focus on getting positive press for the LGBT community than to carry out some kind of vendetta against those who have harmed the community. Again I want to stress that I think the most important thing is to work towards creating a world where people want to live freely and openly, and are able to do it without fear of negative consequences.

TEEN PREGNANCY ON THE RISE

For a long time now the United States has been one of the highest ranking countries in the West when it comes to teen pregnancies (the only Western, industrialized nation with a higher rate is Russia). But throughout the nineties, the numbers were slowly decreasing. Now, the CDC reports that the teen pregnancy rate has risen for the first time in 14 years. The question on everyone's mind is: Why?

Of course this is a complex issue, but we might want to look towards the moral attitudes and policies that have shaped America over the past eight years. Fourteen, fifteen, sixteen-year-old girls have grown up amid policies that restrict their access to information regarding safe sex; they have grown up in an environment that has become increasingly puritan and silent regarding sexuality. Meanwhile, they have grown up surrounded by pop culture that continues to objectify and oversexualize women.

One of Bush's big initiatives after taking office was encouraging schools to adopt "abstinence-only" sex education programs through nearly $1 billion of federal spending spread out over 5 years. These sex-ed programs not only teach teens that abstinence is the only form of contraception and protection against STDs for teens, they are often misleading and provide false information. A 2004 Washington Post article cites a government report which discovered that these federally funded programs frequently provide kids with medically inaccurate information, such as that condoms fail to prevent HIV transmission as often as 31% of the time for heterosexual couples (in truth, when used correctly condoms will fail less than 3% of the time) and that as many as 10% of women who have abortions become sterile (there is virtually no risk of sterility when an abortion is performed safely by a medical professional). Some programs told kids that HIV can be spread via sweat and tears; other abstinence education courses presented as scientific fact a man's need for "sexual fulfillment" and "admiration" and a woman's need for "financial support."

Many of these programs also perpetuate stereotypes about boys being overly sexual and girls being the ones responsible for saying no. A 2006 AlterNet article says that the abstinence double standard promoted by these programs threatens girls' health. The article cites various examples from abstinence-only program workbooks: "The sexist theme that seems to come up the most often in these classes is that girls just don't like sex, and therefore their main "job" is to keep boys, who do like sex, from getting any. A workbook from Sex Respect notes that "because they generally become aroused less easily, females are in a good position to help young men learn balance in relationships by keeping intimacy in perspective." But beware ladies, the increased sexualization of pop culture could interfere with your natural disdain for intercourse. The same workbook tells students that "a young man's natural desire for sex is already strong due to testosterone … females are becoming culturally conditioned to fantasize about sex as well."

The author, Jessica Valenti, explains: "The only messages put forward about boys' sexuality is the idea that their urges are uncontrollable, and it's up to young women not to "tease" them." She furthermore reveals that the increasing obsession with girls' purity has led to many decisions which undermine girls' abilities to protect their health. For example, the new HPV vaccine which has been proven extremely effective in preventing cervical cancer is still outrageously expensive (close to $400 for the three-part vaccine) and not even covered by many insurance companies. Conservative abstinence educators, such as Leslie Unruh of the National Abstinence Clearinghouse, believe that there is no reason to vaccinate children against a disease that is "100 percent preventable with proper sexual behavior." These same attitudes have led to other actions, such as making it increasingly difficult for women to get affordable access to such things as birth control and emergency contraceptive (also known as "the morning after pill" or "Plan B.")

Once upon a time, pharmaceutical companies provided low-cost pricing to college health services nationwide. As a result, university students were able to get birth control through their university health service at a very low cost or even for free. Last year, new legislation by the federal government forbid these type of contracts between colleges and pharmaceutical companies. As a result, the cost of birth control sky-rocketed to as much as triple or quadruple the original price. For many college students, the new prices became unaffordable. Others found themselves having to apply for aid. In Wisconsin, the Wisconsin's Family Planning Waiver covers the cost of contraceptives for qualified patients. But the result of that is a further strain on taxpayers to cover new participants that previously would not have needed the program, had the federal government not pushed through completely moralistic legislation.


Luckily, Planned Parenthood is still available for young women who want to get low-cost contraception. Unfortunately, Planned Parenthood's presence is scarce in many areas of the country. Mississippi, for example, has only one health center in the entire state. Tennessee has 3, Idaho, Louisiana and Arkansas have 2 each and Kentucky has 4. Wisconsin, on the other hand, has 31. Oregon has 17, Minnesota and Illinois each have 25, New York has 78, Washington has 46 and Michigan has 29. Delaware, a state only a smidgen the size of Mississippi has 5 centers. (Go here to find out how many health centers an individual state has). Needless to say, access to family planning throughout the country is highly unbalanced. At least if a girl in Wisconsin is told to abstain, she has somewhere to go for alternate information if she chooses not to. And if a girl in Illinois just can't "control" her boyfriend's "natural desires" and has unprotected sex, at least there are places she can go to get emergency contraception the next day.

But even for girls and women who do have access to these services, the ability to obtain them is becoming increasingly difficult. The anti-choice segment of the population has made significant strides in reducing a woman's ability to obtain an abortion: the costs are astronomical and not covered by insurance, some states have few, if any, medically-trained abortion providers, and many states require 24-hour wait-periods and mandatory counseling and ultrasound. But, not surprisingly, while the Right has put more and more restrictions on abortion, they have done nothing to prevent the need for it. In fact, they seem to be only interested in actions that have been proven to increase the number of unintended pregnancies. Planned Parenthood and other pro-choice organizations have taken on the responsibility of preventing the need for abortion. An article in Slate, written in January 2008, titled Let's Be Frank About Teen Sex and Abortion, explains that Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards, "Boasted correctly, that Planned Parenthood did "more to prevent unintended pregnancies, and the need for abortion, than any organization in America."" In a 2006 Huffington Post article, Richards, muses, "Imagine a day when every woman has access to the information and services she needs to stay healthy and, if she chooses, to plan healthy, wanted pregnancies. A day when teens, too, have every chance to prevent unintended pregnancy, get an education and stay on track to fulfill their dreams. Comprehensive access to the full range of birth control options -- including [Emergency Contraception] -- would inevitably reduce the need for abortion. That's a commonsense goal." A commonsense goal that our government has been doing little to reach.

And unfortunately it seems that the message that abstinence is the only effective method of preventing unwanted pregnancies and sexual transmitted infection, coupled with this increasingly restricted access to and information about contraception and family planning has taken its toll. A January 2008 article in the Huffington Post cited statistics that show that since 2003 contraception use among teens has declined, while the level of sexual activity has remained constant. Basically, kids aren't having less sex. They're just having less protected sex. And the result? 750,000 teen pregnancies in the next year, along with 4 million teens contracting STDs.

Telling teens that abstinence is the only answer has dangerous outcomes. First of all, it fosters an environment where teenagers are uncomfortable discussing sex and sexuality with adults. It turns sex into some kind of clandestine, shameful affair so that when a teenager makes the decision to engage in sexual intercourse, he or she will be less likely to turn to an adult for support in protecting him/herself. Secondly, promoting abstinence also means that those same teens are going to be less likely to be able to get information/protection on their own. Many girls are under the impression that if they go on the pill, they are going to be admitting that they are a failure. And didn't they learn in Sex Ed that condoms fail half the time? And since teens aren't getting real sex education from adults, they are left to learn all about sex from the entertainment world. And the media continues to put forward the message that a girl's greatest asset is her body.

The truth is, that what really prevents reckless or premature sexual activity is honest, open dialogue, trusting relationships between teens and adults and high levels of self-esteem and self-respect in girls. As Richards explains: "All our experience shows that the more young people have their questions answered openly about contraception, relationships, and sexual health, the more likely they are to delay sexual activity. And when they do become sexually active, whether in their teen years, or optimally, later on, the more likely they are to have safer sex and use contraceptives correctly."

It's time to stop moralizing and be realistic. Hopefully it is not too late to undo the damage that has been done to the new and upcoming generations of young people.