“So flattered and honoured that our crazy song
is being used so beautifully for such a great cause.”
(Melanie C.)
The “crazy song” former Spice Girl Melanie is referring to is the Spice Girls’ hit song Wannabe; the great cause is “Girl Power,” as per the link to The Global Goals #WhatIReallyReallyWant video. The video has been getting a lot of sharing and positive comments among my FB friends, but I can’t bring myself to click on share.
The Global Goals is (or seems to be) an internet organization which wants us all to “Make the noise” about inequality and investing in education and other opportunities for girls and women worldwide. In their own words:
Girls and women are disproportionately affected by (challenges of global challenges of poverty, climate change and inequalities) and are key to building resilient communities to withstand them. That’s why we need to ensure World Leaders and the Secretary General of the United Nations listen to the voices of girls and women and put them first in policies and plans.
2016 is our chance to use our collective power and tell world leaders what we really really want for girls and women….
Truly laudable goals…but [1]…
The tune is as catchy as ever; still, I had to sigh the same sigh (as in, not this, again) when I saw the video.
I wanted to love the video’s two brief scenes featuring girls in Arabic/Middle Eastern and African Muslim classrooms [2] with a sign Quality Education For All Girls on the rooms’ chalkboards. Wanted to love, but couldn’t, because I paid attention to the video as a whole, and thought that, however sincere the sentiments behind those who produced it, the people who most need to be reached by the message or ideas the video wants to send are not likely to look at the video or appreciate the ideas/ideals expressed in it, due to the clothing and pelvic gyration-dancing of the other girls/women in the video. The video will likely be seen as just one more piece of Western propaganda.
You see what they mean by “Quality Education?!”
What they really want is for our females to be corrupted by infidel Western immorality….
Content warning: cranky feminist rant ahead.
So I’ll tell you want I want/what I really really want: I want messages of Girl Power to stop playing along with the commercialization and sexualization of girl bodies; I want third wave feminists and their (supposed) supporters [3] to stop illustrating the idea that “girl power,” and the related idea of loving/accepting/celebrating your body means donning tit/ass/ab revealing clothing and using provocative, sexualized gyrations and dance moves to “sell” the idea of equality.
Harumpf.
I think I need some celebration of boy power to change the mood:
* * *
The Book I’m Not Recommending
As in, not merely recommending; rather, urging you to read How Not To Die, by Michael Greger, M.D.
The author, Dr. Gregor, cheekily acknowledges his book’s intentionally provocative title – which really should be, How Not To Die Prematurely, he writes later on in the book. The book itself is provocative in that its message, that a plant-based diet is the healthiest way to eat and can prevent and even reverse chronic disease, has been scientifically established yet is almost unknown among medical doctors, who receive little to no training in nutrition but plenty of indoctrination (and free samples and steak dinners and other perks and incentives) by pharmaceutical companies – companies which, of course, have a strong disincentive in having people choosing nutritional and lifestyle changes over popping pills.
But, don’t just take moiself‘s word for it. Here’s my favorite review of the book: [4]
Stop whatever you’re doing and buy this book. Not only does Dr. Michael Greger drop a metric f*ckton of evidence that a plant-based diet will save your damn life, he lays out the blueprint to make it happen. Dr. Greger shows us how regular folks can eat well and not get taken down by some totally preventable bullsh*t. “Thug Kitchen”
HNTD was recommended by a friend.[5] I was skeptical at first, given the book’s similarity, title-wise, to another book I’d read several years ago: The Thing About Life Is That One Day You’ll Be Dead. But the two books could hardly be more dissimilar.
A “litany of decay and decrepitude,” as one reviewer described it, TTALITODYBE takes a supposedly humorous and fact-filled examination of the medical and philosophical issues re aging and death…and it just got to be too much for me. Chapter after chapter delineating the cognitive and physiological indignities that await you, the majority of which you have little or no control over. Even the ones that didn’t apply to me…it added up to an impacted bowel-ful of dismal TMI. Did I really need to know, for example, about the inevitability of scrotal sagging? Although I must admit it is a lot of fun to type scrotal sagging.
Thanks, mister, but I’ve no interest in seeing if the carpet matches the drapes.
* * *
The Cheese I’m Not Making
But I will be, soon. The following picture is of what will become a batch of rejuvelac, a non-alcoholic fermented liquid made from sprouted grains (quinoa, in this case), which I will use to (attempt to) make non-dairy cheese. The good, the bad, and the ugly shall be reported herein. Eventually.
* * *
Department of With Apologies to Nike, Just Do It
Feeling frisky recently, I wanted to go to a Dollar Tree store, fill a handcart with a miscellany of the store’s wares, get in line at the checkout counter and ask the clerk for a price check on every item.
Sometimes, I am amazed by my self-restraint.
Oh, thank you – because this job doesn’t suck enough already.
* * *
May you restrain yourself when necessary;
May you just do it when just doing it is called for;
May you appreciate the good, the bad, the ugly, and the cheesy;
…and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] You knew a but was coming, didn’t you?
[2] I assume Muslim, as the girls are clothed in identical school uniforms and all wear hijab or headscarves.
[3] Many if not most of whom, I’d wager, are first wave misogynists, clothing marketeers, or just plain lechers.
[4] And you know you gotta trust the opinion of someone who works in the Thug Kitchen.
[5] A friend who has made and maintained the changes recommended in the book for several years now, changes which caused me to literally gasp when I saw her, she looked so %$&* healthy and happy was back to her normal high school weight (and if that subjective evidence isn’t impressive – and BTW health, not weight loss, was her objective – her cholesterol, BP and other “disease indicator” numbers have significantly dropped).
