David Foster Wallace Speech

    “Americans seemed no longer united so much by common beliefs as by common images: what binds us became what we stand witness to. Nobody sees this as a good change. In fact, op-cultural references have become such potent metaphors in U.S. fiction not only because of how united Americans are in our exposure to mass images but also because of our guilty indulgent psychology with respect to that exposure.  Put simply, the pop reference works so well in contemporary fiction because (1) we all recognize such a reference, and (2) we’re all a little uneasy about how we all recognize such a reference.”
    David Foster Wallace wrote this in his essay titled E UNIBUS PLURAM Television and U.S. Fiction, the second essay in this book - an essay and argument collection called A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again. While I have not read all of David Foster Wallace’s books, what I have read has convinced me to tell you all to pick up one of his books and indulge your mind. Tonight, I want to share with you a little about his life and death, some reviews of his books, and finish off with another quite vivid quote.
    David Foster Wallace, born February 21, 1962 in Ithaca, New York. His father, James Donald Wallace, accepted a job in Urbana, Illinois after finishing his graduate work in philosophy at Cornell.  His mother, Sally Foster Wallace, attended graduate school in english composition at the University of Illinois. While living in Illinois, David Foster Wallace was a regionally ranked junior tennis player - tennis became a subject of lots of his writing. Here a few copies of an essay - A Derivative Sport in Tornado Alley - that speaks of this very same subject.
    David Foster Wallace went on to attend his father’s alma matter - Amherst College - where he majored Summa cum laude in English and Philosophy with a focus modal logic and mathematics. Later receiving his Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at the University of Arizona. His senior thesis - The Broom of the System - was bought and published as his first novel in 1987.  He didn’t intend on being a writer, he says specifically, “I discovered that I really liked creative writing (in college). For most of my college career I was supposed to go on and do math or philosophy or math which were things I was good little nerd at. It’s odd, I don’t really think myself as a writer. I think of it as an experiment that is kind of going okay right now and we’ll have to see what happens... While I was there (at the graduate writing program), a novel I did in college was bought. I think once you have something big get bought, then technically you’re a writer - I think it fulfills the criteria in the dictionary.”
    After abandoning studying philosophy at Harvard, he accepted a position in the English Department at University of Illinois where he taught a few classes and focused on writing Infinite Jest. He also has written for a number of magazines; including but not limited to Esquire, GQ, Harpers, The New Yorker and the Paris Review. In 2002, he moved to southern California to become the first Roy E. Disney Endowed Professor of Creative Writing and a Professor of English at Pomona College.
    After battling over 20 years of depression, taking various medications and even electroconvolusive therapy, did not work. David Foster Wallace ended his life by hanging him self at his home in southern California on September 12, 2008.
    On a brighter note, let’s talk about his work;
    Mark Flanagan described his work as follows, “David Foster Wallace was well-known for his stylistic experimentation, often challenging word choices, and lengthy, demanding sentence structure. Wallace’s inventiveness often seemed to be for its own sake, but it made his work addictively fun to read, like the deciphering of a particularly challenging puzzle.”
    Infinite Jest, his 1,100 page masterpiece, argues through fiction that views American society as self-obsessed, pleasure-obsessed and entertainment-obsessed. After publishing this book in 1996, David Foster Wallace was awarded the MacArthur Foundation Grant - popularly called the “genius award.” Time magazine listed this book as one of the best english written novels over the last century. “ A virtuoso display... There is generous intelligence and authentic passion on every page,” says R.Z. Sheppard of Time Magazine. Dan Cryer of Newsday wrote, “ Exhilarating, breathtaking.. The book teems with so much life and death, so much hilarity and pain, so much gusto in the face of despair that one cheers for the future of our literature.” His book Brief Interviews of Hideous Men was critically acclaimed, won the Aga Khan Prize for Fiction by the editors of The Paris Reveiw, and was recently turned in to a movie.
    His life was short, but his works of literary genius will live on forever.  I have shared a little about his life and gave you some reviews of his work.  I will now leave you with one final quote by David Foster Wallace. This is from an essay he wrote about a state fair - this is specifically about the baton twirling competition.

New National Sex Survey

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/04/sex-study-by-national-sur_n_748751.html
http://www.nationalsexstudy.indiana.edu


I ran across this the other week, and forgot to finish posting!

Not much discussion needed, I don't think. Read how American's of all ages are "doin' it" nowadays...

Testosterone

Testosterone

I love This American Life, and this is one of my favorite episodes. Wanna know how important testosterone is in our daily lives? Wanna find out the misconceptions regarding testosterone (straight men don't always have more testosterone than gay men/women)? What about the effects testosterone has on a women in transition? What about a man with a body that quit making testosterone?

This is a vital natural chemical in all our bodies. Find out how much. It's a 1 hour episode. Very much worth every minute!

Sexually Abused Men Speak Out, Seek Out Help On 'Oprah'

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/howard-r-fradkin-phd/why-200-men-are-speaking-_b_779502.html

 This is very interesting, and very moving. Moral of the whole story; Men need emotional help too.  It's been a cultural norm for a man to be an emotionally strong, stoic, brave, in-charge person.  Fact of the matter is, that 1 in 6 men is sexually abused by the age of 18! These numbers are staggering to me... As this topic is a source of non-communication. Maybe since Oprah talks to millions per day abused men will find some comfort in knowing that they aren't the only ones, and that they aren't to blame. I like where this is going..

...Just a few thoughts

Ah... What?

Religion and sex never ceases to amaze me.  Why people sign up for any institution that limits natural behavior is beyond me.  Don't have sex at all, until you're married, and once you do, it better be vaginally and solely for procreation purposes.. Your penis/vagina is for you and you only (excluding the occasional preacher) until you get married.. and get this load of bullshit I just read..

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-shore/how-is-being-gay-like-glu_b_747071.html

"Would you support a serial adulterer who loves his wife, but is just attracted to other women because that's who he is and how he was born? How about an alcoholic who just can't help himself? Would you support him as he leaves his wife for alcohol? A glutton? A man of extreme pride? Why does homosexuality get a pass, and not any other sin? A person with homosexual desires who resists temptation is exactly the same as a married man who resists temptation to carry on affairs with other women---which is to say, a human being battling the temptation to sin. The most compassionate thing that we could tell someone struggling with homosexuality (or any other sin for that matter) is to keep resisting temptation. Keep battling. Don't give in. This is your badge as a Christian, that you fight temptation"

The above quote is taken from the HuffPo blog (the link I shared above)...

This blog is really interesting.. He proposes that the anti-everything Christian movement has turned it's focus from trying to change orientation and sexual choices to that of a sin that any man or woman can overcome.  He says, and I agree, that this way of thinking is telling people with non-bible conforming sexual activities to curb those thoughts as a man trying to quit drinking would do; to give up - on loving someone.  It's in religion's best interest to convince everyone that we are sinning, and that we have the "strength" to "fight" "evil" "temptations," and a "mission" to "battle."  Why is everything so hateful? Why are the same people that speak for this religion engaging in behavior they condemn?

"It's in the bible, it must be true." - Ha, and I also believe everything I read on the internet.  Bobby Henderson , an Oregon State physics graduate, invented a religion also; The Church of Flying Spaghetti Monster, aka (I love this) Pastafarianism. They celebrate Friday as a holy day. They believe that the decline in pirates is causing global warming (this is just a play on the fact that beliefs and fact aren't always linked even though correlational; cause yes, pirate numbers have gone down and temperature has gone up, but they are not related - obviously)...

moving forward....

The recently defeated Ken Buck says that sexual orientation is a choice as well. You can choose whether to eat at Fat Jack's Supersubs, or Deli Zone.. so it's apparent that you can choose whether you like the same sex or not.  This makes total sense.. ha! What makes sense is this...

Sexual orientation just is. It varies across all people.  Straight, straight with occasional cross-dressing, straight with frequent cross-dressing, androgynous straights, androgynous gay, gay, bi-sexual, transgender, polyamorous straight or gay or bi or trans, or "man-baby" fetishes, or fetishes of grass, or what the fuck ever!  I'm making things up now, but I would be willing to bet that somewhere in the world someone does have a grass fetish, and you know what? They deserve to find someone that makes that grass fetish become a fucking reality instead of condemnation of inner desires.  We are all different, and we all find ways (or not in the case of recent suicides) to negotiate our sexuality with our surroundings.  We learn, we change, we accept, and hopefully, flourish as self-aware sexual beings. The same courtesy that is given to the straight, white, middle-class male, should be extended to every different variation of human... cause no one way is, has, or ever will (should) be "right." We are all alive, we all feel... we are all "right."



.....Just a few thoughts

Pregnancy leads to children.. even at age 10

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/03/olimpia-mother-of-10yearo_n_778284.html

Sooo, I just came across this and I really am unsure how to react.  10 year old kid has a healthy baby.  In class last night we were talking about contraception amongst adolescent children, and menarche (onset of a woman's period), and a myriad of other topics relating to when and how children are experiencing sexual and non -sexual behaviors.

Menarche...
Research now a days is linking obesity in children to an earlier onset of menstruation.  A female's body sends chemicals to the brain to start once a certain weight is achieved (approx 107 lbs).  I knew that this age was getting earlier and earlier, but the fact that this girl had a kid at age 10 is really blowing my mind.  They're gypsies in Romania who are not encouraged to educate, and marriage laws aren't enforced... Leading to...?? A child with a child.

When I was 10 years old I was more concerned on whether or not I had practiced my clarinet enough for the week. I admired girls... from a far. The father is age 13.  I barely knew what kissing was (although never experienced at this point), let along how to engage in coitus (I just like that word).

Something needs to be done about the 800,000 teen pregnancies per year (keep in mind that of the 800k, only 500k are born). There is no way around the fact that we are sexual beings and as teenagers (and younger) we can, will, and are experiencing sex.  When I first started buying condoms, the looks that I would get were piercing, causing me to not even want to buy them anymore (although I didn't stop).  Kids should be congratulated for buying condoms, accessing birth control, and practicing safe sex. Parents need to talk to their kids about sex instead of shunning them and taking their birth control away.  Ignorance and intolerance of sexual behavior is how we get in to predicaments where children are raising children. I know I don't have all the answers. In fact, very far from it.  But I think when faux pas become norm, taboo the accepted, the shunned welcomed, the world might look a little different.

.....Just a few thoughts

My Body

A few weeks ago my Human Sexuality class was visited by a fellow named Clint.  Clint is the founder of Boyfriend University and also did work with Family Tree Gemini.  He was brought in to talk to us about body image and how it relates to sexuality.  We started off by closing our eyes as he asked us to focus on each individual part of our body, but in specific steps.  Clint instructed us to focus first on our right big toe, then our next, then each part of our foot... continuing the same process for the left side and the rest of our body.  We were asked to "listen" to what our bodies were telling us, not as merely a whole, but a collective of tiny parts that make up that whole. As I sit and write this right now I am noticing I'm slightly hunched over the keyboard, often times I don't realize it hurts until I think about it.  This was a huge part of what this exercise was all about; paying attention to what your body is telling you instead of relegating it an unconscious part of life.

Our next exercise was to draw how we see ourselves and the messages we've received, either positive or negative, about our bodies and sexuality.  We used only the most proper of art supplies; creme colored construction paper and an array of Crayola products including, but limited to, colored pencils and crayons.  As I attempted to sketch out the best depiction of me that I could, I realized that many of the places on my body that I hated in the past aren't so bad now.  Being skinny had always plagued me with bigger guys thinking that I was a walking invitation for taunts.  I got taller and stayed just as skinny; this did not help me with these problems.  It wasn't until recently (within the past three of four years, age 22 or 23) that I realized that I didn't care what others thought, and that I am happy in my own skin.  I never thought I was "weird" until I was told so and shown what "normal" is.  Quite frankly this is all bullshit.  Without these unreachable societal norms how many people would lead much healthier and productive lives?  Even worse, how many people would still be alive? I just read that there was a 19 year old freshman at Rutgers who jumped off a bridge because of a video taken of him making out with a guy.  There's no reason for this to happen.

It was a nice feeling coming out of this specific class, feeling connected with my body and what it was telling me.  It's a pleasant thought to realize that the parts of me that I shunned in past years are parts that I wouldn't trade now.  I've yet to figure out exactly when it became clear to me that being Me is something I like, but it's here now and I will forever attempt to maintain a sense that the self on display matches the self inside.  I'm aware that this is difficult, for some more than others, but when I feel most comfortable with who I am, I'm more productive at work, home, in relationships.  It allows me to accept love and give it back.  I become optimistic of future, pleased with the present, and accepting of the past...

...Just a few thoughts