Flying Shortbread

Photo by Steph Mineart on Flickr.com Why is it as a culture we are more comfortable seeing 2 men holding guns than holding hands? and Jon Stewart asks "Why can't they have gay people in the army? Personally, I think they are just afraid of a thousand guys with M16s going, "Who'd you call a faggot?"

The debate here, in South Africa, is about a girl who refused to remove a nose-ring on the grounds that it was an expression of her religion. In fact, in that religion a belly-ring is and expression of religion and a nose-ring is an expression of culture. Her parents have taken the battle through Equality Court and are now at the Supreme Court. A 702 caller phoned in and said that the missionaries introduced their Western uniforms during colonial times when apartheid first started and now Blacks view uniforms as a symbol of domination. A valid point. I wouldn't want to have a vacuum cleaner sewn into my hip or a stove as a breast implant. I think uniforms are a good thing, though. Especially at school. As a student you get to know everyone else as equals, and slowly get to know them and gradually find out all the things that divide you. As time passes the feeling you have for that person is great enough for you to consider tolerance of their religion, sexuality, nationalism or

The Indian government is planning to set up a network of cradles around the country where parents can leave unwanted baby girls. India banned gender selection and selective abortion in 1994) .... Last November a Japanese hospital announced plans to set up a "baby hatch" allowing mothers to anonymously drop off their newborns so they could be put up for adoption.... BBC The supreme court has already made a law which forbids any sex determination while pregnant.... The researchers analysed autopsy reports of babies in three socially deprived parts of Delhi over a five-year period and discovered that the overall death rate for girls was almost one-third higher than that for oys. This was particularly the case for sudden, unexplained deaths - three out of four cases were girls. As a result of gender prejudices, in some states the male-female ratio is now so skewed that men are running out of potential brides. Many are resorting to "buying" girls from poor communities

Flashback Friday, a column on feminist notions ... Anna Nicole Smith just died and the documentary about her devoted several minutes to telling us all about the infections she had after the plastic surgery, and the time she had to have her one silicone sack out for a while. She stayed at home so no one could see she was lop-sided. The woman on Doctor 90210 that pitched to have her anus peroxided, one of many procedures she had had done. The woman who phoned into 702 crying because she was about to go for her eleventh operation to fix a botched boob job. Who doesn't see any hope for herself to ever look normal. Put concisely, thankfully by my girlfriend: "I would feel like I was touching props." Who said that boys don't play with dolls, Barbies gone bananas. Soon they will be able to buy a woman on eBay, 'comes with five outfits and a vacuum cleaner'. ... Cinnamon Gurl sparked this off. Thanks. Each week the Flashback Friday: Feminist Edition will f

If you're quiet, you're not living. You've got to be noisy and colorful and lively.” - Mel Brooks ... I love listening to children making a racket on the streets of our neighbourhood. Silence means they are indoors, hiding from crime.

1. If we run into your ex-girlfriend in public, the first thing you should do is put your arm around us. And if we have to introduce ourselves, you are in big trouble. 2. When you tell us about a business lunch you had with a woman, it's a good idea to tell us that she's fat, ugly, old, or a lesbian. Preferably all of them. 3. PMS is real. It's chemical, and it sucks. If someone told you that every thirty days you were going to get jacked repeatedly in the nuts, you'd be pissy around day twenty-six, too. 4. When we say, "I don't feel connected," the only appropriate response is, "I feel it, too. Let's go out for a nice dinner and reconnect." Try it. You will get laid. 5. If you can locate the following items in our home—tape, casserole dish, Christmas ornaments—you will get laid. 6. If you act excited about the bath mat we bought at Target, you will get laid. 7. We really want to have kids. That is, until you want to have kids.