You've got a dirty cooter!

Of course you do. Every cooter is a dirty cooter.

A few months ago, Twisty posted The Lysol Thing (which festered in my imagination until I woke up one morning absolutely furious that every damned Lysol ad I've ever seen has been directed at women). Anyway, I figured this would be a good project topic for my Genre Theory class, so I did a little research and discovered that there are a ton of these ads out there. Go ahead, get an eyeful. (Cooterful? Blech.) I also found one of the booklets, "Lysol vs Germs," copyright 1938, on eBay. Because I only have two midterms to write, I have transcribed for you the section on "Feminine Hygiene."

As we all know, there is a vast and unquiet sea between fe-mi-nine hy-giene and female hygiene. I don't have time to comment in the lengthy, withering way I'd like, so I've just colored my favorite bits pink. Besides that, I have altered it not at all.

FOR FEMININE HYGIENE

Feminine hygiene is the regular practice of vaginal douching with a cleansing and antiseptic solution. It is an important means of guarding immaculate personal daintiness. It is a habit of grooming among modern fastidious women.

A familiar case of a feminine nervous ailment which the doctor treats is the married woman who is losing her husband's devotion because of neglect of that intimate cleanliness . . . so important to feminine attractiveness and to poise. What a pity, then, that so may married women never receive reliable instruction in the proper technique of sensible feminine hygiene; and so lose that aura of personal daintiness that is so important to poise and charm.

The LYSOL method of feminine hygiene is used by millions of women as a means to intimate antiseptic cleanliness. LYSOL disinfectant is probably the most widely used preparation for this purpose. It is recommended by many leading gynecologists. (A gynecologist is a medical specialist in the functions and diseases of women.) For nearly 50 years LYSOL has been their prescription.

WHAT FEMININE HYGIENE MEANS

A generation ago, the douche was used only as a medication in cases of so-called "female trouble." Today, fastidious women use an antiseptic douche regularly as an immaculate personal habit.

The vagina is the passage leading from the outside to the uterus or womb. It is lined with a mucous membrane which produces a secretion as its own means of normally keeping the vaginal passage clean. But as an added means of cleansing, the antiseptic douche may be employed several times a week. If ever there should be anything more than a normal discharge present, a doctor, preferably a specialist, should be consulted.

WHAT FEMININE HYGIENE MUST DO

Your ritual of hygiene must cleanse thoroughly. Obviously, the effectiveness of your practice of feminine hygiene depends on the preparation you employ in your douche. A LYSOL solution is correct for this purpose.

You will not find the LYSOL method difficult to follow. The technique is simple. And it is economical. LYSOL costs less than 1½¢ for one quart of the correct solution for feminine hygiene.

DIRECTIONS FOR THE SOLUTION

LYSOL disinfectant comes to you highly concentrated, for economy. The only possible harm n the use of LYSOL is through your own carelessness.

If the solution is too strong there may be an unpleasant burning sensation. One the other hand, if it is not strong enough, it will not be thoroughly antiseptic. Therefore, LYSOL should be used in a solution mixed strictly according to directions. Whenever you take a douche, do not trust to memory, but look up these directions and carry them out exactly.

The LYSOL douche, properly prepared, is not only cleansing and antiseptic, but it also soothes if there is a slight irritation. If there is any sensation of discomfort afterwards, something is probably wrong and a physician should be consulted.

For the douche, use two or more quarts of water, which should be comfortable warm to the hand. Never use either hot or very cold water. After measuring the water into a convenient container, add one teaspoon of LYSOL disinfectant for each quart of water taken. Stir thoroughly, and then pour the solution into the douche bag. Never prepare the douche by pouring the LYSOL directly into the bag, because by doing so you cannot obtain a uniform solution.

If you use a hand-douche, pour thirty drops of LYSOL disinfectant into a full glass of water and stir thoroughly. Measure the drops accurately with a medicine dropper.

DIRECTIONS FOR THE DOUCHE

The nozzle used in the vaginal douche should be one especially made for this particular use. The end should be perforated so that the water is expelled uniformly in all directions.

When not in use, keep the nozzle clean by immersing it completely in a solution of one teaspoonful of LYSOL to a pint of water in a suitable container, e.g. a fruit jar, keeping the container covered.

Before taking the douche, hang the douche bag in a convenient place, slightly higher than the body. Assume a partially recumbent position. Now introduce the nozzle gently, without force, into the vaginal passage and permit the solution to flow in a steady stream.

Following every douche gently bathe the adjoining surfaces with a LYSOL disinfectant solution of the same strength.

Okay, I have to say that, of the whole rich treasure-trove, just waiting to be analyzed and deconstructed, this has to be my favorite line: "The vagina is the passage leading from the outside to the uterus or womb." Wow! I think that's just about the best summary of the patriarchal conception of the female vagina I've ever heard. It is a passage that leads to the womb from the outside. "I've found it, men: the way in!"

[ETA: If you're a dude and you're having trouble processing why this makes me so uncomfortable ("Well, isn't it the way in?"), I don't blame you. That is how we're all taught to look at women's naughty bits. To understand a little better, try this: Imagine that someone has just characterized your mouth as the passage leading from the outside to your stomach. Creepy, isn't it? I mean, yes, the mouth is how food is generally delivered to the stomach, but don't you prefer to think of your mouth as something that's under your control--as a place where you put stuff that you want to have inside your body? Thinking of it as a "passage that leads to the stomach from the outside" makes it sound like stuff goes in of its own accord, whether you will or no. It's the way in. That's a shudder-making thought. I think most people prefer not to have any of their various holes so characterized.]

Woebegone Indeed

I grew up with Garrison Keillor, and I still listen to "A Prairie Home Companion" every weekend as I putter about the house. Keillor apparently writes the occasional feature for Salon. I just read his latest piece, but I gotta tell ya, it didn't make a lick of sense. Fortunately for me, however, here at Bitey Time Corp., we have a device called the Kleer-Cee Deluxe, which translates coded text into Standard English. (The upgrade that translates Standard English into value-neutral text isn't available yet. Something about how value-neutral language is still in development. Whatever.) I pumped Keillor's drivel into the KCDx, and this is what came out:

March 14, 2007 | I see in the paper that the U.S. Department of Education laid out $750,000 for a study that shows that going to art museums and looking at art is good for schoolchildren, which I would have been happy to tell them for, say, $500 and a nice lunch. I also have some thoughts about the defecatory habits of bears, if the Forestry Service is interested. If the government is paying large sums of money to have the obvious pointed out, then I am your man. Ask me about this war and I'll tell you for free.

I grew up the child of a heteronormative marriage that lasted until death freed one of them, and I could tell you about how brainwashing that is for children, and you could pay me whatever you think it's worth.

Back in the day, that was the only permitted arrangement. Everyone white and decent had a yard, a garage, a female house-slave, a male wage-slave and a refrigerator with leftover boiled potatoes in plastic dishes with snap-on lids. This was before Betty Friedan, before civil rights protections, before non-whites got uppity, for crying out loud. You could put me in a glass case at the history center and schoolchildren could press a button and ask me questions.

A facade of monogamy kept the parents' misery and infidelity in the background where they belong and we children were able to hold center stage in our own minds, where some of us managed to stay. We didn't have to contend with obviously troubled, angry parents trying to make life richer and more rewarding for them. We blossomed and agonized and fussed over our outfits and learned how to perform heteronormative activities and establish economic dominance and do the twist and rape in the front seat of a car back before bucket seats when you could really get someone pinned down, and we started down the path toward begetting children while Mom and Dad stood like smiling, helpless, desperately unhappy mannequins in the background.

Society is about continuation of oppressive gender norms -- in other words, socialization of children. Society does not care about the emotional or physical well-being of any people other than economically powerful adult white males.

Under the old facade-of-monogamy system, we didn't have the problem of apportioning socially mandated quasi-religious imperio-capitalistic rituals among your mother and stepdad, your dad and his third wife, your mother-in-law and her boyfriend Hal, and your father-in-law and his boyfriend Chuck. Today, serial monogamy has stretched the extended family to the point where a child might be able to cobble together a viable support system. A child can now grow up with eight or nine or 10 grandparents -- Gampa, Gammy, Goopa, Gumby, Papa, Poopsy, Goofy, Gaga and Chuck -- and be able to turn to one of them for protection against sexual or physical abuse.

And now gay marriage will produce a whole new string of hyphenated relatives. In addition to the ex-stepson and ex-in-laws and your wife's first husband's second wife, there now will be Bruce and Kevin's in-laws and Bruce's ex, Mark, and Mark's current partner, and I suppose we heteronormative adult white males will have to find some other way of establishing our dominance.

The country has continued to accept comically gay, albeit asexual men -- sardonic fellows with fussy hair who live in over-decorated apartments with a striped sofa and a small weird dog and who worship campy performers and go in for flamboyance now and then themselves. If they want to be accepted as human, however, all forms of personal expression except those in strict compliance with the hetnorm paradigm must be completely eliminated. Adults are supposed to repress their personal desires and ambitions and not deviate from accepted behavior. That's for the kids. Until we stomp it out.

Last week I visited a grade school not far from where I grew up, and I strolled into a second-grade classroom and, good Lord, those ethnic faces -- black, black, Chinese, Mexican. Only about six kids were decently white, and of those, three were foreigners.

It was I Love Reading Week, and I was there as a colonialist blowhard. So I told them a story about how, back in the day, we were murderous imperialists and rode horses across those flat spaces that are now occupied by horribly polluting government-subsidized agri-businesses, rounding up the Native Americans, even in blizzards. For proof, I displayed my collection of real Indian ears and I got them all to do the tomahawk chop.

They seemed to understand it all, at least the chop-chop part, and they better know their place for having met me. Continue to pay me millions of dollars and I'll continue to indoctrinate you and your young with my out-of-tune singing and faux-nostalgic oppressive ideology.

Huh. That's a handy device.

Ouch.

So. Yesterday, I discovered that my dear, darling husband, hereafter referred to as "Sweetie," had been looking at pornography online.

Yipes.

He and I had never really discussed porn, and after a long, tearful, and exhausting talk last night, he sees where I'm coming from. He really is very sweet, though he's one of those who doesn't see his entitlement and its attending innocence. I gave him this article to read, which is a pretty good porn primer for the radfem-curious. Anyway, I thought I might share some of my talking points for any of y'all who have to school their friends and neighbors on the evils of porn:

* This is a picture of a real person, who exists for her own purposes. Her decision to pose nude had nothing to do with you. She did not do it to please you, or because she likes you, or to turn you on. She did it for her own reasons, which probably include paying the rent, feeding her children, and/or not having the crap beaten out of her.

* Even if she thinks she wants to pose nude, why does she think that this is an appropriate way for her to display herself? Why does she see herself as a sex object?

* When this woman poses as a sex object, she is reinforcing the conception of women as members of the sex class. When you look at pictures of her posed as a sex object, you are reinforcing the conception of women as members of the sex class.

* Most women who work in the sex trade do so because it's the only way they can make enough money to support themselves. This raises the question: Why should this be the only way she can make enough money to support herself?

* What makes you think you have the right to look at these women when they don't have any clothes on? Before you say, "They volunteered," imagine this scenario: You and I are walking down the street. You say you are tired, so I get down on my hands and knees and offer to carry you on my back. I tell you I am pleased to do it. Is it right for you to sit on my back and let me carry you? Just because someone invites you to degrade them doesn't make it alright to do it.

There was more, but that's the gist. All this was before my big discussion of the socially constructed nature of gender, around which he's still trying to wrap his mind. He's coming along, though.

Fat Daddy

I should be studying, but instead, I just read this very good article about food and the many ways we misunderstand it in our culture. I recommend it.

Speaking of which, just a couple of weeks ago, I was speaking with my students about American cuisine. There were four students in the class, representing Taiwan, Mexico, France, and Korea. I think the Korean had been here longest, about six months. When I assigned the topic, their eyes lit up, especially the French woman's. She had some opinions, let me tell you what. What they mostly wanted to talk about was how big American portions are, about which they are incredulous. I did my best to explain it, mostly discussing the Protestant work ethic that the Pilgrims treated us to, and how one of their central beliefs was that worldly success is a sign that one is among God's elect. I pointed out that this belief has persisted, and has saturated even the most secular corners of our society. Our obsession with conspicuous consumerism allows the consumer to prove personal merit: "If I weren't a good, hardworking person, I couldn't afford this ________." This attitude extends to consumption of all kinds. Sitting down to a big, fat steak surrounded by delicacies of all kinds? That's power, baby, and might makes right.

I am, however, through careful thought and effort, a resistant consumer. I don't brand myself through purchases, I try not to waste my money on superfluia. Even so, I definitely consume more calories than I need every day. I eat too much. Way too much.

My dad was a big guy. After he died, I read his medical file, which characterized him as "morbidly obese." (Rhetorical Note: Did you see how I distanced myself from that? Nice, huh?) He attended Overeaters Anonymous meetings, which I think did him some good, and it seemed like he was always trying to diet, but never getting much of anywhere with it. I remember that whole cartons of ice cream would disappear between dessert and breakfast, and we couldn't keep cheese or peanut butter in the house, either. When my sister and I were little, we would go on occasional road trips and day outings with our parents. Dad would always pack a big cooler full of food, and it would sit on the front seat with him so that he could get into it at any moment. He would fill it with cold cuts and cheese and diet sodas, and probably some apples and crackers and things like that. Maybe sandwiches. He said that he packed it because he didn't want to spend money on road food, but I don't think I even believed that when I was a kid. He was always happy to share it, but it was really for him. I talked to mom about this once, and she said that maybe the idea of being without food scared him. If I'm to be honest, I'll have to admit that it scares me, too.

I should note here that I'm something of a paranoid. I got that from Dad, too. He was always on the alert for safety hazards. He always had an escape path should disaster strike. I myself am always aware of my surroundings, and I frequently wake up in the night afraid that there's a predator in the house. Specifically to the question of food, there has never been a day when there's been nothing in the house to eat. (There have been many days when there's been nothing I cared to eat, but that's different.) If I'm going out of the house for any length of time, I always consider where, when, and what I'm going to eat. Moreover, I frequently eat when I'm not hungry so that I do not become hungry. Right now, for example, I'm not hungry. (I had a nice lunch of whole grain cranberry-hazlenut bread with mascarpone cheese, pears, and honey. It was pretty good, though the pear could have been more flavorful.) And yet, what am I thinking about? Food. Part of this is because I'm procrastinating. I frequently think about and crave food when I'm bored or restless. But the moments when I'm not thinking about food are vanishingly few, and I think that one of the reasons for this is that I'm afraid all the time. I seem normal, I think, but I'm always afraid of these things:

1. serial killers
2. earthquakes
3. terrorist attacks
4. sarcasm
5. rapists
6. robbers
7. accident
8. illness
9. loss of loved ones
10. confrontation

One thing I'm not afraid of is hunger, and that's because I eat too much. My husband has a good union job, I have a chunk of financial aid in the bank, my mom and my sister live nearby and have stable, gainful employment. Absent citywide disaster, I'm not in danger of hunger. This, I can control. I feel like it's one of the few dangers in my life that I can vanquish.

More on this soon.