Cheryl’s Mewsings

Listen up people, I am about to ask you to sign a petition. This is not something I do very often, and I wouldn’t be doing it if I didn’t think it was important. My apologies if some of you are offended by this, but so it goes.

Many of you will know that homosexuality used to not only be considered a crime, but also a mental illness. As recently as 1973 the American Psychiatric Association (APA) listed homosexuality in its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). Thankfully that has now changed. However, what most of you probably don’t know is that the DSM still includes an illness known as “Gender Identity Disorder” (GID). While this is used as the basis for diagnosing adult transsexuals, it is also often used as an excuse to “treat” children whose behavior is seen as “abnormal” by parents and conservative doctors. And by “treat” I actually mean “torture”, because basically it involves beating and otherwise punishing the kids for “inappropriate” behavior until such time as they learn to conform to what the adults are expecting of them. The primary reason given for this “treatment” is often to prevent children from becoming homosexual, and naturally it appeals strongly to homophobic parents. These days, as gay rights have gained a certain amount of traction, it is often presented instead as preventing children from growing up transsexual, because while persecuting gays is now unacceptable in some circles, persecuting the transgendered is still very much a popular spectator sport. The effect, however, is still the same: kids get bullied into conforming to conservative views of appropriate gender behavior.

Given the overwhelming success of “treating” transsexuals by the novel method of taking them at their word and helping them to live in the gender they prefer, there has been considerable pressure on the APA to remove GID from its list of illnesses. However, a working group set up by the APA to look at revisions to the Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders section of the DSM includes two of the strongest proponents of this sort of cruel “therapy”, Kenneth Zucker and Ray Blanchard. With these people on board (on Zucker is chairing the group) it seems likely that the new DSM will not only still include GID, it will also redefine transsexuals as dangerously perverted.

Obviously very few of you will have much close contact with actual transgendered people because they are a fairly small minority. But this is really just a symptom of something much wider and much more dangerous. The question to ask yourself is whether we really want to go back to a world in which social norms are enforced by declaring anyone who transgresses against them to be “mad”. Remember, it was not that long ago that a woman could be committed to an asylum simply for becoming pregnant outside of marriage.

There is an online petition, and you can find it here. It isn’t the best written petition in the world - it reads like it was written by someone who was upset and angry at the time - but it is the one we currently have to work with. This isn’t a matter of national politics, so you don’t have to be a US citizen to take part. I’ve signed it. I hope that some of you will consider doing so too. Thank you.

It was double-header time in the IPL again today, but I missed the first match because it conflicted with the Turkish Grand Prix. From the scorecard it looks like another disappointing performance by the Deccan Chargers. After their limp surrender against the Royals they must have hoped for a better performance in from of their home crowd. As it was, they found Ganguly in fine form, and his 91 off 57 deliveries helped the Knight Riders to a daunting total of 204. The Chargers’ batting managed to keep pace for a long time, but they lost too many wickets in the process. A swashbuckling 71 by Venugopal Rao late on in the innings makes the final score look respectable, but I don’t think the outcome could ever have been in much doubt.

The second game saw Warnie and the Royals take on one of their biggest rivals, the Delhi Daredevils. It was Dimi Mascarenhas’s first game in the IPL, and he found himself opening the bowling against Gambhir and Sehwag, surely the most destructive partnership in the tournament. To get out of that with an economy rate of 7.25 and two wickets is pretty laudable. The Daredevils finally amassed a total of 156, which should have been fairly easy. As it was the Royals kept making it harder than it should have been, losing Kaif and Watson to run-outs, and Warne and Mascarenhas to wild swings. Thankfully the tail didn’t panic and were able to capitalize on Watson’s excellent 74, making the 7 needed off the last two overs to bring home the win. Which puts the Royals a game clear at the top of the table. That’s my boys!

Today’s Independent has an article about pagans and Goths getting involved in Morris Dancing. My initial reaction to this was that it was going to be a hatchet job much like their treatment of Eastercon, and I have to admit that regardless of any other qualities of the article, I find it hard to take it seriously when it contains cheap shot lines like this:

“Look at it coming up,” says a female voice, and she’s not talking about her partner’s big stick: the sun is beginning to burn orange through heavy grey clouds on the horizon.

Having said that, the rest of it doesn’t look too bad, and I’m pleased to see that there appear to be Morris groups that are actually engaging with what they do and trying to make something modern and vibrant out of it rather than simply looking back on ancient traditions. (This is the neo-pagan in me coming out, can you tell?) I particularly like this comment:

There are radical politics at work too: he sees the dance, and “neo-pagan carnivals” such as the Rochester Sweeps, as a way of resisting the “complacent nostalgia” of Englishness “founded on the detritus of imperialism, Christianity, racism and xenophobia”. His England has more primitive, inclusive roots, and for him the morris is a way of expressing that.

The “he” in this case being Philip Kane, founder of the Wolfshead and Vixen Morris side. His is a sort of Englishness that I think I can get along with (though goodness only knows what some of my American friends will make of those blacked faces).

Wow. For the first time since I got back to the UK I have woken up feeling moderately rested. So far today, no headache and no dizzy spells. If this continues I might actually be able to write.

Talking of which, profuse apologies to David Moles and Larry, both of whom I have made promises to about writing stuff. I haven’t forgotten, honest.

Today saw the return fixture in the battle of the kings. Chennai’s Super Kings won the first match in Mohali, and the Punjab Kings were out for revenge on their visit to Chennai. The match went back and fore. Yuvraj won the toss and put Chennai in to bat. Sreesanth got two early wickets, but then Dhoni and Badrinath took control. The Super Kings didn’t quite accelerate as they would have liked, but 181 was a respectable target. Shaun Marsh once again batted well, as did Irfan Pathan, but the star of the game was Lakshmipathy Balaji. He took the vital wickets of Marsh and Sarwan in one over to break up the Punjab run chase, and then a hat trick in the final over as the Chennai tail got desperate. Chennai win by 18 runs; Balaji finished with 4-0-24-5; and the Royals are still top of the table (if only on net run rate).

I see that my good friend Tony Geer is a featured site this week on WPCandy. Quite right, the lad’s a genius.

An amazing day’s rugby in the English Premiership, though sadly it seems that all the wrong teams are winning (at least from my point of view). Thankfully Bath are still in the playoffs, though if Stevens and Mears are seriously injured I don’t fancy their chances. Will, you must be gutted. I know I am, and I’m not even a ‘Quins fan.

Why does Zemanta think I’m writing about Aussie Rules?

This blog has just been upgraded to support Gravatars (Globally Recognized Avatars) in the comments thread. Check the comment below to see what I mean. If you would like your own Gravatar, you can register for one here. (Note, however, that they have no means of deleting an account. You can remove all your pictures, which has the same effect, but I know some people get unhappy about services that won’t let you go.)

I tend to avoid blogosphere blow-ups these days. The fact that they are a huge waste of time and energy is one good reason for doing so, but one of the things that gets me most wound up reading them is that so many people’s arguments boil down to some variant of, “Your personal experience must be wrong(*), because my personal experience contradicts it.” For some reason we humans find it very hard to understand that the world can be very different for people who are not us (and Goddess knows I’m sure I have been guilty of this myself many times in the past). However, we can strive to do better, and for a little help along the way here is Kelley Eskridge being amazingly sensible and constructive about the whole thing.

* Yes, I know, on the Internet no one is ever just “wrong”, they are always “WRONG!!!”

If ever there was proof that LinkedIn is really a social networking system for people in full time jobs, this is it. I added a job of “freelance journalist” to my profile. I also noted that I was self-employed. LinkedIn then came back and told me that there were 12 other people who worked for that company on their system that I might like to connect with. (And interestingly one of them was David Levine.)

LinkedIn has managed to put me back in touch with various people that I’ve lost touch with from previous phases of my life, so it does have its uses. However, I think I’m going to take a look at Biznik. From what they say, they seem rather more in tune with the modern world.

I’m testing a WordPress plug-in that allows you to subscribe to email notification of follow-up comments. It isn’t really for here, because I get so little debate, but it may be useful on SFAW, and I’d rather test it out here first. You should see the link for subscribing if you try to leave a comment. I know the sidebar is missing on the subscription page. Please test.

I think my brain was fried yesterday. Today’s game was Royals v Chargers, not Royals v Kings. That’s a much easier prospect. Almost too easy, in fact. We do like games to be competitive. Gillie tried hard as usual, but even he was not at his best, and the rest of the Chargers’ batting was hopeless. Set a mere 140 to chase, the Royals did it at a canter. And now Warnie and the boys are back on top of the table. I’m even starting to get confident about a place in the playoffs.

They did finally get playing in Kolkata, and the result was yet another fabulous match. The game was limited to 16 overs. The Knight Riders batted first, and kept losing wickets so they only reached 123. The Royal Challengers were slow in the chase, but they had the big hitting of Cameron White and Mark Boucher to come. In the end they needed 20 off the last over, and only managed 13. Credit to Ishant Sharma for bowling two great overs at the end of the game. Much relief for Ganguly, who looked like his heart couldn’t take many more close finishes. More depression for poor Dravid.

Tomorrow a top-of-the-table clash between Rajasthan and Punjab.

Got some really good news about one of my friends just now. I can’t share it because it was on an F-locked LJ post, but I did want to enthuse about it to the world.

I see from Liz Williams’ LiveJournal that she has been asked to be GoH for Imagicon 2 in Stockholm next year. If I understand things correctly, that’s a firm event that is also bidding to be the 2009 Swecon. Liz is a wonderful writer (and has produced some fabulous Feminist SF as well as the brilliant Inspector Chen series). I hope lots of Finns (and other persons for that matter) make the trip to Stockholm.

(I’d consider going myself, but I have this Word Fantasy Con to prepare for, and anyway I may have no money by then.)

I don’t often do these blogopshere quiz things, but right now I’m too tired to do anything intelligent and this one looked fun, so here you go.

You are The Moon

Hope, expectation, Bright promises.

The Moon is a card of magic and mystery - when prominent you know that nothing is as it seems, particularly when it concerns relationships. All logic is thrown out the window.

The Moon is all about visions and illusions, madness, genius and poetry. This is a card that has to do with sleep, and so with both dreams and nightmares. It is a scary card in that it warns that there might be hidden enemies, tricks and falsehoods. But it should also be remembered that this is a card of great creativity, of powerful magic, primal feelings and intuition. You may be going through a time of emotional and mental trial; if you have any past mental problems, you must be vigilant in taking your medication but avoid drugs or alcohol, as abuse of either will cause them irreparable damage. This time however, can also result in great creativity, psychic powers, visions and insight. You can and should trust your intuition.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Today’s match between Delhi and Chennai was every bit as close as their positions in the table suggested it might be. Third and fourth coming into the game, both sides knew that they had to make a statement. Delhi batted first and set a very respectable total of 188, thanks mainly to a fine 80 off 49 balls by Gambhir. The Chennai innings went back and fore. Vidyut and Flemming started well, but then both got out. Dhoni and Morkel appeared to have rescued the game, but then Morkel got run out. Dhoni appeared able to win it by himself, but then holed out trying one too many hits over the top. Finally it was down to Badrinath and Gony to make 15 off the last over. Fortunately for the Super Kings, Gony was up to the challenge: a huge blow for 6 and a lucky edge for 4, set them up, and Badrinath was able to manufacture a single off the final ball to avoid a tie and the tournament’s first ever bowl-out. “It can’t get better than this.” said Dhoni after the game, and from the neutral spectator’s point of view he’s right.

Today we should be getting a double-header, but it is raining in Kolkata so no play right now.

No, not mine, theirs. Post-Weird Thoughts is a new blog from Jacques Barcia and Fábio Fernandes. It promises thoughts on weird fiction in English by Brazilians. As you know, I’m all in favor of building bridges to SF&F communities in other countries. I wish the new blog well, and I hope you will all enjoy reading now.

One of these days, I want to go to a convention in Brazil.

The latest issue of Chris Garcia’s The Drink Tank is an extended look at this year’s Hugo nominees. It is mainly by Chris, with guest comment from Niall Harrison. Being up for two fan Hugos himself, Chris majors on the fan categories. He says very kind things about me, for which I am very grateful (beer later, Chris, it will be flat if I send it from here), and offers the absurd odds of 5-1 on my winning. If it was 500-1 I might put some money on me, on the grounds that if I did win then I’d also come into enough money to hide away from the hordes of angry Scalzi fans for the rest of my life. But actually Chris doesn’t quite have his math right.

Those of us who have worked in for a bookmaker (it was a vacation job while I was in college), or indeed in commodity trading, are a little sharper. Chris is offering 2-1 on Scalzi and 3-1 on Langford. So if I put $1000 on each of them I’ll be fine. If Scalzi wins I break even, and if Langford wins I make $1000 profit. Alternatively I could put $2000 on Scalzi and $1000 on Langford. Then if Scalzi wins I get $4000 from him and lose $1000 on Dave, netting $3000; whereas if Dave wins I get $3000 from him and lose $2000 on John, netting $1000. Making money from gambling is quite easy of the bookie doesn’t get him odds right.

Of course you might argue that it is not certain that one of Scalzi and Langford will win. And if you do I will also argue that it is not certain that we won’t all wake up tomorrow and discover that we are all characters in a Charlie Stross virtual novel being played by a gang of adolescent squid on a giant artificial habitat orbiting the planet Ambergris.

The latest Jeff Ford novel has slightly more of a supernatural element to it than The Girl in the Glass, but probably nowhere near enough to please genre purists. The Shadow Year is basically a great novel about a geeky kid in 1960s America (and my, doesn’t that seem a like ancient history now) whose neighborhood is threatened by a stalker and possible serial killer. It is, to some extent, a schoolboy detective novel, except that it is much more realistic and scary than Scooby Doo. You can read this for the fantastical elements, and the is supposed to be scary, but if you did you’d be missing out on a great novel about fairly ordinary people. I loved it. Nice one, Jeff.