NYCweboy

Gone To The Dogs

Well, I didn't exactly take a day off... but my schedule out here has been surprisingly hectic.

As a result, I'm rushed to put anything up at all, but here goes.

I haven't said much of anything about Michael Vick and the dogfighting.  Needless to say, I'm appalled; but really, football's not my thing (...there's a surprise) and Vick is not my celebrity.  Do I think the NFL has a problem? Sure, but they're also giving the public what it wants, and I tend to think that the sports industries create problems like Vick and then throw up their hands when they turn out to have problems.  Someone, somewhere, should have seen this coming. 

I'd like, though, to highlight this post from newfound friend Deborah Newell, a/k/a litbrit, with whom I have lively conversations and whose prose is quite impressive. You should be reading her (and I should get off my lazy ass and add a link.  It's on my list).  On the topic of Vick, she references the Morning Joe show (more on Scarborough in a moment) and then makes a good point:

Don't get me wrong: I am fully supportive of throwing the book at Vick. Readers know how I feel about people who harm animals--Robert and I have rescued numerous sick, abandoned, and wounded dogs and cats since we first met, and our own gentle Pit Bull, Winston, was shot several times by a drunken and larcenous neighbor last month (Winnie's doing beautifully, by the way). We were naturally upset--make that outraged--to learn of Vick's abuses. But what Joe Scarborough says is true: women are raped and beaten, abused and imprisoned and murdered all the time, by professional athletes as well as men in every profession and plenty of unemployed ones, too--in every state of this nation. Yet when was the last time we saw video of people outside courthouses carrying signs and banners, demanding that these abusers and murderers be held accountable under the law?

I agree. Vick's case has become so sensationalized (my seatmate on the flight out to LA said "what a convenient time to find Jesus"), that we tend to lose sight of the fact that the NFL has thrown the book at the dog-killer, but can't seem to do anything about spousal abuse.  Read the whole thing. I may not want all anger all the time, but a fresh dose of controlled outrage is sometimes very well placed.  This one of those times.

Craigslust

(I can't claim a lot of originality - Slate thought of it first.)

It's been one of those weird, fascinating days; everyone's talking about the Craig mess, and then he had the press conference (sure to become PR 101 in How Not To Respond), and as I look around, I realize... a lot of people have no idea what we're discussing.

I think this really may separate the gay men from the straight boys - since the announcement of Craig's arrest and guilty plea (hint: the innocent rarely plead guilty), there's been more "is that really so bad" and "is that really a crime?" commentary than I would have imagined.  Really, I thought everybody knew: among men who troll bathrooms for casual encounters, there's really a whole scene with a secret code and the whole bit.  Plenty of gay men, even the ones who don't go for that sort of thing (and we are more numerous than apparently anyone knows), know what the deal is.

I think Andrew Sullivan's guest posters (what a bad week for Andy to pick vaca) are right - though I disagreed with Sullvan's "End of Gay Culture" essay, this world of public sex is very much of the old school, when the secret assignations and hidden signals really were a key part of gay sex.  Now, when we are so open and so out there, the relics would seem almost quaint... except we are talking about cruising bathrooms.

So no, I don't think there's a "sex positive" way to defend Craig's behavior; and no, I don't think there's a lot of doubt about what he did and what it meant. When we talk about Craig's behavior as being too much, it is not using homophobia to separate him from David Vitter. Hanging out in a brothel is not hanging round the loo. Nor does the response of some commentors around the web that this would somehow be okay in a gay bar's men's room but not one at the airport really wash either; thanks, but I don't really like getting cruised in any bathroom.

It's no surprise that a segment of gay men romanticized and fetishized the T-room trade; it was, for a time, one of a few ways for men to connect surreptitiously, as it has remained.  But I don't think it's an unreasonable societal need to say "knock it off."  And given that Craig's made it abundantly clear he has no plans to be anyone's gay poster man, hanging the "gay witch hunt" arguments about police lurking in men's rooms to harass us is misplaced.  Gay men have, in almost every sense, outgrown this.  What's left - in the postgay world Sullivan charted - are the deeply closeted, the sneakarounds and the pervs.  I'm all for letting the freak flag fly and saying there's lots of ways to have sex.  But I think it's well past time to take the restroom off the list. And let the gently naive who still don't know continue to believe it never happened in the first place. Just don't tell them about Craigslist.

No, "Do Him For Trade" Does Not Refer To NAFTA

I was surprised to discover that I had in fact, written about Larry Craig months ago.  Craig was the name that drifted out when "The List" - a list of supposedly gay folks on Capitol Hill - was making the rounds in the wake of the Foley Scandal.  That mention has taken on a new life (and, apparently, someone's new search of the web), now that Senator Craig's arrest and conviction this year for behavior in an airport Men's Room have surfaced.

There's a lot of animated discussion, at this moment about gay sex in public places.  Mayor Jim Naugle of Fort Lauderdale has launched a quixotic battle against T-room trade in Lauderdale parks, casting aspersions on gay people in the process that will likely adversely affect tourism (Florida's gay vacation marketing is huge, and highly successful). Just for the record, I don't find public cruising something I'm wildly in favor of; I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest that this behavior is dangerous on many levels, is often unwanted, and makes the atmosphere in places like public restrooms uncomfortable for others.  Still, when policing such behavior is used to shame and embarrass gay people, that's no solution either.

I'm sure, as Senator Craig suggests, this all just a big misunderstanding. It's easy to misinterpret those covert signals in men's rooms when you want to... oh, wait.  As I was just saying, when the obvious thing is kind of staring you in the face, perhaps it's time to just face up to what you do and who you are.  And stop cruising the bathroom. That's just nasty.

Don't Give That Girl A Gun

Greetings from LA. :)

The flight out - another moment where JetBlue won me back with a perfectly on-time, comfortable flight - allowed me to catch up on some of the news I don't get to see so much of. I mean, of course, getting to watch Entertainment Tonight.

You may not have noticed, but my paid gig seems to be no more. Not good for my finances, but otherwise I'm actually a little relieved.  It's not that I can't do celebrity reporting, but you really have to have a passion for writing gossipy stuff, I think, muh like any sort of writing.  And I'm no Liz Smith.

One thing I could never get used to was the relentless interest in bad news and seeing people misbehave.  Entertainment Weekly actually has an interesting cover story on this in its new issue... which is what I was reading when I found out that Owen Wilson may have attempted suicide over the weekend.

And He's Not Coming Back... That's That

The main thing is, probably, that no one can really be that upset about Alberto Gonzales' resignation. Conservatives have loathed him since his name was floated for The Supreme Court, liberals have loathed him since... well, since time began, it seems.

Even more hilarious is the fact that Michael Chertoff is his likely replacement. Chertoff, who has made considerable hash of leading Homeland Security - whether on the terrorism front, or the disaster preparedness one. While he will likely sail through confirmation, I'd expect him to get dinged a little.

What else, really, is there to say? Well, perhaps only that we can now see the worth of a Democratic majority in Congress, the real failure of Karl Rove, and the actual importance of the US Attorney firing scandal, all rolled into one. For a scandal that no one took seriously, that everyone says is about nothing at all, and where the biggest wrongdoing may be bad personnel management, the US Attorney brouhaha has sure taken out a lot of the leadership of the Justice Department.  Perhaps there's been something to it, all along. That's that.

Hong Kong Phooey

Spent the afternoon - on this, our hottest day - in some modicum of air conditioning at The Brattle Theater.  For a city of its size, you can say Boston does a pretty good job on the Art House front - there's Coolidge Corner in Brookline, the more "class for mass" of Landmark's Kendall Square, and there's Brattle, a bruised, but beautiful house near Harvard Square. Indeed, even AMC admits Boston tastes run to the high falutin by putting more art films in the Boston Common 19 than one might otherwise expect.

Still, we get stuff a week or two after New York, if we're good, and months later when we're bad (but, as Dr. T reminds me, it's better than Buffalo which barely gets anything), and though Kendall gets a nice run of new releases there's nothing like my Film Forum in New York, that provides a combination of retro classics, buzzworthy new work, and smart documentaries.  If anyone does, Coolidge actually comes closest, having more money and clout than Brattle, which has a certain skin of its teeth existence (though armed, I think, with the better space).

I make these observations because while a trip to this or that Brattle film has always been on my list, it never got done - too far, too pretentious, too small... all of these were excuses.  Well, I won't make them again... except for the pretentious part: proximity to Harvard gives one a special view of a certain sort of Cambridge type, filled with a special, grungy self importance that no one has quite replicated (thank God).

But really, what I mean to say is I wanted to like Election (Hak Se Wui), the Hong Kong epic that's gotten such good press since its 2005 release, and instead I was sincerely underwhelmed.  Even air conditioning wasn't really enough.

Lisa's Cynical Affirmation Of The Day - God Gave Rock And Roll To You, Not The War In Iraq

Via Slate:
In Jurisprudence, Dahlia Lithwick leafs through the White House's Presidential Advance Manual, which offers suggestions for suppressing dissent at public events. The government recently settled a lawsuit with a pair of Texans who sued the White House after being arrested for wearing anti-Bush shirts at a rally. The government admitted no guilt but announced that the settlement was best for both parties. "The White House suggestion that, hey, both sides did something bad here, distorts one obvious truth: The only bad thing these citizens did was peacefully disagree with the president in an open political forum." The Advance Manual advises carefully selecting crowds, keeping demonstrators out of sight, and encouraging supporters to "hide" dissenters with large banners. It's all rather amusing but also somewhat disturbing: "[W]hile Rush Limbaugh and Angelina Jolie may be able to get away with talking exclusively to people who worship them, the president should not."

The Sweetest Days We'll Know

Capping off one weird week is the news tonight that my weekend plans just fell through... rather than spend the weekend house-sitting for Red's Mom (again), I am off the hook and, well, free of almost any plans for the next two days.

To tell the truth, it's really rather a relief. I've been feeling way stressed about my travel plans next week (which I planned to describe tonight or tomorrow anyway), and the house sitting meant I would go straight from Connecticut to the airport (with a rather crazy plan to drop off the teal monster back at Red's in Brighton, which is not a convenient way-station to Logan in any sense).

But as I said, this has been one weird week, the various stresses - there's drama at work I really can't describe, plus my trip next week, plus family stuff... plus not writing due to stress - getting the better of me and leaving me barely functional with mostly "work, eat, TV, sleep" as my operating plan. Not healthy.

More than most times, I need a break, I need a rest, I need some time to step back.

Unlike Red, I saw my summer as a chance to focus on writing, but in the end, I think she was right that it's okay to give yourself a break, and I kind of plan to do that as we head towards Labor Day.

So here's the thing: next week, I'll be in LA, and I will keep my posting to once a day. tomorrow and Sunday, and early Monday I'll use to do some catching up... and then Sunday and Monday of Labor Day weekend I think I'll just take off - barring some amazing news calamity. After Labor Day, I realized, I am creeping on my one year blog anniversary... which I've actually been thinking about, and have a few things planned (though not some major redesign or anything).

I believe in vacations. It's not laziness, it's just that I think we need to step back and rest once in a while.  The days when there's nothing committed to, only a book, and the day (and for me, the sun and the beach, preferably)... these are the days, the sweetest days, we'll know.

N.V.

Oh so ironic in so many ways... not least of which that I can't seem to bear the thought of writing just now... via Andrew Sullivan comes this incredible poem by Clive James, as a response to this post by David Leavitt .  And as I say, all sorts of ironical, because I actually can't stand Leavitt's work. 

So, on so many levels, and without further ado, share and enjoy:

'The Book of my Enemy Has Been Remaindered'

The book of my enemy has been remaindered
And I am pleased.
In vast quantities it has been remaindered
Like a van-load of counterfeit that has been seized
And sits in piles in a police warehouse,
My enemy's much-prized effort sits in piles
In the kind of bookshop where remaindering occurs.
Great, square stacks of rejected books and, between them, aisles
One passes down reflecting on life's vanities,
Pausing to remember all those thoughtful reviews
Lavished to no avail upon one's enemy's book --
For behold, here is that book
Among these ranks and banks of duds,
These ponderous and seeminly irreducible cairns
Of complete stiffs.


The book of my enemy has been remaindered
And I rejoice.
It has gone with bowed head like a defeated legion
Beneath the yoke.
What avail him now his awards and prizes,
The praise expended upon his meticulous technique,
His individual new voice?
Knocked into the middle of next week
His brainchild now consorts with the bad buys
The sinker, clinkers, dogs and dregs,
The Edsels of the world of moveable type,
The bummers that no amount of hype could shift,
The unbudgeable turkeys.


Yea, his slim volume with its understated wrapper
Bathes in the blare of the brightly jacketed Hitler's War Machine,
His unmistakably individual new voice
Shares the same scrapyart with a forlorn skyscraper 
Of The Kung-Fu Cookbook,
His honesty, proclaimed by himself and believed by others,
His renowned abhorrence of all posturing and pretense,
Is there with Pertwee's Promenades and Pierrots--
One Hundred Years of Seaside Entertainment,
And (oh, this above all) his sensibility,
His sensibility and its hair-like filaments,
His delicate, quivering sensibility is now as one
With Barbara Windsor's Book of Boobs,
A volume graced by the descriptive rubric
"My boobs will give everyone hours of fun".


Soon now a book of mine could be remaindered also,
Though not to the monumental extent
In which the chastisement of remaindering has been meted out
To the book of my enemy,
Since in the case of my own book it will be due
To a miscalculated print run, a marketing error--
Nothing to do with merit.
But just supposing that such an event should hold
Some slight element of sadness, it will be offset
By the memory of this sweet moment.
Chill the champagne and polish the crystal goblets! 
The book of my enemy has been remaindered
And I am glad.


Clive James

Steal My Sunshine

Ugh... can't just seem to, er, get it up today. Dreadfully uninspired, don't have to be at the 'bucks until late... and still, nothing. Think I'll go work on the laundry for a bit. Any and all encouragement welcome...