Race, Class, Gender, Sexuality – Page 7

Ode to Low-Paying Jobs

Warning: This essay speaks candidly about finances, even citing personal salary history, which few people talk about in polite conversation, for some reason. I believe the social convention originally stemmed from not wanting to appear haughty about having a higher salary than one’s interlocutor, but now it seems the only people who have actually divulged… Continue reading Ode to Low-Paying Jobs

Double Standards

This essay is in response to the following letter, which was originally published in the August 2004 issue of San Francisco magazine: Lesbians with Attitude After reading Diana Kapp’s “The L Weird” in your July issue, I couldn’t help but think how hypercritical the lesbian women in the story are. They struggle to tolerate “clueless… Continue reading Double Standards

The Slut/Stud Double Standard

Everyone—even backlash-prone, conservative anti-feminists—agrees that there is a slut-stud double standard. Do I even need to tell you what that double standard is? I don’t think I need to explain it. You’ve heard it a thousand times, probably. People do tend to disagree about whether that double standard is justified in any way. Some people… Continue reading The Slut/Stud Double Standard

Are we all oppressed?

I just quit my job as an English teacher, and this has given me a lot of mental room for reflection on my experiences implementing curriculum. You’d think it’d have been easy for me as an Asian-American male to teach my students about both male privilege and white privilege, considering the fact that I belong… Continue reading Are we all oppressed?

Fighting Gender Role Boundaries

While there is a difference between sexism and the reaffirmation of gender roles, the two are certainly linked. I realize, as most feminists have to concede, that there are inherent differences in trends between males and females. The question, though, is whether we should exacerbate and exaggerate such differences or just allow the “natural” ones… Continue reading Fighting Gender Role Boundaries

Why I’m a Pro-Choice Christian

My first exposure to talks about abortion came from the conservative Chinese church I attended growing up. The youth minister, the head pastor, almost all of the adults, and almost all of the children espoused the same approach: no tolerance—abortion is wrong; it's murder; it should be illegal; and the only possible excuse for it… Continue reading

Individual Choice

People should be responsible for their own actions—no one should be able to use the excuse, “Well, I was brought up in this environment,” or “It’s just not easy enough for me to do that.” The flip side of being responsible for individual actions (or inaction) is recognizing how much individual “choices” are not so… Continue reading Individual Choice

Distracting Dress Codes

One of my friends from youth group is now a youth pastor and has posted a dress code on his church’s website. I find one sentence particularly amusing: “Undergarments should be worn and they should not be visible.” If they’re not supposed to be visible, what does it matter if they’re not worn? The rationale… Continue reading Distracting Dress Codes

Letters from reputable publications

I don’t know where these are from, but I clipped them a long time ago, and I think they’re just as insightful now as they were then, even if Netanyahu isn’t the leader of Israel any more. Criticism of Netanyahu is not anti-Semitic As an American Jew, I take profound offense at Prime Minister Benjamin… Continue reading Letters from reputable publications

Race Relations: Is Progress Impossible?

Sometimes it seems impossible. Sometimes the riffs and tensions go untalked about. That’s why I like movies like White Men Can’t Jump that have characters who aren’t afraid to reveal the stereotypes they hold about one another, that have white characters who can talk explicitly about their whiteness. I know someone doing a research project… Continue reading Race Relations: Is Progress Impossible?