History

152 posts

An Open Letter to Kim Kardashian from the Ghost of My Mother

My mom was a tough lady. Born to genocide survivors from Turkey in pre-war Palestine and raised in the post-war West Bank she grew up with loss always on the brink, and a sense garnered out of necessity that one can make lemonade out of even the tartest, dirtiest lemons. She was also very, very ill from a young age, one of the first in her generation to be formally diagnosed with SLE (as opposed to “rheumatism”), but regardless of her life’s seemingly endless challenges, she went to school in the states, graduated Magna cum Laude, and was a highly respected linguist and speech pathologist. Along the way she married my dad- a schlubby, sweet Mormon guy (I know), and had me. So it goes.

She was also a bitch of the first order. A woman who inspired fear and respect. She ruled the household with an iron fist clad in a velvet Chanel glove, and made it a point of pride to stand any man down who got in the way of her or her husband’s success. Continue reading →

What Happened on the MV Joyita?

In Haruki Murakami’s surrealist fantasy The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Lolita-esque spitfire May Kasahara recalls a house on the block where she used to live that carried a distinct air of malice. It was later known that an unspeakable act occurred there  in the Miyawaki family, dubbing the outcast property the “Hanging House.” But it wasn’t just the act of what happened that had the town thoroughly spooked. It was the aftermath. Continue reading →

Seventeen Years Later Oklahoma City Still Has Lessons for America

Today is the seventeenth anniversary of the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. 168 people lost their lives on that day and the small, tightly-knit community they lived in has never been the same. The striking thing about this year’s anniversary is that it seems to have been forgotten. The national media is busy discussing the Secret Service Scandal, the death of Dick Clark, and the character of Ann Romney. The largest terrorist attack on American soil before 9/11 is not worthy of a front-page mention of any of my usual news outlets. Continue reading →

A Brief History of Contraception

Today is the fortieth anniversary of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Eisenstadt v. Baird, a decision that barred states from denying birth control to unmarried persons. Unlike its predecessor, Griswold v. Connecticut, Eisenstadt is a relatively uncelebrated decision, though with it, the Court validated what is now a thoroughly modern mindset about sex: that sex can be fun, and it isn’t necessarily all about baby-making. The decision extended the right to privacy to include single persons– using an equal protection argument that claimed that states cannot discriminate against unmarried people when it comes to laws restricting access to birth control. It was a victory for single men and women. Continue reading →

Santorum versus Plato on Sex in the Military

I mean, other than Stanley Kubrick.

When Rick Santorum said last week that “any kind of sexual activity has absolutely no place in the military” he gravely offended not only gay service members, but also straight ones who happen to be in relationships, and people who have watched Full Metal Jacket. But did you know that he was also contradicting one of the great founders of Western civilization?

One may be tempted to read Santorum’s statement as merely a deceptive facade of evenhandedness, where the gay-hating audience will get the intended target while everyone else ignores the implications for hetero service members because, really, who would be ridiculous enough to actually believe that? Presumably, the guy who uttered this gem on CNN: Continue reading →