Via Ben Sixsmith, a new forbidden word. Please update your files and lifestyles accordingly: 

When not publicly threatening to assault people who use the word woke, and being pleased about it, having wilfully construed the term as somehow racist, Mr Anderson writes for Slate, where he tells the world how things really are. Some of the comments by Mr Anderson’s Twitter followers, and their endorsements of his sentiments, are also worthy of note.

Ah. I see a theme developing.

Perhaps Mr Anderson is titillated by the idea of assaulting people and spends his time searching for some convoluted pretext. And having attracted the like-minded, we see people wrapped in a drag of progressive piety – with pronouns gratuitously stipulated, rumblings of opposing some unspecified “fascism,” and the word “ally” in their bios – who thrill to the prospect of white people being walloped simply for using the word woke. It’s a strange kind of righteousness.

If at all highly-strung, maybe look away now. || He builds kalimbas. (h/t, Things) || Big cat diary. || Entirely for the benefit of pedestrians. || Today’s word is broken. || Crab treadmill. || Yes, but are they me…? || Riverside living. || Rome’s imperial poisoner. || Pondering canine head-tilting. || Upscale advent calendars. || “It should be really proud of itself for trying on these new pronouns.” || Pies of note. || Parenting of note. || Possible explanation detected. || The thrill of pumping. || The thrill of tea-bagging. || The Nor-277 tapping machine. || Rock, hard place. || It seems health “equity” requires a little contrivance. || An interesting choice of words. || And finally, wings made of water (and a little detergent).

Lifted from the comments:

On the first page of AT&T’s Listen Understand Act internal portal, the company encourages employees to study a resource called “White America, if you want to know who’s responsible for racism, look in the mirror.” The article claims that the United States is a “racist society” and lays out its thesis plainly: “White people, you are the problem.”

“Racism is a uniquely white trait,” says racist black woman.

He’s 30, by the way. And a teacher, obviously.

When not telling the world that “professional dress codes are inherently racist, sexist, and rooted in white supremacy,” and failing to grade papers on time, a shortcoming that crops up repeatedly, Mr Segal likes to paint his nails, play dress-up in class, and talk about the state of his mental health. A topic also revisited more than once. 

Update, via the comments, where Alice asks,

Are there any actual grown-ups left in the teaching profession?

I’d imagined that one of the functions of dress codes and broader expectations of workplace professionalism is that they help to filter out the delinquent narcissists. People who just can’t get over themselves. Say, 30-year-old men who like to bemuse 12-year-olds by playing dress-up in class, announcing how “non-binary” they are, and painting their nails.

And not, in fact, to bolster some phantom “white supremacy.”

And again, as so often, the above does make one wonder about Mr Segal’s focus on the task at hand and his priorities, which seem to extend no further than himself. Or themself, I suppose. It doesn’t seem unfair to wonder if the children – the children he’s employed to educate – exist primarily as a captive and uncritical audience, there to applaud his self-preoccupation. The hashtags #tiktokteacher and #teachersoftiktok feature prominently, however, the only video I could find in which Mr Segal speaks of what the children in his care have learned in class – a topic you’d think might be mentioned occasionally – involved the children feeling obliged to regurgitate his contrived pronouns.

Readers may wish to reflect on what it must be like to be a man in his thirties whose regular purchases still include blue and green hair dye. Or a man in his thirties who regularly films himself miming to pop records and who uploads the results to TikTok in search of approval. As not-at-all-arrested educators do.

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

Ugh. Am felled by some kind of bug. Please amuse yourselves in the customary fashion. 

The Reheated series is there to be poked at. 

In the pages of Scary Mommy, where progressive ladies roar, Elaine Roth wishes us to know about her mental health problems:

There’s a running monologue whispering in the back of my mind. Maybe it’s whispering in the back of your mind, too. 

Place your bets. 

My running monologue isn’t unique to me. Countless women across the country — maybe across the globe — experience a similar monologue. It results from a shared trauma, and it’s got a name: Patriarchy Stress Disorder, or PSD.

I fear woo may be incoming.

PSD is the idea that the mental, physical, and emotional impact of gender inequality is a trauma that impacts woman and builds over time, and over generations. 

It is, we’re assured, a “collective intergenerational trauma,” and “genetically transmitted,” “passed down in our genes” – albeit in ways left entirely mysterious.

PSD can impact anyone, including nonbinary people and men. Still, few people have heard of patriarchy stress disorder,

You see, you haven’t heard of it, this new and modish ailment, for which no convincing definition is offered, beyond unspecified “systems of inequality” and repeating the word patriarchy many, many times. And yet apparently, simultaneously, we’re assured that said ailment – and its purported transmission – is the obvious go-to explanation for why “high-achieving women” – ladies much like Ms Roth – have so often failed “to have it all and thrive,” despite the promises of feminism. Why supposedly empowered ladies fail to “own their own shine.”

We’re told that the term patriarchy stress disorder was coined by “Dr Valerie Rein, Ph.D.,” and that Dr Rein – allegedly a “women’s mental health expert” – “learned that trauma could be genetically transmitted.” A link is provided, introducing us to “Dr Valerie” – though, again, no explanation or evidence of this alleged genetic transmission is included. We’re merely told that “trauma lives in our nervous system.” Which, as you can imagine, is immensely helpful. A second link, written by the expert in question, supposedly explaining Patriarchy Stress Disorder and its transmission, does no such thing. A third link, to the pages of Good Housekeeping, is similarly mysterious and short on particulars.

Freshly baked, you see. || Don’t blame me for suddenly punching you in the face. || Bad, a cover version. || Today’s word is inadvisable. || A lively neighbourhood. || Scenes of niche dexterity. || Think happy thoughts, comrade. || A challenging restoration. || Yes, there will be a test on Friday. || Spend your money on “feminist studies.” || It needs to be set on fire, she says. || It seems that only some men are allowed to dress up as women. || Underside. || Whee. (h/t, STG) || Caution, variable gravity. || Lomanstraat, Amsterdam. || Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland. || Erratic steel, rather hot. || “They took a look at my crotch and said ‘Wow, that’s amazing!’” || And finally, have you mastered your demon pronouns?

I want to share with people why I didn’t know I was white. Because I think a lot of people don’t know they are white.

I bring thrilling news from academia:

Professor of education and human development at George Washington University, explains how she needed “somatic embodied training” to “learn that she was white”.

These people are responsible for training new teachers. pic.twitter.com/yXBv2KV7VW

— Mythinformed (@MythinformedMKE) October 18, 2021

The speaker quoted above is Dr Julia Storberg-Walker, an associate professor of education at George Washington University. A teacher of teachers, of those who will in turn shape young minds, or try to, anyway. Our educator’s realisation of her own “whiteness” – and thus innate wrongness – was, we’re told, a result of “somatic, embodied training,” which is essential, apparently. In order to struggle with one’s “positionality” as a White Devil, a doer of “harm,” a devourer of souls.

Dr Storberg-Walker’s academic biography tells us,

Her activist/scholar work…

Because one can’t not be an activist, obviously.

is generative and aims to develop equitable and compassionate frameworks, models, and processes for the purpose of catalysing whole planet interdependence and flourishing.

Whole planet flourishing. Goodness. This feat is to be achieved by drawing on,

quantum field theory, and wisdom traditions spanning diverse cultures and historical moments.

Readers are invited to speculate as to exactly how quantum field theory might bear upon such topics as “critical race activism,” or “colonised words,” and how it might inform “deep learning” about the seemingly endless pathologies of being pale. Alas, Dr Storberg-Walker remains coy on the subject, merely teasing us, and instead offers the following:

When job and employee don’t quite gel. 

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

Leaf-blowing drama. || DIY policing. (h/t, Julia) || Needs more dress. || Near miss. || A masterclass in stealth redistribution. || He does this better than you would. || That’s exactly how I would’ve done it. || How deep are the oceans? || “Do you see this?” || Today’s word is oversharing. || An educator speaks. “I’m not anti-white,” says she. || A virtual 1950s electronic music studio. (h/t, Things) || Just tap it, he said. (h/t, STG) || Can pigs jump? || The progressive retail experience (or how to undermine a high-trust society). || “The propped-up people in Victorian ‘post-mortems’ look alive for a much simpler reason.” || A game about a very long baguette. || And finally, because you’d never, ever tire of it.

Update:

I know its creators think it is clever but all I get from it is a sort of prequel to A Clockwork Orange.

Lifted from the comments, where Stephanie is unimpressed by the latest advert for John Lewis home insurance, shared by fellow commenter John. It has to be said, the advert in question does seem to be sending messages that its makers, and executives at John Lewis, don’t quite understand. Presumably, the urge to seem trendy and affirm transgenderism – while coyly hiding behind the fig-leaf excuse that, well, some boys just like to vamp around in their mother’s clothes, so, hey, we’re not really being political – blinded them to other, perhaps more obvious construals. Given the attempt at woke messaging, it does seem odd to associate transgender people with juvenile roleplay, antisocial self-absorption, and gratuitously destructive behaviour. It’s almost funny, in a dark kind of way.

The advert – a theme of which appears to be “I’m fabulous, so fuck you and your possessions!” – isn’t going down terribly well with the department store’s customers, who, it seems, aren’t amused by the thought of their homes being wilfully trashed by an incredibly spoiled child in bad drag. Apparently, we’re meant to find the boy in the advert adorable and affirming. Not, say, selfish and malicious, and old enough to know better. Which is the actual effect.