On Ask a Humanities Grad Student, Part One: Scotch and Lentils
@tigolbitties
The excellent reasons for studying in Nashville are not the schools.
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On Who Wouldn't Want to Touch Her Feet?
@sox
Yeah, I agree with you and guess what? If a journalist interviews you, your remarks will appear in an order convenient to the journalist. And no journalist I know of gives anything like adequate indication of the context, i.e. what the journalist did or said to elicit your remarks.
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On Ask a Humanities Grad Student, Part One: Scotch and Lentils
@tigolbitties
Represent.
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On That New York Times Article About Children and Psychopathy
@melis
"But you'll feel safe with ... us."
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On That New York Times Article About Children and Psychopathy
@Megano!
Concentrating these kids in one group for closer study, and for teaching them psychobabble ... what could go wrong with that?
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On That New York Times Article About Children and Psychopathy
@saythatscool
I bet you're already looking forward to that day when you buy him a van of his own.
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On Sex Diaries: The Results
@planforamiracle
Sorry about the plain language thing. Guilty as charged! You sound like my editor.
In plain language, then, this project bills itself as "diaries," implying that a relatively large number of diverse people participating in the project happened independently to have a number of common issues on their mind, which they chose to write down and share with the maker of the project.
In fact, this is what was happening throughout the week (and I quote, because as you see I did participate):
"... [Day 3, morning question:]
Fill in the blank: 'When I look at the past two years of my life, I feel _________. Because ________. Thinking about this is making me realize ______________.'
[Day 3, evening question:]
How have your looks and ethnicity affected your relationship choices?
[Day 4, morning question:]
Is there any sort of sexual activity you wish you'd explored more? Anything you think you might like, but you've just never tried? Why? ..."
Etc.
So in fact, this is very little like what most people think of as "diaries" and very much like a questionnaire that a journalist might make up to get fodder for a pitchable project. But when the author (and her method makes her more author than editor) retails the content that the participants produced in response to her prompts, she does not characterize that content as responses to a questionnaire, like an old-fashioned magazine survey piece would more honestly have done. She doesn't mention the questions and prompts at all.
I didn't say there was anything creepy about "stimulating healthy discussion about cultural mores and personal neuroses surrounding sex." Many people happily and freely do that on The Hairpin, all the time! This here is different. This is using false pretenses to get people to put their sex lives into conveniently marketable form.
That's what's creepy.
(In addition to the patronizing bit, getting people's habits to disappear with one's Hitachi magic wand and so on.)
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On Sex Diaries: The Results
Speaking of creeps, you know what's creepier than somebody who gets hundreds of strangers to keep a sex diary, so they can thereafter sell the diaries on the internets and in bookstores? Well here's what's creepier: somebody who manipulates the aforementioned sex diarists to cover similar ground day by day, contentwise, constantly intruding with prompts so that the "diary entries" (And what are they actually? They are fill-in-the-blank sex diary forms, only just freer and more individual than a pack of Sex Mad Libs.) that come out will be uniform enough for numerical comparison, generating easily marketable percentages and factoids that will possibly get written up by a lazy journalist or lazy blogger, generating publicity and sales.
Still creepier yet? Somebody who is clearly eager to tell you how to fuck.
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On Sex Diaries: The Results
@squeee
I know, right? It's science! It's idle curiosity!
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On Ask a Humanities Grad Student, Part One: Scotch and Lentils
@Manatee
I hope you stand by making Arkansas part of Tennesse. That means we get Charles Portis.