I'M THE GUY WHO DOES HIS JOB (FOR MOM)

Picture me, juvenile, prankster, having dinner conversation with a collection of people who, by all accounts, are much smarter than I (in defense, I'm obviously much bigger; evolution favors me). I love it. For every one word spoken, a thousand pop up in my head; constellations of decision trees and logic webs blossom like fireworks when I listen to these worthy scholars. I learn so much from hearing these people talk!

Of course, I'm the jackass that believes you can't be privy to an intellectual conflagration without setting a few small fires. This attitude, while provocative and infinitely more interesting than agreeing with everyone else (see: banal dinner conversation among freshman IR majors ["you know, I wish society would just see the futility of war as like, an extension of our own, like inner conflict, you know?" zzzzzzzzz....]), can cause a bit of trouble.

Consider this: I, well fed and content with not being an asshole, am thinking about having intercourse in an fMRI machine (like you do), listening to a very poignant and pointed discussion of gender discrimination. I am a white male.

What I should have said was NOTHING. There are two truths in our (thank Christ) rapidly/rabidly evolving culture which pertain to this discussion in which I strongly believe:

1. Gender discrimination, like racism and ageism, does currently exist, and
2. is shitty.

Duh.

For fuck sake, DUH!

What I DID say, using a gross economy of words, was "nuh-uh." Why? Well, maybe I wanted to see what it was like to defend sexism, you know... just to see what that's like. I expected to be booed off the academic stage by a barrage of heated, and un-measured words (for truly you can't understand a person's motivation while they are cool, calm, and collected, now can you?). What I hadn't intended was the request for elaboration on a point that, in all fairness, I had just pulled straight out of my ass.

For yea, verily, my friends if there is anyone on this planet who would volunteer to beat the holy iced tea out of every beneficiary whiteman who thinks "blacks / women / jews/ A-rabs / poor people / gays / mex-ee-cans" have no business in their business with their own flaccid boy's club, it's me. And if you didn't know, ya ain't spent enough time with me alone in a closet with a case of MGD and a BB gun. So how the hell do I defend sexism?

Not very well, I'm afraid, but I can stick to what I know, and that's all I can do. So you've been labeled a bitchy, aggressive, silly, insignificant woman in the workplace, eh? Well I'll bet you've never begged a woman for sex, now have you. Yea. I thought so.

That's a little joke so we don't get to serious.

Treading water, I looked back on the last corporate job I held (122,000 employees worldwide, wheee!). If I remember correctly, it didn't matter if you were a woman, a man, or a goddamned kangaroo just as long as you did your job and you did it well. My life was mercifully devoid of any snarky, backroom gossip because we were all to busy with our stock dropping 18 points in 2 years to give a shit about politics. Mmmmm Ramen....

Did I just become an angry, white, male, capitalist???

No no no no no! I was working in an industry where the only reputation anyone had to defend was a reputation for not fucking up. Ahhh the simplicity of cash business...

"Sorry... I spilled coffee all over myself this morning, so I had to come to work wearing this lacy, camisole that displays my firm, milky, bosoms in all their glorious splendor."
"Yea, fine, great, grand, wonderful, you think we could find a way to shave 750k of next quarter's budget? Maybe we could cut back on materials cost, but we might run into problems meeting EOY goals, and piss off our QC folks, which might mean the end of bonuses this year. What were you saying about coffee? Oh, we should order some Chinese unless our SA brats want pizza."
"You're right, let's take a look at last month's production numbers..."

Bring your own stripper pole to work for all I care just as long as I don't have to work weekends.

Alas, I'm a product of a different generation and a different lifestyle. I wonder if my freshman Psychology textbook says we men downplay women's ambition because our father's ruled the roost, and our mothers kept to their place? Not so, Psychologists! (And I'll thank you not to suggest I want to shack up with mom, you twisted bastards). No, no! Our mothers were the pioneering feminists in what I would call the glorious second dawn of gender equality (voting, while totally awesome, was just not enough I would say). Many of us were lucky enough to be born into a generation of working mothers. Mom had a job! Mom had a graduate degree! Mom read books, and smoked marijuana, and listened to rock and roll music! And mom, when it came down to it, never took any shit from dad. Mom never let anyone put her "in her place."

Good on ya' girl.

So, fuck, where was I, which is to say where are we? Well, I suppose we give the finger to those who don't share my progressive, albeit rough-hewn, viewpoint on gender equality, and wait for them to retire, die, and pass a shit-ton of money and entitlement to their bratty, culturally impotent children who will do us no more harm. Amen.

After all, if you can't look me (me!) straight in the face and tell me (ME!) that you don't give a flying fuck what I or anybody else thinks, then maybe we're in for a long, tragic, drawn-out slog to the finish line. The optimist in me believes the world is ultimately so reductionist that the quality of one's work will RULE ALL in the end. No matter how white you are or how many Y chromosomes you have (oodles and oodles!!), if you can't suck it up and do what you said you would, you won't get the respect you deserve from those who really know and matter. Or... even little, ol' me?

This line of reasoning, sadly, doesn't work very well when you're begging for sex. Trust me.

Trust me.

In then end, I'm quite sure I didn't win any popularity contests among dinner guests, but what I did find was that firm confirmation that, no matter how far I roam, am surrounded buy brilliant, magnificent women who will never define themselves in any other terms than their own. That's what I was looking for all along.

And, having now read this, some of you women will hopefully consider intercourse with me? Pretty please?

I can cook, ladies! I can cook!!

Thanks, mom.