That Aud Smell

I can't, won't get into the business of how or why someone would know or feel something that's personal to her/him (them!). I think I just have larger issues and concerns with the process by which the culture of individual self-actualization leads us to places where, increasingly, each individual is the master and arbiter of her/his (their!) own human nature. Someone upthread talked about a third arm, or something. That leads me to another point: There are obviously all sorts of infirmities, defects, and disorders that could be congenital to someone that we, as a society, should look to prevent, cure, or heal. But it seems like this cause places gender into that realm -- of something approaching a birth defect. I really struggle with that. Even some of the lexicon is like a needle off a record for me: The gender assigned at birth. Also, I truly do not intend offence by it, but the allegory of Frankenstein (the thoughtful novel, not the Hollywood monster) seems implicated at some point. Good stuff. I think you're getting at something that I am struggling to articulate: At times, this all seems like a bit of a fool's errand. Or, if it's not already one, it's headed that way. Each person a god and universe unto themselves.

I understand and identify with this as well. There seems to be something afoot, though, that's a bit more than live and let live. Within the past three years, I've been brought to task for idly, casually identifying someone as a girl or a boy. The intended takeaway for me was clear enough: "Psssh - did you hear that old dude?! 'Her.' ... 'Him.' Get with the times, old man!" That's a piece of it for me, for sure. I'm good with the main philosophy. But I continue to have ... confusion/reluctance over how the issue of gender dysphoria can, should best be addressed.

^ Way to follow that bouncing ball, sir. I'm not sure JBOT can get it done, but he's going about his business in a smart way, which I do appreciate.

It always mystifies me when I hear my colleagues sniff at the presumed work ethic of so-called millenials. The large majority of people that age, that I know, are working their effing arses off. I mean - did the term "side hustle" even exist before y'all came on line?!

I won't purport to keep attendance logs or anything, but I noticed. In general, I notice it when posters whose content I enjoy are taking a break of any significance.

Right. And that's where a fan can read widely respected journalists reporting that JBOT asked for MTL's 3OA, and then go ahead and put 2 and 2 together. Not ironclad fact, of course, but far from speculation and narrative-building from whole cloth.

Yeah. When we amble up to the point of just feeling or knowing that you were born with the wrong parts -- that it's "inexplicable" -- I don't find the issue being carried for me. Along with my socially liberal bents, I manage to pair a (mostly) abiding faith. I read Pope Francis's exhortation with interest, a while back. Yet another challenge is posed by the various forms of an ideology of gender that “denies the difference and reciprocity in nature of a man and a woman and envisages a society without sexual differences, thereby eliminating the anthropological basis of the family. This ideology leads to educational programmes and legislative enactments that promote a personal identity and emotional intimacy radically separated from the biological difference between male and female. Consequently, human identity becomes the choice of the individual, one which can also change over time”. It is a source of concern that some ideologies of this sort, which seek to respond to what are at times understandable aspirations, manage to assert themselves as absolute and unquestionable, even dictating how children should be raised. It needs to be emphasized that “biological sex and the socio-cultural role of sex (gender) can be distinguished but not separated”. I've been bristling at this as well. It must be a sign that I am finally becoming an old, after holding out for so long. My niece told me a few weeks ago that it was unfairly cis-normative of me to assume a particular person's gender. I was just like, "listen, sister ... ." I'm feeling like I need a center to hold. I need the falcon to hear the falconer.

I'm a bit lost already, I think. I continue to ask: Why? Can't/shouldn't gender fluidity (girlish boys, butch girls) be brought to bear? Isn't the dysphoria a product, at least in some significant part, of the values, roles, modes, behaviours that society ascribes to a certain gender?

And that Bergevin publicly said Buffalo's price was too high.

Interesting thought. But ... I dunno, man. If there were a time to get a Dem-appointed successor to the Court's oldest member, that was it. Maybe she thought/presumed HRC would win.

Good to know that it's generally not about sexual attraction. To the other point: Whence those feelings? From societal cues about what it means to be a boy and what it means to be a girl? It seems like there's a way in which the reassignment effort -- however confidently undertaken -- is almost a capitulation to rigid structures that need not be endorsed.

I regret the trend toward the Senate having such a fine-toothed comb, even obstructive, approach to the POTUS's nominees for the SCOTUS. I'm not a student of history, but, in my mind, the trend took hold firmly with Bork (Reagan). And that was the Dems doing it. Just a bad idea, IMO. The way the thing was set up for generations, again as best I understand it, was that the Senate was vetting these people to make sure there wasn't something egregiously wrong with them. It wasn't used as a forum to wage a sort of non-electoral skirmish over political ideologies. The candidate is progressive and liberal, like the person who's POTUS? Welp, to the victor go the spoils. The candidate is an originalist and conservative, like the POTUS (or the POTUS's people (in the case of Trump))? Welp, like I said. I also wonder about Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Such a mythical darling of so many young Dems. But why the funk didn't she retire when Obama was re-elected? Now she's gotta outlive Trump.

Who pst in your Cheerios? This isn't a narrative -- it's a reference to multiple credible reports of the demand for the 3OA being made, and then substantiated by the MTL GM himself saying Buffalo's price was too high.

It was a rumour sources by multiple credible journalists. And then you had the Habs GM say in a press conference -- we're interested in ROR, but JBOT can call me when the price comes down.

When the gay rights movement was having a "moment" a few years ago, I was a full-blown cheerleader. And I continue to be. I have many gay friends. I know several gay couples -- married and otherwise -- who are raising children. I completely support, and intuitively understand, their inherent rights to associate with the person they love in the precise same way that I associate with the person I love. The transgender issue is trickier for me, though. For many reasons, I think. Perhaps most fundamentally, the hang-up I've long had is that there is, on the one hand, a philosophy to which I long ascribed that essentially says "hey, those GI dolls (or, whatever, that American FOOTBALL helmet) aren't necessarily JUST for your son, and those dress-up dolls (or, whatever, that make-up) aren't necessarily JUST for your girl -- there's plenty of room within each gender for a full expression of "masculine" and "feminine" behaviors. A super "effeminate" boy is just as fine and wonderful as a super "butch" girl. "Straight, not narrow," as it's often said. The trans movement, though, seems rooted in a simultaneous insistence on gender having no definition, but also being rooted in gender being very much a divided house. If you're a boy who *feels* every bit like a girl, what does that mean? It means, what? Often, that you feel drawn to loving men? Because that's something that (only) women do? Does it mean that you want to wear a flowery sun skirt and crop top, and put on some makeup? Because that's something that only women do? Do you see where I'm getting with that? It seems that the trans individual's desire to be of a certain gender is rooted in a fixed way of viewing gender. Which is just ... more than merely ironic. I'm truly not intending to be insensitive. I may just be ignorant. In my view, if you're a girl who feels in every signifiable way that you are really a boy, then you can just go ahead and be the most boyish girl in town (and vice versa).

I'll check it out. As a rule, I avoid punchlines that make certain people feel badly because that, by definition, makes the joke cheap, gratuitous, and therefore unwelcome. So that's not quite what I'm getting at.

*Sigh* I mean, I guess. Maybe I'll visit the OT Politics club or whatever when it opens to discuss this topic. I'm a self-identified cultural progressive in most ways, but that's an area where I have true ambivalence.

This is gold, Jerry. GOLD! This is also gold.

To each their own (like, you do you, right?), but, as my oldest kids became the age of these prized prospects, I really started to internalize and understand this sentiment. It's even changed the way I experience sports, really. I'll wear my Perreault, and that's about it. I have a Rob Ray goathead as well -- that I will bust out ever so occasionally. I also have a bootleg jersey (it might be a Drury?) that I bought off the street during the 2006 Cup run -- I've worn that twice.

That was effing brilliant TV. They sang to the tunes of some famous opera ... I'm too much of a Philistine to remember which one.

Ya - was gonna make the same observation. I feel like certain modifiers get attached to certain nouns without enough thought. "Blind optimism" being one. What dudacek wrote was optimistic - but it was far from blind.

Is that now out of bounds?

I was never clear on that, myself.

Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffling glue.

I'm sure I have no idea what you mean.