After all, a *burqa is an article of clothing designed to  conceal a woman from head to toe with only her eyes to be seen. To my half-white, middle-class American mind, the wearing of a burqa is just crazy. It forces a woman to be “invisible”. She is no longer a person,  she’s property.

And as a feminist, it makes me uncomfortable to be around.**

But, my silent and fleeting satisfaction quickly turned to thoughts of the potential harms of such laws.

Religious tolerance and personal freedoms were first to my mind.

And the women. What happens to the women who have been forbidden by law to wear their coverings in public?

It’s easy for me as a feminist to almost intuitively think that any kind of forced covering is wrong. I mean, she’ll never be equal to anyone as long as she’s hidden behind a veil, right?

but…

the religious person in me thinks that legislating what religious  apparel is ‘unacceptable’  is just establishing a precedent for doing away with any form of outward signs of religion (garments? yarmulkes?).  And what about cultural clothing?

What if a government decides that traditional [insert any traditional immigrant to the new country] clothing is not in keeping with the standards of cultural acceptability?

I know that many women wear the head scarf or burqa do it out of choice–out of religious duty.  I understand and  can respect those arguments. As a person who wears the garment to, in part,  protect my morality and encourage modesty, I am not much different.

I also know that many women are forced to wear coverings. If I were to visit Saudi Arabia, I’d be required to cover-up in public.

So, what is the difference? Assuming their is one.

Where is the line drawn when respecting one country’s customs and laws and infringing on personal freedoms?

Where is the line drawn when respecting one group’s religious and cultural practices and protecting the rights of women/children/animals within the new host country?

What of the women who cannot wear their coverings in public? Will they be forced to stay indoors? Or will they obey the ‘laws of the land’ but be subject to sanctions by their religious and social community?

I don’t have the answers and I  don’t really know what to think on this issue.

However, this does come to mind and whether or not it’s a similar scenario to you, it does help provide a starting point for me when considering France’s potential new law:

Years ago, women used to have their feet bound. Even here in the United States.   Do you think we (Americans) would be so forgiving of such cultural practices now?

* If I have totally misrepresented anyone’s beliefs, please accept my apologies in advance.

**as a person who absolutely loves and celebrates religious and cultural diversity, I find myself in a world of confusion on this one.

Go there to nominate your favorite posts and bloggers from last year.

You can rape, kidnap, murder, assault - destroy the very soul of an individual - and it matters less to us than if you fail in your ponzi scheme to make wealthy people wealthier.

What do we value?

I recognize it is my obligation as a conscious, conscientious Catholic to discern — to know that the church no more belongs to the Vatican than it does to me.  Once I accepted that being Roman Catholic did not require that I be a papist — once I understood that it was possible to be simultaneously outraged by and in love with the Church — I saw the obstacles to being a practicing Catholic in a new way.

I’ve heard this sentiment expressed quite often - that the Mormon church is my church, too - regardless of any disagreement I might have with the Mormon Church’s political positions or current doctrinal interpretations.   It turns out, however, that it’s much easier for a Catholic to simultaneously love the Catholic Church and be outraged by its practices than it is for a Mormon.  And it’s much easier to express this outrage as a Catholic than as a Mormon.First, the author (Michele Madigan Somerville) states:

I love the radical Catholic Church. I love that there are Roman Catholic bishops sticking their necks out to ordain women. That Catholic doctrine places mighty emphasis on the role of conscience in worship and creates fertile ground for conscientious dissent. I support dramatic change as energetically as I can.

There is no “radical” element in modern Mormonism.    No Mormon bishop (or General Authority - sort of the equivalent of a Catholic Bishop) publicly advocates for the ordination of women (can you imagine?!).     There is, however, Mormon doctrine that places a “mighty emphasis” on developing a personal relationship with God and receiving direct revelation from Him.    This doctrine, found in the book of James, led to Joseph Smith’s First Vision, yet it has not created a safe space for faithful dissent within the Mormon church.                                                                                                                     Somerville next mentions a speech she heard during an interfaith gay pride celebration held in a Roman Catholic Church. The speech was given by a former Catholic nun who continues to worship as a Catholic even though she is a lesbian and lives with her partner of 25 years.

That night, her address was filled with surprises, but only one aspect of her speech shocked me: her fervent recommendation that progressive Catholics remain in the Church — so as to be in a position to create change. She still worships in a Roman Catholic Church.

Likewise, progressive Mormons are frequently encouraged to stay and work within the Church to effectuate change.    After reading the article, however, I realized how much easier it is to be a faithful, practicing Catholic under protest than a faithful, practicing Mormon under protest, because a Catholic under protest may join any number of organizations working within the Catholic Church that publicly advocate alternative worship and Church practices.     For example, instead of paying her tithing to the Catholic bishops, Somerville pays it to the Woman’s Ordination Network and to a fund for survivors of abuse suffered at the hands of Catholic priests.     I googled the Women’s Ordination Network and I was amazed.  This group is a well-funded organization established in 1974 that publicly advocates for the ordination of women in the face of clear authority stating that God does not want women to be ordained.    Yet the outspoken, radical members of the Women’s Ordination Network co-exist alongside traditional Catholics.                                                                               I’ve heard that because Mormonism is a young religion, it has not yet matured to the point where it can tolerate faithful dissent (Catholics had this problem, too - the Spanish Inquisition, anyone?).  And the Catholicism practiced by a feminist writer living in Brooklyn, N.Y. is no doubt very different from the Catholicism practiced somewhere in Italy or South America.  Yet a feminist writer who is “outraged” by the Catholic Church finds a space to voice her dissent and in so doing can still see herself as a faithful Catholic.                                                                                                                                                 I wonder whether it is merely a matter of time before Mormons can tolerate a Mormon version of the Womens Ordination Group (or a similar group), or whether there is something unique about Mormonism that would prevent such groups from thriving.

A few months ago, we visited Grandma and Grandpa, who live in the Southern end of Utah County, an area where the population exploded over the last decade. Every couple of blocks, she’d squeal, “Another Jesus castle! Yay! Yay!” When we visited my in-laws’ ward, she commented that the pews in the chapel were green instead of blue and that the same pictures were found in different spots on the hallway walls, but those differences were only noticeable because everything else was exactly the same: the lessons were the same lessons we would have gotten in Texas, the teal and maroon floral couches were the same as the ones in our lobby back home, and we didn’t have to ask anyone where the bathroom was.

Two weeks ago, we arrived at our new ward in Salt Lake for the first time. We pulled into the parking lot (yeah, I drove the two blocks, but in my defense it was threatening to rain) and my daughter started voicing her displeasure from the back seat: “This NOT Jesus’ castle! Not my church!” And sure enough, it wasn’t a standard-issue Jesus castle. Instead, it’s more of a mid-century sort of building, constructed in 1965 of white brick, with beautiful woodwork inside and a steeple sitting on the ground out front, looking like it might blast off into outer space at any second. Once we were inside, the artwork didn’t do much to reassure her either– bronze busts of Joseph and Hyrum Smith decorate the foyers, abstract paintings of Jesus and Joseph Smith hang on the walls, and needlepoint images of women engaged in good works make the Relief Society room feel homey. The familiar teal and maroon couch in the lobby looks out of place; but a Knoll sofa may not have been in the budget.

Since we arrived in Utah, I’ve been driving my kids crazy when we’re out on the road. “Look guys, a Mormon church!,” I announce as they groan from the back seat. In the part of town where we live, we have old red brick churches, old brown brick churches, old stucco churches, mid-century churches, and even a church whose roof looks like the inspiration for the Olympic ski jump venue, but not many Jesus castles.

I remember attending an exhibit in the basement of the BYU Museum of Art back when I was a student about the pioneer-era buildings that were being torn down all over the Salt Lake valley (and a quick Google search isn’t helping me come up with any more specifics). The subtext of the exhibit (at least as I remember it more than a decade later) was that by correlating every aspect of the church, down to its architecture, resulted in the unintentional suffering of our creativity and diversity as a people.

As we spent the last year preparing for our move, one of the things I worried about the most was losing the diversity we had in our Texas neighborhood. And it’s true that the neighbors here are mostly Mormons, mostly white (and so far, very sweet). But here, in this little corner of the vineyard, architectural diversity is alive and well. And for that, I count my blessings.

My two-year-old, however, is still adjusting. She’s missing her nursery friends and her Jesus castles. We went to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house this week, where Jesus in the white robe and pink sash hangs prominently on one wall. “It’s Princess Jesus! It’s Princess Jesus!,” she shrieked at the top of her lungs as I giggled with embarrassment.

1. Don’t become a parent.

2. Don’t read this post.

I can not tell you how dearly I hold the hope that someday the only poop I will come in contact with will be my own. Ahhhh, poop.

Don’t get me wrong, poop is great. It is necessary. Without it, we die. CODE RED: TMI alert: CODE RED. Not to mention the fact that I think pooping is one of the most under-recognized pleasures of life.

Now that’s out of the way. For your reading pleasure I would like to tell you a few poop stories, all true, sadly sadly true. They get worse as I go along, trust me on this.

My first truly traumatic parental poop experience involved my oldest toddling along in nothing but a soggy diaper (can you say white trash), when I see her bending over to pick something up and pop it in her mouth. This is my cue to desperately run to her to remove said “something” only to discover pellet poops falling out of her diaper, and realize that one of them has already been swallowed.

This same child soon thereafter took to sticking her hands in her diaper and wiping it on the walls. Charming yes? The first time this happened I heard her awake in her crib and left her there because she sounded content, after a few minutes I decided to see what was causing such joy and there she was, covered in poop, from head to toe, a big chunk of poop on the tip of her finger, she smiled up at me and said “stinky” then stuffed it up her nose. That was fun.

It happened again soon thereafter. I would camp outside her room during her nap, listening to the slightest sound of movement hoping to catch her before she transformed into poop Picasso. I tried scolding, yelling, crying. She just loved poop.

Then another baby, twice the poop.

One day I was sick, sick as a dog, sick, sick, sick. Crawl-in-a-hole-feel-sorry-for-myself-but-I-have-babies-to-take-care-of sick. So I’m laying there in my bed watching my two-year-old poop on the toilet and as she scoots off the toilet she turns it brown (I told you this got worse) so I drag my barfy buttocks to the bathroom to wipe her poopy buttocks and the poopy toilet and various other poops. And I’m so dang sick I just toss the poop cloth it in the washing machine (a front-loader)(you can see it coming now can’t you?).

Some time later I was collapsed on the couch, being sick. And said daughter comes to me with a toothbrush she’s located somewhere. She pries my mouth open and starts pushing this tooth brush around in my mouth and I submit weakly to this abuse, sniff, what the? What in the holy name of Franklin Delano Roosevelt is that smell?????? Her hands smell like poop. POOOPPPOOOOPPOOOOOOOPPPPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I run to the sink and vomit.

And there in the middle of the kitchen floor is the poop cloth abandoned and lonely and infested with disease. Who knows where it’s been (other than in my mouth and on my toothbrush), who knows what it’s touched between the washing machine and the floor of the kitchen, and I am so damn sick that I want to just die. Right there on the spot. Death would have been preferable to cleaning up poop.

I did not die.

I have many more stories, but I am out of time. I will bring you Poop Chronicles II in the near future, and leave you with the following nugget of important poop-formation.

So anyway today I washed the diapers. And of late, my dear son has been having real poop (as opposed to breastfed poop which is a much less offensive substance). Someone (most likely me) apparently forgot to swish and dump before putting a diaper in the pail and today I got to clean out all the “fiber” from the washing machine. Did you know that grape peels, pea husks, and potato peals look almost exactly the same after its trip through the digestive tract and washing machine as it did before? Now you know.

I really resent being woman when it’s time to clean the house.
It’s true. In our home, equality does not exist when it comes to dust, laundry and clutter.  Though we are all equal offenders when making the mess, because I’m “the mom” I am responsible for cleaning it up.

Now,  I could ask my partner to do more to help out, but that would in my mind,  make me a nag. So I let all that nasty resentment and clutter build up by avoiding the subject in every possible way– until we have a visitor.

Then I break down and get to work. Sure, the floors get swept, and the tub scrubbed but I also break down and let loose on DH for not helping out around the house.

I resent him for not noticing that anything needs to be done.

I’m not a housewife. Until recently, I was an equal wage earner who worked the same amount of hours as DH. And yet, because I have boobs, I’m responsible for the duties in the home.  And I resent it.

Now, to be fair, it’s not really HIS fault. He had a momma that worked and kept house. She made dinner and he never learned to noticed the crap (no pun) on the toilet seat.  He never learned that the pile of paper blocking his studio doorway needs to get picked up and  not stepped over–week after week.

To his credit, if I ask him to tune my bike or collect eggs or build me a garden fence, he’s on it. He will even wash dishes and hang the laundry if I request it. But  noticing that his bike helmet and gloves don’t make an attractive centerpiece at the dining table—not his thing. Yes,  I could make a list, as DH has mentioned in the past. But dang it!!! nobody makes me a list and tells me what needs to be done. I just know by observation.  I could also ask him to do this or that every day and that would certainly lighten my load,   but it still makes me feel like crap because 1., i have to ask [read: nag. and that’s not  cool] and 2.,  that I have to ask him to help me clean his house.

See? don’t you see how petty I am? Help!

So. If I were to ask, how do I (we) train my(our) man to do  _____, you’d all get on my case for talking like that because there’s no way  we’d stand for a man asking “how do I train my wife to be a better housekeeper”.

But the reality is, many (I’d say most) women were trained from a very young age to notice dust on the piano, poop on the toilet seat and and that living room floors are no place for smelly hockey gear. We’ve been trained not to nag our men about chores because that makes us unattractive. We’ve also been trained to respect the wage earner ( *coughs* man) as superior to us because “he had to go to work all day”.

And this leads me to another question:  Why the double standard?  Yes, it’s there. Just as I might be able to ask how to train my husband to be a better housekeeper, my DH would be roasted over a spit for asking “how do i train my wife to____”. And  a woman who’s horrible housekeeper would experience people talking about what a slob she is or what a disservice she does her household and how noble her husband is.

But we tolerate such behaviors in a man. Again, a double standard.

So lets cut the crap and admit that it exists. But why? And it it possible to actually achieve equality in a marriage/family relationship?

Now, help me figure out a productive way to train my spouse to be a better housekeeper and me to be a better, less resentful partner to him.

* I realize that I’m making generalizations, but look past the my little anecdotes at the bigger picture, thanks.

** title is meant to be a play on words.

I’ve talked about his before in the case of abortion. Many people think that it should be illegal because it is immoral, others think that since making abortions illegal doesn’t seem to reduce them, a more practical approach is to make conditions such that abortions are reduced (through available birth control and support for mothers).

The example that is on my mind at present is Obama’s reaction to the situation in Iran. Many people, such as Senator McCain have insisted that Obama should take a strong stance against the actions of Mr. Ahmadinejad, and while I have a lot of sympathy for this stance, and for the protesters . . . It also seems to me that Obama’s initial neutrality was perhaps the more practical approach. American interference (no matter our good intentions) in Iranian politics never ever turns out well.

Perhaps it’s all along the lines of Nephi chopping of Laben’s head for the brass plates?

I’d like to type out more examples of this tension, but I’ve gotta run to the kid’s school for a poetry reading. So what are we to make of this space between what is perhaps the moral stance verses what is the more practical solution. At what point does taking a moral stance outweigh any kind of compromise that might have a more positive outcome, and when is it okay to compromise, to make the morality of a situation a secondary consideration to the practical good?

My first thought when I heard that last one (which came after a sermon on the nature of sin) was that he just reached out and slapped atheists and agnostics: Does he seriously believe that only ‘people of faith’ think that lying, cheating, and turning your back on your job are wrong? Does he seriously believe that people who aren’t religious lack a moral compass?

Or there’s the theory that he threw that in there to cozy up to the religious right - by casting himself as a ‘person of faith’ and more specifically as a Christian, he can still take the moral high ground by insisting on forgiveness. Perhaps it was a last-ditch attempt to salvage his political career.

Thoughts? Opinions?

So let’s chat . . .

I hate hate hate iTunes. I’m wondering about non-Ipod options. Anyone have a MP3 player you enjoy? I was thinking about using one of those phones that hold music, mostly because I could get one for free (with a 2yr contract, but still free) has this worked out for anyone? Or should I break down and just buy another (refurbished) Ipod, after all, I washed it three times and it still worked for a year and a half. It was a little quirky after that, but still that’s quality workmanship if you ask me. Oh yes, and it has to be cheap.

Also music:
I’m always on the lookout of for stuff that’s fun to dance to, I especially like non-English speaking music because then no-one objects to playing it in the church.

Also podcasts: I love the NPR podcasts. Also The Moth podcast is wonderful. What is your favorite listening fare? Any books on tape you’ve particularly enjoyed?