Trans/plant/portation

I’ve done a political clairvoyance act for the last few years on this blog, with more than a few teaspoons of satire thrown in for good measure. But 2012 doesn’t feel like adequate fodder to me, because hello, Barack Obama is going to be reelected President, and all of the other commentary around the election is just noise. So I’m setting my sights on popular culture this time around. With that, here are my thoughts for what I see will be terrific stories, so-so pop moments, and overhyped crap: Read More…

Nothing blows a holiday party like an uninvited zombie guest. I for one don’t want to have all of my planning and preparation ruined by even one moaning undead person with a penchant for biting my other guests. Plus, those zombies are always bringing uninvited friends, and they’re horrible at making small talk. While anyone who smells of decomposition or has limbs falling off is easily identifiable as a zombie, an individual may be in an earlier state of zombification and thus harder to detect. Here are some easy ways to spot the burgeoning zombie so they don’t wreck your holiday: Read More…

Christopher Hitchens was about as likable as a growling groundhog. He was burned toast that you eat anyway because you don’t have the time or money to try again, and I suppose he would say that such mistakes would be better consumed with a quantity of scotch. He was intentionally abrasive. And like most adults, he was complicated–beloved by his friends, of whom there were many, but willing to lose friendships over dearly held principles. Among the stream of obituaries and remembrance pieces that came out upon Hitchens’s death yesterday–articles that have surely been waiting in the wings for their moment to be published–there was much reference to the controversies that he stoked. He took on Mother Teresa, the British royal family, the Vietnam War,  anyone who believes in God, and many others. But it’s not enough to make mention of the television appearances to defend his stances on religion, the state, or someone’s cult of personality. Hitchens professionalized disagreeableness. Thank goodness for that. Read More…

I’ve pondered how to write this post for a while, at least since the third debate of this long GOP primary season, but in all honesty, I don’t know where to begin. We’ve seen one ludicrous statement after another:

April, 2011: Why did it take him two and a half years if it was no story? I made the assumption, and I think a lot of Americans did, there must be something that he wants to hide, there must be something on his birth certificate he doesn’t want people to know. If it was an issue, why wouldn’t you just put the issue away? –Rick Santorum, speaking about the President’s birth certificate

June 7, 2011:  I am only going to allow small bills — three pages. You’ll have time to read that one over the dinner table. –Herman Cain

This post originally appeared over at GayYA.org.

I write speculative fiction, usually somewhere between soft science fiction and magical realism, and often, though not exclusively, with LGBT themes and characters. I suppose I could write more mainstream stories, but I like to twist things up and mess with the universe, and besides, I’m a genre geek. I swear this is less from a God complex perspective, and more about playfulness and political intent. Metaphors for transition, coming out, family acceptance, and the like can replace a description of the real thing, and in so doing, open up some space away from angst so more time can be spent appreciating some of the other aspects of these moments.Personally, I’m over angst, having racked up enough of those moments through two whole puberties! But as a writer for young adult and crossover audiences, I’m invested in finding ways to depict all of that cortisol-inducing stress, especially as it relates to LGBT themes. So I opt to find a different geography, a reinvention of time, nifty gadgets and alien species to push, instead of resolve, tension. Read More…

Back in my usability days, I talked often about measurement error, the idea that something throws a monkey wrench into an otherwise careful attempt at accurate observation. Biases, for example, pop up in all sorts of interesting and confounding ways—I’ve seen users struggle with a site but say they loved their user experience. If not an issue with the Web design itself, users bring expectations with them as they use Web sites; one man I interviewed for the Social Security Administration consistently used an interface wrong because he didn’t personally identify himself as disabled, even though it took him 10 minutes to cross the room with his walker before taking his seat.

Usability scientists who aim to measure the success and efficiency of online systems have created an arsenal of tools for gathering more accurate information that can stem the effect of whatever measurement error is in play. One of those tools is a Likert Scale. We’re all familiar with them, those are the “rate this from 1 to 5, 1 being least and 5 being most,” items that float around opinion surveys and rating systems like Yelp. In truth, a scale can go from 1 to 3, 1 to 4, or 1 to 10, or whatever the designer thinks the range should cover.

But Likert Scales are notorious in the world of usability data collection, because very few people design them correctly, and very few respondents react to them appropriately. Read More…

This week the writers gave us something we all really needed: nostalgia and unconditional love. Who’d have thunk anyone had fond memories of 2009? Spoilers after the jump, as usual. Read More…

Let me begin with a disclaimer: I don’t put the fight for same-sex marriage at the top of my LGBT civil rights to do list. It’s not my priority, as much as I think the US is living in the Dark Ages with regard to marriage rights for all of its residents, not just some of them. I roll my eyes at President Obama’s unwillingness to fully support same-sex marriage, and I think it’s crystal clear at this point that the front lines against equal marriage rights are really about hatred and anger at gay people, and not anything else.

Perhaps it’s because fighting tends to polarize debate, especially in our modern reductivist climate, but it’s easy to chuck a principled stance by the wayside in favor of low blows, bumper sticker sloganizing, and arguments that don’t work, ultimately, in anyone’s favor.

Take, for example, Kim Kardashian’s ill-fated marriage to whatshisname. Read More…

In my early 30s I joined a rough and tumble flag football league, coached by a two-year veteran of the Lions who’d blown out both knees and still hungered to get back on the field. His frustration at enduring such a short NFL career was often realized in the form of shouting at us, and one of his favorite things to shout about was our apparent lack of dedication to winning. Did I mention he’d been on the Lions? When another team so much as assembled together before a game, he would point at them and then tell us loudly, “They came to PLAY!” Why this is relevant and spoilers after the jump. Read More…

In the shadow of the brouhaha around Chaz Bono’s participation in Dancing with the Stars this season, few have noticed the abject sexism and body policing of Hope Solo, the soccer star who is also a contestant on the show. From the judges’ criticism—that she “muscles” through the dances too much, should be more feminine, and exhibit more sex appeal—to the media response after her performances, the stream of negative commentary has left a former confident woman and accomplished goalie visibly shaken and doubting herself. If Chaz has been talked about in the pop culture arena as not “enough” of a man, then Hope has seen the pain of the other side of that coin, in acting too masculine. And a good chunk of my cynicism wants to see any of the DWTS judges defending a goal from the German Women’s National Team. Read More…