Is equality really all that complicated?

Gymboree think that if you're a girl you can be pretty like mommy and if you're a boy then you can be smart like daddy. Other options, however, do not seem to exist in the Gymboree world-view.

Is it not the job of a generation to ensure that the next generation is better equipped to deal with life than they are? Would the next generation not be better equipped to deal with life if they weren't surrounded, from infancy, by messages that tell them that, while mommy might be pretty, daddy's the smart one?

If we want to be superficial, and on some level the vast majority of us are superficial at least some of the time, then could Gymboree not have gone with pretty/handsome?

A lot of the things that we shouldn't be passing on, but we are, aren't actual behaviours but rather they are limitations. There is nothing inherently feminine about being caring, being compassionate, and having feelings; boys can do that too, they're just told that they're not supposed to because that's being like a girl. There is nothing inherently masculine about being determined, being smart, and being able to take charge; girls can do that too, they're just told that they're not supposed to because that's being like a boy.

The message that everyone will think that you, as a girl/boy, is a freak because you're acting like a boy/girl is dangerous garbage. It's dangerous because it's been so ingrained in society that people, people who generally find being judged along the same lines to be painful, will judge you.

This needs to stop but for it to stop we have to recognise the things that contribute to it. And to do that we need to call it out whenever we see it everywhere we see it.

We may not all have the confidence to tell the next generation that they can be whoever they want to be as long as they don't hurt anyone but at the very least could we not stop telling the next generation who they have to be? That would be good.

I have a bad habit

Technically I have several but I think we'll limit this to just mentioning one of them.

I have a habit of occasionally buying lottery tickets, putting them somewhere, and then forgetting all about them. I get told off by people now and again when I mention this as they seem to think that I could be one of the people who has a prize that doesn't get claimed.

This is entirely possible I suppose but I don't feel too bad about it as it's unlikely that those tickets have won anything (just because I occasionally buy lottery tickets does not mean I do not know exactly how unlikely it is that I'll ever win anything of note) and even if they have I can't know about it and the money goes to charities anyway. So maybe my lack of attention is making the world a better place.

Sometimes I think that I would be better placed using an ability to produce structured arguments might better serve me if I used it to actually get something done rather than producing arguments as to why doing nothing was actually a good idea but what the heck.

Anyhoo, the whole point of this post is that I checked some lottery tickets that I had lying around from the last few months and it turns out that I have a couple of winners in there, oh yeah.

What this means is that my partner and I are now sevenpoundsfiftypenceaires!

Living the dream over here. Living the dream.

I have just seen a news story where all of the last ten years of people being harassed, all the groping of passengers, and all of the warnings finally make sense and the TSA have shown exactly what they're... hahaha, kidding, old-fashioned intelligence work has just led to the arrest of some Iranians who were allegedly plotting to kill a Saudi official on US soil.

OK, so the video on here isn't working right now and won't let me embed this clip.

The clip is, however, amazing. Trust me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3OJOGxy21k

Being the grown-up

You know, one of the major upsides to being an adult is that there's now no-one to tell me that I can't have ice cream for dinner.

...

What? Oh right, yeah, the next bit's supposed to be about the downside to being an adult is that there's now no-one to tell me that I can't have ice cream for dinner.

Fuck that noise.

Woo! Ice cream for dinner! Woo!

Woo!

The best headline I've seen today

Drunk Swedish elk found in apple tree near Gothenburg

It is exactly what it says. The picture, that I shall not spoil, is wonderful.

Kitchen kitchen kitchen

Google has stopped showing me an advert connected to bed-wetting in my gmail. Thank you Google. Google has, however, shown me something that has really thrown me and my currently delicate sensibilities.

Yes, even more than Google suggesting that I need to check up on resources to do with bed-wetting. The reason for this is the advert for a website: http://www.kitchen-kitchen-kitchen.co.uk/

I find this troubling for a number of reasons:

1. It's as if this website isn't content with just telling me that they're to do with kitchens. It's like this website is following me around repeating the same stuff again and again to drill it in to my head. I feel like the website is going "hey you, yeah you, kitchen! Kitchen! Hey! Kitchen kitchen kitchen! Kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen! Hey you! Kitchen! Kitchen kitchen! Kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen kitchen! Hey! Kitchen! Kitchen." I am very much thinking that I get that they're about kitchens so please to be shutting up about the kitchens already.

2. This seems to be the internet equivalent of business directories, y'know, for calling people with 'phones an' stuff, with businesses calling themselves something like Aardvark Taxis so that they're at the top of the listing only instead of thinking that people won't make a decision based on how close to the start of the alphabet the business is but how many times they can use the word that's their main selling point. Which leads me to...

3. That this oneupmanship is based on earlier, less kitchen-y, websites.

So I went to look.

The first site I found, upon attempting to get to the first 'kitchen', was http://www.kitchens.co.uk/NewsListProductCats.asp so my initial theory was sound. It was sound but then I realised that if there are three kitchens, and there is one kitchen (or one kitchens but that really doesn't scan well), that there must be two kitchens.

And so it is: http://www.kitchenkitchen.co.uk/

Kitchen website oneupmanship.

I was tempted to register a website called: www.kitchen-kitchen-kitchen-kitchen.co.uk and just have the front page saying something about all those other kitchen guys being dicks. Then I realised that this would only be any use until someone went with www.kitchen-kitchen-kitchen-kitchen-kitchen.co.uk or www.kitchentothepowerofinfinity.co.uk or www.fuckyouwegotallthemotherfuckingkitchens.co.uk and it would come to naught. Then I realised that this wouldn't be the reason it would have come to naught. That would be because it would be really pointless.

Much like this I suppose.

How many people are buying kitchens anyway?