A Friend of the Blog sent me a link to the Man Crunch video that's been making its way around the web.  Obviously based on an old Mad TV skit, the commercial has gone viral, mainly for being rejected by CBS while the Tim Tebow "don't abort me!" ad is set to run on Super Bowl Sunday. 



In a strange twist of fate no unaborted fetus could ever have anticipated, the only reason any of us has heard of the gay dating site Man Crunch is because Tim Tebow's mother decided not to abort him.  It's almost like Tebow was born to promote gay dating on the DL.   I hope he's getting some kind of kickback.  Free blowjobs.  Something.


Personally, I want to say that I'm happy that Tim Tebow was not aborted.  But, you know, it's been twenty years.  I mean, how long can you go around defining yourself by your non-aborted status?  First of all, hello Mr. Obvious.  Maybe it's time to move on?  

Mama Tebow clearly made the right choice.  I'm a thigh man, see. 


And I love my bit of beefcake on a Sunday afternoon just as much as the next guy...


I would never abort a guy like this either. 

The problem is:  for every one fetus that wasn't aborted that turns out to be Tim Tebow there are countless  others that unfortunately don't.  Could there be some sort of in utero QB-DNA test?  I mean, had the likes of Christopher Gribble, Steven Spader, Quinn Glover, and William Marks — none of whom is Tim Tebow — been diagnosed in the womb, and properly disposed of in the first place, Kimberly Lynn Cates, whom they hacked to death with a machete on a lark, would still be alive today.

Unfortunately there is no way, currently, to test for future quarterback potential in the womb.  And until there is a Tebow Test, it would be dicey to just abort them all, right?  But let's be honest here: the alternative is expensive. 

Consider: the average abortion costs $397. A vaginal delivery costs $5,992, while a c-section is $8,558.

Add to that the cost of rearing a child, which now runs anywhere from half-a-million to a million-and-a-half bucks before you can get them out of your hair.

Then, when they and a few of their friends go and hack someone up with a machete for no reason, we end up shelling out another $700,000 for room and board for forty years at your local penitentiary, or $1.2 million for the death penalty. 

OK, so.  That's $397 versus, best case scenario, $1,205,992 (plus damages).

But, like I said, there's currently no fool-proof Tebow Test, so if we don't want to abort them indiscriminately we're just going to end up spending the extra money for now.  That is, unless we opt for gay sex: a time-tested, 100% effective form of birth control.  Even better (and certainly a lot more fun) than an abortion. 

Fortunately for Tim, God seems to have chosen him to promote two worthy causes that are not in the least at odds: anti-abortion and pro-gay sex.  Because, like I said, without the Tebow ad, even though men have been using this form of birth control for ages, no one would ever have heard of Man Crunch.

God certainly does work in mysterious ways.

I met my friend Paco for drinks last night, and for a quick tour of open studios on First Friday.  It was a pretty typical First Friday.  A lot of people were out and about, despite the chill in the air, some hipster hotties — a redheaded couple that makes the rounds fairly regularly that we kept running into.  The art was so-so.

You never know what you'll find on First Friday, though.  In one of the studios I found a recruiter for the 2010 Census!  A stout, bald little man with a satchel full of pamphlets, who was with a skinny hipster in a fur trappers hat with the ear flaps down, who didn't say anything.  I heard the recruiter talking to one of the artists who looked pretty down on his luck.

"It's great pay, and you get to get out and meet your neighbors!" the recruiter was gushing, while the artist poured some cheap red wine into a small plastic cup.

"But I'm Canadian," the artist said.

"Well, that's no excuse!" the recruiter laughed.

That's when I butted in.  I mean, if Canadians can do it. 

The recruiter introduced himself as Lenny and handed me a pamphlet out of his satchel.  Good pay, flexible hours.  And it's the Census!  It's like you're making history! 

I tried to sell the artist on it after Lenny left for greener pastures. 

I was like, "dude, you're obviously no Giacometti.  And by the looks of you you can not only use the money, you could use the work."

Seriously, some artist types they get stuck in a rut, and they need to be rousted out.  Work — in moderation — is good for you.  We overdo it, of course, because that's what we do with everything.  But it seems to me this is the perfect gig for someone like that.  It's part-time — you make your own hours, basically.  It's temporary.  And it's social.  He looked like he could get out more, too.

"You might even meet someone... special" I winked.

You never know.  His teeth were tragic.  Big gaps between each one — I mean, each and every nubby little one.  So that could still be a problem.  But basically, you work for the Census, it's like speed dating, right?  You get all the essential information — you can add a few questions as needed — they don't know what's on that clipboard. 

Just slip it in there: "Marital status? Check.  Income?  Check. Boxers or briefs?  Now, if you'll just turn your head and cough..."  

Many's the time I've suspected I'm actually chatting with a census worker on my local hook-up site.  It's question after question.  Stats and measurements, demographics and preferences.  Do you like it like this?  Do you do it like that?  You know the drill.

Meanwhile, back at the bar, my friend Paco is being honest with me. It all started when he showed up twenty minutes late. I had to drink our first round alone.  And the barmaid had that attitude they have with singles. Her saving grace was that she was not very good at math.  I actually made a profit drinking last night.  It's better than working for the Census, almost.

So anyway, it started when I greeted him with "nice of you to show up."

The gloves were off, but he hung back and let me wear myself out a little before he threw that left hook.  I started right in, banging on about my recent sexploits.  Paco is happily married, and I think he's forgotten what it's like being single.  I don't really mind it so much, myself.  It mainly gives me something to bang on about.

So I was going on and on about some recent dating disaster, and he was like: "you know, sometimes, when you're laid back, you're really lovely to be with, but then you have these moments of excitable rigidity, when no one can get a word in edgewise, and you lean forward and make these chopping gestures with your hands, and then you're not so lovely."

Well, you know what I say to that? We can't be all lovely all the time. 

This is what I told him (in as breezy and laid back a way as possible):  I do have my moments of intensity.  And I am aware that sometimes those on the receiving end of a sudden inspiration sometimes feel assailed by it.  And I appreciate their patience and forbearance in allowing me to go there with them.  Because there are things you have to say in order to hear them yourself.  That's a little selfish, and may even be unlovely on my part, but it means a lot to me to be able to be unlovely every now and again.  It's such a burden otherwise.

He was like: "Hey, that's what friends are for, right?"

And then he bought the next round.

Later, as we were walking to the T, he told me his husband, whom I'd only recently met, had googled me, and found a photo of my bum.  He said it had not occurred to him before, really, but now he wondered if it was wise to have a bum basically anyone could google.

I have to tell you, first of all: I am much prouder of my non-googleable front side than my backside.  But this is as googleable as my backside gets:


...and is ever likely to get.  Big whoop, right? 

I know some people think it's sleazy, but then why were you image-googling me, hmm?  And as far as prospective employers: if someone's not gonna hire me because I have a nice ass, then it's their loss, right?  I figure if conservative Scott Brown can get a senate seat from a Cosmo Centerfold, a hint of booty on my part shouldn't disqualify me from a part-time gig at $22.50 an hour with the Census Bureau.

I hope not at least, because I'm thinking I might get a booty-call or two out of it.

So last week I wrapped up my Home Buying 101 course.  It was worth it, but I should have done the one-day dealio, instead of the two-hours-a-night-over-the-course-of-four-weeks one, because I knew by the end of the first session that I would not be ready to buy for another two to five years, and then I had to sit through three more weeks of classes. 

But real estate has now basically become my new porn.  I can't say I wasn't warned that that happens when you turn 40. But I can't get enough of it.  And my habit's even starting to get in the way of normal, healthy hook-ups.  Like the other night I had a little date, and we went back to his place in the South End.  He had bought when it really was a buyer's market, and he'd done a beautiful, quirky renovation of the space. 

I demanded a tour of the place, and when we finally got round to making out, it wasn't a minute before something caught my eye, and I was hammering him — but with questions about the work he'd done on his condo. 

I'm getting antsy is the thing.  Life on the home front is getting a little tedious, I have to admit.  Jake's a nice guy but when my lease is up here I'll be looking to live alone.  You get to a certain age and you just don't want to deal with a roommate.  I mean, it's really all the worst of a marriage without hope, desire, or even the consolation of the memory of sex.  I don't want to live with a friend, much less a more or less complete stranger who expects me to clean up after him.

Here's a typical Jake thing.  The other day I was working on my laptop in the living room when he came bumbling in. 

"Hey, dja mind if I make some coffee?" he asked. 

Jake usually drinks tea at home.

"Not at all," I answered from the sofa, and told him where he could find the beans.

I heard him rummaging around in the kitchen.

"Um," he finally stammered.  "How do you do it?"

"How do you do... what?" I asked.

"Can it make just one cup?" he asked. "I only want one cup."

"Make half a pot, and I'll drink some later," I told him.

He scratched his head.  

"Oh, forget it," he said, finally.  "I'll just have tea."

The kid doesn't need a gay roommate, he needs a Mexican housekeeper, obviously.  I mean, come on.  Jake is 29.  Is it really possible he's never made a pot of coffee?  And it's not like we have a De’Longhi Prima Donna or something. We're talking a straight-up Mister Coffee I got for $12.99 at the hardware store.  It ain't rocket science.

I considered, at first, when I had to instruct him in how to use a Swiffer — A SWIFFER FOR THE LOVE OF GOD — that this was just Jake being coy and trying to get me to do all the work around the place.  But he's gonna hafta show a lot more skin if he wants me to start making his morning coffee. 

I suppose it's possible he's genuinely adrift when confronted with ordinary, everyday domestic tasks.  I am teaching a computer class one evening a week at the the Community Development Corporation, and a couple weeks ago a gentleman in his late forties, I'd say — a little on the low-income end of things, but seemingly normal, otherwise — came in wanting to know how to check his email.

When he sat down at the computer, it soon became apparent he had never used a mouse before.  And watching him try has got to be the most poignant thing I've seen in yonks.  He was getting a full-body workout.  I kept urging him to stay on the mouse pad, and try to sit still — he nearly fell off his swivel chair twice.

"It's all in the wrist!" I told him, but he never did quite get the hang of it. 

When we finally got into Explorer I was like, "OK, so what's your email address?"

No idea. 

He'd just heard about email, and figured everyone had it, so he must to.  Somewhere.  Maybe at the Fenway CDC?

I felt sorry for the guy.  He was poor, undereducated, and coming late to the game.   Jake, on the other hand, has no excuse.  He comes from a good family.  He's had every advantage.  He paces around the apartment with his Mac Book under his arm and his iphone to his ear.  And he's about to get his teaching license. 

I think the internet is a marvel.  It can boost your IQ by, like, twenty points instantly.  For me, the wonder of Googling shit never wears off.  But then I can remember endless afternoons at the British Council in Budapest in the days of dial-up and metered pay plans, looking through the day's papers for what's at my fingertips in an instant today.  Not to mention porn and real estate.

But it never ceases to amaze me how new technologies that make everything easier also seem to make each successive generation think what's easier for the generation before them is still harder than what's to come.  And we're reaching critical mass here, in case you haven't noticed.  You and I, we think of Googling as easy because we remember having to make a trip across town, during office hours on weekdays, to get information that's at our fingertips now. 

But for generations that never had to go through all that, Googling must seem so-o-o-o-o ha-a-a-ard.  I mean, first you have to type something in, and then you have to wait, like, a whole half a second!  It's so slow!  I could have done ten tweets in that time!  I could have, like, sexted twenty of my facebook friends! 

Still.  Google "how to make a pot of coffee" and you get fifteen-and-a-half million results in .34 seconds.  Make the time.

Or you could bug your gay roommate, and settle for a cup of tea instead.

... I give you Minnie Riperton...


I hadn't heard this song in ages, and then suddenly, last night, I was listening to a friend's ipod shuffle, and there it was. "Lovin' You" was released when I was 6 years old, and I love it. As I am discovering today, however, it annoys a lot of people who were not 6 years old when it was released.

But why "in honor of World Cancer Day"? Well, because Minnie was kind of a pioneer. A year after she had a hit with "Lovin' You" she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a radical mastectomy. She was one of the first celebrities to go public with a breast cancer diagnosis and became the spokesperson for the American Cancer Society. She died in '79 at the tender age of 31.

Perfect Angel, indeed.

I have to admit, I was way wrong on DADT.  This was some serious Ninja diplomacy.  Just as a Friend of the Blog said, Obama's brief mention of lifting the ban has totally blown up into the lead story.  It helps that the military higher-ups are finally on-board.  Removing the onus from those lower down in the ranks is basically a de facto moratorium on the policy.  I mean, if only an admiral can sign off on a witch hunt, it isn't nearly as likely to happen.  You'd have to be a pretty big queen to get the Joint Chiefs on your ass — that's a lot of bling.  Not least because there's a level of acountability outside the ranks for the leadership that doesn't exist at lower levels.



Of course it was a calculated move on the administration's part.  Which is certainly not a problem — it is politics, after all — so long as they're not gonna throw us under the bus to divert attention from the budget, or something.  The old "Hey, lookit!  Drag Queens!"  trick.  Republicans fall for it every time.  But with the military leadership on-board, it looks like the administration could have their cake and eat it, too, as the budget slips by with hardly a snort of indignation from the gay-bashing GOP. 

Of course, the evil genius of it may also slip past many Demtards.  I was reading the Pew Trust's new "Public Knowledge" study (by way of the New York Times' Charles Blow), which found that legislative process is a mystery to many, not least registered Democrats.

In fact, the findings indicated that among Republicans, Democrats, and Independents*, Democrats' "political IQ" was the lowest — and significantly lower than Republicans'.  Dems lagged far behind in all indices Pew used to determine IQ, save one: they knew who Stephen Colbert was (and even there, they didn't beat out Republicans, but were tied).

Even if Pew's latest findings seem to contradict other studies that show that liberals tend to be more intelligent, this doesn't necessarily correlate to "political IQ".  As one commentator on Lazar Stankov's infamous '09 study “Conservatism and Cognitive Ability” reminded us:

[S]ocial conservatives do not always vote for conservative candidates.  Most black Americans, for example, clearly exhibit “the Conservative syndrome” as Stankov defined it—70 percent voted to abolish gay marriage in California—but they routinely give about 90 percent of their votes to the Democratic Party.

It's complicated, y'know?

But then no one said this Ninja business was easy.
______________________________
*Disclosure: I am registered "undeclared" and have been most of my adult life, although I routinely vote in party primaries, which is  allowed here in Massachusetts.

Didja see this story?

A woman admiring the sunset on a tourist webcam in northern Germany spotted a man who was lost on the frozen North Sea and probably saved his life by alerting authorities, police said Wednesday.

The man had climbed over pack ice off the coast to photograph a sunset near the town of St. Peter-Ording, then became disoriented on the ice, Husum police spokeswoman Kristin Stielow said.

Unable to locate the beach, the man began using his camera to flash for help. That got the attention of a woman hundreds of miles away in southern Germany who was watching the sunset over the sea on her computer.

The woman contacted police, who located the man's signals and guided him into shore by flashing their car lights. Officers then lectured him on the dangers of trekking on the ice.

This is exactly why I have that live feed from my bathroom. You know, in case I fall getting out of the shower and can't get up. 

What a bunch of old drama queens at DOD.  Apparently now they're saying lifting the ban on gays in the military could take years and years.  All we're talking about here is ending a witch hunt, which is what DADT is.  Just do it.

No.  Shuddup.  Just. Do. It.

It's hardly uncharted territory.  Here is the list of nations that allow gays to serve:

Argentina
Australia
Austria
Belgium
Bermuda
Brazil
Canada
Czech Republic
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
France
Germany
Ireland
Israel
Italy
Lithuania
Luxembourg
The Netherlands
New Zealand
Norway
Peru
Philippines
Romania
Slovenia
South Africa
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
United Kingdom
Uruguay

Estonia, for chrissake.  And here's a rogues' gallery of nations that don't:

China
Cuba
Egypt
Greece
Iran
Jamaica
North Korea
Pakistan
Russia
Saudi Arabia
Serbia
Singapore
South Korea
Syria
Turkey
Venezuela
Yemen
United States

The US is with the "Axis of Evil" here.

None of our allies who allow gays to serve segregate them or treat them any differently than straight troops.  AND THAT'S THE POINT, BITCHES.  Stop flattering yourselves that our heart's desire is to ogle you in the shower and rape you in your barracks.  I mean, please!  Enough with the straight boy fantasies of gay seduction! 

Gays are soooo picky, especially where there are tons of them and they're out.  Trust me.  I live in gay old Boston.  No one is getting laid.  It's just like the military.  Everyone's jerking off.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in a speech last year at the Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., whinged: "I believe this is something that needs to be done very, very carefully."

But you're wrong, Gates.  Stop edging.  It's like you're building up to this big money shot, but it's gonna be such a huge letdown when nothing happens.  Trust me, bitches.  I know. 

Man up.  Just do it. 

Howard Zinn's passing this week gave me pause.  As a history student at Indiana University in the late '80s, reading Zinn's A People's History was de rigueur.  I was ultimately more drawn to the oral histories of Studs Terkel, another great who died two years ago at 98, but both men's plain-spoken humanism in the earnest search for Truth touched me deeply.



It's Tempting to say that we are getting on to the last of a dying breed here, and there's definitely some truth in it.  In all of the well-deserved accolades for Zinn, we should not forget that his achievement as a scholar was our achievement as a society.  Zinn, who was a bombardier in WWII, was also a beneficiary of the GI Bill, which produced a civic "golden age" in postwar America.  Terkel had likewise benefited from the WPA's Federal Writers' Project.

The deep humanism of both men (and countless other public intellectuals who benefited from such social programs) stemmed at least in part from the opportunities society afforded them, which they repaid, and then some, through their enduring commitment to its highest principles. 

Some see an irony in the fact that these democratizing social programs produced radicals like Zinn, that the generosity of the post-war era was repaid with social revolution.  But they've taken the wrong lesson from history.  As Zinn put it:

Truth has a power of its own. Art has a power of its own. That age-old lesson – that everything we do matters – is the meaning of the people’s struggle here in the United States and everywhere. A poem can inspire a movement. A pamphlet can spark a revolution. Civil disobedience can arouse people and provoke us to think, when we organize with one another, when we get involved, when we stand up and speak out together, we can create a power no government can suppress.We live in a beautiful country. But people who have no respect for human life, freedom, or justice have taken it over. It is now up to all of us to take it back.

Good government can mitigate injustice — it can promote opportunity, not least through education which imparts meaningful skills, and ambitious social programs that empower those without means to become stakeholders in society. 

Unfortunately — or so it seems — having seen the risk in the likes of Howard Zinn, we've recoiled from our radical potential for excellence.

So, didja hear? Ted Haggard is CURED! 


Not to rain on his parade, but I think he might just be in remission.  Whatever.  Po-tay-to, po-tah-to.

According to his wife  — Christians have been getting gay-married for years, just with gays of the opposite sex — the meth-smoking, Bible-thumping power-bottom has been welcomed back into "the marriage bed".  Um, so long as he brings his double-headed dildo.

Wife knows the drill.  She's probably the one doing the drilling now that they can't afford to hire a third.  But there's hope yet. She's written a book about gay marriage called “Why I Stayed". 

She told TODAY’s Meredith Vieira Wednesday: “Through the years, what I’ve discovered is that it would reemerge in Ted’s life from time to time, but he didn’t tell me about it.” 

He was just rockin' it old school.  Now that he's out as a "heterosexual with issues" (that's the closest you can come as an Evangelical to being Metrosexual) it's no holds barred in the Haggard boudoir. 

“Our relationship is better than it’s ever been," she told Meredith. "Going over this mountain together has given me the marriage that I’ve always longed for."

Why do I get the feeling Snuggies are a part of this picture?  Snuggies, meth, a length of rope, and various strap-ons.

Anyway, I'm happy for the Haggards.  You know what they say: a family that prays together and parties-n-plays together, stays together.

Here.

I had one of those nights last night.  I came home from a meeting, all pumped up and ready for the SOTU, and the internet was out.  They've been rewiring the whole house for the last two weeks, with no end in sight, and the place basically looks like the guy's apartment in the movie Brazil.  I just wish Robert DeNiro would swoop in and fix it, rather than the dude with no teeth and a "Get Baked" T-shirt.  Until then, it's all on me.  Jake is hopeless.  Really.  Girls: don't fall for it.  You'll regret it for the rest of your life.

I missed the moment.  I'm just now getting round to reading last night's SOTU — I've watched snippets of it on CNN as well for context. I haven't bothered to read much commentary — I've been too busy all day at work — but I have to say, I was pretty impressed.  Obama didn't even break a sweat over Scott Brown and the Teabaggers on the lawn with their pitchforks, effigies, and misspelled signage.

And to my surprise he did indeed slip in a promise to "work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they gay love".  He didn't say "gay love," but that's what he meant.  And it's true America: we gay love you.

A cursory survey of the gay bloggerati (or gloggerati, as the in-crowd calls it) shows that they're on the whole underwhelmed by the shout-out.  We ain't no holla-back girls, but we do like big Copacabana type show-stoppers, and Obama really kinda slipped this one right past the censors.  Now, the proper way to have gone about it is like so...


But what I liked about how he did it — though it may have seemed too subtle to some — was that the short mention, which garnered enthusiastic applause from at least half the chamber, was embedded in a broader message about rights and responsibilities...

We find unity in our incredible diversity, drawing on the promise enshrined in our Constitution: the notion that we're all created equal, that no matter who you are or what you look like, if you abide by the law you should be protected by it, if you adhere to our common values you should be treated no different than anyone else.

...that assumed and played to Americans' sense of "decency and strength."  What I liked about it, in other words, was how very modest it felt.

Watch the speech, if you didn't.  There are moments of deep, heavy silence from the chamber that are unusual for such a lot of braying asses.  Moments where they almost seem... shamed?  Humbled?  Half-human?

I'm probably imagining it, but if it didn't restore my faith in the process, it did restore a bit of my faith in Obama's decency and strength. 

I guess I'm just a sucker for understatement.

I still think Catcher in the Rye is a great book, a true American classic, but what I will always remember Salinger for is introducing me at an impressionable age to Rilke and Zen.  And bananafish.

I'm sure you've heard about the woman in an adult education class at the Met who "accidentally fell into" a rare rose-era Picasso, putting a six-inch tear in the lower right-hand corner.

I want to write the screenplay.  It's a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode, at a minimum. 

This woman has got to be a piece of work.  Was she wearing 3-D glasses?  I mean, who trips over themselves and manages to put a hole in a priceless painting?  In front of a bunch of people at the Met, no less.  Can you imagine how everyone reacted?   What do you do for an encore?

May I suggest Nude Woman with a Necklace?

There's been, as there's bound to be, a good deal of speculation on what President Obama will say in his State of the Union Address Wednesday, from silly speculation on DADT to reliable reports that he plans to announce a freeze for the next three years on domestic spending. 

ABC News' Z. Byron Wolf asks: "Will President Obama announce new policy regarding the sexual orientation of people serving in the military during his State of the Union address Wednesday?"

Um, no.

Moving right along.

Seriously.  The notion that a President who is drowning in the shallow end of the pool, who's all too willing to toss healthcare overboard because of some guy in a truck...?  I mean, really?

But it would sure make that freeze on domestic spending more palatable. 

What are people smoking?  Can I get some?

It would almost make sense — I mean, Obama wants to freeze domestic spending, but has no plans so far to freeze the war budget.  In fact, according to the AP: "The Obama administration plans to ask Congress for an additional $33 billion to fight unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, on top of a record request for $708 billion for the Defense Department next year".

Now, if he could make a case for shipping all the gays over to Afghanistan on the cheap in return for scrapping DADT, maybe the Teabaggers, who are apparently running things now, would go for it?

I was teaching in Budapest in the icky tween years of the web, before 2.0, when it was mostly seen as an incredibly powerful new masturbation aid. 

I remember leaving class one evening with several of my students, and as we descended into the underground I watched a young man on the up escalator slip a sleek (for back in the day), expensive-looking video camera under the skirt of the young women ahead of him and switch on the bright lamp, illuminating her undercarriage. 

Ah, the wonders of technology. 

It was the bravado of switching on the lamp that impressed me most, as I recall.  I imagined she must have felt the heat from it on her thighs, but the woman remained seemingly oblivious.  I'm sure her panties are still floating out there in the deepest reaches of cyberspace somewhere.

I was so flabbergasted by the scene that I was speechless for a moment.  I literally could not believe my eyes.  By the time I recovered they had reached the top of the escalator and gone their separate ways.  I turned to my pupils, and still struggling for words, managed to stammer: "Did— did you see that?"

"See what?" they blinked and smiled.   

I remember thinking, 

    (a) I've got to get me one of those newfangled cameras, and

    (b) It's such a shame more men don't wear skirts.  At least in public. 

But what I saw that day was nothing compared to what was to come over the course of the next decade:  a veritable peoples revolution in covert digital photography.  Most of it was aimed up women's skirts, granted, but men's locker rooms and showers were a favorite setting, too. 


It was overwhelmingly the male gaze that the new technology served, and no male fantasy was left unexposed (although some, taken without the flash, were sadly underexposed) — from secret stalkers to the seemingly universal male fantasy of exposing our own epic manhood to an adoring audience of millions, no stones, so to speak, were left unturned. Considering the first camera phone came along just 8 years ago, and the first iphone arrived in '07 (and Guys With iphones [NSFW] didn't debut until late last year), we've come a long way, baby.

But who knew things would get so kinky that so-called ninja photographers would have to start photographing ordinary people fully clothed during their morning commute to get labeled "edgy."

Strange days, indeed.

There are loads of fascinating implications to iphoneography, privacy issues not least among them.  These cut both ways.  camphones have warded off would-be subway gropers and led to their arrest.  They've captured images of police abuse, too, that have brought wrongful arrests to light.  On the other hand, they've popped up at parties where people were acting stupid or engaging in unlawful behavior, which in the case of Michael Phelps, led to public embarrassment, professional sanction, and considerable private damages.  And watch out if you ever go to Wal-Mart dressed like this.

There is no question clandestine photography is instantly compelling, but is it art?  To rise to the level of art it needs two things: technical refinement and fearlessness when it comes to discourse on its implications. 

My friend Dejan Djordjevic's photography exhibition, "Subway Series," which opened last weekend at the Accidental Gallery in Fort Point (or FoPo, as the in-crowd calls it) has the one in spades, but not quite the other. 

Don't get me wrong.  The exhibition does not disappoint.  There is an impressive talent-in-the-raw at work here.  There are some amusing and arresting images that are all the more impressive for having been taken undercover and on the fly...

...but the narrative goes in and out of focus.   For me what may have tied the pictures together into a more cohesive exhibition is the element of ninja in them.  The seeing but not being seen.  In other words: the element of voyeurism.

It's not that the photos are exploitative, though they're skewed toward the quirky and topical.  They don't leer so much as cast an imperturbable gaze.  There is nothing the least bit lurid here (in fact the utter absence of any beefcake whatsoever in the whole series reminds me why quitting the T was so easy for me).  Some photos in the series have a slight air of menace about them, as if the subjects sense they are being stalked, but they fall far short of predatory. 

In private conversations, Dejan has expressed surprise — given the benign nature of the photographs — that some people have reacted as if he had violated his subjects' privacy.  He's even had a few threatening messages from anonymous stalkers himself.  But then turn-about's fair play, right? 

He's responded to the charge responsibly, by consulting a lawyer who has assured him that — as many of us are well aware — there is "no expectation of privacy" in public places like the T.  But there is — no denying it — a silent good-faith agreement among fellow commuters to respect each other's space. If there were not, trust me, it would be anarchy in the underground.  To argue that the gaze does not violate that good-faith agreement would be utterly disingenuous — you would not stare at another commuter, at least not in Boston.  OK, so why not take a picture?  It lasts longer, right?  That's what they say.

I would never question Dejan's good intentions, and a few of his portraits here are absolutely exquisite, but the show would actually have benefited from at least a cursory acknowledgment of the obvious element of voyeurism.  We can't help but contemplate the technical skill in light of the self-imposed strictures of the project, but we are then discouraged from musing on the psychological implications of them.  Which is a shame, because everything about the project is topical.  These are all (with the exception of off-topic pics of subway structures, thrown in to lend context, maybe) surreptitious iphone snaps originally posted to Dejan's facebook page.  A facebook friend with a gallery connection thought the project had the makings of a show, and the rest is history. 

When I first saw his "Subway Series" on facebook, I coudn't help but picture the photographer pretending to be innocently minding his own business — pretending to text or like he was test-driving that sick new sudoku app — all the time framing his shots and snapping pictures of his unsuspecting fellow commuters.  Trying not to get caught.  The danger of getting caught seemed like a major part — only just beneath the surface of each shot — of what animates this series, and possibly the photographer, too.  It has real implications for how we view these pictures.

And Dejan did take some heat on facebook for the nature of the project.  I always thought he should own up to the creepier implications of the shots that actually give them a dark appeal, but he's consistently shied away from the personal implications of what is, frankly and unequivocally, voyeurism.  His subjects may be clothed, but in notes on the show he hints at their nakedness and vulnerability.

On a very basic level it is the interplay between the photographer and his subjects that these pictures, like all pictures, are about — whether the subjects are aware of that interplay or not.  And if they are not, our attention is thrown all the more back on the photographer.  But Dejan's brief "about" statement on the Subway Series website, pointedly avoids the issue:

What began as an effort to kill time on the commute to work, armed only with an iPhone and Facebook account, the photographs quickly evolved into an artistic expression of juxtapositions focusing on the commuters on the Boston T. The photos, all taken with an iPhone, capture the real faces of the city. From the homeless to the high-powered, each photo illustrates an edgy look at T passengers from every walk of life. The terrible beauty is derived from the fact that the subjects, not knowing they are being documented, illuminate aspects of the human condition we walk past every day without seeing. 

Even the statement, written in the passive voice, contains not a single explicit mention of an "I" (or an "eye").  There is a grand social narrative here — rich and poor, black and white, "artistic expression", "juxtapositions", "terrible beauty", ahem — that oddly sidesteps the compelling intimacy of the images.  (And I have a beef with the presumption that the truths revealed, however beautifully, in the photos, go unseen or unnoticed by the rest of us — but I'll leave that for another screed.) 

The reluctance to own up to the skewed power dynamic implicit in covert photography could be seen as a moral blind-spot that undermines the grand narrative the show is shooting for. 

This dissociative attitude may be generational.  In a recent issue of Photo-Eye, Richard Gordon describes what he calls "one of the most distressing aspects of much contemporary 'art' photography": 

Pick up a book at random by too many younger photographers... and a pattern of style and (dis) engagement emerges. Contemporary art and high-end editorial photographic portraiture displays a bland, robotic affect of the subject(s) and the appearance of the most minimal emotional exchange between photographer and sitter. It is too early to say whether this affectless stare is — as one hopes — a momentary art tick, or if it is a reflection and proper description of the culture now. Regardless of the collaboration between subject and photographer prior to the click of the shutter, it is in that decision of when to click that the game is made.

The iphoneographer may be invisible to his subjects, but he is always present, though outside the frame, once he posts his pics. 

I decided to hide out last night and get my Friday night dose of testosterone from Netflix.  Last couple of weekends I'd gotten it straight from the spigot, but it's a lot of work going to the source for it.  Jake was having his girlie over, so the fireplace and bearskin rug was booked anyway.  So I picked up a six-pack, popped some popcorn, turn the bed to vibrate, and streamed Spartacus: Blood and Sand, the Starz series that picks up where 300 left off, gaywise, if not abswise. 

What I mean, of course, is that  Spartacus tries so achingly hard not to be gay, that it becomes gayer than anything gays themselves could ever dream up.  It's like using too much antibiotic hand sanitizer — you eventually end up with a super-mega-bug that is utterly resistant.  Spartacus is super-mega-gay.   They have toned down the abs a bit, though.

Aesthetically, there is no attempt at visual realism, which is somehow refreshing, given how ridiculous every line that is uttered is.  Its chick-flick corny moments look chick-flick corny...


Its Playgirl porny moments look Playgirl porny...


And when it's bloody, it's bloody damn bloody...


This is video-game violence.  It alludes to actual violence in the opposite way old-school film violence did.  That is to say, it's so vehemently overstated it becomes abstract, and like everything else in Spartacus, sheer spectacle.  If the character getting thwacked above (redonkulously hunky Andy Whitfield in the title role) had actually lost that much blood, he could not have gotten up and made minced meat out of, like, seven more seasoned gladiators afterward.  Oops.  Sorry.  Spoiler alert.

The first episode is alternately tedious (the "I'm not gay! I'm not gay!!" chick flicky bits) and titillating (the blood-as-semen-substitute gay-as-shit meat-markety bits).  We owe this formula to James Cameron, who's two mega blockbusters Titanic and Avatar blended When Hairy Met Sally and Die Hard into one big swirly Hollywood hot mess.  Now every epic is hermaphroditic.  It has to have girlie bits and boy-y bits both.

The overarching theme here is: how can faithful Sparty get his woman back after she's stolen away from their nuptial bed and they're both pressed into slavery by the sniveling Romans...


Throw in a little Passion of the Christ — but this time Christ fights back! — and you have a... just really weird big gay-not-gay spectacle of bloody beef- and cheesecake. 

As I watched the big, butch, Jesussy Spartacus getting his ass whupped, and then turning the tables on his persecutors...


... I thought, wow, well there's a twist that'll appeal to those wacky evangelicals, eh?  Kind of "my Jesus is bigger than your Jesus!" — "Well, my Jesus can kick your Jesus's ass any day!"  But then I saw that in future episodes Whitfield is clean-shaven with a crew cut (easier to clean all that blood out of your hair), and everybody knows that had Jesus lived he would not have gone around like that. 

So, I decided: can the social commentary.  This is the very definition of "hot mess."

The other movie on my list last night was Tyson, which was surprisingly compelling, given that it's about, as the title suggests, former on-again-off-again heavyweight boxing champ Mike Tyson, who is just a mess, period.


Tyson is basically Tyson telling his story.  He starts out lucid but his narrative unravels pretty quick once he's underway.  In fact, this is what's sort of fascinating about peering inside the mind of Mike Tyson.  That tangled inner logic — the little boy weakness and confusion the heavyweight champ still carries around. 

Tyson was bullied as a boy, and got into boxing because of it.  But he candidly describes the fear he felt before every fight, and his transformation into "a god" in the ring.  There is something still bewildered about him, as if those two personae — the scrawny kid who liked nice clothes and jewelry and got bullied all through school, and the naked animal who destroyed other men in the ring — have never really been reconciled.  In fact, most of his troubles in and out of the ring could be attributed to one of those personae showing up on the other's territory at the wrong time.

These odd juxtapositions were captured in a scene where Tyson reacts to a heckler who's shouted "Get him a straight jacket!" with a bizarre stream of invective...

Put your mother in a straight jacket, you punk ass white boy. Come here and tell me that ‘fo I fuck you in your ass, you punk white boy, you faggot. You can’t touch me. You not man enough. I eat your asshole alive, you bitch. Fuck you, you ho. Come and say it to my face. I fuck your ass in front of everybody. You bitch. Come on you bitch. You scared coward. You not man enough to fuck with me. You can’t last two minutes in my world, bitch. Look at you.  You scared now, you ho. Scared like a little white pussy. Scared of the real man. I’ll fuck you till you love me, faggot.

"I'll fuck you till you love me"?  And who's he calling the faggot?

It's kinda hot, I have to admit, but weird. 

But maybe that's just where heterosexuality is at this cultural moment. 

What's intriguing about the Prop 8 trial underway in California is that it is one of those periodic "debates" about what sort of creatures gays are, with expert testimony from all quarters, as if (a) we were from Uranus, and (b) you couldn't ask us yourself.  We speak English, you know. 

It's hard to communicate to some people who have no experience of it how mind-bogglingly patronizing it is to be the subject of this manner of debate.  It's like people talking about you when you're right there in the room with them.



While there are many ways in which the history of African Americans and that of gays diverge, both populations have experienced the outrageous spectacle of society debating their very humanity, as if they were not "in the room."  Women, too, of course, were second-class citizens for a good deal of our history. (In the US — before it was the US — Massachusetts again led the way: in 1756 Lydia Taft of Uxbridge became the first woman in the colonies to "get the vote".)

But gays have been forced into a particularly modern predicament, and this is where the Prop 8 trial ended up Friday: the question of whether we can change (or, more likely, be changed).  This particular outrage is one those our struggle echoes didn't have to endure.  The question "can medical science cure (eliminate) us?" goes further than "the Woman Question" in isolating and objectifying us, and it continues the modern trend of framing sexuality as a malady.

The question of essentialism versus choice not only persists, it has become so overwhelming that gays themselves have banked on it being their ticket to equal protection under the law.  The argument is simple, but the implications are complex and insidious. If it isn't a choice, it must be "genetic".  We can't change — at least not without medical intervention — ergo we get the same rights others who "can't change" — like blacks and women — get.

What a vile set of assumptions to internalize. Are you getting that at all or is it just me? 

I mean, here the burden is on us to prove that because we are not like them, we are nonetheless fully human.  The reason blacks have been subjected to this outrageous discourse on their humanity is simply because they aren't white.  The reason women have is simply because they're not men. 

Not to be rude, but: fuck you.

The real question is: who is asking these questions?  And why do they have a right?  That's the real question.

As for essentialism, true or not — and while the rules of attraction may be etched in our DNA, the rules of affection and what is considered sexual are negotiated socially — it's a dehumanizing debate that gays can't win.  Crying "I didn't choose this!  Who would choose this?" is not exactly a position of strength to start with.

I've said it before: every gay man chooses.  We choose to identify as gay*. The choice to openly acknowledge the attraction and to express frankly an affection that's sublimated in others is not a minor matter.  It is, in fact, the central issue for many: gay and straight alike. 

Modern society  uses medical explanations to justify its sanctions, but the use of essentialism as the basis of equal protection often ignores other fundamental freedoms — of expression and association — that go to the core of democratic assumptions about what constitutes our humanity.  For either side to rely on a clinical argument is to hide from the wider implications of those truths we hold as self-evident.

Any model of discrimination based on intimacies between consenting adults robs us all of the fundamental ingredient of our humanity. 

The essentialism debate, which for decades has been an effective red herring, is essentially moot.  Gays should stop playing into it by whinging and whining about how "we can't help it!"  Because medical science is always happy to lend a hand.  Shock therapy anyone?  How about a lobotomy?  Castration?  Maybe a little gene therapy?

Consenting adults should be able to negotiate their own relationships, period. 

Time for us all — including gays — to grow up. 
_______________________________________________
* I've written about it here and here, for starters.  Here for more on "The Gay Agenda".   

It should surprise no one that hokey "I'm Scott Brown and this is my truck" populism and simplistic politics-as-sports metaphors have swept another charismatic politician into national office.  And it should shock no one that Sox Nation, known for its epic sulks, gloating and Tourettes-like taunts took the day yesterday.  They stuck a curling iron up her butt, all right.  Woo-Hoo!  U-S-A!  U-S-A!  U-S-A!  U-S-A!

For her part, Coakley played into insinuations that she was an outsider, an other — In everything from turning her nose up at Brown's Fenway meet-n-greets to misspelling "Massachusetts" on a widely televised campaign ad — in an age of intense xenophobia.  It could be said that the major issues of the day all have to do with this hysterical fear of The Other — whether immigrant, minority, terrorist, homosexual, intellectual... 

At least among certain sets.  The electoral map of Massachusetts looks strikingly like a microcosm of the electoral map of the nation in '08...



Not to put too fine a point on it, but one way to look at this map is as a map of the siege mentality — of white flight further into the interior, further away from immigrants and racial minorities, from the diversity that defines urban life, especially on the coasts. Insulated in the suburban interior, with what they perceive as hostile hordes surrounding them, it's no wonder so many Americans feel like they're fighting another Battle of the Alamo.

Looking at the map of Massachusetts I immediately thought of issues like marriage equality, and how, were they to be decided by referendum — and they may yet be, even in Massachusetts, come 2012 — of course they'd go down in flames (and Tourettes-like taunts, too, it goes without saying).  And this is not because gay marriage isn't a cause conservatives can't get behind, it's because the fear factor is at play.  It's about fear of The Other, the longtime M.O. of the G.O.P.

Now, inevitably I'll hear from a Brown backer contending it was Coakley who played on fears, particularly women's fears of losing reproductive rights, in her campaign against him, and that Brown himself remained sunny and smiling to the end.  And it's true: Republicans don't have a monopoly on fear, though they specialize in a certain species of it and are better at firing up their base with it than Democrats are. 

But just as Obama was a blank slate in '08, upon which rabid, delusional supporters projected misplaced religious sentiment, Brown played the role of a symbol for his base much better than Coakley did for hers.  To them "I'm Scott Brown and this is my truck" was enough to establish his bona fides.  Coakley's gender, snooty demeanor, entrenchment in the administration of Massachusetts' first black governor (and — don't forget — only the third in the nation's history, and a FOBO to boot) represented, on the other hand, merely the starting point of her obvious otherness. 

Brown's campaign was smart enough to know that to those with a siege mentality finding an excuse to cry "victim!", however specious and lame, is vital motivation.  And his campaign only really found its footing when he came up with an excuse to.  The irony of his deploying "change" and "yes we can" (in the form of "we can do this!" — as in "we can stick a curling iron up her butt!") as his campaign clarion call was just icing on the cake.

The siege mentality on the right, with its paranoia and intense sense of victimization, is obviously the more powerful political motivator.  It's why we don't blink an eye at burning up nearly a trillion dollars on not one, but two unnecessary and ineffectual wars, and yet raise a great cry of injustice at the mere notion of universal health care. 

I only wish there was some kernel of truth to the paranoia on the right — because it would mean that the rest of us really were fighting tirelessly to win hearts and minds.  It would mean that those who clung so vehemently to "hope" were ready to fight to bring about a society in which it's more than a campaign cliché.  But sometimes it really does seem, as Yeats put it, that:

The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

I made the trek back to the Dilboy VFW in Somerville to vote before work this morning, and was disappointed I didn't have to stand in line long.  I didn't even have to stand outside.  I didn't end up being late for work and get to be all morally superior about it.  During the presidential elections — even the primaries — the line was out the door, down the street, and around the block. 

What happened to all those Hope-n-Changers? 



I guess Coakley just didn't inspire like Obama did.  Looks like we shot our wad on that one.  Wake us up in 2012, right?

I'll admit I wasn't gonna bother to vote back when I thought Coakley had it all wrapped up, which is why I didn't go right out and  register to vote in Boston, or bother to request an absentee ballot from Somerville, where I just moved from.  But I got swept up in all this last-minute excrement — er, excitement, and just had to get out and exercise my franchise.  Luckily, you can go back to your old polling place so long as it hasn't been more than 90 days since your move.

If you haven't yet, and you're registered to vote in Massachusetts (or even in Massachusettes), I have one word for you: Minnesota.  Franken won by 312 votes.  1,212,629 to 1,212,317. 

If you voted in the last election, you're already registered and ready to go.  All you have to do is show up and do the deed.  You have until 8 p.m. 

I got up off my lazy ass this morning and did it, so can you.

REMEMBER MINNESOTA!

Stuff, a local free weekly that is part of the Phoenix Media fiefdom, occupies a murky place in the free weekly ecology of Boston.  About a year ago I met with the new editor, Erica Corsano, who was energized by her mission of turning the magazine into something slightly more stylish and sophisticated than its recent incarnations.  Needless to say, that's where we parted ways.  Alas, she has her work cut out by the looks of it.

It remains abundantly unclear who Stuff is for.  It's hard to imagine, now that it no longer hosts the drink-n-dial section where wasted college kids could leave drunken messages to be faithfully transcribed in the margins of the coming print issue, who's actually left to read it.  And if they can actually read. 



Corsano, to her credit, has obviously been working hard at broadening the magazine's appeal, but the bottom line is ad dollars.  Unfortunately when ad revenue dictates content the end result is always blah.  It's hard to imagine a general interest magazine — even a free one — that has truly mass appeal.  Because most magazines — even free ones — are run by accountants and ad men, not actual content providers, you always end up with something supposedly aimed at everyone.  Which is to say no one.  

Which, as far as I can tell, is who reads Stuff on a regular basis. 

Since I've quit the T — it is finally feasible for me to bike everywhere in the city I want or need to be — I don't really have anywhere to read Stuff, myself, and it's not the kind of thing I'd bring home, but occasionally I'll pick it up outside a Starbucks and  flip through to see what the blah set is up to these days. 

And let me tell you, there's no better embodiment of blah than Stuff's annual "Body" issue.  Flipping through it reminds me of first discovering the South End some fifteen years ago and grasping immediately without the ability to articulate it what a South End Queen was. 

It was not that they were particularly pretty, and certainly had nothing to do with having a great physique, or being dynamite in bed — all things all gay people have to be or have in order to join The Club.  And it wasn't the product — or at least not just the product.  No.  It was more the impressive degree to which they had wholly internalized and mastered a fetishized stereotype. 

Looking at the Body issue there's that same can't-quite-put-your-finger-on-it sense of sameness.  It's not that various body-types aren't duly represented, exactly.  They range from a pint-sized martial artist to not one, but two plus-size models!  (In fact, skinny is the one body type that's not represented — but no plus-size men, either.)  As for diversity, there are men and women, of course, a couple of Asians, and a black guy.  It's still a rather stingy array — as for gender stereotypes —- but it is an array.  Obviously an effort's been made here. 

It's not that they missed the nod toward diversity of a sort.  It's that despite it, they're all still the same, somehow. 

Even the reader submissions on the website are a study in monotony.  This is no feast for the eyes. It's more like the visual equivalent of one of those awful so-called "power bars" that are packed with protein but taste like sawdust.  These bodies are smart, hard and stingy, appropriately enough for Boston.  We are meant to admire them as an accomplishment, maybe envy the results a bit, but there is no hint of eroticism — which to me is merely the generosity of the body.  They are, as advertised, just bodies.

And the way they're presented they are neither lovely — we don't go to the gym to become lovely, do we? We go to  get healthy and strong — nor very compelling.  "the ideal of perfect health," Novalis wrote at the turn of the 19th century, "is only scientifically interesting."  They're called treadmills for a reason, people.

There is nothing wrong with worshiping the body, but the kind of body we revere — and those we revile — obviously says a lot about who we are or want to be. There's a spartan narrative here that suggests that having a body is hard work.  We manage our bodies, like we manage our career and finances. 

And then there's that astringent, defensive display Bostonian's are known for.  We want to be looked at, admired, envied, but don't expect us to look back.  The choice of black and white further drains the vitality out of the portraits and hardens their already unsympathetic subjects — however sympathetic the actual individuals, these portraits are certainly no reflection.  

Even the more Rubinesque among them don't seem the least bit voluptuous, but look more like lumps of flesh posed for Lucian Freud...


And the ones hamming it up for the camera still look stilted and static, as if the body itself is just stuff on which to hang more stuff:


The one attempt at humor in the pages of this issue is Chris Coxen's turn as a porn-bestached, hirsute lounge lizard in animal print boxers and banker's socks...


But isn't this shtick getting a little played out, too?  This is apparently one of Coxen, a comedian's on-stage personae.  His hairiness — and hairiness in general — is treated as a self-conscious sight gag, not simply another perfectly normal body type.  Odd, since studies have estimated upwards of 60% of Caucasian men are fairly hirsute, and only about 6% have no hair on their chests at all.  You certainly wouldn't know it by flipping through this issue of Stuff — aside from a mildly furry (and very hot) Matt Hunwick, Stuff treats us to a gallery of plucked and pumped overachievers. 

I feel for extremely hirsute guys like Coxen, who have to constantly battle the Curse of Freddie Mercury — that even traits traditionally thought of as hypermasculine have a tendency to be swallowed up by sexual ambiguity.  There's an irony here somewhere, when male cleavage is seen as more sexually suggestive than female cleavage.  It's a big deal that plunging neckline's and v-neck tees are making a comeback in men's fashion.  What is the nature of the titillation?  It must have its seeds in a threat, right?

I mean, male displays of flesh are as indiscriminately titillating as female displays, but the male gaze is felt to be more aggressive, more threatening — it implicates (some would say "taints") the object as much as the subject.  Women are free to check out other women.  Men have the same impulse (if not desire), but are strictly regulated.  This is very simply because men can stake a claim of conquest with their dicks, where women, quite obviously, can't — and once you've had a dick in you everything's different, right girls? 

So because straight-identifying men can be implicated as objects of other men's desire (think of the "gay panic" defense in gay-bashing cases, where merely being looked at the wrong way can justify — in a court of law — a vicious beating or fatal attack — the male-on-male equivalent of the blame-the-victim defense in male-female rape cases), wanton displays of male flesh have to follow some very strict rules.  Which is why you will not find in Stuff any skinny, androgynous, or sexually ambiguous men. 

Is there a whiff of homophobia here?  In the strict sense of the word: yes.  It's benign and boring and relatively inoffensive, the acceptable fear of the male gaze and its implications you find in the modern gym.  Rather than risk gay appeal, Stuff's body issue is drained of sensuality.  It's all business.  All work.  Bodies are deployed as weapons or work-out machines, fed and maintained, waxed, oiled, and taken in for regular tune-ups, used as calling cards or comic relief, but there is no hint of the particular pleasures we associate with our bodies in off-hours.   

Yup.  Basically bodies as stuff.  But then what did you expect?