Dumbledore is gay?

Full disclosure here: I've written a young adult fantasy novel, which I will submit to my publsher soon, in which a young girl runs away from home and washes up on the sparkling shores of pre-AIDS Castro street. She and the gay man who takes her in are the two main characters in the book, the heroes. Though I think the book is very good, I have some concerns that a major publishing house with a family-values reputation (hint: it's the same one that published Harry Potter) will be reluctant to publish a young peoples book, however good it may be, that not only accepts, but heroizes gay men and the culture of joy and openness they created, in that time and place.

So back to the good professor Dumbledore. How is it that, in seven books and four gazillion pages of text, Rowling neglected to tell us that, as she said last night in Carnegie Hall, "Dumbledore is gay," and that he was "smitten" with Gellert Grindlewald, who he fought in a battle between good and evil. She went on to add that "his love was his great tragedy." There are so many things I want to say here: homosexual love = great tragedy?; his great love also happens to be a stand-in for evil?; if his love, and loss of it, are his great tragedy, then would the grief of that not somehow have motivated, or at least informed, his self sacrifice at the end of the series?; did the fear of losing, say, 5% of your richer-than-god sales to a few homophobes keep you from telling us, your many fans? These are all deep questions that, no doubt, Rowling will have to answer somehow, somewhere. But really, my main and completely self-interested question is: Why didn't you step up to the plate, show Dumbledore in all his multiplicity of selves - hero, Christ figure, teacher, protector, gay man - so that generations of little witches and wizards and readers could have had him as a fully fleshed out character? And - in very open self interest here - perhaps, if she had, my little book would be a little less scary to publish.

A few final notes. If Dumbledore is gay, then McGonigle's definitely a lesbian and I don't buy for a minute that he would have had that desperately shaggy beard. Though the dress was good.

OK, but only if I can have my big hair back too.

What a relief! Finally the New York Times Style section has announced that shoulder pads are back in style. They write, "At Balenciaga, shoulders of tops rise into stiff peaks or explode into fuzzy pompoms of fabric." I can't wait to get to my neighborhood Goodwill store and buy those faulous 80s big-shouldered shirts before the super models snap them all up. Because I think exploding "fuzzy pompoms of fabric" on my shoulders are just what my larger-than-it-used-to-be figure needs to acheive that "female linebacker" look I've been dying for. But if I add these hot new shoes

by Marc Jacobs to the ensemble - Lucky me! - I can look like this!

The ugly past creeps in, part 2

So what did I hear when I finally emerged from the pile of crumpled Kleenex I was buried under?

Nobel-prize-winning scientist James Watson told The Sunday Times that he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really."

So my grandmother has some distinguished company. To continue on from my earlier post, "Radical Compassion," the past seeps up, like toxic ground water, to taint the present. Unless we examine our individual pasts, our national past, the flawed assumptions and assertions that those in the past called truth will find their way into the so-called "truths" of today. In the 19th century, "scientists" measured human skulls and made declarations about intelligence and ability based on these measurements. (See the lovely chart, above.) Guess who came out as superior?

It's an absolute wonder to me that - with all the dangerous, discredited theories (humors, skull shape, bleeding the sick) that we have gone through in the name of Science - scientists don't have a deeper sense of humility about what they do. And how can ANYONE make such sweeping statements about an entire continent, with its multiplicity of peoples? Which also just happens to be the continent responsible for the development of all human life. What standards are they using and who invented those standards? "Western" scientists, of course, with their deep cultural biases.

You'd think with a Nobel, he'd show signs of intelligence. whereas all the evidence says, "not really."

There, I've vented. Think I'll go hide my head again.

Exactly!

"With violence you can solve one problem, but you sow the seeds for another."
Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

(Still sick and too pooped out to come up with my own words or images. But the Dalai Lama won the congressional medal of honor today, so at least it's topical.)

God it sucks being sick when you have kids

because you can't just fall apart and not function. Little pests need to eat, and wear clothes, and go to school and stuff. So below, for your pleasure, and for my relaxation, are some of my favorite moments from the Wooster Collective site. They document street art all over the world and it's amazing stuff. Enjoy.

These amazing images are made by farmers in Japan planting two different colors of rice. Yow! that's some commitment to art!