I disclose a lot about myself. (SEE: The blog you are reading right at this very moment.) My performance pieces may not be entirely disclosure-based – there’s some storytelling and fantasy, too – but they are entirely built around my experiences with gender and identity. I’m speaking to a class of middle school students soon, and it’ll be about on the same topic. I fully and completely appreciate disclosure as a cathartic, rewarding, and empowering act.

And yet certain types of disclosure – the type of disclosure that my brand of self-narrative work apparently evokes in certain people – makes me quite uncomfortable.

I realize my work is often the first time some audience members have heard honest narratives around trans experience. Perhaps the first time they’ve met an (out) trans person. That’s what I was thinking when a tall individual came up next to me after I finished my show and sat back at the bar. He (this person was presenting as male so I’ll use male pronouns) introduced himself as Joe. He wasn’t dressed particularly well, his hair was unkempt, and he was missing two or three teeth. He said he enjoyed my show, said I was beautiful, and told me he had “had thoughts like that.”

I never know what to say to that statement. It’s not a question, so there’s no obvious response. It’s not enough information that I feel like I can make an intelligent response, but it’s way too much for me to not say anything. This particular situation was made more uncomfortable because Joe then gave me intense, unyielding, unblinking eye contact.

I’m not proud of how I responded: some sympathetic noises and a turn back to the musicians playing on stage. But I was uncomfortable by the intense amount of focus Joe was sending my way, and could see him continue to stare straight at me even after I’d turned away. I got up and went to the bar to get another drink.

Joe followed, asking if he’d made me uncomfortable. I lied, and said no. The  bar was crowded, Joe wasn’t making me feel unsafe, and I wasn’t yet willing to be explicitly rude. We made polite small talk and Joe then asked, “Promise you won’t be angry?”

Those types of questions are obnoxious and unfair. I think they should only be allowed (maybe) by close friends, along the lines of “Can you keep a secret?” But coming from an almost-complete stranger, it seemed out of line.

“Well,” I replied, “it depends on what you say. I’m not going to promise anything.”

“I have masochistic tendencies.”

At that point, I walked away.

Later in the evening, someone told me that he’d had sex once with someone who he was “95% sure was post-op.” He quickly clarified, “I mean, I’ve slept with men, women, I didn’t care. I just wanted to know! When her top came off she’d had these scars under her breasts, from implants. And her clit was bright pink. Like, bright pink.”

Why did I need to know those things? For Joe, I can understand – assuming he was honestly trans or questioning – the desire to connect with another trans person. I’ll even give him the benefit of the doubt and assume his closeted life has led to a tendency for awkward and uncomfortable social interactions. But I didn’t need to know, didn’t want to know, and wish I didn’t know that he had “masochistic tendencies.”

And I know people have a desire to identify their own experiences with something they heard from another. “I have a black friend!” is the easiest example of this behavior. But I don’t like it, even though I’ve thus far been too polite to say “Why the hell are you telling me this?”

It’s particularly hard because I know my show has exactly that type of disclosure: my experiences being sexual, exploring my identity, figuring things out. That’s presumably what makes people feel entitled to the same sort of disclosure. But I don’t know how to respond. Where to draw the line between being a supportive and engaging activist, and keeping my own personal boundaries secure.

I think, in the case of the “did I have sex with a trans woman” guy, next time I will speak up more. Say that I’m not sure why it was important for him to know if she was trans.

But if someone like Joe comes up to me again? I don’t know what I’ll do.

She can't even read that! It's facing away from her! Stop looking so shocked!

I recently had a discussion with a friend of mine, Rose, about pornography and acting. She is involved in the sex industry, has worked as a prostitute and escort, and occasionally does both photographic and film pornography. She mentioned she’d recently finished a shoot where she had earned more in five hours than I’ve yet to earn in all of January.

Curious about her experiences, I asked what being in porn was like. Specifically, whether she viewed it as a sexual experience or a ‘this is an action I’m doing because I’m getting paid’ experience. Rose said that it was the latter: really not much more enjoyable than serving coffee or collating copies, just quite a bit more lucrative.

The conversation got me thinking about what we – as audience members – ask of actors. Because going to a play almost always involves some suspension of disbelief.  Perhaps Chicago’s Neofuturists toe the line  of theatre which requires no suspension of disbelief, but they’re in the minority. For the most part, going to a show involves allowing ourselves to believe that the actors are their characters. That they’re falling in love, planning for battle, forging alliances, destroying relationships, and on and on and on. When I go to a play I could sit there the entire time thinking, “Well, she’s not really in love with him. He doesn’t really find what she says so funny as to laugh out loud.” But that would make me miserable, so I suspend my disbelief and allow their actions to read as true.

That’s not how viewing porn seems to work, however. For whatever reason, audiences want to believe the people they’re watching are really attracted to each other (even if only on a physical level) and do reach a real, satisfying, climactic (natch) orgasm.

Why is that?

This isn’t true for every porn. There’s a great movement of feminist porn that attempts to portray actual, pleasurable, orgasmic, sex (links obviously NSFW): Crash Pad, No Fauxxx, and Doing It Ourselves, to name a few. (Please share more in the comments if you know of any.) But those are the minority. Most porn is filmed the same way any other film would be: actors are told what to do, and they do it. Regardless of whether or not they really cum. That’s what I’m talking about when I use the word ‘porn’ in this post, even though I know it’s a subset of all porn.

I’m also talking from my own cultural understandings and assumptions about porn and American gender dynamics. This is a topic for a 300+ page thesis, not a little blog post, so I’ll be making a lot of unsubstantiated and unresearched claims about why people (mainly men) watch porn, and what they think while doing it. I’m also not focusing on kink or fetish porn. Feel free to correct me if you think I’m way off base at any point.

PORN!

The place to start in answering this question may be the perceived audience. This type of porn is primarily produced by men, for men. There are cultural expectations and understandings around the ease of the male orgasm and the difficulty of the female. Porn feeds into the first, but somewhat contradicts the second: a woman is going to get off because that’s how the audience wants to be projected into the story. The (male) viewer wants to imagine himself with the woman in the porn, easily and handily getting her off.

So there’s no desire for examination of the actors’ ability to portray getting off. Someone might come out of a theatrical production saying, “Wow, you could really feel the emotion on stage.” But – if they stop to think about it – they don’t assume the actors were all actually mad at each other, or in love with each other, or whatever. In porn, though, similar examination leads to questioning one’s own partners: If that porn actress was faking that orgasm, how do I know my own partner wasn’t doing the same?

There also seems to be a parallel with the use of stunt doubles in Hollywood. Audiences are impressed when there aren’t any stunt doubles. “She does all her own stunts” is a high compliment to pay an actress. Because we know what they’re doing is fake. There isn’t really a Nazi chasing Indiana Jones. Salt wasn’t really running from those assassins. And for sex scenes, the love interests aren’t really having sex.

In porn, though, there is actual sex happening. Someone is being penetrated, and someone is penetrating. Or licked/licking. Sucked/sucking. You get the idea. But why go that far if you can’t go the step further? Why aren’t they actually achieving orgasm? It seems more difficult to separate the fiction from the reality. Or to even want to separate the two.

Porn also generally serves a different, more (ahem) utilitarian purpose than non-sexual film or theatre. While audiences certainly view actors to evoke an emotional response, the expectations are generally more open ended. When I go to a comedy, I may laugh at the actors or with them. Likewise, a drama may evoke my pity or tears at love-lost or happiness at love-found-at-last. I don’t always know going in, except in the broadest of fashions. Porn, though, is different. The viewer is expecting a specific physical response.

Justifying any of these assumptions would take research that I don’t foresee doing anytime soon. But thinking about when and why I’ve watched porn, all of the above makes sense. I don’t watch much porn these days, but when I have I wanted where the women looked like they were enjoying themselves. Something I could imagine participating in, either causing the woman’s reaction or having the woman’s reaction (a whole different topic). And if pressed, I’d admit most of those women – perhaps all – weren’t actually enjoying what I was watching as much as they portrayed enjoying it. As much as they acted like they were enjoying it.

I guess my final thought is about whether or not this – the shared desire to believe women in porn are actually cumming – is a good thing. No one says “Dexter sucks! He’s not really killing people!” At the same time, women faking orgasms in porn seems to feed into all of the second wave feminist ideas of why all porn is inherently bad for women and creating unrealistic and overly-sexualized expectations around women. And – both as an occasional viewer of porn and a friend of people who work in porn – I don’t buy into that.

So I’m left not knowing what to think. I’d love to see a move toward more actual orgasms in porn, but some fantasies viewers want to see may simply not evoke an orgasm in the actor participating. And I’m hesitant to say that there should never again be porn of Situation X simply because they can’t find an actress who cums from it. But I don’t know how to balance that with encouraging healthier views of female sexuality. And male sexuality, for that matter.

Any thoughts?

Too Much Light…, with its ever-changing “menu,” is an attempt to perform 30 plays in 60 minutes. The single unifying element of these plays is that they are performed from a perspective of absolute honesty.

So I was a little surprised to come across this listing at Indy Fringe:

The Bloomington Playwrights Project presents The Blizzard, an evening of 30 super-short plays performed in 60 minutes. The Blizzard is short-attention span theatre at a breakneck pace. An ensemble of five actors will be performing each piece in a spontaneous random order selected by you, the audience. To add even more fun, the performers will try to finish all 30 plays in under 60 minutes!

When I asked one of the performers about its striking similarity to Too Much Light he replied somewhat sheepishly “Oh, yeah, we stole it from them.”

In general, you can’t copyright recipes or board game rules or instructions. And doing 30 plays in 60 minutes, as long as Blizzard isn’t using TML’s actual scripts, doesn’t seem to be violating any potential TML copyrights. At the same time, it seems sort of unethical – if not illegal  - to not at least credit TML when it’s so obviously inspired by TML.

I let friends of mine in TML know about this, not sure how they’d respond but pretty sure they’d at least want to be aware of it. They said they were contacting the Blizzard managing director, and I’ll be curious to see what happens. Again, I don’t want the Blizzard shut down, and I’m sure the Bloomington Playwrights Project does good work, I just want them to give credit to the Neo-Futurists.

More broadly, this has made me think about the ethics of inspiration. As many have said, most famously Isaac Newton, we all make artistic and scientific progress by standing on the shoulders of giants. It’s impossible to create in a vacuum, and I know my artistic ideals have been modified and honed by the work I see. (Even, or perhaps especially, by the always-awesome Too Much Light artists.) But when does the line cross from ‘inspiration’ to ‘artistic plagiarism’?

I really don’t know, but would be interested in others’ thoughts…

This – A short two-person show involving a man trying to convince a woman he just met to marry him. Surprisingly bittersweet and evocative.

FreakShow Deluxe – Exactly what it promises, making me remember I actually don’t love freakshows. But human blockhead, dangers whip and sword acts, the whole deal.

The Rocky and Bullwinkle Horror Picture Show Parody – SO MUCH FUN! If you love old cartoons and Rocky Horror, this show is the place to be. Hilarious, well-written, well-sung, and very well-costumed.

Grimm and Bare It – I only really saw the last 2/3 of this show, since I was volunteering at the box office at the beginning. It was fun, a combo of fairy tales and burlesque, but not amazing. Which was surprising, seeing as there was a line out the door and the venue had to turn away maybe 70 people. Definitely worth seeing, but I was impressed by the huge turnout.

A Rumble in the City – Two of Kansas City’s Burlesque and BOYLesque troupes (in KC? Who knew?) in a fun competition to see if men or women are better burlesquers. Very much rigged for the entertainment of the audience, but really well done (and funny and thoughtful) acts ranging from West Side Story to vampires to the song Under Pressure.

Evolution – Another show in my venue. Roman, a trans man, talks about his experiences traveling and hitchhiking across the southern US. A really interesting story which took him to lots of (geographical and emotional) places.

I’ve also been really out there pushing my postcards and have probably gone through maybe half of the 5,000 I ordered. I used some before I came to KC, but most of that has been handing them out while here. A few Fringe-goers have gotten to know me because I keep running into them in line, which is fun. I also enjoyed volunteering last night because, again, it was a great way to meet people.

The burlesque shows are selling incredibly well, so I’ve been hitting up those lines a lot. I’ve also been staying outside all of the shows I’ve attended, handing out postcards until the last minute and then slipping into a back row.

KC Fringe has a ‘hangover show’ award, which means the best-selling show in any particular venue gets a free bonus performance on the final Sunday of Fringe. I’m cautiously optimistic that I’m on track to be the best selling at Loft 122, especially because I heard they’re doing a lazy total sum of tickets rather than a more sophisticated averaging across all performances. (Not that I blame me for their mathematical laziness when calculating something at midnight on a Saturday night, which is when they’ll get the final ticket numbers to make the call.)

So all in all I’m having a great first Fringe trip outside of Chicago. I’m psyched for the rest of the week, and for Indianapolis and Chicago in the coming months

The drive down went smoothly: My air conditioner worked, Phil and I had stuff to talk about and then agreed on Car Talk and This American Life podcasts, and we didn’t get lost. Also, Culvers has delicious shakes.

While stopping at a McDonalds somewhere in Missouri, a guy unloading the McDonalds truck said “Wow, you work on that? Cuz it looks good!” I wasn’t sure if he meant my tan (awesome) or my muscles (also awesome) but either way it made me smile.

Kansas City is pretty. And hilly. And pretty hilly. I say this from my admittedly flat Chicago perspective, but it seems hilly to me!

The people I’m staying with are AWESOME. It’s Brooke and her husband Chris, and their roommate Amber. They own a beautiful early 1900s home in a historic district and have been fixing it up since they bought it three years ago. Which means there are odd gaps in the repairs – the stairs have ridiculous 1970s linoleum - but on the whole it’s lovely. The main AC doesn’t reach the third floor, where I’m staying, but there’s an extra unit up there. It has trouble fighting the heat during the day – the heat index in KC right now is 97 – but at night it’s delightfully cool.

When I got in they had made delicious veggie dinner. Best hosts ever!

The room I’m in also has this beautiful deck, way up on the third floor, overlooking the backyard. As Brooke says, it’s like being in a treehouse. It’s a little warm to be there during the heat of the day (hence my writing this post in the ACed living room) but when the sun starts to set it’s really lovely. But OH DEAR GOD the mosquitoes! I had ridiculously crazy and disgusting welts from them. I need to pick up more itch relief today and definitely get some bug spray. I meant to take pictures, but forgot. Fortunately they’ve gone way down, but were totally ridiculous and disgusting.

Today was pretty productive, I think. I got out of the house a little after 10AM and drove over to Fringe Central to check in. I then wandered around the Crosroads neighborhood, where my venue is located, and put flyers and posters at a bunch of restaurants and stores.

Did I mention how hot it is?

I hit up about half of the venues today, maybe a little less, and tomorrow want to go put flyers and posters at the other venues. I also received some good suggestions of neighborhoods to hit up and flyer. I need to figure out my schedule for the next few days, but I’m planning to do more flyering in neighborhoods tomorrow and Saturday during the day and then wander around the Fringe venues tomorrow and Saturday evening to hand out flyers to Fringe-goers. I really have no idea what kind of audience I’m expecting, so hope Friday and Saturday’s shows will give me a clue how hard I need to push flyers into next week.

Tech today went well, although there were some hiccups. Some my fault – that I need to fix when I get back into Chicago – and some just the joy of tech rehearsals. But we got through it, and I’m feeling good about tomorrow. The venue is maybe 75 seats (actual seats! no planks of wood, folks who came to see my show at last year’s Chicago Fringe!) and has AC and fans. Little itsy bitsy stage, but enough room that I made it work. I’m just worried I’ll lose my light, but if I need to adjust that’s fine.

I also met another performer in my venue, who is also doing a show concerning gender and sexuality. We’d emailed before getting here, and plan to talk up each others’ shows. Hopefully that’ll help with crowds. He was very bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, and made me feel old and cynical, with my whopping one Fringe under my belt.

Tonight is the opening night welcoming thing, where all the shows can do a three minute sneak peak. It’s in 90 minutes and I’m still not positive what I’m going to do, not surprisingly. Ahh, procrastination.

In the meantime, I’m catching my breath, reading a little bit, and going to have a bite to eat before heading out in maybe an hour.

Go Fringe!

My mom’s logic is hard to refute: even though the gas millage isn’t quite as good on the Forester, it can hold more, is newer, has less millage, and rides more smoothly. At the same time, I like my Corolla. I want to drive my car to Kansas City and back (and then to Indy and back). Not her car.

If it were just that, I’d probably take my car. But I’m every-so-slightly worried about my car being covered in COEXIST bumper stickers, in Civil Marriage is a Civil Right, in Howard Brown (hearts) Lesbians, in labor rights and equal rights and gay rights stickers all across the back bumper, the trunk, and curving around the sides of the car. (I like bumper stickers. So sue me.)

I’ve never been to Kansas City, and don’t know the neighborhood in which I’ll be performing or staying. And I’m slightly nervous about leaving my car out on the street, with out of state plates and covered in ‘look at me!’ stickers.

I emailed the woman I’m staying with:

Concerning my car, it’s kiinnnnndaa covered in bumper stickers about union rights, gay marriage, all that jazz. Do you think that’d be cool in your neighborhood, or should I borrow a friend’s car?

And her reply:

Well, shoot, if you have your own car, you’ll be totally safe. We are inner city, but we are in a pretty safe area as long as you’re not wandering around on foot by yourself at night. I walk around my hood by myself regularly (during the day) and unless you have a phoebia of black people, then you’ll be fine.

That definitely reassures me some, but not 100%.

My current plan is to, first and foremost, see what my mechanic says when I take the car in later this week for an oil change. If he says “Um, driving 1,000+ miles round trip in a few weeks, and then another 500+ round trip in August, is a bad idea,” then I’ll probably just take my mom’s. If he says “Go for it,” I think I want to do some more research on the KC neighborhood in which I’ll be staying, and maybe some Google Street View stalking of the area.

But it is moments like this when I question exactly how far on my sleeve I’ve chosen to wear my heart. And I really don’t like that feeling of doubt or second guessing.

PS – Sorry for the very uncreative post title… Can’t have ‘em all be winners.

Friday night I went to Backlot Bash, a mini music fest in my neighborhood behind a local gym. (Hence the ‘backlot’ part.) My neighborhood, Andersonville, is pretty lesbian-y, and Backlot Bash is specifically women-focused. A friend of mine was very excited about the Friday musicians, as they were all acoustic, so we had dinner together and went over. She made yummy vegan pad thai, which was a new culinary experience for me, but much fun.

Backlot Bash was pretty perfect for a Friday night. Saturday and Sunday are usually pretty crazy, but Friday was lots of folks in lawn chairs, good lesbian acoustic rock and folk, and really excellent people watching. It also ended around 10, which was good since I wanted to get as much sleep as possible to prep for Pride. But I definitely want to look up the musicians who played – Katie Quick, Katie Todd, Edie Carey, and Catie Curtis – as they were all excellent.

On Saturday I had brunch with a friend who is going out of town for the next month to work at a sleep-away camp. It was nice to see her before she left, and a good little ‘goodbye.’

Then some friends and I trooped down to South Shore for Dyke March.

A little history. The first Pride Parades were held in 1970 to memorialize the Stonewall Riots and highlight both the actual existence of gay folks and gay rights issues. There were names like Chicago Gay Liberation, the Gay Activists Alliance, and Gay Freedom Marchers. But as time went on the events became more and more gay focused (as opposed to lesbian/gay/bi/trans/queer/intersex/etc) and more celebratory, and less activism-y.

And so, in May of 1981, the first Dyke March, with the goal of being more activism-y and more inclusive. (And less of a straight-up party.) In cities like Chicago this is particularly great, as  the Pride Parade is only minimally about activism and much more about beads, stickers, LOUD music, and scantily glad dancers. And those are all great, but there should also be a venue for activism.

A nifty thing about the Chicago Dyke March is that it moves every two years. It used to be in my neighborhood, Andersonville (although before I lived there) but community members and organizers realized that maybe the march should go somewhere that didn’t already have a strong queer community. So it’s been in Pilsen (predominantly Latino neighborhood) and this was the second of two years for it to be in South Shore, a South Side black neighborhood. I totally agree with this organizational choice, even though I selfishly hope they chose somewhere closer next year.

So I went to Dyke March with a few friends. We parked and got some water from a local Walgreens, and marched along with maybe 500 people along a main thorough-fair and to a nearby park. I have pics which I’ll post later, but it was a fun event. Great to see cars slow down in support (mostly in support, anyway) and to be with so many queers and allies who were there for activism as opposed to being there for a giant party.

The march ended at a nearby park for a rally, which was a very nice and emotionally satisfying picnic-y end. There were BBQs set up with for-donation food, folks handing out flyers for events and organizations (including me pushing Early to Bed with stickers saying ‘Some like it twat’) and difficult-to-hear speakers on a too-small sound system.

I also got in trouble for being topless, and then un-in-trouble. I’ll post about that soon, but no worries – someone overstepped their bounds reprimanding me, and organizers made a point of checking in with me to ensure I felt safe. (Which I did!)

Saturday night I went to the pride show of Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind, an amazing Chicago theatrical institution. (That I’ve auditioned for, was called back for, and didn’t get into, but still love.) It was a really fun time, with lots of nudity, Pride ridiculousness, and a good mix of celebration, silliness, and solemnity. Huzzah!

Because I’d been called back to the Neos auditions, I was invited to march with them at Pride, which was exceptionally sweet of them. I took ‘em up on the offer, so Sunday morning filled my Camelback with water, slathered on lots of sunscreen, and hopped on the bus to Boystown.

The adventure started on the bus, as it was rerouted due tot he parade. The reroute actually helped me, but left lots of people to walk a long distance on foot. I finally made it to the staging site for the parade, and wandered until some Neo folks saw my Too Much Light t-shirt and called me over. To wait for the jeep (our ‘parade float,’ which was running late.) We chilled, chatted, and watched the sights as people began to filter in.

One of the things I love about Pride, which I was reminded of over and over throughout the day, was the range of gender expressions on display. It was really wonderful to see people of all physicalities expressing themselves from extremely masculine or butch to extremely feminine, and everything in between.

The jeep showed up with supplies, and we got to work decorating. “Supplies’ including a sound system, lots of blow-up dolls, tons of streamers, and decorations for the hubcaps and such. We also made a classic Too Much Light style clothesline with numbers 1-30. (Really, you need to see this show. I’d be happy to go with you!) Likewise, we filled out tons of name tags (another Too Much Light staple) with sexually suggestive and silly names.

It was during decorations that I went from t-shirt to bra, and from bra to name tag stickers over my boobs. Ahh, pride! Incredibly, I was successful in sun-blocking myself, so only got a tiny bit red on my shoulders. Go me!

The parade was supposed to start at noon, but since we were far back we all knew we wouldn’t get going until around 1. And then 1:30. Then 2. Then 2:30. We got started around three. But we were cruising down Halsted, waving and handing out buttons and stickers, having a blast. Someone in our group was in a Big Bird costume, another was biking in a princess outfit, and a few (including me) were scantily clad. Then we hit Clark, and were turned onto an ‘alternate route.’

Apparently due to crowds, the police redirected about 40 floats down Clark and off the official parade route. Instead of about 3 miles, up Belmont and back down Broadway, we walked maybe a mile in total. Boo! This was a particular pisser since, marching with a non-profit, I totally think we were much more deserving than Office Depot or the half-dozen moving companies that marched much earlier in the parade than we did. I’ve talked to about a half-dozen friends who were watching the parade but – whoops! – didn’t get to see me marching because we missed most of the fucking parade.

I sympathize with the problem that 750,000 people can bring. I really do. But it’s pride. They knew how crowded it was going to be. (They didn’t, admittedly, know a bunch of floats’ tires would get slashed. That was bogus, and not the City’s fault.) Chatting with other queer folks at and after the parade, we discussed how it was particularly frustrating since so many people were clearly not LGBTQ, or even really allies, and had simply come to gawk. Pride is absolutely supposed to be a celebration, but – having not been in a few years – I forgot how it’s not really ‘our’ celebration.

I don’t know what the city can do, though. I wish there were a way to be, like, “Are you going to Pride because you really care, or just cuz you want to get free stickers and maybe see some boobs?”

I’m still glad I went, even though it was exhausting and somewhat frustrating. I got to meet (and become closer with) a bunch of awesome people. I went to the 7PM Too Much Light show after Pride and then to grab a bite to eat with folks, and was kind of in queer artist heaven. (This statement will be doubly embarrassing  if any of the people I hung out with read this blog.) And then, while walking along Clark, someone came up to me and said “Oh my god, I saw you perform at Fringe! You’re amazing!”

A nice confidence booster, and an awesome way to end Pride weekend.

Sue knows how it's done

A counterpoint to the good gender education posted earlier. Feedback is certainly welcome. This will be delivered as stereotypically ‘gym teacher’ as possible.

Listen up, everyone! The politicians in Washington think we aren’t doing a good enough job teaching you all what it means to be real women. Dunno if you’ve been following the news lately. The whole No Gender Left Behind Act nonsense has lotsa people up in arms, but it just seems good sense to me. Girls should be taught how to be ladies, and boys how to be gentlemen. That’s how it was when I was your age.

Like they always do, those same politicians decided your physical education curriculum would be the best place for this new knowledge. I’m no fancy man in a suite in Washington, but I think gym class should be about a good hustle. Be that as it may, this next week we’ll be having some ‘gender education’ lessons at the top of every class.

Who can tell me what it means to be a boy?

(Audience participation. The correct answer is ‘To have a penis.’ The audience is either right or wrong, but either way…)

Being a boy means you have a penis. That’s all there is to it.

Who can tell me what it means to be a girl?

(Repeat)

That’s right. Girls have vaginas.

And how do the people around you know if you’re a boy or a girl?

No, Susan, don’t go around showing boys your vagina. That means you’re a slut. People know you’re a boy if you act like a boy, dammit. They’ll know you’re a girl if you act like one.

Boys and girls are just different! According to the National Association for Single Sex Public Education, boys like the following:

• Things that are dangerous
• Things that are loud and lively
• Constant movement
• Authority figures
• Snakes
• Dynamite
• Virus outbreaks

Girls don’t like those things! They like:

• Heterosexual relationships
• Being emotional
• Friendships
• Drama

That’s science, and you can’t argue with science.

From now on, we’ll be dividing the class into boys and girls. Boys will be learning football, basketball, and soccer. Girls will be learning badminton, volleyball, and cheering. We’ll also be grading not only on how hard you try, but on how you look doing it. No more weaving and dodging in football, gentlemen: if you’re not getting hurt, you’re not playing right. And, ladies, I expect you to care just as much about how your hair looks playing the game as you do about the game’s score.

So get back to it! Boys, fifty laps. And no complaining! Men don’t complain, they drink! Girls, lets get some makeup on. And no complaining! Women don’t complain, they develop eating disorders!