Tim's journal

An article from Jezebel about the guy who attended my alma mater as an exchange student (emphasis on the past tense, apparently) and proceeded to call the entire campus "whores" would have been great without one line: "boys really can't handle single-sex schools".

I, and the (at least) other two guys who graduated from Wellesley in 2001, handled it just fine. I don't recall ever calling anyone a whore while I was there[*]. Blame Jeremy Pham's behavior on his douchiness -- blaming it on his gender is too easy. This isn't to say that his gender (or rather, his gendered socialization) has nothing to do with his behavior -- just to remark that apparently, even in discussions of men at a women's college, some of us still end up invisible.

[*] except in the "Listen, ho" sort of way [**]
[**] you had to be there

I think next time I give a talk, I'm going to hold up a baby and say, "This baby doesn't believe in uncertified compilation. This baby wants type safety. This baby doesn't want to use an unverified garbage collector. This baby wants strong guarantees that her reasoning about the code she writes also applies to the code she executes."

Does anyone have a baby I can borrow?

You know what I could stand never to hear again? Complaints about stupid people, when such complaints are perpetrated by hip 25-to-44-year-old upper-income types.

Yes, I'm aware that I used to more or less build my identity around complaining about stupid people. I'm trying not to do that anymore. I don't want to hear you complaining about how all the world's problems are due to stupid people (or religious people, or people who fail to share some trait that you congratulate yourself about) if all you do is work at a corporate job and play video games. You are not doing the world any favors by merely existing. Your intelligence is of no value to anyone else unless you're using it to help alleviate the suffering of some other human beings. If your life goal is accumulating wealth, you are actually worse than the stupid people you revile.

Relatedly, I really don't want to hear anyone bemoaning how terrible it is that "people like us" (see previously mentioned hip 25-to-44-year-olds) aren't reproducing, while "stupid people are having so many kids". If you would teach your hypothetical kids to drive a Subaru Outback to the grocery store and aspire to a plush defense contracting job, the world is probably actually better off without those kids. If your life more or less amounts to consuming large quantities of consumer electronics and artisan-made waffles, what makes you think your kids are going to be any different?

In summary, shit is not fucked up because of stupid people. Shit is fucked up because of some smart people who are intent on using their power to make sure they get the goodies whether anyone else or not. And it's also fucked up because a lot of very smart people spend their lives keeping the power structure going rather than using their talent to undermine it. Blaming stupid people is a great way for that latter group to vent their frustrations without threatening the former group's power.

"I am looking for a blender, would prefer that it be black to match the rest of my kitchen, but a working blender would be nice."
-- someone on Freecycle

...

I pose my sempiternal question: how do people back up their computers these days? Now that I have a Mac, I just let Time Machine do its thing. But what if my office catches on fire while my laptop and the backup drive are both in it? Should I have bigger priorities in that case?

Do you use network backups? If so, where do you get your 80 GB of online storage?

Helpful suggestions always appreciated.

A few weeks ago, while reading about Peter Landin, a computer scientist who died recently and was one of the founders of my field of study (programming language theory), I came across an obituary mentioning that Landin was not only openly bisexual, but also was involved in queer activism. This particular fact was omitted from an otherwise excellent memorial talk on Landin that I attended at ICFP 2009.

While following links, I learned that an equally significant researcher, Christopher Strachey, was gay (the fact merits two sentences in an article by M. Campbell-Kelly, "Christopher Strachey, 1916–1975: A Biographical Note" -- sorry, you won't be able to read it unless you happen to have an institutional subscription to the IEEE Annals of the History of Computing), and that during the 1930s, his education was disrupted by a nervous breakdown he suffered that was possibly related to dealing with his homosexuality.

Of course, everybody knows about Alan Turing; when I read about Landin and Strachey, I asked myself "do you have to commit suicide in order to be known as a queer computer scientist?"

I felt as if somebody should have told me that two of the seminal figures in the field I've been working in for the past decade were queer men; I'm not sure who should have told me, or when. But then, I can already hear someone, somewhere asking: "Why should you know, or care? What business is someone else's sexuality?"

Eric Allman, the developer of sendmail (the program that historically has transferred much of Internet email traffic), who's gay, once said, "There is some sort of perverse pleasure in knowing that it's basically impossible to send a piece of hate mail through the Internet without its being touched by a gay program. That's kind of funny." I think that nails it. When you know that something important to you wouldn't exist without the contributions of queer people, it's a bit harder to hate them. The less ability you have to deny that queer people are not "other" but are rather your friends, family and colleagues, the more uncomfortable it is going to be for you to imagine looking at one of them in the eye and explaining why you voted to deny them rights.

Moreover, knowing that a successful person was queer puts their accomplishments in a different light. Knowing that a particular person had to work all that much harder to overcome the shame, guilt and low self-esteem that 20th-century Western culture foisted upon gay and bisexual men makes that person more admirable and creates a feeling of connection, the ability to place oneself in a tradition of people who have struggled and have overcome oppression.

I feel like conventional wisdom is currently saying that queer people have made it: now that we've attained some of the privileges previously reserved for straights, won't we please start acting like them? Not so fast.

I will keep talking about my sexuality in public, because I never chose to make my sexuality a public matter. The people who vote to recognize different relationships differently based on the presumed sexualities of the people involved are the ones who keep my sexuality a public matter. The people who make my ability to board a plane contingent on what set of genitals I have are the ones who keep my sexuality a public matter. Sexuality and reproduction have been matters for public concern forever, and they probably always will be. It's hypocritical to conduct open political debate on the subject of which varieties of sexuality are better than others, and then waggle the invisible finger of social propriety at sexual minority members who dare to engage in that debate by being truthful about themselves.

Who is helped by the taboo against discussing sexuality in public, anyway? I'm not sure that taboos against discussing any kind of sexuality, whether it be gay, bi, non-monogamous, kinky, public, or what have you, actually serve the interests of anybody I'm interested in protecting. What would a world look like where nobody hesitated to be honest about who they are sexually (and when I say "nobody", I mean "nobody" -- queer people aren't the only ones who have closets)? I don't think it would take any of the mystery out of sex; I don't think anything could take the drama and delight out of human relationships. I do think it would make it impossible for any kid growing up to believe that he's the only one who ever liked other boys, or for any kid growing up to believe that she's the only one who ever knew she was a girl despite all appearances to the contrary. Isn't it worth dealing with some discomfort in order to keep those kids away from the pills and sharp objects?

Ultimately, it's not shame about being gay, or bi, or trans, that drives queer people to depression and sometimes suicide. It's the inability to talk about it, and often an accompanying belief that talking about it would keep you out of social life for good. We are truly everywhere, and in 2009, no kid growing up should have to feel they're the only gay or bi or trans person in the world. Maybe what with the advent of the Internet, nobody (in social strata where access to it is ubiquitous, anyway) does believe that anymore. But we're still dangerously close to the time in history where young queer kids believed they were the only one who was like them.

And so although probably everybody who's reading this knows that I'm a transsexual man and that I'm a bisexual person with a moderately strong preference for members of my own gender, I'm saying it again, and I don't intend to let anyone forget it. Happy National Coming Out Day!

What are you coming out as today, and who are you coming out to?

I'm getting rid of more T-shirts that I don't wear often. Some are in good condition, some have minor stains.

Good condition:

• "Into S&M?" on front; "Science & Math - what were you thinking?" on back. Size M, white text on dark blue shirt. (The Society of Physics Students at Wellesley sold these. I am no longer amused.) - taken by amberite
  
• Light gray shirt with "You are dumb" in binary ASCII from ThinkGeek (version 1.0, if you care -- image). Size L. - taken by jholomorphic
  
• "Ask Me About My Penis", white text on black. Size L. (This shirt is only funny if you are presenting as female.)
  
• "Serotonin" with diagram of serotonin molecule below. (image - from Purely Akademik.) Dark blue, size L. - taken by amberite
  
• "Berkelium" with entry from periodic table. (image - also from Purely Akademik.) Dark blue, size L. - taken by jholomorphic
  
• "Bisexual Pride" in large text, "Biversity Boston/BBWM" below in small text. Pink and blue triangles with rainbow stripes, on black shirt. Size L. - taken by nyecamden
  

Slightly damaged:

• "Well-behaved women rarely make history -- Laura [sic] Thatcher Ulrich" on the front, list of Wellesley Alumnae Achievement Awards winners on the back. Light gray, size M. Slight faded stains.
  
• "Berkeley" cartoon (the K is a hand holding up a protest sign with a peace sign on it). Light gray, size L. Very faded stains.
  
• "GEEKISSEXY" - the KISS is in red and the other letters are white - on a black shirt. Size L. No stains, but my bunnies chewed some holes in the collar area. You could cut that part out if that's your thing. - taken by nyecamden
  
• "GOD SAID..." [Maxwell's equations] "...AND THERE WAS LIGHT." Fairly noticeable coffee stain next to text. White, size M. - taken by jholomorphic
  
• "I Got Used at Ned's" (from Ned's Berkeley Bookstore"), some faded stains, white, size L.
  

I'll send any of these to anyone who asks, for the cost of shipping. First come, first serve.

I'm also giving away a gay pride flag, not the standard rainbow flag, but the version that looks like the American flag but with rainbow stripes instead of red and white. It is an awesome flag, I just don't really have anywhere to hang it. It's a smaller version of this. I'd guess about 3 by 5 feet. - taken by Lance.

Dear interwebs:

I'd like to know your favorite vegetarian recipe that takes less than 30 minutes (even better if it's less than 20 minutes) to prepare. Go!

edited to clarify: Must be 30 minutes from zero to ready to eat (that is, I'm not distinguishing between active prep time and passive waiting time).

I had a layover in Minneapolis, but I didn't see Larry Craig.

The plane from Amsterdam to Minneapolis had individual video screens with video on demand. Despite there being about 60 different movies available, the only one I actually wanted to watch was "Ferris Bueller's Day Off". (I watched it. It was okay, but I think I've now seen enough '80s teen movies for a lifetime. If I feel the need to watch another, I'll just watch "Heathers" again.) I watched the first few minutes each of "State of Play", "Lol" (not kidding), "The Uninvited", and "Two Lovers", all of which seemed crap, before settling on "April Bride" as a second movie. It wasn't bad, but the plane landed about halfway through.

There were also games. There was a trivia game where you could play against other people on the same flight, and it also had an all-time hall of fame with people listed by their seat number and flight number.

Having shown my passport once in Portland, twice in Amsterdam, four times in Bristol, twice in Edinburgh, and once in Minneapolis, I didn't get my gender contested once. So that's good (I guess). This might have been the last time I fly out of or into the US, given recent policy changes.

Now I'm sick, so the quest for a thesis topic will have to wait at least one more day.

( Finally, an unrelated random poll )