I know I should be talking about progressive issues that were discussed at the Campus Progress Conference but surely one of the highlights was hearing Linda Sanchez speak. She recounted a story in which two men in business suits in the elevator of a House office building politely asked which office she worked in. "Oh, I have my own office here," she replied.
She also left us with these words of wisdom:
Top Ten Reasons I Don't Date Republicans
by Linda Sanchez
10. The only time they believe in fiscal restraint is when the dinner bill comes.
9. His idea of getting to second base is fondling my stock portfolio.
8. He thinks that Emily's List is a call girl service.
7. His idea of oral stimulation is getting me to recite the Contract with America.
6. He thinks that white pantyhose and pearls are sexy--and you should see what he wants me to wear.
5. Because when Republicans say that they want to create opportunities for minorities, that means they want to date me and Loretta [Linda's sister. Also a congresswoman].
4. Despite all the hype, I still can't find his weapon of mass destruction.
3. His pending prison term for political corruption is just another excuse for him to be emotionally unavailable.
2. Republicans are only interested in screwing the poor.
1. Because they make love like they make war: they lie to get in and don't have a plan for what to do once they get there
Monday, July 14, 2008
Sunday, July 13, 2008
List
I thought I had been to a lot of museums here lately, but after making this list, I guess there are at least as many that I haven't gone to as I have.
Museums visited:
Natural History
National Gallery (west wing)
Freer and Sackler Gallery
Holocaust Memorial Museum
Library of Congress
Folger Shakespeare Library
National Geographic Society Explorer's Hall
Need to go to:
National Gallery (east wing and sculpture garden)
Hirshhorn
Air and Space
National Archives
Health and Medicine
Botanical Gardens
Museums visited:
Natural History
National Gallery (west wing)
Freer and Sackler Gallery
Holocaust Memorial Museum
Library of Congress
Folger Shakespeare Library
National Geographic Society Explorer's Hall
Need to go to:
National Gallery (east wing and sculpture garden)
Hirshhorn
Air and Space
National Archives
Health and Medicine
Botanical Gardens
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
I am an atheist
I haven't read any of Dawkins or Hitchens so I won't comment on their books, but I did watch a TV interviews with Dawkins where he promoted "The God Delusion". Dawkins raised the question of why there isn't a stronger atheist/secular lobbying presence in American politics.
Now that I've been working in policy for a month, I have a much better idea of how powerful interest groups are. (Conclusion: very powerful) I feel somewhat conflicted about outspoken antitheists because I don't like polemical antitheists. I don't like angry people in general.
But I also believe that power comes from creating policy. (After all, my position now at AIDS Alliance is to be an advocate for certain policies.) Therefore atheists do need to be more vocal about their vision of a society. The discussion of atheism can't stall at simply supporting Darwin, the Big Bang. Thinking about it, I now think that the antitheist rhetoric is not any more damaging or mean than what their opponents say or what any interest group says about its opponents. At a point, all issues important to me and you need to be defended and strengthed through the law. Laws affect everyone and so atheism moves into a much more public arena for discussion.
I'd love to work at a atheist/secular advocacy organization. Perhaps an internship next summer?
Dawkins also brought up the negative stigma in America with being an atheist. He said that there are more atheists in America than they will admit. I definitely know that when I tell people I am atheist, a common reply is a joke about the lack of morals. I suppose I could say that I'm agnostic, but that would be lying.
I have morals, thank-you-very-much. My family taught me them.
Now that I've been working in policy for a month, I have a much better idea of how powerful interest groups are. (Conclusion: very powerful) I feel somewhat conflicted about outspoken antitheists because I don't like polemical antitheists. I don't like angry people in general.
But I also believe that power comes from creating policy. (After all, my position now at AIDS Alliance is to be an advocate for certain policies.) Therefore atheists do need to be more vocal about their vision of a society. The discussion of atheism can't stall at simply supporting Darwin, the Big Bang. Thinking about it, I now think that the antitheist rhetoric is not any more damaging or mean than what their opponents say or what any interest group says about its opponents. At a point, all issues important to me and you need to be defended and strengthed through the law. Laws affect everyone and so atheism moves into a much more public arena for discussion.
I'd love to work at a atheist/secular advocacy organization. Perhaps an internship next summer?
Dawkins also brought up the negative stigma in America with being an atheist. He said that there are more atheists in America than they will admit. I definitely know that when I tell people I am atheist, a common reply is a joke about the lack of morals. I suppose I could say that I'm agnostic, but that would be lying.
I have morals, thank-you-very-much. My family taught me them.
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Capital Pride 2008
Yesterday was my first gay pride parade, Capital Pride 2008. The Grand Marshall was Bruce Vilanch. I haven't heard of him either. I thought they'd get someone more recognizable but then I remembered that there aren't that many gay famous people in the world.
Max said that the parade would be as much a perversion of his culture as orientalism was a perversion of mine. I saw a group in the parade that was a clever perversion of both our cultures: Men dressed in costume-y kimonos made up like geishas. They marched to commemorate an elderly Asian woman named Noi Chudnoff and carried a large photo of her. A little googling revealed a Washington Post article about her. She was the owner of Go Mama Go!, a home decor boutique with funky, cool things. She was a supporter of LGBT causes. Born in Thailand, Noi went to college in America and married an American husband.
It always makes me happy to see Asians supporting LGBT causes because I think non-heterosexual sexuality is still very taboo in Asian cultures. However, it seemed insensitive to me that geisha drag queens (is that what they're called?) should represent her in the parade. But perhaps at a pride parade, all we can expect are stereotypes.
Max said that the parade would be as much a perversion of his culture as orientalism was a perversion of mine. I saw a group in the parade that was a clever perversion of both our cultures: Men dressed in costume-y kimonos made up like geishas. They marched to commemorate an elderly Asian woman named Noi Chudnoff and carried a large photo of her. A little googling revealed a Washington Post article about her. She was the owner of Go Mama Go!, a home decor boutique with funky, cool things. She was a supporter of LGBT causes. Born in Thailand, Noi went to college in America and married an American husband.
It always makes me happy to see Asians supporting LGBT causes because I think non-heterosexual sexuality is still very taboo in Asian cultures. However, it seemed insensitive to me that geisha drag queens (is that what they're called?) should represent her in the parade. But perhaps at a pride parade, all we can expect are stereotypes.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Deposed Little Emperors?
I'm seeing something of a pattern develop in my blog posts. NYTimes articles, China
It's been a day and a month since the 5/12 earthquake and I wished I had said something about this earlier but I have finally gotten around to it now. Though there has been much coverage of the earthquake, this article in from The Guardian, "Sichuan earthquake: Tragedy brings new mood of unity", will suffice to highlight some of the things I noticed about the earthquake response.
The outpouring of volunteerism surprised everyone. As in America, volunteers are generally people who can set aside some time and money (in lost income). This requires a certain amount of privilege. In China, this is generally college students because only the very smartest students can enter elite colleges and only their parents can pay for them. Zhang Qiyu interviewed in the article is a student at what the article called "an elite university in Beijing" and there are many in the capital. These examples in the Guardian article and others I have read give me great optimism that volunteerism will continue.
In recent years much of China has become many times wealthier, which would suggest that there should be more people giving up their time and resource for others with no material benefit. But since the early 80s, urban dwellers have been prohibited from having more than one child per couple. I've heard a lot of criticsm of this population policy, that singletons are selfish and coddled by the attention of many grandparents and relatives, that it will strain the public social security system as all nations will low birthrates have a small workforce to support a large aging population. A journalist coined these singleton children "little emperors". So now the one-child generation ismaturing, going to college, and entering the world. By these examples of young people being involved in their community, I hope it will calm some of the concern about this competitive and self-centered generation.
I also hope that mental health will be given more weight in China as well. As part of the earthquake efforts, psychologists were available as well as physicians. There is in no way China has nearly enough psychologists, psychiatrists, and therapists to serve all the people's needs. In addition, it will take much time and effort to dimish the stigma of mental illness and to make people view mental illness as a legitimate condition.
It's been a day and a month since the 5/12 earthquake and I wished I had said something about this earlier but I have finally gotten around to it now. Though there has been much coverage of the earthquake, this article in from The Guardian, "Sichuan earthquake: Tragedy brings new mood of unity", will suffice to highlight some of the things I noticed about the earthquake response.
The outpouring of volunteerism surprised everyone. As in America, volunteers are generally people who can set aside some time and money (in lost income). This requires a certain amount of privilege. In China, this is generally college students because only the very smartest students can enter elite colleges and only their parents can pay for them. Zhang Qiyu interviewed in the article is a student at what the article called "an elite university in Beijing" and there are many in the capital. These examples in the Guardian article and others I have read give me great optimism that volunteerism will continue.
In recent years much of China has become many times wealthier, which would suggest that there should be more people giving up their time and resource for others with no material benefit. But since the early 80s, urban dwellers have been prohibited from having more than one child per couple. I've heard a lot of criticsm of this population policy, that singletons are selfish and coddled by the attention of many grandparents and relatives, that it will strain the public social security system as all nations will low birthrates have a small workforce to support a large aging population. A journalist coined these singleton children "little emperors". So now the one-child generation ismaturing, going to college, and entering the world. By these examples of young people being involved in their community, I hope it will calm some of the concern about this competitive and self-centered generation.
I also hope that mental health will be given more weight in China as well. As part of the earthquake efforts, psychologists were available as well as physicians. There is in no way China has nearly enough psychologists, psychiatrists, and therapists to serve all the people's needs. In addition, it will take much time and effort to dimish the stigma of mental illness and to make people view mental illness as a legitimate condition.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
From the Hill
Two days ago I went to a congressional hearing of the House Committee on Ways and Means health subcommittee. The topic of the hearing was "Addressing Disparities in Health and Healthcare: Issues for Reform." Four Congresspeople and a panel of physicians and public health experts testified on the various disparities. Three Congresswomen (yay for women in government!)were members of the TriCaucus, that is, the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, and the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus. When I think of health disparities, the most common groups that are affected are racial and ethnic minorities. But Congressman Jerry Moran of the 1st Kansas district brought to the committee a disparity I hadn't thought much about, the needs of the rural community. It was pretty cool just to be at a congressional hearing. It was in the Longworth building, which is the office building where some Reps have their offices. Saw lots of staffers, interns walking around.
So I want to make a connection from this hearing to two more articles I read yesterday. The first, "Doctors Miss Cultural Needs, Study Says" is an illustration of the disparity in health outcome. By this I mean that people of difference racial and ethnic groups have access to the same physician or same pool of physicians so the ability of the physician is the same for all people. This was a measure of outcome because it looked at three factors that measure how well diabetes is controlled: LDL cholesterol, blood pressure, and hemoglobin A1C, a stabler, more long-term measure of blood glucose. Given the same physicians AND adjusting for socioeconomic factors AND clinical differences in patient conditions, the study showed that African-Americans had poorer control of their diabetes.
This isn't to say that doctors are necessarily racist but that they need to talk to patients in ways that are tailored to their habits and culture. For example, if a doctor recommends a certain diet that is wholly unfamiliar to people of that culture, then there will be poor compliance. (See previous entry regarding dietary habits.)
There are also disparities in quality of care, which includes barriers such as lack of language interpreters so that patients don't understand their diagnoses, prescription directions, and don't use preventative care. Furthermore, disparities in access of coverage also exist. That is, minorities are also more likely to be poor and therefore don't have private insurance. Even within an insurance plan, there are disparities.
One way to have more culturally competent care is to have more minority doctors! According to testimony by Dr. Mohammad Akhter of the National Medical Association, blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans made up only 6% of US medical school graduates. (I guess Asians are overrepresented?)
Of course doctors can be taught about minority communities, but really, physicians who aren't old white men don't feel as comfortable talking to old white male physicians either. People who grew up in rural areas are more likely to return there to practice because frankly, if you didn't grew up in NYC, you'd think agricultural Kansas is inhospitable. MSU's College of Human Medicine should be praised for its rural medicine program. It trains med school students to practice in rural communities.
From health and healthcare, we go to another issue faced by a particular minority: Asian Americans. "Report Takes Aim at ‘Model Minority’ Stereotype of Asian-American Students" describes how this stereotype is not true because Asian Pacific American is such a broad category that it encompasses a very diverse group of people, from native Hawaiians to Chinese to Sri Lankans. If we look at the APA group by nation, then stark differences appear, "while most of the nation’s Hmong and Cambodian adults have never finished high school, most Pakistanis and Indians have at least a bachelor’s degree."
I want to emphasis this point: The SAT scores of Asian-Americans, it said, like those of other Americans, tend to correlate with the income and educational level of their parents.
The expansiveness of the category APA is another issue discussed at the hearing. There are dozens of countries included in the category APA and hundreds of languages. Timely and disaggregated data is needed to identify their needs and try to create policies that help them. This is a particularly appalling example: The Social Security Agency does not ask the race of its applicants for SS cards. Why is this important? Because many Medicare stats use SSA data.
The sheer number of languages spoken by APA patients makes it difficult for doctors and hospitals to provide translators for them. Unlike Hispanics who mostly speak Spanish, no one language unifies APA.
Data is powerful but data is precisely what is lacking about APA. The statistics in this article really surprised me and they are a potent force dispelling the model minority myth. I was surprised by some of the stats. For example, a larger percent of Asian Americans earned degrees in the humanities and social sciences than all students! The numbers are the same for biological/life sciences. (But they do earn more engineering degrees.)
The implications of disaggregated data are huge: we will be able to help APA patients get medical care that is tailored to their culture, not just that half of the world. Hawaii to Central Asia is a large area! We'll also be able to help APA students who are struggling in school.
Links:
Committee on Ways and Means
Hearing: Addressing Disparities in Health and Healthcare: Issues for Reform (with links to individual testimony)
Congressional Black Caucus
Congressional Hispanic Caucus
Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus
Jerry Moran Kansas 1st District
Doctors Miss Cultural Needs, Study Says
Report Takes Aim at ‘Model Minority’ Stereotype of Asian-American Students
So I want to make a connection from this hearing to two more articles I read yesterday. The first, "Doctors Miss Cultural Needs, Study Says" is an illustration of the disparity in health outcome. By this I mean that people of difference racial and ethnic groups have access to the same physician or same pool of physicians so the ability of the physician is the same for all people. This was a measure of outcome because it looked at three factors that measure how well diabetes is controlled: LDL cholesterol, blood pressure, and hemoglobin A1C, a stabler, more long-term measure of blood glucose. Given the same physicians AND adjusting for socioeconomic factors AND clinical differences in patient conditions, the study showed that African-Americans had poorer control of their diabetes.
This isn't to say that doctors are necessarily racist but that they need to talk to patients in ways that are tailored to their habits and culture. For example, if a doctor recommends a certain diet that is wholly unfamiliar to people of that culture, then there will be poor compliance. (See previous entry regarding dietary habits.)
There are also disparities in quality of care, which includes barriers such as lack of language interpreters so that patients don't understand their diagnoses, prescription directions, and don't use preventative care. Furthermore, disparities in access of coverage also exist. That is, minorities are also more likely to be poor and therefore don't have private insurance. Even within an insurance plan, there are disparities.
One way to have more culturally competent care is to have more minority doctors! According to testimony by Dr. Mohammad Akhter of the National Medical Association, blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans made up only 6% of US medical school graduates. (I guess Asians are overrepresented?)
Of course doctors can be taught about minority communities, but really, physicians who aren't old white men don't feel as comfortable talking to old white male physicians either. People who grew up in rural areas are more likely to return there to practice because frankly, if you didn't grew up in NYC, you'd think agricultural Kansas is inhospitable. MSU's College of Human Medicine should be praised for its rural medicine program. It trains med school students to practice in rural communities.
From health and healthcare, we go to another issue faced by a particular minority: Asian Americans. "Report Takes Aim at ‘Model Minority’ Stereotype of Asian-American Students" describes how this stereotype is not true because Asian Pacific American is such a broad category that it encompasses a very diverse group of people, from native Hawaiians to Chinese to Sri Lankans. If we look at the APA group by nation, then stark differences appear, "while most of the nation’s Hmong and Cambodian adults have never finished high school, most Pakistanis and Indians have at least a bachelor’s degree."
I want to emphasis this point: The SAT scores of Asian-Americans, it said, like those of other Americans, tend to correlate with the income and educational level of their parents.
The expansiveness of the category APA is another issue discussed at the hearing. There are dozens of countries included in the category APA and hundreds of languages. Timely and disaggregated data is needed to identify their needs and try to create policies that help them. This is a particularly appalling example: The Social Security Agency does not ask the race of its applicants for SS cards. Why is this important? Because many Medicare stats use SSA data.
The sheer number of languages spoken by APA patients makes it difficult for doctors and hospitals to provide translators for them. Unlike Hispanics who mostly speak Spanish, no one language unifies APA.
Data is powerful but data is precisely what is lacking about APA. The statistics in this article really surprised me and they are a potent force dispelling the model minority myth. I was surprised by some of the stats. For example, a larger percent of Asian Americans earned degrees in the humanities and social sciences than all students! The numbers are the same for biological/life sciences. (But they do earn more engineering degrees.)
The implications of disaggregated data are huge: we will be able to help APA patients get medical care that is tailored to their culture, not just that half of the world. Hawaii to Central Asia is a large area! We'll also be able to help APA students who are struggling in school.
Links:
Committee on Ways and Means
Hearing: Addressing Disparities in Health and Healthcare: Issues for Reform (with links to individual testimony)
Congressional Black Caucus
Congressional Hispanic Caucus
Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus
Jerry Moran Kansas 1st District
Doctors Miss Cultural Needs, Study Says
Report Takes Aim at ‘Model Minority’ Stereotype of Asian-American Students
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Supposedly my people eat everything.
I take the NYTimes as my primary source of information. I like it most of the time. I just read about a health disparity study and the Asian American model minority myth, and these articles got me thinking and I'm trying to form something coherent about it to write down later.
But sometimes the Times disappoints me. Like the most recent article I've read tonight was "Scorpions for Breakfast and Snails for Dinner". Perhaps making the Times the target of my frustration is somewhat misplaced, or more accurately, too narrow, since I find this generalization rampant throughout American culture.
The author sums up Chinese food as such, "Both Roy and Alice were born and raised here in China, where people eat anything. I’ve seen animal markets in the southern city of Guangzhou where vendors sell live porcupines, pangolins, badgers, crocodiles, cobras and civet cats, all destined for the tips of chopsticks in the city’s costlier restaurants." You know, if all the Chinese eat snails, there would be no more snails in the world. And what is a pangolin??
Some people who read this article are going to say that the warm fuzzy moral of this article is an admiration for the tough, enduring character of the Chinese people despite hardship and famine, as reflected in their non-fussy palate, blah blah blah.
Well the author evidently didn't love the Chinese culture so much as to continue to send his kids to Chinese schools. They went to a French school. His characterization of the Chinese through their food might call for praise of the people, but it continues to distance salmon and granola Americans from those Chinese who "eat everything". Even if this was an ode to the Chinese, it's a very backhanded one.
Furthermore, the author seems try to establish his children as being just like the locals and embracing Chinese culture, including its gustatory one by describing them eating all kinds of things I've never even seen on a menu. Why have I not seen these things on a menu? I don't think I've ever been to that expensive of a restaurant. The anecdote about trout skin was appropriate to describe the poverty level of the people who ate gross non-food items THEN. Now civets or whatever aren't the grub of poor people. It's what you take people to eat on the expense account and want to impress them.
Dear friends, I challenge you to find an article about Chinese cuisine that doesn't gross out its American readers about all the gruesome non-food items that the Chinese eat with relish.
At least the Chinese don't sit down with their family to eat dinner brandishing knives and spears. The pale-skinned people are such barbarians.
But sometimes the Times disappoints me. Like the most recent article I've read tonight was "Scorpions for Breakfast and Snails for Dinner". Perhaps making the Times the target of my frustration is somewhat misplaced, or more accurately, too narrow, since I find this generalization rampant throughout American culture.
The author sums up Chinese food as such, "Both Roy and Alice were born and raised here in China, where people eat anything. I’ve seen animal markets in the southern city of Guangzhou where vendors sell live porcupines, pangolins, badgers, crocodiles, cobras and civet cats, all destined for the tips of chopsticks in the city’s costlier restaurants." You know, if all the Chinese eat snails, there would be no more snails in the world. And what is a pangolin??
Some people who read this article are going to say that the warm fuzzy moral of this article is an admiration for the tough, enduring character of the Chinese people despite hardship and famine, as reflected in their non-fussy palate, blah blah blah.
Well the author evidently didn't love the Chinese culture so much as to continue to send his kids to Chinese schools. They went to a French school. His characterization of the Chinese through their food might call for praise of the people, but it continues to distance salmon and granola Americans from those Chinese who "eat everything". Even if this was an ode to the Chinese, it's a very backhanded one.
Furthermore, the author seems try to establish his children as being just like the locals and embracing Chinese culture, including its gustatory one by describing them eating all kinds of things I've never even seen on a menu. Why have I not seen these things on a menu? I don't think I've ever been to that expensive of a restaurant. The anecdote about trout skin was appropriate to describe the poverty level of the people who ate gross non-food items THEN. Now civets or whatever aren't the grub of poor people. It's what you take people to eat on the expense account and want to impress them.
Dear friends, I challenge you to find an article about Chinese cuisine that doesn't gross out its American readers about all the gruesome non-food items that the Chinese eat with relish.
At least the Chinese don't sit down with their family to eat dinner brandishing knives and spears. The pale-skinned people are such barbarians.
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