Urine unites us. Everybody pisses, everyone shits. Philadelphia, like Yemen, smells like piss in a lot of corners. Piss smell is what happens when people are too poor to piss into elaborate sewage systems that eventually carry the scent to some far-off neighborhood you hope you never get stuck in traffic in. I do not feel superior for living in a country where my exposure to the smell of human waste is tied to the frequency of my own bowel movements; to the contrary, my general sense has long been, "I am someone who deserves to smell human waste everywhere I go," but I do not, and I cannot help but feel bad for people who do, and even worse for people forced to drink said piss, like the Lost Boys of Sudan I read about in that Eggers book, and in turn, bad for feeling bad about that, because maybe they don't know any better. For all I know they have been smelling piss on every street corner for so long that they would actually prefer it to, say, Glade, but it's part of my long-held set of assumptions about the species that the smells of piss and shit and period blood are fundamentally unpleasant to the olfactory senses of most people, probably because Evolution wanted to remind us not to eat that stuff and also, maybe, remind us that our proverbial shit proverbially stinks, which is sort of the essence of humanism.

Now, if humanism is the foundation of your worldview, and I try to make it mine, you are bothered by suffering and pain. An eight-year-old gets sold into arranged marriage to a 30-year-old child molester by a father gone crazy and desperate from the humiliation of losing his job and that bothers you. You learn that this is actually not so uncommon an occurrence and that is sad. Maybe, despite the fact that you don't take your blog that seriously, that you don't have time for a thorough examination of the Whole Story, you'd rather call attention to this thing than that thing. You're pretty sure the big thing fucking everything up is poverty, and that maybe reminding people that, you know, most of the problems dividing us as humans, perpetuating tribalism over pluralism and war over peace and anger and (oh my!) bitterness over the freedom to laugh in the streets are rooted in that. So you try to remind people to take the plutocracy to task for that. And you try to remind people that this stuff is too complex to leave to the blogiverse, that there are nuances and subtleties and that the same politician lobbying to free young girls from sex slavery in the name of God led an effort to get all concerts banned from the country in the name of God, and that the singer who defied Al Qaeda threats to come play her concert anyway credits that same God with protecting her, that God is unpredictable that way, and maybe one day we can all learn to laugh together about the funny little misunderstandings and misinterpretations that make us hate one another, but only if a few of us do like the "Yemenista" and try to understand it all a little better.

On the way, we will learn each other's prejudices and stereotypes, societal phenomena, uppers of choice, sexual proclivities, whatev. Maybe we'll shed light on them or "perpetuate" them or however you'd judge it, in letters and writings and blog posts. But of the most disturbing things about our own exchanges with Racialicious and some of these other blogs is the sense that they are standing by, waiting to catch us being insensitive. One said Jezebel had a history of "fucking up racially" by, I think, acknowledging or poking fun at cultural and ethnic stereotypes.

But are stereotypes the problem? Only if your assumption is that Yemenis oppress women — or black men get sent to prison more often, or women get raped more often or white humor bloggers are invariably irreversibly incapable of empathy — because on some level one group is inherently, irredeemably inferior to another. And if that's your assumption, you know, fuck you, don't read this blog. Because the point of it is not to preach some dogma but to start discussions, discussions that will hopefully involve a few decent penis jokes but also lead to conversations that enhance our understanding of one another, and understanding is really only a legitimate goal if you think other humans are capable of independent thought. And if you don't think that after reading about Nojoud Nasser, well...God willing I hope you change your mind.

Mocking A Culture, Mocking A Friend [Racialicious]

Question: Isn't it usually over by now? Why do I keep hearing that the Republican race is probably going to be over but not the Democratic one? Answer: While the Republicans' insistence on winner-take-all primaries may result in a definitive front-runner after their 21 contests today, the proportional awarding of delegates designed by the Democratic Party means that neither Clinton nor Obama are likely to come out far ahead in the delegate race in the 22 Democratic contests being held today.

This means that the late-voting states' Democratic voters (but not their Republican ones) will be able to influence the party's choice of a candidate more than initially expected. (Late voting states include Virginia, Wisconsin, Washington and Ohio.) Paradoxically, Michigan and Florida moved their primaries despite DNC rules and warnings that it would cost them their delegates at the convention in order to have more influence over the process and ended up with none, while relatively red states like Virginia will actually have more power than anyone expected.

Question: Who do I vote for? And where?
Answer: Need some information about how or where to vote in your state's primaries? The League of Women Voters has tons of information to help. (Are you an American expat in Indonesia? Sorry, Obama already "won".) And, in the meantime, contemplate the above image of intra-party affection and hug your opponent's supporter today.

A Super Guide For Super Tuesday [CNN]
Related:Obama The Choice Of Democrats In Indonesia [CNN]
Grateful Dead And Deadheads Reunite For Obama [Reuters]
Who Said: "The Clinton Administration Was The Best Years For The Adult Industry, And I Wish That Clinton Would Run Again?" [Politico]
Vote411.org [League of Women Voters]

For once no! In fact, when I first saw the Today show clip, I had zero interest and zero outrage. I saw him as the latest in a string of douchebags held up by the media to be stoned and eviscerated for the sins of all dudes. I wasn't interested. "I wouldn't even do him," I told Anna. She thought I was, like, letting him off the hook. "Even if you fall for a guy like that," I said, "he can't really hurt you. That's not real hurt. This is real hurt. The only thing some douche like Paul Janka can hurt is your pride. And all I can say for your pride, my friend, is that pride is like cholesterol; it comes good and it comes bad, and most of it is bad, and if it comes from the affirmation of dudes like Janka it's fucking trans-fats. You have to give up your pride to have a truly meaningful relationship. And even then, you're still going to break up. And that, my friend, is genuine hurt."

Except I didn't say it quite like that; I think I said something more dismissive and mean and she thought I was being too harsh on women and I agreed to stop being harsh on women because, my god, they are so much better than men, and there is probably no better testament to this than motherfucking How To Get Laid In New York, Paul Janka's little manual — he's the Thomas Paine of date rape! — on how to screw as many chicks as possible.

Then I got concerned. I felt bad for Janka, because honestly, he's clearly overcompensating for something — and worse for girls who might let a head case work out his issues on their, um, assholes. But because we're all prisoners of that human condition thing, and I didn't quite think he was a sociopath, I wanted to figure out what was going on with him. Why he needed to screw so many girls, what he wanted out of life, where everything had gone wrong, what I could learn about evolution from the whole thing, etc. So I asked him to get drinks.

Anyway then I went to his house and scratched that whole plan because some shit is too funny and bizarre to ruin with some sort of search for Deeper Meaning.

Also, pageviews!