Schoolgirl loses ‘virginity ring’ fight

MSNBC.com: Reuters

LONDON - A teenager whose teachers had stopped her wearing a “purity ring” at school to symbolize her commitment to virginity has lost a High Court fight against the ban.

Lydia Playfoot, 16, says her silver ring is an expression of her faith and had argued in court that it should be exempt from school regulations banning the wearing of jewelry.

“I am very disappointed by the decision this morning by the High Court not to allow me to wear my purity ring to school as an expression of my Christian faith not to have sex outside marriage,” Playfoot said in a statement Monday.

I'm not too sure "virginity rings" work as a primary means of birth control either.
I kind of wonder if teenage boys consider them a come on, or a special challenge.
Not that they should.
Do boys wear them?

Playfoot’s parents are key members of the British arm of the American chastity campaign group the Silver Ring Thing, a religious group which urges abstinence among young people.

That helps. This had to be American, somehow.

The Veil of French Politics

New York Times Blog: By Judith Warner

[Ségolène Royal] justified this unusual incursion into her private life on the grounds that it advanced “the cause of women.” She also posed at home with Hollande and their children to showcase the kind of “organization” that was necessary to balance high-level government work with the needs of a large family...

...[A]ll this exposure isn’t necessarily shocking from an American perspective. Royal’s penchant for making the personal political can even be seen as an admirable form of public expression for a woman who has consistently spoken out on behalf of working women and their families since escaping from the home of her domineering, authoritarian father in the 1970s. But it’s been a major style shift for France, where the separation between public and private life has traditionally been so absolute – and protected so assiduously by the judicial system, politicians and the inner court of Parisian journalists who cover (and sometimes sleep with) them – that Francois Mitterrand was for decades able to maintain, at taxpayer expense, an illegitimate daughter and a mistress without the knowledge of the broader electorate.

This secrecy, we might say, is self-serving and elitist. But it has also led to a somewhat higher level of political discourse than Monkey Business and Monicagate.

At base, the French would say (they said it to me, in fact, incessantly, when I was there covering politics at the time of the Clinton impeachment scandal), it’s emblematic of a profound philosophical difference that sets them apart from Americans: the fact that the French don’t subscribe to the idea of “transparency.” “Transparency,” in this context, is the notion that a person’s innermost soul is revealed in each and every one of his or her acts. To believe in that kind of transparency is naïve, the French believe; it’s more realistic to recognize that human behavior is murky and messy and, in the case of politicians in particular, often highly compartmentalized. So it’s pointless to make sweeping judgments about a person’s political valor by his or her private life – and it’s none of the public’s business, anyway.

That attitude, apparently, is now changing...

Video: working on our stereotypes

Video

This must be a metaphor for something.
Maybe it's just an ad for Geico.

Tribal music-making

Native American Times :

For the first time ever, traditional Native flute has been beautifully intertwined with Jewish- and Israeli-themed classical cello music, creating magnificent cross-cultural dialogues between world-renowned musicians R. Carlos Nakai, Navajo-Ute, flutist, and cellist Udi Bar-David, Israeli emigre. From these dialogues, the ''Voyagers'' recording evolved, creating an unforgettable unique collection of musical and cultural history.

Preparing for the recording, Bar-David, a 20-year veteran cellist for the Philadelphia Orchestra, listened to American Indian traditional music as well as Jewish- and Israeli-themed music. Once in the studio, Bar-David explained, ''We expanded on themed music and entered an artistic dialogue. We created it at the moment. It was an improvisation, a natural revolution. We created a cross-cultural recording, a first of its kind.''

How Idol insinuates itself into pop-music history

By Katherine Meizel and Jody Rosen - Slate Magazine

Katherine Meizel is a Ph.D. candidate in ethnomusicology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she is writing her dissertation on American Idol.

Oy. Filling a much needed gap in the literature.

The latest cultural Rorschach

If you must, see: Joan Walsh - Salon

The video clip of an earlier Colbert Report with Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem cooking has apparently been removed from YouTube due to a copyright claim by Viacom. I couldn't find a clip on the official Comedy Central Motherload site. Maybe someone else will be more successful.

A ‘First Spouse’ in France? Not Any Time Soon

From The New York Times
By ELAINE SCIOLINO

PARIS, April 26 — No matter who wins the presidency of France on May 6, life in the grand, presidential Élysée Palace is destined to change.

Pretty fascinating commentary on the differences in political culture in the two societies.
I've mostly tended to think America's over-fascination with the personalities and family lives of our Presidents (and Presidential candidates), relative to their ideas and political competence, reflected our barely sublimated desire for a royal family. I was one of the very, very few who thought discussion of a Reagan-Ford ticket for President and Prime Minister (was that 1976?) was sort of interesting (structurally, not in terms of those particular leaders, neither of whom commanded my respect or admiration at the time). I'm still inclined to think a very large share of abiding American affection for Reagan reflects more on his royal/grandfatherly image than on his policies.
The French example complicates that simple explanation. But maybe the French are more interested in casting a cinematic bedroom farce than a government. It still beats whatever we have done the past two elections.

My "American Idol" Posting

See my prior posting on Wisconsin sports. 'Nuff said.
Next topic.