Nervous juvenile, won’t smile, what became of you?

Did that swift eclipse blogwatch you?

A commenter at Amy Welborn‘s site thinks I was too demanding in my post on gender and the “feminine qualities” discourse: “If a bunch of bishops issued a list of men’s gifts, the immediate response would be ‘what a bunch of self-important sexist pigs.'”

But my points were these: 1) When you only list women’s Special Gifts, you’re talking as if women are the only gendered people out there–men are gender-neutral. This elision of men’s gendered nature does a disservice to women (who are viewed as bizarre deviations from the neutral male standard) and men (who are left with no language in which to describe and discuss masculinity).

And 2) That said, I dislike the “list of qualities” talk for either sex, so I would also not be wildly thrilled about a document that listed Special Manly Gifts as well as special lady gifts. My earlier post was an admittedly rudimentary attempt to come up with a more accurate way of describing gender differences and complementarities.

Quoth the Maven: Really intriguing, thought-provoking post on developmental stages and the different fears that serve as threats in children’s literature: getting lost, death, damnation. Via Church of the Masses.

Sean Collins writes an excellent rebuttal of my uncannily and astonishingly disorganized post on New X-Men. (I also note, on rereading, that I used the word “denouement” when I meant “backstory”! Who stole my brain???)

I’m still not convinced that Sean’s account of the Phoenix intervention is more justified by the text than my irritated reading. (I think the sequence of events makes mine more plausible. Then again, I was also somewhat emotionally disconnected by the last volume in the series, and emotional disengagement usually warps rather than enhances critical judgment.) But it’s a possible reading and a far more interesting and charitable one than mine, so when I reread the series, as I undoubtedly will, I’ll reread hoping to find that Sean has convinced me: “It’s the Jean-Phoenix that makes this decision, meaning that all of Jean’s life experiences, beliefs, and desires come into play as much if not more so than the Phoenix entity’s cosmic concerns. And how does this new and better direction get set into motion? By Jean so loving the world (and Cyclops in particular) that she gave Emma her only beloved husband. ‘Live’ is her injunction to Scott (a deliberate echo-twin of The Filth’s concluding ‘We have love’), as she gives not just her permission but her blessing to Cyclops. Through her real, true, total love, he can put aside his grief for a relationship that was kept alive like a zombie for years out of both comfort and fear, and embrace a new, vibrant woman, a relationship with whom will provide both Scott and Emma with a wealth of potential for human growth and happiness.”

Sean points out that this reading, where sacrificial love makes possible–but doesn’t force–new life and regeneration, echoes the Gospels; in fact, that language is very close to how I present the Gospel at the pregnancy center.

Sean is definitely right about Beast’s role, and I am kicking myself for not noticing it.

When Will the Hurting Stop?: Another list of eleven comics that libraries should stock. Via Sean, who needs to fix the links in his posts!

“Mom who smoked dodges jail time”: More insanity from the borderland where divorce court meets the nanny state. Via How Appealing.

“The View from Out There”: What other countries’ textbooks say about American history. Fascinating stuff, via E-Pression and Mark Shea.

“Lourdes 2: Countercultural pilgrimage”: Lovely piece from Uwe Siemon-Netto; excerpt: “There is no other spot in the world where the ill fraternize — in the literal sense of the word — as intensely with the healthy as Lourdes. There is no place where strapping nobles and university professors, wonderful young men and women brimming with health, cheerfully take care of the sick for 16 hours every day, often spending their nights curled up on the floor below the foot-end of their patients’ beds.

“Lourdes is profoundly counter-cultural. It is a mass gathering of those who affirm the ‘you’ as opposed to the ‘me,’ which is why the West’s anthropocentric, anti-Catholic and in the final analysis anti-Christian elites find Lourdes so scandalous — pointing, often dishonestly, to the kitsch that is for sale there.”

Via Otto-da-Fe.