Colorado (Accidentally) Passes Pro-Single Law April 27, 2009
Posted by Onely in Heteronormativity, single and happy, We like. . ..Tags: Beyond Straight and Gay Marriage, colorado law, designated beneficiary, law supporting singles, Nancy Polikoff, redefining family
5 comments
Colorado: more than just heteronormative ghosts!
The state has passed a law allowing “any two unmarried people to designate each other as entitled to numerous legal consequences usually reserved to married couples”, says Nancy Polikoff, author of Beyond Straight and Gay Marriage, in her 15 April 2009 article about the new legislation. (more…)
Footloose Femails April 25, 2009
Posted by Onely in Guest Bloggers, Reviews, Some Like It Single, We like. . ..Tags: accidental pornography, community of single women, footloose femails, footloosefemails, single women email group
7 comments
Guess what, everyone: One of our readers, the wonderfully named Singal, has set up a Yahoo! Groups email community for single women, called Footloose Femails. The title is a nod to the concept of singles being “free to come and go”. Singal started the group as a way to build community among single women, to make friends and exchange ideas. She wanted to call the group Singals, but unfortunately that was already taken by a porno list (we hate when that happens–see Onely’s experience with creating accidental pornography).
So click the link above to go check out the description of the group and maybe sign up. And/or see Singlutionary’s post for a few more details about the group. If you go to Yahoo! Groups and search from there, make sure to type footloosefemails, all one word.
–Christina and Lisa
Honorary Onely Award: The Bronx State Supreme Court April 21, 2009
Posted by Onely in Honorary Onely Awards, single and happy, We like. . ..Tags: bronx state supreme court, dead fiance, harvesting sperm, posthumous sperm, single and sperm
6 comments
Onely is happy to report a refreshingly pro-single bit of news:
A New York woman has won a race-against-the-clock legal bid to harvest her dead fiance’s sperm.
Did you catch that? A SINGLE woman was allowed to harvest her fiance’s sperm after his sudden death!
This was so surprising to us, in fact, that when Christina sent me this article a few days ago, she (ever-the-singlist-vigilant) wrote: “This would never be allowed if she were single.”
But … luckily for singles everywhere, Christina misread the article!
And so, we’re happy to grant the Bronx State Supreme Court an Honorary Onely Award for listening to UNMARRIED Ms. Marrero and allowing her to harvest her fiance’s sperm after his death (which, okay, we both find a little bit gruesome, but to each her own, right?). (more…)
Bad Onely Activities: Bumblebee Removal April 20, 2009
Posted by Onely in Bad Onely Activities, God-Idiot or Asshole?.Tags: bumblebees, chutzpa, dogs named kitty, i hate bees, lamps, Lassie, single and dogs, single and happy
9 comments
As we’ve discussed in previous posts (such as this one), sometimes being Onely means having to resolve undesirable situations when there’s no one else around. We call these Bad Onely Activities.
Over the weekend, I came home late one night to find my dog, Kitty, paying an unusual amount of attention to the lamp that sits on my bedside table. Kitty (you can see her pic on the About Lisa and Christina tab) was so obsessed that she actually put her two front paws on top of the table to take a closer look at the lamp. (more…)
Super Saccharine: Seekingarrangements.com April 17, 2009
Posted by Onely in As If!, Dating, Food for Thought.Tags: Beth Bailey, feminism, heteronormative, power dynamic, Ruth Padawer, seekingarrangements.com, sugar baby, sugar daddy
14 comments
Lisa found an interesting New York Times article by Ruth Padawer about a web site that hooks rich men up with young, beautiful, financially strapped women, often college students working their way through school. The Sugar Daddies provide their Sugar Babies with money, gifts, trips, and swank (often under the euphemism “mentoring”) in exchange for companionship, sex, and arm candy.
Before I read the article, I thought I knew how I felt about this site, Seekingarrangements.com: Yuck! But the piece includes some very interesting quotes from users of the site, Seekingarrangement.com, that shed new light on the practice of being a daddy or a baby. After reading the article, my feelings about Seekingarrangements.com were: Still Yuck!
Whether or not you think this site amounts to prostitution (I’m not sure), it is undeniably perpetuating a sexist power dynamic. As Padawer says, “The ‘baby’ is the one who regulates her appearance, schedule, behavior and emotions to make the payer feel special.” (The baby is overwhelmingly female, and only one percent of the sugar daddies are actually sugar mommies).
I’ll paste a couple of the more interesting quotes from Padawer’s article below and let our Copious Readership weigh in. What do you all think? (more…)
Onely Watershed Moments April 15, 2009
Posted by Onely in Bad Onely Activities, God-Idiot or Asshole?, Heteronormativity, We like. . ..Tags: accepting singleness, bad year, being single, drywall, dumped twice, single mythology, watershed moment
13 comments
In Lisa’s blurb on our “About Lisa and Christina” tab, she talks about how she fell in love with her single life on a road trip across the country. I was wondering what other watershed moments our Copious Readers have experienced in their journeys from (maybe) heteronormative self-expectations to acceptance of singlehood as a viable, healthy, and acceptable lifestyle.
I don’t know that I ever had a watershed moment. I think my default setting has always been “mostly fine with singleness”, with momentary spikes into “feeling obligated to date to meet social expectations”. However, I think I had a Watershed Month or two sometime in mid-2008. (more…)
“We Don’t Want Another Piece of the Pie… We Want a Whole New Pie” April 13, 2009
Posted by Onely in "Against Love"...?, Heteronormativity, Just Saying., Singled Out.Tags: equality for all, human rights, iowa vote april 3, legalization of gay marriage, piece of the pie, same-sex marriage, whole new pie, winona laduke
5 comments
Winona LaDuke, a Native American political activist, is credited with the 
words that I’m borrowing for the title of this post. I don’t know all that much about LaDuke, but I’ve heard her words (slightly altered) before in a different context. About a year ago, I had what turned out to be a very significant conversation with one of my favorite professors, who explained to me why she, as a lesbian, had no interest in promoting the cause of gay marriage. “I don’t want a piece of that pie,” she said — meaning the institution of marriage — “because it doesn’t solve the problem of equality for all…. Hell, I don’t even like pie!” (more…)
Insignificant others: A steppingstone to kids? April 10, 2009
Posted by Onely in Food for Thought, Just Saying., Your Responses Requested!.Tags: biological clock, discrimination against singles, marriage mythology, pairing up to have kids, single and happy, single men want kids, single parent adoption
27 comments
Copious Readers, what does it mean when otherwise Onely people–who don’t mind being single–are looking for a significant other just because they want to have kids? Is this a good reason to look for a significant other? Currently, our world is set up so that it’s a lot harder to raise children if you don’t have a partner. But it’s wrong that our society is set up like that. So are these people supporting a shoddy system when they first get married before having kids? Should more people consider adopting as singles? Or given the current sub-par state of benefits systems for single parents, is that unfair to the children? (more…)
(Old-Timey) Pop Culture: Stephen King’s The Shining April 9, 2009
Posted by Onely in book review, film review, Pop Culture: Scourge of the Onelys, Reviews, We like. . ..Tags: isolation, nuclear family, single writer, stanley hotel, stephen king, the shining
7 comments
My sister and I recently ghost-toured The Stanley Hotel. The building inspired Stephen King‘s The Shining, his classic novel about a classic nuclear family–father, mother, and psychic son–who move to an isolated hotel in the mountains of Colorado to care for it during the snowed-in winter. After our tour, Caroline and I watched the The Shining miniseries, for the thrill of seeing good-looking actor types walk around the same places we commoners had just tread.
While watching, I got to thinking about whether the story is King’s commentary (conscious or not) on the Western world’s view of couplehood (and, by extension, the nuclear family) as the core unit of society, around which our lives should preferably be built. I’m interested to know what our Copious Readership thinks the plot “means”. Here’s what happens when our three fresh-faced heroes (Jack, Wendy, and little Danny) arrive at the hotel in October: (more…)
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