That is an excellent example of how something that can seem to make no sense, makes sense once you know more!
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I am a cis white woman and I do not shave my legs. To each their own, and fuck the naysayers.
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I think the issue is maintenance.
(Personally, I’ve never been able to commit to maintenance of any kind)
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Exactly. Wearing stockings every once in a while can feel awesome. Wearing them 5 days a week to work when they’re basically disposable after only one or two wearings gets annoying real fast. Wearing them in an environment where you need to keep a spare pair in your purse in case you get a run aka ladder really sucks.
Come to think of it, never mind drinking straws, let’s ban fucking nylon stockings.
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Also drinking straws can be an accessibility tool. Banning them is fucked.
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The utilikilt is a nice garment. My ex had one.
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This came out after Handmaids but pretty sure she is cool on sci-fi
Oryx and Crake (MaddAddam Trilogy) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0385721676/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_dFjcDbZ2XPAF7
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She’s cool on SF now. We did a whole discussion in my Can Lit class in university on the difference between SF and “speculative fiction” because she refused for her work to be classed as SF back then.
Atwood has always had an uneasy relationship with genre fiction. Remember that Lady Oracle is about a romance writer who considers writing SF at the end of the book, with the implication she still has some of the denial issues she’s been struggling with throughout the story.
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That can lead to shouting matches. 
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Yup. Especially with undergrads who just want to get the damn credit, and are dealing with a prof whose sum total of discussion questions for every book starts and end with, “So what does this say about us as a country?”
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To be fair, you could have quite the discussion on The Handmaid’s Tale with just that question to start it…
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I lost count of how many points of denial are in this article:
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“We’re probably one of the safest families around as far as weapons”
Yeah right.
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I’m not familiar with firearms, generally, but my understanding is that the Glock is a design that did away with a safety altogether. It’s not just the parents, the arms industry is directly culpable in cases like this.
The parents too, of course.
And gun-fondler-culture generally.
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Like most things, it only holds true until it doesn’t.
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This. I do think people who live in gun cultures need to spend a vacation or three somewhere they’re more controlled.
No doubt the grandmother carried the gun for “protection”.
How many times had she actually used it for that? Probably none.
If she had needed it, how long would it have taken her to get it out of her purse and use it? Probably too long to be of any use.
What were the chances of it being used improperly, like by her grandchild? Very high-- toddlers shoot more people than terrorists etc.
And now the father’s conclusion that the family needs to buy guns with more safety features – that leads back to the previous point, because now in the face of a threat it’s going to take even longer to get the gun to be ready for use.
Things like cars are also dangerous, and there are good arguments for banning then, but things like cars have the saving grace of having a purpose other than being used as a weapon. Guns do not.
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We also license drivers, and have drivers go through extensive testing and training, and get insurance, and register their cars, and we hold them responsible if they break the laws or get in an accident.
Try that with guns and the gun nuts are all blah blah blah tyranny blah blah blah jack booted thugs blah blah blah second amendment blah blah blah shall not be infringed.
Never mind even that literal tyranny and Jack booted thugs are not even incompatible with their ideology.
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I am actually amazed at the number of white people living in virtually 100% white areas who are absolutely convinced that they need to carry a gun with them at all times for protection.
And then they’ll sneer at me about how dangerous Chicago is. Well, yes, if you live in one of the historically oppressed (thanks to racism) neighborhoods where drugs and gangs are a major obstacle to getting out. But everywhere else? You are much more likely to be harmed by someone you know and trust, or a police officer so hell-bent on getting a teen who has just robbed a dollar store that they’ll run down a half dozen bystanders as part of the pursuit. (Not just once. At this point, it’s not even just once a week.)
I have to spend a lot of time in rural Indiana, and I can’t help but be keenly aware of the fact that everyone else in the area owns guns, and many of them are carrying when I am with them.
White people make me very afraid, and for good reason. Black teens stealing because they can’t get a decent education or job? Them, I can understand, and I know I’m a lot safer in their vicinity.
But then, I don’t listen to right wing radio or watch Fox News, so I haven’t been brainwashed into being irrationally afraid all the time.
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Here’s a perfect example. Neighborhoods are the defining feature, the borders of what your life will be like:
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I live in one of those areas. In 23 years the ONLY times I have feared for my safety from another person, it was a cop. Nothing happened in any of those three incidents, gratefully.
In a second hand way, I know a family who all carry, all the time. It’s wild to me that they are afraid, and they think something is really going to get dangerous, and that they, with their weapons, are going to be the difference between a tragedy and a heroic saving-of-the-day. Sure, Jan.
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