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Tuesday, 2 September 2008

Happy Families

I was reading about Sarah Palin's teenage daughter, seventeen years old, five months pregnant, and about to marry. Throughout all the media flurry of a Republican right wing candidate's - shock horror - daughter up the duff, but she's getting married so it's ok, I haven't heard what Bristols (?) herself thinks. And nor will I. I've looked at the photo of the Palins' all, beaming and gleaming like a Mormon dental convention, and it reminded me of those ghastly pics you'd see of a conservative politician who'd just been caught shagging a topless dancer, so a hastily arranged 'happy family hanging over the garden gate' photoshoot would be arranged. "Smile Mrs Politician! Yeah I know you've been humiliated in front of millions but keep that rictus grin a-comin'!"

If it's Bristol Palin's choice to have the baby and get married, well good for her. Only a wishy washy liberal would suggest it might be something she's been pressurised into. Because I don't know about having a baby or an abortion at seventeen but I certainly think it's far too young to get married.

On another note - I'm going to be teaching creative writing at the Open University next term. Husband keeps making remarks about black stockings and mortar boards. Honestly . . . .

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good luck with the OU Creative Writing course. I'm sure you'll be wonderful at it.

At least you can't be any worse than the tutor I had when I did creative writing with the OU a couple of years ago: she had never heard of Edgar Allen Poe. Not never *read*, but never *heard of*.

I left shortly thereafter.

Jane said...

Jaysus! Really?! How can you never have heard of Edgar Allen Poe?

I found the OU interview quite tough so presumed that the standard of tutors was reasonably high. But there are always exceptions.

I once did a short creative writing course and the tutor had a wall eye. Not that it mattered of course but whenever anyone asked what her actual experience of creative writing was, she's sigh, wave her hands about and say: "I am a simple storyteller." Which could mean anything from "I write books" to "I drink too much and am very boring".

I didn't last too long on that course either. I couldn't tell if she was looking at me or not.

Anonymous said...

There was also someone in my class who was blind due to an illness. She had been blind for around 6 months. Very sad for her and all, but one of the exercises was that the tutor handed out slips of paper with a colour on it. We were then to write a short fictional piece and from that the other members of the class had to guess what colour each person had been given. Blind Lady said this was sight-ist and also "colour-ist" because she couldn't see colours. She'd only been blind a few months! Surely she remembered colours?

I don't mean to be an insensitive bitch, but... *really*.