Posted on 05/14/2017 8:30:07 AM PDT by Oldpuppymax
by Tom Ciccotta
An assistant professor at California State Polytechnic University argues in a recent academic research paper that eastern fox squirrels are subjected to a “gendered, racialized, and speciesist” form of media bias.
Teresa Lloro-Bidart, an associate professor of liberal studies at Cal Poly, argues in a recently published postmodernist research paper that eastern fox squirrels are on the receiving end of racially-charged media bias. Lloro-Bidart claims that she worked towards such a conclusion by analyzing the coverage of eastern fox squirrels through “feminist posthumanist,” and “feminist food studies” lenses.
Lloro-Bidart contends that eastern fox squirrels, which is the most populous species of tree squirrel in North America, are on the receiving end of such bigotry due to several factors, most notably, the “western, modernist,” framework by which humans interpret their behaviors and actions.
Given that the shift in tree squirrel demographics is a relatively recent phenomenon, this case presents a unique opportunity to question and re-theorize the ontological given of ‘otherness’ that manifests, in part, through a politics whereby animal food choices ‘[come] to stand in for both compliance and resistance to the dominant forces in [human] culture.’ I, therefore, juxtapose feminist posthumanist theories and feminist food studies scholarship to demonstrate how eastern fox squirrels are subjected to gendered, racialized, and speciesist thinking in the popular news media as a result of their feeding/eating practices, their unique and unfixed spatial arrangements in the greater Los Angeles region and the western, modernist human frame through which humans interpret these actions.
The paper, which is titled, “When ‘Angelino’ squirrels don’t eat nuts: a feminist posthumanist politics of consumption across southern California,” also argues that humans are responsible for “otherizing” eastern fox squirrels.
Eastern fox squirrels, Lloro-Bidart argues, are facing discrimination as a result of the human tendency to lump the species in with the western gray squirrel, a species which is much less tolerant of human beings.
Lloro-Bidart also evokes the concept of intersectionality, an academic concept popularized by Kimberle Crenshaw, which describes overlapping human identities and their relationship to systems of oppression, to analyze the plight of the eastern fox squirrel in California.
OK.
So you made it through the entire screed. Be honest now…does ANYONE understand what the hell this woman is talking about?
According to the Wictionary, “Otherizing” is defined as “making or regarding (a person, social group, etc.) as alien or different.”
And “intersectionality,” is “The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.” Systems of “discrimination or disadvantage.” In other words, treated unfairly; doomed.
It isn’t surprising that leftists should manufacture a language all their own to define the hopeless plight of victims and victim classes. You see, even words which no one really understands can tend to make claims look somehow intellectually “deep,” “thought-provoking,” or official. After all, there couldn’t be a word unless the object or state of being it describes reeeeely exists…right?
So, “otherizing?” Yeah, yeah…I’ve heard of that. It means, dissing somebody, doesn’t it? So these eastern fox squirrels are, like, being insulted and, like, compared with western gray squirrels which like don’t like get along with people. Wow! The fox squirrels must be like pissed, man.
Of course, the real victim class here is the parents who are footing the bill for Chad and Buffy attending a “university” pathetic and desperate enough to have hired Teresa Lloro-Bidart. Ed.
Squirrelbrains
Takes one to know one
Academia is over-populated.
This woman is floating down the crazy river without a paddle.
Good grief.
Is this one of those terribly elaborate, severely sophisticated jokes meant for teachers only?
Oh...it’s not a joke.
Well, she’s nuts...
“The paper, which is titled, “When ‘Angelino’ squirrels don’t eat nuts:...’
“Nuts” being the operative word there.
Over the falls....
A squirrel is just a rat with better PR
How can there be “feminist post humanism” when, if I understand the term, it refers to a time when humans are extinct?
Bmk
We have grey squirrels here in the suburbs but maybe a few fox squirrels out at our farm where we are moving. I don’t know much about fox squirrels but Mr. Mercat and I are certain that grey squirrels are extra-terristral aliens. They have those big bunches of leaves high in the trees in the winter and want us to think that they are nests. Who would build a nest of leaves high in the tree in winter? So we now know that they are portals for them to go up to the mother ship where they have unlimited nuts and nice warm beds. I haven’t figured out why they come down at all but I’m sure it is for a sinister reason.
The Eastern squirrels won. All squirrels seen in LA city are reddish brown. These are the eastern squirrels. You have to get out into the farther hills to ever see an indigenous gray squirrel.
They all taste equally good breaded and fried.
Feminists eat squirrels? Who knew?
Nuttier than squirrel poo
“Squirrels don’t eat nuts?” Yeah, a feminist lens, for sure.
Sorry peeps. I’m not feelin it. This has to be a hoax.
Sounds like ontological otherizing of a binary patriarchal-inspired inner-directed species non-specific micro aggression.
These people speak psycho babble. It means something only to other insane people.
This dwarf needs to be wrapped up and put in the asylum.
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