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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.
Does anyone else think that Lloro-Bidart is a conservative troll? She’s sarcastically writing this liberal drivel and laughing at the liberal “you go girl!” affirmations and the conservative “what is this drivel?” denunciations?
In Spanish, lloro means crying.
Now wait a darned minute. “Squirrel Girl” climbs my steps most morning looking for a handout. I give her peanuts.
Should I call her “Squirrel Guy?” And refer to her as him? Which he may be.
Or should I call her “Squirrel Them?”
I suspect He, Her, Them doesn’t give a squirrel’s patoot just as long as the nuts are there. Ooops, how do I say NUTS in radicalfemineese?
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It's like she's playing Bullshit Bingo with those terms.
The first Mrs. Lurkin always referred to squirrels as “tree-rats.”
A friend of mine in Ohio posted several pictures of eagles picking up squirrels to feed the youngsters. He said that he counted 4 squirrels caught by the eagle and brought back to the nest. I don’t think that the eagle cared what race the squirrel was, but it did care about feeding the young ones.
Teresa Lollobrigida.
I hear tell that there’s black squirrels in Kent, Ohio!
This professor should stay away from squirrels, any kind of squirrels, because they’re going to mistake her for a nut.
You guys may be on to something. Was wondering which CalPoly the professor allegedly teaches at. Have never seen that omitted before. And then there is the vague "liberal studies" which by itself should have been a red flag.
I tried to look her up, but almost every link to her is broken.
I often wonder what these people talk about in the faculty lounge.
Is it a sarcastic: “You think you’re so cool with your $80k grant to study racial bias among newborn babies, well, I’m applying for a grant on racial bias against and among squirrels. It’s amazing what the NSF will fall for. See if you can top mine for nonsense.”
Or is it a serious: “I am impressed with your $80k study on racial bias among newborn babies, so I’m applying for a grant on racial bias against and among squirrels. This will broaden your work. See if you can top mine for relevance.”
Or are they completely oblivious to everything and just stringing words with lots of syllables together and hoping no one else understands what they write either?
My Border Collie was very excited about this study!
...and pretty funny, too.
I have heard that beavers are also charged with a bias but not racial!
*shrug* If they'll eat beaver, why not squirrel?
The war between the red squirrels and the grey squirrels has been going on here in the Northeast ever since I was a kid, and probably back to the days of Pocahontas.
So far, neither side has won.
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