Perhaps Helen Reddy is to blame?

I'm puzzled by a particular idiosyncrasy of modern speech. In recent years, particularly after Nancy Pelosi ascended to the top of the org chart in the U.S. House, a noun that has always performed admirably as a subject has apparently been placed into the pool of available adjectives, and with growing regularity, we hear a phrase such as:

"The first woman Speaker of the House in United States history."

I admit, I do not stay current with the latest usage guide updates, but wouldn't "female" be the more appropriate designation of her gender in that sentence? After all, you would never say:

"the first man Speaker of the House in United States history."

You'd say the first male Speaker of the House. Much like the way you'd say male nurse or male athletes.

This linguistic anomaly is fast approaching common usage---I heard an interview yesterday with "the first woman Senate majority leader" in reference to Oregon Senator Kate Brown. The media seems to have agreed upon "woman", yet I've heard no explanation of female's fall from grace. Did I miss a dramatic public faux-pas that turned public opinion on this stalwart adjective? Is this dismissal a positive move for the language, or has political correctness run out of things to fix and thus set its sights on repairing even that which wasn't broken?

Personally, I like the word "female"---it's equal parts sexy and scientific, fanciful and factual. When I hear "female Speaker of the House" it doesn't sound like an inflammatory statement; it sounds like good grammar. If they referred to Ms. Brown as “the first girl Senate Majority Leader” or “the first chick Senate Majority Leader”, I would certainly protest, but I don’t hear how “female” is less respectful than “woman”.

Perhaps the answer simpler than I think: "Woman" is a noun defining a "an adult female human"; thus, since "female Speaker of the House" does not rule out that that first Speaker of the House was a ewe or a hen (both females), "female" is insufficient in it's adjectival efforts.

I don't know. Do you? I worry that I'm just an insensitive male----wait, I mean insensitive man. (Rats, where is that usage guide?)

Anagrammar

My favorite anagrams for "William Reagan":

Real animal wig
Rail law enigma
Genial mail war

Rain wall image

Linear magi law

Find yours at EasyPeasy.com
(And maybe post your faves as a reply?)

I am he as you are he

I had the good fortune of seeing the late Elliott Smith at a very intimate acoustic show at the late EJ's here in Portland circa 1997. Smith spent the pre-show hour sitting at the bar sipping beers, chatting with a couple of friends, and while I am rarely star struck, I refrained from approaching him for fear of saying, "you….good….really….thanks." He seemed so darn ordinary, in the most wonderful way, like my very talent friends who fix cars seem ordinary and my brilliant musician friends who do carpentry seem ordinary. I love extraordinary most when it comes in an ordinary box. (Prince being a notable exception.)

As the place filled up, I was struck by the number of people who looked like Elliott: black jeans and black t-shirts, pale skin, dyed-black hair under wool knit caps, a little legion of junior-league Elliotts, either consciously or subconsciously emulating their hero.

A similar phenomenon could be seen at The Hold Steady show I attended last year, the crowd featuring a disproportionate number of unkempt, doughy, curly-haired young men who appeared to have gone to the Craig Finn modeling school. Then think of an early Madonna show, where teenage girls mimicked her underwear-as-outerwear style of dress with stunning accuracy. (Much to the delight of teenage boys like me.) The same was true of Joni Mitchell in the 1970s, U2 in the 1980s (every U2 fan I knew went to Goodwill to buy a long winter coat like the band sported on War), Alanis Morisette in the 1990s and so on. (It's also true at a Guided By Voices show, but I don't think that's emulation so much as a shared disregard for so-called fashion.)

I was reminded of the Elliott show by a young man on the bus this week, a pensive-looking introvert who seemed to be on his way to a Heatmiser-themed costume party. I recalled the show, Elliott opting to set up on the floor instead of the stage, everyone sitting on the floor around him like school kids gathering to listen to the teacher at story time, the opening notes of "Speed Trials" bringing an appreciative smile to everyone's face. From where I sat, it was wonderful.

But I wonder what it looked like from where Elliott sat. While I've been blessed to play in bands that had a few loyal followers, none of them seemed to see us as fashion icons. It seems to me that it would be disconcerting to sit down in front of a crowd and find a whole bunch of people wearing Bill Reagan costumes. (I'm not even sure what that would look like: a few dozen smiling men who had gone of their diets and committed to a palette of earth tones?) It's an odd display of affection to display evidence of morphing into your hero's physical form, as if attempting a strange form of alchemy that turns tattered black t-shirts into gorgeous blue chord progressions.

Perhaps that's why I like people who look ordinary: If someone doesn't look like someone else, then they probably look like themselves, something true. No wonder others would want to emulate them.

The value of voting (clarification)

Yesterday on NPR I heard some of a call-in type show (World Have Your Say) discussing voting, whether it should be mandatory, how turn-out can be improved, etc. I was astonished to hear one caller say, "I don't think I am going to vote, because neither of these candidates have earned my vote. I don't think either of deserve my vote." More astonishing, no one bothered to retort, "Young man, you have a fundamental misunderstanding of the voting process."

I understand what he meant---our options represent opposite ends of a spectrum, and many of us fall somewhere in the middle of that spectrum. If neither of the choices represent us, why support either one of them?

This idea equates voting with consumerism, that by not purchasing a product, you aren't supporting the company that produced it. Imagine there are two brands of ice cream at your local grocery store: If you want to protest one ice cream company's treatment of local farmers, and the other's treatment of their bovine stock, you can opt not to buy, and that might send a message to the producers. It might lead to the store not carrying one or both brands because they aren't selling.

But if that grocery store was like our election process, one of the ice creams is going to remain in the store, the other is not. Period. One candidate wins, one loses. So saying "neither of them has earned my vote" isn't sending a message, it is abdicating your leadership decisions to other people who feel that one candidate has earned their vote, people more passionate (read: radical) than you. Taken to ridiculous extremes, if 98% of the nation opts to not vote because they didn't like the choices, then 2% of the nation will elect our leader. (I feel like I'm stating the very obvious here, and for those who agree, I apologize. But apparently, this isn't obvious to everyone.)

There is no "none of the above" option on the ticket---you vote for one of the candidates, or you sit out and let others elect the President. Even if you think they're both evil, you need to figure out who you think is the lesser of two evils and vote for them so that the greater of two evils isn't victorious. When they tally up the votes on election night, no one attempts to differentiate between those who didn't vote because they feel no candidate earned their vote and those who were too lazy to figure out where to vote in their precinct.

I hear intelligent people say that they don't vote because their vote doesn't matter. But by not voting, these people are ensuring that their vote doesn't matter, so the system that they complain "doesn't work" works even less as a result. The obviousness of this irony is hard to miss. Yet some seem to miss it.

So please remember, on November 4: You can't make a statement by saying nothing.