I was on a highway off ramp about three miles from my office. The ramp was packed with cars, waiting for the light to turn green, and I was switching channels, trying to find a music station that hadn’t gone to commercial. All of a sudden I hit a news broadcast about a plane having just flown into one of the towers of the World Trade Center. Illogically, I thought it was some sort of hoax at first, like The War of the Worlds radio broadcast that improbably fooled thousands of people into thinking Earth was under attack by Martians. But that was just me in a state of shock. And then I thought–as most did at that stage–that it was a horrible accident, that something had gone wrong with the plane, causing it to go out of control and crash into one of towers.

By the time I made it to my desk, about 15 minutes later (parking where I was working then was murder), everyone was glued to what news websites they could get to (most were overwhelmed). I managed to get to the BBC’s site and soon had several people in my cube, watching the BBC coverage over my shoulder. We were all in shock, some of us were crying. It was terrifying.

The company announced over the PA and in email that if anyone needed to go home, especially if they had family in New York City, they could go. We were also told we could spend our time trying to get news about what happened. I don’t think I got any work done that day. The company I was working at back then had people in the World Trade Center, and kept us all updated with any news of the fate of company personnel.

I listened to the news on the radio all the way home and immediately turned on the TV when I got home and watched the news until late. The next few days were more of the same.

Other than the attack itself, the thing that moved me to tears was the reaction of other nations. When they played our national anthem after their own in London, and the Prime Minister made a speech about solidarity, I just sort of lost it. In other countries, it was the same. This was something humanity could empathize with. It wasn’t a war with soldiers getting killed in the line of duty–something they’d trained for–it was civilians, going about their daily business in an office building, or flying from one place to another. And horrifyingly, the people who did it sincerely believed God wanted them to do it and would reward them in heaven for murdering all those people, from so many nations.

I look back on it now, nine years on, and wonder what the years that followed the attack would have been like had it never happened. No war in Afghanistan, certainly. The war in Iraq might have happened. President Bush seemed determined to find an excuse to send troops in; trumping up an Al Qaeda connection just made the sell that much easier for him. The Administration wouldn’t have had as much ammunition to do the things it got away with, like wire tapping civilians without warrants. On the flip side, President Bush’s claim that he kept America safe from terrorist attacks (9/11 happened on his watch) would have held more water. Of course, it’s possible he might not have won a second term, either.

The fact is, the terrorists failed to achieve their goal: The United States was not brought to its knees. Our culture was not destroyed. American did not fall. They poked the dragon, and the dragon poked back. Unfortunately, it also thrashed around and hurt itself and others in the process.

We’ll never know how America or the world would have been different if the 9/11 attacks hadn’t happened. The only certainty is that the families who lost loved ones might still have them with them, and Americans would not have had to live in a culture of fear for the rest of the decade.

The latest infraction came from T-Mobile, which provides my mom’s cellular service. T-Mobile is trying to save money and lower its environmental impact by doing away with paper statements. I applaud this move, but then I haven’t received a paper statement from them in years. I get my statements via email, and my bills are automatically deducted from my checking account each month. Easy-peasy. Then again, I have a computer with an internet connection and have for more than a decade now (not counting the office). Now, my mom could agree to have $1. 50 tacked onto her monthly charges in order to continue to receive a paper statement, but apparently $1.50 is too much to pay for her convenience. I’ll be handling her T-Mobile statements and bill paying from now on, which is fine. I can do it faster than she can.

As if that weren’t enough, now her church has gotten her knickers in a knot. Apparently, the Lutheran church is going to let gay people be ordained (“non-celibate homosexuals” is the terminology they used). The pastor announced this development one Sunday, noting that his church would not follow suit, and if the congregants wanted more information they could find it on the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod’s website. My mother and her friends were ticked. She called me to have me look up the news item and print it for her.

Now I read on Rotten Tomatoes that movie listings might not be printed in newspapers anymore. This is the way my mother finds out when and where the movies she and her girlfriends want to see are playing. She’ll have to call me if movie listings disappear, or hope one of her friends has a computer with an internet connection. I’ve told her she can use the computers at the public library in a pinch (if I’m not available), and I’ll be happy to show her how to access the internet on them. She insists it would be too much trouble, and she’d only forget what I showed her.

I endorse any effort to reduce our impact on the environment. And it’s not like T-Mobile (for example) isn’t providing a way for those without an internet connection to receive their billing statements. But I think they might make allowances for senior citizens, maybe offer them a special deal in which they don’t have to pay for paper statements by virtue of their age. Maybe if they provide their AARP membership number, or something. I just think it’s unfair to penalize someone for not wanting to own a computer. It’s not like she uses her cell phone all that much, anyway. Mostly, she just checks her home answering machine when she’s out, or uses it when she’s babysitting my niece at their house, since they’re totally cellular over there (as am I).

I think this situation will only get worse and more frustrating for my mother and others like her in the future. I’m happy to help, and it’s really no trouble for me at all, but I just think it’s not fair. Not everyone has easy access to the internet, and to assume that all or most people do isn’t right. It’s fine for me, but for people like my mom it’s infuriating.

Amanda Tapping (Col. Samantha Carter) one of only 2 women to direct a Stargate episode. Ever. (Photo from GateWorld.net)

I was reading this post in the archives of  Feminist SF–The Blog! about the lack of women writing and directing science fiction shows on TV. Two of the shows author Ide Cyan cites as lacking in females behind the cameras are Stargate SG1 and Stargate Atlantis. In her post, Ide lists two Atlantis episodes written by women and one SG1 episode directed by a woman. That sounded a little short to me, so I dug deeper to see what the real tally of women writing or directing Stargate episodes is.

Here’s a run-down of female writers and directors in Stargate SG1, Stargate Atlantis and the up-coming Stargate: Universe (as mcuh as GateWorld.net knows about it):

Stargate SG1 episodes written or directed by women:

• Season 1 (22 episodes)
  • Emancipation: written by Katharyn Powers
  • Brief Candle: teleplay by Katharyn Powers
  • Thor’s Hammer: written by Katharyn Powers
  • Fire and Water: teleplay by Katharyn Powers who shares story credit with Brad Wright
  • Enigma: written by Katharyn Powers
• Season 2 (22 episodes)
  • Thor’s Chariot: written by Katharyn Powers
  • Family: written by Katharyn Powers
  • Sepent’s Song: written by Katharyn Powers
• Season 3 (22 episodes)
  • Learning Curve: written by Heather E. Ash
  • Foothold: written by Heather E. Ash
  • Pretense: written by Katharyn Powers
  • New Ground: written by Heather E. Ash
• Season 4 (22 episodes)
  • Crossroads: written by Katharyn Powers
  • Beneath the Surface: written by Heather E. Ash
• Season 5 (22 episodes)
  • Rite of Passage: written by Heather E. Ash
• Season 6 (22 episodes)
  • Smoke and Mirrors: story by Katharyn Powers
  • Metamorphosis: story by Jacqueline Samuda and James Tichenor
• Season 7 (21 episodes)
  • Resurrection: directed by Amanda Tapping

After season 8 they hung the “No Girls Allowed” sign outside the SG1 offices, apparently, so let’s look at Stargate Atlantis, which premiered in 2004 (coinciding with SG1 season 8):

Stargate Atlantis episodes written or directed by women:

• Season 1 (20 episodes)
  • Poisoning the Well: written by Mary Kaiser
  • Home: directed by Holly Dale
  • The Storm: story by Jill Blotevolgel
  • Letters From Pegasus: some of the excerpt credits go to Jill Blotevolgel and Mary Kaiser

And that was it for the women. The last two seasons of Stargate Atlantis had no women writing or directing. Ouch!

Stargate: Universe won’t air until October, so details are still sketchy on who did what, but GateWorld has directing credits (at least) on most of the episodes of the inaugural season. Guess what? No women. Now, some of the episodes don’t have writing credits listed, but I’m a regular reader of Stargate writer Joe Mallozzi’s blog and don’t recall him mentioning any female names attached to scripts (but I’m going from memory).

Final tally:

Caille Wray (Ming Na): the first openly gay character on Stargate (Photo from GateWorld.net)

And yet, SG1 and SGA provided some strong female characters who weren’t stereotypes. Colonel Samantha Carter, Dr. Janet Frasier, Dr. Elizabeth Weir, Dr. Jeannie Miller, Dr. Jennifer Keller and Tayla Emmagan, anyone? From what we know about SGU so far, it looks like the trend will continue. I’m especially interested in Ming Na’s character Camille Wray, who is the first openly gay character for the Stargate franchise. There were rumors of other gay characters, but they were never outed on the show. Camille is in a long-term, stable relationship (she’s married)–in fact, hers is the most stable relationship on the show, according Joe Mallozzi and others.

Back when SG1 was airing, it bothered me that we didn’t see women other than Carter and Vala coming and going through the gate on SG teams. Atlantis rectified that a bit, even going so far as to having an episode with an all-female team. The male characters don’t make any comments about it. It’s the leader of the female team who jumps to the conclusion that Colonel Sheppard thinks she made a bad call by choosing all women for her team. Of course he’d know who was on her team, being the Chief of Security on Atlantis, but he still looks a little surprised. According to the show runners (in season 5 DVD commentaries), one of the characters on that team, Alecia Vega, was gay, but she got killed in a later episode. However, on the season 5 DVD extras you can see the scenes that were cut for time, including one of her asking Dr. Jennifer Keller for a date. Major Evan Lorne was also supposedly gay, but that might just be rumor.

I would also have liked to see more people of color going through the gate. There were main characters who were POC on both Atlantis and SG1 and there will be some on SGU. There was Teal’c (Christopher Judge) on SG1, and Lt. Aiden Ford (Rainbow Sun Franks), Tayla Emmagan (Rachel Luttrell) and Ronon Dex (Jason Momoa) on Atlantis. On SGU, we’ll get Mater Sergeant Ronald Greer (Jamil Walker Smith) and the afore-mentioned Camille Wray (Ming Na). And then there are the recurring POC characters like Bra’tac (Tony Amandola) and Apophis (Peter Williams) on SG1. So there’s some representation there.

Oh yeah, I should do some disclosure here: I’m a straight white female, but I pick up on lack of diversity on the shows I watch, and it bothers me that there’s so much of it.

In summary, it looks like the Stargate folks took a stab at having women writing stories for them then bailed on the idea for whatever reason. In spite of this, they still manage to write some female characters that I’ve liked and even admired. So, Stargate show runners, if by some miracle you read this, please give some more women a chance to write and direct, OK? I love you for creating some of my favorite shows, but I’d like to love you more for giving my fellow female writers more opportunities. And, hey, maybe awesome SF writer/consultant John Scalzi wouldn’t mind having one of the women from this list or this list joining him for those advising duties. They could tag team. It would be fun.

Must Tweet! Must Tweet! Must Tweet!

No, I’m not talking about a new toy for your virtual pet. I’m talking about things like email, RSS feeds, Twitter and searches. It’s addictive, and apparently it hurts your attention span and sort of melts your brain. An article in Slate magazine on the subject nails it:

Actually all our electronic communication devices—e-mail, Facebook feeds, texts, Twitter—are feeding the same drive as our searches. Since we’re restless, easily bored creatures, our gadgets give us in abundance qualities the seeking/wanting system finds particularly exciting. Novelty is one. [Washington State University neuroscientist Jaak] Panksepp says the dopamine system is activated by finding something unexpected or by the anticipation of something new. If the rewards come unpredictably—as e-mail, texts, updates do—we get even more carried away. No wonder we call it a “CrackBerry.”

I could have told them that. In my eight months of unemployment, I’ve spent far too much time online and too little time getting out and about and interacting face-to-face with other humans. It’s had a negative effect on my attention span and ability to think creatively. For example, I wanted to improve my web design skills and redesign my old fanfiction website to repurpose it for original fiction, which I naturally planned to write. I accomplished neither of these things. Instead, after staring at a blank Word document for a few uninspired minutes, I would turn to my RSS feeds and get distracted for hours. Whereas I used to be able to write for hours on end, often taking up an entire weekend with it, now I can barely get out a blog post (and the posts I write are dissatisfying). The same thing would happen when I tried to sit through online training modules in an effort to learn web design languages. I’d start one and next thing I’d know I’d be playing Mahjong Titans or reading feeds.

The feeling in my mind when I try to write is like sleepwalking through waist-deep mud in a thick fog. I sometimes think my sleeping mind does a better job of thinking and being creative than my waking mind, if my vivid dreams and nightmares are any indication. Even caffeine doesn’t help. Part of the problem could be the clinical depression I’ve fought off and on for most of my life. It could have something to do with my periodic anemia (I take ferrus sulfate for it), or perhaps my blood pressure or thyroid issues (I take meds for those, too). Maybe I sleep too much or too little. Or maybe it’s all of the available distractions added to the boredom of not having a job to go to.

Something else the Slate article pointed out sent up a flag with me:

Ever find yourself sitting down at the computer just for a second to find out what other movie you saw that actress in, only to look up and realize the search has led to an hour of Googling? Thank dopamine. Our internal sense of time is believed to be controlled by the dopamine system. People with hyperactivity disorder have a shortage of dopamine in their brains, which a recent study suggests may be at the root of the problem. For them even small stretches of time seem to drag. An article by Nicholas Carr in the Atlantic last year, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” speculates that our constant Internet scrolling is remodeling our brains to make it nearly impossible for us to give sustained attention to a long piece of writing. Like the lab rats, we keep hitting “enter” to get our next fix.

That’s another problem I notice I’m having–in fact, I’ve had it most of my life: A distorted sense of time. However, I’m more like the Googler described above, than the person suffering from hyperactivity. Time tends to get by me before I realize it. Conversely, my attention span is shorter. Last night, I actually spent three hours reading a book, something I used to do all the time (Harry Potter in a day, anyone?) Yet, I’ve had that library book in my possession for a month and a half without really digging into it. It’s not a boring book–quite the opposite, in fact–it’s just that I couldn’t seem to read more than a few sentences without my attention wandering. I was interested in what was happening in the story, but found myself wanting to skip to the end of each chapter to find out how it came out. I never used to do that. I was meaning to spend my afternoon reading that book, but what am I doing instead? Blogging, reading feeds, and tweeting. *sigh*

The same thing happens to me when reading articles online. Lately I want my information in small doses, which is a change from my pre-unemployment habit. And yet, now that I’m thinking about it, the trend began when I first started using RSS feeds two years ago. I’m horribly addicted to them, usually only reading the “above the fold” text and rarely clicking through to read the rest. I’m deeply disturbed by this trend.

Clearly I’m incorrigible because I signed up for a Twitter account this week. So far I’ve resisted it’s siren call to tweet every little thing I’m doing, every five minutes, but I do find I keep refreshing it to see what the people I’m following are tweeting about. I eagerly await tweets from my favorite actors, writers, artists, astronomers, pundits, politicians, magazines, and friends. I resisted Twitter for more than a year. Why did I give in? I have friends on Twitter, but I think what really pushed me over the edge was the sales pitch I got in a training class about social media this week. The focus was on using social media tools like Twitter to network while looking for a job. I’m fascinated by the many ways digital media can be used to communicate, market, sell and inform, so the inventive ways people use Twitter enticed me to try it for myself. Now I’m obsessed with finding interesting Twitterers. I am still rebelling against getting it on my cell phone, though I do have unlimited texting on my calling plan. Must…be…strong.

So, now that I’m about to be employed again and will have far less time on my hands, will I be able to ration my social media time and focus on writing when I do have spare time? I hope so. All this will take is some good old fashioned self-discipline and a sufficiently succulent carrot to reward me for achieving my goals! Now, please excuse my while I go find that carrot. And check my Twitter feed.

Read the full Slate article, here

President Carter is also a devout Protestant Christian, who has spent his life trying to live his faith. I’ve admired him for that, as well, for unlike others who make the same profession but use their “faith” as justification for no end of abuses and oppression, Carter believes his God calls on His faithful to love and show mercy to all.

In a recent article in The Age titled “Losing My Religion For Equality”, President Carter condemns those who use religion to oppress women.

This view that women are somehow inferior to men is not restricted to one religion or belief. Women are prevented from playing a full and equal role in many faiths. Nor, tragically, does its influence stop at the walls of the church, mosque, synagogue or temple. This discrimination, unjustifiably attributed to a Higher Authority, has provided a reason or excuse for the deprivation of women’s equal rights across the world for centuries.

At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.

Carter left the Southern Baptist Convention several years ago because it refused to allow women to hold leadership positions in the church. He is a member of the Elders, a group formed by former South African President Nelson Mandela.

The Elders are an independent group of eminent global leaders, brought together by former South African president Nelson Mandela, who offer their influence and experience to support peace building, help address major causes of human suffering and promote the shared interests of humanity. We have decided to draw particular attention to the responsibility of religious and traditional leaders in ensuring equality and human rights and have recently published a statement that declares: “The justification of discrimination against women and girls on grounds of religion or tradition, as if it were prescribed by a Higher Authority, is unacceptable.”

I found this article so inspiring. In my country it’s rare to hear such sentiments publicly stated by an older white, Christian male. Carter’s demographic is usually part of the problem. These are views I’ve always struggled against, being raised in a conservative Christian household that believed women had a “place” that was proscribed by God and Jesus Christ, and they should shut up and accept it “gracefully”. It didn’t jibe with what I read in the Bible, particularly the words and actions of Jesus, so I flat out rejected it and continue to do so. I hope that more leaders from many religions will pursue women’s rights as passionately as the Elders are doing.

Thank you, President Carter.