Chinese one-child policy propaganda from 1982. Photograph by Robert Schedwy.

Sex and the determinedly single girl

February 19, 2020

I have to laugh at the Chinese government pressuring unmarried women to get hitched. A little background: In 1979, the government instituted a one-child policy to curb the population. Because Chinese tradition dictates that the oldest son cares for the parents in old age — and we wouldn’t want to mess with tradition, now would we? — couples opted to abort girl babies or put them up for overseas adoption. And now the policy, which ended in 2015, has bitten the government in its considerable butt. The gender selection chicken has come home to roost as the fewer females of marriageable age have the pick of the crop.

Justify winning the 2018 Belmont Stakes to become the 13th Triple Crown winner. Photograph by Mike Lizzi.

Justifying Justify

September 15, 2019

Let us conduct a thought experiment, shall we? You are a world-class tennis player on the eve of the US Open. The night before it begins, a villainous individual steels into your room and injects you with a powerful, performance-enhancing drug. You, in a deep sleep, barely feel a pinprick. To you, it’s all a dream — but one that is about to become a nightmare.

Pimlico paints its weathervane the colors of the winning Preakness horse. After this Preakness, the track should paint it the colors of Bodexpress.

That's why they call it a horse race

May 18, 2019

Perhaps the commercial that used a subtle version of Fleetwood Mac’s great “Go Your Own Way” was a harbinger, but the 144th Preakness Stakes was as nutty as the Kentucky Derby. We can only wonder what the Belmont Stakes will bring in three weeks.

Justify after winning the Preakness Stakes on his way to becoming the 13th Triple Crown winner. (That’s trainer Bob Baffert in the red tie.) With no Triple Crown on the line this season, the action remains centered on the fallout from Maximum Securi… — Justify after winning the Preakness Stakes on his way to becoming the 13th Triple Crown winner. (That’s trainer Bob Baffert in the red tie.) With no Triple Crown on the line this season, the action remains centered on the fallout from Maximum Security’s disqualification at the Kentucky Derby. Photograph courtesy Maryland Governor’s Office.

Maximum insecurity

May 17, 2019

April is the cruelest month,” T.S. Eliot began his poem “The Waste Land.” But T.S. — we hesitate to be overly familiar and call him Tom — what about May?

Threats to and from Iran, the continuing abortion divide, tariff wars, the stock market bouncing around like a knuckleball again: The only thing that is certain these days is, of course, uncertainty, making us all uneasy.

In the past, culture — specifically, arts and entertainment and sports — has provided stability in a destabilized world. But the real world keeps intruding on these parallel worlds that are framed differently by time and space.

Bartholomeus Spranger’s “Diana-Luna” (1566-1611), oil on canvas. Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest. The work captures the way art eroticizes the virgin archetype.

America's psychological virgin

May 15, 2019

With the passing of movie star Doris Day May 13 at her home in Carmel Valley, California, at age 97, much has been made of her goody two shoes image on film in the 1960s and the way it was pooh poohed in subsequent decades when attitudes toward women’s sexuality were expanding in the advent of feminism. (It was an image that Day, who had a number of troubled marriages, herself dismissed on “The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson,” and indeed she often played complex wives, most notably in Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Man Who Knew Too Much” and as the torch singer Ruth Etting in “Love Me or Leave Me.” )

A muddy, muddled Derby

May 4, 2019

And that’s why they call it a horse race.

After the favorite, Omaha Beach, was scrapped earlier in the week, the new favorite and winner, Maximum Security, was disqualified for drifting into the lane of War of Will. As a result, Country House — a 65-to-1 shot — was declared the winner. Code of Honor finished second and Tacitus, third.

‘Justify’-ing his worth

May 22, 2018

Last weekend was one for hats – at the royal wedding Saturday and later at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore for the Preakness Stakes, in which Kentucky Derby winner Justify edged past Good Magic, then hung on to beat Bravaro and Tenfold. (At least that’s what seemed to happen. It was hard to see the horses for the fog on the rainy, muddy track.)

Can Justify become the first undefeated horse since Seattle Slew in 1977 to win the Triple Crown? Already the naysayers – the No, No Nanettes – are out in force, noting that Justify looked tired and just squeaked by Bravaro. But he got the job done, didn’t he? …