[Trigger warning for discussion of rape in film.]
Okay, a little background here. A while back, Liss and I were talking about Clint Eastwood, a conversation spawned by this photo I took.
Liss: That is so awesome.
Deeky: Seriously, when I first saw it out of the corner of my eye, that's what I thought it said.
Liss: I might buy something called "CUNT" starring Clint Eastwood.
Deeky: Speaking of Clint, have we discussed the über-creepy recurring theme in his movies of him hooking up with barely pubescent girls?
Liss: I don't know if we have. Which movies are you thinking of?
Deeky: Beguiled, for starters. At the beginning of the movie, Clint's character asks a young girl how old she is. Twelve, she says. "Old enough for kisses," says Clint right before jamming his tongue in her mouth.
Liss: He's another one who frequently using women getting hurt/raped/killed to motivate a man to action, too. See: Play Misty for Me, The Outlaw Josey Wales, Mystic River, Million Dollar Baby, Gran Torino, etc.
So, question time: Clint Eastwood has appeared in over 60 movies. Which one is the creepiest?
(Liss votes for Play Misty for Me, just FYI.)
Question of the Day
Dudz Is Gonna Fly Now
Video Description: Footage of the canine rocket at the dog park at the weekend, set to Bill Conti's "Gonna Fly Now" (aka the theme from Rocky). Plus Dudz running around with Iain, and, for a change, I asked Iain to shoot some video of me with Dudz, so there's some of my fat arse (literally) at the end of this one!
Dudley was full of piss and vinegar at the dog park last weekend. We took him twice, and he was just a blur each day. For five minutes. Then, as always: Collapse. LOL.
I made this for Iain, as it's one of his favorite songs, but since the plumber has arrived to fix our shit, and I'll be otherwise occupied for a bit, I thought I'd share it with the whole class.
Blaze of GLOLOLOLOLOLOLory
Shaker RedSonja just emailed me (which I am publishing with permission):
The banner headline at Glenn Beck's new website, The Blaze:Yeesh.
Explicit Poetry GPS Phones Help Illegals
It's like a fucking madlib!!! Or maybe the result of word association games? Who the fuck edits this shit???? Oh, and sponsors include, SHOCKINGLY, that fucking gold investment company. They're really not getting their money's worth.
P.S. If you haven't seen this yet, watch it ASAP. (My apologies; I don't have time to do the full 13-minute transcript this afternoon.)
Words (Yes, All of Them): I Do Not Think They Mean What You Think They Mean
Remember Satoshi Kanazawa? If not, I will tell you all you need to know about him to understand his scientastical views: he's an evolutionary psychologist. He also seems to have a pathological need to gain attention by saying things that even he would know make no sense, if sense-making were a consideration for him. He does this in his blog at that fount of finely-reasoned intellectual discourse, Psychology Today, a blog which, he claims, constitutes "A Look at the Hard Truths About Human Nature". I guess he means "hard" as in hardee-har-har.
He and his stuck-out-tongue previously appeared here at Shakesville just over a year ago, in Liss' post lol your understanding of feminism. Today, we pause to lol Kanazawa's understanding of genetics. Really, he should just stay away from biology altogether. It's clearly too hard for him. Maybe that's what he means when he claims to be taking a "hard look at human nature". He's looking; he's finding it very, very hard; but as long as he can reach his ass, he can by gum come up with some conclusions which meet with his own satisfaction.
Today's conclusion: Barack Obama is so a Muslim! Or halfway to it, at least, because he totes inherited Muslimosity from his Muslim daddy! It's in his genes, which have been scientifically proven to rotate toward Mecca and prostrate themselves five times daily! Where's the proof, you ask? Hah! Is Michael Jackson still black? I mean, besides being dead, and all? Was he still black when he died? Yes? Well, then, Obama is Muslim. It's so scientificalifragilisticexpialidocious! That no one can deny.
Not that there's anything wrong with being Muslim, Kanazawa obligatorily concludes. Let it not be said that he harbors prejudice of any sort. But that our president is lying in the face of his own genes (not that genes have a face, of course — or if they do, Kanazawa doesn't mention it, but he certainly does seem to know things about genes that no one else does), that Obama tells a different story about who he is and what he believes than his very own genes have told to Satoshi Kanazawa — that is not the behavior of an honorable* man.
*I use the word honorable in its new, modern sense of "describing something that voracious attention-seekers unconcerned with decency, logic or scientific fact, but who like to invoke such things to seem grown-up, claim for themselves and deny to any who don't support them."
Via
Photo of the Day
Taken by filmmaker Alizeh Imtiaz, who traveled to remote areas of Pakistan to document the effects of the catastrophic flooding there, for CNN.
"These areas I went to, no other media or NGO had been there," she said. "They were quite surprised to see us in the first place. If we gave them medicine, we had to tell them how to take it. They had never seen bottles of water before."Donations are still urgently needed. You can find out how to help here.
...Imtiaz says the Indus River is normally 1.2 miles wide but persistent rains have overwhelmed the area. The river has swelled to almost 25 miles wide, submerging many homes and fields.
"It was like a nightmare in Venice. The infrastructure has been completely wiped out. You can not tell where one person's land ends and where another's begins."
While Pakistanis have been generous in donations to flood disaster relief during the holy month of Ramadan, Imtiaz worries about the future. Once flood waters recede, she fears people will forget about the homeless who will need to rebuild.
"This is a very long-term problem," she said. "What I am worried about will people get the attention in the next years. It's also about two years down the line that people will be given land to call home."
Imtiaz plans to keep visiting other remote, hard-hit areas of the country where aid hasn't been dispersed. Her photographs tell a very personal story right from the flood zone.
[Previously: Support Flood Relief Efforts, Number of the Day, Quote of the Day, Photo of the Day.]
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
Quote of the Day
"I get a headache when I hear supporters of this endless warfare complaining about the federal budget deficits. They're like arsonists complaining about the smell of smoke in the neighborhood."—The brilliant Bob Herbert, in his most recent column, bluntly titled "We Owe the Troops an Exit."
The Telegraph reports today: "Twenty-one American troops have been killed in Afghanistan since Friday in one of the bloodiest periods of the summer."
End the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Mr. President.
Stonewalling the UK LGB&T Community
by Shaker Andy Godfrey, a British student who has campaigned for LGB&T rights in several UK university societies.
Like many Shakers, I've supported a number of campaigns to petition reluctant governments to support marriage equality for LGB&T people. But recently, I've found myself in the more unusual and frankly rather bizarre position of campaigning to get a reluctant LGB rights group to support marriage equality.
We've been running a Facebook campaign directed at Stonewall, the UK's, and indeed Europe's, largest LGB lobbying organisation. (The LGB isn't a typo by the way - Stonewall campaigns exclusively for lesbian, gay and bisexual people, which as one friend has said is a bit rich coming from an organisation named after a riot started by a trans activist.) Stonewall have rooted themselves firmly in the establishment as an influential and media-friendly group that has overseen the introduction of legal rights that LGB people in most countries can only dream of.
However, in an all-too-familiar story, gaining mainstream acceptance seems to have made Stonewall reluctant to rock the boat. At the moment, UK same-sex couples can have civil partnerships but not marriages (although they confer the same legal rights). Stonewall don't regard campaigning for full marriage equality as a priority because there is no "practical difference" between the two institutions. Which I'm sure you'll agree makes perfect sense - after all, if civil partnerships and marriages confer the same legal rights, what possible reasons could an LGB equality and rights organization have for objecting to the fact that there are two entirely separate institutions for same-sex and opposite-sex couples?
Quite a few, as it turns out. The segregation of marriage and civil partnerships means trans people have to divorce their partners for gender change to be legally recognised (but oh silly me Stonewall are only an LGB organisation, so of course they're allowed to ignore trans rights). Many same-sex couples do want their partnership to be recognised as a marriage - including couples such as Sue Wilkinson and Celia Kitzinger who have been legally married in other countries and rather reasonably want the UK government to recognise that their marriage is, in fact, a marriage. And conversely, there are some opposite-sex couples, such as Tom Freeman and Katherine Doyle, who wish to have their relationship recognised as a civil partnership without all the patriarchal baggage that comes with marriage.
Marriage equality is supported by an overwhelming number of LGB&T people (98% in a recent survey) as well as every major LGB&T organisation apart from Stonewall. Most leading politicians either support it or are not vehemently against it (the current Prime Minister is in the latter camp). In the light of this, Stonewall's refusal to openly acknowledge that marriage equality is fairer and better than the current situation is not just reprehensible. It's also plain weird. Some people have suggested that Stonewall's position is a result of political pressure, but I'm pretty sure that even the most extreme UK politicians wouldn't blink an eyelid if an LGB equality and rights organization came out in favour of marriage equality. After all, it's not exactly an extreme or surprising view for, you know, an LGB equality and rights organization to take. What seems to have happened is that Stonewall have become supremely assured that they know best about LGB rights, regardless of what the LGB&T community actually think. They do not deign to explain or justify their position even to the LGB&T press, leaving many people baffled and frustrated.
I founded the Facebook group "Why the silence, Stonewall? Marriage equality now!" so that the community's voice would be heard. Hundreds of people who don't think Stonewall are listening to them have joined, and our open letter to Stonewall has been signed by numerous activists, academics and student representatives. For any Shakers who want to help, this is one situation where simply joining a Facebook group could actually make a difference (after all, how hard can it be to persuade an LGB equality and rights organization to support marriage equality)? Join the group, link to the group, tweet about the group, ask people to sign the open letter (especially if you know people involved in UK LGB&T organisations) - there are plenty of ways to help without even standing up from your computer!
All in all, it's a cautionary tale for activist movements that achieve a degree of political power - groups that purport to represent LGB&T people need to remain answerable to the LGB&T community. LGB&T people in the UK are fortunate to have legal rights denied to most people across the world, but it doesn't mean there's nothing left to fight for - and it rankles to be ignored by the people who are meant to be representing us.
That's My Geek Girl!
My 5-year-old niece M.J. started Kindergarten last week.
The night before her first day of school ever, The AC at my big sister's house burned its motor out, so M.J. and her brother spent the night with me and the grandfolk. I got M.J. up at 6:30 for her first day. While her mother and I blurred around her--making breakfast and packing a peanut-butter sandwich, cheese-stick and raisin lunch--M.J. staggered through the kitchen in a saggy Pull-Up and a borrowed orange T-shirt of mine, melted cheese in her loose hair. "Mom, why are we up this early?" Her dad half-lay on the couch, altogether covered with dogs and guzzling coffee. Ten minutes later, M.J. was brushed and polished in her new first-day-of-school outfit and dancing for my camera, ready to go. Mom, Dad, and Big Brother took her off to school.
Around 2:40, her dad and brother went to pick her up. It was 108 degrees. She flew from the minivan, stripped all her clothes off and jumped, yelling and naked, into the pool.
I really like this kid.
Kindergarten has gone well so far, and M.J. even won two of the surprises that you get to draw from the treasure box on Friday if you've gotten As on your work all week.
Well, yesterday, M.J. got busted for taking the operation manual for the overhead projector from Mrs. G.'s desk and reading it aloud to her classmates while everyone was supposed to be playing with blocks. --See, she explained, it has a mirror in it!
The teacher told all of this to M.J.'s dad, and sent home a note: "while we appreciate M.J.'s personality, she should leave Teacher's things on Teacher's desk".
Have I mentioned that I like this kid?
They really should be teaching the kids PowerPoint, though.
Down the Rabbit Hole
The other night, Iain and I were sitting together, but separately engaged in different activities, and had the evening news on in the background. There was another—another, OMG another, there have been so many, and it's like what happened during and after Reagan all over again, fuck you George W. Bush—news story about a young black boy who'd been killed by crossfire in Chicago, and part of the narration included the information that he had gone to a party "with a female friend."
Iain looked up. "Why was it important to note it was a female friend? Why not just a friend? What are we supposed to understand about him that he was with a female friend? What are we supposed to infer about her?" He scowled.
"I was just about to say the same thing," I said. I resisted the urge to give him a cookie for noticing precisely the sort of thing his privilege has insulated him from having to notice. But it means something to me when he notices these things.
Still, I sometimes wonder how much he internalizes it. Does it touch him deep down in that place where it matters, the way it touches me? Does it linger?
Yesterday afternoon, he emailed me about the Worst Thing post, sarcastically expressing his dismay at how prevalent that kind of shit is. "Based on the Cosmo covers I see this crap is super interesting, or whatever."
I replied: "There is an entire industry dedicated to telling women what to think, which is really about telling women how to be good members of an oppressed class. And, I imagine the longer you read the stuff I write about every day, the more you realize that's not remotely hyperbolic."
Came his response (which I share with his permission): "No. It's like the other night when we heard a news story about that kid visiting a female friend, and we were both like 'why specify the gender.' You don't really recognize this stuff until you've gone down the rabbit hole."
Not long ago, Iain had asked me to find him a pill case for his stinkabetes meds. The case I bought him (which he loves) suddenly seems more appropriate than ever.
Last night, I told him, "Thanks for coming down the rabbit hole with me."
To feel known is a precious gift—and not an easy one to give. Knowing another person truly, as much as another person can ever truly be known, requires not just compassion, but empathy.
And in inter-sex relationships—as in any other between two people on either side of a privilege divide: interracial relationships, inter-gender (trans/cis) relationships, partnerships formed between a person with a disability or disabilities and a currently abled person, between a fat person and a thin person—empathy requires conscious effort, an authentic and committed willingness to self-examine, particularly on the part of the privileged person who has not, unlike hir partner, been socialized in a world designed to treat hir partner's perspective as the objective reality.
A privileged-by-society partner cannot begin to understand hir marginalized-by-society partner if the former can't begin to comprehend how the latter sees the world.
Teasing out those differences—and acknowledging it's not just down to "Well, I'm a man and you're a woman and we're different and that's why we see it differently and it's all just a matter of opinion, anyway," but down to the internalized prejudices and cultural narratives we have about women and men, and how those influence our perceptions—is the path to real intimacy, to the sort of knowing that honors the parts of a person hardest to articulate, the parts of the marginalized person the world outside your relationship endeavors to deny.
The most basic, and yet endemically disregarded, expression of esteem by a privileged person in a mixed-power relationship is simply this: Your perspective and experience are as valid and valuable as my own.
Examining one's privilege, going down the rabbit hole, is thus not merely an act of love; it is a radical act of respect.
it is a demonstration of fierce loyalty, not just to one's partner, but to the promise of egalitarianism and whatever work it takes to get there.
[Related Reading: Man Haterz, The Bargain, and Its Alternative, Angry Men, Searching Men.]
Seen
So, last weekend, I'm watching the latest episode of Lifetime's "On the Road with Austin & Santino", which is about two fashion designers, Austin Scarlett and Santino Rice, who were runners-up on different seasons of "Project Runway."
In case you aren't familiar with Messrs. Scarlett and Rice, allow me to make the proper introductions…
He is petite and Caucasian and very pale and clean-shaven and has a personal style that is perhaps best described as fop-glam.
He is tall and biracial and swarthy and bearded and has a personal style that is perhaps best described as hobo chic.
Nope!
Bully For You
It's a new week, so Focus on the Family has a new villain.
As kids head back to school, conservative Christian media ministry Focus on the Family perceives a bully on the playground: national gay-advocacy groups.Gee, I wonder why anyone would ever think that labeling an entire class of people as an "abomination" was bigotry?
School officials allow these outside groups to introduce policies, curriculum and library books under the guise of diversity, safety or bullying-prevention initiatives, said Focus on the Family education expert Candi Cushman.
"We feel more and more that activists are being deceptive in using anti-bullying rhetoric to introduce their viewpoints, while the viewpoint of Christian students and parents are increasingly belittled," Cushman said.
Public schools increasingly convey that homosexuality is normal and should be accepted, Cushman said, while opposing viewpoints by conservative Christians are portrayed as bigotry.
Actually, it's no surprise to see FotF standing up for bullies; that's their stock in trade. And isn't it ironic that they get their tails all puffed up about the Radical Homosexuals recruiting kids when that's basically what they do to lure their unsuspecting prey into their din of inequity?
Number of the Day
72: The percentage of British government budget cuts estimated to be born by women, prompting the women's advocacy group The Fawcett Society, to file "an unprecedented complaint with the nation's high court this month arguing that the government failed to consider the effect on women of its leaner 'emergency budget'."
"The government is under a duty to look at its policies and check whether they are likely to widen inequality," said Anna Bird, head of policy for the Fawcett Society. "We do not think they undertook that task when putting forth the hardest, most austere budget in generations. Women are going to be adversely affected as a result. That should not happen."Additionally, the Institute for Fiscal Studies has completed a report demonstrating, to absolutely no surprise at all, that "the nation's poorest residents are set to be hit the hardest by the cuts," prompting Britain's independent Equality and Human Rights Commission to order "the Treasury to prove it considered the impact of its cuts on vulnerable groups or face 'enforcement action'."
...Even more damning, critics of the budget cuts say, is a letter by Theresa May - one of Cameron's top ministers and in charge of woman's affairs - warning the treasury of the "real risk" that its budget could be considered unlawful given a potentially outsized impact on women and disadvantaged citizens. The letter was leaked to the news media.
...The new government is also taking aim at state funds for charities, which critics say serve as a vital lifeline for millions of women. Yvonne Traynor, chief executive of the Croydon Rape and Sexual Abuse Support Center in south London, said a "panic" has set in as cuts are set to eliminate about 40 percent of the center's $460,000 annual budget. "We've struggled for 10 years to build a center that helps women face the trauma in their lives, and now they are trying to claw it back," she said. "Women are often the poorest people in society, with fewer options in their lives. When you cut back like this, they are going to suffer most."
Wow.
The Overton Window: Chapter Two
Noah Gardner stands at the candy machine, his Tootsie Roll falls, and he stares, enchanted, at a young woman pinning a flyer to the breakroom bulletin board. She struggles to reach the top of the board and Noah offers to help.
She ignores him, but he's not put off.
Something about this woman defied a traditional chick-at-a-glance inventory. Without a doubt all the goodies were in all the right places, but no mere scale of one to ten was going to do the job this time. It was an entirely new experience for him. Though he'd been in her presence for less than a minute, her soul had locked itself onto his senses, far more than her substance had.
Oh, Christ. "A traditional chick-at-a-glance inventory"? "All the goodies were in all the right places"? You're kidding me, right? I guess that's what happens when someone's soul locks into your senses. Whatever the fuck that means.
She hardly wore any makeup, it seemed, nothing needed concealment or embellishment. Simple silver jewelry, tight weathered jeans on the threadbare outer limits of the company's casual-Friday dress code, everything obviously chosen and worn for no one's approval but her own. A lush abundance of dark auburn hair pulled back in a loose French twist and held in place by two crisscrossed number-two pencils. The style was probably the work of only a few seconds but it couldn't have been more becoming if she'd spent hours at a salon.
She's a free spirit, with natural beauty. Better than all that arm candy Noah had been musing over in the previous chapter. You got all that, right? I can't wait until she lets her hair down, literally, and her full radiance is revealed. I bet Gardner passes out at that moment.
The woman hangs the flyer, and it's described pretty much just like this. More or less. The eagle was my idea.
We the People
If you love your country but fear for its future,
join us for an evening of truth that will open your eyes!
Guest speakers include:
Earl Matthew Thomas-1976 U.S. Presidential candidate (L) and bestselling author of Divided We Fall
Joyce McDevitt-New York regional community liaison, Liberty Belles
Maj. Gen. Francis N. Klein-former INSCOM commanding general (ret. 1984), cofounder of GuardiansOfLiberty.com
Kurt Bilger-Tri-state coordinator, Sons of the American Revolution
Beverly Emerson-Director emeritus, Founders' Keepers
Danny Bailey-The man behind the YouTube phenomenon Overthrow, with 35,000,000 views and counting!
Bring a friend, come lift a glass, and raise your voice for liberty!
www.FoundersKeepers.com
August 31st, 7:00 PM, Heritage Club
Oh my, the rally (the assembly?) is tonight! Such short notice, Noah asks. (Oh, and yay for the YouTube reference. Relevance!)
"Congratulations, you can read." Oh, she's sassy too! What a woman! She tells him she doesn't much expect anyone here to attend. And why not?
"All you PR people do is lie for a living," she said. "The truth is just another story to you."
I wonder what Beck's PR people think of this sentiment? Anyway, Noah introduces himself and the woman retorts firing off some helpful facts, more for the reader's benefit than anyone's, I imagine:
Noah has a fancy office, he's just been promoted to VP and his father owns the company. No wonder he's so existential and forlorn. Or whatever he is.
Then the sparks really start to fly:
"Hey, I have to confess something."
"I'll bet you do."
"You haven't told me your name yet," Noah said, "and I've been trying to read it off your name tag, but I'm worried that you'll get the wrong idea about where I'm looking."
"Go for it. I'm not shy."
Rowr!
It's like Bogie and Bacall up there on the page. Are you hawt yet? I am so engorged by this. Figuratively, I mean.
Noah checks out the name badge pinned to her chest, notes the edge of a tattoo, "a bird, or maybe it was an angel" (I call dibs on it being a bald eagle!), and learns her name:
"Molly Ross," he said.
She tipped his chin back up with a knuckle.
"This is fascinating and all, Mr. Gardner, but I need to go and service the postage meter."
Okay. Hold on. There is no way that was an accident. She has to service the postage meter, seriously? You know what? I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and suggest that the ghostwriter here knew exactly what he was doing all along and purposefully barfed up the shittiest manuscript he could, as a joke. And somehow, the thing met with Beck's approval ("Don't change a goddamned word!" I imagine Beck yelling at his editor) and got published. Like a prank that's spun out of control. And now library shelves everywhere are stunk up with this travesty.
Noah asks Molly if she's going to the rally (the assembly?) tonight. He says he might go, being how patriotic he is and all. Then Molly tells a joke. But it's not really a joke. Made some weird Dadaist/Libertarian anti-joke. I dunno:
"Noah comes home—Noah from the Bible, you know? So Noah comes home after he finally got all the animals into the ark, and his wife asks him what he’s been doing all week. Do you know what he said to her? He said, 'Honey, now I herd everything.'"
Molly walks away, telling Noah over her shoulder not to forget his candy bar. Noah is left speechless.
I know how you feel, Noah. I really do.
Texting! With Liss and Deeky!
Yesterday morning…
Liss: Our water heater just broke. Water everywhere.
Deeky: OMFG!
Liss: When we got up this morning, Iain got downstairs first, and he yelled up to me, "Get ready to have a shitty day, babe! Our water heater exploded!" LOL!
Deeky: Fuck.
Liss: Total nightmare. Plumber can't come before Tuesday evening unless he comes today for double the rate, and we were already totally fucking broke even before the heater blew, so Tuesday it is! Disaster. But we decided instead of stressing out about it, we're just going to pretend we're playing pirates and swabbing the deck.
Deeky: LOL! Good idea.
Liss: I just figured out how to hook up a garden hose to a drain spigot on the tank, and we hooked it up and ran the other end out to the backyard, so it's draining out, which has significantly minimized the mopping. Yay!
Deeky: Yay! Yeah, that's the back up, ain't it?
Liss: The back up? I have no idea. I know nothing about plumbing. And neither does Iain. Installing new faucets/garbage disposals and fixing toilet tanks is about the extent of our collective plumbing knowledge, lol. So that's what you're supposed to do, then? Drain it via the back up?
Deeky: Yeah, they've spigots built in. For draining them. There should also be a shut off leading into the tank. So you should be able to shut it down completely.
Liss: The first thing we did was shut off the input valve.
Deeky: Good. If it's shut off and draining via a hose, you'll be okay.
Liss: Thank you for your reassurance. I really appreciate it!
Deeky: You may want to shut off the gas to it, too.
Liss: Iain already shut off the gas to it. He says thanks for the suggestion, though.
Deeky: Cool. You'll be fine then. Except if you want a warm shower.
Liss: Fuck warm showers! We're pirates!
Deeky: So, you're not showering at all? Gonna stink like scurvy and mites?
Liss: We can shower at ye olde parental manor, matey. Arr.
Deeky: Is Iain gonna go there every morning before work?
Liss: Probably at night, lol. And it's just 'til Tues.
Deeky: What? He's gonna go to work with bedhead?
Liss: His hair is curly. Looks the same either way. :)
Deeky: LOL!
Liss: Actually, he just got it all sheared off, so it's virtually a buzz cut at the moment. Mad corporate locks, yo!
Deeky: He's straight outta Mad Men.
Liss: He's straight outta Dilbert. [Liss shares this exchange with Iain and he LOLs.]
Deeky: LOL! He's straight outta Wall Street 2: The Wall Streetening.
Liss: LOL 4 realz. Wall Street 2: The Economy Fuckening.
Deeky: LOL! Totes.
Liss: [phone rings once] Did you just butt-call me?
Deeky: Apparently.
Liss: Cute. I like how the only time we actually call each other is by accident. AHHHHHH! No talking! Texting only! LOL.
Deeky: Talking on the phone is soooo last century.
Liss: Really. And you don't see pirates talking on the phone, now, do you?
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
This is so the worst thing you're going to read all day.
[Trigger warning for sexual coercion.]
The Frisky: 22 Things You Should Forgive Your Boyfriend For.
Generally, I just find compilations like this so banal that they hardly merit comment. Which is not to say they're benign: Even the opening salvo, "Forgetting to put the toilet seat down," disappears the many disabled women for whom a partner routinely forgetting to put the seat down is more than a minor inconvenience.
But this list, in addition to the usual curious exhortations to women to overlook some habits that may well indicate a potentially troublesome lack of respect, includes, in its final line, this:
22. Repeatedly trying to talk you into analWow.
Yeah, um, bullying a partner to try to get hir to submit to a sexual act in which zie isn't interested isn't actually forgivable. (Or it shouldn't be.) It's a huge red flag that you're dealing with someone who doesn't have much interest in the concept of enthusiastic consent.
And when that red flag's a-wavin', walk the other way.
Quote of the Day
"We will see if there is any legal action that we might take to restrain you from playing [our recording]. However, it would be more respectful of our wishes if you [would] simply cease to play it."—Peter Yarrow and Noel Paul Stookey, the two surviving members of the trio who performed as Peter, Paul & Mary, in a letter addressed to the anti-equality group National Organization for Marriage, asking them to stop using their recording of Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land" during their rallies, since NOM's bigotry is "directly contrary to the advocacy position Peter, Paul & Mary have held for decades. ... We strongly support the rights of all gays and lesbians to enjoy the rights and rituals of marriage that are enjoyed by their straight counterparts, and consider the abridgment of this right contrary to the sense of equal protection and fairness inherent in, and implied by, the law, of the Constitution of the United States."
[H/T to Spudsy. Via.]
Police State Newz
At some point I may have mentioned that while my family was riding the train between Chicago and New York last December, we were rudely awakened by armed government agents on the hunt for foreign looking people that may have boarded at South Bend, Toledo, Cleveland, Erie, or any number of totally not Canadian stations. They really didn't pay us much mind. Mostly they were interested in the folks seated in front of us speaking a foreign language (Russian, FWIW). That and yelling at the deaf woman in the next row.
Our general reaction (and AFAICT, the reaction of the folks immediately around us) ranged from extreme anger to OMGWTF?!? It was horrible, and as a US citizen, I have to say, horribly embarrassing.
Why was this happening? The US couldn't possibly have a policy of letting armed border patrol agents board trains and buses within our own national borders in an effort to harass and possibly detain foreign-looking folks.
According to today's New York Times, that was precisely what was (and still is) happening. To quote Lee Greenwood: "I'm American...I forget...that...I'm free."
Neat!
[Trigger warning for violence/sexual assault.]
Insert requisite disclaimer here about how Saturday Night Live sucks, except for the times when it hasn't sucked.
I might not have even mentioned that New York's Vulture has a blurb on SNL's three new cast members, except for the video Portly posted by Jenny Slate, a current cast member of SNL whose evident talent is currently being brutally wasted.
Anyway, of the three new cast members (who, btw, all appear to be white), only one apparently has video of his skit-work available for review, and these are the descriptions of the two videos: "Here's [Taran] Killam as murderer Scott Peterson in a kinda not-funny Knocked Up parody" and "Here's Killam again in a Scrubs webisode, as Jimmy, a molest-y orderly."
Yeesh.
This is a real thing in the world
[Trigger warning for "ironic" "joking" about dehumanization and violence]
Perfect for when you want everyone to know you're an asshole, but your girlfriend hasn't washed your Toby Keith shirt:
[Picture of a t-shirt that reads "SLAVERY GETS SHIT DONE." Don't worry, though, the text is under a picture of pyramids. Oh, and the person wearing it is black.]
I can verify that this is real. I saw some dude wearing one this weekend when I was out buying jalapeño poppers to soothe my post-Restoring Honor hangover.
Also, Deeky points out that these ironic but-totally-not-ironic assholes also have a Facebook group, for those of you into web 2.0. The page proclaims "if u don't like it i on't care", which un-ironically, is pretty much how slavery works.
Daily Dose of Cute
[Warning: The below photo essay is redonkulously adorable, but also contains dog dong, so if your particular sensitivities include an aversion to evidence of male doghood, I recommend against clicking below the fold. His mouth tends to hang open when he naps, too, so there are also some viewable dog teeth in a not-grinning expression.]
Image Descriptions: Dudz the Greyhound sprawled out in various hilarious poses, with long legs all akimbo, except for the final image, in which he is curled up in a tight little ball inside the cat bed. This would be why greyhounds are known as the 45-mile-per-hour couch potatoes. Aside from one big burst of energy each day, Dudley is the laziest being on the planet, who requires about five minutes of yawning and stretching just to wake himself up to go out for a walk.
News from Shakes Manor
Last night, as we were lying in bed about to fall asleep, Iain was, as is his frequent bedtime habit, touching different parts of my body and asking me: "What is this for?" to which I am meant to provide a silly answer, e.g. "The conveyance of cuteness." Sometimes, I provide extremely literal answers, which are amusing in their own way.
Iain, taking my thigh in his hand: What is this for?
Me: Locomoting.
Iain, deliberately misunderstanding me: Vocomoting? Is a vocomotive a train that talks?
Me: No, it's a train that's been put through a vocoder.
Pause.
Both of us, simultaneously, in our best attempts at replicating a vocoded voice: CH-oo-OO CH-oo-OO!
Laughter.
There are moments in any intimate partnership in which the two of you look at one another and realize, "This is why we belong together." That was one of those moments.
We are dorks.
Monday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by Shaxco, publishers of Dudley Q. McEwan's Guide to Chillaxing.
Recommended Reading:
brilliantmindbrokenbody: Disability Blog Carnival!
Brad: Bring Your Genes to Your Life Insurance Sales Representative
BeckySharper: Hair Matters
Renee: On "Louie" [TW for sexual violence]
Living ~400lbs: Deciphering Studies: Absolute vs Relative Risks
Andy: Focus on the Family Says School Anti-Bullying Curriculum Forces Kids to Learn That Homosexuality Is Normal
Leave your links in comments...
Random Video
I watched this about 10,000 times this weekend.
MARCEL THE SHELL WITH SHOES ON from Dean Fleischer-Camp on Vimeo.
Transcript below the fold.
Transcript:
Stop-Motion Animation -- A very tiny shell with one googly eye in the shell opening and wearing tiny pink shoes shuffles to the edge of a sofa back (various scene backgrounds follow, such as a kitchen table littered with leaves and small plates, a tennis shoe that looms over, a bathroom with a hairbrush on the floor, etc.)
Marcel: My name is Marshell -- oh no! -- that's not the first time I've done that. My name is Marcel and I'm partially a shell, as you can see on my body . . . but . . . I also have shoes, and um, a face . . . so, I like that about myself and I like myself and I have a lot of other great qualities as well.
[title] Marcel the Shell with shoes on [/title]
Marcel: I know how it looks in here but it's not always so messy, but I didn't know that you were gonna have a camera and I wish that you had said that you were gonna be here today, because I didn't -- I didn't clean up (exasperated sigh). I invited some friends from up state to come and eat salad, so, that's -- I'm sorr . . . well, that's just how it looks right now.
Guess what I wear as a hat.
Camera-person: What?
Marcel: A lentil!
One time I nibbled on a piece of cheese and my cholesterol went up to 900. Guess what I use to tie my skis to my car.
Camera-person: What?
Marcel: A hair. Guess what my skis are.
Camera-person: What?
Marcel: Toenails from a man. Um -- Do you wanna see me talk on the phone?
Camera-person: Sure.
Marcel: (standing on phone) Hello! This is me. What? Yeah. Yeah, I did. Oh yeah. Well, I could do it at -- yes? Wuh -- it would be my pleasure. Uh. . . I did, I did. Yeah, I'm sorry, I forgot to write a note. Thank you so much.
Guess what I use for a bean-bag chair.
Camera-person: What?
Marcel: A raisin. Guess what I do for adventure.
Camera-person: What?
Marcel: I hang-glide on a dorito. Guess what I use as a pen.
Camera-person: What?
Marcel: I use . . uh . . a pen, but it takes the whole family.
I'm afraid to drink soda, because I'm afraid the bubbles will make me float up onto the ceiling.
OK . . . eh, uh . . . my one regret in life is that I'll never have a dog.
But sometimes I tie a hair to a piece of lint and I drag it around.
[Marcel dragging lint] I love you, come on boy, come, come.
One time I smelled a smell from an old tennis sneaker, and it knocked me right out.
One time I looked at a diamond, and it gave me a sunburn.
[standing next to the lint-dog] His name is Allen. Guess where I found him.
Camera-person: Where?
Marcel: Under a tooth. Well, you know what they say . . .
Camera-person: What?
Marcel: Lint is a shell's best friend.
[next to crayons] You wanna watch me try to lift this?
Camera-person: Sure.
Marcel: Alright. [tries to lift crayon -- grunting and groaning] No, I can't, I can't. I can't lift anything up at all.
[in front of toilet] Sometimes people say that my head is too big for my body, and then I say -- compared to WHAT?!
[in front of hairbrush] My brother once got in a fight with someone else, and guess how he killed him . . .
Camera-person: How?
Marcel: He impaled him on a brush.
Camera-person: That sounds very violent . . .
Marcel: We won't fight unless we're provoked.
[dragging lint] Here! Come here! Come here . . .(grunting, tugging) Come heeere! I love you, come . . . . agh!!!
[credits]
Emmys Open Thread
The Emmy Awards were last night, and, while I was the embodiment of wev about almost the entirety of the show, including most of the winners, I loved the opening of the show, in which host Jimmy Fallon was joined in one of his patented Glee homages by, among other notables, Lost's Jorge Garcia (Hurley):
I was also pleased to see Temple Grandin win so many awards, which was a really excellent film about a very interesting woman.
The Overton Window: Chapter One
Two pages.
That's how long the opening chapter is. Two pages. But hey, that's enough to meet our protagonist, Noah Gardner: "Good-looking, great job, fine education, puckishly amusing and even clever when he put his mind to it, reasonably fit and trim for an office jockey, Noah had all the bona fide credentials for a killer eHarmony profile" who had "spent a full decade building what most guys would call an outstanding record of success with the ladies."
Okay, so, I'm not most guys, but let me ask you something. Is "an outstanding record of success with the ladies" a common phrase among your peer group, most guys? Just wondering. It's nice though, to see Beck give a nod to Christian dating site eHarmony, I guess to keep relevant.
As he'd rounded the corner of age twenty-seven and stared the dreaded number thirty right in the face, Noah had begun to realize something... While he'd been aiming low with his standards in the game of love, the women he'd been meeting might all have been doing exactly the same thing. Now, on his twenty-eighth birthday, he still wasn't sure what he wanted in a woman but he knew what he didn't want: arm candy. He was sick of it. Maybe, just maybe, it was time to consider thinking about getting serious.
Noah is having an existential crisis. There. That's basically chapter one. Well, him having the crisis and seeing the woman of his dreams. All while standing at the vending machine at work. (Work, by the way is a PR firm named Doyle & Merchant.)
"Top psychologists tell us in Maxim magazine that the all-important first impression is set in stone within about ten seconds." Again with the pop culture reference. Beck will show you just how relevant he is. I'm waiting for a mention of Facebook and/or Youtube next.
Beck spends several paragraphs sort-of describing the woman (as yet unnamed; suspense!; can't wait for chapter two!), throwing in a mention of the Grateful Dead along the way. More relevance! Well, no. If he'd wanted to be really hip, he'd have mentioned Phish. I'd, again, love to just copy and paste the whole chapter here, to illustrate just how awful it is, but at some point, that would become cumbersome. Besides, if you really want to read this dreck yourself, get down to the library.
There follows more garbage about PR and art and lines and beauty and "the purest essence of a woman" (I'm rolling my eyes right now) ... all of which leads us to the whole crux of chapter one: "Unlikely as it must seem, he knew right then that he was in love."
Noah Gardner, he of the easy life of an outstanding record of success with the ladies, he of the existential crisis, he who may soon consider thinking about getting serious, just found something to give his life meaning: a woman.
"Honor." You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Conservative US radio and television commentator Glenn Beck speaks at a rally dubbed 'Restoring Honor,' to show support of the US military, organized by Beck, one of the de facto leaders of the Tea Party movement at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC, on August 28, 2010. The rally has attracted controversy because it is being held on the 47th anniversary of civil rights legend Martin Luther King Jr.'s 'I Have a Dream' speech, at the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, where King spoke. [Getty Images.]So, Glenn Beck had his "Restoring Honor" rally this weekend, and, despite Fox News' estimate that half a million people were in attendance, it was more like 90,000. Which is still terrifying enough.
People gather at the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall on August 28, 2010, in Washington, DC. Thousands of Americans gathered Saturday in the heart of the US capital for a rally to 'Restore America,' led by conservative icons including talk show host Glenn Beck and former Alaska governor Sarah Palin. [Getty Images.]Yes, Sarah Palin was there, too, right in the center of a rally stewing xenophobic nationalism, patriotic jingoism, militarism, religion, and unfettered anger in a big, fascist pot.
Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin speaks during a rally dubbed 'Restoring Honor,' to show support of the US military, organized by conservative radio and television commentator Glenn Beck. [Getty Images.]There was a lot of this going on:
Two rally-goers stand side-by-side, a white man with a red t-shirt reading "One Nation Under God," and a white woman with a blue t-shirt reading "It is impossible to rightly govern a nation without God and the Bible." [Getty Images.]And some of this:
Men wear colonial costumes as thousands gather to support TV commentator Glenn Beck at his Restoring Honor rally on the US National Mall in Washington, August 28, 2010. [Reuters Pictures.]
Tami Ernst, and her brother John Ernst, both from Houston, are dressed for the occasion at the Glenn Beck 'Restoring Honor' rally in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, Saturday, Aug. 28, 2010. [AP.]As Sinclair Lewis famously said, when fascism comes to America, it will be dressed like a total jackass.
My favorite part of the rally was the giant banners featuring images of Abraham Lincoln and abolitionist Frederick Douglass affixed behind the stage.
All part of Glenn Beck's crusade to reclaim the Civil Rights Movement, no doubt. [Reuters Pictures.]The inclusion of Frederick Douglass is great, just great. I love how it conveys that modern white conservatives are enslaved, seeking their freedom, and Beck is their Douglass. Sure.
If "honorable" doesn't describe the most privileged people on the face of the planet equating themselves to slaves, I just don't know what does.
Beck stands behind the banner of Lincoln, which reads "RESTORING HONOR." [AP.]I will take it as further evidence that God does not exist that Lincoln was not momentarily reanimated just so he could kick Glenn Beck's ass.
Good Morning! The Democrats Suck!
Actual Headline: Democrats can't agree over killing or saving the Bush-era tax cuts.
Of course they can't.
"It's hard to say the Republican economic policies were bad, [and] then continue them," Paul Begala, Democratic strategist and former advisor to President Clinton, told The Hill. "That is a bit of a mixed message."lolsob.
Open Thread
Hosted by a paper octopus.
This week's open threads have been hosted by octopuses. Thanks to the awesome Everything Octopus blog for many of the links and ideas!
The Virtual Pub Is Open
[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]
TFIF, Shakers!
Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!
This can't possibly lead to be an abuse of power
CNN: Court allows agents to secretly put GPS trackers on cars
Juan Pineda-Moreno was recently convicted of conspiracy to grow marijuana.
But he appealed on the grounds that sneaking onto a person's driveway and secretly tracking their car violates a person's reasonable expectation of privacy.
Gee.... do ya' think?
Well, think again:
The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the appeal twice -- in January of this year by a three-judge panel, and then again by the full court earlier this month.
I can't even fathom the flaming rhetorical hula hoops one would have to sashay through in order to allow this sort of surveillance.
Thankfully, there's a Reagan/Bush I appointee present to walk me through it:
"You left place A, at this time, you went to place B, you took this street -- that information can be gleaned in a variety of ways," said David Rivkin, a former Justice Department attorney. "It can be old surveillance, by tailing you unbeknownst to you; it could be a GPS."
He says that a person cannot automatically expect privacy just because something is on private property.
"You have to take measures -- to build a fence, to put the car in the garage" or post a no-trespassing sign, he said. "If you don't do that, you're not going to get the privacy."
Sometimes, I don't get my country at all. I mean, last I checked we were feverously guarding the sanctity of private property from the evils of government. Oh, that's right, we were guarding our property. Who cares about that guy, lolsob.
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
No Gay Soldiers
The American Family Values Children Christian Liberty Freedom Patriot Association Foundation Organization Family Research Council is running a new ad voicing their opposition to the repeal of DADT. There are a lot of things to love about it, but I think my favorite part is the implication that there have never been, and are currently not, any gay servicemembers. Which, were that true, would render DADT unnecessary, anyway—now, wouldn't it?
Of course, logic is not one of the qualities for which members of the Family Research Council are generally known.
Male voiceover: [over footage of soldiers in WWI, WWII, Vietnam, and one of the Gulf Wars] They fought in trenches, stormed beaches, cut through sweltering jungles, marched over burning deserts. [over footage of soldiers marching, and hovering helicopters] Our military has protected our soil, seas, and skies. But today they're drawn into a new battle. [over an image of a Pride parade and a big rainbow flag, accompanied by the text "HARRY REID and HOMOSEXUAL ACTIVISTS pushing their agenda on our military] Harry Reid and homosexual activists are attempting to advance their political agenda [over image of rainbow flag flying near capital] by overturning "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." [over image of tank in the Gulf] Our military is for protection, not politics. [over FRC logo with "paid for by" text] Stop Harry Reid! Family Research Council Action PAC is responsible for the content of this advertising.I also dearly love the idea that advocating for the inclusion of openly gay soldiers is politics, but advocating for their continued exclusion is not.
Funny how the defenders of tradition, the fierce protectors of privilege, are never the ones with the political agenda; it's those marginalized rabble-rousers who want equality, the stinking hooligans, the activists, *spit*, who have an agenda.
The heroes and patriots are merely interested in maintaining the status quo. What's the big deal about that? After all, it's working great for them!
[Via Andy.]
The Overton Window: Prologue
The Overton Window opens with Eli Churchill at a pay phone in the middle of the desert, roll of quarters in his hand, calling Beverly, and spilling the beans on a conspiracy involving a missing two-point-three trillion dollars and eleven nuclear weapons. In two and a half pages, Beck has laid out the entire plot. To hell with suspense, or mystery. No one wants that in a thriller, right? And to say this is poorly written is an understatement. The writing is clunky, stiff, amateurish. It reads like fan fiction, with apologies to writers of fan fiction.
Let's just jump right in, shall we?
He cradled the pay-phone receiver against his shoulder, glanced down the narrow, rutted Mojave dirt road he'd traveled to get here, and then up the long, dark way in the other direction.
In this much quiet your ears could play tricks on you. He could have sworn that there'd been a sound out of place, like the snap of a stalk of dried grass underfoot, even though no other human being had any business being within twenty miles of where he stood, but he couldn't be sure.
So, Eli is in the middle of the desert, twenty miles from nowhere, on a dirt road. Using a pay phone. What? Are there lots of pay phones in the Mojave along narrow, rutted dirt roads? That seems... unlikely. And I wonder if the author has heard of this new thing they have out now called a "cellular phone." Cool thing is, you can buy disposable cell phones now, and they are completely untraceable. That's probably easier than finding a pay phone in the vast expanses of the Mojave desert.
He worked his last six quarters from their torn paper roll and dropped them one by one into the coin slot.
He had just three minutes left. In a way, it was ironic. After years of planning, he'd brought all the evidence he needed to back up his story, but not nearly enough change to buy the time to tell it.
Oh the irony. One more reason to get one of those disposable cells.
"Now where was I ..." As he riffled through his pile of photocopies a couple of the loose papers got caught up in a gust and went floating off into the night.
"You were talking about the money."
"Yes, good, okay. Two-point-three trillion dollars is what we're talking about. Do you know how much that is? From sea level that's a stack of thousand-dollar bills that would reach to outer space and back with thirty miles to spare.
Okay, as is revealed a few paragraphs down, Churchill has infiltrated this deadly conspiracy involving trillions of dollars and stolen nukes, as part of a plot to build a new "political and economic and social structure" and Eli still needs to check his notes to see if he's got this right. I mean, it doesn't sound like the kind of thing one would figure out then be unclear on afterward. Maybe he was checking his photocopies to see how high two-point-three trillion dollars would stack. And again, as if "to outer space and back" was something you'd need to reference your notes on. Not that the stacking height of great gobs money means anything. Not really anyway.
It's a lot of money, and here's what they're doing with it (just who they are will be revealed in coming chapters, no doubt):
"I've seen the place, one of the places where they're getting ready for something—something big—planning it out, you know? I got a job inside in maintenance, as a cleanup man. They thought I was just a janitor, but I had the run of the place overnights.
"I saw what they're planning to do. They're building a structure." He checked his notes to make sure he was getting it right. "Not like a building, but like a political and economic and social structure. They've been working on it for a long, long time. Decades. When they collapse the current system, this new one they've put together will be all that's left."
So, you got that? They're building a new structure. Political and economic and social. Whatever that means. It's vaguely NWOish.
"They're changing the books so that in a generation from now almost nobody will remember what this country used to be. They've got the economy set up to fall like a house of cards whenever they're ready to tap the first one at the foundation. They've got the controlled media all lined up and ready to carry out their PR campaign. And they've got people so indebted and mind-controlled and unprepared, they'll turn to anybody who says he's got the answer."
I think this is the controversial part. The part where Beck, in his author's note, implored us to think. Yes, think, because the media is controlled, the media is some great bugaboo. As if Beck himself isn't part of the media, as if Beck himself isn't a commentator on one of the biggest and most influential media outlets in the world, as if Beck's radio show doesn't pull in 9 million-plus listeners. A very influential media personality tells his audience to listen to him and not listen to influential media personalities? Ummm.... okay.
Churchill warns Beverly "they're going to stage something soon to get it all started" right before he's killed.
A glint of brilliant red light on the wall of the booth caught his attention. He turned, as the man behind him had known that he would, and let the phone drop from his hand.
Eli Churchill had enough time left to begin a quiet prayer but not enough to end it. His final appeal was interrupted by a silenced gunshot, and a .357 semi-jacketed hollow point was the last thing to go through his mind.
Oy. Really? An assassin shows up, in the middle of the desert where this phone booth is and using a silenced 357 with a laser sight, shoots Churchill dead? Because he was a janitor working undercover who made photocopies of the "new structure's" plans to use two-point-three trillion dollar and eleven nuclear weapons to topple the government. All of which he needed to tell Beverly. Whoever she is.
You know, "a .357 semi-jacketed hollow point was the last thing to go through his mind" may sound cool when Morgan Freeman says it, but on paper, it's downright silly. But then, everything about this book appears to be pretty silly.
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by Shaxco, proud distributors of Kate's OMG SHOEZ, now in fuchsia!
Recommended Reading:
Tami: What's So Funny About Antoine Dodson? [TW for discussion of attempted rape.]
Helen G: New Research Into Domestic Abuse Against Trans People [TW for violence]
Liz: The Government's Dereliction of Duty in the Ninth Ward
Echidne: What Are President Obama's Goals?
Living ~400lbs: "I'm squishy, but I'm NOT obese."
Audacia: What Does Feminism Mean to You? Three African Youth Activists Speak Out [video]
Leave your links in comments...
I Would File This Under "Assvertising," But...
So, ladies, you say you want a raise? How should you go about getting it?
First, you have to figure out how to compete with the guy in the next cubicle. After all, he went to a school almost as good as yours. His grades were nearly as good as yours, too. He works hard. In fact, most mornings, he's the second person in the office. You know this, because you're always first. He is young, ruggedly good looking, and he washes his balls with a manly but fresh sandalwood soap.
What to do?
Fortunately, the good folks at Women's Day and Summer's Eve have a few words of advice for you.
[Click to embiggen.]
"1. It should start with your usual routine and all the things you do to feel your best, including showering with Summer's Eve Feminine Wash or throwing a packet of Summer's Eve Feminine Cleansing Cloths into your bag for a quick freshness pick-me-up during the day."
Um. I've seen a lot of variations on the "Your pussy is grody and stinky, lady! So buy our product to clean your disgusting naughtyparts!" meme, but never in all my days have I seen women admonished to clean their vulvas before asking for a raise.
And, seriously: "Only nice, clean girls with sparkly cooters get more money!" is a fucked-up message in ways I can't even begin to deconstruct.
[I]f you think this is one of the most outrageous and insulting advertisements you've ever seen, feel free to tell the people at Woman's Day. You can also call them at (212) 767-6000.
And don't forget the Summer's Eve people. Their toll-free number is 866-787-6383, and the website is HERE.
Teaspoons ahoy.[H/Ts to everyone in the multiverse, and thank you to each and every one of you. Assvertising: Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Eleven, Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen, Fifteen, Sixteen, Seventeen, Eighteen, Nineteen, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117.]
Today in WTF?
Ever want to be class president? Ok, I never did. However, if this was your desire and you attend Nettleton Middle School in Nettleton, MS, and you're white--congratulations and good luck on your goal. If you're black? Well, too bad for you.
Nettleton Middle School in Nettleton, Miss., has segregated its elected class positions by race, according to a memo sent home with children at the school last week that was obtained by NBC News.You can read the memo (.pdf).
The memo was first brought to light when Brandy Springer, a mother of four children, contacted blogger Suzy Richardson, founder and editor of the blog mixedandhappy.com. It was also reported by Gawker.
“My [eighth-grade] daughter came home from [Nettleton] school telling me that she wanted to try out for the school reporter, but it is only open to black students,” Springer wrote Richardson. “They told her ‘she should run for class president, that was open to only white students.'”
The memo indicates that only white students can be president of the school’s eighth grade, while only black students can be vice president.
In seventh grade, whites are the only ones who can be both president and vice president, while the only position a black student at Nettleton can apply for in sixth grade is that of the class reporter.
Separately, Springer told msnbc.com she spoke with the superintendent of the Nettleton school district on Thursday. She said he agreed the policy was outdated and that he was willing to review the policy."Outdated"?! It's "under review"? WTF is there to review? That implies it may be kept and that somehow the school thinks the policy is not racist horseshit (helpful hint: it is, in fact, racist horseshit). While you're at it, Mr. Taylor, you should look at your homecoming policies, too (.pdf).
The school issued a media statement on its website, but would not comment on any specific details about the memo or excerpts from the handbook.
“The processes and procedures for student elections are under review,” Superintendent Russell Taylor said in the statement. “We are reviewing the origin of these processes, historical applications, compliance issues, as well as current implications and ramifications.”
Daily Dose o' Cute
[Also viewable here.]
Video Description: Playtime at Shakes Manor—and the best toy in the world is still a plastic milk bottle ring. Olivia goes wild while Sophie looks on; Dudley tries to figure out how to get into the game; and Matilda remains haughtily disinterested in the other room. She reserves her wild abandon for plastic packing strips, thankyouverymuch.
Still pix below the fold for anyone who can't view the video.
Dudley bringing the cute with some serious dog ears.
Sophs curled up on KBlogz's lap.
Livsy power-lounging.
Tilsy caught in mid-yawn.
