Hosted by a sleepy giraffe.
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!
Quote of the Day
"Corporations are not people. That's why we have different laws that govern corporations than govern individual citizens."—John McCain, in an interview on PBS' NewsHour with Judy Woodruff, yesterday.
Shakers, noted conservative dirtbag John McCain is now the Republicans' voice of reason. The lookingglass ain't even in the rearview anymore.
BushQuotes!
Chapter 5, page 57: "Unbeknownst to me at the time, others who would become my closest friends had also moved to Midland that year. ...Joe O'Neill also moved home in 1975 after working for five years for an oil company in California. His dad had insisted he get training in the business elsewhere, before coming home to run the family company. 'Go make mistakes and learn the oil business on someone else's nickel,' Joe's dad had told him. That's what he did, and it's what Joe recommended I do when I arrived in Midland, ready to apply my Harvard business degree to the real world. 'Go work for a company, learn the business on their dime,' Joey said. I listened to that advice and rejected it. I hadn't gone to business school to work my way up a corporate ladder. If that had been my ambition, I would have stayed back east, gone to Wall Street or a Fortune 500 company. I wanted to be my own boss; Harvard had given me the tools and the confidence to do so."
Privilege and Balls indeed.
[From George Bush's A Charge to Keep, gifted to me by Deeky, because he hates me. In the US, all people who plan to run for president write a shitty book. (Some are less shitty than others, by which I mean the Democrats' books.) A Charge to Keep was George W. Bush's shitty I-wanna-be-president book, published in 1999. I am blogging one random quote per page every day until I have either made my way through the book or lost it behind a couch.]
Misogyny Update
[Content Note: misogynist language, actions, & apologia]
Who could forget yesterday's news about the silencing of women by men because the women dared to question, to disagree very publicly, with them? Well, we have a couple updates.
1. In Michigan, the republicans are saying no, no it's not because of vagina Rep. Brown was silenced, it's because she used the phrase "no means no". AS IF THAT MAKES IT ANY BETTER (hint: it does not).
Majority Floor Leader Jim Stamas, R-Midland, made the decision to prevent Brown and Byrum from speaking on any of the slew of bills the House was racing to pass before adjourning for the summer.Rep. Brown, in her remarks, first introduced the fact that in the Jewish faith, Jewish law that places the life of the mother over that of a fetus. No matter how where in gestation the pregnancy is. Then went onto say:
[...]
"My concern was the decorum of the House, not of anything she said," Stamas told The Detroit News.
"I ask all members to maintain a decorum of the House, and I felt it went too far yesterday," he said.
Speaker Pro Tem John Walsh, R-Livonia, gaveled Brown out of order for saying "no means no" — because it suggested Brown was comparing the abortion legislation to rape, House GOP spokesman Ari Adler said.
"It has nothing to do with the word vagina," Adler said.
”I have not asked you to adopt and adhere to my religious beliefs. Why are you asking me to adopt yours? And finally, Mr. Speaker, I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but no means no.”To which she was censored and her colleagues, such as Rep. Mike Callton (R-Nashville), had this sort of response:
"What she said was offensive. It was so offensive, I don't even want to say it in front of women. I would not say that in mixed company.".
2. Arizona's Republican Party Communications Director Shane Wikfors definitely does not have anything to fear about his job, no matter what he says about two women engaging in a discussion over dissatisfaction with the republican party. His boss thinks he's awesome:
PHOENIX -- The chairman of the Arizona Republican Party said he's "very happy" with his top spokesman who bashed a pair of female critics this week for having a, "bitch session."That's right. They make "mistakes" and then, naturally, take to twitter to tweet things like:
Tom Morrissey said he'd never use the phrase personally, but backed his spokesman, Shane Wikfors, who used it to criticize a columnist for the Arizona Republic and another woman.
"He didn't call anyone a bitch," Morrissey said this afternoon in a telephone interview. "He used the term bitch session."
Morrissey, who took over the party last year, says his spokesman didn't intend to demean women and that, “sometimes people make mistakes."
The very model of professional & charming all-around, that one.
So, to recap:
"Vagina", "No Means No" = "inappropriate", "offensive", "against decorum"
"Bitch session" = Totally ok and not remotely unprofessional
Today in Misogyny: Geek Culture Edition
[Content Note: This post contain transmisogyny, transphobia, the disappearance of female programmers, sexual objectification of women, rape, sexual assault, and rape culture, as well as links to images of objectified female bodies.]
Living as a nerdy woman with a deep love of geek culture, it sometimes amazes me how much I can bear to participate in a culture which has so many people yearning to remind me that I don't belong. Let's take just three examples from this week, shall we?
Writer Caleb Garland takes us on a HIGH-LARIOUS tour of the development of some programming languages, checks out some pictures of the programmers, and offers up the conclusion that what is really necessary to writing a good, long-lived program is having a long beard. There's even a cartoon chart of beard length matched with programming languages.
Shakers, I give you Grace Hopper, one of the key players in the development of COBOL:
[Image by James Davis via Wikimedia Commons]
I get that this post is a JOKE HA HA CANT YOU FEMINISTS TAKE A JOKE? But the fact is that jokes like this serve as a perfect example of microaggressions: the "small" shit that constantly reminds women, trans*men, and insufficiently masculine others that we don't belong in the geek domain. And even if women, trans*men, or others who don't or can't grow beards should happen to develop one of the most important languages in the history of computing, we will be erased or explain away as an "exception that proves the rule" (Garland's actual words for Hopper). Good to know!
2. DC's Catwoman cover reaches new heights of sexual objectification.
Margot Magowan has a great takedown of this ludicrous new cover that manages to simultaneously give a view of Catwoman's enormous cleavage and her sharply defined buttocks, possible only if her spine were replaced with adamantium rubber.
I get that it's too much to ask that one of the relatively small number of female characters who headline their own comic could be treated with a modicum of respect. I get that DC doesn't give a rat's ass about the readers who have stuck with its titles because when their female headliners are well-written, they serve as genuinely empowering, intriguing figures who offer a break from aggressively enforced gender binaries.
But lots of people are pointing out how extremely laughable all of this shit really is. So, if you don't mind your motto being "DC Comics: We Are Ridiculous Ass-Clowns And We Don't Care!" by all means, carry on!
However, let's get it straight: this is yet another aggression, a reminder to every single reader that no matter how daring and brilliant a woman is, no matter how compelling her story, she's really only the sum of her pornified ass and tits.
3. Lara Croft fends off rapists "like a cornered animal." Or, maybe not.
Here's the deal: David Rosenberg, executive producer of Crystal Dynamics' Tomb Raider enthused recently to Kotaku that Lara would encounter "island scavengers" who made rape threats. And this would somehow be a great point of character development because “She is literally turned into a cornered animal. It’s a huge step in her evolution: she’s forced to either fight back or die.” So, uh, survivors of rape and sexual assault are animals? GOOD TO KNOW. And in other helpful stereotypes, all a person needs to do is fight really hard and they can stop rapes. ALSO GOOD TO KNOW! Wait, actually not good to know at all--just another dangerous myth of the rape culture, one which ignores the reality wherein those who "fight back" are likely to be framed as aggressors, and where those who choose not to resist as a survival strategy (or for whom physical resistance just isn't feasible for whatever reason) are liars who really wanted it.
As Alyssa Rosenberg notes:The fantasy of being powerful enough to repulse any attack is a compelling one, but it stops short of placing responsibility where it actually belongs: with rapists. And it’s much more compelling—and less exhausting— to dream of living in a world where you are never threatened than it is to dream of constantly fending off attackers.
Apparently there was enough pushback regarding these statement that the head of Crystal dynamics studio issues a clarification claiming it was a a "misunderstanding." As Kellie Foxx-Gonzalez points out, it's pretty hard to believe that when an executive producer explicitly and clearly talks about rape, it's a "misunderstanding." But okay, player.
Further, the use of rape (or threatened rape, or other sexual assault) as an experience that turns one into a superhero is so incredibly insulting to the millions of people who have experienced it, it's hard for me to even fathom the callousness, the cruelty, of making it a trope in a videogame. No, fending off an attacker didn't turn me into a badass fighter, sirs. It turned me into a fucking mess who blamed myself for getting into the situation. Putting it in a game as a plot device, as a problem to be solved, as points to be gained, is yet another microaggression. Rape isn't some weird, exotic threat. It's an everyday threat that affects women disproportionately, whether because we have experienced it, or whether because we live in a culture that is saturated with it.Here's Foxx-Gonzales:
The odds of women being trapped on a remote island and forced to fight their way off and hunt animals and murder people in order to survive are probably pretty slim. But 1 in 5 women will be raped in their lifetime in the United States. With those odds, sexual violence is not a theme to take lightly, and certainly not one to tack on to an origin story in order to force Lara Croft to become a fighter. Crystal Dynamic developers, rape is not a plot device– rape is a reality.Yes, it remains a real fucking mystery why geeky women and girls, trans*men, and/or rape survivors would feel excluded by any of this. I guess we are just looking for something to complain about.
[Hat tip to Shaker Mod Scott Madin and my friend JBH for links.]
Film Corner!
Below, the trailer for Lola Versus, the IMDb description of which is: "Dumped by her boyfriend just three weeks before their wedding, Lola enlists her close friends for a series of adventures she hopes will help her come to terms with approaching 30 as a single woman." Oof.
The tagline for this movie is not: "Can one woman discover how to be HER OWN Manic Pixie Dream Girl (at least until she finds a new dude)?" But it should be!
The poster for this film informs us it's "from the studio that brought you 500 Days of Summer," and I definitely hated that movie, so I will probably hate this one, too! Even though, as I'm sure everyone knows by now, I LOVE movies (etc.) about quirky white New Yorkers who don't know any people of color and have no time to meet new people because GROWING PAINS!
Hey, did I ever tell you how half my family is from New York City, and so I used to spend part of my summers in Queens? IT'S TRUE! And my grandfather would give me dimes to run down to the corner store on Myrtle Avenue (holla, Glendale!) to buy sweets, and I rode the subway when it was still covered in graffiti, and I splashed around in cement reservoirs at the public park on hot summer days, and I visited the high school at which my grandmother was a secretary and where my dad taught summer school some summers, and I attended Vacation Bible School at my grandmother's church, and I went for long walks with my granddad all around the neighborhood, and, sometimes, when my older cousin would visit, we'd say we were going to Forest Park to ride the carousel, but we'd really go to an arcade and talk to boys, which is where I saw a boombox, and break-dancing, and rappers, all for the first time.
And here is a True Fact: There were people of color in all of those places, and they were not background.
So when people tell stories (SO MANY STORIES) about New York City, and those stories are just full to fuck of white people (SO MANY WHITE PEOPLE), that story is lie. Or it is a story of privilege. Usually both.
ANYWAY!
Music that sounds vaguely Motown-y, but is actually by a white NYC indie band, obviously. Scenes of New York, by which I mean buildings. Cut to Lola, a young thin white blonde woman, trying on wedding dresses with her best female friend, a young thin white brunette woman, and her best male friend, a young thin white dark-haired man, who may or may not be gay and sassy? (TBD.) "Dude!" Male Friend says to the blushing bride. "You look incredible!" Female Friend asks, "Are you trying to take maid of honor from me?" He responds, "I feel like Rupert Everett." Yiiiiikes. "Don't we all?" says Female Friend. Whut. "It's a wedding dress! It's a wedding dress!" Lola exclaims, pumping her fists.
Cut to Lola coming home to her lovely flat, carrying wedding flowers, where her fiancee, Holder from The Killing, is sitting stony-faced on their leather sofa. "Honey, you're gonna die when you see these flowers!" she exclaims. He looks at her with I'mma-barf face. "Honey, what's up—did you have a stroke?" she asks. "I don't think I can do this," Holder tells her. No doi he can't. He needs to find Rosie Lawson's murderer already. Lola looks stricken. Happy music ENDS!
Cut to Lola looking sad and confused, while working out, while wandering the streets, and while lying in bed, stroking the empty pillow beside her where Holder's head used to be. "I feel like everyone saw it coming but me," she says. Male Friend tells her, "Nobody saw it. It was like lightning." Is that a good analogy? Because lightning is usually preceded by thunder. Or is it succeeded? Either way, it's part of a goddamn storm. I'm just saying.
Lola is "shattered." And so she's "power-eating." Scenes of Lola eating junk food. Now we have evidence of what a tragedy this really is. I didn't feel that terrible until I was reminded of the possibility that SHE COULD GAIN WEIGHT HOLY SHIT!
Female Friend urges her to get out there and date and let men put their dicks in her. Ha ha just kidding. She doesn't say that. She actually says "let them ride your pony." Which is even worse.
Lola eats chips. Lola has dinner with some dude. He designs prisons and has a big dick because he was "an incubator baby." Is that a thing? Having a big dick because you were in an incubator? Lola looks dubious. I consider that this is the material they decided to put in the trailer.
Cut to Lola saying goodbye to Incubator Dick on the sidewalk the next morning. He is on rollerblades. Male Friend is there. She says, in voiceover: "I think men are always looking for someone better, and women are just looking for whatever works." (Yuck, that sounds horrible. Also false.) She uncomfortably kisses Incubator Dick before he rollerblades away, saying, "Have a blessed day!" Male Friend asks her, "Did you just have sex with that rollerblader?"
Cut to Female Friend telling Lola that "being single builds character." Cut to Female Friend falling on her face. Cut to Lola on a laptop asking Female Friend: "Is your Match.com log-in still LetMeBeYourHole?" Female Friend replies, "LetMeBeYourHole1. It was taken." Ooooooooof.
Cut to Lola on a psychologist's couch, saying, "I'm constantly obsessing about everything—food, boys." That's pretty much everything! Lola drinks. Lola clings to a stripper pole at a club and has to be dragged off by a large black man. Lola tells her mother (Debra Winger no!) that being obsessed with Cinderella messes all little girls up because "we get obsessed with shoes." Cut to Lola breaking a heel and falling.
Cut to Lola doing some treatment where an older white man hits her with branches while telling her to release her emotions, then pours a bucket of water on her head. She screams. The end.
Via MaryAnn, who says: "Oh, wow. It's a movie about a woman who does nothing but obsess over food and romance and shoes. I've never seen anything like this before. I cannot wait to see what astonishing insights into the female psyche I will discover here." LOL!
Whooooooopsing to a theater near you soon.
Daily Dose of Cute
Sophie
Olivia
Queen Matilda
Bi-Monthly Reminder & Thank-You
This is, for those who have requested it, your bi-monthly reminder* to donate to Shakesville and/or to make sure to renew subscriptions that have lapsed.
It is also an important fundraiser to keep Shakesville going.
Running this strictly-moderated and independent space on donations rather than corporate advertising means that my ability to keep it going depends on your support.
You can donate once by clicking the "Make a Donation" button in the righthand sidebar, or set up a monthly subscription using the "Subscribe" button just below it, which has a dropdown menu of subscription options—or visit the Subscribe to Shakesville page, for even more options.
If you value the content and/or community in this space, can afford it, and want to see Shakesville continue to be managed** as a safe space, please consider setting up a subscription or making a one-time contribution.
If you have recently appreciated getting distilled news about the election, reproductive rights, and other news items; the Fatsronauts 101 series; being able to discuss aspects of the rape culture in a space interested in dismantling that culture; finding out where to direct your teaspoon in support of social justice or in opposition to inequality; getting election news about candidates who are discussed on the basis on their policies alone, I hope you will, if you are able, contribute to support this space and make sure it continues to flourish.
I hope you will also consider the value of whatever else you appreciate at Shakesville, whether it's the moderation, video transcripts, Film Corner, the community in Open Threads, the blogarounds, Butch Pornstache, the Daily Dose of Cute, your blogmistress' penchant for inventing new words, or anything else you enjoy.
Let me reiterate, once again, that I don't want anyone to feel obliged to contribute financially, especially if money is tight. Aside from valuing feminist work, the other goal of fundraising is so Iain and I don't have to struggle on behalf of the blog, and I don't want anyone else to struggle themselves in exchange. There is a big enough readership that neither should have to happen.
I also want say thank you, so very much, to each of you who donates or has donated, whether monthly or as a one-off. I am profoundly grateful—and I don't take a single cent for granted. I've not the words to express the depth of my appreciation, besides these: This community couldn't exist without that support, truly. Thank you.
My boundless appreciation as well to everyone who contributes to the space in other ways: Thank you to our regular contributors, our moderators, our guest contributors, to anyone who has provided a transcription, to those who have linked to, quoted, Tweeted about, and otherwise supportively recommended this blog, and/or to the people who have taken the time to send me the occasional note of support and encouragement. This community couldn't exist without you, either.
---------------------
* I know there are people who resent these reminders, but there are also people who appreciate them, so I've now taken to doing them every other month, in the hopes that will make a good compromise.
** Managing Shakesville as a safe space requires, in addition to the time of our volunteer mods, my full-time commitment, and my salary is drawn exclusively from donations. I do not raise funds by corporate or content-generated advertising, as past attempts have resulted in ads served that violated the safe space, and I do not raise funds by required subscription, i.e. locking content behind a pay wall, as I want Shakesville to be accessible as possible irrespective of one's financial situation.
I cannot afford to do this full-time for free, but, even if I could, fundraising is also one of the most feminist acts I do here. I ask to be paid for my work because progressive feminist advocacy has value.
[Please Note: I am not seeking suggestions on how to raise revenue; I am asking for donations in exchange for the work of providing valued content in as safe and accessible a space as possible.]
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by mac and cheese.
Recommended Reading:
Jos: The Olympic Games Are Obsessed with Policing Femininity [Content Note: The post at this link includes discussion of transmisogyny, gender policing, and racism.]
Lauren: Actor Giancarlo Esposito Stopped + Frisked [Content Note: The post at this link includes descriptions of racism and police harassment/threats.]
Renee: Melissa Harris-Perry Gives the 101 on Black Hair [Content Note: The post at this link includes discussion of racism and hostility to consent.]
Jamelle: The Democrats' Demographic Dreams
Risa: Opening Historic Trails: Accidental Heroes Stomp Sports Inequity
Andy: Defense Secretary Leon Panetta Praises Gay Troops, LGBT Civilians in Historic Pride Video
Adrienne: Thawing the Frozen Indian: Brown University's New Anthro Exhibit
Melissa: Meryl Streep: "Why? Why? Why? Don't they want the money?"
Atrios: Helicopter Drop
Leave your links and recommendations in comments...
Executive Order Authorizes Parts of DREAM Act
I'm not a huge fan of executive orders, but as long as the Office of the President has that power, it might as well be used on stuff like this:
The Obama administration will stop deporting and begin granting work permits to younger illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as children and have since led law-abiding lives. The election-year initiative addresses a top priority of an influential Latino electorate that has been vocal in its opposition to administration deportation policies.This is not a perfect plan. One major objection I have is the blanket disqualification for criminal history, irrespective of whether the arrest was for, say, assault vs. getting caught with some weed. When young people of color are disproportionately targeted by "war on drug" policies, there will be a lot of pointless disqualifications for what effectively amounts to rank racism.
The policy change, described to The Associated Press by two senior administration officials, will affect as many as 800,000 immigrants who have lived in fear of deportation. It also bypasses Congress and partially achieves the goals of the so-called DREAM Act [Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act], a long-sought but never enacted plan to establish a path toward citizenship for young people who came to the United States illegally but who have attended college or served in the military.
...Under the administration plan, illegal immigrants will be immune from deportation if they were brought to the United States before they turned 16 and are younger than 30, have been in the country for at least five continuous years, have no criminal history, graduated from a U.S. high school or earned a GED, or served in the military. They also can apply for a work permit that will be good for two years with no limits on how many times it can be renewed. The officials who described the plan spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss it in advance of the official announcement.
The policy will not lead toward citizenship but will remove the threat of deportation and grant the ability to work legally, leaving eligible immigrants able to remain in the United States for extended periods.
I'm also not happy it lacks a roadmap to citizenship.
That said, this policy is an improvement over our current immigration policies. It's opportunistic politicking, but it's a step in the right direction all the same.
There is much more yet to do.
Related Reading: Why Obama's Decision to Stop Deporting DREAM-Eligible Youth Is Good for the Economy.
Photos of the Day
U.S. President Barack Obama talks to a girl during a visit to the Boys and Girls Club of Cleveland, Broadway section, in Cleveland, Ohio June 14, 2012. [Reuters Pictures]Check out the caption on this similar photo of President Obama with the same young woman:
US President Barack Obama talks to a girl at the Boys and Girls Club of Cleveland in Cleveland, Ohio, on June 14, 2012. Obama's campaign savagely mocked Mitt Romney as 'out of touch' with ordinary Americans Wednesday with a web video featuring a highlight reel of the Republican's gaffes. The move came as Romney, a multi-millionaire former venture capitalist, argues that it is Obama that has lost touch with the economic pain [hurting] the US heartland, and as each candidate tries to outdo the other in professing deep empathy with the middle-class. [Getty Images]That's an interesting caption. I'm not sure Mitt Romney would ever be described as having "savagely mocked" the President. Republicans "criticize." President Obama "savagely mocks."
It's also interesting in its suggestion that Obama is feigning empathy for a photo-op. There are a lot of legitimate criticisms to be made about President Obama. Interacting insincerely with children is categorically not one of them. He is, without question, the president with the most natural rapport with children in my lifetime, and probably long before. He clearly respects children and young adults, and that is no small thing.
Here are some of my other favorite photos from the President's visit to the Boys and Girls Club of Cleveland yesterday:
So the President Gave a Speech Yesterday...
Stumping in Ohio yesterday, President Obama gave a speech about the economy. The full transcript is here. I don't have much to say about it. It's about what I've come to expect, although I was pleased with how unapologetically critical Obama was of Romney's policies.
Overall: Just another reminder that President Obama is not nearly as progressive as I'd like, and not as terrible as Mitt Romney.
[Photo: Getty Images]
Question of the Day
Since we were talking about the screen adaptation of Life of Pi earlier today, I thought today's QotD should be: What book which has not had a big-screen adaptation would you like to see made into a film?
Bonus points if you add who you'd like to see write, direct, and star!
BushQuotes!
Chapter 5, page 56: "When you step outside in Midland, Texas, your horizons suddenly expand. The sky is huge. The land is flat, with not even the hint of a hill to limit the view. The air is clear and bright. The impression is one of the sky as a huge canopy that seems to stretch forever. Appropriately, 'the sky is the limit' was the slogan in Midland when I arrived in the mid-1970s, and it captured the sense of unlimited possibilities that you could almost feel and taste in the air. You can see as far as you want to see in Midland, and I could see a future."
This blissfully privileged bullshit is just rage-making. Just juxtapose that garbage with the Rape Culture Discussion Thread alone, no less the rest of the content on the main page today, and imagine living a life where none of it ever touches you, where the endless plains with nary a bump are the perfect metaphor for your life. Jesus.
[From George Bush's A Charge to Keep, gifted to me by Deeky, because he hates me. In the US, all people who plan to run for president write a shitty book. (Some are less shitty than others, by which I mean the Democrats' books.) A Charge to Keep was George W. Bush's shitty I-wanna-be-president book, published in 1999. I am blogging one random quote per page every day until I have either made my way through the book or lost it behind a couch.]
Today in Misogyny
[Content Note: misogynist language and actions]
A tale of two stories.
1. Michigan State Rep. Lisa Brown (D) has been silenced in state congress due to using the word vagina in her testimony on the floor against the heinous abortion bill (which passed, btw). Rep. Brown said:
”I have not asked you to adopt and adhere to my religious beliefs. Why are you asking me to adopt yours? And finally, Mr. Speaker, I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but no means no.”According to this report from Michigan Public Radio:
Ari Adler is the spokesman for the House Republican leadership.Another woman, Rep. Barb Byrum, also says she has been formally silenced as she was not called on during the debates (from RawStory):
“It is the responsibility of every member who serves in the House of Representatives to maintain decorum on the House floor and when they do not do that, there can be actions because of that. And the action today is to not recognize either representative to speak on the House floor," he said.
[...]
The House Republican leadership confirms that state Representative Lisa Brown will not be recognized during debates as a sanction for mentioning her vagina during a debate on anti-abortion legislation.
Video from the Michigan House floor shows Byrum attempting to speak about an amendment to the anti-abortion bills, but the speaker does not recognize her despite her status as the amendment’s author.
2. In Arizona, Republican Party Communication Director Shane Wikfors went online to call two women having a discussion about the failures and disappointments of the Republican party (of which one was/is a member of) a "bitch session". Yes, that's right. A "bitch session".
“As the spokesman for the Arizona Republican Party, I would have at least expected Ms. Roberts to call and ask a few simple questions about Kathy Petsas’ assertions before going to print, but she didn’t,” Wikfors wrote. “And Kathy Petsas never made any attempt to provide any constructive criticism to the State Party.”Wikfors has defended his phrasing claiming it's common and "Go to any corporate boardroom and you’ll hear that reference.” Right. Because THAT IS THE POINT, SURE. And that TOTALLY makes it ok! I'll really believe you didn't mean it any other way, either. Suuuure.
“Instead, Ms. Petsas ran off to Laurie Roberts and engaged her in a ‘bitch session.’”
Did I say two stories? Silly me! It's really the same bullshit story of misogynists using power to bully, to silence, women who disagree with them.
Photo of the Day
From the Telegraph's Pictures of the Day for 14 June 2012: A skua perches on an iceberg in the Antarctic Peninsula. Canadian photographer Tony Beck snaps penguins and other Antarctic birds in their remote, natural habitat. [Tony Beck / Barcroft Media]
Quote of the Day
[Content Note: Misogyny; harassment.]
"Today, I ordered some food and was asked how spicy I'd like it. I replied that I'd like it to be very spicy, and immediately, the man taking my order winked suggestively and asked me if I 'liked things hot' all the time. I was in restaurant with my friends. I'm a 16 year old girl. I felt uncomfortable and appalled that, as a girl, even my food preferences had to be sexualized."—From the Microaggressions Project.
Whooops your priorities, Catholic Bishops!
[Content Note: This post includes discussion of rape, Christian supremacy, institutionalized abuse, and hostility to reproductive health.]
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is meeting in Atlanta, and have heard tough words about their record on priestly abuse.
The board's report mentioned the Dallas Charter's "zero tolerance policy," which requires the permanent suspension of a priest who is found to have abused a minor, saying some feel it is "too harsh if, for example, behavior occurred many decades ago." But the board continued to back the policy. "Convicted sex offenders cannot be police officers, Boy Scout leaders, or teachers," Notzon said. "They cannot be allowed to remain members of the Catholic clergy functioning in public ministry either."Now you might be encouraged by this statement:
"Our response will require all the energies the Catholic community can muster," [Baltimore Archbishop William Lori] said....except whoooops! He wasn't talking about dealing with predator priests. No, "all the energies the Catholic community can muster" will be turned towards making sure women don't have access to birth control if they work for Catholic-affiliated institutions. Here's the actual quoted response to the board's concerns about clerical rapists:
Oakland (Calif.) Bishop Salvatore Cordileone told the bishops that removing a priest from ministry is not the same as "removing a police officer or a teacher, but more like removing the head of a family from a home," Cordileone said. "We have to be very careful about how we go about this so as not to compromise the identity of a priest."Yes, definitely, compromising the identity of the priest should be your top concern when children are being raped and abused!
Your Excellencies: Your priorities are poisonous garbage. But carry on telling us all about birth control! The world should take take your moral authority very seriously, obviously.
[Commenting note: Please take care to distinguish in comments between "Catholics" and church leadership, as many Catholics are not in agreement with the words and actions of their leaders.]
Discussion Thread: Rape Culture
[Content Note: This thread contains discussion of rape culture narratives, tropes, and behaviors.]
Every week, my Rape Culture 101 post is linked by numerous writers and commenters, at blogs and in forums and on social media sites, trying to refute the idea that the rape culture does not exist, an idea posed, inevitably, by some dude who believes the concept of a rape culture is an invention of man-hating feminists.
The Rape Culture 101 piece is a useful resource on its own, as are collections of stats and refuted myths like this one, and I'd like to complement these general commentaries on cultural narratives, practices, and realities with a thread on first-hand experiences of the rape culture.
This is not a thread in which to share stories of surviving sexual violence, as was The Survivor Thread, but a thread to share the ways aside from actual assaults that the rape culture manifests in our daily lives.
Some of the ways the rape culture manifests in my daily life, as examples:
• I get rape threats from people who disagree with me.
• I routinely hear "rape" used as a synonym for getting overcharged.
• I am often told someone or other "looks like a child molester."
• My rape-related PTSD is treated by people as though it's not a real thing.
• Rape scenes are mislabeled as "sexual content" in movie content notes.
• Rape is constantly euphemized as "having sex" (or some variation) in media reports.
Etc. What you share could be personal interactions, or things you see/hear/read, or narratives that are used to silence you. This thread is about collectively demonstrating how the rape culture functions in the daily lives of the people who live in it.
Film Corner!
Daily Dose of Cute
At the end of nearly every day, I walk out of my office, down the hall, and into the living room to find Zelly on the couch, wagging her tail excitedly as I come into view. (The days this doesn't happen, it's because Zelly's in the office with me, nudging me to FINISH UP ALREADY IT'S TIME LET'S GO PLAY!) Last night, I filmed a bit of her evening greeting.
Video Description: I walk down the hall and then swivel to the right, to find Zelda on the sofa, her head on a pillow and her little Dorito ears sticking out to either side. "Whatsu doin'?" I ask her. "Are you being a good girl, Zelly, hmm?" Her tail starts wagging. "Are you being a good girl?" Her tail thumps against the couch. "Are you such a good dog? Are you?" I walk toward her, and her tail thumps excitedly. She turns her head submissively. "Are you my good girl?" Thump thump thump! "Do you need cuddles?" She lifts her head and looks at me and licks her lips. "You do? I need cuddles, too." Thump thump thump! "Should we cuddle together?" Thump thump thump! "Should we?" I sit down beside her, and her tail goes wild. She stretches her head toward me and I scratch it. "Oh, what a good girl," I tell her. "What a good girl."
Immediately thereafter, she rolled on her back, offering up the haystack (my nickname for her belly, which is covered in coarse blond hair) for some mega-cuddles, a request which I happily obliged.
More Today in Rape Culture
[Content Note: Clergy abuse; rape culture; Christian Supremacy; secondary trauma.]
Laurie Goodstein and Erik Eckholm in the New York Times—Church Battles Efforts to Ease Sex Abuse Suits:
While the first criminal trial of a Roman Catholic church official accused of covering up child sexual abuse has drawn national attention to Philadelphia, the church has been quietly engaged in equally consequential battles over abuse, not in courtrooms but in state legislatures around the country.Right. And there's no bigger victim than the poor Catholic Church. Victimized by survivors of sexual violence. Victimized by "homosexual priests." Victimized by the media. Victimized by gossips. The list goes on and on, but naturally never includes the Church's leadership who shielded and abetted rapists, thus ensuring multitudinous victims.
The fights concern proposals to loosen statutes of limitations, which impose deadlines on when victims can bring civil suits or prosecutors can press charges. These time limits, set state by state, have held down the number of criminal prosecutions and civil lawsuits against all kinds of people accused of child abuse — not just clergy members, but also teachers, youth counselors and family members accused of incest.
Victims and their advocates in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and New York are pushing legislators to lengthen the limits or abolish them altogether, and to open temporary "windows" during which victims can file lawsuits no matter how long after the alleged abuse occurred.
The Catholic Church has successfully beaten back such proposals in many states, arguing that it is difficult to get reliable evidence when decades have passed and that the changes seem more aimed at bankrupting the church than easing the pain of victims.
Already reeling from about $2.5 billion spent on legal fees, settlements and prevention programs relating to child sexual abuse, the church has fought especially hard against the window laws, which it sees as an open-ended and unfair exposure for accusations from the distant past. In at least two states, Colorado and New York, the church even hired high-priced lobbying and public relations firms to supplement its own efforts. Colorado parishes handed out postcards for churchgoers to send to their representatives, while in Ohio, bishops themselves pressed legislators to water down a bill.The Catholic Church is so invested in protecting itself from accountability that it is willing to fight state laws that would empower other survivors of sexual abuse.
The outcome of these legislative battles could have far greater consequences for the prosecution of child molesters, compensation of victims and financial health of some Catholic dioceses, legal experts say, than the trial of a church official in Philadelphia, where the jury is currently deliberating.
Truly despicable.
The denial of justice in sexual assault cases reverberates in terrible ways. Rapists not held accountable continue to rape, thus creating more victims. And survivors are left to feel like their victimization does not matter. That is a great burden to carry, to be a survivor of sexual violence to whom indifference about that shattering breach of agency and safety is communicated in the most contemptuous, self-serving way.
The Catholic Church is trying to make the victims of its employees live as though nothing ever happened to them, or that what happened to them didn't matter, or that by speaking out and seeking accountability for what happened to them, it is they, the survivors, who are bringing ruination to the Church and its reputation (and coffers). This is a profound betrayal—and it a secondary trauma survivors are obliged to weather.
To fail once is shameful. To fail again, in protecting predators, is unforgivable. To fail yet once more, in revictimizing survivors, is an act of such deliberate cruelty I cannot comprehend the cavernous indecency underlying its corrupt instinct.
[Commenting Guidelines: Please take the time to make sure any criticisms are clearly directed at the Catholic Church leadership and not at "Catholics," many of whom are themselves critical of the failures of Church leadership.]
Number of the Day
$1 billion: The potential amount of money conservative billionaire Sheldon Adelson will donate to aid Mitt Romney's campaign for the US presidency. Or more, if need be.
Forbes has confirmed that billionaire Sheldon Adelson, along with his wife Miriam, has donated $10 million to the leading Super PAC supporting presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney–and that's just the tip of the iceberg. A well-placed source in the Adelson camp with direct knowledge of the casino billionaire's thinking says that further donations will be "limitless."Emphasis mine.
Adelson, who has built Las Vegas Sands into an global casino empire, will do "whatever it takes" to defeat Obama, this source says. And given that Adelson is worth $24.9 billion–and told Forbes in a recent rare interview about his political giving that he had been willing to donate as much as $100 million to his initial presidential preference, Newt Gingrich–that "limitless" description telegraphs potential nine-digit support of Romney.
...Thanks to the Citizens United decision, there are no curbs on how much Adelson could give the pro-Romney Super PAC, Restoring Our Future. Given that he's one of the 15 richest people in the world, the Sands chairman could personally bankroll the equivalent of entire presidential campaign–say, $1 billion or so–and not even notice. (The $10 million donation he just made to Romney is equivalent to $40 for an American family with a net worth of $100,000.)
When the Supreme Court handed down the decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which granted corporations, unions, and nonprofits the latitude to donate freely to political campaigns and thus effectively bankroll federal elections, I grimly mused: "It is not hyperbole to say this decision is paving the way for America to become a fully-fledged corporatocracy, which, depending on your perspective, is a sibling to fascism or a version of it. ...This decision further diminishes any voice that isn't backed with a fuckload of money. Someday, we may look back on this day and realize it was the day our democracy died."
That day has arrived.
Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime
Glenn Miller and His Orchestra with Tex Beneke, Marion Hutton, and the Nicholas Brothers:
"(I've Got a Gal in) Kalamazoo"
Today in Rape Culture
[Content Note: Violence; rape culture statistics and narratives.]
Today on its front page, CNN is featuring an article about a serial rapist in Cleveland who is "thought to be linked to four rapes and a homicide dating back to 1996." The article is linked with the text:
"Serial rapist on the loose in Cleveland."
Which is accurate. But note how this framing still plays into the key rape culture narrative that rape is so rare as to warrant alarmist headlines that sound like retro monster b-movie titles: "Serial rapist on the loose in Cleveland!"
(CNN's headline on the actual story is better: "FBI joins search for serial rapist in Ohio.")
The fact is that serial rapists are not rare. They are not even a minority of rapists:
Of the 120 rapists in the sample [identified in the study Repeat Rape and Multiple Offending Among Undetected Rapists by David Lesak and Paul M. Miller, published in Violence and Victims, Vol 17, No. 1, 2002 (Lisak & Miller 2002)], 44 reported only one assault. The remaining 76 were repeat offenders. These 76 men, 63% of the rapists, committed 439 rapes or attempted rapes, an average of 5.8 each (median of 3, so there were some super-repeat offenders in this group). Just 4% of the men surveyed committed over 400 attempted or completed rapes.Emphasis original. Four percent of the men surveyed were, by their own admission, serial rapists. Not four percent of the rapists—four percent of all the men surveyed in an ethnically diverse group of 1882 college students, ranging in age from 18 to 71 with a median age of 26.5.
When four percent of the adult male population are serial rapists, there are serial rapists "on the loose" everywhere. There is certainly more than one in Cleveland.
With a population of 370,000, that means about 177,600 (48%) residents are male, and about 135,000 (76%) residents are men ages 18+. Four percent of 135,000 is 5,400.
That is a good deal higher than one.
It is also a reality not remotely reflected in a tease like "Serial rapist on the loose in Cleveland."
One of the most dangerous lies the rape culture tells about itself is that it doesn't exist. The only way we can begin to dismantle it is by acknowledging, always, the ubiquity of rape, and never treating it like some sort of scandalous aberration.
Feel the Trans*mentum
Yesterday, Ontario added protections against discrimination on the basis of "gender identity" and "gender expression" to its human rights code. Versions of bill 33 had been brought to Ontario's unicameral legislature three previous times since 2007. Yesterday, it passed with the support of all major parties.
Xtra! reports:
The passage of the bill marks a changing in the tides for the trans movement in Canada. Similar bills are being considered in Manitoba and at the federal level. The House of Commons, too, seems poised to pass a similar bill after seven years of trying.
The bill has enjoyed bipartisan support that all parties have recognized as extraordinary. While the final vote was not carried unanimously, it received two very vocal Progressive Conservative endorsers in Christine Elliott -- who co-signed it -- and Rod Jackson.H/t to CaitieCat
“This isn’t the end; this is probably just the beginning,” Jackson said.
Liberal MPP Glen Murray, grinning, said, “It’s not often I get a chance to be a part of making history.”
This victory for the trans community comes on the heels of the passage of Bill 13, the anti-bullying law that will work toward including gay-straight alliances in all Ontario schools.
Here Are Two Stories That Are Definitely Unrelated
1. TPM—Senators Fawn Over JPMorgan CEO After Massive Trading Debacle: "The long-shot big hope for Wall Street reformers Wednesday was that JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon would trip up before the Senate Banking Committee and expose the need for tighter rules governing big banks. His firm, after all, recently lost billions making risky bets with depositor funds on the line. Instead, with some notable exceptions, the senators themselves turned the cross-examination into a coronation, and exposed the extent to which elected officials still feel compelled to genuflect to powerful financial interests."
2. Reuters—Foreclosures Up for First Time in 27 Months: "Foreclosure starts rose year-over-year in May for the first time in more than two years as banks resumed dealing with distressed properties after a mortgage abuse settlement earlier this year, data firm RealtyTrac said on Thursday. The $25 billion settlement between major banks and states, formally approved in April, had been expected to jump-start foreclosure proceedings that were previously stalled by uncertainty about the liability of banks."
Banks are beautiful.
Today in Mitt Romney Stands in Front of Something
Would you be surprised to hear that Mitt Romney is terrible, his campaign is terrible, and they behaved terribly to someone who allowed them to use her restaurant for a photo-op? I bet you wouldn't!
Dianne Bauer opened up her cafe to Mitt Romney and his campaign for a small round table discussion Friday morning before his speech at Bayliss Park.Yes. Yes that is exactly how he is going to be if he gets in office—arrogant, mocking, contemptuous of working people's concerns, and breaking everything in sight.
...Bauer's issues with the campaigns staffers started the night before when they started staging the cafe for the event. She described many of their demeanors as "arrogant". She says her cafe was not treated with the respect it deserved. "Stuff got broke. My table cloths they just got ripped off, wadded up and thrown in the back room."
She says the boom truck she allowed the campaign to borrow to gain access to the roof now has an 8-inch gouge in it that she'll have to take the time to repair. The campaign told her to send them an itemized list of anything that was broken, and they would pay for it, but Bauer says that won't fix everything. "My dad's picture, an emblem my dad gave me, it got broke. Those aren't things you can replace."
Bauer says she never even got to meet the candidate she closed half of her restaurant down for. "Every time we tried to go out or look, secret service was right there," she said. She was complaining about the event to a friend when reporters overheard her and posted about it online.
That's when Romney called Bauer himself. She says he explained that it was just a misunderstanding that she did not get to meet him, but the phone call didn't smooth things over for her. "He responded 'well, I'm sorry your table cloths got ripped off, wadded up and thrown in the back room' and I took it as mocking," she said. "We're the ones he's wanting to get the votes from, you'd think we would have been treated better."
She says the whole experience left her wondering.
"With how he treated me, is that how he's going to treat others? You know, if he gets in office is he going to be that way to us little people?"
Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker BlueJean: If you could live in one book/movie/TV show for the rest of your life, what would it be?
The Golden Girls.
Photo of the Day
Actresses Meryl Streep (left) and Viola Davis arrive at the 2012 Women In Film Crystal + Lucy Awards held at The Beverly Hilton Hotel on June 12, 2012 in Beverly Hills, California. [Getty Images]I love images of women who are colleagues, and sometime competitors, who genuinely seem to like and admire one another. My cockles! They are warmed!
Streep presented Davis with an award that evening, during which she called Davis "a lion-hearted woman." Love.
Sandusky Coverage Full of Rape Apologia
[Content Note: Sexual violence; rape apologia.]
I haven't written much about the trial of Jerry Sandusky, the Penn State football team's former defensive coordinator accused of sexually assaulting 10 boys over 15 years, because there isn't a whole lot I have to say about the case I didn't say when it was first reported, or that I haven't said, literally, dozens of times before.
And yet.
I have been reading coverage of the trial. It is not good. There is rape apologia all over it, in every minimizing euphemism and every bit of oblique victim-blaming and the reminders that, hey, those boys could be lying, even though there is no answer to the obvious question why, given the overwhelming disincentives against publicly identifying as a survivor of sexual violence, no less pointing your finger at your rapist, no less when he is famous, beloved, worshiped.
This CNN story is one of the better articles, and still contains this:
A 25-year-old man testified Wednesday that as a boy, he was abused by Jerry Sandusky and that Sandusky threatened him and then later apologized, telling the child that he loved him and that he didn't mean the threat."Engaging in oral sex" connotes consent. A child cannot consent. The man testified that Sandusky orally raped him.
...He testified the school's longtime assistant football coach sexually abused him on at least five different occasions in the basement of his central Pennsylvania home, pinning him down and engaging in oral sex.
Supposedly, we "all" agree that rape is terrible, in which case we should all be invested in dismantling the rape culture, a key part of which is not misrepresenting rape as consensual sex acts via gross euphemisms. But here we are. Again.
Quote of the Day
[Content Note: Sexual violence; rape apologia.]
"In recent weeks, we've learned of several incidents involving a few bad actors trying to take advantage of some of our younger members."—Skout founder and CEO Christian Wiklund, whose "Flirt, Friend, Chat" iPhone app was used by three different men "accused of raping minors they met after posing as teens in Skout's community for 13- to 17-year-olds. The alleged victims are 12, 13 and 15 years old."
"Trying to take advantage" is certainly an interesting euphemism for rape. And by "interesting," I mean gross and minimizing.
Wiklund is not responsible for rapists committing rape. The rapists are responsible for their actions. But if Wiklund truly gives a shit about his service being used by rapists to locate victims, then he needs to not talk about rape in prettified euphemisms.
"In recent weeks, we've learned of several incidents in which adult men posed as children to meet other children whom they subsequently allegedly raped."
That is factual. That does not minimize sexual violence. That does not uphold the rape culture, even as one purports to disdain it.
Unlike, say, Wiklund's actual comment.
Opt to Adopt
Video Description: A medium-length coated ginger tabby cat sits in a modern, minimally-appointed apartment, bopping its head along to a dubstep track. Dan Harris, a young white male reporter on ABC's Nightline, stands in the kitchen, drinking a cup of coffee from a mug with the cat's picture on it. Text Onscreen: "DAN HARRIS: ANCHOR/REPORTER." He grabs his keys and walks out of the apartment. The cat watches him leave. Text Onscreen: "GEORGE THE CAT." George begins to dance. Text Onscreen: "HOVERCAT." George hovers in the air and begins to dance. He takes a break to eat from a bowl labeled "Hovercat." He jumps and hovers over the bed. Bops his head. Mews. Hovers. Dances. HOVERCAT! As Dan comes home through the door, George falls into his arms. George purrs. Dan pets him affectionately, then sets him on the floor. The music starts again and George flies back into the air. Text Onscreen, between Dan drinking coffee and George hover-dancing: "Millions of viral videos waiting to be adopted." George bops his head and mews. His face morphs into a series of faces of cats and dogs waiting to be rescued. Text Onscreen: "Dan's cat was adopted."
June is adopt a shelter cat month. Visit the ASPCA to learn more.
[Via TDW.]
Secretary Clinton: On Pride Month
Daily Dose of Cute
[Content Note: Zelda snaps at flies in the video.]
Video Description: Zelda sits in the grass beside me. She licks my knee. Looks around with alert ears and sniffing nose. Her head zooms after a fly. She sniffs. Snaps at a fly. Alert ears. Dogbrows. Sniffing nose. Snap snap! I pan to the left. Her back toes are dug into the ground so she can sproing into action in an instant. I pan further left. Dudley lies splayed in the grass on his side, his ears flopped forward. He looks at me. Blinks. Stretches. Shifts position lazily. Fin.
Zelly the Watch Dog, with max Shar Pei face.
Dudley the Not-Watch Dog, with max disinterest face.
Wednesday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by stripes.
Recommended Reading:
David: Trans Pacific Partnership Document Leaked, Shows Corporations Could Violate National Sovereignty
Jim: Boundaries
Maria Elena: Cake Boss's Transgender Disaster [Content Note: The post at this link includes discussion of transphobic bullying.]
FMF News: CT Declares Abortion an Essential Health Benefit
Crunkonia: Something to Cry About: Report from the Kitchen Floor [Content Note: This post contains discussion and descriptions of child abuse.]
Maya: Stand with Servicewomen: Support Access to Abortion in the Military
Andy: Betty White Talks About Her Meeting with Obama, Gay Marriage
Ian: Romney Touts Presidential Salary Plan That Was Literally a Saturday Night Live Skit
Angry Asian Man: Seeking Participants for a Writing Study of Korean American Adult Adoptees
Happy Fifth Anniversary to the Adipositivity Project! [Site may be NSFW.]
Deeky's got the video of Anna Deavere Smith's amazing one-woman show Let Me Down Easy. I recommended this to him after I watched it, and now both of us are pretty much obsessed with it. IT IS SO GREAT! SHE IS SO GREAT! It's quite genuinely one of the most amazing pieces of acting I've ever seen.
Leave your links and recommendations in comments...
Two Facts
[Content Note: Homophobia.]
1. There is an actual for real organization called the "American Decency Association."
2. They are rampant homophobes who assert that JC Penney's inclusion of a same-sex couple in a Fathers' Day advert "insulted millions of us 'traditional,' i.e. 'real,' family people."
lol your definition of decency!
I think I will start an organization called the Decency Association of America which posits that not being homophobic is decent. CONTROVERSIAL!
This is so the worst thing you're going to read all day.
[Content Note: Misogyny.]
The opinion section of the Wall Street Journal has been an unmitigated garbage disaster for years, but this barfatorial is embarrassing even by their usual cavernous void of standards.
Actual Headline: "Women Don't Belong in Ranger School."
Actual Subhead: "Do individuals serve the military or does the military serve them?"
Actual Lede: "The United States Army is debating whether to admit women to Ranger School, its elite training program for young combat leaders. Proponents argue this is to remove a final impediment to the careers of Army women. But the move would erode the unique Ranger ethos and culture—not to mention the program's rigorous physical requirements—harming its core mission of cultivating leaders willing to sacrifice everything for our nation."
Following is eleventy paragraphs elaborating on the hand-drawn sign stuck outside the scrap-wood playhouse in Frankie Flunderton's backyard: "No Girls Allowed."
Stephen Kilcullen does make a valiant effort to convince us his argument is not, in fact, that girls are icky and totes have cooties, but is instead that opening up the Rangers to women just because denying access limits their career opportunities is BULLSHIT, man!
Ranger School isn't about improving the career prospects of individual candidates. ... The promise of something bigger than oneself—bigger than any career track—is what motivates these men.I'mma go ahead and let you parse in comments alllllll the irony (ALL OF IT!) inherent in defending privilege with charges of selfishness.
It is this culture of excellence and selflessness that attracts young men to the Ranger brotherhood. The Ranger ethos is designed to be deadly serious yet self-deprecating, focused entirely on teamwork and mission accomplishment. Rangers put the mission first, their unit and fellow soldiers next, and themselves last. The selfishness so rampant elsewhere in our society has never existed in the Ranger brotherhood.
And that is the secret of the brotherhood's success. Some call it "unit cohesiveness" but what they are really describing is a transition from self-interest to selfless service. The notion of allowing women into Ranger School because denying them the experience would harm their careers makes Ranger graduates cringe. Such politically correct thinking is the ultimate expression of the "me" culture, and it jeopardizes core Ranger ideals.
I will, however, just quickly note that the Army has been selling itself (literally) as a great career opportunity since the 1980s. It doesn't seem very reasonable to complain that women want access to the same possibilities for career advancement as men in an organization that explicitly markets itself as a job corps.
When, of course, it's not celebrating its members each being an "Army of One."
I don't think women pursuing equality is evidence of a "me" culture. "Army of One" adverts, on the other hand... Well, let's just say if people signing up express some modicum of self-interest, there are other sources you might explore besides "political correctness."
It's Not "Just The Internet"
[Content Note: Misogyny; homophobia; fat hatred; rape culture; harassment.]
You may or may not have heard by now about the video project that Anita Sarkeesian proposed for funding via Kickstarter. It's a cool project looking at the tropes of women used in video games. Here is a video introducing the project.
To the surprise of approximately zero feminist bloggers and to the horror of a lot of people who only just now realized How Bad It Is, the reaction by a great swath of self-proclaimed dudes has been abusive and threatening. Sarkeesian hasn't even made the project yet and the push back to silence her has been tremendous. The YouTube video has had threats and harassing comments made on it, her Wikipedia page was vandalized repeatedly. She has been verbally assaulted on Twitter, Facebook, in email, and via the Feminist Frequency website.
We at Shakesville are unfortunately familiar with this sort of abuse. Some of you may still recall the Fat Princess post and the response (Content Note: The comments were left unmoderated to demonstrate how vicious those assholes are/were, they are fat-hating, homophobic, misogynist). Of course, there's also all the crap with that bastion of rape apologia, Penny Arcade (link has links to all the other posts; CN--also unmoderated thread(s)). These are just two examples, culled specifically due to the gaming references. There is so much more outside of gaming commentary.
There have been a fair number of people writing on what has been happening with Sarkeesian's project and subsequent abuse lately. It's a point raised by John Walker at RockPaperShotgun that I want to look at:
It kind of terrifies me that reporting that Sarkeesian has received multiple threats of rape and death feels like it won’t make a significant impact on the reader. Perhaps that the internet’s more wretched areas are so commonly filled with such threats has normalised our reaction to reports of them. The key to snap out of this, and take it on board, is I think to not read about it as a thing that happened to someone else, but to imagine being the person on the receiving end – to imagine being an individual who is reading person after person saying they will sexually assault or murder you.While some disgruntled former commenters may disagree, heh, here is not a "wretched area". It's not just "the internet's more wretched areas" which are filled with such threats. It's areas--just about any site--that have articles that discuss sexism and (gaming, sports, literature, television, pick-a-topic), especially if it is an article written by a woman.
But, really, I want to build on his point of "imagine it's you". See, I am sitting here typing this post and I'm a real person. Really! Shocking, I know. But I'm here on my couch, in my house, my dogs snoring on the floor beside me. My youngest child is playing in another room. Real person doing every day things. And you! You are a real person too, sitting or standing or laying down where ever you are. Neither one of us becomes unfeeling, non-people by virtue of the computer/phone screen. "The internet" is not, in fact (or not entirely), a series of tubes filled with pixels (or 1s and 0s). It is actual people writing, reading, reacting, learning, etc... The use of a phone or laptop or desktop computing device to interact with some other real person on the other end doesn't magically render anyone a non-person. Most people seem to know this, as many people these days first connect online and later offline for friendship, romance, jobs, selling stuff, looking for classes/activities--and if not, many people seem to get the concept anyway.
Yet the bullshit phrase "it's just the internet" still exists. Not only exists, it is repeated frequently when the topic of abuse and harassment online is brought up. Just check the comments section of any article discussing the reaction to the project for recent examples.
It's not, in fact, "just the internet". "It" is "just" a genuine person that has received a message that they should die, as painfully as possible, and hopefully someone will be by soon because we know where you live. Perhaps because they made a comment about how women are portrayed in a video game. It is a genuine person, too, who made that threat. Not some abusive robo-troller program. Perhaps that person is serious or perhaps they think it's "funny" to threaten and abuse another person into silence and fear. It's also the realization of that, that there is an actual person out there threatening you, even wishing your death, that can be the clincher in finding it all if not outright terrifying, at least emotionally exhausting, to deal with.
Saying "it's just the internet" enables the abusers and harassers. That phrase is their ally, their justification. It lets them off the hook for behavior that could be considered criminal if done in person. It shifts the blame to the victim of the abuse by suggesting they just need to, say, "grow a thicker skin" because it's somehow not real because pixels and wifi and anonymous commenting ability. No. That whole line of thinking needs to stop. Now.
Today in Mitt Romney Stands in Front of Something
Good news for all of you who have been worried that Sheldon Adelson might not give Mitt Romney ten million dollars: Adelson Gives $10 Million to Pro-Romney Super PAC. Phew!
Random Nerd Nostalgia: Masters of the Videogame
[Description: title: "Masters of the Universe Power of He-Man Videogame." He-Man and Skeletor are Battling it our in front of Skeletor's nifty castle (ALSO AVAILABLE BY ENTIRELY COINCIDENTAL MERCHANDISING!)A couple of much smaller pixlellated rectangle-screens give a sense of what the videogame might really be like, but who cares because here is the text: "The power of He-Man for Intellivision and Atari 2600. It's the first Masters of the Universe video game. but it could be the last for He-Man. Because even if he survives thirty treacherous miles in his Wind Raider he still has to battle Skeletor in the mysterious Castle Grayskull!""MATTEL ELECTRONICS"]
There were also a shitload of "TM" signs I didn't bother to transcribe. Just figure that I am probably breaking ALL the rules by posting this.
I Write Letters
[Content Note: This post refers to homophobia]
Dear Co-Religionists:
Please stop being ass mitres.
Your ridiculous arguments about same-sex civil marriages in the U.K. amount to "If X then then possibly Y and if Y then possibly z and if Z THE WORLD GOES BOOM." That kind of slippery slop reasoning does nothing to further Christian teaching and everything to encourage fear of queers. The leadership's record with LGBT*QI folk in the church and in civil partnership is spotty, at best. You can cloak it in all the Christian platitudes you like, but every time you engage in this kind of fearmongering, you give sanction to bullies and homophobes the world over.
So stop it. We have nothing to fear from love.
Your fellow member of the global Anglican communion,
Aphra
Washingtonians for Marriage Equality
by Shaker BGK Starbuck
[Content Note: Homophobia; Christian Supremacy.]
Howdy, Shakers!
This is Starbuck, filling in for Dad-Dad again. Things are a bit stressful around Chez BGK because of recent events in Washington State, so I decided to take matters into my own paws, and help write a guest post about the latest round of antigay bigotry.
Back in 2009, Washington Citizens approved Referendum 71, which allowed same-sex partners to register with the sate as Registered Domestic Partners, affording the partnership the same rights and responsibilities as marriage. The law included several provisions to protect religious organizations opposed to marrying same-sex couples.
The Registered Domestic Partnership law was not without flaws. Some in Washington, like the company for which Dad-Dad works, refused to give employees the ability to put their Registered Domestic Partner on their health insurance and other spousal benefits. The court system has had issues with dissolution of registered domestic partnerships, as the new partnerships did not have the case history of divorce, causing difficulty with child custody and spousal support cases. Additionally, the federal benefits of marriage were not given to Registered Domestic Partners.
Back in February, we had people over to watch the Senate and House votes on a Same-Sex Marriage Bill. I remember watching Dad-Dad cry when Gov. Gregoire signed marriage equality into law for Washington State. We became citizens of the Seventh State (and D.C.) to allow members of the same-sex to marry. This was great news for all our LGBTQI friends, many of whom, like Dad-Dad, finally felt equal. The law removed many of the problems Registered Domestic Partners were facing in the state. With the passage of the law, many Registered Domestic Partners contemplated a judicial challenge to DOMA, in order to extend the federal benefits of marriage to Same-Sex Washingtonians.
Unfortunately, the same PAC that failed to get the Registered Domestic Partnership law overturned has qualified Referendum 74 to go to the November ballot. This means that the citizens of Washington must vote to approve or disapprove of the law as passed by the legislature and signed by the governor. Now, I'm just a pug, but I don't believe the rights of the minority should be voted on by the majority.
Today in No Shit, Sherlock
Newt Gingrich thinks US elections favor the rich:
Newt Gingrich said Tuesday that elections are "rigged, frankly, in favor of the wealthy."What a fucking genius.
"It is very difficult in America today," he told MSNBC's Al Sharpton. "If you look at New York where Mayor Bloomberg spent an extraordinary amount of personal money to buy the mayor's office for the third time. It is fairly hard to compete with a billionaire if — if they get to spend all the money they want and the middle-class candidate's raising money in $2,500 units. So I think the current system is rigged, frankly, in favor of the wealthy."
Naturally, Gingrich's proposed solution is not meaningful campaign finance reform but allowing "any American can give any amount of after-tax personal income to the candidate as long as they report it every night on the internet." A perfect solution, I'm sure.
Meanwhile, this is the same guy who has nothing but sneering contempt for citizen participation in politics.
Basically, Newt Gingrich is just pouting because he's not a billionaire. Sad trombones for everyone.
Seen
Last night on the way home from dinner, we had to stop for gas, and the station into which we pulled was across the street from the "He Ain't Here" Lounge.
In case you can't quite make it out, the logo features three cartoon white dudes hiding behind the letters, pointing in various directions. You know, to misdirect any
I got very excited thinking we had stumbled into a wormhole that took us backwards in time, and nearly walked over fully expecting to see "Dewey Beats Truman" in the newspaper stand out front. But then I noticed the gas was still $4. Bummer.
