[Content Note: Pregnancy and birth complications; death. NB: Not only women give birth. Video may autoplay at link.]
"I almost died after giving birth to my daughter, Olympia. Yet I consider myself fortunate. ...I am so grateful I had access to such an incredible medical team of doctors and nurses at a hospital with state-of-the-art equipment. They knew exactly how to handle this complicated turn of events. If it weren't for their professional care, I wouldn't be here today. ...Mary's baby died because there weren't enough doctors or nurses to save him. This is a chronic problem plaguing the most impoverished countries. But what if we lived in a world where there were enough birth attendants? Where there was no shortage of access to health facilities nearby? Where lifesaving drugs and clean water were easily available to all? Where midwives could help and advise mothers after birth? What if we lived in a world where every mother and newborn could receive affordable health care and thrive in life? That world is possible. And we must dare to dream it for every black woman, for every woman in Malawi, and for every mother out there." — Serena Williams, in a vulnerable and important piece at CNN: "What My Life-Threatening Experience Taught Me About Giving Birth."
She urges us all to take action, so that "one day, who you are or where you are from does not decide whether your baby gets to live or to die."
Quote of the Day
And Now for Some Good News
One of the most amazing parts of the uterus transplant birth (besides the baby, of course), is the fact that a woman signed up to have her uterus removed and transplanted into a complete stranger to give another woman a shot at motherhood https://t.co/YwNzDfaz89
— Alexandra Sifferlin (@acsifferlin) December 1, 2017
Goddamn this is amazing. I'm probably just too old to be a donor now, which makes me so sad, because I've long hoped for the option to donate the healthy uterus I don't want to use to a woman who needed one. https://t.co/XJd6D3aXxZ
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) December 2, 2017
Anyway. It makes me really happy that the science has advanced to a point where there could soon be a generation of women (and men, and genderqueer folks) who can support each other's reproductive decisions in such a profound and intimate way.
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) December 2, 2017
The reason I thought I might be too old is because these sorts of studies tend to prioritize younger participants, but it turns out donors in the study can range in age from 30-60, so I'm not too old after all.
The science right now is limited to donations from and to cis (and possibly some intersex) women, but certainly uterine transplants for trans women aren't far away.
There's something very precious and exciting to me about this particular piece of progress, in this moment. This woman-centered scientific advancement, enabling such deeply loving gifts between women.
"I got lost in other people's needs."
[Content Note: Reproductive coercion; stigma.]
In September, I mentioned sociologist Orna Donath's new book Regretting Motherhood, about Donath's five-year study of 23 women, all of whom regretted having children.
Donath has written a piece for the latest issue of Bust, which I highly recommend. It's so good, and she discusses the subject with such compassion and sensitivity.
As you know, I am a firm believer in making space for women to tell these stories without judgment or stigma, because I believe it's only within a context of hearing all kinds of stories about parenting that the next generation can make fully informed decisions on whether to parent themselves.
Writes Donath:
In the end, the aim of my research is not to shed light on the dark side of motherhood—I'm not trying to gather evidence to say "You see? There are negative sides to motherhood!" Instead, my goal is to question the systems of power that present women with only one possibility: that those who do not become mothers will surely regret it, while those who do never, ever will.Yes.
As a woman, as a daughter, as an aunt to three nieces, and as a feminist, I believe that all options should be equally available, and equally acceptable, to ensure that women are the only owners of our bodies, our lives, and our decisions.
It is society's responsibility to face up to the consequences of pressuring women into motherhood, and to look into the eyes of this regret, just as we were looked in the eyes and promised that motherhood is for the best for all of us. Being able to imagine more than one kind of future for ourselves might give us more room to consider our options and our capabilities, giving us the strength to undermine social pressure and, as a result, to reduce suffering and take better care of all women and children.
Regretting motherhood will not disappear if we deny its existence. For the sake of children and women, we should continue to talk about it.
[Related Reading: I Cannot Truly Want What I Am Told I Must Have.]
Pro All Choices
[Content Note: Reproductive coercion; shaming; sexual assault.]
At Rewire, Eleanor J. Bader has a fascinating review of sociologist Orna Donath's new book Regretting Motherhood, about Donath's "in-depth, five-year study that involved 23 pseudonymous Israeli women," all of whom wish they had not had children.
Donath's subjects ranged in age from 26 to 73 and included single, divorced, and married women of all class backgrounds and education levels. All had at least one child; offspring spanned from toddlerhood to middle-aged adults. Five of the women were also grandmothers, and while all were Jewish, the majority self-identified as either atheists or secular.That conclusion is a subject of great interest to me, and one about which I've written many times before, perhaps never as pointedly as in "Pro-Choice: Choosing Not to Parent," where I noted:
Donath's conclusion is forthright: Motherhood should be one choice among many, no more or less valid than other life options.
Motherhood doesn't make everyone happy. What makes people happy is being able to fashion their lives into the shapes they want.That should and must include women who have chosen to parent and wish they had made another choice.
This is a reproductive choice we don't talk about so much, because it's inevitably inferred to be implicitly censurous of parenting and/or children. I am not anti-parenting. I don't dislike children. I am, however, deeply contemptuous of the bad faith interpretations that misconstrue child-free advocacy as one of many reproductive options to be inherently anti-parent/child. I talk about my happiness being child-free because I support a spectrum of equally valid reproductive choice, which includes parenting, too.
It's important for us, collectively, not to silence women who choose and are happy to be child-free—and not just because we're a useful demographic to defend the need for comprehensive reproductive choice and undermine bullshit gender essentialist, cissexist narratives about "natural instincts" and "what women are meant to do." It's important because there isn't really meaningful choice without a public discussion of all those choices, by the people who made them.
Deciding to parent is a monumental, life-altering decision — and most women make it in a culture where there is enormous pressure to have children and an intense silencing of women who have chosen not to parent and women who regret choosing to parent.
The discussion around parenting is so overwhelmingly lopsided that there are women (and men) who don't feel as though choosing not to parent is really even an option.
It is.
And it is a very good option for an enormous number of women. It would have been the better option for a lot of women, too. And they should be allowed to speak about that without being shamed or monsterized, or even assumed not to love the children they have, even if they wish they hadn't had them.
Particularly when many of them were cajoled, forced, or tricked into having them.
I have made the choice not to parent, and I want other women to know that's a viable option. Not because I think my choice is inherently better than another one, but because it is an equally valid choice.
And because I am pro all choices. I am pro all of them being spoken about frankly.
[Additional Related Reading: I Cannot Truly Want What I Am Told I Must Have and Childfree 101: Cultural Reproductive Coercion.]
Here Is Something Nice
Morgan Hartman is a 23-year-old woman with autism. Her father, Gordon Hartman, who made a fortune as a property developer, sold his company and spent $34 million building Morgan's Wonderland — the "world's first ultra-accessible theme park" — for his daughter and for everyone.
Hartman and his wife Maggie asked other parents where they could take their daughter — somewhere she would feel comfortable, and others would feel comfortable interacting with her. "We realised such an inclusive place didn't exist," says Hartman.Since its doors opened in San Antonio in 2010, Morgan's Wonderland has been visited by people from all 50 states and from 67 countries around the world. Amazing.
So in 2007 he decided to build it himself. ..."We wanted a theme park where everyone could do everything, where people with and without special needs could play," Hartman says.
He brought together doctors, therapists, parents, and other people with and without disabilities to consult on the facilities.
...Attractions include a fully-accessible Ferris wheel, adventure playground, and miniature train. Visitors regularly tell Hartman it is the first time they've been able to experience such attractions.
There is also a carousel with specially designed chariots for wheelchairs that go up and down alongside the animals.
...This year, the theme park was expanded with the opening of Morgan's Inspiration Island, a fully-accessible water park.
"Fewer people were visiting in July because the wheelchairs got too hot. So we decided to create a water park next door," Hartman says.
Parts of the island use warm water, which helps visitors with muscular problems. Waterproof motorised wheelchairs are provided, which run on compressed air rather than batteries. There is also an accessible river boat ride.
...A third of staff have disabilities and entrance is free to any guest with a condition.
"I realised Morgan was one of the lucky ones because she had many of the things she needed. I didn't want cost to be a barrier for others with special needs," Hartman says.
Beyoncé and What We Allow Mothers to Be
In February, Beyoncé posted a gorgeous pregnancy announcement on Instagram, which was "controversial" because people are assholes. Last night, she posted an amazing debut photo of her twins, which is referential of her birth announcement and subsequent pregnancy photoshoot, and, as of this writing, it already has nearly 7 million likes.
Naturally, this image, too, is "controversial" because people are assholes. I had a few thoughts about that! (I bet you're not surprised to hear that at all!)
One of those many reasons is that Beyoncé's images of motherhood actually center the mother, which is profoundly transgressive.
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) July 14, 2017
And cultural narratives that children should always be centered, even at the cost of their mothers' health and strength.
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) July 14, 2017
Which is why Beyoncé's images of motherhood are so important. And also why I love them (despite the fact I'm not a mother & never will be).
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) July 14, 2017
If you guessed that the responses in my mentions to this thread immediately proved my point, give yourself a gold star!
It's funny how misogyny works the same way every time. Just like the seething hatred and relentless nitpicking criticsm of Hillary Clinton was "never about her sex" (haha yes it was) but just about "who Hillary Clinton is," the hatred and policing of Beyoncé is "never about" sexism or racism or the ugly stew of both, but only about "who Beyoncé is."
It's not that there's a widespread and demonstrable contempt of mothers who have the unmitigated temerity to continue to audaciously assert their own humanity (and GASP! their own sexuality) after becoming mothers; it's just that Beyoncé "takes it too far." It's not that there's an ancient historical animus toward Black motherhood, even as Black women were patronizingly lionized as nannies; it's just that Beyoncé is "using her children as props." It's not that we are entrained to devalue mothers and simultaneously loathe mothers who want to be defined by more than parenting; it's that Beyoncé is gross and exhibitionist and she's taking away everyone's attention from The Resistance.
(As if celebrating Black motherhood isn't central to resistance against a white supremacist death cult.)
Every woman is an exception when it comes to the reasons why we're hating her. It's never misogyny. Of course it isn't. Every woman is just audited and judged and policed and shamed and hated because she is uniquely deserving of our scorn.
Every one of us.
Maybe that's it. Or maybe it's that we still don't allow mothers to be fully human, and react abominably to mothers who challenge us to view them in their full humanity.
This Is Bad
My Shareblue colleague Tommy Christopher has written a piece that will be of particular concern to single working parents in the US: "Trump's tax plan hits single working parents particularly hard."
With all the chaos surrounding the transition to a Trump administration, it is easy to lose sight of even major policy developments. Rutgers University Professor Brittney Cooper flagged a particularly significant issue that has received little attention: "So everyone is clear that Trump's tax plan doesn't allow single parents to file as head-of-household anymore right?"There is more at the link.
Eliminating the head-of-household filing status is a major change, with potentially severe consequences for some who currently use it.
...The article goes on to explain that a single parent would be no worse off if they made $15,150 or less, and would not see any benefit unless their income reached $560,000 a year. But: "Trump's tax rates would increase a single parent's tax bill at almost every AGI level between $15,150 and about $560,000."
I don't even have words. This could be utterly devastating for single parents surviving on low incomes.
And I will never, ever, stop being angry that the corporate media spent 600+ days on Hillary Clinton's emails, while this kind of garbage was largely allowed to fly under the radar.
This deserved 600 days of coverage.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Misogyny] A Republican Congressman from Texas defended Donald Trump sneering into his microphone "such a nasty woman" during the third presidential debate, because "a lady needs to be told when she's being nasty." Yes, that's a real thing that happened, and I've got a piece at Shareblue on it.
Good news in reproductive health: "A federal judge on Thursday sided with women's health provider Planned Parenthood in a lawsuit aiming to block a Mississippi law that barred medical providers that perform abortions from participating in the state's Medicaid program. The decision by U.S. District Judge Daniel Jordan III is the latest in a string of rulings striking down similar laws elsewhere in the country against the women's health provider. Jordan's two-page order noted a ruling from the 5th U.S. District Court of Appeals that rejected a similar law in Louisiana, saying 'essentially every court to consider similar laws has found that they violate' federal law."
Former RNC Chair Michael Steele says he won't be voting for Trump. I'm not surprised that Steele isn't supporting him, but I didn't realize this: "Steele is the third former Republican National Committee Chairman to say he won't support Trump." Welp.
[CN: Video may autoplay at link] This MIT-engineered crib to help babies sleep looks amazing. Please make one for adults and then take my money.
Awwwwww: "Experts Say Dogs Dream About Their Humans; People Can't Stop Crying."
What have you been reading?
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Terrorism; bombing; death] "Islamic State claimed responsibility for a triple suicide attack on Thursday evening near a Shia mausoleum north of Baghdad that killed at least 35 people and wounded 60 others, according to Iraqi security sources. The attack on the mausoleum of Sayyid Muhammad bin Ali al-Hadi reignited fears of an escalation of the sectarian strife between Iraq's Shias and Sunnis. ...The strike in Balad is being seen in Baghdad as another indication that after losing much of the territory it has held for the past two years, Isis is once again trying to inflame tensions by attacking soft civilian targets and holy sites." Fucking hell.
[CN: Racism; emotional auditing] This is a must-read: "Stop Condemning My Bitterness, Start Condemning the System: My anger is functional. My bitterness is rational. If I am not outraged at the injustices faced by myself, my community, my children, who will be?"
The State Department, which suspended its investigation of Hillary Clinton's emails while the FBI complete its investigation, has now resumed its investigation, and the FBI may now launch another investigation following Republican lawmakers' announcement that they intend to request the FBI investigate whether Clinton lied to the committee during their invesigation. So, everything's normal with our government.
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton continues to run to be the leader of a government intent on making it clear she's better than we deserve, and has a shortlist of veep candidates that reportedly includes: Sen. Tim Kaine, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Sen. Sherrod Brown, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, and Secretary of Labor Tom Perez. Please, Maude, anyone but Tim Kaine.
Newt Gingrich, who is being vetted by Donald Trump for his veep, because no one else wants the job, says of Trump: "I think he is a remarkable figure." I guess? That's not exactly a clear compliment.
And in other supercool election news: "Bernie Sanders has been invited to continue his underdog bid for the White House by the Green party's probable presidential candidate, who has offered to step aside to let him run. Jill Stein, who is expected to be endorsed at the party's August convention in Houston, told Guardian US that 'overwhelming' numbers of Sanders supporters are flocking to the Greens rather than Hillary Clinton." Doubtful.
[CN: War on agency] Go read this terrific piece by Pam Merritt (aka Shark Fu): "Missourians have had enough. That's what brought local progressive activists together, led by Reproaction Missouri organizer Zoe Krause, to launch Show-Me Accountability. We gathered on the sidewalk in front of Thrive, one of at least 65 CPCs anti-choice lawmakers champion despite the fact that the centers have a history of lying to patients seeking reproductive health care. Missouri lawmakers have even pushed legislation to guarantee CPCs aren't subject to regulation or oversight. We chose Thrive as the location of our launch to illustrate the contrast between what Missouri politicians fund, prioritize, and protect, versus what Missourians actually need them to focus on. Someone turned the sprinklers on at Thrive just as activists started showing up, providing a nonstop shower that drenched people walking or standing on much of the sidewalk in front of the building. It was an old-school disruption move that made it clear they knew we were coming and weren't happy about it. We shifted down the sidewalk and started to get in formation."
Good news: "A year after the U.S. Supreme Court's marriage equality decision, state courts are still sorting out the implications for same-sex couples when it comes to disputes over children. The Maryland Court of Appeals, the state's highest court, ruled Thursday that a non-adoptive same-sex partner is still entitled to legal recognition in a custody dispute. ...Maryland isn't the only state still figuring out how to sort out the legal recognition of same-sex parents. Just last week, a federal judge ordered Indiana to list both parents in a same-sex couple on their child's birth certificate, following a similar ruling against Utah last year."
"A ban on women serving in close combat units in the British military has been lifted by Prime Minister David Cameron. Women, who have previously served on the front line in support roles, will now be allowed to enter the cavalry, infantry, and armoured corps. ...The PM's decision follows a government review in which the head of the Army, General Sir Nick Carter, recommended the ban should be lifted. Announcing the move at a Nato summit in Warsaw, Poland, Mr Cameron said: 'It is vital that our armed forces are world-class and reflect the society we live in. It will ensure the armed forces can make the most of all their talent and increase opportunities for women to serve in the full range of roles."
Whoa: "Scientists have designed a robotic stingray that could help our understanding of the human heart. The miniature robot, one-tenth the scale of the actual fish, moves using heart cells taken from a rat. Researchers hope the robotic ray will give new insight into the heart's ability to pump blood and its potential implications in heart disease."
Stunningly beautiful: "A detailed image of the core of the famous Crab Nebula, captured by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, reveals the 'beating heart' that, with every pulse, breathes life into the expanding cloud of gas and debris surrounding it."
And finally! "Photographer Captures the Fun Side of Ground Squirrels." TOO CUTE.
Can We Talk About This Garbage?
[Content Note: Misogyny; classism.]
So, the Guardian published an anonymously authored letter from a dude titled "A letter to my wife, who won't get a job while I work myself to death."
It was subtitled: "The letter you always wanted to write." Sure.
Anyway. This dude is real mad that his wife won't get a job. By which he means a paid job. Because if you already guessed that they have kids for whom she's the primary caregiver, give yourself a gold star!
But obviously this lady is a reeeeeeeal bitch, because she refuses to take on a second job while this guy works himself to death (!!!) in a mine. Just kidding. At a lawfirm. Because, in his own words, "I want you to work so I can get a different position and we can still maintain a similar standard of living."
Does his ungrateful wife want to maintain the same standard of living? Who knows! Who cares, amirite? The point is that this guy does, and it's his wife's duty, if she loves him, to share that goal. Or support it, even if she doesn't.
The best, bar none, response I read to this was Prof. Tressie McMillan Cottom's, on Facebook, which I'm sharing with her permission.
It's such a beautiful deconstruction, in every way, but this part is especially terrific:
Part of that "lifestyle" he's so hot to maintain are children that reflect his economic and social investment in them. Therefore, it would have to be a good school for good careers that his peers would recognize as such. Those things don't just happen. They have to be managed. As he admits to working an ungodly amount of hours and only nods minimally at "helping out" at home, it's reasonable to assume that managing that process is his wife's responsibility. And that doesn't include the transportation, networking, relationship building, scheduling required to get and keep two middle class status-striving kids in music lessons, sports teams, language lessons, tutoring, community service, orthodontist appointments, healthy eating (to maintain physical appearance of middle class, high status), and so on.YES.
All of that sounds like a job. A job that requires his wife hang out with those friends he dismisses as ladies who lunch. Because who knows the word on the new school, new teacher, new requirements for entry into the good life if not the social circle of other parents who manage these things full time? One man's lunching lady is another man's status manager.
The dude's letter ends thus: "But mostly I want you to get a job because I want to feel loved."
If, indeed, this dude doesn't feel loved, then I wonder why it is that he's staying in this marriage. Could it be, perhaps, that he's getting something else out of it? Like someone who is managing his entire home life while he works to maintain a lifestyle he cannot abide to abandon?
In which case, maybe it should be as obvious to him—as it is to the rest of us—that his wife already has a job.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
"Scotland's first minister has said a second independence referendum is 'highly likely' after the UK voted to leave the EU. Nicola Sturgeon said it was "democratically unacceptable" that Scotland faced the prospect of being taken out of the EU against its will. She said the Scottish government would begin preparing legislation to enable another independence vote. Scotland voted in favour of the UK staying in the EU by 62% to 38%."
Disqualifying fuckery: "Donald Trump said Friday that the collapse of the British pound is good news for his Scottish golf course, which he was visiting. 'When the pound goes down, more people are coming to Turnberry, frankly,' he said during a press conference at the course. 'For traveling and for other things, I think it very well could turn out to be a positive.'" This is part of a pattern: Recall Trump saying he was "excited" about the housing market crash in 2007, because he'd make big money off of it.
JFC: "That confusion over what Brexit might mean for the country's economy appears to have been reflected across the United Kingdom on Thursday. Google reported sharp upticks in searches not only related to the ballot measure but also about basic questions concerning the implications of the vote. At about 1 a.m. Eastern time, about eight hours after the polls closed, Google reported that searches for 'what happens if we leave the EU' had more than tripled." That, right there, is the power of fearmongering, xenophobia, and nationalism. People voted for something they didn't even truly understand, and which will have devastating consequences.
[Content Note: Flooding; death] "Some of the worst flooding in West Virginia 'in 100 years' has left at least six people dead, including one child. Tens of thousands of residents were left without power and many roads were impassable following Thursday's pounding rain, officials said. The hardest hit counties include Greenbrier, Nicholas, Fayette, Kanawha and Webster. In Greenbrier, a flaming house could be seen floating down a creek. 'Just high water everywhere. People can't get out; they can't get in,' one resident told CBS News." Damn.
[CN: Racism; gun violence; death] "As almost 170 members of Congress held the House floor on Wednesday and through the night into Thursday, Lucy McBath stood beside them. McBath's son, Jordan Davis, was shot and killed for playing loud music in his car at a Jacksonville, Florida gas station in 2012. In the years since, she has become an advocate for gun reform and this week, she stood outside the Capitol during the entirety of the sit-in, speaking, singing, chanting, and joining other gun safety advocates in supporting the lawmakers inside the chamber. ...The 'No Bill No Break' sit-in was not successful in demanding that the House hold debate before leaving for its July 4th break—Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) dismissed the chamber until after the holiday. And while the Senate's 15-hour filibuster led to a vote on four gun-related measures, all four failed. But McBath said the overwhelming support both inside and outside the Capitol this week was a success in and of itself." Blub.
"The White House has announced the designation of the Stonewall National Monument, where the Stonewall riots took place. Said President Obama in a video making the announcement: 'I'm designating the Stonewall National Monument as the newest addition to America's national parks system. Stonewall will be our first national monument to tell the story of the struggle for LGBT rights. I believe our national parks should reflect the full story of our country–the richness and diversity and uniquely American spirit that has always defined us. That we are stronger together. That out of many, we are one.'"
[CN: War on agency] "Data Shows Surge in Texans Traveling out of State to Get an Abortion: A Rewire analysis has found that while Texas data shows there has been a decline in the number of abortions in the state, data from other neighboring states suggests there has been a dramatic increase in the number of Texans traveling out of state to access abortion care since the passage of HB 2 in 2013." Unconscionable, the people who continually pretend that criminalizing and/or reducing access to abortion will reduce abortions, as opposed to just making pregnant people seek alternatives to safe, accessible abortion.
[CN: Video may autoplay at link] "Seven months ago, Lisa Alamia woke up with a British accent after having jaw surgery. Since then, her neurologist, Toby Yaltho, has diagnosed her with Foreign Accent Syndrome (FAS). ... "Lisa is speaking with reporters from around the world now and hopes her story can help science. 'We thought maybe a local newspaper...we never thought it would turn into national, international news,' she said. 'My thing is just advancing medicine, that this is just something that happened, it's not something that's fake and if other people have experienced it, come out, get help, go to a doctor.'" Fascinating. And what a cool lady that she's sharing her story and offering to help researchers find out more about this confounding syndrome.
[CN: Image of scar; cancer; bullying] "After eight-year-old Gabriel Marshall underwent surgery to remove a tumor in his brain, the large scar left in its place 'made him feel like a monster,' Gabriel's dad, Josh, tells PEOPLE. 'He was very embarrassed about the scar–he wouldn't even leave the house without something covering his head.' ...Josh wanted to make his son feel better about the procedure, especially once Gabriel's tumor–an anaplastic astrocytoma that had metastasized to his spine–was showing no signs of regrowth. So Josh decided to get a tattoo to match Gabriel's scar. 'I asked him if it would be okay if I went and got his scar tattooed on my head if that would make him feel better, and he agreed that yes it would,' Josh says. '[I wanted] to take away some of the stares or attention from him. He was very excited when I came home and showed him that I'd gotten it done. He said, 'Wow that looks so realistic.'' With his dad by his side, Gabriel learned to appreciate his scar. 'He's now very proud of his scar because he knows that that it means that he was tougher than [the tumor] that tried to hurt him,' Josh says. 'He calls it his battle scar.'" ♥
And finally! Baby giraffe! "Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens proudly announced the birth of a male Reticulated Giraffe calf. ...Veterinary staff examined the calf early, the morning after the birth, and determined that it was a healthy boy. He measured 6'4" tall and weighed-in at 187 pounds, and he is the tallest giraffe calf ever born at the Zoo! After trial introductions to his habitat the weekend after his birth, the calf and mother are now on exhibit with the rest of their herd."
This Is What a Feminist Presidential Candidate Looks Like
Hillary Clinton says over and over on the campaign trail that her entire career has been centered around helping children and removing barriers so that everyone can live up to their potential.
And this is a big, big way of proving that she puts her policy where her mouth is:
Hillary Clinton on Tuesday will sketch out an agenda for helping families with young children, including an ambitious promise to put high-quality child care within financial reach of all working parents.But, as always, those details will be forthcoming, because Clinton never puts out a policy without those details, since she's so competent I MEAN BORING OBVIOUSLY.
...The most concrete part of the agenda, the campaign aides say, will be the two narrow but potentially important proposals. One would bolster a highly regarded "home visiting" program designed to help low-income children at risk of emotional, intellectual, and physical harm. If Clinton has her way, the program, known as the Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting Initiative, would reach twice as many children as it does today.
The other initiative Clinton plans to introduce Tuesday would seek to boost pay for child-care workers, as a way to improve retention and attract educators with stronger qualifications. Clinton will call this the RAISE initiative, for "Respect And Increased Salaries for Early Childhood Educators," and it will be based on successful pilot programs now operating in several states.
But by far the most intriguing part of Tuesday's speech may be a promise that Clinton intends to make. According to the campaign aides, Clinton will say that the federal government should commit to making sure that no family ever pays more than 10 percent of its income on child-care expenses.
It's an audacious vow, given that many families now spend far more than 10 percent of income on child care, and one that's impossible to evaluate without details about funding and program design that the Clinton campaign has yet to provide.
This is just, truly, a remarkable set of proposals. Genuinely thrilling. And I'm not even a parent and will never be one! This is the sort of progressive and possible thinking that I really like.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
RIP former First Lady Nancy Reagan, who died at age 94 over the weekend. My condolences to her family, friends, and admirers.
Do you want to see US gymnast Gabrielle Douglas' amazing floor routine at the American Cup? Well, here it is! She is terrific and that routine is outstanding! Yayayayay!
[Content Note: War; terrorism; death] "Tunisia's government said Monday that 45 people have been killed after extremists attacked a town near the border with Libya. The Interior and Defense ministries said in a statement that the Tunisian government has closed its two border crossings with Libya because of the attack. ...The gunmen targeted a police station and military facilities at dawn in the border town of Ben Guerdane in eastern Tunisia, Interior Ministry spokesman Yasser Mosbah told the Associated Press. ...The Tunisian military sent reinforcements and helicopters to the area around Ben Guerdane, and authorities were hunting several attackers still at large. Authorities urged residents to stay indoors. The violence comes amid increasing international concern about Islamic State extremists in Libya."
[CN: Terrorism] Relatedly: "The UK is facing the threat of 'enormous and spectacular attacks' by Islamic State as the extremist group attempts to wage war on western lifestyles, the national head of counter-terrorism has warned. The Metropolitan police assistant commissioner, Mark Rowley, said in a briefing to journalists on the UK terror threat that while in recent years Isis had urged would-be jihadis to attack the police and military, its mission had since widened. ...Rowley said Isis was encouraging supporters who had received military training in Syria to enter northern Europe to stage attacks."
[CN: Refugee crisis] Meanwhile: "European Union leaders are holding a crucial summit with Turkey on ways of dealing with Europe's worst refugee crisis since World War Two. The EU is pressing Turkey, through which many migrants transit, to take some back in return for $3.3bn in aid. ...Turkey is currently sheltering more than 2.5 million refugees from the civil war in neighbouring Syria. The EU wants it to take back thousands of migrants who do not qualify for asylum. In return Turkey is seeking full access for its citizens across the EU's visa-free zone and accelerated talks on EU membership."
[CN: War on agency] In domestic news: "The Supreme Court on Friday blocked a law that would have left Louisiana with only one doctor to perform abortions in the state. The law at issue, Act 620, was signed by former Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) in June 2014. It mandates doctors who provide abortion care must obtain admitting privileges at a local hospital. The law was scheduled to begin on September 1, 2014" but the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR) sued in August 2014 to keep the doors open. Finally, after more back-and-forth legal wrangling: "CRR sought emergency relief from the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that because of the Fifth Circuit's ruling, all but two doctors in the state have been forced to stop providing abortions and have been turning away women with scheduled appointments. ...In a brief order, the Court nullified the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling that permitted the law to go into effect, providing a last-minute reprieve for patients in Louisiana seeking abortion care." A huge relief, but goddammit this fight for basic reproductive healthcare. FUCK.
[CN: Homophobia] In other SCOTUS news: "The U.S. Supreme Court overturned an Alabama court order that had prohibited a lesbian from having contact with the three children she adopted and helped raise in neighboring Georgia while in a long-term relationship with their biological mother. The ruling, without published dissent, reinforces gay rights less than a year after the court legalized same-sex marriage across the country. The justices didn't hear arguments in the case, instead summarily reversing the Alabama Supreme Court."
[CN: Animal endangerment] This is very good news, but only so long as the population is protected: "An international team of researchers has discovered 8,000 Sumatran orangutans which were as yet uncounted. The huge number of this critically endangered species of large apes was found living in mountains, as well as in areas west of Lake Toba. With this discovery, the population of the Sumatran orangutan is now estimated at about 14,600. ...'It was very exciting to find out that there are more Sumatran orangutans than we thought, but this does not mean that we can be complacent,' says Serge Wich of Liverpool John Moores University. 'Numerous development projects are planned in the area that—if they are not stopped—could sharply reduce the number of orangutans over the coming years.'"
Why hello there! "In the ocean near Hawaii, more than 2 1/2 miles underwater, scientists have discovered a small, delicate-looking and ghostlike little octopod—possibly a new species. The animal was discovered by Deep Discoverer, a remotely operated vehicle, or ROV—picture a small, unmanned submarine equipped with cameras and a robotic arm—that was working to collect geological samples. Michael Vecchione, of the National Marine Fisheries Service, described the Feb. 27 discovery on the NOAA website: 'As the ROV was traversing a flat area of rock interspersed with sediment at 4,290 meters, it came across a remarkable little octopod sitting on a flat rock dusted with a light coat of sediment. The appearance of this animal was unlike any published records and was the deepest observation ever for this type of cephalopod.'"
And finally! "Dog from Australia Makes Adorable Real Estate Agent." Awwwww lol!
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Guns; violence; death; Islamophobia] Last week, three young Muslim men were shot and killed in Fort Wayne, Indiana: "The bodies of 23-year-old Mohamedtaha Omar, 20-year-old Adam Kamel Mekki and 17-year-old Muhannad Adam Tairab were found Wednesday evening by officers responding to a 'problem unknown' dispatch. Police Chief Garry Hamilton told WANE-TV each was shot multiple times, and Safety Director Rusty York said authorities don't have any reason to believe the killings were a hate crime. The families of the three were from central Africa and belonged to a community that is heavily Muslim, Hamilton and York told the (Fort Wayne) Journal-Gazette. Darfur People's Association founder and vice president Motasim Adam, who visited with the families Saturday, told The Associated Press on Sunday that Omar and Tairab were Muslim and Mekki was Christian." Al-Jazeera, among other media outlets, noted that their murders have "barely caused a ripple" in the news. That is partly because of who we value as victims, and, increasingly, because of our collective inurement to shooting deaths, by virtue of their sickening frequency.
[CN: Guns; death; domestic violence. Video may autoplay at link.] Prince William County, Virginia, police officer Ashley Guindon was killed Saturday night after only one day on the job. Two other officers were injured. They were responding to a domestic violence incident, in which a woman had been shot and killed. My condolences to Officer Guindon's family, friends, and colleagues, and to those who knew and loved the victim whose death to which she was responding. I have seen this story being filed under the (erroneous) "war on cops" narrative, and one thing I want to note is that a number of police officers killed every year are killed while responding to domestic violence calls. That's not indicative of a "war on cops" so much as it is indicative of the culture of violent entitlement and toxic masculinity.
[CN: Racism; police brutality] Rage-makingly familiar: "On Saturday night, two Salt Lake City officers shot a black teenager in his torso because he refused orders to drop his weapon—a broomstick. The shooting, which left the teen in critical condition, led to clashes between protesters and police. The Salt Lake City Police Department says the shooting occurred when two officers saw two men, including 17-year-old Abdi Mohamed, attacking another man with metal objects. In the officers' version of events, Mohamed refused to drop his weapon and moved to attack the victim, prompting the officers to open fire. But witness Selam Mohammad says that his friend was holding a broomstick and 'barely even turned around' before the officers started shooting." Police said; witnesses said. I desperately hope that Mohamed will recover.
[CN: Misogynoir; violence; police misconduct] Shaker Bruno passes along this story about The Grim Sleeper serial killer, most of whose victims were black women under the age of 35, with the apt note (quoted with his permission): "A story about the systemic dehumanization of black women, with a woefully deceptive and nonsense headline."
[CN: Domestic violence] Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is infamously silent during Supreme Court hearings, never asking questions of the attorneys who present to the Court. But today he "broke 10 years of silence and provoked audible gasps...when he posed questions from the bench during an oral argument." Naturally, it was to ask the wooooooorst question: "The court is considering an appeal from two Maine men who say their guilty pleas for hitting their partners should not disqualify them from gun ownership. With about 10 minutes left in the hourlong session, Justice Department lawyer Ilana Eisenstein was about to sit down after asking the justices if there were no further questions. Thomas then caught her by surprise, asking whether a misdemeanor conviction of any other law 'suspends a constitutional right.'" I am, of course, disgusted by the fact that he opens his mouth after a decade in order to challenge whether men who have committed domestic violence should have their right to own guns infringed. But I am also touched by the fact that it was only after his friend and colleague Antonin Scalia, known for being a tenacious questioner, died that Thomas spoke up, as if to fill the silence that Scalia left.
[CN: Misogyny] Another great piece on Clinton by Sady Doyle: "America loves women like Hillary Clinton–as long as they're not asking for a promotion."
Beautiful: "A new image captured by the Hubble Space Telescope features a rare Wolf-Rayet star. The star, known as WR 31a, is part of the Carina constellation and lies some 30,000 light-years from Earth. WR 31a appears surrounded by a blue bubble—an interstellar cloud composed of gas and dust."
This report is garbage for identifying actress Charlotte Riley in the headline only as "Tom Hardy's wife" and for describing Riley, who recently gave birth to their first child together, breast pumping as "relieving her aching boobs," but it's the only place I saw the description of Hardy being caught hovering outside the bathroom during the Oscars last night and matter-of-factly explaining: "I'm just waiting for my wife to finish breast pumping in the bathroom. She has to do it every hour." I just kind of love how he didn't go for a joke, as so many men do, and just gave a straightforward comment that normalizes breast pumping. A+.
And finally! "Meet Gimo, the Cat with the Biggest Eyes Ever." Awwwwwww lol!
Greatest Country in the History of the World
[Content Note: Misogyny; anti-choice terrorism.]
One of the things you hear a lot from Republicans during an election is that the United States is the greatest country in the world. Sometimes even in the history of the world! They say this to shame Democrats, who have the temerity to believe that there are things about the US that could be improved. President Obama, they sneer accusingly, doesn't even believe that the US is the best nation that has ever existed. (This, even though their entire premise is that the country needs to be "made great again.")
Just during the last debate, Senator Marco Rubio said, "One of the things my grandfather instilled in me, was that I was really blessed because I was a citizen of the greatest country in the history of our mankind." And Dr. Ben Carson said: "I thank God everyday that I was born in this country—the most exceptional country that the world has ever known."
Maybe that's true, if one is an obscenely wealthy, straight, white, cis, able-bodied white man with a suit that renders him impervious to random gun violence. So, like, if you're Iron Man.
But most of us aren't Iron Man.
If one responds to this sort of nationalistic hyperbole by gently suggesting that the US is, in fact, a pretty rough gig for lots of people from marginalized populations, the immediate pushback is invariably the invocation of a place where people in that class have it even worse.
Which is a red herring. Because just because marginalized people might have additional hurdles in other nations doesn't erase the ones they have in the US. And it ignores that there are places where they would have it better, in some or all ways.
That's the conversation that conservatives want to avoid. That there are actually places where lots of USians would be better off—safer, more financially stable, with better opportunities, more respected.
To address that reality means they would have to acknowledge that we can do better here.
Which we could. If only there was the will to do so.
Instead, there's just a lot of bellicose posturing about how we are the greatest country in the history of the world. As if merely saying it, loudly and often, will make it so.
Recently, the United Nations sent a delegation of three women who are human rights experts—Eleonora Zielinska of Poland, Alda Facio of Costa Rica, and Frances Raday of the UK—to the United States. Over ten days, they toured parts of Alabama, Texas, and Oregon to assess gender equality in the US. They evaluated "a wide range of US policies and attitudes, as well as school, health, and prison systems." And they were "appalled by the lack of gender equality in America."
They discovered that the US was "lagging far behind international human rights standards in a number of areas," including abortion access, the pay gap, livable wages, paid maternity leave, affordable childcare, the treatment of female migrants in detention centers, safety from gun violence, and parity in political representation.
Naturally, women whose identities exist along multiple axes of oppression are disproportionately affected by these failures.
Raday said: "The lack of accommodation in the workplace to women's pregnancy, birth, and post-natal needs is shocking. Unthinkable in any society, and certainly one of the richest societies in the world."
But the group told reporters that the "most telling moment" of their trip "was when they visited an abortion clinic in Alabama and experienced the hostile political climate around women's reproductive rights."
"We were harassed. There were two vigilante men waiting to insult us," said Frances Raday, the delegate from the U.K. The men repeatedly shouted, "You're murdering children!" at them as soon as they neared the clinic, even though Raday said they are clearly past childbearing age.Huh. Almost like abortion is treated as though it's basic healthcare.
"It's a kind of terrorism," added Eleonora Zielinska, the delegate from Poland. "To us, it was shocking."
In most European countries, she explained, abortions are performed at general doctors' offices and hospitals that offer all kinds of other health services, so there aren't protesters waiting to heckle the women who enter.
Abortion is discussed in the United States as something outside of basic healthcare so routinely that most US women can't even imagine that it would be treated any other way. Just like rhetoric around the US being the "greatest country in the history of the world" is designed to mask the fact that women in the US are not living in the greatest country in the world for us.
Indeed, the delegation also "discovered during their visit that women in the United States have 'missing rights' compared to the rest of the world," but aren't even aware of it.
While the delegates were shocked by many things they saw in the U.S., perhaps the biggest surprise of their trip, they said, was learning that women in the country don't seem to know what they're missing.It's not just that the Republicans—and, to a lesser extent, the Democrats, too—refuse to enact policies that would meaningfully improve life for women in the US. It's that they endeavor to convince women (and men) that those politics don't even exist, anywhere in the world.
"So many people really believe that U.S. women are way better off with respect to rights than any woman in the world," Raday said. "They would say, 'Prove it! What do you mean other people have paid maternity leave?'"
"You couldn't have it any better than this," they suggest. But we could.
Not in some radical utopian future. Just in another country, right now, with better priorities.
And it's not like countries that, say, provide paid parental leave don't still fail women, especially less privileged women, in other ways. But at least they don't have to hear a bunch of men tell them as though it's unassailable fact that they live in the greatest nation the world has ever known, before those men retreat to strategize about how to make their lives even worse.
Nous avons des fleurs.
[Content Note: Terrorism.]
Oh my heart:
[If the video is removed from YouTube, you can view it here.]
Video Description: A French man who is racially API crouches down on a street near a memorial with his tiny son balanced on his knee. A reporter, who appears to be white, interviews them with a large microphone. They speak in French; the video has English subtitles.
Reporter, to the child: Do you understand what happened? Do you understand why those people did that?
Little Boy: Yes, because they're really, really mean. Bad guys are not very nice. And we have to be really careful, because we have to change houses.
Father, stroking his son's head: Oh no, don't worry. We don't need to move out. France is our home.
Little Boy: But there's bad guys, Daddy.
Father: Yes, but there's bad guys everywhere.
Little Boy: They have guns; they can shoot us because they're really, really mean, Daddy.
Father: It's okay. They might have guns, but we have flowers.
Little Boy: But flowers don't do anything. They're for—they're for...
Father, gesturing to memorial: Of course they do. Look, everyone is putting flowers.
Little Boy, looking at memorial: Yes?
Father: It's to fight against guns.
Little Boy: It's to protect?
Father: Exactly.
Little Boy: And the candles, too?
Father: It's to remember the people who are gone yesterday.
Little Boy: Ahh. The flowers and the candles are here to protect us.
Father: Yes.
They smile at each other.
Reporter, to the child: Do you feel better now?
Little Boy: Yes, I feel better.
I Hate This Every Year
[Content Note: Pranks; bullying; hostility to consent; child abuse.]
Pranks are inherently predatory. The entire intent of pranking is to get one up on someone who is vulnerable, by virtue of their trusting the prankster because of an existing relationship or by virtue of being deliberately denied relevant information or by virtue of having an expectation of safety or security or normalcy. Pranks are also, by their very nature, hostile to consent, because most pranks don't work if the person being pranked is able to give enthusiastic consent to whatever is about to be done to and/or around them.
Taking advantage of someone for a laugh, betraying their trust for one's own amusement, is a shitty, bullying thing to do.
And when a parent does it to a child, it's abusive.
So it is that every year I rage*seethe*boil when Jimmy Kimmel's "parents prank their kids by telling them they ate all their Halloween candy" video goes viral. (He also has an equally terrible Garbage Christmas Present prank.) Here is a typical write-up of this year's video, headlined: "Jimmy Kimmel makes kids cry again with 5th annual Halloween candy prank."
And, naturally, the fact that he's "making kids cry" is supposed to be hilarious: "'I Told My Kids I Ate All Their Halloween Candy' challenge is back for its fifth year and it's better than ever. The Kimmel Show says they received a record number of submissions this year. Like the years before, the videos were filled with many tears, screams and tantrums. Watch the hilarious video..."
I watched the video, which I will neither post nor transcribe, and I did not not find it hilarious, because, as you well know, I am the Most Humorless Feminist in all of Nofunnington. And I seem to lack the circuit in my humor center that makes one laugh at image after image of tiny children being hoodwinked by their parents in the cruelest way, so those children can be the butt of a joke on national television.
One of the most casual forms of emotional abuse that parents commit on their children is the denial of their pain, because it seems trivial. It is crucial for parents to validate children's feelings, even and especially when they are upset. Here, parents set out to deliberately cause that "trivial" pain, and then laugh at their children experiencing it.
The thing about parents pranking their kids—and I cannot believe I need to write this—is that it fundamentally shatters children's security and trust in the idea that their parents will not harm them. (Which, in some of these families, may never have existed in the first place.) The takeaway for a child whose parents like to prank them is that their parent(s) might harm them, and no amount of "JUST KIDDING!" can fully repair the crack in the edifice of what should be an inviolable trust.
Parents who prank, tease, and ridicule their own kids, even if they're "just kidding," do so at the risk of their kids' ability to feel safe even in their own homes. That is not a risk any parent should be willing to take with a child.
And somehow, I don't imagine that "but I only did it so people could laugh at your despair on NATIONAL TELEVISION!" would bring a whole lot of comfort.
Parents—or other older family members, guardians, adult friends of the family—playing pranks on kids is also a dangerous communication—even if an unintentional one—that consent doesn't matter.
Kids who are taught by the adults they are meant to trust that consent doesn't matter are more likely to themselves be hostile to other people's consent. It's tough to, for example, convincingly teach your kid not to bully other kids while simultaneously teaching your kid that whether someone wants something done to them doesn't matter, as long as it's "funny."
And kids who are taught that consent doesn't matter are also more likely to have difficulty drawing boundaries for themselves, because they haven't learned they're even allowed to have inviolable boundaries. Particularly if a child's protests to pranking have been met with shaming that implies they're humorless or oversensitive or unfun, a child will also learn that speaking up on one's own behalf, in one's own defense, will yield more harm, rather than less.
Certainly, there are people who were pranked by their parents as kids who feel quite strongly they enjoyed the familial pranks and have no lasting effects from it. And maybe that is absolutely true for every one of those people, and maybe some of those people are less respectful of others' boundaries than they have really investigated. Either way, it's irrelevant.
The point is that parental pranking stands to communicate to a child that consent doesn't matter. And that is a very dangerous message to convey to anyone. Ever.
Stop it, parents. Just stop.
The Criminalization of Black Motherhood, Again
[Content Note: Misogynoir; choice policing.]
Shaker NineOfCups emails, which I am publishing with permission:
Thought you'd be interested in this story out of PA, which touches on criminalizing the decisions impoverished parents make, esp. WOC: A Pennsylvania woman [named Tiffany Cherry] drove her ill infant to the hospital near her family in Boston rather than the local ER - is now facing child endangerment charges and has lost custody of all three of her children because Pennsylvania issued an Amber Alert on her when she didn't go to the suggested ER.Not only is this a reprehensible criminalization of need—as we've seen in public targeting of other black mothers such as Shanesha Taylor, Moina Lucious, Debra Harrell, and Laura Browder, among many others—but it's a gross abuse of the Amber Alert, a system designed to locate missing children, not to punish mothers who exercise their agency to make their own best choices for their children.
But wait, there's more great reporting here about how she has a lot of unpaid motor vehicle violations and how she once threw her trash into a public housing dumpster. Knowing what we now know about how municipalities use poor people as a major source of funding via traffic citations, the way it ties into this story to paint this mother as a scofflaw is really vile.
And then, with the assist of the media, the state justifies its heavy-handed, cruel, and profoundly racist pursuit of Tiffany Cherry by disclosing her past (minor) criminal violations, which are themselves the products of a heavy-handed, cruel, and profoundly racist system that disproportionately exploits poor people of color.
I cannot state this any more plainly: If a middle-class white mother had taken her child to an emergency room in the town she was from and to which she was soon returning, there is no goddamn way an Amber Alert would have been issued to find that child, nor would her other children be taken away, nor would she be facing charges, nor would there be news articles about whether she had overdue books from the library or whatthefuckever.
This is the criminalization of black motherhood. Again.
Laura Browder and the Criminalization of Need
[Content Note: Misogynoir; class warfare; criminalization of need.]
In a story reminiscent of Shanesha Taylor's, Laura Browder, a black woman who is a single mom was arrested for "abandoning" her children to go on a job interview. The interview was held at a food court at a mall, and Browder "abandoned" her children at another table in the food court 30 feet away.
Laura Browder said she took her 6-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son with her to a mall for a suddenly scheduled job interview because she didn't have enough time to line up child care. According to Browder, she bought the children lunch at the McDonald's in the food court and sat them at a table approximately 30 feet away and well within sight while she interviewed.What if all the time and attention given to policing mothers (especially black mothers) for leaving their children unattended (or not! 30 FEET AWAY!), policing justfied by an abundance of faulty narratives about strangers who prey on children, was actually dedicated instead toward people who actually harm children, as opposed to the
Browder was taken into custody by police when she went to claim her kids, after someone at the mall called police saying the children had been left there crying.
Browder said she was arrested after accepting the job offer, but now worries if the arrest may cause her to lose it.
The woman appeared before a judge who released her and gave her full custody of her children although Child Protective Services is still investigating.
Browder released a statement saying, "This was very unfortunate this happened. I had a interview with a very great company with lots of career growth. I am a college student and mother of two. I would never put my name, background or children in harms way intentionally. I have a promising future ahead of me regardless of what the media tries to portray me as."
And what if instead of holding up the Myth of Bootstraps—"I never got any help from anyone!"—as the makings of some sort of totally true and definitely amazing success story, we saw it for what it is? Total bullshit. Because not everyone is fortunate enough to have the kind of help that is so reliable it's possible to dismiss it out of hand as not even having been help at all.
I hope that Laura Browder doesn't lose the job she just accepted, and I hope that the investigation into her parenting finds what seems pretty goddamn obvious: That she's a good mom doing the best that she can, and that her best doesn't look too bad at all.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Death penalty; environmental harm] Well, that was short-lived: The Supreme Court is back to disappointing the hell out of me, issuing two terrible opinions this morning: In Glossip v. Gross, they ruled "that a drug used by Oklahoma as part of its lethal injection procedure does not violate the U.S. Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, dealing a setback to opponents of the death penalty." And in Michigan v. EPA, they struck down "new rules for America's biggest air polluters...dealing a blow to the Obama administration's efforts to set limits on the amount of mercury, arsenic, and other toxins coal-fired power plants can spew into the air, lakes, and rivers."
The Supreme Court giveth, and the Supreme Court taketh away. And by "Supreme Court," obviously I mean Anthony Kennedy. It's fun when my non-US friends and family express horror that so much rests in the hands of nine people, and I get to tell them it's really only one guy. And by "fun," I mean I'm sobbing and rending my garments.
In some lingering good news from the Supreme Court's better decision-making days of last week, Ian Millhiser explains how "Chief Justice Roberts Rejected Marriage Equality in the Best Possible Way for Liberals."
* * *
Two major debt crises in motion today: In Greece, "Greeks faced shuttered banks, long supermarkets lines, and overwhelming uncertainty on Monday as a breakdown in talks between Athens and its international creditors plunged the country deep into crisis." And in Puerto Rico, Governor Alejandro García Padilla, "saying he needs to pull the island out of a 'death spiral,' has concluded that the commonwealth cannot pay its roughly $72 billion in debts, an admission that will probably have wide-reaching financial repercussions."
I don't have the requisite economic expertise to comment meaningfully on the global consequences of these crises. What I will say, however, is that my thoughts are with the people of Greece and Puerto Rico, and I am desperately sorry that their fates are so inextricably tied to the wills of people whose fortunes have been made in part by exploiting them.
* * *
[Content Note: War on agency] Goddammit: "The Ohio Senate's GOP majority on Wednesday approved a ban on abortion after 20 weeks' gestation only hours after it went through committee. SB 127, which anti-choice group Ohio Right to Life called its 'legislative priority' this year, was passed after exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother were removed from the measure. The bill passed in a 23-9 vote and will now move to the Republican-led state house for approval. ...Ohio is one of at least ten states to introduce so-called fetal pain abortion bans this year. A similar ban was passed in West Virginia after the GOP-majority state legislature overrode the governor's veto. The Wisconsin Senate passed a so-called fetal pain bill this month. The South Carolina legislature will next January take up a 20-week ban despite arguments between conservative legislators that the bill was too lenient because it included exceptions for rape and incest. Those exceptions were eventually removed."
I don't even know what to say anymore that I haven't already said six thousand times about these aggressively hostile thunderfucks who are doing everything they can to subvert the right ostensibly guaranteed by Roe v. Wade. I am just constantly, constantly angry about the erosion of reproductive rights across the country, and it just feels like it's been so fucking long since reproductive justice advocates have had a big win.
Would the country celebrate with us even if we did? (That's rhetorical.) (That's also exactly the problem.)
* * *
[CN: Wimbledon spoiler] Serena Williams won her opening match at Wimbledon today, defeating Margarita Gasparyan of Russia 6-4, 6-1. Because of course she did! "Williams has won three straight major titles, including the Australian Open and French Open. If she wins the title at the All England Club and then defends her title at the U.S. Open, she would be the first player since Steffi Graf in 1988 to win all four Grand Slam titles in the same season." Yowza!
She is amazing, and I love watching her play so much. If you, too, are a Serena Williams fan, you might enjoy [CN: disablist language] "17 fascinating facts about Serena Williams, who's on the brink of tennis history."
* * *
In presidential primary news, Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is reportedly going to announce tomorrow that he's running for president, and Republican Ohio Governor John Kasich is reportedly going to announce his own presidential run on July 21. THAT IS ONE CROWDED CLOWN CAR!
Meanwhile, Democratic Vice President Joe Biden is still weighing a White House run of his own.
LET'S ALL RUN FOR PRESIDENT! EVERYONE RUN FOR PRESIDENT!
* * *
[CN: Homophobia] Jamilah King has written a great piece on what the Supreme Court's marriage decision means for LGB parents in the South: "The American South is home to many ironies, but perhaps none as intriguing as those relating to same-sex unions. Before Friday's historic Supreme Court ruling, same-sex marriage was almost universally banned in Southern states, a reality that painted a bleak picture for LGBT Americans who live there. But then there's also this: There are more gay and lesbian parents raising children in the South than anywhere else in the country, according to an analysis of U.S. Census data by the Williams Institute, an LGBT think tank based at the University of California, Los Angeles. For example, more than 20% of same-sex couples are raising children in Alabama, Arkansas and Mississippi, and of those couples, blacks and Latinos are more than twice as likely as white parents to be raising children. These are facts that help reshape the narrative of same-sex marriage from an individual's quest to legally wed whomever they please to a family's search for legal protection."
[CN: Animal extinction] Holy crap: "We are at the beginning of the world's sixth mass extinction; not since the fall of the great prehistoric beasts has our planet seen such extreme species loss. Last week, scientists writing in the journal Science Advances found that vertebrates—animals with a backbone—are going extinct at a rate up to 100 times greater than in the past. These rates are unusually high, even considering Earth's long history, and humans—for whom a period of such high extinction rates is unprecedented—could feel the consequences in as few as three lifetimes."
LOLOLOL: "Pope's climate change activism sets stage for awkward visit to Capitol Hill." Brilliant.
All right then: "After 35 years in development, the world's first commercially available jetpack will be available next year for $150,000." The worst part about this is that I only have $149,873 in my jetpack fund. DAMMIT!
[CN: Animal illness but happy ending] And finally! A pink flamingo in Sorocaba, Brazil, whose left leg was partially amputated to halt an infection after a break, has gotten a prosthetic leg and: "Within days the flamingo was adjusting nicely to his new leg—even tucking it under his body to make the flamingo's classic one-leg standing pose." Aww!
