"By the very nature of abortion, nobody intends to have one. Nobody intends to get pregnant by mistake, nobody intends to be raped, nobody intends to be [a victim of incest], and no one intends, in the course of a wanted pregnancy, to have a catastrophic event that requires an abortion."—Cynthia Nixon, calling the bluff of lawmakers who are willfully obtuse about the distinction between wanting to be in the situation where you want an abortion and already being in that situation thus wanting an abortion.
Joyous Solstice!
and warm your heart and home.
May good and faithful friends be yours,
wherever you may roam.
May peace and plenty bless your world,
with joy that long endures.
May all life's passing seasons
bring the best to you and yours!
It took us a few years to get our celebrations of the Solstice worked out into ways that work for well for us but we've finally found/worked out traditions that fit our family. If you're searching for some traditions for your Solstice holiday for yourself or family, maybe these will help provide ideas/inspiration. This is what we do:
Sun Chains
This is an activity that we started back at the last weekend before school started. Technically not the end of summer but it's still a good point of reference for change coming. We took yellow and a bit of orange construction paper and cut them into strips. We then decorated the strips with sun stickers and gold glitter and made them into linked chains. I put them away until Nov. 1st (the day after Samhain), when we put them up. It's a way of reminding us of the sun, of the light, of summer days/warmth during times when it gets dark so early. They come down tomorrow, since, well, Solstice = return of the sun & the days get longer and all that. The sun chain project idea came from this book: Celebrating the Great Mother: A Handbook of Earth-Honoring Activities for Parents and Children.
Bring the Light
The above is the name of the...campaign (for lack of a better term)...that we do on Solstice. As I'm sure everyone reading knows--in very short--Solstice was A Big Deal because of the coming back of the sun, sun = light = warmth = growing food = better times (hopefully). So our day of giving is "bringing" "the light" to others. We go out and physically take food to the little local animal shelter and visit with the animals, we take food to the food bank (when the kids are older, we will all work in the bank sorting food). We make bird feeders for the wild birds and go out into the small woods at the end of our neighborhood to hang them.
Yule Log ritual
For this, I make a cake yule log. Oh, it's not fancy Bûche de Noël style, it's usually fairly simple. In past years I've made the sort that are pumpkin with cream cheese filling. This year it's chocolate with homemade buttercream. Anyway, in the evening after dinner, we clear the plates away and bring it out to the center of the table. We do a brief talk about the Solstice and the long dark and what the importance of the return of the sun meant for people and the symbolism in light, etc... We turn out the lights, light three candles in the log, and we all hold hands. Then, going around the table, each of us expresses a wish for ourselves, our family, and our world. After the last person is done speaking, we blow out the candles and sit in the darkness for a few moments. Then we throw on the lights, start music, and each eat a slice of the yule log together at the table.
Another SYTYCD Choreographer Suspected of Sexual Assault
[Trigger warning.]
In August, former So You Think You Can Dance choreographer Alex Da Silva was arrested "on a felony warrant charging him with sexually assaulting four women." Now Shane Sparks—who was almost totally absent from SYTYCD this and last season, which I thought was because of his involvement with MTV's America's Best Dance Crew, but maybe it was also because of this investigation—has been arrested on suspicion of felony child molestation.
Sparks was taken into custody at his North Hollywood home at 8 a.m. [on Dec. 18], said Officer Gregory Baek [of the Los Angeles Police Department]. He is being held in lieu of $590,000 bail.Apart from anything else, this should really make Nigel Lithgow consider the context in which his many "jokes" about the sexiness of the young women on the show are being made.
Authorities released few details but said the alleged crime occurred in the 1990s and that authorities only recently learned about it. More details are expected to be released later today.
[Updated at 6:30 p.m.: The Los Angeles district attorney's office filed an eight-count felony complaint today against Sparks, alleging multiple lewd acts upon a child, starting in 1994. It identified the victim as a girl who was younger than 14 years old when the incidents began.]
Sparks is a hip-hop choreographer who snagged an Emmy nomination for choreography work on "So You Think You Can Dance."
Police say he is 40 years old, but his website says he's 35.
[H/Ts to Shakers Mawee and Julia.]
Army Gets Tough on Pregnancy
Army general in Iraq issues pregnancy ban:
The Army general of U.S. forces in Northern Iraq has banned pregnancy among military personnel in his command, NBC News reported on Friday.Because of the narratives about women in our culture, the first thought most people will have when reading this is: Good, 'cause you know how bitchez get pregnant on purpose to trap men; I bet they totally get pregnant on purpose to get out of service, too.
Anyone who becomes pregnant or impregnates another servicemember, including married couples assigned to the same unit, could face a court-martial and jail time, according to an order issued by Maj. Gen. Anthony Cucolo.
The order, which went into effect on Nov. 4, was first reported by the military publication Stars and Stripes.
...Military officials say the order was issued because Army policy requires the force to remove a pregnant soldier from a war zone within 14 days of learning of the pregnancy, creating a hole in a unit that makes it more difficult to complete its mission.
And because of the realities of the rape culture that we conspire to never address, very few people will stop to consider that female soldiers who get pregnant as the result of being raped in the war zone, in recruitment centers, in military academies, and in the military generally are now probably more likely to themselves be court-martialled than their rapists, whom the US military loves to ignore.
And that's to say nothing of the absurdity that someone could be punished for a simple contraceptive failure. And it's not like abortion is easy to come by in the military, since "military hospitals are banned from providing abortion services, except in cases of life endangerment, rape, or incest (and for the latter two, only if the patient pays for the service herself)."
Starting in 1979, Defense Department appropriations bills have been used to restrict or prohibit the use of federal funds—meaning all military health coverage—for abortion services at overseas military hospitals. Although President Clinton reversed the ban shortly after taking office, anti-abortion forces in Congress made the ban permanent in 1995, preventing future presidents from altering the rules by executive order.Because everyone knows that giving women access to abortion means that they'll go out and get pregnant deliberately just so that they can have abortions. Or something.
...The result of the ban is that active-duty servicewomen and military dependents are faced with a number of equally unappealing options: venture out to local hospitals while overseas, to medical facilities that may have different standards of care, where medical workers may not speak English, or where there is animosity towards the United States; seek a back-alley abortion in a country that prohibits abortion; or undertake an arduous process of obtaining permission from commanding officers to fly home or to a neighboring country, find space on a military transport, or pay for a commercial flight home (a prohibitive cost for lower-ranking servicewomen), and return to their units aware that their superiors know intimate details about their medical records.
...Vicki Saporta, President of the National Abortion Federation, says that military women seeking abortions face a no-win situation. "If you're a woman in the military, you're going to have to obtain a leave to get the care you need. If you're honest about why you need that care, you put your military career in jeopardy. If you're not honest, then you put your military career in jeopardy."
...Rep. Susan Davis (D-CA), argued that "servicewomen do not receive the protection of the Constitution they defend," and tried unsuccessfully in 2005 and 2006 to repeal the ban—or at least to bring it in line with current Medicaid standards by allowing abortion funding in rape and incest cases. Opponents like Kansas Republican Jim Ryan postured in response claiming that, "allowing self-funded abortions would simply turn our military hospitals overseas into abortion clinics."
Anyway, back to the pregnancy ban. One last thing I'd like to note about this ban is that, despite its attempt to be an equal-opportunity punisher, taking action against "anyone who becomes pregnant or impregnates another servicemember," the reality is that only women show the physical evidence of what's being criminalized. So, if I'm a woman who's become pregnant via consensual sex, the only way the Army is going to know which man to punish is if I tell them.
Realistically, that means the only way this ban is gender equitable is if women—female soldiers, who live and die by the same codes of honor and loyalty as male soldiers—snitch on their partners, knowing they'll ruin their careers.
Something tells me there ain't gonna be a lot of trouble for the male soldiers.
I'm sure that's just a coincidence. Ahem.
[H/Ts to Shakers ASDKids2 and Kathy.]
Healthcare Open Thread
TPM—One Premium, Two Checks: How Abortion Will Be Paid For Under The Nelson Compromise:
In the House health care bill, consumers who receive federal premium subsidies would be forbidden from buying any insurance policy that covers abortion. That provision--the so-called Stupak amendment--threatened to blow up health care reform. Originally, it's the language Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) wanted to see in the Senate health care bill. In the end, he didn't get that.Reason—Ben Nelson Gets a Basket of Goodies: "After a week of legislative high drama, it turns out what Sen. Ben Nelson really wanted was... a basket of goodies for his home state of Nebraska. Nelson, the most determined of the Democratic holdouts on health care reform, announced this morning that he will vote for cloture on the bill, shutting down debate so that the Senate can hold an up or down vote on passage. But he only did so after securing handouts for his home state of Nebraska."
But what he did get might still draw the ire of pro-choice activists and legislators. According to a senior Senate leadership aide, under the Nelson compromise, "[i]ndividuals receiving subsidies will have one premium that they pay with two distinct transactions."
Put another way: If you're buying insurance with help from the government, and the policy you want to buy covers abortions, you have to write two checks (or authorize two credit card transactions, etc.) for your plan. If the plan costs $1000 a month, and the insurer plans to sequester $50 to put into a pool that covers abortions, you have to make one payment of $950 and a separate payment of $50.
ABC—President Obama Hails Senate Health Care Bill as Ben Nelson Jumps on Board: "Senate Democratic leaders inched closer to attaining their goal of passing a health care bill by Christmas as Ben Nelson, the Nebraska senator who had been skeptical of the bill, jumped on board, winning major concessions for his state, and the Congressional Budget Office released an optimistic cost estimate of the legislation. ... President Obama today hailed the legislation as "the largest deficit reduction plan in a decade," and praised the changes for making the health care bill stronger."
New York Times—Health Bill Passes Key Test in the Senate With 60 Votes: "After a long day of acid, partisan debate, Senate Democrats held ranks early Monday in a dead-of-night procedural vote that proved they had locked in the decisive margin needed to pass a far-reaching overhaul of the nation's health care system. The roll was called shortly after 1 a.m., with Washington still snowbound after a weekend blizzard, and the Senate voted on party lines to cut off a Republican filibuster."
New York Times—Senate Debate on Health Care Exacerbates Partisanship: "In the heart of the holiday season, Senate Republicans and Democrats are at one another's throats as the health care overhaul reaches its climactic votes. A year that began with hopes of new post-partisanship has indeed produced change: Things have gotten worse."
Paul Krugman—A Dangerous Dysfunction: "Unless some legislator pulls off a last-minute double-cross, health care reform will pass the Senate this week. Count me among those who consider this an awesome achievement. It's a seriously flawed bill, we'll spend years if not decades fixing it, but it's nonetheless a huge step forward. It was, however, a close-run thing. And the fact that it was such a close thing shows that the Senate — and, therefore, the U.S. government as a whole — has become ominously dysfunctional."
R.I.P. Brittany Murphy
TMZ is reporting that Brittany Murphy has died at age 32.
Brittany Murphy died early this morning after she went into full cardiac arrest and could not be revived, multiple sources tell TMZ.Murphy is best known, to me at least, for voicing Luanne Platter in over 200 episodes of King of the Hill. She appeared in over sixty movies and TV shows in a career spanning nearly twenty years.
A 911 call was made at 8:00 AM from a home in Los Angeles that is listed as belonging to her husband, Simon Monjack, the Los Angeles City Fire Department tells TMZ.
We're told Murphy was taken to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center where she was pronounced dead on arrival.
The Virtual Pub Is Open
It's an early pub tonight, Shakers, because I am meeting an old friend for dinner, who I haven't seen in a million years (two years, but it feels like a million). I'm so excited the grin on my face is threatening to break it in half.
New posts below (if anyone posts anything). Have a great weekend!
Photo of the Day
Mayor Adrian Fenty has signed Washington D.C.'s marriage equality bill: "In a raucous signing ceremony at a northwest Washington church, Mayor Fenty officially legalized same-sex marriage in the District, distributing ceremonial pens among the Council members standing behind him. The law now will go through a period of review consisting of 30 days in which Congress is in session. If the law passes that hurdle—as is widely expected—the first gay marriages in the District could take in late winter or early spring of 2010. The ceremony at All Souls Unitarian Church—one of many in the city that supported the legislation—opened with comments by Fenty, Council chairman Vincent Gray, and Council members Phil Mendelson, David Catania and Jim Graham. In his opening remarks, Fenty recalled that when his own parents were married, many states would have refused to recognize their bonds. Fenty's father is black, while his mother is white. 'Today an era of struggle ends for thousands of D.C. residents,' he said. 'Our city is taking a leap forward.'"Via Andy, who's also got video of the signing ceremony.
Good News
Aminatou Haidar, about whom I posted an action item on Wednesday, has been returned home:
Dear Friend,[H/T to Shaker charlotta_pavlova.]
We have wonderful news! After a 32-day hunger strike, 2008 Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Laureate Aminatou Haidar finally left the Canary Islands and returned to her home and family in Western Sahara today.
The RFK Center had been advocating for Aminatou's right to return to her homeland since November 14 when she was expelled from Western Sahara by Morocco. We called upon leaders in Morocco, Spain, France, the United States, and the United Nations to intervene to help bring her back to Western Sahara. The RFK Center had staff on the ground in the Canary Islands at Aminatou's side throughout the hunger strike.
Your actions on Aminatou's behalf also made a real difference. Hundreds of you called on U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanethem Pillay to speak out, and she responded, issuing a statement on December 8 calling on Morocco to recognize Aminatou's right to return. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon also took up Aminatou's cause.
Aminatou's return is a victory for human rights defenders all over the world. Thank you for all your support.
Sincerely,
Monika Kalra Varma
Director, Center for Human Rights
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by Shaxco, makers of Kenny Blogginz Brand Orthopedic Inserts. Now emblazoned with images of Emo Prince Robert Pattinson eating corn!
Recommended Reading:
Abby Jean: "Bad Activist" Moments
Macon: Stuff White People Do: Wonder How to Talk to Black People
Tigtog: The Day Sydney Had No Buses, and I Had No Car
Sady: Sexist Beatdown: Liar Liar Balls on Fire Edition
Melissa: John Waters on Abortion Protesters
Angry Asian Man: Martial Arts Monkeys Turn Against Trainer
Chris: Owl!
Leave your links in comments...
Happy Holidays! I Got You Some Misogyny!
Well, it's that time of year again—so that means it's time to wrap up a bunch of crass and tiresome sexism in stories about shopping and gift-giving!
Shaker Melanie sends along the perfectly titled "Nature's laws of shopping: Men hunt, women gather." And I vomit at the merest whiff of evo psych. Moving on!
Shaker Julia sends along this hot mess, with some commentary:
Some highlights from this gem of an article:Meanwhile, I just stumbled across this helpful gift guide, which includes the note: "What has your mom mentioned that she really needs? Just showing you've listened will land major bonus points, so even if it's kitchen-related, she'll feel special." Oooh, just giving Mom the gift of treating her with basic human decency will land major bonus points, huh? Fancy! Maybe with that special kitchen-related gift, Mom can bake you a fucking cookie!Women tend to care more about gifts. They shop more, and think more about them. They attach more emotion to them. And they can be more demanding and less direct. (If I ask my husband what he wants for the holidays, he will say "nothing" and mean it. If he asks me, I will say "nothing," as well. And God help him if he believes me.)Wow, what a great way to further the "no means yes" argument that seems to be circulating around rape culture."When I began asking people about gifts they received from significant others that had gone awry, examples poured in—all of them from women. (Perhaps tellingly, many of these bad-gift stories involved former husbands.)"Because, ya know, the only thing women care about in relationships is presentspresentspresents.
…Once, Cherie Jorgensen, a 32-year-old event planner in Detroit, had a boyfriend who made her a romantic Christmas dinner. He then gave her a super-absorbent hair towel and a man's bath wrap while they were cuddling in front of the tree. "Needless to say, he is no longer in the picture," she says.
Oh, Goody
[Trigger warning.]
Sounds like Hollywood's Official FeministTM might have another great project in the works:
[Steve Carell and Tina Fey], who will be seen opposite each other in next year's "Date Night," are loosely attached to star in "Mail-Order Groom," a Warner Bros. comedy about a naive single woman who can't find love and ends up with a husband from Eastern Europe, bringing him home to the States.Here's something to notice about the entertainment industry's basic recipe for a particular genre of comedy: The main ingredient is some moderately tragic to undilutedly terrible thing that happens disproportionately to women—finding themselves in a circumstance in which their best option for a good life is marrying a foreign man who may be (pdf) actively searching for someone to victimize, for example—and the secret ingredient is a twist of gender. As soon as a man is subjected to that thing, suddenly it's a high-liarious comedy!
I mean, come on—domestic violence and rape have never been so zany!
On a personal note, I can't wait for this movie to come out so I can hear jokes about how I ordered Iain on the internet all over again.
[H/T to Shaker Julia.]
Discussion Thread: BDSM
[Trigger warning.]
This is an open thread for discussion of consensual BDSM (bondage & discipline, dominance & subsmission, sadism & masochism), opened so that the general open thread would not be difficult to navigate for survivors who are triggered by discussions of BDSM.
Please be very respectful in this thread; even though there is a trigger warning governing the thread generally, not everyone who practices BDSM is comfortable with all its aspects, and internal trigger warnings should be used where appropriate.
Please also note this is a thread that will difficult for me (and some other mods) to moderate, and it will simply be shut down if the discussion does not remain respectful and requires a level of moderation that cannot be accommodated.
A Teen in the Bowels of Health
Hey Shakers! It's Kenny Blogginz, and I'm back with another one of my Teenz Korner American Health Care Updates!
You know, a lot of people have been rappin' at me about health care lately, and I'm starting to get a little bit worried. I can't get a job anywhere, on account of the stank economy. My parents' health-care plans are about to stop covering me in a month. Joe Lieberman is such a douche! How the heck does he think I'm going to pay for my precious pillz? And what about my orthopedic insoles? Fuck! First, 30,000 more troops for Afghanistan, and now this?
I was going to go interview the President of the Hospitals of the USA, but now I'm afraid to leave my house! What if a car runs over my foot? I'll never be able to afford a bionic foot without insurance. I've had to cease practicing the ancient art of Karate, for fear of pulling a hammy. I'm afraid to leave my home, Shakers. This is truly a dark time for our nation's teens.
Shakers, my brother Professor Furious and I have been going to Lollapalooza every year for the past five years. It's like a family tradition. Last year, I developed gigantic blisters on the bottoms of my feet, due to my severely flat feet, combined with the lack of arch support in my shoes. It hurt so bad! Just ask Liss, I showed her some cell-phone pics of my mutilated feet, and she was like Eww, what are you doing with footage from Saw XXXV on your phone? It was that bad.
If I didn't have health insurance, I wouldn't have been able to afford orthopedic insoles for my sneaker shoes. If I couldn't afford inserts for my sneaker shoes, I would have had to stay the eff away from Lollapalooza! Think about it: Without comprehensive health-care reform, all the flat-footed hipsters like myself will have to stop going to outdoor music festivals, and other events which entail long periods of standing and walking.
Naturally, that would cause the economy to crash even harder than it already has, since everybody knows that Fleet Foxes tickets are like 70% of America's Gross Domestic Income or some shit. You think things are bad now? Just you wait until all us mustachioed, skinny-jeans wearing hipsters stop flocking to our concerts and music festivals. President Obama, we need comprehensive foot-health-care reform immediately!
[Note from Liss: Although this is a clearly humorous piece, the issues being discussed herein, including the ongoing medical issues and impending lack of health coverage, are real. KBlogz is sharing his own life experience and using humor to process it; nothing has been invented nor are similar situations being held out for ridicule. And yes, the pictures of his feet were truly gruesome.]
Assvertising
Shaker Hayley emails:
I thought you might like to see the "sexy" new advert I noticed on bus stops today for Joop's Homme perfume. ... Apart from just the sheer ridiculousness of the buff white man with a disembodied woman's arm to sell aftershave, the real kicker for me was the subtle hand on hand position. Notice the man is not wearing a wedding band but the woman is, and his forefinger is pointing to it. Yes, men, wear this aftershave and married women will be yours to own.
[Click to embiggen.]
Aside from all the narrative problems with the image Hayley quite rightly notes, I notice another little problem with the image...
Where, pray tell, is the rest of that woman supposed to be? Hiding behind him? Standing sideways and crouching down? LOL. I imagine they intended the image to look like her hand was coming in off from the right side, but forgot to Photoshop out the part of her arm that indicates the female model was originally standing behind him with her arm wrapped around him.
Or perhaps Joop is suggesting that a gentleman who uses their cologne will grow a lady arm out of the middle of his back to give himself reach-arounds, thereby eliminating the need for actual women altogether.
Magic!
[Assvertising: Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Eleven, Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen, Fifteen, Sixteen, Seventeen, Eighteen, Nineteen, Twenty, Twenty-One, Twenty-Two, Twenty-Three, Twenty-Four, Twenty-Five, Twenty-Six, Twenty-Seven, Twenty-Eight, Twenty-Nine, Thirty, Thirty-One, Thirty-Two, Thirty-Three, Thirty-Four, Thirty-Five, Thirty-Six, Thirty-Seven, Thirty-Eight, Thirty-Nine, Forty, Forty-One, Forty-Two, Forty-Three, Forty-Four, Forty-Five, Forty-Six, Forty-Seven, Forty-Eight, Forty-Nine, Fifty, Fifty-One, Fifty-Two, Fifty-Three, Fifty-Four, Fifty-Five, Fifty-Six, Fifty-Seven, Fifty-Eight, Fifty-Nine, Sixty, Sixty-One, Sixty-Two, Sixty-Three, Sixty-Four, Sixty-Five, Sixty-Six, Sixty-Seven, Sixty-Eight, Sixty-Nine, Seventy, Seventy-One, Seventy-Two, Seventy-Three, Seventy-Four, Seventy-Five, Seventy-Six, Seventy-Seven, Seventy-Eight, Seventy-Nine, Eighty, Eighty-One, Eighty-Two, Eighty-Three, Eighty-Four, Eighty-Five, Eighty-Six, Eighty-Seven, Eighty-Eight, Eighty-Nine, Ninety, Ninety-One.]
