Following up yesterday's horrid story about FIFA refusing to allow distribution of condoms at the upcoming World Cup in South Africa (a country with one of highest HIV infection rates in the world), Shaker rhiain dropped a link to a really wonderful organization, Grassroot Soccer.
Now, it's no surprise to many of you, I think, how much I love that game. I still play every week, nearing 44 and using a cane most of the time (but not while playing! - then, I just take a lot more pain pills), just because I enjoy it so much. So when I see a group who are using the game I adore to do good works, well, that's a time when Caitie gets all squeeful.
This group is using the love of the game, shared by so many people, to spread good HIV prevention, life skills education, and safer sex practices to people growing up in areas with very high infection rates - not just in Africa, but also in Guatemala and the Dominican Republic, a little closer to home for most Shakers.
Anyway, they do a good thing, and like any group doing a good thing, they can always use more support. I'm going to be taking this information to my soccer team myself tomorrow, see if we can come up with fun ways to raise some money for the organization - maybe put together a marathon game or something.
I have no connection to the group at all - I just really like what they're doing, how they're doing it, and want to boost their profile here. They've got a great page listing ideas of how people can help them in their mission, beyond just giving money (although they can find uses for money too!).
If you're in a position to help, it'd be a great teaspoon to do so.
Tip of the CaitieCap to Shaker rhiain, for the awesome link.
Soccer v HIV in Africa
Note to Racist Jackhole
Altered mural fuels racial debate
Local city councilman Steve Blair - a white cis man, apparently temporarily able-bodied and hetero - insists that wanting to whiten the depiction of some of the children in the mural - which have been the target of racial slurs for months, as the artists have - is totes not racist, dude:
He insists the controversy isn't about racism but says the mural is intended to create racial controversy where none existed before.So, your defense against charges that your response to the mural is racist is basically: it can't be, because there aren't any of those people 'round here?
"Personally, I think it's pathetic," he says. "You have changed the ambience of that building to excite some kind of diversity power struggle that doesn't exist in Prescott, Arizona. And I'm ashamed of that."
Anyone got bingo yet?
FIFA to Ban Distribution of Condoms at World Cup
This is just shameful, FIFA. Shameful. I've been playing our game since I was 3 - that's a little over 40 years - and this is one of the very few times I've been ashamed to be a lifetime supporter of the game.
South Africa has the world's largest number of (People living with AIDS), with an estimated 5.7 million people infected – about one in every five adults. There are around 1,400 new HIV infections every day and nearly 1,000 AIDS deaths.There can be no excuse for this most basic failure of common sense by FIFA.
ô,ôP Teaspoons up: FIFA can be contacted through this form, or by other means as listed here.
I'd Do It Again
Torture. War. Suffering and death on a massive scale. Traumatic disruption to the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. And the man who made it all happen is ready for more.
Speaking to the Economic Club of Grand Rapids, MI, on Wednesday, Bush said:
Yeah, we water-boarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. I'd do it again to save lives.There's no reason to doubt the sincerity of the first part of that declaration - Bush's willingness to torture more people - but the pious justification of the dependent clause doesn't hold up.
A group of retired U.S. admirals and generals working with Human Rights First to educate members of Congress and candidates on the importance to national security of treating detainees lawfully and humanely released this statement in response:
Waterboarding is torture and torture is a crime. It cannot be demonstrated that any use of it by U.S. personnel in recent years has saved a single American life. To the contrary, the misguided belief that torture saves lives has cost America dearly. It is shocking that former President George W. Bush said he would use waterboarding 'again to save lives.' When he authorized it the first time he sent America down the wrong road, battering our alliances, damaging counterinsurgency efforts, and increasing threats to our soldiers.Bush still thinks the war against Iraq was a good idea, too, because, "getting rid of Saddam Hussein was the right thing to do and the world is a better place without him."
And, despite Laura Bush's famous comment regarding watching TV coverage of the war that, "no one suffers more than their president and I do when we watch this, and certainly the commander in chief, who has asked our military to go into harm's way," it turns out that her husband found his father's loss of the Presidency much harder. Said Bush of that traumatic episode in his life:
Being a son of the president is a lot harder than being president.Because, I guess, the son of the president doesn't get to torture or kill anybody when his self-respect needs a little pumping up.
Bush does have one regret - not being able to snatch Social Security away from the elderly and disabled. Being unable to push Social Security reform through Congress was "his greatest disappointment" as President.
Excuse me while I go brush the vomit out of my teeth.
Thanks to Scott Madin for the tip.
The Not Quite Daily Teaspoon Report - F100604
Time for another Teaspoon Report.
Leave comments here that describe an act of teaspooning you encountered or committed. They don't have to be big, world-shaking acts; by definition, a teaspoon is a small thing, but enough of them together can empty the ocean.
If you would like to discuss the teaspoons here reported, or even offer congratulations or your admiration to a fellow Shaker, we ask that you do so over here in the Discussion Thread for today's NQDTR.
Shaker bgk has been kind enough to get a Twitter-pated version out there for you young twittersnappers (and by the way, get off my lawn, you meddling kids! *shakes cane*). You can find the details about the Tweetspoons project right here. That runs all the time, as far as I'm aware (*grumblenewtechnologygrumble*), and we encourage you to let other people know that there's at least one tweetstream talking about just going out and doing good things for the human species.
Teaspoons up, let's hear 'em, Shakers!
ô,ôP
The NQDTR Discussion Thread - F100604
Hiya, Shakers, time for another Discussion Thread for the Not Quite Daily Teaspoon Report!
This is the thread in which you may offer congratulations or admiration for a teaspoon or teaspooner. If you're posting with just congrats or admiration, though, do take a moment and check the thread to see whether other people have said so a number of times already. Remember that no one is required to read here just because they posted over there, so there's no guarantee you'll get a response to a given comment.
Blog note: Bread and Teaspoons
Not sure whether it's been much noticed, but I haven't made a B&T post in a few weeks. This is largely because it has seemed to me to be less and less attended, thus making me wonder if it is now past its time, but as with anything else to do with me, depression and physical pain and money stress* (poverty, in case it wasn't clear, sucks large rocks through small hoses) have had their roles to play as well.
I could start it up again, if people wanted, or make changes (maybe less often? maybe different posting guidelines? adding topics for discussion?), but I think as presently constituted, it's just not feeling easy to keep going.
Anyone got any thoughts, or do we just put it gracefully to bed as an idea that didn't quite work?
* It's hard not to feel somewhat irresponsible for putting time and effort into a labour of love (such as Shakesville is for me), when my business isn't making enough to live on as yet. This is tied into very old stuff for me, about my parents' narrative of me as selfish and irresponsible for transitioning.
Two Minute Nostalgia Sublime
Taylor Dayne: "I'll Be Your Shelter"
Bonus I'll Be Your Shelter Starring Jeremy Sisto As Jesus:
National Donut Day
Hey, guess what, Shakers! Today is National Donut Day! Woo hoo! Yes, a day dedicated to donuts of all variety: cream-filled or not! Yay! (And yes, every sentence in this post will end with an exclamation point!) If you love donuts as much as I do, you'll be out getting yours filled today! I mean "getting your fill today"! Woops! Some places are even giving away free donuts too! I bet you could google that and find a local donut perveyor that is celebrating National Donut Day like all good Americans!
So, run out, eat a donut now! It is the right thing to do!
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by Deeky's splendid array of fine products for giant hands. All products in the Deeky line come with matching butt plugs. In honor of this consumer-friendly practice, today's blog links are offered in sets, except where not.
Womanist Musings: Calling Someone the N-Word Can get Expensive
- Renee notes that sometimes black folks find justice - but there's a hell of a lot more of it still missing.
Womanist Musings: Monstrous Musings: Is it better to be feared than loved? White ogre identity in Shrek 4
- Renee's guest poster, Natalie Wilson, muses on monsters and the curiously limited color spectrum explored in film animation.
Sociological Images: Learning How to Stand Like a Girl
- Stand up straight! No, not you, honey.
Sociological Images: Charting Welfare Numbers
- Lies, damned lies, and statistics: that third kind may be even more misleading in the form of charts, because they look so definitive.
Family Inequality: Behind the Gendered Workplace
- That 2nd post at Sociological Images led me to its author's blog, where more interesting stuff is to be found.
Mondoweiss: Blinding the Witnesses
- Naomi Klein on Emily Henochowicz, the young U.S. artist who lost an eye when she was shot in the face with a tear gas canister at a West Bank protest against the Israeli raid on the Gaza-bound flotilla.
Thirsty Pixels
- Emily Henochowicz's blog, with pictures of some of her work. Her most recent post is from May 30, the day before she was shot.
Pam's House Blend: O'Reilly: gay-themed French McDonald's ad equivalent to promoting Al Qaeda
- Bill O'Reilly doesn't think some folks should be coming at all, much less as they are.
Pam's House Blend: It's time for the Family Research Council to be classified as an official SPLC "hate group"
- Rep. Howard Berman introduced a sense-of-the-House resolution opposing proposed Ugandan kill-the-gays legislation. The Family Research Council lobbied Congress on it. Do you think they were for or against it?
Black Agenda Report: AFRICOM and the ICC: Enforcing international justice in Africa?
- The U.S. has refused to allow our citizens to be subject to the International Criminal Court, but we may be interested in becoming their Enforcer. How could that not work out well? Samar Al-Bulushi and Adam Branch will tell you.
Ta-Nehesi Coates: Especially the Blacks and the Irish
- They all look alike. Ta-Nehisi Coates reminds us to look to primary documents, and quotes Fanny Kemble.
Ta-Nehesi Coates: Especially the Blacks and the Irish, cont.
- Ta-Nehisi provides some further original images.
ETA: I forgot to add the invitation to drop in comments links to your blog posts or to others you'd like to share. But links, as always, welcome.
(Incredibly Racist) Quote of the Day
"We already got one raghead in the White House, we don’t need a raghead in the governor’s mansion."- Senator Jake Knotts (R(acist fuckneck)-SC), attacking Nikki Haley,* frontrunner in South Carolina's GOP gubernatorial race. Haley, raised in the Sikh faith, recently changed language on her website to "reflect a more Christian tone."
Countdown to "I'm sorry if anyone was offended" non-apology apology in 3..2..
UPDATE UPDATE: Whoops, got fooled. But yeah, as expected, it "was just a joke."
* (Trust me, don't read the comments at the Think Progress link. Apparently, the commenters there don't actually take the name of the site to heart.)
Question of the Day
We've done this one before several times, but it's always fun.
What's for dinner?
I've got some catfish fillets defrosted. I'm either going to braise them in a curry sauce and serve them over rice, or bread n' bake them with brussels sprouts.
Standard Operating Procedure
Yesterday my husband got an email about a sweepstakes being held by VersionOne, a large technology vendor. This sweepstakes is being called "Real Men of Agile Genius" and is supposed to be a parody of those beer commercials. Here is part of the FAQ from the emailed advert:
Notice their blurb about gender bias? Yeah.
Anyway, my husband, sent them an email about this that quoted that bit and said if you have to explain it, you probably should have thought before using it in the first place. Also,
If we were in a field where participation by women wasn't already an issue, maybe this wouldn't be as big of a deal; as it is,I consider this sweepstakes pretty harmful and insulting to both the women in our industry and anyone else who is working hard to build inclusive environments. I'm disappointed to see this kind of crap coming from a well-known vendor in the agile space.
Do I need to give you all more than one guess at what the response was?
Anyone who guessed the "we're sorry you were offended" gets 100 shiny gold stars. This is the response:
We apologize if this sweepstakes has offended you. VersionOne has customers all over the world and some of them are not familiar with the popular ad campaign we are spoofing. This is why the explanation was given.Apologies: 2; Getting It: 0.
Again, please accept our apologies.
Anyone who is still wondering Why So Few?, needs to look no further than this sweepstakes right here. S.O.P. for a company's response; S.O.P. regarding women in technology. Yes, it's "just a sweepstakes"--it's always the little things, too.
Terrorism AGAINST Muslims - an Inherent Contradiction?
You'd certainly think so if you go by the mainstream media.
The link's a couple of weeks old, but refers to a pipe bomb attack on a mosque in Florida, which seems to have managed to escape the mainstream media's attention. It also seems to be very difficult for those parts of the MSM that did notice it (largely local media in Florida) to bring themselves to admit that white Americans can be terrorists, or that someone attacking Muslims with the intention of creating fear could be considered terrorism.
It sure is good that white Americans don't commit terrorist acts, huh?
Edit: D'oh! Shaker BlueRidge points out that Liss already posted about this. Sorry 'bout the repeat, folks.
Rue McClanahan RIP
Rue McClanahan, perhaps best known as Blanche Devereaux on The Golden Girls, died today after stroke. She was 76.
McClanahan had a diverse career, appearing in films like Starship Troopers, on TV in Mama's Family, and on Broadway in Wicked.
She will be missed.
RIP Rue McClanahan.
