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.
The NQDTR Discussion Thread - M100719
The Not Quite Daily Teaspoon Report - M100719
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
Kumbayah, My Lord . . .
Mixed news on the "fierce advocacy" front comes from Foreign Policy's Turtle Bay. While the Obama administration is pursuing such actions as fulfilling the Justice Dept.'s responsibility to defend DOMA in court, and allowing the Pentagon to inquire how presumed-to-be-straight-until-being-outed service members feel about sharing barracks with, you know — them, before finally parting with the DADT policy which has served so well to squander highly trained personnel while we've been fighting two wars, somebody — the initiative apparently comes from within the State Dept., given that it is being conducted by the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. and because, well, that does seem to be the one enclave within the Obama administration where the advocacy has been more than rhetorical — I say, somebody in the administration has engaged the U.S. government in actively supporting a bid by a U.S. gay rights group, the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), to be awarded "consultative status" by the U.N. Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).
This would allow the IGLHRC to participate in U.N. meetings on human rights and health issues, among others, as do numerous other international non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Normally, accreditation of U.N. NGOs is done by a U.N. committee "dominated by socially conservative Islamic governments". This committee has prevented action on the IGLHRC's certification application for over three years. The U.S. government, therefore, is conducting an initiative to get the 54 member states of the ECOSOC as a whole to proceed to grant the IGLHRC's application.
So naturally, patriotic U.S. Congressmen Christopher H. Smith and Trent Franks (both R-uh-roh!) have stepped forward to support our government's action in opposing this potential Muslim menace to freedom, one assumes? Why, of course they have. Er, stepped forward, that is.
By lobbying U.N. members to oppose the U.S. government's initiative. "I respectfully urge you", wrote the two, apparently speaking as one, in a letter to U.N. members, "to refuse attempts to circumvent UN procedure and secure a premature approval of the IGLHRC in the ECOSOC. Preservation of the rights of freedom of expression and freedom of religion require that IGLRHC undergo further review in the standard review process."
That would be the standard review process which has been holding up IGLHRC's application for years now. But what are these "rights of freedom of expression and freedom of religion" which so concern Reps. Smith and Franks? These gentlemen share the concerns of the governments of Egypt and other nations not generally known for their concern for freedom of expression, about principles the IGLHCR has endorsed which urge governments to "ensure that the exercise of freedom of opinion and expression does not violate the rights and freedoms of persons of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities."
Well, it's pretty obvious where that would lead. Wael Attiya, speaking for the Egyptian government in June, was troubled by the possibility that such principles would lead to the persecution of religious leaders who condemn homosexual behavior.If a "preacher says that a relationship between same sex [couples] is wrong, will the preacher be hunted?"
That's what Wael Attiya wants to know, and apparently Reps. Smith and Franks share his concern.
To sum up: While it remains vital to God's plan for ConservoChristians to continue to bomb the shit out of Muslims in as many countries simultaneously as possible, this should not prevent us from uniting with our soon-to-be-consigned-to-Hellfire-for-all-eternity conservative Muslim brothers and sisters in the equally important task of keeping teh gays in their place, while pretending that it is they who are persecuting us (because, let's face it, that gag just never gets old).
Via
Stay Classy, WaPo
Pulitzers for everybody!
I don't know how many of the USians here have memories of waiting for the dentist and trying to solve the "WTF is wrong with this picture" puzzles in Highlights, but this recent Washington Post profile of Robyn Deane, Virginia governor Robert McDonnell's sister-in-law (who happens to be trans) really brings me back (a larger image is in the photo gallery here):
Feel free to play along. Select answers are below the fold.
As I noted above, Robyn Deane is the governor's sister-in-law (not his "brother-in-law").
Robyn Deane is not a man, and therefore not a "man in the process of becoming a woman." Ms. Deane is a woman.
"Transgendered". Enough already with the "transgendered"
"Deane wants Virginia and national lawmakers to pass legislation that prevents discrimination in the workplace on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. She also wants to convince McDonnell to speak publicly about how being gay or transgendered is acceptable.":picture of Deane using hairspray:
Nice. Bonus points for including a picture of Deane with her face contorted and her eyes shut.
Bonus points for pretty much everything else in the gallery, including:
Deane is a woman who wears eyeliner!
Deane also wears nylons!
Deane is so feminine she even likes cats!
Deane also used to look like a dude!
Deane used to have what many people consider to be a dude's name! It was this!
In the first sentence of the profile, we learn that Deane wore heels this one time. And a red raincoat. (Welcome to [usually] acknowledged womanhood.)
Gay rights, LGBT rights, civil rights, whichever.
Gay or transgender, gay and/or transgender. Whichever. :cough:
The first paragraph under the sub-headline "Fighting for the cause" is mostly about Deane's medical concerns. It mentions sex reassignment surgery prior to describing the nature of "the cause".
Deane used to dress like a man, which is totes important because?
This is an article [ostensibly] about civil rights. It is in the Style section.
Bingo! Bingo, like, on multiple cards.
I wonder if anyone at the WaPo realizes the AP puts out an annual guide to not sucking at their job.
One might say that the WaPo buried the lede, but I'm honestly not sure what the lede is. It might be that there's this one activist lady who is distantly related to the governor, or it might be that said lady is ZOMG trans. Clearly, these are both important stories, ripe for trenchant analysis.
A lot of folks have written tons of stuff about the erasure of trans people's identities, Western society's need to portray trans people's identities as artificial, and the dismissal of femininity as artifice (see Julia Serano). I'm not going to get into any of that, partly because I have other work to do, partly because, wow WaPo, you know how to produce instructional tools.
Here's info on contacting the Washington Post. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to wearing women's clothes, or whatever the hell it is that I do.
--
Didja notice the quotes from Democratic gay rights activists who want Ms. Deane to go away on account of how she might distract folks from issues that really matter? :sarcastic swoon:
Via Lynn. Also at Bilerico.
New Caravaggio Discovered
Following up on the recent discovery of Caravaggio's earthly remains, the Vatican newspaper is reporting a previously unknown painting by the Baroque master may have been found. Tentatively titled "The Martyrdom of St Lawrence" the image depicts a mostly-naked man (duh) "with one arm outstretched as he leans over leaping flames beneath him."
Art historians will examine the painting, presumably spending a long time near the cleft of St Lawrence's ass, to determine its authenticity.
[Cross-posted.]
Bring Out the Pulitzers!
This morning, the Washington Post published a report on its two-year investigation into a "top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 [which] has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work."
According to the WaPo, this top-secret world "amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America hidden from public view and lacking in thorough oversight" and after nearly a decade of unprecedented and unchecked spending to fuel seemingly unlimited growth, "the result is that the system put in place to keep the United States safe is so massive that its effectiveness is impossible to determine."
The fact that there exists in the US a covert anti-terrorism arm of the government that is so vast it can't be coordinated, so disconnected it can't be effective, so lacking in oversight it stands to be easily exploited by the very people from whom it purports to protect the nation, and so flush with cash that there's no incentive to change any of the above, is terrifying.
Of course, it's also something the existence of which we've known since the first term of the Bush administration.
The WaPo, however, began its investigation into this shadowy nightmare only two years ago. Huh. Two years ago, you say? Like, right about just before Bush was to leave office at the end of his second term? Great timing.
Don't get me wrong: I'm glad this story is getting some (more) attention, because it is legitimately a breathtaking model of antidemocratic fuckery—and the oft-promised commitment to transparency that was a hallmark of Candidate Obama's campaign has not been fulfilled by President Obama, who was remarkably keen to adopt the fondness for opacity left behind in the Oval Office by his predecessor.
But seriously. This is shit about which I (and every other lefty political blogger) was writing in 2004—through the Patriot Act, through the Downing Street Memos, through FISA-breaching warrantless wiretapping programs, through Presidential Signing Statements, through National Security Letters, through torture, through extraordinary rendition, through the politicization of the CIA, through the outing of Valerie Plame, through unanswered questions about the laws governing mercenaries private contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, through the mysterious disappearance of White House emails, through so many acres of knee-deep bullshit that the archives of this space and every space like it on the internet are full of posts talking about the building conspiracy and its inevitable consequences about which the WaPo is now writing with seriousness after spending years participating in the dismissal as hysterics and lunatics of the people connecting those dots to paint this picture back when it was a doodle, not a fucking mural the size of America.
Welcome back from your dereliction of duty, WaPo. What the fuck are we going to do about it now?
Boo. Hiss.
This weekend, the Iroquois Nationals lacrosse team returned home, effectively abandoning their goal of playing in the 2010 World Lacrosse Championships in Manchester. The US government originally indicated that it would not allow the team back into the country. Even after the US State Department changed course, The UK government refused to issue visas to the team, as it did not recognize the validity of Haudenosaunee passports.
Well that's just great. Hooray for 18th Century diplomacy. Or 21st Century diplomacy. They look a lot a like some times. Ostensibly this is about the need to microchip everything now that 9/11 blahblahblah, but ultimately, the whole fiasco stems from a disagreement on which people are actually, you know, people.
Previously: Last Monday, Last Tuesday, Last Wednesday, Last Thursday, Last Friday
Open Thread
Hosted by the World's Largest Cuckoo Clock.
This week's open threads have been brought to you by timepieces.
The Virtual Pub Is Open
[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]
TFIF, Shakers!
Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!
More Rhetorical Questions
Actual Entertainment Weekly cover.
How is this a "First Look at Ryan Reynolds as the Green Lantern" and not "First Look at a Terrible, Terrible Photoshop of Ryan Reynolds' Face in Some Green Cartoon Bullshit"?
I can play this game, too!
Not an actual cover of Entertainment Weekly.
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
Learning Fail
by Shaker knitmeapony
[Trigger warning for stalking, misogyny, racism, dehumanization, and general assholery.]
So, there's this fella named Joel Johnson. He's an editor and author on high-profile, popular techy blogs like Gizmodo and BoingBoing. Recently, he decided he wanted to broaden his horizons, after he read that Twitter was popular with black people, but "realized most of my Twitter friends are like me: white dorks."
On Wednesday, Johnson wrote a post about the horizon-broadening experience he'd undertaken. An article called, I shit you not, "Why I Stalk a Sexy Black Woman on Twitter (And Why You Should, Too)."
In it, he imparts his wisdom to the masses: he has decided the best way to open his mind is to just stare at someone from a distance. He breathlessly describes his descent into exoticism: how exciting of him to have followed, unsolicited, a black woman on Twitter. Great Maude in the morning! She's Christian! She likes sex! She's fiscally responsible!
He helpfully diagnoses her psychological issues ("She seems to have some problems trusting men, but she's not afraid of them, either.") in the same paragraph that he is ogling her "faux modeling shots" and "mall fashion".
He publicizes her life, her 'childish' and 'charming' faith; aspects of her sexuality she might never have expected to be public beyond the followers who she knows well.
There's so much that has been said about this article, I think I can leave the description alone in its sleezy glory and give you the quick blogaround:
Salon: Gizmodo stalks a black woman
Deanna Zandt: Privileged Voyeurism
Postbourgie: The Odd Habits and Foibles of Sexy Black Women on the Internet
Channing Kennedy: Shut up, dude.
Ann at Feministing: How to win "black" friends and influence people on the internet
Suffice it to say, he's being called out on his racism, sexism, colonialism, marginalization of sexual violence (stalking: not a happy fun time activity, dude), and privilege.
After this all blew up, he went to his Twitter feed, where he tried to understand why people are pissed about the article. To his credit, he has attempted to engage the criticism there, at least, in a cool-headed if very shallow way. Unfortunately, he had to write about that, too: It gets even worse in his follow up: So This Hipster Tech Douche Stalks a Sexy Black Woman On Twitter... Let's let him speak for himself:If I have any regret about the piece, it's that I didn't title it "Why I Stalk A Sexy Black Christian Woman from Detroit (etc.)"…
...really.
…There's been a lot of talk about me "othering" this woman. Frankly? Duh.…
…Which leads to another denunciation levied: that if I really wanted to get to know this woman, I should have interacted with her instead of just voyeuristically following her Twitter stream. That's fair—but only if you presume that I actually wanted to befriend her. I didn't….
…Sorry to disappoint, but I copped to nothing of the sort. It may be a cliched, horndog thing to say, but if I have a fetish, it's a woman fetish. There's nothing the least bit "privileged" about looking at a picture that someone's put online and saying, "Yup. She's hot."…
…[On Stalking] While I believe that absolutely nothing on earth is off limits for a joke, I can understand how, if you only read the title of the post, you might not get the irony.
My psychic prediction: Next week, Gizmodo once again laments that tech & programming culture have a dearth of women and people of color. I will definitely get that irony. Sigh.
Quote of the Day
"So it comes down to this. Republicans believe they can turn bullshit into gold." - The opening of a brilliant post by Jon Perr, who explains how the Republicans are doubling down on the fallacy that cutting taxes actually brings in more revenue.
Today in Rape Culture
[Trigger warning for sexual assault and victim-blaming.]
Lynette Taylor, wife of NFL Hall-of-Famer Lawrence Taylor—who was indicted last month on charges of third-degree rape, patronizing a prostitute, and endangering the welfare of a child, after paying a 16-year-old girl (who was assaulted and brought to his room against her will by another man) $300 to "have sex with him"—took to the airwaves last night to defend her husband. She told Larry King (emphasis mine):
He should have told her to get the heck out of his room. But I cannot explain why men do what they do. I don't understand why we're destroying the Earth to get to Jupiter. That doesn't make sense to me. I don't understand why we're fighting a war, spending billions of dollars fighting a war over oil, instead of spending that money on stuff that we don't need oil. I don't understand why men do what they do.Ah, the old rape is for nice girls argument: Sex workers can't be raped, because they exist in a perpetual state of consent by virtue of their occupation—and don't even have the right to say no to anything, as long as they get paid afterwards.
And when no one's looking, well, they will try to get away with whatever. I can't say that. But here's the problem. When I say this was an extortion plot that went awry, because what it was to go, did you know that girl was 16, but he didn't have sex with. OK?
So now let's move on to Plan B. Let's just say he raped you and then we can sue him and we'll still get money. All right? This -- this is the most silly, ridiculous thing in the world. And I don't know -- it's like, oh, now she's a prostitute. How in the heck do you rape a prostitute.
She's a run away. Good girls don't run away. I'm sorry. I've been a 16-year-old girl, all right. I've been a 19-year-old girl. I didn't leave my home. That's what happens. That's what I think people need to tell their kids. That's what happens when you run away from home. When you leave the sanctuary of your home and your parents, yes, there are bad people out there. There are pimps waiting at bus stops and stuff things like that. You know what, stop running away. She shouldn't have ran away.
I'm not attacking her, but all I'm saying is, I don't understand how -- it's like, oh, she's only 16. Sixteen is so young. Sixteen- year-olds are driving our cars. Sixteen-year-olds are working in our stores. They're serving our food. They are old enough to have jobs. She was hold enough to, if she wanted to get help, get help. Why did it have to be a rich guy before she decided, oh, I don't want this anymore? It doesn't make sense.
Suffice it to say, this is total bullshit. Of course sex workers can be raped; their consent is required every bit as much as someone who isn't being paid. The exchange of money creates a contract; it doesn't buy a consent exemption.
But the fact that many people believe otherwise means that sex workers are at increased risk of being raped, because rapists know there are always people eminently willing to argue that a sex worker can't be raped at all.
Even when they're trafficked 16-year-olds. For fuck's sake.
And note Taylor's attempt to have it both ways, here: A sex worker can't be raped, but that damn 16-year-old shouldn't have run away, because what did she expect? "That's what happens." What happens to runaway 16-year-olds is that they get trafficked into the sex trade and raped. So she's got no right to complain!
Ugh.
And, as profoundly contemptible as Taylor's rhetoric is, what the fuck is wrong with Larry King that he invites the wife of a man charged with raping a child onto his show to defend him in the first place? No good will come from that—and, without exception, those sorts of interviews turn into spectacles of victim-blaming and heinous rape narratives.
That doesn't serve victims. It wouldn't even serve innocent people wrongly accused. Victim-blaming and rape narratives serve only one master: The rape culture.
Which in turn serves rapists.
[H/T to Shaker Miss_Led.]
Same as it ever was
The UK government is still refusing to issue visas to members of the Iroquois Nationals lacrosse team. The team has now forfeited a second game.
"Erin Taylor, a spokeswoman at the British Consulate in New York, said by email at 12:36 p.m.: Team members must present travel documents her government considers valid, plus U.S. or Canadian passports."
File under: getting it, you are still not.
Here's the full story from the Syracuse Post-Standard.
An affront to my friends and neighbors is an affront to me.
Speaking as a neighbor, I'll add that Haudenosaunee-American relations aren't looking so hot at the moment, what with state and county governments encroaching on tribal rights. Additional fuckery from the UK is precisely what we do not need at the moment, thank you very much.
Previously: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
