Actual Headline: Would America Have Been Better Off Without a Reagan Presidency?
Actual Subhead: "His simple-mindedness had a touch of genius to it."
Oh, Slate. Oh, Christopher Hitchens. Don't ever change.
Via @JamilSmith, who says: "To answer the headline's question, yes." LOL.
Oh Dear
News News
AOL is buying the Huffington Post. I suppose that means we can all expect to receive CD-Roms in the mail with free trial subscriptions.
I kid AOL! But seriously, have you heard the new corporate jingle that's been written for the merger? It's really catchy.
Superbowl Open Thread
I didn't care about the game, didn't watch it, don't care about the adverts, didn't watch them, heard some of them were pretty good, heard some of them were pretty awful, if you're one of those zany people who happens to think sexism, whether reducing women to sex objects or reducing men to drooling knuckleheads, isn't totes trenchant comedy fodder.
I also heard Christina Aguilera has been arrested for treason or something...? Well, at least she didn't scandalize the world by showing her boob.
Iain and I have an annual tradition of going on a movie date during the Superbowl, which is so much fun. The streets are like a ghost town, and the theater is virtually empty. It's like we're the only people in the world.
And that's basically my take on the Superbowl: Thanks for leaving the world to us for an afternoon!
My avoidance/indifference is not an implicit criticism of loving the game and/or the adverts; it does, however, leave me manifestly incapable of writing something insightful or even factually accurate about the whole event, lol. So have at it in comments.
Penny Arcade Open Thread II
[Trigger warning for sexual violence and rape apology.]
Last night's thread was getting unwieldy after 1,000+ comments, so here's a fresh thread.
One observation about yesterday's thread: I opened it to give the people piling into my email an opportunity to speak their minds in this space. The people who were sending the really nasty stuff mostly didn't show up in the public thread where I consented to allow them to have at me. Can anyone think of any other action to which is central a lack of consent...?
The other people who show up in my email and not in the thread are the men (self-identified as men in their emails; I'm not assuming) who contact me to talk about how they are on my side, to thank me for speaking up, and/or to tell me that they've really learned something about themselves, the rape culture, whatever during this whole thing. There are a lot of them, which is good! That's why I do this, why I put up with all the bullshit. But they mostly don't want to say it publicly, and certainly not under their real names, the way I blog every day, because they see what happens to people who speak up.
This, then, is the rape culture at work: Men who want to harass me by violating my boundaries, and men who see that retribution taken on me and don't want to experience the same, intimidated into public silence by the jack-booted enforcers of this fucked-up culture.
This, too, is why I do this.
--------------------
Same rules apply: Whatever you've got to say, say it here. Whether you want to explain the comic to me, argue against the existence of the rape culture, confess that you've learned something you didn't expect to learn about rape culture, talk about my impenetrable tone, ask questions, give me a fist-bump of solidarity, accuse me of censorship, pontificate about the First Amendment, express your own contempt for trivializing rape for entertainment, demand to be educated, share what your wife/girlfriend/mom has to say, note how fat and ugly I am, breathe a sigh of relief at having found Shakesville, or anything else that's on your mind, this is the place to do it.
Threats of violence against anyone will not be tolerated in this space.
If you are a first-time commenter, please note that the Commenting Policy and the Feminism 101 section, conveniently linked at the top of the page, are required reading before commenting.
Please be aware this thread will be left unmoderated, so tread with caution.
[Previously: Rape Is Hilarious, Survivors Are So Sensitive, Quote of the Day, Troll Math and Teaspoons, T-Shirts and Teaspoons and Mythical Creatures, Taking a Brave Stance Against Survivors of Rape, Offended Is the Worst Thing to Be, and An Observation, My Point, Here It Is, Penny Arcade Open Thread I.]
Penny Arcade Open Thread
[Trigger warning for sexual violence and rape apology.]
Judging by my email, lots of people have a lot of stuff they REALLY NEED TO TELL ME. So this is your big chance. Whether you want to explain the comic to me, argue against the existence of the rape culture, confess that you've learned something you didn't expect to learn about rape culture, talk about my impenetrable tone, ask questions, give me a fist-bump of solidarity, accuse me of censorship, pontificate about the First Amendment, express your own contempt for trivializing rape for entertainment, demand to be educated, share what your wife/girlfriend/mom has to say, note how fat and ugly I am, breathe a sigh of relief at having found Shakesville, or anything else that's on your mind, this is the place to do it.
Threats of violence against anyone will not be tolerated in this space.
So have at it, everyone. Noting the above exception, say whatever the fuck you want to say.
Please be aware this thread will be left unmoderated, so tread with caution.
[Previously: Rape Is Hilarious, Survivors Are So Sensitive, Quote of the Day, Troll Math and Teaspoons, T-Shirts and Teaspoons and Mythical Creatures, Taking a Brave Stance Against Survivors of Rape, Offended Is the Worst Thing to Be, and An Observation, My Point, Here It Is.]
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!
Daily Dose of Cute
I took that picture of Dudley the other day while he was watching Iain. He watches us intently when we move, which is, of course, because he's a dog—and dogs specialize in watching humans to learn our gestures in a way no other species does. I know this fact, but it is still beautiful to observe in practice, this intense looking he does to bond with us.
When one of us moves around the room, he watches—but only if we move in a particular way, as he's learned the difference between getting up to, say, go to the bathroom and getting up with Purposeful Intent to Do Something Important—and watches steadily, trying to discern if there is anything we need or expect or are about to give him. If not, he lies back down, with a great heaving sigh of contentment.
He is such a good dog, such an excellent companion. I cannot believe that once upon a time, he was owned by someone who didn't love him.
End Greyhound Racing.
Obviously
Obviously James Franco "likes to relax with a nice shave and a song before he hosts any award shows," and obviously he would post this video of himself getting a shave while singing along to "Cruisin' For Love" by '70s British country rockers The Kursaal Flyers. Did you think he liked relaxing some other way? This man is about to host the Academy Awards, and he obviously needs to relax with a nice shave and a song. No Doy.
[Via Andy.]
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by Shaxco, proudly not neutral.
Recommended Reading:
Problem Chylde: Talking about a Revolution...
Kai: Youth, Joblessness and Revolution in Egypt—and America?
Shark-Fu: Witness
Sady: #DearJohn: A Few Notes on Choosing Your Battles Poorly [TW for discussions of rape]
Peter: This Girl Is Your Sister [TW for rape, violence]
Rose: Carol Ann and Laura Stutte Sue Alleged Arsonist [TW for homophobia, violence]
Echidne: Images vs. Words
Leave your links in comments...
Backlash Backfire
In August of 2007, the state of Iowa's prohibition on same-sex marriage was ruled unconstitutional. In 2008, the case for marriage equality went to the Iowa Supreme Court, and, in 2009, the Court unanimously ruled in favor of marriage equality, thus making same-sex marriage legal in Iowa.
So of course Republicans in the state House introduced an amendment to the state's constitution to outlaw it again—a futile gesture, since state Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal flatly refuses to allow it to come up for a vote in the Senate. (Rock on.) But there were hearings nonetheless, because homobigots love to hear themselves talk in poorly appointed rooms on shitty microphones.
What they weren't counting on was providing a platform to 19-year-old Iowan Zach Wahls, who was raised by a same-sex couple and whose compelling testimony has gone viral, making a passionate appeal for marriage equality the most talked-about event of their stupid symbolic hearing. Whooooooops!
Take it away, Zach.
[Transcript below. H/T to everyone in the multiverse, and thanks to each and every one of you.]
Good evening, Mr. Chairman. My name is Zach Wahls. I'm a sixth-generation Iowan, an engineering student at the University of Iowa, and I was raised by two women.
My biological mom, Terri, told her grandparents that she was pregnant, that the artificial insemination had worked, and they wouldn't even acknowledge it. It wasn't until I was born and they succumbed to my infantile cuteness that they broke down and told her that they were thrilled to have another grandson. Unfortunately, neither of them lived to see her married to her partner, Jackie, of 15 years, when they wed in 2009.
My younger sister and only sibling was born in 1994; we actually have the same anonymous donor, so we're full siblings, which is really cool for me. Um, you know, and I guess the point is that our family really isn't so different from any other Iowa family—you know, when I'm home, we go to church together, we eat dinner, we go on vacations. But, you know, we have our hard times, too—we get in fights, um, you know, actually, my mom Terri was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2000; it is a devastating disease that put her in a wheelchair, so we've had our share of struggles.
But, you know, we're Iowans; we don't expect anyone to solve our problems for us; we'll fight our own battles; we just hope for equal and fair treatment from our government.
Being a student at the University of Iowa, the topic of same-sex marriage comes up quite frequently in classroom discussions. You know, and the question always comes down to, "Well, can gays even raise kids?" And the question, you know, the conversation gets quiet for a moment, because most people don't really have an answer—and then I raise my hand and say, "Actually, I was raised by a gay couple, and I'm doing pretty well."
I scored in the 99th percentile on the ACT; I'm actually an Eagle Scout; I own and operate my own small business. If I were your son, Mr. Chairman, I believe I'd make you very proud.
I'm not really so different from any of your children. My family really isn't so different from yours. After all, your family doesn't derive its sense of worth from being told by the state, "You're married—congratulations!" No, the sense of family comes from the commitment we make to each other, to work through the hard times so we can enjoy the good ones; it comes from the love that binds us. That's what makes a family.
So what you're voting here isn't to change us. It's not to change our families; it's to change how the law views us, how the law treats us. You are voting for the first time, in the history of our state, to codify discrimination into our constitution—a constitution that, but for the proposed amendment, is the least amended constitution in the United States of America. You are telling Iowans that some among you are second-class citizens who do not have the right to marry the person you love.
So will this vote affect my family? Will it affect yours? Over the next two hours, I'm sure we're going to hear plenty of testimony about how damaging having gay parents is on kids. But in my 19 years, not once have I ever been confronted by an individual who realized independently that I was raised by a gay couple.
And you know why? Because the sexual orientation of my parents has had zero effect on the content of my character.
Thank you very much. [applause]
WHAM!
That sound was the sledgehammer:
This morning, the anti-choice leadership of the U.S. House of Representatives decided to modify a provision in the "Stupak on Steroids" agenda that would redefine what constitutes rape.There really are no words that would accurately describe how utterly heinous, how unspeakably vile that is. Truly a horror show in the House of Representatives.
At the same time, these anti-choice politicians opened a new attack on women's health. They added a new provision to H.R. 358, which was introduced by Rep. Joe Pitts of Pennsylvania. The new H.R. 358 would allow hospitals to refuse to provide abortion care even when it's necessary to save a woman's life!
My Point, Here It Is
[Trigger warning for sexual violence, rape apologia, and threats. The background and timeline of the Penny Arcade Dickwolves Debacle, which I will be discussing in this post, is here.]
Since yesterday, when Mike/Gabe declared "Okay That's Enough," once he found himself on the receiving end of the same sorts of threats and violent rhetoric I've been getting from his readers for the past six months—from exhortions to kill myself to threatening emails and comments to a coordinated campaign against me and the blog (to which I won't link, but it's easy enough to find if you're so inclined) which explicitly encourages Penny Arcade readers to stalk and rape me—the amount of email I've been getting has actually increased.
That's not a coincidence.
It is also not a coincidence that many of the people who came into this space to shout at me and stupidly accuse me of censorship and harass/threaten me reacted to having their commenting privileges revoked by sockpuppeting to do an end-run around our security in order to keep commenting and/or treated being banned as an invitation to take up the issue with me personally via email.
When I ask a person not to engage in rape apologia in this space, because it is my space and I have not only not consented to host rape apologia here, but have also explicitly and repeatedly deemed it off-limits, and that person continues to engage in rape apologia nonetheless, without regard for my boundaries or personal autonomy, that's not exactly someone who's demonstrating a commitment to the notions of consent, autonomy, and respect.
That's someone who's leveraging the values of a rape culture to violate my boundaries.
That's someone who's acting like a fucking rapist.
That is what is meant when people talk about a rape culture—not, as it is continually misrepresented, a culture in which one can trace a direct line from every rape joke to an actual act of rape, but a culture in which there is endemic hostility to the notions of consent, autonomy, and respect of individual boundaries, privacy, and dignity.
That endemic hostility is absolutely and demonstrably associated with high rates of sexual violence, and it is also inextricably linked with low rates of conviction for crimes of sexual violence, i.e. institutional support for contempt and/or indifference toward consent. Lower conviction rates means more rapists left free to rape, which underscores the importance of challenging apathy toward consent. And every time someone decides to say "Fuck her/him, I don't have to respect her/his clearly delineated boundaries," and it goes unchallenged, that more deeply entrenches the rape culture and its values.
This shit doesn't happen in a void, and contempt for consent breeds more contempt for consent by normalizing it, by making it a thing so ubiquitous that we begin to believe that's just the way things are.
Rape is inevitable. Subway gropers are inevitable. Stalkers are inevitable. Trolls are inevitable.
We believe those things because we don't accept that they are all part of a continuum which starts with a failure to prioritize respect for consent.
And because we continually reinforce that lack of respect for consent with entertainment—films, television shows, music, books, magazines, comics, video games, sports, advertising—that tells people who don't respect consent that it's okay to hold that belief. Some of those people will be rapists. Some of them will just be people who viciously harass ladies who happen to disagree with their male heroes. Some of them will be self-proclaimed Nice Guys who would never do anything like that, because they don't see their own slightly-too-aggressive, slightly-too-insistent, slightly-too-entitled behavior as part of the same continuum, because it's so easy to react to the evidence of one's participation in the rape culture with knee-jerk revulsion.
It's easier to call me a psycho and accuse me of calling them rapists, than it is to self-reflect on how pernicious the rape culture really is and how maddeningly easy it is to perpetuate it, even if you're not sticking part of your body (or whatever) into someone else's body against hir will.
I have done it. I have perpetuated the rape culture. We have all done it. We were born into it, and we were all socialized to have contempt for consent.
The only issue is what we choose to do about that reality.
By all rights, this entire Penny Arcade debacle should be eye-opening for anyone with a baseline capacity for logic. Of course it was always going to go down this way. Of course treating rape a little too flippantly was going to trigger survivors, and of course triggered survivors and their allies who asked for some consideration were going to get attacked, and of course when Mike and Jerry escalated it by mocking anti-rape advocates, those advocates were going be harassed and threatened in an attempt to silence them, and so on and so on until here we are.
It was entirely predictable—and not because, as the jaded cynics of internet battles would have us believe, that's the way the internet works, but because that's the way the rape culture works.
The rape culture is not just about actual and attempted acts of rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment, but also about all the other ways in which contempt and/or indifference toward other human beings' consent, autonomy, boundaries, and right to halt any unwanted interaction in their personal spaces are violated.
It's about the all the narratives, attitudes, and behaviors that surround the violation of another person's boundaries and sense of personal safety.
It's about the ways in people are targeted with threats (often including threats of rape) in order to intimidate them into silence, especially around discussions of the rape culture.
The act of rape itself is not just about sexual violence; it is also about hostility toward another human being's consent, autonomy, and boundaries—and you don't have to actually be physically violating another person to show hostility toward hir consent, autonomy, and boundaries. And that is the point of the rape culture.
And that is why people like me object to comics (etc.) that, intentionally or not, provide tacit or explicit approval of hostility for consent, even if it's just by treating rape a little too casually, using it a little too flippantly to make a point—because it always turns out this way.
That's not a coincidence. That's the whole goddamn point.
I could never have made as effective an argument for what was wrong with that Penny Arcade comic as the resulting fallout itself has made.
Imagine that—a bunch of dipshits who find a comic about rape funny have no respect for boundaries or consent.
Many people will feel obliged to make the point that there are lots of people who read the comic and didn't act that way. Indeed so. But what they did do is participate in the tacit approval of the rape culture, which empowers the people who are inclined to troll and make threats and engage in general menace.
It's not good enough to say, "Lots of people can laugh at that without hurting anybody," not when laughing along conveys approval of the rape culture, whose vales are embraced by the people who do hurt other people. They aren't formed and they don't exist in a void—and the only responsible position, if you're not inclined to be their ally, is to have a zero tolerance policy on rape as entertainment.
Otherwise, you're just creating opportunities for Bad Guys to have their fucked-up values reaffirmed and for Nice Guys to communicate silent approval.
There is no neutral in the rape culture.
------------------------
Recommended Reading: On Dickwolves, Ethics, and Why I'm Not Attending PAX East.
Previously: Rape Is Hilarious, Survivors Are So Sensitive, Quote of the Day, Troll Math and Teaspoons, T-Shirts and Teaspoons and Mythical Creatures, Taking a Brave Stance Against Survivors of Rape, Offended Is the Worst Thing to Be, and An Observation.
Open Thread: Revolution in Egypt
An Egyptian woman reacts to the situation in her homeland during a demonstration against Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak outside the Egyptian embassy in Amman February 4, 2011. [Reuters Pictures]Recommended Reading:
BBC—'Day of departure' rally in Egypt: "Tens of thousands of Egyptians are taking part in a 'day of departure' to try to oust President Hosni Mubarak. ... Our correspondent says the mood is relaxed but it is not quite the carnival atmosphere that existed before Wednesday—when pro-Mubarak gangs attacked anti-government protesters—and people are watchful."
Christiane Amanpour—Mubarak: 'If I Resign Today There Will Be Chaos' [please note if you're at work that a video starts playing when you click this link; it can be muted]: "I've just left the presidential palace in Cairo where I sat down for an exclusive 30-minute interview with President Hosni Mubarak. He told me that he is troubled by the violence we have seen in Tahrir Square over the last few days but that his government is not responsible for it."
New York Times—White House and Egypt Discuss Plan for Mubarak's Exit: "The Obama administration is discussing with Egyptian officials a proposal for President Hosni Mubarak to resign immediately and turn over power to a transitional government headed by Vice President Omar Suleiman with the support of the Egyptian military, administration officials and Arab diplomats said Thursday."
Nicholas Kristof—We Are All Egyptians:
At Tahrir Square's field hospital (a mosque in normal times), 150 doctors have volunteered their services, despite the risk to themselves. Maged, a 64-year-old doctor who relies upon a cane to walk, told me that he hadn't been previously involved in the protests, but that when he heard about the government's assault on peaceful pro-democracy protesters, something snapped.CNN—News coverage curbed as journalists are targeted in Cairo: "Journalists attempting to cover unprecedented unrest in Egypt reported being beaten, arrested and harassed by security forces and police for a second day Thursday, leading to sharply limited television coverage of the protests. Various news outlets—including the BBC, Al-Arabiya, ABC News, the Washington Post, Fox News, Al Jazeera and CNN—said members of their staffs had been attacked or otherwise targeted. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch also reported that staffers were detained."
So early Thursday morning, he prepared a will and then drove 125 miles to Tahrir Square to volunteer to treat the injured. "I don't care if I don't go back," he told me. "I decided I had to be part of this."
"If I die," he added, "this is for my country."
In the center of Tahrir Square, also known as Liberation Square, I bumped into one of my heroes, Dr. Nawal El Saadawi, a leading Arab feminist who for decades has fought female genital mutilation. Dr. Saadawi, who turns 80 this year, is white-haired and frail and full of fiery passion.
"I feel I am born again," she said.
Al Jazeera's daily liveblog is here.
Question of the Day
What is your favorite album released in the 1990s?
(Yes, re-releases and best-of collections totally count.)
Do Tell
A U.S. News & World Report article headlined "Obama Is Emphasizing Ronald Reagan-like Optimism" (LULZ), contains the following unintentionally hilarious passage:
As the nation prepares to mark the 100th anniversary of his birth, the question arises: Why has Ronald Reagan retained a hold on the popular imagination? Polls of historians often rate him in the top tier of presidents, and everyday Americans tend to agree.Ya think?
Of course, Reagan did have some failures.
