This post might potentially triggering to victims of domestic violence, or people who had to witness it. It also might suck, because my thoughts are a bit muddled and I’m trying to straighten them out via blogpost. For these reasons, I’m putting pretty much the whole thing below the fold.
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Domestic Violence
Sunday, August 15th, 2010Get Over It
Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010A friend of mine was talking the other day about this guy who was yelling at her on the street, and how uncomfortable it was for her. Not an uncommon event, not even for her, but this one was a little frightening because he started following her for a bit. She posted it on her facebook page, and got the normal comments of support. Then she got this comment:
Oh get over it. You’re bitching that someone though you were hot enough to try and talk to.
Harassment is a compliment, dontcha know. Now, I could just go “Asshole says things assholes say” but I think this is a very small illustration of something that women, particularly feminists who point it out, deal with when we point to the many, everyday ways we have to deal with shit in a patriarchy and how those things are completely minimized.
Liberals and Progressives like to say things like “context matters” a lot. A noose hung at the “white” tree where some black kids dared venture is a very different symbol than a noose in a western movie (though they both have the broad stroke of being “threatening”). The context of the first makes it “racist”. The context of the second makes it different. The same is true of the shit women deal with.
If I was an alien being who popped in from the land of Egalitaria and I have never experienced sexism before in my life, the random frat guy that barked at me when I was waiting for the bus would have been baffling, but not rage-inducing to me. Was I doing something wrong in a social context? Was it a warning that I didn’t understand? I would assume from the looks that were delivered with it and the tone of the barking activity that this was a judgment of me in some context, and a judgment met with approval by his peers with him, but I would probably find it more weird than embarrassing. In the real world, it was rage-inducing because I knew exactly what I was doing “wrong”- I was being insufficiently attractive to a guy while in public. Hell, I’d probably say “I was existing in public while female” and that’s probably all the “wrong” there was. I went to happily joking with my husband while waiting for the bus to mad as hell in the context of a bark. I took care of it in my normally mature fashion*, but I had the added benefits of it being in public, with my Hubby, and they were unlikely to come back and escalate the situation. In a different time and place, I probably would have just been silent, realizing the powerlessness of the situation and the added danger that comes from the ever-present threat physical violence.**
The context of a guy barking at me was a context where guys feel free, nay encouraged, to comment on women’s body’s like they are entitled to them. One incident is something that is easily forgettable. One incident where you know that you are going to get an equal level of social support, or more level of social support is equally forgettable. Such an incidence happen to me once when I was walking down Minneapolis. An extremely inebriated individual yelled at me “Hey! Do you know you have really big tits!” not once, but twice at me and was aiming for a third time when I acknowledged him by saying “Yes, I know”. I had my Hubby, I had my friends with me laughing at this guy, but the friend of this guy was busy trying to get him to shut up and saying “not cools” at him. This incident did not make me feel embarrassed, nor threatened, nor have the effect of taking up any of my mental or emotional state. This event did not cause me to pause at the idea of wearing a shirt that was low-cut or a push-up bra. The only thing memorable about this incident is the fact that it was actually a little bit funny to my social group. This event is something, that while annoying, is easy to “get over”. Someone barking at me is in a context of social encouragement, dozens of similar events that I have to ignore if I want to be in public, and an all-pervasive attitude of entitlement.
One cut doesn’t kill someone. One cut probably doesn’t even scar, especially if you throw on some salve right away. But a million of the same size cuts can kill a person.
*Yelling at him to fuck off while delivering the boob of justice at him- if there’s nothing that I can do to get him to stop I’m getting an emotional release from the encounter.
** Or maybe not. I’ve been known to invade the personal space of someone who has been yelling at me in the middle of the night by myself. Being suicidal is marvelous freeing in the context of not being afraid of death.
Today’s Giggle Moment
Saturday, April 10th, 2010
Scholars of boys and men converged Wednesday at Wagner College, in Staten Island, N.Y., to announce the creation of the Foundation for Male Studies, which will support a conference and a journal targeted at exploring the triumphs and struggles of the XY-chromosomed of the human race — without needing to contextualize their ideas as being one half of a male-female binary or an offshoot of feminist theory.
…I read that sentence like, three times in a row and it still made no sense to me…so I hadn’t reached the giggle moment yet–
More than anything else, the event was a chance for supporters to frame men and boys as an underrepresented minority
THERE WE GO! 
Lionel Tiger, a professor of anthropology at Rutgers University, said the field takes its cues “from the notion that male and female organisms really are different”…The culprit, said Tiger, is feminism: “a well-meaning, highly successful, very colorful denigration of maleness as a force, as a phenomenon.”
Paul Nathanson, a researcher in religious studies at McGill University and co-author of a series of books on misandry — the hatred of men and boys — conceded that “there is some critique of feminism that’s going to be involved” in male studies. “There are some fundamental features of ideological feminism over the last 30 or 40 years that we need to question.”
He also decried “the institutionalization of misandry” which, he said, is “being generated by feminists, [though] not all feminists.”
Um…so basically what this is is the creation of the Foundation for Anti-Feminist Studies…it’s not really about men at all, is it? It’s Feminism Sucks 101! Which is why, truly, these folks are not calling their bullshit Men’s Studies, because, uh. Men’s Studies (an interdisciplinary academic field devoted to topics concerning men, masculinity, gender, and politics) already exists and has existed for the past 30 years.
Male studies’ combative tone toward feminism and women’s studies programs is one reason why Robert Heasley, president of the American Men’s Studies Association, turned down an invitation to speak at the event.
Yeah, I don’t suppose he’s too crazy about the idea of his actual, real academic discipline getting associated with a hate movement.
Edward Stevens, chair of the On Step Institute for Mental Health Research, said he wants to see male studies search for ways to improve male academic performance. “What are the ethical concerns of devoting 90 percent of resources to one gender?” he asked (though without explaining exactly what he meant).
LOL, seriously! which gender is that and how can I join up? Cuz that doesn’t describe either of the genders that I’m familiar with…this is SO funny! And amazing that anybody would want to waste their one-and-only adult life on this kind of crap, either founding it or, er, “studying” it. The Westboro Baptist Church, Ann Coulter, “Male” Studies…it takes all kinds…what would a deck of cards be without the jokers? I mean, I’ve never actually played a game of cards in which the jokers were ever used but I’d have missed them if they weren’t there in the deck when I pulled it out of the box! If I even noticed they weren’t there in the first place, I would SO miss ‘em!
Okay, This Is Ridiculous
Monday, April 5th, 2010
I have kept my mouth shut about this…til now. But this is really the outside of enough, folks. I mean, come ON!
Study: Lack of breastfeeding costs lives, billions of dollars
(CNN) — If most new moms would breastfeed their babies for the first six months of life, it would save nearly 1,000 lives and billions of dollars each year,
Let me note now that I breastfed both my children til each one was a year old and breastfed exclusively through the first four months, so my absolute disgust with this article is in no way some kinda guilt-fueled defensive huffiness. I was a good little Mommie! I saved nearly 1,000 lives and billions of dollars each year! (I could use some of that money right now too, thanks–drop me an email, whoever is holding onto that?)
Maybe bunnies wouldn’t be such a metaphorical cliche if they just had easier access to contraception
Saturday, March 27th, 2010First, read Lisa’s little story.
Then listen to the bunnies.
Tell the FDA to Act on Emergency Contraception from Center for Reproductive Rights on Vimeo.
Created by “Once Was A Punkass” Marc Faletti.
Just a little story
Friday, March 26th, 2010
I recently purchased emergency contraception for someone else–fear not, she’s seventeen! So I didn’t contribute to the delinquency of a minor or anything. I bought it for her for three reasons: (1) she lives in a very small town with only one pharmacy, where everyone knows everyone else, and word would probably have gotten back to her parents that she’d bought it, (2) she doesn’t have a car to get to the nearest city to buy it in relative anonymity and (3) she didn’t at the moment have the $40 it costs–she would have in a week, but a week would have been too late.
It wasn’t as easy to actually buy it as I hoped, though–the pharmacy in our small town didn’t have it in stock, and neither did the first three pharmacies that I called in the nearest city. (They did have very disapproving pharmacists, though.) I struck gold in the fourth pharmacy I called, where the phone was answered by a young, cheerful-sounding female voice who informed me that yes indeed, they did have emergency contraception in stock and don’t forget your ID with your date of birth on it when you come to the store to pick it up! I made sure I didn’t forget my ID; I don’t quite look my age, but I don’t look seventeen either! but I wasn’t about to give anyone any excuse to deny me the ability to purchase the stuff after I drove all the way there to get it–time was of the essence in this case.
That was over a month ago, and I am happy to report that she isn’t pregnant. (Not as happy as she is, I can assure you, but still, I’m happy.) I would think that everyone would agree with me that it’s for the best that a seventeen-year-old high school senior shouldn’t get pregnant…but what I find interesting is, apparently there are a lot of people out there who, if she had been a sixteen-year-old high school junior, would have forcefully disagreed and insisted that she should get pregnant. Or a fifteen-year-old high school sophomore. Or a fourteen-year-old high school freshman. This is bizarre and inexplicable to me, given that I think that the more the age of the prospective mother drops, the less and less suited to motherhood both physically and psychologically (and economically, while we’re at it) she is. Apparently others disagree.
Oh well.
Apparently they give PhDs to just about anybody with the cash to buy the college courses
Friday, February 19th, 2010So I saw this article today while surfing the ‘net:
Dreaded diseases dwindle with gene testing
Wider screening curbs inherited disorders such as cystic fibrosis, Tay-SachsSome of mankind’s most devastating inherited diseases appear to be declining, and a few have nearly disappeared, because more people are using genetic testing to decide whether to have children.
Births of babies with cystic fibrosis, Tay-Sachs and other less familiar disorders have dropped since testing came into wider use, The Associated Press found from a review of studies and interviews with numerous geneticists and other experts.
Uh-oh, I thought to myself. Because, you know, the screening itself doesn’t have any directly curative or preventative effect at all on inherited genetic disorders…what it does is allow people carrying genetic disorders to either decide not to reproduce or, more commonly, decide to abort any pregnancy with an embryo or fetus that carries the defective genes. Now, I personally have no problem with this; I am pro-choice through and through. However, I figured that there’d be a sizable contingent of folks out there who would have a b-i-g problem with the idea that giving out access to information that might influence someone to abort could ever, under any circumstances, be regarded as a good thing.
Yep, all I had to do was nip over to the “Comments” section after the article, and what was the very first comment..?
Very ironic and sad that a method touted as a “life-saving effort” is what gives an excuse to kill a baby.
Because of course, you know we are all on the lookout for excuses to kill babies. It’s a lot like being on the lookout for excuses to eat chocolate or go shopping!…sigh.
I can always console myself with the possibility that the hordes of people who are making remarks like that are just ignorant. Or stupid. Or both. But then, linked to the article, is another article written by some dude who presumably is not ignorant or stupid, given that he describes himself as Arthur Caplan, Ph.D.:
Disability-free world may not be a better place
Screening means fewer Down babies, but are we missing out?A fascinating probe by the Associated Press suggests the reason. Genetic testing is leading to birth of fewer and fewer children with Down syndrome and other genetic disease in the United States.
The “fascinating probe” he refers to is, indeed, the article that originally caught my eye. And you can tell by the way he goes on in the article that he did actually read some of it, because he spends a little time talking about Tay-Sachs disease and Cystic Fibrosis. But his main point, the one he keeps returning to over and over again (after a few sops thrown out acknowledging that children born with Tay-Sachs, for instance, die by age 4) is
As some families with a Down syndrome child have noted, fewer kids with Down may mean fewer public programs, fewer resources in schools and for housing and less political clout.
On a trip to Ireland a few years ago, I was struck by a number of faces among the crowds. They were children with the tell-tale look of Down syndrome. What struck me was the realization that I hardly ever see these young faces out on the street in the United States.
…Down Syndrome, which can’t be detected at all through parental screening, which is what the original article is all about, because it’s caused by a mutation in the reproductive cells themselves, not in the parents’ cells. Rinse, repeat: Down Syndrome is not an inherited genetic disorder.
But since the heartstrings clearly get tugged the wrong way by discussing babies born with Tay-Sachs disease–it’s a hell of a lot harder to paint the prevention of that occurence as parents on the lookout for excuses to kill their babies–I suppose Concern Troll PhD couldn’t really use that as his handle, huh?
Things That Are Different and Things That Are the Same
Wednesday, February 10th, 2010The wild-eyed woman-hating that apparently characterized this year’s crop of Superbowl ads got me thinking–what do people who make a point of denying that wild-eyed woman-hating really exists in America have to say about it..? Nothing, as far as I could tell–and I don’t blame them; there isn’t much they could say, though I speculated that maybe one or two would capitalize on it as a much-needed backlash against all dem bitchez! or possibly note that the characterization of men as mindless Neanderthals that frequently accompanies ads denigrating women is pretty insulting to men, too.
But in the midst of my aimless perusal of Men’s Rights-type sites, I stumbled across this article: 10 Lies Men Tell Themselves in Order to Stay in Abusive Relationships with their Wives or Girlfriends. I was struck by how very many of the Lies Men Tell Themselves appeared to be very similar, if not identical, to the Lies Women Tell Themselves in Order to Stay In Abusive Relationships. Perhaps not a dazzling revelation–abuse is abuse, regardless of the demographics of the abuser and abusee–but then, that’s also too simplistic of a statement to make. Some forms of abuse really don’t happen much without pre-existing factors that facilitate them; for example, while both parent-on-child and child-on-parent physical abuse does occur, it occurs far more often in the former case due to size disparity, economic imbalance, psychological dominance overwhelmingly in favor of the parent, etc. etc.
Time to Hurl
Thursday, February 4th, 2010I’m sure everybody remembers this:
Aww, that’s such a romantic pict–! hmm, wait. Isn’t that guy about twenty years older than that barely pubescent girl..? I mean, I can see some serious crepe-like flesh going on under that manly-man jawline there–oh, well, it’s not like even the most superficial perusal of internet porn won’t immediately inform you that “barely legal” is an overwhelmingly common male fanta–uh, wait again. Is that hairy old dude that sweet little sex kitten is being manfully embraced by HER DAD–?
Now, now, maybe I’m overreacting. Maybe this is really meant to portray the pure innocence and beauty of the father-daughter bond, and I just have a dirty, corrupt mind. I’m sure another picture from the very same photo shoot will absolutely clear up any doubt I could possibly have about the theme of this particular series of Miley and Billy Ray Cyrus publicity photos–
Yep, that definitely cleared that up.
But this is old news! The new news is that the sexualization of children shown above is apparently way, way too subtle. The message has not been gotten across, dammit! And Billy Ray Cyrus clearly ain’t gonna let that happen. You know, he has another daughter, and to eliminate the confusing nature of using the daughter that might have actually entered puberty sometime around the date of the photo shoot, this one is clearly nowhere near even the beginnings of sexual maturation.
Because 9-year-olds need a sexy line of lingerie!
..little 9-year-old Noah Cyrus is set to become a lingerie model.
She’ll be teaming up with her pint-sized best friend Emily Grace to launch a children’s lingerie collection for ‘Ohh! La, La! Couture’.
The company’s website describes The Emily Grace Collection as having a “trendy, sweet, yet edgy feel, reminiscent of Emily’s true personality.”
Emily’s collection will appeal not just to little girls – the line also has an exclusive Teen Collection available to a size 14.
Goodness, I suspect you’re right about that. This collection won’t just appeal to little girls.
Thank God it turned out this way, rather than some other way.
Friday, January 29th, 2010“The jury deliberated for just 37 minutes before finding Scott Roeder, 51, of Kansas City, Mo., guilty of premeditated, first-degree murder in the May 31 shooting death” of Dr. George R. Tiller.
Interesting snippets from the trial:
Roeder’s attorneys were hoping to get a lesser charge of voluntary manslaughter for Roeder, a defense that would have required them to show that Roeder had an unreasonable but honest belief that deadly force was justified.
But after hearing Roeder testify (emphasis mine), District Judge Warren Wilbert ruled that his lawyers failed to show that Tiller posed an imminent threat and the jury could not consider such a verdict.
Hmm…wish a transcript was available of that.
At one point Friday, District Judge Warren Wilbert stopped defense attorney Mark Rudy from using the word abortion when cross-examining a witness who had not first used it himself.
If the witness brings it up “that’s fair game, and you can explore it,” Wilbert said.
Paul Ryding testified he had an “awkward conversation” with Roeder when Roeder came to church services six months before the shooting. Ryding said he had a feeling Roeder had “an agenda,” without explaining what he thought that might be.
But Ryding steadfastly skirted the word abortion when pressed — leaving defense attorney Mark Rudy so plainly frustrated that he asked Ryding whether he had previously discussed his testimony with any officials other than detectives.
Nice. 
But lest we forget what else we’re dealing with here…
Photos of Tiller’s body after he was shot showed the doctor lying on his side, with much of his face obscured by blood. A large puddle of blood had pooled under his head.
A Roeder supporter seated in the public gallery grinned widely and swayed visibly in her seat as the gruesome photos were shown — leading a sheriff’s deputy to quietly issue her a stern warning.
Well, he’s locked up for at least the next 25 years. The best we could’ve expected, really. Rest in peace, Dr. Tiller, and I hope your family finds some closure in all this.
So Why Did I Have Kids, Anyway?
Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
So you really want one of these?
It’s a question I try not to examine too closely, frankly. The reason for that is, well, I have them already–I’ve had them for my entire adult life, really. The time to question my decision to have them at all has long since passed, I think.
But sometimes I’ll come across an article like this one–I try not to wince at the tone they inevitably sport, a combination of defensiveness and superiority–and I’ll find myself musing a bit on my own embedded and irrevocable parental status.
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