Sunday, December 31, 2006

Because How Many Hillarys Could There Be?

I've noticed that pundits on cable news networks are referring to Democratice presidential candidate and Senator of New York Hillary Rodham Clinton as simply "Hillary." "Do you think Hillary will run?" "Do you think Hillary has a chance of winning the nomination?" Blah, blah, blah. Doesn't she have a last name? Do they have to call her by her first name because everyone would get confused if we called her Clinton? Are people going to hear about "Clinton" running for president in 2008 and think, "I didn't know the Constitution has been changed so that Bill Clinton could be elected to a third term! I must have been too busy digging up dirt on TomKat to pay attention!"? What other candidates are being regularly referred to by only their first names? I'm going to have to start counting.

Friday, December 29, 2006

OH NOES! Man Assault!!!

So I was watching this ABC News Special Thing called "What Would You Do?" or something. Sadly, Mark Summers was not present nor was there any sliming, but it was still pretty interesting.

They did a segment on what a person would do if they saw a person abusing their significant other in the park. They did it with men and women, and, gasp, no ne really cared when it was a woman abusing a man. Well, duh, why would they in our patriarchal society? Women don't have the power to abuse in our society, so no one took it seriously. It just shows how patriarchy hurts men, too.

However, I had a major problem with the segment right from the very beginning. The segway into it was a showing of clips from various movies, making the point of "Violence against men is shown often in movies and laughed off" or something, as if violence against women isn't used as small story-movers. One was a woman slapping a man, the other was a shot of the "Pirates of the Caribbean" wenches (I guess because they slap Jack Sparrow all the time, but they didn't show them slapping him). But there was another that really caught my eye. I'm not sure what movie it was from, I think it may have been "Shakespeare in Love" but I haven't seen that movie so I'm not sure. Anyway, the clip was of a man kissing a woman, and her shoving him off her her.

So, I'm like "Wtf? How is that violence against men for a woman to shove him off of her if he's kissing her?". Can anyone explain that to me? Or has anyone possibly seen Shakespeare in Love, if that's what this clip is from, and tell me if there's some context that I'm missing? Since when is "Hey, get the hell off me I don't want you to kiss me" domestic violence or abuse?

Saturday, December 16, 2006

Why Condi Won't Run, According to Laura Bush

"Probably because she is single, her parents are no longer living, she's an only child. You need a very supportive family and supportive friends to have this job."

So it has nothing to do with that proverbial Post-It she neglected in January 2001, which went something like "Attn: National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Re: Terrorist Attack by Osama bin Laden."

Here's the segment on last night's Countdown with Keith Olbermann of his interview with Margaret Carlson of Bloomberg News. It shows just how much Laura Bush knows about marriage . . . .

Margaret Carlson: "It may be what's inside Mrs. Bush, that to be single would be a terrible thing. She married 3 months after meeting George Bush and obviously wanted to be married." [emphasis mine]

And what makes a supportive family . . . .

Margaret Carlson: "Condi Rice is the daughter that Bush doesn't have. The twins don't go to Camp David and barely come home for holidays."

And how big of a hypocrite she is.

Margaret Carlson: "I think maybe Laura Bush is an only child."
Keith Olbermann: "Yup. I think you're right."

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Without Dependency, Anarchy Ensues

Okay, so I hate my fourth period class. It's Mystery, Myth, and Horror, and while I love the teacher and some of the curriculum is marginally interesting, I hate my classmates. My boyfriend is in there, an old friend of mine, and a friend of a friend who is actually a very nice guy is in that class. All the rest are basically asinine globs of teengoo. What does this have to do with dependency, you ask? Well, by itself, not much, however, it's merely an intro to another personal situation in which I tried to feminist.

All of the globs of teengoo hate the teacher of this class. I think she's the bee's knees, personally, but then again, I an carry on a conversation with an adult that doesn't involve "You don't understaaaaand meeee!!1", so perhaps I'm just not able to see things from their warped perspective. Anyway, we had a substitute today, so everyone was cheering and thanking God. I sighed and settled in for an hour and a half of stupid.

So anyway, the substitute was no push over. She was a pretty feisty old lady. I imagine that if I knew her outside of school, she'd be a pretty good poster child for "outrageous older woman". In any case, she was simply trying to do her job and everyone was giving her a hard time.

Anyway, I was trying to combat as much dumb as possible with wit and dissent, however, things still steadily went downhill.

First of all, there were two head dumbasses in the class. Dumbass 1 felt the need to sexually harass a female classmate as she walked into the class late. Dumbass 1 is really who we'll be dealing with most in this little story. Dumbass 2 just felt the need to scream obscenities across the room and announce genitalia at random intervals.

I told Dumbass 1 to please stop sexually harrassing the poor girl, as she seemed a little confused as to what was going on. I was not taken seriously and the lewd comments continued, of course.

Finally, toward the end of the class when I got my stuff done I was talking to the aforementioned nice guy and his friend who is also pretty okay. We were prettymuch minding our own business, actually discussing how patriarchy affects definitions of words and how such definitions can create oppression of both men AND women (we looked up "rape" and it singled out females as the only possible victims, it was an interesting discussion). Anyway, Dumbass 1 then felt the need to throw paper balls at us. I happened to feel a wad of paper hit me square in the ass and so I turned around got up, and walked toward Dumbass 1. He ran away yelling that I "looked like Satan" because I was obviously not happy that somehow a body part of mine became a target for him. I told him that if he did it again, there would be consequences. Lo and behold, a feel a paper ball hit my ass again. So anyway, I got up again, he once again screamed for help, and I walked up to the substitute and asked her to write him a referral to the office which she gladly did.

What does this story of asshattery and sexual harassment have to do with dependency?

It sparked a conversation between my boyfriend and I. As I mentioned before, he is in that class. He didn't say anything throughout the entire ordeal, so I asked him why he didn't later.

He said that he knew I didn't need it, that I could hold my own. He said that he didn't want to step on my argument and independence toes. I appreciate that, but that brings me to the crux of this post: Needing versus wanting.

It's a common anti-feminist tactic to draw on men's fears of not feeling "needed" and the awfulhorriblezomgness that those fears cause in men and boys. It seems as though to an anti-feminist, if a woman isn't in dire need of being rescued at all times, men and boys have massive mental breakdowns in record numbers. The sanity of male humans depends solely upon female humans being dependent upon them for, well, everything, it seems.

However, I think this is ridiculous. Not only does it create the idea that women's "power" lies in driving men insane simply for wanting to be treated like real people, and thus no women would really want to be treated like people while being moral in the process, it also creates the idea that being needed is somehow better than being wanted.

This is interesting, to me, because in Patriarchy land, women are not needed, simply wanted for the pleasures of the men that own them. Sure, they "need" them to be broodmares, however, that need is not as pressing as, say, the need to eat or be able to defend yourself against attacks, etc.

So to me, it seems like said anti-feminists are once again saying that sub-human "not being needed" status that drives men insane is okay for women. Women don't need to be needed, they can be "wanted" like all other second-rate things.

I just think that it's amazing how many layers of sexism anti-feminist arguments really do build up and love up on. It's disgusting.

Anyway, you wrap up, I promptly told my boyfriend that he was right. I didn't and don't need him to take over and handle situations like that for me. However, I would WANT him to stand up for me at least a little, like back-up. He had no problem with that. He likes being wanted rather than wishing I needed him. The awesomeness of that in a society that tells him he's less of a man if he's not NEEDED by a lesser woman is astounding.

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

"So-Called Problem Pregnancies"




Hear that, ladies? All that time you thought you actually didn't want to be pregnant and that that was a problem, well, now Mister Asshat has corrected you.

As we all know, today is Free Emergency Contraception Day at Planned Parenthood. This is a great thing for women today. Thanks, Planned Parenthood.

However, whenever something good for women happens, some prick has to go and try to ruin it.

Some dude was on the news because he was protesting free emergency contraception day. In his little interview thing, he had the audacity to say, and I quote "so-called problem pregnancy". What the fuck is that supposed to mean? That pregnancy could never possibly be a problem for a woman? Seriously, this is one dude that I think should be on the list for the watermelon up the ass.

I seriously don't know what would possess someone to do something like that (well, except I do, but you know), especially if they claim to be "pro-life". Just more proof that being pro-life is less about "saving babies" and more about controlling women.

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Stop "Unborn Child Pain Awareness Act"

This Wednesday (December 6), the House will vote on the misleading "Unborn Child Pain Awareness Act," which would make doctors give women seeking abortions after the 20th week of gestation literature suggesting that they be given expensive fetal anesthesia. According to NOW, "[T]he text of this brochure tells each woman that her 'unborn child' will experience pain while 'being killed in an abortion' The doctor would then be required to offer the woman anesthesia or another "pain reducing drug" to be administered directly to the fetus." Sounds like anti-choice scare tactics to me. Being that there's no brain function in human fetuses until the 27th week, it's impossible to feel any pain before then. Isn't it great when right wingers pen medical laws instead of doctors (No, I don't consider Bill Frist a doctor). It looks like they copied and pasted this law from the National Right to Life's official website.

"Partial-birth abortion is an abortion in which the abortion practitioner delivers an unborn child's body until only the head remains inside the womb, punctures the back of the child's skull with a sharp instrument, and sucks the child's brains out before completing the delivery of the dead infant, and as further defined in 18 U.S.C. 1531.

"Child's brains?" I guess we all lose our extra brains until we are left with only one sometime after we're born. The best is how they define "unborn child."

"UNBORN CHILD- The term `unborn child' means a member of the species homo sapiens, at any stage of development."

So according to the US Government, anyone who is reading this (and everyone who isn't) is an unborn child.

EDIT: Phew.