I've recently taken to abusing the Stumble Upon feature on my FireFox browser. As such, I've found some pretty interesting things. First, it was the boob mousepads. Now, it's actually some pretty cool feminist/anti-violence activism.
Here's a link to some awesome posters. I think they're really awesome.
On the other hand, at least they make for good "asshole alerts" so that women won't waste their time on misogynistic douchebags.
This is a good article from NOW's Kim Gandy. In it she talks about how gendered toys for young children are. I know that this is something we've probably blogged about before, but it bears repeating, especially this close to Christmas time.
Here at Feministing is an interesting post about George Bush's latest sexist remark, this time in regards to his daughter Jenna.
When talking to People magazine about Jenna's recent engagement, he had this little gem to give out (of course, not to be confused with a diamond hymen, although I'm sure Bush assumes he's giving one of those away as well):
Q: Tell us about your future son-in-law, Henry Hager. Did he do right and ask for Jenna’s hand?I have a couple of problems with this. First of all, what the hell is up with People magazine pimping sexist marital practices? Let's just get this straight: Asking for your girlfriend's hand in marriage is NOT romantic. It is sexist, it disempowers and dehumanizes her, and s a throwback to the days of marriage as a property exchange. All of those things are gross. Ergo, asking for Jenna's hand was not the "right" thing to do by any means.The President: “He kind of sidled up to me and said, ‘Can I come and see you?’ We were sitting outside the presidential cabin here, and he professed his love for Jenna and said, would I mind if he married her? And I said, ‘Got a deal.’ [Laughter] And I’m of the school, once you make the sale, move on. But he had some other points he wanted [to make]. He wanted to talk about how he would be financially responsible.”
Emphasis mine.Q: Would you like to have a White House wedding?
Mrs. Bush: “Of course, a White House wedding would be a lot of fun. But I also know it wouldn’t be very private. And of course we want to do what Jenna wants to do.”
I just posted about how parents are having trouble breaking the news to the daughters that 16-year-old girls like Jamie Lynn Spears can indeed become pregnant. Shocker, I know. While I was pissed that nobody was too concerned about the fact that Jamie Lynn was living with her 19-year-old boyfriend or about how to talk to teenage boys about safe sex, I think this story has it's high points too . . . from a feminist perspective!
This AP article talks about Jamie Lynn Spears, the real-life pregnant 16-year-old, and Juno, the pregnant 16-year-old played by 21-year-old Ellen Page on the silver screen in the movie Juno. It seems like conservative Christians have to do a little double-talking due to this "onslaught" of pregnant teenagers in . . . places, as if they never existed! Bill Maier from Focus on [a confining view of] the Family had this to say:
It's a double-edged sword in the Christian community. We should commend girls like Jamie Lynn Spears for making a courageous decision to have the baby. On the other hand, there's nothing glamorous or fun about being an unwed teen mother.
I would like to know what's so courageous about deciding to have a baby, or what's particularly glamorous or fun about being a married teen mother. And did Maier think too hard when answering and said "have the baby" instead of "keep the baby" like a good pro-lifer would? I think he might have! What do you say Leslee Unruh?:
When I heard the story, I felt sad at first. Already her life is not the norm of other 16-year-old girls. You have a lot of teens who look at those people as role models. There's a danger of them thinking, 'She got pregnant? I guess I can have a baby too.'
What?! Leslee Unruh said this? Leslee "More babies! We lovebabies!" Unruh? Leslee "Fertility is a gift" Unruh? Leslee "It's a gift to be able to have children" Unruh was sad when she heard that someone was pregnant and nervous at the prospect of other teens wanting babies too? Never thought I'd see the day.
Basically, conservative Christians are in a real spot here. They have to choose between supporting abstinence-until-marriage or birth control, as well as applauding teenagers for having babies instead of abortions (or being on the pill to prevent both, oddly enough) without making it sound like having a baby in your teen years is a good idea. I don't think Maier, Unruh, or any of the other pro-lifers quoted in the article nailed it. Their message goes a little like this: Ladies, don't have sex. Stay virgins until you're married, okay? I mean, you're ladies, not sluts. But if you do have sex, make sure you're not on birth control, because birth control is bad because protected sex doesn't cause babies, and that just ruins our "Sex causes babies" campaign. Chances are, you won't be on birth control, since you've been exposed to abstinence-only education. And since you won't be on birth control, you could get pregnant. If you do get pregnant, go through the pregnancy and birth and either raise the baby or give the baby to someone else. As the old saying goes, there's nothing more responsible than having unprotected sex and becoming a mommy when you're an unmarried teenager without a high school education.
If you haven't heard, Jamie Lynn Spears, kid sister of Britney and star of Nickelodeon's Zoey 101, is pregnant. Lots of 16-year-old girls have been pregnant, as 16-year-old girls tend to have that capability. Now, parents just don't know what to say to their adolescent daughters. I find this worry ironic, since it's Christmastime, and Mary was probably like 12 when she gave birth to Jesus. But we'll celebrate that!
Anyway, like I said, parents are wondering what they should tell their daughters about this particular 16-year-old getting pregnant. I find this stupid for two reasons. First, I was a fan of all those rock bands back in the 90's when I was a kid -- Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blind Melon, Sublime, etc. Nobody's parents asked "What do you tell your children when Kurt Cobain/Hillel Slovak/Shannon Hoon/Bradley Nowell dies of drug overdoses/bullet wounds while they're high?" Nobody asked that! That's because drug use is, unfortunately, a fact of rock 'n' roll life. So why are parents having a fit about what to tell their daughters regarding Jamie Lynn Spears' teen pregnancy, when pregnancy is a fact of life? The second thing that bugs me, as a feminist, is that people are only talking about what parents should tell their daughters, not their sons. Lost in this story is the fact that Spears became pregnant by her 19-year-old live-in boyfriend. The actions of the adults in this situation (the boyfriend and Jamie Lynn Spears' mother) are not being criticized at all! The youngest person in the situation is expected to take most, if not all, of the responsibility.
But back to what parents are afraid of. The above article cites some comments made by regular folks on blogs and message boards about how they're going to deal with this whole Jamie Lynn Spears thing. Here's a good one:
I'm telling the kids 'Zoey 101' has been canceled. I hope Nickelodeon does the right thing and cancels the show. She is a role model for young girls. Looks like she's following in the footsteps of her sister.
So this parent is going to lie to their children. Because lying to kids works so well, especially when it comes to sex. That's why abstinence-only education is so much more successful than comprehensive sex ed. Oh, wait.
Mike Huckabee's spokesperson clarified statements Huckabee made in his 1998 book Kids Who Kill. First, what Huckabee said:
It is now difficult to keep track of the vast array of publicly endorsed and institutionally supported aberrations—from homosexuality and pedophilia to sadomasochism and necrophilia.
So, falling in love and having sex with someone who is the same sex as you is on the same plane as raping children, consensual sex of the kinkier variety (which is bad why?), and banging dead people. Oh, but Huckabee's spokesperson clarifies!
He's not equating homosexuality with necrophilia. He's saying there's a range of aberrant behavior. He considers homosexuality aberrant, but that's at one end of the spectrum. Necrophilia is at the other end.
No way is he saying that homosexuality is like having sex with dead people. That's not it at all.
He was talking about aberrant sexual behavior. Sado masochism and necrophilia are on the further end of the spectrum.
That's like saying any sex is the same. Yes, he considers both aberrant, but no, he does not equate the two in any way.
He was describing behavior. He's not casting judgment on the people themselves. His point is, the culture is becoming more accepting of aberrant behaviors.
He considers homosexual behavior aberrant. But there are degrees of aberrant behavior. He's not saying they're equally as bad. There's a very big distinction there.
So, falling in love and having sex with someone who is the same sex as you is on the same plane as raping children, consensual sex of the kinkier variety, and banging dead people. Thanks for the clarification, dickhead.
Yes, I'm still alive.
Anyway, this is a very interesting article on Yahoo!
Basically, the article talks about how acceptable it is to the American public for different politicians to cry. It mentions that Hillary Clinton is not allowed to show tears because that would make her seem weak, but in men, it looks like sensitivity.
We all know it's true, I just think it's neat when more mainstream news outlets like Yahoo! make it known to people who otherwise might not think about how gender can influence how we think of showing emotion, especially in politicians.
Unlike Jamie Lynn Spears' hymen. I'm sorry, I just had to say that.
Since Asshole in Chief threatened to veto the foreign aid budget if it left out the draconian Global Gag Rule, Congress decided to leave it in. This article doesn't begin to describe how horrible the Global Gag Rule really is.
Unable to override a promised veto, Democrats have backed down on their insistence that the 2008 foreign aid budget reverse President Bush's ban on providing aid to family planning groups abroad that offer abortions . . . .
Since taking office in 2001, Bush has prohibited any assistance to organizations overseas that perform or promote abortion.
Actually, if these organizations mention abortion they don't get funding. That's why pro-life organizations in Zambia oppose it. Here's Megan's post about the Global Gag Rule from a couple months back that gives a more accurate representation of this disgusting policy. The video above is from Access Denied.
The 19-year-old Saudi Arabian woman who was sentenced to 6 months in jail and 200 lashes was pardoned today by King Abdullah. This article places much of the credit for the pardon on outrage from the White House (which I'm sure is true), but we can't forget the feminists in Saudi Arabia who risked what little freedom they have and their lives to protest the sentence.
Mike Huckabee didn't say exactly that, but he used that same line of reasoning to defend his record on women's rights.
If you look at my cabinet, I had more women in my cabinet and on my staff in key positions, including chief of staff, than any other governor probably in Arkansas history.
I'm not even going to look up if that's true. I just need to know Huckabee's vast knowledge of history to conclude that he's probably bullshitting. That record on women's rights is more of a record of women's oppression. Here are some of the things Huckabee believes about women:
A wife is to submit graciously to the servant leadership of her husband even as the church willingly submits to the headship of Christ.
But never the other way around. Of course not the other way around, because once a man gets married, he becomes as great as Jesus (who supposedly was never married. Mind-blowing). Once a woman gets married, she becomes a slave.
[W]omen should be treated with respect and dignity and not subject to the kinds of abuses that could occur in combat.
Replace "combat" with "politics," and you've just been transported to the 19th century.
. . . . I required that a woman be told her baby will experience pain and be given the option of anesthesia for her baby [during abortion] . . . .
Translation: "I forced doctors to lie to women." Like the old saying goes, a man doesn't really care about you unless he lies you into having kids. Actually, that saying never caught on, because it's utter bullshit.
As Iraqi policewomen are forced to surrender their weapons, Palestinian policewomen in the West Bank began working today. Women were usually left to administrative jobs for the most part, but today they directed traffic, searched homes, and frisked women. It's part of a European Union program. Now, I'm not sure how long this will last. The program that placed Iraqi women in nontraditional positions in the police force was funded by the US government, but once funding stopped, so did the opportunities for Iraqi policewomen. So, we'll have to see how this goes.
Interestingly enough, Google didn't seem to believe me when I told it that I wanted to search for the article about this current event entitled First Palestinian Policewomen Begin Work. "Did you mean: First Palestinian Policeman Begin Work?" Google asked. No, Google, that's not what I meant. First of all, there have always been policemen in Palestine. Secondly, that sentence doesn't even have proper subject-verb agreement. God, Google! Why don't you trust me?!
The LA Times reports that late last month, Iraqi policewomen were told to relinquish their weapons or face not getting paid. Women cannot become commanding officers in the police force by Iraqi law, and they are now forced to give their guns to male police officers in exchange for desk jobs. Iraqi freedom indeed. Here are some of the implications of getting rid of women police officers in Iraq:
The article has a lot of great quotes from Iraqi policewomen and how they feel about the new policy.
Did you know that in Australia, you don't have to be the age of consent to give consent to having sex with 9 people, and being the age of consent and having sex with someone who's below the age of consent isn't your fault at all? I didn't think you knew that. I don't think Australians know that. I mean, this principle doesn't go across the board. It does depend on what gender the underage person and what gender the adults are in the situation, obviously. I learned this after reading an article about a 10-year-old Aboriginee girl who suffers from fetal alcohol syndrome in Australia who was moved out of her rural home after being sexually assauted, only to return and get gang raped by 9 guys. But none of these rapists have seen any jail time, even though they pleaded guilty. Not even the 3 rapists who are over the age of consent (one as old as 26) was imprisoned. Why? Because of a prosecuter named Steve Carter and Judge Sarah Bradley. Here's their crazy interpretation of the law:
Carter: It was a form of childish experimentation, rather than one child being prevailed upon by another. I can't say it was consensual in the legal sense but ... in the general sense, the non-legal sense, yes, it was.
I don't think he meant pedophilia when he said "childish experimentation." No, it was the 10-year-old mildly mentally retarded girl who was experimenting. The 26-, 18-, and 17-year-olds who admitted to raping her were just following orders.
In sentencing, Bradley told the offenders that the victim "was not forced and she probably agreed to have sex with all of you" but warned them that having sex with anyone younger than 16 was illegal and they could end up in prison.
Did Judge Bradley forget that she wasn't mentoring a couple of at-risk youths, but actually sentencing 9 guys who admitted to raping a 10-year-old disabled girl? Wow.
Burger King did this thing where one of their restaurants (for lack of a better word) played a joke on its customers by telling them that they no longer serve the Whopper. Hidden cameras captured the "Whopper Freakouts" from within the Burger King, and a person-on-the street got the reactions from people outside. Here's the video, and here's an excerpt from the video (around 4:14 in):
Scrubby Dude: If the Burger King doesn't have the Whopper, they might as well change their name to Burger Queen.
Friend of Scrubby Dude who is equally scrubby and apparently very slow on the uptake: Yeah!
Get it? Because a Burger King without the Whopper is inferior and, thus, more feminine. I mean, I don't think there's such a thing as Dairy King, but I'm sure whatever ice cream they'd sell is way superior to the shit Dairy Queen has!
Yesterday I posted about Mike Huckabee telling the Associated Press in 1992 that people with AIDS should be isolated. I also said that he probably still does want people with AIDS to be isolated. And what do you know? I was right! From this morning's FOX News Sunday:
Chris Wallace: As you rise in the polls, I don't have to tell you that your past is becoming more of an issue. It now turns out that when you ran for the Senate back in 1992, you called for quarantining AIDS patients, you opposed increased federal funding to find a cure, and you also said that homosexuality was a, quote, "sinful lifestyle that could pose a dangerous health risk." Do you stand by any of that now, Governor?
Mike Huckabee: Chris, I didn't say that we should quarantine. I said it was the first time in public health protocols that when we had an infectious disease and we didn't really know just how extensive and how dramatic it could be and the impact of it, that we didn't isolate the carrier. Now, the headlines yesterday started saying that I called for quarantines, which if you'll go back and read my comments, I did not. I had simply made the point, and I still believe this today, that in the late '80s and early '90s, when we didn't know as much as we do now about AIDS, we were acting more out of political correctness than we were about the normal public health protocols that we would have acted — as we have recently, for example, with avian flu, which — I spent hours and hours, and months, in fact, as a governor dealing with a pandemic plan that we were looking at which called for isolating carriers if they contracted that disease.
WALLACE: But, Governor, forgive me. I don't think that's right. All the way back in 1985, this wasn't political correctness. The Centers for Disease Control back in '85, seven years before you made your statement, said that AIDS could not be spread by casual contact.
HUCKABEE: There was also the case of Kimberly Bergalis, who testified before Congress in 1991. She had contracted AIDS from her dentist [I will interject here. Whether she contracted HIV (not AIDS, nobody contracts AIDS) from her dentist is still up in the air]. We didn't think that there was a casual transmission. There were studies that showed that. But there were other concerns being voiced by public health officials. Now, would I say things a little differently in 2007? Probably so. But I'm not going to recant or retract from the statement that I did make because, again, the point was not saying we ought to lock people up who have HIV/AIDS. I knew people who had AIDS. I had a close friend who died of it in the 1980s. He was a hemophiliac. He contracted it through a blood transfusion. I had other friends of mine, one of whom passed away — he was, in fact, homosexual. But my point is that I was trying to talk about the different public health protocols that we were dealing with. I think what it really does show, though, is that when people are digging back into everything I've ever said and done — and I understand that, it's part of the political process. But what I'm not going to do is to go back and now try to change every story I've ever had. I'm going to simply say that that was exactly what I said. I don't run from it, don't recant from it. Would I say it a little differently today? Sure, in light of 15 years of additional knowledge and understanding, I would. [emphasis mine]
Mike Huckabee probably would change his mind about quarantining people with AIDS. And that's what a quarantine is, dummy, isolating people with diseases. As "would" is in the conditional tense, I'd like to know under which circumstances Huckabee would tell the people that people with AIDS should be treated instead of isolated, or that homosexuality isn't a "abberant and sinful lifestyle" but a normal variation of expressing love. Someone needs to ask that question at the next Republican Presidential debate.
It seems like as Mike Huckabee climbs the polls, more skeletons are unleashed from his closet.
Earlier this week, The Huffington Post broke the story about Huckabee letting a convicted rapist go free. The rapist, Wayne Dumond, raped and sexual assaulted numerous women and was rightly convicted. But since one of those women was a 17-year-old who happened to be a distant cousin of Bill Clinton's, Huckabee succumbed to pressure from the lunatic fringe of the right wing and pardoned Dumond, despite receiving letters from the victim's and their families begging him not to. I suppose being cool with rape is part all part of being a Republican, and being a Republican is much more important than making sure a serial rapist is behind bars for the rest of his life (which would have been the case, since Dumond is now dead, but wouldn't have fully paid his debt to society until 2024). Upon release, Dumond raped and killed two women.
Dumond allegedly raped and murdered [23-year-old Sara Andrasek] just one day before his arrest for raping and murdering [39-year-old Carol Sue] Shields. Prior to the attack, Andrasek and her husband had learned that she was pregnant with their first child.
So Huckabee let a man go, and he ended up killing a precious embryo and a couple women that Huckabee certainly doesn't give a shit about. You would think that Huckabee would have compared Dumond to Hitler and the "murder" of this embryo to the Holocaust, like he so flippantly did to women who choose to terminate their pregnancies. But he didn't. That's a pro-lifer for ya. Rapists and murderers? Ha! Women who don't want to be pregnant? Oh, there's a special place in Hell for them, right between Hitler and the Jews he systematically had killed.
That's bad enough, but there's even more. Today it came out that Huckabee wanted (probably still wants) to isolate people with AIDS.
If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague.
It is difficult to understand the public policy towards AIDS. It is the first time in the history of civilization* in which the carriers of a genuine plague have not been isolated from the general population, and in which this deadly disease for which there is no cure is being treated as a civil rights issue instead of the true health crisis it represents.
In light of the extraordinary funds already being given for AIDS research, it does not seem that additional federal spending can be justified," Huckabee wrote. "An alternative would be to request that multimillionaire celebrities, such as Elizabeth Taylor (,) Madonna and others who are pushing for more AIDS funding be encouraged to give out of their own personal treasuries increased amounts for AIDS research.
I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural, and sinful lifestyle, and we now know it can pose a dangerous public health risk.
Keep in mind, he said these things in 1992. That was around the time Magic Johnson disclosed that he had HIV. But how in the world did he contract HIV? By magic? No. I think it was that other kind of sex, you know, the kind between a man and a woman, a woman who is not the man's wife, the wife who is pregnant. What's that kind of sex called? Extramarital heterosexual! That's it! It's amazing that then obese Governor Mike Huckabee didn't have a heart attack after hearing that a heterosexual man in a traditional marriage contracted HIV from engaging in heterosexual sex.
So, the moral of the story is that Mike Huckabee is a horrible person and should be shamed into isolation, just like he wants for homosexuals and people with HIV/AIDS.
*P.S., I wouldn't take anything Mike Huckabee says about "the history of civilization" seriously, since he believes that every civilization that has changed marriage has crumbled. *Looks out the window* No . . . not yet.
Jennifer Love Hewitt took on the bloggers that have been calling her fat lately. I mean, she's a size 2! What a fatty! While out and about, she told this to some creep with a camera:
People should be proud of who they are and what they look like, and not let all this silliness and judgment sort of get in the way.
Right on! From her official website:
"I've sat by in silence for a long time now about the way women's bodies are constantly scrutinized. To set the record straight, I'm not upset for me, but for all of the girls out there that are struggling with their body image. A size two is not fat! Nor will it ever be. And being a size zero doesn't make you beautiful. What I should be doing is celebrating some of the best days of my life and my engagement to the man of my dreams, instead of having to deal with photographers taking invasive pictures from bad angles. I know what I look like, and so do my friends and family. And like all women out there should, I love my body. To all girls with butts, boobs, hips and a waist, put on a bikini -- put it on and stay strong."
Jennifer Love, I love you!
Women from the Congo migrate to Angola to find work. While they're getting deported, they get raped by the Angolan military. If this story gets to the mainstream television media (as unlikely as that is), I'd love to know what O'Reilly and Dobbs have to say about it.
A 7-year-old girl saved her mother from the gunfire of an ex-boyfriend by acting as a human shield. Alexis Goggins was shot six times and, amazingly, survived. Her mother, Selietha Parker, was shot twice. Alexis is a special needs child who suffered a stroke as an infant. The story is truly disturbing:
The drama began to unfold just before midnight Saturday, when Parker called Ford and asked if she and Alexis could spend the night at Ford's home.
"She said she had no heat and they were very cold, and I said , sure I'll come and get you," Ford said.
Ford said she drove her burgundy 1998 Ford Expedition to Parker's home on Dwyer. She said as Parker and Alexis walked up to her vehicle she saw a man on the porch, who she assumed was a furnace repairman. She said Alexis, who walks with a limp, slipped momentarily on the icy sidewalk and as she helped the girl up, she saw the man and recognized him as Tillie. He was holding a gun.
Tillie ordered them into the vehicle, cursed at the women and angrily told Ford to drive him to Six Mile Road, she said.
"He looked like he was enraged and didn't care what he did. I knew if we went to Six Mile, he would kill us," Ford said. Instead, she told him she needed gas and drove to the Fast Stop Gas station in the 5000 block of East Seven Mile Road, a station that requires customers to pay the attendant inside.
Ford said she dialed 911 on her cell phone as she walked into the station.
"The first operator clicked off and I dialed again and told that operator a guy with a gun was holding me hostage with a mother and baby and threatening to kill us. I told her the name of the gas station and then she said they didn't have a unit to send."
The gas station attendant called after he heard gunshots coming from the car. The police arrived less than a minute later. So it's a good thing that little girl is indestructible, because the cops certainly weren't there to help her.
Dan Abrams talked with Rachel Maddow of Air America Radio and some nutty abstinence-only advocate last night. As much as I love Maddow, my favorite part is about 4 minutes in. Watch the video, and you'll see why!
I just saw a commercial for Tampax, and they're doing a cool campaign to get feminine hygiene products to girls in Africa.
For some girls in Southern Africa, getting their period means missing school for several days each month. That's because they don't have access to something many of us take for granted: feminine protection.Helping girls stay in school is critical. An education gives them a future. It helps build better lives - not just for them, but for their families and their communities.
I never knew that this was a problem, but now that I know it is, it makes a lot sense. This program provides pads and education about puberty. You can even buy t-shirts with the message "Use your period for good" (I love that slogan!). A dollar from each t-shirt sold goes to the program. That's not much, but I'm sure it ads up.
And I just added a badge on the side of the blog. Add a badge to your blog!
