Anecdote to Cognitive Dissonance

Tags

abuse, editorial, life in the foothills, women's rights

Life is sure simpler if you avoid conflict. I know how easy it would be to just shrug and say, “well, that’s me, complicated” and just return to my purchased serenity. But the price is the incessant nagging that won’t leave me alone. Conflict must be resolved. It seems, well unseemly to do anything else.

Let me dispel any notion that I was someone of importance in the feminist movement. I was a cipher to put it quite bluntly. I came along at a time when the movement to date meant that I didn’t have to struggle with some things and too late to matter regarding others.

For instance, I showed up right on time when it came to law school, with all universities working hard to bring their women’s numbers up. I benefited no doubt and probably got in when say ten years earlier or maybe even five, I might not have.  I was probably too early yet to be an air force pilot, and other occupations like police officer or firefighter were still male bastions. I consider myself lucky that those jobs were not within reach for me at the time.

I recall no march that I participated in, since those were few and far between. I was one of those “fellow travelers” who made their point largely by commenting on doors opened, “I can open my own door thank you,” and ladies first, “I’m fine being in the place in line I arrived at.”

But my heart was surely there. And as with most women of my time (and those who became politically aware) I read the required texts of feminism, listened to the words of feminist spokeswomen, and re-evaluated most of the “advice” I’d been offered by mother and other female family members. I mostly began to rethink the notions of what women want, and what they need to do to get it.

We rejected the casting couch. We demanded a say at the table of decision making on serious issues, not just those pertaining to “women’s issues.”

But old habits die hard.

I know there are women my age who married their childhood sweethearts. And bless them, if that turned out well for them. But most of us did not, and the 60’s and onward provided us opportunities to test out our sexual freedom as well. And with that came the perils. I would bet that not one woman who was sexually experimenting (meaning separating sex from love as men always do) was not subjected to some form of rape. Date rape is what I refer to. It need not have been violent, but it was insistent to the point that we succumbed rather than continue objecting. We told ourselves or were led to believe by an insisting man, that we had encouraged it, or brought it on, and we can hardly blame him now for wanting to “finish.”

So we understand about emotional and physical abuse, whether overt or “benign”.

Over the years the struggle has had its ups and downs and re-orientations. It has focused on poor women, and women in the boardroom. On wage equality, job opportunities, and image. Lately it has focused on abuse.

Many have recognized that until women and especially young girls have better images of themselves regarding power and influence, real progress won’t be made. This is because too many female children are still being raised in traditions that value being quiet and “polite,” and above all knowing “one’s place.”   Until we teach our young boys and girls that gender is fairly insignificant to their dreams and responsibilities in life, we cannot effectively marshal the numbers necessary to push old white men off their pedestals of entitlement and take our rightful place alongside.

We must however, not merely preach the message, but we must live it, and therein lies my conflict of the day.

We are a culture that deifies to a great extent anyone in the public eye. Whether they be movie “stars” or singers, or sports professionals, we look upon them as objects to be admired. We seek to act like them, in however that translates to the average life. We dress, eat, drink as they do. We attempt to live in our modest means with trinkets that resemble their splendor.

To a degree we do this with politicians as well. Who doesn’t admire those who have managed to become known to large segments of the world simply by wielding power?

We fantasize these people into very inhuman beings, almost in some cases, as incapable of being anything but the perfection we infuse them with. They are bereft of the failings that we suffer. We tell ourselves that this is not the case, but truly we do so.

And yet, many if not all of them are flawed, as deeply flawed as we.

And of course there is a tabloid press out there ready and willing to make a buck trading on their failures. This is good in one sense of course for it reminds us of their feet of clay.  But, to those we worship from afar, we tend to find ways of avoiding what we don’t want to believe.

I and my husband have determined that we cannot bear the ugly underbelly of hate that a Mel Gibson exhibits to the world when he is sufficiently drunk or angry to let his true beliefs come forth. Gibson is nothing but a hateful racist of the worst kind. Yet we recognize his talents in acting and are saddened that we miss the opportunities to enjoy it.

There are others. Many others.

Woody Allen is my nemesis. Such a huge talent, such amazing movie-making, yet  an ugly man in his abuse of girls. One can only claim so long that the charges, which he denies, are false. The fact that he married his adopted daughter speaks volumes. Mariel Hemingway was 17 years old when Mr. Allen tried to convince her to come to Europe with him.  I cannot ignore the obvious any longer, even though Diane Keaton seems to manage.

We cannot continue with “artists must be allowed their quirks” no matter how inappropriate.

Bill Cosby was easier. The sheer number of accusers is all the evidence needed. This man abused women in a ruthless  “because I’m Bill Cosby” sort of ugliness that offends on every level.

Charlie Chaplin abused girls. So did Roman Polanski.

It is said that John Lennon beat his first wife and so did Eric Clapton. Ike Turner beat Tina.

We make allowances because of who they are.

We cannot continue to do so. Lennon, I’m told, publicly confessed his sins. Ike certainly didn’t.

There will be no more Woody Allen movies in my future, much as it pains me to do so. He is a genius of sorts, but a sick bastard as well.

I cannot and will not pick and choose based on how much I admire the work they do. I cannot, because I have a responsibility to girls growing up in this very difficult world. I cannot send mixed signals.

WE cannot send mixed signals. We must stand up for all women everywhere who are subjected to emotional and physical abuse, who are beaten down into believing that they are entitled to no more than they get. We must stand up, or collapse into our suburban retreats being nice grannies while organizing family get-togethers in some refusal to be a part of the reality that confronts our youngsters every day.

That is what it means to be a grown-up. We must leave the world a better, safer place. Damn us if we don’t.

Reasons Why

Tags

choices, feminism, lifestyle, Women's issues

This appeared on Facebook and I put it up on my wall with the caption: “Is this what parenthood does to a person! If so, I’m glad I escaped!”

While there weren’t many replies, one caught my interest and got me to thinking about what might lie behind the statement.

While it may have been meant innocently enough, the comment was “no this is not your normal situation and you did miss a lot.”

I took that, however meant, as a defensive lob, one meant to suggest that parenting is a great thing and I was much the poorer for having “missed” it.

Of course, beauty is always in the eye of the beholder.

I chalked it up as another of those, subtle or not so subtle put-downs by those with children of those of us without. The other one that I remembered vividly was a discussion about corporal punishment by parents (or caregivers) and the suggestion that I was unfit to comment, “since as I recall, you didn’t have children did you?”

I think I know where the defensiveness and consequent “I’m really better than you because you don’t have children” comes from

Dial back the time machine to the late 60’s when I graduated from high school. The sexes were still pretty much set in stone. I knew that a number of my classmates would probably be married within a year or so, but I was off to college. It was the beginning of that “sweet spot” in time–the convergence of the civil rights movement, the anti-war movement, the hippie movement, and the feminist movement. The Vietnam anti-war movement began in the mid-sixties and continued and escalated during the late 60’s and early 70’s. We marched on campuses, got tear-gassed, shut down campuses. Some campuses were more volatile than others, yet we all found ourselves involved in “teach-ins”  (where I first learned of the play Lysistrata by Aristophanes). 

Women were a big part of the movement but often relegated to second-class status behind the men. This mimicked that of the Civil Rights Movement. Rosa Parks did not suddenly pop up one day on a bus in Montgomery Alabama, but had long been a worker in the field. She was of course kept much in the background in terms of leadership as were other African-American women of the day.

The Hippie movement, also a product of the 60’s was most renowned  for Haight-Asbury and Woodstock, but it signaled the advent of free-love, birth-control, and a defining break with the past and all it’s traditional values. The Hippies were also vehemently anti-war. The Beatles, most notably John Lennon became a major force for peace with “Imagine”.

Women in this movement two were pushed to the rear, often treated as secretaries and much needed lovers for the important work being done by the men in the “awakening”.  Angela Davis and others fought back.

Women looked to each other during this period and Betty Freidan, Germaine Greer, Gloria Steinem,  Kate Millet, Shirley Chisholm, and Bella Abzug were the emerging role models for women like myself who were just starting to look higher than the secretarial typewriter for our future. We read with relish The Feminine Mystique, and Sexual Politics. Later, immersed in the Church, I would cling to In Memory of Her and She Who Is, as the patriarchal stereotypes of the bible began to be dismantled by women of faith but also biblical expertise. Women like  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza and Elizabeth Johnson became household names.

I was in that first wave of women admitted in law school in large numbers. We leaned on each other, we learned, and we excelled. Because we were steeped in the injustices of the past, we were angry, defensive, and could spot a “sexist pig” at twenty paces. Offering to hold a door for us was likely to be met with a angry look, and a statement like, “I am more than capable of opening my own door, thank you.”

Plenty of men retreated before us “ball-busting bitches” and sought more traditional women to welcome them home at night and bear their children.

That is the world out of which I emerged into my late 20’s, a time when most women start to realize that if parenthood is on their agenda, one best get busy.

As a look back at the cadre of young women I worked along side of I can recall what we talked about and how we felt quite vividly. We were in our late twenties, still working more often with men than with other women. Most judges were still male, most prosecutors, most defense attorneys, most cops. We were not insignificant, but we were far from a majority. Mostly we were treated with fairness, although there was a lot of what today would be unacceptable sexual harassment. To us it was business as usual. We slipped the grasp of unwanted advances (mostly from judges who somehow thought that being a judge’s mistress must be our dream????), and commanded salaries the likes of which our hardworking fathers (mothers of course didn’t even come close) had never attained in their working lifetimes.

Among those of us who were single, (most of us) the issue of children inevitably comes up. And of course it came up more regularly for single women than married, since we were single mostly by choice. Men were wonderful, but unnecessary as a financial crutch so mostly we were looking to take our time. I don’t count myself as being usual in having had good half dozen serious affairs, and my share of brief flings. There was no reason not to.

As best I can tell, we split about 50-50 on the child thing. About half arranged by any number of methods to get pregnant and have a child with no intent to have the father play any significant role in the raising of the child. The other half, myself included, opted out.

I can say that during my now more than sixty-four years, I spent roughly eight months considering the idea seriously, but I have to say it probably had more to do with the man I was seeing at the time than on the biological clock ticking. I cannot say what was the key reason I chose not to have children, only that it was a combination of over-population around the globe, the desire not to have my own free-wheeling lifestyle disrupted, a serious question whether I would be a “good” parent–having no real role model, and some lack of “mothering” instincts, that I felt should be stronger than they were.

Looking back, I recognize that children bring a certain joy, apparently some sense of accomplishment (though again why escapes me pretty much), and I think some security? about the future that is perceived rather than necessarily experienced. It seems to feed some egos, though not all from what I have seen. I think children are marvelous creatures, and I think being good at parenting is a very hard thing, a thing most people take for granted and therefore don’t do a very good job at. I’m glad I didn’t do it, but I am in awe of some people I know who have.

I definitely think it ought to be way harder to qualify to be a parent. It’s amazing to me that so many people turn out as well as they do given their crummy experience with parents. I wonder how amazing this world might be if so many people didn’t have to spend so much time overcoming their poor upbringing.

At one time, we in the feminist movement disliked our sisters who chose the traditional roles. We thought they made it hard for those of us who wanted to be treated equally in jobs, advancement and pay. I think that time has long past. We, or at least I, recognize that the ultimate freedom is to chose the life you wish, and it is certainly an honorable and important choice to choose parenting.

The opposite is also true. To not choose parenting can be smart, noble, and a recognition that it is a special profession, one not suited to everyone, and not simple the thing “most everyone can do”. It is not an accomplishment, but a sacred responsibility one should take on with eyes wide open.

I think it all points to the fact, that while all of us may have had the same “historical” background, we responded to it differently. It imprinted on us quite dis similarly and we apparently made different judgements about it. That is what makes us human I suspect and why we thrive overall. If Aristotle was right that there is a set of absolute moral precepts, we will, it seems, go on arguing forever about just what they are.

A Serious Case of the Ass

Tags

teabaggers, women's rights

And you thought she would go quietly into the still dark night, returning to her lair, climbing into her sarcophagus, bidding adieu to Marcus, after relinquishing her role as beard to his hetero pretensions.

Nah.

Bat shit crazy don’t play that way.

She continues to play the game of stupid queen of the mountain better than such noteworthy rivals as Sarah, Phyllis, and Marsha, all rolled into one. Michele Crazy Eyes Bachmann once again wins the gold metal for craziest damn woman to ever have a vagina.

But then she doesn’t. See that’s the really fine thing about this new pronouncement by the bible in one hand, gun in the other, reparative theory is your friend, nut job, is that it truly is shocking. See, while Marcus has always been firmly wedged into his closet of gayness, his beard, was really a man all along.

Yes, Michele, nobodies, Belle, is a guy. It’s a fact.

Here’s how we came to know.

She spilled the beans…or shall we say she spilled the gonads for all to see.

She ‘splained it this way: See, your Barack…being all Black and all, now he was elected because there was all this guilt floatin’ around, and him being only “half” ya know, black, it was like getting rid of that black angst thing, without technically ya know, havin’ to actually elect one of them. (I had this explained to me by a couple of Christianist ladies, one of whom howled that Obama isn’t black, he’s only half-black, having a white mother. Another explained that  questioning his citizenship was not racist, because she had taken in a black girl to care for during her pregnancy’ and she was WAY darker than Obama, which proves I guess, in the mind of a racist, that well, only shades of color matter, but somehow that has nothing to do with RACE-ism)

But, Michele, intoned in her cutie little voice, tis not the same when it comes to women. Nah, America is not yet “ready for a woman President”, and for a coupla reasons. One, there ain’t no guilt in America over women, and two well, there is just no “pent-up desire” which is Michele’s way of saying there ain’t no stinkin’ hard-on for a woman.

And she oughta know, since she RAN FOR PRESIDENT. And since she did, and since she appears to believe her own slimy brain farts, well, it can only be that Michele is really Michael and no woman at all.

That’s the logic of it as far as I can see.

It all just was the “last straw” if you get my drift.

I’ve been reading an essay on a critical examination of the phrase “Sarah laughed” in Genesis. Done from a feminist point of view and gathering the linguistic evidence and the EARLIEST manuscripts, we learn that Sarah was actually laughing at the possibility that her old and dried up vagina might become that moist Eden once again and her old and flaccid husband might actually be able to get it up at his age. As such, it violated the shame/honor society of the Egyptian Jews who were translating the Septuagint into Koine Greek–the same version that would be used by the likes of Jesus and Paul as they read Torah in the synagogue of Jerusalem in the early years of the Common Era.

And if it were not for a long line of women starting with Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who just oddly enough thought that maybe God and the baby Jesus thought as highly of them as it did about all the men it focused on, well, we’d still be in the kitchen, barefoot no doubt and with a child at each elbow and one on the hip as we prepared a feast for the menfolk who were out and about “important” business.

And then, just then, before that I have to contend with a Neanderthal male who,without a single modicum of biblical training purports to bolster his ill-conceived notion that it was solely the “Jews what kilt our Lord,” by suggesting that I was not the least bit attractive from his arrogant pig-oinking position, well, I’m getting the feminist juices all fired up again.

So Michele, pseudo-woman, and Phyllis Schafley and her idiotic “be a good wife” while I make millions writing books and speaking for large fees, and Marsha Blackburn, with her “I’ll say whatever you tell me to if I can just be on camera” drivel, you can all go take a massive flying leap cause ladies, and I do use that term most advisedly, you are FUCKING NOT HELPING HERE as some of us are trying to make a world where girls can grow up to be anything they want and make as much as any man, and that child rearing is EVERY BODY’S business and responsibility, and that women’s ideas about compromise, caring, and compassion just might, JUST MIGHT add a segment to the conversation that MIGHT, JUST MIGHT result in fewer wars and less death, and more freakin’ happiness for all.

So THAT’S what I’m thinking about today.

How ’bout you?

Franken-Women! Run For Your Lives!

Tags

equal pay, Rape, Women's issues

During the run up to the 2012 election, the GOP became rather famous for sticking their foot into their collective mouths, up to the knee. Nothing was more famous than their “war on women” an attack they assured us was both unfair and unwarranted.

After all, as countless state legislatures populated mostly by white men, continued to introduce bill after bill that limited the availability of reproductive health care for women, inserted medical instruments into their lady parts, and otherwise suggested that they didn’t really know what was best for themselves, how can that be considered unwomanly?

To say nothing of the strange and mind-shattering medical opinions from men like Todd Aiken on rape. On and on it went, yet, there was no war on women, but in the minds of Democrats who were just playing on the (shh) paternal concerns of husbands and fathers for political benefit. And on and on they went. On election night, 55% of women in America decided that Democrats best served their interests.

That still leaves an amazing 44% of women who voted for the other side, the side doing all the woman-basing.  What can we say about these women? I think we are learning that in the months since the election. In fact, we have always known it, but we grant some leeway that in the heat of battle, some women may in fact grip their thighs and support that which rankles for the “greater good.” So a fairer assessment can be given now.

And it suggests, that what we have is a hybrid creature I have dubbed the Franken-woman. She is in appearance a woman,  but resembles her sisters in very little else. I’m afraid if you look under the skirt, you may well find balls instead of a vagina.

Recently there was some polling by Pew which I believe backs up studies on the subject, that women are increasingly the breadwinners in their families. This of course caused quite a stir. There has been a four-fold increase in the numbers since the 1960’s.

How is this received by the media you ask?

Well Fox News contributor, Erick Erickson cried foul. This is bad stuff he claimed. Everywhere in the animal kingdom (watch out your creationists), males dominate (actually they don’t but he’s from Fox, what can you expect). Why this flood of women breadwinners is destroying marriage and the children! Stop it now!

Of course women are used to this sort of thing.

Soon the topic turned to education and why we are falling farther and farther behind when compared to a whole list of other countries. Once the greatest school system in the world, the US educational system is by many estimations, dismal at best. Mississippi Governor, Phil Bryant (need I add the R?), gave us his assessment of the cause:

I think both parents started working. And the mom is in the work place.

Women are so used to this sort of thing. I hardly matters the topic, somehow it’s the fault of women.

I can attest to this personally.

A while back on Facebook I became engaged in rather heated debate on climate change with a man who was regularly condescending and arrogant in his assertions that there was no such thing as human-made climate change. While both of us threw some nasty ad hominens, he often retorted to my facts with  claims that I had a big mouth, and was a whack job. When I replied that apparently he had no facts, just personal assaults, I was greeted with this gem:

You provoke me!

Indeed, and women who dress in trashy clothes provoke otherwise decent men to rape them! Yes, we’ve heard that excuse.

Well my dismay was not at his remark, which was expected, but rather from the Franken-woman who came to his defense, saying that X was such a nice person, and I was always attacking, and basically, I was up against a brilliant man and was clearly no match.

Now said Franken-woman had already told me that:

1. If you count all the “crab nebula” historically, it amounts to just the number one would expect if the earth was some 6,000 plus years old and,
2. If evolution were true then why are monkeys still having monkey babies?

So you see I’m already dealing with a “woman” who if chosen randomly by an alien visitation would have answered the question, “is there intelligent life here?” with a resounding NO. What hurt however was that a supposedly a fellow woman was unable to see the misogyny in such a statement and agreed that women “cause” men to do bad things.

But as I listened to what moves through the Internet vapor, I discovered that there were indeed plenty of these Franken-women.

That gadfly Phyllis Schafley, attorney, book writer, and speaker, you know, the one who tells OTHER women to stay home and make hubby happy with good cookin’ and good sex? THAT “woman?” Well she weighed in on women in combat, telling us that women in combat would unfairly “entice” men, and the poor men would be blamed for the ensuing rape and harassments that would be inevitable! I kid you not.

Marsha Blackburn, perennial talking points maven for the GOP, had the audacity to tell Meet the Press, roundtable participants that “women don’t want equal pay laws.”  Seriously? We don’t?

“I think that more important than that is making certain that women are recognized by those companies. You know, I’ve always said that I didn’t want to be given a job because I was a female, I wanted it because I was the most well-qualified person for the job. And making certain that companies are going to move forward in that vein, that is what women want. They don’t want the decisions made in Washington. They want to be able to have the power and the control and the ability to make those decisions for themselves.”

Um, dear, how exactly are we to make that happen? By baking them some cookies? Or perhaps, forcing them to address their inequality by MAKING THEM PAY WOMEN THE SAME WAGES? And dear, don’t you EVER presume to speak for me, okay?

Not to be outdone, Ms. Schafley weighed in on this as well:

The Obama feminists recite the tiresome mantra that women are paid only 77 cents for every dollar paid to men. That’s completely false because it doesn’t take into account that men take many high-risk and unpleasant jobs, suffering 90 percent of occupational fatalities, so they should earn more.

Does that even make sense? She then claims (without a source) that men work longer hours and so deserve more. In the end, only employers can really know who does the “most” work.

She ends by taking a swipe at Hispanics. Stop courting them, she advises. After all, “they don’t share American values“.

I say congratulations to the GOP who has apparently successfully transplanted a Republican male brain into a woman. These aren’t women. These are freaks of nature, created to pat the poor man on the head and continue to tell him he is the center of their universe.

Save me from such women.

Related articles

• Rep Marsha Blackburn Backs Corporate Pay Discrimination (lezgetreal.com)
• ‘War on women’ returns (politico.com)
• Mississippi’s Bryant laments when ‘mom got in the workplace’ (maddowblog.msnbc.com)
• Why Erick Erickson Is Wrong About Women Breadwinners (usnews.com)
• All-Male Fox Panel On Female Breadwinners About What You Would Expect (wonkette.com)

I’m Going As Fast as I Can!

Tags

Iraq war, life in the foothills, women's rights

Really I am. Actually, I’m traveling at lightening speed.

For example:

Yesterday I got up, cleaned house until 6:50 a.m., walked Diego two miles, finished cleaning the house, went to the grocery store, returned home, put away groceries, searched through all the papers in the file cabinet, finding 90% of what was necessary for the accountant tomorrow and the taxes, drove the Contrarian to the Eyemart with his new prescription, picked out frames, and stopped for *gasp* fast food for lunch, and arrived home, all before 1 p.m. At 3:00 p.m, I returned to Eyemart and picked up his glasses. The(Two more weeks and I can have chocolate again!)

Today, I cleaned house until 6:50 a.m, (finished by the way!), walked Diego two miles, and returned to make the basic parts of a Shepherd’s Boy casserole, which is now waiting to go in the oven. And *gasp* it’s only 9 a.m. and I have 50 minutes of leisure before we head off to get the taxes done.

Tomorrow, I get to go to the pool, and get my hair cut. We are determined to get all our “stuff” done this month. We have to hit the Veterans Affairs office to turn in our property tax exemptions yet, and something else that needs filling out, which I no longer remember.

I keep waiting for that blessed week when there are no “things” to attend to. I never used to be this busy. I really never used to be. The more retired I get, the busier I get. I know there is something important I should be ingesting from that realization, but I’m either not aware of what it is, or I’m scared to discover what it is.

I once upon a time said that virtually everything I dreamed about moving down here came true, but for a couple. The Catholic churches basically suck here (which I never would have imagined), and there is no pool within two blocks of where I live. Well guess what? One just got a good deal closer.

It turns out that one of the parks and rec outdoor pools is only about four miles from me. A darn sight closer than the approximately thirteen mile one that I go to now. It doesn’t open until Memorial day, but I have been told that almost nobody goes there, so I can enjoy myself in solitary bliss probably. Why they wait so long I have no clue–it’s in the mid-seventies every day now, and often in the low to mid-80’s.  Go figure.

≈

It’s been ten years since the ill-conceived invasion of Iraq. Where are all the celebrations? Were we not greeted as “liberators”?  Yeah, I guess not. It’s really hard to make an argument that awful as he was, the Iraqi people are not really any better off than they were before we “saved” them. I suspect they are much worse. And nobody worth a damn went to jail for that crime.

≈

The GOP screams like a stuck pig that they have “no war on women”. Well, yeah they do. But it’s only a huge segment of a much bigger picture in which a lot more people (mostly men, but not all) are implicated. Cases in point.

• Remember the dude at the CPAC who wanted to know why Frederick Douglass sent a letter forgiving his slave master? After all, the North Carolinian “white demographic” pointed out, he got “food and shelter” after all. He pointed out it would be a damn sight better if we still had segregation, and that Black folk could do all the voting they wanted in Africa. Well it turns out that as that meeting broke up, a woman approached and proceeded to give him a thing or two about his overt racism. Said White Male, retorted, as I am told, “so is this the new rebranded version of the GOP where women confront and tell off men in public?” or words to that effect.
• You all no doubt heard or read about the Steubenville case where at least two young men of high school age took advantage of an inebriated fellow teen girl, and raped her. The coverage has been, to say the least, extremely sexist in its presentation. The reporters and their networks cannot get over how sad it’s been for the boys, who had “promising football careers” and were so altogether nice in every way. They never missed a chance to remind us that the girl was so drunk she passed out. Oh and they ALL “inadvertently” dropped her name in their video reports even though she is a minor.

Forgive me if I still bluster about the need of women to continue the fight for full and complete rights in this still patriarchal world we live in. We put on the trappings of equality, and people do the “politically correct thing” and underneath it all, well, men will be men and boys will be boys, and women? Well women just keep taking it.

Read the link. It’s an important commentary on how we still operate in this country.

And well, it’s time to be off to the tax accountant. Sigh…you know I just love this!

Related articles

• Tar Heel Teabilly at CPAC: Frederick Douglass Should Have Thanked His Former Slave Master for Giving Him Food and Shelter (pensitoreview.com)
• CPAC 2013: The racism at CPAC (dailykos.com)
• CPAC ‘trump the race card’ event goes wrong (thegrio.com)
• A Low, Dishonest Decade: New Details for the Iraq War Crime Mosaic (willyloman.wordpress.com)
• 10 Years After Iraq Invasion: Continued Myths, Hundreds of Thousands Killed (intellihub.com)

Now I Know What’s Wrong With Me

Tags

feminism, Fox Noise, Humor, women's rights

Thank the Lord and pass the peas for Fox News.

Yes you heard me righty-tighty there listening audience.

I mean I coulda spent seconds if not eons trying to figure out what in the hell was wrong with little ol’ me, when all I had to do was ask one of the “expert” ladies on that fair and balanced bastion of true journalism.

Of what was I wronged up about? Why my whole persona as a female person. You see, I am irritating and unappealing to men. Now if your first thought is, whoa, even unpretty ladies snag a man pretty easily since there are plenty (look around) of butt-ugly males traipsing around the parking lots of most any shopping area, some of them nearly dragging their knuckles if you look closely enough.

You see, as I, representing the female persuasion have had the gall to get an education and seek employment at *gasp* equal wages, I have become threatening to poor males who define themselves by the cut of their professional skills vis-a-vis all the other peacocks in the building. Job titles and how many zeros are on the check count as male self-esteem you see, and when WOMEN compete against them, the poor dears just fall apart and have no basis to judge their value as human beings.

So they use us wimmen for sex and say NO WAY when it comes to marriage. Cuz who needs to buy the cow when you get the moo juice for free as they say. Yep, you see it makes men all gooey and caring inside when they have a sweet lil’ thing to take care of (read boss around and dominate), bless their testosterone laden hearts.

In a nutshell, we ain’t women any more, just penis-less men, eunuchs if you will. Ah, now I can finally sleep at night knowing it’s all my fault when men act badly. It’s because I drive them too it. Heck, ask any woman beater, and he will surely agree–she drove him to it. If she would just be quiet, keep the house clean, his shirts ironed in that special way he likes, await him with red lingerie every evening, keep her figure after three kids, agree with everything he wants to buy, everywhere he wants to go, and well just everything, he wouldn’t get so mad he had to hit something. It was just her jaw got in the way of his fist when he was “needing to unwind” from all that ass kissing at work he has to do in order to get points with the boss and therefore get that promotion, which of course he does for the “little woman” in the first place, and there she goes having an actual opinion about something that is different from his, and, well you can see why it’s ALL HER FAULT.

Some smart lady by the name of Suzanne Venker explained it all here. I mean she’s written three books on subjects sorta like this after all, and everyone knows if you write books you must be smart, like David Barton is a freakin’ genius about American history since he has written a whole LOT of books on the subject, and all those televangelicals are always writing books about what God wants me to do about everything, and they are hardly ever wrong, except when your hearing is impaired like Pat Robertson who said God told him that Romney would win, but he was wrong, because he’s getting old and his misunderstood what God said cause his hearing aid wasn’t turned up high enough, and well you can’t fault him for THAT.

See Suzanna said I’m angry and defensive and I think men are the enemy cause that bitch Gloria Steinem taught me that crap, and I have kicked men off their pedestals which everyone knows is a very bad thing to do, since it’s really helpful to a healthy relationship to adore and objectify humans as super human and not  human at all, but more like gods. And worst of all, men are to blame no matter what the issue and so men just feel sad and aren’t going to marry women any more.

I mean what man cares about making something of himself for HIMSELF for goodness sake. They only do it for women, and when women piss them off instead of appreciating how hard they work to be cocksure about everything, well, they say, enough is enough. Ya see, this is all genetic. It’s in the genes baby. A man’s DNA demands that he be the breadwinner and the woman be the “little woman” in her June Cleaver dress and pearls with those two-inch pumps clicking along that vinyl kitchen floor as she smiles her way through the oven cleaning and scrubbing those toilets.

Civilization is at stake here people–I mean women. Listen up girls, life as we know it demands we give up our brains and pick up those dusters! Evolution is at stake which is funny as hell when you think about it because the women that listen most carefully to Suzanne’s blatherings are those who are very damn sure that there is no such thing as evolutionary theory worth a good god damn anyway. Genesis says it all.

So, well, I’m re-evaluating my life I can sure tell ya.

Thanks Suzanne, you are my new BFF and I am going out to get all your books, that is if my hubby approves.

Related articles

• The War On Man (koolnews.wordpress.com)
• No, Ms. Venker…Men Just Love Sex (pheonixreview.wordpress.com)
• Fox News Op-Ed: Men Are Less Interested In Marriage Because ‘Women Aren’t Women Anymore’ (thinkprogress.org)
• The War on Men (foxnews.com)
• Did God Troll Pat Robertson? (littlegreenfootballs.com)
• Pat Robertson’s Magic is All Broken! (scotteriology.wordpress.com)
• Pat Robertson Admits His Election Prediction Revealed From God Was Wrong (crooksandliars.com)

Existential Mindtwisting

Tags

AHCA, astronomy, Health care, Johnny Depp, Mitt Romney, physics, Reince Priebus, Rick Perry, RNC, tea party, Women's issues

You can drive yourself quite silly if you spend much time wondering how something came from nothing, and what came before the “big bang” and how where some atomic particles are concerned at least, they can be in more than one place at the same time, and that the very act of observing alters reality.

And then there is always tsunamis, tornadoes and hurricanes to worry about.

To say nothing of whether it’s safe to drink the milk when it’s a day past its expiration date.  That last one bothers the Contrarian to no end.

Anyway, I’m really glad it ain’t my job to think about that stuff. It is one of the main reasons I didn’t mark an X next to particle physicist on the “what I want to be when I grow up” form that I filled out in kindergarten, or maybe first grade.

That and the fact that they pretty much track you away from physics as a major if you think that Alice and Wonderland was silly fantasy claptrap and not worthy of the human mind. (Which is not to say that I didn’t enjoy the movie–the one with Johnny Depp, for who in their right-thinking female mind would NOT like anything starring the most gorgeous, adept, magnificent, actor in the entire universe, which is saying a lot given that I have familiarity with only one stinkin’ planet in the entire universe which must contain billions and billions as Carl Sagan used to say.)

Which is all a very long way around to saying that you might like to take a look at this book if you do like to waste lazy Sunday afternoons in a hammock thinking about these types of things. It is written by a guy named Jim Holt, and is called “Why Does the World Exist?” You can read a nice review about it here.

Frankly I think that it exists because Satan knew we would have to think about it, and that would drive us crazy, and thus provide the “in” he needs to work his evil machinations. Or on the other hand, it might be because there had to be a good place to put fruit cakes that the other universes banned as uneatable. One or the other, I am sure.

(I can hear the applause from here–connecting Johnny Depp and fruitcake is a difficult task to be sure. There must be a Pulitzer out there with my name on it.)

¤

I’m not sure any human being has spent as much time reproving again and again that he is a horse’s ass than the ubiquitous Texas Governor, Rick Perry. Think about it. Can you come up with a better candidate for permanent court jester?

Mr. I-can-only-think-of-two Perry, assures America that he will have no truck with that socialistic Affordable HCA, no matter what the Supremes have to say. Dumbo says he ain’t gonna set up no exchanges, which is odd, given the fact that the Federal Government will then set them up for him. Hardly the hands-off my medicare approach that one would think he would favor. But having only left-over oatmeal in the brain-case does apparently lend to such anomalies.

¤

I know I heard this in passing. I was passing through one room and into another, gathering all the belongings–all the important ones that is. It’s called a bug-out bag, and smart folks who know that disaster is just around every corner, always have one. And to listen to Rinsed Penis surely you must know that that disaster is set for the day after election day this November such (horrors), President Obama be re-elected.

The man claims that our very nation is at stake.We must elect Willard to “save America” to preserve “our way of life.” Read all kinds of white racist crap into that of course.

I think Rinsed has swapped some DNA with Michele Bachmann. Makes ya shiver.

¤

Okay, I’m all for adding a new sub-unit of humanity–men or women who don’t claim they are transgender, but exhibit a hatred of their own sex that is damaging to the sex. I wish to call them butt-faced Pygmalions infused with cactus-juice blood, my term. Feel free to call them what you like, as long as you keep a long stick handy.

A “woman” called Janis Lane is head of the Central Mississippi Tea Party. Not the entire Mississippi Tea Party mind you, but only the central part. She’s a really important person. Well here is here take on women–herself:

Lane: Our country might have been better off if it was still just men voting. There is nothing worse than a bunch of mean, hateful women. They are diabolical in how than can skewer a person. I do not see that in men. The whole time I worked, I’d much rather have a male boss than a female boss. Double-minded, you never can trust them.

Because women have the right to vote, I am active, because I want to make sure there is some sanity for women in the political world. It is up to the Christian rednecks and patriots to stand up for our country.

Now, given her “Christian” feelings, mightn’t her HUsssband, step in and shut this thing up and get her back to cookin’ his breakfast? Just a thought.

¤

Have a wild one. Adios

Related articles

• Still Confused About the Higgs Boson? Read This. (theatlantic.com)
• Will Higgs lead us to Star Trek transporter? (msnbc.msn.com)