[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]
TFIF, Shakers!
Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!
The Virtual Pub Is Open
[Explanations: lol your fat. pathetic anger bread. hey your gay.]
TFIF, Shakers!
Belly up to the bar,
and name your poison!
Programming Note
This Sunday is my 40th birthday (yay!), and I am celebrating it by spending the weekend with a whole lot of the people I love most in the world. Tomorrow, Deeky will arrive, beginning the delightful descent onto Shakes Manor. So I am taking tomorrow, Friday, and Monday off, and I will see you back here on Tuesday.
Because this is also graduation weekend in a lot of places, as well as Mothers' Day, and some of the mods are able to spend my birthday with me, we're not going to have daily open threads. I'll leave the Virtual Pub (which I'll post shortly) open through Tuesday morning, so there's a place to chat.
I feel like I should write something profound about turning 40, but I have exactly zero profound thoughts about it. I have no anxiety at all about turning 40, and I am quite content to begin a new decade. Bring it on!
CAKE FOR EVERYONE!
Quote of the Day
[Content Note: Class warfare; worker exploitation.]
"The people at the top aren't working any harder or smarter than they were before. They're just stealing more of the money, and it's about time we took it back for the people who actually do the work in this country."—David Atkins, in a great piece about what class warfare really looks like. And—spoiler alert!—it doesn't look like taking rich people's money and giving it to poor people.
Anti-Choicers, in a Nutshell
[Content Note: Anti-choice fuckery.]
Sarah Palin is an asshole of epic proportions, which is not news, but, even based on the garbage expectations she's set with her previous nonsense, this is pretty amazing:
Former Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin hopes that Hillary Clinton will rethink her position on abortion as her first grandchild arrives.So, here we have another example of an anti-choicer espousing the ferociously absurd idea that pro-choice people have never thought about their positions and what it means to advocate for legal abortion, much like they assert that abortion-seeking people have never thought about their choice before they show up to a clinic.
Palin said in an interview with "Extra" airing Wednesday that having a grandchild could "broaden [Clinton's] worldview" with respect to the national debt, which would affect her grandchild down the road, but also in terms of the "sanctity of life."
"It's a real baby! It's not some disposable something – and I know that's gonna be controversial – but those who, perhaps they're in this position now as a parent or grandparent, they realize that sanctity of life, how innocent, how precious it is," Palin told "Extra" host Mario Lopez. "Of all places it should be in the womb that these babies are protected. So maybe even on a social issue like that she'll open her eyes."
I'm reasonably certain that Hillary Clinton has spent more time thinking about her position on abortion than Sarah Palin has spent thinking about any subject of value to modern politics.
We also have another example of an anti-choicer making the claim that pro-choice policy can only be sustained in a hermetically sealed vault of abstraction. Once Clinton sees her grandchild...! (Because having a grandchild is so much more "real" than having given birth herself?) It is a perfect mimicry of the argument mounted in defense of mandated ultrasound legislation, based on the faulty premise that if only abortion-seeking women et. al. see the fetus growing inside of them, they will change their minds.
I'm reasonably certain that Hillary Clinton understands the biology and reality of reproduction.
And finally, we have another example of anti-choicers' profound hostility to agency. Not only are they hostile to women's agency when it comes to allowing women to make the best reproductive choices for ourselves, but they are hostile to the very idea of our having agency at all, even in our own thoughts.
What's "controversial" about what Palin is saying is not what she thinks it is. What's controversial about her statements is that she is asserting to know Hillary Clinton's mind more than Hillary Clinton does.
That assertion of ownership over women's minds and bodies is the defining feature of the anti-choice movement. And Palin may be an asshole, but she's a terrific politician. She's definitely giving her base exactly what they want to hear.
TV Corner: Fargo
[Content Note: Misogyny. Spoilers from the first few episodes of the TV series Fargo.]
Last September, I mentioned that FX was making a TV series based on the 1996 Coen Brothers' film, Fargo. At the time, I said it didn't sound particularly appealing to me, and, frankly, it still didn't sound appealing to me when it premiered a few weeks ago, but then some friends who have similar taste in television as I do recommended it to me, so I tuned in.
The show, which is set primarily in Minnesota, not Fargo, has a whole new slate of characters and a whole new cascading series of crimes, also allegedly (but not really) based on a true story. It's a similar flavor to the film, in that a bumbling jackass decides to solve his domestic and vocational problems by committing a crime directed at his wife, the consequences of which quickly spin his life out of control.
The show is more violent, and its plot more complex, than the film. The story is set against the same sort of snowy, austere backdrop as the film, with the actors doing their best to approximate Minnesota's cadences, to varying degrees of success.
There are plenty of things to criticize about the show (and criticism is totally on-topic for this thread), first and foremost that the cast is comprised almost exclusively of white men.
But I am less interested in writing about what I don't like about the show than about what I do. Specifically: Deputy Molly Solverson.
Deputy Solverson (see what they did there?) is played by Allison Tolman, who is fucking amazing in this show. She fully inhabits her character, a competent small-town cop who loses her rightful place as chief of the department through an unfortunate series of events that I won't spoil, leaving her at the mercy of the aggressively incompetent Bill Oswalt, played to frustrating perfection by the always-terrific Bob Odenkirk.
Basically, Solverson knows what the fuck is up. But she is incessantly thwarted by Oswalt, who is the embodiment of white male privilege and the fraternal assumptions of Good Guyism that render him incapable of even imagining that a white man who appears to be a Good Guy could be anything different.
Tolman plays to perfection all of the things that we know Solverson is navigating: Feelings of frustration, balancing her fierce integrity against subverting the rules that undercut justice, the subterranean slow-boil of anger at the confluence of patriarchy and stupidity that repeatedly stymies her momentum.
Solverson is a great character, and Tolman is a great actress. I can't wait to see where we go with her, the struggling hero, in the second half of the series.
Fat Fashion
This is your semi-regular thread in which fat women can share pix, make recommendations for clothes they love, ask questions of other fat women about where to locate certain plus-size items, share info about sales, talk about what jeans cut at what retailer best fits their body shapes, discuss how to accessorize neutral colored suits, share stories of going bare-armed for the first time, brag about a cool fashion moment, whatever.
Straight-leg jeans by Lane Bryant; blue heeled clogs by Söfft.
One of the things about living in a place with such extreme seasons is that it necessitates a versatile wardrobe. Which has some drawbacks. It can be expensive to have seasonal wardrobes—and, if one can't afford that versatility, it can mean not having clothes that are cool enough in summer or warm enough in winter. It requires storage space. The changing of the seasons, and the unpredictability of wild swings in temperature, can mean one has to pull out the t-shirts before storing the winter coat for the year.
But, every spring, I do enjoy getting to pull out my nice-weather shoes again.
These clogs, which I've had for three or four years now, are a particular favorite. They work with jeans, shorts, maxi dresses, pretty much anything—and they are so super comfy. (Also: I get soooo cold and soooo hot so easily; having my feet partially uncovered in the heat always helps with temperature regulation.) I love the little flower detail on the side, which feels so joyfully springlike.
And there is a flower pattern on the soles, which leaves happy little flowers in my footprints, even on a warm rainy day.
Anyway. As always, this is a general thread for fat fashion, but, if you need a topic: What does the warmer weather (or cooler, depending on the part of the world in which you're reading) return to your wardrobe, much to your delight?
Have at it in comments! Please remember to make fat women of all sizes, especially women who find themselves regularly sizing out of standard plus-size lines, welcome in this conversation, and pass no judgment on fat women who want to and/or feel obliged, for any reason, to conform to beauty standards. And please make sure if you're soliciting advice, you make it clear you're seeking suggestions—and please be considerate not to offer unsolicited advice. Sometimes people just need to complain and want solidarity, not solutions.
The Wednesday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by violets.
Recommended Reading:
Tennessee: [Content Note: Rape culture] Re-Imagining Disclosure as a Collective Act of Listening
Tressie: [CN: Slavery; misogynoir; rape] Here, a Hypocrite Lives: I Probably Get It Wrong on Leslie Jones But I Tried
Imara: [CN: Class warfare; racism] How the Most Ambitious Affordable Housing Plan in the Country Falls Short
Daniel: [CN: Homophobia; violence] Prominent Ugandan Activist Seeks Asylum in U.S. Over Anti-Gay Law
Resistance: [CN: Racism] Interchangeable Asians
BYP: Father Graduates from College with Son
Leave your links and recommendations in comments...
Daily Dose of Cute
Matilda, the Queen.
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Abduction; terrorism; misogyny; abuse.] After another eight girls were abducted by Boko Haram, following the mass abduction 23 days ago, dozens of protestors rallied at the Nigerian Embassy, "with the hope of pressuring authorities to take action. ...Molly Alawode, a leader of the Bring Back Our Girls campaign, told Al Jazeera the protests would continue 'if the government doesn't live up to its duty of service and protect the Nigerian population. We think it's really important to send this message today to let him [President Goodluck Jonathan] and other leaders know that the world is really watching,' she added." Nigerian police have now offered a $300,000 reward for information aiding in the rescue of the girls, and the White House has announced "it is sending a team to Nigeria to aid the effort to find the girls and those responsible."
[CN: Racism] Former Republican Governor of Floria Charlie Crist, who is now a Democrat, says that one of the primary reasons he left the GOP was its entrenched racism toward President Obama: "I couldn't be consistent with myself and my core beliefs, and stay with a party that was so unfriendly toward the African-American president, I'll just go there. I was a Republican and I saw the activists and what they were doing, it was intolerable to me."
[CN: Rape culture] Speaking of intolerable, Tucker Carlson is such a fucking dirtbag: "A 15-year-old boy looks at [being sexually assaulted by a female teacher] as the greatest thing that's ever happened." He is as colossally gross as he is colossally wrong.
[CN: Guns] Speaking at the National Council for Behavioural Health conference in Oxon Hill, Maryland, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned against letting go unchecked the idea that "anybody can have a gun, anywhere, anytime." Said Clinton: "I think again we're way out of balance. I think that we've got to rein in what has become an almost article of faith that anybody can have a gun, anywhere, anytime. And I don't believe that is in the best interest of the vast majority of people. And I think you can say that and still support the right of people to own guns." I will give this a provisional thumbs-up, although I expect that Clinton, should she become a candidate, will disappointingly take the same approach that's popular among Democrats right now and ultimate propose reforms that demonize people with mental illness.
Speaking of Hillary Clinton, former Second Lady Lynne Cheney took to Fox News to discuss Monica Lewinsky's recent piece in Vanity Fair about her affair with former President Bill Clinton, and these are the actual fucking words that Lynne Cheney actually fucking said: "I really wonder if this isn't an effort on the Clintons' part to get that story out of the way. Would Vanity Fair publish anything about Monica Lewinsky that Hillary Clinton didn't want in Vanity Fair?" Jesus Jones.
And finally! NBA MVP Kevin Durant gave a moving acceptance speech last night, in which he "thanked teammates by name, telling personal tales about each of their relationships and why they mattered to him. He thanked his coaches, talking at length about the close bond he has had with coach Scott Brooks since they came together during the Seattle SuperSonics days in 2007. ...When he finally turned his attention to woman who has always been his backbone, everything else seemed to fade away. With the room captivated, the son who is truly one of a kind spoke from the heart. 'Single parent with two boys by the time you were 21 years old,' Durant said, crying. 'Everybody told us we weren't supposed to be here. We moved from apartment to apartment by ourselves. One of the best memories I had was when we moved into our first apartment. No bed, no furniture, and we just all sat in a room and just hugged each other. We thought we'd made it.'" He called his mom "the real MVP." All the blubs forever.
(Video is here. If and when I can finally find a transcript, I'll add a link. If you happen to find one, please drop a link in comments.)
"Changing the Narrative"
[Content Note: Rape culture; sexual violence.]
Jessica Luther has written a terrific piece for Sports on Earth about how sports reporters write about sexual assault cases involving allegations against athletes—and how they should be writing about it.
We end up relying on sports journalists, a resoundingly male group, to talk about a crime whose victims are overwhelmingly women.She speaks to four experts on sports and/or rape culture (of which I am one), and breaks the advice down into six categories: Treat Victims as Human Beings, There Is No Right Way for a Victim to Act After an Assault, Read the Police Report, Know the Facts about False Reporting, Understand the Personal Costs of Reporting, and Avoid the Sensational.
...Many women never report their assaults, and they may be made to feel that they're at fault for a crime committed against them. Because of this, sports journalists — whether they like it or not — have a responsibility to be fair in how they write about sexual assault cases.
It's such a good piece, and a perfect opening salvo in a conversation that needs to happen. Now the people at whom this advice is directed need to have it.
I hope you'll read the whole thing—and bookmark it for sending to sports writers, the next time they fail to write sensitively and responsibility about a sexual assault case.
It Continues to Be a Real Mystery Why Republicans Aren't Connecting with a Majority of Female Voters
[Content Note: Misogyny.]
Today's entry in our ongoing series comes via Kentucky, where Tea Party Republican senate candidate Matt Bevin has said his potential Democratic opponent, Alison Lundergan Grimes, has no substantive experience and is running on her womanhood.
Bevin [who is primarying Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell] argued that Grimes just runs on four things: "She's young, she's new, is a woman, and she's not Mitch McConnell."I'm guessing that Lundergan Grimes doesn't so much expect women to vote for her because she's a woman, but rather because she advocates for women's interests. That's a conflation conservatives love to make, and it's why they ran a candidate like Sarah Palin with the expectation that liberal women are inclined to vote for any woman put in front of us. Whooooooops!
"She's a nice enough person," he said, but when it comes to issues, vision, or life experience, "she really has none of the above on any of those fronts."
Bevin also argued that it was "insulting" that Grimes, who has served as Kentucky's Secretary of State since 2012, would expect that women would vote for her simply based on her gender.
BEVIN: "She runs on four things. She runs on some variation of: She's young, she's new, is a woman, and she's not Mitch McConnell. That's essentially what she's got, in some form or fashion. And all those are true enough, and all of those, while they're not substantive, they're good enough to beat Mitch McConnell. [...] The reality is I negate her only competitive advantages. She's then forced to run against me by talking about issues, by talking about vision, by talking about life experience. And she really has none of the above on any of those fronts. She's a nice enough person, I've met her on several occasions on the campaign trail, seems nice enough, but completely devoid of what it takes for us."Wow.
Bevin repeated this attack during a stop in Lexington on Tuesday, arguing that Grimes is simply running as a new, young woman and saying that she is "so remarkably devoid of life experience." The attack echoes Republican strategist Brad Dayspring, who called Grimes an "empty dress" who is "incapable of articulating her own thoughts" last year.
I love the projection that goes on with white male Republican candidates, whose base is often voting for them literally just because they are white and male and have an R after their names on the ballot, irrespective of how their policies might be completely incompatible with their voters' best interests.
But it's liberal women who are playing identity politics. Because of course it is.
Good luck with your continuing outreach to female voters, GOP. Keep up the fine work. It's GOING GREAT!
Question of the Day
What was the last movie you saw in the theater?
The last movie I saw in the theater was the Captain America sequel. I'm not particularly into Cap, but Iain is a major Cap-head, so I've seen both of the Captain America movies in the theater. I didn't like the first one, but I really enjoyed the sequel!
Photo of the Day
From the Telegraph's Picture of the Day for 6 May 2014: A giraffe wanders across a hot delta at sunrise in Okavango Delta, Botswana. [Mario Moreno/Solent News]Lovely.
Aunt Betty
My Great-Aunt Betty, a couple of years before she died.
Do I even need to tell you how much I loved this woman?
I was thinking about my Aunt Betty earlier today. I don't even know what prompted the thought of her, exactly. It was a thought about getting older, and becoming a woman of a certain age, and my thoughts eventually tumbled down a path that led me back to Betty.
Aunt Betty, who married my grandfather's brother, was an ominous presence in my life long before I met her. She was the kind of woman who marries into a family and gets called by some members of that family, in whispered voices, a battleaxe. Or slightly less kind and subtle, ahem, versions of the same notion.
When I met her for the first time, or the first time in my memory, I was younger than 10. Even without the influence of things whispered about Betty to which children supposedly don't listen, I would have been terrified of her upon our first meeting.
She was stubborn and brusque and quirky and fiercely individualistic. She had been a widow for a long time, and she lived a life that satisfied her and no one else. She had strong opinions about How Things Should Be Done, from chewing food (50 times before you swallow!) to child-rearing. I often heard my mother say, "Betty is an expert on raising children, like everyone who's never had any."
I'm not certain that Betty really had ideas about child-rearing as much as she did the intractable notion that children were tiny adults. Betty always talked to me like an adult, rather than a child, which I adored even as it intimidated me.
She lived in Florida, in a home that was rich with color on the outside and quiet with neutral tones on the inside. We were sitting on her patio one morning when one of the ubiquitous lizards in her garden ran over my bare toes. I watched its tiny feet scamper across mine. "You didn't flinch," Betty said. It wasn't a question, but an observation. She nodded. "That's good. It's good you're not scared of them."
The first time we visited her, I asked for ketchup to put on my chicken. "I don't eat ketchup, I don't like ketchup, and I don't keep it in my house!" she informed me. I shrunk. And I ate my chicken without ketchup.
The second time we visited her, Betty took me shopping with her. She asked me what I wanted at the store, and I told her, and she put it in the cart. I did not say I wanted ketchup.
In the condiment aisle, she grabbed a bottle of ketchup nonetheless. "I'm buying it just for you!" she said. And I felt very loved.
I didn't understand my Aunt Betty as a child, but I knew that I loved her and that I liked her. She was hard, but she was warm. She was tough, but she was wickedly funny.
I still love and like Betty, though she's been gone for many years. The older I get, the more I understand her.
Now I'm the battleaxe who had never had kids. Whose opinions are measured and valued by conformity to ideals that do not suit me and never will.
Aunt Betty. She was meant to be a cautionary tale, not a role model.
I'm so glad I knew her. Having known her helps me know myself.
Shaker Gourmet
One of the most frequent requests I get as a general topic is for recipe-sharing threads. So here's a revival of the Shaker Gourmet series, which Misty used to run as time permitted, which I'll run periodically. Share your favorite recipes, solicit good recipes, share recipes you've recently tried, want to try, are trying to perfect, whatever! Whether they're your own creation, or something you found elsewhere, share away.
* * *
Although I love to cook and experiment in the kitchen, I am a terrible provider of recipes, because I cook by my palate rather than by measurement. But here's my best attempt at a one-pot recipe I've been making lately that Iain and I really enjoy.
Ingredients:
Olive Oil
Unsalted chicken stock
Half and half
Madeira wine
White miso paste
Minced garlic
Minced parsley (or dried)
Diced white onions
Peas (fresh or frozen)
Sliced mushrooms
Diced potatoes
Cubed chicken breast
In a french oven, warm a couple of tablespoons of olive oil over medium to high heat. Once it's hot, add the garlic and onions. Sweat 'em. Add the mushrooms and let them cook for a minute or two. Add a cup or so of the Madeira wine, and let it all cook at a boil for a few minutes. Turn down the heat to low and add a spoonful of the white miso; mix thoroughly. Turn down to low and let it cool. Add the parsley and a splash of half and half.
Bring it back to a boil and add the potatoes and chicken, then turn down to medium. If you need more liquid to cover the chicken and potatoes, round it out with some chicken stock. (Make sure it's unsalted, because the miso is salty.) Cook until chicken is done (but not too done!) and potatoes are soft to a fork. Turn down heat and add peas until they're warm, but still have some texturey pop.
If you're feeling frisky, crumble some goat cheese on top! Delish.
Daily Dose of Cute
Zelda McEwan: The jury has reached a verdict,
and you have been found GUILTY of being TOO CUTE!
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
Tweet of the Day
[Content Note: Militarism.]
My pal Stine just tweeted this image of tanks* going through the train station at Zeitz in Germany headed toward Eastern Europe, which I am sharing here with her permission:
#Tanks going through train station at Zeitz in #Germany @tanyalokot #Ukraine @Shakestweetz @rompenni pic.twitter.com/tU5T5TjoEH
— Stine Eckert (@StineEckert) May 6, 2014As Stine notes, it would be great if we had more details about what's happening, to know precisely what to make of an image like this one.
What we do know is that the German foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, believes Ukraine is "close to war," and that the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, "has ruled out holding fresh talks in Geneva to defuse the Ukraine crisis, unless pro-Russian opposition groups are involved."
Worried face.
* UPDATE: On Twitter, Andrew David Thaler notes they "are armored personnel carriers, not tanks." Which I find only slightly less terrifying. Because the point remains: Something not good is happening. Still, I thank Andrew for the correction.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: War; injury; death] The situation in Ukraine continues to deteriorate: "Ukraine is close to war, the German foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, has warned in interviews published in four European newspapers on Tuesday. Dozens are feared to have died in clashes outside Slavyansk on Monday as Ukrainian troops clashed with pro-Russia separatists. 'The bloody pictures from Odessa have shown us that we are just a few steps away from a military confrontation,' Steinmeier told El País, Le Monde, La Repubblica, and Gazeta Wyborcza. He added that the conflict had taken on an intensity 'that a short time ago we would not have considered possible.'" I have no words.
[CN: Surveillance] Welp: "Email exchanges between National Security Agency Director Gen. Keith Alexander and Google executives Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt suggest a far cozier working relationship between some tech firms and the U.S. government than was implied by Silicon Valley brass after last year's revelations about NSA spying." It appears (at least to me) that tech firms may have agreed to reasonable participation in national security operations in good faith, and sometime along the line, the requests became increasingly unreasonable.
Something something poll something something Hillary Clinton something something Jeb Bush something something Rand Paul something something 2016.
[CN: Abortion; anti-choice harassment] Emily Letts filmed her abortion and discusses why she made the decision to publicly share the film. (Spoiler Alert: It's to help destigmatize and demystify abortion!)
[CN: Sexual assault] Angus Johnston has a great write-up of the responses to the the first report of the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault.
Democratic Governor of Oregon John Kitzhaber helped save a woman's life in downtown Portland yesterday: "Kitzhaber was traveling by car through downtown Portland on his way to dinner around 5 p.m. when he noticed a woman on the ground with someone trying to help her. He ordered his driver to pull over near Southwest 13th Avenue and Main Street and instructed his security detail to call paramedics, the a spokesperson confirmed. The woman was not breathing when Kitzhaber began to perform CPR. Paramedics arrived some minutes later and took over treatment of the patient, who may have overdosed on drugs. She was taken to the hospital and is expected to live, according to the governor's office." Right on!
(Unlike the death penalty, this is the sort of life-and-death business I want our governors to be in!)
[CN: Car crash; injury] In a truly amazing story of survival, Kristin Hopkins stayed alive for five days in her wrecked car at the bottom of a hill off a Colorado highway before she was rescued: "Seeing what he thought was dead body inside a car, a firefighter went to break out the window. 'As he was attempting to strike the window, the patient put her hand against it,' said Lt. Jim Cravener of North West Fire Protection District." Blub.
ADELE IS TEASING A NEW ALBUM! I repeat: ADELE IS TEASING A NEW ALBUM!
Popey Changey!
[Content Note: Misogyny.]
Hey, remember when totes progressive Pope Francis said that women should have more influence in the Catholic Church hierarchy? And everyone was all OMG HE IS SO GREAT I LOVES THIS POPE SO MUCH? Ha ha whoooooooooops!
The Vatican official overseeing the crackdown on the largest umbrella group for U.S. nuns is pressing forward with the overhaul under Pope Francis."Nice organization you got there, ladies. It'd be a shame if something happened to it!"
Cardinal Gerhard Mueller, the Vatican orthodoxy watchdog, reprimanded officers of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious for planning to honor a theologian who had been criticized by U.S. bishops and said the sisters must show more willingness to cooperate.
Mueller made the remarks in a meeting last Wednesday with the group's leaders in Rome. He apologized repeatedly for speaking so bluntly, while reminding the sisters their organization held its status within the church only through Vatican approval.
The reform order was issued in 2012 under now-retired Pope Benedict XVI, after an investigation concluded the nuns' group had taken positions that undermined Roman Catholic teaching on the priesthood and homosexuality while promoting "radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith." Investigators praised the nuns' humanitarian work, but accused them of focusing too much on social justice and ignoring critical issues, such as fighting abortion.Sad trombone!
The nuns' group rejected the Vatican findings as "flawed" and based on "unsubstantiated accusations." Some sisters had hoped for a new approach under Pope Francis, a Jesuit who has stressed mercy over morals and has made social justice issues his top priority.
You might notice that a theme is beginning to emerge, ahem. Pope Francis says something that sounds vaguely progressive; it gets a whole lot of fawning headlines; then comes evidence that it was nothing but empty rhetoric.
Like I've said for a long time now: This guy isn't interested in progress. He's interested in good PR.
[H/T to Aphra_Behn. Related Reading: Pope Francis: Nuns Still Need to Shush About Feminism, Gay Rights. Commenting Note: Please take care in comments to distinguish between the actions of church leadership and of other Catholics who may not support their leadership in its actions.]
White House Releases Climate Change Report
The Obama administration has released a comprehensive report on the effects of climate change, filled with dire warnings and calls for action [video may begin playing automatically at link]:
The Obama administration Tuesday released an updated report on how climate change requires urgent action to counter impacts that touch every corner of the country, from oyster growers in Washington State to maple syrup producers in Vermont.I have to say, I'm pretty pessimistic about climate change. When I read "game changer," all I got is mirthless laughter, because it's already game over. The White House's urgency (at least its rhetorical urgency, when it's not telling us fairy tales about "clean coal") is great and all, but we needed a global plan of shared action about two decades ago.
"Climate change, once considered an issue for a distant future, has moved firmly into the present," the report said.
Some environmental and public health groups hailed the National Climate Assessment as a possible "game changer" for efforts to address climate change.
Okay, maybe that's a wee bit too pessimistic, even for me. I don't know that we have the capacity to reverse the damage that's already been done, but, clearly, we could resolve to not make it worse.
Whether we have the collective will to make the choices that stop accelerating climate change is a whole other story entirely.
223 Girls: Updates
[Content Note: Abduction; terrorism; misogyny; abuse.]
Yesterday, Abubakar Shekau, the leader of the Nigerian terrorist group Boko Haram who abducted 276 girls from their school three weeks ago, released a video in which he declared that the girls were now slaves, whom he would sell.
"I abducted your girls," a man claiming to be Abubakar Shekau, the group's leader, said in a video seen by the Guardian. "I will sell them in the market, by Allah. I will sell them off and marry them off. There is a market for selling humans."He is utterly brazen, showing his face and using his name on the video. Which is indicative of how little he fears consequences. And no wonder, since Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan "did not publicly comment on the abductions for two weeks and the government's clumsy handling of the case has triggered protests across almost every major city."
"Women are slaves. I want to reassure my Muslim brothers that Allah says slaves are permitted in Islam," he added, in an apparent reference to an ancient tradition of enslaving women captured during jihad, or holy war.
..."I will marry off a woman at the age of 12. I will marry off a girl at the age of nine," he said at another point in the video.
That official indifference has yielded to actively misdirecting energies and efforts, as protest leaders have been arrested and police detained and questioned 'Gbenga Sesan, the activist behind the Twitter campaign #BringBackOurGirls.
Further, the government, despite the establishment of its "fact-finding committee," has reportedly been resistant to receiving and processing information about the abduction:
Some parents say their attempts to pass on information to the authorities have been fruitless. Farmer Dauda said his daughter called him from a forest training camp for militants last week. "One of the Boko Haram people came on the phone and told us not to worry; that our daughter is in safe hands," he told the Guardian. "The man told us, we have warned you not to send your children to school and this is the consequence. Then he told us that if we are patient and follow their orders, we will see our daughter again. But the government are not interested in hearing when we try to speak to them."Which is not an issue of resources, but an issue of priorities:
The government has launched a massive security operation in the capital this week as it prepares to host the World Economic Forum, at which dignitaries and heads of state will discuss Africa's positive growth story.This lack of urgency to mobilize on behalf the missing girls has naturally had terrible consequences:
The glitz of the meeting will elude most ordinary Nigerians. Sitting forlornly on a plastic chair outside an Abuja police station, one woman who had travelled from Chibok to protest said: "We don't know why the government is treating us like we are less than animals. It is just really painful."
Reports last week said that some of the girls had been forced to marry their abductors, who paid a nominal bride price of $12 (£7).The UK and US intelligence services are coordinating efforts have offered assistance to the Nigerian government in the form of planning support, information sharing, and improving Nigeria's "forensics and investigative capacity."
Others are reported to have been taken across borders into Cameroon and Chad.
...[UK Foreign Office minister Mark Simmonds] told the BBC's Today programme that it was difficult for the Nigerian government because of the vast geographical area of the north-east.
"The forest area where the girls are rumoured to be being held is 60,000 sq km (23,166 sq miles). It's an area of hot dry scrub forest 40 times the size of London; it's a wild territory, very difficult for land and air-based surveillance operations to take place... you have extremely porous borders with neighbouring countries - Chad, Cameroon, Niger, so there are very serious challenges," he said.
...Boko Haram analyst Jacob Zenn says the girls, aged 16 to 18, have probably been split into smaller groups and it will be hard to track them.
"Any effort to rescue them will have to be done in a very piecemeal fashion and might take over a decade," he told the BBC's Newsday programme.
Boko Haram is threatening retaliation for international intervention, and I'm not sure how thrilled the Nigerian government is for the offers of assistance—or, frankly, how useful those offers of assistance really are—but the families of the missing girls are welcoming any help on offer:
Mallam Mpur, whose two nieces are among the missing: "All I can say is, as parents we are desperate and begging. If the Nigerian government cannot help us, there is no shame in appealing to other African countries or the international community for help."With 223 girls still missing, and the odds of rescuing them decreasing with each passing day, the biggest shame is how little much of the world seems to care.
Happy Birthday, Paul the Spud!
Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday to you!
You like to sit in the dark eating braunschweiger
while watching bad mooooooovieeeeees…
And OMG Shoez I do, too!
I love you, Spudsy.
Thank you for being a friend.
Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker GoldFishy: "What makes you feel empowered? (As one defines it...whether a circumstance, event, internal thought, etc.)"
On Trigger Warnings, Once More
[Content Note: Discussion of potentially triggering material.]
Awhile ago, I was interviewed by Alison Vingiano for a story about the origins of trigger warnings and how they become ubiquitous. The story has now been published, so let's read it and then discuss!
On a personal note, I want to say what a pleasure it was so speak with Vingiano, and how responsive she has been. I had one minor (but meaningful) correction to the story, and when I let her know, she was completely understanding and accommodating and fixed it right away. Awesomeness.
Shooting Culture
[Content Note: Guns; death.]
The problem isn't "gun culture," whatever that even means anymore. The problem is that we live in a shooting culture, in which both cultural narratives and laws are designed to support shooting other human beings as a first response to any perceived danger:
A 26-year-old San Francisco man was shot to death early Saturday when he went to a unit on the wrong floor of his apartment building after returning home from a night out.Here's the thing: Even if Guillermo had been "aggressive," which I'll note is a very subjective designation of behavior, he was shot as a first response. It wasn't as though the resident of the wrong flat moved into another room, behind another locked door, and phoned police, and waited to see if his life was really in danger. He simply shot the person who came to the wrong door and tried to get in.
Stephen Guillermo had been out drinking with friends, his family said, and apparently pressed the wrong floor number on the elevator of the building in the 900 block of Mission Street in the South of Market area. He got off on the third floor instead of the fifth floor, where he lived with his brother and sister, and went to the unit in the same location in the building as his home two stories above.
Guillermo was shot at 1:40 a.m. inside the third floor unit of a 68-year-old man, Amisi Sudi Kachepa, who later surrendered to police and was arrested in the shooting.
Kachepa reportedly told people in the building that he blamed Guillermo for breaking the knob on the door of his unit. The knob on the door was missing Saturday.
..."It just doesn't fit," said his sister, Sharrmaine Guillermo, adding that her brother did not become hostile when he drank, and she cannot figure out how he would even start some sort of confrontation. "Stephen is not the kind of guy who would do that."
Stephen would talk through any confrontation and would not be combative. "We're all confused, we just can't understand how it could have happened," she added.
I understand how that would be scary. I really do. But, frankly, I also think that we are obliged to experience some fear, before we pull out a gun and end another human being's life. At least enough fear to determine whether that fear is even warranted.
But that is not the culture in which we live. The culture in which we live says that you have the right to kill someone, if you have a reasonable (another subjective term) justification for your fear.
[Related Reading: On Sitting with Fear.]
The Monday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by hominy.
Recommended Reading:
Prison Culture: [Content Note: Death penalty; torture] Documenting the State Murder of Clayton Lockett
Jess: [CN: Rape culture] DePaul Student Athletes Upset Over Banner But Not About Rape
Jamilah: [CN: Slavery; misogynoir; rape] Once Again, No One Is Laughing at 'SNL'
Trudy: Three Fabulous Black Ballerinas
Michelle: [CN: Eating; discussion of disordered eating] Watch Me Eat Raspberries
Also! Stavvers does a regular round-up of interesting things she's read, and you should totally read them! Here's the latest one.
Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!
GOOD NEWS!
[Content Note: Racism; carcerality.]
Last month, I wrote about Mike Anderson, the man who, because of a clerical error, was never asked to report to prison to serve his sentence of 13 years after being convicted of armed robbery. That is, until the error was discovered, and Anderson, who had spent the intervening time building a lawful and productive life, was taken to prison after a SWAT team armed with automatic weapons showed up at his front door while he was making breakfast for his three-year-old daughter.
Now, Anderson is a free man again:
Today, after 10 months behind bars, a judge gave him back his freedom.I could not be happier for Anderson and his family and friends.
The AP reports:
Judge Terry Lynn Brown lauded Anderson's "exemplary" behavior during his 13 years of freedom before the arrest. "You've been a good father. You've been a good husband. You've been a good taxpaying citizen of the state of Missouri. That leads me to believe that you are a good man and a changed man."In a statement, Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster said he was pleased with the outcome.
As the judge announced his decision, about 10 of Anderson's relatives broke out in sobs and cried. Anderson stared straight ahead but dabbed tears from his eyes. Afterward, he hugged his toddler daughter tight. The hearing lasted about 10 minutes.
Ten months in prison, however, is no small thing. I can't imagine the disruption to his and his family's lives, and I desperately hope that he and his family are able to restore what has been lost.
[H/T to Shaker Miranda.]
Daily Dose of Cute
This guy. ♥
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
Next-To-Last Update on the Wendy Davis Transcript
Volunteers will have gotten the email last night, but I am basically done with the transcript project. (YAY! SO MANY TIRED YAY!) I've jammed all 266 transcribed segments into a single epub document, which was by far the bear share of the work. The only things left for me to do is to put words on the cover, finish putting in the full list of volunteers, and upload the thing onto Amazon and Barnes&Noble. I hope to have that finished THIS WEEK, at which point the following will happen:
1. I will sleep for a week. This project has been going on for, no joke, almost a full year. I have basically not been sleeping for the past month, just from wanting to get this done. (YAY!)
2. I will put up a final transcript update letting people know where they can get a copy, etc. Then a part of me hopes to never talk about this again, lol, not because it wasn't a good project (IT WAS. IT IS.) but just because now I have to move forward and live with the day-to-day of being in New Gilead right now and that's a lot of feels to work through.
I know some of you have asked me about a paper version of the transcript, and I gotta go thresh out some feels on that. The PDF version of this thing ended up being, like, 2,000+ "pages" long (for a large definition of "page", probably larger than a book would use), and I'm not even sure Amazon's Print on Demand service provides for something of that scope. I'd have to research that and...
...I honestly don't know if I have the brain for that right now, or if there's a corresponding level of demand to off-set the cost. I could Kickstarter it, except that too has an activation energy cost--I'm not sure I'm in a peppy-enough plce for a Kickstarter right now. So, long story short, we'll see on paper and I might need to gauge interest on that but for right now we're looking at ebook only for the near future.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Racism] It seems like Samsung's new smart watch has a race problem: A Shaker who works in a Samsung call center, and who wants to remain anonymous, emailed me with a heads-up about the new family of Samsung smart watches launched in April. The watches feature a heavily touted embedded heart-rate monitor. However, the sensor is not working particularly well — especially on skin tones other than white. Shaker Anon says, as far as zie can tell, Samsung is aware of the issue, but hasn't halted sales, nor has publicly disclosed that people of color with darker skin tones may have issues with their technology. "The last I heard," says Shaker Anon, "is a vague 'it's being looked into' statement."
The uninsured rate for US adults has dropped to a record low of 13.4%: "This is the lowest monthly uninsured rate recorded since Gallup and Healthways began tracking it in January 2008, besting the previous low of 13.9% in September of that year. The uninsured rate peaked at 18.0% in the third quarter of 2013, but has consistently declined since then." Huh! I wonder what it is that could have had this remarkable effect? "This downward trend in the uninsured rate coincided with the health insurance marketplace exchanges opening in October 2013." Welp. The floor is yours, Republicans! *crickets*
(I will note, again, that I have problems with the ACA, and also observe that 13.4% uninsured is still far too high. But that doesn't mean this hasn't been a game-changer for a hell of a lot of people. More and more and more progress on access to healthcare, please!)
[CN: War; violence] The situation in Ukraine continues to deteriorate: "Ukrainian troops fought pitched gun battles Monday with pro-Russian militias occupying the eastern city of Slovyansk, and the government sent an elite national guard unit to the southern port city of Odessa as Kyiv scrambled to bring much of the country back under the capital's control. The Ukrainian Interior Ministry said four officers have been killed and another 30 soldiers injured in the fighting. Gunfire and multiple explosions were heard in and around Slovyansk, a city of 125,000 people that has become the focus of the armed insurgency against the new interim government in Kyiv."
[CN: Terrorism; school violence] In Waseca, Minnesota, a 17-year-old's plan to kill his family and cause massive damage and injury at his high school was thwarted by police: "The investigation began in late March after three small explosive devices were discovered at an elementary school playground in the city of 9,400 people, about 80 miles south of Minneapolis. The youth allegedly admitted setting off practice bombs there. He allegedly told police he planned to shoot his mother, father and sister, then start a fire in a rural field to distract first-responders while he went to the school to set off pressure-cooker bombs in the cafeteria. He also allegedly planned to throw Molotov cocktails, gun down students, and kill a school liaison officer while he helped injured students. He said his ultimate goal was for a SWAT team to kill him. ...Police recovered seven firearms, ammunition and three functional bombs from the boy's home, along with black clothing and a ski mask." What a huge relief that he was caught in time. What a terrifying situation for the residents of Waseca nonetheless.
[CN: Christian Supremacy] The Supreme Court has ruled "that a town in upstate New York may begin its public meetings with a prayer from a 'chaplain of the month,'" because of course they have. Background on the case here and here.
In good news: "The United States Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (OCR) issued guidelines this week clarifying for the first time that Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibits discrimination against transgender students. 'Title IX's sex discrimination prohibition extends to claims of discrimination based on gender identity or failure to conform to stereotypical notions of masculinity or femininity and OCR accepts such complaints for investigation,' the guidelines state. The guidance, included in a larger document on school's responsibilities to protect students from sexual violence, also declares that schools must provide equal access to all programs and facilities for transgender students, consistent with the student's gender identity."
[CN: Sexual violence] Last month, director Bryan Singer was accused in a lawsuit of drugging and sexually assaulting a teenage boy in 1999. Another suit has been filed, alleging sexual abuse of another teenage boy. Singer's lawyer denies the allegations, naturally.
[CN: Guns; violence] The latest news from the Oscar Pistorius trial is that a neighbor testified Pistorius was upset after shooting and killing Reeva Steenkamp. I'm sure he was.
And finally, this is one of the best stories ever: After their dog Reckless was separated from them during Hurricane Sandy, the James family searched and searched for him, but couldn't find him. "Eighteen months later, the James family decided it was time to welcome another dog to their hearts and restored home. ...Charles and Elicia walked into Monmouth County SPCA to adopt their new family member but instead spotted Reckless, the one they had lost 1.5 years ago. 'I told my wife 'That dog looks like Reckless' and she said 'It is Reckless!'' Charles James told NY Daily News. 'He started jumping three feet in the air and we started crying.'" ALL THE BLUBS FOREVERRRRRR!
Quote of the Day
"'How are you so confident?' I'm an asshole! Okay? It's my good time, and my good life, despite what you think of me. I live my life, because I dare. I dare to show up when everyone else might hide their faces and hide their bodies in shame. I show up because I'm an asshole, and I want to have a good time."—Gabourey Sidibe, in a speech, transcribed here, that she delivered last Thursday at the Ms Foundation Women of Vision Gala.
[H/T to everyone in the multiverse, and my thanks to each and every one of you!]
Protest March Leaders Arrested in Nigeria
[Content Note: Abduction; terrorism; misogyny; abuse.]
Three weeks after 276 Nigerian school girls were abducted, 223 of whom are still missing after some of the girls managed to escape, the Nigerian government has been roundly criticized for its inaction in recovering the girls, held by terrorist organization Boko Haram.
Last week, in an embarrassing demonstration of his administration's lack of urgency, Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan established a "fact-finding committee" to "map out strategies to rescue the more than 200 abducted female students of Government Secondary School Chibok in Borno State" and to "liaise with relevant authorities and the parents of the missing students to establish the actual number and identities of girls abducted; interface with the security services and Borno state to ascertain how many of the girls have returned; mobilise the surrounding communities and the general public to support the rescue strategy and operation among other terms of reference."
This colossal insufficiency was met with a protest march, the female organizers of which have been arrested:
Saratu Angus Ndirpaya, from of Chibok where the kidnappings took place, said state security service agents drove her and protest leader Naomi Mutah Nyadar to a police station on Monday after an all-night meeting at the presidential villa in Abuja, the capital.So, while the actual terrorist organization responsible for the kidnapping, who have released 57-minute video claiming responsibility, remain at large and unaccountable, the women who march in protest of that inaction are accused of being members of that organization to discredit their criticism. Awesome.
She said police immediately released her but that Nyadar remains in detention.
...Ndirpaya says First Lady Patience Jonathan accused them of fabricating the abductions.
"She [Jonathan] told so many lies, that we just wanted the government of Nigeria to have a bad name, that we did not want to support her husband's rule," she said in a telephone interview with AP.
Ndirpaya said other women at the meeting cheered and chanted "yes, yes," when the first lady accused them of belonging to Boko Haram, the group accused of kidnapping the girls.
"They said we are Boko Haram, and that Mrs Nyadar is a member of Boko Haram."
She said Nyadar and herself do not have daughters among those abducted, but are supporting the mothers of the kidnapped daughters.
International governments, including the United States, have offered the Nigerian government assistance in the search and rescue of the missing girls. My strong suspicion is that outside intervention on the ground would not improve these girls' fates, but would put them in even more danger. Instead, I would like to see the US and other countries put enormous pressure on the Nigerian government to take meaningful action. Immediately.
Yeah, It's a Real Mystery Why Hillary Clinton Doesn't Like the Press
[Content Note: Misogyny; violence.]
See, here's the thing: It's not "self-pity" to feel upset that there are news organizations who casually invoke your assassination while willfully misconstruing your comments in order to demonize you:
On the May 3 edition of [Fox News' Cashin' In], panelist Wayne Rogers criticized the Obama administration's response to the September 2012 attacks [in Benghazi] and in particular then-Secretary of State Clinton's comments at a Senate hearing, in which she asked "what difference at this point does it make" when questioned about the editing process of a set of talking points relating to the attacks.When you think it's absolutely fine to toss out a rhetorical about someone being assassinated while running for president, for any reason, no less in the process of a mendacious attempt to discredit that person, you really need to stop and take a breath and reexamine your fucking life.
Distorting the nature of her comments, Rogers asked his fellow Fox panelists, "Imagine that Hillary Clinton runs for President and gets assassinated in the process and somebody shows up — a Congressman — and says, 'well, what difference does it make anyway?' I mean — The New York Times would have it on the front page."
Host Eric Bolling agreed, adding, "They would have a field day."
Co-panelist Juan Williams quickly explained to Rogers and Bolling that they were distorting comments Clinton made while testifying about the attack.
During her January 2013 testimony, Clinton responded to a question from Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) about the State Department's role in editing Obama administration talking points on the attack, and said, "[T]he fact is, we had four dead Americans. Was it because of a protest? Or was it because of guys out for a walk one night and decided they'd go kill some Americans? What difference at this point does it make?" She added, "It is our job to figure out what happened and do everything we can to prevent it from ever happening again."
Conservative media figures have repeatedly distorted this Clinton comment, imagining it to reflect indifference to the lives lost in the attack, including Ambassador Chris Stevens. In reality, it is a direct rebuttal to the ongoing conservative obsession with the set of talking points, which were subject to changes made based on intelligence assessments available at the time. Clinton was accurately noting during her testimony that given the ongoing efforts to capture those who were responsible for the attacks and to provide security for U.S. consulates and embassies, the bureaucratic details of who edited a government memo were trivial at best.
