The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Edge Of Tomorrow

Posted on | June 27, 2014 | 24 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


I may be one of the few people in America who hasn’t seen Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, but I feel fairly comfortable in asserting that at no point in that movie does Andie McDowell shoot Bill in the head. This happens a LOT in Edge of Tomorrow, where Tom Cruise’s character, Marine PR major William Cage, finds himself condemned to participate in the invasion of Europe as a buck private after turning down an assignment to serve as an embed in the invasion force. Unfortunately for Cage and his squadmates, the aliens occupying Europe know they’re coming, and the invasion is a spectaularly bloody debacle in which Cage and war heroine Sgt. Rita Vrataski (the “Full Metal Bitch”) both die – but not before she tells him “Look for me when you wake up!”. Cage does wake up, repeating the day over and over again in a hideous real-life rendition of first-person shooter videogames. The reason why this is happening, and how Cage and Vrataski use the loopback to sharpen Cage’s combat skills and eventually figure a way out of the no-win situation they’re in, make for a fascinating if frequently horrible movie. I am given to understand that the movie has a different ending from the original Japanese novel All You Need Is Kill, which I guess isn’t too surprising; the manga version in turn differs from both on various plot points. It was a very good movie, and I may go see it again before it disappears from the theaters.


Aside from that, I’ve been working my way through Gene Wolfe’s Shadow & Claw and Sword & Citadel, which together contain the four novels that make up Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun. I’d passed this up when it first came out, being allergic to things that were popular, and I have to say I’m sorry I waited. The tale of Severian the torturer is an interesting one; while set in the far future, it often feels like a mythic tale set in the distant past, perhaps in some era of Classical Greece. This is partly due to Wolfe’s choice of language: he deliberately chooses archaic and obscure words to describe people and things, and by doing so manages to evoke a sense of wonder while paradoxically precisely describing the people and things he is writing about, in much the same way the late William F. Buckley Jr. would often use one fifty-dollar word in place of a dozen cheaper words. I am enjoying them tremendously, and if you haven’t read them, I suggest you pick them up.


Since I got paid today, next week I’ll be talking about the International Lord of Hate’s Monster Hunter Nemesis, Tom Kratman’s The Rods and the Axe, and Andy Weir’s The Martian.


Category: Books, Movies

Fun With #RadFem: ‘You Magnificent Lesbians — I Read Your Books!’

Posted on | June 27, 2014 | 20 Comments

“Something very strange happened toward the end of the twentieth century. Heterosexuality went from being the norm to being on the defensive. By calling this phenomenon ‘heterophobia,’ I am not speaking abstractly. Rather, I am referring to a distinct current within feminism [since the late 1960s], a current that has been ‘theorized’ explicitly by feminist scholars and agitators alike as they attack men and heterosexuality. . . .
“But heterophobia is not merely the work of lesbian separatists, since they, vastly outnumbered by heterosexual women, could never have imposed such an agenda were it not acceptable to heterosexual feminists as well. . . .
“The British lesbian separatist Sheila Jeffreys, in her 1990 book Anticlimax, gives a clear account of the attitude I am calling ‘heterophobia.’ The ‘sexual revolution,’ Jeffreys argues, is positively detrimental to women. The aim of women’s liberation . . . is ‘the destruction of heterosexuality as a system.’ . . . Far from being grounded in biology, heterosexual desire ‘originates in the power relationship between men and women’ . . . What sort of sexuality, then, does Jeffreys approve of? ‘The opposite of heterosexual desire is the eroticising of sameness, a sameness of power, equality and mutuality. It is homosexual desire.'”
— Daphne Patai, Heterophobia: Sexual Harassment and the Future of Feminism (1998)

It is true, as Professor Patai makes clear, that the lesbian radicalism of Sheila Jeffreys was, in the 1990s, at or near the ultra fringe of feminist theory. However, it is also true that “mainstream” feminism, even 15 or 20 years ago, never condemned such radicalism but borrowed from the anti-male analyses written by women whose hostile attitude toward heterosexuality was as explicit as it was personal.

Understanding this phenomenon does not require us to engage the specific content of every theory propagated by radical feminists since the 1960s, although in the past few months I have excerpted the works of several of the most notable of them. It is not necessary that I refute their arguments or disprove their analyses for the very reason that it does not matter, for my purposes, whether they are right or wrong. As a matter of fact, there are certain passages of the most radical feminist treatises where I find myself nodding in agreement.

What conservative would disagree, for example, with Sheila Jeffreys’ assertion that the sexual revolution of the past half-century has in many ways been harmful to women? How many abortions, divorces and loveless hookups with selfish creeps does it take before a “liberated” young woman starts wondering if maybe her grandmother had a genuinely better deal back in the supposedly barbaric 1950s?

Yet a conservative critique of the sexual revolution based in myopic nostalgia for the Good Old Days is futile, and no more helpful to women living in the early 21st century than the obsolete rantings of radical feminists who inevitably view the past as the Bad Old Days.

A politics that promises a return to the past is guaranteed to fail because time moves in only one direction. We can learn from the past, but we cannot go back there. By studying the past, we seek an answer to an important question: How did we get here? And we can also, by plotting the trajectory points, get a good estimate of where we are heading in the future, if we continue going in the same direction.

To put it bluntly: We are going to Hell, by the most direct route.

Last summer, I wrote a post with the title, “Taking Feminism Seriously,” which in retrospect seems like the start of a series. A few people have suggested I compile my writing about feminism into a book, a proposal that gives me a headache.

Nevertheless, the point I wish to make now is that I do take feminism seriously, despite my habitual sarcasm. Just because Marxist lesbians seem ridiculous to sane people, doesn’t mean that feminists are not serious in their craziness. A phrase like “the destruction of heterosexuality as a system” may strike us as lunatic gibberish, but there are influential academics — tenured professors of Women’s Studies — who toil daily toward that goal. Even if their radical project is ultimately doomed, even if we believe that human nature must ultimately triumph over ideology, this doesn’t mean that the destructive work of feminism has no impact. To see self-described “queer feminist” Sara Alcid denounce Valentine’s Day as a celebration of “heteronormativity and gender roles . . . the very systems of domination that we work to critique and dismantle” is sad testimony to the fact that this insanity is contagious. And of course, “PIV is always rape, OK?”

Yes, it’s true: The anonymously crazy blogger at Radical Wind — “dropped on her head” — has returned to the feminist fray. After weeks of silence following her global-warming gloomfest, she took up a critique of radical lesbianism that is so nuanced only a Women’s Studies major could understand it. Her chief complaint is that some lesbian feminists condemn other women as benefitting from “heterosexual privilege,” a rhetoric Windy rejects because (a) there is nothing “privileged” about being raped and enslaved by men, (b) the category “heterosexual” is itself a male-imposed myth, and (c) women who criticize other women are misplacing blame, because everything that is wrong in the world can and should be blamed on men. She then followed up with a lengthy explainer:

Intercourse and hetero-captivity being the central building block of men’s oppression, it comes to no surprise that men do everything to erase our awareness of it. . . .
The essence of heterosexuality is sexual violation, and no woman has escaped this violation when in close and prolonged contact with men. . . .
Heterosexuality is compulsory, that is we are psychologically conditioned (through propaganda) and physically forced into it (through sexual harassment, rape, marriage and pimping). This is one of the very basic tenets of radical feminism. Compulsory means the opposite of choice. By definition women never choose to be owned by a man, and the only free choice we can make is to resist hetero-captivity by becoming separatist, lesbian or celibate.
Heterosexuality is the system which guarantees each man sexual access to a woman and exclusive ownership over her so he can rape, impregnate and use her as his personal breeder and domestic slave. . . .
The term “heterosexuality” is fairly recent in history, and appeared in the 19th century at the same time as the pathologisation and psychologisation of lesbians and gays. When women started to free themselves from the institution of marriage, men progressively replaced marriage with compulsory intercourse to all men, and this was sold as sexual liberation to women. However this was nothing other than the liberation of lefty men so they could fuck all the women they wanted outside of the constraints of bourgeois society . . .

Read the whole thing if you need more anti-male enlightenment. “The personal is political,” and if your personal experience — either as a woman or a man, heterosexual or not — fails to corroborate the radical feminist analysis, the question is, “Why?”

Windy’s answer is that you have been “psychologically conditioned” to enjoy your hetero-captivity and oppression: The patriarchy has brainwashed you, because women can “never choose to be owned by a man . . . as his personal breeder and domestic slave.”

All women are victims of the patriarchy, whether they know it or not, and if women don’t realize how oppressed they are, it is only because they haven’t been enlightened by feminist consciousness.

“Feminism Is a Journey to Lesbianism,” as I’ve previously explained, and it is not my purpose to prove feminists wrong about this.

If they say the penis is oppressing them, let ’em do without it.

Being bound by “the constraints of bourgeois society” myself — as a married father of six who recently became a grandfather — I am not at liberty to take a personal interest in women’s decisions to subtract themselves from oppressive hetero-captivity. Keeping my own “personal breeder and domestic slave” happy is difficult enough, without concerning myself with the discontents of other women.

What does concern me, however, is how feminism’s anti-male rhetoric insults every man — and every woman who loves men. Even if I don’t give a damn what feminists think of me, what about my four sons and my grandson? Why about my wife and daughters? Am I really supposed to remain silent when confronted by radicals who insist that my oldest daughter is being cruelly victimized by my son-in-law, and who further insist that my daughter (who graduated summa cum laude) is too stupid to know she’s oppressed?

Damn you, and damn your insulting ideology.

There is no use in being too angry about these insults, however. “The personal is political,” and feminists who feel a personal sense of grievance toward men do not think specifically about me, my wife or my children when they publish their anti-male screeds. And knowing that their grievances are personal — they are angry about how they have been treated by specific men, and have generalized their personal experience into an anti-male ideology — I don’t begrudge them their anger.

Feminists are so cute when they’re offended.

The politically correct sexuality advocated by Sheila Jeffries — based on “a sameness of power, equality and mutuality” — is rejected even by many lesbians. Do you really want me to quote the words of a hard-core butch lesbian who is tired of being told that she and other butches (and the women who love them) are doing lesbianism wrong? Or perhaps you’d like me to quote a femme lesbian describing how awkward and inauthentic she felt when a partner asked her to wear the strap-on?

News flash: Sameness is boring.

Intellectuals can sit around all day “theorizing” sexuality to fit their own rigid ideological categories, but real human beings are not androgynous interchangeable units. We are different and therefore unequal and you know something? We like it that way!

Being different is sexy. Even within the context of sameness, people find their differences sexy. Go to any Catholic parish in America and see how many Italian-Irish half-breeds you find. It’s almost a cliché nowadays: Every Catholic under 30 named Murphy has a mother whose maiden name was Castellano and vice-versa.

For that matter, I’m a blue-eyed Southerner who married a brown-eyed Yankee; our redheaded oldest daughter married an Argentine (whose nickname is “Che”); and our nearly six-foot-tall 15-year-old son is now dating a girl who is approximately 5-foot-2. Based on the general pattern, there must be a commie peacenik girl somewhere who will one day marry our Army paratrooper son.

A rigid egalitarianism that demands androgynous uniformity — the abolition of gender, as feminists phrase it — fails to take into consideration the voluntary nature of our preferences and how our orientation toward difference benefits both man and woman. We are able to admire and desire each other without envy or resentment. Is Sheila Jeffreys correct that heterosexual desire “originates in the power relationship between men and women”? Who cares?

We want what we want, and we get what we get, and somewhere in that process of wanting and getting, we hope to find happiness.

Feminists view happiness as a zero-sum game in which all happiness enjoyed by men is the product of subtraction from women’s happiness. This is absurd. Men expend enormous effort in their attempts to make women happy, and if we don’t do as much as we should — if, at the end of the day, the women in our lives still experience a happiness deficit — this failure makes us unhappy, too.

Feminism’s fetishistic obsession with power does not signify a concern for the well-being of women; rather, it signifies a totalitarian ambition, a sadistic appetite for revenge, a desire to obtain psychological validation by inflicting humiliation on men.

Unable to find happiness themselves, they insist on making us all equally unhappy. And the bad new is, they’re succeeding.





 

Category: Feminism

Homo Bureaucratus Is The Problem

Posted on | June 27, 2014 | 20 Comments

by Smitty

Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.–Lord Acton

Over time, even petty amounts of power bring out the Nixon in all of us. Via Instapundit, Mark Fiztgibbons writes:

In America’s first 100 years, federal officials could be sued in state courts for acting beyond their authority. In his book Creating the Administrative Constitution, Yale law professor Jerry Mashaw chronicles how this helped temper bad behavior.

Law professor Glenn Reynolds over at Instapundit is among those who believe that government officials need more civil and criminal liability for their bad acts. There are some private remedies on the books, but they are too weak to be effective.

Liability is not nothing, but I think it’s peripheral to the issue of concentrating power. Power makes cocaine look like talcum. Witness Cochran’s cheerful apparent flouting of the rules in the Mississippi GOP senatorial runoff. Likely not a surfeit of altruism in his case.

There still is no work-around for the need to have offices, and for officials to occupy them. However, in our Information Age, there isn’t any excuse for the rules being other than simple, understandable, and open to all. Furthermore, the kind of ball-hogging we see with career bureaucrats is clearly a 20th century holdover. Thus, other than the military, I submit that about a 10 year cap on all civil service positions would make sense. Keep the job simple, let people do the job, and let them get out of the way for someone else.

Let’s term-limit the corruption in our government down to an absolute minimum, say I. Homo bureaucratus is not the solution.

Category: Corruption, Instapundit

Think Of The U.S. As Walmart, And Nancy Pelosi As A Demented Greeter

Posted on | June 27, 2014 | 12 Comments

by Smitty

Botox Barbie puts a cosmetically crafted smile on matters:

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi will travel to the southern border of the U.S. on Saturday to be briefed by Customs and Border Protection on the flood of unaccompanied minors entering the country.

The California Democrat will also meet with a group of children held at the South Texas Detention Facility.

“The humanitarian crisis unfolding across our nation’s southern border demands Congress come together and find thoughtful, compassionate and bipartisan solutions,” Pelosi said. “We must ensure our laws are fully enforced, so that due process is provided to unaccompanied children and the safety and well-being of unaccompanied children is protected. We must also work to address the root causes of the problem.”

I guess there is probably some fool in Portland, Oregon who doesn’t think this so-called “humanitarian crisis” isn’t some kind of manufactured Cloward-Piven event. I sincerely hope that nothing bad happens to Princess Pelosi while she’s getting her photo op on. She’ll get her justice before the Almighty, and she certainly doesn’t deserve any martyrdom here under the sun.

Category: Democrats, Nancy Pelosi

LIVE AT FIVE: 06.27.14

Posted on | June 27, 2014 | 7 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
Partition Not Seen As Cure For Iraq

Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army militia on parade in Baghdad


Shiite Imam al-Sadr Issues Warning To ISIS Jihadis
Shiite leaders push for PM al-Maliki’s resignation

Kerry Challenges Putin To Prove He’s For Peace In Ukraine
:facepalm:


Supremes Strike Down Massachusetts Abortion Clinic Buffer Zones
Infringes on pro-life protesters’ 1st Amendment rights



POLITICS
Special Prosecutor: Scott Walker Not Targeted In John Doe Probe

“Just one more step in setting the record straight.”

Mary Burke, Mother Jones hardest hit

Supremes Nix Obama’s “Recess” Appointments

Former Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker Dies, 88

VA Reform Bill Delayed Until After Independence Day Holiday

Federal Judge Upholds Colorado Gun Restrictions


Obama Seeks $500M To Equip, Train Syrian Rebels

NYC Council Approves Ordinance To Issue ID To Illegals

Pennsylvania Considers Performance-Based Layoffs For Teachers

Officials Claim CIA Let Iraq Spy Network Wither

Groups Seek UN Help To Restore Detroit Water Service

Miami Police Chief Calls For Changes To Critical Mass

Senate Immigration Bill Declared Dead



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Asian Crude Drops As Iraq Crisis Not Seen To Affect Supplies: NYMEX $105.79, Brent $113.20
Nikkei Leads Losses In Asia After Hawkish Fed Remarks
GoPro Shares Soar 30% In Debut
NZ Dollar Shines In Subdued Currency Market
Crafts Retailer Michaels Raises $473M In IPO
Restrained Consumer Spending Damps US Growth Optimism
Android Wear Devices Are Remote Controls For Phones, Not Dick Tracy Gadgets
The Aereo Ruling: Winners And Losers
Facebook Battles Manhattan DA Over Warrants For User Data
Google Starts Scrubbing Search Results After EU “Right To Be Forgotten” Ruling
Google Cardboard: The Best Wearable You’re Not Wearing



SPORTS
Twins’ Surge Screeches To A Halt

Twins had no solution for Weaver

Ninth inning rally falls short as Angels seal the sweep with 6-4 win

Hope Solo Apologizes After Arrest

Snakes Fall To Tribe 6-1

2014 NBA Draft Team-By-Team

Astros Avert Sweep, Stun Braves 6-1

Pooped-Out Pale Hose Get Blanked By Blue Jays

West Indies Bowl Out NZ For 293 In Third Test

Newly Appointed ICC Chair Srinisavan Under Fire From Aussie Media

World Cup: US Loses, Advances Anyway

Cubs Pull 5-3 Win Over Nats Out Of The Fog



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
The Shailene Woodley Outtakes

Vanity Fair’s July cover girl

Defending Miley Cyrus, aspiring to play Stevie Nicks

Shia LaBeouf Arrested At Broadway “Cabaret” Performance

Sherri Shepherd Exiting “The View”


Lindsay Lohan To Make West End Theatre Debut In “Speed The Plow”

My Castmate Put A Hit On Me!

Beyonce, Jay-Z Show Wedding Video, Baby Pics As Tour Opens In Miami

J-Lo Gets A Visit From Ex Casper Smart

Bravo Bloodbath – Entire Cast Of “Real Housewives Of NY” But One Gets The Axe

Tom Hanks In Talks To Reunite With Meg Ryan In “Ithaca”



FOREIGNERS
Argentina Tests US Court Decision By Posting Interest Payment
Ukraine Rebels Free Four OSCE Observers, Four Still Captive
Norks Test New Precision-Guided Missiles
Iran Reportedly Sent Military Advisors, Head Of Quds Force To Iraq
EU To Ignore UK’s Cameron, Install Juncker
Reports On Jimmy Savile Reveal Litany Of Abuse
Blast At Gas Pipeline In Andhra Pradesh Kills Fourteen
EU Leaders Put Differences Aside To Commemmorate First World War At Ypres
Pakistan Army: No Good Or Bad Taliban; Every Terrorist Will Be Taken Out
Ukraine To Sign EU Deal That Sparked Maidan Revolution



BLOGS & STUFF
Michelle Malkin: Obstructionism Is Patriotic
Twitchy: Chris McDaniel – “We Haven’t Conceded” As More Allegations Of Fraud Surface
Military Times: Are The Marines Procuring Themselves To Irrelevance?
Newsmax: Computer Experts Doubt IRS Lost Trove Of Lerner E-Mails
American Power: Coincidence Or Crime? Anti-McDaniel Race-Baiting Flyers Look Like Work Of Haley Barbour Super-PAC
American Thinker: A Heartbreaking Unspoken Consequence Of Obama
BLACKFIVE: The Elephant In The Room – The Wolf Or Diplomatic Notes
Blackmailers Don’t Shoot: Speaking Of Anti-Semites…
Conservatives4Palin: Obama’s Amnesty Schemes Causing Spike In Young Illegals
Don Surber: Daily Scoreboard, June 26
Jammie Wearing Fools: Irony – IRS Thug Lois Lerner Received “Prestigious” Council On Governmental Ethics Law Award
Joe For America: ISIS Terrorists Rape Christian Mother, Daughter, Kill Four Others
JustOneMinute: The Soccer/PoliticsMash-Up
Pat Dollard: MS Tea Party Claims At Least 800 Illegal Votes In Hinds County Alone
Protein Wisdom: My Response To The GOP Pragmatists
Shot In The Dark: The ACLU Gets One Right
The Jawa Report: Kurds Ice UK Jihadi
The Lonely Conservative: Medicaid Made $14.4M In Improper Payments In 2013
This Ain’t Hell: VFW Calls For Boycott Of Mexico
Weasel Zippers: North Alabama’s Only Abortion Clinic Closing Today
Megan McArdle: Lois Lerner’s E-Mails – Ruh-Roh


Shop Amazon – Contract Cell Phones & Service Plans

Category: Live at Five

Media Bias and Women With Penises

Posted on | June 26, 2014 | 43 Comments

“I am willing to wager that Molly Ball has never once applied the terms ‘extreme’ or ‘fringe’ to any contingent of the Democrat Party coalition. . . . No matter how far off into Crazyland a leftist may wander, so long as he or she continues to support the Democrat Party, no liberal journalist will ever stigmatize them as angry extremists. It’s only Republicans who get shoved through the plate-glass window, so to speak.”
— Robert Stacy McCain, “The Angry Fringe,” The American Spectator

Talk about ironic coincidences: I woke up in the wee hours to find Molly Ball of the Atlantic characterizing Chris McDaniel’s supporters as fringe extremists, cranked out a thousand-word response at The American Spectator before 7 a.m. and then, checking Molly Ball’s Twitter account, discovered she had just won an award from the National Press Club:

Molly Ball of The Atlantic won the Lee Walczak Award for Political Analysis for her coverage of the divided Republican Party after the 2012 election.

The National Press Club is decadent and depraved, to borrow a famous phrase, and the fact that they gave Molly Ball an award is therefore proof that her analysis must be badly flawed. Q.E.D.

Here’s the genuinely weird part, though: I like Molly Ball.

She’s actually one of the more “fair and balanced” reporters within the viciously biased liberal gang of Mainstream Journalists.

A distaff Dave Weigel, as it were.

Molly Ball is an excellent reporter and a good analyst who, unlike the Vox/Salon/TPM crowd, doesn’t rely on Media Matters to tell her what to think. She actually goes out and talks to Republicans, which is something you’ll never catch Brian Beutler doing.

Yet as Rush Limbaugh says, if all he wanted to do is talk about liberal media bia, he could do it three hours a day, five days a week, and the same is true for bloggers. At some level, every story that interests me is a story about media bias. If the New York Times and other mainstream media had reported about Brett Kimberlin’s “progressive activism,” there would have been no need for me to pay attention, and I wouldn’t be getting sued for millions of dollars.

By the same token, I wouldn’t be writing daily about radical feminism if it weren’t for the fact that the mainstream media are so intent on pretending there is no such thing as radical feminism. All feminism is mainstream, the liberal media would have us believe, and only feminism’s opponents deserve the Extreme Fringe label. Gosh, if only there were an award-winning reporter available . . .

Here’s a story assignment for Molly Ball: There will be a conference of radical feminists in London Aug. 30-31. Among the speakers is Janice Raymond, a Women’s Studies professor at the University of Massachusetts who is the bête noire of transsexuals. The conference is “woman only” and, if Molly can prove that she does not have and never has had a penis, she could attend that conference and report on the “extreme elements” and “angry fringe” of the feminist movement — some of whom are so extreme that even I agree with them (e.g., people with penises are not women).

Am I joking? Do I really think that the Atlantic would send their award-winning political reporter to London to cover a conference of Marxist lesbian man-haters? I don’t know if they would, but I do think they should. It isn’t hard to imagine what excellent opportunities for genuine gonzo journalism might result from such an assignment, and if men weren’t forbidden to attend, I might be rattling the tip jar to scrape up plane fare to London myself. (Go ahead and hit my tip jar anyway — just to piss off the feminists.)

What kind of reporting could Molly Ball do at FemiFest 2014? She could do it in the same Anthropologist-Among-the-Natives style that liberal journalists use when covering CPAC every year. Or she might do it in “investigative undercover” style to Expose the Hidden Secrets of Radical Feminism, like a liberal journalist sneaking into a Koch-funded event. The possibilities are tantalizing, even aside from the lurid concupiscent imagination of what goes on behind closed doors at an international convocation of hard-core dykes.

No kidding: I believe Molly Ball could return from London with enough notes for a 10,000-word Serious Journalism article about radical feminism that could make the cover of the Atlantic print edition. perhaps becoming the basis of a book on the subject, and such a book is long overdue. Mainstream liberalism has spent decades pretending that radical feminism doesn’t exist, but in the post-Windsor era, aren’t these Marxist lesbian fanatics more relevant than ever?

It is a central part of our radical feminist analysis that gender is a tool of women’s oppression, not women’s liberation. FemiFest organisers share the view that gender is a human created power hierarchy based on reproductive sex. This gendered power arrangement relegates women to a social status that is secondary to men. None of the organisers consider ourselves to have an innate gender — neither masculine, feminine, trans, cis, gender queer, or any other gender. We are gender abolitionists who have been raised and socialized as girls and women because of our female bodies in the context of a male supremacist social system.

Yeah, baby. Keep talking sexy like that and I might buy you a drink.




 

Category: Feminism, Media Bias

LIVE AT FIVE: 06.26.14

Posted on | June 26, 2014 | 6 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
Iraq’s Al-Maliki Tells US To Get Stuffed

No national salvation government for Iraq

Rejects Kerry’s calls for unity government

Russia Renounces Right To Send Troops Into Ukraine
West demands end to fighting

Supremes Uphold Cell Phone Privacy
Court requires police to get a warrant before rumbling mobiles





POLITICS
E-Mails Show Lerner Wanted IRS To Audit Chuck Grassley – Before He’d Even Filed

Lerner and Senator Chuck Grassley

More evidence of political targeting

Two Senior VA Officials Step Down

Boehner To File Suit Against White House For Failure To Execute Laws


EPA In Denver = Everybody Pooping Anywhere

Army: “No Reason To Believe” Bergdahl Collaborated With Taliban

Democrat Megadonor Tom Steyer Accused Of Hypocrisy

NYT Credits Black Democrats With Cochran’s Win

More Missing E-Mails, Crashed Hard Drives, This Time At The EPA



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Asian Crude Drops On “Unexpected” Rise In Inventories: NYMEX $106.68, Brent $114.20
GoPro Prices Shares At $24 Ahead Of IPO
Econmy Shrank At 2.9% In Q1, Effect Seen As “Temporary”
B&N To Spin Off Nook As Sales Continue To Fall
Limited Free Wifi Coming To NYC Area Airports
Regions Bank Fined $51 Million For Accounting Fraud
House Passes Bill To Expedite LNG Export Approval
Google Drive Update Brings Native Editing For Microsoft Office Files
Like Other Tech Giants, Facebook Very White, Very Male
IBM, Lenovo Trying To Address US Security Concerns Over Server Deal
Netgear CEO Says “Internet Of Things” The Place To Be
Eleanor Holmes Norton Kills Driverless Car



SPORTS
Lincecum No-Hits Padres For Second Time

Lincecum gets a big hug from catcher Hector Sanchez

4-0 win makes Lincecum, legendary Christy Mathewson two of a kind


Braves Shut Out Punchless Astros

Yankees Avoid Sweep, Top Blue Jays 5-3

NFL Lifts Payout Cap In Concussion Settlement


A’s Pound Mets’ Wheeler, Who Blames Stolen Signs

Brown Boots It Away As Phillies Fall To Fish

Vanderbilt Edges Virginia For First CWS Title

Reds Beat Cubs 4-1

Snakes Edge Tribe 9-8 In Extras

Price K’s 11 To Deny Pirates The Sweep; Rays Win 5-1

Cuba Punishes Six Baseball Players For Trying To Defect

Strasburg Shelled, Nats Fall To Brewers 9-2



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Eli Wallach Dies, 98

Officer: “…wanted in 14 counties of this state, the condemned is found guilty of the crimes of murder, armed robbery of citizens, state banks and post offices, the theft of sacred objects, arson in a state prison, perjury, bigamy, deserting his wife and children, inciting prostitution, kidnapping, extortion, receiving stolen goods, selling stolen goods, passing counterfeit money, and, contrary to the laws of this state, the condemned is guilty of using marked cards… and therefore the court sentences you,
Tuco Benedicto Pacifico Juan Maria Ramirez-“,
Blondie: “-known as ‘The Rat’.”
Officer: “-to hang by the neck until dead. Proceed.”

A great actor of the stage, film and TV for over sixty years.

First Look At “Mad Max: Fury Road”

Norks Threaten War On US Over Seth Rogen Movie

“Survivor” Contestant Crushed Between Railway Cars

Adam Levine: “I Did Not Have Sex With Lindsay Lohan!”

Britney Spears, David Lucado Break Up

Melissa McCarthy’s Interview In People

Chris Brown: I Reject Your Plea Deal And I’m Going To Jail!

Kate Gosselin’s Single Mom Blues

OITNB’s Natasha Lyonne To Guest On “Girls”

Justin & Selena Caught On Tape Doing Coke At L.A. Club

Sarah Jessica Parker Eyes Series Return With “Busted”

How “Rizzoli & Isles” Dealt With Lee Thompson Young’s Suicide

Andrew Stern’s Suicide Due To Divorce, Depression

ADL Says Gary Oldman Hasn’t Groveled Enough

Mila Kunis Gives “Cold” Interview

Kaley Cuoco Wears Sports Bikini, Exposes Toned Tummy

Brad Pitt’s WW2Drama “Fury” Releases First Full Trailer

Lourdes Leon Follows Mom’s Footsteps To University Of Michigan



FOREIGNERS
At UN, Argentina Remains Defiant On Debt
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Category: Live at Five

Yalie Aspires to ‘Change … What Heterosexual Sex Looks Like’

Posted on | June 25, 2014 | 24 Comments

Alexandra Brodsky (@azbrodsky) writes a lot about rape:

When someone attempted to rape me my freshman year, I asked my college, Yale University, for help, but instead I was basically advised to keep quiet. I shouldn’t formally report the assault, I was told. Despite my clear and repeated “no”, school administrators cast the whole event as a misunderstanding among friends.

In other words, the administration at Yale is pro-rape. This is the point of her anecdote, and if you are skeptical of Brodsky’s implication that officials of this elite institution do not take attempted rape seriously, then you must be pro-rape, too.

Without any knowledge of the details of the incident Brodsky describes, I suspect that — contrary to her implication — Yale officials were (and are) enormously sympathetic to the plight of Brodsky and other students like her. The problem, however, is that these types of incidents are typically a “he said/she said” situation, where she says she was the victim of an assault, he denies it and, because there are no witnesses or relevant evidence, it is impossible to determine guilt as a matter of criminal law. What can school officials do in such a situation? Stipulate that Brodsky is telling the truth about her “clear and repeated no”; also, however, stipulate that the incident did not actually result in intercourse. What is the difference between “attempted rape” and “she said no, so I stopped”?

Again, I don’t know the details of the particular case, but if Yale officials who did know the details saw it as “a misunderstanding among friends,” why? This question remains unanwswered, but Alexandra Brodsky is one of several plaintiffs in a federal civil rights lawsuit against Yale, and she now writes about rape with such frequency that some might say she’s parlayed this one incident into a career.

In a recent column at Feministing, Brodsky recounted a series of morning-after complaints she says she’s heard from women:

I don’t know. I mean, it’s not that bad, but he did that thing where he kept trying to negotiate with me when I said I wouldn’t sleep with him.
It’s not that bad, but when I wanted to leave he called me a cunt and blockaded his door.
It’s not that bad, but he was really rough, like choking shit, even after I told him it was too much.
It’s not that bad, but he took off the condom without telling me halfway through.

Complaint Number One is not a description of a crime. “Trying to negotiate” after an initial refusal is not attempted rape; otherwise the prison overcrowding problem would be even worse than it is.

Complaint Number Two is probably not a crime, either. It might be evidence that you’re dating a dangerous psychopath, but as long as you escaped without physical injury, you are not the victim of a crime. Are we going to start locking up every guy who slams doors and says rude things when he’s angry? And should we also lock up women who do the same thing?

Complaint Number Three is evidence that the guy you’re dating has watched too much porn and also may be a dangerous psychopath.

Complaint Number Four is evidence that you’re dating a liar.

It seems to me that Miss Brodsky may be trying to tell us that guys at Yale are all lying psychopaths who watch too much porn. Something about those high SAT scores just makes guys weird, I guess.

She’s not willing to stop there, however. No, sir. Miss Brodsky works herself up into a paroxysm of feminist fury that concludes thus:

But this isn’t a contained infection. We can’t just cut it out. It’s a cancer, a pernicious proliferation of what we already are: the “not that bad” is cordoned off from “real violence” only for our own convenience. So we will have to disrupt the whole body, and though all men can help, most won’t want to. Today’s allies might think it’s easy not to be a rapist but find it harder to accept that their desires are not paramount. The flowchart is less appealing when it demands, in successive boxes, Do you believe you are entitled to the fulfillment of your fantasies? Do you believe the women who refuse to oblige deprive you unjustly? Do you believe sex is yours? You do. You do.
It won’t be pretty or comfortable to change not only what heterosexual sex looks like but who gets to judge it and who is allowed to be angry in the morning. Who is allowed to stop excusing and forgiving and so who is no longer–endlessly, endlessly–forgiven and excused.

Suggestion: Maybe you should get yourself some cats, Miss Brodsky.

As for you single guys out there — especially you porn-addicted psychopaths at Yale — let me offer some advice: Assume that every girl you meet is a radical lesbian feminist. This is a pretty safe bet at Yale, probably, but if you happen to encounter a woman who seems interested in you, despite the fact that you have a penis, act as if you are surprised. React with stunned disbelief.

“What? You’re heterosexual? You’re kidding me, right? I mean, sure, I find you very attractive, personally, but when I pointed you out to my friends, they all said you look like a total lesbian.”

Will that work as a pick-up line? I don’t know, but at least you’ll have some interesting conversations. And if she’s absolutely determined to prove she’s heterosexual — hey, that’s consent, buddy.




 

Category: Education, Feminism
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