...What the hell is wrong with people? part something

Just, the shoppers who trampled a Wal-mart worker to death in their stampede for the bargains: someone tell me if this is part of the War On Christmas, or says something about the economy, or, or...anything? I mean,

Other workers were trampled as they tried to rescue the man, and customers shouted angrily and kept shopping when store officials said they were closing because of the death, police and witnesses said.

At least four other people, including a woman who was eight months pregnant, were taken to hospitals for observation or minor injuries, and the store in Valley Stream on Long Island closed for several hours before reopening.

Shoppers stepped over the man on the ground and streamed into the store. When told to leave, they complained that they had been in line since Thursday morning.

...seriously, what -is- that?

And yeah, I know, there's bigger and worse news out there right now: what's going on in India, say, and a million other things that don't even make the headlines.

But...yeah, I dunno. Ho ho fucking ho, eh?

Awesome names for MRA fuckwit blogs!

So, seeing as what a rousing success the Maudlin-Feminist blognames list over to Natalia's was, (now in its second volume!), now thinking it's only -fair- and -equal- to answer the eternal cry,

"But What ABOUT Teh Menz?!"

And sure enough, with real live blogs out there with such titles as:

"One Man's Kingdom: A Member of the Slave Sex Revolts "
"Dick Masterson"
"No Ma'am"
"Rebel Against The Feminazi Blitzkrieg"
"Global Gynogulag"
"End of Men"
"Another Day In The Jungle"

...really, what choice did we have but to offer the lads some helpful suggestions of our own. What kind of helpmates would we be otherwise?

Thanks to everyone who contributed; feel free to claim ownership and/or offer more in the comments.

***


*Belch*
1,000 Men Crying, No Pity In Sight
10 Pints Of Lager And I'm Sick On Your Shoes
Abandoned In The Toy Department
All You Need is a Deep Dicking
Alone On Friday Night: A Tragedy In Five Acts
Are You My Mummy?
Balls Out!: A Blog
Blogging is Cheaper than Viagra
But I Love You- A Stalker's Manifesto
Call Me Cobag
Castrated By Your Laughter
Condoms Are For Girls
Confounded by Mysterious Lady-Parts
Custody Without Responsibility
Derisory...? Misogynist!
Dickswingin' Digest
Ejaculations
Emasculated with a Blow-Torch and Left to Die in the Kitchenware
Entranced By My Own Emissions, Why Aren't You, Dammit??
Eternal Towelboy
Every Sperm IS Sacred
Every Time A Man Cries, Chuck Norris Shoots a Kitten
Everything I Know About Sex I Learned From Traci Lords
Feminists Stole My Precious Bodily Fluids
FRRREEEEEEEEEEH-DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUM
Fuck Me I'm Awesome (Please)
Give Me My Ball(s) Back, I'm Going Home
Go Get Me A Beer
God is a MAN (With Back-Hair and a Mortgage, Just Like Me)
Gold Diggers, Whores, And Dykes, Oh My!
Grabbing My Dick And Jumping Up And Down
Grunting Into The Void
He Blinded Me With Junk Science
How Big's Yours, Then?
Huh Huh Huh Boobies
Hunted by Hairy Man-Haters
I Am A Cliche
I Bought You A Slushee, You Owe Me A Blowjob
I Can Outwhine Any Woman Any Day Of The Week, Go On, Try Me!
I Can Piss Standing Up!! And Other Brilliant Accomplishments
I Can't Even Spell Injunctive Relief
I Can't Hear You Unless You're Naked
I KNEW Girls Had Cooties...
I'm A Nice Guy(tm). So Why Won't You Date Me, Bitch?
IM NOT GAY!!!111!ONE!!
I'm Not Just The President Of The Dickhead Club, I'm Also A Member
I'm Spartacus And So's My RealDoll
Incoherent Rage
It Takes A Deadbeat
It's Gettin' Hard Out Here for a Prick
It's Not A Tantrum, It's A MANtrum!
Jerking My Way To Freedom
LOLdadz.blogspot.com
Loud Is the New Right
MAKE ME A CHOCOLATE CHICKEN POT PAH: A Revolutionary Manifesto
Mauled By The Marauding Myrmidons of the Mingelyrd Oversoul
Me, My Hand, And I
Mom Never Loved Me, The Wife Never Fucked Me
Mom?! MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM?????...
Mother Of All Mommy Complexes
My Bitch Ex-wife Dumped Me For Some Reason
My Mind Is Like A Plastic Bag
My Mom, From Whose Basement I Type This, Is a Feminazi
No Kitchen Chain Is Too Short
No One Knows What It's Like...To Be The Dad Man
No, I Have Not Stopped Beating My Wife Yet
Nobody's Angrier Than I Am
On Her Tits
On My Way To A Manly Coronary
One Lonely Guy
Politically Erect
Proud Dad To Roughly Three Kids
Rebel Without A Clue
Respect My Authoritah!
Robbed Of My God-Given Right To Be A Dick
Rod McManly Pants Does Not Care What You Think
Sad Sacks United
Sandwiches from My Bitches
Scrawling My Name In The Snow Of The Internets
Social Skills Are For Pussies
Somewhere Between Al Bundy And Ted Bundy
Somewhere Over The Rainbow, There Are Women Who Won't Laugh At Me
Sphincter Talk, You Listen
Spitting Out The Pubes of Injustice
The Big Whine
The Black Knight
The Bloodshot Homosocial Gaze
The Family Jewels
The Fiefdom
The He-Man Woman-Hater's Club
The NoMotherland
The Travis Bickle Appreciation (Anti) Society
Two Inches Of Power!
Walk Behind Me With Your Head Hanging Low
Walter Mitty On Meth
Washed The Dishes, Where's My Reward?
What About MEEEEEEEE??!
What's A Clitoris?
What's Your Fucking Problem Anyway? The Earth Always Moves For Me
Where's Dinner?
Woody Woodpecker Sings the Blues
Y'all Don't Know What It's Like, Being Male, Middle-class and White
You Just Wait, I Won't Sleep With You And Then Where Will You Be? Huh???
Your Equality Hurts Me

Pre-holiday weekend Get-Your-Groove-On

Because it's been a while.

I am lately very fond of Bloc Party. To begin: appropriately enough for T-week: "Banquet"



"Helicopter"



"The Prayer"



Here come the Sugababes:



Some mashups. I've no idea wtf Kylie is doing in this video, but the audio's brill:



I am very fond of much of this person's (?) work/collection.

particularly:

"Fade to Ice Cream"



"Toxic Love Shack" (unlikely seeming but really works)



Missy Elliott, Chad Jackson and...Lily Allen:



Finally, a bit of Miriam Makeba, and RIP. "Mbube"

For the record

Dear Violet Socks,

In light of this admirable sentiment,

The attacks on Palin have been analogous to what horrible racist attacks on Obama would look like. I dislike Obama and don’t trust him politically, but that doesn’t give me the right to call him a n***r or a coon or a spade, or indulge in ugly racist stereotypes to demean him.

You may also wish to desist from referring to him as "Oppossum."

In other news, apparently Hillary will be Opossum’s Secretary of State...

Clever and original though that is.

The term coon did not originally appear as a racial slur term for a Black American, though over a short period of time it evolved into that. In early minstrel songs, the "coon" was reference to a raccoon, whose meat was supposedly preferred by plantation slaves. In many cases, for unknowing composers, the term "coon" became entangled with the 'possum, also thought to be a preferred food source. Apparently, many composers were not very familiar with American wildlife and could not tell the difference. As a result, "coon" and "possum" were often used in the same context.

Just putting it out there, friendly-like.

Alternately you could cheerfully ignore it as coming from an evil 'bot (of various sorts), apart from still more whining about how you can't say ANYTHING bad about Obama lest you be accused of being a RACIST, which you so ARE NOT so STOP SAYING THAT.

Btw, as for the rest of that post?

She’s certainly qualified and it’s a position almost worthy of her gifts, but I fear the worst. The last Secretary of State who was given credit for anything or treated as a hero was Henry Kissinger (which is not to say he deserved it). Ever since then the Secretary of State has been the designated fall guy for each administration’s missteps. Given that Hillary is already loathed by the men who run the government and the media, it’s hard to imagine her emerging unscathed.

What’s really interesting, though, is that Obama is willing to entrust such a position to a woman who, according to the Obama campaign, openly lusted for his assassination. A woman who is also, according to Obama, a corrupt plotter, a secretive and sinister agent of evil, and of course a racist.

Innit though.

And a lot of non-PUMA's didn't want Summers and said so, but don't let that ruin your "only us against the tide of DOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!" narrative or anything.

Transgender Day Of Rememberance

Please read:

Little Light on "the quick and the dead"

Queen Emily on how to mourn"

Lisa continues to collate the ongoing toll at Questioning Transphobia.

Zan, simply, Remember.

ETA: also see the full roundup at bird of paradox.

And while we're on the subject of racism:

Yes, I know, "racist" is the worst thing one could ever, ever, ever accuse anyone of being and one must therefore reserve such speculations for, like, actual lynchings, if that ("he's a nice boy! he doesn't have a racist bone in his body! he didn't mean it PERSONALLY. he just got...upset"). Nonetheless. It is hard to know what (else) to make of, well, pretty much anything that comes out of Reclusive Leftist these days, but specifically, now (once again via Palin Puma Watch):

Warning: post contains a quotation with racial epithets.

Apostate, bless her, is still trying:

I agree with you that the sexist stuff is inexcusable. However, please believe me to be sincere in saying that it does seem as if there is simple *adoration* of Palin in the PUMA camp. This adoration is not in keeping with your stated disagreement with most of Palin’s platform.

Plus, at least half of your commenting community sound like Republican women to me. I may be wrong about this, but such is my impression. After a certain point, your commenting community begins to define the tone of your blog.

To which Violet replies:

Apostate, your comment 136 about people “adoring” Palin reminds me of an old and horrible phrase: “nigger-lover.” That used to be what racists called white people who committed the sin of not sharing in the racism of the day. If you refused to join in the slurs, if you stood up for the simple humanity of a black person, if you tried pointing out his or her qualities and abilities, you weren’t seen as being just or decent; you were a “nigger-lover.”

It is a sad commentary on the zeitgeist that by simply refusing to engage in the bashing of Palin, by standing up for her as a person, for trying to see the real woman, for treating her with basic dignity and honesty, I’m “adoring” Palin.

As for the “everyone” you refer to who interprets this as adoration, that is an artifact of your circumstances. From what I know of you, the only feminists you come into contact with (online and in real life) are exactly the same lemmings who have engaged in the kind of sexist Palin-bashing I’m describing. The mostly young feminists online have devolved into a caricature; I’m embarrassed by them. Planned Parenthood allowed the Obama campaign to use its mailing list to send out a smear email about Palin.

The women in my circle, in real life and online, are long-time feminists who are deeply disturbed by what has happened.

By the way: I usually like Shakesville, but the last time I was there they were uncritically repeating the rape kit smear. I haven’t been back since.


What. In. The. FUCK.

Aside from the gratuitous use of racial slurs, the inherent WTFery of a white woman lecturing a woman of colour about racism, and the disingenuous bullshit about how she's just been defending Palin's humanity instead of actively encouraging people to vote for her, read these comments and tell me with a straight face there's no adoration going on. Read Violet's repeated assertions that she recognizes Palin as "kin" to her and tell me she's just objectively defending a woman against sexism...*

So, first of all, seconding the rest of PPW's commentary there (which you should go read), and this and also this, insightful analyses of what else might actually be going on with the Palin fanbase.

I'll just add this, because now I'm good and pissed:

You know. Given just how much projection is going on there ("lemmings" "devolved into a caricature" "embarrassed by them" "smear," and that's just in that one post). And given that there is otherwise very little Earth explanation as to how exactly someone gets from "likes Palin, an unpopular view in the larger feminist community" to...that;

I'm gonna go out on a limb and suggest that maybe, just maybe, -that- was what VS (along with some others) was really wanting to call the "O-bots" all along.

I mean. -Such- betrayal. -Such- outrage. Is it -really- all because gosh darn it we should have just supported the woman, -any- woman, over the man, -any- man? Really. And yet, at that same place: the campaign to throw the vote, however "unwillingly" to McCain; and even now, a number of snarks at Michelle Obama (ain't she a woman?)

So, say the nomination had ultimately come down to Edwards versus Clinton, and had narrowly gone to Edwards (assuming of course he hadn't fucked up with the stupid sex scandal, which of course besides being the political suicide that it was would be duly and correctly excoriated by most feminists: everyone loves Elizabeth, he was another arrogant shit, but anyway moving on). Would the PUMA's have existed at all? In this form? And still be going, and going, and going, and fucking going? With freepers all over the fucking place now, yet? Really.

I mean, anything's possible; we can all speculate a thousand "what if" scenarios, right, and the goddam election, I keep having to remind myself, is -over-. Mostly because, well, now the -hard part-, and the adrenaline is hard to let go of.

But also, yeah, crap like this.

This post-PUMA thing, as I'm looking at it, insofar as it may be relevant at all, is shaping up as an unholy "confluence" between the dregs of what was already a noxious form of "cultural" feminism, which already had more than its share of thinly-if-at-all-veiled racism, creepy calls for "purity" and crypto-fascist nostalgia for mythical times, among other reactionary markers; and actual full-on right wing reactionaries. Now with more xenophobia and nativist bunker mentality!

Which is, of course, -exactly what the world fucking needs-. FEMINISM, especially, we -need- this, fuck knows. I mean the real problem with mainstream feminism, it turns out, is that it's -not focused on white and/or straight women enough.

Oh, yeah: it's hard out there for a white, straight woman.

[from someone called "Cindy"]

The following I’ve written as an open “letter” to Americans (from my perspective as a straight, white woman):

We are American women.
We have done eveything society asked of us.
We behaved in school.
We looked as pretty as possible at all times.
We learned to cook.
We learned to sew.
We went to church.
We dated nice boys.
We got married.
We took our husbands’ names.
We gave up our identities.
We took jobs for less pay.
We bore you children.
We lovlingly taught, nursed, guided, and nurtured these children.
We volunteered at our children’s schools.
We baked cookies for community fundraisers.
We volunteered at political campaigns.
We volunteered at nursing homes.
We took care of our elderly parents.
We have been loyal American patriots.
What have we done wrong? Why do you hate us?
Were we not pretty enough for you?
Did we not scream loud enough during childbirth?
Are we not dying at the hands of intimate partners fast enough for you?
Why do you hate us?

Poignant, innit?

Almost as poignant as the plight of Joe the Plumber (whom?): you bought a dream which was never even -meant- to be applicable to 80% of the population in the first place (and unwanted by another good 15% or so I'd say); and now that the dream is clearly being revealed as a bill of goods, you:

a) cling frantically to the politician who promises to keep the increasingly threadbare, -even to you-, fantasy going, no matter what the cost to you, let alone anybody else in the entire world (whom?)

b) incredibly, are now whining, to the 95% of the population to whom this means exactly jack and shit, for -sympathy-, even as you continue to do everything in your passive-aggressive power to fuck them over. All while denying strenuously that you're doing any such thing.

Ummm...sorry, what was the question? Right, right. "We" hate "you, plural," because, um.

a) You're beautiful, like a Prell commerical (or whatever the fuck that was. Also, popular and shiny, and we covet your red scrunchie.

b For your freedoms, unless it's for your not-freedoms.

c) Because "we're" "the" "axis" "of" "evil." Thugs, 'bots of various sorts, etc. etc. etc.

d) Because we, the WINO's aka "Women In Name Only," forgot the "feminist" rule that you're not supposed to attack a woman (i.e. a "real" woman, whom I guess at this point the only one would be...you), no matter what she does to you first.

Certainly not because "you" are a whiny, plaster-of-Paris, self-absorbed, genteely bigoted, rightwing -git- who's becoming everything you claim you're afraid of and (collectively) would be dangerous if you gave any signs of being able to find your way out of a grease-proof paper bag unassisted.

I'm sorry; was that sexist of me? Too -mean-? -Unfair-? Unladylike unfeminist?

Because, you know, I feel just awful about it.

Damn.

ETA Then again, with endorsements like these, how could you possibly go wrong, am I right?

http://www.greenconsciousness.org/weblog/2008/01/reclusive-leftist....

I, who am a dried up angry embittered angry cynical paranoid angry hag, burst out laughing out loud, over and over and over as I read the Reclusive Leftist. She is anti war and I am not, which is usually the Great Divide but not here. She cares about women even if she doesn't get what it will take to create room for women under Sharia to breath. (it will take a lot of killing).

elsewhere, from the same charming commenter ("Green Consciousness;" she's some sort of eco-feminist too, see, Animal Liberation Front and so forth):

http://www.greenconsciousness.org/weblog/2008/06/another-so-called-...

Muslims are a threat in every country they immigrate to and from -they bring their anti-semitic hatreds, their misogyny, their separatism, their gender apartheid and their dhimmi tactics against the infidels which include a moral threatening outrage over imaginary and legitimate criticism. They cry victim to shame and guilt trip the people they victimize. We must defend our democracy from these Muslim war tactics or we will be their victims.

Obama used these tactics successfully against the Clintons by calling them racists every time they made any factual statement the BO campaign could twist to their advantage. People had to know what they were doing when they jumped on that race baiting band wagon but they wanted BO to win more than they cared about fairness...His backers proudly wear teeshirts with the name Hussein to proclaim their solidarity with his Muslim heritage.

If legitimate fear and loathing of fascist Muslim culture and religious practices can be made to seem racist, soon the hate laws will cover Muslims. Then Muslims will use these laws the way abusers use injunctions against their victims. The way that group of Muslims baited authorities on that airplane where they prayed in the aisles, asked for seat belt extenders, went to the bathroom in groups and generally tried to provoke a lawsuit.

I struggle --- constantly struggle with a hatred that is growing in my own heart, not toward Muslims who I coldly recognize as my enemy, but at those who pretend to stand for women while protecting slave masters who seek to dominate us by overwhelming numbers or by force. Muslims as individuals are both good and bad but it is the women I am concerned with and about - those who feel a desire to be their own boss and oppressed by their religion, practices and culture. The correct thing to do is to help the decent people leave the Muslim faith and find a way to live free. Very hard but battered women do it, all abuse survivors do it. You cannot live free and stay Muslim. This attitude must become part of our foreign policy in that we insist on secular political systems in countries we support. Because the Muslim religion does not tolerate nonbelievers, we nonbelievers must not tolerate the Muslim religion to gain power in our democracy which is vulnerable to it...

Swell.

David Neiwert on the racist backlash to Obama's presidency.

I think ultimately this'll get funneled into the immigrant-and/or-Moslem-bashing crap, which is by and large the most "mainstream" acceptable form of racism these days, although fuck knows the kind that supposedly "doesn't exist" since the civil rights movement was/is still quite rampant just under the collective surface; we see it manifested in breakouts like this. I mean, even Obama (along with McCain) supported the huge wall along the border shite.

Since it looks like it's going to be that -and- the RRR's targeting LGBT folk that's going to be primarily fueling the backlash, it'd be good if we could coalition more, I feel.

"Your life is about to get really, really horrible, and you know why? Because -Barack Obama was elected.-"

"I feel for, you, man. I really do."

via Plucky Punk.

That's one helluva Freudian slip (or something) there, American Family Association...

Via karynthia.

Yes indeed, they are apparently serious:

Let Your "Light" Shine For Christ This Christmas Season!

Looking for an effective way to express your Christian faith this Christmas season to honor our Lord Jesus? Now you can.... with the "Original Christmas Cross" yard decoration.

Light up your front yard, porch, patio, driveway, business, organization or church this holiday season with a stunning Christmas cross.

This beautiful Christmas Cross is 5.5 feet tall, with 210 individual ultra bright lights. SHIPPING IS INCLUDED!

Assembles in just minutes! Includes simple instructions and requires only a screwdriver. The cross is compact when not in use. And of course, it's weather-proof.

Decorate this holiday season with the Original Christmas Cross to remind your friends, family, neighbors, and all who drive by your home, office, or church of the real meaning of Christmas. You won't find the Original Christmas Cross in stores, so order online today!

I'm sure it's just an embarrassing mistake anyone could make, this. It's not as though the "War on Christmas" crap -already- had any racist connotations. Nonono.

You know. They just want to make their last stand in a world apparently already gone "dark," right? Light a candle (or a tacky electric cross, only $81! rather than curse etc):

If the liberals win the upcoming election, America as we have known it will no longer exist. This country that we love, founded on Judeo-Christian values, will cease to exist and will be replaced by a secular state hostile to Christianity. This “city set on a hill” which our forefathers founded, will go dark...

Too late now, I guess. poor little turnip.

--O stop reading all that innuendo, you oversensitive liberals: -that's- not what Don Wildmon MEANS, and you know it. He, along with his entire American Family Association, is -not racist.- Not one little teeny tiny bit. What a terrible thing to suggest.

Just rabidly homophobic unto the point of eliminationism.

Which is, as we know, totally different.

Hillary Rodham Clinton is a "wild wood elf."

TRUFAX (via, once again, the excellent palinpumawatch):

I don’t know. I think [HRC] could get a lot of work done as SOS, should she accept the position. I wouldn’t like her being under his thumb, but she’s a wild wood elf. No one can control her, only the winds and the rains.

All though I worry that it’s just a way for him to have her in his cabinet a couple of years so he can dump her and then ruin her political career.

It’s funny, because the other night I was thinking about Palin’s interview and how if she runs in 2012 and wins, Hillary could be her SOS. I would like THAT.

...It suddenly hits me that I have no words right now: I am rendered momentarily speechless by this...uhmmm...

...

O.K.

Anyway, I just wanted to say that this is by way of a sincere apology to Hillary Clinton for any frustrated venting I had made in your general direction during the primaries (and was I think largely colored by the early stirrings of these people, although at that stage I truly had no idea of the depth of...this). I think you'd make a fine Secretary of State--although it'd be really nice if you , along with the entire new administration could drop any residual hawkish-on-Iraq (to say nothing of Iran) posturing and get us the hell out of there, k?

..Or any other position of power, really, much as you, like indeed Obama with whom you shared very similar positions on many issues, are not my idea of the perfect candidate. Because, you know, a) who is, really b) consider some of the alternatives. At least you're smart. And y'know, lucid. Unlike, ummmm, some people.

Please try not to choke laughing at the idea of yourself serving under (gasp, wheeze) President Palin, and, well, as for your new fanclub here...dude, I -am- sorry. Even my worst enemy, I would not wish this kind of following. Probably. Anyway, you were never that, whatever else.

And no, need it be said, I don't think you're a frigging elf. I mean, I really -hope- not.

Although I WILL admit that I have always harbored a suspicion that McCain is, in fact, a particularly irascible species of garden gnome.

ETA: And the twee goes on. Via YesToDemocracy:

Hello mountainsong. I just really like your name. it sounds so fresh and revitalizing. it always reminds me of a cool clear stream flowing down the side of the mountain, spraying its crystal drops of nectar on every lucky blade of grass and all the plants within it’s emcompassing reach. Cool, refreshing, clear–washing away all the grime and dirtiness of this election year.

and

All is within…as the great Goddess always whispered in our hearts, reminding us that we are women of Earth Wind and Fire-light of the moon and fire of the sun! We are lovers of men, as well, caretakers of our children, our family ties, and beings of multifaceted gifts and talents. Everywhere we go “the Goddess” is…and Dame Hillary, through the travail of this election has carved a legacy of light and fire…indeed!

I...don't know. I just...don't. Look, I like fanfic as much as the next geek, don't get me wrong, but it's like...if you want to go to Ren Faire, then frigging just go to Ren Faire. Trying to go via electoral politics is just a -really- fucking circuitous route, you know? I nearly said "tortuous." I refrained. Just.

Because, okay, making real people into your personal Mary Sue? Particularly someone as blatantly -not- elfin or damsel-y as HRC? Especially in (I take it) the name of -feminism-? Kind of creepy and weird, I mean once past the general ZOMG -boggle- hilarity of it all. Just saying.

And yes, I think the Obama-as-backlit-Messiah shit is cringey and failtastic, also. They're politicians, people. They're SUPPOSED to be wily and tough and self-serving and full of doublespeak and ultimately disappointing ratbastards. That's their JOB. What one is looking for is the one who is going to be a) sufficiently less of an overall ratbastard than the other ratbastard b) -your- ratbastard, at least a majority of the time. Sorry.

Duanna Johnson's Family needs donations for funeral

via shemale:

Duanna Johnson’s family needs donations for funeral.

The balance for Duanna Johnson’s funeral is $1195 and the funeral home is requiring Mrs. Skinner (Duanna’s mother) to pay it by tomorrow (11/14). The cost is a hardship, so we are asking anyone who can to donate. Please send any donations to:
N.J. Ford and Sons Funeral Home
12 S Parkway W
Memphis, TN 38109

If you want any clarification from NJ Ford, here is their contact number: (901) 948-7755.

Please forward this to as many people as you can!! Thanks!

Please donate or spread the word; if you can't afford yourself to donate but can put this someplace where people who can might read it, please put it there.

According to spoggly, out of state checks won't work (due to the length of time it would take for them to get there) unless you overnight them and the funeral home says that credit cards would be ideal; however, barring either of those options, it may be good to just call the funeral home and ask that they delay payment due date until it's possible to raise more funding...

ETA: More info, please read: something seems really dodgy wrt the funeral home.

"So, Dennis Miller and Bill O'Reilly walk into a bar..."

and someone locks the door after the worthless gobshites and drops the whole building down a wormhole and neither are ever heard from again, muhahahahaha!!

Ahem. No, just, via the ever watchful PPW, this charming little bit of dialogue:

O'REILLY: Now, the Sarah Palin hysteria. I mean, can you believe she's getting more ink now than the president-elect is getting? Didn't she lose? It looks like she won.

MILLER: Listen, she's a great dame. People are fascinated by her because the left hate her. I think the left hate her -- mostly women on the left hate her, because to me, from outside in, it appears that she has a great sex life. All right? I think she has non-neurotic sex with that Todd Palin guy. I think most of the women on the Upper East Side, their husbands haven't been aroused since Mailer signed copy of The Executioner's Song at Rizzoli's back in the early '70s.

So they look at her, and they hate her. I think that snowmobile looks like mechanized foreplay to me, and that's why people are fascinated by it.

O'REILLY: So you think that -- cutting through all of the metaphors that even I don't even understand. Rizzoli's used to be a bookstore.

You think that because she looks like a happy, wedded mom with --

MILLER: Yeah.

O'REILLY: -- not so much neurosis, that these people are going, "We have to hate her"? It's -- what, it's schadenfreude? Is that -- how do you say that? German?

MILLER: It's called schadenfreude.

O'REILLY: Schadenfreude. [unintelligible]

MILLER: The Germans concocted it. It's one's vague pleasure in another's discomfort. Leave it to the Germans, by the way, to concoct an intricate glossary of pain terminology.

But I think people have -- I think people have schadenfreude about her. It's like Tina Fey's movie Mean Girls. Women are mean to other women. They look at her, she looks happy, a lot of them aren't, and they're cranky about her.

Yes, Dennis and BillO, that's exactly it. The real reason women (or anyone) can't stand Sarah Palin is because we ENVY her relationship with Radical Fringe Separatist K-Fed. Certainly nothing to do with o we think her policies (insofar as they're coherent at all) are frighteningly reactionary & bad for women and other living things ( gay couples, the body politic, the planet...moose); or that she herself ranges from "vacuous twit" to "crypto-fascist rabble-rouser."

Oh, yeah, and we hate America. And women (i.e. pretty much anyone who isn't either Sarah Palin or a fangirl at this point).

You two, on the other hand, are AWESOME. Blessums ickle jowls. -pinch-

No, really, I was -just- saying the other day, you know, if there's one thing we as a nation and/or culture could really use right now, it's a couple of smug dessicated prick windbags making lumbering cracks on the tellyvision about What Women Want, and then, well:

O'REILLY: OK, and then arrest Barney Frank, correct?

MILLER: Barney might want to be arrested.

O'REILLY: Oh, jeez. Ugh. [shudders] OK, Dennis Miller, everybody. I told you to hide the kids.

Haw haw! No, wait, I geddit! Like, Frank's (lowers voice) gay, and so he probably -wants- to be arrested, because everybody knows prison rape is

a) What Teh Gay Really Want

b) Hiiii-LARious!

Yeah, "ugh, [shudders]." Thanks for sharing your important thinky thoughts there, Combover Central, really.

I mean, O.K., and so meanwhile here we are being treated to Falafel Boy and Dubya-Daddy Complex here speculating about what does and doesn't constitute -neurotic- about -sex-, right:

I think that snowmobile looks like mechanized foreplay to me, and that's why people are fascinated by it.

There really isn't enough "speak for yourself" in the WORLD.

Oh yeah, they've teamed up before to share wisdoms on similar themes, apparently. Just be grateful yer scintillating sidekick there didn't decide to make something of your "always having Bush's back" this time. Know what I mean, know what I mean, nudge nudge?! You dreary arrested-development tossers.

But yeah, Dennis, do explain to us plebes again--along with all your other superior knowledgey knowledges--exactly what means schadenfreude.

Today's bigotry in the name of creeping theocracy brought to you by one Howard Ahmanson.

In case you were wondering who was behind Prop 8, The Daily Beast has a profile:

The campaign for Prop 8 has reaped massive funding from conservative backers across the country. Much of it comes from prominent donors like the Utah-based Church of Latter Day Saints and the Catholic conservative group, Knights of Columbus. Prop 8 has also received a boost from Elsa Broekhuizen, the widow of Michigan-based Christian backer Edgard Prince and the mother of Erik Prince, founder of the controversial mercenary firm, Blackwater.

While the Church of Latter Day Saints’ public role in Prop 8 has engendered a growing backlash from its more liberal members, and Broekhuizen’s involvement attracted some media attention, the extreme politics of Prop 8’s third largest private donor, Howard F. Ahmanson, reclusive heir to a banking fortune, have passed almost completely below the media’s radar. Ahmanson has donated $900,000 to the passage of Prop 8 so far.

...Few Americans have heard of Ahmanson—and that's the way he likes it. He donates cash either out of his own pocket or through his unincorporated Fieldstead & Co. to avoid having to report the names of his grantees to the IRS. His Tourette's syndrome only adds to his mysterious persona, as his fear of speaking leads him to shun the media. While Ahmanson once resided in a mental institution in Kansas, he now occupies a position among the Christian right’s power pantheon as one of the movement’s most influential donors. During a 1985 interview with the Orange County Register, Ahmanson summarized his political agenda: “My goal is the total integration of biblical law into our lives.”

The campaign to teach “intelligent design” in public school classrooms, the Republican takeover of the California Assembly, and the rollback of affirmative action in California—Ahmanson has been behind them all. He has also taken a special interest in anti-gay crusades. Ahmanson’s most controversial episode related to his funding of the religious empire of Rousas John Rushdoony, a radical evangelical theologian who advocated placing the United States under the control of a Christian theocracy that would mandate the stoning to death of homosexuals. With Prop 8 organizers claiming in a virtual mantra that their measure will not harm gays or take rights away from heterosexual Californians, Ahmanson has good reason to conceal his involvement in the campaign...

What the world needed: A Batman for "The Handmaid's Tale."

While we're on the subject of rightful finger pointing, can we please put a proposition on the next ballot to invalidate the marriage of Frank Schubert? Or, I don't know, take away his right to go to the toilet unsupervised, something? I mean:

Democratic legislators ask state Supreme Court to void Prop. 8

Reporting from Sacramento -- Forty-three Democratic legislators, including leaders of the California Senate and Assembly, filed a brief Monday urging the California Supreme Court to void Proposition 8.

Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata and incoming President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg signed the friend of the court brief, filed with the state Supreme Court.

No Republican legislator signed the petition, though Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, denounced the anti-gay marriage measure over the weekend.

..."This is a Hail Mary, no question about it," said Frank Schubert, manager of the Proposition 8 campaign.

..."Proposition 8 seeks to effect a monumental revision of this foundational principle and constitutional structure by allowing a bare majority of voters to eliminate a fundamental right of a constitutionally protected minority group," the brief says.

"If Proposition 8 takes effect, this court will no longer be the final arbiter of the rights of minorities," it continues.

The action contends that the ban, created by the initiative that defines marriage as being between one man and one woman, cannot be done by a mere constitutional amendment. Rather, it must be done by a revision of the entire Constitution and the Legislature would have to be involved.

As advocates of same-sex marriage turn to courts, protests, and perhaps a future ballot measure in an attempt to overturn Proposition 8, Schubert declared that the vote is "as over as Barack Obama's election."

...One of the closing ads featured Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). Popular though she is, Schubert said, it was odd that Proposition 8 foes would select Feinstein to lecture voters, including minorities, about discrimination.

"It had the feel of a lily white, liberal campaign," Schubert said.

FUCK YOU YOU FUCKING FUCK.

Oh, this is Frank Schubert: (whose image I can't seem to be -positive- I'm connecting it to the right Frank Schubert--there are several--but I am 99.7% positive he himself is "lily white," surprise):

The parents of two children featured most prominently in video footage in a Yes on 8 ad have repeatedly asked the campaign to stop using images of their children to promote changing the California Constitution to eliminate same-sex marriage. They've written letters. They've made phone calls. The Yes on 8 campaign has refused to pull the footage.

The parents are at their wits' end. So two of them came to Sacramento on Thursday to appeal to legislators and to Yes on 8 campaign manager Frank Schubert in person. I followed them on their journey.

To legislators, their message was: "I don't want to see another parent have to go through this." Assemblyman Mark Leno told the parents that under current law if the ads were for a commercial purpose, consent to use the images would be required. But ads for a political purpose don't require consent. Leno continued that the Yes on 8 use of children's images, however, reveals a tension between First Amendment rights to free speech and the right to privacy. This is a particularly sensitive issue because the campaign did not use images of adults, but of young children -- without the knowledge or consent of the parents. He made a commitment to explore solutions in the upcoming legislative session. But that doesn't do anything now.

Then the parents went to Schubert's office at Schubert Flint Public Affairs at 14th and L. "I've heard he's a father," said one parent. "I want to ask him how he would feel if his children were manipulated like this." She wanted to appeal to him as a moral human being. "This is our last hope," she said.

Neither Schubert nor others in his office would speak to the two parents. Schubert's office called security and a guard escorted them out of the building. The parents left a letter saying, "We appeal to your sense of decency as a parent to take those ads off the air and off your website."

Okay, the "Black people cost gay people the right to marry in CA ZOMG" meme needs to stop, NOW.

Go read Pam Spaulding (yes, Virginia, some people are gay AND black AND women, TOO, AT THE SAME TIME) on just a whole shitload of reasons why.

I'm also reposting now, with permission, a letter sent to an email list I'm on.

Dear Friends,

I am writing because I am disturbed by the string of articles, blog entries, and list serve threads that have come out in the last few days suggesting that the high turnout of African American and Latino voters for the presidential election was responsible for the passage of California's proposition 8, which dealt a heavy blow to LGBT families by banning gay marriage.

These articles mistakenly imply that the struggles for civil rights for LGBT people and communities of color are separate or even at odds with each other. They deny the work that LGBT people of color do to combat homophobia and transphobia in their families and communities, often while facing racism within the queer community as well. These articles deny homophobia among white people, and they displace blame away from those who actually have the power to consistently deny others civil and human rights, and instead, charge that when communities that have long been disenfranchised and alienated from political processes begin to participate, that the results with be negative for LGBT people.

I believe all communities need to be held accountable for their homophobia and transphobia. I want to acknowledge the suffering and hardship that the passage of Proposition 8 has caused for LGBT couples and families. But, while the media casts blame on communities of color for the failure of civil rights for LGBT people, it is imperative that we struggle against the logic that tells us that struggles for LGBT civil rights and racial justice are separate, and that we examine our strategies for advancing LGBT civil rights and gay marriage and, in particular, look at places where LGBT communities have failed to align our struggles for civil rights with ongoing struggles for racial justice.

In the months leading up the election, I saw a massive mobilization within the queer spaces in which I spend time in San Francisco to get people to vote no on 8. We live in a state that has one of the highest incarceration rates in a nation with the highest incarceration rate in the world. Studies have estimated that at any time, 40 percent of black men in their 20's in California are under control of the correctional system. Criminalization affects many LGBT people, in particular, those that may be experiencing addiction or who, lacking familial support, move to expensive cities where they may have a hard time accessing affordable housing and living-wage work. Despite this, I saw little or no public discourse among LGBT people about very important state propositions: 5, 6, and 9, all of which potentially impacted things like funding for prisons, alterations to sentencing for drug crimes, or the trying of minors as adults in this state.

In the last months, we have seen raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) throughout the state and in San Francisco. Many people immigrate here as a result of the US foreign policy of destabilizing foreign economies. Additionally, San Francisco is home to many LGBT immigrants who have come to the country seeking safety and asylum. While my inbox was flooded with emails pertaining to Prop 8, I heard from very few queer people who were seeking to mobilize around the October 31st demonstration to protest ICE raids, or other work pertaining to ICE raids, and San Francisco's establishment as a sanctuary city.

The November ballot contained several important city initiatives that could have affected the livability of our city both for low-income people of color and for many queer people. Proposition K, an initiative to decriminalize prostitution would have helped sex workers in this city to make major strides in their ability to organize for their rights and safety, allowing them to better protect themselves against violence and police harassment. Despite the fact that many, many young LGBT people in this city earn their livings as sex workers and daily face risks to their safety, and that two trans women working as sex workers lost their lives while working in San Francisco in 2007, I saw shockingly little effort among LGBT people to educate themselves on the realities facing sex workers or the background on Proposition K, let alone to spread any word about it.

Similarly, proposition B, which would have mandated that the city set aside part of its budget for affordable housing was defeated by SF voters. In a city with a history of racist schemes of redevelopment and displacement (SOMA in the 60's, Justin Herman's redevelopment of the Fillmore, illegal evictions in the Mission in the 90s, contemporary cuts to county welfare, and most recently, the gentrification of Bayview—to name a few), San Francisco voters have failed to stand up for working families' ability to live affordably in this city—a city with where remaining working class communities of color face major threats of displacement. Despite the fact that white LGBT people often play complicated roles in the gentrification of the city and displacement of communities of color, I saw no media reports released on November 5th scrutinizing the voting trends of white LGBT San Franciscans on Propositions B, N, K, 5, 6, or 9, as juxtaposed to the numerous articles scrutinizing the voting habits of Black and Latino voters on Prop 8. And despite the overwhelmingly negative outcome of several important local and state propositions, outcry among the wider LGBT community seems to have been reserved only for Prop 8.

As a young, queer, person living in San Francisco, I feel very strongly that affordably in this city is vital to the creativity and well being of the LGBT community of San Francisco. As a white person living in the Mission, I have to think and act critically in regards to the complicated role I play in the gentrification of this neighborhood and the larger schemes of displacement within this city. I love my queer life and love living in this city. I get to witness the ways of living and congregating, making new families, new cultures, and envisioning new worlds that are possible living in a city with so many other brilliant and creative queer people. While I would like to lend my support and compassion to the people who lost the right to marry this week, I also question the logic that tells me that my only struggle as an LGBT person centers around my right to marry, rather than my ability to live and create in many other ways within a city I love. Affordable housing is central to the vitality of the LGBT community in San Francisco, to all communities, and while I sign petitions to support marriage as a right, I would like to see LGBT Californians take a serious look at the fact that housing, healthcare, and freedom from incarceration are also civil and human rights.

I would like to see LGBT Californians talk not only about their right to receive their partners' health benefits but about universal healthcare. I would like to hear us talk not just about how many LGBT people's partners cannot receive citizenship rights because of a lack of marriage rights, but connect this to struggles for immigrant rights in this state. I would like to hear LGBT people not only talk about how their families are discriminated against, but think about how many families in California are living in alternative family structures because of the mass incarceration of parents with children.

The passing of Proposition 8 is a sad day and indicative of the work that lies ahead, however, as we heal from these blows, I would like to challenge us to consider how our struggles are bound up with struggles for racial and economic justice, and how our fight for civil rights, and the health of our communities could be strengthened by taking these connections more seriously. Above all, I would like to challenge us to resist racist media schemes that, during our moment of need and a moment of possibility, are attempting to pit LGBT people and supporters against communities of color in California.

I apologize for the hasty construction of this, but time is of the essence. I welcome your thoughts.

In struggle,

Adele Carpenter

Petition against Larry Summers for Treasurer

Form here.

No Foxes in the Henhouse!


The Washington Note is reporting that former Clinton official Larry Summers is one of the leading nominees to become the Treasury Secretary for the Obama administration. In 1999, Summers was one of the key proponents of the banking deregulation that led to the rise of 'mega-banks' and the current financial crisis. At the time, Senators like Byron Dorgan and policy advocates like Public Campaign were warning the financial deregulation, but Summers did not listen. In addition to this remarkable lapse in judgment, Larry Summers has argued that women are innately less gifted in science than men, that 'Africa is Underpolluted', that child sweatshop work in Asia can be justified, and that energy used to oppose job destroying trade agreements was "very, very badly misplaced".

President-elect Obama spoke eloquently and often about the perils of deregulation and trade agreements that do not include worker and environmental protection, and excesses on Wall Street due to governance failures. Let's ask him to put someone in charge who did not actually help cause the current crisis, who did not contribute to the bleeding of America's industrial base, and who is not part of the corrupted failed elite that has ravaged our country.

A fuller description of the petition is here.

When you sign this petition, your comments will go to John Podesta and Michael Strautmanis of the Obama transition team.

My comments:

Dear Obama, I fully expect crushing disappointments, don't get me wrong, but it'd be nice if you could at least wait until -after- the inauguration.

We interrupt this blog for the following announcement:

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

11th Feminist Carnival of Sexual Freedom and Autonomy

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Oh, Sarah Palin. Stay gold, you know?

...you wacky l'il dumbass maverick, you. -bites lip- oh, bless.



You almost feel bad for disappointing her: she just seems so, so, so, well, -flattered-, doesn't she?

And yet, it probably won't cost her much: one gathers her fanbase does not perhaps have the most ummm uhh errm exacting powers of discernment, let's say.

“John McCain! Not Hussein!”

So goes the latest popular chant on the campaign trail with Gov. Sarah Palin, demonstrated at a morning rally in central Florida.

...After the rally in Florida ended, two of the people leading the chant explained why they did so.

“Because it rhymes,” said Shirley Mitten, 64, a volunteer at a pregnancy center and a resident of Brooksville, Fla.

...Mr. Mitten said he could not trust Mr. Obama because of his past association with William Ayers, the 1960’s radical, and because of his relationship with the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. He also pointed out that Mr. Obama’s father was a Muslim.

The middle name Hussein, he said, added to the suspicion. “I guess Obama was named after Saddam Hussein,” he said.

poor little kittens.

Btw, y'all have seen this, right?

ETA: right, right, sorry, my mistake, Palin's a Brainiac. No, rilly. I apologize for ever thinking that just because a woman running for VP can't accurately explain to a third grader what the Vice President's job actually is, can't answer really tough on-the-spot questions like "what magazines do you read," and consistently provides glittering generalities, mugging and winking as a substitute for actual content, -any- content, when asked -look, how exactly are you going to do your job, can you demonstrate that you take this remotely seriously-, that she might not be the brightest bagel in the box. It must just be internalized sexism: clearly, a Palin presidency would be in -my best interests.-

And anti-Real Americanism: I care -deeply- that she shoots moose, you know, christ knows I've talked about nothing but her huntin' shootin' fishin' credentials and how much that offends my elitist organic latte-sipping sensibilities. Of which latter, expecting someone who's apparently -still- under the impression that she's a viable candidate for the most powerful position on the planet even assuming Tuesday goes down the way the reality-based community expects it to, well, that's part of it too, isn't it.

I mean, damn, look at Dubya! we weren't too hard on -him- just because he gave a -terrific- impression of a deeply incurious, completely incapable of nuanced thinking, smugly, terrifyingly ignorant Yahoo who made terrible decisions with devastating consequences for lo these past eight years, and he's a MAN. Shouldn't we give a woman, yes, -this- woman, a fair chance to fuck up the country at least as thoroughly as he has? I mean, be fair.

And yes, by cracky, this commenter is RIGHT: a vote against Palin is -a vote against feminism-, because!

AndreainNY
I'm in my fifties. Feminism, to me, has always meant having the freedom to reach one's full potential. Contrary to the popular notion, it does not require one to be liberal.

A litmus test of liberalism was never part of feminism. If anything, it's time to liberate feminism from the liberals.

Excellent: the only thing that makes it "feminism" is that it puts a female type person in a position of power, so that that individual, at least, if no one else, can reach her -full potential-, whatever that potential may be, and whatever effect it has on, well, everyone else. I agree completely.

signed,

Beverly LaHaye Judith Reisman Savitri Devi Countess Erzabet of Bathory Marie of Romania, FEMINIST.

and don't you forget it, bub.

This is disgusting.

GOP unearths aunt of Obama's living in U.S. on expired visa.

At this point, never even mind the intent as a last-minute "smear," which as far as Obama's campaign is concerned is probably a dud. Who cares, right? What does this have to do with the price of beans in Peru (presumably going down the toilet along with the rest of the global economy)? Well, for everyone except the rabid base, pretty much nothing at all, as with all the other shit they've been trying to throw at him (terrorist! socialist! elitist snob! twelve foot grey alien!) Which, of itself, move along, nothing to see here, right?

Except for: -this- time, there's also a real other person there, a middle-aged woman who's been quietly living in public housing on an expired visa because her request for asylum was turned down. Who was dragged--illegally, as it turns out--into the limelight by a bunch of opportunistic vultures operating under the delusion that a) significant numbers of U.S. citizens are going to be so outraged at her existence that it'll upset the race somehow b) because clearly, everyone shares their belief that ZOMG TEH ILLEGALS are stealing our precious collective bodily fluids, particularly the quiet law-abiding ones who don't actually have any power or money and are just basically trying to survive as best they can in the face of constant low-grade fear and exploitation and all kinds of other shit, i.e. pretty much most all of 'em. So, what happens to -her- now, hm?

Obama's already doing the "I never knew ye" thing, which, well, not a surprise, but for -fuck's- sake. How long is this kind of bullshit going to go on? Even assuming he -does- win?