Dec

31

This Week in Hysterical Prudishness

Filed Under education and schools, media, sex and sexuality, social conservatives, women’s health | 11 Comments

So this has pissed me the fuck off. Dr. Saunders, the senior public health doctor in Scotland, has called for a reform to sex education in schools, starting gradually from a much younger age than the current system does. No, that’s not the bad part. The bad part is that the article reporting on it is called “Sex Lessons Must Start at Age Five”. Yup, that’s right: “sex lessons.” In addition, it notes “Saunders also called for secondary schools to hand out condoms and other forms of contraception to children from the age of 13.” The (probably deliberate) implication here, of course, is that Saunders’ plan is fanatical and includes using the Kama Sutra at story time, putting on some porn while the kindergarteners take their the snack break and having junior high teachers staple condoms to each graded test sheet upon their return to the students (seriously, why do people not get that “handing out” is different from “having on hand?”).

In reality, Dr. Saunders’ remarks are extremely pragmatic, well-founded, and from my perspective, just common sense. So I think that it’s necessary to quote at length exactly what Dr. Saunders means by “sex education.” And, as is always the case, it doesn’t mean teaching five-year-olds how to fuck.

Saunders, a consultant in public health medicine at NHS Fife, said: “It needs to start at quite an early age, because if you leave it until they are 12 it is too late because some are already experimenting. It probably needs to be started off when children start school. You need to start laying the groundwork to help them and empower them to make decisions and turn things down.

“At five it needs to be a language that they understand and taught in the same way as any other subject. It would be basic mechanics at that age in the same way as you teach a child of that age a tiny amount about geography, a fairly superficial introduction.

“It should start off with relatively simple concepts in the same way as English and science start off with the basics. It could start off with how babies are made and progress from there.”

He added: “You need to start somewhere and it makes an awful lot of sense to start long before it’s needed, because if you leave it too long you are wasting your time.

“Basically sex education needs to be a whole lot better. It’s not just anatomical drawings but what the risks are from infections and what the pros and cons are of having sex or waiting.

“It’s not a simple task to get young people empowered enough to use condoms, but it’s the key. You want to ensure people are not having sex when they don’t want to have it, and that when they do want to have it they are not putting themselves at risk.”

Saunders added that all schools should also provide contraception to pupils. Currently contraception is on offer at a small number of schools.

He said: “Particularly in rural areas, schools may well be the only way that pupils can access contraception.

“It may well be that as time goes on it would make sense to have emergency contraception in schools.”

Read it and weep. The promiscuous, liberal, orgy-promoting Saunders wants to teach children words like “penis” and “vagina.” He also wants to teach kids how to use condoms before they might need them. How can we possibly stop this madman?

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Popularity: 22% [?]

Dec

31

Maybe this year will be better than the last

Filed Under Uncategorized | Leave a Comment

At least, we can certainly hope so.

It’s probably better this way.  Happy New Year’s Eve, everyone.

Popularity: 14% [?]

Dec

29

Date rape drugs sold over the counter in India?

Filed Under Asia, International, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | Leave a Comment

An Indian TV station has done a bit of investigative journalism following a big ketamine drug bust, and found that pharmacists will dispense ketamine over the counter. For those of you who don’t know, in addition to ketamine being used as a recreational drug, it is also one of the most common “date rape drugs.” And no, it’s not supposed to be sold without a prescription.

Now, in all fairness, I know nothing about how reputable this news source’s stories generally are. The story strikes me as being written in the same kind of over-sensationalized style that “consumer affairs” shows have, and since those kinds of stories are often exaggerated I always take them with a grain of salt. Also, the station only mentions having visited one pharmacy. Certainly, it is significant if the first pharmacy they visited sold the drug over the counter, but the logical thing to do would go to other pharmacies and make sure that it wasn’t a fluke (and of course report any that do sell the drug).

I wasn’t able to find any information on the prevalence of rapes in India that are facilitated by the so-called “date rape drugs,” though a lot of articles on the subject being published within the past couple of years suggests that it may be on the rise, and more than one referred to the drugs as being “popular” in this context. Also, Mumbai is the most populous city in the world. This means a couple of things: that if these drugs are being used to facilitate rape, there are a lot of women in danger, and a problem that could be considered statistically “small” in Mumbai could potentially be considered a major issue by more general standards. Without claiming a pandemic when there’s no evidence of one, all of this certainly is enough to freak me out big time.

Popularity: 21% [?]

Dec

29

In 2008, a fresh start for NSW rape laws

Filed Under Australia, International, legislation, misogyny, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, sex and sexuality, violence against women and girls | 3 Comments

Several weeks back, I wrote about a new NSW, Australia rape law proposal that would use the affirmative consent standard — an absence of no does not mean yes — and no longer allow the intoxication of one or both parties to be used as a defense in court. The NSW Bar Association, apparently believing in an extremely misogynist system, argued against the bill, saying that it would “turn our sons into criminals.” When really, it would just send your son who actually is a rapist to jail.

Anyway, the good news is that despite all the “criticism” (which basically amounts to “do you realize this will make it illegal to fuck unconscious women????”), the law is going into effect on January 1st. No, the Bar Association hasn’t stopped their fear-mongering and profuse rape apologism. They’re still whining that “a person accused of rape could be found guilty under the new laws even if they honestly believed there had been consent.”

So basically, men in NSW can no longer legally “believe” there has been consent with absolutely no basis for doing so. Unless they want to risk rape charges, they now actually have to make sure that the women they’re fucking want to fuck them back. They’ll have to do horrible things like communicate with their sexual partners and stop to find out what’s wrong when a woman is not actively engaging with and responding to their advances. They’ll be forced to ruin the romance by saying totally unsexy things like “do you want me?” and “do you like that?” instead of just shoving it in and grunting and thrusting away like there’s not another person there.

In short, a legislative body has finally decided that men deserve to be held to the standards of basic ethics and humanity. And a large section of men are mightily upset about that.

But I’m very pleased with the parliament members of the Australian state in which I used to live. With other current problems with the Australian legal system’s treatment of rape victims, it’s a welcome relief.

I can only hope that the new law will be actively promoted. It really could be turned into a great anti-rape/rape awareness campaign, telling men who sadly need to be told what actually qualifies as rape and encouraging women to report because the chances that they will be believed have increased. I hope like hell that the law will be a success and other governments will feel encouraged to apply the same standards. And if I allow myself to be truly optimistic, I can dream that eventually — not over night, but over many years — this new legal definition of rape will change public attitudes towards women, sex and consent, that it will wake people up to the “she was asking for it” myths and destroy their faith in them.

I know, it’s a crazy long-shot. But please, let me feel hopeful that this world can change and people can be better . . . if only for today.

Popularity: 21% [?]

Dec

28

Not An Invitation

Filed Under feminism, marketing, media, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, sex work, slut-shaming, stereotypes, violence against women and girls | 9 Comments

Today, reader Kate sent me a link to this anti-rape campaign, and I was extremely impressed with it. Unfortunately, a bit of further research showed that the campaign isn’t recent; other blog posts I found indicate that it’s from 2001 or earlier. So you may have seen it before. But I hadn’t, and I liked it enough that I thought it was worth posting about, anyway.The campaign is called, as each poster indicates, This is Not an Invitation to Rape Me. It was created by an organization called Los Angeles Commission on Assaults Against Women, which has since changed its name to Peace Over Violence. The campaign consists of black and white images of women in positions that our society believes either make women prone to rape or makes rape okay, with the words “this is not an invitation to rape me” placed over top in red.

I think that all of the posters covered an impressive and commendable breadth of sexual assault myths. I came up with a few more images that they could have used — a disabled women, a man holding a gun, an undocumented worker — but still think that they did an excellent job with covering a wide range of issues and the most commonly-heard rape apologist arguments. My only genuine criticism is that most of the women (and men) in the photographs appear to be white. The photo above is the only one that seems to clearly feature people of color. I find a couple of others to be indiscernible and the rest to be all very clearly white women. With black and white photos that don’t show faces, more obviously darker-skinned women of color would have been a good thing in terms of making the campaign relevant to POC communities.

My favorite posters are after the jump, but I strongly encourage you to take a minute to go look at them all. Because they’re good.

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Popularity: 27% [?]

Dec

28

Anti-Choice Protesters Picket Outside Construction Worker’s Home

Filed Under abortion, anti-choice extremism, assholes, misogyny, religious fanaticism, reproductive justice, social conservatives, women’s health | 1 Comment

Within 18 hours of writing a post about how anti-choice protesters are fucking nuts, I got an email from Planned Parenthood that revealed just how frighteningly dead on I was. In Colorado, forced-birth proponents are protesting a Planned Parenthood clinic being built in Denver by picketing outside of a construction worker’s home.

The Greenwood Village enclave of Green Oaks is filled with large, custom-built million-dollar homes. And, for two months now, its quiet residential streets have also been filled with as many as 25 anti-abortion protesters.

Their goal is to discourage Bill Hornaday, an executive with Weitz Corp., from finishing work on a new Planned Parenthood headquarters miles away in Denver, near 38th Avenue and Quebec Street.

“This is ridiculous,” said Hornady’s neighbor.

“There is no end to what they’ll do. This is not really about abortion. It’s not about free speech. It’s about intimidation. It’s about harassment,” said a resident, who wished to remain anonymous.

He is the father of two kids, ages 16 and 19.

The 16-year-old boy told 7NEWS he hides in the basement when he sees the van, covered in anti-abortion posters, go through the neighborhood, about four times a week.

The teen said he’s scared when he sees a van sitting in front of the home before sunrise, with an older man in the driver’s seat, pointing a video camera at him.

He’s responded by videotaping adults bringing their own small children to the protest, complete with the large, graphic images of bloody aborted fetuses.

The family told 7NEWS they’ve been yelled at while simply doing yard work, as if they are somehow complicit in the construction man’s endeavors.

They showed 7NEWS a plastic baggie filled with red liquid and a doll in the shape of an aborted fetus that they found at the end of their long driveway. Several neighbors found the same item early one Saturday morning, he said.

The neighbor said a couple of dolls were even found inside mailboxes.

The family said the construction executive felt so bad he came over to apologize to his neighbors for all the commotion. They told Hornaday there was no need to apologize.

Just when you think they’ve hit new lows, the nut jobs love to pull out a surprise. You can click on the news article link to see partial video from the teen boy’s film. It’s pretty disturbing shit, particularly the part where the anti-choice leader proclaims that there will be no peace if Hornaday does not back down.

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Popularity: 18% [?]

Dec

27

Two Planned Parenthood Clinics Vandalized on Christmas

Filed Under abortion, assholes, misogyny, religious fanaticism, reproductive justice, violence against women and girls, women’s health | 5 Comments

Two Planned Parenthood clinics were attacked in Albuquerque, New Mexico . . . on Christmas Day.

Don’t even try to tell me that this wasn’t the work of crazy Christian extremists who thought that they were sending some sort of message by committing the vandalism on Christmas. And I’m sure that their “presents” made Baby Jesus very happy. After all, not everyone can afford frankincense.

According to Cecile Richards, the clinics are okay and open for business. Thankfully. One had its windows broken, the other had its roof set on fire. A few weeks ago, there was another arson attack in Albuquerque against an independent abortion clinic. Authorities, of course, are looking into it and are assuming a connection.

These kinds of cases are difficult. They are terrorist attacks, though I’m sure that the Feds won’t treat them as such. They are designed to scare people, to intimidate women into not seeking medical care and to make volunteers and employees think twice about coming into work. They purposely imply that something worse might be coming (and I hope like hell that it’s not). So it leaves us with the question: if spreading fear is what they want, do we write about it? I say yes, not only because people do indeed deserve to know the risks no matter how small, but also because the public deserves to know how fucking nuts the forced-birth proponents really are.

And they are fucking nuts. They also couldn’t give a shit less about accuracy. PP doesn’t exactly advertise widely where they perform abortions, but if I had to take a guess, I’d say that the it’s a very small chance that they would have two abortion clinics in Albuquerque. The medical equipment is expensive, and so is the added security. It wouldn’t make sense.

But though they pretend otherwise, the antis aren’t just after abortion. I live a block away from a PP clinic. It’s a very small one, in a small town, and is only open one day a week (and it’s not where I do my volunteering). Thursday is not the day that it’s open. And they do not perform abortions at this clinic. But who was standing outside today? The same people who have been standing out there a few times a week for over a month now, two older, retired men and one woman holding anti-abortion signs. There’s something very clear here: either they are too fucking stupid to do their research before standing in the freezing Upstate NY cold, or they just love misleading people. I’m voting for the latter. Again: they’re not just after abortion. No matter what the signs say. They’re going for your birth control and your pap smears. And they’re not particularly bound by ethics.

That I know all of this to be true doesn’t make writing about it any easier of a decision. I don’t like scaring people. The very last thing I would ever want is to have someone read this post and decide to not seek medical treatment or volunteer — as I’ve said, in reality the risks are extremely small. So I wouldn’t write this lightly. I wouldn’t write about it at all if I didn’t think that it needed to be said. But sadly, I do.

Via Feministing

UPDATE: Two arrests have been made in the case of arson against the independent clinic earlier this month.

Popularity: 18% [?]

Dec

27

Texas to tax strip clubs, use funds to help rape victims

Filed Under class and economics, feminism, legislation, marketing, misogyny, objectification, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, sex and sexuality, sex work, sexual exploitation and harassment, violence against women and girls | 7 Comments

Starting in 2008, Texas plans to instate a tax of $5 per strip club patron, with the money going towards help for rape victims. I have to say that I’ve been mulling this over for a few days, trying to figure out my feelings on it. Strip club owners, of course, have sued to block the tax.

Starting on New Year’s Day, Texas plans to tax strip clubs $5 for every customer who shows up to watch performers bump and grind.

Using figures for liquor sales, state officials estimate that the tax will raise about $40 million a year.

The state plans to use most of the proceeds to help rape victims, but club owners are suing to block the tax, saying it infringes on their First Amendment right to freedom of expression.

Despite the noble cause, the owners say, the tax will drive some clubs out of business and unfairly links their industry to sex crimes.

State Representative Ellen Cohen, Democrat of Houston, sponsored the bill, which was approved by the Legislature in May. Ms. Cohen is also the president of a women’s center that could receive financing from the new law.

“This is an industry that largely employs women, and this gives them an opportunity to raise funds for a crime that affects women,” Ms. Cohen said.

She added, “I’ve been told the fees to get into these places can be $10, $15. I don’t think another $5 is going to prevent someone from going.”

I don’t really buy the First Amendment contradiction argument. After all, governments have placed special taxes on products we find to be both unnecessary or unsavory for some time. Cigarettes, alcohol, soda and potato chips when other foods and beverages aren’t taxed, etc. One person in the article argues that if we choose to tax one unpopular industry (strip clubs), there’s nothing stopping extra taxes on other unpopular establishments, like abortion clinics. And though I see the point and certainly wouldn’t put it past anti-choicers to try such a thing, the two are fundamentally different: one is entertainment, the other is a medical service. With all of this being said, though, that doesn’t make it a good idea.

I’ll admit: on the surface, it’s hard to find anything wrong with the proposal. Money going to help rape victims is a great thing. And I can’t say that I’ll shed any tears over men who frequent strip clubs having to hand out a few more dollars to do so. But something bothered me about it from the beginning; it just took me a while to figure out what it was.

While I couldn’t care less about whether or not men will still be able to afford to get their naked dancing women fix, I do care about the women who work in the clubs. I personally think that the claims that this could shut down strip clubs are overblown; I imagine that your average strip club patron probably doesn’t go every day. An extra $5 each week won’t likely deter most of them. But it could very easily mean that they’ll hand out less in tips to the women working inside. And that’s not okay with me. High end clubs will be fine; most patrons will never miss that $5, and the women working there could probably find jobs at other clubs easily if they had to (and which they probably won’t). For women working at the lower-end clubs, it’s a different story. If each man pays an extra $5 to get in and then gives out a few less dollars in tips, the women are definitely going to miss that money. I’m sure that anyone who has worked a crap job for tips to make ends meet knows the terror of losing those tips. So if we’re going to do this, it seems to me that the far wiser and fairer thing would be to instate a tax that is a percentage of the cover charge rather than a flat tax. Bars and clubs need those cover charges, so I don’t see them lowering them significantly to try to beat the tax.

But again.  That still doesn’t make it a good idea.
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Popularity: 23% [?]

Dec

27

Getting Back to Life

Filed Under blogging | 2 Comments

So, I’m getting back into the swing of things, though I might be a bit lazy until the 1st. How about you, fellow Christmas celebrators? How was your holiday?  Is it back to work for you, or are you still on vacation? And more importantly: did you get any cool feminist presents?

Popularity: 15% [?]

Dec

24

Taking Time Off

Filed Under blog news, blogging | 1 Comment

I’ll be taking the next couple of days off. I’ll be back on either the 26th or the 27th, depending on my mood (and the news). It’s Xmas, and hey, I could use the break. To those of you who celebrate, have a Merry Xmas. And to everyone, I’ll see you soon.

Popularity: 17% [?]

Dec

23

The Concord Monitor Declares that Romney Must Be Stopped

Filed Under 2008 election, Republicans, assholes, media, politics | Leave a Comment

It seems that New Hampshire paper The Concord Monitor agrees with my long-held belief that Mitt Romney is a douche. And the editorial board has pretty much made my morning. They broke with tradition today, and instead of providing an endorsement for a primary candidate, they gave Romney an anti-endorsement. You really ought to go read the whole thing; it’s hilariously scathing. Well done, Mitt. Give yourself a hand.

Popularity: 15% [?]

Dec

22

(A Few) Candidates on Choice

Filed Under 2008 election, Democrats, abortion, politics, pregnancy, reproductive justice, women’s health | 3 Comments

RH Reality check recently sent out a detailed and comprehensive questionnaire to all presidential candidates about their views on reproductive rights, from abortion to contraception and the right to parent. Only Senator Edwards and Senator Obama filled out the questionnaire, and Senator Dodd issued a statement (a mix-up meant that Kucinich did not receive the questionnaire until recently, and they are awaiting his responses).

Personally, I found it to be very informative. I thought that Edwards’ answers were great, very powerfully pro-choice, and I greatly appreciated his taking the time to make remarks about the importance of providing support and assistance to mothers. Dodd seems to have a pretty good record, but I didn’t find his statement to be incredibly informative or impressive. As for Obama’s answers, I was very pleasantly surprised to learn just how strong Obama’s record on reproductive rights and women’s health is. I found myself feeling very impressed, and thinking that he might indeed be the most pro-choice candidate in the field. Then, alas, I read this:

Does Sen. Obama support any restrictions on abortion, or does he believe it should be entirely up to women?

Obama supports those restrictions that are consistent with the legal framework outlined by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade.

Sigh. This seems to be a theme with Obama; every time he impresses me, he almost immediately ends up letting me down. Though, to be fair, I had to cringe a little at the end of Edwards’ answer to the same question, when he added that he opposed the federal abortion ban (”partial-birth” abortion ban) because it didn’t provide an adequate exception for women’s health. In any case, read through the statements — and let me know what you think. Personally, I walked away believing that either Edwards or Obama would do a fine job of protecting and increasing women’s right to reproductive health care.

Popularity: 16% [?]

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