Jul

31

Birthday

Filed Under personal and self-promotion | 27 Comments

I swear to god that if I read (or hear) one more fucking person talking about how people who were actually raped are insulting “real victims” by calling their experience rape . . . or saying “but that experience is nothing compared to having a knife to your throat” as if you have some extreme authority over every person’s life experience, and as if it’d be an argument even if you were right . . . I will have a goddamn fucking nervous breakdown and perhaps go on a murderous rampage.

Today is my birthday.  So not wanting today to be that day and not trusting the internets to spare me (thanks ass who sent a trackback to my blog this morning with that absolute bullshit!), I’m out.



There we go.  That made me feel a little better.

Popularity: 15% [?]

Jul

30

Good to see they’ve got their priorities straight

Filed Under assholes, rape and sexual assault, stereotypes, violence against women and girls | 10 Comments

Yesterday, I came across this article about how the rates of sexual violence against women in the military are out of control and victims often do not report because of fears that they will not be taken seriously or even be the ones punished rather than their male assailants. Now, regular readers will know that this is not anything new. At all — though of course, the continued media attention is a good thing. But I just want you to keep that in mind.

Because today I came across this article:

In its recruiting efforts, the military “may try to reassure potential recruits and their families that women in the military don’t lose their femininity, even though they are joining an institution known for conferring masculinity and making men out of boys,” writes Melissa Brown in her paper, “A Woman in the Army is Still a Woman,” which evaluates the gender messages of decades of recruiting materials. Brown, a professor at City University of New York, took the title of her paper from an Army advertisement directed at potential female soldiers.

Brown found that females in military advertisements are often not pictured in uniform. Indeed, that’s the case in a video ad currently posted on GoArmy.com – the Website for the U.S. Army Recruiting Command. The video pictures dozens of soldiers – only three of whom were identifiably female. Two of the women pictured were in non-combat uniforms – one in a white lab coat and another in a firefighter’s uniform – and none were shown carrying weapons, as many of the men were.

The ad reflects realities Sgt. Marietta Sparacino sees every day in her job as an Army recruiter in Salt Lake and Davis counties.

“The males are much more into the range – shooting weapons and everything. The females, not so much,” Sparacino said.

Sparacino, an Army truck driver by training, said some women do express interest in army weapons, vehicles “and jumping out of planes,” but she said she doesn’t make that assumption from the onset as frequently as she would with a male recruit. “We have to get to know them to find out what their passions are.”

Right, because what the army should be most concerned with when it comes to their female recruits, and what those recruits themselves are most concerned with, is whether or not they’ll still want to wear the lipstick they obviously must have liked wearing before joining the military. (Every one of us women love our lipstick.) Not, you know, the threat of being killed for the purposes of upholding a pointless foreign occupation or being raped by a fellow soldier because doing anything about the high rates of sexual violence would embarrass the military too much, and anyway they’re busy directing their resources towards getting more women to sign up for the significantly higher likelihood of being raped or killed.

The article also notes that despite these efforts, female military recruitment are still down and have continued falling every year since 2003 — the year of the Iraq invasion. While we’re busy pretending like that’s some sort of phenomenon exclusive to female recruits, let us wonder why oh why this may be. My guess is that there just isn’t enough pink on the Army’s website.

Popularity: 14% [?]

Jul

29

Pet Peeve of the Day

Filed Under assholes, feminism, random | 15 Comments

Okay, so moderating comments and looking at trackbacks through Feministe, I just randomly saw like three different people make the “feminism is cool, but stuff like X (different each time) is the reason why people hate feminists, and really I’m an equalist anyway” argument.

Because when you start acting like fat hate and rape jokes have a cultural impact, you’re just a crazy bitch now!  And you know, feminists aren’t for equality.  We just want to set up a matriarchy so that we can create a reverse rape culture and control men’s reproductive capacity by making it technically legal but practically impossible to have a vasectomy and also making it difficult and expensive to buy condoms. And of course, we want to pay them only $.70 to our dollar and then say it’s their fault anyway because they made the decision to have kids and go into a totally worthless profession — and that judgment of worthlessness has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that men are the ones doing the job. What else do we want, feminists? To get them to feel social pressure to take our last names and do a vast majority of the housework? Damn right we do!  I would also like the social power to ridicule men when they wear revealing clothing but also ridicule them when they don’t, please.

Oops, I think I just let our secret plan out of the bag! Quick, everyone look busy and pretend like I was joking!

*headdesk* *headdesk* *headdesk*

Popularity: 13% [?]

Jul

29

Day of Blogs Reflections

Filed Under blogging | 4 Comments

For those of you who missed it, on the Day of Blogs we managed to raise a total of $454 for RAINN! As I said over at my Day of Blogs blog, that’s not too shabby for something I decided to do on a whim 5 days in advance, and which I worried would fail miserably.

Thank you to all 18 of the sponsors: Lauren, Ashley, Jessica, Michelle, Erin, Amanda, Dewey and James, Nora, Gaby, Betty, Cassandra, James, Kira, Marcella, LaGuana, Amy, Lindsey and Kristen and Mark.  You’re amazing!  Thanks also to everyone who stopped by and showed their moral support by reading and commenting — especially Anna who kept me company for hours and endlessly amused me with her Beatles-illiteracy.

I’m waiting for the last echeck to clear, which it hopefully will tomorrow.  Then I’ll be transferring the money from PayPal to my account and making a payment to RAINN.  Though I’m sure that you all wouldn’t have sent me $450 if you didn’t trust me to donate it rather than spend it on that new car stereo I really want, or on going to see that Yoko Ono art exhibition, it will make me feel better to post a censored screen cap of my receipt for payment to RAINN once it’s all done.  So I will.

Now that it’s all over and I’m mostly caught up on sleep, some impressions and lessons below the jump.

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Popularity: 13% [?]

Jul

28

LaVena Johnson’s Story Gets Noticed

Filed Under action alert, activism, feminism, misogyny, patriarchy, race and racism, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 1 Comment

Color of Change has picked up the story of LaVena Johnson and sent out an email to all of their subscribers asking them to take action. You can read their full email and take action here.

This is, of course, good news for LaVena Johnson’s family and those who have been working on her case. I also have to wonder if it’s a good sign for black women all around when a major black civil rights organization is actually paying attention to the cover up of her rape and murder.

As you may well (and should) know by now, feminist organizations have a long history and a continued way of ignoring issues important to women of color, including black women. And in an additionally cruel twist, black civil rights organizations have a way of also ignoring the issues important to women in their communities.

Color of Change has in the past supported very real, actual rapist Genarlow Wilson (who may have been convicted on a somewhat unfair charge, but whose ass certainly deserved to be in jail for rape all the same). And just a couple of months ago, Al Sharpton and the NAACP took the side of the young black men who stand accused as the Dunbar Village Rapists, completely ignoring the harrowing ordeal of the black woman who they allegedly gang-raped, tortured and attempted to murder, and that of her 12-year-old son with whom she was forced to perform a sex act.

So this makes me happy and I’m hoping that it is a positive step forward.  As I said in the Dunbar Village post, of course black men do not deserve to be convicted of crimes which they did not commit, and they do not deserve to be treated differently by our judicial system than white men (or anyone else) — this is discriminatory, and sadly it happens a lot.  But black women have a right just like white women (and anyone else) to not be raped — and in Johnson’s case, also murdered.  They have a right to have their rapists held accountable, regardless of the assailant’s race.  And acknowledging this is not setting back the movement but furthering it.

Is Color of Change decision to pick up Johnson’s case a sign of progress?  After all, we don’t know the race of her rapist/murder(s) yet.  If said rapist/murder(s) turned out to be black, would the organization still celebrate the investigation finally taking place?  I certainly hope so — but I hope even more that justice is done and we therefore have a chance to find out.

If only we could get NOW to get up off their asses, too.  Sorry, ladies: though I’m glad that you’re finally starting to take up the case of Michelle Obama like she’s a real woman experiencing sexism in the media, too, that alone isn’t good enough. (Especially since the outrage lacks the same furor seen over the sexism directed at Clinton.)  You’ve cared before about the rates of rape against female soldiers and contractors in Iraq.  I’ll be waiting for LaVena Johnson to be worthy of that same coverage.

Popularity: 14% [?]

Jul

28

Urgent Action for Kobra Najjar

Filed Under International, action alert, activism, courts, human rights, misogyny, patriarchy, sex work | 2 Comments

I received an urgent email this morning from Tyla at Equality Now, informing me of Kobra Najjar’s desperate situation:

Equality Now is urgently concerned about Kobra Najjar, an Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning for adultery who lost her final appeal for amnesty. Iranian women’s rights activists working on her case report that Kobra has exhausted all domestic legal remedies and that her execution by stoning could happen any time.

Kobra is a victim of domestic violence who was forced into prostitution by her abusive husband in order to support his heroine addiction. He was murdered by one of Kobra’s “clients” who sympathized with her plight. Kobra has already served 8 years in prison as an accessory to her husband’s murder. The man who murdered her husband also served 8 years in prison and is now free after paying blood money and undergoing 100 lashes, while Kobra faces imminent stoning to death for adultery – the prostitution her husband forced upon her.

Equality Now is also concerned about recent reports of seven other women and one man, all accused of adultery sentenced to death by stoning, whose executions are also reported to be possible at any time. In Iran, adultery is the only crime punishable by stoning.

[. . .]

Please write to the Iranian officials below, calling for Kobra’s immediate release, the commutation of all sentences of death by stoning and the prohibition by law of all cruel, inhuman and degrading punishments in accordance with Iran’s obligations under the ICCPR. Urge the officials also to initiate a comprehensive review of the Civil and Penal Codes of Iran to remove all provisions that discriminate and perpetuate discrimination against women, including those regarding adultery and fornication, in accordance with Iran’s own constitutional provision for equality before the law.

Equality Now has all of the relevant contact information, some of which I have reproduced below the jump.

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Popularity: 17% [?]

Jul

26

Day of Blogs 2008 has begun!

Filed Under blog news, blogging, blogswarm, personal and self-promotion, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 4 Comments

This is where I will be writing for the Day of Blogs to benefit RAINN.

The first post is even up — only 47 more to go! Stop by, read, comment and show your support. I’m sure that I’ll need your help and encouragement to make it through!

Popularity: 16% [?]

Jul

25

Update on Day of Blogs

Filed Under blog news, blogging, blogswarm, personal and self-promotion, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 2 Comments

Look at that, we’re 92% of the way to my Day of Blogs goal! So close — and as I’ve said, wouldn’t it be great to surpass that goal? Now’s the time to give! Thanks again to everyone who has contributed so far.

I’ve decided to set up a little sub-blog for the day of blogs. I’ll post a very large link to it tomorrow at the start of the event. I’ve decided to go with this idea for several reasons, namely to not bury any and all posts I’ve written for the past several weeks and to not really piss off people who are subscribed to me through a blog reader. If you do read through a blog reader though, please add the event blog to your reader now!

I’m also putting out another call for help, this time more than just financial. I’m going to do my best tomorrow to put up as many posts about sexual assault as I can (though I’m sure that a few “here’s how I’m holding up” and “oh look, it’s a Beatles song!” posts will pop up). That’s where you come in: I’m compiling ideas for various things to write about tomorrow, and can use some help. Since I have to blog so very often, most posts will be short. So if you’ve got: news stories, links to relevant blogs or websites, relevant artwork/videos/music, and/or suggestions for topics that you would like to see me cover, please pass them along! It would be extremely useful if you could email me any links to cara.kulwick@gmail.com. More abstract ideas can be left in the comments.

Thanks so much. My one other request is that you all show up tomorrow, read and comment! I’m sure that I’ll need the encouragement and interaction to see it through. Wish me luck!

Popularity: 15% [?]

Jul

24

HRC: And One Other Thing

Filed Under beauty myths, fat-shaming, feminism, gender, media, misogyny, objectification, patriarchy, politics, sexism, stereotypes | 8 Comments

I’ll be entirely honest: when I saw Hillary Clinton, one of the first things I thought after “wow, that’s Hillary Clinton” was “wow, she’s so pretty.”

Hillary has been attacked for her appearance an awful lot throughout her career. She’s been called ugly, “too” masculine, fat and so on. Allow me to be clear: even if I personally found Hillary Clinton to be the ugliest person on the face of the planet — and obviously I do not — that’s still no good reason for anyone to debase because of her physical appearance. And mocking someone’s features is not only juvenile and mean-spirited, it’s about as far as you get from a genuine political argument. On the other side, if a politician is someone who would be considered very conventionally attractive, “hot” even, it would not be okay to debase her because of her appearance either — you know, calling her stupid because she’s pretty, or making crude sexual comments. None of this is okay — and it’s something that is done far, far more often to women in politics.

The question of why our culture mocks and judges women based on their appearance is a well-worn one. I think we know those answers: it’s a means of keeping women in their place, outside of political discourse and rendering them nothing more than sexual objects for public consumption. Basic stuff.

But when considering this, my mind went elsewhere. The question is not why Hillary Clinton is judged on her appearance, it’s why she’s judged so negatively on her appearance. Why is she called ugly? What’s up with all of those “fat thighs” jokes?

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Popularity: 20% [?]

Jul

23

I Met Hillary Clinton

Filed Under Democrats, activism, events and excursions, personal and self-promotion, politics, reproductive justice | 6 Comments

And no, I do not lie in the titles of my posts:


Look, that’s me (secondish row back, second from left, white shirt, brown hair)!!! With Hillary Clinton!!!

When we went to lobby day at the Hill, I was more or less expecting the same thing I’ve seen when lobbying in Albany.  State legislators don’t usually bother showing up for those meetings (and in terms of trying to get anything done, this is usually for the better), so I certainly wasn’t expecting Hillary Clinton to attend our little lobby visit.

So imagine my surprise and little freak out when we were briefed before our visit about what was going to happen after Senator Clinton came into the room.

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Popularity: 16% [?]

Jul

22

Offensive Remark of the Week: Bill O’Reilly is Getting Desperate Edition

Filed Under 2008 election, Republicans, assholes, bigotry, discrimination, media, misogyny, offensive remark of the week, patriarchy, politics, reproductive justice, sex and sexuality, sexism, stereotypes, women’s health | 25 Comments

You may have seen Planned Parenthood’s new ad with John McCain staring uncomfortably and helplessly for 8 full seconds when asked about whether or not health insurance should have to cover birth control if it covers Viagra. And of course, they would have been inexcusably negligent to not produce such an ad — McCain handed us gold there.

Well Bill O’Reilly is very displeased that someone is trying to take away the male right to have sex when clearly it was something only ever intended to apply to women. (Bill O’Reilly only supports straight sex, but this contradiction has been overlooked for centuries now.) See the video, with key transcript below:

“Viagra is used to control a medical condition; that’s why it’s covered. Birth control is not a medical condition. It’s a choice. Why should I, or anyone else, have to pay for other people’s choices? [very irrately] Do I have to buy you dinner before you use the birth control? Give me and every other taxpayer a break, Planned Parenthood.”

Oh my. Check that shit out. Bill O’Reilly not only managed to argue that penises have inalienable rights but vaginas don’t, he also managed to call women gold-digging whores. The clear anger and frustration he was expressing as he made the “dinner” remark, though, makes me think that he might have a personal axe to grind.

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Popularity: 22% [?]

Jul

22

FYI

Filed Under assholes, blogging, misogyny, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 2 Comments

If you ever have questions about my comment policy regarding the subject of sexual violence, please see this post by Ashley who is made of win. A taste:

It’s true. When it comes to comments, SAFER will stifle your free speech and trample on your constitutional right to use our blog for the purpose of broadcasting rape apologism/denialism.

What it comes down to is this—we are anti-American, and we hate apple pie and kittens. Why else would we refuse to post comments minimizing, justifying, denying, and mocking the existence of sexual violence in our culture?

Yes, why indeed? If you actually need an answer to that question, don’t let the door hit you on the way out. But even if you don’t need the answer, I think you’ll enjoy Ashley’s all the same.

Popularity: 13% [?]

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