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This post was removed by request of the author.

As the studies accumulate in this new era of pseudo-science, it seems that some school systems are embracing the gender studies with a frightening enthusiasm that could prove extremely detrimental to future gender equality.

According to an article published by MSNBC in collaboration with Newsweek, some schools such as Foust Elementary in Owensboro, KY are trying a new program of dividing classes by gender, and using techniques that are gender specific to foster learning:

So Gray took a controversial course for educators on brain development, then revamped the first- and second-grade curriculum. The biggest change: he divided the classes by gender. Because males have less serotonin in their brains, which Gray was taught may cause them to fidget more, desks were removed from the boys’ classrooms and they got short exercise periods throughout the day. Because females have more oxytocin, a hormone linked to bonding, girls were given a carpeted area where they sit and discuss their feelings. Because boys have higher levels of testosterone and are theoretically more competitive, they were given timed, multiple-choice tests. The girls were given multiple-choice tests, too, but got more time to complete them.

It seems that Kentucky classrooms aren’t the only ones to utilize this approach, the article claiming that over 185 classrooms nationwide have also separated the sexes and used the new brain difference studies to establish their curriculums. Critics of this wolf in sheep’s clothing approach are pointing out the obvious dangers of this, but unfortunately to little or no avail:

To some experts, Gurian’s approach is not only wrong but dangerous. Some say his curriculum is part of a long history of pseudoscience aimed at denying equal opportunities in education. For much of the 19th century, educators, backed by prominent scientists, cautioned that women were neurologically unable to withstand the rigors of higher education. Others say basing new teaching methods on raw brain research is misguided. While it’s true that brain scans show differences between boys and girls, says David Sadker, education professor at American University, no one is exactly sure what those differences mean. Differences between boys and girls, says Sadker, are dwarfed by brain differences within each gender. “If you want to make schools a better place,” says Sadker, “you have to strive to see kids as individuals.”

NOTE: I wrote this right at the time that Katrina had hit, and felt I should hold off on publishing it at the time due not wanting to distract from the more pressing issues that deserved more immediate attention. Since it’s still interesting and noteworthy, I’m going ahead and publishing it now for your edification!

The ACLU has joined the Plan B advocation fray this Tuesday, by asking the Justice Department to release records that would explain why they are not advising hospitals to include emergency contraception counseling when treating rape victims.

In this time decade of what has felt like constant back-peddling with regards to reproductive rights, it’s reassuring to see that more organizations and people are starting to stand up and make their voices heard. According to an article in the Las Vegas SUN, the ACLU has joined with several other organizations in submitting a Freedom of Information Act request regarding the first ever national medical protocol that was distributed to state health departments last fall:

“It is time for the Department of Justice to be accountable for refusing to do everything it can to protect sexual assault survivors from unintended pregnancy,” said Louise Melling of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project.

It’s good to know that this rather astounding issue of obfuscation and negligent medical care is getting the attention it deserves, and the support it needs. Hopefully this is just the beginning of a bit of forward momentum.

“Alas” was down most of today, due to trouble at our server caused by the power outage in L.A.. Sorry about that, folks.

Also, I’ve currently got fifteen different illustrations or cartoons waiting on my drawing board, all of which must be drawn before the end of the month, so I’m afraid that I may not be posting much until October. We’ll see how it goes.

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• Spread the URL of If You Want To Help, a new blog which is gathering addresses for folks who want to send supplies to Katrina victims.
• From The Light of Reason, an excellent post discussing why people had a hard time leaving New Orleans.
• Jody Wheeler and Constructive Interference both have long, infuriating lists of links to articles about the various ways FEMA has not merely failed to be helpful, but has actively prevented help from reaching people who need it. Choice reading if you’d like to go blind with rage.
• Political Animal quotes a Knight Ridder report which partly explains why FEMA is so incompetent: “In 2000, 40 percent of the top FEMA jobs were held by career workers who rose through the ranks of the agency, including chief of staff. By 2004, that figure was down to less than 19 percent, and the deputy director/chief of staff job is held by a former TV anchor turned political operative.”
• Another “How FEMA was destroyed” article, from alt.weeklies, concisely describes the major ways the Bush administration undercut FEMA and made sure it was incapable of operating efficiently. I think the record supports my belief that the problem isn’t malice; rather, it’s deep, deep idealogical blindness combined with genuine incompetence.
• The Dallas News has a video about pet dogs left behind. Some army folks are trying to save the dogs; but at least one Sheriff’s office is shooting them in the street. Via Bean, who emailed me this link at Kos.
• Also at Political Animal, a horrifying - and well-documented - story of cops using guns to prevent people from escaping New Orleans.
• This very famous libertarian is too stupid to realize that not all thirsty people have $20 to spend on water, no matter how genuine their need. Via Echidne.

A Katrina refugee shelter in Alabama needs plus-sized clothing to be donated. I just spoke to a worker (their number is 251 626-2646), and she says that although they can use all kinds of plus-sized clothing, they currently have particularly pressing needs for extra-large “female undergarments” and plus-sized male clothing in general.

If you send new clothing, send it with labels and packaging intact - clothing that is obviously new will reach refugees quicker.

If you’re sending FedEx or UPS, send to:

Community Action
26440 North Pollard Rd.
Daphne, Alabama 36526

If you’re sending via the Post Office, send to:

Community Action
P.O. Box 250
Daphne, Alabama 36526

If I’m reading it correctly - and I’m not sure I am, the format is very confusing - the “if you want to help” website says that this shelter in Texas is also looking for plus-sized clothing:

Helping Hands for Texas
c/o Alamo Premier Mortgage Group
10223 281 Freeway, Suite 200
San Antonio 78216

An eyewitness says that some big women are wearing trash bags, so that might be a good address to send plus-sized women’s clothing.

If you’re fat, now might be a good time to pack up and donate clothing you don’t wear anymore. Being fat always means trouble finding clothing that fits, and I’m sure that for refugees the problem is multiplied a thousandfold.

A must-read post by some nice folks who decided to donate food and supplies to Katrina victims.

He then precedes to tell us that some churches had already enquired into whether they could send a van or bus on Sundays to pick up any occupants of their cabins who might be interested in attending church. FEMA will not allow this. The occupants of the camp cannot leave the camp for any reason. If they leave the camp they may never return. They will be issued FEMA identification cards and “a sum of money” and they will remain within the camp for the next 5 months.

I’d like to live in a world where I could dismiss such a story as too unbelievable to be true, but unfortunately I think it probably is true. Read the whole thing. Hat-tip to Bean and to Media Girl.

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This post was removed by request of the author.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

Sacramento — The state Assembly, in a stunning victory for the gay rights movement, approved a landmark bill allowing same-sex marriage Tuesday night and sent it to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The measure, which passed with no votes to spare, marks the first time that a legislative body in the United States has approved a bill that legalizes gay marriage. Schwarzenegger has not taken an official position on the legislation but has hinted that he would veto it.

Regardless of Schwarzenegger’s probable veto, this is a notable achievement. And sooner or later, a pro-gay Democrat will wind up elected to the Governor’s office.

The funny part is that Schwarzenegger has said that he’ll veto because he thinks this is a decision properly made by the courts or the people - not by the legislature. As Fred Vincey of Stone Court points out, “Governor Schwarzenegger seems to have forgotten to check his talking points with the anti-SSM establishment.”

Of course, it’s not hypocritical for Schwarzenegger to disagree with the conservative consensus (Schwarzenegger has always been a bit from Bizzaro-world anyway; remember his statement that “gay marriage is something that should be between a man and a woman”?).

So who are the hypocrites? The thousands of anti-Same Sex Marriage (SSM) folks who, after the Massachusetts Goodridge decision, screamed loudly that SSM is a decision for the legislature. I bet that not more than a handful of them will object to a legislature’s decision being vetoed in deference to the Courts.

From Bean’s blog:

The Louisiana Coalition Against Domestic Violence is accepting donations that are specifically earmarked to assist battered survivors and their children who have been directly affected/displaced by the hurricane. The donations will be used to assist battered victims from the following parishes in Louisiana: Orleans, Jefferson, St. Tammany, St. Bernard, and Plaquemines.

The donations will be used for the following purposes:

1. Relocation of domestic violence victims.
2. Purchasing of basic needs, i.e. baby formula, diapers, food, clothing, etc. that could not be met elsewhere.
3. Deposits on houses, electric bills,
4. Car repair, gas, public transportation
5. Medical/prescription needs,
6. Other basic, life sustaining needs

All donations go directly to victims of domestic violence affected by this hurricane and will not be used for any administrative or other purposes.

“If you would like to make a donation using MasterCard or Visa, you may contact the Louisiana Coalition Against Domestic Violence office at 225-752-1296 with your credit card information.” Go visit Bean’s place for more details and more donation options.

Dawn Eden asks “if a woman feels no instinctive maternal love towards her child, can she be called psychologically healthy? Or is the complete lack of instinctive maternal love a sign of mental illness?”

Stephen Pinker, in The New York Times Magazine eight years ago, argued that killing a newborn, while wrong, was not a sign of mental illness:

It’s hard to maintain that neonaticide is an illness when we learn that it has been practiced and accepted in most cultures throughout history. And that neonaticidal women do not commonly show signs of psychopathology. In a classic 1970 study of statistics of child killing, a psychiatrist, Phillip Resnick, found that mothers who kill their older children are frequently psychotic, depressed or suicidal, but mothers who kill their newborns are usually not. (It was this difference that led Resnick to argue that the category infanticide be split into neonaticide, the killing of a baby on the day of its birth, and filicide, the killing of a child older than one day. )

Killing a baby is an immoral act, and we often express our outrage at the immoral by calling it a sickness. But normal human motives are not always moral, and neonaticide does not have to be a product of malfunctioning neural circuitry or a dysfunctional upbringing.

Nancy Scheper-Hughes, an anthropogist who has studied motherhood cross-culturally, argues for the “motherhood is learned behavior” view:

Mother love is not universal. The idealization of women as natural loving mothers is a cultural belief that gets us into trouble. “We should detach from the idea of universal motherhood as natural and see it as a social response,” [anthropologist] Nancy Scheper-Hughes says. Women in jail reported that no-one believed them when they said they wanted to kill their children. “There’s a collective denial even when mothers come right out and say “I really shouldn’t be trusted with my kids.”

Neonaticide is more common than most people imagine, and it appears to be something done in every culture. It tends to happen when young mothers feel that they are isolated and have nowhere to turn. From Michelle Oberman’s very thorough article “Understanding Infanticide In Context“:

In addition to being isolated from their sexual partners, these women also were isolated from family and friends, fearing that disclosure of their pregnancy would jeopardize their already tenuous links to their support systems. Newspaper accounts often note the role played by fear in neonaticide cases. These fears include concerns such as getting kicked out of their parents’ homes should their pregnancies be discovered, or being exposed as an undocumented person. n9 Financial insecurity also plays a role in these cases. In spite of the fact that the girls and women who commit neonaticide reflect the full range of socio-economic backgrounds, when one considers their personal financial resources, as distinct from those of their families, they are invariably quite vulnerable. n10 This factor is quite important because these women are so convinced that having a baby will jeopardize their current living situations.

Women and girls who commit neonaticide tend to be exceedingly passive, and they respond to pregnancy with a combination of denial, wishful fantasy, and terror. In short, they are paralyzed and unable to settle on a course of action for responding to their pregnancies. Instead, when interviewed later, they report that they spent their pregnancies living day to day, focusing on the banal details of their lives, and hoping that the pregnancy would simply disappear, or that someone else would notice their condition and take charge of the situation. There is a striking absence of trusted confidants in the lives of these girls and women, adding credence to their perception that they have few resources or options to assist them in responding to this pregnancy.

An equally dramatic set of patterns surrounds the circumstances that lead to these infants’ deaths. Virtually all neonaticide cases involve women who confuse the initial stages of labor with a need to defecate. They proceed to spend hours alone, most often on a toilet, often while others are present in their homes. They endure the full course of labor and delivery silently - a shocking feat given the typical noisiness of the birthing process. After delivering their babies, the women’s behavior ranges from exhaustion to panic. Many of these babies drown in the toilet, while the woman is either passed out, recuperating from childbirth, or in some cases, frantically cleaning the room. In some cases, the women suffocate or strangle the baby to prevent it from crying out.

Oberman’s article is especially interesting because as well as looking at contemporary infant deaths, she also studied infanticides from 1870-1930 in Chicago in some detail, and found many of the same patterns applied back then. (Although others do not: maternal homicide/suicide has become much less common over the decades, for example).

If the mother feels isolated, that can be deadly:

A mother’s sense of isolation [is] arguably the most deadly enemy of the mother-child bond, according to both Meyer and Hrdy.

In a society where work and adult social outlets tend to be outside the home, stay-home motherhood can be a sentence to solitary confinement for those who lack a support network.

This is a relatively new and, for some, a tragic development, according to Michelle Oberman, co-author of Mothers Who Kill: “For the past 30 years or so, unlike any other point in human history, mothers of newborns tend to spend long hours alone with their infants, unaccompanied by family, friends and neighbours.”

It is a recipe for disaster when the mother is emotionally unstable, she says: In the majority of the cases she and Meyer studied, “the (children’s) deaths were at least in part the result of maternal isolation.”

I remember reading a article in some online newsweekly, in which several new mothers who were distressed by fantasies of killing their newborns were interviewed. It was quite a striking article, but unfortunately I can’t find it - aargh!

Both Pinker and Oberman point out that the legal penalites for neonaticide are unusually light for something that’s considered murder. From Pinker’s essay:

Prosecutors sometimes don’t prosecute; juries rarely convict; those found guilty almost never go to jail. Barbara Kirwin, a forensic psychologist, reports that in nearly 300 cases of women charged with neonaticide in the United States and Britain, no woman spent more than a night in jail.

(I think that study must have been conducted before the 1997 case, in New Jersey, in which a mother was sentenced to 15 years in prison for killing her one-day infant. She was let out of prison after three years).

Interesting stuff…

This is from the July/August issue of Dollars & Sense (although the version in the magazine is in black and white - oh, well). This is the second time I’ve drawn these characters; the first time was in March..

UPDATE: It may interest folks to know that there was a lot of wrangling with the editors over the punch line of this one. My initial idea was:

BROWNHAIR: The winner gets too sane to be on a reality tv show, so the show has to be cancelled before it even appears.
PINKHAIR: The perfect reality show!

That doesn’t work (”gets too sane” is a phrase that doesn’t work, and how is the show cancelled before it appears when the winning doesn’t happen until the end of the show’s season?), so the editors were right to reject it; and unfortunately, things were on too tight a schedule for me to have time to step back from the line, realize why it wasn’t working, and fix it. If I were to rewrite it today, I’d make it:

BROWNHAIR: The winner gets too much self-esteem to be on reality tv, so the show has to be cancelled.
PINKHAIR: At last, the perfect reality show!

I was tempted to redraw the last panel, this time using the above dialog, before posting it on the blog. I decided not to because I’m lazy and anyhow I don’t have the spare time (I’ve got a ton of drawing on various paid projects - including the Sept/Oct “Dollars and Sense” cartoon - I have to do this week). Additionally, I really like how the body language and expressions in the final panel came out. Besides, I’m not sure “my” ending is any better than the one that was used.

Anyhow, other suggested endings included:

BROWNHAIR: I dunno… self-respect? A measure of serenity?

PINKHAIR: You’d get better ratings if she got a million dollars and then had to wrestle in jello.

And this one, suggested by the editors:

BROWNHAIR: The winner will star in a spin-off called ‘The Simple Waif’, where she will match wits with Paris Hilton for the dizzy heiress’ fortune.

PINKHAIR: Now THAT’s hot.

(I didn’t fully get this one until the editors explained that “that’s hot” is Paris Hilton’s catch phrase.)

In the end, we went with “You really don’t get the point of reality shows, do you?,” which was suggested by my friend Phil Howe. Thanks, Phil!

(This is a comment that Radfem left in an earlier thread).

Racism, or classism have both been evident in many aspects of this tragedy. In fact, I think this will be the second great tragedy that we will remember aside from the human loss … that the whole world has seen the underpinnings of our under the table racist ways exposed. The use of the word “refugee” though has nothing to do with it.

My mom and I were discussing this yesterday, and she brought it up, in that way, which shouldn’t surprise me because she’s tutored kids, pregnant teens, young mothers(through a program that offers these services to young unwed mothers) and she’s seen the neglect of communities exacts a price every day that’s just a less extreme example of some of what happened in New Orleans, during Hurricane Katrina. New Orleans faced that for years before the hurricane that took it off the map.

I don’t know about the use of refugee, evacuee, survivor, etc. All of those terms are loaded in varying ways, and they may all impact people positively, or negatively based on life experiences, cultures, belief systems, personal Katrina experiences and those should be respected, which makes coming up with one acceptable label, more difficult.

With all the racism and classism seen so far, it puts everything under the microscope and maybe for good reason. Racism with “loot” vs “find”, racism with criminalizing large groups of Black people. Racism, ableism, and classism with the access to evacuating safely. The conditions in NO, that have been there for years, which contributed to what happened after Katrina. What was past becomes prologue.

Anyone who has to walk miles to refuge in their bare feet is a refugee. Anyone who has to take a shit in a once public sports arena, on the floor, next to dead bodies, is a refugee.

This is one vivid description of a refugee that has been given, but it also applies to many people in our nation who aren’t directly impacted by Hurricane Katrina, including those who lived in NO and in the South before the disaster.

Anyone who walks for miles in bare feet could be a homeless person, or family doing that, day after day, after day till there’s no break between where the calluses begin and the softer skin ends. We’ve all seen them, and smelled them, especially when they’ve been unable to bathe for a long time. Anyone urinating or defecating on what is, or once was a vibrant business, or a family’s house, goes on every day in many cities. At least where I live. Just last week, I walked down one of our streets and there was a flow of liquid coming towards my shoes and it was from a homeless guy lying in a doorway, who was going to the bathroom.

In downtown L.A., you have to hold your breath for about a minute each time you walk past an alley or a fire escape, because that’s where the “public” bathrooms are. Then people get arrested for urinating in public by police.

If these people from the hurricane are refugees in our society under some of these definitions, then they are not the only ones, just the most visible ones for the moment, until the media moves elsewhere. And some of them, might join the homeless in our country, because they lack the resources for a variety of reasons, or because they were homeless before.

I’m not trying to downplay the disaster, or make comparisons, but people in this country live in deplorable conditions on a daily basis. And while watching the coverage at New Orleans and other places, I was kind of reminded of that and that was one of many reasons why at the same time I felt compelled to watch the news coverage, it also made me want to turn away. Kind of like when I ran into the guy who was lying under the blanket under the doorway at City Hall, on the way to the office.

This disaster presented what can happen in a split second, to a large group of people all at once, rather than piecemeal and it stuck it in our faces, because while the media has no interest in the plight of the most poor people in our society, it’s always been fascinated by massive tragedy, death and damage. But the reality is, you can lose everything in a hurricane, or you can lose it when you live check to check and get sick, without health insurance. Women who are very poor and/or homeless are very vulnerable to rape as well in their lives as were the women and children in New Orleans.

Sydney’s vocabulary tends to reflect what she thinks is important in the world around her: “Cake” is a word she says very clearly indeed.

Don’t you hate it when cheesecake isn’t served fast enough? Sydney decides to get pro-active.

(Out of mercy for folks with slow connections, the rest of this entry is below the fold).
Read the rest of this entry »

Save-the-sperm nutcase Dawn Eden is outraged that Planned Parenthood are offering their services in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

Let’s pretend they don’t employ anyone with any transferrable medical skills whatsoever. Let’s pretend that they don’t offer a wide range of women’s health services that might be useful to some of the victims. Let’s pretend the only thing Planned Parenthood have to offer these people is abortion and contraception.

Being outraged that they make the offer is still the wrong response.

“These people need food and water; they don’t need contraceptives.” Non-sequitur. Needing food and water doesn’t take away any need you might have for contraceptives, and unless Planned Parenthood are telling the Red Cross, “Hey, no need to bother feeding these people, we’re giving them contraceptives!” the need for food and water is irrelevant to the question of whether Planned Parenthood are doing the right thing.

Planned Parenthood don’t have experience in providing food and water, but they do have experience in providing contraception, and some people do need contraception. The young girl in the shelter who’s just been raped needs emergency contraception so she doesn’t have the fear of pregnancy added to everything else she has to suffer. The couple who’ve lost everything except for each other need contraception so they can have the basic comfort of a good fuck and start feeling like human beings again. The woman who’s reached safety but lost her birth control pills along with the rest of her possessions needs replacements so she can begin putting her life in order. If you sincerely believe that these people’s needs are so wrong that attempting to meet them is worthy of outrage, I have doubts about your humanity.

Amanda Marcotte, outraged at a particularly inhuman response, vented her feelings:

Just to spite your sorry ass, I will worship the Disco Ball, say “goddammit” loud and often, commit a dozen or so acts of sodomy, consume way too many alcoholic beverages and if I was pregnant, I would get an abortion just to spite you.

I would make the same pledge out of solidarity, but I’ve put too much effort into growing my baby to consider having an abortion for anyone’s sake. Instead, I’ve done the next best thing by donating what little I can to Planned Parenthood’s relief efforts. Anyone who’s outraged at the save-the-sperm outrage, I urge you to do the same. I found it extremely therapeutic.

Chief Justice Rehnquist died earlier tonight, aged 80.

I can’t pretend to mourn the man, but neither do I have any stomach for attacking the recently departed on their deathday. Clearly his family loved him, and he had many admirers, and I’m sorry they’re feeling a loss. He was without any doubt a brilliant man, and one whose accomplishments were - unfortunately, in my view - enourmous.

Nor do I have any idea what this means for the Court. (Rehnquist was already an anti-Roe vote, so Bush getting to replace him with another anti-Roe vote won’t change the balance).

Truth is, I don’t really have anything to say, yet. But I thought “Alas” readers might like a place to discuss Rehnquist and the upcoming court battles, so….

UPDATE: Whoops! P-A and I crossposted.

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