On another post, Plunky writes in comments:

I ain’t a lawyer, but I don’t think we should have laws about hate crimes. It is the act of the crime that is reprehensible, not whether the crime occurred because of prejudice, stupidity, whatever. Judges and juries have been weighing the motives of criminals for a long time, and they should be able to keep doing it without legislation that makes some _thoughts_ more criminal than others.

Essentially, I think hate crime laws are a violation of the First Amendment. They take something that is not criminal: hating a certain minority/class/etc and then using that to compound criminal sentencing. It is not illegal to hate women. It is illegal to rape women. If a person is on trial for raping a woman, it should not matter that he hated all women. He should be punished for the one illegal act, not his legal thoughts.

I think Plunky’s analysis is mistaken, because it ignores that many “hate crimes” are crimes not just against an individual, but also against an entire community. If I build a small campfire and roast some hot dogs on Woody Allen’s lawn because I’m hungry, that should be recognized as a different crime from burning a cross on Woody’s lawn because I want to tell all the area Jews that they might be assaulted or killed if they don’t move out.

I agree with David at Orcinus:

Bias-crime laws no more create “thought crimes” than do any other laws consigning greater punishments for crimes committed under certain species of mens rea (or the mental state of the perpetrator), including anti-terrorism laws. Differences in intent and motive can make the difference between first-degree murder and manslaughter. Enhanced punishments are especially warranted when crimes are believed to cause greater harm — and hate crimes quantifiably do so. These are standard features of criminal law, and no more create “thought crimes” than do laws providing the death penalty for first-degree murder.

More to the point (and as I also argue at length in Death on the Fourth of July), hate-crimes laws are not about taking away anyone’s freedoms — rather, they are about ensuring freedoms for millions of Americans.

As I point out in the book, hate crimes have the fully intended effect of driving away and deterring the presence of any kind of hated minority — racial, religious, or sexual. They are essentially acts of terrorism directed at entire communities of people, and they are message crimes: “Keep out.”

Amanda once suggested that we should start using the term “domestic terrorism” rather than “hate crime,” because that better explains why it is that these crimes should be punishable. I think she’s right.

[Cross-posted at Creative Destruction, where moderation is less heavy-handed.]

A new addition to the list of the stupidest arguments against marriage equality. From the New York Times article on the House of Reps debate over same-sex marriage:

Another Georgia Republican, Representative Phil Gingrey, said support for traditional marriage “is perhaps the best message we can give to the Middle East and all the trouble they’re having over there right now.”

I’m trying to imagine what would have to be going through someone’s mind to make “we should ban same-sex marriage to send a message to the Middle East” seem like an even remotely rational argument.

Was he thinking that if there’s anything wrong with the middle east, it’s that the culture there is too accommodating of homosexuals, and so we must set a good example by not accommodating our local queers? Was he thinking that the reason people kidnap Israeli soldiers is because lesbians and gays in Massachusetts are getting married, and so we should therefore attempt to placate them by assuring them we hate gays, too? Was he too high on crack to be thinking anything at all? It’s a mystery.

UPDATE: By the way, this is far from being the most repulsive, bigoted, anti-queer statement to come out of an elected Republican this week.

[Cross-posted on Creative Destruction, where the moderation is lighter.]

Elkins discusses why online fights, especially within online fandom communities, can get so very nasty. She reflects on the paranoiac style of many online fandom disputes, and wonders if there’s a connection to how girls in our culture are taught to express aggression:

The other week, however, while I was at the beach, I read a book someone had recommended to me on the subject of girls’ particular modes of aggression–Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls, by Rachel Simmons–and it was really shocking to me just how well many of the things that this book described were things that I strongly associate with online fandom dynamics. That in turn has made me wonder to what extent much of the “paranoiac” behavior that I’ve been seeing in on-line fandom might be an artifact not only of CMC, but also of the predominantly female demographics of the fandom circles in which I’ve travelled. [...]

Because of this, and also because these modes of aggression are often so very subtle, their use actively encourages people to hyper-analyze their social environments, to try to “read things into” all of their social interactions. There’s not nearly as much room for misunderstanding in a fistfight as there is in a dirty look, or in the slight turning away of bodies when a girl who has been targeted for exclusion enters a room. These are shows of aggression which already need to be ‘translated’ in order to be properly understood; if you can’t perform this act of translation, then you will have no idea what is really going on. Girls learn to spend a lot of their time and mental energy trying to analyze and to second-guess the behavior of the people around them precisely because within their social milieus, this is often a relevant social skill.

The above quote only scratches the surface of the post, so I recommend that you head over there and read the whole thing.

There’s a great deal of interesting discussion in Elkin’s comments, as well. I liked this brief discussion of how society views male vs female aggression, for instance, and this comment on the overlap between girls’ friendships, fandom, and romance:

…Another of the things that kept striking me as I read that book was just how similar, in many ways, girls’ friendships at the age at which these behaviors are most common really are to romantic relationships, so much so that I think at times it’s difficult even to avoid the language of romance when we talk about girls’ friendships. Girls get crushes on each other; they have break-ups; they seek exclusionary relationships with their best friends and then become fantastically jealous of interlopers. They write each other what are really, for all intents and purposes, love letters. They’re very passionate about each other.

And that’s something else that I see a lot of in on-line fandom, honestly, although I suspect that some might find it a somewhat uncomfortable subject. :) Fandom interactions often seem to me to have strong homoerotic overtones: we express approbation by giving each other *snogs* and expressing desires to have each others’ “internet babies.” We “fangirl” each other.

I was also particularly struck by the exchange between Lyssabard and Elkins about how the structure of Livejournal encourages paranoia:

The entire ‘friending’ issue is monstrously given to fostering social paranoia, I quite agree, as is the ability not only to friendslock and screen comments, but also to use “private filters,” so that even ‘friends’ can’t really know whether they’re privy to all of each other’s interactions or not. An excellent recipe for paranoia, that - I’m not sure if they could have designed a better one if such had been their intent.

There are many more comments worth quoting, but I’d better stop before I end up summarizing the entire thing.

Although Elkins focuses on online fandom in particular, I can’t help reading Elkins’ essay and thinking about how the interactive style she describes applies to some of the feminist internet communities I’ve been involved with. The closest match I’ve been involved with are the Ms Boards (a large, now-long-defunct feminist bboard that Ms Magazine used to run), where the paranoid style - right down to wondering if parties F were plotting against parties G in private forums or instant chat, and accusations of conspiracies - happened quite a bit. (There was also an appalling amount of cliquishness, which I think encourages that sort of thought).

The Feminist Blogosphere seems to have a great deal less of that sort of thing (at least, I’ve seen it less). I think one reason for that is that there’s less feeling of privacy in blogs. In BBoards - and in LiveJournal communities, for that matter - it’s easy to fall into the illusion (sometimes true, sometimes not) that the people you think of as involved in that community are the only people reading what you write. Blogs, for some reason, feel more like public documents.

Please Note: Moderation at “Alas” is sometimes heavy-handed. If you’d like to avoid all that, consider commenting on the cross-post on Creative Destruction instead.

This is one of the world’s comparatively minor injustices, but nevertheless one that it’s useful to be reminded of from time to time, since there’s no excuse for it: Residents of Washington, DC have no representation in Congress. All they have is a non-voting delegate in the House (though since 1961 they have had three electoral votes for President).

At a bare minimum, DC needs a Representative with status equal to that of the other Reps. The Senate is a bit tougher of a question, since I think the two-Senators-per-state system is wrong (I’d rather change the Senate to nationwide Proportional Representation, in which DC would of course vote). So I’m undecided between giving DC two Senators of its own, or the alternative (and more politically feasible) suggestion of letting it vote in the Maryland Senate elections. Indeed, I would be happy to retrocede DC back into Maryland, just like Arlington long ago returned to Virginia.

There are two basic arguments advanced against giving DC representation: the “vested interest” argument and the “non-favoritism” argument. I don’t think either holds water, particularly when matched up against the competing claims of political equality for all citizens.

Read the rest of this entry »

Comment: Does your family approve of your relationship?
Variations of Comment: What do you parents think? Have you told your family?
What Comment Really Means: I know your family probably isn’t happy about this. Or, my family would be pissed; let me see if this is true for this person. Or, your family couldn’t possibly support you, could they? Or, does you family actually like Blacks/Asians/Latinos/Indians/Whites?
Why comment is racist/inappropriate or both: The main reason this comment is inappropriate is because it is none of other people’s business. It also holds up a double standard. Could you imagine random strangers going up to same race couples and asking them how their family feels about their relationship? Another problem with this question is that it really becomes tedious because people ask it all of the time. So if you get up the nerve to ask someone in an IR this sort of question, your certainly not the first person, and you may have to pay for the fact that many people in interracial relationships get tired of having to justify or validate their existence by answering personal questions.

Is this question ever appropriate? I think if you get to know people well it is a perfectly acceptable question, but people should still proceed with caution. I can also tell you from my numerous interviews with people in IRs that you are probably not going to get an honest answer. This is a really painful subject for many couples and individuals because rejection or distance from loved ones and many people don’t feel comfortable talking about something of this nature.

Comment: What about your children?
Variations of Comment: How are you going to raise you kids? Are you kids _______ or ________?
What Comment Really Means: I think your children are probably going to be messed up, so it’s not a good idea to have kids. Maybe you shouldn’t be together. I really oppose interracial relationships, but I am going to use the excuse of “caring” about biracial children, so I don’t have to say I think IRs are wrong.
Why comment is racist/inappropriate or both: This comment is wrong in part because it is another question that crosses personal boundaries. How other people raise their kids is not the business of random strangers. Additionally, the assumption that people are somehow socially (or genetically) damaged good because they are multiracial is not validated by any legitimate scientific research. This is not to say that there are not individual cases of mixed race people dealing with identity issues, but there are same race people who struggle with racial identity issues too. Moreover, the primary reason that multiracial identity is loathed and pathologized by many people in this culture is racism. You can not blame indidividual interracial couples or multiracial people for this problem.

Comment: Is he/she adopted?
Variations: Are you adopted? Where did you get that child from?
What the comment really means: That child doesn’t look like your biological child. Or, I am really surprised to see this interracial family. Or, I know/hope she didn’t give birth to that child?
Why the comment is inappropriate: Once again this is another none of your business moment. Moreover, many interracial couples who are created by blood take strong offense to the assumption that they are not a “blood family.” In both adopted families and biological families, this is just one more reminder that many people think of interracial families as less than. Moreover, this is another question that people get tired of answering over and over again, especially in cases where the parents are biologically related to the children.

Comment: Is that your husband/wife/child? (usually followed by a drawn out “Oooh”)
Variations: Where is your husband/wife/child? Are you with him/her?
What the comment really means: When I see people of different races together I don’t think they can be related, so I need to do some double checking. Or, Why are you with this person? Or, You don’t look like a family.
Why the comment is inappropriate: The big problem here is the assumption that people of different races cannot be a family or cannot be close to each other. The constant pressure to have to prove you are really a family and you are legitimate is unfair to interracial couples and families.

Comment: What are you?
Variations: What is your background/race? You are so beautiful/exotic. Biracial people are cool/exotic/a symbol of progress.
What the comment really means: Are you biracial/multiracial? Or, I can’t tell your race by looking at you. Or, you look exotic/different/strange/funny/unusual. I’m uncomfortable because I can’t put you into a racial box; please help me alleviate this discomfort.
Why the comment is inappropriate: Part of the reason this sort of question is inappropriate is based on the grammar used. “What” is a pronoun used to refer to things, not people. If people used the more appropriate language, “Who are your?” hopefully, they would also realize the absurdity of this sort of question. How can a person tell you who she or he is in a concise sentence? How can who we are be reduced only to our racial/ethnic backgrounds, as these sorts of questions imply. Are same race people asked those sorts of questions? These sorts of questions exoticized mixed race people. The truth of the matter is when it comes to appearance mixed race people are like everybody else—some biracial people are plain looking, some are exotic, some are pretty, some are ugly.

One of the general problems with these sorts of questions is that they treat interracial couples and multiracial people as if they are some sort of museum exhibit set up to educate everyone else. Rather than being given personal and private space, the boundaries of interracial couples and multiracial families are not respected. This is also true for people of color more generally. I know of cases of African Americans who have strangers or coworkers who want to touch their hair. The respect for privacy and personal space is denied when these sorts of questions are asked (especially repeatedly). I know at some point people need to be educated, but asking these personal questions to complete strangers or casual acquaintances is not the appropriate context. Additionally, other many people in mixed race people and interracial families just want to be treated as “normal” having to answer such questions is not normal. I’m not trying to say that race doesn’t matter in interracial relationships/families, but I am saying treating interracial couples as some sort of exotic oddity is insulting. Maybe people who ask these sorts of questions need to think about why they want to know the answers to these questions?

Admin note: In part 2 I will address the following three inappropriate questions 1)What is the sex like? Does he have a big/small penis? Is she a freak? 2)Could you find a person of your own race? 3)Well you can’t help who you fall in love with.

Hey, fatso - and friends of fatso, too - time to put fingers to keyboard! Body Impolitic has put out a call for submissions for the Fourth Big Fat Carnival. Please submit your own work, or any other blog posts from the past couple of months that you think were wonderful examples of fat advocacy in the blogosphere.

We still don’t have a host for the fifth Big Fat Carnival, so if you’d like to host, please let me know.

I guess you have to give John Howard credit for being honest. The Aussie PM is excited about the prospect of Australia becoming an “energy superpower” by expanding its share of the fossil fuel market. Howard rejects not only the Kyoto Protocol but also any alternative (such as a carbon tax) other than end-of-the-pipe carbon cleanup technology. Burning fossil fuels comes first, because that’s what will make Australia rich. Protecting the environment can’t be allowed to interfere.

Australia is well placed to be an innovator in clean energy, with its cloudless skies and wide-open spaces ready for solar and wind power. But those kind of innovations won’t make money right away for established mining companies, and Howard is clear on whose back he’s watching.

Howard repeatedly cites “pragmatism” as a reason to focus on older forms of energy. It’s a common rhetorical trick, portraying older energy technologies as known quantities while renewable energy is speculative and risky. The problem is, if we demand that our energy source be clean — which Howard gives lip service to — the plausibility of that claim goes out the window. Is it really “pragmatic” to aim for a massive engineering fix that will turn dirty energy technologies into clean ones, but not “pragmatic” to expand the use of already-existing technologies that are intrinsically clean?

Cross-posted at debitage

Over at Pandagon, there’s a good discussion of whether “alpha males” — men who strongly exhibit stereotypically masculine characteristics, like assertiveness, self-control, extroversion, leadership, risk-taking, not-taking-shit-from-anyone — can be (pro)feminists. The conclusion, with which I agree, seems to be a unanimous “yes.” (I will note, in a probably futile attempt to forestall semantic debate, that I realize that the alpha and beta categories are generalized and fuzzy and not mutually exclusive. In any event, we can talk about the alpha-male characteristics without necessarily packaging them under that term.)

What interests me is the implication that whether beta males (unassuming, conciliatory, tolerant, behind-the-scenes, risk-averse) can be (pro)feminist is unproblematic. The issue is raised by, and hence focuses on, alpha males, who are trying to do away with the particular patriarchal expressions of alpha maleness in their lives. Confusion between these two levels — and hence improper generalization of feminists’ criticisms of patriarchal forms of alpha maleness into criticism of alpha maleness tout court — seems to be the core of the problem. Anti-feminists often make this implication explicit, when they charge that feminism wants to turn all men into beta-males, and cite the inevitability of alpha males as a reason why feminism will never succeed.

Looking at the feminist and (pro)feminist responses to the alpha male question, though, it seems that it’s alpha male (pro)feminists whose existence is unproblematic. Indeed, the paradigm case of (pro)feminist action — boldly calling out another man on his sexist behavior — is also a classically alpha male act. So perhaps we should be asking whether it’s possible for beta males to be (pro)feminists.

I must make clear that there’s one jump of logic I’m not willing to make yet. It would be easy enough to end this post by saying “pity the poor beta male, who is left out of (pro)feminism! We must reassure him that he’s OK, that he can be (pro)feminist in his own way.” (A very beta-male sort of argument, incidentally.) Instead we need to entertain the possibility that a certain degree of alpha maleness is a requirement for being a (pro)feminist, at least in a world where injustice and privilege must be actively fought, and where men have no mitigating circumstances or excuses.

Cross-posted at debitage

Over at abyss2hope

Also the carnival now has it’s own blog http://carnivalagainstsexualviolence.blogspot.com with links to past editions and information on future editions.

I used to live in the Southern Appalachian mountains. While there, i became aware of the struggles going on in coal country. It was while involved in these struggles that i learned of the true hystory of the term Redneck. Before, i had believed that the word was a derogatory term for farmworkers. Now, i know that it was the name of the coal miners who took over Blair Mountain in the Fall of 1921. One of the largest armed uprising in US hystory, some 10,000 coal miners confronted state and federal troops in an attempt to unionize the coal mines of West Virginia. The month-long battle was deemed the Red Neck Wars because of the red bandanas that the miners wore around their necks. One of the most notable of the battle’s union organizers was Mother Jones.

Although the miners lost the battle and more than 900 were indicted, they never lost their spirit for struggle and justice. To this day, the coal fields remain a tense ground for struggle between miners, the corporate executives, and coal company thugs (yup, they still got their own thugs).

One things that has changed, however, is the battle. While safety standards remain high on the list of priorities, a new era in coal mining has brought together union and environmental activist. The new foe, mountaintop removal (referred to as strip mining by the industry), threatens the region’s biosphere on a very large scale by cutting off the tops of mountains to access coal and filling nearby valleys with the rocks and soil removed. To see one of these projects up close is heart-wrenching.

As you can imagine, the soil is completely destroyed leaving the land unable to regenerate. So what do you put in nature’s place? Coal companies have a quick response to that one: the new flat ground is perfect for a Walmart or a new prison facility. And that is exactly how the industry is marketing these newely destroyed lands to local and state officials.

Unfortunately, that is also the future for the coal miners, as well. With mountaintop removal, a job that used to take over a hundred people can now be done with just three low-skilled workers. This has reeked havoc on union membership and the ability of the union to increase health and safety standards. Coal companies are also finding it easier to undermine unions by exploiting the undocumented immigrant workforce. Considering the fact that mountaintop removal has destroyed not only land but also homes, schools, roads and entire towns, the many former coal miners that are unable to find work as Walmart greeters or prison guards are sure to find themselves filling one of the privately-owned prison cells.

This week’s letter will not be written to the coal companies. As powerful as they are, we will be writing to a far more powerful influence in our nation: Oprah. This month’s issue of O Magazine featured a story, entitled “You fight for what you got, even if its only worth a dime,” of some of the incredible wimmin in Appalachia who are standing up against the devastation of mountaintop removal. I’ve had the privilege of meeting and working with several of these wimmin and that’s why i want to continue to support them even if i no longer live in the area.

The letter-writing campaign is being organized by EarthJustice. It is a positive campaign in that it is meant to thank the people at the magazine for including the report, but also to encourage Oprah to have some of these wimmin on her show so that millions of others can hear their stories of loss and struggle (one family’s three-year-old son was crushed to death in his sleep by a boulder that was knocked loose by a coal truck that was working illegally one night - the company was given a small fine for working illegally but was not implicated in the child’s death).

As brownfemipower stated months ago, Oprah can be a tool for radical change. She sees herself as such a tool. It is up to us to bring to her attention the struggles of working-class wimmin so that she may share their stories with the nation. Please take a moment and visit EarthJustice’s campaign page to see a sample letter. Then head over to Oprah’s website and submit your letter to the producers. It will take you five minutes for something that can change the lives of thousands and help protect the world’s oldest mountains. le

As I mentioned earlier, I’ll be visiting New York City and I’d love to have dinner with “Alas” readers while I’m there! And it gets better - “Alas” co-blogger Rachel (also of Rachel’s Tavern) will be attending the dinner, as well!

The dinner will take place on August 1st, somewhere in Manhattan. Let’s use this thread to work out the details, please.

First of all, if you think you’ll attend, please post that in comments. (Come one! Come all!) If you’d like to attend but cost forbids it, let me know either in comments or in email - as long as there aren’t many takers, I might be able to subsidize you.

Second of all, can anyone suggest a place we could eat?

The ideal place will serve either American, Chinese, or pizza (sorry, folks, I’ve got narrow food tastes); will have options for both vegetarians and carnivores; and won’t cost too much (between $10 and $15 a meal seems about right to me, but if anyone disagrees, or if it’s insane for me to think that’s possible in NYC, please let me know); and not be so noisy that we couldn’t have a conversation.

The extra-extra-extra ideal restaurant would have a back room type place that we could eat in.

Suggestions?

(I originally found this story on Stephanie’s Journal.)

Two men, Dustin Evans and Jeremy Sweat, have been arrested in Clarendon county, South Carolina accused of a vicious attack on a 15 year old girl. Here is the story,

Investigators say inside the mobile home, the victim was choked and had her neck cut with a knife before she was repeatedly raped by the two men.

They then forced her into a shower, told her to turn around and began stabbing her. The teenager fell into the bathtub and played dead.

She played dead and overheard the men talking about getting some trash bags and dumping her body in a lake. That’s when her attackers left.

Then she ran away, climbing over the back fence to get help next door. Oather Webster tells what happened next, “I could hear somebody stumbling and banging on the wall as they were going down the porch.”

The girl was soaked in blood and pounding on Webster’s house, begging to be let in, “I had this blood-soaked figure come bolting in the house.” (WIS 10, Columbia, SC)

It is rather amazing that this young woman had the presence of mind to get away from these guys given the severity of the attack. Further interviews with the suspects also lead authorities to connect them to another attack on a 45 year old Black woman, and after the publicity of the case some local Black women came forward and said that had been approached as well.

The local authorities believe that the crime was a hate crime,

Jeremy Sweat, 24, who is white, told officers two days after the July 3 incident that the victim, a black female, was “someone society wouldn’t care about, wouldn’t be missed,” said Lt. Tommy Burgess of the Clarendon County Sheriff’s Department.

Sweat and another suspect also are charged in connection with the June 20 kidnapping and rape of a 45-year-old Summerton woman who is black.

Burgess said the department has classified both sexual assaults as hate crimes, according to criteria set up under the National Incident-Based Reporting System, a voluntary national crime database.

However, the hate crime charge will carry no legal consequence because South Carolina does not have a hate crime statute.

You can read more about this case at Clarendon Today.

The deadline is July 16th, and you can find all the relevant links here. If you have a feminist blog post in you about anything fantasy or sci-fi related, now’s the time to get it out.

At TomDispatch, a horrifying but not surprising article by Ruth Rosen on women’s conditions in Iraq post-invasion.

There’s no way I can quote all the important parts of this article, but here’s a few samples:

Amal Kadham Swadi, one of seven Iraqi female attorneys attempting to represent imprisoned women, told the Guardian that only one woman she met with was willing to speak about rape. “She was crying. She told us she had been raped. Several American soldiers had raped her. She had tried to fight them off, and they had hurt her arm. She showed us the stitches. She told us, ‘We have daughters and husbands. For God’s sake don’t tell anyone about this.’”

[...]

Sexual Terrorism on the Streets

Meanwhile, the chaos of the war has also led to a rash of kidnappings and rapes of women outside of prison walls. After interviewing rape and abduction victims, as well as eyewitnesses, Iraqi police and health professionals, and U.S. military police and civil affairs officers, Human Rights Watch released a report in July, 2003, titled Climate of Fear: Sexual Violence and Abduction of Women and Girls in Baghdad. Only months after Baghdad fell to U.S. forces, they had already learned of twenty-five credible allegations of the rape and/or abduction of Iraqi women. Not surprisingly, the report found that “police officers gave low priority to allegations of sexual violence and abduction, that the police were under-resourced, and that victims of sexual violence confronted indifference and sexism from Iraqi law enforcement personnel.” Since then, as chaos, violence, and bloodletting have descended on Iraq, matters have only gotten worse.

After the American invasion, local gangs began roaming Baghdad, snatching girls and women from the street. Interviews with human rights investigators have produced some horrifying stories. [...]

As recently as June 2006, Mayada Zhaair, spokeswoman for the Women’s Rights Association, a local NGO, reported, “We’ve observed an increase in the number of women being sexually abused and raped in the past four months, especially in the capital.”

No one knows how many abducted women have never returned. As one Iraqi police inspector testified, “Some gangs specialize in kidnapping girls, they sell them to Gulf countries. This happened before the war too, but now it is worse, they can get in and out without passports.” Others interviewed by Human Rights Watch argued that such trafficking in women had not occurred before the invasion.

The U.S. State Department’s June 2005 report on the trafficking of women suggested that the extent of the problem in Iraq is “difficult to appropriately gauge” under current chaotic circumstances, but cited an unknown number of Iraqi women and girls being sent to Yemen, Syria, Jordan, and Persian Gulf countries for sexual exploitation.

[...]

Disappearing women

To avoid such dangers, countless Iraqi women have become shut-ins in their own homes. Historian Marjorie Lasky has described this situation in “Iraqi Women Under Siege,” a 2006 report for Codepink, an anti-war women’s organization. Before the war, she points out, many educated Iraqi women participated fully in the work force and in public life. Now, many of them rarely go out. They fear kidnap and rape; they are terrified of getting caught in the cross-fire between Americans and insurgents; they are frightened by sectarian reprisals; and they are scared of Islamic militants who intimidate or beat them if they are not “properly covered.”

“In the British-occupied south,” Terri Judd reported in the British Independent,”where Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mehdi’s Army retains a stranglehold, women insist the situation is at its worst. Here they are forced to live behind closed doors only to emerge, concealed behind scarves, hidden behind husbands and fathers. Even wearing a pair of trousers is considered an act of defiance, punishable by death.”

Invisible women — for some Iraqi fundamentalist Islamic leaders, this is a dream come true. The Ministry of the Interior, for example, recently issued notices warning women not to go out on their own. “This is a Muslim country and any attack on a woman’s modesty is also an attack on our religious beliefs,” said Salah Ali, a senior ministry official. Religious leaders in both Sunni and Shiite mosques have used their sermons to persuade their largely male congregations to keep working women at home. “These incidents of abuse just prove what we have been saying for so long,” said Sheikh Salah Muzidin, an imam at a mosque in Baghdad. “That it is the Islamic duty of women to stay in their homes, looking after their children and husbands rather than searching for work—especially with the current lack of security in the country.”

In the early 1970s, American feminists redefined rape and argued that it was an act driven not by sexual lust, but by a desire to exercise power over another person. Rape, they argued, was an act of terrorism that kept all women from claiming their right to public space. That is precisely what has happened to Iraqi women since the American invasion of Iraq.

There’s a lot more, and many links to more resources on women’s lives in Iraq. Read the whole thing.

I’m sorry to do a quote-post; I’ve tried writing a post on this subject myself many times, but I just get too angry to continue. What the US government (mostly Republicans, but with the cooperation of a shamefully huge number of Democrats) has done in Iraq is evil. If not the evil of malice, then the evil of being so self-centered and egotistical and partisan-sighted that they’re simply incapable of seeing the women whose murder, kidnappings, rapes, and home imprisonments they’ve eagerly enabled. It’s abusive and sick and - at the risk of becoming repetitive - evil.

And the number of pro-war Americans who have written or blogged honestly about the catastrophic decline in women’s rights in Iraq can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Are they sociopaths? Are they so racist and misogynistic that they’re incapable of caring what happens to non-white women? Are they so loyal to Bush that they think that the harm of saying one critical word about Bush outweighs the harm Bush’s policies have done to countless Iraqi women? What’s wrong with them?

(I know, I know; I’m being “shrill.” Why does anyone with a working brain think “shrill” is a legitimate critique of anything? Frankly, if thinking that what’s happening to Iraqi women is a moral travesty makes me shrill, then I’ll be shrill, and furthermore you should be ashamed if you’re not shrill.)

Keep in mind that women are a majority in Iraq. It’s becoming clear that, for that majority (and for many of the male minority, as well) bad as life under Saddam was, life under the American occupation is much worse. It’s a staggering accomplishment, if you think of it, that we’ve managed to outdo Saddam in this regard. Either this war was not fought to free the people of Iraq, despite many claims to the contrary. Or if it was fought to free Iraqis, then the effort has been a dismal failure by people so brainwashed by partisanship and/or pro-war ideology that they’re no longer capable of recognizing failure, let alone taking any responsibility for the unbelievable damage they’ve caused.

How many Iraqi women have to be raped, kidnapped, and murdered before more than a handful of the folks who favored invading Iraq admit they’ve screwed up catastrophically? My guess is: all of them. And even that probably wouldn’t be enough.

PLEASE NOTE:
This thread is reserved for feminist and feminist-friendly posters only. Cross-posted at Creative Destruction .

(Warning: This post is really long. Primarily because it took me about 3-4 weeks to write and research.)

Well, It seems like menstruation has been the hot topic on feminist blogs for the past few months, and I wanted to follow-up on my previous post about using hormonal birth control to suppress menstruation. For those of you who missed the earlier post here it is at Alas and at Rachel’s Tavern. My concerns about menstrual suppression revolved around three issues 1)the lack of studies of the long term health effects of this 2)the possibility that women may get pregnant and not know about it in time to get adequate prenatal care or have access to abortion and 3)the marketing and framing of menstruation as abnormal bad or gross. If I were to prioritize those three things, the last one is the one that I am most concerned about, and that is the one I would like to emphasize in this post.

Amanda over at Pandagon took exception to my view, and made this argument:

The problem isn’t discussing one’s feelings about it or anything like that, but I have a big, fat problem with the kneejerk assumption that “natural” is more valuable than “unnatural”. Every time someone praises menstruation as something that makes them feel like a woman or whatever, I wonder if they’re working for Tampax or something.

The only problem with that argument was that it was not my point. If I was making that argument, I think she has a valid point. I try very consciously to avoid the term “natural”–things like poison ivy and stinging nettles natural. The natural framework is problematic. First, off you’d be hard pressed to get people to agree on what is natural, and second we can’t assume that things that are “natural” are necessarily better than things that are created by people. I also think there are just as many people making money off menstruation as there will be on stopping menstruation. Whether you think a period is “natural” or not, we do need to understand that there is nothing abnormal about periods.

One commenter defended my position very well. La Luba said,

But traditionally, it is the male body that has been viewed as “normal” or “natural,” and the female body that is viewed as abnormal, unnatural, cursed, in need of “fixing.” Arguments like this are really intended to reclaim the female body as OK in its own right; that there isn’t something wrong with us, simply because our bodies aren’t male.

I’m not attached to “natural” as meaning “completely without medical intervention.” But I’m very suspicious of an effort by Big Pharma to focus the marketing of this pill formula towards women without problem periods. The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend. There is a lot of effective right-wing organizing towards abolishing birth control; Big Pharma is reacting to that by targeting the market in a way they know will have a positive effect on their bottom line–by reminding women of the negative aspects of their periods. That will create a demand. Women who wouldn’t dream of fighting for their right to control when and if they get pregnant will definitely get out in the streets to demand the right to live without a period–and don’t think for a minute that has nothing to do with the history of how women, and our menstruation, has been viewed.
Color me skeptical.

And yes, the fact that many women aren’t aware that “periods” while on the pill speaks to the fact that we are taught to be divorced from our bodies and their functions—that we are taught that our bodies are for being seen and being “done to,” rather than being active. I’m seeing this issue against a backdrop of how women’s bodies are viewed and treated, and I see Rachel’s point about semen. Semen has never been traditionally viewed with the negativity menstrual blood has. We haven’t heard semen referred to as “the curse” our whole lives.

I can’t see the marketing of this pill as being any different from the marketing of say, breast implants, or plastic surgery. Restorative breast implants and plastic surgery can make sense for cancer patients, or burn patients….but is this something the rest of us need, or should want? No one would question this “choice” if periods had been traditionally viewed through a neutral lens, as neither good nor bad, just there. That’s not the backdrop we’re working with here. Especially considering the religious overtones of “unclean” menstruating women; of “hysterical”, “unstable” menstruating women. Those myths are still out there. We are still fighting those myths. Whether or not an individual woman makes the choice to take this pill is immaterial. But whether this pill is seen as a “magic bullet” to rid us of the “hysterical” myth is very material. I don’t want a future of “but of course women are just as capable as men! we’re not hysterical anymore, ever since the pill! It’s only those women who don’t take the pill who are hysterical!!” arguments. There’s plenty of pseudo-feminists who would ride that train. (not that it would work. the bars would just be moved again.—but that’s another reason these conversations are necessary.)
I’m not saying that having this pill as an option is adding fuel to these fires. This pill is neutral, in and of itself. I’m saying it’s well worth questioning the why of this option. There are good reasons for making this choice, to take this pill. There are also good reasons for making the choice to not take this pill. Guess which choice is likely to be validated in an antifeminist, capitalist society such as we live in? A world where plastic surgeons make sales pitches in health clubs, because working out isn’t “enough” to make a woman “beautiful?” A world where women are more likely to swallow a man’s semen after oral sex than men are to perform oral sex on a menstruating woman (why is menstrual blood generally considered “ickier” than semen, hmm? wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact it comes out of a female body, would it?).

Natural hell. That’s not the bottom line for me.

Later LaLuba, also added the following comment which I agree with,

Who here is fetishizing “natural” I don’t have high blood pressure; does that mean I’m fetishing the concept of “natural” if I don’t take high blood pressure medicine?
I haven’t really noticed a mainstream tendency to fetishize natural. The mainstream tendency is to fetishize the “better living through chemistry”. And women’s bodies are the favorite battleground. For all the mention of fetishizing “natural”, I have yet to hear of a bottle-feeding mother being asked to leave a public place for not breastfeeding. It’s breastfeeding mothers who are regarded as disgusting, animalistic, filthy, unsanitary, and a public health hazard. Not to mention just plain slutty broads who want to show their tits. I have yet to see much cultural support for women who aren’t getting the full intervention workup. And yes, part of that is because historically, women were/are viewed as being closer to “animal” nature than men. I don’t like fuzzy-headed la-la arguments about some amorphous concept of what is-or-is-not “natural” either, but dammit, we are pressured to tamper with our bodies more than men are, and for specious reasons. Like I said before, there are good reasons for choosing this particular version of the Pill (in reality, a continous dose of the same-old-same-old Pill), but there are also good reasons not to. And women who choose not to are likely to be regarded as unclean freaks, the same way breastfeeding mothers are.
Look. This Pill has been around for generations. There’s a reason it is being marketed in this way, at this time. And it’s because of the pre-existing disgust women were taught to feel about our bodies. Yes, blood stains clothing. Yet people in general do not feel the same way about a bloody nose and a bloody cunt. There is a special revulsion reserved for menstruation. Why? It’s not just about the bloodstains.

I think we need to take a particularly strong stand against the phenomenon that La Luba addresses (in the bold writing). I strongly agree with this proposition. Marketing anti-period or no period pills really is really an ingenious way to help the fight against birth control. I can’t tell you how many young women I know who swear they take birth control pills ONLY to regulate their periods or cut down on period cramps. They say this because they know it is much more acceptable to say, “I am trying to feel better during my period” than it is to say “I’m having sex, and I don’t want to get pregnant.” I’m not chiding people for taking BCP to cut down on painful periods. I’m just pointing out that the “ick” fact associated with periods is something that the right wing embraces, and feminists need to be very careful not to embrace this too.

To me one of the underlying issues is body image—how we feel about our periods is part of our body image. Body image is not just whether we like our weight, breasts, or cellulite. It’s also whether or not we accept the bodily processes that are associated with women. A study by the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals found that MOST women did not enjoy their period (71%) and would like to stop periods (62%). I don’t necessarily find this troubling. I did find some of the study’s other findings bothersome:

Forty-five percent do not avoid touching themselves when menstruating; but the sample was split on whether they thought menstrual blood was disgusting, at 37% disagree/strongly disagree and 37% agree/strongly agree.

I’m shocked at the number of women who will not touch themselves when they are on their period. I remember having an argument with a classmate in high school who believed that women were not supposed to bathe while on their period. She learned this from her mother who forbade her from washing during her period. One of the other findings I found interesting was the fact that 75% of women “believe men have a real advantage by not having the monthly interruption of a period.” On some level this is probably true, but I worry that people are not going to realize that it is the social arrangements of patriarchy that disadvantage menstruation, not anything defective in women’s bodies. Menstrual shame is a real issue that should not be minimized. In fact, Planned Parenthood dedicates a whole webpage to the subject.

The scientific community seems divided over the issue. The Society for Menstrual Cycle Research has released a statement on menstrual suppression. This statement includes results from three studies on the subject of menstrual suppression. Here is a quote on the study findings (the bold emphasis is mine):

Authors of the first paper, Christine Hitchcock and Jerilyn Prior, reviewed studies that have been published on extending the schedule of oral contraceptive pills in order to reduce the frequency of menstrual bleeding. They concluded that we do not yet have evidence to suggest that menstrual suppression is entirely safe and reversible. The second set of authors, Alex Hoyt and Linda Andrist presented results from a study of women’s attitudes toward menstrual suppression. They concluded that negative attitudes toward the menstrual cycle were a better predictor of women’s interest in menstrual suppression than women’s menstrual symptoms, suggesting the importance of psychosocial factors in women’s decision making about altering their menstruation. The third paper, by Ingrid Johnston-Robledo and Jessica Barnack, addressed popular media coverage of menstrual suppression. From their analysis of print media, they concluded that regular menstruation is presented as bothersome and even unhealthy. Advocates of menstrual suppression and its benefits were afforded more space than opponents and risks. As with many other health issues, women are not getting accurate, balanced information, rendering an informed decision about this health care option difficult if not impossible.

While the response of this group is more tempered, the doctor who created Depo Provera, has a popular (but controversial) book arguing that menstruation is obsolete. (I still think menstruation is no more obsolete than semen.) Others advocate menstrual suppression, but don’t go as far. Here are two good sites that give information that is generally favorable to menstrual suppression—The Well Timed Period and No Period.

Some people, who disagreed with my previous post, took me to task arguing that I did not know what a period is. They claim that people taking BCPs do not have periods, just break through bleeding. I think what these people are missing the fact that the definition of a period is socially constructed, and the vast majority of people define a period as bleeding from the vagina as part of the cycle of a woman’s reproductive system. I know cases of women not taking BCP who were anovulatory, but still had monthly bleeding that they label as a period. Most women label the period in which they bleed as their period whether they are on BCP or not. Since my argument was more about the potential marketing of periods as icky disgusting and gross, I think the physiology of BCP is a moot point. What troubles people is blood coming from a woman’s vagina. They don’t care whether she has ovulated or not; they don’t care about the lining of the uterus.

Let’s be real menstruation needs a public relations firm. Imagine if I had written this post about diet pills or a new breast enhancement pill, making the same argument that women should have the right to take it, but that we should be leery of the marketing. I think we would see many more feminists up in arms. I have a feeling the response would have been much different, and I would have been getting high fives all over the place. The disgust with female bodies is widespread unless of course we are talking about the aspects of our bodies that are most accepted by men. (Having your breasts partially revealed on the cover of Maxim is good, but having your breast partially revealed while breast feeding invokes a totally different reaction.) I think views on menstruation are some of the most negative, especially when you have only 45% of women willing to touch themselves while menstruating.

I’m not saying that women should not take these sorts of BCP regiments. I believe in women’s rights to make decisions about our bodies. I also haven’t lost sight of the fact that our bodies have been and continue to be pathologized, and that’s a part of the reason that I still want my period.

Endnote: Clearly, this debate is very contentious among feminists. I collected several discussions on this subject, which are listed below. Overall, the feminist bloggers that I have read are fairly evenly divided on this issue, and both sides seem to feel passionately about the subject. Here are some posts on this subject: Pandagon, Shakespeares Sister, Feministing—Pt. 1 , Pt. 2 , Pt. 3, Niobium, Pandora’s Bazaar, Deanna Zandt, The Primary Contradiction.

Irrational Point is Hosting the Third Erase Racism Carnival!! Here is her call for submissions:

The carnival will be up here on the 20th of July and it would be great if I could have your submissions by noon on the 17th of July (British Summer Time). Posts can be submitted here or emailed to me at irrational_point AT yahoo DOT co.uk.

Anyone can submit a post — either your own or someone else’s, (and obviously you don’t have to have a blog yourself to submit other people’s posts). If you nominate someone else’s post, please make sure you have the permision from the post’s author to do so. Only one post per blogger will appear in the Carnival.

From the New York Times:

BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 6 — The United States ambassador and the top American military commander here together issued an unusual apology on Thursday for the rape and murder of a young Iraqi woman and the killing of her family, saying that the crime, in which at least four soldiers are suspects, had injured the “Iraqi people as a whole.”

I’ve seen many U.S. media stories make the same mistake the Times makes here. In virtually any context other than a crime committed by US soldiers, a 14 year old girl who was raped and murdered would be called a girl, not a “woman.”

“We understand this is painful, confusing and disturbing, not only to the family who lost a loved one, but to the Iraqi people as a whole,” the two senior officials said in a written statement. “The loss of a family member can never be undone. The alleged events of that day are absolutely inexcusable and unacceptable behavior.”

The statement is all the more unusual because no soldiers have been convicted yet or even formally charged.

What I find unusual about the statement, as quoted, is that whoever wrote the “apology” didn’t even read the news reports, or he’d know that four people — Abeer Qasim Hamza, who was raped before she was shot in the head; her parents Qasim Hamza Rasheed al-Janabi and Fakhriya Taha Muheisin al-Janabi, and her six-year-old sister Hadeel Qasim Hamza al-Janabi — had been murdered.

Not “a loved one.” Four loved ones. (Abeer’s two younger brothers were fortunately not home, which is presumably why they’re still alive.)

Does it need to be mentioned that all five soldiers arrested so far have been men?

Heart has been doing outstanding blogging about this appalling hate crime (here, here, here). In her first post about the rape/murders, she quotes the lyrics of a song written by an American soldier. A video that found its way on to the internet showed “The song… performed before thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq who could be heard wildly cheering and laughing in the background.” In the song, a seductive Iraqi woman tempts an American Marine into her home, where she and her insurgent family attempt to murder him.

They pulled out their AKs so I could see

And they said…
Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah
(with humorous emphasis:)
So I grabbed her little sister, and pulled her in front of me.

As the bullets began to fly
The blood sprayed from between her eyes
And then I laughed maniacally

Then I hid behind the TV
And I locked and loaded my M-16
And I blew those little f*ckers to eternity.

The soldier had been planning to release a recording of his song, but in light of recent events he’s put off (or perhaps been ordered to put off) those plans. Not canceled them, mind you. Put them off.

A couple of right-wing bloggers (here here and here) find it ridiculous that Heart sees a connection between an ever-so-funny song about shooting an insurgent and her family to death, and the actual rape and murder that took place.

Seelhoff quotes the Hadji Girl song, and (with typical Feminist logic) segues from a discussion of a humorous skit of a Marine turning the tables on insurgents who attack him, to the case of several soldiers from the 101th Airborne Division of the US Army, not Marines, who have been accused by Iraqis of participating in an incident of rape and murder in the Iraqi city of Mahmoudiya.

(Note the author’s emphasis on the word “Iraqis” - the implication being that the story is not true. When this rape/murder was first reported in American media, the initial reaction of some in the rightosphere was to assume that it couldn’t possibly be true. See, for example, here and here: “…to take seriously the notion that FIVE soldiers gang-raped a girl, murdered her, burned her body, and then murdered her family to cover up the crime is simply beyond the pale. It would make a good movie script, but it’s just too far out there to even begin to take seriously.”)

I think Heart’s point is actually pretty simple: A culture in which a wacky novelty song about killing a seductive Iraqi insurgent and her family is popular and liked, is a culture that is encouraging misogyny and hate against women, and racist hate against all Iraqis. Did “Hadji Girl” cause these five soldiers to rape and murder? No, of course not. But the same cultural racism and misogyny that has (wrongly) convinced thousands of soldiers that “Hadji Girl” is acceptable as entertainment, also convinced these five (or possibly more than five?) men that it was acceptable to rape and murder an Iraqi family.

Oddly enough, right-wingers make this sort of connection all the time, when they (correctly) suggest that hateful anti-Israel propaganda stems is connected to murderous attacks on Israelis, even when there’s no evidence that any particular article was a direct cause of any particular attack. So why is the connection so hard to make when the hatred is directed at Iraqis and Iraqi women in particular?

I am in no way saying that this sort of thing is unique to Americans, or unique to soldiers. Gang-rape is always a weapon used against civilians — nearly always women and girls — in war, but it’s also used against civilians — nearly always women and girls — at home. Ms. Jared, in a comment left on Heart’s blog, linked to this recent story:

More arrests are likely in the rape of an 11-year-old girl by as many as 10 men, most of whom are football players at local community colleges, Fresno police said.

It’s not a coincidence that so many gang rapes are committed by young men in organizations - football, frat houses, the army, etc - which teach the young men that “being a man” is all-important. The sense of entitlement and manhood that convinced the young men in Fresno to rape is the same as the sense of entitlement and manhood that convinced the young men in Iraq to rape; the main difference, I would guess, is that the young men in Iraq had been subjected to a racist regime, devaluing Iraqi lives, which convinced them that it was all right to murder as well.

Please go read Heart’s posts. A lot of the info and links above came from Heart, and also from Feministing, Abyss2Hope, Feminist Law Profs, Footnotes From a Small Village, and Capitalism Bad Tree Pretty.

UPDATE: Ms. Jared, in comments, points me to this post from Riverbend, an Iraqi blogger:

Rape. The latest of American atrocities. Though it’s not really the latest- it’s just the one that’s being publicized the most. The poor girl Abeer was neither the first to be raped by American troops, nor will she be the last. The only reason this rape was brought to light and publicized is that her whole immediate family were killed along with her. Rape is a taboo subject in Iraq. Families don’t report rapes here, they avenge them. We’ve been hearing whisperings about rapes in American-controlled prisons and during sieges of towns like Haditha and Samarra for the last three years. The naiveté of Americans who can’t believe their ‘heroes’ are committing such atrocities is ridiculous. Who ever heard of an occupying army committing rape??? You raped the country, why not the people?

…Imagine your 14-year-old sister or your 14-year-old daughter. Imagine her being gang-raped by a group of psychopaths and then the girl was killed and her body burned to cover up the rape. Finally, her parents and her five-year-old sister were also killed. Hail the American heroes…

Read the whole thing.

UPDATE 2: Punk Ass Blog has more on the misreporting of her age.

***IMPORTANT NOTE***
Comments on this post are open only to feminists and feminist-friendly people. Cross-posted on Creative Destruction.

Bigger version available on Znet.

Well, it’s not like pistol-whipping your wife or firing shots in an argument with her is a big deal or anything, is it? Anyhow, the bitch was probably lying. And they’ve reconciled.

From Rocky Mountain News.com:

July 12, 2006

David Spellman, a former Black Hawk councilman who pleaded guilty to pistol-whipping his wife, will be sworn in today as mayor of the casino town.

“Our mayor had just died. We have a very small pool of eligible people,” Councilman Tom Kerr said Tuesday. “Given Dave’s years of service, it seemed the logical thing to do.”

Spellman was charged in 2005 with hitting Lynnette Hailey, his wife, repeatedly in the head with a .380-caliber handgun and firing at least three shots.

Last week, he entered a guilty plea to felony menacing and third-degree assault and received four years of probation.

Neither Spellman nor Hailey, who is the Central City city manager, was available for comment Tuesday. They have reconciled, town spokesman Chuck Ford said. [...]

The six-member council, including four people who had served with Spellman during his 19 years on the council, voted unanimously in late June to appoint him mayor.

“There was no discussion of the crime or the charges. I don’t believe for a minute that the charges were completely accurate,” said Kerr, who has known Spellman for 26 years.

“I’m not sure anyone is in possession of all of the facts,” he said. “There were inconsistencies and possible slight embellishments.”

“Appalled” is such an inadequate word, isn’t it?

Turtleheart writes:

Plus– “The behavior took place outside of council chambers,” Ford said. “He’s made a mistake, and the community believes he has learned from it.” Oh, well, as long as it took place outside of work, I guess this kind of behavior is okay. And I’d like to add, after YEARS of working in Domestic Violence advocacy– the abuser ALWAYS says he’s learned from his mistakes– well, that’s not true either… The majority of the time the abuser refuses to accept responsibility for his behavior. After all, SHE MADE him do it.

I’ll bet any money that Ford is the sort of person who prides himself on “family values” and looks down his nose at feminists and queers for our lack thereof. Curtsy: Niobium.

Does anyone know what day of the month TANF is dispersed to recipients?

My impression is that the date TANF payments are dispersed varies from person to person. But it’s also been implied, in a post I read recently, that TANF payments are dispersed to everyone on the first of each month. (I say “implied” instead of “said” because the post I read referred to “welfare.” But the main form of cash payments from welfare are TANF, and it’s been that way since Clinton-era Welfare Reform, as far as I know).

Is there anyone reading this who can give a definitive answer? If so, I’d really appreciate hearing from you, either via email or in the comments. Thanks!