must see tv.

clear your schedules for at least 30 minutes.

if you haven't already seen rachel maddow's 'fake president's address' re: the gulf oil spill...even though it's 'capped' now... you'll be glad you spent 10:33 watching her seriously genius commentary.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

and, as usual, keith olbermann hits it out of the park with his special comment on the so-called 'ground zero mosque'. so right on.

scream-worthy

here's what's making me want to scream today:

Fat Hatred
it's insidious "because being fat is viewed not only as a flaw, but as a flaw by choice, a moral failing due to weakness of character." (via Shakesville)

love this last line- so maddeningly true, for so many women:

There is not "a thin person" inside of me screaming to get out. There is only me, screaming for my right to exist in the body I have.

--

Prude? (warning- graphic descriptions of sex in the linked article)
objectification. so old news, isn't it? women are objectified every day, in every medium. great blog post from Ms. Magazine about the effects of that omnipresent objectification. but my question is- so how to we really stop it? really?

the answer i'm coming up with more and more often is: women need to make more MONEY. feminists need to acquire wealth. instead of making feminism our life's work, we need to make money like everyone else, and then we can use it to advance our feminist ideals. but without the power that comes with having serious capital, how will we, for example, have any effect on the development, production and marketing of movies and tv shows that objectify us? really? how will we?

--

Afghan women fear loss of hard-won progress
what the author of this article in the Washington Post really means to say, i think, is that Afghan women fear what women all over the world fear (and in particular, what u.s. women rightfully fear this week as well, as health care purportedly comes up for a "final" vote): BEING THROWN UNDER THE BUS.

forgive us if we find it hard to swallow when men in positions of power and leadership say, "trust us, we have your best interest in mind."

--

After 13 years, police still hunting for East Coast Rapist
hunted like animals; women are victims of men's violence every day. how is it possible that rape is still tolerated in this country. that rapists are not convicted for the predatory criminals that they are, and in fact, rape kits are put on a shelf and never even tested for DNA?

how.
is.
this.
possible?
unless there is a real and systematic repression of women going on? women's voices, women's abuses, and women's lives are silenced, covered up (unless they are deemed "sexy"), and ignored. it's real. and every woman in america is affected by it.

--

How We're Doing: Women and Wealth
this is staggering. literally staggering. Ms. Magazine brings light to the recent study by the Insight Center for Community Economic Development, also highlighted in the Pittsburg Post-Gazette, which reveals:

1. single white women (between the ages of 36-49) make only 61% as much as white men on average. that 61% works out to a median wealth of about $42,600. (and wealth = all owned assets)

chew on that for a minute. lily ledbetter knows what i'm talking about.
next,

2. single black women (of the same age) have a median wealth of $5.
you didn't read that incorrectly. 1,2,3,4,5.

$5.

now either EVERY single black woman between 36-49 is ____(fill in the blank with the disgusting stereotypes of welfare-abusing/drug-abusing/lazy/stupid/makesmewanttothrowup)...

OR

maybe, just maybe, there are system-level inequalities that contribute to this sickening gap in wealth & self-sufficiency. for instance: as a white woman who was raised in a two-parent home, it was just sort of expected that i would attend college. (it was NOT expected that my parents would pay for it.) so i worked 3 jobs and applied for scholarships and made it through.

but what if i hadn't come from a 2-parent household? what if neither of my parents had college educations? what if i couldn't find work on the radio (which i did) because my voice sounded "too black"? what if no one told me about the opportunities to test out of entry-level courses, which enabled me to graduate early and accumulate less debt?

The U.S. has a long history of policies that transferred wealth from people of
color to whites [...]As examples, the Indian Removal Act of 1830 forcibly
removed Cherokees from their traditional lands to make room for white settlers.
Jim Crow laws kept African Americans out of better paying jobs, quality public
education and business opportunities. The benefits of citizenship, open to
Europeans, was forbidden to Asian immigrants. The exclusion of Social Security
coverage for a whole generation of farm workers, laborers and domestic workers,
kept Latino and black elders in poverty. Advantage and disadvantage is passed
from generation to generation, often with a cumulative effect, thereby
contributing to the current racial wealth gap.

it isn't a myth. race matters, especially to women. to women's lives.

so, what makes YOU want to scream today?

*cough* *sputter*

we'd "probably" be a better country if women no longer had the right to vote!?!?!?!?!

i suppose we'd probably be a better country if rape was decriminalized, gays were institutionalized and people of color were segregated too, wouldn't we?

truly: this guy is why our nation and our world is so broken. this guy and the millions of other people like him. he thinks he's just making a little point about 'the good ol' days' (before women were recognized as equally worthy of a voice), but what he's really saying is that anyone who is not exactly like him is simply UNDESERVING of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

winger

really? REALLY?

Judge Sonya Sotomayor's menstrual cycle, language (spanish = "illegal alien"), and of course race, are all totally NON SEXIST and NON RACIST reasons why she should not be the next supreme court justice, right?

thanks for the WHAAAA? moment today, Mr. G. Gordon Libby.

so why would this old nixon-era-convicted-felon care if the next surpreme court justice were a latina woman, as long as she's qualified? why would anyone care? oh that's right- because it means that the POWER will all of a sudden be shared with someone who is not a part of the good ol' boys club. and that, my friends, is the biggest threat of all.

thanks @sarahwarn for the tip on your twitter conversation w/ the esteemed Mr. Libby. keep it up.

life ain't fair

Customers rank women and minority doctors, salespeople and service workers lower than their white male counterparts, even when the customer's interactions with the doctors, sales people or service workers are identical.

key excerpt:
In a related experiment involving bookshop employees, volunteers were shown two videotaped interactions between a customer and a sales clerk and were told to imagine they were customers and rate the shop's service. Some were shown a white male sales clerk, while others were shown a black male clerk or a white female clerk. All the clerks were actors -- and everything else in the videos was identical, down to the script. (emphasis mine)
Those shown the white male clerk rated the service provided 19 percent higher than volunteers shown the woman or the black man. They also rated stores with white male clerks as being cleaner. (emphasis mine)

which is why it's so important to have boards, committees, groups, schools, organizations, city councils, governments and LIVES that reflect the diversity of the world we live in. because if we are left to our own devices, we prove time and again that we are biased, prejudiced, racist, sexist and incapable of systematically treating people fairly. it is only upon closer and sustained examination of our actions and decisions, through the lens of diversity, that we begin to see the inherent fallibility of those actions and decisions. and when we recognize what we're doing, we then have the choice, the opportunity, to change. but if we are never forced, (by simple association), to consider the effect our actions and decisions have on people different from ourselves, then we continue in oblivion.

in other words: until whites and blacks and latinos and arabs, and women and men, and gays and straights, and old and young KNOW one another, respect one another on a personal level and work together across dividing lines- and until ALL those descriptors can be used to accurately describe the governments and boards who wield the power in our communities and across the nation: the inequalities for blacks, latinos, arabs, women, gays, old and young will persist, and will in fact be perpetuated through the governments and boards which hold the power. if our bodies of power do not accurately reflect our communities (which they currently most often do NOT), then the decisions that are made, affecting the entire diverse community, will be exactly like those customer surveys.

it's about more than satisfaction surveys, though. this affects real lives. every day. it's why black men are disproportionately represented in prisons in Iowa. and it's why women are raped but rapists are not hunted down like their victims were. and it's why LGBT men and women aren't given equal protection under the law. and it's why i have missed out on career opportunities.

human beings are unfair to one another. life ain't fair, right? but i choose to stand on the side with all those who say, Imagine.

PWB

DWB = driving while black. it's not a positive connotation.

but this righteous lady (literally), Alysa Stanton, is going to be PREACHING while black... and female... and as of this weekend- an ordained rabbi! very cool. (the first female rabbi was ordained in the u.s. in 1974.)

but of course, the old guard is none too pleased about it. (well, frankly, i don't think they've been pleased since 1974.)

"My general feeling, as a rabbi, is that there is a great deal of room for everyone to have spiritual fulfillment in Judaism but the public role of a rabbi is only for certain people and that excludes women," Orthodox Rabbi Gil Student of New York City told ABCNews.com. "That's based on tradition and enshrined in law."

As for race, Student said that neither he nor the Orthodox Jewish community finds any problem with African-American Jews. "There is no such thing as skin color in Judaism, it doesn't exist," Student said.

why is race invisible, but gender is a problem? a person has no control over either. neither one defines a person's morality, intellect, or character.
so why? why would it not matter if this new rabbi was a black MAN, but somehow the fact that it's a black WOMAN creates controversy?

you guessed it. because deep down, it's because women are still viewed as inferior. the orthodox rabbi flat out said in the article that the correct role for women is only to raise the family.

honestly, every time i hear that kind of sentiment i want to throw up a little bit. not because i don't respect the work of raising a family. but because 1. what about women who have no desire to raise a family? like, you know, ME? so what are we, chopped liver? (i don't think i want to know mr. rabbi's answer to that.) and 2. it's a cop-out. it completely ignores the other parent's responsibility. it's counterintuitive to the whole conservative movement's recent apoplectic fit about "one man and one woman is the only proper way to raise a family". uh...apparently not. apparently, it's the woman's responsibility, period. the man would be much too busy LEADING.

and i love how he justifies the arbitrary exclusion of women by saying it's "enshrined in law". because a. laws are ALWAYS moral and stand the test of time, don't they? (ahem.) and b. what about 'thou shalt have no other gods before me'? (enshrine: to cherish as sacred.) unless i'm misunderstanding that commandment, it's god, not the law, that should ultimately be honored. so if a law is immoral, or just flat out wrong, it should be changed. period.

so anyway- i just wanted to toot Alysa's horn a little bit. kudos!
and also tell rabbi student to bugger off.