cui bono
cui bono's JournalBut that's not the issue. The issue is the objectification of women.
And the harm that these media images - which are airbrushed and photoshopped and give unrealistic "goals" for girls and young women.
Nothing wrong with a healthy sex drive and sexual attraction to whomever you are attracted to, but putting it out like this and ogling over the women in public is crass and rude and is objectifying women.
Again, rather than be defensive about it, why not just see that it bothers a lot of people and act accordingly, as a sensitive human being would do? If your female friends were in a room with you and you were ogling this cover and making comments out loud and they said it bothered them, would you not stop? Even if you aren't able to see the societal problem with it?
And regarding the societal problem, look up all the anorexia and bulimia that comes out of this media onslaught of these sorts of altered women's bodies cases. Do the search as "my friend ana" or "my friend mia". Those searches will get you to pages where females suffering from this talk about what they do and give advice to others on how to not gain weight and avoid eating food. There was a story I saw about a girl who was early teens who would eat paper to fill her up so she wouldn't be so hungry but was still not eating food that would put weight on her.
This sort of objectification contributes to that. As you are not a woman you won't be able to completely know what women go through and deal with, so perhaps you can take what they say into consideration and adjust your public behavior on behalf of their feelings. Have some sensitivity to it rather than be worried that you won't be able to have sexual desires. You can, there's just appropriate times and ways to express it. Imo, this is not one of them.
There was a time when people didn't realize that some varying degrees of racism/homophia were inappropriate or hurtful. As time goes on those views have evolved and changed. Sexism as well. Hopefully they all continue to change as more people become aware and evolve and decide to show some sensitivity to each group's plight.
As to your last paragraph. Do you believe that about racism and homophobia as well?
It's not just about the person it is directed at.
I would think a guy to be crass and rude if I heard him wolf whistle at another woman, it doesn't have to be towards me. And here everyone on the board can see it.
Imagine if you said something offensive to one African-American, would not all AAs who heard it be offended? It's not about the target, it's about the person who is doing the objectifying, about their attitude. And it's about the effects of that on society.
Honestly, I started becoming aware of all the sexism in our society in a class on Marxism in the early 80's because the male professor was in tune to it and brought it to our attention by him having every other person reading aloud substitute "she" for "he" because everything is written as if it only applied to men. It made me think about it.
Perhaps rather than thinking of it in terms of "sides" you can just think of it in terms of what women have to experience every day in their lives. It doesn't have to be a combative issue. Do you think of racial issues in terms of "sides"?
I think that may be part of the problem of these discussion on DU, they become so combative it's no longer about just looking at what a person has to deal with on a daily basis and thinking about how to alleviate that. Seems to me that if people know something is offensive and irritating to people they wouldn't keep doing it and trying to justify it, even if, or perhaps just because, they don't like the way someone is conveying their discomfort.
The REAL Questions Creationists Asked Bill Nye - Funny stuff!!!
Brought to you by The Science of Sarcasm:
See the true meaning behind the questions creationists asked Bill Nye. Here's three samples, many more hilarious ones at link.
http://imgur.com/a/PbBTk/noscript
https://www.facebook.com/thescienceofsarcasmpodcast
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Swedish cinemas launch feminist movie rating
STOCKHOLM (AP) -- You expect movie ratings to tell you whether a film contains nudity, sex, profanity or violence. Now movie theaters in equality-minded Sweden are introducing a new rating to highlight gender bias, or rather the absence of it.
To get an "A" rating, a movie must pass the so-called Bechdel test, which means it must have at least two named female characters who talk to each other about something other than a man.
"The entire `Lord of the Rings' trilogy, all `Star Wars' movies, `The Social Network,' `Pulp Fiction' and all but one of the `Harry Potter' movies fail this test," said Ellen Tejle, the director of Bio Rio, an art-house movie theater in Stockholm's trendy Sodermalm district.
Bio Rio is one of four Swedish movie theaters that launched the new rating last month to draw attention to how few movies pass. Most visitors have reacted positively to the initiative "and for some people it has been an eye-opener," said Tejle, reclining in one of Bio Rio's cushy red seats.
Beliefs about women's roles in society are influenced by the fact that movie watchers rarely see "a female superhero or a female professor or person who makes it through exciting challenges and masters them," Tejle said, noting that the rating doesn't say anything about the quality of the film. "The goal is to see more female stories and perspectives on cinema screens."
more... http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_SWEDEN_FEMINIST_MOVIE_RATING?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-11-06-05-42-17
-------------------
The Bechdel Test comes from Alison Bechdel's comic strip The Rule:
https://secure.flickr.com/photos/zizyphus/34585797/lightbox/
To read more about the Bechdel Test:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bechdel_test
-------------------
US movie theaters would be pretty empty if they used this test for all movies they show.
Before we jump for joy that moderate Republicans are switching to the Dem Party...
take into consideration that it is only going to water down the Dem Party and move it even more to the right.
The reason they're giving for switching is that they think the Tea Party is too crazy and has taken control of the party. It's not that they've had some epiphany and realize that what they believe is wrong and now they see that all the Dem Party stances are the right way to go. So I'm certainly not elated by it.
So we'll be adding a bunch of Dinos who may or may not actually vote with the party, and who will make the party more right wing. Not necessarily a good thing.
The one good thing I see is that it may get the moderates to really work to get their party back away from the extremists. But they've got a big fight since there are several conservative groups working to defeat moderate R's in the primaries and replace them with the crazies. Hopefully if the crazies win the primary, they don't go on to win the general election.
The Rand Paul Plagiarizing Guessing Game - Guess the Next One, or Which Movie!!!
As many of you know, Rachel Maddow has done a couple stories on Rand Paul plagiarizing Wikipedia entries for movies. First reported was Gattaca, then today she reported that Buzzfeed had found he also plagiarized the Widipedia entry for the movie Stand and Deliver.
Gattaca story:
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/watch/more-wikipedia-copying-in-rand-paul-speeches-58387523656
Stand and Deliver:
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/watch/more-wikipedia-copying-in-rand-paul-speeches-58387523656
Well I thought it would be fun to come up with more speeches that he might have plagiarized from Wikipedia, so here's a speech he could give about the difficulty of fitting in and doing well in college:
As a Republican, I have fought long and hard to make it easier for kids to achieve their education goals. The Repbulican Party stands for your right to higher education so that everyone can have a better chance at a good job and a secure future. But there were times in our history when college was a lot harder than today.
In 1962, college freshmen Lawrence "Larry" Kroger and Kent Dorfman seek to join a fraternity at Faber College. They visit the prestigious Omega Theta Pi House's invitational party, but are not welcomed there. They then try next door at Delta Tau Chi House, where Kent's brother was once a member, making Kent a "legacy." There they find John "Bluto" Blutarsky urinating outside the fraternity house. The Deltas "need the dues" so they permit Larry and Kent to pledge, giving them the fraternity names "Pinto" and "Flounder".
Dean Vernon Wormer wants to remove the Deltas from campus due to repeated conduct violations and low academic standing. Since they are already on probation, he puts the Deltas on something he calls "double secret probation" and orders the clean-cut, smug Omega president Greg Marmalard to find a way to get rid of the Deltas permanently.
Flounder is bullied by Omega member and ROTC cadet commander Doug Neidermeyer, so Bluto and Daniel Simpson "D-Day" Day persuade Flounder to sneak Neidermeyer's horse into Dean Wormer's office late at night. They give him a gun and tell him to shoot it. Unbeknownst to Flounder, the gun is loaded with blanks. Unable to bring himself to kill the horse, he fires into the ceiling. The noise frightens the horse so much that it dies of a heart attack.
In the cafeteria the next day, smooth-talking Eric "Otter" Stratton tries to convince the stuck-up Mandy Pepperidge to abandon her boyfriend, Marmalard, and date him instead. Bluto proceeds to provoke Marmalard with his impression of a popping zit by stuffing his mouth with a scoop of mashed potatoes and propelling it at Marmalard and table mates, Chip Diller and Barbara "Babs" Jansen. Bluto then starts a food fight that engulfs the cafeteria.
Bluto and D-Day steal the answers to an upcoming psychology test, but it turns out the Omegas planted the exam mimeograph and the Deltas get every answer wrong. Their grade-point averages drop so low that Wormer needs only one more incident to revoke the charter that allows them to remain on campus.
Spoiler below:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_house
Why We Did Not Win and the Dangers of Saying We Did
First of all, we didn't win. All we get is for government to continue as it is supposed to, some normalcy in governance. But what is in the bill being passed is a budget with sequestration. A bill with less spending than Ryan's budget. And the sequestration was meant to be something horrid that no one would want to resort to, something to force a reasonable negotiation, but it didn't work so it was implemented. However, once the DC elite realized it was going to affect their flights they voted to fund air traffic controllers. So really, the consequences were never completely felt and the sequestration remains as if it is how things should be.
The Dems wanted to be able to negotiate away the pain of the sequestration this time around but they never got the chance. The Republicans wouldn't really negotiate, then they backed out of an agreement and went with the Tea Party faction with their demands to stop the ACA. So because of this drama we ended up right where we started as far as the budget is concerned.
However, many, many people have been hurt by this. They have not gotten paychecks, crab is sitting at a closed port, our country's rating with Fitch is being reevaluated which will most likely result in higher interest rates for us... a lot of people will suffer because of this. Federal workers/jobs will most likely be diminished by this. They keep taking the hit with no pay raises, furloughs etc... people are going to stop wanting those jobs. Then as the work force dwindles, the programs suffer and the Republicans can say the government isn't working and fight to privatize, which is what they really want.
And we only get a temporary extension, so we might just have to do this all over again. This is no way to govern. It is not a win.
Secondly, by calling it a win we are continuing this absurd politics as team sport idea. This is terrible for the nation. We should not back anyone just because of what team they are on, we should back them because of their ideas and policies.
And when we prticipate in the team sport mentality we are buying into the media's portrayal of events, a protrayal that is designed to raise profits for them by enabling them to make more money in advertising dollars. It's in their interest to have two teams, two sides, so that they can "report" the play by play action and have increased viewership from people tuning in to see what the "score" is and if they missed any good action. That is why the media puts forth this false equivalency. For money.
What I fear will happen if we keep saying we won and if we gloat about it and rub the Republicans faces in this is that they will become that much more determined to "win" the next time around and we are just going to go through this again after the new year. Because when you set something up as a win or lose situation, the loser always wants to come back stronger and win the next game.
And this is not a game.
And we did not win.
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