KitSileya
KitSileya's Journal"Sitting out the election is half a vote for the party you dislike the most"
As Norway goes to the election booths today, they do it without the country's most beloved political commentator, Professor Emeritus Frank Aarebrot, who died on Saturday. Professor in comparative politics at the University of Bergen, he won innumerable prizes for his ability to teach. He achieved cult status with his televised marathon lectures on Norwegian history, American presidential elections, and WWII, which had Norwegians of all ages riveted in front of their TV screens for 200 minutes, 227 minutes, and 200 minutes respectively. He got people interested in history and politics. One of his quotes has been widely shared on social media today.
"Sitting out the election is half a vote for the party you dislike the most."
In Norway, with its parliamentary system, many parties on the left, right, and center, and its proportional representative election model this is true, but it is even more true in the American system. Where you have only two viable choices, not voting, not to mention voting third party, is a whole vote for the party that is farthest away from you politically.
RIP, Frank Aarebrot. You will be missed.
Lupita Nyong'o Delivers Moving 'Black Women in Hollywood' Acceptance Speech
http://www.essence.com/2014/02/27/lupita-nyongo-delivers-moving-black-women-Hollywood-acceptance-speechLupita Nyong'o was awarded for her breakthrough performance in 12 Years a Slave by The Black Women in Hollywood Luncheon, and in her wonderful acceptance speech she explains so perfectly why it matters to have women and minorities, and minority women, on our screens, and why it matters how they are portrayed.
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And so I hope that my presence on your screens and in the magazines may lead you, young girl, on a similar journey. That you will feel the validation of your external beauty but also get to the deeper business of being beautiful inside.
There is no shame in Black beauty.
On allies and male feminists
I know that the question of whether men can be feminists or can only be allies is a hotly debated topic, but that isn't what I'd like to discuss. Instead, I want to expand on something I wrote on another thread - the thread "Dear DU Woman - stop throwing back shots of Rum and you won't be raped..."
I wrote:
As it is, I expect better of men. I expect men to change masculine culture to make it ok to say to buddies, "Hey, don't reduce that women to just a body part, she's a whole woman" when they indicate a woman's breasts or bottom and go "Hur-Hur, I'd like to tap dat." I expect men to change masculine culture to make it a cool thing to tell a buddy, "I don't think she's sober, don't have sex with her." I expect men to change masculine culture to make it ok to listen to - and actually HEAR - women when they talk about their experiences and how they experience the world.
It seems to me that too many men who are not themselves misogynists do not feel that the above is their duty. They think that as long as they themselves do not make rape jokes, or make it difficult for women in the work place, or expect women to "put out" on the first date, they've done their part, and feel proud of themselves.
However, to me that is not enough. If any man is to get any cred for not being a misogynist, let alone being an ally, the least he must do is start helping to dismantle the toxic view of masculinity in our culture. We have examples of men doing exactly that here in HoF, and on DU in general, but far too many men still think equality is women's business, if it's something they think is valuable at all. It is not the latter group I seek to challenge, but the former - the men who are decent, yet passive.
Is that not the least we can ask of men?
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