Disability Carnival NOW UP at Not My Disease!

Disability Blog CARNIVAL # 82 which is titled FIRSTS

Read all about people's 1sts there!

At I'm Not My Disease

Angry

So Canada voted in a Conservative Majority despite what would be best for the country so I went to drown my sorrows in one of the two bars I frequent in town. Upon arrival I was told that I had to go outside because my dog was not allowed. I tried explaining that she was a service dog, even producing her papers which were pushed aside and not even glanced at, and firmly told that it didn't matter that they can refuse service to anyone. I asked if they would say the same if I were blind to which they replied again "we can refuse service to anyone."

Having already bought a drink I went outside, but I went back in to ask when I could speak to the owner. They said I could speak to the manager tomorrow at 4. I plan to and if he does not understand the law I am contacting the state disability board and a civil rights lawyer. I have been to this bar many times with Sadie and do not understand why this time was a problem. To top it off there was another, non-service dog in the bar, but apparently that dog is a-ok (he said it's the only dog allowed in the bar).

Yes I cried. To deny my dog is to deny me. I may not have a visual disability, but I have one and I require a service dog to function "normally." To deny me a service because I require outside assistance is just as bad as not having a ramp for wheelchairs. So fark you Overtime in Clemson, SC. I'm going to fight for my right to frequent you then you can kiss my white butt because you will never get my business again.

Sea of Green

Day 5 and indeed the protest is picking up steam. People have asked me, since I have friends in Tehran who (surprise, surprise) are highly political and were around for the 79 revolution if this protest is different then the last round in 99 which eventually fizzled. Indeed it is. It is not just students and it is not just the highly educated. It is spreading to everyone. Women in Chadors join Iran's opposition.

Boorghani is typical of the young reformists who initially backed Mousavi — but that support is growing to include grandmothers, government employees and hotel clerks.

The last time Iran was engulfed in similar anti-government action was a decade ago when a deadly raid on a Tehran University dorm sparked six days of nationwide protests. At the time, they were considered the worst since the 1979 revolution that toppled the pro-U.S. shah and brought hard-line clerics to power. But the student-driven movement eventually fizzled, leaving many people more bitter but the system intact.

This time, though, the protesters are not just affluent students and youth. The middle class is also flooding the streets and even conservative religious Iranians are joining the Mousavi supporters.

.......

"This (the Mousavi opposition) is completely different to 1999. That was between the students and the government. This is between the people and the government. This time it is all of Iran. This is a historic movement," Boorghani said.

Today at 4pm Tehran time there will be a silent march in honour of all the fallen protesters of the uprising. (That link gets updated with names as they become available. Dead bodies are taken from hospitals and thrown into the back of trucks and driven away before names can be taken so there are many unknown.)

A letter from an Iranian medical student:

Hello,

It’s painful to watch what’s happening.

I don’t want anything to do with what has been said this far, as I neither have the strength nor the resilience to face all these unfathomable events.

I only want to speak about what I have witnessed. I am a medical student. There was chaos last night at the trauma section in one of our main hospitals. Although by decree, all riot-related injuries were supposed to be sent to military hospitals, all other hospitals were filled to the rim. Last night, nine people died at our hospital and another 28 had gunshot wounds. All hospital employees were crying till dawn. They (government) removed the dead bodies on back of trucks, before we were even able to get their names or other information. What can you even say to the people who don’t even respect the dead. No one was allowed to speak to the wounded or get any information from them. This morning the faculty and the students protested by gathering at the lobby of the hospital where they were confronted by plain cloths anti-riot militia, who in turn closed off the hospital and imprisoned the staff. The extent of injuries are so grave, that despite being one of the most staffed emergency rooms, they’ve asked everyone to stay and help–I’m sure it will even be worst tonight.

What can anyone say in face of all these atrocities? What can you say to the family of the 13 year old boy who died from gunshots and whose dead body then disappeared?

This issue is not about cheating(election) anymore. This is not about stealing votes anymore. The issue is about a vast injustice inflected on the people. They’ve put a baton in the hand of every 13-14 year old to smash the faces of “the bunches who are less than dirt” (government is calling the people who are uprising dried-up torn and weeds) .

This is what sickens me from dealing with these issues. And from those who shut their eyes and close their ears and claim the riots are in opposition of the government and presidency!! No! The people’s complaint is against the egregious injustices committed against the people.

Today the Iranian football team wore green wristbands in a show of solidarity. They were forced to take them off at half-time.



Persianq is broadcasting live & recorded footage from the streets.

Tehran Bureau is an excellent source of information on what's going on in Tehran. You can also follow them on twitter at @TehranBureau.

If you're tweeting make sure you check Twitspam for a list of bad accounts, liars, gov't spooks, and people posting goatse in the #iranelection and #gr88 channels.

If you read Farsi better then I do here's a list of reliable bloggers and news sources in Farsi that are updating semi-regularly.

Youtube has finally buckled to pressure from the masses and relaxed it's standards in re Irani protest videos and has organised a channel dedicated to videos coming out of the Irani protests.

The Pirate, excuse me, Persian Bay has created a secure forum Why We Protest for Iranians and supporters to gather and talk.

Another pretty good site rounding up info and info on solidarity protests in various cities.

Reliable sources say that the Basiji are randomly attacking people in the street now and that they can be heard speaking Arabic and not Farsi. Rumours that the police and the militia will not attack their own people are true. Only foreign calls are allowed from gov't monitored landlines - will probably not get to talk to my friends, at least not about what's going on.

On Friday Khamenei will preside over Friday prayers. Iranians are calling for global day of solidarity. There will be a march in Tehran with Mousavi.

"Loyalty to one's country, always. Loyalty to one's government when it deserves it." -Mark Twain.

Let the revolution be here and the 30 year reign of terror in Iran be ending.

SEA OF GREEN! SOLIDARITY WITH IRAN!

(I'm too tired to continue - I was up to see the Iran/S. Korea match at 0400 my time this morning. UGH. More as I come upon it.)

This blog has gone green for Iran

So everyone should be aware that the protests in Iran are not stopping and in fact in many ways have picked up steam. At the protests on the 15th flyers were being circulated with a list of demands:

7 point statement distributed among the protesters in Tehran today:

Dismissal of Khamenei for not being a fair leader
Dismissal of Ahmadinejad for his illegal acts
Temporary appointment of Ayatollah Montazeri as the Supreme Leader
Recognition of Mousavi as the President
Forming the Cabinet by Mousavi to prepare for revising the Constitution
unconditional and immediate release of all political prisoners
Dissolution of all organs of repression, public or secret

Ayatollah Montazeri has released a statement saying that no sane person should accept these results. There have been several reports from trusted sources that the night before Ahmadinejad's victory announcement Mousavi was called and told that he had won with a 57% majority.


Translation: "We write Mousavi, they read Ahmadinejad"

All sorts of communication: SMS, cell phones, texts, internet (twitter & facebook & the like), etc, are all being blocked by the Iranian government. They are also searching for the IP addresses and locations of twitterers and bloggers. If you want to help by setting up a proxy go here for instructions in Windows and a link to instructions for Linux, and here for instructions for Macs. There's instructions to get your IP info to people tweeting/blogging from Iran. I used mine for my friends I met there when I visited way back in the 90s. Whoever they share it with I trust. If you do this do not publish it anywhere public. Also if you are on Twitter please change your location to Tehran and your local time to GMT +03:30. Flood them with targets to hide the actual twitterers.

To follow on twitter the hashtags are #iranelection (which we know is being monitored so be careful - don't RT using the names of any Iranian tweeters), and #gr88 (which we should assume is being monitored as well). I recommend following @persiankiwi as well.

Best of Tweets live round-up
Live-blogging the Uprising (huffpo) Best place to find videos and stuff
A comprehensive breakdown of the current situation in Iran including timeline
Pictures showing that candidates lost votes as the day went on
Why We Protest.net Links for rallies around the world, info, etc.

Rally in Tehran


Also people are pressuring Google to follow in the BBC's footsteps and go green in support of the protesting Iranians. Do what you can. If I have anything that I think is not publicised well enough I will post it here.

Protesters take on the police:



(now this is what you do. They were outnumbered, but they didn't let a few police stop them.)

Wear Green, show your support. The BBC went green (for some reason they have since reverted).

WARNING: This is a video of a man being beaten by the police.


Hopefully the genie is out of the bottle and the revolution and overthrow of Ayatollah Khomeni and his religious thugs will occur. To everyone in Iran: stay safe. To my friends in Iran who will probably not get to read this: you are constantly in my thoughts and in my heart I am there standing by your side on those streets.

IVAW pictures are now up.

no words
Originally uploaded by union_clown

I stopped trying to think of titles for the pictures, they speak for themselves. Even titling this one "no words" seems to be taking away from it a little. Find the rest of the photos here.

There's also another set with all the miscellaneous stuff I saw around the DNC that I didn't have any other home for. You can find it here.

2 photo sets up from DNC

Storm stirring shit up
Originally uploaded by union_clown

But not the IVAW since that's huge. I'm going to be doing that tomorrow so it will should be up by tomorrow evening.

Green and Black march

and

18 Million Voices 88th Anniversary of the 19th Amendment/Hillary's Speech Celebration

RNC Updates

**SUPER IMPORTANT**: Undercovers/provacatuers consistently wearing ipod earphones and shiny black shoes. DO NOT ENGAGE, but don't get paranoid.

Dump trucks and snow plows between marchers and Xcel Center.

John Doe who has been water striking has been bonded out. It is believed that no more John Does remain in jail.

Cops are still dropping protesters off in random locations after release. Keep number for rides on you: 651.356.8635

100+ people on Marion Bridge detained and handcuffed face down @ 19:38.

27 arrested at 12th & Cedar, march leadership targeted; one reporter arrested: Susan from Uptake.

Cops again using pepper spray, tear gas, percussion grenades/flash bombs on protesters.

Curfew rumours false; city employees advised to evacuate downtown.

Ramsey County Jail phone #651.292.3698

I wonder (RNC post)

If they're doing what the cops did in Denver where they had their badge numbers embroidered in black on their uniforms so that they technically were identifiable, but god damn if anyone could actually make out what the hell their badge numbers were.



Also, police are trading pepper spray for the offer of flowers. Because flowers are apparently weapons of mass destruction and terrorism.

For more news check out Twin Cities Indymedia and as I posted below, for up to the minute action text "Follow TCIMC" to 40404 (their twitter feed, which is a fucking brilliant idea and makes me want to run to all these places that people are needed even though I can't.)

And Free Speech will be protected in Denver

Mmmm. So the city is preparing for mass arrests during the DNC. Granted there will be your standard stock of anarchists and the like protesting there (did clown bloc exist past the 2000 RNC? They were my favourites, for obvious reasons.), but I think this is more then likely made for us dried up old lady PUMAs who will be there protesting as well. And woo won't it be fancy. A warehouse, complete with metal cages made of chain link fence topped with barbed wire will be awaiting the people who get arrested.

A sign on the wall reads "Warning, electric stun devices used in this facility."

Sallinger showed video of the warehouse to Adam Jung of Tent State University and Zoe Williams of Code Pink, leaders of groups that plan to demonstrate during the convention. "This is very bare-bones and very reminiscent of a political prisoner camp or a concentration camp," Williams said.

"That's how you treat cattle," Jung siad. "You showed the sign where it said stun gun in use. And you just change the word gun for bolt, and it's a meat-processing plant."

Oh yeah, this'll be great. I can't wait. But think of the press if some old lady actually does get arrested. That'll be awesome. Not to mention the fact that no one really cares if a bunch of ragged old anarchists get arrested, but what about when your everyday Jane or John Q. Public gets arrested? People that your average American citizen doesn't look down on? I'm hoping that people will be outraged if what I think is going to happen happens. But I don't want it to happen, doesn't mean it won't.

Luckily I have press credentials and will be there with my In These Times press passes (including my assorted press gear) which has always prevented me from getting arrested. Let's hope the streak continues, but I fear for all those PUMAs and Hillary supporters who have real, legitimate concerns and problems with the Democratic Party who will be silenced because we can't exercise our only avenue to free speech without fearing arrest and imprisonment. Awesome. Way to go democracy.

DISSENT is the highest form of patriotism -- Thomas Jefferson

Protest hate and homophobia Monday June 30th

STOP THE HATE! -Anti-Skinhead Rally

Monday, June 30, 2008
9:00am - 8:00pm
Vancouver City Jail
Main & Cordova
Contact Info Phone: 7788360442
Email: peterlotion@hotmail.com

On Saturday June 28th during Vancouver’s annual Eastside Pride celebration
in Grandview Park a few participants noticed a group of large skinheads
destroying pride signs and stomping on them. Queers and allies confronted
them and were brutally assaulted; they were punched, kicked and thrown
into a vehicle. The skinheads were arrested and are expected to be
released on Monday June 30th. Activists and allies are protesting they’re
presence in our communities.

Come show your pride and resist fascism! The day will include music,
food, drag shows and will end with a Showering of the skinheads with
resistance and community.

Who needs clean water anyway?

At least 16 lakes across Canada are to be reclassified as toxic dump sites.

But Catherine Coumans, spokeswoman for the environmental group Mining Watch, said the federal government is making it too easy. She said federal officials are increasingly using the obscure Schedule Two regulations to quietly reclassify lakes and other waters as tailings dumps.

“Something that used to be a lake — or a river, in fact, they can use rivers — by being put on this section two of this regulation is no longer a river or a lake," she said. "It's a tailings impoundment area. It's a waste disposal site. It's an industrial waste dump."

Coumans said the procedure amounts to a subsidy to the industry and enables mines to get around the Fisheries Act.

.....

A local environmentalist who attended the Long Harbour meeting, Chad Griffiths, said of Sandy Pond: “It's easy enough to consider just one lake as just one lake, as a needed sacrifice, right? But it's not one lake … It's a trend. It's an open season on Canadian water.”

....

Last fall, a Federal Court judge ruled that federal bureaucrats acted illegally in trying to fast-track the Red Chris copper and gold mine without a full and public environmental review.

The decision put the project on hold, but late last week, the Federal Appeals Court reversed the decision, paving the way for federal officials to declare lakes to be dumps without public consultation.

.....

“We want it stopped,” said Dennis, who lives in the native village of Iskut, 18 kilometres northwest of the mine site. “We want to stop the mine … The animals will be drinking that water and they'll all be polluted too.

"Once they do the mine, they’re going to leave, and we're the people who are going to live with that. Not me, but my grandchildren, the small little kids like this. That's who's going to live with the pollution.”

(emphasis mine)

Of course the Fisheries Minister doesn't care, in fact he thinks it's more responsible.

From the Opposition:

"The reality is these Conservatives are giving those mining companies a huge subsidy by allowing them to use freshwater aquatic systems that are fish-bearing lakes as chief waste disposal sites," Nova Scotia MP Peter Stoffer said in the house on Tuesday.

"What they should be doing is having independent linings and holes filled with water, and put the tailings in those things, free and clear of any natural water system."

I wrote an angry letter, so there's something you can do too.

Also, there's another Work Less Party PARTY on the 28th. They're always a blast and why not financially support the best political party in BC while having a bit of fun? It is an election year and Sam Sullivan's not running again! Though I need to find out more about the new guy. Whoever he is I don't like the party so I doubt I'll like him either.

Not done yet? Still want to win in November?

Know that presumptive =/= actual?

Well in her speech she told us that she wants to hear from YOU, her supporters:

… .. Now the question is, where do we go from here, and given how far we’ve come and where we need to go as a party, it’s a question I don’t take lightly. This has been a long campaign, and I will be making no decisions tonight. But this has always been your campaign, so to the 18 million people who voted for me and to our many other supporters out there of all ages, I want to hear from you. I hope you’ll go to my website at HillaryClinton.com and share your thoughts with me and help in any way that you can.

In the coming days, I’ll be consulting with supporters and party leaders to determine how to move forward with the best interests of our party and our country guiding my way.

You should do ALL of the following:

Sign the petition urging Hillary to take it to Denver.

Send an email to comments@hillaryclinton.com with “ATTENTION: HAROLD ICKES” in the subject, and again as the first line of the email itself, followed by something as simple as “Take it to Denver!”.

Send another email to TMcAuliffe@hillaryclinton.com

Finally, go to HillaryCilnton.com and Stand with Hillary. Tell her to stay in it and keep fighting. (Though I added that I think she should suspend her campaign for a little while. The things that the national press has refused to run on Obama are sure to come out with the Republicans.) Make a contribution, anything, if you can. Show her you're still there for her and you need her to still be there for you.

Women's Media Center Petition against sexism in the media

Sign it!

NBC Protest in Burbank

Pictures can be seen here.


Take your sexist, one sided coverage and shove it NBC.


(I like the punk kid with the "Iron your own shirt" sign.)

National Conference for Media Reform

OK, they could do so much better at marketing this. Seriously.

They have people from the Black Agenda Report (see blogroll), Byron Hurt (you can watch his documentary about misogyny and homophobia in the hip-hop community and I HIGHLY recommend it. Here's all 56 minutes of Beyond Beats and Rhymes), someone from Prometheus Radio Project (I was really happy to see this as I'm friends with some of the founders and I love that they're doing so well and it's close to my heart since I'm supposedly banned from the airwaves due to being in the booth during a pirate radio raid (though I have been on WBAI several times, but I doubt that the FCC pays *that* close attention)), and on and on. But I am staring at a flyer for it (I'll put it back) and they use Arianna Huffington. Really? What has she said lately that is so different then mainstream media? I guess it's a big name thing.

Looks pretty interesting due to the other presenters and panelists. Anyway, it's put on by Free Press, so check it out here.

Need to tell the truth

Before I get into it I just have to say that all over the blogosphere people are crying "censorship" and saying that sex workers are being silenced. Bull. Sam was the only one not in attendance at the conference. The women that were put on the panel at the last minute, one of which is a sex worker, were *at* the panel, not Sam. The whole "silencing" thing is bull. Sam's was the only voice that was silenced.

The following is written by Ms. Sam Berg, anti-pornstitution activist and speaker.

On March 19th I was invited to a panel debate on pornography at William and Mary College. My contact for the organizing group was Constance Sisk, who told me funding assistance could likely be found to fly me 3,000 miles across the country so I agreed to be penciled in until enough money could be raised. A call for donations among anti-pornography feminist colleagues covered airfare, and I had just enough vacation days earned at work to take off.

On March 24th I confirmed that I would gladly join the two other two confirmed panelists, on the anti-pornography side, John D. Foubert, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Higher Education at the College of William and Mary, and on the pro-pornography side Amanda Brooks, a former escort and sex work advocate.

Constance told me April 2nd that they moved the panel date to the 21st and the rest of April slid by without communication until April 16th when an anti-porn friend informed me that Jill Brenneman and RenEv blogged they would be on the panel. I had received no word from Constance of this and was dumbfounded that wholesale changes were being made to the panel just five days before the event without informing me. I had agreed to do the panel with John and Amanda, and I hadn’t gotten any emails saying she couldn’t attend or that they were looking for a replacement.

If they had told me Amanda couldn’t make it I would have suggested that pornographers and strip club owners are very easy to find through legal channels so they could have been asked to appear on the panel. I would have also suggested that the number of porn-using men on campus should have been able to produce just one pornsturbator willing to defend his porn consumption. Because I was under the impression that Constance & Co. were being honest with me about their intentions, I chalked up the lack of a pornographer or porn-using man on the panel to inept organizing and the extreme amount of publicity given recently to sex work advocacy at William and Mary.

How much sex work advocacy has been given a voice there can be answered with the name Constance. I spoke with John Foubert for the first time Thursday and he told me that Constance is a big pro-sex work advocate on campus and she brought the sex worker show to campus the past three years. A woman named Audrey invited John to the panel because Constance didn’t think he would agree if she asked him. Constance was a guest on Jill's radio show a few weeks ago, and Jill did a pro-sex work chat with William and Mary college folks a few weeks ago, but in her emails Constance claimed ignorance of the lengthy pro-porn and radical blogosphere debates on this contentious subject.

Constance. Constance said she was excited to have me coming and offered to let me spend Monday night at her place, where she planned on cooking dinner for a group of people post-panel. How do you think it would feel if a pro-choice feminist were invited to a predominantly pro-life campus by a predominantly pro-life group and the pro-life organizer did everything Constance did without revealing her pro-life politics to her pro-choice panelist and house guest?

Little story: Heading home from presenting at a prostitution conference I was in the airport shuttle with a middle-aged black social worker with her name tag still pinned to her blouse. I’m a young, white, tattoo-bearing woman and at the time I think my hair was blue. We exchanged delicate pleasantries and danced around how we talked about the conference until she sat up earnestly and cut to the chase, “So, are you for or against?” When I replied, “Against,” she slouched down and sighed and we grooved on the same anti-prostitution track until we got to the airport.

I agreed to do the panel with John and Amanda three weeks ago. Though it was unethical to make major lineup changes at the last minute like that without telling me and things started feeling really fishy due to the lack of notification about the event anywhere besides pro-john blogs (it’s not listed on W&M’s events calendar or advertised around campus), I agreed to debate Jill. I could not agree to debate Ren, and I don’t suppose I have to tell most of you reading this why but I’ll touch upon it a tad anyway.

Here are Ren’s thoughts on sharing a panel discussion table with me:

“So serious I am taking it very seriously. And looking forward to it in my uniquely grim and serious way. Planning and preparing with a very serious, serious sneer on my face.

And also laughing like a super villain the whole time. Why?

Once upon a time, I had a wish, a dream, a surely wank worthy fantasy of some anti-porn sex work types having to face down, in a forum, and debate those from the other side. And I wanted to be there.”

“And, yes, oh yes, I am seriously looking forward to it. I have so lusted for such an opportunity. Very seriously. And yes, if possible, I will have the whole thing on video. Get your cerebral wanking tissues ready.”

Serious serious sneers, super villain mocking laughter, wank worthy fantasies, whole thing on video, get your tissues ready.

Those are the words of a malicious person licking their chops in anticipation of a messy, humiliation-inducing scene they will relish. Those are the words of a person trying to waste my time with personal attacks when my time is best used educating audiences about the facts of human trafficking, prostitution, and pornography. The trash talk began within hours of being surreptitiously offered the spot on the panel, and that sort of smug pugnaciousness and disrespectful engagement was instrumental in prompting John to cancel his appearance on the panel and he suggested to me that I do the same. I believe we were right to cancel. I refuse to pose for the pornographically spiteful scene being painted.

What to do when a woman who says she’s happy in prostitution says, "Take me, for example” when you know if you actually do take her as her own example by quoting her own words and deeds she will complain, "How dare you make an example of me?" Say you’ll speak with her about prostitution as a global system and of all women’s oppression as the core problem but you don't want to talk about her personally and she'll reply, "You refuse to hear my truth." If you talk about her personally like she insists then you're the baddie radfem who makes it personal. It’s a lose-lose ruse.

I’d love to debate a porn-user, and there are tens of millions of them. I’d love to debate a pornographer and there’s no lack of those either. I’d love to debate a john. They don’t want to debate anti-pornography and anti-prostitution feminists. They want women in the prostitute supply pool to subjectively defend them against the objective mounds of testimony and undeniable data that anti-pornstitution feminists can produce proving pornography and prostitution violate women and girls human rights immensely. Most of you have seen how deftly I wield the wealth of information I’ve collected in my noodle to make the case against men’s right to economically coerce sex from others. Some of you have seen me do it before with Ren.

Saturday morning I woke up to an email from a professor asking if I can come speak to a few women’s studies classes of hers in May. It turns out I can make the date. Life skedaddles on and so do I.

Sam

Tell Rogers Cable to stop selling misogynistic racist pornography!

Here's the petition. It'll take <1 minute of your time.

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month

I bought this shirt. I am a survivor. Jennifer Baumgardner created the shirt as part of a project I Was Raped she has been working on through her organization Scarleteen, a sex education program (which will receive some of the proceeds from the sales of the shirt to fund their work).

This story was in the Sunday NYTimes and the comments are atrocious.

I think the comments on the blog post about the shirt from The NY Times are the most revealing thing about the project. So many people are saying that “no rape survivor should shove this in my face” or that “it’s personal” or “what am I supposed to say” or “if I were a rape survivor I wouldn’t wear it therefore it’s fucked up”, etc., etc.

What's beyond the realm of fucked-upedness is people comparing rape to the mortgage crisis or fucking losing a job:

We have all been victims of something. Ever lose your job, your house, your sanity? Ever been bullied or humiliated?

Yes, those things suck, but A) the victims are not blamed (maybe in bullying) and B) the complete decimation of trust, security, shame, violation, degradation, fear, self blame (what did I do?), and it goes on and on DOES NOT COMPARE ON ANY LEVEL. This is disgusting minimization. Not to mention that rape victims suffer from Rape Trauma Syndrome some of the highlights include flashbacks and nightmares that continue to haunt and traumatize you after the event. Any smell, sound, etc that reminds the person of the event can also further traumatise the victim. Not to mention long term effects like Post Traumatic Stress Disorder which has a lot of the same symptoms as Rape Trauma Syndrome only you get to enjoy it for years to come. I was first raped in high school. Now, over 2 decades later, I am still dealing with PTSD and I probably will be dealing with it for the rest of my life (I will also admit that part of this stems from childhood emotional and physical abuse from my mother.)

It’s obviously doing it’s job and no one’s even wearing them yet! Words cannot express how much rage I have at the people telling me that I am victimizing myself by choosing to buy and possibly wear the shirt and telling ME HOW I should deal with MY OWN healing process. They obviously want us to not bother them with the fact that rape happens, and it happens a lot, and it doesn’t happen in dark alleys, and it doesn’t happen only at gun or knifepoint, and it doesn’t only happen in bad neighbourhoods or that it somehow doesn’t happen to “strong” women. (I was once told that I couldn’t be raped (by someone who did not know my past) b/c I am a hardass.) And it happens often and it happens to people they know.

They say the shirt is stupid and ineffective whereas there are over 300 comments which means it’s pretty damn effective so far in getting people to talk about it. Then they say, “well why not make rapists have the word rapist tattooed on their head”, uh, how about because about maybe 1% ever get found guilty, maybe.

Well, when I get the shirt, I’m just going to head back over and read these comments and I know it will get me to wear it. I’m sorry you don’t want to talk to your children about rape. I’m sorry you don’t want it shoved in your face. I'm sorry it makes you fucking uncomfortable. But you know what? I didn’t want to be raped, and I’m sick of everyone thinking that it’s a private fucking matter. If someone had just beat me up in an alley and I talked about it you wouldn't tell me that was private so FUCK YOU. It's about getting people to talk about the subject, it's about me and letting all the other victims who I come into contact with every. damn. day. that they are not alone. That they can talk about it, that it IS NOT something to be ashamed of or something that should be a dirty secret. And if they want to talk with me, that I'll be there for them.

Play a game, save a life

Play this game and send a malaria net to Africa.

h/t: ginmar

Here's where I ask you to do something

In my previous post I chided the democratic party and the Obama camp for not doing anything to publicly denounce the misogyny being flung at Hillary during this campaign. So I did something about it, because unless they publicly say something, they will lose me, and hopefully all other people who do not feel that it is ok to be silently complicit in allowing this blatant sexism to continue whether it's coming from the campaign staff, the pundits, or the media. Please join me to tell the party that we need this party to be the liberal one, the one that not only talks about change and equality for women, but actually walks the walk.

It doesn't matter who you support. This is supposedly the party that represents us, but you know that it won't until we make them.

Call or email the DNC and tell them to publicly denounce the sexism being bandied about so openly during this campaign.
Phone: 202-863-8000
To email: Go here and under issue select Election 2008.

Ask the Obama to make sure his campaign keeps in line. I know if he wants my vote in November (if he is the nominee) he has to take a stand against sexism.
Campaign HQ Phone: (866) 675-2008
Email: Go here.

Contact your state and local democratic parties. If you feel confident enough in this decision, tell them you will withdraw from the party. (I will, but I know that not everyone is OK with being party-less/3rd party.)

The more pressure, the more likely they are to publicly condemn the sexist overtones. When there have been racist remarks there has been public outcry from everyone all the way down to the feminist blogosphere. When there are sexist remarks, it is *only* the feminist blogosphere, since they are perpetuated by everyone above us. If it's ok on this scale they are saying it's ok everywhere. Tell them it's not. Make them make this a better country and a better party for women.

Also, as a sidenote, if you are upset and/or feel that the voters in MI/FL were treated unfairly, you can sign a petition here. There are examples of letters talking about the dienfranchisement of voters (and yes, sexism) that people have sent here