I made this awhile ago. It is a picture of a white girl in a bikini. She has an idealized body, and a question mark flashing over her face where her facial features should be. Beside her is text that says:
“Once upon a time there was a girl. She did lots of different things on lots of different days, she had friends, she had passion, she had dreams”
One day she decided to go to the beach so she wore her new bikini. This was a special treat. She didn’t go to the beach very often, and she didn’t wear her bikini very often.
When she was about to enter the water some guy took a picture with her with a little phone of his camera, and when he got home he put it on the internet.
He titled it ‘bikinigirl’ and when some people commented on her body they called her bikinigirl too. So she became known to a group of people as ‘bikinigirl.’
Which was funny because she didn’t go to the beach very often, and she didn’t wear her bikini very often. She did lots of different things, she had friends, she had passions, she had dreams.

It is 1:00am December 25th. So, merry christmas, happy holidays, seasons greetings and all that good stuff. I hope that no matter what you’re doing and how you celebrate whatever you celebrate - or how you sit on the couch if celebrating isn’t for you - that you have a good time.
(That isn’t good English is it?)

The Hogfather has been on the last two nights. It’s been good. I enjoy Terry Pratchett, and I enjoyed that movie. Oh, I can’t remember the name of the book but one of them - the one about the girl who dressed up as a boy and went to war - it touched on feminist points and it got me. It was great.
Reading ‘The science of discworld II’ he said things about feminism too. He was talking about how people have always used stories to shape people in different cultures. About how you could dehumanize someone because they don’t know your rituals and your stories. He called these stories the “make a person kit” and said something along the lines that the make a person kit doesn’t work the same way for girls as it does for boys because girls havn’t been people*
he said that even with feminists working there really isn’t a model of story telling for women and girls yet that matches the developed ‘make a person’ kit of stories for men.

Really I’m just going on a tangeant there by talking about how Terry Pratchett seems to know somethings of feminism. What I wanted to talk about was the tiniest little thing I saw in The Hogfather.

Alright. So, The Hogfather is a lot like Santa. He’s discwords Santa. They celebrate Hogswash, which is discwords Christmas. This is one of those ’someone kidnaps/kills santa/the hogfather and someone needs to save christmas/hogswash/the world’ stories and one of those people is the personification of death, who takes on the role of the hogfather, getting all his powers and stuff. In the book he SPEAKS LIKE THIS and I don’t think they quite captured capital letters in sound, but look here I’ve gone on another tangeant.

Death likes, but doesn’t always entirely understand humans. He sees bad things about Christmas/hogswash and he tries to make them better with his hogfatherly powers. Like, he goes to a store and magically whips up presents to give to kids, which makes the owner of the store very distressed because now no-one is buying things, and that’s what christmas/hogswash is about to Mr. Mall. Owner.

He sees that a poor child asks for expensive things. His helper says something like “Well that’s all very nice, but he’s getting a ball and an apple” and Death doesn’t understand. He should get what he wanted. It’s not fair that rich kids get rich things that they want and poor kids get a ball and an apple.
“You have to take into account their socio-economic status”
“That’s unfair”
“That’s the world”
But Death likes humans and thinks this is unfair so he uses his santa/hogsfather powers to give the poor kid what he wanted.

At this point it should be noted that in discword stories are real. The world is run on the power of narritive, and narritives are real in the story. So, at one point we see the real life version of the little match stick girl. Cold and dead. (That story is always so sad! It always got me.)
The guy helping Death understand about christmas/hogswash says that the little matchstick girl is part of the hogswash spirit, because people can look at her and think “Well, it doesn’t matter how poor I am, and how terrible things are for me because the little matchstick girl has things worse”
Death thought this was similarly unfair, brought the matchstick girl back to life and dropped her off with the city watch.

and THAT’s where I wanted to go with this.

I was reading miss crop chicks blog, and then some blogs off the side bar, and some blog off of there. So when I saw that thing, where he brought her back to life I just started thinking about diability. All that “I thank you lord for I am not crippled” sort of stuff.

It’s unfair to make people into symbols of being “worse than.” ‘I’m gateful I’m not like that person’ when that person is still a person.

Uhhh.

That is all.

1:00am rambles.

*I don’t think he literally said girls have not been seen as people. I’m putting my own words here because I don’t remember his.

Rape is not funny.

Today I’m going to be a lazy blogger, like I have been lately. I want to talk about how making jokes about rape isn’t funny. Just going to cheat by copy pasting this little quote from my piece on jokes and joking. (Really, rape jokes are just something under the original jokes and joking thing. Just, more specific. For full understanding, reading that piece could be good.)

“What we laugh at is bound tightly to particular cultures so that there are not many jokes which travel well and in fact many jokes don’t work outside the social word from which they arose. Many jokes depend for their effect on a shared sense of ridicule for particular individuals and groups and if the values underpinning the joke are not shared then it is more likely to be a source of offense then humor.
We have all heard jokes that were not funny because they touched our values in an offensive way rather then amused us. Racial jokes, ethnic jokes, sexist jokes, political jokes all depend on the joke teller and the joke listener sharing stereotypes and values. It isn’t such a long shot to argue that by telling jokes we invite others to share, and perhaps reinforce those stereotypes and values.
Telling and listening to jokes is not just an amusing way to pass the time: it is an important way by which groups can maintain a shared sense of values.
Marie Emmitt & John Pollock, Language and Learning, Oxford University Press, 1991

What you laugh at tells a lot about who you are, and what values you hold. People tend not to laugh at things that are touchy subjects to them. People tend to laugh at other people who hold values the joker doesn’t share.
If you’re a conservative who hates the democrats perhaps you’d joke about dems but wouldn’t take a joke about your own party so well, and vice versa. Laughing tells people what you value, or what you don’t value.

What values does a rape joke hold? I’d say someone telling rape joke doesn’t value the victims of rape quite as much as they might think they do.
I’ll hear folk telling rape jokes but say they detest real rape. I’m not saying that people who tell rape jokes are rapists, or that they think rape is cool or acceptable, but I am saying that joking about rape makes rape a light subject. It takes the seriousness of rape away, if only for awhile. And thats bad.
I’m not really sympathetic to the “lightening it makes it a less scary thing, and it takes the fear of rape away” There are a few reasons for that and I don’t really want to go into them, but I can especially say that I’m not sympathetic to those sorts of arguments coming from people who have never been raped. I’m especially unsympathetic to those arguments if they’re coming from men who have never been raped, and have never been afraid while walking down the street at night that someone might take them into a back alley and then kill and rape them.
If you’re a man and you haven’t experienced the sort of fear that comes from rape. Then I especially don’t like it when you say “it just makes the situation lighter.”

Never having felt the weight of the situation, how would you know what affect jokes have on lightening the situation? Perhaps jokes could be painful reminders to people around you who have actually been there.

Think again to that big-ass-quote up there. What we laugh as is tied to our culture. How do you suppose laughing at rape effects our culture? What happens in a culture that thinks rape is funny?

Just some questions for you is all.

Childfree

In the egl community on livejournal a childfree lolita community was announced. I like lolita, and I don’t really plan on having children (I think I would be a terrible mother.) So I thought I’d join.
But really - I don’t/didn’t know much about what the term “childfree” entails. It’s meant to be a big ol’ community thing. I thought I’d look into it.

I’ve been reading this website for the past ages:
http://www.happilychildfree.com/

Now, there are things this person was talking about that I don’t agree with. A general mocking of people on welfare as well as what appears to be a good dose of classism, but I put that down to the person writing the blog. They even say that not everyone in community agrees about these things. So, this childfree person says some things that I disagree with, but I’m not going to take that as a representation of the whole community.

At one point they say something like all the seeming misogyny in childfree communities can be put down to the fact that a lot of the people who bother them about their lifechoices are mommies.
Some red flags go up.

I read this page:
http://happilychildfree.com/glossary.htm

Warning bells go up more. This is meant to be a page with commonly used lingo in the community. The number of gender specific insults against women seems… uhhh… high. I’m going to list all of the gender specific glossary terms, first listing terms for/about women, and then listing terms for/about men.
For a bit of background reading about gendered words and the power of words, I suggest checking out these articles by Laurelin.
http://laurelin.wordpress.com/2006/10/08/the-terrorism-of-words/#comments
http://laurelin.wordpress.com/2007/01/17/the-power-of-words-i/
http://laurelin.wordpress.com/2007/01/19/the-power-of-words-ii/
http://laurelin.wordpress.com/2007/02/07/the-power-of-words-iii/#comments

In fact, just go read her entire damned blog already!
*note to self, add her blog to your blogroll already.

Anyway, on with the list.

——————

Bint — A British term meaning a woman with no class. Often used on Childfree boards to describe trashy breeder women.

Entitlemoo — Entitlement-minded mother who thinks everyone should worship the ground she walks on and give her everything she wants and make her life as easy as possible because she’s convinced that giving birth earns her the right to be treated like a queen.

Lowing — Female breeders whining and bitching. Also known as “mooing.”

Martyr Mommy Brigade — This new breed of mommys who crave attention and sympathy so much that they’ll go to any lengths to get it.

Mombie — Combination of the words Mommy and Zombie. Occasionally used to describe a woman with placenta brain — she’s turned into a “mombie”.

Mommy — Any woman with kids that you just can’t take seriously. I prefer this to the word “moo.” They think of themselves as nothing more than “mommies” so I think we should think of them as nothing more than mommies. They aren’t grown women, they aren’t ladies, they are JUST mommies. They don’t even like the term “housewife” because they don’t consider themselves wifes — just mommies.
I use this to show how little respect I have for women who consider themselves no more than “mommies”. I’d rather use this than the word “moo” to describe them. She’s not a grown woman, she’s not a lady, she’s JUST a mommy.

Mommy Identity — When a woman’s entire identity is wrapped up in being a mother. She’ll go to great lengths to make her kids totally dependent on her for as long as possible to secure that identity out of fear she’ll have to get a new identity and/or get a job.

Mommy Voice — The voice some breeder women use when they talk to you in a snotty, superior tone as if they were speaking to one of their children. Makes you feel sorry for their kids.

Mommyism — A form of feminism that focuses on getting special rights for mommies and screwing over childfree women and men in the process. Example: Mommies want flextime in the office, but don’t think anyone but them should get it.

Moo — Usually stands for “Mother Obsessed with Offspring” or “Mother Oblivious to Offspring” although sometimes it just means a breeder woman.

Mooing — Female breeders whining and bitching. Also known as “lowing.”

Oblivamoo — Combination of “oblivious” and “moo” …a clueless mother who is either totally ignoring her child’s bad behavior or is just totally clueless about how to be a parent.

Placenta Brain — this describes the disease that happens to many women when they have children. Can also happen to men with children. Symptoms of the disease include: talking about nothing but their pregnancy and/or child(ren), losing all hobbies outside of their children, inability to hire a babysitter, lack of consideration for other people, saying really stupid things, and generally just being an idiot. In some cases, this condition clears up when the children all enter school, but in many cases they never recover.

SAHM, SAHMoo — Stands for “Stay at Home Mommy” (or “Stay at Home Moo”) In other words, unemployed mommy or what used to be called a “housewife”. Sometimes pronounced as “Sham”.

SHAM, Sham — Just a mocking term for “Stay at Home Mommy” (or “Stay at Home Moo”). In other words, unemployed mommy or what used to be called a “housewife”.

SMUM — Smart, Middle-Class, Uninvolved Mother. Basically, the yuppie, suburbanite mothers.

Stork Parking — Any parking that is reserved for pregnant women or women with children. You know, anything that encourages them to get as little exercise as possible. We wouldn’t want our young mothers to be HEALTHY, would we?

Tit Nazi — Overzealous breeders who are obsessed with breastfeeding in public, and yelling and screaming at people about how “breast is best,” bullying other women into breastfeeding, and bullying businesses into relaxing their public decency laws to allow them to whip their tits out in public. Beware of the tit-nazis – they are a very angry bunch with too much time on their hands.

THJITW– Stands for “The Hardest Job in the World” – Mantra of the Stay-at-home-mommies to make themselves feel less insecure about not working. If they weren’t so insecure, they wouldn’t have to claim they are superior to everyone else. Personally, I can think of a lot harder jobs than sitting at home with your own kids – like watching someone else’s bratty kids that you don’t like and aren’t allowed to discipline or scold in any way. So apparently there ARE harder jobs in the world – like being a day-care provider.

TMIJITW — Stands for “The Most Important Job in the World”. Mantra of Stay-at-home-mommies to make themselves feel less insecure about not working. If they weren’t so insecure, they wouldn’t have to claim they are superior to everyone else. Most of these women couldn’t last a day without disposable diapers, DVD players and their monster-sized strollers, so apparently there ARE more important jobs in the world – like the people making disposable diapers, DVD players and strollers.

Womban — Technically, any woman who has at least one kid, although more specifically used to describe gals with kids that want “special rights” to go along with that. Basically, this term is used when you don’t want to malign the whole female gender — just the ones who are the problem. The plural is “Womben”.

Yup Moo — Yuppie or middle class mommies who think they and their kids are superior to all the “peons” in the world. Their children truly are nothing but accessories and they take the kids everywhere to show them off, and they overschedule them with lots of extracurricular activites to show off their “unique” talents. Yup Moos love tell you about all the things THEY would never lower themselves to do, to prove they are far suprior to others. You’ll need a barf bag to be in the same room as one.

——————

Dud — Loser male breeder.

Duh — Slack-jawed, clueless male breeder.

Golden Boy — This is the son born to some sexist jerk who thinks he MUST have a son, and no daughter will be good enough, and then when he finally gets the son, he spoils him rotten.

Sperm Donor — The father. Sometimes used to describe a man who didn’t want to actually RAISE kids, he just had them for the Kodak moments or to please the wife. Also used to describe how some women only use men (even their husbands) for their sperm.

Wallet — Usually used to describe the husband of a SAHM. She uses him as nothing more than a paycheck. Also could be used to describe someone paying child support.

——————

Ouch. If I counted right, there were 76 words in that list. 22 of them were specifically relating to women (pretty much all of them insults/slurs.)
5 of them were related to men, and two of those five can be used to describe terrible behaviors of women.

Ooooh~

*suspicious*

End the killings of women and girls in Ciudad Juárez and Chihuahua, México.

http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=engusa20070130001

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL USA
ISSUE BRIEF

January 2007

Mexico and Guatemala: Stop the Killings of Women

“What language do I have to speak in for you to take notice of what I’m saying, a girl is being beaten and raped …” was what a witness reported to the emergency services in February 2001 in the case of Lilia Alejandra García Andrade, after the police failed to respond to an earlier call. Three days later Lilia Alejandra was found dead in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico.

In Mexico and Guatemala women are being killed at alarming rates but the perpetrators are overwhelmingly never brought to justice. This scandal has led family members of the victims to refer to the problem as a “femicide,” the most extreme expression of gender based violence accepted culturally and by the State when its laws don’t criminalize violence against women and whereby negligence or the lack of political will results in almost total impunity for the perpetrators of such brutality.

According to comprehensive analysis by Amnesty International, approximately 400 young women have been murdered or abducted in the cities of Juárez and Chihuahua, Mexico since 1993. In Guatemala, over 2,500 women and girls have been murdered since 2001. In Mexico, the brutality with which the assailants abduct and murder the women goes further than the act of killing in a significant number of cases. Many of the women are held captive for several days and subjected to humiliation, torture and the most horrific sexual violence before being killed. In Guatemala some of the victims had their throats cut, were beaten, shot or stabbed to death. Many of their bodies showed signs of rape, torture, mutilation or dismemberment. A range of motives are reflected and both state and non-state actors are involved, but in all cases the victim’s gender is a significant factor, in both the kind of violence perpetrated and in the level of response by authorities.

While Amnesty International recognizes that some positive steps have been taken to prevent violence against women in Mexico and Guatemala, those advances are often undermined. Under the administration of Mexican President Vicente Fox a special federal prosecutor reviewed 205 cases in Ciudad Juárez and confirmed Amnesty International?s findings that there was evidence of negligence on the part of local officials. She recommended that the Chihuahua state prosecutor consider administrative or criminal proceedings against 177 state officials who were negligent in the handling of these cases. Amnesty International is aware of arrest warrants being issued for only two officials. They were later dropped.

In early 2006 the Guatemalan “Rape Law” (Article 200) whereby a rapist could escape charges by offering to marry his victim, was deemed unconstitutional. However, legislation addressing violence against women in Guatemala remains severely deficient. For example, Guatemalan law prohibits domestic abuse, but does not provide prison sentences for cases of domestic abuse and prevents abusers from being charged with assault if bruises do not remain visible for at least 10 days. The Guatemalan Special Prosecutor for Crimes Against Women reported that her office receives approximately 800 reports of domestic violence per month, with some of those cases ending in murder and that those murders could be prevented if Guatemalan law provided for prison sentences in cases of domestic violence. As of June 2006, of the over six hundred cases of women reported murdered in 2005, to Amnesty International’s knowledge, only two convictions had taken place.
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL USA RECOMMENDATIONS:

* Cosponsor House Resolution 100 expressing sympathy to the family members of the women and girls killed in Guatemala and urging the Department of State to take specific steps in helping to address this problem with the Guatemalan government.
* Press the Secretary of State and U.S. Ambassador to Mexico to implement specific recommendations of the Concurrent Congressional Resolution on Juarez, which passed unanimously in May 2006, including steps to ensure that addressing these horrendous murders becomes a part of the U.S.-Mexico bilateral agenda.

Here’s a link that Amnesty International provides with actions:
http://www.amnestyusa.org/Bordertown/Take_Action_for_the_Women_of_Juarez/page.do?id=1101544&n1=2&n2=22&n3=795

Here’s another link based on actions you can take:
http://www.lourdesportillo.com/senoritaextraviada/links.html

Just a note: The vast majority of victims would have been WOC and the people who treated the cases negligently are meant to be white folks. Entwined sexism and racism leading to the murders of thousands of women. THOUSANDS of women murdered. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Oh Jesus Christ.

http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Cheryl_Lindsey_Seelhoff

Fuck. I don’t know what to think as I read this shit. They’re trying to find where BB and heart live so they can literally take action to ruin their lives.

“This woman, Biting Beaver, and the rest of them are totally batshit insane. The primary objective here needs to be finding Brandon, Biting Beaver’s son, and telling him that his mom wishes she had stabbed him with a coathanger, rather than let him do what boys are supposed to do.

It maybe possible to contact Brandon or obtain additional vespene gas through the Beaver’s ex-boyfriend, who is frequently referred to as Dubhe. As Biting Beavis appears to have had a messy divorce with her husband Shawn, finding him may lead to epic win.”

What what what?

Wait.BitingBeaver is supposed to be the one who is “batshit insane.” The people who are out to ruin somebodies life because they expressed their feelings on the internet are entirely normal.
It’s normal to form networks of people together so you can harm as many people as you can for no real reason.

They’re normal, and we’re the people who are fucked up?

Jesus Christ.