In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Month: February 2009

Who Gets To Say What (Part I: Tokenism)

Hi everyone, and welcome to the next part of The Story of Blog. This series of somewhat navel-gazing posts is Feministe’s contribution to an ongoing conversation in this neck of blogland — a conversation about the nature and ethics of the kind of blogging we do here. This perennial topic was re-ignited by concerns raised by Mandy Van Deven and Brittany Shoot that the emerging structure of what’s known as “the feminist blogosphere” has become problematic and exploitative.

The Feministe bloggers decided that these topics are very much worth discussing, regardless of how we feel about the specific claims and arguments made in Mandy and Brittany’s post. I feel it’s quite overdue, and just as necessary as ever, to investigate and poke at the operation of power and economic distribution of various kinds of resources. Plus, there was one thing we definitely agreed with in their post, the need for and benefits of transparency, which we’ve tried to cover in Part I of this series.

As a collaborative exercise, we asked ourselves a series of questions, about five in all. The answers got so long that we split them up into one question per post.

Although I’m putting this post up, nearly all of the regular Feministe bloggers have contributed, and you’ll see everyone’s name after the cut. Because we all wanted to participate, it’s taken us a while to get this post up. That’s one of the first facts of blogging life that’s important to understand: what we do and the decisions we make are haphazard, because writing can’t sustain any of us materially, we all have day jobs, and we drop in and out of engagement with the blog. Adding to the inevitable complexity of having this conversation, Mandy and Brittany also posted an apology for their original post earlier this week. Like many apologetic follow-ups, it addresses some issues, and raises or exacerbates some others. Because of varying availability, some of our comments below were written before the second round, some of them after.

Question 1: Are women of color who guest-blog or post regularly on larger blogs being tokenized?

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Weekend Reads

NOVELTY AND CHOICE: After having a terrible 2008, Chen Xiao decided to let go, and let China’s netizens decide how she spends her days for the price of a small fee. She won’t do anything she considers illegal or immoral, but she will pick up dinner for your family, or deliver a hot lunch to the needy, or attend your baby’s birth. It’s an interesting experiment in autonomy and the social workings of the internet, and probably the only feel-good story you’re getting from me in this post.

SEXY OTHERNESS: At Muslimah Media Watch, guestblogger Cycads uses an offensive conversation about an “orientalist fantasy” to discuss the feminization and colonization of foreign bodies and lands.

BORDERS, BOUNDARIES AND RAPE: The presence of “rape trees” — “places where Mexican drug cartel members rape female border crossers and hang their clothes” — proves that this brand of sexual violence is officially present in the United States. Mexican and North American bureaucrats mostly deny this is true.

IT’S CALLED A SHIT SANDWICH, AND YOU’LL EAT IT AND LIKE IT: Schools across the country are “cutting budgets” by giving plain cheese sandwiches to children whose parents cannot foot the bill for a hot lunch, “singl[ing] out poor children in the most storied location of school-aged social hierarchies – the lunchroom.” My boy, Ethan, is terrified of being a cheese sandwich kid since they instituted this policy at his school. Sybil and Renee bring the outrage.

PORN COMES CALLING: Also from Renee, some entrepreneurs have offered Nadya Suleman another way of paying her bills — starring in a full-feature porn movie.

FIRST!: Last week King Abdullah threw out a bunch of reform-blocking cabinet members, and among other sweeping changes, named Norah al-Fayez as Saudi Arabia’s deputy education minister for women. She is the first female minister in Saudi Arabia.

ANTI-ABORTION ANGST: The right-to-life movement is feeling some angst about the ineffectuality of their activism so far, especially now that there is a general consensus that the movement is a political puppet in a panned Republican play.

RT @RANDOMDEANNA: Deanna Zandt’s “non-fanatical begginers’ guide to Twitter.” For people like my mom who still don’t understand what Twitter even is, and me, because I can’t explain it to her either.

Posted in Uncategorized

Target Women: Oscar Ex-Plosion

Sarah Haskins tackles the bizarre media obsession with the fact that both Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Aniston were at the same award show. OMG!

(If you can’t view the embedded video, click here.)

Mainly, as someone for whom the bulk of her celebrity gossip tends to come form reading the tabloid headlines in the supermarket checkout line, I’m really just both completely amazed and totally not that the entertainment media is still so utterly obsessed with this idea of two women constantly at each other’s throats over a man.  Years later.  I mean, granted he is Brad Pitt.  But I’m pretty sure that he not only puts his pants on one leg at a time like the rest of us, but that people also come into contact with their current partner’s ex/their ex’s current partner on, like, a fairly regular basis.

I’m also pretty sure that women sometimes have other things on their minds besides men. Like, as Sarah Haskins points out, being filthy rich.

Perversion of Justice

Perversion of Justice by Melissa Mummert
(Borderwalk Productions)
Note: An updated version of this documentary will be released this spring.

One would hope most feminists know by now that leaving an abusive relationship is no small feat. There’s shelter to think of – where will you (and your children) stay? In which city? With which person? There’s money – survivors of abuse may not necessarily have much or any income for bus tickets and food. There’s health – maybe your abuser has broken you down emotionally, or maybe you have good reason to believe that he’ll come after you (and your children) if you escape. We all know the problem with “why didn’t she just leave?!”, right? Great.

So when you actually manage to escape an abusive partner and the family members with whom you’re staying ask you to help out a little with their source of income, are you going to refuse? They’re putting you up, after all. Maybe they don’t have much room. “Could you do us a favor?” they might ask. “Could you run a couple of errands?” You want to repay their kindness. You want to earn your keep.

I’m generalizing, of course, but Hamedah Hasan is one of the survivors who has lived this story. In her early twenties, after several unsuccessful attempts to extricate herself from an abusive relationship, she and her two daughters managed to leave her partner for good and find shelter with her cousin. She helped out, taking care of children, holding onto packages, and wiring money when asked. But eventually, her cousin was arrested for a drug deal that she had no connection to (in fact, she was no longer living there, having moved on to a welfare-to-work program) and she was charged as a coconspirator. In a criminal justice system that cares little about domestic violence and even less about domestic violence aimed at women of color, escaping abuse and repaying kindness had landed Hamedah in jail.

That actually isn’t the issue, though.

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Obama to Rescind HHS “Conscience” Rule

So by now, I hope we all remember that dangerous HHS rule that Bush implemented during his final days in office?  The one that prevents health care providers from “discriminating” against employees who refuse to to do their jobs, when they include things like providing patients with birth control and accurate reproductive health options?

And indeed, the one that we were all hoping Obama would overturn once he entered office?

The news has come out today that rescinding the rule is exactly what he apparently plans to do:

Taking another step into the abortion debate, the Obama administration Friday will move to rescind a controversial rule that allows health-care workers to deny abortion counseling or other family-planning services if doing so would violate their moral beliefs, according to administration officials.

The rollback of the “conscience rule” comes just two months after the Bush administration announced it last year in one of its final policy initiatives.

Three cheers for that!

The kind of sketchy news is this part:

Officials said the administration will consider drafting a new rule to clarify what health-care workers can reasonably refuse for patients.

For more than 30 years, federal law has allowed doctors and nurses to decline to provide abortion services as a matter of conscience, a protection that is not subject to rulemaking.

In promulgating the new rule last year, Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said it was necessary to address discrimination in the medical field.

He criticized “an environment in the health-care field that is intolerant of individual conscience, certain religious beliefs, ethnic and cultural traditions and moral convictions.”

Officials said the Obama administration’s goal is to make the rule clearer.

Let’s hope that once the administration “considers” this option, they decide to toss the idea back out.  Unless, of course, by making the rules “clearer,” Obama plans to limit the amount of services that health care workers can refuse to provide further than before, thus making access to things like emergency contraception a whole lot easier.  If that’s the route he’s planning to go, it would make this even better news.

NARAL is asking supporters to send Obama their thanks for planning to rescind the rule, and I strongly urge you to do so as well.  Not only is positive reinforcement hugely helpful when it comes to policy, but knowing that he has lots of support for the idea is also likely to increase the chances that Obama gets this done right.

Rush Limbaugh Wants to Know Why Women Hate Him

So after finding out that only 37% of women have a favorable view of him, while 56% of men also do, Rush decided to hold a summit to try to figure out where he’s going wrong with the ladies.

Oh why oh why might women not be huge fans?  I don’t know, but Think Progress has an idea or two:

– “She’s actually a very smart cat. She gets loved. She gets adoration. She gets petted. She gets fed. And she doesn’t have to do anything for it, which is why I say this cat’s taught me more about women, than anything my whole life.” [11/30/06]

– “He’s trying to figure out how he can get involved in the deal down there at Duke where the lacrosse team…supposedly, you know, raped, some, uh, hos.” [3/31/06]

– “You know, there’s a crisis of young man-boy education in the schools. And they did this on purpose, to eliminate male competition in the work force. This is part of feminazi grand plan.” [5/21/08]

– “Classic example of the castrati, the new castrati. Jack Carter is — has been castrated by the feminization of this culture since he grew up.” [2/21/06]

– “I just heard Erin Burnett sounding a little wifey. … Well [she was] whining.” [10/23/07]

And I could come up with many, many more if I only felt that Rush’s sorry ass was worth the waste of time.  For what it’s worth, the first day of Rush’s summit consisted of vile transphobia and whining about how all the women who he asked to call in and tell him what to change are telling him that he should change.

The very concept is good for a laugh, on the one hand.  On the other, I’m really just incredibly concerned that such high numbers of Americans have a favorable opinion of Rush Limbaugh.  Seriously?  Talk about a wake up call.

Open Thread: Child-Free Resources, Suggestions, and General Bitching

Ask and ye shall receive. Commenter Ali says:

“Not to mention that the logical consequence of bringing society around to the point where being childfree is a non-weird, totally acceptable option is more people taking that option.”

Sorry to threadjack for a second but Jill (or Cara or anyone else), could we have an open thread about this please? I was just refused permanent BC (the essure procedure specifically) by my OB as well as another doctor I called because evidently I’m too stupid at 25 to know that I don’t want biological children. ever. I’ve been shaking in rage and frustration all morning and I don’t know what else I can do at this point.

I know this has come up before on the blog, so this may be a good time to pool resources and share stories. These things go both ways: Women who are considered “fit” to reproduce (young, white, middle-income or higher, educated, able-bodied, etc) are often second-guessed in their decisions to not have children or to delay childbearing — and especially in the decision to go on permanent or long-term birth control. On the other hand, women who are deemed “unfit” to reproduce and/or parent (often women of color, poor women, drug-using women and disabled women) are forced or coerced into sterilization, or legally punished for exercising their fundamental right to reproduce.

So this might be a good place to share resources, strategies and information about how we can fully exercise our reproductive rights in a world where our identities shape just how free we’re all allowed to be.

New Legislation Would Expand Domestic Violence Laws to Include Pets

It looks like both Washington and Iowa are considering legislation that would include family pets under domestic violence protections.  In Washington, the legislation would allow courts to issue restraining orders against abusers that include pets as well as the abused party; and in Iowa, the legislation would not only allow restraining orders to be issued, but would also allow a court to issue an order giving the abused party full custody of the pet(s) without a restraining order.

On the surface, for the uninitiated, this may seem a bit silly, or even trivializing of domestic violence.  But indeed, it’s anything but.  These pieces of legislation aren’t just about protecting animals — who, I would argue, do indeed deserve our protection.  They’re primarily about protecting the abused human.

How?  Because it’s not at all uncommon for abusers to used beloved family pets to get to their victims. They may threaten the safety or life of the pet in order to prevent the abused person from leaving, and may actually do harm to the pet, including torturing and killing it in order to do emotional damage to the human victim.

Any of us who has a pet who they love dearly can easily relate to this.  If someone threatened my cat, who I love more than almost anything?  Yeah, that’d probably work.  And it actually does work in a lot of cases.  People, especially women, have been murdered because they couldn’t stand the thought of harm being done to their animals.

So this legislation is good news.  It has the potential to save both animal and human lives.  And if you live in either state?  You should be contacting your legislators to let them know that you support it.

See Abyss2Hope for more.

Three Things to Annoy You Today

1. Octomom’s gift to the pro-life movement. First, don’t get me started on the term “octomom” (not just because it irritates me, but because crass jokes will ensue). Second, yes, this is Jill Stanek and she’s awful, but I still think she illustrates an important point: That when we start messing with the legality of what women can or can’t do with the reproductive systems,* we go down a bad path. I’ve steered clear of the octuplets drama because most of the conversations about it, even (perhaps especially) in feminist circles, have made me really uncomfortable. There are certainly issues of medical ethics involved, and I get the environmentalist arguments that having a lot of kids is not sustainable or “green.” But here’s the thing with freedoms and liberties: Sometimes, people are going to do things that they legally can do that you or I may believe to be foolish or irresponsible or embarrassing or unethical or wrong or crazy. Sometimes people are going to do things you don’t like. Sometimes people are going to do things that are very weird. The Nadya Suleman story is a story exactly because it’s highly unusual. What I find troubling about it is that it’s been turned into some Larger Commentary on the State of the American Uterati. It’s one woman who did one thing that a lot of people think was extremely odd and maybe also irresponsible. Wouldn’t be the first time. Except now she’s held up as the walking example of the Lazy Welfare Mom, eating all of our tax dollars. And the calls for laws about how many embryos you can implant, or regulations as to who can get IVF? Count me out. We all know what happens when you start regulating how and when women reproduce. We all know what happens when you say that only some women should be entitled to reproduce. I don’t disagree with the medical community regulating itself, and I don’t oppose the government stepping in where necessary. But I’m not comfortable with a law saying you can only implant so many embryos — especially when that law came about because a few legislators (who are probably not fertility doctors who understand the ins and outs of their practice) were mad that a woman has 14 kids. Jill Stanek’s column is a perfect example of where this will go: Limiting IVF based on a theory of embryonic personhood. Of course, Stanek also tosses it out there that infertility is caused by illicit sex, so… there you go.

2. The Saturday morning U.S. News poll: “If you had a choice of four daycare centers run separately by Michelle Obama, Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, and Nancy Pelosi, which would you choose for your kids?” I think that speaks for itself.

3. Republican Senator: HIV testing for pregnant moms rewards sexual promiscuity. I know every time I go out on the town, there’s a little voice in the back of my head reminding me, “Remember Jill, if you’re super promiscuous, you may be rewarded with an HIV test! Now get goin’ girl!” The bill is pretty straight-forward: It requires health care workers to test pregnant women for HIV (along with a host of other things), unless the pregnant women decline. The senator’s problem with it is this: Finding out you have HIV in time to prevent transmitting it to your child is a big ol’ cookie that Colorado is handing out to ungrateful whores.** Here’s his statement. To his credit, he does not use the word “whores”:

Thank you, Madam President. You know, this was a difficult bill for me. I voted yes in committee on it because of discussions surrounding the fact that — well, let me just basically say this, it basically modifies the communicable disease laws and it requires the health care providers to test pregnant women for HIV unless they opt out. And that’s basically, that’s the main part of this bill. I voted yes on it. I was a little bit troubled with my vote and was just wondering what was bothering me. I woke up the next morning — Thursday morning — at 5 a.m. and I wrestled with this bill for another hour from 5 to 6 and finally came to the conclusion I’m going to be a no vote on this. I’m trying to think through what the role of government is here. And I am not convinced that part of the role of government should be to protect individuals from the negative consequences of their actions.

Sexual promiscuity, we know, causes a lot of problems in our state, one of which, obviously, is the contraction of HIV. And we have other programs that deal with the negative consequences — we put up part of our high schools where we allow students maybe 13 years old who put their child in a small daycare center there.

We do things continually to remove the negative consequences that take place from poor behavior and unacceptable behavior, quite frankly, and I don’t think that’s the role of this body.

As a result of that I finally came to the conclusion I would have to be a no vote on this because this stems from sexual promiscuity for the most part, and I just can’t vote on this bill and I wanted to explain to this body why I was going to be a no vote on this.

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*Or their “octopussies,” perhaps? Sorry, can’t help it.
**If I ever start a rock band, it will be called Cookies for Ungrateful Whores.