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

Month: March 2010

WAM! It Yourself

For those of you who don’t know, WAM! is having a WAM! It Yourself weekend from March 25-28 in Boston, Chicago, D.C., Los Angeles, New York City and San Antonio. Check out the festivities here.

Here in NYC, there’s a benefit concert on Thursday, a happy hour on Friday, and a mini-conference on Saturday. The concert is a sliding scale donation of $5 to $10 and features Hunter Valentine, Toi Toi Toi, Rad Pony and DJ Hottmomz. The mini-conference is $12 and topics include getting published, personal finances, media training, and so forth. For those who can’t make it, I will likely be live-tweeting over at frausallybenz, assuming the internet/WiFi/phone reception is good and my batteries don’t die.

Hope to see some of you there!

TANF Not Providing Needed Assistance to Domestic Violence Victims

Last week, Legal Momentum and the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence published a study on the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program and how it assists, or specifically frequently fails to assist, victims of domestic violence who are living in poverty in the U.S. The full study, entitled Not Enough: What TANF Offers Family Violence Victims, is available here (pdf). From the press release:

Bureaucratic black holes, indifferent or hostile staff members, inadequate benefits, and shortsighted procedures and policies are preventing many family violence victims from getting the resources they need to escape abuse. According to an unprecedented new national survey of service providers, problems like these plague the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, effectively stopping victims of abuse from accessing help when they need it most.

The report, Not Enough: What TANF Offers Family Violence Victims, was produced by Legal Momentum and the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence (NRCDV). The survey on which it is based is a unique, comprehensive effort to understand when TANF successfully assists victims of family violence, and when the program falls short, leaving victims to fend for themselves. Some 600 staff members from domestic violence programs, legal aid and anti-poverty agencies who work with victims on TANF-related issues completed the survey.

Victims feel lost, confused, and frustrated with the system and it gets to a point where going back to the abuser is easier than dealing with the current system.

Conducted in late 2009, the survey finds that when TANF works well, it makes a significant difference in the lives of victims. But many victims of family violence encounter serious difficulties that undermine their efforts to access resources and forge a path to safety for themselves and their children.

In the survey, a mere 14 percent of respondents said that the TANF family violence responses work well in their states, and 43 percent said fewer than half of family violence victims were able to access TANF benefits. One in four respondents said “no” when asked if family violence information disclosed by victims was handled in an appropriate way.

(All emphasis here and elsewhere in the post is mine.)

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It’s About Control

Have you ever heard someone wish that they had a remote control for humans? With apparently no regard for what an incredibly disturbing thing that would be, or how they would feel if it was turned on them? Maybe you have been fortunate enough to never have had that conversation. I have not been so fortunate. And I now have the dubious pleasure of presenting to you the following novelty toy: the Control A Woman remote.
The Control A Woman remote in red and grey packaging. Described below.
Oh hey! It has funny buttons! You can do all sorts of things to your chick like put her on mute, switch off her PMS, get her to calm down or hurry up. You can increase or decrease her breast size. You can get her to forgive, forget, move on, say no, say yes, remove her clothes, cook, clean and leave. You can get her to give you beer, sex or food. You can get her to stop nagging, moaning or whining.

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Chemical Castration in Argentina

Argentina has just approved chemical castration for convicted rapists in the Mendoza province. The treatment must be voluntary, and because it’s a medication administered for the duration of their consent to treatment, it’s not permanent.

In the feminist community in particular, the debate over whether or not chemical castration should even be an option is still ongoing, but my initial reaction was: does anybody think this is actually going to work?! According to the CNN piece I linked above, there are 11 convicted rapists who will be undergoing treatment with a reduced sentence. It seems the hope is that if it’s successful in this province, it will be adopted in other provinces as well. But if the jury’s still out of how effective this is, how long do they intend to wait to deem it a success?

Food, Friends and Finances

Last night, I had a scrumptious meal cooked by a good friend. Along with another friend, we sipped wine, busted out the Abbey Ale, and enjoyed the pleasure of each other’s company. And to make it a picture-perfect evening, we worked on our taxes.

Yes, it’s tax season here in the States and my friends and I turned what’s usually an annoyance into a fun night of food, drinks and good company.

For my friend, it was her first time filing taxes and we thought this would be a good way to promote financial independence. Hooray for sisterhood! We were able to coach her through the process and get her feeling more confident about being able to keep her finances in order. In fact, I think this dinner, drinks, taxes combo is a great one that I’ll be doing often! Any good cooks out there who need tax help? Or any awesome accountants in need of a yummy meal? I urge you all to start this tradition.

At some point in the evening, I started wondering what it is about women and finances… It shouldn’t be the case that we are easily intimidated by our personal finances, and yet I find that – at least in my groups of friends – many women are. My friend, for example, was completely freaking out about her taxes. She had no idea what she was supposed to do, what she needed, or how long it would take and the panic was getting to her.

With the rest of my friends, there are some who take complete control over their finances, making sure to keep their debt down, buying property, investing, etc. The rest are completely lost, in loads of debt, not even thinking about investing or buying anything, etc.

Do you all find that the women you know fall into the “don’t know anything about money” stereotype? Or do they have their finances in order? I’m curious to see how much of this is an actual problem and how much has finally changed.

Honoring WASPs: Women Airforce Service Pilots

I was doing my nightly read-through of news sites (a practice I haven’t actually done regularly in the past several months. whoops.), when I found this cool slide show of Women Airforce Service Pilots Through the Years. It’s a slide show so it doesn’t exactly have a wealth of information, but I thought it was cool and figured somebody else might to. In the 1940s, these women learned how to fly for the U.S. Army so they could serve their country. Today they were awarded with a Congressional gold medal for their service – pretty awesome stuff.

I have to say, though, that the picture that made this slide show amazing was this one:
Photo of three women and a man with a plane. One woman is sitting in the pilot's seat, talking to the two women crouching by the side of the plane. The man is standing next to the women, smiling broadly at the camera.

I mean, the look on that man’s face is incredible! HE IS HAPPY, DAMNIT!, TO BE NEXT TO THESE WOMEN ON A PLANE! And the women have great hair styles, so that’s awesome too.

So, does anybody know anything about the Women Airforce Service Pilots? I feel like every time I discover a group of bad-ass women, I learn about a new one shortly after. Is there a book I can read about them, or what? (If not, who wants to write it? They sound incredible.)

Thursday LOST Roundtable: Recon

Spoilers below the image!

LOST Screencap. Close-up shot of Sawyer in a restaurant wearing a deep red, collared shirt and black suit jacket. Two women appear in the background.

This week’s episode centered on Sawyer who, off the island, he’s a cop trying to find the man he deems responsible for the death of his parents. On the island, Flocke is still recruiting, Claire confronts Kate about Aaron, Sawyer’s on a mission to get off the island, and Sayid’s heart is cold as ice.

Read our discussion on the episode and add your own thoughts, theories, and general reactions in the comments. Remember to avoid spoilers to episodes that have not yet aired.

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