What Else I’m Reading

21 thoughts on What Else I’m Reading

1. FYI: Posting a link dump on The Mother-Frickin’ Fourth O’ July without including fifteen paeans demonstrating unflinching support for this week’s compulsory what-nots and hoo-has will compel some supremely patrtiotic soul to put you in your place, woman.

   (I would say what their apopletic fits will muddle the transmission of, but you know, it’s a federal holiday, so I’m giving profanity the day off. And some dare call me traitor.)

2. And these are supposedly liberal guys? Or not? Laurelin in the rain did a really good piece about how blamign the victim lets the victimizer get off.

3. http://laurelin.wordpress.com/2006/06/30/perpetrator-mentality/

4. Did anyone here see this episode of Rescue Me? What was the tone of the scene? The context? I’m not willing to pile on and condemn the creators of the show until I see the scene in question. Similar things were said about the film Straw Dogs… objections that I feel ignored the psychological complexity of those characters.

5. Alternet article: fuck. These are supposed to be fucking liberals. Fuck fuck fuck fuck.

   Also, GROSS.

6. I think that the idea that this episode glorifies rape in any way is rather like the idea that Lolita glorifies pedophilia,

   I saw that episode of Rescue Me, and I think that the writers of the Alternet article were dead wrong. What happens in the episode is that Tommy (Denis Leary) and his soon-to-be-ex-wife Janet (Andrea Roth) are dividing up their belongings. Janet says or does something that sets Tommy off, and he starts trying to rape her, eventually succeeding. At first she resists, but then she accepts it, and after it is done, she begins to act as if she had just had a (consensual) illict quickie. By the time her current boyfriend – Tommy’s brother Johnny (Dean Winters) – comes back, she acts almost as if she is gloating about a secret affair (like Dian Lane’s character in Unfaithful).

   Now, on to the issues raised:

   In an episode that aired early last week, the show’s main character… rewards his estranged wife’s perceived insubordination… with what, in the eyes of these writers and producers, is understood to be a reasonable male response to acts of female insubordination: He rapes her.

   Excuse me, but Tommy has never been portrayed as a reasonable man who responds to situations in a reasonable way. He is a controlling, manipulative, abusive a**h**e. When he found out that his estranged wife was in a relationship with his brother, he put his brother’s head through a window. He has on many occasions acted abusively towards women, particularly when he thinks he is no longer in control of his life or when he feels they are not kowtowing enough to him. He is an abuser and raping his wife is completely consistent with the character that has been developed over the previous two seasons.

   And, they would have you believe, she enjoyed it.

   Actually, how I saw it was that when she realized she couldn’t stop him, she simply accetped being raped and stopped resisting. After it was over, she went into denial, and rewrote the incident in her head so that it was a consensual encounter that she had enjoyed, because she simply couldn’t deal with the reality of being raped.

   It isn’t surprising that she would go into such denial when one considers all that she has been through over the past two years, including the death of her son, and getting back together with and then re-leaving Tommy. Sometimes, people find the truth too painful to deal with. Moreover, it must have occurred to her that if she accuses Tommy of rape, his brother will probably kill him and perhaps get sent to jail for a long time. Her first priority now, rightly or rongly, is to get some sort of normalcy back into her life, and it is far easier for her to rewrite the rape in her mind as a consensual encounter than for her to have to deal with the after math of rape.

7. I was going to send Ted Stevens an internet but come to find out we only got one for everybody. Somebody obviously goofed when they ordered the thing.

8. He is an abuser and raping his wife is completely consistent with the character that has been developed over the previous two seasons.

   It is stupid fucking TeeVee. Television is entertainment. For any woman, man or child who has lived through a rape experience, being assaulted without warning while blithely watching the tube is to relive once again the horror, trauma, humiliation and grief. Also, knowing that such is written, rehearsed and then finally aired on an entertainment program for entertainment only debases and belittles the experience of the survivors and those others whose voices have been forever silenced by violence.

   Television producers, predominantly males who’ve enjoyed personal and financial success, have little empathy for the struggles of the average individual and little to no understanding of the experience and the inner workings of a woman, or even probably a man dealing with the trauma of rape either.

   I typed some mean things, but deleted them. I’m sure your explanation of the Big Meaning of sitcom television entertainment was well meaning, just horribly misguided.

   Now onto other things.

   I looked at the Atrios site and the ‘what do people think of Mormons’ drivel was eclipsed by the site on the side bar of two lithe blonde girls wearing what appeared to be Hitler smiley face shirts. My eyes deceive me! Look away, look away, no I look again. Yes they are!

   Oh and they’re not just dumb models posing to sell some poor desperate fool’s effort at media attention, nope, they are the homeschool progeny of some Aryan Nation whackjob and their similarily slanted extended family. Singing songs to celebrate Rudolf Hess and Rob Matthews the former nutjob of The Order.

   You know, I ate some dairy products this afternoon despite my better judgement and was just overcoming the violent cramps and other throes of severe lactose intolerance. The sweat beads were just drying off my forehead and then comes that. My stomach doth wrench again.

   Katha Pollitt is a saint and where she goes I will follow. She writes what I thinks, but methinks, unfortunately, she doesn’t need me to think it.

9. An unfortunate reminder that the people in charge of deciding net neutrality issues don’t even know the basics of what they’re talking about. Perhaps we should all send Sen. Stevens an internet and give him an idea.

   I saw that episode of Rescue Me, and I think that the writers of the Alternet article were dead wrong. What happens in the episode is that Tommy (Denis Leary) and his soon-to-be-ex-wife Janet (Andrea Roth) are dividing up their belongings. Janet says or does something that sets Tommy off, and he starts trying to rape her, eventually succeeding. At first she resists, but then she accepts it, and after it is done, she begins to act as if she had just had a (consensual) illict quickie. By the time her current boyfriend – Tommy’s brother Johnny (Dean Winters) – comes back, she acts almost as if she is gloating about a secret affair (like Dian Lane’s character in Unfaithful).

   Yeah, the part where she enjoys being raped? That’s the only part that really matters. Leary’s claims that it wasn’t rape and the fact that the producers shrugged about it matter, too, but the fact that anyone would present a fictional account of a woman enjoying her rape makes them pretty much irredeemable in my eyes, largely for the reason kate presents above. “Edgy, un-pc” misogyny is still misogyny.

10. An unfortunate reminder that the people in charge of deciding net neutrality issues don’t even know the basics of what they’re talking about. Perhaps we should all send Sen. Stevens an internet and give him an idea.

    Damnit, that part was supposed to be quoted up there. Anyway, as far as Stevens knowing what he’s talking about, take a look at his contributors:

    1 News Corp $47,250
    2 Boeing Co $41,900
    3 Verizon Communications $36,550
    4 Veco Corp $31,750
    5 Viacom Inc $23,000
    6 AT&T Inc $22,500
    7 General Electric $20,000
    7 Walt Disney Co $20,000
    9 BAE Systems $19,000
    10 Northrop Grumman $18,000
    11 Cubic Corp $17,250
    12 Mantech International $16,500
    13 Intergraph Corp $15,600
    14 Cassidy & Assoc/Interpublic Group $15,569
    15 General Dynamics $15,000
    15 Lockheed Martin $15,000
    15 Northern Lights PAC $15,000
    15 Teamsters Union $15,000
    19 Science Applications International Corp $14,500
    19 Sprint Nextel $14,500

    He knows how this issue will affect him, and that’s what matters.
    swiped from mefi.

11. Yeah, the part where she enjoys being raped? That’s the only part that really matters.

    As I said, I don’t think that she enjoyed it. I think that she simply went into denial.

    It is stupid fucking TeeVee. Television is entertainment.

    Some people are entertained by watching sugar-coated life. Others want to watch an exploration of the darker side of humanity. Movies are entertainment, too; that does not mean that movies like Silence of the Lambs should not be made.

    For any woman, man or child who has lived through a rape experience, being assaulted without warning while blithely watching the tube is to relive once again the horror, trauma, humiliation and grief.

    I typed some mean things, but deleted them. I’m sure your explanation of the Big Meaning of sitcom television entertainment was well meaning, just horribly misguided.

    If you don’t want to be “assaulted” by a rape scene on a television program, it is probably a good idea not to watch “edgy” programs that feature violent and hate-filled characters. Rescue Me is definitely not a sitcom.

12. Here’s what a friend pointed me toward yesterday, and it alternately incensed and frustrated me so much, I still haven’t blogged about it. It’s too bad Lauren isn’t still writing, I’d love to know herperspective on the piece as a single mother.

13. If you don’t want to be “assaulted” by a rape scene on a television program, it is probably a good idea not to watch “edgy” programs that feature violent and hate-filled characters. Rescue Me is definitely not a sitcom.

    Well, actually I don’t watch tv, for one, I do find much of the material to classist, mysogynist and racist that is mostly meant to appeal to a demographic that does not has nothing to do with women. The other is that I don’t have the time, hell I spend more time than I should reading friggin’ blogs!

    And that I have to pay some company to get that shit piped into that tv really blows my mind.

14. I watched the Rescue Me scene, since one blog I regularly read linked to a CNN broadcast which included the footage. He assaults her, holding her down as she tries to fight him off, and he forcibly has sex with her, ripping her clothing apart in the process. Denis Leary, who is intimately involved in the production of the show, said that it wasn’t rape, and if you think it was rape you shouldn’t watch his show. So if the guy who ACTED OUT the damned scene, who probably discussed the scene with the writers, doesn’t think it was rape, what are we left with to believe about the intent of the scene? That it was intended as a fascinating portrayal of a defense mechanism (denial) in action when assaulted by a spouse, or a guy having “rough sex” with his wife, which of course she likes. I mean, it’s not like those girls go for nice guys anyway. They want a man to take charge! Like Rhett and all that romantic stuff!

    If Leary won’t admit it was a rape scene, can you honestly believe that the intent of the scene was to portray him as an asshole who raped his wife, who then went into denial? Until I see the episode which ends the series with Leary’s character dragged off in handcuffs for spousal rape, I refuse to believe that this scene was anything other than glorification of the idea that women really do want to be raped.

15. He has on many occasions acted abusively towards women, particularly when he thinks he is no longer in control of his life or when he feels they are not kowtowing enough to him.

    This is ridiculous, its almost like a running joke on the show how completely women dominate over Tommy in his relationships. They routinely dominate over him sexually (Mrs. Turbidy) or else beat the living crap out of him (his cousin’s widow’s lover) not to mention how genuinely terrified everyone is of crossing Tommys sister. And the women characters are just as crazy and flawed as the men. Until this, Tommy has never done anything abusive to women.

    That said, the scene taken at face value did horribly eroticize what was essentially a rape. They depicted a character forcing himself on his wife in a bitter-fight-turned-passionate-sex sort of way. Thats not only wrong but probably dangerous as well, but I’m willing to give the writers the benefit of the doubt and assume it was a miscalculation on their part.

    I say that because the show has been anything but misogynistic in the past, there was the whole woman firefighter driven out because of discrimination storyline, Tommy sincerely hoping his daughters would become lesbians because he finds men disgusting, and the often female dominant relationships. I just have a hard to time believing that these same writers turned around and honestly intended to say that rape is good and that women enjoy it.

16. I think this whole Flanagan/Hirshman issue with working/staying home being framed as a situation where there’s a correct “feminist” choice is kind of ridiculous.

    Workplace equality is clearly necessary for women because women shouldn’t need to depend upon a man for financial support. Providing women with an adequate means of self-support frees them from marriage as a necessity for survival.

    The fact that some women may still choose to marry, and may still choose to give up their careers to dedicate more time to children is completely immaterial to the purpose of the object of the movement, which was to prevent coercion into that situation. As long as the choice exists, feminism should be satisfied, and should abstain from judgment on the choice families make with regard to how to handle child care requirements and where the money comes from.

    I don’t see how it is consistent with feminism or liberalism in general to favor an ideological or political intrusion into how anyone chooses to structure their family.

    As to whether child-rearing or the workplace is a worthier or more meaningful existence, that’s also immaterial, and where philosophy and religion have failed to provide a solution to the general concern that existence is meaningless, I doubt feminism will succeed. You get a right to be free, and a right to be equal, but you don’t get a right to be happy. But life ain’t a bowl of cherries for us either, sister.

    As for the Senate telecom chairman who can’t seem to tell a PC from an HPV, don’t worry. It’s not his job to actually write legislation. That’s what industry lobbyists are for.

17. There’s a book that everyone needs to read, from 1985, by David Finkelhor and Kersti Yllo, called “Licencse To Rape: Sexual Abuse of Wives”.

    In it, they interview lots of guys who committed marital rape. These guys simultaneously admit that it was rape, that they did it because they were angry at their wives for being uppity or unhappy with the way they were treated, yet insist that their wives really secretly enjoyed it – this, despite in every case having subsequently been divorced by them, though usually without pressing charges over the rapes. Their evidence? “She could have fought harder.” “I didn’t hit her.” “Women just do.”

    Some of these guys will even admit that what they did was wrong and rape, and that any other woman in that situation should leave – yet still insist that there shouldn’t be marital rape laws, because women (we all being wicked liars) would use them to punish” innocent husbands who hadn’t done anything *really* wrong, just took what they were owed by those witholding bitches. And really they’re all still Nice Guys and gentlmen – not like those nasty Stranger Rapists!

    The combination of privileged mindset and utter denial with little glimmerings of enlightenment explains exactly where this all comes from – and the justifications and the defenses of the “right” to “take” sex, made in 1985, are exactly the same ones made in 1970s testimony I’ve read when anti-marital rape laws were first being argued for.

18. First of all, Sam, Tommy beat the crap out of his cousin-in-law/lover – remember, in the kitchen? Tommy is a HUGE misongynist and the fact that some women scare him or get over on him is a clear result of that misoginy.

    I watch Rescue Me all the time, and I agree to take that scene out of context and pretend it is something different is crazy.

    The whole argument about whether or not it was rape – I think it is interesting that no one here commented about the way his wife baited him, over and over again, making fun of him and emasculating him verbally all the way up to and during the rape itself.

    The reason they are estranged in the first place is over the death of their son – she blames him even though she knows it’s unfair.

    I saw the baiting as her way of forcing Tommy into doing something – anything, that would force him to show passion towards her, rather than the guilty passive-acceptance he was showing otherwise. That has been their whole sick dynamic from the beginning of the show.

    Im not saying that her baiting him is any excuse for him raping her, but I can certainly see how many people would come to the conclusion that it was mutual, albeit sick, sex.

    His wife in denial? I think she knew exactly what she was doing. (No, i dont mean she “deserved” to get raped, but I do think it was her intention to goad him into that or a similar act). She is as sick and messed-up as he is and the scene and their reactions to it were completely in character.

    I do think it very sad that one of the few rapes in a drama was this particular one – one that is not typical. Having it reminded me of doing a storyline about an abusive wife – while it happens, it happens less often and you rarely see the “normal” kind of domestic violence portrayed.

19. Sam: This is ridiculous, its almost like a running joke on the show how completely women dominate over Tommy in his relationships. They routinely dominate over him sexually (Mrs. Turbidy) or else beat the living crap out of him (his cousin’s widow’s lover)

    The Girl> First of all, Sam, Tommy beat the crap out of his cousin-in-law/lover – remember, in the kitchen?

    As I recall, that was part of why she left and took thbe lesbian lover who “beat the living crap out of him.”

20. The fact that some women may still choose to marry, and may still choose to give up their careers to dedicate more time to children is completely immaterial to the purpose of the object of the movement, which was to prevent coercion into that situation. As long as the choice exists, feminism should be satisfied, and should abstain from judgment on the choice families make with regard to how to handle child care requirements and where the money comes from.

    Very well said. Choices and the ability of women to make them form the crux of the ‘liberation’ movement for women, hence the term liberation.

    Frankly, I see this ‘argument’ as a refusal by many to look at the real issues facing women and families today that need our pressing attention.

    Why must women still obtain as much as a master’s degree to earn a family supportive wage while men can easily get into training or trade school and in two or three years make a near or at middle class living?

    Why is quality childcare still far out of reach for most low income people?

    Why, although training programs and financial assistance abound, so many women still opt for low paying positions and accept poverty and/or destructive marital situations?

    Why is feminism still a largely white middle class construct and what can be done to penetrate barrier?

    Those are the questions that feminsts need to asking and taking action on, I think.

21. As I recall, that was part of why she left and took thbe lesbian lover who “beat the living crap out of him.”

    Actually he left her because she lied about the whole miscarriage thing and she tried to make him jealous with the other woman.

    First of all, Sam, Tommy beat the crap out of his cousin-in-law/lover – remember, in the kitchen?

    Yes he is prone to acting extremely violent when men or women upset him enough (Sheila had lied about miscarrying their baby I can’t quite remember but didn’t he shove her around violently?), like when he beat his brother half to death ( why doesn’t that make him a huge misandrist?). That is not what i was disputing, I was disputing the claim that Tommy abuses any woman that doesn’t “kowtow” to him enough, which is ridiculous. Like I said, Mrs. Turbidy ordered him around and reduced him to a stuttering fool and Sheila’s lover hit him in the face repeatedly at which point he begged her to do it some more and then fell to the ground crying, and generally in every other relationship he’s been in, the women were either dominant or equal to him in every way.

    Tommy is a HUGE misongynist and the fact that some women scare him or get over on him is a clear result of that misoginy.

    EVERYONE is scared of Tommy’s sister because she is actually insane and unpredictable. I just don’t see how a guy who thinks women should be lesbians because men are disgusting could be considered a huge misogynist. Lets keep in mind as well that Tommy is not SUPPOSED to be the antichrist as some people seem to suggest, he’s supposed to be a tremendously flawed jerk of a tragic hero.

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