Saturday, November 14, 2009

try to get a visual

I am lying on a couch in a completely darkened room trying not to move too much because my head is killing me.

But I am also bored. I am bored of the the nausea and eye watering and teeth clenching,

So I am playing on the lap top and reading the internets.

And trying not to vomit.

But the lappy screen is so bright.

So I am lying on a couch in the dark with a laptop on my chest and my gradient sunglasses on my face upside down because they are darker that way and add less pressure on my temples and the kid is making me chicken soup so that either I am less nauseous or if I do throw up it wont be dry heaves.

And this all seems quite ridiculous to me

There has to be a better term

Third world nation doesn't cut it.Neither does developing or less developed,because the countries we use that label for have all had their natural resources developed right into the pockets of rich countries and companies.

Of course any term that aptly described those countries would not be very complimentary to us in the first or developed world.

Terms used now are more than a bit similar to the way we talk about rape, actually. First we talk around the acts of plunder and we never mention a perpetrator. When we talk about a woman being raped it's as if she was walking along and tripped and fell on an invisible, nameless, faceless thing called "rapist". When we talk about poor countries it's as if they are resource-free deserts and never acknowledge that their resources are stolen by the nameless, faceless thing called "capitalism".

I read once that the terms explorers used for newly discovered (by white people) lands were all feminine. "The lush, virgin forests need to be opened up for exploration" is the erotica of colonialism.

You can't fix a thing till you can properly name it. Rape doesn't end when we call it a "sex act", so what do we call this looting of poor countries?

What Could We Do If We Were Whole

Wonder and I were having a chat the other day about panic attacks.

Wonder: Does every woman our age have some kind of anxiety issue?

Me: (Runs through list of every single woman I know) YES.

First- don't gimme that shit that depression, anxiety, psychological problems et.all
are new ways of drug companies making money. What was previously called hysteria was more likely than not the point where a woman just got so fucking fed up with the shit sandwiches that she blew her lid.

Second- Imagine how much more time and energy we would have if we didn't have to spend so much time and energy trying to heal wounds created and constantly reopened by others? Wonder is so fuckingsciencebrainysmart she could have cured cancer by now. No shit.

And I'm so fucking entrenched in the shit sandwich miasma that I don't even know what I'd do. Be an architect I guess. I've been doodling houseplans since I was a little kid. It's what I use as an escape (in place of being a WoW geek like some people we know cough*ouyangdan*cough).I'm trying to convince the family to run away to New Mexico and start and artist commune mostly so I can be the one to design the cabins (from recycled shipping containers with solar power).

I also sometimes threaten to run away to any tropical island where I could make a living selling hand painted coconut shells on the beach, but since I am in a tropical climate right now and am giddy for temperatures that drop below 70, that might not be a workable plan.

And I also sometimes dream of making soup. I don't wanna run a restaurant, I don't wanna cater fancy parties. I wanna make vats of soup and then sell them to a restaurant or fancy caterer or a deli.

So peeps- if the kyriarchy ended tomorrow and all those stupid wounds finally heeled- what else would you like to do with your time and energy?

5 things the Dems needto do ASAP to redeem themselves

1)End DADT and DOMA AND because you've been so douchey allow gays and lesbians all the same federal benefits that straight marrieds get and the gays may come back.

2)Strip the Pitts-Stupak amendment out of health care reform AND because you've been so douchey repeal they Hyde amendment and you may get women back.

3) Enact real health care reform including Medicare for all and reforms to drug pricing and you may get your liberal label back.

4) Enact real regulation of the financial industry including a temporary moratorium on foreclosures and maybe we'll get a functional economy back.

5)Throw money at the problem - JOBS JOBS JOBS. I don't care how. Pay people to stand on their heads and entertain on street corners. It doesn't matter what kind of jobs, but we need them now.

(And for good measure you could strip all anti-choice, blue dog, Joe Liebermans of all committee memberships until they remember what fucking ticket got them elected in the first place)

Sincerely,

An Entire Group of Fucking People Who Should Have Been Reading This Blog During The Primaries But Were Overcome With Hopium Instead*. Oh and RQ.

(*I figure it's nicer just to sign for them rather than do the I Told You So dance)

At what point do we qualify as a third world nation

My friend Ms.J sent me this link and I thought it was too important to just throw in the reader.

UN investigator accuses US of shameful neglect of the homeless.


In my old, super blue, super "progressive" hometown, tent cities have been renamed "Nicholsvilles" after the mayor. There are trailers parked under interstates where homeless people live because it's one of the few places the police won't harass them. The Kid and I are just lucky we have family who could take us in. We don't have a tent or a trailer.

My aunt told me today that she heard half the school aged kids in Las Vegas are homeless because of the housing crisis.

And how many people still can't return to New Orleans after Katrina?

What does it take to wake people up, cause 8 years of Bush didn't do it and Obama seems to be just as thoughtless when it comes to the massive fucktastrophy. Do the homeless have to start pitching their tents on suburban lawns? Or better yet, right in front of the White House?

Would it even matter? I've already been proven right that Obama doesn't care about women, or real health care reform, or anybody who makes less than 100k a year. Would shoving this problem in the face of the Democratic party do anything when the Dems are so busy trying to prove their actually Republicans.

Seriously, cause I'm mad as hell but self-immolation in front of FDR's memorial on live tv seems to be the only way we might get some actual results.



This is the memorial. The sign reads "They (who) seek to establish systems of government based on the regimentation of all human beings by a handful of individual rulers......call this a new order. It is not new and it is not order."

Friday, November 13, 2009

Je suis le président du Burundi

This made me laugh so hard I almost peed myself.



(You all know that the only phrases I can actually say in French are Je suis Americaine and Do you speak English - which I don't know how to write in French)

You know that whole "we got out of the Great Depression because of war thing"

Yeah, not so much

And continuing on in Afghanistan and Iraq in hopes of creating more jobs at home isn't such a good idea either.

Better get moving on that new "green" economy Mr. President, or my prediction that you are the second coming of Hoover will make people flock to me like I'm the second coming of Nostradamus.

H/t to Corrente

Thursday, November 12, 2009

The Quick and Simple Guide to Terrorism

There's a bunch of whinging from rethuglikans that the Ft. Hood shooting is an act of terrorism because it was perpetrated by a Muslim.

Now I know it's asking a lot for rethuglikans to use proper definitions and all,but this is an important one.

Since I've already gone over the dictionary use of the word let's get into the legal definitions.

For judicial purposes you need a perpetrator or actor, a victim, and a motive.

There are specific conditions that must be met for all three things if something is to be considered terrorism.

1) The perpetrator(s)must not be acting on behalf of a government. People who commit crimes on behalf of a government are committing acts of either espionage or war, not terrorism. Perpetrators of terrorism are generally part of a non governmental organization of some sort, though that organization can be of just one person if other conditions are right.

2) Terrorism is an act or threat of violence against civilians. You can even stretch that as far as non-combatant government employees (see Oklahoma City) but a military base does not count as non combatant.

3) The motive MUST be designed to cause or instill fear for political gain. This is vital. Without this it really is just the act of a mad man. Scott Roeder, murderer of Dr. Tiller IS a terrorist because his goal was to terrify other doctors so that they would not perform abortions. That is terrorism.

John Allen Mohammed, the DC sniper who was recently executed, was not a terrorist. His ultimate goal was to kill his ex wife, though he made it look like a terrorist act so as to hide his tracks.

We don't yet know what the Ft. Hood shooter's motive was, but the Army doesn't think it was terrorism. Being that we know he fails the test on elements 1 and 2 (he was not a non-governmental actor and he was not firing on non-combatants) his actions, though horrible, were not an act of terrorism.

That's all people. Terrorism in a nutshell.

It's tea, you fucking dipshit

So I was reading this post at Jezebel and was reminded of a "fun" moment during my pregnancy with the kid.

It was labor day, I was maybe 4 months pregnant. Our entire apartment building got together and had a huge party on the roof.

I was wandering around, mingling with peeps, when condescending neighbor girl walks up to me and starts screaming at me and trying to grab the glass of dark brown liquid out of my hand. Seriously, like I was wielding a knife or something.

She was screaming "You're pregnant, you can't fucking drink, blah blah blah."

At which point I gave her the classic raised eyebrow of doom and said "It's tea you fucking dipshit" and finished the glass.

Now for all this person's concern over the life of my future child, she never once told Kid's dad to stop drinking. He got piss faced, stupid-assed drunk and decided to jump off the roof that night. Ended up with a seriously sprained ankle. No one (besides me) said that getting high in the hospital parking lot might not be the best thing when your girlfriend is about to be wheeled into the operating room for a C-section. No one (but me) told him that driving your new baby home from the hospital should not be done while high as a fucking kite.

But I'm a girl, so throwing public hissy fits because I might not be performing the acts of sainthood required of parents mothers is ok. He's a boy, no sainthood required to be a dad.

Big toe update

For all the swelling, color changing, pain it caused me last night, the toe is in miraculously good shape.

It's just a slightly bruised tone nail after all. Hurray.

Especially since Ouyang Dan was threatening me with stories of drilling holes in toenails with needles or nails or something sharp and non-bendy.

I feel like I've writen this post before.........

Someone at Shakesville (not Liss- and I can't remember which post and I've got literally thousands of things in my reader that I've been catching up on) made an offhand comment in a post about abortion (I think) that overpopulation is what is killing the environment.

Can we please, pretty please, put an end to this racist fucking bit of trollop.

Whenever I hear some over-educated white person bitch about overpopulation, I see white robes and cone hats. They mean too many brown women in poor countries having too many babies.

Truth is, those brown babies use only a fraction of the resources over-educated white people do. A tiny, environmentally sustainable fraction.

The environment is not in trouble because brown women in other countries have babies. It's in trouble because latte drinking, car driving, plane flying white people need an exponentially increasing amount of stuff that is grown, produced and delivered in an oil based economy.

And oil is running out. But those over-educated white folks don't need to worry too long about how many brown babies are alive in the world. Those brown babies are going to be the first famine victims when the price for oil goes so high that coffee drinking becomes a luxury, and land previously used to grow staple crops for poor brown people gets turned into bio fuel instead so that coffee can still be delivered to white folks in developed countries.

It's not the brown babies people, it's the oil. Oil. Oil. Oil.

Happy Veterans Day

I don't know if happy is really the word for it. But thanks Vets. I may totally disagree with the men who give you orders, but that doesn't mean I don't appreciate the work you do.

And since it is your job to follow orders, it is our job as citizens to make sure you're not given senseless orders. We haven't been very good at that for the last decade or so, and I apologize.


Since I've never been one for patriotic chest thumping here's a few songs about the military that I do like.

The Decemberists- 16 Military Wives



Moxy Fruvous- The Gulf War Song (originally written for Desert Storm and Bush I)

I'll Wait

To Bill Clinton and all pass it now, fix it later Democrats.

I dropped a large, heavy, wooden umbrella stand on my big toe today. I'm limping, in massive amounts of pain. The toe is turning colors and at the very least I am going to lose a toe nail.

I have no health insurance, and can't possibly afford care in an emergency room.

I also have an as yet undiagnosed (at least by doctors) chronic pain disease. I have the arthritic hands of an 80 year old woman and I grimace at the idea of grasping things. Some days, every single step I take feels like the ligaments and tendons in feet are going to snap. My shoulders, back, neck, hips and legs always hurt and I've gotten used to it, but the hands and feet bring me to tears.

I could be helped with a medical diagnosis and pain meds. Until then I take fistfuls of Advil every day.

I am absolutely the person you are all talking about when you say we have to pass this healthcare bill, flaws and all,now now now or it won't happen.

But I'll wait. I may be in pain. I may end up with a gangrenous toe. But I can suck it up and wait and will gladly do it if it means not selling out women to forced pregnancy fuckwits. And I will gladly wait for real universal "universal health care" not this milquetoast compromise with insurance and drug companies.

I'll wait, but not forever, just until the next election rolls around. Pass real healthcare for all men AND women. Stop fucking around with compromises to shit heads who shouldn't have any say in this fight.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

The Myth of Female Privilege And Biological Determinism

Because I must be some kind of glutton, I followed a sitemeter hit back to this post about George Sondini and the misogyny of MRAs.


And then (I blame insomnia) I read the comments. Ampersand has a much higher tolerance for the verbose and inaccurate ramblings of misogynists than I do. What keeps coming up is the idea that feminists don't acknowledge "female privilege" and that differences between men and women are because of biology and not culture.

1st let's talk biology.

Yes, women have babies and produce milk for babies. Men can't do that. That sucks and is unfair. But as a feminist I gladly support any medical or technical innovation that makes it so that men who want to be pregnant and nurse babies can. Hell,I'd even offer up my own overly fertile uterus and ovaries as a donation, though I'd prefer if they went to a transwoman or a gay man. I also support any and all advances that make it easier for both women and men who DON'T want to have babies. Bring on the male pill.

That's it. That's all there is to the biology thing. Sure, men and women get different diseases, or the same diseases elicit different symptoms in men and women. There's no privilege there. Where there is privilege is in the different ways medical society treats disease based on gender. But that is not biological, that's cultural.

All other supposed biological truths are really just cultural. The men are stronger meme relies entirely on a a very specific and narrow idea of strength lying in large muscle mass and ability to cause harm. Again, those are cultural applications to biology, not scientific truths like gravity.

And the truth is, along a spectrum, there is more biological difference between women alone or men alone than there is between men and women combined.

(*please note that yes, this portion doesn't mention a thing about issues of transness or gender queerdom. It is not meant to exclude either from the argument. I believe that like sexuality, gender is a spectrum. Some people are hardwired, regardless of genitalia, at one end of the spectrum or the other, and some people fall more in the middle.)

So culture is the thing that tells us little girls like pink and little boys like blue. I know this is a fact, because it wasn't that long ago (100 years maybe) that pink was a boy color and blue was a girl color. I know that not all women want to be nurturing caregivers and not all men want to be brave soldiers.

I also know that violence in men is a trait specifically created by the patriarchy to continue the patriarchy, and not an inherent masculine trait.


Think about that for a minute. Feminists, by acknowledging that, give men more credit than they give themselves. We allow for the idea that they can be better men and better humans than they are allowed to be now. But we're the man haters. Go figure.

But what about that female privilege thing.

From what I can gather, MRAs think women have privilege over men because

1) We don't have to pay on dates
2) We don't have to open doors for people
3) We aren't eligible for the draft or required to sign up for the Selective Service
4) We can choose to have sex anytime (except when we can't choose- that's rape) without having to pay for it.
5) We are(sometimes) believed on domestic violence claims

I will gladly pay my own way on all future dates (and most of my past ones) in exchange for never being street harassed again. Really, if the cost of not fucking up my entire day and being able to go about my business in public without the ever present fear of creepy dudes is buying my own coffee or dinner, then I'm all in.

I already hold open doors for other people, but we can make a gender neutral door opening law if we can also make equal pay for equal work a reality and not a catchy phrase.

On this, I am reminded of a line from my favorite Jane Austen novel, Persuassion, "The only privilege I can claim for my sex, and you needen't envy it," is of not being eligible for the Selective Service. I'm pretty sure there are lots of female soldiers and sailors and pilots who wish the combat restrictions were gone.I don't think anyone should have to sign up with the Selective Service, male or female.

We have more options for having sex, but only if we are willing to fuck any guy. It's not like Tahmoh Penikett is going to walk through my door wearing nothing but a smile. If I was interested in good old boy southern rednecks, I'd be golden. But I'm not.

And there is one thing that women have to fear when it comes to sex way more than men do. We fear you and the harm you can do when you don't believe in enthusiastic consent. So we may seem our to be rolling is dick and ignoring it, but mostly we are worried that our drinks may get roofied or our "No" will be ignored.

The solution to that is feminism though. Then everybody gets to choose more sex (or no sex or some sex- it's about choice)and no body has to fear rape. What MRAs see as privilege is just self preservation.


And domestic violence, sometimes women get believed by cops and judges. But really, it's only sometimes. It's no so much a privilege when you consider the rates of victims of other crimes being believed, like say murder or robbery. We domestic violence survivors actually score pretty low on that. So do rape victims.

That doesn't mean that women have no privilege. As a white women I have more privilege than a black woman. I don't ever even have to consciously act on the privilege. It's always there, whether I want it or not. But just because I don't act on it consciously doesn't mean I don't benefit from it.I knew in my old neighborhood that if someone needed to call the police in my apartment complex, it should be me as the nice white lady because I was going to get faster and fairer service from the police than my black neighbors. Same thing is true for men, just because you don't rape women doesn't mean that you don't benefit from the silencing fear it creates.

Happy Birthday Sesame Street

Sesame Street was originally designed as a way to give kids who couldn't go to preschool the same kind of counting and reading lessons so that they wouldn't fall behind in kindergarten. The original target was poor inner city kids, but now it reaches all over the world teaching kids their abcs and tolerance and kindness.

Just to show how very affecting this little experiment was, I don't know a single person my age who wouldn't finish the line if I started singing "1,2,3,4,5"



And I still joke when I'm making a grocery list "a loaf of bread, a container of milk, and a stick of butter"



May Sesame Street have another 40 years of of being one of the best damn things America has ever exported.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

I'll make the forced birthers a deal

How about this, we make all abortions illegal except for rape and health of the mother if all non-custodial parents who are even a week late with a child support payment get shipped off to work camps where their earnings are sent straight to the children they neglected.

What? Is the idea of forced labor of mostly men types in order to make them care for their children too much for you? Do you think it's a violation of their civil rights?

How is my proposal any different from forcing women to be incubators?

It even passes the forced-birther personal responsibility test, though in this case it's more pants up than legs closed.

Think of it this way, 70 percent of noncustodial parents would now be working on chain gangs, maybe more, but all the baybeezzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz that would be saved would also have a guaranteed income.

What? Still squeamish about controlling a man's body because he was stupid enough to have sex?

Then STFU about controlling women's bodies you sanctimonious fuckwads.

Someday

I will learn to read posts before I hit the publish button and edit out the typos.

Someday

I will find a cure for insomnia and my family will no longer be able to joke that I am a vampire.

Someday

I'll find a job where I am neither stuck in a pink collar ghetto or forced to constantly prove myself as better than to be equal.

What will you do someday?

The Kyriarchy of Blogging

OuyangDan shared this post with me and I thought it was a perfect example of how to climb the kyriarchy pyramid on the backs of people you are supposed to "belong" to.

Now I haven't read Amanda Marcotte or the pink obamabot ghetto that is Pandagon since the racist book cover shit. See Marcotte got a feminist book published- oh ahhhh money and legitimacy for writing about one's beliefs (the blogger's dream peeps- all us bloggers have it) but she didn't get it without stepping on a few people. Namely, blacks. And once you start down that road of selling out to get ahead, it's easy as pie to keep going. Next came all us girls who called Obama out on his sexism, now it's poor sex workers (under the guise of wanting to help them- but remember agency folks- if you're trying to help by giving someone less choice then you are taking away their agency).

But Marcotte is not the only blogger who has used the backs of lessers as stepping stones to elitism. There's Markos Moulitas- go to fauxgressive for the opinion bunnies on MSNBC and head of the Big Orange Cheetoh. Kos is famous for his comments deriding the "women's studies set" as well as banning anyone from Kos who wrote critically about Obama's sexism, racism, classism, corporatism during the campaign, or who wrote enthusiastically about HRC.

And I assume you all know about the shithole that Feministing has become, a beacon of transhate and classism and abelism. Abelist Courtney is now one of the finalists to become a paid blogger for the Washington Post. Congratulations on using the broken backs of women to climb on.

Then there are the token gays- John Arovosis and Dan Savage. Both hate women, but Dan kicks it up a notch by throwing in some abelism, racism, fat hate.

These are some of your A list progressive bloggers folks, and I don't see a progressive in the bunch.

And while I love Kate Harding and think she's brill, there are more than a few fat folks with disabilities who feel stepped on by her promotion HAES (health at every size) and healthy fatties vs fatties with health problems dichotomy.

Now let's contrast that with two big, truly progressive blogs and their leaders, Shakesville and Melissa McKewan and Corrente and Lambert Strether. Neither allows their blogs to use the people on the bottom of the pyramid as stepping stones. Consequently, both have to run regular donation blegs (as do I, though my readership is much smaller). Neither have book deals or tv appearances.

That is your blogging kyriarchy at work. You can't get to the top unless you're willing to step on someone else.

For OD



She knows why.

Monday, November 09, 2009

Dear Mrs.Stupak:

(and all other political wives)

Your husband(s) has done a horrible thing for every woman in this country, regardless of political or religious views. Insurance coverage for abortion of any kind will now be non-existent in this country.

Perhaps you share your husband's views on abortion. Perhaps you think that the women who need abortions should be punished by having to pay for them out of pocket.

But I think about a dear friend who recently had an ectopic pregnancy treated with an abortion before the pregnancy either killed her or permanently ended her fertility. I think of a family member who, terminally ill and believing she was infertile, could either have an abortion asap, or both she and the baby would die. I think about myself, and how lucky both I and my son are that my old home state paid for abortions for poor women. Our lives, though hard and terrible as the are, would be exponentially worse if our little family of 2 was increased.

It is poor women and women with disabilities or traumatic pregnancies that will suffer the most under your husband's amendment. It is women who cannot pay out of pocket for medical care who will find the idea of choice is just that for them, an idea but not a reality. Their reality, our reality, my reality is one of poverty, injury or death.

So I am asking you, as a woman, as a human being, as the person probably called "your husband's better half" more times than you can count, for help.

We need you to stand up and tell your husband that women's health care needs should not be a bartering chip in the political realm.

And if you really want to get creative about it, I would suggest a bit of a Lysistrata moment. If women cannot get insurance coverage for unplanned pregnancies, perhaps you should make sure there is no opportunity for an unplanned pregnancy in your own household by refusing to perform acts that lead to pregnancy. It is, after all, the only option that 90% of women in this country will be left with if this amendment is part of the final bill.

Sincerely,
RQ

You all remember?

During the campaign when the koolaide drinkers were yelling at us dumb girls because Obama was sooooooooooooooooo much better than the rethuglikans on reproductive rights?

You remember being told that we were just voting with our vaginas during the primaries, and then having those vaginas held hostage during the election- vote for Obama or your rights will be gone forever.

Yeah, who would have thunk that when push came to shove it would be the dems throwing women under the bus?

Oh wait- we thought that.

Everyday I am given further proof that my vote for Cynthia McKinney was the right one. I still hope to be proven wrong. I'd rather wallow in equal rights and social progress than revel in righteous foresight.

And yes- this is Obama's mess. He is the head of the country and more importantly (at least for this) the head of the party.

RQ Cooks- White trash tamale pie

Like many poor peeps, I have been known to make what I fondly call white trash pie, though you all may know it by the name on the side of the Bisquick box- impossible cheeseburger pie. At my old place I used to have to save a piece for my neighbor Karen every time I made it (I didn't exactly follow the recipe of the box, I never do). In return she brought me chicken every time she barbecued.

Well we had a mess o' leftover ground beef and some veggies needing to be used. But we wanted something a wee bit different from the old Bisquick version and were way too lazy to make tacos.

Enter Jiffy corn bread mix.

Preheat the oven to 400

In a large (biggest you've got) cast iron skillet, brown some ground beef.

Season the fuck out of it. Garlic salt, red pepper flakes, chili powder, a little cumin, some black pepper.

While the beef is browning, chop an onion or two, a bell pepper or two, a jalapeno if you've got it and that's your thing. Cook till onions are translucent. Remove from heat.

At this point I added one diced tomato that was on its way out and some fresh corn sliced off the cob. You could also add olives or a can of green chilies.

Then cheese- lots of yummy shredded cheese. We used sharp cheddar, but I'm sure a jack cheese would be fine.

Use 2 boxes of jiffy corn muffin mix and make according to the directions. Let it sit in the bowl for a minute or two to get its puffiness going.

Spread corn muffin batter over beef mixture and sprinkle with more yummy cheese.

Bake until the muffin crust is cooked and golden brown (not just the cheese being brown).

Let sit for a few minutes then dig in.

Sunday, November 08, 2009

The seeds of a revolution

Or the rough ideas of a manifesto........

While I was in the land of no internet I was thinking about the kyriarchy and trying to create a visual model of it. I drew things that looked liked Wallerstein's World Systems theory and things that looked like funny spider webs and after about half a day I realized it's a pyramid with certain conditions pushing you to the bottom of the pyramid and certain conditions lifting you up the pyramid. But we are all stones in the pyramid, so every every time you move up it's on someone else's back.

Then we got the internet back and I could look up the actual definition of kyriarchy. At least my half a days labor of chicken scratch drawings wasn't in vain.

In the process I realized something. Poverty is not an oppression like sexism or racism, it's the goal of oppression.

Think of it this way- oppression is the means, control of access to resources is the ends. That's why things like having a disability, being a woman, being a single mother, being a POC, not having the ability to marry (for both lesbians and gays and black women who have fewer men to pick from and an (unfair)image of being difficult) all lead to higher rates of poverty.

The labeling, categorizing, othering, is the means of deciding who gets fewer resources.

So if you are looking at the kyriarchy pyramid, it is sectioned off by economic class. The poor make up the base- it's broad and diverse but not very tall, a thin wide band at the bottom. It's kept as diverse as possible so that the people at the bottom can't come together and change the system. The middle is not as broad but much taller and much more homogeneous. For example, you could be a disabled women in the middle class as long as you are married to a TAB white cis man. You have to have fewer points of oppression and more points of privilege to be in the middle. And the middle has multiple layers, the upper middles who act like elites, the middle middles and those middles who are on the verge of poverty (one injury and crappy insurance away from bankruptcy and poverty). With our current economic downturn and healthcare system, the bottom middle is gaining members. So is the poverty class.

Then there's the top- the elites. The most homogeneous group of of them all. For the most part, the only people with any oppression points who get to this level are ones that are willing to forcefully continue the kyriarchy. (See our corporatist, women hating, anti-gay, classist president for example, or Michelle Bachman/Ann Coulter and even not so women or poor people friendly Arriana Huffington). We have a word for that cough*token*cough.

So with a little math and some basic demographics you can tell what class someone is likely to be in. What's really important to remember is that most (though not all) characteristics are going to be things people have no control over, like race, gender, financial status of their parents, and health, and the things that people do have some control over like number of children or married status or access to education are the ones that we fight about all the time (abortion, birth control, gay marriage, private school funding, college grants).

What we should want from our little revolution is to neutralize the conditions, both positive and negative, that lead to poverty and elitism. Being a het cis tab white dude with wealthy parents and a good education should not make one automatically qualified for elite status. Nor should being a single mother of color make you more qualified for poor status.

Okay so that explains our current system. How do topple something as long lasting as a pyramid? And what do we replace it with?

First- a pyramid is held up by it's base, that's us. How do we throw off the upper stones on our backs? There are the standard methods of revolt-violence and martyrdom. But those tools of revolution have only lead to a rotating of the elites and not a complete change of the system in the past.

Instead I like the idea of organization, work stoppages, "liberation" of resources, squatting, etc. We take what we need and refuse to give back to the system unless we are properly compensated for our labor. (If anyone can tell me how to set up pirate internet service- I will give you a big lip smacky kiss). I'm not saying that we should all be shoplifting from Whole Foods (wink wink) but it's not a bad start. I'm not saying that we should be publishing the names of rapists (yes- rape is one of the tools the kyriarchy uses to keep women in place)or dead beat dads, or ableist/racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic businesses but I think I'd probably throw a name or 10 on that list.

What to replace the system with is trickier. We've lived in a hierarchical system for so long, and attempts at replacing it have failed miserably (communism)that even I have a hard time seeing what a new system would look like.

But baby steps, peeps. Baby steps.

2nd class health care for 2nd class citizens

Hey ladies, wanna hear something crappy?

Democrats (you know the party that is made up of 60% women) couldn't get a health care bill through the House unless vagina americans got thrown under the bus.

Oh ladies, it's not that the men in blue suits hate your lady bits, they just don't want you to use your lady bits in any way that they find icky.

Now if we had a decent supreme court then it could easily be argued that disallowing certain medical practices that only ladies need is a form of discrimination, but we have a supreme court full of scaredy boys who think teh girls are teh icky.

Okay- I'm done with the infantlizing.

We pay for plenty of things we don't like with our taxes, things like bailouts for banksters, wars for oil, extraordinary rendition.

You may not like abortion, you may never want or need to have one yourself. I hate banksters and war and torture and would never sign up for any of them. But my dislike doesn't mean I get to ban all poor kids from military recruiting offices.



The biggest restriction on abortion access in a generation, brought to you by the democrats.

Don't you all love our 2 party system?