Defending Amina

Proof once again that ya gotta be careful with the whole Rights Thing - if some folks get the rights they're entitled to, before ya know it they're all gonna want 'em.

So anyway, in the last several months, we've seen the story about a kid in Afghanistan speaking up in favor of education for women and being nearly shot to pieces for her trouble; then we got the one a few weeks ago about the Islamo-Fundies coming down on a young woman who dared go against her father's choice of a suitable husband or some such nonsense; and now there's this about a young woman somewhere in Tunisia who really just wants the Theocrats to leave her the fuck alone already.

19 year old Tunisian Amina who posted a topless photo of herself bearing the slogan “my body belongs to me, and is not the source of anyone’s honour” has been threatened with death.

Islamist cleric Adel Almi, president of Al-Jamia Al-Li-Wassatia Tawia Wal-Islah, has called for Amina’s flogging and stoning to death saying Amina’s actions will bring misfortune by causing “epidemics and disasters” and “could be contagious and give ideas to other women…”

We, the undersigned, unequivocally defend Amina, and demand that her life and liberty be protected and that those who have threatened her be immediately prosecuted.

On 4 April 2013, we call for an International Day to Defend Amina.

As a well-conditioned American consumer, I readily admit to hearing a bell whenever  somebody runs a little T & A at me; and to being kinda transfixed by the the visual prospects of an actually-naked real-life non-PhotoShopped female human.  So on that one (very important) level I'm like 'Yeah - OK - throw me some jiggle, and I'll follow you anywhere'.

But this isn't about the usual crapola of small-head-thinking or forbidden fruit or any of the standard moralistic bullshit.  It's also not about American First World Feminism bitching about self-loathing and self-objectification; and it's not about showering pity on some poor soul - "oh look at how she has to degrade herself just to make a point; isn't that awful?"  It's not about anything but having the guts to stand up for yourself.

It's about "by any means necessary".

People will be free; they'll do it for themselves when they're ready; and it's best for all of us if we try a little harder just to stay the fuck outa their way.

Today's Movie

A morality tale, and a peek at the need for bread and circus as an empire begins to collapse.



If you watch this movie, you'll need something sunny and happy and cuddly afterwards - you've been warned.

The Esteemed Mr Pierce

From Charlie Pierce at Esquire:

The problem, of course, remains that the president is dealing with a Republican party in which Johnny Isakson is now a "moderate." That is his problem. Our problem is that the conversation over dinner is almost guaranteed to center completely on the proposition, "How much pain ahould we inflict on people who are not us?" The fact that the American economy has almost completely surrendered to corporate oligarchy is not likely to come up.

Every time I think about what's happening - especially what's going on in this "new economy" - I can't help but remember the observational acuity of Yakov Smirnoff: "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us."

Music

And though you try to justify the meaning
Of the note you sent this evening
To my door you're not deceiving me

Well, I'd have thought that you'd have known much better
Sending 'round an unsigned letter
Facing me would be much better now

Is it just that you can't face the future with me
Can't you tell me to my face?
You just took the coward's way to say goodbye
How would you feel here in my place?

And now I know my love is lost on you
And nothing you can say or do
Will turn my head around the other way

I'd have thought you'd have the decency
To come and tell the truth to me
Instead of telling lies your eyes betray

Is it just that you can't face the future with me
Can't you tell me to my face?
You just took the coward's way to say goodbye
How would you feel here in my place?

Tell me to my face you're leaving now
Tell me to my face that you're leaving now

And though you try to justify the meaning
Of the note you sent this evening
To my door
you're not deceiving me

Well, I'd have thought that you'd have known much better
Sending 'round an unsigned letter
Facing me would be much better now

Is it just that you can't face the future with me
Can't you tell me to my face?
You just took the coward's way to say goodbye
How would you feel here in my place?

Tell me to my face you're leaving now
Tell me to my face that you're leaving now

Connections

Like the man said - follow the money.  Wall Street, Capitol Street, K Street, Main Street - they're all connected by rivers of money.  If you have enough money, you can buy your way into or out of just about anything.

From Addicting Info:

Fact is, the food industry is only as safe as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lets it be. It was not that long ago that food companies were found to be doing such things as adding sawdust to bread. Food fraud is rampant, with companies willing to do anything to make a buck. And with the continuing effort to eliminate the powers of the FDA in the name of profits, it is clear that the “free market,” as coined by Milton Friedman, does not work, period.

I'll quibble just a bit with "free market...doesn't work, period".  If the free market is hollowing out the middle class and making it more and more difficult for more and more people to make the end of the month match up with the end of the money, then The Free Market is actually working pretty much as designed.

Making just a slight turn in the road - from Business Insider:

In its early days, the National Rifle Association was a grassroots social club that prided itself on independence from corporate influence.
While that is still part of the organization's core function, today less than half of the NRA's revenues come from program fees and membership dues.
The bulk of the group's money now comes in the form of contributions, grants, royalty income, and advertising, much of it originating from gun industry sources.

Since 2005, the gun industry and its corporate allies have given between $20 million and $52.6 million to it through the NRA Ring of Freedom sponsor program. Donors include firearm companies like Midway USA, Springfield Armory Inc, Pierce Bullet Seal Target Systems, and Beretta USA Corporation. Other supporters from the gun industry include Cabala's, Sturm Rugar & Co, and Smith & Wesson.

The NRA also made $20.9 million — about 10 percent of its revenue — from selling advertising to industry companies marketing products in its many publications in 2010, according to the IRS Form 990.

Additionally, some companies donate portions of sales directly to the NRA. Crimson Trace, which makes laser sights, donates 10 percent of each sale to the NRA. Taurus buys an NRA membership for everyone who buys one of their guns. Sturm Rugar gives $1 to the NRA for each gun sold, which amounts to millions. The NRA's revenues are intrinsically linked to the success of the gun business.

Guns, Oil, Finance, Ag, Defense - even the apparatus of the 2 major parties.  Taking just a quick stroll around Google, you can stumble across an amazing array of organizations and companies that are very very busily making your government their bitch.





And those vids are kinda old now, but y'know what?  $14 Billion to fund all the campaigns of all the congress critters sounds like a fuckin' bargain to me.

Somethin's gotta give.

We Win One

This caught my eye as I was meandering on the YouTube:



I don't recognize any of the various DumFux Doofae Residentium from the clip, so I don't know where to begin looking for followup (which is a convenient if lame excuse for not really caring to spend waste my time looking for more shit to squint at on DumFux News).

Anyway, I did manage to find a nice writeup at The Sensuous Curmudgeon, providing some details about how the teacher appealed to the 9th Circuit; won there, and then was further vindicated when SCOTUS declined to take the case in late 2011?):

When we wrote about Dr. Corbett’s appellate victory, we repeated something we said before, and we still think it’s true so we’ll repeat it again:

[T]he key to this case isn’t whether Chad can go through life with a silly smirk on his face; what matters here is whether there’s any money to be made in creationist litigation. If this case provides a good fee for Chad’s legal team, there will be an incentive for more of the same.

Children and their parents will be used as tools for rapacious “family values” lawyers. Creationist kids will be listening intently in class — not to learn any history or science, but to detect any “ungodly” expressions their teachers may make. Good teachers — who are already on the endangered species list — will become extinct.

I don't much like myself when I do this, but I think I'll just assume Fox followed their usual pattern by never saying another thing about it after the initial airing.

Like I said, I don't much like myself when I make those assumptions, but I have yet to find evidence of my being wrong to make 'em.

Today's Gun Nuttery

via Democratic Underground:

A teenager shot and killed his 12-year-old brother because he mistook him for an intruder in their Florida home, police said today.

According to police the 16-year-old was home alone on Friday when his younger brother came home.

"He heard some noises and he called out for his brother and he didn't answer and then his brother startled him," Orlando Police Department Detective Mike Moreschi told ABCNews.com affiliate WFTV.

Scared that there was an intruder in the home, the older boy grabbed a gun and shot his brother, according to police. Once the teen realized what had happened, he immediately called 911.

So another kid is dead and another entire family is forever fucked up because we can't seem to figure how to live our lives without a fuckin' gun.

The View From Out There

Today's Smartest Thing

Dear Repubs

C'mon really?  Obama is Satan?  At this point, I think we all know that if that was true, then you guys would've made a deal with him already.  So, yeah.

John Lennon's Glasses

God's To-Do List

C'Mon, Michelle

Please just sit down and shut the fuck up, before you do any more real harm.

About That Autopsy

In the frenzy of the last coupla days over the Repubs trying to look in on itself, here's an interesting wrinkle caught by Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs:

Some leaders of the religious right are openly worried this week after a sprawling 98-page report released by the Republican National Committee on how the party can rebuild after its 2012 implosion made no mention of the GOP’s historic alliance with grassroots Christian “value voters.”

Specifically, the word “Christian” does not appear once in the party’s 50,000-word blueprint for renewed electoral success. Nor does the word “church.” Abortion and marriage, the two issues that most animate social conservatives, are nowhere to be found. There is nothing about the need to protect religious liberty, or promote Judeo-Christian values in society. And the few fleeting suggestions that the party coordinate with “faith-based communities” — mostly in the context of minority outreach — receive roughly as much space as the need to become more “inclusive” of gays.

To many religious conservatives, the report was interpreted as a slight against their agenda and the hard work they have done for the party.

“The report didn’t mention religion much, if at all,” said Tim Wildmon, president of the American Family Association. “You cannot grow your party by distancing yourself from your base, and this report doesn’t reinforce the values that attracted me and many other people into the Republican Party in the first place. It just talks about reaching out to other groups.”

So the trick is to figure out if the Repubs are really really trying to change, or if they're just posturing and making noise.  Fun to watch so far - and I guess I don't expect that to change any time soon.

Know Your Mortgage Shit