yo!

hello my fiends, it's been a while, i know. and you should expect some pretty big changes in the next several months, but for now, you'll have to stick with this. i just wanted to let you all know a couple of things: 1. having a job you love means making sacrifices. 2. i'm leaving for Mexico City in two days (which means you betta watch out for some new words and photos coming your way). oh, and here is a new favorite tune for your listening pleasure. keep it real folks.

This is what happens when you drop out of school to be in beauty pageants

Key quotes include: "the Iraq" "they should our education over here in the U.S., should help the U.S." Oh to hell with it, The Assimilated Negro has kindly produced the transcript. via TAN.

An untimely death

The women's movement lost another great presence a couple of days ago: Bina Srinivasan, a smart, tough, beautiful Indian woman with flaming red hair; fighter in the international women's movement and a vocal and ardent struggler involved in the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) dam movement. Bina was not only an NBA supporter but also a very senior women's rights activist. For many years she was active with "Swashraya", an organisation working in the bastis with the poorest of poor rag-picking women in Vadodara. She contributed to the women's right's movement at the national level in a very significant way. I had the privilege of spending brief moments with Bina during the 2007 Feminist Dialogues in Nairobi and found her to be as noble and pleasant as her friends recall. She passed after a battle with pneumonia. She will be missed by the women's movement, the NBA and more. As if our world could afford to lose such committed women. . . .

gawd damn!

alright, so the new "democratic" congress gave up. at least we got lipgloss.

sacrifice

As if you couldn't tell, I've been a little M.I.A. from the blog world but I've been busting ass in the "real" world. It's unfortunate that life involves sacrifices and while in the past some of those have included sleep, boyfriends, or sheep's blood, the blog was the one to go this time. (Only for a little while though.) Watch out for future repurposing.

4th Anniversary

Between 30,000 and 40,000 people took to the streets to mark the 4th Anniversary of the Iraq War. I'll never forget the beginning--my final spring break had just begun and I was screaming at the television in an overcrowded bar watching the bombs drop. From that moment on, I've joined thousands of others to protest this gross violation of governance any chance we got. But, like a lot of them, I've gotten a little f*ing tired of screaming and feeling like no one is listening. So it was a relief to know that people turned out for this weekend's protests (despite the grey, chilly weather in the Northeast). While I heard that the DC protests lacked some energy and the numbers in New York were fewer than normal, it's reassuring to know that civic duty pervades even our most defeated feelings and that at some point, this shit MUST end. Photo via of nickcalyx.

What does $9 billion a month get you?

Well, a war in Iraq silly! Check out the whole chart via NYTimes. I would like to note, for the record, that I just read Nicholson Baker's short novel Checkpoint.

International Women's Day!

In the spirit and celebration of women's work and lives (cause if we don't do it, who will?), I wish you all a very happy International Women's Day.

Green does not mean go for sex offenders

Legislators in Cincinnati are pushing to pass a law that would require convicted sex offenders to put flourescent green license plates on their cars. The bi-partisan effort wouldn't target all sex offenders, though. The revised bill would focus on convicted sex offenders who used violence or preyed on minors and would exclude other offenses like public exposure or consensual sex between an adult and a teenager. The call to more clearly identify sex offenders comes at a time when the failure to rehabilitate them is becoming all too clear. Most recently, a three-part series in the NYTimes outlined the serious failings of privately-run Florida and Pennsylvania sex offender centers. A former employee, Josh Stiles . . . described the facility as “basically a free-for-all prison.” Two men took their shirts off, rubbed each other’s backs and held hands, while others disappeared together into dormitory rooms. Some of the sex offenders appeared to be drunk from homemade “buck” liquor secretly brewed and sold here. So what does it mean to "rehabilitate" sex offenders when we don't adequately staff or fund their rehabilitation centers? Is it then fair that after serving their time, they become community pariahs? I understand the idea behind flourescent green license plates: put the power in those at risk, not in those who've committed the crime. But how will this ever lead to a sex offender's full rehabilitation? If they're always identified by a past they're trying to escape, how can we ever expect them to change?

Remember the (Red) Campaign?

Remember when we thought making all things red was going to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS? Ahhh....the days of yore. Seems like all the hype of the (Red) Campaign--Bono's little buying-based social service program--has cost more than it's paid off. The collective marketing outlay by Gap, Apple and Motorola for the Red campaign has been enormous, with some estimates as high as $100 million. ... So you'd expect the money raised to be, well, big, right? Maybe $50 million, or even $100 million. Try again: The tally raised worldwide is $18 million. Wow. And I really thought that my new tank top would stop disease, poverty and violence. So much for consumption saving the world. Hey I know! Why don't we all BUY LESS CRAP!

in absentia

Apologies for the lack of posts. Will be leaving the good ole' US for several days so don't expect anything until Tuesday someday. Go somewhere else for fodder (but come back soon)!

Time to redecorate

Cause it's Friday, I can't be bothered to think and I'd rather go to the mini mall.

A Camel walked into a library . . .

The Camel Book Drive is a totally rad book donation/distribution program in Kenya. Traveling by camel, the library journeys through Kenya's northeastern province setting up temporary shop under trees. It brings books to a semi-nomadic people who live with drought, famine and chonic poverty. The books are spread out on grass mats beneath an acacia tree, and the library patrons, often barefoot, sometimes joined by goats or donkeys, gather with great excitement to choose their books until the next visit. The book drive is always accepting books and it only costs $23 to send a 5 lb. box of books to Kenya. You can send your donations to: Garissa Provincial Library For Camel Library Librarian in Charge, Rashid M. Farah P.O. Box 245 Garissa, Kenya To donate books or find out more check out The Camel Book Drive. Be sure to check out the video too! Via Galleycat.

To do: mediocre sex

A psychiatrist at the University of Virginia Health System has found that women tend to settle for unfulfilling and mediocre sex. “Whereas men, if they have trouble with sex, it’s a crisis. They run to the doctor and say ‘I need something for this.’ Women don’t do that. They just sort of stuff it down and push it further down on the [to do] list,” Clayton said. She attributes myriad reasons to the lackluster sex life of females, including un-met emotional needs, unhappiness with their bodies, and lack of communication about desires. The doctor offers up several suggestions for making better sex, but this is perhaps my favorite: And to make more time for sex, she said, men can help a girlfriend or wife with tasks around the house. Word.

A feminist ranch roundup

Blame it on the weather, but I've been a bit out of it. Here's a little roundup of some news that still might be news to you: -- Harvard gets a female President. And it only took 371 years! -- An illegally parked California cop stopped a motorist, whipped out his dick, and ejaculated on her. She pressed charges. He admitted to the act. She took him to court. Park's defense attorney claimed, “She [the motorist] got what she wanted . . . She’s an overtly sexual person.” The jury, one woman and 11 men, agreed. They found the officer not guilty on three felony charges. Confused? Disgusted? The Prosecution's closing arguments make the whole thing clear: “Park didn’t pick a housewife or a 17-year-old girl,” Kamiabipour said in her closing argument. “He picked a stripper. He picked the perfect victim.” Because victim blaming is still cool . . . --A wealthy Upper East Side landlord stabbed his wife to death and was found not guilty second-degree murder. And they say the campaign to end violence against women is irrelevant and offensive. In case you're still wondering how violence against women is normalized. And as an aside, does anyone else think that Maureen Dowd's column has gone down the tubes? It--content and style--is just such rubbish these days.

Feminist bloggers resign from Edwards campaign

In the event that no one has read any of this elsewhere (I've been a bit bogged for the last two days), feminist bloggers Amanda Marcotte of pandagon.net and Melissa McEwan of Shakespeare's Sister have both resigned from the Edwards Campaign. What began as an exciting marriage of feminism and progressive Democratic politics--Presidential hopeful John Edwards hired Marcotte and McEwan to join his campaign staff--ended when Catholic psycho and head of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, Bill Donahue had a f*cking free for all, calling for the resignation of Marcotte and McEwan, "two anti-Catholic vulgar trash-talking bigots." Edwards deliberated firing them. He didn't. Marcotte resigned yesterday. McEwan resigned today. Both ladies assure us that neither Edwards nor his camp forced the resignations, but that it was the highly-malicious and seemingly endless onslaught of bullshit that ushered their departure. The whole thing is a fucking mess initiated by a dude who heads a 501 (c) 3 which, as many have pointed out, is legally bound to stay out of political mongering. What a fucking mess, but I think that McEwan puts it best: There will be some who clamor to claim victory for my resignation, but I caution them that in doing so, they are tacitly accepting responsibility for those who have deluged my blog and my inbox with vitriol and veiled threats. It is not right-wing bloggers, nor people like Bill Donohue or Bill O'Reilly, who prompted nor deserve credit for my resignation, no matter how much they want it, but individuals who used public criticisms of me as an excuse to unleash frightening ugliness, the likes of which anyone with a modicum of respect for responsible discourse would denounce without hesitation. This is a win for no one.