Give them all guns

The Supreme Court does it again.

WASHINGTON - June 28 - "This is a truly outrageous decision-the U.S. Supreme Court just hung a 'shoot here' sign around the necks of battered women and their children all across the country," said NOW President Kim Gandy.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court ruled in a 7 to 2 decision that police officers are exempt from legal action, even if their refusal to enforce a valid restraining order results in death. The decision in Castle Rock v. Gonzales said Jessica Gonzales did not have a constitutional right to police enforcement of the court order issued against her abusive estranged husband. Gonzales sued the town of Castle Rock, Colo., after she repeatedly pleaded with police to enforce the restraining order against her husband, who had kidnapped their three young daughters. The girls were eventually found dead inside his truck.

Link: http://www.commondreams.org/news2005/0629-02.htm

What are these women supposed to do? Stay with their abusers? Or leave and be murdered or have their children be murdered? My gut reaction is to give them all guns and the training to use them – people have the right to protect themselves. Especially since the police don’t do shit. Not that I ever expected them to - they’re far too busy killing black kids (link: http://www.october22.org/)

I love Steve!

Stephen King’s commencement address at the University of Maine. I knew there was a reason I loved this man – besides his great stories, that is.

Some bits:

• Hug and kiss whoever helped get you - financially, mentally, morally, emotionally - to this day. Parents, mentors, friends, teachers. If you're too uptight to do that, at least do the old handshake thing, but I recommend a hug and a kiss. Don't let the sun go down without saying thank you to someone, and without admitting to yourself that absolutely no one gets this far alone.

• Give away a dime for every dollar you make. Why not? If you don't give it, the government's just going to take it. You think you can't afford it, one lousy thin dime out of every dollar? If you think you can't, just look at the taxes you pay on every gallon of gas you buy. If you think you can't, look at all the sick, hungry, unhappy, uneducated people standing outside the fence America has constructed around herself, people who only want a little something for themselves and their families. For their children. Very few of them are suicide bombers. Very few of them are Mr. Bush's "enemies of freedom," whether he believes that or not. They might become enemies of freedom, but right now all they want is a little something to get by on. A little chance at the kind of joy most of us are feeling today. A dime out of every dollar. And here's a secret I learned six summers ago, lying in a ditch beside the road, covered in my own blood and thinking I was going to die: you go out broke. Everything's on loan, anyway. You're not an owner, you're only a steward. So pass some of it on. You may not have much now, but you're going to have a lot. And when you do, remember the ones that don't have anything. A dime out of every dollar. If everyone did it, maybe we could make Mr. Bush let go of the weapons he loves so well and give some of the money he spends on them back to the farmers, the unwed mothers, and the working poor.

Plus he ragged on Bush, which can never be a bad thing.

Link: http://www.umaine.edu/news/releases/May05/KingCommencement.htm

My pets!

Booda

Ziggy

Ebola-chan

“Fair and balanced” NYT?

Looks good on paper, but when the rabid dogs of journalism at Fox “News” use it as their motto you know you’d better examine it a little more closely. Putting aside the fact that Fox, and it’s brethren, are about as unbalanced as it’s possible to be (they make the Onion look respectable) the very idea that somehow presenting every crackpot bit of insanity alongside well reasoned fact is just wrong, wrong, wrong. It’s a disease even liberals make – that if you somehow just give equal time to everyone you’ll get to the truth. Of course, while we do need to see different sides of stories, those entrusted with educating the masses need to do more than just cover the angles. Splitting the difference between lies and facts do not the truth make.

Well, the editor of the New York Times apparently believes otherwise. Taking his cue from Fox, that bastion of journalistic integrity, he’s decided to push in the direction of… more religious coverage! Eeeek! http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000968615

Yes, the Christian Fascists are coming – and they’re taking over the New York Times.

Summer at Summerstage

So K (another K – let’s say K2) K2 is slowly but surely managing to overcome my aversion to live music, first with bebop at The Village Vanguard and Smalls, now with Summerstage. I’ve come to the conclusion that, yes, while I’m not a particularly music oriented person (I enjoy music but more as background than something to focus on) the whole music experience can be a hell of a lot of fun if it’s the right crowd.

I’d been to a few rock concerts (including Aerosmith with cousin J) and both rehearsals and gigs with ex-boyfriend guitarist(s) and the other cousins (does every guy join a band in their youth?) I don’t know, it just didn’t do it for me. Maybe it’s partly because I’m not a big drinker and alcohol plays a large role in the live rock scene. I really think it has a lot to do with the actual scene and not so much the music – in fact, I found that what I enjoyed the most about all the performances I went to with K2 was the scene and not the music. The music was great, don’t get me wrong, and there’s a certain wonderfulness about being in the presence of art being made right there in front of you. But the scene – it was so fab! I ended up spending a large part of the concert watching all the wonderful Cassandra Wilson fans. And they are wonderful… Such a range of people! All different ages and colors! As K said, you could tell from the audience how cool Wilson was by how cool the audience was.

And she was cool. Or, more accurately, warm. Besides being an awesome vocalist (and arranger and musician) with a voice like good whiskey – smooth and rough at the same time – she was such a warm person on stage. She talked about her trip out to LA to record her latest album and how it they may have a great landscape out there but how NY has a great “peoplescape” – she compared LA to that scene in the Matrix where the same people come walking by all the time.

Her music is also warm and wonderful – one minute she’s doing Bob Dylan and the next Muddy Waters – and each one so perfectly arranged and expressively sung. Her backup musicians were each and every one masters and artists in their own right. Add to the wonderful scene and wonderful music the wonderful company of friends like K and you had a wonderful, wonderful, WONderful evening. Hooray for Summerstage!

He’s not a man… he’s THE man :)

Found this brilliant blog-bit over at This Space for Rent (Link: http://www.thisspaceforrent.org/archives/000504.html) and I loved it so much I had to repost it.


I Am Not My Cock.

And guys, you aren't your cocks either.

You see, as Gillard's oddly obtuse observations demonstrate, there is a widely held belief amongst even liberal men, that male humans are predators. That they are first and foremost nothing but a cock. After that, balls, then eyes, then rage, and somewhere way down the line, they become capable of speech, thought, and memory.

Whatever.

I want to go on record as saying a big, mean Fuck You to every single man who has ever claimed that men are incapable of stopping themselves when pussy is on the line. Here's why:

I have never raped anyone. I have never hurt someone because they wouldn't put out. I have never gang raped someone. I have never died from blue balls. I have never exploded because some sideboob accidentally came into my line of sight. I have never raped anyone. Shockingly, I also think this is a pretty normal state of affairs.

This isn't something I'm proud of. That's because I can't be proud of not raping people anymore than I can be proud of not shitting on myself whenever I laugh. Not being a rapist is the default fucking setting. Far as I know, most men have never raped anyone. I assume this means that rapists are a minority of men, and in a normal world you'd think that not being an evil, violent monster would make one more sympathetic to the victims of rape, who are also not evil violent monsters.

Hell, you'd think that most guys, who like me have never raped anyone would think to themselves "Hey, I don't go around assaulting people. I don't rape women. When a girl says no, or turns me down, I handle it like an adult. And now that I think about it, I think I'm kinda normal. I guess being able to not hurt and murder and rape is the norm. Why, that means rapists are fucking evil freaks. Golly gee willikers, who'd a thunk it!".

Apparently, that's not the case, as demonstrated by Gilliard's well meaning but clueless observations, and by some frankly disturbing commentary on his and other sites. Tons of male bloggers and commenters are suddenly stepping over themselves to equivocate and fiddle back and forth on the subject of rape. Sure, they lazily toss in disclaimers about their sympathy to women who have been assaulted, but that's usually followed quickly by a lecture on how women ought to behave.

These sad douchebags state with a straight face the manifesto of all sexist dillweeds who can't wait to castigate women for being sexual beings: "Men", apparently meaning them, "can't control themselves", and therefore women shouldn't be surprised by being assaulted. Really? From this point of view, it's somehow the woman's responsibility not to get raped, rather than society's responsibility to punish and prevent rape in the first place.

I Am Not My Cock. Seriously.

Think about what the argument that you have no control over yourself says. They are arguing that men are either animals, retarded children, or monsters without self restraint. who must therefore be carefully controlled and protected from women. Rape after all being, in their worldview, an inevitable outcome of coming within 3 feet of pussy.

Honestly, why would ANYONE want to go on record as even obliquely justifying sexual assault? And with the Corky defense no less? Are you fucking insane? What's next, going on record as "seeing how NAMBLA has a point"? As far as I can tell, rapists, like murderers, are the bad guys. Then again, you can legally kill someone who is trying to kill you. So there is, occasionally, a justification for murder. There is no such analogue for rape. Rape is, simply put, evil inflicted through sex. There is no defense for it, and anyone who goes looking for one out to be ashamed of themselves.

Is it true that some people of both sexes behave stupidly, overly trusting or even self destructive? Do people of both genders deserve to be held accountable when they fuck up? Sure! But then, I'm thinking about criminal behavior here. Last I checked, fucking isn't illegal. Neither is drinking, singing, staying out late, or acting stupid.

And my point? I Am Not My Cock.

Contrary to what many men (even on the left) seem to think, most guys can and do meet women all the time without even once assaulting them. It's really easy. You just, you know, not be a rapist. More controversially, most guys, far as I know, don't lose control of themselves when they see sideboob. So why in hell do we men feel the need to sympathize with, identify with, or justify the behavior of douchebags who haven't leanred the first thing about civilized behavior, or worse, rapists? How can it be so difficult for us to realize that rapists are the lowest form of scum, and that their victims are, in fact, victims?

Rape Victims do not ask to be raped, and no matter how carefully or irresponsibly they may behave, they do not deserve to be raped, no matter what circumstances one may feel makes a situation hazy. Which by the way don't actually tend to, you know exist. Got it guys? Rape victims deserve justice, sympathy and support, not your judgment or advice.

Look, I know the majority of men, myself included, are raised in a horribly sexist culture that considers our cock-prerogatives to be of utmost cultural importance. We're taught to look to the male perspective first, and it bleeds into everything. Sexism is a problem, and women should be ready to deal with it. But guess what dipshits - The answer to that problem isn't to tell girls "Them's the breaks. If you can't handle it, fuck off!" The solution, for those of you not following me, is to fight the actual problem, which is sexism and male entitlement.

But most importantly, I am not my cock. Period. I am not my balls. I am not my hormones, my sex drive, or my lust. I am not my cock. I am a man, capable of making decisions, capable of self control, capable of thought, of reason, of love and hate and lust and boredom and choice. My cock obeys my commands, and not the other way around. Guys, you are not your cock either. You have total control and you are not a slave. Don't fall into the trap of believing otherwise.

I am not my cock, and I'm really fucking happy about it. Anyone who feels differently just isn't a man.

I hate cleaning

Which is why I haven’t vacuumed in, like, months. This is not a good thing. Not when you have extremely hairy cats with awesome tumbleweed producing powers – what you have is kitty tumbleweeds galore (eek!) Oh, what is a lazy girl to do? Well, when her date for the weekend blows her off (with good reason – K’s Mom’s back in the hospital and the hospital isn’t being nice, as usual) and her excuse goes out the window Papercut must face the furry music. But at least she has some DVD’s to soften the blow. What better way to take one’s mind off a boring, brainless task.

Paper’s weekend film festival!!!:

Zany Horror Fun
The Faculty
Eight Legged Freaks
28 Days Later

Weird and Weirder
City of Lost Children
Strictly Ballroom
Sleepy Hollow

Hot Action Romance
Shark Skin Man & Peach Hip Girl
Returner
The Princess and the Warrior


Ok, ok, so trying to clean while you have movies on isn't the most efficient way to get things done quickly but, so what. At least I could pretend I was having a good time.

This is the sound of my brain boggling

Ok, I knew Bush was going to do his best do dismantle the government of the U.S. of A. in these four years but even I hadn't dreamed he'd try to give himself more time to do his demolition duty: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.J.RES.24.IH:

What's so wrong with having term limits people?! What's next? Are they going to declare emergency powers and crown him the friggin' emperor?

I'm just waiting for 9/11 redux for that one.

Nixonian Democrats

Now, I’ve never liked electoral politics – think it’s all a load of horseshit the powers that be like to shell-game us into believing. I feel sorry for people who believe in the system, kind of like I do for Charlie Brown. Every time Lucy pulls the football away and he falls on his ass… the next time she promises it’ll be different and he goes and gets screwed again. But this really takes the cake – dems acting like dirty rotten repubs.

Someone sent out an e-mail claiming to be a guy named Michael Bouldin claiming that a guy named Anthony Weiner (who is running against Bloomberg for the mayorship of New York) didn’t sign the Conyers Downing Street Memo letter. This did not come from Michael. He never sent the above mentioned e-mail. And worse, Weiner did sign the letter.

Someone, obviously a rival, is trying to discredit Weiner. That someone is probably a Democrat.

What a sad world.

I’m the winner!

Yay! I won my first eBay auction! I’m so cool!

Actually, the main reason I did it is because I wanted to sell on eBay. But first you must buy so you’re not a complete unknown. Just a mostly unknown. Guess I’ll have to put up with getting sucky prices for my manga for a while, but at least I’ll be getting more than I would if I’d brought the stuff to Big Off to buy back. And this way I can sell all my excess DVD’s and CD’s!

Of course, initially I had images of making lots, or at least a decent amount, of money dancing in my head but looking at the prices the stuff goes for I seriously doubt I’ll be able to quit my day job. Or even break anything over even. I guess it’s better than nothing, and it’s about time I learned how to use eBay. And now I have a camera I can take the pics with!

Next: I want to get a mountain bike! :D

Feeling paranoid?

Then look out for Shonen Bat!

Just recently finished Paranoia Agent and I'm still not sure what the hell it was about. I also know for a fact the director, Satoshi Kon, didn't either - unless he was trippin' when he did the commentary. But I'm not surprised... about the weird ending, not him trippin'. Or not trippin'. I mean, who needs drugs when you're the mind behind Perfect Blue and Millenium Actress?

Strange, tho. I somehow feel satisfied with the unsatisfying ending. I think if Kon had wrapped it up neatly and explained all our questions it would have betrayed the twisted soul of PA.

I just feel bad about poor Mitsuhiro - I really wish things had turned out better for him. Especially after he practically saves the world!

Weather update

Now it's freakin' freezing out. What the hell is up with this crazy weather??!

It would actually be quite pleasant... if I hadn't dressed for this morning's weather.

Hana Yori TSU

FINALLY! Yoko Kamio, of "Hana Yori Dango" fame, is finished with it and has moved onto something new. And fresh. And definitely not Hana Yori.

I fell in love with Tsukushi-chan when I started - here was a main character with some guts! Not one of those whimpy, whiny crybabies (thank god!) I followed her antics (often unbelievable – like the one where she wins a beauty contest) but by about the 25th volume was getting tired of it. First off, how many unbelievable antics can one deal with? How many trips to Paris and New York - with, of course, the inevitable chance meetings and making friends with hot foreign guys?

So I was glad to see her move onto something new, and this is a real change of pace. The main character (damn, forgot her name and there's no one on the web yet writing about it) is the opposite of Tsukushi in many ways - for one, she's a whiner. But this whiner I can deal with. Because I'm such a sucker for sob stories.

The girl, now a teenager, used to be a child star and was scarred by the treatment of cruel, jealous classmates who ostracized her and a so-called friend who was just using her to get into the business. Now she spends her days wandering around town just trying to avoid human contact as much as she can - because humans are cruel! Just the kind of sad that I love.

Of course she doesn't stay that way. A man, the principal (I think, or maybe the owner) of a "free school" - somewhere kids can just be who they are, unlike most schools in Japan. Or elsewhere - finds her and encourges her to come to his school. There she meets your usual cast of wacky characters, my favorite of which is the goth-lolita sewing wiz.

It's only up to volume two and I have to say I'm hooked. I can't wait for the next volume!

Apparently so

Apparently so.

Can we call them Nazi's yet?

The Christian Fascists are at it again - they want to label the evil homos. http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/06/061305pride.htm

"We put warning labels on cigarette packs because we know that smoking takes one to two years off the average life span, yet we 'celebrate' a lifestyle that we know spreads every kind of sexually transmitted disease and takes at least 20 years off the average life span according to the 2005 issue of the revered scientific journal Psychological Reports," Rev. Bill Banuchi, executive director of the New York Christian Coalition told the Mid Hudson News.

What does he want to use? This?

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHT!!!!!

God DAMN it's hot here. Going up to the mid-nineties but will feel like it's over a hundred.

Just had to get that out.

Bloomy's folly

Well, I have to say one thing for Bloomberg - he just doesn't give up. Despite the fact that this poor beleaguered city is up to it's ears in problems (like underpaid firefighters and teachers, the post-9/11 downtown area and schools that have no friggin' books) he's still trying to convince us that we need to hand a quarter of a billion dollars to his corporate buddies for an albatross we neither need nor want.

And the kicker? We won't actually be getting anything but a parking mess and some jobs selling hot dogs. Mikey wants to give $600 mill to his buddies Woody Johnson, Chad Pennington and the good people at Fox and ESPN to they can reap the benefits.

This is why I hate fucking conservatives so much.

Now that's what I call a good time

Ok, I'm boring.

I just had a lovely weekend doing one of my favoring things - a whole lotta nothing. No, just kidding (although I like doing nothing, too). I spend the last few days alternating between my favorite bookstores and my favorite parks. Aahhhhhhh.

First off was The Strand. Lucky me, there's one within walking distance of my job so I went after work on Friday and spent the larger part of the night wandering the stacks. My only complaint was that they don't have a very good air conditioning system. I'd spent the ride into work reading-material-less and wasn't about to do the same for my ride back but look what happens when I get inside the Strand. I disappear for a few hours! I escaped with my life, three books and a bag.

The books were: one on fascism (figure I should read up on it as that's where it looks like we're headed), skin care through vitamins and such (I'm getting all paranoid already about my face falling to my knees when I get older) and a Storm Constantine book (heard about her from a yaoi site and I keep wanting to give her a try, although I've been getting out of the habit of reading fiction quite honestly). And then I had to get a Strand bag - pink on pink - so cute. There were a crayon box full of color combinations so I'll probably go back for some more. And at 5 bucks a bag wh0 can resist?

The next day was time for me to refuel my manga collection so off I went to one of my favorite places on earth, the used manga bookstore Book Off. Actually it's not just Book Off that I love - it's on the street off the Public Libray (ok, this is also my favorite place on earth) with several Japanese grocery stores and cafe's and such. So after filling out my collections and picking up a few interesting new titles I went over to the grocery store to get some mugi-cha and Japanese mayo (been eating lots of eggs recently and Japanese mayo in the tube is the best!) Then it's off to the cafe to get a slice of strawberry shortcake. Japanese SSC is sooo good - soft cake, creamy cream. Yummers!

I went to enjoy my booty in Bryant Park, behind the library, yet another of my favorite places. Then it was up to Kinokuniya to pick up a couple of titles Book Off didn't have and home I went. Unfortunately, or fortunately, one of the new titles I'd picked up was the new series by the "Hana Yori Dango" mangaka, "Cat Street" and I knew I had to get some more, so back it was to Kinokuniya's on Sunday.

Getting there was a fairly trauamtic experience - weekend train fuckups, of course. But there was a street fair I got lunch at (italian sausage and peppers on a roll) and that was good. Street fairs are always good. I finally made it to Kino's and got the second volume of Cat Street (only two out so far - waah!) and volumes 34 & 35 of Hana Yori. Got pretty sick of it with all Tsukushi's whining - what I loved about her was that she wasn't one of those whiny "poor me" girls - but Cat Street piqued my interest again. Plus, I only had 3 more volumes to go until the end (whew). Topped it off with an ice cold coffee from Starbucks down in the basement of Rockerfeller Center and boy did I need it - another damn hot and humid day. Alth0ugh I probably should have kept my reading for the train - it was yet another project just getting home and I finished reading all three books long before I got to my station. Well, live and learn.

Now all I have to do is figure out how to use eBay - I'm going to need to unload some of these eventually. They've already taken over about half my book shelves !

Liberal anti-feminism

Can I rant? Yes? Ok, here goes.

I just came back from getting my daily Alternet dose and found the following lead article: "The Housewife Theory of History" talkin' bout female power... or, more accurately "Mommy Power" or I guess "Womb Power". In other words, the theory that women have this special sort of "female" power they get from giving birth and raising children.

Hellooooo! First off, I'm single and childless and no less a woman for it. I wouldn't be any less a woman if I was gay, or butch, or had a mastectomy.

But really, the thing that makes us "women" - and what gives us our special power - is that we're, as a group, oppressed. Maybe not a minority (I don't think minority = roughly half the population) but certainly a group that's been exploited up to and including the present. That's what gives us, and every other oppressed group quite honestly, our understanding, our wisdom, our identity, and our power.

Not our uterus.

Time for reflection

Not quite sure what this blog is going to be. I know I'm very political (although there are much better bloggers than me covering the political front). In fact, I started this because I wanted to post on Woman Kossacks and thought Hey, might as well start my own blog while I'm at it. But I think I'm going to just let this be a place for me to get out thoughts, feelings, and to write about things that are happening in my life.

Life passes us by so fast - it's important to reflect every once in a while.