The Double Ghost Standard

Yes, the War on Drugs is Racist

 For those moments you wonder if black people accidentally ended up in jail because of drugs I quote you one of the architects of the war on drugs:

“You want to know what this [war on drugs] was really all about? The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."

- John Ehrlichman, former presidential counsel and Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs under President Richard Nixon and Watergate co-conspirator.

Source: Harpers Article

Another Milestone in American Progress

The United States just had a moment to be noted in history, so let's set fighting aside for a moment and measure its importance. Enough of us believe a woman is capable of being president that we nominated one to run for president as the nominee for a major party.

As a woman, as an American, as a human being at this time in history, I'm proud that we broke this barrier.

Thank you America, for finally seeing vagina-ed Americans as more than baby popping rearers.

A woman's place is in the White House.

‪#‎herstory‬

The Crossroads of Our Country

Assuming both Trump and Clinton will move forward in the coming general presidential campaign, our country is at a cross roads of identity. Status quo is not an option now.

To the left we change into the country which sees women as leaders, may valuable all people, and embrace the potential of the future even though the unknown is scary. We may find the path to economic security for more. We risk the facing what we do not know.

To the right we willfully take the looping road to the past, putting minorities and women beneath white men again, and making economic stability only for a few. We embrace the primal satisfaction of knowing white is the default, entitled to the conquered land and people. We know exactly what we will get, we've already had it. 

America has chosen, we will not be stood still. We now decide where we go.

Feminism, Masculinism, Egalitarianism - The Distraction and Defense of the Perfect Label

Let's just say for a second we call the belief that women are equal to men and deserving of equal protections gender egalitarianism because it is about equality for both genders. We could then ask ourselves - are there challenges that women face which men do not which require consideration, and/or redress? If such things do exist, then it is natural to give such things a name. That is feminism. 

Feminists are not at war with equality. It is just a way of saying - hey -  some hurdles exist which need attention that women face and men do not. Man face challenges which women do not. We could call that Masculinism. Both fall under the heading of equality. Addressing specific needs of either gender and giving those needs and advocacy a name does not take it out from under the realm of equality or devalue the struggles of the other gender. 

When we discuss gay marriage, are we somehow saying that we don't think interracial marriage or trangender marriage or inter-relgious marriage matters? No. Asserting that feminism opposes equality because it labels a particular area of focus or advocacy is to say that the fight for equal access to marriage for gay people opposes equality. 

When someone demands a re-naming, they are doing two things; making a big deal of a semantic issue and attempting to make people defensive about advocating for women's needs. 

Having a discussion about the label is truly pointless. We could call feminism "flim-flam-jim-jam". When you oppose the word but not the meaning, you are truly wasting time and bickering about nothing in an attempt to exhaust the other person so they do not discuss the matters of substance- but that is the point for most people who make this argument. By forcing people to address the label on the idea, not the actual idea, the label objector distracts from the idea, gives themselves an out of discussing the substance of the idea, while making it clear that every level of conversation will be hostile - even the terms.  

By making people defensive about addressing equality for women or labeling themselves a person who cares about equality for women or addressing issues that women face but men do not, they shut the conversation down before it even starts.

It  makes some fair minded people feel badly that each discussion about the needs of women is not accompanied by a need of men, thus making every topic about the needs or rights of women tied to a discussion about the needs of men. It is seen as unfair to discuss pay gaps for women without discussing workplace deaths for men. 

Separate discussions does not mean we are devaluing either side. It means each deserves focus.


Feminism and Masculinism are not zero sum games. The idea that one gender's gain is another's loss is why we see so many hateful pictures from Men's Rights Groups like the ones below. Generally, what benefits women also benefits men. Conflict between the two will occur and that is also not solved by changing a label. 

Damned right I'm a feminist - I believe that women deserve equal opportunities, access, and protections but also have special challenges which men do not which need careful consideration and redress. Damned right I am a Masculinist - I believe that men deserve equal opportunities, access, and protections but also have special challenges which women do not which need careful consideration and redress. Damned right I am a gender egalitarianist. I can be all three. 

Let's do our society a favor and discuss the ideas, not the label of the ideas. 

 

Sluts Cause Dropouts - An Argument in Favor of School Uniforms

This from the chronicles of "wait, it really is 2013, right?": High School Slut Edition

I was listening to the 910 in San Francisco radio today. I was gobsmacked by the what the host, "Frosty" said and the truly sexist sentiments - against both genders.

He was speaking in support of school uniforms. He is a proponent of school uniforms because "of the way girls dress these days." According to Frosty, girls mimic rock stars, who all dress like sluts and trash. So girls at school are dressing like trash and sluts. When girls dress "seductively" or "like sluts" or "like trash" or "show too much skin" at school, the girls distract the boys and lesbian girls so they can't accomplish as much at school. He makes no mention of young men dressed to be attractive.

In order to make this jaw-droppingly sexist of this statement, one has to believe that young straight men and lesbians are so weak that they can't accomplish anything with a pretty girl showing skin in the room. One also has to believe that a woman can be responsible for the failures of straight boys and girls simply by dressing provocatively. The use of "slut" and "trash" to describe women who enjoy or have lots of sex harkens back to when we measured women's worth by what her vag counter would read.

I don't think straight men and lesbians have such marshmallow resolve that they can't accomplish something in spite of sexual attraction. I guess he feels young men and lesbians are like physiological divining rods – following their genitals to the source, no matter the terrain.

It is flabbergasthing to hear some old, white, fuddy-duddy putting sex based values on women. The idea that women who enjoy sex or look like they enjoy sex are somehow tainted or bad is wickedly arcane. We (women) like sex. Hell, we have an entire multiple orgasms organ. We are not male sexual satisfaction apparatuses. The childish desire for a woman who is uncocked screams of personal inadequacies and an unwillingness to be judged against anyone else. Oh, and just because we like sex does not mean we aren't smart or anyone has any right to treat us like we are substandard human beings.

Men and lesbians are responsible for their own failures. If a young man can't graduate from school, it isn't because there were too many pretty girls around - it is because he decided to value a tingling sensation in his pants instead of in his brain. It isn't a woman's responsibility to coverup to stop men from looking at her. Pretty girls don't stop people from accomplishing something. Men and lesbians are responsible for their own behavior. If a teenage boy or lesbian can't stop chasing their genitals, that is their problem - not the girls who are dressed in a way you find provocative.

Asserting that the way women dress can derail progress or makes someone else not responsible for their own behavior has justified rape for generations. Hell, this is exactly the same reasoning that has women in the desert wandering about in meters of fabric, covering their entire body. I'm sure Frosty isn't arguing women should ride around in burqas or get raped, but he is employing the same reasoning for the same reason – to place blame with women for other people's feelings, arousal, and behavior based on it.

Let's get real for a second. Attractiveness rules in schools are not about stopping students from getting distracted. Modest dress never stopped a teenaged hormone. Amish teenagers couple, women in burqas find husbands, practicing Mormon women still have babies, Mennonite teens still find ways toward distraction through attraction. The clothes don't matter too much.

Rules about sexuality in schools are enacted to stop teachers from being attracted to a student and behaving in appropriately. I suspect that all old men who are outraged at the skin women show are pissy about this for the same reason; they find themselves attracted to young women and instead of checking their own feelings, they gets pissed at the broads for being slutty in their eyesight.

It's time we start calling this anti-sex geriatric anger what it is; an emotional slacker's attempt to pass responsibility for their own inadequacies onto the source of their insecurities.

http://www.talk910.com/pages/frosty.html

Rich, Delicate Egotists in Palo Alto Ban Living in Car

People in Palo Alto were so outraged that they had to look at the ugly reality of homelessness that instead of helping people, they banned living in cars. The consequence for living in your car is jail time and/or a $1,000 fine - an impossible amount for a person living in their car.

The sensibilities of the rich and privileged are so fragile that just seeing something unsavory, something uncomfortable is enough to demand their comfort be accommodated. They don't expect the same for the people in the cars, no. The comfort of the unfortunate doesn't matter to these deplorable, self-minded egotists.
Palo Alto, you are a bunch of delicate, heartless, self-important, inhumane debutantes, swimming in a sea of shameful inhumanity. You've done nothing but rain your ruthless, grotesque, self-minded behaviors like acid on everyone but yourselves.

Instead of burning the already injured with your aggrandized social vinegar, why don't you put on your big girl panties and feel the feelings associated with seeing another human being unhoused. Maybe then you might be compelled to actually do something to address the problems of homelessness.

Or will your little baby panties continue to ride up your crack?

http://blog.sfgate.com/stew/2013/08/07/emotions-run-high-as-palo-alto-bans-living-in-cars/

Photo: Kirstina Sangsahachart