Robert Reich on Facebook:

The first thing tyrants do is close schools. The second thing they do is burn books. The third thing is cut off information. Right-wing Republicans are on the way to doing all three: State legislatures continue to cut school budgets; local Republicans are reducing budgets for libraries. Congressional Republicans are now cutting off information — slashing the budgets of the most important sources we have for collecting data on what’s really happening to jobs, wages, and the economy: the Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Because of such cuts, the BLS can no longer collect data on mass layoffs or how Americans are using their time; the cuts may also make employment data less reliable.

Republicans don’t want Americans to know the truth. That way they can hoodwink us even more. But a free society needs good information no less than it needs citizens sufficiently educated to use that information to make informed decisions – such as voting Republicans out of office.

No labor statistics for you, peasants.

The Indian “spiritual” site Speaking Tree warns of bad Vastu.

India has the Himalayas in its North, which – Vastu experts say – goes against Vastu. It is the reason that poverty remains an unending issue in our country.

Huh. So, could they move them to the south?

Facebook readers are not convinced.

Now here’s a story of cis privilege. Girls in Nepal are banished when they are menstruating; they have to sleep outside in skimpy sheds without walls. What about during monsoon season? Well they get wet, of course.

Where do these ideas come from?

Ancient Hindu scriptures say women are highly infectious during their periods, that “all her body is so weak that viruses come out of her mouth and her limbs,” says Mukunda Aryal, who has studied Hindu culture for 40 years.

In Hinduism, there was once a king of the gods, who reigned above others. This god, called Indra, committed a horrible sin. And to atone for it, he created menstruation.

You what? He committed a sin, and to atone for it, he created menstruation? What the hell is the logic of that? Let alone the fairness? He created a sin, so girls and women have to have obnoxious cramping in their lower abdomens every month, and have a lot of gross clumpy blood (that is, endometrial tissue) to deal with? In what sense is it atonement to create an unpleasant inconvenient uncomfortable situation for other people?

The NPR reporters, Jane Greenhalgh and Michaeleen Doucleff, visit one menstrual shed.

It’s about a ten minute walk. It’s starting to get dark, and she doesn’t have a flashlight. “I’m scared mostly of snakes and of men,” she says through translator, Pragya Lamsal of WaterAid. Kamala has heard stories of girls being sexually assaulted when they’re alone in their sheds.

Her shed is shocking. It looks more like a cage — with wooden bars crisscrossed over the top and sides. It’s monsoon season and the rain is torrential. Kamala has a piece of plastic to drape across the top of her shed but she still got drenched.

Kamala was 11 when she first started her period and she remembers being terrified when she first slept outside. The shed is small, barely big enough for her to lie down and sometimes she shares it with 2 or 3 or more girls and so for most of the night they squat.

“I don’t feel good about practicing this,” Kamala says.

The Supreme Court of Nepal outlawed the practice in 2005 so it’s illegal to force women into these sheds, but many villagers in the remote west continue to do it.

Oh well, it’s only girls and women.

Watch Peter Tatchell ask panelists at an iERA debate to say whether or not they condemn the death penalty for blasphemy, amputation, and stoning for adultery, and the panelists refuse to reply.

That’s one time when a yes or no question is not out of place.

This from rubyfruitz at Sisterhood is Powerful a year ago is of interest:

It doesn’t matter what kind of politics a feminist has, unless she is fully accommodating to men (in the shape of anti-feminist, queer gobbledygook and other woman-haters) she will be attacked. Attempts will be made to silence her through a systematic campaign of hatred and intimidation.

…

There has been a recent bout of attempts to stop individual feminists from speaking at events. The chosen method is to call someone ‘phobic’. You can put any word you want in front of it. It doesn’t have to be a real word, you can just make it up. In circulation, we currently have: biphobic, transphobic, whorephobic, lesbians who are somehow ‘homophobic’ (will leave you to work that one out, I can’t) etc.

…

Deborah Cameron does a thorough, good, job of explaining that the constant use of something-phobia is meaningless because it implies oppression is driven by a psychological problem; a condition which gives rise to hatred. Although sometimes oppression is about hatred, it is always about power. A radical feminist analysis always involves where the power lies and why it is being used.

The trouble with libertarian feminist analysis is that it’s clueless about power and coercion.

Structural oppression, as it relates to sexuality, is about the way compulsory heterosexuality is imposed on women, from birth. The purpose is to enforce male domination. It’s nothing to do with someone’s feelings, about bisexual jokes or assumptions made about bisexual people. Any other analysis is bullshit individualism and has a libertarian agenda. That has no part to play in feminism – feminism is about the liberation of women, as a caste. It’s not humanism, it’s not about all other oppressions. It’s an unrelenting fight for women’s freedom.

That’s not to say that, as feminist activists, we should not take into account other oppressions; we may share other oppressions and we may be fighting other injustices alongside our feminism. However, losing focus on the liberation of women within feminism leads to humanist murkiness where women’s concerns, as always, is everyone else but our own caste.

That. It amazes me more every day the way women who consider themselves feminists are falling all over themselves to attack feminism, along with everyone else who is attacking feminism. It amazes me more every day the way women who consider themselves feminists are buying into claims that feminist women are “talking over” trans people, and that feminist women have all the privilege relative to trans people. The masochism and self-silencing of it is stunning to watch.

We are conditioned to put the needs of others before ourselves. Queer ‘phobic’ smoke-screens play right into that. Women, especially ‘feminists’ who have liberal notions of ‘equality’ and ‘fairness’ for everyone, end up fighting for the wrong team and against their own liberation. The reason liberal feminists lose focus is because they don’t recognise the importance of power in a political context. Power is more than the power of one individual. Power is about which group of people (men as a caste) control what social, financial and other resources and why. I really don’t know why we have to keep repeating this to brainwashed women on the left. But we do.

Maybe it’s the threats.

Never has this been more obvious than the recent spat of ‘feminist’ university societies targeting individual feminists. They have worked with male supremacists (whether visibly and consciously so or not) to silence both long-standing and newly emerging feminists. Having a critique, or, even better, a political analysis about why women’s liberation leads to gender abolition, is enough to get labelled one phobia or another. The mere use of the word ‘phobia’ gets ‘feminists’, and their anti-feminist allies, worked up into a frenzy and demand no-platforming of women who have something to say about male violence. It doesn’t even make logical sense half the time.

It’s surely the witch hunts of centuries past, all over again. The lack of analysis is very telling. Julie Bindel was simply called ‘vile’ by the NUS. Very mature. Over and over students admitted they had not read her work but something-something-‘phobia’. Caroline Criado-Perez has recently received the vague accusation of being a ‘damaging and exclusionary figure’ followed by an unsubstantiated but emotive ‘we urge you to distance yourself’.

And if you don’t? We will try very hard to destroy you.

Am I right to see a hint of a threat there? – ‘distance yourself, single-out and ostracise this individual or we will cause trouble’. It’s a threat feminists are beginning to get used to. It comes from MPAs (Male Privileged Agitators) and queer folk alike.

And from people who consider themselves feminists – don’t forget that part.

The mission to train feminists into being submissive, obedient, silent women goes like this: Don’t ever allow yourself to be called ‘phobic’ or else bad things will happen to you. Not to women. To you, personally. You will suffer and be punished if you express radical politics. When you’re challenging, for example, the billion dollar sex industry, you may be called ‘whorephobic’ (sic) and accused of hating prostituted women. And, if that happens, it’s not just a word with ‘phobia’ at the end, it has the power to set a stream of hatred and no-platforming your way.

And what does that do? Why, it silences feminists. Own goal!

Our ‘choices’ are limited. We keep quiet, we go anonymous and hope we’re not doxxed (by anti-feminists or ‘feminists’ who knows?) or we speak our mind under our real name knowing that years of intimidation and harassment lie ahead. The pattern of thinking for the Obedient Woman goes something like this: ‘We avoid any kind of ‘phobia’ (sic) at any costs – but see those women over there? They’re bigots and should be silenced. I am, of course, a good ally of yours, how could you think I am not? Hey you over there! BIGOT! TRANSPHOBE!”.

Witch!

This probably belongs in the Withdrawing Room, but I feel like giving it some space. (I think soon I’ll make a page for Patreon patrons that will be about frivolities and other random things.)

There’s this conversation on Facebook about farmers’ markets, and we were told about the St Jacobs Farmers’ Market, which looks killer. It has a soup vendor! Who creates wonderful new soup recipes (and the soup itself).

And there are Mennonites.

And crafts, and all the good things.

It put me in mind of the Oxford Covered Market, which has been around for centuries. So I found it – and of course it has a Facebook page too.

It’s a lovely place, the Covered Market.

Glosswitch talked about the “pregnant people” issue back in February.

Last week I wrote an article on the discrimination suffered by pregnant women and new mothers. In doing so I wished to stress that such discrimination is rooted not in the nature of pregnancy itself, but in the low status accorded to women as a class. If the rules changed overnight and people of higher status – men – got pregnant, we would treat the whole process very differently. Instead, we live in a world where 800 women die every single day from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth. This isn’t because pregnancy happens; it’s because it only happens to people who don’t matter. These people we call “women.”

Exactly. The fact that it’s women it happens to is crucial, so dropping the word “women” from the discussion is a truly terrible idea.

I am not prepared to compromise on what gender is and how it relates to the exploitation of female bodies if what I’m writing about is pregnancy discrimination (if what I was writing about was favourite sandwich fillings I might take a different approach). I’m well aware that it’s considered polite (at least if you’re a woman) to add some little qualification that undermines one’s whole argument by prioritising gender as brainsex over gender as a murderous hierarchy, but if we’re talking about actual death tolls, I’m not doing it. So that’s it. Much as I’d love to join in [with] the superficial halo polishing I’m out.

Once the murderous hierarchy no longer exists – then it will be another story. But that won’t be on the watch of “third wave” feminism, or “hundredth wave” either.

“Pregnant woman” is not an identity. It is a social reality. A pregnant woman’s ever-contracting rights – whether she can choose to end this pregnancy, whether she will risk imprisonment for drinking too much, whether she will lose her job, whether she will be murdered by her partner – can only be seen through the filter of her inferior social status: that of woman. She neither chooses nor identifies with this status and it matters that the restrictions it places on her and others be fully acknowledged. Hundreds of women died today because of the way in which pregnancy intersects with their political and social status as women. The term “pregnant people” denies them the specificity of their deaths and masks the cause.

What gender-neutral pregnancy campaigning has achieved is wholly negative, making it impossible to articulate why there exists a class of people who are not granted full sovereignty over what lies beneath their own skin.  It has located the abortion debate (which should not be a debate at all) back where conservatives want it: on the status of the foetus, not that of the gravida. It has allowed the misogynist left to consolidate their definition of woman as “passive fantasy girl with tits” as opposed to “person with independent physical functions, emotions and needs.” Above all, it has created the illusion of an opt-out to being placed in the inferior sex class. Well, there isn’t, at least not until you can be bothered to challenge the fundamental idea that half the human race is inferior (oh, but that’s so much harder than messing about with words!).

It’s a lot less fun, too.

A tweet:

Giles Dilnot @reporterboy
Amazed. That’s quite a sign for a London street in 2015.

Description: a demonstration, with one person in the foreground holding a sign that reads:

THIEVING MURDERING “ISRAELIS” GO HOME TO POLAND, GERMANY, USA

It sounds like a sweet idea for schools – have children fill a box with toys and essential items and the Christmas Box charity will send it to a child who is living in poverty. But. There’s more to it.

Emma Williams at Humanist Life reports:

Operation Christmas Child is run by Samaritan’s Purse, a huge and zealous organisation led by Franklin Graham, son of the famous evangelist Billy Graham. Not only is the organisation openly homophobic, it seeks to proselytise in a manner that most people, including liberal Christians, find unacceptable. As a humanist, I am naturally disquieted by the idea of people performing evangelical work with the intended purpose of conversion; but I am positively offended when this work is performed at the expense of vulnerable children in desperate situations across the globe.

It’s a bit like prostitution that way. “Choices” made in circumstances of dire poverty are not really choices at all.

Many UK representatives hotly defend Operation Christmas Child and claim to have seen no evidence of evangelism or of the accusation that the boxes are distributed with ‘strings attached’. These people are either disingenuous or incredibly naïve. A cursory glance at the charity’s own website provides a wealth of evidence that the explicit, stated purpose of Operation Christmas Child is to convert the child who receives the gift and to encourage them to convert their families. The mission statement says that ‘every gift-filled shoe box is a powerful tool for evangelism and discipleship – transforming the lives of children around the world through the Good News of Jesus Christ’. As one of the representatives in India puts it in this promotional film, ‘children become the harvesters’ for Jesus.  Religious literature is distributed, often in the children’s own language, and this is the charity’s own description of how it is used:

‘Through The Greatest Journey discipleship programme, boys and girls can become faithful followers of Jesus Christ. Samaritan’s Purse developed The Greatest Journey as a dynamic, interactive Bible study for use in countries around the world where Operation Christmas Child distributes gift-filled shoeboxes. Wherever possible, children receiving shoeboxes are invited to enrol on The Greatest Journey; 2.8 million children have enrolled on this programme since the curriculum was first developed in 2008.’

The evangelism is carefully hidden in the UK version of this project.

One of the reasons why so many people in the UK are completely oblivious to the extreme agenda of Samaritan’s Purse is that it is deliberately not promoted here, to the extent that many earnest and well-meaning volunteers remain blissfully unaware of its sinister nature. This is an excerpt from one of the organisation’s own statements about their UK-based operation, and it implies that there may well be practices that even those who work for the charity in the UK are completely unaware of:

‘Please be assured that the commitment of Samaritan’s Purse to evangelism is as strong as ever. … However, there is a difference in the way the boxes are processed in the UK for overseas shipment. The UK program removes all religious items … and forwards any Christian literature to our National Leadership Teams working in countries where shoebox gifts are distributed, so the Christian literature can be used with children. … The Gospel is also presented locally as part of the distribution of the gifts, and wherever possible, children are offered a Gospel storybook written in their own language called The Greatest Gift of All. Many children are also invited to enrol in a 10-lesson follow-up Bible study program, and upon completion receive a New Testament as a graduation gift.’

In the USA, where evangelism is broadly accepted and commonplace in many parts of the country, the evangelical message is better understood both by donors and by volunteers. In this country, most volunteers and participants in the scheme cling to the notion that if they haven’t seen it then it doesn’t go on. Do not be fooled – it does.

Tell all your friends.

Merrill Miller at The Humanist:

Recently, certain individuals have appropriated the term “humanism” in an attempt to legitimize their anti-women, anti-feminist message. Masquerading as “activists” for men’s rights, these people do not concern themselves with serious problems faced by men in the United States today such as the disproportionately high incarceration rates for Black men or the shocking percentage of workplace injuries that lead to fatalities for male workers. Instead, they spout regressive, sexist views on the Internet that blame feminism and women for society’s ills while promoting a version of masculinity that applauds men who can coerce women into dating and having sex with them.

It’s a popular catch-phrase for anti-feminists – “I’m not a feminist, I’m a humanist.” (It was depressing to see that Meryl Streep said it the other day.) It’s another “All Lives Matter.” Rights for all; yes indeed, good plan; the fact remains that women are a subordinate class in relation to men, and that has not been fully overturned yet, to put it mildly.

One Facebook group, Humanists United Against Feminism, claims that the majority of women who reported being raped are making false accusations to gain attention, even though research shows that only 2 to 8 percent of reported rapes are false accusations—comparable with the rates of false reporting for other crimes. Another Facebook group, Exposing Feminism, dismisses feminism as “female superiority nonsense,” contrary to the definition of feminism, which is “the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities” and “the theory of political, economic and social equality of the sexes.” Yet another, A Voice for Men: Humanist Counter-Theory, blames women for rape and for the gender wage gap, a pay discrepancy shown by research from many reputable organizations to be the result of societal perceptions of women workers and not the result of individual women’s choices.

It’s not real humanism, it’s fake humanism, mask humanism, gotcha humanism.

While these groups may at first seem ridiculous, humanists should not dismiss them completely, largely because they are attempting to claim the term “humanism” to promote their anti-women agendas. Humanists should also be concerned because, even though there are individuals in the Men’s Rights Movement who identify as religious, many also identify as atheists, agnostics or nonreligious. While atheists and humanists are often quick to rightly criticize the sexism of the religious right, the vitriol spewed towards women by nonreligious men’s rights activists (MRAs) should also be a wake-up call to combat sexism within the secular community.

That’s been obvious for at least the past more-than-four years, but whatever.

Humanists—real humanists who actively promote human rights for all and equality for women—must be vigilant in defining what the humanist philosophy really is—as well as what it is not. Humanism is most certainly inclusive of feminism, and the American Humanist Association’s Feminist Caucus is an example of individuals of all genders and gender identities who identify as both humanists and feminists working toward women’s equality. The American Humanist Association will continue to defend women’s rights, especially from frequent attacks by the religious right to prevent access to necessary reproductive healthcare such as sexual education, contraception, and abortion. But threats to women’s rights are now also coming from people who claim to be humanists, though the views they hold run contrary to the humanist philosophy. Humanists must not let MRAs dictate the conversations surrounding humanism and feminism. Instead, we must continue our longstanding tradition of working toward women’s equality and affirming solidarity with the feminist movement.

Sounds good to me.

Don’t read the comments.

The actor Jennifer Lawrence talks about realizing she was paid a lot less than her male colleagues, and getting annoyed at herself.

When the Sony hack happened and I found out how much less I was being paid than the lucky people with dicks, I didn’t get mad at Sony. I got mad at myself. I failed as a negotiator because I gave up early. I didn’t want to keep fighting over millions of dollars that, frankly, due to two franchises, I don’t need. (I told you it wasn’t relatable, don’t hate me).

But if I’m honest with myself, I would be lying if I didn’t say there was an element of wanting to be liked that influenced my decision to close the deal without a real fight. I didn’t want to seem “difficult” or “spoiled.” At the time, that seemed like a fine idea, until I saw the payroll on the Internet and realized every man I was working with definitely didn’t worry about being “difficult” or “spoiled.”

Because men don’t, because that’s not how it comes across when they look after their own interests.

Could there still be a lingering habit of trying to express our opinions in a certain way that doesn’t “offend” or “scare” men?

A few weeks ago at work, I spoke my mind and gave my opinion in a clear and no-bullshit way; no aggression, just blunt. The man I was working with (actually, he was working for me) said, “Whoa! We’re all on the same team here!” As if I was yelling at him. I was so shocked because nothing that I said was personal, offensive, or, to be honest, wrong. All I hear and see all day are men speaking their opinions, and I give mine in the same exact manner, and you would have thought I had said something offensive.

Because we say it in our little squeaky voices, with our narrow shoulders and puny biceps. It just doesn’t look right.

I’m over trying to find the “adorable” way to state my opinion and still be likable! Fuck that. I don’t think I’ve ever worked for a man in charge who spent time contemplating what angle he should use to have his voice heard. It’s just heard. Jeremy Renner, Christian Bale, and Bradley Cooper all fought and succeeded in negotiating powerful deals for themselves. If anything, I’m sure they were commended for being fierce and tactical, while I was busy worrying about coming across as a brat and not getting my fair share. Again, this might have NOTHING to do with my vagina, but I wasn’t completely wrong when another leaked Sony email revealed a producer referring to a fellow lead actress in a negotiation as a “spoiled brat.” For some reason, I just can’t picture someone saying that about a man.

“Spoiled brat” is something you call a child. Men are adults. Women? Not so much.

The Guardian on Saba and Gulalai Ismail of Aware Girls:

Aware Girls was founded in 2002 and operates in the face of severe violence, not just in Peshawar but also in Pakistan’s tribal areas and other troubled parts of the country. It trains young women on their rights – and, through its Youth Peace Network, makes efforts to encourage more women into politics – who then try to stop their peers being radicalised, leaving Peshawar for villages and towns where they try to dissuade others from joining extremist groups.

In Peshawar, this is highly dangerous work – not least because Aware Girls is run mainly by women. One of its attendees in 2011 was Malala Yousafzai, whose own efforts on behalf of women’s education earned her a bullet to the head from the Taliban at the age of 15. She survived and went on to win the Nobel peace prize. Gulalai says her friend is now a symbol of honour for the organisation. “Violent attacks are happening to many women in Pakistan, so I was happy Malala was able to highlight the issue.”

That’s how I first heard of Gulalai and Aware Girls – the day Malala was shot, I was glued to Twitter, and Gulalai was there.

The group believes the best way to combat terrorism is with education. Gulalai and her sister, Saba, founded it in 2002 when they were still teenagers, their initial goal to advance women’s rights in a city where many females suffer appalling discrimination. The sisters began campaigning against domestic violence, acid attacks, honour killings and exploitative labour.

Since 2010, Aware Girls has also focused on its growing peace network, which stretches out from its Peshawar base to rural Taliban strongholds. Last year, 223 activists reached almost 4,000 “at risk” young people. At the last national elections, in 2013, Aware Girls led all-female teams of polling station monitors, to ensure women were allowed to vote freely and without intimidation.

They’re so amazing.

Eiynah at Nice Mangos is feeling more than annoyed at the way ex-Muslims are ignored by nearly all political directions.

As the Canadian federal election date draws closer, I can’t get my mind off the niqab debate. I can’t stop thinking about the fact that this one issue demonstrates how voices like mine – fromwithin the Muslim community are routinely ignored, cast aside, betrayed by the illiberal ‘liberal’ West …simply for the crime of not fitting the simplistic tribalist narratives.

Zunera Ishaq – a Pakistani immigrant to Canada just like myself ….took on the government regarding the issue of niqabs during the citizenship oath and won the right to wear a mask in court when no one else is allowed to. She won the privilege to flaunt her alliance with an inflexible, misogynistic, hardline, right-wing, extremist interpretation of Islam in the face of already marginalized, threatened, liberal minorities from within the Muslim community.

Widespread liberal support for her is as distasteful as support for ‘White nationalism’ or ‘Straight Pride’. Except not many liberals can see past the ‘minority’ aspect. Well, the KKK would be a minority in Pakistan, but it wouldn’t mean that we start treating them as liberal heroes if they challenged ‘the majority’.

What if the KKK in Pakistan were prevented from wearing their hoods in court (and elsewhere)? Would that make them liberal heroes? Nope, it would not.

This issue showcases how utterly alone people in my position are. We don’t align with the position of the western ‘right’ on so many things, we are orphaned liberals – abandoned by the left which usually champions ‘equality’ and free speech, stands against the religious right….unless….’Islam’, we are thus pushed into a corner where the only people willing to listen to us are associated with the right…which is not necessarily a compromise everyone is willing to make. But if they do, you can’t fully blame them for wanting to be heard.

But not the whole of the left. I’m on the left, and I haven’t abandoned, and there are many who can say the same. Not enough, but many.

But again, regarding Islam even in the ‘human-rights championing West’, our voices are silenced, left out of the conversation, misrepresented. We continue to be marginalized, targeted with unbelievable bigotry from the left and the right. If we speak out against our own oppression, we are labelled ‘native informant’ or ‘house arab’ by the illiberal liberals.

We are seen as being from the same stock of foreign ‘savages’ by the far-right, and the conversation is hijacked by these two extremes; the xenophobes who wish to cast suspicion and doubt on all Muslims, or the ‘liberals’ who ally with our bigoted Muslim far-right, our oppressors.

I am left with an ache in my gut, and a sinking feeling when I see the hypocritical left, fight against victim blaming, slut-shaming but celebrate it in the form of niqab simply because it is not ‘their culture’, it is not their fight. Their fight is with fox news, Stephen Harper, and that’s it. Their fight for equality ends there. Misogyny is acceptable if packaged as part of a foreign culture.

Read the whole thing.

So that’s a great journalist gone – Lyse Doucet on Sue Lloyd-Roberts.

BBC journalist Sue Lloyd-Roberts, who forged a career in secret filming in secretive states, has died of leukaemia at the age of 64. Her courage, compassion and commitment to expose injustice the world over was an irritation to human rights abusers, and an inspiration to many journalists, including me. I’ll miss her as a loyal friend and colleague. And her brave journalism will be missed by many.

I always wondered : “How does Sue Lloyd-Roberts do it?”

How did she keep her nerve when she posed as a European gems importer and filmed with a hidden camera in Rangoon, under repressive military rule, in 2007?

How did she keep calm when she crossed army lines in 2011 with a fake Syrian identity card to become the first Western journalist to secretly film opposition protests at the very beginning of Syria’s uprising?

Doucet asked another journalist how Lloyd-Roberts kept her nerve.

“Her nerve was her rage against the oppressor and the unjust and her absolute determination to expose and if possible humiliate the villain,” he replied.

And that is the story of Sue Lloyd-Roberts’ bold breathtaking journalism over more than 40 years.

We need more like that, not fewer.