Whitehouse Council on Women and Girls

I don't think many people realize how huge this is. Here's President Obama's speech before signing the executive order. I told you he was a feminist.

Is an apple a vegetable? (My appologies to Anderson Cooper)

No. It's not. This question is kind of like asking "Is pornography adultery?" If you have no clue about botany or nutrition, sure you could make the argument that the tree-growing fructose-containing apple is, in fact a vegetable. Similarly, if you have no clue about relationships, sex, or performance art you could make the argument that someone who is alone with their computer watching people ze never has met and never will meet while engaging in the sexual act one performs upon one's self is actually committing adultery.

I hate this question. I hate this idea that masturbation and/or watching porn is "cheating". How is this cheating? Doesn't adultery have to involve another person, not just a picture of another person? What's more, if you think about someone else while having sex with your partner is that adultery? Well, if watching porn is, then thinking about someone else while you're having sex with your primary partner most certainly is as well!

However, it doesn't matter how fervently you argue that apples are vegetables and that watching porn or masturbating is the same as cheating; it's just not fucking true. It's not. I don't care how many degrees in botany or nutrition you have, apples aren't vegetables, and porn isn't adultery.

Here's why: infidelity involves another person. Whether it's an emotional affair or a physical one, someone else is involved. So, unless you've got Multiple Personality Disorder, masturbation regardless of what you watch while doing it, does not involve another person and is therefore not infidelity.

But people hate porn. Some people hate porn (some people hate apples too), and will do whatever the fuck they can to give it an even worse name than it already have. There's a whole lot of bullshit that people use to reason this view, but it basically boils down to an idea that masturbation is "wrong" (why?), and watching other people fuck is "wrong".

And yet, suppose that someone likes to watch CNN while masturbating -- does that mean that watching CNN constitutes adultery? No. It means that they really like to be informed about what's going on in the world. But none of these anti-porn assholes would even make that argument, they would just say that that person is "sick" and that it's "wrong" to beat or rub off while watching Anderson Cooper. I highly doubt that. Have you seen Anderson Cooper?

But the bottom line is, for these people, that masturbation is wrong, porn is wrong, and anything and everything even remotely associated with either of these things is wrong. Morally wrong, and a danger to your relationship because if your partner finds out that you've been masturbating while watching Anderson Cooper, ze is going to think one of twho things:

1. OMG! Ur so sikkkkk!!!
2. Hey, can I play?

And sex for recreation is also wrong.

Oh god, can you tell us when it's going to stop?

Yes. It's snowing again. For the moment it has ceased, but, and maybe it's just me and the weather hasn't noticed this yet -- it's fucking MARCH. The Spring Equinox is less than two weeks away and this part of the country rarely sees snow once in January let alone having it fall in fucking March! I'm so sick of this, I could plotz.

Who knows, I just might. (At which point I will get back to you and detail what is exactly involved in a "plotz", because even though I've used that word most of my life, even I don't entirely know what it's supposed to mean.

In the meantime, I think I know why Uncle Walt chose now to start his regrowth. He knew it was going to keep snowing. Today he went out into the yard and sat under that weird bush-tree thing for about three hours. He says this area of the world isn't the best for his colors since it's not the greatest camoflage, but it still works out pretty well. (He's more used to the blues and greens of arctic ice, rather than the brown of dirt and tree limbs.)

Point of order, re comments

I pretty much publish all comments, whether they agree with me or disagree with me. The only thing I ask of commenters is that you NOT USE ALL CAPS TO TRY TO MAKE YOUR POINT BY DOING THE EQUIVALENT OF YELLING. It's really, really annoying.

So, keep it civil, use proper capitalization, and, if it's not too much to ask, correct spelling and punctuation would be greatly appreciated too. (Although, correct spelling can't be universally enforced since I'm really not that good at it myself.)

Any and all comments which violate civility will be deleted. This includes threats, ad hominem attacks, comments written in ALL CAPS, divulging private information about someone other than yourself, and anything else I deem to be exceptionally rude (although, I will try not to have too thin of a skin on this one).

I want comments and discussion, but there are some things I just won't put up with. The internet equivalent of screaming is one of them.

And now for something completely different: a cardboard drawing of the Kool-Aid man

Ooooh yeah.

Update on the 9-year-old from Brazil

Apparently, her rapist will not be excommunicated like those who helped to save her life. Apparently, abortionis worse than rape in the eyes of the Catholic Church. Well, considering that the Catholic Church has historically used rape as a weapon to help their soldiers get closer to G*D (Crusades anyone?) this doesn't surprise me in the least.

If I had any respect left for the institution itself, I would spit. But I don't. Sorry, but I gotta back Heart up on this one and add my own power to her curse. This is completely disgusting. There will be no rest for the patriarchs, or any of those who uphold this hideous idea that abortion "the taking of an innocent life" (what about original sin?) is worse, so much worse as to (in the eyes of this organization) deny someone salvation, than is the rape of a 9-year-old girl and the destruction of her life.

People, wake up. This is how most religions view women. The violation of our bodies is does not even affect the leaders in the least, but if we try to take our bodies back we deserve hellfire and damnation.

I wonder what Jesus of Nazareth would have to say about this bullshit that's being done in his name?

Attention Seattle: the Croc is back!!!

Why did no one on the Slog mention this? Did they think that the ad would speak for itself?

The Crocodile, the Crocodile, the Croc, is reopening.

For those of you who are especially nerdy in your love for the Seattle music scene (like I am), let me say that again.

The Croc, 2200 2nd Ave Seattle 98121, that, when it closed abruptly "in December, 2007, broke many a heart and" made some "folks [feel] a piece of Seattle had died," is being reopened "[a]fter months of renovations and reconstruction", according to its website.

I fear we're never going to get answers as to why the Croc's manager called all the bartenders one Saturday night in December of 2007 and told them not to come in to work the next day; but at least there will be some return to normalcy in the Seattle music scene... even if there aren't that many acts worth hearing these days. (Although, it appears from the Croc's concert calendar, Special Guest is going to be playing a lot of shows in the next couple of months. Ha ha.)

A couple hints to the Croc's booking staff: Bad Dream Good Breakfast, Toy Box Trio, Cherry Poppin Daddies, and (longshot here...) Spiraling.

Uncle Walt shedding!

You may not know this, but dragons occasionally shed all of their outter scales and regrow a new hide. Usually they are hibernating on great hoards. Naturally, this makes them more vulnerable to attacks by adventurers, and more than a few dragons have been defeated during thier periodic shedding. This explains why this shedding is of an unknown incriment of time.

Mymuch-beloved dragon incarnation of my great-grandad, Walt Abplanalp, has begun his once-a-incriment-of-time shedding and has turned gesso-white all over his body.

I'm not sure how long it's going to take for him to grow all his scales back, but I'll be sure to post pictures of his new hide.

Preach it sista

Brazlian bishop excommunicating mother girl who had an abortion... at 9-years-old.

WitchUponAStar says everything I would say, so go read.

And now for something completely different: a satelite named after a comedian

NASA has plans to launch a new addition to the International Space Station, which will be delivered this December. But first, it wants OUR help to name what they're currently calling "Node 3".

On last night's Colbert Report, Stephen told us the top suggested name was "XENU", but urged the Colbert Nation to do everything within its power to get that node named after Colbert. Why not?

Today, the top suggested name is Colbert, but it's hard to tell how much of the vote the suggested names have, because the percentage tabulation only counts the names that NASA came up with itself -- those Firefly-watching NERDS! Something must be done. Go to the website, click the button for other suggestions and type in "COLBERT". We'll show NASA why Firefly only lasted one season, while Stephen recently did his 500th show!

Aside: Seriously though, I don't get Firefly. I'm the only one of my friends who doesn't own the box set of its single season and has never seen the movie. I don't get it. I don't want it explained to me. I don't want to watch it. It's just like football, okay. I have no interest and the next person who tries to get me to be interested in it is going to have things thrown at them (soft things that won't do any damage, but things nonetheless).

Yay! Another reason to hate the iPhone!

Fat shaming aps!!! Yay!!!

Look, I know, I know, some people need to diet and counting calories helps them, but most of the people who do count calories really don't need to.

And I just hate that contraption so goddamn much!

"The author concludes that the subject is a judgmental bitch."

So, new study comes out (actually came out in 2007) that concludes that feminists aren't all man-hating lesbians. Some of them are heterosexual. Some of them are men! Wow. Neat. In fact:

"They found that having a feminist partner was linked to healthier heterosexual relationships for women. Men with feminist partners also reported both more stable relationships and greater sexual satisfaction. According to these results, feminism does not predict poor romantic relationships, in fact quite the opposite."

(Emphasis mine.) Turns out feminism is good for heterosexual couples, even. (Although, I'm pretty sure those of us who are feminists and in heterosexual relationships already knew that. Just ask my Schmoogie.) Since this promotes feminism as being a good thing (rather than bad), it's been spread around the femi-sphere -- and even Twisty has written about it.

Twisty's story is good until about 2/3rds of the way through.

"Still, I have to wonder how many of the women identifying as “feminist” in the study were in fact the sort of feminist for whom “pole dancer” is a synonym. What I suggest is not altogether an unlikely scenario, since this species of feminist is, as we know, much more common than the feminist kind of feminist. Feminists who use their empowerfulization to reclaim femininity, you know, for themselves goddammit, would of course enjoy the reinforcingly pleasant side effect of appeasing dudes who are threatened by non-patriarchal gender roles. Which just might account for the male satisfaction with feminism found in the study."

Wow. Judgmental much? This little mini-tirade from Twisty translates thusly: unless your feminism is exactly the same as my feminism, you're a pole dancer, and as such have no value as a human being. (Because Twisty is one of these people who thinks that sex workers have no self-respect, no value as human beings -- let alone feminists -- and therefore shouldn't exist.)

The other thing that stands out so glaringly in this mini-tirade (as in fact, it is pretty tame compared to some of the other, rather amusing, things that Twisty has gone off a bridge over), is that Twisty sees heterosexuals as reinforcing the patriarchy simply by virtue of being heterosexual. So, even if you do identify as a feminist, if you're a heterosexual feminist, you are a sex-worker and therefore not only not a "feminist kind of feminist" but also not worth the air you breath.

So really, this study is completely wrong. All the feminists who aren't man-hating lesbians aren't real feminists, because if you want to be a real feminist you must also choose to be a lesbian and hate men. All men. Even Ewen McGreggor and Christian Bale -- actually, especially Christian Bale cause he yells at women. Otherwise, you're a pole-dancing sex worker -- and that's an insult to humanity.

Get over yourself Twisty. You are not the BE-ALL END-ALL of feminism. Cast your jaundiced eye upon my middle finger.

Finally, a reason to be glad you're not an Oscar Meyer weiner

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

So, Barack Obama isn't the anti-Christ because he "isn't popular enough". That means only one thing: Oscar Meyer Weiners must be the anti-Christ. Think about it.

If I were an Oscar Meyer Weiner, everyone would be in love with me.

There are only two positions where the love and adoration of all are expected and required: Oscar Meyer Weiner and anti-Christ. Is it not possible that the two could be one single, delicious sign of the End of Days? I mean, Dobson said that the anti-Christ would be a Jewish male. "Meyer" is a Jewish name -- and there certainly isn't anything more male than being a tube of meat and meat by-products. And we've all already been indoctrinated into believing that this tubed meat is not only delicious, but nutritious! How old were you when you learned the song of the anti-Christ? It's too late! Only the vegans, Kosher Jews, and Halal Muslims will survive unscathed!

EVERYBODY PANIC!

Seriously though, this "end of the world" "anti-Christ" bullshit is getting really old. Every generation since the beginning of time has thought that it was the last. Get over yourselves. Really. And this guy does not need to be narrating a show about the end of the world. He shouldn't be on the teevee at all.

My feminist heros Part 1: Mary Kay Ash

I've been a Mary Kay Independent Beauty Consultant for nearly two years now, and while I'm getting into doing it full-time, I'm going back and reading her autobiography, Miracles Happen. As I've been reading, (actually re-reading), I've been noticing a few things standing out a little more. I hadn't yet come into my feminism fully when I first read Miracles Happen, so there were a few things the great importance of which I missed the first time around.

For instance:

"One company paid me $25,000 a year to be its national training director, but, in truth, I was acting as the national sales manager - and for a salary much less than the job was worth. Then there were times when I would be asked to take a man out on the road to train him, and after six months be brought back to Dallas, made my superior, and given twice my salary! It happened more than once. What really angered me was when I was told that these men earned more because they had families to support. I had a family to support too. In those days, it seemed that women's brains were worth only fifty cents on the dollar in a male-run corporation. Even more insulting was the way a woman's ideas were rarely respected. I became enraged every time I presented a good marketing plan and was dismissed with "Mary Kay, you're thinking just like a woman." I knew that in my company "thinking like a woman was going to be an asset, not a liability!"

(Italics in the original, bolded text mine)

It's statements like those bolded in the paragraph above that make me wonder why Mary Kay Ash has been over looked for 50 years by feminists. Looking at her words now, when contemporary feminist writers don't hesitate to let their words reflect their rage, Mary Kay's words are pretty tame. But when you think about the world in which she grew up, that she would acknowledge her rage and then go on to do something to change the world she lived in so dramatically, it's hard not to see her as a feminist icon. Even if she did change her world with what some might dub as "proping up the patriarchy" -- because after all, Mary Kay's empire was founded on a tool used by the patriarchy to make women feel bad about their bodies -- right? I mean, that's all she did, right? Make up?

Wrong. The company is called Mary Kay Cosmetics, but it's not really about make up. It's about skin care. And the way Mary Kay taught us was that we need to teach other women about skin care. Maybe the reasons skin care is so important is so that we can be physically attractive in our faces, but the motto of the company isn't Enriching Women's Lives for no reason. Mary Kay Ash wanted women to learn about their skin, to feel good about themselves, to be confident in their abilities, to be able to run their own businesses, and to gain financial independence in a world that pretty much ignored a woman's need and ability to provide for herself.

If that's not feminism, then apparently, I'm in the wrong club.

Mary Kay Ash took something that pissed her off and actually created change in the world. Today there are more than 1.5 million active Independent Beauty Consultants, like myself, in more than 30 markets worldwide. South East Asia, Eastern Europe, Iran -- places where women are even less respected than they are in the West, places where it's incredibly difficult for a woman to survive without the support and approval of a man. How is that not feminism?

I'm not saying that skin care is a feminist act. I'm not saying that make up is a feminist act. What I'm saying here, ladies and possibly gentlemen, is that Mary Kay Ash was completely forgotten by the feminist community, and I think that's something that needs to change. Maybe she didn't do a whole lot of feminist writing (that is, writing couched in popular feminist terms), but she did do and say a lot that lead to the actual empowerment of millions of women. Her work is as important to feminism as the work of any other woman (or man, for that matter) who created change for women and for society in the last -- however long its been.

I love Mary Kay. I love Mary Kay products. I love teaching other women about skin care and letting them choose the things they want to learn about (surprise, I don't sell make up to everyone who comes to a skin care class, because not every woman likes make up -- although I do hear "I don't really wear make up" as a reason not to host a class quite often and I smile and say "that's okay, the first class is about skin care anyway -- you do have skin right?" I joke). I love that Mary Kay Ash saw a world that ignored women's abilities and decided to act to capitalize on the abilities of women. She wanted to create a world that had

"instead of a tightly closed corporate door bearing the sign "For Men Only", our company has an open portal that bears the invitation "Everyone Welcome - Especially Women."

And that's the world that she worked to create. That's the world that Mary Kay Cosmetics still works to create. That's why I'm proud to call myself a Mary Kay Independent Beauty Consultant. And I would love to share it with you!

Interview meme, care of Natalia

1. If you had to describe your childhood with just two adjectives - which adjectives would you pick?

Long and hard? Hehe. I'd really rather not describe my childhood if it's all the same to anybody.

2. Could you name some of your favourite photographers?

Yes, I could. I'm very fond of Lois Greenfield, especially her large format black&white stuff (at left). I also adore Richard Avedon (he did a lot of portraiture, fashion photography and pictures of naked men -- btw, he was very gay and died in 2004 -- at right), ManRay (BFFL of Marcel Duchamp, my favorite artist of all time, and pioneer of modernist photography -- up top); and also Annie Liebowitz, but who doesn't adore her? Speaking in more conte-

porary terms, the photography of my colleagues Braydie Duncan and Matt Hinshaw are marvelous, as well as Nikki Allen, and Janna Richards (with whom I traded rose-themed photographs and her work is hanging in my studio).

3. You've mentioned that you despise Dickens - can you write about that in more detail?

I could, but I don't think my reasons for despising Dickens will be very satisfying. I really just don't like his style of writing. It's not only long-winded, but it's boring, and I am certain that a thousand monkeys at a thosand typewriters for a thousand days could write A Tale of Two Cities. Although, I do respect the themes in Dickens' work, the disparities between the upper-crust and everyone else in Industrial Brittain, so at least he's got the social conscious thing down.

4. Describe the most vivid dream that you have ever had - or one of the most vivid dreams ever.
I have done a lot of lucid dreaming, where I can control what happens in the dream. Usually it's because I wake up from a dream I didn't like the ending to and I go back into that dream and redo the ending... like this one dream when I was in the lair of a murderer (it was totally CSI) and he was about to catch me, but I dialed 911 on my cellphone, and got my knife out of my bag and totally killed him (in self-defense, of course).

5. At the moment, what's the coolest item in your desk?

I'm totally obsessed. I've got a whole bunch of Obama paraphenalia, including a(n empty) bottle of Yes We Can Cola, produced by local soda maker Jones Soda (whose HQ is about two blocks from my alma matre, Cornish College of the Arts, and who give away free soda on Friday afternoons between 3-5p -- the rest of the time it's 50 cents a bottle (max 2)).

My desk is a complete mess right now though. I haven't been in there for a while cause it's been cold here. Oh yeah, out there, my studio, in the garage -- but at least it's in the same corner with the water heater so it's kinda warm.

When Elie Wiesel calls you evil...

Nobel Peace-Prize winner, Elie Wiesel wrapped up in Madoff scheme. (Via.)

As Woody Allen would say, sheesh.

If some pictures are worth a thousand words...

How many is this one worth? I certainly have no words. It doesn't even make any sense.

Brought to you by Freeper Madness, the most hiliarious blog on the interwebs.

SeaTac police officer assaults 15 year old girl

I just saw this on the news tonight and I am pissed off.

A young woman (of color, from what I can tell), is shown to a cell, kicks a shoe out the cell door as it is being closed and then an officer rushes in, slams her against a wall, throws her to the ground by her hair, punches her twice, and then after she is hand cuffed pulls her up by her hair and carries her out of the cell.

The officer, Deputy Paul Schene, 31, has pled not guilty to misdemenor assault charges in King County District court.

From the P-I:

"The girl was arrested after she was caught in her parents' car, which had been reported stolen from her parents' Tukwila home. Deputy Travis Brunner spotted the car driving without headlights about 3:45 a.m. on 32nd Avenue South in SeaTac and pulled it over.
She and another 15-yearold girl were arrested and taken to SeaTac City Hall to be fingerprinted before being transported to the youth detention center."

But she had the audacity to be brown and kick a shoe at the officer. How dare she.

I hope this motherfucker, Schene, is convicted, thrown off the squad and actually serves a sentence of some kind.

My heart goes out to the young woman and I hope that she finds some way to trust police again (and doesn't steal her parents' car again, if that is in fact what happened).

Well that was unnecessarily complicated

I had a helluva time getting the new banner up, but there it is:

I chose this particular composition for two reasons:

1. There wasn't enough pink on my blog.
2. I fucking love cupcakes.

Now that I know how to get the new banner up, I can change banners like I eat cupcakes (usually one every 6 or 7 weeks, depending on when people have birthdays and whatever), and never get bored with this whole internet thing. Not that I'm bored right now or anything.

Hehe...

Got my LSAT score...

151. Right smack dab in the middle. 50% of the people who took the test I did on that day did better than me. Conversely, I did better than 50% of the people who took that test that day.

My first thought was "geeze, can I still get into law school? Should I even try?" My next thoughts were of all the people who have told me "if anyone can do law school, you can", and my next thoughts, by far the most reassuring, were that perhaps that test didn't test the skills I possess that make me a good candidate for law school or a good potential lawyer. (Later things like, "I was really stressed out..." and "I've never really been that good at taking tests anyway" popped up too.)

So, I looked at the previous stats for people who were admitted to the school I want to attend. I don't remember which year it was, but 3 people with similar LSAT scores and GPAs were admitted. Three. To some, that might seem dismal. To me, it means there's still a chance. I will be applying, but for now I'm going to get my act together working my business (something that makes me a unique candidate), volunteering, and getting my brain back in shape so that when the time comes I will appear as an ideal candidate, even if my LSAT score doesn't necessarily reflect that.

There's also the possibility of taking it again too. I haven't ruled that out.