Who Killed The E.R.A.?

Thank you Annabelle, for the history lesson.

On The Serious Implications of a Dying Secularism in Europe (and the U.S.)

Via Maryam Namazie.

There are many ways to approach the question of fundamentalist religion in the modern world. But none quite so clear as Maryam's.

I Dare You To Look At This Girl... And Absorb These Statistics

Hillary Understands That "Women's Rights are Human Rights" and She Would Never Have Said What Joe Biden Said in China

THIS "gaffe" by Joe Biden is more than mildly disturbing.

Kirsten Powers (linked) quotes the VP and then explains why his statement is a problematic...

The vice president told an audience at Sichuan University in Chengdu: “Your policy has been one which I fully understand—I’m not second-guessing—of one child per family.”

This was an appalling statement coming from an American leader. What’s next? Will he say he isn’t “second-guessing” and “fully understands” that women are stoned for adultery in Iran?

Chai Ling, a two-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee and former leader of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Democracy Movement, told me she was “shocked and troubled” by Biden’s statement. Ling founded the organization All Girls Allowed to fight the one-child policy, which affects most couples and is designed to limit growth in China, which at 1.3 billion people is the world’s most populous country.

“On behalf of all the Chinese women and girls,” she says, Biden’s “statements are very hurtful. The one-child policy means the child has to be killed, whether it is forced or coerced through pressure. The women don’t feel like they have a choice. In a culture that is not welcoming to women who get pregnant and keep the baby they will be persecuted, financially and politically by the government.”

There is a fundamental disconnect when the U.S. party that claims to be "pro-choice" sympathizes with any government's decision to intervene in a woman's fundamental right to decide if her baby will be born. (Or worse, be killed after she is born.) SYD is, and always has been, pro-choice. I find this "gaffe" to be telling. And I suspect that my "pro-life" sisters (and brothers) will agree with me on this point: Infanticide and Gendercide are no gaffing matters.

It's a sad day for the Dem party when it's pervasive bent toward "cultural relativism" takes the place of sound judgement and moral conviction. To the point of winking and nodding at abhorrant, anti-woman policies like the "one child" rule in China.

I Bet Mr. Obama is Proud to Have Beaten THIS Crusader For Human (Women's) Rights Out of a Justly Deserved Peace Prize

Dr. Denis Mukwege, Congo.

One, of several, passed over by the Nobel Peace Prize Committee in 2009.

Millions of Girls Are "Disappeared" and Trafficked Into Brothels Each Year. Who Knew the U.S. Has A Government Program That Would Bring Them Here??

Thanks to No Quarter for keeping me up to the minute on the ACORN funds available for prostitution rings and brothels: HERE and HERE.

Am I losing my mind? There is actually a taxpayer financed, government program in the USA that would help someone traffic in 13 year old girls from El Salvador?

At the time that the stories above were breaking... I was sitting in a bookstore reading Half The Sky. After listening to this interview with the authors, Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. Their book is about the abysmal treatment of women, worldwide. Including the millions of girls that are trafficked into brothels every year.

I guess I was naive enough to believe that none of those girls could possibly be coming to the U.S.??

Shows what I know....

Be Grateful That At Least One Member of Obama's Adminstration Was Ready On Day One ... Carried Her Vision Forward Despite The Sexist Onslaught

As covered in WAPO.

"Indeed, sexism has followed Clinton from the campaign trail to Foggy Bottom, as seen most recently in the posturing outrage surrounding the exchange in Congo when Clinton reacted with understandable frustration to the now-infamous question regarding her husband's views. Major media outlets have joined the gossipfest, whether the New York Times, which covered Clinton's first big policy speech by discussing whether she was in or out with the White House, or The Washington Post, where a couple of reporters mused about whether a brew called Mad Bitch would be the beer of choice for the secretary of state.


Amid all the distractions, what is Clinton actually doing? Only overseeing what may be the most profound changes in U.S. foreign policy in two decades -- a transformation that may render the presidencies of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush mere side notes in a long transition to a meaningful post-Cold War worldview."

Ya know, this is what I have always so admired about Hillary Rodham Clinton. She is a workhorse. She gets shit done. Very little distracts her. Nothing really throws her off course.

Too bad we don't have her at the helm on Health Care. Huh?

SYD

PS. Thanks to Katalusis for the link!

Sarah Palin At Seneca Falls (& a H/T to the folks at Hillary's Village for covering the story so well!)

A very special H/T to Hillary's Village for keeping us apprised of the FABULOUS story that has unfolded in Seneca Falls!

The pictures themselves are worth a thousand words!


















I have long imagined myself on a pilgrimage to these places. And now I am more determined than ever to make one!

Under the PUMA Umbrella: Afrocity and Donna Darko Are Spot On! And where is Heidi Li?

It takes a while to find out who the deep thinkers in this movement are. One has to work backwards.... from some of the higher profile "political reporting" blogs to the more obscure, philosophically oriented ones.

The first true gem of a Feminist philosopher I found, while navigating the Pumasphere, was Heidi Li Feldman. But, she has been silent of late. So I've had to go poking about for other purveyors of cutting edge Feminist analysis.

Imagine my pleasure then, just this very week, to stumble upon Afrocity's assessment of how the boyz in the GOP are treating Sarah Palin about now. This author's grasp of western, anti-woman, mythologies is plainly obvious. Her choices of artwork, stunning! I was, quite honestly, bowled over by the deep truths the lie between the lines in her deft analysis.

That such an awesome piece comes on the heels of Donna Darko's excellent rant about why white women are not responsible for other people's misconceptions about Feminism speaks for the incredible wealth of wisdom within the PUMA movement. Yes, Ms. Darko nailed it. Hit the ball out of the park, so to speak. Home run!!

Yoohoo! PUMAs!! We have some real thinkers here! Top notch movers and shakers. Herstorians in the truest sense. Their writings deserve attention... the kind of attention that only we can garner for them. And only if we broaden our movement, rather than narrow it.

So, let's not waste time bickering about whether we should more closely associate with Democrats or Republicans. OK?

Let's embrace them BOTH. And more!

SYD

PS. Many thanks to all who have continued to call for a broad PUMA umbrella this week. This (photo above) was the broadest I could find.

Golf anyone?

Phyllis Chesler and Marcia Pappas TONIGHT on No We Won't Radio

Dr. Chesler's thirteen books and thousands of articles and speeches have inspired people on many diverse issues. Her books include: Women and Madness; Women, Money and Power; About Men; With Child: A Diary of Motherhood; Mothers on Trial: The Battle for Children and Custody; Sacred Bond: The Legacy of Baby M; Patriarchy: Notes of an Expert Witness; Feminist Foremothers in Women's Studies, Psychology, and Mental Health; Letters to a Young Feminist; Woman's Inhumanity to Woman; Women of the Wall: Claiming Sacred Ground at Judaism's Holy Site; The New Anti-Semitism. The Current Crisis and What We Must Do About It; and The Death of Feminism. What's Next in the Struggle for Women's Freedom. A revised and updated edition of her classic, best-selling work, Women and Madness, was published in 2005. Her work has been translated into more than ten languages.

No radio needed Our show is online- If your computer is down no problem call on the phone and hear the entire show right on the phone- Please come ! Monday 10 PM eastern/ Bring your questions.
Call-in 347 539-5420 .

Event: Free Us Now Radio Show
What: Performance
Host: BettyJean Kling
Start Time: Monday, April 6 at 10:00pm
End Time: Monday, April 6 at 11:30pm
Where: BLOGTALK RADIO
Call-in: 347 539-5420


These are two very outspoken critics of Shari'a law for women. I HIGHLY recommend tuning in. (And I sure hope I can stay up this late.)

Links to recent essays on the subject are HERE and HERE

Feminist Sticky Wickets: Women and Radical Islam

Recently found this excellent Feminist blog, by a well respected scholar who I am familiar with from my college days. It deals alot with Muslim-American issues. It's now linked in my blogroll, in case anyone else wants to track it from the Stray Dawg Blog.

Dr. Chesler is so well published that I cannot even begin to list her works here. Suffice to say that they are impressive. She is unabashedly pro-Israel, which may be a turn off to some. I, personally, do not see the fight against anti-semitism, to be all that different from the one against misogyny. Oppression is oppression. No form of it should ever be tolerated. So I am OK with Chesler's leanings. Plus, I appreciate *knowing* her "bias." (Most non-Feminist authors don't divulge biases. That is a fact.)

Women's issues in Radical Islam are truly one of the stickiest wickets in Feminism today.... and I give Chesler high marks for attempting to grapple with it! For my money... she is quite accurate in her assessment of the state of crisis that Feminist scholars find themselves in over the subject. I'll be ordering some of her newer books now, to read after I return my Spring Break journeys.

Speaking of books... I'd also like to recommend that everyone who is REALLY interested in this topic read "Three Cups of Tea" by Greg Mortensen. If you take the time to do that... you will find his insider's view of Pakistani and Afghani politics invaluable. Mr. Mortensen insists that the education of women/ girls is the ONLY solution to Radical Islam in those parts of the world. Warring in the areas is, not only unhelpful, it produces more enrollees in militant madrassas. So it's counterproductive. Note: The author is NOT a pacifist. He is a former soldier, in fact. But.... he tries to share *what works.* And his "argument" (if you want to call it that) is impressive.

I am spending quite a bit of time on this subject right now. And will be posting a few blogs on it soon... I hope. But, in the meantime, here is an excellent essay by Artemis March about Feminism's desperate need to break with some of the taboos related to "multicultural relativism."

Peace,

SYD

Don Your Pink Saris, Ladies, And Get Your Big Sticks!

In the wake of the recent wife killing incident in Buffalo, NY, I found this scholarly piece particularly enlightening. I hope that our law enforcement officials are reading it. It outlines some of the major differences between what we usually call "domestic violence" and what would be referred to, in certain subsets of our population as "honor killing."

Let's get clear about this.....

"Honor Killings" are premeditated acts of cold blooded murder. They often take place within families in which several members are involved in their planning and execution. They are particularly gruesome, in that they tend to involve hours of torture leading up to the actual murder. There is nothing "second degree" about them.

I appreciate that "The New Agenda" is calling for agents of the law to explore these distinctions. I think Dr. Socks hits the nail on the proverbial head with this statement:

"It does us no good to paper over the distinctions; on the contrary, we need to study our subject closely to understand how best to expose and combat each variation. We must be like doctors fighting disease, seeking to identify precisely the pathogens involved."

If U.S. women can't get some help from law enforcement in this matter, we may be forced to take matters into our own hands, by donning pink saris and carrying big sticks!

I actually love pink. Wear it all the time! And I have a few big sticks here as well. Who is with me?

SYD

On edit, I'll just add that it's no wonder they want to take Sarah and Kirsten's guns away. Geesh!