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So essentially, the enemy of my enemy is not my friend, he's just another moronic, entitled turd in the bucket.

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Messages - Jenne

#46
Or Kill Me / Re: Rape
December 01, 2011, 05:11:22 PM
I remember that SNL skit and I remember thinking at the time, Wow.  Ballsy.  And not cool.  But then, I'm sensitive to that shit ever since my dad went away.

I think WE, HERE at PD can reason away why jokes about taboo subjects can be "ok" or "not ok"...but I question the level of meta-thinking your average Joe will indulge in over the matter.  I think most humor is learned, just like I think most bigotry against folks is learned, and I think most folks KNOW that rape is wrong without needing to know anyone who went through it.

Male on male rape is one of those ills of Western civ you just don't hear about to the degree it lives with you the way male on female does, just like incest is known, but the degree to which is happens would probably shock most folks who believe it's a rare entity.  It's not.  "Prison rape" gets the treatment it does because folks tend to not see an inmate as a victim.  They "deserve what they get" because they are incarcerated.  Every evil that visits them is what they get in return for their misdeeds, regardless of circumstance.

So to humanize the inmate would mean that we treat that person as we would ourselves--wanting the best possible for them.  Society demonizes inmates and treats them like they don't deserve anything but badwrong anything, badwrong medical practices, badwrong food, badwrong conditions.  Why not add rape into the mix and then laugh HA HA buttrape is funny HA HA?

I think throughout history, you'll see that dehumanizing the victim in a heinous act will actually allow those of us who would otherwise change that act or make it less acceptable to hold off and hold back.  That's not to say we sanction it, but neither do we actively participate in its demise, either.

I know I'm saying something a little bold, here, but I can't remember how many times I've heard "I hope you meet 'Bubba' in jail and get what you deserve"...what does that say?  That we HOPE that people get their asses torn up.  As punishment.  I'm sure it's said in jest, I'm sure those saying it don't actually literally hope that, but it would certainly be a different proposition altogether if someone said to a woman, "I hope you're met by a gang of rapists in the dark of night and ridden till the cows come home."
#47
:lulz: @ Faust.

This guy's a religious nutball.  Pure and simple.  And you know what happens when they distribute that KoolAid to their followers.
#48
We had "Nazis" here at my house recently--unbeknownst to ourselves, of course.  At our Halloween party, my cousin invited HER cousin whose wedding she'd just attended in the OC.  She grew up with her (this is a cousin on her dad's side, she's a cousin of mine on her mom's side), but hadn't seen her in YEARS.  Knew she'd been into drugs, etc.  But thought she'd cleaned up her act, etc.

She and her new husband (tall, palefaced fucker who looks like a WE WANT YOU ad for the Marines) were all chill and shit.  Till the conversation outside turned somehow to JEWS.  She started telling my then-pretty-soused brother "WELL YOU KNOW ABOUT THEM JEWS.  YOU KNOW, HOW IT IS, WHEN YOU HAVE A JEW-FRIEND."  It was like something out of a bad comedy act or something.  Straight textbook assbaggery, and it caught everyone unawares. 

My brother just sorta blinked at her and said, "No, and I hope you don't mean what I THINK you mean, because that's just wrong and weird."

I guess the conversation devolved from there, and my brother ended up making it clear they were no longer welcome.  I didn't know about any of this as I was inside the house entertaining other guests, but they said their goodbyes and had a funny look on their faces when I said they should come back some time when my husband was home.  HAR.

Later on I found out the moment they decided to leave was when my brother said "You KNOW who owns this house, right?  An Afghan Muslim."  HAR HAR.

I hadn't seen the white power tatt on the back of the dude's neck, but apparently my uncle WAS aware that this guy and his buds were part of a white power pack of assholes.  So yeah, I met some real-life Nazi assholes for the first time in my life...I've met plenty of Haulocaust survivors, know TONS of jacked up bigots (my in-laws are the worst perps at it I know of), but damn if I ever met a real-life white-power bastard.
#49
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on December 01, 2011, 03:45:37 PM
Quote from: Iptuous on December 01, 2011, 03:43:33 PM
i would assume the arrow of causality largely points the other direction, no?
surely, Ms. Smith wouldn't have become a nobel laureate if it weren't for the pole dancing?  :)
(not arguing that the sex trade wouldn't act as a catalyst for their destruction, though)

Never mind, dude, we're only pulling your leg.  Everyone knows prostitutes always have a heart of gold, and they love what they do.  Then they all retire to be madams, and the process continues.

Seriously.

Fictional Hollywood Scenario--HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
#50
Quote from: Anna Mae Bollocks on December 01, 2011, 03:28:03 PM
The sex industry seems to fuck everybody up, period. I've known women who only danced in tittie flops, didn't prostitute, and they were fucked up, never had their own place to stay, chronic drug use...look at Anna Nichole Smith, didn't she start at Rick's Cabaret in Houston? That's the "high class" place, not some sleaze joint...she did Playboy, all top-of-the-line stuff and SHE was even fucked up.

I had a neighbor once who was a former escort. She was on crack.

Nobody can force themselves to do any of this shit and not expect to be damaged by it somehow.

Paradoxically, I'd legalize everything, just to make it safer for these women. But it sucks.

Stella, I am on board with your views here, I think--esp the legalization.  All of my experience and those I've read about, seen, heard, etc., viewed in documentaries very much hold out according to what you've personally seen as well.

I know of few instances where this shit wasn't fucked up six ways to Sunday.  Now that *could* be just anecdotal fodder...but I'm thinking, no.
#51
She already did that, and said in very strict words she didn't want that.  She wasn't terribly disrespectful, I felt at the time, just overreacted I thought.  

The only way I would've stopped is if 1) my boss had said to and 2) the co-workers agreed.  But my fellow co-workers and I were on this sort of secret mission to let the kid explore and learn in his own way.  We were a private school--we could get away with that shit.  But if the bosslady had brought the hammer down (now, she was a wife of a longtime friend of my grandfather's, so the nepotism here would have extended far enough that if I'd gotten in trouble with the parents, it'd been ok, something odd had happened similar to this about kids playing in puddles and being wet and I got blamed, blah blah and she had my back), I probably would have had to capitulate.
#52
Quote from: Placid Dingo on December 01, 2011, 02:57:19 PM
Quote from: Jenne on December 01, 2011, 02:34:38 PM
I guess as I said, our own experiences and opinions are going to vary on this to a large degree.  But you can't have one side of this issue, I believe, without the other.  To dismiss it as wholly unplausible and not the main of the whole theme is beyond disingenuous.  I believe, Placid Dingo, your more benign view of those who work as prostitutes and those who use them seems to be rather more or less...in the minority? for lack of a better word. And I understand the need to not villify the john nor codify a prostitute as dirty, rotten people...but in the main, there's nothing to be upheld about either state. (eta: because society tries hard to perpetuate this theme, not as strongly on the side of the john, mind you, more towards the women walking the streets)

Because the so-called freedom to sell yourself in the end is more of a jail, and the so-called freedom to buy someone for a while makes you their jailor.

I guess the simplist I can put it is that I do not believe that if you're talking about prostitution you may as well be discussing human trafficking. I think the two things are so different that what we say about one does not by default relate to the other.

I have views on both, and they differ wildly. I do acknowledge the overlap, but still feel that we should have codes and operations in place to ensure legal prostitution does not support human trafficking, rather than treating them as one and the same.

Not meaning to be a smart arse, but I'm not sure what you're saying I'm calling implausible.

Also, by my benign views, do you mean my view that (afaik) Cain's scenario is, at least in my country, atypical of prostitution in general? Or do you feel I'm being generally supportive of prostitution?

I think your ability to separate what keeps the generation of selling sex as an occupation and those who use it from the evils that come along with it is not a majority view and may minimize the dangers people put themselves in while pursuing this act in either buying or selling.

I agree with those who are saying you cannot separate the bad from the so-called good here, given that the good isn't even ALL THAT GOOD.  And may not really even exist except in the minds of those who believe it's all a-ok.

Again, without villainizing either party outright, I just think it's turning a blind eye to remove one side inherently from the other.  Feminism, humanism, everything aside--the collateral damage of this practice in the world as it exists today just includes too much brutality and malice to be ignored.  And this is even in the most benign of circumstances where it's used.
#53
I thought the supposition on pesitcides was a good one...soil leeching is a huge problem that rarely gets addressed outside the organic farming crowd.

I heard this whinefest on NPR the other day about local San Diego folks who are suing the organic farms around them because of the pestilence that has infected their suburban homes.  This 70 year old harridan was telling the organic farmer who was representing them on the show that she moved to California "to get away from the bugs they have in the midwest!"

The farmer had no sympathy for her.

Neither do I.
#54
Quote from: 'Kai' ZLB, M.S. on November 30, 2011, 10:00:24 PM
Quote from: Jenne on November 30, 2011, 08:35:07 PM
Quote from: 'Kai' ZLB, M.S. on November 30, 2011, 03:59:16 PM

I think it's pretty screwed up that wearing a dress at all was a matter for a beating.

It is screwed up.  It's beyond screwed up.  This classic case of fear cuts to the quick, doesn't it?  It was shocking to me at the time, which shows you how sheltered I grew up.  My own dad's pretty alpha, but he wouldn't beat a child or his mother for wearing a fucking dress...esp seeing how happy the kid was in it.

I tell you what though--when I worked in the preschool in the afternoons, I knew to take the dress off of him 4-5 mins before his mom came to get him.  He still got to wear it, and gaze at himself in the little handheld mirror that came along with all the playset stuff.  He'd build blocks in the dress and sometimes wear a crown with it.  And we let him.  Until we knew it was close to the time he had to go home.  :)

Yes, I was an old hand at subterfuge back in the day.

As Reverend Michal used to say to me, "It's a piece of cloth. How does a piece of cloth have a gender?"

There are cultural stigmas to everything, Kai, you know that.  And clothing has become a line of demarcation folks use to tell one another apart.  Pure and simple.

Some people FEAR, fundamentally, that coloring outside the lines that happens when the mind is open to change.  Some people FEAR and are willing to strike out against their children opening their own minds to change without the parental direction that would make them "safe" in doing so.

It's fucked up.  My kiddo tried on gramma's sparkly spike heels at 2 with his cousin of the same age, and we prize that photo my mom took of it.  The look of sheer joy on the boy's face mixed with "tee hee, lookie what I got?" makes it priceless.  I don't know where this man in my example went wrong in his head about what is well and good for his son at THREE to explore--I shudder to think what has happened to the two of theme these last 15 years!
#55
I guess as I said, our own experiences and opinions are going to vary on this to a large degree.  But you can't have one side of this issue, I believe, without the other.  To dismiss it as wholly unplausible and not the main of the whole theme is beyond disingenuous.  I believe, Placid Dingo, your more benign view of those who work as prostitutes and those who use them seems to be rather more or less...in the minority? for lack of a better word. And I understand the need to not villify the john nor codify a prostitute as dirty, rotten people...but in the main, there's nothing to be upheld about either state. (eta: because society tries hard to perpetuate this theme, not as strongly on the side of the john, mind you, more towards the women walking the streets)

Because the so-called freedom to sell yourself in the end is more of a jail, and the so-called freedom to buy someone for a while makes you their jailor.
#56
I think there's a distinction that needs to be made, and this can be because of where we all live, grew up and our experiences in these things. 

There's prostitution, which includes the sex trade, the illegal side that makes most practices that go along with it something that degrades all involved and is meant to, and there's sex for sale.

Now, there's a reason why there's a difference in what is meant by an escort vs. a hooker.  I think, Placid Dingo, you're trying to say that "prostitution" as you see it is more of a "sex for sale" practice, and slavery, child endangerment, kidnapping, etc. are a separate part of that whole sex TRADING business.

I think unfortunately, as many have pointed out, it's sort of a fantasy to think that they're truly inseparable, and that there isn't something fundamentally broken about someone who sells their body as an instrument for sex for a living.  Broken down into its essentials, it seems to yield that comparison rather more often than not, witihout the other variables of evil listed above.
#57
Quote from: Faust on December 01, 2011, 01:30:35 PM
Quote from: Placid Dingo on December 01, 2011, 01:16:13 PM
Quote from: Cain on December 01, 2011, 12:39:57 PM
You just don't understand how being lied to about being set up for a nannying job in a foreign country, being illegally smuggled across borders, having all your ID taken and being told to pay back an abritrary debt while being held as a virtual prisoner by vicious pimps linked to organised crime groups and made to sell your body can be empowering, you guys.

I get that it's tongue in cheek and you know this, but prostitution doesn't mean human trafficking.
The two are synonymous in Europe and America.

A good chunk in Asia--and you can throw child sex slavery in there while you're at it.
#58
Quote from: Triple Zero on November 30, 2011, 09:53:17 PM
BTW Khara from your last post and your first ITT, you're a really great mother. Just needed to say that :)

Agreed!  She sure is.  And under extreme duress this whole time in her personal life, as well.

I have to say, being a parent is a fucked up thing and a glorious thing at the same time.  Most do it by accident, and it changes your life forever.  If you don't treat it serious enough, it can ruin more than just your own but another human being's forever.  And doing it right all the time is next to impossible--because what other relationship do you think you have where you are perfect all the goddamned time?

There's a strange, medieval part of me that wants folks to EARN the rights to their kids when I hear of the neglect, abuse and downright dumbfuckery the general populce perpetrates on the kids of the earth day after day, moment to moment.  I wouldn't trust 85% of them with my dogs, why would I trust them with a human life that is vulnerable and can't fend for themselves?

But then, what right do I have to decide such things?  None.  But as a collective, we can demand that there are safeguards, preventives and incentives to keep us all on the "do less harm" track when it comes to caretaking and teaching our kids.

By the way, it IS the responsibility, as GOOD parental practice, to teach kids how to survive life and live it well.  But how many of us out there really think folks in general know these things THEMSELVES?  Were taught them THEMSELVES?  Or are not too selfish to say AW FUCKIT and skip the work it takes to do it altogether for their kids?  When you work 100 hours/week, for less pay, are strung out and worried, baking bread and cookies in the kitchen like gramma used to do is not a priority.

I'm not saying these things aren't important--we've just shifted in our priorities to the point that we've un-selected the skills that no longer seem relevant but are indeed still important especially once they are gone.

So like everything else in this day and age, though the spirit is willing (and studies have shown, parents everywhere really DO want the best for their kids--I just question if they know what that is or how to manifest it), the flesh is entirely too weak, undereducated and not well-rested enough.
#59
Self-sufficiency is seen as a luxury these days.  Everyone hires out.  Need to iron?  Why bother--take it to the dry cleaners.  No time to cook?  Take out or drive thru on your way home.  Plan the meals? Fuck no, just drop by willy nilly at the store when you need something.  Whatever lands in the basket, lands.

I'm hoping my kids won't be total assmunches when they get to college and learn to eat more than ramen and pizza...we've taught them to make eggs, fry meat, chop veggies...boil pasta and make rice...I'm hopeful those skills will come in handy when we're no longer living with them day to day.
#60
Must be the seeds--they don't get them out of the way when they crush the apples.  I've always heard there's a tiny bit of arsenic in every seed.  Seems the article puts it down to pesticides.