The Good, The Bad, and The Silly

Posted on March 4, 2011 by lisafindley

The Good

Obama has finally removed most of the provisions of the infamous Bush-era “conscience clause,” so now pharmacists can’t say, “nope, sorry, no birth control for you, I don’t believe in it.” They’ll have to do their job instead, which is providing quality care to all their patients.

Some good news for LGBTs in Wyoming: a proposed constitutional amendment to bar the state from recognizing same-sex marriages performed out of state was dropped in the House because it was unlikely to pass. (However, the bill to amend the constitution to define marriage as between a man and a woman is still pending.)

Read this heartwarming story about how the military is tentatively stepping out into this new post-DADT world and treating same-sex spouses of deceased servicemembers with respect.

Women are an integral part of the revolutions sweeping the Middle East and northern Africa, and it is quite inspiring.

A great piece from the former state treasurer of Michigan on why Walker’s destroying his state by not bargaining with unions.

The Bad

Walker is instituting layoffs, smuggling in ringers to his budget speech, falling prey to crank calls that reveal his dastardly motives quite clearly, hides the even scarier provisions of his budget bill, and just generally is the worst. Kudos to all the Wisconsinites who continue to stick it to him, including the protesters, the few media people reporting honestly on it (ahemnotFoxahem — how is that legal?), and the Democrats who brought their desks outside in the winter weather so they could meet with their constituents after they were locked out of the Capitol.

Gaddafi is doing his damnedest to destroy Libya, and staging an all-out attack on his own people. That’s the bad part. The good part is that Obama has called for him to step down, and the UN is imposing sanctions on him. Vive la revolution! And thoughts for those who have died and those who have lost loved ones in the battle.

Bahrain is also not handling its people’s peaceful protests well.

Military servicemembers have sued the Pentagon for ignoring, downplaying, and otherwise mishandling the thousands of cases of sexual assault reported in military ranks every year (and this doesn’t even take into account the unreported cases). Good luck to them.

In the popular understanding, women trick their men into getting them pregnant so they can keep them and have control over them. But the reality is that it works the opposite way; recent studies show that reproductive coercion is a big problem. One study reported that 1 in 4 women calling a domestic violence hotline said they did not want to be pregnant but their partner removed their access to contraceptives, pressured them to get pregnant, or forced unprotected sex on them. Amanda Marcotte takes a look at this issue and its connection to the shelved (for now) South Dakota law allowing people to murder those who provide abortions to their family members.

Okay let’s look at all the states doing horrific things in the name of “pro-life”:

Virginia is now regulating abortion clinics as hospitals, which means even first-trimester abortions will become almost impossible to perform due to the huge increase in liability insurance costs, building and grounds modifications costs, etc. (oh and cosmetic surgeons don’t have to follow these new rules).
Rep. Franklin in Georgia wants to treat all women as criminals and have them file a police report when they miscarry so that it can be investigated and the miscarriages weren’t actually purposeful abortions (many horrific things here, not the least of which is that miscarriage is often a traumatic experience anyway). Jill Filipovic has a hilarious response to this horrifying suggestion–mail in a photo of your used tampon as proof that you didn’t kill anyone this month.
Americans United for Life is the group behind the expansion of justifiable homicide laws in South Dakota (currently shelved), Nebraska, and Iowa. The lawmakers agreeing to introduce the bills aren’t even always aware of what AUL stands for or how far their reach is, which seems like a troubling lack of research when talking about life and death.

The Silly

Happy National Grammar Day!

The Good, The Bad, and The Silly

Posted on December 10, 2010 by lisafindley

The Good

I didn’t even know there wasn’t an official US stance against child marriage before, but at least there is now! (And PS, how fantastic and lovely are the girls in that photo?)

I wish stories like this would get more press: Obama rights some past wrongs on behalf of the US.

Another terrific Sady Doyle piece, this one on women action heroes and just how important they are for young girls and women alike. I dream someday she will read my Headley Surprise series and we will become friends and talk about books and movies and the power of the all caps function.

A community organization in Ohio is making huge strides in saving homeowners from foreclosure, and saving banks money in the process. A good model that lending agencies across the country would be wise to look to. (Thanks to Mike for the link.)

Remember how last week I shared a link that highlighted more excellent activism from Rosa Parks? Here’s a quick piece on a teenage girl who, several months before Rosa Parks and with none of her community organizing backing, refused to give up her seat on a bus. And it turns out it wasn’t her first time standing up against injustice, either. Kudos to Claudette Colvin of Montgomery, Alabama.

The Bad

The House voted to repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, but the Senate did not, despite a couple key senators previously having stated they would vote to repeal and then changing their minds at the last minute. That kind of trickery isn’t just bad politics, it’s bad faith to show your constituents that you can’t be trusted to do as you say. Reid may bring up the vote again in this lame duck session, so fingers crossed senators’ consciences kick in and we can get this vile piece of law outta here.

The dire economy continues to hit people hard the nation over: Arizona is now dropping people from organ transplant lists if they can’t pay for the operation themselves. There has got to be a better way to deal with funding cuts.

Our tax dollars paid for child prostitution in Afghanistan. Sure, there are a few more steps along the way in there, but when shady companies like DynCorp get hired over and over again despite charges of serious misdeeds and criminal behavior, you have to start phrasing it in the starkest terms for people to pay attention. Just because it’s veiled in backroom negotiations and technically legal moves, doesn’t make it right. (Via.)

The Silly

No words, just an actor, black and white film, and a score that’s aiming for Hitchcockian: the results are a mix of moving scenes and slow-mo Oscar bait.

Here are some cool aerial shots of cities around the world. I can’t wait to visit them! Thanks to my dad for the link.

The Good, The Bad, and The Silly

Posted on October 7, 2010 by lisafindley

I’m off work today and on a library computer (damn AT&T is taking forever to set up at my house), so it’s a short one this week. Feel free to post more in the comments!

The Good:

Kartina Richardson, a great film critic, uses Boardwalk Empire as a great example of how to tackle race in historical art. Mad Men, you’ve run out of excuses. (Ms. Richardson blogs at http://mirrorfilm.org.)

A California judge imposed a ban on “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

The Bad:

Oh but Obama didn’t mean it, apparently, when he said he was for ending “don’t ask, don’t tell,” because he’s ok with the Justice Department challenging Judge Philips’ ban.

Glenn Greenwald, bless ‘im, takes on Andrew Sullivan’s absurd defense of widespread, secret, and presidentially approved assassinations. Do people really want to live on the show 24? (Via.)

And of course there has been a lot in the past few weeks about this sudden increase in children and teens committing suicide after being bullied, specifically being bullied for being gay or being perceived as gay. I don’t know that it’s an actual increase so much as people are paying a little more attention, but regardless, we need to be paying attention. We need to have strong anti-bullying policies that actually get enacted. We need to reject this BS notion that teachers can have a “neutral” stance on whether kids can torment one another — there is no neutral stance when kids are in danger. We need to stop teaching kids that hate is ok.

The Silly

Sessily sent me the link to this great flowchart of female tropes in movies/TV. Tell me someone who doesn’t fit on here!