Ebola updates & linked articles

The newest links and information will be posted here at the top.
7 October 2014 – News item about Cuba sending doctors to Ebola hotspots in Africa. Same article says world is criticizing Israel for doing nothing. After criticism put Israel in a bad light the foreign minister now say they will do something. Doing any just talk are two different things. Cuba has medical personnel in Africa now with more on the way.

Well a GOP nitwit is using Twitter to demonstrate his astonishing lack of knowledge. He can Twitter and thus one would think he could Google for accurate information on Ebola. Nope. This assh#le wants anyone with Ebola to be put down. His Twitter posts are a testimony to the willful and deliberate stupidity of a select species of human. Ebola is not 100% lethal.
This quote from the Guardian article below from some with real knowledge of Ebola and treatment outcomes counters Mr. Dumb ass’s tweets: “Whether a person survives or doesn’t is greatly dependent on when they present for treatment,” she said, “having appropriate treatment and where they get it.”

Guardian news has this article with information about the survivability percentages depending on an early diagnosis and early treatment. That medical staff in Dallas that turned away patient #1 . . . . But then there are stories of the poor being turned away or refused care, dying on the waiting room floor in LA. Add Ebola to the mix – poor people having little access to medical care – both in Liberia and in big city USA – that is where epidemics grow and fester. Dallas screwed up, neither the nurse nor the software was to blame. Treating an epidemic – or avoiding an epidemic and a pretty business model don’t play well together.

Across the US, health experts and officials have insisted that the US has the infrastructure and resources to combat the disease. The reason the disease is so deadly in west Africa is because of the poor health systems in place, they say.

“The biggest misconception is its fatality rate,” said Aileen Marty, professor of infectious diseases at Florida International University, answering questions during a Reddit AMA.

Marty spent a month treating Ebola patients with the WHO and CDC in Nigeria.

“Whether a person survives or doesn’t is greatly dependent on when they present for treatment,” she said, “having appropriate treatment and where they get it.”

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Good thing the LIbertarians (political party and political philosophy) are not in charge of public health in the U.S.. The blog post at this link does a good job of reviewing poor media coverage of the Ebola out break in Africa. And then as patients arrive in the U.S. Hint – fear sells news.

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The news on Ebola is evolving so for my convenience I am posting links and updates below. The link to my earlier article about the Dallas, TX case of Ebola is here.

News about the trickling into Africa Ebola hotspots of U.S. Military personnel. Numbers reported are not consistent. The goal seems to be about 4,000. The stock photos do not look encouraging. Photos of military guys wearing camouflage ponchos and carrying rifles.

More on the mishandling of the Dallas, Texas Ebola case. INSURANCE. In other words who is going to pay. From the first days of the roll out of Obamacare my concern was what happens if America has an epidemic? The privatization of health care and promotion of health insurance will be meaningless if we are hit by an air borne flue like virus. The flue epidemic of 1918 comes to mind. Or there was a huge epidemic during the Census year 1860. That epidemic impacted data collection – which is probably why we have some idea how wide spread the 1860 epidemic was.

But in addition to lapses at the Dallas hospital where Duncan is being treated, officials say they are fielding inquiries from hospitals and health workers that make it clear that serious questions remain about how to properly and safely care for potential Ebola patients.

A CDC official said the agency realized that many hospitals remain confused and unsure about how they are supposed to react when a suspected patient shows up. The agency sent additional guidance to health-care facilities around the country this week, just as it has numerous times in recent months, on everything from training personnel to spot the symptoms of Ebola to using protective gear.

Handmaid’s tale becomes reality

Margaret  Atwood’s novel Handmaid’s Tale published in 1985 was set in the future.

Short summary of the plot from Wikipedia:

The Handmaid’s Tale is set in the near future in the Republic of Gilead, a theocratic military dictatorship formed within the borders of what was formerly the United States of America. It was founded by a racist, homophobic, Christiannativist-derived, theocratic-organized cult’s military coup as an ideologically driven response to the country’s ecological, physical and social degradation.

Beginning with a staged terrorist attack (blamed on Islamic extremist terrorists) that kills the President and most of Congress, a movement calling itself the “Sons of Jacob” launches a revolution and suspends the United States Constitution under the pretext of restoring order. They are quickly able to take away all of women’s rights, largely attributed to financial records being stored electronically and labelled by gender. This allows the new rulers to freeze women’s bank accounts (the story also takes place in a future of a cashless society utilizing electronic money which leaves them with no funds after this), then outlaw employing them. The new regime moves quickly to consolidate its power and reorganize society along a new militarized, hierarchical, compulsorily cult-Christian regime of selectively skewed Old Testament-inspired social and religious ultra-conservatism among its newly created social classes. In this society, almost all women are forbidden to read.

The story is presented from the point of view of a woman called Offred (literally Of-Fred). The character is one of a class of individuals kept as concubines (“handmaids”) for reproductive purposes by the ruling class in an era of declining births due to sterility from pollution and sexually transmitted diseases. The book is told in the first person by Offred, who describes her life during her third assignment as a handmaid, in this case to Fred (referred to as “The Commander”). Interspersed in flashbacks are portions of her life from before and during the beginning of the revolution, when she finds she has lost all autonomy to her husband, through her failed attempt to escape with her husband and daughter to Canada, to her indoctrination into life as a handmaid. Through her eyes, the structure of Gilead’s society is described, including the several different categories of women and their circumscribed lives in the new theocracy.

Atwood must be a psychic, prophet, or seers — or she is merely able to let the “what would happen if” the radical hard line radical right continues down this path? We already know from records kept by the Catholic Church during the dark ages that women about 9 million women were murder by the zealots of the Inquisition.

Flash to the present day and the story of Sara McKenna who has a very brief affair with a professional athlete, Bode Miller. She is pregnant and according to text messages from her ex-lover he wasn’t at all supportive. McKenna moves to New York to attend college. Now is the time to cue in Monty Python’s musical number called Every Sperm is scared. You Tube has blocked the video clip — too bad that the copyright whores are busy disrupting history.

Every sperm is sacred,

Every sperm is great.

If a sperm is wasted,

God gets quite irate.

Back to the present and Sara McKenna’s problem with one particular New York justice who decided that McKenna had fetus-napped the fetus she was carrying. HER BODY apparently was now owned by Bode Miller — although they never married they just fxxxed. The Miller — the sperm donor was given primary custody of the baby. Oh Miller had replaced McKenna with another woman shortly after McKenna and he had parted company. Miller has a history of out of wedlock parenthood — a four year old female child and another dispute with the mother. Oh — Miller and his current wife live in California and McKenna lives in New York.

Of course this story raises red flags all over the place. The current efforts, of the wacked out religious right, to return women to the dark ages and to control women’s bodies (no sex for you my dear UNLESS your owner wants you pregnant), comes to mind.

McKenna said she asked Miller to be an involved father, but he initially pushed her away. She released a text from June in which Miller, explaining why he would not accompany her to an ultrasound, said, “U made this choice against my wish.”

The baby was born last February. Suddenly in the Fall Miller decides he wants to play daddy.

By last fall, Miller was taking action to secure a major role in his future son’s life, filing a declaration of his paternity and interest in custody in San Diego. Once the boy was born, McKenna filed in New York for temporary custody. But on May 30, a Family Court referee refused, rebuking McKenna for “unjustifiable conduct” and “forum shopping” and making the unusual decision to leave the case in California, even though the baby was born and lived in New York.

Who is this “Family Court referee”?

Here’s the fetus-napping charge from above referee jerk:

While McKenna “did not ‘abduct’ the child,” the court said, “her appropriation of the child while in utero was irresponsible, reprehensible.”

Life imitates Art or a Novel in this case. Also it could be a case of women are women’s worst enemies — the new Mrs. Miller miscarried and then encourages Bode Miller to get his kid. Who knows what is really going in in the minds of Mr. & Mrs. Miller — but a child is involved — a real human being. Is a woman’s body owned by the males who control the legal system?

Are we that far away from A Handmaid’s Tale? The dark ages for women could return — as it has in Texas and other dogmatic religious States.

This is the 21st Century and not the dark ages. Human Rights are Women’s Rights and why hasn’t the ERA part of the US Constitution?

 

 

Women in the military

This is a story about rape in the military as seen through the eyes of a child in the bygone days of the Cold War. This is also a story about the old war on women which is the same war on women going on today.

What is it with some Neanderthal dimwit male politicians who believe that the cure for service men raping women is to eliminate the victims? Or as a dimwitted man with boobs remarked several months ago — well what do women expect?

For some unknown reason the Neanderthals gene seems to eradicate all common sense — or is it the Y chromosome defective in some males? Do these rape defenders and rape enablers believe that the US military is completely devoid of any women? Do these GOP males believe that that the military could function without any women on base or anywhere near where the macho guys do their “thing”.

Women have been part of the military ever since the feeble minded violence loving males formed the weapons of war and started wracking the men from the other war party. “Defenseless” women left alone are targets — this happened thousands of years ago and it is still happening today. Rape is used as a weapon of war — the US armies in Iraq and Afghanistan include a few rapists and a few have been identified. Most probably get away with their crimes — just like they always have.

I grew up on military bases, although there were very few women in uniform there were still plenty of women — nurses, secretaries, civilian employees and WIVES and children. Wives and children are called dependents and we grew up hearing the joke: “If the military wanted you to have a wife and kids you would have been issued a wife and kids.”

My dad was career military. He was deployed for 6 months and then home for 6 months, as were the fathers of most of my classmates. Our moms learned to manage as women have managed since men have been going off to war for thousands of years. This is about what happened when I was in the 5th grade.

The rapes happening on the base where I lived were reported in the newspaper (Honolulu Advertiser & Star Bulletin) and that’s were I read about something wrong and horrible that I really did not understand. No names were used — but the women were neighbors and I knew something horrible had happened because everyone in the whole neighborhood  (Military base housing) was tense. Women, mothers of my friends were crying and women were hugging each other and crying. Who died and why were so many moms afraid, I had to know. Military wives are generally tough — they have to be to survive all the garbage involved in being married to the military (man).

At first the suspect was thought to be one of the civilian employees — someone with access to the housing. This rapist would sneak into homes in the middle of the night, rape, threaten and then leave. The mothers of my friends and classmates had no idea when they might be a target and many were getting very little sleep. If you want to know what being under constant treat of terrorism is — imagine that if you fall asleep you might be awakened by the rapist. Image this was a daily part of your life for weeks and weeks. One of our neighbors piled up pots and pans in front of her doors and windows. One pile was knocked down as someone tried to enter her kitchen and she work up rushed to the window to see a medium build person dressed in black running through the brush filled boondocks.

The civilian male employees (locals who lived off base) were eliminated as suspects. I don’t know how this investigations was carried out but with adult maturity I suspect that the process was probably quite brutal. There was also probably an element of racism — since the civilian employees are nearly all non-white and the military police were white. Military police are often not very nice people to begin with — unfortunately this has been my experience and that of other military brats I grew up with. The behavior of the military police toward the victims, was one of the reason why very few women reported being raped. The message I took away from this whole episode was if you are raped DO not report it — the aftermath of the rape and the actions of those in authority is often worse than the rape. This was the overwhelming attitude of the victims of this rapist and the officers who were in command of the base. Women in the military are still living under the same male dominated — blame the victim — structure.

Next on the suspect list were noncoms or non commissioned officers. And these men were eliminated as suspects. The rapes continued.

At some point the newspapers seems to stop reporting about the rapes and the atmosphere seemed to calm down. But that didn’t stop me from seeking answers to what happened. Military kids have a communication network — generally we know what our dad’s do when they are gone for 6 months. We all have bits and pieces of the puzzle. My classmates and I discovered that the rapist was an officer who had been attached to the supervision of military housing. I’m guessing that he probably had a master key and that’s how he was able to sneak into so many homes and rape so many women. I also know that only a fraction of the rapes were reported. From the military kid’s telegraph we heard that someone recently arrived from a mainland base knew about a string of similar rapes and that the rapist was shipped off to the base the where I lived. We believed that the same office who had been transferred to our base was the rapist — and as soon as he disappeared the rapes stopped. I never heard his name spoken — the military command structure has and still has that much power as to silence the truth. The problem was eliminated and shall no longer be mentioned.

Although nearly all our neighbors, the wives of deployed men, were raped or scared off the rapist — my mother was never a victim. We had a medium sized poi-dog, a local dog that we rescued as a puppy. Basically I found her and insisted that she needed us. If a strange person tried to enter our home in the middle of the night our dog would have alerted us with very loud barking. She slept with me. Other homes that had dogs also were never visited by the rapist. Apparently there was a list of all homes that had “pets” and notations about which home had deployed husbands. All the rapist had to do is check the chart and then go hunting.

My neighbor who boogie trapped her doors and windows saw the intruder running off through the boondocks toward the officer’s section of the base housing. So it didn’t surprise her that the rapist turned out to be an immune officer.

As far as I know there was never any trial. What we think happened was that this guy was either discharged from the military or worse sent to yet another military base to continue his terrorism on female dependents — or the women of the military who are found on nearly every base.

Serial rapist just don’t stop — and from the research I’ve read the majority of rapist are serial rapists. The rape culture is still alive and well and not much has changed — women are still blamed and most women still don’t report being raped.

One other detail or aftermath of the rapist’s reign of terror I remember so clearly which taught me that the rapist’s impact remains long after he has disappeared. I spent most of my time playing outside and while walking down the street passed a row of houses I heard screaming coming from the second story window. I looked up to see a woman trying to climb out the window to get away from her husband who was violently beating her. He beat her to a bloody pulp. His white undershirt was bloody from her blood. No one made any effort to help this women. She was one of the victims and because she reported the rape — that fact went on her husband’s record. He was beating her for being raped and then reporting the rape.

What a fu***** way to grow up. Not much at all has changed. Service women are being beaten and raped — some by their superior officers (a documentary, The Invisible war,  has been made about rape victims and the military’s chain of command ignoring the problem — see Democracy Now for an interview on this subject).. The only way this will stop is for more women to join the military and more women working their way up the chain of command. There will always be women who enable rapists as there are women who enable crimes against civilian women — but I’m hoping that the majority of women will have empathy for their military sisters and bring an end to the reign of terror that a minority of males have gotten away with for thousand of years.

To the jackass GOP male & female politicians who believe the way to reduce rape is to toss women out of the military ranks — I am a witness rapist will still rape women. Save us from the morons in the world. The link is to a list of morons as well as their misogynistic words.

Drones and state of the dis-Union

Drones are being used to kill. Seems like even former toys are being used for warfare.

What I find disturbing is that the gamers who are playing with the Drones and “following orders” to kill and harass people in foreign countries might get medals for killing people. Does that mean that medals for the highest “kills” will be awarded to creeps who sit on their asses and are far removed from the battle field and any personal danger.

Before I witnessed Drones flying over the National Forest in New Mexico — I assumed that these death machines were quiet. No way — they are loud but only after they pass. Which means that unless these killing machines are circling a target they can make a silent approach and drop bombs and missiles and the survivors will hear the loud engines as the drones fly away.

0bama can get away with murder — International war crimes. What if Bush had sent out drones to kill as often as 0bama? We can guess what the Democrats would be saying. But for 0bama — only a few seem to even care that children are being murdered by the President of the USA.

But then 0bama isn’t really a liberal — he is and will always be a Reagan Republican. The GOP offers no alternative — since wing nuts and radicals have taken over the former Grand Old Party. The GOP war on women continues – male Senators vote no on the Violence Against Women Act and 8 males tried to block this Bill. It almost seems like the GOP is enabling rapist and wife beaters. It is really discouraging to see the GOP sink to this level of misogynistic behavior. Hard to believe that at one time this party supported the ERA. Betty Ford would be very disappointed in today’s GOP.

Oh and then 0bama care — still not cost control. 0bama care is welfare for the “Health” Insurance Companies. From my reading of the whole bill plus other review of this mess — many people will buy “insurance” that they can’t afford and will end up being sicker. The co-pays for the Silver and Bronze plans are so expensive that there might not be any money left to both visit the doctor and pay for the visit.

What is so hard to understand about “single payer” and cost control. Why do we need to insure the lavish lifestyle of the insurance company CEOs. Seems like that is the only thing that these insurance plans really insure.

Which is worse

Racism or misogyny. Which is worse? Hate for a whole group of people — either by gender or race is stupid. And yet in this “modern” age mass hatred for the other is still going on.

In 2008 we had a black guy running for President of the US against a white woman — and this black guy poured on the misogynistic remarks and played the misogynistic music. It was obvious that this man really did NOT like nor understand women. So he back stabbed and cheated and bought his way into the White House. He got women to work for him and clean up his messes. He was not nor will he ever be ready to be President of the WHOLE United States of American. 0bama only works for the really really rich males who bought the White House. Some say that he has learned on the job. Others say that all he has ever done was run for office.

Now we know who 0bama will be running against this November. Mittens Romney. His GOP party is involved in an all out war against women — while claiming to really really love women. Romney is the member of a church where women are second class — almost considered subhuman. The sole purpose of women of this church is to produce babies. Women according to the dogma of this church cannot get into heaven unless they are pulled into heaven via a secret handshake. This church like so many other Christian churches has very little respect for women. As far as I can tell all Christian religions are patriarchal. The forced subservience of women has been drummed into women and girls since the days of the witch trials when millions of women were put to death by roving bands of male priests (dressed in skirts).

What a choice women have — the ones who are able to think for themselves. Should we vote for a misogynist who sided with Stupak and helped to restrict and deny women control over our own bodies — or should we vote for a member and leader within his church who considers women less than human?

In my case I refuse to vote for any extreme — and that includes either of two males running for President — who have shown that they hate women.

If anyone needs proof how much women are the target of hate — check out this video clip on Cooks and Liars.

http://crooksandliars.com/david-neiwert/hannity-hijacked-angry-kirsten-power

Kirsten Power was on a GOP talk show with one of the many Republicans who is at war with women. Hannity had invited a misogynist who calls all women little whores and sluts.

After all, there’s no one in the mainstream media who has quite the array of running associations with far-right nutcases that Sean Hannity has—going back to the days when he palled around with white supremacist Hal Turner, and continuing through his ongoing sponsorship of wackos like Birther extraordinaire Jerome Corsi. Most notably, Hannity continues to promote and support another WorldNetDaily nutcase, Jesse Lee Peterson.

Last night, however, even a Fox Democrat like Kirsten Powers found it too hard to contain herself when seated next to Peterson. As Ellen at NewsHounds points out, Powers completely derailed Hannity’s planned Obama-bashing segment by turning to Peterson and demanding he explain himself for his recent declaration that most women are “little whores”.

Check out the last link for the details about this misogynistic “minister”.

This creep can get away with calling all women whores and sluts — thanks to 0bama opening up Pandora’s box for all misogynistic males. (Let’s not forget the female misogynists — like the Governor of Arizona.)

How far down the path of misogyny will the Republican and Democratic parties go this year???

Hatred of a whole group — based on race or gender (or sexual orientation) is just plain stupid and primitive.

Gay Bashing — who and why?

Gay bashing is a cultural thing. Gay bashing is also about sex role stereotyping.

My first college experience was at a fundamentalist college. I’m not going to hell because I was in hell for two years at that college (besides I don’t believe in hell anyway). I managed to survive and I’m a stronger person. In that college I saw a whole lot of hate directed at anyone who was gay or who didn’t meet the sex role stereotyping of male or female. Of course, I was never accepted because only my mother was a member of the church, so I was always one of the “odd” ones in college. My father was also active duty military, meaning that I was a full fledged military brat and an expert at being a “participant observer”.

The military wa/is also another gay hating/gash bashing culture. Both the fundies and military have so many examples of cultural sex role extremes:  Ultra feminine housewives and ultra macho – tough guy males. I came from two cultures where I was exposed to homophobia — and their hating is foreign to me. It could be because I was always the other — the not normal the outsider — that I developed great empathy for other outsiders?

After my two years of hell I went to public colleges in California. I have degrees in Psychology and Anthropology. The professor I took Abnormal Psychology from was light years ahead of most psychologists of his day, he was also one of the fathers of Sports Psychology. He told his classes that although male macho professional athletes are the ultimate in what is considered masculine/maleness — many of these fine athletes are also gay. At the same time some males who appear to be soft or not very macho and who might meet the stereotype of gay — these men were not gay at all. This professor brought gays into the classroom so that they could tell us about what it was like trying to live their lives in a culture that hated them. Cops were not friends of gays and all the men said that they had been abused by cops. Bashing gays was a cop sport. Cops are considered very macho and yet we know that there are gay cops. I wonder how many gay cops have joined the gay bashing — fearful that if they didn’t bash gays they might be outed?

Ironic isn’t it that the fundies and radical right conservatives want control of education and that they bash “liberal” professors. Haters want to keep the next generation of haters coming.

PBS Frontline has produced a program about gay bashing  called, Assault on Gay America.  It is an in depth examination of the Who and whys of Gay bashing.

War on Women Continues

New Hampshire

Planned Parenthood of Northern New England

The six Planned Parenthood centers in New Hampshire stopped dispensing contraception last week after the Executive Council rejected a new contract with the organization.

Planned Parenthood had operated under a limited retail pharmacy license that was contingent on having a state contract, said Steve Trombley, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Northern New England. Two weeks ago, the all-Republican Executive Council voted 3-2 against a new contract that would have provided the organization $1.8 million in state and federal money for the two years starting this month.

The aim of the right wing religious fanatics isn’t only the stop abortion — their goal is to stop contraception. They want women to return to the dark ages. This is war on women — control of women — Taliban US style. The next step is to ban girls from going to school and ban women from working. That is working outside of the home.

 

The Family – a book review – part 2

The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power, by Jeff Sharlet [Kindle Edition]

Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade, Rousas John Rushdoony, J. Edgar Hoover, Rev. Billy Graham, Prayer Breakfast, John C. Broger, Papa Doc., Chuck Colson – Prison Crusade, Promise Keepers.

Dictators for God: Papa Doc, Emperor Selassie (Ethiopia), General Park – Korea, General Suharto – Indonesia, General Medici in Brazil. It almost seems that the bloodier the dictator the more the Family adores the guy.

All of these organizations and individuals are closely associated with the Family (or the Fellowship). Sharlet builds the list of players slowly, showing how each individual and organization is directly linked to the family.

This is not an easy book to read and for that reason many people will not bother. Also, anyone who reads the book and realizes the implication of what these New Christians have done and are doing to America could be at some point considered a raving lunatic.

There is an individual on a popular liberal blog who has appointed himself as gate keeper — that poor sucker is in deep denial about the existence of  a virulent form of fundamentalism.  But in a way this is exactly what the Family planned when it went underground. The plan was to fly under the radar of the media and thus the majority of Americans. Little groups of believers took on the role of front men with different projects. Although the Family’s main constituency is the very top of the food chain, the Family still needs soldiers and workers to carry out the goals of the leadership. So where is the proof that this powerful American Fundamentalist group exists? This group is hiding in plain sight.

“Elite fundamentalism, unlike the moralistic masses of popular crusades, did not care much about sin; they cared about salvation, a concept they understood in terms of nations, not souls, embodied by the rulers to whom God had given power, whether through ballots or bullets.”

America has perhaps the most complicated religious history of any country in the world. Sharlet reviewed the early history of American Fundamentalism in the first third of The Family. Sharlet’s review of the early history of religion in America  followed the direct religious ancestors of the current leadership of The Family. Anyone who has studied Genealogy knows that some churches kept detailed records of church members. Sometimes the church records are the only records still in existence to trace family lines. I’ve traced my family’s roots back to the early days of the English colony in the new world, in the process of my research I’ve discovered religious sects rarely mentioned in history books. Along with the small extinct religious sects, there were also the large denominations like the Church of England, Catholic, Jews, and assorted major Protestant sects. Two hundred years ago there were many, what we might today call, New Age religions, Shakers and Quakers and commune living sects and cults.

The American fundamentalists evolved from the Baptists and Puritans and earlier sects. However, what is different with The Family is that the founding religious personality realized that a very special segment of the population has been ignored. The very rich and very powerful also needed a “personal relationship” with the American Jesus. Some churches like the Methodists have humanitarian goals and beliefs. Methodists is the second largest organized religion and Southern Baptists is the largest. The Family is no such lofty creed compatible to the Methodists.

The goal of the leadership of the Family is to collect small Nations with leaders who are God friendly. The founder of the Family or the Fellowship very much admired the fascist dictators of the 20th century — their dictators where some of the most blood thirsty monsters the world has ever seen. Indonesia’s  General Suharto was responsible for well over one million deaths, both before and after he started his “personal” relationship with God.

The Family and their close allies — the New Life church in Colorado Springs brand of Evangelical Fundamentalism is  totally alien to the Evangelical sect that I grew up in. The members of these new style of fundamentalism use all the familiar code words, but these words and phrases have a completely different meaning.  Sharlet spends a lot of time decoding the Secret Fundamentalism. So while those of us who have been raised in one of the many Fundamentalists sects may understand the words — we still need a score card and a decoder to understand the world view or glasses these people are using.

“Which came first, American fundamentalism or the Cold War? Is American fundamentalism the essence of the economic policies by which we unraveled the New Deal, or is it simply a coincidental phenomenon of the Reagan Revolution and the “globalization”?
[snip]
The New Christians ; “His followers are not anxiously awaiting his return at the rapture; he’s here right now. They’re not envious of the middle class, they are the middle class. They’re not looking for a hero to lead them; they’re building biblical households, every man endowed with “headship” over his own family.

Part III of the book review of The Family— coming soon. 0bama probably made some sort of deal with the elite Fundamentalists. The proof is his close association with known members of The Family. The proof is the fact that the continued support of the religious right just like GW Bush’s support of the religious right — Faith Based social services.  The key words to Google are — Faith based — which will lead you directly to the White House website. On the first page of the google search using “Faith Based” as the key search phrase, the White House’s website turned up as the third listing.

Enlightened Sexism- a book review

Enlightened Sexism; The Seductive Message that Feminism’s Work is Done. By Susan J. Douglas. [Kindle edition, 2010]

Sex sells. Sexism is learned. Sexism is taught.

Sex role stereotyping may have decreased somewhat since the 60s and 70s.Today on TV there are women talking heads, news reader or announcers on most of the major networks and cable news programs, whereas in the 60s/70s there were a few weather girls.

In occupations that have historically been male dominate – women have made some progress. The statistics look encouraging, a few women have invaded male professions. On television Women are portrayed in what would have been strictly male roles over thirty years ago. Girls have role models for some of the high profile occupations. But the bimbo role model is still front and center and girls are still being taught to know their place.

Susan Douglas spends the first few chapters reviewing the programming of the 80s and 90s that was fed to  TV viewers. That list and those role models aren’t that encouraging – with a few exceptions. Sex role stereotyping has in fact become more rigid and the pay gap between his and her salaries has remained wide.

For anyone who buys into the mass media propaganda that sexism no longer exists and that the battle for human rights for women has been won – the corporate media’s brain washing was successful. The fact is that the patriarchy is still in charge and the patriarchy still has the overwhelming need to control the evil descendents of Eve.

Quote:

Media image of “representations of female achievement and control” . . . unintended consequences: under the guise of escapism and pleasure, we are getting images of imagined power that mask, and even erase, how much still remains to be done for girls and women, images that make sexism seem fine, even fun, and insist that feminism is now utterly pointless-even bad for you. And if we look at what is often being said about girls and women in these fantasies—what we can and should do, what we can and can’t be—we will see that slithering just below the shiny mirage of power is the dark, sneaky serpent of sexism.  (first chapter – locations 167-80 – Kindle edition).

. . .

While enlightened sexism seems to support women’s equality, it is dedicated to the undoing of feminism. In fact, because this equality might lead to “sameness” –way too scary—girls and women need to be reminded that they are still fundamentally female, and so must be emphatically feminine. Thus enlightened sexism takes the gains of the women’s movement as a given, and then uses them as permission to resurrect retrograde images of girls and women as sex objects, bimbos, and hootchie mamas still defined by their appearance and their biological destiny. So in the age of enlightened sexism there has been an explosion in makeover, matchmaking, and modeling shows, a renewed emphasis on women’s breasts (and a massive surge in the promotion of breast augmentation), . . .

“Because women are now “equal” and the battle is over and won, we are now free to embrace things we used to see as sexist, including hypergirliness. In fact, this is supposed to be a relief. Thank God girls and women can turn their backs on stick-in-the-mud, curdled feminism and now act dumb in string bikinis to attract guys. In fact, now that women allegedly have the same sexual freedom as men, they actually prefer to be sex objects because it’s liberating. [Red Shoe Diaries]

According to enlightened sexism, women today have a choice between feminism and antifeminism, and they just naturally and happily choose the latter because, well, antifeminism has become cool, even hip. Rejecting feminism and buying into enlightened sexism allows young women in particular to be “one of the guys.” Indeed, enlightened sexism is meant to make patriarch pleasurable for women. [locations 294-305].

“Enlightened sexism emerged, in part, from the fact that young women were coming of age in an era of expanding opportunities. It came into full bloom under the Bush administration, and especially after 9/11. Coincidence? I think not. Before he and his ilk trashed the economy, Bush presided over the perfect enlightened sexism presidency. And talk about the illusion of power!

End quote

What Bush started – his frat brother, 0bama plans to finish. As I write this the Democrats intend to present 0bama with health care (whatever) that places an ovary penalty on women. The legislation was written as if the “norm” is male and anyone not male pays extra for medical “insurance”.  This is one example of blatant ongoing institutional sexism.

How many women were on the panel of the recent Health care summit – answer, about 1%. Men AGAIN were making decision FOR (AGAINST) women. The current supreme misogynist – stupid Stupak is interjecting his wacked out religion on American women – one hateful male wants to control over the Eves of the world.

Douglas carefully outlines the media’s efforts to change the subject – look over there on HD tv – where  they give you the illusion that women are strong and in control. It is all play acting, the message is controlled. Sex sells. Sexism sells. Girls will conform to the cultural message of the mass media. The corporate media will create the illusion to sell their own brand of sexism. No harm intended – what matters is the bottom line, the quarterly bottom line, the stock holders, the CEOs and board members. The ones making the fast money on products sold through the advertising could care less about the lasting effects of well being of children and teen agers and the world the younger generations will inherit.

Enlightened Sexism – read this book.

Note:

I never watched any of the TV programs mentioned in Enlightened Sexism, except for a few episodes of Zena. Douglas didn’t mention any of  Science Fiction programming that are my personal favorites.

My MA Thesis was on  Sex role stereotyping in the mid 1970s.

What we can learn from Haiti

As the extent of the crisis in Haiti unfolds we are learning about the screwed up internal workings of the Patriarchy. One day the world’s energy may be rebalanced – into the yin/yang or the positive/negative or male/female plus a whole lot of the neutral gray.

In Haiti the UN finally figured out how to solve the chaos of food delivery, give WOMEN the food coupons. Why on earth didn’t they start this at the very beginning? It is obvious that the strongest (men) will muscle their way to the front and grab the food, caring not a whit about anyone else. Which is why the young men are sent off to fight wars, after first being taught how to follow orders and work together. (Story is found on Yahoo.com and other news sources.)

The other crisis we see unfolding is that the medical evacuations from Haiti to the US have been suspended, because the medical crisis in the US is completely out of control. The world must know by now that the US medical delivery system is close to a system failure. Victims of the Haiti earthquake are refused admittance to US hospitals because of the questions of payment. Send the money “over there” but let’s not clutter up US hospitals with “those” victims. But then many hospitals have that attitude about “certain” segments of the US population. For example hospitals in LA and in Chicago have been known to “dump” unwanted patients. Seems like Mrs. 0bama was involved in “redirecting” patients from the hospital where she pulled over ½ million $ salary. Mrs. 0 is certainly could a poster child for everything that is wrong with the US medical care system. (Pay the directors huge salaries deny health care insurance to anyone but the healthiest of the population, increase out of pocket payments for every service possible. The US ends up with the most costly per person health care in the world and with millions without health care insurance.)

The earthquake has created orphans. For some people the thought of unloved and uncared for orphans creates the perfect conditions for the deletion of common sense. Most people who travel outside of the boarders of the US realize that immigration officials just love paperwork. Whenever you cross boarders the first thing the guys want to see is your “papers’ or passport. There is a universal personality type manning the boarders –authoritarian, rigid, and mostly unpleasant little men (and a few women). But knowledge of the real world and going through government channels didn’t get in the way of some god fearing missionaries from Idaho. This group of church folk from Idaho managed to get into Haiti and load up vans with orphan but the very first boarder they crossed (Dominican Republic) provided them with the shock that not everyone is listening to the same god. (Story of Idaho church group and Haiti orphans found on Yahoo.com and other news sources.)

How did this group select the orphans and how did they determine that these children had no relatives or anyone? It would be interesting to know exactly what they did while they were in Haiti; did they have contacts in Haiti before they left Idaho? In this case the immigration authorities were doing their job.

There is a hypothetical question I’ve been asked, which do I fear most – hurricane, earthquake or volcano? After having been through all three and watching the US respond to these three types of disasters – the earthquake seems the worst. With the hurricane and volcano, there is some warning or perhaps over warning. But at present there is no real way to predict where and when a major earthquake will strike.

GW Bush wasn’t prepared to be a leader when hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and surrounding areas. It is apparent that under BH 0bama’s watch we are seeing another leadership vacuumed.  What happens when the next disaster hits the US? I don’t feel very encouraged. The current Triage of first determining if the patient can pay and then find out from a NON medical person associated with Ribbons and Bows Health insurance IF the ER care is covered under subsection xyz.333 – is so primitive and third world. It might be kinder if the unapproved patients were put in a termination room with a choice of the red or green pills.

America is Haiti, with the men forcing their way to the front of the line and women and children get the leftovers. We see this happening in Congress, men dominate here and the few women who mange to be admitted, had better learn to behave themselves and follow the male determined rules. We watched a chaotic mess of a health insurance bill classify being female as a pre-existing condition and thus instantly raising the insurance rates for half of the population that can afford insurance. This men’s health care insurance was another example of males forcing their way to the front of the line – with the complete disregard for the well being of women and children. Women make about 75 cents to men’s one dollar and that wage gap hasn’t changed much in decades, yet women are increasingly a huge part of the workforce and often the sole support of their families.

But America is not yet Haiti, America’s poor are better off than the dirt poor of Haiti. If American continues down the current path – Haiti of today could be America’s future.