Sarah Palin is Not a Feminist and She Agrees!
Just two months ago, when Sarah Palin was announced as the Republican vice presidential candidate, I wrote a post voicing my outrage over Palin calling herself and being called a feminist. To this day, that post is the most popular post on Menstrual Poetry, receiving more comments than any other post on this website, mostly from McCain and Palin supporters telling me that indeed Palin is a feminist and how dare I say that she isn’t just because she possesses stronger anti-woman policies than even most male Republicans.
Recently, much to my satisfaction and most likely to the dissatisfaction of some Palin supporters (like the LA president of NOW, for one) Palin has recently had a change of heart on her whole “I’m a feminist” stance.
So what’s behind her change of heart on feminism? Perhaps it’s because of the disapproval of actual feminists. Perhaps she realized that it’s a hell of a lot easier to claim she’s a feminist than to actually believe in what feminists fight daily for. While I doubt Palin will comment on her flip flop, I think we can all think of a few reasons why it’s really a great thing that she is choosing to not label herself as anything. For a woman with strong, anti-woman policies to label herself as a feminist is an insult; not only to feminists, but to all women, everywhere.
Good going, Palin! Never insult us by claiming you are one of us again, got it? Good.
Divine Mercy Care Pharmacy. We See Where this is Going, Right?
A drug store in Chantilly, Virginia has recently become the seventh pharmacy nationwide that are stepping right over what they were hired to do and are refusing to fill prescriptions for birth control. And why are they refusing women access to medications they need? Because god doesn’t like it; or at least that is the conclusion that many people have come to over the years.
“I am grateful to be able to practice,” pharmacy manager Robert Semler said, “where my conscience will never be violated and my faith does not have to be checked at the door each morning.”
So what Mr. Semler is saying is that certain aspects of our lives should not be “checked at the door each morning” when we go to work. So does that mean if we have something personal going on at home, when we arrive at work in the morning we must tell every one of our coworkers about it before the day’s end and let it affect the efficiency of our work? According to the workers of the Divine Mercy Care pharmacy and the other six around the country, of course! In fact, we would be bad people if we didn’t. The problem is that when something we believe or have something affecting our lives and it starts to have a negative effect on our work, to the point where we are not able to do our jobs, in any other world we would be fired or our business would be shut down because we are not able to do our jobs, but if we attach religion to it, it’s all good because no one feels as if they can tell that person that they are wrong when they claim that their superior power says so. What if Catholics believed that cancer was a god-given illness and due to their faith, would not help a cancer patient or prescribe medication that would help them because they thought god wouldn’t like it? Would we still have the same, “Oh, what can you do?” mentality?
Many women use birth control, in fact, 98% of women in the United States will be on birth control at one point or another in their lives and to simply assume that all women looking to obtain birth control are participating in premarital sex without wanting to become pregnant… and what is so wrong with that, anyway? The first order of business to cut down on the amount of abortions in this country is to teach, condone and practice safe sex. Safe sex=less abortions and it is thanks to doctors, clinics and pharmacies that understand that mentality and respect women enough to let them make their own choices.
Divine Mercy Care pharmacy and other pharmacies who share the belief that women are only as good as the babies they can produce are hurting women by not filling a prescription for a medication that that women chose to take. A pharmacy that cannot respect a woman’s choice does not deserve the business of any person, male or female, who respects a woman enough to make her own decisions.
Sign the pledge to boycott anti-birth control pharmacies and tell all Virginia pharmacies: If you don’t respect our choices, you don’t deserve our business! or share your thoughts with the Divine Mercy Care pharmacy personally. Contact them directly at:
DMC Pharmacy, LLC
13945 Metrotech Drive
Chantilly, VA 20151
Phone: 703-961-9055
Fax: 703-961-9211
Hours:
Monday – Friday: 9am-6pm
Saturday: 9am-12pm
Sunday: Closed
I Would Suggest that Cindy McCain Change Shoes with Any Middle Class American
At a recent McCain/Palin rally in Bethlehem, PA, Cindy McCain made a speech where she said:
“I’m proud of my sons, but let me tell you, the day that Senator Obama cast a vote not to fund my son when he was serving sent a cold chill through my body. I would suggest that Senator Obama change shoes with me for just one day, and see what it means.”
First of all, Cindy McCain is not the first person in this Republican choke hold to the top to make this remark; in fact, she probably was not smart enough to come up with it on her own, so she took it from Governor Sarah Palin, who was most likely told to say it by Senator McCain or one of the Bush speech writers lending Palin a hand with all of this political talk business. On October 2, 2008, during the vice presidential debate in St. Louis, Missouri, Palin said:
“I know that the other ticket opposed this surge — in fact, even opposed funding our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Barack Obama voted against funding troops after promising that he would not do so,”
So let’s take a closer look at this particular, horribly misleading remark (although Obama has already disproved this remark several times, but you know, people don’t listen to him and would rather get their information from a camp that has been proven to have made over 62 different false and misleading points about Obama throughout this campaign.)
Obama, along with 13 other senators, voted against a war-spending plan that would have provided emergency funds for American troops overseas on May 24, 2007. The reason Obama voted against this plan was because, he said:
“We must fund our troops, but we owe them more. We owe them a clear, prudent plan to relieve them of the burden of policing someone else’s civil war.”
Now, what Palin and Cindy McCain failed to mention is that Senator Obama supported and voted for an earlier version of that bill which would have provided the same funding for American troops, but had established a timeline for Bush to begin bringing them home.
Also, as a side note, Biden had also voted for that version of the plan as well.
Now guess how McCain voted on this war spending plan? Yeah, he didn’t, so doesn’t that make McCain, a former POW and also a father of a deployed American soldier just as bad as Palin and the McCains are trying to make Obama out to be? Yeah, I think so.
So now that we know the point both Sarah Palin and Cindy McCain made about Obama is bullshit, let’s take a look at how a woman who is an heiress to an estimated $100 million beer company, who makes approximately $6 million a year, has the right to compare herself to average, middle-class citizens who have sons and daughters currently deployed or who have been deployed themselves.
If we know anything by now, it is that the McCains make enough money where John McCain seriously cannot recall just how many houses he has, so why does Cindy McCain think it is okay to compare herself, a woman with potentially 11 different homes, to a family who is struggling to pay their mortgage on their one and only home, or perhaps even their rent on their one apartment? Because her family and your family both have deployed family, although she will rest her head on $800 sheets and you will be laying awake all night wondering what bill is important to pay this month or if you can afford to put gas in the car and buy groceries? While Cindy McCain makes bold statements, do you think she would change shoes with you, or any middle class citizen with deployed family? I wouldn’t count on it and neither would the many military spouses (most of which who coincidentally support Obama) Cindy McCain offended with her statement.
“When millionaires such as Cindy McCain act as if they understand our lives, and the lives of everyday military families and veterans, we get upset,” said Himel-Nelson.
Perhaps the next time Cindy McCain feels the need to publicly offend middle class, military families, someone should ask her why John McCain received a 20% rating from Disabled American Veterans (Barack Obama received an 80% rating) and a D grade for his voting record on issues such as additional funding for combat body armor and for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other medical treatment by the non-partisan group Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. (Barack Obama received a B+.)
Rally of the Buzzwords
From here on in, expect any smear campaign that McCain launches towards Obama to be taken at face value, but instead of those of us who are sane, practical and logical, we know to do our homework on any candidate, no matter who they are, and make an informed decision based on what that candidate can do for this country and for us. However, like many of us are all too aware of, there are some people out there who instead of doing their research on a candidate or thinking for more than 1.3 seconds about the legitimacy of what kind of bullshit “their” candidate is putting out into the media, there are way too many people who will soak up McCain’s bogus ads, go to see him speak and then throw nothing but buzzwords out, believing wholeheartedly that the bullshit their brains soaked up like a sponge from the oh so “reliable” sources like Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, Fox News and John McCain and Sarah Palin themselves are completely right, not giving any of these accusations a second thought and accepting them as truth.
So for those who believe that the video in the last post was a fluke or that “not all” McCain supporters think or act like those who made asses of themselves in that video, here is another from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. I am ashamed to share a state with these people.
A big thanks goes out to all of the aforementioned sane, practical and logical folks who were also at that rally trying to spread the truth about McCain/Palin such as the fact that Palin made women in Alaska pay for their own rape kits. The replies of their supporters? Well, they believe that a woman who is raped should pay for their own rape kit and not only that, but they should pay double, die, or be killed.
Nice, huh?
This election is ugly, yes, but a woman is never at fault for being raped and the people who believe that a woman is at fault are the same people who believe that she was asking for it, deserved it, should be killed because of it or they are the people who believe rape doesn’t exist, don’t teach their children about sexual assault at a young age, or maybe they are also the people who are abusers themselves.
While it is obvious that the McCain camp is “turning a page” and doing very little but launching attacks on Obama, what the fuck ever happened to humanity? As a feminist, activist, and advocate for rape and sexual assault, myself and many other people out there are speaking out about abuse and trauma and if you ever thought “Hey, this is about human decency, who doesn’t care about something that should come naturally to being a human?” These are obviously the people we are up against.
If there is one issue that is screaming at the top of its lungs that we need to reform, it’s education. There are so many people in this country who need to be educated and you just saw a video of several.
This is What McCain/Palin Supporters Look (and Act) Like
While Obama makes his supporters feel uplifted and hopeful to the point where they will encourage people to vote, start conversations through party lines, speak with their friends and family about the upcoming election, McCain supporters are a little different; they embarrass themselves–Repeatedly. They take the smears, hate, and most of all, the ignorance and arrogance that McCain puts out there and run wild with it.
This video shows that there are still some people whose minds are still so clouded with racism and with ignorance and belligerence that I am truly blown away by the amount of hate that is being fueled by this campaign. To put it bluntly, this video and the people (especially the blond woman who doesn’t believe in letting her fellow McCain/Palin supporters speak because the word ‘tact’ was never taught to her) who are spouting McCain and Palin’s regurgitated bullshit makes me sick.
This is perhaps the most crucial election that many of us will have the responsibility to vote in in our lifetime and the reason for that is because of a Republican regime who shoveled very, very deep into the Earth, put our country in the hole and proceeded to bury us alive. It is because one candidate wants to give us the same, exact Republican regime that many of us have been the victim of for the next four years. Another candidate has a shovel and is willing to dig us back up again and make sure that we don’t have to tell our children that we can’t afford to send them to school or decide what bills are important that month and what bills can wait until the next month or be a person, like myself, who are plagued by illness but don’t have health insurance because we can’t afford it and we can’t go to the hospital because we can’t bear to think of the amount of debt that would bring upon us and so we live in pain.
This video is proof that instead of reading or even watching the news (C-SPAN is great because it shows you what is actually going on and isn’t being funneled through a reporter with obvious bias) or reading the websites of the candidates to read about the issues and how each candidate feels about them, McCain supporters are merely parroting buzzwords and smear campaigns and taking them as truth without a second thought and making pure asses of themselves (especially the blond woman.)
This video also proves that people can be very, very proud of their ignorance.
Edited to add: If you wish to Digg this story, please digg this one. This video needs as much attention as possible.
Pennsylvania Voter Registration Sets Record
People registered to vote in Pennsylvania has hit an all time high and set a new record of 8.6 million Pennsylvania people registered to vote–And last minute registrants who sent in their registration as late as yesterday still have to be counted.
Democrats saw the largest increase in voter registration with an increase of 500,000 new Democratic voters. While Democrats increased in numbers, Republicans voters have dropped by 28,000.
Pennsylvania, I want to thank you for waking up; for crawling out from whatever dark hole you’ve been hiding in for the past how many or so years to get out there and make your voice heard. I also want to thank the young, recently 18 and voting in their first election and also the other people who had never registered to vote before and are voting for the first time in this election because they finally want to believe and to have hope in America. All 500,000 (and counting) new Democratic Pennsylvania voters, thank you for standing up for what you know this country needs. Those of you who have been registered to vote for years but never did because you either didn’t know much about politics or didn’t realize just how much of an impact you could have, thank you.
It is about fucking time. Now let’s win this shit, okay?
Just Name One Newspaper! Any Newspaper!
How does a question like “What newspaper did you read before accepting the vice presidential nomination from John McCain?” turn into Palin talking about how American citizens think Alaska is a foreign country?
Apparently Palin has either read every newspaper ever created or none at all. Do Alaskan cities have local newspapers? If so, why can’t she name one? Just one? She could have just named a newspaper out there that she has at least heard of that she didn’t really read, but at least knew the name of.
What is expected of someone who runs as a Republican vice presidential candidate? I mean, apparently all you need to do is not drool all over yourself while speaking, know how to read a little bit, talk in circles, make up your own questions in your head and answer them while completely ignoring the question that was initially asked. Oh Sarah, you’re lowering the bar more and more every time you open your mouth.
A candidate for any type of office in the United States should be just that–An educated, intelligent and on point candidate; not hours of entertainment. But hey, what the hell am I talking about? Look who was “voted” into the presidency for the past 8 years.
Via Blue Alto
Utah Lawmakers Want to Go Backwards on Choice
Utah has big plans for women in 2009–Big, big plans regarding women and how they want control over their bodies. Marvelous.
Several conservative (umm…really?) Utah state lawmakers will be sponsoring anti-choice legislation in the 2009 legislative session to ban abortion except in cases of rape, incest, or endangerment of maternal health. Why is this? Well, Utah state lawmakers do not believe that women in Utah should have responsibility over their bodies nor do they believe that women really know what is best for them. I mean, come on, who knows more about how a woman would feel after an abortion, the woman or a group of men who will never be pregnant or have an abortion in their lifetime?
Stephen Sandstrom, (who I am willing to bet has a penis and cannot get pregnant) a primary supporter of the new proposal, said:
“Our hope is that the Supreme Court might make this into a state’s rights issue….I’ve spoken to legislators from twelve other states who are ready to jump on board if this goes through. If we can have Utah lead the way, that would be wonderful.”
Hear that? Utah just doesn’t think women are smart or capable enough to make their own decisions, but the legislators in twelve other states believe that they should also have rights over women! So apparently, what Utah aims to do is lead the way in bringing back alley abortions into women’s lives again. They want to lead the way in telling women “Um, no, that zygote inside of you has more rights than you do, now go home and pick up some cookie dough on your way there!” They want to lead the way in more women of their state dying because they did not have access to safe and legal abortions. They want to lead the way in states telling their women that the rights they once had don’t mean shit.
You know what would truly be wonderful? If men stayed out of reproductive rights issues.
Keating Economics
Something for you all to chew on for a bit.
It IS the Same as Palin’s Head on a Bikini-Clad Body
A picture of Sarah Palin’s head on a bikini-clad body is sexist and this picture, found over at Feministing and made by Ann, of Joe Biden’s head on a set of abs is also sexist.
First, the defense of the posting of this picture:
Indeed, this is a play on words. It’s a joke about Palin’s repeated use of the phrase “Joe Sixpack.” What sets this apart from, say, the photoshopped image of Palin’s head on a bikini-clad body, is that the point of the bikini image was, “Isn’t she HAWT?!” I’m not attempting a sweeping statement about gender here, or trying to take a cheap shot at Biden based on his looks, or trying to “level the playing field.” It’s a play on words. One that I found funny.And when I prefaced it with a note that this explained my feelings on the debate, I meant the absurdity of her “folksy” turns of phrase. And really the absurdity of this entire election. Not that I came away from the evenings festivities thinking I wanted to see Joe Biden shirtless.
All that said, please keep debating this. (Respectfully, of course.)
Firstly, I am glad that Ann is encouraging debate about this image, but the fact that it greeted visitors going to their website to read the thoughts of the Feministing women on the vice presidential debate, because they usually have insightful and thought-provoking things to say, disappoints me.
While it is true that the response to a picture of Palin’s head on a half-naked woman’s body is usually “OMG SHE’S SO HAWT I’M TOTALLY VOTING FOR HER!!!111!!!!!” what if someone were to take this picture of Joe Biden, put it up on their site and say the same thing about him? Would it be sexist then, by Feministing’s standards? Of course it would, but because Ann defends her decision to post this picture by saying that it is a play on words, it is supposed to be accepted when it is simply not funny and indeed sexist behavior.
To point out every sexist picture and remark of Palin, as Feministing and other feminist blogs have been doing, even if we considered that some of the accounts were also defended as being a play on words, and then doing it yourself and claiming it is different is going backwards.
I find it ironic that during the vice presidential debate Biden brought up gender in saying that he knows what it is like to be a single parent yet not a lot of people know that or consider that possibility because he is a man and then finding a picture like this really makes you think about that whole gender equality thing. This picture is sexist and a woman who posts a sexist picture of a man is just as bad as a man posting a sexist picture of a woman.
Via Womanist Musings
Get Social
Flickr
Out Campaign
The OUT Campaign allows individuals to let others know they are not alone. It can also be a nice way of opening a conversation and help to demolish the negative stereotypes of atheists. Let the world know that we are not about to go away and that we are not going to allow those that would condemn us to push us into the shadows.
