The Rise of Sarah Palin is Like a Really Bad Disney Movie
Matt Damon has recently spoken out about his feelings about Sarah Palin. Why am I posting this? Why do I care about what Matt Damon has to say? Well, because his thoughts and feelings are pretty much what a lot of Americans are feeling as they decide who they support in the upcoming presidential election and no, the majority of people who haven’t been keeping up on politics, the candidates and issues have no idea who Sarah Palin is and what she stands for.
Gloria Steinem on Sarah Palin
Gloria Steinem recently published an article in the LA Times entitled ‘Palin: wrong woman, wrong message‘ In a piece that was published under ‘opinion,’ which I find to be a mistake since a lot of women are unanimously agreeing on the fact that Palin is indeed the wrong woman for potential vice presidency and she is definitely touting the wrong message across America. Why do I think this? Well, let’s leave it to Gloria Steinem herself to clear up the Sarah Palin myths people are buying into when they believe that Palin is a good candidate for women and set the record straight for the media who believe that women who support (and supported) Hillary Clinton for president would be so simple-minded and jump at the chance to get a woman (any woman!) into that white house and vote for McCain simply based on his vice presidential pick.
Great points in the article (that you should definitely read in its entirety):
- This isn’t the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It’s about making life more fair for women everywhere.
- To vote in protest for McCain/Palin would be like saying, “Somebody stole my shoes, so I’ll amputate my legs.”
- Palin has been honest about what she doesn’t know. When asked last month about the vice presidency, she said, “I still can’t answer that question until someone answers for me: What is it exactly that the VP does every day?” When asked about Iraq, she said, “I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq.”
- She was elected governor largely because the incumbent was unpopular, and she’s won over Alaskans mostly by using unprecedented oil wealth to give a $1,200 rebate to every resident. Now she is being praised by McCain’s campaign as a tax cutter, despite the fact that Alaska has no state income or sales tax.
- McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act.
- She opposes just about every issue that women support by a majority or plurality. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but disbelieves global warming; she opposes gun control but supports government control of women’s wombs; she opposes stem cell research but approves “abstinence-only” programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions; she tried to use taxpayers’ millions for a state program to shoot wolves from the air but didn’t spend enough money to fix a state school system with the lowest high-school graduation rate in the nation; she runs with a candidate who opposes the Fair Pay Act but supports $500 million in subsidies for a natural gas pipeline across Alaska; she supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, though even McCain has opted for the lesser evil of offshore drilling. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
I’m not going to quote the entire article, but these points were way too important to not note here. Read the entire article here.
More “Fun” with the LA Times and Politics of Fashion
Well at least the LA Times are consistent with their extremely fucked up hobby of tearing a woman’s political aspirations down to merely the clothing she chooses to wear. Who knew politics were merely a fashion show?
We’ve already seen the LA Times put a Politics of Fashion poll up about Michelle Obama asking if the clothes she wore to political events were too frumpy, too matronly, if she was a flawless first lady, or too sexy and now it’s Sarah Palin’s turn.
In the latest Politics of Fashion poll we can vote about Sarah Palin’s fashion choices and vote on whether she misses the target, VP bulls-eye, too beauty queen, or too backwoods.
For the record, does what Sarah Palin or Michelle Obama or Hillary Clinton or Cindy McCain or any other woman in the political spotlight wears matter at all? Nope, not one little bit. No woman should be subject to the ridicule of the media and of the people for merely what she wears; it just doesn’t matter. No one ridicules a man in politics if he wore a blue suit and not a black suit and so on and why is that? Because it really doesn’t matter. I hate the belief that where there are women, there is fashion because don’t you know all women are consumed by fashion? Ugh.
What does bother me about the LA Times poll of Sarah Palin’s fashion of politics, however, is that when putting Michelle Obama under the fashion microscope the voting choices included too matronly, too frumpy and too sexy and when dissecting Sarah Palin’s fashion we are not given voting choices that completely degrade the woman which is somewhat commendable, but inconsistent and makes me believe that the media believes it’s just fine to degrade the potential first lady of the United States but not the potential vice president.
That, or Elizabeth Snead and Stephanie Lysaght, the LA Times staff writers who put these two polls together are merely just partial to Palin and want readers of the LA Times to degrade the potential first lady along with them.
Target Women: The Sarah Palin Edition
Get your P.A.N.T.H.E.R. pride right here!
Oh do I love that Sarah Haskins mentioned that the “news” has finally admitted that sexism exists. Because as we all know, sexism did not exist when Hillary was running in the primary. Sexism did not exist when it was just McCain vs. Obama and the “news” was attacking Michelle Obama like it was an extra credit assignment in school that they were getting graded on. Sexism did not exist until…McCain chose Sarah Palin as a running mate. But oh well, right? I guess sexism is only sexism when it’s targeted at a member of the Republican team that they agree with…all of the other women in the world with whom they don’t agree with just deserve it then, huh? Makes you wonder…
Women DO Deserve Better, Women Deserve CHOICE
I was linked to a post on Work It, Mom! via Twitter claiming from it’s soapbox that Sarah Palin is indeed good for feminism. Of course, because I’m well, me, I had to get on my own symbolic soapbox and leave a comment and after making some pretty rad points, I thought I would share my thoughts.
Please note: The article at Work It, Mom! is a great article and very thought provoking. Excerpt:
Feminists work to ensure that women and girls have access to equal education, have agency in their health decisions, are respected whether or not they give birth, and ultimately trust women to do what is right for them. Palin & the GOP do not trust women…They only trust women who can stand up and say, “Vote for me so I can tell you want to do with your life.” The Pink Elephants give a great break down of things Palin has done for Alaska, but none related to moving women forward towards equality.
What does a feminist candidate look like to you? What does feminism mean to you? I’ve met plenty of feminists who call themselves Republicans, but they usually differ from me on business issues. Some are even endorsed by feminist organizations. Are you one? How do you reconcile the tension between feminism and the goals of the Republican Party?
Granted, the following are not very thorough explanations, but rather some stream of consciousness bullet points that I will most likely be coming back to again and again for the next two months because frankly, this is how I feel and I’m unapologetic like that.
I think that feminism (and feminists) stand up for human rights and equality.
1.) I support a man’s right to get a vasectomy so I support a woman’s right to get an abortion.
2.) As a feminist, I support women and do not go as far as to directly and blatantly insult their intelligence and say that they should have no choice or simply aren’t smart enough to have control over their own bodies. Sarah Palin is directly horrible for feminism and should not even be deemed as a feminist because as a woman she thinks that women should not be given a choice but should be forced to carry a pregnancy to term despite rape or even incest and that is disgusting and inexcusable. Sarah Palin’s “traditional family values” moves people back in history instead of propelling us forward. Her politics are corrupt and she is one of the most horrible VP picks in American history.
I’m a feminist and because I believe in feminism, I believe in a woman’s right to choose whether or not she wants to have an abortion. I am a feminist because I believe in women.
As for the whole “women deserve better” bullshit from Feminists for Life…Yeah, I believe women DO deserve better. Women deserve a hell of a lot better than being forced to carry a child they do not want, cannot afford, or is the product of a traumatic and heartbreaking event. Oh, and speaking of women deserving better, take a look at this:
Don’t Believe It, Pro-Choicers!
While blog-hopping today and catching up on some news (Yes, I know, I have missed a lot that has been happening, especially with RNC, and will get some opinions of mine up on that shortly) and found this little gem floating around:
Fox News is labeling Palin as a pro-choice candidate. Leave it to Fox News to spread blatant lies like this!
For the record, Sarah Palin is not pro-choice; she is a strict anti-choice, abstinence-only education and creationism education-supporting candidate. Overall, she is a complete anti-woman candidate. She is even a member of Feminists for Life, as much as an oxymoron that is! Catholic.org has even cited Palin as being “truly pro-life.”
So pro-choicers out there, don’t believe the lies Fox News is spreading to make Palin look like a more attractive candidate. She does not stand for choice, she does not stand for real sex education, she does not stand for any education that is based on science, but only on “creationism;” which even Wikipedia states in its first sentence can also refer to “creation myths.” Lastly, Sarah Palin does not stand for feminism or for women.
Via News Hounds.
And for the people who keep pointing out and asking why I keep grouping anti-choice and anti-woman together, here’s a lovely form of entertainment that speaks volumes and volumes of truth:
Bristol Palin is Currently Pregnant
It was released today that Bristol Palin is currently 5 months pregnant.
A statement from Palin released from the McCain camp:
“We have been blessed with five wonderful children who we love with all our heart and mean everything to us. Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned. We’re proud of Bristol’s decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents. As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support.”
“Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they will have the love and support of our entire family. We ask the media to respect our daughter and Levi’s privacy as has always been the tradition of children of candidates.”
I guess we know why Bristol hasn’t been attending Palin’s speeches lately and has been “taking care of Trig,” huh? Do I think this story broke just as the media coverage of Palin allegedly covering up her daughter’s pregnancy? Yes; hell, Reuters even made it their headline. Do I think there are any facts to claim that the aforementioned is true or believe it 100% when I posted it? Nope and I even said so; but I’m still skeptical, I’m always skeptical when it comes to politics and more so when it comes to politicians. With that in mind, I will refrain from the 50 different talking points and headlines that shot through my head as soon as I heard this story and speak about something else that is a hell of a lot more important than what I think.
For the 17 year old daughter of a staunch, conservative, anti-woman, anti-choice politician to become pregnant goes to show the American voters that not only does abstinence-only education not work, it is dangerous. We have seen “alternatives” to safe sex teens have come up with in the past and that was scary enough, thanks.
While you can preach all you’d like to a teenager, inevitably, they are going to do what they choose to do and if they choose to become sexually active then you have to be confident, as a parent, that you raised them with enough resources to take care of themselves when it comes to keeping themselves healthy. You can say “I do not condone you having sex before you are married” but at the end of the day, you can disapprove of it all you want, that teenager is going to do what they wish and the questions left are–Did they use a condom, is she on birth control, do they know about sexually transmitted diseases and infections? If you do not ask yourself these questions, as a parent who is obligated to ready your child for adulthood, then along with a pregnancy test coming out positive, an HIV test could also come out positive and that is what we have to think about now. With every teenager who chooses to become sexually active, they must have the facts because while we hear about pregnancies and families supporting a young girl with child, it doesn’t always come out that pretty.
My heart goes out to Bristol, a 17 year old child who will be wed to her child’s father…as soon as she’s old enough.
Obama has also released a statement today in response to Bristol’s pregnancy:
“Let me be as clear as possible: I have said before and I will repeat again, I think people’s families are off limits,” Obama said, “and people’s children are especially off limits.
“This shouldn’t be part of our politics,” he continued, “It has no relevance to Gov. Palin’s performance as governor, or her potential performance as a vice president.
“And so I would strongly urge people to back off these kinds of stories,” he said. “You know my mother had me when she was 18, and how a family deals with issues and, you know, teenage children, that shouldn’t be the topic of our politics and I hope that anybody who is supporting me understands that’s off limits.”
Good on him for doing the right thing this time.
And She Did So Much While Pregnant! Right?
I wasn’t going to touch upon this, however, I read a good amount of conservative blogs and talk to a great deal of conservatives. I hold nothing against them, I believe that one must challenge their world views and without doing so, you will never know what you truly believe or how deeply you believe in something until you open your mind to the other side. You truly find yourself when you accept criticism and have in depth conversations with someone whom you may not agree with; it is when you do this that you truly understand who you are and what you stand for. With that being said, quite a few Republicans are rejoicing over McCain’s VP pick of Sarah Palin; moreover, they are repeatedly shoving the phrase “feminist role model” down the throats of their readers and boasting that she is a great advocate for “traditional family values” and pro-life policies as she gave birth to a son last April who was diagnosed with Down Syndrome; not only that, but she stayed in office as a working governor while pregnant and didn’t even announce that she was pregnant until March 6.
First of all, I do not believe that a woman giving birth to a child with Down Syndrome and choosing not to abort said child when she found out about his disability is hardly a focus point on her politics. As an anti-choice candidate, she has created a pro-life record by standing up against a woman’s right to choose by using such phrases as “It’s not a choice, it’s a child,” which many pro-lifers yell, scream and carry on about during protests and harassing women outside of Planned Parenthood clinics. Using her politics, her son is a child and he was not a choice and yet her son is the first (or close second) thing people bring up when defending her as a candidate saying that it was her choice to give birth to a child with Down Syndrome; this point has also come up in the comments in my last post on Palin. People are very quick to throw that her birth to a child with special needs is a choice, but isn’t that what pro-lifers spend their hours trying to convince us is not the case? (Cara at The Curvature has a more in depth post on this specifically that you should check out)
As I stated in what I’m calling my obligatory Sarah Palin post, Palin is against reproductive rights and believes that abortion starts with contraception. Frankly, Palin is a traditional believer in not having sex until you’re married and ready to begin baby-making. That is all well and good and also fool proof in roping the pro-life voters who weren’t going to vote for McCain at first; but perhaps if her abstinence-only values and pro-life policies were concrete they would work, however as the hours tick by, more and more dirty laundry on Palin is surfacing.
We met Palin’s family at the McCain/Palin rally in Dayton Ohio; we were introduced to her children, Piper, 5; Willow, 12; Bristol, 16; Track, 17. Also amongst the clan was the newest member of the family, Trig, born last April.
Palin did not tell anyone outside of her family about her pregnancy until she was 8 months pregnant and even at 8 months, she did not resemble a woman with child; as Palin is a very slim and slender woman, a pregnancy would have been abundantly apparent. Alaskan media did comment on this, yet their speculations went no further.
Months before Palin’s birth announcement, Bristol Palin, 16, became ill with mononucleosis (mono) and had to leave school. Mono typically lasts between 2 weeks and 3 months and that is if it is a particularly horrendous and threatening case, but Bristol was out of school for 5 to 8 months, ironically this took place at the same time Sarah Palin was pregnant with Trig.
A pregnant Palin, wardrobe still fitting, her physique remaining the same in February, went hiking. A video was released where Palin said:
[5 minutes 55 seconds into the video]
…”I like running the hills, it kills me, that’s why I like it, I mean it thrashes your guts and your lungs and your thighs…”
Now I don’t believe that is something that should come from a pregnant woman’s mouth.
Rumors ran rampant through Bristol’s school while several of her classmates accounted that Bristol was gaining a significant amount of weight and appeared to be pregnant when she abruptly left school.
Sarah Palin went into labor while in Dallas, Texas just before she was schedule to deliver a keynote address at the Republican Governors’ Energy Conference. Palin, instead of checking into a hospital, delivered the keynote speech. She said:
“I was not going to miss that speech,” she says.
She rushed so quickly from the podium afterwards that Texas Gov. Rick Perry nervously asked if she was about to deliver the baby then.
Instead of checking into a hospital after supposed hours of leaking amniotic fluid, Palin then made the very bold move of flying while in labor to Alaska so Trig would be born “an Alaskan.” Palin is obviously wonder woman since she was said to be in labor during the entire 8 hour flight and was said to be extremely pleasant to flight attendants who oddly were not even aware that the woman was pregnant, never mind in labor.
As most of you may know, airlines typically have strict rules regarding women who wish to fly while more than 7 months pregnant. Palin said that it was through the birth of her four previous children that she became comfortable with the signs of active labor and did not feel that she or the baby were in any form of danger by boarding the flight.
I find it rather peculiar how a woman can be eight moths pregnant and deliver a 6.2lb child and no one can even notice the woman is pregnant. Palin then returned to work after three days. I understand that middle-class citizens may have no choice but to return to work, not being able to afford to take time off even after a child is born, but obviously Palin and her big oil-working husband are well equipped to take a little time off to enjoy their newborn, right? Why would any woman want to separate from her newborn child who has special needs to be taken care of after just three days?
Well, because Sarah Palin was not pregnant, Bristol Palin, her 16 year old daughter, was. Mono is a common excuse used in “respectable” families and Catholic school systems as to why teenage girls must be taken out of school when they are really pregnant. The same thing is still happening today.
Yes, Trig was born with Down Syndrome and while this occurs with newborn babies of older women, such as Sarah Palin, the same also occurs in cases of very young women, which Bristol is.
Pictures of the family, the Bristol bump and the lack of Sarah bump after the jump.
Sarah Palin is Not a Feminist
I woke up yesterday and by the time I was awake for 11 minutes I felt like I had been punched in the gut several times after reading on several conservative blogs how Sarah Palin, McCain’s VP pick, is such a great feminist role model. After doing some research on this woman whom I’ve never even heard of before it became abundantly clear–Not only is Sarah Palin not a feminist, she is as anti-woman as Bush and McCain combined. That is the reason why McCain picked her; not because she is a woman and he wanted to be underhanded (which he totally did,) but because she’s a Republican, conservative man who just happens to be in a woman’s body.
Feminism means to stand up for human rights; it means to stand up for equality and the freedoms and liberties of people and Sarah Palin is disgustingly right wing, anti-choice and has no record of representing women’s interests; though her record in general is quite minuscule.
So here are some things you should know about Sarah Palin–The woman vice presidential candidate with strong, anti-woman policies.
Palin is adamantly opposed to reproductive rights. She opposes abortion including in cases of rape and incest. She opposes birth control, emergency contraception and just like McCain, is all about abstinence-only education. Basically, she agrees with McCain regarding all forms of sexuality and wants to tell people everywhere that if they have sex, that woman better be damn ready to squeeze out that baby in 9 months. A McCain/Palin regime for women would look eerily similar to this.
Palin has absolutely no federal or international experience whatsoever. Prior to being the governor of Alaska for less than two years, (I can’t believe she and Mike Gravel actually share a state) she was the mayor of a small town made up of around 6,000 people. Before that, she was a beauty queen. (Is McCain looking for a new mistress? A third wife, perhaps?)
I found it oddly peculiar how the Republicans who were bashing Obama about not having enough experience are fully supporting a McCain/Palin ticket when Palin has no experience at all.
Palin strongly supports big oil. Hell, not only does she support it, she’s profiting from it with her husband working for an oil company. A McCain/Palin ticket would mean just more of the same when it comes to going after countries for their oil–They both make a killing from it and us meager, middle class Americans can just keep enlisting in the military and having our lives taken away from us in vain to support the wallets of these people. Oh, did I mention she’s 100% pro-war? Yeah…no surprise.
She believes that global warming is not only not man-made, but is a total farce and goes as far as to being opposed to listing the polar bear on the endangered species list. But that isn’t her only anti-animal policy; she also supports aerial shooting of bears and wolves in Alaska.
She is in favor of public schools teaching abstinence-only education (Alaska is currently considering spending more on abstinence-only sex education) and creationism. I can see the syllabus…”Yes, a man in the sky made you and he says not to have sex until you’re married no matter what. Got it? And if you are raped, even if you’re raped by a member of your family and become pregnant you will have that baby!”
When it comes to other issues of women, such as equal pay for equal work, she is following McCain’s lead and isn’t even on the record.
Palin has went on the record, however, with how she feels about LGBT rights:
“[...] she’s not out to judge anyone and has good friends who are gay, but that she supported the 1998 constitutional amendment.
Elected officials can’t defy the court when it comes to how rights are applied, she said, but she would support a ballot question that would deny benefits to homosexual couples.
“I believe that honoring the family structure is that important,” Palin said.
She said she doesn’t know if people choose to be gay.
“But, but, but…I have gay friends!” Come on. And why hasn’t she asked these said gay friends if they chose to be gay? For the record: No, people do not choose to be gay and if they did, who do you think would choose to be denied basic, human rights and be discriminated against to such a degree? There are the cases of Brandon Teena, Matthew Shepard and so many others who have been brutally attacked and killed for nothing other than the fact that they happened to be gay. Who would choose to be the target for hate crimes? Yeah, I don’t think so.
Best of all, Palin has already managed to get herself involved in a scandal:
A legislative investigation is looking into allegations that Palin fired Alaska’s public safety commissioner because he refused to fire the governor’s former brother-in-law, a state trooper.
Palin acknowledged that a member of her staff made a call to a trooper in which the staffer suggested he was speaking for the governor.
Palin has admitted that the call could be interpreted as pressure to fire state trooper Mike Wooten, who was locked in a child-custody battle with Palin’s sister.
This is a direct abuse of power on her part and I don’t want to see what else she is capable of if she ever saw the white house.
Sarah Palin stands for everything Hillary Clinton is against so please, Hillary supporters, do not be fooled.
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.
