Category Archives: The XX Factor

With You But You Are Not With Me

Posted by Tata on

Via Angry Black Lady Chronicles, get a load of this shit:

House Republicans prohibited state Rep. Lisa Brown from speaking on the floor Thursday after she ended a speech Wednesday against a bill restricting abortions by referencing her female anatomy.

Brown, a West Bloomfield Democrat and mother of three, said a package of abortion regulation bills would violate her Jewish religious beliefs and that abortions be be allowed in cases where it is required to save the life of the mother.

“Finally, Mr. Speaker, I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but ‘no’ means ‘no,'” Brown said Wednesday.

Brown’s comment prompted a rebuke Thursday by House Republicans, who wouldn’t allow her to voice her opinion on a school employee retirement bill.

“What she said was offensive,” said Rep. Mike Callton, R-Nashville. “It was so offensive, I don’t even want to say it in front of women. I would not say that in mixed company.”

Brown’s comments were published in Thursday’s Detroit News.

Majority Floor Leader Jim Stamas, R-Midland, determined Brown’s comments violated the decorum of the House, said Ari Adler, spokesman for the Republican majority.

“If I can’t say the word vagina, why are we legislating vaginas?” Brown asked Thursday at a hastily called Capitol press conference. “What language should I use?”

Brown noted “vagina” is the “medically correct term.”

As you may be, so I was inspired to dash off a letter.

Mr. Callton,

Women have vaginas. We talk about them. We use them to start families and for fun. Having a vagina can be fully awesome.

If you think they’re icky or unmentionable, you certainly shouldn’t get to regulate vaginas. That’s ridiculous. In fact, if you look at internet, you are the subject of fantastically funny ridicule, which is delightful. Laughing at men who can’t bear to think of vaginas is great sport. But no, you absolutely have no business going near a vagina.

Seriously, stay away from vaginas if you’re that squicked out. No vagina for you!

Sincerely,

Tata
Vagina! Vagina! Vagina!

I considered paraphrasing Caesar, but that gooey Latin verb joke would just puzzle the guy having trouble with nouns. But not you. And you know what to do.

See the Evil And the Good Without Hiding

Posted by Tata on

When last we left god-forsaken Kansas, it was ready to forsake caring for women, even sick women. Perhaps the bill will pass, perhaps not, but that’s not really this issue, in my opinion. No, the real question is where is the AMA? Why does the AMA not step in and insist that legislators knock off this destructive shit that will make doctors all but uninsurable in Kansas and any other state that permits or, as in New Hampshire, demands doctors lie to patients?

Neutrality favors the oppressor 100% of the time.

It’s the best question the AMA’s website does nothing to address. Have a look at the site. It’s so mild it says nothing at all about anything, really. Fortunately, there’s a contact site, so you can ask the AMA yourself. I wrote a charming, profanity-free letter asking why the AMA is silent when women are harassed, misled, misinformed, mistreated, left untreated and, as far as the statutes are concerned, raped? This is not medical care. It is complicity with torturers.

You too might want to write a letter.

The Blues Get Ahold Of You

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Mutts on leashes. Squirrels. Outdoor cats. Birdies. Fat, tasty toddlers. It’s sort of a miracle screens contain tiny couch panthers and window sill mountain lions.

Kansas Bill Permits Doctors to Refuse to Administer Chemotherapy to Pregnant Cancer Patients

Anti-gay Amendment One passes in NC

I can’t talk. This is all too fucking sad.

Waiting For the End of the World

Posted by Tata on

Oh Arizona, you slay me:

The American Civil Liberties Union’s Reproductive Freedom Project has called Arizona’s proposed law the “most extreme bill of its kind,” one that would be more restrictive than any others currently in force in the US. Although it includes exceptions if the pregnancy poses a threat to the life of the woman, there are no exceptions if, for instance, the fetus is found to have a life-threatening condition or other severe impairment. Banning abortions at the 18-week mark would also preclude women from obtaining information about the condition of the fetus, as many medical tests are either not performed or are not conclusive at that early date.

The bill doesn’t stop there. Under this law, if a doctor performs an abortion after that 18-weeks, he or she can be charged with a crime, have his or her license revoked or suspended, and can be held liable for civil penalties if the father of the fetus decides to pursue legal action. The bill also requires a mandatory ultrasound for anyone seeking an abortion at any stage of pregnancy (hello, transvaginal probes) and mandates that a doctor offer to show a pregnant woman the ultrasound, describe it to her verbally and provide her with a photo of “the unborn child.” It would also require a woman to wait 24 hours after the ultrasound before she can obtain an abortion.

I have a proposal of my own: it’s time to empty a state of religious wackos and let women move there who want to be left the hell alone. No bishops with squishy, dudely feelings. No snake-handling mouthbreaters pounding their fists and parishoners. No church ladies pursing their lips and pushing their daughters through the abortion clinic’s back doors. No more witchhunts and small-town gossip. Out they all go.

In go women who have no use for men with control issues. In go women who will never need a women’s shelter. In go women who get the healthcare they need in peace. Women can make a living there because there’d be no need to compete with men for jobs, so from construction to scientific research: it’s all women. All women, all the time. It’d be a state with one menstrual cycle for all, but few of us really need those anyhow. Children would never need to fear child molesters.

We’ll take South Carolina. It’s kind of nice there and I like the ocean, but I sure would enjoy hearing Jim DeMint and Lindsey Graham kiss women’s asses in vain attempts to keep their jobs. Let the yahoos and godbotherers clear out and we can all have drinks on the porch on long, sunny afternoons. Men in other states would have to reconsider how they treat women because, in fact, women would have someplace better to go. And when you called, Arizona, you might not hear back from us for a long, long time.

Longing To Linger Till Dawn

Posted by Tata on

You see that movie last night with pretty pretty Dorothy Dandridge singing –

A woman can do what she’s gotta
Even if it isn’t what she oughtta

– while rowing a canoe made of feathers and Adam’s Sour Apple Gum? There’s no such movie, you say? Huh. At least this fever comes with an awesome imaginary video soundtrack.

On the other hand, via Digby, being awake is no picnic:

Naturally, I’m going back to bed.

The Boy For the Last Time

Posted by Tata on

It’s warm for March and people are restless.

Pete plays with my camera. I am filled with ennui!

The Treasury has gone paperless, which means no more savings bonds for children. Customer service representatives must be getting their asses handed to them all day every day because they sound like they tell the same tired story over and over: no more paper, gifts in electronic gift boxes, minors can open accounts when they turn 18.

Tata: And what good is that? It teaches children nothing about saving. There’s nothing to see, nothing to handle, nothing to appreciate. They learn nothing.
Customer Service: We can’t fool you!
Tata: Who do I talk to about this stupid new policy and getting my own way?
Customer Service: The address is –
Tata: Phone number, please! My naive charm and wrath are more impressive when my victims can hear me cackle.
Customer Service: My supervisor is gonna love this –
Tata: I’m putting you on speaker phone so my next door neighbors learn to fear me properly.

By the time I hung up I thought my name was Thankyou Forholding, of the New Brunswick Forholdings. Surely you’ve heard of our lengthy history and many awkward pauses. I mean branches. If you’ve been buying savings bonds for your children or grandchildren, little has to change for you. You can open an account and pop some cash into the thing. Poof! Savings! But I can’t see how this works for my nieces, nephews and cousins, so I expect to spend some time fighting tree surgeons and hanging from odd limbs.