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Links in this episode:
Washington U. protests
Go gay marriage!
History lesson
"Judicial activism" is an empty phrase
Ellen Degeneres
Bashing the happy couple
The Family
Fox 31 on the Human Life Amendment
Most sexism on the campaign trail
Transcript:
This week on Reality Cast, I'll be interviewing Jeff Sharlet
about his frightening new work of investigative journalism called The
Family. Also, the aftermath of the gay
marriage decision in California, a loss for the right to use birth control in
Colorado, and more sexism against the first major female candidate for
President.
Congrats to the students and faculty at Washington University who stood up for common sense.
- insert schlafly *
They're absolutely in the right to do this. Schlafly has always railed against women's equality, and yet here she is taking an honorary degree. She should put her money where her mouth is and refuse to take the degree on the grounds that these sort of things should be reserved for men. She's an odious person who has spent much of her life agitating against women's very right to be safe in the own homes, and she defends men who beat and rape their wives, saying that if women leave such men, they're to blame for breaking up the families.
****************
Go, gay marriage!
* insert gay marriage report *
In our little part of the world---the social activist feminist sex positive part---the California court ruling for equal rights laws was the big news of late. First of all, let me say this to this to the thousands of couples who have been waiting for this day to arrive.
- insert champagne *
- insert woo hoo *
I'm sure the wedding industry is gearing up to take full profit advantage of this new onslaught of potential customers. California is a big state after all.
What I want to know is why people feel so compelled to be on the wrong side of history on these sort of things. I mean, history has not looked well upon those who supported segregation, bans on interracial marriage, or denying women their rights. You know how these things turn out when they get underway, and the progressives will win the moral victory. Why not be on that train from the beginning?
Here's a clip from Gloria Allred explaining some of the history of the lawsuits.
- insert Gloria *
Naturally, the media went straight to the bigots and haters to weigh in on the ban. Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council was immediately ushered on Fox News to spew hate.
- insert perkins *
Lies, all lies. The legislature recognized same-sex marriage and the Governator vetoed it and said that it should be left to the courts. Judicial activism" is a meaningless phrase and always has been. Right wingers will pinch your rights however they can, and this phony concern for process should be recognized as the dishonest maneuvering that it is. It's like how opponents to civil rights suddenly got this enthusiasm for the letter of the law during the era of nonviolent resistance.
- insert perkins 2 *
I love how conservatives invoke images of forcing gay marriage, right down to Perkins implying that someone's going to be frog marched down the aisle. I can assure you that the ruling does not mean you have to marry someone of your own sex. I have relatives in California and in the week and a half since the ruling, not a one has been assigned a spouse of the same sex.
The anti-same sex marriage arguments are remarkably weak, even by the low standards set by social conservatives, and I think people are really beginning to see through them. Perkins might win a little rope with his lies about judicial activism, but everyone knows this is about gay marriage, period. And the injustice of it is beginning to be really obvious.
One thing that's going to help is how many beloved Hollywood stars are now going to make it official, and show people that gay marriage, even very famous gay marriage, won't be the end of the world. The most famous announcement, of course, was Ellen Degeneres's. Grab some tissue, this one's a weeper.
- insert ellen *
She and Portia di Rossi did not, after the announcement, grow fangs or eat any children. I suspect their very normal sweetness will make haters like Perkins seem that much uglier. The audience went nuts, which shows that a lot of people are already on board.
Of course, Greg Gutfeld on Fox News had an excuse to bash the happy couple.
- insert greg gutfeld *
Cute. He's pretending this is about proclamations of love in general, but if that were true, then he'd have had segments bashing straight couples for getting married a long time ago. A quick Google search demonstrated that Gutfeld has produced the equivalent of a public bowel movement, because he's married, and he described his courtship of his wife in great detail in his book. So it was okay for him to make a big public stink over his sexuality and relationship, but not okay for Ellen Degeneres?
Of course, he could just be jealous of her greater talent.
************
- insert interview *
********
We give you the good news, and now for the bad. Anti-choice crazies in Colorado have managed to get enough signatures for the Human Life Amendment to be put on the ballot in Colorado. It's an amendment aimed at defining personhood as beginning at fertilization, and contrary to most reports, this isn't just an attack on abortion rights, but on the right to use contraception.
Fox 31 News covered it, and I have to say, what's really funny about the You Tube page I got this link from was the paranoid ranting in the info section written by the guy who uploaded it. His main beef seems to be that they allowed female reporters to cover the issue, suggesting that this is further evidence that the media is anti-American. He's also angry that one reporter has given sympathetic coverage to what he describes as "foreign invaders", that is undocumented workers.
He's probably mad that the anti-choice nuts look stupid just by having cameras put in their faces.
- insert hla 1 *
One day, someone should infiltrate one of these protests and convince them to sing this.
- every sperm is sacred *
I bet you they'd do it. You'd have to sell it with the right amount of piety, but if you could work yourself up into a holy rolling fit while singing it, the word "sacred" would be too alluring and the protesters would be all about it.
- insert hla 2 *
It's worse than that. If the anti-choicers just wanted to ban abortion, they could define personhood as beginning when a woman is pregnant. This is about defining it at a point prior to pregnancy, and as such is not just an assault on abortion rights, but on the right to use birth control. That's why anti-choicers lie and claim the birth control pill works by flushing fertilized eggs. It actually works by preventing ovulation, but if this bill passes, expect not just assault on abortion, but on hormonal contraception.
As I've noted before, it's also broad enough that overzealous misogynists could take it as an assault on the right to menstruate in peace, because in theory any random menstruation of a sexually active woman could have a fertilized egg that didn't implant.
Don't think they wouldn't go that far. Remember the crazy Romanian government, that got really excitable about anti-choice legislation and had mandatory pregnancy checks and other assaults on women's rights. And remember that our anti-choice nuts are even crazier than the ones in communist Romania. At least in Romania they had a real world reason for it---they wanted to create more workers for the state. Anti-choice arguments in the U.S. are based in magical thinking and therefore are not nearly as bound by reality.
Meanwhile, I hope they at least throw a bone to non-pregnant women who could have imaginary persons floating around inside, and let them use the HOV lane on the theory that every woman, no matter how not pregnant, could be driving for two.
****************
Now for the Wisdom of Wingnuts. It looks like, barring any last minute changes, that Hillary Clinton is not going to make it across the finish line to be the Democratic nominee for President. But that doesn't mean that I can't continue to spank the whiners and moaners on TV and radio who just can't stand the idea of a woman running for high office. Is this the 21st century or the 1st century?
The most recent example of a man openly calling Clinton a "bitch" on TV was Alex Castellanos on CNN.
- insert white bitch *
One day I'll crack the mystery of why no one seems to be willing to understand that sexist slurs are, you know, sexist.
