Ok, now I'm REALLY Pissed

So I asked my boss out to coffee to explain to him that there might be times i have to miss a meeting, or may not make it to a company function because I had to get home to my baby. No surprise there, the significant other has appointments and gigs too, so we have to work together on these things. Plus, I think putting in ten hour days is probably pretty reasonable...but.....I almost had to miss a completely inane meeting once and got a few mixed messages out of the whole ordeal. So here I am, tripping over my words, spluttering about how I'm really comitted to my job and how does my boss feel about working moms (now, keep in mind, I watched the only other working mother get pushed out because she spent too much time with her daughter...)so my paranoia about losing my job because i miss a meeting here and there isn't so far fetched. Now keep in mind, I've never missed a meeting to date. Yet somehow I worry about losing my job because of family responsibilities...Long story short, my boss looks at me and says, "well, X on the team has three kids, you're not in a unique situation." Ok first of all, X is a dad. I'd say by virtue of having a vagina I'm pretty damn unique. Second of all, what the fuck kind of an answer is that? I'm not in a unique situation? You've got to be fucking kidding me! When i lamely explained that I feel responsible for my baby in a different way than her dad because, after all, I was solely responsible for her existance for 40 weeks prior to birth...and then I was her ONLY food source...so yeah, I'd say that makes me a little more unique than the sperm donor. And don't get me wrong; my husband is the primary caretaker. He stays home with the girl and does an exceptional job. But I'm her MOMMY. And I'm guessing working dad over here doesn't feel guilty about pulling late hours to advance his career. I mean, after all, that's what men do. And I don't give a rat's ass what the feminists say; women can't have it all and do a good job everywhere. I sure as hell am not pulling long hours, coming up with brilliant ideas. Christ, I can hardly get through my email! And guess what? Daddy X does all of the above!! So don't tell me I'm "not in a unique situation" especially when A) you're a man, and B) you'll NEVER have kids. (for reasons I won't disclose, but trust me...no kids in this man's future. Maybe a Shitsu.) That's it. I'm done.
- posted by SassGirl @ 12:46 PM

 
Uranium up Uranus...

Yes, I realize it's been forever since I've added to this particular blog. I declared a news free zone around myself after reading something so horrific it almost sent me over the edge. I won't recount it here , but let me just say, anyone with a conscience and a heart would be fighting for an end to the conflict in the Congo. Apparantly they don't discriminate between adults and children when it comes to the machete. I'll leave it at that.
On to more amusing news. I've just read that our president has said that the intelligence he received regarding WMD in Iraq was "darn good." Oh my fucking god. Seriously. Ok there, cowboys! I can just hear him using the phrase "Get along, little doggies" as his battle cry in Iraq. Oh wait, he's not going to war, I think that was his dad....but I digress. So here's another quote: "When I gave the speech the line was relevant," (referring to the now infamous 16 words stating that Iraq was purchasing uranium from Africa...) Ok, so it was relevant then..but now it's not? What exactly does that mean? It was relevant then because it suited his purpose and helped make a case to invade Iraq? Does he really think we're that fucking stupid??? ( the sad part is that most of us actually are....)
And then there's the whole spin on the "16 words." Nice try. I love how the White House is trying to diminish the scale of this particular faux pas by compressing it into a neat little package. It's an ironic parody of a serious issue, a symptom of a larger pattern of dishonesty, and an outright contradiction when you consider both Rumsfeld and Condi Rice have said " the intelligence falls short of the elevated standards necessary for a presidential address"... so it was in his speech because.........? And what's with George Tenent now? Is he suddenly Bush's bitch? Does he seriously think he's going to get brownie points for being the fall guy? Didn't work too well for Ollie North now did it. Justifying planting false information in the susceptible minds of the American people by claiming "relevance at the time" is like Clinton asking what the definition of the word "is" is......just as ludicrous, and just as much of a fuck you to the whole process.
- posted by SassGirl @ 8:34 AM

 
Civil Liberties Be Damned!

Let's first start with the Patriot Act, since most people actually have no idea the extent to which our civil liberties are being threatened. The USA PATRIOT Act is a clever little acronym that stands for "Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism". Here's a few bullet points, unabashadly plagerized from The Village Voice:
It is a crime for anyone in this country to contribute money or other material support to the activities of a group on the State Department's terrorist watch list. Now keep in mind that this is a "secret" list designated by the government, and you can't challenge the list in court. So, since I donate monthly to OSPIRG, and suddenly the government decides they are eco terrorists, I'm committing a crime, even though I'm donating legally to a legal organization, who are operating, (you guessed it) LEGALLY. It's important to emphasize that this list is chosen randomly and secretly. You have no way of knowing if that check you sent to your local mosque will land you in jail.
The FBI can monitor and tape conversations and meetings between an attorney and a client who is in federal custody, whether the client has been convicted, charged, or merely detained as a material witness.
Ok, attorney-client priviledge? Out the window baby. This has actually already happened. NYC lawyer Lynne Stewart has been indicted for aiding and abetting terrorism based on conversations with her client. Her client, by the way, was Sheik Abdel Rahman, who was convicted in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Foreign citizens charged with a terrorist-related act may be denied access to an attorney
By the way, this one doesn't just apply to those "damn foreigners" either...
American citizens and aliens can be held indefinitely in federal custody as "material witnesses
This is a great way to imprison people for whom you have no evidence of terrorist activity.
The government can conduct surveillance on the Internet and e-mail use of American citizens without any notice
Big brother is alive and well, and he's on your computer......oops, guess I better get rid of all of my bookmarked politcal websites...especially the Palestinian Authority and Al Jazeera.... but I just wanted more accurate reporting.....
The FBI can conduct aerial surveillance of individuals and homes without a warrant, and can install video cameras in places where lawful demonstrations and protests are held
Keep in mind the ramifications here; a protest against a war can be deemed an act of terrorism, and with the FBI's facial recognition software, you could be identified and imprisoned.
.....and hey, let's not forget those Military Tribunals.Any idea what those are? They operate on rules not based on the American justice system (innocent until proven guilty, yahdah yahday...) but rather on procedure defined by the Pentagon and the DOJ. And to qualify for the exceptional honour of landing in a military tribunal? Weeellllll...glad you asked. Just get fingered as an "unlawful combatant." And how would one qualify for that title? All it takes to be named an unlawful combatant is the affidavit of a Pentagon employee, who is not required to provide the rationale for his or her decision, even to a federal judge. Go ask all the "unlawful combatants" in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. They are without access to attorneys, family contact, and under conditions said by some to be tantamount to physical and psychological torture. A federal court ruled in March that these persons had no access to the federal courts since they were on Cuban, not American, soil. That's clever! Move them off country! God we're amazingly resourceful.
Now hold your horses, there's actually a new version of the patriot act coming out. It's benignly titled the Domestic Security Enhancement Act, and it allows for even more civil liberty violations. This is some seriously scary shit. Listen to this:
*Grants government the power to strip away the citizenship of any American involved in the lawful activities of an organization deemed to have terrorist ties. Such people could be held indefinitely, or deported to any country that agreed to take them.
*Broadens the definition of Americans who could be under surveillance without a warrant
*Creates new crimes and punishments relating to nonviolent activities linked to terrorist groups, which could include making charitable contributions to a group on the State Department's terrorist list.
*Expands surveillance powers to grant easier government access to bank accounts, home computers, telephones, and credit card accounts based upon subpoenas issued by the Department of Justice. You would have no right to know why you were charged.
*Amends the Freedom of Information Act to curtail even further the public's ability to obtain information about people detained or charged. If you were arrested for a crime of terror, your accuser could remain nameless. Does this not sound like the New England witch hunts?? Seriously. At least those poor women knew who their accuser was before they burned to death.
So what does this all mean?? I know one thing for sure, I'm scared. My last name is Persian, and you can damn well bet your bottom dollar I'm being surveilled.
- posted by SassGirl @ 2:33 PM

 
More on the Democratic Republic of the Congo
I've gathered that the current fighting is specifically between the rival ethnic groups of the Lendu and the Hema, Lendu being the majority, Hema being the minority. The struggle is mainly for the reasource rich land that yeilds gold, rich mineral deposits, vast timber forests and fertile land. Hemas, traditionally cattle-raisers, and Lendus, predominantly farmers, have sparred for centuries over land and other resources in Ituri.

I am so upset writing this blog I can hardly put the words to paper. United Nations officials say they have never seen such "horrific" conditions as those in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. This last slaughter in Bunia left over 450 people dead, and I've read that during this five year civil war, over 3 million people have been killed. The UN officials returning from the area have said they had never witnessed such an appalling humanitarian crisis on such a large scale. Here's a few quotes from CNN, describing the carnage:"We've seen the most horrible things in Bunia. Women who've lost their arms and legs, child amputees, men chopped to bits, women raped,"
"I saw the killing. I saw the way they removed the heart, the way they roasted it in a fire and then ate it,"
"We're not just seeing women who have been raped, we're seeing women who have been torn apart, who have been cut up and who are on the edge of death," .......
And what has our response been? NOTHING!!Oh, ok, we sent Green Berets in the year before the full fledged civil war broke out. For some reason that seems a bit suspect. The U.N.'s own humanitarian and human rights agency has appealed three times to the U.N. Security Council about the atrocities in the Congo. Here's another quote: "I'm about to submit my third report on the subject to the security council. I am tired of presenting reports of mass human rights violations in the Congo on mass graves in the Congo and I believe it is time to take preventive measures," said U.N. Human Rights High Commissioner Sergio Vieira de Mello.
And again, our response has been what? To "invest" in the Congo, not offer aid. There's unarmed UN "peacekeepers" there, and ironically, it's France that's offered to send a 1000 member multi national force to the Congo to work with the peacekeepers. There are young girls being kidnapped and forced to join opposing tribal forces, as both murderers and sex slaves. They are repeatedly raped, beaten, and starved. Now I ask you, how the hell do we justify going into Iraq under the auspices of freeing the Iraqi people from a dictator, yet choose to do nothing about the Congo? Of course we all know the answer to that: oil.
Let's just draw some quick parallels between Iraq and the Congo:
Both have (or had) a dictatorship. The Congo has Museveni, Iraq had Saddam.
Neither supported Democracy; one of Museveni's charters is to illiminate muliti party elections. And he supresses his opposition the same way Saddam did. The only difference is while Saddam used guns, Museveni's henchmen tend to like the machete.
Both have multiple human rights violations, including rape as a weapon of war, torture and murder, all documented by several groups including the UN.
And both, ironically have been backed at one time or another by the U.S. Iraq of course was backed during the Iran-Iraq war, when we actually sold arms to them. And when Sadaam gassed the Kurds, we were the only country in the UN that actually abstained from voting to ban chemical weapons.

I don't think I need to illustrate the differences between the action taken by the U.S. in both countries;we've all just witnessed the ridiculous hipocracy called "Operation Iraqi Freedom". Now I understand Bono's comment about putting out a fire in Africa with a watering can. Too bad they don't have oil.




- posted by SassGirl @ 10:21 AM

 
Death in the Congo
Sadly, I don't know as much about this as I'd like. I know that I've been morally absent from this issue, mainly because it hasn't been publicized extensively here in the U.S. It's hard to search for something you have no knowledge of. I do remember seeing an interview with Bono after U2 won an award. He made some remark about how we're "putting out a fire with a watering can in Africa". I had no idea what he was talking about. Now I have a small idea.
There's been a civil war going on in the Congo. In a nutshell, war broke out in August 1998 when Rwanda and Uganda sent troops to back rebels seeking to oust then-President Laurent Kabila. They accused him of backing insurgents threatening regional security.

From what I've been able to find so far, this is another example of ethnic cleansing. In 1997, we sent U.S. Green Berets over to Uganda, their mission described as training African troops to launch a "peace-keeping" force for the continent. According to the U.S. State Department, this peace keeping mission was in response to the 1994 Rwandan massacre of Tutsis by the ruling Hutu government. Like many other foreign scandals, the U.S. is implicated in aiding in the promotion of that civil war. Big surprise. (think Iran-Contra, El Salvador, Vietnam..)After the Tutsi slaughter, the group that took over is widely known to have favor with Washington DC. The Rwandan Patriotic Front originally came from Uganda, and has been a player in this crisis from that time forward. Honestly, there are so many groups involved in this conflict that it's difficult to keep them all straight. My hope is that in the coming days and weeks I"m able to gather more information regarding our role in this crisis, and help disseminate more information on an obviously dire situation that hasn't received the publicity it deserves.

- posted by SassGirl @ 7:37 AM

 
Reality TV
What is it that attracts normally intelligent, thoughtful people to this type of show? I've read that many people find these shows so fascinating because they reveal the multi-faceted aspects of human nature. I tend to think it's more the tittilation of voyeurism, and the morbid curiosity that goes with watching people's raw human emotion and response to adrenaline pumping scenarios. It's like a train wreck that you just can't look away from.
Now, this isn't an academic or intellectual commentary. I'm not looking to list and deconstruct each and every reality tv show. I'm simply stating why I personally find reality tv so incredibly abhorrant. Having said that, let's first just take a look at a few show titles: Who wants to marry a millionaire, Big Brother, Greed, Survivor, American Idol, The Chair, and god let's not leave out The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. I don't think I need to point out the Orwellian overtones here; the shows pretty much do that on their own. What DOES concern me, is that as a country, especially after 911, we are moving more and more towards a surveillance nation. And what's worse is that we're actually rewarding people for being surveilled!! Hey, let us video tape you 24/7, and maybe you'll win a million dollars! That scares the hell out of me, and quite frankly, far more alarming is that NO ONE ELSE seems to get it! These shows enjoy immense popularity; there's chat boards, web sites, fan sites, you name it. Has anyone actually reviewed The Patriot Act? It specifically allows for "enhanced surveillance procedures" (Title II, sections 201-225) Basically, this let's US intelligence to tap into your phone, your email account, your library card, your bank account or anything else without a warrant. I can't tell you how ironic I find the titles of these shows as it relates to losing our anonymity as individuals.
I also find it singularly indicative of our narcissistic culture that we actually have to put our lazy, privileged American asses on an island with no water or food to get a taste of "reality." While we're all sitting around having these vicarious epiphanies about what it would be like to "lose it all" on a remote island somewhere, thousands of Ugandans are being slaughtered in an ethnic cleansing that hasn't even been publicized on our air waves. While that insipid idiot on Joe Millionaire is experiencing a crisis of conscience because he's lying his sorry ass off to a bunch of money hungry, shallow women, we've got Israeli's bulldozing over a young American woman protesting the demolition of a Palestinian doctor's home. And killing her. And we don't hear about any of this......could it be that we're too busy watching The Bachelor????.......
- posted by SassGirl @ 10:14 AM

 
What the hell is IFeminism?......or,
Libertarian feminism for a new world order.



Here's a quick definition for those of you who actually thought I misspelled the word in my introduction. Individualist feminism, or ifeminism, advocates the equal treatment of men and women as individuals under just law. The core principle of individualist feminism is that all human beings have a moral and legal claim to their own persons and property. For a more detailed def visit www.ifeminists.net Let me submit a small caveat here...I neither identify myself as wholly Libertarian, nor IFeminist. They are simply concepts that come closest to my paradigm. And yes, the irony of my blatantly contradictory statements is not lost on me. In my world, I CAN have it both ways!
Some common questions:
Sometimes the inequality works to women's advantage, as in affirmative action laws. Do you oppose them as well?
Yes. Equality means neither privilege nor oppression. Besides which, it hardly benefits women to have a paternalistic state treat them as children or "lesser" human beings who need state assistance to become equal. Now, let's also keep with reality here. I'm covered with bruises from continually bouncing off the corporate glass ceiling so yes, I personally do believe that for now, the sad truth is that we have to have some form of government intervention in order to level the playing field. The libertarian point of view is incredibly idealistic but in theory, is correct.
Opposing affirmative action and defending property rights is generally associated with conservatives. Isn't ifeminism just conservative feminism?
Oh you're going to love this answer. Many conservatives are uncomfortable with the way ifeminism embraces radical civil liberties. For example, ifeminism calls for the decriminalization of prostitution and pornography. To an ifeminist, there is no schism between economic and civil liberties. They are both expressions of an individual's right to use her own body and property in any peaceful manner she chooses. Like the legalization of drugs, victimless crime, people. Seriously, get your fucking laws off my body.
What is the ifeminist position on gun ownership?
Ifeminism supports the right of individuals to defend against violence. Firearms are a legitimate tool of self-defense. Firearms have been widely referred to as "the great equalizer" because they give individuals who would otherwise make attractive targets the ability to defend themselves against more powerful attackers. Many women (as well as men) have successfully used firearms to ward off attacks against themselves and others, sometimes without ever discharging the weapon. Again, people, keep this in mind. Criminals prefer unarmed victims. Now does this mean I'm against gun regulation? Hell no! What business does anybody have weilding an AK-47 around?? Seriously.
I think that's enough for you to chomp on for now. Keep the peace.
- posted by SassGirl @ 11:56 AM

 
Here's a little bit about why I too am choosing to express myself through a blog. I've discovered I have alot to say, and no one to say it to. So I'm posting it for the world to see. You'll find a range of topics here, from the political to the personal, ifeminism, office politics, imperialism and conspiracy theories. You might even find a little bit about religion thrown in here and there. And you might even find something here that actually offends you. Good. That shows that you actually have a brain in your head, and you're using it. Congratulations.
Enjoy!
- posted by SassGirl @ 11:39 AM