Heather Heyer

Heather Heyer. May her memory be blessed.

Quixote, I have a question. I was reading about how the nazi and KKK bunch rallying in Charlottesville are anti Semitic, and so they are. But then I remembered the right wing is also supposedly pro Israel, so I am confused. How does that go together? Do you know?

I was happy to see slavers’ statues being taken down all over the place after this horrible event. The blessing may have started!

As for the right and Israel, I’m not sure I have it correctly because it’s beyond nuts. As far as I know, it goes like this:

According to some of the fundies, a bunch of prophecies have to be fulfilled for the Second Coming. Stuff like the Jews have to return to their complete biblical homeland. Since some of the religious Israelis also want all the land that they interpret as theirs in the bible, they’re in agreement on that.

But it’s for opposite reasons. The fundies want it because it’ll be the beginning of the annihilation of everyone but them. The Israelis want it to live in and don’t care that the fundies expect to see all the Jews dead if they succeed. The Israelis are just glad of the help to get the land back.

Another prophecy for the 2nd Coming is that a heifer with a completely red coat has to be present in Israel. (No, I don’t know why.) Genetically, that’s difficult and if you examine the poor heifer long enough you invariably find the occasional white hair. (DNA engineering will probably finally get them to their Stone Age goal, but I digress.) The US has some of the best red heifer strains around, and the fundies keep hopefully shipping calves off to Israel, only to have them grow in the occasional white hair. It must be very frustrating. The Israelis give them the necessary permits and help them ship the cattle because, hey, if fundies want to spend tens of thousands of dollars on livestock transport, their money is green.

(You can probably tell that I get kind of a kick out of the rational, practical attitude on one side.)

I’m glad to see the slavers’ statues come down too. It is long overdue. I liked dakinikat’s idea of a statue of Heather being put up in place of the Lee statue in Charlottesville.

So, it’s all about religious prophecy. Crazy! I didn’t know, thanks for telling me. It’s hilarious that the fundies are always shipping red heifers to Israel. The Israeli dairy industry (if they have one) – paid for by the anti Semitic American right wing! Hahaha!

Have you noticed how so many white females who are all “Black Lives Matter” are completely without outrage about the thousand of women murdered by men every year in this country? It’s all “sigh”, hand-wringing and nothing else. No urgency, no outrage.

A *white woman* was killed in a protest in support of the rights of non-white citizens, half of whom *by law* have more rights than she herself does. How many men, let alone non-white men, have ever, ever been killed or even risked their lives to support women’s rights, lives and safety?

Yet middle and upper class white women, the ones who have the access and power to actually change things, continue to turn their heads away, study the flowers by the side of the road, take a giant step backwards, anything but have the courage to stand up for themselves.

It’s the hardest thing in the world to do: admit that even if you yourself are comfortable and accepted (for now, and on clearly known extra-legal terms), you are as vulnerable as those you champion – when, of course, you have the time, if there’s nothing else urgent going on.

People of any race other than white, or gender other than male, or sexual orientation other than hetero, who do fight for their own rights, know exactly where they are in this country. Then it becomes something you live every day, and can’t drop when it gets to be overwhelming or inconvenient.

Just to add, this rant [1] is certainly not directed at you, Quixote, or anyone who’s posted here. You’re very much an inspiration – without wanting to make an impertinent judgement, you seem to have used your many abilities and your opportunities to the fullest, but still retain the ability to see clearly the caste you’ve been put into.

[1] Rant: a sustained monologue on the rights of women, as opposed to anything else.

How many men, let alone non-white men, have ever, ever been killed or even risked their lives to support women’s rights, lives and safety?

This.

Women are there in all sorts of causes. Men in women’s cause? Really there? As in to help, not to take over. They exist but sightings are rare.

It frustrates the hell out of me that there’s so many pixels lit up over the racism when the destruction of women is just as bad.

It’s not like we’re all born with some finite amount of anti-bigotry and, ZOMG, we better spend it carefully on the right cause.

The anti-bigotry has to apply to all the stereotyping. It’s bigotry that has to become unthinkable. All of it. Otherwise you can get rid of racism till you grow a duck on your head, and the -isms will just come roaring back.

Okay, sorry, just one more.

This happened today, on the 15th. Cassini sent to its death, torn apart by Saturn’s atmosphere, faithfully sending back data to the last.

Sniff. It’s only a machine, but I’m glad I’m not the only one having frissons from Piercy’s “He, She and It”.

^[1]

Aw, Earlynerd. Don’t go! Except do go West (why do I want to add a “young woman!” to that?) I’m convinced coastal Orego,n Washington, also BC of course, are going to be among the places that pull through the coming Dark Ages better than most.

And sure, I’ll delete what you want, but it’s a good comment. Let me know if you change your mind.

I feel much as you do. You’ll notice that the blogposts are pretty thin on the ground. I’ve been thinking of one called “The polite way to mention killing women.” Call it domestic violence. But I’m having a hard time summoning up the energy to state the obvious.

About Cassini too. Just looking at that last photo of Saturn where it dove in, I have to go do something else so I don’t get depressed!

Why -thank- you, Ms. Alger!

I shall certainly make my way out West if it’s all possible. And continue to post here occasionally, given your tolerance for out-and-out feminism. Still think that last one should stay deleted, though.

Just to repost the only salient points in it, I did think of some men who had stood up for women, risking and sometimes giving their lives for women’s rights – the doctors, staff and escorts at women’s health clinics. But then again, from any point of view of morality or justice, -every- heterosexual man has a duty to do so, since women would not need abortions without their active participation. And especially since the first, most effective organization of murderers, the soi-disant “Right To Life” was founded by priests, ruling members of the exclusively male-ruled Catholic Church.

Was the last Cassini picture in the link I posted or do you have a more final one? Please post the link if you do! I’m listening to ????????? to get over the dumps of a particularly bad week and it would fit right in with that glorious, dolorous mess!

Of course, being all too familiar with Russia, you may not have the Wodehousian view of Russians as the benchmark of what fate can do to you and still leave you able to talk about it.

But for us Anglo-Irish Americans, that opera’s sublimely melodic chaos is just the doctor ordered – or would if any of us could afford said doctor.

?? Comments won’t post Cyrllic – how very Drumpian of WordPress. The opera is Khovanshchina.

I do get a kick out of seeing Drump’s name in Russian media – it transliterates as “Tramp”.

I’m sorry to hear you don’t want to post any more, earlynerd. I am angry too and your posts always help me to feel not so alone. I have also noticed that white women who are all about Black (Male) Lives Matter show much less outrage about all the women killed by men in this country every year. I am a little nervous to admit this as I don’t know what you (and quixote) think, but I personally find Sky Dancing blog to be a moderate offender in this category. Often you (earlynerd), quixote, NW Luna or sometimes, Sweet Sue will post comments about misogyny or women/girls being raped and killed, usually in a thread where the main post more prominently highlights racism (which *is* rampant and terrible now) or some abuse of boys or gay men, but that is usually about as far as it goes. Attention to women specifically in the main posts is usually (not always) limited to issues of abortion and contraception access, which is important but not sufficient. One exception to this is their extensive and excellent coverage of the hatred and abuse heaped on Hillary, who is in fact more Everywoman in that category than she is an exception. I could also speak of other things happening to women, such as the near total erasure of lesbians going on and the loss of all our spaces, but I am getting a little overwhelmed with it all right now.

Thank you, Branjor. I’ve noticed you’re also one of the ones who takes women’s rights seriously. Not to the exclusion of every one else’s, but every bit as much as theirs.

Or, as the woman whose work made this country an actual democracy almost 200 years after its founding, who has yet to have one single national holiday dedicated to her, said:

“Men, their rights, and nothing more; women, their rights, and nothing less”

One of my best friends, now teaching in Germany because even with her off-the-charts credentials she still couldn’t find a tenure track job in the U.S., is probably still maintaining to the last that sexism is a personal problem but racism an urgent issue of morality and justice.

Because she is white, and heterosexual, and was married for a long time, she’s as accepted as a woman will be and has the luxury to drop in and out of outrage on behalf of others, the further from her actual situation the better. That lets out lesbians, of course, and all other women who suffer extreme injustice due more to being women than anything else.

I’m not being harsh. It’s what kept her going and left her still able to use her extraordinary mind and to function socially. There are so few who can manage to see the enormity of what women are up again and still keep their integrity, their agency and their voice. I think Quixote’s one of the very few remaining feminist bloggers who has achieved this. (Madamab’s another, when her tech job (thank goodness she still has one!) lets her post).

Wow. Sexism is personal but racism is a matter of injustice? :boggle: Why did that never occur to me as a defense mechanism? Honestly. Every day I’m reminded how much less smart I am than I think I am.

(Seriously: it’s just sad the mental triple flips and pretzel logic necessary to be able to stand the world as it’s currently made.)

I’m pretty sure that (gorgeous!) pic of Cassini is a composite. Where would the camera be that could take that picture? Cassini’s own last pic is, I think, this one: ^[2] .

No need to apologize for stating the obvious truth, Branjor. What you say is just a fact. Women die every day in gendered violence in isolated ones and twos. Constantly. Everywhere. So the actual numbers are hideous. And yet because there’s no one footbal stadium full to the top with murdered women, and because noticing the numbers would mean noticing all the toxic misogyny, it’s next to invisible.

And then people wonder why crap like Nazism can resurrect itself, even though they refuse to deal with -isms that would force changes in their own lives.

(Thanks, Earlynerd, for repeating the important parts of your comment. And it’s definitely important to point out that there are men with a real sense of justice out there! We need more people of all shapes and colors like that.)

“Thank you, Branjor. I’ve noticed you’re also one of the ones who takes women’s rights seriously. Not to the exclusion of every one else’s, but every bit as much as theirs.”

Thanks, earlynerd, but women and girls are my first priority. I don’t exclude everyone else’s rights (since we are talking about women’s rights “everyone else” can only refer to men and boys), but if I have to make a choice I put women and girls first.

It’s not that my sympathies for men and boys can’t be excited, they can and often are, but in the end women and girls, who I can’t help personalizing as myself, are more important to me.

I have been crucified for this before, but hope I won’t be here.

Branjor, I certainly understand – and doubt very much Quixote would take exception to your putting women and girls first, either.

I appreciate your honesty. I think I’ve been conditioned to reflexively add the equivalent of “Of course, you (I, they) don’t hate men!” for fear of being jumped on by people who see any advocacy for women, in any group that doesn’t include men (and groups that include men -always- put men first), as selfish and privileged.

But the exact opposite is true. Unflinching advocacy for women’s rights, everywhere and at all levels of society and culture, would benefit far more people, including men, than the current patchwork of fighting for the rights of certain groups, always saying to one half “Oh, but yours will have to wait” and leaving out others completely.

(Sorry about my tangled syntax. Just can’t seem to get it right recently.)

Quixote, I don’t know if this is OK or not. I am dying to reply to something I saw on Sky Dancing which really irks me, but I cannot because I am banned from there. If it is not OK for me to post my reaction here to something that was said there, please feel free to delete this.

From Sky Dancing:
“To be fair, Sady did mention feminists.”

Well, whoopee for Sady, generously deigning to “mention” feminists – AFTER trans and queers, of course – as having led our own movement. I guess we should crawl on our bellies with gratitude at having our lowly, secondary existences acknowledged at all. Bostonboomer has some sick and insulting ideas about what’s “fair.”

“There definitely was a visible queer culture at that time.”

In those days, “queers” were simply gays and lesbians. Nothing more and nothing less. “Queer” was a straight slur for homosexual, not for straight people with BDSM kinks, who today are called “queers” and are included in the LGBTQ spectrum.

And trans people, as you said, quixote, were not on the radar at all. A few vanishingly rare individuals were known, such as George “Christine” Jorgensen and Renee Richards, who broke into women’s tennis, and no doubt there was a small number of unknown trans, but that was it. Trans people as a group simply did not exist, much less “lead” movements. The trans revisionism of the Stonewall history is a lot of bull, as Marsha P. Johnson was a drag queen, not a self identified “trans woman” and the rebellion was mostly one of gay drag queens and butch lesbians, not trans people, as trans was not even a concept then.

Hey, Branjor. What’s this about being blocked on Skydancing? That really makes me sad. Actual out and proud feminist web sites are just disappearing.

I didn’t really understand bb’s comment, since I hadn’t said Sady did not mention feminists. I go into “Whatever” mode pretty fast when it feels like we’re talking past each other in a conversation.

As for commenting here re Skydancing, on the whole I guess I’d rather we comment about whatever is here rather than there, but what you had to say was about me there, so it’s in the ballpark :D.

Hang in there, Branjor. Everything seems to be getting worse on all fronts and there’s little to do but ride out the storm as best we can. As Masha Gessen said in one of her brilliant articles in NYT before I stopped reading that paper, (I paraphrase) I knew we were headed down but I didn’t know how bad it would feel.

Popping my head up again, just to not comment (like Wonkette’s deleted comments 🙂 ).

I was looking up a legal reference in a court case that cited “fuck” as an adjective used by a Vietnam infantryman to emphasize extreme weariness, as differentiated from sex.

Couldn’t find that (the papers and books are in my 15+ years of life in storage on the West Coast), but did remember this extraordinary article from those years I would like to pass along.

^[3]

It is an almost backwards looking view at the kind of intelligence and integrity women had on our side during the 70’s to mid-eighties. I don’t know where Judith Resnik is now [2], but I do know that Carolyn Heilbrun did eventually carry out her plan of not outliving her usefulness. Not,however, before she bequeathed women “The Last Gift of Time”.[1]

It is also a huge alarm that precedes Catherine MacKinnon’s “Women’s Lives, Men’s Laws”. Similar to the way that I thought of economics as the invisible trolley tracks on which we all ran, I had thought of law as the invisible armor we all wore. These works were the first to delineate not just the cracks, but the complete shredding of that armor for women.

[1] Heilbrun was also Amanda Cross, the author of “An Imperfect Spy”, among others.

[2] She was not the extraordinary woman who died on Challenger. Same name, different person.

Amazing paper at the Yale Law School link. Thanks for that!

Glad you like it!.

I read it about the time it first came out and posted on a legal email list that it just might start a run on “A Jury Of Her Peers”. I know I became aware of the play and read it for the first time because of the article, and embarked on a Thomas Hardy run that’s lasted till now.