Good morning!

Michelle: It seems girls with similar names think alike. :)

I was going to post a write that talks about exactly what you mentioned – the number of women who become pregnant each year from being raped. I had no idea of the number but it is astonishing to know that out of almost 200,000 women who get raped each year in America, 32,000 women get pregnant each year.

Rape-related pregnancy occurs with significant frequency. It is a cause of many unwanted pregnancies and is closely linked with family and domestic violence. As we address the epidemic of unintended pregnancies in the United States, greater attention and effort should be aimed at preventing and identifying unwanted pregnancies that result from sexual victimization.

If you’re looking for hard numbers, the study concludes that the national rape-related pregnancy rate is 5.0% per rape among victims of reproductive age (12—45), and that an estimated 32,101 pregnancies result from rape each year. Does 32,000 pregnancies per annum sound “rare” to you? It’s not.

Parental Rights for Rapists?

Women’s rights advocates have paid little attention to what happens to women who bear children as a result of rape, and whether they are able to raise those children without threat from the men who raped them. But for the thousands of women in the United States who become pregnant and bear children as a result of rape each year, the need to ensure that they can raise their children without further threat from the rapist is a critical – and largely unacknowledged – concern.

Why the Inattention?

There may be several reasons for this inattention. Some may assume that this is a rare event, or be unaware that rapists may have parental rights. Some women raising children born of rape may want to keep their children’s provenance a secret. Regardless, the result has been that women in this situation typically suffer in isolation, with little coordinated women’s rights advocacy to champion their cause.

Unfortunately, this has resulted in the passage of paternity laws in every state that rarely address the concerns of mothers who wish to raise their children born of rape. The ultimate effect of these family laws is to ensure, in most situations, that a rapist has parental rights, thereby diminishing the significance of rape and ignoring the threat the rapist poses to the mother and the child.

When Rape Survivors Decide to Parent

To illustrate the problem, imagine Maria, a young adult woman who becomes pregnant as a result of a rape – one of approximately 32,000 women who become pregnant in the United States as a result of rape each year. Of those women, about half decide to terminate their pregnancies, rather than cope with the psychological torment of going through the pregnancy. Many others, for just as legitimate reasons, decide to carry the pregnancies to term and have babies. Maria decides not to terminate the pregnancy. And, like the vast majority of women who make this decision, Maria keeps her baby rather than give the child up for adoption.

Once Maria has the child, the rapist may gain parental rights depending on his relation to Maria. If the rapist is a stranger to Maria and risks implicating himself criminally, he is probably unlikely to pursue parental rights in the child. But most rapes are perpetrated by someone the victim knows.

If the rapist is Maria’s abusive husband, his parental rights are presumed upon the birth of the child. If he is an acquaintance or a former boyfriend, he may learn of the child and file a paternity action to establish his legal parenthood. Or, if Maria receives public assistance benefits, the state will pursue his paternity, unless she is lucky enough both to live in a state that exempts victims of violence from participating in such paternity cases, and she is actually informed of her right to exercise that option.

Under most state’s laws, the rapist’s biological connection to the child, regardless of its provenance – even, in many states, in the case of incest – is sufficient to gain parental rights.

At the very least, the attempt to gain legal recognition of parental rights enables the rapist to bring Maria in to court, in which she will be forced either to relive the rape in her efforts to seek justice, or to pretend it didn’t happen rather than risk a judicial violation of her privacy. And if a rapist secures parental rights, generally, parental rights guarantee a lifetime of ongoing contact between the mother and the rapist – including visitation rights, child support, and even ongoing legal disputes over custody.

And what if Maria proves to a court’s satisfaction that the child was a result of a rape? Many state laws make no provision for such a situation and thus the court may be obligated to legally recognize the rapist’s paternity.

How Should Advocates for Women’s Reproductive Freedom Respond?

I do not call for a simple legal solution, but exhort our community to recognize the problem and began working towards a comprehensive approach.

We must recognize that this is a complex issue: women raising children born of rape are not identical, and neither are their concerns. One woman – raped by an acquaintance she barely knew – raised her child to adulthood without interference, and decided when her son was grown to tell him the story of his father, a secret she had kept his entire life. Another survivor, a 14-year-old girl, decided to give up her baby for adoption. She was required by law to give notice of the adoption to the rapist, an adult man. While she was permitted by a court to give up her rights to the child, the rapist retained his and then sought child support payments from her.

Women raped by abusive husbands have children whose legal relationship to their biological fathers is presumed by law and can only be challenged by affirmative legal action on the part of the mother. Another survivor, who gave birth to twins after a date rape, raised them peacefully with her intimate partner until they were five years old, at which time the rapist learned of their existence and filed a lawsuit to establish his paternity and gain visitation rights, and attempted to use the mother’s sexual orientation against her in the legal proceedings. Women who are trafficked, whether for labor, sex work, or for marriage, who have children resulting from their sexual exploitation may face immigration obstacles that force them to remain in dangerous situations or risk losing their children.

Another complication is the well-known judicial bias against rape victims and the difficulty of “proving” a rape charge in the context of either the civil or criminal justice systems. Nationally, less than 20 percent of rape survivors report the assaults to law enforcement, but those few states that do permit courts to deny parental rights to a rapist tend to grant this exception only for cases in which the putative father is convicted of rape, and make no provision for addressing the vast majority of rapes that are not reported or prosecuted.

Interacting Rights

But the rape survivor’s perspective should not be our only consideration. Inherent in this discussion is the constitutional nature of parental rights, and whether and how those rights interact for both the mother who has been raped and the rapist who is the progenitor of the child. It is especially important to recognize the demonstrated tendency of the legal system to hold the parental rights of men of color and poor men in lesser esteem – and, for that matter, its greater willingness to view men of color as rapists and women of color as unlikely victims.

A case like Pena v. Mattox, in which a Hispanic 19-year-old man lost the right even to notice of his offspring’s adoption when convicted of statutory rape of his 15-year-old girlfriend, is alarming not only because of the obvious injustice in the situation but for the way the decision ignores the racist undertones of the actions taken against the father and how it renders the mother entirely faceless and voiceless. In the wake of that decision, commentators gave little or no attention to the situation of a mother raising a child born of rape. It is critical for us to consider a legal framework that grants justice for the mother but does not result in the perpetuation of other injustices.

For this very reason, the child’s interests must also be considered. A child’s human right to a life free of violence is of paramount concern. But denying parentage to a biological father eliminates the child’s right to financial support from that parent, ensures that the child is not recognized for inheritance purposes, and may deny that child knowledge of his or her genetic history. Advocates for women’s rights should consider and address the child’s concerns while developing a response that ensures the humanity and safety of the mother.

An Unlikely Alliance?

Finally, advocates for reproductive freedom may struggle – or see an opportunity – with the realization that on this issue, we may find allies in the fervently anti-choice. The Maryland State Legislature is considering a bill sponsored by pro-choice Democrats that would permit a court to refuse to recognize a biological father’s parental rights if the mother shows by clear and convincing evidence that the child was born of rape.

This bill is supported by the anti-choice Maryland Right to Life. As that organization proclaims on its website: “[w]omen who choose childbirth when rape results in a pregnancy should be able to do so without fearing the rapist’s involvement in decisions regarding the child’s welfare. These women need care and support, not the additional stress and burden of a rapist’s paternity rights.”

While I predict that we will come to radically different conclusions about how to approach this problem, on this, for once, we agree.

******

Allison: My comment to Talibah should’ve been addressed to you as well, as you are correct in your statement too.  I am sorry what happened to you, and saddened that your mother was not a support for you. I HOPE that you are doing well.

HH: Thanks for the kudos but just in case you haven’t noticed, this is a women’s blog. I expose the plight of women, and I tout and illuminate their successes. Men, in my opinion get enough airplay in the media. That is not to say that I don’t honor great men every now and then.

With respect to men getting raped, I am not clear if you are speaking of men getting raped by other men, or women. I am well aware that men get raped by other men. But that is the point isn’t it? The heinous act is done by other men. In my opinion, women cannot rape men. You need a hard dick and if the dick is hard, he wants it from her. Hence it is not rape. I know that some disagree with me on this, but that is my stance.

Perhaps when men stop raping women, (Did you read the above stats?) and protect and stand up for women more, I might be more concerned about men getting raped by men. But when there is so much violence toward women in this world from men, I can’t say that I am having sleepless nights worrying about men getting raped.

David: I like what you said. And there are always concerns such as what Helen Pointed out.

Social Butterfly: Too cute. I got the visual – It seems you do too. :)

Zen Lill: I got your message. How about I try you tonight?

Fred: Yes, He did and His first model of a human was not quite right – Hence, He improved the model human vastly and created woman.

Donna: I cannot tell you how many times that thought has crossed my mind, but I am HOPEing and counting on there being another solution. The ball is in the women’s court. I just wish we would support each other more, take this ball, and run with it.

Marisol: No need to ask for forgiveness; I did not take your comment personally. There are many good women, white and OTW, who are in support of each other. However, you did make some very valid points and I hear and feel your frustrations as well.

Ruth: This is true, and yes all but the 1% we will most likely be screwed. And I am not even sure the 1% will survive what atrocities would occur in America and the world should Romney win.  I don’t think they are aware how devastating their choices could be.

With respect to skin color, it is a factor when it comes to whites. You don’t see OTW’s saying they are better because of their skin color. It isn’t the OTW’s that are racist.

What’s been pointed out here many times is that racism and greed are what rules. When racism is that strong whites don’t think that they will be the ones affected – they just want a white man at the helm. Yes Bush got us in to this mess but did people learn or do they care? Obviously not because they want round three. Their little dicks and the other head cannot bear having a black man be the most successful president, even at the detriment of their own country.

And greed…well many in the 99%  think they are going to make it into the 1% club, so they follow lock step whatever the 1% ask them to do, HOPEing and planning to join them. It will never happen but they follow anyway, blindly in my opinion, with false HOPE.

Even some OTW’s join them thinking they will be an exception – they will be the ones saved from the gas tanks, but they won’t. It will never happen but they follow anyway, blindly in my opinion, with false HOPE. (Yes, the repeat was intentional)

The 1% know this so they lie and make promises to anyone they need to; promises that they never intend to keep.

Readers: I wish I could respond to more of you but my time is up. Once gain, it is your turn. Blog me.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

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“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

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Good morning!

If you’ve been watching the news like I have, Akin seems to be getting his 15 minutes…and really more, whether he wants it or not. I found this article that tells the disgusting thoughts that go through the minds of some men.

Akin’s Spiritual Mentor: Women Occasionally Invite Rape, Victims Are ‘Hysterical’

By Zack Beauchamp on Aug 20, 2012 at 11:37 am

Reverend D. James Kennedy (Left) and Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO).

Rep. Todd Akin’s (R-MO) spiritual mentor Reverend D. James Kennedy harbored extreme and sometimes flatly misogynistic views about rape and abortion, according to a ThinkProgress review of Kennedy’s sermons on the topic. The Senate candidate, who set off a massive controversy by claimingthis weekend that victims of “legitimate rape” don’t get pregnant, has deep ties to Reverend Kennedy, having cited some of his sermons as key intellectual influences and having been namedin Kennedy’s book How Would Jesus Vote? as one of the Reverend’s “favorite statesman.”

Kennedy, who the Anti-Defamation League has termed a “Christian supremacist,” repeatedly railed against legalized abortion, calling it the “American Holocaust” and suggesting that it would lead inevitably to genocide in the United States. But Kennedy’s discussions of rape and abortion in particular betray extraordinarily disturbing views about rape victims:

1. Kennedy believed that rape victims who chose abortion are “hysterical.” In “Abortion: Myths and Realities,” Kennedy labels victims of rape who chose unsafe abortions when safer procedures are illegal “hysterical,” saying “We are told by some of the radical feminists that the women will become hysterical, that they will abort themselves with coat hanger.” Abortion rates are, in fact, higher in nations where the procedure is criminalized, and men describing women whose choices they disapprove of as “hysterical” has a storied sexist history.

2. Kennedy suggests rape victims can be responsible for being raped. In “Life: An Inalienable Right,” Kennedy expresses concern that rape victims who chose to get an abortion are occasionally responsible for their own rape, saying that “Even if they want to say the woman had some part in it—which in most cases they probably don’t—surely the baby did nothing wrong, so the only innocent party is killed and the rapist often goes free.” He doesn’t elaborate on how this might be true, but another Kennedy sermon says “the immodest woman is contributing to the lust of other people” by wearing revealing clothing.

3. Kennedy held that the Bible should set our laws about rape and abortion. Kennedy is very explicit on this point, saying “In the Bible, the child of rape was allowed to live and the rapist was put to death. Today, we find that the penalties against rape have become more and more lenient, whereas the child is now the subject of capital punishment. Justice has been totally destroyed and perverted in that the guilty are practically allowed to go free and the innocent are killed.” This fits with Kennedy’s general view that we should “rebuild America based on the Bible.”

4. Kennedy thought husbands should determine if their wives can have abortions. Though not specifically addressing rape, Kennedy approvingly cited a Roman prohibition on abortion motivated by the husbands should have control over women’s reproductive choice, saying “That newly created life is as much the husband’s as it is the wife’s. Historically, it is interesting to note that when the Roman Empire did away with laws that allowed abortion, it was done not because of the woman or the harm that abortions were doing to women (and indeed they do vastly more harm than most people are aware of), but because the husband was being defrauded of his progeny.” Interestingly, Akinhas worried that criminalizing marital rape provides women “a legal weapon to beat up on the husband.”

Given that Akin’s rhetoric and policy views bear clear marks of Kennedy’s influence, it’s perhaps no surprise that Akin co-sponsored (with Paul Ryan) a bill that could, by limiting federal funding of abortion to cases of “forcible rape,” make rape survivors give birth to their rapist’s child.

*****

Readers: What do you have to say about this? Blog me.

So many compelling comments from yesterday and the day before. I just perused them but I need to catch up and comment because there are some that I really want to address. Let’s see how much time I’ve got.

Holly: I love a girl who sees the glass half full. I HOPE the skies are shining blue on you today in Missouri.

KS: Bravo to your comment. Sounds perfectly logical to me.

XXX: Why should one only be blessed once? If you want a second shot at ecstasy, give me a call. I am tempted to say I will pencil you in but we both know that you are way bigger than a pencil. I would say more, but at the risk of losing my ladylike modesty, I will simply say, you give as good as you get.

Brittany: That is a good question. At this point I don’t even think it is common sense but just stupidity. I am assuming that you read Talibah’s comment from yesterday’s write.

I rarely skip around when commenting to readers that I want to address, but since you broached the subject I have to first say to Talibah: You are so right on. We do suffer much in the same way, and that is frightening to me. Especially because with everything that is happening in the republican party…with men (not all) that just can’t seem to leave our vagina’s alone and out of the political environment, our rights are in danger. We are not far from losing all that way have unless we act fervently.

This is not the time to sit back and be dispassionate.  Any woman not voting, and I know 1 or 2 women that don’t, (stupid) is a vote for the other side. It is frustrating, infuriating and stupid when women have a voice, a voting right, and don’t exercise their rights and use it for their own health, life, and betterment of all concerned.

As you stated, “American women GIVE their men over and over again the right to control their bodies and lives.”

We women have the power at the polls. If we don’t we will lose them, plain and simple because although there are men who support us, there are not enough. Hell, there aren’t enough women who support women.

With this kind of radical, no longer fringe, thinking,  republican women just have to come to their senses. But when I read comments from Charlotte and Frances, my conclusion is yes, white women (not all) are that stupid. But I still HOPE and continue to talk about it. One just can’t give up when it comes to these kinds of issues.

Mary, and all of the other women who are anti abortion: Think about it this way – what if the shoe was reversed? Say our planet was over populated and we were running out of resources. Or maybe men just decided that they wanted to control women in a very extreme way (sounds familiar huh?)

What if the law were that all women had to abort babies? No more babies allowed. And lots of women who were on board with this idea to “save the planet” or they were just following their men lock step.

How would you feel then? Forget getting all the mens’ support. And there would be no way to get all women to vote their needs over saving the planet, or sadly, to speak their own minds. So would you be fighting for pro-choice? Would you be telling everyone to just stay out of your vagina –  that you should be able to have a baby if you wanted one? No doubt you would.

Does the scenario sound pretty extreme? Well it is and that is how we pro-choice women feel the way it is today.

If you want to have a baby then you have that choice, but then allow me as well the choice to make the hard decision to have an abortion if that is what is best or needed in my life. That sounds fair and logical to me. But for some reason I know the extremists won’t want to give in to this logic.

The freedom to choose: We all deserve it. This is an area where women can support women, and sadly, the support is not strongly there.

I am done for the day. Your turn. Blog me.

Peace & Love and ladies…don’t be apathetic when it comes to your rights of your body, your health.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

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Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

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Good morning!

With all the talk about Akin’s disturbing, out of touch, ignorant “legitimate rape” comment ( Thanks you /SB for broaching this topic- I did read it yesterday morning), I thought that I would post this today.

This isn’t the first time I have heard of a woman who was required to marry her rapist. But this young girl, after telling her mother that she was being beaten by her rapist/future husband, decided to take rat poison and kill herself.

And like the stories I posted the other day that were not given much media attention, stories such as this one, do not get much attention either. So, I am bringing it to light.

16-year-old Amina Filali Who Was Forced To Marry Her Rapist, Commits Suicide

March 14, 2012 · By itsbits

16-year-old Amina committed suicide last Saturday after being forced to marry her rapist.

Under Moroccan law, any man who rapes a minor will be forgiven of all charges, as long as they marry their victim. Last year, Amina was walking the street when she was accosted and raped by a man who was 10 years her senior. When she finally reported the incident, their parents agreed to a marriage to protect her family honor.

After submitting to the marriage, Amina confided to her mother that she was subjected to violent beatings from her husband; her mom simply asked her to be more patient. As a final resort to escape her violent marriage, Amina injested rat poison and ended her life.

With a huge public outrage, the victim’s father, Lahcen Filali told reporters that the marriage was suggested by the court officials, “The prosecutor advised my daughter to marry, he said ‘go and make the marriage contract.”

An online petition has been formed to call an end to Article 475 of the Moroccan code which reinforces the practice of marrying rapists and their victims.

*****

Readers: Ya know, Todd Akin would probably tell the young girl Amina, to “shut that whole thing down”, marry the man and get over it. I would like to see how Todd Akin, would react if he was in the wrong place at the wrong time and got raped in that virgin (?) ass of his. How would he feel? How would he like it if someone said to him, “Well…c’mon just shut it down. I know your ass is sore and you feel violated but really, just go to that part of your brain and shut it down. Forget about it.” Easy right?

Not so easy – that I am sure of. I could go on and on getting into the dirty details of rape, and try to paint a not so pretty picture for Mr. Akin to visualize. But I am not so sure I could do that. I probably couldn’t paint a picture so horrific as it truly is because I have never been raped, thankfully. I could never in my wildest dreams imagine the horror of what it must be like to live through such a violation. Nor would I ever say anything off the cuff  when it comes to rape using the expression “legitimate” rape as if to imply there were any such a thing as “illegitimate rape”.

So I will give the floor to Eve Ensler, a rape survivor, who can talk from experience…and who will have no problem getting Mr. Akin to imagine…

Dear Mr. Akin, I Want You to Imagine…

Dear Todd Akin,

I am writing to you tonight about rape. It is 2 AM and I am unable to sleep here in the Democratic Republic of Congo. I am in Bukavu at the City of Joy to serve and support and work with hundreds, thousands of women who have been raped and violated and tortured from this ceaseless war for minerals fought on their bodies.

I am in Congo but I could be writing this from anywhere in the United States, South Africa, Britain, Egypt, India, Philippines, most college campuses in America. I could be writing from any city or town or village where over half a billion women on the planet are raped in their lifetime.

Mr. Akin, your words have kept me awake.

As a rape survivor, I am reeling from your recent statement where you said you misspoke when you said that women do not get pregnant from legitimate rape, and that you were speaking “off the cuff.”

Clarification. You didn’t make some glib throw away remark. You made a very specific ignorant statement clearly indicating you have no awareness of what it means to be raped. And not a casual statement, but one made with the intention of legislating the experience of women who have been raped. Perhaps more terrifying: it was a window into the psyche of the GOP.

You used the expression “legitimate” rape as if to imply there were such a thing as “illegitimate” rape. Let me try to explain to you what that does to the minds, hearts and souls of the millions of women on this planet who experience rape. It is a form of re-rape. The underlying assumption of your statement is that women and their experiences are not to be trusted. That their understanding of rape must be qualified by some higher, wiser authority. It delegitimizes and undermines and belittles the horror, invasion, desecration they experienced. It makes them feel as alone and powerless as they did at the moment of rape.

When you, Paul Ryan and 225 of your fellow co-sponsors play with words around rape suggesting only “forcible” rape be treated seriously as if all rapes weren’t forcible, it brings back a flood of memories of the way the rapists played with us in the act of being raped — intimidating us, threatening us,muting us. Your playing with words like “forcible” and “legitimate” is playing with our souls which have been shattered by unwanted penises shoving into us, ripping our flesh, our vaginas, our consciousness, our confidence, our pride, our futures.

Now you want to say that you misspoke when you said that a legitimate rape couldn’t get us pregnant. Did you honestly believe that rape sperm is different than love sperm, that some mysterious religious process occurs and rape sperm self-destructs due to its evilcontent? Or, were you implying that women and their bodies are somehow responsible for rejecting legitimate rape sperm, once again putting the onus on us? It would seem you were saying that getting pregnant after a rape would indicate it was not a “legitimate” rape.

Here’s what I want you to do. I want you to close your eyes and imagine that you are on your bed or up against a wall or locked in a small suffocating space. Imagine being tied up there and imagine some aggressive, indifferent, insane stranger friend or relative ripping off your clothes and entering your body — the most personal, sacred, private part of your body — and violently, hatefully forcing themself into you so that you are ripped apart. Then imagine that stranger’s sperm shooting into you and filling you and you can’t get it out. It is growing something in you. Imagine you have no idea what that life will even consist of, spiritually made in hate, not knowing the mental or health background of the rapist.

Then imagine a person comes along, a person who has never had that experience of rape, and that person tells you, you have no choice but to keep that product of rape growing in you against your will and when it is born it has the face of your rapist, the face of the person who has essentially destroyed your being and you will have to look at the face every day of your life and you will be judged harshly if you cannot love that face.

I don’t know if you can imagine any of this (leadership actually requires this kind of compassion), but if you are willing to go to the depth of this darkness, you will quickly understand that there is NO ONE WHO CAN MAKE THAT CHOICE to have or not have the baby, but the person carrying that baby herself.

I have spent much time with mothers who have given birth to children who are the product of rape. I have watched how tortured they are wrestling with their hate and anger, trying not to project that onto their child.

I am asking you and the GOP to get out of my body, out of my vagina, my womb, to get out of all of our bodies. These are not your decisions to make. These are not your words to define.

Why don’t you spend your time ending rape rather than redefining it? Spend your energy going after those perpetrators who so easily destroy women rather than parsing out manipulative language that minimizes their destruction.

And by the way you’ve just given millions of women a very good reason to make sure you never get elected again, and an insanely good reason to rise.

#ReasonToRise

Eve Ensler
Bukavu, Congo

♥♥♥♥♥♥

Unfortunately there are others out there besides Akin who feel the way he does. Sickening but true.

Many years ago I knew of a woman from design school that was raped when she was very young. Years later in therapy she discovered who her rapist was when she began to have flashbacks of him. When she finally confessed it to her parents, her father told her to put it out of her mind and forget about it. And I have to say, her mother who was “lock step” (that’s a nod to you Sabrina) pretty much said the same same thing. And yes, they are republicans and no doubt still holding onto their twisted moralic ways and bad mouthing our beloved man in the white house.

(Yes, in case you didn’t notice, I just made up a word. It’s been awhile since I have delved into that pleasure, but it flew into my brain, so here it is: Morals + Moronic = Moralic)

I will end with a by adding to /SB’s comment last night: We women have the numbers when we vote en masse –  If women don’t shut down the republican party strictly from our majority body count, we can expect that the republican party will shut down women’s bodies and try to throw us back into the dark ages.

Remember this…If men (not all) could do what is done to women in so many parts of the world, lay down crazy laws such as the one I just posted above from Morocco, and try to control us and our bodies, believe me, don’t ever doubt for a minute that they wouldn’t.

Zen Lill: I knew I would get a laugh out of you.

Wills: Well said.

Радка: Thanks to you and all the Girlz of Bulgaria. All the good luck you can send is appreciated. I am certainly doing my best. Let’s HOPE it’s good enough. 

Peace out. 

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

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Good Monday morning!

Sometime last week I think I said that I would have more to post about Paul Ryan. This write was pointed out to me. I found the info to be of value, so I decided to post it.

Paul Ryan represents political dark age

Robert B. Reich

Published 1:05 p.m., Saturday, August 18, 2012

Paul Ryan espouses 19th century social Darwinism - reward the rich, penalize the poor, and the rest are on their own. Photo: Jeff Swensen, Getty Images / SF

Mitt Romney‘s chosen running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan, is the reverse of Sarah Palin. She was all right-wing flash without much substance. He’s all right-wing substance without much flash.

Ryan is not a firebrand. He’s not smarmy. He doesn’t ooze contempt for opponents or ridicule those who disagree with him. In style and tone, he doesn’t even sound like an ideologue – until you listen to what he has to say.

It’s here, in Ryan’s views and policy judgments, that we find the true ideologue. More than any other politician today, Ryan exemplifies the social Darwinism at the core of today’s Republican Party: Reward the rich, penalize the poor, let everyone else fend for themselves.

Dog eat dog.

Ryan’s views are crystallized in the budget he produced for House Republicans in March as chairman of the Budget Committee. That budget would cut $3.3 trillion from low-income programs over the next decade. The biggest cuts would be in Medicaid, which provides health care for the nation’s poor – they would force states to drop coverage for an estimated 14 million to 27 million low-income people, according to an Urban Institute estimate.

Ryan’s budget also would reduce food stamps for poor families by 17 percent ($135 billion) over the decade, leading to a significant increase in hunger – particularly among children. It also would reduce housing assistance, job training and Pell Grants for college tuition.

In all, 62 percent of the budget cuts proposed by Ryan would come from low-income programs.

The Ryan plan also would turn Medicare into vouchers whose value could not possibly keep up with rising health care costs – thereby shifting those costs to seniors.

At the same time, Ryan would provide a substantial tax cut to the very rich, who already take home an almost unprecedented share of the nation’s total income. Today’s 400 richest Americans have more wealth than the bottom 150 million of us put together.

Ryan’s views are pure social Darwinism. As William Graham Sumner, the progenitor of social Darwinism in America, put it in the 1880s: “Civilization has a simple choice.” It’s either “liberty, inequality, survival of the fittest” or “non-liberty, equality, survival of the unfittest. The former carries society forward and favors all its best members; the latter carries society downwards and favors all its worst members.”

Is this Romney’s view as well?

Some believe Romney chose Ryan solely to drum up enthusiasm on the right. Since most Americans have already made up their minds about whom they’ll vote for, and the polls show Americans highly polarized – an almost equal number support Romney as President Obama – the winner will be determined by how many on either side take the trouble to vote. So in picking Ryan, Romney is motivating his right-wing base to get to the polls and pull everyone else they can along with them.

But there’s reason to believe Romney also agrees with Ryan’s social Darwinism. Although Romney has carefully avoided specifics in his own economic plan, he has said he’s “very supportive” of Ryan’s budget plan: “It’s a bold and exciting effort … an excellent piece of work and very much needed … very consistent with what I put out earlier.”

At the same time, Romney wants to permanently extend the Bush tax cuts to the wealthy, reduce corporate income taxes and eliminate the estate tax. These tax reductions would increase the incomes of people earning more than $1 million a year by an average of $295,874 annually, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.

Oh, did I mention that Romney and Ryan also want to repeal Obama’s health care law, leaving 50 million Americans without health insurance?

Social Darwinism offered a moral justification for the wild inequities and social cruelties of the late 19th century. It also undermined all efforts to build a more broadly based prosperity and rescue our democracy from the tight grip of a very few at the top. It was used by the privileged and powerful to convince everyone else that government shouldn’t do much of anything.

Not until the 20th century did America reject social Darwinism.

We created a large middle class that became the engine of our economy and our democracy. We built safety nets to catch Americans who fell downward, often through no fault of their own.

We taxed the rich and invested in public goods – public schools, public universities, public transportation, public parks, public health – that made us all better off.

In short, we rejected the notion that each of us is on our own in a competitive contest for survival.

By choosing Ryan, Romney has raised for the nation the starkest of choices: Do we want to return to that earlier time, or are we willing and able to move forward – toward a democracy and an economy that works for us all?

******

And if that’s not enough proof, here’s more from Think Progress:

*****

Readers: We keep talking about Ryan…and we’re going to keep talking about him because there is just so much to say….so much that needs to be revealed and illuminated. I’m HOPEing he’ll keep opening his mouth, along with Romney, the media will continue to disclose these LSOS’s, and people will realize that the Romney-Ryan ticket is not the ticket you want to mark come November.

Claire: ZL was correct – you needed attention and you got it. Now here’s more. I don’t consider my comment an “assault” on you. I was just responding to you. You are the one that said my blog sucks. I just suggested that you give it a try or go elsewhere. I now recommend the latter strongly since you repeated that my blog sucks and now you think I suck too. Well…let me tell you…I do suck and I’m damn good at it. How is that for a little “cohesiveness”?

Sabrina: All I want to say is that I got a kick out of your statement: “I am white but I don’t do lock step.”

Peace out. 

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"

Good morning!

Maka: Thank you for posting about Pe’ Sla, and bringing it to my attention. Your story moved me. I feel for the Lakota people and their land. When I began to read more about it, I decided that I would make it the topic for today’s write just in case my readers passed over your comment, my featuring it would give it more light, and HOPEfully more attention.

I wish you and yours my very best and I HOPE that Pe’ Sla gets enough media attention that the sacred land can be saved. Click here to donate.

Pe’ Sla: Help Save Lakota Sioux Sacred Land!

The sale is perfectly “legal,” but is it morally, ethically, and spiritually correct?

In a race against the clock, the Sioux Nation is fighting to save Pe’ Sla, one of its most sacred religious sites.Pe’ Sla, located in the Black Hills of South Dakota, is the epicenter of the creation story of the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota nations. Tribal elders and spiritual leaders conduct ceremonies essential to their culture and beliefs at times of the year when the stars are in special alignment. On Aug. 25, 2012, approximately 1,942.66 acres, sold in five tracts of land, will be auctioned off to the highest bidder. Once sold, it is highly likely that Pe’ Sla will be opened up for development, with the State of South Dakota building a road directly through it, according to a press release I stumbled across on Facebook. If the Sioux ever needed a savvy PR and fundraising team, now is the time, and it may be too late.

The fact that native sacred places were taken illegally by the United States government is secondary to the urgent need to do something to protect this privately owned yet cosmologically significant site before Aug. 25, less than two weeks from now. In a gallant effort the Sioux Nation is fundraising to buy as much of the holy ground of Pe’ Sla as possible. What is possible and what is realistic may be two different things, or they may not.

To be honest, when this writer discovered the story, the situation seemed overwhelming and hopeless. How would the Sioux be able to raise over one million dollars in a fundraising campaign in two weeks? So I dutifully posted it on Facebook, tried to go to sleep, tossed and turned in protest at my inaction, and now find myself blogging away at 1 AM–hoping and praying that by throwing this sad, terrible story against the wall, something might stick.

Winona LaDuke, the great native activist and teacher wrote a note “from the heart” about the importance of the Great Mystery to indigenous peoples, and here is the link to it. Read it. It may uplift you and it may bring a tear to your eye, but most of all it may inspire you to offer testimony and “talk story” about what is happening. The act of speaking is an act of spiritual solidarity.

“In the time of the sacred sites and the crashing of ecosystems and worlds, it may be worth not making a commodity out of all that is revered,” LaDuke writes, asking the critical question of morality.

She goes on to cite Lakota scholar Chase Iron Eyes, who said:

Pe’Sla, to the Lakota, is the place where Morning Star, manifested as a meteor, fell to earth to help the Lakota by killing a great bird which had taken the lives of seven women; Morning Star’s descent having created the wide open uncharacteristic bald-spot in the middle of the forested Black Hills. (On American maps, this is called, Old Baldy) The Morning Star placed the spirits of those seven women in the sky as the constellation “Pleiades” or “The Seven Sisters.”

On May 24, 1996, President Bill Clinton issued Executive Order 13007 that requires the government to “accommodate access to and ceremonial use of Indian sacred sites by religious practitioners.” Unfortunately, the order applies to federal and not privately held lands, leaving an ethical chasm between what should be and what is reality at sacred sites.

And now, at this moment, there is absolutely nothing we can do about that harsh fact.

It is the hour of dark skies here in northern Minnesota and the Pleiades are just now rising in the eastern sky, soon to be followed by Jupiter, Venus and the waning crescent moon. I find myself wondering what the skies are like just one state to the west in the Black Hills. Part of the writer wants to go there to better explain the sense of the sacred lands, but there is no time to waste when the hands of the clock have moved into another day since the time I sat down to write this testimony.

So, feeling completely helpless and inadequate, we offer what little we can and hope that a solution can be found in the coming days to save the “heart of all that is.“

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Anonymous: Thank you so much for making a contribution in my name. I am going to make a contribution today as well, and I HOPE that many of my readers will too if they have not already done so.

Readers: There isn’t much time. If you can help Maka and her cause, please make a donation. Click here to donate. I have said it before and I will say it again, “If every single one of us just contributed $1 we would have a huge impact”.  Thank you.

Oh…it looks like Ryan is now a member of the LSOS Club. Did I ever doubt he would be? No.

Peace & Love…

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"