Author Topic: Women's Issues (Read 362898 times)

MaryPage · « **Reply #120 on:** January 18, 2013, 04:48:26 PM »

Women's Issues

If Art imitates Life, what does Literature show about the place of women in our society? From the Red Tent to the new movie Anna Karenina, to Malala Yousafzai in the news, has the state of women changed? What IS the state of women today, in your opinion?

Let's talk about how women are portrayed in the press, and in literature, and how accurate it is. How does advertising reflect, if it does, how women are portrayed? (Remember heels and pearls to sell refrigerators?)

How does it seem to you that women are portrayed today?

Let's talk!

National Women's History Project

Well, Jean, exactly.

I shudder at the thought of ever having to take that culture of life in again.

But I cannot hide from it and pretend it does not exist. So what is to be done to counter this unruly barbarism?

I sigh at the thought of burdening our teachers with ever more workload. I know my teaching daughters work at their jobs 7 days a week, what with all they have to take home to work on and the extra curricula activities they are asked to appear at and/or chaperon.

So perhaps those children their teachers pick out as hopeless in their lack of manners and their potty mouths EARLY ON should be sent to special "special ed" classes, not for the learning disabled, but for the culturally disabled? They could be taught what is and what is not acceptable in polite society, and be taught to like it and like being accepted by their peers.

When and where the problem takes in an entire school, then these Manners classes should be mandatory for all, but NOT part of what the regular classroom teacher has to do. They can hire Manners teachers and send the classes out to them in the same way they send them out to PE or Music or Art or Computer Science or Library.

I mean, my goodness, SOMEthing must be done, or our nation will be so dumbed down we will become unrecognizable.

BarbStAubrey · « **Reply #121 on:** January 18, 2013, 05:06:35 PM »

I think it is not something Teachers can take on - they are there to teach language yes, but not to be a judge and school books are not written in the vernacular of the day. As long as we have TV glorifying the base in society and songs that include this vile language and the idea the excellence is no longer what makes you popular but rather how much you can imitate those society castes aside because of their poverty the kids are going to rebel and either copy or some will thumb their nose at those who look down on others and copy the down and outs. None of this is new it has been growing since Elvis with each succeeding decade worse than the last. Just ask a few kids and find out how many sit down together for their evening meal - most eat alone at a kitchen counter with mom dishing out the food with 10 more things that she needs to complete before she can hit her pillow. No one has time any longer and many kids are bringing up themselves.

If women were paid more fairly they could hire the kind of help that would allow family life to return even for a single mom. Asking teachers to change the culture of kids is asking teachers to be co-dependent to business power, making it easy for business to keep their unfair practices - and if there is no effort to stop the vacuuming of wealth from the 99% we will continue to see Lord of the Flies played out around us.

Steph · « **Reply #122 on:** January 19, 2013, 06:24:32 AM »

Reality TV is a mess.. I watch very little of it.. I originally liked Storage Wars, but then it got sillier and now proves to not be real. Oh well, my opinion of real is that no reality tv is that. It is simply theatre and not very good theater at that. But it is so popular with most people.. The Kardashians have somehow made millions by being spoiled too made up women who do nothing interesting.. Simply get paid to appear.. How sad..
Honey BooBoo, I watched once.. I am sorry, that family is the worst example of trash I have seen in a long long time.. No reality tv for me.. Very little TV period.. I like Big Bang Theory.. watch reruns of NCIS and Law and order SVU.
I read, thank heaven..

MaryPage · « **Reply #123 on:** January 19, 2013, 08:14:51 AM »

Steph, I have never, ever watched Reality TV, but for this one bout of curiosity because of Barbara Walter's and her 10 most interesting people of 2012. I simply had to know what the hoorah was all about.

And I totally agree, they live really gross lives. But my thought is this: if these children are going to school, and as it is quite obvious they are NEVER, EVER going to learn manners from their parents, couldn't there be a special course just for them. My goodness, if NO ONE ever teaches them, they will grow up that way and have a bazillion babies of their own and THEY will grow up that way and so on and on. We need to eradicate it with a manners course that is taught by special teachers and not added on to their classroom teacher's workload.

salan · « **Reply #124 on:** January 19, 2013, 09:31:23 AM »

I agree with Steph---what trash Honey Boo Boo is! Barbara Walters lost credibility with me when she chose her. I watched the program once to see what all the fuss was about. Why anyone watches is is beyond me! I used to watch Storage Wars, too, Steph; but quit for the same reason. I liked Survivor when it first came out; but not so much anymore. I like some of the cooking shows like Top Chef, but that's about it for reality.
Sally

BarbStAubrey · « **Reply #125 on:** January 19, 2013, 11:53:18 AM »

Just do not watch Barbara Walters at all any more - she lost with me when she was so rude to the Queen of England a couple of years ago - she was interviewing just the Queen - I believe when Barbara was there for Prince William's wedding. She had the manners of this honey to do or whatever - I have never seen her or it either.

There is only one show I watch other than PBS and that is The Good Wife - oh yes, and the 5 o'clock news - my take on the Barbara Walters thing is these are not folks who we admire so much as they the folks that most people are talking about and remember she lives and works in an area where the interests are often not matching the interests of other parts of the nation - I see a lot of TV is about either the Northeast or Southern California if not as the setting certainly in the tone.

Of the Oscar nominations - I still have not seen Lincoln and this one about the capture of Bin Laden and the one with Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee Jones - my daughter saw that one and was disappointed and she also saw Lincoln that she praised to the moon saying how good it was.

MaryPage · « **Reply #126 on:** January 19, 2013, 01:26:43 PM »

I get up in the mornings to Morning Joe on MSNBC, except on the weekends, when I just listen to my public radio station that plays all classical music.

Then nothing more on weekends until the six o'clock news. I never watch daytime TV. Weekdays, I turn on Chris Matthews HARDBALL at five; again on MSNBC. Local news at six, Diane Sawyer at six thirty, Brian Williams at seven, and then not much of anything until Rachel Maddow at nine on MSNBC. I watch Switched At Birth, Criminal Minds, Nashville and Major Crimes, when they are on and if I am in the mood. I watch Doc Martin and Midsomer Murders on PBS, and of course all of the Masterpiece productions, currently Downton Abbey. I love television and movies, but really gag at violence, sex, rude and unrefined, and crude language. Criminal Minds is quite violent, but I am fascinated by the character Penelope Garcia, a computer genius who dresses up in the MOST outlandish outfits (no nakedness, thank goodness!), and their real in-house genius. This is about a real FBI unit. It is not portraying the real one or any of their cases, so far as I know, but the aerial photo at the start is really of the FBI complex at Quantico, Virginia.

Sunday mornings I watch Chris Matthews on NBC and George Stephanopolous on ABC and check out Face The Nation and catch as much of Meet The Press as I can. MSNBC repeats Meet The Press later.

mabel1015j · « **Reply #127 on:** January 19, 2013, 01:27:55 PM »

In my 8th or 9th grade health classes we had a section on "manners" and other domestic things, how to set a table, which utensiles to use, how to make a bed, etc. i think it was helpful to many students at the time (1954/5) who also may not have had dinner together or salad forks in their homes. Health teachers today - my son is one - have drugs, alcohol, std's etc to talk about - altho that same health teacher i had took us to see Frank Sinatra in Man w/ the Golden Arm, about heroin use, so maybe things aren't as different. We are just seeing on tv cultures we don't live in and now know about them when we didn't know about them when we were growing up.

I too watch Good Wife and NCIS, but also Scandal! Olivia Pope may be the strongest woman character that has ever been on tv. It's very well-written, except for the gratuitous sex scene that seems to be imperative in every show. I can put up w/ it because the rest of the show/story is so good. Thursday night 10:00, ABC.

My DH and i were watching Suits last night on USA, and i said "Well, George________(?) 'seven words you can't say on tv' is no longer apropos!" i'm not a prude about language, but good grief! Those 7 words seem to be mandatory in shows these days. (Sorry, his last name is alluding me)

Barbara, i agree with your comments on Obama as scapgoat. Again, the 6:00 news gives us the 6 murders that happened in the city lst night at the top of the news, or whatever other bad news they can come up with, even tho the serious crime rate has continued to decrease for two decades. As we watch it every night i think it has a compounding effect and we think of the world as being more and more evil. My little twice a week small town newspaper had 99% good or neutral news in it as i was growing up. I wasn't seeing city crime even if the tv stations of the city were showing it. So crime seems like it's exploding when statistics tell us that generally it's not - except for the mass shootings, or the drug and gang shootings in Chicago or Phila. NYC continues to have a dropping murder rate........but i've gotten away from Obama. The NUTS have an easier way to communicate bcs of the internet, and we hear more about them bcs of national tv, and bcs Limbaugh et al can get on the airways.

As i said, i fear for the Obamas, the potential reasons for endangering them piles up each day - his race, his gun control stand, the economy, the ranting about his tyranny, etc.

maryz · « **Reply #128 on:** January 19, 2013, 01:36:17 PM »

George Carlin.

Funny man!

mabel1015j · « **Reply #129 on:** January 19, 2013, 01:49:02 PM »

Yes! TY Mary

JoanK · « **Reply #130 on:** January 19, 2013, 02:53:30 PM »

Well, good for Carter. (And nelson mandela who founded the group that issued the statement). Some sanity in an insane world.

Steph · « **Reply #131 on:** January 20, 2013, 06:34:57 AM »

jeriron · « **Reply #132 on:** January 21, 2013, 10:10:59 AM »

MaryPage

All the reasons you mentioned for why there are so many people that hate Obama are probably true but no matter what the reasons are it all boils down to racism. No one will ever admit to that but that's what it is. If it is brought up to them they will say you're the one that brings it up not me. I think most of these people were in shock that a black man became President in this country and be voted in again was a slap in the face. I worry about him and his family today.

Steph · « **Reply #133 on:** January 22, 2013, 06:33:22 AM »

All went well. I loved that Joe Biden used Sonya as his justice to be sworn in.. I want to read her autobiography. I saw an interview on TV and she has such an easy way about her..Very honest about her Mothers problems, etc.

jeriron · « **Reply #134 on:** January 22, 2013, 08:59:11 AM »

Yesterday was a great day. Joe Biden is so funny, I think he was having a great time walking to people and shaking their hands and I think the FBI (security) was trying to get him to stop and get back in the car.

Also while the Obama family were watching the parade did you notice the girls and Obama himself had a cell phone it was so typical American family. Also Chris Mathews was talking about him chewing gum, they thought it might me a nicotine type gum to stop him from wanting to smoke, anyway after Michelle and the girls had left he appeared to be looking down at his phone and I wondered if she texted him and told him to to get rid of the gum because his suddenly took it out of his mouth.

I'm glad all went well. It's so nerve racking with how many people were there.

mabel1015j · « **Reply #135 on:** January 22, 2013, 12:34:07 PM »

Yes, Jeriron, i kepy saying "get back in the car!". But they are a fun family to watch, so normal and natural, you want to have them over for dinner. And i agree w/ you about the racism. It's interesting how much there still is and yet how nobody wants to be called, or admit to being, a racist.

Just came across this wiki article about women's statistics, thought i'd share. Good news and bad news.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_America

MaryPage · « **Reply #136 on:** January 22, 2013, 10:58:13 PM »

I was very upset by the Rachel Maddow show on MSNBC tonight. Not upset with her, as I am a big fan, but upset with the news brought by a lot of women she interviewed. All over this nation MEN have been working diligently to deny women the legal medical abortions they have a constitutional right to by the laws of these United States of America. With relentless urgency, men are seeking public office with campaign promises of lowering the national debt, and then they get into office and the first thing they do is introduce all sorts of legislation to impede and make difficulties for any woman who finds she must have an abortion. And the threat of death makes it hell for the doctors who want to provide these services and keep thousands upon thousands of women from dying. I just don't get it. I don't get where and when and how it became the most important issue for the men of our country to keep women from making their OWN decisions about whether or not to have a baby. Oh, I just wish God would turn the tables and MAKE men understand how intrusive and cruel they are being. Our bodies and our individual lives belong to US, and it is wrong for anyone else to dictate what shall become of any woman's body. They are making judgments about situations and people they know NOTHING about. Oh, it is just so unbelievable. Tell me, why do not the folks who yell loudest about government intrusion into our private lives yell about THIS extreme intrusion? Is it because they are one and the same people who are doing the yelling?

Steph · « **Reply #137 on:** January 23, 2013, 06:35:34 AM »

like you, I truly do not understand all of these politicians who get into office and immediately decide to regulate women.. My body is just that.. mine. I don't tell any males what to do.. but oh boy do they think they should tell me ... or any woman..really. Yesterday I saw a survey that said 70% of the people in the US.. would not change roe vs wade.. So why do the pols love to jump on it.. They need to do so many things in congress, but instead.. they campaign and use divisive issues to cause publicity.

MaryPage · « **Reply #138 on:** January 23, 2013, 07:42:32 AM »

It seems to be clothed in the fervor of religious belief, but I do not, at bottom, buy that, for it is just the same as the "religious" fervor that moves the Imams of Islam who insist God does not mean women to be seen by any men other than those who own them as daughters or wives, and that these women must not receive educations or eat with the men of the family or drive cars or receive medical care in which a male doctor sees or touches them. It is BARBARISM, whether it is here in this country or in the Middle East or wherever.

Our general public shrinks from going on the attack against our own politicians who do this, albeit we approve our children being outfitted for and sent to war to wipe out the religious fanatics of OTHER nations and die doing so, but I think we have to stop and think and once and for all realize this is NOT religion, although they claim it is, but it is plain old-fashioned bigotry against females from birth to death. I think we have to call their bluff and tell them publicly that they are bigots and bullies masquerading as godly men of religious belief, and that they need to get off their high horses on which they get their jollies in life from depriving women of their rights as human beings and perhaps, just perhaps, pass some laws to fix the myriad things this country REALLY needs fixing, and which have nothing to do with the terrorizing of women.

Steph · « **Reply #139 on:** January 24, 2013, 06:25:16 AM »

Well said Mary Page.. I read a book one time on the theory that men are secretly afraid of women and this causes the savagery of the attacks.. That is one of the reasons I have ordered the course onEarly Christianity.. I wanted to see if I could figure out when and why the early church was so anti women.

MaryPage · « **Reply #140 on:** January 24, 2013, 07:31:26 AM »

The early church was that way because it was the culture already. The myth that Eve tempted Adam to sin and displease God set it up way before Christianity. Jesus was a feminist, but was unable in a short life to change anything, though goodness knows He tried.

Men get urges when they see women. Not us, Steph; we do not bring on those urges these days. But from teen years to fifties, women cause urges. Sick men start with baby girls, but that is another discussion. Ordinary men get urges, and the feminist argument is they should learn to control these. The male argument down lo these thousands and thousands of years is that it is ALL THE FEMALE'S FAULT that she makes men want to sin and have sex with every one of the nubile ones. It is OUR BAD. What more is there to say?

mabel1015j · « **Reply #141 on:** January 24, 2013, 12:33:11 PM »

The misogyny is one of the reasons i am not religious. Even as a young girl i dismissed the Adam and Eve stories, etc and always thought of the Bible stories as myths. When i was growing up in the Methodist church, they did have some women ministers, but it was difficult for women to get into seminaries. I also saw blatant racism in my own church when they refused to allow an African American to join the church!?! This was in Pennsylvania in 1962, not in the South.

I am surprised how often men voice a fear of women, altho i don't think those men would call it a "fear"........we're able to "manipulate" them, we're "deceptive," we're "intimidating", we're "irrational" and therefore they can't understand us, etc. I too remember reading that the "power" to have children, "give life", was mysterious to men and may have been passed down in DNA, or subconsciously, thru the centuries. That seems irrational to me, but my husband is a biologist and he assures me that it is possible.

News today: women have new opportunities in combat positions in the military. I'm not a supporter of war, but i believe we need to have a defense and for those women who wish to make a career in the military they should have every opportunity that men have. If you can't be in combat postions it's very difficult to make it to general officer. Plus, there are few "frontlines" in war and regardless of the positions women have held since the beginning of time and combat, including nurses, they have often found themselves in combat. Therefore, they should be eligible for all postions, pay and opportunities that they are capable of handling, as are men. Btw, some of those positions had been opened in the Carter and Clinton administrations and rescinded in the Reagan and G W Bush admin.

MaryPage · « **Reply #142 on:** January 24, 2013, 01:14:23 PM »

During World War II, most of the men of this country were taken in to service for combat positions, so women went into the factories and government offices, etc.

There was still a shortage of needed help in the services, so women pilots were taken in as WASPS, but not "officially" in. So they flew and flew and flew, and some were killed, but they had no benefits. The women pilots had to get together their own contributions to bring their dead home for burial. True! Only a couple of years ago did the Pentagon finally admit these women existed and give them some thanks. Most of them dead by then, of course.

I had the great privilege of flying beside one (in a commerical flight) from Dulles Airport to Pittsburgh some years back; around 1989 or so, I think. She was off to give a speech about their service to their country, and was quite remarkable. I was humbled and proud, at one and the same time. She, too, is dead now. She lived in Middleburg, Virginia. Fantastic human being. Huge power of personality.

http://www.wingsacrossamerica.us/wasp/

mabel1015j · « **Reply #143 on:** January 24, 2013, 10:24:53 PM »

They are a great story. PBS - American Experience has a documentary about the WASPS. You can see it online.

I had a great warm evening, even tho it's 22degrees here, i had dinner with 5 of my favorite people, all women, a warm, fun, delicious dinner. Every January, we, all members of the founding Board of the Alice Paul Institute, have dinner together. Alice's birthday is Jan 11. One of them and the one i'm closest too was a volunteer president of API for 15 yrs, through the buying of the Paul estate and renovation. She also was instrumental in starting a National Collaborative on Women's History Sites. One of them is a NJ State Senator, has been for two decades. One is a retired elementary school teacher and union activist for decades; one is an atty and one is a very busy activist for women and has been for 40 yrs. They are not only productive women, but are great fun and current on events and great conversationalists, even though 5of the 6 are "introverts". LOL It's an evening i love and look forward to every year, even though i see each of them at various events thruout the year.

Steph · « **Reply #144 on:** January 25, 2013, 06:28:44 AM »

Sounds like a lovely evening. Women of a certain age tend to get more and more involved in causes.. WE have the time and energy now.. no little children, careers over.. we take on causes.. Men retire and turn to tv..but women become stronger as we age.. I am convinced of this.

kidsal · « **Reply #145 on:** January 25, 2013, 07:50:37 AM »

I served in the Air Force during the Korean War. At the time women had few options - clerical,etc. I was fortunate and attended radio school and worked in flight operations. Believe if we want to go to war we should bring back the draft and draft women as well. Israel does! Perhaps then we would think a little more about it and not be oblivious as we seem to be now as to what is happening in our war zones.

MaryPage · « **Reply #146 on:** January 25, 2013, 09:25:40 AM »

Good on you! You bust my buttons with pride!

The facts on the ground are these: women HAVE BEEN and ARE in combat. They just do not receive credit for being so, because to be a woman in combat has been against the law.

So the Pentagon has not been able to "assign" a woman to a combat unit. They have had to "attach" them where needed. Attach means they are not part of the unit they are indeed a part of. They are an extra, an auxiliary, a "contract" part of the unit, and as such they see combat but it does not go on their record. These women are needed as experts in the local language, as questioners of the local women (where the culture does not allow a man to speak to or touch them, or the local women may be subject to honor killing after the American men have moved on!), as medical aides, as radiomen, as drivers, you name it! But the work of going with the unit means they DIE when the others do, get wounded when the others do, DO NOT get the medals and purple hearts the others do, do NOT get the increase in pay called "combat" pay because, hey, they are not in combat! And the career women do not get the promotions the men who have been in exactly the same place at precisely the same time get. Promotions often require combat duty on the record of the one being promoted, especially to the higher ranks.

The question of Women in Combat is an Augean Stable of a question. You can sincerely be opposed, and I have no problem with that. What I do have a problem with is TRUTH. The truth is that women ARE in combat and everyone knows it and the women are left out of the glory and the perks which they deserve just as much as the guys.

maryz · « **Reply #147 on:** January 25, 2013, 09:50:35 AM »

I've always been in favor of the draft, and for women, too. This was even when our four daughters were still teenagers (they're now in their 50s).

BarbStAubrey · « **Reply #148 on:** January 25, 2013, 02:39:23 PM »

Excerpts from

Hate Crimes: A Rape Every Minute, a Thousand Corpses Every Year
There' a pattern of violence against women that’s broad and deep and incessantly overlooked

...Occasionally, a case involving a celebrity or lurid details in a particular case get a lot of attention in the media... while the abundance of incidental news items about violence against women in this country, in other countries, on every continent including Antarctica, constitute a kind of background wallpaper for the news...

Never mind India ...The story of the alleged rape of an unconscious teenager by members of the Steubenville High School football team was still unfolding, and gang rapes aren’t that unusual here either. Take your pick: some of the 20 men who gang-raped an 11-year-old in Cleveland, Texas, were sentenced in November, while the instigator of the gang rape of a 16-year-old in Richmond, California, was sentenced in October, and four men who gang-raped a 15-year-old near New Orleans were sentenced in April, though the six men who gang-raped a 14-year-old in Chicago last fall are still at large...

...Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta estimated that there were 19,000 sexual assaults on fellow soldiers in 2010 alone and that the great majority of assailants got away with it, though four-star general Jeffrey Sinclair was indicted in September for “a slew of sex crimes against women.”...

...So many men murder their partners and former partners that we have well over 1,000 homicides of that kind a year -- meaning that every three years the death toll tops 9/11’s casualties, though no one declares a war on this particular terror. (Another way to put it: the more than 11,766 corpses from domestic-violence homicides since 9/11 exceed the number of deaths of victims on that day and all American soldiers killed in the “war on terror.”) If we talked about crimes like these and why they are so common, we’d have to talk about what kinds of profound change this society, or this nation, or nearly every nation needs. If we talked about it, we’d be talking about masculinity, or male roles, or maybe patriarchy, and we don’t talk much about that.

Instead, we hear that American men commit murder-suicides -- at the rate of about 12 a week -- because the economy is bad, though they also do it when the economy is good; or that those men in India murdered the bus-rider because the poor resent the rich, while other rapes in India are explained by how the rich exploit the poor; and then there are those ever-popular explanations: mental problems and intoxicants -- and for jocks, head injuries. The latest spin is that lead exposure was responsible for a lot of our violence, except that both genders are exposed and one commits most of the violence...

...Rape and other acts of violence, up to and including murder, as well as threats of violence, constitute the barrage some men lay down as they attempt to control some women, and fear of that violence limits most women in ways they’ve gotten so used to they hardly notice -- and we hardly address...

...“A woman was stabbed after she rebuffed a man's sexual advances while she walked in San Francisco's Tenderloin neighborhood late Monday night, a police spokesman said today. The 33-year-old victim was walking down the street when a stranger approached her and propositioned her, police spokesman Officer Albie Esparza said. When she rejected him, the man became very upset and slashed the victim in the face and stabbed her in the arm, Esparza said.”

The man, in other words, framed the situation as one in which his chosen victim had no rights and liberties, while he had the right to control and punish her. This should remind us that violence is first of all authoritarian. It begins with this premise: I have the right to control you.

The entire article written by the gal who in 2000 wrote - Wanderlust: A History of Walking

Read it either here...
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175641/tomgram%3A_rebecca_solnit%2C_the_longest_war/#more

Or here
http://www.alternet.org/gender/hate-crimes-rape-every-minute-thousand-corpses-every-year?paging=off

Steph · « **Reply #149 on:** January 26, 2013, 06:26:31 AM »

Years ago I read a book based on the fact that rape is not sexual in nature, but a method of control.. I thought at the time and still do that this is quite true. The very idea of gang rape makes me shudder. I think these people need the highest punishment allowed. They are a mob.. pure and simple. No excuses...no if but... just put them in jail and leave them there.

jane · « **Reply #150 on:** January 26, 2013, 09:42:19 AM »

See...I get so emotional about stuff like this, I can't read a lot of it. I don't react rationally, I know. Gang rape? Then public castration out there for all who think this is somehow "macho and about controlling women" to see. Slice, slice, slice....and then into jail for life at hard labor. Give 'em a chance to work off that "control" issue! I know...I'm not rational on this.

maryz · « **Reply #151 on:** January 26, 2013, 10:01:26 AM »

Those sounds like good plans to me, jane!

MaryPage · « **Reply #152 on:** January 26, 2013, 11:55:57 AM »

I think you are perfectly rational, Jane.

You mirror my own emotions and thoughts exactly.

We have thousands and thousands of years of indignation in our genes. Our sex has been owned, raped, beaten and murdered for centuries, and it has all been allowed and shoved under the rug. But let a man so much as assault a policeman or dignitary, and their sorry butts are in jail forever, if not executed.

CallieOK · « **Reply #153 on:** January 26, 2013, 01:40:36 PM »

Is there any reliable scientific information on why men can't control their urges - or even why they "need" to satisfy them legally any time they have one - including with a wife?

BarbStAubrey · « **Reply #154 on:** January 26, 2013, 01:56:00 PM »

One step more - consider that when someone assists a drunk or drug addict in their behavior they are considered an enabler - If rape is the right to control than the law makers and those who base their rational on religion who want to control a women are enablers continuing the world wide historic notion that men and society have the right to control women.

If those in this country were not pushing to go back before Roe the legislatures would not be as harsh - they are simply pandering for the vote and throwing women under the bus to do it.

If a behavior that does not affect everyone is controlling a group we need to be more powerful and piece by piece make laws to eliminate all control over women just as the Black community not only affected our Constitution but changed the view of Blacks on TV - we may have women commentators but that still does not stop the attitude of control -

Unfortunately many of our popular sitcoms keep women in the dumb blond role. Often as mothers and wives showing them when they are vulnerable, when they do silly and dumb things. The last time we had a man playing that role was Tim the Toolman. Now we have a 1950s corporate husband as the hero.

This latest hammer seems to all be about the almighty sperm - not only is abortion threatened but the day after pill and now they are even going after contraception. The gays have made some headway but even there the sperm is not reproducing - at this point whatever is the origination of this viewpoint goes back to before recorded history and so, like much change in behavior of the last century that way is the better road to change -

We at our age may not be as able to shout and scream on the streets but there must be something we can do - any ideas...?

BarbStAubrey · « **Reply #155 on:** January 26, 2013, 02:01:36 PM »

Callie with as much putting down of women I am thinking like any addiction one bit of behavior leads to the next - I think believing there is a right to control is only carried out by either verbal abuse or physical abuse or sexual abuse - when someone believes they are better than or must prove they are better than they dismiss the value of another - we all did it during war - we make the enemy out as less than ourselves - and once there is this sense of superiority then abuse is the next step - and so to control your own urges has to be predicated on the concept that the other is respected equal to yourself or why bother to control your urge to defile and abuse.

CallieOK · « **Reply #156 on:** January 26, 2013, 04:30:01 PM »

Barb, I agree. I've always wondered if researchers had ever dared to even suggest the idea of studying the topic. I suspect the suggestion would be squelched immediately.

MaryPage · « **Reply #157 on:** January 26, 2013, 06:03:53 PM »

It's like for years and years and years all research was done on MEN'S diseases and it was assumed women had the same type problems and it was not necessary to study them separately. As for female "troubles," it was assumed that menstral pain was all in our heads and nothing was going on with that and a huge variety of other things.
Only in MY LIFETIME have they come to realize that men and women have different bodies and function differently.
Big emphasis has always been placed only on the male.
Did you ever stop and think about the fact that from its invention until now, when it is a battle royal still, birth control has not been deemed a thing to be paid for by insurance? But the very MINUTE Viagra and its copy cats were invented, our Congress passed a law that they must be paid for by insurance?
In short, men's enjoyment of sex must be prolonged and at public expense as long as possible.
But the women they do this with have no right to a free pass when it comes to the results on THEIR bodies of the male virility!
The differences and the prejudices have been so very OBVIOUS, but most Americans have paid it no attention at all. Blows my mind, it does!

mabel1015j · « **Reply #158 on:** January 26, 2013, 11:12:16 PM »

Here's a very small thing we can each do, sign the petition to get the Equal Right's Amendment moving again. It's a petition to the White House. You have to sign up for an "account" but it does nothing unless you want to receive newsletters from them. We lacked 3 states to ratify the amendment after the Congress passed it in 1972. There is a legal discussion as to whether we just need to have 3 states ratify uit, or whether the whole process has to start all over.

Sign the petition and encourage as many people as you can to sign it. We need over 6,000 signatures yet to meet the required 15,000.

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/vigorously-support-womens-rights-fully-engaging-efforts-ratify-1972-equal-rights-amendment-era/16XQWXpS

Here is more info

http://www.change.org/petitions/equal-rights-amendment-sj-res-21-hj-res-69-sj-res-39-and-hj-res-47

BarbStAubrey · « **Reply #159 on:** January 27, 2013, 01:22:20 AM »

Thanks I have passed it on to my email list and already received some emails back thanking me - this is something we can do...

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Author Topic: Women's Issues (Read 362898 times)