Women's Issues

[JeanneP]

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

No need to.  There is help out there. I see no need of it.  Don't see it around here.  See some who expect people to just feel sorry for them and give.  Want things handed to them. The old saying " god will help them who help themselves."  Some don't want to do that.  Long as the can get for doing nothing they will never change. This is the US. Not a third country.  You can stop having babies. Be educated..go where you want. Find help if sick or needing help.   Feeling sorry and just giving without teaching doesn't help the poor. Just makes them lazy.  That use to be the thought in the past.  Now it is called do more for the unfortunate . To many now working the system.  It needs thinning out.  Many are way to young to be doing nothing.  They  do get more help than the elderly. They do still have pride.

[nlhome]

I guess I see a different world also. There are always some who take advantage of a situation, but most people use the help to keep themselves afloat until they can grasp onto a job or a better job.

[maryz]

Ruth Benerito died today at age 97 in LA. Until today, I'd never heard of her or that she was one of my heroes.  She invented permanent press. Anyone who knows me knows how I feel about ironing - and that I stopped ironing as soon as permanent press was invented and I could replace all our clothes.  This previously unknown savior contributed a large benefit to my life. Click here for a Wikipedia article and click here for a Slate obituary about her.

[JeanneP]

Never a lover of ironing. Years ago when the girls young I dressed them in dresses. Hated pants on myself and them. However I had a lady living close who loved ironing and she did all mine. When that material came then I know it helped with the shirts men wore.  I must not know how to do laundry right so that things come out not needing to be ironed. I still iron a little my slacks. Blouses. Cotten tops. Now up to  10 years ago when my MIL passed she was still ironing her panties.husbands under shorts. Pillow cases,sheets and even Cotten dish towels along with all their clothes.
One thing I can't stand is the smell of things done at dry cleaners. Never buy anything that has to go there.
Growing up I never saw laundry done. A list was filled out on a Monday of all the dirty clothes and things. All returned Thursdays all clean. Ironed. By a laundry company. Came here a my MIL had a machine with tub where they washed from whites first to colored last. Put through a



ringer. Hung out to dry. Was a full day job . Will say ,they always looked and smelled so good. But looked hard work to me.

[BarbStAubrey]

scratching my head trying to figure it out - because I never iron and yet, I do not own anything that is permanent press - how can that be - I do know years ago we learned permanent press is very uncomfortable to wear in our heat - it does not breathe and you end up becoming a soaked dripping wet stinky mess in no time flat -

I do wear cotton Ts everyday including long sleeve cotton Ts in winter and to dress it I wear either a silk shirt that gets cleaned at the cleaners or some cotton or linen big shirts - that's it - aha - I wash them and then bring them to the cleaners for them to press and since they are worn like jackets you wear them a bunch before they need to be washed - my pants are either that crinkly whatever that Orvis sells or some sort of cotton knit or jeans and in winter fake suede or corduroy  - they all wash and dryer dry. Mystery solved.

I do remember though when the older two were in their earliest years in elementary school we lived in Kentucky and permanent press then was a God Send - there was a clean shirt or blouse or dress everyday and my little one also wore shirts and even shorts that had to be ironed - thinking back kids didn't wear Tshirts except as underwear. I wonder when wearing Tshirts started.

[JeanneP]

P.s on my last posting
My MIL was a example of what I called growing up poor. Grew up on a old farm in the country.9 brothers and sisters. Her mom.left a widow when young .all had to leave school about 16. MIL at that age  and worked until  65
. I never saw. Them getting anything for free or complaining how hard life had been. They took any work the could get. Her mother was the sweetest lady. No complaints for her life.  Some of them did well.some just got by.  One sister still here age 95. Had to give up her home she and husband worked hard to build .lost him year he retired . Moved in to take care of a daughter for 20 years. Then she passes at 50.  I talk to her once in a while . She lives in assisted living in Chicago.  Still not a complaint from her. Makes me feel good when I hang up.
That is why I think that many young   today are not doing enough to help themselves.  Life is much easier to do it now.

[Steph]

I guess it would be nice to live where Jeanne lives. I guarantee here in central Florida, there are a lot of children doing without meals.. unless they get them in school. which means every weekend, they dont eat. They live in cars.. I have been workiing with the teens and I could cry over their lives. They have none of the carefree anything. Many of them have never had a father around..Their mother has too many children, but it does not make the children bad.. just the mother who keeps hoping for love in all the wrong places.

[JeanneP]

Then they should start with the women who do have baby after baby. This is we're most of the poverty is. Looking at one photo in today's paper. Wanting us to be sorry because with the problem of gov close down she can't get the form allowing her to renew. Food card for another.  3 year.. 4 children under seven. None have the same last names.  Single. (What kind love she looking for?)
Maybe this new health the pres. Is trying to bring out. Every one have a health card. Will make people notice this.  Birth control. Cheapest health thing there is .available to everyone. Why should these women be catered to. If it had been allowed in our younger days. We could have gotten welfare. Not had to work. Had as many children as we wanted . Think what the country would be like. Now think what will be like when our GGGrands grow up.  Won't be better. Some people just being sorry think will take care of problem. Remember the old saying.( you have to be cruel ,to be kind) maybe Obama heard this.

[MaryPage]

Jeanne, I do feel that is a very harsh view of things.  But then again, I have seen so very much desperate poverty, and obviously you have not.
We have, in this country, many women who have been disadvantaged from birth.  Children raised in poverty, often with one parent who is struggling to simply survive and has no time to be a role model.  The males of this culture promise the attention and affection these females quite naturally, being as human as you and I, crave.  The males learn to promise them the moon, and then, finally caving and allowing sex to happen, many, if not most, gals get promptly dumped.  The males have a natural instinct to spread their seed.  The female just wants to be loved.  But NO ONE provides this young woman with birth control.  There is a very vocal, even though a small minority,  segment of our population that insists birth control remain unavailable through any government service OR government SUPPORTED service.  And these same people do all they possibly can to close down Planned Parenthood clinics where women suffering poverty can get for FREE the pills they so desperately need.
Can a young woman trying to raise a child on wages earned at MacDonald's find dollars within her budget to purchase birth control pills?  Not on your life!  She cannot even afford diapers or formula!
But where can she go to get them for free?  No clinic within a hundred miles or more!  The very same people who castigate her for getting pregnant in the first place have seen to that!
Poverty goes on and repeats itself and much of society does its damnedest to make it worse.  If you miss one rent payment, you get evicted.  If you miss a utility payment, they pile on the late fees.  There is a never ending vicious cycle.
We who have been blessed with the advantages of a decent life and a good education have a moral obligation to take care of those members of our community who have slipped between the cracks.  We do.  It is beholden upon us.  And we cannot allow children to be continually sick and malnourished because there are some grownups who cheat.  If our congress would just set up the funds to OVERSEE the programs they fund, we could prevent cheating.One of the dirtiest secrets in Washington DC and in every state capital is that the legislators fund programs to help and then no money for oversight.  No money for inspectors or investigators or even ordinary clerks to be hired and paid to double check.  Everything is scrimped on, and then when a cheater is outed and the media proclaims the story, they want to quit helping anyone at all.
Most of us humans have an instinct to be self sufficient.  But children need adult help.  They do not ask to be born.  

[JeanneP]

But Mary page.
This is now 2013 in the USA. Not the poor countries . How long are women go to stay the way you are showing them. World was that was back in our grandmothers days.not now . Didn't women learn from them ?. The next learn and by the time WW2 ended shown what women were capable of. Morals seem to be going downhill. Far more poor children with single women these days.
As I said before. I have seen in US with my daughter being involved with this life style for 35 years . I am a European know what hard times were like going through the war years. Food short . Freezing cold going without . Little hard for me to accept what has happened to the US . People want so much for doing nothing.
I was at the Salvation Army food distribution the other day and saw what they could not give away. Lots of veg. Told me people only took can goods. P.butter. Cereal things that did not take them long to fix . Seethe same when theuse the food cards in the store. Walk behind and watch. Stores don't bother now to pick out what not suppose to buy on them. Caused a problem and so potato chips.soda . Garbage.
Butchers say can ask for meat bones. Get free veg ,in food distribution places. Soup feeds a lot  of people. Take time to make it.  No way.  We should have been so lucky back in the forties.. The should teach these young people by showing how the immigrants did in the late 80s with the food they had. That was poverty days ,not now.

I am going to quit going on (people here tired of reading) but I may have felt sorry for some years ago here but just seen to much to buy it now.

[BarbStAubrey]

Jeanne what you have to understand is most of at least 80% of poor women were raped as kids most often by family members or their family did nothing to stop it or to protest and told the girl nothing at best and to shut up at wost - they learn that love means rape - this is no joke - and so their view of life is very altered and they do not feel they have the power to make their life better because that is what incest and rape does to a girl - they either get family support of therapy and lots of it - take a teen in this winter and learn a lot - your idea of bringing up a child will not work - you have to be open to learn if you are going to make a difference so that at least one teen will not join the give away lines that you see as mis-managed and mis-used.

Remember there is no time to cook - kids are hungry and hungry for attention that comes in the way of mom feeding them regardless how worn out and poor she is - there is no place in these iitchens for anyone to leave a crock pot on for hours with no one there while they go to work so the food has to be instant. A can opened and heated in instant.

I think you are a Christian and someplace the Bible says something about throwing stones - if you have had no husband no love in your life several children with a barley paying job then we can pass judgement on how folks exist - they have had enough pain why add to it when we all have so much - if you think they can do better than visit a family and offer to help and cook for them for a few days. Change does not happen by finding fault - it takes someone seeing a better way and a way that makes them feel respected and worthy.

[JeanneP]

I don't think we are talking about the same thing. When the gov. Talking about how thousands of families inUS now are livng under the poverty line which I believe now is over 40 thousand ,which is  rediculas  as some college grads I know not making that.
Not talking about women raped. 80 pct of so called poor have not been raped. I know 4 women around me. All on welfare. Single.children. Their sex was not rape. More stupidity. I knew their parents they were not raised to be the way they are.

This is what we are catering to. Lazy  grownups who  know how to work the system .it has now become a popular thing to do.  Makes it hard for the ones who lost jobs but want to work.all being thrown in the same group.  Needs to be lot more people checking. Separating them out. it has gotten easier now to get on the welfare if you have never gotten a job or able to keep one ,than if you just got laid off .

 

[BarbStAubrey]

Jeanne take a teen girl in and you will learn what the real story is... anyone can look at a book cover it takes reading the book.

[nlhome]

I do agree, it's not helpful to judge. It's easy to look from the outside and criticize the way a person appears to live, but we don't know all the facts, reasons or even how hard the person tries. Poverty has a way of sapping energy, of limiting people's vision.

[MaryPage]

I feel such deep sorrow and despair when I hear sentiments of disbelief about the condition of our desperately poor, because I know first hand that they do indeed exist, and are indeed hurting terribly, most often through no fault of their own.  It makes no sense to me to let 90 starve to death, or become so sick from malnutrition that they stay sick and unable to function indefinitely, ending in an early death, all because 10 people cheat.
When we were in High School and College, we saw the one or ones who cheated and were awarded diplomas and degrees they most certainly did not earn.  It did not change the fact that we earned ours.  We were raised to believe that sooner or later the wrong would be caught out and sooner or later we would earn our laurels.  If not, we were told, God knows.  In the very end, at the time of the Last Judgment, the Good will be justified and the Bad punished.
Well, I am not so certain I buy into that dogma anymore, but it surely turned us out with good attitudes.  Visit the Sick, Comfort the Dying, and give food and alms to The Poor, for they are always with Us!  Yep.  Not a bad way of viewing our human family.  I feel gratitude for the way I was raised up, and for the people to saw to that.  My love for them increases every passing year.  Would I could bring them up from their graves and tell them so!

[MaryPage]

I have to stop myself from screaming at the top of my lungs at outrageous nonsensical judgments on the part of Old Men.  They should know better.
But then I tell myself to try to calm down and be fair.  These men purport to believe that we mammals of the human species are made in the image of God (how egotistical, I think!) and God means every conception to take place, including rapes by fathers and/or brothers that spawn idiots and maniacs, or rapes by the criminally insane, that spawn more of that ilk to fill our prisons.  It never seems to occur to them, not once, that perhaps God gave us brains to figure out such like!  They truly are convinced that abortion is murder.  This, of course, is a perfectly natural result of the genes turned on during puberty in most males of our species;  said genes screaming at THEM to go forth and spread their seed in order to make certain they live on ad infinitum throughout the coming generations.  So of course they will it to be so that God Himself (of course not Herself!) wants that seed to be successful and bring forth armies of stalwart sons.
So we have in Nebraska this week a 16 year old Foster child who is the victim of that state's new "there must be written consent from a parent for a child to have an abortion" law.  This girl is a foster child because her family abused her terribly and the State had to rescue her.  The law has removed her from all parental authority.  The State is the authority now, not even the foster parents can give such a signature.  She begged the court for an abortion when she was only 10 weeks along, saying she had no money to raise a child and wanted to finish High School and be better situated in life before having a family.  One court after another refused.  Finally, 4 months along in her pregnancy, the state Supreme Court gave her a final no.  They claim she is too immature to make the decision to NOT give birth!  Too immature!  But hey, guys!  She is also TOO IMMATURE to raise a child!!!!  So what IS she?  A baby making machine?   And how about HER future?

[JeanneP]

Well now things seem to be getting looked into. It's a start  long article out inthe paper today.the found stamp program is being abused. It is the title.

In last 10 years over 100 BILLION has been spent. When a card is issued it only has a number on the front, the person then gives it a PIN number. This is never questioned when using.No I.d can be asked for.it is easy for a person to trade the card along with pin number for money  a 300 dollar card can sell for half .this money is then purchasing drugs. A buyer can then go to a stoe buy and sell food to another for money.no I.D  needed. They can be bought all over in any town. Years ago when they.  used stamps I even got some just to see how easy.( did finely give to some one to use)

Well now Gov. Finely figured this out I  think.  They are thinking to have a persons drivers


lic.No. Stamped on card or SSNo.  Any kind of photo I.d which has to be shown same time as the card. This will not stop all the cheating as there are some that will go with a person into a store with them and help them shop and then use their  card . You will catch them doing this in large cities.  They can then go to the food distribution places and pick up their food  the need.  8 churches around give lunch every day.  


Soon that will be plentiful at thanksgiving and Christmas.. Last year I saw one young single women with 2 children pickup 3 food baskets last TG. And Christmas with full dinner fixing . Turkey and all .did not cook a thing.
Country could wipe out this going hungry by the millions just by taking a look at how it can be done. The food is there . Twice needed is thrown away.  Set up a way that makes sense. Not just a easy way.  People can be poor. Uneducated but learn really fast how to work a poor system.

Found in Illinois alone and paid out ,millions last ten years in Chicago area Social security payments under people name that had been dead for years. One family of3  brothers living on their dead fathers payments.

Just a sample as to how much cheating goes on. It is sad for all the honest people. They are the ones that will lose out soon . Country running out of money. Owing more to china than we are worth.  Maybe we should let them come up with a better welfare system for us.  Bet the dont spend as much on theirs without checking.

[BarbStAubrey]

Ugly hearts can find all sorts of justification.

[nlhome]

The percentage of fraud, considering how much money is involved, is not that high - of course, dollar wise it is, but percentage is not so high.

I  have always wondered how people know someone is using their food card and what exactly they are buying with that card and what they are paying cash for - I have never, in all my years including when I had 3 children and shopped almost daily (or so it seemed), seen anyone using a card (or food stamps when they were used) in the grocery store. Maybe I'm not observant enough.?

[MaryPage]

I see it all the time.  Often right in front of me in the grocery store.  They are strictly prohibited from buying items such as cigarettes, and if they try to purchase something on the no list, somehow our Giant's computer OR maybe it is the clerk, I am not close enough to be sure, but the item gets put aside and they cannot have it.  All the ones I have seen seem to be very embarassed about using food stamps.  Our local paper says the usage shot up hugely after the recession started causing so many people to lose their jobs.  I know I had to go to work, for free, for my son-in-law because he could not get work.  He had to let go the bookkeeper/office manager he had had for 19 years, and have me come in in her place.  As I say, I not only get not one penny of pay, but I have loaned him a large sum of money to keep the company going.  Well, a large sum FOR ME.  Both he and I hope he can pay me back.  He had to lay off, at first all but 2 of the men;  finally those two as well, and we left the office he had been in for 25 years and moved into his home.  My daughter's home.  Lots of these people had to go on food stamps to survive.  As soon as they found work again, they went off them.  Our newspaper, THE CAPITAL here in Annapolis, Maryland, as well as The Washington Post, report the system working, for the most part, very well indeed.  Sure, one worm can seem to spoil the whole apple;  but common sense tells us that just ain't so.  Those who try to "get away with something" have been with us since the beginning of time.  They cannot, must not,  put a halt to our duty to the suffering amongst us.

[Steph]

Food Banks.The good ones know that when you are homeless, living in a tent in the woods or a car, that canned goods are the only things that work.. Fruit is good, but does not fill the children up.. There are many many people desperate for a permanent job..
I owned a retail store in a small shopping center.We had a lot of part time workers and even the full time for the tiny stores, that mighthave three employees did not pay more than minimum wage and no health. I knew two diferent people in that center, that lost the little they had ( tiny trailers) and their jobs because they got infected teeth and ended up going to emergency room, since dentists do not work on the poor.. Both times, they lost too much time from work and the employers really did not have much choice. If you only have two or three employees and you run a store, it is really impossible to hold a job for someone.. I help with the teens here and I come home and cry sometimes because they dont even have sanitary pads or the privacy to use them , when the whole family lives in a car. We are trying to prove the middle schools and high schools with all of the standard items others take for granted. Soap,, toothpaste and brush, sanitary pads, shampoo,, etc etc. Think of being a teen and having literally nothing, but you still struggle and come to school every single day.

[MaryPage]

You're telling it like it is, Steph.
No work, no pay.  No pay, no home.
No car home, pretty soon.  No money for the insurance, you see.
No insurance, car impounded.
Family living in the woods or under an overpass, unless they can get in a shelter.
But shelters full to overflowing.  Long lists.
How do you get a job when you have no place to live and no place to shower and no soap to shower with?
And you stink.
And yes, no diapers for the babies.  No formula.  No Kotex for the women and girls.
And how to you come up out of this?

[JeanneP]

Since 2009 the federal SNAP have spent 45 .2 billion into that program. Having the benefits for a average family of four go from getting $588 a month to $668 . Should be no hungry people out there if using them right. I see working people with larger families not spending that much.  
Gigerets and alcohol can't buy. Household goods  no. Has to be eatable goods only. Some baby products can be bought  although truckloads of diapers,and soaps are available at most distribution centers. Food banks. Church centers. Right now in malls .around this town
Winter clothing is already being collected.  Over 800 coat. jackets. sitting at one church already.  The mall have collected thousands.

This goes on to say that now because of the laziness of our society, to many people now willing to let gov.provide a meager living for them . It all now comes to down to.laziness,improper education,and bad parenting

Most people see America as what is going on around their own  lives. They take the rest from the shows on T.V and the articles printed in papers showing the worse things.

[BarbStAubrey]

Blame the victim - a useful approach

As Doug Coupland says, Blame is just a lazy person's way of making sense of chaos. Newspapers need chaos for a story.

[MaryPage]

I had never heard that quote before, but have realized for simply years and years now that a certain small portion of every culture, be it ours or any other from first, second or third world civilizations, is quite loudly vocal against their numbers who are struggling to cope with life.  This Anger, and a deep well of inner anger it is, is, of course, spawned by fear.  Their unspoken fear is of having to give up a sliver of the life situation they have managed to carve out for themselves and their own blood line.  They are obsessed with a constant paranoia of having it taken away from them.
Altruism has been discovered to exist in almost all sectors and species of our animal world.  So has fear of "others." 
I do think a lot of this is innate.  You notice from toddlers upwards who seems disposed to share and who is very vocally opposed to adopting any such notion.  One two year old little darling in my own family has not been treating us to the famous "terrible two" "No!"  Instead he has learned to say:  "Mine!  Mine!  Mine!"  Needless to say, his parents are working hard to disabuse him of continuing this attitude.
But "give" and "share" are indeed important concepts, and I feel thankful most of us, especially most Americans, do feel compelled to reach out and give assistance.

[nlhome]

Error rate for food stamps is about 3%, fraud rate is somewhere around 1.3%, according to what I have read in several sources. A good share of the fraud is conducted by the merchants, not the recipients.

What is, is - we have hungry people. It's a fact that we have a lot of hungry people in this country, especially children and elders. Families with children and elders make up most of the food stamp groups. Many of the adults are the "working poor" which means they have jobs, but they don't earn enough to feed their families well and pay all their bills. I remember working when my children were young, feeling there wasn't enough time in a day to prepare meals, do laundry, clean the house, help the children with their homework, so I had to resort to "convenience foods" now and then. And I had good transportation, a working spouse, a home with affordable rent, a washer and dryer.

[mabel1015j]

I wonder about elderly people, especially in large towns or cities, who have no family nearby. I can understand, even if they live in "safe areas", if they don't feel stable when walking, they may be afraid to go out to shop. They may not have cars, many large towns don't have good public transportation, even if they did, how much can one carry on the bus? I fear there are many such people that few people know about.

 All of us here probably are people who know how to call the county, or find agencies who could help us, but i fear there are people who don't know how to get information to help them.

Jean

[Steph]

I am sure that larger cities have a lot of items. I live in a rural county in a smaller community, where a car is a necessity to get anywhere. We have all sorts of charities, but getting the people to them is hard..
Many of the women are terrified of state charities. They are convinced their children may be taken away.  Not true, but there it is. In the state of Florida, you can only get all types of assistance if you have minor children.. Singles and elderly are at risk..
and no, I did not read about them in the newspaper, I saw them when I had several retail stores and held their hands. I had people living behind one of my stores in the woods.She was a second generation woods person,, no birth certificate, no schooling,, her Mother was mentally ill and kept her a secret.. She was raped and then run down by the car of the rapists. She came to me, all bloody and wounded. I took her to the emergency room and saw them humiliate her over and over. I just came home and cried and cried. She was dirty, smelled, but she loved to read and I gave her a book a week from my store, she always brought them back and thanked me. She found a small dog wandering and she would feed him before she would eat herself.. She has no hope.. who would employ her. no skills. I think of her when people talk of benefits.
My younger daughter in law works for the state in the get them back to work department./ She tries to get them retrained, etc. but she says herself that t here are some people who simply are too low down mentally to work..

[MaryPage]

We should all try to see the new documentary out called INEQUALITY FOR ALL.
Me, I hate going out to the movies anymore, so I plan to purchase the DVD as soon as it becomes available.
This film has been put together by an expert on the subject.
Some of his credentials:
Secretary of Labor of the United States of America
An academic
An author of books
A candidate for governor of a state
An advisor to presidents
Robert Reich knows what he is talking about and has access to all of the statistics kept by all of the various government agencies.

Remember:  INEQUALITY FOR ALL

[Steph]

I will wait for net flix..our local movie house does not do documentaries.

[MaryPage]

I saw a 2 page spread of a photograph in the October 14, 2013 issue of THE NEW YORKER that made me feel like throwing up.
It is titled:  AT HOME WITH THE ONE PER CENT
And it shows a real fireplace in the Wyoming ranch home of F.F. Formica (the real name of a bazillionaire)
Seems he loves fireplaces.  So he built one a mile long and he keeps it going 24/7.  It has its own fire department and a motorized crane that goes up and down to keep it fed.  It burns up a hundred square miles of forest per year.
You have to see it to believe it!
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/bios/david_letterman/search?contributorName=david%20letterman

[BarbStAubrey]

well since we cannot do a thing about it - we cannot even get Congress to establish a tax system that includes the fair share of these Billionaires - we could waste a lot of our own mental health being outraged with no one to affect other than others in our own circumstance so, the only choice I see is we can look at the salaries that are helping worker's families, whose were paid to quarry the stone, ship it, build this useless monstrosity, build the fire engine and crane, and now those who maintain this monument to what someone can do and does because he can.

Some monuments keep burning an everlasting flame using Gas as the heat source that since, we think there is underground gas that will last forever we are not conserving its use where as, the Forest we can see and we know it is slowly disappearing - no fracking of forests as we frack for oil - maybe seeing forests disappear and being outraged over wasted use we can see how what oil and gas we do not see and we use with abandon is disappearing.

Well I sure hope that the room where this monument is located holds some great parties to give many more a salary providing and serving food, setting up and clearing this room - looks like it is in the blood of many who need huge spectacles - this Teutonic nature for huge spectacles helped to raise Germany out of its stupor that led it to reversing the numbing inflation after WWI when whole streets were set aside at night as the sleeping location for hundreds of the homeless.

[MaryPage]

I think it must be just a spoof.  There is no disclaimer, at least none in the magazine that I could find.  But my brain tells me it is just a spoof, as the reality would be far beyond what anyone could yearn for.

[BarbStAubrey]

Could be - looked more like a drawing than a photo - a piece to get the blood boiling maybe??!!??

[MaryPage]

If it is a spoof, I cannot imagine the point of it.  And especially in a magazine as old and staid as The New Yorker.  Their cartoons have always been up to the moment and hilarious (consider especially the cover of this "Money" issue with all the old men in suits in the heavy gilt laid frames on the wall and the final one of a company CEO who is very young and wearing jeans and a hoodie (with the hood off the head)!), but I have not known them to kid around otherwise except in a veddy English tongue in cheek manner.  This fireplace thing, as I say, I just don't see the point.  There are enough excesses in the 1% without making up this sort of thing.  I point to GOLD bathroom faucets.  Now those are REAL!  And when I think of the money spent on SHOW OFF excess such as that which should be going to feed hungry children instead, I seeth!  Yes!  I seeth!

[BarbStAubrey]

do you think it is showing the disregard for reasonable size and use of resources - if you think of the forest as representing the world's resources including the energy of those who work to support the heat that is throw back onto the earth but within the controlled space and design of the work space and the fire engine and crane are protecting the energy, both resources and workers to stay within the confined space within the rules of that space that they zillionaires have established while the workers and resources give off this heat and not get out of control to benefit the space owned by the nillionaires. It is as if the workers like the resources are fuel for their consumption - they get used up and do not benefit from the glow or their dissipating energy.

[Steph]

mark

[MaryPage]

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2013/10/house-stenographer-yanked-from-chamber-ranting-about-god-freemasons/
 
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/16/stenographer-shouting-on-house-floor_n_4112145.html
 
 Just in case those of you not close to the infamous beltway, which I am, missed this item from the time of the vote in the house last night.  Terribly sad, but indicative of our times, I fear.

I very much fear.

[Steph]

I knew something had happened and a woman was doing the shouting, but no idea what she was saying.

[MaryPage]

I am downright allergic to the notion of attempting to foist the perspective I myself arrive at, from the historical events of a long lifetime and gut instincts, on ANY other human being, including my dear friends in here.  But if you will take it as a given that I make no attempt to indoctrinate you (as if I were dumb enough to believe I could!), I will share what I believe to be true:
All these long years past I have heard that tune played about Freemasons and the lack of our countrymen taking Jesus Christ as their Savior.  And on and on and on, and I am sure each of you has heard the same litany.
It is a fact that George Washington and a lot of others from our earliest days as the United States of America were Masons.  As a disclaimer I feel bound to make here, my own father was a Mason.  Also a Mason, as that was my maiden name.
That being said, I do not believe there has ever been a conspiracy of any shape or size whatsoever to have the Masons run this nation or to force their countrymen  or their government either to repudiate or accept Jesus Christ.  On the contrary, despite the Masons incorporating The Bible into their rituals and each Mason declaring a reverence for the Almighty,  I have never seen or heard, except from these conspiracy theorists, the slightest indication that members of this society wish their group, as a group, to cause so much as the tiniest influence upon our communities.  Men invited to join the Masons do tend to have special individual qualities which set them apart from the pack, as it were.  They do tend to become leaders in every section of life and in every way.  But this is due entirely to their own abilities and efforts, and has nothing to do with their membership.
I get tired of hearing this so very old lying attempt to smear the Masons and alarm the public.

As for the accusation that the nation is crumbling because it has not declared Jesus to be its Saviour, the fundamentalist Christians who preach this (and endless war!) and cause a huge rift in Christianity, are the mirror twins of the Islamic fundamentalists who preach the exact same thing, albeit with a different prophet! Each of these frenetic groups is dividing the peoples of their section of the world into warring factions that hate one another!  Each wants to see the others perish, and are willing to lend a hand to that end;  all the while certain God is on their side.

My personal prayer is God save us from the fundamentalist fanatics of every creed!