Today marks the 10th anniversary of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, decreed by the UN General Assembly in 1999. In the words of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon:

“Women around the world are the very linchpin keeping families, communities, and nations together. On this International Day, let us reaffirm our commitment to women’s human rights; let us invest more resources in countering [violence against women]; and let us do all it takes to end these horrific assaults once and for all.”

Today also marks the first of this year’s 16 Days of Activism to End Violence Against Women, which itself will conclude on December 10th, Human Right’s Day.  Interstingly, Australia has independently themed the day White Ribbon Day, and urges Aussie men to take the following oath:

I swear:
never to commit violence against women,
never to excuse violence against women, and
never to remain silent about violence against women.
This is my oath.

Pretty basic, huh? If you want clarification about what constitutes violence against women, the White Ribbon Foundation says,

“In simple terms, violence against women is violence directed against a woman because she is a woman or that affects a woman disproportionately.” [Em. mine]

This last is important because many of these abuses happen to men and boys as well, but the rate of occurrence and global levels of tolerance for these kinds of behaviors overwhelmingly validate this as a women’s issue.  Consider 

• domestic violence, family violence, wife-beating, intimate violence, intimate homicide, femicide
• sexual violence, sexual assault, rape, marital rape, gang rape, date rape, acquaintance rape, indecent assault, sexual harassment, sex-based harassment
• genital mutilation
• enforced prostitution
• enforced sterilisation, enforced abortion, killing of unwanted female babies, enforced motherhood

Earlier this month the UN began Say NO – UNiTE to End Violence Against Women, an initiative that “records what individuals, organizations and governments worldwide are doing to end violence against women.” Say NO strives to reach 100,000 actions by March 2009 and 1 million actions by November 2010. They count volunteering, donations, outreach, advocacy, and even individual instances of helping someone in need.  If you’re doing something, stand up and be counted.

I’ve spoken to too many people (men and women, incidently) who roll their eyes upon what they think are “women’s issues” or “feminist” complaints in a world they like to view as more or less equal by now. The finer points of sexism, discrimination, and gender politics aside,  according to UNIFEM:

Violence against women and girls is a problem of pandemic proportions. Based on country data available , up to 70 per cent of women experience physical or sexual violence from men in their lifetime – the majority by husbands, intimate partners or someone they know. Among women aged between 15 and 44, acts of violence cause more death and disability than cancer, malaria, traffic accidents and war combined. Perhaps the most pervasive human rights violation that we know today [...] It takes many forms and occurs in many places – domestic violence in the home, sexual abuse of girls in schools, sexual harassment at work, rape by husbands or strangers, in refugee camps or as a tactic of war.

I highly recommend reading the factsheet in its entirety (all stats documented), but here are a few nuggets:

• In the United States, one-third of women murdered each year are killed by intimate partners. Perhaps the most pervasive human rights violation that we know today, violence against women devastates lives, fractures communities, and stalls development. It takes many forms and occurs in many places — domestic violence in the home, sexual abuse of girls in schools, sexual harassment at work, rape by husbands or strangers, in refugee camps or as a tactic of war.
• In South Africa, a woman is killed every 6 hours by an intimate partner.
• In India, 22 women were killed each day in dowry-related murders in 2007.
• Women and girls constitute 80 percent of the estimated 800,000 people trafficked annually,7 with the majority (79 percent) trafficked for sexual exploitation.
• Approximately 100 to 140 million girls and women in the world have experienced female genital mutilation/cutting, with more than 3 million girls in Africa annually at risk of the practice.
• In São Paulo, Brazil, a woman is assaulted every 15 seconds.
• Approximately 250,000 to 500,000 women and girls were raped in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Further Info:

WHO Multi-country Study on Women’s Health and Domestic Violence against Women

Violence Against Women – We Can’t Look Away: Blogging and Updates from the International Rescue Committee

Ending Violence Against Women: What Works – 2006 Report from the UN’s WomenWatch (pdf)

Veterans: Men and women who have voluntarily curtailed their own freedoms and agreed to give their lives, if  neccessary, in order to protect you and I as citizens of the United States and defend the freedoms and privileges we largely take for granted.

On this Veterans Day, checkout a great post on Huffington –  ”5 Things You Didn’t Know About Veterans (And How You Can Support Them)“. It covers  homelessness, PTSD and other types of disability, and issues involving active duty. Lots of links on how you can help.

The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America do a great job in addressing needs of vets, particularly in an oft-overlooked area: the difficult re-integration into daily civilian life. Checkout their latest outreach PSA:

The NFL and NBC rejected the following pro-gay marriage ad by the California organization Get to Know Us First. The group planned to target counties that most heavily supported Prop 8 by running their 30-second PSA on the Los Angeles station KNBC, however were prevented from doing so when the spot was rejected by the legal department at the NFL, which asserted that it was banning all advocacy spots for the entire day of programming on Superbowl Sunday. This, however, wasn’t true because yesterday ads for the anti-smoking group TobaccoFreeCA.org and the anti steroids group DontBeAnAsterisk.org ran twice each.

When pushed for further explanation, NBC fobbed the question off on the NFL, which failed to provide any concrete reason, vaguely siting “certain restrictions in [their] network television contracts.” The NFL then tried to toss the issue back to NBC, who so far has declined comment.

Earlier this year Los Angeles ABC affiliate KABC rejected ads by Get to Know Us First during the Presidential Inauguration deeming them “too controversial” to run when families were likely to be watching. It can only be assumed – since they won’t explicate – that similar reasoning went behind  the NFL’s/NBC’s decision. (It similarly rejected a pro-life ad, also telling CatholicVote.org that it was banning all advocacy commercials.)

Let’s go over this again… THIS ad was unsuitable for family viewing:

Yet this ad (Voted a Superbowl 2009 “Winner” from NBC’s L.A. affiliate KNBC) was perfectly suitable for families:

I’m not making a comment on ads targeted to a largely rowdy male, beer swilling, sports loving demographic. I’m making a comment on organizations that block PSAs for certain causes without having the balls to say why.

Didn’t want any “downers”? Wanted humor/sex/sports related ads to fill the entire day? Don’t want to be “political?” Believe that gays shouldn’t have the right to marry?” One way or ther other just say it NBC/NFL, because your excuses are insulting.

There was quite an uproar with the short-lived inclusion of a family planning initiative in the proposed national economic stimulus package. Conservatives scratched their heads at how contraception had anything to do with economy. On Hardball last Monday Georgia Congressman Phil Gingrey, equating family planning services to contraception alone, quipped “Now, indeed, that may stimulate something, but I don‘t think it‘s going to stimulate the economy!” Sex, sex, its encouraging more SEX!

Rush Limbaugh drew the erroneous conclusion that the initiative (and family planning itself) is akin to “abortion all over the world”, its economic aim was to reduce the country’s birth rate and that a better method to do so would be to “… put pictures of Pelosi in every cheap motel room in America today, that will keep birth rates down because that picture will keep a lot of things down.”

Normally quoting Limbaugh serves little purpose, and I’m going to ignore a large part of why this comment is offensive, but I wanted to mention it because it demonstrates a conservative belief about the purpose of family planning clinics. “In every cheap motel room in America…” Seedy, sordid, illicit sex. The kind in sleezy motels across the land. Irresponsible, immoral behavior. That’s what contraception is for. That’s what clinics serve. If you want to engage in THAT kind of behavior, and dodge its logical consequences, why should the government help you out?

This kind of thinking, whether vocalized or not, is pervasive, damaging, and just plain inaccurate. It belies a person who knows very little about what clinics such as Planned Parenthood are all about, and a willful ignorance of what was in the stimulus package regarding family planning.

First, let’s look at what the nation’s largest family planning organization actually does on a daily basis. In 2007  a breakdown of Planned Parenthood services looked like this:

• 36% Contraception
• 31% STD testing and treatment
• 17% Cancer screening and prevention
• 11% Pregnancy tests, pre-natal care, menopause, and infertility.
• 3% Abortion (*No federal money can be used for this – see below)
• 2% Primary care and adoption referral

If you’re a low-income man, woman, or couple with no health insurance, who do you go to? Where do you go?

Now let’s look at what the inclusion of this legislation actually would have accomplished. Currently low-income women of child-bearing age cannot access Medicaid until they become pregnant. If a woman wants federal help for family planning before this time, she has to petition for a waiver, providing her state allows for this. 27 states offer a waiver, which can take as long as two years to acquire. Obama proposed eliminating the federal waiver thereby allowing states to directly access Medicaid funds for family planning services if they so choose. States that never offered the waiver remain completely unchanged.

This money would fund mammograms, cervical cancer screenings, medically relevant sex education, contraception, STD testing and treatment, pre-natal care, and infertility treatment -  but not a penny would go toward abortion! *Remember the Hyde Amendment? Since 1976 no federal dollars may be spent to fund abortion. In fact, Medicare and Medicaid explicitly state that under no circumstance may abortion “be claimed as a family-planning service.”

Family planning. Essentially ensuring low-income women’s gynecological health and empowering them with the means to control when they become pregnant. How can a multitude of  pregnant teens, women who drop out of college for a menial job to raise an unexpected child, and couples who can’t afford more children nevertheless finding themselves pregnant again NOT be a drain on the economy? AIDS or other STD’s being contracted, untreated, and exponentially spread. Women who seek emergency room help for cancer only after it had advanced to the point that her physical symptoms impair her daily life. Low-income, mostly uninsured women. Again, NOT a drain on the economy? On the health care system? This isn’t complicated, it’s common sense!

Even if we were dealing solely with contraception – is that so wrong? Deciding where and when to have a child is a basic fundamental right. Again, we’re not even talking about abortion. We’re talking about PLANNING! The most responsible thing a person can do. Why is there such a backlash?

Is it sex, again? Are we back to sex? Pro-creation only sex? Because as great as it sounds I don’t see a whole lot of neo-cons with 15 kids. Even outspoken Huckabee only has three. I suppose he abstains.

The fact is that people have sex. Teenagers do it, college kids, singles, couples, married people. How can being healthy along the way and in control of your life be a negative thing?

Dr. Pete Klasky has a great piece on Huffington where he points to evidence that family planning significantly reduces the number of abortions and saves the government money.

To understand how this works, it is helpful to look at California’s experience with a state-funded contraception and family planning initiative for women with incomes between 100% and 200% of the poverty level:

Four years after implementing the program, California saved an estimated $500 million in public health care spending, net of what they spent on the program itself. In fact, for every dollar invested in the program, the state of California saved an estimated $5.33, over a period of five years. These are conservative estimates that do not include money saved through increased productivity and cost savings from reductions in paid medical leave and sick days that result from unplanned pregnancies. Few other public spending plans can boast such a positive return on investment. [Em mine]

He also points out that sex education and access to contraception do NOT lead to an increased amount of pre-marital sex. Another myth opponents assert time and again.

In 2002, the Department of Health and Human Services (under Republican Secretary Tommy Thompson), released a report documenting an increase in contraceptive use with a decrease in sexual activity between 1995 and 2002. Supplying contraceptives and educating adolescents about sex during the late 1990s did not increase their likelihood to engage in sexual activities; it did keep them from getting pregnant. Even supplying emergency contraception to adolescents, prior to sexual activity, has been proven not to affect sexual behaviors.

Of course, we all know that abstinence-only “education” has the exact opposite effect (doesn’t delay onset or frequency of sexual activity, but rather increases the likelihood of unprotected sex because it purports – among other things – that condoms are ultimately ineffective), and yet the Bush Administration spent more than $1.75 billion on it – not in an effort to boost the economy, but an attempt to spread good Christian virtue to those who would otherwise find themselves sullied and impure.

So what is the reasoning behind indignantly rejecting an initiative that would reduce the number of abortions and save the government money? What is it? Politics? Ignorance? The misplaced notion of seedy hotel room sex?

I do understand the argument that the economic stimulus package simply wasn’t the appropriate vehicle for this initiative and, in fact, its inclusion simply lofted a softball for opposition to self-righteously whack over the fence – that it was a tactical error on Obama’s part. Its ability to instantly appall conservatives and consequent swift removal from the package bears this out.

But family planning will be back. How will the debate go when we don’t have to show that that it’s good for the economy, but simply that it’s good for the country? The very fact that we’re beginning to have these conversations on a national level is a start and I am hopeful that over the next few years we will see signifiant changes in both policity and cultural attitudes about women’s health and reproductive freedom – that dicussion of sexual issues won’t revolve around fear and shame, but will instead focus on  self and mutual respect, healthy relationships, education, safety, emotional and physical health, autonomous control, and responsibility. Am I too optimistic?

I have a hard time understanding the current fervid “defense of traditional marriage” position. How is marriage being attacked, again? As Jason Linkins pointed out recently on Huffingtonpost:

…it’s a lot like saying that my preference for chocolate ice cream over vanilla threatens the sanctity of dessert. Must we have these conversations over harms that are entirely imaginary?

But way too many Americans voted for Prop-8 or similar legislation, so what did they tell themselves to make that okay? I’m trying to understand. I am. Which is why when Jon Stewart managed to have a civilized discussion about gay marriage with Mike Huckabee this week, I sat up and paid attention. Huckabee speaks for the core of social conservatives, right? What did he have to say when Stewart questioned him?

…um, that’s all he’s got? Sadly, I was expecting more. If you look closely at what he asserts, you find merely age-old rhetoric without an ounce of logic or demonstrable fact.

Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look:

• Marriage between a man and a woman should be the only marriage because “it’s always been that way.”

Since when has this been a vaild reason for anything? Earlier in this country it had “always been” that a woman had no right to enter into a contract of any kind and she legally held no possessions. First she was a dependent of her father and then a dependant of her husband and held no legal rights to make life choices that might go against their wishes. (See Debran Rowland’s awesome book,  The Boundaries of her Body.)

In 9th century Europe, and for centuries before, it had “always been” that a woman who learned to read was sinful, dangerous and very likely possessed.

Things that had “always been” but were eventually changed for the betterment of society are so numerous you could dedicate a book to the topic.

And besides that, it HASN’T always been that way. Far from it. Although Huckabee boldly asserts that it was one man one woman for “the past 5000 years of recorded history,” it’s just not true. In a 2006 article historian Stephanie Coontz writes:

Pundits and politicians love to pontificate about strengthening traditional marriage. But as someone who has studied marriage forms and family life for more than three decades, I wonder how many of them have the faintest idea of what they’re talking about.

I suppose they mean the “traditional” marriage of one man and one woman.

But through most of human history and in most cultures the most widely accepted tradition of marriage has been polygamy — one man and multiple women. We’re not just talking about exotic island cultures or lost tribes in the African jungle. Polygamy is the family form most often mentioned in the first five books of the Old Testament.

In some societies, traditional marriage meant one woman wedded to several men. In others, a woman could take another woman as a “female husband.” In China and the Sudan, when two sets of parents wanted to forge closer family ties and no live spouse was available, one set sometimes married off a child to the “ghost” of a dead son or daughter of the other family. Among the Bella Coola and Kwakiutl native societies of the Pacific Northwest, two families who wished to become in-laws but didn’t have two sets of marriageable children available for a match might even draw up a marriage contract between a son or daughter and a dog belonging to the desired in-laws. Most traditional marriages were concerned with property and wealth, not love or sex.

But what about the sanctity of marriage in the Christian tradition? It is true that Jesus, contradicting Moses, forbade his followers to divorce. But Jesus was not very keen on having them marry in the first place, holding that it was better to abandon worldly ties and dedicate oneself to building the faith. “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke, 14). The Apostle Paul thought that getting married was better than burning in hell for unmarried fornication, but that the truly good thing was to remain a virgin and devote oneself to spreading God’s word. [Em. mine]

• Marriage is all about making babies and hey, they just ain’t got the plumbing for it…

We’re talking about the law here. What part does procreation play in the law of marriage? Barren couples can marry. A couple can marry who has no intention of ever having children. A couple can marry and then proceed to adopt the offspring of others. All perfectly up and up. So the feeling is basically “As long as you’re having sex the way we expect you to, your marriage doesn’t have to be about procreation at all!”

And seriously, what does he mean by

“But even anatomically- let’s face it, the only way that we can create the next generation is through a male female relationship.”

So… gay marriage would replace heterosexual marriage and therefore lead to our eventual extinction?

• If you “open up” the definition of marriage to include same sex couples, then you “have” to open it up to include everything else – (with multiple spouses, children, and animals ostensibly the first in line.)

Really? Why? Because you need to equate two men falling in love, getting married and spending their lives together with the profound abuse of children and animals? (assuming the animal marriages were, uh…consummated.) Sadly the equating of “grave sins” with whatever he disagrees with is not new territory for Huckabee.

Let’s look at other groundbreaking moments of  ”redefinition” over the past 60 or so years.

* When “free man” in the US was redefined to include all races, were children suddenly emancipated from parents? Live stock emancipated from owners? Pets roaming the streets? Zoos emptied?

* When the definition of a legal voter changed to include women, did the floodgates open so that children, animals, and immigrants suddenly lined up at the polls?

* When an interracial couple could legally marry – did that immediately pave the way for marriage between homosexuals, children, animals, and next of kin?

Then why? Why would gay marriage lead to everything else you propose? Never once has anyone elaborated on this. Why.

• It says so in the bible.

This one is so flawed that even Huckabee didn’t touch it during his Daily Show chat. First of all, contrary to the opinions of some, the bible does not inform our laws. Cheating on your spouse, disrespecting your parents, shouting “Goddamnit, Jesus Christ!” and lusting after another dude’s wife are all perfectly legal. Rather, our laws are explicitly informed by the US Constitution and the Separation of Church and State is in its oldest amendment.

That really is all that needs to be said to on the topic. Separation of Church and State. Yet, it’s only the beginning of why this “reasoning” is flawed. So although I don’t have to go here, it’s so much fun, why the heck not?

Yes, the bible says a man shall layeth with a woman, etc… The bible, in fact, says a lot of things. Deuteronomy Books 21 and 22, for example, have an awful lot to say…

• You must stone to death a disobedient child. Deuteronomy 21:18-21

• “A woman shall not wear anything that pertains to a man, nor shall a man put on a woman’s garment; for whomever does these things is an abomination to the Lord your God.” Deuteronomy 22:5

• Any man whose bride has not shown sufficient evidence of virginity upon the wedding night must publically stone her to death upon her father’s doorstep. You know, to “purge the evil from the midst of [him].” Deuteronomy 22:13-21

• If a married man cheats with another woman “both of them shall die.” Deuteronomy 22:22

(The previous culled from the wonderful Michael Shermer in his book Science Friction.)

Sure, there are lots of positive “do unto other” sentiments in the bible, especially once God has a son and everyone mellows out. But if you proclaim that what is written in the bible is the word of God, how can you dismiss some points while emphasizing others as absolute truth?

As Shermer says:

The problem here is consistency, and selecting ethical guidelines that support our particular or social prejudices. If you are going to claim the Bible as your primary (or only) code of ethics, and proclaim [...] that homosexuality is sinful and wrong because the Bible says so, then you’ve got to kill rebellious youth and nonvirginal premarried woman.

Instead, the social conservative culture chooses to target homosexuals (no marriage!) while going easy on equally offending sexually active single women (please marry!…Oh, and have babies as soon as possible…)

Prop 8 proponents also spew another attack line, which again Huckabee was smart enough to avoid in his tete a tete with Stewart – Gay marriage defiles children. How?

The official Prop 8 site has this cute video (I’ve linked to it before, I know…) where a couple fears for the well being of their child because a teacher spoke about same-sex marriage in class. How the child would be harmed is never delineated.

This woman, gets more specific with

If you look at homes where one parent abuses the other parent, especially if the child is a girl, she will grow up to pursue guys who abuse her. My prediction is that if two lesbians raise a little girl/boy, the child will have a very high chance of either committing suicide or turning homosexual himself. Especially if one of the parents has been artificially inseminated.

She also happens to believe

…homosexual lifestyle leads to high rates of suicide, depression, HIV, drug abuse, STDs, and other pathogens.

What kind of koolaid has she been drinking? I don’t even feel the need to rebut this, as it’s a sentiment that has never been substantiated in any way – not even in theory.

Random House defines homophobia as “unreasoning fear of or antipathy toward homosexuals and homosexuality.” Now, explain to me how actively supporting Prop 8 (or similar legislation) doesn’t make you homophobic.

Go on , Huckabee. I’m listening…

I’ve had zero time to blog recently, but came across a well-written comment on the passing of Prop 8 in California and want to quickly second it. Although a significant mental disconnect exists in embracing the intelligent musings of one whom I’ve come to unconsciously view as the horny and hapless Charlie Runkle, I have to admit that Evan Handler is spot on with the sentiment

“[T]he passage of Proposition 8 in California is an embarrassment to, and an indictment of, all Americans.”

He also noted that although the gay community is vocally protesting the measure, the straight community has been shamefully quiet. He’s right, and it’s another reason I’m taking a few minutes to write this tonight.

Handler continues

Denying any Americans any rights that other Americans hold is discrimination. Period. It doesn’t matter whether the discrimination is motivated by morality, or religious beliefs, or a Ouija board, it’s still discrimination. And that makes it illegal. (And that comes after the fact that it’s wrong.) It should be clear to everyone (or made clear to them) that it puts us all in danger of the same kind of discrimination being pointed our way the moment someone decides we’re on the wrong side of their moral or religious measurements.

He suggests supporting those businesses who openly opposed the proposition – notably Google and Apple, each of whom formally denounced Prop 8 – and denying business to those who supported it. This is my favorite way to protest, capitalism at its very best – hit ‘em in the pocketbook!

Already the struggle has begun to overturn Prop 8 in court. You can sign a petition to Gov. Schwarzenegger or donate to the Invalidate Prop 8 campaign at the LA Gay and Lesbian Center. All donations are made in the name of the Thomas Monson, head of the Mormon Church, which spent $15 million on a PR campaign to convince people gay marriage would corrupt and defile their children. Many more suggestions are available on the What Do We Do Now? page at ProudParenting.com.

Thanks to Ann at Feministing, here are the outcomes of other Nov 4th ballot measures affecting LGBT rights:

Amendment 2 in Florida: Passed. Yet another gay marriage ban.

Proposition 102 in Arizona: Passed. As Dana noted previously, “Arizona became the first state in the nation to reject an anti-gay marriage amendment in 2006, but they’re likely to pass the measure this year, now that it has been stripped of language that also denied domestic partnership benefits to hetero couples.” Looks like that was the magic change to make bigotry palatable to Arizona voters.

Act 1 in Arkansas: Passed. Now gay couples are unable to adopt or foster-parent children. This from a state with 3700 children in the foster-care system, and only 1000 foster homes. Disgusting.

Question 1 in Connecticut: Failed! Lindsay at Female Impersonator explained earlier that this initiative would have allowed the state constitution to be changed — essentially clearing the way for anti-gay and anti-choice amendments to be tacked onto it. Glad it didn’t pass.

California-based mega-companies are uncharacteristically coming forth to speak out on a political issue.

Yesterday Apple publically came out against Proposition 8, the California ballot initiative to reverse the state’s recent legalization of gay marriage by amending the state constitution.

Apple is publicly opposing Proposition 8 and making a donation of $100,000 to the No on 8 campaign. Apple was among the first California companies to offer equal rights and benefits to our employees’ same-sex partners, and we strongly believe that a person’s fundamental rights — including the right to marry — should not be affected by their sexual orientation. Apple views this as a civil rights issue, rather than just a political issue, and is therefore speaking out publicly against Proposition 8.

In September Google did the same, stating

…while there are many objections to this proposition — further government encroachment on personal lives, ambiguously written text — it is the chilling and discriminatory effect of the proposition on many of our employees that brings Google to publicly oppose Proposition 8. While we respect the strongly-held beliefs that people have on both sides of this argument, we see this fundamentally as an issue of equality. We hope that California voters will vote no on Proposition 8 — we should not eliminate anyone’s fundamental rights, whatever their sexuality, to marry the person they love.

For more information visit No On Prop 8. For some outrageous/head-shaking/hilarious propaganda (depending on your viewpoint and/or mood), check out the interview of

“Robb and Robin Wirthlin, the Massachusetts parents who courageously decided to fight the system after teachers began teaching second graders about gay marriage in public schools.”

at ProptectMarriage.com. Because as everyone knows, “protection of marriage” is all about protecting the poor little children! Seriously, God-fearing Robb can barely choke out the words “homosexual” and “gay.” He pauses then practically whispers them. What’s wrong with these people?

NPR just did a piece on the Social Justice High School Pride Campus – a proposed high school specifically for LGBT & allied students in Chicago. The website explains its objective as, in part:

The Greater Lawndale Little Village School for Social Justice believes that, to further the mission and vision of the school, it should replicate the successful components of the Social Justice High School and create a new high school campus to address the needs of the underserved population of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning youth and their allies (LGBTQA youth). Research shows that there are low attendance rates and high drop-out rates among LGBTQA youth, and they struggle with harassment, depression, poor academic achievement, and suicide. Our goal is to provide a school with a safe, affirming, and supportive environment where every student — particularly LGBTQA youth — would develop the knowledge and skills needed to create better lives for themselves and their families and to succeed in their post-secondary pursuits.

My problem with this is that we should be working to make all schools “safe, affirming, and supportive environment(s) where every student…would develop the knowledge and skills needed to create better lives for themselves.” Why is bullying and harassment against LGBT (and questioning youth and allies…) accepted as so inevitable that the best recourse is to remove kids from “mixed” schools? “Separate but equal” springs to mind, although I realize no one would be forced to attend Pride Campus.

The idea of a temporary “safe haven” just doesn’t make sense to me. We obviously still live in a world where these teenagers are treated with intolerance and bigotry – so how are we best serving them by sheltering them from this conflict, when upon graduation they will only be returned to it?

Efforts should be directed at the climate of hatred and intolerance that prevents these schools from being safe and supportive for everyone. If you have a certain population that skips classes and drops out because of the aggression of another population – the answer cannot be to reward that aggression by removing the persecuted kids from the school!

A message needs to be sent that the problem is NOT LGBT teenagers, but the bullies who abuse them. If the very people in the public school system who support LGBT teens won’t hold the student aggressors accountable, who will?

CNN reports a study released Wednesday by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN):

The national study, which the group says is the most comprehensive report ever on the experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students nationwide, found that 86.2 percent of those students reported being verbally harassed, 44.1 percent physically harassed and 22.1 percent physically assaulted at school in the past year because of their sexual orientation.

Hey kids! Adults! LGBT’s are a part of your community – YOU, whoever you are. So take the stick out of your ass and get used to it! What are we still in the days of Brown v The Board of Education?

Instead of segregation, I’d rather see heightened awareness and support programs along with higher discipline for harassers. I’d rather see a community, a school system that says “We don’t accept this behavior. We don’t want our children mired in the hatred of an entire group of people. This is NOT okay!”

New York City expanded its partnership with GLSEN last month in a training initiative called “Respect for All.” According to press release on GLSEN’s site:

Having already trained more than 1,000 New York City educators, the Respect for All Initiative will now include additional interventions to reduce bullying and harassment of students in city schools. The program began last school year training school staff to identify and address bias-related bullying and harassment, including bullying and harassment on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity/expression.

New components of this year’s program include the designation of a Respect for All liaison in every school and the school-wide distribution and posting of Respect for All materials, mandatory incident reporting and a requirement that every principal have a plan for the full implementation of the Chancellor’s Regulation and the Respect for All initiative.

A liasion is a fantastic idea – especially since students aren’t the only ones that mishandle themselves when it comes to the treatment of and attitudes toward LGBT’s.

This is a hard issue. If I was a LGBT high schooler afraid to attend classes, I’d be pretty happy about the Pride Campus. But as someone who expects more from society, I just can’t help but see it as a step backward.

Then again, there’s the Harvey Milk School in Manhattan (named for New York native and California’s first openly gay politician), which admits only LGBT teens who are at risk of dropping out. Their graduation rate is 95%, much higher than the state average of 58% (in 2003). More striking is the fact that the majority of HMHS students are black or Latino, and graduation rates for this demographic average 35.5% in New York State. Whatever else I feel about the concept of separate schools as a solution, HMHS takes near high-school drop outs poised to fall through the cracks and helps them transform into 60%+ college students!

I think my reaction comes down to this – I appreciate that these teenagers are being given a resource that will help them live the kind of lives they deserve, but I don’t like the fact that it’s being done in a way that allows a hate-filled segment of society to carry on as usual. Helping individuals is good, changing a society is better.

A group of friends in the film industry  ventured up to Wasilla to document resident’s views on Sarah Palin. They describe The Wasilla Project as follows:

When McCain nominated Palin for VP, we were especially intrigued. The stories from the right and the left have flown back and forth furiously and it’s been hard to know what to believe.

So we decided to go to Wasilla to find out for ourselves.

What do the people of Wasilla really believe about Sarah Palin? Who is she? How was she as an executive in Wasilla? Is she a religious fanatic? A competent administrator? A compassionate conservative or a dangerous kook?

By taking a credible, authentic look at the real Wasilla, and the real Sarah Palin, in the first person voices of the people who really know her, we hope to counter the mythical “narrative” with something a lot more nuanced and valuable.

The first short was just released and it dealt with the rape kit controversy.

NOTE: I know nothing about the people involved in the Wasilla Project. They could be interested solely in discrediting Palin and unwilling to document any glowing endorsements they might come across. I don’t know – I’ve only seen the one short. What I do know is that the facts presented in the film can be verified ten times over in the mainstream media – and no where have they been blatantly refuted.

See for yourself:

ANOTHER NOTE: I realize that my blog is beginning to look like a Palin hate-space as of late. I don’t hate Sarah Palin, I just don’t want her holding the second highest position in the country and the possibility of that is something I guess I’ve yet to recover from.

Most of this stuff is being passed by on the election trail, I suppose to keep things from devolving into the tit-for-tat finger pointing of “Reverand Wright!” “Pastor Hagee!” “Reverand Muthy!” (Which candidate’s clergy are the craziest? Um…ALL of them.) But since it doesn’t seem to be on anyone’s minds when discussing who’s voting for whom, I feel compelled to talk about it here. I assume the people behind the Wasilla Project had a similar motivation.

I thought I was observant, informed, and cynical enough to recognize the reality of behind-the-scenes electoral politics. I was wrong. So I was savvy enough to realize that elections are about manipulating public perception, spinning the truth, and using under-handed tactics when deemed neccessary. Reading “How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative” by Allen Raymond showed me I clearly had NO IDEA.

The book is laugh-out-loud funny and, despite his questionable ethics in the years described in the book, Raymond is a likeable guy who, cheating aside, you somehow want to win. I found myself morally repulsed yet endlessly fascinated. What would he do next?

You might remember the New Hampshire phone-jamming scandal in 2002. That stunt caused higher-ups involed to summarily throw him under the bus and earned Raymond federal jail time, although phone jamming seems down-right banal (and bi-partisan, by the way) in the world Raymond describes.

Read this book and you’ll never look at a campaign ad or operative talking point the same way again.