Only Korans? - Part 3, unfortunately

[04/16/2012] - I feel like I've learned a lot since I wrote this, and it now no longer 100% represents my views on the subject; they aren't enraged because we burned some books.


"Worse than useless" is the most concise way I can think of to describe that bigot Terry Jones.

That's all I have to say about him.

In Afghanistan many people have now been murdered because of a Youtube video of a Koran being burned. I'm disgusted by the bigotry of the group that burned that Koran. I'm outraged that those people were murdered. There is nothing to justify what has happened, though there are certainly explanations. Understanding their outrage is not a reason to sanction their actions. Understanding the maliciousness of the original offense does not mean that any part of the retribution should be forgiven.

When I made the original post I titled it "Only Korans?" to imply that no so-called Holy Book should be safe from burning in an act of defiance. Now though I'd like to repurpose that title for its other meaning.

That book is merely a Koran.

To Hell with the accommodationists and strict-multiculturalists. Their wretched hypocrisy, essentially born out of pity for murderers and tyrants, is nauseating. I have no respect for you or your opinions if you can look at the events that have just occurred in Afghanistan and say, "See? This is why we must forbid insulting Islam."

Fuck it. I have nothing left to say.

I'll quote Madison-area band Erebus instead:

(From 'God Loves Us')

The bones of infidels

Of countless human souls

How could the world forget

The graveyard it’s built on

This earth is drenched with blood

In the name of God

Surely the work of the Lord Has been Done

Let us pray for the 3 million children a year,

That are destroyed by the holiest butcher

Let us pray for the billions of infidels

That were created,

So they can burn in hell

Has he the will but not the power?

Impotent

Has he the power not the will?

Sadistic

Just fucking end it all

I’m blessed,

you’re blessed,

we’re fucking blessed

I’m saved,

you’re saved,

it’s fucking great

Grab mom and dad and grandma too

Cuz it’s true,

God loves me and you!

Why keep a prison

When we’ve got one here on earth

What can we expect at the gates?

When you’ve turned your back on us?

You wash your hands

And sit in judgment

Or are we just fuel

For the Flames

Let us pray to the god that has betrayed us all

Born a sinner, you will die nothing more

Pray to the tyrant, laughing on a throne of despair

Demanding all from a world too poor to give

We are controlled by guilt and fear

Suffering

Gambling on a roll of the dice

Cowardice

What are you waiting for?

I’m blessed,

you’re blessed,

we’re fucking blessed

I’m saved,

you’re saved,

it’s fucking great

Grab mom and dad and grandma too

Cuz it’s true,

God loves me and you!

How much worse can it get?

I’m disgusted

I don’t want your paradise

Send me to hell

Guilty Conscience Much?

Media Matters has a video of one of those "traditional marriage" quack-experts, by the name of Peter Wolfgang, addressing Connecticut's state congress. His argument is that providing legal protections to trans-gendered individuals will lead to men going into women's bathrooms to sexually assault little girls while the child's (presumably) straight father stands outside.

Mr. Wolfgang literally calls the bill, "The Bathroom Bill".

Stare rep Holder-Winfield responded to the inanity very well (the following transcript is literally copy-pasted from the link above):

REP.HOLDER-WINFIELD: Good afternoon, Mr. Wolfgang.

WOLFGANG:Good afternoon.

REP.HOLDER-WINFIELD: You said if this bill passes, nothing would prevent thesexual predators from taking the actions that you suggest might happen. What prevents themfrom doing that now?

WOLFGANG:Well they’d certainly have more of a reason to do it. And men in general shouldnot be allowed into women’s bathrooms. At issue is the fact that you have anexception for sex but not for gender identity and expression if this billpasses and men can enter women’s bathrooms.

REP.HOLDER-WINFIELD: But my question to you is, whatprevents them from doing it now? Youranswer, while a response, doesn’t actuallyindicate what does that.

WOLFGANG:Well, I mean, you know, there are laws thatprevent crimes, obviously, from taking place in bathrooms in general. But, I mean, why give sexual predators a pretext? Whygive them an excuse to say, “Look, I’m transgendered and that’s why I went intothe women’s bathroom.” Obviously it’s – you know, there are laws for registeredsex offenders.

REP.HOLDER-WINFIELD: And so those laws would actually exist if the crime wascommitted after entering the bathroom, even if thislaw passed – if this bill passed, is that not correct?

Wolfgang and his ilk betray a severe lack of comprehension of the issues at hand when they rattle of the type inanity seen above. I'm honestly proud of Wolfgang for acknowledging that sexual assault is a problem in America; but his single-minded fixation on trans-gendered males, and those who would pose as one, obfuscates and distracts from other possible types of harassment and assault. I'll ignore men and boys as victims, since Wolfgang doesn't seem concerned about them, and point out that by his logic he should be arguing for separate bathrooms for the L and B women of the LGBT communities. IMHO a *more* sensible topic to discuss would be how to offer protections to everyone from everyone else.

The failure of his imagination to think of those possible scenarios makes me wonder; what has Mr. Wolfgang been fantasizing about that makes him so concerned about protecting little girls from straight men?

Or maybe he's just a dumb-ass bigot.

Fun fact: I've always assumed that it was spelled "Conneticut" until I spell-checked this post and discovered "Conne[c]ticut" is the correct version. Also it was only a few weeks ago that I discovered "gover[n]ment" isn't spelled "goverment". Somewhere all of my English and social studies teachers are crying :'(

Only Korans? - Part 2

[04/16/2012] - I feel like I've learned a lot since I wrote this, and it now no longer 100% represents my views on the subject; they aren't enraged because we burned some books.


Funny story; my internet died about an hour after I posted last time.

I really am starting to hate Charter Communications with the type of passionate dislike that I usually reserve for classmates who, upon buying hot chocolate, proclaim that it tastes, "Too much like coffee."

Anyways....

I guess what I was trying to say before is that burning the Koran = bad

Threating to kill people over burning the Koran = Worse

I hate to boil it down to a doltish formula like that, but over the last week I realized that I really don't care. I much prefer drawing the Prophet; rather than destroying something Islamic you are creating an image so as to express yourself. And when I see how upset the global Islamic community becomes over petty insults I honestly believe that the only reasonable response is to continue the petty insults in the most benign way possible.

The fact that Molly Norris has had to go into hiding is an absolute travesty. I don't care that most Muslims are great people. I don't care that they will be insulted too. And it doesn't make sense to say that we should all treat Muslims with respect rather than insult them. Until the Islamic faith and community can be freely mocked or critiqued without fear of death it is impossible to truly communicate with them in a respectful way. Politeness at the point of a gun is a survival mechanism, not respectful dialog.

So I say that drawing the Prophet Muhammad is a good thing. It's a peaceful way of saying, "Welcome to the civilized world. You will be mocked. You will be insulted. And until you learn to deal with it in a civilized way nobody will have any respect for you at all."

Nobody should be exempt from that either. Freedom of speech is not a promise not to be insulted.

More importantly Halo: Reach is a quality product that I readily endorse :D

I'm going to go play it now.

Speaking of Rape Apologists.....

I'm not a fan of Glenn Beck. I used to try to stay up to date on his conspiracy theories simply because so many of the male college students I know are fans of him. I gave up a long time ago though and have mostly been living in blissful ignorance for the last few months.

Then I heard that Beck has a novel coming out and instantly I became intrigued. For whatever reason I have an obsession with paranoid literature and apocalyptic rhetoric; so while I'm sure it'll have more in common with the so-awful-it's-hilarious The Turner Diaries than it will with Orwell's masterpiece 1984 I'm certain that The Overton Window will be a thoroughly entertaining read.

Media Matters obtained a review copy, and has already posted aTop Ten List of what they claim are the most blatantly awful parts.

I'll spare you all the details, but I do want to discuss their #1 pick. Quoting from the above link, Media Matters posted (emphasis in the original):

1. Rule number one is: "Don't tease the panther"

Noah and Molly [the protagonists] find themselves in bed together early in the book after a harrowing experience at a Founders' Keepers rally. They agree to sleep in bed together because Molly is too scared to sleep at home, but Molly insists that nothing sexual will take place. Noah agrees, on the condition that she "not do anything sexy." She presses her cold feet against his legs, and Noah responds:

"Suit yourself, lady. I'm telling you right now, you made the rules, but you're playing with fire here. I've got some rules, too, and rule number one is, don't tease the panther."

First of all; That's just fucking hilarious. I'm pretty sure that "DON'T TEASE THE PANTHER!" is going to be my official battle cry from now on whenever I feel like being a jackass in an online game. As far as awful dialogue goes that has to be tied with.... well that has to be tied with pretty much anything that George Bush or Sarah Palin has ever said.

More importantly though I want to take this opportunity to decry to tired notion that females are responsible for any sexual arousal that males experience. I'm not sure which is more insulting, the idea that males are incapable of stopping themselves from fucking the nearest hole when they get hard or that it's female's fault for naively tempting fate simply by existing and seeming fuckable. Either way I'm sick and tired of this bullshit paradigm going relatively unchallenged within our culture, and for that reason I'm adding Glenn Beck to my list of people who officially bear the title of Disgrace To the Entire Human Race (D.T.E.H.R.).

As a side note; how can anyone take The Turner Diaries seriously? The prose is awful, the story lacks drama, and its theory that all Jews and so-called "negroids" are working to overthrow the so-called "white race" is (just like every other racist theory out there) patently false to the point of being laughably absurd. And people have died because of this fucking book.

Know what William Luther Pierce? I'm giving you a D.T.E.H.R. badge too. Wear it with pride asshole.

Dead Men Don't Rape

Trying to read the posts on Glenn Sacks' website is an exercise in intellectual masochism. The goal of overcoming cultural and legal systems that are harmful to males is admirable and necessary. To claim that struggle is anywhere near being as important as feminism is absurd.

Basically the entire so-called "Men's Rights" movement needs to collectively quit their pathetic whining. By essentially taking a stand against feminism they not only encourage direct harm against half of our species, they also create a cry-wolf scenario that prevents productive discussion on important issues.

Are rapes by female aggressors much more common than reported?

The answer: NOBODY GIVES A SHIT BECAUSE YOU WON'T SHUT THE FUCK UP! We get it. You're losing your precious patriarchy. It hurts any time you lose power. But you're just embarrassing yourselves with your crazy ranting*.

Especially when they start talking about false rape reporting. That link leads to an article by the above mentioned Mr. Sacks where he states;

The 2% claim originated with Susan Brownmiller in her book Against Our Will which was published in 1974. Where'd she get the figure? As Sherlock Holmes would say, "The game is afoot!" In other words, that's where the mystery lies. But solving it is like feeling in the dark. All who have tried - and there are more than just Greer - come away with empty hands.


Fuck you. According to the this 2007 report on rape in the US 18% of american women have been raped at least once and only 16% of rapes are ever reported. As far as I can tell every credible study in the US and UK has found that false reporting for rapes is at the same level for other violent felonies, around 2%. That number rises to 8% if you look at cases that are considered "unfounded", meaning that cases where the victim drops charges or refuses to cooperate with in investigation are included.

In that light any attempt to discredit or call into question the testimony of Rape victims is utterly contemptible. Glenn Sacks is a disgrace to the entire human race.

Thanks a lot Sacks. Now I'm going to have to listen to "Dead Men Don't Rape" a few times to scrape my brain clean of this insanity. (I'm mostly talking about Red Harvest's cover of the G.G.F.H. song, but 7 Year Bitch also has a song by that name that's pretty good.)

That's all I have to say right now, so adios!

*Yes. I am familiar with irony.

Update: Originally said that it was an FBI study, it isn't. It was funded by the Dept. of Justice and published by the NCJRS.