tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18093857683733348362023-11-17T04:12:12.593-05:00Life After GonzalesLegal and political commentary on women's rights in a post-Gonzales v. Carhart America and other topics.alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.comBlogger27125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-90778430868002083592009-07-06T14:27:00.001-04:002009-07-06T14:32:02.559-04:00Live Telesur Feed - On-Location Coverage of the Honduran Coup<iframe src="http://telesur_origin.media.ultrabase.net:8080/gigajsp/index.jsp" width="100%" height="370px" frameborder="0"></iframe>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-13300994238932685822009-07-05T21:40:00.003-04:002009-07-05T21:49:17.380-04:00Honduras - Land without Neda<a href="http://s3.amazonaws.com/twitpic/photos/large/15862979.jpg">http://s3.amazonaws.com/twitpic/photos/large/15862979.jpg</a><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;"><br />Neda is her name. By now, everyone knows her, and refers to her familiarly by her first name. We’ve all seen the beautiful picture of her, a young Iranian philosophy student who defied the repression of an authoritarian state with thousands and thousands of her compatriots in the conviction that another way of doing things is possible. Her family mourns, and Europe and the US – who would love to bomb her city – mourn with them.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">The dead have no names in Honduras. They have no faces, no biographies, nothing that might indicate that they are human beings, people with whom we can and should identify. At least two participants in the peaceful demonstration in front of the international airport in the capital city of Tegucigalpa were killed by the Honduran army in its ambush of its own civilian population. Another was run over by a military vehicle a couple of days ago in front of the Honduran telecommunications company Hondutel. There are many people mourning in Honduras these days, mourning their dead and missing friends and family members, mourning the hope, represented by their elected president Juan Manuel “Mel” Zelaya, that another way of doing things is possible in their country, where a small elite has long oppressed the poor majority with the tolerance and assistance of the US. Hondurans live, struggle, suffer, and die anonymously.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Neda is known the world over. As far as the dead in Honduras are concerned, the world doesn’t even know how many there are. We see a brief item about a coup in a small, unknown Central American country. The UN, the OAS, and – after initial hesitation – even the US government condemn the attack on Honduran democracy, and that’s the end of it. People think that President Barack “Hope & Change” Obama is taking care of it, and change the subject. We hear and read the words, but don’t find anything out about the actions.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Despite its moderate criticism of the Honduran coup, trade relations between the US and Honduras (accounting for 70% of Honduras‘ foreign trade) go on as usual. The idea of suspending the delivery of weapons to the Honduran army – without which the coup would immediately fail – is under “review” according to the US government. The world should take this about as seriously as the Honduran army, i.e., not at all. If the army command seriously believed that the coup could result in the suspension of military aid on which it is completely dependent, there wouldn’t have been a coup in the first place. Without US weapons, the defeat of the golpistas would be a matter of time – once they ran out of ammunition, their only source of power would run dry.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">But the Honduran generals aren’t worried about their supplies. Why should they be? The US has absolutely no interest in the return of Zelaya, who threatens major US interests with his independent nationalist policies.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">And it will all continue as long as Hondurans continue to die anonymously.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Perhaps the civilian population and the solidarity movement in Latin America will crush the coup regime. Perhaps they will manage to do things differently in Honduras despite everything. Unlike the case of Iran, we can make a decisive contribution to bring about that result by demanding that the US government terminate all weapons transfers and foreign aid to the Honduran coup regime.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">If we refuse to make even this minimal expenditure of energy, we will all – through our cowardice and laziness – be complicit in the fate of the courageous Hondurans, who are putting everything on the line in their struggle for freedom, democracy, and social justice.</span>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-8049249368645705782009-07-02T02:14:00.004-04:002009-07-03T22:28:59.153-04:00The Doctrine of "Change of Course" - A Case Study<a style="font-family: verdana;" href="http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefield/day-three-democracy-held-hostage-honduras#comment-30677">Al Giordano</a><span style="font-family:verdana;"> continues to provide the interested reader with a wealth of sociological information about a certain segment of the US liberal community and the state of US imperial ideology. It turns out that the latter is in quite good health indeed, while the only thing still critical about the former, to paraphrase Volker Pispers, is its mental status. </span><br /><br /><a style="font-family: verdana;" href="http://www.maxajl.com/">Jewbonics</a><span style="font-family:verdana;"> has suggested that arguing with someone who holds his readers in such low regard that he will lie about the content of the page they have in front of them (see below) is a waste of time and energy. I understand his opinion, but I disagree. What we have in Al Giordano is a rather more vulgar and blatant version of the thought processes we regularly see dressed up with intellectual polish on the pages of </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:verdana;" >The New Republic</span><span style="font-family:verdana;"> or the </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:verdana;" >New York Times. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">While he never makes it entirely explicit, the underlying premise of every one of Giordano’s attempts to deny that there are even reasons to suspect US involvement in the Honduran coup is what has been referred to, </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:verdana;" >inter alia, </span><span style="font-family:verdana;">by Noam Chomsky as the “doctrine of ‘change of course’”. The doctrine of “change of course” is essential to the survival of any ideology intended to serve power in that it gives official ideology the elasticity needed to deal with inconvenient facts. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">When it becomes impossible to deny the cynicism and atrocities committed by or on behalf of one’s chosen state, the doctrine teaches that one must admit to past crimes (usually euphemised as “mistakes” or the like) while claiming that we need not concern ourselves with what those “mistakes” might tell us about present policy because the state has turned over a new leaf. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">In Carter’s day, the self-proclaimed “Human Rights Administration” used its rhetorical (and sometimes not even that) commitment to human rights to declare even recent history irrelevant; this allowed the Human Rights Administration to provide decisive support to such dedicated human rights activists as Anastasio Somoza, Shah Reza Pahlevi, and Augusto Pinochet. Clinton rode into Washington on a similar line (with a little “Place Called Hope” mixed in), and proceeded to orchestrate a positive extravaganza of atrocities in East Timor, Colombia, Iraq, Turkey, and Yugoslavia. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Now, we have Barack “Hope and Change” Obama. One might think, against the historical background just reviewed, that scepticism would be warranted.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Not so, says Giordano, unless, of course, one happens to be a “dishonest” “woefully ignorant” “stupid dinosaur faux-leftist”. These creatures do not argue. They “screech” and have “guns blazing”, they do not propose, suspect, take nuanced positions, or admit to uncertainty. They “[insist] that [their view of the situation is] "THE TRUTH," and the ONLY POSSIBLE TRUTH.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">One might be forgiven for wondering if there isn’t the tiniest bit of projection going on here. </span><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Returning to the real world, Giordano’s beliefs are based almost exclusively on the public statements of government officials, which he takes at face value, and which those who comment on his blog would also do well to take at face value if they don’t enjoy the online equivalent of having excrement thrown at them. I say "almost exclusively" because they are also based on interpreting the relationship between those statements and actual practice in the light most favourable to the Obama Administration. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Thus, the US equivocated for so long about the Honduran coup because Obama, as a former community organiser (see Adolph Reed’s articles from the 1990s on for an examination of that aspect of his career), wanted to let the rest of Latin America take the lead in order to avoid appearing to be a bully. The evidence he offers in support of this interpretation, apart from Obama’s time as a community organiser and his own alleged status as a community organiser, is nil. To interpret the delay any other way, according to Giordano, is “errant” (by which I assume he means “erroneous”), though, again, no argument is needed when defending the Obama Administration. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Indeed, he uses this difference of </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:verdana;" >interpretation</span><span style="font-family:verdana;"> (my sceptical interpretation vs. his own credulous one) as an example of my factual claims being “pure fiction”. When the reputation of the Holy State is at stake, interpretation is elevated to the level of empirical fact. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Similarly, in order to avoid being “stupid dinosaur faux-leftists”, we must take at face value State Department statements that they are “still reviewing” whether to formally declare the Honduran coup a coup. Such a determination, as Giordano (accurately, to his credit) states, would render continued aid of any kind to Honduras a violation of federal law (to see how scrupulously federal foreign aid restrictions are followed, see, e.g., Indonesia, Colombia, Chile, Turkey, and the Contra mercenaries under Reagan). </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">That is to say that the US has been providing military aid to Honduras, is continuing to do so, and is considering whether or not to issue a formal declaration that would require any further such aid to be covert. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">This all is adduced as proof that the Obama Administration’s statement – reported yesterday by </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:verdana;" >Democracy Now! </span><span style="font-family:verdana;">– that it did not intend to discontinue military aid to Honduras is “a bold-faced [sic] lie”. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">As to the issue of USAID funding to the pro-coup NGO Paz y Democracia, Giordano changes course a bit himself. Instead of providing any kind of source to “refute” this claim, he argues the burden of proof. Since in other cases he at least cites specific sources, it appears that in this case he has none to back up his insinuation that USAID funding abruptly ended on the day of Obama’s inauguration. He then proceeds to argue in the alternative, asserting that an organisation “can have received funds from USAID for one thing and then gone out there and supported a coup even if the US wasn't behind it.” </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">We then move out of the realm of interpretation and into that of pure nitpicking. I had pointed out that General Romeo Vásquez of Honduras was an “SOA graduate”. Now, the term “graduate” can be used with a number of meanings. One can speak, for example, of a “graduate of San Quentin”, meaning not that that notorious prison provided some kind of diploma, but that the person in question had been incarcerated there. It is true that I did not check to see whether Vásquez received a diploma from the School of the Americas, because it’s irrelevant. My point, rather obviously, was that Vásquez attended the notorious training camp for Latin American torturers and mass murderers. Giordano does not dispute this; indeed, he confirmed it. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">“Some of Chavez's military that are loyal to him and overturned the 2002 [coup] were also trained at SOA,” Giordano continues, “Doesn't that make your head explode?” No, not really. That does not change the fact that Vásquez, who uncontroversially attended the School of the Americas, went on to do precisely what a good SOA grad - I'm sorry, </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:verdana;" >former SOA attendee - </span> does: overthrow a government that is showing too much independence and impinging upon US interests.<br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">Once again, Giordano uses “logic” that could also be used to “prove” that the US was not in any way involved in the coup against Chilean president Salvador Allende, the only problem being that 24,000 declassified documents say otherwise. And once again, the issue is not one of fact, but one of interpretation. His quarrel is not with the fact that Vásquez attended the SOA, but with the idea of interpreting it in context. The hallmark of a “stupid dinosaur faux-leftist” would seem to be a willingness to doubt the most innocuous possible interpretation of any given fact. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:verdana;">The point here is not that Al Giordano is a crass apologist for the current administration who resorts to personal insults when short on evidence and argument. The Internet is certainly full of those. The point is that he is an excellent specimen of the sort of ideological acrobats that populate our mainstream press and journals of articulate opinion. His crassness puts in stark relief what is otherwise so subtle as to be virtually undetectable: the operative principle, at all times, is to irrebuttably presume the innocence and good faith of one’s Dear Leader/Party/Holy State, declaring all contrary current and historical facts irrelevant. Even the most damning facts must be interpreted in the most innocuous way possible. Contrary evidence is to be examined in a vacuum, as if each contrary fact were being advanced alone, rather than as one piece of an overall pattern. And, if all else fails, hurl invective and change the subject. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-family:verdana;" >Exhibit A: Giordano’s “Refutation”</span><br /><br /><blockquote style="font-family:verdana;">Elise - Your claims of "fact" are pure fiction.<br /><br />To wit:<br />1. You claim: <span style="font-style: italic;">"the US dragged its heels on condemning the coup"</span><br /><br />I've already explained why that's an errant interpretation, but even if it weren't, it offers zero evidence that the US was behind the coup.<br /><br />2. You claim: "the US government intends to continue providing military aid to the Honduran army"<br /><br />That's a bold-faced lie, Elise, and it makes you a dishonest blogger. Issue a correction if you want any credibility left. See today's Miami Herald: <a href="http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking-news/story/1123020.html">SouthCom Chills Ties with Honduran Military</a>. [<span style="font-style: italic;">one wonders whether the chill, unlike previous similar cold fronts, will actually produce a notable change in temperature in Tegus</span>] See also the multiple reports that State Department counsel "is still reviewing" whether to impose the legal classification of "coup," which would [<span style="font-style: italic;">note the operative word "would"</span>] trigger not only the shut off of military aid, but of all other aid, too.<br /><br />When [i.e. <span style="font-style: italic;">if</span>] they do that, will you admit that your judgment has been clouded by what you want to believe? Or will you just move the goal posts to claim some other definition of what constitutes support for the coup.<br /><br />As with your claim #1, even if your claims in #2 were accurate (they're not, but I'll play along), it still would not prove US involvement in the coup itself [<span style="font-style: italic;">except, of course, for providing military aid to those who carried it out, which not even Giordano disputes</span>].<br /><br />3. You claim:<span style="font-style: italic;"> "one of the major pro-coup political organisations, Paz y Democracia, receives USAID funds, as well as the fact that the Honduran army is armed and trained by the US and that General Vásquez is a graduate of the School of the Americas."</span><br /><br />"Receives" (that's a present-tense verb, Elise USAID funds? Have you any proof of that? Or are did you really mean "received" (past tense). Have you any proof at all that the group received those funds since January 20, 2009? Cough it up, or admit that you're exaggerating and making shit up.<br /><br />Regarding Vasquez, do your homework. He is not a "graduate" of SOA (SOA Watch will verify that for you), but, rather, he attended the school long ago when it was based in Panama, but he did not graduate it.<br /><br />Your sloppiness when it comes to these facts only indicates that you haven't done any independent investigation at all. You take claims by others and if you agree with them you presume them to be "fact" when I've just demonstrated that they are not.<br /><br />And, again, even if your claims were accurate - they're not, I repeat, but playing along with your silly game, I'll say it - neither of those "facts," even if they were true, proves US involvement with the coup [<span style="font-style: italic;">Note that I never claimed that they definitively proved that US involvement, merely that they give cause to suspect it</span>]. Generals can be trained at SOA and then do things on their own. It happens a lot. Some of Chavez's military that are loyal to him and overturned the 2002 were also trained at SOA. Doesn't that make your head explode?<br /><br />Likewise, a sleazy NGO (and I agree that one is bad news) can have received funds from USAID for one thing and then gone out there and supported a coup even if the US wasn't behind it.<br /><br />Finally, you say I am "lashing out at anyone who thinks the question is worth asking." That's revisionist history of your posts here. You came in, guns blazing, insisting that it was "THE TRUTH," and the ONLY POSSIBLE TRUTH. Now you're backpedaling because your four "proofs" offered above are less firm than oatmeal [<span style="font-style: italic;">the textbook definition of projection</span>].<br /><br />Thank you again for proving my point [<span style="font-style: italic;">as with any delusional system, the doctrine of 'change of course' allows all facts, no matter how contrary, to be adduced as proof of whatever point happens to be useful to make]</span>! Let's see if you've got the stuff to post this response onto your blog, too!</blockquote><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-family:verdana;" >My response (suppressed by Giordano):</span><br /><blockquote style="font-family:verdana;"><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Finally, you say I am "lashing out at anyone who thinks the question is worth asking." That's revisionist history of your posts here. You came in, guns blazing, <span style="font-weight: bold;">insisting that it was "THE TRUTH," and the ONLY POSSIBLE TRUTH. </span>Now you're backpedaling because your four "proofs" offered above are less firm than oatmeal.(emphasis added)</span><br /><br />First of all, I never insisted that it was "the TRUTH" that the US was behind the coup. I made it quite clear on more than one occasion that it is entirely possible that it is not. Your claim to the contrary is pure invention, as will be obvious to anyone who bothers to scroll up.<br /><br />To provide just one quote:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Does that mean that the US is definitely behind it? <span style="font-weight: bold;">No, of course not. </span>There are plenty of other possible explanations for the initial fencesitting (though I have yet to hear anyone propose one). But the suggestion that the Obama Administration, which has explicitly stated that it will continue providing military aid to the Honduran army, might be less than 100% candid, is certainly so absurd as to warrant personal attacks against anyone who raises the question." </span>(emphasis added)<br /><br />Your "refutation" of the fact that the US has been and currently is providing military aid to the Honduran army is a public statement by an official that the aid to Honduras is being "reviewed". The astute reader will not that that does not even amount to an ultimatum, let alone a statement that aid has been terminated. A similar stratagem was used to assuage public outcry against US material support of Indonesian atrocities in East Timor. Officials announced that aid had been suspended, but it later turned out that the Indonesian generals were completely unaware of the suspension because aid currently in the pipeline continued to flow.<br /><br />How much weight to assign the claim by US officials that aid to Honduras is under review depends on one's personal judgment of the credibility of the officials and institutions in question. That, in turn, depends on one's view of the relevant historical context, which in the case of Central America shows a consistent line of policy priorities spanning an entire century.<br /><br />You do not deny this history; instead, you declare it irrelevant, and deride those who would dare examine the wealth of historical context and draw conclusions from it. You have yet to provide any justification for your dismissal of the historical context apart from strident professions of faith in the words of politicians and <span style="font-style: italic;">ad hominem</span> attacks on those who dare raise questions.<br /><br />It has, in every instance, been you who seeks to shut down any discussion of the subject with insults and personal attacks that range on the bizarre. Indeed, if one eliminates the blatant self-promotion and gratuitous insults from your comments here, they would barely fill a single page.<br /><br />Your blind spot for any evidence that might suggest that Obama's policies in Latin America are consistent with those of virtually every other president over the past 100 years brings to mind a quote one of your fans posted:<br /><br />"The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it." - Flannery O'Connor<br /><br />The fact that you blatantly misrepresent what I have said on the very page on which it is posted shows just how much contempt you have for your regular readers. One only hopes that they will prove themselves unworthy of it.<br /></blockquote>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-7083516986567472342009-07-01T04:16:00.007-04:002009-07-01T14:29:16.032-04:00Haiti, Honduras, and "Obama Derangement Syndrome"<span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Obama Derangement Syndrome </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">– A persistent delusion, impervious to contrary facts, evidence, and analysis, that the Obama Administration is a fundamental break from conventional US foreign and domestic policy; a common comorbidity is Clinton Amnesia, in which the bleak, violent reality of the Clinton Administration is obscured a rosy, nostalgic picture of Life Before Bush. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">(Credit for the term itself goes to Al Giordano of </span><a style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" href="http://narcosphere.narconews.com/users/al-giordano"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Field</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">; the definition is mine)</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The similarities between the coup currently underway in Honduras and the abortive coup in 2002 in Venezuela have led some, including Venezuela’s main public television network VTV, to ask whether the United States might somehow be involved in the events unfolding in Honduras. Given that Honduras has long served as a base for US subversion and terror in Central America, and that US corporations stand to lose quite a lot from the sorts of reforms the left-leaning nationalist Zelaya administration is likely to implement, it would seem that there is good cause to explore the question.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">However, some otherwise sane observers appear to be so infatuated with Brand Obama that even suggesting the mere possibility of US involvement provokes inarticulate tirades. Such is the case of Al Giordano of the Narcosphere-hosted blog The Field. Giordano has referred to those who suggest the possibility of US government duplicity as “dishonest”, “woefully ignorant” “faux-leftists” who need to “Shut up and read the facts before [they] go around spreading falsehoods”. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Why does Giordano feel so confident in dismissing any suggestion of US involvement in a coup carried out by a military that it continues to arm and fund and supported by USAID-funded NGOs such as </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Paz y Democracia? </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Because of “Multiple statements from Obama, Secretary Clinton, Ambassador Llorens, the US Ambassadors to the OAS and the United Nations, ALL calling for the reinstatement of Zelaya and declaring that the US doesn't recognize the coup government.” QED.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Giordano – who describes himself and his colleagues as “doing all the heavy lifting to defeat this coup” (a statement that would no doubt delight those who are risking their lives in confrontations with the Honduran military) – has nothing but contempt for those who dare to question the public statements of one of the last governments in the Hemisphere to condemn the Honduran coup, which also happens to be the one government in the Hemisphere to refuse to withhold aid from the Honduran military. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">“Sorry, you win no points from me with that kind of delusional and self-serving mode of thought. It's just about reinforcing your world view, isn't it? Facts be damned! You want to believe it, and therefore it is true!”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">As I pointed out in the comment that led to that example of what passes for reasoned argument in Giordano’s view, it would not be the first time that the US has publicly condemned something while quietly supporting it. Indeed, this was the exact </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >modus operandi</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> employed by Bill Clinton when a coup by the US-founded and –funded Haitian National Guard deposed elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. While condemning the coup and making a show of trying to reach a mutually acceptable solution, Clinton violated an OAS-imposed embargo in order to continue supplying the National Guard as it slaughtered thousands of Haitian civilians. One of the principal perpetrators of the slaughter, Emmanuel Constant, went on to live under US protection in New York. Extradition requests were summarily dismissed.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">This, however, is beyond the pale for Giordano, because “it doesn't help the people of Honduras fighting against this coup. Your opinion, if believed there, would give solace and embolden the coup plotters while demoralizing the civil resistance.” </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">There are two issues here. The first is an empirical question: is the US involved in the coup (in some way going beyond the continued provision of military aid)? This is a question of fact. It is entirely possible that, despite the history and despite the US interests at stake, the US was not directly involved in the coup itself (that the US arms and funds the Honduran military and provides funds to anti-Zelaya political organisations is uncontroversial). It is likely that we will not have certainty on this score unless and until the documents currently circulating in the State Department and the White House are declassified. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The second is more speculative in nature: What is the practical effect of assuming US involvement based on the available evidence? Contrary to Giordano’s assertion, the fact that a coup is associated with </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >imperialismo yanqui</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> has generally been a rallying point for resistance rather than an impediment. Furthermore, the upper echelons of the Honduran army – far from being swayed by the opinions of outside observers and activists – are in a position to know for sure whether, and to what extent, the US is involved in the coup. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Moreover, the question has enormous practical significance. If the US is involved in the coup, then international protest directed merely at Micheletti and his military retinue will hardly have any more effect than the OAS embargo against Haiti under Cédras – immediately violated by the US – did. In that case, protest would have to be directed squarely at Washington, calling for an immediate end to military aid for the Honduran army and funding for pro-coup groups (referred to in the Orwellian language of Washington as “democracy promotion” activities).</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Perhaps sensing that he is coming up rather short in the area of facts (self-serving public statements by government officials do have a tendency to be wrong), Giordano posits that those who have doubts about the Obama Administration’s protestation of clean hands may be suffering from a mental disorder he terms “Obama Derangement Syndrome”. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The term does seem apt, even if not for the field of application Giordano imagines. It is nothing short of amazing to hear the lengths to which avowed progressives will go to defend their image of Obama as fundamentally new and different to everything in the history of US policy, just as many liberals cannot begin to entertain the notion that the antidemocratic cynicism and violence of US foreign policy predate not only George W. Bush’s administration, but his birth. Ultimately, Giordano’s argument boils down to the “idea” that we should believe what the Obama administration says, just as we’re told to believe that he means well on Iraq, health care, Afghanistan, and a host of other issues. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Because it is so illustrative, and to avoid rewriting things I’ve already written, I am including below my comment on </span><a style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" href="http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefield/day-three-democracy-held-hostage-honduras#comment-30617"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Field</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">, followed by Giordano’s “response” and my reply (which appears not to have made it through moderation - <span style="font-weight: bold;">this morning, 1 July 2009, it has shown up on the page</span>):</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >My original comment:</span><br /><br /><blockquote style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">When a group of generals in the (US-founded and -funded) Haitian army, led by Raoul Cédras, overthrew the democratically elected president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, US President Bill Clinton made all sorts of public gestures of condemnation towards the coup, while at the same time going so far as to violate an OAS embargo to ensure that the army would be supplied with fuel.<br /><br />Meanwhile, Aristide remained an involuntary guest in the United States, where he remained until he finally agreed to implement the neoliberal economic program of the candidate Washington had supported in the election.<br /><br />Obama & Co. have accurately described the coup as what it is, and have - albeit haltingly - condemned it. However, Obama has made no move to stop the military aid on which the Honduran army is dependent for its very existence. If military aid were cut off, the coup would grind to a halt. Given how complete the integration of the Honduran army into the US command structure is (indeed, the general that Zelaya fired was a graduate of the notorious School of the Americas), it is hard to believe that they would act without at least the expectation of US support, and even harder to believe that they would continue a coup in the face of US condemnation unless they were aware that it was not meant seriously. There are many such examples in the annals of US foreign policy (Haiti and Indonesia, to name just two prominent ones).<br /><br />Zelaya is in a delicate position. Although the coup has been condemned almost universally, even by the US, he knows full well that he is dealing with an army that does not take his orders, and cannot be sure that his safety will be guaranteed when he returns to Honduras (particularly considering that Micheletti has ordered his arrest). In these circumstances, any denial by Zelaya that the US was involved in the coup (beyond having armed and trained the Honduran army, which is well documented) is just as likely to be an attempt to avoid angering the US. Plus, even assuming that it is sincere, there is no reason that he would even be aware that the US was behind it (the standard US coup strategy is to give the whole affair the best local facade possible).</blockquote><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">--</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Al Giordano’s “response” (note that the stated moderation criteria for comments include coherency and an absence of gratuitous insults):</span><br /><br /><blockquote face="trebuchet ms">Elise - Duck! Here comes some "tough love." Nobody apparently has told you, so I will...<br />While I agree that nothing "rules it out," I get the sense that you and others have a great psychological investment in "ruling it in," even though you offer zero evidence (other than the circumstantial, "well, it happened in the past so therefore that must be the case now" leap of faith [<span style="font-style: italic;">note that the "leap of faith" is not swallowing official US government pronouncements, but recognising longstanding patterns in US policy]</span>.)<br /><br />Excuse me. I was at the forefront of exposing the US involvement in the Venezuelan coup of 2002 and subsequent attempts. I'm not a "coup denier."<br /><br />But I find it unimpressive that after three days of stupid dinosaur faux-leftists screeching at the top of their lungs to blame Obama for this coup that not one of you has come up with a single shred of evidence.<br /><br />And now you say that Zelaya won't or can't say what you insist (without any fact to back you up) is the case?<br /><br />Are you going to say that Chavez, too, is afraid of Washington? Because after some hours of initially being on the track you're on, he broke from that conspiracy theory, and now worries aloud that "May God protect Obama."<br /><br />But you're SO INVESTED in NEEDING to believe it's true, that you believe it with no evidence. That's delusional.<br /><br />And it doesn't help the people of Honduras fighting against this coup. Your opinion, if believed there, would give solace and embolden the coup plotters while demoralizing the civil resistance. But you don't think about that, do you? You just want to believe that Latin Americans aren't capable of doing anything - good or bad - unless big Uncle Sam holds their hand and does it for them [<span style="font-style: italic;">says the man who believes he, and not the Hondurans risking their lives in confrontations with the military, is "doing all the heavy lifting</span>]!<br /><br />Sor ry, you win no points from me [<span style="font-style: italic;">I hadn't realised it was about "points".</span>] with that kind of delusional and self-serving mode of thought. It's just about reinforcing your world view, isn't it? Facts be damned! You want to believe it, and therefore it is true!<br /><br />I feel sorry for you. Really.<br /><br />Meanwhile, we're out here 24 hours a day exposing the coup and getting the facts out there to reverse it. While you're still trying to make claims about who started it. I'll point out that all of Latin America is doing what we're doing, not what you're doing... if "doing" is a word that fits your verbose excuses for non-action on your part.<br /><br />I might add…<br /><br />That I posted a series of important updates about the coup today in Honduras. The post was not about what happened outside of Honduras. It was about what happened inside Honduras, breaking the media blockade, to boot.<br /><br />And what do our three first commenters want to talk about?<br /><br />Each one of them wanted to instruct me in one form or another that "Obama is the coup plotter."<br /><br />None of them are listening to the people on the ground in Honduras. So, okay, maybe they don't speak Spanish. But I do, and I'm here translating it for them.<br /><br />But they're not really interested in what is going on in Honduras unless it can show US involvement in a coup!<br /><br />I talked about Chavez Derangement Syndrome in the previous post to this one.<br /><br />Maybe my next should be on Obama Derangement Syndrome.<br /><br />Two sides of the same coin!<br /></blockquote><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >My (apparently suppressed - now published) reply:</span><br /><br /><blockquote style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">I don't see any particular need to resort to <span style="font-style: italic;">ad hominem. </span>My point was merely that the US <span style="font-style: italic;">has </span>provided decisive support to coups and atrocities that the US government has publicly condemned. The idea that a public condemnation of a coup by the US makes it impossible (or even improbable) that the US might be supporting a coup that happens to be very much in its interests is simply not tenable.<br /><br />It's also worth keeping in mind the timing of the Obama Administration's condemnation. Initially, the only statements forthcoming from Washington were equivocal calls to respect the "democratic process" without any explicit condemnation of Zelaya's ouster. In the meantime, not only the ALBA countries, but the entire hemisphere - including the few remaining countries that don't regularly enrage the US government - unanimously condemned the coup in no uncertain terms.<br /><br />Only once it was clear that the US was virtually alone in failing to issue an unequivocal condemnation did we start to hear these clear words coming from the Administration.<br /><br />Does that mean that the US is definitely behind it? No, of course not. There are plenty of other possible explanations for the initial fencesitting (though I have yet to hear anyone propose one). But the suggestion that the Obama Administration, which has explicitly stated that it will continue providing military aid to the Honduran army, might be less than 100% candid, is certainly not so absurd as to warrant personal attacks against anyone who raises the question.<br /><br />Thus far, your only response to the suggestion of US involvement is that US officials (eventually) made public statements condemning the coup. I do not seem to be the only one who thinks that the analysis should not end there.<br /><br />Perhaps I should add that I am a native speaker of Spanish and have contact with people throughout Central America, including in Honduras, none of whom seems to consider the issue as clear cut as you seem to.<br /></blockquote>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-47273842933882888812009-06-29T14:57:00.002-04:002009-06-29T15:00:10.312-04:00Iran and HondurasIt is hard not to be impressed by the outpouring of international online support for the people who have been braving massive state violence to protest against – now admitted – electoral fraud in Iran. The sincerity of the international supporters of the reform movement in Iran appears to me beyond doubt in most cases. Equally beyond doubt is the sheer cynicism of politicians in the US, Europe, and Israel, who now express their solidarity for the Iranian protestors despite the fact that, had they already been successful in their efforts to drum up support for another war of aggression against Iran, many of those protestors would be dead now. It also bears mentioning that these same governments not only uttered not one word of protest when the Shah’s army started opening fire on Iranian demonstrators in the 1970s – they continued to send money and weapons to their chosen dictator.<br /><br />What the supporters of the Iranian demonstrators do not seem to realize, however, is that they have not one iota of influence over the actions of the Iranian government. Whatever else one can say about Iran’s current government, it is not beholden to the West (which, from the point of view of the US government, is precisely the problem). Even if the entire population of the United States and Europe took to the streets in their respective countries calling for an end to the violence against the demonstrators in Iran, the only likely reaction on the part of the Iranian government would be to increase the repression in order to get the flow of information back under control.<br /><br />This stands in remarkable contrast to the case of Honduras. Two days ago, the elected president, Manuel “Mel” Zelaya, was awakened by armed soldiers in his presidential residence and abducted, and flown to Costa Rica. In blatant violation of the Honduran constitution, which prescribes a specific order of succession, Zelaya’s political rival, president of the Honduran legislature Roberto Micheletti usurped Zelaya’s office and was sworn in as president. The notorious Honduran military has declared a curfew, prohibited the transmission of international cable TV stations, and has abducted several foreign diplomats in violation of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. This coup d’état has been almost unanimously condemned in the hemisphere, with only the US seeking refuge in ambiguity.<br /><br />There are some key similarities between the cases of Honduras and Iran. In Honduras, as in Iran, an election is at the centre; the coup appears primarily intended to prevent a non-binding consultative referendum on the convocation of a new constitutional convention (asamblea constituyente). In Honduras, as in Iran, the immunity of foreign diplomats has been flagrantly violated. In Honduras, as in Iran, those in power have imposed censorship on all independent media (some of the more powerful media outlets, as in 2002 in Venezuela, have been actively involved in the coup). In Honduras, as in Iran, people have taken to the streets and are, even now, facing off with an army that has been dispatched to shoot at its own people. The Honduran coup, like the Iranian electoral fraud and repression, has been internationally condemned.<br /><br />That is where the similarity ends. Honduras, unlike Iran, was virtually a US dependency until very recently. Throughout the 1980s, the <span style="font-style: italic;">de facto</span> ruler of Honduras was US ambassador John Negroponte, referred to in Honduras as “Proconsul” (Negroponte later went on to assume the same function in occupied Iraq). It is during this period that the current Honduran constitution, which Zelaya ultimately seeks to amend, was adopted. A minuscule domestic oligarchy, together with the US business interests that control Honduras’ natural resources, has long ruled over a crushingly poor majority. The Honduran army, which is notorious for its brutal repression of the Honduran poor, is dependent on US military aid for its weapons and a substantial part of its budget.<br /><br />The events in Honduras follow a pattern that is quite familiar in Latin America. A reformist government seeking to end oligarchic rule and dependence on the United States is elected with the support of the poor majority. The US cuts off all aid apart from military aid and funding for political front organisations (e.g., the pro-coup NGO Paz y Democracia in Honduras). The military, using whatever pretext happens to be available, overthrows the elected government and restores the oligarchy and US corporations to power. The US either avoids making any direct pronouncement on the coup or rhetorically condemns it without cutting off, or even reducing, the flow of US weapons that made the coup possible. We have seen variations on this theme in Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama, Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil, Peru, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and, most recently, Venezuela (where the US-backed coup was defeated by a popular uprising within 48 hours). The list would be much longer if we were to include the Asian and African countries that have experienced similar US “democracy promotion” efforts.<br /><br />Thus, the evidence is overwhelming that the US is behind the coup in Honduras. This means that, unlike in the case of Iran, there is some possibility that domestic and international protest could be effective. The coup would collapse almost immediately without the weapons and money provided by the United States. As a matter of consistency and of the elementary moral principle that protest should be directed toward places where it is likely to do some good, it would seem that the outcry against the coup in Honduras should be equal, if not greater, than the international protests against electoral fraud and repression in Iran. Why, then, is Iran a “trending topic” on Twitter, while Honduras is not?<br /><br />Iran is an official enemy in the US and Europe. Accordingly, there is no difficulty getting negative portrayals of the country and its government through the filters of the dominant media outlets. Indeed, as the impassioned op-eds about the grave danger of Iran’s nonexistent nuclear weapons program have demonstrated, one need not even bother with the facts as long as one is condemning the Great Satan. Thus, Western governments and mainstream media have done an impressive job of getting the word out and keeping their populations focused on the events in Iran, just as they would if the same thing were happening in any other official enemy state. In the case of Honduras, on the other hand, sustained reporting and exposure are not in the interest of either the US and allied governments or the corporate media. Indeed, it would cost US business interests millions, if not more, if the coup in Honduras were to fail and the elected government restored to power.<br /><br />This is not to say that the international online supporters of the reform movement in Iran are as hypocritical and cynical as the governments of the US and Western Europe. It appears clear that their concern for democracy and their outrage at the repressive tactics of the Iranian government are sincere. However, it will be up to them to prove that this is the case by directing at least some of their energies toward stopping an affront to democracy that they can actually influence.<br /><br />For a detailed discussion of the Honduran coup and its background, see:<br /><a href="http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/21817">http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/21817<br /></a><a href="http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/21821">http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/21821 </a><br /><a href="http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/21816">http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/21816</a><br /><br />In Spanish:<br /><a href="http://hablahonduras.com/">http://hablahonduras.com/</a><br /><a href="http://jbcs.blogspot.com/2009/06/adolfo-perez-esquivel-sobre-honduras.html">http://jbcs.blogspot.com/2009/06/adolfo-perez-esquivel-sobre-honduras.html</a><br /><a href="http://alainet.org/active/31280&lang=es">http://alainet.org/active/31280&lang=es</a><br /><a href="http://www.kaosenlared.net/noticia/95351/primeras-lecciones-golpe-estado-honduras">http://www.kaosenlared.net/noticia/95351/primeras-lecciones-golpe-estado-honduras</a>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-52003832164862938282009-04-17T19:16:00.002-04:002009-04-17T19:20:53.753-04:00On Crises, Bailouts, and Prosperity<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">In order to understand what is meant when élites speak of a “crisis”, the rational observer will naturally ask a few basic questions. A first enquiry would concern the situation before the current crisis: what was happening in society before the crisis was declared? By examining the status quo ante, we can gain valuable insight into what does and does not constitute a “crisis” in the minds of ruling élites. Another, related, question concerns the measures proposed and taken by government to respond to the crisis: what is done directly, and what is done indirectly? What is guaranteed, and what is left to chance? It seems entirely reasonable to assume that those things considered by a person or institution to be of crucial importance are the ones least likely to be treated as a hoped-for </span><span style="font-style: italic; font-family: trebuchet ms;">byproduct </span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">of that person’s or institution’s actions. One does not generally leave one’s true priorities up to chance. Further, it is instructive to ask who the principal beneficiaries of the measures taken are, and at whose expense they are taken. The fact that these questions are at best peripheral to the public debate, if they are asked at all, is instructive in and of itself. </span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center; font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">The “Non-Crisis”</span><br /></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">The years preceding the current crisis were characterised by two key features: increasing poverty, unemployment, and underemployment with stagnating or declining real wages, and sharp cuts in social benefits on the one side, and ever-increasing record profits and massive concentration of wealth on the other. Over 30 million Americans suffered from hunger, 12 million children were so undernourished as to severely impair their physical and mental development, 49 million Americans lacked health insurance coverage, those who did have insurance could only be sure that their “insurers” would spare no expense to deny them necessary treatment, while ever more Americans were forced to depend on various forms of predatory lending to survive. Meanwhile, corporations such as AIG benefited from the dismantlement of the regulatory framework in the form of steadily increasing profits. Economists estimate that between 1980 and 2005, approximately 20 trillion dollars were redistributed upward to the top 10% of the population by income.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">This, it bears repeating, was not a “crisis”. This is what was called “prosperity”.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">The “crisis” did not begin until the speculation bubble, built as it was on poorly understood, “exotic financial instruments” backed by virtually nothing, predictably popped, causing “record losses” for those who had been celebrating “record profits” for over a decade earlier. </span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; font-family: trebuchet ms;">Crisis Management<br /></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Based on the above analysis of what is and is not a “crisis” for policymakers, it is not hard to predict the official response to the current crisis. Indeed, the engineers of the crisis (including some, such as Lawrence Summers, Robert Rubin, Henry Paulson, and Timothy Geithner, who went on to become the US government's crisis managers-in-chief) were so certain of the governmental response – which has been repeated many times over the past several decades – that they took risks that would otherwise have been suicidal.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Given that the “crisis” lies not in the impoverishment of the population but in the entirely predictable consequences for the financial sector of its irresponsible (and highly profitable) conduct, the response to the crisis should come as no surprise. The immediate response has, predictably, been to pump trillions of dollars, with no conditions and no oversight, into the pockets of those largely responsible for the crisis. While the public justification for these infusions of cash has been the need to restart the flow of credit, there is no such requirement attached to the funds. While this measure has led to jubilation on the stock market, it has not – surprise, surprise – led to any significant increase in the availability of credit. While the recipients of the bailout funds have generally refused to account for their use – understandably, as they are not required to do so – it has become clear that they have generally found other places to spend their free tax money, ranging from bonuses, dividends, and mergers and acquisitions to lobbying efforts to defeat the Employee Free Choice Act, which, if passed, would be a first step toward restoring workers’ right to organise.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">While one might be moved to ask how badly these companies could possibly be doing if they can afford to spend their public assistance on such things, the media and government have dedicated their energies to concentrating public attention and outrage on the executive bonuses, which make out a minuscule portion of the funds, while the Treasury Department woos investors with the offer to buy up “toxic assets” jointly with hedge funds, while guaranteeing government absorption of any losses incurred. The profitability of the speculative “investment” banks that caused the crisis, then, cannot be left up to chance. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Though the focus of the crisis management might suggest otherwise, the majority of the population has problems of its own, to which the financial sector has added rapidly increasing homelessness and unemployment. This is not to say that the problem has been entirely ignored in Washington, of course, where the Obama administration intends to spend up to $75 billion – less than half of what was paid out to AIG alone (so far!) – to help those of the millions of homeowners facing homelessness who the administration feels have bought their homes in a responsible fashion. Similarly, the administration is acting to protect US auto executives from early retirement by forcing auto industry workers – one of the few groups of workers to have even marginally effective union representation – to accept substantial cuts in pay and contribution-based health care and retirement benefits. It is, of course, only fair that those enjoying continued prosperity should make sacrifices to aid those in crisis.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">The hierarchy of bailouts is telling. The speculators who are responsible for the crisis receive taxpayer funds unconditionally and without limitation. When the funds run out, as they tend to do rather quickly, they can always get more. The government protects them from the risks inherent in the highly profitable “toxic assets” they created. The only apparent criterion for receiving these funds is that recipients must be partially at fault for the crisis. When auto executives need assistance, the government is rather less forthcoming. The major auto companies must first submit a plan for the use of the government funds, and be accountable for their proper use. Of course, this is not too onerous a burden for the auto executives, as the “recovery plan” required imposes the bulk of the burdens on the auto workers (the only people whose pay and benefits have been cut as a result of this crisis). Though this is certainly not as good a deal as was offered to the principal architects of the crisis, it isn’t all that bad, either. All that is required is a plan for the future that imposes the burdens squarely on the workers. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">For the millions of homeowners facing homelessness due to fraudulent loans offered by shady subsidiaries of “reputable” financial institutions, on the other hand, the situation is rather less rosy. In order to get a piece of the much smaller pie theoretically available to them, homeowners must prove – how is anyone’s guess – that they were not irresponsible in buying their homes. While it may seem a bit odd at first glance to impose such a condition on the main victims of the crisis and not on the architects of the crisis, it actually makes perfect sense: no financial institution or investment banker could possibly meet the burden imposed on homeowners by the Obama administration. If a homeowner facing foreclosure cannot satisfy the government that her past conduct was responsible, her only recourse is to find space in America’s growing tent cities. No plan for the future use of government funds is good enough.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">As harsh as the administration’s treatment of soon-to-be-former homeowners is, the rest of the population can expect even less. At best, the Obama administration’s stimulus package will replace the underpaid, non-union, and generally shitty jobs they lost with </span><span style="font-style: italic; font-family: trebuchet ms;">new </span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">underpaid, non-union, generally shitty jobs. For those lucky enough to get one. As much as the Obama campaign talked about passing the Employee Free Choice Act, the Obama administration has been at pains to make it clear that EFCA is not currently on the agenda. This means that union organisation, one of the few effective ways in which workers can improve their wages and working conditions, will remain beyond the reach of most of the population. Similarly, the millions (insured and uninsured) nearing bankruptcy under the weight of health care expenses, can be sure that the one reform that they almost unanimously demand – single-payer health care – is, in the words of one Obama spokesperson, “off the table”. Nor, in our current era of “Billion? Trillion? Who’s counting anymore?” is the subject of student loan and consumer debt forgiveness, which would substantially increase the buying power of the average American and provide a powerful demand-based stimulus to the economy, even mentioned. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">To put it in the language of our Orwellian times, then, most Americans will continue to experience unabated prosperity, undisturbed by government interference.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">If we were to assume that the crisis consisted of something other than a mere predictable drop in profitability on the part of an industry that produces nothing but profits for itself, a completely different crisis management strategy would emerge. The first priority would be to ensure that no one loses their home or income, or has their utilities shut off, as a result of the conduct of unaccountable institutions that have been allowed to gain control of the economy. FDR did this in the 1930s simply by decreeing a moratorium on foreclosures, evictions, and utility shutoffs. The second priority would be to conduct a massive investigation into the activities that led to this mess, including mortgage-trail audits of all mortgages involved and a full-scale SEC audit of the institutions involved, steps that have thus far been assiduously avoided by the Bush and Obama administrations. Simultaneously, the state could acquire controlling shares in the relevant institutions and use those controlling shares to save the viable and useful segments of the institutions (if any), while letting the remainder go bankrupt (a tactic that would also neatly resolve the bonus issue). Once the situation has been stabilised, the viable portions of the banks could be broken down into small, manageable, locally accountable units, and regulations could be (re-)enacted to ensure that no financial institution ever becomes “too big to fail”. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">It all depends on what one considers a crisis. </span>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-55332773681186474772009-02-05T18:38:00.002-05:002009-02-05T18:48:11.556-05:00"An Open Letter To A Citizen Of Gaza : I Am the Soldier Who Slept In Your Home " (Parody)<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Today, I happened upon <a href="http://www.theisraelproject.org/site/c.hsJPK0PIJpH/b.672631/apps/s/content.asp?ct=6710711">this gem</a>, which I sincerely hope is not what it purports to be. In it, the author, an IDF soldier who, by his own admission, used the home of a Gazan civilian as a military position, brings new meaning to the phrase "adding insult to injury". This is not, as one might hope, an apology for the appalling state in which the attacking Israeli army left the civilian homes it requisitioned (racist graffiti and other vandalism are the norm), but rather a truly nauseating exercise in self-pity and self-righteousness, in which this (probably) teenage soldier presumes to <span style="font-style: italic;">lecture </span>an entire people about proper behaviour and who their "real enemy" is. After barely managing to prevent every meal I have eaten in the past month from coming up at once, I wrote this:</p><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">-------------------------------------------------------------------------------</span><br /><br /><p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Hello,</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Perhaps you don’t remember me. I’m the nice young man who kicked down your bedroom door and ordered you to “Get the fuck outta here!”, but faces are hard to remember, I understand, and you seemed much more interested in the barrel of my Galil assault rifle. You Arabs and your weapons fetish!</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">I thought you might not remember me, so I decided during my off hours to leave you a little memento, as a contribution to understanding between my innocent, noble people, and your almost human people. I really mean that, too! You really are just THIS close to humanity. To the left of the living room window that I expanded for you, I drew a little self-portrait, just so you’d remember me. It’s the one right over the line saying “Arabs into the ovens!” , the stick figure taking a shit on a Palestinian flag. I noticed that you have – or should I say, had – a very nice collection of paintings hanging on your wall. I love art, too! It’s so nice to know that we can connect on these little things.</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">I just want you to know that I really don’t have anything personal against you people. I think that with a little evolution and a little culling of the herd, you might even be acceptable for continued existence on Earth! My CO always tells me I’m a “rosy-eyed optimist”, but I don’t think that “subhuman” means “subhuman <i>forever”. </i>But I really can’t get past the great resentment I feel at having had to blow up that school where those people were taking refuge. If only you loved your children as much as you hate ours…or whatever it was that Golda Meir once said. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">I know, I know: you’re thinking “If you’re such a great guy, why did you shit all over my living room?” How typical of you people not to notice that I put it all together in a neat pile and even put a little piece of paper over it saying “WATCH YOUR STEP”! And in case that isn’t enough to make you appreciate the agony I went through during our latest heart-wrenching exercise of our right to self-defence, I just want you to know that I didn’t shoot your cat for fun. I love cats. No, I shot it out of peer pressure. The guys and I were bored one afternoon when we were almost certain there wasn’t another living being left in your neighbourhood, and they dared me to do it. It seems sad now, I know, but just think of all the cats that have now been freed of their previous families. You’ll find a new one in no time!</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">I like to think that I have a special sort of empathy for your people. My great-grandfather was in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Of course, the situation is totally different. His desire to resist being slaughtered made him a hero, while yours makes you terrorists. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Ahh, I would love to just muse with you on the ironies of history someday, maybe over coffee and that shisha crap you Arabs like so much, but I have a feeling you won’t<span style=""> </span>accept my olive branch. In fact, I have a distinct feeling that right now you’re thinking “Who does this inarticulate teenager think he is lecturing someone 30 years his senior on good behaviour and gratitude?” </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">But let’s face it: if you people had gone just a little bit farther away back in 1948 and 1967, we wouldn’t be having all these troubles. We’d have left you alone long ago if you’d just left. You had the chance to be free of our “oppression” just by running as far as you possibly could. You people really never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity! But since you’re here, we’ve felt a need to care for you. You seemed to be developing an obesity problem in Gaza (3 out of 5 adults with a triple-digit weight in pounds!), so we put you on a diet. When your complete lack of self-control caused you to start digging tunnels to smuggle things in that we were keeping away from you in your best interest, we helped you understand that that was the wrong thing to do. And what did you do in response? You lobbed makeshift explosives at areas near where our people lived! The nerve of you people, the gall! If you’re going to lob explosives at us, make sure the fucking things are name-brand and actually work! Anything less is an insult. All we want is <s>peace</s> <s>and to be rid of you</s> peace, and we will be happy to make peace with you the minute your culture evolves to the point where you are capable of it.</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Please, try to keep a sense of proportion in your indignity. You may have lost over 1,300 friends, family members, and neighbours because of us, but I lost my INNOCENCE because of you!</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Sincerely,</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Anonymous soldier who spent an agonising week in your flat.</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">PS. I really didn’t enjoy leaving your refrigerator open, dropping a lit cigarette on that lovely rug you had, <span style=""> </span>tearing holes in every cushion and pillow in your house, and leaving several pairs of dirty underwear on your dinner table. It was just the necessity of war. I will be in therapy for years over the things I was honour- and duty-bound to do to you, your family, and your people. So often, I wished I could just disappear from the whole thing. But then a pedestrian would come into my sights, and I would wipe away a tear and blow his head off. If you only knew how painful my lot in life is!</p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-19318717920836943042009-01-19T03:06:00.004-05:002009-01-19T03:18:52.316-05:00Israeli Super-Emetics, Part II<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" face="trebuchet ms" class="MsoNormal">If last week’s “pro-Israel” demonstration was not a powerful enough demonstration of Israel’s latest-generation emetics, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jan/16/elizabeth-wurtzel-antisemitism-israel-gaza">Elizabeth Wurtzel</a> has graced the pages of Britain’s <i>Guardian </i>newspaper with an embarrassing display guaranteed to propel your most recent meal out of you at speeds approaching the sound barrier. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" face="trebuchet ms" class="MsoNormal">It appears that the <i>Guardian, </i>which once appeared to be a quality paper – has deemed it appropriate to offset the attack on the defenceless civilian population of Gaza with one of the more mawkish expressions of American Jewish self-pity in our young millennium. </p> <p face="trebuchet ms" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">The headline to Wurtzel’s piece reads: </span><b style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“</b><strong style="font-weight: normal;"><span style=""><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">It is not Israel's action, but the vitriolic reaction to it that has been disproportionate. There's only one explanation: antisemitism [sic]”. Certainly, writers do not always have the last word on the headlines that accompany their work, so it would be unfair to assume that Wurtzel herself feels that this is an accurate summary of either the situation or of her piece (or, come to that, that she is unable to spell </span><i style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">anti-Semitism </i><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">correctly). It is neither. Wurtzel’s piece is long on emoting, but short on anything else, and does not even attempt to show that the worldwide response to Israel’s attack on Gaza is due to anti-Semitism.</span> <o:p></o:p></span></strong></p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal"><strong><span style=""><span style="font-weight: normal;">Her argument, to the extent that one is discernable, is as follows: It is “artificial” to distinguish between opposition to Zionism and anti-Semitism:</span><o:p></o:p></span></strong></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36pt; font-family: trebuchet ms;">[W]hen there is more than one Jewish state, the world's hatred of Israel might become no different from its exasperation with any other country, but since Israel is the only homeland, and really it is nothing more than six million Jews living together in an area the size of New Jersey, I can't pretend that the problem with Israel is that it's a poorly located country that happens to be at odds with its neighbours and only coincidentally happens to be Jewish. <i>The trouble with Israel is the trouble with Jews.</i> (emphasis supplied)</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Never mind that Zionism, as an ideology, has never garnered unanimous Jewish support (which would seem to me a reasonable prerequisite for equating Zionism with Jewry). Never mind that one does not even need to be anti-Zionist to oppose the idea of a Jewish state (a matter that remains contentious amongst the various political tendencies that make up what we know collectively as Zionism). Never mind that (as Wurtzel herself points out later on) it is in fact entirely possible to be Jewish <i>and </i>Zionist <i>and </i>be utterly disgusted with Israel’s policies toward the indigenous Palestinian population. Never mind that Israel is indeed more than “six million Jews living together in an area the size of New Jersey” – 20% more, to be precise, as fully one fifth of Israel’s citizens are not Jewish. Israel is the only state that defines itself as Jewish, and thus “the trouble with Israel is the trouble with Jews”. QED. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Iceland is the only Icelandic state. I think Iceland’s policy of requiring naturalised Icelandic citizens to adopt Icelandic names is absurd. Therefore, I must have a problem with the entire Icelandic people, rather than merely with a law made by people claiming to represent them.</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Lest one think this novel idiocy, it is worth recalling that Wurtzel is essentially reiterating the positions taken by both Hitler and Stalin. (1) There is no distinction between the people and the state, (2) National Socialism/Stalinist “Communism” is the national will of the people, as expressed by the policy of the state, (3) THEREFORE, criticism of Nazi/Stalinist policies is an attack on the people. <a href="http://everything2.com/e2node/The%2520White%2520Rose%253A%2520An%2520Epilogue">Dr. Freisler</a> would approve.</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Wurtzel, it turns out, is “profoundly uncomfortable”. Any attempt to discuss the issue of Israel with anyone “rightminded (and left-leaning)”, we are told, lays bare “the purest antisemitism [sic] since the Nazi era”. Instead of providing examples of such interactions, she goes on to lament that comparisons of Israeli policy with (often strikingly similar) Nazi policies are “de rigueur” (she might add that they are quite commonplace in Israel, particularly amongst proponents of those very Israeli policies). </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">She is also quite upset that Europeans see “the experience of the Palestinians as a form of ethnic cleansing”. She might have added that the Europeans might have got the idea that the Palestinians are being ethnically cleansed from the fact that leading Israeli historians and policymakers throughout the political spectrum say so quite openly, with Benny Morris, for example, lamenting only that the ethnic cleansing was not seen through to the end. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">“Hamas and Hezbollah”, she continues, shunning any supporting evidence, “are thought by the French and British to be social welfare organisations, and Israel is viewed as a terrorist state.” While it would be nice to see some actual figures on how many of “the French” and “the British” hold these views, it is worth noting that those who do see Hamas and Hezbollah as social welfare organisations likely do so because both Hamas and Hezbollah are known for providing schools, sanitation, health care, social assistance, nursing homes, and other much needed social services. Nor would she need to go as far as Europe to hear people say that Israel is a terrorist state. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/14/opinion/14friedman.html?ref=opinion">Thomas Friedman</a> just recently <i>praised </i>Israel for using what constitute terrorist tactics under the standard legal definitions (attacks directed at the civilian population in order to achieve political goals). If a terrorist state is a state that routinely engages in terrorism (as defined by applicable law), then Israel certainly qualifies, and the assault on the people of Gaza is a perfect example. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">Credulity is further stretched by her bizarre pronouncement that “Here, we honor the linguistic discoveries of Noam Chomsky and otherwise experience him as a quaintly brilliant crank, but in the bookstores in London there are entire sections devoted to his political thought – and he is read as if the distinctions between Leninist and Trotskyite philosophy had genuine consequence in today's world.” There are two possible explanations. Either she has never read Chomsky’s work, and is too lazy to read even a synopsis of one or two of his recent works, in which case she is at best unqualified to comment, or, she is sufficiently familiar with Chomsky’s work to know that most of it concerns US foreign policy and the US corporate media and intellectual culture, with scarcely a single word devoted to distinguishing between Leninism and Trotskyism, in which case she is a liar. In any case, it is interesting to note that she considers political ideologies that were at the centre of much of the history of the twentieth century to be of no contemporary interest. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">For those who remain only mildly queasy after the shameful display Wurtzel has treated us to thus far, she decides to shift into high-gear, transitioning seamlessly from American Jewish self-pity to American Jewish self-adulation:</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36pt; font-family: trebuchet ms;">But I think it is this very fact – my attempt to understand both sides – that disturbs me the most. Because trying to see all sides, <i>such an instinct is particularly Jewish</i>. The most vehement critics of Israel and champions of the Palestinians – hello, Professor Chomsky; greetings, Norman Finkelstein – are always Jews: <i>we are always trying in our even, level, thoughtful way to see reason in the behaviour of those who are lobbing rocket grenades at us</i>. <i>As a people, we are hopeless Talmudists, we examine all the arguments and try to sort out an answer. What is both strange and difficult for Jews to watch in the case of Israel is that, as a nation surrounded by enemies, it does not make such calculations; it does not have the luxury of rationality that is eventually irrational.</i> Israel fights back, which is very much at odds with the Jewish instinct to discuss and deconstruct everything until action itself seems senseless. Israel, hell-bent on survival, has learned to shoot first – or, at least, second – and blow away the consequences. Whereas it actually hurts my feelings when someone says something nasty about Israel, or even the United States, for Israelis, this is just the way of the world: they probably manufacture their flags to be flammable. (emphasis supplied)</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">One might note that there is little evidence in Wurtzel’s piece of any “attempt to understand both sides”, and that, after her shamefully dishonest non-treatment of the assault on Gaza, she attempts to take credit for Noam Chomsky and Norman Finkelstein, one of whom she has already completely misrepresented, and both of whom have written things that she has already called “the purest form of antisemitism [sic] since the Nazi era”. One might also note that Israel’s survival has not been in question for decades. The only true danger to Israel’s survival is the lethal combination of Israeli militarism and U.S. enablement. The Palestinians, on the other hand, have been pushed ever closer to the brink of subsistence, in hopes that they might realize, in the words of Moshe Dayan, that “we have no solution. You will live like dogs, and those who wish to leave, can leave.” We are no longer, as the old Jewish partisan song goes, <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zog_Nit_Keynmol">a volk zwischn falendige wend</a> </i>(a people standing between walls caving in); the Palestinians are. </p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal">I recently mused that the most anti-Semitic slogan in the world today would have to be “Israel is the state of the Jewish people”. Wurtzel’s piece, which seeks to erode justifiable distinctions between our people and those who commit crimes in our name, is a strong runner-up.</p> <p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-42965363965784364912009-01-16T02:40:00.005-05:002009-01-17T01:08:09.694-05:00Don't be ashamed you're Jewish - Be ashamed THEY are!<span style=";font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Concert pianist Anton Kuerti recently said that “Israel’s behaviour makes me </span><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:";font-size:100%;" >ashamed of being a Jew.”<o:p></o:p></span><p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >I personally don’t think much of being proud (or, come to that, ashamed) of being something that one is by birth. I am neither proud nor ashamed of being Jewish or a U.S. citizen; neither fact is due to any achievement or failure of my own. Both are merely accidents of birth.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB">But Kuerti’s comment reminded me of an oft-quoted line from Wallace Markfield’s novel <i>You Could Live if They Let You: </i>“Never, never, never be ashamed you’re Jewish, because it’s enough if I’m ashamed you’re Jewish.” The behaviour – which I personally had as little to do with as with the fact of my being Jewish – does not make me ashamed that I am Jewish; it does, however, make me ashamed, or perhaps rather <i>disgusted</i>, that I share that background with the likes of Tzipi Livni, Ehud Barak, Ehud Olmert, Alan Dershowitz, Joe Lieberman, Thomas Friedman, and the rest of Israel’s criminals and their apologists in the media and academia.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB">It is hard to escape the fact that we Jews - though certainly not only us - are in some pretty unenviable company. We’re reminded of it every time we turn on the TV to see ourselves represented by yet another another thug (Peres, Olmert, Livni, Sharon, Kissinger), sycophant (Friedman), goniff (Madoff), liar (Foxman), or all-round schmuck (Dershowitz, Lieberman). Let’s admit – even if it’s just to ourselves – that it is not a pretty sight. In fact, it’s damned depressing to see some of the most prominent products of the culture that once brought forth (to name just a few) Viktor Frankl, Hannah Arendt, Kurt Tucholsky, Heinrich Heine, Albert Einstein, Maimonides, and Noam Chomsky (even if - alas! – it will take some of us another fifty years to realise why <i>he</i> belongs on the list). Anyone wishing to theorise about vast anti-Semitic conspiracies could have a field day just looking at the people who claim to speak for us all!<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB">And yet, for the most part, we put up with being represented by these people. Some of us even go so far as to jump down the throat of anyone who criticises them even mildly. The rest of us hear the likes of Foxman and Dershowitz and the Israeli government claiming to be our representatives – even going so far as to claim occasionally that it is anti-Semitic to distinguish between us and our purported representatives – and wonder why we always end up being held responsible for what Israel and our other avowed representatives say and do.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB">In response to criticisms that his many brilliant essays on the German judiciary took the worst judges as representative of the entire group, the Weimar-era essayist and satirist Kurt Tucholsky had the following to say:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 5pt 36pt;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >My work does not say that the basest member of a group is its representative; he is no more a representative of the group than the most elevated member that the gentlemen would want to have mentioned to their credit. I said that the basest member is characteristic for the standard of a group: the member that the group just barely tolerates. For example:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 5pt 36pt;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >If a German physician rapes an under-age female patient, and these facts and the perpetrator’s criminal liability are proven beyond doubt, the entire medical profession will distance itself from the man. Even more – they will remove him from their ranks. Thus, the group cannot be judged based on this member. The group cannot help that he was once one of them. They do not tolerate him, they throw him out.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 5pt 36pt;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >If a German judge takes a bribe, the group will react immediately – all members will want the man kicked out; the ethics hearing would be a mere formality in this case. Thus, the judge who takes bribes is not a prototype of the German judge.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 5pt; text-indent: 36pt;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >[…]<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 5pt 36pt;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >And as long as the group of judges do not demonstrate against this type of judge, even if it is merely in the form of serious opposition, as long „the“ judiciary, out of a false sense of collegiality, takes the side of the overrated expert against the “layman” – I will continue to call a German judge a German judge. And I would like that to be understood in the way that a proletarian would understand it – remembering the reports of the Nazi trials [here: trials of Nazis in the 20s and early 30s for political murders and coup attempts, for which they were either acquitted or received absurdly lenient sentences] – when he stands before these judges.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB">Put differently, as long as members of a group do not clearly shun fellow group members for engaging in a particular sort of conduct, it is reasonable for a person standing on the outside to assume that the group as a whole condones - or, at the very least, does not condemn - that conduct. Unless followed by immediate and public condemnation, a Palestinian might reasonably assume, for example, that Alan Dershowitz is speaking for us all when he calls the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians "a fifth-rate moral issue", or that Tzipi Livni speaks with our overall approval when she threatens Palestinian citizens of Israel with expulsion ("You should seek your future elsewhere."). Nor can the hypothetical Palestinian be blamed for assuming group approval when he sees Abe Foxman and the Anti-Defamation League launch a campaign on behalf of the Turkish government to deny the Armenian genocide, eliciting no condemnation (or even notice). Unless we truly wish such behaviour to be taken as representative of our community, we must act immediately to make it clear that the offending party is acting on his or her own and does not speak for us.<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB">Recent events suggest that at least some of us have begun taking Tucholsky’s words to heart. We are not eternally bound and indebted to the Israeli government and its apologists, nor should we, in a false sense of “ethnic solidarity”, feel obliged to waste our breath defending the indefensible. When we defend – or deny – Israeli crimes and Palestinian suffering, we are doing ourselves no favours. Ultimately, we are merely telling the world that this – be it the assault on the defenceless population of Gaza, the ethnic cleansing of 1948, the use of torture, the various attacks on Lebanon and other countries – is the sort of behaviour we tolerate in members of our community. By defending such crimes, we are in reality telling the world that they meet our minimum standards of acceptable conduct. <span style=""> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p> <span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:";font-size:100%;" lang="EN-GB">Open repudiation of the indefensible conduct of our avowed representatives is the only way to avoid being held personally responsible for it. It is also the only way that justice – without which any “peace” is merely violence by other means – will ever be achieved in the Middle East. </span>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-20810313650428193222009-01-13T20:10:00.005-05:002009-01-14T02:15:49.373-05:00"Pro-"Israel demonstrators demonstrate the latest weapon in the Israeli arsenal - the ability to cause vomiting on command<p class="MsoNormal">Jewish demonstrators in New York at a rally in favour of Israel’s eventual self-destruction (what is known, absurdly, as the “pro-Israel” camp) were interviewed for today’s edition of <i>Democracy Now </i>by journalist Max Blumenthal. The views expressed by the demonstrators are nothing short of nauseating. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">In my Jewish education as a child, I remember hearing quite a bit about the values held dear by Jewish tradition, among them justice (<i>tsedek) </i>and acts of kindness (<i>gemilut hasadim). </i>As far as I can recall, mindless, proto-fascist jingoism was not amongst them. Alas, this latter value was quite heavily on display at this week’s “pro-Israel” demonstration, which was awash in bluster about Israel’s (US-provided) arsenal and considered declarations of principle such as “Jews kick butt”. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">If this had been the only view expressed by the demonstrators, <i>dayenu. </i>Sadly, there was more. One woman described Palestinians as a “cancer” to be excised, while another declared that “the fighting must go on until we’ve wiped them all out.” Others expressed agreement with these re-cast Nazi slogans; if any of the participants dissented, they kept quiet about it. Clearly, "Never Again" means different things to different people.<br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Another, younger, demonstrator opined that we are witnessing a “repeat of the Holocaust” (I should note, for clarity’s sake, that she was calling the actions of the <i>Palestinians </i>a new holocaust). While I have studied the Nazi holocaust in great detail, I seem to have missed the part where the ZOB fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto were armed with white phosphorus, cluster bombs, Apache attack helicopters, tanks, and F-16 fighters and the SS fought desperately with nothing but ineffectual improvised explosive devices. I’m sure the likes of David Irving and Ernst Zündel will happily sign on to such a declaration.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Our young friend was not given pause, in her invocation of the Nazi holocaust, by the openly genocidal rantings of her comrades. The capacity to recognise irony, it would seem, is not equally distributed throughout the population. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">If this <i>is </i>a remake of the Nazi holocaust, it would seem that Central Casting has decided to switch up the roles a bit. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Fortunately, these are no longer the only <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/11/gaza-israel-letter-british-jews">Jewish voices</a> being heard on the matter. There appears to be a rebellion of sorts afoot in the Jewish community in <a href="http://www.freegaza.org/en/home/658-a-call-from-within-signed-by-israeli-citizens">Israel </a>and throughout the world. <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/10/letters-gaza-uk">Statements </a>are appearing on <a href="http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=11&ar=2458">almost </a>a daily basis, from the US to <a href="https://dl.getdropbox.com/u/193052/responsetoBOD.html">South Africa</a>, from <a href="http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/01/418015.html?c=on">Jews </a>who are no longer willing to let “Jewish” organisations that have become little more than Israeli PR agencies create the false impression that all Jews are united, Kim Il Sung-style, in support of every atrocity the Israeli government has committed in our name. </p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-30256407197837840572008-12-29T18:24:00.003-05:002008-12-29T18:39:08.162-05:00More on the Gaza attacks:Highlights include Israel's unilateral violation of the cease-fire in preparation for the Gaza attacks and the exploitation of the ceasefire to lay the groundwork for the assault. From the major Israeli newspaper <span style="font-style: italic;">Haaretz. </span><br /><br /><a href="http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050426.html"><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">"Disinformation, secrecy and lies: How the Gaza offensive came about"</span><br /></a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050460.html">"Delusions of victory in Gaza"</a><br /></span></span>("Six months ago Israel asked and received a cease-fire from Hamas. It unilaterally violated it when it blew up a tunnel, while still asking Egypt to get the Islamic group to hold its fire.")<br /><br /><a href="http://haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050636.html"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">"Little Baghdad in Gaza - bombs, fear and rage"</span></span></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;"><a href="http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050459.html">"The Neighborhood Bully Strikes Again"</a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span></span></span></span>("Within the span of a few hours on a Saturday afternoon, the IDF sowed death and destruction on a scale that the Qassam rockets never approached in all their years, and Operation "Cast Lead" is only in its infancy."; "Once again, Israel's violent responses, even if there is justification for them, exceed all proportion and cross every red line of humaneness, morality, international law and wisdom.")alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-75693712024782780532008-12-28T21:05:00.005-05:002008-12-29T03:43:26.607-05:00Response to the statement of the Cincinnati Jewish Community Relations Council<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Cincinnati’s Jewish Community Relations Council issued a <a href="http://www.wcpo.com/news/local/story/Cincinnatis-JCRC-Statement-On-Gaza-Attacks/ii3Xw7VOykifkwR1ZiAfoA.cspx">public statement</a> today condoning the ongoing Israeli attacks on the civilian population of Gaza. Framing Israel’s most recent attacks as Israel’s “military response”, the JCRC goes on to claim that “a record number of more then 2,900 rockets and mortar shells [were] aimed at Israeli civilians” in 2008. Alas, readers will search in vain for an accounting of the number of Israeli bullets, bombs, rockets, mortar shells and other munitions fired at the population of Gaza in the past few days, not to mention over the entire year of 2008. Similarly, readers will find no discussion whatsoever of the recent history of Gaza, apart from a vague reference to the “<a href="http://www.btselem.org/English/Gaza_Strip/">Disengagement</a>” (the standard euphemism for the seige of Gaza) and the peculiar claim that </span><br /><br /><blockquote style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Despite the ongoing threat from Hamas, Israel has demonstrated ample willingness to help avoid a humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Over the past several months Israel has risked the opening of key border crossings – which have often come under attack – to allow shipments of food and medical supplies to the residents of Gaza.</blockquote><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The reader is left to infer what the JCRC prefers to omit: namely, that Israel has, with few and minor exceptions, systematically <a href="http://www.unhchr.ch/huricane/huricane.nsf/0/183ED1610B2BCB80C125751A002B06B2?opendocument">blocked</a> the entry of food and medicine to Gaza, thus creating the humanitarian crisis that Israel is supposedly “ampl[y] willing[]” to help avoid. Likewise, the JCRC wastes no words on the widespread condemnation of Israel’s economic strangulation of Gaza, including by the <a href="http://www.un.org/unrwa/news/statements/2008/OpEd_10dec08.html">United Nations</a>, to which Israel has responded by <a href="http://www.humanrights-geneva.info/Access-denied-to-Israel-Interview,3964">imprisoning and expelling UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Prof. Richard Fal</a>k in order to prevent him visiting Gaza in order to be able to report in detail on the conditions there. The UNRWA, the UN agency in charge of ensuring that the population of Gaza and the rest of the Occupied Palestinian Territories, has been forced by the Israeli blockade to <a href="http://www.un.org/unrwa/news/releases/pr-2008/gaz_18dec08.html">stop providing food and medicine to Gaza</a>, but, again, not a word from the JCRC. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The JCRC does, however, see fit to boast that Israel’s attacks have received the seal of approval of the Bush Administration. As </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Boston Legal</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">’s Alan Shore once quipped: “When such an obvious straight line is lobbed at me, I cannot be held responsible for my actions.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Much of the remainder of the JCRC statement is a litany of the standard, long-discredited clichés. No such litany would be complete without a few bars of </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Hamas’ avowed goal of Israel’s destruction,</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> or that oldie-but-a-goodie: </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Whenever Israel’s military is called into action, it consistently seeks to minimize civilian casualties. </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Those of us who prefer a sentimental tune will be happy to hear </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Israel is still committed to peace</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">,</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" > but there can be no peace while an entire population is subject to terrorist attacks</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">. For the grand finale, we are treated to </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >Israel’s right to exist</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">This charming medley is not spoiled by pointing out such inconvenient facts as Hamas’s formal <a href="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article702812.ece">recognition </a>of the <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/04/04/mideast/index.html">two-state settlement</a> based on the international consensus as the basis for negotiations. Similarly, the authors of the statement do not point out that even Alan Dershowitz has tacitly admitted that the only way one can speak with a straight face of the IDF’s efforts to minimize civilian casualties is to redefine the term </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >civilian</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> (by concocting a “<a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-dershowitz22jul22,0,7685210.story?coll=la-opinion-rightrail">continuum of civilianality</a> [sic]”). The invocation of “Israel’s commitment to peace” could stand to be qualified by reference to Israel’s consistent record of <a href="http://haaretz.com/hasen/spages/789009.html">rejecting </a><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/04/02/1048962816402.html">diplomatic</a> <a href="http://www.thenation.com/doc/20041213/scialabba/3">settlements </a>in favour of expanding illegal settlements in the Occupied Territories, or its consistent use of violence to avoid the danger of serious negotiations. And when even Ehud Olmert is forced to describe settler violence (with near-complete impunity) against Palestinian civilians as a “<a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7616269.stm">pogrom</a>”, one might be forgiven for asking which “entire population” is subject to terrorist attacks (at least if we accept standard legal definitions of terrorism). Furthermore, it just wouldn’t do to point out that no state has a </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:trebuchet ms;" >right to exist, </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">apart from the right to exist in peace within recognised borders, a right that also applies to the Palestinians, who have repeatedly offered over the past few decades to recognise just that right for Israel. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">One wonders why the JCRC bothered to issue such a statement at all when the virtually identical press releases of the Israeli government would fully suffice!</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">In a time when <a href="http://www.jstreet.org/page/media-advisory-new-survey-american-jewish-community">Jewish </a><a href="http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/12/12/ajc_poll/index.html">opinion </a>is increasingly moving in the direction of disgust at the behaviour of the Israeli government, statements like these by mainstream Jewish organisations raise an uncomfortable, but urgent, question: Do these organisations see themselves as representatives of the interests of our Jewish community in the US, or those of the Israeli government? Some might think that those interests are one and the same. Certainly, this is what we are led to believe by such groups as the Antidefamation League. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">However, if there ever was a time in which the interests of Jews here coincided with those of the Israeli government, that time is long since past. By issuing uncritical statements of support for criminal Israeli policies whilst claiming to represent the Jewish community, groups like the JCRC paint us all as advocates of and accessories to criminal actions that more and more of us condemn. It cannot be in our interest for Jews to be portrayed in the media as unquestioning supporters of some of the worst international thuggery of our time. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">This certainly is in the interest of the Israeli government, which depends on the appearance of international (and especially US) Jewish support to insulate its conduct from criticism. However, it is most certainly not in the interests of the Jewish community as a whole. As long as mainstream Jewish organisations such as the JCRC seek to create the impression of unity between Jews in the US and the Israeli government, they virtually guarantee that Israel’s crimes will result in an increase in anti-Semitic sentiment (which Israel then uses to encourage immigration in order to solve the “demographic problem”). </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">As long as “our” organisations continue to blur the line between Israeli conduct and Jewish opinion, it is incumbent upon us to make it clear that these organisations do not represent us. If groups like the ADL and JCRC will not clearly and unmistakably draw the line, it is up to us to draw it ourselves by unequivocally and publicly stating that we do not condone the crimes that Israel commits in our name. </span>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-63577992694859604582008-11-02T16:42:00.002-05:002008-11-02T18:02:42.739-05:00Obama Without Illusions<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; font-family: verdana;" align="center"><b><i><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:18;" ><span style="font-size:180%;">The Single Issue: Shutting Up the Fundamentalists</span><o:p></o:p></span></i></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; font-family: verdana;" align="center"><span style=""><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >We are getting ready to vote in what will hopefully be the first <i>un</i>successfully manipulated presidential election this century, and it’s important to do so without illusions.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >We hear that Obama is a socialist. If only! He’s not, and he in fact agrees with McCain on most issues. Let’s not deceive ourselves about what’s at stake here. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >There is one issue – and one alone – that makes it worthwhile, perhaps even <i>vital, </i>to ensure that John McCain and his witchcraft-vaccinated sidekick do not make it into the White House: <b><i>It is high time that we finally kicked these fundamentalist clerics out of the White House.<o:p></o:p></i></b></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >Domestically, the last eight years have been an all-out war on women, gays, lesbians, transpeople, non-fundamentalists, and anyone who fits in more than one of these categories. We have seen a rapist put in charge of reproductive health at the FDA, seen a judge appointed to the Supreme Court who believes that a man should have the same power over his wife that the law gives him over his minor children, seen the beginning of an offensive against birth control, and we have heard the words “homosexual agenda” so often that we GLBT folks have to wonder whether it isn’t time to actually create one. We have seen the forces of ignorance, superstition, and bigotry attack every facet of our national life, while trying to convince us that it’s the Muslims (the Jews of our time) we should be afraid of. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >Is there a single honest, self-respecting person in this country who isn’t sick of this shit? Is there any woman in this country who doesn’t look with dread on the possibility that Justice Stevens’ replacement may be chosen based on the jurisprudential philosophy of Ms “Pay for your own rape kit” Palin? Is there anyone who thinks of the chance that foreign policy will continue to be determined by people seeking to fulfil the prophesy of exterminating Jews and Muslims without being overcome by nausea?<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >Obama won’t end the murderous wars against Iraq and Afghanistan, but at least he’ll give us some respite from the fundamentalist Christian war against the people of this country. We’ll have four years in which the White House isn’t issuing the press releases of clinic bombers and Christian Dominionist militias. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >Those of us who are distracted from fighting against the war and insurance industries will have four years in which we don’t be fully consumed by defending shit we thought we already had. Four years in which women’s chief worry doesn’t have to be whether we’re headed for the 1950s or the 1850s. Obama won’t be handing us what we want, but his election will allow us to focus our energies on our ultimate goals. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:100%;" >As the late Georgie Carlin said 20 years ago, “<i>I have just about had it with these fucking church people!</i>” After eight ears of watching them define the domestic agenda, haven’t we all? Who among us doesn’t feel just a little joy at the thought of the crestfallen faces of our homegrown Taliban? Who doesn’t want to see Ted Haggard, James Dobson, and the Southern Baptist Conference shitting themselves with rage rather than coming in their pants with glee? <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: verdana;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-size:16;" ><span style="font-size:130%;">Let’s deal these fundamentalist motherfuckers a blow that doesn’t come from their teenage meth connections!</span><o:p></o:p></span></p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-3277411483325153832008-09-22T21:41:00.003-04:002008-09-23T18:37:32.310-04:00Der eigentliche "neue Antisemitismus"<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Ein Gutes hatte der sog. Antiislamisierungskongreß vergangener Woche: Die Herren Entislamisierer haben nämlich unmißverständlich deutlich gemacht, was jeder halbwegs vernünftige Betrachter bereits seit Langem weiß. Seit 1945 hat sich freilich vieles geändert. Das Land, in dem es einst alles zu „arisieren“ galt, hat jetzt eine erstaunlich vielfältige und multikulturelle Gesellschaft vorzuweisen. Selbst der braune Restbestand holt sich erst mal Döner oder Schawarma vor dem allnächtlichen Klatschgang. In einem Land, in dem einst der häßlichste Antisemitismus der Geschichte zum Vorschein kam, blüht jüdisches Leben allmählich wieder auf (in manchen Germanistikstudiengängen kann man inzwischen sogar Jiddischkurse belegen).<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Doch eins ist im euroamerikanischen Kulturkreis beim Alten geblieben: die ethnisch-kulturell-religiös definierte Zielscheibe. Gestern hat man gegen die „Verjudung“ Europas gewittert; heute hetzt man gegen eine erfundene „Islamisierung“ (daß Juden hierbei nicht mehr als Zielscheibe, sondern als politisches Schutzschild, verwendet werden, ist ein weiteres Zeichen gesellschaftlichen Wandels). Die Rechte ist dieselbe geblieben; nur das Feindbild hat sie gegen ein neues ausgetauscht. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Interessant ist hierbei zu bemerken, daß eigentlich nur die Namen ausgetauscht worden sind. Sogar die Stereotypen, sowie die Ängste, die es zu schüren gilt, sind 2008 dieselben wie 1930. Damals galt die gesellschaftlich-politische Ausgrenzung vor allem den sog. <i>Ostjuden </i>(auch „Galizier“ genannt). Die Ostjuden kamen v.a. aus Polen und Rußland, lebten erst in der 1. oder 2. Generation in Deutschland, waren größtenteils arm, und hingen sehr an ihren heimischen Bräuchen und Traditionen. Sie sprachen eher Jiddisch als Deutsch, und blieben – nicht zuletzt wegen der sozialen Ausgrenzung – lieber unter sich. Nach dem heutigen Sprachgebrauch würde man ihnen „mangelnden Integrationswillen“ bescheinigen. Häufig wurden sie den heimischen, assimilierten, eher gutbürgerlichen deutschen Juden gegenübergestellt, die sich ebenfalls von ihnen distanzierten. Eine der ersten großangelegten antisemitischen Maßnahmen nach der sog. „Machtergreifung“ war die Massenabschiebung sämtlicher Ostjuden. Die Ostjuden galten als dreckig, hinterlistig und kriminell, sowie als die Träger fremder Einflüsse. Sie waren, so die gängigen rechten Parolen, an allem schuld, woran man nur schuld sein konnte: Arbeitslosigkeit, Armut, gesellschaftlichen Unruhen, usw. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">So hat z.B. ein preußischer Polizeipräsident 1920 geschrieben: „Die Ostjudenplage wird, da es sich hier nicht nur um lästige, sondern um höchst gefährliche Ausländer handelt, in ihrer jetzigen Duldung und wohlwollenden Behandlung künftig politisch, wirtschaftlich und gesundheitlich die furchtbarsten Gefahren zeitigen<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>“. Ihnen wurde in antisemitischen Postkarten eine „</span><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Freifahrkarte nach Jerusalem… hin und nicht wieder zurück“ angeboten<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1cm;"><i><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">„</span></i><i><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Die Physiognomie des jüdischen ‚Schmarotzers’, der als dunkelhaariger Mann mit langem Haar und Bart, mit hagerem Gesicht, Schirmmütze und Peies dargestellt wurde, diente zur Visualisierung des unmaskierten ‚wahren’ Juden, der allerdings aufgrund seiner Assimilationsfähigkeit in die Rolle des zivilisierten Westeuropäers schlüpfen könne; doch ‚die äußerliche Erscheinung ändere nichts an der rassischen Andersartigkeit und ihrem parasitären Charakter<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>’.“<o:p></o:p></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Ein Grundzug der Propaganda war also, daß (Ost-)Juden absolut, unnahbar <i>anders </i>seien, so daß eine rationale Auseinandersetzung oder ein friedliches Zusammenleben mit ihnen schlichtweg undenkbar sei. Nur als Gegner könne man sie verstehen.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Der Vergleich zum heutigen Zustand liegt wohl auf der Hand. Nur das Feindbild hat sich geändert. Ostjuden sind kein geeignetes Feindbild mehr, und zwar nicht zuletzt deshalb, weil sie größtenteils ermordet worden sind. Der nationalsozialistische Massenmord hat such die Einstellungen im euroamerikanischen Kulturkreis zum Judentum, und deshalb auch zum traditionellen Antisemitismus, grundlegend geändert. Heute werden alte NS-Sprüche wie „Juden raus“ nicht nur allgemein verachtet, sondern auch noch strafrechtlich geahndet (anders aber „Türken raus“ o.ä.). An die Stelle des traditionellen, wie auch des nationalsozialistisch verschärften Antisemitismus ist ein Philosemitismus getreten, der aber in manchen Hinsichten – wie z.B. die häufig unkritische Einstellung zur israelischen Politik – den Juden eher schadet als nützt. An die Stelle der Ostjuden als Gegenstand nationalistischer Hetze – das bestätigt erneut der „Antiislamisierungskongreß“ – sind die Muslime getreten. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Schon am Sprachgebrauch ist das zu erkennen. Nicht umsonst nennt die Rechte das Zusammenleben mit Menschen islamischen Glaubens und nahöstlicher Kultur „Islamisierung“. Damit soll nämlich zum Ausdruck gebracht werden, daß es sich nicht um Menschen wie dich und mich handele, sondern um gefährliche Unterwanderer, vor denen die „abendländisch-christliche“ Kultur hermetisch abzuriegeln sei. Daß die heutigen Inhaber der Ostjudenrolle sich nicht nur sprachlich, kulturell und religiös, sondern auch noch häufig aufgrund der Hautfarbe, von „uns“ unterscheiden, ist hierbei ein kleiner Pluspunkt (die Herstellungskosten gelber Halbmonde o.ä. kann man sich nämlich sparen). <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Wenden wir uns den heutigen Propagandisten einer vermeintlichen „Islamisierung“ zu, sehen wir einen Umgang mit dem „Gegnervolk“, der dem damaligen politischen Umgang mit den (Ost-)Juden verblüffend ähnlich sieht. Der Bau von Moscheen – wie einst der Bau von Synagogen – wird als „Drohung“ bezeichnet, der man sich entgegensetzen müsse. Als typische Beispiele der islamischen Ausländer, die die deutsche Gesellschaft bevölkern, und die die Mehrheitsverhältnisse in der Bundesrepublik „[u]m[zu]kippen“ drohen, führt ein sog. <i>Minority Report</i> über die „Islamisierung“ an:<span style=""> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1cm;"><i><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE">„Muslime, die ihren deutschen Hausfrauen drohen, ihnen ‚die Hand abzuhacken’, wenn sie einen anderen Mann auch nur anschauen (...). Oder analphabetische Patriarchen, die ihre Familienangelegenheiten mitten in Berlin nach dem Hausbrauch afghanischer Bergvölker regeln. Die Symptome (!) sind so unterschiedlich wie auch die Ansichten darüber, was schon eine Parallelgesellschaft ist und was noch nicht.“<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a><o:p></o:p></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Derselbe <i>Report </i>betont eine vermeintliche muslimische „Geheimniskrämerei“, und fragt rhetorisch, „Was denken diese Leute wirklich von uns, wenn sie unter sich sind?“<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a><span style=""> </span>„</span><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE">Hoffentlich sind wir diesen Verbreiter von Haß und Gewalt bald los! Doch wenn Staat beziehungsweise Land schon einmal Härte zeigen, folgt gleich die Beschwichtigung, er sei ja nur eine Ausnahme, alle anderen seien doch lieb und nett. <i>Sind sie das wirklich? Was wissen wir denn, was in den Moscheen gesprochen und verkündigt wird?</i>“ (Hervorhebung von mir) heißt es in einem von demselben <i>Report </i>zitierten Leserbrief im Berliner Morgenpost. </span><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Einzelheiten zur angedeuteten „muslimischen Weltverschwörung“ werden wir sicherlich demnächst in den <i>Protokollen der Weisen von Arabien </i>erfahren. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;">Gewalt, Kriminalität, Verschwörungen und Frauenschändung gehören also schon zum neuen Feindbild (wie auch in etwas anderer Form zur alten). Es bleibt dann nur noch das unnahbare <i>Anderssein </i>übrig. Doch auch das stellt uns der Verfasser des <i>Report </i>gern zur Verfügung. „</span><b><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE">Hinzu kommt,“ </span></b><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE">zitiert der <i>Report </i>einen Artikel des rechtsradikalen Blatts <i>Junge Freiheit</i>,<b><i> „</i>daß die Zuwanderung statt aus modernen und bildungsorientierten aus archaischen Gesellschaften erfolgt, und zwar aus deren Unterschichten. So weisen die migrantischen Jugendlichen in Kreuzberg einen durchschnittlichen Intelligenzquotienten von 86 auf, ein alarmierendes Unterschichtenindiz, denn erst ab 105 beginnt die höhere Gesellschaftsfähigkeit<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>.“ </b>Ein Dialog sei also undenkbar, weil die „gesellschaftsunfähigen“ Muslime rein geistig nicht in der Lage seien, einen zu führen<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[7]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE">In beiden Fällen werden also völkisch, sprachlich, religiös und kulturell definierte Feindbilder heraufbeschworen, die Europa angeblich unterwandern und erobern werden. Wie die Ostjuden wegen ihrer jiddisch- und hebräischsprachigen Gottesdienste werden die Muslime wegen der Führung von Gottesdiensten in ihren jeweiligen Muttersprachen verdächtigt. Die Gebetsstätten selbst werden als geheimnisvolle Verschwörungsstandorte beschrieben, in denen „die“ alles mögliche über „uns“ sagen, ohne daß „wir“ es mitbekommen. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;color:black;" lang="DE">Der im Titel dieses Aufsatzes verwendete Begriff des „neuen Antisemitismus“ ist freilich ein unpräziser. Zwar sind viele Muslime Araber, und damit auch semitischer Herkunft; dies trifft jedoch nicht z.B. auf Türken und Afghanen zu. Vielmehr soll mit dem Begriff zweierlei verdeutlicht werden. Zum einen soll dem als Schimpfwort für (auch jüdische) Israelkritiker verwendeten „neuen Antisemitismus“ eine weniger realtitätsfremde Bedeutung entgegengesetzt werden. Zum anderen soll durch die Verwendung des Antisemitismusbegriffs betont werden, daß beide Feindbilder dieselbe gesellschaftliche Funktion ausüben. So wie der Antisemitismus als „Sozialismus der dummen Kerle“ die Angst und Wut der weniger begüterten Schichten auf eine Zielscheibe lenkte, die eine Fundamentalkritik am Kapitalismus verhinderte, lenkt der heutige Islamisierungswahn von den ökonomisch-politischen Prozessen ab, denen man Massenarbeitslosigkeit, sozialen Abstieg und Hoffnungslosigkeit wirklich zu verdanken hat. </span><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <div style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><br /><hr align="left" size="1" width="33%"> <!--[endif]--> <div style="" id="ftn1"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"> Zit. n. http://www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/bsz/516/516lager.htm<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn2"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"> Zit. n. Judith Kessler, <i>Ausstellung: „Gruß aus Bad Kissingen“: Eine Ausstellung im Kommunikationsmuseum befaßt sich mit judenfeindlichen Postkarten, </i>http://www.berlin-judentum.de/news/2004/01/postkarten.htm<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn3"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"> Zit. n. Diana Carmen Albu, <i>„Der ewige Jude“ – Geschichte und Hintergründe eines NS-Propagandafilmes, </i>http://david.juden.at/kulturzeitschrift/50-54/Main%20frame_Artikel54_Albu.htm<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn4"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"> <i><span lang="DE">Minority Report, </span></i><span lang="DE">S. 20, erhältlich unter: http://www.islamisierung.info/file/Minority_Report.pdf<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn5"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"> Ebenda, S. 22<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn6"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"> Ebenda, S. 30, Hervorhebung im zit. Werk. <o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn7"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=327741148332515383#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[7]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span lang="DE" style="font-family:Tahoma;"> An diesem Zitat erkennt man auch einen der wichtigsten Unterschiede zwischen dem traditionellen europäischen Antisemitismus und dem heutigen Islamisierungswahn. Den (weißen) europäischen Juden bescheinigte man nämlich meist eine überdurchschnittliche Intelligenz und eine vermeintlich damit einhergehende „Gerissenheit“, die einen ehrlichen Dialog unmöglich machte. Den größtenteils nichtweißen Muslimen hingegen spricht man die Dialogfähigkeit wegen ihrer vermeintlich <i>unter</i>durchschnittlichen Intelligenz ab.</span></p><br /><p class="MsoFootnoteText"></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Post Scriptum:</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Seit dem gescheiterten Antiislamisierungskongreß werden von rechter Seite die Antifa- und sonstigen Gegendemonstranten als "Nazis" und "Faschisten" beschimpft. Das ist an und für sich nicht überraschend. Aber es drängt sich da eine Frage auf: Was wäre eigentlich gewesen, wenn den Gesinnungsgenossen der heutigen Herren Entislamisierer 1932 eine ähnliche Begrüßung begegnet wäre wie letzte Woche in Köln? </span></span></span><br /></div> </div>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-25131233581742710422008-09-21T16:51:00.004-04:002008-09-22T04:54:40.801-04:00Alle lieben (mund-)tote Juden!Wie weit der Philosemitismus mancher rechter Israel-"Unterstützer" reicht erkennt man sehr schnell daran, wie sie mit den Äußerungen von Juden umgehen, die ihnen nicht in den Kram passen. In solchen Fällen wird sofort klar, daß sie uns nur insofern leiden können, wie dies ihren neuen Erzfeinden, den Muslimen, schadet.<br /><br />In seinen Bemühungen, den gescheiterten Anti-"Islamisierungs"kongreß in Köln zu entnazifizieren, hat das Blog "PI-News" <a href="http://www.pi-news.net/2008/09/linksradikaler-mob-greift-juedischen-mitbuerger-an/">behauptet</a>, linke Demonstranten hätten einen jüdischen "Mitbürger" angegriffen. Durch ihre wohlgeschminkt zur Schau getragene Empörung über die zu "SA-Horden" und "Nazis" verkommenen "Linksfaschisten" sollte bewiesen werden, daß diese Entislamisierer zu einer "neuen" Rechten gehören, die keinerlei faschistische Altlasten mit sich herumschleppe.<br /><br />(Es ist natürlich gut möglich, daß die PI-Blogger das ganze erfunden haben. Das wäre ihnen schon zuzutrauen.)<br /><br />Auf dem Hintergrund habe ich mir folgenden Kommentar erlaubt. Leider ist die Datei, in der ich den Kommentar gespeichert hatte, verlorengegangen, also könnte der Wortlaut in einigen Einzelheiten vom Inhalt des ursprünglichen Kommentars abweichen.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;"><blockquote>Wozu brauchen wir Juden eigentlich Feinde, wenn wir solche "Freunde" wie euch haben?<br /><br />Lassen wir einmal beiseite, daß ihr einen jüdischen BÜRGER zum "Mitbürger" degradiert habt (der Begriff stammt nämlich aus dem römischen Recht und heißt "Staatsbürger zweiter Klasse"). <br /><br />Dem Artikel liegt die Annahme zugrunde, man könne Juden einfach so erkennen. Das ist natürlich völkisch-antisemitischer Schwachsinn. Antisemitische Beweggründe für den angebl. Angriff können jedoch nur dann unterstellt werden, wenn man davon ausgeht, daß nicht nur rein zufällig, sondern vorsätzlich ein jüdischer "Mitbürger" angegriffen worden sei. Ohne die Annahme, Juden seien sichtlich zu erkennen, macht der ganze Artikel also gar keinen Sinn.<br /><br />Wenn ihr aber nicht davon ausgeht, daß Juden alle gleich aussähen, gibt es nur eine andere Möglichkeit: Die angebl. jüdische Herkunft dieser Person wird als Schutzschild gegen die Vorwürfe, mit denen eine Organisation, die sich gegen Menschen einer bestimmten ethnisch-kulturell-religiösen Herkunft richtet, üblicherweise rechnen muß. <br /><br />Ihr mißbraucht also Juden zu euren eigenen Zwecken. <br /><br />Da sehnt man sich geradezu nach den Zeiten, als wir euch noch bestenfalls völlig egal waren!<br /><br />Früher hat man gegen die "Judaisierung" Europas gewittert. Heute ist das eben passé; man hat inzwischen andere Semiten gefunden. <br /><br />Dieser Zweck-Philosemitismus ist der schlimmste Antisemitismus überhaupt.</blockquote><br /><br /></span><br /><br />Die PI-Blogger haben sich entschieden, den Kommentar zu unterdrücken. Etwas anderes habe ich aber nicht erwartet. Bei der Rechten dürfen Juden entweder als menschliches Schutzschild oder als Sündenbock fungieren. Wer da nicht mitmacht, wird eben mundtot gehalten.alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-71885313947751315832008-06-23T01:49:00.007-04:002008-06-27T00:07:21.343-04:00Quiet, down there!<span style="font-size:130%;"><b style="font-family: arial;"><br /><i><br />The Discourse of Academic Freedom as Defence of Hierarchy in the Aftermath of J. Michael Bailey's </i>The Man Who Would Be Queen</b><br /></span> <p style="font-family: arial;" align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><b>Élise R. Hendrick</b><sup><b><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote1anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote1sym"><sup>1</sup></a></b></sup></span></p> <p style="font-family: arial;" align="center"> <span style="font-size:130%;"><b>I. Introduction:</b></span></p> <p style="font-family: arial;" align="center"> <span style="font-size:130%;"><b>Focus and Limits</b></span></p> <p style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />For the purposes of these remarks, I will assume that Alice Dreger and J. Michael Bailey, along with David Horowitz, Lynne Cheney, and many others over the past several years, are quite sincere in their vociferous defence of what they call "academic freedom". I make this assumption not because I believe it to be the only reasonable interpretation of the relevant facts, but because their sincerity, or lack thereof, is ultimately irrelevant to the question at hand, specifically: </span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 0.35cm; font-family: arial;" lang="en-GB"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><i> What is the nature of the "academic freedom" that Bailey, Dreger, et al. are so forcefully defending?;</i></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />Because of the narrow question presented, there will be no detailed discussion of such interesting subjects as the scientific status of J. Michael Bailey's <i>The Man Who Would Be Queen (TMWWBQ) </i>or the underlying work by Blanchard et al. on which that book was almost exclusively based. These matters have been discussed exhaustively elsewhere by myself and others. Nor do I intend to discuss the veracity of allegations that Bailey had sexual relations with at least one of his research subjects; to the extent that this matter is discussed at all, it is for the purpose of situating Bailey's public remarks on the propriety of such conduct within the overall framework of the "academic freedom" at issue. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />In examining the nature of the freedom so vigorously defended by Bailey et al., I will not make assumptions based on common usage or dictionary definitions. Instead, I will ascertain the contours of "academic freedom" ?la Bailey, Dreger et al. based on the specific conduct they claim violates it. Only by taking them at their word and looking in the directions in which they point us can we truly begin to comprehend their understanding of the concept and situate this understanding within its proper historical and political context. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;"><b><br />II. Freedom and its Defenders</b></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;"><i><b>"Academic Freedom": Content and Boundaries</b></i></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">In order to determine the contours of the academic freedom defended by Bailey, Dreger, et al., it is initially instructive to ask what conduct, in their view, falls within its scope, either as an exercise or a permissible defence of academic freedom. As strident defenders of academic freedom, it is reasonable to assume that they would not engage in any conduct that they themselves considered to be violative of it. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />It should be noted here that we are concerned with the <i>minimum scope </i>of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom (BDAF). Given the limited data available, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to locate the outer limits of BDAF; however, based on the conduct of Bailey and Dreger themselves, and the conduct assailed by them as violative of academic freedom, we can determine what, at a bare minimum, it includes, and how, at a minimum, it can be violated. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"> In examining the right of academic freedom asserted by Bailey and Dreger, it is useful to start by asking who are the beneficiaries and addressees of the right, i.e., who can assert the right, and against whom. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />The second prong of the question is also the simpler of the two. Bailey-Dreger academic freedom may be asserted against <i>anyone. </i>There is no limitation - as is customary in legal definitions of academic freedom - to state and quasi-state actors. Here, for example, Bailey and Dreger have asserted that their academic freedom has been violated by fellow academics, a graduate student, and persons entirely outside of the academic establishment. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">At first glance, it may seem obvious who can claim the protection of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom. Based on the cases in which Bailey and Dreger have asserted that his or their academic freedom has been violated, it might appear that BDAF is a purely status-based right: a person holding an academic position may assert the right with regard to conduct of any kind, even when, as in the case of<br /><i>TMWWBQ, </i><br />the asserting party expressly disavows any intention of engaging in scholarly activities.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />However, this picture omits an important aspect: Bailey and Dreger assert that their academic freedom has been violated by conduct - including conduct by persons holding academic positions - that is virtually indistinguishable from the conduct they assert is protected by academic freedom when engaged in by them. Indeed, the only meaningful difference between the conduct that Bailey and Dreger consider to be protected by their version of academic freedom and the conduct they consider to be a violation of their version of academic freedom is that the protected conduct is their own, whereas the (virtually indistinguishable) violative conduct is that of their critics.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />Thus, as we will see, Bailey-Dreger academic freedom accords heightened protection to their right as academics to engage in whatever conduct they wish, while prohibiting any criticism of that conduct by anyone. There is no requirement that their conduct be scholarly in nature, nor that those against whom the right is asserted be state actors.<br /><br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">Let us turn, then, to the most peculiar feature of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom, namely, the lack of any requirement that the underlying conduct be scholarly in nature. It should be noted that, with regard to <i>TMWWBQ,</i></span><span style="font-style: normal;font-size:130%;" > there are two paths by which this conclusion can be reached: either, as Bailey now claims, he had no intention of engaging in scientific research, but rather merely wished to create the impression that he had done so by means of the book's title ("The Science of Gender Bending and Transsexualism"), marketing materials ("based on his original research"), and numerous allusions to "our study" and the like in the book itself; or, as the book itself indicates, Bailey did in fact intend <i>TMWWBQ </i><span style="font-style: normal;">to be a work of science, but did so poorly. Whether one chooses to credit the version offered by Bailey in his book, or the version offered in response to criticisms of the book, the conduct in question need not be scholarly or scientific; anything written by a professor will do.<br /></span></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><b>Case Study I: "Sympathetic" is in the eye of the beholder</b></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />For the most part, the criticism of <i>TMWWBQ, </i>unlike the book itself, has been a fairly decorous affair, conducted at the level of fact, research, science, and ethics. Thus, there has only been one case in which the criticism can be considered to have even approached the edge of the minimum scope of the conduct protected by Bailey-Dreger academic freedom: the captions placed by Andrea James on publicly available photographs of Bailey's children.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />However, before we conclude that this conduct is analogous to Bailey's, certain distinguishing factors must be taken into account. Of these, the most important distinction is the <i>intent. </i></span><span style="font-style: normal;font-size:130%;" >Unlike Bailey's portrayal of transsexual women as inherently deceptive beings who transition either to enhance their masturbatory activities or to bed as many heterosexual men as possible (the latter group being "especially suited to prostitution" and "especially motivated" to commit theft), Andrea James was by no means seeking to convince her audience of the truth of her captions. To my knowledge, not even Bailey and Dreger claim that James' captions were intended as factual assertions, nor has James at any time asserted that there was a scientific or other factual basis for the content of those captions.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />Rather, James' purpose was to point out to those who saw the captions how they would feel if the labels Bailey calls "sympathetic" when aimed at trans women were instead directed at their own children. Furthermore, in response to the entirely predictable outrage, James - who, whatever one may think of the method, had already proved her point - issued an apology and removed the offending pictures from her website.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><br />This indisputably (and intentionally) offensive act, of which much has been made by Bailey & Co., stands in stark contrast to Bailey's own conduct, conduct that clearly falls within the heightened protection of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom. It is uncontroversial that the epithets Bailey directed at trans women as a group were meant to be taken as fact. Indeed, they are printed in a book that proclaims itself "the science" on the subject, a book based on Bailey's "original research".<br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />While Bailey has not always been entirely consistent on whether the book is to be treated as a scientific work (depending on whether he wishes to claim the authority of science or duck the responsibility that comes with it), he has never suggested that <i>TMWWBQ </i></span><span style="font-style: normal;font-size:130%;" >was intended as a satire or parody of certain fields of science; indeed, the one matter on which he has not wavered is the fundamental scientific accuracy of his proclamation that all trans women are liars seeking to live out sexual fantasies. Any clinician or researcher who begs to differ is "squeamish" or "not scholarly enough", and, accordingly, does not even deserve to be mentioned by name.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">Page after page, he asserts that his characterisations of trans women are "scientific" and "the truth", regardless of what those notoriously deceptive trans women might have you believe. Bailey has issued no apology, retraction, or qualification, and <i>TMWWBQ </i></span><span style="font-style: normal;font-size:130%;" >continues to be touted as "The Science of Gender Bending and Transsexualism" and marketed as "based on his original research".</span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">With those caveats in mind, we are left with two instances of virtually identical conduct, in one case, that of J. Michael Bailey, in the other, that of Andrea James, one of Bailey's most vocal trans critics. Alice Dreger, in her lengthy defence of Bailey, describes James' conduct as a "disgust[ing]", "unethical" "intimidation tactic", rendering James "not the sort of person who [is] good for a scholarly institution nor the sort who [is] good for trans rights." Interested readers will search in vain for such harsh terms to be used to describe what Dreger calls "Bailey's alleged treatment of transsexuals in his book" (Dreger, p. 4)<sup><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote2anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote2sym"><sup>2</sup></a>.</sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><br /></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">It is important to reiterate here that the question is not whose conduct deserves what degree of condemnation. Unless one believes that trans women, as a class, deserve less dignity and respect than professors' children, that question is easily disposed of. Rather, the question is: what do these two substantially similar cases tell us about the nature of the "academic freedom" Bailey and Dreger are committed to defending? This is a particularly instructive case because Bailey's conduct is treated as a protected exercise of academic freedom, whereas James' "parody" (to use Dreger's own term) is a violation of that same freedom.</sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><br /></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">Clearly, there must be some crucial distinction that leads these two examples to fall on completely opposite ends of the spectrum of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom. Certainly, it cannot be the fact that James' conduct was not scholarly in nature and did not seek to assert or establish a matter of scientific fact. Neither James nor anyone else has claimed that her conduct was intended as an assertion of scientific fact, and Bailey has been at great pains to disavow any attempt to create a work of scholarship on his part. Nor can it be the content of James' captions or Bailey's book. If anything, if the judgment were based on content alone, James' captions - which make no factual assertions, were retracted and taken out of circulation, and were intended as a parody - would be trivial in comparison to a work that makes, as categorical, scientific fact, similar assertions about an entire class of people. Similarly, it cannot be a question of the relative "innocence" of the victim; trans women, as a class, were not "asking for" this sort of treatment any more than were Bailey's children. Nor can the crucial distinction be a matter of choice of words. If anything, James' use of slang and expletives makes it clear that the assertions are not to be taken seriously as a matter of fact, whereas Bailey's prose further seeks to lend the authority of science to his labels. </sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><br /></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">Yet, the one - to return to Dreger's description - is a disgusting, unethical intimidation tactic unbefitting a scholarly institution and damaging to trans rights and academic freedom, while the other is merely a permissible, protected <i>exercise</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> of academic freedom. </span></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><br /></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"></sup>Having exhausted all content- and style-based possibilities, we are left with matters of status. Bailey is a tenured academic at a respected institution, who is thus accorded the privilege to define and categorise. James is a trans woman, worthy only of being the object of the definitions and categorisations bestowed upon her by the guardians of received knowledge. James' conduct upsets the order of things, whereas Bailey's <i>is </i>the order of things.</sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><br /></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><b>Case Study II: "Not that there's anything wrong with it."</b></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">This order of things becomes clearer as we move on to another instructive episode for our analysis of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom. In the course of the investigation by Lynn Conway et al. into <i>TMWWBQ </i><span style="font-style: normal;">and its making, Bailey was accused by one of his research subjects, who has come to be known as "Juanita", of having had sexual relations with her. It bears repeating at this point that we are not concerned here with the accusation itself - which Bailey has, albeit equivocally, denied - but with what the Bailey-Dreger treatment of the accusations tells us about the nature of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom.</span></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">In his search for material to include in <i>TMWWBQ, </i>Bailey posed as a clinical psychologist evaluating trans women for sex-reassignment surgery (SRS) approval letters. While he was not, at any relevant time, licensed to practice as a clinical psychologist in the state of Illinois, he was able to avoid legal sanction for practicing without a license because he did not receive payment in exchange for his services, as required by the relevant Illinois statute<a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote3anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote3sym"><sup>3</sup></a>. In this context, he became acquainted with "Juanita", who has since accused him of having had sexual relations with her.</sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br />Bailey addresses this accusation in his <i>Academic McCarthyism</i><sup><i><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote4anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote4sym"><sup>4</sup></a></i><i>. </i></sup></sup></sup>Because it is so instructive, his response is reproduced in its entirety below:</sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.35cm; font-family: arial;" align="left" lang="en-GB"><span style="font-size:130%;"></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">Sex With a "Research Subject." This charge was clearly intended to embarrass me rather than to protect a research subject. <i>The complainant was, after all, a prostitute.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> I offer two responses.</span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="margin-left: 1cm; font-family: arial;" align="left" lang="de-DE"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >First, there is nothing intrinsically wrong or forbidden about having sex with a research subject (and I insist that Juanita was not a research subject). Some of my colleagues have had sex with their research subjects, because it is not unusual to ask one's romantic partner to be a subject.</span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="margin-left: 1cm; font-family: arial;" align="left"><span lang="de-DE" style="font-size:130%;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><i>Even if Juanita's complaint were true, there is nothing wrong with what she claims.</i> But her "complaint" is not true. The alleged event never happened. If I ever needed to do so, I could prove this, but there is no reason why I should<span lang="de-DE"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote5anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote5sym"><sup>5</sup></a></span></span></sup><span lang="de-DE"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">.</span></span></sup></sup></span></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">Of the 125 words Bailey dedicates to "Juanita's" charge, only 30 are dedicated to actually denying that he had sexual relations with her, with an additional 10 dedicated to denying that "Juanita" was in fact a research subject. We need not tarry on this material. Ultimately, whether to credit the accusation or the denial is a credibility judgment, and Bailey has provided more than enough material for interested individuals to reach their own conclusions on his credibility. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.35cm; font-family: arial;" align="left" lang="en-GB"><span style="font-size:130%;"></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">What is, however, of interest in Bailey's response to "Juanita's" charges are his more general assertions on the propriety of the conduct of which he is accused. We begin by noting that "the complainant was, after all, a prostitute", and therefore, apparently, is forever estopped from objecting to, or claiming to have been harmed by, any sexual encounter. Having reminded readers of the complainant's all-important status, he proceeds to inform us that, even were "Juanita" a full-fledged human being with the attendant rights of sexual autonomy, it is perfectly right and proper to have sex with one's research subjects. Indeed, he informs us, he knows people who have had sex with their research subjects "because it is not unusual to ask one's romantic partner to be a subject."</sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"></span><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.35cm; font-family: arial;" align="left" lang="en-GB"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">Thus, for the purposes of determining what conduct is protected by Bailey-Dreger academic freedom, there is no difference between asking one's romantic partner to participate, say, in a memory study, and posing as a clinical psychologist, providing unlicensed evaluation services in that guise in order to glean intimate details about one's "patient's" sex life, and then, having established the relationship thusly, having sexual relations with one's unwitting research subject. Nor does it make any difference that one is posing as a person with the power to grant or deny access to a treatment the unwitting research subject/"patient" desperately needs. Indeed, the overall context of the relationship - of whatever sort it may have been - with "Juanita" is so irrelevant to the question of the propriety of Bailey's conduct that he does not even address it. </span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup> </sup></sup></span><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.35cm; font-family: arial;" align="left" lang="en-GB"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup>Nor does he address the propriety of having sex with a person with whom one has a clinical psychologist-client relationship, though it seems reasonable to take his silence on the issue as an indication that this conduct, too, is protected by Bailey-Dreger academic freedom and therefore immune from criticism<sup><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote6anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote6sym"><sup>6</sup></a></sup>. And if the complainant is a sex worker, the matter is clearly not worthy of even that cursory treatment. </sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup> </sup></sup></span><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.35cm; font-family: arial;" align="left" lang="en-GB"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup>That is not to say that there is nothing objectionable or harmful about such matters. However, as Dreger points out in her defence of Bailey, perhaps we should keep things in perspective. The public criticism of <i>TMWWBQ </i><span style="font-style: normal;">and Bailey's conduct in producing and<span style="font-style: normal;"> marketing the book "came remarkably close to effectively destroying J. Michael Bailey뭩 reputation and life" (Dreger, p. 52). Whether the publication of a purportedly scientific book branding all trans women as lying erotomaniacs might have had psychological, personal, legal, and professional consequences for trans women, on the other hand, is irrelevant. Under the Bailey-Dreger doctrine, consequences matter only to the extent that they harm worthy victims.</span></span></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup> </sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup> Thus, it appears that whether trans women, as a group, are entitled to the same level of dignity and respect as professors and their children is a matter of some controversy, after all. </sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup> </sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><b>Case Study III: Holding the line</b></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup> </sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup>One of the most interesting case studies in the Bailey-Dreger doctrine arose in response to the call for proposals that led to the present panel discussion. In her CFP, which was posted on the Women's Studies listserv WMST-L, Joelle Ruby Ryan gave the following accurate summary of the <i>TMWWBQ </i><span style="font-style: normal;">controversy: </span></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup>While Bailey's book The Man Who Would be Queen was released in 2003 to overwhelmingly negative reviews, the book caused a stir for its assertion that trans women can be split into two groupings: "homosexual transsexuals" and 밶utogynephilics." Trans activists and allies mobilized and took Bailey to task for his bogus claims and helped to document a compelling case against him. Many considered it an open-and-shut case until the 2007 appearance of an article by Bailey colleague and intersex researcher Alice Dreger, who published a lengthy apologia for Bailey in the Archives of Sexual Behavior and castigated trans women activists for their attempts at "ruining" Bailey. </sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup> </sup></sup></span><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.35cm; font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br />In her CFP, Ryan raised a number of issues as potential topics for discussion, including the accusations of research misconduct, the propagation of "master narratives" harmful to trans women, and Bailey's advocacy of a "parental right" to test for a supposed "gay gene" <i>in utero </i><span style="font-style: normal;">for the purpose of selective abortion (described by many, including Ryan, as "eugenics"). </span></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br />Dreger immediately attacked Ryan's CFP, claiming that it was "laden with factual errors and misrepresentations about the history of the Bailey controversy and [Dreger's] work<sup><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote7anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote7sym"><sup>7</sup></a></sup>." Of particular interest to our discussion is that Dreger frames Ryan's CFP - though not in so many words - as a threat to (Bailey-Dreger) academic freedom: </sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /></sup></sup></span><blockquote style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><br />In this work, I trace what happened to Bailey, a sex researcher who said some politically unpopular things.. What happened to Bailey was shocking and important enough that my findings were covered in the New York Times a few weeks ago[...] I encourage scholars in Women's Studies to read my paper because I think they are in danger of similar things happening to them, since they often say politically unpopular things<sup><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote8anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote8sym"><sup>8</sup></a></sup>.</sup></sup></span></blockquote><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup> It is worth noting that Dreger did not provide any examples of the alleged factual errors or misrepresentations.<br />Indeed, on the following day, in an exchange on the same listserv with Emi Koyama, Dreger still does not supply any specifics,<br />though she does add an adjective. The alleged misrepresentations are now "profound<sup><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote9anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote9sym"><sup>9</sup></a></sup>",<br />though they remain unspecified. Nor do Dreger's accusations increase in specificity on the following day, though they do increase in intensity:</sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup>I also appreciate your advising Joelle Ruby Ryan " that <i>she was </i><i>putting herself at risk as a<br />scholar</i> working within a controversial field (trans issues) by tolerating tactics that breed fear and stifle academic freedom."<br />I would add that one is not acting like a scholar when one <i>repeatedly</i> misrepresents facts and the work of other scholars,<br />as Ms. Ryan did in her CFP<sup><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote10anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote10sym"><br /><sup>10</sup></a></sup>.</sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup>A month later, little has changed. The unspecified alleged misrepresentations in Ryan's CFP have now been<br />upgraded to "defam[ation]<sup><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote11anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote11sym"><br /><sup>11</sup></a></sup>". Dreger now asks: "Should I sit around and let someone say false, harmful things about me and my<br />work, just because I'm not as oppressed as them? (Would you?)<sup><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote12anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote12sym"><sup>12</sup></a></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup>After the unspecified accusations against Ryan have hung in the air on WMST-L for over a month, Koyama<sup><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote13anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote13sym"><sup>13</sup></a><br />suggests that Dreger might wish to provide something in the way of actual substantiation of her repeated claims of misrepresentations,<br />profound misrepresentations, and defamation. "No problem," Dreger responds<sup><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote14anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote14sym"><sup>14</sup></a>.<br />Why it apparently <i>had </i>been a problem for over a month prior to Dreger's e-mail of 23 October, 2007 is, of course, beyond<br />the scope of this work.</sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup>Ultimately, it turns out that Dreger's accusations refer to Ryan's characterisation of Dreger's 62-page defence of<br />Bailey as "a lengthy apologia", Ryan's reference to Bailey's advocacy of what could reasonably be called "eugenics" and what is euphemistically called "reparative therapy", Ryan's statement that Bailey was accused of having sex with a research subject, and Ryan's reference to "master narratives" harmful to trans people<sup><span style="font-style: normal;"><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote15anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote15sym"><sup>15</sup></a></span></sup><span style="font-style: normal;">. The first of these "profound", "libelous" "misrepresentations" is a statement of opinion, a characterisation of Dreger's "scholarly history" with which Dreger does not agree. The "eugenics" comment is a matter of interpretation; reasonable people can differ on whether it constitutes eugenics to put the power to eliminate gay people from the gene pool in the hands of individual prospective parents. As for the "reparative therapy" reference, anyone familiar with the "Danny" narrative in Bailey's <i>TMWWBQ </i><span style="font-style: normal;">is aware that the claim is accurate.<br />What constitutes a harmful "master narrative", on the other hand, is another matter of opinion.</span></span></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup>Having thus outlined her <i>casus belli, </i>Dreger announces that:</sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><blockquote style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup>A lot of scholars (including several ethicists I saw at ASBH this past weekend) have outright begged me to move on to<br />lawsuits, not so much for myself as to protect other scholars from similar future smear campaigns like the one I document<br />in my article<sup><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote16anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote16sym"><sup>16</sup></a>.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></blockquote><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>That Dreger's list of "profound", "libelous" "misrepresentations" does not include a single item that would give rise to a<br />cause of action for libel or defamation is a matter for a symposium on <i>New York Times v. Sullivan</i><sup><i><br /><a class="sdfootnoteanc" name="sdfootnote17anc" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote17sym"><sup>17</sup></a></i><br />and its progeny. Nor need we tarry on the question of whether Dreger was aware of the rudiments of libel and defamation law when she<br />made this threat, or whether she simply hoped that Ryan would not be. Instead, we are concerned here with what constitutes a<br />permissible defence of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom, and this episode is quite instructive in that regard.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>At this point, it is worth reiterating that we are dealing with a quintessentially scholarly activity: a call for submissions<br />for an academic panel discussion. From Dreger's response to Ryan's CFP, however, it is clear that this scholarly activity -<br />unlike <i>TMWWBQ </i>or Dreger's apologia - is well outside of the protection of Bailey-Dreger<br />academic freedom. Indeed, not only is it not protected by the Bailey-Dreger doctrine, it is, in itself, a violation of it.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>From Dreger's response, it appears that there are few limits - if any - to the means to which a beneficiary of Bailey-Dreger<br />academic freedom may resort. Surprisingly, even threats of potentially devastating defamation litigation - the ultimate in<br />state-supplied coercive mechanisms - may be employed in order to bring miscreants to heel. Even short of employing the coercive<br />measures of the state, it is permissible to defend one's Bailey-Dreger academic freedom by issuing vague, unspecified accusations,<br />and allowing them to hang in the air for extended periods, in order to undermine the reputation and credibility of a violator<br />of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>Here, again, we see the Bailey-Dreger doctrine's interesting treatment of consequences. The consequences of a violation of<br />Bailey-Dreger academic freedom for its beneficiaries are all-important, more important than the substance of the protected<br />activity or the nature of the violation. The consequences that the exercise of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom might bring for<br />others, on the other hand, are irrelevancies, trivial matters not worthy of any serious time or attention.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>If, for example, someone takes <i>TMWWBQ </i>and its production seriously enough to research<br />its making and publicly critique its content, the validity of their critique is of no consequence; the only matter of importance<br />is the damage that such attention might cause to Bailey's reputation. The logic is akin to that of Justice Antonin Scalia's order<br />enjoining further vote counting in Florida on the grounds that, if the count revealed that Bush had lost, this would cause<br />irreparable harm to his legitimacy as President.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>If, on the other hand, Dreger decides to damage a graduate student's career with vague, unspecified (and ultimately false)<br />accusations in order to forestall an academic discussion that is violative of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom, the consequences<br />for the graduate student are no concern of ours. She was asking for it.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>From these case studies, it is clear that Bailey-Dreger academic freedom is fundamentally status-based. Unscholarly conduct<br />may be protected, and scholarly conduct unprotected, based on the status of the person engaging in that conduct. However, it<br />is clear that the relevant status is not a position within the academic establishment. While the two known beneficiaries of<br />Bailey-Dreger academic freedom both hold faculty positions at a leading university, Lynn Conway and Deirdre McCloskey, both<br />respected academics at other institutions, clearly do not merit the protection of the Bailey-Dreger doctrine.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>What, then, is the key status attribute that distinguishes those who benefit from the virtually absolute right of Bailey-Dreger<br />academic freedom from those who are subject to the corresponding duty to applaud or remain silent? It would be cynical to suggest<br />that the only beneficiaries of the doctrine of Bailey-Dreger academic freedom are Bailey and Dreger, and no evidence suggests that<br />the doctrine would never apply to anyone other than themselves. Thus, the necessary status attribute must be something more than<br />merely belonging to the academic establishment.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p style="font-family: arial;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup>Judging from the case studies above, it would appear that the key criterion is not <i>membership</i> in the academic hierarchy,<br />but one's attitude toward hierarchy itself. This is the one clear distinguishing characteristic between the conduct of Bailey<br />and Dreger and that of Conway et al. Bailey and Dreger, above all, defend the hierarchical position of "experts", their right<br />to define and categorise the lower orders, without regard to the lived experiences or insights that the latter might provide.<br />By demanding to be heard on the question of "who and what are trans women," and even daring to contradict a J. Michael Bailey,<br />Conway et al. challenged one of the most entrenched hierarchies in our society: the right of Thorstein Veblen's "substantial<br />people" to define the discourse on any given subject. It is not the butterfly's place to lecture the entomologist; it may feel<br />pain whilst being pinned to a corkboard, but it had best keep that to itself.</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote1"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote1sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote1anc">1</a><br />Freelance writer and translator, Cincinnati, OH, elise.hendrick gmail com. For other articles on the Bailey controversy and<br />other subjects, see http://lifeaftergonzales.blogspot.com. </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote2"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote2sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote2anc">2</a>References to "Dreger" refer to Dreger, A.D., <i>The Controversy Surrounding </i><span style="font-style: normal;">The Man Who Would Be Queen: <i>A Case History of the Politics of Science, Identity, and Sex in the Internet Age, </i><span style="font-style: normal;">Archives of Sexual Behavior, 2007.</span></span></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote3"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote3sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote3anc">3</a><span lang="de-DE"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">See 225 ILCS 15 ?(6) (providing that a person only "represents himself to be a clincial psychologist" within the meaning of the Illinois Clinical Psychologist Licensing Act when he offers relevant services "for remuneration".)</span></span></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote4"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote4sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote4anc">4</a>Bailey, J.M., <i>Academic McCarthyism, </i><span style="font-style: normal;">Northwestern Chronicle, 10/09/2005, http://www.chron.org/tools/viewart.php?artid=1248, last accessed on 19 June 2008. </span></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote5"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote5sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote5anc">5</a><i>Id, </i>(emphasis supplied)</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote6"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote6sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote6anc">6</a>It is, however, worthwhile to note that the Illinois legislature has been less reticent on the subject, and, in 740 ILCS 140 ?2 <i>et seq., </i><span style="font-style: normal;">has declared such conduct tortious, expressly extending the cause of action to "unlicensed mental health professionals" such as Bailey. </span></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote7"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote7sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote7anc">7</a>Dreger, A.D., p.e.c. on WMST-L, 19 Sept. 2007</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote8"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote8sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote8anc">8</a><i>Id., </i><span style="font-style: normal;">URL omitted.</span></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote9"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote9sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote9anc">9</a>Dreger, A.D., p.e.c. on WMST-L, 20 Sept. 2007</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote10"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote10sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote10anc">10</a>Dreger, A.D., p.e.c. on WMST-L, 21 Sept. 2007 (emphasis supplied)</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote11"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote11sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote11anc">11</a>Dreger, A.D., p.e.c. on WMST-L, 19 Oct. 2007</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote12"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote12sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote12anc">12</a>Dreger, A.D., p.e.c. on WMST-L, 22 Oct. 2007</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote13"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote13sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote13anc">13</a>Koyama, E., p.e.c. on WMST-L, 22 Oct. 2007</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote14"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote14sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote14anc">14</a>Dreger, A.D., p.e.c. on WMST-L, 23 Oct. 2007</sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote15"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote15sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote15anc">15</a><i>Id. </i> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote16"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote16sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote16anc">16</a><i>Id.</i></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><div style="font-family: arial;" id="sdfootnote17"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span><p class="sdfootnote"><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><a class="sdfootnotesym" name="sdfootnote17sym" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#sdfootnote17anc">17</a>376 U.S. 254 (1964) (in order to state a claim for defamation, a public figure must show that allegedly defamatory statements are false and published knowingly, or with reckless disregard for the truth). </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup> </sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><sup style="font-family: arial;"><sup><sup><sup><sup><sup><br /></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></sup></span>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-36577831643927636302008-04-02T04:06:00.001-04:002008-04-02T04:11:12.898-04:00Wake-Up Call: Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale<p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Imagine: <i>You go to the store. When you attempt to ring up your purchases, you find that your card keeps being declined with a cryptic "invalid number" message, even though you know there's more than enough on your account. The man at the till - who has without comment replaced the woman who worked there just yesterday - seems to know a bit more about your debit card woes than he's letting on. After you, and all your female colleagues, are sent home from your office on the orders of rather inhospitable-looking gentlemen with automatic weapons, you find out that all of your assets have been frozen and can only be released to your husband or closest male relative.</i></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><i><br /></i> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><i>And that's just the start...</i></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><i><br /></i></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Even two weeks after finishing Margaret Atwood's <i>The Handmaid's Tale </i>in a 24-hour flurry of pages, I find that the profound sense of dread I have felt creeping into the back door of my consciousness is making it quite hard to approach the book with any semblance of analytical distance. In part, this is due to Atwood's beautiful writing, which creates such a powerful empathic bond with the narrator that I felt as if, instead of reading the memoirs of Offred, I <i>lived </i>them. And like an all-too-plausible nightmare, part of me remains stubbornly unwilling to partake in the profound relief I should be feeling that the world of <i>THT </i>is in fact not (yet?) a reality.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><i>But</i>: Even before opening <i>THT, </i>I was acutely aware of the beating that the rights of women have taken over my lifetime<i>. </i>In 2008, women have already lost the right to sue for pay discrimination (rendered a practical impossibility by <i>Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire Co.). </i>In 2008, the state has already been given a green light to dictate what medical care we may receive without regard to any attendant risks to our health (thanks to <i>Gonzales v. Carhart), </i>and the same decision, reached by an all-male majority, spends about as much time on the "feminine mind", deemed too emotionally immature and indecisive to make important medical decisions, as it does on actual constitutional issues. In 2008, we have a Supreme Court Justice who believes a man should have as much power over his (adult) wife as he does over his (minor) daughter.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">The fundamentalist clerics who had just begun their ascent to power in the mid-80s, when Atwood wrote <i>The Handmaid's Tale, </i>far from being thankfully raptured out of existence on 1 January 2000, have had plenty of reason to celebrate. From the grip they now have over our Air Force to the indoctrination centres featured in the documentary <i>Jesus Camp, </i>from the pressure they now exert over our educational system (getting science out of our schools and taking the sex <i>and </i>the ed out of Sex-Ed), the dream shared by the likes of Ralph Reed, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and Tim LaHaye of becoming one of the most powerful reactionary forces in our society has come frighteningly true.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Thus, in reading <i>The Handmaid's Tale, </i>I found that I perceived the fundamentalist Christian theocracy it described (which came to power by suspending the Constitution after an alleged Islamic terrorist attack) not as speculative fiction, but as a warning of an entirely possible future.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><i>The Handmaid's Tale </i><span style="font-style: normal;">is the story of Offred ("of Fred"), told as a first-person, oral memoir. In "the time before", Offred was a university-educated IT professional who worked at a local library, and was married with a 5-year-old daughter. What we hear of her life in "the time before" (as she always calls it) is told in brief, disconnected flashbacks, distant recollections of a time that hardly seems real to her anymore. And understandably so. In the time in which the principal story is set, she has lost all she once had. First, she lost her bank account (transferred to her husband, Luke). Then, she lost her job (it is now illegal for women to work outside the home). Then, she lost her home, her husband, and her daughter (Luke was previously divorced, rendering the marriage adulterous and thus criminal in the new order). Not only that, she has lost the mystery novels she used to enjoy reading (women are forbidden access to reading or writing materials in an effort to eliminate female literacy), and every last vestige of control over her body.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Offred's new status, which brought with it her new name, is a great honour. Or so she is constantly told. She is a Handmaid, a fertile woman assigned to a member of the élite of the new regime, a Commander of the Faithful, so that he might use her uterus to conceive a child. If she fails to conceive - by definition <i>her </i>failure, as official doctrine holds that there is no such thing as male infertility - she will be sent to the Colonies, the slave-labour camps of the new regime, as an Unwoman. If she does conceive and give birth to a healthy child, she will be spared this fate. Her posting in the household of Commander Fred is her last chance.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">She is not the only woman-in-captivity in Fred's house. Together with her are two Marthas, infertile women used for domestic services, and Fred's wife, whom she calls Serena Joy. To the Marthas, she is a pariah, though fraternisation with them is illegal, anyway. To Serena Joy, she is the object of resentment, though Serena Joy has plenty of resentment to go around. In "the time before", Offred remembers seeing her on television, copiously made up, evangelising to women about the joys of staying home and being submissive to one's husband, joys in which she did not herself partake. Now, she - like all women - has been completely banished from the public sphere, and divides her days between knitting the same scarf over and over again, smoking, and making Offred - with whom she must now share her husband - feel as unwelcome as possible.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Offred's days are spent in mind-crushing boredom. Most of the time, she stays in her room, which has been carefully rid of any potential instrument of suicide, with the only reading material she has left: a pillow embroidered with the word FAITH and a hidden inscription in the closet reading <i>Nolite te bastardes carbondonum, </i>a message she surmises was left by her predecessor, who was found hanging from a light fixture that has since been removed. She wears the same thing every day: a blood-red ankle-length dress designed to obscure every contour of her body below the neck and a bonnet designed to cover her hair and eliminate her peripheral vision. Once a day, she is allowed to leave the house to do the day's shopping, accompanied by another Handmaid to ensure mutual surveillance.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Her partner on these daily shopping excusions is Ofglen. After enduring multiple painstakingly orthodox conversations about safe topics ("Blessed be the fruit", "May the Lord open," amongst other gibberish), Ofglen begins outing herself as a member of a resistance group known as Mayday, thus becoming the only person with whom Offred can speak with anything approaching candour. From Ofglen, she learns that Mayday is bringing women to safety in Canada (or "removing our precious national resources from the country" in official regime parlance). On their excursions, they always pass by the Wall, where the recently executed are hanged, allowing Offred to ascertain whether any of them is her husband.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Gradually, the situation in the household of Commander Fred becomes somewhat more complicated. Fred, it seems, would like to see Offred privately, outside of the officially sanctioned context of the "Ceremony" (the bizarre monthly ritualised rape in which the Commander attempts to inseminate his Handmaid). While this is strictly forbidden, Offred has no real option and acquiesces, uncertain what she is to expect. As it turns out, she is to expect a game of Scrabble and the opportunity to read an assortment of magazines so banal that she could barely tolerate them in "the time before", but which now are like a bottle of Perrier in the intellectual desert of her life. In exchange for this, Fred wants her to kiss him "like you mean it". She must also endure his lectures on what a lovely idea this new order was. From him, she discovers that the inscription in her closet is dog Latin for "Don't let the bastards grind you down", an enterprise in which her predecessor met with rather limited success.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">To make matters even more uncomfortable, Serena Joy begins speaking increasingly candidly with Offred, and even offers her one of her cigarettes (nicotine, alcohol, and caffeine are all illegal for Handmaids, and Offred spends many a paragraph talking about how much she's dying for a smoke). As it turns out, Serena Joy is convinced that her husband is sterile, as appears to be the case with many of the Commanders. In order to secure a child for Serena Joy and safety from the Colonies for Offred, Serena Joy proposes that she sleep with Fred's driver, Nick, a rather enigmatic character who is either affiliated with the Mayday Resistance or with the secret police ("the Eyes"), a proposal to which Offred agrees.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">There are too many facets to <i>The Handmaid's Tale </i>to attempt a full synopsis without it becoming a mediocre retelling of a brilliant story; thus, I will leave the remainder to the interested reader, and move on.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Margaret Atwood's prose is a <i>tour de force. </i>Her style beautifully reproduces the feeling of oral recollections retold without the aid of anything but the teller's memory. The descriptions of Offred's daily life are laden with free associations of words, puns, and other verbal tics that can often be heard from a person trying to force vague or difficult memories to the surface. Her writing gives Offred's story an immediacy and an urgency that break down any analytical walls that may separate the content of the book from the mind of the reader. It is all too easy to see and feel oneself in Offred's position, to feel what she feels, to see the world and her life as she sees them. It is, indeed, like an all-too-real nightmare that leads one to spend the entire day not entirely certain whether the events in the dream actually happened or not.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">I am no stranger to heavy reading material. For years, atrocities and dystopias, historical and fictitious, have been a major staple of my library. It is exceedingly rare for me to be shaken by something I have read. I was shaken by <i>The Handmaid's Tale, </i>and, to a certain extent, still am. One of the most peculiar side-effects of reading <i>THT </i>has been a heightened awareness of things that I normally take for granted (as I should be able to do).</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">In particular, it has made me extremely conscious of the very act of reading, even in trivial instances. Normally, unless I am reading a language I cannot yet read well, reading for me feels like a purely sensory act. I <i>see </i>a word. The underlying interpretive act that connects the symbolic data in front of me to the phonetic and conceptual representations and associations I have in my mind is normally reflexive and unconscious. Since I began <i>THT, </i>I have become remarkably aware of this process. The day I started reading it, I had to go to the supermarket to buy a bottle of red wine, where I found that I was extremely aware (and somehow rather surprised) to find myself reading the words on the wine labels. I have the same feeling, the same vague fascination and <i>relief </i>now any time I read something and don't need to be clandestine about it, the things one feels about something to which one is not entirely accustomed.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Perhaps, though, the greatest threat to the rights that allow us, as women, to live our lives is the fact that we <i>have </i>grown accustomed to them, to the extent that we often give little or no thought to our exercise of them. Even less do we think about how <i>recent, </i><span style="font-style: normal;">how utterly </span><i>new </i>those hard-fought victories are. It was not until the early 1970s that the Supreme Court decided - parting with about a century of precedent and the entire enactment history - to interpret the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution as even a limited prohibition on sex discrimination. The right to self-determination over our reproductive systems, now in great danger, was not officially recognised until 1973. A late-1950s business law hornbook I bought years ago at a used-books store includes a footnote in its section on "Contractual Capacity and Disability" (essentially who is legally capable of concluding a binding contract) listing the states in which as of the date of publication a married woman could not sign a contract without the written consent of her husband, even if he was in no way bound by it. In the decade that saw the publication of that hornbook, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor graduated at the top of her class at Stanford - an achievement that would cause every major institutional law firm to roll out the red carpet for a male graduate - and could not find a firm that would offer her a position as more than a legal secretary. Last but not least, there are still people living today who remember our first major victory, suffrage (which we have had for all of 88 years).</p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><br /></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Put briefly, our social and legal victories are nowhere near sufficiently settled or indisputed to be taken as a matter of course. A small, but powerful and well-funded, minority has been working tirelessly for decades now to reverse every single one of them, and their every success is thanks in part to our complacent assumption that what we have so recently won can safely go undefended. In reading <i>The Handmaid's Tale, </i>it is worth keeping in mind that every major feature of the society Atwood describes has been actively advocated in one form or another by the people who rejoiced at the nomination of the men who gave us <i>Gonzales v. Carhart</i>. It seems to me that we need a reminder of how vulnerable our rights really are (and if there's anything I felt whilst reading the book, it was <i>vulnerable)</i>, and Margaret Atwood's excellent book is a very powerful reminder.</p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-86157879743041830302008-02-15T21:21:00.002-05:002008-02-15T21:36:50.997-05:00Thank you, Phil OchsI recently had occasion to listen to Phil Ochs' bitingly satire of Establishment liberals <span style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/%7Etrent/ochs/lyrics/liberal.html">Love Me I'm a Liberal</a>, </span>and couldn't help but write the following updated version:<br /><br /><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="center"><i><span style="font-size:180%;">Love Me, I'm a Liberal ('08 Edition)</span> </i> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">I joined the anti-war movement<br />in '05, but not in '03,<br />'cause watching Saddam's statue falling<br />was way too emotional for me.<br />Our bombs are the bombs of freedom,<br />and justice and democracy...</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">REFRAIN:<br />So love me, love me, love me,<br />I'm a liberal.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">I don't understand these Iraqis;<br />Why can't they just all make nice?<br />Even if they're not fans of our country,<br />can't they respect our sacrifice?<br />Instead they shoot us when we bomb them,<br />a "thank you" would surely suffice!</span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">We all know Saddam was a Hitler,<br />Killed, tortured, and even gassed Kurds<br />He was a psychotic dictator,<br />quite evil, or hadn't you heard?<br />But Abu Ghraib and Fallujah were diff'rent,<br />Your comparison's simply absurd</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">The Bush administration's wrongheaded.<br />Their policies just go too far.<br />Their foreign policy's a disaster;<br />it's caused our good name to be marred!<br />But let's stop this talk of impeachment;<br />that's going a little bit too far!</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">At least since '04 (or around there...)<br />I've looked forward to Campaign '08.<br />I say - having watched his commercials -<br />Obama is my candidate!<br />I'm impressed that he's so well-spoken!<br />He's feel-good, he doesn't berate.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">I really don't like Cindy Sheehan,<br />Noam Chomsky and Robert Fisk, too.<br />And Finkelstein - I just don't get him,<br />I think he's a self-hating Jew.<br />They just aren't all that constructive,<br />They hate on the Red White & Blue.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">I'm a big fan of globalisation,<br />I own every Tom Friedman tome,<br />It's done wonders for my portfolio,<br />Hell, last year I just bought a new home.<br />But what was the deal in Seattle?<br />Why were those kids' mouths full of foam?</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">I know I said I like Obama,<br />But actually Clinton's as good.<br />Like him, she thinks that this country<br />Is going the way that it should;<br />Withdrawal from Iraq or good health care<br />would ruin us like nothing else could</span><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><br /></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">I, too, once protested...Grenada<br />And cried when they bombed Tripoli,<br />And once, in a heated discussion,<br />I remember defending Chomsky.<br />But the world changed on 9/11,<br />And that's why I won't send you money.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><br /></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;" align="left"><span style="font-size:130%;">[REFRAIN]</span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;" align="left"><br /></p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-74344835695615422452007-11-17T01:52:00.000-05:002007-11-17T02:41:22.766-05:00Fuck Euphemisms<p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><i>Shit, piss, fuck, prick, dick, cock, cunt, damn, goddamn, motherfucker, cocksucker, fuckface, bastard, ass, asshole, shithead, crap, fucker, dickhead, bullshit, bullcrap</i></span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><i><br /></i></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">These are obscenities. Practically from the moment we learn to talk, we hear how awful these words are. They have a strangely mystical, talismanic quality, we are taught, that makes them so evil that they may not be uttered, on pain of a whole plethora of punishments.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">If you say them on TV or the radio, you're <i>really </i>asking for trouble. In fact, in the United States Reporter, the publication containing every decision and order of the United States Supreme Court, you'll find a complete, unabridged transcription of a George Carlin bit. Pacifica Radio decided to broadcast the bit, which ridicules the notion of "bad words", and, in so doing, lists them. The FCC was not amused, and the matter eventually made it to the US Supreme Court, where Pacifica lost.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Hundreds of pages of FCC administrative decisions every year concern issues such as whether "dickhead" is more offensive than "bullshit" (it apparently isn't), and whether either is fit to be said on network and basic cable television. These proceedings, it is worth noting, are initiated when viewers actually get mad enough about the use of a word to file an official complaint!</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Millions of dollars are spent on "editing" (i.e. "censoring") films for broadcast. In one case, the "standards and practises" censors took issue with a character in <i>Spies Like Us </i>exclaiming "Oh, my God!" (abridged to "Oh, my!"), and an entire sequence involving a Baby Ruth bar that is mistaken for a piece of shit had to be excised from <i>Caddyshack. </i>In at least one movie, the censors felt a need to get rid of the phrase "I think it sucks". Sometimes these censorial choices are truly surreal. The censors in charge of bowdlerising the 1984 hit <i>Ghostbusters,</i> for example, could not bear to hear "We came, we saw, we kicked its ass!" or a woman saying "I want you inside me", but "Let's show this prehistoric bitch how we do things downtown!" was perfectly all right by them.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">This censorship is not cheap. It involves writing and reading additional dialogue, or stringing words together from other words uttered by the same actor, and dubbing them over the original soundtrack of the film so that unsuspecting viewers will not realise how close they came to ultimate evil.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">This is clearly serious business. These words, as George Carlin noted in the aforementioned bit, "<span style="">are the ones that'll infect your soul, curve your spine, and keep the country from winning the war."</span></span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style=""><br /></span></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"> <span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">A few weeks ago, someone in a chatroom was bemoaning the lack of socially conscious singers in the present day. "There are no Dylans in your generation," she said to me. I replied that this was completely untrue. Hadn't she heard of Ani DiFranco, Jello Biafra, Propagandhi, or even some of the really good, socially conscious rap artists of the past decade or two? At the mention of Tupac Shakur, she asked "does he swear?" When I answered that, yes, he did indeed, she remarked "Well, then that's just trash, then." When I suggested that it isn't exactly incomprehensible for someone to swear about the police violence, discrimination, social marginalisation, and poverty that devastate his or her community, she responded: "There's no excuse for swearing."</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Tupac Shakur's </span><i>Changes </i><span style="font-style: normal;">is a song about the misery of the present and the urgent need for change in a world in which</span></span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><br /></span></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Cops give a damn about a negro<br />pull the trigger kill a nigga he's a hero<br />Give the crack to the kids who the hell cares<br />one less hungry mouth on the welfare</span></span></p><p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span> </span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;">His raw, undiluted lyrics tell of the bleak facts of life in the besieged post-Panther African American community ("It's time to fight back, that's what Huey [Newton] said / Two shots in the dark, now Huey's dead"). The world he evokes is one in which police officers can kill unarmed African Americans with impunity, where the only viable employment option for many is the drug trade, and where poverty and hopelessness are so omnipresent that the only way for many not to starve is to go outside of the law:</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><br /></span> </p> <p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;">I see no changes wake up in the morning and I ask myself<br />is life worth living should I blast myself?<br />I'm tired of bein' poor & even worse I'm black<br />my stomach hurts so I'm lookin' for a purse to snatch</span></span></p><p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;">N.W.A.'s notorious <i>Fuck tha Police </i><span style="font-style: normal;">is a song of deep anger at the everyday racism, harassment, and violence suffered by African Americans at the hands of unaccountable police forces. It is presented as a trial at which each member of the group gives his "testimony". The song's first verse puts the problem in unmistakable terms:</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Young nigga got it bad cause I'm brown<br />And not the other color so police think<br />They have the authority to kill a minority</span></span></p><p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">In addition to talking about the myriad everyday abuses suffered at the hands of the police (e.g., "</span>Searching my car, looking for the product / Thinking every nigga is selling narcotics"), <i>Fuck tha Police </i><span style="font-style: normal;">contains detailed narratives about fighting back:</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Fuck that shit, cause I ain't the one<br />For a punk mother fucker with a badge and a gun<br />To be beatin’ on, and throw in jail<br />We could go toe to toe in the middle of a cell</span></span></p><p style="margin-left: 1cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size:100%;">The song ends with the verdict that the unnamed police officer on trial is a "</span></span>redneck,<br />whitebread, chickenshit motherfucker<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size:100%;">".</span></span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Essentially, then the idea is that random police violence and torture, the complete nullification of the constitutional rights of an entire ethnicity, crushing racialised poverty, and internecine violence are bad, but not bad enough to say "fuck".</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">"Obscenities" may be jarring, disturbing, or even revolting at times, but they all speak truth. Sometimes, they speak truth about the matter being described ("Cops give a damn about a negro"). Other times, as with the use of racial epithets, they speak truth about the person speaking. Words like these exist in every human language, though the specific items included often differ. Wherever they are used, though, they bring us back to a primal and visceral reality, one free of whitewashing or window dressing. As such, if they didn't exist, we'd have to invent them.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><i>Faulty intelligence, intelligence failure, enhanced interrogation, coercive interrogation, detainee, officer-involved shooting, waterboarding, neutralise, collateral damage, peace process, police-community relations, military commissions, depopulate, forced-draft urbanisation, intervention, civilian contractor, authoritarian leader, death in police custody, pro-life, strategic hamlet, shock and awe, free market, free trade, rationalise, downsizing, rightsizing, outsourcing, restructuring, union avoidance, payday lender, tort reform, school choice, crisis pregnancy centre, special relationship, democracy promotion</i></span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><i><br /></i></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">There is another class of words that you don't normally hear about when "obscenities" come up. Unlike the "explicit" words declared "obscene" by conventional wisdom, these words speak no truth. They do their best to conceal it. They are bloodless, heartless evasions that destroy the truth whilst leaving the underlying facts mostly intact (though they are occasionally outright lies). These are the euphemisms.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Commentators speak of "the war <i>in </i>Iraq". The United States "intervened" in Iraq, they will say, because of "faulty intelligence". Regrettably, there has been the odd bit of "collateral damage" in the midst of what military experts call "low-intensity conflict" or "counterinsurgency operations", which often involve "depopulating" large areas, including "village closures", in order to "neutralise insurgents". This policy of "shock and awe" "counterinsurgency" sometimes involves "civilian contractors", who help in "the defence of Iraq".</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">On the news, you will often hear that there has been an "officer-involved shooting" or that someone has "died in police custody". This revives the on-again-off-again debate about the serious "police-community relations" problem that has plagued law enforcement.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Sometimes, you might hear about the (implicitly isolated) "abuses" of "detainees" detained as part of the "war on terror". Sometimes, these "abuses" include such things as "waterboarding", "sensory deprivation", and other methods of "softening them up". Often enough someone will bemoan these "coercive interrogation techniques" as a major public relations disaster for "Operation Iraqi Freedom". However, on the other side, someone will note that "enhanced interrogation techniques", while not pretty, are essential in the fight for "peace and security". These same people will argue that "military commissions" are necessary in order to try offences for which "the application of the rules of evidence would be inappropriate".</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Turning to business news, we often hear that management has decided to "restructure", a process involving the "rightsizing" of the workforce in order to "rationalise" workflows and "curtail redundancies". While the "externalities" may be substantial, they pale in comparison to the excellent return on investment the shareholders can expect, due in part to "significant wage restraint". Sometimes, rather than "rightsizing" the workforce, certain work processes are simply "outsourced" to "less cost-intensive environments", where "free trade agreements" have led to "economic miracles". Editorials will tell us of the need to enhance "workforce mobility and flexibility" as part of the transition to the "new economy", and hail the increase in "opportunities" in the "service sector". Needless to say, this is all "at-will employment", so it will not present a hindrance to any future "rightsizing" that might become necessary.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">The new, "flexible" worker may find, whilst enjoying his new "opportunity", that he is experiencing "negative cashflow". Luckily, there are benevolent "payday lenders" on every street corner to help him make ends meet. The only downside to this arrangement is that he must use his "payday loan" "responsibly".</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Each of these expressions manages to express an identifiable fact, while totally obliterating the underlying truth.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">There is, indeed a war "in" Iraq. Though one might wonder how it got there, this question must remain unanswered. "Faulty intelligence" has the ring of truth, but only if it is used to refer to the failure of the American people to react intelligently to the campaign of outright lies used to whip them into a warlike frenzy. "Collateral damage" does an admirable job of strangling every last bit of humanity out of the concept of dead civilians (and if it doesn't succeed, the almost complete suppression of accurate casualty figures will). "Low-intensity conflict" and "counterinsurgency" are misdirectors: they focus on the military classification of a series of tactics - in this case, terrorist warfare against a civilian population - while avoiding any actual mention of the tactics themselves. A "village closure" sounds rather innocuous; it refers to the practise of turning villages into concentration camps ("strategic hamlets" in Vietnam-era parlance). "Depopulate" and "neutralise" actually manage to strangle the life out of "killing". A "civilian contractor" sounds like a construction worker, someone who is probably involved in the "reconstruction of Iraq" we keep hearing about; in fact, "civilian contractor" refers to a member of one of the many mercenary forces - many of which include notorious terrorists and mass murderers - operating with complete impunity as part of the occupation of Iraq.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">One never hears of a "civilian-involved shooting"; those are just called "murder". When a police officer kills a civilian, however, he has just "participated in an officer-involved shooting". If the death comes as a result of a beating after the civilian has been arrested, he will have "died in police custody"; of natural causes, of course. And just what are "police-community relations"? What community? And how exactly are the police "relating" to them? It does however, sound somewhat better than, "the ongoing pattern of police violence and discrimination".</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span> </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">"Waterboarding" sounds like a sport that might be big in Malibu. In fact, it refers to repeated simulated drowning of the victim, relenting only long enough to prevent actual asphyxiation. These "abuses" (i.e. "systematic torture" or "war crimes") are often described as "enhanced" or "coercive" "interrogation techniques" in order to make it sound like they are somehow useful for - and used for the purpose of - obtaining useful information to protect us all. And what of these "military commissions" that try these people once they have been enhancedly interrogated? As it turns out, the term actually refers to "unaccountable kangaroo courts" that can sentence people who haven't had the benefit of a defence attorney or the right to confront their accusers to the death penalty based on no evidence at all.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">When an employer "rightsizes" its workforce, it is, of course, "downsizing" the incomes of employees who will now be lucky to avoid homelessness in the age of "welfare reform". "Externalities" refers to poverty, insecurity, unemployment, destitution, loss of health care, destruction of entire working-class communities, and other irrelevancies. "Mobility" and "flexibility" are positively connoted, and they aren't precisely lies. They just leave out the direction of the mobility (hellward, in a handbasket) and the nature of the flexibility (going to bed not knowing whether you'll have a job when you wake up). The same is true of "at-will employment". At whose will? The employer's, of course. And "opportunities in the growing service sector" does certainly sound better than "low-status shit jobs with starvation wages and no security or hope of advancement".</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Who are these "payday lenders" who are only too happy to help out our haplessly flexible working-class friend? You may know them as "loansharks", gone legit. They lend out pittances to poor people at high interest, accruing rapidly. How does one use them "responsibly?" There are two options: default and skip town, or don't use them at all.</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">If we were not so deeply deluded, we would easily realise that "shit", "piss", "fuck" et al. do not hold a candle in the obscenity department to even the mildest of the above expressions. Each one eliminates unspeakable atrocities and great injustice and suffering from the picture. They seek to anaesthetise mind and conscience alike. They distort the realities that lead people to say "Fuck tha police" or note that "cops give a damn about a negro" into the bloodless truthlessness of "the problems of police-community relations". They turn crimes for which every one of us should feel deep outrage and shame into neat, tidy abstractions, each syllable a mass grave hiding thousands of bodies. They turn the great sadistic butchers of our time into great visionaries who seek only peace and democracy. The mental operation that turns the mass murder of innocent civilians into "collateral damage" is not at all far removed from the one that gave us "special treatment" and "final solution".</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family:Book Antiqua,serif;"><span style="font-size:100%;">No wonder you're not allowed to say "bullshit".</span></span></p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-33562420387708332532007-09-25T23:02:00.000-04:002007-09-26T00:31:04.584-04:00With "Defenders" Like This...<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><b><i><span style="">Alice Dreger Destroys Academic Freedom in Order to Save It <o:p></o:p></span></i></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="">It is an old adage that “crime, once exposed, has no refuge but in audacity.” This appears to be the thinking behind Alice Dreger’s latest attempt to stifle criticism of J. Michael Bailey’s pseudoscience in the name of “academic freedom”. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:georgia;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="">Joelle Ruby Ryan recently issued a Call for Proposals for a proposed panel of the National Women’s Studies Association entitled <i>The Bailey Brouhaha: Community Members Speak Out on Resisting Transphobia in Academia in Beyond. </i>In it, she accurately summarises the history of the “controversy” around Bailey’s <i>The Man Who Would Be Queen: The Science [!] of Gender Bending and Transsexualism, </i>as follows:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <blockquote style="font-family: georgia;"> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">While Bailey's book The Man Who Would be Queen was released in 2003 to overwhelmingly negative reviews, the book caused a stir for its assertion that trans women can be split into two groupings: "homosexual transsexuals" and “autogynephilics." Trans activists and allies mobilized and took Bailey to task for his bogus claims and helped to document a compelling case against him. Many considered it an open-and-shut case until the 2007 appearance of an article by Bailey colleague and intersex researcher Alice Dreger, who published a lengthy apologia for Bailey in the Archives of Sexual Behavior and castigated trans women activists for their attempts at "ruining" Bailey.</p></blockquote><p style="font-family: georgia;" class="MsoBodyTextIndent"></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:georgia;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> </span><span style="">In response, Dreger declared that the CFP was “laden with factual errors and misrepresentations about the history of the Bailey controversy and my work”, of which she could identify none, and points to her own dubious “<a href="http://deirdremccloskey.org/docs/dreger.pdf">scholarly history</a>” (to be published by a journal controlled by Bailey, Blanchard, and Lawrence) and <a href="http://lifeaftergonzales.blogspot.com/2007/09/science-and-ideology-ii-j-michael.html">a breathtakingly inaccurate <i>New York Times </i>article</a> that I have discussed previously as reliable sources of information. Dreger repeats her unsupported and unspecified claims of misrepresentations (in one case “profound” misrepresentations”) and factual errors throughout her correspondence on the subject with Emi Koyama on the Women’s Studies listserv WMST-L, and falsely claims that Bailey’s critics attempted to censor him. She does not enlighten interested readers about the <a href="http://lifeaftergonzales.blogspot.com/2007/08/science-and-ideology-blanchard-bailey.html">scientific status of Bailey’s claims</a> or his defamatory <a href="http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/Bailey%20Responses/How%20Bailey%20Responds.html">responses to criticism</a>. She closes the e-mail exchange by endorsing a veiled threat directed at Ryan by Emi Koyama:<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:georgia;"><span style=""></span></p><blockquote><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="">I also appreciate your advising Joelle Ruby Ryan " that she was putting herself at risk as a scholar working within a controversial field (trans issues) by tolerating tactics that breed fear and stifle academic freedom."<br /></span></p><span style=""></span></blockquote><span style="">What is the “academic freedom” that Dreger defends so fiercely as to resort to threats and blatant misrepresentations? Is it the freedom to publish scientific findings and engage in scholarly discussion without state or institutional censorship? Clearly not. That right has not been impinged upon. No one is calling for censorship of Bailey’s work, nor has any censorship occurred. The book remains in print, for all to see. Bailey’s right to fetishise “controversy” over science remains inviolate.</span><span style=""><br /><br />No, the “academic freedom” Dreger is so vigorously defending goes much farther. She believes that Bailey should not only have the right to publish and discuss his work without censorship, but without <i>criticism. </i>She believes that academic freedom includes the right to be free from complaints by research subjects whose rights you have violated, the right to make defamatory misrepresentations without them being exposed. Dreger believes that academic freedom includes not only the right to misrepresent pseudoscience as <i>The Science of Gender Bending and Transsexualism, </i>but also the right to have one’s work go unchallenged. By her own definition, then, she is violating the academic freedom of the scientists and other academics who have exposed Bailey’s <a href="http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/LynnsReviewOfBaileysBook.html#Complaints">quackery and research misconduct</a>.<br /><br /></span><span style="">Dreger, ultimately, is defending the Emperor’s right to demand that his new suit of clothes be praised.<br /><br /></span><span style="">Lest one start to think that Dreger has reached the height of audacity, Dreger actually attempts to defend her fanciful version of academic freedom by using intimidation and defamation to stifle an <i>academic discussion </i>of Bailey’s work! What other purpose could be served by unsupported claims of unspecified (and, in fact, nonexistent!) “misrepresentations”? What else would Dreger be trying to do by cautioning Ryan that she is “putting herself at risk” by attempting to hold an academic forum to discuss the issue?<br /><br /></span><span style="">In Dreger’s bizarre world, Bailey’s misrepresentations are “science” and Dreger’s defamation and intimidation tactics are a “defence of academic freedom”. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism">Lysenko</a> would surely approve.</span>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-88395662996007776592007-09-02T16:17:00.000-04:002007-09-02T17:02:01.982-04:00Science and Ideology II: The J. Michael Bailey Affair in the New York Times<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;"><b><i><span style="">Science and Ideology II:<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;"><b><i><span style="">The J. Michael Bailey Affair in the </span></i></b><b><span style="">New York Times</span></b></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><span style="font-style: italic;">Martyr for Academic Freedom or Thin-Skinned Quack?</span><br /><i><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><i><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">The opening paragraphs of Benedict Carey’s 21 August article for the <i>New York Times</i>, entitled <i><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/21/health/psychology/21gender.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5070&amp;en=e9d3d67ae0802d46&ex=1188792000&adxnnl=0&adxnnlx=1188694851-07vvNx+EVp3agAM8Y5bllQ">Criticism of a Gender Theory, and a Scientist Under Siege</a>, </i>draw the lines of the recently revived controversy around J. Michael Bailey’s <i>The Man Who Would be Queen (TMWWBQ) </i>quite clearly: science versus ideology. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">On the one hand, we have J. Michael Bailey, a “Scientist Under Siege”, who authored a book (<i>TMWWBQ) </i>“intended to explain the biology of sexual orientation and gender to a general audience.” On the other, we have his “critics”, identified as “several prominent academics who are transgender”, who think his “theory” is “inaccurate, insulting and potentially damaging to transgender women”. No non-trans critic is identified, nor is there any mention of the scientific status of Bailey’s “theory” (which, in reality, is Ray Blanchard’s brainchild). Nor do we find out in any real detail why Carey’s carefully selected Bailey critics – he steers clear of anyone from the relevant scientific community<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a> – object so vehemently to <i>TMWWBQ, </i>or, indeed, anything else that might contextualise the controversy.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">Instead, we are told about the fear that the “harassment” (read: criticism) of Bailey has engendered in Bailey’s (unnamed) peers, who complain of the “corrosive effects of political correctness on academic freedom”, asserting that “it has become increasingly treacherous to discuss politically sensitive issues”. Indeed, “If we’re going to have research at all, then we’re going to have people saying unpopular things, and if this is what happens to them, then we’ve got problems not only for science but free expression itself”. Alas, Carey does not see fit to muse on the irony of charges of censorship being levied against the very people whom Bailey sought to silence and stigmatise with his book. Nor does he point out that “criticism” and “censorship” whilst both beginning with the same letter, are indeed two very different things.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">Carey tells us precious little about the actual subject matter of Bailey’s book, apart from the statement that he “argued that some people born male who want to cross genders are driven primarily by an erotic fascination with themselves as women,” a “theory” that is contrasted with “the <i>belief</i>, held by many men who decide to live as women [sic],” which Carey describes in the most hackneyed and stereotypical terms, “that they are the victims of a biological mistake — in essence, women trapped in men’s bodies.” (emphasis supplied) Bailey’s “argument”/”theory”, we are told, is based on “Canadian studies done in the 1980s and 1990s”. Readers will have to search elsewhere for any discussion of the basis of the opposing “belief”; Carey provides none. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">And thus, Carey has successfully created the impression that the only counterpoint to the “scientific theory” of J. Michael Bailey and Co. is a “belief” held by “men who decide to live as women”. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">At this point, a few nagging questions arise: Why is Carey’s sourcing so lopsided? Why is it so important for the story Carey wants to tell that Bailey appear to be opposed only by a few trans women who aren’t even psychologists? What would be wrong with quoting some of the many psychologists and psychiatrists who are much more respected in their field than a J. Michael Bailey – a member of the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association, perhaps? <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">In fact, Carey does quote one critic from a relevant field: Stanford neurobiologist Ben Barres, but the quote Carey selects – “Bailey seems to make a living by claiming that the things people hold most deeply true are not true.” – is so ambiguous that it could even be taken to suggest that Barres supports Bailey’s “theory”, about which Barres has in fact said that<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2cm;"><span style="">Bailey truly doesn't get the gender identity dissonance that transsexuals experience--it really is hard for people to understand what they haven't experienced themselves. I have talked with many MtFs [trans women] who have contacted me, and have listened to the feelings they have gone through their whole lives, and it is always an exact mirror of what I have experienced as an FtM. These MtFs have no reason to lie to me, as I have no power over what treatment they receive. <i>For Bailey to say that most MtFs are primarily doing the gender change because of a fetish rather than a true gender-identity issue just doesn't ring true to me, or to many other people that have worked in clinics taking care of many MtFs</i><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">(emphasis supplied)<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">The answer to the above questions is obvious enough. A few phone calls and a PsychLit search would suffice to demonstrate that the Ray Blanchard “theory” luridly regurgitated by J. Michael Bailey is not, and has never been, accepted science. Indeed, had Carey wished to go to the trouble, he would have discovered that Blanchard’s own studies not only fail to validate his separation of trans women into two mutually exclusive categories, but have also never been reproduced by anyone else. He might also find that the Clarke Institute so highly praised by our “scientist under siege” has fallen into such disrepute that they have to refer their patients to England for surgery, because the leading Canadian surgeons won’t take their referrals. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">It is also clear why Carey would choose to quote only trans women as criticising Bailey. The article explicitly makes the controversy a battle between the popular right-wing fiction of “political correctness” – i.e. opposition to bigotry and other similarly offensive things – and “science”. By putting only trans women in the “critics” corner<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>, it becomes easier to frame the controversy as a dispute between a scientist and those personally offended by his findings.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">In effect, had Carey sought out gender specialists in psychology and psychiatry to discuss the Blanchard-Bailey-Lawrence “theory” of trans women, he would have had to come up with a new headline: <i>Quackery Exposed – Northwestern in Damage-Control Mode, </i>perhaps.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">Bailey’s (carefully selected) critics get a much chillier reception from Carey. Carey insinuates that Drs. Lynn Conway and Deirdre McCloskey, two of the aforementioned “prominent academics who are transgender”, were the driving force behind the ethics complaints filed by several of Bailey’s unwitting “research” subjects, complaints Bailey associate Alice Dreger (identified only as an “ethics scholar” who carried out a “lengthy investigation”) characterises as “harassment”. We hear that Conway chronicled the accusations against Bailey on her website<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>, but not that her site also linked to scientific critiques of the Blanchard-Bailey-Lawrence model by psychologists<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">We are told that Andrea James “downloaded images from Dr. Bailey’s Web site of his children, taken when they were in middle and elementary school, and posted them on her own site, with sexually explicit captions that she provided.” While we do read James’ response, that the captions were intended to “echo [Bailey’s] disrespect”, we do not hear that “echo” is meant literally. In fact, the captions James placed on the photos in question were epithets from Bailey’s own book, terms he found “sympathetic” (at least when used on trans women). Nor does Carey mention the interesting contrast between Bailey’s defamatory epithets and the (almost as indefensible) way in which Andrea James sought to echo them: Unlike Bailey, James actually took the pictures down and apologised for what she did. Bailey, on the other hand, not only has yet to apologise for smearing a highly vulnerable group with sexually explicit (and patently false) epithets; he actually compounds them by directing even more invective at his critics.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>And while we hear Alice Dreger bemoan the “harassment” suffered by Bailey, we (unsurprisingly) do not hear of Dreger’s harassing and defamatory blog postings about (and e-mails to) Andrea James (including, ironically enough, one comparing James to a neo-Nazi). Nor, of course, do we get to hear how Dreger used defamatory claims in an attempt to cause a student group at her university to rescind its invitation to James to discuss her critique of Bailey, or how she sent harassing e-mails with similar content to James’ agent<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">To Carey’s credit, he does get one fundamental thing right: the Bailey “controversy” is fundamentally a conflict between science and ideology. Unfortunately, Carey seems to have mixed up the cast of characters. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">To put Bailey on the side of science is an insult to science. Even a cursory look at the scientific literature on transsexuality would reveal that the Blanchard-Bailey-Lawrence “theory” has been overwhelmingly rejected by the scientific community, and that the “belief” attributed in hackneyed, stereotypical terms to Bailey’s critics in fact more closely represents the scientific consensus. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">As if that were not enough, Carey compounds this insult to science by placing the <i>real </i>scientists – the ones who publish in peer-reviewed journals and don’t use samples that could easily fit in an efficiency in Queens – in the corner of “political correctness”, i.e. ideology. As noted above, there is no shortage of scientists who are critical of Bailey and his cronies. It would be relatively easy to find well-documented scientific critiques of the vaunted “Canadian studies”, which do as much as any of Bailey’s unprofessional behaviour to discredit Blanchard’s own theory, or to find at least one of the many clinical psychologists or psychiatrists specialised in trans issues – Bailey is neither<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[7]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a> – to provide a scientific counterpoint to the BBL clique<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[8]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>. One could even go so far as to look at Bailey’s book, in which he is quite proud to note that his “theory” successfully inoculates the uninitiated against any sort of empathy for trans women<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[9]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>, or look to back issues of the <i>New York Times </i>for information on his other discredited claims<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[10]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>. If Carey were to quote <i>genuine </i>academic gender specialists – thus placing the contenders in the right corners – it would quickly become apparent that Bailey is a purveyor of ideologically motivated pseudoscience who prefers to evade the peer review process by “publishing” his findings in press releases and pop psych books. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Of course, this would probably make it harder to sell Bailey as a beleaguered truth-seeker, besieged by “political correctness”, but ultimately exonerated by an “ethics scholar” (who herself happens to be anything but a neutral observer). <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <span style="">If Carey’s article demonstrates anything, it’s that no one has anything to fear from “political correctness”, when even <i>scientific </i>correctness cannot make it through the ideological filter of the Newspaper of Record. </span> <div style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><br /><hr align="left" size="1" width="33%"> <!--[endif]--> <div style="" id="ftn1"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> One might note that this echoes Bailey’s own preference for tiny, unrepresentative samples.<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn2"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1568/is_6_35/ai_109085443/pg_6<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn3"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> While Ben Barres is a trans man, his context-free quote, as noted above, can be easily taken as either critical or supportive.<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn4"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/LynnsReviewOfBaileysBook.html<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn5"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> Bockting, W, <i>Biological Reductionism Meets Gender Diversity in Human Sexuality, </i>J. Sex Research, Vol. 42, No. 3, Aug. 2005, pp. 267-270, available online at: <a href="http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/Bockting/Bockting%20Review.html">http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/Bockting/Bockting%20Review.html</a> ; See also http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/bailey-blanchard-lawrence.html<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn6"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/alice-dreger/hermaphrodite-monger.html<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn7"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[7]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> Nor is he even a member of the major associations of psychological professionals.<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn8"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[8]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> See, e.g., http://www.genderpsychology.org/autogynephilia/j_michael_bailey/<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn9"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[9]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> <i>TMWWBQ, </i>p. 206<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn10"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.do#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[10]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""> See, <i>e.g.,</i> <i>Gay, Straight, or Lying, NY Times </i>5 July 2005, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/05/health/05sex.html?ex=1278216000&en=5a82f18cadf2ad83&ei=5088<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> </div>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-13213433303927955552007-08-28T03:28:00.001-04:002007-09-01T22:56:58.160-04:00Science and Ideology: The Blanchard-Bailey-Lawrence Model of Transsexuality<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><b><i><span style="">Autogynaephiles, Homosexuals, and Fabricators: <o:p></o:p></span></i></b></p> <p class="MsoBodyText">The Blanchard-Bailey-Lawrence Taxonomy of Trans Women</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <h1 style="margin-left: 0cm; text-indent: 0cm;"><span style="font-size:14;"><span style="font-size:130%;">I. A Hypothetical</span><o:p></o:p></span></h1> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Let us suppose that someone claimed to have found that rape is primarily a function of the sexuality and presentation of the victim, and proposed a binary taxonomy of rape victims:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36pt; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="">(1)<span style=""> </span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span style="">The provoker: </span></b><span style="">Provoker-type rape victims are heterosexual women no older than their mid-to-late twenties at the time of the incident. They are generally sexually active, and are characterised by general attractiveness and a preference for attractive, even provocative modes of dress and behaviour. In these women, the rape is the subsconsciously desired result of their behaviour and presentation. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36pt; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="">(2)<span style=""> </span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span style="">The confabulator:</span></b><span style=""> The confabulator, like the provoker, is heterosexual, but homely and unattractive, and at least in her late twenties or thirties. She is not sexually active, nor does she dress in a particularly attractive or provocative manner. She is most likely to have convinced herself that she was raped in order to deceive herself into believing that she is sexually desirable despite her age and appearance. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Let us further suppose that the person who has “discovered” these categories also claims that there are no categories outside of the two above, and that any woman who claims not to fit within these categories in any particular is either lying or delusional. In dealing with these claims, rational people will likely do as suggested by Noam Chomsky in <i>The Case Against B.F. Skinner<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>, </i>and ask:<i> ”</i>What is the scientific status of the claims? What social or ideological needs do they serve? The questions are logically independent, but the second type of question naturally comes to the fore as scientific pretensions are undermined.”<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>The scientific pretensions of the provoker/confabulator taxonomy would most likely be dismissed with derision by all rational observers because this binary taxonomy accords no validity to the accounts and experiences of the women involved, implicitly privileges the rapist’s claims over those of the victim, and is not falsifiable, i.e., any example that might lead the rational observer to question the validity of the model is automatically deemed a fabrication or a delusion. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>If the proponent of the hypothetical model sketched above were to respond to serious questions about his methodology and the substance of his claims with derisive comments about “political correctness” or insinuations that critics were mentally unbalanced or improperly motivated, this would be taken as proof that even the proponent of the model considers it indefensible (as already suggested by the built-in “liar/delusional” catch-all). <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Thus, the scientific status of the claim would be recognised virtually immediately as nil, and rational observers would quickly move on to examine the social and ideological needs that the provoker/confabulator model serves. They would turn their attention to the significance of repeated assurances that rape victims are generally liars and to lurid and detailed descriptions of the attractiveness of the proponent’s research subjects. They would note that the entire taxonomy operates to validate the rapist whilst marginalizing and dismissing his victim. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>It would, thus, quickly become clear that the provoker/confabulator/ liar model is a pseudoscientific fabrication put forth for the likely purpose of validating the perpetrator of rape and harming the victim. Its proponent and adherents would be <i>ipso facto </i>discredited, and attention would be returned to real scientific work.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <h1 style="margin-left: 0cm; text-indent: 0cm;"><span style="font-size:14;"><span style="font-size:130%;">II. The Blanchard-Bailey-Lawrence Autogynaephilic/”Homosexual” Model</span><o:p></o:p></span></h1> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><b><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>In the 1980s, Ray Blanchard, of the disreputable Canadian Clarke Institute, proposed a model of male-to-female transsexuality (like many of his colleagues, he ignored female-to-male transsexuality altogether), at the heart of which was a binary categorisation very similar to the hypothetical one sketched above:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 54pt; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="">(1)<span style=""> </span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span style="">“Homosexual<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a> [sic] transsexuals”: </span></b><span style="">“Homosexual” transsexuals, <i>i.e. </i>heterosexual trans women, are sexually attracted to men, present in a conventionally feminine manner, are attractive as women, and transition at a relatively young age. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 54pt; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="">(2)<span style=""> </span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span style="">“Autogynaephilic (AGP) transsexuals”:</span></b><span style=""> Autogynaephilic transsexuals are trans women who transition later in life, are not conventionally feminine in appearance or behaviour, are not particularly attractive, are sexually attracted toward women, and are sexually aroused by the idea of themselves as women. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>It must be stressed that, as in the hypothetical above, the BBL model claims that these categories encompass <i>all </i>trans women. While this taxonomy in itself would seem trivial, Blanchard (and his adherents Anne Lawrence and J. Michael Bailey) added to these two discrete, all-encompassing categories assertions about causality. “Homosexual” (i.e. heterosexual) trans women transitioned in order to be attractive to heterosexual men, while “autogynaephilic” trans women transition out of a “mis-directed” heterosexual sex drive that leads them to sexually fetishise the idea of themselves as women. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>The BBL model attributes male-to-female transsexuality entirely to sexuality: Matters of identity not only take a back seat to sexual desire as the driving force behind transition; they are actively dismissed as fabrications. In his <i>The Man who Would be Queen<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>, </i>Bailey writes as follows:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent">Most people—even those who have never met a transsexual— know the <i>standard story</i> of men who want to be women: "Since I can remember, I have always felt as if I were a member of the other sex. I have felt like a freak with this body and detest my penis. I must get sex reassignment surgery (a "sex change operation") in order to match my external body with my internal mind." <i>But the truth is much more interesting than the standard story</i>.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">(Bailey, p. 143; emphasis supplied). Thus, in a few short sentences, Bailey has relegated an account that will resonate with many (if not most) trans women to a significant degree to the “standard story”, a piece of conventional wisdom that is much less interesting than the “truth”. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>“One way”, Bailey continues, <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"></p><blockquote>that the standard transsexual story is wrong is in its singularity. Two types of men change their sex. To anyone who examines them closely, they are quite dissimilar, in their histories, their motivations, their degree of femininity, their demographics, and even the way they look. We know little about the causes of either type of transsexualism (though we have some good hunches about one type). But I am certain that when we finally do understand, the causes of the two types will be completely different.</blockquote> <p></p> <p><span style="">(Bailey, p. 145). Thus, the “standard story” is juxtaposed against the “truth”: a binary typology about which Bailey admits to nothing more but a “hunch” and his certainty that “when we finally do understand, the causes of the two types will be completely different”. This is, in itself, an odd claim to be making in a purportedly scientific work. It is one thing to propose a direction for future research, a direction that may or may not be promising or have intuitive appeal; it is quite another to state that there is reason to be “certain” about the ultimate result of inquiry into an admittedly poorly understood subject. Claims like this should make us suspect any scientific pretensions in a work that makes them. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Bailey explains the fact that the observations of the general public and the relevant medical community do not generally confirm the BBL model by asserting that “members of one type sometimes misrepresent themselves as members of the other.” Indeed, “they are often silent about their true motivation and instead, tell stories about themselves that are misleading and in important respects false.” (Bailey, p. 146) The claim that trans women who are not consistent with the BBL model are deceptive is a pervasive feature of the model.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>In discussing the “autogynaephilia” category invented by Blanchard, Bailey dismisses out of hand the single most consistent feature in trans people, the painful lifelong inconsistency they feel between their gender identity (“subconscious sex,” in geneticist Julia Serano’s phrase) and their superficial physical and social sex, asserting that</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><span style="">Autogynephilia is not primarily a disorder of gender identity, except in the obvious sense that the goal of the transsexual is to become the other sex. At the cross-dressers' meeting I attended, the wife of one of the men asked me: "When they say they feel like women, how do they know what that feels like?" This question, which reflected the woman's skepticism about the men's account, is profound. How do we ever know that we are like someone else? Unless you believe in extrasensory perception (and I don't), the answer must be found in overt behavior, which somehow signals fundamental similarity. Evidently, the woman did not get those signals from the men. (If instead of being the wife of an autogynephile, she were the sister of a homosexual transsexual, I doubt she would have asked an analogous question.) The fact is that despite their obsession with becoming women, autogynephilic transsexuals are not especially feminine.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Bailey supports his claim about “autogynaephilia” with an example drawn not from the trans women he claims to be describing but from cross-dressers, many of whom have no desire to transition. One could as reasonably draw conclusions about schizophrenics by making observations about LSD enthusiasts.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Also notable is his insistence on remaining at a superficial level, even to the extent of reporting the views of the wife of one of the cross-dressers whilst completely ignoring anything the cross-dressers themselves might have to say. In reporting the rhetorical question of the wife of one of the cross-dressers at the meeting, he does not point out that “to feel like a woman” has more than one meaning. While it can certainly mean “to feel similar to a woman” (or “to want [to do] something”, come to that), in this case the more likely meaning is “to feel one is a woman”, i.e., to have a persistent sense of inconsistency between one’s social and superficial gender and one’s gender identity/subconscious sex. Except where the context is truly ambiguous or where one is being intentionally obtuse, a normal speaker of the English language will instinctively assign the respective interpretations to the phrases “I feel like a meatball sandwich”, “I feel like a woman,” and “I feel like you do”. Bailey has no time for such niceties, and thus does not hesitate to select the most easily dismissed interpretation.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Having thus elected to interpret “I feel like a woman” as “I feel similar to how a woman feels”, Bailey seeks to dismiss this statement:</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><span style="">How do we ever know that we are like someone else? Unless you believe in extrasensory perception (and I don't), the answer must be found in overt behavior, which somehow signals fundamental similarity.<br /><!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style="">Here, Bailey seeks to discredit what is in reality a rather hackneyed, stereotypical phrase by setting up a false dichotomy (as he is wont to do). Either one believes in ESP, and therefore can claim to “feel like” someone or something in Bailey’s preferred sense (his failure to even mention empathy is unsurprising), or one must remain at the entirely superficial level of “overt behavior”.<span style=""> </span>If one’s overt behaviour is not “especially feminine”, then, Bailey decrees, one cannot claim to have a female identity.<span style=""> </span>Or, as Bailey puts it, “Supposedly, male-to-female transsexuals are motivated by the deep-seated feeling that they have women's souls. However, - - - men who want to be women [sic] are not naturally feminine. There is no sense in which they have women's souls<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a>." (Bailey, p. xii)</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>How, then, Bailey – despite his avowed scepticism about ESP – can claim to know that what others feel is not what they say they feel, is a mystery on which I feel no overwhelming urge to speculate.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Thus, for Bailey, all women behave in a stereotypically feminine manner and overt behaviour is a reasonable basis for drawing far-reaching conclusions about a person’s identity. The possibility that these “autogynaephilic” trans women might have learnt early on that feminine gender expression in someone perceived to be male would be met with severe consequences, and thus learned to project masculinity to the extent they were able as a defence mechanism, does not even occur to Bailey. Either you demonstrate a satisfactory degree of conventional femininity, or can lay no claim to a female identity. One wonders how the butch lesbian community took the news.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Thus, the identity of trans women whose superficial behaviour is not sufficiently conventionally feminine to satisfy Bailey is at best an “obsession”. One might think, therefore, that Bailey might be more inclined to portray the second BBL category, the “homosexual” transsexual, in a more humanising fashion. Alas, while Bailey certainly finds the latter category – trans women who are more conventionally feminine, are heterosexual in sexual orientation, and transition at a younger age – more attractive (“There is no way to say this as sensitively as I would prefer, so I will just go ahead. Most homosexual transsexuals are better looking than most autogynephilic transsexuals” [Bailey, p. 180]), this does not stop him painting this category with equally derogatory stereotypes.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Attractiveness aside, Bailey is no more respectful of the identities of “homosexual” trans women, who “simply lust after men” (p. 191), than he is of those of “autogynaephilic” trans women. These women, in Bailey’s eyes, are “a type of homosexual man” (p. 146) with a “short time horizon, with certain pleasure in the present worth great risks for the future." (p. 184) “"Prostitution,” Bailey notes, “is the single most common occupation that homosexual transsexuals in our study [a sample found by “cruising” bars frequented by sex workers] admitted to." (<i>Id.)</i> "Nearly all the homosexual transsexuals I know work as escorts after they have their surgery." (p. 210)<br /><!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>When not discussing the occupational similarities in a sample of trans women selected from venues likely to have a high percentage of sex workers, Bailey moves on to his other favourite subject: their sexual attractiveness (to him) and willingness to sleep with men. In this vein – apart from the already-quoted line – Bailey states that "Many of the transsexuals we interviewed in the course of this study were more attractive than the average genetic female." Consider also his description of “Kim”:</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><span style="">I start upstairs to get the panoramic view, and I see Kim for the first time, on the stairs, dancing, posing. She is <i>spectacular, exotic </i>(I find out later that she is from Belize), <i>and sexy</i>. Her body is incredibly curvaceous, which is a clue that it might not be natural. And I notice a very subtle and <i>not-unattractive angularity of the face, </i>which is also not clearly diagnostic on this <i>tall siren. It is difficult to avoid viewing Kim from two perspectives: as a researcher but also as a single, heterosexual man</i>. As I contemplate approaching her, I am influence by considerations from each perspective. I have this strong intuition that I am correct about her, but if I am not, I may have the unpleasant experience of simultaneously insulting, and being rejected by, a <i>beautiful woman. </i>[…] in a tribute to her beauty, I decide for now not to approach her.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style="">(p. 141-142; emphasis supplied). When we move on to “Terese”, we are regaled with pronouncements such as “In many ways Terese has <i>blossomed </i>since her surgery. <i>She looks great. </i>Not only do people fail to notice that she is a transsexual, but <i>most men find her sexy and attractive. </i>Depressed and in self-imposed isolation when I first saw her, she is flirtation, energetic, and socially busy now. Among other things, she models lingerie [at least it’s a <i>representative </i>sample with such common professions]. (p. 150; emphasis supplied) Later, we are told that “homosexual [sic] transsexuals aspire to be objects of desire.” (p. 180) “Homosexual” transsexuals express femininity because “they want to attract men, and they get constant feedback (in the form of propositions from men […])…This allows them to hone their presentations faster than the autogynephilic transsexual, who has spent most of her femme life looking at the mirror by herself.” Reading all of this, one is forced to wonder whose sexual proclivities this book is supposed to be about.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>In addition to prostitution, for which Bailey believes that “homosexual” trans women, with their “male” psychology, are “especially well suited” (p. 185), Bailey uses a combination of rumours and sweeping generalisations to tell us of another supposed occupation of “homosexual” trans women: theft:</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><span style="">As for shoplifting, homosexual transsexuals are not especially well suited as much as especially motivated. For many, their taste in clothing is much more expensive than their income allows. Transsexual call girls are among the few who can afford expensive clothes. In female impersonator shows, transsexuals often wear designer gowns, which are widely believed (by other transsexuals) to have been acquired via the five-fingered [sic] discount.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style="">(<i>Id.)</i><br /></span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><br /></span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style="">It is, of course, possible to propose another model that accounts for all of the characteristics on which the BBL model is purportedly based. One could begin by noting that there is nothing particularly unusual about one’s sexual fantasies including oneself in the body of one’s identified sex. Indeed, it seems reasonable to assume that non-trans men and women, regardless of sexual orientation and gender expression, generally have sexual fantasies in which they are men and women, respectively. Both groups would likely have a great deal of trouble achieving arousal whilst imagining themselves in the body of a member of a sex inconsistent with their own gender identities. One would further note that these “autogynaephilic” fantasies generally subside once trans women begin living in their identified sex, and therefore cease to feel the dissonance the BBL group are at great pains to ignore, and posit that such fantasies are a function of the deep, subconscious need to live and be perceived as their identified sex, rather than the other way around.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Once we remove the constraints imposed by the assumptions of the BBL model, it is also not hard to deal with one of Bailey’s admitted stumbling blocks: the fact that there are gay men who are highly feminine in gender expression but nonetheless do not transition. If we accept the BBL model, this datum is a true riddle, because it is based on the assumption that sexual orientation equals gender expression, and that gender identity does not exist. Thus, the existence of men and women – regardless of sexual orientation – who do not have any desire to transition and live as the other sex despite having gender expression typical of the other sex, cannot be explained. However, once we give credit to the accounts of trans people and others who have long reported a lifelong, persistent sense of dissonance between their assigned sex and their gender identity/subconscious sex, all of these mysteries quickly evaporate. It is only by Bailey’s refusal to accept what he admits is the consensus of the relevant professional community that the answers to questions like these become unattainable.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Not only is a model like the one sketched above – which reflects the essential contours of the scientific consensus – able to provide adequate answers to questions that lead BBL adherents to throw up their hands and change the subject; such a model is capable of providing consistent explanations of the bulk of the available data on issues of gender identity, expression, and transsexuality without the need to resort to so many assumptions. Unlike the BBL model, this model has no need to assume that trans people are fundamentally deceptive or deluded, that trans men are somehow a completely different species, or that identity simply cannot be the motivation for the desire or decision to transition.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;" align="center"><b><span style="">II. The Scientific Status of BBL-Style Taxonomies</span></b></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;" align="center"><br /><b><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Ultimately, Bailey’s account (and the underlying BBL model) is abysmal from a scientific standpoint. It does not meet one of the basic – and most easily met – requirements for a scientific theory, falsifiability, because it pervasively paints trans women as liars who will misrepresent themselves to avoid being placed in one of the two categories. Thus, it does not even attempt to account for the many lesbian and bisexual trans women who are conventionally feminine in appearance and gender expression and transition in their twenties or earlier and do not have a history of erotic cross-dressing, nor does it seriously contemplate trans women who, at least prior to transition, manage a conventionally masculine gender expression, but transition young (thus undermining its ability to adequately describe and explain a wide range of pertinent data). The ink that could have been dedicated to these vaguely important issues is instead dedicated, in substantial part, to Bailey’s “hot or not” judgements about trans women. It is not exactly a great shock that this “theory” has failed to gain acceptance in the relevant professional communities.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>However, the above discussion of the BBL model does not mention its most salient characteristic: its vapidity. It takes little to no intellectual effort to invent BBL-type taxonomies for any imaginable group of people. One is reminded of a popular joke: “There are two kinds of people: those who say that there are two kinds of people and those who don’t.” Indeed, about all one needs to do in order to create a BBL-type taxonomy is to start by <b>(1)</b> declaring that there are two kinds of people. Then, carefully following Bailey’s injunction to stick to the superficial (lest one appear to believe in ESP), <b>(2)</b> one delineates the specific characteristics of the “two kinds of people” identified. In order to escape triviality, the dichotomy must then be <b>(3)</b> enhanced by making assertions about causation: the overarching category to which these “two kinds of people” belong exists <i>because </i>of a common superficial characteristic allegedly shared by the two groups. Once this is all in place, all one has to do to render one’s BBL taxonomy immune to contrary evidence (particularly non-superficial contrary evidence) is <b>(4)</b> to claim that “members of one type sometimes misrepresent themselves as members of the other,” and that both types “are often silent about their true motivation and instead, tell stories about themselves that are misleading and in important respects false.”</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>It is instructive (or, at the very least, amusing) to illustrate this by creating a BBL-type taxonomy for the BBL clique and their adherents. Essentially, one would say, BBL adherents break down into two fundamental types: <i>deluded BBL adherents </i>(DBAs) and <i>mendacious BBL adherents </i>(MBAs)<i>. </i>Both groups commonly claim that they are fundamentally scientists, and that their adherence to the BBL model is scientifically motivated, and (the former type in particular) may indeed actually <i>believe </i>that this is the case. However, the argument would go, the careful observer will discount these protestations (after all, who can truly claim to <i>be </i>a scientist unless they actually know how it <i>feels </i>to be a scientist, by ESP perhaps) and instead look at the common denominator in the overt behaviour of the two groups. They both are obsessed, in different ways, with sexualising trans women. DBAs <i>need </i>to believe (and MBAs, similarly, need to convince others) that trans women are, in fact, men, who transition either out of a pathological need to have sex with large numbers of heterosexual men or out of a pathological need to achieve sexual arousal and climax by seeing themselves as women.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>According to this model, these types are not readily visible to the untrained eye, since MBAs commonly misrepresent themselves as DBAs (and may even come to believe this themselves), and both types are often silent about their true motivation, and instead tell stories about their “research” and “findings” that are misleading, and, in important respects, false. Why, a proponent of this model would ask, do BBL adherents exist, given that there can be no true scientific motivation in a group of pretend scientists? One answer would quickly commend itself: both groups spend an inordinate time – even at the risk of public ridicule and the loss of their careers and credibility – sexualising trans women and portraying them as men. This pathological need could be termed <i>alloandrophilia<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a> </i>(aloe-andro-feel-ya), a need to achieve sexual arousal and climax by viewing others as hypersexualised men.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Both DBAs and MBAs will often take offence at being assigned to either diagnostic category, and try to downplay the erotic aspects of their fixation with viewing trans women as men. Many will invent long, detailed narratives of their “research” and even go to the extent of founding “scientific” journals to create the superficial impression in the uninformed public that they are in fact real scientists, despite the fact that their overt behaviour will often appear to be anything but scientific. In any case, the argument would go, we must discount anything we may hear about the “true” motivations of BBL adherents. While one occasionally encounters open and honest BBL adherents of both types, who admit to the erotic nature of their obsessions, most BBL adherents are desperate to convince both others and themselves of the validity of the standard BBL narrative.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Because it is easily possible to shoehorn any group one wants into a BBL type taxonomy (though the above case has at least empirical validity speaking for it), its scientific status is even more undermined. The BBL taxonomy fails to conform to the criteria of a scientific theory in multiple respects. First: it lacks <i>explanatory and descriptive adequacy </i>in that it fails to adequately explain, or even describe, a wide range of pertinent data. Second: it seeks to create an unsupported catch-all (lying) in order to discount any contrary data, thus rendering it <i>unfalsifiable. </i>Third: the BBL taxonomy is vacuous and lacks any serious theoretical content, and thus is accurately termed <i>trivial.</i></span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><i> <o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Accordingly, the scientific status of the BBL taxonomy is <i>nil.</i></span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><i> <o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;" align="center"><b><span style="">III. The Social and Ideological Function of the BBL Taxonomy</span></b></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;" align="center"><br /><b><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Moving on to the second issue, the social and ideological needs served by the BBL claims, Bailey himself inadvertently tips his hand in a section dedicated to the issue of public and private funding for sex reassignment surgery:</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><span style="">My undergraduate students at Northwestern are surely more liberal than average […] but even most of them balk at the idea that the surgery should be subsidized. <i>They are especially hesitant to support surgery for nonhomosexual transsexuals, once they learn about autogynephilia</i>. <i>The idea of men sexually obsessed with having vaginas is incomprehensible to them, and like most Americans, they are too puritanical to give sexual concerns much priority in the public trough. </i>But even when I invoke the standard transsexual narrative – “Imagine that you have felt your entire life that you had the body of the wrong sex” – they balk. When I press them, they say something like the following: <i>“But they don’t have the wrong body. They are mentally ill.”</i></span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 2cm;"><br /><span style=""><i> <o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style="">(p. 206; emphasis supplied) In other words, Bailey expressly acknowledges that the effect of teaching the BBL model, especially to inexperienced undergraduates who may not know any better, is to bias them against the legitimacy of the needs of trans women. By inculcating in these students “the idea of men sexually obsessed with having vaginas”, he is – by his own account – able to eliminate any empathy or understanding the students might have for the “standard” (i.e. actual) narrative. The typical response Bailey claims to get when he presses these students is exactly the one he has been at great pains to propagate: “They don’t have the wrong body. They are mentally ill.” (<i>Id.)</i></span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><i> <o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Thus, while not capable of even attempting to explain the vast range of gender-variant identities and behaviour without resorting to broad, sweeping assumptions, the BBL model is quite suited to the ideological and social needs of those who seek to do serious harm to the social, political, and legal position of trans women. This also explains why Bailey would choose to address his book to a lay audience, rather than the relevant scientific community: like the undergraduates he describes, the lay public is unlikely to have the sophisticated understanding of the issues that would allow his colleagues to recognise his work as nonsense.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;" align="center"><b><span style="">IV. Conclusion: Conforming Popular Ideology to Reality</span></b></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;" align="center"><br /><b><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: center;" align="center"><b><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Returning to the hypothetical case we considered initially, it is important to remember that it is not particularly hypothetical. While the terminology and pseudoscientific window-dressing are products of my own imagination, the basic ideas that the model put forth were common coin just a few decades ago. Why, then, would the hypothetical provoker/confabulator model now be likely to be dismissed with derision, while the long-discredited and fundamentally flawed Bailey-Blanchard-Lawrence fetishist/effeminate gay man model can be published by an imprint of the National Academy of Sciences? Why can the proponent of such pseudoscience, after being exposed, be portrayed in the media as the victim, and those who seek to counteract his propaganda as the aggressors?</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>I would submit that the answer ultimately lies in the hypothetical case. What happened that caused the scientific community and the public to go from generally accepting the ideas about rape underlying the hypothetical provoker/confabulator model to recognising it as the misogynistic nonsense it is? The data did not change. The ideas underlying the model were no more objectively valid before than they are now. However, the political position of victims of sexual assault <i>has </i>changed. Through the feminist movements, these and other (cisgendered) women have demanded a voice in defining their lives and their experiences, and their fundamental right to self-determination and personal autonomy. One sign of the moderate success they have enjoyed in these efforts is the fact that a proponent of a model of rape like the hypothetical one sketched above would be immediately recognised by most as a misogynist and an apologist for rapists.</span></p><p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Trans women, on the other hand, have not yet been successful in their struggle to define their own lives and experiences, much less in vindicating their right to meaningful personal autonomy. Because of this, the proponents of the BBL model can play to the media (the only forum left since their colleagues have long since rejected it), and expect the prevailing climate of ignorance and cissexism to prepare fertile ground for their propaganda. However, the response of a number of trans women – scientists, educators, lawyers, and others – to <i>The Man who would be Queen </i>is a definite step in the right direction. Their immediate efforts to debunk the BBL pseudoscience and document the severe methodological and ethical irregularities of Bailey’s work<a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]--></span></span></a> successfully led to Bailey’s forced resignation from his post as department chair at Northwestern, and caused the National Academy of Sciences to remove his book from their website. While those who would seek to prevent trans women telling their own stories on their own terms were quick to cry “censorship” and blame the justified outrage of those defamed by Bailey’s work on “political correctness” or “identity politics”, it is only through persistent, vocal, and public challenges to bigoted propaganda such as Bailey’s that the ideological climate will be forced to catch up to the realities of trans women’s lives. </span><span lang="X-NONE" style="font-size:14848;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <div style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><br /><hr align="left" size="1" width="33%"> <!--[endif]--> <div style="" id="ftn1"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""><span style=""> </span> Available online at: http://www.chomsky.info/articles/19711230.htm<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn2"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""><span style=""> </span> The BBL model categorically denies that trans women are, in fact, women, and thus considers trans women who are attracted to men to be “homosexual”. <o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn3"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""><span style=""> </span> Available in full text online at: http://web.archive.org/web/20041010020208/books.nap.edu/books/0309084180/html/1.html#pagetop<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn4"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""><span style=""> </span> While much could be said about references to “souls” in a work that claims to be grounded in the scientific method and based on “research”, there are much bigger fish to fry.<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn5"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""><span style=""> </span> From the Greek <i>allo- </i>meaning <i>other </i>and<i> </i><i style="">andro </i><span style="">meaning man/male.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> </div> <div style="" id="ftn6"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="" href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1809385768373334836&postID=1321343330392795555#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" title=""><span class="FootnoteCharacters"><span style=""><span style=""><!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style=""><span style=""> </span> See, <i>e.g.</i>, NAS member Lynn Conway’s documentation at http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/LynnsReviewOfBaileysBook.html<o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> </div>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-38542062738555583732007-08-01T21:46:00.001-04:002007-08-01T22:57:36.509-04:00House Bill 287: A new thrust from the rape lobby<span style="font-family:verdana;">Representatives of the Rape Lobby in the Ohio General Assembly have introduced a new bill, <a href="http://www.legislature.state.oh.us/bills.cfm?ID=127_HB_287">HB 287</a>, which would make it a misdemeanour for a woman to get an abortion, regardless of whether the foetus is viable, without the "written informed consent" of the "father" (perhaps "sperm donor" would be the more appropriate term) of the foetus. There is no exception for women who do not know the identity of the "father"; they must submit a list of possible "fathers" and obtain paternity tests from each of them, at their own expense. Nor is there an exception for women who were impregnated by abusive spouses or boyfriends, who are often in mortal danger if their abusers find out of attempts to get an abortion. Rape victims are required to file and submit a police report - regardless of whether there is any chance of prosecution - before getting an abortion, thus exposing them to a heightened danger of reprisals.<br /><br />This threat should be taken seriously. While it may not pass, the events of the past year should serve to disabuse us all of any optimism about the chances of defeating or invalidating legislation like this. The man who, in <span style="font-style: italic;">Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, </span>said that a man should have as much control over his adult wife as he does over his minor daughter (Samuel Alito) is now on the Supreme Court. Women's rights are in greater danger now than they have been in the past twenty years. This bill may ultimately be defeated, but we cannot leave it up to chance, nor can we leave it up to a federal judiciary that has abdicated its role as protectors of the Constitution.<br /><br />Ohioans have the power to amend the State constitution by referendum. If a State law is invalidated on "independent and adequate" state-law grounds, the federal courts can't stand in the way of its invalidation. Accordingly, I would suggest that we attempt to get the following constitutional amendments on the ballot as soon as possible:<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Equal Rights, Nondiscrimination.</span> (1) No person shall be denied any right, privilege, or immunity on the basis of race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, ethnicity, or national origin.<br />(2) No branch or agency of the government of the State of Ohio may discriminate against any person on the basis of race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, ethnicity, or national origin.<br />(3) All branches and agencies of the government of the State of Ohio shall have the power and the duty to establish and protect the substantive equality of all persons without regard to race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, ethnicity, or national origin.<br />(4) Nothing in the fore<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span>going shall be construed to prohibit any measure taken by any public or private institution to remedy or prevent discrimination.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bodily Integrity, Self-Determination. </span>(1) No branch or agency of the government of the State of Ohio shall abridge the right of all persons to bodily integrity and self-determination.<br />(2) Such right of bodily integrity and self-determination shall include, without limitation, the right to take measures to prevent or terminate pregnancy.<br /></span>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-37984762599689402942007-07-22T04:11:00.000-04:002007-07-22T04:12:02.577-04:00Abusive Relationships, Personal and Political<div style="margin: 1ex;"> <div> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">The Democrats are not our allies. No matter how much sunshine we blow up their asses and how many rhetorical blowjobs we continue to provide, they aren’t on our side. Why do we stand by them through their weak and inconsistent support of reproductive rights, their active exacerbation of poverty and discrimination, their declaration that they don’t “do women’s issues”? </span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">Because we feel dependent on them.</span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">Because we’re scared of what might happen if we were to leave them. </span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">“They’re concerned with important things right now. They’re under a lot of stress. In better times, they would never treat us like this. Maybe we offended them somehow. Could we be asking too much from them? They do <i>so </i> much for us, after all.”</span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">That is what’s called an “abusive relationship”.</span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">We feminists are great at pointing them out when it’s our girlfriends, our mothers, our sisters, our daughters, our coworkers, or even some random woman in a “reality” series. “Why don’t you get the fuck out of there? He’s going to kill you one of these days!” Why haven’t we noticed that we’ve all been in an abusive relationship for decades now? </span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">And yet every election cycle, we stick out our hands to the DNC and hope that we get a little extra allowance (“Please, just this once, honey?”). We never get it, of course, because our Democrat pimps are confident we’d never leave them for their colleagues in the GOP. <i>Of course </i> we haven’t. The Democrats are at least not <i>openly </i> misogynistic.</span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">What’s the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans?</span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">Democrats say “I’m sorry, baby” after they knock your front teeth out.</span><br /></p> <p><span style="font-family:Times New Roman;font-size:100%;">Let them both eat TV dinners. We can do better.</span></p> </div> </div>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1809385768373334836.post-46844925704291220282007-07-05T05:41:00.000-04:002007-07-05T05:46:45.301-04:00Moral Crisis<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><b><i><span style="">The United States at Age 231<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><b><i><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></i></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>“Morals and values” are ubiquitous in the media and political discourse. We are told of “values voters” who support George W. Bush out of a sense of moral rectitude. We hear of the decay of “traditional values” and the likely culprits almost incessantly. Fundamentalist clerics blame everything from the 9/11 attacks to Hurricane Katrina on the decline of morality in our society. This is clearly a serious matter.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>The likely culprits are easily identified, and are the same every time. Gay marriage, feminism, abortion, contraception, homosexuality, anti-racist movements, dissident professors, “taking God out of our schools”, and many more of the usual suspects are paraded before us on a daily basis in a bizarre rhetorical perp walk. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Listening further, we learn that to be moral means to be heterosexual and fundamentalist, antifeminist and pro-Bush, anti-abortion and pro-war; to be moral means believing that the Earth is a few thousand years old, and was created by an invisible deity in the sky (out of sheer boredom, one assumes). These are the “morals and values” to which we must urgently attend, lest we fall over the precipice. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>These, we are told, are our values, and they are in crisis. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Meanwhile, a cluster bomb maims a child in Kandahar, a woman in Baghdad is dismembered by American machine gun fire at the local market, still another child is diagnosed with leukaemia due to exposure to US depleted-uranium munitions, and a young man in Sadr City is dragged out of his bed in the middle of the night by machine gun-toting foreigners, and will wake up the next morning with no front teeth and electrical burns all over his body. A hospital is raided, doctors are hogtied, patients die for lack of medication. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>The <i>New York Times, </i>the <i>Washington Post, </i>and FOX News either praise our great leaders for bringing freedom to benighted regions or argue that we must not terminate our invasion out of a sense of responsibility to its supposed beneficiaries. The raid on the hospital is praised, the rest is kept quiet, ignored altogether if at all possible. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>And the self-appointed moral apostles of our country react either with silence or unmasked glee.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>Six decades ago, a group of student anti-war activists wrote:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent"></p><blockquote> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 42.55pt;">There is nothing less worthy of a civilised people than to submit without resistance to the "government" of an irresponsible clique of rulers who are ruled by base instinct. Is it not true that every honest German is ashamed of his government? And who amongst us can imagine the measure of the shame that will befall us and our children once the veil has fallen from our eyes, and the most hideous, infinitely unmeasurable, crimes reach the light of day?<br /><i><span style="">[…]<o:p></o:p></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 42.55pt;"><i><span style="">Do not forget that every people deserves the government that it tolerates!<o:p></o:p></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span></span></p></blockquote><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="">In our time, the authors of those words – Hans and Sophie Scholl, Christoph Probst, Willi Graf, Alexander Schmorell, and Prof. Kurt Huber, names that history must remember – are hailed as heroes. Schools are named after them. Children are taught of their courageous acts. In their time, they were decapitated for “betraying the troops” and “aiding the enemy”.<span style=""> </span>One of the leading intellectuals of their day, judge Roland Freisler, summed it up in eerily familiar language:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 42.55pt;"><span style="">Whoever, like [the authors of the leaflet quoted above], treasonously weakens the home front, thus sabotaging our defensive strength and thereby rendering aid and comfort to the enemy of the <i>Reich </i>[…], raises the dagger to stab the back of our troops at the front! […] Anyone who acts in this manner is attempting - particularly now, when it is essential for our nation to stand united to open a first rift in the unity of our fighting front. And these are the acts of German students, whose honour was always grounded in self-sacrifice for our people and our nation! <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 42.55pt;"><span style=""><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>The moral crisis in this country is real, and it is not yet clear whether optimism is warranted as to its outcome. We may very well deserve the government that we yet tolerate, but do the people of Iraq deserve it as well? Or the people of Afghanistan? <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>The crisis is real, and we see it every day. We live in a country where the reaction of the intellectual class to the revelation that our military tortures civilian prisoners – a war crime – ranges from red-herring discussions about “ticking time bombs” and doubts about the effectiveness of the methods to outright praise. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>We live in a country where people are in uproar over the “murder of children” when a woman decides to terminate her pregnancy, but not when an Iraqi toddler is sliced in half by his “liberators’” bullets. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>We live in a country where “sodomy” is condemned when two men want to get married, but not when a soldier shoves the barrel of his gun into the rectum of his prisoner. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>We live in a country where officials who declare that Iraq will be able to finance the reconstruction of all we’ve destroyed are criticised not because the idea that the victim should pay for the devastation we’ve wrought borders on sociopathy, but because it didn’t turn out to be true.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>This is where we live. This is our country, and these are the values of those who control it. They make no effort to hide them, because to them these values are right and proper, and thoroughly unremarkable. If we ever wish this to be a country we can call our own without shame or qualification, we cannot plead ignorance. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>We must recognise where we live, and face the moral and ethical consequences. If we do not, we can only weep for this country, along with the millions who now weep because of us rather than with us.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span><span style=""> </span>We will not be rescued from the <i>true </i>moral crisis of this country by enlightened leaders, pundits, or clerics. <i>This is a crisis of their making.</i> Only we – the people of this country – can ever hope to save ourselves. It is up to us whether the people of the world ask our children how their parents could have done nothing, knowing what was happening, or whether, instead, we are remembered as the generation that finally said <i>ENOUGH.</i><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""><span style=""> </span>The world is watching us. <o:p></o:p></span></p>alboradahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733821719264747371noreply@blogger.com5