Category Archives: Politics

Not So Fun Facts about Rape

05 Friday Oct 2018

Posted by in Politics, Rape Culture, Uncategorized

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• Rape is not solely or even mostly about sex. There can be several reasons for rape, including sexual gratification, revenge, recreation, power/control, and attempting to prove masculinity. Men don’t rape 80 year-old women because they are horny. If rape were only about sex, then only attractive young women (or men) would be raped (although women under 30 are by far the largest group of victims and that includes children). Anyone of any age, gender, or sexual orientation can, and have, been raped.

• Women can also commit rape. While most of the attention is on male sexual violence, and rightly so, because females are ninety-one percent of rape victims, some of those rapes are perpetrated by women, and women perpetrate some of the nine percent of rapes that happen to men. We can’t truly understand and hopefully end, sexual assault without understanding all aspects of the problem.

• It does not matter if a woman who is raped is a virgin or has slept with every man that moves. A woman who enjoys her sexuality is A) NOT a slut (that particular bit of male shaming of women’s sexuality is especially egregious) and B) if raped, was not raped because she enjoys her sexuality or in any way deserved it. See first comment if the reason why still eludes you.

• False accusations of rape are rare. There are actually two types, a false allegation, meaning a woman claims she was raped, but does not name a perpetrator, and a false accusation meaning the woman claims she was raped and names a perpetrator. The distinction is important because false allegations (no one is named) are more common than false accusations (a perpetrator is named), and many news reports that claim that false allegations of rape are around 40%, are not making the distinction that the majority of those never named a perpetrator, meaning no one suffered from the allegation. False accusations are no joke and can cause much harm to the accused including loss of job, expensive court proceedings, and loss of reputation, and very rarely jail time. What is troubling however, is that because a vanishingly small number of men face very real issues from false accusations, a very large number of women are automatically assumed to be lying about their sexual assault. The vast majority of rapists walk free among us. Any accusation of rape or sexual assault must be take seriously, and investigated thoroughly, to make sure that women get justice and that falsely accused men get the same.

• Worry over falsely accused men is not the only reason women are not believed. Two of the most common questions rape survivors are asked are, “Why didn’t you fight back?” and “Why can’t you remember certain things about the assault?” How our brains and therefore our bodies and minds react to trauma hold the answers. When a sexual assault is occurring the victim can literally be paralyzed. This is called tonic immobility. Several different hormones are released that inhibit thought processes, that help deal with potential pain, and to help the victim remain calm. Other hormone levels fall, leaving the victim with less energy available to fight or flee. These same hormones affect the hippocampus, which turns sensory information into memories, and the amygdala, which then processes the emotions related to the memory. So the same hormones that work to keep our bodies safe during an attack, also make it difficult to remember in great detail that same attack. In spite of the hard facts of science, the myth persists that unless a woman fights back or remembers every specific detail of her assault, she is likely a false accuser.

• Why don’t more women report rape? The last two paragraphs offer a big clue. One study indicates that 90% of survivors who report, face secondary victimization, including being told by police that they shouldn’t file a report, questioned about what they were wearing, questioned about their prior sexual history, and even if they had an orgasm during the attack, although that particularly nasty question usually only happened if the victim did not have an advocate present. The idea that a woman must have a pristine reputation, must have behaved as expected during her assault (fighting back), must remember every single detail of the assault, had to have been primly dressed, stone cold sober, have physical injuries, and most ludicrous of all, witnesses to the assault, persist and women know they aren’t likely to be believed. The U.S. media is also to blame for perpetuating the rape culture that is so entrenched in society. And people wonder why rape is the most underreported crime, with 63% of victims never reporting.

• Let’s talk a bit about consent. This really shouldn’t be that hard folks. Someone who is so drunk, that you’re positive they couldn’t make it home safely by themselves, also cannot give consent for sex. Just because someone has said yes before, that’s not a blanket yes for all sexual encounters. If someone uses coercion to force the issue, they do not have consent. Consent is an active act by both parties and it should be totally obvious that both parties are totally into it, whether that consent is verbal, or through body language.

• There are many myths surrounding rape that just won’t die including a few discussed above. One of the most common is that most rapes are perpetrated by strangers who yank unsuspecting women into dark alleys and rape them at knife point. While that kind of rape does happen, the majority are perpetrated by someone the victim knows. Another myth is that it wasn’t really rape unless the victim is physically injured. The rapist may use a weapon to control the situation, the victim may succumb to tonic immobility, they could be drunk, or they could have been drugged by the rapist. Another persistent myth is that victims who withdraw a rape allegation were never raped in the first place. There are many reasons why women decide not to pursue a rape claim including pressure from family, fear of reprisal from the perpetrator and more. Another enduring myth is that sex workers cannot be raped. This goes back to consent. If there is no consent it is rape, no matter what a person does for a living. These and other longstanding myths must be combated and counteracted at every opportunity if we are to ever get a handle on the issue of sexual assault.

• As rare as they are, there are false allegations of sexual assault and rape made. Why do women do this? This article does a deep dive into allegations, accusations, the reasons they are made and the mind-set of the accuser. It is well worth the read.

• Finally, let’s talk a bit about how credible women are seen to be when they accuse someone of rape. If you’ve been paying any attention at all, you would answer, they are rarely seen as credible and you would be right. Let’s suppose Suzy Smith came home from work and her apartment had been burglarized. Would she be afraid to call the police? Would she be afraid that they wouldn’t believe her, that they would find any number of reasons to find her report of a burglary not credible? Of course not. What about if she reported her car stolen? Her purse? What about if she called and said she had seen a child kidnapped off of the street? Or that she had seen a suspicious looking person leave a suspicious looking package somewhere? No to all of the above. Do lawyers see women as so non-credible that they never call them as witnesses in court or seat them on juries? Yet again no. So then why do women have little credibility when reporting a sexual assault? Rape culture. It is up to each and every one of us to educate ourselves on what rape culture is, and what we need to accept that we’ve been doing or believing to perpetuate it, and then making it a priority to change.

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Bernie Sanders vs. The Powers That Be

10 Friday Jun 2016

Posted by in Politics, Uncategorized

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I’ve had a couple of days to digest the primaries on June 7th. My stomach is still upset. I knew things were bad in this country. I knew wealth inequality was at levels not seen since the Gilded Age. I knew that our government had been bought and paid for by the oligarchy and I knew that it would be a long term struggle to reclaim it on behalf of the people. What I didn’t quite realize yet was how deeply, in the media, and in local, state and national government the rot had penetrated.

I’m going to talk about how the media completely ignored Bernie Sanders until it was obvious he was building a movement and how they then saturated the airwaves with he has no chance of winning despite his winning state after state. I’m going to talk about the media ignoring the massive and ongoing voter fraud that has been perpetuated in this primary. So let’s start with exit polling.

Exit polling is done extremely well. Exit polling is used by our own State Department and the UN to monitor elections for fraud in third world countries. If exit polls are off by more than two to four percent, the election is considered invalid due to fraud. That’s 2% to 4%. Got that? Take a look at this graphic and the election polling results for the democratic primary in several states:

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Look at the differences in election polls and actual vote counts, and how off they are in favor of Clinton. And by the way, this is hardly the only graphic that shows this, but you do have to dig a bit because the mainstream media is ignoring this. How could they ignore this you might wonder? Well, when it became increasingly obvious that in the United States of America, one of the two major parties was running an election that would be thrown out as fraudulent by our own State Department, the mainstream media just up and declared they would not longer be using exit polling because they were “unreliable”. So what’s good enough to call into question elections in other countries is too unreliable for our stand up democracy. Huh.

But here’s the kicker. They decided to quit exit polling before California. Before the state with so many delegates up for grabs it could change the trajectory of the race, in spite of the clear voter fraud happening in previous races. Because if the exit polling was off by large margins in California more people would sit up and take notice. So we got no exit polling in California. And even though pre-election polling showed Sanders and Clinton in a statistical tie, she “won” handily. And we have no exit polling to compare with vote totals.

[Edited to add] Just found this. An exit poll of CA early primary voting (with a statistical margin of error of 3.52%) was off by 16% in favor of Hillary. That is a statistical impossibility. This same exit poll was spot on for all other races in CA on Tuesday. Combine this with the fact that in the 24 states where the exit polls were off by more than the statistical margin of error, 22 of those states exceeded that margin of error in favor of Hillary Clinton. The odds of that scenario occurring are approximately 1 in 78 billion.

Now lets talk voter suppression. From the constant barrage of Bernie will never win, Clinton is inevitable, coming from every single pundit on every single media platform including those same pundits calling a Clinton win the second polls closed, but waiting until 70, 80, 90% of the vote was in to call for Bernie even when he was winning a state by landslide margin; to adding super delegate totals to the pledged delegate total to make it look like Clinton had an insurmountable lead, even though super delegates do not vote until the convention and only if needed; to massive poll closures in important states that restricted where people could vote and causing hours long lines that many people just couldn’t wait in due to work and other commitments; to thousands and thousands of lifelong Democrats as well as newly registered Democrats getting to the polls and being told they either weren’t registered or weren’t registered as a Democrats so they could only vote provisionally, meaning their votes ended up in the dumpster; the suppression is obvious and would be called out in any truly functioning democracy.

But the  overripe cherry on this putrid primary season was the AP announcing the night before California and 5 other states voted that Clinton had clinched the nomination and was the Democratic Party nominee. Clinton did not have the pledged delegates needed when this announcement was made. The AP called the race based on phone calls they made to super delegates who confirmed their commitment to Clinton. So they outright lied to the electorate in order to suppress turnout. So now the entire media narrative is Clinton is the nominee, Bernie needs to exit gracefully and all the party bigwigs including President Obama and Elizabeth Warren have endorsed her.

There is only one major player who has not announced Hillary Clinton as the nominee and that is the DNC. In spite of claiming neutrality during the primary Debbie Wasserman-Schulz, the chairman of the DNC, has been doing everything in her power to stack the deck in favor of Clinton. Why would she not jump on that bandwagon now? Because according to the party’s own rules, unless a candidate has 2,383 pledged delegates (Clinton does not) they are not the nominee. Super delegates do not count until they vote at the convention. Their loyalties can and do switch for any number of reasons. That is why Bernie is taking this all the way to the convention. Clinton is not yet the nominee according to the DNC’s own rules. Bernie supporters, by the way, aren’t sitting around wishing for “unicorns and rainbows” in the form of the super delegates moving over to him en masse. They are establishment and will stay with Clinton, that much has been made clear. But Bernie’s movement deserves time and attention at the convention and we are grateful he’s still willing to fight for us.

But for me, the most disheartening thing about this whole business is how many Americans are willing to ignore and overlook the subjugation of our democracy because it benefits their candidate. These are the same people who act all appalled at the Republican’s voter suppression tactics through highly restrictive Voter ID laws that impact the poor, elderly, minorities and young people disproportionately and who just happen to vote Democrat by wide margins. But the very real, verifiable and egregious voter fraud and suppression happening in their own primary and it’s crickets. Do they not understand that if this kind of corruption is allowed to stand, it could very well be their candidate who is screwed next time around? Do they not understand that they are no better than the Republicans they vilify? Do they not understand? Or do they only care about democracy when it works in their favor?

Bernie Sander’s movement will continue well beyond this election in spite of the powers that be working diligently to make sure he doesn’t have a platform to return this country to one that works for all Americans. In point of fact, their fraud has made sure of that.

 

 

Equal Pay Day

14 Tuesday Apr 2015

Posted by in Culture, Politics, Writing

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Today is Equal Pay Day. It is the day that brings us a sort of divisive political holiday, representing how far past Dec. 31 women must work to earn as much as men did the previous calendar year. Put another way, for the average woman to earn as much as the average man did in 2014, she has to work 104 days into 2015. But oops, look how far behind she is in 2015 now. And that yearly difference is not made up during her lifetime. The average woman loses $420,000 dollars of income over the course of her employment years due to this disparity, making only .78 to every $1.00 earned by the average man. And this impacts not only her yearly income, but her retirement income since a) Social Security payments are based on your earnings, but also, b) it’s a lot harder to save for yourself when you’re struggling to make ends meet. And since women still on average live longer than men, it impacts them even more.

In 1936 my grandmother was married with a 10 year old son, a 7 year old son and was pregnant with my mother. This was in the middle of the Great Depression. In May, when she was 6 mos. pregnant with my mother, my grandfather was eating peanuts, throwing them into the air and catching them in his mouth. He choked on one and inhaled it. The peanut in his lung gave him pneumonia. This was before antibiotics and the pneumonia combined with the enlarged heart that he got serving in World War I, killed him a week or so later. My grandmother gave birth to my mother in September and then had to go to work to support her family. Her mother, my great-grandmother Mary Anne whom I’m named after (and who was supported by my grandfather before his death because there was no Social Security at that time) looked after my mother and uncles while my grandmother went to work as a teacher. So my grandmother was working to support herself, 3 children and her mother.

At one point, my grandmother went to the school board to request to be paid the same as the male teachers on staff. Keep in mind that this was in a small town and everyone knew her circumstances. The board unanimously denied her request, telling her with straight faces that the reason men made so much more than she did was because they had families to support. When she politely pointed out that she was supporting her family since her husband’s death, they told her that she needed to get out there and find herself another husband. My grandmother never remarried. She taught for many years and then became a principal until her retirement. She was never paid, either as a teacher or a principal, anywhere close to what her male counterparts made throughout her long career. She was respected and well loved in her school district, but never deemed worthy to earn as much as a man.

It is 2015 and things really aren’t much different. For any number of reasons, there are large numbers of single parent families, the vast majority of whom are led by women. Child support laws are enforced with varying degrees of success from place to place, with far too many places doing a terrible job. The number of men who abdicate their financial responsibilities to their children is outrageous. And yet it is the women who are more often than not demonized in our culture. The vast majority of them work, many times more than one job at a time to support their children, on 78 cents to the dollar. Equal pay is not something that should be controversial. People who earn more money spend more money, benefitting the entire economy. Fewer children would live in poverty if their mothers earned more money. It is far past time that the sexist, misogynist views that women don’t deserve to make as much, or should be taken care of by a male, or whatever goes on in the mind of the majority, male power structure, are cast aside. Equal pay is a win, win for everyone.

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The State of Things

17 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by in Government, Media, Politics

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I’ve been thinking a lot about the state of the U.S. since the mid-term elections. Well, if I’m honest since way before the elections. And if I’m honest, I’m having a hard time being optimistic. Of understanding what people are thinking and why. Why there is either rabid, angry, ugly discourse from some and complete apathy from others. How is it that people are so lacking in sympathy, let alone empathy, toward fellow human beings.

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Why people will vote against their own self interests just so that they can be seen as better than those “others”. How science and education became dirty words, academia seen as nothing but “liberal” ideology. Conservative states like Texas actually changing history in textbooks to gloss over what they would rather have people not know, advocating NOT teaching critical thinking skills in their party platforms, to keep the populace stupid and uninformed. Politicians repeatedly stating, “I’m not a scientist, but I believe climate change is a hoax” to keep the oil, gas and coal industries happy and raking in the billions, while 97% of scientists are raising ever more strident alarms. Demonizing low income workers as lazy and uneducated (just the way they like them) and refusing to raise the minimum wage to something even remotely livable while working feverishly to cut food stamps for children, the elderly and veterans. Propagating “patriotism” and “love for country” and “supporting our troops” to make it seem ok to fight never ending wars that make the rich ever richer all while making more veterans they can refuse to do right by. Bailing out banksters and their banks to the tune of billions of dollars, refusing to prosecute even one of the rich SOB’s who tanked the global economy, causing millions of people to lose their retirement funds, their homes, their jobs, their hope, while those few get ever richer hoarding and sitting on trillions of dollars. How one family, the Walmart heirs (6 people) own more wealth than the bottom 40% of Americans (120 million people) yet they claim they cannot afford to pay a living wage or give full time work to their employees and rely on the government to provide aid to 70% of their workers all while working towards taking that aid away. And the Waltons are just one example, the Koch brothers another, of the 0.01% who have more money than they could possibly ever spend who diligently work toward keeping the masses poor and hungry and uneducated, and fighting amongst each other so they won’t realize the real problem has nothing to do with they deserve it because they worked hard but that the playing field was so ridiculously slanted in their favor. Pay equality for women still a pipe dream, a “pro-life” agenda that is really only “pro-birth” that is only about regulating a woman’s choices, not allowing her to make her own decisions and because once you are born to that poor woman who was unable to access needed reproductive healthcare or able to afford birth control so she could plan her family and who works 2 or 3 jobs at minimum wage and who can barely pay the rent and put food on the table, too bad, so sad, you should have been born into a “better” family.

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Colleges and universities operating for profit, graduating students with so much student debt they have to live at home with their parents, putting off marriage and home buying and families they can’t afford with a collective debt load in the trillions making the mortgage crisis look like a walk in the park, but hey the rich are getting richer.

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A militarized police force that murders with impunity, especially those of color, that pepper sprays, tear gases and arrests peaceful protestors, criminalizing our constitutional right to peaceful assembly, legally confiscating anything they “claim” might come from “drug” activity without having to prove that, to the tune of billions of dollars stolen from law-abiding citizens. And the corporate media, bought and paid for by the wealthy, disseminating fear and mistrust and false outrage, keeping focus on what the oligarchy wants while ignoring what they don’t. I could go on and on and on. And while both political parties are complicit in many of the laws that have allowed such a massive and unprecedented gap in income inequality, conservatives, the Republican party are by far the drivers of most of the above. And they were voted back into control of both houses of congress because people either voted against their own interests, buying into the horse shit arguments that they are better than all those “others” and they have the right to decide how huge swaths of people live their lives and believing that “conservative” values and Republicans will make sure “they” are taken care of, or because they were too apathetic to go to the polls and let their voices be heard and so made sure they would stay stuck. It boggles my mind. But hey, as long as there’s American Idol and CSI and the Bachelor and the Kardashians and sports to watch on TV and new shoes and TV’s and cars to go into debt purchasing and church to go to so they can learn to judge who “deserves” what and why and when because they’re “good”, they put money in the collection basket and donate to charity during the holidays, smug in their white, middle-class, privilege not noticing as even that is slipping away.

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But, I’m not going to give up. I’m going to keep fighting for progressive reform because I believe with every thing I have that every person born, no matter their gender, their skin color, their place of birth deserves to live with dignity and that means making a living wage, no matter what they do for a living, having food to eat, a roof over their heads, having access to decent education, healthcare, income equality, rights over their own healthcare decisions and more. And yes that means the super wealthy, the regular wealthy, and the well-to-do will have to put in their fair share. Think about it like this. Say there was a 10% across the board, everyone pays it tax rate. If you make $20,000 a year you would pay $2,000 in taxes leaving $18,000 to live on. If you made $80,000 a year you would pay $8,000 in taxes leaving you $72,000 to live on. If you made $500,000 a year, you would pay $50,000 in taxes leaving you $450,000 to live on. If you made $2,000,000 a year you would pay $200,000 in taxes leaving you $1,800,000 to live on. Do you see where I’m going with this? The more money you make, the more you can provide to the social good and still have more than enough money. And don’t even get me started by saying that the poor don’t pay taxes. Of course they do. They pay sales taxes, and all those local taxes in the form of fees for services and those taxes as a percentage of their income are very regressive meaning it is much harder for the poor to pay those and still have enough to live on. I guess my hope is that the average person will wake up, quit allowing the wealthy and their bought and paid for media and politicians tell them what is right and what is wrong and instead start practicing compassion, understanding and kindness to their neighbors. Wasn’t it Jesus who said, “love thy neighbor as thyself”? Your neighbor is every other person born on this Earth. Believe it.

Dallas vs. Ebola pt. 6

20 Monday Oct 2014

Posted by in Government, Healthcare, Media, Politics, Texas

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There is much good news about Ebola and Dallas. First, some four dozen people who were in quarantine after having contact with Thomas Eric Duncan while he was ill are now through the quarantine period and have been cleared as being Ebola free. This number includes the four family members who lived with him for three or four days before he was hospitalized and were in the contaminated apartment for a couple of days after. From what I’ve read, it is a small apartment and was pretty harrowing before they were moved. And yet not one of them got sick. This should calm a lot of fears about how easy it is to catch Ebola, which is not very. Or at least it should, but listening to some of the people around here, who I thought were intelligent, well educated adults, I have some doubts about that. Sigh. Seriously people. Chill. Out.

The two nurses who were treating Mr. Duncan while he was most contagious and contracted Ebola have been moved to other hospitals with the capabilities to handle Ebola without further infecting healthcare workers. So there are no active cases of Ebola in Dallas at this time. There are 120 others being monitored, mostly those who also treated Mr. Duncan and the two nurses who are being monitored. Quarantines for that group will go as long as to November 7. I have no idea if it is a good sign that no one else has become symptomatic, but I choose to believe it is. People are not dropping like flies, even after treating someone ill with Ebola while protocols were not being followed. Again, Ebola is not that easy to catch.

The people who have been cleared, including Mr. Duncan’s family members, have zero chance of carrying the Ebola virus and need the community’s support and compassion, not fear and mistreatment. It is my hope that the Dallas community will rise to the occasion and welcome them back with open arms. I would hope that the hysterical levels of fear being seen in other communities, such as the school in Maine who put a teacher on 21 days leave (it better be paid!) because she was in Dallas at a conference 10 miles from Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital, or a school in Ohio closing because a student was on an airplane with one of the nurses who later became ill will not be the norm for the people who have been cleared here in Dallas. I hope we can show the country and the world how to compassionately and humanely treat people who have been through such a harrowing experience and not treat them like lepers.

November 7th is eighteen days from now. If no one else becomes ill, Dallas will be completely Ebola free. If someone else does become ill, their contacts will have a 21 day period of quarantine. But, as is becoming increasingly clear, Dallas nor the United States has an outbreak or epidemic of Ebola. Stop watching and listening to the fear-mongering news shows trying to get ratings and the fear-mongering politicians trying to score political points. Below are two links to information about Ebola from the CDC and Dallas County Health and Human Services. Despite all of the idiots out there squalling that the government is lying to you about Ebola, these ARE good sources of information.

Ebola information link one

Ebola information link two

Today is an absolutely beautiful day here in Dallas. It is sunny and 80º. In fact we’ve had beautiful weather all month. That may have played into why The State Fair of Texas brought in $41 million in tickets sales, breaking the previous record of $33 million. Hmmm. Seems like most of the people of Dallas and it’s visitors have not been taken in by the fear-mongering after all. Good on you, Dallas!

Dallas vs. Ebola pt. 5

15 Wednesday Oct 2014

Posted by in Government, Healthcare, Media, Politics, Texas

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A second nurse who treated Thomas Eric Duncan has tested positive for Ebola. I’ve been being stupid again and reading comments on various news forums and Facebook and the amount of panic, fear-mongering and outright stupidity is staggering. And the finger pointing in all the wrong directions is mind-boggling. I did find this meme which cracked me up:

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So, who’s fault is it? Because as much as some people detest the man for their, of course, (snicker) non-racist beliefs of birtherism, socialism and any other -ism they throw at him and hope it sticks, this is not President Obama’s fault. And it wouldn’t matter if there were a Republican president right now, this is not one man’s fault. Whose fault it is cannot be pinned to one or even a couple of people. Believe me, there is lots and lots of fault to go around and there are a whole lot of people in this country who see part of the problem in the mirror every day but prefer to blame the President.

Let’s start with the state of Texas. How could a state be at fault? Well in case you hadn’t heard, Texas politics are deeply red (conservative). There are a whole lot of progressives in Texas working to change that and change will come, but not soon enough in this case. Texas is a “right to work” state. A conservative euphemism for union-busting, pro-corporation policies. What it means in the real world is take this job as is, or leave it. Speak out about problems or issues or low pay or hazardous working conditions and we can fire you with impunity. And you have absolutely no recourse to appeal. It breeds environments where all kinds of problems can occur. Remember that huge explosion at the fertilizer plant in West, TX that leveled half the town? Do you think the people that worked there didn’t know there were problems? Of course they did. But you’ve got to feed your family and keep a roof over their heads, so better to keep your mouth shut and keep your job. Hospitals are no different. This kind of policy breeds workplace cultures that punish whistleblowers and allows the companies behind them to make ever more profits. And hospitals in this country are for-profit ventures. More on that later. It is now coming to light that the nurses didn’t have the protective gear they needed, in fact they were told by hospital ADMINISTRATORS that face masks were unnecessary. Hospital ADMINISTRATORS, you know, the folks who balance the budget (I mean make sure there’s a tidy profit) told nurses they didn’t need protective masks to keep them safe from Ebola. Not to mention that there apparently was a shortage of needed gear in the first place. I mean, why keep a surplus of gear that would keep your staff safe in an emergency situation because, profits! [ETA: Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital stated in a press conference this morning that all CDC protocols were followed and that all protective gear was available for nurse’s use.] And let’s discuss the fact that Mr. Duncan was sent home with antibiotics the first time he went to the hospital. The hospital has been hemming and hawing, at first blaming Mr. Duncan for not telling them he was from Africa, then admitting they knew he was from Africa but blaming a nurse for not telling the doctor, then admitting a doctor knew but their computer system messed up etc. The fact is he was an uninsured black man in a deeply conservative southern state. If you haven’t figured out what I mean by that, I’ll point it out for you. He was black. Racism is still rampant in this country despite what the very people who are the most racist want you to believe. You know, the ones who start a racist rant by stating, “I’m not racist, but…” And he was uninsured, meaning it was unlikely the for-profit hospital would get paid. So despite the fact that they all knew where he was from and that his symptoms were consistent with Ebola they sent him home. He just wasn’t good for the hospital’s bottom line. And now we’re learning that even after he came back the second time and in spite of a head nurse’s increasing outrage, hospital ADMINISTRATORS didn’t want to put him in isolation. Bad for the bottom line, because that stuff’s expensive. It is the very policies that this state endorses and embraces that allow that kind of outrageous practices in a hospital. And if you vote for the politicians who endorse these kinds of policies, you are part of the problem of Ebola spreading in Texas.

Now would be a good time to talk about the healthcare system in this country. You know, the one conservatives crow about being the best in world. Well, maybe it is for the wealthy and a bit better for those with insurance. But even with insurance, it is really easy to be bankrupted by a bad accident or illness. The Affordable Care Act also known as Obamacare (or according to conservatives the single most horrific law ever enacted in the history of everything) has made insurance affordable and available to more people, keeps insurers from discriminating based on pre-existing conditions, keeps insurers from dropping people from the insurance when they get sick, and prevents insurers from putting caps on the amount of insurance a sick person can get. All of those are good starts in the right direction. The other big part of the ACA is the expansion of Medicaid to a lot more people. All the states have to do is accept money from the federal government to expand Medicaid in their states. Of course Texas being red (conservative) threw a hissy fit about taking more money from that (insert insult of choice here) in the White House and turned down that money leaving many thousands of people here still without insurance that otherwise would have qualified. Would Medicaid have covered Mr. Duncan since he was a visitor from another country? No, but if hospitals here were getting Medicaid for the uninsured they by law have to at least make an attempt at treating in the ER it would cut down on their costs and make it less likely they’d turn away a foreign national without insurance. At least it should. But there’s that bottom line to consider, so maybe not. And here’s the thing, because our hospital system in this country is for-profit, not for doing the morally right thing of treating any person with any illness, even people with insurance are screwed on a regular basis by doctors and hospitals who exploit the system to line their own pockets. So when you have a system that puts profits ahead of patient care, that put administrators in charge of treatments and mix that with an uninsured, minority patient it’s a recipe for disaster. And if you are one of those people who believe if all those low-income people would just quit being so lazy and work harder at those minimum wage jobs they could all just magically get better paying jobs that don’t exist and get their own insurance then you are part of the problem of Ebola spreading in Texas.

Now, lets move on to the CDC (Center for Disease Control). The CDC has been a presence in the media since Mr. Duncan was diagnosed and have been doing their job of attempting to keep the populace calm. And that is an important job. Have you ever seen a herd of animals stampeding? Have you ever seen a large group of panicking humans? About the same. Of course, most people in the comments I’ve been reading think the CDC is just lying to them about how hard it is to spread Ebola and everyone is at risk!!!! But seriously people. Mr. Duncan’s family members, who spent days with him while he was sick with symptoms and who then spent more days in the contaminated apartment before they were moved have not gotten sick and are past the most likely timeframe for getting sick. They still have a few days of quarantine left, but each day that passes they have less likely a chance of getting it. The two people who have contracted it had daily extensive contact with Mr. Duncan when he was the most ill and contagious. They clearly did not have the resources or training to be safe and that is partially on the CDC and partially on the hospital, but to believe the CDC is lying about how easy it is to get Ebola is to not understand the science. Oh wait, conservatives and science don’t mix. The CDC has also sent personnel to help the hospital and city of Dallas with their response. Since the diagnoses of the 2nd nurse to have contracted Ebola, they have admitted they should have sent a much larger presence to Texas to help. Well, how in the world can we trust the CDC when they would screw up so badly? Well, lets talk funding. Remember the sequester? You know, when conservatives held the government hostage, shut it down unless it got draconian austerity measures passed? And President Obama relented thinking he could manage to work with Republicans and then sequestration went into effect because of course Republicans weren’t going to work with the (insert insult of choice here) in the White House. Well guess which budget got huge cuts? You guessed it, the CDC (along with everything else except the military). And we’re not just talking about the resources to send personnel to Texas. The CDC goes to other countries to help them with outbreaks that occur. To keep them from spreading. So that they don’t spread to this country. The best way to keep diseases like Ebola from spreading to this country is to keep them from spreading in other countries. But if the CDC doesn’t have the resources to help do that, it is inevitable that something will start to spiral out of control and it will hit here. Which is what has happened with Ebola. And let’s not forget everyone’s favorite armchair solution: ban all flights into this country from Africa. IT WILL NOT WORK FOLKS. You ban all flights from certain African countries, people who need to get here will just fly into another country and then fly here. The only way to would be to stop ALL flights into this country. Do you think the US economy not to mention world economy could handle that? The other thing I’ve heard from the panicked masses is to close the borders of the countries who have people infected by Ebola. OK. Whose going to close the borders of 3 or 4 large countries? Our military? If that were even possible, which it is not, that would put thousands and thousands of American servicemen in contact with Ebola. If President Obama ordered American troops into 4 countries to forcibly try and control their borders, then I might think he’s as awful as conservatives believe. And it wouldn’t work. There would be no way to completely stop people from coming or going across borders as we here in border states understand. You’d think all the panicked conservatives would get it too since they constantly whinge about our porous borders. The best way to stop the current outbreak is to make sure there are enough resources and personnel both in the countries with outbreaks and here at home and that will mean spending money. Congress should immediately reinstate previous budgets and add as much more as is needed. But they won’t. And they’ll blame Obama and so will all the other conservatives out there who refuse to understand how the real world works.

So, OH MY GOD, EBOLA!! WHAT SHOULD WE DO!! WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING!! WE HAVE TO BLAME SOMEBODY!!! Well, I’m glad you asked. Here’s what to do. First, calm the f*ck down. If you want to worry about something, worry about how 88 people A DAY die from gun violence in this country. I will repeat that. 88 people A DAY die from gun violence in this country. That is nearly 31,000 people a year. And the conservative wing nuts are just fine with that because “my right to own as many and every kind of gun there is with no restrictions trumps your right to be alive.” You want to be furious and up in arms about something? How about that? Next, how about the fact…no wait. Never mind. If you truly care about what is going on in the world and wish to stay informed you either already educate yourself or are capable of looking up and confirming everything I’ve stated in this piece. If you want to stay true to your ideology, your fear, your hatred of those who are different or “other”, if you want to believe that you are better than anyone else for whatever reason, then nothing I say here will change your mind. You won’t get that opinion is not equal to fact, that ideology is not equal to science, that your worldview is not the end all and be all. You’ll just stay fearful and angry and continue to vote for and support policies that seek to exclude and denigrate and keep downtrodden those “others”. The good news is that progressive ideals have ALWAYS won in the end. People who believe in the sanctity of ALL life, not just those of unborn fetuses, people who believe resources are there for ALL people no matter their circumstances, people who believe war-mongering is not the way to a peaceful world, people who believe science can advance our civilization and make life better for EVERYONE, those people and their ideals will prevail. So I will continue to stay optimistic that despite mistakes being made, despite a lack of resources, despite the greed and opportunism of so many in this country, this outbreak (if it can really be called that at this point) will be contained as will the real one in Africa. Lessons will be learned that will help doctors and scientists deal with the next one. And life will go on.

Graphic takes on emerging Ebolaphobia

11 Saturday Oct 2014

Posted by in Media, Politics

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Some hilarious cartoons that fit in perfectly with my series Dallas vs. Ebola and my post Media and the Politics of Fear

eats shoots 'n leaves

First from Jack Ohman, editorial cartoonist of the Sacramento Bee::

BLOG Ebola 1

And this from Jim Morin, editorial cartoonist of the Miami Herald:

BLOG Ebola 2

And from Jeff Darcy of the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

BLOG Ebola 3

Finally, from Bill Bramhall of the New York Daily News:

BLOG Ebola 4

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Media and The Politics of Fear

03 Friday Oct 2014

Posted by in Media, Politics

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The politics of fear is not a new idea. Google that phrase and you’ll see what I mean. As I wrote about in my last post, Dallas has the dubious distinction of having the first case of Ebola diagnosed in the United States. I also mentioned in that post that I stay away from TV media most of the time. I find it tiresome, not very informative and in many cases nothing but propaganda. Curiosity has gotten the better of me and I’ve taken a peek at the coverage of the Ebola case here in Dallas. The level of near hysteria over this so far ONE case of Ebola would be laughable if it weren’t so disgusting. And it is disgusting, on so many levels. The media coverage of Ebola in Dallas is fear mongering at it’s worst. Everything, from the hosts and pundits overwrought demeanor, to the headlines, the graphics and the news crawls are carefully crafted to let everyone who watches know that this is not just a serious story but that they are in serious danger. While the news shows bring on experts to explain Ebola and the (almost non-existent) risks of anyone here catching it, I’ve watched anchors and pundits actually question them repeatedly, challenge them on the science and hint through their facial expressions, body language and words that the experts are not to be trusted. Giant headlines flash across the screen EBOLA IN AMERICA, with ambulances and hospitals in the background, while ominous music plays. Today, the CDC sent in cleaners to clean the apartment where the victim stayed and to remove any biological hazard. There have been three news helicopters circling the area all day. Three. To catch a hazmat team clean one apartment and get more footage of rooftops and parking lots. I tried to show in a humorous way in my last post the fear that many people have over this. But the truth is, there are a lot of people who are truly terrified that they are at risk of getting Ebola. There are a lot of people who truly believe the government is lying to them about the risks or the number of cases. They don’t hear the dry and boring reassurances of doctors and other experts on infectious disease. But the headlines, flashing lights, ambulances, red, red, red graphics and the near frantic skepticism of their favorite news anchors is branded into their consciousness.

Why do most of the media behave in this way? Why terrify so many people in this way? Why make people believe they are at high risk of dying from a disease that actually poses almost no risk, but rarely even mention the real threats to American’s health? It’s not just Ebola. Terrorists are practically at our doorsteps, ready to kill as many of us as possible! Except you are more likely to be killed by a toddler than a terrorist. Why does the media do it? One word. Propaganda. It’s so much easier to keep the populace frightened by real and terrifying but actually low risk threats, when you don’t want their attention on the status quo that you have a vested interest in maintaining. Six corporations control 90% of the media. And who owns those six mega-corporations? The very wealthy. And why would the very wealthy want everyday Americans worried about Ebola and terrorists and every other crisis of the week rather than the very real problems this country faces? Because they don’t want them to wake up to the looting of income from the bottom 99% of the population to the top 1%. Income inequality is monster in the closet they’re trying to distract us from. And scaring the living daylights out of everyone isn’t the only trick up their sleeves. The media is guilty of propagating a false equivalence in everything from politics to science. If just as much attention is given to both sides, a whole lot of people are going to believe both sides are valid. If politicians are allowed to go on air and lie with impunity all while getting nothing more than a serious nod or maybe once in a while a mild “are you sure?”, a whole lot of people are going to believe those lies. And the the other trick up the media’s sleeve is to keep the populace divided. A divided populace is way less likely to unite for major change. The media is a master at the us vs. them game. The media uses politics, racial tension and moral issues, among others, to keep us angry at each other instead of at their masters.

How do we fight back against propaganda? Never take information at face value. I’ve always been very curious and very eager to learn new things. If someone tells me something I didn’t know, my reaction is to say, “that’s interesting” and then do as much research as I can to figure it out for myself. Sometimes I find out what was said is true, sometimes bogus and sometimes incomplete. But I then know the truth for myself. I also know that so many, many people take whatever is said to them at face value. And if it is from someone they trust, whether a relative or religious leader or news anchor, it is taken as gospel to be defended to their last breath. I don’t get that at all and I never will. We are so lucky in this country to have the right to learn things for ourselves and to dissent if we don’t agree, which of course is a right the media is working to demonize. I’m not sure what it will take to wake up the average American to the fact that our democracy and our rights are being eroded away by a very wealthy few and their politician and media puppets, while we fight amongst ourselves, fearing everything except the truth of what’s happening. Knowledge is power. Don’t give up yours.