OurLadyJ

it’s my right to be a witch, bitch.

September 29, 2008 on 3:01 am | In politico | No Comments

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAWM7E_WMfo

palin’s church

September 24, 2008 on 3:48 am | In queer, politico | 1 Comment

I’m on my way to sleep

but thought i’d check in first…

i’ve never felt so blessed to have had my particular upbringing than i do now.

a cavalcade of religious monstrosities pelted at me

day after day

week after week

year after year.

it gave me the tools to survive any weather

and to understand the current political climate.

sarah palin is a member of the assembly of god church,

the church of my own upbringing.

my parents, brothers, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins

are all “upstanding” members of the church.

i’m pretty sure they’ve dropped my membership by now.

and in this church, here are some things I learned:

i learned to identify the ways of the world community

(the UN was considered a nation constructed by the ‘evil’ world),

and to identify this world community’s ideals as “other than” or “wrong.”

i learned to be ready for a spiritual war that was brewing,

a war that would come soon and one that we would lead.

they taught me to be ready to die for the church,

to kill for the church,

and to teach others to do the same.

i was taught to not question authority.

i was taught that the gay community is to blame for AIDS.

i was taught that condoms don’t work.

in my early teens, the entire youth group was brought up onto the platform (stage)

and persuaded (forced) to sign a contract with god,

stating that we would save ourselves for marriage.

my sex was exploited. my life was expendable. my identity was raped.

in this church, i learned to hate my queer-self along with the world around me.

fast-forward through years of great friendships, wonderful support groups, an amazing therapist

and a career that’s allowed me to see the world for it’s diverse beauties…

now i can say i love who i am, and i love the world around me.

but what about those who weren’t able to escape

the pelting cavalcade of religious monstrosities

know as the ‘assembly of god’ church?

what about those who fit into the tidy teachings of their ‘conservative values’?

sarah palin seems to have gone from one of their victims to one of their leaders,

as most abuse cycles turn-out.

a woman who will unleash this mental un-health onto the rest of the nation

if she gets into office.

god, assembly or not… help us all.

Transgendered Woman Wins Sex Discrimination Case

September 23, 2008 on 1:32 am | In queer, politico | No Comments

A transgendered woman, who lost a job offer because of her sexual status, has won a potentially groundbreaking federal sex discrimination lawsuit.

A federal court judge ruled today that Diane Schroer, a transgendered woman, was discriminated against when the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., offered then rescinded a job because of her sexual status.

A federal district court judge in Washington, D.C., ruled today that the Library of Congress discriminated against Diane Schroer when it offered her a job and then rescinded it after learning she was transgendered.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represented Schroer, said Judge James Robertson’s ruling is the first to hold that the federal sex discrimination statute, Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, applies to transgendered people.

Other courts that have considered the issue have said Congress only intended for the anti-discrimination statute to protect men and women, but not people who change their sex, the ACLU said.

Robertson disagreed, saying Schroer’s case “was discrimination based on sex.”

“It is tremendously gratifying to have your faith in this country, and what is fundamentally right and fair, be reaffirmed,” Schroer said. “I very much hope that this ruling will help to eliminate the all-too-pervasive discrimination against sexually nonconforming people in all areas.”

She added, “I hope, too, that employers, family members, friends and co-workers will begin to understand variations in sexual orientation and identity from a basis of knowledge and not fear.”

Schroer said she applied for, and was offered, a job at the Library of Congress as David Schroer.

When David went to his first meeting with his soon-to-be boss, Schroer told her that he would be transitioning to a female before starting the job. The next day, the job offer was rescinded, Schroer says.

GO TO ABC.COM for more on this!

Sam Harris on Sarah Palin and Elitism

September 22, 2008 on 1:15 am | In politico | No Comments

read this!!!

http://www.newsweek.com/id/160080/page/1

From Eve Ensler

September 16, 2008 on 6:23 pm | In politico | No Comments

Eve Ensler, the American playwright, performer, feminist and activist best known for ‘The Vagina Monologues’, wrote the following about Sarah Palin.

Drill, Drill, Drill

I am having Sarah Palin nightmares. I dreamt last night that she was a member of a club where they rode snowmobiles and wore the claws of drowned and starved polar bears around their necks. I have a particular thing for Polar Bears. Maybe it’s their snowy whiteness or their bigness or the fact that they live in the arctic or that I have never seen one in person or touched one. Maybe it is the fact that they live so comfortably on ice. Whatever it is, I need the polar bears.

I don’t like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists.

But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical to Feminism which for me is part of one story – connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.

I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country chose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas
that America may never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would have on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. In my lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected to the presidency with regularity.

Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a metaphor. In her world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the arctic, the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of cancers, are all part of God’s plan. She is fighting to take the polar bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin’s view, is here to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is here to be taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, ‘It was a task from God.’

Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women who are raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a right to determine whether they have their rapist’s baby or not.
She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that makes.

Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather she has tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with people who think independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of ambiguity and difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse populations on the earth.

Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot hundreds of wolves from the air.

Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is declared in God’s name, when the rights of women are denied in His name, that is the end of separation of church and state and the undoing of everything America has ever tried to be.

I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this election in our hands. This vote is a vote that will
determine the future not just of the U.S. , but of the planet. It will determine whether we create policies to save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will determine whether we move
towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and attack. It will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or invest our money in

alternatives that will free us from dependency and destruction. It will determine if money gets spent on education and healthcare or whether we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether America is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear, fundamentalism and aggression.

If the Polar Bears don’t move you to go and do everything in your power to get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after Palin spoke at the RNC, ‘Drill, Drill, Drill.’ I think of teeth when I think of drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of domination. I think of military exercises that force
mindless repetition, emptying the brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent. I think of pain.

Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the floor of the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?

Eve Ensler
September 5, 2008