Americanism and Thought-Crime

Stop saying bad things about the world! Seriously. I mean, nothing's more American than being happy and loving everyone. Which means that me and the CEO of the company dumping toxic waste into the town lake are totally on the same page, man. We love each other, we're good neighbors. We both want some good old harmony.

Let's play the analogy game! Force is to Authoritarianism as what is to Democracy? If you guessed Propaganda you win the grand prize! It's called thinking. Sometimes it sucks. May cause feelings of intense hopelessness and pessimism. Use with caution.

Unhappiness, dude, that's not American. If the state of the world sucks, then don't think about it! In fact, ignore and alienate agitators. Like the government told you to. Or your boss, he's pro-American just like you. You ever hear of the Mohawk Valley Formula? No? That's good. Ignorance and bliss is the American way.

My slogan man, it's totally vacuous. Nobody's against it, because not supporting X, Y, and Z is bad news. Nobody really knows what it means, because it doesn't mean anything. All it does is keep me from asking, "do I support this policy?". But I'm not allowed to talk about it. Keep moving guys, there's no racism, sexism, classism, starvation, and disenfranchised here. It's a post-Feminist, post-Racist, post-classist society. Somebody told me so, and they must be right. I'm happier if I agree with them anyway.

So, do you support our troops? Well, you say, it's not like I don't support them. I've won. It's all Americanism and Harmony. We're all together, empty slogans, blank faces, corporate uniforms, daily grind. Join me, and together we can make sure that nobody ever talks about that nasty class struggle, racist, homophobic, sexist, exploitive, corrupt "issues" ever again.

Don't Call it War

Stop calling the Iraqi Conflict "war". If you have to call it anything, it's a Military Occupation. The war was over when the Iraqi military surrendered years ago. It might sound like I'm harping on a stupid and pointless question of semantics that does nothing to alter the framework of the debate. However, the use of the word "war" is very important if you happen to be a Republican.

"War" implies a grave threat. When the American public thinks of the usual war, we think of a conflict between two nations, or many nations, in which the losing party's surrender will result in the massive loss of human life and the potential shifting of borders. Even as recent as the Cold War, the consequences of war have moved borders and made the inhabitants of one nation suddenly citizens of another. The term "war" as it applies to Iraq is therefore, inappropriate. "Failure" would result in the rise of a new dictator--a powerless dictator, given that the infrastructure of Iraq is still in shambles and its population is impoverished and unlikely to support continued warfare. The price of "failure" in Iraq, for the Western world, is nothing compared to the price that Iraqis have paid, and will continue to pay for generations. Between a dismantled infrastructure, the leveling and loss of historic monuments, massive loss of life, and the poison of depleted uranium missiles, the occupation of Iraq has taken a very hefty toll from the innocent civilians of an already poor country. No such horrible fate would befall Americans if the occupation "failed". The use of the word war implies a somewhat equitable consequence resulting from the struggle of two or more equally powerful entities. Thus, the use of "war" is inappropriate to describe a situation in which a wealthy Western nation occupies a Middle Eastern country suffering from poverty and persistent civil violence.

Furthermore, "war" is a romantic term, attracting patriots and idealistic high school graduates who want to serve their country, and the political leaders that cloak their stock gains in nationalistic pride. Republican supporters call President Bush the "war president", would this title be as romantic if Bush was a "military occupation president"?

In a "war", we can justify autocratic leadership. We can sit idly by while liberties are sacrificed and foreigners are brutally tortured in our military prisons. We can excuse economic woes at home because of the "war" which "must be fought". Our "war" justifies airplanes loaded with hundreds of coffins of the Americans who never will make it out of their twenties. Can anyone say that a military occupation merits the same sacrifices?

"War" fashions heroic tales of valor. "War" creates glorious myths of an underdog fighting to protect itself and its freedom. A "war" illustrates nefarious villains would would stop at nothing to see the the destruction of our homes, and who have the means to accomplish this diabolical scheme if it was not for the brave actions of our military. In a military occupation, our heroes are overstressed youths raping each other, throwing puppies over cliffs, and committing suicide en masse. In a military occupation, the underdog is a nation run by oil barons, mercenaries, religious nuts, and construction contractors. In a military occupation, nefarious villains are farmers selling their daughters into marriage at younger and younger ages to support their families after their opium fields were burned, urban youths allying themselves with others sick of the war and prepared to fight back, and many other nobodies with no hope of posing a real threat to those on American soil.

In sum, "war" is what the neo-cons want every American to call the situation in Iraq, because just a single word justifies atrocities that the true situation cannot.

Stop calling it a "war", and start calling it what it is: the military occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan. This isn't just semantics, this is a matter of global importance.

Shit That Makes It Hard For Me to be Proud and Jewish

What the fuck? From Khalid Amayreh's blog:

Last week, the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem released video clips showing masked Jewish settlers ganging up on and severely beating elderly Palestinian peasants near the town of Yatta, southwest of Hebron. At least three Palestinians were wounded in the unprovoked assault, including a man and his wife, both in their early sixties.

The latest act of settler terror was not an isolated incident, as official Israeli spokespersons would often claim. It represents a disturbing and persistent phenomenon as young and usually heavily armed settlers continue to attack Palestinian farmers, peasants and shepherds and vandalize their property in an effort to drive them away from their lands and villages.

Holy hell. What the fuck is wrong with Israelis? Also, what the fuck is wrong with American media that they aren't all over this shit like white on rice? The unspoken rah-rah-Israel sentiments here in America are nauseating. Every single Israeli goes through the military upon becoming an adult, where the prejudices against Palestinians are further cemented in a hierarchical structure where armed angry youths learn that everyone that is confined to the other side of their wall is The Enemy. I sincerely hope that not all Israelis are that brainwashed. Unfortunately, the Israelis I had the misfortune to encounter through working for a Jewish summer camp all were the most militaristic pro-American anti-Muslim devotees. Not a single free-thinker in that bunch.

Although, I really don't expect anything but horse shit to spew from the fellow Jew's mouth when it comes to Israel. My mother's side―the Jewish side―all are so unquestionably pro-Israel that any attempt to point out the gross human rights violations is met with incredibility. I might as well hand in my Jew-Card at the Passover Sedar for not being a Good Jew(TM) and hating all brown people. What the fuck, man? I really think we stopped being the oppressed when we started acquiring nukes, building walls, and forcing the native population into ghettos in an eerie parody of Nazi Germany. Racial cleansing is not fucking cool, even if you are Jewish.

People wonder why I avoid mixing Judaism and politics. Well, this is why. Then again, it's probably a good idea to conclude that any country Fuhrer President Bush supports is probably an oppressive regime that encourages its citizens to play Hitler's Youth with the disenfranchised du jour of the area.

Dear Conservatives, I'm Pro-Abortion! And You Know What That Makes You?

Anti-American!

I really tire of the abortion debate. Even so-called liberals that I have contact with through various political groups always claim to understand the motivations behind the Anti-American clusterfuck that is the conservative party and their holy quest to deprive women of fundamental freedoms.

I'm talking, specifically, about reproductive freedom.

You dudes: us women, well, we don't rape people in the same numbers you do. We can also chalk our violence up to mental deficiencies, rather than the self-perpetuating prophecy of masculinity. If you weren't content with the free pass the justice system has given men to rape women that I detailed exhaustively in my last post, your penis-buddies on Capitol Hill also would like us women to know that they value the "life" of a clump of cells, a fetus, or whatever you want to call it, more than freedom.

Because in case you haven't gotten the message: America's "freedoms" only apply to white men. Also, because I'm having a bad day, I tire of talking points and meaningless posturing.

So here it is, for everyone who cares to know: I'm Pro-Abortion. I don't dress my opinions up with fancy terms like "pro-choice" to distance my stance from the fact that I am supporting the systematic termination of a pregnancy that will result in the "death" of a fetus, embryo, fertilized egg, or a sack of cells that might be a human depending on your political agenda.

So, I admit that I am Pro-Abortion. Which means that if we wish to dispose of loaded phrases and cut to the heart of the issue, we're going to redefine "Pro-Life".

Note: graphic shamelessly lifted from Andy Singer's No Exit

First, you are not pro-life. Most conservatives support the death penalty, and holding enemy combatants in Guantanamo Bay until presumably the Apocalypse or nuclear winter. Killing people and torturing them isn't pro-life. Conservatives also shoot down any efforts to expand affordable health care, even to children. That's not pro-life either.

To liberal dudes who sympathize with conservatives: you might be pro-life. Sure, you might oppose the death penalty. You probably think water-boarding sucks. Your trendy liberal sentiments might also require you to admit that reducing the cost of health care is instrumentally important to the thousands of children who go without. However, you do share something fundamental with anti-abortion conservatives:

You're Anti-American.

Nothing is more intrinsic to the idea of Americanism than freedom. Not the hijacked definition of freedom which is used to mount submachine guns on a suburban Hummer, but the kind of freedom to go where I want and do what I please, provided I am not impeding anyone's rights. Probably the best and most basic exercise of freedom is that over your own body. Someone that does not even have the right to control their own body would, obviously, be a slave.

Now we've arrived at a point where sound bites are irrelevant. If I wish to be honest, then I must say that I am firmly and completely Pro-Abortion. If you wish to be "pro-life", you must oppose the unnatural and purposeful death of all of humanity. Your policies, instead encourage or allow war, torture, grueling child poverty, or a complete dismissal of the rulings of the Supreme Court. Anti-abortion activists and sympathizers are firmly and completely Pro-Slavery (of the reproductive variety) and Anti-American.

So let's just cut the bullshit, okay? I admit that I love abortion. Now you admit that you love reproductive slavery, and that you hate freedom. Fair is fair, after all.

(Cross-posted)

Legal Shenanigans: How to Blame That Lying Whore

As a pre-law student and a feminist, the antics of defense attorneys in rape trials is always of particular interest. I've been sitting on these stories for about a week now, formulating my response. Without further ado, a glimpse inside how the American legal system dispenses justice to those lying sluts and the poor slandered men:

1. Ask trick questions

From abyss2hope:

''Did you have sexual intercourse with Mr. Vanderbeek?'' [defense attorney Maureen] Coggins asked the alleged victim. She replied that she had not.

Coggins then asked that the charges be dismissed. Greth denied the motion. Coggins then asked that the alleged victim take the stand again for a clarification. The alleged victim then testified that she had engaged in sexual intercourse, but that it was not consensual.

First of all, rape is not sexual intercourse. I would hope that a defense attorney would be aware of this fact. Doubtless, Coggins was aiming for a dismissal regardless of the answer. If she had said yes, then the term "sexual intercourse" implies consent. When she said no, that implies—falsely and only to someone with no legal training or common sense—that no penetration took place (which is doubly absurd, because many forms of sexual abuse do not require vaginal penetration). The only dismissal that I think would be appropriate in this instance is the dismissal of Coggins from her job.

2. Ban the use of the word "rape"

If I thought that the above was horrible, I was sorely mistaken when I discovered via Jezebel and Shakesville that if you have a vagina, and someone sticks a penis in it without your permission, you are not allowed to call that "rape" in a courtroom lest you bias the poor stupid jurors:

It's the only way Tory Bowen knows to honestly describe what happened to her.

She was raped.

But a judge prohibited her from uttering the word "rape" in front of a jury. The term "sexual assault" also was taboo, and Bowen could not refer to herself as a victim or use the word "assailant" to describe the man who allegedly raped her.

The defendant's presumption of innocence and right to a fair trial trumps Bowen's right of free speech, said the Lincoln, Neb., judge who issued the order.

This boggles the mind. How else are you supposed to describe the crime committed against you on the stand? This kind of shit is akin to an assault case in which the witness is forced to say that he "accepted a fist offered to my face" instead of "the defendant punched me". Witnesses and victims are supposed to testify honestly and completely to the best of their abilities. Banning the use of the only word that describes what happened is absolutely ludicrous, and not only implies that the defendant had consensual sex, but also that the witness is lying. Which brings me to my next point:

3. Force victims to perjure themselves to protect rapists

Using "sexual intercourse" to describe rape is completely inaccurate because it misses an extremely relevant point: the lack of consent. Defense attorneys are not required to use the term "rape", so why are prosecuting attorneys finding that they must use a term that implies no crime took place?

Simple: because in the minds of rape apologist judges, no crime took place. The only crime is that some disgusting whore is out to ruin a poor upstanding boy's life for her shame over giving it up too soon. The best way to make sure that the jurors understand the horrible crime that is being perpetuated against the innocent victim of a liar is to require the "liar" to use a term that implies consent, which then implies that she filed a false report.

Of course, to anyone with half a brain, this method of victim blaming is called perjury and is extremely and blatantly illegal. Like I said above, if defense lawyers and judges are not willing to conduct trials without a working knowledge of the nuances of the English language and the crime they are discussing, they should be disbarred.

4. Load the jury pool

Via The Curvature's coverage of how a defense attorney selected his jurors:

“Would you take into consideration that none of these young women, when they were removed from the situation, called 911?” he asked a potential juror. Parrinello asked other potential jurors if they would consider that there were “no eyewitnesses” and “no DNA” and that none of the alleged victims had gone to the hospital to have what’s called a “rape kit” examination for signs of assault and evidence.

[District attorney] Tantillo, meanwhile, asked potential jurors if they would consider that the girls might have been too scared to immediately report what had happened to them or even confused.

Parrinello later asked the panel of potential jurors: “Does anybody know what’s so confusing about whether or not you’ve been raped?”

Hey, I might be new to this legal game, but I'm pretty certain you can be disbarred for loading the jury in a case against a Muslim with jurors that are blatantly and unashamedly racist. The same principle should, but doesn't, apply to rape trials: you don't load the jury pool with jurors that have ignorant assumptions about rape and rape victims.

5. Question the testimony with medieval assumptions about intercourse and scare the jury

Parrinello is expected to crack away at the alleged victims’ credibility, drawing attention to the fact that three of them had consensual sexual relations with Wido before the alleged attacks. “How do you know any of them said ‘no’?” he said.

The defense attorney pointed out that the women were slow in notifying authorities and said there is no DNA evidence or eyewitnesses, “no credible evidence.” He asked the jury: “Is this a rush to judgment? Is this a slanted prosecution? Is this a Duke lacrosse prosecution?”

A good defense attorney would attempt to prove that the sexual encounter in question was consensual. Parrinello, however, goes for the tried and true, "once consensual, always consensual" tactic. I remain completely unaware of any sort of legal statute that states once I have sex with someone, I am not allowed to withdraw or withhold consent for the rest of my natural life. The assumption Parrinello makes here harkens back to a not-so-distant past in which men owned their wives because they had consummated their marriage. Since marriage is not a precursor to sex today, apparently a man does not have to buy a shiny bobble before he claims ownership over her body forevermore. All he has to do is get her to consent to sex once!

If the jury was not taken in by the throwback reference to the fact that women are property, they must be scared into submission by reference to the Duke lacrosse prosecution. To this day, I am not entirely certain that the Duke lacrosse players were innocent or guilty. As Cara over at The Curvature says, the Duke case has become the new "women are lying whores!" rallying cry. What a reference like this does is circumvent the question of the accused's innocence or guilt. It plays upon the jury's hesitance to wrap their minds around the fact that such a popular, attractive, white athlete could commit such a crime. It also asks, "are you willing to ruin this guy's life just because he probably raped someone?" After all, sports before justice. A man's right to rape and play sports is always more important than a woman's right to say no and seek justice.

6. Just plain harass and verbally abuse the victims

If all of the above fails—which it probably will not—the defense attorney can just become a pedantic asshat to make sure that all rape victims know what awaits them lest they seek justice (via MPN Now):

While the prosecution witness — one of Wido’s three alleged rape victims — was still seated, the argument began, with Parrinello at one point highlighting previous testimony that she had willingly performed a sexual act on Wido in the weeks before the alleged rape — only Parrinello used crude, street language to describe the act, drawing out both Tantillo and the judge, William Kocher.

“What Mr. Parrinello just did was outrageous in the presence of this witness!” Tantillo shouted, calling it “abusive,” “harassing,” and “disgusting.”

Parrinello fired back, “You know that’s what happened — I’m not making it up… I have a right of free speech.”

Parrinello then briskly approached the judge, coming within a few feet of his bench and pointing his finger while defending his actions. A security guard rushed to Parrinello’s side.

“I want him away from me,” Parrinello told the judge of the guard. Then Parrinello pointed at the guard, face to face, and hollered, “You’re not to get near me.”

Parrinello then told the judge: “He’s not going to intimidate me. If he does it again, we’re going to have a big problem: I’ll have him arrested.”

Judge Kocher ordered the defense attorney not to “make such editorial comments” and asked him several times if he understood. Repeatedly, Parrinello told the judge that no, he did not.

Amid the fiery exchange of words, the alleged rape victim began to wipe tears from her eyes, eventually breaking into sobs. The young woman was led out of the courtroom by Sarah Utter, the victim and witness advocate from the D.A.’s office.

The best way to shut those uppity women up is to be a violent loud jerk and reduce her to tears. Threatening judges and guards is also highly effective. Nothing feels better to a woman reliving her rape through testimony than a defense attorney that describes you and the situation as vulgarly as possible, and then lambastes from his arrogant soapbox about his right to be an abusive moron. Which, of course, would be:

7. Defend your antics with the highly ironic appeal to the First Amendment

I hope you caught that bolded passage in the quote above. Parrinello thinks that he has more of a right to the First Amendment than the victim. Oh the appalling irony! Why is it that when I see someone invoke the First Amendment, they are nearly always white men defending their right to be pedantic abusive asshats? I have a shocking idea: how about we use the First Amendment to protect the victims from perjury instead of defending an egomanic defense attorney?

And so, there you have it, the reason why only 16% of rapes are reported to the police, 8% of reported rapes are deemed unfounded (not false, but not prosecutable), less than half of those arrested for rape see trial, 54% of rape trials end in dismissal or acquittal, 21% of convicted rapists never serve time, and 24% of the convicted receive less than 11 months behind bars (statistics from Rochester University).

Considering that only 2-3% of reports are fabricated—a statistic no different from the false reporting rate of other crimes—there is a very large chance, almost an inevitability, that if you rape a woman she won't report it. If she reports it, it probably won't see trial. If it goes to trial, you probably won't get convicted. If you get convicted, you probably won't serve any time at all, or less than 11 months. Which means that in the eyes of the law, a convicted rapist is less guilty than a robber, a burglar, a drug addict, a drug dealer, and anyone who misuses a weapon for whatever reason; all of which receive more time on average than a convicted rapist.

This is how the justice system treats a rape victim: it looks for any and all excuse to discredit her and drag her name through the mud. In the end, if she perseveres, defies the odds, and gets a conviction, she probably could be rubbing elbows with her rapist in less than a year's time.

In this patriarchy, raping a woman is more excusable than stealing a television. Which leads me to conclude that not only has the justice system, by its actions, defined women as property, that they also think of them as particularly useless property at that. Considering that women/property may be raped without much of a fuss from the legal system, I do not think it illogical of me to say that not only does the legal system regard women as property, it also implies by the reality of the extremely low rape conviction that the purpose of a woman is to be abused at will.