Shit That Pissed me Off – 10/30
The Internet Rushes to Defend a Cop Who Beat up a Kid
I’m very careful to research the stuff I post for this blog. I want to make sure I understand the complete story before I rage against something that isn’t nearly as bad as it first appears. If my information comes from addicting info, I make sure I find another source.
So when a cell phone video of a “school resource officer” throwing a teenager around surfaced, you’d think I would look for the other side of the story.
Nope.
See it literally doesn’t matter what the student was doing wrong prior to the video. The extremely violent action was not provoked by a kid sitting at a desk. Even a kid refusing to leave the classroom. The officer lost his cool and physically assaulted a child.
To enter a dialogue saying “well she must have done something to deserve that action” ignores the fact that circumstances in which someone deserves to be beaten up are extremely rare.
Did Apollo Creed deserve to be beaten up by Rocky? Or Rocky by Apollo? If only they had just talked it out.
If the assault had been committed by a guy who wasn’t in uniform, nobody would be trying to make excuses for his act. But he’s a cop so he clearly did everything right and his actions shouldn’t be questioned, right?
No.
He’s a cop. So he should know better.
And the rest of us should stop trying to find an excuse to blame the victim. When someone starts hitting a person who is not hitting back, the person doing the hitting is to blame.
Shit that Pissed me off – 10/16
LUSH is in Trouble for “Offensive” and “Pornographic” Ads featuring Women’s Butts
I think it is universally understood that women are never supposed to be naked in public. Breast feeding is the sort of thing that should be done in private and goodness knows you should never feature the bare ass of a woman on a poster being displayed where children might see it.
The bare ass of a little cartoon girl, however, is completely OK!
Calling it “pornographic” seems a little bit excessive, though. Right? I mean, we are talking about butts here. They don’t have dildos sticking out of them.
It seems to me that our threshold for what is pornographic is beginning to creep into the “any part of a woman’s body that is not her forearms or knees” territory.
Parents sure are concerned about what their kids might think about sex. Having kids myself, this concern seems so completely baffling. When my kids were young, they would probably have giggled at naked butts because they thought the word “butt” was funny. Then they would have made fart jokes.
Because kids love fart jokes.
Shit that Pissed me off – 10/9
No Hymen, No Diamond
No link on this one. Do a Facebook search if you want to find it.
This Facebook group is dedicated to the idea that men deserve virgins to marry. If a girl doesn’t have a hymen, they aren’t going to put a ring on it.
They also post a lot of really super funny misogynist jokes like “How many feminists does it take to change a lightbulb…. 0, everyone knows feminists can’t change anything!”
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! Checkmate, feminists! You haven’t changed anything at all! Ever!
Well, sure. You got the right to vote and paid family medical leave and legalized abortion but what have you done lately?
I shouldn’t give a shit about a bunch of insecure men’s rights assholes and for the most part, I don’t. They are an embarrassment to other human beings but I believe their point of view is the minority and they just look like petulant douchebags who resent all the women that won’t date them because they are disrespectful cocks.
But I’m raising two boys. And I’m trying to teach them that women should be loved and respected and afforded all the rights men take for granted.
And the existence of garbage like this makes my job a little bit tougher.
Shit that Pissed me Off – 9/25
A Story about the Legends Football League
In case you’ve never heard of the Legends Football League, perhaps you might know of it by its previous name: The Lingerie Football League. It is the only “professional” football league for women in the United States.
I put “professional” in quotes because the athletes aren’t paid, get no medical care, and are expected to play football in swimsuits.
The reason they wear swimsuits instead of, you know, pads, is because nobody will watch women play football unless they are scantily clad. It’s all very depressing because the article points out that what these women really want to do is play football.
As a result they are exploited in almost every conceivable way. And they allow and accept it because they get an opportunity to play football.
Are you ready for some FOOTBALL??? What do you mean you didn’t notice the score?
If you are a woman and your passion happens to be football, what other choice do you have?
It is not the fault of the women who are in the league. They recognize the choice that they have to make and they make it freely.
I know these ladies aren’t ever going to be paid as well as men but I have to ask: shouldn’t they get paid something? The league wouldn’t exist without the players and someone is making money. Too bad it isn’t the women who are, quite literally, the face of the league.
Shit that Pissed me Off – 8/28
Sarah Palin is Still Able to Say Things People Will Repeat
Earlier this week, Curt Schilling was suspended from ESPN for tweeting something really stupid. In case you are wondering, it was the following meme.
It’s said only 5-10% of Muslims are extremists. In 1940, only 7% of Germans were Nazis. How’d that go?
So we are using Godwin’s law to compare all Muslims everywhere to Nazis.
The problem isn’t even the logical fallacy involved. It is the fact that Schilling works for ESPN and some of the people who watch ESPN are Muslims. ESPN could give a fuck about Schilling’s politics. In fact, I’m guessing sports fans skew slightly conservative so that probably isn’t an issue.
It would also appear most Republican sports fans are left handed.
However, the fact that Muslims could choose to stop watching ESPN because they employ someone so publicly Islamophobic is going to be an issue.
Enter Sarah Palin, who apparently still gets to talk into microphones. Any time a conservative gets punished for doing anything, she figures it is because the liberal media hates conservatives. And she says so. And for some reason, she keeps getting air time.
So let’s make this really clear: Schilling didn’t get suspended because he’s a conservative. He got suspended because if ESPN didn’t do anything, his tweet could have cost them money.
Seems like a reason Republicans should be able to get behind.
Shit that Pissed me off – 8/21
Josh Duggar Wasn’t Cured by God
As a friend of mine pointed out online, Duggar’s apology about being “addicted” to online porn and looking for adulterous affairs was pretty good. He took full responsibility and admitted he was a hypocrite. So good for him.
I mean, he’s still an adulterer and a hypocrite but at least he realizes it.
But we all remember that he had some issues with sexuality in his youth as well, right? And his ultra-religious parents used some sort of faith-based counseling to “fix” him, right? It seems like he wasn’t fixed, doesn’t it?
I’m going to pray away your healthy sexual appetite!
But what if he was never broken? I’m not talking about sexually assaulting his little sisters. That’s fucked up.
But what I’m asking is this: if he didn’t live in a household where sexual repression is the norm, is it possible he wouldn’t be so sexually confused right now? Is it possible he would have gotten involved with a woman who was interested in an open relationship so he could have had extra-marital sex in a supportive environment?
What will happen in the wake of this scandal? No doubt Duggar will get more religious counseling aimed at “curing” him of having a sexual appetite that is deemed improper. And it won’t work.
Because Josh Duggar likes sex. And he lives in a community where that is not OK.
Shit that Pissed me off – 8/14
Gunman Fires at Police in Ferguson Protests
The protests to mark the one year anniversary of Michael Brown’s murder (my bias may be showing in my selection of words) were mostly peaceful. And then some asshole shot at the police.
Now this idiot was not a protestor. He was an extremist who wanted to hurt someone and used the protests as an opportunity to do it. Even if he claims he was angry at the police for documented racism, there were a lot of people angry at the police for documented racism who didn’t bring a gun.
In this picture are dozens of people who didn’t bring guns.
When one guy does something stupid, though, it is as if all the other people who weren’t doing anything wrong become co-conspirators. What they have to say is no longer considered important because of that one dude who tried to shoot the police.
So please, everyone, can we stop bringing guns to word fights?
Shit that Pissed me off – 8/7
First Woman to Coach in the NFL Finally Gets Interviewed on ESPN
The Arizona Cardinals became the first team in NFL history to add a woman to their coaching staff when Jen Welter was hired as a pre-season intern working with the inside linebackers.
Don’t care about sports? That’s fine. The breaking of the gender barrier is still important even if she is not a permanent member of the coaching staff. If she does a decent job, one can assume she will open the door for as many as two or three other women to have temporary coaching jobs in the NFL.
Sounds a little bit like being a temporary honorary colonel in the state militia
The article linked above is in Welter’s own words and mostly she is talking about how excited she is by the opportunity.
Later, though, she talks about friends in women’s football being called up to do interviews with ESPN because of her. And she says this:
I won four championships and two gold medals and I was never asked to go on ESPN. None of us were.
Got that? She was an accomplished athlete before she temporarily joined the Cardinals coaching staff and nobody on a 24-hour sports station wanted to talk to her. Or anyone else involved in women’s football. Until now.
Have no fear, gentlemen (including the brilliant guy who commented on the article by saying women will never be equal to men until they have to sign up for the draft). The glass ceiling is still very much intact.
Shit that Pissed me off – 6/26
Writers note: What with landmark Supreme Court rulings in favor of Obamacare and same-sex marriage this week, I contemplated taking a week off. I mean, why be pissed when two things I strongly support are taking their victory lap?
Sadly, there are still things that piss me off. Please accept, though, that I am writing this week’s column with a satisfied smile on my face.
What the Fuck is Wrong with Clarence Thomas?
While Antonin Scalia can be counted on for red faced dissenting opinions in which he bemoans the fact that social liberals exist, much less occasionally win, Thomas’ dissent in the same-sex marriage case is positively draconian.
In it, he suggests that slaves in America and the Japanese Americans who were interred during WWII did not lose their dignity. He reasons (wrongly) that nobody can take away your dignity.
It seems odd that anyone would need to tell a black man how the system of slavery in the south was specifically designed to strip people of their dignity. It is certainly odd that I, a white guy, seem to be more aware of this fact than him. Calling a person “property” doesn’t feel particularly dignified.
While Scalia is bemoaning the death of our democracy, Thomas seems to be questioning the definition of our humanity. He wants to believe that we all have a limitless capacity for handling bullshit and the Government has no responsibility to make it stop.
If anyone here felt they lost their dignity, it was their own fucking fault!
Government can and has taken away human dignity. Today, it handed a little bit of dignity back.
What really bugs me about Scalia and Thomas is their dissent doesn’t feel like it is about law. They are personally pissed that they lost and because they are justices on the Supreme Court, they get to write a long dissertation on just how pissed off they are.
Guess what guys? So do I. And a nearly unmeasurable fraction of the people who read yours also read mine!
SUCK ON THAT!!!!
Shit that Pissed me off – 6/19
NRA Board Member Chooses the Occasion of a Tragic Shooting to Blame the Victims
I could mention a lot of things that piss me off about the latest mass shooting in Charleston.
I’m pissed that in spite of the fact the killer is a self admitted racist, there are lots of people who insist that this wasn’t about race.
I’m pissed because South Carolina still flies the Confederate flag at its state capitol and state leaders continually try to pretend there are no racist connotations that can be associated with that flag.
Flying these two flags together kind of misses the point.
And I’m pissed because every time there is a mass shooting, some pro-gun nuts find ways to blame it on the victims because they weren’t carrying a gun.
This dude blames one of the victims because he was a legislator who actively campaigned against allowing guns in churches. As if that is some sort of crazy far left-wing position that made him some sort of fringe politician.
What kind of whacked out liberal would oppose guns in churches?
The NRA solution to gun violence is always MOAR GUNZ! I guess I understand because that’s their solution to everything.
One wonders, though, if just once they could wait until the bodies are in the ground.
Grail Diary 