Shit that Pissed me Off 5/3/19
Appeals Court Rules that Bde Mke Ska Name Change was Illegal
I’m not pissed at the court. It is entirely likely that their ruling was fully supported by Minnesota Law and their job is to uphold what is legally right. Not was is morally correct. So they did their job.
The lake currently known as Bde Mke Ska was previously named Lake Calhoun. It was named after the 7th Vice President of the United States, John C Calhoun. Calhoun was not from Minnesota (he was from South Carolina) and was a strong proponent of slavery (as I said – he was from South Carolina).
If you’d like to know what he thought about slavery, this just about sums it up:
Calhoun asserted that slavery, rather than being a “necessary evil,” was a “positive good,” benefiting both slaves and slave owners.
Before the lake was named after Calhoun, it was called Bde Mke Ska. That’s what the locals called it before the locals got told they didn’t live here any more and were told to pack up their things and move to land the people with guns didn’t think was worth anything so they were OK with people they didn’t give a shit about living there. They figured if the land turned out to be worth something, they could make the former locals move again. Because they still had most of the guns.
So the DNR and the City of Minneapolis decided the change the name back to Bde Mke Ska. Their reasoning was the name Lake Calhoun was actually a slap in the face to both black people and native Americans. Which it was. It was also kind of a slap in the face to Minnesotans seeing as Calhoun was, as I mentioned, from South Carolina.
Not everyone was thrilled about this change. And that’s OK because you are totally allowed to not give a fuck about black people or Native Americans or Minnesotans because you’ve called it Lake Calhoun for your entire life and why should you have to change?
I know I resent the hell out of all the changes made to my computer over the years!
So a venture Capitalist asshole named Tom Austin decided he hated being “bullied” by “elites” (because black people and Native Americans have historically been super elite) so he filed a lawsuit to change the name back. And he won. Because the court of appeals determined the Legislature needed to make the name change and not the DNR.
Here’s what pissed me off about Tom Austin and all the people who are thrilled that they won this court case – it didn’t fucking matter to them. If the name had never been Lake Calhoun, they wouldn’t have cared that the name was Bde Mke Ska. They just would have called the lake Bde Mke Ska.
And if someone had decided to change the name to Lake Calhoun, they would have fought that because they don’t like it when names change.
But the name Lake Calhoun was hurtful to people. So the decision was made to change it back to a name that was not. Because we’ve figured some shit out and we’re trying to do better.
Austin wasted taxpayer money on a lawsuit that didn’t fucking matter to him. He was just pissed off because he didn’t want to remember a new name and because he didn’t want to be reminded that white people in America have done some really shitty things. I mean, Tom Austin never owned slaves. And he never forced Native Americans off their lands. Why should he have to learn a new name (actually it was an old name but whatever) when none of that was his fault?
So now it is probably up to the legislature to make things right. And they probably won’t. Let me tell you why!
Shit that Pissed me Off – 10/26/18
Man Gropes Woman on a Plane and Says it’s OK Because Trump
Now I understand that not every man who voted for Trump feels it is OK to grope women without consent. Some of them just think it is OK for Trump to do that but they would never imagine doing it themselves.
Well, OK, maybe they would imagine doing it themselves. But they would never actually do it unless there was absolutely no chance that they would be caught.
The thing is, our President has normalized sexual assault. He has turned victims into punch lines and perpetrators into supreme court justices. He has shown a lot of men in this country that you can do this kind of thing and get away with it.
Given rape culture in this country, that should actually not be a surprise. Thing is, when you have an admitted sexual predator in the white house (he’s on tape so shut up with your apologist bullshit), even the minor amount of stigma that existed before has been shredded.
Tell me more about how it’s a scary time for young men!
Sure, this guy was arrested and he’ll be fined or spend a few weeks in jail. He’s not going to stop thinking that what he did was OK.
And the biggest problem with Trump is that he’s popular with a subset of the American public because he represents all that deeply felt awfulness in each one of us. He releases the national desire to be a bunch of fucking unapologetic assholes.
So congratulations, women of America! You already had to deal with ten million other problems. Now you have a bunch of white dudes who have been told that actions don’t have consequences.
Shit that Pissed me Off – 2/9/18
White House Defends Senior Official Who is a Serial Abuser
I know the headline would make you think that I’m talking about our President but I think that it is important to note he is a sexual predator. While he may also be physically abusive, I think the odds of that are slim because it would require him to engage in strenuous physical activity.
No – that is not a dig on his weight. I’m just saying that I think he’s lazy.
However, this week it came to light that White House staff Secretary Rob Porter physically abused both of his ex-wives.
Now I now the narrative is to say “look – we all know that when a woman accuses a Democrat of being physically or sexually abusive, it has to be the truth. But this is a Republican and members of the Republican party are only accused of such activities as part of a massive plot perpetuated by the liberal media.”
Did you know if you type Liberal Media Plot into a Google Search, you get a ton of pictures of Rush Limbaugh?
That is certainly the narrative the White House seems to favor as they rally behind Porter and say he’s very good at his job and they didn’t know his home life included regular assault and battery.
At least not before last fall. They knew last fall. So maybe they were surprised then. But they aren’t surprised now.
Look, I don’t know that every transgression one commits in life should necessarily prevent one from holding a job. Using marijuana, for instance, should not result in being raped by cops (see below). But being someone who regularly beats women? I don’t think you should be able to work in the White House.
And I definitely don’t think the White House should be defending your sorry ass.
Shit that Pissed me Off – 10/13/17
Judge Gives Rapist Joint Custody of His Child
With all the news of Harvey Weinstein and Ben Affleck and the fact we elected a known sexual predator President of the United States (fucking fuck), we should remember that this is all part of a culture that actually rewards rapists and sexual predators.
In this case, a 12-year-old girl was raped by a much older man and she chose to bear the child that was conceived as a result. Her body, her choice.
But when she applied for Government aid, she was forced to reveal the name of the biological father. And then that biological father took her to court for custodial rights. The prosecutor claimed the young woman had approved of allowing her rapist to spend time with his now eight year old son.
Thing is, she didn’t. And the judge didn’t fucking check.
Maybe they used some sort of alien mind control.
The whole story is out now and the judge has suspended the order pending another hearing but that likely means the young woman has to sit in court with her rapist just to explain why that fucker shouldn’t get parental rights to a kid who isn’t that much younger than his mother was when she was raped by his father.
All I’m saying is that women shouldn’t have to fight these fights, should they? Read More…
Shit that Pissed me Off – 10/6/2017
Sorry I’ve been gone for almost a month. Over the last three weeks, I’ve been out of town for my 50th Birthday (yay me) and playing at a funeral for someone who died much too young (boo the inevitability of death). Thanks for waiting patiently and not filling my e-mail with angry messages.
So anyway – here goes!
It Took Less Than Two Days for Conspiracy Theories To Pop Up About the Las Vegas Shooter
Here’s the dirty little secret about this kind of conspiracy theory: It never seems to happen when the shooter is a person of color. At least nobody seems to spend a lot of time talking about them.
I know someone is going to point out that there are conspiracy theories around 9/11 and the attackers there were (allegedly) people of color. Yeah, but I’m talking about mass shootings.
And the thing that seems to come into play here is that people don’t believe white guys would do this sort of thing. Not unless those white guys are members of the CIA or the FBI or Interpol or whatever the fuck these people think.
When a person of color shot up an Orlando nightclub, nobody started saying that it was a cover up. It was terrorism.
But white guys don’t commit terrorism. They are lone wolves.
Which is bullshit because wolves don’t even have opposable thumbs
So the alternative is to look at an act of senseless violence and think “I understand Islamic extremists. I don’t understand some 64 year old dude shooting up a concert so it must not be that.”
By the way – they don’t understand Islamic extremists either. But that’s for another day.
It is kind of remarkable to me that some of us can’t wrap our heads around a guy shooting up an elementary school but we can totally wrap our heads around the idea that some shadow agency decided to stage the event so they could get gun control legislation passed.
Which they can’t so what the hell is that about anyway?
Thing is, at least some of this is racism. Some of it is our inherent response that we’ve been taught the more pigmentation you have in your skin, the more violent you are.
Conspiracy theories are dumb. One guy shot all those people in Las Vegas and we will probably never know why. But it was one guy. And he was white. Deal with it.
Shit that Pissed me Off – 3/24
Look, I honestly believe that someone charged with a crime should serve their time but then they should have the chance to live their life. People make horrible, awful, stupid, mistakes and sometimes we need to be big and forgive them. Give them a chance to be better people.
We aren’t, generally, interested in such things. We are interested in placing people into the category of “generally a good person” or “they should be dead.”
So anyway, Bruno Fernandes de Souza was a star goaltender in the Most Popular Sport in Every Country But America (TM) and he had his girlfriend murdered and fed to dogs. He was sentenced to 22 years but after only six years, he was released on a technicality.
So what happened next? He got a chance to play Soccer again. Because he’s that good. Or at least he was.
I am grateful my life has reached a point where I had need of this image.
I might even be able to deal with that if he wasn’t an insufferable jackass. He basically categorized what he did as “a mistake.” To be fair, he did say it was “a serious one.”
And here’s the thing – he’s has a skill that is important to a lot of people and that means he will get as many chances so long as he’s still good at it. And that’s the bullshit message of this story.
You can get away with murder. As long as you are a celebrity.
Shit that Pissed me Off – 10/26
Someone Destroyed Donald Trump’s Star on the Walk of Fame
I’m probably just including this story because given how many words I have devoted to my distaste for Donald Trump, I want it to be known that at least one dude dislikes him more than me.
But seriously, asshole, vandalism isn’t the answer. It makes people who support Trump look more reasonable than those of us who know he’s a bigoted, misogynistic, narcissist, who would probably be the worst President in the history of our country. Which is saying a lot since Buchanan set the bar pretty low, not even George W. Bush was able to limbo under it.
No joke – I Googled “George Bush Limbo” and I found this!
I’ve read people likening it to the destruction of statues of Lenin or Hussein but the thing is: Trump hasn’t been elected yet. And hopefully he’s not going to be. Does it make sense that we should destroy a statue of John McCain simply because we don’t like his stance on using the Senate to blockade the Supreme Court?
Or destroy a statue of George W. Bush because he was a terrible President?
I don’t think there is justification for this kind of behavior. If you think it would be wrong for someone to destroy something that says Hillary Clinton (or Gary Johnson or Jill Stein), it is just as wrong to destroy something that says Donald Trump.
If you’ve got a problem with Trump, how about you work your ass off to make sure he doesn’t get elected? Read More…
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