I have packed up my things and relocated to my own domain, which you can find here at Thinkerbell

All my old posts and comments are there, I hope you enjoy!

-Laura

I was stumbling around the Internet earlier when I came across this piece from the website Psychology Today called “How Psychopaths Choose Their Victims”. I didn’t really go in to the article with many expectations, to be honest, but what I certainly wasn’t prepared for was to come away from the piece having learned that women specifically make themselves vulnerable to male psychopaths.

Who knew?

I have a few problems with this. Primarily that the article chose to make all of the possible victims in the study females (or at least if they weren’t all female, the article doesn’t make that clear), which is troubling, as it seems to indicate that men cannot be victims of violent crime. As if this weren’t enough, the psychopaths used in this experiment were all men, to the reader’s knowledge. Already the situation is rife with a negative gender dichotomy, that of the shadowy man lurking in the bushes waiting to pounce on a woman walking home alone at night. This paints a very unrealistic picture as to how abuse happens to women overall, while also setting up the popular notion that men are always the abusers and women are always the abused – a false reality which hurts men and women alike.

Then we have this little gem (emphasis my own):

The rather depressing upshot of all this is that, as much we may hate the idea of “blaming the victim,” people who are on the receiving end of crime often do mark themselves out, if only subliminally. I suppose that we could look on the bright side and recognize that there are things we can do to make us less vulnerable. But unfortunately there always going to weaker and more vulnerable members of society — the lambs on whom the wolves will focus their attention.

So…these “weaker and more vulnerable members of society” should just accept their fate as some violent stalker’s play thing?

The article says that the traits which made the women stick out as being vulnerable included actions which are “socially submissive… lack of eye contact, fidgeting of the hands and feet, and the avoidance of large gestures when shifting posture”. These sound like social cues, to me, that we pick up as we grow, when boys are encouraged to dominate space, and girls are encouraged not to; getting into that would require a separate post, but my main point is that these socially dictated norms are what seem to be being turned around on these women by society in the form of victim blaming. Oh, what a tangled web we weave.

What really irks me more than anything, though, is the sheer cop out on behalf of the author Jeff Wise (pun most certainly intended), who acknowledges the rampant issue of victim blaming, then falls for the excuse anyway. If you’re going to shun something, shun it entirely or not at all.

But why am I so against dogs going to church? Because it’s not at all as harmless as it appears to be. It is a testament to the gullibility and contradiction of Christians, and it’s taking place in my own backyard.

It is hard for me to read statements such as this:

“They did beautifully. There was some sniffing and barking but once we began worship they weren’t disruptive at all,” said the Rev. Thea Keith-Lucas. “They just added to the joy of the experience.”

and not get upset. The implication in the above sentence is that the dogs quieted down because they knew the service started. As if God Himself had reached down to muzzle the canines. So not only are these people bringing their pets to church (to save them? PawMen?), but they also believe that the atmosphere of the church is having a nearly tangible effect on these animals. It makes my mind wither to think about.

And then, of course, the next thing I thought was, “what’s the point?” Nearly every Christian I’ve ever spoken to on the matter of all dogs going to Heaven is in agreement that Spot doesn’t have a soul to reach the pearly gates in the first place. So why bother dragging your animal to the service? They can’t be “saved”, and they certainly don’t understand what’s going on.

These Church-goers apparently beg to differ with me on that, however, or else they wouldn’t bring Fido along at all. Donna Mercier of Revere, MA, said she likes to bring her dog because ” it just allows me to get that much closer to my pet”. Donna, try taking your dog for a walk, sometime. I’ve also heard they love playing fetch. Just sayin’.

Overall, I think this is just a ploy by the Church to get peoples’ minds off of the fact that members of the Catholic Clergy have been in some hot water with that whole pedophilia thing lately. And I would expect nothing less of the Catholic Church than to deflect peoples’ attention rather than to own up to their mistakes. PawMan to that.

The most obvious example of this would be Temperance Brennan, or “Bones” from the show of the same name. This is one of those shows which I only watch occasionally, but I am always drawn to Bones’s character when I happen to catch it on. She is consistently using logic and reason in all of her decision making, actively putting her emotions aside to pursue the most reasonable course of action. Granted, sometimes this is shown as being a flaw, but overall, it makes her the successful forensic anthropologist that she is.

The next character only plays a very minor role in her show, but I felt she was worth mentioning nonetheless. Played by the always fabulous Christine Baranski, we have Dr. Beverley Hofstadter, the mother of Dr. Leonard Hofstadter of the sitcom “The Big Bang Theory”. Beverley, while clearly a parody, is analytical, precise, and rational above all else. Her existence is built upon facts and evidence, and she dismisses that which lacks even slightly in either of the two. Also, she is possibly the only person capable of wooing Sheldon Cooper, and for that reason alone, she is a great woman capable of great things.

Finally, I turn my thoughts to Maeby Funke of “Arrested Development”. While I wouldn’t exactly call her a “rational” woman – she is a horrible student, after all – she is clever and driven, enough so to con her way into being a film executive. The Bluths and Funkes in general are a pretty heathenistic lot, but Maeby has always held a special place in my heart, if not for this exchange between her and her uncle Michael:

Maeby: Do you guys know where I could get one of those gold necklaces with the ‘T’ on it?

Michael: That’s a cross.

Maeby: Across from where?

Simply brilliant.

What other rational/ heathen women am I forgetting?

Hirsi Ali is currently employed at the American Enterprise Institute, a public policy, conservative think tank.

Um, what? Feminist…atheist…intellectual…and conservative? In my mind, one of these things is not like the other. And the fact that I find these ideas so completely opposite is the very reason why it is so important for everyone to find there biases and claim them when appropriate, because there is always going to be someone who defies them. I think of feminism, atheism, and intellectualism as traits which go hand in hand with liberalism. However, Hirsi Ali is obviously not a stupid woman, and has no problem working with a conservative public policy organization. She single-handedly broke my bias.

Of particular note in the news right now for claiming biases is the issue of Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan’s sexuality. While I personally am not caught up in this particular topic – because her sexuality is of no importance to me – many others are, because they believe it would mean a vote for same-sex marriage at a federal level. Kagan has already made it clear that she is against same-sex marriage at a federal level while her sexuality remains completely unknown, but what is important to note is that, despite her stance, people assume that if she is gay, that she must automatically support same-sex marriage. However, this isn’t the case for many members of the GBLTQ community, many of whom I’ve spoken to on the topic who have very valid reasons for their stance. So these people – these unnamed, anonymous few who believe all gay people support same-sex marriage – need to know their bias, and claim it.

Only through recognizing where our biases lie and being able to claim them can we become more informed by letting go of our preconceived notions. It is hard for me to reconcile a feminist, atheist conservative – in my mind it doesn’t make a while lot of sense – but it may be hard for Hirsi Ali to accept me as an atheist, feminist liberal. It’s hard for me to understand religious people, but if I let go of my biases against them, I can least create a more open space for dialogue.

But really…an atheist, feminist conservative? My mind is still a little blown.

This is especially relevant to me right now because I am about to graduate college, and be thrust out into the real world. Being in the real world means having a career, and while I’m very happy with the job I have now (where I am also openly atheist and accepted by everyone!), I have been thinking about what I want to do with the rest of my life. This has made my non-belief front and center in doing research for career opportunities, because I am faced with a very serious problem: Do I lie about being a non-believer to get a job?

The ideal situation would be that I wouldn’t have to lie, because atheism wouldn’t be as publicly shunned as it currently is. And while I see a glaring ethical dilemma in lying about something which I am so supportive of being open about, the fact of the matter is that I also need a career.

The other issue to consider here is that, in this age of employers using the internet to conduct mini background searches on their prospective employees, a search of my name brings up a few links which directly connect me to atheism-related organizations and content. So the other question would then be if covering up my non-belief would even be necessary.

This is still something I’ve just been turning over in my head, and I still don’t have a straight-forward answer. Have any of you had to hide your non-belief in the workplace?

…but moving right along.

I am a feminist, and I look how I look. I have a few pictures up on this blog, so it’s no mystery. In the words of Popeye, I am what I am.

I'm the one on the left.

I have been apprehensive about approaching this subject because I have been fearful of the reaction I might get. After all, most women are conditioned not to come right out and admit their attractiveness; we are taught to hate our bodies, to criticize them from every angle, and to never, ever be satisfied with how they look no matter how many creams, thigh-masters, or pairs of heels we buy.

But that’s just what I’m doing: I’m coming out and saying that, yes, I know I am conventionally attractive. This doesn’t mean that I don’t pick apart my body any less than most women – because I do – but it is a fact I am aware of. But why even mention this? I’m not trying to gloat, I could have done that much more directly. Rather, I want to talk about how my physical appearance sometimes gets in the way of my feminism. Not in how I interpret feminism for myself, but in how others see me functioning within it.

Although it appears all of the comments which were directed at me have been removed, back in December when Think Atheist was putting together its Girls of Think Atheist Calendar I received a backlash from a few people about claiming feminism and also being attractive. In a private message, a member suggested that the women who were going after me might not have if I “weren’t a stop-traffic, dead-sexy, hot, young, BABE… with pictures to prove it”. This made me take a few steps back to look at myself in the mirror and ask “Am I really being told I can’t be a feminist because I’m too pretty?” For a movement which has spent a good portion of its time trying to remove the focus on women’s appearance, this seemed like a step in the wrong direction.

I have two main problems with this argument: 1. It boils me down to a being worth nothing more than my looks, as if someone were saying “Yeah, I see her mouth moving and she’s saying something stupid about Patriarchy, but I’m too busy looking at her to care or take her seriously”. I agree that the objectification of women is a systemic problem in society, but I feel as if we focus too often on the objectification of women by men, and barely at all on the objectification of women by other women. Correct me if I’m wrong, but having women tell me I can’t be a feminist because of how I look seems pretty un-feminist to me.

The second issue I take up with this argument is that, when it is flipped, what is really being said is that only “ugly” women can be feminists. You know the stereotype: masculine, hairy, lesbian man-haters who wear men’s clothes and despise femininity. By believing in something so clearly not true, a caricature of feminists is created, once again making it hard for us to be taken seriously. It’s about time to move past the issue of how people look – no matter what their attractiveness is – when it comes to people identifying as feminist (and, of course, when it comes to everything, but I’m not that hopeful).

So yes, this is what I look like, and therefore I am what a feminist looks like. The most important thing to remember here, though, is that feminists can look like anyone: male or female; black, white, brown, red, or yellow; tall, short, or somewhere in between. And I think that’s a pretty radical notion!

8 couples and 3 widows from the state of Massachusetts along with GLAD will be challenging the portion of the Defense of Marriage Act, signed into law in 1996 by President Clinton, which defines marriage as being between one man and one woman.

DOMA is something which has needed to be overturned for a while. I know attempts have been made, but I’m hoping that by starting a little smaller this time around, a chain reaction will start.  Goodridge v The Board of Public Health was a catalyst for so many other same-sex marriage debates to open up, even though some of them haven’t been successful. I’m just hoping that Massachusetts will once again do right by its people and allow all of our citizens the equal rights and protections we deserve, so that other states – and eventually the nation – can follow suit.

Abraham Lincoln, at the height of our Civil War, confided, “I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction I had nowhere else to go.”

There was nothing theoretical about our 16th president’s faith. Indeed, the final Act of Congress he signed before his assassination was the one that placed “In God We Trust” on all our currency.

That’s not Bible thumping. That’s just basic American history.

Yet a Wisconsin judge, Barbara Crabb, personifying the pathological secularism now rampant in our judiciary, recently ruled that the National Day of Prayer, which will be celebrated in communities across the land tomorrow, is unconstitutional because, she contends, the government should not influence an individual’s decision to pray.

This “pathological secularism now rampant in our judiciary” seems pretty on par with what we should want in our judicial system, right? If I knew that the person sentencing me was referencing their Bible/Torah/Quran while shaping their verdict, I’d be pretty pissed (and also receiving a maximum sentence, no doubt). And, just as freedom ‘of’ religion also ensures Americans freedom ‘from’ religion, a National Day of Prayer should be accompanied by a Nation Day of No Prayer (or of Reason, to jump on the New Orleans bandwagon!), or should not exist at all.

The Unremitting Moron backs his support of the National Day of Prayer by bringing up the totally relevant and current..9/11?

[Crabb would] have had a hard time making that case the day after the World Trade Center attacks when members of Congress linked arms on the Capitol grounds and sang, “God Bless America.”

She’d have had an even harder time two days later when five former presidents and the entire U.S. Supreme Court joined those members of Congress for a nationally televised prayer service.

An emotional response to a traumatic event is no way to back up your negative viewing of Judge Crabb’s ruling, Moron. Especially if said event took place almost 9 years ago. To say that we need a National Day of Prayer because of September 11th is unfounded and irrelevant, and completely avoids addressing the real issue here: how can this country nationally endorse a day devoted to prayer without also giving equal recognition to those who choose not to pray?

Keeping religion out of the court systems is more important than ever, since now rulings are being made which declare the cross isn’t a symbol of Christianity. If the Supreme Court can make such a blatantly false ruling, how is allowing a National Day of Prayer not encouraging of this kind of behavior? Clearly the sentiment is that religious preferences can be smoothed over by the courts, and that doesn’t sit well with me. Before long, Our Unremitting Moron will be celebrating not just his National Day of Prayer, but his National Day of Prayer to Jesus.