Category Archives: women

Eat a damn cup cake

by

I found this blog on the women and weight issue.  She points out that the same magazines that criticize women for being too skinny also turn around and criticize them for being too *cough* fat.  It is pathological.

She does a great job of listing the statistics of women and how  the media distorts its portrayal of women.

I love the line:  Eat a damn cup cake!

She also advocates, as I do, eating a healthy diet and not sitting on the couch all day.  It’s all about balance.

I will be forever grateful that I started doing aerobics after my first child was born.  I was active as a kid, but slacked off when I became  a teenager–sports were considered unladylike in my hometown–you were a lesbian if you participated in sports (yes, they were that backward)….and people who exercised regularly were considered “health nuts” .  Geez-o-pete.

But I do believe those years of exercising helped with the health issues I’m dealing with now—I think I would have been much, much worse off from the effects of slowly being poisoned if I had not been as healthy to begin with.

And I’ve discovered that I’m much more likely to exercise when it’s something that is active and sports-like.  I do like aerobics, but even they can become routine and boring….I’m more likely to want to do something like playing in the snow or riding a bike or hiking a trail…and on…it’s something that I think is probably more beneficial not only to the body but to the spirit, as well.  Gotta have that.

 

 

Fat?

by

Seriously…this cheerleader is considered “pudgy”…?

And the question “why are women so mean” is soooo far out of line it’s unbelievable.  Men can be just as cruel.  It may be a little more subtle, but still impacts his partner.

Anyway, it is really disgusting to see how Hollywood and the media  have demanded women become anorexic in order to be considered sexy and desirable.  It is pathological and unhealthy.  (it’s also personal as my ex was constantly on me about my weight.  I was 125 pounds–and small–and he was constantly telling me that I “better not get fat”.  It was a control thing with him.)

I’m not ashamed of being a woman. Of having curves.  The only time I feel bad about that is when those curves are somehow seen as “public property” that can be groped or commented on…like I’m not even a human being….

Some good news

by

The poster that I blogged about here is apparently okay, as s/he is posting again.  Perhaps didn’t see the post asking if s/he was okay.  Some good news for a change…and yes, we have lost people to suicide in this group…I posted about one a while ago, but it has been lost. <sigh>   She was mercury toxic, without a job,  money,  or health insurance, and living out of a car.   She took her life in her despair.

Meanwhile….corporations get welfare while they ponder cutting Medicare, Social Security, and food stamps….

Hunger in America

by

…speaking of hunger:

http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/us_hunger_facts.htm

..an issue for the  poor whom are also Celiacs, would be made ill by bread and other commonly donated food.  Things get more difficult for the poor and sick when the efforts of those trying to help aren’t helping–and would instead make them sick—I’m sure many would seem ungrateful to those trying to help when they would refuse food.

 

 

The strength of women

by

This story is refreshing in that it paints a woman as empowered.  She fought back:  http://www.commondreams.org/further/2013/04/26-1

I have a quibble with it, however, because then the question from the minds of those who wish to blame women for being raped:  why didn’t they fight back…?

First, this woman is trained in defense.  Most women are not….which begs the question of why not…??  Why aren’t self defense classes for women offered in high school? (on that note, why aren’t they taught how to change the oil in a car…but that’s another subject for another post.)

Secondly, this woman apparently has enough upper and lower body strength to put on a good defense.  What if she did not?  If she was unable to fend off her attacker and was raped, would she be considered complacent?

And lastly, if this were another scenario, where she were out on a date and was raped, but not violently….she would have a much more difficult time of proving it was raped….and this would be only after her sex life and, well, her entire life were examined to *know* that she was telling the truth and not a slut…

Domestic violence mirrors war

by

I swear that I did not see this before making my previous comment on the connection between domestic violence and war.  Wow, what a timely article.

From the article:

Some 3,073 people were killed in the terrorist attacks on the United States on 9/11. Between that day and June 6, 2012, 6,488 US soldiers were killed in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, bringing the death toll for America’s war on terror at home and abroad to 9,561. During the same period, 11,766 women were murdered in the United States by their husbands or boyfriends, both military and civilian. The greater number of women killed here at home is a measure of the scope and the furious intensity of the war against women, a war that threatens to continue long after the misconceived war on terror is history.

~~~~~~~

On the photos taken of the violence at home:

The photos are remarkable because the photographer is very good and the subject of her attention is so rarely caught on camera. Unlike warfare covered in Iraq and Afghanistan by embedded combat photographers, wife torture takes place mostly behind closed doors, unannounced and unrecorded.

~~~~~~~

An excellent point–because in Communications, the Vietnam War is known as the media war —a war that was lost because of the diligence of the press–they brought the war home every night on the nightly news.  People could see with their own eyes what was happening–politicians in Washington could not whitewash it.  The violence we were doing to others could not be denied.  The thought of a photographer taking photos while someone commits domestic violence makes my stomach turn…and at the same time, I’m thinking “is this what it takes to make it *real*….???”  Do the people have to see photos of women beaten to a pulp on the nightly news, every night to grasp how horrible this is?

Here’s another report on domestic violence in Africa following war.  Does the war cause domestic violence or is it a cycle repeating itself?

 

 

The bombing

by

Bear with me, I’m still trying to move stuff, so I’m trying to keep up with the news of the Boston bombing, and may have missed something…

What strikes me about the story is that everyone around these two brothers describe them as “normal”.  That is, they didn’t talk of guns and violence, and no indication of their wanting to harm the public by setting off bombs.  Of course, you would expect that from the parents, but others are saying it, as well.  And the uncle?  He was livid at what they had done and demanded they turn themselves in (before they were caught).

The one detail that is pretty much downplayed here is that Tamerlan had a police record for hitting his girlfriend.  Domestic violence will not be given the importance that it deserves, as far as character and indicator of disregard for boundaries.  This, I believe, is a bigger reason for what happened…somehow Tamerlan got the idea that hurting someone weaker than you is okay–perhaps he saw it in the home.  I would go out on a limb here and say that if the reporters would dig, they would find a link to domestic violence in situations such as this.  I think religion is just an excuse for justifying the behavior.  Islam also has the “do unto others as you would have done unto you…” in the q’uran, so this goes against their religion.

Something else that bothers me is the recent statement by George W. Bush, who announced that he wasn’t sorry for anything that he has done.  Has anyone explored that as incitement to the Boston bombing?

And does anyone else see the irony of the definition of sociopath being applicable to both boys and Bush?