Month: June 2013

Powerful men say the darnedest things, especially when it comes to systemic and rampant rape in the military.

I’d like to acknowledge their feats and award them for the lengths to which they’ve gone in order to distort the reality of the military’s rape problem. They have managed to avoid the obvious causes of and solutions to rape in the military. And they’ve shown remarkable creativity and imagination in the way they understand it. Coming in third, with the bronze, is General Mark A. Welsh III, a top Air Force commander. This was his insightful response to May’s Pentagon report showing that sexual assault had jumped from 19,000 cases in 2010 to 26,000 in 2012: sexual assault happens all the time [jazz hands] outside of the military. I mean everyone [jazz hands] is doing it. So get used to it! And we have hookup culture to blame. I, of course paraphrase, but barely. Here’s what he actually said when testifying at a Senate hearing on sexual assault in the military: 20% of women report they had been sexually assaulted, “before they came into the military … So they come in from a society where this occurs … Some of it is the hookup mentality of junior high even and high school students now, which my children can tell you about from watching their friends and being frustrated by it.”

General, I’m sorry your children and their friends are frustrated with their love lives. They must feel just like the women (and men) who are raped by their fellow officers and superiors and then on top of that, face indifference at best and retaliation at worst, if they report the sexual assault.

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Read more at Policymic

The case of “Beatriz,” the pseudonym of a Salvadoran woman denied a life-saving abortion in  country where abortion is illegal without any exception whatsoever has drawn international attention, controversy, disbelief and advocacy, organizing and activism, including this Care2 petition, which collected over 27.000 signatures.

In the latest development, Monday, Beatriz underwent a Caesarian section and had an “induced birth” and not — officially, at least — an abortion. Yet, as Jodi Jacobson writes at RH Reality Check,  Beatriz “had a hysterotomy, a form of abortion carried out through c-section.” In other words, thanks to the dominance of conservative sectors like the Catholic Church and anti-choice movements in El Salvador, people are pretending an abortion isn’t an abortion.

Because the 22-year old woman  suffers from lupus and kidney problems and almost died during the delivery of her first child, Beatriz’s doctors had wanted to terminate Beatriz’s pregnancy, which they feared would kill her. Also, the fetus had anacephely,  a severe and fatal birth defect in which parts of the brain and skull are missing. The longest a baby born with anacephaly can live is days.

Thus Beatriz’s case seemed particularly sympathetic, given that the pregnancy wasn’t viable anyway. But none of this mattered in a country where abortion is illegal even in cases of rape, incest or for the health and even life of a mother. And when doctors asked for a guarantee that they wouldn’t be prosecuted if they performed an abortion, they were denied.

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Read more at Care2

Beyond Ex-Gay describes itself as “an online community for those who have survived ex gay experiences” like ex-gay therapy or “sexual orientation change efforts.” They recently conducted a survey of 400 survivors of ex-gay therapy, who no longer participate in any conversion efforts.

Perhaps the saddest part of the survey were the responses to the question “[w]hat were the reasons (the motivations) you tried to follow an ex-gay path?” As you’ll see, the primary reasons for doing so were religious. The other reasons relate to societal pressures to fit in. All of this goes to show that a LGBT identity in itself doesn’t cause unhappiness. Homophobia does.

 1. To Be a Better Christian

One participant was “was forced by my parents, counselor and church members to participate in ex-gay activities.” Another participant seemed to still believe that homosexuality is wrong and incompatible with Christianity: “Scripture is CLEAR that homosexuals and other kinds of unrighteous people will not inherit the kingdom of God.” Another said, “My pastor at the time implored me to deal with this. I had no desire to change my sexual orientation. This was upon his insistence.”

2. I Believed It Was What God Wanted Me to Do

One participant described a “fear of ruining God’s plan for my life.” Another participant wrote, “Mostly it was because I wanted to please God and I didn’t think being gay was an option.”

3. I Feared I Would Be Condemned By God

One participant wrote, “I was told to be gay was sinful.” Another was told they had “demons.”

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Read more at Policymic

What are people doing in New York this summer?  Well, we know what a whole slew of them are doing on the evening of June 28th.  Literally selling like ‘hot cakes,’ as the old saying states, tickets to Program 06 of this year’s VF13 line-up are SOLD OUT.

One of two “Centerpiece” blocks of this edition of VF, Program 06 boasts the World Premiere of Katie Halper’s COMMIE CAMP, a documentary film about Camp Kinderland, a summer camp which, since 1923, has been preaching the gospel of peace and social justice for all, just as Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck rage against the supposed indoctrination of today’s children by ‘extremist’ liberal institutions.  This film shows what really goes on at one of these ‘training’ camps.  Preceding the feature presentation will be the animated short, THE COLLECTOR’S GIFT, by Ryan Kravetz; the coming of age short, I FEEL STUPID, by Milena Pastreich; and the fun on wheels short doc, THE GASKETTES, by Jason House.

Excerpted from Domanivisionfilm