And then the waiter stabbed me with a steak knife.

Once upon a time (and by once upon a time, I mean this past November) I went on a cruise with my kids and about 200 family members.

Okay, 20 family members, but sometimes it seemed like more.

On one of the last nights of the trip, my girls and I decided to go, just the three of us, to one of the boat's sit-down restaurants.

By the way, that thing about putting on 15 lbs on a cruise?  Totally not a myth. There's like, never-ending buffets.  Constant eating.  The only thing that ensured that my pants still fit at the end of the trip was walking my ass roughly 5000 km back and forth across the boat over the course of the week trying to meet up and keep up with our ridiculously large group.

But I digress.

We went to the restaurant where we were waited on by a lovely, genial man who had the misfortune of being saddled with a trio of hyperactive doofuses who should probably never be allowed in public ever (that'd be us). 

A lovely, genial waiter who stabbed me with a steak knife.

As he was clearing away our plates, one of the knifes was sitting precariously on the edge of a plate and brushed my arm in passing, serrated side out.

The waiter hurriedly brushed my arm and apologized.

My oldest, misinterpreting the gesture leaned over and whispered "Mom, was he making a pass at you??"

"No!" I whispered back, checking my upper arm for signs of blood. "He got me. With the knife."

The both blinked at me.

"The waiting friggin' stabbed me with the steak knife!"

This sent the girls, who had been laughing like hyenas throughout our meal (Not gonna lie, I was feeling pretty punchy myself) into renewed fits of hysterics, because having your mother get stabbed by a steak knife is fucking hilarious.

When he came back to the table he was much more quiet and subdued. I, for some reason attributed it to the fact that we were being so loud and boisterous, and for a moment felt bad that  he probably thought we were laughing at him.

In retrospect, he was probably feeling really shitty about stabbing me.  Also, probably worried, since that's the kind of thing I guess usually gets waiters fired.

All in all, it wasn't that bad, since I wasn't bleeding or anything.

Since we weren't carrying much cash, since most gratuities and costs were covered or billed to the room, I felt bad I couldn't tip him, thinking, again that we were terrible patrons laughing at this poor dude who was trying to do his job.

But then again, he did stab me, with a steak knife.  So, maybe I don't feel so bad, after all. 

Putting your money where your mouth is.

Well, fuck.

Another day, another senseless act of violence, another show of meaningless 'solidarity' by changing a facebook picture, all the while ignoring the terrible things that happen to people around the world, people who look less like you.

Yup.  It's good to be home.

Since the events in Paris this week, a mosque in Peterborough was deliberately set fire.  A woman near Toronto was punched in the stomach, the hijab ripped from her head while she was called a fucking terrorist and told to go back where she came from.

People disgust me, yo.

It's exhausting, explaining to people, so-called Christians, people who supposedly worship a man who decried pointing out the splinter in another's eye while ignoring the beam in your own, that all terrorists are not muslims and all muslims are not terrorists.

But I'm privileged in that if I don't feel like speaking up, I don't have to.

I'm tired of trying to explain that the refugees fleeing Syria are NOT the threat.. they're running from the same threat.

And I will fucking scream if one more person talks about 'taking care of our own first' while doing fuck-all to actually help the homeless and the mentally ill.

Homeless people need help. Yes.  No shit.

The mentally ill need help.  Again, no big revelation there.

Refugees need help. 

None of these things need to cancel the others out.  If we have problems with mental health access and homelessness, it's not because of a piddling number of what... 25,000 refugees? That is 0.07% of this country's entire population.  Not even an entire tenth of a percent. 

That's one town.  One rather small town.

The mentally ill and the homeless aren't going to suffer because we accept a small town's worth of refugees.  They're suffering because of multiple governments that had already forsaken them several times over, governments supported by people who ignore the homeless and shit on people who have to rely on government assistance, but trot them out as an argument for having to 'take care of our own'.

The people complaining don't actually care about the homeless.  One person in a thread said that "The money has to come from somewhere."

Yes, it does.  Probably taxes.  I'm okay with that.  I'm willing to pay taxes if it means homeless people, mentally ill people, and refugees all get help they need (btw, there's overlap in these groups, in case you didn't know).  Fuck yeah.  Sign me up.

If you actually care about homeless people, then I hope you're speaking up just as loudly when MP's and MPP's and municipal politicians are giving themselves raises every year.  I hope you're fighting for better access to affordable and emergency housing.  I hope you're donating to food banks more than just at Christmas and Thanksgiving.  I hope you're fighting for legislation that prevents discrimination against people with mental illness or people with criminal records*, things that often lead to people being unable to support themselves.

But don't trot out the homeless to support your bigotry by saying "We need to take care of our own." 

Mesothelioma Awareness Day

It's been almost two years (less about a week and a bit) since I got the news that I had cancer in my ascending colon. After surgery, six weeks off work and a much longer period of both physical and mental recovery, I'm now approaching two years cancer free (as of November 1st).

I was lucky, in that colon cancer, if caught early, is pretty easy to treat.  Mine was caught very early, stage one.

Others are not so lucky.

September 26th is Mesothelioma Awareness Day.  Mesothelioma is a cancer of the lungs, caused by exposure to asbestos, otherwise known as that stuff that people used to put in houses for insulation, until people found out that it was all kinds of terrible for you.

Although asbestos use has been drastically reduced over the years, (Canada's last two mines closed in 2011) it's still legal for use in both the U.S. and Canada, and even if people aren't actively using it as much (however, they still are, which is mind-boggling and scary), it's still all over the place, in older homes and buildings. 

Hell, two years ago, when the sewer backed up into the basement and the line had to be dug up, one of the original pipes was made of asbestos, and got left in our yard over the winter.  I had to keep calling to get it removed, because I'd be damned if either myself or the Well-Travelled One were going to touch that thing with a ten-foot pole.

Mesothelioma is one of the major side effects of asbestos exposure, and it's outcome is general devastating.. Victims are usually given less than a year to live.

If you want to find out more, visit www.mesothelioma.com

And then, all at once my head exploded - or - The tale of the world's tiniest violin, which I shall now play for these poor forsaken souls

Somebody call the wahhhmbulance, already.

Is it me, or does this article sound like the weirdest kind of humble-brag?

Somebody gave this woman a platform to tell a heart-wrenching (I think that's what she was going for) sob story about how she and her husband, through meticulous planning and what sounds like a fuck-load of privilege, achieved everything they ever wanted -- two kids, some dogs, yearly vacations, and shit-damn, even a riding lawn-mower for the beautiful yard that surrounds their dream home -- but somehow, it wasn't enough.

You're basically Ross. And Ross is the worst.

(Image: Three panels of Chandler and Joey. Captions read "Oh, no. Two women love me. They're both gorgeous and sexy. My wallet's too small for my 50's and my diamond shoes are too tight!")

Because now they want another kid, but the cost of another kid would disrupt their perfect economic equilibrium and send them spiralling into the void of "possibly having to downsize to a less than spectacular dream home and maybe pushing a lawnmower instead of riding it" debilitating, abject poverty in order to soothe the literal ache in her well-planned out uterus.

Don't you understand.. they might have to sell the time-share!

Holy shit.  Cry me a damn river.

If I sound bitter, it's because yeah, I am. Because I, too, scrimped and saved and bought thrift store clothes and made a down payment on what was not my dream home, but simply a home, and even I can recognize how damned lucky I am that I have a roof over my head to call my own, even if said roof and attached walls have seemingly been cobbled together with high hopes, salvaged materials and sheer what-the-fuckery.

This article made me angry on a visceral level.

It is quite likely the most obnoxious thing I've ever read.

I almost wonder if we're not being trolled on a grand scale, because really, can someone really lack this much self-awareness, to not realize that there are people who cannot have children at all (instead of merely having to make a choice between a kid and a time-share).  Does she not realize the vast numbers of people who lack even a clean, dry place to lay their heads at night?

Does she think these people just didn't plan well enough?

Imagine, living off of canned food for a whole year? Buying consignment clothing?  What sacrifice! 

The idea of someone marvelling over eating canned food when there are people who are happy to, you know, eat food, makes me think of this guy. (Image: Old man chained to a wall. Caption reads "Wot I wouldn't give to be spat at in the face!")

Don't get me wrong.  There is nothing wrong - morally wrong - with working hard and planning your life out to a tee.  I'm also not going to judge people who get hit on the metaphorical head with their biological clock.  It happens, and plans change.  Wouldn't it be lovely if we all got a national platform to air our grievances when life doesn't *quite* work out how we expected.

Material or maternal, don't martyr yourself over choosing your luxury home over another mouth to feed like it's some massive sacrifice.

Shit or get off the pot, and just be glad you have a pot to piss in.

Humility is for suckers.

I got called out yesterday morning by a friend I hadn't talked to for a while.  I fully deserved it.  It was in regards to a facebook post I had made for a recent post on the art blog.

He pointed out that I seem to preface every post with a negative comment about my work.

Fair enough.

Not having ingested enough coffee at the time, I thought this observation to be mainly in reference to the blog post itself, which being a post about one of my first painting attempts, I thought was critical but fair.

It hadn't occurred to me that on the Facebook post, I had included the words "Be prepared for terribleness."

Okay, that's pretty negative.

Although I created the art blog with the intent of sharing more of the stories behind my artwork, I also wanted it to be a place where I could examine and critique my own work:  where I've improved and where I'd like to see improvement.

But I'm not going to lie. I tear myself down, a lot.  I've been using self-deprecation as a defense mechanism for a ridiculously long time, and it's a tough habit to break.

I know there one major thing at play here: there is the desire to point out my own flaws before anyone else can.  It's as though if I don't let anyone see that I might actually be taking this somewhat seriously, then I don't have to live up to the expectation of being any good at it.  It's the thing that keeps me referring to myself as a dabbler, or a hobbyist, as opposed to an artist.  I feel like if I act like I take it too seriously, then I'm at risk at becoming the living embodiment of the insufferably pretentious art snob.  So I fall back on "Ha ha, I suck."

I've always felt rather mediocre at most of my endeavours.  Perhaps I've only ever been mediocre because I won't allow myself to immerse myself in anything enough to be more than 'just okay' because if I do, then there will be expectations.

And let's face it.  Pride is still considered, in many circles, to be a vanity, a sin.  Women especially are expected to downgrade their accomplishments, to deflect compliments with phrases like "Oh, you don't mean that," and "You're just saying that to be nice." 


It's bullshit. The idea that people should be humble, should not draw attention to their strengths, is a great way to keep people down, to keep them from realizing their full potential.  We don't know the things we are capable of if a fear of pride or appearing immodest drives us to downplay every single accomplishment we have.  We internalize the message that those things we learn and do and become good, great, or even experts at (outside, of course, of those things we do to earn money, because capitalism.. you are your job, in this system) don't matter, that they aren't a big deal.

You, my friends, are a big fucking deal.  If you tried something new today, that's a big deal.  If you did something today that you love and did it even the teensiest bit better than you did yesterday, that's a big deal.

From today, I am going to try to work extra hard not to be so self-deprecating when it comes to my art, my music, my writing or myself.  I am a big fucking deal.

SOURCE

I do dumb things.

While at work today, I answered a phone call and hit myself in the face with the receiver.  The caller on the other end heard me say 'ow' as I attempted, and failed spectacularly, to maintain some air of professionalism.

On my third or fourth day of seventh grade, I was leaning forward in my chair, when it slipped out from under me.  I grabbed the desk for support.

You all know how sturdy school desks are, right?  Not very. Needless to say, I made a great first impression as 'the new kid'.

Sadly, I hadn't learned my lesson from when I was six and I nearly concussed myself after leaning too far back in my chair, becoming well acquainted with a wooden work bench.  This was back when first graders were allowed to use saws and hammers during playtime. Oh, the 80s.

At the age of 14 I smoked.  I laboured under the assumption that my parents didn't know.  They probably did.  One balmy summer's eve, I stood out on my back porch enjoying a cigarette when I spotted my dad coming down the hill to our house on the way home from the Legion.  Like the ninja I am, I tossed the butt and raced straight into the house.

And by 'house' I mean 'the screen door.'

Once at the Y, because I am a living cartoon and I have no sense of time+distance, I nearly set my shirt on fire before catapaulting myself across a room, all because I thought that 6 kilometers an hour on a treadmill seemed a reasonable speed for a beginner.

I fell under a bus once.

Just the other week, I provided my children with an excellent cautionary tale called "Why it's a bad idea to jimmy a glued-shut jar of Mod-Podge open with a paring knife," starring Mom's Mangled Index Finger.

Lastly, a headboard is no place for an antique clock.  That's all I'll say on that topic.

Some small justice, or, Depressingly, comment sections fail to surprise me. (TW Sexual Assault)

Source

I read a blog post this evening.  It was a post from Dennis Canning, the father of Rehteah Parsons.  You may remember her.  She killed herself two years after some guys she was drinking with raped her, took pictures and circulated them around her school and community.  One of the guys involved recently plead guilty to producing child pornography, as the who took the pictures of Rehtaeh and the catalyst to the images being disseminated

If you click on that link, just don't read the comments.

I read the comments.  I have the rage.  All of the rage, and the anger, and the bilious, spitting, horrible "fuck this world and the people in it" disgust.

Most of the comments were sympathetic.  But who in the bloody-minded hell goes onto the blog of a grieving parent, who sought justice for his daughter and was so utterly failed by the authorities involved as they basically shrugged off a gross violation, who now will share with Rehteah's mother the everlasting grief of losing a child, especially one who could have been saved if only someone, anyone, gave a flying shit... 

What vile creature tells this grieving father that he MUST forgive the boys whose callousness and cruelty cost his daughter her life?

Who tells this family that by seeking justice for these wrongs, they will be ruining a kids life? The kids involved were old enough to know what they did was wrong.  The fallout is theirs to deal with.

What kind of person quibbles over the semantics of saying that Rehtaeh's death was a result of her rape and subsequent humiliation, by pointing out that sometimes people who DON'T have something so horrendous happen to them may also commit suicide? 

If Rehtaeh had mental health issues, I'm sure they were not helped by two years of reoccurring humiliation and a lack of compassion from institutions - the police, her school - that were supposed to help, not turn a blind eye.

And who, I ask, thinks it appropriate to pull out the "Where were this girls PARENTS??" card, when I am sure that Glen Canning and Leah Parsons wonder on a daily basis what THEY could have done different.

I know I would. 

I would bet Vegas odds that the jackass anon who made THAT comment probably lied to their parents at some point in their life.  Probably drank before they were legal age as well.

There but for the grace of something, go you, anon.

I'm a parent of two girls on the cusp of adolescence.  If this was one of my children it would take everything in me not to want to track down these kids and tear them apart with my bare hands.

I cannot fathom what a bitter victory this guilty plea must seem.  Small consolation for a family that will never have their daughter back. 

Body acceptance and 'unacceptable' bodies.

Before I start, I just want to point out that societal standards and the idea that there are acceptable bodies and unacceptable bodies are bullshit.  Complete, grass-fed bullshit.

That being said, these ideas and standards exist, and it is naive to say societal standards are bullshit so you should just ignore them and feel good about yourself.  Context matters and there is only so far you can go in 'ignoring standards'.

I include this caveat mostly to make clear that when I speak of acceptable and unacceptable bodies, I mean by societal standards and definitely not my own.  Had I my druthers, we wouldn't be having this conversation at all, because there'd be no concept of a body that was unacceptable.

The other day I read a post on my Facebook feed, lauding Australian 'plus-sized' model Robyn Lawley for posting a number of un-retouched, un-airbrushed bikini pictures in the name of body acceptance.

I'm not even going to get into discussing how ludicrous the modelling industry's idea of plus-sized is.  Most of the average-sized women I know are considered too large for plus-sized modelling.

Yup.  Plus-sized.  Okay, then.

First off, I want to say, on a personal level, hats off to you, Robyn Lawley.  Body insecurity can be an issue for anyone of any size and shape and putting yourself out there like that can be a great act of bravery.  I applaud you for calling out the practice of PhotoShopping and airbrushing that gives women even more unrealistic standards to try and live up to.  You, along with so many other women, live within the context of a capitalistic system where industries make money off of tearing down the self-esteem of women, in a never-ending quest to sell us more make-up, more diets, more surgeries and more ways to hate our bodies for being less than utter perfection.

So, yes.  On a personal level, a big thumbs up for you, Robin Lawley.

All that being said, I just wish that the body acceptance movement would focus more on 'unacceptable' bodies.  Practising body acceptance, while a generally good thing, is a lot easier when you live in a body that falls near the "most acceptable" end of the spectrum.  Having a slender, white, youthful women preach body acceptance leaves me feeling pretty underwhelmed.

A woman like Robyn Lawley can post online a picture of herself, flaws and all, and will most likely receive accolades and support and comments to the effect of how beautiful she already is.  Granted, you always get a few assholes that will pick apart her appearance.

I have to wonder.. what if someone like myself, at 200+ lbs, stretch-marked, scarred, flabby, posted the same picture in my own bikini (which I have, because fuck societal standards)?  Mockery, cries of "No one wants to see that!", fake concern for my health and possibly threats of violence because the internet is like that.

Body acceptance should be applicable to all bodies, not just acceptable bodies.  Black bodies, brown bodies, short bodies, fat bodies, disabled bodies, old bodies, scarred bodies, tattooed bodies, trans bodies.  All ethnicities, all genders.

We need to celebrate ALL bodies.

Entitlement to Women's Bodies at its Most Horrifying.

Trigger Warning: Extreme Violence, Misogyny

Last night, a 22 year old man named Elliot Rodger allegedly opened fire on a small community near Santa Barbara,California, killing six people, possibly himself included.

The night before, he posted a video to YouTube, complaining about being rejected by women and still being a virgin at 22.  He declared that he would take retribution on the women who refused him love, and sex.  He labelled them sluts and said he would mow each of them down. (By the way, that video is disturbing as hell).

A Facebook acquaintance who posted the story referred to him as America's own Marc Lepine.  She's right.

People will see this story and rave on about gun control (which I am all for).  They will see this story and scapegoat the mentally ill.  I get it.  There are not enough resources for the mentally ill.  They need more help that society is willing to provide at this point.  But every time we jump to "They must be mentally ill!" it does a disservice to the numerous non-violent mentally ill.

This guy have been ill.  What he definitely was, is entitled as hell. People will likely ignore the sheer amount of entitlement that it takes to justify murdering numerous people in cold blood because you can't get laid.

Elliot Rodger thought that because women refuse his advances they were sluts and deserved to die.  Women were supposed to be there for his enjoyment.  They didn't provide that.  So they had to be punished.

That is entitlement.

Crowdsurfing, like so many other things, does NOT justify sexual assault.

Trigger Warning, because obviously.

Full disclosure:  I do not know who Iggy Azalea is, nor do I really want to.

I'm old.  I'm not hip.  I'm not cool.  I'm okay with this.

I am told this is an Iggy Azalea.  Source

Ye old Facebook feed is chock-full of debate over an interview she gave with the Huffington Post where she talks about how she had to stop crowd-surfing because people, both male and female, were using this as an opportunity to sexually assault her.

Gross, right?

Just as gross as the load of people who are using this to spew the same old rape-apologist B.S. about how women, when going certain places and doing certain things, should expect to be assaulted, even though it's totally bad and wrong and of course no one is saying it's okay, but that still, we should expect these kinds of things.  Cue shrug.

Nope, sorry.  No one should expect to be sexually assaulted in any context and nobody should shrug it off like it's just one of those things.

The two popular arguments seem to be A) Men are disgusting, so we should just expect them to be disgusting and violate us; or B) People who are crowd-surfing should expect to be touched because duh! Women like Azalea are just being over sensitive.

The A crowd are doing both women and men a huge disservice because they basically imply that a man's default setting is rapist, and that women need to suck it up and just not go anywhere.  It's patently untrue.  Most men are capable of controlling themselves in almost any situation.  We call these men 'decent people who fucking get that you don't assault others'.    This argument also ignores that she said that BOTH men and women have done this.

I believe the B crowd probably haven't bothered to read the actual article.

There's a big difference between someone brushing or palming your boob or ass to support you as you're passed overhead, and what Azalea described in her interview.  Not sure what the lingo in other places is, but where I come from, "fingering" refers pretty blatantly to digital penetration of the vagina. Which is something that is pretty damn difficult to do by accident.  Not to mention that in her interview she cites people actually tweeting her saying that they were going to try and 'finger' her while she's surfing the crowd.

I will get lurk tweets for like a week before my show, like 'I'm about to go to the Iggy Azalea show and I'm going to finger her,' and I'll see it and be like, please don't!," she said. "That's a violation. I don't actually like that stuff."

If you tweet a celebrity to tell them outright that you plan to assault them at a show, then all arguments about "accidental" grabs and brushes being blown out of proportion flies right out the window.

FYI (If you're a nosy asshole)

This post. I mean, this friggin post.  

Had the *ahem* pleasure of reading Mrs. Hall's lengthy missive to the teenaged girls who have Facebook friended her precious wee boys regarding the seemingly scandalous selfies young girls seem to like to take of themselves.  Mrs. Hall is quite concerned that her boys may be exposed to these wanton adolescent hussies, posing in their pajamas in sultry poses.  Some of these girls are even (gasp!) not wearing bras!

Mrs. Hall is trying to raise young men with a strong moral compass, who don't "linger over pictures of scantily clad ladies."  Which is apparently quite impossible to do when there are pictures of teenaged girls posing for selfies on the Internet.  Any female friend of the Hall boys who thinks of posting a vaguely sexy picture of herself online should consider themselves as good as blocked because Mrs. Hall only wants her boys thinking of girls respectfully and Gord knows, being a sexual being and being a human being worthy of respect are two mutually exclusive things.  Well, if you're a girl.. Isn't that right Mrs. Hall?

Mrs. Hall, I noticed that your boys are posted all over your blog in beachwear, which some would argue is much more revealing than pajamas or even a towel.  I guess girls (or non-hetero boys) can easily un-see that, though can they? And still think of your kids as people worthy of respect?  But you said yourself, once a boy sees a girl naked (or in towel, or in pajamas or without a bra) he can't unsee that.  You seem to have a high level of confidence in your boys' ability to behave like gentleman and not like rutting animals.  Or maybe not.  Because if you did, the spectre of some silly, pouty pictures wouldn't loom such a threat.

There are a dozen good reasons to be careful of what you post online.  Surveillance, online weirdos and pedophiles, and the fact that stuff you post does NOT GO AWAY are all things we should be concerned about and I agree that we should be encouraging kids (and adults, of any gender) to be extra self-critical of what they post.  These safety and privacy issues don't seem to be on your radar, however.  You seem more concerned about not letting these girls sully your preciouses virginal little minds.

I find the attitude that in order for men to respect and cherish women they must not think of them sexually is a harmful one.  The implication you've made here is that a girl or woman cannot be sexual while still being worthy of respect.  That is what we call, in feminist circles, slut shaming.  And it is harmful.  Girls are continually sexualized and objectified by our culture, while simultaneously being shamed if they dare to be sexual on their own terms.  A girl's history or perceived history can be used against her in sexual assault cases.  

Mrs. Hall, if you want your sons to be men of integrity who eventually meet and possibly marry women of character, teach them that a woman's worth is about more than her sexuality.  Teach them that being sexual and being a person worthy of respect.  Teach them their respect for someone should not be predicated on their sexual history or whether or not they're wearing a bra in their profile picture.  If you can't teach them that, I think my soon-to-be teenaged girls would be better off blocked.

The Strawman Cometh

First off, my apologies for what is probably a ridiculously unoriginal post title.  I'm not so arrogant as to assume that I simply MUST be the first one to come up with such a clever play on The Iceman Cometh.  But anyway, that is neither here nor there.

Back to this particular man o straw.  For this playing along at home, here's a little 101 level info for you:

Strawman (def): a weak or imaginary opposition (as an argument or adversary) set up only to be easily confuted.  - Merriam Webster

A few folks have posted a link to this article from Natural News claiming that an MSNBC anchor basically endorsed infanticide by stating that parents decide when their children are in fact children and go on to make this out to be part of some kind of death cult that believes it is okay to murder children up to three months in age.  They're claiming that this is part of a radical-left desire for 'Post-Birth' abortion (Hi, not actually a thing).

The quote from the article from anchor Melissa Harris-Perry reads as follows: 

When does life begin? I submit the answer depends an awful lot on the feeling of the parents. A powerful feeling -- but not science.

I clicked through to some of the sources and found a longer clip that gives some context to Harris-Perry's statement, which incidentally, seems to deal only with pregnancy and not with the question of infanticide.


The argument she's presenting here is one that I have come across in abortion debates - when does the fetus become a baby?  I've taken parts in debates where one side refers to zygotes and fetuses and clusters of cells and the other to babies and children and innocent life.  The latter may respond that they NEVER thought of their babies as just clusters of cells.

And that's totally valid.

There have been people who have described a sense of relief post-abortion, as though a burden had been lifted.

Also valid.

No one is obligated to feel sad about terminating a pregnancy.  Nor are people obligated to be nonchalant in the face of losing a wanted pregnancy, whether by miscarriage or through having to make a heart-breaking decision due to health or financial constraints.

However, Natural News turns this into a straw man argument by equating pre-term abortion with infanticide and coming to the conclusion that if you agree with one, you must agree with the latter, when they are two separate entities, and some studies have shown that in areas where abortion services are more widely available, infanticide rates drop as unwanted pregnancies are terminated well before birth.

As far as the "poll" asking people whether they'd support 'Fourth Trimester' abortion, I'm inclined to think that this is less about people approving of infanticide and more about people not having the slightest clue about pregnancy and how it works.  You can people to agree to fucked up stuff if you word it in vague and confusing ways.

Come to think of it, I'd probably forgo shaving, too. #Revolution

Since its inception, The Well-Travelled One and I have been pretty regular viewers of Revolution, the dystopian-future drama set 15 years after a human-made disaster wipes out almost all electricity (and for some reason, combustion engines, because why not?) and the world, especially North America, goes to shit.

Like, I said, Dystopian.

Without giving away too many spoilers, last night after many many episodes worth of almost non-stop gratuituous violence, we FINALLY got to see a little sex.  Not a lot, because I'm pretty sure this is a network show and not HBO.  I make this assumption due to the fact that for a future where people are getting slaughtered left, right and center, there's surprisingly little cussing.  Graphic violence in multitudes is cool, but please, no cussing or hint of side-boob, right NBC?

So a couple of characters who will remain unnamed ended the episode by engaging in some implied naked fun time.

This morning I got to thinking.. if I were living in a dystopian future would there be any purpose to wearing a bra?  I'm thinking no.  At least not for me.  I know there are women who HAVE to wear bras, otherwise face massive discomfort, so I'm not about to begrudge more endowed ladies their undergarments, even when the world is going to hell in a handbasket.

As my friend Nic pointed out, all that running from zombies, robots, authorities etc. could very well make some kind of support a necessity, in which case I'd probably settle for binding myself instead of oh.. I don't know.. MATCHING BRA AND PANTY SETS?  Somehow I think if my life was constantly under threat, I'd not care much what my underpants looked like, and would be more worried about not constantly shitting them every time someone was trying to kill me.

Like how Aaron looks 90% of the time he's on screen.

Where in a dystopian future with no electricity where our heroes are consistently on the run from forces that would see them dead, does {redacted for spoilers} get a fucking matching Victoria Secret bra and panty set?

Did she sew them herself?

In the immortal words of Sweet Brown, "Ain't nobody got time for that."

Are they shipped by steamships from sweatshops that have gotten even sweatier since the lights (and thus the air conditioning.. because sweatshops totally have THAT) went off?  How the hell would they get to her?  The main protagonists are ALWAYS ON THE MOVE.  CONSTANTLY.

And NOBODY is going to convince me that these are they same underoos she's had for the last fifteen years.  The show is set in 2027, so she'd have to have bought them last year, in 2012 at the latest.  I'm a buyer of underpants and a purchaser of brassieres, and the shit that gets manufactured and sold in stores in present-day North America is NOT made to withstand 15 years of fighting, killing, running, plotting and the occasionally beating against a rock to launder them.  She would have stabbed herself with the underwire a thousand times over by now.

I guess in an electricity-void, dystopian future where hair always looks conditioned, EXIT signs in building still glow red and people inexplicably drink whiskey from late 19th-century antique glass bottles in spite of the fact that their 15-year-old empty Canadian Club 26ers would probably work just as well, a little bit of realism when it comes to the characters gotchies is probably too much to ask.

Oh, Fuck No.

Today in sexist fuckwittery, a school in New jersey has had it's female students take a "no swearing" pledge. You read that right, folks. Just the girls.

Look, in spite of my own potty mouth, I'm not a fan of swearing and have even made (valiant, but failed) attempts at keeping my own expletives to a minimum.  It can make people sound ignorant and uneducated.  In some contexts though, a well-placed expletive can place emphasis on a phrase, really hit a point home.  That's neither here nor there.  Because it seems much more than a little fucked up to me that only the girls are being asked to take this pledge. Am I alone here?

The school denies a double standard is at play. Of course not. I mean, yeah, none of the boys had to take the pledge but they were asked kindly to not swear around the girls, so that's gotta count for something, right?

FYI.

It counts for making this pledge doubly insulting, because it gives the message that swearing is in appropriate for "ladies" but fairly innocuous when guys do it, unless of course they do it around d us girls and our delicate sensibilities.

What the fuck?

Tumblr user Afroboheme noted that it was telling that the pledge pin was a pair of lips with a red slash through them:

It really got me that they’re promising pins with a ‘red slash through pink lips’. Cause that’s what they actually want. Ladies should keep their fucking mouths shut, amiright? Try and tell me this isn’t what this is actually about? Getting women to shut the fuck up.

Does that seem hyperbolic to you?  Maybe, except that tone arguments and admonishments to be ladylike and not make waves have been used for years to suppress and derail women, who when expressing dissatisfaction and yes, even anger are told they are being hysterical.

So color me fucking unimpressed by this one-sided attempt to teach civility.   If you run a school and you have rules of conduct, then enforce those standards across board.  Don't hold the girls to a different standard than the boys and then claim that you are not upholding a plainly sexist double-standard.  Otherwise, I say, fuck that double-standard bullshit.

*special thanks to Kate for bringing this to my dashboard

Hug your babies tight.

This morning in Ontario there were parents grumbling and inconvenienced because they couldn't send their children to school due to the one-day teacher's strike.

Today, in Connecticut there are parents who will wish, possibly for the rest of their lives, that they had never sent their children to school this morning.  They will go over and over what they could have done differently.


No one should have to consider the possibility that when they send their little ones to school, that they might never come home.

Some will thank God or whatever forces of the universe they put their faith in for the fever, or the stomach bug or even the case of head lice that may have kept their child home today.

I can't even imagine what possesses a grown man to open fire on a building full of children.

It boggles the mind.

No child should ever have to see their teacher, principal and peers gunned down before their eyes.  No child should have to live with that memory.

The teachers who were on duty, some of them will live with the memory and guilt, guilt that they should not have to bear, from being unable to save the children.

It feels like there should be some kind of metaphor here, but I have nothing. It's just as well.  Enough people will use this event to political ends as it is.  I don't want to add to it.

I don't want to speculate on this guys mental and emotional state.  I don't want to talk about guns.

I just want to hold my babies.

Wherein an era comes to a close, and customer service flies out the window.

So annoyed right about now.

I went to pick up the girls only to be informed that the youngest's indoor shoes, which I bought not more than two months ago, were broken and in need of replacing.  It seemed a good idea to take them back to Zellers and ask for a refund because in no universe should a pair of children's runners fall apart after two lousy months.   She never even wore them outside.

Zellers used to offer a "Kidurable" guarantee on all of their children's wear.  If they wore it out before they outgrew it, then they'd replace it.  Since I still had the receipt, I figured piece of cake.

Yeah, except that not too long ago, Zellers got bought out by Target and now all the locations are either in the process of becoming Target or, if you live in an area that is economically depressed and already has a Walmart such as we do, being liquidated and closed down.  One of the first steps was saying "effyoo" to the Kidurable guarantee.

No, wait it gets better.

So because the shoes are no longer guaranteed I have only the option of exchanging them for a new pair.  Which would be awesome, if there were more than, oh say, two pairs in the kids size available.  And two of those pairs cost about twice as much as the original pair.  We had the foresight to re-measure her feet, thankfully her feet had grown and she was up a size so this brought us up to three or four possible pairs.  That's if you count the ones in the boys section as well.  Yeah, it's safe to say they're pretty picked over in their shoe selection.

So let's recap shall we?

1. The cheap-assed shoes that lasted a mere month beyond the 30 day return period can only be exchanged.  No money back, even though logic would dictate that if I bought a shitty pair of shoes somewhere which fell apart after two months, I'd want to take my money elsewhere, perhaps somewhere the shoe selection was less shoddy and craptacular on-the-whole.
2. Had I not been able to find a suitable replacement, I'd have been stuck with the original broken pair.
3. I not only have to go through the whole pain in the ass that is children's shoe shopping a second time, I have to pay extra for the privilege since no shoes are available in the original price range.
4. Because of the exchange-only policy and the lousy fucking 'We're liquidating and oh yeah it's winter' selection of running shoes I am limited to the same shitty line of shoes.
5. This means that in two or three months time, I'm almost inevitably going to be in the exact same boat only this time Zellers will either be in total liquidation so my exchange-only selection will be even MORE limited and shitty or the whole damn store will be gone and I'll be completely shit out of luck.

So, thanks for nothing Zellers.  If not for the bitter taste this incident has left in my mouth, I'd almost be sad to see you go.  At least your demise blessed us with this:

Oh and then in all but perhaps karmically unrelated incident I proceeded to dump the contents of the green bin on the kitchen floor.  Which was awesome.

So, how is your night?

Shoppers Drug Mart Agrees to Hold Off on Christmas Music, People Predictably Lose Their Shit, Act Like Total Assholes.

Holy crap, you guys.  A store actually listened to a customer complaint.  A CHAIN store, even.  And then, everything went to hell.  Because we can't have nice things.

I picked this up via fellow blogger Tom Megginson, who writes  at The Ethical Adman

So, I guess someone complained about Shoppers Drug Mart playing Christmas music in their stores the freaking day after Halloween and shockingly the store chain said, via their Facebook page "Okay, cool, we'll hold off"

Predictably, people are freaking out about political correctedness gone apeshit and the so-called "War On Christmas."

The store chain has stated that this is not a permanent ban -  they're just holding off citing that many people thought it was too soon.  There are a lot of Canadians who are pushing to have people and establishments hold off on putting up Christmas decorations and playing music until after November 11th, so as not to take attention away from Remembrance Day.

Can I reiterate?  NOT A PERMANENT BAN.

Holy shit, people.  I'm the first one to say that when I start hearing Christmas carols in stores when there are still dead babies on my lawn, it kind of takes some of the magic out of the season.  Give us a chance to breathe before throwing the general public into another harried holiday season.  I personally like a little chance to get excited about Christmas before I move onto being stressed as fuck about it.  So kudos to Shoppers Drug Mart for this move, says I.  If you can do something about your bloody make-up counters and their proximity to the front door, then we'll be on a roll.

Anyway, to no one's surprise, the thread has devolved into the ultimate game of War-on-Christmas bingo, complete with racist, go-back-where-you-came-from anti-immigrant sentiment.   Check out Tom's post for some of the worst offenders.  I'm thinking of getting a big old bottle of something alcoholic tonight and reading through the epic thread that has already reached over 3600 comments in the last three hours.

If you wanna take part, just take a drink everyone someone invokes the following:

• Allusion to people being 'too politically correct'
• References to a War on Christmas
• Telling non-christians to go back where they came from and ignoring the fact plenty of non-christians are born here.  Including the millions that lived here before Christians ever showed up.
• Anti-muslim comments
• Complaints about not being able to say "Merry Christmas" 
• References to "Holiday Trees"
• Putting the Christ back into Christmas
• The Grinch or Scrooge

Something tells me I'm going to be feeling rough tomorrow.

Parenting Win plus Other Things.

Oh Hallowe'en.  Just because I've been slow on the uptake as far as preparations go, doesn't mean I don't love you as much as I always have.

I usually take this holiday pretty seriously.  My kids take the brunt of it.  The oldest one mostly just humours me but the youngest has taken my enthusiasm for blood and creepiness and run with it.  I dropped her off at a Halloween party at her friend's place today.  At the door we were greeted by a Little Red Riding Hood, and a cute little skeleton and an adorable cowgirl.

And then there's my kid, looking, very much of her own accord, like something coughed up from the very bowels of hell.  Gray, pasty skin, scraggly black hair and blood dripping from her eyes.

I'm so proud.

**********************************************

Back in 2004, I took a road trip to Fort Frances, Ontario which is roughly a 20-hour drive away from where I live.  On the way, I stopped for the night and slept in the back of my car in the back of a Ford dealership outside of Wawa, Ontario.  In the cramped backseat of my 1992 Ford Tempo, I had dreams of my children turning into werewolves.

As of yesterday, a good chunk of that dealership has been washed away with a stretch of the Trans-Canada highway.  It no longer exists.

Yeah.. I was parked right around there.  - Source

I'm thinking that's a metaphor for something, but I don't know what.

Daniel Tosh is not being censored.

A day late, a buck short, I know.  This is all old news by now.  Whatevs, brah.

But I couldn't let this one pass.

Daniel Tosh, the so-called 'comedian' that I fully admit I hadn't really known of or paid any attention until this week, got called out at one of his shows for saying rape jokes are funny.

For the record, they're not.

He responded by making what have has been interpreted by some as a not-so-veiled threat and by others as a joke.  I'm kind of in the threat camp on this one.

After I called out to him, Tosh paused for a moment. Then, he says, “Wouldn’t it be funny if that girl got raped by like, 5 guys right now? Like right now? What if a bunch of guys just raped her…”

I've laughed at some pretty wrong and fucked up stuff in my time, and this didn't even make me giggle a bit. Not even in that "omigod-i-so-shouldn't-be-laughing-at-this-I'm-a-bad-person-and-obviously-going-to-hell" way.

So as it happens, this girls post has gone viral and a bunch of people have called Tosh an asshole, and a bunch of people have come to his defence, claiming free speech etc etc.

People, I cannot stress this enough.

Criticism is not Censorship.
Saying "Don't be an asshole," is not Censorship.

Saying "This thing you said, it's shitty and hurts people" is not Censorship.

Criticism is not Censorship.

Saying "I'm not coming to your performances or watching your show any more, you rape-apologizing, unfunny assbag." is not censorship.

Telling sponsors and advertisers "Hey, I'm going to stop using your services or buying your products if you keep giving money to this rape-apologizing, unfunny assbag," is not censorship.

Bringing attention to the actions of an unfunny, rape-apologizing assbags through various medium and suggesting that "Hey, maybe supporting unfunny rape-apologizing assbags is bullshit really fucking hurtful and erases victims and perpetuates a culture where rape is normalized and acceptable and seen as a joke," is not censorship.

Criticism is not Censorship.


To the best of my knowledge, no one is advocating jailing, deporting or otherwise sanctioning Daniel Tosh.  Governing bodies have not stepped in and taken away his show.  If I'm wrong, then yes, that is censorship.

But the same people who are saying that we are taking away Daniel Tosh's right to be an asshole free speech are silencing the victims, or potential victims who are trying to say "Hey, that shit is not funny."

"Are there no Burger Kings? Are there no No Wal-Marts?"*

Oh, Mr. Flaherty, you've really lost touch with the common Canadian, haven't you?

I can only assume this is the reasoning behind the statements you made today regarding those receiving unemployment benefits and the seeming unwillingness to accept employment that is 'beneath them' or 'too far away'.  

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said Monday new rule changes to define "suitable employment" and "reasonable" efforts at finding work have yet to come down, but as far as he's concerned people should be prepared to take pretty well any available job.

"I was brought up in a certain way. There is no bad job, the only bad job is not having a job," he told reporters. "I drove a taxi, I refereed hockey. You do what you have to do to make a living."

I'm sure on a six-digit government salary it is easy to adopt a boot-strap attitude, seeing as how you, Mr. Flaherty, will likely never be faced with the prospect working two or more minimum wage, part time jobs to put food on the table.  The truth is that no, it is not always a case that any job is better than no job.  

A family faced with deciding between paying daycare and paying rent because even a full-time minimum wage position doesn't always cover both, especially in cases where there is only one parent, or more than one child.  This may not have been an issue if the National Daycare Program had ever come to fruition, but I guess that $100.00 a month bribe to make us forget about it made it ALL WORTH IT.

As far as working out of town, I like how you assume that this is an option for most people.  Consider those without cars... That's right.  Some people do not own their own vehicle, or may have medical conditions that prevent them from obtaining a drivers licence.  Shocking I know.  Also, shitty and/or non-existent mass transit systems are also a thing.  Let's assume that a vehicle is readily available.  Consider the current price of gas, sitting at between 1.27 and 1.35 per Litre in Central Ontario... once again, one falls into the trap of spending a good portion of their wages on fuel, which is aggravating enough when one lives relatively close (my own commute is a decent 10-minute drive) but becomes teeth-clenchingly frustrating when one is earning minimum wage and paying (in fuel) for the privilege to do so.  Not to mention, coming back to families, commuting adds time to the workday that ends up covering the cost of.. you guessed it! DAYCARE.

I've known people who have, repeatedly, found themselves in the position of having to decide if a job is even worth taking once expenses such as fuel and daycare are considered.  Often, it's not.

As far as the lack of laborers in Alberta and Saskatchewan, well it'd be pretty awesome if everyone on EI benefits had the resources (money, transportation) or the lack of ties to their current geographical area (oh, like schools, family, support systems) combined with the skills for the jobs available out there to relocate for the sake of work.  Ideally, anyone should be able to do this if they wish.  Here's the thing.. packing up and moving across the country the size of Canada is kind of a BFD, if you read my acronym.

Jim, you make it sound like the unemployed are all simply turning their noses up at jobs deemed 'unworthy' but mostly the need to turn down employment is a simple case of logistics, as illustrated above.  Does pride play into it as well?  I'll be honest.. as someone who worked their ass off through three years of school earning a Bachelor's degree which was supposed to help me escape a life of convenience store servitude, if today I were to find myself unemployed (she says, knocking on wood), I'd be more than a little fucking hesitant to get behind a counter for 10 bucks an hour while trying to pay off the crippling amount of student debt that BA earned me.

And do you know what, Jimmy?  Canadians pay into their EI benefits.. EI is not a government handout.  It is a fund that we as workers pay into, and should be able to use to our full advantage.  If I pay for auto insurance on a brand new 2012 Lexus and someone rears ends me, the insurance company shouldn't be able to hand me an '84 Chevette and say "Well, any car is better than no car!"

Should people on EI benefits be making a concerted effort to seek employment?  Yeah, for sure.. and I am willing to bet that most of them do.  But to say that people who have found themselves without work through no fault of their own should be satisfied with any given job offered them is condescending at best, downright insulting at worst.

Some would rather die.*


*is invoking Dickens melodramatic?  Maybe a touch.  I offer no apologies.