How Long Does it Take for Mitt Romney to Earn Your Salary Calculator
for a starting public high school teacher’s salary (aka my dream job, which earns $46,000) it would take romney only 18 hours 36 minutes and 9 seconds.
How to Talk To Young Black Boys About Trayvon Martin
By Toure
1. It’s unlikely but possible that you could get killed today. Or any day. I’m sorry but that’s the truth. Blackmaleness is a potentially fatal condition. I tell you that not to scare you but because knowing that could possibly save your life. There are people who will look at you and see a villain or a criminal or something fearsome. It’s possible they may act on their prejudice and insecurity. Being Black could turn an ordinary situation into a life or death moment even if you’re doing nothing wrong.
2. If you encounter such a situation, you need to play it cool. Keep your wits about you. Don’t worry about winning the situation, your goal is to survive.
3. There is nothing wrong with you. You’re amazing. I love you. When I look at you I see a complex human being with awesome potential but some others will look at you and see a thug. Even if their only evidence is your skin. Their racism relates to larger anxieties and problems in America that you didn’t create. When someone is racist toward you—either because they’ve profiled you or spat some slur or whatever—they are saying they have a problem. They are not speaking about you. They’re speaking about themselves and their deficiencies.
4. You will have to make allowances for other people’s racism. That’s part of the burden of being Black. We can be defiant and dead or smart and alive. I’m not saying you can’t wear what you want. Your clothes are a red herring. They’ll blame it on your hoodie or your jeans when the real reason they decided that you were a criminal is you’re Black. Of course, you know better. Racism is about reminding you that you are less human, less valuable, less worthy, less beautiful, less intelligent. It’s about pre-judging you as violent, fearsome, a threat. Some people will take that prejudice and try to enforce their will on you in order to make sure you feel like a second-class citizen and to make certain that you get back to the lower-class place they think you’re trying to escape. The best way to counter them will not involve your fists but your mind. You know your value to the world and how awesome you are. If you never forget that, they can’t damage your spirit. The best revenge is surviving and living well.
5. Be aware of your surroundings. Especially when it’s dark. Or bright. Some people are on the lookout for muggers or rapists. You need to be on the lookout for profilers who are judging you. Don’t give them an opportunity to make a mistake.
6. So what do you do if you feel you are being profiled and followed, or worse, chased by someone with a vigilante streak? If you are hunted in the way it seems Trayvon was as he was followed by someone bigger than him, who was armed and hopped up on stereotypes like assuming you’re armed and on drugs and up to no good? Well then you need to act. By calling the police. That is the exact time to snitch. I know there are times the cops will be your enemies but sometimes calling 911 and letting the threatening
7. What if it’s the cops who are making you feel threatened? Well, then you need to retreat. I don’t mean run away. I mean, don’t fight or resist. Now is not the time to fight the power. Make sure they can see your hands, follow all instructions, don’t say anything, keep your cool. Your goal is to defuse things, no matter how insulted you are. Play possum. They may be behaving unjustly but never forget this: their lives aren’t in danger. Yours could be. If you survive you will be able to tell your lawyer what happened. If you don’t…
8. Never forget: As far as we can tell, Trayvon did nothing wrong and still lost his life. You could be a Trayvon. Any of us could.
Subject for Debate: Are Women People?
All my adult life, I’ve been pretty sure I’m a sentient, even semi-competent human being. I have a job and an apartment; I know how to read and vote; I make regular, mostly autonomous decisions about what to eat for lunch and which cat videos I will watch whilst eating my lunch. But in the past couple of months, certain powerful figures in media and politics have cracked open that certitude.
You see, like most women, I was born with the chromosome abnormality known as “XX,” a deviation of the normative “XY” pattern. Symptoms of XX, which affects slightly more than half of the American population, include breasts, ovaries, a uterus, a menstrual cycle, and the potential to bear and nurse children. Now, many would argue even today that the lack of a Y chromosome should not affect my ability to make informed choices about what health care options and lunchtime cat videos are right for me. But others have posited, with increasing volume and intensity, that XX is a disability, even a roadblock on the evolutionary highway. This debate has reached critical mass, and leaves me uncertain of my legal and moral status. Am I a person? An object? A ward of the state? A “prostitute”? (And if I’m the last of these, where do I drop off my W-2?)
In the hopes of clarifying these and other issues, below I’ve recapped recent instances of powerful men from the fields of law, politics and literature tackling the question that has captured America’s imagination: Are Women People?
Case No. 1: U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes
The Recap: Following a 10-week maternity leave, a three-year employee of a Houston debt collection agency filed a sex discrimination suit, alleging she was fired for asking permission to bring a breast pump to work. Hughes sided with the company, but added that the truth of the plaintiff’s claim was irrelevant. “Lactation is not pregnancy, childbirth or a related medical condition,” he ruled in February, paraphrasing Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. “She gave birth on Dec. 11, 2009. After that day, she was no longer pregnant and her pregnancy-related conditions ended. Firing someone because of lactation or breast-pumping is not sex discrimination.”
What We Learned: Possession of naturally functioning secondary sex characteristics is a fireable offense; a woman with a fetus has more rights than a woman with a baby.
So, Are Women People? Only when they’re pregnant.
Case No. 2: Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell and Alabama State Senator Clay Scofield
The Recap: Both lawmakers pursued—and then backed off from—laws that would require any woman getting an abortion to submit to the invasive procedure known as a transvaginal ultrasound and, in McDonnell’s words, “view her child.” “This was about empowering women with more medical and legal information that previously they were not required to get in order to give informed consent,” McDonnell said on March 2.
What We Learned: Acquiring informed consent isn’t necessarily consensual; having an eight- to ten-inch wand inserted into your vagina against your will is “empowering”; because they lack vaginas, some male politicians seek empowerment in different ways.
So, Are Women People? I’m guessing no, but you should ask Virginia delegate Kathy Byron, the woman who introduced the bill in her state.
Case No. 3: House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa
The Recap: The California congressman convened an all-male panel of clergy to discuss the mandate that insurance companies include coverage of birth control pills. He declined to include Sister Carol Keehan, president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association, which oversees some 1200 Catholic health organizations across the U.S., or Georgetown law student and activist Sandra Fluke, whose health plan does not cover contraception. Of the latter woman, Issa stated, “As the hearing is not about reproductive rights but instead about the [Obama] administration’s actions as they relate to freedom of religion and conscience, he believes that Ms. Fluke is not an appropriate witness.”
What We Learned: Freedom of conscience is not an appropriate topic for women to discuss; freedom from unplanned pregnancy, ovarian cysts, symptoms of endometriosis, irregular periods, migraines, and other health issues are not matters of public conscience; talking about icky body stuff is easier for dudes when ladies aren’t around.
So, Are Women People? If you look at photos of this hearing, you wouldn’t even know that women exist.
Case No. 4: Sad Loud Man in a Small Room Rush Limbaugh
The Recap: “Slut,” “prostitute,” “she wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex,” “we want you to post the videos online so we can all watch,” etc.
What We Learned: Taxpayers are billed across the board for private insurance plans; women who use birth control pills are not taxpayers; women whose insurance covers birth control pills are sluts and prostitutes; taxpayers enjoy watching movies about sluts and prostitutes.
So, Are Women People? They’re more like really expensive blow-up dolls.
Case No. 5: Novelist Jonathan Franzen
The Recap: His much-discussed recent New Yorker essay argued that novelist Edith Wharton is an unsympathetic figure due to her wealth, conservative political views and the fact that she “wasn’t pretty.” (She “might well be more congenial to us now if, alongside her other advantages, she’d looked like Grace Kelly or Jacqueline Kennedy.”) Her unprettiness, according to Franzen, contributed to the sexual dysfunction of her marriage, while her success as a writer caused her husband’s mental illness and underscored her antipathy toward her own sex—her friendships with writers of similar stature such as Henry James and André Gide, Franzen says, showed that “she wanted to be with the men and to talk about the things men talked about.”
What We Learned: Plain girls aren’t good in bed; female success is a brain-eating virus; a (female) writer forging relationships with other (male) writers is a form of penis envy; Jonathan Franzen might not think you’re pretty.
So, Are Women People? Not quite—they’re objects with certain people-like traits.
Case No. 6: Briefly Viable Republican Presidential Candidate Rick Santorum
The Recap: He calls his wife “the rock which I stand upon.”
What We Learned: That’s apparently a compliment.
So, Are Women People? No, they’re rocks! Finally, a definitive answer. Thanks, Senator Santorum!
InvisibleChildren
Invisible Children’s Response to the critics.
very interesting, another piece of information to consider
to be honest, sitting around and finding the flaws in the kony 2012 situation reminds oddly enough of the united states congress.
here is an idea of something we can do. of course, it has its clear flaws. from what i have come to understand, invisible children is not a perfect organization. and i certainly can’t see myself supporting another war. i see the flaws i really do, and i definitely have some reflecting to do on how i will deal with the kony 2012 situation.
but i feel like so many people are just sitting around, tearing apart something important and meaningful because it is not perfect. here is a chance to do something or even just start the momentum to doing something, but people are bringing it down because it doesn’t 100% fit what they want.
for the love of god, congress and people of the world, why can’t we just calm down so that maybe someday we can get something done. why does it all have to be so freaking controversial?!
again, i’m probably being ignorant. i just don’t understand it all sometimes. but i swear, i’m willing to learn. give me the resources and the information. don’t take away my ability to make educated decisions.
and don’t tear apart people who are earnestly trying to make a difference - or at least open their minds.
i wish everyone would just calm down about putting down the kony 2012 video. i see your arguments, i really do. the united states doesn’t need another conflict, invisible children apparently isn’t the best of charities, etc.
but really. stop trying to put down this movement or idea or whatever it is just because it’s popular and you want to have an unpopular opinion. simmer down.
i respect your opinions i really do and i see your argument but i think you’re missing a key point. before today i had no idea who joseph kony is. this man is a bad man and i seriously hope that’s not an issue we’re debating here. i know so little about this ongoing conflict - and that’s why these videos are so important.
i beg you, get over the drama. be filter not a sponge. accept the flaws in the videos, but realize that you are learning and spreading knowledge. knowledge is power.
i don’t know, i just think this is ridiculous. watch the videos. respect the cause. and think about it. reflect on how fucking lucky you are that you’re reading this on a computer screen. and how fucking lucky you are to be reading. enjoy the videos for what they are, and open your mind. learn a little. research. i hope kony 2012 gets you thinking about other unknown conflicts.
call me ignorant, i’ll gladly accept that insult. because at least i’m not close minded.
this could potentially sound like one of the stupidest posts i’ve ever made, but i just want to know if anyone else has noticed this.
has anyone noticed how MTV doesn’t really make shows about black people?
that’s a pretty broad statement but really think about it. right now i’m watching caged (the new show it looks really trashy thus i’m so there) and so far there’s no black people. this is a completely ignorant statement, but there are tons of black people who box. (is boxing the same as cage fighting? i need a fact checker…) but every character that has a speaking role or anything is white.
and then there’s teen mom. now, on one side i see what MTV made me trying to do here. for a lot of people whether they’ll admit it or not, the first thing that comes to mind when someone says teen mother is a black single mother in the hood. and it’s awful that that’s the case. so to an extent i understand MTV wanting to show that teenage pregnancy is not a poor black issue, it’s an american issue. 39.1 births of 1000 in the united states are to a teenage mother ages 15-19 (i fact checked that one myself!). that being said, it’s a little ridiculous how MTV doesn’t even have one teen mom of color on the show. (i’m talking teen mom 2 here, i missed the first one so maybe i’m wrong about all of this). 134 in 1000 black teenagers become pregnant, followed by 131 in 1000 hispanic teenagers. non-hispanic white teenagers have a rate of 48 in 1000 of becoming pregnant. i’m not saying that MTV should perpetuate the stereotype of black teenage mothers, but i mean really. with statistics this high, it’s an issue that needs attention. the way we want to see teen pregnancy in american society is so juno-sized. i love juno. that’s the problem. i want to watch teen moms driving minivans, falling in love, and see cute little notebook sketches about it. and MTV knows i want this. because i’m not alone in wanting this.
but therein lies the problem. MTV exists to make money. and it can make money off of shows like these. it makes me sad knowing race stands in the way of relate-ability.
so this could either be really pretentious or really ignorant but probably both….
here are things i know to be true:
-i am neurotic and paranoid yet occasionally right
-people disappoint me
-even more people disappoint me
-i am either easily forgotten by way too many people, or i’m ignored
-or both
-it’s really cold outside
