Closed. The boat sank, the sharks won.

I’m out of tolerance, out of patience and out of compassion. I’ve had enough and want to go crawl under a rock for the rest of my days.

My voice here doesn’t make any difference to anyone, no-one reads, no-one listens and nothing changes. I just end up covered in the shit I’m wading through and the stench of it fills my world and poisons my life.

Enough, I need to go hide. 

Fed up with blogsome, not really blogging here much anyway and thinking about moving over to someplace else. Not fond of blogger either - any suggestions? Or shall I just quit and go away?

19 year old Chris Brown pleaded guilty to a single count of assault on his former girlfriend and was sentenced to 6 months community labour, with 5 years probation during which time he will have to attend courses on Domestic Violence.

Is that enough for a first offence? Or is it a slapped wrist for a young man who will go on to do it again?

Brown was originally facing a jail term of up to 4 years but in a statement outside the court his lawyer said that

"He embraces this as a chance to get the message out that domestic violence will not be tolerated. He wants to get his life back on track."

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Patricia Schnegg told him:

"I think it’s commendable that you took responsibility for your conduct, sir."

He made the right noises and got away with less punishment. Does it make any difference that Brown is This Chris Brown? And that the former girlfriend is Rihanna? I’m not sure, but I don’t think it should. On the one hand the celebrity of a young R&B singer standing up and speaking out against domestic violence could have a HUGE impact, but he’s not suggested he do that has he?

But you know what bothers me more? 

After Brown left the courtroom, Rihanna entered and was addressed by Judge Schnegg who explained to the Barbados-born singer that she had issued a stay-away order.

The singer had not been seeking such an order, but the judge imposed one anyway.

The order requires that Brown and Rihanna stay at least 50 yards (45m) from each other, except at entertainment industry events when the distance is reduced to 10 yards (9m).

The judge also told Rihanna it is not a one-way order - and that she, too, should not get any closer to Brown than the order allows.

Rihanna didn’t seek a Stay Away order but one was imposed anyway? And that last bit "it is not a one way order" just implies that Rihanna is just as wrong as he is and just as guilty. Well, I suppose we don’t know all the details of this particular case but how many times do you hear "she asked for it" or "she provoked me"? How many? And how many times is that allowed as a good reason for violence?

So says Nick Griffin, BNP leader, who was pelted with eggs and forced to abandon an impromptu press conference outside parliament. He goes on to say that the BNP:

won votes because it spoke openly about the problem of immigration

he argued that the "political elite" were responsible for making "the indigenous British majority… second class citizens in every possible sphere".

Now I don’t condone pelting anyone with eggs and I believe firmly in the freedom of any individual to speak their own political views, but this man’s hate and intolerance are somehow too much for that. The BNP are, reportedly, aiming to fund the resettlement of non-white immigrants living in the UK so they can return "home" and then the indigenous white majority will have enough jobs will we? Then life will be good again will it? Very familiar start to a familiar process there Mr Griffin.

"In Germany, they came first for the Communists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist; And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist; And then they came for the Jews, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew; And then… they came for me… And by that time there was no one left to speak up."

So, first the non-white immigrants, then who? What if they don’t want to leave Mr Griffin? What then? Will you use force and deport them instead? How will you decide who gets to stay and who gets to leave? Will you use skin colour grading? The pencil in the hair test? DNA?

I am just plain disgusted that the UK managed, through political apathy and disinterest, to actually elect 2 of these fascists into power.I despair, I really do.

Apparently, according to Sir Stuart Rose, chairman of M&S.

"Women can get to the top of any single job that they want to in the UK," he told the Observer newspaper.

Sir Stuart also rejected the suggestion that having children can damage the careers of working mothers, saying he knows many who are successful.

He said: "Apart from the fact that you’ve got more equality than you ever can deal with, the fact of the matter is that you’ve got real democracy and there are really no glass ceilings, despite the fact that some of you moan about it all the time.

"Women can get to the top of any single job that they want to in the UK. You’ve got a woman fighter pilot who went in to join the Red Arrows yesterday."

He told the newspaper: "I mean, what else do you want to do, for God’s sake? Women astronauts. Women miners. Women dentists. Women doctors. Women managing directors. What is it you haven’t got?"

I’d like a life where I’m not afraid of male violence, a life where I have genuine equality not something a man hands to me on a plate and tells me is equal.  This man is so entrenched in his white male privilege he has no idea what he is really saying. "Hey uppity women, I’ve given you jobs and something that looks like equality, will you quit threatening my precious patriarchy now?"

No. Not going to happen. Yes, some individual women can achieve those positions within the male world and I celebrate that they are able to do so. But those choices are not open to most of us still and those that pursue them can only do so by becoming more male than the men in many cases. You still make us play by your rules and with your tools and strategies.

HT and thanks to Witchy. Thank you. 

"Women united will never be defeated!"

*cough, sneeze* I think I may be breaking out in rashers…

Now, I know that any form of flu can be dangerous for the young, elderly, immune compromised or those with respiratory problems. And I know that this swine flu is a nasty one. I also believe that one day some virus will adapt to resist all our medicines and will become the pandemic that we fear and millions will die, if not billions. But 28 cases does not make a pandemic.

So, compare that with 2 women dying every week, 104 every year. That’s this year, next year and the year after.  This is something that targets women and kills with terrifying regularity.

Not large enough numbers for you?

Try 100 women affected every day. That makes 36,500 every year. Now is that a pandemic yet? Are those numbers big enough to frighten you?

Yet these are not diseases as such, they’re not caused by a virus or bacteria. These cases do need medical help, and there is a long recovery if the woman survives. 

104 women every year are killed by their partner or ex-partner. The disease that is pandemic here is Domestic Violence.

100 women every day are victims of Sexual Violence and that’s just in the UK. Globally it must be so huge that I don’t even want to think about the numbers involves. Yet, where is the news? Where is the panic? Where is the outrage?

Oh, there isn’t any, no-one cares and life goes on as normal because it’s just women isn’t it……

Source: Shock, Horror - From the Foot of Witchy’s Stairs.

Honest, it’s not…

I’m not well. 

I spent my teens passing out every time I menstruated, pouring blood, throwing up etc and no-one would listen apart from "Oh you just need to go on the pill." Which is
so damned bad for you long term. So I was on the pill for years until I decided to have kids. Oh and as for "It’s normal, you’re female you just have to live with it." 

So I took birth control pills for years until I decided to have kids and that was when I stopped taking them and my periods were actually fine, all settled down and no-one had thought to suggest that they might do that and that I could stop filling my body with unnecessary and potentially harmful synthetic hormones.

Then 2 years ago I had a catastrophic period which wouldn’t stop and I had to have a blood transfusion and lots of medication to get it under control. I ended up back on the pill again for a few months but now I was armed with so much more information and was determined to get off it as soon as possible. 

I saw a (male) gynae doc and was again told that, I could be offered a hysterectomy, and a microwave ablation of the uterus - I refused both. If we can’t understand it, whip it out, it’s probably not worth having…. Besides, it’s not a penis…. Oh and those nasty female hormones? I can take as many man made ones as I like, they’re perfectly safe and do not ever cause reproductive tumours or other problems….Sheesh, well why is it that I get crippling uterine cramps while taking the pill and never, not ever when I’m not?

So, what’s wrong with me? We don’t know.  I suspect it’s menopause, but we’re not even sure this IS my menopause…. Because there’s no bloody test for it that sodding works and because the NHS doesn’t take any sort of baseline for each woman’s hormone levels so has no idea when they’re out of kilter. I’m sure that in the past women wouldn’t have survived this.

That friend of mine Witchy Woo said to me, "You know that "it’s normal, you’re female you just have to live with it" comes from the patriarchal model of medicine, don’t you… "they’re only female - we needn’t even try to understand those things". Same goes for reliable individual tests for menopause."

And she’s so right… As always..  Do they really hate us so much?

Last Friday, Delara Darabi was hanged in an Iranian jail with no warning and with total disregard for a 2 months stay of execution granted by the head of Iranian Judiciary.

BBC News.

early on Friday morning Delara Darabi made a desperate phone call to her parents, saying she could see the hangman’s noose.

"Mother they are going to execute me, please save me," she said, before a prison official took the phone away and said: "We are going to execute your daughter and there’s nothing you can do about it."

Her lawyer was not informed of the execution and neither was her family. 

"Amnesty International does not consider her trial to have been fair, as the courts later refused to consider new evidence which the lawyer said would have proved she could not have committed the murder,"

A young women’s life is ended for a crime she did not commit. She confessed to protect her boyfriend, funny how there’s no mention of him or him being tried and convicted for the murder.

I’ve been reading this:  Feminism is for Everybody: Passionate Politics, bell hooks. and it got me thinking. I’m liking this thinking malarkey, even though it makes me feel like my brain is melting at times.

If we start from the position that Patriarchy exists and exists to control human beings by favouring the men and boys and devaluing the women and girls then surely it stands to reason that the deconstruction of patriarchy will affect males more than females.

Anyway, back to my thinking… Men stand to lose more if/when patriarchy fails or is deconstructed.  Men will fight however they can to preserve the patriarchy that favours them, that they gain power and control from. How much they would gain is open to interpretation, but women stand to gain everything. So we are opposed.

But should we be?

Surely this patriarchy that we live in, that controls us also controls our brothers, our sons, the fathers of our children, our fathers?  Surely it controls and boxes and defines the men and boys in our lives just as much as the women and girls?

Now, feminism has an image of man hating, hairy separatists and I don’t like that. I don’t hate men, just what they do and the power and control they use over women. It’s not even about me, although my experience does colour my beliefs, as I’m sure it does most people. So, bell hooks has me thinking that although Feminist is a label that does describe my political beliefs and stance, it does neatly underpin the thinking and where I’m coming from, it also doesn’t take everything into account.

I have loads more thinking and exploring to do but I think I’m going to be an Eco-Humanist/Feminist and try to look at the future as a bright place where everyone has an equal footing in the world, where women and men are all free of patriarchal control, where our sons and daughters can all be who they are without constraint. Ok, it’ll take generations, maybe grandchildren then… or even great-grandchildren, but it’ll happen. As part of that vision I can see a place where a true respect for our planet is tied with a true respect for every individual human being as well as the overall ecosystem.

It all goes together for me. 

In the meantime there’s loads of change to make happen….. Time for another mug of tea I think, and some chocolate…