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I didn’t realize that I needed a new tag for posts, but indeed I do. Observe.
Yah. Wow. Hard to cram more wrong into a picture.
“Rape/revenge is replete in tension and bloody cathartic release; there is terrifying violation, and then there is revenge you can feel good about. The films use women’s trauma to justify stereotypically male pleasures of hyperbolic violence. So Thelma and Louise get to pick up guns and shoot people like they’re in a Western, while Furiosa drag races across the desert and then gets to murder and take the place of the evil patriarch. Rape/revenge fits feminism into male genre narratives that Hollywood can embrace.
…rape/revenge films are designed, often quite consciously, to let everyone in the audience experiment with, and experience, different gender roles, whether as trauma, empowerment, or both. That instability leads to a wide range of responses—and perhaps explains why rape/revenge is responsible for both some of the most critically lauded and most viscerally derided films of the last 40 years. For better and worse, the rape/revenge trope reveals how violence squats upon our understanding of gender—and how rarely, and timidly, that is confronted in popular culture.”
-Excerpts from the article by Noah Berlatsky found on The Establishment.
Two Christmases? Yes you can. Oh yah, find some borscht, cabbage roles, nalisnyky and of course perogies and celebrate Ukrainian Christmas. :) Christmas Eve is tonight. :)
Now a tradition here at DWR, I present the final moments from the episode of the West Wing titled ‘In Excelsis Deo’. A powerful reminder of all the happenings of the holidays and the courage people muster during these forcefully happy times.
Be Well All.
Warm wishes to you and yours from all of here at DWR.
This is a heroic tale of a brave woman who sacrificed her saving children from terrorists. Can you ever imagine a Hollywood film portraying this kick ass female hero’s life?
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Yah, me neither. It’s too hard for the hollywood dude establishment to tart up the heroine and tell a serious story at the same time. :( Instead we get more of the tight sexy skinsuit phenomena (bleh):
Let’s not go there. Onward to the real hero.
“Yesterday would have been her 52nd birthday, but PAN AM Flight Attendant Neerja Bhanot of Chandigarh, India died at 23 being a hero. She is credited with saving the lives of 360 passengers onboard PAN AM 73. When radical Islamic terrorists hijacked her A/C in Karachi, Pakistan she informed the pilots (who used their escape hatch to runaway) and kept both the passengers/remaining crew calm. When the terrorists demanded to know who the Americans were on the flight so they could execute them she gathered all the passports and hid the ones belonging to Americans under seat cushions. The terrorists confused and unable to determine the national origins of the passengers didn’t execute anyone. When Pakistani police raided the plane she was able to nearly singlehandedly evacuate all the passengers as the firefight ensued. She being one of the last people on board did a last check and found three children still hiding. As she led the children to safety the surviving terrorists spotted the children and opened fire on them. Neerja jumped in the way of the bullets and was mortally wounded. She was able to evac the children to safety before dying from her wounds. Neerja was awarded the Ashok Chakra Award by India, the highest peacetime gallantry award possible. She was the youngest and first civilian to ever be awarded this honor.”
There is some good news, there is a film being made outside of Hollywood about this fine female hero.
The cesspool that is toxic masculinity, the sea we all swim in, had a newsworthy (aka an effect on people other than women) peak at the Planned Parenthood in Colorado.
“Three people were killed and nine others injured after gunfire ripped through a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, Colo., during an hours-long standoff that unfolded Friday afternoon.
Officials announced the casualties — one police officer and two civilians — at a brief news conference Friday evening.”
The resolution was thus:
“The standoff involved at least two exchanges of gunfire and lasted about five hours, before the gunman was taken into police custody.
“We did get officers inside the building. They were able to shout to the suspect and make communication with him, and at that point they were able to get him to surrender and take him into custody,” said police spokeswoman Lt. Catherine Buckley. He was apprehended at 4:52 p.m. MT.”
Well, so we have the murderer in custody, after a shootout, with police casualties. Care to guess the ethnicity of shooter? (Helpful Clue: He’s still alive). He allegedly said the following:
“He uttered the words “no more baby parts” to police after his arrest, according to a law enforcement official, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to speak publicly about the ongoing investigation. The official did not elaborate on the comment.”
Ah, motivation for saving babies – You would think that endorsing a violent man’s actions in shooting up a women’s medical centre would bring nothing but anger, shock and censure. You would be wrong.
The notion we have a fair playing field, a balance, whatever you’d like to call it is quite patently false. We have not all just fallen out of some sort of Rawlsian simulator into a just society. Injustice and anti-egalitarian ideals are normative in society, they are the water we swim in, the air we breathe. Otherwise interactions like the below just wouldn’t happen.
bleatmop
Mystro
The Arbourist
Dead Wild Roses 
Your opinions…