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It is not even a useful question anymore. Fox News might as well be renamed the Republican Party News Channel and get it over with. What they are doing more resembles propaganda than anything else. Liberal Viewer continues his expose on the foibles of faux news.
And to think that a good segment of the American populations has views that are informed by this station, it is the stuff of nightmares for rational people.
Learning about how our culture operates is critical for enlightenment and understanding. Jill from I Blame the Patriarchy shares her view on consent within the culture. In this case, a simple link would not do, as I want to copy/paste this concise definition in another spot on the internet, maybe pissing off some MRA’s in the process.
“For it is the stated position of the Savage Death Island Chapter of Spinster Aunts International that, in a patriarchy, “consensual sex” (between women and dudes) doesn’t even exist. This is because, in a patriarchy, agency is not conferred equally upon women and dudes. This untoward circumstance creates a contingency wherein the notion of consent is, for women, entirely non-substantive, a figment, a desperate fantasy invented to obscure the true nature of women’s status as the sex class. The true nature of our status as the sex class is, by the way, that we are imprisoned in a rape continuum. This continuum ranges from the “voluntary” performance of femininity (which quantifies women’s usefulness to men), to compulsory heterosexuality (which ensures availability to men), to pornography (which eroticizes inequality), to violent sexual assault (which is at the apex of the Global Accords Governing Fair Use of Women).
Wait. What?
The issue of consent — or, more precisely, the idea that women are considered by both custom and law to abide in a persistent state of always having given consent — is the absolute crux, nub, hub, axis, polestar, and epicenter of women’s oppression. The thing is, women can’t freely give consent because women can’t freely withhold it. “Consent” is a meaningless concept in the context of women’s reality.
In a patriarchy, women are, at essence, considered to be giant vaginas with the word “YES” stamped all over’em in red. Because of the sex-based power discrepancies inherent in our social structure, members of the sex class — that is, women — are always “yes” unless they specifically, adamantly, and in front of 3 witnesses with video cameras, say “no.” But even when “no” obtains, other (subjective and arbitrary) factors are almost always seen as mitigating it into a “yes.” Such as not saying “no” loud enough, not fighting back physically, being the dude’s girlfriend, or wearing a tight sweater.
Curious about the issues surrounding the Tar Sands of Alberta?
I have long filed the 300 under the category of movies that I like. I enjoyed the theme of the many versus the few and of course the super slow motion battle sequences that make killing look like its superawesome cool.
(http://youtu.be/VW4d3Kukcu8 – cut and paste into a another window for the fight scenes)
Superawesomeness aside though I did not think too much of the rest of the movie. It was spectacle, it was special effects and it was most certainly not about the wafer thin plot. Yet, the story itself was somehow familiar and possessed enough of that “different-sameosity” that made the 300 appealing.
The problem is that the familiar tropes and themes are culturally rooted in heteronormativty, ableism and racism. Not so good 300…
The cultural artifacts present in the film still reflect many of the normative standards of our society. When people talk of progress and equality one does need to look very hard to see how much work we still have left to do.
When you break down what it would actually mean to be a deity, or to have absolute power and control over another one can start to appreciate the ghastly way in which events and decisions can go wrong. Unchecked power can only lead to psychopathy, and that is precisely the power so many of the faithful want to ascribe to their particular godhead.
I do not, and will not submit to any celestial dictatorship that is so potentially cruel remorseless. Is the video far fetched? Or is the video a chilling commentary on the system the religious so desperately seem to need?
A happy wish of green goatishness to you.
We can be good without consulting the godhead of your choice. Qualia Soup makes an engaging look at morality and religion.
bleatmop
Mystro
The Arbourist
Dead Wild Roses 
Your opinions…