I shame the matriarchy

we could all play Six Degrees of Nina Hartley.

Ha! I wanna play that game.
 

you're not alone, Amber. ;)
 

perzackly.

meanwhile, apparently Pony has outdone herself...somewhere, fortunately or unfortunately, the person who sent me her latest didn't send the link. gist being: if Amp can afford to eat so much, he can afford not to "pimp" his blog. (basically going, once again, off pictures he posted; oh, and his family's fair game as well, apparently). obviously her exact words were much nastier than that. oh yeah, and anyone can exercise, including paraplegics and quadraplegics, she read it somewhere, so he has no excuse...for, um, what was it again? whatever it is: no excuse.

she is: deeply ill.
 

On her blog, Heart just quoted antiprincess in a laudatory fashion while quoting B/L's comment out of context.

Pony's got a thing about weight that has cropped up in other places. It's an issue whence she seems to diverge from other radical feminists.

You *did* see her post that attempted to imply a connection between links to porn sites and Amp's kidblogging. Didn't you? This was shortly before she accused me of being a troll on VS' blog.
 

I not only saw it; I still remember it:

[From Alas, a Blog]
Pony Writes:

October 11th, 2006 at 10:06 pm

Amps site links to porn.

Amps site posts pix of his daughter.
[/Pony]

Forgetting the fact that the site does NOT directly link to actual porn (only to a porn review site with NO explicit pictures or content, where you actually have to click deep into the actual review at least TWICE to even get to the actual porn), to imply that Amp is a closet pedophile and a sex predator merely for selling his domain is beyond and beneath contempt...even for Pony.

I guess that she and the rest of the antiporn fundamentalist caucus are still bent that he didn't give them the space on his blog to vent without approval...and the fact that he wouldn't give up his site to them.

Maybe he should have been a bit more open and honest about the sale of his domain and given his readers a better heads-up...but he certainly didn't deserve the virtual lynching that he's been getting.

And isn't it funny about Pony's "lose weight" smack....that puts her on the same virtual side as none other than Rush Limbaugh. One of Jabba the Oxycontin Addict's favorite bash lines at poor people and liberals is "If they are so poor and homeless and suffering, why do they have such big guts?? Just get off the dole and exercise more, and poverty will disappear."

"Six Degrees of Nina Hartley"??? LOL -- Ain't touching that one.


Anthony
 

Mandos - I'm almost positive Heart is not being esp. laudatory. Upon further review, I'm forced to conclude she's being a little (or maybe a lot) snide.

which is her right. her blog, her rules and all.

not to say it doesn't get under my skin. I'm only human.
 

I mean, I could comment on her own blog about it, but even if I don't get modded out just on GP, that would still open up a porn-access vector that she probably wouldn't dig.

I wouldn't dream of making her dirty-by-proxy, so I'm sort of stuck ruminating on it by myself.
 

Anyway, it probably goes without saying that if I had a blogroll, Alas A Blog would be on it. But so would Women's Space The Margins.

Because I'm just contrary.

actually that's not so true. they'd both be on it, but because I respect both of them and appreciate the hard work they're both willing to do. I don't think they're working at cross purposes at all, even though I rarely-if-ever toe Heart's party line.

maybe that makes me contrary.
 

i would not link to that Gift to the Universe (nanoo nanoo); i'd prefer an exchange, please, thanks.

antip, if you do decide you want a blogroll, it's not that complicated; you can do it all through cutting and pasting, pretty much. You just click the blogger icon, go under "template" and then where it says google-edit me, you can start replacing the starter links with your own.
 

duly noted, BD.

this particular exchange over at Heart's -

stormcloud Says:

October 14th, 2006 at 3:44 pm
Heart, thanks for highlighting A&Q’s post.
Not so sure I can thank you for highlighting the words of a Handmaiden of the Patriarchy…*ponders and winks*

womensspace Says:

October 14th, 2006 at 3:54 pm
Yeah, really, stormcloud. Maybe that was just bait so everybody would come in and gasp appropriately. No fun to gasp alone.

Heart

is chewing at my innards.

As much as I respect the time and effort and sincerity she throws into her work, I have a hard time reconciling that against her desire to bait me & b/l.

Which is largely why I haven't replied to that thread on her site.
 

because I am clearly the world's biggest masochist - my latest reply on her latest thread, dumped here against the probability of getting modded into oblivion.

my reply is in response to a story Heart reported about a woman who was stoned to death recently for prostitution.

Heart: For my purposes, the “fun” kind of feminists are feminists who endorse pornography and prostitution as matters of “choice” for women

Me: Heart, as I've said elsewhere (and maybe even here) I really appreciate all your hard work and dedication, and respect the community you've built here as a result of all your hard work and dedication, and admire your committment and resolve - even if we disagree on whether water is wet, I will not stop appreciating/respecting/admiring you for that.

However - how much "fun" do you think I'm having over here, reading this? do you really think I've got ice water in my veins instead of blood? Do you think there's some kind of joyful celebration racing jubilantly through the so-called sex-positive community?

Although I respect and admire you, it bothers me that you seem to think that supporting women's autonomy (even unto accepting money for sex) causes these sorts of stoning deaths.

I hate the fact that a woman was forced into prostitution. but it's the FORCED that bothers me, not the prostitution.

if she was fortunate enough to have the privilege to choose, and she chose prostitution, and she was stoned to death, would you even have reported the story?

There's plenty in this story for everyone to deplore, not just the feminists you like and approve of.

But no one deplores like you deplore - so rock on.
 

antip, she posted a dramatic tale of her own abuse, using it to make a point. you responded with your own story, using it to suggest that her story didn't support her point. and oh yeah: also, you've got your own tsuris.

it was at least as naked and raw a story as hers. and you know she saw it; she came over here to argue with BL. did she acknowledge your point? no, but so okay, fine: she's not doing anything so linear and malestream as you know debating; she gave a "gift to the universe" (goo goo ca choob).

does she acknowledge your own gift? can Miz Overflowing Heart O'Bounty even manage so much as "I feel your pain?" Not a dickie-bird. Just more self-congratulation about how "powerful" her own post is. and how it speaks to "womens' truth." oh, there's another woman who sez her truth is different? lalalalala can't HEAR you...

not even for long enough to acknowledge, "say, human being here. another WOMAN here. who's been honest and vulnerable her own damn self."

I'm sorry, but as far as I'm concerned she's so full of shit she squeaks going into a turn. Why try to garner her favor? Yeah, she does great work on her own terms, super, great, i'll leave her to it, then. And she's more than welcome to her "margins;" i'm -so- not interested.
 

if I were a clearer thinker, I probably would not have commented.

but you know, I felt the need to speak up, so I did. same as she does.

I wish I could stop feeling so insulted. For all the energy I expend wrestling with all those inner demons, I could have singlehandedly ground the whole damn Patriarchy into penisbutter by now!

I know good and well that I don't have to hang out with people who think I suck. (the goddess of mushrooms told me so, and what higher authority exists?)
 

"Margins" gets me thinking.

why not the whole damn page? take up some space! spread out! write big!

My favorite historical figure (warts and all) - Victoria Woodhull - was not a scribbler in the margins. she was a whole-page girl, for good or ill.
 

as far as favor-garnering? jeez. I think a successful bid to garner actual favor would have to include some changes in me on a cellular level.

Unlikely at best.

I don't want favor, but I'd appreciate a grudging respect, maybe, and an absence of The Snide.

not likely to get even that.

but here I stand, I can do no other.
 

why the Margins: BL was talking about this wrt the Hegelian business a while back: i.e. the whole notion common to a lot of folks on the loosely defined left, not just feminism, that the slave knows more than the master because sie has to. (and therefore, it goes, one chooses to remain identified with the slave/servant/oppressed; this is the source of that weird inverted hierarchy thing that happens).

Anyhoo i'm reading this book edited by Dorchen Leidholdt and (your favorite, piny) Janice G. Raymond, "The Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism." In it, there's a piece by a Sonia Johnson, "Taking Our Eyes Off the Guys," which prettymuch does spell this out inso many words:

"There are many reasons for our being in the only position, historically, to change things. One of these is the basic paradox of tyranny, that the oppressors are always less free than the oppressed. Another is tha, as women, we are truly outside men's system. Virginia Woolf said that, you know. She said in Three Guineas that women are the Society of the Outsiders, that that's where we have our power..."

...and of course, Virgina Woolf is exactly who you want as your role model/inpiration wrt systemic change. Yesyesyes.

and,--yep, BL did nail it--here is the rationale for why all the hectoring baout EXAMINE yourself as opposed to, like, anything else:

"But the truth is that [themen] are not -going- to change-- *can't* change--so we don't have to waste our time trying to get them to any more. *We8 are the ones who must change, because we *can.* And when *we* change, everything outside us will have to change to accomodate our new way of being in the world--including men, but that's beside the point."

Ironically of course, this is the same principle (sort of) as what drew me to therapy. However, it doesn't -quite- work that way, ime. That is, i think thingie's idea of what needed to change and mine are/were very very different indeed.

all i know is: i know what the results have been in my life and the way i interact. i do think that there are political ramifications, indirectly, to "knowing oneself." Thing is, you can't do it -for- anyone else or decide -how- that's gonna go, merely by dint of we share the same chromosomes and/or naughty bits.

That's -one- thing.

The other is; well, okay, and no point even talking to any of THEM, the menz (all 3,450,678,901 of 'em, especially the one with the infected blackhead), what a relief. We'll just, what, sit around and raise our consciousness, is it? When was this piece written? (rummages) 1990, okay. How's that been working out, then?
 

anyway, just about all the talking points that we've been batting about/with lo these many months online are right here in this little volume. as i don't doubt they also are in the Big Red book (i was looking for that also, but forgot the exact name. anyway there's only so much of this shite i can plow through at a time).
 

well the "Amp is probably a child pornographer" crap is right there on Alas, or some was anyway.

which is even better than the fat-taunting, really.

she's seriously got springs coming out of her head, and the fact that so many of these other folks don't practically sprain themselves trying to distance themselves from her (thus far spotted elephant's the only one i know for sure has called her out for her awful behavior) really says a lot, to me.
 

There's a reason why there are extra-private forums on genderberg. I am really ashamed that other 'feminists' would 'trade' information on other posters on the net. I don't think there was one person on genderberg who applauded Pony's comments, but I do think it's revolting that you would need an 'informant' to 'spy' on an extra-private forum (we do have a public forum to share resources). Among other information in this section - there are personal things that women say that are supposedly said in a 'safe space', including things that ex-sex workers relay.
At the end of the day anti-porn feminists are just as diverse in their opinions of things as you are.

When people resort to leaking things out, it devalues the trust among our community, and obviously other feminists.

Thanks so much for your consideration.

-Aniters, moderator at genderberg
 

Andrea - just to clarify, Pony's fat-phobic comments came from genderberg's extra-pvt forum, which as you see is unethical in every sense.

If you ask your informant if there was anyone who was in support of Pony - you will see that she was chastized for her fat-phobic comments. Other than that, I think you should ensure that your 'informant' understands what they are doing and why it's completely unethical.
 

I didn't know that the fat-phobic stuff came from a private universe. I've seen Pony write about it on several other occasions, including IBTP, where she was slapped down by other commenters.
 

Well, I thought about this.

on the one hand, I'm bad at individual-bashing, even when the individual so richly deserves it. And talking behind that individual's back makes me feel a little wrong in most cases, save possibly for public figures in the news.

So, y'all know the drill. Naughty commenters - scold, scold, scold.

On the other hand, I find myself feeling disgusted-yet-intrigued at the notion of a super-extra-double-secret forum that only the most feminist of feminists can access, where they can, you know, relax, let their hair down, put their feet up, and say mean things about people behind their backs in so-called "safe space."

(I'm reminded of the saturday night live sketch where Tom Hanks is introduced to the other five-time hosts...)

Consider a very exclusive country club (possibly safe space for intolerable racists and classists), or a private senate chamber...occasionally the private, confidential conversations going on there are QUITE newsworthy, yes?

A very wise woman once told me "never EVER say anything on line that you would be embarrassed to see attributed to you in the New York Times."

does there exist a truly private forum on the internet?

it's kind of all done on a handshake I'll-share-your-delusion-you-share-mine basis, I think.
 

and furthermore...

I'm not sure that objecting to the violation of private space simply because the space is assumed to be private is such a solid objection.

consider the existence of porn "rings", wherein illegal material is traded in a private, confidential setting.

wouldn't ya just love to bust that super-extra-double privacy wide open?

but if private, or "safe" space is inviolable simply because it's private, then it would be hard to justify busting up a porn ring, in my opinion.
 

Generally, yes, it's considered bad form to "leak" stuff that's in a "private" forum.

that said,

1) Andrea to my knowledge was not aware that that particular Pony quotage came from any such place

2) as mandos and others say: it's not exactly news that Pony says all kinds of insane fuckwitted shit. Apparently including the weight business, but anyway:

as far as I'm concerned, the whole "Amp links to porn/Amp posts pics of his children on his blog" was more vile even than the "fat" business; and that she posted right there on Alas.

I'm glad y'all have double-secret "safe spaces" like this, though; it is important to be able to let one's hair down and -really- say what one feels.

I mean, if having Pony in a private space doesn't make it "safe," what *would*, I ask myself?
 

>Generally, yes, it's considered bad form to "leak" stuff that's in a "private" forum.

And yes, that does include saying really nasty foul shit about other people. It has to. Otherwise it simply isn't a "private" space.

But, well, for another thing, yes: how exactly do you know that pony hasn't said something along these lines anywhere else?

and, too, not that this makes "leakage" O.K., but I will say this: on the WELL, which does self-enforce very strict rules about "you own your own words," both for the general BBS and then with specific rules for private forums within, it is -also- understood that really, realistically, if one is -really- concerned, one ought not to post anything there (or anywhere online) that one wouldn't be comfortable seeing on the headline of the New York Times. Yes, one does one's best to enforce the "safe space, private forum" business. at the same time: you pays your money and you takes your choice.

Sucks, not saying it's okay, but: it's just what it is.

anyway, unless you're positive that this is where the alluded-to Pony assholery comes from, it would -also- be considered a bit rum to blurt out the existence of heterofore unknown to the public (if that is what they were, of course) "secret" forums, much less allusions to the kind of really sensitive material that might be posted within.
 

I can't help but be put in mind of some kind of Illuminati-Bilderberg-Bohemian-Grove thing going on.

We're back to that bunker in South Dakota again...
 

btw, as long as we're on the subject: what's your policy on sockpuppetry?

I ask because it has come to my attention (in public, yes, all this was said aboveboard) that someone who's had both of them post on her board is of the belief that Pony and NYMOM are in fact the same person; at any rate she claims that according to her own stats, they're coming from the same IP.

Personally I can't speak to this, but it seems to me that an administrator ought to be able to confirm or deny such a thing fairly easily.
 

it would -also- be considered a bit rum to blurt out the existence of heterofore unknown to the public (if that is what they were, of course) "secret" forums,

well, I wonder if there's a difference between "private" and "secret".

I knew there were member's sections and public sections of G'berg, but I didn't know there were extra-double-secret-private sections...until now...

of course, now that I know there's some place in the world that is closed to me, all I wanna do is open it up with a big fat crowbar.
 

antip: everyone has private forums. that in itself is no big.

i am a tad amused by the sudden emphasis on "privacy" and other such "individualistic" assumptions, though, seeing as how, illegality aside (yes, obviously this is not equivalent to an illegal porn ring, as nothing that was said here is illegal), this, ummm, worldview? set? ideology? has been rather dismissive of appeals to such things in the past, in other contexts.

I mean, how'd that go? free speech isn't the be-all and end-all of everything? Funny...
 

private -and- secret, yes, I should say.

i support the general existence of such things. sometimes you just want to talk.

ironically of course, again, the...tolerance? of such things is pretty much made possible by those devilish Enlightenment concepts like free speech, individual rights, yadda yadda.

i wonder if the same people who were eager to call up the TIPS line on accounta people might be entering oogy search strings feel this way about private seekrit spaces.

yes, i know, one has nothing to do with the other; all bets are off when it comes to PR0N, or even the hint of a scintilla of a suggestion that some might be involved somewhere.

yesyes.
 

BD - I've never actually seen a sockpuppet, to my knowledge. I've heard of them, I've read summaries of flamewars that have featured sockpuppets, but I've never experienced the phenomenon of having two or more distinct personae emanating from the same single poster.
 

oh, i have. it happens. people do all kinds of cwazy shit on the Internets.

not to say that it happens with nearly the frequency that some people seem to think it does, however.

generally it is -also- considered good form to assume someone is who sie says sie is, unless one has solid or at least strongly suggestive evidence to the contrary.
 

The intriguing thing is that now we *know* that Pony was talking about this in the G'berg forums...

I saw Pony's Amp-accusation right after Pony *begged* me to stop being an "exquisite" example of a troll. Tee hee hee.
 

I'm not so sympathetic to Pony, mostly because she never seems to miss an opportunity to mess with me. If she could refrain from calling me a man every now and then, maybe I'd be more concerned with her privacy etc.

I'm more sympathetic to Aniters, who inadvertently violated the first rule of Gossipy Feminist Fight Club, which is of course "Don't Talk About Gossipy Feminist Fight Club."
 

By the way, in the interest of full disclosure (and so that no one can accuse me of throwing in a false apple of Eris), here's where you can find the IBTP threads where Pony has been involved in an obesity discussion.

Google: site:blog.iblamethepatriarchy.com pony obese

High recall, low precision. That's Google for you.

I guess it could all be interpreted as concern...

Sample:

"If my response seemed rather over the top Twisty (and Terry), it’s because I’ve lived it. He blamed his mother, he blamed me, now he blames his daughters. Fat acceptance is for deniers and blamers."
 

dude. if she has a problem with "blamers" then wtf was she doing saying it -there?-
 

following that google search. i'd forgotten about some of that older shit. the "Morphing Into Mama" business (oh, look, here's some random woman i found who's upset because she doesn't want to gain weight, on account of her husband won't like it. Discuss).

http://blog.iblamethepatriarchy.com/2006/03/22/hot-mama/

not just Pony being her usual more-than-fuckwitacious self, or the usual dreary litany of

>“Feminine beauty is a load of pornographic crap.”

Yes. Yes! I want to embroider this on a pillow and spray paint it on a water tower.

Thankfully, though I am married, I seldom wonder about my own fuckability from my husband’s perspective. (He does, in fact, fuck me, so I guess the proof is in the idiomatic pudding.)>

but also responses like:

>MIM, of course, is an idiot, and I feel sorry for her kids. She should have snagged herself one of those adorable Chinese babies — in any case, MIM’s and Husband’s DNA hardly seems worth perpetuating, although I’m sure they feel otherwise...>

>How long has MIM been married? Does she seriously think that she and her moronic husband aren’t going to change with age? Will she submit herself to botox? plastic surgery? starvation? Where does it end?>

>I said on Brazen Hussy’s site that what I really wanted to do was slap MIM for her stupidity.

Having had all day long to think about this, and fume at yet another hapless woman falling for the whole sexbot crap, I have to admit that my gut reaction on wanting to slap her silly is because I know where she comes from.

I used to live there, sometimes still vacation there (albeit against my will, and damn if that water doesn’t give me the runs!), and have been working long and hard to put it all behind me. With 30 odd years of training on how to be the best sexbot one can be, it’s sometimes hard to remember that I don’t live there anymore. MIM probably doesn’t realize it, but right now, that where she lives..>

>Is MIM concerned about her falling hotass because husband supplies all money to this disgusting superficial family that should have remained childless? Is she just afraid of being left without money and a roof over her head? Do a lot of women (who don’t have financial freedom…an inheritance, marketable skills, work experience) feel this way? I guess it would depend on how much crap husband gives wife about her ‘looks.’ If hotass is that important to husband, wife needs to get big insurance policy before husband has ‘accident.’>

>I almost ran over a woman like that today with my truck. In a shopping center, prancing from a yellow car was this smallish woman with purple sneakers, light purple tight pants, died purple hair and little yellow handbag and a stupid foo dog with a yellow coat on. Good god and she was heading to some clothing store. She looked at me and kind of pouted as she stepped right in front of the truck and I almost hit the idiot.

The post about the women lamenting her husband’s disapproval only made me want to scream at her, “And you are still married?? This hasn’t taught you what a trap that institution is?”>

>Sweet Jebus! That MIM character wrote a follow-up post intended to clarify what she originally said and clear up any misunderstandings. She just comes off as an even bigger stooge in her follow up.

http://morphingintomama.typepad.com/morphing_into_mama/2006/03/its_like_a_real.html

She’d expect her husband to consult with her if he grew a beard? If she wanted to dye her hair blonde she’d clear it with him? Is she fucking kidding? That doesn’t sound like an adult relationship between equals, to me. That sounds like being 15 years old and living at your mom’s house again. I think I’d jump off a bridge if I was stuck in such a controlling, infantalizing relationship....>


Yeah, this shit's been going on for a while, hasn't it.

fucking hell.
 

Hi everyone,

I didn't expect the kinds of responses I recieved here. I am still of the same mind though. I haven't found the so-called "Pony's Attack on Barry's weight" anywhere else on the net. Neither have any of you been able to validate your sources. Yes, Pony's 'fat-phobic' comments appear on IBTP, but they are not in reference directly to AMP.

In the post by belledame at 1:38am on this very thread, belledame makes the direct statement that Pony made fatphobic comments to amp.

I am not saying you are lying, I am just trying to make you aware of the situation. And as a moderator at genderberg I have to ensure that the people on our site can maintain confidentiality in a safe space. I too have used the genderberg pvt forums to discuss my experiences with racism, some have used it to discuss their experiences in sex work. No word of a lie, some people on our forums have had death threats against them for their direct activism. So you can see why it's vital for us to have a safe-space.

We are not a bunch of gossip-mongering savages, and I certainly would not have posted here to alert you of this - if I didn't trust that you would be understanding of this. Nor are we a bunch of people who are all of the same opinion, we've also sadly lost many of our members. So, yes, bad experiences do occur and disagreements happen - just like any other community.

I would if anything appreciate your cooperation. If Pony's made these comments elsewhere - please direct me to them, cause it's been two of you who have seen these statements.

I've taken personal slack for posting here myself- trust me. I thought we could look beyond the politics for one moment in order to understand that there has been someone using the genderberg forums for their own necessity, and in that respect I would appreciate your help.

If not, that's fine too. I am not trying to play any 'sympathy' card here either - just stating why it is that I posted here.

If, of course I am wrong, then I take back what I've said.

Thank you
-Aniters
 

I've taken personal slack for posting here myself- trust me.

I beg your pardon?
 

i assume she meant "personal flak," but i've been wrong before.

if so, well, y'know...sheesh.

you know, leaking stuff from prviate fora aside (and i hope by now it's pretty clear that 1) i don't approve of the practice and 2) i have no idea who originally might have done such a thing wrt genderberg/pony/fat/amp, if that's what happened, as i got that at least third-hand), i gotta just say this:

whatever else, i'm pretty sure i've never given anyone static simply because -they posted on the Enemy's site- (the horror). or for that matter, who they even made friends with; well certainly not based on -ideology.- doesn't mean the friend of my friend is now automatically my bestest bud, and it's true that there are certain points where i haul out my "alliance to Me/Us" cred, but...sheesh. really? -is- that what you're saying? you're not supposed to be here. like, at all.

Because if so, i gotta ask: is that level of internal scrutiny something you're cool with? because personally i can't imagine it.
 

and by the way, i also was on the level wrt the alert wrt Pony's possible double identity. you don't have to tell -us,- of course, what your findings are; but i trust that that sort of thing, too, would be a security concern.
 

anyway, i really think that if the concern is that someone -within the group- has sprung a leak, then the proper thing to do is to ask those group members, on their honor, did they or not; once it's leaked, it's really not up to the outsider leak-hearers to maintain the integrity of the group, you know. it's sort of like asking everyone in the village who let the horse out of the barn, when in fact there are only a certain number of people who could've possibly opened the barn door, and you know better than anyone else who those people are.
 

Aniters - although it's clear that you take your avocation as Genderberg forum moderator very seriously (as befits the position), I'm not sure your authority over any damn thing extends to my comments threads.

and if your friends give you grief for posting here, maybe you shouldn't oughta post here. Alternately, you could get some new friends.

Whatever suits you.

Admittedly, this level of hostility is uncharacteristic for me. but hey, it's not every day that such an august and respectable personage as a Genderberg forum moderator deigns to stain the hem of her petticoats and stoop to conquer around these parts.

as you can see your efforts went largely unappreciated.

I'm surprised that your pals even let you back into the fold after being so...contaminated. That was a big risk and it was indeed brave of you.

Sorry I can't see beyond the obvious insult and give you the credit I'm sure you deserve.
 

Well at any rate, we -aren't- members of said forum; so, again, really not up to us to help police its boundaries. Or even, you know, particularly care about it, really. I also appreciate the appeal to our common humanity (well, sort of, I guess; i guess we're, you know, -sort of- human).

anyway, I'm mildly intrigued by this:

>Nor are we a bunch of people who are all of the same opinion, we've also sadly lost many of our members.>

See, the conjunction of "we're not all of the same opinion" and "we've also sadly lost many of our members" implies (to me, anyway) that the membership loss was BECAUSE of not all being of the same opinion. Which, well, is not -exactly- my own experience of communities, you know, online or off. Yes, sometimes people have stupid fights and storm off because of "disagreements," happens everywhere, sure. I do wonder, though, if there isn't a erm continuum here at least. I mean in my experience the fights have been at least as much about personality conflicts as anything else. Sometimes exclusively that. More to the point, though, some people seem rather better at tolerating dissent than other, I observe.

and on that note, if the "also" was meant to suggest that "our" (?) community has "lost many members," too, i feel compelled to note: actually, well first of all the posters here represent a kind of Venn diagram of overlapping but not synonymous communities. Second, as far as -my- online "community" goes, however you want to define it, I can literally count the number of people I once counted as friends with whom I'm no longer on speaking terms on one hand. For the most part, my -personal- experience is that i just keep meeting more and more amazing people; and that the ties i'd already started to form (offline as well as on) just keep getting deeper and more solid. Occasionally I've even gotten into fights that were then resolved.

Then again, as I've said, perhaps my standards for whom I care to associate with, ideologically speaking at least, are lower than yours.

In terms of interpersonal -behavior-, however, i think it just might be another story.
 

> If Pony's made these comments elsewhere - please direct me to them, cause it's been two of you who have seen these statements.

So, just to spell this out, though, slowly and painstakingly:

1) I heard it from Andrea.

2) Andrea heard it from someone else (whom I do not know who it is).

3) Someone else did not provide a link or source to Andrea. as far as Andrea knew when she told me, it could've been from anywhere. still could, as far as i can see.

therefore:

4) we. don't. know.

You can try to get Andrea to lean on the someone else to see if she'll "cooperate" with y'all, i suppose. It doesn't sound to me like Andrea's much in the mood for "cooperation" of that sort, even if it were somehow her responsibility to do so; which, i think has been pretty clearly explained by now, really not.

Nor is it any of our responsibility to prove that the cite came from somewhere else, much less go chasing all over the Internetz for something that frankly no one here really has much if any investment in, other than yourself of course. Sorry. Best of luck, though!
 

Then again, as I've said, perhaps my standards for whom I care to associate with, ideologically speaking at least, are lower than yours.

lie down with dogs, wake up with me, BD... ;)

Yeah, Aniters - in case I wasn't clear (and it occurs to me that my meaning may have been obscured in the heat of my extra-huffy temper fit), the reason why I'm insulted resides in the implication that posting here somehow diminishes you in the eyes of others.

why else would other people give you grief because of it, if the act of commenting did not reflect badly on you?

what's wrong with me that you can't post here without losing face among your friends?

If you can explain to me why your pals gave you a hard time for posting here, that would go a long way towards helping me understand and maybe ratcheting down my ire somewhat.

if it's because you and yours feel like I'm dirty or something, I'd at least like to know that up front. I don't think I'm particularly disrespectful to any commenter (unless provoked) and in fact up 'til now I had something of a reputation for being a pushover.
 

Thanks for the clarification belledame, I really appreciate it.

I wanted to clarify - no one thinks of you as 'dirty', or the enemy or that 'i've soiled the hemline of my skirt'.

In fact it was 'mandos' who made the correct assertion here - and why I received so much 'flak'...

QUOTE: First rule about Gossipy Feminist Fight Club, which is of course "Don't Talk About Gossipy Feminist Fight Club."

But, I've tried to explain the objective of this portion of the site was not to 'gossip'. Our site is for anti-porn activists, solely.

This is the sole reason for my 'embarassment' and why I recieved flak for it.

Like I said, if I didn't think I couldn't trust posting here - or that you wouldn't take me seriously, I wouldn't have posted. I know it's not "your" responsibility for "our" problems, but it was a simple request for assistance.

Thank you for your cooperation and assistance.

I won't be bothering you again.
 

so i finally read that "fun feminists are apparently somehow responsible for women being stoned to death in Other Places" thread, and after i carefully groped for my spooned-out eyeballs on the floor till i found them and sewed them back in, i wrote:

>How can prostitution be “OK” for men, and not for women?

What makes you think it is?

Oh, right–men as johns, of course, not as prostitutes. Silly me.

And yay, okay, castration! Now we’re talking! w00t

who’s the last person I heard talking that line? oh, right, i think it was Wally George, proto-Limbaugh.

and Hothead Paisan, who’s a lot more fun; then again, she is a cartoon. also deigns to hang around with actual prostitutes without constantly lecturing them about how they’re enabling the patriarchy, last i checked.

but then, for an actual cartoon, she’s a lot more three-dimensional than certain people…

***

i surely don't expect it to make it past moderation.

as for the meen: hey, i'm already an Enemy of Class Woman; may as well be hanged for a sheep as a sweater, or however that goes. also, it's a positive froot orchard in there.

seriously. why even go there? i ask rhetorically, but: it's sort of going down the rabbit hole and trying to start an earnest debate with the whole cast of characters.
 

backup of my most recent comment @ WSTM

“do I think about all the ways that my “choice” participates in, and shores up, all of the systems, mechanisms and structures which ensure that women like this man’s mother have no meaningful choice?"

what exactly do you think I'm personally choosing, that makes a man pick up rocks and throw them at someone until she's dead?

blaming me lets a guilty man walk. Guilty men, in this case.

and using this sad-beyond-words story as an excuse to trash "fun feminists" is distasteful, at the very least.

A man, this woman's husband, forced her to have sex for money. Several other men threw rocks at her for hours until she died an excruciating death, tortured her until she died - because she had sex for money.

The men who sentenced her to death by stoning thought having sex for money was wrong. You also think having sex for money is wrong. I think the condemnation of sex-for-money contributes more to the end result of such cruel and unusual punishment, than does a more accepting view of sex-for-money.

maybe you'd save your rocks for the men she fucked, or for the man who forced her to fuck. Either way, capital punishment for prostitution is an outgrowth of condemning prostitution, not accepting it.

"Do I think about how useful my arguments are to male supremacists?"

Do you?

arguments against prostitution based on womankind's innate virtue, or inviolable selfhood as symbolized by sexual gatekeeping, or any other reasoning based on innate qualities of womanhood, also bolsters the arguments of male supremacists.

"Do I think about how useful my arguments are to male supremacists?"

sometimes. but as was pointed out in the great Unholy Alliance debate vis-a-vis the link between evangelical christianity and the antiporn movement, it's okay not to care about that.

"Do I ever really consider that everything is connected. It’s all connected.”

Yes. of course. But I don't see how accepting prostitution connects to the death penalty for prostitution.
 

backup comment

your blog, your rules. I can respect that.

you asked for an answer to those specific questions. I took some GOOD AND VALUABLE TIME to think about it, and that's what I came up with.

For a change, I stand by my comment.

I'd like to be clear that I'm not disagreeing with you because you're mean and prudish and no fun. I'm sure you're quite amenable, openminded and fun enough for your own purposes or anyone else's, most days.

I'm disagreeing with you because I still feel that capital punishment for prostitution arises from the condemnation of prostitution - that is - the idea that it is wrong to exchange money for sex.

I mean, there's no need for me to throw rocks at people until they're dead, if the people aren't doing anything objectionable.

But it's clear that your objections arise from a different point of view, with which I sympathize, but don't particularly share.

I don't feel I mischaracterized you. I was answering Delphyne's question the best way I knew how. I really can't speak for all of the "they, them" in Delphyne's question - I can only speak for myself. Hence, every time she used a plural pronoun, I had to substitute first person singular if I wanted to say anything true.

So, if you are at all holding "fun feminists" responsible for this woman's death on any level, and you consider me a "fun feminist", then yes, I feel you are blaming me. And since I can only answer for myself, so I did.

for what it's worth, this whole "fun feminist" thing irks me on a personal level. I get tired of feeling attacked, getting defensive, demanding citiations as to where I ever said "forced prostitution! Whee!" blah blah blah - but what the hell. You fling your straw, I'll fling mine.
 

I really can't speak for all of the "they, them" in Delphyne's question - I can only speak for myself. Hence, every time she used a plural pronoun, I had to substitute first person singular if I wanted to say anything true.

Awesome. You kick ass.
 

And, wrt that thread at WSTM? I at least appreciate that Heart is staying civil for the most part; but I'm getting flustered because I feel like for whatever reason, the message I am attempting to convey is just not getting through. I'm sure that's due in part to me not expressing it well enough. BUt maybe it's also due to the listener not wanting to hear? I don't know to what degree of each, though.

Anyway... it's frustrating.
 

truly.

But it takes all kinds, I suppose.
 

Ha! Good point, piny!
 

personally, i think sometimes calling a person a pig sphincter is more integrity-laden than, well, a number of other things one might do...
 

It is useful to try everything in practice anyway and I like that here it's always possible to find something new. :)