Post from my blog (tenderhooligan/ wordpress)

I’ve written about this genius before (here or elsewhere or somewhere). He’s an evolutionary psychologist from the London School of Economics (LSE) – one of the top universities in the UK – and he writes, a lot, for Psychology Today. Now,Psychology Today is not, by any stretch of any imagination, a reliable academic source but it does have readership. It’s probably the best feeder of pop-psychology around at the moment.

I’m not a fan of evolutionary psychology. I don’t like its reductivist approach in making everything about sex. Because that’s what it does, when you strip off the big words. The boys have sperm, the girls have eggs, the boys want the girls but the girls need the boys and then a whole host of things happen that bring us where we are today. One of my very favourite colleagues does a bit of evolutionary psychology, and he argues it well, but I just don’t agree with the premise or the implications. No more than I agree with any of the offensive, sexist, racist, ill-informed claptrap that  Satoshi Kanazawa is known for on Psychology Today. (Not that I am equating my lovely colleague with Kanazawa, of course).  His latest stint involved a piece which was entitled “Why are Black women less physically attractive than other women?” Yeah. Seriously.

The piece was met with uproar, naturally, and was removed from the site almost immediately. (It doesn’t even deserve a critique but if you’re interesting in reading one anyway, you can find an interesting post here on Sociological Images.) Since then, change.org, a petition site, started a petition demanding that Psychology Today stops publishing sexist and racist articles and explains why  Kanazawa’s piece was published initially. (If you were cynical of mind and suspected that it was published because it’s good for site traffic, you may not be wrong.) The peititon also called for the removal of Kanazawa as a contributor to the site. And not before time. Indeed, since then, the student body of  LSE have called for Kanazawa to be sacked. He is not doing that institution, or the academy, any favours at all.

Two weeks after the offending article, Psychology Today issued an “apology”. It’s very sorry indeed if anyone was offended by the article. (Read: we’re not saying the article was offensive but if you were offended then I suppose we’re sorry. But you should probably be less sensitive.) It’s not good enough. Kanazawa is still listed as a contributer and Psychology Today did not address any of the on-going issues with his pieces, choosing instead to pretend that this piece was an isolated incident. Please sign the petition to keep the pressure on Psychology Today to address this problem properly. Its claim that it doesn’t support the publication of racist or sexist pieces is disingenuous when it had to remove a piece for exactly those problems. We have to put up with, “I’m not racist/ sexist but…” in too many places on the Internet and we shouldn’t have to put up with it on a “academic” site too.

Psychology Today is probably hoping that this will turn out to be a storm in the teacup (and, sadly, it probably will for there’s a lot of -isms around and eventually we’ll have to move on to the next one) but it really, really shouldn’t be allowed to wait it out and get that moron Kanazawa back on the front page again next week.

Post from my blog (tenderhooligan/ wordpress)

(In brief because I’m still too busy with work.)

If you need any convincing today that religion and feminism just do not mix, have aread of this piece. The site on which I found the piece seems to be devoted to merging religion and the state as much as it can (and we all know what a good idea that is!), and claims that it wishes to “support the self-evident truths found in the Declaration of Independence, and their faithful application through upholding the U.S. Constitution, as written. Its purpose is to thoughtfully and courageously advance the cause of our nation’s Founders”. Um.

The piece in question maintains that the Christian church (denomination unclear) has bought into the “lie” of feminism and women’s rights. In doing so, the church has  allowed the poor menz to be emasculated and has (breathe deeply) put women on the pulpit. Women don’t have “god-given” roles. Men do. Women should be kept in their place. And that place is not the pulpit. Bonnie Alba, there. She knows her place.

When we see women pastors standing in the pulpit, we have to wonder, what happened? to the men and male leadership? Thirty years of being emasculated and undermined by women striving for an equality they already had, men have ceded to women. Men have abandoned their God-given roles.

Reading further, the author engages in a little bit of slut-shaming just for good measure. “Fallen women” always want a man to blame, or something. That bit doesn’t make a great deal of sense. I think she just wanted to have a bit of a go but wasn’t really sure how to go about it.

The author concludes that because of feminism (read: women in general) the US of A is on its frickin’ knees. Much like women should be, I dare say…

Nearly 70 years ago, Recy Taylor was gang-raped at gunpoint. Her attackers admitted to kidnapping and raping her. And nothing was ever done about it.

As a young African-American woman living in Abbeville, Alabama, in 1944, when Jim Crow laws institutionalized discrimination against black people, her hopes of legal redress were slim. Though Taylor’s cause gained international attention through the efforts of a well-known civil and human rights activist, Rosa Parks, she couldn’t force racist and sexist law enforcement in Abbeville to take action.

Today, Recy Taylor’s name and story have been swept under the rug and go largely unrecognized in America. “The sheriff never even said he was sorry it happened. I think more people should know about it … but ain’t nobody [in Abbeville] saying nothing,” Taylor lamented in an interview with The Root.

“It’s curious, to say the least, that Taylor’s name is not mentioned in history books,” Cynthia Gordy criticizes in her article at The Root. “While most analyses of circumstances that inspired the civil rights movement focus on black men — being lynched or railroaded into jail, or facing down segregationists — the stories of countless black women like Recy Taylor, who were raped by white men during the same era, have gone understated, if not overlooked entirely.” The modern ignorance of a case that launched a major campaign run by an impressive coalition of progressive groups, one that was successful in pressuring the Alabama governor into investigating but was then blocked by city law enforcement, is a sad reflection on our attention to the darkest spots of American history.

“It was a long time ago,” Taylor told The Root. “But I still think something should have been done about it.” Not so long ago that Taylor isn’t still pained by the memory of the assault and failure of justice. Her brother, Robert Corbitt, has spent the last decade of his retirement searching for information on her case and seeking a long-delayed justice, after Taylor broke down into tears while telling him about the gang rape 55 years after the fact. “I’d like a public apology from the city of Abbeville and the state of Alabama,” Corbitt asks, and Taylor agrees that this simple measure represents the least that could be done, after police took the lead in covering up the horrific assault against her.

Help Recy Taylor get the apology she deserves and public recognition of the injustice perpetrated by signing this petition to Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley, Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock, the Abbevile police department, and state and city representatives.

Well, this isn’t really a surprise now is it? One -ism is normally closely followed by another -ism. What I cannot understand at all, though, is how members of the Christian community can hate certain groups with such vitriol. Surely that goes against everything that Christianity is supposed to be about?

Welcome to Jacksonville, Florida, where a federally-funded abstinence-only program taught to more than 50,000 students has some shady and scary ties to a Ugandan pastor who wants to see gay people locked up in jail forever or executed.

Andy Kopsa over at The Florida Independent has an amazing investigative piece looking at the organization Project SOS, an abstinence-only program founded in 1993 by a woman named Pam Mullarkey. Turns out Mullarkey is best buds with a pastor in Uganda who has been championing a piece of legislation known as the Anti-Homosexuality Bill. That pastor? Martin Ssempa, the religious leader who travels around the country showing graphic pornography to men, women and children in order to whip up anti-gay sentiment, and who has said that LGBT people in the country deserve to be locked up in prison for life, or sentenced to the death penalty.

Ssempa’s beliefs have been criticized the world over, and he’s been marginalized by many religious leaders who once used to work with him. But that’s not the story with Pam Mullarkey, who in addition to founding Project SOS, still serves on the organization’s board of directors. In fact, Mullarkey has praised Martin Ssempa, and a quote from her is even featured on Ssempa’s own web site.

“Martin Ssempa is the man to watch. He’s the most powerful voice for abstinence in the world and his passion, charisma and character make his vital message irresistible,” Mullarkey says of the minister who wants to see LGBT people locked up in prison forever or killed. Now that’s some charisma.

I really, truly do not understand the world sometimes.

These are happy days in Illinois, where because of a new law passed by the state legislature, and signed by Gov. Pat Quinn, same-sex couples will be able to have their civil unions recognized. Many same-sex couples in the state are already planning their ceremonies for later this year.

Take Todd Wathen, for instance, who has been together with his partner for eight years, and started calling around to several Illinois bed & breakfasts looking for a venue for his civil union ceremony in June. But when Wathen called up the TimberCreek Bed & Breakfast in Paxton, as well as the Beall Mansion in Alton, he was told by both bed & breakfasts that his civil union party wouldn’t be welcome.

Beall Mansion gave a bizarre response, saying that despite the fact that they hold events for weddings, anniversaries, receptions, corporate retreats, fundraising events, and baby showers, they don’t allow people to use their venue for civil unions. They just don’t do civil unions, said a spokesperson from the place.

TimberCreek was less vague with their stance, though equally as discriminatory. Jim Walder from TimberCreek actually responded to Wathen by saying: “We will never host same-sex civil unions. We will never host same-sex weddings even if they become legal in Illinois. We believe homosexuality is wrong and unnatural based on what the Bible says about it. If that is discrimination, I guess we unfortunately discriminate.”

At Wichita East High School in Kansas, a student got the green light to author an editorial, and have it published in the school’s newspaper (The Messenger), that said same-sex relationships were not normal, and then quoted from a Leviticus translation that says men who lie with other men should get the death penalty. So much for creating a learning environment where all students, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity, can feel respected and safe. In Wichita East High School, you can just get on the Internet or open up a copy of The Messenger and be told that you’re not normal, and that some people think it’s moral to have you killed. The article, “Homosexual Teens Alienated By Current Societal Trends,” is still available online here. (Here’s a PDF in case they take it down.) Among the points that the student author makes: “[Same-sex relationships] relationships just are not normal. One thing to notice is that there is legislation against homosexual marriage. However, there are no legislative restrictions to same-sex dating. Dating does often lead to marriage, so same-sex dating should be frowned upon.”

A Ugandan gay rights advocate was recently bludgeoned to death in his home. His name had been among those listed in an anti-gay magazine, under the headline “Hang them!”

Right-wing U.S. extremists have fueled a climate of hatred in Uganda – and it’s got to stop.

A few months before a bill was introduced in Uganda that would make homosexuality punishable by death, Scott Lively and two other anti-gay ministers from America held an anti-gay conference in Uganda.

Prominent right-wing leader Lou Engle visited Uganda this year to preach against “the threat of homosexuality” (portrayed as a “satanic attack against families”) at a rally that focused on prayers for the bill.

And now, Georgia-based pastor Carl Ellis Jenkins is opening 50 new churches in Uganda that exist to preach against “bad morals, including homosexuality” and they’re expanding across East Africa.

Stoking fires of hostility isn’t religion – it’s blasphemy. Tell Lou Engle, Scott Lively, and Carl Ellis Jenkins to stop exporting hate in the name of religion.

Because that’s OK then. If she’s bisexual, she’ll probably enjoy it really.

It’s not just South Africa that has a problem with straight guys thinking lesbians are there for the raping. Michael Hughes, a 23-year-old British man, stands accused of raping a lesbian friend at a wedding last March. Even more creepy (if true): Hughes refers to his alleged victim as his “little sister.”  The Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard reports:

The woman claimed she followed Hughes to his room at the luxurious Clearwell Castle hotel in the Forest of Dean on the pretence that she was just going to have a look around as she could not afford a room. The jury at Gloucester Crown Court listened as the 23-year-old described how events unravelled. She said: “I saw Michael and we had a hug. I said I couldn’t afford to stay at the hotel and he told me that the room was lush.

“He said come and look at the room so I went up with him. I was walking around the room and sat on the bed. He pushed me back and I said ‘stop it Michael, this isn’t you’. It was the last thing I’d expect to happen – he’s like my best friend. “I would never have gone up there if I thought he liked me.” CCTV footage from the hotel shows the pair leave the smoking area and head to Hughes’ room. Just over 20 minutes later cameras capture the woman leaving the hotel at speed.

Sarah Regan, for the prosecution, told the court that the woman was openly gay and was in a relationship with another woman at the time of the alleged assault. “He knew of her relationship so she had no concerns of following him to his room.” The woman said she had no reason to suspect Hughes would carry out such an attack as they were close and he would often refer to her as his little sister. She added: “If I was going to cheat on my girlfriend, who I absolutely adored and worshipped the ground she walked on, I definitely wouldn’t do it with a man.”

(Source: rainbowrevolution, via rightsandhumanity)

Hey, fair maidens, ever wondered why you’re not married? It’s because you like the sex. And, you know what that means, spinsters? That you’re a filthy slut.

For more sickening misogyny, read on at Tracy McMillian’s edifying piece in the HuffPo. It’ll tell you all about where you’re going wrong. And you’re going wrong plenty, it seems…

3. You’re a Slut. Hooking up with some guy in a hot tub on a rooftop is fine for the ladies of Jersey Shore — but they’re not trying to get married. You are. Which means, unfortunately, that if you’re having sex outside committed relationships, you will have to stop. Why? Because past a certain age, casual sex is like recreational heroin — it doesn’t stay recreational for long. That’s due in part to this thing called oxytocin — a bonding hormone that is released when a woman a) nurses her baby and b) has an orgasm — that will totally mess up your casual-sex game. It’s why you can be f**k-buddying with some dude who isn’t even all that great and the next thing you know, you’re totally strung out on him. And you have no idea how it happened. Oxytocin, that’s how it happened. And since nature can’t discriminate between marriage material and Charlie Sheen, you’re going to have to start being way more selective than you are right now.

“Homophobia is like racism and anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry in that it seeks to dehumanize a large group of people, to deny their humanity, their dignity and personhood” - Coretta Scott King As the advocacy officer for a rights group called Sexual Minorities Uganda, David Kato was one of Uganda’s most high profile gay rights activists. Just weeks after winning a court victory over a tabloid that called for homosexuals to be killed he has been bludgeoned to death in his home….