Thoughts, Rants, and Other Stuff

Dear Tumblr,

I would like just the text of what I copy and paste to show up. Not all the formating complete with colors and pictures flayed across the text box in which I’m typing.

Best Wishes
Me

I’ve seen this video on every social media site I’ve been to lately; generally posted by women who think this is a game changing talk that will make men fall into the lap of feminism with adoring eyes and a zealotry not seen since the crusades. GOD WILLS IT!

So in an attempt to collect my thoughts on this latest absolutely sexist talk I’m just going to make this post and link to it. The following may not be safe for work due to language. (I say may because I haven’t finished writing it yet).

First a little basic background. Feminism is a movement started to gain gender equality for women. On this I do not have an issue. Women are most definitely a step behind the male culture in our nation and the world over. It is something that needs to be addressed. I support that. What I don’t support is the demonizing of men in pursuit of this goal nor do I support the hypocritical attitude of many of its followers, Dr. Katz included.

Dr. Katz starts off his talk thanking all the women who have come before him, saying that he might get a lot of credit but it was all due to the women who came before in this field. I call bullshit right out of the gate. He thanks the women who started a movement to give themselves equal rights but not Edison who was the father of the light bulb and thus lit the stage he was on. He failed to thank Columbus for the monetized discovery of the Americas or the people who built the building he was standing in. He did not thank the inventor of the English language or his elementary teacher for teaching how to read and write. It is faux modesty. He wrote the words, he was standing up there giving the speech, and if he gets praise it should be well earned. Everything is built off of something else. If he truly has a sense of thankfulness, he is most selective in his praise of those who have come before making sure to extol the virtues of those he claims to help. However, even though this seems like faux praise, I will give it to him because I guess that was what he was there to talk about.

My next problem with this TEDx talk was Dr. Katz immediate launch into trying to make feminists a gender neutral movement and claim they aren’t demonizing men. Well I gave it a listen and I was optimistic at the onset. He explained (I guess to some of the less intelligent) that gender does not mean women, race does not mean African-American, and sexual orientation does not mean homosexual. Well good on ya mate! So we are actually going to talk about gender issues right? Nope. I’m afraid not. More men bashing.

You see in every instance or abstract or example he gave in his speech, it was always the male who was in the wrong. Domestic violence was always the result of a man beating a woman or child. There was no mention of a woman beating a woman or a woman beating a child. There was no mention of a man beating a man. Why? Because men are just there to be the bad guy and are never the victim. Women are always the victim.

Still the sexism continues on. When talking about making it socially unacceptable to abuse people the example was guys sitting around playing poker (“not a woman in site” because homosexuals don’t play poker) and a disparaging remark about women (never a man) is made. *facepalm* By now you see a pattern.

 And the pattern does continue on with the example of coaches in sports abusing their power I thought “Finally, some pressure on female coaches too!” until he started with the masculine pronouns to describe the coach. WTF! To make matters worse he continues on talking about mandating collegiate domestic abuse classes FOR STUDENT ATHLETES AND COACHES! No, he doesn’t want it to be mandatory for all college students, just the overwhelmingly male side of colleges and universities. Why? Because men are the bad guys never the victim and women are always the victim and never the bad guy.

So why do I not join the feminist band wagon? I’m a guy and I’m the bad guy. It never fails that my gender is to blame. Now I’m all for equal rights and opportunities for women, just like I’m for equal rights and opportunities for men. But I cannot align myself with a movement that shows no love or understanding for the male half of the population or issues affecting men such as family court cases and domestic abuse while casting men as the perpetual bad guy. He might say that feminism isn’t about “man-hating” and that might be true. But I’ve yet to hear a single feminist talk about women being anything more than a victim of a man which, by Dr. Katz’s own admission and illustration, is using language to make men the bad guy.

Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTvSfeCRxe8

Post Script: I feel I need to emphasize something I was accused of earlier in a talk railing against this. I am not a MRA. I think MRAs, as a whole, are dumb. Of the crap they talk about 98% of it is “we hate women who won’t shut up and get back in the kitchen”. However 2% is something that needs looking into and that 2% is important. But once again I cannot, in good faith, call out feminist for being hypocritical for hating men and side with MRA’s for the equal yet opposite problem. 

There seems to be a gross misunderstanding on what Obamacare does. There are some things I like, but the majority of it is horrible. For the brief synopsis, it is a bill that hurts the poor while protecting the fiscal side of the medical industry.

The good it does; It requires medical insurance agencies to provide medical coverage for preexisting conditions. This is great news for people with cancer, CF, Alzheimer’s, MS, PTSD, clinical depression, ADHD, HIV/AIDS, etc. Likewise it forces those in the medical field to have open and honest conversations with people on options available to them (the right wing has predictability declared these death panels as they include things like DNR’s)

The bad is too numerous to mention. The poor having hours cut to come in below the line for mandated health care. Those same people are required by law to have health coverage or they are fined. Those people who are working minimum wage, less than thirty hours a week, and struggling to support themselves and/or a family… are forced to buy a medical insurance package they can’t afford because it is often 25-50% of their monthly income. They are not eligible for federal (and most often state) health care. Meanwhile, the small businessman is being destroyed by this mandated healthcare. Some are even electing to pay the fine as it is cheaper than paying the partial health care dues. It is now a major financial burden to move to the place where you employ more than 50 people which is a drain on the economy as those with over fifty in their employ are most often unskilled manufacturing jobs which, especially in rough economic times, we need. This isn’t what “might” happen, this is what IS happening.

The merits and flaws of the health care reform act are plain as day. They don’t need some catchy meme or poor fiction writer to extol its virtues and denounce it’s flaws. What it needs is an informed and aware public willing to take a bit of time out of their day from texting and facebooking and tweeting to read a law that affects every person in the country. What it needs is for the spin doctors and fear mongerers to shut up long enough for responsible journalist to rely important facts that are not crouched in a political agenda.

If you are uninformed on what this bill does and how it affects you, the media is to blame, politicians are to blame, and YOU are to blame. A good tip, if you think it gives free government health care to even a single person, you are wrong and need to inform yourself.

*climbs off of soap box*
*end rant*

dftbanews:

Sports on DFTBA News? Yep! check it out!! http://dftbanews.wordpress.com/2013/04/29/jason-collins/

Lets talk about Jason Collins, a Boston Celtics basketball player,  and the fact that he is the first professional athlete to come out openly gay while still an active player and how badly some people are trying to spin it.

Let me be clear,  This ISa big…

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Well that SI article was a great read. It is also really sad that I’m so excited to see what happens next like it is some kind of serial drama :-S