Saturday, April 29, 2023
A Christopher Titus sampler
Friday, April 28, 2023
Way past the Flogging Bureau
RantWoman has scheduled this post to appear several days after the events that evoked it.RantWoman expects that unfortunately the outrages will not be out of date.
RantWoman is a little unsettled by various news streams, unsettled in ways that call for words and in ways that the daily snippets of quirky music from Youtube are probably not going to fix. Please understand, there are WORDS her and probably RantWoman will either feel better or feel too exhausted to do anything after releasing the words with prayers.
Readers who need background on RantWoman's multilingual, multicultural, multiconfessional flogging bureau are invited to use the search bar with the word flogging.
Tonight RantWoman's media streams have served up a number of items that are WAY beyond RantWoman's nothing ever gonna happen snark Flogging Bureau and far into the zone of absolutely need prayers.
Readers who need a nip of raw racist fears could do worse that the TN GOP caucusing at some point during the #TennesseeThree events. Here though are items that are even more appalling.
Rachel Maddow reports on the McCurtain County OK meeting after the meeting
There is time to click away after the intro before the details.
Beau on McCurtain County and the DoJ Civil Rights division
TN Air National Guardsman arrested after applying for a job on a hit website
CONTENT WARNING: not the other TN stories in the news. Not the MA Air National Guardsman accused of espionage. Also DEFINITELY not a job opportunity that should be on anyone's vocational rehabilitation plan. RantWoman unfortunately imagines that swirling around the dark web, there are probably sites that are NOT parodies. RantWoman cannot decide whether such sites should be taken down because they themselves are solicitations to commit crimes OR whether they should be left up as a way to help round up anyone naive or bonkers enough to respond to such ads.
God have mercy on us all.
Tuesday, April 25, 2023
Various moments in gender reality.
.@SecretaryPete your administration requested $2.6 billion to advance gender equity. THAT is not putting the American taxpayer first. Nice try! https://t.co/3kwpiVi9RR
— Rep. Lauren Boebert (@RepBoebert) April 21, 2023
Ummm. #LandslideLauren are you having trouble with arithmetic again? What percentage of US taxpayers are women? Hit more than your margin of victory. Gender discrimination--and toxic plumes from train derailments--harm everyone.
— Amb. Thwack Vaxxed & Masked (@AmbassadorThwa1) April 21, 2023
But then there here come some traffic safety issues.
As terrified as some are about the transgender menace and #erasure of certain bodies i can't believe everyone getting upset about @SecretaryPete .
— Amb. Thwack Vaxxed & Masked (@AmbassadorThwa1) April 21, 2023
PS also daily travel patterns and exposure to different risks vary partly for gender reasons. It's that science stuff. #MoveEquity https://t.co/0AkB7NZDMt
Reproductive Health: Today's rants
RantWoman is not doing so well about convening groups of Friends to discuss the FCNL discernment on Reproductive health.
Most recent post with background links
RantWoman has sent email inquiries two directions locally. So far Crickets. RantWoman will try again on both next week after a clogged schedule this weekend.
RantWoman also tried to respond to something from a larger group. RantWoman walked on one person'f feet and feels badly; a related conversation got derailed by a round of pronoun policing. RantWooman is unclear whether she will try again.
RantWoman understands FCNL's desire for clear policy direction.
Look people, RantWoman does NOT think people need to unite behind single statements. RantWoman wants people to spend time in prayerful threshing, collect comments and send them off into the larger river of discernment.
AND
Repeating, RantWoman thinks it will be extremely valuable for Quakers from different states with different legal environments to talk to each other.
At this point, RantWoman is having enough trouble herding her own thoughts in helpful direction that RantWoman may simply offer up blog posts, let go of any need for feedback. trust that the FCNL policy committee and other Friends who might be involved in this discernment find something useful here.
Repeating the most recent set of popcorn kernels
Lately, RantWoman has been wrestling with parents' rights rhetoric.
Parents should of course talk to their own kids but everything to do with sex and sexuality melts too many Parents' brains. Many who are cool and realistic are now terrified by realities in their home states. This means need for at least mental and maybe electronic maps of where it is safe, legal, easy to get both abortion care and gender affirming care.
And YES, gender affirming care belongs in the conversation. That is, RantWoman really wants any policy statement to reflect both privacy in difficult personal decisions and respect for medical providers professional judgment over the uninformed depradations of random legislators with no medical qualification.
More pointed media bits.
TYT Antichoice activist thinks 10 year old should have her rapist's baby
This OH case has resurfaced for reasons explained near the end of the clip.
Governor to Governor
News ahead of the gubernatorial exchange below:
The #IDLeg just enacted bills attempting to ban interstate travel for abortion and gender affirming care.
The #WALeg just defeated one anti-trans bill and enacted sanctuary state legislation designed to protect people who come to WA or assist anyone in coming to WA for reproductive health or gender affirming care.
RantWoman wishes to thank her favorite ardently Catholic eastern WA newspaper columnist and her Twitter feed for calling the following exchange of gubernatorial Perspectives.
KREM WA Gov. Inslee asks ID Gov. Little to veto "abortion trafficking" bill
Go. Inslee's letter is in the link above.
KREM: ID Gov LIttle Responds to letter from WA Gov Inslee
For the record:
ID also bans gender affirming care, though RantWoman has not plumbed the depths of what exactly the ban covers.
In WA the state of medical consent when young people can seek medical are on their own is 14 for everyone. RantWoman is curious how other states do or don't address this issue.
RantWoman's comments:
Thank you I guess, Gov Little, for concern about the WA Tax code. Your comments seem unhelpful in terms of changing what is the most regressive tax structure in the country.
Ummm, your state is already losing OB/GYN services because of the legal environment. Why do you imagine either new doctors or new residents want to come to ID in the current environment?
Wednesday, April 19, 2023
States of Meeting: the world does NOT fall apart when....
Why editorialize about only one State of Society Report when one is up close and personal with the genesis of two. (Accessibility note: the final versions have not been posted anywhere yet so RantWoman promises links and diatribes later.
Meeting number 1: Salmon Bay Friends.
There are several people at Salmon Bay who have become dear to RantWoman. RantWoman wants to honor gifts and TRY not to throw fits. Still:
--There are a number of Friends connected with Salmon Bay, including the current clerk, who are working hard pursuing various kinds of education. Maybe RantWoman should have been more insistent. RantWoman so wanted the report to say something along the lines of "We see you. We are glad you are here. We are rooting for you even when we can't see more of you."
--Zoom autocaptioning is not equipped for the joys of baby chatter during worship.
--Speaking of seeing, RantWoman NEVER has problems with vision metaphors, well probably almost never. On the other hand, RantWoman is intrigued by mention of the figure in Alice and Wonderland who seemed to alternate between seeing things very large and very small. Apparently, there is some evidence that this is a real neurological phenomenon. It did not even occur to RantWoman to put this into the State of society even though this perception pattern is an apt metaphor for many things.
--Speaking of gun violence, any number greater than 0 of shootings in or near schools is too many. RantWoman reads police Twitter feeds to know that shootings occur depressingly often, mercifully not every week but too often near particular schools. This year there was a shooting at a school not on RantWoman's usual list. A young Friend, as well as the daughter of another couple RantWoman knows go to that school. One possible mark of being a cool Quaker parent--or at least a self-employed work at home parent is when one's child's friends all list that parent as an emergency number.
--RantWoman cannot figure out what to say about ups and downs of disability matters. Assume there is candor, holding in the Light and that there are ups and downs.
Meeting number 2. South Seattle Friends.
RantWoman sort of stumbled into teaming up with a very weighty Friend. Two different sets of queries went out to the meeting email list. Wonderful replies came back, telling many meaningful stories. RantWoman and CoAuthor Friend quickly agreed that we did not feel like trying to boil the life out of anything trying to shorten the offerings. We further agreed that state of society reports are now mainly distributed electronically so we figured the process can cope with a longer than average offering. Many people greeted this with enthusiasm even when RantWoman also added a number of blind-person specific accessibility notes. See. See world. The planet does NOT stop when there is actual space for such things.
--RantWoman did not sign up for a lifetime gig so probably the report and go back to its more usual customary length.
RantWoman has more to say about the subject of disability. Suffice it to say, there is more to say about plenty of room for improvement even though the topic assuredly has not made the world blow up in two meetings.
Hello FBI, we have a sexual harassment problem in our insurrection planning cabal.
Tuesday, April 18, 2023
Media Coverage of the HI FCNL Advocacy Team vigil, video via Twitter
Honolulu ABC news affiliate covered the FCNL Hawai’i Advocacy Team’s Candlelight Vigil for Peace and the Red Hill military disaster, which polluted the water, ocean and land. It plays right after 2 seconds of weather news. Take a look! pic.twitter.com/NAs2YQzHhT
— Dr. Michele Shields (@kahumikala) April 16, 2023
Monday, April 17, 2023
Two girls and the adults who believed them
View from Zoom of the in person half of the memorial |
This post is dedicated to two young girls and the adults who believed them. The girls are probably grown by now and RantWoman prays that they are surrounded by love and care as they as adults walk through everything that must have been part of their childhoods. Yes, the above is a weird visual; RantWoman hopes it reflects others praying as well.
RantWoman greatly appreciates the message in the memorial for the safest sex offender on the planet who clearly was NOT safe but was a sex offender at the time he was babysitting his female friend's children. He only became the safest sex offender on the planet later after much back and forth and community awareness. RantWoman also has a sense of walking in some zone of well it helps one starfish even if a person walking along a beach cannot through all the stranded starfish back into the sea. In this case, the starfish is one offender who will get PLENTY more air time elsewhere and this blog is about two girls and the adults who believed them not about everything going on in and around the sea.
This post is dedicated to lots of other people struggling about gnarly childhoods and disability and mental illness and neglect.
RantWoman is glad the girls came up at all.
RantWoman is touched they came up after this somewhat snarky part of RantWoman's ministry:
"The date of the memorial was Orthodox Easter. If you didn't get enough resurrection last week come back for more this week.
"One time RantWoman and the safest sex offender... were in a spiritual sharing group together. We were kind of flailing about format and reading options. RantWoman suggested reading a poem by the Guatemalan liberation theology poet Julia Esquivel called in English 'They have threatened us with resurrection'
This poem can be found elsewhere on this blog but here is the search result that first popped today.
They have threatened us with Resurrection
The safest sex offender...is the one who brought out of the poem concern not to repeat cycles of violence."
RantWoman has more to say but saying it here does not do justice to need for the girls to have their own space.
Sunday, April 16, 2023
Tonight's War Montage: Why China Isn't Helping Russia and other topics
Thursday, April 13, 2023
Roland on Tim Scott and Hip hop nation on TN
Rumi: The Guest House and Thomas Edison
Quakers don't usually do wakes, and certainly not wakes as a series of prose hiccups all over a blog. Yet, that is what we have.
The Friend RantWoman has called The Safest Sex Offender On the Planet passed away in the fall. His passing was well accompanied by many retired health professionals serving on a care committee. A memorial has now, in typical dawdling fashion, been scheduled. Between the memorial, the collision of multiple religious holidays on the calendar, the windup of an interesting project in RantWoman's life, state of society seasoning, the press of news streams, and Life, RantWoman's supply of spiritual popcorn kernels is running stronger than average. Probably holding it all in the Light would be a good start.
RantWoman does not promise a great deal specifically about the safest sex offender...more travelogue of RantWoman's experience on the journey
First, the prompt from a recent FCNL Witness Wednesday.
The Guest House
By Jalaluddin Rumi
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
And from a wrap-up event for The Blind Leaders Development program, paraphrasing:
Thomas Edison: It's not failing. Sometimes it just takes 10,000 tries to make things work.
RantWoman, WHY must you open the electronic wake with these texts?
Stay tuned!?!?!
Lawrence: Tennessee Three walk onward from Memphis where MLK was assassinated
‘Louisville Bank Shooting "This is about life and death": Louisville mayor makes plea for gun control
Wednesday, April 12, 2023
Weekly Skews 4/11/2023 – Talking Tennessee with Rep. Gloria Johnson
Let us not forget The WAR in Ukraine
RantWoman has not permanetly dropped out of Russia / Ukraine / Belarus /... media streams. RantWoman IS consumed by amtters in TN, about which vids in a separate post.
RUSSIAN troops surrender to Ukraine in Liman
Beau on ATTACKS within Russia including death of VT
Sunday, April 9, 2023
Friday, April 7, 2023
TN Legislature GOP cares more about guns than children??? Tennessee Legislature Expels two you black legislators.
Thursday, April 6, 2023
The Russia Ukraine War Etc
Too busy on other threads to do more than wish all who observe a blessed Passover and or blessed ramadan.
Links from yesterday.
ANKA: Belarussians fighting WITH Ukraine
MAS: Ukraine destroys Russian train
Times Radio: "Putin has gone crazy" very high level Russian defector
Times Radio: interview with Russian Ambassador to UN
The Inforgraphics show: Finland in NATO scenarios if Russia attacks
Monday, April 3, 2023
Who killed VT, day 2 and more
Various war stuff
William Spaniel: Russia has a combat compliance problem
Crimea is on fire; people want putin to step down
Note to self: look up what the Hindustani Times is saying.
Also, RantWoman can't deal with any more war footage so save drones, Russia's thermobaic weapon (flamethrower) whatever Ukraine is getting from Israel, which navy can't go where for another day.
Special "hold a fool ferociously in the Light" for Marjorie Taylor Greene and everyone else who "just wants peace."
(RantWoman will write "I will not say 'Putin stooge'" 500 times in Braille)
There was a bonus segment to the famous MTG interview on CBS. One of the videos, oddly enough considering MTG is an antivaxxing diva, was SPONSORED BY PFIZER. It's Youtube. I don't know what that sponsorship means.
In the supplemental segment MTG said "Ukraine isn't the 51st state." Um, yeah. The #GOP is going bananas over legit refugees arriving at the southern border on foot. Just imagine if they came in tanks. And this chick is on the Homeland Security committee and on the Trying to exert Oversight over things they have no jurisdiction over committee.
Another cynical comment: western defense contractors are quietly salivating over all the old Soviet era tanks from Eastern Europe getting donated to the Ukrainian war effort: the assumption is that everyone will need to buy NEW tanks and of course they will buy them from Western suppliers.Of COURSE They will.
ALMOST enough to want to deliver some FCNL materials on cutting the defense budget as part of efforts to cut spending growth. Almost, because then one has to figure out both how to frame it and how to get past an urge to barf on people's shoes just to get in the door.
And speaking of just wanting peace, Russia is President of the UN Security Council for its regular rotation for the next 3(?) months.
RantWoman means to look at the Chinese plan which should go nowhere plan and also something that came up in one of yesterday's videos about something that Belarus may be floating.
More on Assassinated mil-blogger.
Who killed Vladlen tatarsky?
Vlad Vexler makes one think about biblical New Testament motes and logs.
Times Radio: Michael Clarke another rundown of everyone with motive.
Special Compline of Lament and Remembrance dated March 19, 2023
RantWoman has meant to do SOMETHING to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of the launch of Gulf War 2, Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Here is such Light as comes to RantWoman
Video of special compline of lament and remembrance, St Mark's cathedral March 19, 2023
We MUST talk about Donald J. Trump; we MUST also talk about George W Bush.
Mehdi Hasan and Tom Nichols on Iraq / Bush and Putin / Ukraine
RantWoman is not nostalgic about a Friends World Committee on Consultation Section of the Americas gathering whee Arab Americans spoke of "my name is random" when passing through TSA checkpoints and where others said things along the lines of "if war in inevitable, let's get it over with."
RantWoman remembers MASSIVE antiwar demonstrations all over the world, although there is crickets about any mention of that in most restrospectives RantWoman has encountered..
And today RantWoman was remembering in a email exchange about a law student with PTSD and issues with VA benefits he should be entitled to: RantWoman recalls the cost of pensions and benefits for US troops not even being figured in Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's calculations of war costs.
Example story: former US Senate candidate Tiffany Smiley and her husband scotty
[Correction and Blindness related digression The story above is factually inaccurate though about Scotty being the first blinded veteran to return to active duty. There is at least one other one from the Iraq era. He became a campus recruiter which to RantWoman seems like a tough sell for people considering signing up. More importantly after WWII the military specifically kept some blinded troops on active duty so they could be ordered to do mobility training and other rehabilitation.]
And we will not even discuss the truly SHITTY treatment and bureaucratic mazes that interpreters the US depended on had to try to hack through to achieve the refugee status their sacrifices entitled them to.
RantWoman is thinking off all this contemplating the current frightening layers of the war in Ukraine, but more on that in another post.
The war as of 4/3/2023
Again, RantWoman posts a sampling of what Youtube sends her for background, preferably from multiple points of view, with minimal effort to analyze.
Oracle Eyes: The war, from Lukashenko's perspective
Updated reports on Russian naval losses
First woman who volunteerd on Russian side killed. Now women prisoners getting drafted
BBC report on assassination of pro Russian blogger Vladlen Tatarsky
Times Radio report on death of milblogger Vladlen Tatarsky
WION reports RU Health ministry says 25 casualties at Tatarsky lecture no shortage of motive
MAS News on situations inside Russia
Infinity: General Petraeus on a bunch of topics
US Warships involved in naval blockade
CNNFareed Zakaria interviews Gen. Mc Craven about what Ukraine needs to win