Saturday, April 29, 2023

A Christopher Titus sampler

Content warning:


RantWoman decided as long as she is binge-watching Christopher Titus on Youtube, some of her adoring public also deserves a sample.

These videos are raw, contain upsetting references to upsetting topics, involve language that would melt RantMom's brain.

These Videos also make RantWoman laugh very hard.

RantWoman definitely does NOT endorse every comment here


UPDATE: New Standup special about pandemic, dentist, why aliens haven't landed.

Now Enjoy The Rest Of The Videos




For better or worse, this one aged well


TW: Reference to rape


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to appear several days after the events that evoked it.RantWoman expects that unfortunately the outrages will not be out of date.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.



MT is no place to be a trans legislator. Republicans Censure First Trans Woman Elected in Montana, Zooey Zephyr





In other news, this week, Twitter is ablaze with Tweets about what does it mean to be a "real woman." Also members of the GOP are attempting to write a federal budget. Consider these two Twitter moments. CO is not in NPYM, but RantWoman's possibly childish leading to troll a certain Congresswoman, Rep. Lauren Boebert, R #CO03 persists.






 But then there here come some traffic safety issues.


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.


AOC on defunding schools and tyranny in abortion rulings

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?


Yes, I know this is an image. Both letters are linked in the articles above.


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.

One of the side effects for RantWoman about LOTS of Quaker discussion about protocols related to sexual abuse and the safety of children: RantWoman has sat through vehement commentary about the need for background checks and two adults with children's activities, as well as nostalgia for earlier times when children of privilege thought nothing of running free in venues where other groups had other behavior standards. 

RantWoman has developed a sort of chagrined realism about the need for such policies in LOTS of situations including other groups RantWoman is attached to as well as among Republicans busy losing their minds about grooming, beer with the wrong influencer on the label, and children who really NEED libraries precisely because everything to do with sex and sexuality melts their parents' brains. . 

There is NOTHING funny about any of this, but please bear with RantWoman's tart observation that not only where the #J6 planners violent thugs and liars (Yuck!), they were also pedophiles (double yuck!).



RantWoman's comment on Youtube
Why the Right is afraid of comprehensive sex ed: people of all genders are not supposed to know they have a right to say no. And what insurer on planet capitalism do these people find to insure them if they don't have PUBLIC sexual harassment policies and protocols for dealing with issues that come up???



In a related story involving members of the Far Right and dick pics,

At least MTG recognized actual grooming. This, though, is the same MTG who wanted to defund the FBI over document probes now wants them to embrace immediate investigation of dick pics! What if they investigate the dick pics and discover even more reasons to indict event planners?

Such nuance! Such perspicacity.

Also, imagine the cold calls to lawyers "we're planning an insurrection and we need you to help us write a sexual harassment policy."

This all is ALMOST as droll as Lauren Boebert, gun fanatic extraordinaire worried about 87,000 ARMED IRS agents in the infrastructure bill. Please, ma'am, how about just skipping the guns at call centers.

Tuesday, April 18, 2023

Media Coverage of the HI FCNL Advocacy Team vigil, video via Twitter

 

Monday, April 17, 2023

Two girls and the adults who believed them

 

UFM Worship room Cellphone Screenshot
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

Tonight's collection of videos with comments and disclaimers:

--RantWoman is making no effort to track down the funders of various media outlets referenced here.

--RantWoman is not particularly doing in-depth analyses of the content, more like collecting specimens of the media streams

--As an aside, Elon Musk hates NPR and wildly exaggerates the percentage of NPR budgets that comefrom the US government. RantWoman is by no means distressed though that SO FAR the peevish child who decides what constitutes free speech and / or worthwhile content on Twitter has not found a couple resources RantWoman considers valuable; these are specifically funded by the US government.

--RantWoman has made no effort to collect the range of thoughts she has seen about the arrest of Jack Teixera (Sp?) The air national guardsman arrested to great fanfare. The arrest has been all over not only US media but a number of the foreign streams RantWoman sometimes visits. 

--RantWoman gets annoyed to hear Tuck Carlson's voice mixed in with vile Russian commentators on some Russian channels. Also MTG is an idiot and since she has apparently paid her twitter fare, she now gets to go way past either 280 characters or anything approaching sensible reasoning.

--RantWoman has curated one Twitter account into a decent stream of diverse views and in-depth analyses. Too bad rantWoman has no time to read everything compiled.


Again, blind person protip: in settings on hte video, one can set increased playback speed and still maintain comprehension.










Thursday, April 13, 2023

Roland on Tim Scott and Hip hop nation on TN

RantWoman again posting example videos with different voices




And on another note:





Sorry Justice Thomas, you and your Nazi paraphrenalia collecting billionaire have to wait.


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

Perhaps it is a little incongruous to post these wonderful videos of hope and energy arising from the #TennesseeThree now all being returned in the TN legislature while the gunpowder still lurks in Louisville, (see earlier post).  But post RantWoman will.

Enjoy!?!





‘Louisville Bank Shooting "This is about life and death": Louisville mayor makes plea for gun control

RantWoman is posting these videos about the Louisville bank shooting because:

1. The smell of gunshots and the ensuing galvanized protest has not yet settled down from Nashville shootings memorialized elsewhere.

2. Selfishly, RantWoman visited Louisville last summer. This does not make RantWoman an expert on anything, but does make RantWoman breathe hot summer air, air that is both humid and reeking of August dryness, while going near the news.

3. KY is an open carry, no barrier, probably easier to buy a gun than to register to vote state. It helps RantWoman's inclination toward scorn and rage to see and pray that MAYBE these events will spur action.

RantWoman is happy to let the voices hear speak for themselves. Readers who "need" vicarious traumatization, use your dang search engines.








Wednesday, April 12, 2023

Weekly Skews 4/11/2023 – Talking Tennessee with Rep. Gloria Johnson

So much courage, groundedness and integrity about layers of reality.

Holding Justin Pearson in the Light as steps about getting his job back move forward.

This video is worth every minute. Readers who are impatient could go to Settings and adjust the playback speed. 1.5x works really well for RantWoman

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. 


ANKA: belarusian uprising


RUSSIAN troops surrender to Ukraine in Liman


Uprisings in Crimea


Beau on ATTACKS within Russia including death of VT



Friday, April 7, 2023

TN Legislature GOP cares more about guns than children??? Tennessee Legislature Expels two you black legislators.

We interrupt our regular streams about racism, war and carnage over several ponds to bring news related to gun violence and racism here at home.

Tuesday was the 55th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King. This week's civic eruptions arise after a mass shooting last week at a Christian school in Nashville that left 3 (white) children and 3 (white) adults besides the shooter dead. By all accounts the shooter had serious mental health issues. The shooter's own parents had been pleading for years to enact red flag laws to try to keep guns away from their child.


Shout out to the #TennesseeThree democratic TN lawmakers: two young Black legislators expelled and one white woman who survived an expulsion vote by one vote.


Rep. Gloria Johnson @VoteGloria nailed it and Twitter commentators perhaps unintentionally confirmed the story. The Tuesday before the Thursday vote, Representative Johnson was visited by a lawyer from the TN Legislature's ethics committee. The lawyer told her if she resigned she would not lose her insurance. Kind of "Please don't make us do something icky." 

A voice on Twitter mentioned that maybe Rep. JOhnson kept her seat because someone was worried about her losing her insurance. RantWoman read no such concern about the two young Black legislators. Instead the speculation was that they would get a lot of publicity as if fame is how people keep their insurance.

Another galling point: Rep. Johnson had two lawyers with her on the floor while the amendment about her was being voted on. Neither of the two Black legislators had lawyers with them. NO elected official should need lawyers on the floor in order to do their jobs!

RantWoman forgets which video linked below shows Rep. Pearson enumerating all the disgusting behaviors white men have NOT been expelled from the Legislature for.

The last flavor of intellectual swill oozing out of RantWoman's Twitter feed calls the TN protests against inaction in the face of children getting slaughtered in school an "insurrection." Let's see all you nice #BackTheBlue folks: 
#J6: At least 4 dead police officers and 140 officers seriously injured. Over 1000 people arrested for violent felonies.
Nashville Protests: 0 dead policemen. 0 reported injuries of police officers that RantWoman is aware of. NO arrests for violent felonies. Just some white men with their Fee-fees hurt.


It's the guns. It's the guns. 

RantWoman will now let the videos speak for themselves.

Do Better y'all!


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.

CNN

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



WMD Inspector Bush should have faced War Crimes trials and Mehdi Hasan has just blistering commentary


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


MSNBC on death of 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



VOTE Vets Ad calls for military bases to BAN Fox news.

RantWoman recommends that EVERYONE not just people represented in Congress by the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee take to heart this ferocious plea to Pentagon brass to ban Fox News on military bases or at the VERY least stop barraging the troops with it everywhere.

RantWoman is cautious on her other blog about the interests that seek to ban one media channel or another. Those comments also apply here BUT Fox has been forced to admit during document discovery that they are basically Fraud through and through. So they get to be first in line.