freckles make me strong.
Month
You are awful. Stop lying to me. First you say 15 minutes. Ten minutes later you say 3 miles away. 10 minutes later still you say it’s 6 miles away. LIAR!
Daily Dose - Wal-Mart Gets Behind Employer Mandate
This is suprizing.
needtherapy:
Parents of children born with an ambiguous gender often beg doctors to let them choose one gender or another. Now, in Sweden, a couple has decided to raise their now 2-year-old with no gender. Of course, the kid has one, but they won’t tell anyone what it is. They dress the kid in any old colors. When they change the diaper, they hide its parts. The kid’s name is Pop. “We want Pop to grow up more freely and avoid being forced into a specific gender mould from the outset,” Pop’s mother told a Swedish newspaper. “It’s cruel to bring a child into the world with a blue or pink stamp on their forehead.“
notthatkindagay:
notthebarefootcontessa:
A small Kansas church that has gained nationwide attention for protesting loudly at funerals of U.S. service members killed in overseas conflicts received a temporary victory from the Supreme Court over their free speech rights.
The justices Monday rejected an appeal from Missouri officials over their efforts to keep members of the Wichita-based Westboro Baptist Church from demonstrating at least 300 feet from memorial services and burials.
The church, led by pastor Fred Phelps, believes God is punishing the United States for “the sin of homosexuality,” through events including soldiers’ deaths. Members have traveled the country, shouting at grieving family members at funerals and displaying such signs as “Thank God for Dead Soldiers,” “God Blew Up the Troops” and “AIDS Cures Fags.”
notthatkindagay:
thatswhatimsaying: molls: pams: buyhercandy: abbyjean
On a daily basis as a straight person…
- I can be pretty sure that my roomate, hallmates and classmates will be comfortable with my sexual orientation.
- If I pick up a magazine, watch TV, or play music, I can be certain my sexual orientation will be represented.
- When I talk about my heterosexuality (such as in a joke or talking about my relationships), I will not be accused of pushing my sexual orientation onto others.
- I do not have to fear that if my family or friends find out about my sexual orientation there will be economic, emotional, physical or psychological consequences.
- I did not grow up with games that attack my sexual orientation (IE fag tag or smear the queer).
- I am not accused of being abused, warped or psychologically confused because of my sexual orientation.
- I can go home from most meetings, classes, and conversations without feeling excluded, fearful, attacked, isolated, outnumbered, unheard, held at a distance, stereotyped or feared because of my sexual orientation.
- I am never asked to speak for everyone who is heterosexual.
- I can be sure that my classes will require curricular materials that testify to the existence of people with my sexual orientation.
- People don’t ask why I made my choice of sexual orientation.
- People don’t ask why I made my choice to be public about my sexual orientation.
- I do not have to fear revealing my sexual orientation to friends or family. It’s assumed.
- My sexual orientation was never associated with a closet.
- People of my gender do not try to convince me to change my sexual orientation.
- I don’t have to defend my heterosexuality.
- I can easily find a religious community that will not exclude me for being heterosexual.
- I can count on finding a therapist or doctor willing and able to talk about my sexuality.
- I am guaranteed to find sex education literature for couples with my sexual orientation.
- Because of my sexual orientation, I do not need to worry that people will harass me.
- I have no need to qualify my straight identity.
- My masculinity/femininity is not challenged because of my sexual orientation.
- I am not identified by my sexual orientation.
- I can be sure that if I need legal or medical help my sexual orientation will not work against me.
- If my day, week, or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether it has sexual orientation overtones.
- Whether I rent or I go to a theater, Blockbuster, an EFS or TOFS movie, I can be sure I will not have trouble finding my sexual orientation represented.
- I can walk in public with my significant other and not have people double-take or stare.
- I can choose to not think politically about my sexual orientation.
- I do not have to worry about telling my roommate about my sexuality. It is assumed I am a heterosexual.
- I can remain oblivious of the language and culture of LGBTQ folk without feeling in my culture any penalty for such oblivion.
- I can go for months without being called straight.
- I’m not grouped because of my sexual orientation.
- My individual behavior does not reflect on people who identity as heterosexual.
- In everyday conversation, the language my friends and I use generally assumes my sexual orientation. For example, sex inappropriately referring to only heterosexual sex or family meaning heterosexual relationships with kids.
- People do not assume I am experienced in sex (or that I even have it!) merely because of my sexual orientation.
- I can kiss a person of the opposite gender on the heart or in the cafeteria without being watched and stared at.
- Nobody calls me straight with maliciousness.
- People can use terms that describe my sexual orientation and mean positive things (IE “straight as an arrow”, “standing up straight” or “straightened out”) instead of demeaning terms (IE “ewww, that’s gay” or being “queer”).
- I am not asked to think about why I am straight.
- I can be open about my sexual orientation without worrying about my job.
Why are men, taken on average and as a whole, funnier than women?” inquired Christopher Hitchens in “Why Women Aren’t Funny,” Vanity Fair, January 2007.
That’s a good question. And by that I mean, fuck you.
Since women are so hilarious all the time/everywhere (see: Margaret Cho, Janeane Garofalo, Starlee Kine, Katie Crouch, Kristen Schaal, etc.), I’d like to feature the women of McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, who are reliably hysterical, clever, and concise. Below is what I consider the best of what women have written for the site since the beginning of 2008.
…
The list (out of hundreds and in no particular order):
The Sexually Fluid Person’s Guide to a Seamlessly Uneventful Coming Out by Amy York Rubin
Commentary by David Simon, Creator of The Wire, for the He’s Just Not That Into You DVD by Maureen Miller
Shakespeare Wrote for Money: An Introduction by Sarah Vowell
Ulysses Sells Out by Rebekah Frumkin
The Talk by Julia Weiss
Sick of the Revolution by Deb Olin Unferth
Everything Is Wrong With You: A Letter from Dr. Phil by Wendy Molyneux
An Overheard Conversation at the Suburban Neighborhood Pool, if the Suburban Neighborhood Pool Were in Deadwood by Kari Anne Roy
Children’s-Film Sequels as Imagined by Famous Directors by Rebekah Frumkin
The Letters of Abelard and Heloise: Mattress Salesman and Customer by Marianne Hess
Proust Discovers LiveJournal by Summer Block Kumar
Amazon.com’s Recommendation Algorithm Applied to Life Events by Maribeth Mooney
Borges Teaches Self-Defense by Susan Schorn
Yoga Proverbs by Crystal Schachter
OK, It’s Time to Talk about the Elephant in the Room by Wendy Molyneux
Conversations My Parents Must Have Had While Planning to Raise a Child by Jen Statsky
Real Historical Dolls: A Catalog by Kathryn Higgins
A Suburban Mother Tells Her 14-Year-Old Babysitter How to Make Her Parties More Raging by Wendi Aarons
Abstinence-Only Driver’s Ed by Suzanne Kleid
The Tom Tom Club Catechism by Maureen Miller
Production Rider for Kate Kershner’s Holiday Visit Home Tour by Kate Kershner
Bikram Writing 101 by Liz Worthy
Essay Prompts for the 2009 Senior Advanced Placement High School Engish Exam for Women by Wendy Molyneux
And a special treat: Comments Written by Actual Students Extracted from Workshopped Manuscripts at a Major University collected by Tanya Rey
(via notthatkindagay)
Lawyers for President Obama are quietly drafting first-of-their kind guidelines barring workplace discrimination against transgender federal employees, officials said Tuesday.
The guidelines will be in an updated federal handbook for managers and supervisors to be distributed and posted online in the next couple of months, and they could also be included in other materials for managers. They will list transgender people — those who identify their gender differently from the information on their birth certificates — as among several groups protected by antidiscrimination laws.
Though transgender men and women are not believed to make up more than a fraction of a percent of the federal work force, their inclusion in the discrimination guidelines is seen as a breakthrough by transgender and gay rights advocates.
“The president is making a very clear statement that transgender people won’t be discriminated against,” said Mara Keisling, the executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, a group that has been talking with the White House about the new provisions.
This is the kind of change I believe in and the progress I know we are capable of.
On Saturday, I was walking around the Green Lake neighborhood and I saw a man across the street from me fall out of his wheelchair while trying to navigate the curb.
I was about the cross the street to try to help when I saw three dudes coming sprinting over to the scene. The men hoisted the stranger back into his wheelchair, made sure he was okay and helped him over the curb.
It is moments like these that make a person believe in the common humanity of us all and the general goodwill of people.
Thank you, fellow Seattleites, for this moment of inspiration.
(via seashelllz)
My personal favorite:
“I’m a Republican.”
There is no surer ticket to the Western State Mental Hospital for the Criminally Insane than to make this declaration in Seattle today. Republicans haven’t been a factor here in 40 years. Most people in Seattle have never met a Republican, let alone voted for one. To admit to being a Republican is to declare war on the sensibilities of the recycling, biking, companion-pet-owning, suburban-hating loners you live among. If you are not involuntarily committed, you will be advised to move to Bellevue, where you can speed the way toward planetary death with your own kind.
apsies:
President Barack Obama is expected to sign into law the “cash for clunkers” program, which was approved by the Senate on Thursday. For owners of low-mileage models such as the 1994 Ford Bronco, 1998 Nissan Pathfinder or the 1995 Chevrolet Blazer, the plan could give them a reason to visit their local car dealer during an economic downturn.
Here’s how the plan works: Car owners could get a voucher worth $3,500 if they traded in a vehicle getting 18 miles per gallon or less for one getting at least 22 mpg. The voucher would grow to $4,500 if the new car’s mileage was 10 mpg higher than the old vehicle. The mpg figures are listed on the car’s window sticker.
Owners of sport utility vehicles, pickup trucks or minivans getting 18 mpg or less could receive a voucher for $3,500 if their new truck or SUV got at least 2 mpg higher than their old vehicle. The voucher would increase to $4,500 if the mileage of the new truck or SUV was at least 5 mpg higher than the older vehicle
My head says, “no.” My gut says, “NO CHANCE”, but my bank account says, “Well, maybe…”.
(via notthatkindagay)
The brief also maintains that the Defense of Marriage Act represents a “cautious policy of federal neutrality” — an odd assertion since the law clearly discriminates against gay couples. Under the act, same-sex married couples who pay their taxes are ineligible for the sort of federal benefits — such as Social Security survivors’ payments and joint tax returns — that heterosexual married couples receive.
In the presidential campaign, President Obama declared that he would work to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act. Now, the administration appears to be defending it out of a sense of obligation to support a validly enacted Congressional law. There is a strong presumption that the Justice Department will defend federal laws, but it is not an inviolable rule.
If the administration does feel compelled to defend the act, it should do so in a less hurtful way. It could have crafted its legal arguments in general terms, as a simple description of where it believes the law now stands. There was no need to resort to specious arguments and inflammatory language to impugn same-sex marriage as an institution.
The best approach of all would have been to make clear, even as it defends the law in court, that it is fighting for gay rights. It should work to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,” the law that bans gay men and lesbians in the military from being open about their sexuality. It should push hard for a federal law banning employment discrimination. It should also work to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act in Congress.
The administration has had its hands full with the financial crisis, health care, Guantánamo Bay and other pressing matters. In times like these, issues like repealing the marriage act can seem like a distraction — or a political liability. But busy calendars and political expediency are no excuse for making one group of Americans wait any longer for equal rights.
See something, say something. Share your dissapointment with President Obama.
Really?
When I pointed out the box office successes of Sex and The City, Mamma Mia, and Obsessed, he called them “flukes.” He said “don’t quote me on this.” So, I’m telling everybody.
”—Nia Vardalos in a HuffPo guest column
This just puts concretely the sentiment behind that Dear Pixar piece. Studio executives DO want movie leads to be male, and they feel they have the right to tell the writers so, even if the writers are themselves female, and apparently, a lot of writers respond.
(via natface)No doubt there are some genuine horror stories in Canada, as there are here in the United States.
But the bottom line is that America’s health care system spends nearly twice as much per person as Canada’s (building the wealth of hospital tycoons like Mr. Scott). Yet our infant mortality rate is 40 percent higher than Canada’s, and American mothers are 57 percent more likely to die in childbirth than Canadian ones.
”—Op-Ed Columnist - This Time, We Won’t Scare - NYTimes.comLaw enforcement officials have identified the suspect in the Holocaust Museum shootings as James Wenneker von Brunn, born in 1920, from the Eastern Shore of Maryland. D.C. Police Spokeswoman Traci Hughes reportedly said the suspect walked into the museum at about 1 p.m. ET with a rifle and shot a guard. [full article]
notthatkindagay:
If gay marriage is allowed, the nation will soon begin to experience more and more degradation of the nuclear family - resulting in fewer kids being raised by both a mom and a dad…
What will the landscape of America look like if same-sex marriage is legalized across our nation? According to the writings of Dr. Stanley Kurtz, nations who have gone this way see a dramatic increase in out of wedlock births, long-term singleness, and other symptoms of the devaluation of the institution. If the American family loses the presence of its birth dad in the home, there will be several huge consequences.
Consider these statistics.
- Over half of Americans studied in a survey in 2001 by Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government believe that the high number of single-parent families is a major cause of poverty.
- Studies also reveal that most Americans believe that welfare programs encourage single-parent families and teenage pregnancy.
- Malcolm D. Williams in 1997, used a sample of 1,610 10-13 year-olds in a study. He found that children who learn to share significant ideas with their fathers had fewer behavior problems and developed stronger cognitive abilities than their peers.
- Similar results were found in a 1995 study of 254 black adolescents living with both of their biological parents. Ninety-six percent of these boys said their fathers were their role models. In this study, only 44 percent of black adolescents who were not living with their fathers said their fathers were their role models.
- The Journal of Family Psychology in 2000 reported a study of 116 African American students ages 10-13. The boys with married parents were found to have much higher levels of self esteem and a better sense of personal power and self-control compared to single-mother homes.
- Repeatedly, scholarly studies focused on adolescence show that early onset of puberty in girls is a major problem. It is associated with negative psychological, social, and health problems. Depression, alcohol consumption, and higher teenage pregnancy rates are some of the results. An eight year study of girls and their families showed that a father’s presence in the home, with appropriate involvement in his children’s lives, contributed to later pubertal timing of the daughters in the seventh grade.
Gay Marriage is why black children don’t have role-models, girls hit puberty earlier, and why we have poverty, welfare, and births out of wed-lock.
Gays: stealing your fathers, your money, and your daughter’s virginity (without protection) since 1969.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the source of poverty was as easy to diagnose as marital status? We would no longer have to consider socio-economic background, education or employment discrimination based on race or gender or any of the other messy dimensions of privilege. We wouldn’t consider the working poor who take the bus from job to job to job and still can barely pay rent because minimum wage isn’t enough to pay for rent and day care and medical bills. All we have to do is pick something that makes us uncomfortable and say it is caused by something which we disapprove. Watch, it’s easy!
Single people on welfare CAUSED BY gay marriage
Teen Pregnancy is CAUSED BY discussion of safe sex
School shootings are CAUSED BY Marilyn Manson
Seymour Gottlieb, 87, on his wife, Marcia
60 Years Of Marriage: Laughter Is Love : NPR
(via missbrightside)North Beacon Hill/Rainier Valley bucked that trend. Big time.
Here, the median price per square foot climbed 12 percent from 2007. No other neighborhood experienced greater appreciation. None even came close.
What made the hill and the valley so desirable? The area is relatively affordable, people who bought here last year say.
It’s close in. Its diversity is a big plus.
And it boasts an amenity almost no other neighborhood can offer: the region’s first light-rail line, scheduled to carry its first passenger July 18.
This is the third article about my new neighborhood that has come out this year. Apparently, what I like other people like to. Fantastic!