Women Born Transsexual

From The New York Times:  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/30/arts/music/sylvia-robinson-pioneering-producer-of-hip-hop-dies-at-75.html?ref=obituaries

By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
Published: September 30, 2011

Sylvia Robinson, a singer, songwriter and record producer who formed the pioneering hip-hop group Sugarhill Gang and made the first commercially successful rap recording with them, died on Thursday in Edison, N.J. She was 75.

She had been in a coma at the New Jersey Institute of Neuroscience and died there of congestive heart failure, a family spokeswoman said. Ms. Robinson lived in Englewood, N.J.

Ms. Robinson had a successful career as a rhythm and blues singer long before she and her husband, Joe Robinson, formed Sugar Hill Records in the 1970s and went on to serve as the midwives for a musical genre that came to dominate pop music.

She sang with Mickey Baker as part of the duo Mickey & Sylvia in the 1950s and had several hits, including “Love Is Strange,” a No. 1 R&B song in 1957. She also had a solo hit, under the name Sylvia, in the spring of 1973 with her sultry and sexually charged song “Pillow Talk.”

In the late 1960s, Ms. Robinson became one of the few women to produce records in any genre when she and her husband founded All Platinum Records. She played an important role in the career of The Moments, producing their 1970 hit single “Love on a Two-Way Street.”

Continue reading at: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/30/arts/music/sylvia-robinson-pioneering-producer-of-hip-hop-dies-at-75.html?ref=obituaries

Transsexual and Transgender Folks try to damned hard to be accepted by a bunch of irrelevant bigots.

Since I started exploring this topic of “radical feminism” aka “cultural feminism” aka “gender feminism” I’ve discovered a couple of things.  First:  Some women, who rightly fall in the conservative right wing camp were right in their criticisms of some of the things proposed by the “radical feminists”.  (Daphne Patai: Heterophobia: Sexual Harassment and the Future of Feminism and Christina Hoff Sommers: Who Stole Feminism?: How Women Have Betrayed Women)

I want to make it clear that I endorse neither Patai nor Sommers, however Sommers did lay out how cultural feminism, which she labeled as “gender feminism” became the post- 1970s face of Feminism.

Radical Feminism has nothing to do with NOW.  It has nothing to do with left wing revolutionary feminism.

It is more like a small cult of fanatical bigots.  The interesting thing is how most of them wear hoods (hide behind aliases) I give Bev Jo Von Dohre, Julie Bindel, and Sheila Jefferys credit for at least being open bigots rather than hiding behind aliases like GallusMag.

Yet when you scope out just who the spreaders of anti-trans hate and disinformation are on sites like Gender Trender you discover the same handful of aliases cropping up again and again.  I have to give them this many have the same level of tenacity as Zoe Brain shows on the Transgender side of the aisle.

These people should not be considered representatives of the LGBT/T  community nor should they be considered representative of the feminist community.  Although those communities act like the main line religions who refuse to denounce the religious fanatics among their midst.  Allowing this handful people to intimidate them into silence regarding the hate this tiny minority of “radical feminists” spew gives tacit approval to their message.

To cite an old cliche regarding the banality of evil, “All evil and hate needs to succeed is for good people to say nothing.

I am not one to remain silent in the face of evil.  Years ago, much to my regret I said nothing when these same bigots were trashing people I knew were good people.  I was afraid of losing the acceptance I had gained.  I overly valued a place and an acceptance that was all too fragile and conditioned upon my either remaining silent or joining in the bullying.

Eventually I realized my feminism was based on my personal values and not upon my being part of a group that allowed the bigotry of people like Jan Raymond to go unchallenged.

I realized that most lesbians didn’t give a shit about the politics, but were instead simply women who loved and had sex with other women.  I found many of them thought the games played by the cultural feminists and political lesbians (Explaining political lesbian is another column completely) were completely absurd.

I discovered that lots of lesbian couples were more interested in their careers, and other causes.  Many were part of the local Democratic Party organizations, the food movement, the Eco-movements. Not to mention the sit around and drink beer and smoke dope while screwing around playing music movement.

But digging into what makes these people tick was perversely interesting, as I have discovered that their filthy bigoted shit could have been scripted by Porno Pete LaBarbera, or Charlie Prince.  Or for that matter by anyone of thousands of homophobic, misogynistic religious bigots out there who have made life harder for women as well as LGBT/T folks.

Change the noun used in the rants of these people and you have the message of the racist or the anti-Semite.

Examining their material for more than an instant should make its contradictory hateful nature obvious to all but the most willfully blind.

The hateful shit put up on Gender Trender exposing the WBTs who went to the Michigan Wimmin’s Hate Fest, the maliciousness of their lies and abuse shows the real nature of these self-appointed “radical feminists”.

I would urge any post-transsexual women and transgender women too (who might want to extend their activism beyond the Borg) to look at what is happening with the folks who are with Occupy Wallstreet.  Or protesting the oil sands pipeline.

The women involved in those movements are real feminists unlike the self appointed “radical feminist wankers”.

Hell, Medea Benjamin of Code Pink and Robin McGee of Get Equal are leading movements that really are movements where feminism is a core value.

When I was a little transkid getting the shit abused out of me by the same sort of bullies as these “radical feminists” I learned I had a variety of options.  I could wage war against them or I could ignore them.  Or do a combination of both.

What I couldn’t do was accept that the bullies had a point, not when their point was that I was worthless as a human being.

I recently had an exchange with a douche bag named BevJo, who has stalked my friend Beth Elliott for some 40 years.

When she He’ed me and started trying to put me down, I engaged in verbal Aikido.

I stated that what she thought of me was meaningless and irrelevant.  Indeed she can think what ever she wishes regarding me.  I think she is full of shit and that what ever bile spews forth from her poisoned mouth is filth that I can ignore as having zero value.

I consider this person a bigot and anything she thinks or says has less value than a truck load of dioxin laced soil from a toxic waste clean up site.

My self esteem comes for inside.  It comes from those who know and like me.  It comes from the things I do and accomplish.

I don’t even need to stand in front of a mirror in the morning and recite positive affirmations, the way I did on the recommendations of a therapist back in the 1970s. Back then I made the mistake of internalizing some of the hateful shit spewed by these bigots and wound up in therapy.

No more.

Life has been hard and like the quote from Nietzsche, “That which does not kill us, only makes us stronger.”  I’ve turned into a resilient, tough old hippie woman and I don’t take shit from bullies.

From The Business Insider: http://www.businessinsider.com/a-massive-union-just-voted-to-side-with-the-wall-street-protesters-2011-9

Linette Lopez
Sep. 29, 2011

According to Daily Kos, The New York Transit Workers Union (TWU) voted to supportthe Wall Street Protestors at their meeting last night.

A member of TWU Local 100 told a reporter that they would join the protest Friday at 4PM.

Here’s more about them from their website:

The TWU has four main divisions: Railroad; Gaming; Airline; Transit; and Utility, University and Service. The Union has 114 autonomous locals representing over 200,000 members and retirees in 22 states around the country.

Occupy Wall Street has been picking up some decent support from unions in the past few days. Yesterday we reported that the Teamsters Union declared their support for protestors, and we also found out that the United Pilots Union had members at the protest demonstrating in uniform.

Romney is a freaking pathetic ass kisser who is sucking up to people who hate him because he is Mormon and he just doesn’t get it.

He would probably have been better treated if he had been a moderate Democrat.

At least he wouldn’t have to kiss the ass of Christo-Nazi Bryan Fischer, who is pissing on him.

Plus he could have stood by some of the decent things he did as governor, like the Massachusetts Health Care Program he helped pass.

From People for the American Way:  http://www.pfaw.org/press-releases/2011/09/romney-to-share-stage-with-bryan-fischer

Press Release:  Sep 29, 2011

At next week’s Values Voter Summit, Mitt Romney is scheduled to take the stage immediately before Bryan Fischer, an American Family Association (AFA) spokesman with a long and shocking record of bigotry against gays and lesbians, American Muslims, Native Americans and other minority groups. Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, Herman Cain and Rick Santorum are also scheduled to speak at the event, which is sponsored by the anti-gay Family Research Council, the AFA, and other Religious Right groups. PFAW is urging these candidates for our nation’s highest office to condemn bigotry.

At next week’s Values Voter Summit, Mitt Romney is scheduled to take the stage immediately before Bryan Fischer, an American Family Association spokesman with a long and shocking record of bigotry against gays and lesbians, American Muslims, Native Americans and other minority groups. Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, Herman Cain and Rick Santorum are also scheduled to speak at the event, which is sponsored by the anti-gay Family Research Council, the AFA, and other Religious Right groups.

Last year, People For the American Way called on Romney and other prominent GOP leaders to denounce Fischer’s bigotry before appearing with him at the Values Voter Summit. This year, the event’s organizers kept Fischer off the list of “confirmed speakers,” but listed his Oct. 8 speech on an event schedule posted yesterday, PFAW’s Right Wing Watch reports.

• Fischer, the chief spokesman for the AFA, has insisted that American Muslims have no First Amendment rights, has said that Muslims should be banned from the U.S. military, and has called for a ban on the building of new mosques in the U.S.

• · Fischer has written that “ gay sex is a form of domestic terrorism ,” thinks gays and lesbians should be “ disqualified from public office ,” claims that gays are responsible for the Nazi Party and that gay people today will ” do the same thing to you that the Nazis did to their opponents in Nazi Germany “.

• Fischer has insisted that Native Americans are “ morally disqualified” from controlling American land and insists that American Indian communities are “mired in poverty and alcoholism” because not all have converted to Christianity

• He has written that African American welfare recipients “ rut like rabbits.”

• Last year, Fischer insulted Medal of Honor winner Sal Giunta, who saved the lives of two fellow soldiers under heavy fire in Afghanistan, saying “we have feminized the Medal of Honor” because “we now award it only for preventing casualties, not for inflicting them.”

People For the American Way president Michael Keegan urged Romney and his fellow presidential candidates to denounce Fischer’s bigotry before appearing with him at the event.

“Bryan Fischer’s stunning record of public bigotry would make him a pariah in any sane political movement,” Keegan said. “But his long record of hate speech doesn’t seem to bother the supposed ‘mainstream’ GOP politicians like Mitt Romney and Rick Perry who are sharing the stage with him at an event sponsored by his employer. Candidates don’t have to agree with the views of everyone they appear with – but they should be wary of lending legitimacy to those who peddle hate and fear of their fellow Americans.

“If Mitt Romney wants to appeal to mainstream audiences, he should publicly disassociate himself from Fischer’s bigotry before handing him the podium.”

For more information on Bryan Fischer, see PFAW’s report, The GOP’s Favorite Hate-Monger: How the Republican Party Came to Embrace Bryan Fischer and the video Four Minutes of Hate: The Naked Bigory of the AFA’s Bryan Fischer .

From Truth Dig: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/class_warfare_bring_it_on_20110928/

By Richard Reeves
Posted on Sep 28, 2011

LOS ANGELES—President Obama came out here last Tuesday to proclaim himself a “warrior for the middle class.” Would that it were true.

In a similar situation to what we have today—that is the rich get richer and the poor (and middle class) get poorer—President Franklin Roosevelt said of what used to be called plutocrats: “I welcome their hatred.”

I’m not sure that Obama, the rationalist beloved, is capable of talking that way or acting that way. Evidence be damned, he has acted as if we are in a time of rational discourse about class, job creation, incentives, and all the rest of modern populism. He seems to accept Republican and conservative blather about “job creators.” Where the hell have the job creators—rich investors and their banks—been these last few years of heartbreaking struggle for the middle and lower classes?

Well, they have been “creating wealth,” piled up in banks, profits and their own accounts. The “investing class,” as President George H.W. Bush called them, has been creating jobs—in China and other points east maybe, but not here.

In The Guardian in England, economist Richard Wolff has written:

“The charge of class war is particularly obtuse. Consider simply these two facts. First, at the end of the Second World War, for every dollar Washington raised in taxes on individuals, it raised $1.50 in taxes on business profits. Today, that ratio is very different: For every dollar Washington gets in taxes on individuals, it takes 25 cents in taxes on business. In short, the last half-century has seen a massive shift of the burden of federal taxation off business and onto individuals.

“Second, across those 50 years, the actual shift that occurred was the opposite of the much more modest reversal proposed this week by President Obama; over the same period, the federal income tax rate on the richest individuals fell from 91 percent to the current 35 percent. Yet, Republicans and conservatives use the term ‘class war’ for what Obama proposes—and never for what the last five decades have accomplished in shifting the tax burden from the rich and corporations to the working class.

Continue reading at:  http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/class_warfare_bring_it_on_20110928/

From Alternet: http://www.alternet.org/belief/152538/how_conservative_politicians_wait_for_god_to_fix_the_economy%2C_with_frightening_results/

The theology embraced by American religious conservatives may render them immune to evidence and reason when it comes to economic management.

By Joshua Holland
September 26, 2011

Is it merely partisan politics and the misguided ideology of “austerity” that leads conservatives to reject commonsense fixes for this miserable economy? Or is something else going on?

It may well be the latter. A study released last fall suggests that the theology embraced by American religious conservatives may render them immune to evidence and reason when it comes to economic management. The study found that a sizable minority share a uniquely faith-based view of how the economy functions, believing that both good and bad outcomes are an expression of God’s will, and are therefore beyond the reach of mere mortals.

This may help explain the disconnect between the gravity of our economic crisis and lawmakers’ – especially conservative lawmakers’ — decided lack of a sense of urgency in addressing it. Consider for a moment three related facts that, taken together, cast what appears to be the sheer madness of our nation’s economic stewardship in sharp relief.

First, we have an “infrastructure gap” of over $2 trillion. According to a report by the American Society of Civil Engineers, the nation’s “deteriorating surface transportation infrastructure,” if not upgraded, “will cost the American economy more than 876,000 jobs, and suppress the growth of the country’s Gross Domestic Product by $897 billion by 2020.” That doesn’t speak to energy or communications infrastructure – just roads and bridges and the like.

Second, the construction industry was absolutely devastated by the bursting housing bubble. While the overall unemployment rate hovers around 9 percent, it’s still at 13.5 percent for construction workers. The Architechtural Record estimated that 20-30 percent of the nation’s architects were jobless as of last fall.

Finally, in effect, investors are now willing to pay the United States government to lend it money. That’s right, after factoring in inflation, the real interest the government must pay on five- and seven-year bonds is currently in negative territory.

So we face a huge gap between our potential and actual output. People and equipment are standing idle, we have deteriorating infrastructure which, if left unrepared, the civil engineers tell us will cost the average American household $1,600 per year in higher prices and lower incomes, and the government has access to what is essentially free money to repair it — a move that would get a lot of unemployed people back to work in the process.

Within the reality-based community, this situation represents a true no-brainer. As economist Dean Baker writes, “We know how to get out of this mess, we have known how for 70 years. We just need the government to generate demand. That means spending money.”

But, according to the study — commissioned by Baylor University, the National Science Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation — only about one in five Americans adhere to a purely secular view of the economy. Almost three in four say, “I know God has a plan for me,” and within that group, about half believe the government is “trying to do too many things” that should be left to the private sector, eight in 10 believe “able-bodied people who are out of work shouldn’t receive unemployment checks” and more than 90 percent believe in the myth that the American economy represents a pure meritocracy in which people are limited only by their innate talents and appettite for hard work.

Continue reading at:  http://www.alternet.org/belief/152538/how_conservative_politicians_wait_for_god_to_fix_the_economy%2C_with_frightening_results/

From The Rolling Stone:  http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-keystone-pipeline-revolt-why-mass-arrests-are-just-the-beginning-20110928

Inside the growing movement to shut down the environmentally devastating tar-sands project

When we were hauled away from the gates of the White House on the morning of Saturday, August 20th, where 65 of us had been peacefully sitting in for an hour to urge the president to veto the proposed Keystone XL pipeline – a 1,700-mile fuse to the biggest carbon bomb on the continent – we were taken, hands cuffed behind our backs, in paddy wagons to the Park Police headquarters across the river Anacostia. There we sat – hands still cuffed – on a lawn for a couple of hours, until one by one we were called inside, uncuffed and stripped of all but our clothes. (I mean all – they took away my wedding ring, which hadn’t been off in 23 years, saying, “Where you’re going, they’ll cut off your finger for that.”) An officer with a ballpoint pen filled out every form in triplicate. (The Park Police still seem to be deciding if the whole digital thing is going to work out – there were three IBM Wheelwriter typewriters circa 1974 on a desk, but Bic apparently remains the technology of choice.) We stood 15 men to a five-by-seven cell for five or six hours (until need finally overcame squeamish reticence and we used the toilet in the center of the cell). Eventually, they recuffed us and put us back in the wagon for the ride to Central Cell Block, still with no idea of our prospects.

There the District police fingerprinted us and locked us up, two apiece, in four-by-seven cells. No beds, just two stainless-steel slabs without mattress, sheet or pillow. (Shoes make decent pillows, but it’s harder than it sounds to sleep on bare steel – my hips were still bruised two weeks later.) We stayed there all night, all the next day and all the next night; baloney sandwiches and a Styrofoam cup of water arrived at 3 a.m. and 3 p.m. The lights never went off, the din was constant and the heat stifling. (We counted ourselves lucky, however, when we found out that the 20 women under arrest had been left in a single cell without beds of any kind, huddled together to keep warm as guards blasted an air conditioner at them.) The hours passed with incredible slowness, especially since the guards, who had taken our watches, kept lying about the time. But on Monday morning at 5 a.m. (we walked past a clock), they shackled us again, this time by the feet – you really do have to put your hand on the next guy’s shoulder, and shuffle down the hall, just like in the movies – and took us to the holding cell at the courthouse, where the 45 of us stood, feet cuffed together, in a giant cage with the rest of the District’s weekend criminals for about 10 hours. No food, no water – until finally, all of a sudden, they simply called us out and let us go. The judge, apparently, had dismissed all charges, and we were free.

Continue reading at:  http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-keystone-pipeline-revolt-why-mass-arrests-are-just-the-beginning-20110928

From Grain:  http://www.grain.org/article/entries/4357-food-and-climate-change-the-forgotten-link

GRAIN
28 September 2011

Food is a key driver of climate change. How our food gets produced and how it ends up on our tables accounts for around half of all human-generated greenhouse gas emissions. Chemical fertilizers, heavy machinery and other petroleum-dependant farm technologies contribute significantly. The impact of the food industry as a whole is even greater: destroying forests and savannahs to produce animal feed and generating climate-damaging waste through excess packaging, processing, refrigeration and the transport of food over long distances, despite leaving millions of people hungry.

A new food system could be a key driver of solutions to climate change. People around the world are involved in struggles to defend or create ways of growing and sharing food that are healthier for their communities and for the planet. If measures are taken to restructure agriculture and the larger food system around food sovereignty, small scale farming, agro-ecology and local markets, we could cut global emissions in half within a few decades. We don’t need carbon markets or techno-fixes. We need the right policies and programmes to dump the current industrial food system and create a sustainable, equitable and truly productive one instead.

Food and climate: piecing the puzzle together

Most studies put the contribution of agricultural emissions – the emissions produced on the farm – at somewhere between 11 and 15% of all global emissions.[1] What often goes unsaid, however, is that most of these emissions are generated by industrial farming practices that rely on chemical (nitrogen) fertilizers, heavy machinery run on petrol, and highly concentrated industrial livestock operations that pump out methane waste.

The figures for agriculture’s contribution also often do not account for its role in land use changes and deforestation, which are responsible for nearly a fifth of global GHG emissions.[2] Worldwide, agriculture is pushing into savannas, wetlands, cerrados and forests, plowing under huge amounts of land. The expansion of the agricultural frontier is the dominant contributor to deforestation, accounting for between 70-90% of global deforestation.[3] This means that some 15-18% of global GHG emissions are produced by land-use change and deforestation caused by agriculture. And here too, the global food system and its industrial model of agriculture are the chief culprits. The main driver of this deforestation is the expansion of industrial plantations for the production of commodities such as soy, sugarcane, oilpalm, maize and rapeseed.

Continue reading at:  http://www.grain.org/article/entries/4357-food-and-climate-change-the-forgotten-link

Getting away from Industrial mono-crop farming would help avoid these out breaks as would having an FDA that was well enough funded to have more food inspectors out there.

From The Guardian UK:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/29/listeria-outbreak-us-cantaloupe-melons

Outbreak of listeria in cantaloupe melons from Colorado farm has caused at least 72 illnesses and up to 16 deaths so far

Associated Press in Washington
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 29 September 2011

An outbreak of listeria in cantaloupe melons in the US may cause more illness and deaths in coming weeks, say health officials.

So far, the outbreak has caused at least 72 illnesses and up to 16 deaths, in 18 states, making it the deadliest food outbreak in the country in more than a decade.

The Colorado farm where the potentially deadly cantaloupes were traced to, Jensen Farms in Holly, says it shipped fruit to 25 states, and people with illnesses have been discovered in several states that were not on the shipping list.

A spokeswoman for Jensen Farms said the company’s product is often sold and resold, so they do not always know where it ends up.

“If it’s not Jensen Farms, it’s OK to eat,” said Thomas Frieden, director of the US Centres for Disease Control. “But if you can’t confirm it’s not Jensen Farms, then it’s best to throw it out.”

The recalled cantaloupes may be labelled “Colorado Grown,” “Distributed by Frontera Produce,” “Jensenfarms.com” or “Sweet Rocky Fords” but not every recalled cantaloupe is labelled with a sticker, the US Food and Drug Administration said. The company said it shipped out more than 300,000 cases of cantaloupes that contained five to 15 melons each, meaning the recall involved 1.5m to 4.5m pieces of fruit.

Continue reading at:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/29/listeria-outbreak-us-cantaloupe-melons