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Life After Domestic Violence

CN: description of r*pe, uncensored use of that word, domestic violence, violations of privacy, coercion, alcohol, emesis

Heed the content notice, while this post ends on a positive note, the bulk of it is tough and potentially triggering. Please take your time and take a break if you need to.

Continue reading “Life After Domestic Violence”

Life After Domestic Violence

UPDATE: New Year, Same White Fragility: Cathy Brennan is still a Fake Goth

Back in July of last year, I wrote a post about Cathy Brennan. Since then, I and several friends have gotten 1, 3 and 7 day bans. Several friends have had their jobs called in the hopes my friends would be fired. They weren’t.
My last ban lasted a week back a few months ago. I was banned for simply posting “Cathy Brennan is a fake goth”.

It is now February 9th 2017, and I have just gotten a 30 day ban for that blog post from July ’16.

I am no one. I have this blog and Mandesty. I have my tumblr and Twitter accounts. I do not have many followers. So why the fuck does Cathy Brennan care so much if I call her a fake goth? It really is like white people JUST LOVE feeling oppressed.

My Facebook profile is a huge source of emotional support. Let’s talk about that, Cathy. I am a Latina, trans, single mom, disabled and poor. I blog about the oppression I face in my daily life.
You are a well off white cis lesbian who I’m told is a lawyer but all you seem to fucking do is go after people calling you a fake goth.

Don’t you claim to care about women, or is it just cis women you care about? No answer needed here. We’re all aware of Gender Identity Watch.
Don’t you espouse supposedly intersectional feminism? Is it in your feminism that you find it’s OK to get a Latina blogger banned on Facebook? Is that sisterhood?

Do you go this hard after the racist, sexist, misogynist posts? After the posts that make light of rape? The homophobic posts? Or do you only care that some small time blogger called you a “mean” name a few times?

Keep getting me banned on Facebook. You can’t ban me on all my social media. You can try but it’s not a good look, gringa. COME AFTER ME, I FUCKING DARE YOU.

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UPDATE FEBRUARY 9TH 2017

Cathy graced us with her presence over on my blog’s Facebook page. Below are screenshots of this. Of course she misgenders me and assumes I am male.

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According to her, I got banned for “bullying behavior”. If that was the case then how come Facebook never takes down pages or posts which post bigotry? Is she saying that bigotry is not bullying?

As the Blue commenter noted, this Catherine Brennan profile is new. My friends and I had her Cathy Brennan profile blocked. Can it be called bullying when we don’t go to her with this silly name? We post on our own pages, and she’s the one who finds us. That is not bullying. That’s abusing whatever influence or privilege she has to get vulnerable people banned.

As I noted, she insinuates I’m emotional, but again, all I did was post something months ago, and then this post today. Who’s emotional now?

UPDATE: New Year, Same White Fragility: Cathy Brennan is still a Fake Goth

Mourning a Rando’s Dick

CN: t-slur

A man messaged me on a dating site to let me know how much my feminism was a “dick killer”. How as soon as he saw my picture he lost interest and would rather “fuck a hole in the wall”. How he thought I was interesting until he saw “feminist”, how he thought I was a “tr*nny”. And again reminded me how much of a “dick killer” I am.

Oh how will I ever go on? I have hurt this man. He was so confused. How dare my uninteresting face made him look at my interesting profile until he saw that dreaded F word.

I know this man’s pain. Many times I have walked into baseball stadiums to loudly tell every one how much I hate that game.

I once bought a cheeseburger and then angrily demanded my money back because of how much I hate them.

This poor man.

How will I ever go on knowing the hurt I caused this man? How will I ever go on knowing he won’t fuck me?

Tis truly a sad day him.

Let us all mourn this man’s dick’s death. RIP, dick. RIP.

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Mourning a Rando’s Dick

Dad Jokes

So there’s this new thing that fathers are doing called the Cheerio Challenge and it’s about who can prove who’s the biggest tool  funniest dad.

Ever wonder why there is such a thing as “dad jokes” but not the mom equivalent? Because dads are allowed to be silly. Dads are allowed to do this type of shit and not have people question their parenting ability. It’s why we have goddamn parades for weekend dads but condemn single moms. Seriously, look at any story about a single dad and you’ll get bombarded with comments on how “selfless” and “wonderful” the dad is. Look at stories about single moms and you’ll find comments questioning her ability to parent. They’ll wonder why she’s single. Single dads (or dads in general really) get praised. Single moms get scorned.

It’s why people went gaga over Chris Hemsworth baking a cake for his daughter. Seriously? He baked a cake. Clearly, he’s wasting his talents on acting. Get that man in culinary school!

It’s why we say dads are babysitting their children while mom is away.

Google “dad jokes” and you get this:

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Google “mom jokes” and you get this:

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So, do we see a difference?
Dad gets to be silly and fun; we wink at each other over how ridiculous dad is but we never say, “hey fattie, stop the jokes and get in the kitchen and feed your kids. Look pretty while you do it, toots”

The mom results are all a bunch of racist, ableist, sexist jokes at the expense of mom.

Getting back to the Cheerio Challenge: Yes, it’s cute and it’s silly, but as a single mom I really wonder what the response would be if this had been started by moms.

I also have to wonder why the fuck you’d risk waking your baby! Parents know that when baby sleeps, we can try to relax. Emphasis on try. This just seems like an incredibly inconsiderate thing to do. Because we also know how labor is usually divided in households with both parents, we can then extrapolate that mom ends up doing most of the emotional and physical labor while dad gets to waste cereal on a challenge to prove how big his dick is  how funny he is.

Fathers, doesn’t the fact that you get praised for doing the bare minimum bother you? Think about it: society is basically saying your mediocrity is just fine. You don’t need to improve; to strive to be a better parent. Doesn’t that offend you? Society doesn’t expect the best from you. It’s much like how rape culture dictates that all men can’t control themselves. We know that isn’t true. So why not do better; be better? Disrupt the narrative that fathers merely babysit their kids. Make people let go of the notion that we shouldn’t expect fathers to be fully involved in their children’s lives.

 

Dad Jokes

Ethics in Outing Abusers

CN: SA, r*pe, victim shaming

Sharing screenshots where an abuser admits to abuse isn’t morally the same as abusing someone. Sharing screenshots where an abuser admits to abuse isn’t morally the same as abusing someone.

Sharing screenshots where an abuser admits to abuse isn’t morally the same as abusing someone.

I cannot believe I have to say this. I said it last year during the Phoenix Drake fiasco and again, this year around the same time as well, concerning Dan Linford.

In both cases before any screenshots were available some people, mostly men, asked “where’s the evidence?”. Never minding the fact that both Phoenix Drake and Dan Linford admitted to rape. Never minding the fact that several people in both cases came forward with their own stories about these two.

But this post isn’t about not believing victims. Which honestly I could write a post about. No, this post is about the ethics in sharing screenshots. I’m writing this because, frankly, I am sick to death of having people not believe victims only to then shame them when they DO provide evidence. Why do they get shamed? Because apparently since both Phoenix Drake and Dan Linford confessed in private messages, they both have an ethical right to privacy.

This is where I call bullshit. If they had confessed to a mandated reporter, that person BY LAW would have to notify the authorities. This is no different. In both cases, confessions were made and the people who heard these confessions did the ethical thing and warned others. As you read in both articles linked above, these men infiltrated groups with vulnerable people, several times. This is important. They were able to do so because there hadn’t been a way for their previous victims to warn others.

But it stops here. This is how women and non-binary people protect ourselves.

Phoenix Drake and Dan Linford didn’t confess to eating too much chocolate and feeling bad about it. They confessed to rape. In both cases, they made excuses, they minimized what they did to their victims. They weren’t sorry for what they did (if they were, they would have turned themselves in, they wouldn’t have made excuses, they wouldn’t have confessed to women and NB folks and used them as emotional labor). They certainly didn’t show any ethics in their behavior.

Once someone shows themselves to be abusive they lose any right to privacy. There is no moral equivalence here. The unethical thing to do in this case would be to keep the confession to yourself. Rapists lose any right to privacy the minute they demonstrate they’re a danger to others. Indeed, it is because of this privacy that they felt confident and comfortable enough to be able to abuse again and again. (As an aside: Dan teaches philosophy and ethics. Let that bit of irony set in)

Phoenix Drake and Dan Linford will not and cannot get away with this. We will not let them. We’re tired of being abused, we’re tired of being gaslit. We’re tired of giving our trust to people unworthy of it. We don’t have many ways to defend ourselves, but we have this. I will be damned if anyone is going to guilt us for doing what we need to in order to protect ourselves.

Ethics in Outing Abusers

Tall Barbie: A Review 

Previously I had reviewed Curvy Barbie. Today I review Tall Barbie.

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Barbie Fashionistas, Fab Fringe (image is of a Brown skinned doll, she is black long sleeve top with floral print on, she’s wearing blue shorts and black booties. Her hair is red and in a curly Afro.

Original Barbie is 11.5 inches tall. This Barbie is about 13 inches tall. One of the reasons I wanted to buy this doll was because unlike most Barbies, she has short hair. Plus, she’s sporting a curly Afro!

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In addition to the new body types, Mattel has also added new face sculpts. This doll has a wide nose and full lips. Her eyes are light brown and she has a medium skin tone.

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Tall Barbie comes accessorized with black Booties and a white wrist watch

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Mattel will be releasing other tall (and curvy) dolls with fashions but for now, these dolls have to make do with the outfits they’re wearing. Tall Barbie does fit into Original Barbie’s clothes but since she is a few inches taller, the clothes are a bit shorter.
Original Barbie can fit into Tall Barbie’s clothes but as you can see above Original Barbie has a thinner waist so Tall Barbie’s shorts a bit big around that area on the Original.
Tall Barbie also has wider flatter feet but she is able to wear Original heels, however because her feet are flatter she isn’t able to stand upright with them on.

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Tall Barbie wearing Original Barbie heels. Because her feet are flatter, she ends up leaning forward when wearing these.
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Swapped outfits

Like most Barbies, Tall Barbie is not articulated.

Just like Curvy Barbie, Tall Barbie has been a big hit here at home. TJ and I are both tall and we both have curly hair. TJ is thrilled to see a doll with features closer to hers. My daughter has named her Savannah.

 

 

Tall Barbie: A Review