when a story has this paragraph in it:
Every television meteorologist and every orthodox bishop I've ever met has bought me something and later tried to fuck me. What are the odds of that? Most of them have ended up crying alone in a Vietnamese restaurant parking lot in Midtown at some point. Having bought me dinner....you should read it.
those of us who have a proper appreciation for that sacred beverage, qahwah, the bitter beans roasted to an oil-perfect finish and ground fine as flour just before le cafeterie get placed 'pon stoves or the steam machines gust and whistle into choochoolicious action, know also the secret of adding the spice. (on our left is a picture of the spice flower.)
in fiction (dune), spice is disgorged by God (which we call شئ خلود [bless the Maker and all His works; bless the coming and going of Him; may His passing cleanse the world!]).
but in reality, the real spice is known vulgarly as cardamom and it is a highly valued commodity in arab lands.
cardamom comes from india - in fact, one of the words reliably attested in reconstructions of proto-dravidian is el- "cardamom" - and it is utterly divine.
In fact, cardamom coffee — al-qahwat al-'arabiyyah or al-qahwat al-hail in Arabic — is a nearly universal symbol of hospitality on the Arabian Peninsula. [...] Like many spices, it was used as a medicine well before it found culinary uses. The Ebers Papyrus, a pharmacological document dating from about 1550 BC, provides evidence that Egyptians were already using cardamom, as well as other spices, in medicines; they also used it in cosmetic ointments, perfumes and aromatic oils, for fumigation and for embalming.the above bits point both to cardamom's ancient popularity as well as to the ancient trade routes running from the middle east into distant meluhha (what is today pakistan-north india). enough trade ran those routes in this period - which predates the arrival of the aryans into persia and north india, when a flourishing civilisation of unknown provenance and speech communities - that vast quantities of copper made their way from mesopotamia in exchange for what apparently were even more massive quantities of foodstuffs, spices and the like. (you can read about the harappans and the indus valley cultures galore online if you like, but the point is that they offered the mighty spice cardamom in sufficient quantities for it to be available in egyptian markets.) the above article, which incidentally ran in saudi aramco magazine, explains its modern significance as well:In India, cardamom was sometimes prescribed, along with cinnamon, ginger and turmeric, to remove fat and cure jaundice and urinary infections. The Indian Ayurvedic system of medicine, based on the earliest Brahmanic texts, recommended that spices such as cardamom and cloves be wrapped in betel-nut leaves and chewed after meals to increase the flow of saliva, help digestion and eliminate bad breath, and millions of Indians do precisely that today.
In Saudi Arabia, however, cardamom enjoys almost universal popularity, and a well-prepared pot of Arab coffee — with praise for the generous quantities of cardamom in it — is a staple subject of traditional colloquial poetry in Arabia.and this, dear friends, is the secret - which i tell you to offset any displeasure at a certain pear blossom meme - : put cardamom in your coffee. that is, add it ground to your grinds before espressing them; be generous, and you shall enjoy great wisdom, pleasure and joy.During the period between Ramadan and the Hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Makkah, consumption increases as between one and two million Muslims enter the country as pilgrims, swelling the population during a three-month period. Throughout the kingdom, green coffee beans are lightly roasted, crushed with a mortar and pestle, or ground in an electric coffee mill, and boiled briefly with ground cardamom seeds.
If you order ready-ground cardamom coffee in a speciality store in Arabia, the clerk will add five or 10 grams of ground spice to 250 grams of coffee, but for special occasions, or to honor a guest with a particular display of generosity and good manners, quite large quantities of cardamom may be used. The spice gives the brew a greenish tint and a heady fragrance, and in some variations, it is the cardamom, and not the coffee, that is the dominant flavor.
also, your coffee breath will be much improved - this is perchance one of the finest effects of said spice, along with improved digestion.
i wish to end by noting that the scientific name of cardamom is elettaria cardamomum. and that, unfortunately, you will have to use some other spice to get high: it does not have the mind-altering effects of real mélange. *sigh*
yes, it's true. penelope cruz has found herself on the defensive after extensively groping the *gulp* luscious ass of salma hayak during a press conference for their new film, bandidas.
oh my [l-]word. *gulp* ye gods, have you no mercy on us mortals?
reports queerday,
At a press conference for their new film "Bandidas," Penelope Cruz's hand was busy feeling up Salma Hayak's ass. Why? Cruz now says that caressing her best friend's buttock was the result of the flu and the pair are not lesbians. She was apparently just feeling a little delirious when she let her hand slip down and linger on Hayak's booty, which might make anyone delerious.well, if every time a woman's ass got grabbed it meant she was in a relationship with someone, i'd have fucked nearly half the city of boston. (see previous post re: loolwa khazzoom and consequence.)"I grabbed Salma's ass just to keep things moving, because everyone was a little slow. And, of course, the energy changed when I did that. There are magazine covers in Mexico describing us as these lesbians because of that. A lot of people were saying we were lovers."
of course, if it were penelope cruz' hand what "lingered" on my booty, a lesbian affair would, in fact, occur. prolly right fucking there on the platform in front of all the hoi polloi - a kind of l-word LARP.
BTW, salma, i hope you carpe the diem and tag that ass. i mean, penelope cruz. c'mon, she even made the first move.
you don't have to tell anyone, but for the sake of all that is holy, please tag that ass. the cosmic significance might help balance out the election of palpatine emperor benedict 16th.
more from loolwa khazzoom:
For much of my childhood I struggled with Iraqi-Israeli family members trying to change my name to Lilly so nobody would suspect my Iraqi roots. I finally got them to leave me alone when I started calling all of them Alex.what chutzpah she must have had. i have this vision of a furious six- or eight-year old loolwa calling her mom, dad, and assorted relatives "alex".
dizzam.
incidentally, this came from a piece entitled "making a splash", which contains the following colophon:
Loolwa Khazzoom (www.loolwa.com) is a published author whose essays have been featured in anthologies and countless periodicals. She is a self-defense instructor, a feminist activist, a Jewish multicultural educator, and a musician.emphasis mine, but ordering of self-descriptors hers.
sweet.
i've got a new book on my wishlist, and it's straight at the top: consequence: beyond resisting rape. it's by loolwa khazzoom. it sounds like one bad-ass book; if you want to get me a copy, here's all about it.
i know that if you haven't felt like this cover - or like this book describes - you must be a man. you don't have to be a dickhead to not understand the experience, but fucking sexual harassment is like a plague upon the earth. thank god i don't like boys because i would be schizophrenic from my overwhelming need to wish for the sudden death of all men on the planet. i think if i liked boys i'd be stark fucking raving mad.
anyway, i want it. i want it so i can learn and revel. i want it so i can be braver than i am. i want it so i can enjoy her uncontrolled rage at being a piece of meat.
god, it's all so inane. it sounds so bland, when it's so fucking insidious. i can't even tell you how outrageous it is to experience.
well, that's enough about me, i think. here's the description of consequence, followed by an excerpt:
things go downhill from there - for the men, anyway. check it out yourself, there's a nice excerpt on her page.Xena, Buffy, & Dark Angel all make a great fantasy...
BUT YOU'VE JUST HIT REALITY!Consequence follows the adventures of Loolwa Khazzoom as she pushes the envelopes in responding to daily doses of sexual harassment. Whether grabbing the balls of a soldier, hitting a security guard in the face or taking on the whole damn system, her boldness and humor will bring you on a breathtaking roller-coaster ride over the edges of socialization.
* * * * * "Hello, sweetie, how are you?"
It started from the moment I stepped off the airport bus. Innocuous-sounding enough, but poison in its context. Wherever I went, whatever I did, there he would be, in my face. Asking me questions, making comments. I could not lie on the beach alone, walk down the street alone, sit at a cafe alone. It was constant, unceasing, without mercy. And without consequence.
"Don't start with me," I cautioned the first two. "Whopa!" they said, simultaneously impressed and entertained by my response. They left me alone after that; but usually I was not so lucky.
unfortunately, the book is sold out... you can try a.k. press or e-mail zzoomzzoom productions for more info. you can also try amazon, they might have used copies listed.
yeah. we're responsible. not republican-voting assholes who act like conservation is a fucking crime against humanity. enjoy your SUVs mothafuckas!
well, in response to a wry comment posed by one of the emilys who has a girlfriend who is being meticulously observant of the pesach mitzvah (me9wåh of peså7, to those of you internet semiticists) about not eating chametz (7åme9), here's what i learnt: although it is, indeed, a bean, coffee is not 7åme9.
the sweet-&-lowdown is basically this (emphasis & links mine):
There are two major mitzvot with which we are obligated on Pesach. One is to eat matzah on the first night. The other is not to eat chametz.that quote comes from an article by richard j. israel entitled "kitniot revealed". "aha!" you say. "but what about these kitniot, and what about the ban on eating everything vaguely grain-y from my girlfriend, nu?" well, mr. israel explains:The gemara tells us that matzah can be made from five types of grain and only these five: They are wheat, barley, rye, oats and spelt. [...] The gemara then continues and tells us that chametz can only come from stuff that could have been used in the production of matzah, the five grains. Nothing else can be chametz. Rice, millet and kitniot [...] cannot become chametz and therefore may not be used for matzah.
In general, kitniot are those small (kitniot - from katan) seeds or beans which look a little like grains and which need to be cooked to be eaten. Though frequently translated as legumes, aside from peas and peanuts, they are NOT legumes. And some legumes, like alfalfa leaves which can be used for salad, ARE NOT kitniot. Legumes are plants whose root nodules make nitrogen. Since "teensy-weensies" or "tinies" are not translations that are very likely to make it into ordinary English parlance, the most appropriate translation for kitniot, it seems to me, is kitniot. [...] Ashkenazic (though not Sephardic) Jews have accepted a great stringency regarding these products, despite the fact that they are not chametz, and despite the permissibility of these items documented by earlier sources.anyway, like i said: you're a mezrå7iyåh ("mizrahi") anyway, which in this case means you follow the sephardic rules. that means see definition of chametz above: you can eat all the maize, mustard greens and every other thing that isn't wheat, barley, rye, oats or spelt.The reason for the prohibition is based on a gezeirah, a preventive decree, from Ashkenazic rabbinical authorities. [...] The gezeirah was justified on the grounds that people can too easily confuse a product cooked with kitniyot with a similar product cooked with one of the five grains, and if the kitniyot product is allowed, one may come to allow a grain product, which is really chametz, as well.
Moreover, kitniyot are similar to the five grains in other ways too, including the fact that some people make bread out of kitniyot as they do from the five grains, and people who are not knowledgeable may end up making a mistake and eat real chametz.
Kitniyot are not like other vegetables which are allowed on Pesach because vegetables will never get confused with the forbidden grains, but most any product which could conceivably be confused with the forbidden grains has been added to the list of kitniot. Mustard was added since it is said, that it often grows with or is harvested with or is stored with the five grain species. And then sesame seeds and caraway seeds and still further, most any seeds which people eat.
Coffee was considered for prohibition, but the Ashkenazic sages must have liked coffee a lot more than they liked caraway seeds and it was allowed. And don't ask why we are permitted potato flour, because I don't know. The closest I can come to an explanation is noting that when there was a famine in Furth Germany in 1771, potatoes, which were otherwise prohibited on Pesach, were permitted on an emergency basis. Maybe someone forgot to cancel the prohibition. If so, we should keep quiet about it lest the people who like prohibitions find out that they have missed one.
boy, what an exciting post.
okay, i just thought i'd share. i just returned from the florist, because it's my sixth month anniversary, and um, i got flowers for my girlfriend. when i turned to go, a small fluffy dog that had previously been quite cordial, jumped up and tried to bite me. the small fluffy dog only managed to graze my knee before falling on its back. the small fluffy dog belonged to the florist.
"he has problems. he doesn't like straights," quoth the florist.
excuse me?! i think that was what he said. i started laughing, and i left.
i noticed that, as the door closed behind me, the small fluffy dog was in hot pursuit (as well as he could be, scrabbling across the linoleoum floor). then the door and the dog had an unfortunate meeting which left the dog making pathetic whining noises.
how surreal.
The culture of the people who were called "rednecks" and "crackers" before they ever got on the boats to cross the Atlantic was a culture that produced far lower levels of intellectual and economic achievement, as well as far higher levels of violence and sexual promiscuity. That culture had its own way of talking, not only in the pronunciation of particular words but also in a loud, dramatic style of oratory with vivid imagery, repetitive phrases and repetitive cadences.then the article goes on to say something like "black people adopted redneck culture, and now they're in the ghettos." i don't want to discuss the merits of this article. instead, i'm going to be facetious.
so... black people stole redneck culture from redneck white people, and then elvis came along and stole it back. then dr. dre stole it from elvis, and now eminem stole it from dre. now what?
[an aside: the guy who wrote the article appears to be a "milton friedman" scholar, which, if you look below, means he's all "chicago" in the house. today looks like chicago day. i don't get it... another aside: *puke* he writes for townhall.com]
the industry that profits off of illegal immigration is truly crappy. ya know... i think the feds should make it a priority to go after smugglers, who may be the biggest charlatans in existence.
when undocumented workers cross the border, they think they're entering the land of opportunity when in reality they're entering the land of "you got punk'd!" no constitutional protections, no way of ensuring that they're getting paid fairly (i lost the link to the sharecropping article - but damn... SHARECROPPING in this day and age? that's one step removed from slavery!), no way of holding an abusive employer accountable... really, no protections at all and no way to move up any career ladder. it's depressing.
maybe there should be a massive p.r. drive called "OPERATION REALITY": "hey, people who are looking for a better life. stay home. you're not going to find it here unless you're here legally. and even if you come legally, it might be a good idea to have a university degree, be at least middle class, speak good english, and already have a social network in place, so if anyone decides to step on your toes, you have the power to strike back and have the support you need. those who don't sometimes go insane. also, if you don't have specialized skills, we encourage you to stay home, not because we don't like immigrants, but because you're going to be expendable, and you came here for a better life, not to work a dead end job, which truly blows. to get an education is expensive as well. and you better have good credit, which is hard when you're living paycheck to paycheck. so before you get on that plane, put on your walking shoes, or tell scotty to beam you up, consider staying home. it's tough in the wild west."
no, i'm not turning into michelle malkin. i'm not trying to raise hysteria by saying "rio grande" and "9-11" and "mexican criminals" over and over again like a broken cuckoo clock. i just think that there is an entire industry of liars and crooks that smuggle wide-eyed workers into the country, who then get stuck in less than favorable conditions.
furthermore, ever wonder why george w. bush decided to give undocumented temporary workers a place here? it's because they're cheap labor who won't cause "trouble" because they have no legal recourse or political networks. a means to break up unions? who knows. anyway, i'm done babbling.
Ditty on The Chicago School of Economics
The Third Chicago School (1970s-Today)"Coase" and "Posner" -- names that came up in my law studies. "Posner" is widely known as a badass in legal circles, and the Coase Theorem is taught in property. Has this "Chicago" school dribbled its way into standard legal curriculum? Since I have nothing to do, I might as well look into it...* Milton Friedman and Chicago Monetarism
* James M. Buchanan and the Public Choice Economics
* Robert E. Lucas and New Classical Macroconomics
* Ronald H. Coase and New Institutionalist Economics
* Robert Fogel and New Economic History
* Gary S. Becker and the New Social Economics
* Richard Posner and Law-and-Economics Movement
the thing that struck me most about this article was that it noted that the civil war in china took place about six decades ago. to me, that's a long time ago. my parents were still crapping in their diapers back then. the leaders that were in power back then are like, dead or breathing with the aid of oxygen pumps. yet the aftereffects still resonate throughout the region.
then i thought about the middle east. you want to talk about shit that started "a long time ago"? damn.
um, that's all for now.
by the time i got to the end, i had a mild headache. and it didn't tell me what i was. i got 45/100. since austrian = 4, chicago = 2, keynesian = 1, and socialist = 0 and there were 25 questions on the quiz, 45/25 is a little less than 2... so i'm somewhere between keynesian and chicago, closer to chicago.
and i still don't know what "chicago" means, except that it is a town in illinois and it is the name of a movie that won some oscars. i just kind of picked the answers that seemed to fit with the voices in my head when i think about economics, fully knowing that i don't know shit. i certainly didn't learn anything in ec 10 - did either of you? i didn't think so.
it's too bad that there wasn't a choice E in any of the questions - i would have picked E most of the time. please see below:
E. like, i don't know, dude. and i don't think economists know either. economists are like weathermen -- always trying to make sense out of a chaotic system of infinite variables. they try to sound smart, but they're usually wrong, or at least off. and when one is right, once - it's like he's "pope awesome the I" instead of someone who got lucky that one time in the right set of circumstances.
all i know is that most of the "austrian" answers seemed to be written in an overly positive tone (that implied an underlying break from reality), and every single "socialist" answer was written in a shrill and negative tone. gee, i wonder if the people who wrote this came from the "austrian" school - oh yeah, of course.
so, what i've learned from this little exercise is that the austrian school of economics think the socialists are morons.
sorry, i'm ignorant. sue me.
in one of the stories from warren ellis' global frequency, the global frequency dispatches a woman who is the one of the foremost experts in the world on software and psychology to combat an alien invasion.
but this invasion isn't little green men - it's a sound transmission carrying a sophisticated viral meme that infects humans like software viruses do your hard drive. it reprograms you without damaging the physical body.
well, it is springtime in cambridge, and it is time for the pear trees to blossom. pear blossoms smell like man-spunk.
that's right, kiddos. the "cum trees" are in bloom.
yes, my em'lys and my henrys, i have a viral meme - and you just caught it. you got pear blossom brain fever, and it's as incurable as genital herpes. now you will never, ever be able to smell the strange, throat-ticklingly bleachy scent of pear blossoms without thinking of the strange, throat-ticklingly bleachy scent of cum.
don't fight it. don't even try. it's burnt into your brain; the virus has now done to you what a certain yale secret society did to our president - branded you on the asscheeks so that you can never forget whose bitch you are.
i bet you think the meme will fade. nuh-uh. you can spread it around (which eases the pain and suffering - clearly a function of the virus's adaptive reproductive system, ensuring its survival) - but you cannot be cured.
it will happen like this: one day, you are walking with your mother-in-law, or perhaps an important client, or maybe you are sitting at the big folks' table with the judges and the politicians, and then, from nowhere, right in the middle of sentence (yours or someone else's), your lizard brain sniffs that unwholesomely irresistable stink. you realise what is happening but you are as helpless as a virgin male on his first fuck: before you realise what's happening, even what you are sensing, your body instantly reacts. your mouth spurts, "JISM BLOSSOMS!"
and then the meme has them, too. and it's your fault, you fuck.
don't say i didn't warn you: judges become angry when you give them brain-herpes.
hey, look at these winners! one americal idol finalist was nabbed for possession of cocaine, and another finalist was nabbed for beating up his girlfriend.
neither were let go.
but remember frenchie davis? no? well, she was the woman who FOX bounced from the show, because she got naked once on the internet. hey, i didn't know that showing boobies was a crime.
boobies are great. domestic violence is not. and cocaine possession, although not harmful to anyone except possibly the possessor if the possessor is an addict, is a crime.
moral of the story: crime pays. boobies don't.
back to you, em0 and em1...
well he weaseled his way out of a rape conviction, which (according to my gut instinct after reading around) is ridiculous, but it's on record that he has herpes and knowingly failed to inform his victim.
take a look at this guy. his picture is here. the law sez he has a diseased weenie, and he infected an innocent woman. if i weren't writing a paper right now, i'd consider downloading the picture and writing "i have herpes" on the top and start spreading it around the internet. what scum. if any of you out there have some free time, feel free to open photoshop and get jiggy.
and remember, kids... it isn't slander if it is true. and in this case, there is no contest. :)
the nyu law student's response to criticism he got after asking scalia whether he sodomized his wife... here
a little belated, but hey... i didn't check my reading assignments. it's spring break.
that guy has a way with words. give him a friggin' columnist spot in salon or the new york times already.
what about for a cameraphone shot? would you kill her then?
a jordanian man would - and did.
Sister Shot for Phone Photofucking fucker. fuck fuck those fucks. god damnit!
25 April 2005 - (SA)Amman - A Jordanian man shot dead his divorced sister after seeing her photo on his friend's camera-equipped cellphone in the latest "honour" killing in the kingdom, hospital officials said Monday.
The unidentified man shot the 31-year-old mother twice in the head Sunday night and then turned himself in to police saying he committed the murder to "cleanse his family's honour".
The incident is the fifth example of a so-called honour killing in Jordan this year. Those found guilty usually face sentences of a maximum of one year in jail under Jordanian law.
Last month, a man stabbed his sister to death after finding out she had agreed an unofficial marriage with a man who subsequently disappeared.
At least 19 women lost their lives in honour killings in Jordan last year, according to the local press.
this article, which ran in an alaskan newspaper back in 2002, is interesting enough for a reprint here. with interlineal commentary from this emily, of course. it is about an obscure non-Muslim religious group whose members are Kurds (who are, culturally and linguistically, Persians): the yazidi.
Yazidisthe parsi word for peacock is tavus, and the initial letter is written with the Arabic 'emphatic t', which suggests a non-Iranian origin.
Mariam Fam, Associated Press Writer, 4 January 2002Followers of obscure sect accused of devil worship
Yarmouk Compound, Iraq (AP) - Tucked away in a mountainous area in northern Iraq is the Yarmouk Compound, home to followers of an obscure faith derided by some as a religion of devil worship. Yazidi traditions are so shrouded in secrecy, no outsiders have seen its most important rituals. Few people besides Yazidi religious leaders have copies of the group's holy books.
Living on the margins of this predominantly Islamic country, Yazidis struggle to maintain their traditions, with many settling in the compound's 3000 squat mud houses at the end of an unpaved three-mile road.
[snip]
Accusations of satanic worship are rooted in a central figure in the Yazidi tradition called Malak Ta'us, or the Peacock Angel, who many Muslims and other non-Yazidis consider the devil.
the old persian name for divinities was yazata; in pahlawi (the middle persian language used by zoroastrians in their writings), it is yazd and in farsi (the 'standard persian' of iran), it is ized. these altter two specifically refer to the lesser divinities of the zoroastrian pantheon, who something like patron angels under the one, true God (avestan ahura, pahlawi ohr), Wisdom (avestan Mazdâ, pahlawi Mazd)/
in contrast, malak is an arab loanword; although it literally means "king, regent" it is used in the qur'ân to refer to angels. hence malak ta'us is the origin of the term yazidi - "angel/yazd-[worshippers]" - through a system of replacement. this might be deliberate misinformation given the secretive nature of most Near Eastern religions oppressed by Islam (see also the muwa7iddun "unists", known internationally as the druse or druze of lebanon and israel, and the alawites or alawi of syria and lebanon).
Yazidis, however, believe Malak Ta'us fell from grace, then later repented and must be appeased to avert his wrath. Yazidis have a hymn dedicated to Malak Ta'us and often display his peacock image and kiss it as part of their rituals."He can kill us, destroy our houses and punish us. We fear him," said Aizdu, sitting on the floor in a bare room where the compound's men gather for coffee and a smoke.
the peacock appears in the middle east as a sign connected with a divinity or the soul during the time when the first indo-iranians arrived; i wonder if this tradition remains from that time. about 1900 BCE, this pot style appeared in the latest stages of the indus/harappan societies of modern pakistan and northwest india; it is a funeral urn used for storing ashes and apparently heralds, with its new peacock imagery, the arrival of the first indo-iranian peoples into the end-stage culture of the area.Yazidis have small communities in Syria, Turkey, Iran, Georgia and Armenia, but the majority of the estimated 100,000 followers of the religion live in Iraq. Iraq's government boasts of its tolerance of the Yazidis, but Yazidis are little more than tolerated. Most live in poverty and are the target of contempt.like iranian zoroastrians, they don't wear blue; for zoroastrians, this was the most common colour of iranian peasant clothing but under islamic rule, they were forbidden from wearing blue. common origin, perhaps?
The government forbids discrimination in hiring or housing, but can't stop other Iraqis from calling Yazidis "devil worshippers" or viewing them as defiled. Though their beliefs and lifestyle may set Yazidis apart from other Iraqis, they say times of need bring them closer, like in the army.they neglect to mention here that butter beans are also prohibited. lettuce and butter beans store up evil - have to remember that.[snip]
Today, most speak Kurdish and few understand Arabic - the language of their holy books, called Kitab al-Jilwah, the Book of Emergence or Book of Revelation, and Mashef Rash, the Black Book.
Men are encouraged to leave beards untrimmed, grow their hair and braid it. They prefer to dress in white, since they believe their religion sanctifies the color. Yazidis regard marriage outside their faith as a sin punishable by ostracizing or even death to restore lost honor.
Among their more unusual beliefs is that evil is found in lettuce; therefore, the vegetable should never be eaten. It is one of the traditions Yazidis said they make sure to observe though they don't know their origin. [emphasis mine]
"We have to follow our traditions," Aizdu said.i'll have to look into how the Yazidis are doing in post-saddam iraq. were they, in fact, re-Kurdified and have they joined the greater Kurdish alliance? if so, that's a very, very good thing.
time yet again, my darlings, for another edition of holy cow, men are soooo fucking annoying.
signing up for profile on naseeb so you can read the articles on the site? free.
From: [a man we shall call] Tsudden attention from people seeking Someone Like You? free.
hi how are youhello i like your profile. let's talk. what you think?
From: Meemail from prospective dater? free.
Re: hi how are youi am fine, thank you. but you might want to read my "desired partners" description. it's a little different than your usual naseeb's.
From: Tanother email from progressive dater: also free.
what is the deal herei read your profile, i don't know.
From: Meouting yourself to the online muslim community? still free.
Re: what is the deal herei am a dyke.
From: Ttotal and complete cluelessness? fucking priceless.
Re: what is the deal here
04/26/2005i love dyke, can you send me your picture..we can talk? what you think
dale carpenter speaks of a time when catholics were the liberals in the christian realm.
however, through all of the dour predictions, it appears that europe doesn't seem to care very much about the pontiff's stance on homosexuality (spain, for example, a nation with a large catholic presence, is still set to pass its same sex marriage bill much to the chagrin of a huffing and puffing ratzinger)... and we already know americans are still going to use birth control no matter what that old dude in vatican city says. the more out of touch with the modern world the pope becomes, the less legitimate the church becomes in developed nations. and with the AIDS epidemic reaching frightening proportions in africa, i think local clergy might take a pragmatic rather than a dogmatic approach - i.e. rubbers are okay.
i wonder if the papacy will eventually end up like the royal family in great britain. like, they supposedly have all this prestige, but no one really listens to them. the paparazzi just sort of chases them around with cameras and give them air time, because they are the royal family, and they live in a cool house. (this is a somewhat ironic analogy, since at some point, henry viii declared himself the head of the anglican church and effectively replaced the papacy in england. and now an aside: holy nuts... the current royal family truly IS inbred!)
it sounds like the worst kind of antisemitic polemics, but in this case it's straight outta the BBC's mouth. and not only that, it seems par for the course for current politics. remember the right-wing israeli attempt to storm the Noble Sanctuary the other week? as the news article notes, "The Jerusalem compound, housing the 1300-year-old al-Aqsa and Dome of the Rock mosques, is Islam's third holiest site." and the jewliban, angry at the government's decision to (mostly) remove them from the gaza strip and illegal settlements in palestine, decided the best recourse was to threaten it. apparently, they weren't kidding when the gazaistas insisted they wouldn't stop their protests there.
Amnesty: West Bank farms poisonedpoisoning wells and poisoning the lands. "if we can't have it, no one can."
BBC, 25 April 2004Amnesty International has called on Israel to investigate the deliberate contamination of Palestinian farmland - allegedly by Jewish settlers. The human rights group said that toxic chemicals had been spread on fields in the Hebron region of the West Bank.
Farm animals had died and farmers had been forced to quarantine their flocks, the organisation said. It also demanded that Israel put an end to "increasingly frequent" attacks on Palestinians by West Bank settlers.
"These poisoning incidents appear to be part of a deliberate attack on the livelihood of Palestinian farmers in the West Bank," said Kate Allen of Amnesty International UK. "The Israeli authorities should mount a full investigation and bring the perpetrators to justice."
Rat Poison
The chemicals were spread on fields near the villages of Tuwani, Um Faggara and Kharruba in March and April, the group said. Sheep, gazelle and other animals have been contaminated by the chemicals, and farmers livelihoods had been affected, the organisation said.
According to Amnesty, Israeli and Palestinian scientists who analysed the chemicals spread on the fields found two types of rat poison - one of which is banned in Israel. Amnesty says that the Israeli authorities have made no attempt to remove the chemicals safely from the fields or to investigate the poisonings.
The villages affected are in a part of the West Bank that is under Israeli military control. Palestinian security services are forbidden by Israel from operating there. Palestinians also complain of violent intimidation by Jewish settlers in the Hebron area.
In July 2004, Israeli police said they suspected Jewish settlers were responsible for poisoning a Palestinian well in the same area.
this recipe was adapted from one published last fall in the new york times. this recipe is not for nazirites (נְזִיר) because it contains a grape product.
1 duckling (we recommend muscovy)
2 tablespoons five-spice powder
6 tablespoons soy sauce
12-15 fresh black figs (mango is a good alternative to black figs)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
6 shallots, minced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves, minced (2 tablespoons dried if fresh ones are unavailable)
3 cups red wine (basically 1 750 ml bottle -- we recommend merlot)
1 tablespoon salt
2 tablespoons black pepper
1 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1) preheat oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit. combine five spice power, soy sauce, and 1 tablespoon of pepper in a bowl. rub this mixture all over the duckling. score fatty outer layer of duckling in a criss-cross pattern on front and back.
2) heat a large skillet (or wok) with 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil until it is very hot. Sear duckling on the back and front until skin is golden brown. place duckling in a deep baking dish in oven.
* note: ducks are very fatty, so you will need a dish large enough to hold the duck, the wine sauce, and all the oil that will collect in the dish. ducks tend to dry out while roasting, so you will want the duck to roast in its own juices and the wine sauce to prevent this from happening.
3) reheat skillet (or wok) with 1/2 tablespoon of vegetable oil and 1/2 tablespoon of pepper. sear figs for 3-5 minutes on high heat and set aside.
4) lower heat and melt 1 tablespoon of butter in the skillet, and cook shallots and garlic until soft (approx. 1-2 minutes). stir in thyme, wine, and add figs. cook until wine is reduced by 1/3. stir in remaining butter and pepper and 1 tablespoon of salt. remove from heat.
5) pour wine sauce and figs over duckling. duckling should be at least half immersed in sauce. after duckling has baked for an hour and a half, remove duckling from oven and pour sauce and figs into the skillet and reduce on the stove-top for 15-20 minutes. meanwhile, continue baking duckling in oven for an additional 15-25 minutes to crisp the skin.
* note: for a lower fat option, bake duckling for 45 minutes and remove oil from baking pan before adding wine sauce.
i haven't posted about ratzinger's election as the new pope because i've been busy, and because i was struck speechless by it. in all honesty, he was the last person i thought they'd choose. i never thought for a second that he'd be the new pope. it's not as if i expected a progressive pope who would call for an end to the persecution of gays or an end to the ban on ordination of women. the catholic church is not an institution i expect to be at the vanguard of progressive values. when the word went around at my job that a new pope had been chosen, i surfed to msnbc.com. when i saw that man's face and name plastered across their homepage i felt the cold splash of disbelief wash over me.
the blogosphere exploded in a frenzy, sparking more than a few flame wars among liberals. some people objected to the heated rhetoric -- the word 'nazi' was thrown around too casually for their taste. some pointed out that he wasn't technically a nazi because he never joined the nazi party. fair enough. precision in the use of that word is usually sorely lacking whenever it is mentioned. it is that phenomenon that engendered godwin's rule. so, i won't call ratzinger a nazi. he was fourteen when he joined the hitler youth. he was still in his teens when the war ended. yes, i agree, that he was like most german teenagers. he did as he was told. he wasn't extraordinary. he is now spiritual advisor to over a billion people, the head of the world's oldest and largest christian denomination. i think that role should belong to someone who is extraordinary.
i don't even pretend to believe that i would have made a different choice than young ratzinger. i simply don't know what i would do in a similar situation, facing similar consequences for resistance. in fact, i don't think this is something anyone can know about themselves until they have made such a choice. undoubtedly, i would like to think myself different. i would like to think i am made of stronger moral fiber than the majority of people.
i resist that much, at least. i think people who readily tell themselves that they are above the moral failings of others are just as weak, if not weaker than those they disdain. sometimes, i think those who are quick to laud their own characters to themselves and to others know that they are in fact weaker than average and that knowledge torments them too much to accept. most people are not tried and tested in the way that the citizens of nazi germany were. we do know, however, that ratzinger was tried, tested, and found wanting. he was weak. other german teenagers made different choices, and they paid dearly for them. they were strong.
i'm not catholic, or even christian. i have been an atheist since my early teens and was an agnostic for a while before that. so even in my own mind, this post is odd. i had a strong emotional reaction to ratzinger's election that bewildered me. it goes beyond the church's reactionary position on the rights of women and gays. one of the overarching themes of christianity is human beings are special. above all other creatures, they are capable of moral reasoning. i think human beings are far too arrogant in their assumptions about themselves as a species and as individuals. i find it impossible to trust people who do not express doubt about themselves. i think they are either ignorant because they have never been tried and tested or they are in denial because they have been tried, tested, and found wanting.
less likely, but also a possibility i entertain is that they were tried, tested, and they made the right choice, but arrogantly assumed that was the last word on their character. facing such a test and making the morally and ethically worthy choice does not indicate with total accuracy that they will make similarly good choices in future, different situations that test their character in other ways, or even in the same or a similar way. a single, appropriate choice is a measure of one's character, but it is by no means, the measure.
before one starts thinking about how special human beings are because they are capable of moral reasoning, one should read about the milgram experiment and the stanford prison experiment. these experiments are considered unethical today. the participants in the milgram experiment overwhelmingly rated their participation in the experiment as a positive experience. it actually gave one of the subjects the impetus to claim conscientious objector status during the vietnam war. yet, despite different variations of the experiment, between 61 and 66 percent of the subjects were willing to administer an electric shock to another person even when the victim appeared to suffer greatly simply because an authority figure told them to do so.
the stanford prison experiment is somewhat more disturbing in my own personal opinion. while milgram found that physical proximity to the person receiving the shock decreased compliance with the authority figure, the stanford prison experiment resulted in brutal behavior on the part of 'guards' towards 'prisoners' where there was little physical separation between them. the separation was mostly psychological. they were all playing roles as 'prisoners' and 'guards'. even more shocking than the behavior of the guards was the behavior of the prisoners.
from the wikipedia article:
[...] Prisoner #416 [...] was horrified at the guards' treatment and went on a hunger strike in protest. He was forced into solitary confinement in a small closet for three hours, and the other prisoners saw him as a troublemaker. To exploit this feeling, the guards offered the other prisoners a choice: Either the prisoners could give up their blankets, or #416 would be kept in solitary confinement overnight. The other prisoners chose to keep their blankets.several years ago, i took a class in human behavioral biology, popularly know as 'sex' on campus. jesse's comment on my last post brought back memories of that class. one of the questions posed was, "What makes human beings special?" as the class progressed, we learned that this was not exactly an easy question to answer. things that we thought were unique to humans were not.
moral reasoning was one of those things. in fact, in one experiment, macaque monkeys demonstrated moral and ethical behavior that put the choices of the subjects in the milgrim experiment to shame. in that experiment, the monkeys could not get food without administering an electric shock to an unrelated monkey whose reaction to the shock was visible through a one-way mirror. well over eighty percent of the monkeys refused to pull the chain. one monkey went without food for two weeks. those who received electric shocks in previous experiments were more unwilling than average to administer a shock to the other monkey.
this post is already too long, so i'll wrap it up. one of the tenets of christianity is that moral choices are the province of human beings alone and it is that characteristic that makes human beings different from other living creatures. ratzinger is now the head of the largest christian denomination in the world, with over a billion adherents. no, he wasn't a nazi, but he collaborated. he was not a leader. he was a follower. the condition of humanity is and has been wretched. it was particularly wretched in nazi germany. the human race needs leaders, and by that, i mean that humanity desperately needs those who are willing to be morally and ethically extraordinary. those people are as precious as they are rare, and their effect on the behavior of their peers is incalculable.
from the wikipedia article on the milgram experiment:
Milgram also combined the power of authority with that of conformity. In these experiments, the participant was joined by one or two additional "teachers" (who were actually actors, like the "learner"). The behavior of the participants' apparent peers strongly affected results. When two additional teachers refused to comply (Experiment 17), only four participants of 40 continued the experiment. In another version, (Experiment 18) the participant performed a subsidiary task with another "teacher" who complied fully. In this variation only three of 40 defied the experimenter.
emily0 brought this article to my attention this morning:
Trap-building ants torture preyonce, when i was a child, i was sitting on the grass while my mom was hanging laundry out to dry. i was talking and laughing, and a split second later, i was screaming. my legs were on fire from what felt like hundreds of excruciating stings. my mom realized that my legs were covered with dozens of fat black ants and whisked me to the bathtub. i inadvertently sat on top of an anthill. looking over my mom's shoulder, my stomach turned when i saw a rapidly expanding, seething mass of ants on the spot where i was sitting just moments before.A fierce species of Amazonian ant has been seen building elaborate traps on which hapless prey are stretched like medieval torture victims, before being slowly hacked to pieces.
more...
for a while afterwards, i delighted in exacting a childish form of revenge by pouring all manner of liquids down the anthills in our yard and watching with satisfaction as ants swarmed out in a panic, some writhing in their final death throes. many years later, as a seventh-grader, i read Leiningen versus the Ants. my skin crawled at the memory of those stinging, swarming ants, and i was thankful they never sought revenge on me.
ants are fascinating creatures -- leafcutter ants are farmers - they cultivate a fungus for their own consumption. in fact, they depend on that species of fungus to survive, and it is the only fungus they eat. there is an Argentinean species that is capable of building and maintaining super-colonies that stretch for hundreds of kilometers. the cooperative nature of eusocial insects is in my opinion one of the most astounding products of evolution. ants can form complex societies capable of amazing feats of engineering, all made possible through the division of labor.
i... i can't...
i don't know what to say...
except perhaps DON'T FUCKING DO THAT AHHHHHHHHHH
Romanian Woman Thief Hid Mobile Phones In Her Vaginai can't help asking - why didn't she just set it on vibrate?
18 April 2005, WomenFirstUkRomanian police searching a woman suspected of theft found her hiding a mobile phone in her vagina.
They made the astonishing discovery after dialling the number and hearing a muffled ringing coming from somewhere under the woman's skirt.
A witness said he had alerted police when he saw Ruxandra Gardian steal the phone from a customer in a restaurant.can you imagine the insurance forms?Police questioned the 34-year-old and were about to let her go when the witness suggested they ring the phone to determine whether she was hiding it. On dialling the number they heard a sound coming from under Gardian's clothes and took her to police headquarters to be strip-searched.
Police officers conducting the search were shocked to find the phone stashed in the woman's vagina.
However, the owner of the phone has since refused to have it returned to him, saying it was damaged beyond repair and he would be filing an insurance claim.
Officer Aurel Popescu commented: "I've seen a lot in my time as a policeman but never anything like this."
thanks (i think?), qiyamah forecast & womenFirstUK.15. HOW WAS ITEM DAMAGED DURING CRIME? Woman stuck it in her hoohoo.
okay, let's get real. it was fun being part of the peanut gallery, but when it comes down to it... i don't care who the pope is. whoever it is doesn't really affect the united states. most american catholics, according to a poll, said they'd follow their conscience rather than the orders of an old fart in vatican city. that's right... my sister and her fiance aren't going to get all medieval on anyone's asses, nor are most catholics i know, who are only catholics out of habit. the link is on cnn.com - go find it if you care. but this made me giggle...
i foresee more converts to the episcopalian church. this is an aside, but it feels like it's become a refuge for catholics who are sick of catholicism. :P
according to an article today, the rebel group fighting for independence in the Philippines has come to an agreement for peace with the government.
unfortunately for them, their name is the Moro Islamic Liberation Front - which, in case you are not paying attention, is referred to by its acronym, MILF.
oh, man. some things are just too unfortunate.
sweet. egyptologists made a wicked new discovery from the enigmatic pre-dynastic period of egypt.
Ancient Necropolis found in Egypti'm very interested in these earliest periods of egypt.
BBC-UK, Thursday, 21 April 2005The find pre-dates the pyramids
Archaeologists say they have found the largest funerary complex yet dating from the earliest era of ancient Egypt, more than 5000 years ago.
The necropolis was discovered by a joint US and Egyptian team in the Kom al-Ahmar region, around 600 km (370 miles) south of the capital, Cairo.
Inside the tombs, the archaeologists found a cow's head carved from flint and the remains of seven people.
They believe four of them were buried alive as human sacrifices.
The remains survived despite the fact that the tombs were plundered in ancient times.
[snip]
The complex is thought to belong to a ruler of the ancient city of Hierakonpolis in around 3600 BC, when it was the largest urban centre on the Nile river.
Egyptologists say the city probably extended its influence northwards defeating rival entities. The unification of Upper and Lower Egypt eventually led to the establishment of rule by the Pharaohs.
Excavations at the site started in 2000 under the leadership of Egyptologist Barbara Adams, who died in 2002.
The site contains some of the earliest examples of mummification found in Egypt.
more sullivan...
THE POLITICAL ANALOGY: I was trying to explain last night to a non-Catholic just how dumb-struck many reformist Catholics are by the elevation of Ratzinger. And then I found a way to explain. This is the religious equivalent of having had four terms of George W. Bush only to find that his successor as president is Karl Rove. Get it now?dude. not so sweet.
in the interest of more dune analysis, i have located a few other lovely sites what discuss them: here are analyses of the names of paul "muad'dib" atreides...
مؤدب [mu2adib, meccan arabic muwadib] The nickname that Paul chooses in the story is Muad'dib, and is said to be the name of the desert mouse who comes at night in the moon light. Although the English pronounciation of this word calls for a long "i", there is an almost exact word in Arabic like it (Mu'adib), which means "private tutor" or "teacher". It used to be that the Caliphs, the rulers of the Muslim world, would hire a Mu'adib to teach their children. The practice seemed to be common for other strata of society as well.the desert mouse was spoken of in dune as an auspicious choice because it teaches the people of the desert.
here also i found the arabic forms of the names of his sister aliya...
علية Alia [3aliiyat] is the name of Paul's little sister. Alia was the name of one of the many queens of Jordan under King Hussein. The name is the feminine form of "High Above"....and Ghanima...
غنيمة Ghanima ['3aniimat] [S]omething acquired in battle or single combat. Commonly, a memento of combat kept only to stir the memory. Ghanima in Arabic comes from the root GH-N-M, which means "to win", "to gain". Many Arabic proper names use this root, as in "Ghanem", "Ghannaam". If pronounced with a long "i" vowel, Ghanima could mean war booty.in fact, her name is defined as "War Booty", so it clearly is the last form listed.
thanks, khalid
i'm watching the second dune miniseries, and reveling in it. one thing what's always bothered me is one term, of which i now have discerned the origin.
Kwisatz Haderach is a term which means "Shortening of the Way." This is the label applied by the Bene Gesserit to the unknown for which they sought a genetic solution: a male Bene Gesserit whose organic mental powers would bridge space and time. Also known as "the one who can be many places at once."i would transliterate that rather as qfiSæt hæddrak - & i'll be looking deeper into it to recognise the origins and cognates. i think i recognise derek off the bat.The phrase Kwisatz Haderach קפיצת הדרך originally came from Hebrew (poss. originally Kfitsat or Kfitzat Haderech) and means "Jump ahead of the path", i.e. a significant breakthrough.
apparently, chani's name is a nickname for Hænnah חַנָּה "Grace, Charm, Mercy". Significantly, the same site observes the following about Hænnah:
[Hænnah] was a wife of Elkanah and the mother of the prophet Samuel as recorded in the Book of Samuel. Elkanah's other wife, Peninnah, had provided him with children, but Hannah was childless. Elkanah favored Hannah, but her rival Penninah taunted her because the Lord had not allowed her to bear children yet.obviously, some of this relevant, particularly given her role as second wife, as most-beloved female figure of the series and because her son became the all-prescient god-king leto II.Hannah beseeched God to grant her a child, and vowed to give that child back to God. God granted her request, and she and Elkanah conceived the baby Samuel, whom she gave to the House of the Lord at Shiloh once he had been weaned. From that day, Samuel was in the care of the high priest Eli, living his life as a Nazirite.
In Judaism she is regarded as the prime role model for how to pray. Hannah's famous prayer in 1 Samuel 2 exalts the Lord's providence, power, sovereignty and holiness. This is read on the first day of Rosh Hashanah as the haftarah.
thanks, explore literature.
one of the guideposts by which we might review ratzinger is his most recent work. it has included:
* An "Eyes-Only" internal document banning transsexuals from entering consecrated life, ordering the expulsion of all current transsexual consecrates and ordering church workers not to change baptismal records or otherwise accommodate transsexual worshippers (2003) - how very christian and charitable of them. it's important to keep the freaks marginalised, don't you know.
* dominvs iesvs or "Lord Jesus", a document endorsed by jp2 and subtly subtitled "On the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church", which rescinds the Vatican II notion that there is salvation for those who aren't Roman Catholic (V2 had rescinded the old dogma extra ecclesivm nvlla salvs - "outside the church there is no salvation") (2000) - there is a lovely analysis of the work here. i especially like the lists of ratzigner's explicit statements of what he believes. in a chilling, "i like horror flicks starring me" kind of way.
* the lovely Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons (2000), which does what you'd expect but goes another league or two into the offensive: it says strictly heterosexual behaviour is the definition of what it means to be a human being and not an animal, it claims that it has been demonstrated that the children of homosexuals grow up stunted and evil, and says homo relationships are evil, selfish things that do not benefit society because homos don't breed (yeah, i realise they preceded that point with the one about the children raised by homo couples, but i'm not the one with cognitive dissonance here - don't kill the messenger).
that 5% - it's all emily one's fault.
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well, it's official: the catholic church has officially chosen as its new, infalliable voice of God on earth an ethnic Bavarian who was a member of Hitler Youth, a POW captured by the Allies in WWII, and whose most recent job has been head of the Inquisition (renamed in 1908 "the sacred congregation of the doctrine of the faith" to throw off bad vibes.)
Ratzinger is elected as new popeFUCK.
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger has been elected as the pope - the head of the world's 1.1 billion Roman Catholics.Taking the name Pope Benedict XVI, the 78-year-old German appeared on the balcony of the Vatican palace.
His arrival was greeted by loud cheers from the many thousands of pilgrims who had packed St Peter's Square as news of his election spread across Rome.
He was chosen on the third round of votes by the 115 cardinals meeting to select Pope John Paul II's successor.
Giving a short address in Italian to the crowds gathered below the new pope paid homage to his predecessor, and great friend, Pope John Paul II saying:
Dear brothers and sisters after the great Pope, John Paul II, the cardinals have elected me, a simple and humble worker in the Lord's vineyard.Clad in white papal vestments and a short red cape, he then delivered the traditional "Urbi et Orbi" blessing to the city of Rome and the world.The fact that the Lord can work and act even with insufficient means consoles me, and above all I entrust myself to your prayers.
In the joy of the resurrected Lord, we go on with his help. He is going to help us and Mary will be on our side. Thank you.
The new Pope was widely tipped to be one of the front runners in the election, which began on Monday when the 115 voting cardinals were sequestered in the Sistine Chapel for their secret conclave.
Conservative pope
Pope Benedict XVI, who is the oldest pope for more than a century, was born in 1927 into a traditional farming family in Bavaria, Germany, although his father was a policeman.
The BBC's Ray Furlong in Berlin said Cardinal Ratzinger's election as pope would generate amazement and enthusiasm in Germany as well as concern among those who had hoped for a more liberal pontiff.
The future pope's studies at seminary were interrupted by World War II and his supporters say that his experiences under the Nazi regime convinced him that the church had to stand up for truth and freedom.
A close friend and confidante of Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI is also known as a fellow conservative.
For more that 20 years he was head of the congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith in the Vatican - the Vatican's guardian of orthodoxy.
The BBC's William Horsley in Rome says his papacy is sure to continue John Paul II's strongly traditional interpretation of the Catholic faith, including opposition to abortion, homosexuality, priestly marriage and women priests.
FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!
according to "drudge" and cnn: benedict XVI, joseph ratzinger of germany
since i'm just part of the peanut gallery looking in... how about some updates from someone who was actually raised catholic (andrew sullivan):
Ratzinger?! The dread rises...
And so the Catholic church accelerates its turn toward authoritarianism, hostility to modernity, assertion of papal supremacy and quashing of internal debate and dissent. We are back to the nineteenth century.
There is simply no other figure more extreme than the new Pope on the issues that divide the Church. No one... What this says to American Catholics is quite striking: it's not just a disagreement, it's a full-scale assault... For American Catholics, I foresee an accelerating exodus. But that, remember, is the plan. The Ratzingerians want to empty the pews in America and start over. They will, in that sense, be successful.
and then...
I should shut up now. And pray.
eep! mr. john "i don't really like gay people and i protected child-abusing clergymen but i reached out to people of all faiths and mended ties between people from differing cultures and wasn't a total douchebag" paul deux seems so lovely now.
even if you're not a catholic, it's a fact that the pope is one of the most powerful and influential politicians in the world (and spiritual leader of over 1 billion people - i mean, like whoa). and i've got to run back to class, but yeah, this is heavy stuff. maybe more later.
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what's that saying about how we should never doubt that the actions of a few can change the world? here's a note from the morocco times (Italy) about the repercussions of the woman-led jum3a prayers in march.
Naima Gouhai, 30, a Moroccan expatriate in Tuscany, Italy, seeks to be the first woman Imam in Italy, after American Amina Wadud had broken with Islamic tradition by leading the Friday prayer service in a New York chapel, where men and women sat together. This issue was raised last month by the Milan-based daily Corriere Della Sera.now that's some progress.According to the paper, Gouhai – nurse and mother of three children – applied for the Imamat at a local mosque in Tuscany two days after Wadud had led the Friday prayer in NY.
Amina Wadud, an associate professor of Islamic studies at Virginia Commonwealth University, led the Islamic weekly service, where 50 men and women prayed behind her, after she had delivered the sermon, thus defying basic Islamic rules.
Naima Gouhai told the Corriere Della Sera that “it is not a problem for a woman to become Imam if she is more qualified than a man to lead prayers”.
Firas Jabrin, an Imam in Tuscany, also saw no problem in her being an Imam. He also said that she could come to the mosque where he is leading prayers. However, many of the 1500 Muslim in the area have refused to accept a woman Imam.
Abdelbari Zamzami, an Imam and a religious researcher, told Morocco Times that “a woman Imamat is not totally forbidden in Islam. That's why some prominent religious scholars enabled both men and woman to be Imams”.
“Throughout history Muslims did not need a woman Imam to lead prayers, because men were enough”, he said adding that “there is no Prophet's sayings forbidding women to be Imams”.
Zamzami said that what happened in America is not accepted, referring to Amina Wadud leading Friday prayers.
“A woman should be covered up while praying, but what we have seen in America is different. Women prayed with their hair uncovered, wearing Jeans, which contradicts with praying requirements,” said Zamzami.
Mustapha Rmid, a leader in the Justice and Development Party, said that “Throughout history, there was a consensus that a woman cannot lead men and women in prayer”. He added that this is not “an important issue to discuss”.
Al Mustapha Moatasim, leader of Al Badil Al Hadari Party, said that “there is nothing in the Koran that forbids women from being Imams and that some religious scholars allowed them to lead women in prayer, but not men”.
Dr Abdelhadi Boutaleb, member of the Academy of the Moroccan Kingdom and a researcher, favours men Imamat but said that a woman can lead prayers for women.
“Wadud masters Islamic teaching; she was reciting the Koran properly, and was wearing descent clothes, respecting Islamic prayer traditions. However, the women who were praying behind her were not covered up, which is against Islamic teachings,” said Boutaleb.
He added that “praying in the church is allowed, because Islam enables praying in churches and synagogues.”
Woman Imamat raised heated debate among Muslim communities around the world. Some claim that Islam bans women from leading women and men and that the congregation should only be made up solely of women. Others see no problem in a woman leading men and women.
Qatar-based Sheikh Yussef Al-Qaradawi, an influential Muslim cleric said that “Prayer in Islam features getting up, sitting down and kneeling... It is not befitting for a woman to make these movements in the presence of men when worshipping requires a peaceful mind and concentration on communicating with God."
But Egypt's Grand Mufti, Sheikh Ali Guma, declared that woman-led prayer of mixed-gender congregations is permissible, so long as the congregation agrees to it.
amazing that some people (not mentioned in this article) have given up on the argument on the acceptability of an imaamat ("woman imaamat" is repititious - al-imaam is the word for a male prayer leader and imaamat for a female one, but i guess it was used for clarity) and have turned instead to condemning the prayer ms. wadud led because there was a female muezzin.
that is a stupid response clearly motivated by a legalistic mind: someone starting from a particular 'intellectual' position (i use the term lightly) and then finding niggling ways to win the argument. women can lead the prayer, but they can't call the people to the prayer? what kind of ridiculous argument is that?
the hijabistas are a separate issue. talk about cognitive dissonance.
as for al-qaradawi, he is a weird dude. he comes up with some modernist opinions and then he turns around and goes all medieval on our asses on other things. there's a great commentary by amine tais at MWU! about his position with commentary by a female scholar named leila babès (a professor of the sociology of religion):
A month after the historical woman-led prayer in New York, the reactions are still pouring from all over the Muslim world. In this article, I want to highlight the opinions of two North-African Muslim intellectuals residing in France. Leila Babès and Abdelwahhab Meddeb are regular commentators on the Morocco-based radio station Médi 1.isn't it classic, then. who doesn't fall down, east, west or center, when it comes to the bodies of women? control, control, control. the taliban, the ameritaliban (practitioners of hypochristianity), the so-called "middle of the road" guys, the so-called 'right to life' nutjobs: can't anyone just leave us the fuck alone? damn, take a look at your own selves for a while. you could maybe worry about your own libido instead of us as walking pornography.As a professor of the sociology of religion at the French Catholic University of Lille, Leila Babès has regularly contributed to the debates over Islam in the European scene. She is the author of Le Voile Démystifié (The Veil Demystified) and co-author of Loi d’Allah, Loi des Hommes (Law of Allah, Law of Men).
In one of her latest programs on Médi 1, she responded to Dr. Yusuf Al Qaradawi’s stance on Amina Wadud and the unprecented woman-led Friday prayer. Babès started by presenting Dr. Wadud to her audience as a scholar that has been struggling for Muslim women’s rights for years. The New York event was thus a natural transition from theory to practice. Babès maintains that equality between men and women is central to the Islamic message; however the interpretations of the male Muslim jurists in their patriarchal contexts compromised the original élan of the religion. This unfortunate state of affairs continues to this day as witnessed by the fatwa of Al-Jazeera’s fiqh expert Al-Qaradawi.
When asked about the woman-led prayer in New York, the highly influential Egyptian jurist responded that “being Imam in a mixed prayer is reserved for men only, it is inadequate for a woman to perform the movements (of Salat) in front of men. The Divine wisdom wanted the body of a woman to be different from that of a man. The body of a woman has certain characteristics that excite the libido of a man thus allowing for marriage in order to perpetuate the human species. It is normal that the wise Legislator aimed at protecting men from temptation by banning the causes of this excitation.”
In Babès’s opinion, when Al Qaradawi speaks of the “wise Legislator”, he clearly illustrates how the Divine will is automatically and erroneously equated with the deficient human interpretation. In other words, a group of human interpreters agreed upon something, made their opinion sacred and therefore closed the door to any subsequent interpretations or needed reforms. The famous Egyptian scholar added that “the four Islamic juristic schools, even the eight, affirmed that a woman could not lead men in any prescribed prayers even though some allowed a Quran-memorizing woman to lead prayers in her own family knowing that the men behind her are her mahrams… No Muslim jurist of any known school authorized women to deliver the Friday sermon and to lead men in prayer.” Babès shows her astonishment that Al-Qaradawi failed to mention the names of jurists who actually saw the practice as permissible. Famous early jurists like Al-Muthani (d. 878), student of Shafii and contributor to the establishment of the Shafii juristic school, Ibn Thawr (d. 854), mufti of Iraq, and At-Tabari (d. 922) historian, exegete and founder of a now defunct juristic school all allowed women to unconditionally lead men in prayer. In addition, the Hanbalis permitted that a woman leads men in taraweeh prayers.
Al-Qaradawi advises those women who want to lead prayer to do so in a group of women instead of committing this heinous innovation of leading men and creating fitnah. According to Babès, this is a hypocritical stance since the same Al-Qaradawi authorizes and even encourages suicide bombings committed by Muslim women in Israel. In other terms, a Muslim woman may legitimately kill herself and take innocent lives but may absolutely not lead men in prayer because of the libido. And as everybody knows, the libido is the cause of the destruction of the community!
Al-Qaradawi even leaves the impression that Amina Wadud might be an apostate when he calls upon her to return to her Lord and religion and to condemn this act of conspiracy against Islam. Babès views this statement as more than simple preaching; it is almost a call to murder. [emphasis mine -ed.]
there's more in that article on MWU!, and it's only part one of an ongoing series. i'm keeping tuned, fer sure!
dear the religious right,
thank you for your attention. now go about your business.You do not own the flag.
You do not own the Bible.
You do not own the Constitution.
You do not own God.
You do not own the media.
You do not own righteousness.
You do not own the cross.When you speak as if you do, you are wrong.
When you act as if you do, you are stupid.
And when you think you do, you are wrong, you are stupid, and you are evil.
thanks, sturgeonslawyer.
sometimes there is some justice. in regards to an earlier post on this site, it seems the culprit has been caught - and pled guilty.
Man pleads guilty to trying to sell Hawaiian skullNorth County Times wire services, 14 january 2005
Los Angeles - A Huntington Beach man who tried to sell the 200-year-old skull of a Native Hawaiian warrior on eBay pleaded guilty Friday to a federal charge.
Jerry Hasson apparently took the skull from an excavation site near a Maui beach in 1969.
The then-teen and his friends sneaked into the archaeological site - it was determined to be the location of one of King Kamehameha's bloody battles to unify the Hawaiian islands - and uncovered an entire skeleton, but only kept the skull, Hasson stated in his auction notice.
In his plea deal with the government, the 55-year-old acknowledges that he was trying to sell the skull in an auction where bidding started at $1000. Buyers who wanted to forgo the auction and "Buy it Now" could pay $12500, according to the plea agreement.
The eBay posting sparked an e-mail to Hasson from a member of a Native Hawaiian group, who asked that the auction be stopped and that the skull be returned to the group for reburial.
The e-mail warned Hasson that selling the skull would violate the Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act, and might violate the federal Archaeological Resources Protection Act - which bars interstate or foreign commerce in archaeological resources that may have been unearthed illegally.
Hasson responded by removing the auction posting from eBay.
Last February, a US Bureau of Indian Affairs agent posing as a potential buyer sent Hasson an e-mail, inquiring about the skull.
Hasson responded that he took the auction page down because it was offensive to native Hawaiians, and that he was instead offering the skull directly to a handful of "serious bidders."
Hasson then negotiated with the undercover agent, eventually agreeing that the skull would be sold for $2500, which would be disguised as a payment for a 1966 Fanzine comic to be sold on eBay.
Hasson entered the guilty plea in Los Angeles to one count of trafficking in an archaeological resource via interstate commerce. Sentencing is set for May 23.
In his plea deal, Hasson agrees to perform at least 600 hours of community service and to publish, and pay for, an apology to the citizens of Hawaii in three newspapers in the state.
The judge could also sentence Hasson to a year to 18 months behind bars and prosecutors have reserved the right to recommend a $15000 fine.
Hasson's lawyer has declined to comment on the case.
because, really, what the fuck is he going to say? "my client is a pile of human faeces who got what he deserved"? i still hold that "[h]is penalty should be to be stuffed and posed in a public window after his death. which, frankly, should be sped up by some hefty beatings with a qulu maika." (picture of said object at right.)here's a post announcing his arrest in september of 2004:
Charges filed in eBay skull casefucker. i've half a mind to go do some research and dig up his momma's grave and sell her dead fucking body over eBay.
Sally Apgar, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 9 September 2004Federal prosecutors say a California man put the item up for bid
A California man was criminally charged yesterday for allegedly trying to sell on eBay.com what he claimed was the skull of a 200-year-old Hawaiian warrior.
Jerry David Hasson, 55, of Huntington Beach allegedly started the bidding at $1000 and set an immediate purchase price of $12500 last February, according to a statement issued yesterday by the US Attorney's Office in Los Angeles.
Along with a picture of the skull, a description of it ran on eBay that said the skull came from "one of King Kamehameha's bloody battle sites in his war to unite the Hawaiian Islands in the 1790s."
Hasson also wrote on eBay, "For the last 34 years, I've kept this 200-year-old Hawaiian warrior as a souvenir of my youth, but now it's time to give it up to the highest bidder."
Hasson was charged yesterday with illegally trying to sell the skull and therefore criminally violating the federal Archaeological Resources Protection Act. Hasson faces a maximum fine of $250,000 and a maximum federal prison term of five years.
Hasson did not return telephone calls to his home.
Assistant US Attorney William Carter said Hasson will be arraigned in about two weeks.
In a telephone interview, John Fryar, a special agent with the Bureau of Indian Affairs who investigated the case, said Hasson obtained the skull when he was a teenager visiting Kaanapali Beach on Maui in 1969 during the time when Whalers Village, a shopping center, was being built.
Fryar said that Hasson decided to sell it "when he saw the prices of human skulls selling on the Internet."
Edward Halealoha Ayau, a spokesman for Hui Malama I Na Kupuna O Hawai'i Nei ("Group Caring for the Ancestors of Hawai'i"), a native Hawai'ian organization involved in the reparation and reburial of native Hawaiian remains and artifacts, said yesterday that several people alerted him by e-mail when the skull went on eBay.
"It looked Hawaiian," said Ayau describing the picture of the skull. "I wouldn't have done anything if it hadn't looked Hawaiian."
Ayau said he e-mailed Hasson that selling a skull was illegal under federal laws.
"I pleaded for him to take it off the Internet," said Ayau.
Ayau said yesterday he then contacted federal agents. Once the skull is no longer needed as evidence, it will be reburied, said Ayau.
Hui Malama is supporting a federal investigation of the alleged theft of artifacts from a burial cave on the Big Island. The artifacts allegedly showed up for sale in July on the black market.
In a detailed affidavit of his investigation, Fryar said that after being alerted to the sale, he started posing on the Internet as an interested buyer from New Mexico named John Garcia.
The affidavit said Hasson allegedly e-mailed back that he had recently learned that the auction of the skull was offensive to native Hawaiians and had chosen to take it off eBay and sell it privately.
According to Fryar's affidavit, Hasson told him that his attorney told him that if he gave the skull as a gift, he might not violate laws.
The affidavit details the negotiations Fryar alleges he had with Hasson.
It says Hasson suggested that Fryar or a friend buy a comic Fanzine online for the price of the skull, and "then I will GIFT to you the skull. That way there's no connection whatsoever."
Fryar agreed to buy a Fanzine, believed to be worth about $20, for $2500. Hasson sent the skull Federal Express to Fryar.
According to the affidavit, Hasson said he was a teenager during the excavations for Whalers Village. He said that he and two others evaded guards and sneaked into the site one night. He said he dug into the sand and found part of a leg and kept digging until he found the skull.
The affidavit also quoted Hasson saying "right next to this skeleton, there were some warrior artifacts ... like hatchets and stuff like that, but I was afraid to take those things, I left those in the sand."
insomnia is a humiliating experience. i am not a violent person. in fact, i am on the edge of shame when i think about my short temper and visions of blood-letting over a towed car. rage and hatred do lend a certain feeling of invincibility. when one has reached the stage where the prospect of clawing one's eyes out to shut out that horrid, penetrating, headache-inducing light that just seems to pour from all directions despite pathetic efforts to retreat to place of darkness, a feeling of strength and power is welcome. insomnia is a quick introduction to the experience of the self as a thing. the body rebels in the most infuriating, inert way. it cannot be reasoned with, so sleep cannot be negotiated.
when i could sleep long enough to enter the REM state, i had intense vivid dreams in which my body disintegrated. my skin sloughed off and my hair and teeth fell out. in the dreams, i felt no horror or sorrow at this. the loss of the body was a relief. it was wish fulfillment on a grand scale -- i wanted to discard my body and its need for rest because it so obstinately refused to take the rest i was so earnestly offering it. the body was a source of misery in waking life -- hypersensitive to both sound and light. sometimes, the sound of people talking felt like nails driving relentlessly into my skull.
after a few days of bad sleep, my whole self feels sandy and gritty, and i lose my way in the world. i can't judge time passing because i can't remember anything with the proper context. spilling coffee grinds on the floor causes as much frustration, nay rage and hatred, as having my car towed. i can't assign relative importance to anything, because the mental work involved is simply too much. nevertheless, bodily rebellion is nothing like rebellion of the mind. it spews garbage because the cleaning lady has been locked out. negative emotional energies coagulate in the pathways of my brain, stalking me, waiting for the right moment to seize the controls and unleash all my helpless fury.
never take your mental maid service for granted.
why is it that i have this overwhelming urge to post a comment on yek-e em's post, "The Reptilian Brain, Bathed In Rage and Hatred"?
it's like a giant, red button labeled DO NOT PUSH appears on my computer whenever i load the w4d website.
damn you, flanders!
... i present this homage. it might be misogynistic... i guess it depends on your level of irreverence. (actually, on alias the situation was reversed.)
A few months ago, there was an opening with the CIA for an assassin. These highly classified positions are hard to fill, and there's a lot of testing and background checks involved before you can even be considered for the position. After sending some applicants through the background checks, training and testing, they narrowed the possible choices down to two men and a woman, but only one position was available.love it.The day came for the final test to see which peson would get the extremely secretive job. The CIA men administering the test took one of the men to a large metal door and handed him a gun. "We must know that you will follow our instructions whatever the circumstances," they explained. "Inside this room, you will find your wife sitting in a chair. Take this gun and kill her."
The man looked horrified and said, "You can't be serious! I could never shoot my wife!"
"Well," said the CIA man, "you're definitely not the right man for this job then."
So they brought the second man to the same door and handed him a gun. "We must know that you will follow instructions no matter what the circumstances," they explained to the second man. "Inside you will find your wife sitting in a chair. Take this gun and kill her."
The second man looked a bit shocked, but nevertheless took the gun and went in the room. All was quiet for about 5 minutes; then the door opened. The man came out of the room with tears in his eyes. "I tried to shoot her; I just couldn't pull the trigger and shoot my wife. I guess I'm not the right man for the job."
"No," the CIA man replied, "You don't have what it takes. Take your wife and go home."
Now they only had the woman left to test. They led her to the same door to the same room and handed her the same gun. "We must be sure that you will follow instructions no matter what the circumstances; this is your final test. Inside you will find your husband sitting in a chair. Take this gun and kill him."
The woman took the gun and opened the door. Before the door even closed all the way, the CIA men heard the gun start firing, one shot after another - 13 shots in total. Then all hell broke loose in the room. They heard screaming, bashing and banging on the walls. This went on for several minutes; then all went quiet.
The door opened slowly, and there stood the woman. She wiped the sweat from her brow and said, "You guys didn't tell me the gun was loaded with blanks. I had to beat the son of a bitch to death with the chair!"
thanks, random poster on the bulletin board of MWU!
i'm posting today about a very personal issue for me. it's not something fun to discuss: when you have no bathroom. more specifically, when you are denied access to the toilets because you are judged insufficiently male or female (as appropriate) to use them.
you might think this is a ridiculous issue, but let me assure you, it is no joke. i used to work at a lawfirm and i was required to use the visitor's bathroom because the company judged i would make other women uncomfortable if i used the women's room. no matter it was rarely available, either because it was broken or in use, or that it was seven flights of stairs away from where i worked. no matter how i felt about it.
i had a haitian coworker, a woman, who when she discovered i had to use the lobby bathroom began referring to it as "the coloured bathroom". i can't say i didn't feel about as offended as such a term would suggest, either. it was extremely insulting to me that, as a one of the roughly one in a thousand americans not born with the easy luxury of having a clear alignment with one sex and one gender, i was treated as a freak. sometimes i felt like a circus sideshow.
hell, let's be honest: half the reason i watch carnivàle is that it is a social group where a bearded lady is just another person.
and that doesn't even speak for those dykes or gay men who are treated badly for their apparent gender rule-breaking. i even had a girlfriend who was unusually tall and was forcibly removed from the women's restroom at the Boston airport by the police. she is unequivocally female in genetics and gender presentation, but apparently someone thought she was too tall as a chinese person to "really" be female. so they got the police to drag her out of the bathroom. she had to show them her passport to 'prove' she had the right to piss.
in that light, i present the following:
A Quest for a Restroom That's Neither Men's Room Nor Women's Roomit's a nightmare to go out, and that just makes it worse. i mean, when do you have to use the bathroom more than when you are nervous?
Patricia Leigh Brown, NYT, 4 March 2005San Francisco - Political epiphanies can occur in unexpected places. For Riki Dennis, a 35-year-old humanities student who is transsexual, it was the women's room at a rest stop on Highway 101 north of Santa Barbara.
"The boyfriend hit me, even in mellow California," said Ms. Dennis, who was in the early stages of becoming female when she was assaulted by a stranger after using the women's room. "I said, 'Sir, I have no designs on your girlfriend.' I just want to use the bathroom."
Ms. Dennis, whose lowish voice is now the lone betrayal of her birth sex, is a foot soldier on a new political frontier: the campaign to establish gender-neutral bathrooms in public places. The idea is to make sure that transgender people (an umbrella term that can include transsexuals, cross-dressers and those with a fluid, androgynous identity who do not consider themselves completely male or female) can use bathrooms without fear of harassment.
Ms. Dennis is one of 250 or so members of People in Search of Safe Restrooms [that spells P.I.S.S.R - ed.], a group founded here three years ago. It reflects a small but active movement, mostly on college campuses but also in a few cities, in which the bathroom, that prosaic fixture of past battles against racial segregation and for the rights of the disabled, has become an emotional and at times deeply personal symbol of a cultural and political divide.
In fact, bathrooms have become a cultural "fault line," said Mary Anne Case, a law professor at the University of Chicago, where the Queer Action Campaign for Gender-Neutral Bathrooms recently got 10 single-use restrooms on campus designated gender neutral.
"Very few spaces in our society remain divided by sex," Professor Case said. "There's marriage and there's toilets, and very little else."
To young transgender people, especially college students, the issue has particular resonance.
"Students are looking hard at the right to express their gender, a painful rite of passage for every young adult," said Riki Wilchins, executive director of the Gender Public Advocacy Coalition, a nonprofit group in Washington that fights discrimination and violence based on gender stereotypes. "These kids are demanding the right to be who they are and what they are 24/7. They're tired of being harassed or hassled when they simply need to use a public facility."
And so many students - including those at Beloit College in Wisconsin, Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, N.Y., and the University of California, Santa Barbara - have lobbied successfully for gender-neutral bathrooms.
At the New College of California, a liberal arts college in the Mission District of San Francisco, men's and women's rooms have recently given way to "de-gendered" restrooms, devoid of urinals as well as of white stick figures with pants or a skirt. Signs on the doors proclaim the new restroom politics: "Lots of people don't fit neatly into our culture's rigid two-gender system."
At the City College of San Francisco, a community college with more than 100,000 students, about 10 percent to 12 percent of the students are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender. After complaints of harassment by a transgender student, campus administrators recently transformed some men's bathrooms into gender-neutral ones.
Two new satellite campuses, to open in 2007, are being planned with men's, women's and gender-neutral bathrooms on every floor of the buildings. Major new construction on the University of California, Santa Barbara, campus is also going to include gender-neutral bathrooms.
One reason the issue has significance on these campuses is that in contrast to previous generations, in which many sought to transform their birth sex through hormones or surgery, today's young transgender people are content with a more fluid identity.
"I use the male bathroom, because I live my life as a male," said Rolan Gregg, a 29-year-old student at the California College of Arts and Crafts in San Francisco, who was born female and, though he is taking hormones, does not "pass yet," as he put it. "The problem with not passing is that my risk of violence is really high. So going to the bathroom becomes really scary."
Public restroom use is governed by a legal patchwork of city and town ordinances and state laws. San Francisco is one of five cities, including New York, with regulations protecting public restroom access based on "gender identity," which refers to a person's internal sense of gender rather than their birth sex.
But in other places, restroom access based on gender identity is "an evolving area of the law," said Chris Daley, executive director of the Transgender Law Center, a San Francisco-based civil rights organization.
Here in California, where the governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, speaks derogatorily of "girlie men," the battle over public municipal bathrooms began in San Francisco in 2001, when the city's Human Rights Commission surveyed use of the city's bathrooms after complaints by transgender people and others about harassment in public and private bathrooms. As a result of the survey, the city passed guidelines recommending gender-neutral bathrooms be an option in public places.
"In San Francisco," said Marcus Arana, the a discrimination investigator for the commission, "the choice between being hassled or holding their water affects thousands of people."
Elsewhere in the Bay Area, advocates of gender-neutral bathrooms are beginning to make themselves heard. In January, they pressed the board of supervisors of Alameda County to adopt a resolution forbidding discrimination in public facilities, including restrooms, based on gender identity. Alameda County was the home of Gwen Araujo, a 17-year-old transgender high school student who was murdered in 2002.
But at the meeting, opponents to the provision focused on potential side effects of the law.
"You can be sure that stalkers and peeping Toms will take full advantage of this change," said Catherine Norman, 54, a substitute teacher from Fremont. She added, "Bathrooms are about biology, not perceived gender."
Whenever he is in an airport, Shana Agid, a 30-year-old transgender art student, finds himself praying he can hold out until he gets on the airplane.
"Day after day, it gets a little old," he said of a ritual he confronts at least a half-dozen times a day. "It feels ridiculous to tell people as a grown person that you have trouble going to the bathroom.
