Wish-fulfillment in Iran – it’s just a dream after all
what are seeing in Iran is something like a reality based TV show. It’s based on a real incident, but it’s still being shaped by the show’s writers and director (ie, the western media) to be the most interesting to a Western audience. We’re only seeing the bits of tape that conform to what the western media (which represent us) want the story to be. It’s real but it’s not reality.
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Does the road to Tehran run through Jerusalem?
Mon, 10/05/2009 - 8:34am
By Dov Zakheim
Press reports this past week indicate that the Western powers' discussions with Iran appear to have mollified the Israelis, at least to the extent that Jerusalem has toned down jeremiad-like rhetoric regarding the Iranian nuclear program. How long Israel will be prepared literally to hold its fire while Iran transfers some, but by no means all, of its enriched uranium for processing in Russia, and opens its facility in Qom for IAEA inspections, very much remains to be seen.
Clearly, with the West talking tough, Israel does not want to be viewed as carping on the sidelines. But the Israelis recognize that the so-called secret facility at Qom was not so secret at all; the United States and others were aware of its existence for some time. The Israelis also harbor grave doubts about the IAEA's ability to monitor Iranian activity that Tehran prefers it not monitor. And Jerusalem knows full well that sanctions have a mixed record of successfully obtaining whatever objective motivated their imposition.
At the same time, however, Israel recognizes that Washington is now increasingly positioning itself to take military action against Iran if the talks, transfers to Russia, and sanctions fail to halt the momentum of the Iranian program. In particular, the Obama administration's announcement that it will reposition its missile-defense forces so as better to protect Europe against an Iranian strike has the direct effect of supplementing Israel's missile defenses. In fact, the American military deterrent has far greater significance than the talks, sanctions, or reprocessing deal. By committing Aegis ships to the eastern Mediterranean, the administration is also putting its forces in harm's way: There is no way that ships off Israel could avoid the effects of an Iranian nuclear strike on that country.
At the same time, however, Israel recognizes that Washington is now increasingly positioning itself to take military action against Iran if the talks, transfers to Russia, and sanctions fail to halt the momentum of the Iranian program. In particular, the Obama administration's announcement that it will reposition its missile-defense forces so as better to protect Europe against an Iranian strike has the direct effect of supplementing Israel's missile defenses. In fact, the American military deterrent has far greater significance than the talks, sanctions, or reprocessing deal. By committing Aegis ships to the eastern Mediterranean, the administration is also putting its forces in harm's way: There is no way that ships off Israel could avoid the effects of an Iranian nuclear strike on that country.
Israelis have long recognized -- though rarely acknowledged -- that there is an additional factor that would give Iranians pause before they launched a nuclear attack. Even one successful detonation would likely have devastating effects not just on Israeli Jews, but on Palestinian Arabs (thereby offering one way, perhaps, to conclude the peace process, namely, by wiping out both sides), and, indeed, on neighboring Lebanese, Jordanians, Egyptians, and even Saudis. And while a cynic might point out that Persians have as much contempt for Arabs as they do for Jews, the fact that Jerusalem might not survive may be the greatest of all deterrents for an Iranian leadership that views itself at the vanguard of Islam.
On the other hand, there is no guarantee that the Obama administration's tough talk will translate into action; tough talk has accomplished little to move Pyongyang, for example. There is considerable uncertainty as to how exactly the administration will deploy naval forces to the Mediterranean: the Navy's force levels are dropping below 300, and the demand for Aegis ships in the Pacific and Indian Oceans has not diminished. Moreover, the fact that, in a remarkable exercise in role-switching, European leaders and intelligence analysts are more pessimistic about the progress of the Iranian nuclear program than their American counterparts, inspires little confidence in Washington's ultimate intentions.
The Israelis are prepared to give their closest ally the benefit of the doubt for the time being. And "the time being" may not be that long. In the end, however, unless they are absolutely certain that, as several senators proposed on Sunday, the United States commits itself to a military strike on Iran if the negotiations fail, they will act on their own. "Sinn Fein," ourselves alone, may be the name of an Irish movement, but it embodies the very essence of Israeli policy in the face of what it continues to view as a threat to its very existence.
On the other hand, there is no guarantee that the Obama administration's tough talk will translate into action; tough talk has accomplished little to move Pyongyang, for example. There is considerable uncertainty as to how exactly the administration will deploy naval forces to the Mediterranean: the Navy's force levels are dropping below 300, and the demand for Aegis ships in the Pacific and Indian Oceans has not diminished. Moreover, the fact that, in a remarkable exercise in role-switching, European leaders and intelligence analysts are more pessimistic about the progress of the Iranian nuclear program than their American counterparts, inspires little confidence in Washington's ultimate intentions.
The Israelis are prepared to give their closest ally the benefit of the doubt for the time being. And "the time being" may not be that long. In the end, however, unless they are absolutely certain that, as several senators proposed on Sunday, the United States commits itself to a military strike on Iran if the negotiations fail, they will act on their own. "Sinn Fein," ourselves alone, may be the name of an Irish movement, but it embodies the very essence of Israeli policy in the face of what it continues to view as a threat to its very existence.
Beware of silencing the military
Tue, 10/06/2009 - 1:45pm
By Kori Schake
The release of Gen. Stanley McChrystal's report on the war in Afghanistan has occasioned full-throated cries of insubordination from the president's liberal supporters. The most ignorant and offensive of these is Eugene Robinson's belief that the military "need to shut up and salute."
Let's leave aside that liberal commentators showed no such compunction when the Bush administration was being criticized by the military -- including both active-duty servicemen like Army Chief of Staff Eric Shinseki and retired servicemen like Lt. Gen. Greg Newbold -- for its conduct of the Iraq war and for Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's disrespect of their views.
Then, dissent was patriotic. Now, evidently, our military is not to be afforded views on the war they are fighting.
But shutting up the generals would be a terrible mistake, one much more hurtful to the Obama administration than to the military. Here are the main reasons the administration should not take the counsel of its supporters and silence the dissent being vented by our military.
They're more popular than he is. The American military is the most respected institution in these United States, with 82% of the public expressing high confidence, routinely outpacing all other institutions in American life -- to include the presidency (51%), the Supreme Court (39%) and Congress (17%). They're likely to win this one in the eyes of the American people, and that can't be good for the president.
They want to support him. After President Bill Clinton commenced his administration with the ill-fated executive order on homosexuals serving openly in the military, Secretary of Defense Les Aspin wrote him a terrific memo about how to repair relations with the military. The fundamental point was that the military is a winnable constituency for any president. They want him to succeed. Treating them like they're the enemy will offend their professionalism.
They understand the difference between policymaking and execution. It's their job to salute and carry out orders once the president gives them, but that does not proscribe them from influencing policy in the making. Go back and read the transcript of Gen. Colin Powell's lecture at the National Defense University during the "gays in the military" imbroglio for a poignant reminder of how well they get it. It will be a better policy if the president takes account of their concerns.
They know more about war than you do. Less than 1% of Americans serve in the military, and few of our political elites have any experience of the military. Those who are serving or have served do actually know more about the theory and practice of warfare than those of us who have not. They've risked their lives to acquire the knowledge, and deserve us giving deference to their judgment on what it takes to fight and win the nation's wars.
He was persuading allies to remain committed to the fight. President Obama is not General McChrystal's only boss. As the NATO commander, he works for all the governments with forces committed to the mission in Afghanistan. In his comments in London, McChrystal was defending the strategy President Obama asked allies to commit to, and for which their forces are risking their lives. He was helping make the case for the war to skeptical European publics; surely the White House does not want to do all that heavy lifting itself?
Ask yourself why it leaked. Internal government documents like the McChrystal report on Afghanistan tend to be leaked in one of three circumstances: (1) someone who cares desperately about the policy believes an administration is about to make a catastrophic mistake; (2) someone involved in policy formation believes their point of view isn't getting a fair hearing; or (3) someone wants to force the administration to publicly defend its choices. The latter usually occurs when, say, the national security advisor tries to intimidate military commanders into politicizing their advice. Or when the president curries favor with the military by telling the Veterans of Foreign Wars he's all in, then a month later getting cold feet when the bill for achieving his objectives comes due. Whichever of these factors drove this leak, the administration should take it as a canary in a coal mine they aren't building consensus within the government, either for their process or their preferred course of action.
You get the military leadership you deserve. If you penalize military leaders who give you unwelcome advice, they'll stop giving you their best judgment. They'll either fall silent, (as then Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers did in the run up to the Iraq war), or they'll retire (as Lt. Gen. Newbold did in the run up to the Iraq war and Gen. Ron Fogleman did after the commander of the Khobar Towers facility in Saudi Arabia at the time of the bombing was later denied promotion), or they'll go through the motions of what you've asked and achieve little (as Gen. George W. Casey, now Army chief of staff, did when he was the top U.S. commander in Iraq). The president needs -- and should want -- military leaders who give their military judgment, which is all General McChrystal has done.
Secretary Gates judiciously suggested in his speech to the Association of the U.S. Army Monday that the president has a right to receive advice confidentially. He is serving the president well by trying to turn down the temperature on this civil-military imbroglio. People in the White House would also be wise to stop trying to silence the military -- or they won't like the military they end up with.
Photo: Pete Souza/White House
( That's a nice 'Aye,Aye,Sir!' puff piece categorizing dissent as 'liberal' and disloyal : a 'two-fer' diametrically opposed to the notion of intelligent debate. The MSM are nothing if not inconsistent. The 'military' I want to hear from are vets : sick,homeless,unemployed and ignored. Not too much glitz left on their thoughts : AND WELL AWARE OF THE ACTUALITIES 'ON THE GROUND.' 'Silence from the Military' : there's a catchphrase with two sides.
BTW There is a clear implication...that Obama should not listen to 'Liberals' .
Funny. He was busy trying to 'sell' himself as one not too long ago.)
The once and future global imbalance
Wed, 10/07/2009 - 8:03am
By Phil Levy
The Pittsburgh G-20 meetings concluded with a call for strong, sustainable, and balanced global growth. Countries were going to get their acts together, to shape up, to mend their ways. And if they don't? What if they just go with their own domestic political imperatives? Then someone will call them out, the leaders said.
But who? The International Monetary Fund, perhaps. After a meeting of finance ministers, the AP reported:
Four governments -- including the United States and China -- renewed promises to enact policies aimed at rebalancing global trade.
They said an orderly reduction in the U.S. trade deficit and trade surpluses in Asia would benefit the world by defusing protectionist trade action...
"It was agreed that a rebalancing of domestic demand growth across economies would be key to reducing imbalances...," said the statement, issued on behalf of the group by the IMF.
China pledged to take steps to increase domestic demand, deepen financial reforms and increase the flexibility of its currency, a step long demanded by the United States and other industrialized nations.
Wait! This story is from April 2007, on the eve of the global financial crisis. (Plus ça change...). That meeting followed a 2006 agreement that the IMF would adopt a new surveillance system to identify misaligned exchange rates. The surveillance program essentially came to naught. This ineffectiveness was not due to any analytical weakness on the part of the good folks at the IMF. It turned out, rather, that big countries like the United States and China dislike being publicly criticized.
Of course, smaller nations share this distaste for criticism, but they usually have no choice. The IMF has leverage when it lends money. When a nation like Hungary orIceland finds itself in serious trouble, it must accept IMF policy prescriptions along with the cash. The bitter memories of this cash/criticism combo from the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s help explain why Asian countries have built up such substantial piles of exchange reserves; they want to ensure they are not in that position again.
Why should the IMF or World Bank care, though? Why not just call it the way they see it and let the big countries deal with their own bruised egos? Because the big countries are the IMF and World Bank. The leaders of the bank and fund spend their days reporting to boards of executive directors, seeking the boards' approval for all they do. These institutions are not like the U.N. General Assembly -- one country, one vote -- the executive directors' votes are roughly weighted according to the economic heft of the countries they represent.
This creates a dynamic that played out this week in Istanbul, where the bank and fund are holding their fall meetings. According to the Financial Times, World Bank President Robert Zoellick asked his governing council for an infusion of $5 billion. Without it, he said,
"[A]s we start to get towards the middle of next year we are going to start to face some serious constraints and we would have to ration..." He said uncertainty over future financing capacity was already affecting bank work with developing countries.
Developing nations voiced unanimous support for a capital increase.
But developing nations are not the ones paying the bills. Zoellick faced a much more skeptical reception from the British, the French, the Japanese, and the Americans. It is the major donors to which any bank president is beholden. This dependence did not stop Zoellick from making a relatively forthright speech about global imbalances last week at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, but the FTpictured him yesterday with his head in his hands.
The independence deficit of the IMF and World Bank is serious, but perhaps not the most significant obstacle to achieving global rebalancing through coordinated reform. Even if Bob Zoellick launched the kind of scathing critique of which he's certainly capable, it would not suffice to bring serious cuts to U.S. federal deficits or to prompt revaluation of the Chinese currency. President Obama's political prospects depend heavily on delivering a costly expansion of health-care coverage. The Chinese leadership's legitimacy rests heavily on maintaining employment in the manufacturing sector. In each case, the domestic political stakes are far too high to be overcome by global opinion, no matter how blunt.
Change will come, of course. But it will be through average American voters worrying about borrowing from their grandchildren, or from average Chinese worried about the value of their massive dollar holdings. Right now, even if the IMF or the World Bank were to call out, those key constituencies aren't listening.
Win McNamee/Getty Images
XVIII Airborne Corps HQ set for permanent Afghan duty
Wed, 10/07/2009 - 11:25am
This may sound obscure, but it really is newsy: Word at the Pentagon is that the Army is going to designate the XVIII Airborne Corps as the permanent headquarters for Afghanistan. This is part of Gen. McChrystal's long-term plan to create a team of "Afghan Hands" who can build for several years, during multiple tours, on their experience and relationships in the country.
In order to do this, the corps headquarters will nearly double in size. At any given time, about half will be in Afghanistan and the other half back home in Fort Bragg, N.C.
The old saying is that amateurs talk tactics, and professionals talk logistics. But I think people who really are in the know talk about personnel policy. That is how real change is effected, at least in the U.S. military today.
And this headquarters plan looks to me like a major change for the Army. I think it makes a lot of sense, and also gets the Army out of the troubling dilemma of either rotating units (and so starting over almost at zero every 12 months) or of keeping units in place and rotating individuals (which was the policy in Vietnam that was thought to undermine unit cohesion). This also provides more evidence that McChrystal really is serious about changing the way the Army has operated in Iraq and Afghanistan, trying to fit its square, industrial era personnel policies into the round holes of small, difficult, far-flung wars. Essentially, XVIII Airborne Corps will have an approach akin to the Navy's system of manning ballistic missile submarines with a "Gold Team" and a "Blue Team." In fact, I'm told that in coming up with this plan, the Army looked at how the Navy does that. Those involved are to be congratulated.
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Iran: Dreams Underfoot
June 22, 2009 · 1 Comment
by matttbastard
Following the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq, Tom Regan’s Terrorism and Security Briefing for the Christian Science Monitorbecame a must-read for anyone who wanted a daily general analysis of counterterrorism/counterinsurgency developments around the world. Unfortunately, Regan no longer compiles the briefing. But, late last week, he quietly emerged from an undisclosed location to pen this must-read take on the ongoing post-election turmoil in Iran.
Regan notes that the West may be projecting its own collective desire for transformative political reform in the region onto a murky, still-fluid situation that is not quite the widespread democratic uprising that the mainstream media and Western political establishment would have us believe:
…I strongly believe that what are seeing in Iran is something like a reality based TV show. It’s based on a real incident, but it’s still being shaped by the show’s writers and director (ie, the western media) to be the most interesting to a Western audience. We’re only seeing the bits of tape that conform to what the western media ([which] represent us) want the story to be. It’s real but it’s not reality.
First, this is most definitely NOT a national revolution. This is a protest largely based, as I said, in northern Tehran, the more affluent and prosperous area of the city where most of the universities are located as are (surprised) the hotels where most western journalists stay. As Time’s Joe Klein (who just got back from Tehran) noted in an interview on CNN yesterday, there is no protest at all in southern Tehran, the largest part of the city where the poor and less-educated live. This is Ahmadinejad ’s base. And there is almost no protest at all in rural areas. The regime is firmly in command in most of the country, and the more repressive elements like the Revolutionary Guard have yet to really make their presence felt.
You know, this beginning to sound like Beijing 20 years ago.
Now, there is always the chance that a revolt driven by a relatively small number of the country’s population will succeed in overthrowing the country’s regime. Especially in Iran, where one revolution has already done that. But that was a revolt approved by the large majority of the people against a hated despot. This is not the same situation. If there is hatred of Ahmedinejad it comes no where near close to the hatred felt for the Shah. It’s just not going to happen.
As they say, read the whole damn thing.
h/t Karoli via Twitter
Related: Patrick Martin provides a history lesson on Mir-Houssein Mousavi, a most unlikely champion for Western-style liberal democracy, while John Palfrey, Bruce Etling and Robert Faris of Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society share an informative survey of the overall Iranian web presence (which–surprise–may not conform with what we’ve been voyeuristically observing via Twitter). Elsewhere, Dana Goldstein gives us these twomust-read posts on the role Iranian feminists have played in the uprising (h/t Ann Friedman). Also see the one and only Antonia Zerbisias (taking a welcome respite from blogging about her thighs and pention [sic]) for more on how–and why–the women of Iran have taken the lead in demonstrations.
Review: “Encirclement: Neo-liberalism Ensnares Democracy”
Dear Diaspora
Confidence, Not Caveats: Butch, Femme, And Tearing Down Stereotypes
October 3, 2009Along these lines, I’ve been thinking a lot about the fact that butch and femme identities seem to be disproportionately bogged down in sexist stereotypes. And rather than being assailed from the outside, by those who don’t understand them, femme and butch seem to be weighed down with insults launched largely from the inside, by those who have the most reason to use them. (There’s a great post more or less about this over at things to think about.)
Once in awhile one will hear a statement as simple and shameless as “I’m femme,” or “I’m butch,” but more often, it seems to me, such sentences are so swamped with stipulations they’re barely legible. I hear things like “I guess I lean more to the butch-ish side of the spectrum of things, but — I mean — I’m just me, I don’t necessarily do all the stereotypical butch things…” I hear things like, “I hate labels but I guess if I have to choose, I would be more femme, but you know, sometimes I wear jeans, and I know how to change my own oil, so I’m not sure, I guess my attitude is butch because I’m outspoken…” Many of the videos here are great examples of this.
Do people feel the need to do this when they identify themselves as men or women? “I’m a woman, but just so you know I do wear pants, and I played rugby in high school”? “I guess you could call me a man, but I hate labels, and I pluck my eyebrows, and I cry sometimes, so maybe I’m a woman”? No — because we’ve opened our understandings of manhood and womanhood to include at least a modicum of gender variance. Whither butch and femme?
Let me clarify, here, that I’m all for everyone using whatever words work for them. If femme and butch don’t work for you, more power to you — that’s perfectly alright, and I hope you find the words that do, if you so wish. There are all kinds of people out there and they need all kinds of words to describe them. As far as I can tell, femmes and butches are minorities among queer women. So if all these caveats are because people are feeling pressured by some outside force to use the terms, but they don’t really fit, so they’re modifying the hell out of them, then, well — that pressure (if it exists) is wrong, and I object to it.
All I have to go on is my experience, though, and my experience is that, if anything, the opposite pressure — the “I hate labels, I identify as me” pressure — is the powerful force today. I think there is something else going on here.
Partly I think it’s a real lack of intra-communal agreement aboutwhat the words even mean. For what it’s worth, my Oxford American Dictionary says: “butch, n., a mannish lesbian, often contrasted with a more feminine partner; femme, n., a lesbian or an effeminate male homosexual who takes a traditionally feminine sexual role.” I don’t think these are perfect, at all — I do they’re an eminently reasonable place to start.
The other thing I think is happening — and I don’t claim to understand the causes of this — is the subscription to sexist stereotypes about butches and femmes by butches and femmes themselves. Notice that the definitions above, which, given their source, I think we can use see as a more or less mainline understanding of the terms, mention nothing about make-up or motor oil. One might think such stereotypes are largely a problem of the concepts “masculine” and “feminine,” but I don’t notice such excessive qualification when people use those words. These denunciations seem to be specific to the words femme and butch, and, as far as I can tell, specific to self-identified femmes and butches.
But in their eager disavowal of stereotypes, the speakers are actually subscribing to and perpetuating them. These disclaimers reintroduce the stereotypes to the discourse, and, in their claims of exceptionality, imply that most or even all other butches and femmes do fit them. It’s not, “I’m butch, and I’m really sensitive — butches can be thick-skinned or vulnerable, just like anybody else.” It’s “I’m butch, but [unlike other butches] I’m sensitive, so maybe I’m not really [because butches can't be sensitive].”
What would the conversation look like if no one felt the need to note that she is femme but outspoken, implying the latter conflicts with the former? If no one felt the need to identify as butch but fashion-conscious, or a bottom, or a sissy? If everyone who wanted to claimed those words, demanded them, made them fit? We would have people who are femme and wear jeans and fix cars, people who are butch and love to bake and put rhinestone collars on their little fluffy dogs, not buts about it. We would have nothing less than the transformation of the terms. We could crack them open, make room inside them for everyone who wants to be there.
The way to tear down stereotypes is not to except oneself alone, leaving them otherwise intact. The way to tear down stereotypes is to fucking tear them down.
Tags: butch, femininity, femme, gender identity, masculinity, queerOnce in awhile one will hear a statement as simple and shameless as “I’m femme,” or “I’m butch,” but more often, it seems to me, such sentences are so swamped with stipulations they’re barely legible. I hear things like “I guess I lean more to the butch-ish side of the spectrum of things, but — I mean — I’m just me, I don’t necessarily do all the stereotypical butch things…” I hear things like, “I hate labels but I guess if I have to choose, I would be more femme, but you know, sometimes I wear jeans, and I know how to change my own oil, so I’m not sure, I guess my attitude is butch because I’m outspoken…” Many of the videos here are great examples of this.
Do people feel the need to do this when they identify themselves as men or women? “I’m a woman, but just so you know I do wear pants, and I played rugby in high school”? “I guess you could call me a man, but I hate labels, and I pluck my eyebrows, and I cry sometimes, so maybe I’m a woman”? No — because we’ve opened our understandings of manhood and womanhood to include at least a modicum of gender variance. Whither butch and femme?
Let me clarify, here, that I’m all for everyone using whatever words work for them. If femme and butch don’t work for you, more power to you — that’s perfectly alright, and I hope you find the words that do, if you so wish. There are all kinds of people out there and they need all kinds of words to describe them. As far as I can tell, femmes and butches are minorities among queer women. So if all these caveats are because people are feeling pressured by some outside force to use the terms, but they don’t really fit, so they’re modifying the hell out of them, then, well — that pressure (if it exists) is wrong, and I object to it.
All I have to go on is my experience, though, and my experience is that, if anything, the opposite pressure — the “I hate labels, I identify as me” pressure — is the powerful force today. I think there is something else going on here.
Partly I think it’s a real lack of intra-communal agreement aboutwhat the words even mean. For what it’s worth, my Oxford American Dictionary says: “butch, n., a mannish lesbian, often contrasted with a more feminine partner; femme, n., a lesbian or an effeminate male homosexual who takes a traditionally feminine sexual role.” I don’t think these are perfect, at all — I do they’re an eminently reasonable place to start.
The other thing I think is happening — and I don’t claim to understand the causes of this — is the subscription to sexist stereotypes about butches and femmes by butches and femmes themselves. Notice that the definitions above, which, given their source, I think we can use see as a more or less mainline understanding of the terms, mention nothing about make-up or motor oil. One might think such stereotypes are largely a problem of the concepts “masculine” and “feminine,” but I don’t notice such excessive qualification when people use those words. These denunciations seem to be specific to the words femme and butch, and, as far as I can tell, specific to self-identified femmes and butches.
But in their eager disavowal of stereotypes, the speakers are actually subscribing to and perpetuating them. These disclaimers reintroduce the stereotypes to the discourse, and, in their claims of exceptionality, imply that most or even all other butches and femmes do fit them. It’s not, “I’m butch, and I’m really sensitive — butches can be thick-skinned or vulnerable, just like anybody else.” It’s “I’m butch, but [unlike other butches] I’m sensitive, so maybe I’m not really [because butches can't be sensitive].”
What would the conversation look like if no one felt the need to note that she is femme but outspoken, implying the latter conflicts with the former? If no one felt the need to identify as butch but fashion-conscious, or a bottom, or a sissy? If everyone who wanted to claimed those words, demanded them, made them fit? We would have people who are femme and wear jeans and fix cars, people who are butch and love to bake and put rhinestone collars on their little fluffy dogs, not buts about it. We would have nothing less than the transformation of the terms. We could crack them open, make room inside them for everyone who wants to be there.
The way to tear down stereotypes is not to except oneself alone, leaving them otherwise intact. The way to tear down stereotypes is to fucking tear them down.
October 3, 2009 at 5:46 pm
October 3, 2009 at 6:18 pm
October 3, 2009 at 6:32 pm
October 3, 2009 at 6:35 pm
October 4, 2009 at 11:21 am
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