Tag Archives: sexual assault

On Too $hort and apologies.

Posted on February 27, 2012 by | 13 Comments

So a couple of weeks ago, this rapper I’d never heard of before he really pissed me off — really pissed me off.

In a video shot for the online presence of XXL Magazine, rapper Too $hort said:

When you get to late middle school, early high school and you start feeling a certain way about the girls. I’m gonna tell you a couple tricks… A lot of the boys are going to be running around trying to get kisses from the girls. We’re going way past that. I’m taking you to the hole….[Push her] up against the wall or [pull] her up against you while you lean on the wall. Take your finger and put a little spit on it and you stick your finger in her underwear and you rub it on there and watch what happens.

So. Here we have a grown man of some renown advising pre-teen and teenaged boys to sexually assault girls. Which, you know: Awesome.

Initially, Too $hort appeared to apologize on Twitter, if with a certain lack of understanding, explaining that he’d been “in character” and had gotten carried away, but he changed tack fairly quickly, essentially lashing out at those who took the video as anything other than a joke.

Which, you know: Awesome. (And hence my reference to him here).

HOWEVER.

In the meantime, having been swamped with responses, reactions, stories and no little anger, Too $hort (nee Todd Shaw) gave an interview to Dream Hampton, a writer with Ebony and one of the women involved in WeAreThe44% (a reference to statistics that show that 44% of American girls are assaulted before their 18th birthday). This time, here was what Too $hort  said:

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Posted in Emily L. Hauser, Respect, War on Women

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Fox News's Liz Trotta on Sexual Assault in the Military: Men Get Rapey Sometimes. Get Over it!

Posted on February 13, 2012 by | 16 Comments

Jesus take the wheel

Seriously.  Just take the wheel and drive the car into a tree:

During a segment about new rules regarding women in the military, Fox News contributor Liz Trotta attacked the Department of Defense for increasing spending on support programs for victims of sexual assault. Trotta also reacted to a Pentagon report showing a 64% increase in violent sexual assaults since 2006 by stating: “Well, what did they expect? These people are in close contact.” Continue reading →

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Posted in Body/Health Shenanigans, Fox News Fvckery, Please Die in a Fire, War on Women, What the Crap!?

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Sexual Assault Prevention Tips

Posted on February 10, 2012 by | 7 Comments

I love this.

Remember not to assault people!  It shouldn’t be that hard!

(h/t Danielle Cloutier)

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Posted in Kick Ass, Lady Bits

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Major win for rape victims – Obama admin updates definition of rape

Posted on January 6, 2012 by | 10 Comments

Just like George W. Bush, only different

Today the Obama administration announced that it is updating the formal definition of rape. This move will help many rape victims who were previously unaccounted for achieve justice against their perpetrators and will more accurately reflect the extent of the problem of sexual crimes in our country.

Attorney General Eric Holder today announced revisions to the Uniform Crime Report’s (UCR) definition of rape, which will lead to a more comprehensive statistical reporting of rape nationwide. The new definition is more inclusive, better reflects state criminal codes and focuses on the various forms of sexual penetration understood to be rape. The new definition of rape is: “The penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” The definition is used by the FBI to collect information from local law enforcement agencies about reported rapes.

“Rape is a devastating crime and we can’t solve it unless we know the full extent of it,” said Vice President Biden, a leader in the effort to end violence against women for over 20 years and author of the landmark Violence Against Women Act. “This long-awaited change to the definition of rape is a victory for women and men across the country whose suffering has gone unaccounted for over 80 years.”

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Posted in Body/Health Shenanigans, Eclectablog, Lady Bits, Obama 2012: Yes We Will!, Read Me!, Respect

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“Men can stop rape.”

Posted on January 4, 2012 by | 11 Comments

I do a lot of ranting about the ways in which our culture, down to and including the words we use in daily discourse, supports and perpetuates the reality and fear of rape for 50% of the human race.

But yesterday I saw this, and I think it’s pretty damn wonderful, so I thought I would share:

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Posted in Body/Health Shenanigans, Emily L. Hauser, Lady Bits

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Glenn Greenwald and the national conversation about sexual assault and rape

Posted on January 3, 2012 by | 26 Comments

We’ve got a long way to go, baby

My friend Extreme Liberal posted a piece here awhile back titled “I was sexually assaulted as a child”. With Glenn Greenwald’s obscene comments about my good friend Angry Black Lady, I thought now might be a good time to tell my own story of being sexually molested as a young boy.

Unlike Extreme Liberal’s assault, I was, in fact, not aware that I had actually been assaulted until many years later. You may well ask, “If you didn’t know you were assaulted, how can you say you were?” You can trust me when I tell you that I have asked myself that same question.
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Posted in Eclectablog, Personal Tales, Puritopians, Respect, War on Women

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Herman Cain's Press Conference: His Tale Doesn't Pass the Smell Test (with video)

Posted on November 8, 2011 by | 6 Comments

“I don’t even know that lady!”

Cain went all in during his press conference today, claiming that dirty Democrats are behind this scandal. He further claimed that he does not know Bialek, didn’t recognize her face or her voice, and categorically denied the allegations.

Throughout the press conference, Cain repeatedly referred to the allegations as “anonymous” before finally claiming that the allegations came from “both anonymous and non-anonymous sources.” He also blamed Democrats:  “The Democrat machine in America has brought forth a troubled woman to make false accusations.”

Right — because Politico is the bastion of liberal journalism.

When trying to explain his initial flip-flopping regarding whether he recalled any settlement agreement, Cain tried (and failed) to walk a tightrope and draw a distinction between a “settlement” and an “agreement.” He claims that at first, he didn’t remember there being a settlement agreement, but then later that day — “after all those years” — he recalled that there was an agreement — emphasis on agreement:

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Posted in Balloon Juice Cross-Posts, Legal Shenanigans, The Hermanator, War on Women

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On wresting good from stupid: Herman Cain, sexual harassment and sexual assault.

Posted on November 8, 2011 by | 5 Comments

A very quick thought:

Herman Cain was never a serious contender for the Republican nomination. He is, in more ways than I have time to enumerate right now, a clown, and he has never been more than a shiny object by which we the people have been duly distracted.

As such, it is my humble opinion that Herman Cain’s candidacy (such as…) has done actual, objective damage to the American political system and those invested in that system (just as we have been damaged by Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, and Rick Perry, though considerably less than we were damaged by Ralph Nader), because all he has served to do is distract us and suck up wildly expensive time and resources.

HOWEVER.

With the revelation of what is turning into quite a slew of accusations of sexual harassment and/or assault (“Hey, baby, you’re lookin’ gooood tonight!” [or some such] being the former; grabbing a woman’s inner thigh and pulling her head toward his crotch [the actual accusation that Sharon Bialek has leveled] being the latter) we have an opportunity to wrest some objective good out of this mountain of stupid.

Every woman I know can tell a story of harassment or assault. Every single one.

For some, this has meant being yelled at on the street; for others, horrifying tales of violence and rape. It’s a huge range between the two, and I do not mean to conflate all the various kinds of harassment and assault, but merely want to say: Sexual threat or violence, or fear of same, is a constant in the lives of all women and girls. Full stop.

So here’s what we can do: Continue reading →

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Posted in Emily L. Hauser, Lady Bits, Musings, The Hermanator, War on Women

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Herman Cain Goes on the Offensive Against Sharon Bialek

Posted on November 8, 2011 by | 4 Comments

I’m running out of popcorn.

Herman Cain is gearing up for his big press conference this afternoon during which — if I’m reading the tea leaves correctly — he will deny that he knows what that crazy bitch is talking about, after which he’ll yell “look over there!”

What Cain wants you to look at is Bialek’s tawdry past — a tawdry past that actually is not tawdry at all.

Today, the Cain camp released a statement about Sharon Bialek, and it is nothing more than a sad attempt to drag Bialek through the mud.  And when I say “sad,” I mean sad.

The press release points out that Bialek has been a defendant in several lawsuits, three of which were brought by the same plaintiff — a company called Broadcare Management.

Cain also points out that Bialek has worked for nine employers over the course of seventeen years, and that she filed for bankruptcy twice. Shock! Horror!

Cain then poses some questions, the answers to which are both readily available and entirely irrelevant.

Here’s the text of the press release: Continue reading →

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Posted in Balloon Juice Cross-Posts, Lady Bits, The Hermanator

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