Adding Insult to Injury

Detroit police have decided to stop asking questions about the death of Andrew Anthos, who died after being beaten by a homophobe. Why? They’ve ruled the man’s arthritic neck was what killed him, not the blow that may have aggravated that arthritis.

Anthos’ cousin is continuing to pursue the case because no one has answered how the man ended up in the hospital with a 2″ scar on his neck, and while she is okay with them disputing him having died of the blow, she insists that he was attacked and that the attack was a hate crime. The Triangle Foundation, an LGBT group, have offered $5000 to anyone who can step forward with more information.

But the really pathetic thing is that the American Family Association of Michigan called on the Detroit police to look into the “filing of a false police report” concerning this incident. If any of us have any doubts, these folks not only want to prevent LGBT folks from being protected from discrimination and hate crimes, but they want to prevent our families from finding justice. Hateful.

Not Tonight

Just to repeat, once more: the launch party for She’s Not the Man I Married is NOT happening tonight. It is currently being re-scheduled.

That said, tonight is Night of 1000 Gowns, with this year’s fundraising going to PFLAG.

Deceiving Looks

She is just too cute, isn’t she? All fluffy & orange. & Then, if you try to touch her, she rips your hand off.

For those of you who don’t know it, this is a really defensive posture for a cat. Dogs do this when they want you to rub their bellies; cats do it so that they have all their claws & teeth ready for attack. When a cat puts her back to you, that’s a sign that she trusts you – not the other way around. In a sense, when you’ve “got a cat’s back” she’s got yours, as well.

Yet another way that people misinterpret cat behavior.

Blinding Paperwork

A Polish woman with a worsening eye condition needed to get an abortion after being warned by her doctor that she might go blind if she didn’t abort. Unfortunately for her, Poland requires written authorization for an abortion – which it only allows in cases such as hers, where the women’s health is at risk as a result of pregnancy – and she couldn’t get the doctor’s note. She instead carried to term and delivered the baby and her vision, as predicted, got worse – so much so she was declared legally disabled.

She did win $50k from the Polish government after the European Court of Appeals ruled in her favor, but I read this as a cautionary tale: making it too difficult for a woman to get an abortion results in unnecessary tragedy.

Cycles

A recent Washington Post article about a book called Cycle Savvy: The Smart Teen’s Guide to the Mysteries of Her Body, discusses the debate going on as to whether or not teenagers should know anything about when they’re more or less likely to become pregnant. Charting your cycles is intricate work that requires diligence, & for that reason alone some people think it’s not a good idea, “since a little information is a dangerous thing,” according to one woman who ended up pregnant as a result of screwing up her own chart-keeping.

I’d argue there might be teens who are more diligent – or maybe even brighter – than her.

But the usual suspects chime in about how sex information only ever encourages girls to have sex. A spokesperson for Concerned Women for America proffers “high ideals,” instead.

Come now: doesn’t that sound like “keep your knees together” all over again?

Cancelled Launch Party

I just wanted to let people know, if they didn’t yet, that the She’s Not the Man I Married launch party is NOT happening at Mo Pitkins this Saturday night. I don’t know when/if it will be rescheduled at this point, but I’ll let you know when I do.

Church & State

Bad policy is sometimes based not on science, but on belief:

. . . the Pentagon’s top general, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, said that homosexual acts are immoral and should not be condoned by allowing gays to serve in the military. Then . . . Rev. R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said that if homosexuality were genetic, it would still be evil and should be treated prenatally.

& It’s on geniuses like these that we base the “don’t ask / don’t tell” policy, even if there is no good evidence that homosexuals make bad soldiers, and conversely, there’s plenty of evidence that sometimes male heterosexual soldiers suck: one third of female soldiers report rape or attempted rape. So no matter what Mohler thinks, is morality really the reason we don’t let (out) gays serve? Of course not.