Students protest Milo Yiannopoulos’ appearance at UC Berkeley Wednesday evening. CREDIT: AP Photo/Ben Margot.
Milo Yiannopoulos calls President Trump “Daddy,” and it seems the relationship might be mutual.
Wednesday evening, UC Berkeley ultimately canceled a speech by Yiannopolous, Breitbart editor and professional provocateur, just two hours before it was to take place. The speech, organized by Berkeley College Republicans, was massively protested, and those demonstrations turned increasingly violent after masked protesters not affiliated with the university started marching on Oakland.
Early Thursday morning, Fox News commentator Todd Starnes railed against the protests:
The birth place of free speech became its graveyard. So here’s what needs to happen: President Trump should immediately issue an executive order blocking Berkeley students from receiving any federal funding. Same goes for any other public university that wants to silence conservative voices. Free speech for all or no federal money! Not a single taxpayer penny, period!
That segment aired around 5:17 am. An hour later, Trump tweeted:
If U.C. Berkeley does not allow free speech and practices violence on innocent people with a different point of view – NO FEDERAL FUNDS?
Then, at the top of the 7 o’clock hour, Trump counselor Kellyanne Conway appeared on Fox and Friends to reinforce the tweet. She mocked the students who protested, saying, “I don’t even know if they know what they’re protesting. I would love to do this big survey nationwide and ask everybody outside these airports, on the college campuses: what’s got you so in a lather?”
“Life doesn’t work that way folks,” she said. “You’re going to work with people who disagree with you. You’re going to encounter folks who aren’t just accosting you in this protective environment.”
The students know exactly what they are protesting, Madame Alternative Facts: sexism, racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia, transphobia, homophobia, and oh yes, fascism. Pretty much everyone in our now fascist government is someone I disagree with, and they are busy accosting people on every level. We know what that’s like, and so do college students. They aren’t babies, and they aren’t stupid.
Yiannopoulos himself insisted that “the Left is absolutely terrified of free speech and will do literally anything to shut it down.”
No, the left and all anti-fascist, anti-nazi peoples are simply exercising their rights, and you don’t like that at all. If anyone wants to shut down free speech, it’s the fascist-nazi people. If you’re shouting in the public square, people have the right to respond.
What Yiannopolous offers is not just speech, but bullying of the most vulnerable. He openly encourages those who are white and male to attack basically anyone and everyone else. Trump, taking his cues from Fox News, is validating his behavior.
Indeed. Yiannopolous has already proved, time and time again, that he’s perfectly willing to endanger the lives of others, while taking exception to any and all criticism. The fact that he has the support of the Tiny Dictator is no comfort.
A close look at the marker drawings of Ben Biayenda reveals a wide range of direct references from African tribal art to French Post-Impressionism and current pop culture. The Paris-based art student’s work celebrates black beauty in all of its diversity. His sensitive portraits depict black women in moments of intimacy, connection and self-care. His scenes are of beauty parlors and plant-filled bohemian apartments. In girl’s dinner, three black women sit down together to share some sushi rolls. An African mask, a Matisse cut out, and a poster of Angela Davis hang on the wall behind them. One of the guests has vitiligo, perhaps an homage to Winnie Harlow, a Canadian model with the skin condition.
Biayenda started drawing black women two years ago, inspired, he says, by “black femininity, sisterhood, and little moments of beauty.” He is also inspired by black feminist conceptual artists like Adrian Piper and Michèle Magema to interrogate race, gender roles, Western beauty standards, and art itself through his work. Born in Namibia to French and Congolese parents, the artist grew up in France and was exposed to fine art at a young age. He grew to especially love French painters, from Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres to Henri Rousseau. “I was really fascinated by painting and I was going to museums in Paris. I really loved it, but there was some frustration to not see much black representation in famous paintings,” he recalls to The Creators Project over a Skype call. His response was to create his own version of art history through work that reflected his own standards of beauty, while drawing on the poses and atmosphere of the classic works he admired.
Savage announced that he’s launching Impeachthemotherfuckeralready.com, where like-minded people can buy merchandise to display their campaign shorthand.
“I didn’t think I’d see a worse president than George W. Bush in my lifetime,” Savage wrote. “But here we are. So I’m bringing back ITMFA buttons and adding T-shirts and, yes, red hats to the ITMFA collection.”
He also added that the money raised will be donated to the American Civil Liberties Union, Planned Parenthood, and the International Refugee Assistance Project.
“We’re in for a long and ugly four years, readers,” he continued. “Let’s raise some money for groups fighting Trump, let’s bring ITMFA back into our everyday vocabulary, and let’s remember that we—people who voted against Trump, people who want to see him out of office as quickly as possible, people who are appalled by this and this and this and this—are the majority.”
The CDC’s 2015 HIV Surveillance Report is out, and with it, the 15 cities with the highest rates of new cases of HIV. What’s striking here is that most of the new cases are in the South. Tireless work has helped to reduce the stigma of HIV, but with the ongoing and ever increasing bigotry against all queer folk, that stigma is re-asserting itself, along with the stigma of being LGBT in many states. It must be emphasised, once again, that hetero people also contract HIV, it’s no guarantee at all that you won’t be at risk. I don’t care what people do sexually, as long as they are fully consensual adults, but in such hateful and uncertain times, especially in regard to healthcare, this is no time to take risks or blithely assume it won’t be a problem for you. It’s best to remember that a great many people cheat, too. And cheaters have a tendency to lie. Please, be careful, protect yourself and your partner[s] at all times, take the time to be aware of not just HIV, but all sexually transmitted diseases, get tested, urge others to get tested, and don’t let yourself be bullied by any partner or potential partner who does not want to use protection or get tested. If you are sexually assaulted or raped, don’t eschew testing, it could save your life. This applies even if you do not want to report. No one can force you to report, but get tested.
Cities, in order: 1, Miami, Florida. 2, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. 3, New Orleans, Louisiana. 4, Jackson, Mississippi. 5, Atlanta, Georgia. 6, Orlando, Florida. 7, Louisville, Kentucky and Jefferson County, Indiana. 8, Memphis, Tennessee. 9, Jacksonville, Florida. 10, Baltimore, Maryland. 11, Houston, Texas. 12, Washington, DC. 13, Columbia, South Carolina. 14, Las Vegas, Nevada. 15, Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida.
If you’re in one of these cities, be vigilant about your health, but remember, being outside these states is no guarantee. Be careful, please.
The T.R.U.T.H Project will be active in one of the listed cities, Houston.
To commemorate National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, an initiative to engage the Black community about the importance of HIV education and testing, on February 7 the T.R.U.T.H project will hold a performance and panel discussion with Houston health professionals and advocates to discuss and answer questions about HIV and mental health.
The one-night only event is titled “I am My Brother/Sister’s Keeper: Fight HIV/AIDS” and will also be providing free HIV and Syphilis testing for all who attend. The show is sponsored by the Houston Department Bureau of HIV/STD Prevention and Walgreens, with additional support from AIDS Foundation Houston, and will be moderated by author and empowerment coach Jai Sneed.
[…]
“We can’t address HIV/ AIDS without touching on mental and emotional health. The public health and scientific communities are working on great new biomedical interventions, but uptake and effectiveness are stagnated when other needs aren’t being met.”
Panelists include licensed professional counselors Dr. Kimm Perez and Milton Smith, Human Rights activist and HIV advocate Deondre Moore, PrEP and HIV Advocate Adonis May, clinical social worker DeShantra Moore, HIV/AIDS advocate Tiffany Quinton, and will feature artists Nick Muckleroy and visual artist Ashley “Pinklomein” Price.
Those with mental health issues are at higher risk of becoming HIV-positive, and once poz are more likely to have negative health outcomes, especially if they are Black gay men.
South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard (R). CREDIT: AP Photo/James Nord.
Last year, Gov. Daugaard vetoed an anti-transgender bill, after meeting with a number of transgender persons. Unsurprisingly, the bigoted bill is back on the table, with a new twist.
The 2017 bill, SB 115, has the same purpose as last year’s: blocking schools from letting transgender students from accessing bathrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity. But there’s a new word included in the bill — one not seen in other anti-transgender bills — that could set a dangerous new precedent for legislation designed to discriminate against transgender people.
“The term, biological sex, as used in this Act, means a person’s immutable biological sex as objectively determined by anatomy and genetics existing at the time of birth,” the bill reads. “A person’s original birth certificate may be relied upon as definitive evidence of the person’s biological sex.”
That word “original” means there would be no way for any transgender person to ever obtain legal recognition.
Currently, in South Dakota, transgender people can obtain court orders to amend their birth certificates to reflect their gender identity without any specific medical requirements.
[…]
But if anti-trans legislation starts referring to “original birth certificates” like South Dakota’s new bill does, that would further limit the already-few ways trans people have to protect their gender identities under the law. Indeed, it would eliminate the relevance of any legal documentation they obtain that confirms their gender identity.
[…]
Given South Dakota’s otherwise-identical bill made it all the way to the governor’s desk last year, this year’s version could similarly have legs. And there’s nothing to stop the many other states considering various anti-trans bills from incorporating the same change or propose new bills with this extra rejection of transgender identities.
This is absolutely evil, and so unnecessary. I’m tired of saying it should not be alright to legislate hate and bigotry. I would hope that Daugaard find the spine to do the right thing again, but I’m doubtful. Even if he does, this will be picked up by spiteful, bigoted, hateful, christian asses in many other states.
Sign from Saturday’s Women’s March on Washington (Twitter.com).
WASHINGTON — The day after the Women’s March brought half a million people to Washington, 500 women from across the country spent Sunday learning how to run for office.
The candidate training held by EMILY’s List, the largest Democratic women’s group in the country, focused on overcoming the “intimidation factor” when navigating political campaigning, especially for women of color. It was the group’s largest training event.
“We still have ceilings to break, even inside our Democratic Party,” said Muthoni Wambu Kraal, senior director of state engagement and development at EMILY’s List.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., told the women about breaking through as the first Indian-American woman in the House of Representatives.
“As a woman of color in particular, barriers are high. They’re very high,” she said, encouraging women to pursue their point of view in elected office.
“It’s important, not only because of the color of our skin or anything like that, (but) because of the experience that we bring in from our different perspectives,” she said. “Don’t think that because you’re not connected to the wealthiest people in the world that you can’t run for office.”
Wax That Ass, Allison Bouganim. Images courtesy of the artist.
What do laundromats, bus stops, and supermarkets have in common? Besides being everyday locales, these seemingly innocuous sites are also hotbeds of sexual harassment. Wax That Ass, a project by artist Allison Bouganim, fuses sculpture, photography, and on-site intervention to explore the everyday discomfort felt in public places.
Bouganim began the project by making a series of sculptural butts cast from actual butts. The results were a series of plaster and wax butts (hence the project title, Wax That Ass) in a variety of different shades that seem to represent a spectrum of skin tones. Once these were made, Bouganim went to a series of sites that are not only breeding grounds for sexual harassment, but are also places where the artist herself has been sexually harassed before, to enact the performative aspect of her project.
Three of the half-dozen octogenarian protesters who set up shop near the senior citizens’ residence where they live in downtown Washington, D.C., during Saturday’s Women’s March. CREDIT: Alan Pyke/ThinkProgress.
Nasty, Brave Women came out all over the world to march, and even those who were unable to march found a way.
…These women would love to be joining the march. But they had a hard enough time convincing their landlords to let them go even as far as this spot in Thomas Circle. They are in their 80s and 90s, veterans of many cycles of American political harmony and social discord. The management at their building were terrified these seniors might get hurt even walking three hundred feet to the circle.
That concern wasn’t going to stop 83-year-old Harriet Fulbright from demonstrating her dissent against Trumpism.
“Damnit, I feel strongly about making our views and feelings known,” Fulbright said. “I’m here because I’m very worried.”
Like her fellow senior sign-wavers, Fulbright remembers the mass upheaval of the Vietnam era and the paranoia which government surveillance and sabotage of dissenters inspired.
Something about today’s moment is scarier than the demagogues before, both losers like Barry Goldwater and winners like Richard Nixon.
“This is new. Nixon was not my favorite,” Fulbright said, with a wry grin, “but I’m more worried now.”
Mamie Chesslin, 83, nodded along with that comparison from her wheeled scooter. As a former Department of Justice attorney who spent her career enforcing environmental laws, Chesslin knows better than most just how much federal agencies influence the future — for brighter or dimmer.
“I honestly wonder how we’re going to survive it,” Chesslin said. “He’s pathological in a way we haven’t seen before. The world doesn’t stop because of Donald Trump, but nobody told him that.”
Ms. Chesslin is right on the money. She puts that sharp mind right on the big, huge problem: Trump thinks he can do anything he wants, and he’s surrounded himself with people who tell him that’s right. He’s also surrounded by people who have enough power to try and make that a reality.
“I’ve been astonished and delighted by the reactions from younger people today,” said Tina Hobson, 87, who helped rally the group to defy the well-intentioned concerns of the residence staff. “Instead of an intense, anxious day, it’s been a lot of fun.”
[…]
“When you get to this age you remember what life was like before Roe vs. Wade. You can tell the stories,” she said.
“None of us thought we’d be doing this again.”
At a mere 59 years of age, and the unwanted product of pre-Roe life, I never thought we’d be doing this again, either. Yet here we are. Stay strong, stand up, shout out. Resist.
All of life has become one gargantuan facepalm, ennit? Here are a few of them, adding to the whole:
Corey Lewandowski is now on record saying that no republicans ever questioned the legitimacy of Barack Obama’s presidency, no, not those holy rethugs. That’s just so baldfaced, it’s hard to say it qualifies only as a facepalm.
“You’ve seen that the Democrats are trying to say that he’s not a legitimate candidate,” he said. “Can you imagine just for a second if a Republican congressman would have gone out and said this about Barack Obama and continued that narrative? It would be an uproar in the mainstream media.”
Right, because there wasn’t round the clock, constant coverage of all the rethugs screaming for birth certificates and the like.
Kevin Swanson, who is rabid in his hatred for all things queer, is now raging about…Highlights. It’s just as bad as ISIS, did you know? Oh yes, just as evil, and maybe more evil. What brought on this irrational tirade of abuse? Inclusivity, natch. Inclusiveness of any kind is always to be found right at the top of the most evil list the Religious Reich has in their pocket.
Highlights Magazine announced they will be featuring same sex parents in future editions. That’s nice, isn’t it? Well, it’s nice for people who aren’t terrified by inclusiveness, and think it’s a good thing for the children of same sex parents to see themselves and their families represented. That helps to establish healthy, stable children, and a healthy, stable society, things which Christian Republicans are fanatically against. None of that inclusive wholesomeness for them, oh no!
Swanson said that while ISIS is releasing videos showing young children killing prisoners, Highlights is just as evil because it will “encourage the support for the sin of homosexuality among kids.”
It will encourage acceptance, yes. That’s a good thing, at least if you’re a decent, ethical person. I guess we know where that places Mr. Swanson.
“So now, here’s Highlights magazine, an American kids’ magazine promoting homosexuality amongst kids,” Swanson fumed, “and now ISIS is teaching kids how to kill people. Now, I got to thinking: Which sin is worse? Homosexuality or murder? Which is worse? Are we really that much better than ISIS?”
No, Highlights is not promoting homosexuality, anymore than it promotes heterosexuality. It’s simply reflecting their readership, and society as a whole. As for which sin is worse, can we just count Christianity as one big evil stain of a sin? It would save time. There are times I wish the xian hell did exist, because some people definitely deserve an extended dip in it, like Mr. Swanson. Even I’m not nasty enough to think he deserves such for eternity though. I’m simply not evil enough to be a good christian.
Okay everyone, hang onto those hats…
Yeah. Are you impressed? I think we’re supposed to be impressed.
We reported earlier this week that a group of Trump-supporting dominionists has launched a POTUS Shield project to protect Trump and his presidency from his enemies. They’ve now posted video[warning: autoplay] from last week’s prayer gathering at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. In addition to prayers of gratitude for Trump’s “anointing” and his having “surrounded himself with evangelical people” and “magnified Christianity,” the group prayed individually for each member of the Trump family, as someone came forward to act as a sort of Hollywood-style stand-in for each of them.
Lance Wallnau, who had repeatedly declared that Trump was anointed by God, prayed for Donald Jr., declaring that God would give him a personal heads-up—“a word of knowledge ahead of time”—when the media is trying to trip up or embarrass the family.
Sure, why not get to the really important stuff right away? I’m sure there couldn’t possibly be anything more urgent than embarrassment, given that Trump is sort of the living embodiment of embarrassment.
Frank Amedia, who served the Trump campaign as a voluntary “liaison for Christian policy,” prayed for Eric, saying that he too has “an anointing on him” and that Eric’s “humility for you is already beyond natural.” Amedia prayed that God would “bless his seed and the seed of his seed.”
Eeeuuuw. Seriously, christians, just start fucking more, maybe it will take care of this constant need to shove your noses into crotches, and stop concerning yourself with people’s semen. As for humility, Eric. Really. Guess they didn’t see those disgusting hunting photos.
Leigh Valentine, a beauty-industry entrepreneur associated with John Hagee’s Christians United for Israel, thanked God for “the anointing” he had placed on Melania to walk alongside her husband. The “wisdom of God”, she said, will be upon Melania, who will “astound the women of her nation.”
What nation are we talking here? Astounded. By what? Her penchant for plagiarism? The fact that she was hawking her QVC crap on the whitehouse.gov site before someone hastily yanked it? Her standing silently by when her husband is busy drooling all over his daughter? Standing by her man when he talks about grabbing women by the pussy?
Mark Gonzalez prayed that young Barron would be given wisdom beyond his years and asked that God protect his heart when he sees “evil” being “launched at his family.”
I don’t know that I’ve ever seen such a blank looking kid. Either he’s so overwhelmed he’s close to paralysis, or he’s simply not affected by anything. I think he should be protected too, but that’s a tough call when he’s in the bosom of his family.
Clarence McClendon, a Los Angeles-based preacher who said in post-election Twitter messages to “the Prophetic Community” that the election was “supernatural” and a “Re-Set” for the country, prayed for Mike Pence has his wife, saying that God had told him Pence was “a covenant man.” Pence, he said, is “malleable and pliable” in God’s hand, and prayed that Pence would speak wisdom into Trump’s ears.
I wouldn’t describe Pence as malleable and pliable in the least. Rigid, cold, uncaring, devoid of empathy, and a willing toady, yes. There’s more at Right Wing Watch.
Oh, where to start. I guess we’ll start with “Hey, look, a tiny, Bane-full inauguration!
(Photo: Wikipedia commons and screen capture).
For all the boasting about the bigliest ever, the crowds at Trump’s inauguration were woefully scant. The Twitternet jumped all over this immediately, and you can see many of the tweets here. Also noted by the Twitternet, and most everyone else on the planet, Trump borrowed a bit of his speech from a fictional villain, which is terribly apropos, but he picked the wrong villain, Bane. Bane was more of a “eat the rich!” kind of villain. That didn’t stop Trump:
Fans of the Batman franchise film The Dark Knight Rises were startled to hear the words of the movie villain Bane coming out of Republican Pres. Donald Trump’s mouth as he made his inaugural address — purportedly written by Trump himself — on Friday.
“We’re giving the power back to you. The people,” Trump said Friday, a nearly verbatim quote from Christopher and Jonathan Nolan’s screenplay for the 2012 film starring Christian Bale as Batman and Tom Hardy as Bane.
You can read all about this one, and see some of the tweets here.
The Twitternet also broke out in gales of laughter and comparisons over Kellyanne Conway’s outfit:
Kellyanne Conway attends President Trump’s inauguration (Screen cap).
Conway’s outfit, which TMZ claims she describes as “Trump Revolutionary Wear,” is a red-white-and-blue getup that is meant to be somewhat reminiscent of Revolutionary War-era military uniforms.
You can read all about that, and see tweets here. Oh, and the buttons on it are cat heads.
Then there’s a compilation of all the things that didn’t happen, didn’t come through, and weren’t bigly at all:
Women’s March bus permit requests outnumber inauguration requests by 3 times.
Most hotel bookings have been made by anti-Trump protesters.
Trump is wrong (again): dress shops still have plenty of available frocks.
“There’s never been less demand for inaugural ballgowns in my 38 years,” Peter Marx, who owns D.C. dress shop Saks Jandel, told People. “Never ever has it been less for the inaugural.”
Other shops expressed similar sentiments.
“We were expecting heavy traffic and it has not been that way,” a D.C. Bloomingdale’s representative told Elle. “The last inauguration was a lot more people shopping.”
A spokesperson from Intermix told the outlet, “Usually, it is really big for us, but this year we haven’t seen anything yet, surprisingly.”
Elle notes that “among others we called, White House Black Market and Cusp in Georgetown confirmed they have options in stock. So does Neiman Marcus. And Gucci. And Lord & Taylor. And Nordstrom.”
And there were artists out, as well as all the marchers and protesters. FORCE put on a big show:
CREDIT: Nate Larson.
…For roughly 45 minutes, a slideshow of photos and quotes from survivors circulated on the front of the building, as passersby stopped to take it in. The organizers of the installation hoped their message reached at least a few visitors here for Trump’s inauguration.
“As a native woman, as a queer woman, as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse and intimate parter violence, there’s so much that is traumatic about seeing my country support somebody that represents violence against all of those things,” said Rebecca Nagle, a co-director of FORCE. “The racism and the misogyny that [Trump] represents is bigger than just him as a person and a figurehead, but is something that is deeply embedded in American culture.”
Many victims of sexual assault were particularly traumatized by the election of Donald Trump, who bragged on tape about sexually abusing woman. Now, as he prepares to enter the White House, there are already signs that Trump won’t pursue policies aimed at preventing sexual violence. As part of his proposed plan to reduce government spending, Trump administration officials reportedly approached the Department of Justice with a plan to eliminate the federal grants used to combat violence against women.
“The goal of the piece is really to uplift survivors voices at a time that a lot of people are normalizing Trump’s behavior,” said Nagle.
President Donald Trump’s whitehouse.gov page omitted references to a number of policy issues championed by his predecessor, including climate change, civil rights and healthcare, providing a blueprint for the new administration’s priorities over the next four years.
If you can’t make the women’s march on Washington, there are sister events! They are going on everywhere, not just here in uStates, but all over the world. Check out the sisters page, and see if you can find a march near you. (There are even three here in nDakota!)
