Tamora Pierce's Blog, page 11
February 19, 2011
To help the Republican party make things easier for women
I'm posting this subtext-provided rendering of House Speaker Boehner's thoughts on why his party wants to strip women of their protections for our own good. The translation is provided by Morning Gloria at Jezebel, to help us understand "Anti Woman Legislation Code." This is important because we've been sinfully, selfishly, and stupidly making our government pay money to correct the idiotic and silly choices we make.
Remember, as the vet told the boy cat, this is for our own good.
Goddess be thanked, , some legislators fought back. But make no mistake about it, these woman-haters aren't done. Write your legislators, post how you feel about this trend in politics, march--do everything you can to keep these people from turning us into second class citizens again. We are people, and we don't have to submit to this.
Remember, as the vet told the boy cat, this is for our own good.
Goddess be thanked, , some legislators fought back. But make no mistake about it, these woman-haters aren't done. Write your legislators, post how you feel about this trend in politics, march--do everything you can to keep these people from turning us into second class citizens again. We are people, and we don't have to submit to this.
January 18, 2011
The Good News, and the Not-So-Good News
cross-posted to my fan lj, because I have a zillion things to do
The first draft of MASTIFF is finished!!!!! Now all I have to do is rewrite all 660 pages by the end of March! (After that I'll put a sample on my webpage.) At least, with 660 pages, you know what took me so long!
The not-so-good news:
I'll be going offline for two weeks minimum as of Thursday, January 20, because I am going into surgery to have both knees replaced. And then I'll be in a rehab facility to get myself walking again. Should be quite jolly! Tim keeps making Bionic Woman and robot jokes for me. So amusing.
Could be worse. Could be raining. And I'll be taking a color Nook into rehab, so I'm not lugging a library's worth of reading!
Hm. I wonder if John Keegan's THE FIRST WORLD WAR is available in Nookbook form . . . ?
The first draft of MASTIFF is finished!!!!! Now all I have to do is rewrite all 660 pages by the end of March! (After that I'll put a sample on my webpage.) At least, with 660 pages, you know what took me so long!
The not-so-good news:
I'll be going offline for two weeks minimum as of Thursday, January 20, because I am going into surgery to have both knees replaced. And then I'll be in a rehab facility to get myself walking again. Should be quite jolly! Tim keeps making Bionic Woman and robot jokes for me. So amusing.
Could be worse. Could be raining. And I'll be taking a color Nook into rehab, so I'm not lugging a library's worth of reading!
Hm. I wonder if John Keegan's THE FIRST WORLD WAR is available in Nookbook form . . . ?
January 11, 2011
The Rhetoric of Violence
Melissan McEwan of Shakesville has written a splendid post on just who in the media and on the internet has been spewing a steady stream of violent and sometimes outlandish hate speech over the last few years, complete with references.
The right counters with complaints that the left is just as bad, per this post by right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin. In going over Malkin's list, all I see are musician and comic rants, internet cartoons, and street images, not the rhetoric of media figures with audiences numbering in the millions. (Well, except for Madonna.)
One blogger also claims that a Daily Kos blogger, a former Giffords fan, saying Giffords was dead to him because she didn't vote for Pelosi as minority speaker, may have triggered Loughner.
Lacy Bryant from Wagerrun.Com is alarmed that the liberal smear machine will drive for laws</a> that will make it impossible to say anything negative, ever; also that said machine "moved right in" to blame the Loughner shooting on the right.
It amazes me how, after people die, the right scrambles to point the finger at the left and to deny its own culpability in its media leaders love of violent imaginings and scenarios played out in front of audiences of millions. Already they scramble to blame all this on the left, despite the frighteningly specific map and Gifford-blaming Palin put out there.
I'm not saying the left is pure of violence-speak. But the size of the audience is different, don't you think?
In any case, these scenarios, left and right, for the murder of some opposition leader, or the destruction of some city with a liberal reputation, made by the cynical or the unbalanced, have a way of finding a path into the ears of the unstable.
What unstable? I've been keeping track.
On May 23 Joseph McVey came to an airport where President Obama was expected, armed, driving a vehicle equipped like a police car, and claiming he needed to speak with the president. He was charged for "going armed in terror of the public," and various hinkinesses about him were still under investigation according to the article about his arrest.
Jerry Kane of Ohio and his 16-year-old son shot and killed two policemen in West Memphis, Arkansas, and wounded two more. Kane had made threats against police on his radio show after he was stopped in New Mexico, and ran a debt-escape seminar for two years. Like many "sovereign citizen" believers, Kane felt Americans were under no obligation to repay credit card or mortgage debt. He also demanded that the state of New Mexico pay him $100,000 in gold for each day the state held him for driving without a license.
Somebody cared enough about a Florida mosque to attempt to bomb it, but apparently the mainstream media doesn't care enough to cover that, and no one is willing to give information on the bomber. Now, if it had been a church, or a synagogue . . .
A Georgia man headed to Madisonville, Tennessee to help free a man named Fitzpatrick. The Georgia man, Darren Huff, armed with a pistol and an assault rifle, planned to enact citizen's arrests on federal, state, and local officials while freeing Fitzpatrick. Fitzpatrick was going to court because when his attempt to get the Madisonville grand jury to indict President Obama on charges of treason failed, he attempted a citizen's arrest of the grand jury foreman. He was arrested on charges of disorderly conduct, inciting to riot, disrupting a meeting, and resisting arrest. He too wrote out citizen's arrest warrants for 24 federal, state, and local officials.
Let's not forget Joseph Stack, who flew his plane into a Texas IRS office to settle a grudge.
On July 18, Byron Williams was stopped by police on his way to shoot up the San Francisco ACLU and the Tides Foundation, a group frequently denounced by right-wing demagogue Glenn Beck.
On July 18, 2010 Glenn Beck</a>, who says that "hard core über left radicals" will attack and kill Obama because he has purged the über left radical violent wing of his government. So the really ugly violence doesn't come from the right, but the left. Glenn Beck said so, even if he had to make it up.
The right counters with complaints that the left is just as bad, per this post by right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin. In going over Malkin's list, all I see are musician and comic rants, internet cartoons, and street images, not the rhetoric of media figures with audiences numbering in the millions. (Well, except for Madonna.)
One blogger also claims that a Daily Kos blogger, a former Giffords fan, saying Giffords was dead to him because she didn't vote for Pelosi as minority speaker, may have triggered Loughner.
Lacy Bryant from Wagerrun.Com is alarmed that the liberal smear machine will drive for laws</a> that will make it impossible to say anything negative, ever; also that said machine "moved right in" to blame the Loughner shooting on the right.
It amazes me how, after people die, the right scrambles to point the finger at the left and to deny its own culpability in its media leaders love of violent imaginings and scenarios played out in front of audiences of millions. Already they scramble to blame all this on the left, despite the frighteningly specific map and Gifford-blaming Palin put out there.
I'm not saying the left is pure of violence-speak. But the size of the audience is different, don't you think?
In any case, these scenarios, left and right, for the murder of some opposition leader, or the destruction of some city with a liberal reputation, made by the cynical or the unbalanced, have a way of finding a path into the ears of the unstable.
What unstable? I've been keeping track.
On May 23 Joseph McVey came to an airport where President Obama was expected, armed, driving a vehicle equipped like a police car, and claiming he needed to speak with the president. He was charged for "going armed in terror of the public," and various hinkinesses about him were still under investigation according to the article about his arrest.
Jerry Kane of Ohio and his 16-year-old son shot and killed two policemen in West Memphis, Arkansas, and wounded two more. Kane had made threats against police on his radio show after he was stopped in New Mexico, and ran a debt-escape seminar for two years. Like many "sovereign citizen" believers, Kane felt Americans were under no obligation to repay credit card or mortgage debt. He also demanded that the state of New Mexico pay him $100,000 in gold for each day the state held him for driving without a license.
Somebody cared enough about a Florida mosque to attempt to bomb it, but apparently the mainstream media doesn't care enough to cover that, and no one is willing to give information on the bomber. Now, if it had been a church, or a synagogue . . .
A Georgia man headed to Madisonville, Tennessee to help free a man named Fitzpatrick. The Georgia man, Darren Huff, armed with a pistol and an assault rifle, planned to enact citizen's arrests on federal, state, and local officials while freeing Fitzpatrick. Fitzpatrick was going to court because when his attempt to get the Madisonville grand jury to indict President Obama on charges of treason failed, he attempted a citizen's arrest of the grand jury foreman. He was arrested on charges of disorderly conduct, inciting to riot, disrupting a meeting, and resisting arrest. He too wrote out citizen's arrest warrants for 24 federal, state, and local officials.
Let's not forget Joseph Stack, who flew his plane into a Texas IRS office to settle a grudge.
On July 18, Byron Williams was stopped by police on his way to shoot up the San Francisco ACLU and the Tides Foundation, a group frequently denounced by right-wing demagogue Glenn Beck.
On July 18, 2010 Glenn Beck</a>, who says that "hard core über left radicals" will attack and kill Obama because he has purged the über left radical violent wing of his government. So the really ugly violence doesn't come from the right, but the left. Glenn Beck said so, even if he had to make it up.
January 6, 2011
Why isn't the whole world crying?
Joss Whedon once wanted to know why so many people considered half of the human race (women) to be broken. (I've tried like hell but I can't find the link to this.)
Joss, man, I hate to be the one to break this to you, but maybe because it's that so many men set out to deliberately break us, in places like the "Democratic Republic" of Congo, where 33 women were raped en masse on New Year's by armed rebels (their way of battering in 2011?). Congo is a particularly gaudy offender, since rape is a weapon of war there, and they have 15,000 victims approximately so far to show for their efforts.
Don't get me wrong. It's not just the rebels of Congo I hate for their raping. It's just their way of marking New Year's Day.
edited to add:
And in case anyone thinks I have noticed recent events only in Africa, there is now an Amnesty International report on the sudden increase of rapes of women and girls by groups of men in Haiti.
The U.S. is no better. We still have the highest rape statistics in the world. But this predation on isolated women and girls by packs of armed men, with no help within thousands of miles, makes me feel sick at heart.
I know what will be said if we asked our government to go to the help of these people: "We're not the world's policeman." "We're cleaning up one war and involved in another." "The country can't afford it." And the rest of the world will say the same, except their replies on their wars may vary. And so nothing will be done except by a few small groups whose members will be driven out or killed.
And people ask why I write fantasy.
Joss, man, I hate to be the one to break this to you, but maybe because it's that so many men set out to deliberately break us, in places like the "Democratic Republic" of Congo, where 33 women were raped en masse on New Year's by armed rebels (their way of battering in 2011?). Congo is a particularly gaudy offender, since rape is a weapon of war there, and they have 15,000 victims approximately so far to show for their efforts.
Don't get me wrong. It's not just the rebels of Congo I hate for their raping. It's just their way of marking New Year's Day.
edited to add:
And in case anyone thinks I have noticed recent events only in Africa, there is now an Amnesty International report on the sudden increase of rapes of women and girls by groups of men in Haiti.
The U.S. is no better. We still have the highest rape statistics in the world. But this predation on isolated women and girls by packs of armed men, with no help within thousands of miles, makes me feel sick at heart.
I know what will be said if we asked our government to go to the help of these people: "We're not the world's policeman." "We're cleaning up one war and involved in another." "The country can't afford it." And the rest of the world will say the same, except their replies on their wars may vary. And so nothing will be done except by a few small groups whose members will be driven out or killed.
And people ask why I write fantasy.
the B-word
Since when has it become okay for men to respond to women's posts in online articles beginning with "Bitch"? I've seen it often, but the one that set me off today is in the comments to a Daily What article, where Obvious says "`with reason and science' Bitch, don't make me laugh."
Men online continually address women as "bitch," and women say nothing in reply. They call one another "bitch," for that matter, and the women they write about are "bitches."
I've raised a stink about this before, and have been told, firmly, by younger women that they are reclaiming the world and expressing the inner bitch. Well, in these instances, the men who constantly refer to women aren't reclaiming the word for women unless they're doing so in a "heel!" way, and the writers aren't reclaiming it for the women they write about.
So will someone tell me why people are just accepting this without at least trying to point out this is an unacceptable term to use for women and to ask why it's still used when it's clearly pejorative in these contexts? Because I'm hoping that some of these people didn't really put it together.
Honestly, I'm hoping, because it's that or slug somebody.
Men online continually address women as "bitch," and women say nothing in reply. They call one another "bitch," for that matter, and the women they write about are "bitches."
I've raised a stink about this before, and have been told, firmly, by younger women that they are reclaiming the world and expressing the inner bitch. Well, in these instances, the men who constantly refer to women aren't reclaiming the word for women unless they're doing so in a "heel!" way, and the writers aren't reclaiming it for the women they write about.
So will someone tell me why people are just accepting this without at least trying to point out this is an unacceptable term to use for women and to ask why it's still used when it's clearly pejorative in these contexts? Because I'm hoping that some of these people didn't really put it together.
Honestly, I'm hoping, because it's that or slug somebody.
January 1, 2011
Who can help?
cross-posted to my fan journal, because I'm really pissed
Maybe a lot of you won't know of this, but there was a whole genre of stage plays, some of which made it to silent movies, about evil, rich, slimy villains who used their wealth to force impoverished, sweet, virtuous, usually blond, young things to surrender their virtue in order to keep their homes, get medicine for ailing parents, brothers, sisters, or grandparents, or solve any other really drastic financial problem. You see bits and pieces of this heritage in old Dudley Doright cartoons, with adjustments (there was no Horse in the silents and the plays).
Nadya Suleman, infamously known as "the Octomom" for giving birth to eight babies at once, is in financial trouble. In fact, her home is in foreclosure. We know people foreclose on others all the time, but foreclose on them in order to force them to make a porn movie?!
Steve Hirsh of Vivid Entertainment--which has already approached Suleman about making such a movie--has offered to take on her debt from the man who currently holds it. He says if she won't do the movie, he can give her a job in which she keeps on her clothes and is paid enough to support her family. He says.
Suleman is barely getting by. She can't afford the house her father bought for her on the condition that she take over the payments. And here comes Hirsch, oozing to her rescue, with offers she has turned down from him before.
It's insanely familiar, except in the old melodramas, there was always a hero who came to the heroine's rescue. Not only has no hero appeared, but Suleman--broke, with 14 children, 8 of them toddlers--can't even find the resources to save herself.
Is there anyone who can intervene?
Don't get me wrong. If people want to make pornography; if they're of legal age and the sex is safe, that's their choice. (I say "if the sex is safe" because I hate to see anyone catch STDs.) People should be allowed to make their own choices in these matters. But this is extortion. Suleman has made it plain she doesn't want to work for this man, and he is trying to muscle her. Whatever anyone may think of Suleman's other choices, this ain't right.
Is there anyone who is trying to help her?
Maybe a lot of you won't know of this, but there was a whole genre of stage plays, some of which made it to silent movies, about evil, rich, slimy villains who used their wealth to force impoverished, sweet, virtuous, usually blond, young things to surrender their virtue in order to keep their homes, get medicine for ailing parents, brothers, sisters, or grandparents, or solve any other really drastic financial problem. You see bits and pieces of this heritage in old Dudley Doright cartoons, with adjustments (there was no Horse in the silents and the plays).
Nadya Suleman, infamously known as "the Octomom" for giving birth to eight babies at once, is in financial trouble. In fact, her home is in foreclosure. We know people foreclose on others all the time, but foreclose on them in order to force them to make a porn movie?!
Steve Hirsh of Vivid Entertainment--which has already approached Suleman about making such a movie--has offered to take on her debt from the man who currently holds it. He says if she won't do the movie, he can give her a job in which she keeps on her clothes and is paid enough to support her family. He says.
Suleman is barely getting by. She can't afford the house her father bought for her on the condition that she take over the payments. And here comes Hirsch, oozing to her rescue, with offers she has turned down from him before.
It's insanely familiar, except in the old melodramas, there was always a hero who came to the heroine's rescue. Not only has no hero appeared, but Suleman--broke, with 14 children, 8 of them toddlers--can't even find the resources to save herself.
Is there anyone who can intervene?
Don't get me wrong. If people want to make pornography; if they're of legal age and the sex is safe, that's their choice. (I say "if the sex is safe" because I hate to see anyone catch STDs.) People should be allowed to make their own choices in these matters. But this is extortion. Suleman has made it plain she doesn't want to work for this man, and he is trying to muscle her. Whatever anyone may think of Suleman's other choices, this ain't right.
Is there anyone who is trying to help her?
And here it is, 1/1/11
With hopes for a 2011 filled with steps forward, not back; with conversation based on civility, not shrieking and invective; with more good jobs instead of grudging grants that make people feel like dirt by the time they're authorized; with health, happiness, creativity, and prosperity for old friends and new.
And instead of my usual fireworks photo, I'm posting one of Nature's pinwheels:
Happy 2011!
And instead of my usual fireworks photo, I'm posting one of Nature's pinwheels:
Happy 2011!
December 31, 2010
the Banished Words List 2011 and a small end of year rant
Did you know that Lake Superior State University publishes a yearly list of words the folks who post to it wish were banned from the English language? I think I remember it vaguely, but this year I actually caught the news about it when it came out, and here it is!
Okay, I don't think "viral" or "epic" are over-used, but I'm not into mainstream media that much. "Wow factor" gives me the pip, though--not for over-use, simply for silliness. Are we really that short of adjectives that this is the best we can do? "A-ha moment" and "backstory" are in the same category for me. I think people use "backstory" because it makes us feel like we're in the movie or TV business. ;-)
BFF just plain annoys me. "Man up" does as well, but for other reasons. Folks use it to mean "suck up your courage"--what has that to do with being a man? Aren't women courageous, too? (That's a rhetorical question. I know the term comes from the days when a real man stood up and owned up to his errors and flaws. I'm saying that by perpetuating this phrase you're also perpetuating the myth that only men have true honesty and courage.)
Sarah Palin's "refudiate"--please. Enough discussion of this bit of stupidity, please. Ditto "mama grizzlies"--the ones with done hair, manicures, and expensive outfits. Being attractive does not an authority make, any more than being unattractive does.
If you took away the phrase "The American People," most political speeches would be shorter by one quarter. True fact. (This paragraph is a joke.)
I like "just sayin." It's a way to say you're being silly without spelling it out.
I personally would like to get rid of finger-pointing--the act--by pundits. I was always taught it was rude to point. And yelling, ditto. I'm really tired of all these yelling people, aren't you? Also, drunken parties in rehab, songs with the words "ho," "bitch," the c-word, "rape," woman-slapping, and woman violence in them, and clothes that look ugly no matter who wears them.
While I'm on getting rid of things, how about getting rid of incompetent staff at Veteran's Administration hospitals and replacing them with competent staff who do their job right away? How about cutting money for sports teams and putting it into education? How about getting rid of politicians who only work against things, never for anything?
How about getting rid of unemployment and replacing it with real jobs? How about helping the poor and middle class people instead of leaving them to flounder?
Okay, I don't think "viral" or "epic" are over-used, but I'm not into mainstream media that much. "Wow factor" gives me the pip, though--not for over-use, simply for silliness. Are we really that short of adjectives that this is the best we can do? "A-ha moment" and "backstory" are in the same category for me. I think people use "backstory" because it makes us feel like we're in the movie or TV business. ;-)
BFF just plain annoys me. "Man up" does as well, but for other reasons. Folks use it to mean "suck up your courage"--what has that to do with being a man? Aren't women courageous, too? (That's a rhetorical question. I know the term comes from the days when a real man stood up and owned up to his errors and flaws. I'm saying that by perpetuating this phrase you're also perpetuating the myth that only men have true honesty and courage.)
Sarah Palin's "refudiate"--please. Enough discussion of this bit of stupidity, please. Ditto "mama grizzlies"--the ones with done hair, manicures, and expensive outfits. Being attractive does not an authority make, any more than being unattractive does.
If you took away the phrase "The American People," most political speeches would be shorter by one quarter. True fact. (This paragraph is a joke.)
I like "just sayin." It's a way to say you're being silly without spelling it out.
I personally would like to get rid of finger-pointing--the act--by pundits. I was always taught it was rude to point. And yelling, ditto. I'm really tired of all these yelling people, aren't you? Also, drunken parties in rehab, songs with the words "ho," "bitch," the c-word, "rape," woman-slapping, and woman violence in them, and clothes that look ugly no matter who wears them.
While I'm on getting rid of things, how about getting rid of incompetent staff at Veteran's Administration hospitals and replacing them with competent staff who do their job right away? How about cutting money for sports teams and putting it into education? How about getting rid of politicians who only work against things, never for anything?
How about getting rid of unemployment and replacing it with real jobs? How about helping the poor and middle class people instead of leaving them to flounder?
December 22, 2010
Keith Olbermann disappoints me bigtime
It's the Assange case. I don't know if he's guilty of the rape; I leave that for the courts to decide.
But Michael Moore (who always leaves me uncomfortable because he always pushes too far, too hard, and too extremely) appeared on Keith Olbermann's show to talk about it, and basically said that the rape complaint and the women who made it didn't matter. Keith, much to my heartbreak, did not call him on it, and when people responded, Keith got mad. Now it's a hot mess and Keith looks worse all the time. Why can't he say he was wrong to let Moore's dismissal of the rape victims pass?
I've sort of looked the other way for years on how heavy-handed Keith Olbermann is with women. (As a sporadic viewer I miss some of his worst offenses, and I honestly didn't think he was harder on Hillary Clinton than the people she was running against.) But this is more than too much.
Keith, you're too smart for this, so you don't get away with it. You know better. And just because you were a jock once, it doesn't give you a free pass to talk and act like one.
But Michael Moore (who always leaves me uncomfortable because he always pushes too far, too hard, and too extremely) appeared on Keith Olbermann's show to talk about it, and basically said that the rape complaint and the women who made it didn't matter. Keith, much to my heartbreak, did not call him on it, and when people responded, Keith got mad. Now it's a hot mess and Keith looks worse all the time. Why can't he say he was wrong to let Moore's dismissal of the rape victims pass?
I've sort of looked the other way for years on how heavy-handed Keith Olbermann is with women. (As a sporadic viewer I miss some of his worst offenses, and I honestly didn't think he was harder on Hillary Clinton than the people she was running against.) But this is more than too much.
Keith, you're too smart for this, so you don't get away with it. You know better. And just because you were a jock once, it doesn't give you a free pass to talk and act like one.
December 18, 2010
regarding self defense and heroism
cross-posted from my fan journal, where ![[info]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1380442897i/1319734.gif)
's post can be found
In my post on Self defense from pervos,
simargl_wings
makes a point so important that I think it's well worth posting about separately.
You know I write girl heroes. Some of them are pretty jocky, too, if you think about it. And because we often don't have the height, weight, and upper body strength to match guys, my girl warriors work out a lot to have that chance to beat the odds. Their confidence in their training, their stronger bodies, and their causes, gives them the courage to speak out.
Not all of us are like that. Some of us have slower reflexes. We don't do well at athletics. I was always the girl who was a tenth of a second behind the ball coming at me, and years of phys ed didn't make me any faster. In self defense I learned ways to deal with my slowness that would save me a trashing under ideal circumstances, but in a stand-up fight against an experienced martial artist I would lose, because slow is built right into me. When something comes at me, whatever the circumstances, I freeze. When two men broke into my first NYC apartment and robbed my friend and me, we both froze. We couldn't see what was happening to each other, so not only were we scared for our own lives; our captors were using our fear for our friend to control us.
You know what happened after? Two of our fellow students in our martial arts class were strutting around, telling us what they would have done, how they would have beaten those robbers to a pulp, asking us why we didn't do this or that. We felt like shit. It was our teacher who told them to shut up. He told them they couldn't know until it happened to them.
Some of us, for whatever reason, can't respond to a harasser. (I couldn't for years.) We can't get back in their faces; we can't fight back; we fear that this man may do something worse if we try. I think, if we'd fought those guys, at the very least we would have racked up some punches.
There is nothing wrong with being this way. You can only do as your instincts bid you. If you fear that if you do something, things will get worse, go with your gut. The important thing is that you survive. Not all of us are warriors. The person facing you may be crazy. You have to do with what you have to do, to come back to us in one piece. And there's no shame in that.
A friend of mine had an abusive boyfriend, one with combat experience. He was crazy and she was terrified. I did all the research needed so she could get a license and get a shotgun to keep within reach at home. We talked about it, and I was sure she understood why I was so frightened for her--but she didn't get the gun. I was completely baffled. I would have had that weapon in a NY second. One of the other women I worked with, hearing me, said, "But you would have pulled the trigger, Tammy. She wouldn't--and he'd have taken it and used it on her."
I had never heard of that before, and I was horrified. Now I've heard it a lot, and I understand, or at least, I know I wouldn't condemn a woman for not being able to use a weapon. Don't carry a weapon unless you're convinced you'll really, really use it. You don't want to give a bad guy something to use against you.
Nobody knows how she'll react in an emergency, and our reactions to different kinds of emergencies are different. And if you do nothing? Sometimes nothing is all you can do. Sometimes nothing is the right thing to do. You do what you have to. And we'll be here, happy to see you. We won't condemn. None of us knows how we'd react, until we're in that position. And no one has ANY right to point a finger at someone else.
Thanks,
simargl_wings
. You reminded me to say something I don't say nearly enough.
's post can be foundIn my post on Self defense from pervos,
simargl_wings
makes a point so important that I think it's well worth posting about separately.You know I write girl heroes. Some of them are pretty jocky, too, if you think about it. And because we often don't have the height, weight, and upper body strength to match guys, my girl warriors work out a lot to have that chance to beat the odds. Their confidence in their training, their stronger bodies, and their causes, gives them the courage to speak out.
Not all of us are like that. Some of us have slower reflexes. We don't do well at athletics. I was always the girl who was a tenth of a second behind the ball coming at me, and years of phys ed didn't make me any faster. In self defense I learned ways to deal with my slowness that would save me a trashing under ideal circumstances, but in a stand-up fight against an experienced martial artist I would lose, because slow is built right into me. When something comes at me, whatever the circumstances, I freeze. When two men broke into my first NYC apartment and robbed my friend and me, we both froze. We couldn't see what was happening to each other, so not only were we scared for our own lives; our captors were using our fear for our friend to control us.
You know what happened after? Two of our fellow students in our martial arts class were strutting around, telling us what they would have done, how they would have beaten those robbers to a pulp, asking us why we didn't do this or that. We felt like shit. It was our teacher who told them to shut up. He told them they couldn't know until it happened to them.
Some of us, for whatever reason, can't respond to a harasser. (I couldn't for years.) We can't get back in their faces; we can't fight back; we fear that this man may do something worse if we try. I think, if we'd fought those guys, at the very least we would have racked up some punches.
There is nothing wrong with being this way. You can only do as your instincts bid you. If you fear that if you do something, things will get worse, go with your gut. The important thing is that you survive. Not all of us are warriors. The person facing you may be crazy. You have to do with what you have to do, to come back to us in one piece. And there's no shame in that.
A friend of mine had an abusive boyfriend, one with combat experience. He was crazy and she was terrified. I did all the research needed so she could get a license and get a shotgun to keep within reach at home. We talked about it, and I was sure she understood why I was so frightened for her--but she didn't get the gun. I was completely baffled. I would have had that weapon in a NY second. One of the other women I worked with, hearing me, said, "But you would have pulled the trigger, Tammy. She wouldn't--and he'd have taken it and used it on her."
I had never heard of that before, and I was horrified. Now I've heard it a lot, and I understand, or at least, I know I wouldn't condemn a woman for not being able to use a weapon. Don't carry a weapon unless you're convinced you'll really, really use it. You don't want to give a bad guy something to use against you.
Nobody knows how she'll react in an emergency, and our reactions to different kinds of emergencies are different. And if you do nothing? Sometimes nothing is all you can do. Sometimes nothing is the right thing to do. You do what you have to. And we'll be here, happy to see you. We won't condemn. None of us knows how we'd react, until we're in that position. And no one has ANY right to point a finger at someone else.
Thanks,
simargl_wings
. You reminded me to say something I don't say nearly enough.
