Hmmm.... Fat Tuesday and Women's day are the same day.

Interesting....

The day known for women showing their breasts for cheap beads is the same day that is known for... OK, never heard of it before.

While I agree that the day is condescending, saying that groups that want to help women want to "fuck off and die" is silly.

Charity groups tend to focus on specific demographics. There are very few "We work on all the problems of the world" groups. Its too vague. Groups target.

I mean, are groups who help at-risk inner-city youth saying "fuck off and die" to suburban bulimic youth? Are eating disorders clinics saying "fuck off and die" to drug addicts? No, they just have specific targets.

There's nothing stopping you from forming a battered mens' shelter if you want to.

Former Banker: Teehee!

"How are we supposed to celebrate this special occasion, by dressing up as giant vaginas and running around snorting Summer's Eve?"

That's what I did. Did I celebrate wrong???

I'd never heard of International Women's Day until yesterday, but a friend of mine recalls that while studying in Italy, she would go into shops on March 8th and was greeted with flowers and "Ciao, bella."

I could go for a "holiday" like that. All the empowerment and armpit hair can go pound sand.

@Former Banker,
your comment gives me an idea: Maybe The TSA could hand out strings of cheap beads to the women they make show their breasts.

I joke to hide my revulsion. Sorry to be off topic on the post.

It was also my birthday.

Wow, sometimes it really is all about me.

It was BF's daughter's birthday yesterday too. I had her and her BF over for dinner and made shrimp scampi. Both the guys cleaned up so we girls could sit, chat and drink wine. Rather apropo, I would say!

Planned Parenthood was out en masse, wearing hot pink, protesting at the state Capitol yesterday. (They were protesting budget cuts and a sonogram bill, but I do wonder if they picked the specific date because it was "Women's Day.")

I realized I was officially old when my husband asked me what I wanted for my birthday and I told him an orthopedic pillow.

But, I don't really celebrate my birthday. Every day I wake up and a meteor hasn't flattened me seems like my birthday.

That or what I like to say: Any day we wake up on THIS side of the dirt is a GOOD day.

(Many happy returns of the day to you, Amy!)

That, or a 200-ton stack of worthless T-bills. That one may happen. I keep watching the skies... It's no secret to anyone here that the entire concept of "XYZ Day" has been so cheapened by the number of XYZs who think they deserve their own special day that few people other than the XYZs themselves pay attention any more. It's a microcosm of where our society is at today. President's Day is no longer a day to celebrate the remarkable story of American democracy; it's just a day off for federal employees. Etc.

The sad thing is: If they wanted to make it "Support Women Who Are Persecuted by Sharia Day", that's a cause I could get behind. But it'll never happen.

"What if you need help but you have a penis?"

Maybe a man can help a woman with his penis?

"There's nothing stopping you from forming a battered mens' shelter if you want to."

Actually Nicole people trying to do this very thing do run into the usual bureaucratic in-fightuing becasue the people already running shelters (for women) see the new shelters as competiton in a zero-sum scramble for funding. And this gets spun as a misogynistic attempt to restrict women's access boo hoo flounce flounce and all that shit.

Oh, and since men's abusers tend to be women, this affronts some people's superstitions about how women are all sugar and spice, so they try to call it misogyny too. That gets all the radfems and their white knight male allies in an uproar.

But basically you are right, it's no different from any other hassle to set up a pblically funded organization.

The real issue is equal funding for services that serve different populations. It's the same principle as public schools and Brown v. Board of Education. Men's and women's shelters pretty mcuh necesarily need to be separate, so then you have to think of a way to make separate really be equal.

It doesn't help the discussion that a more than a few women's shelters have not exactly covered themselves with glory when it comes to males - cases where a women shows up with her terrified self and family, including a 13 year-old boy, and they all welconme excelt him because of course he is the evil Patriarchal oppressor now that he has the beginnings of a fringe around his evil PENIS -in other words bigoted ideology mascarading as a therapeutic concern. so the women's shelter community doesn't enjoy a lot of credibility when it comes to males overall. That may be unfair, but they made their bed.

Meanwhile, back in Cairo:

"In Tahrir Square, women's rights activists attempting to hold a rally to demand a greater role in the political system were set upon by scores of men who beat and groped them"

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/09/world/middleeast/09cairo.html?ref=world

oh, but Martin, those men are just following their male compusions... it doesn't have anything to do with their religion! :massive>eye>roll:

I got into a minor arg. with a femme site commenter about the assult Laura Logan in Egypt. Her comment was basically that all men are like that given a chance... I basically said I hope you never have children, certainly not sons... and that she had better get used to the idea of submission if the jihadis win.

I've been abused and It was a woman who abused me 1 year I decided to try and organise a target match at a local gun club what else would a gun owning male who was a victim of violence do to help Victims of violence?

I was attacked By a gay male who Stupidly enough felt he had a right to attack me cause "he owned guns two and My insensitive ass needed to be nocked down a peg" I was attacked cause i was being insensitive to the victims OF spousal violenc... it didn't done on the idiot that he was accusing me of being... Insensitive to... my self... yeah... Dump and illogical... i've met a number of gays who fit that discription OOOOH and hypicritical the one's who argue gun owning isn't a right cause it isn't in the charter of right's... and then prance around Blathering on about the Right to gay marrage that under aint in the charter aint a right equally applies to.

Womens Day? How was mine?...utterly unremarkable, thank you- just the way I like it.

Secretly however, I was desperately wishing someone mentioned it to me so I could graciously accept their well wishes, and in turn, ask them when Anglo-Male Day would be?

"Her comment was basically that all men are like that given a chance... "

That is so absurd.

There are Men since the dawn of time that have found the rape of a women detestable. There are men now that find it detestable.

What I experienced with the Egypt situation, from the men around me, was nothing less then a white-hot protective instinct to mame and kill the animals involved in her attack.

"ask them when Anglo-Male Day would be? "

That would be every day!

Well hell, it took out the funny bit because I put it in angle brackets. Let's try again:

"ask them when Anglo-Male Day would be? "

That would be every day! (insert evil laugh here...)

Happy Birthday Amy! Here's a really bad birthday joke (as told to me in the first person).

A bunch of guy friends get together to celebrate their buddies birthday. After a few drinks, the man whose birthday it was said "You know guys? This is really nice of you. I haven't really celebrated my birthday ever, and this means a lot to me." So they ask him why he never celebrates his birthday.

"Well, my grandfather, who practically raised me, died on my birthday in Auschwitz. We were really close, so it always just never seemed right for me to celebrate on the anniversary of his death."

Silence ensues. (The key is to wait until the silence becomes unbearable, because nobody ever wants to be the first to same something.)

"Poor son-of-a-bitch showed up drunk to work. He fell out of the guard tower."

Some good writing on Women's Day in Tahrir Square here, in case anyone thought this sort of thing only happened to blond infidel reporters:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/10/opinion/10iht-edjohnson10.html?pagewanted=all

For Women's Day I read about Marhaba Karimi, the Women's Affairs director in Afghanistan who, along with her husband, got the death penalty for torturing and murdering her daughter-in-law last year.

Is that an example of irony? I'm never sure.

I actually ranted about this to my gf because of that stupid Daniel Craig, Judy dench psa that was full of lies and there is probably no corresponding mens day. Turns out I was actually wrong. There is an international mens day in November. I highly doubt it gets as much press but for once there is a corresponding day for men.

So Scott, how much did you have to grovel for sex that night?

Posted by: Jim at March 9, 2011 8:51 AM

Quite sincerely, Thank You for posting my thoughts before I had to. ;-)

CD,
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Jim, the teenage boy issue was actually a big problem in Philadelphia, as I learned when I taught a class for kids in a shelter. You've got shelters for women and children, but males over 16 are not allowed in them. You've got shelters for men, but you have to be over 18. There were a couple shelters in Philly where you could be a 16 or 17 year old boy, but not enough.

It's a tough one, because if you've worked with at-risk youth you know that it really could cause a problem in a womens' shelter. They have a sex drive by then, and many are involved with gangs. Of course, if you're a shy, respectful, non-violent homeless kid you're screwed.

If I were going to start a shelter in Philadelphia, I would target teenager boys.

nicole thats every where.

not just philly there are NO homes for boys really AND yeah throwing someone out on the street for having a penis Makes the problem worse.

there are 5 programs Toytall for those with estrigin in the city i live in Half as many for males and most Are for adult males.

Now... Personaly IF there was mor ehelp for at risk male youth The montreal massicure would never of happend and canada would be a nice place to live.

All my info here is from newspapers and a few years old.

There is only one shelter for men around here and it designed for 10 or so men but they manage to squeeze in about 20. There is one private transion home for 3 men. By private I mean it is just some guy who chooses to rent out 3 rooms in his home real cheap. The shelter only allows single men over 18 so if you have a kid in tow you have a problem. Also as Nicole noted there is a gap for teenage boys from when they can be in the family shelter to the mens shelter.

there are 8 women and women & family shelters with around 100 beds. 20 some transion houses - one is an apartment building. Plus a number of safe houses.

Yet the city and/or county wanted to fund more help for women. That was before the budget crisis of course.