.This blog is for my various interests, such as bicycling, karaoke, clean living, internet memes, video games, roleplaying games, progressive politics, humor, and futurism.
The law and its sponsor, state representative Tom Riner, have been the subject of controversy since the law first surfaced in 2006, yet the Kentucky state Supreme Court has refused to review its constitutionality, despite clearly violating the First Amendment’s separation of church and state.
Fuck everything about this, and fuck everyone who claims there’s some kind of “war on religion” in the United States.
Signed,
An Atheist.
I worked at American Apparel for two years. During the time that I worked there, the company implemented a company-wide recruitment policy where any person applying for a position must be photographed (1 headshot, 1 body shot) The actual resumes were thrown in the garbage. These photos were then sent to a company email address where someone would either give a thumbs up or down to the photographs. Staff were encouraged to recruit instore and on the street and were given a $100 bonus for every person they got approved.
Before this was implemented, all existing staff were photographed (again, 1 headshot and 1 body shot) Anyone deemed to be physically unworthy was let go from the company. Of course this wasn’t legal, however right before they started this process every employee had to sign a waiver form, that was pretty much a lot of legal gibberish, on the spot. I wanted to have a lawyer take a look at the form however I was told I had to sign it on the spot or I would be let go.
There was also a company intranet website which all employees where to check on a regular basis. This was Dov’s main line of communication to all staff. The site would have pictures of girls from the stores where he would rip them apart for having too thin eyebrows, for having “ugly make-up” or bad tattoos and piercings. They were basically publicly shamed for not looking the way he wanted to. He would also post memos saying things like “HIRE MORE ASIANS”
Most of the girls that I worked with were super young, I was the oldest in the store at 20. We even secretly employed one girl’s little sister who was only 13. A lot of the time when the guys from head office would come in they would take pictures of the girls in the store. Some of the girls wanted extra attention so they would pose pretty raunchy for them, mostly they just side boob and stuff but sometimes it got kind of weird. Also, every city with an American Apparel also has a company hotel room. Personally, I never went with them, but when the head office guys came to town they would take a few girls from the store with them for the night. I heard stories about tons of weird crap going on those nights and I know for a fact many of those girls were under 18.
I worked at AA for a year and I can verify all of this. I was a merchandiser that was let go for not being up to physical standards (but the official reason was time and attendance, when I was pulling 12 hour days 4 times a week). They had an “auditor” from corporate come into town to “audit.” She had an hour long meeting with us telling us that we needed to dress sexier and wear more heels and tights (but if we had a run in our tights we could be fired/written up). Since I was a merchandiser, there was no way I was going to be wearing heels on 12-foot ladders, lugging around mannequins all day. They told me to dye my hair and get rid of my piercings, I said no, they let go of me a few days before Christmas.
AMERICAN APPAREL IS SO FUCKING GROSS AND NO ONE EVER SEEMS TO BELIEVE ME eeeeeeeeeeeeu
god wtf
(via ballsoutsupermania)
The so-called “pro-life” movement’s philosophy.
One of the best political cartoons that I’ve seen.
You know what pisses me off about this? Really, REALLY pisses me off? That’s George (H.W.) Bush holding that umbrella. He was president 1981-1989. Do you get that?
It means that the right have not budged an inch on their ridiculous pro-foetus, anti-actual-persons position in THIRTY GODDAMN YEARS. We should not still be having this argument! Thirty year old political cartoons should be bafflingly opaque, not crystal clear!
^ Reblogging again for that comment.
Agreed.
(via wilwheaton)
(via anattractivecryingman)
The best campaign counter-attack video I HAVE EVER SEEN. Obama 2012
”So we’re going to call their BS when we see it and we need your help to call them on it too and set the record straight. So share this, tweet it, facebook it, I keep hearing about tumblr and whatever that is…please use that too. Thank you.”
-Stephanie Cutter / Deputy Campaign Manager at Obama for America.
And a Tumblr shout-out.
Reblog this so it goes to everybody. Facebook it to everyone. Cover the internet in a call to arms to keep the truth in politics. Never let them lie again.
Emailed to me by Sarah L.
It’s sad because it’s true.
Spinster Aunt on Komen Khaos
Man do I love Spinster Aunt’s screeds on the excellent I Blame the Patriarchy. Today’s post “Komen Sucks, Pt. 47” is no exception.
“Listen everyone, Komen doesn’t prevent cancer, and Komen doesn’t pay for breast cancer treatment. It “raises awareness” through “early detection” and funds “research” focused on pharmaceutical cures for cancers that many of Komen’s corporate sponsors might likely have a hand in causing in the first place.”
Return your pink Kitchen-Aids! Un-dye the City Hall foundation! Rouge pink nipples until they are as red as the necks and political beliefs of Komen’s CEO Nancy Brinker, Karen Handel and Jane Abraham!
Oh, boy, have I missed Twisty.
Her conclusion is killer:
“Komen is the most visible brand in the whole cancer industrial complex. It disguises itself as some big altruistic community effort for women’s health, but it’s really just another conservative, honky organization with a misogynist political agenda. A marketing juggernaut instrumental in raking in piles of cash for and cleansing the tarnished images of its evil corporate sponsors, Komen has successfully brainwashed millions to believe that the “problem” of women’s health can be solved by licking yogurt lids.”
(via stfuconservatives)
A physician at an abortion clinic (via fuckititsfriday)
This is from The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion. If you haven’t read it already, READ IT RIGHT NOW.
-Jess
(via stfuconservatives)
(via stfuconservatives)
Senate Votes To Stop Congressional Insider Trading
New York Times:
“In an effort to regain public trust, the Senate voted Monday to take up a bill that would prohibit members of Congress from trading stocks and other securities on the basis of confidential information they receive as lawmakers. The vote was 93 to 2.
This was in Obama’s SOTU. Pretty quick turnaround.
Congress was pissedddd when Obama mentioned that. It was one of the few times he was actually booed.
I’m looking for reader input on whether and when New York Times news reporters should challenge “facts” that are asserted by newsmakers they write about.
Another example: on the campaign trail, Mitt Romney often says President Obama has made speeches “apologizing for America,” a phrase to which Paul Krugman objected in a December 23 column arguing that politics has advanced to the “post-truth” stage.
As an Op-Ed columnist, Mr. Krugman clearly has the freedom to call out what he thinks is a lie. My question for readers is: should news reporters do the same?
If so, then perhaps the next time Mr. Romney says the president has a habit of apologizing for his country, the reporter should insert a paragraph saying, more or less:
“The president has never used the word ‘apologize’ in a speech about U.S. policy or history. Any assertion that he has apologized for U.S. actions rests on a misleading interpretation of the president’s words.”
On the one hand, I’m glad to see that someone at the Times is at long last considering the importance of reporters identifying and calling out lies. I can’t help but wonder how different the last 12 years would have been if they’d, you know, done their jobs and actually informed their readers, instead of letting lies from anonymous sources go unchallenged.
On the other hand, it’s appalling to me that this is even a question that needs to be asked. Isn’t seeking the truth and informing readers in the fucking job description?
Alabama One Step From Reinstating Slavery
This article describes quite well how Alabama is going about this. Alabama, a few months back, got real scared of all them brown illegals crawling through the tall grass stealing jobs, so Alabama outlawed ‘em and sent their cops through the land, demanding to see everyone’s proof of citizenship.
So, all of Alabama’s migrant workers ran like hell. Even the ones that were there legally. That is wrong on so many levels, but Alabama’s lawmakers only recognize one problem with this: apparently, Alabama’s entire economy depends on picking things, and all the thing-picking jobs were held by Latino migrant workers who are gone now.
So, a bunch of policymakers, bureaucrats and genial Southern land-owners got together, and now they’re trying to hash out a plan whereby Alabama’s prison population will be put to work on private farms.
Private farms, for profit. This is worlds different than roadside clean-up, or prison farms, or stamping license plates. This is not public work for the public good, this is a new animal: Alabama is about to start taking its inmates and loaning them for a fee to private companies and businessmen. “Loaning for a fee” is a lot like “leasing”.
Alabama, good old Suthin-land-o-goshin, is about to start taking its (primarily black) prison population and auctioning them off to plantation owners. Really.
Prediction
Now that #occupywallstreet has got its legs underneath it, and every major news distributor is trying to figure out what to make of it, I’d like to put in my own predictions. The spin factories of the right are going to present a new batch of cooked statistics and anecdotes to try to refute #OWS’s core assertions. Faux News is going to start running rock-the-clock bullshit from serious-looking men that Wall Street, and the top 1%, really are suffering as much or more than the rest of us. They’ll try different tactics, but it’ll mostly revolve around cup-and-ball tricks with numbers to try to change the argument, and personal stories from honest-looking men and attractive-looking women to try to convince viewers that the corpocrats and uber-rich are not profiting. The bestest trick that the right-wing has is playing the victim, and I expect them to make that their go-to strategy, but to do that they have to plead for pity for the wealthy. They’ll dummy up some proof that the super-rich are hurting SO BAD, and they’ll whine that the big bad protesters are slandering them and blaming them for stuff, and that if they could just get a few more tax breaks, a little less regulation, then everyone will be okay again and everything will be happy.
Let’s see if I’m right in the coming weeks.
Also, I predict a lot more hostility and violence towards protesters. This stage in the game has only just begun. The real opposition is yet to come.