A Post for the Bored

I pretty much collect favorite webpages in my bookmarks for Firefox. I have no doubt that I have at least 200 favorites, a great many of which are just articles that interested me. In an attempt to not have those in my bookmarks anymore, I am going to share them with you! In batches of twenty or so at a time, separated by content. If you are ever bored, just follow a few of these and prepare to be interested. Hopefully.

After the cut...
My first section is a downer: more on rape culture, domestic abuse, sexual abuse, and a few other articles in the same vein.

RAPE CULTURE AND DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Good Morning, Let's Talk About Rape Culture! This post is a response to an awful event that happened in the fandom of one of my favorite shows, Supernatural, which was my trigger into getting more involved with learning about Rape Culture. I was not there, I just followed the fallout from it.

All Rape Is 'Real' Rape. This one was especially triggery to me because my step dad made an assertion when i argued with him about rape that in states that allow concealed weapons, instances of rape went down by over 60%. That's bullshit. I can tell you it's bullshit, because the majority of rape that occurs is a) done to people younger than 20 by b) people they know and thought they trusted. Stranger rape is not common. The kind of rape people think of as rape, where a woman (or man) is jumped and raped in an alley at 3 am? Not very common at ALL. That is where a concealed (or any) weapon would come in handy. Most rape? It's a relative, or a teacher, husband, or an acquaintance, the guy you just went on a date with. What triggered me is that my step dad refused to listen to this. He's just that kind of guy.

Which brings me to this, Facts on Firearms and Domestic Violence. This was interesting to me because I was raised in (two) houses (after the 'rents divorced) with no guns, but my stepfather moved in and brought his small arsenal. Well, really just three guns. He carries a concealed weapon (with the license, he's nothing if not stringently rule-following [unless he's driving, then he speeds, the criminal]), and there are guns in the house. I may just have sounded anti-gun--I'm not. I am anti people. Guns don't fire without a person causing it. And I LIKE firing guns, I do. At targets. The thought of firing at a living creature? No way. Guns are terrifying.

And the last of this sort of article, The Latest Trend in Child Sexual Exploitation: Rape in Adult Prisons. This was something that was a bit of an epiphany to me. Prior to this article, I didn't often think much of children being tried as adults. But this? This article made me sick. Basically, what we are saying when we try children as adults, and then also using prison rape as a fear for people to keep them from doing crime, is that when a child does something really really bad, they should be fodder for child rapists in adult prisons. Because, well, they're bad, right? Bad people deserve to be punished. If they didn't want to be raped they shouldn't have been bad. That, right there? That's bullshit. I don't care who you are, no one deserves rape.

For more articles dealing with Rape Culture you can visit another links post back in May (2010) HERE.
CRACKED.COM ARTICLES

I love Cracked. Here are 4 of my favs.

The 5 Most Half-Assed Apologies for Historic Crimes
6 Historic Acts of Revenge That Put Kill Bill To Shame
The 6 Creepiest Places on Earth
5 Ways Your Brain Is Messing With Your Head

THE NEWS, MEDIA, AND PERSONAL PRIVACY

This is a bit of a grab-bag--some articles will not directly relate to others, but they are news stories or stories about privacy and copyright, and media like movies.'

This first one pissed me right off. US Soldiers Punished for Not Attending Christian Concert. WTF? Dear military: if you want my support, you should start fucking earning it. Start now. I dare you. (And no, starting a war and getting servicemen and women killed in another country for reasons that do not effect my freedom is not protecting said freedom. Try again.)

The NYPD Tapes. This is the story of a cop in New York who got fed up with the hypocrisy of cops, so he recorded it. It's...terrifying. And not at all singular to just that precinct.

Seen Not Heard: How Obscure Security Makes School Suck. Looking at things like this makes me absolutely positive that schools self sabotage their students just for kicks. If kids don't feel safe at or want to be at school because of teachers and administrators, that's not conducive to learning. If you treat students like criminals, that's how they will feel. That does not seem like the kind of school where I'd be at all excited to learn.

A Bill of Privacy Rights for Social Network Users.

Orson Wells on Privacy, the Passport, and Personal Rights.

The Entertainment Industry's Dystopia of the Future.

Rapunzel, Rapunzel. Disney decides they don't cater to the male audience enough and respond by turning a story about a girl into the story about the man who rescues her. Thanks, Disney. Because a good half of the movies you've put out in the last 20 years were about men, and the ones that pretended to be about women tended to be about women finding their man and then becoming submissive to him. So forgive me for not leaping for joy in your want to alienate your female audience by catering to little boys (who, surprise surprise, DO like the girl movies--if you make the girl movies GOOD). /rant.

(P.S. do I have that right? I haven't put the numbers together. Girl: The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Pocahontas, Mulan, Lilo and Stitch, Princess and the Frog...shit, check that, much more than half of the movies has a male protagonist as the lead. Rescuers Down Under has a duo, but then MALE: Aladdin, The Lion King, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, Tarzan, The Emperor's New Groove, Atlantis, Treasure Planet, and Brother Bear. And that's not counting the other Disney movies like Chicken Little or Bolt which are also male protagonists. So basically, what Disney is REALLY saying, is fuck little girls, we want our audience to just be boys! Thanks, Disney.

Kid Keeping a Lending Library in His/Her Locker. I LOVE this one. Go kid! Fuck censorship! XD

Okay, that's all for today! Tomorrow I will follow up with links involving SCIENCE, THE FUTURE and MISCELLANEOUS OR FUN.