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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
Published Letters: 49 Editor's Choice: 8
Maybe you just forgot about that pathetic moment in history when you gave a forum for the absurd, illogical, rantings of David Horowitz? One of your best calls was taking him out of your lineup, but any one of his columns could be selected as one of Salon's most embarassing moments.
My great-grandmother, who grew up in a fairly affluent San Francisco family often frequented The Mission, because 60 years ago SF's Mission more closely resembled what we would now consider a 'yuppie' enclave. It had movie theaters, nightclubs and small shops. This is immediately clear if you walk down Mission Blvd. and notice that not only does the sidewalk have tiles in it -- do they really tile the sidewalk of a slum? -- but the older buildings have a lot of the types of architectural details that are usually reserved for higher income neighborhoods.
What happened is that there was a mass exodus of upper income families to the suburbs in the 1950's -- ie my great-grandmother moved to Burlingame -- turning thriving neighborhoods like The Mission into slums.
When affluent neo-bohemians started moving back in during the 80's they were most likely just moving back to a place their great-grandparents had lived in.
Obviously other neighborhoods have different stories -- Lower East Side was always a slum, for example -- but it irks me how often people like O'Heir fail to realize that in the case of The Misssion, the years when it was neglected were more the anomaly than the current state of affairs.
Not like I am a huge fan of convicted sex offenders, but it continually amazes me how we single them out above all other criminals.
Wouldn't you say that a neighbor who has a history of alcohol abuse and a couple of drunk driving convictions is more dangerous to you (and your children playing in the street) than a child molester? Why doesn't that drunk driver have to have a special license plate?
That is a really good point about how if the sentence is huge then it makes it harder to get a jury to convict the person.
In addition, if a rape conviction carries a life sentence, there isn't any reason for a rapist to spare the life of his victim. Same goes for child molesters. If a molester knows that the prison time is the same whether he murders the child or not, why shouldn't he murder the prime witness?
I'd love to rid the earth of these criminals, but in our zeal we need to be careful we don't wind up with unintended, gruesome consequences.
I wonder about the "partially responsible" aspect of the survey questions. We don't know whether these people are thinking, "if a woman gets really drunk at a bar, then maybe she is 5% responsible for having put herself in a risky situation" or "any woman who gets drunk is just asking for it." The former response, although, still pretty ignorant, is decidely less frightening than the latter response, and this survey doesn't seem to differentiate between the two people.
I would have liked to see the survey be a bit more specific, before Salon starts saying that 1/3 Brits think women are "Still asking for it."
What is with this idea that somehow only men experience a strong enough arousal to inhibit judgement. Isn't there something offensive about the idea that women were not included in the study? Isn't that an implicit suggestion that women's orgasms are weaker and less worthy of study than men and their "awesome" erections?
Shouldn't the 'feminist' bloggers of Broadsheet have also picked up that the omission of women from the study is actually pretty offensive to women?
Or, since I am a man, am I missing something necessary in order to fully comprehend this Broadsheet section?
Or, is the real problem that men are just not given enough encouragement to stay at home and take care of the house.
With all the time and effort spent to pave the way for women to have careers, I think everyone forgot that it is just as big a cultural shift for a man to stay at home with the kids. There remains an intense pressure for men to have successful careers. While it is certainly arguable that men have many more choices than women, it remains the case that the choice of staying home with the kids is almost never one of those options.
What depresses me is that when I have been in children's stores in Berkeley -- a town that considers itself totally progressive and smart -- that the gender stereotyping is almost worse than at Toys 'R Us. Almost without fail one side of the store is filled with rockets, firemen and cowboys, while the other side is all ballerinas, princesses and butterflies. Pottery Barn Kids is so offensive I have a hard time entering it. Almost all of the home-making toys -- kid kitchens, mops and vacuums -- are in garish pink colors and are only on the 'girly' side of the store.
And lets connect the dots here. This strict gender sterotyping that happens in the children's retail environment is TOTALLY related to the article from yesterday about how many women continue to quit their careers and stay at home to take care of the kids.
The Swedes have a solution called 16 month family leave ... with 80% pay. As in 1 year and 4 months of time out of the office during which you get to earn 80% of your salary and then you get to return to your job.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
