Happy Freedom of Speech Day!

O RLY?

"I love all animals. I have a fascination with fish, birds, whales - sentient life - insects, reptiles. I actually choose the way I eat according to the way animals have sex. I think fish are very dignified with sex. So are birds. But pigs, not so much. So I don't eat pig meat or things like that. I eat fish and fowl." 

- Nicolas Cage

I personally like how he threw 'sentient life' in there...

Bad Lines from Scripts

Introducing a new tag/section for my blog: WTFery, where I share with you the worst lines from some of the scripts I have to read. There are all real. Seriously.

And our inaugural line is...

Suddenly, Bradley relaxes and Rachel's mouth travels across his cheek and finds his mouth, like the celestial snail closing the great gate.

Getting a Handle on the Oil 'Spill'

Click to make bigger.  Original here.

Reporting Matters: Rape Culture

There has been a lot of fail going on when it comes to reporting sexual assault and rape. Newspapers seem to dislike using the word rape. They like to substitute 'had sex with.' As in:

"Police in New Jersey's capital say a 15-year-old sold her 7-year-old sister to have sex with as many as seven men and boys." "Have sex with" implies consent. It implies the ability to consent. Agency. Children cannot consent, they cannot 'have sex with.' Do not try and place me in collusion with a 7-year-old's rapist. And do not try and argue that "they didn't mean that, it was just poorly worded." Media outlets substitute rape with "had sex with" all the time. They also like to put rape in quotations too--this article's headline used to read 11-Year-Old Mexican 'Rape' Victim Wants to Keep Baby. Ignoring the byline, which states Despite pressure from women's groups, the 11-year-old is enthusiastic about her impending motherhood, according to sources, are we doubting that this girl was raped? Or is she a 10-year-old Jezebel who seduced her stepfather with her womanly wiles? What, Dear Major News Media Outlet, were you trying to say here?

A woman who was "vomiting and drifting in and out of consciousness" cannot have sex with anyone. And the boys who raped her never "put on condoms and took turns having sex with" anyone--they raped a woman. Who was dying of alcohol poisoning at the time. You read that correctly: two boys carried a woman with alcohol poisoning down some stairs, raped her, and then ran away when Mom came home. (For a full review of all the ways this particular article failed, I suggest reading This is Not an Analysis of Rape Culture. This is a Rant.)

There are so many examples of this kind of 'reporting' that it was hard to just pick a few. There are no small number of people incensed about this wording. And it's not just limited to Media Outlets trying to place agency for the rape on the victim.

Consider this question, posed by NPR's Frank de Ford:

At a certain point, don't you just stop caring whether our athletes - who for some reason or other are always called "role models" - don't you just stop caring whether they behave? Don't you just want to say, "Let the thugs play"?

OK, if they violate the statute law, fine, put them in the hoosegow. But really, otherwise, why are we expending so much angst worrying about the character of our well-muscled celebrities?

No, Mr. de Ford. I do not want to call a rapist a thug and just let him play. I want him in jail, behind bars, with a giant red R on his chest that will be with him in the same way his actions will be with the woman he raped. I want you to stop saying he didn't "behave." Rape is not the same thing as throwing a temper tantrum in the grocery story or trashing a hotel room. Also, this isn't about your NFL-star's 'character.' This is about his actions. He raped a woman. That's against the law. It's not a character assassination, and I do very much care whether anyone rapes another person. And I will continue to care--well-muscled or not. Celebrity or next door neighbor.

"Americans have trouble facing the truth, so they invent the kind of soft language to protect themselves from it, and it gets worse with every generation. For some reason, it keeps getting worse." -George Carlin