Ka Leo's Free Speech Forum

Earlier today, at UH-Manoa's Campus Center Executive Dining Room, the Ka Leo O Hawaii (the university's newspaper) sponsored a forum on free speech issues.

This was in response to last semester's controversy over the Ka Leo sponsored mural surrounding the renovated parts of Campus Center.

Well, one of the murals protested against the new telescope (sponsored by UH) on Mauna Kea. The Ka Leo staff covered up the written message on that mural! That obviously pissed off a lot of campus activists.

But that's not the only problem that Ka Leo O Hawaii had with the issue of free speech. I had a problem with the Ka Leo O Hawaii's editors when I submitted an opinions article arguing for the need to have the campus security armed. That article got rejected for being "too paranoid"

I blogged about those issues at http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2013/10/problems-at-ka-leo-again.html

 ===========================


The discussion panel included Jeff Portnoy (UH regent/lawyer/sportscaster), Gerald Kato (UH journalism professor) and Roger Fonseca (ACLU member).

The host was faculty advisor James Gonser. Also there was Ka Leo O Hawaii editor-in-chief Bianca Bystrom Pino.

Of course, the forum stated off with the controversy over the murals.

Jame Gonser showed a KITV news clip about the mural controversy.
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kctg2ZAIV44


Then the artists in the mural spoke up.

They were ANGRY about a UH staff member confronting them while they were painting the mural.  It was mentioned that it was a European-American male staff member who got in the face of a  Native Hawaiian female artist. So that brought up the racial and sexism issue.

They were ANGRY that the even though the forum was about their mural, that the artists themselves weren't invited on the discussion panel. 

They were ANGRY that the university was disrespecting the Native Hawaiian culture, mentioning the Mauna Kea telescope construction desecrating their land, and also mentioning past battles Ka Leo O Hawaii had with Native Hawaiian activists.

One of them said about the Ka Leo O Hawaii, that the newspaper's name is Hawaiian for The Voice of Hawaii but that they didn't respect the voices about UH students.

---

Then...........................................it was my turn to speak.

I stood up and  mentioned that around the same time the mural controversy was going on, I put up flyers around campus stating this

Ka Leo

Doesn’t just censor murals

They also censored an opinion article

expressing the need for armed campus security

The Editors refused to publish

saying it was too paranoid!

Their faculty advisor is a gun-phobic person

who says an armed campus security is “scary”

I think what’s even scarier is if an incident happen

and the campus security can’t do anything but wait for help

Read and judge for yourself!

Within that same flyer, I put the QR code and tiny url for my blog post  http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2013/10/problems-at-ka-leo-again.html

When I spoke, I was standing up, raise my arm up high with the flyer in my hand.

I told the audience I dont have extra copies (and apologized for that) but that they come to me after the forum so they can scan the QR code or copy the tiny url listed.

At that point, I was on a roll. In a very loud agitated voice, I mentioned what they flyer was about.

I mentioned that my article on having armed campus security was rejected because the editors said it was "too paranoid".

I mentioned that as being a case of the Ka Leo rejecting an article because it didn't conform to popular opinion. 

I emphasized that my article had citations to back up the facts mentioned in the story.  I emphasized that lower-level editor Doorae Shin already corrected whatever grammar mistakes were there. I emphasized that the article didn't slander anyone and wasn't written for the sake of offending anyone.

Then I went back to what one of the mural artists said about the Ka Leo O Hawaii editors,  stating that the editors are violating the spirit of the newspaper being the voice of the students at the University of Hawaii.

I also went back to the point Jeff Portnoy said earlier denouncing any act that censors a political opinion.

Then I emphasized again that the Ka Leo O Hawaii editors were being hypocritical in claiming for free speech but yet refused to publish an article expressing an unpopular opinion that goes against the lefty-pacifist viewpoint that is popular on campus.!

I said all of this in a loud, agitated, passionate voice!

---

While I was speaking, I could see some of the mural artist nodding in agreement with what I said.

While I was speaking, I could see the cameras pointed at me and flashing. I also saw a video camera pointing at me. ( a YouTube moment?)

----

Then I was done. James Gonser, the forum's host (and a person criticized on the flyer and my blog post) mentioned "he's referring to an article that he sent that didn't get published".

Then the Ka Leo O Hawaii's Editor-in-Chief (Bianca Bystrom Pino, whom I never met before) stating there was a meeting on my article with the editing team, and that claimed it wasn't rejected for political purposes, but that it needed revisions (which I didn't agree with and refused to make).

It was so obvious that Pino was lying when she stated that the article wasn't rejected for political purposes. It was so obvious that I felt I didn't even have to point it out the audience!  I pretty much trusted the audience to know Pino is practicing the usual cover-up tactics that we usually associate with corrupt politicians who got caught.

-----

Jeff Portnoy stated that university newspapers in general are in a bind, because they have more restrictions placed on them as compared to regular newspaper. 

Portnoy also stated that from a legal standpoint, university newspapers (or any newspaper) are not obligated to print anything that comes to them.

While Portnoy was correct from a legal standpoint, it is damn obvious that Ka Leo O Hawaii (um........The Voice of Hawaii) was violating the spirit of their name when they refused to print an opinion article because it was "too paranoid".

Then another panel member (I already forgot if it was Kato or Fonseca) responding to Portnoy's point about the bind the university newspapers are in. That panel member stated that being that Ka Leo O Hawaii is a part of a government agency, that they have to post various viewpoints, otherwise it would look like the government is endorsing one viewpoint over another. 

----

Afterwards, the discussion moved on to other topics. Hawaiian Studies professor Jon Osorio spoke about the mural controversy. Then Bianca Bystrom Pino showed a video about a Free Speech that was posted on campus where people could write whatever they wanted. (I only found out about the poster after the fact).

Then it was over.

-----

As for the reaction to my speech, a couple sitting in the back of me asked to look at my flyer. I showed them flyer, and one of them scanned the QR code. 

Afterwards, I talked to Sarah Yap, one of the UH Campus Center staff members who worked in the Student Activities office. I already had a previous discussion with her about my flyer and my conflict with the Ka Leo editors.  Yap said it was a good thing that I went to the forum and spoke up about this issue.

----------------

Last semester, I took a class on Intellectual Freedom. The campus mural controversy came up in that class on the day the controversy started.

I was still in the middle of deciding how shall I respond to the editor's rejection. With the mural controversy going on, I decided to refuse to conform to the editor's suggestion and posted the flyers around campus.

So, was I going to bring that topic up in the Intellectual Freedom class?  Then I thought "with those flyers all around campus, someone would bring up the topic in class. I'll let them bring up the topic first" . But nobody did!

Oh well!

Facebook's 1-decade anniversary.

Here is my facebook status update that I want to share on this blog

Congratulations to facebook for their 1 decade anniversary.
Facebook allowed me to reunite with people in my past and allow them to be a part of my future!

Facebook has broken down barriers in that it allowed me to get to know people that I only had a few interactions in person, and it allowed them to get to know who I really am!

Facebook also gave allowed us to share articles, music videos and photos with each other, giving us greater access to information out there.

I'll go as far as saying that Facebook is one of the greatest inventions that occurred in my lifetime. Thank you to the founders of Facebook. And more importantly thank you to everyone on my Facebook friends list, I really appreciate you all!

Check out my previous blog posts about facebook

"One year on facebook" which I wrote on June 2010, my 1-year anniversary of joining facebook
 http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2010/06/one-year-on-facebook.html

Now, my facebook list has 214 friends. These are people from various parts of my life, from elementary school, middle school, high school, college, a few work colleagues, and a few others I met in other phases of my life! You'd be surprised how easy it is to get that many people on your list. In fact, I know people who started facebook later than me, have more people than 214.

Having that many people on the list, and reading their updates on their lives has been very emotionally beneficial for me! Just being connected to them makes me feel good, even on days when I am feeling down. We can also share our joys in our triumphant moments, and we can also console each other in our greatest tragedies. Even if we live miles away and haven't seen each other in person since the previous millenium. I've seen so many of that happening in my 1st year of facebook, and will so more of it soon.

The most heart-warming part of using facebook was reconnecting with a few I haven't seen since elementary school. So much life happened since then, but we still remember each other! I'll always cherish that!

Also check out ................

 "My debate with a facebook hating uncle" (one of my shortest blog posts ever)
http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2011/05/my-debate-with-facebook-hating-uncle.html

"Facebook and Pop Culture is GREAT for the world!"

http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2011/07/facebook-and-pop-culture-is-great-for.html

music and cultural segregationists

Brittney Cooper is at it again!

Brittney Cooper is a black supremacist "professor" who writes for Salon.com, and I already mentioned here in an earlier blog post at http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2013/11/how-saloncom-lost-its-way.html

Salon.com

Brittney Cooper

(aka Disugsting Racist Prick)

(aka cultural segregationist)

Brittney Cooper is so upset that Macklemore won a Grammy award in which Kendrick Lamar was a nominee. 

Macklemore is of European-American, Kendrick Lamar is African-American.

That shouldn't matter to rational thinking person.

Brittney Cooper is NOT a rational thinking person! She is a racist punk who wants cultural apartheid! She thinks hip-hop should be "blacks only"! She is hostile to any European-American who is successful in hip-hop or any related genres (ie. R&B, reggae, etc)

You may say "why bother going after Cooper, she's nobody". Well, this "nobody" is a professor in women's studies and African-American studies at Rutgers University. In other words, New Jersey taxpayers are FORCED to pay her salary!

Also, she is given a forum in an extremely prominent news/editorial/arts/culture website Salon.com

In other words, she is given access to a very high-traffic website!

Well, if she got Freedom of Speech, so do I! 

Well, let's start analyzing Brittney Cooper's piece of racist trash!

 http://www.salon.com/2014/01/27/macklemores_useless_apology_grammys_and_the_myth_of_meritocracy/?source=newsletter 


Cooper: The Grammys have long been a source of disappointment because of the recording academy’s lackluster record of acknowledging the gifts and artistry of black musicians.

My response:What "lackluster record of acknowledging the gifts and artistry of black musicians"?  

Just because a white guy won an award that usually goes to African-Americans?

Let's look at the whole list of Grammy award winners this year

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/grammy-awards-2014-winners/2014/01/26/aa881be8-86da-11e3-916e-e01534b1e132_story.html

And here is some of them

Pharell

Jay-Z

Alicia Keys

Rihanna

Darius Rucker

Gregory Porter

Ben Harper 

Wayne Shorter
Terri Lyne Carrington

Tye Tribbett

 Tasha Cobbs

Ziggy Marley

Ladysmith Black Mambazo

Snarky Puppy With Lalah Hathaway

Gary Clarke, Jr

What do they all have in common (besides winning a Grammy this year?). All are of African ancestry!

Yet Brittney Cooper has the nerve to say the Grammy's have a "lackluster record of acknowledging the gifts and artistry of black musicians" ? STFU, Brittney Cooper!

Someone went on Twitter and mentioned that Pharell won 4 Grammy awards the same night Macklemore won. Here is the my screenshot of that Twitter exchange!

 

Twitter

(screenshot taken on 1/28/14)

Yep, Brittney Cooper who asked "Unclear how you pointing to one Black artist winning changes my analysis at all" shows the following

• this "professor" doesn't even know how to count
• this "professor" doesn't even know how to do a basic Google search (which was how I found out how the lesser-known award winners  look like)
• her "analysis" is NOT much of an "analysis" at all!

Kyle Robinson mentions some past Grammy award winners (ie. Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, etc) which totally disproves Brittney Cooper's nonsense about "recording academy’s lackluster record of acknowledging the gifts and artistry of black musicians"

 And other stats to prove Brittney Cooper's pile of BS

http://seattletimes.com/html/entertainment/2022756910_grammysbynumbers1xml.html 

But other musicians with Seattle roots have done way better. Ray Charles, who got his start on Jackson Street in the Emerald City in the late ’40s, was nominated after his death in 2004 for eight awards and won seven in one night. Over his career he nabbed 17 Grammys.

That’s nothing compared to Charles’ Jackson Street pal Quincy Jones, who has so far racked up 79 nominations — the most in history — and won 27 times.

The record for most Grammy nominations in one night goes to Michael Jackson, who got 12 nominations and won eight in 1984, a record for wins later tied by Santana and Charles.

(note: put the jokes about Jackson's skin color changes aside -- he is African-American)

And from Wikipedia's list of top Grammy award winners

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Award_records

 

Wikipedia

(screenshot taken 1/30/13)

Yet, Brittney Cooper has the nerve to say that the Grammy's have a " lackluster record of acknowledging the gifts and artistry of black musicians" just because a RARE European-American guy won an award for rap music?

-------------------

But the nonsense goes on from the same Cooper article I mentioned earlier.

http://www.salon.com/2014/01/27/macklemores_useless_apology_grammys_and_the_myth_of_meritocracy/

Cooper: The most egregious error of the night was seeing the brilliant Kendrick Lamar get totally shut out. Everyone knows he’s the best new artist.

My response: "Everybody knows ...."? 

AlexK

"Everybody knows"?  You know what everybody knows? Everybody knows they're sick of sore losers claiming "everyone knows the guy I wanted to win should have won."

The_Ox

"Everyone knows." Wow. Argument from omniscience. Logical fallacies 101.

Sorry, the second a writer relies on "everyone knows" to make their argument is the second I lose interest,.

Musical taste is subjective! None of this "everybody know this singer is better than the other" is something a  middle schooler would say!

---------

Cooper: Even Macklemore acknowledged that he “robbed Kendrick,” via a text message that he then sent out screenshots of via social media. However, Macklemore claimed that fear prevented him from taking a courageous stance and saying exactly that when he went up to accept his award.

My response: What the hell does Macklemore have to apologize for? His apology was just a simple message of condolence you will say to a friendly competitor!

It's like saying "even though my team won the game, I got no hard feelings towards you!"

It's called good sportsmanship, something Brittney Cooper can NEVER understand!

Cooper thinks Macklemore should give his trophy to a defeated opponent. So what next, the Super Bowl winner giving the trophy to the defeated opponent?

I think a message of condolence is enough!

-------

Cooper: Simultaneous to us witnessing this whitewashing and erasure of the black bodies and black artists who helped create the sound of folks like Macklemore, Justin Timberlake, Pink, Katy Perry and Robin Thicke, the Grammy’s force-fed us a lie of American progress

My response:  In other words, Brittney Cooper is upset that European-American artists are collaborating with African-American artists. 

Brittney Cooper is angry when European-American musicians get recognition in an African-American musical genre.

That is like being angry at a part-African, part-Asian guy who excells at a game started by the Scottish!

That is like being angry at two African-American sisters from Compton who excell at a game invented by the French! 
 

In other Brittney Cooper is a racist, segregationist piece of crap!


--------

Cooper: Macklemore is so popular in part because his music critiques gratuitous consumption and homophobia, both of which are figured to be problems endemic, not to American society, but to hip-hop culture in particular. Thus both he and Lorde scored big awards, he as best new artist, and her song of the year, because the view is that these white folks have come to a transnational consensus, that hip-hop culture is what ails us, and their critiques constitute a cure.

My response: So in other words, Brittney Cooper thinks that only African-Americans can criticize other African-Americans!

Look, I may be part-Latino, but I expect people from all races to NOT HESITATE to criticize any Latino who is promoting homophobia or elitist snobbery!

This was what Martin Luther King was talking about when he hoped his children would be "judged by the content of their character" . He NEVER said "dont judge my children", just to use the correct criteria when judging them.

Now, it is true there is a lot of homophobia in hip-hop! You expect Macklemore to be silent, just because he happens to be a different race from most rappers? Or did you just want Macklemore to perpetuate the same negative stereotypes of hip-hop that Eminem did a decade ago?

As for Lorde and her anti-materialist song "Royals", it was about materialism in pop culture in general!  Not just hip-hop.

But racist prick Brittney Cooper wants Lorde to just criticize only those materialist snobs of her own race? Screw that!

-------
Cooper : The problem is that their shit ain’t original.


My response: Who cares?

I mean nearly every R&B/pop/country/EDM song is either "I love you" or "I'm heartbroken". Where is the originality in that?

What is so original about another alternative/emo band singing about "life sucks"

Originality is over-rated anyways!

What matters to most music fans is the background music, the voice and the flow!



---------
Cooper: The progenitors and producers of hip-hop culture have had and have maintained a robust critique of the music and the culture since its earliest days.


My response:  Yeah, I remember when  Root's "What They Do" or Jeru Da Damaja "You're Playing Yourself" criticized the  pimp & playa lifestyle back in 1996. Those videos only got MTV airplay on "Yo! MTV Raps" on Friday nights.


How is it that Macklemore's and Lorde's fault? He was only 13 years old when that was going on?  Lorde was born that exact year!



-----------

Cooper:  In other words, black folks merely take up space, but they are not ever able to move forward in time in the American cultural imaginary. Thus it is the movement of black cultural aesthetics onto the bodies of white folks – Justin Timberlake, Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry, Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, and Robin Thicke — that reads as American racial progress. When black folks cry about appropriation or point out the ways in which we are being written out of the history of shit we entirely made possible, we are accused of being “stuck in the past,” unable to move forward in time.


My response: "Cultural Appropriation"? Excuse me?

This "cultural appropriation" nonsense is a bunch of crap saying "how dare white people use black people's music"?

But musical influences are NOT a one-way street.

Jazz was started with African-Americans using European instruments. Same with the blues. Similar thing going on with Jamaicans and their reggae music.

And hip-hop isn't just influenced by African-American music like soul, funk and disco

Much of early hip-hop was also influenced by Kraftwerk, a group of white German guys who are the pioneers of what later became techno and EDM.

Photograph: Michael Ochs Archives

Kraftwerk 

(major influence on hip-hop, techno, EDM) 

Just listen to Afrika Bambatta's "Planet Rock" and then listen to Kraftwerk's "Trans Europa Express"
(by the way, "Planet Rock" also used  Japanese culture by the chanting of Japanese numbers -- ichi, ni, san, shi)

Listen to Jay-Z (feat Foxy Brown and Babyface) "Sunshine" and then listen to Kraftwerk's "Man Machine".

Listen to Afro Rican "Give it All you got"  and JJ Fad's "Supersonic, then listen to Kraftwerk's "It's More Fun to Compute" 

Dr Dre listed Kraftwerk (along with Parliament Funkadelic) as major influences.
http://www.hiphopdx.com/index/news/id.11005/title.dr-dre-says-hes-listening-to-kraftwerk-parliament-funkadelic

Hard to argue with one of the biggest hip-hop legends, isn't that right?


So doesn't that make Brittney Cooper look like the stupid, racist loser that she is? Yes.





Also, look at Brittney Cooper's nickname

 

screenshot from Salon.com

Crunk is a hip-hop subgenre that started in Atlanta, Georgia!

But Brittney Cooper is NOT from Georgia, she is from Louisiana!

So who is practicing "cultural appopriation" now? So who is "stealing culture" from the people of Atlanta?

Racist prick Brittney Cooper is the answer.

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Cooper: The second lie is like unto the first – namely that white folks have received these awards because of meritorious performance rather than racial privilege. Meritocracy is a myth.


My response:  Hah! Macklemore benefits from "white privilege" just because he is an occasional "white" winner in a category which is usually awarded to African-Americans?


So what next, be mad at Darius Rucker for being an African-American guy who wins an award in a mostly European-American genre  called country music? And that happened the same exact award show!

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Cooper:
But white privilege is real. It creates space for folks like Macklemore to do “conscious” and “positive” hip-hop and become superstars, while completely ignoring the work or killing the careers of black artists who wish to do the same.
Macklemore emerges then as just another white savior figure come to redeem the pathologized black masses. The fact that he doesn’t want the mantle means nothing. Lest we forget, real Jesus didn’t want the mantle either. Perhaps Lorde is Mary, the mother of Jesus, in this sick morality play.


My response:  I already addressed  most of those stupid charges already, so
 I'll let another commenter take it from here

fauxcault

To Ms. Cooper:
You write, "In my humble estimation,  though, we have been Royally screwed. To riff on the work of the late great legal scholar Derrick Bell, the Lorde – no, not Audre — is here 'and we are not saved.'”
1) Nothing about this piece suggests that you've been humble.

2)  Audre Lorde is one of my favorite authors. You do her a disservice by evoking her name here. She was motivated as much by issues of class, gender and sexuality as she was by issues of race (she once described herself as “consciousness as a woman, a black lesbian feminist mother lover poet all I am”). To quote Henry Louis Gates, she "insisted that [all] those whom society has marginalized must communicate their experiences and render visible, however painfully, what society endeavors to keep invisible."
How do you think she'd react to you reducing Macklemore to his ethnicity? That should be the easy one (although I guess you'd just as easily find fault with his ally stance towards sexuality?). As for her namesake, she wrote a song, "Royals" which has already been attacked by other writers who have engaged in a weirdly reductive reading that limits it only to a critique of hip hop culture (and I thought we had squared that away months ago). A more convincing reading would point to its expression of class consciousness and its critique of materialism, period; the signifiers Lorde includes are hardly limited to hip hop these days, and hip hop is not monolithic--plenty of hip hop artists critique materialism, themselves. 
Your myopic presentism does them a disservice, as well, just as your myopic focus on race alone at the expense of sexuality and class does a disservice to what should be considered the joint struggles of others that are oppressed.

3) There's real racism out there. Hyperbolic outrage only fuels the fire of trolls who claim that all charges of racism are bogus (just look at some of the comments here) and it makes it harder to call on the public when genuine outrage, condemnation, and action are required.

---------------

But what disturbs me about Brittney Cooper is


1) she is given a forum at Salon.com, where she  poses as someone who speaks for all African-Americans. No she doesn't! Nobody voted for her to be the ethnic spokesperson!


2) She is not being aggressively criticized in the mainstream media because too many people are scared to death of her race cards!

Imagine if someone like Ann Coulter said something like what Brittney Cooper said? Nobody would hesitate to mock her on social media or the mainstream media!

But Cooper plays the guilt trip card as if her ancestor's oppression immunizes her from aggressive criticisms of her non-logic!

That stuff shouldn't fly!


Macklemore and Lorde will be probably take "the high road".  Britney Cooper probably knew that, so she starts fights with them, knowing they won't fight back. In other words, Brittney Cooper picks on easy targets

 If Brittney Cooper tries to start a verbal fight with Eminem, Eminem would  go into Slim Shady mode and win big time!  Dr Dre and 50 Cent would probably join in, and humiliate the living crap of Brittney Cooper!




3) And most importantly, I'm a strong believer in cultural integration!

Music is for everyone. We should all have the right to enjoy (and even make hits) from all musical genres, regardless of race!

Dont let anyone tell you "hip-hop is for black people only" or "country music is for white people only" or "mariachi is for Mexicans only"Screw all that!


WORLDWIDE CULTURAL INTEGRATION FOREVER!

The psychological danger of Radical Feminism towards little girls

No, I am NOT some Taliban person, NOR am I one of those fundamentalist religious fanatics who want "girls to be super-feminine or boys to be super-masculine".

As I mentioned in earlier articles, I think its dangerous to expect all boys to fit a mega-macho stereotype.
http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2014/01/locker-room-manhood-and-bullying.html
http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2013/11/what-is-be-man-supposed-to-mean.html

And I think it's dangerous to expect all girls to fit a mega-feminine stereotype.

But what if your daughter wants pink shoes and have princess dolls?

For the average parent, the answer is easy --- if you can afford it, buy it! The children want toys to enhance their pretending to be fictional characters. It's a NORMAL part of childhood!


But the Radical Feminists have a different reaction to such innocent requests from preschool girls!

You think I'm kidding?

Look what I found on Salon.com

"My Problem with Pink" by Emily McNally
http://www.salon.com/2014/02/02/my_problem_with_pink/

I took my 3-year-old daughters shoe shopping recently. One of my daughters chooses a cute navy pair that fit her narrow feet, but my other daughter wants something glitzier. I try to steer her away from those awful, overpriced shoes with garish pictures of Disney princesses on them, but she still manages to find the girliest, sparkliest shoes she can find. They are Barbie pink, coated with silver sequins. Lights flash when her little feet hit the ground.

I start back-pedaling. “How about these purple ones?” I ask her. They have sequins too, but in comparison, they now look practically demure.

“I love these,” Eva says gravely, looking down at her feet. Eva is a sweet-natured girl, not inclined to make a fuss, and I use it to my advantage in this moment.

“Babe, those don’t look comfortable. Let’s look around.” We leave the store without any shoes for her and a promise to come back if we don’t find anything else. But walking down the street holding my daughters’ hands, I begin to doubt myself. The problem with those shoes isn’t my daughter’s discomfort — it’s mine. What is going on? Why am I making such a big deal about such a little purchase?

and more

Yet, even with all this open-mindedness, I am virulently opposed to princess culture. I try not to judge other parents, but when I see a little girl in a tiara and puffy dress on the playground, part of me wants to thrust “Cinderella Ate My Daughter” at her parents. I want to ask them if they worry about the ramifications of allowing their child to worship a culture that teaches them girls are for looking pretty and rescuing.

Give me a effin break already!


Nearly every boy my age wanted to be a GI Joe or  a Ninja Turtle or a pro-wrestling!

Pretending to be fictional characters is what kids do!

That's a phase they naturally grow out of, without stupid this  "living in theory" nonsense that passes for "enlightenment" by Radical Feminists and other phony liberators!

As boys my age got older, they listened to songs like "F--- the Police" or "Cop Killer". How many of those kids killed a cop?  Probably more of them became actual cops!

It' just entertainment, but people take entertainment way too seriously!

Now back to the Radical Feminist author

Another uncomfortable thought occurs to me. If I had a little boy who wanted to wear dresses, or only wear pink, I would make sure I nurtured that. I would stare down anyone who judged. I would be comfortable defending his right to wear whatever made him feel like himself, whatever made him happy. But Eva can’t have pink, light-up shoes? What gives?

In other words, the Radical Feminists are like the Taliban in reverse! Whereas the Taliban (and other conservative fanatics) want all boys to be super-masculine and all girls to be super-feminine, the Radical Feminist refuse to be tolerant of masculine boys or feminine girls!

For this I consider the Radical Feminists as dangerous to children's psychology as the Taliban.

It makes sense that I want to protect my daughter from a culture that will idealize her beauty and trivialize the rest of her. But doing that by not allowing her to wear pink, light-up shoes? It sounds stupid to me, too. What I realize is that I am denying Eva something she wants, something that it is easy for me to give, because I am afraid of a lot of things that are out of my control.

Children do not come to us as blank slates. They are already packed with all kinds of complexity. Their identities are revealed to us in facets all the time, with so much intricacy the mind boggles. Eva loves soccer, Daniel Tiger, and tutus. She wants to be a builder, a policeman, and a bunny baby sitter when she grows up. She is cautious, but extremely coordinated. She is sensitive, but resilient. She has a fantastic sense of humor, but if you hurt her feelings she draws herself up like a queen, haughty and dignified. Our life together will be a series of revelations. I will not like all of them, but it’s not my business to. My job is not to turn her into who I think she should be, my job is to nurture who she already is, to help her become more fully herself.

Now, here's the climax to the author's essay!

Back out on the busy sidewalk, I turn to her. “Eva, do you still want those shoes in the shop?”
“Yes!” She answers immediately. We go get them. She wears them out of the store. When we get home, the babysitter is there. Eva runs to show off her new shoes. “Look Ana, I got these shoes. Mommy says they’re not her favorite, but I can have them anyway.” The touch of regret in her voice breaks my heart.

You see that............. this is why I consider Radical Feminism (and their jihad against "princess toys" and "pink clothes") as psychologically dangerous to little girls!

How is this different from locker room cultures that stigmatizes boys who refuse to act like Richie Incognito?
How is this different from the Taliban who stigmatizes boys who refuse to be ultra-masculine relgious fanatic terrorists?
How is this different from ultra-conservatives who stigmatizes their daughters who might have lesbian tendencies!

That article is proof that Radical Feminists stigmatizes little girls who have an ultra-feminine personality!


Sure, the Radical Feminists may not have as many supporters like the ultra-conservative evangelical groups or the ultra-conservative Islamic groups have!

But Radical Feminism is still dangerous to anyone (even little girls) who get in the way of their extremist agenda!


I'll let the author continue here

Before I leave them for the afternoon, I want to say something to her. Something about the shoes, something about what I was thinking. What I really want to tell her is this: I love you like a crazy person. You could burn the house down, crash the car, get pregnant at 16, and I would still cheerfully lay down my life for you. But the problem with being a parent is mostly you don’t get to make grand gestures, and sometimes it’s easy to get stuck in this binary system of yeses and nos. Sometimes it seems like there are mostly nos. No you can’t do that, eat that, play with that. It’s not polite, organic, it has lead. And on and on. And sometimes mommy is an idiot and she forgets that it’s not your job to prove her right, or be the living example of some parenting philosophy. Because, really, you are perfect right now, and my job is to not mess that up. But that is way too much information for a 3-year-old, so what I say is, “Eva, I love your shoes. They’re great. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you the first time.”

You see, the author is learning the extreme danger of Radical Feminist ideology!

Look, I  understand why Radical Feminism appeals to some women. Some women grow up with abusive environments. Many women have legit anger towards the world around them. Radical Feminism appeal to their anger, and their leaders/activists fill their heads with supposedly "great" ideas.

It's not much different from how gangs, cults, racial supremacists and terrorist groups recruit angry boys from abusive environments. Those groups appeal to the anger of teen boys and young men, and their leaders/activists  fill their heads with supposedly "great" ideas.

Those "great ideas" make give the angry youth some "purpose" in life, but they are all emotion, no logic! Their ideology doesn't stand up to scrutiny when it's compared to logic related to how things are in the real world.

The author recognizes the errors of taking Radical Feminist ideology too far!

But how many little girls will continue to suffer, all because some crazed Radical Feminist ideology.

And how many of us will remain silent out of fear of being called a "sexist" and  "misogynist"?

Coming soon

Black supremacist Brittney Cooper is pissed off that Macklemore won a Grammy!  She claims it's "white privillege".

Read her piece of garbage here.
http://www.salon.com/2014/01/27/macklemores_useless_apology_grammys_and_the_myth_of_meritocracy/?source=newsletter

I started my response, I'll get it up as soon as I'm done!

Super Bowl and a "sign of the times"

The upcoming Super Bowl will feature the Denver Broncos and  Seattle Seahawks.
Here is my facebook message on it.

First off: I have never smoked anything in my life!

But still, I think the Super Bowl teams (Denver vs Seattle) is a sign that our nation must follow the lead of Colorado and Washington (the state) and end the bans on adults using marijuana!

With all the drunken ruckus that goes on, the police have more important things to do than to arrest a bunch of consenting adults smoking pot.

Again, this is NOT an endorsement of "smoking weed", just a statement that the government need to stop micro-managing people lives and STOP using police force to abuse those who refuse to conform to "moralistic norms".

Will Obama take the hint?  Only time will tell! 

Blackberry's response to competition

In an earlier blog post, I mentioned about finallly getting a smartphone last year. I mentioned that I got a BlackBerry Q10 because it allows users to type on a QWERTY keyboard while still allowing us to slide our fingers on a touchscreen.
 http://pablowegesend.blogspot.com/2013/10/adventures-on-my-new-smartphone.html

Blackberry.com

BlackBerry Q10

I was wondering why the competitors (ie. Apple's iPhone, Samsung Galaxy) didn't have a version that has allows users to type using buttons?

I mean, I  hate   typing on touchscreens because they are either

• too finger sensitive

OR

•  requires a hard press on the screen.

My oldest brother ( I got 2 of them) is the tech guy in a family of non-techies. I had a brief conversation about the BlackBerry and I mentioned that I liked the Q10 (because it has buttons), and the BlackBerry had a crappy marketing strategy (more on that later) and my oldest brother said "nobody wants to press buttons anymore" and said "BlackBerry will go out of business soon"

I was ready to get all defensive, but someone came up to him  and distracted him with an unrelated topic.  So much for getting the verbal upper hand. 



And yet I wonder, why hasn't the iPhone or the Galaxy have a QWERTY keyboard option.


Well, one company had a solution to that dilemma

http://reason.com/archives/2014/01/16/blackberry-sues-the-competition

Consider the Typo Keyboard Case, which is supposed to start shipping to consumers this month. The idea behind the device is simple. Right now, people who prefer a smartphone with a physical keyboard basically have just one option, the BlackBerry.

If you like real keyboards but prefer the iPhone's operating system, you have to either put up with the BlackBerry's software or put up with the iPhone's virtual keyboard; no phone-maker offers a product that combines the best of both worlds.

The Typo fills that gap. It's a case that lets you slip a keypad over an iPhone and type the way the QWERTY gods intended, without a flat touchscreen that makes errors inevitable and without an algorithm that "corrects" words that weren't errors in the first place.

Typo's co-founder - Ryan Seacrest (yep, the American Idol host) was interviewed by CNN

 When a CNN correspondent discussed the device with Typo co-founder Ryan Seacrest—yes, the American Idol host—the reporter suggested that the product gives users "the best thing about a BlackBerry, within the iPhone." Seacrest replied, "That's kind of how this came to fruition." Many press accounts have noted how much the Typo keyboard looks and feels like a BlackBerry keyboard; the phrase "BlackBerry clone" comes up a lot.

 So what does BlackBerry do about that? They sued Typo over "patent violations"!

 Enter BlackBerry's lawyers. In a suit filed January 3, the company charged the upstart with violating three of BlackBerry's patents and its trade dress. (A trade dress is a set of distinctive visual characteristics that reveal what company made a product—the shape of a glass Coca-Cola bottle, for example. They are legally protected in order to prevent customer confusion, so the premise here is that people might mistake the Typo for a BlackBerry product, even though it does not bear the BlackBerry logo and even though BlackBerry is not in the business of making cases for iPhones.) In addition to asking the courts to block sales of the Typo, BlackBerry is seeking triple damages.

 One of the commenters to article suggested the following

R C Dean|1.16.14 @ 4:50PM|#

Last serial post:
The smart play for Blackberry here would, of course, have been to buy out the Typo case and make it their own. Would have been faster and might have actually turned into a real revenue stream for them.

and this

JPyrate|1.16.14 @ 8:47PM|#

You know I have to wonder. Did BlackBerry even try to approach Typo with a deal, or did they just go straight to the lawyers ? This could have been a big advertising win for them. Blackberry could have cut a deal and put out a PR piece about how they support innovation in small start up companies, or hired someone to write a hit piece telling consumers that their competitors design is so bad someone had to come along and make it like a BlackBerry.

The sad thing is this -- if the BlackBerry had a REAL marketing campaign for their Q10 phone, they wouldn't need to resort to this!

I sincerely believe that had BlackBerry put an effective ad for their Q10 phone during last year's Super Bowl , that it would've

• 1) tell everyone "we're back"

• 2) made the Q10 phone highly competitive (and even equal in popularity) versus the i-phone and the Galaxy.

 They could've made a funny ad showing people's frustration with typing on a touchscreen and then showed the Q10 as a solution

(BlackBerry also has the Z10 that is all touchscreen, so they could've presented that as an option for touchscreen fans too)

 But they didn't have an effective marketing campaign and many people still remain ignorant of the Q10 option. And if people don't know of your great products, well ............. they can't buy what they don't know exists.

They think that just making good products is enough. They don't understand that you got to make your products trendy in order to get people to buy in to it, and that you need a real marketing strategy to do so!

But now, BlackBerry is in the news for suing the competition, and it will only remind the public about BlackBerry being a "company in trouble" instead of a company that actually made improvements in their smartphones!


Because I do like my Q10 phone, I hate to see BlackBerry go down. But if the company can't get it's act together and receives negative PR (which makes it harder to market their product), then things will only get worse.

As for me, I just hope that smartphones with a QWERTY keyboard doesn't go extinct!