Weaving
wrapping
touching
kissing

without words
I am surrounded
with misunderstanding

thinking I know
unspoken language
expectations
unfilled

questions
unanswered

confusion and frustration
at what should
be known
but is not

out of your head
into your body
the answer resides

but not in my body
only in my head

wishing you could
answer the unanswerable
I push and prod
for meaning
delivering nothing
I reject

alcohol is not spirituality
inebriation not excuse
for trespass
my receptivity is not
understanding
your vagueness is not honesty

what you think I know
I do not know
what you mean I do not understand
what you intend
exist only in your head
if you can't explain it
don't cross my boundary
don't enter my space

I am mind
among bodies
understand
that

the dance is an ocean
a sea of emotions
shared
sought
discovered
imposed
the ocean of dance has possibilities
for sharing
connecting
for what is mutual
or what is not
the not
the uninvited intrusion
the unwelcome advance
the unexpected psychic cord
inserted
what is the difference between the sharing
and the cording
mutuality
agreement
respect
sharing

invasions
impositions
violations
cords

we can feel the difference
others may not

Where do you feel the music
the beat of bass
the percussion of sound
does it move up your leg
does it resonate between your hips
a grind of sound?

Or when you feel the music
is it an ocean
holding you in its embrace
surrounding you and your senses
disappearing

When the music and I are one
I disappear
and when you move with the music
I feel you
inside
the beat

as if we are one
not separate beings
but one being
in a sea of emotion
in an ocean of feeling
shared

Between I and thou
not our creation
not in our control
what is between us
what is beyond us
was not of our making
but
we have the power
to deny or affirm
to ignore or pay attention
to consider
consequence

between I and thou
mystical
and
ineffable
unknowable

it is rare
and exceptional
an exception
to the rule

I feel it
between
near and far
bumping up against
the edge of my being

what is to be done with this
how to respond

chosen at random
against our will
so great that gulf between
our worlds
so great the time
of our experience

fate intervenes
for what purpose
with what in mind

express
repress
pretend

without substance
it clings
pulling
and pushing

a mind of its own

Feminism Keeps My Marriage Together
By Christie Church, Girlistic Magazine
Posted on March 26, 2008, Printed on March 26, 2008
www.alternet.org/story/80417/
When it comes to heterosexual marriage, feminism gets blamed for everything from the divorce rate to declining birth rates, or even in the case of Ted Haggard, meth addiction and secret gay affairs. Feminism is, after all, the movement that teaches women to leave husbands, kill children, and become capitalist-destroyin', witchcraft lovin' lesbians (thanks Pat Robertson!). But on the eve of our second anniversary, my husband and I credit feminism with keeping our marriage together.
Many second-wave feminists argue that no matter how many gains feminism makes, it should never cease to be taught, because the younger generations will be stunned powerless in the face of unexpected sexism without having feminist education to help put that sexism into context. Thanks to my marriage, I know this to be true. Patrick and I considered ourselves equal partners, but not necessarily feminists. One night while folding laundry, we, two equal partners decided to get married.
We got engaged for all the reasons that very young 20-somethings do -- we wanted a public declaration of commitment, we hoped we would be together forever, we were straight and it never occurred to us to do anything else, and we were a little bit crazy. From that moment on, sexism smacked us in the face at every turn.
We didn't want an engagement ring, as we felt it was a one-sided gesture based on a tradition involving the man proving his financial worth to the woman he would take care of. We did, however, buy each other some badass high-top sneakers. At first were thrilled. We were counterculture. But I became less thrilled when the same script played out with nearly every person I knew.

"You're engaged? Congratulations! Where's the ring?"

"Oh, we didn't want one."

"You poor thing. He'll buy you one soon."

"No, I didn't want one. We bought each other these rad sneakers, though. We thought it would be more equal. I wanted him to have something too."

"Well, he'll come around. How did he propose?"

"He didn't. We just had a discussion. That's really our style."

"He didn't get on one knee or plan a big surprise?"
"Nope. Hey, don't you know us? I hate surprises and he sucks at keeping secrets. And I've never really appreciated the knee thing."

"Oh, honey. You really shouldn't settle for this. I'm sure he'll buy you a nice diamond if you just drop some hints. You deserve better that this."

This what? This equality?
The overwhelming majority of romantic traditions are deeply rooted in sexism and any deviation from those traditions left me pitied and questioning my own value. Sure Patrick and I thought that sexist traditions were stupid, but if he didn't offer me sexist traditions, how else could he show me that he really did love me? What else was there? I had always known that I wanted to keep my name if I got married, but suddenly I was pretty pissed that Patrick was OK with this. "Why aren't you upset that I won't share your name? Why doesn't this bother you like everyone keeps telling me it will? Oh my god, you don't want to marry me, do you? If you wanted to marry me, you'd be insisting that I keep your name! Everyone told me so!"
We had a lot of confusing, bitter arguments. Patrick couldn't understand why we couldn't just make decisions in a vacuum. Surely if he and I wanted things one way, then all the other ways shouldn't matter. I couldn't understand why there was so much dissonance between what we wanted and what family, friends, magazines, and seemingly the rest of the country told me to expect -- and why it all made me feel awful. I felt guilty for letting Patrick do most of the wedding planning, even though he loved designing invitations, buying decorations and all the other artsy aspects that bored me silly. I felt guilty for not having an aisle.
I felt guilty for not stressing out enough over the wedding itself; I simply didn't do anything that I didn't want to, and it seemed to close me off to bonding with other women who were always asking if I was "going crazy yet" (I was, but it had nothing to do with reception menus). I felt guilty for making decisions, because someone was bound to say, "Hey, look out for Bridezilla!" I felt guilty just for buying a wedding band after the jeweler saw us walk into the shop and said to Patrick, "Poor guy. I know this is the last place you want to be right now. Well, let's make her happy and then you can leave."
Looking back, it's a wonder we even got married. I wish that I had the language of feminism back then, to understand how we are all socialized to see marriage as a woman's prize for being appropriately attractive and wily, and how men are offered no part in it except as reluctant, defeated lumps following behind. But the wedding was just the beginning.
As a wife, thanks to popular culture, well-meaning friends and family, and generations of sexist baggage, I was convinced that I had to be constantly capable. Growing up in my family, the women handled all the cooking, cleaning, event planning and what we call "friend maintenance" (making plans, returning calls, sending cards, etc.). The men didn't dare handle any of that because everyone knew they would fuck it up.
If television has taught us anything, it's that men in the kitchen produce inedible meals and explosions. Men with mops will ignore piles of visible dirt. Best to leave the details to women, who are innately suited to the more mind-numbing elements of daily life. I tried to do it all, plus pet care, paying the bills on schedule, and keeping track of birthdays and big events in both our families.
The more I controlled Patrick's life as well as mine, the better I convinced myself I was at marriage -- and the culture at large reinforced that. Sometimes I told myself that it was better this way, because if we tried to split chores 50-50, then Patrick wouldn't do things as well as I did. But I was kidding myself. Patrick was a great cook and an OK housekeeper. If we would abandon the idea that men don't or can't clean, he would learn to do things well, just as I had learned them.
Marilyn French once said that with feminism, "it always comes down to the damn dishes." In my house, it came down to sex. I wanted it constantly. He didn't. When the tables are turned and a woman has a lower drive, it's natural. It's expected. When a woman wants more sex and isn't getting it, then something is badly wrong. She must be gaining weight. She must be ugly. Because as we all know, men are simply walking penises who want sex all the time. A woman who can't convince him to have it with her must be doing something wrong. Or there's a deeper issue at heart, as a friend said when I complained to her that our drives just weren't synching up. "Do you think he could be gay?" she asked, quite seriously. At this time, we were having sex about twice a week. "Still," my friend said. "What kind of a man turns down sex?"
For me, that's when things began to change. What kind of a man was Patrick, to be an independent, thinking, feeling, capable person, when everything in the world was giving him marching orders to be something completely different? What kind of woman was I to do the same? We always had been individuals who valued equality, but we were gradually beginning to see the impact and influence of sexism on our lives. We didn't live in a vacuum, and we never could. The day we began to acknowledge sexism, instead of pretending that it didn't exist, was the day we started to treat each other like adults.
Patrick has taught me a lot about feminism by being my husband. I've learned that patriarchy hurts men, too. While I was feeling guilty for anything and everything I did, he was beating himself up over his salary and benefits, his lower sex drive, and his own struggles with anxiety and lack of confidence -- emotions that men aren't supposed to have, much less express to their partners. He was chafing under the idea that he wasn't smart enough to manage his own daily life, and he was insulted by the implication that he was so governed by his penis that he would cede all control to it at the prospect of sex.
Just as sexism tells women that they must fit a very narrow mold, it tells men the same thing. Any attempt to simply be yourself is met with derision and disapproval, even from supposedly equal partners who expect you to act as they've been told "all" men do. Intimacy just isn't possible under patriarchy. You don't see your partner or even yourself as a real person, but instead you see through the lens of gender expectations, through which deviation is confusing at best and threatening at worst. You suppress every scary impulse -- whether nonmonogamy, demanding equal effort on chores or relationship issues, or simply slumming it all weekend -- lest you upset the security of living under those expectations. Maybe that works for some people. But at 23 and 25, we hope to have a lot of years of marriage ahead, and we'd rather just relax and be real. There is enormous security that comes from knowing that your partner respects you enough to handle what you dish out, and vice versa.
These days, we're both feminists. In feminism, we've found a language to describe the challenges inherent to being multifaceted, complex people in a society that reduces us to pink and blue, and we've found alternatives to buying into that society. Being heterosexual has afforded us many privileges, but it also has allowed us plenty of opportunities to challenge assumptions about what heterosexual marriage should be. This summer, I'll be enrolling in full-time law school while Patrick takes over all of the household responsibilities. Eventually, Patrick would like to take some time off work to focus on writing. We've even discussed living apart for travel and internship opportunities.
Whatever we do, I'm confident that it won't be motivated by the guilt that drove the early part of our relationship. While our marriage may not look like the ones we knew growing up, it works for us. We married a friend, but we got an ally.

© 2008 Girlistic Magazine All rights reserved.
View this story online at: www.alternet.org/story/80417/

Opposition to Sadam was called terrorism when the Kurds did it
then we did it
and it was called liberation
freedom fighting
spreading democracy...

READ Third Paragraph!





Stalwart Service for U.S. in Iraq Is Not Enough to Gain Green Card

By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, March 23, 2008; A01

During his nearly four years as a translator for U.S. forces in Iraq, Saman Kareem Ahmad was known for his bravery and hard work. "Sam put his life on the line with, and for, Coalition Forces on a daily basis," wrote Marine Capt. Trent A. Gibson.

Gibson's letter was part of a thick file of support -- including commendations from the secretary of the Navy and from then-Maj. Gen. David H. Petraeus -- that helped Ahmad migrate to the United States in 2006, among an initial group of 50 Iraqi and Afghan translators admitted under a special visa program.

Last month, however, the U.S. government turned down Ahmad's application for permanent residence, known as a green card. His offense: Ahmad had once been part of the Kurdish Democratic Party, which U.S. immigration officials deemed an "undesignated terrorist organization" for having sought to overthrow former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

Ahmad, a Kurd, once served in the KDP's military force, which is part of the new Iraqi army. A U.S. ally, the KDP is now part of the elected government of the Kurdish region and holds seats in the Iraqi parliament. After consulting public Web sites, however, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services determined that KDP forces "conducted full-scale armed attacks and helped incite rebellions against Hussein's regime, most notably during the Iran-Iraq war, Operation Desert Storm and Operation Iraqi Freedom."

Ahmad's association with a group that had attempted to overthrow a government -- even as an ally in U.S.-led wars against Hussein -- rendered him "inadmissible," the agency concluded in a three-page letter dated Feb. 26.

In an interview Friday at Quantico Marine Corps Base, where he teaches Arabic language and culture to Marines deploying to Iraq, Ahmad's voice quavered, and his usually precise English failed him. "I am shamed," he said. He has put off his plans to marry a seamstress who tailors Marine uniforms. "I don't want my family live in America; they feel ashamed I'm with a terrorist group. I want them to be proud for what I did for the United States Marine Corps," said Ahmad, 38.

"After I receive this letter, it's been three weeks, since then my whole life turns upside down. You might hear from the lawyer, they're not going to revoke your [visa], but how can you guarantee this? . . . I'm expecting, they stop the process of green card, tomorrow they're going to tell you to get out."

A nearly identical denial was sent the same day to another Iraqi Kurdish translator living in this country, according to Thomas Ragland, a lawyer with Maggio and Kattar, the Washington law firm representing both men in court challenges to the denials. The second translator, who worked with U.S. intelligence and Special Forces in Iraq starting several years before the U.S. invasion, declined to discuss his case out of fear for his family in Iraq.

Petraeus, now the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said in an e-mail that he did not recall Ahmad personally but that KDP forces had performed valuable security services for the 101st Airborne Division he led in the northern city of Mosul in 2003. He said he had never heard of any U.S. agency labeling the KDP as terrorists.

Many of the thousands of Iraqis who have served as linguists for U.S. forces have been threatened in Iraq. Ahmad left the country after he was branded a "collaborator" from mosque pulpits in Anbar province and posters calling for his death began appearing there.

Under congressional pressure to allow such translators into the United States, the Bush administration in 2006 authorized 50 visas for them annually. That number was increased to 500 in fiscal 2008, and the quota will revert to 50 a year in fiscal 2009. In announcing the program, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) emphasized that it allows translators "to gain admission to the United States, apply for permanent residency and eventually acquire U.S. citizenship."

According to Petraeus's command, 648 of the 5,300 Iraqi translators now working for U.S. forces in Iraq had special-visa applications pending as of December. Petraeus has assigned legal officers to facilitate their petitions, helping gather the documents, signatures and military affidavits required, and said he has signed many letters urging individual approvals. The program's Special Immigrant Visa allows only entry into the United States, however, and immigrants are advised to petition for permanent residence upon arrival.

Retired Marine Capt. Jason P. Schauble, who returned from Iraq in 2004 after being wounded, is Ahmad's official sponsor. In a letter he appended last week to Ahmad's immigration file, Schauble condemned whatever "faceless bureaucracy" rejected the application. "I don't know what a foreigner has to do that is greater than what Saman Ahmad has done in service to his American allies," Schauble wrote.

USCIS spokesman Peter Vietti said regulations prevent him from commenting on any specific case, adding that denials can be appealed only in court. After inquires about Ahmad from The Washington Post, he said, "I can tell you the matter is being looked into."

The second youngest of five children, Ahmad was away at college when Saddam Hussein, striking at rebellious Kurds, launched a chemical gas attack against Ahmad's home town, Halabja, in 1988. The infamous assault, in which more than 5,000 died, was often cited by the Bush administration as part of its justification for invading Iraq. It left Ahmad without a single living relative, as he has recounted to Americans many times over the past six years.

After graduation from Salahadeen University in Irbil, Ahmad was conscripted into Hussein's army, served his time and then held various jobs. He turned to smuggling and spent a period in jail, then fled to Turkey. He worked as a hotel dishwasher in Istanbul. When he decided to return home in December 2001, he turned himself in to Turkish police as an illegal immigrant and was deported.

At the time, KDP forces were fighting both Hussein and a rival Kurdish party. Ahmad joined the KDP militia. "I don't have any resources, I don't own a penny. I want to eat," he recalled. In his area of Kurdistan at the time, "even you cannot clean up street if you do not become part of that group."

By early 2003, U.S. Special Forces in the region were working to unify the Kurds as allies in the invasion of Iraq. Ahmad, the only English-speaker in his KDP unit, became a translator and liaison. After Petraeus's arrival in Mosul, Ahmad's offer to work full time for the Americans was turned down on grounds it would anger his KDP commander, he said.

He deserted the KDP military and decided to try his luck at U.S. headquarters in Baghdad, taking with him the commendation for his "outstanding service and dedication to the 101st" signed by Petraeus on Sept. 11, 2003.

In Baghdad, Ahmad became a Marine translator and was sent to Anbar. In an affidavit, Gibson -- now a major -- said Ahmad was the first translator in Iraq to wear a Marine uniform, body armor and helmet, and "the first one to be entrusted with a weapon." Ahmad accompanied Gibson's Kilo Company on more than 200 patrols over seven months in violent areas of western Iraq. "I simply could not have accomplished my mission without Sam's tireless and unconditional efforts," Gibson wrote.

But threats against Ahmad's life by anti-coalition forces led the Marines to decide to get him out of Iraq. Schauble shepherded his visa application and met him at John F. Kennedy International Airport on arrival.

A USCIS "Fact Sheet" on special translator visas notes that applicants must be "otherwise admissible to the United States for permanent residence," so Ahmad and Schauble foresaw little problem in his obtaining a green card. To buttress his case, Ahmad successfully applied for political asylum once he reached the United States.

In 2006, he began applying for permanent residence -- submitting the same documents that had won him a visa and asylum -- and finished the process last August.

In the meantime, he continued working for the Marines at the Quantico-based Center for Advanced Operational Culture Learning, established in 2005 when the corps realized that its lack of knowledge and understanding of Iraq was undermining its mission.

Ahmad spends much of his time being flown by Marines to training bases around the country to provide rudimentary Arabic and cultural pointers. The maximum language training is 40 hours, which he said is too little. "But at least you can teach him to say a tactical word, how to survive," how not to shoot "a guy who didn't stop" at a checkpoint. Those on their second or third tours have more complicated queries, he said. "They say: okay, we're going to go there and it's Ramadan time, what is 'no'? What is 'do this -- don't do this'? What do I tell my Marines?"

According to Human Rights First, a nonprofit that handles similar immigration cases, groups such as the KDP do not appear on U.S. government lists of designated terrorists. Instead, determinations of "undesignated terrorist organizations" are made, case by case, by the USCIS, part of the Department of Homeland Security.

Using definitions in the Immigration and Nationality Act, the USA Patriot Act and other legislation adopted after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, it is up to USCIS officials to research an applicant's background and make a decision. According to Ahmad's denial letter, the information in his case was obtained from the Web site of the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, a DHS-funded nonprofit group.

The legislation contains waiver provisions -- by the secretary of state for foreign petitioners, and the secretary of homeland security for those who, like Ahmad, are already in this country. But there is no path for a denied individual to apply for a waiver.

In a velvet box in his desk drawer at Quantico, Ahmad keeps two medals he received for his service in Iraq -- the Navy-Marine Corps Achievement Medal and the War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal. Above his computer, he has a snapshot of President Bush. He was a guest at the White House last year when Bush presented a posthumous Medal of Honor to a Marine for actions in an Anbar mission in which Ahmad participated.

Ahmad remains in this country under his special visa and asylum status, but neither one has the permanence of a green card. Under U.S. law, those granted asylum can be sent back to their country if the secretary of state determines that it is at peace and that the danger to the person has subsided.

Ahmad said he would like to return to Iraq, but only "as a Marine." He has no family there, he said, but "I have the greatest, biggest family in America. I have the USMC."

Dance, is it a means or an end?

When you go out dancing what are you doing? Are you going out to dance or are you going out to find someone to be with ( to "be with" may be for the night or for a relationship)?

How we view other dancers is often the consequence of our own agenda when we dance. Most people it seems are dancing not in the cultural tradition that almost all cultures experience of celebration of the life of the community, but instead as a means to establish an exclusive relationship, at least for one night, with one person. The conventions of our individualistic culture is that the dance floor is a meet/meat market where those looking find other also looking. The dance thus becomes one means to an end. Once the end is achieved, the " dance" is no longer needed and the relationship retreats into the domestic bliss of coupledom.

Because our culture places a high value on couples and domestication, the dance floor is reduced to a means of achieving a cultural value: domesticity.

In two longterm relationships I was in I asked why there was such reluctance to go dancing and in both cases I was told that " they had gotten what they wanted from dancing and therefore did not need to go out anymore, or at least not as frequently..."

Obviously this conventional thinking is the norm. People go dancing in order to get something, to score the relationship. Dancing is a cultivated means to an end and once the end is achieved the " need" to dance is gone.

From this conventional perspective, the dancer is the ultimate predator, since the point of the dance is a means to get to some understood end: the long term or short term sexual relationship: coupling, coupledom.

Because this is the conventional use of dance, dancers are seen in this light, they can not escape this conventional view since the conventional view controls people's brains. If you are dancing, according to these people, you want to get some...

I wonder what would happen to these people if they ever left Arcata, or the United States? What if they went to a wedding in another country and watched young and old dancing? What if they went to Mexico or Cuba or actually almost anywhere else in the world and watch young and old, grand parents and grand children dancing? Wow, how would their conventional minds deal with such a reality??? Would they think that the grand kids, two and three year olds were all dressed up and dancing in order to score?

The unconventional is not only misunderstood, it is judged by a standard that borders on stupid. It reveals not the " sin" of the unconventional, of the one being judged, but the stupidity of the judgment.

Dance is not a means to an end. Dance is the end itself. If you watch a young child, they will move to music, they will feel the music and translate that feeling into motion. It is innate, part of our human nature. For society to circumscribe this natural aspect of our being, our desire to feel and move to music as being a means to an end is perverse. Convention is oppressive.

To dance with you does not mean I want to have a relationship with you, to sleep with you or to have sex with you. Dance with or without you is the meaning and the end. It is the purpose of being on the dance floor, it is the reason I find you and agree to move next to you on the dance floor. I do not want to go home with you, I know nothing about you simply because I dance with you, for a moment, in time, to the beat of the bass or drum.

Dance is.

Dance is the relationship.

Dance is the means and the end.

When I dance I am rejecting convention, I am rejecting our cultural norms about who can and can not dance, I am rejecting the agenda and the rules of
"proper" acceptable behavior.

Go ahead and use dance, abuse the celebration of life so you can get into couple-dumb, into the boring and stifling relationship of domestic consumptive bliss that drives our economic machine to destroy the earth. But leave me alone. And take your conventional morality with you when you leave.

Dogma is the mental process by which we force the world to conform to our belief system.

Analysis, on the other hand, is the way in which we force ourselves to face reality.

The dogmatic process does not see reality because it is too busy imposing it's view upon reality, filtering and altering reality to conform to it's own preconceived concept.

Let us look at an example of feminist dogma at work: Every year around the date of 'take back the night' there is chalking on the HSU campus that quotes the law about consensual sex. The chalked statement reads that "maybe" is not yes, "no" is not yes and that yes can never be given in a intoxicated state. Now who exactly is this message directed towards? Obviously if a person is a sexist ( dogmatist), this statement is directed towards men. Men want sex, women don't ( of course that gets a little confusing when you deal with a "sex positive" campus...), but the person saying no, to the dogmatist, must be the woman not the man, because only women have unconsesual sex....

But what if we weren't sexist? What if we applied the tools of Feminist Analysis to sexual relationships and looked at this statement in a non sexist manner?

For instance let us consider a man and a woman at a bar, both having arrived independently. The woman drove and therefore is not drinking excessively, the man walked and is intoxicated. While dancing the woman starts hitting on the man and he, being in an inebriated state, responds to these overtures. Eventually the woman ask the man to come to her house for the night. He agrees. Has he consented to have sex by agreeing to go to her house? Has he consented to have sex if she gets him in bed and initiates sex? In the morning can he accuse the woman of date rape? How often do men find themselves in situations that they have not explicitly consented to, but because they are men, they are considered the predator not the prey?

The above illustrates the nature of sexist and dogmatic thinking. Analysis reveals that it is not the biology of the person but an individual's actions that who is the victim.

And yet, dogma will not allow sexist to recognize that in 30% ( some suggest the figure is much higher) of domestic violence cases the man is the victim of an abusive woman. Or, that a Redbook survey found that over 70% of all women in relationships with men admitted to being the first person in an arguement to use violence.

Feminist analysis has integrity because it does not predetermine the outcome of its observations about relationships but instead forces people to look at the dynamic of power between men and women. Dogmatist lie about reality to enforce a lie that they use to gain a political advantage. Dogmatist imply that women are the victims and men the abusers, women the prey and men the predators. Truth is the goal of anlysis and the victim of dogma.

Woman are as likely to be predators as prey in relationships, but dogmatist refuse to acknowledge that biology is not the determinig factor in abuse.

Now let us for a moment consider the words predator or womanizer. To the dogmatist these words are morally loaded terms that imply male dominance. The implication is that the male is taking advantage of the innocent female victim. The dogmatist, however, has a problem that they can not acknowledge without causing conflict with their artificial system of reality: Predator, unless it depends on the use of force, means that the prey is intellectually inferior and thus the predatory behavior is the consequence of an intellectual, not physical, inequality. This is especially true when the dogmatist uses the word womanizer, or implies that a certain male hits on women or takes advantage of them. Womanizing would imply that women are the vicitms of a man's superior ability to manipulate a woman's reality, and the woman is intellectually incapable of defending herself from such manipulation! Dogmatic Feminist thus support the inferiority of women! A man who respects women and thus engages them in flirtation, conversation, dating or dancing is expressing his respect for their equality and capacity to engage as equals. But dogmatist, can never acknowledge a woman's role as an equal in a relationship of any kind with a man because that would deprive the dogmatist of claiming moral status of women as victims.

If a person believes in equality and respects the person they are engaging, they should expect and demand that the world honor their relationship as equal and reciprocal, until proven otherwise. If the world choses to impose a standard upon a relationship based on the biological sex of the individuals in the relationship and not upon the dynamic of the relationship itself ( ie reality) they are participating in dogmatic lie creation.

The way in which we observe the world reveals the nature of who we are...do we lie in order to force the world to conform to our beliefs or do we seek to see and understand the truth even though it threatens our belief system?

A month ago I resigned my position on the Executive Board of the California Faculty Association ( CFA) at HSU and as a Delegate to the CFA's State Assembly. For the past year I have tried to work with the CFA to organize faculty both at HSU and statewide to fight for quality higher education in the CSU. What I have found among faculty is fear and intimidation. Faculty members are afraid to speak up about what they know is happening in the CSU. They are intimidated by the administration, they worry about not getting promoted, not getting tenure, losing a grant or losing status.

Fear is corruption.

Fear corrupts the soul, it silences dissent, and it leaves politics to the powerful and the thoughtless reactionary.
HSU and the CSU are microcosmic examples of fear at work. On a grander scale, fear is silencing Democrats in Congress. They are frightened of taking a stand on anything. They won't vote for impeachment against a criminal administration for fear of voter reactions, they vote to approve an Attorney General that appears to condone torture, because they fear not to do so would make them look soft on terrorism. They refuse to reform the tax code for fear that they will alienate their corporate benefactors. They do nothing about those without health insurance for fear that someone might call them socialist!

Courage is not protest by U.S.students who have little to lose by their actions, who protest as lifestyle with little effect; courage is the action taken by those with much to lose: a promotion, a job, a house, a future, an election, a name....a life, who do it anyway. Courage is not the bombastic rhetoric of those talking to their peers at a rally who agree with them already, courage is standing up and speaking with wisdow and compassion to those who will stone you to death for speaking out.

Fear keeps the frightened intimidated and silent, it allows the debate to be controlled by those who are drunk with power and leaves the response to those drunk with ego.

If teachers,with so little to fear, refuse to speak up at risk of a promotion or a juicy grant, how can they expect anyone to speak up in an intelligent and meaningful way when it comes to WAR or environmental destruction? The silence of teachers and political " leaders" has left students and citizens without role models of real courage.

Fascism is the consequence.

From: NewScientist.com
Pentagon sets its sights on social networking websites

*
* Paul Marks


"I AM continually shocked and appalled at the details people voluntarily post online about themselves." So says Jon Callas, chief security officer at PGP, a Silicon Valley-based maker of encryption software. He is far from alone in noticing that fast-growing social networking websites such as MySpace and Friendster are a snoop's dream.

New Scientist has discovered that Pentagon's National Security Agency, which specialises in eavesdropping and code-breaking, is funding research into the mass harvesting of the information that people post about themselves on social networks. And it could harness advances in internet technology - specifically the forthcoming "semantic web" championed by the web standards organisation W3C - to combine data from social networking websites with details such as banking, retail and property records, allowing the NSA to build extensive, all-embracing personal profiles of individuals.

Americans are still reeling from last month's revelations that the NSA has been logging phone calls since the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. The Congressional Research Service, which advises the US legislature, says phone companies that surrendered call records may have acted illegally. However, the White House insists that the terrorist threat makes existing wire-tapping legislation out of date and is urging Congress not to investigate the NSA's action.

Meanwhile, the NSA is pursuing its plans to tap the web, since phone logs have limited scope. They can only be used to build a very basic picture of someone's contact network, a process sometimes called "connecting the dots". Clusters of people in highly connected groups become apparent, as do people with few connections who appear to be the intermediaries between such groups. The idea is to see by how many links or "degrees" separate people from, say, a member of a blacklisted organisation.

By adding online social networking data to its phone analyses, the NSA could connect people at deeper levels, through shared activities, such as taking flying lessons. Typically, online social networking sites ask members to enter details of their immediate and extended circles of friends, whose blogs they might follow. People often list other facets of their personality including political, sexual, entertainment, media and sporting preferences too. Some go much further, and a few have lost their jobs by publicly describing drinking and drug-taking exploits. Young people have even been barred from the orthodox religious colleges that they are enrolled in for revealing online that they are gay.

"You should always assume anything you write online is stapled to your resumé. People don't realise you get Googled just to get a job interview these days," says Callas.

Why is it that some people are convinced that their view of reality is reality?
Two interesting conversations,
one with a "conservative",
one with a "progressive":
Both believed in the universal truth of their own morality, epistemology.
In other words both believed that everyone held the same world view, or that they should!
They both knew that their moral view was the right view
Deviation from their moral perspective was the equivalent of sin, evil, error, political incorrectness
and that those who disagreed should be shot
expelled
excommunicated
ignored
and knew that they were wrong.
What is more, these dogmatist were convinced that people who disagreed with them were immoral!
Wow, this is amazing. Left or right, doesn't matter.
Dogma is a state of mind.
A state of closed mind.
A state of mind that knows but can not think.
Thinking is always dangerous,
it is open to possibility,
it has not decided on reality
Thinking is an adventure in exploration.
Thinking is an open ended journey,
and you never arrive at your destination
there isn't one
With Dogma,
you never leave the station
Stuck
Frightened of disagreement
Surrounded by those sharing your conventions
The dogmatist practices their religion
Oblivious to possiblity

An Interesting Article on How the Dogmatic Brain, LEFT AND RIGHT, works:
Study Ties Political Leanings to Hidden Biases

By Shankar Vedantam
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 30, 2006; A05

Put a group of people together at a party and observe how they behave. Differently than when they are alone? Differently than when they are with family? What if they're in a stadium instead of at a party? What if they're all men?

The field of social psychology has long been focused on how social environments affect the way people behave. But social psychologists are people, too, and as the United States has become increasingly politically polarized, they have grown increasingly interested in examining what drives these sharp divides: red states vs. blue states; pro-Iraq war vs. anti-Iraq war; pro-same-sex marriage vs. anti-same-sex marriage. And they have begun to study political behavior using such specialized tools as sophisticated psychological tests and brain scans.

"In my own family, for example, there are stark differences, not just of opinion but very profound differences in how we view the world," said Brenda Major, a psychologist at the University of California at Santa Barbara and the president of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, which had a conference last week that showcased several provocative psychological studies about the nature of political belief.

The new interest has yielded some results that will themselves provoke partisan reactions: Studies presented at the conference, for example, produced evidence that emotions and implicit assumptions often influence why people choose their political affiliations, and that partisans stubbornly discount any information that challenges their preexisting beliefs.

Emory University psychologist Drew Westen put self-identified Democratic and Republican partisans in brain scanners and asked them to evaluate negative information about various candidates. Both groups were quick to spot inconsistency and hypocrisy -- but only in candidates they opposed.

When presented with negative information about the candidates they liked, partisans of all stripes found ways to discount it, Westen said. When the unpalatable information was rejected, furthermore, the brain scans showed that volunteers gave themselves feel-good pats -- the scans showed that "reward centers" in volunteers' brains were activated. The psychologist observed that the way these subjects dealt with unwelcome information had curious parallels with drug addiction as addicts also reward themselves for wrong-headed behavior.

From AVEN:
asexuality.org

An asexual is someone who does not experience sexual attraction. Unlike celibacy, which people choose, asexuality is an intrinsic part of who we are. Asexuality does not make our lives any worse or any better, we just face a different set of challenges than most sexual people. There is considerable diversity among the asexual community, each asexual person experiences things like relationships, attraction, and arousal somewhat differently.

Relationships
Asexual people have the same emotional needs as anyone else, and like in the sexual community we vary widely in how we fulfill those needs. Some asexual people are happier on their own, others are happiest with a group of close friends. Other asexual people have a desire to form more intimate romantic relationships, and will date and seek long-term partnerships. Asexual people are just as likely to date sexual people as we are to date each other.

Sexual or nonsexual, all relationships are made up of the same basic stuff. Communication, closeness, fun, humor, excitement and trust all happen just as much in sexual relationships as in nonsexual ones. Unlike sexual people, asexual people are given few expectations about the way that our intimate relationships will work. Figuring out how to flirt, to be intimate, or to be monogamous in a nonsexual relationships can be challenging, but free of sexual expectations we can form relationships in ways that are grounded in our individual needs and desires.

Attraction
Many asexual people experience attraction, but we feel no need to act out that attraction sexually. Instead we feel a desire to get to know someone, to get close to them in whatever way works best for us. Asexual people who experience attraction will often be attracted to a particular gender, and will identify as gay, bi, or straight.

1.1.Is the earth holy?
2.Is the process of creation sacred?
3.Is wilderness the garden of god/dess/s?
4.Is defilement of the sacred intentional?
5.Is drilling for oil an act of desecration?
6.Three eco-warriors were arrested trying to stop the machine,
arrested, and convicted, and sentenced for crimes against the system
7.Oil spills on the ground in Alaska
8.The air is filled with mercury next to power plants
9.We can no longer eat fish from the sea, it is contaminated with mercury and PCBs
10. Who are the terrorist who defile the earth, who are rewarded with position and status, who are honored by the system for their accomplishments?
11.Who are the terrorist who want to build roads into the last place of the holy, that will drill for oil in the last remnant of the wild, that will spew their chemicals into our air?
12.Why do the terrorist against creation not stand trial? Why are they not charged for their crimes?

What is the role of reciprocity in relationships?
Does it matter if the relationship is a friendship?
What role does reciprocity play in romance?
Is there a role for each gender?
Do you accept this role?
What is the role you expect each person to play?
Do you expect equality or equity or niether?

give me a higher love
higher than hollywood's love story of eros
higher than madison ave's love story of owning that new SUV
higher than the surge of immediate passion
higher than candy and flowers delivered on a holiday
give me love that is Truth revealed
give me love that is beyond the self and its desires
give me love that is friendship beyond years
give me love that is shared life and vision
give me love that is creation manifest
give me love that is justice sought and delivered
give me love that is boundless for the sacred
give me love that is compassionate for the suffering
give me love that is full of wonder
give me love that does not end with the end of the movie
give me love that can not be contained in an item purchased
give me love that is slow to grow, that sinks deep into knowing, that is gentle in its expression, that last beyond commercial time
let me be this love
happy V day

1.The individual is sovereign. The source of all freedom is the awareness of self sovereignty, the understanding that nothing can take away our sovereignty. Sovereignty can not be surrendered, it can not be given to another, it can not be submitted to an external authority. Surrender or submission to an external authority or force does not eliminate sovereignty, it only creates the illusion that one is not responsible for one's own life. Force, violence and fear may be used to coerce an individual into compliance, into physical submission, but this act of force affirms the individual's inherent freedom. Force is the recognition that a person will not submit without coercion or the threat of violence, which is an acknowledgment of the individuals innate freedom.
2.Because the individual is sovereign no relationship that is based on coercion, force or the threat of violence is legitimate. Any relationship that is compelled, that is rooted in obligation and not free choice, that is a role created by an institution ( marriage, school, intimate relationships) is illegitimate.
3.Any person who is forced into any kind of relationship against their will is in an illegitimate relationship and has no obligation to obey the rules of that relationship, for the source of authority in that relationship is a violation of the individual's sovereignty.
4.My body is my property, my possession, my province. A person who does not respect my personal boundaries in regard to my body violates my sovereignty. The violation of my sovereignty is disrespect for my freedom. Nothing that follows from such a violation is freely given, it is taken, it has no legitimacy: it can obligate me to nothing for it is not voluntarily given on my part.
5.Relationships become prison camps of the soul when the demands of one or both parties to a relationship become an imposed obligation on the other free and sovereign person to submit, conform or meet expectations.
6.Since relationships are between free and sovereign people the parties to a relationship have the right to state what they want, but they do not have the right to take what they want, to demand what they want, or to use force or fear to get what they want.
7.To be sovereign is a process of knowing the self and being clear about what you want from yourself. You can not expect someone else to satisfy your needs, wants or desires. If you experience your needs, wants and desires being met by another, that does not mean that that person meeting your needs, wants or desires is obligated to meet those things, in fact the minute that you expect them to do so, you have denied them their freedom. Anything they give based on obligation or expectation is then tainted with illegitimacy and corruption. If it is not freely given, it is not given at all, it is taken. Taking is an act of theft. The thief is trying to steal something that is only yours to give. Taking your time, taking your energy, taking your body against your will is a form of violence. Control is violence, manipulation is theft, demands are coercive.
8.The Celibate demands that a person wanting or desiring a relationship with the celibate acknowledge their own sovereignty and the celibate's sovereignty. The act of celibacy is a statement of independence in the face of social expectations and institutional roles.
9.The Celibate isn't saying they won't be in a relationship, but what they are saying is that relationship integrity is only possible if it is based on conscious freedom between all parties to the relationship. What I mean is that the relationship can not be defined by society, it can't be determined by the expectations of sex or gender, it can't be framed by Hollywood romance. The Celibate demands that relationships are consciously negotiated between conscious equals.
10.Anarchism, asserting individual sovereignty, and Celibacy, which is an expression of sexual and relationship sovereignty, reject claims of obligation by society, institutions or individuals.
11.Celibacy is not a stagnate state of being, but a dynamic expression of individual freedom from which a relationship based on freedom and voluntary association is possible. Celibacy is the state of being from which all free and voluntary relationships must evolve. In other words, the state of singleness, in which a person is looking for another person to meet their needs is inherently disrespectful and coercive. The person in a state of singleness is not content with themselves, they are looking and expecting another person to satisfy them, to meet their needs. Singleness is based on a belief that the natural state is coupledom ( or couple dumb!). The single person, feeling inadequate in themselves, is a thief waiting to steal, looking for a victim, plotting conquest in order to take what is not theirs. The Celibate is not looking to be satisfied by another. The act of celibacy is the act of satisfying oneself without expectation that another person will or is obligated to satisfy you.
12.Love. Love is never perfect, but it is free. To demand that a person love you is contrary to the state of loving. Love can only be given freely. Sex can be required, stolen, expected, but love can not be stolen. You can not expect love. You can not demand to be loved. Love is the ultimate expression of sovereignty, for it is the deepest expression of freedom possible. Only a sovereign person can love, and give love, and only a sovereign person can accept love and respect that it is given freely without obligation. The instant love is expected, or demanded, what is given is no longer love.
13.Words that Lie. When a person who neither respects your freedom or sovereignty and who does not accept their own freedom and responsibility for their own well being, states that they love you, they are lying. In fact the statement “ I Love You ” usually means the person wants something from you, that you are some how obligated to them. The words are actually the very opposite of love for they imply a therefore: I love you therefore you must love me back, or therefore you must do this for me, or I therefore expect this from you. When the word love is attached to obligation, expectation or implied or stated demand, it is not love, it is evidence of force.
14.Dance is a medium in which one can discovered freedom and slavery. Dance is holy flirtation, it is the act of giving freely, of sharing when dancers agree to share. But on the dance floor, when a person demands your energy, attention, or violates the sovereignty of your physical being, it is no longer holy flirtation, it is involuntary control, it is coercive, it is psychic violence.
15.The sovereign celibate on the dance floor is happy dancing with themselves. They do not need another person to experience the celebration of holy communion between music, body and soul. But the celibate loves to celebrate with free sovereigns the dance as long as it is freely shared. The minute either party to the shared dance withdraws from the dance the other sovereign respects the other sovereign's freedom as the source of what was shared in the moment. What was shared was holy because it was free. When it is no longer free it is no longer sacred.