<^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> ........Catt's Claws # 110 ... June 23, 1996......... ........ A Feminist Newsletter by Irene Stuber......... <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> Richard Savill, Irish Correspondent for an English newspaper reported the recommendation "that known or suspected child sex abuse involving priests should be reported to a senior police officer, was accepted by the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland." The recommendation follows on the heels of numerous scandals involving priests in child abuse-rape. The new rules are meant to offset the scandals which date from 20 years ago to the present. Bishop Laurence Forristal said, "Sexual abuse of children by priests and religious has shocked and angered many people, and provoked a crisis of faith and confidence among many Catholics." The bottom line is that for the first time suspected child abuse by priests are to be reported to police authorities. Is that the rule in the U.S.? Or are they still covering up by transferring the priests? Isn't it strange that most of these offenses involve boys ... seems as if the rape of little girls isn't a big deal. Recently Dr. William Walsh, Bishop of Killaloe, said the church should recognize it has been sinful and set aside time for repentance to reflect on the suffering it has caused to children. He criticized priests and nuns for covering up sexual and physical abuse of children with "a web of secrecy designed to protect the abuser and not the abused". "We need to apologize, to ask for forgiveness". . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . It was bound to happen in the world of information overload but a new computer program has been announced that will be able to sum up most reports in ONE SENTENCE. The program developed by British Telecom scientists is called Netsumm. It distilled the first chapter of Genesis: "And God said, 'Let the water teem with living creatures and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky.' " Good thing it was developed in Britain where the English language is still alive and well. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A new has appeared on usenet. A lot of women are watching it carefully figuring it as another Father's Rights propaganda tool. Strange how so many in the Father's Righters movement owe child support. Some of the other names these characters operate under are the Children's Rights Council, COPS (Coalition for Parental Rights), Fathers United for Equal Rights, Mothers Without Custody, and F.R.E.E. Jeffrey Nichols, 47, the commodities and precious metals investment adviser, who owes $642,550 for the support of his three children has only paid a mere $9,540 after promising to pay up to get out of jail. A VERY angry judge (woman, of course) slapped him back into the pokey. Among his ploys to try to get out of child support was to claim he wasn't the father. Such a sweetheart! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Janella Cox wants women to start objecting to the less-than-equal treatment they get when dining out without a male escort, i.e., getting bad seating, poor service, etc. She suggests carrying cards that read "I ordinarily tip 20% of the check but in this case I am not because you did not give me good service. I hope it wasn't because I am a woman and you believe those false rumors that women don't tip." It's a small thing but Catt's Claws' author remembers when she was younger and lived in the big city that she felt like she was getting shunted aside in many restaurants. Until, of course, she learned to speak up: "No, I don't want that table, I want that one over there." If I didn't get it, I asked for the manager, made my complaint and walked out. Trust me, after a time I never had to do it. Perhaps it was the way I walked or that gleam in my eye that said, "I DARE you!" I haven't thought of this subtle type of discrimination in some years and am amazed in this day and age that it still goes on. Naive me. Ladies/women/y'all ... don't take it. Object, demand equal rights and you'll get them. And if you don't - go spend your money where they treat you right. Stop acting like a victim waiting to happen. As the women of the OLDER feminist movement knew, no one is going to GIVE you your rights. You have to TAKE them. Remember the chant, "hell no we won't go"? Learn it again and break the chains of the modern Washingtonian-inside-the-beltway-feminist-leaders who are trying to teach us the "victimization of women" instead of being women who DEMAND AND TAKE our equal rights. At a meeting we attended to teach women facts about battering, several woman who had been battered said that the first step was to tell their husbands to stop hitting them, that they didn't like it. Most of us said, "Huh? Doesn't the guy have good sense? Of course women don't like getting punched around." But it turns out that a surprising number of men actually stop being abusive when told their wives or girlfriends don't like it. They had grown up watching their fathers abusing their mothers and thought it was the right thing to do since the churches,the police, and polite society never said it wasn't. Remember year when a representative of the ACLU testified before Congress against Bill Clinton's Violence Against Women Act? Seems he thought wives should be smacked. Women have to learn to say "NO!" And means it. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Convicted murderer Darn Lee Boltan was executed by lethal injection last week in Arizona. Bolton was convicted of the 1986 rape and murder of 2-year-old Zosha Lee Pickett and police have definitely tied him in several more murders of young girls. PC or not, the author of CC is in favor of the death penalty in many situations - the murder and rape of small children is one of those situations. There is no known treatment for men who rape and sexually abuse children. Done once, they will do it again. Even Ted Bundy started going after younger and younger women, his last victim a girl. Yes, an eye for an eye ... a death for a death. Oh yes, there are some who will die who aren't guilty. That's why we bend over backwards with appeals - although even then some innocents will die. But how about the innocents who will die because we put *proven* murderers back on the streets? Or *proven* sexual predators. Have you ever seen a small child after he's been raped by a crazy? A next door neighbor's child was. He'd wake up in the middle of the night screaming. If that boy grew up to be a half-way normal human being I'd be surprised. Or a woman who was raped and beaten? She will live her entire life with constant pain from the broken bones and head injuries - and her rapist is generally back on the streets to rape again in less than five years all nice and healthy on state supported health care! How about protecting the second victim, the third ... the 30th by keeping the monsters caged? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . While Russian dancers who wanted to earn western big time dollars were allowed to defect and seek political asylum in the U.S. (tennis players too, Martina), women who faced genital mutilation were not. They were sent back to their homelands to be horribly maimed. Women did not qualify for asylum if they faced only "social and economic hardship" and community ostracism if they refused to submit to the procedure that cut away their exterior flesh right down to the bone in the genital area. The skin is then sewed together, allowing only a small opening the size of a straw for urination and menstrual flow. When such a woman marries, she is cut open for her husband to have sex, etc. You don't want to know the etc. The women cannot walk as we do. There's nothing to give between their legs. Through the efforts of many women (and good sense) the Board of Immigration Appeals broke with Immigration and Naturalization Service policy Thursday to grant asylum to 19-year-old Fauziya Kasinga, of Togo, who says her family planned to force her to submit to female genital mutilation. Unfortunately the ruling only applies to Kasinga and although it opens the door to future refugees, the board did not set rules. Let's be honest here. Most of the women who would seek asylum are from Africa and are black or dark-skinned. There's not only rampant sexism involved in the refusal to give asylum - after all it's just a woman and it doesn't prevent her from having babies - but there is also racism. IRONICALLY, many African Americans oppose the granting of wholesale asylum to avoid genital mutilation. They say that we don't have the right to judge another society. Alice Walker who has written extensively against genital mutilation has been toasted by other African-American women writers for her opposition. In essence they are agreeing with the Philadelphia immigration Judge Donald Ferlise who in 1995 denied Kasinga's request for asylum by ruling that female genital mutilation wasn't persecution because it was done to the other women of her country. Genital mutilation is wrong, black or white, Negroid or Egyptian or White. WRONG. W_R_O_N_G! If it is right, cut OFF the man's ENTIRE penis and his testicles which is exactly what genital mutilation of women is. (The sunna type that is generally done in Egypt "merely" removes the clitoris while that performed in equatorial Africa removes everything.) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . How many front page stories were written about a President Clinton action "to distribute $46 million in grants to 336 communities in 49 states for local domestic violence-prevention strategies by police agencies that has shown be effective in reducing domestic murders by more than 50% Under the project, police in selected communities will be required to monitor abusers, set up procedures to respond to domestic violence incidents and develop a strategy for early intervention. The Violence Against Women Act, passed as part of Clinton's 1994 crime bill, AND OPPOSED BY BOB DOLE enables victims to sue in federal court, allows police to pursue offenders across state lines and provides for shelters and counseling for victims of domestic violence. How about sending an email to President@whitehouse.gov to say thanks? He might appreciate a thanks from feminists with all the hell he's been getting from our beltway-bound leaders who forget who our friends are. But will we see this latest tool against domestic violence that Clinton has instigated his in banner headlines on front pages? Hell, no. No, we'll read about un-indicted co-conspirators, a dodge to blacken someone's name legally without having any concrete evidence against him. Just innuendos. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . My GAWD, we're back to Salem, Massachusetts when any woman who steps out of line is ... Senator Kay Hutchinson of Texas, Republican to the core, was BOOOOED at the Texas Republican convention because she believes in a woman's right to choose. So much for Bob Dole's call for tolerance of Republicans who favor choice (although he wants a constitutional amendment BARRING abortion). BTW, doesn't it make you feel good that the head of the American Red Cross who gets a bigger salary than the President of the United States is ANTI-ABORTION? No way am I ever going to donate any money or time to the Red Cross as long as Mrs. Dole heads it. Her lies about her income from speeches and appearances would have removed anyone else from that position. Talk about influence peddling. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . According to a California newspaper, "A Butte County man jailed for nearly $11,000 in unpaid child support is a leader of a self-styled patriot group who declares that he is the victim of 'political persecution.'" As the mask is torn away from so many of the men's rights, father's rights, and anti-government militia groups we are finding out that many (most) of them are men who refuse to take the responsibilities for what their penises do. Is there any wonder there are so many jokes about men's brains being below their waists? When their entire lives are controlled by their toys? Real men - thank GAWD I know so many - take responsibility for their actions. Unfortunately my children's father wasn't one of the good ones. Anyone out there know a Joseph Francis Stuber, B. 05-24-1925? He owes his children a LOT of money even though he inherited about a million dollars back in the 1960s. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The woman who was attacked and horrifically beaten in New York's Central Park has no health insurance. Donations for her care are being solicited. (Her attacker and murderer of another woman Royster of course will have all the FREE health insurance he needs while in jail.) The woman will never be the same, will live in pain the rest of her life, and may be seriously brain damaged. She may never be able to care for herself. Her life is forever ruined. In a note soliciting donations, the writer mentioned a Japanese woman who had casually befriended the murderer. The note implied, in a left-handed manner, that the Japanese women was at fault for spurning Royster and causing him to go on his rampage. Come on, kids. How about mentioning that his father is in jail for life for murdering *his* girl friend. Are you saying that kind of parentage is no more important than casual conversations with a stranger? From guyz we would expect such blame but from women? Anyway, it isn't the victims fault, and the address for donations is Friends of the Pianist Fund, Mayor's Community Assistance Unit, 51 Chambers St., Room 630,New York, NY 10007. Even a $1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . In Zimbabwe, at least 40,000 new AIDS cases were reported last year, the National AIDS Coordination Program said. The agency added that the actual number could be greater than 40,000 and that the estimated total cases could be as high as 150,000. These are HETEROSEXUAL cases. In all nations except the U.S., AIDS is almost entirely a heterosexual disease. According to the CDC, at least 10% of the entire population of Zimbabwe is infected. As an example of how rapidly it is spreading, in Namibia, the number of people infected with HIV rose from four in 1986 to 21,737 in April 1996 and expect to go up by 20% this year. One of the reasons for the terrible plague in Africa is that the men are too macho to use a condom. Sound familiar? The whining of your mate: "I can't feel anything!" Unbelievably, there are still some nutsies in the U.S. who still claim that AIDS is a gay disease. There is one so-called authority on national TV who is trying to say that the African AIDS is not the same as the American AIDS. In Africa is it hetero and in the U.S. it is homo. GAWD we have REALLY intelligent viruses. They now the difference between homosexual and heterosexual blood. Oh, come on. And by the way, although the GAY and Lesbian Task Force ignores the facts, Lesbians are one of the two groups least likely to have AIDS. The other, of course, are nuns. Unless infected through needles, contaminated blood or donated sperm, lesbians who are exclusively lesbians (not bisexual, i.e., have or have had sex with men within 15 years) are not at risk. Just for once we'd like to see the gay movement stop using lesbians to drop the men's AIDS stats. And yes, married or heterosexual women are the groups who are being infected with AIDS at the greatest rate in the U.S. As we have said before, even married women should insist on a condom. AIDS is death forever. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Those of you collecting info for the presidential race, note that NARAL documents that Bob Dole voted "against a woman's right to choose 107 out of 113 times" during his nearly three decades in the Senate. With liberty and justice for all... except women, of course. NARAL is putting out a 30-second TV spot to point out Dole's dismal record. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Raymond Mitchell III described as a churchgoer and hard worker by his friends was also the phone "Fantasy Man" rapist, who called women posing as their lovers, whispering enticements to take part in his sex fantasy. How many women he talked into believing that he was their lovers is unknown, but could be extensive since one of the women who came forward at the trial had been trying to get Mitchell, 45, arrested for SEVEN years! She testified that a caller convinced her that he was her fiance acting out a longtime sexual fantasy. At his bidding, she checked into a motel room where she waited for him naked and blindfolded. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Connecticut Gov. John G. Rowland said his state will spend $250,000 in a public awareness campaign aimed at changing attitudes toward sex between adults and girls younger than 16. "The guys look at this event as fun," Rowland said. "The social experts call this a rite of passage. We here in Connecticut are going to call it statutory rape because that's exactly what it is." In 1993, 23 percent of all births in Hartford were to mothers younger than 20 -- a figure matched only by New Orleans and St. Louis, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. Many areas see the rate at around 20%. Rowland is also trying to enact legislation that would force girls to reveal the name of the father before getting welfare payments and to use the information to prosecute the man in court. How come we are raising girls to protect their rapist-lovers while the girls are to suffer a lifetime of servitude to the rapist's child. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Of course the information was put out to help women trying to *get pregnant, but perverse me thinks that it is also helpful for women who are trying to avoid getting pregnant and don't have the help of irresponsible husbands who won't use condoms. A recent study indicates douching could impede fertility. The study author Donna Day Baird, an epidemiologist at NIH's National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences published her findings in the American Journal of Public Health. According to Baird, women who douched were 30 percent less likely to become pregnant each month they tried to conceive, Baird reported. For young women, ages 18 to 24, douching appeared to reduce monthly fertility by 50 percent. Women who douched more than once a week had the lowest pregnancy rate: 27 percent. But Dr. Jaroslav Hulka of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, questioned the infertility link. Hulka said he has practiced gynecology around the world and has never seen an association in European and Arab countries where douching is a daily habit. Some research has shown douching pushes bacteria too far up the reproductive tract, causing dangerous pelvic inflammatory disease. Catt's Claws doesn't know the truth of any of this but thinks claims that douching pushes bacteria to cause PID is like claiming mouth wash shoves bacteria down your throat to cause stomach ulcers. Come on ... Why do we park in driveways and drive on parkways ... why do we put Braille dots on the drive-in ATM pads? When one thinks about some of these studies we wonder whether anyone is thinking ... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Our thanks to Jennifer Gagliardi for taking care of the subscription list and listserv that gets Catt's Claws out to you ... and to our new proofreader who hopefully will make reading CC a little easier. ....................... * ........................ Women's rights are young and tender and we must protect them from the plagues of holy hypocrisy and newts. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- >>> Send your ideas, comments, and news to istuber@cswnet.com for inclusion in the Catt's Claws feminist newsletter which will be emailed up to three times a week. This is NOT an interactive discussion net but an exchange of information. Catt's Claws is NOT sponsored by any organization. We are accepting *limited* donations (only what can be spared) to help offset the online costs of posting Catt's Claws. Copyright 1996, Irene Stuber. PO Box 6185, Hot Springs, AR 71902.<<<<