<^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> ........Catt's Claws # 123 ... September 8, 1996......... ........ A Feminist Newsletter by Irene Stuber......... Irene Stuber is solely responsible for the contents of Catt's Claws <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> <^> A lot of people have wondered why Bob Dole, hip deep in the big muddy of radical religious reactionary right-wing redivivus, rapacious Republicans, took such pains to condemn teacher unions. A wonderful woman in Texas gave us the reason. (She's had lots of experience with this because of the long-standing school board wars with the koo-koo birds who argue against textbooks that teach science instead of biblical creationism, human rights instead of white supremacy, etc.) It seems that when religious right stealth candidates get control of a school board, one of their first actions is to intimidate teachers so that they will accept a new curriculum where religious beliefs of the religious right take stage center. Sex education is long gone. Real science would be long gone. Also gone would be those teachers who don't fall into line with the new Neo-Nazi religions. Girl sports are gone. Remember, in the RR, girls are to be seen and not heard, virginal, bred young, etc., etc. Guessie what stands between the radical right and control of your children's minds? Strong teachers made stronger yet by their sisterhood with each other, their support group, i.e., their UNIONS. As one of the great patriots in the American Revolutionary wars said, "If we don't stand together then surely we shall hang separately." And such is the power of unions. Divided, without a union, the teachers would be easily picked off, one by each. But when they are united in unions, they form a mighty bulwark against idiocy. Without the teachers' unions, the good teachers are history and the religious, rightwing crackpots are in charge re-writing history and science and the future of our children. And so Dole, the ultimate dittoman, came out against the teacher unions in the battle to control your children's minds. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . Although there are a few women inside the Washington beltway who seem to be living in never-never land, let us repeat the words of Mario Cuomo in his address at the Democratic Convention: Cuomo said he was one who "believed that the risk to children was too great to justify signing that bill -- no matter what its political benefits." But after speaking to Clinton, he was assured that Clinton would fix the problems. "Ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, the Republicans are the real threat." Yes, Governor Cuomo, but Catt's Claws wishes you could deliver that message to the hard-headed women, the political know-nothings inside the beltway who are spreading their ignorant poison to women who trust them. It's really very simple, actually kindergarten-level logic. No Clinton in November, ergo, the welfare reform would be replaced by NO welare. No Clinton = no Violence Against Women Act. No Clinton = no Defense of Women's Clinics, ad infinitum, including the attempts to override Clinton's veto of the Congressional ban against Late Term Abortion. An organization is sending out urgent notices for its members to influence its Senators and representatives against over-riding the veto - without giving anyone any clue as to where the various members of Congress stand on the issue. Associated Press quotes Lucy Gettman of the Columbus YWCA as saying about the Get Out The Vote campaign, "Most, if not all, issues in this election year are women's issues. Women are affected professionally or personally by them." Right on, sister. Right on. We are being treated with certain women "leaders" claiming there's no difference between Clinton and Dole. We'd laugh, but it's really too sad. Have those "leaders" forgotten Gingrich's orphanages proposal? Or the radical republicans statements about sterilizing welfare mothers? Putting them in institutions? How short are the memories of those who refuse to learn government, politics, or the realities of human life. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . While five men dropped out, the four women at the Citadel have made it through the 1996 Hell Week. Last year when there was so much to-do about Shannon Faulkner dropping out, 32 MALE cadets dropped out. Guess one makes 100% and 32 makes - ah - excuses. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . In what will be a landmark action in Canada and must have repercussions in the U.S. eventually, Ontario's Labor Relations Board will hear a case based on the charge that sexual harassment is a workplace hazard. Pauline Au, 47, claims she was fired after complaining to the management of Lyndhurst Hospital that a male supervisor was harassing her. Au claims that just as asbestos is a working environment hazard, so is sexual harassment. GO GIRL! Another hero fighting our battles for us. By the way, has anyone except me (who admittedly is age impaired) noticed that many of the women complaining about sexual harassment in the workplace are OLDER women? Older at least than those portrayed in the comic pages where the general is ogling a young thing? Is there something wrong with the picture you have engraved in your mind? One that erases older women as sexual beings from YOUR consciousness and allows the boyz to engage in their sex gamz behind the shawl of indifference? . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . Oh I could give up. Is there a growing sickness out there or are we just becoming more aware of what's ALWAYS been going on. If this is so, then they guyz have been covering for each other a long, long time. Of course it's always been going on but the patriarchal media didn't let YOU in on the dirty secrets. To unmask the accepted horrors is one reason Catt's Claws is posted - and one reason its readership is probably as large as anything on internet. A Mentor, Ohio, high school principal Walter Conte, 50, was arrested after using a concealed camera to video tape a group of high school cheerleaders changing into swimwear for a beach party. He faces up to eight years in prison and will surely lose his job. Men have drilled peep holes in women's lavatories for as long as there have been perverted, emotionally sick men around - and men who are decent citizens have been making excuses for them (and sometimes sharing the peep holes - in clean fun, of course). . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . In a New York Times column, Mark Parent wrote touchingly of the father of Nadine Lockwood rushing into the apartment and to her crib trying to breath life into the dead four-year-old. The father is NEVER mentioned by name nor does author Mark Parent explain why the mother (on welfare) was alone with the seven - SEVEN - children while the unnamed and unblamed father was living somewhere else. Maybe he just came around for sex and then headed out so he wouldn't be bothered with kids' noise and complaints. Who knows. The boyz taking care of boyz censorship is in full sway. The NYC authorities will probably fire the case worker and his superintendent who let this poor child slip through the system's fingers. And the mother is JUSTIFIABLY being charged with murder. Everyone, it seems, will be held responsible except the father. Until we start holding men responsible for their children the way we do women (and government agencies), this horror will not begin to abate. Men have ALWAYS deserted the fruits of their loins. Male-controlled society and churches deem that sex is a pleasure for men and societal pressures force the woman to pay for his fun. Wouldn't it be nice if for once the punishment fit the crime? We have the drugs. Let's inject fathers who don't support their children with a impotency drug until they come (sic) up with the money. Yes, women too can be made impotent. Oh, yes, I can hear it that women can do it no matter what. Doing and enjoying happen to be two different things ... but then only women seem to know that. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . Women in Herat, Afghanistan, are being confined to their homes and are not allowed to work or to study since the area was overrun by the Islamic fundamentalists of the Taliban militia. The news reports say the women are not allowed to work - a gross, general misstatement that shows the male bias and perhaps the journalists' ignorance of traditional Islamic home environment and family values. Historically the Islamic home was a factory where the many wives and children turned out cigars, tied rugs, etc., in wretched conditions. And so, it seems that the religious fanatics are seeking to put things back so that the women in Herat live in virtual slavery. Amena Safi Afzali, president of the Islamic Women's Movement of Afghanistan. is asking the U.N. for help. Betcha a bunch of women in the U.S. will cry out that we should allow those people their religious freedom - just as a bunch of U.S. feminists are yelling at those of us who condemn genital mutilation as an infringement of their religious and ethnic freedoms. Strange how these religious "freedoms" seem to impact women more than men. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . Gene Jamison got credit for the year he's been in jail waiting trial and will only have to serve another year - although paroles the way they are he probably won't even have to change clothes before he's out. His crime was gluing his mentally deficient daughter's eyes shut with Krazy Glue because his wife wouldn't give him money for drugs. No mention in the AP story about whether Jamison is getting any rehab or if he's forbidden to go around the child ever again. The girl's eyesight was saved and Daddy will be home soon. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . We received a number of posts about Sia Ye Vang, 32, who was convicted by a jury of molesting two girls in Detroit. Instead of getting the full anger of the court, he was excused and given 24 years PROBATION and 1,000 hours of community service because - grab your seatbelts - because it is traditional in Laos for older men to do such things to young girls. Oh yes, Vang was instructed to continue learning American ways. We have received posts about other men being excused from U.S. legal punishment because their crimes were accepted behavior in their homeland. What is going on? Why are U.S. laws are being put aside because of an immigrant's claimed ignorance while ignorance is no defense for a U.S. citizen? And strangely (HA!) almost every single thing that is "excused" happens - just happens - to be a crime against women or women-children. Wonder what happened to Pat Schroeder's bill that was introduced in the Dole-Gingrich-family-values-Republican-style-Congress that would have forbidden genital mutilation in the U.S.? Oh, how we're going to miss Representative Schroeder! . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . An ex NOW official wrote: "After all, it was reported in national news that when Jesse Jackson asked for a meeting with the WH re welfare they turned *him* down! Now, what do you make of a situation when a man who is considered important enough to speak at the convention is not met with, but they meet with Patricia Ireland?? Hardly." This same source mentions that Sen. Joe Biden remarked that NOW was initially opposed to the Violence Against Women Act (as was the ACLU) because they were concerned about the *rights* of men. It wasn't until AFTER President Clinton stirred up support (along with Biden, Sen. Kennedy and others) that National NOW reversed course and began to support it. And the question remains ... does NOW have a Congressional or White House lobbyist since AC was let go? Don't know if it was reported in your newspaper but Kate Michelson of NARAL addressed the democratic convention. We posted a copy of her address on choice in the Abigail's Rebels email list and have posted her speech as well as others on our web page: http://www.imageworld.com/vsp/istuber/ref/ . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . While the world has been focused in horror on the growing number of child sex abuse cases that have surfaced in the third world countries such as Thailand, and the Philippines, our own little American world of horrors is being swept away with the wedding rice. If you can believe this (I sometimes wish I was like so many inside the beltway who hide their tender eyes from such things) the Orange County Social Services Agency (San Diego and environs) is arranging the marriage of pregnant adolescent girls to the adult men who impregnated them. Girls as young as 13! The agency head admitted there was agency help in the marriage of at least 15 underage girls. In some cases, the agency has helped the girls go back to living with their rapists, sans marriage. Yes, we're talking about STATUTORY RAPE victims being put back with their rapists! According to California law, an adult who has sex with someone 17 or under is guilty of statutory rape, and child molestation is when there is sex with a child 14 or less. *Consent is not a defense in either case!* Some social workers and agency supervisors complained of the practice but the agency head said there was no indication of such things occurring. Then the women insisted and provided proof. By the way, even these same social workers and agency supervisors are urging prosecution, the District Attorney's office has decided NOT to get involved. Catch that euphemism. Not to get involved? Rape is a crime. What they are saying is they don't want to prosecute criminals who rape. What bunk! Shame! What if these girls had been white and not Hispanic? Double shame! . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . Do they change as they are westernized? Isn't more than one wife common in the tribal mores? A younger wife to play with and older wives to do the work and support him? South African President Nelson Mandela, 78, who recently divorced his older first wife, Winnie, has announced his romantic relationship with Graca Machel, 50, the widow of former Mozambican president Samora Machel. The romance appears to date from 1990. She is involved with the United Nations Children's Fund. Winnie who kept Nelson's name alive for the many years he was in prison, and who formed a tight organization that was ready to serve him when he was released, was given the full "she's bad, no good, etc., media treatment" for the past six years. Well it seems Nelson's began his relationship with Machel about six years ago. Winnie now joins the thousands of women who have been thrown aside when their husbands gain prominence and wealth. She is now eligible to join the First Wives Club along with the discarded first wives of Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . We were sent information that the New York Post - owned by Rupert Murdock, the tycoon who wanted to GIVE Gingrich millions for his book - ran the story on Republican strategist Dick Morris's affair with a prostitute BEFORE The Star. Among Morris' clients are Jesse Helms and the new governor of Arkansas, Southern Baptist minister and Republican stalwart Mike Huckabee. To read the media, the only client Morris had was Bill Clinton! Oh well, one can understand a working girl trying to get ahead, that's what business tycoons do, but what on earth causes a man of Morris' stature to try to impress a woman whose time and attention he has bought and paid for. This is a joke, I think, but are we SURE men should have the vote when they are subject to such strange behavior because of their raging hormones? . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . Robert Shapiro of OJ fame has taken on the defense of Sina Akhtarzad, 46, of Beverly Hills, who has been charged with oral copulation and 18 counts of forced sexual rape. He is out on $1 million bond. At least three women who own and operate small retail shops in two of Akhtarzad's malls are involved. More are expected. Akhtarzad was said to have threatened to ruin the women's businesses and livelihood as well as kill their children. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . If you're looking for the email address of U.S. Congress and state legislators, check out http://congress.nw.dc.us/c-span/congdir.htm It's even more complete than the one online provided by the Republican leadership of the U.S. Congress. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . George Spitzer was already in jail in connection with the alleged rapes of three women. Soon his twin brother Stefan, also 40, of Marina del Rey, California, was arrested and also charged with rape. Police found a cache of video tapes which show at least one of the men raping a number of women who appear to be drugged. A supply of Rohypnol was found in their apartment but authorities do not know if the date-rape drug was the one used in the videos. The twins are attempting to cover for each other and claiming the women were engaging in consensual sex and having a good time. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . The news media, including Tom Brokaw who just carried on so, has made a lot about the divorce of Princess - now commoner - Di and jug ears. Chatter, chatter, blather, blather. And not one of them said anything about modern divorce being a better way than how British kings used to do it: with an ax. So, frankly most women go "hurrah for divorce." Ooops - that's another thing that the religious right reactionary renegades are against: divorce. They want to go back to biblical standards of marriage until death: Stoning women, I guess. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . Moonshadow questioned my statement opposing the New York Board of Education girls-only school policy. "Am I to understand from this," she wrote, "that you would not support an institution the likes of Mills College, Smith, Wellesley, etc.? Or you only railing at the establishment of publicly funded same sex schools? I think a clarification might be in order." Railing? Tsk. As I have written several times: when tax dollars are used, the educational system MUST be equally accessible to all sexes, religions, ethnic groups, etc., in keeping with the U.S Constitution and confirmed in _Brown v Brown_, the landmark case for black integration. The awareness that the U.S. Constitution spells out equality for matters supported by tax dollars is why even the Texas Women's College allows men to enroll. If we want equal rights then *we* must believe in equal rights. . . . . . . . ^c^c^ . . . . . . . One in eight women in our country will develop breast cancer during her lifetime, compared to one in 20 a generation ago. At least 46,000 American women will die of breast cancer this year. Time for your monthly breast exam - remember, the breast you examine is the one you want to keep. ....................... * ........................ 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.<<<< To receive Catt's Claws by email, write and in the body of the note The archives are located at http//www.imageworld.com/istuber.html We thank Jennifer Gagliardi for handling the madding Catt's Claws subscription list through her listserv.