Posts by Rachel Neumann

Rachel Neumann is Rights & Liberties Editor at AlterNet.

No "Roe v. Wade for Men"
Posted by Rachel Neumann on July 24, 2006 at 3:20 PM.

Matthew Dubay thought that he shouldn't have to pay child support because he was under the impression, when he had unprotected sex with a woman, that she couldn't get pregnant. Turns out, despite what she said, she could. Dubay felt so aggrieved that not only did he refuse to pay child support, but he filed a lawsuit to declare Michigan's paternity law unconstitutional. He called his lawsuit "Roe v. Wade for Men," which is particularly dumb, because Roe v. Wade, what's left of it, actually benefits men, and society as a whole, just as much as it benefits women.

Last week, a Federal judge dismissed his lawsuit.

Dubay had argued that men "have a right to procreate" and a "right not to procreate."

Well, no. A right to procreate would basically be a right to rape. No one, man or woman, has an innate "right" to procreate.

Do people have a right not to procreate? Sure, as the many childfree will be happy to tell you. Roger at Blogging Baby puts it well: "No man should be forced to have sex at all, nor should they be forced to have sex without protection. What Mr. Dubay fails to realize is that he has -- and, more importantly, had -- the right to avoid procreation. He failed, unfortunately, to exercise that right when he had sex without wearing a condom. Because he did not take steps to prevent the pregnancy, he is fully responsible for it."

Bush personally stopped eavesdropping probe
Posted by Rachel Neumann on July 18, 2006 at 11:34 AM.

There really is something in the Justice Department called the Office of Professional Responsibility, unfortunately, it seems to be on an extended margarita vacation. After all, it announced earlier this year it could not pursue an investigation into the blatantly illegal wiretapping of American citizens. Why couldn't it? According to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, it's because the President wouldn't grant investigators "security clearance" to investigate.

It was pretty clear from the beginning that Bush had personally authorized the National Security Agency to monitor — without court warrants — the international communications of people on U.S. soil. But why no one from the Justice Department challenged that authorization, on the grounds of is blatant illegality, can only be explained by blatant cowardice.

But hey, it's all water under the bridge, right? Bush has realized that with this Congress, he can just get them to pass a new law that says he doesn't need any authorization to spy on U.S. citizens. So let me get this straight. If the President says so, then he can do whatever he wants. If Congress says so, the President can do whatever he wants. Funny thing is, if you look at the Office of Perfessional Responsibility's Website, it's clear they are a few attorneys short. They's got the job posting right here. Any takers?

Just two questions
Posted by Rachel Neumann on July 12, 2006 at 3:16 PM.

If your child became an adolescent or teenager in the past two years, you can thank the Supreme Court and George W. Bush for the fact that your child has now taken thousands of more tests than ever before. Kids aren't just taking more written tests, although they are doing that (from Kindergarten on up, "No Child Left Behind" means every child tested within an inch of its life), they're also more than four times as likely as they were two years ago to take a drug test.

In 2002, the Supreme Court ruled that random testing of student athletes and others in competitive extracurricular activities did not violate the students' privacy rights, the Bush administration has made testing middle- and high-school students a priority. In the 2005-06 school year, 373 public secondary schools got federal money for testing, up from 79 schools two years ago. And Bush has asked Congress to further increase the amount for drug testing, up to $15 million dollars in 2007. Some schools just test those involved in athletics, or school clubs. Others, such as the Nettle Creek School District in Indiana, want to randomly test all students.

Is any of this causing teenagers to uses less drugs? The results are confidential, and it seems like a lot of money to spend for something that no one knows if it works at all. Besides, even if teenagers are using less drugs during school hours, testing kids, and then "failing" those who test positive, is a pretty dumb way to get kids to engage in less risky behavior.

Risky behavior, according to the New York Times and the Department of Homeland Security, includes such things as going to the petting zoo in Woodland, Alabama and attending the Apple and Pork Festival in Clinton, Illinois. I could see how anything with the words Clinton and Pork in it could get some people riled up, but the petting zoo seems rather tame and the Mule Day Parade in Tennessee looks very charming. I guess I'm confused by the logic. If the Times leaking the story that the Feds are collecting bank records could get the Bush administration all up in arms that we're giving something away to terrorists, wouldn't leaking the location of the Apple and Pork Festival be just as harmful, if not more so? The stories, point, of course, is that the list needs to be updated and that, based on the current target list, those red and amber alerts mean as little as you suspected they did. Still, I think the real problem is that the Mule Day Parade could get a lot more crowded this coming year. After all, who wouldn't drive a ways for a chance to look at a genuine terrorist target? Perhaps they can institute random drug testing at the entrance to keep us all safe.

Belated anti-hybrid hype
Posted by Rachel Neumann on July 6, 2006 at 2:12 PM.

Evan pretty much said what I was going to say about the homophobes who are somehow obsessed from keeping gays from getting married. (I'm not married, so I don't know, but my question to the married people out there: is it really that particularly special a thing that heterosexuals have to keep gays from doing it? And if it's related to love, isn't it still true that if you "give it away, you end up having more?") So instead, I'll just ask about something that's been bothering me ever since the Fourth of July.

I went with friends and my small child to the Alameda Fourth of July parade, which is your basic small town parade with veterans and saxaphones and old cars and waving elected officials and, sadly, not very many costumes. After waving our anti-war flags at the NRA and various other contigents, we got to the progressive section of the parade, where the Women in Pink and Impeach Bush bus were strolling by, followed by about twenty middle-to-upper-class folks driving by in their hybrids, all with signs that proudly stated their gas mileage. "I get fifty miles per gallon!" One sign said, to our slightly lackluster cheers.

I thought of my own car, over 10 years old, that probably doesn't get even half that. And I'm pregnant and transporting a small child a large distance, so biking isn't an option. Because of where I work, sadly, neither is public transportation.

But isn't it still environmentally better than going out and buying a new fancy hybrid, even if, hypothetically, I could afford one? The Washington Post recently asked if it was "moral" to drive a gas-guzzling vehicle. But if it's an old one, and the whole family fits, isn't it more moral than getting some corporate job, if you even can land one, to be able to make more money to buy an expensive new hybrid? And shouldn't changes in fuel emissions be a national priority, not a personal consumer choice, since we all have to breathe the air and put on the extra sunscreen? And does all the cheering for hybrids actually lessen the imperative to get all cars to use alternative fuels or have some kind of converters?

I'm not against hybrids. My mom has one and, because she can use the car pool lane by herself now, is much more likely to be on time to babysit. But is my mom in her new hybrid really saving more gas than an old jalopy filled with five people? And if so, isn't the situation dire enough that we should declare a moratorium on all non-hybrid driving and let everyone trade in their old cars for new ones, free of charge. Or, if it's clogged roads that are a big part of the problem and the whole car-trade thing is just too far-fetched, I'd be fine if my medium-sized city just got some decent affordable public transportation.

Death=innocence
Posted by Rachel Neumann on July 5, 2006 at 1:55 PM.

Enron's Ken Lay, recently convicted of lying and defrauding investors and employees, died of a heart attack at his vacation home in Aspen, Colorado this morning. Peter G. over at TalkLeft, pointed out this key fact about Ken Lay's death:

[W]hen a defendant in a federal criminal case dies prior to sentencing, the entire prosecution process "abates" -- all the way back to the beginning. The indictment will be dismissed; Lay will be deemed to have died without a conviction and without a criminal record.

Lay was due to be sentenced in October. I'm all for forgiving in death and while I expect this may bring some comfort to his family, it's hard to forget it will also make it more difficult for the thousands of broke ex-Enron workers if they try to sue his estate to recover lost pensions or other lost wages. It's unclear whether the government will continue to pursue a 43 million dollar lawsuit against Lay and Skilling or whether civil cases will be allowed to go forward.

Cell phone drivers vs. drunk drivers
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 30, 2006 at 3:36 PM.

I was going to write something cynical about the Supreme Court's rebuke of the Bush administration's secret military tribunals, but because it's the last even slightly progressive thing we're likely to hear from the Court in a long time, and because it's a long weekend (for many), I'll focus on safety instead:

Whatever you do this Fourth of July, whether it be light fireworks, drink, or barbque with flaming coals, just don't talk on your cell phone and drive.

A new study that drviing while talking on your cell phone is as dangerous, if not more so, than drinking (at .08 blood alcohol level) and driving, whether or not you use one of those hands-free devices.

To the relatively small sample size of the study (40 people), I can add my own anectodal experience. I was hit head on by someone who was talking on her cell phone while attempting an illegal left turn. Even when the driver smashed into my car in the middle of the intersection, totaling both my car and hers, she never got off her phone. It was only when the police came (and pried me out of my car) and requested that she hang up that she did so. And no, it wasn't an emergency call.

But whose to blame for these accidents? Laws that say it's ok to yak and drive? The cell-phones themselves? Certainly not, says an "industry spokesman" who sounds a hell of a lot like the gun lobby:

An industry spokesman said cell phones don't cause accidents, people do.

"If cell phones were truly the culprit some studies make them out to be, it's only logical that we'd see a huge spike in the number of accidents [since their introduction]," said John Walls, a vice president at the industry group, the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association-The Wireless Association. "To the contrary, we've experienced a decline in accidents, and an even more impressive decline in the accident rate per million miles driven," he said.

It's not clear where he's getting his statistics about the decline in accidents and how much, if any, can be linked to cell phone use. Your best bet is still to tay off the phone while driving, or better yet, take public transportation. There are no reports of increased bus accidents while passengers yak on their phones. Not yet, anyway.

Right-handed gay fetuses
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 27, 2006 at 10:07 AM.

I've never liked the political language of "choice," whether it's applied to sexuality, reproductive rights, or the work world. It's always struck me as too airy and artificial a concept, isolated from the sociological, economical, biological mess of life. And a new study by scientists at Brock University in Ontario finds that, in relation to male homosexuality, "choice" doesn't have that much to do with it.

In 1997, a study showed that whether a man's chance of being gay increases by a third with each elder male brother he has. But the original study didn't speculate whether this was because of social-cultural factors in the house or biological factors. This new study looked specifically at the influence of genetically related male siblings (as opposed to those connected through adoption or marriage) and also looked at whether it mattered if the siblings were raised in the same house. The study found that only biological siblings influence the chances of the younger male sibling being gay, and that they influence it even if they haven't been raised in the same house as the younger sibling. In other words, the gayness starts in the womb, or maybe in the zygote.

There's no similar correlation for homosexuality in women. Also, in an odd related finding the correlation between gayness and elder brothers seems to be true for right-handed males. Other research had previously uncovered that both men and women who are left-handed are slightly more likely to be gay.

Who knows what other factors are yet to be discovered: perhaps a link between a pregnant woman's craving for rice pudding and the chances of her unborn daughter becoming a lesbian? Are pregnant women with cats more likely to have lesbians and pregnant women with dogs more likely to give birth to gay male babies?

And if we really explore it, perhaps other correlations exist. As the first-born Jewish girl, was there some chemical in the womb that predicated I'd fall in love with a goy farm boy?

All I'm saying is, this study is a good opportunity with those many with lingering homophobia to get over it. Will it make a difference? Unlikely. As one anti-gay group said when presented with the new evidence: We don't believe that there's any biological basis for homosexuality. 'We feel the causes are complex but are deeply rooted in early childhood development.''

"My son could no longer be silent while atrocities were committed in the name of democracy."
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 26, 2006 at 1:29 PM.

On Friday, the Stryker Brigade was deployed to Iraq. The mother of Ehren Watada, the officer in the brigade who refused to go, sent this letter to explain her son's actions:

Dear Fellow Americans,

I am the mother of Lt. Ehren Watada, an officer stationed at Ft. Lewis. He is part of a Stryker brigade unit that deployed today to Iraq. Despite an unflinching commitment to his men and to democratic ideals, he chose not to accompany his men. His decision came through much soul-searching and through research and consultation with experts across disciplines, inside and outside of the military and the government.

After weighing the evidence, he came to the conclusion that he could no longer be silent while atrocities were committed in the name of democracy. He could no longer be a tool of an administration that used deception and lies to make the case for pre-emptive war.

As a member of the armed forces, sworn to uphold the US Constitution, he refuses to blindly participate in a war of aggression, an illegal war that undermines who we are as a nation and violates international law. Implicit in his oath as an officer is the duty to disobey all unlawful orders for; to carry out these orders renders him an accomplice to a criminal act. Furthermore, to order his men to participate in a war of aggression multiplies his guilt a thousand fold. His conscience will not permit him to do so. He believes that he can best serve them by taking a stand against the war. In so doing, he demonstrates that one does not relinquish the freedom to choose what is right, even in the military, and that the freedom to choose what is right transcends the allegiance to man and institutions.

As a mother, I have evolved from fearing for his safety and for his future to the realization that there is a higher purpose to all that has transpired. My son no longer stands at the crossroads. He has chosen "the road less travelled." Come what may, he is committed to staying the course.

I invite you to affirm your support of Lt. Ehren Watada on June 27th, National Day of Action. On this day, groups across the country will participate in peaceful demonstrations, prayer services, candle light vigils, parades, leafleting, visitations to recruitment stations to provide counsel to prospective recruits.

For updates on news and actions regarding Lt. Watada, please check out: www.thankyoult.org or www.couragetoresist.org.

My deepest thanks,

Carolyn Ho
Ehren's Mom

Buy My Baby
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 23, 2006 at 1:01 PM.

Just the other day, I was naive enough to worry about blatant advertising for make-up in young adult novels, but that was before a friend told me aboutBuyJake.com. For ten thousand dollars, you can get your company's name tattoed on the toddler's forehead for a month. For a year, the cost is a hundred thousand dollars. Questions? Talk to his publicist.

The woman who made $4,000 by advertising space on her belly on Ebay is one thing. It's cringe-inducing, but it's her body and if she want to sell it I suppose she can. In fact, it's she's become part of a trend with a number of bellies available on Ebay. A woman in New Zealand is even starting a business called Bump It Up that specifically connects advertisers with pregnant women who need money and would be willing to sell their belly space.

But selling your children's bodies, even your children's forehead, is another thing altogether. Even if there's still quite a bit of debate about when personhood begins, almost everyone agrees that once a baby is out and toddling around it is most definitely it's own person. A person with a rapidly growing brain who doesn't need the words "Golden Casino" tattoed on his forehead, even if it's only temporary.

The money for all this advertising goes into a savings account for Jake for when he's bigger. In fact, as the parents write, via Jake's voice, on his "blog": "My Mom does not need and is not going to use a dime of my money." But the problem with it isn't the money involved, it's the impmrinting to that young child that everything, even you, are for sale.

Gender confusion, five-year-old style
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 22, 2006 at 1:38 PM.

Nicole, a 5-year-old who just wants to go swimming with her friends, doesn't understand what all the fuss is about. And, reading an article that calls her the country's youngest transgender child, neither can I.

Nicole was born male but wears dresses and has long hair and thinks she's a girl. Her parents let him. No problem there, as far as I'm concerned. Will things be hard in kindergarten? Probably, but then it seems to me that while lots of children are acting out socially-approved gender roles by this age, a good many of them still aren't. And five seems a bit young to be forcing them to make a choice or making such a big deal out of what they do choose. (Actually, any age seems a bit young to me to force someone to choose a gender.) It's not clear what bad would happen to Nicole, and a number of other children like him/her, if they were allowed to just play with being whaterver gender they want, for as long as they wanted.

While Nicole's parents (who have three other children who seem more traditionally gendered), are trying to deal with it in the best way they know how, by respecting their child's choices, the reporter for the story seems more excited by all the lurid details:

"Minutes later, [Nicole] scampers back, now as naked as a jaybird except for her underwear. Without the dress, you can clearly see her penis, tucked carefully into her pink patterned panties."

Nicole has been insisting she's female since she could talk, her parents say. "He has always been attracted to the flowers, the bright colors, his Barbie dolls, and his beloved mermaids," the mother says (she switches pronouns throughout the article). Yes, but aren't many children?

The story gets more disturbing when it talks about what's happened to children who've made this choice before. In 2000, a 6 year old child was taken away from his parents becuase they attempted to enroll him and send him to school as a girl. Zachary/Aurora was diagnosed with "gender confusion" and hospitalized.

And the story ends on a particularly disturbing note:

"What would you change about yourself?" the reporter asks Nicole.

"Mm... my penis," Nicole murmurs.

"What would you do with it?" her mother asks.

"Cut it," Nicole replies.


When Nicole reaches an age where she can make this decision for herself, that will be one thing for for her and her parents to deal with. In the meantime, like any other five year old, she'll have to deal with the challenges of starting kindergarten. Only she'll have the extra challenge not of her gender choices, but of societal disapproval.

Police say No to the Feds
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 21, 2006 at 12:12 PM.

U.S. Customs and Immigration has been travelling the U.S., asking local police departments to do the Feds' job and track down undocumented workers. But police, mayors, and city councils of some of the counrty's biggest cities are saying no. In fact, a national group representing 57 big-city police chiefs warned this month that local enforcement of federal immigration laws would "undermine trust and cooperation" among immigrants.
Perhaps they're remembering that their mandate is to help stop actual crimes in process and help the community instead of harassing people who may be victims of violent crimes.

According to a front page USA Today story, Police chiefs, mayors and city councils are ordering local cops not to get involved in the federal crack down.

"Vulnerable people have always needed to see the police as being there to protect and serve, and that can't happen when the first words out of a cop's mouth are, 'I need to see your papers,' " Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak said.

Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt also had some words of common sense: "We have spent many years ... getting special communities to talk to us, to report crime, to be witnesses. If we stop individuals (to ask about immigration status), we would lose all of that."

Mayor Rybak also asked federal agents to stop wearing vests labeled "police." The agents have not altered their wardrobes. And the Minneapolis City Council voted in 2003 to prevent police from asking about immigration status or enforcing immigration laws. Chicago passed a similiar resoultion this year.

Of course, some police chiefs have been only too happy to help in the crack down. Leading the charge are th state police in Alabama and Florida, the Arizona corrections department (thanks to the very scary Sherrif Arpaio) and sheriff's departments in San Bernardino, Los Angeles and Riverside counties in California and Mecklenburg County, N.C.

If only all the refugees looked like celebrities
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 20, 2006 at 10:47 AM.

I thought I would be writing something cynical today about how all the hype and focus on refugees for just one day of the year wasn't going to make much of a difference, but after scanning the major news media and not finding a single top headline about refugees, I realized I'd have to write something about them being ignored 365 days instead of just 364.

Apparently, even having celebrities having refugee children isn't enough to get them much attention.

Which is too bad for the nine million people, the majority of them children, with no safe place to go.

Amnesty International has a good list of the facts behind the refugee statistics and AlertNet points out that one of the main reasons girls in these refugee camps don't go to school isn't just ideological, it's practical: no separate bathrooms, no female teachers, and no means to get the required school clothes.

Perhaps part of the problem is that talking about refugees requires us to talk about Palestine and Darfur. It requires talking about solutions that include either, ideally, repatriation into their countries of origin if they are safe enough, integration into whatever country they are in, or asylum and resettlement to a third country. Ironically, it is often other very poor countries that are most likely to offer asylum. Last year, the U.S. took in 54,800 refugees. Given our own problems resettling New Orleans residents, and the hysteria over immigration, I wonder if the numbers for 2006 will be even less.

Nike is doing its part, it says, by sending refugees 40,000 footballs. Perhaps we can send them some fashion designers as well and then refugees will start getting the attention they need, and maybe even some toilets.

There's a lipstick ad in my book
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 19, 2006 at 1:53 PM.

It's not clear if Cathy's Book, a young adult novel with copius specific mentions of Cover Girl make-up products, is a book. Given the developer, the authors (two guys who have never been adolescent girls and do not currently have daughters that fit this description), the fake authors, the illustrators, and the many marketing professionals involved, it's more of an ensemble.

Cover Girl doesn't even have to pay for the advertising references, sprinkled throughout the book. All they agree to do is promote the book on one of their websites.

These two quotes are particularly bad:

"What we are selling here to the customer or the reader is an experience that transcends the book itself," said David Steinberger, president and chief executive of Perseus, the publisher. "The relationships with Beinggirl.com and Cover Girl are enriching that experience."

But the whole idea of reading is that it's the imagination, not the product placement, that "enriches the experience."

And here's the rationale of the publisher:
"There's a risk in putting so much emphasis on the Cover Girl relationship that it comes across as a crass commercial project," he said. "But it's not."


Oh wait, though, the two guy authors do hae some standards. References to make-up are fine, but they absolutely will not include references to branded tampons or other feminine hygiene products. "That would be very far over the edge," one of the authors said. I guess ads for contraception, or anything else that might be useful to teenage girls, would really be taking it too far.

"There's no more important issue than this one"
Posted by Rachel Neumann on June 7, 2006 at 1:47 PM.

The whole blow-up and blow-out of the gay marriage ammendment (which died today in the Senate) befuddles me. I find it hard to believe than anyone, much less 49 Senators, actually care that much whether strangers marry other strangers of the same gender. I mean, I care who the people I love marry, and hope-against-hope that it's someone I like, but other than that, I couldn't care less. There's plenty of married people, plenty of not married people, and plenty of children everywhere you look, so I really can't imagine a rational argument for changing the Constitution.

Obviously, David Ritter, a Republican Senator from Louisiana, disagrees with me: " I don't believe there's any issue that's more important than this one," he said. This, as War Room points out, from a man whose from state that just drowned during Hurricane Katrina. And here's the other thing, the last time the Senate voted on this issue, in 2004, 48 Senators voted for it. So, while it's still being defeated, you could say it's gaining ground.

But most Americans (who aren't deeply closeted or deeply evangelical or both) still don't seem to care about the ammendment. They're too busy voting their prejudices about undocumented immigrants. I agree with David Corn who argues that it will be the extent of the paranoia the GOP can whip up about immigration, rather than about gay marriage, that may determine who controls Congress in November.

If threats don't work, try bribery
Posted by Rachel Neumann on May 30, 2006 at 2:26 PM.

Perhaps you, like me, are one of those last stubborn hold-outs who still thinks that people should be able to choose for themselves whether or not to have children. Well, consider this. If laws that restrict your access to birth control and abortion don't work; there's always pseudo-science, and if, that fails, good old-fashioned palm greasing.

First, the Washington Post reports that new federal guidelines ask that doctors treat all women who are physically capable of having children as "pre-pregnant," regardless of whether or not they have any plans to have children.

The report acknowledges that "women with no plans to get pregnant in the near future may resist preconception care." Well, yes. Given that this "pre-pregnancy" care requires taking folic acid supplements and giving up smoking, it's no wonder that some women, who aren't planning on having children, might not take kindly to it. As Dan Savage writes, categorizing all women as "pre-pregnant" vessels, only makes sense in a dictatorial society where you're also categorizing all post-pubescent males as "pre-fathers," who should similarly give up smoking, take supplements, stop taking hot baths, and, while we're at, learn to change dirty diapers. (Hmm, doesn't sound too bad now that I think about it.)

Meanwhile, in the former Soviet Union, where people are just not having enough children, the government is trying bribery, offering the equivalent of US $36,000 to any woman who has a second child. Alas, as Slate points out, it's probably not going to work. After all, the cost of raising a child to seventeen is somewhere between $140,000 and $280,000. That's not including any pre-high school expenses or the loss of income when one parent stays home to take care of the child.

I'm not saying I wouldn't reject the $36,000 check if someone offered it to me, but I do have a little hint for those governments who really want more children. It won't guarantee your country is chock-full of kids but might help make it easier for those who do decide to help out the state of the union by reproducing: try national good quality health care; universal preschool and college; increased equality, and respect for women's reproductive and political rights. If that doesn't convince folks to have children then, hey, maybe they just don't want to.