This Week in Stoopid: Bigots, Religists and Misogynists, Oh My! [Updated]

OH, it’s been a great week for Stoopid.  Of course, that means not such a great week for humanity.  Usually, I feature just one person – but this week we’re spoiled for Stoopid.

Actually we always are, but this week, I just had to get it all out in one fell swoop.  It is what my blog is for after all – well that, and so I don’t annoy the heck out of Steven with my rants.

I want to apologize that almost all the Stoopid I’ve highlighted in this post is based in the US.  We all know that Stoopid happens all over the world, and I will make an effort to be more inclusive next time.

1. First up today are the legislators in Mississippi, Texas, South Dakota, Indiana, Oklahoma, Kansas, Minnesota, Georgia, Arizona, Louisiana.  I know.  That’s a lot of people, but they all deserve to be here.  I won’t stop blogging about these kinds of issues ever, because they’re just too damn important.  It isn’t just a Pro-Choice thing anymore.  This runs the gamut of women’s health, and the well-being of girls and women all over the US are at risk because of these laws.

I’m going to shut up now, before I say lot of things that probably shouldn’t be in print.

Just click on on the screen-cap to learn more.

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2. Updated: May 25, 2011 @12:37pm

I knew I forgot something.  Last week, one of my friends of FB posted about this brave and awesome Saudi woman, who has been protesting the law that females can’t drive in Saudi Arabia – by driving.  I just got on FB today, and  another friend posted that she’s been arrested.  I don’t think I really need to say anything else, do I?

Click on this.  [This screen -cap is courtesy of  Al-Jazeera by way of the Atheist Media Blog.]

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3. I’d only just read about these people in the city of Bastrop, Louisiana, who have made it their business to make Damon Fowler think he’s less of a person for believing in the constitution.  Perhaps some of you have already heard of Damon Fowler – the high school student, who also happens to be an atheist…in Louisiana, USA.  He recently protested a planned prayer to be said at his high school’s official graduation.  When he sent a letter to the school, citing the ACLU, they backed down.  And then the proverbial s@#$ hit the fan.  (link to the post from Damian and the follow-up from his brother on Reddit)  Cue the ostracizing, sanctioned by the school district and carried out by a whole community.  And, after all this, take a look (and read) to see what still happened at commencement  rehearsal – courtesy of Hemant Mehta@The Friendly Atheist, and then at the actual graduation ceremony.

If I remember correctly, at my high school (in small-town-just-outside-of Cleveland-Ohio), we had a “Baccalaureate”, that was basically a non-denominational church service, separate from  the graduation ceremony but on graduation weekend – which was optional (except for those of us in the choir – lol!)  – and then we had the actual commencement ceremony,  during which I don’t remember having said any prayers or even had a “Moment of Silence”.  That seemed to work well…

Damon Fowler is one brave kid.  I, for one, am proud of him and I support him 100% (and I sent him an email to that effect because he could use all the support he can get right now).   I wish him an excellent life OUTside of Bastrop, Louisiana and far away from the school district and its denizens.  It’s not the first time something like this has happened, and it won’t be the last, but I’m watching.  And, I’m not alone. 

Below is the original post from Damon (which is linked to the Rock Beyond Belief blog that I originally read it in).

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3.  At the top of any self-respecting list of Stoopid belong those people who not only oppose, but OVERTURN anti-discrimination laws – as Governor Bill Haslam (R) and roughly 75% of the men and women in the Tennessee state legislature have done a few days ago.  How disgusting of a person do you have to be to do something like this.  I’m so heartily sick of GLBTs being treated as if they’re the root of all evil, because there’s obviously NOTHING in the world more important than making sure they will never be treated as equals in the eyes of the law.

Click on this.

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4. And, finally, we have the last but certainly not the least of this week’s Stoopids.  As you guys know, I blogged the Rapture-That-Wasn’t on Saturday.  Faced with such blatant CRAZY, there were few other ways I felt that I could have gone about my post, which was not one I was ever going to write.  But, after a brainstorm in the witching hours, I outlined the whole thing in my head and ran with it.  I didn’t sleep on Friday night at all and updated it in real-time all of Saturday.  It was obviously done with a lot of snark and jollification and with my tongue planted firmly in my cheek. 

Nevertheless, I want to make it clear that I think these people are dangerous – to themselves, and to the world we live in.  What is more dangerous than a whole group of people practically salivating at the destruction of our world at the hands of an angry, petulant, mass murderer of a God who they think is on their side?  They are beyond all rationality and almost beyond all help.  In addition, certainly there has been tragedy along with the hilarity – and while these people were responsible for their own actions, Harold Camping now also shares responsibility for these deaths.  However, it is clear that not only is he unchastised, but he’s at it again.  It seems he was simply off by a few months.  Apparently, his millions simply aren’t enough for him and he’s going to milk this for all it’s worth.  Now, whether his followers/believers have had enough from him, I don’t know and I don’t care.  After all, these are people who are willing to excuse Camping’s failed prediction on the grounds that we can’t know when the End is coming, only that it is undoubtedly coming.  I call it the big “Screw You” to the rest of us, and I DO NOT trust these people with my planet.

I wish I could say that I don’t have any friends who believes in this bulls@#$, but I do – not among any of the friends I’ve made since I left the afore mentioned school in small-town-just-outside-of-Cleveland-Ohio, though.

These people get extra super special mention in this week’s “This Week in Stoopid“.

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Imagine not having the right to drive…

because of your gender

tomorrow, when i get up, I'm driving to the library to return a book

in Saudi Arabia, i couldn't do this

imagine not ever being able to just get in the car to do errands; take your kids to school; visit friends; go to work or just go on a road trip

because a bunch of men got together and found yet another way to interpret your religion to curb your freedom

driving is something so many of us take for granted

independence of movement

freedom from control of movement

imagine having to fight for the right to drive a car

just because you're a woman

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/23/AR2007092300862.html?wpisrc=newsletter

Saudi Women Petition for Right to Drive
Challenge Poses Risks in Sole Country Where Only Men May Take the Wheel

By Faiza Saleh Ambah
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, September 24, 2007; A09

DHAHRAN, Saudi Arabia, Sept. 23 — For the first time since a demonstration in 1990, a group of Saudi women is campaigning for the right to drive in this conservative kingdom, the only country in the world that prohibits female drivers.

After spreading the idea through text messages and e-mails, the group's leaders said they collected more than 1,100 signatures online and at shopping malls for a petition sent to King Abdullah on Sunday.

"We don't expect an answer right away," said Wajeha al-Huwaider, 45, an education analyst who co-founded the group. "But we will not stop campaigning until we get the right to drive."

The kingdom follows one of the world's strictest interpretations of Islam. Women in Saudi Arabia, a deeply patriarchal society, cannot travel, marry or rent lodging without permission from a male guardian.

Powerful clerics in Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's holiest shrines, say that allowing women to drive would lead to Western-style freedoms and an erosion of traditional values.

The driving ban applies to all women, Saudi and foreign.

Public transportation is limited, and though taxis are common in major cities, women tend not to use them because riding with male strangers is deemed unsafe.

Some women can afford to hire live-in drivers; others rely on male relatives to drive them.

Though live-in chauffeurs are all male, they are not viewed as a threat because they are foreigners, often from the Philippines or the Indian subcontinent, and are considered unlikely to develop relationships with the women.

Many women reject this argument. "Women and their children are at the mercy of sexual harassment by these foreign drivers, and we know many incidents of this happening," said Fouzia al-Ayouni, a retired school administrator. "It is much safer, and more appropriate, for women to chauffeur themselves and their children around."

When she was first married, Ayouni recalled, her baby became ill one night. Her husband, a democracy advocate, was in jail, so she went out into the street at 2 a.m., holding the sick child and trying to find a ride to the hospital. She finally reached a brother-in-law, who drove her to the emergency room.

The last time Saudi women lobbied for the right to drive was in 1990 during the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Forty-seven women were briefly detained for driving in a convoy of 15 cars in the capital, Riyadh. The women were banned from traveling, lost their jobs and were ostracized by their families and acquaintances.

Though no laws explicitly ban people from gathering signatures or circulating petitions, independent political or social activity is frowned upon in Saudi Arabia, and rights activists are routinely imprisoned.

Ayouni, a 48-year-old mother of three, counted the possible consequences of agitating for change. "We could be detained, we could lose our jobs, and we could be banned from traveling," she said. "But if we get the right to drive, it would be worth it."

The petition has received more attention overseas than in Saudi Arabia, where the news media are government-controlled and the issue was taboo until several years ago.

But Saudi Arabia has slowly become more open since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Ayouni said. The shock of Saudis being largely involved in the attacks forced the country to reevaluate its ultraconservative lifestyle, and many subjects that had been off-limits are now discussed more openly in the media.

"The Internet and satellite television have also brought new ideas," said Ayouni, whose 16-year-old daughter also signed the petition.

Letters to al-Watan newspaper on Saturday responding to an article about the petition were almost equally divided for and against.

"Allowing women to drive will only bring sin. The evils it would bring, mixing between the genders, temptations, and tarnishing the reputation of devout Muslim women, outweigh the benefits," wrote one man.

Others expressed admiration for what one called the group's "daring and courage" in tackling the issue.

Huwaider, the group's co-founder, is no stranger to controversy. During last year's war in Lebanon, she stood on the bridge between Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, holding a placard addressed to King Abdullah. "Give Saudi Women Their Rights," it said.

She was detained and interrogated, and had to sign a petition pledging not to demonstrate again. But the most humiliating part, she said, was waiting at the police station until her male guardian, her brother, could arrive to pick her up.

"The whole Arab world was inflamed at what was happening in Lebanon," she said. "And I wanted to say: Yes, that's bad, but why don't you look closer to home and see how bad our lives are here?"

At a meeting at Huwaider's house last week, the women in the group, the Association for the Protection and Defense of Women's Rights in Saudi Arabia, went over their campaign. Ayouni, in black pants and a long black-and-gold top, paced back and forth in platform sandals as she spoke on her cellphone with a BBC reporter calling from the United Arab Emirates.

"It's not a luxury, it's a necessity," she said. "Many women support their entire families and can't afford paying half their salary to a driver."

Ayouni said her group had at least "broken a barrier of fear that Saudi women had of asking for their rights."

"That has been our major achievement. And we want the authorities to know that we're here, that we want to drive, and that many people feel the way we do," she said.

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