I’ve wanted to comment on both these stories, but time and tide have washed up excellent posts that I can’t improve upon.
Bernice Balconey on Benazir Bhutto’s assassination.
Lauren on Jamie-Lyn Spears’ pregnancy at age 16.
I realise that the juxtaposition of the assassination of a world leader and a scandal involving a teen celebrity may seem a bit jarring, given that politics is considered purely serious and celebritism is considered purely trivial, but both women have led public lives that contribute to the aggregate discussion about the expanding roles for women in most societies. Both women have aspired to more than an average or quiet life, and both women have discovered that such aspirations bring difficulties in their wake.
May Pakistan’s social organisations be spurred to honour Bhutto’s vision (if not her actual achievements which were tainted by corruption) for a stable secular state, and may Spears find that motherhood can be the positive experience that she anticipates (at least she has the financial resources to support her child comfortably on her own if necessary).
The comments at Lauren’s include the inevitable wally who seems to assume that pregnancies only occur if the couple is taking no contraceptive measures at all – why don’t more people understand that contraceptives tip the odds in favour of not conceiving, but that none of them guarantee that conception will not take place? Do people simply not listen in Personal Health classes?
Categories: ethics & philosophy, law & order, Sociology
Privacy, Transparency, Surveillance and Sousveillance 
Hoyden About Town 
In the US the absitence-only programs teach that birth control is destined to fail, and that extra-marital sex will inevitably lead to psychological trauma, if not disease. But naturally it’s still okay to shame someone for supposedly not using those measures. Of course, whether or not she used contraceptive measures is irrelevant now– it’s not like she’s more deserving of support if she used contraception. The real problem is that society believes that women’s bodies– and particularly pregnant women’s bodies are public property; this is only enhanced by Jamie-Lynn’s celebrity status. Everyone feels like they have a right to tell her what she should have done/should do because they see her as a piece of public property, not as a person.
What do you think of recent reports that the father is actually a much older man, and that Casey Aldridge is merely claiming fathership to avoid a statutory rape charge? If this is true, and the father is actually her boss who is many years older than Jamie-Lynn, I’d have no problem with him being prosecuted, but as far as I can tell, Jamie-Lynn has made no such claim. As with the birth-control issue, this seems to be another one of those inherently contradictory things: when a woman claims that she has been raped, she’s likely to be called a liar. But here people are trying to represent her as a rape victim. Could this be the public property thing again? People feel that they have the right to scrutinise her life even more if it was statutory rape? That’s not to say it isn’t true– obviously adult abusers cover this sort of thing up all the time, and convince their victim to go along with it– I’m just sceptical of all this public “concern” that she may have been raped when that same public is usually so reluctant to believe women who do come forward with these claims.
I hadn’t heard the latest details of the scandal, Beppie.
Word.
why don’t more people understand that contraceptives tip the odds in favour of not conceiving, but that none of them guarantee that conception will not take place?
Why do more feminists not understand that the object of the game is not to debate the fricken bloody obvious, but that the object of the game is to continue the game?
And to continue the game, you stretch it out as long as possible by throwing out obviously stupid crap which has to be painstakingly refuted, one point at a time.
How do you stop that kind of game? That is the next question.
Hoydon, thanks for the insight, that was helpful. Please, is it my imagination or do most feminists not look at the big picture? Surely they do, but why am I the only one who winds up thinking men are worthless?
m Andrea’s last blog post..How to Blame the Patriarchy by a Feminazi
I suspect the people who ask “why weren’t they using contraception?” are people for whom contraception has worked 100% of the time they weren’t trying to get pregnant.
But some of us have living breathing proof that contraception, even in grown up educated and careful hands, does not always work.
Poor kid(s), all the people who have a go at teenagers for getting pregnant would do well to remember that harassing people doesn’t make them better parents.
m Andrea, I apologise for your comment being held in moderation for so long, I was out for a family day yesterday and didn’t get on the computer when I came home (for a change).
Your conclusion that “men are worthless” seems absurd to me, even though I agree with you that people who try and focus on easily rebuttable trivia all the time are often playing rhetorical games. In my experience, not all men, not by a long shot, play such games: just because a substantial number of defenders of the status quo do so is no reason to assume that *all* men are innately essentially on their side.
It’s quite amusing that you’ve “m Andrea” has left a comment about obviousness and such things, but has left a comment that is not only bleeding obvious and predictable, but also has a really really obvious blog.
Using the feminazi word is sooooooo original.
Ho hum, more boys hiding behind stupid names who won’t own their own women hating, fear of women etc etc
I think “m Andrea” is trying to drum up business for his blog so beware any female blogger who has a feminist blog. He’ll be around soon to make an obvious comment.
That should have read:
It’s quite amusing that “m Andrea”…
Silly feminazi me.
Darlene I don’t think mAndrea is a he at all but a feminist genuinely frustrated with the game playing. I don’t agree with her conclusion either but I absolutely understand the frustration.