Moving Day and Porn

I am moving out of Grand Forks, and heading to the big city! Well, no, not really- I'm actually just heading to Minneapolis/ St. Paul. But, bigger city at least :).

Over at Punkassblog, there's a great discussion going on about porn; who looks at it, the type consumed, and what it says for the feminist movement. Now, I'm a pretty sex-positive feminist: I look at porn, and I would never advocate for it to be banned, though I do think that misogynistic porn is still bad (wow, is that a simplistic analysis). But I wasn't always like this.

When packing up, you find weird things. One of the things I found was a planner from my senior year of high school, which I brought to college because I thought I would use the "quick fact sheet" in the front (FYI, I did not. You almost never use that stuff you learn in school, particularly in mathematics, unless that's what you go into.) And, I found in the back of it a conversation that I had with a friend of mine, that just so happened to be about porn.

A- "You wanna go to Minot tonight? Pleasure Palace here we come! You're 18 now, we have to go!"

Me- I have absolutely no desire to go to porno areas. I'll allow, but not participate. Besides, if I wanted to, I could get the real thing.

God, I was a snot. At this time in my life I was full on in my "saving myself for marriage, it's against God's will to pleasure myself", la la la, hypocritical bullshit. This was even more hypocritical when at this time in my life, I didn't believe a single word of it- god was no more real to me than the tooth fairy, but I wanted everyone to believe I was a good person, and the easiest way to do that was to be a "Good Christian Girl" (TM). I might have not masturbated, nor had sex, but my boyfriend and I had done everything but have sex. We would get all hot and heavy, and stop when I really wanted it, then congratulate myself on this restraint.

Possible TMI warning- but that vaunted virginity lasted about one year after this conversation. Guess I wasn't saving myself for marriage- I was saving myself for college.

Guest post

Lisa KS, one of my fellow PABs, would also like to put her story up to the cold, calculating stare of the internet. So, without further ado: The Wall.

Look, said one of Joni's squadmates, elbowing her sharply in the ribs. Look at him! Joni looked, past the pointing finger to the object of its focus. At first she saw nothing out of the ordinary: a recruit, a noob by the looks of his half-mown skull and skeletal frame, standing just inside the mess hall entrance. He did look even sicker than usual—her attention sharpened as she realized what it was about him that gave that impression, and her squadmate hissed into her ear again—Ain't never seen anybody that white!

He was white. He was white as a bleached sheet, white as the moon—Joni watched him sidle over to the food line; he was elbowed aside and stepped back after a moment, then tried again. He was allowed to stay that time, but now that she was paying attention, Joni noticed that he was standing in line with vets. Not noobs. She didn't have to try to remember if she ever did that, fresh out of training; she hadn't. Like everyone else, she had stuck with her own cycle. That first group that had shoved him back out of line—her eyes tracked them farther up and found them—noobs. Probably his noobs.

It happened that way sometimes, that everybody in a cycle took a dislike to one in particular. It wasn't often—it hadn't happened in Joni's cycle, two years ago—and she had only heard of it happening once since, though it might've happened more; she didn't pay much attention to the noob cycles. The one she'd heard of hadn't made it out of training. Accidents happened.

He looked like a corpse shuffling along in a line with the living. Joni tried to concentrate on her food—she had a shift outside coming up—but her attention kept wandering back to him. He didn't sit with any noobs, either—which meant he couldn't sit with anybody, and he ate standing up, next to the disposals. A few other people did too; somebody was always running late or in a hurry for some other reason. She watched him out of the corner of her eye as he finished up, dumped his tray and walked quickly out the door. Then she forgot about him.


* * * * *

Joni stood in formation with the rest of the squad, idly wondering what the day would bring—she was reasonably sure they wouldn't have to go outside again til next week at the earliest, and therefore didn't really care what assignment the squad pulled—when the platoon sergeant came striding into the briefing bay, the white noob of the day before trailing at his heels. Joni stared. The platoon sergeant rarely came to squad briefings. He certainly didn't escort noobs around the barracks. But there he was, and so was the noob.

He didn't leave them in suspense long. "Shut up," he advised, though the entire squad already had as soon as he'd entered, in unison as if slapped in its collective face. "This is Barkley. He's new. Treat him right." The platoon sergeant glanced down at his clipboard. "Johnson. He's yours. You're on garbage patrol. Take him with you, then get him settled down for the night."

He left. The noob walked over and stood gingerly at Joni's left shoulder. An explosive snort of laughter from in front of her woke her up sufficiently to wipe the horrified expression off her face and roughly settle the noob—Barkley—into proper position beside her. She didn't look at his face, but he was compliant enough; his uniform shirt, rough under her palms, felt like anyone else's. She stared straight ahead through the squad sergeant's arrival and assignments and token lecture on behavior, then motioned him to follow her with a jerk of her head. She was aware of the stares directed at her back and hated them, though she made a conscious effort not to hate the noob. It might not be his fault, the way his cycle obviously was about him, even his presence here. She preferred to reserve judgement.

Even if it killed her. She grimly ignored the catcalls and snickers as she marched the noob to her room; she'd known she was going to get a new roommate sooner than later, nobody ever got to keep a single for long.

His gear was strewn across her bed. She took a deep breath, turned, and met the noob's stare head-on. He was staring. She managed not to glare back. "That's the open bed," she said, civilly, and nodded at the unoccupied bunk a few feet away. He gathered up his belongings, neatly enough, and carried them over and began stowing them away. Joni gave up any pretense of doing anything else and just sat cross-legged on her mattress and watched.

He didn't look particularly weak, and at least he wasn't so hesitant now as he tucked his gear in the wall locker beside the bed. His bed. She swallowed a sigh. Best to get everything out in the open up front—"Barkley," she said. He turned, a little too quickly. His eyes were large and hazel-brown. His hair was hazel-brown too; lots of people had that color hair, that color eyes. It was just his skin, that dead white-on-white that drew the eye, that unsettled. "What's your problem?"

"What?" he said. The word was toneless, his face expressionless—not like a deliberate mask, just a shocked-numb one.

"Why are you here?"

He paused, inhaled. "I was assigned here—"

"Don't," said Joni conversationally. "I saw you in the mess hall yesterday." He flinched. "Why are you here?"

Something went out of him, maybe fight, maybe just fear; his shoulders sagged and he sat down heavily on his new bed. His eyes never left her face but the tension around them, and in his mouth, relaxed. "I guess it doesn't matter," he said. "I'm stuck here now. You can do what you want to me."

She didn't want to—it would probably scare him all over again—but she couldn't help quirking her mouth up at him. He was noob-skinny and noob-ignorant; she'd been out on the perimeter for over two years; there was no question who'd come out on top if they got into it—but still—"You're a foot taller than me," she remarked. "It'd look funny."

He clearly couldn't believe she was joking, even a little, so she stopped. He was still a very unknown quantity anyway; it'd be sick if she let her sense of humor get her hurt. "Talk," she said. "Why…are…you…here?"

"They were probably going to kill me," he said. He took a deep breath. "They—figured out I'm different. Not exactly how, but they hate it." Another deep breath. "I don't blame them."

I would, Joni thought. Her eyes narrowed. "Why not?"

Now he did look a little scared, though she thought he was trying not to show it. "I'm not from the inner city," he said finally.

Joni felt stupid. Of course he wasn't. A piece fell into place, one of the ways he had—
that careful way he had of speaking—they all had to speak properly, of course, around sergeants and officers, and Joni had adopted some of it as a matter of course because she didn't care enough to maintain the speech patterns of her birth. But he was being careful not to sound more proper than he had to.

"It isn't just that," Joni said—involuntarily; she had spoken her thoughts more aloud than she'd intended. He was very tense now, and still. "What else?"

"Nobody knows anything else."

Normally, she'd have dropped whatever line of questioning she was engaging in right there. People's business was their own past a certain point. But her self-preservation instincts were fully engaged now; he was her roomie and more, had been assigned to her specifically; they were going to be associated together now in the minds of everyone else, and damned if she was going to end up dead without knowing why. Or, more likely, find herself having to arrange an accident for someone else without knowing why. Instead, she shook her head, and forced her face into a hard, dangerous mask. It wasn't natural to her, but it was effective, she knew. "No," she said. "You'd best tell me." She took a chance. "This is your last stop, isn't it? On the one-way train to hell. This doesn't work out for you, nobody's going to care why."

She'd hit home; that was obvious. He stood up; so did she. He really was unusually tall, but so fine-boned it wasn't obvious without standing right next to him. She was only a few feet away from him now, but she didn't feel threatened. She felt like she could break him in half instead, and the feeling made her nauseous. "Maybe you'll kill me instead," he said.

She jerked back; she couldn't help it. "No," she said. "I won't. Not if whatever it is won't hurt or kill me first." What was wrong with him? A disease? They wouldn't have let him in the militia if he had something communicable—

"I'm not from the inner city," he said again, and then, "I'm not from the outer neighborhoods, either."

Joni stared at him. There was nowhere else to be from and be here.

"—I'm from the towers," he said. His tone was weirdly conversational.

"You're crazy!" It was horrible though, how the idea made sense, how it fit in with everything about him—

"No," he said. "Or yes, for coming here."

* * * * *

They pulled garbage patrol for the next two days, she and Barkley; he was docile and uncomplaining, although she was careful not to give him an unfair share of the work in either direction. Two or three times she had been tempted to push him into doing something really crappy—it was when she believed his astonishing assertion the most that she was seized with those sudden desires to order him to do something she knew he shouldn't be doing. Garbage patrol was one of the easiest jobs there was inside, but there were still a few parts that weren't really safe. Nobody gave noobs those parts; it was pointless cruelty, and for those who weren't adverse to pointless cruelty, it was a waste of future resources that might someday save their own hides. Still, a few times, she had felt like doing it. It took her a long way towards understanding why his cycle hadn't wanted him around. They obviously hadn't figured out his real secret—he really would have been dead already—but they'd sensed enough, smelled enough of it to hate him anyway.

Off-day rolled around and Joni dragged him out of the barracks and into the perimeter town for a break. He hadn't wanted to go, though he never came out and said so; it was just like tugging and cajoling at a reluctant rock. However, Joni had perfected the art of uncomprehending denseness herself years before and wasn't about to be outdone by an amateur. After kicking him into the changing closet with a set of civ clothes that were more boring than the most boring civ clothes she'd ever seen in her life, she changed herself and waited until he tentatively emerged and walked over to stand in front of her.

He looked like a sickly noob in boring civ clothes, and even whiter than usual. She sighed. "C'mon," she said. "Let's go."

"Joni," he said. She stopped moving toward the door, startled. He hadn't addressed her even as Johnson since the day they'd met. He must have overheard somebody else calling her that. "Joni, I don't want to go."

"Yeah, I figured that out." They stared at each other in silence. Finally, she said, "I do want to go out. I need to. I hate this room, sometimes."

Whatever else he was, he wasn't stupid. He had to know she couldn't just leave him there alone, not when they'd just been assigned together. Not if he didn't want to be a target all over again. She tried to read his face, his eyes, but still couldn't. It was enough, though, that he relaxed his stance and when she stepped toward the door again, he followed.

She didn't take him to where the squad usually hung out; she wasn't quite ready for that. There were a lot of places in the perimeter town to go, to drink, to just forget life for a little while—she took him to one of those, barely more than a hole with three walls and only half a roof; fairly packed already but she found an unoccupied corner and dialed up two beers from the tiny table dispenser. The music wasn't much more than a heavy beat with a periodic wail like a feral cat's. Joni liked it; it was ugly and mindless and soothing. Like the beer. She finished her first and ordered a second.

Barkley took small sips of his, steadily. She wasn't sure exactly when they started talking, except that it was sometime into her third beer. She thought he was on number two, though it was hard to tell at the rate he drank. She was a little high; maybe he was too. He was smiling occasionally now, and it made his face entirely different. Beautiful—if he'd been a girl, and not so eerily pale, he really would have been beautiful, with his fine and perfectly symmetrical features, full lips and big hazel eyes. She firmly pushed that observation away. That was trouble of the absolute last kind she needed.

Hours later it was his turn to steer her, back to the barracks. The corridors were mostly deserted, and the few people still in them were far too drunk to care what they looked like. Still, it struck her as extremely funny that their usual roles were reversed; she tried to explain that to him, in-between fits of the giggles, but he either didn't understand her or didn't find it as funny as she did.

Back in the room and sitting on their beds, cross-legged and facing each other—like two Buddhas she had seen once at a bazaar in the inner city. She smiled.

"How old are you?" he asked suddenly. She blinked hard at him, trying to steady her focus. He was blurred at the edges; it made him glow a little, like her initial fancy of him in the mess hall line, the first time she'd seen him.

"What?" she said, then focused on the question. "Oh. I don't know. They give you a birthday after your medical exam. You know." She peered at him across the few feet separating them, then remembered. It sobered her up a little. "I guess you do know yours, huh? They didn't have to give you one?"

Free Thread

If you have anything you want to talk about, here's the place to do it. Meaning of life, god, whatever, let's use this comment thread.

My Mom Thinks I'm Talented, Surely You Will Too

Hi all.

I know this is generally a political blog, but hey, it's mine so I can do what I want in it. I have been working lately on a fantasy story. I think I've finished the first chapter, and would like the editorial feedback of the void. (Note, Blogger apparently does not like Copy and Paste from Word, so the formatting is a little funky).



It was a dark and stormy night-

“-and WET! Skye, why are we out in the middle of this goddess-forsaken forest in the middle of the Dark One’s NIGHT?” whined a high-pitched voice that was strangely musical, like listening to the tinkling of bells, if those bells were annoyed and petulant.
“I think the better question, Della, is when are you going to realize that whining about our condition is not going to improve it any?” said a brisk, professional voice that was just this edge of annoyed. “Besides, Fluffy tells me that there’s a settlement not too far up ahead. We can rest there”.
“I can’t even FLY in this weather!” Della moaned. “Why can’t I ride on Fluffy’s head?”
“Because,” Skye explained with the degrading patience of one who has had to repeat herself “The last time you tried to do that, he tried to eat you.”
“Maybe I should do that anyway” Della mumbled. “It may smell like dog breathe, but I bet it’s dryer in his mouth”.
Fluffy snapped his tail at the little pixie riding on his back, who stuck out her tongue in response, a pointless endeavor since she was invisible.
“Stupid little pup, I have all the power of the universe at my finger tips, why I could-”
“Hush, oh-ye-who-complains” Skye commanded. “There’s a village right up there. We’ll spend the night at an inn”.
The community that Skye referred to was a group of houses that could barely be referred to as a “village”. A wooden wall, weathered and faded with loose boards ran around the length of the community, the barest protection against wolves and other wild beasts. A sleepy guard, who looked like he would let all of the underworld in if it meant he could get out of the rain and in front of a warm fire, did the barest of inspections on Skye’s face before opening the gate. The main road was wide enough for two horses to pass side by side, if the riders weren’t too wide, and currently was less a road and more of a muddy swimming hole. The houses, much like the gate, were weather-worn and faded, but unlike the gate well-maintained and white washed. Reddish-orange glows seeped out through the windows, promising warmth and comfort against the miserable grey rain and wind. There were very few people out during this weather, and the ones who were out were bent over against the wind, hurrying to get out of the weather again.
Skye took the supplies off of Fluffy, and slung them over her back, as Della, who was still invisible, flung open the inn door. The innkeeper saw the door open, and thinking the wind blew it open, went to go shut it. Once he was upon, the door, he looked up and saw Skye and her mount. “You can’t keep that here,” said the innkeeper with a note of panic. “I’d be afraid it’d eat the horses”.
Fluffy snorted at the innkeeper. Skye gave him a look that clearly communicated “Behave” and to the innkeeper said “No worries, he will keep to himself.” With another look, Fluffy bounded off towards the village gate, and into the woods beyond. “Innkeeper, I would like to rent a room for the night.”
The innkeeper sniffed “2 silver for the night, and that includes a breakfast in the morning”.
“And by “two silver”, you actually mean 2 bronze, right?” Skye said.
The innkeeper looked hard at Skye’s well-worn cloak, and her taut muscles clearly visible under her shirt, nearly translucent from the rain. “I mean 3 bronze for the night, and mind you don’t drip on my freshly washed floors”. With that he stormed back into the inn.
Skye walked in, shook the most of the water off her cloak at the door, and walked to the fireplace. In the dimly lit common room, one was capable of seeing her features more clearly. Her face, under the mud of the road, was a pearly white that seemed almost phosphorescent, and had the high cheek bones and angular features that were common among her people. Her pointed ears peeked out behind dark black hair, which was currently plastered against here head and strands were falling out of her waist-length braid. She wore a sturdy linen shirt, which was fraying a bit at the collar and wrists and had patches on the elbows, and dark black pants. Over the shirt was a deer-skin vest, bleached in some places from the sun, and dark brown where it was wet. If one was particularly observant (or looking for something to steal) one might notice the amber pendant that was on her chest, between her nearly non-existent breasts. If one was very observant, they would see a dagger hidden under her sleeves, strapped to her forearm. Slung across her back were a long-bow and a quiver of arrows.
The inn itself was crowded from travelers forced in from the rain. The smell of wet human musk was heavy in the air, and mingled with the smell of smoky pine wood and stale ale. The fire threw off a great deal of heat, but the warm light seemed to disappear shortly after leaving the fireplace, giving one the uncomfortable feeling of being stuck inside a jack-o-lantern. On such a hellish night, it was quiet, with no one interested in the music of a travelling bard or the antics of a story-teller. Low murmurs emanated from shadowy corners, almost unheard over the crackling of the fireplace and the clanking of mugs and sloshing of ale.
While Skye was warming herself by the fire, and quietly contemplating what the next day had to bring, Della was getting bored. Now, as a general rule, a pixie should not be bored, both as a positive and a normative statement. Pixies are easily distracted, and can find the flickering of fire or the sparkling of the stars entertaining for hours on end. Many believe this is because pixies are simple-minded creatures, but they would be dangerously wrong. Pixies say it is because they are penetrating the veil of the universe but aren’t going to tell and then stick out their tongues and float away; but generally it is good advice not to believe the word of a pixie. But when pixies do get bored, they generally decide to remedy this ennui by introducing chaos into the world.
This particular Pixie was not only bored, but offended at the innkeeper for his rudeness towards her friend, and looking to cause mischief. First, she decided that there was a special discount for pixies on honey mead (namely, free). After taking advantage of the discount, she went to look for a key to take or a book to misplace (as a nod to her gremlin brethren) but was instead distracted by the sound of voices from under the floor.
“That’s weird,” she thought, “floors don’t normally talk”. After a bit of investigating (and twenty minutes being distracted by candlelight flickering off a shinny kettle) she discovered a trap door, hidden under a rug.
“Hmm”, thought Della. “Hidden places, with hidden voices normally means hidden fun”. She fluttered down the stairs, unseen, into the dark room.
“Please sirs, my daughter is my life,” pleaded the self-same innkeeper that had, moments before, told Skye the price of the room. “She was taken from me, and the Duke will do nothing to get her back. I’m afraid that she’ll be sacrificed at the harvest moon, in three days time”.
“While I regret the loss of your daughter, I myself am on a far more important quest” intoned a voice. Della shivered involuntarily; the voice rasped like a dry quill across a death certificate. He was not speaking loudly, but his words still carried through the dark cellar. As Della flew around the corner, she saw three people talking with the innkeeper. The first, the one the voice clearly belonged to, was clothed in black breast-plate with a raven holding a skull in it's talons. A mace that looked like a skull was slung on his back. He seemed to drain the light out of wherever he was standing. Standing aside from him was a man dressed in simple garb; a loose tunic and breaches, and a cape with the hood down. He kept playing with the edges of his sleeves, and Pixie would bet a pretty shiny that he had daggers down there, but couldn’t see any to be sure. The last one in the room was a halfling that almost escaped Della’s notice, who kept creeping around the edge of the firelight. After watching the little sneak, Della noticed him look straight at where she was flying. She paused, involuntarily, but then remembered that she was invisible and no one can see her, not that they no enough to look. But then Della noticed something rather odd: the little hafling’s shadow seemed to be looking at her too. Della shook her head, thinking she needed to lay off the honey mead a bit, and then noticed that the shadow disappeared.
“Must have moved too far away from the lantern” thought Della. At that point, the shadow that had been growing behind her reached out and wrapped its black arms around her.
“Look what I found” squeaked the halfling in an inordinately happy voice. The party looked at the shadow, which seemed to be thrashing about with itself.
The man in the dark robes, after looking at the struggle said “You may as well show yourself, invisible one”.
Della, deciding that it wasn’t worth her effort to fight these people, turned visible. Turning with her cutest look, she asked “Could you let me out of this, halfling?”
“Ok,” said the halfling with a smitten look. The shadow started to loosen his arms.
“I would advice against that” said the dark lord. “We don’t know what she’s heard, and what she’s seen”.
“Me?” Della said incredulously. She giggled self-consciously. “I haven’t seen or heard anything. Come, Mr. Halfling; what could you possible fear from me? Please, I’m cold.” At this, she batted her eyes at him.
The halfling blushed and chuckled, and the shadow released her grip entirely. Like a shot, Della, was invisible and shot out the top of the trap door.
“Skye, Skye,” Della yelled, flying through people’s mug of beer.
“Della, you know that this is easier when you are visible” Skye said.
“Oh yeah,” she said, going visible. As she became visible, the patrons were startled to see a figure that was about 2 feet tall with butterfly wings out of her back. Her skin was a milky white, and her hair was a bright impatiens pink with a sheen through it. The very tips of her ears poked out from bunches of hair on either side of her head, giving her hair the appearance of a very wild, pink bush. Her eyes seemed impossibly big and were the green of a new buds in spring. She had a quiver of arrows and a bow on her back, and bracers on her arms, and an amulet around her neck, but not too much else. The scraps of clothes that covered her seemed to cover just the basics of propriety; and counter-intuitively, had the effect of making her look more naked than if she would be entirely nude. As she noticed the eyes on her, she winked and smiled at the patrons, enjoying their shock and discomfort.
“If you have had quite enough at teasing the patrons, you seemed like you were in some distress just a moment ago,” Skye said, rolling her eyes.
“Yes, yes I was” said Della, snapping back to attention. “In the basement, the rude jackass was pleading with some evil looking dudes, about a girl and a Duke, and a shadow grabbed me but I defeated it and I need you to attack the dark one”.
“So what I got out of that is “you got in trouble and now someone is chasing after you.” Is that about right?” Skye asked.
“Um,” said Della thinking, “Maybe”.
Walter came out from the kitchen, eyes searching for Della. His eyes seized on her and her companion. “Panzer,” he said, “Seize them”.
In the corner, a figure that everyone had assumed that was a statute gets to his feet. “Okay boss,” its gravely voice responds as it starts it’s slow lumbering towards them.
“This is a mistake” Skye replied evenly, her hands up, but not quite at her bow. “We have done nothing to harm you.”
“Panzer, wait.”
“Okay boss” replied Panzer, instantly stopping.
“If that is the case, why don’t you and your little pixie friend come back here and we can talk…away from the crowd”.
“Give me some assurances to your character, and we will talk rationally” Skye replied.
“Do I have that for both of you?”
“You shall have to ask Della for her own assurances”
“Well, small one?”
“ She just said my name, tall, dark and creepy” said Della.
“Della…remember the moving statute behind us?” asked Skye, with just a hint of worry in her voice.
“Oh, who cares about the moving tin can, I have the powers of the universe at my finger tips, and no dark dummy is going to be rude to me. I happen to be of the perfect size, you know.”
“Enough of this,” said the dark man. “My name is Walter….the Tomb Lord and High one of (figure out what the rest of his titles are). I give you my word that I shall not harm you, and I request your assurance of the same…Della”.
“Okay, fine” said Della happily. Just zoomed towards the kitchen. “Last one there is a rotten egg!”
Walter gave Skye a look like “You travel with this one?”. Skye did a motion that may have been shrug, but may have just been her adjusting her cape.
“Come on Panzer” said Walter.
“Yes boss,” said Panzer.
Once in the kitchen, Walter made a gesture to the other man. Suddenly, a burlap bag snapped into the air, and Della found herself inside of a burlap sack.
“Heh, heh, pixie in a bag” said the man.
“Hey, let me out of here!” yelled Della. “I’ll turn you all into JELLY! Let me out!”
“Tomblord, you promised me safety” Skye said, going for her bow.
“I did, and she is perfectly safe”. Walter replied. “I just need her to stay inside of the room for a bit, and the only way to make sure she does that is to restrain her.”
“Sir, speak your piece, and quickly, and let me go, or golum or no golum, I will take you all on.” Skye said, notching an arrow on her bow.
“I’m not a golum,” said Panzer.
“It can say something other than ‘Yes boss’” asked Della from inside of the bag.
“Yes. I just find most of the time I don’t need to,” said Panzer.
“Huh, that makes sense.” said Della.
“Your pixie doesn’t seem to mind the bag too much,” said the man holding it.
“I’m not her pixie” Della said at the same time Skye said “She’s not my pixie”.
“But you’re right, I am quite comfortable in here” said Della.
“You see? She’s perfectly safe,” said Walter.
Skye put her bow away. “If she doesn’t mind, I don’t mind.”
“By why wouldn’t she mind?” asked the man. “She’s in a burlap sake!”
“Yes, but the sake is full of gold,” said Della. “And jewels. I like sparkly things. I think I’ll put some of these into my own bag, so I have them for later.”
“What?” said the man, swallowing the lie wholesale. “I must have grabbed the wrong bag when I went to nab her!” At this, she went to open the bag. Della, seizing her opportunity, flew out of the bag.
“Wow, you’re dumb,” said Della with a smirk.
“This is a waste of time,” said Walter. “You, Pixie-“
“Name,” Della said in a sing-song voice. “I have a name, you know my name, call me by my name-“
“Della,” Walter said through clenched teeth. “What did you hear downstairs?”
“Well, I heard that you were a meanie that didn’t care about helping this guy’s daughter, and something about a duke…really, I got distracted by a shadow”.
“Then, you heard nothing about my greater quest?” asked the Tomblord?
“Your what?” asked Della.
“We’re done here” said Walter. “We must press on.”
“Please, sir, please!” begged the innkeeper. “I need your help!”
“What is your problem, exactly,” asked Skye.
“My daughter, she has been taken from me,” at this, the inn-keeper started weeping.
Skye, looking around awkwardly, said “Please sir, I cannot help you unless you give me more information.”
“Man, stop crying” said Della, her annoyances at the inn-keeper turning to pity. She hugged his head, “We will help you find your daughter.”
“Truly?” asked the inn-keeper.
Skye looked him straight in the eye. “Truly, good sir. I am at your service.”
“What of the others?” the innkeeper asked.
“They have to make their own decision.”
“Tell your tale, old man, and I’ll see what I can do,” said the man with the burlap bag, ignoring the glare of Walter.
“This morning, in the wee hours of the night, my daughter was getting water from the well. I heard her scream, and went and rushed to find her. The water bucket was overturned and I saw footprints in the ground. I went to the Duke’s representatives, but they didn’t want to do anything. I fear that she will be sacrificed in 3 days, when the full moon rises, for some sort of dark magic”.
“Then I will make way at first light to find her,” said Skye. “Do you have any idea where they may have taken her?”
“My guess is the old castle to the north,” said the Innkeeper. “If you get my daughter back to me, unharmed, you will have my gratitude, and a bag of silver”.
“Shall you be joining us, friend?” Skye addressed the man.
“Aye, Mordain shall help you,” he said after a pause.
“As shall I and Shadow,” said the halfling.
Walter glowered at his party. “Since I have to wait for my party to finish, I might as well help you. At least we can be done quickly. Panzer shall join us as well.”
“Wait a minute,” said Della. “He can talk, he can think, why don’t we ask him what he wants to do?”
“I’ll do whatever the boss tells me to do,” said Panzer.
“Satisfied, Della?” asked Walter, a shadow of a smirk on his face.
Della, sticking out her tongue, did a barrel roll in the air and disappeared.
“Where’d she go?” asked Panzer.
“You get used to it, my friend,” said Skye. “Well, we are all tired, and the trail is going to be dead with this rain anyway. We shall sleep for the night, and then pursue in the early morning. Be ready to leave at 6 bells.”

Negative Ads

Dear sweet zombie Jesus, I want this election to be over. I am sick of this: I want Obama to win, but at this point I'll take a McCain win if it means we can all move on with our respective lives.

But, we still have one more week left, which still means one more week of campaign ads. I finally got sick of each side saying that the other was running a negative campaign, and how negative it is, and who did what, so I decided to do a little research on my own. That's right, you guessed it: it's time for another Excel graph!

I had a difficult time coming up with an objective standard of what was a "smear" and what was a "criticism" so I went with a fairly objective, but not very in-depth, analysis of the ads. Additionally, I only used the television ads (Obama, for instance, has over 1000 Obama Youtube ads). The ads were split into four categories: Opposing candidate not mentioned, Ads compare/ criticize opponent, ad only talks about opposition, and ad countering opponent's assertions. Just in case it wasn't clear, the ads in blue are Obama's, red are McCain's.

The final count is: 21 of Obama's ads are just about him, 19 compare/contrast Obama and McCain's ad, 45 are ads just criticizing McCain, and 10 of them are countering ads. Which adds up to little over a fifth of the ads as "positive".

McCain's ads break down as: 14 are just about him, 11 compare/contrast, 16 are just opposing Obama, and 4 are countering opponent's information. Which makes a little over a third of his ads are "positive".

What does this all mean? It means that both candidates are running a mostly negative campaign. And why shouldn't they? Negative ads are the most effective. If people REALLY wanted to stop politicians from running negative ads, they should stop responding to them.

This break down was the best I could do for an objective standard, but I still feel like it is somewhat misleading. For instance, the worst thing Obama said about McCain was that he "lied", he was "out of touch" and "more of the same". The worst thing McCain did was imply Obama was the Anti-Christ and likened him to a pack of wolves. I honestly think that McCain's were more negative, but like I said, how could I come up with an objective standard? A

Final points: Obama has WAY more ads. Like, twice as many ads. I guess his fundraising is doing better. From a communication standpoint, I liked Obama's ads better because I felt they were more creative and better done. There were more citations in Obama's ads as well, pointing out the voting record of McCain and Obama. The running meme seems to be that Obama's "all talk" but it was the McCain ads that never pointed to anything specific. I particularly liked Obama's 2-minute "explanation sessions" that he had.

Obama also had way more Spanish ads too, but I guess Obama's probably better suited to that demographic.

As always, multiple pairs of eyes going over my work is appreciated.

Small Town Values Suck

Sarah Palin, in her acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, ended up quoting known racist, right-wing writer (via Pandagon). The quote she used was:

We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty and sincerity and dignity.”

.

Let's ignore, for a minute, who she choose to quote (and whether or not she was even aware of it) and focus in on the substance of her statement. She is claiming that people in small towns are more moral than the rest of us: those of us who live in cities. Now, first and foremost, this statement irritates me because of it's vagueness: I live in a "city" in North Dakota, but you can drive across it in less than twenty minutes. Do they raise "good people" here, or are we dishonest, and insincere, and undignified?

But, beside the ambiguities of "small town", I'm still going to call shenanigans on her statement. People in small towns are no more honest, sincere, or dignified than people in cities, and a lot of times, they are substantially less so.

I have lived in multiple communities, in multiple states, that are various sizes; and nobody was de facto more moral. My bike has been stolen in small towns, whereas my wallet full of money was returned to me in a big city. I was threatened in a suburban school by a white girl, and I was tortured by guys in a small town. I have met cultured people in towns in the middle of nowhere, and complete neadrathals in cities. The number of people you're around doesn't make you a better or worse person.

In general, there are a few differences between small towns and large cities.

Small towns compared to cities:

A greater percentage of people feel comfortable being openly racist, sexist, heterocentrist, and discriminatory to non-Christians in more public places. That doesn't mean that there aren't racist people in cities, or even the same amount in sheer numbers. But, I think it tends to be that if you live in the city, at some point you actually have to run across people of different ethnicities, belief structures, women in more than one career field, and non-heterosexual people, than if you live in a small town.

Small towns are filled with gossipers. Big towns, are too, but because of sheer numbers, it is impossible for everybody to know everybody else's business. There are no secrets in small town.

Small towns lack culture. They generally have one community theatre (if that) that puts on nonthreatning plays like Okalahoma and Shakespearean plays that most people don't know are dirty. The variety shows that they put on are likewise the only form of concerts, generally, except for an extremely local band for county fairs and the like. The theatres put on completely mainstream movies, about two weeks after they are released, and even they get filtered a lot. Compare that to a city which, at any given night, you have your choice of performances, concerts, clubs, museums, whatever.

There are pros and cons to living anywhere, but to suggest that people are more moral in small towns means the person doing the suggesting doesn't know what "moral" means.

Pro-Life Organizations: Which Lives?

This is part of a continuing series.

When looking at pro-life organizations, I wanted to see which groups were actually non-violent and which were not. I choose not to be somewhat of a smart-aleck and include such things as opposition to war, and the death penalty (which most organizations were not), and I choose to overlook such organizations that were anti-stem cell research (which could potentially save thousands of lives), but do a narrow focus on their tactics and actions. This was particularly difficult, as there were many organizations that professed peace, but then did bullying tactics or their founders were in jail for murder of a doctor or something. To bridge this gap, I included if they either condoned violence, or had ties to violent groups. Bullying tactics such as yelling "baby-killer" to passing women going into abortion clinics did not get classified as violent, but if they had signs that suggested that "baby-killers" should be shot, I included that in "condones violence". If the group advocated for harassment of doctors, I stuck that it the "ties to violence" block, as well. I also did not differentiate between organizations that had no ties to violence but did not condemn the violence of other pro-life organizations and organizations that had no ties to violence AND condemned the violence of other pro-life organizations.

UPDATE- I'm linking to where I found violence for the groups.

Army of God- http://www.armyofgod.com/POClist.html

Life Dynamics Inc- http://www.kaisernetwork.org/frame/index.cfm?goto=http://www.kaisernetwork.org/reports/2000/03/kr000322.4.htm
Uses harassment and stalking against doctors.

Missionaries to the Preborn- http://www.mhrn.org/publications/fact%20sheets%20and%20adivsories/Missionaries.pdf

Missionaries to the Unborn- http://www.mttu.com/elijahmin/PPWrite-In%20Campaign.htm

Operation Rescue- http://www.now.org/nnt/05-98/scheidler.html

Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust- Founder was jailed for violence: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivors_of_the_Abortion_Holocaust but organization does condemn violence.

Pro-Life Organizations: Do they help women raise babies?

This is part of a continuing series.

If an organization was truly pro-life, they would try an attack the causes of abortion (unwanted pregnancy), and the major reason cited for abortion (financial constraints). The best way to do this is community support for children. I put in organizations that did not support governmental assistance, but did support "pregnancy crisis centers" of some variety. These centers generally run from a place to stay during pregnancy and the first year, to some material assistance (diapers, formula, teddy bears, et cetera).

UPDATE-

I changed the graph, because Army of God does not support Pregnancy Crisis Centers. They do not address welfare. Sorry for the mistake.

Pro-Life Organizations: For Sex Ed?

This is part of continuing series.

In tandem with contraceptives, there is a strong correlation with comprehensive sexual education and low unwanted pregnancy rates (and corresponding low abortion rates). "Abstinence Only" education has been associated with higher rates of unwanted pregnancy then no sexual education at all.

Pro-Life Organizations: Are they for contraception?

This is part of a continuing series.

I also wanted to determine if pro-life organizations supported the most effective way to reduce abortion rates, which is increased contraception use. If the organization was fine with they barrier methods, but not hormonal methods like the pill, I gave them "limited support for contraceptives". If it was "Natural Family Planning" but against all other forms, I put them in "anti-contraceptives". If they were opposed to one form of contraceptives, and did not address others, I put them in "opposed contraceptives".

UPDATE
To clarify, if a group gets put into "opposes contraceptive" it does not necessarily mean that they wish to criminalize it. But, if an organization supports Pharmacists "right" to not dispense birth control, or if they said that contraceptives contribute to a "culture of death" or "a child-unfriendly environment" I put that in "opposes contraceptives", even if they don't speak to making it illegal.

UPDATE the Second
In order to be more fair, I looked over the organizations again, and added whether or not they were against birth control, or whether or not they were against some types of contraceptives and did not address other ones. I went over the ones that also didn't address contraceptives, and found some of them did actually oppose Emergency contraceptive, so they were added to the last list.

Pro-Life Organizations: Are the Secular?

Awhile back on Punkassblog, I said I was going to do some investigating into Pro-Life Organizations. Unfortunately, Wordpress seems to not like me, so this post will be exclusively here where it all began, Teller of Truths.

The only pro-life organizations I looked at were groups in the United States on the national level, that were on the Wikipedia pro-life organization list.

The first thing I checked was whether or not the organization was secular, or explicitly Chrsitian (none of the organizations claimed any other kind of religious affiliation). They were considered to have ties to Christian organizations if they had three articles that spoke from a Christian perspective, and/or linked to five Christian organizations.

Pro-Life Organizations: Women's concerns?

This is part of a continuing series on pro-life organizations.

To see if pro-life organizations were really about women's concerns, I then looked to see how many of them were run by men or women (as sort of an easy marker). Abortion concerns being particularly related to women, as (aside from Mr. Beatty) they are the only one's who can get pregnant, they are the ones who should have the most to say about it.

I looked at who ran the organizations, and how balanced the board was.