sundries

[rm]

Last night my father sent me an email about my paper. Despite my specifically stating that I did not want this to devolve into a judgmental conversation about psychology and god, guess what's happening? And he's not even done yet. I have to respond to his letter today, which is, in many ways, incredibly kind, supportive and gracious. But I loathe "I know you asked me not to do X, but I am going to do it anyway." There's only one reason that happens, and it's not a pleasant one.¹

Am totally submitting a proposal for the academic con at Dragon*Con, just have to write in on paper instead of my head. Tried last night, did laundry and took a nap instead.

The oil spill, one month later. ONE MONTH. OIL STILL SPILLING.

Something is happening on DADT today, but what it is, no one is sure. Not only do we not know how the vote is going to go, we're not even sure what the repeal means, as one thing that's being floated is that repeal will merely transfer power to decide this issue back to the Pentagon, and in fact bring us no closer to allowing the gay men and lesbians already fighting and dying for our country to do so openly. Keep an eye on this, as it may be one of those things that gets worse before it gets better. ETA: post with language on this and analysis, in short: "we'll discuss the potential negative impact of homosexuals forever and never fix anything" seems to be a pretty good interpretation of what's up.

Mississippi school denies prom was fake.

The Warren Cup was once banned from American museums because it features explicit sex acts between men. NSFW if classical art is a problem.

Anyone possibly toying with doing scholarship on RPF (or just wants a handy thing to talk about in relation to its existence), should check out this post immediately. via brewsternorth on Twitter.

Last night on Angel and Buffy: Gunn is sort of a dick in terms of getting how to have a relationship and get your damn job done. Also, him and Fred? Paranoid much? Wesley's behaving pretty well; not perfectly, but pretty well. Also, OMG, Hamburger Drive Through Oracle! Paired with the Buffy fast food episode. LOVE. The Earthquake, Fire, Blood has just happened and Angel has made his cryptic remark about a snack and that's all we saw last night.

Meanwhile, annoying Willow plotline continues to be annoying. Seriously, how did we go from "magic is an ethically grey area that can lead to toxic adventures with dark dark things" to "spells don't really do shit other than make you feel good, it's your birthday!"

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¹When I first dyed my hair black when I was 15 and spending the summer taking classes at Yale, my father got very angry, despite the fact that black hair isn't all that different from my natural color. In the ensuing argument, I used the Angry Teen Strategy of Petulant Kids Everywhere, and said "It's my hair!" My father replied "No, it's not." I have lived every moment of my life since then understanding, rightly or wrongly, that he considers me his property.

Comments

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

This DADT repeal? Yus, my face is set to "not impressed" Even if it's repealed it's back in the hand of the Pentagon with no anti-discrimination provision. Assume it's implemented at all

So, in theory it's perfectly possible for this or a furture pentagon to go back before DADT - which doesn't protect GBLTs much

[p-zeitgeist.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how you're getting "it's possible for this or a future pentagon to go back before DADT." DADT was put into place by executive order, and could always have been taken away by executive order; this statute is the background against which it was put into place. While it's possible for the Pentagon to foot-drag under this compromise, there's nothing here that allows it to go back before DADT: not without a repeal of the executive order putting it into place, which the Pentagon has no power to do.

And this appears to be a repeal provision. The plain reading allows the statute to continue in force until the stated conditions are satisfied, but it does not call for a continuing certification -- that is, it's not a provision requiring the Executive Branch to re-certify that the conditions are met at periodic intervals, failing which Section 654 comes back into force.

So I'm not seeing where it comes back from once it's gone, short of further Congressional action.

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

It hands the implementation of it into the Pentagon's hands AND doesn't include any overt anti-discrimination provisions

So there's nothing STOPPING discrimination against GBLTs AND the Pentagon is free to enact policies according to what it believes is necessary for:

"military readiness, military effectiveness, unit cohesion, and recruiting and retention of the Armed Forces."

Which are all the excuses used by the anti-gay forces against gays in the military

[p-zeitgeist.livejournal.com]

Ah, well. If people were expecting language like, "No person shall be denied the right to serve in the armed forces of the United States by reason of gender identity or sexual orientation," I understand that this is not going to be satisfying. But I wouldn't have expected to see language like that. And as for implementation: it's the armed forces. Who else was ever going to be implementing it?

I mean, I grant that the trigger thing isn't good. Ideally this would be a clean repeal, with no conditions to be satisfied first. But let's say for the sake of discussion that the conditions are satisfied within some reasonable time frame -- say, 18 to 24 months.

I'm beginning to have the impression, though, that people have meant something by the words "repeal DADT" that goes beyond repealing DADT. Because if/when the trigger is satisfied here, unless I'm missing something crucial that I haven't seen explained yet, DADT will in fact have been repealed. No, this doesn't implement specific anti-discrimination provisions, but legally that's a separate argument: repealing DADT doesn't automatically carry any such provisions with it, just as repealing the ban on women in combat wouldn't.

But yeah: if you expected to see antidiscrimination provisions, this compromise doesn't do it.