Tiger Beatdown

So, here is something that is in the news a lot lately: GLBT kids committing suicide. I know, right? SCARY. Definitely not suited to an article in which there are jokes. Because, my God. However, here is a nugget I came across in my internet searches, which I will now share with you:

In the Anoka-Hennepin School District in Minnesota, there have been four suicides in the last year alone due to anti-gay bullying. When asked why they do not teach about sexual diversity and enforce any anti-gay bullying policies the district spokeswoman, Mary Olson, explained, “We have a community with widely varying opinions, and so to respect all families, as the policy says, we ask teachers to remain neutral.”

Oh! Right! “Neutral!” You know, in that “explicitly on the side of the bullies who seem to be continually driving kids to the point where suicide seems like the only possible option” kind of way.

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Sort of! We are currently messing around with lots of things, up to and including post schedules and that sort of thing. And thus, the silence. Which is no doubt obnoxious! Sorry! I was at the movies! And so on, and so forth.

However, this leads us to our next request: One of the many things we are hoping to revamp, on the new and semi-improved Tiger Beatdown, is our blogroll. Thus, we request that you use the comments to tell us which blogs we should be checking out! They can be your blogs. But we will probably take you more seriously if you recommend someone else’s?

Anyway! Thank you, for your patience. And your blog recommendations. And your shining faces! And everything else!

Say! You know what’s a fun word to have an argument about the definition of? Probably not “rape,” as it happens. But for some reason, everyone’s just in a rape-definition-debating mood. Like, for starters, we have “birth rape,” reported on by Birth Trauma Truths via Irin Carmon over at the Jezebel, which goes like so:

Sounds assault-y! Ah, but wait, because Amanda Marcotte over at the DoubleX has some hesitations:

The problem is that actual rapists have completely different motivations than imperious doctors who inadvertently traumatize their patients by pushing them around in the birthing room. Actual rapists want to traumatize their victims—getting off on the power they have over their victims and the fear it instills in them is the whole point of raping them. (Don’t believe me? Here’s some evidence to ponder on this subject.) Doctors who push around their patients are rarely doing so out of sadism so much as contempt for the intelligence of their patients… If the social definition of rape is rooted in the trauma to the victim and not in terms of what the actual rapist did and why, we’ve lost our main tool in stopping rape from actually happening.

Well! A different opinion! But could we add a third, unambiguously messed-up voice as well? Turns out, we can. Because over at the Daily Caller, someone has decided that there is one group of people who should definitely not be allowed to use the word “rape.” And that is researchers, who interview rape victims.

[The] SVCW study reports that when those categorized as rape victims were asked if what they described was rape, nearly 50 percent said “no.” Further, 80 percent of the subjects researchers labeled as rape victims stated that the incident resulted in neither physical or emotional injuries. Only 5 percent of those identified as victims of rape actually reported the incident. “If an attorney defending a rapist were to use this, they’d say ‘Well, what’s the big deal? 80 percent of women who are raped don’t have any adverse affects,’” Gilbert said.

And how did we know about this? Why, because of the lovely and delightful Amanda Hess of TBD! Join us, therefore, as we engage once again in a hearty and spirited debate (with jokes? Sure, with jokes! What could go wrong) about who gets to use the r-word. SPOILER: It isn’t you.

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