I'm not gonna let it bother me tonight

Atlanta Rhythm Section - I'm not gonna let it bother me tonight



Congratulate me on not letting myself get all stirred up by online insanity (and getting called the b-word). Getting a jump on my New Year's resolution, which is not to let anger control me or rule me, as it has in the past. NO MORE. I won the first round and I am proud of myself.

As the 12 steps counsel us: One day at a time. I can refrain from anger for one night, can't I?

I'm not gonna let it bother me tonight. :)

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Military Fakes don't help Veterans

At left: My father, who was not a fake veteran.







I first started reading blogs in 1998, when the USA was still at relative 'peace'--in terms of war and military interventions. In the past decade, I have witnessed the increase and escalation of military activity in several countries... and with this escalation, an astronomical increase in online trolls and fakes, claiming all sorts of bogus military experience.

Yes, you read that right. Fakes.

On this Veterans Day, I am hereby calling out the fakes.

A real military veteran is usually not afraid to name themselves, or at the very least, share a significant part of themselves online: their photograph, their blog, their location, their Twitter or Facebook profile. Like all real people, pseudonymous or not, their experience rings true, because it comes from the heart. They don't always make themselves look good, or certain, or without ambivalence. Like the rest of us, pseudonymous or not, real veterans have a social-media presence that is believable and consistent. People know them, and there is genuine proof of their ongoing interaction in the world, including their military service.

By contrast, the fakes are anonymous troublemakers and the tellers of tall tales. They often claim to be signature bad-asses, such as Marines or Navy Seals (as the Vietnam Era fakes could not refrain from claiming to be Airborne Rangers or Green Berets). They always claim the violent, romanticized, movie-magic aspect of war; the fakes never claim kitchen duty or the boring grunt work of checking in thousands of uniforms. They claim to have seen lots and lots of carnage. They tell stories of car-bombs and how they breezed through such events, unblinking. They brag about drinking coffee next to piles of corpses, unfazed.

And this is how we know they are fakes. Nobody drinks coffee next to piles of corpses, unfazed, unless they are monsters. I simply refuse to believe our veterans are monsters.

For this reason, the fakes are a blight.

The posturing phonies who brag about their fictional service are doing actual harm to genuine veterans, making up bullshit-bad-ass stories, thereby claiming sympathy, expertise and respect that simply does not belong to them. The arrogance and superiority that is frequently obvious in their online personas (undoubtedly reflecting feelings of inferiority and unimportance in real life) creates antipathy in people who would otherwise feel great empathy for veterans. The fictional crap they constantly spew forth (and I have caught them in countless contradictions and lies) aggravates existing negative feelings that many of us have about war; it doesn't do the military any favors.

The stories of well-known Vietnam-era fakes (or 'partial fakes'--such as historian Joseph Ellis and recent congressional candidate Kenneth Aden) have been part of our culture for a very long time... and due to the endless war of the past decade, we can now expect to see a whole new crop of them. The problems with these fakes will be never-ending. There is already enough trouble tracking down the frauds who dare to name themselves and claim jobs they do not deserve.

The online versions are fast-becoming the same sort of plague--and there seems to be little we can do to expose them.

My advice to one and all, is, do not readily assume someone (especially an anonymous online person repeatedly blowing his/her own horn) is automatically telling the truth about military service. The internet has made it exponentially easier to research the specificities of war, as well as the in-depth details of various actions and incursions (and their casualties). There are more photos, facts and figures online than ever before in history. Any of us, gifted enough in story-telling and accompanying ego-driven motives, could likely pull this off with enough effort. Americans typically want to honor and believe the best of veterans, and are unlikely to call someone a fake, unless that evidence is literally staring them in the face.

But in the case of anonymous commenters and people hanging out on blogs, be skeptical. Just as anyone can claim to be a model or cheerleader or actor or math-genius, anyone can claim to be a veteran. When that person decides to show their ass or treat people in a deliberately unkind, nasty fashion, they tarnish the reputation of ALL veterans, while using their supposed (nonexistent) military service as an excuse to be a first-class asshole.

They don't deserve your indulgence, they deserve to be exposed.

Or at least ignored.

Happy Veterans Day.

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Cinco de Mayo!

It's been a tough week for blogging. But at least I saw another antique Chevy when I went out to grab a bite earlier in the week!




I am grateful I woke up this morning without any notifications of direct threats, as I did last Saturday. It is not a day I am likely to forget. Five people sent me messages as soon as I signed on, several making sure I TOOK THE SCREEN SHOTS. I obediently did as they told me to do, but I did not visit the hate-page after I initially took the shot, because I found it too unnerving.

I have spent the last week decompressing from disaster, even though I gained a parcel of new Facebook friends and radio-show listeners. At the same time, I have been extremely careful, looking over my shoulder. Is this what it's like to be well-known and controversial? Apparently so. I have been wondering if I am up for this.

I was blocked from Facebook for about 24 hrs. I am not sure of the specific reason, since all my requests for clarification were totally ignored. One of my comments was deemed "threatening"--which is pretty ironic under the circumstances (as stated above, there was a whole Facebook page threatening me physically), and my questions ("Why or how is this a threatening statement?") sent to the proverbial round-file. I have since learned that if your comments are deliberately targeted (as mine have been) and reported X number of times, THAT is what deems it offensive, not the actual content of the comment(s) in question. It's all about the clicks. The warnings and blockages are executed by Facebook-bots, not by actual people. This explains the wildly-varying standards: on one Facebook page, you can talk filth and nobody cares, but on another, a simple factual statement such as (for instance) Bob Jones University-affiliates are covering up for rape-apologists is considered "offensive."

The truth is now subject to censorship for being "too offensive" for certain overprotected, neurasthenic people to be able to tolerate. And their intolerance is what makes it "offensive."

I am suddenly reminded of a bone-chilling line in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by the legendary Philip K Dick, a line that (tellingly) did not make it into the screenplay of the film, which became Blade Runner. Paraphrasing: What proof do we have that empathy exists, asks the android, except the humans' word for it? Isn't it something they just made up to prove they have this special thing?

And the Bob Jones University-apologists similarly ask: What proof do we have that your truth exists, except your word for it? Isn't it something you just made up, to say something bad about us?

It's scary, isn't it? After all, they already say this about science and evolution, global-warming and gay people.

I've long been claiming there is no such thing as objectivity, and I think this whole debacle is proof of that. The word "offensive" is no longer about unacceptable cuss words and sexual terms; the word is now assigned to any statement that bothers you, for any reason. Whether the statement is "objectively true" is of no importance in this determination.

Empathy is next. What proof do we have that it exists? OOOPS, is that an offensive statement? BOOM, down the memory hole.

You should NOT have to read such disconcerting, disorienting notions.

~*~

I attempted a joke on my show this morning, off the cuff, and it bombed. Nobody's perfect. Better luck next time and thank you for playing!

Podcast of bad joke and other topics, is up.

And last night, saw another cool car and took another picture. My favorite color! I am not sure of the make/year of this very lovely, cherry-red beauty, but if you know, speak up.

Biographical aside: I used to work in the purty pink building, which is at the corner of Main and East North Streets in Greenville. It is now a clothing store, but was a GNC when I worked there.

~*~

Lots of interpersonal ups and downs in local Occupy groups, including mine, as well as groups in Spartanburg and Columbia. (I haven't yet checked the astrological charts, but I am sure something must be going on.) I shall refrain from bad-mouthing liberals and their inability to SUBMIT TO COLLECTIVE DISCIPLINE (Yes, Barack, I am lookin at you too) but.... well, they DO have a problem submitting to collective discipline.

Simply put, if a whole group votes that you are disruptive, stay your ass away. Is that too difficult to understand? People seem to get this concept in ANY endeavor but politics. It appears that some folks think they are just so wonderful that they deserve to be heard and listened to (including their sorry excuses) more than other people, certainly more than they have ever listened to anyone else. How does that work exactly?

In any event, I am once again reminded of my mentor, Steve Conliff, and his rule of thumb for the Yippies, that I know I have quoted numerous times previously, in this space: If you let anybody in, anybody WILL come in.

And yes, they do. The confused, the argumentative, the power-tripping, the lecherous, the whole Hee Haw gang is present and accounted for. I always take their presence as a given. I can easily accept these people, if they are aware of their personality-issues, as I am (mostly) aware of mine. I want people to cut me slack, so I cut others slack, too. But I notice many of these people do not think they have any personality-issues, in fact, they think they are just peachy-keen and wonderful. Unfortunately, that is often where the liberalism comes in: they have been believing their own press. They believe they are compassionate, aware and kind, just because liberals are said to be compassionate, aware and kind. (By contrast, radicals never get this kind of good press; radicals are dangerous, crazy, insane, outside agitators, etc.) Thus, when these folks go off the rails, you also have the attendant spectacle of other liberals going into catatonia: But I thought he was... NICE!

And there is often no evidence that this person was EVER "nice"--except that they agreed with us. We tend to assume a lot about the people who agree with us: they MUST be good, since (it goes without saying!) WE are GOOD!

Maybe the operative difference is, I don't think I am particularly good. I try, but I fail repeatedly. Thus, I assume others are trying and failing, repeatedly, all the time. And as we know, passing the kid who has consistently failed is ultimately a mean thing to do and sets them up for more failure. So it is with people who repeatedly fail us.

At some unavoidable juncture, it is time to send them back to Decency 101, that class they obviously missed. We tolerate their continued failures at our peril.

~*~

Greenville Occupiers, bringing the radicalism! Yeah!







There will be an Occupy Picnic in McPherson Park this afternoon, 3:30pm, be there or be square. General Assembly is tomorrow at 2pm in Bergamo Square; Main and Coffee Streets, across from Coffee Underground... which is especially handy for quick coffee-junkie fixes, also a very good refuge for bad weather, which has only happened a couple of times.

Bergamo Square is currently under construction; it will soon be the home of some monstrous new building, currently given the ominous title of PROJECT ONE. (Wasn't Kampuchea named that by Pol Pot?*) It is growing fairly enormous by the day, and we usually picket right in front of it.

The Greenville Antiwar Society used to have our yearly candlelight vigil exactly where the construction is now, but the small building with two giant flights of steps (where I took this photo from) is now gone.

Since we are standing there with signs, several people have asked us if we are protesting the construction.

They seem disappointed when we say no.


*Correction, that was THE YEAR ONE. I always get capitalism and communism mixed up, sorry about that. ;)

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Dirt

Some angry local "Democrat" wrote a nasty, 1445-word (!) hit-piece on me, and has now even outed me with my legal name.

Otherwise, I would link it here and we could brawl further.

But using my name is an unbridled personal attack and here in upstate South Carolina, could even expose me to actual physical danger. I use a pseudonym here and on the air, for good reasons.

About this sordid affair, I will say no more (((sigh))), but its been going on for days now. (This guy obviously has the serious hots for Ann Romney! My radio-show comments about her have made him bloody frantic.) Also, this is my golden opportunity to link the blog Genderratic, where Gingko often discusses the phenomena he calls "damseling"--when men come to women's rescue for ostensibly pseudofeminist reasons; you know, like this "Democrat" defending poor, beleaguered Ann Romney, who needs serious protection from little nobodies like your humble narrator. (Or something like that.)

And it made me think of this song. It just POPPED into my head. :)

I am pretty sure Lou wrote it about Iggy Pop, since Iggy also wrote a song by the same name.

I guess they weren't getting along so well, at that point.

Dirt - Lou Reed



This is my last word on this subject, since I am now banned from this guy's blog (so people can go on to discuss me without me interfering or correcting the copious inaccuracies). Considering what happened to left wing radio host Alan Berg, I am thinking I need to start carrying a weapon myself. After all, South Carolina has lots more white supremacists than Colorado ever did. And this man has deliberately turned me into a target by naming me.

What kind of gun? I'd prefer an M-16, but I don't think it will fit into my purse.

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Tuesday Tunes: The Problem is You

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The static hurts my ears

As stated in previous comments, I don't know from tumblr, despite various net-savvy people attempting to explain it's sacred mysteries to me. Therefore, I couldn't respond to the latest charges being lodged. So, I will have to do it here.

For the record, I'd really rather not, but it does appear necessary, at this point. (sigh)

This is from the tumblr blog The View From My Brain:

I didn’t read the post when you linked it before, so I didn’t realise who it was. Daisy Deadhead of Daisy’s Dead Air is a hateful bigoted and privileged asshat.

She is the feminist who literally told me to go die, because my coping methods for my autism issues were not approved by her holy vegan standards. And she did this in a discussion about something completely irrelevant, rather than on the post where my coping method was actually mentioned.

Good God, yall.

I have no idea at all what this refers to. I do not know Jemima Aslana, although I have seen her name before. I have never interacted with her, although I think she may have commented here once or twice. I have commented (in the past) on lots of blogs, but as stated above, have not figured out how to "do" tumblr and Aslana's blog is a tumblr blog. So the comments she refers to could not have been made on her blog. I'd like to know where this (mythical) exchange took place?

As regular readers know, I am not vegan and could not live more than 72 hrs (at most) without cheese--preferably smoked gouda or Tillamook aged cheddar. I think she has me confused with someone else.

Further, "literally" telling people to "go die"--that just isn't me. That is somewhat ungrammatical and unpoetic; I am more likely to quote Lou Reed, "I'm just waiting for [them/you] to hurry up and die," which I've been saying since the release of Sally Can't Dance. Old habits die hard. (I have never quite broken the habit of saying "far out" in, well, far out circumstances.) Simply put, I am not a person who tells people to go die, all while upholding holy vegan standards I don't have.

Of course, Jemima Aslana didn't bother to link to this very incendiary accusation. She was so eager to join the junior-high-school pile-on, she couldn't be bothered to check the facts. And said pile-on does get ugly, as I am enthusiastically called a "total shithead" and suchlike, by people who have never met me... including an individual I once foolishly complimented for their writing. (For some reason, I especially feel like the archetypal dumb hillbilly when someone I have lavishly complimented turns on me.)

As for the other spin-offs from spin-offs from Tweets and Twats and alllll the rest? I can't keep up. It all started here, but I am now getting links from strange corners of tumblrville and beyond. It's like that child's game "Telephone"--now they are writing about the writing about the writing about me, not writing about what I exactly wrote. If that makes sense. This is why I decided to address Jemima's accusation, since it seems to have taken on a life of its own and is getting repeated even more than anything I wrote on Renee's blog [Womanist Musings].

And it simply isn't true.

But I saved the best for last! Jemima's last paragraph:

Believe me, sweetheart, you aren’t getting anywhere with Daisy. She will first derail and if that doesn’t work for then she will assault your mental health until you become suicidal. I advise you to pull out now, because it can never end well with her. Never.

Jemima darlin, I have to say, that paragraph is one of the most bad-ass things ever written about me, and I love it! Thank you!!!

Am I a bad bitch or what?! ((((preens))))

My mother (who would have happily slit all their tires by now) would be so proud of me. Seriously, I wish she had lived long enough for me to read that paragraph to her, since she often considered me a silly, bubbleheaded peacenik and believed I let people walk all over me. Wouldn't she be thrilled to learn that the apple didn't fall far from the tree?

I must end here, on a decidedly positive note. :)

~*~

When the world is running down - The Police



turn on the radio
the static hurts my ears
tell me where would I go?
I ain't been out in years
turn on the stereo
it's played for years and years
an Otis Redding song
it's all I own

when the world is running down
you make the best of what's still around

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Monday Music: Letter never sent

Letter never sent - R.E.M.

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Your Friday Blogdonia Soap Opera

You know you've needed one.

I really, really, did not want to address this nonsense here. Really. But when people write entire posts about me, calling me out for my transgressions, well, whatcha gonna do.

What is really funny is that I responded. Like, 12 times, and I was moderated. And they keep asking questions. I answer...incredibly long-ass, intricate replies, and the answer is moderated.

No other choice, but to come here and settle it. (sigh) Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days in Feminist Blogdonia.

~*~

The brawl, we see, starts here and here. (Trigger warning, transphobia)

Background: The so-called radical feminist blog AROOO, aka "A Room of Our Own" (I say "so-called" because they always seemed rather ignorant of Second Wave feminist history, all while claiming it as their own), has a history of extremely nasty transphobia. I was banned from the blog after I objected to (trigger warning, viciousness and bullying) a post in which they (seriously) posted a photo of what they claimed was the genitalia (!) of a trans woman, and made fun of how weird it looks. To me, this was over the top, even more over the top than usual. As regular readers know, I react strongly to making fun of people's appearance, for whatever reason.

I also found it pornographic and deranged, but that's probably quibbling.

Margaret Jamison, the (apparently former) blogger in charge of AROOO, seemed to become more and more obsessed with trans women over time. There was less and less posting about feminism and racism (subjects she was keenly insightful about) and more and more hate speech directed at "tyrannies" (her word for "tranny") that she claimed sent her all manner of threats. This posting-genitalia nervous-breakdown was virtually inevitable. I had believed the general hate speech and turning trans women's attempted-replies into monkey-photos was bad enough, but the genitalia-photo, to me, was the real turning point. I objected, was banned in due course, and went away.

The End. (Or possibly one of those American International horror movies from the 60s: The End?)

Nah, you gotta be kiddin.

Joan Kelly, whom I love, recently met Margaret Jamison in the flesh and became unaccountably besotted with her wonderfulness. Perhaps Margaret is utterly fabulous in person, despite her increasing obsession with trans women, accompanying hate speech and photos of monkeys and genitals, I don't know. I suppose it's possible.

And rather suddenly, Joan has started running all kinds of anti-trans nastiness on her blog (see links above), when she did not used to hold this position. I assume it's to impress Margaret or in solidarity with Margaret, something like that. Unfortunately, these posts are becoming as embarrassingly obsessive and frequent as Margaret's posting at AROOO, which by the way, has ended. Now her co-blogger, Kitty Glendower, has taken over, posting about movies. (?) Huh? What the hell happened?

What happened is that some of Margaret's wack-ass transphobe "friends" (gotta watch those hater-friends, they tend not to be such stable personalities) turned against her (nah, say it isn't so) and posted her private business on the net. I haven't seen any of this private business, but I am assured it exists. (Paranoia will destroya) In fact, I have not seen much discussion AT ALL about Margaret, frankly, except for what I linked above by Suzan Cooke, which is from almost a YEAR AND A HALF AGO (and that tells you how long Margaret has been fulminating non-stop over the evilll trans people, Jesus H Christ).

In one of my offhand snipes in one of the many unpublished posts to the many rants Joan has published over the last few days (including threats to hunt down and shoot whoever outed her dear Margaret... I TOLD you it was bad, people), I mentioned something I've known about Margaret for a long time: the elite school she attended. As regular DEAD AIR readers know, I never forget stuff like that, and if you are going to get all self-righteous with me about 'oppression' -- you'd better not have a major privilege like that stashed away somewhere, or Daisy will drag it out of your privilege-closet and wave it right in your fucking face. Which I did.

And in so doing, I caused Joan and Margaret and the whole Hee Haw gang to have apoplexy. That is PRIVATE INFO!!!! WHO OUTED MARGIE AS A RICH KID!!!???!!! Heads will roll, baby.

Another blog informs me that this so-called "private" info was posted right on Margaret's Facebook page, so I think this is just another excuse to clutch one's pearls, squeal and holler, that the evilll trannies are at it again. I don't remember where I read it, but it didn't seem private... actually, I think Margaret was bragging about it herself when I first read it. (NOTE: people who went to rich, important schools can usually NEVER keep this to themselves for long.)

Anyway (cut to the chase; I am SO SORRY it takes awhile for soap-opera catch-up!), I stand accused of being a racist for comparing the use of the n-word to the use of anti-trans insults (see first link above). I was read the riot act, probably by someone who lives in an all-white neighborhood and never once helped beat up a klansman. Figures.

And I replied, for what, the 12th time? One part of my comment was allowed, the rest was edited. I told Joan, I would print it here if she censored me again. It is really unconscionable to call people out for racism and then not allow them to reply WITHOUT CENSORSHIP to your accusations. I am a lifelong activist who takes such accusations very seriously, not some dilettante who throws words and posts around recklessly. So, here is my complete, unedited reply, which Joan would not publish:



I should be very clear about one thing.

I do think racism and transphobia are analogous. You betcha. Amen. I believe is transphobia/racism are horrific, mindless, oppressive, repressive, evil hatreds of whole groups of people around the world, throughout history, that the haters have NOT EVEN MET. (That’s the part that I find so bizarre and even psychotic.) I grew up with this mindless, obsessive hatred of entire groups of people… and in my piece about my father, I made the analogy between racism and transphobia; I’ve done it before. This isn’t new.

http://daisysdeadair.blogspot.com/2008/09/brute-heart-of-brute-like-you.html

My point was badly made, n-word and ‘transgendered males’–I should not have compared these words, but the hatred they represent. This is what I meant to say, which I only now realize. (my real excuse: exhaustion, lack of education, no time to read over what I type in a hurry, which is almost everything these days. As I have said over and over, I do not have internet access to blogs, email, etc at work.)

A crucial aspect of hating people you have never met, is letting them know, so they will stay away from you. Haters proudly announce hate, by using insulting terms that will hurt. Example: N-word, misgendering. I think the intent to insult is the same. The. Same. And of course, the overall hatred and obsession is VIRTUALLY IDENTICAL in advanced cases like my father and Margie and m_Andrea. And that is what I meant to say, or should have said.

This is what I find analogous, the intent that would cause anyone to say these words after being nicely asked to stop. Words that have prefaced lynching, rape, murder, and thus, deliberately push buttons. NO, by God, you will not spare their feelings.

Neither would my dad, in fact, like Margie, it just made him worse.

Hate is hate and I will never countenance it. Sorry, Joan. But this is what you are trafficking in.

Now, if you cannot post this, as I suspect you can’t, please do your readers the courtesy of letting them know I have responded and delivered the sought-after mea-culpa.

I really hate the ‘putting words in my mouth’ and (I feel you have) incorrectly paraphrased me in this post and find it a hostile act. You can make this up to me by printing this comment. (I guess that will happen after the second Tuesday after the third Wednesday hell freezes over, yeah?)

But you asked, and you got.

~*~

Comments welcome, but rudeness and anti-trans bigotry will get the trap door, as well as a dose of redneck justice, which makes Margaret's [rich school] games, look like a tea party. Be advised, boyz and girlz.

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