Linklog

[tinyjo]

Two links from my friends page which caught my eye.

First, No pity. No shame. No silence. Personally I've never been a victim of violence, sexual or otherwise, which makes me very lucky. I still found the post very affecting and I want to support the idea of bringing the scope of this into the light. I've seen a few people on my friends list make this declaration and I want to bear witness.

Secondly, and completely unrelatedly, http://www.electoral-vote.com/, which is a predictor of the electoral college results, based on polls in all the states. I thought the graph of how the votes are shifting was particularly interesting - I noticed that the democrats actually took a dip after Farenheit 911 came out.

Third and last, a rant by swisstone about the King Arthur film and Arthurian scholarship generally. I do plan to see the film but the historical Arthur? Come off it!

Comments

Re. F911 (which I have finally seen)

[t--m--i.livejournal.com]

My take on this is that it's more likely to mobilize existing votes than to change minds - for those who have seen it, and they, by and large, would not be tribal Republicans anyway.

On the other hand, a lot of conservative (small 'c') voters who *haven't* and *wouldn't* see the film felt threatened by its very success (anything the cheese-loving surrender monkeys like, etc... yadda yadda).

As time went on you get word-of-mouth about the film (which seemed very carefully done so as to avoid any suggestion of Not Supporting The Troops) and the Democrats not suddenly turning into anarcho-communists overnight, the fear dies down, and people start thinking about "how much this war is costing" and "how are we going to do without all the reservists we employ" and so on - and bingo! Up goes the Democrat vote again.

did you read the director's manifesto piece?

[cleanskies.livejournal.com]

I quote: "the British need for Arthur and his Knights to be indigenous is akin to people who need to find aliens at Roswell no matter what"

oh dearie me.

No pity. No shame. No silence.

[greengolux.livejournal.com]

I too have been reading posts about this subject on my friends list today. I can't imagine what it must be like to have your life affected by sexual violence.

I guess I have been a victim of sexual violence, once, but I'm wary of speaking out about it because it just seems so small and petty, and I don't want to seem like I'm equating it with the serious stuff that other people go through. One time when I was walking home alone at midnight when I was about 16 a guy came up behind me, grabbed me and managed to get his hands up under my T-shirt before I fought him off. I think he was intending to rape me, but I stabbed him with my keys and screamed really loudly, so he ran off.

I know how lucky I was. The incident left me feeling not much more than a bit silly for having been caught walking home alone. It certainly wasn't traumatic and hasn't affected my life at all compared to what other people have experienced.

[eudaimonia-nz.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the link to the King Arthur rant - quite interesting.

Rather than being 'historical' I would call King Arthur an intelligent war movie. Although I am usually not gun-ho (sic) about such things, I thought the way they clearly portrayed the battle tactics was clever and significantly added to the film. No sham "heroic" generals were required to explain the battles, as tactics were clear from watching the battles on screen.

In degrees of separation

[applez.livejournal.com]

This is probably the 3rd or 4th rape I've heard of, and perhaps the 8th or 12th sexually-related assault tale I've heard, most closely associated to me.

I would like to think that these sorts of experiences are still in the minority for women as a whole, but I worry how prevalent it all is...whether ranging from the grope to the rape.