Weekly WTF: the Milwaukee version
I’m still in Milwaukee–more info on the Ecological Society of America meetings tomorrow! (Right now I’m focused on finding a good cup of coffee, and my roommate, who is AWOL.)
I haven’t done a WTF in a while, so I’ve got a good head of steam to work with. If you haven’t been following the travesty of rape by military contractors in Iraq, you may not get a chance to learn more– the DOD Sexual Assault Prevention officer was ordered not to testify before congress.
The House has been holding hearings on military sexual assault, and the testimony is just horrifying. Women serving in the Military are “more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire in Iraq.“
Damn.
And God only knows how many Iraqi women have been attacked.
Other WTFs in the news:
Little kid denied kindergarden for honoring his native culture
Pastor uses Myspace to spy on his congregation–and then denounce them publicly. Whoops! I got fooled on this one–but I could totally do this with my students, so I found it pretty believable. And it is pretty funny.
Rolling Stone has amazingly racist illustration (and mocks McCain’s POW status)
SexPS has an great essay on what it means that women in the Olympics are suspect for not being feminine enough:
“What is so striking about this is that it represents an insistence that women be held to a biological standard of womanhood. Consider the variations among women. What does it mean to set aside some group of women and say they are too powerful to be ‘real women’?”
And from a comment on that post:
“What sort of message does this send to young women other than that if you are any good you will be investigated as some sort of freak due to an assumption that women are inherently inferior to men, and that only masculine characteristics allow for achievement.”
Amen to that.
My own personal WTF:
Why is it that hotels nationwide seem to have conspired to make shower handles that are completely incomprehensible? I can never figure out which way to turn the handle to get actual hot water. Our current hotel’s configuration requires me to turn the handle to cold to get hot water. WTF?
Also, cheeseheads are 20 bucks, which is dissapointingly expensive, and I haven’t been home in 2 weeks, and won’t be home for another week. 
I’m glad to see that despite your busy schedule, you’re finding time for blogging and ranting against asshattery. Preach on, buggirl!
FYI, the myspace pastor thing originates at Lark News, a satirical site.
Well, that’s a bummer! At least I wasn’t the only one that was taken in.
*blush*
My personal WTF? People who go to the theatre to watch a play and then spend the whole performance reading the script.
Oh, and people who pour mixers like lemonade into superb single malt Scotch. Ugh.
Stonehead,
someone who spends most of the play reading the script probably has a hearing loss and would otherwise not understand most of the dialog!
andrea
That’s a good point, Andrea.
Here, I just had someone get a call in the middle of a presentation–and TAKE THE CALL.
WTF?
I’ve seen it happen a few times and each time the person was quick to spot differences between what the actors were saying and what was in the script. They’d sit there with a penlight, scouring the script and then point out the mistakes to their companions. WTF?