Goldman Sh--ty Deal Testifies Loud and Clear, Drug Company Pays $500 Billion Fine, How to Detect Liars - News Headlines 27 Apr 2010

From Denny: The Senate hearing today with Goldman Sachs squirming in front of grilling Senators sure was entertainment TV at its best: a rockin' reality show! The real question remains that is this only to remain a fond memory of great dramatic theater or will the Congress actually get serious about taking these financial scumbags to task and put them in prison?


Sen. Levin Calls Goldman Sachs Allegations 'Deeply Troubling' (ABC) Senator Demands to Know Why Goldman Sachs Pushed 'Sh**ty Deal' on Clients

In a testy exchange at today's Senate grilling of Goldman Sachs executives, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., confronted a former Goldman trader with an e-mail in which another former Goldman executive described a mortgage-backed deal as "sh**ty."

The transaction in question was Timberwolf Ltd., a $1 billion collateralized debt obligation holding pieces of other CDOs. In an e-mail to Daniel Sparks, then head of Goldman's mortgage desk, Thomas Montag, Goldman's former head of sales and trading, called a set of mortgage-linked investments sold by the firm as "one shi**y deal," according to an e-mail that Sen. Levin quoted. Within five months, Timberwolf lost 80 percent of its value.

"Do you think it was a sh**ty deal?" Levin asked Sparks, one of seven Goldman executives appearing today. Sparks said he did not recall the e-mail, and did not directly answer the question.

"If you can't give a clear answer to that one Mr. Sparks then we're not going to get any clear answers from you today," Levin said.

In his opening remarks, Levin called the allegations against the Wall Street firm "deeply troubling."

"The evidence shows that Goldman repeatedly put its own interests and profits ahead of the interests of its clients and our communities," Levin said. "Its misuse of exotic and complex financial structures helped spread toxic mortgages throughout the financial system. And when the system finally collapsed under the weight of those toxic mortgages, Goldman profited from the collapse."



Watch CBS News Videos Online




It sure is amazing how the GOP thinks this idiot strategy will work FOR them in the November elections when poll after poll keeps reminding them the public and former Republicans have pulled away from them in favor of the Democrats. Now if the Democrats can just not step on their tongues, keep their spines strong and straight, get serious about all kinds of reform - then they might actually get to stay in office and run the country for a few decades before they get lazy again, forget to take care of the middle class and get thrown out in favor of lobbyist puppets Republicans. Yeah, that's choice in American politics...


Stance Against Financial Bill Risky For GOP (NPR)

Republican senators are offering a united front to block a Democratic bill that would revamp the rules for Wall Street. But the GOP's hard stand against the bill is not without political peril, party strategists warn -- and it has the potential to hurt the party with voters this fall.

"I think most people believe that Wall Street got away with something," says Reed Galen, a Republican consultant who was deputy campaign manager for Sen. John McCain's presidential bid.

Republicans blocked the financial overhaul bill from moving to the Senate floor for debate. The vote was 57-41, three short of the 60 needed for Democrats to advance their measure. A third test vote is expected on Wednesday.

On Monday night, all 41 Senate Republicans -- plus one Democrat -- blocked the bill . But no matter what they think about the details of the bill, Republicans have to be careful of appearing to be the party of the "wealthy, detached elite," Galen says.

The GOP also should be wary of playing into the hands of Democrats, who are privately pleased that they have been handed much-needed fodder -- and a simple message -- for the fall midterm elections. Republicans expect to make significant
gains on Capitol Hill...





Yes, Mr. Vice President, this IS a "Big F--king Deal!" :)


Biden 'Absolutely Confident' On Economic Recovery (NPR)

Vice President Joe Biden is bullish on the Obama administration's efforts to mend the U.S. economy after the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

"I'm absolutely confident that the policies that we put in place are sending the economy and the American public in the right direction," Biden told NPR's Robert Siegel on Tuesday.

Last week, Biden told a political fundraiser in Pittsburgh that the economy would create 100,000 to 200,000 jobs a month, adding that there will be some months in which as many as 250,000 to 500,000 jobs would be created. The comments prompted White House spokesman Robert Gibbs to quip: "He's an optimistic man, and that's why we like him."

Biden acknowledged Tuesday that those predictions were "a long way [from erasing] an 8-million-job deficit."

"What has to happen is there has to be continued forward progress," Biden said. "There's going to be ebbs and flows ... but it has to constantly be moving in the direction of job creation..."





And yet another huge Scumbag Alert...


AstraZeneca Paying $520 Million To Settle Seroquel Charges (NPR)


AstraZeneca became the latest drug giant to pay up for marketing an anti-psychotic medicine for uses the Food and Drug Administration had not approved.

Federal officials announced a $520 million settlement of civil charges stemming from the drug maker's promotion of Seroquel, an antipsychotic with sales of $4.9 billion worldwide last year.

AstraZeneca pushed doctors to write Seroquel prescriptions for a host of unapproved uses, including anger management, post-traumatic stress disorder and sleeplessness, the settlement alleges. The drug was improperly promoted for use in children and also the elderly.

In addition, the government claims the company curried doctors' favor with money. "AstraZeneca paid kickback to doctors as part of an illegal scheme to market the drug for unapproved uses," Health And Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said at a news conference about the settlement.





I like the way Wall Street says this is no big deal because they were expecting it. Yeah, I guess not when they are making billions every quarter off the derivatives market to this day going unregulated! No wonder they are not sweating the small stuff.


Stocks Plunge on Europe's Deepening Debt Woes (CBS/AP) Dow Jones Plummets 213 Points as Debt Problems in Greece and Portugal Threaten Global Economy

Investors are once again worried that debt problems in Greece and Portugal could threaten the global economic recovery.

Stocks plunged in the U.S. and Europe Tuesday after Standard & Poor's downgraded the debt of the two European countries. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 213 points, its worst loss in almost three months. All the major market indexes were down about 2 percent.

The ratings downgrades also sent the dollar up more than 1.1 percent against the euro, hitting its highest level in about a year. At the same time, gold and Treasury prices also rose as investors sought safer investments. The three often do not trade in the same direction.

"It was a knee-jerk reaction," said Brian Peardon, a wealth adviser at Harrison Financial Group in Citrus Heights, Calif. Peardon said the small size of Greece and Portugal's economies mean their debt struggles are not yet a major problem. But if they were to default on their debt, other countries that hold their bonds would also suffer...





Hmmm... if you want to learn how to spot a liar just hike on over to Liars News aka Fox News. Just watch their lips move and you will automatically know on the spot that they are lying about everything - even what they had for breakfast. Yes, it's that bad over there. Definitely Liars News has only two kinds of audience draw: weak minds that believe lies easily and those who enjoy mocking them. Yep, that about sums it up!


Dr. Phil: How to Sniff Out a Liar in Your Midst (CBS) Famed Talk Show Host Tells of Common Indicators that Someone is Lying to You

Can you spot a cheater?

Dr. Phil can.

Famed talk show host Dr. Phil McGraw, better known simply as Dr. Phil, appeared on "The Early Show" Tuesday to tell you how you know someone's lying...



Watch CBS News Videos Online





And for the laughing bizarre story of the day...


Police Say Man Wrapped In Toilet Paper Robs Store (CBS) Nebraska Police Say Man Who Concealed His Face With Toilet Paper Robbed A Convenience Store


LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - A man who concealed his face by wrapping his head with toilet paper robbed a Lincoln convenience store. Police said the man was armed with a knife when he robbed the store around 10:30 on Saturday night. He escaped on foot with an undisclosed amount of money from the safe.

Capt. David Beggs said Sunday that no one was injured.


And that's all she wrote...




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This must be a joke... please tell me this is a joke

Nature's laws of shopping: Men hunt, women gather

University of Michigan psychologist Daniel Kruger has found that how we shop has an awful lot to do with how we once found our food. Men hunt. Women gather. Conjugal chaos ensues.
[...]
As a scientist, he refused to do the sensible thing – shrug his shoulders. He wanted to know the reason. He combed over studies of aboriginal tribes and did a battery of tests on student volunteers. The results will be published in the upcoming issue of the Journal of Social, Evolutionary and Cultural Psychology.

Kruger found that our habits haven't changed. Our environment and our goals have.

In prehistory, women gathered or foraged for food. This kept them close to home, performing a daily, intensive and social activity. A good memory, a keen eye and a lot of patience when choosing help make a good gatherer.

Men hunted for meat. This was an intermittent, asocial activity that earned them prestige only through the biggest catches. Short bursts of energy were followed by long periods of sitting around waiting for women to bring in the harvest.

There are so many things wrong with this article, I don't even know where to begin.

Masculine, Feminine, or Human?

Robert Jensen on categories of masculinity and femininity:

In a guest lecture about masculinity to a college class, I ask the students to generate two lists that might help clarify the concept.

For the first, I tell them to imagine themselves as parents whose 12-year-old son asks, "Mommy/daddy, what does it mean to be a man?" The list I write on the board as they respond is not hard to predict: To be a man is to be strong, responsible, loving. Men provide for those around them and care for others. A man weathers tough times and doesn't give up.

When that list is complete, I ask the women to observe while the men answer a second question: When you are in all-male spaces, such as the locker room or a night out with the guys, what do you say to each other about what it means to be a man? How do you define masculinity when there are no women present?

The students, both men and women, laugh nervously, knowing the second list will be different from the first. The men fumble a bit at first, as it becomes clear that one common way men define masculinity in practice is not through affirmative statements but negative ones — it's about what a man isn't, and what a real man isn't is a woman or gay. In the vernacular: Don't be a girl, a sissy, a fag. To be a man is to not be too much like a woman or to be gay, which is in large part about being too much like a woman.

From there, the second list expands to other descriptions: To be a man is to be a player, a guy who can attract women and get sex; someone who doesn't take shit from people, who can stand down another guy if challenged, who doesn't let anyone else get in his face. Some of the men say they have other ideas about masculinity but acknowledge that in most all-male spaces it's difficult to discuss them.

When that process is over, I step back and ask the class to consider the meaning of the two lists. On the first list of the culturally endorsed definitions of masculinity, how many of those traits are unique to men? Are women ever strong? Should women be strong? Can women be just as responsible as men? Should women provide and care for others? I ask the students if anyone wants to make the argument that women are incapable of these things, or less capable than men. There are no takers.

I point out the obvious: The list of traits that we claim to associate with being a man — the things we would feel comfortable telling a child to strive for — are in fact not distinctive characteristics of men but traits of human beings that we value, what we want all people to be. The list of understandings of masculinity that men routinely impose on each other is quite different. Here, being a man means not being a woman or gay, seeing relationships as fundamentally a contest for control, and viewing sex as the acquisition of pleasure from a woman. Of course that's not all men are, but it sums up the dominant, and very toxic, conception of masculinity with which most men are raised in the contemporary United States. It's not an assertion about all men or all possible ideas about masculinity, but a description of a pattern.

I ask the class: If the positive definitions of masculinity are not really about being a man but simply about being a person, and if the definitions of masculinity within which men routinely operate are negative, why are we holding onto the concept so tightly?

Robert Jensen has a gift for breaking down this kind of thing so simply. A good article - read the whole thing

This Week in Intelligence

And I don't meant the secret CIA kind - I mean the part of I.Q. that comes before "quotient".

It's been a busy week for intelligence.

To sum up:

Men don't like intelligent women. This is, of course, the fault of teh feminists. (We pencilled the plan in our agendas, right after "Destroy the Family".)

Also, Stupidity is the best defense against the left's pesky rationality

But of course, I shouldn't worry my pretty little head about all of this, because my pretty little head holds a pretty little brain, which due to its cute and womanly IQ cannot possibly think about anything but shoes and lipstick. But fortunately I was born in Canada, where we have a respectable "national IQ". That almost makes up for the fact of my womanhood. Because can you imagine if I was born in, say, Kenya or Rwanda? Not that I can draw that conclusion by myself. Being a woman and all.

Don't you just feel smarter already?

Blue is for Boyz, Pink is for Gurlz - It's Scientifikal

From Bad Science:

This week every single newspaper in the world lapped up the story that scientists have cracked the pink problem. "At last, science discovers why blue is for boys but girls really do prefer pink" said the Times. And so on.

The study took 208 people in their twenties and asked them to choose their favourite colours between two options, repeatedly, and then graphed their overall preferences. It found overlapping curves, with a significant tendency for men to prefer blue, and female subjects showing a preference for redder, pinker tones. This, the authors speculated (to international excitement and approval) may be because men go out hunting, but women need to be good at interpreting flushed emotional faces, and identifying berries whilst out gathering.

There are so many things wrong with this study, most of it covered over at Bad Science. And yes, this is Very Bad Science.

Anyone wanna bet if they found out men had a preference for pink, they would say it's because men are programmed to seek out womens' flushed emotional faces and pink labia? (Don't forget the first law of evolutionary psychology: men are motivated by the desire for sex, while women are motivated by the desire for security). And if women showed a preference for blue it would be because of our innate attraction to blue eyes - really, no foolin'! This is fun. We could play this with every color. Men like orange - quick, what does it mean?

Well, I suppose I should get back to gathering my pink fruits and vegetables (how many pink gatherables can you think of?). And my male readers should go hunt us up some blue meat. No excuses, it's in your genes.

Can Biological Essentialism Die Already

Come on people. I thought we got beyond this decades ago.

Creepy Love Songs

So, this post at The Vanity Press has been lurking in the back of my head. Then this morning, I was listening to this song, and the refrain began to creep me out:
"My salvation lies in your love"*


That got me thinking to another song that is really creepy:

I'm sorry that I hurt you
It's something I must live with everyday
And all the pain I put you through
I wish that I could take it all away
And be the one who catches all your tears
Thats why i need you to hear

I've found a reason for me
To change who I used to be
A reason to start over new
and the reason is You

Gag me with a spoon.

This CD was sent to me by a creepy** ex, who was stalking me. Interestingly, I was involved in an online support group and I wasn't the only one who'd had this exact same song sent to me. It's THE abusers' anthem.

Other notable mentions: Every breath you take; Escape ("You can run you can hide but you can't escape my love"); Never gonna give you up ("A full commitment's what I'm thinking of /You wouldn't get this from any other guy"); Figured you out, Savin' Me, and others by Nickelback; How am I supposed to live without you; Broken Wings ("you're half of the flesh and blood that makes me whole"); You're Havin my baby ("Havin' my baby/What a lovely way of sayin' what you're thinkin' of me")

It's so hard to like love songs when they are about unhealthy attachment and codependent love. Some even make excellent stalker songs. Don't some of them just make you feel like you're being smothered (Don't Want To Miss A Thing)? If this is what we hear on the radio, no wonder relationship "issues" are the new black.

As TVP says:

A lot of men are looking for their anima -- the term Jung gave to the feminine side of a man's personality. But what a lot of men in a patriarchal culture do not understand is that the anima is part of them, and is not to be found in another person. This is because men in a patriarchal culture are taught precisely that they don't have an anima: that there is nothing feminine about them, or if there is, that it is a bad thing and must be suppressed... I wasn't reacting to women as if they were real people. Instead, I was reacting to them as if they were the missing part of myself.

A lot of these so called love songs are of the "you complete me" variety, or "I can't live without you". Some are all about possession.

So, what creepy love songs come to mind for you?

* Turns out on reading the rest of the lyrics, Murdoch is talking about his brother and sister. Phew. It's a good song, and I was afraid I'd hate it after this.

** Sorry to use this word so much, but sometimes a better word can't be found. Definition: 1. Of or producing a sensation of uneasiness or fear, as of things crawling on one's skin. 2. Annoyingly unpleasant; repulsive.

The Mythic, Heroic Narrative Obscures the Essence of War, which is Death

All troops, when they occupy and battle insurgent forces, as in Iraq, or Gaza or Vietnam, are swiftly placed in what the psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton terms "atrocity-producing situations." In this environment, surrounded by a hostile population, simple acts such as going to a store to buy a can of Coke or driving down a street means you can be killed. This constant fear and stress leads troops to view everyone around them as the enemy. The hostility is compounded when the enemy, as in Iraq, is elusive, shadowy and hard to find. The rage that soldiers feel after a roadside bomb explodes, killing or maiming their comrades, is one that is easily directed over time to innocent civilians who are seen as supporting the insurgents. It is a short psychological leap, but a massive moral one. It is a leap from killing - the shooting of someone who has the capacity to do you harm - to murder - the deadly assault against someone who cannot harm you. The war in Iraq is now primarily about murder. There is very little killing. American Marines and soldiers have become, after four years of war, acclimated to atrocity.
[...]
War is the pornography of violence. It has a dark beauty, filled with the monstrous and the grotesque. The Bible calls it "the lust of the eye" and warns believers against it. War allows us to engage in primal impulses we keep hidden in the deepest, most private interiors of our fantasy life. It allows us to destroy not only things but human beings. In that moment of wholesale destruction, we wield the power of the divine, the power to give or annihilate life. Armed units become crazed by the frenzy of destruction. All things, including human beings, become objects - objects to either gratify or destroy or both. Almost no one is immune. The contagion of the crowd sees to that.
[...]
It takes little in wartime to turn ordinary men and women into killers.

From A Culture of Atrocity by Chris Hedges

So we have ridiculous rationalizations for the killing of children. We have disappearing freedoms justified by war. We have war heroes being treated like crap.

Feeling Like a Victim, Acting Like a Perpetrator

We have learned about the cycles of abuse within families, about the way a child who is beaten and abused can grow up believing there are only two choices, victim and perpetrator, and can become an adult who feels like a victim while acting like a perpetrator.

But, somehow, as activists, we have failed to see the immense implications of that knowledge for the work of social change.

Over and over I see movements of liberation get stuck at the same place, the moment when we "other" the agents of our oppression, without trying to understand why they are as they are and how we can prevent more people being that way in the future. If we even begin to ask those questions, we are rapidly drawn to the places where we ourselves have been most deeply wounded.

In the exact place where it is most difficult to understand how anyone could do as our enemies have done, and still be human, in the exact moment when they cease to be our kin in our imaginations, is the place of greatest potential illumination.

From the forward to Power Under: Trauma and Nonviolent Social Change

This is important for understanding how men, white people, Westerners, rich people are at once victims and perpetrators. Capitalism, patriarchy, war, racism, it all relies on one common value, which is the precise antithesis of equality: domination. This motif, "dominate or be dominated", runs throughout our lives and our history - we learn it at a very young age. But some groups, simply by virtue of their privileged social position or status, fall on the dominating side, while others fall on the dominated side. Most fall somewhere in between, as the quote above says, feeling "like a victim while acting like a perpetrator".

How can this understanding help our movements? What kinds of choices can we make in our personal, our political, and our social lives to overcome the whole structure, instead of simply trying to change our position within it?

Related Reads:

• Privilege Is Driving a Smooth Road And Not Even Knowing It
  
• Empathy and Power
• Inventing Whiteness
  
• Validating the Suffering of the Palestinians
  
• The Perpetrator as Victim, too
  
• Just a few thoughts
  
• Authoritarianism in America
  

This upsets me so much I can't even think of a title for this post

From Sick joke or sick reality?:

"Parental Alienation Syndrome has been used nationwide by batterers as a courtroom tactic to silence abused children by attempting to discredit their disclosures of abuse. This theory is not recognized as valid by the American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association, or the American Medical Association. Parental Alienation Syndrome is not accepted as a psychiatric diagnosis, and has been rejected by the mainstream psychological community. Parental Alienation Syndrome is junk science; there is no valid research or empirical data to support this unproven theory."

PAS is all about punishing mothers, while abused children are denied their safety and the validation of their own experiences.

In Florida, Indiana, Connecticut, Kentucky, Nebraska, Iowa, Maine, and Nevada, there is now reportedly a whole day officially dedicated to raising "awareness" about [Richard] Gardner's theory called Parental Alienation Syndrome, in which the very reports of abuse by a child against a father are themselves evidence that the child is being brainwashed by the mother (and if the child is angry at the father, or doesn't want to visit, that's even more evidence) and the only "cure" for this syndrome is to force the child to live with the abuser and deny ANY contact with the protective mother, who has no history of abuse.

C'mon, you're thinking, what judge would buy this crock? Doesn't it matter if the abuse really happened? Apparently not.

So why is PAS being allowed into the courts?

This month, the NOW Foundation joined other leading organizations working on family law and family violence in a complaint filed against the United States with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. The complaint charges that U.S. courts are failing to protect the life, liberties, security, and other human rights of abused mothers and children by frequently awarding child custody to abusers and child molesters. PAS is one predominant strategy being used by lawyers to place children in such danger. A recent Newsweek article noted the finding of a Harvard study that in custody cases involving documented spousal abuse, 54% granted custody to the batterer, and parental alienation was used as an argument in nearly every single one.

Don't Miss: Courageous Kids (powerful) - kids who had to live with an abusive parent are speaking out about their experiences.
Also: A Letter to Richard Gardener (funny)

She Hit Me First! And Other Poor Justifications for War

Photo Credit

Yesterday, I was watching the (excellent and engaging) film I Know I'm Not Alone with D.S.

In the segment before Michael Franti goes to Israel and the Occupied Territories there's a few short statements to fill in some background. To paraphrase: "In relation to Israel there's as many versions of history as there are people telling it" and then "in 1967 Israel launched a pre-emptive strike". At which point D.S. said that was weird, because he knows Israel was attacked first. He was a kid at the time, but it wasn't history to him, he actually remembered it. He was in synagogue when it was announced and he remembers it very well. For me I learned something different, but then again, it's history to me (since I wasn't born yet). I said it's complicated figuring who started something, especially when you consider the possible biases of those reporting an event. Consider last summer's war with Lebanon. Who started it? 30 or 40 years from now, what will the history book say?

According to the current consensus at Wikipedia (yeah, I know, but still, it's a good resource) it was a pre-emptive strike by Israel, although they have a nice long list of sources for both sides of the debate.

Today, I stumbled on a piece (ha ha) by Daniel Gilbert which is all about the psychology behind the "he started it" argument.

Research shows that while people think of their own actions as the consequences of what came before, they think of other people’s actions as the causes of what came later.

In a study conducted by William Swann and colleagues at the University of Texas, pairs of volunteers played the roles of world leaders who were trying to decide whether to initiate a nuclear strike. The first volunteer was asked to make an opening statement, the second volunteer was asked to respond, the first volunteer was asked to respond to the second, and so on. At the end of the conversation, the volunteers were shown several of the statements that had been made and were asked to recall what had been said just before and just after each of them.

The results revealed an intriguing asymmetry: When volunteers were shown one of their own statements, they naturally remembered what had led them to say it. But when they were shown one of their conversation partner’s statements, they naturally remembered how they had responded to it. In other words, volunteers remembered the causes of their own statements and the consequences of their partner’s statements.

What seems like a grossly self-serving pattern of remembering is actually the product of two innocent facts. First, because our senses point outward, we can observe other people’s actions but not our own. Second, because mental life is a private affair, we can observe our own thoughts but not the thoughts of others. Together, these facts suggest that our reasons for punching will always be more salient to us than the punches themselves — but that the opposite will be true of other people’s reasons and other people’s punches.

So, it's psychologically sensible for us to think the other party started it. We also tend to escalate in our response:

Research teaches us that our reasons and our pains are more palpable, more obvious and real, than are the reasons and pains of others. This leads to the escalation of mutual harm, to the illusion that others are solely responsible for it and to the belief that our actions are justifiable responses to theirs.

This explains the pattern of fighting over the victim position, since the victim can get away with anything.

Of course, there's a larger question: does it really matter who started it?

Afghanistan war: who started it? Al-Qaeda? The US? How about the Iraq War? What will history say?

Last Night I Dreamt of War

Last night I dreamt of war. I dreamt the nameless, faceless attackers were getting close to my house. We needed to get away, and we weren't certain exactly how close they were.

The first moment of panic came when realizing that everybody would be trying to escape. If a whole city is emptying, we were likely to get stuck on the highway - it's like just waiting for certain death. I momentarily considered hiding in the basement, but couldn't stand the thought of waiting in the dark to be found and killed, not that way.

I was trying to pack things I would need in my backpack. My dream here slowed down as I tried to plan what to take. I was going through all the stuff that I surround myself with, the stuff that forms the nest which helps me feel at home. But with such scarcity of space, few things could be taken. That meant choosing between necessities and keepsakes. Is an extra pair of pants more important than a photo album?


Living as I do in the comfort of the peaceful Western World, I can't truly know what it must be like to have one's country invaded. One day to be going about your life, expecting the next day to be much the same, and then suddenly it all changes. No longer can you imagine your future. Survival becomes the only goal.

My nightmares are others' realities.

All I can do is imagine - try to open myself to experience just a little bit of the pain and terror and anger. I think my nightmares help me to be more empathetic. I have a lot of them (I'm recovering from PTSD) and in a weird way I think they help me to be a better human being.

Trying to understand things from the point of view of the other is so crucial, and yet I see such a lack of it from our so-called leaders. It's as if they are afraid to show there's more than one possible view or interpretation. Better to stick to what you're doing, even if what you're doing is walking off a precipice, I guess, then to say: "now that I'm closer to it and have a different perspective, I see this is a cliff, so I'm going to go the other way instead."

Perhaps positions of power simply attract particular personality types. After all, if no one suffers like George and Laura, you'd think they'd be a little more compassionate.

The Gender Genie Thinks I'm a Dude

Via Do you Blog Like a Girl?, comes the Gender Genie, which is supposed to predict the gender of an author.

I ran several of my posts through; here are my results:

• Microcredit and Women Empowerment - Female Score: 692, Male Score: 993. The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
  
• Humanitarian War in Afghanistan? Female Score: 581, Male Score: 857 - The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
  
• The Fraser Institute and Drowning Public Education in a Bathtub Female Score: 888, Male Score: 854 - The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: female!
  
• Class and The Pursuit of Happyness - Female Score: 434, Male Score: 817 - The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
  
• Pseudo-Scientific Hate Propaganda and "Women Drivers" - Female Score: 363, Male Score: 1039 - The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
  
• International Women's DayFemale Score: 424, Male Score: 985 - The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
  
• Blame the Victims Female Score: 594, Male Score: 2068 -
  The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
  

So, despite the fact that almost all of these were wrong, apparently the algorithm is pretty accurate.

Interestingly, I took a nice long post from Daddy Dialectic: peein like a boy, or the follies of fathering in which the author talks about being a father. The results: "Female Score: 2014, Male Score: 1903 - The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: female!"

Which leads me to wonder if my voice would be more "female" if I wrote more about personal relationships and less about politics and social issues? If so, that means the "out of the home" topics are still largely the purvey of men, while "in the home" topics are womens' topics. Or is "serious" writing considered to be male? Or do I feel the need to take on a "male" writing style when discussing serious topics? Is there really such a thing as a female or male voice, or are we simply so programmed to communicate differently? Are these different linguistic styles simply a clear demonstration of patriarchy? Are women relational communicators due to our subordinate position in the hierarchy? In which case, does my "male" voice indicate I'm not writing submissively? Or is it because women are still the primary caregivers - then of course we'd communicate more relationally?

Or is this tool just bunk?

Try it out yourself. Choose posts that are longer than 500 words, and that quote the least from other sources, so as to ensure your own style comes through. Let me know if it is accurate.

The Perpetrator as Victim, Too

This is a note from a young, thoughtful man who has a lot of significance to say. To understand the minds of our youth, it is important to listen to them. So read this:

I'm dead tired of them demonizing the shooters. People fail to see the shooter himself as a victim as well. A victim of exclusion, bullying, beatings, ridicule and being ignored. The most frustrating thing is that I can relate to these shooters. I feel like every time they criticise them they indirectly criticise me. Another very frustrating thing is that they dodge the issue of ignorance. If I go to someone for help, and they criticise, ignore or admonish me, will I bother? I got lucky there were no firearms readily available and just got forced to quit school. I wonder if only two students who had it coming ended up on the news, what would people say? Poor guys, boo-hoo, nice guys, what a shame. How about a couple witnesses saying that they pushed him too far, they had it coming. It's no different than silencing the protests to the war on Iraq. They only keep one side of the story. Then you hear the typical opinion of a prof. of psychology. My mom and dad still maintain that it was my fault that I "quit" school. I've still got that beef with them. They didn't help much. But Mr. [xxx] (principal of [xxxx]) is still in my black books. I still want him dead, I just don't want to do it myself. I need to speak out about the FACT that the SHOOTER was VICTIMISED without being told how insensitive and mean and evil I am. I want to save lives. I want bullies to get expelled on the first offence and sent to juvie for assault and harassment like any other criminal. Once you can't get away with something, people don't do it as much. Then comes the problems of popular kids sticking up for popular kids, getting bullies off the hook or other kids (maybe 12 of them) saying YOU'RE a bully and getting YOU expelled. How come a kid can break another kid's arm and watch him scream with a smile on his face, before some other kid gets a teacher. If you can resolve the REAL problem (bullies, ignorance etc.) you won't usually have to deal with the RESULT (the shootings) as often. I want to do something about this. Any ideas?

Written by Emerson MacIntosh.

How is it that a 24 year old understands this, but our politicians and pundits can't seem to wrap their heads around it?

It's extremely hard to grow up in this hyper-individualized super-paced and highly complex world. The widening poverty/wealth gap, isolation, bullying, pressure to conform, child abuse, pressure to succeed, and a culture of violence have their effects on the children who will one day be the adults running the world.

If we insist on fearing and pathologizing the emotions and behaviour that are an inevitable result of the society we live in, we only alienate these kids even more. Is it any wonder that depression, eating disorders, partner violence, binge drinking, and drug abuse are common among kids and young adults?

One example: anger. Our society doesn't demonstrate healthy ways of dealing with anger, a normal natural emotion. Kids learn either that anger is bad and shouldn't be felt, or they learn that anger is best expressed through violence (at least if they watch TV - and I'm not even talking about Rambo, watching a White House press conference is enough to give that message).

Also on the Virginia Tech massacre

Children and the Traumas of War

Three Stories about Iraqi Children:

On an Iraqi morning Khaled, 11 years old, went, as he used to do everyday, to the nearby school in central Baghdad. What was unusual this time was by the end of the first lesson blasts rattled the school snatching the children's innocence from their faces.

It was horrible. Windows shields smashed hitting the children's soft bodies. Khaled, like others, hide himself under desks that could not withstand the falling ceiling and its fan. Exercise books, pencils, blackboard and the pupils' dreams were all buried under the falling ceiling. All went to the sky except for Khaled and his colleague who lost an arm. The tragedy is still preoccupies this little Iraqi child, though the incident occurred sometime ago. He is not the only to suffer from similar experiences, as scores of kids his age share with him the same experience. Many are still paying, along with their families, the endless war bill. The rest of the story

There are millions of stories like Khaled's, in Iraq and other war-torn countries. Children are killed and forced to kill. They are orphaned. They are raped. They lose their homes, schools, and any sense of stability. They are hungry, sick, and frightened. And often, very traumatized. Without rehabilitation and healing, they can sometimes grow up to perpetuate the violence, because they don't know anything else.

Iraqi boys in a refugee camp in Baghdad play with toy guns.
Photograph: Namir Noor-Eldeen/Reuters

Abdul-Muhammad and his five younger brothers, aged between six and 12, should have been at school. But their mother, Sayeeda, like thousands of parents in Iraq's perilous capital city, now keeps her boys at home. Three weeks ago, armed men had intercepted their teacher's car at the school gates, then hauled him out and slit his throat. Just like in their game.

"That day they came home and they were changed because of the things they'd seen," said Sayeeda as she ladled rice into the boys' bowls. "The youngest two have been wetting their beds and having nightmares, while Abdul-Muhammad has started bullying and ordering everyone to play his fighting games. I know things are not normal with them. My fear is one day they will get hold of real guns. But in these times, where is the help?" The rest of the story

These children are paying the price of wars they did not start - some adults somewhere sitting safely in their offices, war rooms, and white houses made the decisions that cause innocent children to suffer. When you ask children, they overwhelmingly say they want peace.

Just 8 years old, Noor fell victim to an all-too-common crime in Baghdad. Kidnapped from school, she was held for ransom – beaten, blindfolded, and locked in an empty room – for four days.

Her father raced to come up with the money, fearing she would be yet another casualty in the city's plague of abductions. A driver by occupation, he sold the family's car to give his tormenters what they wanted: $8,000 for his daughter's life.

Noor and her family fled Baghdad. But three years later she was still haunted by her memories. They joined some 1 million Iraqis now living in Syria – among them an untold number of children struggling to cope with the emotional wounds of war.

For Noor, and many other Iraqi children like her, there appeared to be no place to turn until a Syrian psychiatrist, risking his job at a state institution, defied authorities and decided to help. The rest of the story

Meanwhile, even American kids are suffering because of war: As Iraq war cost climbs, 9 million U.S. kids lack medical coverage. There's enough money to ensure all Iraqi kids are dead, displaced, or scared, but apparently not enough to keep American kids healthy - really, click this link to put the cost of war into perspective - it's truly disgusting.

Psychological Torture as bad as Physical Torture

Archives of General Psychiatry (vol 64, p 277):

...the findings challenge the common perception that psychological torture is less distressing than physical torture. "Implicit in this distinction is a difference in the distressing nature of the events. The evidence takes issue with that," he says. "And since psychological torture is as bad as physical torture, we shouldn’t use it." (New Scientist)

All I can say is: "duh". How can anyone think mock execution, starvation, or rape threats are ok?

The US psychological torture system is finally on trial.

To understand the effects of trauma, I recommend Judith Lewis Herman's Trauma and Recovery.

Executions Create Generations of Victims

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 12 (IPS) - "They're going to kill him because he killed somebody, so when they kill him, who do we get to kill?" asked the 10-year-old daughter of Christina Lawson at the time of her father's execution by the U.S. state of Texas in 2005.

Yet another reason the Death Penalty is wrong.

The families of the executed suffered from "shame, increased isolation and feelings of personal failure". They might also feel responsible for the crimes of their relatives or blame themselves for their inability to save them from execution.

Janis Gay, whose grandfather Alex Kels was hanged at California's Folsom Prison in 1924, confirmed just this in an interview with IPS.

"People assume violence ends with the execution," she said. "It doesn't. Just like with any murder, the family is shattered, with the added impact of being crushed by shame."

From IPS News

Empathy and Power

The powerful are less able to understand the emotions, perceptions, and motivations of others, according to the December 2006 issue of Psychological Science, as reported in Science Daily.

...possessing power itself serves as an impediment to understanding the perspectives of others. Through several studies, the researchers assessed the effect of power on perspective taking, adjusting to another's perspective, and interpreting the emotions of others.

This is not exactly surprising. For example, critical psychologists have noticed that many stereotypically "female" traits or skills, such as empathy, caregiving, nonviolence, and nurturing, are due to power differentials rather than biology. In other words, groups in subordinate social positions learn these skills for survival. I think it has something to do with being able to read those who hold more power; for example, anticipating their needs could lead to better rewards.

The abstract of the study reports:

Four experiments and a correlational study explored the relationship between power and perspective taking. In Experiment 1, participants primed with high power were more likely than those primed with low power to draw an E on their forehead in a self-oriented direction, demonstrating less of an inclination to spontaneously adopt another person's visual perspective. In Experiments 2a and 2b, high-power participants were less likely than low-power participants to take into account that other people did not possess their privileged knowledge, a result suggesting that power leads individuals to anchor too heavily on their own vantage point, insufficiently adjusting to others' perspectives. In Experiment 3, high-power participants were less accurate than control participants in determining other people's emotion expressions; these results suggest a power-induced impediment to experiencing empathy. An additional study found a negative relationship between individual difference measures of power and perspective taking. Across these studies, power was associated with a reduced tendency to comprehend how other people see, think, and feel. (emphasis mine)

Other interesting related links:
What can the Stanford prison and Milgram experiments tell us about abuses at Abu Ghraib and Creating Gender Role Behavior: Demonstrating the Impact of Power Differentials