Women are not safe in Egypt

Appalling news from Egypt this morning. From the NYT:

“A woman needs to be confined within a framework that is controlled by the man of the house,” Osama Yehia Abu Salama, a Brotherhood family expert, said of the group’s general approach, speaking in a recent seminar for women training to become marriage counselors. Even if a wife were beaten by her husband, he advised, “Show her how she had a role in what happened to her.”

“If he is to blame,” Mr. Abu Salama added, “she shares 30 percent or 40 percent of the fault.” 

Nice, huh? And Morsi's spokesperson sounds little better. (And let's remember that Morsi is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood party.) But perhaps the most awful thing about this report is the reaction of most women in Egypt:

But Mr. Abu Salam also argued that husbands should keep their wives under tight control. “It’s the nature of the weak to overstep the required framework if she is given the space and the freedom, like children,” he said in the seminar. Most of the women nodded in agreement. 

If you read the linked story, you will be sickened -- guaranteed. That is, if your morals aren't already skewed by religion or other vile notions.

A question answered

About two years ago, two young guys drowned in a public pool on Staten Island. At least one was planning to take the test to join the Navy Seals. It is assumed that they were practicing holding their breath. In any case, they drowned in fairly shallow water during the exercise.

I couldn't understand it. How could two young, healthy guys drown? You run out of air, you pop up and breathe, no? But today, while I was reading a story about drowning, I encountered this explanation of what drowning is like:

Osinski says one of the most subtle forms of drowning is called "shallow water blackout."

Typically, a person holding his breath will be triggered to breathe when his CO2 levels get high. But if a swimmer is holding his breath for a long time while exhaling underwater, or is going underwater repeatedly, his CO2 levels are lowered. When that happens, the brain's built-in alarm to breathe doesn't go off, despite a lack of oxygen.

"You can't tell when they go unconscious, until it's too late," Osinski says.

Their brain alarms didn't go off, they passed out and they drowned. Mystery solved. It's still a very sad thing, but at least I understand it now.

Peanut allergies

I have intense allergic reactions to many natural things. I went to an allergy clinic long ago and a doctor began to poke needles in my arm, to learn what I was allergic to. He stopped midway through the process, laughed and said, "You're allergic to everything." Luckily, this changed for the better as I got older. I still have to be hauled to an emergency room now and then, but it's way better than when I was a child.

Okay, that was a digression. Here's the thing. I do not suffer from peanut allergies. I eat them all the time. My local grocery store has begun to sell 5-lb. bags of peanuts (in the shell) for $5.99 -- a monster bargain. I buy six of these bags every couple of weeks -- to feed the crows, squirrels and jays.

When I tear open one of these bags, an intense peanut smell wafts up to me. And in that moment, I can almost understand why people have violent allergic reactions to peanuts. There's something intense and different about the scent. To someone as allergic as I am, it hints at power of these things. I can almost sense its ability to choke and overwhelm a person. Peanuts are powerful. I get it.

Wikipedia Commons image by Pollinator

My observations of the new pope

1. The new pope is straight. How do I know this? When he put his tall, foolish popey guy hat on for the first time, he didn't fuss with it. Benedict would have been adjusting it this way and that, unsure of how it looked. Pope Frankie didn't care how it looked. He just popped it on and was all like, "All right! Let's go out for pizza!"

2. He did not look like a man who was surprised to be elected pope. In fact, his facial expression said (at least, to me): "It's about time they got it right."

And now for the Popeyguy Question of the Day:

How long do you think it will be before the new pope says something vicious about gay people? I give him 24 hours. Any other predictions?

Wingnut Christian textbooks

Mother Jones did a scathing report about the idiocy peddled in Christian textbooks -- books that kids actually use in their studies. After telling students that dragons were real, hippies were Satanists, and humans and dinosaurs lived side-by-side on the Earth, they turn their attention to literature. These were my favorites:

Mark Twain and Emily Dickinson were a couple of hacks: "[Mark] Twain's outlook was both self-centered and ultimately hopeless…Twain's skepticism was clearly not the honest questioning of a seeker of truth but the deliberate defiance of a confessed rebel."—Elements of Literature for Christian Schools, Bob Jones University, 2001

"Several of [Emily Dickinson's] poems show a presumptuous attitude concerning her eternal destiny and a veiled disrespect for authority in general. Throughout her life she viewed salvation as a gamble, not a certainty. Although she did view the Bible as a source of poetic inspiration, she never accepted it as an inerrant guide to life."—Elements of Literature for Christian Schools, Bob Jones University, 2001

And then people wonder why Americans don't believe in evolution or global warming. Religion is poisonous.

Boy Scouts survey encourages anti-gay discrimination

They just wanted to poll their members. Right. This Boy Scouts survey is designed for one purpose only: to encourage fear and hostility toward gay scouts and leaders. Reading the questions made me ill. It's like they were dreamt up by NOM.

• A gay male troop leader, along with another adult leader, is taking a group of  boys on a camping trip following the youth protection guidelines of two-deep leadership. Is it acceptable or unacceptable for the gay adult leader to take adolescent boys on an overnight camping trip?
• Bob is 15 years old, and the only openly gay Scout in a Boy Scout troop. Is it acceptable or unacceptable for the troop leader to allow Bob to tent with a heterosexual boy on an overnight camping trip?
• Johnny, a first grade boy, has joined Tiger Cubs with his friends. Johnny’s friends and their parents unanimously nominate Johnny’s mom, who is known by them to be lesbian, to be the den leader. Johnny’s pack is chartered to a church where the doctrine of that faith does not teach that homosexuality is wrong. Is it acceptable or unacceptable for his mother to serve as a den leader for his Cub Scout den?
• David, a Boy Scout, believes that homosexuality is wrong. His troop is chartered to a church where the doctrine of that faith also teaches that homosexuality is wrong. Steve, an openly gay youth, applies to be a member in the troop and is denied membership. Is it acceptable or unacceptable for this troop to deny Steve membership in their troop?

If you don't know what's wrong with these questions, you're probably at the wrong blog. I'm surprised they didn't ask this one:

• Johnny is gay and has a bomb that he carries around with him all the time. Is it okay for Johnny to sleep with your 8-year-old son on a single cot, with a lighter and lube in his hand?

The Boy Scouts of America is playing this game just as the Vatican would -- with a stacked deck. Christian churches have made a mess of gay issues, just as the Scouts have. And it seems, judging by this survey (and the election of the new anti-gay pope), that nothing will ever change in either of these organizations.

Habemas Satanam!

We've got a pope. Now, we have to wait to see who it is. (Taps fingernails on desktop...)

Update: Via joe.my.god I learn that Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Buenos Aires, Argentina won the golden crown. His popeyguy name will be Popeyguy Francis I. 

I've never heard of the guy but I'll do what Joe did, and go to the Wikipedia video tape. And lo and behold, he's a gay-hatin' crazy guy:

He strongly opposed legislation introduced in 2010 by the Argentine Government to allow same-sex marriage. In a letter to the monasteries of Buenos Aires, he wrote: "Let's not be naive, we're not talking about a simple political battle; it is a destructive pretension against the plan of God. We are not talking about a mere bill, but rather a machination of the Father of Lies that seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God." He has also insisted that adoption by homosexuals is a form of discrimination against children. This position received a rebuke from Argentine president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who said the church's tone was reminiscent of "medieval times and the Inquisition".

Did you get that? "Reminiscent of 'medieval times and the Inquisition"! Wowee! We've got us a swell new popey guy! Hooray.

Catholics can rest easy. The new pope will be as awful -- or worse -- than the popeyguy emeritus. Good. Change is so difficult.