Gonzo Times does not condone sexism, racism or any other form of hierarchical dominance of people groups. Many of us are anarchists. We promote No Rulers. This would mean no rule of one people group over another.
I would like to have some input here from our readers on how they feel the site should proceed in this matter.
I made a post back in October asking why it seemed our ranks are full of mostly white males. This post was re-posted on international woman’s day on our social media sites. As a response to the backlash here and on other sites I addressed here, asking why the subjects of gender and race were met with such hostility. This went into a debate which seems to have dominated the site lately. I do believe it is an important thing to address. My asking these questions seems to have scratched a surface which brought out much of what I was writing about in the first place. The attitudes towards women specifically have been revealed. This has been productive in one way because the issue was not being discussed and was something many were happy about keeping quiet on.
I have given the writers here liberty to post whatever they wish to write about. This has led to many articles I do not support being posted on the site over the last year or so. I do not wish to remove articles from the site. I do however feel that there is a great injustice we have become a part of. I wish for the site to be a safe place for people of all genders, race and people groups in general. I feel it has not been this. It has become a place where right wing prejudice has been given another voice. Such right wing stances for racial, gender or cultural supremacy has many other places it is given voice. They dominate mainstream media, talk radio and many other sites. Historically such views have dominated culture in general, which is part of the problem I initially addressed.
A dynamic of sexism and a problem of the gender issue has played itself out here on the site. We have seen the few women who have been brave enough to speak out have been met often with verbal attacks. Men who find it difficult to let go of their privileged and power wish to maintain their dominance.
Any action that would be taken to remove content or comments I would not take without one of two things. I would need either a mutually agreed upon outside source of dispute resolution or a general census from all writers and contributors at Gonzo Times. I view this site more as the Commons that Professor Elinor Ostrom speaks of.
I have encouraged some differing views to speak up. I will continue to do so. I will not condone sexism. I find myself at odds with my ethics.
I would like to see the site return to other topics. Some great articles have been over shadowed by this dispute, such as Jehu Eaves Capital, Absolute Over-Accumulation and the Fascist State (Part two).
Should Gonzo Times continue allowing any post regardless of message?
Bishops’ message blunted in NY gay marriage vote
AP Online June 28, 2011 | RACHEL ZOLL NEW YORK (AP) ? New York’s same-sex marriage debate was the toughest test yet for U.S. Roman Catholic bishops and their position that only heterosexuals should wed.
The outcome for the hierarchs was dismal. New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan was criticized ? even by some sympathetic to Catholic teaching ? for comparing the bill to the family policies of China. Brooklyn Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio was even more pointed, publishing photos of three Catholic lawmakers who said they would support the bill on the front of his diocesan newspaper under the headline, “Shame! Shame! Shame!” Yet political observers say Dolan and the church can still have influence on issues like abortion and immigration issues ? but not necessarily on gay marriage, which many rank-and file Catholics support. web site ny gay marriage
“It’s a question of which particular issue and how they weigh in,” said Mark Silk, professor of religion in public life at Trinity College in Hartford, Conn. “A lot of Catholics really feel the force of the equality argument. People in the church have complicated feelings about this. They have gay relatives.” Catholic leaders say they worked intensively against the bill, but were outspent and outmaneuvered by the other side. Legislators approved the New York bill last Friday and Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Catholic who put the force of his office behind the measure, swiftly signed the measure into law.
The bishops and their representatives said they met repeatedly with lawmakers and mobilized a citizen lobbying network of more than 60,000 voters through the New York Catholic Conference, the bishops’ state public policy arm. The Brooklyn diocese organized a rally outside a district office of state Sen. Joseph Addabbo, a Catholic who said he supported the measure because he conducted polls to determine what his constituents wanted.
In March, Dolan and other New York bishops met privately with Cuomo. Dolan’s spokesman, Joseph Zwilling, would not release details of any further conversations between the archbishop and Cuomo. On the Monday before the vote, the bishops made a last-ditch appeal in a conference call to Dean Skelos, leader of the Senate’s Republican majority and an opponent of gay marriage, said Dennis Poust of the Catholic Conference. Skelos was deciding with Republican senators whether to bring the bill to the floor.
Dolan spoke publicly and wrote on his blog about the legislation. But during a critical week ahead of the vote, he was in the Seattle area for a national meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops ? Dolan’s first such gathering as the group’s new president. When he returned, he preached on the issue from the pulpit of St. Patrick’s Cathedral at the Father’s Day Sunday Mass.
“We thought we could win and we tried our best,” Poust said. “I’m not sure we worked harder in my time here on defeating a bill as we did on this one, and I’ve been here 10 years.” Church leaders strived to frame the debate in a way that it would not be perceived as only a Catholic issue. However, Catholics are the largest single religious group in the state, comprising about 37 percent of the population, and is the largest religious group in the country. New York Jewish leaders did lobby on the issue, but had strong groups on opposing sides. Liberal Protestant leaders either supported the bill or largely stayed out of the fray.
Paul Moses, a journalism professor at Brooklyn College and the City University of New York who spent more than two decades covering state politics and religion, said the bishops have a harder time making their case because Catholics born after the Second Vatican Council, which modernized the church in the 1960s, tend to evaluate what bishops say through their personal experience. see here ny gay marriage
Moses said the bishops also hurt themselves with some of their rhetoric. A June Quinnipiac University poll found 58 percent of New York voters supported legalization of same-sex marriage ? a figure Moses said had to include a significant number of Catholics given the composition of the state population.
“A pretty good percentage of them decided that same-sex marriage wasn’t going to destroy civilization in the way the bishops made it sound it would,” Moses said. “The bishops are more influential on abortion. That’s an area where more Catholics tend to agree with them.” New York is the sixth ? and by far the most populous ? state to legalize same-sex marriage since Massachusetts led the way, under court order, in 2004. Gay rights advocates are predicting a big boost to their cause nationally. However, observers caution against making sweeping conclusions about whether Catholic bishops and their religious supporters can prevail in other states.
New York bishops are generally more moderate in their approach, which partly explains their strategies in recent months. While Dolan has spoken out forcefully on marriage, abortion and other issues, he has never joined U.S. bishops who have publicly denied Holy Communion to dissenting Catholic lawmakers in their own dioceses. Dolan prefers to maintain a dialogue with the legislators. There is no indication he has changed his position since the vote.
“Dolan’s cachet is as a communicator and evangelist, not necessarily a political heavyweight,” said John Allen, longtime Vatican correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter, an independent newspaper. “That’s part of the reason most Catholics see him as a reconciler.” DiMarzio also hasn’t instructed clergy in his diocese to deny Communion to any legislator, the bishop’s spokesman said, despite growing pressure for church discipline for Cuomo from some conservative Catholics. But DiMarzio instructed Catholic schools and parishes in his diocese to refuse any honors bestowed by Cuomo or lawmakers who voted to legalize gay marriage. He also told them not to invite any state lawmaker to a parish or school event; it was, DiMarzio said, a protest against the state’s “corrupt political process.” In an op-ed in the New York Daily News, DiMarzio suggested the lesson for bishops may be they should be more aggressive in their advocacy wherever gay marriage is proposed in the future.
“We have in part failed as the proponents of the historical understanding of marriage as that between a man and a woman precisely because we have sought to be sensitive to those who have same-sex attractions,” wrote DiMarzio, who helped draft the U.S. bishops’ national voting guide. “Perhaps we must now speak more forcefully and clearly.” ____ RACHEL ZOLL
Pingback: Takedown of an Anarcho-Misogyist: Introduction | The jVerse