Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth: “I don’t want my son serving alongside troops who are out of shape or in combat [units] with females who can’t meet the same combat arms physical standards as men.” The War Horse at the same link: “Women serving in combat specialties have always been required to meet the same job-specific standards as men, based on the physical demands of their chosen field, such as infantry or artillery. But the broader physical fitness tests taken by all service members once or twice a year serve a different purpose: measuring overall fitness. Those tests have historically been scored using age- and sex-based standards.” Astonishingly (he said sarcastically) “Whiskey Pete” is fine with keeping the adjusted standards for older men.
In case you’re wondering, 90 percent of women in the Marines can meet the new standards. Of course, Hegseth is starting from a loathing for women in what he sees as male roles, so we’ll see what happens next. Remember, his spiritual mentor, misogynist Doug Wilson, is very big on male supremacy.
“The U.S. already has abortion travel bans—we just don’t normally call them that.”
“A judge criticized the Department of Health and Human Services for citing nonexistent scientific evidence or potentially AI-generated citations to support sweeping changes to federal teen pregnancy prevention programs. The Trump administration had said money Congress appropriated for such programs should avoid encouraging teen sexual activity and be used only for programs that promote abstinence and “body literacy.” The administration’s changes were challenged after HHS cut tens of millions in grants.” No surprise. It’s a proven fact that comprehensive sex ed and affordable birth control can reduce the unwanted pregnancy rate, ditto the abortion rate — but Republicans would sooner have more abortions than approve of women enjoying sex.
“A death related to ectopic pregnancy should really be a never event,” said Dr. Alice Abernathy, an OB-GYN in Philadelphia. At the link, ProPublica reports that since abortion bans became legal, ectopic deaths have soared.
Danny Katch looks at “the deep misogyny of an anti-trans movement that poses as defenders of women when it’s convenient but ultimately is driven by a desire to police all violations of traditional gender norms.”
The Girl Scouts support members in their faiths, including Muslims. Needless to say, bigots hate that.
Republican Florida governor candidate Byron Reynolds assures women repairing Florida’s roads is so they can get to the hair salon and stay pretty.
“Although many families strive to share these responsibilities, research has consistently found that mothers tend to shoulder a larger share of the work tied to their kids’ schooling. That includes not only attending school events or packing lunches, but also the less visible work of scheduling doctor appointments, signing up for after-school activities, and responding to emails or calls from teachers and administrators.” One of the reasons is that no matter what instructions they get, schools tend to call the mother first.
“White men get to fail,” said Amanda Litman, co-founder of Run for Something, which recruits young, progressive candidates to run for office. “Women do not get to make mistakes. People of color do not get to make mistakes.” Litman said the argument was not that serious allegations should be treated differently because of a candidate’s identity, but that Platner had been granted an unusual degree of latitude to recover from earlier controversies that a female candidate or a candidate of color would probably not have been afforded.
“It is a very strange thing to move through the world understanding that the one half of the population that never had their humanity doubted on the basis of their genitalia, that enjoys the privilege of being the default category of human, remains the primary arbiter of your physical safety and, sometimes, your personhood.” — from Jill Filipovic’s essay on the Cornell Seven.
