: Floyd: ........ Personally, his comment on tailhook ticks me off a bit, but that's my opinion. : DDN: Well, I followed your lead and did a little research and I am stunned at what I'm finding. Let's start with YOUR objection to his tailhook comment. Why does it tick you off?
Well, I had only read what he was quoted as saying ("much ado...") and didn't bother to follow up much on it. The information you provided below, if accurate, changes my opinion of that as well. A colleague of mine, a woman and self-styled "feminist," thinks that the women "should have expected" that kind of treatment from a bunch of drunk fly-boys. I disagree. We "should" live in a society where that kind of abuse is unheard of, rather than expected, IMHO. We should also live in a society where claims of harassment are taken seriously and the victims aren't blamed for bringing it on themselves. Now if Jesse Ventura said only what you claim he said, then I can see your point, that comment is not particularly offensive, it's simply realistic.
:All he said was that he understood why those men behaved in that fashion. Isn't that a GOOD thing? Understanding why things happen? Would you prefer that he NOT understand why the tailhook incident occured? Why would you prefer a govenor to be ignorant instead of knowledgeable about ANY situation?
Well, this actually raises another issue. I would like to think that sexual abuse is such an alien, strange and incomprehensible phenomenon that no normal person could understand why those men did what they did. In an ideal universe, I'd be able to feel this. Of course this isn't an ideal universe.
:(SNIP) ...it has Jesse saying that the men invloved in the tailhook scandal felt that it was "much ado about nothing", NOT JESSE!!! Isn't that true? That the officers involved felt it was no big deal? That was certainly MY impression. Wasn't it yours? What's so offensive about this observation?
Again, I agree with you completely. I admit I haven't read the interview, and only heard the comment second-hand. Perhaps I should have looked into the issue more deeply before I passed that link on. Advice taken.
: Can somebody please come up with a substantial complaint about Jesse's playboy comments to justify this media campaign against him? Otherwise I'm going to off on the biggest, longest and most annoying media conspiracy rant you've ever seen in your lives.
The only reason there is any media campaign against him is that this sort of side-show keeps people's minds off any major issues that might actually have some relevance (WTO meetings, for instance?). Right now, he's the flavor of the month. Next month, when Oprah gets the reform party nomination, she'll be the hot topic. I predict that the media will take the "can she beat Bush and Gore?" approach to Oprah's candidacy. Again, it will be completely irrelevant. What one politician can actually accomplish is, at best, trivial. However, the fuss and hype on this and other non-issues will keep us all distracted while the WTO guts the few remaining "legal" protections of the environment and labor, Monsanto dumps a few more tons of genetically engineered toxic crap into our food, and other criminally insane mutants cary out their nefarious projects using us as guinnea pigs. Frankly, in this context, I can't get too worked up about whether or not the media like Jesse Ventura.
Thanks for correcting me on the quote though. I won't spread that rumor anymore.
None.
