Bitchin'

by pissed off patricia

So we're told, and I guess I believe it, Saddam paid families in Palestine if one of their members was a suicide bomber in Israel. Today the congress is mulling over yet another increase in death benefits to members of our military and increased veterans benefits. I see something similar in these two stories. To me both are encouragements to fight and die.

Maybe I'm just getting too rough around the edges but the entire idea of war and fighting seems to me to be a pastime for leaders of countries. The leaders say we will sit behind our desks and watch as people die to make us look even stronger, even more powerful. When this disaster in Iraq ever ends, the soldiers won't be the victors, our country's leader will be crowned the victor and the families of the dead will have a bit more money in their pockets. That disgusts me. See, I told you that perhaps I'm getting cranky and maybe a little out of line. But hell, who drew the line and why?

What is going on now? I listened to few country songs on the way to Savannah. Not much to choose from in radio stations along part of the way. You need to listen to these songs. One was a woman singing about being proud to be a "redneck woman". Another was a man singing about how cheap and low class his girl friend was, and yet another said America would kick butt. So many spoke of women being clueless, backwoods, cheap, girlfriends. It's scary folks. To hear these songs, you would think they were written in the woods by moonshine chugging jerks. Maybe they were, but the bad news is that they are popular right now. People seem to take great pride in their own ignorance. Seems it's in to be stupid, especially if you're a country girl. Why is that?

I think we're on our way to making women look so damned stupid that they can't be relied upon to do anything. Anything like have sense enough to decide whether or not they should give birth if they're pregnant. How can a real damned stupid woman make an intelligent decision about such things as abortion? Well obviously you dear sweet stupid moron, you can't. Better let the men make that decision for you little lady. You just get back into the kitchen, remove your shoes and wait for your big daddy to get ready to get you pregnant in the biblical way. Okay sure, big daddy may walk out the door to never return as soon as that new little baby cries for a couple of hours straight, but that's your problem, not his. You tell me which is best for a child, to grow up in a home filled with hell, or to never have to suffer such torment? How about the mother? Doesn't she get a say in all this? After all, it's her life too. Okay it is, but the direction we're going in doesn't sound like her life matters all that much. Why should it, she's just a "redneck woman" married to a brilliant, war loving, gun toting, butt kicking man. Not much going for her, and damn, he has so much going for him. Her best accomplishment is getting pregnant. His best accomplishment is keeping her that way. To hell with the future of their offspring as long as they can brag about giving birth to another human being. Jesus god, we're going backward at warp speed. Someone must have rewound the tape from the fifties and we're starting over. I don't mean to be rude or ruin it for anyone, but this is where I came in. I've already seen how things come out and it is a long tough slog for women. Why the hell are we going back when going ahead is so much more rewarding?

Maybe we're going backward because back when men ruled alone, some of them found it so much easier when they didn't have to entertain the idea that maybe, just maybe, women could equal or best them. Remember the battle of the sexes? Who won that one?

So Saddam fished for Palestinian suicide bombers and he used money as bait. We are fishing for military volunteers and we too are using money as bait. Meanwhile, women are being baited into believing that it's better to be downgraded from equals to baby machines with shit for brains if they want to get themselves a man. All this fishing going on and no one seems to be catching anything but hell.