“It takes 25 minutes to turn a live steer into steak at the modern slaughterhouse where Roman Moreno works. For 20 years, his post was ‘second-legger’, a job that entails cutting hocks off carcasses as they whirl past at a rate of 309 an hour. “The cattle were supposed to be dead before they got …
Category: violence
May 15
Can’t decide which is more appalling …
While reading Laura Bates’ Men Who Hate Women, a scene from a movie based on a true story about a young woman who was captured by a man and kept imprisoned/enslaved by him for years popped into my head: at one point, she was allowed outside to help him wash his car or something and …
Feb 08
“Rape: leave it to men to …”
“Rape: leave it to men to turn the creation of life into a degradation.” from Jess (forthcoming), Peg Tittle
Feb 06
excerpts from MacKinnon’s Women’s Lives, Men’s Laws
I’ve just finished reading yet another MacKinnon book, Women’s Lives, Men’s Laws, and as usual, it’s absolutely brilliant. The book is well worth a complete read; I paste below some perfect gems. (My used copy is marked DISCARD by the Porter County Library system. In itself, telling. Sigh.) Reading this now. It’s heavy-going, but well …
Dec 31
Killing What You Enjoy
So I saw an ad on the website of the far-too-nearby gun club for a book by one of its members (“The Gun Guy”) that “takes the reader through the joyful and humorous stories about life at the hunt camp, hunting culture, and the joys of nature and wildlife.” I wrote him a short letter: …
Nov 01
Open Season on Women: More evidence of the pornification of our society
I live in a small lake-centered community about three hours north of Toronto, consisting of about thirty houses: about ten are occupied year-round; the others are occupied mostly just during the summer. So, small neighbourhood. Over the past few years, I’ve experienced six instances of what I would call over-the-top insult. Specifically misogynist insult. Man …
Nov 08
Hunting – simply unjustified
It’s hunting season again — moose for a week, then deer for two weeks — and I have yet to hear an acceptable justification. The animals are having enough trouble surviving because of what we’ve done, and what we’re still doing, to the forests. And now you want to just go out and kill them. …
Dec 07
How to Make a Man Grow Up
I was recently surprised to discover that in the U.S., men are required by law to register for the “selective service system”. Only men. I thought women were allowed in their military now. And required. I didn’t think they had ‘the draft’ anymore. When I expressed my surprise, hoping to engage someone in conversation, the …
fiction
