ASK Musings

Injustice

– “The deal has another effect: it all but confirms a two-tier justice system in which senior officials are slapped on the wrist for serious violations while lesser officials are harshly prosecuted for relatively minor infractions.” Patraeus Plea Deal Reveals Two Tier Justice System Leaks (via The Intercept)

Sexism in Tech

– “There are all kinds of studies and surveys and reports that utterly contradict what Mayer is saying, that gender is, in fact, “an issue” in the tech industry—especially viewed through an intersectional lens that reveals the lack of equitable opportunities for women of color and women with disabilities.” Today in LOLOLOLOL WHUT (via Shakesville)

– “Adria trusted Ronson to tell her story, to do it justice, only to have Ronson draw a false equivalence between her, a woman challenging inappropriate sexual jokes at a tech conference (at which everyone had signed a photo disclosure form), and the man who was making those inappropriate sexual jokes. And to draw a false equivalency between her, a woman challenging sexism in a professional space for technology workers, and Justine Sacco, a woman casually making racist jokes under her real name while employed as a senior director of corporate communications for tech company IAC.” The Falsest of False Equivalencies (via Shakesville)

War on Drugs

– “Rhonda was sitting quietly in a windowless courtroom between two lawyers last week, her jaw set and her fate unclear. Her lawyer, and the lawyers representing her son and daughter-in-law, were doing their best to make their case in spite of being legally prohibited from making their case. Instead, the lawyers painted the family as honest and hardworking, calling them “salt of the earth people.” Obviously, they couldn’t say what they wanted to say, what Rhonda wishes she could shout at the jury: The plants were for medical use. Washington State has a medical marijuana law.” A Stunning Overreach from the DEA Is Playing Out in Eastern Washington (h/t @FakeDanSavage)

Misogyny

– “Young people need a clear understanding of what sexual assault is through a curriculum devised by experts, a comprehensive explanation of enthusiastic consent, and a roadmap for how to deal with a culture that victim-blames and is generally decades behind where it should be.” College is too late to start teaching students about sexual assault (via @JessicaValenti)

– “It is actively unhelpful for Kristof to be using a discussion of unconscious bias in order to suggest that conscious, active, harm-objective racism and misogyny isn’t all that common. It’s an argument that gaslights every woman and every person of color who reports lived experiences that suggest otherwise.” Nicholas Kristof Is Being “Helpful” Again (via Shakesville)

– “It also paints a fairly inaccurate – and transactional – picture of female desire. Despite terrible gift books to the contrary, most women don’t get off on men vacuuming or picking up socks (not that there’s anything wrong with those that do). What turns women on is what turns men on: good sex.” Women don’t need ‘choreplay’. They need men to do some chores (via @JessicaValenti)

Worker Rights

– “The cutbacks have been so drastic in some places that they virtually guarantee injured workers will plummet into poverty. Workers often battle insurance companies for years to get the surgeries, prescriptions and basic help their doctors recommend.” The Demolition of Workers’ Comp (via @ProPublica)

Racism

– “For example, few Seattleites seem to be aware of the large role our city has played in re-segregating America’s schools. In 2007, courtesy of a suit brought by a group of predominantly white Seattle parents (Parents Involved In Community Schools v. Seattle School District), the Supreme Court dealt a huge blow to education equity when it declared U.S. schools could not seek to achieve/maintain integration by taking account of student race.” Time to shed the ‘progressive mystique’ and confront racism in Seattle (h/t @StrangerSlog)