To meet LiveJournal's puritanical decency standards, this userpic may require censoring. This userpic is clearly pornographic. Please Photoshop® a shirt over the mother and children or discuss proposed censorship on the talk page. See LiveJournal's guide to living in the 1950s for suggestions.

As part of a move towards Wikipediaesque editorial standards, the LJ team has been cracking down on what they obviously consider to be a virulent form of pornography that could easily corrupt the minds of young children. Is it Jack/Will slash? Kirk/Spock slash? Kefka/Kim Jong-il slash? Child porn? Food porn? Pictures of the new MacBook? Lesbian tortoise tribadism? No, no, unfortunately not, no, thankfully no, not yet, and no. I'm not actually sure what a lot of these are, but I noticed these and many more in the latest LiveJournal posts. The problem here is breastfeeding. The LJ team seems to think that it's a fluke that civilized countries and at least some parts of the United States are okay with this kind of thing going on in public, and they'll be damned if they'll let it go on unchecked in their servers. I think most people will agree that it's not pornography. It's natural and healthy, and there's no reason mothers should be ashamed of it. Breastfeeding helps promote healthy youngsters, and as long as there is still a stigma attached to it, we need communities to promote it. These communities need icons, and maybe, just maybe, a logical icon might involve breastfeeding. As long as LiveJournal is 100% cool with hosting pro-cutting communities (groups of people who sneak into libraries, slice pretty pages out of antique books, and sell them on E-bay), I don't see how they can possibly object to breastfeeding.

Since LJ is now taking all of their queues from Wikipedia, I decided to see what kind of take Wikipedia had on breastfeeding. Here's a usurpt from what they say:

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Breastfeeding
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A breastfeeding infant
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A breastfeeding infant

Breastfeeding is the

They follow this up with an actual photo of a breastfeeding infant! Come on, LJ, what is your problem? Wikipedia doesn't feel the need to censor images of breastfeeding. Why should you?

Feel free to use this icon in the fight against censorship. Power!

Okay, so the new Harry Potter book came out today, and the Winter Solstice will be held July 16. July seems a bit late for the Winter Solstice, but that's what I saw while skimming my friends list.

In other news, I wandered around Fremont today and saw a copy of Glynda-Lee Hoffmann's book, The Secret Dowry of Eve: Woman's Role in the Development of Consciousness. Glynda-Lee feels that, however fuzzy the Bible might be on topics like dinosaurs and evolution, it is quite clear on psychology and neurophysiology, and armed with her secret decoder ring, she sets out to prove that Genesis is actually a pro-woman story and not, as the words themselves suggest, a justification for sexism. What this looks like from my point of view is another person writing a book that says, "Hey, it's okay to be a member of [insert name of group that doesn't get the respect it deserves], and we know this because some external story has validated us." That's totally the wrong way to go about trying to make people feel better. I'd like to see a book that says, "Hey, it's okay to be a member of [insert name of group that doesn't get the respect it deserves]." I mean, I don't need any sort of external validation. I don't. Do I?

I'm an animal test subject, and I think it rocks! Pounce, the people who make some kinds of cat food, sent us a bunch of free cat treats that they are testing, and let me tell you, it's quite tasty. In the next few months, you should buy and eat anything you see from Pounce that says, "New!" Take my word for it. It's tasty. It's not unagi-tasty, but it's really good. Plus, it's Tartar-control, so I'll never have to go to war like Alexander Nevsky did to keep the Mongol hordes out of my town.

Serously, though, I'm not sure why people object to animal testing. I guess it's a species-based anti-outsourcing argument. I mean, I am taking the job from some human who would otherwise have been paid to taste-test this Pounce stuff. However, it's not like the jobs are leaving the country, so I can only assume people who are against animal testing are speciesist spigots.

I've been involved with animal testing for a long time now. When I was very young, my parents enrolled me in a cognitive disorders experiment. A bunch of protesters shut it down, but not before my parents had some cash. Plus, since I was part of the test, I guess I must be protected against cognitive disorders for the rest of my life. Mom said that the money probably saved my life. She said it was the only way they could afford to keep me instead of drowning me in a bucket. Of course, when she was drunk, she said it was so Dad could buy a couple of expensive Magic: The Gathering cards. Dad's story is and always has been that he wanted the money to buy a bigger bucket. Anyhow, whatever happened to the money, I'm protected from cognitive disorders. That means I'll never have cancer of the cognitive or anything like that.

I'm interested in taking part in more tests. I've heard that a lot of makeup companies test hot new makeup on animals. Since I'm a goth, I could use some makeup. I'm thinking a little black eyeliner would bring out the yellow in my eyes, but I'd be happy to have any hip new makeup.

So for those of you who are not as well-read and well-informed as I happen to be, sixteen women came forward during California's ill-fated recall election and accused Arnold Schwarzenegger of groping them. He seemed very shocked and promised to have himself investigated. To everyone's surprise, he went back on his promise. Then his campaign group released records to the press and said that one of the women, Rhonda Miller, was a convicted prostitute and drug user with more pages on her rap sheet than Schwarzenegger could count (six). However, it turned out that this was nothing more than a cheap attempt at character assignation -- the rap sheet didn't actually belong to Rhonda Miller. It belonged to Robert Hess, a known prostitute.

Naturally, Rhonda was outraged at this. She filed a lawsuit, but it was dismissed. Today she gave up appeals, since otherwise she might have to pay for Arnold's legal bills.

You might thing this is nothing more than another case of the rich and powerful crushing opposition by renting judges and threatening people with financial ruin, and you'd be right. However, I really would have expected Judge Robert Hess to sympathize.

Also, just in case convicted prostitute Robert Hess tries to sue me, I know you are not the same person as Judge Robert Hess. Please don't be insulted.

The laptop is finally fixed and I can get on the internet and I see that MIT's Bonehead-at-Large, Marilee Jones, has decided that people who need medication for things like depression shouldn't come to MIT. She's cool with people who need help walking, talking, breathing, or seeing. She's cool with people who could die if they eat something with peanuts. She's okay with Jessica Simpson (except that she has "special pheromones and stuff" that will make her want to be just like every other woman) and Walter Cronkite. She's okay with the Swift Boat Veterans the VC Are Glad They Didn't Kill. However, if you need to take an antidepressant, you shouldn't be at MIT. I know my commenting on this is sort of bringing out the big intelectual guns, but she's a fucking nutcase. People like that make me sick to my cute little stomach.

Since Clint was gone all day, I used his phone line and was on Ebay. I got on at about 8 in the morning and found this truly awesome basketball signed by Yao Ming. OH MY GOD, he is so cute! He's so tall that when you sit on his shoulders, you can probably see for miles. His hands must be so big and warm and wonderful to be scritched by. In case I didn't already say it, he's just plain cute (No, I do not have an Asian fetish). Plus, he can probably get all of the unagi (or whatever they call it in China) that a cat could eat. I'm kneading the keyboard just thinking about it all.

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