Big Fat Phallusy

Hari Kondabolu (via temporarydust)

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fyeahsociology:

What the Data Actually Say About Illegal Immigration

• We are not being flooded with illegal Mexican migrants. The total number of migrants from Mexico has varied very little since the 1950s. The massive influx many have written about never happened.

• Net illegal…

(Source: azspot)

Kailash Srinivasan (via blandarchist)

(via fyeahsociology)

(Source: fralcon, via sociolab)

Lee Atwater, a head republican strategist, in an anonymous interview in 1981. He is admitting that republicans use coded-language to appeal to the racists in their base. Because, as he always said, “people vote their fears.”

Lee, who would eventually become the head of the Republican National Committee, helped Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush win their Presidential elections by teaching them to use overtly-racist tactics.

When the N-word became taboo, Republicans began referring to black people in less-direct ways, with terms like “welfare queens.” They learned how to say the N-word, without saying the N-word.

Sadly, this still continues today. As seen in Newt Gingrich’s claim that Obama is a “food stamp President” and Rick Santorum’s assertion that he doesn’t “want to make black people’s lives better by giving them someone else’s money.”

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terrymooreart:

There will be a new Strangers In Paradise story next year for 2013—the 20th anniversary of SiP. You’ll have to wait until then to find out what America’s cutest couple has been up to, but one thing I can tell you, they’re very clean.

WHAAAAAAAAAATT MY LIFE IS NOW SUBLIME

the-womanifesto:

stfuconservatives:

other-stuff:

Afghanistan 90 days
Algeria 14 weeks
Angola 90 days
Argentina 90 days
Australia None ETA: No longer true - as of 1/1/2011, you get 18 weeks government-funded paid leave. -added by STFUConservatives
Austria 16 weeks
Bahamas, The 8 weeks
Bahrain 45 days
Bangladesh 12 weeks
Barbados 12 weeks
Belarus 126 days
Belgium 15 weeks
Belize 12 weeks
Benin 14 weeks
Bolivia 60 days
Botswana 12 weeks
Brazil 120 days
Bulgaria 120-180 days
Burkina Faso 14 weeks
Burma 12 weeks
Burundi 12 weeks
Cambodia 90 days
Cameroon 14 weeks
Canada 55% up to $413/week for 50 weeks (15 weeks maternity + 35 weeks parental leave shared with father)
Central African Republic 14 weeks
Chad 14 weeks
Chile 18 weeks
China 90 days
Colombia 12 weeks
Comoros 14 weeks
Congo, Democratic Republic of the 14 weeks
Costa Rica 4 months
Cuba 18 weeks
Cyprus 16 weeks
Côte d’Ivoire 14 weeks
Denmark 18 weeks
Djibouti 14 weeks
Dominica 12 weeks
Dominican Republic 12 weeks
Ecuador 12 weeks
Egypt 50 days
El Salvador 12 weeks
Equatorial Guinea 12 weeks
Estonia 455 calendar days (100%)
Ethiopia 90 days
Fiji 84 days
Finland 105 days
France 16 weeks (100%) rising to 26 weeks (100%) for third child
Gabon 14 weeks
Gambia, The 12 weeks
Germany 14 weeks (100%) 6 before birth
Ghana 12 weeks
Greece 16 weeks
Grenada 3 months
Guatemala 12 weeks
Guinea 14 weeks
Guinea-Bissau 60 days
Guyana 13 weeks
Haiti 12 weeks
Honduras 10 weeks
Hungary 24 weeks
Iceland 90 days 80% up to a ceiling of Íkr480,000 (€5,300, $6,700) monthly (minimum monthly payment Íkr 91,200 (€1000, $1,275) + 90 days to be shared between the parents
India 135 days (Central Government) 90 days or 12 weeks in State Governments
Indonesia 3 months
Iran 90 days
Iraq 62 days
Ireland 22 weeks (26 weeks from March 2007)
Israel 12 weeks
Italy 22 weeks (5 months) (80%) 2 before birth
Jamaica 12 weeks
Japan 14 weeks
Jordan 10 weeks
Kenya 2 months
Korea, South 60 days
Kuwait 70 days
Laos 90 days
Lebanon 40 days
Libya 50 days
Liechtenstein 8 weeks
Luxembourg 16 weeks
Madagascar 14 weeks
Malaysia 60 days
Mali 14 weeks
Malta 13 weeks
Mauritania 14 weeks
Mauritius 12 weeks
Mexico 12 weeks
Mongolia 101 days
Morocco 12 weeks
Mozambique 60 days
Namibia 12 weeks
Nepal 52 days
Netherlands 16 weeks
New Zealand 14 weeks
Nicaragua 12 weeks
Niger 14 weeks
Nigeria 12 weeks
Norway 54 weeks (12.5 months) (80%) or 44 weeks (10 months) (100%) - mother must take at least 3 weeks immediately before birth and 6 weeks immediately after birth, father must take at least 6 weeks - the rest can be shared between mother and father.
Pakistan 12 weeks
Panama 14 weeks
Paraguay 12 weeks
Peru 90 days
Philippines 60 days
Poland 16-18 weeks
Portugal 120 days
Qatar 40-60 days
Romania 112 days
Russia 140 days
Rwanda 12 weeks
Saint Lucia 13 weeks
Saudi Arabia 10 weeks
Senegal 14 weeks
Seychelles 14 weeks
Singapore 12 weeks
Solomon Islands 12 weeks
Somalia 14 weeks
South Africa 12 weeks
Spain 16 weeks
Sri Lanka 12 weeks
Sudan 8 weeks
Sweden 480 days (16 months) (80% up to a ceiling the first 390 days, 90 days at flat rate) - shared with father (minimum 60 days)
Switzerland 16 weeks (100%), 8 weeks mandatory
Syria 75 days
Tanzania 12 weeks
Thailand 90 days
Togo 14 weeks
Tunisia 30 days
Turkey 12 weeks
Uganda 4 weeks
Ukraine 126 days
United Arab Emirates 45 days
United Kingdom 6 weeks (90%) 20 weeks at a fixed amount (as of March 2006 = £108.85)
United States None 
Uruguay 12 weeks
Venezuela 18 weeks
Vietnam 4-6 months
Yemen 60 days
Zambia 12 weeks
Zimbabwe 90 days

The US and Australia with the outstanding 0 days or weeks of mandated paid maternity leave.

America and Australia are the only countries on the list without mandated paid maternity leave.* (I notice North Korea isn’t on there — we probably don’t have access to that information given that it’s North Korea and everything. Anyone know?)

In America, we have the PDL and the FMLA.

PDL. Pregnancy Disability Leave (PDL) which entitles you up to four months of unpaid, job-protected leave when disabled by pregnancy, childbirth, or a related medical condition.

FMLA.  Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA) if you have been employed with the Company for at least one year, provides up to 12 weeks job protected leave.

So you get a few unpaid months off if you gave birth, and they can’t legally hire someone to replace you. But that’s about it. Shameful, America.

-Jess

ETA: Australia has a new legal policy where you get 18 paid weeks’ leave. So America is alone on this one.

Wow. And I love how Americans think that we’re so much more advanced than these other countries that they stereotype. Look at that list. Look at your stereotypes and which countries on that list you would consider to be lower than the U.S. with a lower quality of life. Mmmmhhhm.

I don’t know what else to call this person in my life - ex-boyfriend, roommate - we have a strange arrangement but it works.

He’s older than me, and hasn’t achieved much of anything. He says he’s leaving this summer. I’m worried about what’s going to happen to him.

If he “goes west” as he says he will, he won’t have his medication anymore, because he won’t have a job. He quit his job because he says he’s worn out and sick of working the only jobs he can get without an education. He has no options. Every suggestion and plan I have is met with complete hopelessness.

We’re still on the same phone plan.

What’s going to happen? He’ll send me money for the phone bill. One day the payments might stop, but I’ll see he’s still using the phone. I’ll be faced with the choice of cutting off the phone service and losing contact with him, or keeping it going and paying for it myself.

I’ll be struggling more, living alone paying all the bills myself. I know he’s leaving soon. I just don’t know when.

How can I help someone so helpless? How can I give hope to someone so removed from any idea of hope? How can I let someone that I care about and have shared my life with go, not knowing if they’ll be safe and protected? How do people let people go? I don’t actually know how to do it.

I never believed that hogwash of “the hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world.” Greed, power, aggression - these are the motivations of those who rule the world. The hand that rocks the cradle is spurned when it should be loved, put down by half of us and sentimentalized/romanticized by the other. The hand that rocks the cradle exists in a never-ending position of being pre-judged and judged. The hand that rocks the cradle is the most hardworking hand, proof that hard work is not directly correlated to wealth or power. Give thanks for the women who raised you today, whether they be mothers, sisters, aunts, babysitters or friends - their hands hold everything you are.

TRUTH

Jimmy Kimmel

True story.

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This I can’t argue with.

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