This week's We Have Brains topic is by Morgaine:

I can't think of much besides the quagmire that is Iraq. ... We have a shortage of military personnel and almost a dozen countries in our "coalition" are bailing out. We're running out of troops to the point that 20,000 troops that were supposed to come home are having their service extended. There's a bill before congress right now to reinstate the draft. Both the Democratic and Republican candidates support it. To the best of my knowledge, this would be the first time in modern history that women in the "free world" will be subject to the draft. ... My question is - is this equality? Should someone who makes .76 cents on the dollar compared to a man; who has never had a President in the history of this country; who has little say in the development of public policy; who is not allowed the freedom to control her reproductive activity; who is vulnerable to rape and torture by her own comrades in arms with no recourse for protection be subject to forced military service?

Madness! Insanity! This was the first I had heard of this; someone suggested that it's a fake bill that supposed to scare people into waking up. I hope it is, there's no way in hell I'm going to war. I think the draft is absurd to begin with, but the inevitability of rape in the military means I'd be more willing to hurt "allies"than I would "the terrorists." My partner's family is all gung-ho America forever nuke anyone who doesn't agree, and seeing the other side is scary because it drives home how real it all is. People are still being blindly lead by Bush and people still, somehow, believe in this war. I'm not an amazingly paranoid person, but just the idea of being drafted makes me want to run for the hills.

Someone brought up the point that you can't just pick and choose what parts of equality you want. Well I'll take the good with the bad, but I'll be god damned if I'm taking the bad without getting the good.

This week's We Have Brains collab topic was posted by April and is in response to this news article, which I've reprinted for convenience sake. My response assumes you've read the article, so don't blame me if you don't get it!

What does this case say about modern medicine and women? Does it elevate a doctor's advice over a person's own choice, or an unborn child's rights over a woman's? Should we be worried? And what (if any) actions should this drive from feminists?

Things like this really horrify me, frankly. In fact the idea that a woman could be imprisioned for killing her baby during birth is a major reason I'm afraid to have children. I'm scared of male doctors because I see them as dehumanizing and I'm afraid of the damn government because in their eyes I seem to be some kind of baby machine. One of my more "radical" beliefs is that the government has absolutely no right whatsoever to interfere with what a woman does with her baby making super power. I mean, when those crazy ass Christian folk come on Dateline with their conjoined twins and keep talking about God and such while one twin dies on the operating table and the other is on an iron lung for life because they didn't have the common decency to abort in the first place, do we get up in their business and accuse them of murder? How about crippling a person for life? Hell no we don't! Because "crazy" people and non-Christians don't have rights, but Christians do. That, to me, is absolutely insane.

New topic on We Have Brains as posted by Alison:

Please put on your imagination caps. You have been granted the position of editor for a new feminist magazine. Your budget is not a problem, allowing you to be picky about writers and advertising. What would this magazine look like? Who would be your target audience and why? What types of articles would you have and who would write for them? What would be featured on the cover? To follow up on the question from last week, if popular culture figures such as Christina and Britney (or Pink, Jessica Simpson, Avril L., and so on) wanted to be on the cover, what would you cite as your standards and would they be featured?

I like this topic because a feminist magazine is one of my "what if" things that I imagine doing when people ask me, "What if you won the lottery?" I would absolutely love to do a magazine for young women especially, since I think society robs many school-aged (I'm including college) women of the basic knowledge that they need to make informed decisions. I would have a lot of information on sexuality and health, things that they (parents and school) never teach girls like they're supposed to. Articles on natural cures, how to love menstruation, how to pick out a good gyn, information about contraception, birth, and abortion. In short, a monthly Our Bodies Ourselves for young women. I would also have other articles, of course, but that would be my #1 monthly feature. Other things I would have monthly ... One would be a spotlight on a Feminist great in politics, literature, history, art, etc. with that being the focus of the entire issue every March (Women's History Month). There would be a section for book and music reviews, like in most magazines, but also a section for zine reviews and an artist spotlight each month. I would want international political news as well as pop culture commentary and simple ways that women can get involved, minor acts of activism, if you will. I would want the magazine to be tempered between entertaining and informative and I would want it to make readers angry as much as it makes them laugh.

I would not want to fall into the same sex-positive fag hag trap that I watched Bust fall into because I think it's absolutely rubbish. The fact that the majority of their ads are for vibrators is revolting to me, I'm not going to go into it now because that's a whole topic on its own, but I wouldn't take money from those shops. I guess since most other people are scared to advertise in Feminist magazines I'd have to do it not for profit, or only take money from organizations and businesses that I believed in. I'd rather have balanced articles than neutral ones, but I don't feel the same way about advertising. It comes so close to pimping one's readership that I'm not going to step on the toes of feminists who don't need a phallic object to achieve orgasm and are sick of people trying to foist one on them in the name of empowerment. Oops, there I go ...

Once on TV (Dateline?) Britney Spears' manager came on to comment about her sexually suggestive music/stage show and the way it impacted young girls who emulate her. He said, "Britney's an adult, she's doing what any woman would do" (my italics). If one of the pop princesses wanted to be in my magazine they'd be subjected to a REAL interview and be fully clothed on the damn cover. If I couldn't wring something positive out of them I wouldn't publish the interview. Why? Because then I'd be exploiting them to make sales, and even if they are okay with that I'm not. I'm a not for profit anyway, what do I care about sales?

So ... any takers? ^_^

* Nagazine is a slang word for zine that Layla's partner made up, my title is actually a stolen inside joke ... but it's not meant to imply "nagging." Just to clarify!

This week's topic on We Have Brains is:

Alternet has an interesting article called Dragging Women Down that equates men doing drag with whites doing black face. I thought that might be a nice topic to throw out, so there you go. Do boys in drag insult your feminist sensibilities?

Unfortunately I had no way to read the article, since I'm not making another username and password unless I absolutely have to, but I still have an opinion. I think that the comparison between drag and black face is a perfectly valid one, the purpose of each is to allow a member of one group (men, whites) to do an exaggerated impersonation of a member of another group (women, blacks). They take physicality to the level of farce and then dramatize personality via absurd makeup and/or costume.

But, like all comparisons, this one falls apart pretty easily. Black face was done by actors to get laughs at the expense of a racial group. Drag is done (for many reasons) because there is a performance and while their are elements of folly there can be elements of respect. Many drag queens have tremendous respect for women and some do drag off stage, this does not hold true for old school users of black face. I'm a little surprised the this topic didn't mention drag kings, women dressed like men dressed like women. Talk about deconstructionist!

All that being said: I do still think that drag has a destructive element. It propagates the absurd notion that gay men really just want to be women. It's an incredibly insulting misconception of the vast majority of the gay community, and things like drag, unfortunately, help those stereotypes along. Of course those stereotypes are stupid and I certainly wouldn't want anyone to stop doing a job they love because the "straights" can't get it through their egotistical heads that they don't want to be them.

Drag, if it mocks anything, mocks exaggeratedly feminine characteristics, exaggeratedly heterosexual feminine characteristics. It's a million times less demeaning to women than sex work or even daytime TV commercials.

All of the images I'm using for the layout right now are made by Hot Chocolate, a great materials site. They will be credited soon in a more proper way, but this will have to do for now.