Author of Ender's Game decides to screw over his fanbase in anti-gay rant.

Straight outta Minnesota: Stripping for clothing donations enrages charities across country

"So, what's wrong with strip clubs doing a clothing drive?" you may be asking. "Oh, sure, it'll wad up conservatives' panties, but isn't that half the fun?"

No, no, no--you see, some marketing geniuses at Virgin Mobile and the National Network for Youth (NN4Y) thought it would be a good idea to encourage young people to post videos of themselves doing stripteases in exchange for clothing companies donating clothing to charities. Like, for instance, Catholic Charities of MN.

Uh-huh. That was my reaction, too, I assure you. Complete with the jaw-dropping and funny noises.

Oh, and apparently, they didn't even consult some of their own members and the charities they were supposed to be supporting:

"Strip2Clothe" has sparked outrage among NN4Y's own members. Some groups say they were never consulted about the concept and are appalled by the idea of young people stripping as a means to get clothes for other young people. The organizations' names have since been taken off the site.

"It was a shock to everybody," said Trudee Able-Peterson, coordinator of outreach services at StreetWorks, a Twin Cities collaborative of outreach programs. "This is the message we send kids? That my granddaughter, who's 17, should strip to provide clothes for other kids?"

Another quote from the article:

The concept is especially jarring, (Catholic Charities spokeswoman Rebecca) Lentz said, considering that many kids on the street find themselves sexually exploited within a day or two of becoming homeless.

According to a spokesperson for NN4Y, the promotion is now being "reconsidered." Ya think? Maybe it's just me, but when a promotion includes the words "young people," "striptease" and "videos," I get a little skeeved.

Shoot the Messenger is an NYC based live talk show, where guests are interviewed. One segment is "Thinking and Drinking," where guests have a cocktail and discuss current affairs. Editors of Jezebel, Moe and Tracie, were guests last week. The host, Lizz Winstead, is not pleased with their interview. She says they were sloshed the whole time and were poor role models for the many young women who idolize them. Selected video clips and quotes from Winstead at Huffington Post:

( Show me that smile, oh show me that smile )

The comments at the previously mentioned Huff Post blog are nasty, and the comments at Shoot the Messenger are nasty. Meanwhile Tracie posts at her personal blog chalking it up to too much booze interacting with drugs that aid cessation of smoking, and that the whole conversation got out of hand. It is mentioned in her comments that there was allegedly someone at the event who didn't want to sit on a toilet seat Slut Machine (aka Tracie) sat on beforehand because she had gonorrhea a few years back.

Meanwhile, there is no official response at Jezebel. ( Don't waste another minute on your crying ) Watch commenters get on the backs of the editors! Watch commenters gang up on each other! Will the editors talk about what happened? Only time will tell, but if they do there will be a shitstorm.

You may remember The last big shitstorm at Jezebel, when Moe Jessica and Tracie discussed the new Roman Polanski doc on HBO and said it was probably consensual because the 13-year old had quaaludes and a relationship with an older man before, which resulted in 600+ comments on both that post and a follow-up.

Are the commenters entitled? Are the editors inconsiderate to their community? You decide!

ETA: There is a post up from managing editor Anna. Five hours in there are already over 750 comments.

Via coffeeandink

Hey, rape is just the evolutionary equivilent of stealing food!

Riffing off this post, Scott rewords his question: Why do we, as a society, provide food stamps for the hungry but not sex stamps for the celibate?

Because maybe women aren't responsible for the trauma of your weaning?

*sigh*

Another example why the Open Source Boob Project was a fucking stupid idea from the start.

And given that liz_marcs got anonymous trolls accusing her of being a "killjoy" because she didn't drink the OMG THIS IS SOO EMPOWERING! kool-aid, anonymous commenting will *stay* off.

The Open Source Boobs Project: Dear sir: I believe your patriarchy is showing.

The second post linked there had comments disabled, with a pointer to comment at the first post. The first post now has two heidipologies appended to the top, and he somehow managed to delete all 1300+ comments accidentally in the process of locking them. (Despite having been on LJ since forever and hosting many popular discussions.) I have a few of the upper-level pages in cache; anybody have more? ETA:Comments appear to be back for now; you can now follow comment links in peoples' posts.

For those of you who have been lucky enough not to see this yet, basically, some SF fans were trying to start a utopian project where anybody wearing a green "Yes, you may" button may be punched in the face for being gratuitously stupid. (And a slightly more hard-core swift kick to the balls version.)

It spreads: (These links all have lots of good discussion in comments too.)
Coffeandink's response
Kate-nepveu's response
Springheel-jack's response
the-red-shoes's response
brown_betty's response, and a poll
nestra's response
cereta's response
Mystickeeper summarizes
Rachel Manija's response part 2
thebratqueen's response
elynross's response
seperis's response
ojouchan's response
movies-michelle brings out the big guns
go-go-gidget/rowleyorama's response
pixelfish's response
pleonoastic's response
blueraccoon's response
oulangi's response
RivkaT on Open Source and the Endowment Effect
plasticsturgeon's Open Source African Hair Project
sparkymonster, compiled.
giandujakiss part 1 and part 2
tablesaw's lj post
liz-marcs's post
( and this thing is now being cut, 'cause it's getting silly. Be smarter than me, and just stop reading. )
Rusty-halo's response
Feminist SF - The Blog speaks up
Feministing throws in
Scalzi's response part 2
Oh boy, metafilter is here!
Randy Milholland has T-shirts!
the abortive otf_wank post - DO NOT COMMENT THERE - this is *so* not funny (crotch-kicking aside) - but it's a pretty good write-up if you want more than bare links. ETA: Comment all you want, with mod approval. It now features a boobie train. Hooray?

Comment thread links, readable for now:
Loligo makes an excellent suggestion, followed by excellent discussion.
Tablesaw is win.
More face-punching. (I wonder why so many people were thinking along those lines?)
mswyrr is also win.
sparkymonster explains cloven oranges.
He has addedThe court of public opinion has added tags to the entry now. o boy.
A LOLFerrett from robin_ma

A list of penguicon con reports - there were also giant pirate ships and singing Tesla coils there!

ETA: Just added a bunch more response links (I find wank migration patterns fascinating, I can't stop looking) and there are twoa few I want to point out in particular:
vito-excalibur and the Women Back Each Other Up Project: "I would like to propose a little real world help for a real world problem."
Back-up follow-up: We Has T-shirts and buttons! (There will be fliers!); Men's Auxiliary; Why men are only auxiliary; It's About the Problem.
novapsyche, for a perspective from someone who actually wore a green button: "if I'd read theferrett's post about OSBP before someone offered me the pin, I would have turned it down."
nineveh-uk writes Harriet Vane & co. vs. OSBP: ‘And then someone started going on about post-lapsarian inhibition, and how the only free soul was in a free body -’
The Boobie Project entry on Feminist SF - The Wiki, which has a great link round-up with chronology and edit history and commentary and things!
the-red-shoes collects soundbites! "Should fit on a t-shirt."

LAST ETA: I have just disabled anon comments; porn spam has started arriving faster than legit discussion, sorry. If any anons want to keep talking, well, you can get a JF account!

Will be adding more links as I find them (feel free to drop them in comments); but as much of the great discussion was in the comments of the OP and is now gone, I wanted to get this up as soon as possible. ETA: Now adding more links. If you don't want your post linked, ask and it's gone.

Discuss!

I shouldn't be surprised by anything that comes out of Dr. Laura's mouth, but this still made me headdesk: Women Share Blame for Cheating Men

While looking up info on the UW student that was randomly attacked near campus Tuesday morning, I stumbled across this article on The Stranger's website: "UW Campus Stalked By El Creepo."

University of Washington police are looking for a man who solicited three students for sex on campus yesterday.

Apparently the guy hung around the parking lot for hours, following people, and was creepy enough that three separate women filed complaints with campus police. The comments are what got my blood boiling, though. There are some real gems, like this:

"Wow, after reading some of these comments I didn't realize how messed up and uptight things are around Seattle. I am sure a lot of us wish we had the courage to just go up and say our feelings to someone we are interested in. I am thinking the ugly description has a big influence on what this women think. It's really common courtesy to be up front about expectations and as long as he does not pursue them after they decline."

"#12 your on crack if you followed men around and asked them for sex you'd get more than 50 percent yes no matter what, and no one would call the cops on you ever. thats the gender gap in our society, if your a guy then your arrested for wanting sex or asking for it unless you do it THE RIGHT WAY and with THE RIGHT CLOTHES and THE RIGHT BODY AND FACE."

"We both know if it were Johnny Depp propositioning women on campus there'd be no complaints, and there would be women climbing over each other to be next."

"What's troubling is that a guy is finally just being honest and up front and they are treating him like a criminal."

Why do I ruin a good mood with posts I know are going to be filled with stupid wank? You've got a bunch of idiot guys yelling "Just because he's not allowing her to have any friends and keeps manipulating her into staying with him doesn't mean he's abusive or that he'll become physically abusive", and then janusdoa being a trans hating fucktard.

I'm really glad I didn't reply to s/h/it when s/h/it replied to me here or I think there would be bloodshed.