Okay, I don't want Democrats to "grow balls."

[jobycom]

Balls, testicular fortitude, a big brass pair, cajones grande, stones, globes, boulders, round hairy globs, dangling dabs of maleness, whatever the hell!

We need courage, integrity, honor, steadfastness, compassion, strength, indefatigable spirit, soul, heart, intelligence, indomitable will, even love and charity. None of those are found in sex organs of either gender, and they damn sure haven't been necessary components of all our shafted leaders, if you know what I'm saying.

Why the hell do I want more testicles in government? Haven't we had enough over the past 240 years?

[The Magistrate]

1. Well Said, Comrade

To me, the phrase "balls" has long meant only the propensity to a strain of foolhardiness, a truculent willingness to take risks graced by neither necessity nor profit, that can only be engaged in by a person afflicted with a srrious asmixture of stupidity in his or her character....

[lildreamer316]

2. They need to grow a pair of ovaries and concieve of an idea.

Nurture it in the uterus of the liberal family and birth it into the world.

[jobycom]

9. Oh, brilliant! I love that one! nt.

[silverojo]

3. I'd be happier if they grew a spine

'Nuff said.

[Turn CO Blue]

38. All the more reason to invest in stem cell research!

Think of all the wiggly, gelatinous Dem politicians without spines - oh, the humanity! Not to mention all the Repukes without hearts, and a few on both sides of the aisle with little or no brains!

Stem cell research may be their last hope!

/snark

[niyad]

4. can you imagine the reaction if we started insisting that the pols grow a

set of ovaries?

your list of what is needed is absolutely correct. we don't need organs, we need valuable and honourable MENTAL attributes, not physical ones.

[PowerToThePeople]

5. I have two already, don't want any more. n/t

[yurbud]

6. ovaries, cajones, fire in the belly, the point isn't the metaphor, it's

getting them to do their damn job.

[yurbud]

8. We could just call them the Weimarcrats

[jobycom]

10. The metaphor is always the point.

It shows societal gender bias more clearly than Penthouse Magazine.

[yurbud]

14. So if I said Cynthia McKinney and Barbara Lee have more balls than

anyone else in the Congress, I would still be a sexist?

[jobycom]

16. Even more so.

Balls are a male attribute. Why does a woman have to have a male attribute to be brave, or whatever the metaphor means? It furthers gender stereotypes. Add that to people who call weak politicians "pussies" or "pink tutu Dems," and the implication is women are weak, men are strong, even if sometimes those roles are reversed.

[yurbud]

22. pink tutu Dems...thanks! I'll photoshop Joe Biden into one.

[mopinko]

34. .

[Bernardo de La Paz]

35. Why are you providing propaganda for Republicans?

[mopinko]

51. traitors are traitors

i hardly think republicans are interested. if anything, they should be worried about the outing of their collaborators. corruption is corruption. they can't win without the vischy dems.
really, who does this help and how?

[belle]

41. Ever seen a guy walk down the street in a pink tutu? Trust me,

that takes more *guts* than any amount of macho posturing. Enough with the fem-bashing already.

[jobycom]

42. ROFL!

just, :rofl: !

[Captain Hilts]

45. Do you say "that's awfully white of you" to blacks?

And thus imply that being black isn't good enough?

That's what praising women for "having balls" is like.

[yurbud]

15. if somebody is on your side and cheering you on, don't get too picky

about what words they use.

At the same time, I prefer not to be called white or caucasian.

I like Gringo, Anglo, or haole. If you referring to me as anything else, you are insulting my crackerosity and I can't support you even if you are fighting for my rights and democracy.

[jobycom]

17. Words are power

They create our thoughts, our assumptions. If you undermine while praising, you might be losing the war while winning the battle. I grew up in Mississippi. It was fairly common for people (not me) to tell a black man that he was pretty smart for a black man. Is that a compliment? Or is it rather a furthering of a disgusting stereotype, disguised as a compliment?

[yurbud]

20. that's a little different than using black or African American

you could pick the term the person doesn't prefer without meaning any malice.

Likewise, if someone says a woman has "balls" it isn't implying her courage is surprising or of a lesser quality than a man's.

Your "smart for a black guy" example would only be used by someone who thought blacks were inferior, wanted to insult the person they are talking to, or both.

Why don't you invent a better metaphor and start using it.

But you aren't going to stop existing ones by browbeating people.

[jobycom]

23. No, it just seems that way to you because you aren't aware of it yet

Saying a person is "smart for a black man" isn't offensive to the person complimented, it's offensive to all black people, because it implies that most African Americans aren't. Same as the "articulate" compliment.

Telling a woman that she's got balls (meaning it as a compliment) is telling her the same thing. It's not insulting her, it's a compliment. The insult is in what it says about the rest of the gender. Women don't have balls. Therefore to suddenly honorarily assign balls to a woman is to compare her to a man. It's exactly the same as saying "You are brave for a woman. Brave enough to be a man."

It doesn't have to be your intention. A lot of my friends sincerely thought they were being very open-minded by using the racial compliment above (and many similar ones). But at heart, what they were saying is that the whole race was inferior. Same as using male parts to signify good things while using female parts to signify bad things.

[yurbud]

28. Technically, you are correct, but when referring to a woman in a position

of power, it's hard to believe it hurts her feelings or holds her or other women back in any way.

I don't know how old you are. I grew up in the 70s, so I believe the feminist stuff and just assume women are my equals. So if I say a woman has balls, I don't expect it to hurt her feelings because she is as tough as me or tougher--or I wouldn't be making the balls comment.

This is an odd topic to bring up now. I find it tedious at all times but in our current political climate, it's a little like chewing someone out for wearing white after Labor Day while you're both racing for the lifeboats on the Titanic.

[jobycom]

30. It has nothing to do with hurting someone's feelings

It has to do with furthering stereotypes that divide the genders. You're not hurting the individual, you're categorizing an entire gender as inferior. "Women are weak, men are courageous. A strong woman is acting like a man."

I don't know why you're a Democrat, and maybe it's for a different reason than me. I'm not really even a Democrat. I just vote Democrat because their beliefs line up with mine on most issues. More than any of the other parties. And my beliefs are simple. Everyone is equal, everyone demands equal treatment, and anything that pushes us in the opposite direction is wrong.

So it's not rearranging deck chairs to say that we should live up to the ideals for which we claim to fight. It is piloting the damn ship around the icebergs. It's living up to the ideals we espouse, even if we aren't in power, and don't have leaders who can wave a magic wand and get it done. You and I can make a difference on the world simply by living up to our ideals here, so that when someone wanders onto our board they don't see the exact same type of behavior and name calling they see on Free Republic. There are some threads that, if I weren't a party wonk, I wouldn't even know the difference between the two parties.

I started a thread yesterday joking about Bush nominating Ann Coulter to the Supreme Court. She's a woman, she's conservative, she's an attorney, and she has no experience, either, so she's a perfect Bush appointment. I expected some discussion on that. What I got were a bunch of comments that she wasn't a woman, that she was an "it," that she was a hermaphrodite. There's not enough reason to find Ann Coulter unappealing, apparently, without resorting to gender insults about her appearance. (Not to mention they are stupid insults: most people would find Ann Coulter reasonably attractive and well dressed, so our insults just look like sour grapes and hatred to an outside. Hell, that's all they look like to me.)

We kill our ideals. We don't even have Bush to blame for that.

I'm not browbeating you, you can act however you like, I don't control nor pretend to control anyone, and don't care to try, I don't get angry when people disagree with me. But I'm going to state my opinion. That's why we are all here.

[spooky3]

32. Why don't you ask yourself why, if this is such a small matter and

you are committed to equality, you are fighting so hard to continue to use language that someone has explained very logically and clearly to be offensive and sexist? Why do you feel you know better than the person who is so patiently pointing out facts to you whether something is or is not offensive to a woman or sexist toward women?

If you are really honest with yourself I think you will soon see the answers to these questions requires some more progressive behavior.

[yurbud]

50. the language has force and clarity that ideologically pure alternatives do

not.

The problem with trying so hard to avoid being offensive is you end up avoiding being interesting too.

[spooky3]

52. ???? so usage IS important then? and what empirical evidence do you have

that the offensive AND SEXIST usage you advocate is so much more interesting than non-sexist language?

And--even if it were true--why is "interesting" talk more important than overcoming sexism?

Sorry, there's no point in continuing a discussion when there's no openness to evidence and reason.

[yurbud]

55. do you like stories with conflict or without?

Politics has to tell a story, and good stories have conflict, passion, and an edge.

Let's face it, how much would we all be talking about new orleans if not for the hurricane and the inadequate response? If everybody did their job, it would have been a one day story.

Likewise, many of us are here because we see a crisis in our democracy, and if things were going well, we'd be interested in something else.

The empirical evidence might be the success of the GOP with their in your face rhetoric, and the fact that the only candidate they feared in 2004 was Dean, not the bland inoffensive Gephart or Kerry.

Nice has resonance in person, and if I met you and you told me not to call you a girl or a chick, I would honor that. In writing though, our words need more passion to make up for the distance created through abstract expression.

On another visceral level, when I read something where someone has bent over backward to be gender neutral, it seems affected, forced, and insincere. You aren't talking to me as a peer, but at a distance.

I'll stick with my original challenge. If you don't like a metaphor like balls, come up with a better one and spread it around instead of bitching like a crybaby.

Grow up. This is the kind of issue that the right can use as a club to beat us with. It's the secular equivalent of debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

[lukasahero]

59. Ah yes, leave it to a man to tell women their concerns are unimportant

:eyes:

[yurbud]

60. that's lame

you didn't even bother to address the content of my post.

[lukasahero]

61. "bitching like a crybaby. Grow up"

"This is the kind of issue that the right can use as a club to beat us with. It's the secular equivalent of debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin."

I thought I addressed this content quite nicely actually. Women's conerns over language you equate with "debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin." In other words, irrelevant. Again, leave it to a man to tell women their concerns are irrelevant. What point did you not get?

[yurbud]

62. you want to talk about actual rights or actual oppression, I'm with you

I don't think most women care about this, even fairly liberal ones.

This is a niggling issue that makes you look like a strident ideologue straining at gnats, and you'll chase away people who otherwise agree with you.

On the other hand, if I was a stay at home dad who took care of the kids, I don't know that I would want to be referred to as Mr. Mom--but I don't know that I'd go on a campaign to stop the use of the term either.

[Captain Hilts]

63. We could also discuss the term "bitching"...

Yes, men don't think it's sexist and most women have never stopped to talk about it.

[jobycom]

64. You gave it more consideration than I could stomach giving it.

I gave up long ago. Remember LBJ's comment about teaching pigs manners. You won't succeed, and you'll just make the pig mad.

Anyone who argues that language isn't the real issue doesn't get the real issue.

[Captain Hilts]

46. Having moral fortitude doesn't require "balls."

And, in our society, a lot of the same folks that credit people with "having balls" are the same ones that criticize people for being "pussies."

[MarianJack]

7. I Don't Want Them To Get Angry,...

...I want them to get PISSED OFF!

Theres a MAJOR difference!

[Rowdyboy]

11. In college, 30 odd years ago, we decided to substitute "tits" for "balls"

After all, men and women both have tits and it seemed to be an appropriate way to show respect. This went on for several years, until the last of us graduated. The guys didn't care, and the women thought it was cool (hey, 1974-it was a different time)

Life can be hard, brutish and nasty, but if you've got the tits for it, you'll make out okay.

[jobycom]

19. I'm still working on this one

Clever, and certainly addresses the issue I was addressing...

And of course you always get brownie points for being from my home state! The college wasn't MSU, was it?

[Rowdyboy]

25. Nope, Began and graduated at Millsaps....We referred to Harvard as...

"The Millsaps of the North"

[jobycom]

31. I came one week from going to Millsaps in 1983.

I was enrolled and had a partial scholarship and even a roommate, but a woman I had a crush on talked me into going to a junior college instead. Funny, I had wanted to go to Millsaps all through high school, too. And the woman and I never wound up together, anyway, though that was my fault.

[applegrove]

12. Well said.

[babylonsister]

13. Your post burst a bubble for me.

Thank you!

[jobycom]

18. Ooo, sorry, that sounds painful...

:-)

[Tsiyu]

21. You left off bullocks and 'nads ; )

Actually, gonads is gender-neutral.

As Mr. Rogers used to croon:

Some are fancy on the inside.
Some are fancy on the outside.
Everybody's fancy.
Everybody's fine.
Your body's fancy
And so is mine!"

[jobycom]

24. Sad, but

I didn't know that's what bullocks are! Now I do. My education continues.

[question everything]

26. All I want is a clear positive message and effective communication

Not blasting the Republicans for doing this and not doing that.

Rather, a vision of where we want the country headed and how we would like to achieve this. And, yes, talking with courage, compassion and strength, but be bold and take a stand. Sure, it will torn down to pieces by the other side. But if we know how to communicate the message, it will spread among the voters.

[Warren DeMontague]

27. How about they just stop with the mushy-mouthed mealy wishy washy bullshit

Give me a forceful, strong, UNAPOLOGETIC democratic candidate who will say the following things:

"45 Million Americans with no health insurance is a fucking outrage. You can call it socialized medicine, you can call it Hillary-care, you can call it Merv God-damn Griffin, but we need a Single Payer Health Care System."

"Um, you can't WIN a war based on lies, occupying a country full of people who don't want you there. Nor, for that matter, can you 'see it through'. Bring the troops home from Iraq. NOW."

"Oh yeah. Uh, so, what, precisely are we getting for this multi-trillion dollar military industrial complex? Jeep-mounted microwaves to control unruly peace protesters? Fuck you. We need that money for real stuff, like a renewable, long-term solution to our ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT PROBLEM"

"Speaking of spending ridiculous amounts of money on crap that makes no sense, can someone tell me, again, why 40 Billion of our tax money goes every year to make sure granny isn't smoking pot for her glaucoma? Or to make sure anyone else isn't smoking it, for that matter? That stops now- and while we're at it, lets reserve the prisons for the people who really deserve to be there... Murderers, rapists, other violent criminals, and Ken Lay"

"Love Jesus? That's great. Show it by volunteering at a soup kitchen. But you are not being 'discriminated against' if you can't post the ten commandments in the courthouse or force OTHER people's kids to pray -and learn your religion in science class- in public schools. That's what churches are for, and there are plenty of them. Oh, and while we're at it- if you have a problem with abortion, birth control, or gay marriage, you are WELL within your rights not to have or use any of them!"

...Next candidate to say those things on a national platform-- he or she doesn't even need to use the word "fuck"-- I promise I won't make any comments about his or her gonads, or lack thereof.

[mshasta]

29. here you go...

[kansasblue]

33. besides.... I love Barbara Boxer... and that just doesn't work.

[southlandshari]

36. ...

:loveya:

[jobycom]

43. ...

:loveya: too!

[charlie]

37. They need to grow spinach

and eat a Popeye-sized helping every day.

[nofurylike]

39. well said, thank you jobycom. eom

[belle]

40. "Spine" works fine for me.

[Captain Hilts]

44. Well said. nt

[McCamy Taylor]

47. Wu wei = "doing what needs to be done". This would suffice.

The easiest way to do this would be "do" one verb a day instead of all the time trying to decide what the party should "be".

[Warren DeMontague]

48. I don't really give a shit about the phraseology

I just want my party and my country back.

[clitzpah queen]

49. You certainly get no argument from ME on this point!

I've always prefered "spine" myself....

(but it would be good as well to spread a little "clitzpah consciousness" here on DU when describing Feisty, strong women)

[geniph]

53. We need a goddam spine, not more gonads

Capitol Hill is covered with gonadal goons already.

[Greyhound]

54. Do I detect some dissatisfaction with the party's current leadership,

and the direction it is headed in?
Dare I hope this discontent may grow into something effective?
Maybe, we'll see. :smoke:

[jobycom]

58. That wasn't really my point

But it wasn't not my point, either.

[greblc]

56. You forgot a few...

nuts,kiwis,berries,(making you hungry?),jewels,tackle,Abe Vigodas,Machesters,....I know there are more, guys help me out here?

[Captain Hilts]

57. Onions. That's what Tony Kornheiser says on his radio show. nt