[Caption; A series of tweets by josie duffy rice/ @jduffyrice
Now that we’re all on twitter because of this game, I am making a public service announcement: PLEASE STOP SHARING THAT STORY ABOUT 1500 KIDS MISSING. The outrage I’ve seen is the result of a total misinterpretation and could SERIOUSLY threaten the children you want to save.
Before I get to it, I’ll answer the question that 99 million ppl will inevitably ask: I know this because I’m a lawyer, i works on criminal justice issues (sometimes incl immigration), and 4 of my closest friends are immigration attorneys dealing with this EXACT THING.
There are two things going on. 1) HHS doesn’t know where 1500 unaccompanied minors are. 2) we are separating parents and children at the border.
These are different. The kids in 1) were not separated from their parents at the border. They crossed the border alone* or arrived here without a parent.
That’s not really the point I want to make, though it is important.
These kids were dealt with by ORR, the office of refugee resettlement. They were released into the care of people that almost always fit within one of these three categories:
1) immediate family 2) extended family 3) other people that the child has a pre-existing relationship with. If none of these categories apply, then the kids normally stay in a shelter.
(After a number of children were trafficked in 2014, these restrictions got tighter.)
So those kids are released and then they are no longer ORRs responsibility or problem. THIS IS A GOOD THING.
One analogy I heard from my dear friend who I won’t tag without her permission, is that ORR is basically a jailer. Do you want the jail keeping track of where every former inmate is?
Now I have more to say about that but before we do that, let’s talk about the word missing. Basically by all accounts HHS did a cursory reach out to check on these kids, and couldn’t find out where they were exactly.
When I say cursory I mean cursory. We’re talking about phone calls. Phone calls! Like, no door knocks. No checking school records. They called. They didn’t find answers.
There are so many reasons why people wouldn’t answer. Maybe these kids are living with someone undocumented. Maybe they aren’t but their sponsor is (legitimately) completely scared of immigration authorities in trumps America.
They aren’t missing! They are almost certainly living with family members who almost certainly don’t want to interact with the government and WE SHOULDN’T ASK THEM TO
ORR’s job is NOT to track and monitor these kids, and it shouldn’t be. As my friend said, if there were an issue- abuse, or other wrongdoing- it should go through the appropriate agency: children’s services or what have you. It SHOULDN’T GO THROUGH HHS/ORR or DHS/ICE
When your school loans provider can’t reach you, are you missing? No. When your boss can’t find you on a Friday night, are you missing? No. They aren’t missing. Some unanswered phone calls does not a missing child make.
Now, I started out identifying two things that were happening. The second- the separation of children and their parents at the border- is goddamn unconscionable and sickening.
But DO NOT confuse the two. The potential for it backfiring is real. What we’re demanding is that ORR, which works hand in hand with ICE, “keep better track” of kids they basically would like to deport if giving the chance. We don’t want that!!!
You’re asking immigration authorities IN TRUMP’S AMERICA to BETTER MONITOR UNDOCUMENTED CHILDREN AND THEIR FAMILIES. You don’t want this. I promise you don’t.
I get it. It sounds awful. But at WORST it’s benign. At best, it’s a GOOD thing that ORR doesn’t know where these kids are. There’s a reason. We actually now have pretty strict requirements before we release these kids. They aren’t all being trafficked. They aren’t dead.
It doesn’t mean life is easy, but life won’t be easier if ORR starts tracking them. Trust me. And trust my brilliant friends who know about this shit and have warned me and are now warning you. DONT conflate the two things.
AND because some people are obviously taking this as an opportunity to exonerate the president- NO. Trumps immigration policy is disgusting. His separation of kids and parents at the border is SICKENING. He’s a tyrant. Just don’t conflate them.
Man oh man I forget that at least 50 percent of people on twitter refuse to learn basic reading comprehension. Tonight should be fun!
] *[Also it says “alien” up there where it should say “alone”, cool, autocorrect.]
*corrected autocorrect/typo in my transcription for the sake of being less confusing, especially for anyone listening to the text rather than reading it visually.
Since I reblogged a post about this issue, here is a correction.
(GDPR) is going into effect, and is enforceable as of Friday, May 25th, 2018. The policy basically mandates that internet companies don’t get to collect what’s called personally identifiable information (IP and MAC addresses, physical addresses, the content of your posts, and so on) without the user’s consent to do so, and that the user can revoke consent at any time. As a result, basically every company on the internet, all of whom rely on collecting and selling this information, are updating their terms of services, particularly if they are based in Europe, or understand you to be European.
A big challenge for a lot of these companies is a provision called “Right of Erasure” which means if you revoke consent to
have your data processed by a company, they have to delete that data.
Basically everyone in the industry hates it, but it’s a big win for
consumers, if you’re in the EU, of course.
If you’re outside of the EU, this stuff doesn’t apply to you, but in many cases it’s easier for a firm to change its policies to be GDPR compliant everywhere, or alternatively let everyone know that they have to consent to whatever terms the firm demands if they are to continue using the product.
🤔
I hope you don’t mind me putting your tags on here @thefloatingstone but I think they are important.
Ok so I was looking for historical slang terms for penis (gotta be era-accurate when writing vintage dick jokes) and I came across….something
some linguist compiled a literal timeline of genitalia slang–a cock compendium, if you will–that dates back all the way to the fucking 13th CENTURY. This motherfucker tracked the evolution of erection etymology through 800+ years, because if he doesn’t do it, who else will? Thank you for your service, Johnathon Green.
Some of my favorites include:
Shaft of Delight (1700s)
Womb Sweeper (1980s)
Master John Goodfellow (1890s)
Nimble-Wimble (1650s)
Corporal Love (1930s)
Staff of Life (1880s)
Spindle (1530s)
As good as ever twanged (1670s)
Gaying Instrument (1810s)
Beef Torpedo (1980s)
and last but not least, the first recorded use of the word Schlong, which was in 1865 CE. Tag yourself, I’m Nimble Wimble
And are the lovely ladies feeling left out? not to worry! Johnathon’s got you covered, gals, because he also made one for vaginas. Highlights:
Mrs. Fubb’s Parlor (1820s)
Poontang (1950s)
Spunk Box (1720s)
Ringerangroo (1930s)
Ineffable (1890s)
Itching Jenny (1890s)
Carnal Mantrap (1890s – a busy decade apparently)
Bookbinder’s Wife (1760s)
Rough Malkin (1530s)
Socket (1460s)
and a personal favorite, crinkum-crankum, circa approximately 1670.
Also how can Arthur Conan Doyle write a character like Irene Adler 1891 and have her 1. Outsmart Sherlock Holmes and get away with it and 2. Be in no way a damsel or love interest to Sherlock.. But every modern retelling not only has her be a sexual /love interest character but she is posed as being very very smart… But never smart enough to just outwit him, get away with it and move on? Women can be smart, sure, but no one is allowed to be smarter than Sherlock.
It’s been over 120 years and Irene is, at her best, never as decently treated as the original.
Arthur Conan Doyle: Here’s a story about male insecurity where the police underestimate her for being a woman and feel the need to get her because she’s a woman and Sherlock is ultimately beaten by a woman and in a bit of character development accepts it and acknowledges her intellect.
Sherlock fans: Uh no way Sherlock is smart Sherlock is so so smart she must have used her feminine wiles or her sexy things or her love to undermine him but he gets her in the end i feel a strange catharsis at changing this ending but I’m sure Doyle always meant to be this way, it just feels right.
Half of the reason that Adler was able to out-wit Holmes was because Holmes was too narrow-minded. Holmes is smart and has knowledge of many subjects, but he also strongly relies on social order and norms to solve crimes. He’s even says in A Scandal in Bohemia that:
“When a woman thinks that her house is on fire, her instinct is at once to rush to thing which she values most. It is a
perfectly overpowering impulse, and I have more than once taken advantage of it
… A married woman grabs at her baby; an unmarried one reaches for her jewel-box.”
Holmes uses this social norm and order to stage an attack and find out where Adler hid the photo in her house. He drops his guard and is so proud of himself because he knew that this would work, he knew that if he created disorder, “natural” order would attempt to counteract that disorder.
Adler defies those social orders and norms: she is an untitled American woman who earned her own money through a career as an opera star, instead of relying on a husband or family to have financial security; she outwitted Holmes because she cross-dressed and indicated that she frequently did so, allowing her to have a lot more freedom roaming around London on her own terms, and her stage career aided that so that she could act like a man easily; and she didn’t care one bit about her reputation or being a “pure” woman, had several boyfriends, and was known for being an “adventuress”. More importantly, she had the ability to defy those social norms while simultaneously being able to present herself as the ideal respectable and under-estimable Victorian-era woman.
Adler literally defeats Holmes by dressing in drag then happily goes off with her new husband whom she loves very much. And Holmes respects that and is thoroughly impressed. Not only does he respect that, he realizes that he was on the wrong side of things, that he shouldn’t have agreed to take on the case for the King of Bohemia. This is the exchange that follows after Holmes, Watson and the King read Adler’s letter.
“Would she not have made an admirable queen?
Is it not a pity that she was not on my level?”
“From what I have seen of the
lady she seems indeed to be on a very different level to your Majesty,” said
Holmes coldly
Holmes takes Adler’s side and realizes that the photograph is her protection from the King, not something she intended to use as a weapon against him. Adler never exploited the King to get what she wanted, only kept it as a safeguard of her own happiness. She made sure she had a way of ensuring that she alone guided her future.
Irene Adler is “the woman” to Sherlock Holmes, not because she was sexy or he was in love with her. She was a reminder that real life doesn’t always follow what social norms and order are to be expected, that people shouldn’t be taken on face value or respected just because of their title or apparent respectability and ability to follow social order and norms, and that there are two sides to every story.
Take a lesson from Sherlock Holmes, people. Doyle knew what he was doing. If we’re going to keep making him roll over in his grave from creating Sherlock Holmes media, please, at least respect him and Irene Adler.
funeral-biscuit 