Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

[Federate]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

Leading the Platoon in Iraq

BY VICKEN SOSIKIAN

On a cold winter night a large group of US combat helicopter pilots and their wives had gathered at the home of their platoon leader in Colorado. It was an opportunity for the servicemen and their wives to enjoy a light-hearted atmosphere over dinner, drinks and music. It was an opportunity for the wives to get to know one another and bond; an opportunity for the platoon leader to promise all the wives that nothing would be spared to ensure the safety of their husbands; an opportunity, for just a short while, to have some fun before deploying to Iraq for security, reconnaissance and attack missions during the early days of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The pilots flew what is known as the Kiowa Warrior, a combat helicopter, which utilizes .50-Caliber machine guns, 70-mm rockets, air-to-air stinger missiles and Hellfire Missiles. The platoon leader was a “top gun” pilot earning the status by having registered the highest performance marks during flight and weaponry training.

The platoon leader was having a great time seeing all the pilots and their wives enjoy themselves. Everyone was happy, but things got a little more serious when one of the wives approached the platoon leader with tears in her eyes and said: “I am very thankful that you are his leader. My husband respects you so much. He will miss the birth of his first son, but I am comfortable knowing that he is under your command.”

Touched by this vote of confidence, the platoon leader promised to do everything possible to safeguard her husband.


Adrineh Shahijanian was more than their platoon leader. She was their friend and knew each of her pilots and mechanics well. She cared about them and understood the heavy burden of responsibility for their lives and safety.

Shahijanian has been awarded the Army Air Medal and the Bronze Star. She is the 34th female Kiowa Warrior pilot in US history and, likely, the first female Armenian.

“When I first arrived to my unit, there was no female latrine in the pilots’ area. Obviously, there hadn’t been a need for one. I also worked with a few people that definitely liked things the way they were back in the day when only male pilots flew combat airframes. But, in time, even the most stubborn of them had to admit a job well done—whether it be done by a male or female—is a job well done.”

Shahijanian’s mother, Knarik, who worked as the director of the Krouzian-Zekarian Vasbouragan Pre-kindergarten in San Francisco for 29 years, was known for nurturing and caring for all her students. They were like her children and she was like a mother to them. Just in the same way, Adrineh cared for her platoon. She knew each of their difficulties and challenges and, in leading them, she did everything she could to assist them in every way.

Adrineh’s mom was concerned when she learned that her daughter wanted to join the military, and even more, become a combat helicopter pilot. It wasn’t just about Adrineh’s safety. Her father was proud and appreciated the news, but like most Armenian parents, he was concerned about her future. “How will you find an Armenian man? How will you get married and have kids,” he would say.

Adrineh believed in discipline and doing good. She wanted to serve the country that accepted her family and gave them opportunity. She often encouraged others to do so, and explained to her mother that she wanted to practice what she preached. She completely understood her parent’s concern and believed that if she got married one day and if she had children; they would respect her past and value it.

Military policy dictates that combat helicopter pilots would not know exactly when they will be deployed to war. Furthermore, when they are informed of their deployment, they are expected to keep the information fully classified and confidential.

This was especially hard for Adrineh. She was based in Colorado and her parents were in San Francisco. She had no family in Colorado. Her platoon was her family. She would talk with her parents every night on the phone and after being updated about all the developments back home, she would end the conversation by telling her mother that she does not know when she will be deployed—that it can happen any day within the coming month or two. She always made sure to end her conversations by reassuring her mother that everything would be all right.

One February evening she ended her conversation the same way. She just wished she could have had the opportunity to see her parents and hug them and thank them for everything. She knew she was being deployed the following day, but in compliance with military policy, she refrained from saying a word about it to her parents.

The next day, she and about 60 others boarded a plane to Iraq. She explains that often there would be periods of silence on the plane, times during which she could not help but think about the fact that she and her pilots may never return from this mission.

Adrineh did. However, of the eight pilots directly under her command at the time, two did not. Fort Carson’s Third Armored Calvary Regiment, where she served as a platoon leader, suffered the most losses between 2003 and 2005.

Every flight could have been her last. Kiowa Warriors are low flying helicopters, which makes piloting them even more dangerous. Insurgents often targeted them because they knew that Kiowa Warriors are either providing security for an immediately pending ground attack or surveying an area for the purpose of planning a future attack.

“Insurgents would use anything they could to bring us down—from hand-projected rocks, to machine gun fire, to rocket attacks.” Any one of these could have brought the helicopter down and ended it all for Adrineh. However, the entire time she would work to keep her focus on the promise she made to her pilots’ wives.

“Some of our guys were not there to see the birth of their children, so I would organize two-week breaks for the guys to go back home and see their kids.” After days of planning, she had arranged a Chinook helicopter, a large aircraft capable of transporting dozens, to pick up some of her platoon’s pilots (as well as others) and take them to Baghdad; so from there they could go home. Adrineh was happy to make that possible for her guys and with a clear conscience was working with her commander to plan their next mission.

“I have never felt so much anger and guilt as I did when I heard over the radio that the Chinook had been shot down and two of my guys were gone,” she said.

Despite the range of feelings and emotions racing through her heart and mind, Adrineh was a platoon leader and did not have the luxury to take a break. She had to continue her work while putting the trauma she experienced aside.

By the end of her service Adrineh had become an executive officer of some 500 soldiers and reconnaissance helicopter pilots. She was medically discharged in 2004 after suffering injuries when, to avoid RPG fire, she crash-landed her Kiowa Warrior.

“After war, after your injuries are healed, the emotions you had put aside throughout the war begin to surface. It is then that you need to deal with your losses, the damages, the memories,” she explained.

Luckily, there are some good memories as well.

“One of the most memorable experiences was when one day; I came out of my aircraft to talk to some of the local folks with my interpreter in tow. A gentleman in his mid forties read my name tag and exclaimed, “Hye ek???” Just goes to show you, we always connect, wherever we are and whatever the circumstance.” The gentleman invited Adrineh and her interpreter in to his home, where he and his wife offered them some tea and a modest meal.

Adrineh Gouloomian is now a mother of two children. The older child, Garen, recently started attending Krouzian-Zekarian-Vasbouragan in San Francisco, where she was once a student.

“We sometimes stereotype gender roles, not out of bad intent but by habit, and it is perfectly fine to break out of those roles. I believe my daughter will be able to push her limits not because I tell her so but by leading by example. I am a combat veteran but I am also an Armenian wife and mother and I believe all these things can exist in harmony. I am proud of all of my roles in life.”

Adrineh is very grateful for everything she experienced. She believes that all of her experiences happened for a reason and will play a role in her and her family’s life. She encourages Armenians and women to do good and be ambassadors of good, to have an influential role in our society, to never be limited or bogged down. “We all can achieve any and all aspirations and can do what we dream of.”

At a time in our society here and around the world, when we still witness abuse of women, unequal reference and treatment of women, under-representation (or non-existence) of women within our government in Armenia, our armed forces in Armenia and our community organizations, Adrineh’s story should serve to motivate and encourage Armenian women… And men.

http://asbarez.com/93544/leading-the-platoon-in-iraq/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Asbarez+%28Asbarez+News%29&utm_content=Twitter

[Federate]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

Karabakh War Changed Women’s Roles for Ever
Women say they are much more prominent in civil and business life due largely to the full part they played in the fighting.
By Karine Ohanyan, Anahit Danielyan - Caucasus
CRS Issue 571,
20 Dec 10


Women in a military unit during the Karabakh War. (Photo: Margarita Taranyan)

The balance of the sexes in Nagorny Karabakh appears to have been permanently changed by the war between Azeris and Armenians, with women retaining the greater equality they gained on the frontline.

Just three ministers and five members of parliament are women, but in the non-governmental and business sectors women often outnumber men.

That is a major reverse for a society that was strictly traditional towards the end of the Soviet period, with women crediting much of the change to the full part they took in the fighting.

“Despite the fact that the main burden in actual fighting was born by men, the role of women in the war was no less important,” said Zhanna Krikorova, chairwoman of the International Cooperation Centre of Nagorny Karabakh, which coordinates connections between non-governmental organisations in Karabakh with international non-governmental bodies.

“Although this goes against the Caucasus mentality, many Karabakh women, despite their traditional place, went to fight alongside men. Others took upon themselves all the difficulties of wartime survival.”

Nagorny Karabakh, although unrecognised internationally, declared independence from Azerbaijan unilaterally and has governed itself unimpeded ever since the ceasefire of 1994.

According to research conducted by the entity’s regional business centre, women adapted much more quickly to the difficulties of post-war life, when the economy was destroyed and trade was restricted by all connections between Nagorny Karabakh and Baku being severed.

“Since Armenian women are responsible for their families, many representatives of the weaker sex used their initiative and became more active. This social activity has been preserved, meaning we have a different kind of life in Karabakh,” Krikorova said.

Nagorny Karabakh was an autonomous region within Soviet Azerbaijan with a majority Armenian population. In 1988, the Armenians appealed to Moscow for their region to be joined to nearby Armenia, sparking ethnic clashes in Baku and elsewhere, in the first major disorders to herald the end of the Soviet Union.

Ordinary women in Nagorny Karabakh threw themselves into the defence of the territory, and some even went to the frontline to serve alongside men, though often as nurses, such as Margarita Taranyan.

“I still do not understand how we managed to save ourselves. I cannot believe that after all those horrible and cold days I managed to preserve good health,” said Taranyan, who served as a nurse from 1992-4.

Now she is a major in the police, with a position in the defence staff. It would once have been rare to see a woman in epaulettes in Nagorny Karabakh, but since the war, it is fairly common, though they do not serve on the frontlines.

“Such lads were killed, one better than the next. And the girls too,” she trailed off, before talking about her friend Margarita whose body they waited until night to recover.

According to men who fought in the war, women have not retreated to their traditional subservient position after the ceasefire. Gagik Avanesyan, an activist from the Movement for Nagorny Karabakh’s Independence, said women often gave blood for the wounded, cooked food, or served as medical orderlies.

“Now of course it is not the war veterans who are so active, but younger women. And I have a sense that young men became more inert, and that women more frequently take the responsibility on themselves,” he said.

But the war did not spare women the traumas associated with violence and fear. Many war veterans have struggled with getting the psychiatric care (http://iwpr.net/report-news/mental-s...h-war-veterans) they need to overcome the horrors of the fighting, and women who served as nurses often do not even have the minimal help that has been available.

“You’d think that I should have been scared then. We’re the weaker sex after all. But I felt no fear at all. There were so many killed and injured, and I understood I could be next, but I had some feeling inside that I would live,” said Anahit Petrosyan, a mother of two from Martakert who continued working as a military nurse in civilian life.

“The fear came later. After the war, when I told someone about the horror I had been through, and it was then I felt this indescribable terror.”

All the same, however, Nagorny Karabakh’s women say they are tougher now than they were, and that the society will not turn back.

“War has so hardened us women,” said Julietta Arustamyan, the widow of a fallen officer and now head of the Harmony non-governmental organisation, which organises cultural events for women. “We lived through so much that if someone told us to sit on a tractor and fly to Mars, we could do it,” she said.

Karine Ohanyan is a freelance reporter. Anahit Danielyan is a correspondent for the Armedia news agency.

http://iwpr.net/report-news/karabakh-war-changed-women%E2%80%99s-roles-ever

[KanadaHye]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

Levon, no matter how much you try to open people's minds, you can't beat the propaganda. Feminism is a precursor to communism. It is all staged by the oligarchs and you can't fight it. The destruction of Armenian culture began in WWI and what we see today is the result. Kill the family, kill the culture, kill the history, kill the people.

[levon]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

The arguments made here by self profesed biggets are so flawed that a junior high schooler can prove them ignorent nonsence.

Go ahead, keep insulting everyone. You're doing great, and in no way what you're doing is similar to what deranged feminists do when one disagrees with them.

Mr yerazhishda why is it that you dont understand that it is every mothers desire to do what is best for her childeren.

Really, then what the hell was wrong with this woman.
http://www.news.com.au/world/michiga...#ixzz0teZhR6Ls

Quick quote:
"# Mother gives up boy for adoption
# Finds him on net, has sex with him
# Jailed for between nine and 30 years"

I know a lot of people who say i dont want to let my wife work because if she is successful then she might leave me. Can you get anymore hetamnats then this? If you base your relationship with your wife only on you being the provider then sure she might leave you once she gets on her own feet but what exactly does that tell you about the relationship you had with your wife?

What you are describing are side-effects of the current wave of feminist inspired values. The current mainstream western culture works hard to destroy the bond between a husband his wife and their children.

If you pay attention, you'll see that rather than refer to a family as a husband, wife and their children, the current view is to refer to it is woman, her children, and the father. In essence, it promotes the idea that the children are the woman's , the father's presence is not required, but he is financially responsible for them nonetheless. Add to that the fact the the current social environment praises single motherhood, encourages women to leave their husbands, and promotes the idea the a woman raising children without a man is more respectable.

Add to this the fact that the justice system makes it much easier to get divorced, get custody of the children, shut the father out of the children lives, and still force him to be financially responsible for the children. And of course, when a woman fails to properly raise the children after she shuts the father out of their lives, she along with everyone else will blame the father for not being there, and fail to note the fact that he was legally shut from the children's lives. Their justification is always "If he really cared for them, he would have done everything possible". The sad fact is that many if not most do all that's possible, often losing thousands of dollars and in the end get nothing.

So let's recap. Women are told that the children are hers, not theirs (hers and her husbands). It's cool to be a single mom, women are constantly told that they are better for the children than the fathers, woman are told that fathers are not necessary but fathers are still kept financially responsible. The legal system allows women to divorce any time for any reason and still get full custody of the children along with child support. Women know that they can leave their husband any time they want, shut him from the children's lives, and still keep him financially responsible.

What does this mean?
It means that the western values encourage women to see men as nothing but providers, whom they can leave anytime they way
So mothers have rights and privileges, and fathers have responsibilities. If the child fails, then the father should have done more. If the child succeeds, then the woman is praised for being such a good mother. It's lose-lose for the father.

Given such a hostile environment towards fathers and husbands, one can hardly be surprised to find men that make such statements.

Wives are not sheep or dogs which you can use for a thing or two and expect them to be content with that. Women are human beings to and they have desires beyong just being a wife or a mother.

And neither are husbands just sperm-donors and source of funding; however, you along with many others take great care to of women's issues, yet ignore men altogether.

I am sick of idiots making it sound that hetamnatsutsiun is the Armenian thing to do. Havent you morons ever heard of Hripsime, or Gayane, or Tamar or... .

Right, and haven't you ever heard of Andranik, Garegin Njdeh, Hovsep Arghutian, Nikol Duman, Khristofor Oganyan, Kevork Chavush, Serob Axpur,... and many many more just for the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

What's your point?

Sure false rape accusations do happen and are deplorable to say the least, but real rape also happens and people get away with that to so your point is moot.

The point is not moot. People who get accused of false rape may have their entire lives destroyed, yet the accuser walks off scott free. Also, there are many many more false rape accusations that real rapist walking off.

Levon you are the king of stupid examples well maybe be right behind Kanadahye! Your comment like " If 100 years of empowerment didn't brink equality, then either the targeted group is incapable, or just flaunts "me, me, me, want, want, want, give, give, give". " is a shining example of this.

I thought that was a reasonable deduction, and it's rather indicative of the situation now. If gender equality cannot be achieved, change the standards to get "artificer equality"

Using your logic we should just forget the genocide ever happened and that a crime was commited and that our people our vitims just because it happened 100 years ago.

Please don't try to draw similarities between womens movements and the Armenian genocide. These are two completely different topics, and you are showing nothing but disrespect by even posting such a comment.

Using idiotic logic like this there would not be a Armenian nation or people today. Maybe instead of just blaming women for everything you fathers can raise responcible childeren who are not spoiled. Raising childeren to become respncible adults does not mean placing artificial limits on them.

See above, I believe I already answered that.

A woman can have a education and a career and a good family if that is what she wants, it is not up to you to tell her what she should with her life. Sure this makes it harder for most men to deal with women but if you want something easy then go buy a freakin dog and stfu.

Education is not the problem, and educated women aren't harder to deal with than uneducated women. The difficulty is not education, but the entire atmosphere created by feminist values. The atmosphere encourages a divide between men and women in all areas of life, most emportantly the area that traditionally dominated both men's and women's lives called a family.

Rather than encourage family values, western culture encourages consumerism, and a men vs women atmosphere. People are constantly told that traditional families are no better than single-parent, or non-traditional family units (such as gay/lesbian families). Women are also told that the children are hers. Such an atmosphere has nothing to do with having educated women. Both educated and un-educated women can easily fall victim to these unnatural values.

What we oppose are feminist values that aim to destroy the family.

[Haykakan]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

The arguments made here by self profesed biggets are so flawed that a junior high schooler can prove them ignorent nonsence. Mr yerazhishda why is it that you dont understand that it is every mothers desire to do what is best for her childeren. If what you say is true then the mother feels opressed and does not want her daughter to experience the same oppression. What exactly is wrong with that? The bigger problem that totally blows past you is why are these women feeling so oppressed that they would tell their daughters to do such a thing. Oppressing wives is not a Armenian tradition, it is the tradition of the hetamntats. I know a lot of people who say i dont want to let my wife work because if she is successful then she might leave me. Can you get anymore hetamnats then this? If you base your relationship with your wife only on you being the provider then sure she might leave you once she gets on her own feet but what exactly does that tell you about the relationship you had with your wife? Wives are not sheep or dogs which you can use for a thing or two and expect them to be content with that. Women are human beings to and they have desires beyong just being a wife or a mother. I am sick of idiots making it sound that hetamnatsutsiun is the Armenian thing to do. Havent you morons ever heard of Hripsime, or Gayane, or Tamar or... .
Sure false rape accusations do happen and are deplorable to say the least, but real rape also happens and people get away with that to so your point is moot. Yes the USA system of justice does favor women in divorce cases a unfair manner but nothing states that this is the end result of giving women rights. You cant take the worst example and pretend it is a fair example when most other countries legal systems are not this biased. Levon you are the king of stupid examples well maybe be right behind Kanadahye! Your comment like " If 100 years of empowerment didn't brink equality, then either the targeted group is incapable, or just flaunts "me, me, me, want, want, want, give, give, give". " is a shining example of this. Using your logic we should just forget the genocide ever happened and that a crime was commited and that our people our vitims just because it happened 100 years ago. Using idiotic logic like this there would not be a Armenian nation or people today. Maybe instead of just blaming women for everything you fathers can raise responcible childeren who are not spoiled. Raising childeren to become respncible adults does not mean placing artificial limits on them. A woman can have a education and a career and a good family if that is what she wants, it is not up to you to tell her what she should with her life. Sure this makes it harder for most men to deal with women but if you want something easy then go buy a freakin dog and stfu.

[levon]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

The link to the video

[levon]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

Must-See Aussie Documentary on False Rape Case

By Glenn Sacks | Mon, Jun 14 2010, 06:19 PM

This Australian documentary video about a false rape claim is excellent, even though I do have one complaint (SBS, 6/9/10). (I hope you can view it. I've recently gotten a message saying it's blocked and another saying it's "no longer available for viewing.")

It's 52 minutes long and tells the story of 15-year-old Patrick Waring who woke up one night to find police at his door with a warrant for his arrest. A 17-year-old girl had told police that Patrick had brutally and repeatedly raped her. He said he didn't know who she was and had never had sex with her. Nevertheless, she had his telephone number and identified him as her assailant in a police lineup.

The judge denied Patrick bail, so he remained in a juvenile detention center for a year enduring beatings at the hands of other inmates. His parents and sister strongly believed that Patrick was not the type of boy to do the things the girl claimed were done to her. So they hired the best legal and forensic scientific talent they could find.

And with those people in Patrick's corner, the Crown's case immediately started to unravel. From the start, police procedures had contaminated the crime scene and evidence. Interviewed four separate times, the girl's story was never the same twice. Add to that the fact that the place in which the "rape" supposedly occurred was frequented by the public and therefore an unlikely crime scene, and the prosecution's case began to look thinner and thinner.

Nine months after the charge, DNA test results came back. (Why it took that long is anyone's guess.) There was no evidence of the girl's DNA on Patrick's clothing and none of his on hers. Patrick's defense team then moved for bail which was then granted. Patrick walked out of the detention center for the first time in a year.

But his ordeal was far from over. Even though the Crown's case consisted solely of the testimony of the complainant who, for a year, had lied repeatedly to police and prosecutors, the case went ahead. That's because, in rape cases, Australian law no longer requires any corroborating evidence. If the jury believes the complainant, the accused can be convicted, even though all other facts point to innocence.

So throughout a three-week trial and ten hours of jury deliberations, 15-year-old Patrick Waring waited to learn whether he would return to a semblance of normal life or spend the next years of his life in prison. The jury acquitted him.

As his attorneys tell us, no one who has gone through what Patrick went through comes out the same as he went in. He will never be the same. And that's true of his parent's bank account too. They spent every dollar they had and mortgaged their home which they must now sell in order to pay their son's legal bills. Neither they nor Patrick will receive any compensation for the agony they were intentionally and maliciously put through.

He and the girl had met the day of her allegations outside a movie theater. They'd never set eyes on each other before; they chatted briefly, exchanged phone numbers and went their separate ways. For reasons not explained, Patrick was the boy she chose to subject to a year of fear and anguish, apparently as a cover for a sexual escapade she'd had with another boy.

The documentary pulls few punches. It unequivocally states that Patrick was charged with a crime that he did not commit. It lets us see the anguish his parents and sister endured throughout the long months leading up to the trial.

This being legitimate journalism, the piece takes aim at the Australian criminal justice system, and rightly so. In these blog postings, I've described the U.S. system as a conveyor belt that begins with an accusation and ends in prison, and the Australian system is presented as the same. In Patrick's case, as in most cases, the wheels just keep turning and no one seems inclined to push the 'Stop' button.

The documentary makes clear that the police not only violated basic tenets of crime investigation, but that they did so with one thing in mind - convicting Patrick Waring of the crime he was charged with. Prosecutors also proceeded with little regard for the facts of the case. At any time someone should have called the case what it was - a sham, a lie. But no one did, and that's the real complaint the documentary makes. The system cost Adelaide taxpayers a bundle and the Warings far more. It cost an innocent boy a year of his life and barely imaginable terror. It cost his family untold anguish. And anyone at any time could have pulled the plug on it. Someone should have.

And that brings me to my complaint. Although clearly not a fan of the girl (as usual, she's granted anonymity even though she's the guilty party), the piece never addresses the obvious - that, but for her multiple lies, none of this would have happened. However culpable police and prosecutors were in the matter - and they unquestionably were - they'd have had no opportunity to act badly if the girl had just told the truth. But the documentary fails to say that. It presumptively calls for changes in the system of criminal justice, but never demands consequences for false charging. Like the system generally, the documentary gives the girl a pass.

The lesson likely won't be lost on her or others. False rape allegations are a free shot. They may not get the guy thrown in prison, but on the other hand they may. In any case, there will be no consequences to the woman. She won't be charged, she won't be required to pay damages. She won't even be identified. As long as that is true, there will be more Patrick Warings, except that some of them won't be so "lucky." Some of them will go to prison; in fact, some of them are there now. And for what? To protect the unfettered power of any woman any time to call the weight of the state down on any man any time for any reason.

But remember, this is the 21st century. We're all about gender equality now.

....

[KanadaHye]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

The author and all of these women need a reality check, one which many self-respecting Armenian men now a days have already declared; as the famous adage goes, "LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT"! Just remember, if you do decide to leave, don't bring what you've left this culture for back into our communities, no odar can ever take the place of an Armenian man, regardless of how many Armenian words and sentences the odar may learn.

Chisel that in stone and frame the f'ing thing. That, there in bold, is the icing on the cake.

[levon]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

Some more

Feminism's genius was in linking class oppression (watered-down neo-Marxism in the 60's and 70's) to gender.

Women became, de facto, a class of victims, sufferers under the Evil Patriarchy. (The first victim class in history that outlives and outspends their "oppressors...")

Clearly, as the last forty years have shown, there's a lot of money to be made in the Victim Industry.

There is much bank to be harvested by subverting the law to include vague notions of subjective victimization, and the whole "mental and emotional anguish; pain and suffering" scam.

The latest exemplar of this racketeering is Ms. Mackrie, suing Bill O'Reilly for her own inability to hang up the freakin' phone! (I know, I know, she was victimized by diabolical male telephony technology that imposes the misogynistic notion that individuals have a degree of choice and self-responsibility.... In one of her TV interviews she actually stated -- "I couldn't hang up! I was afraid I'd lose my job!")

Thanks to VAWA, the DV bureaucracy, and the Family Courts, our society now enjoys a rigged playing field where female predation has become a lucrative interconnected network of exploitative franchises.

Gender fascism is a profitable business.

Manufacturing victims (of both genders) is its currency de jour.

[levon]

Re: Armenian women: should play a bigger role in our economy, politics and military.

Some food for thought

An interesting aspect of our culture of "victimhood" is that it continues to erode the sense of personal responsibility that while we are told is important to our growth and development as a whole person is continually being eroded by the legal system and society. Victimhood cries out for a rescuer, for a protector, for someone to come along, fix it, and make it right.

For me, this has always created an interesting dichotomy for feminism, which promotes the individual overtly while promoting victimhood covertly.

Victimization is directly related to the censorship of political correctness which has taken over our speech and society. No longer can you say what you think because it may cause someone to feel hurt. Once again, we see the direct connection to a lack of personal responsibility. I was taught that if what someone says offends you, then you need to examine why you feel it necessary to give that person power over your emotions, in other words to take responsibility for your actions.

They even teach this in anger management classes, that one should take responsibility for one's own actions, and not to blame it on someone else. Yet we have somehow come to a point where the finger of blame is immutably fixed, perpetually pointing at the person committing an act that someone else may misinterpret or not as they desire. Sexual harassment laws are a perfect example of this. There are no concrete examples of sexual harassment specified in the law; it comes down to how the "victim" "feels".

The scary part is that we could be so easily hoodwinked. After all, what is wrong with trying to make sure that everyone feels good, with trying to make sure that people aren't mean to one another? I mean, that's a good idea, right? The problem is that certain facets of society have attempted to legislate morality instead of teaching it. By legislating correct behavior instead of teaching it as the right thing to do, not only have we lost our moral compass and the ability to know inherently what is good and what is evil, we have abdicated our personal responsibility to the state, becoming - in effect - all wards of the state.