tough cookies's topics - tribe.net

Lilith

maryellenmarshall — Mon, 23 Jan 2006 21:19:48 GMT

I am currently doing some research on Lilith & have been *amazed* at how her character seems so appropriate for 'modern times' & how she crosses over into so many of the subjects I study, but thought were 'separate interests' ~ I just found this through a tribe ad, none the less! & wondered if anyone had any comments:

The true nature of Lilith – An answer to Patriarchal Age Propaganda
The central “character” (if that’s the correct word to use?) in Nine Deadly Venoms is called Lilith. It’s Lilith who reveals the Nine Deadly Venoms. A simple search on the Internet will reveal much conflicting information about Lilith. Unfortunately a lot of this information is derogatory and wholly inaccurate. What is written about Lilith is patriarchal age propaganda designed to push people farther and farther away from any true memory of the Matriarchal Age. In this article Alex Gordon attempts to put the record straight.The true nature of Lilith by Alex Gordon

Following the downfall of the Matriarchal Age the conquering barbarians destroyed nearly all remains of that age, and all references to feminine principles were either corrupted or demonised.

Over time, 'Astarte', the feminine principle of the Babylonians became 'Astoreth', a new 'name' containing the vowels of the word 'boshet' meaning 'worthless' or 'unclean', thus, by speaking the name Astoreth people were actually blaspheming it. Likewise, 'Anu' the Celtic sky-goddess degenerated in myth and folklore to become 'Black Annis', a repulsive old crone who lived in the Dane Hills of Leicestershire and who ate children. Such is the nature of propaganda.

The references to Lilith that are available refer to her as the rebellious first wife of Adam before Eve, and in biblical references or Hebrew legend as a 'night monster' or 'night hag', who spawns demons and again, eats children. Even the name itself is a corruption, because the word 'lil' in Hebrew means 'demon', although in Sufi tradition it is stated that the name has an ancient Semitic root meaning 'night' Also in Sufi tradition, because the old Akkadian form of her name was 'Lilitu', which in Hebrew becomes Lilith, the Arabic form becomes 'Layla', and to Sufis, Layla means the power of love, so at least they have retained some respect and correctness towards her true nature.

Now, the wheel of time has almost turned full circle. For thousands of years, the wind has blown over desert sands. The stars have journeyed across the heavens. The face of the Earth has reformed and been reshaped. Empires, kings, emperors have all come and gone, back to dust, until now, when, many billions of light-years away beyond the belt of Orion, a ship is coming. It is a huge inter-galactic ship, black and powerful and it is bringing Lilith back to re-establish the new Matriarchal Order.

How do I know this? I can sense it, feel it. I know her energy. I know her, as much as my limited perceptions can do so, and the sense of her ship droning through the vast expanse of deep space coming ever closer towards this planet gives me a deep sense of peace and reassurance, a feeling that I can, at last, rest.

But what is she truly like? This is a very hard question because truth can only be conveyed correctly to the limit of the reporter's perceptions and level of evolution. A good person will always see the good in things and find light and colour in their observations even though the amount of such brightness may be small. Conversely, a bad person will see the bad in everything and report that everything is bad. Therefore I cannot tell you the total truth, because I am not evolved enough to know that.

I believe her to be at least 280 million years old, and in that time she has obviously experienced and observed almost everything whereas I, by comparison, have observed and understood virtually nothing. I do not know and cannot even begin to understand where or how she was born, or where she lives, or the manner of her life, although I believe that she lives much as we do, except that in her world, there is no negativity, a state of which we can barely imagine.

I know her to be incredibly beautiful, and wise, vain and tempestuous yet clinically efficient. I suspect her to be rather insular and private and to communicate with pure feelings. I believe also that she can alter and form matter with thought.

When anyone searches for her, the information will fall into four categories. Firstly, the old legends formed from barbaric propaganda which simply insult her, and which come in many diverse forms but which are all basically blasphemous towards her. Secondly, her name and image has become something of a feminist icon, which is understandable, given the nature of the legend that she was Adam's first rebellious wife, but this too is completely misplaced because although, yes, she is a woman, she is not like women here simply because she is using so much more of her DNA, and also has so many more references in her DNA.

The idea that she should need, or wish to be a 'feminist' is quite laughable, given that I feel certain that she could destroy any enemy with a single thought, therefore she is never likely to have been, or to be, dominated or oppressed.

Thirdly, because of the base nature of some legends which refer to her as a succubus demon who sexually assaults sleeping men, her name has become drawn into the seedy world of pseudo-gothic sexuality, and lastly, as with the Sufi legends, a few references are pointing in the right direction and are complimentary, and do contain a vestige of truth, honour and respect.

I feel rather uncomfortable in saying this, because it sounds somewhat arrogant which is not my intention, but firstly I would advise all those who use her name in the first three categories described above to erase them as soon as possible (especially those in category three) because she will eradicate all derogatory references to herself, giving no quarter to anyone nor making any exceptions or accepting any excuses. Ignorance of her true nature or of the nature of one's own actions will in no way be a mitigating factor. Secondly, if you wish to know what she is truly like, ask me, and I will do my best to answer you assuming that I judge the nature and form of my answer to be honourable towards her. I have met her. I know.

Alex Gordon

The days of priests and gurus are coming to an end - People want reality now, truth, and the ability to help themselves. They want to be empowered.

(c) www.ninedeadlyvenoms.com

love all-ways,
mem

posted in tough cookies - 1 reply

on the news this morning

fluff-goddess — Thu, 22 Sep 2005 19:49:26 GMT

Though I LOVE LOVE LOVE the original Volvo's, they are now unfortunately owned by Ford....anyway, heard on the news today that Volvo now has created a car for women.....it contacts a local garage for roadside assistance when the car breaks down.....UM!!!.....I may not know how to change a tire or even how to do stuff with the oil and it usually takes me quite awhile to find the hole you pour the blue liquid in that cleans the glass but that does NOT mean that they need to degrade women in such a way.....

Just needed to vent.....

posted in tough cookies - 0 replies

Hearts filled with Love Cookies

arcadia — Fri, 11 Feb 2005 21:08:47 GMT

Fill these favorites with raspberry or strawberry jelly.

Sift Together:
2 1/2 cups of flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Cream Together:
1 cup shortening
1 cup sugar

Stir In:
1 well beaten egg
2 tablespoons canned milk
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Chill overnight before using.
Roll-out dough and cut with a heart cookie cutter. Each cookie needs a top and bottom. Bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes. When cool, assemble cookies. Place a teaspoon of jelly on the bottom of a cookie, then cover with another cookie. (The tops of the cookies should be facing outward on both top and bottom.) Sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Happy Valentine's Day!

posted in tough cookies - 0 replies

That's the Way the Cookie Crumbles!

arcadia — Sat, 05 Feb 2005 02:13:26 GMT

These girls were just trying to act like "Girl Scouts" but I think they are being made out to be "Cookie Monsters". You decide.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6914824/?GT1=6190

posted in tough cookies - 1 reply

Hats Off To Sharon Stone!!!

I-Storm — Sat, 29 Jan 2005 00:59:44 GMT

http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/world/10760901.htm?1c

At forum, Stone's impromptu appeal raises funds to fight malaria
BY KEVIN G. HALL
Knight Ridder Newspapers

DAVOS, Switzerland - (KRT) - Actress Sharon Stone hijacked the staid World Economic Forum on Friday, interrupting a panel on poverty with a spur-of-the-moment fund-raiser that within minutes brought in more than $1 million to fight malaria in Africa.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., was moderating a session on anti-poverty efforts when Stone stood to address a panel that included Microsoft founder Bill Gates and the presidents of Brazil and Tanzania.

"Please identify yourself," said Frist, perhaps one of the few men on the planet who couldn't visually identify the sultry star of such hit movies as "Basic Instinct" and "Casino."

"Sharon Stone," she said dryly, proceeding to announce that she was giving $10,000 on the spot to help Tanzanian President Benjamin William Mbaka's anti-malaria efforts. As Frist tried to steer the conversation back to poverty, Stone talked over him, urging people to stand up and give to Mbaka.

"People are dying in his country today," she said.

The surprised senator yielded to the spike-haired movie star. Mbaka, a large, round man, grinned widely as roughly three dozen people stood to be counted and have their pledges written down.

After a few minutes, Frist announced that more than $1 million had been pledged. Actors Richard Gere and Angelina Jolie looked on as Stone said she'd route the money through a charity that Gates funded. The Microsoft founder has donated billions from his fortune to help find vaccines that would prevent malaria and AIDS.

More than 2 million people die each year from malaria, which is carried by mosquitoes. At least 150,000 children in Africa die annually from the disease that, thanks to Stone, is now assured of becoming a "cause celebre."

"Malaria is not problematic in most developed countries; that is unfortunate," Gates observed, noting that if it were, the health-care sector already would have developed a vaccine.

---

©2005, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.

posted in tough cookies - 0 replies

song I heard....

fluff-goddess — Tue, 25 Jan 2005 13:59:56 GMT

I heard this song today by John Mayer and tho it's a typical mushy tune...it irritated me too...a man being the weight of a womens world??? hmmmmm.....

Maybe I'm just cranky today.....

I know a girl.
She puts the color inside of my world.
She's just like a maze,
Where all of the walls all continually change.

I've done all I can
To stand on the steps with my heart in my hand,
But I'm starting to think
Maybe it's got nothing to do with me.

Fathers be good to your daughters;
Daughters will love like you do, yeah.
Girls become lovers who turn into mothers,
So mothers be good to your daughters, too.

Oh, you see that skin;
It's the same she's been standing in
Since the day you two met.
I bet I was on your mind
Never never anytime.

Fathers be good to your daughters;
Daughters will love like you do, yeah.
Girls become lovers who turn into mothers,
So mothers be good to your daughters, too.

Boys you can break,
You find out how much they can take.
Boys will be strong, and boys soldier on,
But boys would be gone without warmth
From a woman's good, good heart

On behalf of every man, looking out for every girl,
You are the god, and the weight of her world.
On behalf of every man whose looking out for every girl,
You are the god, and the weight of her world.

Fathers be good to your daughters,
Daughters will love like you do, yeah.
Girls become lovers who turn into mothers,
So mothers be good to your daughters, too.
So mothers be good to your daughters, too.

posted in tough cookies - 3 replies

Martha X

maryellenmarshall — Thu, 27 Jan 2005 01:12:51 GMT

Martha X: The Radicalization of Martha Stewart

January 19, 2005
By Max Gordon

Today is January 19, 2005 and Martha Stewart has spent 103 nights in a Federal prison camp called Alderson. Her prison number is 55170-054. In our country of African-American communities bathed in swirling red and blue lights, police radios waking sleeping neighbors and handcuffed black men lowered into the backs of squad cars, the idea of Martha Stewart, our
doyenne of lavender-scented linens and homemade pumpkin cookies at Thanksgiving, being thrown in the slammer like a black ex-con who has violated his parole, seems like someone's idea of a nasty political joke.

White women like Martha Stewart don't go to prison in America; they don't even know what a prison looks like from the outside. Yet Martha Stewart is very much a woman, very much white, and she is, at the time of this writing, very much in prison. How did it happen?

Reading about someone in jail brings many of us a perverse delight. Our freedom, however much unappreciated every other day of the year, tastes a little sweeter when accompanied by the refrain, "Well at least I'm not in prison like her". It's the reason the newspaper ultimately satisfies; unable to gather any real enthusiasm about our own bleak existences, our lives have a momentary gleam when contrasted with the starkness of someone else's misfortune.

A divorce, imprisonment or murder adds a bounce to our step - we may not have it good, but thank God we don't have it "that bad." Our desperatecomparison is even yummier when the person suffering is a celebrity like Martha; superior and distinctly separate from us, we've been waiting to see her brought to her knees.

When I left my apartment this morning, there was a police car in front of my building. The training I received as a child about the police will last my lifetime. I gather myself, make my face expressionless and stare straight ahead.

I was taught if I ever saw the police to keep moving, not to make
eye-contact, never to be belligerent or antagonistic in any way, and if stopped, to answer all their questions and cooperate fully, always remembering that an unannounced hand in a pocket to retrieve identification could result in death. I was made to understand that the police can do whatever they want to you if you are black, and you have absolutely no protection whatsoever; the courts will always stand behind the officer.

I am an American as is Martha Stewart, but she is an American white woman with wealth and I am a black man in my mid-thirties, who, statistically, might have been shot or incarcerated by my age: our having been born in the same country may be all that we share. Women like Martha Stewart see the police and think protection by. I see the police and think protection from.

I haven't done anything that would warrant interrogation, but that doesn't change the fact that I feel hot with guilt - someone who looks like me, who is black and male, is doing something, somewhere, and that is enough for me to be guilty in America. I know intuitively the police can call me over or fuck with me if they feel like it, if they are interested or bored enough. It is the reason I am always aware of a police car passing by as I walk alone on an empty street, why I always record how many officers are inside the car.

I tell myself that reports of police brutality are exaggerated and I'm overreacting to my parent's pre-civil-rights paranoia; the country has changed since then. But it is there again, on the way to work, a story in the paper. There will be another in a couple of months. A black suspect was shot off a roof by an officer, a psychotic black man ran towards the police with a hammer and was shot to death, a black man pulled out a toy pistol and was blown away.

I blame the black men for being shot because it's easier than feeling powerless. Why the hell was he on that roof anyway, didn't he know he was in New York, it was late at night and he was black? Didn't that man know better than to be black and psychotic?

We tell ourselves that if someone is in prison it is because they deserve to be there. If there are human rights violations we say, "Prison isn't supposed to be a picnic." If rehabilitation is requested and denied we say,"You should have thought about that before you got arrested." Like thefabled Bermuda Triangle, people go to prison and disappear from the face of the earth.

It will be easier to go to work this morning if I believe that everyone who is in prison belongs behind bars because he is a bad person who needs to be punished. I don't have to consider the lack of education and training, substance abuse, heartbreak and rage that all contribute to crime, that prison construction is a lucrative business venture, and some states have built prisons to revitalize their economies. That it costs the same amount
of money a year to maintain an inmate as it would to pay for a year's college tuition.

It's hard to enjoy a Saturday picnic with your kids if you know that an imprisoned mother will have to wait years to have the same picnic with her own; convicted for the bad checks she wrote trying to feed them or for defending herself or the children from an abuser.

For black men who want to experience the American dream but, exasperated with the limited opportunities racism affords, only see the possibility of success realized through crime, prison exists as an inevitability. And contrary to the hardened criminal image that most of us have, there are "regular" people who are truly bewildered about how they ended up in prison, having gone from too few schools, to even fewer options, a direct route laid from their birth to their jail cell with the precision of Amtrak.

When one considers the number of people who are currently in jail, on their way, who have family members who are incarcerated or who work in correction facilities, it could cynically be argued that half the United States is in prison. It's the "other" America, like the commercials that advertise pork as the other white meat.

If you are not in jail or love someone who is, you have no reason to know or care about the overcrowding, the gangs, the possibilities of rape or murder behind bars by other inmates or guards; the suicide, substance abuse and exposure to HIV/AIDS without condoms, treatment or access to medications; the inmate labor used to manufacture goods for private firms, the long-distance service providers who take advantage of prisoners'
isolation and charge exponentially even for collect calls, the visitors turned away because of a technicality or suspended indefinitely; the unnecessary strip-searches, withholding of food as punishment, the extortion, bribes and state-sanctioned executions; the loss in some states, for the remainder of one's life, of the right to vote in any state or national election.

I never believed Martha Stewart would really see the inside of a jail cell. She'll get a slap on the hand and a stern warning from the judge, I thought. A fine, community service. I envisioned her grumbling bitterly, a kerchief covering her hair as she raked leaves beside some highway or spooned mashed potatoes onto the plate of an older black man in a homeless shelter. Or, most likely, she'd never be convicted at all.

As the trial began to stumble toward its close, the possibility increased that Martha might indeed be found guilty and that charm, celebrity status, letters from powerful famous friends, expensive lawyers, tears, and Rosie
O'Donnell offering Martha's prosecutor M&M's wasn't going to influence the outcome. Friends' reassurances at the beginning of the trial that "You're not going to jail, for God's sake," must have diminished, and Martha had tobe very scared, no matter how fabulous the handbags were that she carried every day to court.

After all the damning testimony, after Douglas "baby put Miss Martha in herplace" Faneuil's triumph as the underling who was not going to go down for his bosses, and Martha's vacation friend who couldn't remember whether she or Martha said, "Isn't it nice to have a broker who tells you those things," the final verdict was guilty, and for the first time, being white,or blonde, or rich wasn't going to make a difference. Martha Stewart was definitely going to jail.

From the first headline that suggested wrongdoing, America couldn't wait to laugh at Miss Perfect getting her comeuppance. Jokes at her expense were made nightly on the The Tonight Show and Letterman, comedy shows parodied her. There was daily commentary on the morning news weighing her guilt,
headlines in every newspaper and moment-to-moment coverage on the Internet.

Fresh revelations reported that bit by bit Martha was losing everything; money, power, friends. Then there was the merchandizing; the "Free Martha"mugs, tee-shirts and buttons; the websites, the dinner-party conversations, the speculation and assumption of guilt debated by "experts" on CNN, the
condemnation before any evidence was even presented in a courtroom.

Demonized, ridiculed and humiliated before the American public, Martha may have achieved the dubious distinction of being the first rich white woman to be lynched in the United States. It's a princess lynching, of course - she's out in five months and then can look forward to house arrest; a 63-year-old teenager who's been grounded.

Where does the delicious satisfaction come from, watching Martha go to jail? Innumerable places, although I can only account for my own. As a black man with an unavenged history, Martha's sentence atones for all the "Miss Anns" of slavery who accused a black man of rape and got him killed.By putting America's whitest white woman in prison, even if it is only for ten minutes, the revenge begins for all the black men murdered or mutilated
for "disrespecting" a white woman in the South, for "assaulting"
her by saying good morning.

Although I consciously know it's not fair to make Martha pay for America's history of racial insanity, and that white women were victimized in a different way by whiffs of magnolia from the plantation house porch, when you make your money as the poster child for white womanhood, you inherit all the projections and mythology, not just the ones that make you rich.

Like Mary Tyler Moore, Doris Day, Betsy Ross, and Hazel, Martha is the leading member of the white-women-we-aspire-to-be club, white women who always have a freshly baked cake in the kitchen and a pot of coffee on no matter when someone drops by. Who can throw a meal together in an hour even when their husbands tell them at the last minute that the boss is coming
over, who never get angry or lose their patience, who never burn dinner or have orgasms, or want anything other than what their families want.

In her private life, Martha may have been something else, but Martha Stewart Incorporated is another TV-commercial-white-woman brandished at us with blonde hair and an apron, smiling and holding a meatloaf, smiling and holding a bottle of disinfectant, smiling and holding a mop, an iron, a
toothbrush, a bowl of pet food, a jar of mayonnaise, a box of laundry detergent; a white woman of perfect lawns, fresh air, polished chrome, and a backyard with all the world's sunshine. A woman to shame and embarrass the rest of us as we vicariously get off on her order, perfection and starchy whiteness, watching her through a lens of disappointment at our own failed, squalid lives.

Martha is the smart-ass student who always does her homework when everyone else blows off theirs; the one who gets an A on the test and ruins the curve, and who when confronted in the hallway snaps, "It's not my fault you people didn't study." In my fantasy, Martha gets caught cheating on the final exam, not because she isn't smart enough to pass, but because she has
to have the best grade, she has to be better than everyone else, and she can't risk the possibility of failure. As she is escorted to the principal's office crying, all suspicions are confirmed, all heads nod knowingly. "See, I told you she cheats. I knew she couldn't be that smart."

Martha is all the bosses I've worked for as a secretary. She comes in all shapes and sizes, male and female, black and white. She is the executive outraged with you because the copier isn't working, even though you have no control over whether a copy machine decides to work or not. She bangs the phone down on you with disgust because you have not finished typing
something she needs right now, even though she gave it to you only twenty minutes ago, and she'll need a conference room for six people at two o'clock, and did you order her lunch yet?

She is not concerned that the other secretary called in sick and you are the only one answering the phones today; she demands to know why you have to leave early, even though you've explained three times your child has an ear infection and you have to take her to the doctor. At least once a week
someone walks out of her office and back to their desk in tears. She is not specifically outraged at you because of the malfunctions of the day, she is angry because you are an assistant, and it is your job to make sure she never feels pain, experiences inconvenience or discomfort of any kind.

That is what you are paid to do. It is what all the secretaries, the
nannies, the doormen, the taxi-drivers, the bathroom attendants, the hotel maids, and the clerks are paid to do. There is no delicate way to put it: Rich people wipe their asses with poor people. When you have a certain amount of money in America, you don't even have to focus your eyes on individual poor people anymore - they are a blur if they exist at all.

A disembodied "hand" extends a towel in the restaurant washroom, "littlefairies" (illegal immigrants paid less than minimum wage) cook your food and clean your hotel room, "pixies and sprites" (black and Latino mothers
working two jobs) clean your toilet bowl and raise your kids.

You aren't required to see anyone you don't want to see, because you have earned your money and you have paid for a service and that makes it fair. One day, perhaps, if they are so fortunate, they may earn enough money to have a poor person to wipe their ass with too. And that is how America works. Land of the free, home of the slave.

Secretaries sit and wonder about their Marthas; "What will ever make her stop and consider anyone else besides herself? What will ever penetrate through this selfishness? When will she learn to share?" For the companies that settle one sexual harassment lawsuit after another because the same male supervisor can't stop himself from pinching his secretary's ass or telling the receptionist cock-sucking jokes during her coffeebreak (the
golden boy who will never be fired because he earns the company a ton of money), the answers are nothing will, and never.

No one will talk about the fact that there were survivors of 9/11 who said that they left the towers warning co-workers of the danger, but that some refused to leave their desks right away, as they made "one more call" or completed a final trade. It is too ugly and painful to look at our attachment to money even in the face of imminent death. And so we say that someone drove planes through our twin monuments to financial power because
they hate our "freedom."

It might be worth asking, in our own self-interest, was it really freedom they were trying to smash? How do we talk about fruit, and coffee, and chocolate, designer jeans, shoes, and watches that "magically" appear in our stores from "exotic lands" where the products are exported for ouruse, but arrive free of the pain, torture, sickness and early death that are required so that we may enjoy them so cheaply?

How do we deal with a world of people who watch our television programs and know how rich and healthy we are, as they work twelve-hour days, exhausted and weak from malnutrition, to make us even healthier and richer? How do we face a "Third World" that refuses to be a munchkinland for American comfort
any longer? No wonder the idea of Santa's elves is so appealing. If the North Pole weren't so far, I'd assume they were from Guatemala too.

It seems obvious that Martha made a wrong choice somewhere, and that what she did had to be addressed. But something else snags when one considers her plight. Despite myself, I feel protective of her as I watch the merciless glee with which she is excoriated in the press.

Perhaps Martha and I have something more than our national origin in common after all. For a black man and a white woman, the American dream, in its purest form, is not really intended to work. Martha and I can definitely aspire to having a piece of the American pie, but ultimately, as a woman she is supposed to bake it, and as a black man I'm meant to serve it.

There is an extra bit of contempt reserved for her, guilty or not, as there is for an O.J., Michael Jackson, Clarence Thomas, Kobe Bryant, Ethel Rosenberg, Mike Tyson, Bill Clinton (yes, Clinton: though not "oppressed"in the same way, Clinton falls in this category as a white man too sympathetic to black people). Bigger than our country's fascination with power or cruel gossip is our need for retribution for a crime that extends beyond the transgression in the headlines.

This gathered storm, this surge of hatred, is absent from the scandals of Ollie North, Dennis Tyco, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly. These white men are in the papers too and we lick our fingers over their scandals, but the thrust towards them, the conviction to bring them down is never quite the same - there is an absence of malevolence, the spiteful "get 'em" as theviolent mob makes its advance.

Despite the fact that some families lost everything they had because of Enron or that we as a nation are currently on trial in the world's "criminal court" for torture violations, there are some Americans who will never see the machinations of a Kenneth Lay or George Bush as anything more than good guys who've been "a little naughty." The response to their white-boy debacles lacks the bloodthirstiness of an America wanting to prove to an uppity nigger that in spite of the fact that he's got money, he can still go to jail, or to a powerful woman who runs her own company that
she is really just a bitch who is finally going to get what's coming to her.

The sinister surprise is that this mob is not only made up of bitter
rednecks and competitive corporate white men anxiously waiting for Martha to bite the dust. It's a crowd of the oppressed: other women, blacks, gays. There is a sense of the inevitable in her downfall and an awful tension released. We wondered how long she could maintain herself at such a great height, how long "they" would let her have power.

When she failed, there was the satisfaction in knowing that even if she reached the top, a Martha Stewart can't really last in America. Our indignation and jealousy come from our deep self-hatred and our pain at having always to compete against other oppressed people for scraps: we tried to be "Martha Stewart" too (i.e. loved, rich, powerful), and Americaonly had room for one: the good news about someone else's failure is that there is always a job opening.

Martha might have to count herself in her own mob - as she unconsciously metes out and attracts the punishment that she feels she deserves for being a woman who has too much power. The challenge becomes a balancing act of not self-destructing while maintaining oneself against a cultural imagination that wants to believe it accepts strong women, but itches to destroy them.

Oprah lives at this altitude, and the tension must work on her. She succeeds greatly, but there are the ingratiating games that she must play with her white audience. Her struggle with weight may have more to do with the razor at the throat of the richest black woman in America who may choose no longer to be fat and jolly for us, who, when she stops driving her Miss Daisies (co-dependent white women who "can't live without her")and allows herself a more compelling sexuality and relationship, may
actually threaten the people who support her the most. (For anyone who just said, "But she's got Steadman" - that's another essay.)

They may allow her to make money as a personality who reassures their perceptions, but will they identify with her rich experience and history as a woman of African descent who also happens to be thin, wealthy, powerful and loved - without punishing her? (They have their ways: no one saw "Beloved.")

Martha's greatest failure wasn't insider trading or lying, but what she became; a great capitalist, a company woman. At the center of the American dream is the nightmare of what oppressed people must become to prove themselves, that no matter how much we "succeed" at the dream we can never truly realize its promise - a woman or a black man who has the societal power of a white man.

In our efforts to conquer, we become unrecognizable and grotesque, (which, at times, Martha was) but what we will never become, no matter how many secretaries we abuse, is a white man. Some aspect of patriarchal power will always elude us. We may be feared and hated by the same oppressed people as
white men and have the same American Express cards, but we can never be more than the gatekeepers of patriarchy. The American dream is to have a white penis; and biology, regrettably, prevents us from that achievement, even those of us with the greatest determination.

Martha's mistake was that she thought her money and power made her unassailable, that she could do anything and get away with it, which is what it means to be male and white in the world. The failure is not that she lost money or status, it's the unexamined assumption that patriarchal power is something to aspire to, a worthy achievement.

Instead of our being allowed just to acknowledge the talent of the
remarkable woman Martha is, her gifts and accomplishments are used by an oppressive society as signs of equality, and as tools to bury the rest of us alive. She is proof, despite the obvious evidence to the contrary in most American lives, that the system works. Instead of raising the minimum wage, or creating job programs and training, we point to her success and say to the welfare mother, the underpaid factory worker, the high-school
dropout who supports her family: Oprah did it. Martha did it. Anyone who desires it enough can make it in America, regardless. What is wrong with you?

When Diana, Princess of Wales died, a friend remarked that the overwhelming grief around the world about her passing was more than just for Diana herself. Something archetypal had been lost. It was the end for princesses everywhere, for anyone, woman (or man) who felt they would one day find someone in the world to sweep them from a dismal and dreary life into wealth, power and protection. It was the end of happily ever afters. Diana, with her eating disorder, her despair over her husband's affair, her
hateful mother-in-law, and her eventual "black" boyfriend, revealed throughher life that an era had definitely ended, and that a princess could wait all night for her husband to come home just as any lawyer, schoolteacher or homemaker could.

In the end, however tragically, Diana did us a great favor. She discovered something in herself more worthy than having a royal title to drape lovely things on, or a living fairy-tale myth endlessly waiting to be rescued from a high tower by her adoring prince. She was the funkiest, saddest and most handsome princess one could be; a princess who might say, "Fuck the carriage, I feel like walking tonight."

It has been said that the Fifties ended with the death of JFK, the
introduction of the Beatles, hippie culture and "free love." Actually,
the Fifties were only put on pause, their conservatism and isolationism returning through the Eighties and the Reagan years. The Fifties officially ended October 8, 2004, the first night Martha's cell door clanked shut and a guard shouted, "Lights out." The American fantasy of white-womanhood is now over.

Martha did us a favor, too. She helped us to see that nice white ladies were never "nice", "ladies", or "white." It takes
more than a little courage to run a company; you can't faint at the first sign of trouble and you have to be willing to get dirt on your hands. Martha's vicious power, her anger, and her ruthlessness may have blown her life apart, but they have also helped blow apart an enduring myth, encouraging the end of white patriarchal racism and violence perpetrated through the archetype of a
white female "sweetie-pie." Laura Bush take note.

I read in the paper this week that Martha has been a support to troubled younger inmates - one woman who was particularly distraught was given a pep-talk by Martha: "If I can do it, you can do it." Martha catches the"spirit" at a Thanksgiving gospel performance, Martha says in an open letter on her site MarthaTalks, written during the Christmas holiday, "I beseech you all to think about these women - to encourage the American
people to ask for reforms, both in sentencing guidelines, in length of incarceration for nonviolent first-time offenders, and for those involved in drug-taking. They would be much better served in a true rehabilitation center than in prison where there is no real help, no real programs to rehabilitate, no programs to educate, no way to be prepared for life 'out there' where each person will ultimately find herself, many with no skills and no preparation for living."

An arrogant, smug, self-centered, obnoxious white woman, convicted of a crime, having lost millions of dollars, power within the corporate world and most of her reputation, goes to prison. Sullen and withdrawn at first, she is affected by the pain and horror of the working-class women and women of color she encounters, and after listening to their stories and courage,
has a major transformation. She becomes a person of moral conviction and great valor; a true leader of the people. Private Benjamin meets the Autobiography of Malcolm X.

Maybe Martha will get out of prison and go back to her same old tricks, or her "changes" will be of the patronizing socialite kind; a once-a-yearfundraiser for women in prison as a token gesture, or checks she never sees, written by her secretary and mailed to faraway charities or foundations. Maybe Martha's kindness is just more manipulative press; fodder for the ongoing reality shows all our lives have become.

However, I believe that real change is possible in Martha, because I know the effect of pain in my own life, how it can shatter and redeem. It's strange in this world of money we live in; Martha Stewart had to go to prison to find out how to have compassion for poor women again. A rich successful boss lady who wasn't always a Miss Ann or a fairy-tale princess, but was once working-class herself in Nutley, New Jersey - once upon a time.

Visit Max Gordon's blog at maxgordonworks.blogspot.com.

posted in tough cookies - 0 replies

Hello!

arcadia — Wed, 19 Jan 2005 20:34:11 GMT

Hi Everyone: I decided to take the reigns as the new moderator. Lets get our tribe going again with photos, discussions and new members. Feel free to post any topic of discussion related to the tough cookie in all of us!

posted in tough cookies - 3 replies

your favorite tough cookies

arcadia — Wed, 13 Oct 2004 22:10:59 GMT

i just posted a picture of one of my favorite tough cookies: Angelina Jolie. I admire all women who live life on their own terms.

who are your favorite cookies?

posted in tough cookies - 14 replies

Note from tribe.net: please assign a moderator

touguy — Wed, 29 Dec 2004 19:10:42 GMT

Hey there, "tough cookies" members--

This Tribe doesn't have a moderator, but as a matter of policy, Tribe.net likes all groups to have a leader.
Could you collectively choose someone to moderate your Tribe?

When you've reached consensus, have the new moderator send a note to help@tribe.net, letting us know that you've selected a new leader.

Thanks,
-- TOU (Terms of Use) Guy

posted in tough cookies - 5 replies

whats to be done?

Thu, 04 Nov 2004 18:47:22 GMT

Alright, gw is still in office, but i dont believe that should be anyones exuse to give up. This weekend im going to green fest, a two day event on living in a way which is environmentally sustainable. I would absolutly recomend you all be there. I need to do my own small part in balancing out the current governments war against the environment. Anyone else who wants to go, the web site is www.greenfestival.com

Tanya

posted in tough cookies - 1 reply

please vote

tattooed_kitty — Tue, 02 Nov 2004 19:02:28 GMT

please vote!!!

posted in tough cookies - 8 replies

happy happy joy joy

tattooed_kitty — Sun, 31 Oct 2004 23:49:38 GMT

Let me be the first to wish everyone a blessed Samhain, happy All Soul's Eve, merry All Hallow's Eve & a happy Hallowe'en.
xxoo
kitty

posted in tough cookies - 0 replies

a what if qt

tattooed_kitty — Fri, 22 Oct 2004 06:27:43 GMT

so how will you feel if bush gets re-put into office ( i just cant bring myself to say elected)

posted in tough cookies - 0 replies

The draft? how daft.

Thu, 21 Oct 2004 18:21:04 GMT

Im sure you all have heard the rumors which have been making their way around, that the draft will begin if bush is re-elected. (thought that may be the least of my worries is B continues in office) So, curious to the response, If you were drafted, would you put aside your political objections and fight for your country? Would you whip out your tin of mood stablizers and inform them that youve just shat yourself? Would you leave the country? Personally, I'd shit myself. Luckily for my brothers, they are brazilian born.

posted in tough cookies - 4 replies

Hey...it's me bein' silly!

Thu, 21 Oct 2004 19:03:37 GMT

Thanks to our lovely, tough cookie of a moderator for puttin' me up there :)

posted in tough cookies - 0 replies

Helllooo!!

Thu, 07 Oct 2004 16:52:27 GMT

Alrighty folks, tell us something about yourselves that makes you "tough cookies"...PLEASE!!

posted in tough cookies - 9 replies

LOL

alotta — Mon, 11 Oct 2004 16:13:24 GMT

It's street walker pic!! That thing's been popping everywhere!!

Thank you Tanya my darling :)

posted in tough cookies - 3 replies

the debates

Mon, 11 Oct 2004 19:32:56 GMT

So i was watching the debates the other day and a theme which kept popping up was, "how will you keep us safe."

This is a ridiculous question, in my opinion. Its assuming that a) we were safe before 9/11 b) it is possible for a single man to assure millions that their lives are secure.
september 11 only shattered our *feeling* of security, and in my opinion, the current administration has used that insecurity to their advantage. Of course we'll agree to a war if its presented as the only option. Of course we'll sacrifice the rights this country was based on if it means a little more security. I hope this election brings us out of this fog of paranoia.

posted in tough cookies - 2 replies

political conversation

Sat, 09 Oct 2004 05:35:31 GMT

I wanted to know if people feel comfortable opening this space up to political conversation.... I know many of you must feel strongly one way or another, but I dont want anyone to feel uncomfortable coming here or expressing their views. At the same time, I think tough cookies is about standing your ground while still being midefull of alternative vierws

posted in tough cookies - 4 replies

ahhhhh

tattooed_kitty — Fri, 08 Oct 2004 06:15:14 GMT

ahh im blushing im the cover girl...

posted in tough cookies - 2 replies

Just going to put it out there

alotta — Thu, 07 Oct 2004 17:04:59 GMT

You know you're all thinking it so I'm just going to say it:

Our lovely moderator for this tribe is damn sexy!

There. I said it. I'll be in the corner blushing.

posted in tough cookies - 8 replies