Ed Royce lying to women about the length of his … pro-woman agenda. More condescending massaging of women voters’ egos is coming tomorrow!
Set your irony deflectors on “maximum,” everyone! Rep. “Desperate Ed” Royce is trying to shore up his reputation with the wimmenfolk again, a month after trying to amend the “Violence Against Women Act” to water down or remove its protections for some or all lesbians, Native Americans, and unauthorized residents, and just a week after voting against raising the minimum wage, which disproportionately affects women. (Be sure to check out the video at the bottom for a wonderful response to agenda for last year’s women’s conference, which “reads like a Home Ec class”!)
Yes, it’s his 5th Annual Women’s Conference, this Saturday, March 23, at Cal State Fullerton, and the agenda covering all of the topics that women worry about, like reproductive rights, inadequate child care, the high cost of tuition and books, the unavailability of jobs, workplace sexual harassment and discrimination, their pretty little heads about!
Here’s the schedule:
TIMELINE
Protesters against Royce’s voting record gather outside CSUF’s Titan Student Union: 8:25 a.m.
(Note: the protest — come and go anytime between 8:25 and 11:30 is not part of Rep. Royce’s program.)
(Bring your own signs – no wooden stakes, please! – or signs will be available! Permit has been granted.)
Registration: 8:30am
Program: 9:00am
Breakout Seminar I: 9:20am
Breakout Seminar II: 10:30am
Keynote: 11:45am
Women (and men!) are invited to enjoy speeches and to attend breakout sessions on topics such as:
- Financially Fit & Savvy, with four speakers, the first two on (A Woman’s Journey toward Financial Independence):
- Monica Chandra, whose “number one objective” is “helping you reach your financial goals,” and who will “evaluate your situation and make adjustments as needed,” because “it just makes sense – as your life changes, so do your financial needs” and she’ll “be here for you at every stage of your life.”
- Kathryn Hackney, who “over the last 30 years [has] helped a great number of people make sound financial decisions that were in their best interest while maintaining consistent service with their individual comfort level, investment time-line, and goals,” and also agrees with the “it just makes sense” statements above.
- Katerina Soukhorado, a mortgage lender with Orange County’s Credit Union, speaking on The 3 C’s of Home Buying.
- Leticia Mata, the same credit union’s Assistance [sic]Vice-President of Community Education and Development, speaking on Easy Ways to Save Money.
- 5 Health Facts Every Woman Must Know
- with Joanna Tan, M.D. — Immediate Past President of the Orange County Medical Association (OCMA)
- Achieve Uncommon Career Sucess [sic], with two speakers:
- Rod McDermott, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of McDermott & Bull Executive Search;
- Kristin Thuve, “a recent collegiate athlete who earned a scholarship to both Division 1 / NAIA schools in Indiana and locally at Vanguard University,” who has “learned the value of building relationships with key influencers and personal stakeholders in both her athletic pursuits and her career, and has been able to achieve personal success by building on those relationships where she delivered outstanding results, and gained followership.”
- A Celebrity Chef’s Guide to Healthy Cooking
- with Jamie Gwen, author of A Celebrity Chef’s Guide to Healthy Cooking. She is a celebrity chef. (Note: CHICKS DIG THIS!)
Kathleen Baty will explain how to avoid being vulnerable to stalkers. No, not “stalkers” — sorry, I mean “to rapists.”
The Keynote Speaker is Kathleen Baty, author of A Girl’s Gotta Do What A Girl’s Gotta Do: The Ultimate Guide to Living Safe and Smart and College Safety 101: Miss Independent’s Guide to Empowerment, Confidence and Staying Safe (Chronicle Books, Spring 2011). She is the President and CEO of Safety Chick Enterprises. From Royce’s event website:
Baty was the victim of an obsessive stalker for over 15 years, culminating in a kidnap attempt at gunpoint. Teaming with US Congressman Ed Royce in 1990, Baty set out to change the system. Within a few months, the two had played a key role in passage of the first national anti-stalking law. In the years since, Baty’s reputation has grown as a dedicated and articulate victims’ rights advocate and Personal Safety/Threat Assessment expert—she is known to millions through her appearances on news programs such as The Today Show, Larry King Live, Good Morning America as well as features in publications such as People, Time, Cosmopolitan, Glamour and USA Today.
Royce has been living large as a faux-feminist on that anti-stalker bill for literally decades now. It makes one wonder what he and Baty will say about the burning issue of the day: “rape culture,” in which society worries less about victims of rape and more about the effect that accusations of rape will have on the lives of otherwise successful high school and college boys. If you guessed that the advice will be along the lines of “be smart, college girls — don’t drink, stay out late, and go to wild parties with young men, even if you already know them” — well, here’s a snippet from an interview with Patch.com:
The most common factor in the majority of sexual assaults/date rapes in college involves alcohol. The same safety rule applies—always have a buddy, and safety in numbers. Date rape drugs are extremely dangerous because they are odorless and tasteless. Never accept a drink someone just hands you, never drink out of a punch bowl, and always keep your drink in your hand. Remember this Safety Chick tip: When in doubt, pour it out. True safety chicks always have each other’s back—and make sure everyone gets home safely!
(I was actually under the impression that common factor in the majority of sexual assaults was a power imbalance. Do you think that Carlos Bustamante bothered to get his female employees drunk? And the disinhibiting effect of alcohol — which is supposed to render women into the non-punch-bowl-partaking class — is an entirely different matter that the de-consciousnessing effect of a drug like Rohypnol that , believe it or not, also can also be dissolved into plain cola, chocolate milk, or — a special danger to women — jasmine tea.)
If you’re looking for a “teach men not to rape women and get them active in stigmatizing rape culture among their male peers” rather than merely a “constrain your activities so as not to run afoul of those wild and uncontrollable males” message, you can either look elsewhere or — you can attend and ask her about it! (I’m especially interested in how “have a buddy” and “safety in numbers” apply to dates themselves. Is making out in a dorm room after a date something that thus becomes the woman’s fault — because she wasn’t being a proper “safety chick”?)
More from Rep. Royce, with links, because we at OJB are all about community service!
Attendance at my annual Women’s Conference is free and registration begins at 8:30 a.m. in the lobby of Cal State Fullerton’s Titan Student Union. Parking for the women’s conference is free and located in the N. State College Parking Structure. Additional directions and maps can be found here.
Once you check in you will receive your packet which will include a welcome letter from Representative Royce, information on the breakout seminars, a timeline for the half-day conference, and more.
Those with any questions about Saturday’s event may contact Royce’s office at (714) 255-0101. If you are no longer able to attend Saturday’s conference please contact Chelsea Wilson at chelsea.wilson@mail.house.gov.
If you have not yet submitted an RSVP for the conference, you can do so the day of the event by visiting the ‘Same Day’ registration table at the Titan Student Union.
Additional details about Rep. Royce’s 5th Annual Women’s Conference can be found here.
And here are some more additional details about the protest and Rep. Royce’s voting record:
What: Protesters with signs to stand along walkway leading to conference.
When: Saturday, March 23, 2013, anytime between 8:30 – 11:00 AM
Where: Cal State Fullerton Titan Student Union.
Why: Protest Ed Royce’s Voting Record.
How: Hold signs on his voting record, or bills you would like him to vote on.
At this Saturday’s Women’s Conference there’s a session call“Easy Ways to Save Money.”How can you save money when you only make$7.25 an hour?
There’s another session called
“Financially Fit and Savvy.”Rep. Ed Royce voted NO against the
Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009.
What other discriminatory issues does Rep. Ed Royce support?
See you there tomorrow — whether you’re inside or outside!
P.S. Here’s a great video by a bright young woman named Ashley Song that was prompted by last year’s conference that I meant to publish last year but had been waiting for the right moment — and ultimately didn’t get around to it. I think that this is the right moment!
“If you’re looking for a ‘teach men not to rape women and get them active in stigmatizing rape culture among their male peers’. . .”
I’m sorry– who’s looking for this? I wasn’t aware that I needed to be taught not to rape. Anything else I need to be educated on for the betterment of humanity?
Something weird got in the water this week. This CNN piece was titled (originally) “Raising a boy not to be a rapist.” http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/22/living/son-do-not-rape-steubenville/index.html?hpt=hp_bn11
Ryan, do you think that young men and boys all understand what does and doesn’t constitute rape? If, for example, a boy believes that if a girl “leads him on,” he’s entitled to have sex with her, then he absolutely does have to be “taught not to rape.”
I’m certainly interested in getting young men and boys active in stigmatizing others like the athletes in Steubenville — aren’t you?
*ugh* This has been everywhere. It’s just exhausting.
How about we ask a 15 yo boy what constitutes a just war? How about his theory on justifiable homicide? How about their view on water boarding while we’re at it? Maybe their feelings on the IMF, AIDS, or homosexuality?
I’m not exactly sure what your impressions were the last time you audited an ethics class entirely composed of 15-16yo boys. It’s complicated to say the least.
Boys don’t need to be taught “not to rape” just because they have a penis. It’s flatly absurd. Identifying violent crime with athletic culture, or sub-culture more accurately, is about as absurd.
In general, I’m interested in having any individual stand up to protect a potential victim of any crime, which includes rape. Standing up to bullies has been part of American culture since 1776.
“Rape culture” (in America at least) would more appropriately be labeled anti-cultural or counter cultural, which wouldn’t put your average male in the position of either identifying with protecting an individual’s right to not be abused or identifying with a sex that’s inherently evil.
When I was a 15-16 year old boy, I wanted to have sex with girls (or as close as I could come to it.) My understanding of what constituted rape was therefore of some importance.
At that age, I was not interested in the prospect of invading foreign countries without legitimate justification. That didn’t happen until my late 20s. My understanding of what constituted just war was of far less importance.
My opinions on the IMF have been pretty much fixed since I was 7 of course. I do not lend personal money to dictatorships.
Fine, Greg. Boys are inherently prone to being rapists. Let’s go educate the world and save everyone from themselves. There will be no unintended consequences of labeling 50% of the population as inherently evil.
Good luck with that. Don’t expect a whole lot of help from moderate males. We don’t like being stereotyped as delinquents based on our physicality– but who cares, we’re just mindless lust zombies with erections who can’t control ourselves BUT FOR the saving grace of education dispensed by liberals.
I mean Jeez! You apparently BARELY made it through your teens and you’re a liberal? What possible hope could there be for the rest of us who aren’t blessed with a conscience . . . just a penis!
“Inherently prone” is somewhat self-contradictory, isn’t it? It’s a bit like “definitely likely.”
I’m not “labeling 50% of the population as inherently evil” — or even 100% (as do some religions.) I do think that there are plenty of signals that go out to young men that certain sorts of sexual practices that we consider rape are not “evil” — or even rape — but just “having fun” or “boys being boys.” And a lot of the time, those practices are tolerated by society — they would have been in the Steubenville case had not outside “liberals” (and I hope others) intervened.
As for “we’re just mindless lust zombies with erections who can’t control ourselves BUT FOR the saving grace of education dispensed by liberals” — if I substitute “religious leaders,” does it still seem like such an outrageous claim?
I never said I “BARELY” made it through my teens. As for your saying that you are “blessed” by your penis — uh, I’ll take your word for it.
“they would have been in the Steubenville case had not outside liberals”(and I hope others) intervened.”
Indeed. I look forward to liberals intervening into 385 million lives on a daily basis. Thank God for big government and liberal love.
Well, if it brings rapists to justice, surely you should look forward to it.
Damn bathwater . . . how can I get rid of it? Oh, I know . . .
Blammo! Well said, sir!
Also, of note– I had 800 likes on a comment I made. CNN’s response? Delete it.
Classy.
When you were a kid, I’d wager that someone — say, a parent? Faddah Foley down t’the Holy Name Society there? — told you not to rape anyone. Sadly, and apparently, not everyone gets such counseling:
http://www.fearus.org/
*”So…..you have a Massage…..for me?” “No Inspector Cluesou! No Massage for you!”