Phyllis Schlafly Month #2 IWOTA #21

For the brilliance of her thought, I name Phyllis Schlafly an Indigenous Woman Of The Anglosphere (IWOTA).

Here are some examples:

“Any judge who allows an adulterer with a live-in girlfriend to terminate the life of his wife should be impeached.”

“Suppose the pay gap between men and women were magically eliminated. If that happened, simple arithmetic suggests that half of women would be unable to find what they regard as a suitable mate.”

“What I am defending is the real rights of women. A woman should have the right to be in the home as a wife and mother.”

“I think the main goal of the feminist movement was the status degradation of the full-time homemaker. They really wanted to get all women out of the homes and into the workforce. And again and again, they taught that the only fulfilling lifestyle was to be in the workforce reporting to a boss instead of being in the home reporting to a husband.”

“You can’t be an American if you don’t speak English. Our public schools should be mandated to teach all children in English.”

“Anyone with a child knows that children learn about the world through binary options: up or down, hot or cold, big or little, inside or outside, wet or dry, good or bad, boy or girl, man or woman.”

“History offers no evidence for the proposition that the assignment of women to military combat jobs is the way to win wars, improve combat readiness, or promote national security.”

“No country in history ever sent mothers of toddlers off to fight enemy soldiers until the United States did this in the Iraq war.”

God Bless Phyllis Schlafly

Geoff Fox, midwife, 22nd September, 2013

Previous Indigenous Women Of The Anglosphere include Shirley Temple, Patsy Cline, Audrey Hepburn, Rosa Parks, Barbara Stanwyck, Twiggy, Tammy Bruce, Yvonne De Carlo, Mary Astor, Mrs Patrick Campbell, Virginia Satir, Lady Gregory, Joy Davidman and Gertrude Bell

IMOTA #21 James Cash Penney businessman

James Cash Penney’s words are the embodiment of community minded free enterprise at its best. For that I name him an indigenous Man Of The Anglosphere. (IMOTA)

Penney was born in Hamilton, Missouri, on September 16, 1875. In 1902, he invested $2,000 with the owners of the Golden Rule chain of stores in a one-third partnership in a new Golden Rule store in Kemmerer, Wyoming.  Wikipedia reports: “He participated in opening two more stores, and when Callahan and Johnson dissolved their partnership in 1907 he purchased full interest in all three stores. By 1912, there were 34 stores in the Rocky Mountain States. In 1913, he moved the company to the Kearns Building in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. The company was incorporated under the new name, J. C. Penney Company. In 1916, he began to expand the chain east of the Mississippi and during the 1920s, the Penney company expanded nationwide, with 120 stores in 1920 (mostly still in the west). By 1924, Penney reported income of more than $1 million annually.”

I think it is easy to see from Kenney’s own words that The Golden Rule was something he believed in:

“Honor bespeaks worth. Confidence begets trust. Service brings satisfaction. Cooperation proves the quality of leadership.”

 “I do not believe in excuses. I believe in hard work as the prime solvent of life’s problems.”  

“The five separate fingers are five independent units. Close them and the fist multiplies strength. This is organization.”

“No serious-minded man should have time for the mediocre in any phase of his living.”

“A merchant who approaches business with the idea of serving the public well has nothing to fear from the competition.”

“It is always the start that requires the greatest effort.”

“Success cannot come from standstill men. Methods change and men must change with them.”

“I believe a man is better anchored who has a belief in the Supreme Being.” 

“The greatest teacher I know is the job itself.”

“We get real results only in proportion to the real values we give.”

“The disciplined are free.”

 “No man can climb the ladder of success without first placing his foot on the bottom rung.”

Do as you would be done by.

A discipline that can keep us free.

Geoff Fox

Previous Indigenous Men Of The Anglosphere (IMOTA) are:

1. John Wycliffe
2. Douglas MacArthur
3. George Pell
4. R.S. Thomas
5. Donald Trump
6. John Barrymore
7. William Shatner
8. Thomas Jefferson
9. Count Basie
10. Clint Eastwood
11. Walt Whitman
12. Brigham Young
13. John Wayne
14. Sitting Bull
15. Marlon Brando
16. George Gershwin
17. Will Rogers
18. Ron Paul
19. Alan Dershowitz
20. A. J. P. Taylor

Women for Freedom # 41 Annie Oakley

Sharpshooter Annie Oakley, born On August 13, 1860, Was A Very Tough Woman.

In the twentieth century, Betty Hutton had a voice like a weapon. Her career highlight was (arguably?) her cinematic musical celebration of Oakley . “You Cant Get a Man with a Gun.” “Anything You Can Do” and “There’s No Business Like Show Business” 

In this century, Oakley, for me, is a beacon of deeply American and female toughness and freedom.

She said:

“God intended women to be outside as well as men, and they do not know what they are missing when they stay cooped up in the house.”

“I would like to see every woman know how to handle guns as naturally as they know how to handle babies.”

“Any woman who does not thoroughly enjoy tramping across the country on a clear frosty morning with a good gun and a pair of dogs does not know how to enjoy life.”

“For me, sitting still is harder than any kind of work.”

“My mother…was perfectly horrified when I began shooting and tried to keep me in school, but I would run away and go quail shooting in the woods or trim my dresses with wreaths of wildflowers.”

“A crowned queen was never treated with more reverence than I was by those whole-souled western boys…And for seventeen long years I was just their little sister ……. “

“After traveling through fourteen foreign countries and appearing before all the royalty and nobility I have only one wish today. That is that when my eyes are closed in death that they will bury me back in that quiet little farm land where I was born.”

God Bless America

Geoff Fox, 13th august , 2023, Down Under

August 4, 1962, Marilyn Monroe’s Deathday

In May 1962, Marilyn Monroe sang her legendary breathy version of “Happy Birthday, Mr President” to JFK at a Democratic Party fundraiser in Madison square Garden. Two and a half months later on this date, the 4th of August, at home in Brentwood, Los Angeles, she died.

In The Guardian, in 2016, David Thomson described her appearance in May 1962 with these words: “……. (she) stood there, with her massed blonde waves jutting off to one side, like the control on tower (of) an aircraft carrier, in a dress that could have been painted on her. ……. This is maybe her greatest moment – the most reckless – and she knows it, even if the summer of 1962 is her hell.”

Marilyn’s deathday is a legend.

So was she.

Because of the way so many of us men love beautiful women who appear to be free.

Lest We Forget.

Geoff Fox, 4th August, 2023, (Los Angeles time)

Being A Mum #1 Cate Blanchett Month #2

Men, women and children need to live with love; this is an indispensable foundation of human society. – my words from August, 2018.

The glorious gaze of Cate Blanchett reasserts Faith in Being A Mum.

Today, the 14th of May, is Mother’s Day in Australia and the 54th birthday of mother-of-four, and dual Oscar winning Australian born actress Cate Blanchett.

Here are some of her thoughts on being a mum:

“Children are spirited, passionate, political, demanding. They are also heartbreaking. They constantly extend parents and so parents are constantly confronted with their failures, don’t you think? I’d rather presently live life this way than not.”

“My husband and I worry about our generation trying to be friends with their children rather than parents of their children. If you’re going to try and make your children like you, you’re in dangerous waters I think.”

“I always tell my boys that my situation ― having the ability to work or not to work as I choose ― is not the case for all women ……….. I hope that one of the good things about the more modern way ……….. is that we are all able to see that there is a lot more that unites us than divides us.”

God Bless Family

Geoff Fox, 14th May, 2023, Down Under (I was a registered midwife for three decades.)

(The above picture by of Cate Blanchett with words added by Geoff Fox is published under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic licence.)

Women For Freedom # 35 Doris Day

“I like joy; I want to be joyous; I want to have fun on the set; I want to wear beautiful clothes and look pretty. I want to smile, and I want to make people laugh. And that’s all I want. I like it. I like being happy. I want to make others happy.”

– Doris Day, who died on May 13, 2019, 4 years ago today, died famous both for her wholesome public image in the sixties and her later work for animals through her Doris Day Animal Foundation.

In the movie “Love Me Or Leave Me” which was nominated for 6 academy awards (winning Best Story for Daniel Fuchs), Day was a dime a dance nightclub singer who had two love interests in a smalltime gangster played by Jimmy Cagney (nominated for Best Actor) and her singing coach played by Cameron Mitchell. She marries and divorces the Cagney character because of his jealous violent rage, but the singing coach becomes her second husband later. By the end of the movie the gangster accepts that reality.

Fellow actress of the time, Elaine Stritch, said of Day’s performance “She was up, she was honest, she was forthright — I could tell she was scared, but she got over it. She was brilliant in the movie she did with James Cagney ………”

When jimmy Cagney was give n a life achievement award Day spoke these words, “you breathe life into your own performance. and make the rest of us really look good that’s because you are there and tonight you make the whole world feel good just because you’re here. I wish it were possible to tell you what knowing you means to me Jimmy.“

Day was lifelong friends with Clint Eastwood and Rock Hudson, who nicknamed her “Eunice” because it made him laugh ……… Day said of him: “If there is a Heaven, I’m sure Rock Hudson is there because he was such a kind person.”

God Bless American Freedom which enabled Doris Day to rise from normal middle class beginnings in Cincinnati, Ohio to have a great Hollywood and television career, and then help and be loyal to those she loved.

Geoff Fox, 13th May,2023, Down under

Women For Freedom # 34 Victoria Woodhull

On May 10, 1872, Victoria Woodhull became the first female candidate for US President.

She was implacably opposed to government control of the individual, saying,”I shall not change my course because those who assume to be better than I desire it.”

She was a libertarian when it came to sexual morality: “I am a free lover. I have an inalienable, constitutional and natural right to love whom I may, to love as long or short a period as I can; to change that love every day if I please.”

Geoff Fox, 10 May, 2023, Down Under

There Is More Than One Lolita In This World

Those of us who, as libertarians, believe passionately in freedom, usually believe in freedom as the equal human right of all people.

In sexual issues, it is relatively easy to say that consenting adults should be able to do what they like in private.

But when it comes to teenagers, it is much harder to draw clear lines.

When do they become fully adult with adult rights to autonomous sexual choices?

IMHO not at puberty, even though that is when, as I understand it, the physical capacity for sexual functioning begins.

At 16?

At 18?

At 21? Or even older? In 2013 bbc.com reported:

” ‘The idea that suddenly at 18 you’re an adult just doesn’t quite ring true,’ says child psychologist Laverne Antrobus, who works at London’s Tavistock Clinic. ‘My experience of young people is that they still need quite a considerable amount of support and help beyond that age.’ Child psychologists are being given a new directive which is that the age range they work with is increasing from 0-18 to 0-25.”

A 44 year old man in Florida, whom I will only identify by one initial “M”, since I believe he faces a horrible time in getting the presumption of innocence, has been arrested in Florida, as I understand it for shooting into a room in which he believed there was a 44 year old man who had been naked in bed with M’s teenage daughter.

If this girl was 13 years old, then I am inclined to be very sympathetic to M’s rage. Much less so, if she was 19. Yet in both cases the word pedophilia might be used.

Knowing what to do with teenage sexuality, in a world where online porn is free, is not easy.

When the 1981 production of Lolita ran on Broadway it had 31 previews but closed after 12 performances. Donald Sutherland starred with 24 year old Flanche Baker. (both pictured above)

When director Stanley Kubrik made his film Lolita (in 1962), the actress, sue Lyon, who played the title role was 14 years old.

Actress Sue Lyon starring as Lolita in Kubrik’s 1962 film.

Clearly one of the most abominable crimes one human being can commit against another is non consensual sex (i.e. rape) of a pre pubescent child.

Any rape is bad, but but rape of kids incapable of sexual response is possibly the worst imaginable. Lock him up (or sometimes her) and throw away the key is a pretty understandable response.

But consensual sex with a teen in his or her late teens is not so easy to automatically condemn and punish as hard. Yet both can be described by the one word “pedophilia.”

Sometimes words fail us.

Parents have a right and responsibility to protect their children.

Completely stifling all adolescent sexuality is going to often amount to counter-productive repression. but adolescence takes along time and the last thing any society should do is make parenting even harder by expecting parents to protect their kids but condemning them if they make the wrong call under enormous stress.

I think it is extremely difficult to say when parental rights finish and adult rights of adolescent children begin.

Geoff Fox, former Registered Midwife, 10th March, 2023, Down Under

Women For Freedom # 20 Elizabeth Taylor

Legendary actress Elizabeth Taylor was born on this day 101 years ago.

She loved men, quite a few of them: she got married 8 times to seven different guys (Richard Burton twice) and said that she only slept with men she married. (I view this as a fantastic line by a very beautiful actress. It might even be true.)

Taylor said both, “Marriage is a great institution.” and “I am a very committed wife. And I should be committed too – for being married so many times.”

Freed0m doesn’t always give us exactly what we want or believe that we need.

But Freedom is more likely to work for us than tyranny

God Bless Elizabeth Taylor.

And all seven of her husbands.

By and large, she loved them all.

Geoff Fox, 27th February, 2023, Down Under

IMOTA #6 JOHN BARRYMORE

It is John Barrymore’s 141st birthday today or tomorrow. I mark the occasion and his gifts by naming him an Indigenous Man Of The Anglosphere. He was called the “greatest living American tragedian” giving acclaimed performances as Hamlet and Richard The Third.

Barrymore with Carol Lombard in “Twentieth Century”

His sister Ethel and brother Lionel were also actors.

To begin with, on the stage, his brother Lionel was more likely to be cast as a leading man. John would get the comedy roles. An American cinephile friend of mine writes: “By the time they all went into the movies ( silents ), John became the one to have the leading man roles and was known as “THE GREAT PROFILE”. 

He loved living free.

Actors to portray Barrymore include W.C. Fields, Lawrence Olivier, Errol Flynn and Jack Cassidy.

Barrymore had alcohol problems at 14 years of age and was bankrupt in later life. He said, “Happiness often sneaks in through a door you didn’t know you left open.”

It wasnt always the life of a an unattached libertine. He married Dolores Costello, pictured below.

John Barrymore described Hamlet as a “normal, healthy, lusty young fellow . . … he was a great fencer, an athlete, a man who led an active, healthy life.” In the above photo Barrymore is being a normal young man with Dolores Costello in “The Sea Beast”. Later on, she became his third wife.

God Bless Freedom

But for most of us, Family Life Comes First.

Geoff Fox, 14th February, 2023, Down Under