From ARIEL GORE, about Allison Crews:
"The community is heartbroken with the news that Allison Crews, fierce
maternal activist and longtime editor of girlmom.com, has passed away.
She was 22 years old.
Her mom, Kim, asks you to light a candle for Alli. And to do something in her name. A few suggestions from Girlmom are: Go back to school, leave a shitty relationship, fall in love, start a movement, be a kickass mom, get to know the young mama down the block .
. .
For the next issue of Hip Mama, if you have notes, tributes, pictures or stories about Alli--whether you knew her personally or simply through her work--please send them my way (even if you've already posted them online). You can email them to me or snail-mail to Hip Mama, P.O. Box 12525, Portland, OR 97212. Unless you need them back, I'll send the originals to Alli's mom for Cade.
A funeral and several memorials and benefits are being planned around the country. If you'd like information on those, please let me know and I will make sure you are in the loop as I get details.
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that.
About Me
Blogs I Like to Read
- Amy's Very Cool Homeschooling Family
- Ann Douglas
- Blogging Baby
- David Rhoden
- Domestic Psychology
- First Impressionist
- Jonathan Hickman
- Lemuria Books
- Mamas Ink
- Marrit Ingman
- Martini Made
- Meagan Francis
- Mo's Journal
- Remembering Ward
- Suburban Turmoil
- The Vol Abroad
- This Woman's Work
- Women's Health News
- Zygote Daddy
Good Stuff on Being a Parent/Family Life
Books I"ve written/contributed to
Blog Archive
-
▼
2005
(844)
-
▼
June
(91)
- knoxville gets a skatepark
- first friday in market square
- the twilight sentinels
- paparazzi mother
- damn
- class matters?
- some things i don't like about being divorced
- knoxville magazine
- my musical to-do list for the next few days
- the purpose-driven psycho
- Hott Fest
- more on jimmy buffett
- nestle
- sleater kinney
- wow!
- gymkhana
- corner lounge
- more on the News Sentinel/South Knox Bubba/Metro P...
- ATL
- knox rocks
- motion city soundtrack
- corndogs
- well, DUH
- the anti robin hood
- memories
- mic harrison and xavier rudd
- south knox bubba gets the shaft
- bored
- yarnjunkie
- are political parties over?
- rural journalism
- bad dog
- mic harrison
- openminded
- get paid to write for MSN
- to edit or not to edit?
- New Todd Steed
- Favorite
- fantagraphics
- downing street memos
- fathers' rights on fathers' day
- Jane & Me
- fox news & neurotoxins
- allison crews memorials
- happy father's day to my dad
- I've been listening to the new White Stripes recor...
- Jane & Sydney
- End of the show -- sleepy child, sleepy pony
- homebirth
- new car
- new brutalism rocks knox
- badcrowd
- need fence guy
- bonnaroo video now online
- mrs. somebody
- don't judge, just read
- watch
- male pattern baldness...
- nonstop
- the housewife theory of history
- palaver
- They're home!
- H, E and J - June 13
- Supper on the porch, June 13
- Henry, June 13
- monkeys
- rock on
- be a kickass mom
- no first date
- when i was garbage
- shock
- blogging from bonnaroo
- we are here
- goodbye
- marriage, a history
- good genes/bad genes
- chat me up
- Elliot's baseball team
- Hubris!
- Henry in Charleston
- hooray for birth control!
- love,life
- quandary
- Bonnaroo
- Provenance of Fellini Kroger unmasked?
- what 1,000 miles in 48 hours looks like
- travelocities+music
- If the Bugaloos had been hyper-patriotic...
- nursing
- new book coming out
- deep throat
-
▼
June
(91)
13 comments:
an excellent suggestion, one you wont see anywhere on the girlmom site is to stamp out poverty by getting a job. I couldnt believe the articles on the website...what a load of entitlement. I cant believe I pay taxes so these slugs can avoid growing up. I mean if these people put HALF the effort into earning money that they do about moaning about poverty and screaming about their "rights" they wouldnt have a problem. I found myself thinking if they have the ability to organize all these homeless people for all these protests and be such "activists" they certainly should be able to be innovative enough to become self supporting. but thats not PC, I guess... I read the article on going to college, knowing of course they would not have the suggestion to take more than four years and work part time(the way many a non left leaning person, including yes, single moms, have done before) and I was right. of course the suggestions were all about how to weasel as much money out of everyone else because of course, you are ENTITLED. because you are a VICTIM.and you hate what our government wastes money on so they may as well waste some of it on non working you. not you made a bad choice so now you are going to have extra work to do..but you made a bad choice so that entitles you to bully the government, the colleges, whoever else you can think of, into paying your way for you. I am, to say the least, unimpressed. this website sums up why I am not a liberal. it all sounds good and caring but in the end it enables people to avoid growing up and becoming adults. it might be of interest that the ONLY program for the homeless that has had any success in weaning people into self sufficiency are those that demand job training and work in exchange for a leg up. the ones that just give without expecting it to lead to self sufficiency just breed more dependents. this is not to say there are truly people who are not able bodied enough to work who truly need freebies, but ironically those are the people who seem to have enough pride to not sit on thier duffs at taxpayer expense and instead want to work, even when it is very difficult for them to do so.
You hit that on the nail!!!
"one you wont see anywhere on the girlmom site is to stamp out poverty by getting a job."
Yeah cause we all know that the jobs teen moms can get are REALLY going to get them out of poverty.
Sorry, I'd rather pay taxes and watch someone live off the system while they went to school (like Alli and many others did) to better themselves then to see them stuck working at McDonalds forever.
and how many of them DO better themselves? most of them dont. meanwhile the liberal elite continue to deny that there is any problem at all with kids jsut "expressing themselves sexually". you know..this used to be a rare problem..now its commonplace...why do you think that is?
Seriously None of those girls that you're talking about are trying tolive off the system. I'm a full time Veterinary Med university student with a son who turns 1 today. I don't live off the system, but my son does go to subsidized Daycare oh dear god he goes to daycare that the gov't pays for, does that make me taking advantage? because if so Then I'm Damn proud to shout that I am a Teen Mother and I am in university and MY Son goes to gov't paid for daycare! The types of Jobs that Teen Mothers can get aren't usually enough for them to support their children! So they quite often work AND go to school AND recieve Gov't assistance You've got not a fucking clue what you're talking about don't go judging anyone who requires assistance until you've been in the situation where you're wondering where your childs next meal is coming from, or where you're gonna get the rent money or where you're gonna get the diapers your baby has to have.
Alot of teen mothers can't find the money to go back to school because everything they have goes to their children. But I think that going out and working their asses off to support their children is better then anything you'll ever amount to. We Aren't Victims of Anything except judgemental assholes like you.
none of them eh? just because you are working your butt off doesnt mean that a lot of them dont feel entitled to sit back and let the state play husband to them. I have read the articles in mothering magazine whining about how they need to "attachment parent" their child and so they have chosen to collect welfare rather than work and oh aint it awful that just no one understands. unfortunately once you get pregnant out of wedlock none of the solutions are perfect. I am not condemning single mothers as a group..I was appalled at what I saw on that website, I didnt think it was great, I thought a good chunk of it promoted people who rather than admit they made a mistake and that the difficulties in thier lives are fruits of that mistake; that instead they were on a campaign to wring out of society what they feel is "owed" to them. its not even about begruding help to people who need it: its the attitude of "gimme" that bothered me. and the attitude of "demand your rights" if what they think they deserve isnt forked right on over to them. I also am rather appalled that this woman who made such a big stink about how her child would be better off with her than with adoptive parents did one of the worst things you can do to a kid. I confess to having thought at times that I have made such a big mess of things that I just would like to check out (and I have been depressed enough that I have been unable to function at times) but I thought man, what would that do to my children??? my grandmother killed herself and the legacy it left was pretty ugly. now it is being said this was an "accidental suicide"...which sounds mightly strange..an accidental death is usually stated as such. even someone playing around with a gun that accidentally went off I have never heard referred to as "accidental suicide", it was referred to simply as an "accident"..this "accidental suicide" bit sounds like she was trying to pretend to kill herself and accidentally succeeded.
another thing I might add is that I never hear these activists say they are in their situation because of decisions they made and go on to encourage other girls (and boys too) to not make those same mistakes. no, depending on what they did about their pregnancy they are blaming the powers that be for not giving them enough free goodies or blaming people who talked them into adoption or saying how the best thing they ever did was have thier abortion or blaming the government for not finding a cure for AIDS fast enough. I have never heard a peep that the troubles they face are because they stepped outside of the way sex is intended to be. this is not about not having grace for someone who has made a mistake. this ia about a very disturbing social trend, one that I saw evidenced on that web site. not that single teen motherhood is a sucky consequence of bad choices but that its just dandy, not a thing wrong with it. and if you dare suggest that abstinence might a way for others to avoid their dilemmas then you must be one judgemental bitch or worse..if you do not think children suffer from not having a father, guess again. I grew up with no father (he died) and it sucked. stuff I have read on the matter actually says that kids whose fathers died fared far better than those who lost thier fathers thru divorce or who never had them in the first place because of how they were concieved. because there is closure and not the abandonment issues. and some adopted kids have problems too. we will not even visit abortion. yet no where amongst this do we see anything but "oh isnt it great" there was one post on that web site with this kid (and thats what she was, a kid) saying how great it was that all over her street there were all these "girl moms" and its just this revolution and isnt this great. no its not great, its SAD. and when those babies grow up to be adults that repeat the cycle, yeah, that will be just dandy wont it??? and this is what this woman Allison promoted. this isnt about mutual support...they are acting as if what they have done is something good that others should do too.
Stepped outside of the way sex was supposed to be? sex isn't Supposed to be for only those who are married, it's an activity that some people do for the simple pleasure, and Our children may come out of that fact. But We aren't going to condemn them by calling them a mistake for the rest of their life. That's not fair. How would you like to be told on a regular basis that because your mother is young, that You are a mistake, Not only by people around you but by society in general. There's Nothing wrong with being a young mother, sometimes we're single As I am and sometimes we're lucky enough to be partnered with someone who can accept the responsibilities that we as mothers don't have the choice but to. It's not fair to tag them as a whole, because they accept help in a time of need. Being pregnant takes so much out of you, being a mother takes so much out of you that sometimes it takes a while to wake up and realize that you need to be part of a functional society even though society sees you as disfunctional. It's hard to take that step out into the world and be seen as a slut or a bad mother just because of your age. Sometimes Society puts so much pressure on these girls to be perfect that they screw up, or that they're afraid to take part. If I wasn't on a financial Grant from my school, I don't think i'd be supporting my child on my own, I'd probably be recieving other gov't asisstance outside of the daycare. I work a part time job and I go to school full time but it's not always enough.
I agree That attachment parenting can be beneficial. However I don't think that gives them a right to sit back and take advantage of the assistance that is made readily Available to them.
The point of this, is don't judge us all as a whole, I am a part of girlmom and I Love that site, because when I face the everyday Judgementalness of society they're there to pick me back up and send me back out into the world, stronger then before. These young women face enough of a challenge trying to decide what is best for them, or what is best for their unborn child, or how they can make society understand why they chose what they did. All they want is someone to understand or at the very least, forgive.
I just re-read what you wrote and I cant believe you'd even DARE to try and take something away from a young woman who is DEAD! She wasn't trying to promote lets all have kids young and make mistakes. What she was trying to get out to the world, was that as teenagers we are capable of being parents we're not incompetent we're intelligent young people who can choose our own paths in life, and all she wanted was for the world to see as us as capable, because I could be 35 with my first child but be single and living off the system, It's not all young women who need gov't assistance, there's others out there too. That's a big part of it, just because we're young we don't wanted to be treated as anything but people who deserve respect like anyone else in this world.
And if you bothered to read everything on that website, it's not All Oh everything is fantastic we love the everyday struggles we face as teen mothers, it's more We're here to support your choices but we're not going to tell you it's easy because it's not.
I also grew up without a father and had a young mother, and maybe i'm here with a son at a young age, but i'm not repeating my mothers steps. I'm getting somewhere in my life. Not that my mother didn't but I'm going to school and I'm a damn good mother at the same time. MY Father walked out of the delivery room when I was born, He didn't want me and apparently he couldn't even stand to pretend he did. MY parents were married yeah fucking married and he still didn't want me. That's ok it didn't hurt me any to know that the rest of my family Loves me even if he doesn't. You grew up without a father and that sucks but you can't compare that to what these young women are going through.it's not even close to the same thing. and the fact that you'd call me a judgemental bitch or worse, just makes me see that you really don't know what you're talking about. that you have no respect for women. even if you are a woman. and I wouldn't be judgemental in that case, I'd be a Hypocrite. I'm Not going to suggest Abstinence because Sex is an amazing thing, Protected sex is another story, I'll recommend to protect yourself against STD's and pregnancy if you're not ready for a child. But I don't believe Abstaining is the best thing to do, unless that is specifically what you want.
I am so mad I could just spit nails. why do you think society judges you??? maybe its because they see what you dont....and thats that you out there spreading your legs and "enjoying what a great thing" sex is without the benefit of marriage is costing taxpayers big bucks. not to mention the emotional problems of kids raised in single parent homes and kids who are adopted (while I think adoption can be a solution I also realize adoptees have issues..although I think a lot of them should just shut up and quit whining and be grateful for the life that they have had) so yeah, you just go out there and enjoy fucking each other while those of us who are more responsible foot the bill for your little bastards.
I understand people who make mistakes and are repentent although after hearing what some of thier kids go through I also can understand why someone wants to have a baby from a fourteen year old raised by an intact mature responsible family, even with the issues that adoption brings. no the children are not a mistake, somehow God works even through mistakes, but that doesnt mean go out and keep making them. while you are enjoying your "right" to enjoy sex without the benefits of marriage, many others are getting taxed to the hilt to support your right to behave irresponsibly. after your last couple of posts rationalizing your actions any shred of sympathy I might have for single mothers went right out the window.
I should say I do feel for people who know they have made a mistake and are committed to not repeated it. however the idea of giving my tax dollars to some bimbo who hasnt gotten the message after one unplanned pregnancy and the hardship it brings taht maybe she should keep her legs shut until she is married...you know..I can think of a lot better ways to spend the money. the poor kid however did not ask to be born...its really rather selfish to be pursuing your pleasure knowing that if the condom breaks your kid will suffer for it. I mean when do you see your kid? and of course the man who enjoyed what great fun sex is is probably not in the picture any more, he got his milk so why buy the cow now...so the poor kid has to grow up with male abandonment issues. you sluts have bullied society into enabling your irresponsibility and a lot of us are sick of it. its not about being "perfect"...its about getting a clue as to why sex belongs in marriage. I cannot believe that someone who has already had one child out of wedlock could continue to rationalize nonmarital sex as something desirable and acceptable. if the rest of us stood up and refused to pay for your little bastards unless you handed them over to responsible people I would imagine that you would learn that abstinence is a good thing very very quickly.
I should add too I can just see someone getting on and telling me how I dont have a clue, blah blah blah...I tell you , I used to engage in premarital sex and I regret it to this day. I cannot say how glad I am taht I did not have a child out of wedlock or give up a child for adoption or have an abortion and have all that baggage to deal with and the guilt of having hurt an innocent child over the selfishness of wanting to just gratify my needs without thought of consequences. had I had a child out of wedlock knowing what my actions had cost another (and myself while we are at it) would make me even more adament that what I am seeing here is just gross irresponsibility and selfishness of one of the worst sorts. not to mention stupidity.
I don't want my tax money to go to selling weapons to other countries or to corporate welfare breaks or agricultural subsidies to big agribusiness, but I don't get a say in it and guess what? You don't get a say in your money going to social welfare programs. That's just how a representative democracy works. Dig up a civics book and get cracking.
And while you're at it, remember that you will be judged with the measure you use in judgement of others. It bears mentioning, since y'all sound like you're probably really big into the "judging" philosophies.
Post a Comment