Sunday 8 March 2009

BREAKING! Vatican Discovers Washing Machine, Misunderstands Its Significance


As if we needed any further evidence of the Vatican's complete cluelessness, after it endorsed the excommunication of the Brazilian mother and doctors involved in the abortion performed on a 9-year-old girl impregnated by her rapist step-father, today, on International Woman's Day, there's this:
Washing machine brought rights to women: Vatican

VATICAN CITY -- The washing machine has had a greater liberating role for women than the pill, the official Vatican daily said in an International Women's Day commentary Sunday.

"The washing machine and the emancipation of women: put in the powder, close the lid and relax," said the headline on the article in Osservatore Romano.

"In the 20th century, what contributed most to the emancipation of western women?" questioned the article.

"The debate is still open. Some say it was the pill, others the liberalisation of abortion, or being able to work outside the home. Others go even further: the washing machine," it added.

Yes, indeedy, the Vatican goes even further. Into absolute and total irrelevancy.

I stole that delightful photo of Ratso from Antonia Z.

UPPITY-DATE: In the comments, Anonymous provides a link to the article in Italian and says that it is written tongue in cheek. Who among us reads Italian well enough to call bullshit say? Paging LuLu perhaps?

FURTHER UPPITY-DATE: Anonymous provides a working link to the original article in Italian. It's at Free Republic (big surprise).

27 comments:

Anonymous said...

ARRGGGHHH. The stupid... it burns!

Besides, my husband uses our washing machine far more than I do. I do food acquisition and preparation, handle mechanic-y things and deal with the outside world; he cleans (up after me...), does laundry, and balances our finances. So... the washing machine liberates him? I fail to see how this works.

Also, I <3 the pic of Papi Ratzi.

deBeauxOs said...

fern hill, the topics we chose - without consulting each other - for blogging on IWD are so very bizarre and appropriate.

Anonymous said...

I am so stealing that photo.

Washing machine as liberation, ugh. I don't know what to say.

fern hill said...

Michelle: You're thinking with your lady-brain. If you could think with a cross-dressing pedophile's brain, you'd get it. ;)

dBO: Maybe we'll soon be synchronized on our periods, too. Oh. Wait. :D

deBeauxOs said...

ahem. Read between the lines in my blogpost about eggs past their due date, fern hill.

;)

the regina mom said...

OMFG! OMFG! OMFG! I'm speechless!!!

Zorpheous said...

Instruction so simple, even a priest could follow them,...

Next decade they explain the mysterious mop and pale,...

Zorpheous said...

need to make ears more pointy and give him some fangs, and don't forget his pope hat-thing

That guy said...

Please tell me that was from the Onion. Please please please.

Beijing York said...

What regina mom said.

Anonymous said...

Except that the outraged blockheads who are so upset by the article didn't read it. Guess what, oh Clueless Oones?
1) It was written by a laywoman, not a male priest; her name is Giulia Galeotti
2) The piece is tongue-in-cheek social commentary about the absurd way that certain products are presented in advertising as part of the "modern lifestyle" for women
3)Ms. Galeotti has a sense of humor, while a good portion of the world press cannot tell satire from hard news. This is distressing, but the fault does not lie with the female members of the staff of the Osservatore Romano.

Next time, before you get in a dither about everything that gets spoonfed to you on line by people who cannot be bothered to read the articles they criticize, try going to the source yourself to see what was *really* said.

http://www.vatican.va/news_services/or/or_quo/text.html#12

fern hill said...

Anonymous: Your non-link took me to the Vatican's home page. Care to provide some evidence that the piece was tongue in cheek?

Anonymous said...

I'm inclined to think the way this story is being picked up without question by every major paper in the world, it's genuine. Contrary to what Anonymous so politely said.

The Vatican doesn't have a sense of humour like that, and even if it was a joke, it's in extremely poor taste, this is just the kind of bone-headed thing they would do.

Anonymous said...

No, that does not take you to the Vatican's home page. www.vatican.va will take you to the Vatican's home page --but that was not the URL I posted, was it? What I posted was the URL of the particular article in this week's Osservatore Romano. Ever hear of copy-and-paste?

deBeauxOs said...

Especially since it's obvious that Benny Ratzo and his men in furs at the Vatican don't do humour.

Closet crossdressing follies don't count.

Anonymous said...

deBeauxOs, while I realize you are trying to be oh-so-cuttingly-clever with your comment, did you notice that the article was not written by a man, but was instead written by a woman? And can you also tell me why you are so sure that the Osservatore Romano never writes anything in a lighter vein? Have you read the article being discussed? Have you read the Osservatore Romano before now? Indeed, do you even read Italian?

fern hill said...

Anonymous: Sorry, you're right. That does take one to today's articles (my, they have a lot to say there). But it is in Italian. So, unless Anonymous wants to have a go at translation, I think I'll stick with bruce's and deBeauxOs's take on it. Vatican not=funny, except for their outfits, of course.

Anonymous said...

God forbid that an inability to read something should prevent you from commenting on it, especially when you have bigotry to fall back on, right?

While we are at it, do we want to take a swipe at blacks, or Hispanics, or Jews? I mean, they are so not-us too, right?

Anonymous said...

If indeed it was humour, the fact that they thought it was funny is telling enough.

fern hill said...

Ding, ding, ding! 'Bigotry'. That would be anti-Catlick bigotry, yes?

Well, Anonymous, unless you'd like to provide an alternative translation, I'm going with:
a) msm's taking it literally
b) the Vatican's usual approach to women
c) it is not funny, and, as Mandos said, that the Vatican thinks it is is telling enough.

Dr.Dawg said...

I read Italian, but that link doesn't seem to be working. Not a periodical noted for its light-hearted moments, however.

While we are at it, do we want to take a swipe at blacks, or Hispanics, or Jews? I mean, they are so not-us too, right?

That's beneath contempt.

fern hill said...

Dr. Dawg: Argh. That link seems to take you to today's page only. I can't figure out how to navigate the site to get to yesterday's edition.

To choose International Women's Day to mock women's rights is right up the Catholic Church's alley, isn't it?

JJ said...

"While we are at it, do we want to take a swipe at blacks, or Hispanics, or Jews? I mean, they are so not-us too, right?"

I said 12-48 hours, right? I was being optimistic, obviously.

Anonymous said...

SOMEONE agrees with the article.

Anonymous said...

The article can be found here:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2202820/replies?c=22

Anonymous said...

Stunning anti-Catholic bigotry here, by you cleverer-than-thou hipsters. Even when faced with the facts, you prefer your snide supposed superiority, cloaked in the invincible armor of ignorance. Pathetic.

fern hill said...

Bigotry, schmigotry.

Facts? That that snide article was supposed to be funny? That it was written by a woman (some of the most misogynist people I know are women)?

It wasn't funny. It mocked the long and unending struggle for women's rights. And it did it on International Women's Day.

Now that's pathetic.

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