If you’re a boy writer, it’s a simple rule: you’ve gotta get used to the fact that you suck at writing women and that the worst women writer can write a better man than the best male writer can write a good woman. And it’s just the minimum. Because the thing about the sort of heteronormative masculine privilege, whether it’s in Santo Domingo, or the United States, is you grow up your entire life being told that women aren’t human beings, and that women have no independent subjectivity. And because you grow up with this, it’s this huge surprise when you go to college and realize that, “Oh, women aren’t people who does my shit and fucks me.” And I think that this a huge challenge for boys, because they want to pretend they can write girls. Every time I’m teaching boys to write, I read their women to them, and I’m like, “Yo, you think this is good writing?” These motherfuckers attack each other over cliche lines but they won’t attack each other over these toxic representations of women that they have inherited… their sexist shorthand, they think that is observation. They think that their sexist distortions are insight. And if you’re in a writing program and you say to a guy that their characters are sexist, this guy, it’s like you said they fucking love Hitler. They will fight tooth and nail because they want to preserve this really vicious sexism in the art because that is what they have been taught. And I think the first step is to admit that you, because of your privilege, have a very distorted sense of women’s subjectivity. And without an enormous amount of assistance, you’re not even going to get a D. I think with male writers the most that you can hope for is a D with an occasional C thrown in. Where the average women writer, when she writes men, she gets a B right off the bat, because they spent their whole life being taught that men have a subjectivity. In fact, part of the whole feminism revolution was saying, “Me too, motherfuckers.” So women come with it built in because of the society. It’s the same way when people write about race. If you didn’t grow up being a subaltern person in the United States, you might need help writing about race. Motherfuckers are like ‘I got a black boy friend,’ and their shit sounds like Klan Fiction 101. The most toxic formulas in our cultures are not pass down in political practice, they’re pass down in mundane narratives. It’s our fiction where the toxic virus of sexism, racism, homophobia, where it passes from one generation to the next, and the average artist will kill you before they remove those poisons. And if you want to be a good artist, it means writing, really, about the world. And when you write cliches, whether they are sexist, racist, homophobic, classist, that is a fucking cliche. And motherfuckers will kill you for their cliches about x, but they want their cliches about their race, class, queerness. They want it in there because they feel lost without it. So for me, this has always been the great challenge. As a writer, if you’re really trying to write something new, you must figure out, with the help of a community, how can you shed these fucking received formulas. They are received. You didn’t come up with them. And why we need fellow artists is because they help us stay on track. They tell you, “You know what? You’re a bit of a fucking homophobe.” You can’t write about the world with these simplistic distortions. They are cliches. People know art, always, because they are uncomfortable. Art discomforts. The trangressiveness of art has to deal with confronting people with the real. And sexism is a way to avoid the real, avoiding the reality of women. Homophobia is to avoid the real, the reality of queerness. All these things are the way we hide from encountering the real. But art, art is just about that.

Junot Díaz speaking at Word Up Bookshop, 2012  (via unapologetically-yellow)

this. this. and all of THIS!

If owning a gun and knowing how to use it worked, the military would be the safest place for a woman. It’s not. If women covering up their bodies worked, Afghanistan would have a lower rate of sexual assault than Polynesia. It doesn’t. If not drinking alcohol worked, children would not be raped. They are. If your advice to a woman to avoid rape is to be the most modestly dressed, soberest and first to go home, you may as well add “so the rapist will choose someone else”. If your response to hearing a woman has been raped is “she didn’t have to go to that bar/nightclub/party” you are saying that you want bars, nightclubs and parties to have no women in them. Unless you want the women to show up, but wear kaftans and drink orange juice. Good luck selling either of those options to your friends. Or you could just be honest and say that you don’t want less rape, you want (even) less prosecution of rapists.

A Short Post on Rape Prevention (via brute-reason)

BOO + YAH!

read the whole post.

the way the world exists right now, the proper thing to do is say that most men of the world are JUST not like this.

that is simply bullshit.

this is the majority view/behavior/wtfever summed up.

and that shit needs to change. and by that i mean immediately. 

sarah is so right that this man will see no social consequences from this outburst, no one will make him a pariah for his misogyny.

why?

if it had been her, she would have been written off as a bitch by all those around.

this is horribly fucked up. and some say sexism no longer exists.....

I was dealing with some personal ish and decided to grab dinner with a friend and then meet some other folks to watch the debate/football. Was already stressed and emotional, but whatever, had some whiskey and some ice cream and was feeling OK by the time we were actually able to leave our spots...

holy hell, what an amazing man

totally, completely, and wholly agree

people, please be more like this

If you aren’t a fan of Patrick Stewart (Captain Jon Luc Picard of STNG), this might make you ask yourself why not? “Our house was small, and when you grow up with domestic violence in a confined space you learn to gauge, very precisely, the temperature of situations. I knew exactly when the shouting was done and a hand was about to be raised – I also knew exactly when to insert a small body between the fist and her face, a skill no child should ever have to learn. Curiously, I never felt fear for myself and he never struck me, an odd moral imposition that would not allow him to strike a child. The situation was barely tolerable: I witnessed terrible things, which I knew were wrong, but there was nowhere to go for help. Worse, there were those who condoned the abuse. I heard police or ambulance men, standing in our house, say, “She must have provoked him,” or, “Mrs Stewart, it takes two to make a fight.” They had no idea. The truth is my mother did nothing to deserve the violence she endured. She did not provoke my father, and even if she had, violence is an unacceptable way of dealing with conflict. Violence is a choice a man makes and he alone is responsible for it.” ~Patrick Stewart By: Independence House, Inc. Hyannis, MA

Please share this.

AMAZING!!!

Oskar the Blind Cat vs. Blow Dryer 

Transvaginal ultrasounds to dissuade you from getting an abortion

Now, strip-searches to dissuade you from dissenting or risking arrest

Invasive policies that deploy sexual assault in order to keep you in line

Where does it end?

there is nothing right and/or okay with this idea

Pic Nic Pants: The jeans that double as a picnic table

“The flap functions as a table on which to rest a sandwich or chicken leg, and also boasts an adjustable drink holder that attaches to the outside of one leg.”

The craziest part of this brainwashing is how a very basic situation has been twisted into something incredibly ugly. An unarmed child is shot and killed for doing nothing but walking home by a man with no authority who had been told to stand down by the police. This is cut and dry. You can look at this and go, “Oh, that’s a tragedy.” But because the kid was black, because everything is ultra-politicized, because racism is so ingrained in the DNA of the United States of America, this is somehow a controversy. I repeat: an unarmed child was shot dead by a grown man. This is one situation that everyone should be able to understand. It’s a nightmare scenario for every family ever. And yet… the news is telling us that the child may have possibly been a thug, a drug dealer, a hoodlum, a monster, as if any of that has anything to do with why he got shot. There are people out there actively digging up (incorrect) dirt on Trayvon Martin as if that matters at all. He’s a… I don’t even know, a point in a long-running argument, an abstraction about the evils of black youth.

http://4thletter.net/2012/03/thats-just-the-way-it-is/ (via comixace)

a really great article that you should read in full

This is Richard Hayne, President and CEO of Urban Outfitters. He’s also a supporter of Rick Santorum and donated over $13,000 to him. He’s against gay marriage and abortion. His company pulled a pro-gay shirt back in 08, they also blatantly ripped off an Etsy designers work, featured a t-shirt for women that said “eat less” and most recently had a card with a “tranny” slur on in. Why do you shop at this store? I imagine because you weren’t aware of these facts. Now you are, so stop shopping there.

I want to tread carefully here: I do not accuse Kristof of racism nor do I believe he is in any way racist. I have no doubt that he has a good heart. Listening to him on the radio, I began to think we could iron the whole thing out over a couple of beers. But that, precisely, is what worries me. That is what made me compare American sentimentality to a “wounded hippo.” His good heart does not always allow him to think constellationally. He does not connect the dots or see the patterns of power behind the isolated “disasters.” All he sees are hungry mouths, and he, in his own advocacy-by-journalism way, is putting food in those mouths as fast as he can. All he sees is need, and he sees no need to reason out the need for the need. But I disagree with the approach taken by Invisible Children in particular, and by the White Savior Industrial Complex in general, because there is much more to doing good work than “making a difference.” There is the principle of first do no harm. There is the idea that those who are being helped ought to be consulted over the matters that concern them.

The White Savior Industrial Complex - Teju Cole - International - The Atlantic

(bolding mine)

this. charity allows you to feel better and to ignore the root problems. to give handouts instead of talking to people.

it is particularly dangerous for someone like Kristof, who is at least theoretically a journalist. your job is to talk to people, to get the whole story, to get as deep into it as you can. particularly when you have the luxury of a fat New York Times paycheck and travel budget, you damn well owe it to the people you cover not just to skim the surface of their stories. your job is not to fix their problems, your job is to help them tell their stories. 

I used to wonder how one could do this kind of journalism and NOT want to save people, to help the individual right in front of you right now, even if it doesn’t solve the problem. because it is so tempting and so hard. covering labor issues makes it a little bit easier for me—the people in front of me don’t need what little money or “help” I can give, they need more people to hear their story. they need solidarity in a very practical way. there is no “saving” I can do. 

the people who want to “save” people always seem to want to do it overseas, too. they don’t want to save people in their own country, their own city. they only wanted to save people in New Orleans when the city was flooded—then we saw Anderson Cooper and Geraldo and the rest of them rolling up their sleeves and carrying babies. 

your job is not to save people. your job is to help them tell their stories. when you become the story, you are no longer doing your job. 

(via champagnecandy)

i am so hating on you and your seeing the magnetic fields right now.

HATING!!!!!!

this gets a much deserved mumblegrumble&shit, but glad you had a good time

Every year I go to SXSW Music, I keep a handwritten notebook alongside me to take notes of each show I see. This year I managed to see 39 bands, 2 movies and help a friend with a brand new baby during music. I try to rank shows in the top 10 order, but this year there were several that blew me...

mr anderson, you are killing me. i swear you know about my NO bruce willis rule. i swear it. then you go and cast him in this and of course i feel i must see it.

mumblegrumble&shit...

Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom - Official HD Trailer

Como gran parte de la filmografía de Anderson, promete… Ojalá cumpla, como gran parte de sus películas lo ha hecho.

this is wonderful

damn i miss vinnie's being 3 blocks away

and my after shift treat for when i volunteered at empty cages

rip freddie, 20 yrs on

sexismandthecity:

Trafficking of Females

michaelzeon:This is so fucked up.

thenearsightedmonkey:

I was a kid growing up in a troubled household. We didn’t have books in the house but we did have the daily paper and I remember picking out Family Circus before I could really read.

There was something about the life on the other side of that circle that looked pretty good.  For kids like me there was a map and a compass hidden in Family Circus. The parents in that comic strip really loved their children. Their home was stable. It put that image in my head and I kept it. I’d always heard that great art will cause people to burst into tears but the only time it ever happened to me was when I was introduced to Bil Keane’s son, Jeff.  As soon as I shook his hand I just started bawling my face off because I realized  I had climbed through the circle.

And how I did it was by making pictures and writing stories.

I am so very sad to know Bil Keane has died. To me the Family Circus is my family. They are my soul family in the image world.

That’s why if you say a word against Family Circus to me I will slug you so hard.