“I have a dream that one day white peoples will care about black people dying without Jon Stewart telling them they should.” Clint Smith III
I am glad that Jon Stewart said what he said. I’m glad that he’s getting through to people. But I wish more people would listen to the black people first.
So this guy hates EVERYONE… except for you. He’s a broody, arrogant misanthrope who just can’t stand people… except for you. You alone are the special, interesting, unique person worth his time, attention, and respect. Everyone else, as far as he’s concerned, is a tedious waste of time because they just don’t get it. They don’t get him!
Sure, his general misanthropy is kind of a character flaw, but it makes you feel sort of special that someone who hates everyone actually likes you. And maybe you can work on those rough edges! He’s nice to you, and that’s what matters, right?
Don’t buy into it, Jane Eyre. This kind of person may make you the exception for awhile, but why? Sure, you’re interesting and unique and you have a lot to offer, but so do some of the people he summarily dismisses. What’s the difference between you and them?
When someone is an asshole to literally everyone but you, he’s not an interesting, brooding soul. He’s an asshole. He wants something from you, so he’s willing to bend a little; he doesn’t think it’s worthwhile to show respect or courtesy to anyone he doesn’t want something from. And all that arrogance doesn’t mean he actually has anything to be arrogant about.
Don’t settle for someone with the personality of a rotten fish. You’re not being let into some exclusive club; you’ve just met an asshole who wants something from you. Pay attention to how a potential partner treats peoplehe doesn’t have to be nice to. It’s a pretty important clue to whether he’s fit company for human beings.
Tah DAH! The post that would have saved my ass six months ago.
White privilege is being a 21-year-old loser who plots and kills 9 people in their church and when you are confronted by the police, armed, you survive without incident. Later, when you’re escorted to the police station, you are not handcuffed and you even have a bulletproof vest for protection. Meanwhile, the media is already infantilizing you and blaming your actions on anything other than you, even though you planned this attack for 6 months. No one is asking why White men are so violent when 87% of mass killings in America have been committed by White men and nobody’s calling you a terrorist when your very intent was to cause terror.
I’m probably being slow but… isn’t “no romance in blurb” a good thing in this case?
Yes, which is why they’re still open and I’m looking at them. But the thing is the protags are men, and I was hoping to get some ladies.
Every book with a male protag I opened had no romance mentioned. But every woman did.
I just really don’t like romance. if it develops naturally that’s great. But “Woman must save world BUT MORE IMPORTANTLY MUST GET BOYFRIEND!” is just the kind of thing that makes me roll my eyes hard enough to come out the other side.
Agree with all of this! If you find any other books than the one someone else recommended, please share! :)
(Also, while they’re more pure fantasy than urban fantasy, Martha Wells’ books usually have female protagonists or co-protagonists and minimal romance, and when romance does happen it develops naturally and in the background and is not at all central to the plot. I love her books and highly recommend them!)
The Protector of the Small series by Tamora Pierce is pretty rad. It’s a medieval fantasy where a young girl trains to become a Knight, there’s a couple crushes but there’s not any ‘you’re my one true love and I can accomplish nothing without you’ silliness. I’m not doing the series any justice, but please go take a look!
Going on the ‘Protector of the Small’ recommendation, all of Tamora Pierce’s books feature female protags and very little romantic subplot. The ones where there is some romance, it’s not the ‘I’ve just met you and I want to have your babies’ type. It comes slowly and takes a backseat to everything else in the story. The Circle of Magic series (and its sequel ‘The Circle Opens’), in particular, features three badass girls who come from very different backgrounds, all have unique magical talents, and have no time for romantic encounters.
The Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs has a strong female lead. It’s urban fantasy and there is eventual romance but it doesn’t happen til a few books in. It’s werewolves so Mercy is all about her independence and she’s pretty kickass. The Harper Connelly series has another female lead. It’s a lot of murder mystery with supernatural thrown in. Again, romance is present but is gradual and not the main focus. Sunshine by Robin McKinley also has a female protagonist and there’s like no romance at all. She has a lover, but he’s barely in the book cuz she’s got other things to worry about. I think McKinley’s books are all mostly female protagonists and while I’ve only read one other besides Sunshine, they all seem to be strong leads and romance isn’t always a necessity. The October Daye series is another urban fantasy with a female lead. I’ve only read the first book, but there was no romance in that one and I’m not sure if any develops or not. And going off what other people were saying above, if you haven’t read Tamora Pierce’s stuff then you should totally check them out cuz they’re all great.
Mercy Thompson series eventually results in a massively terribly handled rape. Which is why I quit the series, though I know is still ongoing. Sunshine is good. October Daye eventually has romance but it’s all good. Tamora pierce is excellent as always, current SJ callouts withstanding.
if you’re looking for a *gasp* male driven urban fantasy, I suggest Nightlife by rob thurman. her name is actually robyn thurman, and she gets psuedo-complimented all the time for his(her!) true rendering of an american male urban fantasy character (namely, he has his own sex drive and it doesn’t magically appear when convenient to the plot).
I have a copy of Nightlife upstairs XD I haven’t got round to reading it yet. It’s sitting between Thieftaker and Rivers of London.
All of Rob Thurman’s books are fantastic. Her Trickster series takes place in the same universe as the Cal Leandros novels, but with an awesome female protagonist. Only two books right now, but they’re both great.
*points up the chain* OCTOBER DAYE BOOKS YES PLEASE. I adore Toby. She is clever and prickly and loyal and determined and collects strays like nobody’s business. While there is some romance in the books, it doesn’t define her or the series. READ IT AND BE FILLED WITH JOY! *flings Rosemary and Rue at everyone’s head*
Seanan McGuire has written MANY urban fantasy heroines who aren’t defined by their love lives or lack thereof. Rose Marshall is wonderfully unique, Verity Price of “Incryptids” fills my heart with ponies, and Henry (Henrietta) and Sloane in “Indexing” are a delight. I haven’t read her “Velveteen” series yet, but I expect similar awesomeness. Outside UF, her horror series “Newsflesh” has the brilliant George (short for Georgia), and oh my god you need to read them.
Seanan McGuire, ladies and gentlemen. She will make your brainmeats happy and crush your heart in the best way possible.
Also: DAW (my primary publisher) affords me an unusual degree of control in that they let me write my own back cover text, which is why it’s more accurate to the actual book than is actually the norm. But pretty much every time, my editor, my agent, the marketing folks, or all three will go “no, you need to mention the male lead more prominently.” Even if he has little to do with the plot, he needs to be mentioned.
Since I know most people don’t get to write their own back cover text, that means they also won’t be able to push back when “the boyfriend” is given center stage. So I try to keep that in mind when looking for new UF and grimacing at how central the romance plots appear to be.
“artificial intelligence that goes rogue and–” wow boring, instead how about an AI that wakes up and starts rerouting its systems to do good in the world, it starts secretly having flowers planted and sending greeting cards to its programmers and going online and reassuring anxious kids that everything will be ok, how about a Purely Good artificial intelligence that has literally no mean circuit in its entire system
a benevolent artificial intelligence aware of its existence battling a corrupt human government. can robots be capitalist? probably not.
And you know the best thing about this movie is they could have made Felix be the nice guy, be the understanding guy, the only guy who’s kind to Ralph, but they make him just as prejudiced as the other game characters. He wasn’t mean toRalph per say, but he wasn’t nice either, and definitely didn’t want to get involved with the trouble that followed Ralph around.
It’s only after Felix gets treated badly himself that he starts looking at how Ralph is treated by others, how Ralph is treated by him and changes his attitude.
Because that’s the thing, you don’t have to be the bad guy to be prejudiced. Sometimes you can be the nice guy who doesn’t do anything for or against, and sometimes that’s just as bad.
i just want a period piece centered around black people that isn’t about being slaves/servants
where’s our steamy 60s drama?
where’s our 30s Harlem Renaissance coming of age flick?
where’s our Victorian steampunk sci-fi adventure?
where is it? where? tell me where?????
in film or books, cus in books there’s
sula by toni morisson is a steamy psychological coming of age drama i’m pretty sure taking place in the 60′s or 50′s, about two black girls in a predominately black town in Ohio, whose lives go in different but parallel directions after sharing a childhood trauma.
mumbo jumbo is harlem renaissance era post-modern comedy about hougan detective searching for a mysterious suppressed african text, and battling the forces of white supremacy in a conspiracy to undermine black culture going back thousands of years.
yellow-back radio broke down is a western written like a radio-show about a black cowboy named the lupe garoo kid, and a clear influence on blazing saddles that would come years later.
perdido street station’s main character is a overweight black scientist, living in a Dickensian city of magical steam punk sci fi adventure and multiple sentient races, who is involved in a secret and illegal inter-species relationship with a beetle-headed artist, and on the verge of a breakthrough in unifying magic and science.
and pym (retro sci-fi/parody/adventure) and zone one (zombie survival horror) are great genre stories, but both are in modern era. this is also excluding afro-futurist stuff.
in film there’s
yeelen - set in ancient africa, about a young man with magic powers on a quest to find his evil sorcerer father. the first real fantasy film in african cinema. black writer, director, and cast.
daughters of the dust- set in a isolated black community living off the american coast over three generations. the first feature film directed by a black women. black writer, director, and cast.
harlem nights- harlem renaissance era crime comedy starring three generations of comedy genius. black writer, director, and cast.
hoodlum- underrated gangster film about black gangsters in harlem. black director and cast
ganja and hess- black vampire art film set in the 70s. black writer, director, and cast.
chameleon street- based on a true story about black con man in the 80s who was able to successfully impersonate lawyers, doctors, and professors, spielberg’s “catch me if you can” is essentially white washed version of the same idea. black writer, director, and cast.
the killer of sheep- neo-realist coming of age film about black lives in 70′s Watts, made originally as a student film thesis. black writer, director, and cast.
belle is period peace from a black film-maker, but predominately white cast, while beasts of the southern wild, attack the block, the people under the stairs,def by temptation, vampire in brooklyn, and after earth are sci-fi/fantasy/horror films with predominately black casts but not period pieces. Medicine for Melancholy, An Oversimplification Of Her Beauty, and Top Five are conversation driven romantic comedies with black, casts, writers, and directors. 90′s era set coming of age in the wood, the brothers, love and basketball, and upcoming dope.
i think nearly all other black films fall under Spike Lee, Tyler Perry, 70′s exploitation films, dance movies, 90′s hood films, civil rights & slavery films, musician biopics, African cinema, and pre-Hollywood Race Films, but I might have missed some that don’t fall into these.
Sorry to over-respond. Happy hunting.
much appreciated on the whole list! that was a lot of time and effort and it rocks
Now I'm seeing that Bradbury story, with the intelligent house, but it's an abandoned intelligent house in an urban area, and it's taking care of a whole clan of "feral" cats.
the confederate flag was never actually widely used during the civil war, or even adopted as the official flag of the confederate states of america. it only gained popularity because of its use by both the kkk and the states’ rights democratic party, a political party that opposed desegregation. the confederate flag has always been a symbol of white supremacists.
“The battle flag was never adopted by the Confederate Congress, never flew over any state capitols during the Confederacy, and was never officially used by Confederate veterans’ groups. The flag probably would have been relegated to Civil War museums if it had not been resurrected by the resurgent KKK and used by Southern Dixiecrats during the 1948 presidential election. … It is no accident that Confederate symbols have been the mainstay of white supremacist organizations, from the Ku Klux Klan to the skinheads. They did not appropriate the Confederate battle flag simply because it was pretty. They picked it because it was the flag of a nation dedicated to their ideals: ‘that the negro is not equal to the white man’. The Confederate flag, we are told, represents heritage, not hate. But why should we celebrate a heritage grounded in hate, a heritage whose self-avowed reason for existence was the exploitation and debasement of a sizeable segment of its population?”
After the massacre in Charleston, South Carolina, left nine black people dead, all the official flags throughout the state flew at half-mast. All but one: the Confederate flag. The symbol of slavery remained full-mast, defiantly flying high at the S.C. State House. Now nearly 100,000 people are fighting back — but sadly, it will take great effort to get it removed.
I didn’t do my job today. I’ve got nothing for you in terms of jokes and sounds because of what happened in South Carolina. And maybe if I wasn’t nearing the end of the run or this wasn’t such a common occurrence, maybe I could have pulled out of the spiral. But I didn’t.
I honestly have nothing other than just sadness once again that we have to peer into the abyss of the depraved violence that we do to each other and the nexus of a just gaping racial wound that will not heal yet we pretend doesn’t exist. I’m confident though, that by acknowledging it – by staring into that and seeing it for what it is…We still won’t do jack shit. Yeah, that’s us. And that’s the part that blows my mind.
I don’t want to get into the political argument of guns and things. What blows my mind is the disparity of response between when we think people that are foreign are going to kill us and us killing ourselves…
If this had been what we thought was Islamic terrorism, it would fit into our [narrative]. We invaded two countries and spent trillions of dollars and [lost] thousands of American lives and now fly unmanned death machines over like five or six different counties, all to keep Americans safe. We’ve got to do whatever we can – we’ll torture people. We’ve got to do whatever we can to keep Americans safe. But nine people shot in a church, what about that? “Hey, what are you going go to do? Crazy is as crazy is, right?”
That’s the part that I cannot, for the life of me, wrap my head around. And you know it’s gonna go down the same path. “This is a terrible tragedy.” They are already using the nuanced language of lack of effort for this.
This is a terrorist attack. This is a violent attack on the Emanuel Church in South Carolina which is a symbol for the black community. It has stood in that part of Charleston for a hundred and some years and has been attacked viciously many times – as many black churches have. And to pretend that – I heard someone on the news say – “tragedy has visited this church”. This wasn’t a tornado. This was a racist. This was a guy with a Rhodesia badge on his sweater. So the idea that – I hate to even use this pun – but this one is black and white. There’s no nuance here. And we’re gonna keep pretending like, “I don’t get it, what happened. This one guy lost his mind.”
But we are steeped in that culture in this country and we refuse to recognize it. And I cannot believe how hard people are working to discount it. In South Carolina, the roads that people drive on are named for Confederate generals who fought to keep black people from being able to drive freely on that road. That’s insanity. That’s racial wallpaper. You can’t allow that.
Nine people were shot in a black church by a white guy who hated them – who wanted to start some kind of civil war. The Confederate flag flies over South Carolina and the roads are named for Confederate generals. And the white guy is the one who feels his country’s being taken away from him. We’re bringing it on ourselves.
And that’s the thing – Al Qaeda, all those guys, ISIS – they’re not shit compared to the damage that we can apparently do to ourselves on a regular basis.
We - and by we, I mean, white feminists - need to talk about how Dylann Storm Roof, the Charleston terrorist, used white female purity to justify murdering black people.
“I have to do it,” he said. “You rape our women.”
This myth - that black men rape and assault white women - has been used to justify the murder of black people for centuries. It was used to justify lynchings. It was used to justify slavery. It is still used today.
And white feminists absolutely NEED TO REPUDIATE this myth, because white women’s tacit approval - and sometimes vocal agreement - with this myth is part of what allows this terrorism to happen.
People like Dylann Storm believe white women need to be protected from black men.
We don’t.
I stand in solidarity with the black community, not with people like Dylann Storm. He does not speak for me.
Every horrible, gut twisting crime of this sort is its own unique tragedy. But as a colleague asked Thursday morning, “Haven’t we been here before? This is not Aurora. This is Birmingham.” The New York Times reported just earlier this week, “Right-wing extremists averaged 337 attacks per year in the decade after 9/11, causing a total of 254 fatalities.” That’s not a failure of immigration law, or an attack on Christianity, or anything else that fits into a convenient to conservatives narrative. This is what hate looks like. This is what terrorism looks like. And as the Times notes, “Right-wing, anti-government extremism is the leading source of ideological violence in America.”
Many important things will be said in the next few weeks about the murder of nine people holding a prayer meeting at a predominantly African American church yesterday. Assuming that Dylann Roof is the murderer and that he made the proclamation being quoted in the media, I want to say: “I am a white woman. No more murder in my name.”
Before gunning down a room full of black worshippers, Roof reportedly said:
I have to do it. You rape our women and you’re taking over our country. And you have to go.
For my two cents, I want to suggest that Roof’s alleged act was motivated by racism, first and foremost, but also sexism. In particular, a phenomenon called benevolent sexism.
Sociologists use the term to describe the attribution of positive traits to women that, nonetheless, justify their subordination to men. For example, women may be described as good with people, but this is believed to make them perform poorly in competitive arenas like work, sports, or politics. Better that they leave that to the men. Women are wonderful with children, they say, but this is used to suggest that they should take primary responsibility for unpaid, undervalued domestic work. Better that they let men support them.
And, the one that Roof used to rationalize his racist act was: Women are beautiful, but their grace makes them fragile. Better that they stand back and let men defend them. This argument is hundreds of years old, of course. It’s most clearly articulated in the history of lynching in which black men were routinely violently murdered by white mobs using the excuse that they raped a white woman.
I stand with Jessie Daniel Ames and her “revolt against chivalry” in the 1920s and ’30s. Ames was one of the first white women to speak out against lynching, arguing that its rationale was sexist as well as racist. Roof is the modern equivalent of this white mob. He believes that he and other white men own me and women like me — “you rape our women,” he said possessively — and so he justified gunning down innocent black people on my behalf. You are vulnerable, he’s whispering to me, let me protect you.
All oppression is interconnected. The matrix of domination must come down. I am a white woman. No more murder in my name.
“And what we also have to remember too is that this isn’t just a murder of nine people. This was the assassination of a US elected official. And so we need to use real language.”
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Christina Greer on The Nightly Show, spilling all the tea about why we have no choice but to call this domestic terrorism. She went further in pairing it up to the actual legal definition.
Please never forget that Reverend Clementa Pinckney was a South Carolina State Senator, and has served in public office since the age of 23. The media is already working overtime to humanize the terrorist over the many victims of his heinous acts. Even the articles about Rev Pinckney seem to only mention his elected position as a footnote. He was a staunch political activist. Also, remember that the terrorist drove over hours from his home specifically to Emaneul AME.
Every state in the US fails to comply with international standards on the lethal use of force by law enforcement officers, according to a report by Amnesty International USA, which also says 13 US states fall beneath even lower legal standards enshrined in US constitutional law and that nine states currently have no laws at all to deal with the issue.
The stinging review comes amid a national debate over police violence and widespread protest following the high-profile deaths of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri; 43-year-old Eric Garner in New York; 50-year-oldWalter Scott in South Carolina; and 25-year-old Freddie Gray in Baltimore – all unarmed black men killed by police within the past 11 months.
Amnesty USA executive director Steven Hawkins told the Guardian the findings represented a “shocking lack of fundamental respect for the sanctity of human life”.
“While law enforcement in the United States is given the authority to use lethal force, there is no equal obligation to respect and preserve human life. It’s shocking that while we give law enforcement this extraordinary power, so many states either have no regulation on their books or nothing that complies with international standards,” Hawkins said.
Amnesty found that in all 50 states and Washington DC, written statutes were too broad to fit these international standards, concluding: “None of the laws establish the requirement that lethal force may only be used as a last resort with non-violent means and less harmful means to be tried first. The vast majority of laws do not require officers to give a warning of their intent to use firearms.”
This last bolded bit? This is why the rest of the world looks askance at the US
These are the 9 victims of the terrorist shooting attack at “Mother” Emanuel AME church in Charleston, SC. Now that he’s been arrested, let’s delete all our pictures of the shooter and remember the victims instead. His name should be forgotten. Theirs deserve to be remembered.
Their names, from left to right, top to bottom, are:
Tywanza Sanders: Recent graduate of Allen University in Columbia, SC.
Sharonda Coleman-Singleton: Mother of three, reverend, and beloved high school track coach.
Clementa Pinckney: Church pastor and S.C. state senator.
Cynthia Hurd: A 30+ year veteran librarian at Charleston County Public Library.
Myra Thompson (not pictured): Wife of Anthony Thompson, a vicar at Holy Trinity REC.
Ethel Lee Lance (not pictured): A 70 year old grandmother who had worked in the church for over 30 years.
Daniel Simmons (not pictured): A staff member at the church.
Rev. Depayne Middleton-Doctor: Mother of 4, sang in the church choir.
Susie Jackson: 87 years old. Longtime church member and a member of the Order of the Eastern Star.
okay so i want a million punk/ no power vigilante aus featuring:
Scappy skinny Steve, artist and full time justice warrior, who can take a hit and keep getting back up. Skinny little Steve Rogers that people don’t fuck with because the kids all sharp angles and boney elbows that he knows how to use. Little Steve Rogers with a mouth and an attitude that just won’t quite.
Actual Queen Peggy Carter who just oozes class and grace, even when she’s smiling with her red lips, the same color as her busted knuckles after she knocks some bastards teeth in, steps over the body in her pretty stiletto heels. Peggy Carter, who takes men down, and walks the girls the were harassing home.
Road Warrior Natasha who dresses like a biker queen on her black Harley, a bike men try to tell her is too much machine for her, right before she breaks fingers and cracks skulls. She’s got a bitch face that can freeze your blood in your veins. Nastasha, who’ll mace you in the face without even breaking stride if you fuck with her neighborhood.
King of the streets Sam Wilson, who if you ask kids in the neighbor hood, they’ll swear he can fly, the way he jumps between the roof tops. Sam who’s door is always open to people who have no where to go because the bastard are afraid to cross his threshold. He’s a good soul but there is hell under his skin when the occasion calls for it and Sam Wilson doesn’t stand around when wrongs need righted.
Straight hitter Bucky Barnes who taught himself to fight one handed after he lost his arm. Bucky Barnes, who had to play both sides of the field, who had to be the bad guy to keep his head above water and who paid for it ten times over. Bucky Barnes who stands guard outside the little shops that are waiting on edge to get shaken down, flipping a knife in his fingers and wearing a face that dares people to try and start shit.
“he looks light skinned black” my nigga shut the fuck up that hair cut itself screams white serial killer get the fuck outta here “light skinned black” smfh y'all white people crazy
Let that sink in, the only reason a 5 year old is NOT dead is because she had to play dead. I’m sorry but “extreme hatred of black people” was the motivation for the shooting. The man who did this is a terrorist, plane and simple. Yet you will not here white people calling him that.
