Sophianotloren

I tried calling my mom on her cell earlier to remind her to stop by the bank. The call connected, but I couldn’t hear anything on her end, so I hung up and tried calling back.

My dad answered, and I could hear him but he couldn’t hear my end. After a “hello? hello?” or two on each side, he tried addressing me… by a name that is no longer mine.

I had forgotten just how fucking much it hurts to hear that sound. Twice, like a stab to the gut. That syllable repeated, an echo of a little boy I used to be, a firm reminder of the little boy he still sees. He started to say something else — I figured he was going to let me know that my mom was driving, which I already had assumed since that’s the only reason someone else would answer her phone.

I sent a text saying why I had been calling, with a little silly note about technology being unreliable. I pretended I hadn’t felt anything. Hours and hours later, I’m awake in the middle of the night and it all hits me again.

I want to shout at them — especially him — “My name is Sophia. My name is Sophia! MY NAME IS SOPHIA!” I want to show them how much it hurts. The angry part of me wants to hurt them back, to make them know my pain. The compassionate rest of me — the part I listen to because they taught me to trust that compassionate voice, taught me that love is so much stronger than anger — wants to hold them close and look them deep in the eyes and show them how much it means when I speak my full name, first, middle, last. I want so very, very much to hear them speak my name back to me, to know that they see me; that they understand who I am.

I can’t be who or what they wanted me to be. I can only be who I am, and I am who I must be. And I don’t know how to help them see that. I wish, but wishing never made it so. I hope, but hope seems to fail me. I try to show them love, but I need their love in return because I can’t keep endlessly giving away that love if it never comes back to me.

It hurts. It hurts so, so much.

Filed under: General

SAN FRANCISCO — The past year has seen many powerful, violent images. Whether of the racial justice movement in the United States, the democracy movement in Hong Kong, or the many conflicts and natural disasters in different parts of the world, gripping images have dominated the internet and broadcast media. They ripple out, get remixed into memes or reappropriated into other contexts, and are then spread broadly across different networks. Out of context, viral images of violence can appear to tell a full story, but in fact they can only reflect a small part of the larger truth.

Threshold, a video and mirror installation by Sanaz Mazinani at the Asian Art Museum (curated by Marc Mayer, with whom I’ll be working with on a museum event this summer and who gave me a tour of this show), combines beautiful, laser-cut mirrors along the walls while a looping video at the back of the installation shows kaleidoscopic explosions taken from popular Hollywood films. It’s not immediately obvious that they come from the world of entertainment, but little details — like an airplane — give us clues. Inspired by regular trips to Iran, where the artist was born, Mazinani references Islamic geometric designs in laser cuts, including the mirrored interior of the Shah Cheragh mosque. As the museum walls twinkle and undulate with reflections of these explosions, a soft bass, composed by Mani Mazinani (the artist’s brother), pounds like a heartbeat.

When I visited, I couldn’t help but take a selfie, and it seemed that most visitors felt the same. But as I lifted my phone, I saw my face broken into many layers and views, not just on the wall in front of me, but on the side walls. While the construct of a fractured mirror initially struck me as a cliché, I found the details of Mazinani’s installation, with clean, geometric lines, offered a fresh take on the concept. Peering through star-shaped holes in the mirrors, I saw more mirrors, which in turn reflected the explosions, which were themselves refracted to begin with.

“Architecture and site are important in understanding one’s position from which the world is viewed,” Mazinani noted in a statement. “The mirrored surface provides a reflective space, a place for speculation on the nature of perception, and the complexities of representation and the self.”

The choice of Hollywood representations of violence lends a dimension of uneasy seduction to the piece. For so many people living outside of war zones, Hollywood and other forms of mass, broadcast media provide the only vision of what conflict looks like. Highly aestheticized, Threshold awes, and the shock comes after realizing that the shimmers in the walls are in fact aestheticized images of violence. These representations, like Mazinani’s installation, capture attention and mesmerize. But unlike her work, they exist more to entertain than unsettle.

Viewed from afar, images of violence can depict only a part of the whole story, and their spread and dissemination blur the context. The perspective on the ground is often more painful and traumatic than anyone can imagine, but all we’re left with are images that tell a myriad of tiny, incomplete truths.

Sanaz Mazinani: Threshold continues at the Asian Art Museum (200 Larkin St., San Francisco) through May 3. 

by Gaius Publius

I haven't written much about Greece lately, but there's quite a story going on. It's not that difficult to follow, but you have to be careful whom you read. Conventional wisdom (backed by corporate, pro-austerity media outlets here and abroad) says it's a morality tale — bad Greeks who went into too much debt and now they can't pay up. Good German bankers want their money and are reluctant to forgive bad deeds because it might encourage other debt-owing entities to seek relief as well. They're calling that "moral hazard," fear that a bailout might encourage more bad behavior. There must be consequences, or so they think.

The bottom line of those who tell this tale — Greece provides a place for lovers of austerity (like cuts to social programs) to point and sneer. Their refrain, which I'm sure you've heard, is "We don't want to end up like Greece, do we?"

The reality of the Greek situation is different — not hard to understand, just different. Briefly, the Greek back story is a tale of looting, but by elites. Greek elites looted the economy through their control of government and their tax avoidance; American banks like Chase looted Greece by selling them unaffordable swap deals (the link is to Matt Taibbi's great reporting) which masked Greek economic problems, for a while; and at the same time, European bankers poured a ton of hot money into the Greek economy (and that of Spain, Italy, Portugal and other "peripheral" countries) looking for profit in a bubble.

Then the bubble burst in Europe — in Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy, everywhere the hot money flowed. And now the European bankers, especially the Germans, want to be made whole. Despite the fact that the country is in depression and on the verge of radical political transformation, Greece, in their minds, must pay its debts. Period. 

All you need to know:








Something is about to break, and it could break very soon. If Greece defaults on its government debt, it will send shock waves around the world. If Greece also exits the euro, the consequences will likely be worse, though maybe not worse for Greece.

How Syriza Has Painted Itself Into a Corner

With all of that said, I want to send you to the best analytical article I've read about Greece and the problem facing Syriza. As you'll read, they tried to do something very clever. It didn't work. This comes via Naked Capitalism; please read Yves Smith's excellent introduction to this analysis, then the analysis itself. A taste (my occasional emphasis):

Why Syriza Failed

Yves here. While the path for the ruling Greek government to make a deal with its creditors is fraught, it is pressing forward to try to come to an agreement by the next Eurogroup meeting, May 11. Greece has an IMF payment due May 12 that it will find difficult to meet. With the new urgency and the, um, realignment of the negotiating team, the odds now look to favor Greece capitulating even in the event of a default even if the ruling coalition tries holding ground on some of its red lines like pensions. If a default were to occur, it’s not hard to imagine that the IMF and the ECB would make Greece an offer it can’t refuse: the IMF would reverse itself on giving Greece a grace period for its payment if it relented on the disputed issues, otherwise the ECB would have no choice in light of the default to remove or limit its support under the ELA [Emergency Liquidity Assistance][.] That would force Greece to impose capital controls, nationalize its banks, and issue drachma to [recapitalize] them. Both the Greek public and most Syriza members are opposed to a Grexit [Greek exit from the eurozone]. ...

With those dates in mind, especially May 12, consider the following. Yves printed it in full in her post. I'm including a portion, with the hope that you go to the source and read the rest. As I mentioned above, this is the most enlightened piece on where Greece stands now, and what Syriza has tried (and failed) to do, that I've seen anywhere.

From a Washington DC insider

Syriza Has Created a Beg-ocracy Based on Fear

It’s been two months since Syiza took power, which is enough time to do some sort of evaluation of their governing philosophy. Here’s what we know. When Alexis Tsipras was elected to head the new Greek state, his government promised two mutually exclusive objectives. The first was to stay in the Euro. The second was to repudiate the policies of austerity and the colonial arrangement of the institutions that manage the Euro. Both policies represented different wings of the Syriza coalition, and Tsipras believes both must be placated.

Tsipras’s strategy was not to pick one of these objectives and stick with it to the exclusion of the other, but to attempt to mesh the two of them in an audacious attempt to transform the entire Eurozone.

Tsipras decided to make Greece a demonstration project. When he was elected, he spoke early on of a “European New Deal”, in a nod to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s new governing arrangements. And indeed, his early legislative attempts included things like ‘food stamps’ and electricity for the poor. His finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis, talked of European-wide investment in infrastructure to boost overall European aggregate demand.

By governing Greece reasonably well and reducing corruption, along with taking money from those who didn’t need it and giving it to those who do need it, they were hoping to show European elites and voters that another way was possible. With the added boost from more European economic activity, Greece could prosper. Certainly it would grow since its base state is so depressed.

In other words, Tsipras and Varoufakis sought to ‘save Europe from itself’ by demonstrating that the austerity policies peddled by European banking elites were tearing Europe apart....

The European project is one of the great achievements of humanity. From the fall of the Roman empire until 1945, [Europe] has basically been one giant warzone, with varying degrees of violence. The EU was essentially an American-brokered marriage between France and Germany. This union was then expanded outwards, with a strong social welfare state undergirding peace and prosperity. This is the EU that they want to save[.] ...

Keep that last in mind. The postwar "European project" is itself an attempt to prevent one more continent-wide disaster. To repeat: "From the fall of the Roman empire until 1945, [Europe] has basically been one giant warzone, with varying degrees of violence." And: "Tsipras and Varoufakis sought to ‘save Europe from itself’ by demonstrating that the austerity policies peddled by European banking elites were tearing Europe apart."

But it's not working:

Nevertheless, the EU has been inverted. It is now a set of actors going through a set of austerity policies that in geopolitical terms reflect the Saw horror films, sadistic conditions imposed by bankers and Eurocrats who just enjoy the torture. America is absent. Germany is dominant and malevolent, both corrupt and self-pitying. Nationalism and greed are increasingly rampant, with fewer and fewer institutional controls. It is in this environment that Syriza leaders are trying to negotiate what are essentially fiscal transfers in a structurally deficient currency union that has been organized to suck wealth from the periphery and transfer it to German banks.

Which leaves Syriza holding the bag. As the writer says:

What this means is that Tsipras and Varoufakis are now effectively working for bankers. [emphasis in original] They do not want to govern with an independent power base, they do not believe in governing along the lines of what they promised unless it is easy to do so, and they are organizing their governing apparatus as a beg-ocracy. ... It’s been two months straight of negotiations, which looks more and more like begging, and they have had no time to take control of the bureaucracies or to pay attention to what is going on in any area except the immediate political situation. The Greek economy is not improving, because the uncertainty has impeded what little commerce there was. ...

Syriza leaders ... are not bad people, and in ordinary situations, they might even be good leaders. But the strategy being pursued is bad and their attitude based on being afraid of the Europeans is worse. This is a fight over power, and Greek leaders simply aren’t willing to advocate for their own people in any serious way. They are deluding themselves about who they are up against. ...

I'll point you to the rest, and to the writer's bottom line. Syriza tried to save both Greece and Europe, at least by this analysis (one I think is essentially correct). It looks like Europe, driven by the culture of greed and by German elites, doesn't want to be saved. Like the hyper-rich everywhere, Europeans just want their money.

There's an inherent risk in lending, but they don't want to assume those consequences (talk about the "moral hazard" of never facing consequences). European bankers are doing everything in their power to "make themselves whole," but it's not going to work. And in my estimation it's going to not-work very soon. I agree with the writer: "Time’s about up."

I'm putting this up so what happens next won't catch you by surprise. TPP is the biggest hot story in the country right now, and rightly so. But the slow death of Greece, and potentially the "European project," is the biggest cold story, the one you hear nothing about. Until you do.

The world is collapsing because of greed and the unwillingness of those with billions to part with a dime. People are in debt because they're broke. Breaking them further just brings us closer to this. It's not dark yet, but it's getting there. Stay tuned.

GP

After five years, seven months, and eighteen days at The Rumpus, Ted Wilson Reviews the World is coming to an end. Then it’s immediately coming to a beginning when it begins appearing each week at Electric Literature, starting today.

My time at The Rumpus has been wonderful, and I’ll miss being a part of it. I have a lot of fond memories, like the time Isaac Fitzgerald and I got lost in the woods overnight and he cut off all his hair with a pair of nail clippers so we’d have a blanket to keep warm. (It was itchy, but it worked so well we spent an extra night in the woods just for fun.) Or the time Stephen Elliott hugged me from behind and said “I’m sorry your wife died,” even though I was in the middle of eating a sandwich and watching TV. I couldn’t finish my sandwich after remembering Rosie but I still appreciated the sentiment. The Rumpus has made me who I am; whoever I am.

My decision to make the move to Electric Literature was purely logistical. For years I’ve had to mail my reviews all the way to The Rumpus offices in San Francisco, and many of the reviews were often lost in transit. Of my 281 reviews to-date, 642 were actually written. In fairness to the USPS, a number of the ones that didn’t make it had been dropped off at what I thought was a mailbox but turned out to be a tree stump. That one’s on me.

No longer will I have to suffer through days of uncertainty and worry about my letter arriving. I’ll also be saving a ton in postage. Now I’ll be able to hand deliver my reviews to New York City. It’s only eight hours of driving time, which means I can leave home at 4am and be back in time for lunch. Email has never been a reliable option because you never know if the email upload-link will work.

It’s sad to say goodbye. As I write this I’m literally wiping away a tear. I hope it’s my own and there’s no one standing over me, crying onto me. I’m too scared to look. I’m excited to see all the wonderful pieces The Rumpus will continue to publish in my absence, and to read their new replacement column which I hope is called Why We Miss Ted Wilson.

The Rumpus will continue to be my friend, and I will continue to be yours. If you ever need me, my phone number is (617) 379-2576, my email is iamtedwilson@gmail.com, and you can also be my Twitter friend at @iamtedwilson.

Your Friend Forever,
Ted

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Art Pope’s lackeys are working to change North Carolina education standards in ways that make climate change denial, abstinence-only sex ed, and creationism almost seem rational.

The state Senate will vote Wednesday on whether to add the gold standard and other conservative principles to the state’s high school curriculum.

Senate Bill 524, sponsored by Sen. David Curtis R-Lincoln, builds on a law passed in 2011 requiring the addition of a “Founding Principles” curriculum to the state’s history standards.

The curriculum, a model bill from conservative free-market think tank American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, requires students to receive education on the nation’s “Founding Philosophy and Principles” as found in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Federalist Papers.

The five principles to be added to the curriculum are as follows:

“Constitutional limitations on government power to tax and spend and prompt payment of public debt”
“Money with intrinsic value”
“Strong defense and supremacy of civil authority over military”
“Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none”
“Eternal vigilance by ‘We the People”’

“Money with intrinsic value – is that in the Federalist Papers?” asked Sen. Josh Stein D-Wake.

“Yes, it is,” Curtis replied, with agreement from Sen. Jerry Tillman R-Randolph.

In fact, it is not. A search of all 85 letters that make up the Federalist Papers turns up no mention of money with intrinsic value. It is, however, taken verbatim from the ALEC model bill.

These people aren’t just corporate lapdogs. They are also idiots. I also have to ask, wouldn’t a return to the gold standard be an absolute disaster for ALEC’s member corporations? Like with much in capitalism, ideology trumps rational thought.

Despite every freak out when black people riot, white Americans love rioting too and always have. From the Boston Tea Party to any given sports championship, white people love raising some hell in the streets. But of course they are white and so it’s OK. Heather Cox Richardson with some context and many examples of white people rioting.

As long as America is a democracy, we will have riots. But they will not all be viewed in the same historical light. Riots bring popular attention to a perceived inequality. Once people start paying attention, the unfairness of the underlying situations in places like Ludlow or Watts or even colonial Boston, make them sit up and work to fix those inequalities. But as often, popular attention to the rage of rioters makes it clear that the rioters are the ones trying to maintain inequalities. Popular disgust for the mobs in the New York City Draft Riots or at Ole Miss moved society forward too, but not in the way those rioters anticipated. Far from achieving their ends, the rioters in New York City in 1863 or the ones a century later at Ole Miss created a backlash that advanced the very policies they opposed.

The people who are burning Baltimore are not thugs. They are Americans, acting in a grand American political tradition. Calling them thugs and demanding non-violence prejudges them as those who are out of step with modern America. It says that, like the New York City Draft Rioters or the segregationists at Ole Miss, the wrongs they are protesting are in their own heads. That the city of Baltimore has paid damages to more than 100 victims of police brutality in the past three years, and that Freddie Gray’s spine was mysteriously severed and his larynx crushed in police custody, makes it seem unlikely that today’s protesters are imagining injustice.

If you commit a crime while intoxicated in Los Angeles you will likely be sentenced to AA by our local 12 Step Caliphate.  Where you will learn that you have a disease and you are powerless to alcohol and likely to get drunk again and commit crimes – ‘relapse’ is expected.

Here is the fabled ‘court card’:

And the judge’s order:

Of course, perhaps you’ll be lucky enough to meet someone at your meeting who will tell you it’s a shame that judges are sending kids to AA but hey it’s better than jail or community service right? and as long as you’re here might as well not leave 5 minutes before the miracle happens and if you still aren’t interested they will gladly sign all the lines just meet them in the park after the meeting.

Don’t believe it?  Just head over to your local AA meeting and see for yourself.  Admitted criminals and self-professed liars will gladly regale you with their drunkalogs.

At noon today, a group of artists and activists including members of the Gulf Ultra Luxury Faction (known as G.U.L.F.) unfurled a large parachute in the atrium of the Guggenheim Museum, demanding to meet with a member of the institution’s board of trustees to discuss the labor conditions at its Abu Dhabi site. At the appointed time, members of the collective threw leaflets inspired by the current On Kawara exhibition from the museum’s upper levels and the protesters articulated their demands through a human microphone chant.

“It’s the most beautiful piece in the show,” remarked a French tourist watching from the top of the museum’s rotunda. I asked an older man visiting the museum if he knew what the protest was about, and he said: “I think it has something to do with treatment at a university.” Nearby, a Guggenheim employee was explaining to two visitors that “they’re protesting the museum’s expansion in Abu Dhabi.” Throughout the occupation, protesters explained the purpose of the demonstration to curious museum-goers.

Though the protesters’ banner was swiftly destroyed by a guard wielding scissors, the group was allowed to remain seated in the museum atrium. As many as six NYPD officers arrived on the scene but, an hour after the protest began, they were called off by the museum administration.

“The museum doesn’t want to arrest us,” Amin Husain, one of the organizers, told the group after consulting with NYPD officers. “The museum has communicated to us through the cops that we can stay in this number, but we can’t grow.” The announcement was met with cheers.

While the museum has remained open since the protest began — no effort was made to clear the building — no new visitors have been admitted for over an hour now and a long line has formed outside the building.

The Guggenheim has not acquiesced to the protestors’ demands by sending a trustee to meet them, but reportedly sent a deputy legal council to the museum from its offices on Hudson Street in Lower Manhattan.

According to various tweets, protesters, including members of the Guerrilla Girls, are outside the Fifth Avenue museum with banners that read “Right to Organize” and “Debt Jubilee Now.”

Today’s event is the latest in a series of actions that began in February 2014 at the Guggenheim Museum related to the labor issues at the museum’s Abu Dhabi franchise.

Gorilla girls outside the Guggenheim in solidarity #guggoccupied pic.twitter.com/wnDaFFqRQF

— Ayasha Guerin (@urban_praxis) May 1, 2015

We will update this story as it evolves.

Update, 1:45pm ET: The One Million Years reading in the atrium of the Guggenheim — which invites volunteers to read years aloud — stopped when the occupation began at noon but resumed roughly 20 minutes later.

This is currently the view in the museum atrium:

Update, 2:07pm ET: The protesters have three demands, which are on the back of their flyers:

And the occupying group’s specific demand is to meet with a Guggenheim trustee to discuss these points.

Update, 2:20pm ET: The On Kawara reading stopped at 2pm. It’s unclear if the break was scheduled, or because of something else, like the readers not being able to get into the building.

Update, 2:37pm ET: The museum has tweeted that it will close for the day, though there are still small scheduled group tours coming in. It appears that a lot of staff members have been sent home.

Update, 2:55pm ET: Still about a dozen protesters outside the museum chanting “Listen up Guggenheim,” “Shut it Down,” and other messages, while they are holding up banners with the three demands.

The On Kawara reading has also resumed.

Update, 4:11pm ET: Protesters just spelled out the word “Win” in the Guggenheim lobby:

Update, 4:45pm ET: Protesters are discussing their next move:

Update, 5:25pm ET: The 16 remaining members of the group that took over the lobby of the Guggenheim left the museum and gave a public declaration outside.

The declaration said:

Today we successfully occupied the museum with bodies and voices, inside and out. The Guggenheim authorities would rather shut down the museum for the day than talk to their critics. We didn’t come to shut the museum — we came to ask to attend a meeting with the Board of Trustees, and we hope that meeting happens soon.

Today is International Workers’ Day. When workers in Abu Dhabi — who are not allowed to organize — go on strike, they may be arrested, beaten, and deported. We repeat the demands for a living wage, a debt jubilee, and the right to organize.

We appreciate all the workers we spent time with. On this May Day, we also stand in solidarity with the struggles of workers everywhere, including the museum guards who make $11 an hour, and the groundskeepers who make $9 an hour, which is not a living wage in New York City.

The art we brought with us was shared by all but then violently destroyed by the museum. We thank SASI (South Asian Solidarity Initiative), DRUM (Desis Rising Up and Moving), the Taxi Workers Alliance, the Guerrilla Girls, Mahina Movement, and our allies in the South Asian community who rallied in support outside.

This is part of an ongoing campaign, with 52 weeks of actions to come. The   museum’s disdain for the public and criticism will mean that this movement only grows.

When the group left, it was met with 20 pizzas sent by art nonprofit Creative Time.

Update, 6:40pm ET: The  Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, which operates the Guggenheim Museum in New York City and the forthcoming Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, responded to our request for a comment on today’s action with the following statement:

We are disappointed that the actions of today’s demonstrators forced the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum to close its doors and turn away thousands of members of the public.

We have met with representatives of the group behind today’s demonstration on several occasions and have tried to maintain open lines of communication. We share their concerns about worker welfare in the Gulf Region, but these kinds of disruptive activities run counter to our objective of building the cooperation and goodwill necessary to further change on an extremely complex geopolitical issue.

Despite erroneous reports to the contrary, construction of the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi has not yet begun and a contractor has not yet been selected. In preparation for these milestones, the Guggenheim has been working with our partner, the Tourism Development & Investment Company (TDIC), and other authorities and stakeholders inside and outside of the UAE to continue to advance progress on conditions for workers.

The Guggenheim seeks, as we have from the start, to advance meaningful and verifiable actions. This is evidenced by our continuing contributions to the TDIC Employment Practices Policy (EPP).  Significant and documented progress has been made on a number of fronts, including worker accommodation, access to medical coverage, grievance procedures, and retention of passports.

We believe the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi project presents an opportunity for a dynamic cultural exchange and to chart a more inclusive and expansive view of art history.  These efforts at real action will take time to become a reality on the ground.  We understand that this endeavor comes with great responsibility and we believe strongly in the transformative potential of the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi.

A fascinating article by my friend David Perry, and one I know is of interest to Farley (since I saw him post about this issue on Facebook last week) and which I thought might be of interest to y’all as well. Sample:

Comics matter. They have become the dominant genre for depicting heroism in mass media. This dominance spills from Hollywood to television, toys, apparel, and more. When children imagine the heroic, they are influenced by the major brands like Marvel (owned by Disney) and DC. This puts a lot of pressure on these creators to get things right, and when it comes to gender, they mostly are doing a terrible job.

Every time a major movie involving super heroes comes out, fans ask – where are the female characters? Guardians of the Galaxymerchandising sparked a “where’s Gamora?” campaign. A producer of Big Hero 6 merchandise left the female characters off because, “Eeeww girls! Yuck! Haha.” Fans of the new Avengers: Age of Ultron movie are complaining that Black Widow rarely appears in the official licensed products. Irritated fans have coalesced online under the hashtags #WheresNatasha and #IncludeTheGirls. Irritated fans have coalesced online under the hashtags #WheresNatasha and #IncludeTheGirls. Even Mark Ruffalo (who plays Hulk) Tweeted, “@Marvel we need more #BlackWidow merchandise for my daughters and nieces. Pretty please.”

Sometimes the sexism is overt. Both DC and Marvel have licensed products that suggest girls should be love interests, not heroes themselves. DC has shirts saying “I only date superheroes” and “training to the Batman’s girlfriend.” Marvel released a shirt showing four Avengers bursting out of the chest and likewise reading “I only date superheroes.” Marvel also released a product line in which a boys’ shirt said, “Be a Hero” and the girls’ reads, “I need a hero.” Let’s be clear, when my daughter goes outside to fight bad guys, she doesn’t need a hero. She is one.

The pattern is obvious – female characters from Disney (which owns Marvel) and DC are under-marketed. The few products exist in segregated “girls only” categories and often reflect sexist ideologies. What was unusual about the Big Hero 6 “Eeeww girls” comment was that the spokesperson said aloud what clearly most marketing executives are all thinking – add a single girl to a product, and boys just won’t buy it. Moreover, while the companies apologize for sexist products, they never seem to investigate the corporate structures that allowed such products to be created in the first place…

A few days back, @midnight did a bit about the new Joker. Host, Chris Hardwick read pants-pooping quotes from fanboys, upset about the recast. In case you haven’t heard, there’s a new Joker in town, and it’s Jared Leto. The fun part about the bit was that the fanboy freakout was a response to the casting of Heath Ledger as The Joker. Ha! Take that, pants-poopers!

I don’t know what the response to Leto’s Joker is going to be. I’ve seen a bit of snark directed at this already-heavily-memed image. (Trigger warning and after the jump, because I find the image genuinely disturbing.)

Ha ha ha! He has a grill and a tattoo that says “Damaged!” That’s totally reason to dismiss his performance, never having seen it! I get it. “Damaged” is a little too on-the-nose. But let’s not pretend this makeup isn’t badass. It is badass and genuinely creepy. And I, for one, cannot wait to see how Leto fares in the role. Partly because I think he’s a bold choice, partly because I’m the only person on the planet who didn’t like Ledger as The Joker. I found his portrayal mannered and gimmicky.The first time I watched him in the role I liked him. But upon subsequent viewings, his performance just became a ball of weird twitches and grimaces. So I’m anxious to see his–now iconic–performance challenged.

 

The book was, we can now see, crying out for the invention of the web, which would enable the holding of multiple domains of knowledge in the mind at one time that a proper reading requires.

At the Guardian, Billy Mills looks at the love match that is the Internet and Finnegans Wake and has good tidings: hypertext may make the formerly unreadable novel readable.

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Frozach Submitted

The "Selfie Arm" is a fantastically bizarre improvement over the traditional selfie stick. Read the rest

biodiverseed:

lazyevaluationranch:

8/3 Today we picked the white apples. They have skins the color of old yellowed bones, and translucent flesh so that when you slice them open you can see the seeds through the flesh. Bone-and-glass apples, parchment apples, ghost apples.

They bruise easily, a purplish brown rather too similar to a bruise on human skin. If you pick one up, there’s a good chance the shapes of your fingertips will be marked on it the next day. I want to try writing words on them by pressing on them with a pencil eraser sometime.

They smell very faintly of perfume, maybe roses. They do not smell like apples. Apple maggots never infest them (probably because their growing time is too short to support the apple maggot fly life cycle. It’ll be another month or two before the rest of our apples are ripe).

They’re lovely. They are also disgusting. Mealy and soft, with no flavor whatsoever. They’re not sweet. They’re not even sour. It’s like a mouth full of wet cotton ball. I’m pretty sure I spit it out the first time I tried one.

I hope you all understand how weird this is: even the goats are reluctant to eat them. They’ll eat an apple or two, but then they lose interest (except in keeping the sheep from eating any, of course).

I have no idea why a previous resident planted the ghost-apple tree. If they have any flavor at all, only the restless dead can taste it.

I have to say, I’ve seen, researched, and planted a lot of apples in my time, but I have never seen anything like this.

My best guess is that your tree is a chance seedling with a genetic mutation, given that it is both leucistic/albinoid and early-ripening. I’d hazard a guess it’s also polyploid.

lazyevaluationranch: If you’re able to save some scion wood next Autumn, I’d be very interested in grafting a branch or two of this to one of my trees: not for the utility of it, so much as for the novelty and breeding possibilities.

pleatedjeans:

via

Carroll Shelby's iconic Cobra roadster has been making jaws drop for half a century now. To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Cobra's debut the US Department of Energy built one of its own. The new Cobra's entire chassis and bodywork--from the pa...

via http://www.wmagazine.com/images/celebrities/2011/02/cess_rooney_mara_05_v.jpg

kitsune-gari:

I was googling recipes but I fell down a rabbit hole and found this picture of a bunch of chickens eating a sheet cake.

Me: *waiting for drink in Starbucks*
Me: *putting on makeup*
Guy: You know nice guys don't like when girls wear so much makeup.
Me: *without looking up* Nice guys like you?
Guy: Well, yea.
Me: Have you ever considered that's why we wear it?
Girl behind me: *spits out coffee laughing*
Guy: Um.
Me: *deadpan look* Nice girls like me don't give a fuck what you like.

Freddie Gray's Death A Homicide, Criminal Charges Pending, Prosecutor Says:

karnythia:

Here are the officers names and the charges each are facing. I’ve also added their potential max sentences as AJ Plus is reporting that the DA’s office has passed out fliers containing that information. All of the misconduct in office, and false imprisonment charges are considered to have 8th Amendment guidelines which essentially mean any sentence can be applied as long as it wouldn’t considered cruel & unusual punishment. This is just a step, but I’m cautiously optimistic based on the way they have been charged. Of course the police union is already asking for a special prosecutor to replace Marilyn Mosby. You can guess why.

Officer Caesar R. Goodson, Jr.: Second degree depraved heart murder (30 years); involuntary manslaughter (10 years); second degree assault (10 years); manslaughter by vehicle (gross negligence)(10 years) ; manslaughter by vehicle (criminal negligence) (3 years); misconduct in office

Officer William G. Porter: Involuntary manslaughter (10 years); second degree assault (10 years); misconduct in office

Lt. Brian W. Rice: Involuntary manslaughter (10 years); two counts of second degree assault (10 years); manslaughter by vehicle (gross negligence) (10 years); two counts of misconduct in office; false imprisonment

Officer Edward M. Nero: Two counts of second degree assault (10 years); manslaughter by vehicle (gross negligence) (10 years); two counts of misconduct in office; false imprisonment

Officer Garrett E. Miller: Two counts of second degree assault (10 years); two counts of misconduct in office; false imprisonment

Sgt. Alicia D. White: Involuntary manslaughter (10 years); second degree assault (10 years); misconduct in office

findyourspine:

the buffy generation has outgrown joss whedon. 

his scraps of watered down late nineties feminism fed us and nurtured us and provided a good foundation for more complex conversations about nuanced subjects like race and class and gender and privilege. 

while we kept moving and learning and growing, he did not. his “feminism” is still the same barely there nod it always was but we’re bigger now, and hungrier - we don’t want scraps, we don’t want to settle. we want everything. 

amen

micdotcom:

The other man in the van with Freddie Gray has a different story 

The passenger inside the police van with Freddie Gray, the 25-year-old black man who died April 19 in the custody of the Baltimore Police Department, is speaking out after initial reports indicated he heard Gray “trying to injure himself” after Gray’s arrest on April 12. Now, however, in the full interview with WJZ Baltimore, Donta Allen is saying that was far from the truth.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Dutch “Cuddly Owl” finally caught on video. This bird has been cuddling the citizens of this town for a while. It likes to land and stomp on people’s heads.

Watch the video

via http://www.balloontree.com/illustrations.php?img=hunger

newshour:

Freddie Gray’s death has been ruled a homicide.

Maryland state attorney Marilyn J. Mosby just announced that Baltimore resident Freddie Gray’s death was ruled a homicide.

Criminal charges have been pressed against the six police officers involved in his arrest.

Learn more.

TINY HULK

Support me on Etsy! https://www.etsy.com/shop/IlluminescentArt

-SMASHES TINY OBJECTS-

Cheers,

Lume