Sophianotloren

iraffiruse:

Living the dream

themarysue:

Mulder, calm down.

wasiafooltothink:

"How much money does college cost in America?"

barleytea:

u tryin to start shit labelle

fuck-yeah-feminist:

A look into the experiences of bisexual women who happened to fall in love with men. 

Graphics by Chris Ritter

Good read for those who struggle to understand bisexuality.

Once again, liberal feminism is up in arms about a no-platform, and according to abuse apologist liberal feminism, if a woman gets no-platformed, that’s sexism.

This is one of those lines which focuses largely on the feelings of the oppressor rather than who has actually made no-platforming decisions. And who does make no-platforming decisions? A lot of the case it’s women: feminist societies, feminist collectives, groups of women collectively organising towards a goal.

These women are working hard to carve out a little safe space in an unsafe world, which is difficult where there is so much social violence going on. They’re doing their best and have few tools at their disposal. No-platforming is one of those, and it’s a powerful one. It’s a statement of what women think is helpful, and what is harmful. It’s a statement and an enforcement of boundaries. It’s a gesture of free speech, and one of the few freedoms we have.

Under patriarchy, women are expected not to have boundaries. We’re expected to allow anyone access to our spaces, both personal and physical. We’re expected to accept it even when it hurts us. So when we actually state what we will allow near us and what we will not, when we band together in solidarity against the few women who do like attacking women, it’s considered an outrage. Women are not supposed to do that. We’re behaving like bad girls by having and showing our boundaries, by exercising one of the meagre instruments available to us.

Women are not above bigotry, and are not above actively harming other women. It can be seen in transmisogynistic stances, in anti-sex-worker stances, in racism and disablism. Many of us now band together in solidarity around marginalised women, and this is the position from which no-platforms come. This increased solidarity and sisterhood is only a positive thing, building an ever-stronger movement. Unfortunately, this still meets resistance, because the idea of all women united is an idea which terrifies those who benefit most from patriarchy.

I support no-platforming. I support women’s collective organising. I am opposed to the misogynistic beliefs that underpin the anti-no-platforming stance. I am appalled by the level of obfuscation which always surrounds no-platforming decisions, and furious that once again I have to explain something which should be absolutely basic.

Related: Shit I cannot believe needs to be said: no platforming and censorship are different

This article is cross-posted from AncientCurses.com, a research project about curses and cursing in the ancient world. If you would like to read the full article, or would like to know more about cursing, I invite you to visit the website!

Scholarship on curses often explores the significance of cursing rituals—how did performers of curses expect them to work? Did they believe that the malicious things they wished upon their target would come true? For example, a famous “voodoo doll” at the Louvre depicts a female figure with nails driven into various points on the body. Did the person who made this curse hope that the woman would literally suffer from being pierced, or was something else at work?

A Case of Sympathetic Magic?

The term “sympathetic magic” was popularized by Sir James Frazer, an anthropologist who released his influential book on magic and religion, The Golden Bough, in 1890. While much of his work has been questioned (for example, the idea that certain stages of belief were more primitive than others), there can be no argument that his work laid the foundation for investigating magic. For example, it was Frazer who first described how the “magician’s logic” worked:

“From the first of these principles, namely the Law of Similarity, the magician infers that he can produce any effect he desires merely by imitating it: from the second [the Law of Contact or Contagion] he infers that whatever he does to a material object will affect equally the person with whom the object was once in contact, whether it formed part of his body or not.”

“Both branches of magic, the homoeopathic and the contagious, may conveniently be comprehended under the general name of Sympathetic Magic, since both assume that things act on each other at a distance through a secret sympathy, the impulse being transmitted from one to the other by means of what we may conceive as a kind of invisible ether, not unlike that which is postulated by modern science for a precisely similar purpose, namely, to explain how things can physically affect each other through a space which appears to be empty.”

(Frazer, The Golden Bough, III.1.1, III.1.2)

Fritz Graf observes that the concept of sympatheia did not originate with Frazer. In fact, ancient thinkers such as Plotinus and Theocritus also believed that everything in the universe was linked and that some things were more connected than others due to sharing similar properties or what not (Graf 205-206). Nevertheless, modern scholars dispute that instances of sympathetic magic indicate a straightforward equivalence on the part of the practitioner, or that a magician is manipulating an “invisible ether.” While there is something to the ideal of similarity, Frazer’s view has generally fallen out of favour, and we’ll see why shortly.

Instances of Sympatheia

So what would constitute sympathetic magic? I mentioned the figurine at the Louvre (pictured here), but there are other ways a curse could be considered in sympathy with its target. In addition to figurines, many curses also included what is called ousia, a Greek word that literally means being or substance. In this context, it refers to physical objects that belong to the victim—things like hair or bits of clothing which stood-in for the persons they represented (Gager 16-17). For example, one “love spell” from the Greek Magical Papyri specifically requests the “magical material” of ousia:

“Wondrous spell for binding a lover: Take wax [or clay] from a potter’s wheels and make two figurines, a male a female. Make the male in the form of Ares fully armed, holding a sword / in his left hand and threatening to plunge it into the right side of her neck. And make her with her arms behind her back and down on her knees. And you are to fasten the magical material on her neck…” PGM IV.296-466

I left out a lot of the rest of the spell, but it would be fitting to disclose it here. Copper needles are stuck in various places on the figurine and supernatural figures are appealed to in order to bind the target and compel her affection. Many of the pin placements (brain, mouth, genitals, etc.) correspond to specific requests that the victim lose her appetite, have restless thoughts, and be hindered sexually. Can we say there is a correspondence? If so, to what extent were such effects expected? Graf argues that “sorcerers did not wish to wound the victim’s members in the same way that they pierced the members of a figurine” (Graf 145). So what was going on then?

Read the entire post at AncientCurses.com!

Photo by Marie-Lan Nguyen.

SEK is on his way from Baton Rouge to Houston. Outside of Scott, Louisiana he witnesses a bus try to switch lanes, clipping the car in front of him and sending it spinning into the median, where it finally comes to a halt on an incline, almost sideways.

The bus just keeps on going.

SEK pulls over, exits his vehicle, and walks back toward the car and peers into the car. SIDEWAYS GUY is slumped over unconscious on his deployed airbag. Then –

Richard Long, “Red Slate Circle” (1988): “A group of people sit on the beach with two bags but also a group of people are on the beach with blankets. Reminds me of people on a beach, walking and laying on blankets.” (Image via Tumblr)

In the futuristic Spike Jonze film Her, the main character’s romantic interest is a computer operating system named Samantha that can interact, make jokes, and even have sex. While the two never make it to an art gallery, it’s not a stretch to think Samantha would be able to critique art, too. Off-screen, that kind of artificial intelligence still seems fanciful, but a new Tumblr blog suggests it might not actually be too far off.

Novice Art Blogger records the impressions of a computer encountering abstract and representational art from the Tate’s digitized collection for the first time. Artist-researcher Matthew Plummer-Fernandez utilizes publicly available deep learning algorithms developed by University of Toronto scientists to generate the computer’s artistic interpretations.

At times, the computer’s responses to the artworks are charming, almost poetic. It describes one untitled 1979 grayscale print by Brice Marden as “a picture of a wall that is black and white but also a black and white picture of a wall.” And Frank Auerbach’s “Reclining Figure II” (1966) recalls “a wooden bench near the beach decorated with purple chiffon.”

But for the most part, its musings sound like they came from the lovechild of humorist Jack Handey and a clueless art history major. Under its analysis, three figures in Henry Moore’s 1974 lithograph “Three Cloaked Figures I” become “a pair of elephants next to a wall.” In fact, our inexperienced blogger seems to have a proclivity for elephants, believing Menashe Kadishman’s 1979 screenprint of a flock of sheep to represent “a lot of elephants in the river … similar to a sandy area with an elephant made from sand.”

Just because the computer’s artistic interpretations read a bit silly today doesn’t mean they always will. Some scientists say they’re closer than ever to closing the emotional gap between humans and machines — that is, the ability to feel, which is essential to arts criticism. In 2013, Google’s chief artificial intelligence researcher Ray Kurzweil told Wired he believes computers could be emotionally intelligent by 2029 (granted, it’s a hotly disputed subject).

Yet even if computers could respond to art emotionally, it seems doubtful it would ever enrich them the way it enriches us, which has implications for how meaningful their artistic insight might be. Art lovers often return to the same paintings repeatedly over long stretches of time, gaining a deeper relationship with the work that nourishes their understanding of it. Could machines ever really experience that?

Maybe not, but they may still prove useful in enhancing our own art historical knowledge. As Selena Larson noted on The Daily Dot, computer scientists have also used deep learning algorithms to find undiscovered influences of famous artists. Who knows what else they might reveal as technology grows more sophisticated. Until then, Novice Art Blogger offers an entertaining diversion from the daily grind — a harmless opportunity to poke a little fun at ourselves and art both.

Alberto Giacometti, “Hour of the Races” (1930): “A picture of a flower on a glass table, or possibly a black and white vase on a wall with a plant. It stirs up a memory of a vase sitting on top of a wooden roof.” (Image via Tumblr)

Frank Auerbach, “Reclining Figure II” (1966): “A wooden bench sits on the sand on the beach or two benches sitting next to each other on a beach. That reminds me of a wooden bench near the beach decorated with purple chiffon.” (Image via Tumblr)

Henry Moore OM, CH, “Three Cloaked Figures” (1974) (Image via Tumblr)

Menashe Kadishman, “Sheep B” (1979): “There is a lot of elephants in the river but also there is a lot of elephants in the river. It is similar to a sandy area with an elephant made from sand.” (Image via Tumblr)

Ian McKeever, “Colour Etching D” (1996): “A book with a digital camera with a few inside of it or I think there is a cell phone holder in front of it. I’m reminded of several different cell phones on a white surface.” (Image via Tumblr)

Tim Mara, “Glass Jug” (1983): “A painting of a white wall with a tree or quite possibly black and white photograph of a plant in a wall. It is similar to a map hangs on a wall near a hat and a cane.” (Image via Tumblr)

h/t The Daily Dot

The vaccine troofer-curisoity from Chris Christie Erik mentioned early today isn’t new:

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie suggested Monday that officials find a “balance” between requiring vaccinations and allowing parents to turn them down. But his run in with the issue may go back much longer.

Louise Kuo Habakus, an anti-vaccination activist who runs the site FearlessParent.org, provided a letter to MSNBC Monday in which Christie purportedly endorsed her concern that vaccines may be linked to autism – a concern long discredited by public health officials. She shared a photo showing Christie meeting with her and what she said were other anti-vaccination activists with her organization, the NJ Vaccination Choice Coalition, as well as other autism groups at a meeting they organized with the then-candidate in August 2009.

Christie won election twice in a blue state, and is likely to run for president. Conservatives making vaccinating your kids a conspiracy liberal elitists inflict on your kids, like global warming or evolution, is just going to be awesome if you like lots of unnecessary death and suffering. (Hey, at least when you don’t vaccinate you save a few bucks on the front end!)

…And while we’re here, let us also consider Christie’s disgraceful killing of the new Hudson tunnel.  In fairness, he’s not opposed to all infrastructure: wherever there’s a casino in an over-saturated market or a useless mall, he’ll be there will taxpayer money.  He’s just opposed to useful infrastructure.

If you care about men’s issue and gender equality, and you’re the conference-going type, this is one you should check out. A collaborative effort between the Center for the Study of Men and Masculinities (headed by Michael Kimmel), the American Men’s Studies Association, the MenEngage Alliance, and the Man Up Campaign, the conference’s theme is “Engaging Men and Boys for Gender Equality.” The Conference will be held March 5–8, 2015 at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City.

I’ll be performing some of my poems on Saturday night, along with a lineup of other performers. If you’re there, I hope you’ll come over and say hi.

You can register for the conference here; and you can get a look at the tentative program here. Here’s the speaker’s lineup for the opening gala:

• Welcome: Samuel Stanley, President, Stony Brook University
• Introduction: Michael Kimmel, Director, Center for the Study of Men and Masculinities
  • Ambassador Henry Mac Donald
  • Phumzile Mlabo-Ngcuka, Executive Director, UN women
  • Sally Field, actor
  • Sheryl Sandberg, executive, activist, author
  • Gloria Steinem, founder, Ms. Magazine
  • Jennifer Seibold Newsome, filmmaker
  • Amy Zwerdling, filmmaker
  • Carlos Andres-Gomez, author and spoken word artist

Just look at it. (more…)

Our former selves live in the cloud, in the Wayback Machine, on the servers of the NSA’s data centers. They lie waiting to betray us.

Online, as in middle school, everything goes on your permanent record.

Over at The Toast, Mallory Ortberg gives us a compendium of signs that you’re stuck in a soft sci-fi novel. Among the more notable signifiers:

You live in a world where robots masturbate, for some reason.

The ship’s doctor has a drinking problem.

You’re going to have to go through the asteroid belt you’d hoped to avoid at the beginning of this journey.

Everyone living on your space station has forgotten about the importance of crop rotation.

Related Posts:

• Get A Little Less Precious
• Architect like a motherfucker
• Raise Your Glass to The Toast
• The Rumpus Interview with Josh Weil
• Fat and Sexy

Cartography site mapsbynik has created a fascinating map based on 2010 Census data that highlights the surprisingly common blocks in the United States that report having no population. In all, the zero population covers 4.61 million square miles of the US, which is around 47-percent of the country’s land mass.

Ultimately, I made this map to show a different side of the United States. Human geographers spend so much time thinking about where people are. I thought I might bring some new insight by showing where they are not, adding contrast and context to the typical displays of the country’s population geography.

The site is also offering up a framed print of the map.

image via mapsbynik

via coudal partners

deathtouchxoxo:

Deathtouch

I’d say that’s a lovely strawman that you’ve constructed, but I’d encourge you to work on the render a little bit.

bubonickitten:

…did i just witness a three-way crossover

yes

yes i did

Diversity reared its lovely head, pissing off racist and misogynist fanboys everywhere. Get used to it. 

The primary cast of director Paul Feig‘s upcoming Ghostbusters reboot has finally been announced with Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon, and Leslie Jones set to star. Wiig and McCarthy previously worked with Feig on the film Bridesmaids, and McKinnon and Jones are both current cast members on Saturday Night Live. Feig announced he was officially attached to the project in October of 2014 as director and writer along with with Katie Dippold.

Feig posted a photo of the four women today on Twitter.

pic.twitter.com/LBtv2YXfv6

— Paul Feig (@paulfeig) January 27, 2015

image via Paul Feig

via The Hollywood Reporter

A recent episode of the American Chemical Society series Reactions excellently explains the three ways (occlusive, humectant, emollient) by which moisturizers work to effectively repair dry skin.

Occlusives are the old school moisturizers and they work in the simplest way possible. They form a barrier over the skin that water can’t penetrate, stopping evaporation and keeping your skin moist. …more popular these days are the emollients. Instead of coating the skin, these are designed to penetrate, making your skin feel softer and more flexible. …the third kind of moisturizers are called humectants. Broadly, these kind of molecules help attract and retain moisture in the epidermis. Humectants get the younger, moist cells to the outer layers of the skin as well as reduce the flakiness of dry skin.