The myth of white neutrality persists in the world of gaming, where black characters in fantasy games can be deemed less "realistic" than dragons. Read the rest
Content note: this post discusses homophobia, transphobia and biphobia
Tomorrow sees London’s Pride parade, supposedly a celebration of how brilliant things are. Each year, it leaves a sour taste in my mouth, because things are not great. They really, really aren’t, unless you’re one of the lucky ones who yell over the voices that should be heard and dominate our movement.
On a personal level, I wouldn’t feel safe attending the event with either of my partners. For a supposedly inclusive space, Pride in London is peculiarly intolerant of anybody but monosexuals and cis people. Marchers yell “breeders” at bi people, with many overtly expressing that they thing bi people shouldn’t be there.
And then there’s the transphobia, which they say they’ve cleared up, but it doesn’t look like it has. Perhaps “toiletgate”–transmisogyistic barring of trans women from accessing toilet facilities–has been cleared up. but a lot of the trans women I know don’t want to be the guinea pigs in finding this out.
So, even if I went, my friends and partners wouldn’t be there, so what’s the fucking point?
It seems as though a schism is becoming more visible than ever in our community. On one side are the marginalised, the oppressed. On the other are those who don’t give a fuck. This issue was perhaps exemplified in this week’s intervention by Jennicet Gutierrez, and the reaction to it.
Gutierrez is a trans woman and undocumented migrant. At a White House dinner, set up to circlejerk about how very good on LGBT rights Barack Obama is, Gutierrez shouted out truths. She pointed out the violences occurring against LGBT migrants, how they were being detained and deported, facing sexual and physical violence, by Obama’s very own administration. As reward, she was shouted down by the hypocrite she was trying to address, and hauled away by the Secret Service. The audience, who were ostensibly comprised of LGBT people, booed her and showed happiness at her silencing.
We have little to celebrate, all things considered. Yes, we can get married, and yes, in the US a breakthrough was made where now openly gay people can be killed in combat. Yet these are hardly victories when our siblings are homeless, facing violence, in poverty, in fear.
London’s Pride events ignore all of this. London’s Pride events actively march perpetrators of the violences we face through our streets. There was protest about UKIP marching, but so many more of the marchers are our enemies. The police, Tories, and countless corporations. If you can’t see why it’s inappropriate that they’re there, then you are out of touch with the very real violences which face a lot of us.
We have a lot of work to do, and the Pride parade is like a rainbow flag pinned to a wall covered in cracks. The issues are still there, but it distracts from them, giving the cishet population a feeling of warm fuzzies. Too many LGB people are complicit in distracting from the fights yet to be won: the fights which are barely being fought.
So no, I’m not going, because I know there’s nothing to celebrate, and nothing to be won by being there.
And If I want to find the song “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac I have to remember that I bought it for someone in the fall of 1983 pile, but didn’t give it to them for personal reasons.
“Actually, I believe my straight white maleness affords me some clarity and nuance to this issue that you may have missed in your article. (I mean, obviously you have missed it. I'm just trying to pretend to be nice).
1. Some people have an idea that videogames should only be one particular thing. Obviously you are not aware of this. When things differ from the norm, it makes some people uncomfortable. You must not be aware of this. I am very upset when you imply that a shitty Twine game is built upon the same building blocks as Skyrim, because that makes me feel weird about myself. It's one thing to say that an escapist world with shiny weapons and flying dragons that makes me feel good about myself is a game, it's another to say something with stories from the real world that make me feel bad is.
2. I think somebody once said that shorter is better, which obviously means this principle that I am abstractly invoking out of context is universally better. Especially because some people don't like things that are long.
3. Another part is when people have an attitude that places themselves up against other attitudes. This is wrong. When people are passionate about something, they ruin everything. EVERYTHING! Both sides are clearly wrong!!
Have you also considered my new take on non straight white male characters? Obviously you have not, I'm just being nice again. Once again, my straight white maleness affords me much more nuance to this issue. So let me spell this out for you as well:
1. There's a difference between calling any sort of attention to yourself, which is bad, and making me vaguely aware that you exist as a non straight white male in some kind of nonexistent postracial/postsexist/etc fantasy universe somewhere far in the background, which is probably okay. The first is obviously bad, because it makes me uncomfortable by calling attention to real world cultural issues that upset and/or implicate me and that I use videogames to escape from dealing with. The second is fine because you don't implicate my straight white maleness in any way with any of your feelings or background stories, nor do you acknowledge that they exist in any way (thereby also potentially implicating me).
2. Other people perceive that you are pushing an agenda of inclusiveness, and that makes them feel bad. When they feel bad, they lash out. I’m not saying I do this, though I do. But I will say that when a character becomes not straight white and male anymore, they more easily become a commodity - but they are not a commodity otherwise. That is how Capitalism works, according to Marx.
Then there's the people who are very unhappy with the state of the videogame industry. Or "baddies", as I call them (flippantly, of course =P). Sometimes the "baddies" like to suggest that there's something wrong with me if I don't believe the videogame industry should change. Obviously they are wrong about this, and uppity. This is an act of aggression on their part, which they obviously need therapy for.
...Ok, so I'm not saying internet commenters aren't bad. But maybe you deserve it?”
Not so, says Benjamin Powell, a professor of economics and business at Texas Tech University who, controversially, argues that sweatshops are economically and socially beneficial to the countries they’re in.
“If you care about the consequences for the lives of developing nations workers I believe it is ethical to buy products made with sweatshop labor,” he says. Powell argues that sweatshops are not exclusive to poor countries in our modern, globalized world.
“My ancestors worked in the mills in Massachusetts. For the United Kingdom and the US, the process of development took more than 100 years to move through the sweatshop phase,” in which women and children worked in cotton mills, factories and manufacturing, he says.
Powell doesn’t suggest that sweatshops should be permanent fixtures but a stage in the development of developing nations, and they “often pay far above the levels of extreme poverty that exist in these countries and often even better than the countries’ average incomes. In 1960, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea all had sweatshops,” he says, but “in a generation they jumped from a pre-industrial standard of living to first world status.”
Major eyeroll here. First, sweatshops are not beneficial for these countries. They are rank exploitation. The sweatshops themselves did not lead to the economic explosion of South Korea and Taiwan. It’s not like those sweatshop workers were gaining skills that led to an information economy in Korea. And it’s not like the long-term sweatshops of Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala has led to those nations rising economically. Rather, they have just been a next stage in a century of post-colonialist exploitation by American corporations. Note that the people making these arguments that sweatshops are great never reckon with the Latin American examples. They only focus on the Asian Tigers. But those nations have alternative reasons for their economic rise that include a) being close Cold War allies of the United States that led to massive economic growth as part of US foreign policy and b) steel and other heavy industries building huge new factories that out-competed the outdated US steel mills of the 1970s and 1980s, eventually forcing them to close. The heavy industry of China is a big reason why that nation has risen economically. Neither of those factors are likely to repeat themselves in the low-wage sweatshop economy of Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Cambodia. In other words,
And Lowell and the Triangle Fire were not necessary moments in the history of the rise of the American economy. The idea that the heavy exploitation of women workers in apparel factories is somehow required to have economic growth is completely absurd. Rather, these are highly avoidable situations where modern companies could still take advantage of relatively cheap labor while also not killing these workers, forcing them to undergo sexual harassment, pregnancy tests in order to work, stolen wages, etc. These are false choice offered by the defenders of the global race to the bottom. Back to the linked article:
“About 4 million people in Pakistan work in the textile industry and 95% of them never get the paperwork to prove it,” says Nasir Mansoor, deputy director of Pakistan’s Nation Trade Union Federation. “This means there’s no way for them to fight for their rights if something isn’t right.” The garment sector, he says, has some of the worst conditions for workers in the country.
“All garment factories, by law, have to register with the Pakistani government, but we estimate that 90% fail to do so and the government doesn’t enforce the law. It wasn’t too long ago that even inspecting the factories that were registered became outlawed in some provinces so there was no way to know what was happening in them either.”
It was only after the Karachi garment factory fire of 2012 that killed nearly 300 people and injured a similar number that the inspection ban was lifted.
Sajida Khanum, a 45-year-old, has only ever worked in sweatshops. She doesn’t want to disclose which factory she’s working in now for fear of losing her job and being blacklisted from working in factories again.
She says there is no security in her job, and that sometimes, when there is not enough work to do, she has to beg her contractor for work. Khanum gets paid about 40 cents per item she makes. “We have to work fast because we get paid per dozen garments.”
Khanum has been working in garment factories for 15 years. She says most workers live the contradictions of working in sweatshops. “We all do it because its necessary, what else are we to do? I’m uneducated, all I know is this job.”
It might be a hard pill to swallow, but what Pakistani garment industry workers Ahmad and Khanum say reflects what Powell has found in his research.
“When workers choose to take employment in a sweatshop, it demonstrates that they believe it is the least bad option available to them,” he says. “That means that, relative to their previous situation, these sweatshops improve their lives.”
Despite the rather specious reasoning over worker choice offered above (what other choice do these workers have, starvation? prostitution?), I do agree that we should not shut down these factories if we aren’t going to replace them with something else for these workers. After all, Kalpona Akter, head of the Bangladeshi workers’ movement, urges developed world consumers not to boycott these clothes because these workers need jobs.
So how do we fix these conditions while also empowering women workers and helping the world’s poor increase their economic status? As I’ve said in Out of Sight (now available for a Madison presidential election price of $18.08!), we have to create international standards that allow the poor of the world to live dignified lives and create middle classes of their own in ways that do not accept rampant exploitation. That must place power in the hands of workers to sue these corporations like Walmart and Gap if they or their contractors violate international standards of wages, working conditions, and pollution. This is how you create middle classes in nations like Bangladesh while taking away the incentive for these multinational corporations to move to the next nation as soon as these workers succeed in forming a union or enforcing a minimum wage. This is how you work toward international labor solidarity and it’s how you push back against defenders of the exploitation and murder of poor workers on the job.
Jurassic World, Mad Max Fury Road, and Little Girls
For her birthday, we took my soon-to-be six year-old to Jurassic World. Prior to that, she had watched a bootleg copy of Fury Road with me after I had confirmed that it fit the levels of violence I consider acceptable based on what I know of my daughter.
The most interesting thing to me was her reactions after each film.
After watching MMFR, she talked incessantly about it. (She had talked during the film as well, making observations, etc.) Her name was suddenly changed to Angry Cereal, mirroring two of her favorite characters. She made a new Sims game, spending more time than she ever had before perfecting the characters - and giving them all pets. A Lego car set was turned into a crazy car that could fit into the Mad Max world. Barbies were now the Wives and her dad’s Diablo figurine was now Immortan Joe. It’s been a little over two weeks and she still talks about it.
When the credits rolled on Jurassic World, she said, ‘Can we go see another movie?’ –And that was it. The only other comment vaguely related to the movie was her assertion she liked dinosaurs. Nothing else. No elaborate recreations, nothing.
I had thought with MMFR that my excitement had rubbed off on her but that doesn’t seem to be the case. After Jurassic World, I was excited, encouraging her to talk about her favorite parts. She asked for a Happy Meal. When we went to spend a gift card at Toys-R-Us the next day, I pointed out all the Jurassic World toys. They had Blue! She barely gave them a second glance.
It didn’t jive. She had tons of dinosaur books. Why was she infinitely more interested in an adult movie that was pretty much one big car chase rather than a movie about dinosaurs? Was it because despite the differences in ratings, Jurassic World had frightened her more? Maybe. But when she picked out a new stuffed animal to buy with her gift card, she informed us the little owl’s name was Splendid.
And that was it.
She had watched Fury Road in almost complete silence until the first shot of all the Wives. Then she turned to me and said, “There’s so many girls!” That was her takeaway from MMFR: there were lots of girls! All the girls were fighting together against the bad guy! The girls were the heroes! That was important to her, seemingly even more important than it was to me. Maybe because she’s just getting her first taste of playground culture where boys and girls are separate and the two don’t mix often and it’s been confusing. Maybe because she just really liked seeing girls on the screen. When I ask her, she just shrugs and says, “I don’t know, mommy, I liked all the girls. I liked Toast.”
As an adult, I’m aware of issues with representation. I don’t remember consciously noticing it as a child but I remember Leia and Uhura and Janeway being my favorites. I remember dressing up as Dana Scully. As a mom, I watch my daughter gravitate to girls and women on screen. A movie I thought would a sure thing because DINOSAURS! became a total miss because for her, there was no one on screen that she left the theater wanting to dress up as. There was no incentive for her to change her name to mimic favorite characters. I left grinning because holy shit, raptor squad! She left wanting a cheeseburger.
Children know when they’re being marginalized. They might have no idea what they word marginalized means, but they can still tell, instinctually, when they’ve been misrepresented in and/or excluded from the story.
Privacy and open source advocates complain over secret installation of audio-snooping software from Google.
Photograph: Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images
Privacy campaigners and open source developers are up in arms over the secret installing of Google software which is capable of listening in on conversations held in front of a computer.
First spotted by open source developers, the Chromium browser – the open source basis for Google’s Chrome – began remotely installing audio-snooping code that was capable of listening to users.
It was designed to support Chrome’s new “OK, Google” hotword detection – which makes the computer respond when you talk to it – but was installed, and, some users have claimed, it is activated on computers without their permission.
“Without consent, Google’s code had downloaded a black box of code that – according to itself – had turned on the microphone and was actively listening to your room,” said Rick Falkvinge, the Pirate party founder, in a blog post. “Which means that your computer had been stealth configured to send what was being said in your room to somebody else, to a private company in another country, without your consent or knowledge, an audio transmission triggered by … an unknown and unverifiable set of conditions.”
The feature is installed by default as part of Google’s Chrome browser. But open source advocates are up in arms about it also being installed with the open source variant Chromium, because the listening code is considered to be “black box”, not part of the open source audit process.
“We don’t know and can’t know what this black box does,” said Falkvinge.
However, reports from developers indicate otherwise.
After having identified Chromium as the culprit, developer Ofer Zelig said in a blog post: “While I was working I thought ‘I’m noticing that an LED goes on and off, on the corner of my eyesight [webcam]’. And after a few times when it just seemed weird, I sat to watch for it and saw it happening. Every few seconds or so.”
Google also blamed the Linux distribution Debian for downloading the non-open source component with Chromium automatically, rather than Google Chrome.
“The key here is that Chromium is not a Google product. We do not directly distribute it, or make any guarantees with respect to compliance with various open source policies,” Google developer mgiuca said.
Falkvinge countered Google’s explanations saying: “The default install will still wiretap your room without your consent, unless you opt out, and more importantly, know that you need to opt out, which is nowhere a reasonable requirement.” He says a hardware switch to disable the microphone and camera built into most computers is needed.
Voice search functions have become an accepted feature of modern smartphones, but their movement into the home through the smart TV, and now browser, have caused concerns over the possibility of being listened to within the home.
While most services require a user to opt in, privacy advocates have questioned whether their use, which requires sending voice recordings over the internet to company servers for processing, risks unintentionally exposing private conversations held within the home.
A Google spokeswoman said on Wednesday: “We’re sure you’ll be relieved to learn we’re not listening to your conversations – nor do we want to. We’re simply giving Chrome users the ability to search hands free at their computers by saying “OK Google” while on the Google homepage – and only if they choose to opt in to the feature.”
Rotunda dome of National Gallery Singapore beneath the paneled roof (photo by Jnzl/Flickr)
The largest public collection of modern Southeast Asian art is opening this October, and the institution that will house it just announced a collaborative exhibition with the Centre Pompidou in 2016. National Gallery Singapore (NGS) joins two historic buildings — the city-state’s former Supreme Court and City Hall — with an adaptive reuse design by studioMilou Architecture. A gold roof of 15,000 aluminum panels sweeps between the neoclassical structures, with a light-strewn courtyard constructed in the center.
Exterior of National Gallery Singapore (courtesy National Gallery Singapore, via Flickr) (click to enlarge)
As the museum announced last week, next April one of its inaugural exhibitions will feature more than 100 pieces from the Pompidou in Paris alongside NGS collection works from 1900 to 1960. NGS Director Eugene Tan will co-curate the show with Pompidou Deputy Director Catherine David and Curator Nicolas Liucci-Goutnikov. Gareth Harris at The Art Newspaperreported that this follows recently appointed Pompidou Director Serges Lasvignes’s talks with Chinese officials last month about the possibility of pop-up Pompidou installations in the country.
While this exhibition will bring significant Western art to Singapore, including works by Kandinsky and Chagall, it also could focus international attention on a place that’s not often on the art world radar. Cultural engagement within Singapore is also something that NGS hopes to foster. Chong Siak Ching, CEO of the museum, told CNN: “The understanding and appreciation of art in Southeast Asia is not deep. Art education and appreciation can start and must start with the very young, so we have a dedicated center for art education.”
Rendering of National Gallery Singapore (courtesy National Gallery Singapore, via Flickr)
A few public tours of the “naked museum” were offered this April, prior to any installation of the planned 10,000-object collection in the 64,000-square-meter space (set to be the largest visual art venue in Singapore). At a cost of $530 million, the 10-year construction has been elaborate, with rooftop ponds installed to act as skylights and the City Hall building at one point totally suspended to strengthen its foundation. (Previously, City Hall was better known as the site of Japanese surrender in World War II.) With the Pompidou initiative launching a series of collaborations with major institutions, as well as its significant collection of Southeast Asian art dating back to the 19th century, NGS could help bring Singapore into the cultural spotlight.
A Florida sergeant pulled over a young lesbian couple for making an illegal U-turn. Then he allegedly forced one to strip while he masturbated, threatening to arrest her if she didn’t comply.
According to the two women, who are 17 and 20 years old and remain anonymous, they were pulled over by Sgt. Jesus Menocal, Jr., who told the younger one to hop in the back of his vehicle. Menocal allegedly drove her to a police substation and brought her to a private room, where he asked her a series of obscene questions.
“[He asked me] how do I have intercourse, and I told him, ‘Why do I need to answer that? Why is that necessary?'” she told WSVN. “He insisted me to answer it, so I told him how me and my partner have intercourse, which is me and my girlfriend. After, he asked if I was a virgin. He asked me, if he was to test me right that moment, if I had any diseases on me.”
Then, she said, Menocal began rubbing his genitals, and told her she’d be arrested if she didn’t strip. After she took off her shorts, the Sgt. allegedly asked her if she was on her menstrual cycle. “He wanted me to take off my shirt and my bra together, and I told him, ‘No. Why do I have to do that? There’s no reason to do that,'” she said. Menocal allegedly responded, “Oh I thought you wanted to fuck.”
The teen was released with no charges after fifteen minutes, and she was never told why she was detained. The couple filed a complaint shortly thereafter, and believes the Sgt. may have sexually harassed others as well. Menocal has since been suspended with pay, and an investigation is pending.
“I’m terrified of the police right now,” the teen explained.
Although data is limited, sexual misconduct by police officers is a national problem. In 2010, the National Police Misconduct Reporting Project determined that, out of 618 officers tied to sexual misconduct investigations, 354 were accused of committing non-consensual acts — half of which involved minors. Bowling Green State University conducted a separate study of 398 non-federal law enforcement officers from 43 states, concluding that the majority of officers committed sex crimes while on the job, and 17 percent were either repeat offenders or victimized multiple people. And the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN) previously informed Truthout that the organization’s hotline receives multiple calls about sexually violent acts committed by cops.
“This is a crime about power and control, and when you have people who are in a position of power who perpetrate that crime, it can really undermine a victim’s belief in systems or structures,” Vice President of Victims Services Jen Marsh told Truthout. However, no government or nongovernmental organization tracks sexual misconduct perpetrated by cops.
IF you loved Secretary, our new collection will make you purr: Bent Over His Desk: Hot Office Kink ($4.49).
Image: From sense8, the Netflix show I love right now, a perfect pick for Pride.
“The Internet has become integral to modern life,” John Oliver says in a recent segment from Sunday’s episode of Last Week Tonight. The host breaks down the perils that women encounter online, including revenge-porn and chilling cyber threats. ”Congratulations on your white penis,” Oliver cracks, “because if you have one of those, you probably have a very different experience of the Internet.” John Oliver Takes on Revenge Porn on ‘Last Week Tonight’ (Rolling Stone)
All the creativity at the Cannes Lions festival clearly became too stimulating for one couple spotted getting romantic outside the famed Palais’ des Festivals, right in the middle of the red carpet. Couple caught having sex on Cannes red carpet (Page Six)
Thank you to our sponsor in Spain, women-run Lust Cinema.
This is so cool! MiKandi announced today that publishers can now share their adult comics and hentai manga in its Android adult app store. Today’s launch marks the culmination of months of collaboration between MiKandi’s team and launch partners Studio Cutepet, Class Comics, Triangle! and Hizzacked that now have a presence in its app store, MiKandi’s Jennifer McEwen said. Fans can discover new comics by publisher, author or illustrator — and more are on the way. MiKandi Now Supports Adult Comics, Hentai Manga (XBIZ)
Director and producer Sam Scott left no stone unturned in The Big Turn On, speaking with SexTech stalwarts such as Cindy Gallop, Kiiroo, Hot Octopuss, Ashley Madison owner Noel Biderman and a host of other commentators, and delving quick and fast inside the industry. The consensus is unanimous: SexTech is here and ready to stay. The Big Turn On: SexTech Hits The Silver Screen (BaDoink)
“For the past decade, and in numerous capacities, I’ve toiled as a sex worker. I’ve peddled my trade in bars and hotel rooms, on the sets of feminist pornos, and in shady peep shows. I also work in academia—arguably, an equally shady enterprise.” How the Government and the Christian Lobby Quash Real Research on Sex Workers (PS Mag)
When exes and relatives call social workers on BDSM-loving moms and dads, the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom is there to help. Like many women, Samantha likes kink. Unlike many women, she lost custody of her children over it. (…) Parents Can Lose Custody of Children Just for Being Kinky (Daily Beast)
One way or another, you can be sure anti-porn crusaders will push to extend Australia’s new anti-piracy laws. The Australian Christian Lobby didn’t even wait for the legislation to pass, calling for the proposed anti-piracy laws to extend to porn in April during the copyright senate enquiry. Back when Conroy’s porn filter was on the table, there were calls to expand it to cover other vices like piracy and gambling. Now that the piracy bill has passed through the Senate, you can be sure the ACL and others are looking for ways to expand it or loopholes to exploit it. Porn will be next on Australia’s website-blocking agenda (Sydney Morning Herald)
Behind the scenes of Erotic Chatbots, Ltd. are two British men: chess genius Dr. David Levy and digital erotica king Paul Andrew. Dr. Levy is the President of Erotic Chatbots, Ltd. and the International Computer Games Association; he’s also the only person to have entered the esteemed Loebner Prize for human-computer conversation more than once and achieved a 100 per cent score by winning it each time. VICE spoke with the duo about loneliness, passion, and what it means to fall in love with a smooth-talking robot. A Chess Genius and an Erotica Publisher Are Making the Perfect Dirty Talk Chatbot (Vice)
“A little googling led me to the only brothel in Melbourne that was owned and operated entirely by women. It was nothing too flashy, but in reviews clients consistently referred to the club as “friendly,” which sounded nice. Plus, I couldn’t miss the chance to support a woman-owned business. I screwed up my courage and called the club.” I loved working at a legal brothel in Australia (Hopes and Fears)
This one’s by me! The U.K.’s online-sex censorship crusade is a toxic encounter between government arrogance and things it simply does not understand: sex, free speech, and the internet. https://www.instapaper.com/read/602991509 (Penthouse)
Thank you to our sponsor in Holland, Abby Winters.
A must-read: Do any of the anti-porn criticisms hold water? It would be nice to know. Reliable statistics about pornography are notoriously difficult to obtain – many people underreport their own habits, and many porn companies are loath to share any sort of viewership statistics. Does too much porn numb sexual pleasure? (Aeon Magazine)
Multiplayer survival game Rust randomly generates players’ physical characteristics for them, imitating the screaming chaos of biology rather than letting players choose. The next step in this boundary pushing social experiment? Penis size, of course. Rust Randomizes Penis Length, Players Compare Sizes (Kotaku)
Le WTF: Germans will be able to buy adult-themed e-books only between the hours of 22:00 and 06:00, under new rules. The rules have applied to German cinemas showing adult films since 2002, but they are now being extended to cover books available on the internet. Sex-themed e-books given curfew in Germany (BBC News)
San Francisco’s “Water Conservation is Smart and Sexy” campaign features voluptuous shots of shiny water features along with suggestive messages, such as “Replace Your Old Toilet and Get Paid for Doing It.” San Francisco thinks sex will make your showers shorter (Mother Jones)
Warning for survivors of sexual assault and trauma. About 50 people a day are sexually assaulted or raped while they’re on the clock, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. Any statistic about sexual violence, though, is a farce – only a fraction of victims ever come forward to report the crime. Under cover of darkness, female janitors face rape and assault (NAME)
CHARLOTTE, North Carolina — The Art Books of Henri Matisse at Charlotte’s Bechtler Museum of Modern Art is a travelling exhibition with a new twist. This iteration offers the chance to see four of Matisse’s print books next to a handsome selection of artists’ books from the Bechtler Museum’s own collection, some of which rival the great French Modern Master’s work in this medium.
The largest room in the Matisse section is given over to pages from Jazz, perhaps his most well-known art book. Printed in 1947, it consists of playful images of circus performers and animals, interspersed with notes by Matisse in his own handwriting. The bold, flat colors and arresting shapes arose from the decoupage technique (cutting up pieces of colored paper) that he discovered in the 1940s, and which became his major form of creative output in his final years (and which were justly celebrated in a survey at New York’s MOMA last year). Jazz is notable for being the first public statement of this technique, and even though Matisse was dissatisfied with the book when it was printed (believing that the stencil-based reproduction did not do justice to the vibrancy of the cut paper), he came to appreciate the status of Jazz as introducing a new form of visual language to the contemporary art of the time.
A view of the Matisse exhibition (photo by the author for Hyperallergic)
Seeing these pages from the original edition makes one appreciate the high degree of skill involved in their making: each color and shape was applied by hand using mainly gouache applied through stencils, for every shape on every page of every book in the edition. Most reproductions of Jazz don’t catch the resulting subtle variations of color from page to page, or the slight smudging sometimes between one color area and another that accentuates the book as a handmade object.
Henri Matisse’s frontispiece for Henry de Montherlant’s Pasiphae, linocuts (1944) (photo by the author for Hyperallergic)
Henri Matisse: Poems of Charles d’Orleans, lithographs, (1950) (photo by the author for Hyperallergic) (click to enlarge)
The other three books are an edition of poems by Stephane Mallarmé, illustrated by sinuous line etchings; a story by Henry de Montherlant, illustrated with linocuts; and poems by Charles d’Orleans, illustrated by lithographs.
The de Montherlant illustrations are particularly fine, combining a symmetrical balance between the dense text and the simplicity of the prints. The least successful book is the Charles d’Orleans, consisting mainly of a few repeated heraldic designs that look hastily produced, proving that even the great Matisse could occasionally run out of inspiration.
An adjacent gallery houses books produced by an impressive array of 20th-century artists, from George Braque’s collection of intaglio prints The Order of Birds, and densely textured prints by Antoni Tàpies, to several accordion-fold books by Swiss artist Warja Honegger-Lavater. To contemporary eyes, it’s perhaps true to say that many of these art books gave the artists the opportunity to try out work in a different medium that was nevertheless very similar to their studio work. Certainly, compared to the experimentation on view at New York’s Center for Book Arts, or the Joan Flasch collection at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the books by Matisse, Braque, et al, seem almost conventional in their format. Nevertheless, an exhibition like this one at the Bechtler Museum is a chance to see some rarely seen artist’s books, and affords a riveting snapshot of a new form of expression in its first full flowering.
Henri Matisse: Jazz, The Nightmare of the White Elephant/The Clown, pochoir plates and lithographic text (1947) (photo by the author for Hyperallergic)
Warja Honegger-Lavater, The Cicada and the Ant, watercolor, ink, collage, artist book (1960) (photo by the author for Hyperallergic)
The Art Books of Henri Matisse continues at the Bechtler Museum of Modern Art (420 S Tryon Street, Charlotte, North Carolina) through September 7, 2015.
From 1936 to 1943, around 2,000 posters were created as part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA). An executive order signed on May 6, 1935 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt set up a federal assistance program so millions of the unemployed could get to work, including artists. The Library of Congress (LOC) holds over 900 WPA posters created to advertise the national parks, promote local cultural programs, and prevent drunk driving and syphilis. Their Work Projects Administration (WPA) Poster Collection (the WPA was renamed in 1939, although its acronym stayed the same) is the largest collection of such posters, and earlier this month they added new copyright-free examples to their Flickr page.
“As old as creation: Syphilis is now curable” (1937), silkscreen, for the New York WPA Federal Art Project (click to enlarge)
Much of the legacy of the WPA remains, in the highways we drive over or the murals hanging over us while we wait in line at the post office, but a lot of the art went missing, something the WPA Art Recovery Project has been trying to fix since it launched in 2001. The posters in particular were mass-produced for 17 states, mainly in California, New York, Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, and often disposed of after use. Artists were asked not to sign their names. Nevertheless the posters endure, as do their creators. The Posters for the People project, which published many of them in a 2008 book, identifies artists like Vera Bock, who was born in Russia and inspired by woodblock prints in her designs, the Bauhaus-trained Richard Floethe from Germany, and Tony Velonis of New York, who was influenced by Cubism and experimentation with printmaking techniques (the LOC has an interview with Velonis on its site).
All those distinctive styles of modernism found an unexpected outlet through the WPA, with advice on hygiene, ads for zoos and local marching band parades, or ominous, collage-style warnings like Robert Lachenmann’s “Don’t mix ’em” lithograph, in which a skull hovers behind a bottle of whiskey and a gas pump. The posters for the Federal Theater program, United States Travel Bureau, and other State Departments hold up surprisingly well with their direct messages and simple designs. At a time when unemployment was at almost 20%, these posters encouraged people to get out and explore their country and participate in local life in defiance of the hardships of the Great Depression.
“John is not really dull – he may only need his eyes examined” (1937), silkscreen, for the New York WPA Federal Art Project
Alexander Dux, “See America” (1939), silkscreen, for the United States Travel Bureau
Robert Lachenmann, “Don’t mix ’em” (1937), lithograph, for the Pennsylvania WPA Federal Art Project
John Wagner, “Don’t kill our wild life” (1940), silkscreen, for the Department of the Interior, National Park Service
Stanley Thomas Clough, “Live here at low rent – Lakeview Terrace” (1940), silkscreen, for the Cleveland Metropolitan Housing Authority as part of the Ohio Federal Art Project
Nathan Sherman, “Work with Care” (1936), silkscreen, for the Pennsylvania Federal Art Project
“Keep your fire escapes clear” (1937), silkscreen, for the Tenement House Department of the City of New York
“In March read the books you’ve always meant to read” (1941), silkscreen, for the Illinois Library Project
“The Drama of the Heavens: Adler Planetarium” (1939), silkscreen, for the Chicago WPA Federal Art Project
“Indian Art of the United States at the Museum of Modern Art” (1936-41), silkscreen, for an exhibition prepared by the Indian Arts and Crafts Board U.S. Dept. of The Interior
“Lassen Volcanic National Park, Ranger Naturalist Service” (1938), silkscreen, for the Department of the Interior, National Park Service
"Donald Trump's use of 'Rockin' in the Free World' was not authorized. Mr. Young is a longtime supporter of Bernie Sanders."—Elliot Roberts, manager of Neil Young, whose song "Rockin' in the Free World" was used by Donald Trump during his presidential announcement yesterday.
Republicans, WHO TOTES LOVE THE FREE MARKET YO, have a rich history of stealing liberals' songs for their garbage campaigns. And a rich history of misunderstanding those songs. "Rockin' in the Free World," for example, is a song critical of George H.W. Bush's administration and its contempt for the poor.
Ten-year-old Isaiah Francis and eleven-year-old Jeremiah Grimes were playing video games when they started to smell smoke. They looked out the window and saw that the house next door was on fire, so they called 911 and then ran over to see if anyone needed help.
"So we ran over there as fast as we could, and the dad was outside trying to find water," said 10-year-old Isaiah. "We asked them if there were any kids in there, and he said, 'Yes!' We said, 'Where?' He said, 'In the kitchen!'"
So the boys raced inside the home.
"I grabbed the infant, and Isaiah grabbed the one-and-a-half year old," explained 11-year-old Jeremiah.
Isaiah said he saw flames inside the home.
"Yes, it was really close to the babies, because it started by the couch," he said.
..."Mostly, it was just dark. You could see black and orange flames everywhere, and I was kind of scared of doing that," Jeremiah said.
Isaiah added, "I was scared, but got through my fear and went into the fire."
After the boys carried the children out of the burning home, they headed five houses down, to Isaiah's house, where they placed them on the couch and gave them some water.
"We made sure they were ok, nothing wrong with them," Jeremiah said.
When the firefighters arrived, because Jeremiah had called them, they rescued two other older children, ages 2 and 5, who were still inside. They are both in critical but stable condition.
The cause of the fire is being investigated, and the parents of the children are super grateful to the two boys: "They said, 'Thank you so much! We're so proud of you for saving our children!'"
In 2009, almost immediately after taking office, President Obama issued an executive order which restricts all government employees from using on anyone detained during any armed conflict "any interrogation technique or approach, or any treatment related to interrogation, that is not authorized by and listed in Army Field Manual," thus effectively ending the torture program used by the CIA and US military.
This radical (!) order prompted outrage from conservatives, including Bush's former chief speechwriter Marc Thiessen, who moaned: "It's not even the end of inauguration week, and Obama is already proving to be the most dangerous man ever to occupy the Oval Office."
Dramatic!
Except: Because it was an executive order, it could be overturned by the next president. And almost surely would be, if the next occupant of the White House is a Republican.
So Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstin and Republican Senator John McCain joined forces to co-author an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act to reaffirm and codify President Obama's executive order banning the use of torture.
Should the McCain-Feinstein amendment be made law...it will be harder for future administrations to repeat the actions of the Bush administration, which used controversial legal opinions to justify torturing detainees. The amendment would also turn into law a second component of the Obama order, which requires the Red Cross to have access to detainees in US custody, bringing America into line with the Geneva convention.
Despite opposition from many of McCain's Republican colleagues, whom he urged to avoid the "dark path of sacrificing our values for our short-term security needs," sounding like a reasonable human being for once in his life, the amendment passed in the Senate, 78-21.
And any further Republican opposition to the amendment is unlikely to hold up the legislation to which it's attached, because the National Defense Authorization Act is the defense appropriations bill neither party likes to delay even for the most objectionable amendments, because they don't want to be accused of failing to support the troops or being soft on defense or whatever.
So, the long and the short of it is: We are very close to outlawing torture once again.
Until the next Republican War President, anyway.
* * *
[Video autoplays at link] Relatedly, if you can access video, John Oliver did a segment Sunday night on US torture policy that is definitely worth a watch, with warnings for description and images of torture, as well as a rape joke. In addition to the usual providing of solid information, he also employs a video clip that is near and dear to many of our hearts. I won't spoil it for you, though. *jumps into Christmas tree*
Web experience by Taylor Crane combines instagram timelapses with Soundcloud playlists to create audio visual montages.
Do you see those Instagram #hyperlapse
videos on the left? They were just posted to Instagram; it’s a
real-time feed. Enjoy a peek into the lives of others, from locations
around the world. Hyperlax is meant to be a bit of an escape, a bit
voyueristic, a bit relaxing. I think it’s mesmerising. Maybe you will
too!
Honestly, it's all about what's available. Plenty of newer shows haven't been licensed for dubbing yet. I'm for whatever gets people to watch more anime. I can't pick a side.
King Solomon
Subs preserve the nuance of the original. Look at something as basic as Princess Mononoke - I'm not saying Gillian Anderson doesn't have a great voice, but in traditional Japanese anime, dogs are voiced by men, and cats by women, and that gets lost when you recast without respect for the original.
Hannibal Barca
That's actually not even true? Moro was a wolf goddess. She was clearly female. Did you even watch the whole movie?
Amy first realized something was amiss in the third grade. There she was one minute, staring out of the window, thinking about the blueness of her classmate Jonah’s eyes, when suddenly a week had passed.
It always happened like that. She would lose herself in a daydream and then lose herself in real life. She’d imagine a comet hurtling towards the earth, laying waste to the school, then wake up a day later in bed staring at the ceiling, her mom’s voice calling for her over and over. She’d imagine mountains folding into each other like origami paper, the sky cracking like glass, a boy in class passing her a love note. Next she’d be sitting in her mother’s car on the way to grandma’s house, December having passed with no notice from her.
She didn’t mention this to anyone at first. It didn’t matter much anyways—she was young and there was a lot of time to waste. There was always more where that came from.
So she let time pass like that. Sometimes she willed it on. When exams came during high school, she’d think about the future—apartments in New York, weddings in the snow, herself disappearing into the world with just a suitcase. When she was done, she’d pick up her term papers.
It wasn’t until she met Matt that it became a problem.
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![Henry Matisse
Henry de Montherlant
Pasiphaé, Chant de Minos (Les Crétois) (Pasiphaé, Song of Minos [The Cretans])
Paris: Martin Fabiani, 1944
Number 17 of 250 copies
...L’angoisse qui s’amasse en frappant sous ta gorge...(The Fear Which Grows
and Sticks in Your Throat)
Linocut on vélin d’Arches filigrané paper, 13 1/5” x 10 1/10” (
© 2015 Succession H. Matisse / Artists Rights Society, New York)](http://hyperallergic.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Pasipha%C3%A9-Chant-de-Minos.jpg)
The largest room in the Matisse section is given over to pages from Jazz, perhaps his most well-known art book. Printed in 1947, it consists of playful images of circus performers and animals, interspersed with notes by Matisse in his own handwriting. The bold, flat colors and arresting shapes arose from the decoupage technique (cutting up pieces of colored paper) that he discovered in the 1940s, and which became his major form of creative output in his final years (and which were justly celebrated in a survey at New York’s MOMA last year). Jazz is notable for being the first public statement of this technique, and even though Matisse was dissatisfied with the book when it was printed (believing that the stencil-based reproduction did not do justice to the vibrancy of the cut paper), he came to appreciate the status of Jazz as introducing a new form of visual language to the contemporary art of the time.
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