#I have thoughts about how misogyny impacts our view of Our Lady

[violet-viriditas]

Petition for more art portraying Our Lady to have her with crows feet and smile lines and grey hairs.

I want to gaze into her face as she would have been the death of her son - not a fresh faced teenager saying yes to God, but as someone who has experienced half a century of joy and of suffering, the kind motherly face of a woman who has walked with God - and parented God - for decades. The Mary that walks with us saw her son crucified, suffered and carried on, she aged! and she should also be portrayed as such.

[milfyclaus]

on our lady and her relationship with her own femininity - a meta looking at the character of lady a. c.omstock through the lens of religion, victorian womanhood, and pseudo science of the era.  or - a rewrite of an old meta that i needed a refresh given that i was in high school when i wrote this originally.  given the historical content from many sources in this post, please proceed with caution as it will contain heavy examples of misogyny and medical sexism. this post will also contain mentions of child birth, child rearing, pregnancy, and infertility.  THIS IS A MONSTER OF A META. GOD BE WITH YOU, YE WHO READ THIS.

Lady Comstock, within the narrative of of Bioshock Infinite, is shown to be a paragon of virtue - the wife of the cult’s prophet, the mother of the messiah; the ideal woman in all respects - the perfect mother, wife, and citizen and a model for all within columbia to emulate. While in the canon shown to the player within the game shows that she has been dead for near twenty years (providing Zachary the ability to use her corpse as a political prop, which is another discussion for another time) - it does not allow much exploration into Lady Comstock’s relationship with this mantle of holy mother, reconciling that with her own past, and the relationship she has with her own femininity and how she views herself under the influence of victorian upbringing and societal norms. 

By 1912, Lady Comstock’s perception of her femininity, self, and womanhood is incredibly - horrifically - skewed; almost self-hating while deifying. I will split this meta into 3 sections - her past and victorian ideals, Mary’s role in faith (and thus, Amelia’s within the cult); and some culminating thoughts on how all of these factor into and impact Amelia near twenty years into her role as mother of the messiah within the narrative of Infinite.

PART I: PAST REVELATIONS AND VIEWS OF THE ERA.

Not much is known of Lady Comstock’s past within the canon of the game - it boils down to a single voxophone singing praise to the prophet, her redeemer, and is left open-ended for audience interpretation for as to what, exactly, she was seeking forgiveness for. the transcript of said audio diary is as follows: 

“To those who loved me, I was the most generous of souls. There was no pain I would deny them. No betrayal I would not gladly give. And when I had scorched the hearts of all who loved me, the Prophet said, “There is nothing you can do for which I will not forgive you, for God has granted me sight, and through His eyes, even you are loved.”” (Unconditional; recorded in universe on April 1st, 1893)

Without reading too much into the audio and its implications, one can rightfully assume that Lady Comstock, at the very least, played with the affections of others for her own amusement until she was left alone due to her actions towards others. Aside from Daisy Fitzroy mentioning that Lady Comstock had ‘experienced hardship’ in her youth, nothing more is said about her past. The most popular fanon interpretation (one that i also subscribe to) is that this voxophone refers to promiscuity. Given that the character of Lady Comstock is based off of American socialite and political figurehead Alice Roosevelt Longworth - a woman known for breaking many social rules in her day; in addition to several affairs throughout her life, which she did not hide and were common knowledge in high society, I agree with this interpretation of the audio diary. With Alice’s proximity to the white house, the social consequences for this would be less severe, however - turning back to Lady Comstock, in my own canon, this voxophone does refer to her engaging in multiple affairs with multiple partners with the express intent of playing with their affections and publicly betraying them for her own gain and amusement. 

I have already discussed here why Lady Comstock must be of the upper class for Zachary to gain the traction he needs for his cult to flourish. with that in mind, most of high society could turn a blind eye to affairs - provided they remained discreet, which Lady Comstock at the time was not. The consequences of a promiscuous woman were more than just of the social variety, leaving her isolated; but of a moral variety as well. Elizabeth Lee (who received a BA from Brown University in ‘97 and wrote most of her material during a summer research group) also had this to say:

“Women were portrayed either frigid or else insatiable. A young lady was only worth as much as her chastity and appearance of complete innocence, for women were time bombs just waiting to be set off. Once led astray, she was the fallen woman, and nothing could reconcile that till she died.” “This preoccupation developed into an ideology that legitimised unequal power relations in the economic and political sphere even as it glorified women’s role in the domestic and “moral” sphere. It is easy to see, therefore, how the myth of women’s salvatory and redemptive potential victimized women.” (Langland, Patriarchal Ideology and Marginal Motherhood in Victorian Novels by Women).

The Victorian Era had given rise to the cult of domesticity and the role of the ‘angel of the house’ - in engaging in torrid, obvious affairs, Amelia directly defies these societal expectations, and brings the ire of that society upon not the man involved in the affair, but the woman. Though these affairs, Amelia would have made her social worth and capital null and void - an ‘unwoman’; with nothing to remove that mantle from her in life. She would have been considered the lowest of the low; and become a fringe society member. In addition to this, women with sexual drive were considered ‘ill’ and ‘unnatural’; disrupting the ‘order of things’ through their anomaly - 

 “… there can be no doubt that sexual feeling in the female is in abeyance … and even if roused (which in many instances it never can be) is very moderate compared with that of the male…. The best mothers, wives, and managers of households, know little or nothing of sexual indulgences. Love of home, children, and domestic duties, are the only passions they feel. As a general rule, a modest woman seldom desires any sexual gratification for herself. She submits to her husband, but only to please him; and, but for the desire of maternity, would far rather be relieved from his attentions. (Boumelha; Thomas Hardy and Women. P. 14). “Middle-class women who, by mid century, were giving birth 'confined' within the home, now achieved true womanhood if they responded emotionally to their infants and bonded with them through breast-feeding and constant attendance. Motherhood was seen as an affirmation of their identity.” (Abrams, Ideals of Womanhood in Victorian Britain).

Victorians, in addition to the moral consequences facing women who engaged in affairs and were connected with their sexuality and desires, also believed that women who were as such had something wrong with them on a medical, biological level - and subscribed to the belief that women were biologically destined to be subservient mothers - in addition to that, the Victorians also placed intrinsic value to a woman’s chastity: 

“And how is the vice of unchastity confined within boundaries so rigid in the case of the female sex? … it is because even an unchaste man will marry none but a chaste woman.”  (Boumelha; Thomas Hardy and Women. P. 19). “Even if Victorians did not subscribe to the idea of the Angel in the House, they were attracted to the implicit idea of women’s redemptive or salvatory potential.” (Langland, Patriarchal Ideology and Marginal Motherhood in Victorian Novels by Women).

Amelia, through her affairs, is victimised by this victorian mindset - and was not only removed of social capital and status, but ostracized from society and isolated with the consensus being that no matter what she did in the future that she would never be considered a ‘true’ woman - no amount of confession or repentance could change that. She would be, in the eyes of society, ‘damaged goods’; and nothing short of death could change that. With that in mind, we lay the societal groundwork and environment that Amelia grew up surrounded by, and was conditioned in.

PART II: MARY, MOTHER OF GOD; HER ROLE IN THE CHURCH, AND LADY A. COMSTOCK, HOLY MOTHER. 

After the elevation of Columbia and isolation of the cult, Zachary Hale Comstock reveals that Lady Comstock is to birth the messiah in seven days time - a girl who shall ignite the world and cleanse the sodom (re: Earth) below in flame. This prophecy and the action of Elizabeth being brought to Columbia cements Lady Comstock as the cult’s holy mother - the modern day ‘Mother Mary’ for the people to rally around.  Pope John Paul II wrote an encyclical on Mary’s role in the church which can be found here. Given the cult’s proximity to Catholicism in game canon, I have chosen to reference this in regards to Lady Comstock’s role within the cult as the mother of the messiah and the ‘mistress of forgiveness’. 

Mary embraces each and every one in the Church, and embraces each and every one through the Church. In this sense Mary, Mother of the Church, is also the Church's model.

Mary is thus present in the mystery of the Church as a model. But the Church's mystery also consists in generating people to a new and immortal life: this is her motherhood in the Holy Spirit. And here Mary is not only the model and figure of the Church; she is much more. For, "with maternal love she cooperates in the birth and development" of the sons and daughters of Mother Church. 

Amelia, with this position within the cult in mind, is also positioned socially at the helm of society - and in an environment where religion is one with all things in every level, she is to be a model for the women of Columbia and a piece of living, breathing propaganda - all that they are should aspire to be. She is, all at once, the perfect vision of a wife, mother, woman, and citizen in all that she does and must be above reproach in temperament, manner and history - and while she certainly has left things at the proverbial riverside, Amelia’s past is, according to the society she has grown up in and continues to be in, an unforgivable act. It should be noted, of course, that in my canon, lady comstock downplayed her relationships with others, her affairs, and lied in confessional to Zachary Hale Comstock - fearing another rejection after living as a pariah for so long.

Be that as it may - Lady Comstock must be, much like Mary, above her own humanity; a model to all and the spirit of the cult and its reach - for not only is Lady Comstock mother to the lamb (Elizabeth); she is mother to Columbia and all its people - it is her divine and (only) purpose within the cult and its hierarchy - and to fail or waver in that duty - or to question the prophet, who is both god and the church/cult embodied - would, of course, mean she has outlived her usefulness.

The Mother of that Son, therefore, mindful of what has been told her at the Annunciation and in subsequent events, bears within herself the radical "newness" of faith: the beginning of the New Covenant.

Lady Comstock, as the figure/spirit of Mary within the cult, bears the heavy weight of carrying it with her in all forms - Zachary may be a more tangible figurehead than God, and even redirects attention from Amelia to himself, but the narrative remains the same - she is the one to birth their messiah, it is her that carries the future of the cult and prophecy - and with that weight upon her, it is a venerated position meant for an ideal - not a living, breathing person to live up to and occupy. Indeed, Lady Comstock’s role within the cult goes beyond mother to the lamb - but becomes mother of the city and its people; with several referring to her as ‘sweet mother of Columbia’ and ‘mother of forgiveness’ et cetera, et cetera (all Marian-esque titles, might I add).  But Mary, of course, is not just a mother to the messiah and a carrier of the faith - but also a mediator between god and mankind - entreating to god for man, guiding christ to ensure he looks out for man. Mary is the balance - the bridge - between the holy and the mundane; and as such, Lady Comstock serves that same role - and does so, as far as iI can see within canon perception of her as some omnipotent entity ("You won't hide long from her! She knows no blindness!" "Her eyes are open even in the grave! You will not escape!" "I will shine her light on you!" "She sees in channels! Yes, she does!" Which, in canon, she has become in death a saint of justice and in that way they would be praying to her to intercede on their behalf in order to gain god’s justice; but again, Amelia the saint is a separate conversation for another day - and I have already discussed her narrative role as caritas) has her acting on behalf as a conduit for the loyal and devoted when the prophet is ‘busy’; or the prayers are not ‘important’ enough for him to act upon.

Thus there is a mediation: Mary places herself between her Son and mankind in the reality of their wants, needs and sufferings. She puts herself "in the middle," that is to say she acts as a mediatrix not as an outsider, but in her position as mother. She knows that as such she can point out to her Son the needs of mankind, and in fact, she "has the right" to do so. Her mediation is thus in the nature of intercession: Mary "intercedes" for mankind.

The teaching of the Second Vatican Council presents the truth of Mary's mediation as "a sharing in the one unique source that is the mediation of Christ himself." Thus we read: "The Church does not hesitate to profess this subordinate role of Mary. She experiences it continuously and commends it to the hearts of the faithful, so that, encouraged by this maternal help, they may more closely adhere to the Mediator and Redeemer." This role is at the same time special and extraordinary. It flows from her divine motherhood and can be understood and lived in faith only on the basis of the full truth of this motherhood. 

Of course, this role is steeped in the fact that she is still a mother to the city, the faith (read; cult), and to its messiah - it is because she is a mother that she intercedes on behalf of man, and in that vein, it is also why Lady Comstock is shown to be that same mediator in the balance between god and man - because she is a mother; and not just any mother, but the mother of mothers within the cult. Above all else, her role is that of holy mother - mother in all ways, mother of all things; perfection and humility incarnate - and selfless, as only any holy mother can be. 

PART III: SIMPLY, AMELIA. 

Now that I have discussed the environment and views in which Amelia was raised in and formed by - as well as her role within the cult, we can discuss how all of this has impact her at her core; her identity, and her relationship with herself and the societal ideal of womanhood that she has found herself to be exemplifying. The years of social shunning and shame and the sudden exaltation of herself by the masses has, to put it lightly, twisted her sense of self and her views on herself.

Amelia was 16-18 during the time she found herself ostracized from society - two years of being treated as lower than dirt; two years of being reviled and shunned; of having all manner of comments and insults hurled her way by “polite society”. While obviously, her treatment of her flings was not the greatest - she did not deserve the outright disgust from the people around her, who would have simply been neutral on the matter had she been a man. Not only that, but having friends and those who had watched her grow up - people she had respected - and eventually, her own family; not only turn away from her and leave her alone, but to insult her and shun her at every turn? That would deeply effect someone at any age; let alone an upset teenager who is lashing out at the world. Give it enough time, and no matter how much she might pretend that it does not effect her, it will - and Amelia begins to internalise these thoughts, these insults, these actions - believing that she deserves this; that she is everything that has been said about her, that she is unforgivable, and nothing could reconcile that now that she had left the good graces of society, and all that she understood about womanhood - that there was nothing beyond duty, motherhood, and rearing children; and now that she had strayed from this path, there was no recovering, or going back from this no matter what she did to attempt to fix it.  With all of this in play, it did leave Amelia open to being indoctrinated into the cult under the guise and appeal of finally finding redemption and getting a second start - a clean slate. She would have had no support system, no family looking out for her in order to keep their own reputations unsullied, and would have been at a very low point mentally/emotionally. This leaves her vulnerable - and it is all too easy for Zachary to draw her deeper into the cult once he finds out she has money to spare. Even with all this talk of redemption and clean slates, however, Amelia knows at this point that what she has done is unforgivable to the eyes of society - and fearing losing her chance at this second chance, she would lie to Zachary; claiming that the gossip was hearsay spread by men who she had spurned. This omission is understandable - but she continues to internalise these thoughts and beliefs, having no one to healthily discuss her emotions and thoughts with.  Her self-view continues to twist upon entering Columbia - the sudden exaltation; the prophecy that she is to bear the Messiah; first met with elation, but then sadness and despair as it becomes clear in game canon that she and the Prophet cannot conceive. Zachary mentions this in audio briefly:

“The Archangel tells me that Columbia will only survive so long as my line sits the throne. Yet Lady Comstock produces no child. I have done what a man can do, yet there is no child! I have asked Lutece about the matter, but even she refuses to help.” (A Broken Circle; recorded in universe on September the 10th, 1893; a month before Elizabeth’s arrival in Columbia)

The implication here is that Zachary blames Amelia for their failure to conceive - something that was common to do at the time with couples struggling with fertility. Amelia, too, blames herself - believing that her indiscretions have manifested into infertility; and that for lying to Zachary about the extent of these affairs, that God, himself, is punishing her with infertility - as all she knows is that women who have ‘fallen’ in the way she has never receive grace. 

With that in mind, it can also be argued that her outburst in Rosalind Lutece’s home after Elizabeth’s arrival in Columbia was as much anger and hurt at the thought Zachary had had an affair with her, but a projection of her own thoughts and feelings towards herself on to Rosalind. 

I have touched on the fact Amelia does not enjoy the deification she has received within the cult and in Columbia - it makes her uncomfortable at a base level; for she does not believe that she deserves it. Elizabeth is not ‘her child’ (though she comes to accept that she is indeed her daughter years down the road) - the messiah is a lie, the prophecy is a lie; and she, too, is a lie - but at every turn, she is praised as mother, above all else - when she knows this to be a lie; and believes that God, again, is punishing her for her transgressions. It is a heavy thing, to go from a social pariah to the apex of society - the ideal in everything. All those expectations would be crushing - and they are. Amelia has no resources or ability to cope with the self-loathing she feels internally, nor any ability to cope with or compartmentalize the devotion the public shows her - and it is killing her; and the blind adoration she receives does not sit well upon her shoulders. It is uncomfortable, to say the least - and has, over the years, twisted into self-loathing as she understands herself to be ‘unwoman’ in the eyes of society, while exemplifying womanhood within the cult - and endeavours to redeem herself by acting and being as she should, resulting in an unhealthy relationship with herself and her own sexuality. 

Going deeper into that, Amelia treats herself with distance - she is not herself, her desires are not hers, and has become, in years, very much a voyeur into her own life - she has numbed herself, frozen herself; and in attempting to become this caricature of a woman and mother that Columbia has asked her to be: unerring, perfect - and above feeling. It manifests in certain ways - namely in her appearance, as she attempts to reclaim her femininity and own womanhood and exist with it in peace.

But if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her for a covering. Luke 7:38 ESV

Hair was also a symbol of womanhood in the Victorian Era with extreme importance placed upon it - Amelia covers hers, grows it long; wears it in elaborate styles - it is an intrinsic part of her; an extension - a visual representation of her reclamation of what she feels was taken from her. She’s got an unhealthy attachment to her hair - won’t let scissors near it - it is a core part of her identity. In addition, she dresses, of course, as she must - never too gaudy or ostentatious; always down to her toes, up to her neck, and down to her wrists - always blue, as a symbol of motherhood, of femininity. This, of course; is not as important to her as her hair - nor is it as important to her as the repression of her own sexual desires and appetites; which she cannot get rid of and are a great source of destress for her when they do surface, as she is constantly fighting against herself to be as she believes she is supposed to be: devoid of any desire. 

But at the end of the day, she still finds that she does hate herself - and believes, at her heart, that it will only take one small thing to send her back to the state she once was in, for she has never achieved grace - and feels altogether undeserving of the title of mother, and all that it implies. 

[lo-lynx]

A brief defence of Selyse Baratheon (kinda)

CW: sexism

Spoiler warning: All A Song of Ice and Fire books

Now, I’m the first one to admit that Selyse Baratheon née Florent is an extremely unpleasant, filled with racism and internalised misogyny (see for instance Jon XI in ADWD… or any ADWD chapter she’s in… or any chapter she’s in generally). But nevertheless, I want to offer a brief defence of her, mostly because I’m tired of seeing her joked about in particular ways (both in story and in the fandom), specifically regarding her looks. This essay will most likely be shorter and have slightly less depth than my usual work, but I just wanted to get my thoughts about this out there.

When we’re first presented to Selyse in the prologue of A Clash with Kings she’s described thusly:

Lady Selyse was as tall as her husband, thin of body and thin of face, with prominent ears, a sharp nose, and the faintest hint of a mustache on her upper lip. She plucked it daily and cursed it regularly, yet it never failed to return. Her eyes were pale, her mouth stern, her voice a whip.

So, the reader immediately gets a description of her that’s not exactly flattering. In Storm of Swords we get a similar description from Davos’ fifth chapter:

Queen Selyse, a pinched thin hard woman with large ears and a hairy upper lip.

By A Dance with Dragons this has evolved to rumours of her having “a great dark beard” according Val (in Jon XI). Jon assures her that it’s only a mustache, but later Val counters:

You lied about the beard. That one has more hair on her chin than I have between my legs.

So, it seems pretty established that most characters think Selyse is ugly and notice this mustache of hers. In the Clash prologue that I started quoting, we also get one of the many mentions of how bad Stannis’ and Selyse’s marriage is:

Stannis had always been uncomfortable around women, even his own wife. When he had gone to King's Landing to sit on Robert's council, he had left Selyse on Dragonstone with their daughter. His letters had been few, his visits fewer; he did his duty in the marriage bed once or twice a year, but took no joy in it, and the sons he had once hoped for had never come.

So, Selyse’s marriage isn’t great, and she hasn’t been able to give her husband the sons he had wished for. Later, in Tyrion III, Littlefinger talks of Stannis’ and Selyse’s marriage like this:

Lord Stannis has spent most of his marriage apart from his wife. Not that I fault him, I'd do the same were I married to Lady Selyse.

So, further confirmation of the unhappy marriage, and further insulting of Selyse (probably of her looks, though it’s not made entirely clear). Then in ASOS Davos IV:

The throne is mine, as Robert's heir. That is law. After me, it must pass to my daughter, unless Selyse should finally give me a son.

My point with all of these quotes is basically to prove two things:

1)    Selyse is continually described as ugly, with prominent ears and a mustache.

2)    It’s continually pointed out how she hasn’t been able to give Stannis the sons he wants (one could of course argue that this is hardly just her fault…)

This, I argue, essentially makes her a failure as a woman in Westeros (and to a certain degree in our world).

As I’ve written on numerous occasions before, the gender norms of Westeros are very restrictive, and those who break them are generally punished. Based on how much different characters comment on Selyse’s, and other character’s, looks, beauty ideals seem to be part of those gender norms. We can see that Selyse’s body, particularly her ears and mustache, makes her ugly in many people’s eyes. Her body and looks doesn’t confirm to the norm, even less so the ideal. Researcher Denise Malmberg describes how the normative body in contemporary Western society is defined what it is not, for instance too fat, too tall, too short etc. I’m pretty sure we could add hairy and having prominent ears to the list of things an attractive body should not have. As Malmberg points out, women who are not seen as attractive, who aren’t sexualised, is in some ways seen as less of a woman. They’re not womanly, not feminine, not a proper lady. I also find it interesting that Selyse’s mustache in particular is pointed out so often. To me, it immediately brings associations of so called “bearded ladies” who often figured in the “freak-shows” of the 19th century and have remained in the public imagination ever since. As for instance researcher Clare Sears have pointed out, such shows often included people who in some ways broke gendered (and racialised) norms of embodiment, and in that way policed the borders of gender norms (2008). By showing for instance bearded ladies as “freaks” it became apparent to the public that having such a body was unacceptable. I’m not saying that GRRM purposely drew on such history when describing Selyse’s mustache, but I think the description of her looks have a similar effect; that is to show what is unnormal.

 When it comes having children, loads of feminists and feminist researcher have written about motherhood’s significance for womanhood, for instance this is something Denise Malmberg mentions as well. Malmberg writes that a “normal” woman is expected to become a mother, and a woman who doesn’t have children is therefore exempt from true womanhood (this is also something I explore in this essay about disability and gender in ASOIAF). Authors such as Jack/Judith Halberstam, Sara Ahmed, Anna Siverskog etc. have all also written about how having children are expected by the heterosexual life script that we’re all expected to follow (2005, 5; 2006, 85; 2016, 14). I did a quick search for scientific articles about childfree women and got an overwhelming amount of results, and to write a complete overview of the topic would take ages. But, for instance, a 2011 article about childfree women in Australia found that childless women were seen as “unnatural” and unwomanly” (Rich, Taket, Graham, Shelley 2011). So, I think that we can conclude, that in general in society, women are expected to have kids. To not have kids is unnatural and unwomanly. The fact then, that Selyse is seen as not capable of giving Stannis a son, contributes to her being a bit of a “failed” woman in the eyes of Westeros.

So, in conclusion, the way Selyse is described in story makes it clear that she fails to live up to the norms and ideals of womanhood. For that I feel sorry for her. That’s it, that’s the defence. As I pointed out in the beginning of this essay, that doesn’t make her less of a horrible person with her racism against Free Folk, and internalised misogyny. That part of her personality should be critiqued, and harshly so. However, her looks are not part of that. It should be possible to criticise her without making fun of her mustache or ears. Such jokes only contribute to already existing sexist views of how people of different genders should act and look.

 References

Ahmed, Sara. 2006. Queer Phenomenology: Orientations, Objects, Others. Duke University Press: Durham

Halberstam, Judith. 2005. In a Queer Time and Place. New York: New York University Press.

Malmberg, Denise. 2012. “’To Be Cocky Is to Challenge the Norms’: The Impact of Bodynormativity on Bodily and Sexual Attraction in Relation to Being a Cripple.” lambda Nordica, 17:1-2, 194-216.

Martin, George RR. 2011. A Clash of Kings. Harper Voyager: London.

Martin, George RR. 2011. A Storm of Swords. Harper Voyager: London.

Martin, George RR. 2012. A Dance with Dragons. Harper Voyager: London.

Rich, Stephanie., Taket, Anne., Graham, Melissa. & Julia Shelley. 2011. “‘Unnatural’, ‘Unwomanly’, ‘Uncreditable’ and ‘Undervalued’: The Significance of Being a Childless Woman in Australian Society”. Gend. Issues, (2011)28:226–247.

Sears, Clare. 2008. “Electric Brilliancy: Cross-Dressing Law and Freak Show Displays in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco”, WSQ: Women's Studies Quarterly, 36: 3-4, 170-187.

Siverskog, Anna. 2016. Queera livslopp. Att leva och åldras som lhbtq-person I en heteronormativ värld. Linköping: Linköpings universitet.

[duchessofostergotlands]

if you were given the opportunity to pick the women featured on the cover for being forces of change, who would you pick? I loved several of the ladies especially Yara Shahidi, who is around my age. She does so much that it makes me ashamed but also proud of her/my generation lol.

Gosh, I don’t even know. The thing is that women who inspire me personally may not be the same as women who are forces for change. Those are different things. I guess these are a handful of women I think are changing the world or have changed the world (although I’d say something different next week haha). Also these are not all necessarily royally appropriate:

I would keep Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie which is probably of no surprise to anyone given that I keep gushing about her. She has brought a whole generation of young girls and women into feminism with her TED talk and her essays, with her work on feminism being shared across whole nations as part of government run female empowerment projects. She also centres African women in her work, discussing the intersections between race, class and gender. 

I would also probably keep Jacinda. Her decision to have NZ focus on wellbeing over GDP is groundbreaking. She has gone back to the drawing board on how a country should operate and is fundamentally rethinking the way government cares for its people. Plus she made history with her decision to have a child and take maternity leave as sort of Head of State (I know it’s HM but it’s basically her who does all the stuff). In the UK, female politicians still have to turn up to vote even if they’re heavily pregnant so it’s refreshing to see a female politician smashing those entrenched views 

I would also have to agree on one more, Greta! She has changed the conversation around the environment from one of mild concern to urgent action. Although her words weren’t new, she has managed to express them in a succinct and personal way that has connected with people from all over the world. She has the weight of the world on her shoulders- literally- and has been bullied by grown men for her autism but she has been unfailing in her commitment. She is also encouraging a wave of youth activism as a peer rather than as an adult who can often be patronising or overly simplistic:

Malala Yousafzai- Education and gender equality activist. She has changed discourse around girl’s education- especially in traditional societies- and has spoken truth to power with bravery and conviction. The Malala Fund has since become a global force, attracting the support of some of the most powerful people in the world 

Hannah Gadsby- Stand up comedian. Her comedy special Nanette is perhaps the greatest stand up routine ever written. For the first time that I’m aware of someone exposed and deconstructed their routine and how it impacts on them away from the stage, and in the process touched on homophobia and mental illness in such sensitive ways. She’s reinvented a whole form of expression 

Leyla Hussein- Anti-FGM activist and co-founder of Daughters of Eve. She is a survivor of FGM herself. She has been instrumental in raising awareness of what’s generally a secretive practice and pushing for change for young girls. If it wasn’t for her we would probably never have seen anyone in power discussing FGM, let alone people being arrested for it.  

Phoebe Waller Bridge- It would be easy for someone who hasn’t seen any of Phoebe’s work to think that she’s over hyped.  She isn’t. She’s been such a fresh voice on screen, bringing stories of real women with messy lives in to the public eye without straying in to the “insufferably privileged” Lena Dunham school of writing.  

Caroline Criado-Perez- One of the most intelligent voices in feminist activism. She has led several successful campaigns to ensure women’s representation, including the push for a woman on bank notes and a statue of Millicent Fawcett. But her expertise is in data and she has opened up a groundbreaking conversation about the gender gap in data. Data is going to be the future of our society and if we aren’t recognising these gaps now then the future is going to continue to be inherently biased so her work could have huge ramifications. 

Laura Bates- Founder of the Everyday Sexism project. The site gave a platform for hundreds of thousands of women to share the small acts of sexism they deal with every day, bringing these previously “harmless” acts in to the open. Laura’s work has sparked new conversations in feminist thought, linking the small daily experiences women go through to the more extreme acts of gender motivated violence and oppression. 

Munroe Bergdorf- A highly controversial figure but it’s part of why I think she’s changing the world. As a trans woman of colour she has refused to be silent about trans rights, white supremacy, misogyny, and the areas where they intersect. She has become a lightning rod for public opinions on trans rights, losing or walking away from a series of high profile positions due to the increase in transphobia in the UK. Her voice is powerful, and that scares people

Nadia Murad- Nobel Peace Prize winner. After dealing with kidnapping and sexual violence as a young woman in Iraq, she became a committed activist raising awareness of the way violence against women is used as a weapon of conflict. She has spoken to the UN Security Council on human trafficking- the first time that has been done- and has since met with everyone from Trump to the Pope to discuss her life and her vision for the future. Her groundbreaking work has been a huge force for putting sexual violence and human trafficking in conflict on the world agenda 

Carole Cadwalladr- Another one who could never be included if I was a royal. We are on the precipice of never being able to have a free and fair election again and Carole is one of the people leading the global fight back. Her investigative journalism has broken scandals on electoral law violations in the US and the UK and exposed the link between Facebook and Cambridge Analytica 

Loujain al-Hathloul- Currently imprisoned in Saudi Arabia. She publicly defied the ban on women driving and travelling without male companions and was instrumental in placing pressure on the Saudi government to change the law. Despite Saudi Arabia allowing women to drive, she was arrested and has been tortured. She is still in prison. 

Amika George- Only 18 years old but she has already changed the landscape for girls in the UK through her campaigning around menstruation. She has been instrumental in campaigns to end the tax on menstrual hygiene products, provide tampons and pads freely in schools to prevent period poverty, and teach young boys about menstruation to prevent stigma in future generations. Her work has changed government policy and she’s just getting started

Zubaida Bai- Childbirth is still one of the biggest killers of women in the developing world. Zubaida has created a low cost, accessible healthy birth kit after experiencing an infection after giving birth. The item was launched in her home country, India, and has now spread to other countries. It has improved outcomes for 1.5 million mothers and babies and has the potential to transform maternal health. Most importantly she is considering the structural context and part of her work involves training up health care professionals so there’s no need for the birth kits! 

[manifestoonmoralmanlove]

Gormless Ch. 5 - Try to kill my boss? Haha you kids are alright!

A well-meaning friend gave me a book series that is hilariously bad. The first book was Souless and my riffs were entitled brainless. This second book is entitled Changless and these riff are then gormless.

I mean to say I have entitled them gormless! Not that my riffs are dumb, and the effort I spend on them stupid since I’m the only one who enjoys them. HAHA!

The story is SUPPOSED TO be about how a badass lady wearing a rad-looking carriage dress hits baddies with her umbrella and bangs her hot werewolf husband.  In reality it’s mostly poor attempts at being witty, flirty, and superior.

For the last book check out the brainless tag.

If you want the TL;DR version but want to read these new riffs anyway?

This story is set in supernatural Victorian steampunk England.  Alexia is our NOT LIKE OTHER GIRLS protag.  She is a soulless, which means she’s able to negate the abilities of vampires and werewolves by touching them. She’s recently married a big oaf, named Lord Connel Maccon.  He’s the manchild in charge of the supernatural police with a zillion dollars and he’s totes super hot too ok.  Their relationship is mostly arguments about how Maccon can’t tell her fucking anything.  Alexia has also recently become head of ~Soulless affairs~ in Queen Victoria’s government.  She has a dumb friend named Ivy, a gay vampire friend named Akeldama, a family who’s evil because they do the same shit as her but while being blonde, and most importantly Alexia is better than everyone cause…cause.

Last time on Gormless:

There’s some mysterious force that’s turning the Vampires and werewolves into humans. Alexia is in charge of figuring out that deal, and she is doing a bad job at it.  Her husband is in charge of the Supernatrual Police (BUR) so he’s going to Scotland about it.

There’s a hot werewolf guy into Alexia called Channing and he’s a big jerk.  Ivy is getting married to some rich slub, even though she’s in wub with Maccon’s servant Tunstell.  Alexia just met a hot lesbian named LeFoux and wants to take her to visit her smart Vampire gay bestie Akeldama.

Chapter 5 – Try to kill my boss? Haha you kids are alright!

This chapter opens up with her seeing Lord Akeldama.  Basically they start by inviting Madame LeFoux and just catching up.  Turns out Akeldama has not seen the humanization phenomenon before even though he hella old, but his scouts discovered a military ship called the Spanker had people from the Kingair clan aboard who were humanized. We got similar info before, but there’s an implication that the humanization is traveling directly with the people of the Spanker.  There’s the implication that it’s moving north, and it has to do with the dead alpha thing.  

Something also of slight interest is that Akeldama tried to ~recruit~ Channing back when Channing was human. That Channing, so they say, used to be a charming sculptor and vampires and werewolves were fighting over him. That he went into the military/werewolfism cause it was more ~romantic.~ I think that’s all there just to put Channing back on the table as a love rival.

HE’S BAD RIGHT? BUT LIKE MAYBE NOT ALL BAD?

On one hand they’re fleshing him out.  On another hand it reeks of Marty-Stuing and it is not convincing me he deserves another chance.

Well what would make him desirable to you Faps?  Put him in an oversized sweater, with glasses, and he’s petting a cat?  

Okay okay!  My kink is valid and so is the kink for a man-child meathead okay.  I just wish my kink was more main-stream gosh.

So Madam LeFoux shows up and there is a brief bit of sassing between Akledama and her before Akeldama has to show off his aethographor.  They spend a lot of fucking time on this.  I guess this is for the folks into the steampunk aspect but like…I don’t really understand this appeal.  It basically boil down to it’s a telegraph machine but it prints letters onto metal with caustic chemicals. It has to be manned at all times, and some old ones need specific ~ Crystalline valve frequensors~ to communicate to one another but Akeldama’s LATEST EDITION doesn’t need it. I am a history nerd and reading about old machines is fascinating because you get to see how the machines have impacted the culture. I also like reading about Sci-Fi technology because either it’s cool to see what people decades ago thought was going to happen, or speculative future possibilities. In theory speculative fiction about an alternate universe’s history could be cool but this machine is just not that far removed from a telegraph machine and sounds like it’s a pain in the ass. But perhaps I’m just so spoiled by the fact that I could get a snapchat of a strange person’s butthole from Australia instantaneously without having to operate a machine the size of a room 24/7.  You have not truly enjoyed a stranger from down under’s…down under until you’ve seen it with the leopard ear snapchat filter!

Anyway he gives Alexia a ~ Crystalline valve frequensor~ with his frequency just in case.  She puts it in a pocket on her umbrella and it’s like DAMN GIRL WHY DIDN’T YOU LEAD WITH THE FACT THE THING HAS POCKETS? THAT’S WAY COOLER! (Even if impractical for regular umbrellas.)

The three of them part ways, Alexia is planning on taking a dirigible to Scotland in order to face this humanization and save her dumb-fuck husband.

Here we switch point of views to look through Lyall’s eyes. He’s tailing Alexia for reasons and some vampires are sneaking around Lord Akeldama’s place while she was visiting. The vamps almost attack Alexia but Lyall stops them with some pow pow action.  The vampires say they were just going to ~test~ Alexia and Lyall is just like haha that’s fine, go home you kids!  Also Alexia did not notice any of this.

I mean I’m kinda glad we had a bit o’ action but this was dumb. Lyall just lets these two jackoffs go after they tried to maybe kill/kidnap/whatever his master’s wife.  Also he doesn’t tell Alexia she was nearly attacked? Cause drama later on I guess? Fuck this writing!  I take back the nice things I said about Lyall!  Lyall instead just argues that Alexia shouldn’t go to Scotland. Sure Maccon relies heavily on his superpowers for everything, but not letting him know his powers are going to be suddenly taken away by a mysterious force which maybe out of his blood will definitely be fine. I guess because it’s now Lyall’s policy to make sure everybody around him, whom he attempts to protect with his life, is unaware of the danger around them. Cool, cool.

At least this time when Alexia badgers somebody about something she’s going to do, she’s right that it makes no sense why she shouldn’t. However she unwittingly has to take along a merry batch of fuckers. You’ll hear about them in a bit.

We have a big old scene where Alexia’s mother shows up and is like, “YOUR ONE SISTER IS GETTING MARRIED THE OTHER SISTER IS SO WRACKED WITH JEALOUSY SHE’S MAKING EVERYONE MISERABLE! YOU TAKE HER!”

Oh and there’s this inconsistent writing here where Alexia’s mother is passive aggressively racist toward werewolves and Scots. Yet at the same time there are lines about how pleased Alexia’s mother is that she married a Scottish werewolf.  There’s the direct line, “It was a constant source of amazement to Alexia that the only thing she had ever done in her entire life that pleased her mama was marry a werewolf.”  I think what the author is trying to say is that Alexia’s mom was happy that Alexia married a rich and powerful man, and LOOKS PAST the fact that he’s a werewolf but still kinda hates werewolves.  However they don’t bring up that her mom is impressed with all her money and power. They just keep saying WEREWOLF THIS and WEREWOLF THAT!  They made it unnecessarily muddled here and it’s confusing, annoying, and could have been easily fixed.

In Alexia mother’s defense the only thing I’ve seen Alexia do that’s pleased me, is hit that douche werewolf over the head a bunch.

So of course, Alexia’s mother won’t take no for an answer when it comes to her sister. Therefore Alexia is saddled with generic shallow, petty, bitch blonde sister #2.  Felicity, the blonde in question, agreed to this, despite hating her sister cause she knew her sister would be surrounded by hunky werewolves.  SHE GOTTA GET A HUSBAND NOW TOO! IT’S ALL US LADY FOLKS CARE ABOUT!  Due to English custom you can’t just leave your sister in your castle to have wild gangbangs with werewolves all day and night. But I mean, considering the amount of misogyny the 3rd in command is packing? Not leaving her alone there is probably a good idea. (Also I will puke blood if Felicity and Channing become an item.)

Ivy shows up at this time as well cause I mean…Ivy has always been sexually drawn to inconvenient timing.  Don’t kink-shame her!  When Ivy hears that Tunstell will be going on the Dirigible, she pouts until Alexia just let’s her go along too, cause HAHA WHY NOT AT THIS POINT!?

(A gif of Hillary Clinton laughing and throwing her hands up.)

So she’s taking Angelique (to dress her), Felicity (to be obnoxious in the bitchy way), Ivy (to be obnoxious in the ditsy way), and Tunstell (cause this 90lb actor will protect them all.)

OH BOY WE GOT A SMORGSEBORG OF IMPENDING WACKINESS TO CONTEND WITH!  IS THAT EXCITEMENT I HEAR OR THE CRACKING OF MY OWN GRINDING TEETH!?

Say something nice Faps:

Dang I’m having a hard time saying nice things here that aren’t simply just, “Well at least X didn’t happen!”

She uhhh tried to steampunk?

I get a masochistic tickle when Alexia’s family is around.  I dislike Alexia so I like seeing her insulted, but the cartoonish villainy of her family is hilarious to me.  It’s just so spot-on, the archetypal “BASIC SHALLOW BLONDE BITCH-SLUT TO MAKE PROTAG LOOK BETTER THAN ALL OTHER GIRLS!”  However I have yet to see an author fail so spectacularly at differentiating the evil girls from the protag. “I can’t believe all my family cares about is how they look, their social standing, and men!” Huffs Alexia, as she ponders her own romantic dalliances to the king of the Universe, in her new blue carriage dress, which has SHOOK the London fashion world to its VERY CORE!

[rootfauna]

A Handmaiden’s Tale. Specifically, Mine.

I’e been debating on whether or not to make this post for a while now, and I’ve decided that the benefits of saying my piece outweigh any hate I’ll get for this. It’s really long but I have no more fucks to give. 

I am so, so, sick of the trend in radical feminism of calling women who aren’t radical feminists “cocksuckers” “wastes of time” “dick riders” “sellouts” “cowards” and “handmaidens”. Anti feminist women and liberal feminist women can be incredibly annoying and have made me want to put my head through a wall, and I honestly can’t blame anyone for making a snide remark about them here or there. But I absolutely cannot wrap my mind around the fact that a group of women who supposedly A) understands the misogyny of using a woman’s (real of hypothetical) sexual interactions with a man as an insult against her, B) acknowledges the realities of female socialization in a patriarchal society and C) understands the potential dangerous outcomes of a woman speaking up against misogyny, can go around unabashedly talking about women this way. Every time I scroll through my dash I’ll come across at least one post lamenting how young girls are indoctrinated into believing their worth lies in their beauty, femininity, and (hetero)sexuality. Why then, do I see so much vitriol directed at the ones who believed it? 

The last time I spoke about this I was accused of ‘making it all about myself’ because I shared a snippet of my personal experience. Well, I’m about to share more than a snippet. Yet this isn’t about me, and I will be the first one to tell you that I am nowhere near unique in this sense. So I guess this is actually the experience of thousands and thousands of women, this is just how it happened to me:

To start with, y’all need to understand where I grew up. If the ‘y’all’ wasn’t a big enough clue, I grew up in bumfuck nowhere USA. Here’s another fact that’s vital to my story: I was born in 1991. That fact, coupled with my geographic location, meant that when I started school in 1996, corporal punishment was still legal (to be carried out by the principal) and up until around that time my mother could still legally sign documents as “mrs” *insert my father’s name*. 

Growing up in this environment meant that gender roles were highly enforced around me and that at an early age I saw deviance from them met with hatred and scorn. I could name plenty of examples, but really, haven’t we all seen that? Even the respectable women who dared not be housewives never rose to a more prominent position than a teacher, bank clerk, or selling Mary Kay. Before the age of about 10 I have absolutely no memory of seeing a woman in a position of skill and power beyond these things except for Terry Irwin on tv. It might be noted that I grew up wanting to be a zookeeper. I don’t remember the first time I heard the word “feminist” but from my earliest recollection it was not a good word. Then, as today in my neck of the woods, “feminist” is an insult. I can remember sitting in the back seat of the car listening to my father and his friend ranting about something they heard on the radio about how “the feminists” (word spat out like tobacco juice) were ruining something or other. It was clear to me that whatever these feminists were, they were bad. 

Things really kicked into gear once I got into middle school. What had been a vague concept in the back of my mind was now pulled to the front of the classroom. I distinctly remember sitting in 7th grade biology and learning about the inherent differences between male and female brains. The teacher explained how our brains were wired differently, and that male brains were designed so that logical and analytical thought came naturally to them, but expressing emotion and communicating did not. This, the teacher said, is why men often erupt into fits of anger rather than say how they feel. On the other hand, female brains were designed to have ease of communication, and to be more aware of our own emotions and those of others. They were not designed for quick, logical, rational thinking. Don’t get me wrong; it was never taught to me that women were incapable of logical, rational, thinking, just that we were biologically at a disadvantage to men in that regard. I tried (like other girls in the class) to have some pride in my lady-brain. I’m wired to be better at something than a boy! Ha! Though it was around this time I began to shift my focus away from scientific pursuits and towards the arts. 7th grade was also the beginning of outright public sexual harassment that no adult seemed to give a shit about. There was “thong Thursday”, for example. We 12-13 year old girls were encouraged by the boys to wear thongs and lean over so that they could see the tops of them, or to wear our jeans low enough for them to peek over. This happened openly in the halls, but never once addressed by the adults. And woe to any girl who spoke out about it. That much feared “feminist!” accusation could be hurled at her, and she’d be publicly humiliated and mocked, and no one would dare help her lest they be feminist by association. There was also ‘grab-ass Wednesday’ which makes absolutely no sense but is exactly what you’re thinking. 

The official school lesson on male and female brains resurfaced again, this time in 10th grade sociology class. This time in addition to the physical differences in the brains, we learned about inherent differences in behavior and societal roles. It was honestly something taken straight from some MRA’s drivel; men evolved to be the Strong Hunter Protector of the species, brain different, this why big words make man ANGRY he hit you because his brain can’t make his mouth talk feelings he want to BREED. Woman want BABY lots of emotions need man to protec blah blah blah. To us at this point, all of this was objective fact. Also at this point, the effects and impact of female socialization were starting to become disgustingly apparent. Around this time the security officer at the school was fired for ‘having sex’ with a fourteen year old freshman. It was so SCANDALOUS because...what a SLUT! It would not occur to me until YEARS later that maybe sex between a 14 year old girl and the adult male security officer hired to protect her was...uh, rape. As high school continued, so did the development of our female anti-feminism. I’ve seen radfems on here discuss how men are socialized to think that their thoughts and emotions are objective fact, but I’ve never seen it pointed out that women are socialized to believe so, too. As interactions with boys became more frequent their attention became more and more prized. When a boy said “you’re beautiful” or “you’re not like the other girls” or “you’re smart” it was seen as a pure and shining compliment, a shining nugget of truth. If a girl said the same thing? You never knew, she could just be two-faced, she would change her mind in a matter of seconds, or just be on her period. Of course, we began to strive to receive more compliments from boys because what teenager DOESN’T want to be respected and valued by their peers? 

By the end of high school several of my peers were married and/or had a baby already. I had intended to go to school for journalism, but in a sudden fit of either teenage rebellion or wisdom, I took the plunge into working with animals. This saw me moving about a thousand miles away from my home town, my parents, friends, and all forms of social support. As it turns out, animal training and handling, particularly dog training and handling, is an incredibly male dominated field. Even compared to my previous life experience, it was extremely misogynistic. I found myself working long shifts at night, often with only male coworkers who were near universally older, larger, and stronger than I was. Here, I was expected to laugh it off when one of them said that if the world were about to end, the first thing he’d do was rape me. Or when my boss joked about raping me. Or when one of them (more or less out of nowhere) said that he didn’t think there would ever be a female president because “when I think “president” I think “man””. I did what I was supposed to do and took some satisfaction in their approval despite my first, suppressed, twinge of discomfort. In a strange city, in a strange area of the country, sleeping during the day and working long hours, I had little elsewhere to look for friendship and social interaction. So I made friends. Long night shifts with no one else to talk to and little else to do will do that to people. Of course, I wasn’t the ONLY woman at my place of work. I was friendly with the other women but the lifelong effects of being socialized to view women as inferior kept any of us from growing too close to each other. After all, despite growing up elsewhere they had similar upbringings. When they weren’t present the men openly chatted about who they thought the woman had slept with, how smelly her vagina must be, what her nipples probably looked like, and I held my tongue still under the delusion that if I was Good and Not Like the Other Girls, they wouldn’t speak like that about me behind my back. Feminism was only mentioned to mock women, or, more importantly, to bring up how the the country was sexist against men. The men lamented about how “in this country a man can’t be raped I guess” and “female special privileges” and “the DRAFT” and I believed them, because I didn’t have much of a reason or incentive not to. Women were viewed and treated as walking cries of rape unless they laughed when groped. 

I called one of these male friends one night, in tears. My kitten, a tiny little thing named Ginkgo, had escaped from my apartment and I pleaded with him to help me search for her. He came over and we searched in vain for her. I was heartbroken, sobbing, and desperate for comfort and when the hug I was given became lustful I tried to refuse. He argued that I had woken him up in the middle of the night to come all the way to my home to look for a lost kitten; I owed it to him. That it wasn’t fair for me to refuse him and that it was selfish of me to expect compassion and company for nothing in return. And at that time in my life, I believed him. It was only fair. Afterwards, alone in my apartment, I was confronted with the reality that the only reason anyone would ever show me compassion, love, or kindness was because I was female and therefore potential sex. At the time, I was beginning to realize I was asexual (though it would be many years before I had a word for it). It was like I had been shown that my worth, my worthiness of love and life, and all my achievements were housed in my sensuality and sexuality. And I didn’t posses either. Dark times, I tell ya. Of course, there was no chance of me seeking sympathy from any female friends or acquaintances for what took place. Years later when a man in a bar shoved his finger inside me and I smashed a beer mug over his head I was berated by my female companions for overreacting and ruining the night. Further blows to any sense of being anything other than “woman” came in the form, ironically, of my achievements. I excelled at dog handling, particularly scent detection and received many an award for it, each time being told by my male peers that the only reason I received it was because I was a woman. I took my awards with a pinch of shame, believing I had taken it from a more deserving man. 

 It was around this time I first dipped my toes in the shallow end of feminism. I got a Tumblr! I was about 23. The internet wasn’t too big a thing when I was growing up and I got my first social media account when I was 17, the year I moved out. Until I logged onto the blue hell site, I didn’t use the internet outside of facebook (with only my irl friends there to form an echo chamber) and looking up definitions of words. Now, for the first time, I discovered that feminism wasn’t taboo everywhere. Fascinating! Of course, the “feminism” I found was pretty much identical to the patriarchal world I lived in, just with more lipstick. But it was a step. Secret radfem blog? Shit, I had a secret libfem blog and was still terrified of being found out by people I knew. I had good reason, too. When I tried to, very tentatively, voice some opinions that were not male-approved, I was met with swift and immediate backlash. I mentioned to a male coworker that I didn’t want children, which ended with him screaming at me to go out and have a hysterectomy right now if I really didn’t want any because I was being stupid and of course I wasn’t serious otherwise I’d just rip my uterus out. Or when I voiced concern over that one politician that said women should be forced to deliver stillbirths naturally because that’s what happened on his farm and was publicly berated for being a crybaby and a little girl, freaking out over ‘one weird fluke’. Still, I grew more and more interested in feminism. I spent a year deeeep in the libbiest-of libfem glitter-choked hells until one fateful day: I saw a study that proved there was no such thing as brainsex. 

My entire perception of reality was irreparably shattered. Over the course of a few days, I was forced to realize that I had been lied to my entire life. I had been lied to by my teachers and the adults in my life as a kid, I was forced to realize how deeply sexist and inappropriate the boys at schools were being, that I was taught in school to excuse male violence as not their fault, that no one ever owed anyone sex, that what my coworkers and ‘friends’ were saying was blatantly false and not ok, that I was just as capable of pursuing a scientific field as a man, to realize just how much the most important people in my life really hated me. And I was forced to confront the fact that I had backed myself into a corner, cut off any escape routes, and that I relied on the acceptance of these men for my safety and job security. That made the next few years......uncomfortable. And yet, bit by bit, little by little, I’ve pulled myself away from that world and set up a new life for myself. I’ve said goodbye to a lot of people. I’ve hurt a lot. I’ve cringed a lot. The antifeminist keyboard smashing seen on radfem posts is something I could have (and probably would have) typed myself back then, safe in the conviction that I was right. 

“No one held a gun to your head and forced you to be an antifeminist” I’ve been told. That’s true, I guess. At nine, after riding my bike to the one small library in town I could have checked out a book by Dworkin (whom I’d never heard of) from the feminist section (which may or may not have existed) instead of Animorphs. I could have walked around shouting “hey, anyone want to be a feminist so I can see how it’s done?” to try and find someone to look up to. I could have, upon getting internet in my late teens, immediately googled “how to be a feminist”, but I didn’t so my bad. Certainly there were girls who grew up in similar circumstances who were always feminists, and certainly there are women who grew up with outlets for feminism that are antifeminist, but I feel my story is a much more common one and in the end at least I made it. I think most radfems have had a libfem phase and I think most of us would cringe at it, but in so many ways I’m grateful for it. Not only did it introduce me to the movement that would change my life, but it was inviting and welcoming. I cannot, and DO NOT want to imagine what would have happened if, seeking to find voice for my discomfort, I had come across radical feminism first and saw the words that were beginning to cut so deeply echoed by the women who claimed to be for women. Cocksucker. Waste of time. Stupid. Coward. Being told I ‘lapped it all up’. The thought of it really makes me uncomfortable, and I think the only message it all would have sent was “Your entire world is against you and hates you but also you wanted it and it’s your fault.”. 

I see radfems speak often about non western women and how they face and view sexism. It’s quite universally accepted that non western women are acutely aware of biological sex and wouldn’t stand for this gemgender floridesexual nonsense and that’s lauded as a sort of....kinship I guess. When I see radfems speak about non western women in this way, I feel they have a sense of kinship with them, like they’re one of the radfem crowd. I wonder, however, what the women who grew up and lived in those environments would really think about everything radical feminism stands for? Surely some would agree completely, but how often do you see women in these situations agree that rape is sometimes (or always) the girl’s fault? Or that women should not be educated? Are they still our sisters, or cock sucking cowards? And is the extension of sisterhood dependent on their hypothetical ability to, if they hold these beliefs, listen to what feminists have to say and change their minds to agree? Let’s say the woman in your gifsets is presented with these resources and never changes her mind. What then? Even still I've seen it said that anti feminist women will never change so there’s no point in trying. I see libfems pointing to non western cultures with ‘other’ genders and saying ‘see? see? THEY agree with me! They’d agree with liberal feminism!’ and I see radfems pointing to non western women and saying ‘see? see? THEY agree with me! They’d agree with radical feminism!’ and I can’t help but see these cultures and women within them being pressed into an ideal of one argument or the other purely for internet posturing. 

I’m very disheartened to see the movement which once seemed so academic and helpful to me seeming to become a ‘cool girls’ club. Sisterhood, compassion, and help, but only for women who think the way we do. Others are there to be mocked. It’s eerily similar to the way we laughed at the ‘other’ girls in high school, completely full of ourselves and thinking we were so much better. 

When I think of anti feminist women, I see the little girl being told men were prone to violence instead of talking because that’s how they were built, I see the girl being called a whore for being raped by someone she was told to trust, and I see the women pitted against each other, who have never had a feminist role model, and the girls who harbor a strange feeling of discontent and isolation they can’t articulate. I don’t see wastes of time. 

If you’re still reading, thank you. 

[clarenecessities]

Queerquiggle/Cybunnypoop

Subtitle: This Again

It’s been around two years since the shit hit the proverbial fan, but seeing as the individual in question has since deleted & remade, some of you may not be aware of whom you’re interacting with.

Queerquiggle & queerneopets are the latest installments in a series of urls belonging to one person, hereafter referred to as the original url, cybunnypoop. Other former urls for his neoblog include (but are not limited to): gaygelatin, shewhoneopetswiththee, neobloq, and candypaintbrush.

I should tell you all off the bat that he’s a Trump supporter, a “recovering” transphobe, and extremely Islamophobic, so this post may contain some upsetting information. There are some instances of misogyny, antisemitism, homophobia, and racism, as well. Oh, and ableism. Honestly, pick an -ism.

None of the information in this post should be a repeat of my first post regarding the matter. Warning: this post is even longer.

As before, I’d be remiss if I didn’t lay out my bias: I don’t like him. He’s been downgraded from “nemesis” to “nuisance,” as he’s no longer harassing minors (as far as I’m aware), but we’re never going to be best buddies.

We’ve spoken several times, though never to any resolution, and with each interaction it became increasingly obvious that it was futile. I ultimately blocked him following repeated propositioning and an unwillingness to engage beyond casting any disagreement as bullying and telling the kids to go back to their safe spaces.

Cybunnypoop is now 25 years old, and he hasn’t started anything major in a while. His posts remain fairly unpopular, though whether that’s the result of the quarantine or simple bad content, I couldn’t say. You’re under no obligation to take my word for any of this. Though I’ve provided links and screenshots where I can, what you make of that evidence is up to you.

TRANSPHOBIA

As it so happens, Cybunnypoop has recently tried listening to another human being, and has been educated about trans issues in a way that ~100 people on the internet offering resources apparently couldn’t accomplish.

What this means is that Cybunnypoop is now IDing with various names (itself nothing new, pseudonyms are an old hat here), gender identities, and pronouns, depending on the platform. I’m sticking with he/him for this post, as those were the last requested on his neopets blog. His description says shey/shem but unfortunately I have no idea how current that is, and his about says “whatever”–so if I’m misgendering here, I apologize; it is not intentional.

I, Clare, Author of This Post, am cis. So it’s not my place to gatekeep or say whether or not he’s ““really trans””. And, as he has expressly admitted to being transphobic in the past, none of this section is really up for debate. I’m just going to provide the information, including his apologies and the redaction thereof. I don’t know that he truly understands everything he did wrong, but he’s explicitly stated he thinks transphobia is bad, so hey, maybe we can all learn something.

I’m gonna try to keep this chronological, so here we go:

A fun little addition to a post via an anonymous terf, “You are still males, you have male privilege, you KNOW NOTHING & NEEVER [sic] WILL KNOW of our goddamn struggles.“ which Cybunnypoop began with “So much agree!”

When asked about the “trans bathroom debacle,” he stated he was, “just afraid it’ll result in sacrificing handicap-accesible bathrooms.” which is only tangentially transphobic but bears addressing: Why would it ever mean that?

Cybunnypoop has something of a preoccupation with the potential negative impact equity would have upon him, and ableism is a convenient vehicle for this–lord knows this country is appalling in terms of accessibility. However, no proposed version of “trans bathroom”s leads to the dissolution of ADA-compliant spaces. Whether it’s allowing trans people to use the bathroom they identify with, or installing/redesignating gender neutral spaces, it remains an issue of improved accessibility, not diminished. A disabled trans person has as much a right to use a bathroom as an able-bodied one.

When he graduated he was questioned on his political beliefs, specifically how he could support Trump and remaining uneducated about trans issues while claiming to be an LGBT ally–and congratulated on graduating. Rather than answering the questions, or thanking them for the congrats and ignoring the rest, Cybunnypoop declared it “harassment”. This is about the standard for what he deems harassment/bullying: Anything that disagrees with him.

Reposted a quote from Dixon Diaz, the alt right guy you may remember him quoting in several citations from my last post, which read, “Liberal: a person who tells you that you’re a bigot if you’re afraid of having weird men in the ladies room, but becomes traumatized if they see “Trump 2016” written in chalk.“ [sic]

trans people bad, diversity bad, children bad & trauma fake

An ongoing problem with fetishizing trans people, dating back long before his identification as trans, and indeed, during the period in which he was a self-avowed transphobe. (Warning: link contains slur!)

This grew more pronounced as he came to understand what it means to be trans, and zeroed in on transwomen in particular. This is itself a complex issue: When is a kink flattering and when is it dehumanizing? Are immutable adjectives inappropriate to fetishize, or is it positive representation?

Again, as a cis person, it isn’t my place to say–I’m just letting y’all know what he’s said, and you can determine how you feel about it. This post isn’t a thinkpiece on my opinions.

Select quotes from The Apology:

“I was transphobic. I was resistant to that term because I felt it was a misnomer. I was more…trans-ignorant, I felt, than “transphobic.” […] I couldn’t see what I was doing because I was too busy, I felt, being attacked.”

“I had a warped view of trans people, and I was too ignorant and stubborn to acknowledge it–to see it, even.”

“[…] it’s hard not to let a jerk taint your view of a minority, especially when that jerk was your introduction to the minority.“

I’ll be honest, my problem with this apology is in how it’s structured, not in its content. It seems to convey genuine remorse, but focuses the bulk of the message on excuses, including that last point, which… isn’t relatable.

Even this I could forgive (after all, he’s new to apologies) if it had heralded a change in attitude–but nothing changed. He continued on as before, and continued to refuse discussions of other issues (which we’re getting to soon).

Which brings us to The Second Apology:

Posted some day and a half after the first, it opens with the artfully passive aggressive line, “I thought this could be over but it’s obviously going to stick around.” And it’s all downhill from there, folks!

“What do you want? What more can I say? There isn’t anything left to say. Nothing will satisfy some people.”

“I never bullied anyone like some do to me.“

“If you don’t want to believe I am different,[…] then the problem is not mine. In these cases, it is a good idea for you to stop talking about me and lying about me“

Here is a glimpse, perhaps, into what he expected. He was waiting for accolades. Commendation. He’d just apologized–and unlike earlier attempts, it was genuine! I don’t know that he anticipated forgiveness, but the outright rejection of that apology by several individuals drove him almost immediately into a bitter tirade, once again foisting the blame onto the people he had hurt or offended.

Aaaand a redaction of former apologies. Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be a date on this one, so it may be referring to the older apologies, but its content bears addressing:

“Yeah, I apologised like a year ago […], and they refused it, so I’m done apologizing–not that I even have anything to apologise for.

“I’ll sooner die than acknowledge and apologise for their demented reconstructions of my words.“

Which, if this is about the older apologies–oops!

“I won’t deny I said some things that people found offensive, […] but they just took everything and ran apedoodie with it. It amazes me that, for all they claim to hate me, they have this obsession with everything I do and say.”

This is actually fairly emblematic of my own interactions with Cybunnypoop: Specifically, the characterization of all attention as both positive, and obsessive.

What is it about being held responsible for his actions that leads him to cry wolf? Historically, an unwillingness to debate his political beliefs. Oh, he’ll espouse Trump’s “virtues” for paragraphs and paragraphs, but anyone who criticizes him is obviously a liberal idiot who just loves to hate him, and I’ll bet they say “lame,” right? It’s these assumptions about other people that lead him so often to tilt at windmills, rather than addressing the subject at hand.

RACISM

“Obama spending $21 million to put refugees to work…why not spend that money in the inner cities to put young blacks to work… once again Obama and the Democrats have proved the black community is their who’re [sic] because we always come back to them after they screw us” a quote he posted from a Facebook page I won’t even name, because it’s literally got the N-word in it! But he’s definitely not a racist, right?

Obama being (literally) booted out of office, by a Confederate battle flag, symbol of white supremacy since the 1960s. (There’s been some suggestion it’s in the classic minstrel show style. Though he forwent the traditional depiction of red/pink lips in favor of purple, there remains the possibility that he just can’t draw caricatures).

I’m going to address this post more in the ableism section, but it’s worth noticing how often, and how readily, he uses the word c*lored unprompted. This is not the first occasion.

More lambasting of whitewashing as a concept, sarcastically proposing we paint a black person white and mutilate them to better portray Michael Jackson (whom he refers to as ‘Wacko Jacko’, an ableist and derogatory nickname) apparently under the impression that there are no other black men with vitiligo.

I think it’s important to cover this, as from Cybunnypoop’s posts suggesting we be outraged at the “yellow-washing” of Joan Watson (see my previous post) it’s clear that he has no idea what whitewashing means.

It is not literally painting POC white.

The term whitewashing is derived from cheap white paint of chalked lime, used for a long time to refer to a specific means of censorship, “to gloss over or cover up vices, crimes or scandals or to exonerate by means of a perfunctory investigation or through biased presentation of data”. Simply put, it’s revisionist history, and the methods used to maintain that illusory timeline.

It isn’t difficult to see how the term came to be applied to the representative censorship in Hollywood.

Shared a Facebook graphic, “Black people who were never slaves are fighting white people who were never Nazis over a confederate statue erected by democrats, and why, because democrats can’t stand their own history anymore and somehow it’s Trumps Fault? [sic]“

“Also, you see Blacks everywhere, but they’re still considered a minority.” (He appended some context but frankly it’s even more damning.)

The term “spirit animal” is annoying but not because it’s racist, I guess

ISLAMOPHOBIA

Cybunnypoop’s Islamophobia is tied in pretty heavily with his support of Trump, so I’ll be citing a few of those posts in this section as well.

“Ban seven countries’ worth of ideology which promotes violence against women, LGBT people, animals, and nonworshippers? Sounds good to me!”

The cognitive dissonance of a self-avowed Catholic posting this is… incredible.

“Sorry to inform you, but the terrorists who attacked New York, Boston, Orlando, our embassies, and others weren’t Hindus, Buddhists, Christians, Jews, or atheists. They were Muslims.

“It’s not Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism, or atheism which oppresses women, slaughters animals, kills gays, and calls for the conversion or beheading of nonbelievers. It’s Islam.

“Until the ideology evolves to be as peaceful and tolerant as it claims, it doesn’t belong in America.”

There’s a lot to unpack here. Let’s begin by refuting Trump’s claims that “the vast majority of individuals convicted of terrorism and terrorism-related offenses since 9/11 came here from outside of our country.” Plain old xenophobia, not even in the ballpark of truth. Over the past 15 years, none of the self-described Muslim terrorists committing crime have come from the countries on Trump’s ban list. Zero. The country producing the most successful attacks against the USA is the USA itself.

A basic look at the data further reveals that white supremacist, self-described Christian terrorists actually lead the rate of attack and death toll by about 2:1. Yet, bizarrely, nothing from Cybunnypoop about the ‘violence and intolerance’ of Christianity, or even white supremacy… Who saw that coming?

It speaks to Cybunnypoop’s prejudice that he would believe such a blatantly false piece of information with no investigation or critical thought whatsoever. Although, it may speak more to his unwillingness/inability to use Google. We have had some problems with that in the past. 

“Dear Liberals: [sic] You claim to protect women. You claim to protect LGBT. [sic] You claim to protect animals. You claim to protect people who don’t ascribe to the dominant faith. But you’re protecting a violently misogynistic, homophobic, intolerant ideology which still slaughters animals in the name of their god and beheads people who worship otherwise. What the *** is wrong with you?”

Man, for derailing conversations so often to complain about perfectly valid modal grammar he sure loves breaking the English language.

When asked how he could still support Trump, he replied, “Because he hasn’t actually said or done anything wrong. The only thing with which I disagree was the transgender military ban, and that has been shot down, so it’s hardly relevant.”

Particularly in conjunction with his condemnation of liberals on the basis of not like, banning Islam, this is an explicit endorsement of everything from repealing the Alternative Tax Minimum to his sexual misconduct. Everything, except the one thing that directly affects one of Cybunnypoop’s demographics, was right.

HOMOPHOBIA

“I’m not like others in the LGBT spectrum. [bolding mine]

“I hadn’t cared for gay marriage nor had I especially cared to support the cause. […] I’ll fight for the welfare of the many before I’ll fight for the wishes of the few.”

(Well, historically, no, he won’t). Even without the implication that all the gay people who want to get married are selfish, this ignores the reason behind the push for the legalization of gay marriage: The AIDS crisis. Terminally ill gay men were forcibly evicted from their homes after watching their partners die, horribly, because they couldn’t inherit the lease/property. Their partners’ remains were the custody of parents who often wouldn’t allow the survivor to attend the funeral.

Up until gay marriage was legalized on a federal level, these incidents still occurred. One Indiana woman had to pay over $300,000 in taxes upon the death of her wife, and was told by the funeral home she could not arrange for her wife’s cremation as she was an “unrelated third party,” despite having the power of attorney. This is a significant concern.

“I don’t care for "pride.” I’ve actually started to loathe the undertones of the pride movement. […] is it truly worthy of a month and a gold star? […] I think it’s losing relevancy. Can we really celebrate something that’s no longer legally unique? Can we really have pride for… wait, what is it we’re proud of, anyway? We’re legally equal now; we’re socially equal, for the most part.” [bolding mine]

I don’t know if he forgot the homophobia he’s experienced, or if it just doesn’t matter unless it happened it to him.

“The next time someone asks you why LGBT Pride marches exist or why Gay Pride Month is June tell them ‘A bisexual woman named Brenda Howard thought it should be.’“ -Tom Limoncelli

“Another thing–and the most loathsome part–about the “pride movement” concerns the very word itself. “Pride” …be proud of who you are, and be proud of not caring what others think of you. Fine. Sure. It’s fun to wildly flaunt your differences. But what’s the opposite of “pride”? “Shame.” So, if gays are to have pride, does that mean straights are to have shame?”

So why are we to be entitled to pride–why are we allowed to feel good about ourselves and they are not? […] The majority are not oppressive, and even if they wanted to be, they legally couldn’t. 

Good news guys, homophobia is dead and definitely super illegal.

“(Never mind the fact that pride is a negative, narcissistic trait and one of the Seven Deadly Sins.)” [bolding mine]

(We interrupt this post to bring you his “Antipridist Pride”)

“While it seems most of the LGB world makes their sexuality their entire identity, I leave it as just one facet of many.“ Once again, he’s not like Those Other Gays.

“ I’ll bet I pissed off a lot of gays with this post, but I don’t care, and I’m proud of not caring.“ (proceeds to describe the LGBT community as loud, angry, straight-bashing, etc. for a good paragraph or so, obviously very much caring)

That’s enough of that post, huh? Let’s move on.

“I know that a lot of the LGBT community is hypocritical–and intolerantly, angrily so. They scream about others giving them tolerance and respect while they don’t give others such basic rights.

“If there’s Black Pride, why couldn’t there be Caucasian Pride? Gay Pride, Straight Pride.“

As I broke down in my last post, Caucasian≠white, and was first misapplied by white supremacists and popularized by actual, literal Nazis. He evidently doesn’t care, and claims I “created” it. (I can assure you, I haven’t been alive since 1785).

“Is it me, or are there actually very few good gay celebrities?”

Doesn’t like the term “lesbian” because its “image is too pornified”. As I understand it this is fairly common among those who were raised in more conservative or religious families, so it’s not an issue per se; it just becomes weird in conjunction with his wanting to be called a dyke at one point (though I can’t find the post where he said that explicitly, only ones where he describes himself as such).

Said he’d expected Ted Cruz to be a “gay prostitute” because he gave off untrustworthy vibes.

MISOGYNY

As I’m sure most of you are aware, Cybunnypoop is pro-life. From certain parties, that can be motivated by misinformation rather than misogyny (though certainly the misogyny drives that misinformation). In his case? Well, actually only about 75% misogyny. The other 25% is empathizing with fetuses just until they’re born. Idk if it’s because of his parental situation or his existential dread or what, but we’re not here to psychoanalyze him; we’re here to review.

“It’s a point which I make constantly. It’s not hard to not get pregnant. You have a variety of options. There’s birth control. There’s getting your man snipped […]. And there is one absolutely fool-proof, sperm-proof way: ABSTINENCE. It’s stupidly simple, but there are self-righteous women and men out there who say–if you’ll pardon my pun–screw that. Free sex, rah rah. But if you don’t want to “risk” a baby, don’t do the do. There are plenty more things to do in life.”

Yeah, it may be “stupidly simple” for an “asexual homosexual” but other people do, in fact, get horny. “There’s birth control.” Where? You gonna pay for it? You gonna talk their “man” into getting a vasectomy? Pay for that?

I want you all to keep in mind that this is the same person who waxed poetic about his addiction to porn. And hentai. Which he downloaded in a public library, because he was just that addicted. But if someone (god forbid) “does the do,” and their birth control fails? Well, too bad. You should have been able to control your libido.

When Trump was elected he had the following to say:

“This is a time for healing.” No, this is a time for you to suck it up. You may not have wanted this result, but I and half of the country did. So, instead of bitching and moaning and trying to undo what I and half of the country have been working hard for, you need to shut the fuck up, go to school, work, or volunteer, and stop being an intolerant, selfish, hypocritical asshole.

Frankly this could go in a lot of sections but it’s using bitch pejoratively so…

Honestly there are more instances but I feel like you get the picture and this thing is already absurdly long, so we’re going to move along.

ANTI-SEMITISM

On screenshots of a neoboard discussing the origins of the ichthys symbol (the Jesus fish), Cybunnypoop added, apropos of nothing, “Hey, how about the fact that Christianity was originally illegal while Judaism was lawful, and the early Christians had to hold some Jewish mores so they wouldn’t be arrested and executed? Interesting, isn’t it…” and tagged it “two can play at that game”.

Christians weren’t being persecuted for not being Jewish; they were being persecuted for refusing to participate in state events from which the Jews were exempt via religious tradition. Christians were too new to be considered traditional, and were therefore considered in contempt of the state when they refused to, say, make a sacrifice on behalf of the Emperor. Also, we called each other brother & sister but still got married, and spoke weekly about eating a man alive, so people were kind of concerned.

Also, like, it was an explicitly socialist religion in an empire. That was never going to end well. The “mores” they had to hold were “don’t be anti-fascist” and “stop meeting in secret, we don’t know who you are and it’s freaking us out,” neither of which is explicitly Jewish and neither of which you can blame the Jews for.

Pretty minor, but in a poorly executed attempt to be inclusive, he wished everyone a happy Easter & Passover at the same time, only to be informed that Passover wouldn’t be happening for a month. So more about the assumption that Jews are lesser Christians again than any direct hostility. Perhaps better evidence of his ignorance of Jewish customs/how to hit “search” on Google.

 ABLEISM

Here there be slurs!

Alright. We’re going to begin this with a breakdown of the “lame” issue. Here’s the thing: Cybunnypoop hates it. He compares it (ceaselessly) to the r slur, which he uses liberally in his own defense.

I’m certainly not saying it isn’t a slur, or that you should use it, but to be frank, he’s wrong.

In both severity and time in which it’s been part of the English vernacular, lame is far more akin to other ableist slurs like “dumb,” “stupid,” “moron,” “idiot,”–all words which Cybunnypoop uses on the regular. The closest comparison we have to the r slur would be “cr*ppled”–which Cybunnypoop quotes on the regular.

Dumb is the closest analogue, as those middle three weren’t really popular until the American Eugenics Movement kicked in, but hey. If it bothers him so much, why say any of them?

Simply because, it only bothers him when it affects him directly and is said by his enemy.

For example, no problem whatsoever quoting Trump’s book, Cr*ppled America.

Here he calls someone ableist scum for calling him the r slur, yet here he mocks another’s offense at the term by comparing it to modern medical jargon.

Atheists and Liberals [sic] are “dumb”

“entirely okay” with the R slur

This post, which was also in the racism section, littered with fun slurs and what’s either blatant hypocrisy (see: his regular use of words like dumb/stupid) or one of the most incredible point-dodges I’ve ever seen.

Now we get into a recurring theme, with a recurring character. The problem with most of Cybunnypoop’s legitimate criticisms (e.g. lame is a slur, accessibility is bullshit) is that they’re never even googled, let alone researched, and that they come, 9 times out of 10, at the expense of another minority. Or, through sheer ignorance, one of his own.

“Trans people get [famous trans people]. Gay people get [famous gay people]. Black people get [famous black people]. Who do I get? I get Joe Swanson.”

“While everyone’s battling over how to bend backwards and make others comfortable, I’m just sitting here, cursing out the ungrateful bastards because there are places I can’t even ACCESS. […] And never mind the fact that there is no good disabled representation out there. You know who I get to look up to? Joe frickin’ Swanson. It’s so nice to be a forgotten minority. [bolding his]

Joe Swanson, for those of you who (like me) have no idea who that is, is a character on Family Guy in a wheelchair. This begs the question: Why do you need to shit on other groups and their representation to acknowledge how bad you have it?

There are dozens of famous disabled people I can name off the top of my head. Stephen Hawking, Hellen Keller, Beethoven, Lord Byron, FDR, Frida Kahlo, Sudha Chandran, John Milton–a cursory Google search reveals even more. Saying there are no famous disabled people is a shitty fucking thing to do, both because you’re erasing their accomplishments and you’re depriving other disabled people of that representation by pretending it doesn’t exist. Spreading misinformation so you can complain that everyone else is better off than you specifically is just plain cruel.

“I’m so sick and tired of society catering to race, ethnicity, sexuality, gender, but never giving a thought to people with disabilities. We don’t get a slice of the “diversity” pie.“

Catering to. … Catering to.

“Until our society can grow to acknowledge, accept, and represent the diverse world of disabilities, then we don’t have true equality and diversity.”

Like… he could have just made a post saying this. I mean, we have diversity regardless of equality, but that’s semantics. We don’t have to tear down other minorities to be heard. There’s enough “pie” for everyone.

Society: You should accept everyone regardless of sex, culture, gender, sexuality, race, class, ethnicity, economic status Person: What about disabled people? Society: Huh?

I’m not a big fan of his little infographics, primarily because he uses them exclusively as a platform to strawman himself, but this one in particular is uh, frustrating. If he’s speaking about popular society, very few people accept all the groups he listed, particularly class/economic status. If he’s speaking about our country….

Federal protected classes include: Race, color, religion/creed, national origin/ancestry, sex, age, physical or mental disability, veteran status, genetic information, citizenship. 

It’s the same story.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:

BLOCK HIM. Do not reblog his content. Stop him preemptively from reblogging yours. Do not engage with him. 

If you try to debate him, he will probably call you a bully, and you will probably get some not-so-mysterious anons. You will definitely be unable to reach a resolution. I know of at least one individual who’s attempting to “rehabilitate” him, so I guess we’ll see how that goes? I’d be genuinely delighted.

Reblog this post if you can, to spread the word.

Educate yourself about the issues addressed in this post. If you have questions, my inbox is always open.

I am not infallible, and I will also make mistakes. Please bring these to my attention immediately and they will be addressed.

This is a much less urgent situation than the previous post, as he’s (mostly) stopped harassing people, but you have a right to be aware of whom you’re interacting with. Whether you block him or befriend him or whatever is up to you, and I hope whatever choice you make is the right choice for you.

[tenscupcake]

my first, and possibly only, official statement on the new doctor.

i've honestly been truly and thoroughly baffled, and rather disappointed, by the lack of discussion occurring around this polarizing issue. in fact, in my brief experience on various social media platforms, discussion is rarely, if ever, allowed. the tiniest expression of discontent with the new doctor immediately elicits a slew of insults and accusations of misogyny. i have yet to have an actual conversation with anyone about this, aside from close personal friends who share my views, because those who don't share them will not even engage them. they instead immediately resort to name calling and shut down any attempts at conversation i make. honestly, it has driven a wedge between me and doctor who and its fandom like i've never experienced, not even in all my suffering through the moffat era.

i hesitated for a while about coming back on here at all. but i figured it would be wrong of me to not give my friends and acquaintances here a chance to really hear me out, since before i took a hiatus i hadn't really properly articulated my reasoning (for the aforementioned reasons). so to anyone interested in my thoughts on the matter (and let me explicitly mention here that i am referring only to rational people who are willing to either read silently and go about their day or else engage in a polite discussion with me, not people who are just going to send me vicious anonymous asks), here they are.

i’m sure it’s no surprise to any of my followers that i haven’t been actively watching the show for some time now. in fact, i stepped away indefinitely sometime early season 8, not because i had any issue with capaldi, but because i didn’t feel moffat’s writing had improved any since the last season.

so, it may have come as a surprise to many of you that i even had a strong reaction of any kind, be it positive or negative. and i can certainly see where you’re coming from, if that’s the case.

when it was announced early last year that moffat would finally be leaving, i threw a party. i literally did. i got together with my one other real-life friend who watches the show, watched rtd episodes, and made blue cupcakes (that were supposed to be TARDIS colored but turned out more of a pale teal and baby blue combo). i can’t even explain how happy i was at the mere suggestion of him leaving. because in my eyes, he took my favorite show and turned it into something i resented. it was such a slow and painful process to come to terms with the fact that a show i once loved was causing me so much grief, and finally part ways with it (at least in the sense of following along with the new episodes; i’ve obviously remained active in the rtd sect and continue to devote a significant chunk of my life to the doctor and rose *blush*). but i just couldn’t deal with the constant disappointment and rage anymore. i knew it was for the best.

i liked broadchurch well enough, with the exception of the second season, and i thought there was no way chibnall could be worse than moffat. and best case scenario, he could potentially resurrect the show into something i’d enjoy again. maybe it was foolish to hope for such a thing, but i owe far too much to this show after all it’s done for me to not give it a second chance under new leadership. so when, a few weeks ago, they told us the date they’d be announcing the new doctor, i got properly excited again. to put a face to my renewed hope in the series? it was hard not to get excited. the sound of the tardis still makes my heart swell with joy and gratitude. i’m still invested. just look at my room or my wardrobe. i’m a self-proclaimed doctor who geek through and through. if i wasn’t, i don’t think it would be possible for me to be genuinely upset about anything that happened to the show. the things we love are the things that can hurt us the most.

so, without prolonging the inevitable any longer, i’ll try to explain why i was/am upset by the casting announcement.

i really have three main reasons.

1. the issue of representation.

let me start out by saying i am a passionate advocate for better (i won't say more, because i don't think that's the issue at hand) female representation in media. especially film. i desperately want more intelligent, strong, powerful women in fiction. but what i absolutely do not want is to recycle traditionally male characters into female ones. doesn't this seem counterproductive to anyone else? its almost as though a man always has to pave the way, and only once he's established a character can a woman potentially take over. it’s trite and more than a little insulting.

give me more original female characters who kick ass. give me more natasha romanoffs, more reys, more elle woods, more leslie knopes.

don’t give me more batgirls or supergirls. don’t take a character as prominent and culturally significant as the doctor and morph him into a woman after 50+ years (or 2000+, depending on your perspective).

and you know, i've actually seen people say (addressing people who are upset about the casting): ‘a character’s gender doesn't have to match yours to be a good role model for you.’ you know what? to an extent, i actually agree. as a matter of fact, i strongly identify with and take inspiration from the doctor, even though he's a man. does nobody hear how hypocritical it sounds to say you want a woman to play the doctor purely so girls can have another role model, and then turn around and in the next sentence say gender is irrelevant to role models? yeah, this one really floored me.

but though i do think that one’s role models don’t have to match one’s gender 100% of the time, it is important to have some that do. and i do think there is an imbalance in the number of strong male leads in tv and film versus the number of strong female leads. keyword: strong. i’m tired of sexist stereotyping and failed bechdel tests, too. probably more than most, actually. but i think taking existing male characters and gender bending them is the absolute worst way to go about rectifying this imbalance.

2. the issue of the nature of gender.

i want to preface this by saying that, until fairly recently, i was something of a fundamentalist when it came to gender. but over the years, i’ve realized how problematic such views are. i’ve invested hours upon hours of my free time scouring reddit threads and watching documentaries about trans issues to understand this crucial part of the LGBT community. to learn. and what i’ve gathered from my thorough research, and heard from the many personal experiences of transgender individuals i’ve read, is that gender is something distinct from biological sex that is immutable. the gender you’re born with is the gender you are for life. (and yes, as i understand it this does also apply to genderfluid individuals - they’ve always been genderfluid even if it was not always expressed.) and changes made to physical appearance are merely affirming one’s gender, not changing it.

changing the doctor into a woman flies directly in the face of this very concept. and to me, it really, truly feels like an insult to the trans community.

it’s going back to the regressive fundamentalist view that sex = gender. that because the doctor has a woman’s body now, he must therefore identify as a woman. though this hasn’t been explicitly confirmed in so many words, given the widespread use of feminine pronouns and the term ‘woman’, i think it’s safe to conclude this is the case for the show. and this is so contrary to the whole message the LGBT community is trying to put out.

now. i’ve heard several potential counterarguments to this, so bear with me as i go through them.

first, people say ‘but the doctor is an alien, not a human. our gender expectations don’t apply.’ true. yes. he is an alien. but is the show really about his alienness? i think you’d be hard-pressed to convince me that it is. the truth is, though it’s told through tales of distant planets and creepy aliens, it’s really a show about humanity, and always has been. doctor who has always espoused a meaningful kind of secular humanism. it’s explored what it means to be human in so many impactful ways. and it’s because the doctor looks and acts human much of the time, succumbs to human emotions and has such human flaws, that he is so relatable. yes, it’s a sci-fi show about time travel and regeneration and spaceships, but if the doctor were completely alien and had no human qualities, it wouldn’t have become such a hit. don’t try to deny that. trying to distance the doctor from humanity is a detriment, not a benefit, to the show.

and though some may argue we ought to hope for and potentially work towards a future where gender is irrelevant, the fact is in today’s society gender is exceedingly relevant. and important. transgender people and feminist movements wouldn’t exist - wouldn’t need to exist - if it weren’t.

second, i see people say ‘the doctor has no gender.’ this one admittedly really throws me. no gender? where is the evidence for that?

for one thing, what point would there be to differentiating between time lords and time ladies if gender was not of import on gallifrey?

there is also a plethora of evidence to the contrary: the doctor has in fact consistently identified as a man. starting JUST with ten:

in ‘the christmas invasion���: he says ‘same man, new face. well, new everything.’

also in tci: ‘oh, that's rude. that's the sort of man i am now, am i?

also in tci: ‘no second chances. i’m that sort of man.’

in ‘fear her’: ‘look at my manly hairy hand’

in ‘evolution of the daleks’: ‘the only man in the universe who might show you some compassion’

in ‘utopia’: ‘i was a different man back then.’

in ‘voyage of the damned’: ‘i’m the man who’s going to save your lives’

in ‘the end of time’: ‘even if i change, it feels like dying. everything i am dies. some new man goes sauntering away.’

a couple of these quotes actually indicate that he has an innate sense of being a man that transcends regeneration. depending on his current level of angst, it seems, he sees himself as a different man or the same man, but the ‘man’ part remains the same. he doesn’t say ‘person’ or ‘character’ or anything to that effect. he says ‘man.’

not to mention, the doctor consistently objects to being called a human (or martian), and corrects those who mislabel him as such, but never once objects to being called a man (which is quite often).

and just so that no one accuses me of singling out one doctor too much, here’s a quote from the first doctor from the pilot, an unearthly child: ‘i’m an old man. how can an old man like me harm any of you?’

right off the bat. the doctor has been identifying as a man for literally thousands of years.

sorry for lingering on that sub-point for a while. it’s just so mind-boggling to me because there’s so much freely available evidence to the contrary.

third, i’ve noticed there seems to be some level of collective amnesia of the backlash from when the master made a comeback as missy. given what i’ve observed of people praising the decision retroactively, no one seems to remember the fandom’s response from that revelatory episode anymore. but i remember it vividly. a number of people were furious, the trans community and its allies in particular. and this outrage returned with a vengeance when missy kissed the doctor (12) later on. though i had already given up on watching the show by then (at least as long as moffat’s hellish reign continued), the anger and frustration i was seeing really resonated with me. 

i have never forgotten that, and it is undoubtedly a big part of the reason i’m so angry and frustrated now. i am at least consistent, if nothing else. but conversely, there seems to be a lack of consistency among much of the fandom, as i sense none of the widespread ire from the past making a resurgence now, and it’s unclear why. the same issues regarding gender are at play. it’s leading me to assume that many people are embracing this decision purely for perceived representation, while disregarding potential cultural issues it may raise, which i think is dangerously selfish and shallow.

3. the choice of actress.

i’m not going to pull any punches here, since i’m already putting my blog’s reputation in jeopardy by making this post at all. i don’t like jodie whittaker, specifically. i think she’s a terrible actress.

this is based purely off of watching broadchurch, because it’s the only thing i’ve seen her in. but her performance paled miserably next to david’s and olivia’s, and even some minor characters’. i mean, beth’s life thoroughly sucked, and everything in it went from bad to worse for a while, but i didn’t really care. she didn’t make me care. i think that’s a huge red flag for any actor. because, i mean, compare that to olivia’s performance. i mean, SHIT. miller made me feel things every episode. intense things. and beth didn’t. at all. ever.

so, even IF the other two issues were somehow resolved, i still wouldn’t be happy with the casting choice, because i am not at all impressed with this person’s acting ability. the doctor is a huge role. a critical one. and i’m honestly not sure what she did to earn it.

so, that’s it. it’s not every nook and cranny of my position, but it’s the gist of it.

as my final thought, i’ll reiterate what i said at the beginning, to anyone considering responding to this: hostile ad hominem responses will be resolutely ignored, but (time and volume of responses permitting) polite intellectual debate will likely be engaged. but let it be said that though i’m willing to listen to reason, it’s highly unlikely anyone will change my mind.

i don’t want this to widen the chasm between me and the fandom. i already feel so distant from it already, like i’m hanging on by a thread. in all likelihood, i won’t discuss the subject at all any more after this post, save for when responding to others’ comments or questions about it. and even then, i will do so privately whenever i can. because i really don’t want to dwell on it anymore. i’ve finally sunk myself back into ep after an extended hiatus due to surgery and work, and that’s what i’d really like to dedicate my free time to from here on out. that and my other d/r fics. that’s what makes me happy; not bickering with people who don’t agree with me.

so please! feel free not to respond to this at all. it is completely optional and even somewhat discouraged, because i am tired of thinking about it and being yelled at and insulted for it. i’d love to forget about it and move on, at least until i’m forced to confront it again this christmas. i want to get back to what my blog is all about - nine and ten’s era. david. the fun smattering of friends and parks gifs. but above all else, the doctor and rose. the couple i’ve dedicated the past four years of my life to.

no matter what happens, i’m going to stay with them. whether or not i stick around on tumblr, i’ll continue posting my fics on ao3. they’re my happy place. these characters mean the world to me. and doctor who will always be very dear to my heart, regardless of how the future of the show pans out. i hope my followers never doubt that.

[clubpassim]

Women in Folk - McKain Lakey

Hey there!

Katie here with the next installment of the ‘Women in Folk’ blog. Today’s interviewee is McKain Lakey!

McKain is a freelance folk musician who primarily plays solo. She started playing guitar at age 11, writing original material at 12, banjo at 13 and has been singing since before she can remember. While she’s been mostly a solo artist (who toured for 8 months last year), she used to be in an old-time music duo called Woolly Breeches, and has made appearances with other bands as well; her electro-folk duo with Aseem Suri, Wyman Street, will be releasing their debut single June 30th. McKain came out with a 4-track solo EP entitled West about a year ago. While the EP stands on its own, McKain mentioned that one of the tracks entitled Sadie’s Song, became the beginning to an entirely different project she’s working towards now;

“One of the songs on the EP was inspired by a murder ballad entitled ‘Little Sadie’. Most murder ballads tend to represent only one side of the story. The stories are often told by the person that survived - the person doing the killing. That’s the side of the story that gets passed down from generation to generation. In researching a lot of old ballads, I found myself pretty frustrated by the lack of women’s stories, women’s voices. so I decided to write a response to the ballad of Little Sadie, taking it and re-writing it from Sadie’s perspective as she’s dying. The song talks directly to the person that killed her. Since writing ‘Sadie’s Song’ I’ve been working to develop that concept into a bigger project, which will hopefully culminate in a full-length album eventually. I hope to make it a collaborative project with other women musicians who are doing similar work.”

McKain did a 10-day writing residency in February with Hedgebrook in support of this project where she researched many of the old stories from which these murder ballads came. Her biggest musical influences for this album are “bad*ss old-time ladies” such as Hazel Dickens, Ola Belle Reed, and Ginny Hawker.

She attended the Berklee College of Music where her primary focus was on Audio Engineering, and it was being on the “fringes” of the Roots program there that introduced her to Passim, where she has since given three shows.

The next part of the interview reflects on her experiences of being a woman engineer and artist. (*strong language is used in the following interview*)

[full interview under the cut]

Club Passim: Talk a little about your experiences as a female artist in the Folk/Americana genre.

McKain Lakey: I’ve worked for many years as an audio engineer so most of my more pointed experiences with gender in music have been on that side of things. That is a big reason I became a performer actually. I did want to pursue my own music but it became pretty clear to me that that was my career path after delving into the world of live sound and getting burnt out from dealing with misogyny all the time.

Even though there are still a lot of stigmas and challenges to being a woman performer, I find it is a lot easier to be a woman performer than be a woman audio engineer. We are definitely underrepresented in both areas but I definitely experienced a lot more blatant sexism as an audio engineer than as a performer. But I really wouldn’t have it any other way. I feel like the experience of being a woman really informs the music I make and informs my perspective in a different way. I feel like we’re coming to a time where that perspective is becoming more valued, and it feels like a really ripe moment to make an impact as an artist by being true to those experiences as a woman in the world. It’s a cool time to be a woman artist.

Being a part of this community of women folk musicians reminds me of when I wrestled in high school. I was on a women’s wrestling team which was still a pretty new concept, so most schools didn’t have a team with girls that filled every weight class. This meant we wound up wrestling for each other’s teams a lot because if your team had two people in one weight class you would loan a wrestler to a team that didn’t have someone in that weight class. It really felt like a ‘wild west’ of women’s wrestling. But what was cool was that whenever I went to a tournament, there was always this huge sense of camaraderie. Even though we were technically in competition with each other, we were also rooting for each other because we played for each other’s teams all the time. You’re all in it together as women wrestlers, and I feel that same sense of camaraderie within women in folk music. There’s always this sigh of relief when you see other women, like “oh, my people”. The bond is very strong for ladies in folk music and that feels very cool.

CP: Do you notice a difference in how you’re treated by other artists, venues, audiences, and industry professionals before vs. after you play?

ML: Yes. Most of the time before I play people don’t take me seriously, but after my set they’ll understand I know what I’m doing. I’ve had a lot of luck with different venues that are very supportive, but every once in a while you have to play that sh*tty gig where no one really cares until you play your set and have a chance to make an impact.

CP: Often, all-male bands have a heavy female fanbase that buys merch, go to shows, support, etc. Do you feel your music is supported by men in this same way? Why or why not do you think that is?

ML: I would say so. If I look at the statistics online of the people who are streaming my music (though I don’t think it is a very good indicator), it’s more women than men, but it’s actually pretty evenly split. At shows, I hear positive responses from both men and women. Actually, for the song I wrote about Little Sadie, I get more comments from men telling me, “Hey that was a really interesting perspective. I’m going to think about that more, let’s have a conversation”.

CP: Incredible classical artists such as classical pianist Yuja Wang use their performance attire as a way to express themselves. This provocative style of dress has been viewed as “distracting” from the music by some. What are your personal thoughts on women using fashion and sex-appeal as a means of bringing in more audience members and assisting in selling their music?

ML: I don’t think it’s my place to judge what any woman wears on stage, period. Whatever your personal style is, whatever is authentic to you is what you should be doing. Women claiming their sexuality is a very powerful thing, so if that’s a big part of your art, then f*****g go for it, that’s rad. I don’t see any problem with that.

There’s a big focus on what women wear, but that conversation distracts from what they’re actually saying with their music. Maybe they’re trying to make a statement with what they’re wearing and we’re completely missing the statement because we’re focusing on the fact that it was “provocative”.

That is definitely something I struggle with as a woman artist. ‘What is the appropriate stage attire that is going to be reflective of who I am as an artist but still comes across as professional’? It’s something I think about a lot, and it frustrates me that men don’t have to think about that. They can show up in jeans and a t-shirt and no one’s going to really think less of them. I also struggle with what feels authentic to me vs. what comes across as authentic.  That’s something I encountered a lot in my duo Woolly Breeches- we often experimented with gender-bending, wearing a lot of men’s clothing. If I were a man I would wear pearl snap shirts every day, but wearing pearl snap shirts every gig as a woman was often seen as a gimmick. That’s the line that I struggle with and feel a lot of frustration towards. It’s completely uneven between the genders with stuff like that.

CP: In your opinion, how can men be more aware or informed about their women co-workers and collaborators in the music industry?

ML: Listening is a big part of it. On the personal accountability side, I’ve been trying to be okay with having any conversation that I would have with a female artist with a male artist. I think sometimes there’s this weird secret club of ladies where we’ll talk about our experiences of being woman musicians together, but we’re not super visible to our male peers. I’ve been trying to focus on being very transparent with where I’m at and not catering the things I talk about based on the gender of who I’m talking to. That has done a lot to spur conversations with male peers who have the potential of being strong allies but don’t necessarily know how to do that.

It’s definitely a two-way street, though. Males need to be actively listening to women. That goes in any setting. From listening when women are advocating for themselves and paying them what they’re actually worth, to listening to us in musical settings. Dudes - don’t just play over women musicians, make sure you’re listening to woman bandleaders just as well as you’d listen to a male bandleader. There are a lot of really subtle ways that men are socialized to ignore women or downplay their contributions. The simple act of listening and being present for women musicians is the foundation of implementing change.

CP: What do you do in a situation when you feel disrespected by the artists/co-workers you’re surrounded by?

ML: It’s very circumstantial. I am really picky with who I spend time with. Going to Berklee, I learned really quickly that I just don’t believe in forgiving a**holes based on their musical merit. I can always find another good musician to play with or hang out with who is a good person too. There are so many amazing musicians who are working hard to make this world a more equitable place, so when I see people being disrespectful, I just leave it. I don’t need to be in this situation, there are so many other places I can go where I WILL be respected.

However, there are those moments where you do need to confront the situation right away. The introduction to a person has been the biggest point of asserting myself actually. I learned this as an audio engineer. If I didn’t assert myself as having power and knowledge within the handshake of meeting an artist, then they would walk all over me for the rest of the night. I’ve definitely carried that with me in my interactions with other people. You have to introduce yourself as someone who is friendly, but also won’t take anyone else’s s**t. It immediately puts a damper on any further disrespect that might occur. That’s usually how I confront the issue before it even happens, though it sucks that that has to happen in the first place.

CP: What message do you want to display as a performer in folk music?

ML: To have respect and compassion for people’s stories. A big part of my work has been exploring perspectives of marginalized people throughout history. I focus mostly on women and queer folks because those are identities I carry. But at the heart of it, it’s about going into your interactions with people with kindness and compassion and to be present for the people you’re around. In the end, it’s all about respect.

CP: What words of wisdom/encouragement do you have for aspiring women in folk?

ML: The women in the folk industry, both musicians and tech, are a really good group of people. Having so many amazing women mentors, colleagues and friends that I’ve gotten to know through this scene is what I cherish most. Collaborating with these women is one of the best parts about doing what I do.

My biggest words of encouragement would be ‘Welcome!’ There are people here that really love you and want to support you. Your best resources are the women around you. We have to keep working on building this community together because it’s a really important one to have. There is a lot of potential for us to express ourselves through this genre, we just have to dive in.

                                                           ~

Perhaps my favorite thing McKain said in the interview was that she doesn’t believe in forgiving people for their attitude or behavior based on their musical merit. While attending Eastman I have most definitely run across this issue a number of times. Being an incredible musician does not excuse nor warrant the poor treatment of friends, peers, and mentors. Unfortunately, this still seems to be lost on many musicians today, men and women alike, though in my experience this attitude tends to appear more frequently in men.

Thanks, McKain for bringing this up and sharing your thoughts and experiences! We can’t wait to see your projects come into fruition.

Thank you for reading, and stay tuned for the next installment of the ‘Women in Folk’ blog!

Katie

[reddyreddy7-blog]

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[i-am-very-very-tired]

"Tupac Broke Up With Madonna Because She's White!" That's the headline many outlets are going with to describe a recently unearthed letter written by Tupac to Madonna in 1995 about their breakup. While that statement may be accurate in theory, it's a sensational dumbing down of the nuance and complexity of Tupac's words. The letter is an introspective, heartfelt apology from a repentant ex-boyfriend as well as an admission that race played a significant role in the end of a relationship, as it sometimes does. In the letter, uncovered by TMZ and addressed to “M,” Tupac apologizes multiple times to Madonna about how he treated her in their relationship and he’s candid about the difficulties that come with dating interracially. He also admits to worrying about how dating one of the most famous white women in the world could negatively impact his “image,” while potentially giving hers a boost. “For you to be seen with a black man wouldn’t in any way jeopardize your career – if anything it would make you seem that much more open and exciting. But for me, at least in my previous perception, I felt due to my ‘image,’ I would be letting down half of the people who made me what I thought I was. I never meant to hurt you.” There’s a lot to unpack in this excerpt. I want to start with “letting down half of the people who made me what I thought I was.” “Half of the people” could be a reference to his black fans in general but to me, that line seems like it’s specifically referring to black woman. When I reviewed the recent Tupac biopic All Eyez on Me, I mentioned how much ‘Pac’s song Keep Ya Head Up meant to me when I first heard it. It’s a celebration of black femininity and a call for black men to recognize the strength, resilience and beauty of black women. But Tupac’s relationship with black women was complicated. He spewed misogyny on certain songs and was incarcerated for sexually abusing a black woman. But he’s also the guy who was raised by two Black Panthers and became a symbol of unapologetic blackness. He’s the guy who told the heartbreaking story of a black woman’s struggle on Brenda’s Got a Baby and applauded black motherhood on Dear Mama. When ‘Pac writes “at least in my previous perception,” I think he was speaking to the precedent of black women feeling lesser than white women and the glorification of whiteness the media so often maintains. If images of Tupac and Madonna were splashed all over the tabloids, he would be perpetuating the stereotypes so much of his music railed against. So, even though there’s an unfortunate history of black men dating white women for a status boost, ‘Pac viewed his romantic affiliation with Madonna not as a way to get more famous or gain crossover fans (which it probably would have) but as a betrayal to his community. I’ve written before about the politics of black love. Interracial dating is never simple. There are always going to be judgments and societal implications that follow high-profile interracial relationships but there are also the everyday issues that go along dating outside your race. There are the things the other person will never truly understand. There are the offhand comments that they make, thinking they mean nothing while, to you, they mean everything. In Madonna and Tupac’s case, one of her offhand comments sounds like it was the cause of their breakup. In the letter, written while ‘Pac was in prison, he recalls being hurt by something Madonna allegedly said in an interview. According to ‘Pac, Madonna said, “’I’m off to rehabilitate all the rappers and basketball players’ or something to that effect.” He goes on to explain how that quote made him feel: “Those words cut me deep seeing how I had never known you to be with any rappers besides myself. It was at this moment out of hurt and a natural instinct to strike back and defend my heart and ego that I said a lot of things.” If Madonna was joking about fetishizing black men in interviews, of course Tupac would be hurt by this. Tupac and Madonna’s relationship was only officially confirmed a couple years ago when Madonna admitted to Howard Stern that they had dated while explaining why she was so angry during an interview with David Letterman. This is the quote from 2015: “I was dating Tupac Shakur at the time, and he had got me all riled up about life in general. So, when I went on the show I was feeling very gangster.” “Gangster” is the word Madonna chose to describe Tupac’s influence on her. OK. Does that make you a bit uncomfortable? Madonna has also said some other super problematic sh-t about black men in the past. Here’s what she said to Spin Magazine in 1998. “I believe that I have never been treated more disrespectfully as a woman than by the black men that I’ve dated. I’ve never actually said that to anybody, but it’s true and I think it’s a cultural thing. So many black men grow up without fathers, without strong male figures, without a sense of romance and seeing a man treat a woman with respect.” When I first read this story about Madonna and Tupac’s breakup, it reminded me of a couple months ago when some stories came out about Barack Obama’s ex-girlfriends claiming race played a role in why each of them never became First Lady. They claimed that the only reason Barack and Michelle became the gold standard of black love and the definition of #marriagegoals was because Michelle was black. According to these exes, who were white, Barack Obama specifically wanted to be with a black woman. Michael Harriot wrote an impeccable piece for The Root in response to these claims. “…perhaps Barack Obama did marry Michelle because she was black. If—as every one of these women reportedly said—Barack was obsessed with questions of race and self-identity, then it makes sense that he would have gravitated toward someone who identified with his innermost thoughts about himself. These women might not be bitter, but they might not understand that—although there is a part of blackness that can be verbalized to them—someone who is not black can never truly know it… there is the possibility that a man who contemplated and even questioned his blackness his entire life might want someone who he felt truly knew him completely.” So, even though it sounds like there were other factors that led to Madonna and Tupac’s breakup, one of them was definitely race and, you know what, that’s OK. I’ve been in an interracial relationship for almost 6 years. My partner and I have had some very uncomfortable, no holds barred, heated conversations about race. They were necessary discussions and honestly, they made our relationship stronger but I would be lying if I didn't admit there were times when I thought our differences were too much. There have been times we've almost broken up over these differences. Tupac may have broken up with Madonna over their differences but it sounds like it was a lot more complicated than "he broke up with her because she's white!"