#John Valenti

[myfavoritemaneuver]

Al Davis - CONS Spot

[uwmspeccoll]

Shakespeare Weekend!

William Shakespeare’s historical play, King John, is Volume 16 of the thirty-seven volume The Comedies Histories & Tragedies of William Shakespeare, published by the Limited Editions Club (LEC) from 1939-1940. King John was adapted by Shakespeare before 1598 from his earlier work, The Troublesome Raigne of King John. King John was first printed in the folio of 1623. 

Italian-American printmaker and book illustrator and designer, Valenti Angelo (1897-1982) illustrated this edition of King John. Angelo decorated and illustrated around 250 books in a span of thirty four years, working first at the Grabhorn Press in San Francisco from 1926 to 1932, producing thirty five books for them. He then moved to New York City and fell on hard times during the great depression until he found a place for himself working at the Limited Editions Club in New York City. In 1937 Angelo also began illustrating his own children's books with the mentorship of the American children's book editor, May Massee at Viking Press. 

For King John Angelo produced a series of drawings that were reproduced in three colors and gold. The volumes in the set were printed in an edition of 1950 copies at the Press of A. Colish, and each was illustrated by a different artist, but the unifying factor is that all volumes were designed by famed book and type designer Bruce Rogers and edited by the British theatre professional and Shakespeare specialist Herbert Farjeon. Our copy is number 1113, the number for long-standing LEC member Austin Fredric Lutter of Waukesha, Wisconsin.

View more Limited Edition Club posts.

View more Shakespeare Weekend posts.

-Teddy, Special Collections Graduate Intern

[jt1674]

[spilladabalia]

Quicksilver Messenger Service - Fresh Air - 12/28/1975 - Winterland - San Francisco -

[androfiles]

[michaeltrevinosource]

Michael Trevino and Trevor St. John pose for portraits at the 2019 TCA Winter Press Tour in Pasadena, California.  

[readerviews]

"13 Poets from Long Island" by John A. Valenti 3rd and Evelyn Kandel

Poems from Long Island #books #bookreview #reading #readerviews

13 Poets from Long Island John A. Valenti 3rd and Evelyn KandelBushwickborn Productions, Inc. (2023)ISBN: 979-8988919308Reviewed by Natalia Kavale for Reader Views (10/2023) Former US Marine Corps sergeant, author, poet, and Writing Poetry teacher Evelyn Kandel has compiled, together with national award-winning journalist John A. Valenti 3rd, a fourth collection of poems by herself and twelve…

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Do you have a list of good sex ed books to read?

BOY DO I

please bear in mind that some of these books are a little old (10+ years) by research standards now, and that even the newer ones are all flawed in some way. the thing about research on human beings, and especially research on something as nebulous and huge as sex, is that people are Always going to miss something or fail to account for every possible experience, and that's just something that we have to accept in good faith. I think all of these books have something interesting to say, but that doesn't mean any of them are the only book you'll ever need.

related to that: it's been A While since I've read some of these so sorry if anything in them has aged poorly (I don't THINK SO but like, I was not as discerning a reader when I was 19) but I am still including them as books that have been important to my personal journey as a sex educator.

additionally, a caveat that very few of these books are, like, instructional sex ed books in the sense of like "here's how the penis works, here's where the clit is, etc." those books exist and they're great but they're also not very interesting to me; my studies on sex are much more in the social aspect (shout out to my sociology degree) and the way people learn to think about sex and societal factors that shape those trends. these books reflect that. I would genuinely love to have the time to check out some 101 books to see how they fare, but alas - sex ed is not my day job and I don't have the time to dedicate to that, so it happens slowly when it happens at all. I've been meaning to read Dr. Gunter's Vagina Bible since it came out in 2019, for fucks sake.

and finally an acknowledgement that this is a fairly white list, which has as much to do with biases with academia and publishing as my own unchecked biases especially early in my academic career and the limitations of my university library.

ANYWAY here's some books about sex that have been influential/informative to me in one way or another:

The Trouble With Normal: Sex, Politics, and the Ethics of Queer Life (Michael Warner, 1999)

Virginity Lost: An Intimate Portrait of First Sexual Experiences (Laura M. Carpenter, 2005)

Virgin: The Untouched History (Hanne Blank, 2007)

Sex Goes to School: Girls and Sex Education Before the 1960s (Susan K. Freeman, 2008)

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex (Mary Roach, 2008)

Transgender History: The Roots of Today's Revolution (Revised Edition) (Susan Stryker, 2008)

The Purity Myth: How America's Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women (Jessica Valenti, 2009)

Not Under My Roof: Parents, Teens, and the Culture of Sex (Amy T. Schalet, 2011)

Straight: The Surprisingly Short History of Heterosexuality (Hanne Blank, 2012)

Rewriting the Rules: An Integrative Guide to Love, Sex and Relationships (Meg-John Barker, 2013)

The Sex Myth: The Gap Between Our Fantasies and Realities (Rachel Hills, 2015)

Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Tranform Your Sex Life (Emily Nagoski, 2015)

Not Gay: Sex Between Straight White Men (Jane Ward, 2015)

Too Hot to Handle: A Global History of Sex Education (Jonathan Zimmerman, 2015)

American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus (Lisa Wade, 2017)

Histories of the Transgender Child (Jules Gill-Peterson, 2018)

Revolting Prostitutes: The Fight for Sex Workers' Rights (Juno Mac and Molly Smith, 2018)

Ace: What Asexuality Reveals About Desire, Society, and the Meaning of Sex (Angela Chen, 2020)

Pleasure in the News: African American Readership and Sexuality in the Black Press (Kim Gallon, 2020)

A Curious History of Sex (Kate Lister, 2020)

Boys & Sex: Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity (Peggy Orenstein, 2020)

Black Women, Black Love: America's War on Africa American Marriage (Dianne M. Stewart, 2020)

The Tragedy of Heterosexuality (Jane Ward, 2020)

Hurts So Good: The Science and Pleasure of Pain on Purpose (Leigh Cowart, 2021)

Strange Bedfellows: Adventures in the Science, History, and Surprising Secrets of STDs (Ina Park, 2021)

The Right to Sex: Feminist in the Twenty-First Century (Amia Srinivasan, 2021)

Love Your Asian Body: AIDS Activism in Los Angeles (Eric C. Wat, 2021)

Superfreaks: Kink, Pleasure, and the Pursuit of Happiness (Arielle Greenberg, 2023)

[leikeliscomet]

A Brief Look at Stem(me) History

Wanted to know more about Black lesbian identities and I couldn't find a lot on Tumblr or Twitter so I did some research on stem/stemme myself. I'm not involved in queer discourse like that but I've noticed stemme being compared with futch both positively an negatively. The term "futch" is a mash up of butch and femme and the OG Futch Scale was posted 17th February 2011. In 2015, it got posted to Tumblr and became a meme, then an accidental "guide" on lesbian identity. Regardless of stances pro-futch or anti-futch I wanted to find info on stem/stemme as a Black lesbian identity for gender and gender expression. The modern definition of a stem/stemme is a Black lesbian whose gender expression and mannerisms fall between stud and femme. I've managed to find definitions not only supporting this but also definitions predating the futch scale, both pre and post meme version:

"Stem – A person whose gender expression falls somewhere between a stud and a femme.  (See also ‘Femme’ and ‘Stud’.)" Stud is defined as "An African-American and/or Latina masculine lesbian.  Also known as ‘butch’ or ‘aggressive’." (John Jay College of Criminal Justice LGBTQ+ Terminology, Eli R. Green, 2003-2004)

"Stemm A stemm is a gay/lesbian female who dresses like a guy, and dresses like a girl. Person 1: Look at that girl, she looks like a dude with all those guy clothes on, she has to be a stud Person 2: Well she was wearing girly clothes yesterday, so I thought she was a femm Person 3: Actually she's a stemm, she's wears boy clothes sometimes, and girl clothes other times" (Urban Dictionary definition of Stemm by user JenniferHill, November 8th 2009)

"A lesbian, who identifies as a Stemme, retains traits from both Femme and Stud/ Butch lesbians. Stemmes are in the center of the lesbian spectrum of classification and identities. Therefore, it is considered natural or common for Stemme lesbians to share the same behaviors as women of two diverse identity groups. Often times, the Stemme identity is viewed as the “transitional” stage of lesbianism, when a lesbian woman goes from being a Femme to a Stud/ Butch, or (on rear occasions) from a Stud/ Butch to a Femme... *In this blog the characteristic and behavioral difference between a Femme and a Stud is conjoined. The way a Femme or a Stud dresses is not the only way she can be identified. They can also be distinguished by their attitudes, actions and the way they interact with other people. A Stemme is the in-between identity of a Stud and Femme. She is apart of both groups and her identity is subject to change at anytime. A Stemme identity is often referred to as the transitional stage; however, some lesbian women remain a Stemme because they enjoy representing male and female dominance." (Lesbian Identity: Stemme, Nell S., 6th Nov 2009)

"'one who could switch up one day, she could be a femme and other occasions dress like she has a li’l hood, li’l ghetto inside her; a stemme –  part femme part stud a tomboy'" (STORY OF INTEREST: Lesbian Speaks Out, Dominica News Online, April 12th 2010)

"Stemmes presented themselves one day as femme and another day as stud; as such, they were visibly unrecognisable unless they divulged their gender identity. Stemmes expose the amorphous nature of gender identity and are invisible – silenced, ostracised or prescribed a gender identity. Many participants refused to recognise that stemmes existed and instead described them as confused. As Shane (age 22) admitted: ‘Sometimes they [studs and femmes] think that we’re confused. We don’t know what we want to be.’ Stemmes show that personal identity claims were often at odds with community perceptions of identity." (Good gay females and babies' daddies: Black lesbian community norms and the acceptability of pregnancy, Sarah J. Reed, Robin Lin Miller, Maria T. Valenti & Tina M. Timm, 21st April 2011)

"Stem, described as a cross between or combination of stud and femme, is a label that was used to refer to a lesbian that presented both masculine and feminine traits and characteristics. Short Dawg said, 'A stem, for me, is a little mixture of a lot of different things. One day you can be super feminine, and the next day you can be not so feminine.'" (Labelling, Butch, Femme Dyke Or Lipstick, Aren't All Lesbians The Same?: An Exploration Of Labels And "Looks" Among Lesbians In The U.S. South, Danielle Kerr, 2013)

Videos

Who has it harder in the world of lesbians? [studs? stems? or fems?}, iRoqStarStemme, 10th Jan 2011

WTH is a STEM??, AmbersCloset, 1st Feb 2013

The Black Lesbian Handbook: The Stem, Channel 4, 9th Feb 2015

There's a lot more I found and I'll post each article and video separately because they all go into more detail but tl;dr;

Stem(me) is an identity coined by Black lesbian spaces

Stem(me) mainly follows stud/femme dynamics rather than butch/femme (but can reference it)

Stem(me) predates the futch scale meme

Stem(me) is defined by clothing but also behaviours, so it can be a form of Black gender expression or gender itself

[deadpresidents]

"I'm going to get [John F.] Kennedy's tax cut out of the Senate Finance Committee, and we're going to get this economy humming again. Then I'm going to pass Kennedy's civil rights bill, which has been hung up too long in Congress. And I'm going to pass it without changing a single comma or a word. After that we'll pass legislation that allows everyone in this country to vote, with all the barriers down. And that's not all. We're going to get a law that says every boy and girl in this country, no matter how poor, or the color of their skin, or the region they come from, is going to be able to get all the education they can take by loan, scholarship, or grant, right from the federal government. And I aim to pass Harry Truman's medical insurance bill (which ultimately became Medicare and Medicaid) that got nowhere before."

-- President Lyndon B. Johnson, on his immediate domestic policy goals, to aides Jack Valenti, Bill Moyers, and Cliff Carter, as they sat with him in his bedroom before he went to sleep at 4:00 AM on November 23, 1963 -- just hours after being sworn in as President following John F. Kennedy's assassination. LBJ achieved each of those goals -- basically in the exact order he mentioned -- during his first two years as President.

[rapeculturerealities]

South Carolina's “Heartbeat” Lawsuit - by Jessica Valenti

Before the current 6-week ban went into effect, the South Carolina Supreme Court had struck down a similar ban—in part because justices said that 6 weeks wasn’t enough time for a person to make a decision about their pregnancy. Soon after that decision, the sole female justice on the Court—who wrote the majority opinion striking down the ban—retired. Once she was off the bench, Republicans worked quickly to get another ban in front of the Court, this time claiming that they changed the language of the bill to be constitutional.

In an attempt to get around the previous block, state attorney Thomas Hydrick argued that the new ban prohibited abortion after “cardiac activity” is detected, not after 6 weeks. Hydrick also claimed that because pregnancy tests might work as soon as ten days after conception, it’s women’s responsibility to find out if they’re pregnant as early as possible: “There is a distinction legally between do women know, and can women know?”

Justices liked the idea that women have a responsibility to know about their pregnancy and take early action. Justice John Few, said, “I think it's a valid notion that the state, as part of its policy judgment can say, we want you to start thinking about your choices early.”

In short: a huge part of how Republicans enacted this ban was by claiming women have plenty of time and ability to find out they’re pregnant and get an abortion before ‘cardiac activity’ happens. That brings us back to Shelton, who did all of the “right” and “good” things that Republicans wanted her to do.

[dr-lizortecho]

Top 10 Ships Involving POC in 10 Different Fandoms

Tagged by the lovely @welldressedllama <3 imma cheat and mention like seven for rnm (but only list one, lol)

1) Liz Ortecho/Max Evans (Roswell New Mexico) they are my brain damage tbh

honorable mentions to Liz Ortecho/Kyle Valenti, Kyle Valenti/Max Evans (I see you!) and Liz Ortecho/Max Evans/Kyle Valenti, basically those three mean the world to me in like every set up imaginable, echo is personal tho so they get the gif, lol

2) Bonnie Bennett/Elena Gilbert (the Vampire Diaries) I’ve been feeling this one a lot lately

3) Francesca Bridgerton/Michaela Stirling (Bridgerton) ik I just got them- but I’m obsessed (I adore John too- I was petitioning for him to live)

4) Aisha/Musa (Fate the Winx Saga)

5) Alina Starkov/Kirigan (Shadow and Bone)

6) Theo Crain/Trish Park (the Haunting of Hill House)

7) Lady Sam/Mon (Gap the Series)

8) Percy Jackson/Annabeth Chase (PJO)

9) Alex CD/Henry (red white and royal blue)

10) Gwen/Arthur (Merlin)

no pressure tags @mimi-and-the-next-20th-century @ihavenoideahowtodream @ajna-eye-cogitations @pleasantfanartist @primalmusic @maeglinthebold and anyone who sees this and wants to!

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Jessica Valenti at Abortion, Every Day:

You don’t need to be a political genius to know that Republicans are straight up shitting themselves right now. The Arizona Supreme Court ruling in favor of an 1864 ban was a tipping point across the country, and the GOP—in every state, at every level—knows that voters are furious.

It’s not just the nightmare stories of raped children being denied care and women going septic that put voters over the edge, but the disdain for women that seeps out of every anti-abortion decision. At the same time Arizona Republicans are enacting a law from before women had the right to vote, anti-abortion groups and Idaho Republicans are headed to the Supreme Court to argue that states shouldn’t have to give women life-saving abortions. How much clearer can they get? All of which is to say: strategists have their work cut out for them. How can they convince voters ahead of November that the anti-abortion horror show they’ve unleashed on Americans is good, actually?

If anyone has an answer, it’s Kellyanne Conway. The Republican strategist and all-around terrible person has been doing damage control in the wake of the Arizona ruling, pushing out talking points at record speed. And the messages she’s focusing on paint a clear picture of what we can expect to see from GOP candidates—including Donald Trump—over the next few months. In a recent appearance on Fox News, for example, Conway stuck to some of her old standards—namely, attacking Democrats as the real extremists. She honed in on ballot measures, specifically, saying that abortion rights activists are trying to pass amendments that are “more permissive than pre-Dobbs.” Of course, this is demonstrably false. It’s also one of the reasons I don’t love ‘viability’ language in proposed amendments—in addition to the fact that it’s just another restriction, Republicans will claim we’re pushing for abortion ‘up until birth’ regardless.

Conway also repeated some of our favorite anti-abortion bingo words like “compassion,” and “federal minimum standard” in lieu of ‘ban’—but it was something she said about states’ rights that piqued my interest.

[“What is state’s rights? Is it when the state Supreme Court speaks? Is it through a ballot initiative? Is it through the governor and the state legislature working together? Is it through the trigger laws that have been on the books? I can argue that it’s all of the above.”]

Over the last few months—especially as pro-choice ballot measures have advanced in multiple states—I’ve noticed Republicans tinkering with the definition of states’ rights and the ‘will of the people.’ Essentially, they know that they’re passing abortion bans against voters’ wishes, so they need to make it sound as if these laws are something Americans actually want. (That’s why they say ‘consensus’ instead of ‘ban.’)

This week, for example, Fox News ran a headline about the EMTALA case headed to the Supreme Court, stating that the Biden administration is “subverting state’s rights” by requiring hospitals to give women life-saving and stabilizing abortions. John Bursch, an attorney from Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the radical legal group arguing the case, told Fox News, “It’s pushing abortion on states that don't want it.” It takes a lot of nerve to pass abortion bans no one wants, only to then accuse pro-choice politicians of disregarding voters’ wishes! But that’s the message I’m seeing come up again and again among Republican legislators, anti-abortion activists and conservative media.

Jessica Valenti’s Abortion, Every Day Substack exposes the GOP’s abortion bans are the “will of the people” charade in which they falsely suggest that the Democrats are the ones extreme on abortion.

These nimrods claim to be for “states’ rights” when it comes to abortion bans, but they would ban it nationwide in a heartbeat if given a chance to do so.

[spilladabalia]

Quicksilver Messenger Service - Mona - 8/15/1969 - Sonoma State College -

[lboogie1906]

Geraldine Whittington (September 11, 1931 – January 24, 1993) was the personal executive secretary to President Lyndon B. Johnson and was the first African American secretary in the White House.

Johnson was famous for working long hours and insisting his assistants worked long hours as well. When John F. Kennedy was assassinated and Johnson became president, he requested a new slate of secretaries. He saw her working in a government office and requested that his assistant Jack Valenti get her home phone number. Johnson called her unannounced one evening and requested that she come in that night for an interview. According to audiotapes of Johnson’s phone calls, she at first thought the call was a joke, but came to believe that it was the president on the line. She applied for the job and was offered the position.

Having a Black woman in the White House was very unusual in the early 1960s. Johnson wanted to advertise the fact that he had hired a Black woman, but chose not to call a news conference. He arranged for her to appear on the television game show” What’s My Line?”, wherein contestants attempted to guess her profession. This may have seemed less overt but exposed her to more viewers than if a standard press conference had been held.

She appeared on episode #696 of the game show What’s My Line? On January 19, 1964. She was the first contestant. After she signed the blackboard as “Jerri Whittington,” she told host John Daly that she was from West River, Maryland. Her occupation was shown on the screen as “Secretary to President Johnson.” After her game, she described President Lyndon Johnson with the following words, “great warmth, fair, kind, a perfectionist.”

She appeared in several magazines, including Jet and Sepia.

She was the first person to learn that Justice Thurgood Marshall had been nominated by President Johnson to the Supreme Court. Minutes before LBJ made the official announcement, he took his nominee down to her office and said, “Here’s the next Supreme Court Justice!” She told friends that she thanked the President for choosing the first Black court justice. #africanhistory365 #africanexcellence

[brookstonalmanac]

Birthdays 9.5

Beer Birthdays

Jack Daniel; distiller (1846)

Beevo Moore (1983)

Five Favorite Birthdays

Michael Keaton; actor, comedian (1951)

George Lazenby; actor (1939)

Freddie Mercury; rock singer (1946)

Bob Newhart; comedian, actor (1929)

Raquel Welch; actor (1940)

Famous Birthdays

J.C. Bach; composer (1735)

John Cage; composer (1912)

William Devane; actor (1939)

Dennis Dugan; actor (1946)

Werner Erhard; cult leader (1935)

Robert Fergusson; Scottish poet (1750)

Cathy Guisewite; cartoonist (1950)

Werner Herzog; German actor (1942)

Jesse James; outlaw (1847)

Arthur Koestler; writer (1905)

Nap Lajoie; Philadelphia Phillies/Cleveland Naps 2B (1874)

Carol Lawrence; actor, singer (1932)

Bill Mazeroski; Pittsburgh Pirates 2B (1936)

Rose McGowan; actor (1973)

Patti McGuire; Playboy playmate, model, television producer (1951)

Giacomo Meyerbeer; German composer (1791)

Buddy Miles; jazz musician (1947)

Arthur Charles Nielsen; market researcher (1897)

Cardinal Richelieu; French minister, clergyman (1585)

Al Stewart; pop singer (1945)

John Stewart; folk singer (1939)

Frank Thomas; animator (1912)

Jack Valenti; film industry thug (1921)

Cornelius Vanderbilt III; engineer, inventor (1873)

Loudon Wainwright III; singer, songwriter (1946)

Daryl F. Zanuck; film director (1902)

Dweezil Zappa; rock guitarist (!969)