#i realized who she was and what she was doing by rejecting the predominantly white mode of artistic expression

[1eos]

and its funny bc the same ppl who will defend rohtkos or mondrians or matisses to the fucking grave will look at a clementine hunter and SUDDENLY all that shit abt how art doesn't have to be perfectly rendered and its an exploration of style will go right out the window. i wonder why paintings like these arent as defended....no idea why tho (i know exactly why)

no art movement is precious enough where everyone is obligated to like it or get it tbh. if someone hates modern art so much where theyre compelled to pick up a paintbrush to prove how 'easy' it is then that's a win. if they hate it and it compels them to look for contemporary subjective artists that's a win. like the point of art isnt just to enjoy dumbly its supposed to evoke emotions and opinions and conversation

[xulachics-theblackgirltake]

500 Kenadi C

Would you change your looks for a high paying corporate job? I'll start this blog post by saying that this is complete discrimination.The CROWN Act stands for Creating A Respectful and Open World For Natural Hair and was first passed in California in 2019. The CROWN Act was designed to prevent discrimination based on hairstyle and texture. The Black culture has faced prejudice in corporate and educational settings. As a young girl in a predominantly white  elementary school, I wore a flower headband along with my ponytail of box braids. Shortly after I began wearing the headband, a new rule surfaced saying that I could no longer wear the headband because it was a distraction. A distraction to who? There were no rules in the handbook against my choice of expression, but because I was a black girl, I felt targeted. In the real world,  I think all black women are targeted when it comes to their professional look especially when they are out of social norms to the public eye. I watched my mom work in a corporate setting and fit into all of the social norms that she was “supposed to” as a black human resources manager amongst her white peers. If a company were to not hire me because of my hair I would file a discrimination lawsuit. Also, I think this shows how the company functions as a whole. How does my hair affect my performance? This is where the company may mess up because what they do not realize is that they just lost their best candidate for the position as well as have a discrimination lawsuit on their hand.

As a black individual, I believe in being woke. Woke is a term of the African American vernacular that means to be alert to racial prejudice and discrimination. To be woke in a situation like this is to know what you can do. I’ve done my research and I’ve found that there are many lawsuits that can take place against the company. Through the Employment Discrimination Lawsuit, they can file under the Title VII of the Civil Right Act in 1964. This can be filed only if the company’s request for hair change is under a protected characteristic such as origin, religion, or race. A violation of state or local laws would be if a company were to discriminate after being hired on the job. For an individual who is not aware of his/her rights, they would be easily convinced that now that they work for the company they have to do as they. A violation of local or state laws such as The CROWN Act, could result on the affected employee to file a lawsuit under the state or local legislation. The Breach of Employment Contract is designed to protect employee’s other individual appearances such as piercings, tattoos, hair color or sense of style. The last action that can be taken against a company is the Hostile Work environment Claim. This could be filed if an employee rejects the request of hair change and the company creates a hostile work environment.

-Kenadi Charles

[sepublic]

Sorry about the double ask so here's a fun idea, Emperor Belos wrote The Good Witch Azura books. Like he wrote them in his younger years before becoming a parasitic tyrant. - Pixel Anon

           That seems like it’d be the perfect opportunity to segue into a lesson about Death of the Author, which- Given Sense and Insensitivity, and how this show already discusses how fiction affects reality and connects with it… Would be VERY refreshing to see, especially as a moral that I don’t really see other kids’ shows exploring! I do recall OK KO bringing it up with the Hero Cards not representing Kappas, but the more the merrier. It’d also be fitting to discuss Death of the Author, and separating a work from a terrible creator- Given the show’s frequent references to Harry Potter, which has a rather infamous author…

           For neurodivergent kids who really get into hyperfixations and fandoms, which Luz and Amity basically are- It’d be fascinating to see them navigate this kind of twisted revelation! And it’d also force them to really re-examine The Good Witch Azura, because sometimes a work can’tbe separated from the harmful ideas of its creator, especially if it was made to transmit them… If Azura ever talks about dealing with ‘savages’, that’d be VERY sus and make matters a lot more complex. But then again, Azura also reconciles with Hecate, so it could be a matter of recognizing a work’s more problematic areas and criticizing them, while still enjoying it.

          And, this makes sense, as The Owl House really does convey that experience of engaging with media and fiction, and how it relates to real life… And how media and fiction CAN mean a lot to people, it’s perfectly valid for one’s hyperfixations to mean the world to them! It’s treated as objectively terrible for Luz to throw away her Azura book, and bar a few social misunderstandings, the Azura books have otherwise brought nothing but happiness for her and Amity, and even functioned as something for them to bond over!

          It’s perfectly okay for fiction to mean a lot to Luz, and she’s not being childish for wanting to hold on, to keep enjoying it- So it’d be an interesting discussion when Belos’ authorship is thrown into the mix, amidst potential problematic bits here or there. Then again, Luz is an ND-coded kid who continues to find solace in these stories, which would suggest that there isn’t anything there that would bother her- At least, nothing she’d have really noticed until someone pointed it out to her.

           Then there’s the appropriateness, of Belos’ own fantasy being what could’ve led to Luz being deluded in her own right, projecting fantasies and dreams onto reality, wanting to be a chosen one… It’d be an extension of the kind of harmful delusions and ideas he puts into others, tying it back all the way of Luz herself, prior to arriving on the Boiling Isles! It’d give us insight to Belos as someone who really gets people to believe in the idea of being special, of being chosen, specifically for the Emperor’s Coven… And how this could relate to HIS character, if he himself is also a victim of these kinds of issues. If Belos is Luz, in that she never learned to differentiate fantasy from reality, and felt entitled towards bringing her stories to life.

          Perhaps Belos isn’t REALLY chosen by the Titan, he just likes to think of himself as a Chosen One- Or he was, but others can also quality for this honor, which is something that aggravates Belos because it alludes to him not being more special than others. Because to Belos, it’s not enough to be unique and valid in your own way; You must be actively better than others, and the creation of the Emperor’s Coven above all reflects this. The belief that magic is a privilege, a luxury, something you must actively earn or be more worthy of than others for…

           It’s also an interesting contrast, as if Belos has also been influenced by his works, or his works are a reflection of that- Then it’d set him apart from Luz as someone who actively deludes himself. As someone who is voluntarily blind, and willfully ignorant- Just like Lilith, who was inspired by Belos and looked to him as a role model when she was younger. Even before becoming a parasitic tyrant, Belos was a dark reflection of Luz, subjecting others to fantasies and delusions… Maybe not initially maliciously nor willingly, maybe it was just him having fun like any author. But then this innocuous action became very dark in retrospect, as Belos and his ‘hobbies’ worsened and took on a more harmful role for the people of the Boiling Isles.

          I suppose it’s worth noting that Belos’ imagery invokes a lot of white, which is also seen with Azura’s predominantly white-and-purple robes… While Belos is white-and-gold. If Belos is a dark deconstruction of Luz’s assumption of a Chosen One narrative and fantasies, then maybe he’s also a deconstruction of Azura herself; And this of course suggests that he actively emulated his own creation. He’s artistic and a writer like Luz is, but it seems Belos got TOO convinced by how good he was, and couldn’t take constructive criticism- Which could be like King as an author in Sense and Insensitivity, up until he realizes that Luz’s input helped make him so great!

           Luz and Amity can still engage in fantasy and fiction, the show always lets them find joy in this… It’s just a matter of finding the distinction between the two and recognizing it. Fully indulging into fantasy is what could’ve led Luz to accepting Adegast’s illusions… But entirely rejecting is is the path that is the Reality Camp, which would’ve sucked the fun and joy out of Luz and turned her into a hollow, soulless imitation of herself. It’s okay to find comfort and media and even be inspired by it, to even take lessons from it; And while you should always prioritize listening to real life when it says otherwise, I think it’s worth observing that Luz’s quest to be a good person like Azura… Well, influences her to be kind!

          And it’s this desire to emulate Azura that influences Luz to learn magic, which creates yet another hyperfixation that brings the girl joy, and leads to her connecting with Eda and everyone else in the Boiling Isles in the first place by staying there! Perhaps Belos will contrast with Luz in that while he recognized media’s ability to make him feel happier, he ultimately used it as a crutch, a substitute for actual meaningful interaction and connection with other people- Thus creating the monster we see today. There could be the idea of finding role models, people you want to emulate- But also recognizing their flaws, where to criticize them, and not be like them. That could tie into how Eda is a teacher to Luz, but isn’t always right and excels by taking Luz’s feedback into consideration, instead of assuming she always knows better and will never be wrong.

           All in all, this is a fascinating idea Pixel Anon! Even if Belos has no literal connection to the Azura books, I am a big fan of the idea of him being a dark reflection to Luz… A Luz as we see her start out in the series, only to be a Luz who never learns the lessons we see her go through. Belos wanted to be a hero, a main character; But he never went through the actual arc and character development of one, and instead ended up as the static villain, the main antagonist who causes problems for actualheroes. If some characters become what they despise most by trying to avoid that, then perhaps Belos is someone who avoids becoming what he wanted to be, in his attempts to be like that.

          Whether or not media has played a role in Belos’ life has yet to be seen, but there is the idea of him having lived out a traditional ‘fantasy’ without realizing it as such, because to him this IS his reality- So it’s ironic then that Belos deludes himself while Luz doesn’t. Maybe it’s because of this, because Luz has that self-awareness to consider the divide between her fantasies and what reality actually is; Because she has an actual frame of reference for what fantasy and fiction is. Suddenly I’m reminded of that joke in Lost in Language, when Gary sees “Fiction-Fiction” because the Non part, the reminder of reality, was erased; And he has an existential crisis, wondering if any of his life was real…

          Imagine this being foreshadowing to BELOS, of all people, having an epiphany- Realizing that so much of his ‘reality’ was just his own fiction, that he questions what things were real and what things never were. Belos realizing he forgot to consider reality, and now he’s questioning everything he knows, if his arcane knowledge is all for naught if he can’t even distinguish facts from fantasy… etc. What is real and objective- What if all of his ‘Non-Fiction’ was simply just Fiction, and Luz the troublemaker must reveal this to Belos? I’m just imagining Luz very awkwardly cringing and navigating around Belos’ breakdown, but also sort of relating to his dilemma and helping him recover; At least for the sake of everyone else, because a reformed Belos makes life easier than a dead one.

          Plus, Luz is very compassionate in that sort of way… And while Belos’ radiance has blinded him for so long; Now, it’s Luz’s less harsh Light, which helps open his eyes and allow Belos to properly see the world around him. Eyes DO seem to be a major motif in the Boiling Isles, and with Belos, whose eyes need to be fixed by some palisman bile… If Belos’ light has blinded all, himself the first victim; Then Luz’s more Night-time, Star-oriented Light can bring a sunset to Belos’ shining era, for now the sun sets on his empire after all these years. And with the lights dimmed, Belos can appreciate the darkness around him as a contrast, and truly recognize things for what they are… And Luz can metaphorically open his eyes and mind.

          If Luz illuminates others to the truth of their situation and what they’re doing- Then maybe her final obstacle can be Belos… Alongside her mother Camila, when Luz reunites with her and reveals just how much happier she’s been in the Boiling Isles, instead of the Reality Camp that was actually going to hurt her. THAT would be an unusual parallel, Belos and Camila, as two significant adults in Luz’s life… Potentially ones who taught Luz everything she knew prior to Eda, with Camila providing social interactions to the girl, while Belos provides lessons through his Azura fiction and media. If Azura and Camila were all Luz knew and learned from, it’d be interesting for her to teach THEM something herself- Again, a continuation of that theme of the teacher having a lot to learn from the student, and not being so infallible and all-knowing themselves. Even a teacher like Eda can still enjoy the wide-eyed opportunity and curiosity to learn as a student, once more…

[eighthxjune]

aixa writes black people + love #2 community: A “World” Still Necessary

It was 1987 when A Different World premiered.  I was young, like not yet double digits, young.  Every Thursday night, at 8:30, my mom, dad, sister, brother and I gathered around the TV, belting out the show’s theme song by Phoebe Snow in season one, Aretha Franklin in seasons two through five, and Boyz II Men in its final episodes.  Those lyrics were soon my alma mater:

I know my parents loved me Stand behind me come what may I know now that I’m ready For I finally heard them say

It’s a different woorrrrrld than where ya come from

Hillman College was a pinnacle place for me.  It personified cultural identity, and as someone who grew up in a predominantly white suburban town, the only Black pupil until high school, it was majestic and I wanted to be there.  Hillman displayed the cool factor our culture exudes so effortlessly; highlighting our style, dialect, posture, passion, and purpose from every region of the country, the continent of Africa and the Caribbean.  This “world”, was different than where I came from, and it was beautiful.  It gave me hope that a place - outside of my own home - supportive, caring and nurturing existed.

I saw Black teachers champion students who didn’t see their own unique potential, and dorm directors give sage advice. Witnessed roommates with nothing in common become best friends, and confidants.  I got hyped, and danced when adamant voices rallied together until a donor ceased support of South Africa’s apartheid.  And understood what loyalty looked like when a friend rescued his homegirl from what nearly turned into a date rape.  I cheered on two Black men fighting the weapon of racial injustice brought upon by a rival school, and marveled in a student reclaiming the image of Aunt Jemima, realizing her imperial complexion was to be treasured.  I observed discoveries, rejections, failed attempts, triumphs and losses, and empathized as if they were my own, because honestly they were.  Hillman was a community, a Black community, our community, an extension of who I was, who I am.  At such a young age, it was introducing me to myself.  This “different world” was a reflection of my desires and dreams.  It was an aspirational exhibit of Black successes - a rarity shown in media. Hillman was a place that encouraged you to stretch your capacity of thought and understanding.  It valued unlearning stifled ways of thinking, to learning expansively and with zeal.

Debbie Allen, an HBCU alum of Howard University, and the show's brilliant producer, as of season two, understood the importance of telling Black stories with all of their complexities.  She used television as a tool to address what was most difficult and challenging about us.  “If we’re not doing that, we’re not doing a good job.”  She expressed to Netflix’s Strong Black Legends.  When brought on board she excitedly wrote a storyline for character Denise Huxtable (Lisa Bonet), who, at the time, was pregnant in real life.  She thought it would be great to present the experience of a young Black student from an upper middle class family, not married, about to embark on motherhood.  Though the idea got nixed by the show’s creator, Bill Cosby - who didn’t approve of Denise being pregnant in college - I wonder what her story would have developed into as a student mother, a credible notion, and one I’m certain would have advanced her role.  

See, at Hillman, students strived to be the best versions of themselves, and looked forward to reciprocating care to those who raised them.  But, even more vital, they knew their obligation to boost those who were succeeding them. They cherished their Blackness and its power.

The hub of the campus was The Pit - the school’s eatery that made an appearance in practically every episode.  It was where students solely exhaled after a day of grueling classes and friends merged to catch up on the latest of tales.  Conversations flowed candidly at this hangout and with comedic flair.  Everyone passed through the beloved grumpy owner, Mr Gaines’ (Lou Myers) spot.  Even my forever heartthrob, Tupac, made a stunning guest appearance as Piccolo, an old flame from Baltimore coming to put claims on his childhood love, Lena James (Jada Pinkett Smith).

Relationships played a significant part in character maturation at Hillman, and the love story that tugged at my heartstrings was Whitley and Dewayne, performed by Jasmine Guy and Kadeem Hardison.  Cleverly laced throughout the show’s entire series, we journeyed with a high maintenance southern debutante from Richmond, VA and a Brooklyn native in J’s and flip-up glasses, who got a perfect score on his math SATs.  Allen took us on an exciting ride while these two people - growing individually - were also hesitantly falling in love with each other.  It was the ingenious love story I needed, and subconsciously yearned for, even if I were only in the fifth grade.  How could I not gush over this attainable fairytale that spoke my love language. I kept twinkling at the idea that, ‘In just a few years, this college life will be a reality for me.’  

Although Hillman College was a fictional place, its impact tripled enrollment of Historically Black Colleges and Universities.  As you may have gathered by now, A Different World ignited my love for HBCUs, and then began my search in finding one most suitable for me; a place that served as a home and fostered my voice, since it was currently muffled, allowing others - who didn’t look like me - to feel comfortable in the presence of my Black skin.  By the time I got to high school I attended the Black College Tour, twice.  Not because I was having trouble finding a good school, but really I was in awe of the noteworthy offerings provided at these historically Black schools.  The curriculums were impressive, the faculty resembled me, and the alumni were groundbreakers.  I was visiting institutions that are irreplaceable.  There was so much to learn about myself, and it was to happen in this next phase.  During my visits, I watched students purposefully carry themselves across campus, greet friends with hugs and daps, expressively admire each other’s gear and hairstyles, pause on building steps to continue debatable class discussions, only to be interrupted by an eye-catching smile.  The exploration alone made my heart flutter, and shortly after I was back at home flexing in my new Black college apparel - showing off the schools I toured.  By senior year of high school I decided to attend Howard University in Washington, D.C. and it was more than I imagined it to be; finding me in a way I didn’t think it could.  It met me where I was and readied me to rule the world.

There have always been skeptics who find HBCUs to be limiting.  But, honestly there isn’t a place that will “teach you how to love and know yourself” like one - a necessary move after centuries of oppression; especially as a Black woman who receives bare minimum support when it comes to this country’s level of respect. These institutions encourage you to go inward and prepare yourself for life ahead, beyond Black communities.  On the backs of scarred ancestors, almost 200 years ago, HBCUs were created, reshaping American history.  Literally built by their hands, these Black forebears constructed a place to acquire a well desired education, and for once, as a majority, marked a setting where Black issues could be discussed. Despite what history instilled upon us, Black people were thriving and these HBCUs had a strong hand in making sure of that.

Howard University is a big part of my DNA, a connection made due to A Different World.  It’s not easy expressing to those who have never attended an HBCU how magical those four years were, and how much rich history is seeped in the campus soil.  However, the show is the best demonstration; restoring a feeling that will always remain in my heart, reminding me of friendships built that reside at my core.  I graduated from Howard years ago, started a career in New York and since moved to Los Angeles to begin a new chapter.  But every autumn, when I can, I race back to celebrate Howard’s homecoming, in high hopes of reliving just a taste of some of the greatest years of my life.  It's never quite the same, but I don’t expect it ever will be.

A Different World came to an “end of the road” in 1993, and now I stream its episodes to emotionally reconnect with a missed experience; watching amusingly as if I hadn’t seen each one several times already.  Because I still yearn to explore a “world” that inspires me to reach for more of myself, and a Black love story that provides hope.  And though this “world” may be different, I know, I’m not alone.

Take care of yourself.

[theliterateape]

The Orwellian DoubleSpeak of Anti-

by Don Hall

Everybody's talking at me I don't hear a word they're saying Only the echoes of my mind People stopping, staring I can't see their faces Only the shadows of their eyes — Harry Nilsson

Upon the road to Damascus I encountered a Christian.

He smiled. "Have you accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior, friend?"

I smiled back. "No. I was in to all that when I was younger but have found that the societal constructs that surround that belief system don't make much sense to me."

He stopped smiling. "So you are anti-Christ?"

"No. Not anti-Christ. Just not pro-Christ, I guess."

He launched into an increasingly angry monologue. Highlights of this polemic were a few simple concepts. If I wasn't pro-Christianity then I was, by his definition, against it. By refusing to see and capitulate to his faith, I was his enemy. By not joining him in his beliefs, I was actively denying them.

I decided to walk on, his taunts and rage following me for a half mile before he got tired of yelling.

✶

Upon the road to Starbucks along Clark Street in Chicago I encountered a Cubs fan.

He smiled. "How about them Cubbies, huh?"

"I smiled back. "I don't really follow sports. Not my thing."

"So you hate the Cubs? Why do you hate the Cubs? Are you one of those fair-weather fans or what? Motherfucker!" He spit on me as he stormed off.

✶

Upon the road to Circa on Fremont Street in Las Vegas I encountered a transgender woman.

She smiled. I smiled and continued walking.

"What? Are you fucking transphobic or what? What's your fucking problem?

I turned. "I don't know what you're getting pissed about. All I did was smile."

"But I could tell. You're transphobic, right?"

"No. Not transphobic."

"You didn't even ask for my pronouns!"

"Oh. I don't really care what your pronouns are because I don't know you. It seems you assume I'll be talking about you to someone. Otherwise, your pronouns are irrelevant to me."

"TRANSPHOBE!" she screamed and pointed. She collapsed on the cement walkway. "I can't take the micro aggressions!"

✶

The further into the tribal mindset we submerge ourselves into in America, the less likely we are able to communicate effectively.

I recall, years ago, as I was directing the very popular series of DADA Soirées in Chicago, realizing that the nonsense poetry and onstage chaos required a certain set of rules the DADAists needed to grasp onto lest the shows become a bunch of poorly improvised faux-German moments.

Each DADAist performed nonsense poems but I directed them to have each poem mean something that they are trying to communicate to the audience but the audience doesn't understand the language and thus cannot receive the meaning. It made the characters of the DADAists frustrated and angry and made the show increasingly confrontational.

We're now entering the DADAist stage of American dysfunction as we are all desperately trying to communicate ideas to others who simply aren't using the same language. It sounds the same but meanings are changing and it fuels more frustration and anger and results in an almost non-stop confrontation.

✶

Ricky Gervais, on a radio talkshow, makes a point that racism is horrible but, in his opinion, it is the intent that makes it racist rather than the reception. "That's why," he added,"wearing blackface is racist but wearing a mud mask is not."

The caller rejects this and claims that Gervais is practicing white supremacy. He continues to tell Gervais that racism and white supremacy are the same thing which Ricky disputes. They talk over each other until one of the hosts get frustrated and dismisses the caller as being completely full of shit.

✶

As used in 1984, doublethink is the ability to hold two completely contradictory thoughts simultaneously while believing both of them to be true. In Orwell's book, doublethink was critical to the success of the Party as it supported the state-imposed practice of language control, or newspeak.

Our new version of doublethink proliferates itself as different tribes redefine ideas and intentionally confuse communication.

How bizarre that when cops kill people, we blame cops but when 108 people are shot in Chicago over the July 4th weekend, we blame the guns. Which is it? The doublethink holds that both are true with no explanation. It's either guns or the people or perhaps a far more complicated cocktail of reasons that include cops, criminals, poverty, and the proliferation of guns but, fuck, isn't that too many problems to solve so let's simplify it down to cops and guns are bad, criminals have excuses, and what the fuck does this all mean?

How malfunctioning is it that for half the U.S. population cancel culture means holding the powerful accountable but for the other half it means online bullying to punish people for stupid things they did or said 20 years ago. For every Weinstein there is a Franken, for every Louis C.K. there is a James Gunn.

"Equality" is now "equity" but only for 50% of the country. For a tiny but increasingly vocal bunch the term "mother" has been replaced with "birthing person". "Riots" are "protests" or "rebellions" unless you are on the other side of the issue. Blacks who marched on the Capitol with the predominantly white mob are now considered to be suffering from "multicultural whiteness."

Even Orwell would've had a hard time imagining this bullshit.

✶

We are not speaking the same language between tribes these days. There has to be common understanding of usable terms and insisting upon preferred definitions only makes it more difficult to communicate. No communication, no unity of purpose. No unity of purpose, no society.

For me, given my completely unexceptional position in society, I will go with the definitions I prefer and do my best to be respectful of the lunacy of others.

No matter what you call elbow pasta with cheese sauce, it's still Mac n Cheese. And bullshit is bullshit even if you want to have it identify as stroganoff.

[positively--speculative]

“I’m Not Like Other Blacks!”

So, a week or two ago, I watched this video about the “Cool Girl” trope:

And I’ve been thinking about it for a while and I realize that while this is true for how a certain *type* of woman is idealized by men in and outside of film studios (regardless of how unrealistic she is), I think there’s also an idealized version of Black people that white and non-Black people create and some Black people, unfortunately, end up emmulating.

We all know about the cringey “Not Like Other Girls” mindset, but I don’t think everyone knows about the “Not Like Other Blacks” mindset.

The two have very much in common. Much like how “The Cool Girl” aligns with the interests and beliefs of men, “The Cool Black Friend” aligns with the interests of white supremacy. “The Cool Black Friend” is easy-going and never gets angry--even when their white and non-Black friends are being racist.

The video points out that many young women end up emmulating “The Cool Girl” because it’s what they see in these movies, which unfortunately, are made mostly by men. I think the same can be said for Black men and women who emmulate “The Cool Black Friend,” but while good Black representation in the media leaves a lot to be desired, I think “The Cool Black Friend” can be born as a way to survive in non-Black spaces. “The Cool Black Friend” can also be a result of some Black people who wish to benefit from the privilege their white friends and peers have with hopes that the general public will regard them as a “step above” the rest of the Black population (this is often seen in those like Ben Carson and Clarence Thomas who are known for throwing other Black people under the bus while rubbing elbows with the people who actively hurt Black communities).

You will often see and hear “The Cool Black Friend” rejecting things such as music, movies, television shows, etc. made by Black people, and in fandom, you will see them reject the characters who most resemble them. This is not to say that all Black people have to like everything made by other Black people and shouldn’t consume things made by non-Black artists or like every single Black character. In fact, you will find that most Black people like a mix of different things and don’t limit themselves to things made by Black artists. However, for “The Cool Black Friend,” it’s a performance to reject things made by people who look like them, and they often make it a point to be as critically negative about these things as possible so that their white and non-Black friends can see and hear. They’re the ones who will jump in an argument and say first and foremost, “Well, I’m Black and I don’t like [insert whatever thing associated with Black culture].”

Now, while it may seem “The Cool Black Friend” is doing well among their predominantly non-Black social circle, being such does nothing for themselves or other Black people. Remember: Much like “The Cool Girl,” “The Black Friend” is not supposed to get angry, which means if one of their friends, peers, coworkers is being racist, “The Cool Black Friend” can do nothing but smile as they are praised for “being able to take a joke!”

For some, it’s a phase that ends as they begin to expand their horizons and learn about the different people in their communities and in the world. But for others, especially those who managed to gain a little bit of power through their actions, it is never ending. They will become the epitome of “The Cool Black Friend” and the “upstanding example” people will point to when it comes to their expectations of what Black people should be.

In regards to the gender aspect of this discussion, I think it’s also important to notice that the video doesn’t include examples of “Cool Black Girls,” and I think it’s because many Black women don’t have the same experiences of white women in what men expect from us...but I think that’s a discussion for another time...

[dippedanddripped]

For more than a year, Los Angeles-based streetwear designer Tremaine Emory had been working with Converse on a red, green and black sneaker inspired by Jamaican political activist and Black nationalist Marcus Garvey’s Pan-African flag and artist David Hammons’ 1990 work “African-American Flag,” an original of which was acquired by the Broad museum in Los Angeles last year.

Emory’s brand, Denim Tears, tells the story of Black people in the United States starting in 1619, when the first documented enslaved Africans arrived in Virginia; according to the designer, the brand’s logo, a cotton plant, is a direct reference to slavery. That’s why the proposed packaging for his Converse sneaker collaboration depicts a coffin covered with Hammons’ flag and a cotton wreath, as a tribute to Black Americans who have died under unjust conditions. The image is based on an art installation, “A Proper Burial, Thanks America,” that Emory debuted in London last year.

However, in late May, as protests spread across the country after George Floyd’s death in police custody, Emory announced on Instagram that he and Denim Tears couldn’t go forward with the partnership until Converse’s parent company, Nike, went beyond its plan to donate $40 million over four years to support the Black community. (Michael Jordan, through his Nike subsidiary Jordan Brand, is donating an additional $100 million over 10 years.)

Emory called the move by Beaverton, Ore.,-based Nike, which reported $37.4 billion in revenue last fiscal year, a very expensive Band-Aid. He said he wanted to use his voice to push Nike to look inward at its own record on diversity and inclusion.

“It’s accountability,” Emory said in a phone interview. “It’s about Fortune 500 companies and how they are run under the guise of white supremacy and patriarchy and how I take accountability, that I need to see the steps — and brands that I work with dispensing that — or guys won’t work with me.”

In recent months, nearly all major industries, including entertainment, journalism and sports, have been forced to confront how closely their statements opposing systemic racism align with their treatment of Black and brown employees. The fashion industry, which has frequently been criticized for cultural appropriation, instances of blackface and a lack of diversity, is no different.

According to a count by trade publication Women’s Wear Daily, Black people make up only 4% — 19 out of 477 members — of the invitation-only Council of Fashion Designers of America, whose new chairman is Tom Ford. In an email to The Times, a CFDA spokesman said, “The CFDA does not record nor require members to state their race upon application, but it is estimated that members of color make up approximately 25% of the total membership.”

June 8, 2020

In anecdotal comments, Black streetwear designers from L.A. to New York told The Times that their subset of the fashion industry is no different.

“You can’t ignore the fact that there aren’t many Black brand owners in the streetwear space,” said Scott Sasso, who founded 10.Deep in 1995 while he was a student at Vassar. “And [at] some of the biggest companies, I don’t know if they’ve even had Black employees.”

Streetwear brands such as Denim Tears and 10.Deep offer casual clothing, primarily for men, that blend the styles of various subcultures, including hip-hop (as popularized in the 1990s by brands such as FUBU, Walker Wear and Phat Farm) as well as surf and skate motifs. It’s an identity that can be found in the clothing from brands such as Supreme and Stüssy. Instead of offering widely available, mass-produced products, streetwear brands tend to offer limited-edition drops for consumers who hear about companies through social media or by word of mouth.

Although Black style — from hip-hop to sneaker culture — has played a major role in shaping the fashion industry while bringing new designers and brands to prominence, Black fashion professionals and streetwear brand owners said in interviews with The Times that the clothing industry has failed to elevate and promote Black creatives in a way that reflects that influence.

Several designers also questioned the sincerity of corporations promising to invest in Black communities. They reflected on their own experiences trying to explain Black art to predominantly white company leaders.

Chicago-based designer Joe Freshgoods started selling T-shirts in high school and has been selling his designs out of Fat Tiger Workshop, the streetwear retail hub he co-owns, since 2013.

“I feel like a lot of these brands are in these boardrooms having these talks about how to fix this or how to just clean up their mistakes real fast, and it’s just like, ‘Hey, let’s just fill in the blanks real quick and see if this will make them happy,’” Freshgoods said.

He said he tried to include the logo of the Black Panther Party on a design for an Oakland-themed collaboration with an apparel brand last year. The company’s legal department rejected his proposal. At the time he went along with it, but now he’d push back, he said.

“A lot of Black collaborators are the reason why a lot of brands are super successful right now, so that’s a lot of power to have,” Freshgoods said.

Emory, who has partnered with New Balance and Levi’s, called on Nike to stop supporting Republicans while President Trump is the party’s leader. He also wants the company to release more information on its record of hiring Black employees and assist in “the defunding and total reform of all the police departments across America.”

Since his initial Instagram post in June, Emory has spoken to Converse Chief Executive G. Scott Uzzell or Uzzell’s team about a half dozen times over the phone or in video-conference meetings. In those discussions, Emory said the company acknowledged it hasn’t done everything it could in terms of creating a diverse corporate structure and laid out its hiring plan, especially in its executive suite. The designer said he discussed current initiatives at Nike to invest in Black communities and to address systemic racism and police brutality. “They want to get involved in all that, and we will see,” he said.

The release date for his red, black and green Converse sneaker has been moved up from February to October, ahead of the November election. Emory said the marketing for the shoe will focus on promoting voting. The shoe will be available in North America, Europe and online for $95 to $100.

“We respect and encourage the efforts of any collaborator or athlete we work with to raise their voice against racial injustice,” a Converse spokesperson said in a statement to The Times. “We have spoken with Tremaine and look forward to working through these issues together.”

At its core, streetwear is about authenticity and the personal connection between consumers and the designers and labels they love.

The push by larger brands and corporations — specifically in the fashion industry — to meet the current moment with statements, donations and new initiatives is in direct contrast to what many Black streetwear designers have been doing since the inception of their brands. Those designers have been hiring diverse staff, speaking up about political issues and infusing their works with references to Black culture.

“Now I feel like everybody’s rushing to make some type of relevant shirt or make some relevant message on their Instagram,” said Zac Clark, a Black designer who started his brand, FTP, while in high school in Los Angeles. “To me, a lot of this stuff right now seems very unnatural and just forced from a lot of these brands, so they won’t get ‘canceled.’”

Olivia Anthony, the designer behind the Livstreetwear brand, said the turning point for her New York-based company was her 2017 My Love Letter to Our Culture collection, which paid tribute to Black trends of the ’90s — think long nails, grills and slicked-down baby hairs — that were largely considered unfashionable until they were adopted by other races.

“It was so beautiful, but it was looked down upon,” said Anthony, adding that she wanted her brand to reflect how those Black trends, now featured in magazines including Vogue, have been “shown in a different light.”

Kacey Lynch said he created his South L.A.-based streetwear company, Bricks & Wood, after years of working at streetwear brands where he felt Black representation was missing.

“They wanted a lot from us, but they didn’t want to do the work, what it took to understand us,” Lynch said of his past employers. “Whether that’s Black culture, South-Central, minorities … wherever the cool came from, they all wanted it but they didn’t really know how to identify with it.”

In May 2019, fashion website Hypebeast and Strategy&, a consulting firm in the PwC network, released its Streetwear Impact Report, based on interviews with more than 40,000 Hypebeast readers and 700 global industry insiders. The survey found that 70% of respondents said they care about social issues, 59% said brand activism is important and 47% said they would stop shopping from a brand because of inappropriate behavior.

“It’s fine as a starting point for corporations to say, ‘This is what we stand for and this is what we believe,’” said Elena Romero, a fashion journalist and author of 2012’s “Free Stylin’: How Hip Hop Changed the Fashion Industry.”“But that’s not going to be enough.”

Romero, an assistant professor at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology, said companies likely will face questions over where they invest their profits, the diversity of their staff and how they’ve helped build the communities from which their dollars are coming. She said many companies will realize they’ve fallen short because the answers to those questions weren’t a priority until their profits were at risk.

“Now the consumer is saying, ‘You can’t fool us anymore,’” she said. “If you’re not authentic and truly supporting the very same things that these young people believe, your business will suffer.”

The result has been an industrywide push to make those investments now but also to make amends for past inaction. After Black Adidas employees criticized the company’s response to racism, Adidas announced June 9 that it would add more diverse staff, start a scholarship program for Black employees and invest an additional $20 million over four years in programs that serve the Black community. A day later, Adidas upped its $20 million pledge to $120 million. (In addition to those changes at Adidas, the company’s global head of human resources, Karen Parkin, resigned at the end of June after facing criticism for her handling of racial discrimination.)

Adidas also apologized for its past silence. “For most of you, this message is too little, too late,” a tweet from the Adidas account read. “We’ve celebrated athletes and artists in the Black community and used their image to define ourselves culturally as a brand but missed the message in reflecting such little representation within our walls.”

In the broader fashion community, various organizations and members of the industry have offered different strategies for creating a more inclusive environment. Aurora James, a New York-based creative director, started the Fifteen Percent Pledge, which calls on companies to provide at least 15% of their shelf space or contracts to Black-owned businesses.

After the CFDA announced its plan to promote diversity, a group called the Kelly Initiative called for the CFDA to adopt its proposal to conduct and publish a census of diversity in the industry, audit its recruitment practices and release an annual list of top Black talent, the Kelly List. The initiative is named after the late Patrick Kelly, a Black fashion designer who rose to prominence in the 1980s with work that played with Black cultural symbols and racial stereotypes.

April Walker, whose New York brand Walker Wear was worn by ’90s hip-hop stars including Method Man, Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G., stressed that Black designers need to look outside the fashion industry for success by collaborating, mentoring and sharing resources with their counterparts.

“We just need to not look for the fashion industry, as it’s been very oppressive for the last 30 years, to be the end-all, be-all for our opportunities,” she said, “but to create our own.”

Among streetwear companies, the effort to fight systemic racism in the country and the fashion industry has been on an individual basis, with brand owners of all races deciding how much they’re willing to give back and how comfortable they are using their platforms to discuss and condemn racism.

For some, that means speaking up in solidarity with the Black community. Bobby Kim, cofounder of the Hundreds, a Vernon-based clothing brand, teamed with Pharrell Williams’ brand Billionaire Boys Club to raise money for Black Lives Matter and the Black Mental Health Alliance with a shirt that was available for 48 hours. After the Fairfax shopping district where his shop is located was vandalized in late May, Kim, who’s Korean American, defended the right to protest.

In an interview, Kim said, “If you have been given a lot of money, and especially if that money has come by way of participating, contributing, or even stealing or borrowing from Black culture, then you — more than anybody else right now — need to tithe, need to pay up, in a sense, in order to reflect how influential Black culture has been in your career and your profitability as a company.”

Sasso’s 10.Deep stopped selling its regular collection for most of June and instead offered a new line of 10.Deep products to draw attention to activism against racial injustice and police brutality. The profits went to national bail funds for protesters.

“Streetwear, in its truest form, is about shooting yourself in the foot as often as possible but also just doing what you think is right,” Sasso said.

He said he was drawn to streetwear because it was a multiethnic community of different countercultures, a blend of the skate, surf, hip-hop and graffiti scenes, with a dash of punk rock, united by an exclusive knowledge of where to find and buy certain brands.

However, he has noticed a shift among streetwear consumers. For some shoppers, it’s not about the community. It’s just about the clothes.

He said he lost “several thousand” social media followers after he posted about Black Lives Matter and has received comments asking him to just stick to fashion.

“My thought is: If you want just some regular clothes, go buy Banana Republic, go buy Levi’s,” he said. “Those are companies that aren’t gonna take political stances. They’re providing basic stuff. This space is about a culture. If you want to participate in it, this is what it’s about.”

[massagemayfair]

How Tantra Healed My Soul

My Name is Devi Ward and this is the totally absurd story of how practicing Tantric Sex healed my soul.

I was born in 1974, the result of an inter-racial marriage. My father is of African, European, & Native American ancestry (otherwise known as black). My mother is half Polish & half Czechoslovakian, blond, blue-eyed, aka white.

My parents were married in Detroit, Michigan in 1969, just 2 YEARS after inter-racial marriage was no longer considered a felony offense in many American states.

I grew up in Maryland, New Jersey, and Michigan. My parents divorced when I was 6, and I lived with mom in predominantly white, working-class neighborhoods, while she struggled to make ends meet as a single parent.

I am what is called a "hi-yella", my skin tone is very light, pale, even ivory colored at times. I burn easily, need sunscreen, and have sun-damage as a result of my negligence in this area. My hair on the other hand is nappy, very curly, unruly, and a white woman's nightmare!

Growing up, the images of feminine beauty that I aspired to all had long, flowing, straight, (usually) blond hair. All of my female friends were white, and boys liked them. Even in 3rd grade, they were considered "pretty", while I with the freakishly pale skin, nasty hair, and freckles was more than just an ugly duckling, I was a racial absurdity, and there was no one like me around for miles.

I was conditioned at a very young age to believe that white women were superior to me, and that white men were just plain superior. My life experiences confirmed this belief on a regular basis, and the images of beauty that I was and still am exposed to, continue to re-affirm this culturally conditioned belief.

And then, something extraordinary and completely unimagined occurred. I started practicing Tantra. Sex that is. I started practicing Tantric Sex. I started practicing CONSCIOUS SEX, meaning, I stopped chasing the romantic dream that had been spoon-fed to me through mainstream media as my "fulfillment", and I chose to explore sexuality as a path of self-realization, self-awareness, and self-empowerment.find more info  london tantric

I began to experience levels of pleasure that were indescribable. I literally lost my mind, and entered altered states of consciousness, that were generated by physical-sexual-bliss.

I began unlocking emotional traumas that had crystalized in my body, and had severely inhibited my sense of self- confidence and self-worth as a woman.

Seemingly minor traumas such as; being described as repulsively ugly by these pretty white boys that society treated as young gods.

Doors that had previously been locked flew open, as a result of awakening to sensations of sexual bliss that are beyond description. Beyond the rational workings of my conscious mind, into the as yet untapped depth of my subconscious, that which was hidden before rose to the surface, as a result of engaging the shadow of my sexuality...consciously.

I began to heal from wounds that I did not even know I had. I began to reclaim sexual awareness... and awareness is POWER! I wish that I could convey in words the depth and profundity of personal healing that has occurred simply as a result of practicing Tantric Sex.

It seems ridiculous, it seems absurd that SEX, SEX, conscious SEX could lead to the complete healing of wounds that were so deep and so painful, that I was unable to see them directly, and the scope of their effect upon my life and my choices.

What I discovered through Tantra, of all the weird and bizarre things, is that racism is a cultural condition. It is a program that is introduced to us as a society on an almost imperceptible level, and maintained, reinforced again & again by mainstream media, and our cultural orientation as a whole.

Unless you are on the receiving end of the equation, you will never understand the effect of it. Never. Just as those who have experienced the emotionally crippling effects of living in a culture indoctrinated with racism, will never understand what it is like to live without it's shadow.

As a result of unraveling my social and cultural conditioning in relationship to sexual acceptance and normalcy, I began to unravel a much deeper level of subtle programing relating to race and social acceptance. As I became sexually free and empowered, sexually satisfied and celebrated, a much deeper level of suffering became apparent, and the ways in which I had been sensually repressed as a woman became glaringly obvious. The ways in which that occurred because of my race became even more so.

The divinely beautiful irony is that, the catalyst for all of this epic growth was the result of being brutally rejected by one of those superior white men, that I oh so adored, but could never quite convince of my worth.

I was in fact "dismissed", to make way for "the great white goddess", a woman I would always and forever fall short, according to my racial programming.

Day after day I was confronted head on with the internal belief of my inherent inferiority.

For I am not white, blond, wealthy, beautiful, and socially well adjusted. I am light skinned, nappy haired, beautiful yes, but socially mal-adjusted, and definitely NOT normal! I live on the "fringes" of society and have yet to experience social acceptance at the level of mainstream white society.

Nor do I ever aspire to at this point. I have earned my freedom from the mainstream mind, and I intend to keep it.

I am now married to a white man, who through his love and emotional acceptance, has become my best friend, and my healer on many levels. We consider ourselves "poly-amorous", we have the ability to love many, not just the romantic dream of one.

This for me is another example of healing and empowerment, for instead of hoarding and owning his love out of fear of scarcity or lack, as my partners friend, I truly desire his love and happiness, as well as my own.

We accept that though we may fill many needs for each other, we don't fill all of them, and we celebrate and uphold our individual freedom to meet needs for connection, expression and joy with others and in other ways.

I continue to find it absurd that the deepest most profound healing of my life resulted from the simple practices of sexual communication, eye-contact, genital massage, and semen retention. It's stupid that something as obvious as SEX, could be a gateway to such internal emancipation.

[texanredrose]

Since it was the first of your stories I found, I would love to see the director's commentary on "Omega's Strength" if you're willing.

Yo, Omega’s Strength is definitely a passion project (that’s nearing completion!) that I love with all my heart. I’m almost to the scene that sparked the whole story and I genuinely can’t wait, the anticipation is killing me!

Aside from being extremely self indulgent, Omega’s Strength is the first time I’ve actively re-written the rules of something established. Sure, I love my AUs, but when it’s an AU of my own design, I can make my own rules. Omegaverse AUs, on the other hand, are almost defined by the fact they all use the same rules. Most of which, I hate, because they’re stupid. So, I decided to make my own AU of an AU to incorporate elements I actually wanted to see- using heat and scent marking and such in a positive, conscious way rather than... well... the borderline-not-consent way most stories use them.

This is arguably one of the stories I put Yang through the most shit. It focuses heavily on Yang’s poor state of mind and self image following the amputation of her arm and really dwells on it, for the purpose of showing how to overcome it. That’s the main thing about Omega’s Strength that I don’t think gets mentioned enough; yeah, I put Yang through shit, and her bad headspace allows her to make some bad decisions, and she hurts herself almost as much as the events she goes through hurt her. However, through the course of the story, she gets stronger. She picks herself up, puts herself back together- and that’s a big thing for me. It’s not someone else fixing her. It’s not someone else making everything okay. It’s Yang reaching her lowest, realizing it, and saying ‘fuck this’, and then clawing her way out. She has her friends and family for support, sure. She can lean on them when she needs to, even when she’s being too stubborn to ask for help. But, she’s the one being proactive and taking the steps she needs to heal. Confronting herself, her situation, her reality. Gritting her teeth and doing the work to get back to a better state of mind. Rediscovering her confidence.

There’s a companion piece to Omega’s Strength that I’m working on as well, told from Winter’s POV, which is something I generally don’t do for my fics. Offhand, I’ve only done this one other time with Monochrome, and fairly recently; once I’ve told a story from one perspective, I typically don’t revisit the same events. For this one, though, I feel like I have to, because Omega’s Strength, for all the angst, only tells a small fraction of the story. It’s taking a world spanning trek to save the people of Remnant and giving the reader only one set of eyes to see it through. It’s limiting- which works, in some respects, to amplify the drama, because all the events are only examined in how they affect Yang- but it leaves a lot unsaid. We see how Yang interprets Winter’s actions and intentions, but not how Winter intended them to be taken, so I look forward to finishing the story, and then releasing Winter’s side of things. I’ve often said that, for all that Yang suffers through the story, Winter suffers just as much, it’s just not shown. While the saying goes “show, don’t tell” sometimes not showing everything and not telling everything ends up painting a much more interesting picture in the long run. Stories like Omega’s Strength are more akin to puzzles, each piece of which an agonizing journey to find and fit together, but when you step back and see the whole picture... it’s something else.

This is also one of the few fics where I incorporate a ton of OCs. Amusingly enough, Terry Cotta (the first of their name) and their team was designed back in V2 as a direct response to someone else claiming there was only one way to make an OC team in RWBY. Long story short, the person claimed that the team ‘motif’ shouldn’t be decided until the end, after character creation. So I said ‘fuck that’, picked two motifs to blend together, and created the characters that way. Terry Cotta, Dal Semper, Aegean Forecastle, Rudy Cirrus, and one as of yet unintroduced character draw their inspiration from the five branches of the American Military (also, fuck, now I have to make a sixth for the dumbass space forces, good grief) and five branches of emergency services. Terry Cotta, of course, represent the Army and Police, that’s where they get their name, and why they’re both Winter’s best friend and her worst enemy, depending on the AU (I might fall into both categories myself but I’m also highly critical of my chosen professions). Dal Semper represents the Marines and Firefighters, which is why she’s characterized as being stubborn, direct, and hotheaded. Aegean Forecastle is the Navy and EMTs/Paramedics, which is why he’s the polar opposite to Dal and often watching her back. Rudy represents the Air Force and Search and Rescue, specifically mountain rescues, which informs his quiet but dependable nature. The last member of the team represent the Coast Guard and Dispatchers and as the Coast Guard is often neglected when talking about the branches of the military while Dispatchers are often forgotten in terms of emergency services, she’s often in the background getting shit done rather than on the front lines with the others. Together, they form Team TARDIs (which I admittedly offered as a cheeky joke to piss off the person mentioned earlier) but formally named the Atlas Rapid Response Team, or ARRT for short, keeping the color themed naming convention intact. Because of what they represent, I’ve always headcanoned that ARRT would be opposing Team RWBY in some way, because they represent organizations that should benefit the public, but can be misused to the public’s detriment, and I always wanted that to be a recurring theme with the characters. It’s why Terry’s such a little shit in almost every incarnation, whether they’re allied with Winter or not. Terry- and the rest of their team- ultimately has the best of intentions but not so great execution, and it entirely depends on who they’re following. When they follow Ironwood, they get used to devastating results, but when they follow Winter/Team RWBY, they’re much more helpful.

On the other hand, there’s Team SNOW. They are as much a result of me being cheeky as me interpreting the color rule to its logical extreme. Stryker, for instance, has a predominantly predominantly black and white color scheme. This isn’t because she’s from Atlas; it’s because she’s a soccer ball. Her name makes me think of soccer (football, for you non-American folks), and that makes me think of the black and white balls used for matches. Nigel? Makes me think of Nigel Thornberry and his ridiculous orange mustache, which is why he’s Inexplicably British(tm). Oswald? Makes me think of that one otter Pokemon, which is predominantly blue. Wisteria? A running joke in some of my other Elderburn fics, a rejected name for Winter and Yang’s kids because Yang wants to follow the ‘W’ naming rule but Winter doesn’t. Ergo, makes me think of white and yellow and blue and purple and all the other colors associated with Winter and Yang. There’s a lot of ways to read ‘evocative of color’, and I took it to its furthest possible conclusion, not just literal translations but more of a word association exercise.

Also, yes, I hate Stryker with a passion. Is it because I used to be a goalie? Possibly.

[ultimate-miles]

Spider-Men II (2017) - Or, the comic book that shouldn’t exist

Spider-Men II is a meandering, unfocused mess of lukewarm ideas with no pay-off, that dabbles in colorism and whitewashing.

Somewhere around the “Venom Wars” and the “Spider-Man no More” arc, there was a sharp decline in the quality of writing for Ultimate Comics Spider-Man. At the crux of it was the death of Miles Morales’ mother – Rio Morales – and the emotional bullying of a kid who wanted nothing to do with superheroing following the death of his mother, but was battered into thinking otherwise by the female clone of Peter Parker (Jessica Drew), Gwen Stacy, and his friend, Ganke Lee. 

If “Venom Wars” was the signal that things were going south in the writing department, the death kneel for Miles Morales’ storyline truly began with the story arc “Spider-Man No More”, which was lead directly into a discombobulated series of story arcs that preluded and finalized the death of the Ultimate Universe.

Since then, Bendis’ take on the character – who had a fairly solid start (from Issues #1-19 of UCSM) – declined in a way that I can only describe as a writer simply losing interest in their pet project and disregarding how he handled the character from thereon out. There was no emotional investment in Miles’ day-to-day life, his family unit, friends, and etc. like there was for Ultimate Peter Parker. Ultimate Spider-Man was, as far as Marvel comic title goes, was fully realized story. But, if we’re being honest, Bendis also didn’t have to do a lot of thinking for Peter’s stories because they were often retreads of plots written fifty-sixty years before his time at Marvel.

With Miles Morales, Bendis, was, to some degree, flying blind and more or less had an open field of possibly and stories to play out. He could’ve created a legit mythology for Miles. Yet, when you boil it down, if Miles wasn’t being thrown into a “Blockbuster Event” meant to boost title sales then he was often standing in the shadow of some version of Peter Parker or Peter Parker’s family members in his own title. Simply put: Miles could not be Spider-Man in the same way Denzel Washington’s The Equalizer couldn’t Jason Bourne the hell out of bad guys without the say so of a white authority. Every time Miles’ story circles back to Peter Parker, the limitations of Bendis’ imagination with his Black Male Superhero was clear.

I don’t think anything encapsulates this more than the unwarranted sequel to Ultimate Marvel’s 2012 miniseries, Spider-Men: Spider-Men II – released in 2017 with about the same amount of issues to its name (five).

Spider-Men saw a then-brand new Spider-Man, a thirteen year old Miles Morales – encounter the 616 Universe version of Peter Parker, who accidentally ends up the 1610 Universe after some convenient circumstances involving the 616 version of Mysterio and a dimension hopping device.

Similar to Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #1-5 and Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #13-14, and Miles Morales: The Ultimate Spider-Man #1-7, Spider-Men #1-5 runs Miles through the third consecutive gambit of getting “The Blessing™” of someone connected to Peter Parker, or Peter Parker himself. Spider-Men is more or less about how an adult Peter Parker deals with the fact someone much younger than himself (when he started doing what he was doing) was playing the role of Spider-Man following the death of teenaged version of himself (1610 Peter Parker), and eventually accepting that. It was a fun crossover that saw Miles work alongside someone he admired, and most importantly, didn’t lose sight of its tone and who the story was about in the end (Miles).

Spider-Men II, unfortunately, does the exact same thing, but now there’s no Brand New Car Smell, the question of how Peter Parker would react to a kiddy Spider-Man has been answered and Miles has been friggin blessed, officially, four friggin times, by Peter Parker and his unit in every way you can think of.

 Whitewashing your Protagonist is a Bad Idea™

The crux of Spider-Men II is to answer the question that Miles Morales asked: “I wonder if there’s a me in your universe?” The original Spider-Men ended with 616 Peter Parker searching – online – for the existence of a Miles Morales in his universe and being “shocked” by the answer. Knowing in advance that the series was only five issues long meant that the answer Bendis would provide – almost five years after the original Spider-Men – would be both underwhelming and rushed with no satisfactory resolution to rest on.

The bread-and-butter of a comic book character is their ability to become relatively different characters or offshoots from the one that was the origin point. Marvel’s brand revolves around allowing writers to reinterpret established characters into someone radically different, or just update them for younger audiences. Sometimes this works for good, other times for bad. Anna Paquin’s Rogue isn’t 616 Rogue, 1610 Rogue isn’t X-Men Evolution’s Rogue, and so on and so forth.

Where the reinterpretation of a character becomes an issue is when it begins to erase a marginalized identity. It would be common sense among anyone with enough sensitively and the ability to look beyond themselves to know: You don’t reinterpret a Black character – like Virgil Hawkins or Ororo Munroe – into a white or non-Black character, you don’t reinterpret an LGBT character – like Renee Montoya or John Constantine – into a Heterosexual character, you don’t reinterpret a female character into a male character. White or male or female characters? Most of the time their fair game – with reservation (Heathers is a perfect example) – there’s usually nothing remarkable or unique about those characters because they’re representative of the norm, the thing people have been socialized to sympathize and empathize with.

Unfortunately, Brian Michael Bendis and Sara Pichelli are white, so they have neither sensitivity nor the ability to look beyond themselves. Spider-Men II confirms that, yes, there is a 616 Miles Morales. But, he’s a criminal who makes friends with Wilson Fisk (the Kingpin), and is so light-skinned there is no resemblance to his Black counterpart. He’s just the ambiguously brown stereotype. To brazenly imply that Miles Morales was, as a lot of folk were saying when the title was being published, “Sammy Sosa’ed”, is to imply that the story was tackling the subject of learned self-hatred, self-harm, and anti-Blackness and that somehow figured into 616 Miles’ narrative. Instead, this just atypical comic book racism played straight.

There’s little reason to even sympathize with 616 Miles Morales, and the point of sympathy is merely watching him cry over a woman named Barbra Rodriguez, a gallery curator, then use his criminal enterprise, namely the hired hand Taskmaster (which counts like a DC Comics reject tbh) facilitate a means for him to travel to another dimension to be with another Barbra – who presumably hasn’t met that universal equivalent of Miles Morales. For lack of a better word, 616 Miles Morales is probably the version of Miles Morales Bendis would’ve executed if he hadn’t killed Peter Parker (lbr). He’s a terrible character and a particularly woeful answer to a question better left hanging in the air.  

There is no “Mary Jane Watson” for Miles Morales

Bendis’ attempts to provide Miles a love life has been – on all accounts – incredibly bad and unsurprisingly limited to white women. Jason Reynolds might be the only writer to tackle Miles Morales to even remotely consider that Miles’ dating pool might be predominantly Black – but, he’s also the only Black writer to tackle the character, so therein lay the problem. 

One of the biggest issues with trying to shack Miles up with a girlfriend is that his character has never been allowed to mature. Where Peter Parker (in the 616 universe, anyhow) was allowed to graduate High School and go to College before he started any serious romantic relationships (Gwen Stacy, Mary Jane) or flirtations (Felicia Hardy) and was, therefore an adult where more adult situations could occur, Miles is a teenage boy who’s mind arguably would change like the four winds about girls, but this is never reflected or explored in his title.

Add to the fact that there were no longstanding female characters in his mythology, no one Bendis planned on introducing was going to work. Then there’s the fact that most readers were probably rooting for Miles and Ganke Lee to hook up as opposed to dropping a female character on him – because they liked their dynamic and most were content to compare their relationship to Peter/Mary Jane anyway. But Marvel was gonna pull the trigger on that in the same way neither Miles or Miguel O’Hara will ever get their big media break in something that isn’t a animated film (Into the Spider-Verse), or television series usurped from them (Spider-Man Unlimited).

Early issues of Ultimate Comics Spider-Man (namely issues #12 and #19) preluded the character who would later become Ultimate Kate Bishop – Katie Bishop. Katie Bishop would play a supporting role as a then fourteen year old Miles’ girlfriend – a year after the death of Rio Morales – from issue #23 of UCSM until the end of Miles Morales: The Ultimate Spider-Man (which was only thirteen issues long). But, the persisting issue with Katie Bishop is that – unlike Mary Jane Watson (in almost any iteration of Peter Parker’s story) – she was never given any proper build-up or development as someone who would be important to Miles’ arc before the romancing starts.

She’s just dropped into the middle of his story, and audience is supposed to accept it. Then, Bendis and co. ultimately decide the only way to make this character interesting is make her the daughter of Neo-Nazi and a Neo-Nazi herself who follows the Ultimate version of Hydra. Instead of building any kind of goodwill with the reader, Bendis poisons the well altogether and sabotages the character and this was way before the bullshit he, Nick Spencer, and other writers would pull that would lead to creation of Nazi Captain America (el-oh-fucking-el).

The second attempt to give Miles a love interest was in the misfire series All-New Ultimates, wherein a fourteen year old Miles began flirting with the idea of messing around with, for all intents and purposes, a grown-ass woman named Diamondback – highlighting one of the major issues with why Miles and Romance subplots never work out. Following Miles’ move to the 616 universe, Bendis and whoever was responsible for the Spider-Gwen title tried to establish an Instant Oatmeal romance between a eighteen year old Gwen Stacy and a now fifteen/sixteen year old Miles Morales that was both misguided (Bendis really tried to justify it with the line “I’ll be seventeen in a month!” fuckin’ creep), gross and flat-out boring.

Bendis, has, summarily struck out two times in his lack of effort to create a version of “Mary Jane Watson” for Miles Morales. One was underdeveloped (Kate), the other was outright creepy and his living out the fantasy of fucking Gwen Stacy. Michel Fife’s (the writer of All-New Ultimates) creepy and halfhearted attempt to give Miles a “Black Cat” equivalent unilaterally failed with the end of the title itself. Spider-Men II, unfortunately, is Bendis’ third and final miss in the pursuit of Miles Morales’ love life and it’s a big part of why – outside of the whitewashing – Spider-Man II fails as a story.

Bendis attempts to posit that – for every universe that has a Miles Morales, there is a woman named Barbra Rodriguez that he will ultimately fall in love with. 616 Miles Morales’ entire narrative motivation – which renders 1610 Miles Morales’ side of the story completely irrelevant and void – in Spider-Man II is to escape to another universe where there is a Barbra Rodriguez, because his version of Barbra Rodriguez has died. But in the same universe (616) there’s a younger 616 Barbra Rodriguez that just shows up for no reason for 1610 Miles to swoon over. It’s so groan inducing.

Like Ultimate Kate Bishop, as an idea, Barbra Rodriguez isn’t a bad one per se. The issue is, like Ultimate Kate Bishop, that Barbra Rodriguez is dropped into the lap of the reader and expected be swallowed wholesale. In a series of panels illustrated by a perpetually bored Sara Pichelli (who’s interpretation of Miles has become, honestly, more and more ape-like than anything resembling the stellar character design she and David Marquez started out with, but only Marquez remained faithful to before his departure from Miles’ story) in something that resembles the image of the conceited little girl from Monster House selling Halloween candy to a neighborhood she doesn’t live in, the reading audience is meant to believe Miles falls in love with Barbra.

Barbra Rodriguez is a painfully unwritten and boring character to the point where I don’t think you can call her a character – just a prop for a half-baked romance subplot that doesn’t involve the version of Miles Morales readers have picked the book up for. As a character, she brings nothing to the table, as a prop she’s not even interesting. Bendis tries to pull the Star Crossed Lovers Xena-level Soulmates position without ever earning it and as a result Barbra is forgettable. Maybe if he actually introduced her in his last outing for Miles instead of creating a walking stereotype of a grandmother, this might’ve worked better. As it is, Barbra Rodriguez is a last minute thought the story itself fails to capitalize on for anything other than manpain.

Miles Morales isn’t Peter Parker, so naturally, he will never have a Mary Jane Watson. Not even on a metaphorical level, or for the sake of comparison. I honestly think that the only character, if it had to be a woman and not Ganke Lee, that would’ve worked, would probably be Bombshell (Lana Baumgartner). She’s the only female character within his age group he’s actually interacted with and established a genuine relationship. 

616 Peter Parker is an Asshole

Peter Parker’s interaction with a then thirteen year old Miles Morales was a fairly fun read. I liked the idea of Peter indirectly promoting himself to temporary mentor because he’s a grown man overly worried about the fact that someone far younger he was superheroing and largely in the memory of even younger version of himself – who he can’t quite deal with being dead (because it’s him). It was cute. The rationale behind Peter’s actions made sense, and it didn’t overstay its welcome.

Peter in Spider-Men II is a jerk for almost no reason. Because the narrative begins in medias res, with Miles and Peter arguing about how they got tied upside down, the reader spends a great deal of their time wondering why the hell Peter is being so antagonistic with Miles – to the point where he bluntly tells Miles that his being Spider-Man was a “mistake”.

Spider-Men II does not really answer this question – but instead spends the bulk of its first two issues being evasive about the issue altogether (because issues #3 and #4 are dedicated to 616 Miles Morales and his relationships with Barbra and Kingpin, with issue #5 “wrapping” things up for 616 Miles). Recapping that Peter Parker searched and presumably found Miles Morales in his universe before the implosion of the UM, Spider-Men II then has Peter pretending to help Miles locate the 616 version of himself, going as far enlisting the help of Jessica Jones – who summarily tells them there are no traces of a Miles Morales equivalent to even be worried about.

Because the reader is either meant to believe or knows that Peter is lying or being dishonest with Miles, a lot of their dynamic is artificial. Whatever Bendis managed to capture with the first crossover event between the two characters has vanished altogether. A lot of the time Peter Parker – who I keep forgetting is basically a diet soda version of Tony Stark, right down to wearing an armored suit with a glowing symbol and owning his own billion dollar franchise (Parker Industries) – comes off as condescending and a spandex wearing asshole. An asshole operates on the belief that he has the right and authority to tell a now fifteen year old Miles Morales when and when he can’t be Spider-Man.

Even weirder, instead of shutting that nonsense down, Miles takes it on the chin is more less like, “aww, gee, I guess you’re right, I’ll go be depressed now” even as Peter offers him a half-hearted apology and Miles can only say “well, you said it”. It’s the equivalent of Cyclops telling Storm she can’t be the leader of the X-Men, but without the holy retribution of Cyclops being smote with lightning. Like, I spend a grand bulk of this series – which doesn’t even legitimately resolve or explore the fraught dynamic between the two – wishing Peter Parker would fall into a hole and die. Peter Parker’s character in this title is downright insufferable. I miss John Romita Jr. and that other guy’s Peter Parker, but I hear he died in the Civil War. 

MISSED OPPORTUNITIES

Behind all the mess that is the core of Spider-Men II, there was a fairly interesting idea to explore. Bendis really could’ve focused on how the two Miles Morales dealt with existing in the same space. He could’ve dealt with how Miles was coping with having his mother back, and living in a universe that was not his own – and how the death of the Ultimate Marvel universe affected him.

If he had established Barbra Rodriguez before this miniseries, he could’ve actually dedicated the time barely spent on her to simply furthering the relationship that should’ve started way before this story.

As it stands? 1610 Miles Morales and his exploits are more or less an afterthought to the core of the story itself. Peter Parker is a billionaire asshole throughout most of the plot and honestly not even required to tell the story. You can remove him from any and all plot points involving the “who is 616 Miles Morales?”, Jessica Jones, and the conflicts with Taskmaster, and nothing would change. He is irrelevant.

There’s too much time spent on the whitewashed version of Miles Morales – something that both hinders and illustrates just how far gone Bendis’ writing for Miles has diminished since 2013. 616 Miles Morales wasn’t a bad idea, but the execution of the character is fairly horrendous and racist.

Almost no one talked about Spider-Men II when it was released, almost in the same way there was barely an eye bated when the confusingly branded Spider-Man title (Miles’s 616 outing) was released in 2016 (beyond the “who cares if I’m Black?” bullshit). Everyone was talking about Spider-Men and Ultimate Comics Spider-Man when they were released, a lot of people liked it, some didn’t, but it was rather an indicator of its quality. The almost unilateral silence even Miles Morales fans visited upon Spider-Man and Spider-Men II rather speaks volumes of how bad it got.

I don’t recommend this to anyone who is a Miles Morales fan. You’re better off pretending Spider-Men never got a sequel.

[notyourmoniker]

hi can i ask why you're not a fan of denna's character arc? i'm just curious :)

Ok so I took forever to respond to this and I apologize. I’ve been incredibly busy and I wanted to get my thoughts in order. Thank you for asking though! Before you read further, be warned! Not only did I basically write an essay, this is one of the few instances that I’m going to contend that the Sword of Truth books handled a character better than the show.

My issue with Denna’s portrayal on Legend of the Seeker basically boils down to two main issues; agency and intention. The show takes a different approach to these features of her character than the books do, affecting her portrayal in my opinion for the worse. That’s not to say I don’t like TV Denna. I do! I just believe she serves a very different and ultimately weaker function.

So to start, I should add a little context. My initial exposure to the show was very sporadic. I watched reruns on ABC, and still being kind of young, I didn’t really have the resources to watch them in order from start to finish. This led to me reading most of the books before completing the television series in full.

This means I read the book version of Denna’s story prior to seeing it enacted on screen.

Her arc in the books, culminating with her death, was for me, extremely powerful.

Here was a character who’s life had been taken from her as a child. She had been broken and made into something intentionally counter to who she had been before. And because of this process her conception of self was dominated by the wills of others and her value to them as a weapon.

However, as she trains Richard (a much longer period of time than in the show) we see this start to change. Though Denna is meant to break Richard, change him to suit her needs, the reality is that their transformation is mutual. The more broken he became the more tenderness, compassion, etc. he showed her. In exchange, she starts to see herself as a person worthy of those things, a person who is more than what she has been told, a person who can take the kindnesses Richard has extended to her and return them to him.

Thus, Denna in the books undergoes a slow return to her humanity, finding redemption and independence in doing so.

While some may attribute her transformation to Richard and her attraction to him, I would argue Denna’s ‘love’ is more like gratitude - a deep respect for being reminded of the humanity and sense of self she had lost in becoming a Mord’Sith.

Her death, to me, solidifies this interpretation. Though she does indeed die to save Richard, how she died was the ultimate declaration of agency. Asking him to kill her was a rejection of everything life had made her. It was redemptive,  a definitive moment in which she becomes more than she had been, more than she had been told she could be. This was not how a Mord’Sith would want to die, but it was how Denna chose to die.

And in killing her, Richard recognizes her autonomy. The anger that turns the blade white is not because of what she had done to him but what the Mord’Sith and Darken Rahl had done to her.

The relationship they had was unique and based upon mutual tragedy, trauma, healing and eventual understanding.

Her death and what she and Richard underwent together serves an important purpose in the books. Besides the obvious things, such as introducing the Mord’Sith, the concept of sincere forgiveness is established, as well as the power of autonomy and the magic that comes when it is acknowledged and lived out. Denna’s life and death is therefore made meaningful because of how she developed, and how Richard changed with and because of her.

None of this is true in the show.

On Legend of the Seeker Denna’s initial plot line is cut short. Rather than having the time and space to truly develop she remains more or less the same. Rather than slowly understanding herself as a person capable of independent thought, compassion, and humanity she remains predominantly antagonistic. She is never really given the opportunity to see herself outside of and independent of the Mord’Sith.

So, when Richard kills her it is not her choice, and therefore is not a declaration of agency, of understanding, or of growth. It is just the hero killing a villain to save himself and the woman he loves. Without the relationship Richard and Denna develop in the books, her story is less impactful and less meaningful in the greater context of the show.

And then they bring her back.

Almost as soon as she’s gone, she’s alive again and nothing about her experience has really altered her character at all.

I understand why she was brought back. Until Nicci could be established as a villain and with Rahl rarely acting as his own muscle Legend of the Seeker needed a recognizable villain. But in choosing Denna to fulfill this role her entire character is made weaker. Her characterization and plot line is shifted about so she can be used when the story demands it - having her play a Madame, even for a short while, is one of the show’s weaker decisions.

And the writer’s seem to realize how much of a departure their character is from the one she is meant to be based on, because right before she dies permanently we gets this touching and sad scene with Zedd. It looks like Denna might be realizing that she doesn’t have to be what other people have made her. But then she gone, and her story is robbed of the redemption and self assertion she is granted in the books.

Though logistically it would have been foolish for the writers to handle Denna’s arc the same way it had been done in the books, I think it still could have been done much better. They could have even maintained her role as an antagonist. Not every character needs a redemption arc. But seeing a character grow, seeing them assert themselves, redefine their conceptions of self, and challenge other’s perspectives of them is what makes interesting stories.

Kahlan is a confessor but more than. Cara is a Mord’Sith but more than. Nicci is a Sister of the Dark but more than. Denna remains in a place where she never quite reaches a significant ‘more than.’

So while in the books Denna grows to show compassion, humanity, and a clarifying sense of agency, TV Denna was never given that chance.

[rezares]

Reza Kasraoui-Müller Five* (8)  Identities

 *five identities he claims, two he doesn’t acknowledge, and one he is struggling to

Word Count: 1366

 Father - In late 2009, an agreement was made between a sorcerer and a fairy, to conceive a child. The fairy and the sorcerer had slept together before, but were always nothing more than ‘allies with benefits.’ But the fairy wanted a child. A child, but not a husband. The sorcerer wanted neither but agreed to supply the other half of the DNA for the child. As the fairy’s pregnancy progressed, however, the sorcerer realized he couldn’t just have a child in this world and not be involved, so the arrangement was modified to be a co-parenting situation between two people that are not, never were, and would never be in love.

 On August 27th, 2010, Sabiha Ibitsam Ghadir Basira bint Reza Kasraoui was born in Hammamet, Nabeul Governorate, Tunisia. Reza’s life revolved around her from the moment she took her first breath. Her mother, a fairy named Rafika, had to practically pry her from his arms to nurse her.

 Sabiha is Reza’s greatest joy and he cannot imagine ever being separated from her again. To Reza, being a father - Sabiha’s father - is his whole reason for living. Before he is anything else, he is that wonderful little girl’s father.

Sorcerer/Magick - It’s predicted for this to be in the number two spot, but I actually struggled whether or not to place this here. Because frankly Reza feels disconnected from the experiences of most sorcerers around him - currently. I think...Reza himself would more closely identify with ‘magick’, and with pan-magickal struggles and social justice.

 Like...Reza probably has more in common as far as lived experiences, with a British werewolf than a British sorcerer. Because British werewolves and Tunisian sorcerers are both heavily discriminated against. Magic is illegal in his home country, he’s been put in jail and denied housing and work for being a sorcerer. British sorcerers, while inconvenienced by restrictions and regulations, simply do not face a comparable level of stigma to sorcerers in Tunisia.

 Reza would probably say that prior to living in Austria and now Swynlake, he would have identified more strongly with “sorcerer” as not just a label, but an entire piece of his identity. Tunisian sorcerer culture is rich, complex, and really forges a community. It means something very specific to be a sorcerer from North Africa. Now in Europe, he doesn’t as strongly identify as a sorcerer. At least, he doesn’t...think of himself as part of a community of any sort that would also specifically include say, Howl, Hera, or the Qin sisters.

 In Swynlake, Reza feels more connected to this abstract pan-magick identity. He feels closer to Hades than to any sorcerers here other than his sisters and his apprentice, Aurora.

Activist  - Reza, before anything other than being Sabiha’s father and being a sorcerer, identifies strongly with being an activist for magick rights. His pen name for pro-magick writing, Ares, the god of war, was a fitting alias.

 It isn’t just magick rights, though. During the Arab Spring, Reza was heavily active locally in the movement that ultimately toppled the Ben Ali dictatorship. He cares a lot about social justice and in every society he lives in, whether Tunisia or Swynlake, he actively seeks to speak out and fight against injustices.

 His activism is intersectional, no matter what continent he’s on.

 Muslim - This one is interesting because of its placement on the list. I thought Muslim would be fifth, below Tunisian, but it’s not and I’ll explain why in the Tunisian blurb.

 Reza is...not the strictest Muslim. He drinks alcohol and has sex outside of marriage - you know, breaks “rules” that are convenient for him like every person of faith does. But he finds comfort and community in Islam and his Muslim identity is very important to him.

 As a now out magick, Reza is unable to even enter Saudi Arabia, and is therefore unable to complete his hajj, one of the five pillars of Islam. It legitimately hurts him, but he tells himself all the time “God will understand,” and make sure he gives to charity more than is simply required by Islam.

 Tunisian - The fifth most important identity of Reza’s, is his nationality. I thought it would be higher, honestly, like maybe second or third, but as I psychoanalyzed Reza more, I realized that while it was important to him, and that he’s proud to be Tunisian...it’s number five.

 Because Tunisia’s rejected him in a way. He can’t live freely in the country that he loves. He is Tunisian but Tunisia does not see him as part of her.

 I thought Tunisia would be above Muslim on his list of identities, but I’ve come to find out that apart from his most important identity - as Sabiha’s father - he feels more strongly about the identities were he finds community. He finds more community in being Muslim here in Swynlake than with being Tunisian.

 Demiromantic - So, honestly. Reza has never heard this word, he doesn’t know what it is. But he’s demiromantic, booooorderline aromantic. Like he’s not ace, he’s quite heterosexual, but he’s never...loved anybody. Like that. And never had a longing to.

 He has the capacity to - he’s not actually aro, but he’s not able to love somebody in that way unless there’s a strong emotional attachment. Reza’s never had an attachment that strong to somebody emotionally. Even with his daughter’s mother, he wasn’t even that close friends with her, they were just a sorcerer and fairy who had mutual friends and sometimes hooked up.

 He had few female friends in Tunisia that he got very close to. While attitudes toward men and women interacting are less conservative generally in magick circles, people still can raise eyebrows if single men and women act too chummy. So Reza’d only ever really had male true friends; and he’s hetero, so of course none of those strong emotional bonds turned to something deeper.

 Like, he finds it odd that he’s never really had a proper “crush” on a woman, but he just writes it off as “my life up until now was fucking wild, of course I didn’t have time for that.”

 Disabled - This is one Reza both isn’t fully aware of, but is also aware of and in denial. The bomb set off by anti magick extremists at a sorcerer’s wedding Reza attended that nearly killed him had left him with permanent effects.

 Before the attack, Reza made most of his money as a server, bartender, fisherman, or construction worker. Even after the nearly two years of surgeries, physical therapy, and re-learning to walk again, doing these things is now impossible for him. He cannot stand up for eight, ten, thirteen hour shifts waiting tables or slinging drinks. Standing for more than a few hours at once is extremely painful. Sometimes he’ll have pain flare-ups if he’s not even doing anything.

 He keeps thinking one day it’ll get better, that it’ll go away, but he’s coming to realize this isn’t going to change back to normal.

 POC - This is the identity that like, Reza always was aware of, but has only recently come to understand what it fully means. I’ll explain.

 Reza is a man of color...from a country populated by people of color. Of course he was aware of global white supremacy - Western European beauty standards, colorism, etc -, and he was aware that he and his sisters were a bit different than most of their neighbors, as they were half white Austrian, but like….eh. Lots of Tunisians with two Tunisian parents were lighter-skinned than Reza so.

 Prior to about four years ago, when he lived in Austria for medical treatment, Reza hadn’t ever lived a racialized existence. For the first almost thirty-two years of his life, his ethnicity and Muslim faith were two things that made him blend in, not stand out.

 It’s only in the last four years that Reza’s had to grapple with what it means to be a person of color in a predominantly white society -- because he’s from a society of other people of color.

[lay4decolonisation-blog]

She-Ra: Princesses of Power (2018) and the Representation that I Want

 **CONTENT WARNING:  ABUSE, VIOLENCE**

When I heard She-Ra was back and GAY, I had to jump straight or not so straight into it. The amazing characterisation and themes of the show fit the modern audience perfectly. She-Ra: Princesses of Power (SPOP) did what Voltron: Legendary Defender wish it did. RIP. 

The SPOP series was written by Noelle Stevenson, and produced by Dreamworks. Season 1 aired on the 13th November 2018 via Netflix. 

There’s two things I want to discuss, so I’ll split this up into sections: visual character design & complex characterisation.

Visual Character Design

80’s She-Ra         

 2018 She-Ra

 She-Ra is the hero alter ego of Princess Adora, who transforms when she calls forth “For the Honour of Grayskull!” with The Sword of Protection. 

When I saw the visuals for the series and the new outfit for She-Ra I nearly screamed. It was perfect. I will always prefer Marvel cinematic movie adaptations on the basis that women wear full body armour, and not a skirt. So it was natural for me to fall in love with the shorts, flowy skirt, useful boots and 80’s influenced shoulder flares on She-Ra’s new threads. 

She looked PRACTICAL, and totally badass. I see no male gaze in the update. She-Ra isn’t wearing heels, or red lipstick, her dress doesn’t look like it’s about to give her a nip slip, and her hair still flows like golden threads in the wind! 

Notice how I just used the ‘Male Gaze’. The Male Gaze is essentially a patriarchal control of representation of women and/or other genders in media, and can be applicable to historical documentation (Mulvey 1989). Ponterotto (2016) describes it expands on the media’s control of feminine bodies as: 

“The invisibility of women has been accompanied in an extraordinarily inversely proportionate manner by the visual display of her physical appearance, of her body as material object, to be observed, judged, valued, appreciated, rejected, modified and essentially commodified, for socially-constructed purposes. From a feminist point of view, this purpose can be claimed to be essentially male pleasure, concomitant social benchmarking and commercial profit.” (134)

From the ‘controversy’ from predominantly male audiences on the release of She-Ra’s costume it’s obvious that it’s doing its job (Lenton 2018); with men reacting with things like: 

“The character designs for this show are god awful. She-Ra looks too much like a man.” MECCA_Studios @ twitter

“if you're trying to make your girls look like boys for your show then you are not actually fighting for equality you're proving that men is the superior gender and taken more seriously than a beautiful women, you're only helping sexism not fighting it” - iamconsumer @ twitter

I wanna acknowledge this was mainly white, cishet males reacting to a show that is predominantly AIMED AT YOUNG GIRLS. SPOP’s visual design of She-Ra was so key in getting this show right. She is a woman icon for young girls growing up and seeing her on screen wearing a non-sexual costume whilst being feminine, strong and beautiful will mean something for them growing up. Women/Feminine peoples can look at the screen and say “I’m She-Ra!” and not have to feel like they have to look good for male gaze to do that.  

People Of Colour (POC) Representation

Bow, Mermista, Frosta, Netossa and Catra’s - along with ethnically ambiguous characters - redesign was kind of glossed over with the amount of objections about the Queer and Feminist arguments going around. 

So here’s some of my babies:

Bow 80s 

                                                            Bow 2018

Mermista 80s

                                                            Mermista 2018

Catra 80s                                                  

Catra 2018

Frosta 80s

                                  Frosta 2018

Bow stood out to me alot because I empathize alot for my dark skinned brother’s who don’t have any or many examples of good representation on screen that explores queer identity, gender performativity, body image and positive masculinity that is casual and fun. (I speak of course from an Indigenous background, but a lot of my community look at the African-American community on TV for dark bodies representation.) Imagine a young dark skinned boy watching Bow being fun loving, supportive, gentle, obsessed with crop tops, hanging out with girls and embodying positive masculinity, then using as a mold to treat their sisters, mums and cousins. Incredible. 

 SPOP centers ethnic looking characters amazingly with their characterisation. Having POC on screens breaks out of normalizing whiteness, and de-centers it as the default way of being (Scharrer & Ramasubramanian 2015). People might argue that fantasy worlds don’t overlap with real worlds because race mightn’t exist in the fantasy world, but when you’re a ethnic kid growing up watching/ reading white bodies being superheroes and warriors and People of Colour don’t exist you have no representation, or worse POC are negatively stereotyped. Representation is IMPORTANT. Representation is the ability to control the way the world perceives a group of people, or yourself - white people often struggle understanding this because whiteness as an identity is invisible by normalization (hooks 1992, Dyer 1997). It can be compared to men as ungendered compared to women, or non-cis and queer people with heteronormativity. So it can only be visible when colour is involved, and depending on whether it’s good or bad POC representation it can create racial stereotypes (Brigham 1971, Nosek 2007). 

LGBTQIA+ Visual Representation

I feel like you can find a lot of this, but not any by me! 

I will start with Scorpia cause she’s such a dear. 

JUST LOOK AT HER. 

Everyone is screaming ‘butch lesbian’ little to know that she is a total femme (anyone can fight me on this). Her open attraction towards Catra was loud, unapologetic and was super ultra normal. Despite her giant crab claws, I just want her to hold me gently. I think it’s another good example of different body types. Like it’s not just an exterior what makes a woman a woman or a good person a good person. Before I die of thirst, let’s move on to my Bow’s dads. 

OH MY GAWD. Bow resembles Lance and George so much. Like the perfect little mix between their two personalities UGH. Both very different individuals who share a common obsession with history. Two gay Black dudes just be out here owning the biggest collection of ancient artifacts, studying the classics and raising 13 kids like wojefdikewajfaij

Lance out here rocking dreads and the glasses with sandals *bathump* and George with his little moustache and fancy hair. They go on like a normal couple picking on one another and knowing each other’s personalities, caring about their son and reflecting on their parenting when they realize they messed up instead of blaming their kid for not understanding them okmfoerngfa

Sorry, my heart nearly went into cardiac arrest thinking about them. 

I won’t miss the exceptional drop of them telling Bow their disappointed that he had to hide a part of himself because he was afraid of what they’d think of him or do. I remember that feeling….*glances at my physical wooden closet*

SPINNERELLA AND NETOSSA.

Netossa is the only character (I’m pretty sure) who was originally dark skinned in the 80s She Ra - she also had no powers. 

Now rocking up with powers and gf, she is out here living her best life. Look at them. Just look at my babies. They swapped chokers, like wow, what a lesbian power move. Plus sized, buff queer women rocking their femininity being loyal and totally badass. Their actual appearances on screen are limited but impactful as they are seen as people seem to question more what the heck they do in the Rebellion rather than their queer relationship. 

Complex Characterisation

Let’s start with Shadow Weaver’s relationship with Catra and Adora. 

Starting off at Mystacor as Light Spinner, she a teacher and getting one of her students, Micah, to perform a spell that conjured evil magic - The Spell of Obtainment - ultimately decided her path as Shadow Weaver. She became an abusive, manipulative and self righteous authoritative figure to Catra and Adora. 

Shadow Weaver is an abuser. Abuse works differently in each situation but is defined by White Ribbon Australia in categories of:  Physical, Financial, Emotional, Verbal, Social, Sexual, Stalking, Spiritual, Image based, Dowry and Elderly Abuse. 

The emotional, verbal, social and I’m going to add economical (instead for Financial) abuse she inflicted on Adora and Catra made them stick together as companions through the hardships. Adora upon realizing the Horde’s actions and motives rejects and calls out Shadow Weaver’s abuse. Catra, on the other hand, looks for something like approval from Shadow Weaver. Catra grew up neglected and constantly compared to Adora in her duties to the Horde by Shadow Weaver, so when Adora left a shift happened in Catra. Adora was her main source of comfort and sense of safety in Shadow Weaver’s irract attitude towards her. Adora was her constant feeling of affection and comfort, when she went against the very codes that kept them together their entire lives - Catra was betrayed. Finally, maybe she could get the parental approval she was seeking from Shadow Weaver she never got when Adora was around. Also looking for validation of her moral that has been cause her actions other than rage and sadness that Adora had left her alone. Catra sort out her Abuser’s approval because that’s the only way she knew how to get validity and self assurance of her identity as a member of the Horde - all she ever knew. 

Catra feels alone and like she can’t depend on anyone, and because she knows how that feels she was also able to emotionally manipulate Entrapta into join the Horde. It’s a consistent cycle of isolation that stemmed from one person’s influence. 

The thing that differs Adora and Catra, was more Adora being given opportunities to lead and step up where Catra was always on the side. Adora gained leadership skills and an emotional capacity where she was able to trust others and trust herself. This ultimately allowed her to do the right thing and join the Rebellion. Catra on the other hand had to quickly use her head and be more aware of things other than herself which made her falter in the leadership role of Shadow Weaver, but that is her coping mechanism of isolating herself and having to immerse herself with other people and the world to take action. 

Adora’s culture shock between the way the Princesses live and the way it was in the Horde only shows how she’s been manipulated through learning the knowledge and behaviours that were enforced on her in the Horde. Princesses aren’t evil. The Horde is evil.

Adora’s role of She Ra has put a lot of pressure on her, and she is fighting her own self. 

What happened with Adora was she was specifically chosen because she’s had the experiences she’s had. She knows what it's like in the Horde. How their systems work. What type of people and kids are there. She knows all of that to use to win the war. She’s not gonna break into it, but out of it. 

When Adora breaks out of the Horde’s learning, and the truth telling begins the walls will crumble and there will be internal upset. There’s a good and evil battle going on inside of each character. Adora wants to protect her friends and do the right thing, but sometimes those two things aren’t the same thing. 

Another character I wanna bring up is Glimmer. Glimmer has been fighting to fight. She’s having to fight a struggle in her internal kingdoms. She’s been trying to tell the truth to the other Kingdoms and unite the Kingdoms so they can beat the Horde and save everything they love. She needed to stand up to her mother, the other Princesses, and herself. She is so damn strong and I love her so much omg. 

When Bow went to the ball with Perfuma and she was upset, this was because she was afraid Bow would leave her. She’s been isolated also by her mother into doing Princess things that don’t actually have a big impact, but Bow has been consistent in her life and training to be a leader. When he left her side, she was scared that she was going to be isolated again. She knew it was irrational, but that kind of stuff just happens. Sometimes our feelings don’t always make sense to us at first, and we have to look somewhere else to understand what we’re feeling right then and there. But the besties will prevail. 

The other thing I didn’t touch on earlier, but will now is age. The Princesses age from around 11-18 (?). The thing about having young people saving the world is really where we’re at. Kids are rioting in the streets trying to get big corporations led by greedy bastards who want resources and exploit people to stop, and save their entire world - yeah, you know I’m talking about situations like the climate strike. We will learn from our elders mistakes and do it right. 

We shouldn’t give up because our parents did. We will be the ones to win, just like Glimmer, Adora, Bow and the gang.

Representation isn’t a debate - it’s a necessity.  

Thanks for reading babes. 

Reference List

Dyer, Richard. (1997) ‘The Matter of Whiteness’ in White, London: Routledge.

Brigham, John C. "Ethnic stereotypes." Psychological bulletin76.1 (1971): 15.

Nosek, Brian A., et al. "Pervasiveness and correlates of implicit attitudes and stereotypes." European Review of Social Psychology 18.1 (2007): 36-88.

Bell, Hooks. "The oppositional Gaze: Black Female Spectators." Black Looks: Race and Representation (1992): 115-131.

Mulvey, L. (1989). Visual pleasure and narrative cinema. In Visual and other pleasures (pp. 14-26). Palgrave Macmillan, London.

Ponterotto, D. (2016). Resisting the male gaze: feminist responses to the" normatization" of the female body in Western culture. Journal of International Women's Studies, 17(1), 133-151.

Scharrer, E., & Ramasubramanian, S. (2015). Intervening in the media's influence on stereotypes of race and ethnicity: The role of media literacy education. Journal of Social Issues, 71(1), 171-185.

https://www.whiteribbon.org.au/understand-domestic-violence/types-of-abuse/

[blackkudos]

James Baldwin

James Arthur Baldwin (August 2, 1924 – December 1, 1987) was an African-American novelist, essayist, playwright, poet, and social critic. His essays, as collected in Notes of a Native Son (1955), explore palpable yet unspoken intricacies of racial, sexual, and class distinctions in Western societies, most notably in mid-20th-century America, and their inevitable if unnameable tensions. Some Baldwin essays are book-length, for instance The Fire Next Time (1963), No Name in the StreJames Baldwinet (1972), and The Devil Finds Work (1976).

Baldwin's novels and plays fictionalize fundamental personal questions and dilemmas amid complex social and psychological pressures thwarting the equitable integration not only of blacks, but also of gay and bisexual men, while depicting some internalized obstacles to such individuals' quests for acceptance. Such dynamics are prominent in Baldwin's second novel, Giovanni's Room, written in 1956 well before gay rights were widely espoused in America.

Early life

Baldwin was born after his mother, Emma Berdis Jones, left his biological father because of his drug abuse and moved to Harlem, New York City. There, she married a preacher, David Baldwin. The family was very poor.

Baldwin spent much time caring for his several younger brothers and sisters. At the age of 10, he was teased and abused by two New York police officers, an instance of racist harassment by the NYPD that he would experience again as a teenager and document in his essays. His adoptive father, whom Baldwin in essays called simply his father, appears to have treated him — by comparison with his siblings — with great harshness.

His stepfather died of tuberculosis in summer of 1943 just before Baldwin turned 19. The day of the funeral was Baldwin's 19th birthday, the day his father's last child was born, and the day of the Harlem Riot of 1943, which was portrayed at the beginning of his essay "Notes of a Native Son". The quest to answer or explain family and social rejection—and attain a sense of selfhood, both coherent and benevolent—became a leitmotiv in Baldwin's writing.

Education

James attended P.S. 24 on 128th Street between Fifth and Madison in Harlem where he wrote the school song, which was used until the school closed down. His middle school years were spent at Frederick Douglass Junior High where he was influenced by poet Countee Cullen, a leading figure in the Harlem Renaissance, and was encouraged by his math teacher to serve as editor of the school newspaper, The Douglass Pilot. He then went on to DeWitt Clinton High School, in the Bronx's Bedford Park section. There, along with Richard Avedon, he worked on the school magazine as literary editor but disliked school because of the constant racial slurs.

Religion

The difficulties of his life, including his stepfather's abuse, led Baldwin to seek solace in religion. At the age of 14 he attended meetings of the Pentecostal Church and, during a euphoric prayer meeting, he converted and became a junior Minister. Before long, at the Fireside Pentecostal Assembly, he was drawing larger crowds than his stepfather had done in his day. At 17, however, Baldwin came to view Christianity as based on false premises and later regarded his time in the pulpit as a way of overcoming his personal crises.

Baldwin once visited Elijah Muhammad, leader of the Nation of Islam, who inquired about Baldwin's religious beliefs. He answered, "I left the church 20 years ago and haven't joined anything since." Elijah asked, "And what are you now?" Baldwin explained, "Now? Nothing. I'm a writer. I like doing things alone." Still, his church experience significantly shaped his worldview and writing. Baldwin reflected that "being in the pulpit was like working in the theater; I was behind the scenes and knew how the illusion was worked."

Baldwin accused Christianity of reinforcing the system of American slavery by palliating the pangs of oppression and delaying salvation until a promised afterlife. Baldwin praised religion, however, for inspiring some American blacks to defy oppression. He once wrote, "If the concept of God has any use, it is to make us larger, freer, and more loving. If God can't do that, it's time we got rid of him". Baldwin publicly described himself as not religious. However, at his funeral, an a cappella recording of Baldwin singing "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" was played.

Greenwich Village

When Baldwin was 15, his high-school running buddy, Emile Capouya, skipped school one day and, in Greenwich Village, met Beauford Delaney, a painter. Capouya gave Baldwin Delaney's address and suggested paying him a visit. Baldwin, who was at the time working after school in a sweatshop on nearby Canal Street, visited Beauford at 181 Greene Street. Beauford became a mentor to Baldwin; it was under Beauford's influence that he came to believe a black person could be an artist.

While working odd jobs, Baldwin wrote short stories, essays, and book reviews, some of them collected in the volume Notes of a Native Son (1955). He befriended the actor Marlon Brando in 1944 and the two were roommates for a time. They would remain friends for more than 20 years.

Expatriation

During his teenage years in Harlem and Greenwich Village, Baldwin started to realize that he was gay. In 1948, he walked into a restaurant where he knew he would not be served. When the waitress explained that black people were not served at the establishment, Baldwin threw a glass of water at her, shattering the mirror behind the bar. As a result of being disillusioned by American prejudice against blacks and gays, he left the United States at the age of 24 and settled in Paris, France. His flight was not just a desire to distance himself from American prejudice, but to see himself and his writing beyond an African-American context. Baldwin did not want to be read as "merely a Negro; or, even, merely a Negro writer". Also, he left the United States desiring to come to terms with his sexual ambivalence and flee the hopelessness that many young African-American men like himself succumbed to in New York.

In Paris, Baldwin was soon involved in the cultural radicalism of the Left Bank. His work started to be published in literary anthologies, notably Zero, which was edited by his friend Themistocles Hoetis and which had already published essays by Richard Wright.

He would live in France for most of his later life. He would also spend some time in Switzerland and Turkey. During his life and after it, Baldwin would be seen not only as an influential African-American writer but also as an influential exile writer, particularly because of his numerous experiences outside the United States and the impact of these experiences on Baldwin's life and his writing.

Saint-Paul-de-Vence

Baldwin settled in Saint-Paul-de-Vence in the south of France in 1970, in an old Provençal house beneath the ramparts of the famous village. His house was always open to his friends, who frequently visited him while on trips to the French Riviera. American painter Beauford Delaney made Baldwin's house in Saint-Paul-de-Vence his second home, often setting up his easel in the garden. Delaney painted several colourful portraits of Baldwin. Actors Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier were also regular house guests.

Many of Baldwin's musician friends dropped in during the Nice and Juan-les-Pins Jazz Festivals: Nina Simone, Josephine Baker (whose sister lived in Nice), Miles Davis, and Ray Charles, for whom he wrote several songs. In his autobiography, Miles Davis wrote:

I'd read his books and I liked and respected what he had to say. When I got to know him better, Jimmy and I opened up to each other. We became great friends. Every time I was in the South of France, in Antibes, I would spend a day or two at his villa in Saint-Paul-de-Vence. We'd get comfy in that beautiful, big house and he would tell us all sorts of stories...He was a great man.

Baldwin learned to speak French fluently and developed friendships with French actor Yves Montand and French writer Marguerite Yourcenar, who translated Baldwin's play The Amen Corner.

His years in Saint-Paul-de-Vence were also years of work. Sitting in front of his sturdy typewriter, his days were devoted to writing and to answering the huge amount of mail he received from all over the world. He wrote several of his last works in his house in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, including Just Above My Head in 1979 and Evidence of Things Not Seen in 1985. It was also in his Saint-Paul-de-Vence house that Baldwin wrote his famous "Open Letter to My Sister, Angela Y. Davis" in November 1970.

Literary career

In 1953, Baldwin's first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain, a semi-autobiographical bildungsroman, was published. His first collection of essays, Notes of a Native Son appeared two years later. He continued to experiment with literary forms throughout his career, publishing poetry and plays as well as the fiction and essays for which he was known.

Baldwin's second novel, Giovanni's Room, caused great controversy when it was first published in 1956 due to its explicit homoerotic content. Baldwin was again resisting labels with the publication of this work: despite the reading public's expectations that he would publish works dealing with the African-American experience, Giovanni's Room is predominantly about white characters. Baldwin's next two novels, Another Country and Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone, are sprawling, experimental works dealing with black and white characters and with heterosexual, gay, and bisexual characters. These novels struggle to contain the turbulence of the late 1950s and the early 1960s: they are saturated with a sense of violent unrest and outrage.

Baldwin's lengthy essay "Down at the Cross" (frequently called The Fire Next Time after the title of the book in which it was published) similarly showed the seething discontent of the 1960s in novel form. The essay was originally published in two oversized issues of The New Yorker and landed Baldwin on the cover of Time magazine in 1963 while Baldwin was touring the South speaking about the restive Civil Rights movement. Around the time of publication of The Fire Next Time, Baldwin became a known spokesperson for civil rights and a celebrity noted for championing the cause of black Americans. He frequently appeared on television and delivered speeches on college campuses. The essay talked about the uneasy relationship between Christianity and the burgeoning Black Muslim movement. After publication, several black nationalists criticized Baldwin for his conciliatory attitude. They questioned whether his message of love and understanding would do much to change race relations in America. The book was eagerly consumed by whites looking for answers to the question: What do blacks really want? Baldwin's essays never stopped articulating the anger and frustration felt by real-life black Americans with more clarity and style than any other writer of his generation. Baldwin's next book-length essay, No Name in the Street, also discussed his own experience in the context of the later 1960s, specifically the assassinations of three of his personal friends: Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Baldwin's writings of the 1970s and 1980s have been largely overlooked by critics, though even these texts are beginning to receive attention. Several of his essays and interviews of the 1980s discuss homosexuality and homophobia with fervor and forthrightness. Eldridge Cleaver's harsh criticism of Baldwin in Soul on Ice and elsewhere and Baldwin's return to southern France contributed to the sense that he was not in touch with his readership. Always true to his own convictions rather than to the tastes of others, Baldwin continued to write what he wanted to write. As he had been the leading literary voice of the civil rights movement, he became an inspirational figure for the emerging gay rights movement. His two novels written in the 1970s, If Beale Street Could Talk and Just Above My Head, placed a strong emphasis on the importance of black families, and he concluded his career by publishing a volume of poetry, Jimmy's Blues, as well as another book-length essay, The Evidence of Things Not Seen, which was an extended meditation inspired by the Atlanta Child Murders of the early 1980s.

Social and political activism

Baldwin returned to the United States in the summer of 1957 while the Civil Rights Act of that year was being debated in Congress. He had been powerfully moved by the image of a young girl braving a mob in an attempt to desegregate schools in Charlotte, N.C., andPartisan Review editor Philip Rahv had suggested he report on what was happening in the American south. Baldwin was nervous about the trip but he made it, interviewing people in Charlotte (where he met Martin Luther King), and Montgomery, Alabama. The result was two essays, one published in Harper's magazine ("The Hard Kind of Courage"), the other in Partisan Review ("Nobody Knows My Name"). Subsequent Baldwin articles on the movement appeared in Mademoiselle, Harper's, The New York Times Magazine, and The New Yorker, where in 1962 he published the essay that he called "Down at the Cross" and the New Yorker called "Letter from a Region of My Mind". Along with a shorter essay from The Progressive, the essay became The Fire Next Time.

While he wrote about the movement, Baldwin aligned himself with the ideals of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). In 1963 he conducted a lecture tour of the South for CORE, traveling to locations like Durham and Greensboro, North Carolina and New Orleans, Louisiana. During the tour, he lectured to students, white liberals, and anyone else listening about his racial ideology, an ideological position between the "muscular approach" of Malcolm X and the nonviolent program of Martin Luther King, Jr.. Baldwin expressed the hope that Socialism would take root in the United States.

By the spring of 1963, Baldwin had become so much a spokesman for the Civil Rights Movement that for its May 17 issue on the turmoil in Birmingham, Alabama, Time magazine put James Baldwin on the cover. "There is not another writer," said Time, "who expresses with such poignancy and abrasiveness the dark realities of the racial ferment in North and South." In a cable Baldwin sent to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy during the crisis, Baldwin blamed the violence in Birmingham on the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, Mississippi Senator James Eastland, and President Kennedy for failing to use "the great prestige of his office as the moral forum which it can be." Attorney General Kennedy invited Baldwin to meet with him over breakfast, and that meeting was followed up with a second, when Kennedy met with Baldwin and others Baldwin had invited to Kennedy's Manhattan apartment (see Baldwin–Kennedy meeting). This meeting is discussed in Howard Simon's 1999 play, "James Baldwin: A Soul on Fire" The delegation included Kenneth B. Clark, a psychologist who had played a key role in the Brown v. Board of Education decision; actor Harry Belafonte, singer Lena Horne, writer Lorraine Hansberry, and activists from civil rights organizations. Although most of the attendees of this meeting left feeling "devastated," the meeting was an important one in voicing the concerns of the civil rights movement and it provided exposure of the civil rights issue not just as a political issue but also as a moral issue.

James Baldwin’s FBI file contains 1,884 pages of documents, collected from 1960 until the early 1970s. During that era of illegal surveillance of American writers, the FBI accumulated 276 pages on Richard Wright, 110 pages on Truman Capote, and just nine pages on Henry Miller.

Baldwin also made a prominent appearance at the Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. on August 28, 1963, with Belafonte and long-time friends Sidney Poitier and Marlon Brando. The civil rights movement was hostile to homosexuals. The only known gay men in the movement were James Baldwin and Bayard Rustin. Rustin and King were very close, as Rustin received credit for the success of the March on Washington. Many were bothered by Rustin's sexual orientation. King himself spoke on the topic of sexual orientation in a school editorial column during his college years, and in reply to a letter during the 1950s, where he treated it as a mental illness which an individual could overcome (the common view of the time). The pressure later resulted in King distancing himself from both men. At the time, Baldwin was neither in the closet nor open to the public about his sexual orientation. Later on, Baldwin was conspicuously uninvited to speak at the end of the March on Washington. After a bomb exploded in a Birmingham church not long after the March on Washington, Baldwin called for a nationwide campaign of civil disobedience in response to this "terrifying crisis." He traveled to Selma, Alabama, where SNCC had organized a voter registration drive; he watched mothers with babies and elderly men and women standing in long lines for hours, as armed deputies and state troopers stood by—or intervened to smash a reporter's camera or use cattle prods on SNCC workers. After his day of watching, he spoke in a crowded church, blaming Washington—"the good white people on the hill." Returning to Washington, he told a New York Post reporter the federal government could protect Negroes—it could send federal troops into the South. He blamed the Kennedys for not acting. In March 1965, Baldwin joined marchers who walked 50 miles from Selma, Alabama, to the capitol in Montgomery under the protection of federal troops.

Nonetheless, he rejected the label "civil rights activist", or that he had participated in a civil rights movement, instead agreeing with Malcolm X's assertion that if one is a citizen, one should not have to fight for one's civil rights. In a 1964 interview with Robert Penn Warren for the book Who Speaks for the Negro?, Baldwin refuted the idea that the civil rights movement was an outright revolution, instead calling it "a very peculiar revolution because it has to...have its aims the establishment of a union, and a...radical shift in the American mores, the American way of life...not only as it applies to the Negro obviously, but as it applies to every citizen of the country." In a 1979 speech at UC Berkeley, he called it, instead, "the latest slave rebellion."

In 1968, Baldwin signed the “Writers and Editors War Tax Protest” pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.

Inspiration and relationships

As a young man, Baldwin's poetry teacher was Countee Cullen.

A great influence on Baldwin was the painter Beauford Delaney. In The Price of the Ticket (1985), Baldwin describes Delaney as

...the first living proof, for me, that a black man could be an artist. In a warmer time, a less blasphemous place, he would have been recognized as my teacher and I as his pupil. He became, for me, an example of courage and integrity, humility and passion. An absolute integrity: I saw him shaken many times and I lived to see him broken but I never saw him bow.

Later support came from Richard Wright, whom Baldwin called "the greatest black writer in the world." Wright and Baldwin became friends, and Wright helped Baldwin secure the Eugene F. Saxon Memorial Award. Baldwin's essay "Notes of a Native Son" and his collection Notes of a Native Son allude to Wright's novel Native Son. In Baldwin's 1949 essay "Everybody's Protest Novel", however, he indicated that Native Son, like Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin, lacked credible characters and psychological complexity, and the friendship between the two authors ended. Interviewed by Julius Lester, however, Baldwin explained, "I knew Richard and I loved him. I was not attacking him; I was trying to clarify something for myself." In 1965, Baldwin participated in a debate with William F. Buckley, on the topic of whether the American dream has adversely affected African Americans. The debate took place at The Cambridge Union in the UK. The spectating student body voted overwhelmingly in Baldwin's favour.

In 1949 Baldwin met and fell in love with Lucien Happersberger, aged 17, though Happersberger's marriage three years later left Baldwin distraught. Happersberger died on August 21, 2010, in Switzerland.

Baldwin was a close friend of the singer, pianist, and civil rights activist Nina Simone. With Langston Hughes and Lorraine Hansberry, Baldwin helped awaken Simone to the civil rights movement then gelling. Baldwin also provided her with literary references influential on her later work. Baldwin and Hansberry met with Robert F. Kennedy, along with Kenneth Clark and Lena Horne and others (see Baldwin–Kennedy meeting) in an attempt to persuade Kennedy of the importance of civil rights legislation. Kennedy referred to Baldwin as "Martin Luther Queen" throughout his life.

Baldwin influenced the work of French painter Philippe Derome, whom he met in Paris in the early 1960s. Baldwin also knew Marlon Brando, Charlton Heston, Billy Dee Williams, Huey P. Newton, Nikki Giovanni, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean Genet (with whom he campaigned on behalf of the Black Panther Party), Lee Strasberg, Elia Kazan, Rip Torn, Alex Haley, Miles Davis, Amiri Baraka, Martin Luther King, Jr., Dorothea Tanning , Leonor Fini, Margaret Mead, Josephine Baker, Allen Ginsberg, Chinua Achebe and Maya Angelou. He wrote at length about his "political relationship" with Malcolm X. He collaborated with childhood friend Richard Avedon on the book Nothing Personal, which is available for public viewing at the Schomburg Center in Harlem.

Maya Angelou called Baldwin her "friend and brother", and credited him for "setting the stage" for her 1969 autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Baldwin was made a Commandeur de la Légion d'Honneur by the French government in 1986.

Baldwin was also a close friend of Nobel Prize-winning novelist Toni Morrison. Upon his death, Morrison wrote a eulogy for Baldwin that appeared in The New York Times. In the eulogy, entitled "Life in His Language," Morrison credits Baldwin as being her literary inspiration and the person who showed her the true potential of writing. She writes,

"You knew, didn't you, how I needed your language and the mind that formed it? How I relied on your fierce courage to tame wildernesses for me? How strengthened I was by the certainty that came from knowing you would never hurt me? You knew, didn't you, how I loved your love? You knew. This then is no calamity. No. This is jubilee. 'Our crown,' you said, 'has already been bought and paid for. All we have to do,' you said, 'is wear it.'"

Death

Early on December 1, 1987, (some sources say late on November 30) Baldwin died from stomach cancer in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, France. He was buried at the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, near New York City.

Legacy

Baldwin's influence on other writers has been profound: Toni Morrison edited the Library of America two-volume editions of Baldwin's fiction and essays, and a recent collection of critical essays links these two writers.

One of Baldwin's richest short stories, "Sonny's Blues", appears in many anthologies of short fiction used in introductory college literature classes.

In 1986, within the work The Story of English, Robert MacNeil, with Robert McCrum and William Cran, mentioned James Baldwin as an influential writer of African-American Literature, on the level of Booker T. Washington, and held both men up as prime examples of Black writers.

In 1987, Kevin Brown, a photo-journalist from Baltimore, founded the National James Baldwin Literary Society. The group organizes free public events celebrating Baldwin's life and legacy.

In 1992, Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, established the James Baldwin Scholars program, an urban outreach initiative, in honor of Baldwin, who taught at Hampshire in the early 1980s. The JBS Program provides talented students of color from underserved communities an opportunity to develop and improve the skills necessary for college success through coursework and tutorial support for one transitional year, after which Baldwin scholars may apply for full matriculation to Hampshire or any other four-year college program.

In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante included James Baldwin on his list of 100 Greatest African Americans.

In 2005, the USPS created a first-class postage stamp dedicated to Baldwin, which featured him on the front, with a short biography on the back of the peeling paper.

In 2012 James Baldwin was inducted into the Legacy Walk, an outdoor public display that celebrates LGBT history and people.

In 2014 128th Street, between Fifth and Madison Avenues, was named "James Baldwin Place" to celebrate Baldwin's 90th Birthday. He lived in the neighborhood and attended P.S. 24. Readings of Baldwin's writing were held at The National Black Theatre and a month long art exhibition featuring works by New York Live Arts and artist Maureen Kelleher. The events were attended by Council Member Inez Dickens, who lead the campaign to honor Harlem native son, Baldwin's family, leaders in theatre and film, and members of the community.

Works

Go Tell It on the Mountain (semi-autobiographical novel; 1953)

The Amen Corner (play; 1954)

Notes of a Native Son (essays; 1955)

Giovanni's Room (novel; 1956)

Nobody Knows My Name: More Notes of a Native Son (essays; 1961)

Another Country (novel; 1962)

A Talk to Teachers (essay; 1963)

The Fire Next Time (essays; 1963)

Blues for Mister Charlie (play; 1964)

Going to Meet the Man (stories; 1965)

Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone (novel; 1968)

No Name in the Street (essays; 1972)

If Beale Street Could Talk (novel; 1974)

The Devil Finds Work (essays; 1976)

Just Above My Head (novel; 1979)

Jimmy's Blues (poems; 1983)

The Evidence of Things Not Seen (essays; 1985)

The Price of the Ticket (essays; 1985)

The Cross of Redemption: Uncollected Writings (essays; 2010)

Jimmy's Blues and Other Poems (poems; 2014)

Together with others:

Nothing Personal (with Richard Avedon, photography) (1964)

A Rap on Race (with Margaret Mead) (1971)

One Day When I Was Lost (orig.: A. Haley; 1972)

A Dialogue (with Nikki Giovanni) (1973)

Little Man Little Man: A Story of Childhood (with Yoran Cazac, 1976)

Native Sons (with Sol Stein, 2004)

Music/Spoken Word Recording:

A Lover's Question (CD, Les Disques Du Crépuscule – TWI 928-2, 1990)

Wikipedia

[theonceoverthinker]

OUAT 2X16 - The Miller’s Daughter

I actually don’t have a pun this time, but if you want to read some semi-interesting thoughts on this episode, comedy bits that may or may not be funny, and for me to try to analyze costumes despite having fork all knowledge about them, then come with me and you’ll be in a world of fairytale serialization!

Press Release Cora’s desire to rid herself of Rumplestiltskin in order to take his place as The Dark One takes one step closer to becoming reality as she and Regina try to overpower a dying Mr. Gold, and Mary Margaret is once again tempted by dark magic. Meanwhile, in the fairytale land that was, Rumplestiltskin agrees to offer his services to a younger Cora - for a price - when the king calls her bluff and orders her to actually follow through on her boast of being able to spin straw into gold. General Thoughts - Characters/Stories/Themes and Their Effectiveness Past Cora’s psyche was FABULOUSLY written in this segment. She’s not completely unsympathetic, but seeing the things that tick her off and her suggestion of “bloodlust” as her fuel for her magic show that she’s a psychopath. She wants to torture people for looking down on her and it’s appropriately petty. Her ambitions are so strong and appealing to her that they eclipse even her sense of love. We get such a complex picture of this woman here and it frames her perfectly for the tragic fate that comes upon her in the present.

Cora, you are an evil woman but I’d be lying through my teeth if I said you didn’t rock that dress! Actually, despite knowing fork all about fashion, I want to continue. Let’s talk about the use of color in this scene. Cora’s wearing a red and black dress, though it’s predominantly red. I feel like this can be read (Or rather, RED XD ) as Cora being a person who wants bloodlust and who is finally deciding to let the blackness in her heart take over in order to get what she wants. Also lets not the silver on he dress as well in the form of the jewel or brooch (Note my lack of fashion know how), a small but noticeable reflection of the values Henry Sr. wants in a wife. And speaking of, Henry Sr. is dressed, not only in white, but white and silver. The white, of course, is his sense of goodness which does win out in the end, but the silver to me stands in for the speckle of darkness that his future endeavors with an evil Cora and an eventually evil Regina will be involved in. Finally, let’s look at the king. His clothes are roughly half black and half white. I read that as him ultimately having good intentions for his son and kingdom but being wicked for all that he puts Cora through, knowing her rank, status, and likely abilities.

While I understand that this borders of shipping stuff, and I usually separate that, I like how while Cora and Henry Sr. have a relationship that’s not at all antagonistic at the very start, they don’t spend enough time together to discover whether or not it’s love, making their dysfunction later on make so much sense. Present I have a lot to say about Snow wanting to kill Cora...just not here, if that makes sense. While I remember it going overboard in upcoming episodes (Prepare for the longest eye roll in the world when Snow goes on about how it was easy to kill Cora), it’s really well executed here. Snow riles herself up to kill Cora and when it finally happens, she realizes how she wasn’t ready for the internal consequences in regards to her heart and sense of goodness (Not to mention her safety from Regina!). Snow’s rage from the last episode’s ending is still so present, and it’s appropriately framed as a risky path she might not want to take, but just might have to.

Snow utterly GETS Regina as she’s giving her the heart. It’s horribly twisted just how much she’s able to pick on Regina’s need for a mother’s love and use that to get Regina to kill Cora. That moment really struck as the one where she realized (And me) that for as tactical as the move was, it may have been too cruel. All Encompassing I love seeing Cora as she started out because it says so much about the presentation she’s built around herself over the course of her rise to power. Cora has a fiery and snippy temper that she can just hardly control, even among the royals who she so desperately wants to be one of. The Cora of the present composes herself so well and it’s such an interesting contrast, especially in the moments when that anger does comes out.

It’s such an interesting contrast as the scene where Emma learns how to use magic cuts to the one where Cora learns to use magic. In the Emma scene, Rumple has her conjuring a mental idea of those she loves and wants to protect and why so that she can help others. Meanwhile, in the Cora scene, the ideas Rumple has Cora conjure have to deal with those she wants to harm and kill so that she can better her own status. It’s a great point of contrast not only for the two characters, BUT also for how light magic and dark magic are uniquely created. Also, given how Rumple is a Dark One who was at one point a Savior (Though I acknowledge that that might not have been created at the time), it’s great to see Rumple at the cornerstone of both lessons, showing a sympathy and understanding for both women.

“I realized no matter how good I was or how hard I worked, I was never gonna be more than I am now.” Cora and SNow are conflicting characters in this episode, and it’s so cool to see that at one point (Obviously longer for Snow by a huge margin), both women held the idea that goodness being the cause of good fortune as true. Insights - Stream of Consciousness -I love the design of Cora’s home in the past. With the placement of her father in the wheelbarrow and the dirty colors all around, it really highlights the squalor that Cora’s lived in all her life. Additionally, the castle in the still quite visible distance is the perfect thing to show her ambition to be more than she is and ascend to royalty. The melancholic music in the background just brings it all home. -Going off of my last review, I love how Eva is characterized in her small moment. The trip is pre-mediated (But in a smart way) and the Season 3 episode where they first meet even gives more of a reason as to why she was so horrible here. -Those bunks are actually roomier than I thought they’d be for a pirate ship. -I like Rumple’s subversion of expectations with Emma as he asks if she wants him to die before they return to Storybrooke. He always expects the worst out of people (As semi-justly as that mentality is) and when they show that that’s he’s wrong (whether he understands that or not) is just so nice! -”I-I’m not wicked.” You are about to kill at least four people! Yes, you are wicked! Or evil, since ‘wicked’ is more of Zelena’s schtick. -Also, Cora’s reaction to the phone call is hysterically petty. She’s like a cat. -Yes, Regina! Doubt her! (fork me with a rusty fork, the dialogue is just AMAZING here!) -*wistfully sighs* The stylized design of this ball is so beautiful. The masks, the dancing, the layout! It’s so distinct! -I have to ask: Does Cora know that that’s Henry Sr. when she originally gossips about him right to his face? On one hand, I’m not sure we’re supposed to interpret that that way, but on the other hand, it’s a very Cora thing to do. -It’s really weird to see someone on this show say ‘whore’ (“Whoring” in context, but still!). -”Cora. Sounds like something breaking.” I can’t say that I agree with you, Rumple. Cora’s a lovely name! We just need someone less evil to have it! -”Can ya read”” I think this is the first time Rumple’s actually checked to see if someone could read! He really should do that more! Like, so many of the people he deals with are defenseless peasants! So what the hell?! -Love that pen, Rumple! THAT is a deal-making pen! -”For a rainy day.” You say that a lot, Rumple. What, did a rainy day eat your dog or something? -”And there’s no coming back from death, either.” Give it a season, Rumple. And then another. And Then Another. And. Then. Another. AND THEN ANOTHER! I don’t hate this plot device, but it really happens a lot! XD -”...When he learns that you killed his grandpa.” Rumple, the other solution is her killing his adoptive grandma/great-grandma. This isn’t as much of a point in your favor as you think it is! XD -I love how they showed Emma using magic here. You really feel the step-by-step process in how it’s done. I wish they’d use that filming style more often in the future, but I guess I get that the creators acknowledge that we get the deal in the later seasons. -”I rip out his throat and I crunch his veins with my teeth.” That is amazingly disturbing imagery! Like, the writing of those lines are so impactful and frankly scary! -”To a child.” So, I don’t know if this was the fault of casting, but Eva and Cora are too close in age for the difference to be all that remarkable. -”I want their kneecaps to crack and freeze upon the stones. I want their necks to break from bending.” Another instance of disturbing as all here writing, but done so eloquently that it’s beautiful. -I like how Regina and Cora are able to pretty easily take down Emma’s protection spell together while Cora takes longer to do it on her own, showing that even though Emma’s the Savior and indeed powerful, she still has a lot to learn. -Also, good on you, Emma for giving Regina a last chance! -”WHEN YOU SEE THE FUTURE, THERE’S IRONY EVERYWHERE!” Finally! I not only now know for life where that forking quote comes from, but after referencing it time after time, it’s so good to hear it again! -Another note on the costume colors: The only time Cora rejects her ambitions are when she’s wearing her opposite color: White. The goodness in her is so overpowering! -I love the distorted version of the classic Once tune that plays as Snow is getting Cora’s heart. -”At least this cursed power will pass from this world.” I’m not sure how I feel about this line when it comes to Rumple, given how just two episodes ago, he was so on team magic, but given that the dagger both threatens his family now and caused the initial separation from Bae, I can understand the sentiment. -I’d like to think that when Cora sent Emma and Neal away, she essentially just did it via subconscious randomizer! XD -”Did you ever love me?” Given everything that happened with Milah, it makes sense that Rumple would ask this going forward with his romantic endeavors. -”I did nothing.” Yes, you did! Rumple, who the here told Snow about the freakin’ candle the second time? I love you, man, but don’t weasel completely out of this! -Something I noticed: So, I know that the point of contention with Regina blaming Snow for Daniel’s death is a hot topic (Hell, I even saw a debate about it this morning), and I can’t help but feel like this was written partially so that Regina would have a more...legitimate reason to hate Snow. Arcs - How are These Storylines Progressing? Rumple Finding Baelfire/Neal - I actually discuss there two in just a moment! Regina’s Redemption - This episode definitely shows Regina’s sense of good and evil being pit against each other and Cora is right in the middle of it. In the shop, she’s directly by Regina’s side and there, she won’t even entertain the idea of Emma’s offer to change sides. But when Cora and Regina are separated, and the idea of Cora’s real love is brought up, that’s when we see her goodness win. Cora in Storybrooke - Here concludes this arc, and I honestly loved it. Like all of the best villains and their arcs, Cora leaves so much on the floor (Apart from her corpse, that is) in terms of emotional issues for our main cast, especially Snow and Regina. The arc itself  was also well written and well paced. Not to mention, it mixed very well with Regina’s Redemption by forcing it to be turned back a bit, showing that Regina’s redemption won’t be so easy. Favorite Dynamic Rumple and Neal - These guys have a scene that’s maybe half a forking minute and they steal the god damned episode with it. Rumple finally gets to say what we all know he really wanted to say. And what I especially love here is how Neal hears him out but does not forgive him! Like, Rumple is dying and he doesn’t fully absolve him, and I think that was such a bold and brilliant thing for Espenson to do. It shows that Neal’s pain, even in this moment, still matters, and while there can be softness, that pain hasn’t gone away. It’s such a small, but insightful understanding of their relationship. Writer Jane Espenson hit the writing out of the forking park! At least a few times during the episode had such intricate language. Honestly, it almost freaks me out a bit with the imagery she painted during the ‘bloodlust’ scene with the way she has Rumple and Cora speak about the harm they wish to inflict on those who scorned them! While there are errant lines here and there that I don’t like (I jotted a few down in “Insights”, they’re so few and far between that they hardly matter. The storytelling and character work here is great, too. She took advantage of all of the little nuances from the other episodes and shows just how much attention she was paying here. Rating Golden Apple. This was a great end to Cora’s story. Intersped with two fantastic stories that connect pretty well are great character moments between our main cast. It’s incredibly solid for an episode that serves as such a big moment of culmination, but it is. It’s entertaining, heartwarming, heartbreaking, disturbing at some points, and everything else in between. The feeling of tension as the Mills/Charming-Stiltskin war comes to a head is present through the entire flashback and Cora’s backstory only shows how much of a threat she truly is. Flip My Ship - Home of All Things “Shippy Goodness” Snowing - I like how David knows Snow well enough to know exactly what killing Cora will do to her psychologically. A subtle moment like that really shows how well these two click. Golden Heart (Cora/Rumple) - I’d be lying if I didn’t say there weren’t sparks that could light the Enchanted Forest up like a menorah between Rumple and Cora. I love the way they bond over bloodlust and their kiss in front of the mirror while Cora’s in her wedding dress is a little hot! Look, I LOVE mopey dopey puppy love ships like Snowing, Rumbelle, or Captain Swan, but I LOVE villain ships! I love when a couple loves evil and each other, the exact order notwithstanding and this episode gives me exactly what I want. In another world, I would totally have had Rumple and Cora be together and have episodes and be recurring villains, but that (partially) doesn’t happen. Still, I’m grateful for what we get here. Also, I love when while Cora places her heart on Rumple’s chest, he says “I will show you EVERYTHING,” meaning his heart and love as well. I’ve also got to point out that Rumple and Cora can do that thing that the True Loves do when their kisses can be indicative of when something is wrong. Finally, Cora’s pentultimate dying words are “this would’ve been enough,” and Rumple and Regina are the only two in the scene, meaning that she would’ve wanted to be with them as a family. Rumbelle - I could honestly just put the entire phone call here and it would cover everything I want to say. It’s such a beautiful goodbye. However, I’m going to reference just a single line that comes in early on. “You are a hero.” Rumple knows how much being a hero means to Belle and that’s the first thing he tells her. It’s her ambition for herself and he places that ahead of her ambitions for him. That’s just heartbreaking. And it’s here that Rumple first says a sentiment that carries him to the series finale: “You make me wanna go back to the best version of me.” And that forking almost silent “Thank you, Belle” legitimately choked me up. ()()()()()()()()() Thank you for reading and to the fine folks at @watchingfairytales!

Wow. After all the pain that Cora caused, Storybrooke’s more or less a new town! I guess we should welcome ourselves there. ;) See you next time. Season 2 Tally (142/220) Writer Tally for Season 2: Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis: (39/60) Jane Espenson (35/50) Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg (24/50) David Goodman (24/30)* Robert Hull (16/30) Christine Boylan (17/30) Kalinda Vazquez (20/30) Daniel Thomsen (18/20)* * Indicates that their work for the season is complete

Operation Rewatch Archives

[fillecurieusewritings]

Tuesday Thoughts (1/4/2022)

A while ago I had a crush on this guy and as freshman in college, I figured this would be a fresh start. Noting that I had never been in a relationship before, I figured with college there are an endless amount of outcomes. For reference, I grew up in a predominantly white area when I was a child and I am a black girl. Going to school with mostly white people led me to develop feelings of insecurity because I was oftentimes looked down upon. I remember vaguely what one kid said to me in regards to dating me. He said "I would never date a black girl, because I do not like black girls". That one statement hit me like a truck. Being in middle school at the time it really made me realize that the reason why a lot of people don't like me (romantically or platonically) is because I'm black.

Therefore I developed an insecurity that lasted even after I moved to a predominantly black area. Upon going to a new school where there were more people who looked like me, there was a lack of people who acted like me. Many people would say I acted white and wouldn't befriend me, with the little white people that were at the school I attended, they didn't want to befriend me because well I live in the south so you get the picture. Essentially I attend all of K-12 friendless and boyfriend-less.

So when college came around I was quite desperate. Initially upon starting college I just kept to myself and only joined one club. Within that club I was still reserved but had a great time.

As time moved on I started breaking from my shell some and had developed feelings for this guy (who for the record is white) that was an avid member. One night I was hanging out with some other members and I told them how I felt about him, in which they responded that he had a girlfriend at the time. Now I'm not a home wrecker so I let the feelings die, but a few weeks later he broke up with said girlfriend. Not wanting to be a rebound, I tried to tread lightly with him in hopes that we would become friends and he would develop feelings. That all changed when the girl he's currently dated joined the club. I knew from the moment she walked through the doors of the classroom we were using, that she had him hooked.

As members in the club grew closer (it was club that consisted of at least 20 people) we stared having kickbacks and parties (pre-covid). I remember at one I tried to talk to him and start making my advances. Within that same week he told me himself he liked her, and in a fit of denial I confessed my feelings to him hoping it would sway his mind a little.

It did not.

He reiterated that he had feelings for her.

The statements of "if he wanted to, he would" rang out to me a lot. He would constantly pick her up for the parties making sure she had a ride, he would walk her home from club meetings (even though she lived on campus and he lived in the apartments located near the campus - in which he would have to walk all the way back across campus), he would give her his jacket if it was cold outside.

All these little things made me realize more and more that he did actually like her. Then I started getting jealous and upset, thinking about all the times I was rejected. From a physical standpoint she's the perfect girl, model material. Pasty white skin, with light green eyes and long slightly curly brown hair. She was skinny and had one of the best fashion senses I've seen in a while.

Now that I reflect, I too had a crush on her, it was because she was everything I wanted to be.

I remember one encounter I had with her was at one of the parties the club hosted. At the time her and I were cool because we had many encounters outside of the club so we were familiar with each other. I remember pulling her aside and telling her about my feelings for the guy. Part of me hoped that she would back of or tell me she wasn't interested, but the other part wanted her say she felt the same towards him so I could process it and move on.

Essentially, she gave a response that told me she wasn't interested at least not in that moment. Which gave me hope the two of them would fall through. I felt slightly betrayed when they started hanging out more and more because I told her how I felt, it seemed like she didn't care at least enough to tell me to give it up.

But he was not without fault, he did play me a little. He would hug me and hold my hand. He would have long deep conversation with me to the point that it felt like it was just us in the room. He constantly made me feel wanted, I could be looking into things, but briefly it seemed like I had a chance.

All of this happened in the fall semester of freshman year, come spring, they had made things official and began dating. For spring break we all went to this beach in and stayed in a beach house. They were all over each other, but yet he still found time be get into my business. He would constantly do things that made me question his feelings towards me.

Then COVID happened I had to go back home which was 4 hours away from campus, both were from the city of my school so they stayed. Their relationship blossomed and fell more and more into despair.

But.

The more and more I was away from them the more I grew. I realized that how I acted was wrong. I should have let the both of them be. I grew obsessed with them and it wasn't healthy. Quarantine was a blessing and a curse. I wasn't able to have much interaction with peers, but I was able to grow as a person. I took time to myself and focused on what makes me happy. He wasn't the one for me and it took me time to realize that now.

I recently saw an Instagram post with the two of them and I forgot all about them, seeing them together made me feel no other emotions but joy. I'm happy for the two of them. I'm happy that they're happy and still together (even though initially I wanted them to break up so bad and stated multiple times to different people that they wouldn't last).

I am a hopeless romantic, I just love love. And love shouldn't be forced. My person is out there I just have to be patently.

I'm learning to love myself for who I am. I am a strong black women and even though the world may be against me at times, who I am to myself is what is most important. Focusing on me and being a little picky has led me to realize that I'm not missing out on much (straight men suck sometimes).

WIth that being said love who you are first and everything will come along ( I know that sounds cliché, but it holds to be true)

Thank you for listening.

Sincerely,

A curious girl