#its always been sad to me when people are complicit in their own oppression and like. their own communities calling them traitors yeah alr

[nyxi-pixie]

been thinking abt this a lot but the idea of 'pick me girls' has done alarming damage to nuanced discussion of certain characters

[diaryofanangrybitch]

Anger / Apathy

September 2024

I’m a crier. I cry all the time, about everything. I cry when I’m happy, I cry when I’m sad, and I cry when I’m angry.

Angry is something I’ve been a lot lately. Not frustration and annoyance, but red, hot steaming fury. Rage sits beneath my skin and festers there for days on end, begging to be released. I am a kettle on the verge of boiling over, and when the kettle boils over, my tears spill out, too.

Shame comes along with it. Anger has negative connotations, and so do tears. People view anger as something they need to expel — as something to hide or dismiss. It’s something they don’t want others to see. I’ve felt that, too, recently.

Voicing anger is hard. It’s an art form. There are strict social guides around it, and to an extend, these are reasonable. When you’re angry towards a loved one, you must remain contained, avoiding yelling or other aggressions. When you’re angry towards political situations, you must be loud and demanding, but not too much, or you’ll be viewed as violent.

In my case, when I’m angry, I assume people view me as unstable. Why? Because I cannot feel any strong emotion without shedding tears over it. I cannot articulate myself properly. I become one giant human sack of feelings.

That being said, there are only a handful of things that truly make me reach that point — where the feelings are too large for me to hold.

One of those things is injustice. And there seems to be a lot of that at the moment. I’ve always been used to exposure to some level of injustice. I work in violence against women, for Christ's sake. I see it everyday. But right now… the world seems to be in a place darker than its been in years. There is conflict everywhere. From Palestinians being massacred, to children shot dead at school, and from mass rapes to police violence. We cannot get away from it, no matter how hard we try.

The world is a really fucking awful place, and yet somehow, most of us seem to be able to function within it.

It has always baffled me how people can carry on with their lives, making small talk and talking shit, when people (and let’s be honest, mostly men) are out here harming innocent people with no concern. How can people spend time at parties when children are having their limbs blown off? How can they stay silent when police abuse their powers to oppress us?

For me, when I see these things on the news, I can’t leave them alone. I can’t put blinders up and carry on with my day. My whole mood has shifted.

I see these things on the news and feel deflated. That’s the thing with anger, it’s never just anger. It’s hurt. It’s betrayal. It’s disappointment. It’s pure heartbreak. It’s devastation.

People will say that this doesn’t directly effect me, so why does it bother me so much but how could it not? They want us to be silent — to sit still and let it it happen. They don’t want to see our tears or our cries. Our silence gives them what they want — complicity.

Complicity is easier than deviating from the norm, to any extent. If you’re not complicit, you risk your reputation and your own comfort. It’s not easy feeling frustration and hurt and hopelessness. Ignorance truly is bliss. But I don’t want bliss if it means complacency to the abuse of millions of people — if it means allowing injustice and abuses of power to continue to occur.

You’re wrong if you think these don’t effect you. These injustices are so deeply ingrained in our systems that you don’t notice them. That’s their whole purpose and they’re succeeding it in. It’s not normal to have the constant threat of homeless or gun violence looming over us — having our safety depend on our ability to conform.

And I’m sick of it. I’m sick of hearing politicians talk about the importance of public transport, and investing billions in tax payer money to upgrade facilities, just to see PSOs at every single station, ensuring only those deemed deserving by the state are allowed the privilege of movement. It’s the pinnacle of gate keeping. These people with power and authority are not here to keep us safe. They are here to control us.

This increased sense of anger I’m currently feeling, has lead to a steep divestment in over aspects of my life. Things I used to care about have been completely overshadowed. I’ve lost interest in what used to matter, because it doesn’t.

I’ve lost compassion for others concerns, too. Their complaints about minor parts of their days seem so mundane. Everyday life inconveniences pale in comparison to the atrocities occurring across the globe everyday. Don’t be mistaken, I still care, just not to the same extent as I have in the past, which arguably, was already too much.

I’ve been desensitised. It’s not just the news, but my work, too. I see the worst of the worst every single day, knowing there’s little that can be done to stop it, because their struggle is necessary for those in power to uphold their power. More injustice.

It bothers me. It irks me. It weighs on me so heavily I no longer have enough strength left to carry the same compassion to my peers that I used to.

It’s an uncomfortable feeling. I worry I’m dismissing those around me or undermining their experiences. I worry about what others will think when I share my anger. I feel ashamed, but I’d rather sit with that vulnerability than without it, if it means remaining complicit in the persistent abuse and oppression of our fellow humans.

[aion-rsa]

Kevin Can F**K Himself Shows Why The Laugh Track Needs to Die

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

The title card for the new AMC series Kevin Can F**K Himself isn’t accompanied by a jaunty tune or a wild sound effect. When the title appears on the screen, it’s soundtracked by a smattering of aggressive laughter. Creeping up below the laughter is a distressing screeching noise, meant to indicate the rapidly fraying sanity of our heroine. 

So it’s quite fitting that Kevin Can F**K Himself makes a compelling case for why laugh tracks (or canned laughter) need to die a quick death. The series centers on Allison McRoberts (Annie Murphy), a woman trapped in a marriage to the titular Kevin. Kevin is an infuriating man-child. He throws keg parties on his wedding anniversary, spends obscene amounts of money on sports memorabilia, and treats Allison like an accessory. He is emotionally abusive, often making Allison feel worthless by telling her things like she’s a bad driver or that she never finishes things so that he can keep her all to himself. 

Approximately a third of the series takes place in lala sitcom land in which the lighting is abundant, the set is clearly facing an audience, and Kevin is always there, chewing up the scenery like Pac Man chowing down on glowing dots. However, whenever Kevin exits, Allison finds herself in a more contemplative and complex (aka: single-camera) existence. The trouble is she doesn’t have much of an identity anymore because her entire life has hinged on being Kevin’s long-suffering wife. The juxtaposition of the sitcom world against a more realistic setting serves to illustrate just how jarring and unnecessary canned laughter is to a TV show. When we watch dramas, we don’t hear people bawling over the sad parts or gasping during the shocking moments. Nope. So why do laugh tracks persist?

As an early millennial, I grew up in a world in which laugh tracks were the norm. From “Must See TV” on NBC in the ‘90s to the vintage sitcoms on Nick at Nite, comedy was always served up with a heaping side of giggles and guffaws. Historically, the sitcom cadence did rely on a call-and response reaction as they actually were often filmed in front of a live studio audience, but it was rare that the responses that made it to the final episode were genuine and uncut. 

To be clear, when I’m referring to canned laughter here, I’m not just referring to the prerecorded kind. Sure, that might be the official definition, but even the laughter we hear from live studio audiences is goosed in some way prior to airtime. The practice of “sweetening” the laugh track, or adding in favorable reactions to amplify certain jokes has been in practice for decades, and it’s still in use today. While the creators of a show might be able to proudly say that the reactions came from an actual audience, the reactions are almost always tweaked in post-production in order to punch up the jokes that the creators or network want to land. Therefore, the laugh track on all of your favorite sitcoms is a lie. 

An argument could potentially be made that the practice of adding in a laugh track might make people feel a sense of camaraderie or community with others watching. And this is somewhat true. In a 2011 article on laugh tracks, NBC News noted a 1974 psychological study in which it was found that people laughed more frequently if they heard canned laughter following a joke. These types of social cues can make individuals feel comfortable, but they can also promote conformity. Looking back on the history of sitcoms, it sure seems as if laugh tracks have been complicit in keeping misogynistic and racist messaging at the forefront of comedy.

Kevin Can F**K Himself plays with this idea in every frame of its sitcom world. Nothing is actually very funny within the brightly lit walls of the McRoberts’s house. As previously established, Kevin is simply awful. He’s a huge loser. Yours truly wanted to throttle him, Homer Simpson style, during every scene he was in. Yet, since the sitcom land dictates that Kevin is a damn delight, the audience plays along. 

(It’s worth noting here that Kevin Can F**K Himself was filmed in front of a studio audience. However AMC tells us that, due to COVID restrictions, the audience was small and far away, so the laughs were not picked up on the audio. Therefore, much of the laughter you hear on the show was added in post-production.)

The dynamic between Kevin, Allison, and the viewers in the studio is an exaggerated version of a tableau that has been unfolding on our TV screens for decades. We see a harried, hot wife play a straight man to a dumpy doofus husband, and we’re all supposed to think it’s simply hilarious. It’s worth noting that Kevin Can F**K HImself cribs its title from the Kevin James’ sitcom Kevin Can Wait, in which the series unceremoniously killed off James’s first super hot wife on the show (Erinn Hayes), only to replace her with his prior super hot sitcom wife, Leah Remini. Because women are oh so very interchangeable in the sitcom world, the laugh track on that show never skipped a beat. 

Canned laughter has historically enabled the entertainment world to lift up mediocre men such as Doug Heffernan (Kevin James), Raymond Barone (Ray Romano), and Kevin Gable (Kevin James, again) at the women’s expense. For ages, only a very small handful of white males were allowed to create content as showrunners, directors, and writers at networks. As they had control over the laugh track, they became the arbiters of what was funny and what was not funny. They got to shape reactions according to their worldview, painting the schlumpy dudes as heroes and the women as eager sidekicks. 

While there are oodles of examples of the long-suffering wife throughout sitcom history, we rarely think of these women as victims. All in the Family is considered a classic, but Archie Bunker was viciously verbally abusive to his wife Edith in almost every episode. Sure, it was a different era (and Archie surely isn’t intended to be a role model), but take away the laughs, and what’s left is a depressing portrait of a red-faced husband straight up screaming at his beleaguered wife. And don’t even get me started on The Honeymooners classic line, “to the moon, Alice!” Ahahahaha, yes, spousal abuse. Hilarious. Well, the laugh track thought so, anyway. 

In more recent years, verbal abuse on sitcoms focusing on husband-wife dyads has given way to a more subtle form of emotional abuse. Often, this appears in the form of financial abuse in which a spouse spends or hides money from the other in order to keep them in their place. In Kevin Can F**K Himself, Kevin consistently spends money without consulting Allison first. In one episode, he even proudly states that a recent purchase cost “more than our wedding, but less than our car.” 

This type of abuse has played out in sitcoms forever. Doug Heffernan often hid his spending from Carrie, Raymond Barone invested in a go-cart venture without telling Deborah, and even Fred Flintstone stole money from Wilma’s hidden stash (yep, The Flintstones was a cartoon, but it inexplicably also had a laugh track). These transgressions are generally perceived to be harmless on screen, leading to those canned laffs and a resolution in 30 minutes or less, but in real life, this type of clandestine behavior in relation to finances can be catastrophic, trapping an unhappy wife in a relationship with no means to escape. 

Even TV series that didn’t utilize the wife/husband premise – notably Frasier and Friends – often used audience laughter to support misogynistic punchlines. Friends notoriously used the laugh track to support harmful jokes about fat shaming and transphobia while Frasier’s archaic attitudes towards women were often played for comedy. Personally, I will never ever get over how Frasier Crane treated Roz Doyle, slut shaming her at every turn for over a decade when, in fact, Frasier was sleeping with half of Seattle with nary an eyebrow raise in his snooty direction. (Sorry, rant over. But, seriously, Peri Gilpin rules. #JusticeForRoz)

Laugh tracks help normalize these behaviors. If you’re not laughing at the joke when everyone else is, something must be wrong with you. Women have faced this exact dilemma since the beginning of time. Laugh along or be judged as cold and unfeeling. Be in on the joke or be tossed to the side. This truism is even noted in the recent HBO Max series Hacks in which aging comic Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) confesses to a newbie comedienne why she makes fun of herself in her own act. With a wan smile, Deborah says, “I realized they would rather laugh at me than believe me.”

These are the same exact challenges that Allison finds herself facing in Kevin Can F**K Himself. When Kevin is around, Allison tries her best to play the role she’s been given so that he won’t make her life even more miserable. No one believes or cares that Kevin is awful because they think Allison is lucky to even have landed a man at all. The series overtly illustrates that these types of stories have always just shrugged at viewers, telling us, oh well, boys will be boys, while women’s suffering is shoehorned into punchlines instead of taken seriously. Rather than confronting the thorny reality of disentangling the institutions that lift the Kevins up and keep the Allisons down, the sitcom world treats women’s pain like a joke.  

After years and years under Kevin’s oppressive thumb, Allison isn’t laughing anymore. She’s full of rage and ready to break free. When we see her in her life without Kevin, there are no prescriptive beats dictating what’s funny and what’s not. And it’s so refreshing. Life can be funny! Sometimes Allison is funny in her real life too! Annie Murphy is also very very funny! And yet, even in the absence of a laugh track, viewers can pick up on the funny. Because in this modern age of entertainment, viewers are savvy enough to know what they feel. 

As canned laughter has slowly disappeared, TV has opened up to more nuanced emotion, allowing viewers to discover and explore the highs and lows for themselves. It’s probably not surprising to learn that the few existing series that do still use laugh tracks, such as United States of Al and Bob Hearts Abishola – both airing on CBS and both created by Chuck Lorre – have been critiqued for leaning on racist and sexist stereotypes. Oddly enough, an urban myth has been circulating the internet for years, claiming that everyone on laugh tracks is actually dead because the recordings were made so long ago. As modern audio engineers now update their recordings regularly, this is not true, but the truth is that the laugh track itself is soon headed to an unmarked grave in the entertainment cemetery alongside tube televisions, Smell-O-Vision, and home video rentals.  

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

With critically acclaimed comedies such as Schitt’s Creek (also starring Annie Murphy!), Fleabag, and The Good Place getting laughs without any pre-recorded assistance, home audiences are getting more savvy as to what’s actually funny and what’s just a cheap shot. In addition, social media and the ubiquitous sharing of memes have effectively displaced the laugh track, as people can now actually be part of an interactive community with others, watching and reacting to the same show at the same time. 

In Kevin Can F**K Himself, canned laughter has finally taken its rightful place as a relic of the past. The chuckles and chortles that pepper the series are a knowing nod to a bygone era in which TV series tried to force the funny on viewers instead of letting them find their own way. Finally, laugh tracks aren’t in on the joke; they are the joke.

Kevin Can F**k Himself airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on AMC.

The post Kevin Can F**K Himself Shows Why The Laugh Track Needs to Die appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2UmnzJj

[thepatriotplace-blog]

The Patriot Warrior Class

Its been awhile since I’ve posted on Tumblr. In fact I actually kind of forgot I had the account. I created this account a few years ago and I named it “the patriot place”. Pretty self explanatory.

Let me tell you about me. I am first and foremost a patriotic American. I have always called myself a patriot. I’ve been a libertarian party member for many years. I’ve voted in many POTUS general elections for the libertarian candidate (with the exception of 2x). I’ve always had a deep love for the US constitution have spoken out about the blatant corruption of the constitution that has been going on in America my whole life.

I also consider myself a warrior. Although I have never served in the military I was a police officer for 25 years and have since retired. My duties as a police officer included SWAT and emergency tactical medicine. I have been trained by the best warriors America has to offer.

Since the election of Donald Trump (who I didn’t vote for) I have seen the rapid decay of the Libertarian Party. It has become polluted with progressives, pedophiles and people suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome. My interactions with the neo-libertarians has been sad. Justin Amash has completely flipped in my view and I align more with Rand Paul than I do with Ron Paul. Jo Jorgesen who is the Libertarian’s Party POTUS candidate is and her public support of a Marxist organization was the last straw for me. I am no longer a member of the libertarian party.

I now consider myself a member of the patriot warrior class. I am prepared to fight and die for the Republic and its constitution. I took an oath to uphold the constitution of the United States and that doesn’t end when there is  (Ret.) at the end of my name. There are many like me. Men and women who served and are currently serving to protect our Republic who believe in what I believe in are what will save this country from the Marxist insurrection, which is back politically by the Democrat Party and financed by the CCP and George Soros that is taking place within the US’s borders.

The neo-libertarians wont fight for the Republic. They are feckless and nothing more than internet bottle throwers and trolls. Their mentality is the same as the progressives, ‘Burn it down at all costs to get Trump out.”

The single most important event that turned the page in this chapter in my life had to be Trump’s speech at the National Archives Museum on Constitution Day. I have never heard a politician since Reagan deliver a speech more patriotic than this speech. I’ve included the transcript of that speech. So I will end this post with this.... In 2020 I will vote Vote Trump.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Thank you, Mike. A great Vice President. I am truly honored to be here at the very first White House Conference on American History. So important.

Our mission is to defend the legacy of America’s founding, the virtue of America’s heroes, and the nobility of the American character. We must clear away the twisted web of lies in our schools and classrooms, and teach our children the magnificent truth about our country. We want our sons and daughters to know that they are the citizens of the most exceptional nation in the history of the world. (Applause.)

To grow up in America is to live in a land where anything is possible, where anyone can rise, and where any dream can come true — all because of the immortal principles our nation’s founders inscribed nearly two and a half centuries ago.

That’s why we have come to the National Archives, the sacred home of our national memory. In this great chamber, we preserve our glorious inheritance: the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights.

On this very day in 1787, our Founding Fathers signed the Constitution at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. It was the fulfillment of a thousand years of Western civilization. Our Constitution was the product of centuries of tradition, wisdom, and experience. No political document has done more to advance the human condition or propel the engine of progress.

Yet, as we gather this afternoon, a radical movement is attempting to demolish this treasured and precious inheritance. We can’t let that happen. (Applause.) Left-wing mobs have torn down statues of our founders, desecrated our memorials, and carried out a campaign of violence and anarchy. Far-left demonstrators have chanted the words “America was never great.” The left has launched a vicious and violent assault on law enforcement — the universal symbol of the rule of law in America. These radicals have been aided and abetted by liberal politicians, establishment media, and even large corporations.

Whether it is the mob on the street, or the cancel culture in the boardroom, the goal is the same: to silence dissent, to scare you out of speaking the truth, and to bully Americans into abandoning their values, their heritage, and their very way of life.

We are here today to declare that we will never submit to tyranny. We will reclaim our history and our country for citizens of every race, color, religion, and creed.

The radicals burning American flags want to burn down the principles enshrined in our founding documents, including the bedrock principle of equal justice under law. In order to radically transform America, they must first cause Americans to lose confidence in who we are, where we came from, and what we believe. As I said at Mount Rushmore — which they would love to rip down and it rip it down fast, and that’s never going to happen — two months ago, the left-wing cultural revolution is designed to overthrow the American Revolution.

As many of you testified today, the left-wing rioting and mayhem are the direct result of decades of left-wing indoctrination in our schools. It’s gone on far too long. Our children are instructed from propaganda tracts, like those of Howard Zinn, that try to make students ashamed of their own history.

The left has warped, distorted, and defiled the American story with deceptions, falsehoods, and lies. There is no better example than the New York Times’ totally discredited 1619 Project. This project rewrites American history to teach our children that we were founded on the principle of oppression, not freedom.

Nothing could be further from the truth. America’s founding set in motion the unstoppable chain of events that abolished slavery, secured civil rights, defeated communism and fascism, and built the most fair, equal, and prosperous nation in human history. (Applause.)

The narratives about America being pushed by the far-left and being chanted in the streets bear a striking resemblance to the anti-American propaganda of our adversaries — because both groups want to see America weakened, derided, and totally diminished.

Students in our universities are inundated with critical race theory. This is a Marxist doctrine holding that America is a wicked and racist nation, that even young children are complicit in oppression, and that our entire society must be radically transformed. Critical race theory is being forced into our children’s schools, it’s being imposed into workplace trainings, and it’s being deployed to rip apart friends, neighbors, and families.

A perfect example of critical race theory was recently published by the Smithsonian Institution. This document alleged that concepts such as hard work, rational thinking, the nuclear family, and belief in God were not values that unite all Americans, but were instead aspects of “whiteness.” This is offensive and outrageous to Americans of every ethnicity, and it is especially harmful to children of minority backgrounds who should be uplifted, not disparaged.

Teaching this horrible doctrine to our children is a form of child abuse in the truest sense of those words. For many years now, the radicals have mistaken Americans’ silence for weakness. But they’re wrong.

There is no more powerful force than a parent’s love for their children. And patriotic moms and dads are going to demand that their children are no longer fed hateful lies about this country. American parents are not going to accept indoctrination in our schools, cancel culture at our work, or the repression of traditional faith, culture, and values in the public square. Not anymore. (Applause.) Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.

We embrace the vision of Martin Luther King, where children are not judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

The left is attempting to destroy that beautiful vision and divide Americans by race in the service of political power. By viewing every issue through the lens of race, they want to impose a new segregation, and we must not allow that to happen.

Critical race theory, the 1619 Project, and the crusade against American history is toxic propaganda, ideological poison that, if not removed, will dissolve the civic bonds that tie us together. It will destroy our country.

That is why I recently banned trainings in this prejudiced ideology from the federal government and banned it in the strongest manner possible. (Applause.)

The only path to national unity is through our shared identity as Americans. That is why it is so urgent that we finally restore patriotic education to our schools.

Under our leadership, the National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded a grant to support the development of a pro-American curriculum that celebrates the truth about our nation’s great history. (Applause.)

We are joined by some of the respected scholars involved in this project, including Professor Wilfred McClay. Wilfred, please. Thank you very much. Welcome. (Applause.) Thank you. Dr. Peter Wood of the National Association of Scholars. Dr. Peter. (Applause.) Thank you. Thank you. And Ted Rebarber. Thank you, Ted. (Applause.) Thank you very much, Ted.

Today, I am also pleased to announce that I will soon sign an Executive Order establishing a national commission to promote patriotic education. It will be called the “1776 Commission.” (Applause.) Thank you. Thank you. It will encourage our educators to teach our children about the miracle of American history and make plans to honor the 250th anniversary of our founding. Think of that — 250 years.

Recently, I also signed an executive order to establish the National Garden of American Heroes, a vast outdoor park that will feature the statues of the greatest Americans who have ever lived.

Today, I am announcing a new name for inclusion. One of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence was a patriot from Delaware. In July of 1776, the Continental Congress was deadlocked during the debate over independence. The delegation from Delaware was divided. Caesar Rodney was called upon to break the tie.

Even though he was suffering from very advanced cancer — he was deathly ill — Rodney rode 80 miles through the night, through a severe thunderstorm, from Dover to Philadelphia to cast his vote for independence.

For nearly a century, a statue of one of Delaware’s most beloved citizens stood in Rodney Square, right in the heart of Wilmington.

But this past June, Caesar Rodney’s statue was ordered removed by the mayor and local politicians as part of a radical purge of America’s founding generation.

Today, because of an order I signed, if you demolish a statue without permission, you immediately get 10 years in prison. (Applause.) And there have been no statues demolished for the last four months, incredibly, since the time I signed that act.

Joe Biden said nothing as to his home state’s history and the fact that it was dismantled and dismembered. And a Founding Father’s statue was removed.

Today, America will give this Founding Father, this very brave man, who was so horribly treated, the place of honor he deserves. I am announcing that a statue of Caesar Rodney will be added to the National Garden of American Heroes. (Applause.)

From Washington to Lincoln, from Jefferson to King, America has been home to some of the most incredible people who have ever lived. With the help of everyone here today, the legacy of 1776 will never be erased. Our heroes will never be forgotten. Our youth will be taught to love America with all of their heart and all of their soul.

We will save this cherished inheritance for our children, for their children, and for every generation to come. This is a very important day.

Thank you all once again for being here. Now I will sign the Constitution Day Proclamation. God Bless You. And God Bless America. Thank you very much.

[torreygazette]

My Lament

It’s been a year and two weeks. Fifty-four weeks ago I said goodbye to my church home of twenty years. After the service, we came back home with those friends who understood the depth of pain, relief, and joy that leaving this church was to us. We fellowshipped, lamented, and celebrated. Looking back, that day is a swirl of surreal. It’s also the last day I felt I had community.

We quickly settled into another church of like faith and practice. We chose it because our two teenage boys, who had suffered incalculable pain and loss over the last two years, needed friends. This church had a few boys their age whom they knew through our annual church camp in the Black Hills. It felt like the right choice. Week after week we have gone—morning, evening, and Sunday School. We began to invite people over. When the piano player left, I volunteered to play every other week. I attended a women’s Bible study. We offered our home to begin a youth group. And then COVID-19 happened.

The resulting “couch church” allowed us more flexibility and we began to listen to sermons by one of my favorite pastors (Dale VanDyke at Harvest OPC in Grand Rapids, MI). We continued to listen to our church’s morning service but chose VanDyke’s sermons on Job for our evening “church.” These sermons were like the balm of Gilead to my cracked, fractured, and taped-together soul. But it wasn’t just me; the kids listened raptly, the sermons spoke directly to my husband’s deep wound, and we drank it in.

Then George Floyd was murdered. The country screamed at each other like rabid, frothy-mouthed dogs from their two poles. I broke with grief. These systemic and racial issues are not a new awareness for me (my brother and my daughter are both African American). I have long lamented how most of America sees them and I have seen these very real slights first-hand over and over again. But now—the country “awakening” to what has always been true—brought a mixture of joy (finally!), frustration (where have you all been?), and anger.

My anger, prompted by what I saw on social media from fellow church members and friends in our small OPC and PCA circles, undid me a little bit more. They claimed to care about racism yet denied the truth of history and its effects on the present and—even more acutely painful—they denied the countless stories of their black brothers and sisters. Still nursing my own deep wounds of betrayal and hidden trauma, I felt the rejection and dismissal afresh as my fellow Presbyterians explained away their complaints. I began to feel a queasiness settle in my gut and I fought the urge to flee. These people are not safe. 

Eventually, I decided I needed to quit social media. My anger was troubling my conscience. I needed more patience and forbearance with my fellow Christians, as Christ had infinite patience with me and my own blind spots. I had all but made up my mind when I got a voicemail from an old friend from my time at a children’s charter school (this school is 30% white, the rest mostly African American with a large immigrant population from Africa). I was on the board there and worked hard to recruit Black voices for the board as well as other committee work in order to best represent our students and take advantage of such beautiful diversity. I started a monthly culture club where we celebrated different countries and learned about their customs, food, and dress. Sadly, I had to leave the school two years ago when we were forced to begin home-schooling our girls, a situation directly related to our leaving our church home.

And so the voicemail. I haven’t heard from this friend since we left the school. She was a strong Black voice in the community and had joined the board, doing much to help the other (white) board members understand the unique needs and gifts of her particular community. She was compassionate, loving, and didn’t mind educating others. In her message, she thanked me for my voice on Facebook and for communicating love to her and those who looked like her without further polarizing the divide. She said that my posts gave her and her husband “hope,” and they wanted to let me know how much it meant to them. I cried. My feelings of frustration and even guilt over my frustration faded and they were washed away with a needed reminder that these things matter. 

It was the next week that Aimee Byrd was kicked off one of my favorite podcasts. Having read three of her books and listened to Mortification of Spin for years, I had been watching from a distance as the patriarchy club of the OPC (and PCA) became more and more agitated by her. I admired Aimee and her cool and leveled reasoning, her clear Biblical exegesis, her refusing to stoop to low blows, and her continued presence and speaking the truth in love. Though not a fan of Twitter (fewer pictures of cute kids and kittens, I guess), I started reading, mouth agape, the things people were saying about her. So many false things. My gut churned and stirred again. 

The Earthly Body of Christ

After all of this, I was left with questions. What is going on? Has it always been this way? Is the OPC changing or am I just waking up? It has been a while since I aligned with one political group or the other. The evil that is abortion tends to push me into one camp by necessity, but with so many other issues growing in importance, I have been “at sea” politically for quite a while. But now, one’s political stance and all that encapsulated seemed to be creeping into the church. Identity politics and virtue-signaling impacted a new set of “issues,” but underneath it all, the same. The arrogance of those with power. Ignoring the voices of those who have been oppressed. Not believing those stories of abuse because the accused abusers are “people we know and we know what we know.” Such arrogance and blind eyes to fellow believers’ pain!

“Mourn with those who mourn.” Where are the fellow lamenters? Where is the outcry? Why do we need to temper our outrage over injustices in order that we don’t appear to be on that other side? Why are our pulpits filled more with beseeching God to “restore law and order in the land” than to “restore justice and equity”? Where is the cry of agony over how the church and its people have been complicit, albeit inadvertently, to the sufferings of others? Why is that not the first stop, the first response, the loudest wail? Why the rush to defend our own policies and innocence? It is not just good secular psychological practice to listen and hear the stories of those who have been traumatized as a first step toward healing—it is Christ’s example to us! He came to rescue the down-trodden and the broken-hearted, his mercy toward the weak and abused ended in his literal self-sacrifice—how much more ought we just listen and mourn.

Coincidentally (yes, I know, “providentially”), my husband was asked to preach at other churches in May and June. I decided to do a three-week road trip with the kids to visit friends and family in several states. Leaving home without him, I was trepidatious and not enthusiastic. Yet as the miles slipped by, I enjoyed the company of my children (especially my oldest boy who was my co-driver for the first time), listened to more excellent preaching, and attended three different churches. I began to acknowledge just how very adrift we were.

I was alone. My family and I are alone. We are aliens in this land and we are in pain. We have been betrayed by those close to us and it hurts very much. We have a story we cannot share. We know first-hand what it is to be forced into silence while those in power flourish. Our unwavering faith in a God (who loves us personally and has a plan of goodness I don’t need to understand for it to be true) has kept us steady. But here I was, unmoored from the “have-to’s” of daily life, enjoying those relationships that matter most in my life, not being daily bombarded with reminders of our recent past and the present political climate, and it left a small space for my own loss to begin to wash over me.

Jogging with my brother in the humid and sticky air of Wisconsin, he asked how we were holding up. I said, “We’re doing all right, but just under the surface I am sad. And I am sad all the time.” I didn’t realize this was true until I said it out loud to him. Typing this now makes me cry. It’s true: I am sad all the time. 

I don’t know how to heal without community. I am reading Philip Ryken’s commentary on Jeremiah and Lamentations for my daily devotions (it is rich and wonderful). I am listening to the sermons that remind me of God’s character and his infinite love for me and my family. I am reciting my gratitude list and making “Christ is everything and I have Christ!” my daily mantra. But yet the wound has begun throbbing more acutely than it did a year ago and I am just so sad.

This is my lament. It ends not in despair but in clinging to the only thing that is not sad: Christ and his resurrection. But God calls us to more in this earthly life: eventually, I need to learn to love His people again. No, not love (for I do love them). But to trust them.

I realized last night that my problems with my current church begin and end with me. I have been there long enough that I can see people’s flaws—and their flaws scare me. I am a wounded animal, watching with hyper-vigilance from a corner of the room, unsure where my escape route is, not trusting anyone enough to receive their help. It is easier to find reasons to dislike and dismiss than it is to admit I simply don’t feel safe enough to stay.

But how long, O Lord? How long until I can stand in front of a congregation and profess my commitment to that local body of believers and begin serving and making myself vulnerable and working toward intimacy? How long until I am not afraid of each and every person and their capacity to rip the rug out from under me and my family? How long until I can feel safe? 

Pray for me. Pray for us. Pray for all those who are lamenting in private because they do not feel safe enough to do so publicly in Christ’s church surrounded by reassuring arms, hands, and hearts of non-judgmental love and unconditional acceptance. Feeling stuck in the former, my heart longs for the latter. 

I miss my church community.

[jeremystrele]

Author + Comedian Catherine Deveny On Raising A Trio Of Boys

Author + Comedian Catherine Deveny On Raising A Trio Of Boys

Family

Emma Eldridge

Comedian and author Catherine Deveny and her partner Anthony Artmann near her home in Melbourne’s north. Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

Catherine has three sons: Dominic (21) Hugo (17) and Charlie (16). Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

She recently contributed to an important new anthology on the topic of abortion, Choice Words. Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

Anthony and Catherine have ‘become tedious, active seniors’ hitting the gym at 6am! Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

Catherine hopes her boys to embrace the notion of logical, not biological, family. Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

‘My kids are lucky because I’ve always lived the life I wanted. They expect to look after themselves,’ tells Catherine. Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

Catherine believes that if motherhood was so amazing, men would be pushing women out of the way to do it! Photo – Sarah Collins for  The Design Files.

I moved from Melbourne to Sydney in my mid-20s, and would often pass The Private Clinic in Surry Hills on my way to university or work. This was before it became illegal to protest outside an abortion service, and the screaming intimidation of pro-life activists (not to mention their plastic models) would take my breath away.

Edited by Louise Swinn with a foreword by Tanya Plibersek, Choice Words: A Collection of Writing about Abortion draws attention to the fact that, though a decade has passed and progress has been made, abortion remains a criminal act in parts of Australia, with prosecution a real risk. In states where procedures are legal, access can prove nearly impossible.

Today we talk with author and comedian Catherine Deveny about her contribution to the book, and how she’s fiercely balanced a multifaceted career with care for her family.

You’re a comedian and columnist, author and atheist, television personality and teacher – with three sons. Can you tell us a bit about your professional vision and how it’s evolved since starting out in stand-up and writing for Steve Vizard’s Tonight Live?

I am a carnie and have simply set out to make a living and support my family and friends by doing what I love to do – which is a heap of things that involve words, people and creativity. I’ve muddled through having no idea what was next.

When I was four, my kindergarten teacher asked the class what we wanted to be when we grew up. Darren wanted to be a fireman, Leanne a nurse, but I wanted to be Carol Burnett. I’ve always loved performing, and music was one of the bright lights of my childhood. From six to 12, I was desperate to learn dance, singing and piano but we couldn’t afford it. So when I wasn’t cooking, I was hunched over macramé, knitting, sewing and crochet.

I grew up poor, in a dysfunctional and emotionally chaotic family. When I was 10,  things were particularly dire. The car had been repossessed; the water was down to a drip; and things were broken, dirty, missing and old. I would collect the mail, and if there was a ‘letter with a window’ I’d know it was a bill – and when mum and dad got home, no matter how shit they felt the sight of more bills would make it worse.

One night, Mum and Dad said, ‘We’ve got no money. If you can cut any corners please do.’ I had a camp note in my bag from school that day; I was so excited about it, the break from home was all I’d been thinking about since being handed the form. I remember silently scrunching up the note and putting it in the bin. I remember tears and gulping. I didn’t say a word to my parents, and remember the day the kids went to camp. I watched the bus leave and felt excluded, alone.

The next year I was in Year Six. We’d lost the house and were now living in public housing. My parents had sold their shop and were bankrupts; the worst was behind us financially, but we were still poor. When the form for camp was handed out, I took it home and asked Mum to sign it. ‘But we’ve got no money, Catherine – we can’t afford it.’ I said, ‘I’ll find the money, Mum. Just sign the note.’ And she did.

So I sold macramé owls, lavender bags and pin cushions door-to-door. I made the money and went to camp – and still look back on it as one of the happiest weeks of my life. That sense of achievement has never left me, and I’ve  been financially independent ever since.

I did stand-up for the first time at The Espy when I was 23; I got a very positive review, which was thrilling. On my 24th birthday, I was offered a full-time job as a comedy writer on Tonight Live with Steve Vizard. From then until now, I’ve shifted through television writing, stand-up, being a ‘warm-up man’ for studio audiences, writing columns, doing one woman shows, writing books, giving keynotes, hosting conferences, facilitating panels and now running my Gunnas Writing Masterclasses, workshops and retreats. I’ve done quite a bit of television, including being on Q&A five or six times and appearing on Go Back To Where You Came From.

You’ve written on what you term ‘the narcissism of motherhood… the competition and judging each other from labour to Year 12 results to grandchildren.’ It’s so true, but why? I imagine you have an excellent approach for dealing with this or calling it out?  

Sometimes I say, ‘That’s amazing about your high achieving, good looking, well-balanced kids – congrats! My kids play computer games, watch porn and make bongs.’ I won’t enable their competition parenting. When they ask, ‘What school do your kids go to?’ I respond, ‘What difference does it make?’ and flat out refuse to answer until they give me a rational answer. They never do.

But I don’t really call it out – I observe it and feel sad. These women are complicit in their own oppression, and we’ve all had a role to play in that. If motherhood was so amazing, men would be pushing women out of the way to do it – and mums would be paid bucket loads and not used to advertise toilet cleaner.

Religion, the patriarchy and state have had a vested interest in sucking women in to be slaves and incubators. Not only does having women raise children allow the powers-that-be to have full access to control, decision-making, money and recreation, it keeps women away from those things and makes them dependent. They appeal to women’s egos, take advantage of social conditioning and manipulate them to feel they are not real women unless they’re caring for children in a labour-intensive way.

I hold these views despite really loving being a parent. My experience has been excellent – the boys’ dad and I practised more or less equal parenting and paid work/career building. I have always been financially, creatively, socially, emotionally and intellectually independent. That is all my sons know – they consider it normal.

As one of the Top 100 Most Influential Melburnians, you’ve got quite a platform – and views you’ve expressed regarding veterans and farmers have blown up. How do you deal with the outrage and trolling, and teach your sons to get through it and consider alternative perspectives?

The lion does not lose sleep over the opinion of sheep; I don’t care what morons and trolls think, they don’t matter. I’ve tried to teach my sons to consider different perspectives by modelling that behaviour. I just eyeroll and vague out when I hear people say things like, ‘I raised my kids to…’ They’re like plants, you can’t make them grow how you want them to! I treated them as equals from the get go, and have never told them what to think. Jung said, ‘The greatest burden a child must bear is the unlived life of its parents.’ My kids are lucky because I’ve always lived the life I wanted. They expect to look after themselves, have a meaningful life and a career that makes them happy. They expect a life not a living because that is all they’ve ever seen.

You contributed to Choice Words, an anthology on abortion. From Trump’s use of stark, graphic language to condemn late-term abortion in his State of the Union address (see Backyard Briefing’s investigation into this in Oz) to the Queensland Government’s legalisation, abortion has been back in the news big-time. Why do you think it’s still considered a women’s (and not human rights) issue, and one that men have an outsized interest in?

Because men don’t want to parent. They don’t mind being dads, but as far as truncating their lives and career trajectory, they’ve no interest. And that’s fine; I’ve written about my support for ‘financial abortion,’ where men can opt out of parenthood’s responsibilities (and privileges) in the case of unwanted pregnancies.

But women should not be forced to become parents any more than men should. The financial and emotional wellbeing of a mother and child should not be dependent on a potentially unreliable and/or abusive source like a father who never wanted a child.

Can you give us a glimpse into how your days start and end at home with your family – an all-male, atheist kibbutz that makes you want to wear a T-shirt emblazoned with the words ‘where have you looked?’

Our days start with coffee. My partner Anthony and I have become tedious, active seniors and often go to the gym at 6am, but if it’s the weekend we will generally sleep in, have a shag, hop on our bikes and have brunch somewhere. But on a school day, it’s coffee, coffee, coffee and then everyone bikes to school, university or work.

I spend most of my days weaving through administrative, domestic, social and work tasks. This can involve anything from emails, invoices, phone interviews and writing for TV and radio to face-to-face interviews and/or photo shoots, running a Gunnas Writing Masterclass, hosting a conference or facilitating a writing workshop at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre.

If I’m not cooking at 5pm, I’m at the IGA preparing to start. I do all the cooking; the boys can cook and do when I go away for weeks at a time, I just don’t want to eat their food, and I like cooking. Dinner can be anything from cabbage rolls, kranskys and ratatouille, sushi poke bowls, schnitzel or stroganoff. One of our favourites is Mongrel Dinner when ‘any mongrel I find in the fridge is getting cooked.’ So grilled halloumi, tomato, basil and bocconcini salad, buttery, garlicky mushrooms and half a chook with some fresh bread and sauerkraut.

Two or three nights a week, I’m out for work or play with or without my darling Anthony. Most of the time I’ll leave food for whoever’s here – the boys have a constant stream of mates over, and we always have drop-ins for dinner.

With your sons now young adults, how might you like them to remember you to their own families – what do you think your parental legacy will be?

They call me a ‘wog mum’ – their Dad is Sicilian, and I’m a bit obsessed with cooking. I’m always asking them what they want to eat, what’s the best thing they’ve had and what I haven’t made for a while. So I hope it’s food, hospitality and generosity that I’m remembered for. The boys have also had housemates their entire lives – there may have been a period of 18 months when it was just ‘mum, dad and the kids’ – so I’d like for them to embrace the notion of logical not biological family.

 Family Favourites

Activity or outing

Breakfast at A Minor Place, lunch at Lobbs and dinner at La Luna Bistro.

Book, film, or show

The Australian Women’s Weekly Children’s Birthday Cake Book? We don’t have a family favourite on many things, we’re quite different and independent.

Place to travel

We all love Asia, but had a great time in Europe 18-months ago together with their dad, his partner, my partner and his sons – we’re a splendid (not blended) family. Closer to home, we holiday in Bear Gully in the winter and Cunjurong in New South Wales in the summer. We ski at Mt Bulla, and this year the youngest came with Anthony and I to Niseko, which we loved.

Choice Words: A Collection of Writing about Abortion by Louise Swinn includes contributions from Jane Caro, Claudia Karvan, Tanya Plibersek and many more. Proceeds from the book go to the charity Marie Stopes Australia, the only national, independently-accredited, not-for-profit safe abortion provider, that has helped more than 600,000 women in the past 20 years.

[in-sightjournal]

Interviewer: Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Numbering: Issue 15.A, Idea: Outliers & Outsiders (Part Nine)

Place of Publication: Langley, British Columbia, Canada

Title: In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal

Web Domain: http://www.in-sightjournal.com

Individual Publication Date: December 15, 2017

Issue Publication Date: January 1, 2017

Name of Publisher: In-Sight Publishing

Frequency: Three Times Per Year

Words: 2,345

ISSN 2369-6885

Abstract

An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. She discusses: UK, Canada, and complicity in activity around Iraq and Kurdistan; the ongoing Iraq and Afghanistan wars; helping with the Culture Project and what it is; the Culture Project act as a repository and incubator for the arts and culture of the Kurds; helping out with money or expertise; war, trauma, rights, and asking why people act this way; and wondering why people can’t be like other animals, like birds that sing. 

Keywords: Culture Project, feminism, Houzan Mahmoud, Iraq, Kurdistan, Kurds.

An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A.: Co-Founder, Culture Project (Part Two)[1],[2],[3],[4]

1. Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Take an example of a developed country such as the UK, or Canada, are they complicit in any of this activity in Iraq and regarding Kurdistan?

Houzan Mahmoud: The UK certainly was complicit in dividing Kurdistan among four countries, i.e. between Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey, due to this we have been suffering endlessly. After the fall of Ottoman Empire and the new reshaping of the map of the Middle East, the borders were drawn, genocides were taking place, and Kurds were denied their right to statehood.

For almost one century, in four different parts of Kurdistan, people waged different struggles – both armed and civilian struggles – to fight for their rights, freedoms, and independence. The four countries that we are confined within, their borders have continuously denied Kurds basic rights and inflicted genocide, imprisonment, and even cultural erasure.

These have been part of their policies towards Kurds. This is why most Kurds never felt a belonging to these countries. Rather, they felt oppressed, degraded, and colonised in their own homelands.

The West, of course, has always kept a blind eye to our suffering. Instead of recognising our rights, all they do, for example in the UK, is to emphasize the unity of Iraq. They know that Iraqi regimes have always oppressed people and carried out crimes against people throughout Iraq, especially against Kurds. Canada also was part of the coalition against Iraq in the first Gulf War in 1991.

2. Jacobsen: What are the quantitative details about women and children, and soldiers, who have been affected by the ongoing Iraq and Afghanistan wars?

Mahmoud: This is beyond knowing. I don’t think even statistics can provide a true account of the loss of lives and casualties of these nasty wars. Although, when we think of war, people mainly think about the number of the dead, but we need to also think about those who are disabled, lost their loved ones, who are traumatised, and have to live with the sorrow of losing their loved one.

The consequences of any war and its damage is not only in the number of the dead, but in the entire destruction of lands, homes, dreams, and turning laughter into a long-lasting sadness. War can turn your life upside down within minutes.

I can think of the recent example of the invasion of Sinjar. The Yezidi town where ISIS killed so many of them. ISIS took the girls as sex slaves and sold so many of them in slave markets. Just imagine, so much crime within an eye blink turned so many lives into hell.

There is more ugliness, more crime, and atrocious outcomes that can never be fully investigated or accounted for, because so many complicit parties in wars don’t want to go into these details. All I really can say is in every war situation that the ordinary civilians have been and will be the main and only victims.

3. Jacobsen: I have helped with the Culture Project. What is it? How is it important to the Kurds and yourself?

Mahmoud: Well, let me tell you something Scott: first of all, thank you so much for your ongoing support, it means a lot to us and our writers and Kurdistan of course. In addition to the fact, that you are probably the first journalist who could make me visit my past as someone who grew up in a war zone, and reflect upon it, otherwise, I wouldn’t usually write or talk about it in such detail.

We have many wonderful writers in the Culture Project and want their work to be proofread and edited to encourage them to write more, and to be sure that their writings are of high calibre and importance.

Secondly, there are other wonderful supporters who were the backbone of Culture Project, one such person is Benjamin David founder of Conatus News, and writer and friend Sarah Mills who have helped tremendously. I want to thank you all for making time to support us, and our writers, essayist, activists and poets.

4. Jacobsen: How does the Culture Project act as a repository and incubator for the arts and culture of the Kurds?

Mahmoud: Culture Project is a unique project that promotes progressive ideals, and critical engagement with art, literature, music, feminism, and gender. We place the question of women in the heart of our project. This is why it is important to make sure our platform is supportive and encouraging to those who want to express their ideas in English.

We are trying to bridge between Kurdistan, its Kurdish diaspora, and the outside world through knowledge production about our society, art, literature, and cultural production, but from a critical point of view.

We are lucky to have a new wave of egalitarian and progressive generation of men and women, who are active against patriarchy, oppressive regimes, and are for rights and freedoms of women.

One highlight of this project is that it’s exposing Kurdish masculinity, violence against women, and advocates for feminism and feminist critique of artistic production that reinforces subordination of women.

5. Jacobsen: How can people help out? Can they donate money or expertise?

Mahmoud: We need all kinds of support. Financial support for our activities in Kurdistan and abroad. As well as expertise from those who know more about art, literature and editing, we need reviewers for artists’ work, music, films, and short stories as well as poetry. We have a wealth of Kurdish literature, art, and poetry that needs exploration and reviewing.

6. Jacobsen: We were talking one time about war and trauma, and women’s rights. You idly asked, “Why are people like this? Why do they go to war? Will they ever learn? Why do they repeat these same mistakes?” I mentioned the several tens of thousands of years of evolutionary history and gave an academic response.

You know Scott, sometimes, I realise that despite the wealth of literature on war, be it history books, poetry, photography, movies etc., some people still don’t ask themselves this simple question; why war?

Why should they support their oppressive governments into war? Hundreds of years of repetitive wars in different contexts and format, still humanity cannot learn from the past. It’s true most ordinary civilians are often opposed to war, but it is governments who decide it and they are the ruling class who do not suffer themselves but it’s the ordinary people who pay the price.

I wish one day comes when people no longer go to war on the order of their government. Another thing makes me feel sick when I think about it, is the use of science in the civilised west and its scientists who continue to produce latest weapons and atomic bombs. Have you realised how many governments possess atomic bombs?

Just imagine if they were used in any wars what will happen to our beautiful planet? To life, to people to animals, trees and flowers, to the birds and even insects? I wish the “clever” scientists of the advanced capitalist machine ask themselves this question why creating all these weapons? Why not try to find cure for disease instead?

Why not spend their lives in a good cause to serve humanity instead of thinking and working day and night of how to invent a new weapon, rocket, bomb or bullet. This is gross, this why sometimes I question the word “human beings” in this case, what kind of humans are they?

7. However, we kept going. You agreed with the explanation, but asked, “Why can’t people be like other animals, like the birds? All they do is sing.” We laughed about that. I reflect on that and think about it.

Mahmoud: Yes, indeed, we did speak about so many things and with some laughter. You know Scott, these issues are so tough, and sad. If I lose sense of humour, I might get trapped in these memories for ever in a very sad and traumatising way.

This not to reduce the importance of these issues. But for us as survivors and activists who fight against the causes of these wars and for rights of people, we have to be hopeful, full of life, and love laughter, songs, and music.

This is why I like birds. They produce these nice sounds, almost as a special song of their own. When I go to the park, especially to Hampstead Heath, I look out for the birds. Those who sing, without any particular reason. They just sing. This makes me happy.

You know Scott, the more we read about war academically or in literature or poetry, even in photos or art about war, it still cannot tell us enough about the reasons of why wars still happen. Why men specifically speaking go to war or make war?

The problem is end of one war is the start of another one. This is what I have seen in my life. No reasoning, justification or excuse can legitimize any war in my opinion.

As much as I am against war, and hate war, and those who start war, I think to myself, “When you are invaded, then you need resistance. When there is resistance, there is glorification. When there is glorification, then there is sacrifice and the story goes on, till we see there is too much destruction and many lives are lost.”

Growing up as a Kurd, we were and still always are a project for invasion and colonisation. This is why resistance is important and often necessary to survival.

I hope there comes one day when the capitalist countries stop making weapons and selling them to our government. I hope that human beings come to a state where they no longer resort to war and invasion of other countries. I just want to live in peace and see peace prevail on our planet.

References

Fantappie, M. (2011, January 30). Houzan Mahmoud of Owfi Tells Us About Her Role in the Struggle for Equality in Iraq and Kurdistan. Retrieved from https://www.w4.org/en/wowwire/equality-human-rights-social-justice-in-iraq-kurdistan/.

IHEU. (2008, September 31). Volunteer of the month: Houzan Mahmoud. Retrieved from http://iheu.org/volunteer-of-the-month-houzan-mahmoud/.

Jacobsen, S.D. (2017, December 8). An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part One). Retrieved from https://in-sightjournal.com/2017/12/08/mahmoud-one/.

Jacobsen, S.D (2017, July 4). Interview with Houzan Mahmoud – Co-Founder, The Culture Project. Retrieved from http://conatusnews.com/interview-houzan-mahmoud/.

Jacobsen, S.D. (2017, June 24). An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud — Co-Founder, Culture Project. Retrieved from https://medium.com/humanist-voices/an-interview-with-houzan-mahmoud-co-founder-the-culture-project-7c8861d186a1.

Mahmoud, H. (2006, September 27). A dark anniversary. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/sep/27/ontheoccasionof24thseptember.

Mahmoud, H. (2006, June 12). A symptom of Iraq’s tragedy. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/jun/12/theendofzarqawitheusmade.

Mahmoud, H. (2004, March 8). An empty sort of freedom. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/mar/08/iraq.gender.

Mahmoud, H. (2005, August 14). Houzan Mahmoud: Iraq must reject a constitution that enslaves women. Retrieved from http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/houzan-mahmoud-iraq-must-reject-a-constitution-that-enslaves-women-5347236.html.

Mahmoud, H. (2005, January 28). Houzan Mahmoud: Why I Am Not Taking Part in These Phoney Elections. Retrieved from https://www.vday.org/node/989.html.

Mahmoud, H. (2007, May 2). Human chattel. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/may/02/humanchattel.

Mahmoud, H. (2006, October 7). It’s not a matter of choice. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/oct/07/wearingtheveilhasneverbee.

Mahmoud, H. (2014, October 10). Kobane Experience Will Live On. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/houzan-mahmoud/kobane-isis_b_5958150.html.

Mahmoud, H. (2014, October 7). Kurdish Female Fighters and Kobanê Style Revolution. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/houzan-mahmoud/kurdish-female-fighters-_b_5944382.html.

Mahmoud, H. (2016, November 1). Mosul And The Plight Of Women. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/houzan-mahmoud/mosul-isis-women_b_12740882.html.

Mahmoud, H. (2006, October 17). The price of freedom. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/oct/17/655000isnotjustanumber.

Mahmoud, H. (2007, April 13). We say no to a medieval Kurdistan. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/apr/13/thefightforsecularisminku1.

Mahmoud, H. (2007, December 21). What honour in killing?. Retrieved from https://www.newstatesman.com/international-politics/2007/12/women-rights-iraqi-honour.

Appendix I: Footnotes

[1] Co-Founder, Culture Project.

[2] Individual Publication Date: December 15, 2017 at www.in-sightjournal.com; Full Issue Publication Date: January 1, 2017 at https://in-sightjournal.com/insight-issues/.

[3] MA, Gender Studies, SOAS-University of London.

[4] Photographs courtesy of Houzan Mahmoud.

Appendix II: Citation Style Listing

American Medical Association (AMA): Jacobsen S. An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two) [Online].December 2017; 15(A). Available from: www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two.

American Psychological Association (APA, 6th Edition, 2010): Jacobsen, S.D. (2017, December 15). An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two). Retrieved from www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two.

Brazilian National Standards (ABNT): JACOBSEN, S. An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two). In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal. 15.A, December. 2017. <www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two>.

Chicago/Turabian, Author-Date (16th Edition): Jacobsen, Scott. 2017. “An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two).” In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal. 15.A. www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two.

Chicago/Turabian, Humanities (16th Edition): Jacobsen, Scott “An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two).” In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal. 15.A (December 2017). www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two.

Harvard: Jacobsen, S. 2017, ‘An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two)‘, In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, vol. 15.A. Available from: <www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two>.

Harvard, Australian: Jacobsen, S. 2017, ‘An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two)‘, In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, vol. 15.A., www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two.

Modern Language Association (MLA, 7th Edition, 2009): Scott D. Jacobsen. “An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two).” In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal 15.A (2017):December. 2017. Web. <www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two>.

Vancouver/ICMJE: Jacobsen S. An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part One) [Internet]. (2017, December; 15(A). Available from: www.in-sightjournal.com/mahmoud-two.

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Copyright

© Scott Douglas Jacobsen, and In-Sight Publishing and In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal 2012-2017. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Scott Douglas Jacobsen, and In-Sight Publishing and In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.  All interviewees co-copyright their interview material and may disseminate for their independent purposes.

An Interview with Houzan Mahmoud, M.A. (Part Two) Interviewer: Scott Douglas Jacobsen Numbering: Issue 15.A, Idea: Outliers & Outsiders (Part Nine) Place of Publication: Langley, British Columbia, Canada…