#just because all white people in present day america are very assimilated together

[weedle-testaburger]

it's funny how americans can understand that not everyone who lives in a red state automatically agrees with the reactionary policies of republicans there, but not that not everyone who lives in a foreign country that does awful shit is automatically supportive of its reactionary policies

[rachelbethhines]

Vintage Shows to Watch While You Wait for the Next Episode of WandaVision - The 60s

So the 60s is the era that Wandavision pulls most heavily from for it’s inspiration. So much so that one could make the argument that each of the first three episodes are all set in the 1960s. Episode one pulls from the early 60s with multiple Dick Van Dyke refences, episode two is very Bewitched inspired, and episode three is aesthetically very similar to The Brady Bunch which started in ‘69. As such it was hard to narrow down the list for this decade and I had to get creative in some ways. 

1. The Andy Griffith Show (1960 - 1968)

The Andy Griffith Show gets kind of a bad rap now a days for being, supposedly, a conservative’s wet dream. People claiming it as such have apparently never actually seen the series. Oh yes, it’s very much set in white rural 60s America and will occasionally present the obliviously outdated joke, but the story of a widowed sheriff being the only sane man in a small town full of lovable lunatics, who prefers to solve his and others problems with negotiation and hair brained schemes as opposed to violence has far more in common with modern day Steven Universe than whatever genocidal fantasy fake rednecks have in their heads.  

As the gif above shows Andy Griffith was very subtlety progressive for its time. Andy was a stanch pacifist, pro-gun control, treated drug addicts and prisoners with respect, and all the women he would date had careers, ect. and so on. It’s not a satire making any sort of grand political statements but the series had a moral center that was far more left than many realize. 

But if it’s not a satire, then what type of comedy is it? 

The Andy Griffith Show excels in what I like to call, ‘awkward comedy’. See everyone in Mayberry is far too nice to just come out and tell a character they’re making an ass of themselves, so therefore whoever is the idiot punching bag of the episode’s focus must slowly unravel as everyone looks on in helpless pity until said character realizes the folly of their ways and the townsfolk come together to make them feel happy and accepted once more. Wandavision takes this polite idyllic awkwardness and plays it up for horror instead of laughs.  

2. The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961 - 1966)

The creators of Wandavision actually met with Dick Van Dyke himself to pick his brain and learn how sitcoms were made back then. Paul Bentley also took inspiration from Van Dyke in his performance of the sitcom version of Vision, while Olsen stated Mary Tylor Moore had a heavy influence on her character of Wanda. But more than just being a point of homage, The Dick Van Dyke Show was hugely influential in modernizing the family sitcom and breaking a lot of the unspoken traditions and ‘rules’ of the 50s television era. It’s also just really, really funny.  

3.The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (1962 - 1965) 

Bit of a cheat here. Alfred Hitchcock Presents actually started in 1955 as a half hour anthology show, but in ‘62 the show got a revamp and was extended into a full hour tv series. I knew I wanted The Twilight Zone to be covered in my episode one recap, but ‘The Master of Suspense’ couldn’t be forgotten. While The Twilight Zone reveled in the surreal and supernatural, Alfred Hitchcock pioneered the thriller genre and made real life seem dangerous, horrifying, and other worldly.   

4. Doctor Who (1963 - present day) vs Star Trek (1966 - present day) 

Just like how westerns dominated the air waves during the 50s, science fiction was the center of the cultural zeitgeist of the 60s. From Lost in Space to My Favorite Martian, space aliens and robots were everywhere. So naturally I had to name drop the two sci-fi juggernauts that still air to this today. If you thought that the rivalry between Star Wars and Star Trek was bad then you’ve never seen a chat full of Whovians and Trekkies duking it out over who is the better monster, the Borg or the Cyberman. But which one has the more influence over Wandavision?

Well Star Trek owes it’s existence to sitcoms. As with The Twilight Zone before it, Star Trek was produced by Desilu Productions and it’s co-founder and CEO, Lucille Ball, was the series biggest supporter behind the scenes, lobbying for it when it faced early cancelation. As with all things sitcomy, everything ties back to I Love Lucy in the end. However despite that little backstory, it would seem that the series has very little to do with Wandavision itself beyond being quintessentially American. 

I would argue that Wandavision owes much to Doctor Who though. Arguably more so than any show mentioned in this retrospective. Time travel, alternate realities, trouble in quite suburbia, brainwashing, people coming back from the dead, ect... just about every trope you can find in Wandavision has also appeared in Doctor Who at some point. As a series that can go anywhere and do anything, Doctor Who was a pioneer of marrying genres in new and interesting ways. 

5. Bewitched (1964 - 1972) and I Dream of Jeannie (1965 - 1970)

It’s hard to pick one series over another because they’re essentially the same show. A mortal man falls in love with a magical girl who upends their lives with magic filled hijinks as they try their best not to have their secret discovered by the rest of the world. And both have their fingerprints all over the DNA of Wandavision. 

There’s only two core differences; Samantha and Jeannie have completely different personalities, with Sam being confident and knowledgeable and Jeannie being naïve and oblivious, along with their relationships with their respective men, Sam and Darrin being married and in love at the start of the series and Jeannie chasing after Tony in the beginning in a will they/won’t they affair, finally only getting together in the last season. 

6. The Munsters (1964 - 1966) vs The Adams Family (1964 - 1966)

Fans of these two shows are forever sadden that there never was a crossover between them. Because they’d fit perfectly together. Both shows are about a surreal and macabre family living in American suburbia and disrupting the lives of their neighbors with their otherworldly hijinks. Sound familiar?     

The main difference between the two shows is the way the characters viewed their placement in the world they inhabit. 

The Munsters were always oblivious to the fact that didn’t fit in. They just automatically assumed everyone had the same personal tastes as them. Whenever they encountered anyone who behaved strangely around them they would write that person off as being the odd one rather than questioning themselves. As such the main cast was structured like a stereotypical sitcom family who just happened to be classic movie monsters. 

The Addams were well aware that they were abnormal and they loved it! They lived life with in their own little world and didn’t care what anyone thought of them. As such the characters were far more colorful and quirky as individuals but there was little in the way of refences to other horror franchises beyond just a general love of the twisted and strange. 

7. Green Acres (1965 - 1971) and the Rual-verse (1962 - 1971)

So the MCU is not the first franchise to bring viewers an interconnected universe to the small screen. Far from it, as sitcoms had been doing this for decades, starting with the ‘rualverse’. Beverly Hillbillies, Petticoat Junction, and Green Acres were all produced by the same company and were treated as spinoffs of each other, complete with crossovers and shared characters and sets. 

Of the three, the last show, Green Acres, has the most in common with Wandavision. A well to do businessman and his lovely socialite wife settle down in small town America on a farm in order to get away from the stresses of city life, only to find new stresses in the country. Eva Gabor, herself a natural Hungarian, plays the character of Lisa as Hungarian making her one of the few non-native born Americans on tv screens during the cold war. Despite her posh nature and original protests to the move, Lisa assimilates to the rural life far easier than her husband, Oliver. Who, as the main comedic thread, can’t comprehend his new quirky neighbors’ odd and often illogical behavior.  

8. Hogan’s Heroes (1965 - 1971) and Get Smart (1965 - 1969)

So as comic fans have been quick to point out, it’s looking like both A.I.M. (Hydra) and Sword (Shield) will be players in the story of Wandavision. To commemorate that here’s two shows to represent those opposing sides. Although in truth, neither series has anything else in common with each other but I need to condense things down someway. 

In Hydra’s corner we got Hogan’s Heroes. A show all about taking down Nazis from within. 

I love, love, love, ‘robin hood’ comedies where a group of con artists try week after to week to pull one over the establishment. The Phil Silvers Show, Mchale's Navy, and Top Cat, just to name a few examples are all childhood favorites of mine. However while those shows had a lot of morally ambiguous characters, Hogan’s Heroes has very clear cut good guys and bad guys, cause the bad guys are Nazis and the show relentless makes fun of the third reich as should we all. In fact I was watching Hogan’s Heroes while waiting for the GA run off election results. Fortunately my home state decided to kick out our own brand of Nazis this year. 

For Shield, we got the ultimate spy spoof, Get Smart. Starring, Inspector Gadget himself, Don Adams, as the bumbling Maxwell Smart. Get Smart, is a hilarious send up of Cold War espionage but the real selling point of the show, imho, is Max and his co-worker 99′s relationship. You can cut the sexual tension in the air with a knife all while laughing your ass off. 

9. Batman (1966 - 1968)

First was Superman and then came Batman. Yet while Superman was a serious action show, Batman was a straight up comedy. Showcasing that superheroes could indeed be funny. 

Also shout out for Batman being the only show on this list to have an actual crossover with it’s competitor, The Green Hornet. 

10. Julia (1968 - 1971)

Since episode two features the first appearances of Herb and Monica, let’s highlight the first black led sitcom since the cancelation of Amos ‘n Andy over a decade earlier. The show focuses on single mother and military nurse, Julia, as she tries to live her life without her recently decease husband, who was killed in Vietnam, as she tries to raise their six year old son on her own.  

The series is cute. It’s more of a throw back to earlier family sitcoms where there’s no fantasy and life lessons are the name of the game. It’s the fact that the main character is a single black woman is what made the show so subversive and important at the time. 

Runner Ups

There’s much good stuff in the 60s, so here’s some others that didn’t make the cut but I would recommend anyways. 

Car 54, Where Are You? (1961 - 1963)

I call this the Brooklynn 99 of the 1960s. Bumbling but well meaning Officer Toody longs to do good in the world and help anyone in need, but often screws things up with his ill thought out schemes. He often drags his best friend and partner, the competent but anxiety riddled, Muldoon into his escapades. 

Mr. Ed (1961 - 1966)

The grandfather of the sarcastic talking pet trope. 

The Jetsons (1962 - 1963 and 1985 - 1987)

Hanna-Barbera often took popular sitcoms and just repackaged them as cartoons with a fantasy theme to them. The Jetsons has no singular show that it rips-off but is rather more a grab bag of sitcom tropes that feature, robots, computers, and flying cars. 

The Outer Limits (1963 - 1965) 

The Outer Limits was The Twilight Zone’s biggest competitor in terms of being a sic-fi/horror anthology series. 

Gillian’s Island (1964 - 1967) 

The only comparison to WandaVision I could think of was that this is a sitcom about people being trapped in one place. But by that point I was running out of room on the list. Still it’s one of the funniest shows on here. 

So yeah, this took longer than expected cause there’s a lot, here. Hopefully the 70s will be easier. Which I’ll post on Friday. 

[sarita-daniele]

Hi, angel! Hope you're doing alright 💓 (hola ángel! También hablo español :) ) I was wondering if you could give some advices in starting out in an arts career?

Hola amigx, ¡perdón que nunca vi tu mensajito! I’m not on my Tumblr very often and definitely forget to check my messages. Luckily my favorite causita @luthienne told me you’d messaged me! 

I don’t know what arts discipline you’re in, so feel free to let me know if the advice I have doesn’t apply to you (and ignore it!). There are so many ways to build an arts career, but I’m happy to share some things I’ve learned through trial and error along the way. 

(Outrageously long post below break!)

Educate yourself in arts technique, but also study widely. 

Techniques are important in art, but only as important as the concepts behind them. When I was younger, I wowed people by drawing near-photographic portraits, but that technical talent and skill alone couldn’t make me a professional artist. Memorable artwork has not just a how, but a why. It isn’t just the object but the story behind the object, and the meaning of the object in the world. Art is about what interests you, what makes you think, what you most value and want to change in this world. So as you build an arts career, learn the techniques behind drawing, woodworking, casting, writing, music-making, whatever your discipline is, but take time, if you can, to also study history, sociology, anthropology, ecology, linguistics, politics, or whatever else you’re drawn to conceptually. Study as widely as you can. 

The studio art program I went through (a public university in the US) was very technique-forward; we signed up for classes according to technique, like printmaking or small metals, learned those techniques, completed technique-based assignments. Then I did a one-term exchange at arts university in the UK that was very concept-forward. We had no technical courses, just exhibition deadlines, and what mattered in critique was the concept. Both of these schools had their strengths and flaws, but what I learned was that, to be a practicing artist, I needed both technique and concepts that I genuinely cared about and could stand behind. If I could go back and change anything, I would probably take fewer studio courses (after graduating, I couldn’t afford access to a wood shop, metal shop, or expensive casting materials, and lost many of those skills) and more courses in sociology, Latin American studies, linguistics, ecology, anthropology, etc., because my artwork today centers on social justice, racial justice, Latinx stories and histories, educational access and justice, the politics of language, and community ethics. 

And please know that whenever I talk about seeking an education, I’m not talking solely about institutional spaces. College career tracks in the arts (BFA, MFA, etc., much less high-cost conservatory programs) are not accessible to everyone and aren’t the only way to establish an arts career. You can study technique and learn about the world using any educational space accessible to you: nonprofits that offer programming in your community, online resources, Continuing Education programs. And of course, self-education: read as much as you possibly can!

Know the value of your story. 

I come from a Cuban/Peruvian family and grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA. My father’s family fled political violence surrounding the Cuban Revolution and came to the U.S. when he was a teenager. My mother was born in Brooklyn to Peruvian parents on work visas and moved back to Lima in her childhood. I grew up with these two cultures present and deeply embedded in our household, in our language, our food, our sense of humor, our sense of history. And yet, some residual assimilation trauma still affected me. I drifted towards the most American things, the whitest things, English authors and Irish music, in part because I enjoyed them but also because those were the things I saw valued in society. I wanted to fit in, wanted to be unique but not different, wanted to prove that I could navigate all spaces. The reality of marginalized identities in America is that our country tells us our identities are only valuable when they can be seen as exotic, while still kept inferior to the dominant, white American narrative (note that this “us” is a general statement, not meant to make assumptions about how you identify or what country you live in). 

But as an artist, all I have is my story, and who I am. I wasn’t willing to look at it directly. For years, I avoided doing so. It turns out, though, that I couldn’t actually begin my career until I reckoned with myself and learned to value everything about myself. To fully acknowledge my story, my history, my cultural reality, my sense of language, and my privileges. So I encourage young artists to look always inward, to ask questions about themselves, their families, and what made them who they are. 

The reason for doing this is to understand the source from which you make art.  Sometimes, however, for marginalized artists, the world warps this introspection into a trap, pigeonholing us into making art only “about” our identities, because that work is capital-I-Important to white audiences who want to tokenize our traumas. This is the white lens, and if anything, I try to understand myself as deeply as I can so that I can make art consciously for my community, not for that assumed white audience. 

Know that your career doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s, or like anything you’ve envisioned up to this point. 

As a high schooler I imagined that a life in the arts meant me in a studio, drawing and making, selling my work, getting exhibitions near and far, and gaining recognition. It was a solitary vision, one with a long history in the arts, rooted in the idea of individual genius. My career ended up completely different. Today, my arts projects involve teaching, collaborating, collecting interviews and oral histories, and creating public installations, rarely in traditional galleries or museums. 

As you work towards an arts career, figure out what does and doesn’t work for you: the kind of art you like and don’t like, the kinds of spaces that feel comfortable and those that don’t. I always thought I wanted to be part of traditional galleries, so I got a job working in a high-end art gallery in Boston during my grad program. Once in that space, however— even though I found the space calming and the work beautiful— I realized that there was something that I deeply disliked about the commodified art world. I didn’t like that we were selling art for over $10,000, that our exhibitions were geared exclusively towards collectors and wealthy art-buyers. The work was often technically masterful, but didn’t move or connect with me on a deeper level, and I realized that was because it wasn’t creating any change in the world. I liked work that shifted the needle, that made the world more inclusive and equitable, that centered marginalized stories (that gallery represented 90% white artists). I liked artwork that people made together, which drew me to collaborative art. I liked artwork that was accessible to everyone, not just the wealthy, which drew me to public art. I liked art exhibited in non-institutional spaces, which led me to community spaces. Since I was in an MFA for Creative Writing, I liked interdisciplinary art that engaged performance, technology, text, that was participatory and not just a 2D or 3D object. Figuring out all of these things led me to apply to my first major arts job: as a teaching artist in a community nonprofit that made art for social change in collaboration with local youth, in a predominantly Latinx neighborhood. 

My career path didn’t look like anything I expected, but I love it. The bulk of my income comes from teaching creative writing and art classes for nonprofits, working as a core member of a public arts nonprofit, and freelance consulting for book manuscripts. I love being an educator and consider it part of my creative practice. I love that I’m constantly collaborating with and talking to other artists. I love working with books and public art every day. I publish poetry, fiction, and literary translations, and exhibit artwork I’ve created in the studio and through funded opportunities. 

Fellow artists tell me often that I’m lucky, that my “day jobs” are all within the arts. But there are downsides to the way I’ve chosen to structure my career. I’m constantly balancing many projects, and my income is unstable. It’s difficult to save and plan towards the future,. I get by, but financial instability isn’t an option for many artists with families and dependents, with debts, medical expenses, and just isn’t the preferred lifestyle for a lot of people. I know artists who worked office jobs for years to support their practice and gain financial stability. I know artists who had entire careers as lawyers or accountants before becoming artists full time. I know artists who teach in public schools or work as substitute teachers. I know artists who are business owners and artists who work in policy and politics. I know artists who work in framing stores and shipping warehouses while being represented by galleries. These are all arts careers, and I admire every one of them. So as you build your career, don’t feel like it has to look like anyone’s else’s, like there’s anything you “should” be doing. Focus on the kind of artwork you want to make and what kind of work-life balance is best for you, then structure your career around that as best you can. 

Any job you use to support yourself can connect to an arts career!  

I get asked often by young people looking for jobs what kinds of jobs will best propel them towards an arts career. I believe that any kind of job can connect to and support an arts career, and I know that some suggestions out there in the arts world (like “get an unpaid internship at an art gallery!” or “become a studio apprentice to a well-known artist!”) assume a certain amount of privilege. So I want to break down how different kinds of jobs can connect to your art career: 

1) Jobs that allow for the flexibility and mental capacity to create. My friends who work restaurant jobs while going to auditions fall into this category. Who work as bartenders in evening so that they can be in the studio by day. Who dog-walk or babysit or nanny because the timing and flexibility allows for arts opportunities. My friends who are Lyft drivers or work in deliveries. These are often jobs outside of a creative field, but they can be beneficial because they don’t drain your creative batteries, so to speak. You still have your creative brain fully charged, and some jobs (like dog-walking) even allow for good mental processing (you can think through creative problems). As long as the job doesn’t drain you to the point where you have no energy at all, these kinds of jobs can be great because they allow time and space for your creative work. 

2) Jobs that place you in arts spaces, arts adjacent spaces, or spaces where you can learn about material/technique. My sculptor friends who work in hardware stores, quarries, foundries, or in construction. My printmaker friend who interned with graphic designers. My writer friends who work in bookstores and libraries, artists who work in art supply stores. My friend who worked with her dad’s painting company and got to improve her precision as a painter, which she then took back to the canvas. My teen students who get paid to work on murals or get stipend payments for making art at the nonprofit I work for. My filmmaker friends who worked on film crews. Friends who worked as theater ushers, in ticket sales, or as janitorial staff at museums. All of these jobs kept these artists adjacent to their artwork, whether through access to tools, materials, supplies, or books, through networking and conversations with other artists, or through skillsets that could enhance their art. 

3) Jobs that deeply engage another interest of yours, that bring you joy or can influence your work in other ways. If there’s a job that has nothing to do with your art but that you would love, do it! First, because I believe that the things we’re passionate about get integrated into our art, and second, because any job that gives you peace of mind and joy creates a positive base from which you can create. My friend who worked at a stable because she got to be around horses. My friends who worked at gyms or coaching sports because it kept them active. My friend who worked in a bike repair shop because he was obsessed with biking. An artist I knew who worked at the children’s science museum because she loved being around kids and planetariums. An artist who worked at a mineral store because rocks made her happy. If you have the opportunity, work doing things you like without worrying about whether it directly feeds your arts career.

Because believe it or not, all jobs you work can intersect in some way with your art. You’re creative— you find those connections! A Nobel-Prize winning poet helped his dad on the potato farm and wrote his best-known poem about it. Successful novelists have written about their time working in hair salons and convenience stores. A great printmaker I know who worked in a flower shop began weaving botanical forms and plant knowledge into her designs. The key in an arts career is to see all your experiences as valuable, to find ways that they can influence your art, and to be constantly thinking about and observing the world around you. 

As for me, I worked as a tennis instructor, a tennis court site supervisor, an academic advisor, an art gallery intern, and a coffee shop barista before and during my work in the arts!

Let go of objective measures of what it means to be good. 

I was always an academic overachiever. Top of my class, merit scholarships, science fair awards, AP credit overload, the whole thing. On the one hand, I grew up in a house where education was valued and celebrated, and my parents emphasized the importance of doing my best in school— not getting good grades, but working hard, doing my personal best, and reading and learning all I could. I loved school. I loved academics. And I’m not saying this to brag, but to lay the groundwork for something I struggled with in the arts.

It is jarring to be an academic overachiever and enter an arts career. I thrived off of objective value systems: study, work hard, get an A. If I worked hard and learned what I was supposed to learn, I earned recognition, validation, and opportunity. 

And then I entered the arts. The arts are entirely subjective. We hear it over and over— great artists get rejected hundreds of times, certain art forms require cutthroat competition, etc. —but it’s hard to understand the subjectivity of the art world (and the entrenched discrimination and commercial interests that affect who gets opportunities and who doesn’t) until you’re trying to live as an artist. That you can work hard on something, give all of your time and physical effort and mental and emotional energy to it, only to have it rejected. That what you think is good isn’t what another person thinks is good. That there is a magical alchemy in the act of creation that can’t be taught, or learned, but must be felt, and that you can be working to find that light while actively others try to extinguish it. That you can be good and work hard, yet still not get chosen for the awards, the exhibitions, the publications. If you chased being “the best” your whole life, you’re now in a world where there is no “best”, where greatness is subjective, where the idea of competitive greatness is actually detrimental to artists supporting each other, and where work that sells or connects to white, cishetero traditions is still the most valued. 

After struggling with this for a long time, I came to the conclusion that the most important thing to me now is making the art I want to make, the art only I can make, whether or not it fits what arts industries are looking for or what’s going to win awards. If I make art I believe in from a healthy mental and emotional place, doors will open, even if they aren’t the doors I expected. So try to let go of any sense that worth comes from external validation. Learn to accept critical feedback when it is given kindly, thoughtfully, and constructively. Surround yourself with friends and artists who who can talk to about your work, who build up your work and help you think through it rather than cutting you down. Don’t believe anyone in the arts world who thinks they get to be the arbiters of what’s “good” and who has “what it takes”. People have probably said things like that to the artists you most admire, and if they’d listened, you wouldn’t have experienced art that changed your life. 

Work to gain skills in basic business, marketing, and finances for artists. 

Many artists (at least where I am in the U.S.) go through an entire arts education without receiving resources or training in the financial side of the arts world. Your arts career will likely involve some degree of self-promotion and marketing, creating project budgets and grant proposals, artist statements and bios, sorting out taxes, and other economic elements. I can’t speak to other countries, but for artists in the U.S., taxes can be extremely complex. If you’re awarded a stipend, grant, fellowship, or employed for gigs or one-time projects, you’ll likely be taxed as an independent contractor and have to deduct your own taxes. Through residencies and exhibitions, you may pull income in multiple states and countries, which can also affect taxation. If you’re an artist who doesn’t have access to resources about finance and taxation in your arts program or who doesn’t independently have expertise in those fields, I recommend finding ways to educate yourself early: online resources, low cost courses, or even just taking your financially-savvy friends out for a coffee!

ANYWAY SORRY FOR THE LONG POST I HOPE SOMETHING IN THIS DIATRIBE WAS HELPFUL I HOPE THERE WEREN’T TOO MANY TYPOS AND I hope you have the most wonderful, fulfilling arts career! <3 

[prince-of-elsinore]

On Gunslingers, the "March of Progress," and Leaving a Legacy

An analysis of themes in Supernatural Season 12

In a previous post rambling about season 12, I stumbled onto the idea of American Hunters vs. the British Men of Letters as a classic Western set-up: the lone gunslinger who lives by his wits, skill, grit, and personal moral code, vs. the advance of "civilization" colonizing and "taming" the West, effectively pushing out the gunslinger and making him obsolete. The land becomes a more inhabitable place (for white settlers), but with the comforts and safety of civil society come society's norms and mores, which leave no space for the shades of gray in which the vigilante gunslinger operates. If we take the BMOL mission at face value, they are attempting the same sort of colonization of "wild" (monster-infested) America. Britain is "civilized" (monster-free) thanks to the BMOL, whereas in the US, lone operator hunters (gunslingers) rove the country, sometimes saving people, but not all the people, and always operating according to their personal judgment, faulty as it may be (see Gordon, Roy and Walt, Martin, to name a few). Leaving aside the question of whether the BMOL's goal of ridding the country of monsters is realistic (the US in not an island like Britain), their aim, if achieved, would undoubtedly make the US a safer country for its human residents.

(I'm aware that this analogy is problematic for equating monsters with native inhabitants who must be wiped out or assimilated, and humans with white colonizers. This is an implication that the show itself makes. This post isn't about the problematic and ethically inconsistent portrayal of monsters in Supernatural, though, which is a huge topic in and of itself, so I acknowledge that it is an issue, but one I don't aim to address here.)

What the US would lose if the BMOL succeeded is the "rugged individualism" of the hunter ethos, and the nuances that their personal codes allow--a second chance for the psychic Magdas and werewolf Claire Novaks of the world. The show, of course, wants us to side with the hunters, the good ol' fashioned gunslingers. It makes it easy (too easy) for us to do by presenting the BMOL as caricaturish villains with a cruelly rigid code. This has the effect of aligning the audience against the "march of progress" (just as many Westerns implicitly do--therein lies the genre's subversive potential).

Let's take a closer look at 12x14 "The Raid" in this light. The Alpha vampire has been drawn out of retirement by the BMOL's meddling:

Alpha: I'm old. I like living quietly. You've been making my life awfully noisy lately. You've killed so many of my children. I've seen your work. In England, I didn't get involved because, well, it's England. But America, yes. America is my home. And it's time that you get off my lawn.

Clearly, America holds a privileged position in monsters' minds, or at least in this particular very, very old monster's mind. It is still the "Wild West," and it is "home" for monsters. No reason is given for this; it's safe to say it's a purely ideological impulse on the part of the show.

This exchange between Sam and the Alpha follows:

Sam: My family and I, we kill vamps when they get out of line. And you've let us. Alpha: I have many children, Sam. What's one, two, here or there? Sam: Exactly. So? Let my mom and me go. We'll walk away, go back to the way things were, to the way things are supposed to be. Hunters and vampires, cops and robbers, a fair fight.

"Cowboys and Indians" could just as easily fill in for "cops and robbers" there--in fact, the obvious absence of that analogy is a ringing silence. The show is skirting dangerously close around the edges of its uncomfortable premise.

What I want to draw attention to, though, is Sam's assertion that this is a "fair fight." What he's proposing is a return to the status quo, where some people, by default, will die. Of course, Sam is bluffing--he does plan to kill the Alpha here and now, hardly "fighting fair" (hm, just as European settlers made so many underhanded deals with Native Americans)--and at the end of the episode he does team up with the BMOL. By the end of the season, though, with the hunters uniting to drive out the British invaders, this is precisely the status quo the Americans are fighting for: one where many people who don't deserve will die at the hands of monsters, but perhaps a few others will live whom the BMOL would have killed. The protracted struggle between humans and monsters is thereby positioned as a sort of natural symbiosis, part of the circle of life. This allows for the perpetuation of the mythic "Wild West," which is necessary for the very existence of the show, and especially for the hunters to be seen as the "good guys." The show convinces us to reject "civilization" and embrace vigilantism as better than the alternative. It's impossible to pinpoint this ideology as exclusively conservative or progressive; it has implications in either direction. The world of hunters and monsters was never a perfect metaphor, after all, but one thing is clear in season 12: hunters are the heroes.

This brings me to another central theme of the season: legacy. After season 11, it seems that the show wanted to "correct course." Season 11 is entirely about Sam and Dean cleaning up a mess (the Darkness) they directly caused, after all, and after that narrowly-averted apocalypse, it's fair to ask the question, "do Sam and Dean really do more good than harm"? Season 12 gives us a resounding "yes," over and over again. The message is that hunting, for all its hardships and messiness, is worth it.

In 12x06 "Celebrating the Life of Asa Fox" (which I've written about previously) we get a taste of the sort of legacy Sam and Dean are making for themselves. It might come as a surprise, after seeing hunters hunt down Sam and Dean in previous seasons (Gordon and Kubrick in season 2, Roy and Walt in season 5), that other hunters now welcome Sam and Dean in their midsts and even revere them. One might rightfully ask, what would they do if they knew Sam and Dean and their codependency nearly caused another apocalypse not too long ago? Inconsistencies aside, it's apparent that Sam and Dean are appreciated as something like heroes in their own world. In the episode, they share this exchange:

Sam: Did you know people tell stories about us? Dean: Yeah. Apparently we’re a little bit legendary. Sam: Yeah, but, I mean, so was Asa. Then a hunt went bad, and he ended up hanging from a tree, alone in the woods.

Sam still wonders, characteristically, if the heroism is worth it. But in 12x09 "First Blood," he's the one with this iconic line:

SAM: We’re the guys that save the world.

This is a statement of identity, in response to the question "who are you?" Sam might as well say, "we're the heroes."

In 12x11 "Regarding Dean," Dean has his moment to affirm that their line of work is worth its toll. Talking about the curse that made Dean lose his memory, Sam makes this comment:

Sam: Some of the things we've done, we've had this weight for... forever. And seeing it gone, uh, you looked happy. Dean: Huh. Well, look, was it nice to drop our baggage? Yeah, maybe. Hell, probably. But it wasn't just the crap that got lost. I mean, it was everything. It was us, it was what we do, you know? All of it. So... that's what being happy looks like? I think I'll pass.

Again, Dean is making a statement of identity. The Winchesters are what they do, and what they do is the right thing, and that is worth giving up happiness for.

One common complaint about season 12 is that it heroizes Sam and Dean too much. They were never meant to be the Big Damn Heroes, the "guys who save the world," as if it's a day job--they're meant to be the underdogs, the messy humans doing their best, sometimes failing, but rising to the occasion when it counts most, despite the terrible costs. Perhaps this is true, and perhaps this season does go overboard in trying to smooth over the messy cracks in the heroic facade. The show could have done better than to make the heroes and villains so black and white, certainly. Perhaps the show does lose some of its identity in erasing the moral ambiguities that always made it so intriguing.

There are moments, however, that are still thematically resonant with the show as a whole--more understated moments that remember the bigger picture. One such moment is when legacy is explicitly addressed in 12x18 "The Memory Remains":

Dean: What do you think our legacy's gonna be? When we're gone, I mean, after all the stuff we've done, you think folks will remember us? You know, like, a hundred years from now? Sam: No. Dean: Oh, that's nice. Sam: Well, I mean... Guys like us, we're not exactly the type of people they write about in history books, you know? Dean: Mm. Sam: But the people we saved, they're our legacy. And they'll remember us and then I guess... We'll eventually fade away, too. That's fine, because we left the world better than we found it, you know.

This exchange presents Sam and Dean's heroism on a human scale. They're not the guys that save the whole world--even if they did do that, a few times. They're the guys that save individual human lives, time and again. That's who they are, and it's what matters most. Sam's right: in the world of Supernatural, few people 100 years on will know the names of Sam and Dean Winchester. Perhaps a few hunter stories will still be passed around, and maybe a new resident of the bunker will piece together some old information. But everyone that the Winchesters saved will remember them for the rest of their lives, and those very lives they get to live are the Winchesters' legacy. Once those people pass away, Sam and Dean will fade from memory, but for them, it was never about being remembered; it was always about doing good--a common aim to which they are equally committed, at this point. Sam and Dean's greatest redemption has never been in saving the world (often from problems they themselves caused), but in saving people, and this holds true to the very end of the show.

[aimeesuzara]

Questions from Maiana Minahal’s Students in English 272, “Filipino Women Writers”...My Responses

Dear students and readers,

I’m honored that you’ve read my work and are interested in these facets of my life and craft as an artist. I love the challenge of being given questions to write about. So, here goes!

1. What is the best thing that writing, performing, creating, etc. provides you? It seems you have many talents, how do each contribute to the person that you are? What do you love about each?  

I’ve combined a couple of similar questions here.  First, thanks to whomever has said that I have many talents; I’m flattered.  I do believe I was blessed with a variety of areas of interest and natural “talent” that I got to explore and develop in different phases of my life.  I even felt split about whether to respond to the questions in writing and using my voice and image (because I love storytelling and the voice).

First, what do I love about writing?  And perhaps writing, as opposed to performing or creating other kinds of multidisciplinary art (plays, collaborations with dance, music, etc)?  

Writing is most private; it’s also a place for confession because in many ways, it’s hidden, is behind a mask.�� Writing can be on one hand too analytical, but when it’s the most powerful it can also be magic-making, enabling a metaphor to be developed and breathe, an image to vibrate and have scent and color; a scene and characters to come alive with dialogue, backstory, and motivation.  It’s a place of invention, slower invention that has no immediate impact except itself on the page - as opposed to live performance which is more of an improvisation and collaboration together with an audience.

Performance, then, is that other thing; I believe performance happens on the page, in that invention, as well, but if we’re talking about performing on the stage or at a microphone, it’s a collaboration among many elements: space (architecture, weather), time, other people / audience, circumstance.  It’s also very natural, an ancient throwback to the griots and oral historians and singers and spiritual leaders making incantations...it predates writing.  The body is a vessel with so many faculties, and this is the most exciting set of possibilities.  Should this line or this word be whispered?  Yelled?  Projected on the body?  Who is my audience when I perform?  Are you my audience?  Is my audience in the past, present or the future?  Am I in the past, present or future?  What am I able to bring to life right now, and even co-create with you a new circumstance within the present moment?  In theater and in poetry, even if it’s the same exact play or the same poem, each rendering is unique.  Did someone laugh at a different part?  Did someone cry?  Am I feeling the spirit of my grandmother that day?  Or my future child? Also, the voice is vibrational.  There’s a way in which, when we perform, we are contacting others through the voice, through the heat of our bodies; we share a space and time that never occurs again.

Creating multidisciplinary work - I’ll differentiate as projects that are collaborative, that may involve production elements such as video-poems, dance theater, or collaboration with musicians and filmmakers: this takes the Performance and the Writing to another level.  Now, let’s add other people who are experts in their own fields: choreographers, dancers, composers, emcees, filmmakers.  I have had the opportunity to work with a variety of these, in making projects such as a “Tiny Fires” poem collaboration (click for excerpt) with San Francisco State University’s Dance Theater, in which my poem was translated into choreography and the dancers learned all of the lines; a recent collaboration with Alayo Dance Theater called “Manos de Mujeres” in which I researched, interviewed and wrote about the lives of Cuban Women and the dance company danced and choreographed to my words; a recent project called “Water and Walls” (click to watch) in which we all wrote verses to music about a shared theme and a filmmaker worked with us to produce a video. These are all exciting ways for the writing to live and breathe and thrive in different ways, through different mediums.  When it comes to plays, I do not even perform in the work, but get to see talented actors bring the stories to life, with directors at the helm and production crew helping execute a vision.  It’s like giving birth...and seeing someone grow up beyond you, doing things you could not do...

2. What are some influences on your poetry/work? (I reworded this one somewhat; I hope it is still fine!)

I think I’ve answered some of this in the above, in a way.  I am influenced by many art forms, and can’t see it any other way. I’ve never sat well with only poetry or only words, which can be limiting, and often, as referenced earlier, can become too cerebral.  Words are meant to be released, like songs are meant to be sung.  I am influenced by my early exposure to playing piano and dancing ballet, and later playing percussion and dancing West African and Afro-Cuban and Salsa and a slight bit of Filipino movement.  I am influenced by the work I love to watch - other theater-makers, poets, dancers.  Music influences me deeply, and often I hear poems come to me like strains of music, with melodies and rhythms.  The natural world influences me.  And history. As you have seen in my book, I can get nearly obsessed with history.  The way it was written, the way it omits, the glimpses it gives us into the minds of people.  Who is heard and who is not; who is rendered silent in the writing; who needs to be heard, if even in imagination.  History excites me and leads me to get possessed.  Lastly, change-makers and activists, because I came out of that.  I first wrote most fiercely and performed my first spoken word poems because I wanted to tell the story of a little girl, Crizel Valencia, who died at age 6 of leukemia after growing up on a toxic wasteland left by the United States military.  I lived in her community and in her home and we drew together.  When she died, after making dozens of drawings of herself envisioning her community and her own survival, I felt possessed to write, and speak. So, spirits influence me too.

3. About the book, SOUVENIR: What was the inspiration behind the layout and style of your poems? For example, the use of different fonts and inclusion of outside texts like in your poem "Manifest Destiny 1980."  I really liked how you wrote and organized your book by using exhibits (like in the museum, there's a story for each object or subject) I find it very creative. What gave you this idea or how did you think of it?

Each poem definitely has its own inspiration, but I can focus on the one you mentioned, first.  In “Manifest Destiny 1980″ I was basically writing parallel realities - one in 1980 (my own personal story of migration across the country) and the one in 1803 of the Lewis and Clark Expedition - both which moved from East to West.  In mapping out my own family’s road trip from New Jersey to the small Tri-Cities (Pasco, Kennewick, Richland) towns of the Pacific Northwest, where I remembered growing up with stories about Lewis and Clark and Sacajawea, I found that we followed similar route as Lewis and Clark. But, while our trip and our experience was about immigrants and their daughter adjusting and assimilating to White America, Lewis and Clark went to study and exploit the knowledge and resources, and the environment, of Native people.  We were subjected to being analyzed and studied and ostracized; they were, as well, but in the end were in the position of power linked to the destruction and removal of local people.  The parallel in the layout was meant to enable the two readings (top to bottom) and also one interrupting the other.

As for the exhibits: as you probably know, the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair (Louisiana Purchase Exposition) celebrated the 100-year anniversary of the Louisiana Purchase, which followed the Lewis and Clark Expedition.  In the 1904 Fair, Filipinos were displayed in living exhibits, forced to re-enact rituals (at far too many intervals, unnaturally, for show and even competition), eat, sit, and interact in the public eye, as the living conquests of the US Imperialists.  I realized that so much of our lives was and is performance as well - my parents needing to demonstrate their ability to work and function within the American context; my striving to fit in, disappear, or perform as the rare Filipino girl in often non-diverse environments.  Without being too literal, I was interested in how we can see our lives on display, and what is lost or gained in that performance.  And objects - what are the objects that are collected as treasures of war - including our own bodies?

4. In the poem, "My Mother's Watch,” did that situation really happen to you? If you do go back to the motherland regularly, does the profiling still happen to you today?

Yes; that poem is actually pretty true to life.  I wouldn’t have called it “profiling” in that I think that term carries meanings of power within a racist context such as the United States.  In the Philippines, it was more of curiosity, more of realizing that you could never really “go back” in a way that is simply nostalgic or “authentic” -- that once the departure from the homeland, and the living within the United States context occurs, we may appear similar in skin and features, we may be 100% the same as our relatives in some ways, but we are not because we have lost our native tongues, or cultural norms, or gestures.  And also - that I felt so much bigger and taller than other Filipinos speaks to the fact that many of our own relatives or people just like us back “home” had access to fewer resources and nutrition, whereas we were able to grow up on milk and in my case, packaged and microwaved foods.  Even in our bodies, we are altered forever.  There was an article/ interview about this poem here that may be of interest: http://www.lanternreview.com/blog/2011/05/31/process-profile-aimee-suzara-discusses-my-mothers-watch/

5. What was the hardest part of the book to write?

The whole thing was hard to write, but it was actually harder to write the “colonizer”/white man/government/military and scientific voices because they were so emotionless at times, so declaratory, and in many cases, so condescending, if not overtly racist.  To dwell in the language in which Filipinos were called “niggers” and “rabbits” and that torture of Filipinos seemed to be so much fun; or that Native and Filipino and Black people’s skulls and genetics were inferior (according to the scientific racism of the time); and also that so much of it seemed to ring true to today.  It’s much easier to write personal narrative, lyrical narrative.

6.  What do you hope for readers to remember the most?

I hope that readers can see themselves reflected in the glass of the museum exhibits.  That regardless of their background, they see how Filipino-American History is American History and not some niche piece of history, but actually demonstrated some of the most egregious cases of scientific racism and exploitation, the epitome at the end of the 19th century, of colonialism and imperialism.  I hope readers check out more of the history, and also reflect on themselves and where they come from.

7.  What is the most nerve wrecking thing about becoming a mother for the first time? (Congratulations by the way!)

I put this at the end because it feels, in a way, like a bonus question, but also something very relevant to our lives as artists.  Becoming a first-time mother involves putting everything aside - my writing, my teaching, my projects - in service of my health and the health and protection of the child I am going to birth.  I have birthed many other things: projects, plays and poems, but a human being -- this requires the most sacrifice and faith I’ve ever had to summon.  At the same time, I think it’s very important for you, readers, to know that as artists, our lives are our art, just as art is our life.  We never stop being one or another (people, mothers, playwrights, performers).  If I believed I would stop being an artist, I could despair, but if I were to stop being an artist, what kind of mother would my son have?  He deserves my full self.  So, while our time becomes more limited and we have to focus on the child, we do not lose ourselves; we simply change.

Thank you for your interest and I hope you’ve enjoyed my answers!

[onedayatatimeblog]

Episode 1: “This Is It”

One Day at a Time

Alejandra Guzman

Key Characters in the Episode

↠ Penelope (MC): US Army Nurse Corps Veteran; single mother of two ↠ Elena: Penelope’s daughter  ↠ Alex: Penelope’s son ↠ Lydia: Penelope’s mother and Elena and Alex’s grandmother ↠ Schneider: Landlord and good friend of the Alvarez family ↠ Dr. Berkowitz: Penelope’s boss at work  

Episode Overview:

Penelope and Lydia try to convince Elena to have a traditional quinceañera to celebrate her 15th birthday and honor her Cuban roots (Wolfe, 2017). This conversation brings about many disagreements and perspectives on what the celebration represents. As the episode unfolds, topics about Cuban culture, expected gender roles, mental health stigma, military service, and immigration emerge. Although the family faces a series of complexities in life, as they seek to understand each other and their connection to certain things, the family realizes despite divergent viewpoints, their love and support for each other is most important. After constant debates between Elena, Penelope, and Lydia, a meaningful conversation between Elena and Penelope takes place. In which they reconcile, and afterwards Elena agrees to the have the celebration.

Race, Ethnicity, and Culture:

The entirety of the show is based on a Cuban American family’s experiences with aspects of life in America, therefore, ethnicity and culture, are continuously present. In this episode, conversations about Cuban culture are a main focus, as the family tries to convince Elena to celebrate her quinceañera. Particularly Lydia is concerned that their Cuban roots will be forgotten, as American culture dominates. In an argument about the quinceañera, Lydia says “you are throwing away your Cuban heritage” (Wolfe, 2017). The concept of heritage is very important to Lydia because it is part of the family’s identity. The comment suggests minorities in the US often struggle with keeping their roots, as children start to move away from them. Author Nadine Naber (2010) brings attention to this through an Arab lens. She writes about how transgressing parent expectations causes cultural loss, and the struggle immigrant generations face trying to strengthen cultural continuity, while adapting to American life (p. 76-77). So although heritage seems personally important to just Lydia, many immigrant families feel the same way.

This show does a good job at representing the Latinx community and the majority of the cast itself is Latinx. However, some stereotypes emerge and reinforce unrealistic ideas about the diverse ethnic groups under the umbrella term Latinx. A reinforced stereotype is that Latinx folks are loud, especially women.  In this episode, the family is noisy and Penelope and Lydia do dominate conversations as they speak loudly and freely. This draws the false belief that Latinx folks are loud and always ready to celebrate. Although I do not see it as a negative stereotype, it still influences what we think about Latinx folks, so when a person does not fit this expectation, they are seen as outsiders of the culture.Furthermore, since quinceañeras are a Latinx tradition that celebrate the transition into womanhood, many assume Latinas want one. However, as in Elena’s case many girls do not see it as an important life event, nor want want one. Whitney Pow (2012) addressed how these stereotypes can be harmful. She stated that the few portrayals of certain cultures in the media are often full of stereotypes, which turn into what people expect of that specific culture, which creates a form of identity erasure (p. 84). 

In this episode, the inclusion of Schneider highlights the power and privileges that come with race and even gender. In many instances, Schneider pitched in his opinion, without thinking about his position in the Alvarez family and the privilege of his culture. His presence brings attention to the unconscious implications of race. In one scene, Schneider seeks to have a conversation with Elena to convince her to have her quinceañera. Despite not having an understanding of the culture or history, he pitched in his opinion. In another scene, when Alex questions the family’s income, Schneider tries to step up to explain the situation. I think this comes to imply how white folks have privilege that makes them feel entitled to speak on behalf of things they have no personal connection to. Along with Schneider’s race, his gender also gives him privilege. And although he might not intend to come off as rude in these instances, the way he instantly interfered before Penelope could speak, shows how he unconsciously places himself in a higher position to her.

Gender & Sexuality: 

In this episode, the implication is that the main characters are all cisgender. However, as the show progresses, representation of gender and sexuality diversifies. At the moment, there is a balance of male and female characters, which all seem to speak evenly. Although, the narrative is more focused on Penelope, as she is centered as the single mother dealing with the complexities of life, family, and culture. In this particular episode, many gender stereotypes emerge to reinforce ideas about gendered expectations, but also many are challenged, which demonstrates the awareness of the cast. 

In the beginning, a patient at Penelope’s work sees a picture of her in an army uniform, and assumes it was a Halloween costume. This largely implies that society has not fully accepted women in military services, as it is seen as a male dominated sphere. In a later scene, a particular stereotype that stood out is the one about boys growing up to be the man of the house, when a father is absent. Alex is only a middle schooler, yet he feels he needs to grow up to be the family provider. This norm exists in many cultures, but it is very prevalent in Latinx culture because it ties into the idea of machismo. It brings a sense of manliness and pride to be able to protect and provide for your family. A way that Penelope defies this stereotype is by demonstrating that women can be providers too. She is a single working mother, and provides most of the family’s income. Penelope also raises her kids against expected gender roles. In one instance she asks both Alex and Elena to help in the kitchen, instead of reinforcing the idea that cooking and cleaning are a woman's job.

Towards the end, Elena is surprised to find out her mother has feminist views, and Penelope’s response is “I can assemble a rifle in thirteen seconds. I’m a total badass” (Wolfe, 2017). This expresses how feminist are stereotyped to be loud, obnoxious, man haters, for the abolishment of patriarchy. Which is mainly born from liberal and social feminism, as these currently have more outward expressions (Kirk, 2020, p. 9). This erases the reality, that feminist fight to address various issues and in many ways. It also suggests that to be a feminist one is suppose to be a certain way. For instance, Elena’s feminism is never questioned because of her open expressions and appearance. In regards to sexuality, Latina women are often hyper-sexualized and exoticized in the media. This is problematic because it reinforces the idea that women of color do not fit Western beauty ideals, and only certain aspects of them are desired. Whitney Pow (2012) addresses this “exoticization” as causing harm because it presents certain communities as unable to assimilate, which is untrue (p. 84). In this show, Elena is portrayed as a nerdy feminist that dresses tomboyish, which breaks away from this hyper-sexualization of Latinas, allowing her to assimilate. However, it can still be harmful because it portrays the message that if a woman of color does not seem exotic, she is not desired.

Subtle Remarks With Larger Political Implications:

Within this episode, topics brought up seem as if only relevant to some characters due to context, however, many remarks have larger implications. For instance, Penelope is prescribed antidepressants to help with her depression and PTSD from being deployed in Afghanistan. However, she is hesitant to take them because “Cubans suffer in silence” and she does not want her mother to think she is a drug addict. Later on when Lydia sees Penelope about to take the antidepressants, she says “you don’t need drugs, you need your husband” (Wolfe, 2017). This scene implies the stigma around mental illness, particularly in the Latinx community. Speaking from a Latinx perspective, often times older generations have a hard time understanding mental health, and are quick to label people as weak for resorting to taking medications. Furthermore, saying that Penelope needs her husband also implies that women need men. Lydia goes on to justify that Penelope’s husband is doing the right thing, by leaving to earn money as the provider. Although a subtle remark, it reinforces the idea that women rely on men and basically a man is all they need, as he will provide.

In another scene, Elena pretends to be her grandmother to demonstrate Lydias view on the quinceañera. Elena proceeds to say “I worked so hard to give you an opportunity in this land of the free and home of the brave” (Wolfe). This subtle remark draws attention to immigration. Lydia herself immigrated from Cuba to the US, to have a better future.  The comment suggests how often individuals who face undesirable conditions in their home country, look to the US as a place of opportunities. During the end, Penelope also admits the main reason for wanting Elena to have a quinceañera was because she wanted people to say “look at the amazing single mom pulling it all together by herself” (Wolfe, 2017). Although specific to Penelope, this is an undertone of how a lot of women feel the need to prove themselves. Specifically, single mothers feel the need to go above and beyond, apart from doing a two-person job alone, just to receive some simple acceptance and validation for their efforts.

References:

Kirk, G., & Okazawa-Rey, M. (2020). Untangling the “F”-word. In Gendered Lives: Intersectional perspectives (7th ed., pp. 2-17). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Naber, N. (2010). Decolonizing Culture: Beyond Orientalist and Anti-Orientalist Feminisms.In Gendered Lives: Intersectional Perspectives (7th ed., pp. 76-83). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Pow, W. (2012). That’s Not Who I Am: Calling Out and Challenging Stereotypes of Asian Americans. In Gendered Lives: Intersectional Perspectives (7th ed., pp. 84-88). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Wolfe, D. (Staff Writer), & Hochman, S. (Co-Producer). (2017, January 6). This Is It (Season 1, Episode 1) [TV series episode]. In N. Lear & B. Miller (Executive Producers), One Day at a Time. Netflix.

[go-redgirl]

By Conrad Black Monday, 24 August 2020 05:55 AM Current | Bio | Archive

The opening two nights of the Democratic national convention last week produced the greatest deluge of monstrous political falsehoods in any two evenings of American television history.

The champion mythmaker was the venerable Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.

After the usual fictions about "systemic racism," the most convenient way of ignoring this summer’s widespread urban terrorism, came the familiar pieties about climate change, an issue that, happily, has run largely out of steam during the coronavirus crisis.

Sanders then decried "the greatest economic collapse since the Great Depression."

After four years of the Great Depression, unemployment was over 30 percent and there was no direct aid for those out of work.

This recent artificial dip was a response to a shutdown supported by a broad political and scientific consensus and has already shrunk through a reduction of unemployment in the last three months larger than the entire number of net new jobs created in the eight Obama-Biden years.

Sanders declared that Donald Trump is "leading us down the path of authoritarianism . . . greed, oligarchy, and bigotry."

He urgently assured the convention that the election was about "preserving our democracy," because Trump had "tried to prevent people from voting, undermined the U.S. Postal Service, deployed the military and federal agents against peaceful protesters, threatened to delay the election, and suggested he will not leave office if he loses."

"Under this administration," Sanders said, "authoritarianism has taken root in our country . . . I will work to preserve this nation from the threat that so many of our heroes fought and died to defeat."

President Trump’s concern about huge numbers of ballots being mailed to nonexistent voters or to the wrong addresses and filled out and returned through the post office fraudulently by party organizers is well-founded.

He has appointed a postmaster general with a mandate to shape up the Postal Service, but there is no reason for optimism that in its present condition it could handle 75 million presidential election ballots coming and going.

The occasional deployment of federal marshals and national guardsmen has been to prevent urban guerrillas and hooligans from burning down federal buildings and destroying the monuments to America’s great men.

Trump expressed concern that the Democratic plan to flood the country with posted ballots and harvest them to their own advantage might provoke litigation that would not allow the winner to be identified by inauguration day. He has said that, of course, he would leave office on January 20 if he lost the election. This entire argument is an unutterable fabrication.

So is the allegation of “authoritarianism.” Not a scrap of illustrative evidence was or could be cited in support of it.

But the most odious assertion of all in this farrago of malignant calumnies was to assimilate Trump to the enemies of America whom generations of veterans fought and gave their lives to defeat. I am quite relaxed about political hyperbole, but the comparison of Trump to Nazism, which is what Sanders was implying, gave the entire proceedings what Tennessee Williams called "the stench of mendacity."

It is supremely irritating to have Democratic hypocrites call for unity and promise to "bring the nation together" while denouncing the incumbent president as akin to a Nazi all while failing even to mention, much less criticize, the urban mob violence they have helped provoke and have effectively condoned.

"By rejecting science," Sanders continued, the president "has put our lives and health in jeopardy, refusing to produce the masks, gowns, and gloves our healthcare workers desperately need."

In fact, Trump showed great executive ingenuity in producing those items in great quantities with astounding speed, emancipating the country from the absolute shambles in public health emergency response capability bequeathed to him by Obama and Biden.

Sanders pretentiously affected classical learning in saying "Nero fiddled while Rome burned; Trump golfs. His actions fanned this pandemic, resulting in over 170,000 deaths."

Nero was a self-adulatory psychopath with no aptitude to be emperor, a position he inherited. He was assassinated by his palace guard while he was attempting to commit suicide in recognition of his total failure.

Sanders was inexorable; Trump’s "negligence has exacerbated the economic crisis; instead of maintaining the $600 a week of unemployment supplement," he has unconstitutionally replaced it with "virtually nothing," in fact, he authorized a $400 weekly supplement so that the unemployed have an incentive to return to work. And, naturally, Sanders accused Trump of "threatening the very future of Social Security."

Providentially, Sanders added, "Joe Biden will end the hate and division Trump has created. He will stop the demoralization of immigrants, the coddling of white nationalists, the racist dog-whistling, the religious bigotry, and the ugly attacks on women."

An absolute majority of the sentences in Sanders’ bilious harangue were false.

It was an unintended profession of the total moral bankruptcy of the Democratic campaign; there were no positive suggestions, nothing but unexplained hatred of the president.

The one truthful sentence in all of it may have been the eerie triumphalism that his socialist "movement" had effectively taken over the Democratic Party.

Yet the pièce de résistance of Tuesday evening was from former first lady Michelle Obama. The fact that it was taped more than a week before in Martha’s Vineyard prevented her from inflicting the merits of the vice presidential nominee on us. But what we got was a lengthy avalanche of sanctimonious claptrap.

"A never-ending list of innocent people of color continue to be murdered; stating the simple fact that a black life matters is still met with derision from the nation’s highest office," she said.

[Americans] see people calling the police on folks minding their own business just because of the color of their skin. They see an entitlement that says only certain people belong here, that greed is good, and winning is everything because as long as you come out on top, it doesn’t matter what happens to everyone else . . . They see our leaders labeling fellow citizens enemies of the state while emboldening torch-bearing white supremacists. They watch in horror as children are torn from their families and thrown into cages, and pepper spray and rubber bullets are used on peaceful protesters for a photo-op.

Those who accuse their opponents of Nazi tendencies reinvent Goebbels' "big lie" adapted to squalid Alinskyite Democratic urban bossism. The cages were in fact comfortable simulations of McDonald’s outlets and were set up during her husband’s regime and the “peaceful protesters” had been rioting for hours, hurling projectiles at the police, and trying to tear down a statue of Andrew Jackson.

The walk to the "president’s church" the day after her peaceful protesters tried to burn it down may have been a photo-op, but it was an elegant gesture indicating that, unlike the Democratic Party, the administration would not tolerate unlimited violence, arson, assault, and vandalism from the mobs that the Democrats not only "coddled," but lionized.

Michelle Obama’s promise that "when they go low, we go high," was more galling than usual as the indictments of her husband’s administration begin, for the greatest outrage against constitutional presidential elections in American history.

Mercifully, the second evening closed with a tasteful, even encouraging, note with the gracious address of Jill Biden.

After all those who preceded her, she was a tentative reassurance that some sanity, decency, and integrity remain in that party, which has been hijacked by extremists.

One can only wish her well.

[omgktlouchheim]

Diary of Katie Louchheim

Below are thoughts and feelings of mine that have been brought forth by current events. My expressions below are solely my own, I do not claim these experiences to be anyone else’s or claim to speak for everyone with similar backgrounds or feelings.

Pretty much since the election I’ve been trying to gather my thoughts together. I feel like I’m being torn in a million directions. I wake up every day praying that this is an episode of The Twilight Zone, or a really fucked up dream I’m having and not reality. But I know it’s real. I’ve always known it was real. Growing up Jewish in Arizona was a constant reminder of my otherness while being within the Jewish community was a constant reminder of how much we’re hated solely based on that otherness. The weird thing about never knowing what it’s like to go to your place of worship or day school without security and metal detectors, or that when school gets cut because there was a bomb threat at the JCC or a swastika tagged on one of the synagogues in town, is that these things are not normal. And yet, by the time I was a young child they were completely normalized.

Maybe it didn’t seem so bad because I’ve had a complicated relationship with my Jewish identity so siding with people who were suspect felt easier. Or because that insecurity balanced out with my white privilege.  When people didn’t know my heritage, I definitely benefitted, and still mostly benefit, from that. That’s the lie of assimilation, though. There’s something off-white about living in America while having a Jewish background. (Obviously, for Jews of color it’s a whole other ballgame). Once that part of my identity was known I became “nice for a Jew” and “pretty for a Jew” but I most certainly was not nice or pretty enough to make me human enough to open up the minds of those bestowing compliments to me with their backhand. It would be me; alone, trying to toe the line between making a good and diplomatic impression while also denying a part of myself and any emotional reactions to people and instead, making sure to accommodate their feelings. I didn’t realize how small I was making myself in these situations. And how much responsibility I was shouldering that wasn’t my business to shoulder at all.

One time in high school, a bunch of us choir buddies were asked to sing at one of our friend’s churches. We went, sang a song about Jesus, nailed it (sry, too soon?) and then were forced to listen to this preacher sermonize about how non-Christian people are going to hell. At which point I turned and looked at my friend (an Iranian Zoroastrian) and we both just rolled our eyes because we were so used to this treatment by people toward us. Fucking jaded as fuck from this shit by 17 years old. I think the girl who asked us to go apologized after. I really don’t remember. At this point, and honestly since the dawn of time, apologies are not enough.

Being nice is not enough. There are no “both sides” to this equation. It’s not ok to tell people being brutalized that they need to identify or compromise with their abusers. It is not my job to hold your people accountable. Or hold your hand through your discomfort. White Christian folk, it’s yours. If I had been at that service today, I would have just gotten up and walked out. I don’t have the tolerance my younger self had for bullshit and no one’s fuckery is entitled to my time and space.  It is not my job to constantly try to prove my worth to people who already believe I’m worthless and taking up space that belong to them. All I know, without a doubt, is that my life is more important than White Christian Feelings™. The lives of my friends and family and all the various communities we are members of: POC communities, LGBTQ+, immigrant, Indigenous, Muslim, etc. are more important than White Christian Feelings™. If YOU have feelings it is YOUR job to go to a therapist and work on them and not culturally appropriate the use of tiki torches by using them to throw a tantrum while waving Confederate and Nazi flags, ramming your cars through crowds of people, and beating the shit out of peaceful protestors.

I try to be a good person. I know that majorities of people in this country are also trying to be good people. But, I’m going to level with you white Christian folks. I don’t trust you. I also have a lot of resentment toward you.  If you’re hurt by me saying that, I don’t care. It’s taken me a very long time to admit this. It’s taken an incredible amount of work to unpack and uncondition myself to the idea that I’m a bad person for feeling this way and for not seeing the “many sides.” But, you don’t deserve my trust. You’re not entitled to anything from anybody. Once again, YOUR problem. Tough titties, bro.

When I started seeing images of the gathering of angry white men with torches on Friday night, I had a feeling I wasn’t going to be able to participate in the onslaught of coverage of what was happening in Charlottesville, VA. I was right. The moment I opened Facebook and saw image after image and article after article of the Pasty Wasps Boys parade screaming anti-Semitic slurs, racist drivel, and throwing their arms up in Sieg Heil to Fuhrer Trump I found my breath catch in my throat. Those images turned into the countless hours of footage of the Nazis and their methodical tactics to exterminate our families shown to us every year to make sure we never forgot. The shots of piles of dead bodies found and photographed by the liberators morphed in my head from unknown members of the tribe to my parents and my siblings. Lifeless forms hanging from trees became my friends who dare to be themselves; worship who they wish to worship, love who they love, celebrating being black as fuck (Talia, I am living for you and your InstaStories right now and forever and always). It took me almost a full twenty-four hours and a hiatus from social media to get the panic attacks to stop.

Never again. Our communities make a point to pass down the atrocities we faced so we can make sure these things never happen again to anyone. Why don’t you learn what has happened to us? How is it that our heritage, which is intertwined with yours, weighs so heavily on only our hearts?

 Do you not have hearts?

 What exactly is wrong with you.

 Here’s a collection of other things that have been swirling around in my brainhole:

- Have we past the point of no return for democracy in this country? I’m afraid of staying in this country until it’s too late. I’m afraid of leaving this country that I love and have so much hope for and not knowing if I’ll have more confidence in my survival instincts at the end of it or live with feeling like a coward for the rest of my life. Then again, some of my family made it here in time. Others were murdered and dumped in a grave they were forced to dig themselves.

-I was in Israel with my family in June and I remember I had a moment while sitting on the roof of the hotel we were staying at in Jerusalem with my dad. I remember feeling very quiet and comfortable. I thought of a conversation I had had with my aunt a few weeks prior when she had said that when she went to Israel for the first time 30 some years ago it amazed her that she was in a place where everyone was Jewish. Then, it clicked. I realized that despite the fact that Jerusalem and much of Israel is religiously diverse and that there is still a hugely unsettling political environment present there, that I was in a place where Judaism was accepted. It was a norm. I was in a place where I didn’t have to explain myself to anyone no matter what my actual beliefs, practices or lack thereof are. That’s when I thought, “Wow. This is what it must feel like to be a White Christian back home.”

- I love this country. Maybe, more accurately, I love the concept of this country. I’m a 6th generation American. Which means that my lineage has been here almost as long as this country has been the United States of America. Which also means my lineage has been oppressed while actively engaging in and benefitting from the oppression of others. Immigrants were able to come and build a life for themselves as a result of the genocide of hundreds of millions of First Nations people. My five-times great grandfather fought in the Civil War against the Union. He was not allowed to fight with his fellow southerners and instead was in a separate infantry specifically for Jews. Everything about this sucks. I can only guess that this relative was doing what he felt was right, as way to assimilate, get closer to the American Dream, I’ll never know. Here’s what I do know: The Confederacy lost, as they should have. State’s rights my ass. And failure is a good thing. Failure means things have the potential to be better. It gives us a chance to sit back, deal with our filth, and clean it out. Something this country still hasn’t done.

#BlackLivesMatter

#StopDAPL

#NoBanNoWall

#LoveisLoveisLove

#TransisBeautiful

#WomensRightsAreHumanRights

#ImmigrantsWeGetThe Job Done

#DisabledandCute

#Resist

[ogiarts-blog]

MY PRESENTATION- IT’S NOT JUST A HAIR STYLE

My topic is identity. My project has mainly focused on how race and gender are part of my identity. I’ve looked at other black artists, feminists and how important I think that those communities are and how they impact me. But also how being a person of colour, being mixed race, and a woman have affected me. And addressing somethings like my hair growing up and my hair now as a part of my identity and also about inclusivity, wanting to see people who looked like me growing up in books and on television. I’ve been exploring this from a personal perspective and also looking at other theorists and also artists who look at similar themes.

For a lot of people culture, race , ethnicity is part of their identity. Its part of your history, your lineage and for some people a huge sense of pride. For my presentation I will be focusing on a reading called “ Hair matters”.

Below there are some terms in the reading and terms I will use to discuss my topic.

CULTURAL APPROPRIATION-

“the act of taking or using things from a culture that is not your own, especially without showing that you understand or respect this culture:"

BLACK FACE-

“black makeup worn (as by a performer in a minstrel show) in a caricature of the appearance of a black person

also : a performer wearing such makeup

NOTE: The wearing of blackface by white performers was, from the early 19th through the mid-20th centuries, a prominent feature of minstrel shows and similar forms of entertainment featuring exaggerated and inaccurate caricatures of black people. Its modern occurrence in imitation of such performers is considered deeply offensive.”

WHITE PRIVILEGE-

“the fact of people with white skin having advantages in society that other people do not have:

The concept of white privilege explains why white people have greater access to society's legal and political institutions."

MELTING POT-

“A melting pot is a metaphor for a society where many different types of people blend together as one. America is often called a melting pot. Some countries are made of people who are almost all the same in terms of race, religion, and culture. Historically, it is often used to describe the assimilation of immigrants to the United States.[1] The melting-together metaphor was in use by the 1780s.["

CULTURAL EXHCHANGE-

“provide an opportunity to explore other cultures, traditions, customs, beliefs, societies, languages and much more. Hence, such opportunities make you view the world with a different lens. This provides alternative perspectives! It broadens one's horizons and increases the tendency of acceptance.  “

TRANS-CULTURATION-

“ is a term coined by Cuban anthropologist Fernando Ortiz in 1947 to describe the phenomenon of merging and converging cultures.”

THE READING-

these extracts are from a book called Hair Matters, written by Ingrid Banks in 2000.

The reading I will look at further and more in depth in my blog. But I just wanted to refer to some parts from these extracts, which build a picture of how hair plays a big part in identity for other people.

The introduction explains there’s a lot of anecdotes from different people. And  “ their experiences with hair, intersecting with race, gender, motherhood, freedom, law, appropriation and identity”

Straight away it highlights all the issues surround hair and black women. It is not as simple as just hair- it can cause discrimination, law suits with work or education, cultural appropriation, gender and hair length, and cultural aspects of how women wear their hair. And how all these different personal experiences build a very individual picture of what hair means to them and how it plays a part in their identity. And because it can be individual and personal how these discussions need to start .

In some instances for people of colour hairstyles can result in certain prejudgments being made and stereotypes being assumed. The extract states “ I infer that hundreds, perhaps even thousands of Afro- wearing Black women were arrested, harassed and arrested by the police, FBI and immigration agents during the two months I spent underground” which is in reference to natural hair at the time immediately being associated with “ radical black groups”.  And today, other assumptions may be made about class, hygiene, and other things based on someones dreadlocks or braids. Also resulting in discrimination and job loss.

“ Understand how hair meanings represent broader articulations about beauty, power and a black woman’s consciousness “  then going on to explain the consciousness as something“… that represents difference and the multiple realities that black women face” and that “ A social and political history and reality exist that constitutes what is meant to be black and female within a racist and sexist society”. Showing that a hair style should not just simply be taken at face value. That it can be a paving journey for some women to finding self love, or acceptance. It can be a hair care change or be and this is known as a “ hair journey” for many black women.  And say how their hair can define their “blackness”. Whether there’s a certain image of the time period or wanting to look different and stand out like the afro , where the civil rights movement inspired people to wear their hair naturally.

And even though this book was written in 2000, I would like to highlight the relevance. This month, February 2019 it was made illegal to discriminate in a work place for people of colour in New York City. Which is shocking to me because that means it is still legal in many states to fire an employee based on their hair in other states in America, in 2019. People are loosing their jobs for what is a hair style. Below are some extracts from the reading “ hair matters” where I have got the quotes from.

Personally I can’t agree that when it comes to dreadlocks and braids that  “ its just a hair style”.  The problem stems from generations  of discrimination but also the Eurocentric beauty standards. When for two reasons it isn't as simple as that for us. One there may be generations of culture or history behind that item of clothing and/or hairstyle.

Two, for the fact that it would be nice if it was “just hair” but the simple fact it isn’t unfortunatlety. But there are literally thousands of articles and stories of people being discriminated against for having dreadlocks or braids. From being kicked out of school, loosing a job, all because of a hair style,. Furthermore,  for many this hair style may be used as protective styling for many people, braids and cornrow are to maintain the condition of their hair and essential in order to manage their hair. Others have their hair for spiritual reasons, like dreadlocks for people who are Rastafarian.

To go further back to slavery cornrows were used as a protective styling and essential for them. They were only allowed one day of the week, Sunday. To do their hair, which meant they had to maintain the same style for a whole week. And this was after a few years. When slaves first were taken to America they were forced to shave their heads. Which stripped them of any choice, any identity. Because from the tribes in Africa people coloured their hair, weaved materials into their hair and braids which were used to signify who you were, where you were from and your status in the society.

The problem sets in when this is normalised or ‘white washed’ it in turn wipes away the culture. In this photo Kim Kardashian is wearing Fulani braids. I Some may argue that she has a black husband and mixed race children, and she wants to be inclusive. But the problem prevails when the disregard for where it came from arises.

But Kim posted the photo on Instagram with   M followers she said “ bo braids”...

*Fulani Braids come from the fulani tribe. “Fulani. Fulani, also called Peul or Fulbe, a primarily Muslim people scattered throughout many parts of West Africa, from Lake Chad, in the east, to the Atlantic coast. They are concentrated principally inNigeria, Mali, Guinea, Cameroon, Senegal, and Niger.” https://www.britannica.com/topic/Fulani

However, the Bo braids Kim was referring to was in reference to actress Bo Derek who had Fulani braids for the 1979 film 10. She said in a video she's wearing “ bo braids” and “ she's really feeling this look”. Not only is it not the correct term, or giving recognition to where it actually originated from. But after the film 10, people of colour were getting fired from jobs for their hair style. Even having court cases rejected because the court deemed people to be “ copying from the film not culture” . And thats where it becomes a problem, because bo Derek had the opportunity to be “ deliberately provocative” and wear a black hairstyle at the time was un common. And it became a trend, a trend which had repercussions for the lives of black women. Who were wearing their hair in a style of their culture for maintainace, protection or even just styling, were denied the right to do so.

And still from 1979, it wasn't learnt that this blatant disregard and ignorance for black culture, is damaging. Kim references it in 2018 as “bo vibes” as if its history repeating its self and no-one has learnt.

What is evident is that designers have a blatant disregard for consideration of their customers who are of colour, their customers who and worse, an almost arrogance amongst the fashion industry to continually insult and disregard the feedback and backlash that they recieve from the black community. And for me that comes from a stand point of being  in the position of a white privellage. Where it is allowed to disregard and not consider the effect on the black community .

And then theres the infamous Marc Jacobs SS17 runway show where he had all his models wearing dreadlocks attached to their heads. Which caused a lot of controversy.

Designer Marc Jacob responded “ funny how its not a problem when people of colour straighten their hair”

Firstly not all “ people of colour” have curly hair , many hair textures which vary between person to person. Not only is the comment ignorant to the disregard that P.O.C can have straight hair it is worsened by the fact that “ straightened hair” is not a culture, it’s a genetic factor, similarly to having curly hair. Because it is not a culture it is not being appropriated. DR DELICE said that cultural appropriation  "happens when there are power inequalities between different cultures” and that is the problem here. Furthermore, this is comment comes after years and years of people believing that it was more desirable to have straight hair. Generations of instilling that it is better to be white and more beautiful to be white. Even after slavery was abolished and black people were moving from Southern States more North to cities like New York. And it was encouraged to wear wigs and perm your hair as it was seen as more Hollywood more glamorous. Women used knives and hot combs to get straight hair back in the 1800’s and then later in the 1860’s people were using potato, egg and lye. Which often caused severe burns to the scalp . People went to extreme lengths to conform to beauty standards and these attempts often resulted in people loosing their hair https://www.bustle.com/articles/189044-a-brief-disturbing-history-of-all-the-times-society-straightened-afro-textured-hair .  And therefore, I believe the criticism he received was justified because even when confronted on the matter Marc Jacobs, did not credit where the style was influenced from him and his stylist said “ rave culture” and then made his uninformed remark about straightened hair.

Marc Jacob in ANOTHER instance got recignition for the “ mini bun” a “ new trend”. Which is also known as bantu knots.

Jane kellock works in the fashion industry, she has worked for Topshop and many other brands.She said...

"Design is a mish-mash of different styles, cultures, ideas - and that's what makes it interesting," she says.

"I really, genuinely don't think that designers look at other cultures and think 'I'm just going to copy that and I'm going to rip off that culture'."

JANE KELLOCK- https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-46297329.

Which I believe would be a lot of peoples response that cultural appropriation is sometimes appreciation. And a lot of people may consider that in the world we live in, that there is an amalgamation of people and cultures and that its only right to share and appreciate what else is around you. And I am not suggesting that all designers deliberatly “ rip-off” cultures. But whether intentional or simple ignorance the problem still stands, it is happening. 

But she then went on to say...

"Fashion brands have to be more aware and diverse in general, because they're not. They're really not.”

"They'd rather use a celebrity that they know will get lots of people interested in it, rather than the original source of the idea.”

"In most cases, unfortunately, designers don't even have time to undertake proper research and appreciate a culture.”

She acknowledges the lack of diversity and inclusivity for P.O.C in these industries. 

Going back to the earlier point about Eurocentric beauty standards. Even amongst the black community there are issues surrounding  colourism, without including other races. There is an ideology amongst a lot of people of colour that it is more desirable to be lighter it is more desirable to have a paler complexion than to be a dark skin woman. Which is relevant again for me and my project more personally women of colour. There is often a sense of inadequacy. I didnt really notice too much until I was older the distinction with “ light skin “ or girls being “ lighties” and this being a sexualised preference for some men.  And also the term “exotic” and the derogatory undertones of highlighting that essentially you’re “ different”. That the lighter you are the more attractive you are which also ties into hair. Black hair is often described as messy, nappy, frizzy often quite negative descriptions people pay a lot of money to get hair relaxed, treated or wigs or weaves to achieve a different look. And of course, for a lot of people this is a choice, and some people do like change. But it stems from certain beauty standards which we are upheld to. With hair shops throughout the UK selling bleaching and lightening creams and even ‘celebrities’ like Blacc Chyna selling lightening cream in Nigeria to impressionable followers, who will believe this light skinned sucessful rich blonde woman is the standard of woman they’re against. 

As it said in the extract also black hair comes with stereo types and labels. And after years of women trying to conform to the Eurocentric beauty standard people do wear their natural hair more than in previous decades and it is frustrating to often hear these styles are ghetto or hood or ratchet but may be called “ urban” “raw” when not referring to a person of colour with the same styles.

Recently more so there has been a celebration of natural hair, curly hair,  with yearly conventions like “ CURL FEST” and other festivals encouraging embracing who you are and what you were born with . A lot of people are transitioning their hair back to natural and stopping using harsh relaxers which are very damaging to afro hair.

On top of all of this, I think that there’s also a blatant disregard  for black customers and black people in general for a lot of high end brands.

Recently a lot of designers have been called  out for creating racially insensitive clothing . Even last month, it was Black History Month and people were highlighting on twitter and other social media platforms which then led to the companies often removing the stock and following with some kind of apology.  But Prada, have released the “ black monkey red lips” Gucci last month the black balaclava with red lips,  chanel and their urban tie cap ( du rag you can get anywhere for a pound) , D&G and their $2,395 SLAVE flip flops, Moncler and their “ penguin Malfi, from friendswithyou” a campaign from Moncler who said the aim was “global friendship”, and Burberry and their “noose” which people were offended at the history of lynching and even insensitivity also towards suicide victims.  

These brands announce diversity education and initiatives  in order to “ stop these kind of events happening again”.  But it seems unnecessary   for these things to ever occur in the first place and to believe its even accidental in the first place seems naive. And makes it hard to want to “share” braids, and dreadlocks, and dashikis when high end brands also sell wolly wog printed items and blackface. 

So it calls me to ask how will society move forward as a melting pot of cultures or a society built on difference but acceptance. Holding the title ‘ white privilege  ’ isn't a fault of anyone now but it is deep rooted into society but to me, it should just be handled well and with consideration. And SHOULD therefore prioritise the other cultures before taking casual wear and someones hair style at face value. And to wear it as though it is simply just a costume, or just an accessory. A lot of people will argue its not our job to educate others, but I think it’s good to start the discussion .

[wishcub8-blog]

“Somebody Told Me My Body’s Not Mine to Hold”: An Interview with Erica Dawson

NOVEMBER 2, 2018

ERICA DAWSON’S THIRD BOOK of poetry, When Rap Spoke Straight to God, came as a surprise to me. A single poem, it takes her familiar approach to poetry — one that foregrounds virtuosity, insists on clarity, scrambles idioms, and delights in speaking freely — and turns it into something scarier, stranger, and more complex. Where, before, Dawson had frequently played at being dangerous, the speaker in this book seems imperiled by a world of bigotry and violence that no amount of brilliance can command — though the brilliance persists, as does her fascination with the world that threatens her. In one moment, she writes, “I press a flashlight hard against my womb, / spreading my legs to see if white comes out.” Earlier, in the voice of the “Lady Jesus” she tries to draw into her dreams, she imagines terrible violence and transformation, ecstatically:

And when the grave sky’s body-farm of gods and gutted animals serves me, you’ll eat me, masticate me with your tongue. My mouth, a bit of gristle.

            When I asked for grace the dust hid all the stars and not a single thing happened. But now I am the dust. The rivers choke on my fine silt. 

This summer, Erica and I talked via Skype about her new approach and the circumstances that forced and enabled those changes, with Erica sitting in her office at the University of Tampa, where she is an associate professor of English and Writing and the director of the University’s Low-Residency MFA in Creative Writing.

¤

JONATHAN FARMER: Your first two books were engaged in staking a claim, establishing the authority to say whatever the speaker wants, often in contexts where that might not be acceptable. That’s still the speaker’s approach in this new book, but the world is more resistant to it. This is a book where there’s more danger in your being fully present.

ERICA DAWSON: That’s definitely true, and I think it’s probably just a real-life result of living where I live at this particular point in time. Florida is an interesting part of the South. It’s not the South like Alabama or Mississippi; it often appears to be much more liberal. I was pretty alarmed around the time it seemed like a realistic thing that Trump might be president. It became very apparent that the liberal population here was outnumbered, more so than I thought. It just started to feel that way locally and then statewide and then globally in some senses, and I felt like people like me no longer had a voice in the public arena, and I started to just get angry about it, frankly. It felt as if I had something to fight against, more so than I have in the past.

And at the same time the book seems to dramatize a situation where the fight, in ways both large and personal, could very well be lost.

Something more is at stake in this book. It might be the first time I’ve really imagined the speaker fully immersed in the world. So much of what’s happening in the first two books is internal struggling, and what’s happening here is more about outside forces, and it feels as if it’s actually a real possibility that this voice could get lost in the chaos and the shuffle.

It really does feel that way. And another part of it is that in the first two books, phenomena are very discrete: this is this thing and this is this thing. Here, the boundaries seem to be breaking down. The boundary between internal self and external world has thinned, and the categories outside of the self are breaking down, too.

The world that I was trying to create on the page is very much in flux. Everything moves and shifts constantly, and I did that on purpose because I wanted to create something realistic that felt like the fierce and yet fragile world that we’re living in. But there was also a world hovering right above that, so that things seemed very literal at the same time as they seem larger than life. That really started to come out once I got kind of into the groove of mixing the biblical with the everyday. I wanted there to be a flood — a quality where the reader still knows where he or she is but feels unsteady in that place, and that required that I blur the boundaries between things. It’s a kind of precision in confusion.

Absolutely. As I was reading, I put together a partial list of themes that end up entangled with each other: race and racism, sex and sexism, violence, religion, family, art, myth, Trump, nature … I can list those things, but there are very few moments in the book where I can easily say, Alright, now we’re just dealing with nature. Or we’re dealing with sex here. We’re dealing with sexism here. Which is true of the world we live in, as well.

I kind of wanted to make it difficult for someone to say this is about X or this is about Y. I wanted to create a whirlwind. I had to sort of aim for a kind of complexity that I haven’t really worked toward in the first two books. I wanted there to be a lot of things happening at once. I wanted it to really feel like the poem takes you and whisks you off into some other space.

I think it does that. But then, having said that, I’d still like to talk about some of those themes, because they’re no less real for being blurry and entangled. Let’s start with race and racism, which is both constantly present and highly unstable in this book.

I feel like it’s a bit of product of where I live right now. I’ve obviously always been black and a woman, and I’ve obviously always been a minority, but I feel more “other” here in Florida than I have in Maryland or Ohio. In a way, I’ve become more aware of my blackness.

In the last couple of years, people have just gone out of their way to make it clear that I’m not part of the majority. Like the moment in the poem where the guy says something about my hair. It sometimes feels like people are going out of their way to point out the fact that I’m different. It’s allowed me to see being in black in America in a very different kind of way. This is gonna start to sound cliché, but it seemed like we had made all this progress. I lived in very liberal places and never really had those moments where you felt scared or very uneasy, as if people were staring at you. That happens now on the regular in Florida.

It’s been a discovery for me in the last couple of years, and I wanted to explore that, I wanted to look at a race in a different way than I had in the past.

I feel like part of that, too, is a desire to speak very directly and assertively about blackness even as you’re trying to hold on to these other things and wondering, How does race fit here? How much room is there for blackness in this language? How much room is there for blackness within this literary tradition? You joke at one point about being into dead white boys. Those moments feel playful, but there’s a sense at times of something very dangerous just underneath that.

It was important to me to capture that sense of riskiness or danger. I’m the black girl who likes to read Robert Herrick, who decided to study these dead white guys for her PhD instead of doing African-American Lit or something that some people expected from me. While working on this book, I started to think about how my scholarly interests were maybe about trying to assimilate into a certain crowd, or working against or with my own race or culture. I’m still not really sure, but I definitely wanted to push myself into thinking about race and art and culture and language in a way that I hadn’t done before.

You’ve always written about sex, but in the past you were presenting yourself as dangerous, this larger-than-life figure, and now your body feels imperiled in all kinds of ways.

I’ve always felt comfortable writing about sex.

But I backed away from the swagger a bit, which I think I had adopted to mask the vulnerability I felt in sexual situations. I wanted to think about the times when I felt as if I wasn’t in control of my sexuality or I wasn’t in the power position that I thought I was in. I remember writing the scene where I’m in the club and the man assaults me. It was one of those moments when I felt I had the power. The woman was in charge. She’s having her night, she’s dancing with people, she’s having a really great time, and then all of a sudden the situation has turned and she’s terrified and no longer has control of her space and her body. It was time to start investigating those particular realities about being a woman.

Even if you are a confident woman and you’re okay acknowledging that you’re a sexual being, the boundaries that you created for yourself aren’t always intact. Other people are going to push against those boundaries, and there’s a lot of fear, I think, that was hiding underneath the confidence that I have.

That’s tangible. The sense of wanting to still be able to move through the world in those ways. Of still having this way of using language that suggests profound authority and profound freedom. But also the awareness of that as a kind of coping technique. At one point here you write, “Then somebody told / me my body’s not mine to hold.”

I think that circles back to what we were saying about the different relationship between the internal and the external, where it became less about telling myself something and more about starting to really receive some of the messages that specific individuals or that society at large are coming at me with at the same time. There’s so much out there that it is telling women that our bodies aren’t ours. As much as you think that you’re claiming authority over it, that authority is being challenged every single second of every single day. It was important for me to dive deeper into the confidence that I had expressed in the past and ask, really, what’s fueling that confidence. I think in a lot of ways a kind of hyper-confidence. To make up for the anxieties underneath.

Absolutely.

I’d love to talk about all this in terms of the book’s conclusion. Three pages from the end you step into this highly authoritative mode that comes right out of Genesis: “Let there / be black never absorbing white. Let there / be skin born back on every scar.” Then it gets cut off. The Angel Gabriel steps in. Then there’s this really long break.

And then we get: “Outside, a dark and empty heaven. // A wind gone on about its blackness.” And this recurring phrase: “the exodus of light.” It seems like a lot of these things are kind of coming together through force of will. The relationships between them are still really unstable, but there’s a deliberate act of trying to get them in a place where you can speak about it in some comprehensive way.

I struggled with the ending for a really long time. I had no idea how I wanted to handle it. Moving through so much and at a really quick pace, I started to figure out that it was a good idea to slow down. I needed the ending to sort of roll its way to a finish, but at a much more deliberate pace.

I wanted it to be an attempt at resolution — a moment where I could slow down and the language would come together, the light and the darkness, the light and the blackness, the Bible and real-life myth, and the mundane. I wanted everything to exist in that same space, and that’s where the villanelle sneaks in with the repetition of “the exodus of light.”

But then I wanted to leave that sort of unsettled. There is no closure here.

It’s open and shifting. The terminology is shifting and our understanding of these things is shifting, and so that’s why I wanted that very large amount of white space after the Angel Gabriel. A somewhat bizarre fraught space, but you just have to exist in it. Then I just wanted this one last move that was hushed. I wanted an image that was the opposite of the image on the first page, where the heavens turn red from the fire. I wanted to make it the opposite of that, where everything was dark and calm and slow. And equally terrifying.

It was a move toward some sort of conclusion, but then the acknowledgment of the fact that that conclusion is just as questionable or fraught with difficulty as any other moment in the book.

And it feels as if that difficulty is something that’s handed down. The more time I spend with this book, the more I think about it as a book that is very interested in kinds of inheritance. Some of the inheritances are chosen and some are not, a lot of them are not. You talked earlier on about this one inheritance that you chose, the inheritance of poetry.

It seems like you’re trying to reimagine what it means to inherit that and to keep working with that. You’re still working with these traditional forms, but they’re more scattered.

Whenever I’m starting something new, I challenge myself to do something that I haven’t done before, because I get really irritated with poets who just keep publishing the same book over and over again. It’s really important to me that I don’t do that. I wanted to give myself the freedom to do whatever it was that I wanted to do. I decided if I wanted to do it, I was going for it.

People very much want to talk about me as a formalist, but I’m not only interested in “the rules.” I’m interested in the ways we can improvise and play with the instruments and tools that we have. The book reflects that interest perhaps more palpably than my first two. Here, there’s always some sort of organizing principle — I can’t write without that — but I wanted to allow myself to be as loose as I wanted to be and as formal as I wanted to be at the same time. It was about carrying on with the family that I had always been part of, this formal family, the British poets that I love so much. But also allowing myself to move into a space that was a little more natural for me at the same time. Something that felt like, I’m not a formalist, I’m an Ericaist.

Craig Morgan Teicher has a new book about the ways poets evolve. There’s a chapter on Sylvia Plath where he talks about these early poems of hers that are masterful, but in which the mastery is kind of overriding everything else. He makes the case that she developed the skills in advance of her ability to apply them to the world, and that it was finding subjects commensurate with that mastery that let her leap forward. I don’t mean to denigrate your first two books. As you know, I’m a big fan of those. But it does feel, with this new book, as if the skills you exhibited in those have met their match, and that the skills are more meaningful as a result.

I 100 percent agree. The cool thing about writing in form is that when you are learning, you can take to it very quickly. It was always easy for me, then it’s so easy to just rely on those skills. And I stand behind all the poems that I’ve written. But a lot of times the performance of the form was more prominent than me actually fully engaging with the content of the poem. It became more of a, “Look at this fantastic set of rhyming couplets!”

It was really important to me that I really let the content drive the formal decisions that I was making. It was like, okay, I need something that’s going to give me the opportunity to be sort of meditative or ruminate, like that villanelle portion at the end of the poem or in the middle where you get the pantoum stanzas, where I was going to use these forms to create the kind of music that I want to create, to create the song that I actually want to create. It’s no longer someone else’s form. I’m taking ownership of it now and trying to make it my own.

¤

Jonathan Farmer is the editor-in-chief and poetry editor of At Length and critic-at-large for the Kenyon Review.

Source: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/somebody-told-me-my-bodys-not-mine-to-hold-an-interview-with-erica-dawson/

[teachanarchy]

Indigenous Peoples’ History: An Annotated Bibliography

Teaching American Indian history, or history in general, has transformed dramatically over the past 20 years. Much of this is due to technological advancements such as PowerPoint, online resources, and web platforms such as Blackboard. But in large part it is also due to our changing perspectives on the past. The one truism to remember when teaching history is that all history is revisionism.

Our present-day realities shape the way we think about the past and interpret historical trends and figures. All too often, wide-eyed freshmen (and many others) cling to the notion that somehow history is a social science. Many institutions place the field in the social sciences department, right alongside psychology, sociology, and anthropology. It’s true that history is based on a set of facts and events that are unchangeable. For example, Christopher Columbus’ three ships—the Niña, Pinta, and Santa Maria—landed on an island in what is today the Bahamas in the year 1,492 of the Gregorian calendar. But our interpretation of those facts changes dramatically from generation to generation. Years ago, many people learned that Columbus “discovered” America and that the world changed for the better because of it, a belief held so strongly that the United States has a federal holiday commemorating the man. Today, I would venture to guess that very few college-level instructors teach this interpretation of Columbus and his voyage. While all may not portray him as a man driven by greed who committed countless atrocities, most at least complicate the narrative and point out that there is more than one story about Columbus.

In many ways, tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) are on the cutting edge of such historical revisionism. Long before perspectives on Columbus changed at mainstream institutions, TCUs offered an Indigenous perspective on the man and what his voyage meant for the millions of people living in the Americas. Indeed, a uniquely Native interpretation of events has been applied to the field of history at TCUs, setting them apart from their peer institutions. Fortunately, mainstream colleges and universities have diversified, opening the door to Native voices and historical interpretations. The historiography is also changing. Today there is an ever-growing body of literature that revamps our understanding of the past. Much of it is based on new evidence, both oral and archival, but other studies give new interpretations using the same historical records that previous generations of historians utilized.

Below are 10 history books that TCU educators may find useful. While Native historians have authored some of them, there are also titles by non-Natives, further evidence that Native voices are influencing the wider academy. In another 20 years, I am sure that some of these books will seem antiquated and out of touch with the then present realities. Just remember, all history is revisionism—and if you think that historians and educators today have had the final word on Columbus, you’re wrong.

Calloway, C.G. (1997). New Worlds for All: Indians, Europeans, and the Remaking of Early America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Historian Colin Calloway helped revise American Indian history in the academy with the publication of this award-winning book. Unlike previous studies that focused on how Europeans imposed their institutions on Native people and changed them forever, Calloway explores how the contact experience was a two-way street. He argues that Native people and culture profoundly influenced the invading Europeans and that, together, they created a new, distinctly American society.

Denetdale, J.N. (2007). Reclaiming Diné History: The Legacies of Navajo Chief Manuelito and Juanita. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

In her first book, Jennifer Nez Denetdale pulled few punches in her excoriation of the academy and how Western scholarship is another form of imperialism. The first citizen of the Navajo Nation to earn a Ph.D. in history, Denetdale employs some unique methods to make her case. She examines popular constructions of Chief Manuelito and Juanita, studying photographs, stories, and even their clothing. Uncompromising and ideological, Denetdale’s study helped forge a new path in the academy for Indigenous peoples’ history.

Dunbar-Ortiz, R. (2014). An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States. Boston: Beacon Press.

Perhaps more than any publication in the past decade, this book dramatically showcases recent historical revisionism. It is a scorching condemnation of the United States as a settler-colonial state built on White supremacy and genocide. Dunbar-Ortiz rips previous historical interpretations (including many in this bibliography) as perpetuating national myths and rationalizing land theft and murder. Even the multiculturalism that informs many histories today fails to escape Dunbar-Ortiz’s indictment, which she claims is “an insidious smoke screen” that obscures the country’s “national chauvinism” and sordid history. Written concisely and accessibly, this book packs a powerful ideological punch.

Fixico, D.L. (2013). Indian Resilience and Rebuilding: Indigenous Nations in the Modern American West. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Donald Fixico, a Native historian who currently teaches at Arizona State University, has authored or edited numerous volumes over the past 30 years. In his most recent book, he re-conceptualizes modern American Indian history as one of great achievement and progress. Where most histories focus on the tragedies of allotment, assimilation, termination, and relocation, Fixico explores the expansion of sovereignty and self-determination. Native nations were on the “verge of extinction in 1890,” he says, but persevered and went on to build their communities, harness resources, and protect their land base. The road was hard and there remain many obstacles ahead, but Fixico maintains historians should “look anew at what has been accomplished by Indians” over the past century.

Hoxie, F.E. (2012). This Indian Country: American Indian Activists and the Place They Made. New York: Penguin.

Acclaimed historian Frederick Hoxie traces American Indian history using biographies of Native activists who worked on behalf of their tribal communities. Some of the subjects in this book will be familiar to readers, while others will not. But by illuminating these obscured histories, Hoxie shows how individuals have deftly utilized political and legal channels for the betterment of Indian Country and the larger Native community.

Jennings, F. (1975). The Invasion of America: Indians, Colonialism, and the Cant of Conquest. New York: W.W. Norton and Company.

Francis Jennings’ groundbreaking book did the same for professional or academic history as Dee Brown’s Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee did for popular history. While Brown’s bestseller focused on the American West, Jennings uses New England as his case study of European conquest and its catastrophic effect on the Native nations. Jennings was writing during the Watergate scandal and a low point in Americans’ trust in government institutions, which clearly had a profound influence on the tenor of this study.

Mann, C.C. (2005). 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. New York: Vintage Books.

Charles C. Mann was not trained as an academic historian, but he does have a profound gift for writing. This acclaimed, bestselling popular history is both highly readable and intellectually stimulating. Mann brings to the masses a dramatic reconceptualization of the Americas before contact. Utilizing a variety of methodologies, his book shows how Native people transformed landscapes and made impressive technological advancements long before the arrival of Europeans.

Nabokov, P. (Ed.). (1991). Native American Testimony: A Chronicle of Indian-White Relations from Prophecy to the Present, 1492-1992. New York: Penguin.

Unlike the other books on this list, Nabokov’s edited volume presents a collection of Native voices from the past 500 years, offering Indigenous perspectives on major historical events and developments. Recently, Nabokov has been heavily criticized for his book The Origin Myth of Acoma Pueblo, which revealed sacred stories without the tribe’s consent. This volume, however, has been widely acclaimed, including accolades from Vine Deloria Jr. who penned the foreword. The book presents a wide array of Native viewpoints on issues ranging from Anglo trade practices during the colonial or early republic eras to the Alcatraz occupation and beyond.

Richter, D.K. (2001). Facing East from Indian Country: A Native History of Early America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

“If we shift our perspective to try to view the past in a way that faces east from Indian country, history takes on a very different appearance,” asserts historian Daniel Richter. That is how this Pulitzer Prize finalist approaches the early history of what would evolve into the United States. Rather than succumb to the classic national story of westward expansion, readers view the contact experience and its repercussions from Indian Country, which, Richter reminds us, was America until recently.

Roessel, R. (1974). Navajo Livestock Reduction: A National Disgrace. Chinle, AZ: Navajo Community College Press.

Diné College founder Ruth Roessel compiled this collection of stories and oral histories chronicling the federal government’s livestock reduction program of the 1930s. All of the stories are firsthand accounts from Navajo people who experienced this tragic chapter in American history. Moreover, this was one of the first titles from the first tribal college press, further underscoring the historiographical significance of Roessel’s work. Difficult to find, this gem is as much about self-determination and sovereignty in the historical discourse as it is about livestock reduction.

Bradley Shreve, Ph.D., taught history at Diné College for several years and currently is managing editor of Tribal College Journal.

[johneburton]

It's Time to Start Scaring Visitors Away From the Church JOHN BURTON 4 MONTHS AGO - 14 MINUTE READ Many are working hard to attract the wrong crowd on Sunday—and the result is an Ichabod church. We soon won't be able to define going to church the way we do now. God is coming to reform, to crush structures of old for what is to be introduced very soon. Our call isn't to stand strong until the shift comes, it's to prophetically sound the alarm and awaken those at risk! God is coming! The force from Heaven, the celestial asteroid, is going to impact the Church, and most pastors and people will resist with everything that's within them. Man-made support systems will be removed. People's financial and relational structures will be threatened by this strange new spiritual invasion. The human wisdom and natural common sense that have been involved in the development of the current church structure will not be usable in the new. Those who walk by sight are in danger. ~The Coming Church, John Burton I've met countless pastors and others who say they are focused on revival, but who are misguided on exactly what it is. Their focus is on attracting people to the church, on people getting "saved" and on other church growth strategies. The problem? The foundational pursuit of revival has nothing to do with church growth or the lost. It has everything to do with the church awakening, contending in intercession and attracting the fire of the Holy Spirit. The lost didn't show up in the upper room. Marginal followers of Jesus were repelled by the upper room. Revival isn't marked by a full house. Revival starts in a room that reveals the remnant. The revival that erupted in that roomful of remnants resulted in explosive church growth and kingdom advance. Premature church growth will result in a multiplication of lukewarm, dead and dying people who have no idea what it feels like to have tongues of fire igniting over top of them. When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like a mighty rushing wind came from heaven, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. There appeared to them tongues as of fire, being distributed and resting on each of them (Acts 2:1-3). Visitors Should Be Shaken by What They See in the Church. The pure Christian message of surrender, repentance, holiness, intercession and rescuing souls from hell has been replaced by a self-centered gospel that boldly affirms a focus on benefits without cost, on personal gain without sacrifice, on freedom without consecration. The Church has been unapologetically and boldly focused on how to have faith to receive while forsaking the call to have faith to give. The spirit of the age infiltrated churches long ago—and now, all too often, that demonic spirit is the primary counselor. ~The Coming Church, John Burton It's time self-focused, semi-interested people are no longer given the opportunity to demand what they are looking for in a church. It's time to close up the welcome centers and put away the welcome gifts. When presented with the unmistakable burning only a supernatural church can offer, their decision to stay or leave will be immediate. I've often said that one indicator of the Holy Spirit moving in power is that bystanders will do one of two things. They will either marvel or they will mock. They were all amazed and perplexed, saying to each other, "What does this mean?" Others mocking said, "These men are full of new wine" (Acts 2:12-13). When naturally minded people walk into a furnace of intercession, a place that is electric with supernatural activity, they should be radically unsettled, yet so many church assimilation teams today attempt to make the environment as familiar and comfortable as possible. I've often heard pastors admit they hide the pre-service prayer (for those who have pre-service prayer at all) in a side room instead of filling the sanctuary with groans of intercession because they don't want to freak out the soon-arriving visitors. I've heard that many, many times, and I was grieved every time. There are a few legitimate reasons why prayer might not work in the sanctuary prior to the service in some churches, but that's not one of them. If we are attempting to introduce people into the wonder of a supernatural encounter with Jesus, why would we, at the same time, work so hard at shielding their eyes? I propose bringing the fire and the groan right into the heart of the Sunday service. Those who remain will be the laborers you need to fulfill your mission. Many years ago, when I first started Revolution Church in Manitou Springs, Colorado, I worked hard at assimilating visitors. I would excitedly connect with them and share just how much they would enjoy making our church their new home. It didn't take long for me to start feeling like a used-car salesman: dirty, compromised. My strategy grieved my spirit. The truth was that our atmosphere and our vision were called by God to be driven by intercession and marked by a strong prophetic emphasis. The messages were intense. Revolution Church was not designed for those who would be marginally committed (as no church is}. The "Sunday go to meeting" Christians would, by choice, not remain for long. The reality was, that by attempting to attract those types of people, I was compromising the vision. The church needed the remnant who would lock in and pray, who would contend for revival and who would endure with great strength. A large group of non-remnant people would be a distraction. Years would be lost. Lives would be at risk. Eternities would be in danger. So, I shifted. I started literally trying to scare people away from our church. To the dismay of those who simply want to hear a little worship and listen to good (and short) teaching, services will become more like prayer meetings. This is one of the most critical and most upsetting shifts that will come–and it must come now. Today, most of the energy church leadership teams expend is usually on attracting and keeping visitors instead of training and engaging intercessors. ~The Coming Church, John Burton A Church on Fire America doesn't need another bed-and-breakfast church that comforts our flesh (our natural desires). Our nation needs a church with a volatile atmosphere that explodes, burns human flesh and shocks our culture. —The Coming Church, John Burton I knew we were called to lead a church on fire, and that just wasn't possible with tepid, resistant, lukewarm people. I know your works, that you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain but are ready to die (Rev. 3:1-2). I was confident that, if I clearly shared the wild, costly, other-worldly vision that God had given us, and how people at our church were called to invest into that vision, that those who would not be interested in such a lifestyle would not return. Understand, my invitation for them to run with us was genuine. Our door was wide open. When I say "I tried to scare them away" I mean I was simply authentic. I stripped off the suit of a salesman and shared my raw, passionate dream of God to advance with a team of zealots for Jesus. Such an invitation was all I needed to see who was deeply hungry for revival and who was not. I would do my best to help those people connect in another local church. I'd give them the names of some churches they might enjoy. While I truly wanted the very best for them, it always broke my heart when they decided against adopting a lifestyle of intercession and revival. That lifestyle is not for a specialized few. It's for all. This resulted in a confidence that those who remained were, in most cases, part of our remnant, firebrands who would dig in and assimilate with our tribe of revivalists. When you spend energy attracting the mildly committed, you compromise your entire vision. Simply, you need soldiers to become equipped and ready to lay down their lives and fight for the freedom of souls in the region. I believe it's core to the mission of the church to give opportunity for people to clearly evaluate their commitment and to give room for them to leave. The intensity of the truth demands it. We must call people out of a natural life and into the supernatural, out of a casual place and into radical surrender. It is the Spirit who gives life. The flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit and are life. But there are some of you who do not believe." For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray Him. Then He said, "For this reason I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it were given him by My Father." From that time many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him. So Jesus said to the twelve, "Do you also want to go away?" Understand, similar to the way Jesus ministered in the above passage along with other key examples in Scripture, the Upper Room served as a filter. It filtered out those who weren't radically devoted. Most were repelled by the call to pray. The agenda did not change in the hopes of assimilating more people. The disciples loved them as they went their way, and then they turned the world upside down with the few who remained as a result. What filters do you have in your church, pastor, to call people to a transparent, genuine place of soul searching and decision? You must start and continue with an Upper Room atmosphere and an offensive, flesh-crushing Gospel message. It's important to remember that the ekklesia, the church gathering, was not designed for the lost. So many pastors get derailed on this point alone. The church is a house of prayer for all nations. The predominant church activity should be white hot intercession with tongues of fire atop everyone, with groans filling the atmosphere. It's a remnant ministry. This call is for all who call themselves Christian. If you build a church with people who won't devote themselves to the prayer room, you build your church with those who are disinterested at best and lukewarm at worst. Your church will be a low-water-level church. It will be a place where the fire can't rage. It will be naturally familiar with distant, elusive, marginally supernatural dreams. Pipe dreams. Christians who aren't invested in fervent, supernatural prayer will be enticed by the natural familiarity of Ichabod churches (where the glory has departed). —The Coming Church, John Burton What About the Seekers? A question I hear from very good-hearted people is this: What do we do with people who are seeking? Do we just turn them away? We absolutely don't turn them away! We invite them into the furnace. We do not turn down the fire. We turn it up! Those who are hungry for God must not be introduced to a tepid, natural environment with an image of God that looks just like themselves. Reveal the glory of our mysterious, fiery, living God and watch them collapse to their knees in desperation. However, as I have stated already, many will choose to leave at the sight of something so alien and costly. That's a choice they themselves have a right to make. Again, we must faithfully reveal the cost of following Jesus. We don't come on our terms. We come on God's. Too many are interested in warming their flesh by the fire instead of their flesh being consumed by the fire. When he heard this he became very sorrowful, for he was very rich. When Jesus saw that he became very sorrowful, He said, "How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." Those who heard this said, "Who then can be saved?" He said, "What is impossible with men is possible with God." Peter said, "Look, we have left everything and followed You." He said to them, "Truly, I tell you, there is no man who has left his home or parents or brothers or wife or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who shall not receive many times more in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life." Many will turn away sad. Even the most devoted will feel the severity of a life devoted to Jesus. They will cry out, "Then who can be saved?" That tension will result in a church that is sober and on fire and something that true seekers will give themselves to. Pretenders will certainly go away sad as the remnant church is revealed. My lifelong commitment in ministry is this: I refuse to tone down the activity of the Holy Spirit out of respect of those less hungry. That commitment requires everything I do to have the smell of smoke. In fact, pastors, one reason even the most devoted people aren't coming to your prayer meetings is simple—they are dead, humanistic and boring. They are logically driven. They are simply a rehashing of what the natural mind can discern. As someone who comes alive in prophetic, prayer-fueled environments, I aggressively avoid powerless prayer meetings that are driven by lists of needs and human understanding. I don't want my soul activated. I want my spirit to burn! I think tired, powerless petition-driven prayer meetings can do more damage than good much of the time. Do your prayer meetings have the smell of smoke? Are tongues of fire resting on everybody? If not, don't be surprised when the even the most devoted disciples are no-shows. We need a church on fire today more than ever. The lost are being introduced into lukewarm, natural, Ichabod religion instead of a supernatural shaking that can only come from the Great I Am. They are convinced they are saved as they are assimilated into a community of likeminded quasi-spiritual people who would love to see God manifest in their natural realm—yet have no interest in manifesting in the spiritual realm where the Holy Spirit broods. My challenge to pastors is simple: Risk everything. Allow your church to dwindle, if necessary, to a few remnant people who will live, pray, walk and advance in the Spirit. The world is waiting for them. You can download a free chapter and order The Coming Church by John Burton as at burton.tv/resources. This article originally appeared at burton.tv. John Burton has been developing and leading ministries for over 25 years and is a sought out teacher, prophetic messenger and revivalist. John has authored ten books, is a regular contributor to Charisma Magazine, has appeared on Christian television and radio and directed one of the primary internships at the International House of Prayer (IHOP) in Kansas City. A large and growing library of audio and video teachings, articles, books and other resources can be found on his website at burton.tv. John, his wife Amy and their five children live in Branson, Missouri.

[everlonghope]

The simplicity of the phrase “I am Iranian-American” completely contradicts the complexity behind it.

I grew up in the Bay Area and am still a resident of this pretty diverse hub on the west coast. From what I have put together from stories my mom told me about my childhood, I have come up with my own story, my own identity.

I spoke Farsi (the language Iranians/Persians speak, different from Arabic but still similar) as my first language. When I went to pre-school, I was younger than the other kids in my class and couldn’t speak much English, so I relied on other little kids to help me through the day. At the same time, these kids also took me under their own little wings. I learned English quickly and soon became bilingual. I spoke Farsi at home with my mom and grandma, and then I spoke English at school.

Up until kindergarten, I traveled to Iran every year because it was easy to take a month off pre-school education. We traveled as a family during the springtime because it was the best month to go to Iran – the flowers were blooming and the air was fresh.

As I entered elementary school, my English skills outweighed my Farsi skills, and I soon could only understand Farsi when spoken to. At the same time, I would slowly desire to assimilate into the “normal” white food culture. I loved the Iranian food my mom packed for me for lunch, but eating it while all the other kids were eating pasta, casserole, and soup stirred unwanted gazes and glares. I didn’t want the other kids to think that my food smelled, and even though I was proud of it and stood up for it to other kids because it tasted so damn good, I brought my own culture’s food less and less in order to fit in.

Around third grade, a few things happened in my 9-year-old life. I started taking Farsi lessens at our public library, learning how to read and write with a couple other kids. It was difficult to go to this class once a week but I did it for around a year and a half. Keeping up with my Farsi homework always annoyed me, and I resented having to learn this language even though my mom always said that I would regret it if I didn’t learn it now… something that I find 100% true now.

The other thing that happened was High School Musical. As a child, I grew up on Disney cartoons and princess movies. My favorite princess was probably Ariel, but I always loved the film Aladdin because it was practically about me (even though the actuality was it was probably set in modern day Iraq). It was about people who looked like me. Jasmine was the princess I knew I could be because she looked like me. When High School Musical came out, I had a live-action Disney character that shared similar features to my own: Gabriella. Dark hair, dark eyes, tan skin. I felt saved. On the same note, in third grade I also felt really isolated by multiple people in my extremely tiny class, and a lot of the girls who were mean to me shared similar features to the “whiter” Disney characters like Cinderella, Aurora, and…Sharpay Evans from HSM. My love for characters like Gabriella and Jasmine matched my resentment for Cinderellas and Sharpays. The ease I have admitting this right now is because I’m 18 and realize I was being a bit extreme for a little kid, but I think my love and hate was very valid and very much associated with my racial and ethnic identity – as a minority.

Entering fifth grade and later middle school, I became obsessed with reading and writing admittedly shitty stories that took inspiration from my growing imagination. Characters like Hermione Granger and Bella Swan shared a feature I had: darker hair. That was a check in my book. I could relate to them. In the stories I created, the main female character almost always looked like me. I wanted to be represented and I made sure I was.

At the same time, basically after I quit Farsi class, my resentment for Iran grew. We only traveled twice more before my mom got sick, and both times I didn’t want to go. There was no internet access and basically nothing for me to do there. The flight was long and I just didn’t enjoy going. The last time I went before my mom got sick was the summer in between 6th and 7th grade, and I was going through my own middle school phase of moodiness and questionable behavior. I didn’t care about my identity as an Iranian-American; it wasn’t as important as other things.

In my late middle school era, I was friends with a girl who was half Iranian, and we became best friends. Besides how well our personalities meshed together, it was so nice to have someone to talk to because she understood some Iranian family quirks that I experienced. I felt like my identity was validated because there was someone my age like me.

As I entered high school, my Iranian-American identity was simultaneously something always on the back of my mind and something I clung to because it made me different from my peers. I did my “country” project in 9th grade history class on Iran, for example. I started becoming more comfortable bringing Iranian food to school (usually from restaurants because my mom was to sick to cook or already passed away) in 10th-11th grade. I also think gaining a very great group of friends in high school allowed me to open up and be myself, and being myself included the Iranian-American me.

Throughout almost all the years of my life, I went to a Chaharshanbe Soori celebration in Berkeley right before Persian New Year. It was probably the only part of the holiday I liked besides the food because it was when people jumped over little fires and “left behind” the bad parts of life in the old year, welcoming and celebrating the new year to come. This holiday was always super cool to my friends, no matter what age, and it instilled some pride in me, that my identity was cool.

We missed Chaharshanbe Soori the year after my mom’s death (11th grade) because of too much schoolwork, and I honestly don’t remember if we went in 10th grade. Those years were mostly a blur, but Chaharshanbe Soori was definitely a memory and celebration that always made me feel close to my culture. In a way, when my mom died I lost the connection I had to my Iranian identity. She was a constant speaker of Farsi in the house and always pushed me to connect with my ethnic identity. In elementary school, she sometimes gave presentations to my classes during Persian New Year, like the Chinese moms did during Chinese New Year. She always encouraged me to share who I was and where I came from.

When I lost my mom, I lost a lot of who I was. Since 11th grade, I have gone to Iran twice – once before senior year, and this past winter break. The first trip without her ended abruptly, and I felt like my time in Iran wasn’t done. It was cut short. The second trip, the one I recently came back from, didn’t feel this way. It felt complete and whole, and I am really excited to go back – whenever that will be.

Iran is a really triggering experience for me because everywhere reminds me of my mom. Simple taxi drives are weird without her in the backseat.

This one coffee shop in Frankfurt airport will always remind me of my mom because I have pictures of her in it from the last trip she went on.

I have so many pictures of her from Iran.

Something I’m grateful for is staying in a different place when we visit now, because staying in the same place that I was in with my mom would be so triggering and so so overwhelming. The trip is already overwhelming, but it reminds me of who she was, and who I am.

We would go to the bazaar and look at jewelry together, complain about the heat, eat lots of cream puffs and drink tea. I miss her so much and Iran reminds me of her because that’s who she was. She was a beautiful, intelligent Iranian woman who makes me proud to be Iranian, to carry her as a part of my identity.

Similarly, the past trip we had reminded me that Iran is home, because Iran is family. Simply sitting at the dinner table in my great aunt’s house reminded me how many loving people I am surrounded by and have on my side. Cousins and second cousins and aunts and great aunts. My grandma on my dad’s side made many trips to America before and after my mom’s passing, so she was more or less a part of our America-located family. Actually visiting Iran is different because I’m literally placed in a city that contains so many family members. It’s overwhelming.

My family threw me a little birthday party this past trip  because I would be in college during my actual birthday. It was super small, and I actually almost napped before they surprised me with the birthday cake. When I walked out into the living room I had to tell myself not to cry. It is such a crazy, emotional experience to lack family most of your life and then be emerged in it all at once. Holidays don’t really mean much to me because they are just normal meals and days with my immediate family (Armita and my dad). I don’t go to my grandma’s house for Thanksgiving or visit my aunt’s for Christmas because the majority of my family lives in a different country. Visiting Iran reminds me of how much I miss out on while living in America, but it also allows me to be super grateful and happy to be spending time with family while I’m there because it is not something I can take advantage of often.

From the end of senior year until now, a second-semester freshmen at UC Berkeley, I have become more comfortable with the pride I have in being Iranian-American. I shared Chaharshanbe Soori with some of my closest friends at the end of senior year, and it made me feel so validated and alive as an Iranian-American teen. I have friends who love me for who I am. I wrote an article for the Iranian literary magazine on campus, Perspective (pg. 12). I plan on taking Farsi in my sophomore year to brush up on the language that has always been a part of my life one way or another. In general, I want to take advantage of the resources my education allows me to have by taking as many Iran-centric classes as possible. I want to learn about who I am and I’m so happy I have the opportunity to do so.

Lastly, I plan on immortalizing who I am on my skin sometime in the next couple months. I want to get نور چشم من  (pronounced “Nur-e cheshm-e man”) tattooed on my arm, which means “the light of my eye” in Farsi. Under it, I want to put my mom’s “dates” – 8.18.61-5.26.14. I have memories of my mom calling me this phrase as a kid, and I think it is the perfect homage to her.

A simultaneous reminder of who I am and who I will always have with me.

Hyphenated Identity The simplicity of the phrase "I am Iranian-American" completely contradicts the complexity behind it.

[johneburton]

It’s time to start scaring visitors away from our churches: Many are working hard to attract the wrong crowd on Sunday—and the result is an Ichabod church. We soon won’t be able to define going to church the way we do now. God is coming to reform, to crush structures of old for what is to be introduced very soon. Our call isn’t to stand strong until the shift comes, it’s to prophetically sound the alarm and awaken those at risk! God is coming! The force from Heaven, the celestial asteroid, is going to impact the Church, and most pastors and people will resist with everything that’s within them. Man-made support systems will be removed. People’s financial and relational structures will be threatened by this strange new spiritual invasion. The human wisdom and natural common sense that have been involved in the development of the current church structure will not be usable in the new. Those who walk by sight are in danger. ~The Coming Church, John Burton I've met countless pastors and others who say they are focused on revival, but who are misguided on exactly what it is. Their focus is on attracting people to the church, on people getting “saved” and on other church growth strategies. The problem? The foundational pursuit of revival has nothing to do with church growth or the lost. It has everything to do with the church awakening, contending in intercession and attracting the fire of the Holy Spirit. The lost didn't show up in the Upper Room. Marginal followers of Jesus were repelled by the Upper Room. Revival isn't marked by a full house. Revival starts in a room that reveals the remnant. The revival that erupted in that roomful of remnants resulted in explosive church growth and Kingdom advance. Premature church growth will result in a multiplication of lukewarm, dead and dying people who have no idea what it feels like to have tongues of fire igniting over top of them. 1 When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. Acts 2:1-3 (ESV) VISITORS SHOULD BE SHAKEN BY WHAT THEY SEE IN THE CHURCH. The pure Christian message of surrender, repentance, holiness, intercession and rescuing souls from Hell has been replaced by a self-centered gospel that boldly affirms a focus on benefits without cost, on personal gain without sacrifice, on freedom without consecration. The Church has been unapologetically and boldly focused on how to have faith to receive while forsaking the call to have faith to give. The spirit of the age infiltrated churches long ago—and now, all too often, that demonic spirit is the primary counselor. ~The Coming Church, John Burton It’s time self-focused, semi-interested people are no longer given the opportunity to demand what they are looking for in a church. It’s time to close up the welcome centers and put away the welcome gifts. When presented with the unmistakable burning only a supernatural church can offer, their decision to stay or leave will be immediate. I’ve often said that one indicator of the Holy Spirit moving in power is that bystanders will do one of two things. They will either marvel or they will mock. 12 And all were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” 13 But others mocking said, “They are filled with new wine.” Acts 2:12-13 (ESV) When naturally minded people walk into a furnace of intercession, a place that is electric with supernatural activity, they should be radically unsettled, yet so many church assimilation teams today attempt to make the environment as familiar and comfortable as possible. I’ve often heard pastors admit they hide the pre-service prayer (for those who have pre-service prayer at all!) in a side room instead of filling the sanctuary with groans of intercession because they don’t want to freak out the soon-arriving visitors. I’ve heard that many, many times and I was grieved every time. There are a few legitimate reasons why prayer might not work in the sanctuary prior to the service in some churches, but that’s not one of them. If we are attempting to introduce people into the wonder of a supernatural encounter with Jesus, why would we, at the same time, work so hard at shielding their eyes? I propose bringing the fire and the groan right into the heart of the Sunday service! Those who remain will be the laborers you need to fulfill your mission. Many years ago, when I first started Revolution Church in Manitou Springs, Colorado, I worked hard at assimilating visitors. I would excitedly connect with them and share just how much they would enjoy making our church their new home. It didn’t take long for me to start feeling like a used-car salesman; dirty; compromised. My strategy grieved my spirit. The truth was that our atmosphere and our vision were called by God to be driven by intercession and marked by a strong prophetic emphasis. The messages were intense. Revolution Church was not designed for those who would be marginally committed (as no church is}. The “Sunday go to meeting” Christians would, by choice, not remain for long. The reality was, that by attempting to attract those types of people, I was compromising the vision. The church needed the remnant who would lock in and pray, who would contend for revival and who would endure with great strength. A large group of non-remnant people would be a distraction. Years would be lost. Lives would be at risk. Eternities would be in danger. So, I shifted. I started literally trying to scare people away from our church. To the dismay of those who simply want to hear a little worship and listen to good (and short) teaching, services will become more like prayer meetings. This is one of the most critical and most upsetting shifts that will come–and it must come now. Today, most of the energy church leadership teams expend is usually on attracting and keeping visitors instead of training and engaging intercessors. ~The Coming Church, John Burton A CHURCH ON FIRE America doesn’t need another bed-and-breakfast church that comforts our flesh (our natural desires). Our nation needs a Church with a volatile atmosphere that explodes, burns human flesh and shocks our culture. ~The Coming Church, John Burton I knew we were called to lead a church on fire, and that just wasn’t possible with tepid, resistant, lukewarm people. 1 …I know your works. You have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead. 2 Wake up, and strengthen what remains and is about to die… Revelation 3:1-2 (ESV) I was confident that, if I clearly shared the wild, costly, other-worldly vision that God had given us, and how people at our church were called to invest into that vision, that those who would not be interested in such a lifestyle would not return. Understand, my invitation for them to run with us was genuine. Our door was wide open. When I say “I tried to scare them away” I mean I was simply authentic. I stripped off the suit of a salesman and shared my raw, passionate dream of God to advance with a team of zealots for Jesus. Such an invitation was all I needed to see who was deeply hungry for revival and who was not. I would do my best to help those people connect in another local church. I’d give them the names of some churches they might enjoy. While I truly wanted the very best for them, it always broke my heart when they decided against adopting a lifestyle of intercession and revival. That lifestyle is not for a specialized few. It’s for all. This resulted in a confidence that those who remained were, in most cases, part of our remnant, firebrands who would dig in and assimilate with our tribe of revivalists. When you spend energy attracting the mildly committed, you compromise your entire vision. Simply, you need soldiers to become equipped and ready to lay down their lives and fight for the freedom of souls in the region. I believe it’s core to the mission of the church to give opportunity for people to clearly evaluate their commitment and to give room for them to leave. The intensity of the truth demands it. We must call people out of a natural life and into the supernatural, out of a casual place and into radical surrender. 63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64 But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) 65 And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” 66 After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. 67 So Jesus said to the Twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” John 6:63-67 (ESV) Understand, similar to the way Jesus ministered in the above passage along with other key examples in Scripture, the Upper Room served as a filter. It filtered out those who weren’t radically devoted. Most were repelled by the call to pray. The agenda did not change in the hopes of assimilating more people. The disciples loved them as they went their way…and then they turned the world upside down with the few who remained as a result. What filters do you have in your church, pastor, to call people to a transparent, genuine place of soul searching and decision? You must start and continue with an Upper Room atmosphere and an offensive, flesh-crushing Gospel message. It’s important to remember that the Ekklesia, the church gathering, was not designed for the lost. So many pastors get derailed on this point alone. The church is a house of prayer for all nations. The predominant church activity should be white hot intercession with tongues of fire atop everyone, with groans filling the atmosphere. It’s a remnant ministry. This call is for all who call themselves Christian. If you build a church with people who won’t devote themselves to the prayer room, you build your church with those who are disinterested at best and lukewarm at worst. Your church will be a low-water-level church. It will be a place where the fire can’t rage. It will be naturally familiar with distant, elusive, marginally supernatural dreams. Pipe dreams. Christians who aren’t invested in fervent, supernatural prayer will be enticed by the natural familiarity of Ichabod churches (where the glory has departed). ~The Coming Church, John Burton WHAT ABOUT THE SEEKERS? A question I hear from very good-hearted people is this: What do we do with people who are seeking? Do we just turn them away? We absolutely don’t turn them away! We invite them into the furnace. We do not turn down the fire. We turn it up! Those who are hungry for God must not be introduced to a tepid, natural environment with an image of God that looks just like themselves. Reveal the glory of our mysterious, fiery, living God and watch them collapse to their knees in desperation! However, as I have stated already, many will choose to leave at the sight of something so alien and costly. That’s a choice they themselves have a right to make. Again, we must faithfully reveal the cost of following Jesus. We don’t come on our terms. We come on God’s. Too many are interested in warming their flesh by the fire instead of their flesh being consumed by the fire. 23 But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. 24 Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, said, “How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! 25 For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” 26 Those who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?” 27 But he said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.” 28 And Peter said, “See, we have left our homes and followed you.” 29 And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, 30 who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life.” Luke 18:23-30 (ESV) Many will turn away sad. Even the most devoted will feel the severity of a life devoted to Jesus. They will cry out, “Then who can be saved?” That tension will result in a church that is sober and on fire and something that true seekers will give themselves to. Pretenders will certainly go away sad as the remnant church is revealed. My lifelong commitment in ministry is this: I refuse to tone down the activity of the Holy Spirit out of respect of those less hungry. That commitment requires everything I do to have the smell of smoke. In fact, pastors, one reason even the most devoted people aren’t coming to your prayer meetings is simple—they are dead, humanistic and boring. They are logically driven. They are simply a rehashing of what the natural mind can discern. As someone who comes alive in prophetic, prayer-fueled environments, I aggressively avoid powerless prayer meetings that are driven by lists of needs and human understanding. I don’t want my soul activated. I want my spirit to burn! I think tired, powerless petition-driven prayer meetings can do more damage than good much of the time. Do your prayer meetings have the smell of smoke? Are tongues of fire resting on everybody? If not, don’t be surprised when the even the most devoted disciples are no-shows. We need a church on fire today more than ever. The lost are being introduced into lukewarm, natural, Ichabod religion instead of a supernatural shaking that can only come from the Great I Am. They are convinced they are saved as they are assimilated into a community of likeminded quasi-spiritual people who would love to see God manifest in their natural realm—yet have no interest in manifesting in the spiritual realm where the Holy Spirit broods. My challenge to pastors is simple. Risk everything. Allow your church to dwindle, if necessary, to a few remnant people who will live, pray, walk and advance in the Spirit. The world is waiting for them. You can download a free chapter and order The Coming Church by John Burton as at www.burton.tv/resources.