Category Archives: Linkspam

Linkspam

Link Spam – Early March edition

Hello readers, I have joys of posts to share with you and then to blog about something else, this just closes the tabs I’ve had opened for the past couple of weeks.

First up is a post by China Mieville on the Belgium’s recent court ruling to not ban Tintin in the Congo.

ii) One can insist that the book’s attitudes ‘reflect its time’, as the court held.

There are two interesting points about this ultra-common defence for every undeniably racist (sexist, homophobic, &c) text in existence. The first is that it is historically bogus. Such ideas, like all ideas, were – are – contested. Certainly & obviously the mainstream shifts, the balance of forces alters, but the implicit or explicit claim that there were no dissident voices on supremacist agendas is a lie. To claim that everyone talked like Tintin about the Congo back in the day is (whatever other serious political arguments we may have with them) to slander, say, Felicien Challaye, Albert Londres, the French Socialist movement that declared at its 1907 conference that colonialism ‘relies on violent conquest and institutionalises the subjection of Asiatic and African peoples’.

The second point is that even if these attitudes do ‘reflect their time’ in the sense of reflecting a then-more-mainstream agenda, so the fuck what? The point about attitudes is that they change, in response to struggle, to a battle for ideas. The question here is whether or not Tintin au Congo is racist. Which it is. That may perhaps in part be because white supremacism was less contested back then – just as well we’re not back then, then, isn’t it? & that instead we live in now, when the resistance of those deemed unable to add 2 & 2 has forced the recognition that this kind of shit is shit. These days a ‘collective synapse’ should kick in ‘forged by mass movements … that have forced a lot of people, particularly white straight men, to have a clue.’

Next is a post by Franklin Veaux on Radical Honesty, which neatly dovetails into my post recently on “Responsibility“:

The folks I have met to advocate Radical Honesty™ tend to fetishize blunt, unvarnished, raw communication, at the expense of compassion or of any sort of concern for the emotional response of the people to whom they are speaking. Like the main character in Bones, they tend to display a lack of empathy toward their fellow human beings that, from the outside, borders on active hostility.

And that’s unfortunate, because it means that conversations about Radical Honesty almost always end up being framed in terms of “Is honesty good, or do we need little white lies and other small deceptions in order to make civilization go?” The debate gets set in terms of honesty vs. dishonesty, and that’s a damn shame.

…

Honesty without compassion is rubbish. The question should not be framed as “Which is better, honesty or dishonesty?” but rather “How can we strive for absolute honesty in a framework of respect, compassion, kindness, and sincerity?” All too often, when the question is framed as Radical Honesty™ vs. The Little White Lie, the only compassionate answer is The Little White Lie, because the philosophy of Radical Honesty™–at least as I’ve seen it practiced–treats compassion with disdain, or even contempt.

And then Margaret Cho with her beautiful post, “You are not ugly.  Don’t make videos“:

I thought I was so ugly for so long and I wasted so much of my life on this dumb notion. I punished myself and avoided my reflection in mirrors and any windows. I would see myself reflected back and I would look away, trying to pretend I didn’t exist because I hated myself so much. I hated the way I looked and it started early on. My father found a school project from 1st grade, where I had written on a photo of myself that I looked like a flat faced mummy – and firstly, how does a kid that young know what a flat faced mummy is and secondly, I cry at my own self judgement and thirdly, I was such a cute kid. Imagine my face and then miniaturize it in your mind until the age of 6. I know, fucking adorable.

One day I looked at myself and I thought, shit, this is it. this is what I look like. No amount of self hatred is going to change my appearance. I am who I am. I am stuck with this and I have to love it or else I am going to die early from my own suffering and idea that I got shortchanged in the looks department.

And finally from Geek Feminism, “Why do we watch Doctor Who?: A fan scholar’s perspective“:

Yes, the female characters are secondary. But that’s a production decision. And fans don’t generally let production decisions get in the way when there is still something to scavenge from the show. This is the beautiful thing about fans: they don’t let creators tell them how they get to experience the show. I mean, the creators often do tell us how to experience the show (*cough, cough,* George Lucas), but fans don’t comply. And I would say that fans don’t just ignore the voices from on high that directly tell them “You can’t read it that way,” but they also ignore plot details, the structure of casts, and other elements in shows that tell them how to read it indirectly. So even though the companions are definitionally sidekicks to the Doctor, plenty of women will still read those companions as the heroes. They’ll still read the Doctor as a genderqueer character they can relate to. And they can do all that while complaining that Doctor Who needs a lady protagonist every once in a damn while.

 

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Linkspam

Link Spam – end of February

Closing some tabs I have open of some very interesting articles I’ve found about on the internets recently.

At Charlie’s Diary, “Life With and Without Animated Ducks: The Future Is Gender Distributed“, an excellent and timely reminder how technology and women’s work aren’t all that great together.

This may sound like bitching, and of course in some sense it is. But it began to occur to me that the tech I was using was incredibly gendered. In the “male” sphere, of professional operations, offices, corporations, pop culture, businesses, the available technology was extremely high-level, better than anywhere I’d yet lived. In the “female” sphere, the home, domestic duties, daily chores, cleaning, heating, anything inside the walls of a house, it was on a level my grandmother would find familiar.

At LGBTQNation, “It’s 2012. Do you know where your transgender children are?“:

Something out of the ordinary happens when cisgender adults talk about transgender children. People who wouldn’t normally make a child’s genitals a public issue are suddenly desperate to publicly scrutinize and debate the intimate details of children’s bodies. Some of these bodies belong to kids as young or younger than seven, like Bobby Montoya, the first openly trans Girl Scout.

At Love Joy Feminism (one of my new favourite blogs), “You can’t pray the gay away, even at BJU” discusses those LGBTIQ individuals who study at Bob Jones University and realise that they’re not straight and that being LBGTIQ is ok (though a long journey to get there for some).

I grew up believing that being gay is a disorder of some sort, likely caused by either sexual abuse or having an absent father or distant mother, and that gay people can be “cured” through prayer and therapy and go on to lead normal lives as straight people. No one from a functional, Christian family should ever end up gay.

But of course, the reality doesn’t work out that way. And it’s that reality that these GLBT Bob Jones alumni want to make known.

s.e. smith writes “Where Are All the Nonbinary Parents? And Children?“:

Don’t mistake me. I know they exist, because I see them. They’re pretty active online, for example, and have lively communities offline as well. I’m talking about where they are in media and pop culture, because right now, it appears to be pretty much nowhere; along with the rest of nonbinary people, of course. There is something particularly sinister about the erasure of nonbinary parents and children when it comes to pop culture and mass media descriptions of families, though.

Margart Cho contributes to the It Gets Better project with a blog post about they bullying she survived at school:

I was bullied pretty badly when I was a kid, the worst period falling between the ages of 10 and 14, I think. People tell me to get over it, and that I am an adult now, privileged and famous and constantly applauded not only in my primary field, stand-up comedy, but also in practically every endeavor I have chosen to devote myself to, from acting to burlesque bump-and-grind to songwriting. I am told I have no right to complain, and that may be true to some extent, the good in my life flowing in from all directions, satisfaction pulsing through me every second of the day, but I will never stop complaining until I am dead in the ground or even afterward, probably, if I can find a way back out of the light to complain about the afterlife. I will never stop complaining. It’s kind of fun to me now, and looking back, I was treated so terribly that I don’t feel I have the capacity to forgive. Fuck forgiveness and all that. I think that even Jesus would say, “Yeah I guess you do have a point…”

A very interesting article at New Matilda, “The War On Birth Control“, detailing issues of the current US Republican Presidential wassname that they have going on currently.  The article, despite my issues with the US democratic system, is a very interesting read:

Obama’s hard-fought health reforms, the Affordable Care Act, include a provision that requires all employee insurance plans to cover contraception — without any religious exemption. In practical terms, this means that the employees of religious-affiliated institutions such as universities and hospitals (but not churches themselves) will have access to birth control as part of their health insurance. Twenty eight states had similar provisions before this announcement and the stated goal is to provide more affordable birth control.

A bill introduced by Republican up-and-comer Mario Rubio attempts to counter the lifting of the religious amendment. The Religious Freedom Restoration Act would allow not only religious-affiliated institutions to opt out of employee health plans which cover contraception, but also those provided by individual employers whose religious beliefs are at odds with contraception.

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Linkspam

Link spam – post birthday edition

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Some interesting news on bisexuality which I’ll open with for this collection of Linkspam.

Maria Burnham writes about “What ‘Bisexual’ Means to Me, and Why I Claim the Title“:

Is it simply a matter of liking both sexes? And does “liking” mean sexual attraction, or emotional attraction, or both? Or more? I sent out an inquiry to my queer community and was surprised by the variety of responses. One thing most people agree on is that there is a scale, with gay on one end and straight on the other, and each person falls on a different part of the scale. According to some, “true” bisexuals are at the halfway mark, 50/50, smack dab in the middle. Others believe that falling anywhere other than at the two points on the end grants you the right to claim the bisexual label. And what about pansexuality? Some believe it to be interchangeable with bisexuality, while others say that it is less exclusive than bisexuality, truly open to everyone and not based on a two-gender binary. And if you end up in a monogamous relationship with someone of the same sex, does that mean you’ve graduated to gay status? If I end up marrying a man, does that give my friends the right to say, “I told you you were straight”?

The PinkPaper details a recent report released in the UK on the mental and physical health of sexuality groups.

Attitudes towards bisexual people were found to be more negative than those towards other minority groups, with them often being stereotyped as promiscuous, incapable of monogamy, a threat to relationships and spreaders of disease.

…

Although the attitudes and behaviours of others, and exclusionary structures, cause issues for bisexual people, the report found that there are many positive aspects to bisexual peoples’ experiences – the ability to develop identities and relationships without restrictions, linked to a sense of independence, self-awareness and authenticity.

The full report is available here.

The Salt Lake Tribune reports on Utah’s Immigration Law HB497 and the impact that law has on Utah’s LGBTIQ community, especially since same-sex marriage is not recognised in Utah.

HB497 would force couples like these to choose between love and the law, resulting in a life of immobility and fear. Nearly 260 binational families composed of lesbian and gay U.S. citizens with noncitizen partners live in Utah. HB497 contains a harboring clause that unfairly and unconstitutionally forces binational couples to choose between breaking the law, or turning in his or her noncitizen spouse or partner to immigration officials to be deported.

Annie Murphy Paul in an opinion piece in the New York Times, writes about the upsides of dyslexia:

Dyslexia is a complex disorder, and there is much that is still not understood about it. But a series of ingenious experiments have shown that many people with dyslexia possess distinctive perceptual abilities. For example, scientists have produced a growing body of evidence that people with the condition have sharper peripheral vision than others. Gadi Geiger and Jerome Lettvin, cognitive scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, used a mechanical shutter, called a tachistoscope, to briefly flash a row of letters extending from the center of a subject’s field of vision out to its perimeter. Typical readers identified the letters in the middle of the row with greater accuracy. Those with dyslexia triumphed, however, when asked to identify letters located in the row’s outer reaches.

N K Jemisin writes, “Dreaming Awake”

I am African American — by which I mean, a descendant of slaves, rather than a descendant of immigrants who came here willingly and with lives more or less intact. My ancestors were the unwilling, unintact ones: children torn from parents, parents torn from elders, people torn from roots, stories torn from language. Past a certain point, my family’s history just… stops. As if there was nothing there.

I could do what others have done, and attempt to reconstruct this lost past. I could research genealogy and genetics, search for the traces of myself in moldering old sale documents and scanned images on microfiche. I could also do what members of other cultures lacking myths have done: steal. A little BS about Atlantis here, some appropriation of other cultures’ intellectual property there, and bam! Instant historically-justified superiority. Worked great for the Nazis, new and old. Even today, white people in my neck of the woods call themselves “Caucasian”, most of them little realizing that the term and its history are as constructed as anything sold in the fantasy section of a bookstore.

These are proven strategies, but I have no interest in them. They’ll tell me where I came from, but not what I really want to know: where I’m going. To figure that out, I make shit up.

 

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Linkspam

Linkspam not quite mid February 2012 edition

Things that I have read about the place and thought that would be interesting to share:

The Nation writes about Obama standing up to Catholic Bishops, which has been a topic of discussion on twitter and elsewhere.

As if it had finally noticed that women out-
number bishops, the Obama administra
tion has decided against permitting religious organizations a broad exemption from rules requiring that all methods of contraception be covered, with no co-payment, by health insurance plans. Strictly religious organizations—churches, missions and such—will be exempt, but not universities, hospitals and charities. As a public health matter, this is excellent news: for women whose health plans don’t cover birth control, it can be difficult to obtain and costs hundreds of dollars a year out of pocket.

As part of “Why I am an Athiest” on Pharyngula, Frances shares her thoughts on atheism and feminism *trigger warning for discussion of sexual harassment and rape*:

I wondered where god was in all this. Not in an angry, he-should-have-my-back sort of way, but in a literal way. I went to church every Sunday for my entire life, and as near as I can tell, god has no opinions at all on rape, sexual harassment, sexual assault, or actually any of the issues women have to deal with. I knew the church was against abortion, premarital sex, and being gay (I was raised catholic in an area with lots of fundamentalists), but beyond that, there was literally no guidance. There were no ethics relating to this at all, or if there were, the priests were very tight-lipped about them.

Sandy Ghandi writes on The Anti Bogan about the racism she’s faced in Australia, in “F**k Off You Indian Monkey“:

The reply from the newsdesk was probably predictable, although I didn’t see it coming. After all, I had been submitting my weekly column to the Northern Star for four years, receiving the the stellar payment of $50 (raised from $30 after some agitation).

The email came from the then acting editor and he said, in part: “I know you are trying to push the envelope and be feisty but I think in trying to do that you sometimes confuse the point you are trying to make.”

“Like it or not, we are a family newspaper (the demographic is 40-65, mainly professional people working in Lismore, Casino and Ballina). That’s a fairly conservative audience so swear words are not going to go down too well.

“… thank you for your input to the Star, but we won’t be reconsidering the decision (to cease your column), nor will we be asking readers what they think. If we do cop some backlash and get some letters to the editor, we’ll run these in the appropriate place.”

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Linkspam

Linkspam – definitely the end of Jan 2012 edition

Just need to close some tabs, and share some awesome writing by s.e. smith, and another equally awesome author.

The Lorax at Liar, Lunatic, or Lorax writes, “I am Cissexist” (trigger warning for discussion of transphobia and suicide):

There are 40 babies being born today that will find themselves in hell.  And it will happen again tomorrow.  And the next day.  And forever.

I am cissexist when I am not angry about this.  When I am choosing my words carefully so as not to offend anyone. I am cissexist when I think I am doing some good by talking, writing, telling others how it is and how it should be.  I am cissexist when I start talking and stop listening.

s. e. smith writes “Beyond the Binary: But What Does It All Mean? I Don’t Get It!“:

What does it mean, I want to ask cis people, to be a cis woman, or a cis man? What does it mean? How do you know that you are a woman, or a man? Is it a conscious choice? Do you wake up in the morning every day and decide to do that? How do you express your gender? What things do you do or not do as markers to signal your gender to the world? What does ‘woman’ mean to you? People have also been grappling with these questions for a long time, in larger discussions about masculinity and femininity, in discussions, for example, about cis women who are challenged on their gender because they’re too butch.

People want a smooth, flawless, easy definition of what it means to be genderqueer, but I look at cis women who have never encountered challenges about their gender and have never stopped to think about what it means to them to be a cis woman, and defy people to come up with a single neat definition of what it means to be a cis woman. Is it how someone looks? Dresses? Behaves? Is it about chromosomes and phenotype and endocrinology? Is it about reproductive capability? What is it? How do people define ‘woman’? Many of these questions sound offensive and intrusive and ridiculous because they are, and I use them illustratively to demonstrate how some nonbinary trans people feel in discussions where cis people are trying to ‘get’ their gender.

s. e. smith writes “Fat-Positive Shopping Is More Than Garments“, a post that should be compulsory reading for anyone who sells plus sized clothes:

Clothes shopping while fat can be an exercise in frustration. Many stores don’t stock larger sizes at all, or if they do, they offer a narrow range, like 14-18. Those clothes may still fit poorly, or don’t mesh with the taste of the dresser, because they’re designed in the belief that all fat bodies are the same and that all fat people want to cover their bodies in shame and misery. Some stores only offer larger sizes online, for fear of having actual fat people in their storefront, which would of course upset the other customers. Finding environments that don’t just sell a wider range of sizes but actively welcome the people who wear them is rare and such spaces are to be treasured.

What was offered at Re/Dress wasn’t just a chance to buy awesome vintage clothes in a range of sizes meant for fat bodies. It was also an environment to be yourself in. It was an environment where fat bodies weren’t things that needed to be hidden and minimized and controlled, but could be celebrated and embraced.

 

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Linkspam – end of January 2012 edition

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From the new and awesome blog Queereka, “Sunday School Salutations” which is soon (probably already has) launched a sex advice column and is seeking questions:

The most instructive answer I got was “your first column must contain at least two (2) hymen jokes.” However, this answer is mostly useful because it is pretty bad advice, at least as regards the goal of this column and this blog. I mean, not to get all RAWR HETEROSEXISM on my friend (who was, of course, making a joke), but one of the goals I have for Sunday School in the first place is to tear down the dominant narrative about sex. Raise your hands, dear readers: did your first sexual experience involve hymen rupture?

Yeah, mine didn’t, either.

The Huff Post lists some very interesting tech failures at marketing products to women, noting that women are already big consumers of electronics.

On Monday HSN announced the results of a survey by the international research firm Parks Associates that asked 2,000 adults about purchases they wanted to make before 2012. The results showed women outstripped men in their interest in owning electronics, with 18 percent of women planning on buying a tablet before 2012 (compared to 15 percent of men), 20 percent of women wanted a laptop (only 14 percent of men did) and 20 percent of women planning on purchasing smartphones — compared to 17 percent of men, Mashable reports.

The MailOnline has an interesting piece on the BMI of models and how they would be ranked as anorexic.  This article is NSFW – there is nude “plus” size model posing with a “straight” model.

Tesseral Harmonics reblogs (it’s Tumblr, I’m not sure how it works really) on ““Bisexual” is not oppressive, can we talk about biphobia and straight privilege? and other thoughts on bisexuality”:

It’s a big problem that people who are bisexually identified (or engage in bisexual behavior) are dismissed and mocked by gay/queer/lesbian people. I honestly don’t think I need to spell out an explanation of why it’s important for spaces that call themselves “queer” or “LGBT” to be inclusive. In short, anyone who is bi (in name or behavior) is still queer and may need support as a queer person. Biphobia also makes it difficult for anyone who is gay-identified and experiencing sexual fluidity (Lisa Diamond’s research on sexual fluidity (pdf) is super interesting, btw). It also means that gay people who are in “straight” relationships for whatever reasons (family and religion are two examples) are dismissed by the queer community. Biphobia is part of a culture of identity-policing, where if you don’t adhere closely enough to the requirements delineated by the official bureau of gayness you’re out of the club.

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Linkspam

End of 2011 linkspam

The last (and second ever) linkspam for 2011.  Here are some articles and/or links that I’ve found interesting over the past… whenever it was since the last time I did this.  (Blogging sporadically because I’m playing lots of Skyrim).

The awesome Greta Christina blogged on why “Yes, but” is a terrible response to misogyny *trigger warning for discussion of rape*.

When the topic of misogyny comes up, and men change the subject, it trivializes misogyny.

When the topic of misogyny comes up, and men change the subject, it conveys the message that whatever men want to talk about is more important than misogyny.

When the topic of misogyny comes up, and men change the subject to something that’s about them, it conveys the message that men are the ones who really matter, and that any harm done to men is always more important than misogyny.

And when the topic of misogyny comes up, and men change the subject, it comes across as excusing misogyny. It doesn’t matter how many times you say, “Yes, of course, misogyny is terrible.” When you follow that with a “Yes, but…”, it comes across as an excuse. In many cases, it is an excuse. And it contributes to a culture that makes excuses for misogyny.

The anti-discrimination blog (formally The Anti-bogan) asks Why is Facebook is Protecting Pro Rape Language and Abuse of Women? *Trigger warning for discussion of rape*

If it was not clear before, we must understand now that Facebook wasn’t built for us — it was built for the profit of the very few. That Facebook is of value to the public as a communications platform is only important to Facebook insofar as it allows them to sell targeted advertising against our own speech. Its governing document, the Terms of Service, has been repeatedly applied unfairly and without accountability to its users, as its purpose is to legally protect Facebook from our conduct, not provide us with a free space, or even a safe space. Facebook needs to be only as minimally welcoming to us so as to ensure our return to use it again. And that we might use Facebook as a public square for activism? Not even in the business model.

I recently watched This Gamer Girl Manefesto Pwns, it is awesome – if you’re a gamer please click and enjoy.

And this video is just full of the win

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Linkspam

Linkspam of the gods December 2011

Stuff I’ve been reading about the place:

Stephanie Bolt’s (Andrew Bolt’s sister)’s piece: I want marriage equality for all

Some gays and lesbians view their relationships as equal to those of straight people. But I know of others who would admit to feeling “lesser” or, even if they don’t, are fed up with receiving negative physical, verbal or other signals from the world around them.

Burt Humburg’s journey to outing himself as gay: ‘There’s only one Burt’

“(Suppressing the desires) worked for a while. … but I started to become quietly insane,” Humburg said. “My craziness was getting worse and worse and worse. I was a jerk.”

He said he briefly considered suicide.

“Within 10 seconds I concluded that was not the answer,” Humburg said. “I just thought, ‘You’re a straight-A student headed (into) medicine at some point. What are you gonna do – throw that all away just because of some Bronze Age understandings of the Bible and human sexuality?’ Let’s just take this slow and see how it goes.

“So I stopped fighting it. And as soon as I allowed (homosexuality) to be a consideration – bam. I knew.”

A fascinating article on the Christian basis of the understanding of marriage in Australia: Should Marriage Be A Life Sentence?

In order to preclude the legal recognition of same-sex marriages, the 2004 Bill proposed to incorporate the common law definition of marriage set out by Lord Penzance in the case of Hyde noted above, which involved the status of Mormon polygamous unions made in America. Lord Penzance noted: “marriage, as understood in Christendom, may for this purpose be defined as the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others”. The words, “as understood in Christendom”, do not appear in section 46 of the Marriage Act nor in section 43 of the Family Law Act. The Hyde definition is otherwise intact in those sections.

Sady Doyle’s article: The Girl’s Guide to Staying Safe Online

For years, it’s been an open secret that having a visibly female online identity – especially if one writes about sexism – is a personal security risk. Highly visible bloggers such as Jessica Valenti report receiving hate mail every day. Some have been subject to campaigns aimed at getting them fired. This doesn’t only happen to high-profile feminists, or women; some people, including men, have been harassed at work simply for commenting on the wrong blog. But it is a gendered phenomenon: W.H.O.A. reports that, in 2010, 73% of cyberstalking victims were female.

A great article on body image and how large women with breasts can been seen as problematic in the office: It Happened to Me: I Got in Trouble for Bringing My Boobs to the Office

At one point in the “conversation,” I’d tried to point out that my dress wasn’t any different from what the other women in the department wore. In fact, it was pretty common knowledge one of the other women had a certain outfit she wore when she wanted something from her boss. I, uh, did not mention that to the department head. That was when my department head told me, in uncomfortable and tentative wording, that the issue was really my large boobs.

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