Category Archives: All Posts
Reads of the Week: LGBT YA, Outrage, Cosby
Take a look at this week’s Reads of the Week: Great articles about the LGBTQ community, feminism, women and anything else worth reading.
“In 2014, mainstream publishers published 47 LGBT YA books. This is a 59% increase from 2013, when only 29 LGBT YA books were published by mainstream publishers.” – Malinda Lo, “2014 LGBT YA By the Numbers“
- “[…W]e resolved to keep track of what people got outraged about every day of 2014. Since January, a phalanx of editors, writers, and interns has been scanning the horizons for funnels of fury[…]The rage-a-day calendar above contains the fruits of their labor: a comprehensive listing of what was outrageous and whom it outraged, for every single day of the year.” – Slate, “The Year of Outrage”
- “Rape culture, particularly as it manifests in black America, demands that justice for sexual assault victims be positioned secondary to the reputations of “good” black men. And in a white supremacist, capitalist patriarchy that cares little for black men, and even less for black women, “good” black men are too often the only victims we collectively exert the energy to save.” – Kirsten West Savali, “Bye, Phylicia Rashad. Your Romanticizing of Cosby—and Cosby—Is Wrong”
Reads of the Week: Billings, Trauma, Gender and Straightsplaining
Take a look at this week’s Reads of the Week: Great articles about the LGBTQ community, feminism, women and anything else worth reading.
“We have got to realize that we are all students of the human experience. And if we do not start learning from each other and really listening and receiving the gift from the person across from us, we are lost.” –Alexndra Billings, Jezebel
- “The paradox of the current system is that the reliability of the victim is crucial to the prosecution of a crime that features unreliability as an almost guaranteed byproduct. This point seems lost on many of the people currently swept up in a reactionary obsession with the account of one alleged survivor.” – ThinkProgress, “I Was Sexually Assaulted as a Child. Here’s Why I Didn’t Remember for Years”
- “Gender is not sex, and sex is not gender, although explanations of both will vary. And gender identity is not gender expression, although they might play into each other. And a sandwich is not a wrap, although you can convert it into one.” – Autostraddle, “Rebel Girls: Waiter, There’s Some Theory in My Gender”
- “If you want to know about gay people—their lives, their desires, their ideas, their cultures—listen to gay people. If you want to know about straight people, listen to straight people talking about gay people.” – Gawker, “A Fieldguide to Straightsplaining”
Jimmy Fallon vs. Parks & Rec
Just a fun little video for a Monday, featuring the cast of Parks and Recreation versus Jimmy Fallon in a Glee-style sing-off from a couple of years ago.
Really Don’t Care – Demi Lovato
Demi Lovato’s “Really Don’t Care” filmed at Los Angeles Pride early this month. Happy Pride Month!!!
Frozen’s ‘Let it Go’ – The Diva Version
Just some Frozen fun for today with vocalist Christina Biano’s diva-filled cover of Frozen’s “Let it Go.” Enjoy!
The Trouble with ‘Glee’
I was frantically running around my bedroom, angling my computer just right to capture the action on the TV screen and making sure my computer wouldn’t go to sleep in the middle of recording. (This is what I call poor woman’s DVR.) I chewed all my fingernails off with anxiety before I even left the house in fear my sad attempt at recording a live television show wouldn’t capture what I needed it to. I barely made it out the door on time. What was wrong with me?
On that night, Glee was airing its season three Valentine’s Day episode. At the time, I was still trying to convince myself I wanted to be a professional saxophone player (along with denying other parts of my identity). So, I was out the door to rehearse a big saxophone solo I was performing with a local orchestra. Unfortunately, the rehearsal time was scheduled so that I might miss all or part of the Valentine’s Day episode of Glee. Sure, I could watch it later, but there was no way that was going to cut it. Not at all. Rumor had it, and oh, I don’t know, maybe twenty episodes overdue, that a beautiful moment like this was happening:
Glee characters, Brittany (on the left) and Santana, Glee’s resident lesbian (on the right)
TEDxTeen – Tavi Gevinson: Still Figuring it Out
Found this TEDx video about female characters, female representation, feminism and what that means for teenage girls. Pretty cool little video.
The Presidential Inauguration – Something to be said for Pop Culture
I am lucky enough to live in Washington, DC when President Obama was inaugurated for his second term last weekend. While the hordes of people that swarmed into my favorite eateries was certainly an inconvenience (I never have any groceries), being able to stand on the National Mall amongst fellow Americans while the president took the (ceremonial) oath of office was nonetheless exciting.
Thousands of us were standing there huddled in the grass around large screens watching the important government people walk onto the “stage” area at the Capitol before the ceremony. Former President Jimmy Carter walked out. He got some cheers, but people in my age bracket (myself, admittedly included) had to ask the wiser among us who he even was. Sure the other recognizable faces of government got respectable cheers (or jeers); John McCain, John Boehner, Bill and Hilary Clinton, Jill Biden, Vice President Biden, Michelle Obama, and of course for President Obama himself.
Then, Beyoncé and Jay Z walked out and the whole crowd really went wild. Someone near me made the comment of the pop singer couple, “You’d think they were the first family.” And that comment was absolutely right. The feeling I got was the crowd recognized a handful of the politicians, and I would bet many people (again, myself included) wouldn’t even recognize the representatives from their own state. But everybody knew who Beyoncé was.
The experience was a powerful illustration of the wide reach of pop culture; those politicians are no match for Beyoncé (except maybe President Obama himself.)
