I don’t know how many of you are familiar with the Bread and Roses Strike, which occurred in 1912 when textile workers struck for dignity, better working conditions, and fair pay. Led by women, most of whom were immigrants, the strike was violently suppressed. Strikers died in the fight for better conditions, a not uncommon occurrence at the time.
In the books, there was an obvious and clear connection to the Bread and Roses Strike; Katniss and Rue are both women of color forced to labor by the state in unsafe conditions, living in poverty while the capitalist upper classes enjoy every possible amenity. They are forced to perform by the state to the death, and when Rue dies, Katniss attempts to give her dignity and humanity through the floral tribute; in return, Rue’s home district gives Katniss bread.
Right on! I never even considered this connection before!
A woman that was involved with this came to speak to a class I was in last year. They’d have BBQ’s over the fence too, when it was actually small enough to accomodate that kind of thing. They also used to stash water bottles in the desert for migrants but the border cops would go and find them and slash the bottles. Now they run a community centre on the Mexico side that serves those who are about to try crossing, and those who’ve been recently deported - giving them food, water, supplies and a safe place to sleep, and for those who’ve tried and failed enough times that they’ve lost the will to try again, they fund tickets to get them back home. I have a huge amount of respect for this project and the people that do it.
The woman who spoke to us was a white woman from Arizona. It was reassuring to realize that there are white Arizonans who aren’t crazy racists, and that there are a whole bunch of them actively fighting against the tide of anti-immigration racism in that state. Even the most fucked up places are full of great people, even if the wrong ones seem to have the upper hand right now.
What happens when gay parents get bashed by a waitress in Texas? Thankfully, not what you’d expect.
This is absolutely fantastic. I never thought I would be proud to live in Texas, but right now I am.
One, this is right by my parents old house (the one I grew up in.. it’s about 15 minutes away), and I can say that I’m pleasantly surprised by this. However, I have to wonder what would happen if it were a queer couple of color… or even a queer mixed race couple.
Aaron’s suggestion for pronoun inclusion on facebook. Xe wrote them a letter asking for alternative gender options.
Do you think that your 16 year old daughter hasn’t masturbated already? Like, do you really think there’s anything in that scene that this chick hasn’t already tried when the lights go out at night, or in the bathroom, or in the tub, or with the shower head or something like that? I’m telling you, man, I’m not teaching this broad anything new. If I were to create a rating system, I wouldn’t even put murder right at the top of the chief offenses. I would put rape right at the top, and assault against women. Because it’s so insanely overused and insulting how much it’s overused in movies as a plot device, a woman in peril. That, to me, is offensive, yet that shit skates.
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Kevin Smith (director) on the ridiculousness of movies about sex receiving NC-17 ratings while extremely violent movies get by with R ratings. (via hmsboatsix)
Although I disagree that rape is “worse” than murder (that’s a tricky question), I agree with the rest.
The 500 Years of Resistance Comic Book is a powerful and historically accurate graphic portrayal of Indigenous resistance to the European colonization of the Americas, beginning with the Spanish invasion under Christopher Columbus and ending with the Six Nations land reclamation in Ontario in 2006. Gord Hill spent two years unearthing images and researching historical information to create The 500 Years of Resistance Comic Book, which presents the story of Aboriginal resistance in a far-reaching format.
Other events depicted include the 1680 Pueblo Revolt in New Mexico; the Inca insurgency in Peru from the 1500s to the 1780s; Pontiac and the 1763 Rebellion & Royal Proclamation; Geronimo and the 1860s Seminole Wars; Crazy Horse and the 1877 War on the Plains; the rise of the American Indian Movement in the 1960s; 1973’s Wounded Knee; the Mohawk Oka Crisis in Quebec in 1990; and the 1995 Aazhoodena/Stoney Point resistance.
With strong, plain language and evocative illustrations, The 500 Years of Resistance Comic Book documents the fighting spirit and ongoing resistance of Indigenous peoples through 500 years of genocide, massacres, torture, rape, displacement, and assimilation: a necessary antidote to the conventional history of the Americas.
The book includes an introduction by Ward Churchill, a writer, political activist, and co-director of the American Indian Movement of Colorado.
I just picked this book up from the Toronto Women’s Bookstore (which is pretty effing sweet, so check it out) and I can’t wait to share it with every person I see.
Something that makes me feel better about tomorrow: starting my Novel & Modern Sex class.
The class description:
In the seventeenth century, the French philosopher La Rochefoucauld declared that “some people would never have fallen in love if they hadn’t first heard the term.” Almost 300 years later, another French philosopher, Simone de Beauvoir, famously announced that “one is not born a woman; one becomes one.” This course takes seriously the proposition that even phenomena as apparently basic, natural and hard-wired as sexual desire, identity and expression are in a very real way cultural artifacts, with histories whose subtle shifts and radical transformations can be mapped and analyzed. In particular, we will examine the role of the novel, a genre notoriously concerned with interiority, secrets, and solitary pleasures, in constructing and policing sexuality. Reading eighteenth-and nineteenth-century novels, along with theory ranging from Havelock Ellis to Judith Butler, we’ll explore same-sex desire and ompulsory heterosexuality; extra-marital sex and the redefinition of marriage; normative masculinity, deviant femininity and the separate spheres; sex, class and money; sex and race; and the sexualization of power and pain.
