#and someone accused them of being racist for drawing her with big lips

[4kadhd]

I think ppl should check the like...context of some art before they accuse someone of being racist because like...there's a difference between someone daring monolid or big noses in a picture that's clearly meant to make fun of those features vs. Someone drawing those same features but in a way that the character is merely existing ya know?

[en-la-casademiamor]

Pelo bueno. Pelo malo There is a specific rage rising in me.  It is a festoon of harpoons with the sound of my father’s voice attached to the day’s current events: It is my father’s hurt: my father’s confusion: my father’s violence like a cyclone that devastates and eats at the air in a room.

When my father used to beat me, I knew he was beating: his mother: his father: his Indio grandfather and the golden cross he forced my father to carry during endless processions.  I recall him telling me as a young child never to marry a cop.  He’d read me passages of Malcolm X and begin to tell me stories of his youth.  Next commandment was never to marry a white man and not to think of a black man. One will never accept you and the other will take you nowhere.  Don’t you see why I married your mother? (He’d rub his forearm with his other  hand) Don’t you see how they treat me?  (He’d stroke his arm as if to wash away: wash away: wash away its beautiful caramel coloring).  I needed to bring forth the race: needed to leap forward from generations of backwardness. I was unloved in an unloving society—I was poor.  They/being my grandparents never took me to a dentist.  My mother used to collect coffee beans for hours and heat them up in a mammoth sized pot; and with a big branch she used to turn and turn over the coffee; and I would sit there, be ignored; and I would watch the coffee grow darker and darker.

I never told my mother he would say these things to me.  It’s only now that I’ve ventured to tell her. I would respectfully listen back then because I feared him—I would use the moment to tap into the unnerved frequency of ugly words he would take care to pronounce lightly. I knew that when he did this, his mind was going back into time and that he was reliving some horrible experience.  

Pelo bueno.  Pelo malo.  Good hair.  Bad hair.  It all begins with this he’d say and then he’d tell me too on how white Cubans would know who had mixed it up by examining the color of a person’s nail bed.  Past would draw toward the present. He’d next retell of the time Malcolm X met Fidel in Harlem.  He was no Fidelista but he admired the meeting of these two men in some way and that it happened in Harlem!  It was later on when I would read of Malcolm X’s life that I would see the similarities between Malcolm’s life and that of my own father’s.  I would see how this hatred of self would cause psychological damage and terror in families.

My father’s soul ached.  It constantly lived in the past.  He tried to absolve his suffering with valium, with shock treatments, but nothing ever healed the deep seeded puss filled excremented wound that society had inflicted upon him.

I look back and see how I was always a witness to his torment. I credit God with having me live this so that I would not go into the world of passing.  I would somehow live through my father the indignation felt when racists would glare at him, when we’d be in a town we were not from:  when we’d walk into a store and a sales associate assumed he could not afford a thing.  We would walk together and people would ask, astonished, She’s your daughter? His temper used to flare and how I hated when that would happen. It made me feel afraid of him, of white people, of cops, of this country.  

Several explicit words would knife at the air and I would want to run far away, but I couldn’t escape.  I was small and I had to stand next to his tall, lean legs;  looking up with tears in my eyes, praying that no one would call the police. These situations schooled me, deep into the muscle and into the bone of my ancestry about the underhanded cruelty people exercise upon one another; specifically racists upon people of color--of how they could manipulate, twist and turn the emotions of another like a wire hanger forced straight by the use of sly references of race, only to follow up by saying:  It was just a joke or you misunderstood me or you are overreacting.  (The sad part is that I began to see my people as aggressors too)  These phrases are like stomping raw salt crystals into the mouth of someone who is thirsting for water:  for dignity:  for justice:  for your everyday average respect.

We’d go home after these incidents.  I would say nothing to my mother and then like the quiet before the storm, I could feel the air in my home grow thick and I could feel the pressure in my father’s heart; and the noise in his head; and then the house would explode into terrible violence.  If ever I hated him during these moments, I hated the world who did this to him as well.  The one that caused my suffering too.  I hated those people who stayed quite as well, while my father would be minimized.  I hated those people who would spill their hatred onto my dad because they could; whom would then spill it onto me because he could.

There came a time when my father used to beat me with a closed fist and it coincided around the time I was reaching puberty.  My hair had suddenly curled.  It was no longer thick, heavy like a log, but now it lifted and swirled.  For my father, this meant the past had come back. His efforts to whiten, lighten had maybe failed?  And so he’d beat me hard: harder each morning I walked out of my room with hair turned tight against itself. I’d go to school late with my hair all wiry.  My scalp would throb from the handling it had received.  

My hair to me eventually became a trembling fist risen in defense: it said no to complicity and to silence. My hair asked questions and provided answers. Did my father think each strand of my hair could kill him? Yes. He thought so—so he had to pull it like rope while dragging me on the floor.  He had to accuse me of some strange treason that happened maybe sometime as far back as the 1400’s.  And then I would hear, pelo malo.  Pelo malo.  Bad hair.  Bad hair.

He hated me. I’m sure he believed this then. He hated me because I was in fact his mirror.  His features on a girl:  a mirror but with white skin. He hated my hair because with its presence it spoke back and reaffirmed itself; and  when my fat lip was sealed because of the treading down of my tears, my eyes stared at him with conviction.  He knew that I would never go down the road he’d got lost in. So he’d beat me some more and take some breaks.  And then beat me some more.  It got so bad he ordered me one day to cut it all off! I’m surprised he didn’t get the electric razor himself. Could it be that this was the last act of self inflicted hatred he could not commit against himself?

My mother, not aware of why he wanted it cut, took me to the slaughter—That day I sat on some hairdresser’s chair listening to her / a Cuban lady, who could not fathom why I would want to cut off such beautiful hair.  Meanwhile, my father sat on his recliner back home, with his blood pressure rising, waiting for me to come back; and when I came back home, he looked at me proudly.

He was proud of his erasure: his present day power before generations of intermingling that ran through his veins and that were then pumped into mine at conception—but this sudden glory was unsustainable. Nothing could change where we came from, who are people were and are.  Nothing but love of self and family could rescue us from the rampant viciousness of racism.  

[tyrionsnose]

I read this post about revolutionary villains and it got me thinking about what is so weird and unsatisfying (besides generally awful writing) about Tyrion’s ending in GOT, even though he ostensibly “won the game.” And yeah, yeah, I’m not really interested in hearing about how him surviving is an example of the writers letting privileged men off the hook because...it isn’t. Despite ending as hand of the king, Tyrion is also punished by the narrative in some weird ways and ones that are specifically designed to de-emphasize those aspects of his character that do make him a revolutionary figure in the books.

They couldn’t kill Tyrion because he’s a popular character, he drinks and he knows things, he’s played by Emmy winning Peter Dinklage, and he provides a lot of the show’s comic relief (although it stopped being a relief a while ago because again, poor writing). But they did something worse to the character, imho, they neutered him.

If Daenerys is a revolutionary and a kind of well-intentioned extremist, Tyrion’s character has always been a deconstruction of another villain trope that sort of goes hand in hand (no pun intended) with that archetype: that of the evil advisor.

I’m thinking about this in part because I just went to see the new live action Aladdin, in which the villain, Jafar, frequently rants about how being second isn’t enough for him, he has to rule everything. He even compares himself to the title hero, implying that he too started from nothing and worked his way up. It’s another story about using magic to upset the social order, and it’s interesting to look at since, at least for me, the original movie provides one of the most recognizable pop culture examples of the evil chancellor who is motivated by naked ambition. It’s also a trope rife with ableist and racist implications.

What’s sort of interesting about Tyrion is that he plays the role of the evil chancellor in different ways at various points in the narrative. In the asoiaf books he is a clear deconstruction of the role, and this is actually made explicit in A Clash of Kings, when he is labelled a “demon monkey” and blamed for Joffrey and Cersei’s crimes. His later motivation for joining Daenerys’ revolution in the books is initially a desire for personal revenge, but it’s also something that comes about because he himself has been booted by the system and blamed for other people’s crimes because of his vulnerability as a disabled person, and his own family helps to let him take the fall for this because he’s a convenient scapegoat. A revolution is what Tyrion needs to help him get back his birthright, and by the end of ADWD he is already starting to believe in Daenerys’ cause despite himself.

In the show, Tyrion is motivated to aid Daenerys because he believes in her cause, because he believes that she can change the world for the better. He is explicitly told in season five that he himself cannot hope to rule because of who he is, but he can aid another in creating a world where people like him are not abused and used as scapegoats. He comes to believe in Daenerys not only for what it means to him personally but also because he genuinely believes that she can make things better for everyone. In the scene where Tyrion is made Daenerys’ hand, he gives a speech about how she restored his belief in justice. It’s interesting to note that the way this scene is filmed, Tyrion is standing a step above Daenerys so that the height difference between them is minimized. They are on equal footing, and Daenerys treats Tyrion as an equal where previously other characters saw him as lesser because of his disability. As Joffrey’s hand, he is constantly belittled and undermined, and then disposed of when he is no longer useful to the Lannister regime. Here, Dany has purposefully made him her equal, and also defends his right to sit in her council when others attempt to belittle him.

A big problem on the show is that the writers did not really know what to do with Tyrion once he joined Daenerys, though, so he spent a long time treading water. As I said above, the show could not kill him, but they couldn’t let the Tyrion from the books be portrayed onscreen, either. He had to be stripped of all of his ambition and made largely a passive actor, lest he be accused of the same thing the characters in A Clash of Kings accused him of. And indeed, he becomes the scapegoat for Daenerys when she needs someone to lash out at. When the narrative calls for it, he gives bad advice - because revolutions are not supposed to work out - and when the narrative calls for someone to give lip service about Dany’s “madness,” he becomes Exposition Guy, because he drinks and he knows things and he’s there to give information but doesn’t really have any personal interests anymore, he’s just an advisor to everyone else. This was contradictory because the show ALSO seemed to be promoting the narrative that he wasn’t as smart as he thought he was - which is a common narrative aimed at marginalized people that dare to be competent. The show also seemed to be characterizing him as someone who is “easily offended,” who “can dish it but can’t take it,” also stereotypes about marginalized groups. Meanwhile the show has characters remark and point out how stagnant he is. In season 8 he spends a lot of time waffling between Varys, Jon Snow, Sansa, and Dany, but then when the show needs someone to do the dirty work and explain to Jon Snow the hero why he has to kill Daenerys, it’s Tyrion who does that, because he can do all the manipulative and less savory stuff that our heroes can’t do. As he tells Jaime, he can do this because is a “bad person,” and specifically invokes his dwarfism when he explains this. “Tens of thousands of innocent lives, one not-particularly-innocent dwarf. Seems like a fair trade.”

And yeah, he’s made hand to king Bran at the end, but he’s also right back where he started. Tyrion’s learned his lesson about trusting in revolutionaries, he’s back in a role of servitude, and the social order has been maintained. He doesn’t even get a mention in the “Song of Ice and Fire” because he doesn’t get his own story, he’s literally there to give advice to and serve others. The fact that he’s technically lord of Casterly Rock and the Westerlands now doesn’t even get a mention, just like he doesn’t get a mention in the “book of the book.” I guess he really does just drink and know things, after all, but what he should have known is that this story was never about him. I saw a lot of criticism of the finale along the lines of Tyrion talking too much, and he does, but hardly any of what he actually says is about himself, it’s all about others and “the realm,” and explaining the story to the audience so that the writers can make sure we draw the right conclusions. Book Tyrion is a character of deep longings and rage against the way things are, a perfect pair for Dany’s revolutionary spirit. Show Tyrion doesn’t even really seem to want things anymore, his appetites dulled. Dying for his own ideals would have been a better ending than having his edges gradually sanded off and whittled away until he’s literally just a hand and a voice for whoever is in charge.

[nauseateddrive]

PROFILING by Alan Swyer

Pre-meeting chit-chat was about to give way to serious shop talk in a Burbank office at the NBC Studio when suddenly there was a knock on the door. The four men gathered together turned as in stepped an apologetic assistant named Ginger.

“Sorry, Mr. Young,” she said to the silver-haired man presiding, “but there’s an urgent call for Mr. Lerner.”

Mike Lerner excused himself, then followed Ginger into the hall. “It’s your wife,” she informed him. “She asked you to call ASAP.”

Pulling out his iPhone, Lerner wandered down the hall to a quiet spot from which he could gaze at the San Fernando Mountains. “Know how I’m always telling you not to make trouble?” asked his wife Julie when she answered on first ring.

“Yeah.”

“Now it’s time to make trouble.”

“Because?”

“Our son and his friend Lonnie are accused of shoplifting.”

“Holy shit!”

“My words exactly,” replied Julie.

“Where?”

“The Best Buy in West L.A.”

Lerner’s drive west on the Ventura Freeway, then south on the 405, was a balancing act between trying to set speed records while not being nailed by the Highway Patrol. Yet as fast as his Audi was racing, his mind was going faster, and not because he’d walked out on the heads of the News Division.

Though Lerner’s son had inherited many of his own traits – among them a taste for pranks, plus a healthy disdain for authority – neither Jake nor his friend Lonnie was a candidate for serious trouble.

Despite a need to keep a cool head, Lerner found both his blood pressure and ire skyrocketing as he wove in and out of lanes, then at last exited the freeway to enter the Best Buy parking lot. Into the megastore Lerner strode like a man possessed, accosting a security guard who led him to what seemed like a holding pen. There, two fourteen-year-olds whose lips were quivering – Jake and Lonnie – stood under the disapproving gaze of the manager, whose name tag read C. Norkus, and the assistant manager, N. Martinez.

“I’m Mike Lerner,” he announced before addressing Jake and Lonnie, who were standing balefully in the corner. “Have a seat, kids,” he told them.

“They’ll sit when I tell ‘em to,” snarled Norkus.

“Bullshit!” Lerner exclaimed decisively, giving each of the boys a hug before ushering them toward chairs.

“What in hell is going on?” Lerner then demanded of the two managers.

“I don’t like your tone,” Norkus retorted huffily.

“If you’re trying to put me on the defensive,” replied Lerner, “you’ve got the wrong guy.”

“Want us to call the police?” snarled Martinez, coming to his boss’s assistance.

“That a threat?” asked Lerner, pulling out his iPhone. “I’ll do it for you, to let ‘em know two really nice kids – one white, the other black – are being held captive.”

“Race has nothing to do with this,” insisted Martinez.

“Says who?” insisted Lerner.

“Plus,” snapped Norkus, “you don’t even know what happened.”

“Because you two geniuses haven’t given me an explanation.”

“You can’t talk to us like that!” sneered Martinez.

“I just did. Now you going to explain, or do I call the cops?”

“We found the kids stealing tons of stuff.” offered Norkus.

“PlayStation 5, burner phones, batteries –” added Martinez.

“And where exactly was this?” demanded Lerner.

“In the store,” was Norkus’s answer.

“Not on the moon?” replied Lerner.

“That’s not funny,” sneered Martinez.

“Do I sound like I’m being funny?” Lerner shot back. “What exactly put it in your heads that these two nice kids were shoplifting?”

“We have our methods,” answered Norkus defensively.

“Before they’ve even gotten to the checkout?” wondered Lerner.

“You bet!” shouted Martinez.

“Did you see them sticking big boxes under their shirts? Or into their pants?”

“Not the point,” insisted Norkus.

“How about footage?” asked Lerner. “Got that?”

“Like I said,” snarled Norkus. “We’ve got out methods.”

Lerner studied the two employees dubiously. “Know what your methods sound like?”

“I bet you’re gonna tell us,” said Norkus.

“Ever heard of racial profiling?” stated Lerner.

“You calling us racists?” bellowed Norkus, his face turning bright red, causing Jake Lerner to elbow his buddy Lonnie.

“Your actions are the answer,” Lerner avowed. “So tell me, since you’re so damn smart. Any idea what I do for a living?”

“Bet you’re gonna say you’re a lawyer,” grumbled Martinez.

“To my mother’s chagrin, no. But for you clowns, what I do is worse.”

“Why?” mustered Norkus, his self-importance having seriously diminished.

“Because I make documentaries. Ever heard of NBC?”

“Who do you think we are?” asked Martinez, feigning hurt feelings.

“Sure you want an answer? Right now, I’m doing one for ‘em about the breakthroughs in the treatment of diabetes. Pretty good soapbox, huh? But know why that’s different from what I

usually do?”

“Why?” mumbled Norkus.

“Because most of the time I’m a muckraker. Since that word’s probably above your pay grade,

I’ll explain. I expose dirt, scandals, and wrongdoing.”

“H-how do we know that’s true?” stammered Norkus.

“Google me. But know what? To keep other kids from being subjected to bigotry –”

“Bigotry?” yelled an incensed Norkus.

“I think I’ll reach out to someone who’ll be pretty interested. Want to guess who?”

“I’m sure you’ll tell us,” groused Martinez.

“Ever heard of Jesse Jackson?”

Fuming, Norkus paced back and forth before pointing a finger at Lerner. “How do I know

you’re not talking through your goddamn hat?”

Lerner smiled icily. “Here’s the fun part. You don’t. Maybe I’m just bluffing,” he said, turning

toward Jake and Lonnie. “Right, guys?”

Despite the way their mistreatment, both teenagers managed a laugh. Then Lerner once again

faced Norkus and Martinez. “Here’s the scoop. If I’m making it up, everything I’ve said falls

apart. Right?”

The two managers nodded.

“But if it’s true,” Lerner continued, “let’s examine the consequences. First, I’d say the two of you will be out of a job, with a black mark against you in perpetuity.” Once more, Lerner turned to Jake and Lonnie. “Right, guys?”

After watching both kids nod vigorously, Lerner again addressed the management team. “Then there’s the fact that these two kids will likely own this store.”

“You trying to shake us down?” demanded Martinez.

Lerner glared. “Extortion’s a serious charge, buddy boy.”

“I ain’t your goddamn buddy!”

“No shit!” countered Lerner, drawing chuckles from Jake and Lonnie. “Tell you what. Since

you two like to play tough guy, let’s see what you’re made of. Willing to bet on who I am, or what I claim to be? Willing to risk your livelihood, your reputations, and your careers?”

No response was forthcoming as Norkus and Martinez remained mute.

“What happened to the bravado?” asked Lerner, rubbing in it. “Where’s the macho show and the swagger?”

Norkus and Martinez exchanged glances, then the manager spoke. “Why,” he asked softly, “are you making such a goddamn big deal out of this?”

“I could say,” answered Lerner, “I’m offended that you pulled this on two really nice kids. I can add that I like to see justice prevail. But there’s also a third reason. Ready?”

Both Norkus and Martinez shrugged.

“If it happens to them, and nothing’s done, it’d keep happening to others. Most of those kids won’t have someone like me on their side. What’s that mean? More and more racism.”

“I resent that!” snapped Martinez.

“Tough shit!” was Lerner’s rejoinder. “Letting the world know what goes on here would be a public service.”

Lerner studied the two crestfallen managers, then spoke again. “So what’s the verdict, guys?”

Forty minutes later, three people emerged from the store, their arms laden with PlayStations, cell phones, and other electronics.

“Thanks, Mr. Lerner,” said a grateful Lonnie.

“You were great, dad,” added a beaming Jake.

“So what did you guys learn,” asked Lerner once the acquisitions were placed in the trunk, and all of them were seated in his Audi.

“Stick up for yourself?” ventured Jake.

Lerner nodded. “And?”

“Tell us,” said Lonnie.

“Never let the turkeys get you down. And know what? There are far too many turkeys in this world.”

Lerner started the car and headed toward the exit, then turned suddenly toward Lonnie. “Your mom’s a churchgoer, right?”

“Every Sunday,” said Lonnie.

“Don’t tell her, but there’s something you ought to know. Ready?”

“You bet.”

“Despite what it says in the Bible, the meek don’t always inherit the earth.”

Alan Swyer is an award-winning filmmaker whose recent documentaries have dealt with Eastern spirituality in the Western world, the criminal justice system, diabetes, boxing, and singer Billy Vera. In the realm of music, among his productions is an album of Ray Charles love songs. His novel 'The Beard' was recently published by Harvard Square Editions.