#seeing casual queer media where its not about queer pain

[birches-and-hawks]

i love how movies are going away from

'here, learn about the sufferings of this underrepresented group in media'

to

'here, learn about the joys of this underrepresented group in media'

[pippin-katz]

I understand being upset that Mary & George is about filthy sex vs. RWRB but also... As a queer person, straight people have shows like GoT which are mostly filthy hetero sex so we can have the same.

People had sex for power throughout history, that's just how it is. And George was mentioned in the RWRB novel by Henry specifically so to have Nick portray him in this show is pretty cool.

You misunderstand me.

I have absolutely no qualms about Mary & George being the show that it is. I have no problem with it being raunchy and sex-filled. I'm entirely for variety of content and genres for all groups of people.

What I was pointing out is that this show is truly getting attention. There's interviewers, articles, social media posts, etc. that are all buzzing about it. It's not just a niche group of book fans that are anxiously awaiting the adaptation. There is a lot of hype, and one of the first things everyone mentions when discussing this show is the sex.

That's all completely fine, but I can't help but feel like this excitement and anticipation would not have applied to Red, White & Royal Blue, even if it had gotten the promo it should've.

People love getting excited/flustered/teasing/curious over sex on the screen, particularly if it's dirty and/or kinky. "Sex sells" is a saying for a reason.

It hurts to finally get a movie like Red, White & Royal Blue, that is beautiful, hopeful, funny, happy, and unapologetically queer, without it being the center plot point, and know deep down that it would never get as much praise or attention as something like Mary & George would.

The painful truth is that for the general masses, gay relationships boil down to sex. It's what they think of first. It's what some of them only think about. When a ship/pairing is proposed, what's one of the very first questions asked or teased about?

"Who's the top and who's the bottom?"

It is treated as something that they are expected to share based on how casually it's asked. You would never ask that question to a heterosexual couple even though those terms can be applied to them too. It's all they want to talk about, and yet they're also oblivious and ignorant. I mean, for fuck's sake, at least 75% of the viewing population of RWRB, even those who would consider themselves dedicated allies, did not know that men could have missionary sex. All they picture when they think of gay sex is rough, back-to-chest sex where they aren't facing each other. It did not even occur to them as a possibility that men could have gentle, face-to-face sex.

Loving sex is rarely depicted between queer couples on the screen, which is what made Red, White & Royal Blue so different and important.

The film is also not centered around their sexualities. They are contributing factors to the plot, but they are not the focus the way it is in movies like Love, Simon. Taylor recently quoted Matthew with this phrase: "It is not a gay love story; it's just a love story."

Henry and Alex's relationship is depicted no differently than any heterosexual romcom couple. If you switched one of them to a woman, you could play the plot out the exact same way; all you would change would be the scrutiny based on their sexualities, which can be substituted for class differences, race, or literally anything else that the public could hold against them.

And to clarify again, there is nothing wrong with showing the other side of this. I have no problem with it whatsoever!

It is just disappointing and frustrating to see how fast and easily the media flock to a show like Mary & George because it's so "outrageous" and "sexy", while Red, White & Royal Blue has practically been brushed off only six months following its release after it dominated the worldwide charts for several weeks.

I know what people will say: "Oh, the window for promo has passed!" "Oh, they're still talking about it a bit!" "Oh, it's because of the strike!"

Yes, it was, but I cannot shake the feeling that even if it hadn't happened, Red, White & Royal Blue would have still gotten the short end of the stick compared to something like Mary & George, or The Idea Of You that's coming out later. I'm pushed more towards that mindset after RWRB lost the SAG award the other night even though it was easily the best one on that list.

RWRB is treated as inferior and has already suffered from homophobic Hollywood standards multiple times, but I almost guarantee you that M&G will receive mountains of praise and awards, despite being way more explicit than RWRB is.

That is what I have a problem with.

[emblazons]

I think the thing that makes me sometimes "doubt" Byler endgame is how the writers seem to treat Will in the narrative by either making him nonexistent, sidelined and unimportant overall with often minimum screentime. Idk. A lot of ppl tried to explain why it was necessary for him to be sidelined but that resulted in the audience thinking that Byler has no chance of becoming canon and that Will is just a useless background character. Add the monologue moment in S4 and Mike constantly talking about all in S4, how do you explain the duffers will make the narrative fit in what they have showed so far in the show? Most ppl will think Byler came out of nowhere and if Will gets a huge moment regarding fixing/saving the world ppl will think it came out of blue and there was no buildup. It takes really pains to prove Will's importance and Mike's love for Will. And not sure if the writers will manage that.

—so I’ve answered some version of this kind of doubt several times on this blog before, so I’m going to direct you to those posts, so as not to reinvent the wheel:

Will's Taking a Backseat in S3 + Dustin companion piece

The Duffers, Show v Tell, and people missing subtext

The Duffers Aren't Writing "Casual TV"...they're writing for themselves and people like them

Why people assume ST is written poorly (like other shows)

General Audiences, Media Literary, and "Catching" Byler

Why I Don't Understand "Duffer Doubt"

On: "Objective" Byler (and ST) Commentary

The Duffers, the "GA," and how your value system affects how you go about interpreting (or missing things in) media

Mike & Will's 3 season arc (and how it fits in the wider narrative)

On: M&R being "2 Straight White Guys" writing a queer story

+ a cut for more thoughts about how Will really wasn't all that sidelined lmao

That said: if I’m honest, I fundamentally disagree with the premise that the duffers somehow need to “make the narrative of Will fit into s5,” as though he hasn’t been integral to the Hawkins connection to the UD since literally day one.

That, combined with the fact that he was barely even in season one outside of flashbacks (and yet still managed to carry all of S2) + hasn’t really been sidelined at all if you know how to read emotional beats and not just “action” ones? Like, sure, him not being front and center was true in S3, but given that he is the center of all of Mike’s emotional decisions across all of S4 and is now quite literally holding the “main relationship” (which it’s not, but we’ll let that go) together…saying he’s not central to what’s to come given his active connection to El, Mike, every single Byers, the rest of the Party and now Henry/Vecna as we file back into Hawkins is insane.

IMO, the real problem (and at the risk of sounding like every byler critic on the internet) is that the show is made of an ensemble cast who have all had their rounds in the spotlight over the seasons…which means that Will is not going to always be at the fore front of the action, because this is not The Will Show and not every season is written with his story as its primary narrative core. That said, if you are paying attention to the emotional and even supernatural beats of the show, you can clearly see where they’ve set Will up to hold an important and even critical role in the final season—

—especially given that characters like Henry and Vecna didn’t even technically exist 2 seasons ago, and yet now hold primary weight in the story and in the minds of this “general audience” people love acting like matter most to the Duffers (even tho they have repeatedly said they don’t lmao).

I personally do not give a damn about what “the GA” thinks is possible given that half of them were mad when Will was central to the story in S2 (the 'S2 was my least favorite season / the season I don't watch much of people) and half of them couldn’t even tell he was gay, despite being plain as day to anyone who doesn’t need every single beat of the story spelled out for them….and that the duffers literally and repeatedly make fun of people for doing I throughout the show.

All that said...I respect your right to doubt, but…of all the things I could doubt The Duffers being able to pull off in the minds of this nebulous “GA” everyone thinks is so stupid they haven't picked up on any subtext or plain narrative (which I could make a strong case they aren't...which is why they pitch such a bitch lmao), making Will central to the 5th season after all the pains they’ve taken to flesh out both his connection to the UD and his romantic feelings/sexuality is not one of them.

It's not as nearly "blindsiding" as people seem to think it is—because the second you stop thinking everyone is heteronormative, you realize a lot of people who just aren't as loud as the naysayers on the internet see it plain as day.

[wolf-queer-discourse]

Adventures in Aphobia #1

So I was scrolling through Tumblr the other day (a regrettable mistake as always), and I had the great pleasure of seeing this joyous post.

*deep breath*

Not gonna lie, posts like this make me real pissed. Pissed because the person who posted this exists in a space where they feel comfortable enough to post this online. Pissed because these posts are so common and often face little backlash. And pissed because there’s nothing better than allosexuals condescendingly explaining to asexual people why they’re dirty attention whores who invent their own oppression. Ace people deserve to be defended against this horseshit. Young people see these posts, and it’s extremely damaging to have your identity be nothing more than fuel for people in discourse to mock you and demand you bled in order for them to notice your pain.

Anger aside, many people do not see why this post is wrong, so why is it? Let’s unpack this clusterfuck of bigotry:

“would love to see substantive evidence of systematic “aphobia” that isn’t actually just misogyny, toxic masculinity, or rpe culture.”

God damn, we are not mincing our words here XD. A few things: systematic in bold, which tells you if you do not make a blood sacrifice on the altar of queer pain you will not be taken seriously. Potential nitpick, but systemic and systematic are not the same thing. I believe systemic is the word they’re looking for. Systematic implies a lot more intentionality that can be hard to prove. Systemic merely means that systems, in their current state, do aphobic things, which they absolutely do.

“Aphobia” in quotes is absolutely rich. Not only will this person refuse to acknowledge systemic aphobia, which is only one type, but this poster casts clear doubt upon the mere concept of aphobia in and of itself. We love to see it.

There’s a lot to unpack here. The statement, as clearly condescending as intended, is sort of correct, though it doesn’t mean a whole lot. Systemic oppression is about the systems in a society (government, healthcare, etc) discriminating against people. Systemic oppression is not bigotry faced on a person-to-person level. In short, systematic oppression is something a person experiences in their overall life, while personal discrimination is experienced on a personal level by people who are not singularly in control of the systems. This post boils down the negative comments ace people face into being called “weird”, which is an understatement for sure, but calling a gay person weird isn’t systemic oppression either.

It’s still bad and discriminatory.

This is such a snotty way to dismiss aphobia as some mere, insignificant comment with no meaning as if it doesn’t reinforce society’s painful aphobic views in the same way casual homophobic comments reinforce heteronormativity and society’s hostility toward gay people.

Ace people face discrimination in healthcare, most notably, which is systemic discrimination, but the systemic discrimination of asexuals really ought to be its own post if I’m to nosedive into it. Even if ace people faced no systemic discrimination, it wouldn’t make this point anymore correct. Discrimination is a perfectly valid reason to feel disregarded by society, and often only ace people are denied the right to feel this way and are instead gaslit into admitting what they face is no big deal and they’re just making it up for attention.

The experience of being pressured to have sex when you’re allo vs ace is very different. The vast majority of allo people do not plan to be celibate their whole lives. Many ace people do not want to have sex, ever. “Waiting for sex” in much of western society and in Christianity is seen as pure and honorable. Yet being asexual and never wanting sex is seen as a deviant disorder and people are accused of robbing their partner of sex forever.

There’s really a specific flavor of sexual pressure that is unique to ace people. Sex being to “fix” someone or because they “just need to try it”.

In this respect, aphobic sexual pressure is better compared to that faced by gay people and lesbians. Lesbians especially often can face this same struggle, men pressuring them to have sex because they think lesbians just need to “try it” or to “fix them”. I can imagine this poster would have no issue acknowledging lesbophobia being the root of lesbians coerced into sex with men, yet she does not give ace people the same.

Imagine if someone said (and knowing our fucked world, someone probably has): “Lesbophobia doesn’t exist. It’s just misogyny. Straight women are coerced into sex too!”

It’d be pathetic bullshit. Toxic masculinity, misogyny and many other issues can all tangle into combined messes with other forms of bigotry. Lesbophobia is an experience that deserves to be recognized apart from misogyny, even if the two are linked. Please stop erasing ace people’s experiences with this when it’s not the same thing.

Honestly, though, this post, as trashy as it is, if anything, is perhaps, really asking: Is there any type of aphobic experience that’s inherently exclusive to ace people?

I still wager to go say, yes, yes there is, but I must make an important point first:

Most experiences of queer discrimination are not limited to queer people.

Homophobia and transphobia are both experienced by cishets in certain instances. Feminine straight men can be victims of homophobic harassment. This does not disprove the fact that it’s homophobia just because a straight man is the victim of it. A tall cis woman with broad shoulders and a lower voice may be the victim of transphobic remarks or comments. The basis of these comments is rooted in transphobia, however, so the fact that the victim is cis does not erase the transphobia.

People who argue that experiences ace people complain about can be experienced by allosexuals are not poking a legitimate hole in doing this. Certain experiences related to aphobia can and are experienced by allosexuals. If you do not acknowledge this, then homophobia and transphobia aren’t real because cishet people have sometimes experienced them.

Despite cishets sometimes experiencing queerphobia, most of us acknowledge that their experience of that bigotry, however unfortunate, is not the same as that experienced by actual queer people. It’d be quite homophobic for a feminine straight man to claim he knew just as much about the gay experience as an actual gay man. Similarly, when allosexual people relate experiences that were rooted in aphobia, it’s overstepping a line when they claim asexual discrimination isn’t real because they experienced elements of it too.

Cishet (cishet including allosexuals) people do not experience their doctors telling them their sexuality might be a disorder or caused by trauma. Allo queer people can experience this with their sexualities too.

“using sex appeal to sell products is misogyny, it is not engineered to gross sex-repulsed people, it is meant to objectify women.”

This is a strawman thinner than my last nerve. Uh, what? What ace people are you seeing that literally think sex appeal was engineered to gross-out sex-repulsed people?? I don’t think this is a core argument??

Yes, sex-repulsed ace people sometimes complain about sex appeal in media being uncomfortable. But that’s it. Every time an ace person shares a discomfort of theirs doesn’t mean it’s the entire basis of their oppression. For the love of God, let ace people discuss their experiences without being blow-torched over not being oppressed enough with an individual discomfort. 

BONUS ROUND

(This was in the tags)

“Completely vilifies celibate individuals” 

...no…? What…? Huh…? 

The most charitable interpretation of this vague accusation is that the poster means celibate people face aphobia as well, due to not wanting to have sex. I have no idea how this “vilifies” anyone, but that aside, as said before: people who are not queer can face aphobia. Also worth noting that society treats celibate people way better than ace people, which is really another example of aphobia. Celibate people can be told they’re missing out (which could be at very least related to aphobic ideals), but they’re rarely called broken. Celibacy is seen more as a respected, controlled ideal in allo people, but when ace people want to do it, they’re just mentally ill.

Anyway, the post was aphobic trash, and it needs to be debunked more often. Mocking ace people online is not a good look anymore, guys. Don't be ugly.

[wangxiandecoded]

Episode 9

Previous Episode | Next Episode

(Spoilers for the whole show ahead!)

Lan Zhan remembers what Wei Ying had mentioned about the puppets the first night at Cloud Recesses showing he remembers quite a lot about him, he just doesn’t let on.

NHS is a big mood in this scene, an absolutely useless gay depending on two warrior gays to save his life. But he’s hindering their flawless team work so Lan Zhan uses the silencing spell on him.

This dialogue is so uncalled for and delivered in a way that makes you think Wei Ying just wants to see Lan Zhan have an outburst, kick back and admire how hot that is.

Wei Ying’s “you can go ahead and blame me for everything that is wrong with this world but my man has done nothing wrong in his life ever” smile.

You didn’t have to expose him like that but thank you, Jiang Cheng.

Wei Ying’s “sorry I accidentally did a hetero thing, let us please not remember this for the sake of my clean conscience” smile.

Yet Another Plot Device To Show Off Wangxian’s Chemistry

The Dire Owl subplot is one of the dreamiest scenes on the show and a fight sequence that proves Wangxian own the patent for words like soulmates, symmetry, equilibrium, balance, yin and yang, mirrors and their derivatives.

Here’s something that’s bothered me : Wei Ying calls for Lan Zhan twice and he doesn’t answer him the first time even though he looks searchingly in his direction. It is only when they knock into each other the second time that he explains the fog is a hallucination caused by the Dire Owl. (But of course Lan Zhan doesn’t need to answer him, the red string of fate will inevitably help them find the other.) 

Clear-headed as he is, did he for a second believe that the Dire Owl was making him hallucinate Wei Ying’s voice the first time, and is that why he ignored him? Because Lan Zhan’s mind could be the spotless sea of tranquillity it is, but Wei Ying has now become the shrillest thought that breaks through and demands his attention. He doesn’t respond though, so he must have been sure Wei Ying is safe.

For Lan Zhan, Wei Ying will do even the impossible. He’ll try his best to seal off all his senses and mute his head that’s forever brimming with thoughts. 

Ok, pause. I cried when I watched this for the first time and let me tell you why. The implications of this fight scene are astounding. We all know Wangxian are soulmates who can confront anything together but did we know that they could feel and find their way to each other even when their senses are completely shut? I mean, how attuned to someone’s existence do you have to be to achieve that? They are hyper focusing on nothing but the Dire Owl and yet moving perfectly with eyes closed in an outrageously impressive synchrony. They can feel the other’s presence and have utmost trust in each other to shield their direction. They move as if they’ve spent infinite lifetimes by the other’s side mastering this skill; they leap, spin and swerve like they think with the same mind. The way they fit together is to die for, nearly impossible and the legendary stuff from stories that we all wish we could have with someone in this existence. If I was whatever that stood in Wangxian’s way, I’d be terrified and call it a day. They are not just soulmates, they are The Original Formidable Soulmates™. 

Wangxian Are Here To Kick Queerbaiters In The Ass

This fantastic display of battle prowess by the two heroes fighting back-to-back is one of the many things that convinced me The Untamed is not like the other stories out there. Simply because every stop of their journey is too romantic and the others don’t come close enough. It is an injustice to compare or group their relationship with the ‘dude bro, no homo’ chemistry that bromances usually sell. Lan Zhan and Wei Ying are two people who are so passionately devoted to and absolutely belong with each other, they are soulmates not just in the minds of the audience or because the creators were afraid to make them something more, but soulmates by their own admission. There are other factors that strengthen their already supergay case like the absence of a female love interest in their lives and their flirty interactions being genuinely adorable as heck, as opposed to just isolated instances of b(romance). And it really, really, helps our case that the novel is canonically gay but it is also remarkable that a show that’s teeming with gay subtext can exist at all and go on to become one that is widely embraced by everyone, casual watchers and shippers alike. 

Lan Zhan and Wei Ying's chemistry gives all the Western superheroes a run for their money. We no longer have to wonder what it looks like when two queer heroes who are in love get to kick ass together. See, this is what happens when you have the guts to invest in a gay romance. This show looked censorship in the eye and said gay rights anyway. (I’m going to digress from this show for a sec and just plainly weep for all the queer pairings on mainstream media that we shipped but couldn’t see the light of day because of the homophobic people behind them. It is great that the truth still lives in our hearts and the millions of words on ao3. But life feels a lot sweeter to know with certainty that our heroes are in love this time and celebrate the fact that the people who made this show knew and honoured that very well, that they honoured the audience. In my eyes, CQL is the unparalleled forefather of gay romance from now on. Because reading these epic queer stories is one thing but watching Wangxian’s story unfold along with the entire world means believing in the power of gay love. And seeing our favorite heroes in action makes the characters we look up to so much more real.)

Lan Zhan comes flying like the Prince Charming he is to break the shackles of heteronormativity trying to kill his soulmate! Hell yeah, king! Save us from that straight trope that’s been choking us since time immemorial.

We did not just see Wei Ying pretend to be dead so he can outsmart the bird and simultaneously get Lan Zhan to save him just because he likes that sort of thing. Nope, totally didn’t happen. 

Oh, hello Ah Yuan! Details like this prove the show is well worth multiple rewatches.

There is nothing more uniquely Wangxian than the million thoughts they share with each other through mere glances, the frequency of which steadily increases. Who knew you could speak with zero articulation? Not having a soulmate sure sucks for the rest of us mortals. I doubt the audience can truly grasp the depth of their communication but I’m pretty sure it goes like this most of the time. 

Wei Ying teasing Lan Zhan that the Goddess Statue tried to kill him because she had a crush on him is all kinds of hilarious. Lan Zhan looks somewhere in between “Wei Ying, we’re talking about the fate of the universe, stop being gay for 2 seconds please,” and "STFU, just because I can find my way to you blind doesn't mean I will hesitate to Silence you again."

Wei Ying Is Crumbling All Of Lan Zhan’s Walls

Most people maintain their distance from Hanguang-Jun, the Noblest Of Them All, he whose robes command respect and inspire fear. There is hence something very sweetly domestic about Wei Ying latching on to his silk tassel while subtext-whining, "Where are you going Lan Zhan, I refuse to live without you", and "Ugh Lan Zhan, you're so lost without me, ok fine, I'll help you.” It’s like he granted himself the lifetime entitlement of being Lan Zhan’s nuisance-companion the night they met, and thank goodness for that because Lan Zhan wasn’t going to let anyone into his life. Wei Ying is the exception who managed to charm his way into his heart and dissolve his barriers.

Notice Wei Ying even turns down free alcohol for Lan Zhan. And the sheer undisguised panic on his face that Lan Zhan is going to leave him alone after all the bonding activities he made sure they went through is endearing comedy at its peak. 

We see Lan Zhan no longer believes resolutely in His Ways and lets Wei Ying persuade him to believe there is a better one. This is a great 𝙙𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙡𝙤𝙥𝙢𝙚𝙣𝙩 for them because they’re communicating.

Lan Zhan doesn’t fight him anymore, period. 

The Yin Iron starts acting up and Wei Ying is immediately there for Lan Zhan, gently grounding him. He can feel the horror and pain Lan Zhan has seen in the vision because of course he can. But does Lan Zhan see how much Wei Ying loves him and hurts for him? He has to. In moments like this, Wei Ying’s presence shows how wrong Lan Zhan is in wanting to do everything alone. We all need a friend in life. And it was destiny that led them to each other because their lives would’ve evidently been a lot lonelier without the other in it. 

Episode 9 shows Lan Zhan warming up to Wei Ying some more : he has stopped being antagonistic altogether, lets Wei Ying pull him around, freely accepts his help, shares many glances with him and is ready to blast anything that lays a finger on Wei Ying sky high. (Of course we see that Wei Ying exaggerates needing his help most of the time. He plays the “I’m a frail man desperately in need of Hanguang-Jun’s protection” card because swooning into the arms of his lover is one of his favorite things. And not even Lan Zhan calls him out for it. They’re just so whipped for each other.)

[qqueenofhades]

(1/2) Honestly, Hilary, you are a blessing. I want to scream about your amazing Fic, how I love Immortal Husbands and the whole Immortal Family and how I had more fun learning history from your writing than in my whole damn school. But I also want to appreciate your TOG answers and meta. All the more because my friends outside the internet saw TOG as some boring movie with shitty plot and I'm just here in the corner, wanting to scream at someone who will understand about FINALLY seeing...

"(2/2) ...some GOOD queer representation, without throwing stereotypes in our faces, and I can't even begin with the found family trope because THE FEELS. Anyway, what I was trying to say with this rambling: thank you. <3"

....I’m sorry what. Who. Who is saying this. Straight people? I feel like the answer is definitely straight people. Because they have had EIGHTY FUCKING THOUSAND shitty action movies with the Boring White Man Hero, the disposable Muslim-coded (or actually Muslim) villains, the equally disposable eye-candy female love interest who either gets fridged or is secretly evil, Grimdark Everyone Is Secretly Bad And Nothing Matters crap philosophy, Moral Hand Wringing Over Superhero Violence, on and on. So of course they can moan and whine about “iT’s nOt OrIGinAL” and apparently not sufficiently Grimdark and Amoral, and how the dynamics of the team are completely reshuffled in a way that actually doesn’t prioritize THEM, and like.... this is why I never trust media only beloved by straight people, and only ever watch anything after it’s been recommended to me by a trusted queer friend. Because sometimes I remember the difference, and WHOOF.

Because: the gays and people of color DESERVE formulaic action/superhero movies as much as the Generic White Bro (in fact, we can all agree, far more than the Generic White Bro). This is the trap where every piece of media that’s not made by a Mediocre White Man has to be the best all-time of its genre, apparently, rather than using some of the same well-loved storytelling tropes but recoding them and re-deploying them for a more diverse audience. Instead of the Hard Bitten White Man Action Hero, we have Andy and Nile (two women, and Nile as a young Black woman who literally cannot be shot to death, in the year 2020, is fucking revolutionary on its own don’t @ me). As I said in my first meta, even Booker, who comes closest to fulfilling that trope, is made the closest thing to a “villain” there is on the team and even then for entirely sympathetic motives that rest on him having teary-eyed conversations with Nile about how he misses his family and feels like he failed them. His emotions help drive the story in an actually GOOD and useful way, rather than sacrificing everyone else to coddle him through his feeble heterosexual manchildness (why yes, I AM staring directly at the Abomination without blinking). Nobody in the story is EVER penalized or made a fool of for loving their found family (itself an intensely queer trope, even before the queerness of the individual characters) or trying to do the right thing even in the middle of the horrors, and frankly, I just want to consume more media with that as the main message. I’M SO FREAKING TIRED OF GRIMDARK. GOD. IF I WANTED THAT I COULD JUST TURN ON THE NEWS.

And of course, my BELOVED Joe and Nicky: an interracial, interreligious gay couple that has been wildly in love for literal CENTURIES and gives me the opportunity to do things like write the most self-indulgent historical romance backstory fic ever with DVLA. They met in the embodiment of religious conflict and have transcended that, there are never any cruel jokes or expectation for you to congratulate the narrative for being so beneficent as to give you “an exclusively gay moment” (fuck you Disney!). Joe and Nicky’s love story is central both to who they are as characters, doesn’t revolve around them being suffering or being Tormented over being gay (when the cops pull them apart for kissing, they beat the cops the fuck up, WE STAN), gets to unfold naturally in the background of the story with these beautiful little beats of casual intimacy (the SPOONING /clutches heart) and since THEY LITERALLY CANNOT DIE, no chance of the “burying your gays” bullshit. Even when they’re captured first by the bad guys, and I briefly, upon first viewing, worried that they were going the Gay Pain route just for cheap emotional points, they remain constantly united and fighting together and able to do stupid things like flirt when they’re strapped to gurneys by a mad scientist. Then the rest of the team ends up right there with them, so it’s not something that happens to them alone, and Nile comes in to save everyone’s asses, and Joe and Nicky get ANOTHER beautiful moment of fighting the bad guys and being worried about each other and tender even in the middle of this chaos and GOD! MY HEART! MY WHOLE ASS HEART! I LOVE THEM!

And just the fact that it’s not the Evul Mooslim Turrorists or Boilerplate Scary Eastern Europeans or whoever else who are the bad guys, but Big Pharma, nasty white men with too much money and not enough ethics, the CIA (at least tangentially; they could have pushed a lot harder on that but I’ll give Copley individually a pass), and the very forces that want to stop the Old Guard and discount what they do (helping the little people) as worthless... GOD. That is fucking POWERFUL. They literally take the time to explain with Copley’s Conspiracy Wall that even the little things the team does, when they can’t see it themselves, spiral out through centuries and have positive effects down the line. And it’s NOT just in the Western world (no scene in the movie takes place in America, none of the main four characters/heroes are American, and they only go to England when the English villains capture them). They’re in Africa, in Asia, in South America, in all these places where the Western/imperial world order has harmed people the most and in a way that Euro/American audience often gets to forget. On the surface this might be an action movie with Charlize Theron beating up men (which I mean, that alone is fine if you ask me) but there are SO MANY WAYS in which it achieves these deeper moments of meaning and subversion of the narrative that we are so often fed and the ways it could have done this (i.e. the same old Mediocre White Man ways).

I love the fact that the team unabashedly LOVES each other as their family members (I will never get over them all liking to sleep in one room even in their safe house in France), even when they struggle, and that they continue trying to make it right and never consider leaving Booker behind, because he screwed up but they still love him (and he them). I LOVE LOVE LOVE that this movie gave me not just Joe and Nicky but Andy and Quynh: two completely badass queer couples who kick tons of ass and have romance and Drama and rich and well-realized lives outside being used as emotional manipulation or suffering porn for straight people. (I realise it’s only been two weeks since the first one released, but where is my sequel, I have Needs. Especially Andy/Quynh and Quynh/Joe/Nicky needs). I was disappointed that they’d gotten rid of Quynh in a Bad Medieval Way to cause pain for Andy and then shocked and DELIGHTED when she turned up alive in Booker’s apartment at the end of the film. I LOVE that this movie gave me Nile Freeman and everything that she represents in the middle of this hellish year. I even love Booker! BOOKER! When he’s usually the character type I can’t stand and have the least patience with!

So yes. I have watched it three times already. I am sure I am going to watch it several times more. It just makes me so happy.

[uaklauslovesdave]

Hi, thank you for sending me asks, I really appreciate it! :D Could you do 002 for klave, I always want to hear your thoughts about them <3

my buddy, my dude, it’s been roughly 17 years since you sent this ask, and i’m oh so sorry for taking this long to answer. it got to be one of those situations where i wanted to do it Properly, which of course brought the anxiety, which of course then brought the avoidance. But we’re here now! it’s a new era and i have a whole bunch of klave thoughts to dump on my unsuspecting followers. let us begin.

when i started shipping it:

Pretty much immediately! I remember first watching s1 and getting that slow confirmation that Klaus time traveled to the Vietnam War. We saw him on the bus with his fatigues and bloody hands and I was like ‘oh god oh no he went to Vietnam didn’t he.’ And then later we have Klaus experiencing flashbacks in the bathtub and there are echoes of the noises of war but also a strong and clear “Dave!” And in that moment my interest was piqued. Dave, he said? Who is this Dave? Is this someone he loved? Did he have a war-time romance with another soldier? And I was hopeful but I also didn’t want to get too ahead of myself because of Queer Baiting in Media reasons (like, I was in the marvel fandom, ok? I went through the whole stucky dance routine). But then, but then! We got more. We got roughly five minutes (or less?) of scenes of Klaus dropping down in front of a disoriented soldier, of this soldier introducing himself as Dave on a bus, of Klaus and Dave dancing in a bar, of Klaus and Dave sharing a kiss in a quiet corner, of Dave bleeding out and dying in the middle of combat as Klaus sobs above him. And it was quick and it was short but it was meaningful and it was tender and immediately I knew that I was gone for them. There was no turning back at this point. I was all in on the Klave Train.

my thoughts:

My thoughts? Where do I even start? I have many! Some are incoherent! Some are devastating! Some are sickeningly sweet! Some are raunchy! Stay tuned to find out!

what makes me happy about them/what makes me sad about them:

So I decided to combine these two questions because, well, I Do Not Know how to untie the happy and the sad when it comes to klave. I tried and I cannot do it. They’re two sides of the same coin with these two. Because their entire relationship is tinted by tragedy, you know? They only met each other because Klaus was tortured and then flung into a notoriously traumatizing war in the 1960s. And who knows what number tour Dave was on. Had he been there for just 2 months or was this second or third time around? I’m not sure which option is more painful, really. And it’s unclear, did Dave genuinely want to serve in the military? Did he truly subscribe to those values instilled by his family? I’d lean towards no, based on the conversation Klaus tries to have with the Younger Dave in the diner. But I think it took Dave some time to get there, as he grew older and came to better understand and accept himself and perhaps grew more and more disillusioned with the life he was pushed into. And then there’s Klaus, whose own experiences somewhat parallel Dave’s (they just happened on a different timeline). Klaus, who grew up under Reginald’s reign of terror, who was taught to be a soldier just like Dave was. But his own disillusionment was expedited and he was able to rebel and remove himself from that scene more easily than Dave could (but at the expense of losing shelter and security and stability). And we have some insights into what it was like for Klaus to grow up in that environment, constantly surrounded by death. When we first meet him he is a person who clearly does not do genuine attachment or sincerity, because that is far too vulnerable and far too dangerous in his experience. He looks out for himself and he does what he needs to do to get by, and he approaches things from a casual, crass (safe) distance. And then there’s Dave, who we learn a little bit about from his interactions with Klaus in 1963 Dallas. He appears earnest and kind, just a Really Good Kid. He seems somewhat confused by Klaus, but also intrigued. Pretty much every time we see Klaus interact with someone in the 1960’s who is not a member of Destiny’s Children they approach him with disdain (referring to him as “pretty boy,” kicking him out of the diner, etc.). But not Dave. Not until he is pressured into it by Uncle Homophobe. And after that Dave seeks him out and apologizes, says that’s not him. And he and Klaus talk, and we see that they really knew each other, they really had a relationship, but by the end of the conversation Dave has been pushed too far. He’s not quite ready to rebel yet, he’s not quite able to make that leap into living as his true self. Just like Klaus, Dave grew up trapped and restricted and surrounded by ghosts. Not literal ones, no, but the ghosts of dead war heroes who came before him, the ghosts of the Ideal Man and Good Son that he thought he had to be, that he thought he had to prove he could become. And it’s not quite clear how and when Dave finally got to that point where he could rebel, where he could finally push past the fear, knock down the walls of the box he had been shoved into. But by the time he and Klaus crossed paths in 1968 Vietnam he was ready. And Klaus was ready. And they brought that genuine, true, real love out in each other. Something both of them probably thought was never possible. Something both of them probably thought was just a myth. Just turning themselves inside out and sharing that with each other. Trusting the other to take care of it and hold and keep it safe. All in the middle of a deadly war. It’s beautiful and it’s painful and it’s why I love them.

things done in fanfic that annoy me:

Nothing really specific comes to mind. Generally if there’s something I don’t like in a fanfic I’ll stop reading and move on. There is, of course, the Fanon Klaus Problem that makes its way into klave fics, so I suppose that annoys me. Or stories where Dave is one-dimensional and seems to exist just to comfort and take care of Klaus. But really, I don’t wanna hate on anyone who writes fanfic in a particular way. You do you. If it appeals to me I’ll read it and if it doesn’t I’ll just pass it by. No big deal.

things i look for in fanfic:

It absolutely depends on the day and what I’m in the mood for in that particular moment. I’m a sucker for angst so I absolutely do not mind reading something terribly sad and tragic. I like hurt/comfort with an emphasis on the hurt. I’m a fan of the GhostDave Watches Over Klaus Through the Years genre. I like stories that explore their time together in Vietnam. I’m into AU’s that include AliveDave traveling back to 2019 with Klaus and they hang out in Klaus’ room in the academy and Dave meets the siblings and Diego gives him a shovel talk. Sometimes I just want that sweet, sweet smut. Mostly I look for something that is both lovely and sad, which is not hard to find because that is, essentially, their relationship. There’s lots of good stuff out there. All y’all writers are talented. I salute you.

my kinks:

Alright, I’m just gonna preface this by saying that I will try my best to be unapologetically open about this, but at my core I am both shy and repressed. My easy and safe answer to this is that my kink for klave is love, happiness, and tender intimacy. That’s what I really want for them. But also. But also! Let them be smutty! Let them find places to sneak away and fuck, Dave’s hand over Klaus’ mouth to stop him from making noise that will alert the other soldiers to their activities. Or maybe they’re sitting under a tarp in the pouring rain and Klaus sees how far he can take it, and Dave doesn’t back down, and it ends up with Klaus blowing Dave while some other guys are sitting just feet away, oblivious to what’s going on between Katz and Hargreeves just over there. And then there’s that time they get to take leave together, and they’re able to get a hotel room, just to themselves, with real walls and a door that locks and a bed and everything. And the digs aren’t great but it feels like a palace compared to what they’re used to, and they absolutely do not waste this opportunity. Dave fucks Klaus into the mattress, and Klaus gets to learn what it’s like to have someone take control because you actually want them to and you feel safe with them, and Dave gets to learn what it’s like to have someone trust you implicitly and be willing to be vulnerable with you. And it’s not perfect, of course, sometimes their histories and understandings of sex and intimacy bump heads, but they love each other, they really do, and they work through it. And they both cry during sex at some point. For Dave it’s the first time he’s done so, for Klaus it’s not (but this is nothing like those other times this is because he wants to be here this is because he’s overwhelmed with love this is a release this is being seen this is being cared for).

who i’d be comfortable with them ending up with if not each other:

Let me be real and say that I really, really, really want them to end up with each other, and I think that this is where the show is headed. But, if that is not the case, as long as they are happy I will be happy. Perhaps that is cliche, but oh well. Just let them experience love and support, whether that’s with each other, someone else, or just on their own.

my happily ever after for them:

I don’t know how and I don’t know when (like seriously, when in the timeline is a big question), but I want them to find a way to be together. Maybe it involves some time-traveling, maybe it involves some timeline-hopping, maybe it involves some Commission interference, maybe one or both of them will be dead, maybe (most likely) it involves something that has not even crossed my mind as a possibility. But, like I said, I think that somehow there WILL be a (perhaps nontraditional) happily ever after for them. It might take some time to get there and I don’t think it’s gonna be a smooth road, but I do think that’s the ultimate destination. And I’m looking forward to the whole process.

who is the big spoon/little spoon:

Good question! My first instinct was Klaus as little spoon. Because he is Klaus but also because of the Bar Kiss scene where Dave tenderly cradles his face and those Very Important blurry behind the scenes instagram photos of Klaus resting his head on Dave. But I also think it would be really nice for Dave to be the little spoon? Because Klaus gets to hold him and act as a Protector and maybe he can feel Dave’s heartbeat beneath his (hello) hand and he gets to wrap around him and hold on tight and he can let go when he wants to but he doesn’t want to, he wants to stay right here as long as Dave will have him. And Dave will have Klaus wrapped around him, holding on, as long as Klaus wants to stay. Dave gets to be held and cocooned in the arms of this beautiful person he loves. Dave doesn’t have to be strong right now, he doesn’t have to put on the face of the Good Soldier. All he has to do is fall into the space between them.

what is their favorite non-sexual activity:

I’m gonna say that they had a lot of time to sit together and talk while they were in Vietnam. Sure, they had their duties and sometimes they were in the shit but there was also a lot of down time, just sitting around and waiting for something to happen. And so they’d sit and they’d smoke and they would talk. About their interests, about where they come from, and eventually about the life they would build together after they got out of there. But here’s a specific image that I have: they’re sitting close together, maybe it’s dark, there’s no one nearby. Cigarette smoke lingers in the air, mingles with the fine mist. The conversation has turned to music, somehow. Conversations have a tendency to meander when Klaus is involved, and Dave follows him step for step, never tripping, never questioning how they got there. And Klaus asks Dave about his favorite song, and Dave hesitantly mentions “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence,” like he’s embarrassed, but he’s loved it for years and he wants to be honest with Klaus. And Klaus hums and says he doesn’t know it, hasn’t heard of it, and he leans against Dave, lays his head against his chest. And Dave says, that’s ok, it doesn’t matter, it’s just a stupid old song anway. But Klaus says, no, you should sing it for me, I want to hear it, I want to know it. And Dave scoffs and laughs, but Klaus looks up at him, and then Dave looks away, and his mouth lifts into a smile, something small and fragile. He turns back to Klaus, looks him the eye, and softly, so softly, starts singing, “When Liberty Valence rode to town, the womenfolk would hide…” And Klaus drops his head and shifts closer to Dave and hears the words slip from Dave’s mouth and feels the words vibrate in Dave’s chest. He closes his eyes. There’s a war going on. It’s 1968 and he’s in Vietnam and his clothes are damp but he’s right where he wants to be. The song is not romantic, but it’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever heard. He never forgets the words.

[conduitandconjurer]

how does ur blog personally handle the klaus cult storyline? i saw in ur tags abt how u didn't like it so i was wondering if u were canon divergent about that part of season 2? sorry if this is a weird question lfjdksljfdklsfj

Not even remotely a weird question, and please don’t apologize, Lucky dear <333   Media crit is like My Thing™ so I love this kind of question.

My blog handles the Klaus cult storyline by de-emphasizing it, which is not so much an attempt to duck it entirely as an attempt to encourage others to find it occasionally funny in an ironic sense (more on that later) but mostly to not rely on it as a comedic staple, and even less so as a staple of Klaus’s character.  It’s a symptom not of his growth but of his continued stasis, and probably his biggest stumbling block in the entirety of season two. I don’t go completely canon-divergent and deny that it happened, because I believe there are lessons to learn in the folly of it, and because it reveals character flaws (or perhaps better put, maladaptive coping mechanisms) that Klaus needs to overcome.  

Klaus forming a cult in Season Two is revelatory: revelatory of where Klaus is emotionally himself, and what he needs to change.  It’s uncharacteristic of him, because Klaus is, at heart, beneath the sarcastic bluster and the addiction, a kind and vulnerable person who doesn’t want to control anyone--in fact, I’d argue that, despite his individuality, Klaus is a problematically passive person, who lets himself BE controlled--and cults are ordinarily ways to prey upon and ideologically control socially vulnerable, often young, people, and indoctrinate them in toxic beliefs.  So it’s uncharacteristic,....until you realize that he’s using the cult as one more big way to DEFLECT from his problems, and take the easy out.  Klaus is necessarily weaponizing his queerness and pacifistic tendencies to pad himself with monetary and social support, in the increasingly anti-war, pro-free-love, hippie sixties.  Moreover, he is anesthetizing himself with empty hedonism: this time--instead of with drugs--with the pure, unfettered, casual love of perfect strangers.  

Why (beyond staying alive and safe in a volatile society that is even more homophobic than the 2010s?) Because he thinks the rest of his family didn’t survive the time jump.  The cult signifies an emotional REGRESSION. And why is it ironic? Because in trying to escape his problems, Klaus has circles right back around to them. What is his cult--clawing at him night and day, begging him for words of wisdom, begging for his help, exactly like? The ghosts that haunt him 24/7, knowing only he can see them. The cult  members are displaced and marginalized, desperate for answers, in the same way that ghosts are. And THAT, i will admit, is good writing. THAT is worth not throwing the baby out with the bathwater. 

Is it bad of Klaus to deceive people this way? Yes. Is it irresponsible of the writers to turn a cult storyline into a joke about “haha look at Klaus being eccentric and lazy and conniving again”? Yes.  In fact, the TUA writers have a pattern of irresponsibility and insensitivity when it comes to Klaus as a character. They make a punchline out of his addiction, too. They have characters coded by the narrative as morally superior (Ben, for instance) calling Klaus a loser and a “junkie” (which is a pretty slurry, offensive term for an addict) and shaming him; the writers should not be doing that.  Worse, they equate Klaus’s “usefulness” (read: his intrinsic worth) with his sobriety (he can only conjure when sober, and conjuring is the only “good” thing he can do, which, given t he fact that Reginald raised these kids, isn’t their fault per se, but at some point the writing needs to counter this very wrong-headed, abuse-based rationale, and it hasn’t).  The writers shouldn’t do this, either.  But they do. So am I surprised that the same people who made a punchline out of substance abuse also made a punchline out of cults? No. 

For those reasons, I wish this plot device had never been used (particularly when we talk about squicky things like the sexual flings he’s had with devotees simply because they think he’s some kind of prophet).  I don’t think it’s particularly funny, and I think there would have been other ways to show Klaus diving headfirst into hedonism to avoid mourning his “dead” siblings.  But it happened, and I can’t deny that it’s in-character for a falling-off-the-wagon, emotionally regressing Klaus.  And in its way, it’s a good way to reveal that he isn’t doing any better than he was when he was homeless and strung-out. 

On the other hand, is this a cult on the level of certain religious sects, or Charles Manson?  Of course not.  Klaus doesn’t give a damn if these people exist under his control, agree or disagree with him.  He wouldn’t ask them to do illegal things, or things that cause them emotional or physical pain.  Basically they ride around in a rainbow painted hippie van, travel the world fully funded by a rich elderly lady, probably eat vegan, and live in a gorgeous mansion.  They’re deluded, and that’s wrong, but they’re only deluded about the fact that Klaus is  really not a prophet, and is just spewing nineties song lyrics that haven’t been written yet. In a sense this diminishes the ethical squick, and I can live with it. I still don’t write about it much here, and I continue to decentralize it, because it’s still a dumb insensitive idea about a subject that causes real people real harm. 

[nosunsetsjustsilence]

The Manics and Gender Identity, Part 1

There is a lot to unpack in Nicky and Richey’s early lyrics pertaining to gender, particularly in terms of identifying with women. Richey approaches the subject — as he is wont to do — with regard to the exploitation and degradation of the female image, while Nicky’s attitude is more inquisitive and casual. Both use lyrics to express their own personal “What if?”

Make no mistake: I’m not claiming that either Nicky or Richey is/was non-cis or trans or anything other than curious. But it’s clear from their personal lyric struggles and hard-won lifestyle choices that this was a different time they were living in. In the 1990s, gender identity was not a topic with any kind of mainstream recognition, at least beyond those who wanted a “sex change” or girls who were considered “one of the boys”. I think it’s fascinating, at least from my perspective, to go back and examine the themes of gender dysphoria, identity, and frustration in lyrics written before any of it was part of popular conversation, and in a way that emphasized the then absolute cultural disconnect between desire and society.

Also, it’s important to note that both Nicky and Richey have presented gender in ways that don’t have anything to do with lyrics. Nicky is comfortable in traditionally female clothing and wears dresses on and off stage; both band members wore makeup and feathers on a regular basis. I’ve tried to write about gender in terms of lyrics only, but at times I do take examples from visual media.

Finally, keep in mind that yours truly is non-binary, and the discussion will hopefully not reek of a cis person watching queer men from behind bars in a zoo.

Special thanks to @sinisterrouge for vetting this before I posted <3

Little Baby Nothing

Although Richey seemed to find comfort in claiming that his lyrics were about the larger world — in the case of Little Baby Nothing, feminism and the way women are perceived in media — a closer look usually reveals a personal stake. When I discussed the meaning of this song previously, I emphasized that the “Little baby nothing” in question is clearly Richey himself, writing in the first person and deconstructing his own image to align with a kind of mindless female groupie used for sex.

My mind is dead, everybody loves me Wants a slice of me Hopelessly passive and compatible Need to belong, oh the roads are scary Hold me in your arms I wanna be your only possession

Richey often refers to himself as a “slut” and a “prostitute” and uses self-referential porn star imagery in his lyrics (So Dead: “You need a fix I’m your prostitute”, Yes: “there’s no lust in this coma even for a fifty”), aligning the industries of pornography and music performance in very vivid ways most often pertaining to exploitation. Appropriately, singing pivotal stanzas on this track is none other than Traci Lords, arguably most famous (especially in the early 90s) for an underage porn scandal.  

What’s more, in the lyrics booklet for Generation Terrorists, there is a quotation or excerpt included for each song. The following corresponds to Little Baby Nothing:

“The male chromosome is an incomplete female chromosome. In other words the male is a walking abortion; aborted at the gene stage. To be male is to be deficient, emotionally limited; maleness is a deficiency disease and males are emotional cripples.” -Valerie Solanos.

Ninety percent of what the Manics said and did in their early years was intended to be shocking and/or ironic. Of course they were trying to incite anger and riots, the questioning of institutions, and a teardown of normalcy. But the fact that Richey later used part of this radical statement as the title to one of his songs (“Of Walking Abortion”, natch) proves that he took it somewhat seriously, even if only in the most simple sense — that part of him resented his own maleness.

Life Becoming a Landslide

This is another song I’ve previously discussed, mostly in the arena of Nicky and Richey individualizing their distinctive voices into lines that can clearly be attributed to one or the other. In a song about nature vs nurture and the plastic confines of greater humanity cracking down on who or what someone is really supposed to be, we have:

Life becoming a landslide Ice freezing nature dead Life becoming a landslide I don’t wanna be a man

As far as writing style goes, Nicky was always fairly straightforward. Richey loves to convolute his message with proper nouns and alternating verb cases and a lack of a subject just to throw  people off, but here’s Nicky, my boy, just saying, “Dude. Being a man sucks. I don’t like this.”

He could mean that being human in general sucks. But, since his attitude towards women leads me to believe he would not abbreviate humanity in this way, and given his and Richey’s track record with gender and Nicky’s well-documented gender presentation, I think it’s clear the lyric means that he doesn’t want to be male. Because he feels it doesn’t suit him, for whatever reason. And that nature failed by making him a man instead of a woman.

Yes

‘Yes’ is an incredible song. Its major-chord melody juxtaposed against Richey’s raw portrait of degradation is truly a thing to behold. The theme? Being used, prostitution both literal and metaphorical (“For sale? dumb cunt’s same dumb questions”), exploitation in the name of capitalism (“In these plagued streets of pity you can buy anything”), and reaching the lowest possible point of existence (“Purgatory’s circle, drowning here, someone will always say yes”). But the chorus — the chorus boasts one of the rawest images of sexual violence the band has ever used:

He’s a boy, you want a girl so tear off his cock Tie his hair in bunches, fuck him, call him Rita if you want

Wow. Okay. Where to begin? The implication here is that gender, along with everything else, is mutable if you have enough money and power to abuse people. However, it appears the change would be made not to entertain others, but to appeal to a specific person, sexually (“fuck him”). The “you” in question is clearly attracted to women, so the narrator offering to mutilate himself to please them can be seen as a last-ditch act of desperation. (“It feels like this massive defeat,” said a friend. “You can make him a woman to pleasure someone, but what’s left to change after that?”)

Richey wrote most of the song; “Rita”, obviously, is the name used for an alternative female identity. But who would Rita be? Richey seems to be wondering. Would she still be me? And would the change even be worth the affections of whomever he’s speaking to? If the means are so drastic (and difficult to picture without experiencing secondhand pain), that answer would usually be “no”. But the song is called “Yes”. I would say yes to anything at this point, Richey is saying, even the most extreme sexual violence imaginable, if that’s what you wanted.

4st 7lb

This is an extreme example of Richey using world issues to examine his own nature. Although anorexic himself, Richey writes “4st 7lb” from the point of view of an obsessive young girl admiring thin models. There could be multiple reasons for this, not the least of which is that when a person fails to fit the “classic” case of an eating disorder, they are often ignored. So, Richey says, you need me to be a teenage girl? I can do that. 

(Note that in 1994, when this song was written, any eating disorder demographic outside the “white girl who loves fashion too much” model did not exist by medical standards and was usually subject to ridicule.)

Karen says I’ve reached my target weight Kate and Emma and Kristin know it’s fake Problem is diet’s not a big enough word I wanna be so skinny that I rot from view

Embodying the anorexic female stereotype allows Richey to criticize both the world and himself; by creating a parody of a young girl with an eating disorder, he creates commentary on how ridiculous and counter-intuitive her thought process actually is. The song is brutal and often focuses on nudity and sexual imagery, as it has been suggested in studies that eating disorders occur in those who are trying to annihilate their own puberty. Though Richey was well into his 20s when he wrote this, he often expressed a loathing of aging and the entire concept of adulthood.

Stomach collapsed at five Lift up my skirt my sex is gone Naked and lovely and 5 stone 2 May I bud and never flower My vision’s getting blurred But I can see my ribs and I feel fine My hands are trembling stalks And I can feel my breasts are sinking

Ultimately, “4st 7lb” hits hard as both an experiment in identity and a vicious satire of the rich white girl eating disorder cliché. Although the lyrics do not express a desire to become female, they do indicate that Richey feels everything might be easier and fit more neatly into a box if he were a girl.

[Coming in Part 2: The Girl Who Wanted to be God, Tsunami, Born a Girl, and Pretention/Repulsion.]

[oookaline]

A response to this tweet:

https://twitter.com/LETMEVOL6/status/1318301718610923520?s=19

"ok. i’m bout to ask a question to the larries. yalls whole argument is that simon and modest are homophobic right? please explain to me how Harry got away with being such a strong advocate for the LGBTQ+ community while being in One Direction? Why was harry the only one dropping hints on his sexuality. if they were so dead set on pushing this heterosexual narrative onto the boys then how did Harry get away with the things that he did? harry was dropping hints at his attraction to males. no, not with over analyzed song lyrics. i mean dead ass saying it. I genuinely want to know because Harry‘s been out of the closet for years now .y’all claim that Louis is closete. Harry managed to get out of the “evil clutches of Simon Cowell“ what stopping Louis and doing the same? unless this whole Larry theory was a lie and y’all were bored like, can someone please tell me why that happened? if Harry is allowed to be so open about his sexuality what stopping louis? if Harry got away from Simon would stopping in Louis they all have the same opportunity Harry may be the richest member but Louis can’t be that far back so tell me how did Harry manage to get away and be so open about his attraction of males and louis didn’t? i genuinely don’t get that."

Harry has been refering to his partner as gender neutral since forever, its not something he dropped hints on.

Not only that you have to also consider the narratives management pushed upon each of them aswell: Ima try to do a brief summary on H and Lou only, as this is reffered to Larries.

Louis: Perfect Boyfriend, a stable girlfriend throughout the years, influencer pretty girlfriend, no background on her so no backlash, constant papwalks on them and the occasional 'theyre toguether' tweets. Literally what it would be normalized as a happy relationship.

Harry: Fuck Boy, dated a lot of people, womaniser, headlines every week linking him to a new person, kendall, Taylor, Caroline etc, all big names yet all stunts, papwalks, 18 months of dating or interaction then never talked about again, the boy to wisk you away to a magical night then leave you the next morning.

Now taking these both you can see they are very different narratives, thus enabling them for two very distinctive ways to hinting at their sexuality with us.

Louis due to stunt reasons had to make his love songs (or his songs overall) seem like they hint at a specific girl, eleanor. Building up on the narrative they've had over the years. So while he can't directly call out his 'perfect woman' in gender neutral pronouns like Harry does, he CAN on the other hand choose what he specifies her as: a good chef, long brown hair paired with a british accent.

Very specific things that very obviously link to Harry while making press and hets think its towards Eleanor.

That one interview which didn't air where Louis said he had a boyfriend...

But this is just verbal. Lyric whise Louis has been more open and smart then anyone I've ever listened to-

The lyrics directly paralleling gay relationship, the struggles, the fear of not being able to be with them... Everything that a Heterosexual reletionship would NEVER experience. A few examples:

→Alive - One Direction (Louis) MM

"My mama told me I should go and get some therapy"

"I asked the doctor, "can you find out what is wrong with me? I don't know why I wanna be with every girl I meet"

"I can't control it"

"She said, "hey, it's alright Does it make you feel alive?"

"We got to live before we get older. Do what we like, we got nothing to lose. Shake off the weight of the world from your shoulders. Oh, we got nothing to prove"

"Went to a party just after the doctor talked to me, I met a girl, I took her in up to the balcony, I whispered something in her ear that I just can't repeat, She said, "okay" but she was worried what her friends will think"

This whole song is about questioning you sexuality and realizing you like the same sex.

Read over the lyrics and change:

girl - boy

she/her - he/him

and you'll see what I mean

→End Of The Day (Louis and Liam) MITAM

"Love can be frightening for sure"

"All I know at the end of the day is you want what you want and you say what you say, And you'll follow your heart even though it'll break, Sometimes"

"All I know at the end of the day is love who you love, There ain't no other way, If there's something I've learnt from a million mistakes, You're the one that I want at the end of the day"

"The priest thinks it's the devil, My mum thinks it's the flu, But girl it's only you"

"When the sun goes I know that you and me and everything will be alright, And when the city's sleeping, you and I can stay awake and keep on dreaming"

this whole song (apart from that one "girl") is just a huge gay awakening. If you keep the girl its a wlw anthem then.

some more exaples from scattered songs:

"There's a moment when you finally realize, There's no way you can change the rolling tide" -Ready To Run

"There will always be the kind that criticize, But I know, yes I know we'll be alright" -Ready To Run

"Told myself I kind of liked her, But there was something missing in her eyes" -Home

"I was stumbling, looking in the dark , With an empty heart, But you say you feel the same"-Home

"Still high with a little feeling, I see the smile as it starts to creep in, It was there, I saw it in your eyes" -Home

"But I know you're only hiding, And I just wanna see you" -Through The Dark

"And I can see your head is held in shame, But I just wanna see you smile again" -Through The Dark

"And I will hold you closer, Hope your heart is strong enough" -Through the dark

"People say we shouldn't be together, We're too young to know about forever" -TDKAU

"They don't know about the things we do, They don't know about the "I love yous"-TDKAU

these are just some out of the many Louis wrote. You can see where I'm going with it now.

and im not even going to touch i to all the shading Louis did with his clothes, tattoos, actions etc...

Now, Harry 'got away' with those actions because of various reasons, but I wouldn't say that he got away, I'd call it more of a "You stop me from doing this we will get backlash for possible homophobia and then y'all lose money so suck it up fuckers we're going on a rainbow ride" which is true; Yes, Harry did always refer to his ideal partner in gender neutral forms, but during the rainbow direction project was when he really amped it up so he could always go with the casual "I'm just supporting my fans, there's no harm in that" when confronted about it, which includes him waving the flags around and all the other stuff.

But it also seems you all are forgetting about how along with all the Queer!Harry we got, we also got more and more headlines of Wom!Harry, more stunts and etc: 5 different official relationships (not counting Kendal twice, which would make 6) between late 2014-early 2016 ALSO NOT COUNTING RUMOURED GIRLFRIENDS which then would make the list go so much higher, Harry couldn't before and still can't hang out with WOMEN or else there will be rumours of them dating.

And this doesn't happen with Men :/ He can hang put with multiple men, and there probably will be barelly one and a half articles written about it -only by small outlets- which in comparison to when he is seen hanging our with a 'mysterious woman' we'll get hundreds of articles about it in a span of an hour.

So what I'm trying to say is that sadly he can still call his ideal partner a he and be seen kissing a guy that the media probably will focus on the chick on the background and write an article like "Harry Styles seen out with friends in LA and he seemed extra cozy with mysterious blonde".

But again, the same with Louis, he hints at us about his sexuality so much, be it us the only one who properly listens to him.

With his songs and the flags and the pins and everything.

Here's some of his lyrics from the Oned era:

"We were meant to be but a twist of fate, Made it so you had to walk away" -Happily

"I don't care what people say when we're together"-Happily

"I can't even think straight but I can tell, You were just with her"-JABOYL

"And nothing's ever easy, That's what they say"-JABOYL

"Pay attention, I hope that you listen 'cause I let my guard down, Right now I'm completely defenseless"-If I Could Fly

"I've got scars even though they can't always be seen, And pain gets hard, but now you're here and I don't feel a thing"-If I Could Fly

"One day you'll come into my world and say it all, You say we'll be together even when you're lost"-Something Great

"I want you here with me, Like how I pictured it, So I don't have to keep imagining"-Something Great

"The script was written and I could not change a thing, I want to rip it all to shreds and start again"-Something Great

"You're all I want, So much it's hurting"-Something Great

So yeah, its sad that you just alienated that one thing without having context nor looking at the bigger picture. If I missed anything please tell me. :]

sorry for the long post

(copied from my answer on twitter)

[askanaroace]

So I was reading this awesome aromantic roundtable led by one of the editors, writers and creators - Claudie Arseneault - of the upcoming Common Bonds Anthology (which did get fully funded, if you remember its kickstarter!), and early on, there was a question proposed about everyone’s favorite platonic relationships in media, and it got me thinking. At first, I couldn’t even think of any platonic relationships. Too much pressure! And I wasn’t a part of the roundtable, LOL. But I’ve been stewing on it for the day now, and I want to share some of my favorite platonic relationships in media to help celebrate them!

Christina Yang and Meredith Grey (Grey’s Anatomy)

The friendship that, from what I knew, spawned the “my person” trend. The unlikely friendship that grew from similar ambition and mutual respect of knowledge and skill. Christina and Meredith were always there for each other through everything. At the end of the day, they were there for each other. Sandra Oh leaving Grey’s Anatomy was a huge blow to me because this duo is an extremely important female friendship. These women compete with each other, but they use that ambition to better themselves. They don’t cut each other down to get ahead. They don’t mistreat each other for the attention of men. They’re not just misogynistic tropes that men write a lot. They’re real, complex, beautiful, wonderful women. And they’re not very touchy-feely, but you can still see and feel the depths of how much they care for each other. They’re extremely important for me as a person who’s fairly touch averse and slogged through friendships with people who literally used the word “train” to describe their invasion of my boundaries, as in training me to stand their touch.

Carla Espinosa and Elliot Reid (Scrubs)

A slow-burn friendship that grew out of the embers of conflict and annoyance for each other. This relationship is important to me because it’s a very similar relationship that I had with one of the very best friends I’ve ever had. Like Elliot, she was well-meaning and wanted to be friends. Like Carla, I had a hard time putting my defenses down and it didn’t help that I found her eagerness annoying. But through a ridiculous - and looking back on it, hilarious - situation, we did become friends, just like Carla and Elliot. This friendship shows growth. I love how Carla and Elliot didn’t just become friends at first sight. We see them work on fostering their relationship and working to re-connect later in the series when they’ve become distracted by other things going on in their life.

John Dorian aka JD and Chris Turk (Scrubs)

It’s so refreshing and wonderful to see such a close male friendship on TV between two men who, even if one sometimes struggles with it or just struggles to admit it, are vulnerable with each other. Turk and JD are so close, and their relationship is often lovingly teased for seeming so romantic. This friendship breaks barriers of what platonic relationships really can be. It’s a great example of how much two friends can love each other and how important friendships can be. It’s a celebration of platonic love in a world where platonic love is often downplayed and dismissed in favor of romantic relationships.

John Dorian aka JD and Carla Espinosa (Scrubs)

Honestly, Scrubs is just a goldmine of different types of relationships, of celebrating them and understanding them and exploring them. I miss this show so much; it was a gift in so many ways. JD and Carla are so sweet with each other. I especially love how good of friends they are, and it never becomes romantic with them. There’s never a will-they, won’t-they between them. They drunkenly kiss once and both of them find it awkward and weird. They’re friends, and there is no “more” than that for them. Their friendship is something to be celebrated and nurtured. It’s meaningful, and I love it.

Liz Ortecho and Maria DeLuca (Roswell, New Mexico)

I’m not even fully through this show yet, and Liz and Maria are just so wonderful and heartwarming to watch. Their friendship is not the focus of the show, but what we see of it is strong and supportive and just makes me plain happy to see. (((SPOILERS))) [When they’re starting to think Maria may be the murderer, Liz vehemently defends her and knows she can’t be the killer. In this day and age of grim and gritty shows, it would have been easy to let Liz doubt Maria and grow suspicious of her. Instead, she stayed true to their friendship.] (((END SPOILERS))) Just the small ways in which they support each other are really great, too, like when Liz lays her head on Maria’s shoulder for comfort.

Okoye and T’Challa (Black Panther)

Everything in Black Panther was so well done. It’s absolutely a movie that showcased and celebrated so many different kinds of healthy relationships: platonic, familial, romantic... It was part of the draw of all the protagonists. I especially love Okoye and T’Challa, though. That moment when T’Challa’s story really begins and we see Okoye playfully teasing T’Challa about the mission stole my heart. Okoye isn’t just a bodyguard, and T’Challa isn’t just a leader. They are truly friends. They know each other extremely well. They’re friendly and familiar with each other, again, in a way that’s never meant to be leading up to romance. They just have such familiarity and comfort with each other that even without any backstory, it’s clear to us all how important they are to each other.

Leslie Knope and Ann Perkins, Leslie Knope and Donna Meagle, Donna Meagle and Tom Haverford, Leslie Knope and Ron Swanson, Ron Swanson and April Ludgate (Parks and Rec)

Honestly, I never planned on even watching Parks and Rec. Then one day I was out of shows to catch up on and nothing sounded interesting and Parks and Rec had a lot of seasons that could keep me busy, and I fell in love despite thinking I’d hate the show. Leslie and Ann were the first friends to pop into my head, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized how many amazing friendships were in this show, and I couldn’t pick. But considering how many it is, I didn’t want to separate them all out. Anyway, we all need a good humor once in a while, and Parks is Rec is one of those I’ll keep coming back to when I need something to cheer me up. A lot of these friendships are established at the beginning of the show, but we also get to watch a lot of them grow and evolve. I love all the different ways they support each other, from Leslie’s blatant showering of love and affection with words and physical touch and gifts to Donna and Tom encouraging each other to just do something for themselves to Ron and April’s stoic but deeply caring relationship and walkaround communication. They’re all such strong and different personalities, yet they come together in this beautiful melding of hope and optimism. Throughout it all, they never lose their individuality or sense of self, and that’s what makes them love each other even more.

Phoebe Buffay and Joey Tribbiani (Friends)

There’s a lot to be said about Friends and a lot of it is bad, but I’ve always loved Phoebe and Joey. I love their casual flirtation with each other. These two can say pretty much anything to each other, even the weirdest stuff, with basically no judgement. They have the sweetest, funniest moments when it’s just the two of them, when they can be unabashedly themselves in front of each other.

Rowan Northwood and Rán (Dragonoak trilogy)

I love Rowan and Rán separately and I love them together. Rán is just so friendly and open, you can’t help but immediately fall in love with her. She becomes someone Rowan can really lean on, and she’s Rowan’s teacher in many ways about the wider world than the one she grew up in. By the end of the trilogy, their friendship has grown into something that seemed really reminiscent to me of a queerplatonic relationship. We get to follow the journey of them meeting and becoming friends and growing to really love and support each other more and more throughout the series. Honestly, they’re like a warm hug or freshly baked plate of cookies.

Zélie Adebola and Roën (Children of Blood and Bone)

Two people with very different experiences and backgrounds who have both experienced deep pain and loss and have a pretty tragic backstory. They’ve ended up coping with these experiences in pretty different ways. Zélie has become extremely passionate and serious, and in the beginning, she’s always ready for a fight. Roën is a charmer who is more likely to use humor and quick wit to cope. Yet they can share really intimate moments of understanding between each other as they get to know and really understand who the other person is. There’s definite chemistry between them. They’re both extremely magnetic personalities who dominate the pages they share together. 

Jamie and Hazel (Girls with Slingshots)

I think I originally checked out this webcomic after hearing it had an asexual character. Though the comic has a lot of sex and sex jokes, I immediately fell in love with it, and that was absolutely a result of the friendship between the upbeat, cutie Jamie and cynical, pessimist Hazel. So many different aspects of their personalities and relationship reminded me of me and my friend, though it was different aspects of both of them that represented both of us. Jamie and Hazel were really the first friends I read about who could be so open with each other no matter the subject. My friends and I in HS all gravitated towards each other because we were closeted/unknowing queer kids. As a result, we went through our teenage years pretty repressed. Sex jokes were made, but none of us were seriously talking about or even considering sex. My friend was totally embarrassed and ashamed to admit that she masturbated, and it wasn’t because she felt awkward that I was asexual. Seeing the totally open and unashamed relationship between Jamie and Hazel taught me a lot and broke down a lot of social barriers I hadn’t realized existed. I love how well these two totally different people could work with each other.

Troy Barnes and Abed Nadir (Community)

I was super late to the Community bandwagon, but glad I decided to give it a watch, anyway! Who couldn’t love the totally weird duo of Troy and Abed who loved just getting weird, doing shenanigans, and performing bits with each other? Another great example of two people very different from each other just finding this innate bond with each other and truly taking joy in each other’s company. Watching them have fun together is a treat; it’s just plain fun to see how much fun they can have doing the silliest, even rather meaningless, things.

Anyway, I’ve been working on this post for a while now, it’s already very long, and I need to go to bed, so I’m going to stop here!

Please feel free to add your own favorite platonic relationships to this post! From any medium! You don’t have to write as much as I did! Just naming them is fine! Let’s celebrate platonic relationships in all their glory. o3o

[thesinglesjukebox]

JAMILA WOODS - BALDWIN

[8.20]

Her legacy is secure on our sidebar, but she clearly has more lofty ambitions...

Alfred Soto: Absorbing James Baldwin's incantatory power into musical history that encompasses soul horns and a unforced communitarian spirit, Jamila Woods remains skeptical of his legacy anyway. She understands how an influence is a menace too. [8]

Nellie Gayle: How do you live a legacy, honor a history, that's equally heartbreaking and triumphant? Jamila Woods brings brightness and joy to her reflections on African American history in the United States, without ignoring the trauma implicit in its story. "Your crown has been bought and paid for. All you have to do is put in on your head" the video quotes from Baldwin. Much like the author she named the track after, Woods will not gloss over the daily suffering and indignities of white supremacy in the US. But also like Baldwin, she's an optimist who derives happiness and hardwon joy from a history of resistance. So long as there is a vibrant culture and community whose stories deserve to be celebrated (not just told), Woods will literally sing its praises with melodies reminiscent of Bill Withers - upbeat, sunny, and heartfelt. Another Baldwin quote for Woods, one that deserves to be framed & hung up on bedroom walls in times like these: "To be a pessimist means that you have agreed that human life is an academic matter, so I'm forced to be an optimist. I'm forced to believe that we can survive whatever we must survive." [9]

Nortey Dowuona: A warm, dreamlike roll of piano chords swirl with the wind as a loping bass limps alongside dribbling drums as warm bursts of horns drift past Jamila, who gently stirs the cauldron, which bubbles warmly as the kids gather around in cautious excitement. [9]

Kylo Nocom: "BALDWIN" is a perfect explanation of how the idea of (argh!) optimistic and loving resistance can (often justifiably) feel like a pointless endeavour, especially when applied to the struggles of black Americans. Poetic descriptions of gentrification, police brutality, and non-black inaction are painfully outlined, betraying a central exhaustion that lies in Jamila's doubts of her friends' and icons' messages of hope. Jamila's croon also reads as tired, perhaps unintentionally, but with the help of some tasteful vocal accompaniment the sincerity beneath her uneasiness is allowed to flourish. Despite the underlying hesitance, "BALDWIN" is ultimately inspired by a real desire to see love as a means towards building community. As for Nico Segal, it seems he was just invited to aim at my weakness towards percussive horn blasts, punctuating the lines that seem to resonate the most powerfully: "we don't go out, can't wish us away." [9]

Joshua Lu: Utterly sublime and warm, like the aural equivalent of a hazy summertime sunset, which is startling for a song with this subject matter. "BALDWIN" touches on the different ways racism manifests, bringing up not just images of black fathers dead on the streets and white women clutching their purses, but also referencing the "casual violence" in white speech and white silence. It's subtly damning, and Jamila sounds too weary to accept the solution she's been offered, to extend love to the people who will never reciprocate it. The song ends uncertainly, hanging on a cryptic line and an unsatisfying melody, as if daring the listener to provide their own resolution. [8]

Joshua Copperman: "BALDWIN" struggles with its namesake's theory that "you must accept them with love" - 'them' referring to white people - "for these innocent people have no other hope." How is love even possible, even in Woods' definition of love, with the aggressions both macro (police brutality) and micro (purse-clutching) addressed in the lyrics? Obviously, there aren't easy answers, but Woods' educated guess on surviving is not just resilience, but community. That chorus starts with "all my friends" for a reason. It's not quite as anarchic as "You can tell your deity I'm alright/Wake up in the bed, call me Jesus Christ," but it's the same eventual conclusion. Instead of defying religion, Woods defies the expectation of being respectable. That's the interesting thing about this beat too, from Slot-A, mixing more traditional R&B instrumentation like Rhodes piano and canned synth pads with trap snares and horn stabs. He takes advantage of Woods' thin voice, not only contrasting it with those heavier textures but also giving it space to breathe. Another hook of this song - there are several - is "You don't know a thing about our story/you tell it wrong all the time," suggesting that if love alone won't overcome, telling your own tale will be more than sufficient. [9]

Will Adams: So many (usually white) musicians handle the topic of racism as deftly as if it were a hot potato slathered in grease. Jamila Woods cuts to the core in a single verse, addressing police brutality, gentrification and purse-clutching casual racism. The arc of the song is balancing that anger with weariness of those who preach civility in the face of hate. If that all sounds a bit too down, Nico Segal's punctuation in the form of bright horn stabs are there to keep the message alive and resonant. [7]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: Not the most transcendent piece on LEGACY! LEGACY! (see "BASQUIAT"), but a close competitor. The jazzy production sets the groove well, and the stabs of Nico Segal's horns and Gospel-adjacent choirs fill the space beautifully. But it's Jamila herself who takes "Baldwin" from something pleasant to something glorious. She bridges romance, protest, and memory like no one else can, melding them with her sweet, pointed voice into the album's best demonstration of its thesis. [9]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: "BALDWIN" is a song that finds Jamila Woods detailing the outright, inescapable racism that occurs against Blacks every day. In referencing James Baldwin, she makes clear how such fear and hatred-fueled actions have persisted to the present day. But what makes this so fascinating a song is that Woods muddies the waters; she spends a bit of time wrestling with the positivity that Baldwin espoused throughout his lifetime, finding herself conflicted by the effectiveness of such praxis. In a way, listening to this feels like a legitimate Sermon on the Mount moment, where "lov[ing] your enemy and pray[ing] for those who persecute you" comes as a shocking command instead of a spoonfed Sunday School lesson. Miraculously, "BALDWIN" doesn't end up feeling knotty and tense, but overwhelmingly triumphant. You can sense it in the gospel choir and Nico Segal's horns, but it's Woods's own silk-smooth vocals and circuitous melodies that announce her impossible serenity. Has she found truth in such ostensible cognitive dissonance, or is she too elated to be bothered by this disagreement? That internal struggle finds no conclusion here, but Woods transcends it all by being an inspiration herself. She embodies something that Baldwin had written to his nephew in 1962--a specific instruction that feels ever necessary today: "You don't be afraid." [7]

Iris Xie: With such a clear, gentle series of asks here, you would have to have an adherence to bigotry, or at least avoiding the discomfort of examining your own internalized anti-Black biases, in order to avoid considering what Woods is saying here. I think about this a lot as a queer Asian American, what my responsibility is to the project of helping not contribute and help demolish the project of anti-Blackness as enacted by white supremacist institutions and those who are complicit and facilitate them, especially when I see the amount of pain in both the news and what my friends experience. The line of "All my friends / Been readin' the books / readin' the books you ain't read" cuts deep for me especially, because I have an Bachelor's degree in Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies, which is an enormous amount of privilege in itself to receive and is due to countless activist histories that made that possible. It also made me think of the sheer amount of books about queer Black feminism that I genuinely feel I've barely scratched the surface of understanding, but am always in awe of the brilliance exuding forth. All of it is already written here for anyone to read, with new scholarship and articles and media produced all the time to help digest and made accessible for the rest of us. The loveliness of this song is that in its quiet neo-soul tempos, with the subtle snares, synths, and horns, results in a vibe she is secure in itself and asks the listener to move towards Woods. Black activists have put together the work and articulated these for decades, for any of us to read. The least we can do is listen and pay attention, as a complete bare minimum. [7]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

[windowwinnipeg]

WINDOW 49: JOY IS MORE THAN JUST A FEELING (JULY 16 - SEPTEMBER 18, 2020)

WINNIPEG’S ONLY 24 HOUR ARTIST-RUN CENTRE PRESENTS JOY IS MORE THAN JUST A FEELING

Location: Artspace Building, corner of Bannatyne @ Arthur [sidewalk level]

window is pleased to present our forty-ninth installation:

Joy is more than just a feeling

Featuring work by Iyunade Judah, Glodi Bahati, RYAN AD, Opal Rose White, Akum Maduka, and pluetoe. Curated by Mahlet Cuff and Ekene Maduka. 

Works on view July 16 - 27, 2020, L-R: Iyunade Judah, Sequel to bond, 2019. Glodi Bahati, When she asked me why I left, 2020.

Work on view July 31 - August 11, 2020: RYAN AD, PHANTASY no.3, 2019.

Work on view August 18 - September 4, 2020: Opal Rose White, This Joy Is / Joy After Storm, 2020, poetry. Akum Maduka, Group Photograph, 2020, graphite, ink, and charcoal on paper; and Today, I bought a flower, 2018, graphite, ink, and charcoal on paper.

Work on view September 14 - 18, 2020, in partnership with Wall-to-Wall Mural and Culture Festival, at Synonym Gallery: pluetoe, juno, 25:00 min.

Curatorial statements:

To understand trauma as a Black person and see the pain that not only you yourself go through but the suffering of others in your community–it leaves you and stays with you always. The events of racism, anti Blackness, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia and ableism being heightened and used against Black people in the recent months is not new. It is not new to see violence, discrimination and ongoing trauma being displayed for everyone to see and witness at the same time. I know for myself and the ways I have been able to digest everything that has happened, it is important to take time to process, think and rest. To take care of myself when I see Black people being murdered and accountability is not even a part of the equation.

To be angry, sad and be okay with that. To know that through all this grief, there is happiness within it. To connect with my community, to be surrounded by Black people however that looks like in the age of social distancing. These pieces by these three emerging artists showcase the feeling of pleasure as a Black person and to understand the humanization of the Black experience.

-Mahlet Cuff

I often think about little knee-jerk reactions that I impulsively make. Undoubtedly, waking up and jumping straight on my phone is one of those many actions that have become reflexive. The past few months have felt like a lot of things and nothing all at once–from an overwhelming consumption of violence against black bodies on multiple media outlets, to everything else in-between that has made the majority describe this time as “strange.” Not one work email coming into my inbox has missed out the words “I hope you are well in these trying times” and to some degree, these words have become redundant and lacking in comfort. A paradox really. Despite the strain, despite not being able to fully digest my anger and mixed emotions, one thing is constant; I’ve somehow found ways to genuinely laugh, to smile, to feel stronger in  vulnerability. Words are interesting and so is semiotics. The word ‘joy’ with its commonplace nature is as mundane as the act of casual laughter at a table with friends and loved ones. These moments are unaccounted for and are painted as “small” and quotidian. Reduced to just a symbol but robust in feeling. Reduced to the flatness of 2 dimensional prints by virtue of July’s artists Judah, Glodi and Ryan we see these moments frozen and highlighted as being important. I smile with Ryan’s subject with teeth and skin a deep cobalt blue from concert lights in the background. I am warm, I am lifted by the women embracing each other in Judah’s work and feel safe in the vulnerability and intimacy of Glodi’s women in white. From me and Mahlet Cuff and by window winnipeg, we write to you this love letter, a reminder really, that in the midst of our consumption of violence there exists many other sides to the narrative of “the black community”.

-Ekene Maduka

~~

About the artists:

Glodi Bahati is a 20-year-old black woman photographer, based in Winnipeg. Born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and raised in Uganda as a refugee fleeing the civil war in her home country, art was a comfort in her life. Glodi has been captivated by photography from a young age, living in Canada, she started her unique journey by taking photos in her last year of high school. Glodi took part in an intensive program for her final year of study, where she was able to focus entirely on photography, within this program she was able to publish her first photography book “The Following.” Glodi currently showcases her work through Instagram but is working on a second book and future showcases. She is inspired by the women in her life and the world around her. Glodi’s work draws inspiration from street, conceptual and fashion photography. Artists like Vivian Maier, Petra Collins, Micaiah Carter and Carrie Mae Weems are a consistent inspiration.

Iyunade Judah is an artist-photographer based in Winnipeg Canada, originally from Ogun, Nigeria. His work focuses on the black experience from an African’s point of view in the diaspora. He has worked on a number of photo projects and short films on black masculinity, gender and afrocentrism. Judah's work primarily focuses on identity and a need for consciousness in African art. Iyunade says that "My work is inspired by my curiosity to discover African history and art. I found out that there’s almost no identity for me and a lot of people like me. I make use of imaginary narratives such as reincarnation in my practice to convey a message which might be on sexuality, history, identity or love. I infuse fabric as a backdrop to appreciate African prints and patterns which has become a personal style." 

RYAN AD is an interdisciplinary artist, cultural worker, and curator. i create multimedia experiences.

Opal Rose White (aka Sappfyre Mcleod) is a first generation Canadian of Jamaican descent. Her works create space for introspection with imagery that lingers, and pacing that captivates an audience. Themes in her works center around heritage, diaspora, and making moments of the mundane. Opal Rose White uses her poetry as a means of exploring: Identity, and blackness. Finding elements to celebrate and ponder in her writings.

Opal R. W. is a pen name dedicated to honouring the author’s Mother and Grandmother. Holding space for the names of her foremothers whose genealogy is erased in patriarchal systems. The name itself places honor, reverence and legacy for the three generations of women.)

Akum Maduka is a Winnipeg based emerging artist with Nigerian roots. Originally from an architectural background, her work investigates the role of societal constructs and their influence on human performance within space and how such notions have created skewed ideals of what a normative life should be. Her intimate drawings entwine these narratives with ongoing lived experiences, as she examines the pliancy and complexity of gender roles, sexuality, desire, and ethnicity in modern society. 

pluetoe, also known as Victor Ilunga, is a video and performance artist who has been honing his craft since 2013 and recently graduated from the Vancouver Film School where he studied game and app development.

Despite being a different domain he states he loves activating his creative side and is unafraid of the unknown. Often dabbling between videography, game programming & photography, pluetoe is constantly learning new ways to express his ideas using different mediums and artistry.

A Winnipeg-based video & performance artist, pluetoe has gradually submerged himself in to the Winnipeg art scene. pluetoe’s evolution into videography allowed him to introduce another element to his style, often stating that his influence comes from the music he listens to and not so much the films he watches.

Raised in South Africa, moving to Turtle Island (“Canada”) had an impact on his approach to how he creates his art, as well as his presentation.

About the curators:

Mahlet Cuff is an interdisciplinary artist from Treaty One territory, so-called Winnipeg, Manitoba, who uses mediums such as photography, collaging and poetry. Through their work she hopes to create more awareness about the lack of representation of women of colour and queer people of colour in media. Their work has been shown at local galleries and events such as aceartinc and Black Space’s Nuit Noire at Nuit Blanche. Their work has been shown at window winnipeg, Flip Fest, and in the artist-run center Tea Base in Toronto, Ontario. She explores topics of feminism, Blackness and gender through her artistic and activist practice.

Ekene Maduka is an emerging artist making work that combines lived and formulated events relating to notions of displacement, self representation and reconstructing identity. Her work often investigates the effects of cultural, social and political exposure on developing individual identity and its relationship to communal experience. More of her work can be found via her Instagram: @ekenemaduka

~~

window is located on Treaty 1 Territory, the original lands of Anishinaabeg, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota, and Dene peoples and the homeland of the Metis Nation. Window is co-curated by Noor Bhangu, Mariana Muñoz Gomez, and Sarah Nesbitt.

This installation was made possible with the generous support from the Winnipeg Arts Council and the Manitoba Arts Council.

[thesnhuup]

Pop Picks – November 25, 2019

My pop picks are usually a combination of three things: what I am listening to, reading, and watching. But last week I happily combined all three. That is, I went to NYC last week and saw two shows. The first was Cyrano, starring Game of Thrones superstar Peter Dinklage in the title role, with Jasmine Cephas Jones as Roxanne. She was Peggy in the original Hamilton cast and has an amazing voice. The music was written by Aaron and Bryce Dessner, two members of my favorite band, The National, with lyrics by lead singer Matt Berninger and his wife Carin Besser. Erica Schmidt, Dinklage’s wife, directs. Edmond Rostand’s 1897 play is light, dated, and melodramatic, but this production was delightful. Dinklage owns the stage, a master, and his deep bass voice, not all that great for singing, but commanding in the delivery of every line, was somehow a plaintive and resonant counterpoint to Cephas Jones’ soaring voice. In the original Cyrano, the title character’s large nose marks him as outsider and ”other,” but Dinklage was born with achondroplasia, the cause of his dwarfism, and there is a kind of resonance in his performance that feels like pain not acted, but known. Deeply. It takes this rather lightweight play and gives it depth. Even if it didn’t, not everything has to be deep and profound – there is joy in seeing something executed so darn well. Cyrano was delightfully satisfying.

The other show was the much lauded Aaron Sorkin rendition of To Kill a Mockingbird, starring another actor at the very top of his game, Ed Harris. This is a Mockingbird for our times, one in which iconic Atticus Finch’s idealistic “you have to live in someone else’s skin” feels naive in the face of hateful racism and anti-Semitism. The Black characters in the play get more voice, if not agency, in the stage play than they do in the book, especially housekeeper Calpurnia, who voices incredulity at Finch’s faith in his neighbors and reminds us that he does not pay the price of his patience. She does. And Tom Robinson, the Black man falsely accused of rape – “convicted at the moment he was accused,” Whatever West Wing was for Sorkin – and I dearly loved that show – this is a play for a broken United States, where racism abounds and does so with sanction by those in power. As our daughter said, “I think Trump broke Aaron Sorkin.” It was as powerful a thing I’ve seen on stage in years.  

With both plays, I was reminded of the magic that is live theater. 

Archive 

October 31, 2019

What I’m listening to: 

It drove his critics crazy that Obama was the coolest president we ever had and his summer 2019 playlist on Spotify simply confirms that reality. It has been on repeat for me. From Drake to Lizzo (God I love her) to Steely Dan to Raphael Saadiq to Sinatra (who I skip every time – I’m not buying the nostalgia), his carefully curated list reflects not only his infinite coolness, but the breadth of his interests and generosity of taste. I love the music, but I love even more the image of Michelle and him rocking out somewhere far from Washington’s madness, as much as I miss them both.

What I’m reading: 

I struggled with Christy Lefteri’s The Beekeeper of Aleppo for the first 50 pages, worried that she’d drag out every tired trope of Mid-Eastern society, but I fell for her main characters and their journey as refugees from Syria to England. Parts of this book were hard to read and very dark, because that is the plight of so many refugees and she doesn’t shy away from those realities and the enormous toll they take on displaced people. It’s a hard read, but there is light too – in resilience, in love, in friendships, the small tender gestures of people tossed together in a heartless world. Lefteri volunteered in Greek refugee programs, spent a lot of interviewing people, and the book feels true, and importantly, heartfelt.

What I’m watching:

Soap opera meets Shakespeare, deliciously malevolent and operatic, Succession has been our favorite series this season. Loosely based on the Murdochs and their media empire (don’t believe the denials), this was our must watch television on Sunday nights, filling the void left by Game of Thrones. The acting is over-the-top good, the frequent comedy dark, the writing brilliant, and the music superb. We found ourselves quoting lines after every episode. Like the hilarious; “You don’t hear much about syphilis these days. Very much the Myspace of STDs.” Watch it so we can talk about that season 2 finale.

August 30, 2019

What I’m listening to: 

I usually go to music here, but the New York Times new 1619 podcast is just terrific, as is the whole project, which observes the sale of the first enslaved human beings on our shores 400 years ago. The first episode, “The Fight for a True Democracy” is a remarkable overview (in a mere 44 minutes) of the centrality of racism and slavery in the American story over those 400 years. It should be mandatory listening in every high school in the country. I’m eager for the next episodes. Side note: I am addicted to The Daily podcast, which gives more color and detail to the NY Times stories I read in print (yes, print), and reminds me of how smart and thoughtful are those journalists who give us real news. We need them now more than ever.

What I’m reading: 

Colson Whitehead has done it again. The Nickel Boys, his new novel, is a worthy successor to his masterpiece The Underground Railroad, and because it is closer to our time, based on the real-life horrors of a Florida reform school, and written a time of resurgent White Supremacy, it hits even harder and with more urgency than its predecessor. Maybe because we can read Underground Railroad with a sense of “that was history,” but one can’t read Nickel Boys without the lurking feeling that such horrors persist today and the monsters that perpetrate such horrors walk among us. They often hold press conferences.

What I’m watching:

Queer Eye, the Netflix remake of the original Queer Eye for the Straight Guy some ten years later, is wondrously entertaining, but it also feels adroitly aligned with our dysfunctional times. Episode three has a conversation with Karamo Brown, one of the fab five, and a Georgia small town cop (and Trump supporter) that feels unscripted and unexpected and reminds us of how little actual conversation seems to be taking place in our divided country. Oh, for more car rides such as the one they take in that moment, when a chasm is bridged, if only for a few minutes. Set in the South, it is often a refreshing and affirming response to what it means to be male at a time of toxic masculinity and the overdue catharsis and pain of the #MeToo movement. Did I mention? It’s really fun.

July 1, 2019

What I’m listening to: 

The National remains my favorite band and probably 50% of my listening time is a National album or playlist. Their new album I Am Easy To Find feels like a turning point record for the band, going from the moody, outsider introspection and doubt of lead singer Matt Berninger to something that feels more adult, sophisticated, and wiser. I might have titled it Women Help The Band Grow Up. Matt is no longer the center of The National’s universe and he frequently cedes the mic to the many women who accompany and often lead on the long, their longest, album. They include Gail Ann Dorsey (who sang with Bowie for a long time), who is amazing, and a number of the songs were written by Carin Besser, Berninger’s wife. I especially love the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, the arrangements, and the sheer complexity and coherence of the work. It still amazes me when I meet someone who does not know The National. My heart breaks for them just a little.

What I’m reading: 

Pat Barker’s The Silence of the Girls is a retelling of Homer’s Iliad through the lens of a captive Trojan queen, Briseis. As a reviewer in The Atlantic writes, it answers the question “What does war mean to women?” We know the answer and it has always been true, whether it is the casual and assumed rape of captive women in this ancient war story or the use of rape in modern day Congo, Syria, or any other conflict zone. Yet literature almost never gives voice to the women – almost always minor characters at best — and their unspeakable suffering. Barker does it here for Briseis, for Hector’s wife Andromache, and for the other women who understand that the death of their men is tragedy, but what they then endure is worse. Think of it ancient literature having its own #MeToo moment. The NY Times’ Geraldine Brooks did not much like the novel. I did. Very much.

What I’m watching: 

The BBC-HBO limited series Years and Years is breathtaking, scary, and absolutely familiar. It’s as if Black Mirrorand Children of Men had a baby and it precisely captures the zeitgeist, the current sense that the world is spinning out of control and things are coming at us too fast. It is a near future (Trump has been re-elected and Brexit has occurred finally)…not dystopia exactly, but damn close. The closing scene of last week’s first episode (there are 6 episodes and it’s on every Monday) shows nuclear war breaking out between China and the U.S. Yikes! The scope of this show is wide and there is a big, baggy feel to it – but I love the ambition even if I’m not looking forward to the nightmares.

May 19, 2019

What I’m listening to: 

I usually go to music here, but I was really moved by this podcast of a Davis Brooks talk at the Commonwealth Club in Silicon Valley: https://www.commonwealthclub.org/events/archive/podcast/david-brooks-quest-moral-life.  While I have long found myself distant from his political stance, he has come through a dark night of the soul and emerged with a wonderful clarity about calling, community, and not happiness (that most superficial of goals), but fulfillment and meaning, found in community and human kinship of many kinds. I immediately sent it to my kids.

What I’m reading: 

Susan Orlean’s wonderful The Library Book, a love song to libraries told through the story of the LA Central Library.  It brought back cherished memories of my many hours in beloved libraries — as a kid in the Waltham Public Library, a high schooler in the Farber Library at Brandeis (Lil Farber years later became a mentor of mine), and the cathedral-like Bapst Library at BC when I was a graduate student. Yes, I was a nerd. This is a love song to books certainly, but a reminder that libraries are so, so much more.  It is a reminder that libraries are less about a place or being a repository of information and, like America at its best, an idea and ideal. By the way, oh to write like her.

What I’m watching: 

What else? Game of Thrones, like any sensible human being. This last season is disappointing in many ways and the drop off in the writing post George R.R. Martin is as clear as was the drop off in the post-Sorkin West Wing. I would be willing to bet that if Martin has been writing the last season, Sansa and Tyrion would have committed suicide in the crypt. That said, we fans are deeply invested and even the flaws are giving us so much to discuss and debate. In that sense, the real gift of this last season is the enjoyment between episodes, like the old pre-streaming days when we all arrived at work after the latest episode of the Sopranos to discuss what we had all seen the night before. I will say this, the last two episodes — full of battle and gore – have been visually stunning. Whether the torches of the Dothraki being extinguished in the distance or Arya riding through rubble and flame on a white horse, rarely has the series ascended to such visual grandeur.

March 28, 2019

What I’m listening to: 

There is a lovely piece played in a scene from A Place Called Home that I tracked down. It’s Erik Satie’s 3 Gymnopédies: Gymnopédie No. 1, played by the wonderful pianist Klára Körmendi. Satie composed this piece in 1888 and it was considered avant-garde and anti-Romantic. It’s minimalism and bit of dissonance sound fresh and contemporary to my ears and while not a huge Classical music fan, I’ve fallen in love with the Körmendi playlist on Spotify. When you need an alternative to hours of Cardi B.

What I’m reading: 

Just finished Esi Edugyan’s 2018 novel Washington Black. Starting on a slave plantation in Barbados, it is a picaresque novel that has elements of Jules Verne, Moby Dick, Frankenstein, and Colson Whitehead’s Underground Railroad. Yes, it strains credulity and there are moments of “huh?”, but I loved it (disclosure: I was in the minority among my fellow book club members) and the first third is a searing depiction of slavery. It’s audacious, sprawling (from Barbados to the Arctic to London to Africa), and the writing, especially about nature, luminous. 

What I’m watching: 

A soap opera. Yes, I’d like to pretend it’s something else, but we are 31 episodes into the Australian drama A Place Called Home and we are so, so addicted. Like “It’s  AM, but can’t we watch just one more episode?” addicted. Despite all the secrets, cliff hangers, intrigue, and “did that just happen?” moments, the core ingredients of any good soap opera, APCH has superb acting, real heft in terms of subject matter (including homophobia, anti-Semitism, sexual assault, and class), touches of our beloved Downton Abbey, and great cars. Beware. If you start, you won’t stop.

February 11, 2019

What I’m listening to:

Raphael Saadiq has been around for quite a while, as a musician, writer, and producer. He’s new to me and I love his old school R&B sound. Like Leon Bridges, he brings a contemporary freshness to the genre, sounding like a young Stevie Wonder (listen to “You’re The One That I Like”). Rock and Roll may be largely dead, but R&B persists – maybe because the former was derivative of the latter and never as good (and I say that as a Rock and Roll fan). I’m embarrassed to only have discovered Saadiq so late in his career, but it’s a delight to have done so.

What I’m reading:

Just finished Marilynne Robinson’s Home, part of her trilogy that includes the Pulitzer Prize winning first novel, Gilead, and the book after Home, Lila. Robinson is often described as a Christian writer, but not in a conventional sense. In this case, she gives us a modern version of the prodigal son and tells the story of what comes after he is welcomed back home. It’s not pretty. Robinson is a self-described Calvinist, thus character begets fate in Robinson’s world view and redemption is at best a question. There is something of Faulkner in her work (I am much taken with his famous “The past is never past” quote after a week in the deep South), her style is masterful, and like Faulkner, she builds with these three novels a whole universe in the small town of Gilead. Start with Gilead to better enjoy Home.

What I’m watching:

Sex Education was the most fun series we’ve seen in ages and we binged watched it on Netflix. A British homage to John Hughes films like The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, and Pretty in Pink, it feels like a mash up of American and British high schools. Focusing on the relationship of Maeve, the smart bad girl, and Otis, the virginal and awkward son of a sex therapist (played with brilliance by Gillian Anderson), it is laugh aloud funny and also evolves into more substance and depth (the abortion episode is genius). The sex scenes are somehow raunchy and charming and inoffensive at the same time and while ostensibly about teenagers (it feels like it is explaining contemporary teens to adults in many ways), the adults are compelling in their good and bad ways. It has been renewed for a second season, which is a gift.

January 3, 2019

What I’m listening to:

My listening choices usually refer to music, but this time I’m going with Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History podcast on genius and the song Hallelujah. It tells the story of Leonard Cohen’s much-covered song Hallelujah and uses it as a lens on kinds of genius and creativity. Along the way, he brings in Picasso and Cézanne, Elvis Costello, and more. Gladwell is a good storyteller and if you love pop music, as I do, and Hallelujah, as I do (and you should), you’ll enjoy this podcast. We tend to celebrate the genius who seems inspired in the moment, creating new work like lightning strikes, but this podcast has me appreciating incremental creativity in a new way. It’s compelling and fun at the same time.

What I’m reading:

Just read Clay Christensen’s new book, The Prosperity Paradox: How Innovation Can Lift Nations Out of Poverty. This was an advance copy, so soon available. Clay is an old friend and a huge influence on how we have grown SNHU and our approach to innovation. This book is so compelling, because we know attempts at development have so often been a failure and it is often puzzling to understand why some countries with desperate poverty and huge challenges somehow come to thrive (think S. Korea, Singapore, 19th C. America), while others languish. Clay offers a fresh way of thinking about development through the lens of his research on innovation and it is compelling. I bet this book gets a lot of attention, as most of his work does. I also suspect that many in the development community will hate it, as it calls into question the approach and enormous investments we have made in an attempt to lift countries out of poverty. A provocative read and, as always, Clay is a good storyteller.

What I’m watching:

Just watched Leave No Trace and should have guessed that it was directed by Debra Granik. She did Winter’s Bone, the extraordinary movie that launched Jennifer Lawrence’s career. Similarly, this movie features an amazing young actor, Thomasin McKenzie, and visits lives lived on the margins. In this case, a veteran suffering PTSD, and his 13-year-old daughter. The movie is patient, is visually lush, and justly earned 100% on Rotten Tomatoes (I have a rule to never watch anything under 82%). Everything in this film is under control and beautifully understated (aside from the visuals) – confident acting, confident directing, and so humane. I love the lack of flashbacks, the lack of sensationalism – the movie trusts the viewer, rare in this age of bombast. A lovely film.

December 4, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Spending a week in New Zealand, we had endless laughs listening to the Kiwi band, Flight of the Conchords. Lots of comedic bands are funny, but the music is only okay or worse. These guys are funny – hysterical really – and the music is great. They have an uncanny ability to parody almost any style. In both New Zealand and Australia, we found a wry sense of humor that was just delightful and no better captured than with this duo. You don’t have to be in New Zealand to enjoy them.

What I’m reading:

I don’t often reread. For two reasons: A) I have so many books on my “still to be read” pile that it seems daunting to also rereadbooks I loved before, and B) it’s because I loved them once that I’m a little afraid to read them again. That said, I was recently asked to list my favorite book of all time and I answered Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. But I don’t really know if that’s still true (and it’s an impossible question anyway – favorite book? On what day? In what mood?), so I’m rereading it and it feels like being with an old friend. It has one of my very favorite scenes ever: the card game between Levin and Kitty that leads to the proposal and his joyous walking the streets all night.

What I’m watching:

Blindspotting is billed as a buddy-comedy. Wow does that undersell it and the drama is often gripping. I loved Daveed Diggs in Hamilton, didn’t like his character in Black-ish, and think he is transcendent in this film he co-wrote with Rafael Casal, his co-star.  The film is a love song to Oakland in many ways, but also a gut-wrenching indictment of police brutality, systemic racism and bias, and gentrification. The film has the freshness and raw visceral impact of Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing. A great soundtrack, genre mixing, and energy make it one of my favorite movies of 2018.

October 15, 2018 

What I’m listening to:

We had the opportunity to see our favorite band, The National, live in Dallas two weeks ago. Just after watching Mistaken for Strangers, the documentary sort of about the band. So we’ve spent a lot of time going back into their earlier work, listening to songs we don’t know well, and reaffirming that their musicality, smarts, and sound are both original and astoundingly good. They did not disappoint in concert and it is a good thing their tour ended, as we might just spend all of our time and money following them around. Matt Berninger is a genius and his lead vocals kill me (and because they are in my range, I can actually sing along!). Their arrangements are profoundly good and go right to whatever brain/heart wiring that pulls one in and doesn’t let them go.

What I’m reading:

Who is Richard Powers and why have I only discovered him now, with his 12th book? Overstory is profoundly good, a book that is essential and powerful and makes me look at my everyday world in new ways. In short, a dizzying example of how powerful can be narrative in the hands of a master storyteller. I hesitate to say it’s the best environmental novel I’ve ever read (it is), because that would put this book in a category. It is surely about the natural world, but it is as much about we humans. It’s monumental and elegiac and wondrous at all once. Cancel your day’s schedule and read it now. Then plant a tree. A lot of them.

What I’m watching:

Bo Burnham wrote and directed Eighth Grade and Elsie Fisher is nothing less than amazing as its star (what’s with these new child actors; see Florida Project). It’s funny and painful and touching. It’s also the single best film treatment that I have seen of what it means to grow up in a social media shaped world. It’s a reminder that growing up is hard. Maybe harder now in a world of relentless, layered digital pressure to curate perfect lives that are far removed from the natural messy worlds and selves we actually inhabit. It’s a well-deserved 98% on Rotten Tomatoes and I wonder who dinged it for the missing 2%.

September 7, 2018

What I’m listening to:

With a cover pointing back to the Beastie Boys’ 1986 Licensed to Ill, Eminem’s quietly released Kamikaze is not my usual taste, but I’ve always admired him for his “all out there” willingness to be personal, to call people out, and his sheer genius with language. I thought Daveed Diggs could rap fast, but Eminem is supersonic at moments, and still finds room for melody. Love that he includes Joyner Lucas, whose “I’m Not Racist” gets added to the growing list of simply amazing music videos commenting on race in America. There are endless reasons why I am the least likely Eminem fan, but when no one is around to make fun of me, I’ll put it on again.

What I’m reading:

Lesley Blume’s Everyone Behaves Badly, which is the story behind Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises and his time in 1920s Paris (oh, what a time – see Midnight in Paris if you haven’t already). Of course, Blume disabuses my romantic ideas of that time and place and everyone is sort of (or profoundly so) a jerk, especially…no spoiler here…Hemingway. That said, it is a compelling read and coming off the Henry James inspired prose of Mrs. Osmond, it made me appreciate more how groundbreaking was Hemingway’s modern prose style. Like his contemporary Picasso, he reinvented the art and it can be easy to forget, these decades later, how profound was the change and its impact. And it has bullfights.

What I’m watching:

Chloé Zhao’s The Rider is just exceptional. It’s filmed on the Pine Ridge Reservation, which provides a stunning landscape, and it feels like a classic western reinvented for our times. The main characters are played by the real-life people who inspired this narrative (but feels like a documentary) film. Brady Jandreau, playing himself really, owns the screen. It’s about manhood, honor codes, loss, and resilience – rendered in sensitive, nuanced, and heartfelt ways. It feels like it could be about large swaths of America today. Really powerful.

August 16, 2018

What I’m listening to:

In my Spotify Daily Mix was Percy Sledge’s When A Man Loves A Woman, one of the world’s greatest love songs. Go online and read the story of how the song was discovered and recorded. There are competing accounts, but Sledge said he improvised it after a bad breakup. It has that kind of aching spontaneity. It is another hit from Muscle Shoals, Alabama, one of the GREAT music hotbeds, along with Detroit, Nashville, and Memphis. Our February Board meeting is in Alabama and I may finally have to do the pilgrimage road trip to Muscle Shoals and then Memphis, dropping in for Sunday services at the church where Rev. Al Green still preaches and sings. If the music is all like this, I will be saved.

What I’m reading:

John Banville’s Mrs. Osmond, his homage to literary idol Henry James and an imagined sequel to James’ 1881 masterpiece Portrait of a Lady. Go online and read the first paragraph of Chapter 25. He is…profoundly good. Makes me want to never write again, since anything I attempt will feel like some other, lowly activity in comparison to his mastery of language, image, syntax. This is slow reading, every sentence to be savored.

What I’m watching:

I’ve always respected Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, but we just watched the documentary RGB. It is over-the-top great and she is now one of my heroes. A superwoman in many ways and the documentary is really well done. There are lots of scenes of her speaking to crowds and the way young women, especially law students, look at her is touching.  And you can’t help but fall in love with her now late husband Marty. See this movie and be reminded of how important is the Law.

July 23, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Spotify’s Summer Acoustic playlist has been on repeat quite a lot. What a fun way to listen to artists new to me, including The Paper Kites, Hollow Coves, and Fleet Foxes, as well as old favorites like Leon Bridges and Jose Gonzalez. Pretty chill when dialing back to a summer pace, dining on the screen porch or reading a book.

What I’m reading:

Bryan Stevenson’s Just Mercy. Founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, Stevenson tells of the racial injustice (and the war on the poor our judicial system perpetuates as well) that he discovered as a young graduate from Harvard Law School and his fight to address it. It is in turn heartbreaking, enraging, and inspiring. It is also about mercy and empathy and justice that reads like a novel. Brilliant.

What I’m watching:

Fauda. We watched season one of this Israeli thriller. It was much discussed in Israel because while it focuses on an ex-special agent who comes out of retirement to track down a Palestinian terrorist, it was willing to reveal the complexity, richness, and emotions of Palestinian lives. And the occasional brutality of the Israelis. Pretty controversial stuff in Israel. Lior Raz plays Doron, the main character, and is compelling and tough and often hard to like. He’s a mess. As is the world in which he has to operate. We really liked it, and also felt guilty because while it may have been brave in its treatment of Palestinians within the Israeli context, it falls back into some tired tropes and ultimately falls short on this front.

June 11, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Like everyone else, I’m listening to Pusha T drop the mic on Drake. Okay, not really, but do I get some points for even knowing that? We all walk around with songs that immediately bring us back to a time or a place. Songs are time machines. We are coming up on Father’s Day. My own dad passed away on Father’s Day back in 1994 and I remembering dutifully getting through the wake and funeral and being strong throughout. Then, sitting alone in our kitchen, Don Henley’s The End of the Innocence came on and I lost it. When you lose a parent for the first time (most of us have two after all) we lose our innocence and in that passage, we suddenly feel adult in a new way (no matter how old we are), a longing for our own childhood, and a need to forgive and be forgiven. Listen to the lyrics and you’ll understand. As Wordsworth reminds us in In Memoriam, there are seasons to our grief and, all these years later, this song no longer hits me in the gut, but does transport me back with loving memories of my father. I’ll play it Father’s Day.

What I’m reading:

The Fifth Season, by N. K. Jemisin. I am not a reader of fantasy or sci-fi, though I understand they can be powerful vehicles for addressing the very real challenges of the world in which we actually live. I’m not sure I know of a more vivid and gripping illustration of that fact than N. K. Jemisin’s Hugo Award winning novel The Fifth Season, first in her Broken Earth trilogy. It is astounding. It is the fantasy parallel to The Underground Railroad, my favorite recent read, a depiction of subjugation, power, casual violence, and a broken world in which our hero(s) struggle, suffer mightily, and still, somehow, give us hope. It is a tour de force book. How can someone be this good a writer? The first 30 pages pained me (always with this genre, one must learn a new, constructed world, and all of its operating physics and systems of order), and then I could not put it down. I panicked as I neared the end, not wanting to finish the book, and quickly ordered the Obelisk Gate, the second novel in the trilogy, and I can tell you now that I’ll be spending some goodly portion of my weekend in Jemisin’s other world.

What I’m watching:

The NBA Finals and perhaps the best basketball player of this generation. I’ve come to deeply respect LeBron James as a person, a force for social good, and now as an extraordinary player at the peak of his powers. His superhuman play during the NBA playoffs now ranks with the all-time greats, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, MJ, Kobe, and the demi-god that was Bill Russell. That his Cavs lost in a 4-game sweep is no surprise. It was a mediocre team being carried on the wide shoulders of James (and matched against one of the greatest teams ever, the Warriors, and the Harry Potter of basketball, Steph Curry) and, in some strange way, his greatness is amplified by the contrast with the rest of his team. It was a great run.

May 24, 2018

What I’m listening to:

I’ve always liked Alicia Keys and admired her social activism, but I am hooked on her last album Here. This feels like an album finally commensurate with her anger, activism, hope, and grit. More R&B and Hip Hop than is typical for her, I think this album moves into an echelon inhabited by a Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On or Beyonce’s Formation. Social activism and outrage rarely make great novels, but they often fuel great popular music. Here is a terrific example.

What I’m reading:

Colson Whitehead’s Underground Railroad may be close to a flawless novel. Winner of the 2017 Pulitzer, it chronicles the lives of two runaway slaves, Cora and Caeser, as they try to escape the hell of plantation life in Georgia.  It is an often searing novel and Cora is one of the great heroes of American literature. I would make this mandatory reading in every high school in America, especially in light of the absurd revisionist narratives of “happy and well cared for” slaves. This is a genuinely great novel, one of the best I’ve read, the magical realism and conflating of time periods lifts it to another realm of social commentary, relevance, and a blazing indictment of America’s Original Sin, for which we remain unabsolved.

What I’m watching:

I thought I knew about The Pentagon Papers, but The Post, a real-life political thriller from Steven Spielberg taught me a lot, features some of our greatest actors, and is so timely given the assault on our democratic institutions and with a presidency out of control. It is a reminder that a free and fearless press is a powerful part of our democracy, always among the first targets of despots everywhere. The story revolves around the legendary Post owner and D.C. doyenne, Katharine Graham. I had the opportunity to see her son, Don Graham, right after he saw the film, and he raved about Meryl Streep’s portrayal of his mother. Liked it a lot more than I expected.

April 27, 2018

What I’m listening to:

I mentioned John Prine in a recent post and then on the heels of that mention, he has released a new album, The Tree of Forgiveness, his first new album in ten years. Prine is beloved by other singer songwriters and often praised by the inscrutable God that is Bob Dylan.  Indeed, Prine was frequently said to be the “next Bob Dylan” in the early part of his career, though he instead carved out his own respectable career and voice, if never with the dizzying success of Dylan. The new album reflects a man in his 70s, a cancer survivor, who reflects on life and its end, but with the good humor and empathy that are hallmarks of Prine’s music. “When I Get To Heaven” is a rollicking, fun vision of what comes next and a pure delight. A charming, warm, and often terrific album.

What I’m reading:

I recently read Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko, on many people’s Top Ten lists for last year and for good reason. It is sprawling, multi-generational, and based in the world of Japanese occupied Korea and then in the Korean immigrant’s world of Oaska, so our key characters become “tweeners,” accepted in neither world. It’s often unspeakably sad, and yet there is resiliency and love. There is also intimacy, despite the time and geographic span of the novel. It’s breathtakingly good and like all good novels, transporting.

What I’m watching:

I adore Guillermo del Toro’s 2006 film, Pan’s Labyrinth, and while I’m not sure his Shape of Water is better, it is a worthy follow up to the earlier masterpiece (and more of a commercial success). Lots of critics dislike the film, but I’m okay with a simple retelling of a Beauty and the Beast love story, as predictable as it might be. The acting is terrific, it is visually stunning, and there are layers of pain as well as social and political commentary (the setting is the US during the Cold War) and, no real spoiler here, the real monsters are humans, the military officer who sees over the captured aquatic creature. It is hauntingly beautiful and its depiction of hatred to those who are different or “other” is painfully resonant with the time in which we live. Put this on your “must see” list.

March 18, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Sitting on a plane for hours (and many more to go; geez, Australia is far away) is a great opportunity to listen to new music and to revisit old favorites. This time, it is Lucy Dacus and her album Historians, the new sophomore release from a 22-year old indie artist that writes with relatable, real-life lyrics. Just on a second listen and while she insists this isn’t a break up record (as we know, 50% of all great songs are break up songs), it is full of loss and pain. Worth the listen so far. For the way back machine, it’s John Prine and In Spite of Ourselves (that title track is one of the great love songs of all time), a collection of duets with some of his “favorite girl singers” as he once described them. I have a crush on Iris Dement (for a really righteously angry song try her Wasteland of the Free), but there is also EmmyLou Harris, the incomparable Dolores Keane, and Lucinda Williams. Very different albums, both wonderful.

What I’m reading:

Jane Mayer’s New Yorker piece on Christopher Steele presents little that is new, but she pulls it together in a terrific and coherent whole that is illuminating and troubling at the same time. Not only for what is happening, but for the complicity of the far right in trying to discredit that which should be setting off alarm bells everywhere. Bob Mueller may be the most important defender of the democracy at this time. A must read.

What I’m watching:

Homeland is killing it this season and is prescient, hauntingly so. Russian election interference, a Bannon-style hate radio demagogue, alienated and gun toting militia types, and a president out of control. It’s fabulous, even if it feels awfully close to the evening news. 

March 8, 2018

What I’m listening to:

We have a family challenge to compile our Top 100 songs. It is painful. Only 100? No more than three songs by one artist? Wait, why is M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes” on my list? Should it just be The Clash from whom she samples? Can I admit to guilty pleasure songs? Hey, it’s my list and I can put anything I want on it. So I’m listening to the list while I work and the song playing right now is Tom Petty’s “The Wild One, Forever,” a B-side single that was never a hit and that remains my favorite Petty song. Also, “Evangeline” by Los Lobos. It evokes a night many years ago, with friends at Pearl Street in Northampton, MA, when everyone danced well past 1AM in a hot, sweaty, packed club and the band was a revelation. Maybe the best music night of our lives and a reminder that one’s 100 Favorite Songs list is as much about what you were doing and where you were in your life when those songs were playing as it is about the music. It’s not a list. It’s a soundtrack for this journey.

What I’m reading:

Patricia Lockwood’s Priestdaddy was in the NY Times top ten books of 2017 list and it is easy to see why. Lockwood brings remarkable and often surprising imagery, metaphor, and language to her prose memoir and it actually threw me off at first. It then all became clear when someone told me she is a poet. The book is laugh aloud funny, which masks (or makes safer anyway) some pretty dark territory. Anyone who grew up Catholic, whether lapsed or not, will resonate with her story. She can’t resist a bawdy anecdote and her family provides some of the most memorable characters possible, especially her father, her sister, and her mother, who I came to adore. Best thing I’ve read in ages.

What I’m watching:

The Florida Project, a profoundly good movie on so many levels. Start with the central character, six-year old (at the time of the filming) Brooklynn Prince, who owns – I mean really owns – the screen. This is pure acting genius and at that age? Astounding. Almost as astounding is Bria Vinaite, who plays her mother. She was discovered on Instagram and had never acted before this role, which she did with just three weeks of acting lessons. She is utterly convincing and the tension between the child’s absolute wonder and joy in the world with her mother’s struggle to provide, to be a mother, is heartwarming and heartbreaking all at once. Willem Dafoe rightly received an Oscar nomination for his supporting role. This is a terrific movie.

February 12, 2018

What I’m listening to:

So, I have a lot of friends of age (I know you’re thinking 40s, but I just turned 60) who are frozen in whatever era of music they enjoyed in college or maybe even in their thirties. There are lots of times when I reach back into the catalog, since music is one of those really powerful and transporting senses that can take you through time (smell is the other one, though often underappreciated for that power). Hell, I just bought a turntable and now spending time in vintage vinyl shops. But I’m trying to take a lesson from Pat, who revels in new music and can as easily talk about North African rap music and the latest National album as Meet the Beatles, her first ever album. So, I’ve been listening to Kendrick Lamar’s Grammy winning Damn. While it may not be the first thing I’ll reach for on a winter night in Maine, by the fire, I was taken with it. It’s layered, political, and weirdly sensitive and misogynist at the same time, and it feels fresh and authentic and smart at the same time, with music that often pulled me from what I was doing. In short, everything music should do. I’m not a bit cooler for listening to Damn, but when I followed it with Steely Dan, I felt like I was listening to Lawrence Welk. A good sign, I think.

What I’m reading:

I am reading Walter Isaacson’s new biography of Leonardo da Vinci. I’m not usually a reader of biographies, but I’ve always been taken with Leonardo. Isaacson does not disappoint (does he ever?), and his subject is at once more human and accessible and more awe-inspiring in Isaacson’s capable hands. Gay, left-handed, vegetarian, incapable of finishing things, a wonderful conversationalist, kind, and perhaps the most relentlessly curious human being who has ever lived. Like his biographies of Steve Jobs and Albert Einstein, Isaacson’s project here is to show that genius lives at the intersection of science and art, of rationality and creativity. Highly recommend it.

What I’m watching:

We watched the This Is Us post-Super Bowl episode, the one where Jack finally buys the farm. I really want to hate this show. It is melodramatic and manipulative, with characters that mostly never change or grow, and it hooks me every damn time we watch it. The episode last Sunday was a tear jerker, a double whammy intended to render into a blubbering, tissue-crumbling pathetic mess anyone who has lost a parent or who is a parent. Sterling K. Brown, Ron Cephas Jones, the surprising Mandy Moore, and Milo Ventimiglia are hard not to love and last season’s episode that had only Brown and Cephas going to Memphis was the show at its best (they are by far the two best actors). Last week was the show at its best worst. In other words, I want to hate it, but I love it. If you haven’t seen it, don’t binge watch it. You’ll need therapy and insulin.

January 15, 2018

What I’m listening to:

Drive-By Truckers. Chris Stapleton has me on an unusual (for me) country theme and I discovered these guys to my great delight. They’ve been around, with some 11 albums, but the newest one is fascinating. It’s a deep dive into Southern alienation and the white working-class world often associated with our current president. I admire the willingness to lay bare, in kick ass rock songs, the complexities and pain at work among people we too quickly place into overly simple categories. These guys are brave, bold, and thoughtful as hell, while producing songs I didn’t expect to like, but that I keep playing. And they are coming to NH.

What I’m reading:

A textual analog to Drive-By Truckers by Chris Stapleton in many ways is Tony Horowitz’s 1998 Pulitzer Prize winning Confederates in the Attic. Ostensibly about the Civil War and the South’s ongoing attachment to it, it is prescient and speaks eloquently to the times in which we live (where every southern state but Virginia voted for President Trump). Often hilarious, it too surfaces complexities and nuance that escape a more recent, and widely acclaimed, book like Hillbilly Elegy. As a Civil War fan, it was also astonishing in many instances, especially when it blows apart long-held “truths” about the war, such as the degree to which Sherman burned down the south (he did not). Like D-B Truckers, Horowitz loves the South and the people he encounters, even as he grapples with its myths of victimhood and exceptionalism (and racism, which may be no more than the racism in the north, but of a different kind). Everyone should read this book and I’m embarrassed I’m so late to it.

What I’m watching:

David Letterman has a new Netflix show called “My Next Guest Needs No Introduction” and we watched the first episode, in which Letterman interviewed Barack Obama. It was extraordinary (if you don’t have Netflix, get it just to watch this show); not only because we were reminded of Obama’s smarts, grace, and humanity (and humor), but because we saw a side of Letterman we didn’t know existed. His personal reflections on Selma were raw and powerful, almost painful. He will do five more episodes with “extraordinary individuals” and if they are anything like the first, this might be the very best work of his career and one of the best things on television.

December 22, 2017

What I’m reading:

Just finished Sunjeev Sahota’s Year of the Runaways, a painful inside look at the plight of illegal Indian immigrant workers in Britain. It was shortlisted for 2015 Man Booker Prize and its transporting, often to a dark and painful universe, and it is impossible not to think about the American version of this story and the terrible way we treat the undocumented in our own country, especially now.

What I’m watching:

Season II of The Crown is even better than Season I. Elizabeth’s character is becoming more three-dimensional, the modern world is catching up with tradition-bound Britain, and Cold War politics offer more context and tension than we saw in Season I. Claire Foy, in her last season, is just terrific – one arched eye brow can send a message.

What I’m listening to:

A lot of Christmas music, but needing a break from the schmaltz, I’ve discovered Over the Rhine and their Christmas album, Snow Angels. God, these guys are good.

November 14, 2017

What I’m watching:

Guiltily, I watch the Patriots play every weekend, often building my schedule and plans around seeing the game. Why the guilt? I don’t know how morally defensible is football anymore, as we now know the severe damage it does to the players. We can’t pretend it’s all okay anymore. Is this our version of late decadent Rome, watching mostly young Black men take a terrible toll on each other for our mere entertainment?

What I’m reading:

Recently finished J.G. Ballard’s 2000 novel Super-Cannes, a powerful depiction of a corporate-tech ex-pat community taken over by a kind of psychopathology, in which all social norms and responsibilities are surrendered to residents of the new world community. Kept thinking about Silicon Valley when reading it. Pretty dark, dystopian view of the modern world and centered around a mass killing, troublingly prescient.

What I’m listening to:

Was never really a Lorde fan, only knowing her catchy (and smarter than you might first guess) pop hit “Royals” from her debut album. But her new album, Melodrama, is terrific and it doesn’t feel quite right to call this “pop.” There is something way more substantial going on with Lorde and I can see why many critics put this album at the top of their Best in 2017 list. Count me in as a huge fan.

November 3, 2017

What I’m reading: Just finished Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere, her breathtakingly good second novel. How is someone so young so wise? Her writing is near perfection and I read the book in two days, setting my alarm for 4:30AM so I could finish it before work.

What I’m watching: We just binge watched season two of Stranger Things and it was worth it just to watch Millie Bobbie Brown, the transcendent young actor who plays Eleven. The series is a delightful mash up of every great eighties horror genre you can imagine and while pretty dark, an absolute joy to watch.

What I’m listening to: I’m not a lover of country music (to say the least), but I love Chris Stapleton. His “The Last Thing I Needed, First Thing This Morning” is heartbreakingly good and reminds me of the old school country that played in my house as a kid. He has a new album and I can’t wait, but his From A Room: Volume 1 is on repeat for now.

September 26, 2017

What I’m reading:

Just finished George Saunder’s Lincoln in the Bardo. It took me a while to accept its cadence and sheer weirdness, but loved it in the end. A painful meditation on loss and grief, and a genuinely beautiful exploration of the intersection of life and death, the difficulty of letting go of what was, good and bad, and what never came to be.

What I’m watching:

HBO’s The Deuce. Times Square and the beginning of the porn industry in the 1970s, the setting made me wonder if this was really something I’d want to see. But David Simon is the writer and I’d read a menu if he wrote it. It does not disappoint so far and there is nothing prurient about it.

What I’m listening to:

The National’s new album Sleep Well Beast. I love this band. The opening piano notes of the first song, “Nobody Else Will Be There,” seize me & I’m reminded that no one else in music today matches their arrangement & musicianship. I’m adding “Born to Beg,” “Slow Show,” “I Need My Girl,” and “Runaway” to my list of favorite love songs.

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