Charleston.

How much longer can we live like this?

Hi y'all! I'm baaaaaaack.

It's been nearly a year since I blogged last. Sorry, different priorities. But I am ready to scream into the void again feel like it's time to start engaging in this platform again with my opinions on this human culture, pop and otherwise.

A couple of things on my mind to catch you up with where I'm at -- some timely, some not so much:

1) If you're not sick of it already, how you doin', Game of Thrones?

Big fan of the books here, even though GRRM's writing evokes a massive clusterfuck; as such, I was really impressed with how the showrunners streamlined it into a lithe and springy animal. And yes, I acknowledge the depiction of unnecessary and added violence (particularly sexual) against women has clearly become lazy knee-jerk writing and a turnoff. That's why Outlander is where I've been getting my epic sword fighting fantasy lately, as well as really digging that a 70-year old white man is outdoing these young bucks in engaging a female audience.

(via Feminist Mad Max)

But, me = digression; back to brass tacks. I have been a bit reluctant to rejoin the world of GRRM because clusterfuck and because even with how overly rapey it is, the show seems to still be making that clusterfuck feel more cohesive. Reading not being a lot of humans to-do list anyway (boo!), I do also think that I'm not alone among people who still do enjoy reading. So, this:

Stop Defending "Game of Thrones": How HBO Gutted the Stories I Love

UGH. This shit is all over the internets. A slow build, from tweets his editor put up and took down, to GRRM's slow boil from happy go lucky collaborator to tsk tsker. Funny how this happens only prior to release of the next book. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I see this phenomenon we are experiencing as an orchestrated way to generate renewed interest in the books. This is a huge franchise with lots of big players and massive money to be made, not a bunch of amateurs squabbling over scraps. If this crap really exists and it's not helpful to the machine, it gets locked down. Bleh.

Speaking of clusterfucks...

2) Rachel Dolezal: Black or White? A Woman's Story Stirs Up a Furor

I have been ignoring this story because it IS complicated, but a friend who is a creative writing professor and someone who has personally struggled with issues within her mixed family posted this bit to the Friendface from her friend, and it spoke to me.

Transracial Lives Matter: Rachel Dolezal and the Privilege of Racial Manipulation

It's a powerful piece of writing with some controversial ideas. To get the negatives out of the way first: I am a bit uncomfortable with the some of the more aggressive attitudes she shares regarding transracial adoption -- that there's somehow always an injustice that was done to the child, or the idea that seems to be put forth here that adoptive parents are complicit in destroying a child's potential identity if they involve them in white culture or should be ridiculed if they try to seek out ways to incorporate their child's racial or ethnic background in their daily lives. Another friend also pointed out that her only problem with this article is that the author says Dolezal adopted her black brother to gain authenticity, and how could this person possibly know why Dolezal did this, why can't it just be out of love? I, like my friend, am more inclined to think love might have had something to do with it. Nothing is perfect, and I always feel like love is completely divorced from a lot of these conversations.

Anyway, I wasn't adopted, but I was just talking to my husband about this within the context of my experience growing up as a biracial girl in a very small town, all-white environment. My parents both prepared and tried to heal me the best they could for how I was treated, and I identify with a lot of what she is saying. It is very hard for anyone who has an outside that looks like the dominant culture to understand what that privilege is truly like, and I say this as someone who has had the ability in the past to "pass" -- and let me tell you, I did it when I could because it DOES grant you privilege.

I get really tired though, and sometimes feel like the best way is what a white male friend from my hometown commented:

I'm so salty toward people's judgments at all anymore. I'm like an old man that's done caring about stuff like "opinions" grumble grumble life is too valuable. Let's get it over with and just say, "does it increase diversity or not?" If not, then let's not do that thing.

If only life was so simple. Can it be? Not until we all stop caring about judgments, which is a defining aspect of being human.

Witnesses to History, 50 Years Later

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

~ Martin Luther King, Jr., August 28, 1963

I'm not much for fancy schmancy celebrity stuff, but *sigh* Cannes.

And *sigh* fashion at Cannes.

THIS. JUMPSUIT.



(Balenciaga by Alexander Wang jumpsuit)

And oooohhhhhhhhh...



(Christian Dior haute couture 2013)

Yummy.

But in more important, Cannes closer to home news, the Ryan Coogler film, Fruitvale Station -- based on the last day of the life of Oscar Grant, the unarmed 22-year-old black man who was shot and killed in Oakland by a transit officer on New Year’s Day in 2009 -- is getting rave reviews. The shooting of Oscar Grant was in a lot of ways a last straw for a community with an uneasy relationship with police (Riders anyone?), and the frustration and anger resulted in several weeks of rioting and protests.

Hopefully the film will make this reality that many people of color experience in "post-race" America something that is understood beyond the borders of Oakland.

A little late to the party, but this is oh so good.

Stephen Colbert Spoofs 'Accidental Racist'

If you haven't heard the original 'Accidental Racist' I think that really, it's not necessary: Colbert covers the salient points. I also think David Graham at The Atlantic does a bang up job of laying down how offensive, and in many ways, damaging, this song is.

It really hits home here:

It's pretty insane to compare an inoffensive piece of headgear to a flag that represents a treasonous secession movement devoting to maintaining the practice of slavery. It's even more insane to compare jewelry to, you know, slave shackles.

The deeply offensive gold chains and iron chains thing aside, we're also talking about a flag that represents a movement devoted to maintaining the practice of slavery and comparing it to a 'do-rag' -- a piece of clothing that has been given connotations of offense by, well, racists. The flag, however, remains what it is. I get that these guys probably had good intentions, but good intentions aren't enough when it comes to learning how not to be entitled. This song does not much more than bolster white privilege and white entitlement around racism.

In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing and inevitable fallout for the Muslim community (and the poor Czechs!) I've been thinking a lot about "accidental racism" and white privilege. I read two great pieces on this recently.

For anyone who struggles with the idea of white privilege, this:

The Saudi Marathon Man

Why the search, the interrogation, the dogs, the bomb squad, and the injured [Saudi Arabian] man’s name tweeted out, attached to the word “suspect”? After the bombs went off, people were running in every direction—so was the young man. Many, like him, were wounded; many of them were saved by the unflinching kindness of strangers, who carried them or stopped the bleeding with their own hands and improvised tourniquets...In the midst of that, according to a CBS News report, a bystander saw the young man running, badly hurt, rushed to him, and then “tackled him,” bringing him down. People thought he looked suspicious.

What made them suspect him? He was running—so was everyone. The police reportedly thought he smelled like explosives; his wounds might have suggested why. He said something about thinking there would be a second bomb—as there was, and often is, to target responders. If that was the reason he gave for running, it was a sensible one. He asked if anyone was dead—a question people were screaming. And he was from Saudi Arabia, which is around where the logic stops. Was it just the way he looked, or did he, in the chaos, maybe call for God with a name that someone found strange?

And this one, which while written from the perspective of a Swede, had so many hallmarks of my own tiny town American childhood that I could recall my Japanese mother's pride, shame, and anger at the hands of "accidental racists" like it was yesterday:

Sweden's Closet Racists

Being 6 years old and walking toward passport control with Dad, who has sweaty hands, who clears his throat, who fixes his hair and shines up his shoes on the backs of his knees. All the pink-colored people are let by. But our dad is stopped. And we think, maybe it was by chance, until we see the same scene repeated year after year.

Being 7 and starting school and being told about society by a dad who was terrified even then that his outsiderness would be inherited by his children. He says, “When you look like we do, you must always be a thousand times better than everyone else if you don’t want to be refused.”

I remember my mother's bewilderment -- then fear when security arrived, then shaking rage when she realized what was happening -- when a department store in my hometown wouldn't take her check; the check with her strange and difficult-to-pronounce name printed in script below my white father's, the check accompanied by a military ID ("it's from the US government, it's better than a driver's license," my non-driving mother repeated over and over, in vain). They demanded that my father be there, in person, for them to honor the check. I remember her shame and defeat, and moreover I remember my embarrassment at yet another thing that set me apart from my white peers -- an embarrassment only rivaled by my shame now in looking back on my childhood lack of perspective and support for my mother.

When someone wears a Confederate Flag in spite of the fact that it is first and foremost a symbol of whites owning human beings, and then has the nerve to tell me that foundational symbolism isn't intended -- it's only "accidentally racist" and purely on me -- privilege is the first thing that goes through my mind.

Some states have forward-thinking lawmakers, and some have, well...Betty Brown:

Texas Lawmaker Suggests Asians Adopt Easier Names

A North Texas legislator during House testimony on voter identification legislation said Asian-descent voters should adopt names that are “easier for Americans to deal with.”

Because people of Asian descent aren't really Americans, right?

“Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could deal with more readily here?” (Rep. Betty) Brown said.

Get out of town. For real?

How about putting some effort in to educate yourself and learn to accept and represent your full community? Betty Brown, you insult all Americans with this crap. With the election of an African-American president with decidedly non-Anglo first and last names, this is even more ridiculous.

Oi, I'm sure Betty Brown is glad I have my Dad's German last name -- no problems there, ever (riiiiight) -- and not my mom's phonetic Japanese last name.

I said it once, and I'll say it again, as it often sadly rings true -- you don't have to pass an IQ test to be [a public servant].

Death of 17-year-old pregnant farm worker incites campaign against Trader Joe's.

Merced Farm Labor was subcontracted by West Coast Grape Farming, whose president, Fred Franzia, also owns Bronco Winery, makers of Charles Shaw wine — also known as Trader Joe's cheap and wildly popular "Two-Buck Chuck." Approximately 72 million bottles of the $2 wine are sold each year, exclusively at Trader Joe's.

United Farm Workers, responding to [Maria Isabel Vasquez] Jimenez's death, have asked supporters to fire off letters to Trader Joe's requesting the company "implement a corporate policy to ensure that [its] suppliers are not violating the law by failing to provide basic protections such as cold water, shade, and clean bathrooms."

More at The Daily Kos.

The inhumane treatment of farm workers in California (and elsewhere in the US) is a pervasive human rights issue that many seem to turn a blind eye to in favor of low produce prices. It's all about the money, baby. But it is exactly large, successful, purportedly more "progressive" groceries -- with a high percentage of well-to-do and socially-conscious clientele -- like Trader Joe's who can make a difference by demanding suppliers treat their employees humanely.

I really like Trader Joe's. An early purveyor of natural, organic, and vegetarian foods, touted as a chain of groceries privately-owned by one family, and a company that pays a competetive wage to their employees, I rejoiced when one opened in my neighborhood. I also love myself some Two-Buck Chuck. But I won't be buying it until they take some responsibility for the actions of their suppliers. And while they're at it, why not be a little more forthcoming about their "organic" dairy products? I've stopped buying those products too.

While I understand it's impossible to monitor as socially conscious every little morsel of food one gets from a grocer, it's important to bring this kind of gross negligence and disregard for human life to light. Please send a fax to Trader Joe's, demanding that they use their buying clout to help improve their suppliers' treatment of farm workers, here.

I've been trying desperately to become a regular reader of the Freakonomics blog at the New York Times. Always a thought-provoking read, but dude, I just can't seem to keep up!

So, in the tradition of my lateness in all things, and my wanton ignorance of the internet space-time continuum -- where one day in internet time is like, 5 years, thus rendering anything you discover posted from three days ago an instant fossil...

This post from a few days ago on the sometimes distinctive African-American naming process (along with their nod to the Freakonomics chapter Perfect Parenting, Part II; or: Would a Roshanda by Any Other Name Smell as Sweet?) -- which chronicles whether or not distinctive and misunderstood names set children up for failure or success -- was a HOOT.

Why? Because it led me to the one of the mightiest of blogs: The Peoples News.

I am dying. Dying, I say! Go now!

Oh man, this is class.



And speaking of wasting time clicking links and looking for cool shit on insane cultural phenomena like GooTube: even though Saturday Night Live has its sucky months (or years), I still could spend all day clicking links in the SNL Wiki.

BTW, I love you Will Forte. You have been added to my man-harem to have my man-harem babies.

So yeah, anyway, karma. It's a goddess.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, check out the wiki on dolphin hunting methods in Japan.

Texas-Based Pizza Chain Accepts Pesos.

Why is this national news, and why do I care? Because:

A pizza chain has been hit with death threats and hate mail after offering to accept Mexican pesos, becoming another flashpoint in the nation's debate over immigrants.

"This is the United States of America, not the United States of Mexico," one e-mail read. "Quit catering to the damn illegal Mexicans," demanded another.

I laughed, because yesterday on SFGate this article was the centerpiece:

Mexicans Flee Tijuana for U.S.

(01-09) 11:28 PST Chula Vista, Calif. (AP) --

A border city that has long watched illegal immigrants pass through on their way to low-wage jobs up north is increasingly welcoming a very different kind of arrival: wealthy Mexicans seeking refuge from kidnappings and other violence.

"I feel a sense of relief as soon as I cross the border," [said] Lorena Flores, in the living room of their sparsely furnished home, which the couple bought for $585,000. (emphasis mine)

We want your property taxes and your cheap labor, Mexicans, but not your stinking currency! Go spend that money at home! And while we're at it, why do you come here and make money and then send it back to Mexico instead of spending it here and boosting our.....? Uh, er, nevermind.

Haha, whatever. SFGate should have actually titled that first article about the pizza chain, "Why We'll Never Be Europe." Here's another reason.

I think that role models should be close to home, rather than people you don't know at all. That's why I'm so honest about everything that goes on in my life, 'cos I understand that there are young kids who look up to singers and people in the media as role models. But you don't really know anything about their lives. They don't talk about their weird sex habits and drug habits (laughs). Yet you idolize them. And when it eventually gets printed all over the papers, people become very disappointed. -- Lily Allen

Now, I don't know shite about Lily Allen except for what the media tells me. But I do know I live in a country that idolizes Tom and Paris and Britney and their excruciating lives, so hearing about someone like this Allen chick is pretty refreshing. Maybe it's a put-on, but if so, it's a damn good one.