Utterly Repulsed By You

Dear Stargate Universe Fans,

There already exists, in our reality, a device which can essentially swap out a woman's personality and make it so when she returns all evidence of sex is gone and she would have no memory of the act.

The street name for this device is 'roofie'. A more clinical street name is 'date rape drug'.

The episode Sabatoge so far, as defended, is all about the two white characters named Rush and Eleanor, vouyeristically getting off on the rape of an Asian lesbian. And getting away with it, because the 'drugging' was sanctioned by SG Command (and the US Government).

Someone pass the smallpox blankets and the railroad timbers please - we're going back in time.

[I did not think I would have to make this post, here. I've already discussed it elsewhere and privately. But here is my public stance on just how far the SG franchise has sunk.]

-- Utterly Repulsed By You,
Willow

PSA: Scientists Behaving Badly

Go here for more information about a certain survey going around.

In sum: Someone from outside the fannish communities has determined fan communities are the perfect breeding ground to fill out their paperwork on 'unified fabric of human desire'.

Some individuals have logged the survey as being heterosexist, heteronormative and cissexist just for starters. But most importantly the supposedly anonymous survey isn't. IP addresses have been matched to journal names and ID's.

More links expressing the WTF here at this journal.

Personal note: I get enough of the Zoo aspect in my life to volunteer for more. And history shows that as a black woman, a woman and a lesbian, there will always be someone trying to codify, box and explain my sensuality and sexuality to suit their comfort zones.

ETA: Best. Summary. Ever.

Disney To Accquire Marvel Entertainment

Woke up.

Saw this.

Here is the link.

Cue Slightly Hysterical Vengeful (slightly Jokerlike) Laughter: "Hahahaha hahahaha ahahahahaha ha heee huuu haaa hahahahahah haha."

Disney vs Warner Brothers, now, will it? Those titans of whitopia.

How fitting.

White (American) Heroes In Exotic Worlds

When watching anime today, I accidentally hit upon English dub a couple times. The American accents jarred me, incredibly so. So much so in fact that I found myself with this thought:

"I wonder if part of what convinces some people (what seems to me to be mostly Americans) to think that Anime and Manga are filled with white people, is because they're reading/hearing them in English."

Yes of course there's years of propagandas on how Asian peoples 'should look' in sequential art, but hearing the jarring American accents made me immediately wonder if dubbing doesn't also contribute to people's perceptions.

On the one hand being able to watch a show in your own language is pretty darn sweet. But dubbing also has some serious cultural washing (in this case whitewashing) too, doesn't it? One of the instant jars for me, was my expecting, due to the anime symbology for a character, a deep heroic voice and instead there was this median older boy-band voice. It's very jarring to hear Kon-el when you're expecting serious Bruce Wayne merging into Batman.

And then in a different case and separate occasion there happened to be cursing. I don't remember what the Japanese version was - the American stuck with me (and it's probably not right cause it was the last word that stuck with me the most). 'Shut the fuck up, you ugly cow'. Now, someone Japanese could tell me that statement gets said in anime all the time and fan translators get it wrong wrong wrong and more wrong. But for the moment it's standing out for me as American culturally themed cursing.

On a third occasion the voice actor didn't sound at all like a teenager and while the character was supposed to whine and I suppose come across as unpleasant - the few sentences I heard struck me as the whining of an American man-child in a sitcom.

The moment that made me decide to write about this; which undoubtedly is something anime fans have been discussing since time immemorial; was the difference in comprehension and mood and character understanding in the same scene with two different languages.

A character tells a potential kidnapper (said kidnapper being the first step in future potential brainwashing) "I won't be influenced by you."

In the American version. "I'm not getting involved."

One version hints at a character who refuses to be manipulated, by an individual or the group they work for; the other hints at a character who just doesn't engage. Maybe such differences only change the story for me. Maybe this is a subtle or small difference in interpreting the characters and it is not a big deal in terms of iconic Japanese heroes, tropes and plotlines. Maybe it doesn't change the story at all.

But it feels like a big deal to me. It feels like English language audiences could be missing out - the other side of institutional and aversive and unconscious racism with whitewashing. And this lack and twist is not just happening with Japanese animation.

I found Galactik Football, Season 1 and enjoyed it muchly last year. Except, for the character of Sinedd. Oh Sinedd, whiny little emo boy, bully with self esteem issues. I couldn't understand my friend's obsession with him or the fact he apparently had a huge fan following. He was not a notable bad boy.

And then I found out that in the original French, Sinedd's voice actor makes the character much more sympathetic. And in the German translation, Sinedd's voice makes the character a touch of sin, a personal indulgence.

Why wasn't the English voice actor doing similarly? Well, assuming the English voice actor was not an actual 15 year old boy (and net scuttlebut says the irish actor is not), then it was some kind of allowed decision that Sinedd's voice be played as always on the verge of breaking. In fact on some occasions it did seem to break. The snarker in me wants to insist it was during his 'passionate' I don't need anyone speeches - thus adding eye rolling, groan filled, painful humor to what could possibly have been a bad boy rant about independence. But I honestly can't remember because everything about the character irritated me because of that voice.

Animation is a sum to me, a complex sum. It needs parts A and B and C in order to come together. It needs the art, the voice acting and the music. With Youtube around it's relatively easy these days to get a quick idea of how mood can be changed if someone switches around the soundtrack.

With English dub, B and C can be switched out. All that needs to happen is that the plotline spoken mostly fits the depicted action. The emotion, original mood and original intent can all vanish beneath the need to make things more relevant for an American broader based audience.

A loner, lonely bad boy, becomes an insecure 15 year old whiner.

The expertly disguised villain is revealed almost immediately due to having a villain's slimy undertones.

A hero's emotional last stand speech, becomes a monosyllabic Western style 'You're going down'.

No wonder when people start pointing out traditional hero values or samurai overtones in something anime, another group bounds up with 'What the ___ are you talking about?' It's not just their lack of exposure to knowing certain things relate to real cultures. It's also their indoctrination to seeing all other cultures as dressing.

ETA: And this explains TokyoPop's translations of Juuni Kokki which manage to add boggarts (no doubt for 'familiarity') while exoticizing certain, titles, other nouns and phrases. I still don't know how why they used 'Prophet' for the Late Empress Yo; (eta) I mean translate for sense.

[Comments Open]

Reading Rainbow Cancelled

The show's run is ending, Grant explains, because no one — not the station, not PBS, not the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — will put up the several hundred thousand dollars needed to renew the show's broadcast rights.

Grant says the funding crunch is partially to blame, but the decision to end Reading Rainbow can also be traced to a shift in the philosophy of educational television programming. The change started with the Department of Education under the Bush administration, he explains, which wanted to see a much heavier focus on the basic tools of reading — like phonics and spelling.

Showing once again the folly of the Bush Administration. Kids who learn to love reading, focus on their own to pick up phonics and spelling and vocabulary because they want to understand the story.

It's like something out of the summary for the plot of Truancy to focus on the letter of education while doing everything to erase the pleasure of learning.

I just - I guess it goes to show my priorities. The US sanctioning and continuing to hedge around torture and repercussions for those who engaged in it has been disappointing as all hell. But this? Torture of soldiers is philosophical to me. I know personally that pain never gets you correct answers - people will say anything to get abuse to stop. But water boarding and people being hung by the arms and put into cramped areas with insects is all theory.

Reading is not philosophical. It's not a moral question. It's not intellectual theory with which one should try and connect some aspect of empathy (though not torturing has several logical aspects as well).

My love of animation was likely fostered in part by those clips (in RR) where the story was drawn out in parts (often in charcoal). I can hum 'Butterfly In The Sky' while I'm in the library trying to choose a book.

On seemingly little thing, and 2009 has managed to be the crappiest. year. ever.

I. am. done. with. the. world.

Maybe 2010 will show the US be less asinine and cowardly. But I'm beginning to doubt it. Yes, it was amazing to see the power of voting as part of the concept for democracy being about bloodless revolution and I will never forget that feeling and moment of awareness. But one moment cannot last forever. It needs bolstering.

No more Reading Rainbow. No more intriguing children to worlds of magic and wonder and learning about responsibility and feelings and anxieties and how to calm them and that somewhere is a writer who knows about bad dreams, divorces, being forced to eat broccoli - that somewhere there is a writer who knows about daydreams of being a princess or prince, a warrior and champion, smart enough to outfox the mean adult...

[ imagine many words in this spot equal to me bashing the Department of Education about with a crow bar ]

Action

So, I had some pretty words about me, superhero comics, western comics and manga. Seriously pretty words.

Favourite phrase? "Hope is a shade of rose"

See? Pretty.

But then I decided to call my sibs and give them manga reccs instead. My sister's been begging me for herself, and because she's trying to get her big brother to read more.

I'm considering 'cheating' and getting said brother to watch anime with subtitles.

Characters Of Colour? Where?

If I wrote an open letter right now I don't know who I'd address it to; The Creator(s) of The 99 wherein I beg them not to make deals with DC? Or would I, should I bother with an open letter to DC telling them to take their pudgy, imperialistic, white supremist hands off all properties involving non-white (and non America focused) characters?

The White Man Lies - But That Ain't New. Milestone Characters Dropped Like Rocks And Other Tales Of "But We Have No Current Plans For Anyone Who Ain't White".

Who knows, maybe they figured using Milestone characters would upset the Birthers who're a prominent subset in their demographic.

Hmm. I guess I'm leaning towards writing a letter to beg the creators of The 99 to run far, far away from DC. I still have issues to buy to catch up. Reading still makes me smile. Seeing heroes, brown heroes, from all over the globe still brings me to tears (of joy).

At least now I have it confirmed that my aversion to reading anything by authors I don't know is me not wanting to deal with anymore majority white worlds anywhere; where the author's skanky race issues can surprise and accost me, hanging there, all gross off their naked butts.

Manga, The 99 and a couple of web comics. Alright then.

And for an actual opinion rather than just my tired disgust, see 4th Letter.

Wow, Static in Teen Titans, and a manga based off the white washed characters in the live action movie version of The Last AirRacebender - all this attention to beloved non white mythic and heroic icons, it's enough to make me flush, flutter, faint and fall over. [/ sarcasm]

D9's Racefail Hits Keep Clocking

Nigerian author, Nendi Okorafor Mbachu, of Zahrah the Windseeker fame, comments on District9.

“The Nigerians”, that’s how they were described in the film, as if the mere title is enough to explain their savagery and baseness. My sisters and I are Nigerians and as Nigerians, this aspect of the film was AGONY to watch...

Our reactions were not just because we were Nigerian women with long dreadlocks. I mean, she might as well have had a bone through her nose and been muttering “unga munga”. She was just… alllll wrong. One great big very old stereotype.

...

I think I quit Hollywood.

I...

Movie. Speech making. Mob attacks an asian car dealer. PLAYED FOR LAUGHS.

Via Racebending. With more at Angry Asian Man.

I can't even...

There are Latino and Asian individuals getting mobbed and beaten in real life. A Latino man DIED and they put this into a movie as a joke?

...

Ok yeah and This is ANOTHER PARAMOUNT MOVIE. So if you were already boycotting Paramount due to The Last Racebender, nothing to change, there.

Ugh.

So someone I read regularly reviewed District 9 and called it this:

A better than your average Summer scifi movie. Sure that isn't a high bar, but its clever and funny enough as well as having stuff exploding and guns and running and a cute kid... Eventually the local government cuts their way into the ship and discovers it seems to be full of the equivalent to boat people refugees... Eventually, under public pressure, the government agrees to move the million plus aliens to a newer, "better" home several hundred km away from the city

Needless to say, they are no longer someone I will be reading regularly.

Yeah, the white people I'm willing to stand, is a group that just keeps getting smaller and smaller and smaller this year.

2009 - Bringing the interpersonal as well as societal racefail.

Yo Lurker? Trail of Tears? That was just a government relocation program to a 'newer better home' too, right?

A WOWIO Update

Huh.

Apparently WOWIO got sold again and the new company has made vague statements about the year and change overdue payments due the artists who had/have their work up.

The new owner is something called Perks.com who have the catchphase 'The Science of Motivation'.

And then there's this on WOWIO news:

Perks.com, an industry-leading provider of corporate incentive and motivation programs, has added WOWIO to its list of premier product suppliers, joining world-class companies including Apple, Canon, Carnival Cruises, Coach, Dell, FootLocker and many others. Perks solutions enable organizations to maximize the value of the audiences vital to their success, providing motivational Sales Incentive, Corporate Incentives and Promotions, Employee Performance and Customer Loyalty programs.

In the initial release, starting August 3, WOWIO will provide nearly $1000 in promotional cards in $5, $10 and $15 increments. Perks program members will be able to redeem incentive/loyalty points for promo cards, which will then be used to pay for downloads of eBooks at WOWIO. Publishing partners will benefit by the exposure to, and purchases from a new audience of eBook buyers. Both companies anticipate an increase in revenues for WOWIO through this program.

Stay tuned!

So...

WOWIO, which once seemed like an incredible model that merely needed some tweaking for digital comics and digital books is now some kind of bonus imprint to a company that sells...motivation to executive types?

You could get travel points for a free airplane ticket, new sneakers or... a digital comic? I'm probably not understanding PERKS well at all though. I don't do well with doublespeak, be it corporate, political or racist. It's all 'wah wah wah bullshit, wah, wah' bull to me.

Seriously. Here is a c/p of Perks.com own 'Perks Facts'.

Having maintained a growth rate of 100-200% per annum over the past 5 years, Perks and our clients are seeing the fruits of the investment placed in developing the most scalable and dynamic technological infrastructure together with a second to none US and international catalogue – all backed and supported by years of expertise and our “Science of Motivation” platform.

Unlike most companies that started in this industry by "giving stuff away" – Perks started with a blank sheet of paper and the knowledge of the methodologies and science that drive human beings within business environments to perform. We have continuously integrated new knowledge and techniques gained by our “living laboratories” into the DNA of our technology solution – adapting to specific industry, client, geographic and cultural realities – while also keeping abreast of the newest technologies that can better serve those needs. Most other companies having had legacy systems to deal with - cannot deliver the integrated and individualized services that we provide.

At the most practical level our executive staff come both from the buy-side and sell-side of the industry so that we have a broad knowledge of the needs of companies of all sizes and industries. Perks serves a slew of clients ranging from one who uses our services to incentivize over 20,000 call center sales and service reps across 4 continents to a product manufacturer needing sales and training incentives for salespeople in 3500 Big Box retailers. From Banks to Telecoms – we have experience driving performance for the "Who’s who" of the worlds companies.

Overall we incentivize over 200,000 people worldwide to perform better, sell more and know their products better. With ROI of 300-1500% on our programs – is there any wonder why we are growing so rapidly?

Inventivize, people. Oh the words North America USA has introduced into the English language. And yes, I did check dictionaries. It's an Americanism.

Anyway, WOWIO, the company seems to be getting further and further away from the business of promoting reading and digital media. The site itself, however, is still there looking like a portal site for webcomics and web literature.

Oh yeah. And it's possibly now some kind of 'living laboratory'.

Yeah...

Use of Personal Information
WOWIO collects and uses your personal information primarily for the purpose of subsidizing the price of ebooks available on the WOWIO site. Sponsors pay for the opportunity to present their products and services to you, and in return you get free books. Your personal information is shared with sponsors and other clients and partners of WOWIO in aggregate only. No personal identifying information is available to clients or partners.

Though I'm not sure if that's the Platinum model Privacy Terms or the new PERKS term. Somehow, living laboratory doesn't make me think 'aggregate only' applies.

Unholy Possum Chicken

I repeat, Unholy Possum Chicken Sh*te.

Yeah I'm spammy - bite me. I'm reposting parts of the interview Shyamalan gave to IF Magazine, because just as I had to find the interview and read the quotes for myself (Seriously I heard about him mentioning fart jokes and could. not. believe.) I'm sure there are those who like me, will want to see his words themselves. Note, some quotes are abridged with ...

iF MAGAZINE: What was the plan with this film and what were you trying to achieve, to re-invent yourself?

M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN: I have always wanted to develop a long mythology based franchise like THE LORD OF THE RINGS...

Or Harry Potter. Two white Eurofocused mythologies versus one young adult / children's asian focused series. Yup, I'm seeing similarities everywhere. But I digress.

M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN: ... I always thought about it, but I had, until now, never found a good one where I could also add a little bit of my personal vision. I really wanted to find a franchise where my accent could be complementary to the piece...When I saw the cartoon I thought it was so well thought out in term of mythology. It had Buddhism, and martial Arts... I knew we could do something that wasn’t going to be just a great treat for the eyes, but also for the mind and the soul. This is my approach when it comes to getting into this type of material, to approach it through the characters and keep it grounded. It has also deeper issues at its core, it talks about Genocide and Balance, and the connection to the Planet. And you know from my other movies that I’m interested with these subject matters -- it’s an important movie, not just a blockbuster summer movie.

So far we've got LOTR, Harry Potter + Buddhism and Martial Arts as a combination of Shyamalan's personal vision with mentions of Genocide and Balance (the Genocide in his personal vision being headed up by a brown guy, against a tribe of which two white children play a huge part).

Shall we continue? It's my blog, so I think we shall.

iF MAGAZINE: Are you going to push for the political tone in this film as we’ve seen in your other films?

SHYAMALAN: Well, there is a lot in the mythology. What I did was remove anything that was too slap-sticky and cheesy -- the stuff that was there for the very little kids, but wouldn’t work in a live action feature like the fart jokes...

Cabbage man. Uncle Iroh's constant yen for tea. Aang riding around on a ball of air. Momo being Momo. Sokka cracking jokes. Toph being badass with a grin on her face. Haiku competition of goofy dorkness. Zuko dorkness. The hippies from the episode where they go through the cave to get to Omashu.

No. I don't remember any fart jokes.

Aang making a water octupus. Aang trying to water-ski using giant Koi. Sun Warrior goofy-dorkness.

Still don't remember fart jokes.

SHYAMALAN: ... I grounded Katara’s brother for example [played by Nicola Peltz] and it brought a great new overall tone to the whole movie. But the political tone is for sure intact and the one about a culture who is in an industrial revolution and use their way in their belief system and then decide “we don’t need to follow the old way of thinking, the old way of seeing God”...

*scratches head* The Old Way Of Seeing... who? It's the second question and he's forgotten all about Balance already?

SHYAMALAN: ...And the movie focuses on a higher power and the spirit world. And so this culture decides that we can make our own machine and be our own God -- it was there in the cartoon, but more affirmed in our movie.

It was where in the cartoon? For those who've watched Avatar: The Last Airbender all the way through to the end, are you with me in total. utter. confusion as to how Shyamalan's interpretation of the motives of the Fire Nation fit into the animated series' colonialist motives? Which were actually far more true to life in terms of an established country thinking it needed to be a civilizing influence on the rest of the world. Cause I sure as heck want to know how someone with former colonial background can so utterly miss that point.


There were more questions here. Blah blah blah, but I'm only going to c/p and highlight his quotes on Dev Patel. No wait. I forgot this bit.

SHYAMALAN:...but to be honest, the film was more influenced by martial arts movies in general. What is funny is that you can see so many influences in the cartoon with scenes almost copied entirely from martial art movies, but I wanted the live action film to be truly original with action scenes you had never seen before. I’m a huge martial art freak. I even have a Bruce Lee statue in my office!

1. Bruce Lee is turning over in his grave.

2. Shyamalan really did say 'Eff you Sifu Kisu' and apparently does not realize, for all his love of Martial Arts that many of the styles in Hong Kong Kung Fu movies, especially old school HK fare, are based on various Martial Arts schools and that some movies preserve forms that have since disappeared because there are no longer any living masters. I am not a martial arts freak. Or even a Hong Kong Movie freak - not in the sense of even matching names to movies. But I've loved the possibilities movie restoration has for me to rewatch as an adult movies I saw as a child, which helped instill in me the concept that 'Girls Can Kick Ass And Do The Dishes'. And I love learning about the history - whenever I can find books or documentaries about it.

The only styles I recognized as something recognizable in Avatar, without being told what they were, was the Water Bending Tai Chi (nope, found an old note, I thought it was Qi Gong) - which made me giggle, because it seemed so apt. And the sword movements of The Blue Mask. The stances there seemed familiar.

Meanwhile the trailer of Avatar has Aang doing what I call the 'Kula Kula Kula' of Michelle Yeoh's Silver Hawk character's adopted brother. And his stance there is played for laughs as he makes the above mentioned sound.

iF MAGAZINE: Can you talk about casting for this film?

SHYAMALAN: ... I was so lucky to have this young actor Dev Patel [who plays Prince Zuko]...He is so vulnerable and so strong at the same time and this was the perfect mix to play Zuko. I had auditioned him for the role before the Oscar success and I wasn’t sure if I could get him after, but he wanted to be part of this film and I’m blessed. He is like a man-child and this is perfect...

I never thought of myself as particularly a Zuko fangirl. But Zuko. A man-child. Zuko. Zuko? Did Shyamalan and I watch the same series? Sokka is the man-child, who matures beautifully by the way. Zuko...is wrapped up in shame, pain and confusion and totally unaware of his own strength. Which is something Iroh tries to remind him of/instill in him.

But Patel's a talented actor, so whatever comes of Zuko on screen, will be about how he was directed and what the script actually was. Still, man-child. That is some Robin Williams sh*t if ever I heard any.

And now, gentle readers - the fly on the turd.

iF MAGAZINE: How does this compare to the STAR WARS trilogy?

SHYAMALAN: Wow, this is hard to compare it to STAR WARS. STAR WARS is true religion to me. I can understand what people who are into religion feel when I think about STAR WARS, but if I can make a comparison, it is with the notion of “journey” both trilogies have. THE LAST AIRBENDER is truly the journey of this young maverick boy, Aaang. His journey is similar to the one of Luke Skywalker.

Aang is a Maverick? Cheerful, compassionate, Aang? Is a maverick? Really? And he's on a similar journey as Luke Skywalker? Luke Skywalker who wanted to prove himself, possibly redeem his father's death and who brought balance back to the Force by touching Vader's heart?

That Luke Skywalker? The Luke Skywalker whose journey most closely matches that of Prince Zuko? Right down to recieving disfiguring injuries as reminders that they weren't yet ready to take on 'the big boy's table' ?

And STAR WARS is a religion to Shyamalan? But he can't properly recognize the character in A:TLA who most closely resembles that mytholgy's hero figure? Right down to having a beloved elder guiding his actions and teaching him control of his power?

Do they have remedial catacheism for Star Wars geeks?

What happens when someone in need of such re-schooling gets their hands on A:TLA? The trailer already says Aang is the Last Of His Kind. So I'm going to guess, if he's Luke Skywalker, only bald, that there is no reincarnation in the live action movie. And somehow Aang is just the magically special white boy, whose pure heart is going to allow him to learn the three other elemental bending powers so he can defeat the Sith Fire Nation and avenge the Jedi Council Air Benders, while saving the galaxy world from evil.

Do you think George Lucus will sue?

Meanwhile I guess, to switch things up, if Katara is Leia, Sokka will be Han Solo and become the practical realist, thus being all grounded n'stuff. And icy-lands and Leia. Icy-lands and Leia. So Greenland was Hoth and Katara's a native Hoth Princess?

And considering the promo/trailer showing Patel-Zuko in black - I guess he's Darth Vader, chasing 'our white heroes' around the galaxy world, as they try to recruit a resistance based on some mythical prophecy on when the best time to strike the Sith Empire Fire Nation will be. And they'll have to convince unbelievers that no, really, the magically special white boy really IS a magically special white boy and he WILL fulfill the prophecy, if given a little help.

Wow. It's soooo original. Not.

*goes back to fantasy director casting for the remake*

[ Comments on and moderated ]

Small Comforts

I've spent an hour or more reading up and getting up to date on The Continuing Saga of Live Action, Last Airbender Racefail.

Latest news? No more Hanzi instead the writing in this hodgepodge mishmash shall be GIBBERISH!

I have come to this conclusion:

One day, 10 years from now, Zhang Yimou will announce he is doing an Avatar Trilogy. It'll cost the same ghastly amount as an anime boxed set, but will have descent english subtitles.


I think I'm going to open a savings account now, and start putting aside $5 a month for it.

Zhang Yimou's work with symbolic colour, is well known. His ability to get the best out of his actors, is also well known, even when they're speaking in a dialect of Chinese that is not their native tongue. I think he would do amazing things with young Asian Talent. I only sigh that Gong Li will be considered too old to play Mai or Azula. But perhaps she could play June the Bounty-hunter? Or oooh. Gong Li as Zuko's mother makes me go 'Ooooh'. She who did what had to be done to save her son.

I have no idea how Zhang Yimou would manage Momo and Appa, but I have faith.

Who is your dream director for a true live action Avatar: The Last Airbender, where Aang Saves The World While Being Asian?

PS: It has to be a director who won't take an Asian creation as his chance to make his own version of Star Wars (No Thank You M.Night Assimilationpants)

[Comments Open]

Read These Links

Read This

- The Neutral and The Marked: A Primer For Your Kids


- From Pale To Pumped: With Racial Stereotypes


- Why & How People Of Colour Are Included In Advertising: 1st of a Series

- "Your Body": Men Are People and Women Are Women

Everything that activists have been saying, of how white equals the default, equals neutral primarily white male at that and everything else is other. Everything else is marked and labeled differently.

When we say this stuff is everywhere we do mean everywhere. It's indoctrinated from the very beginning of life; in toys, on tv, in how people relate to the infant or child.

"What a pretty baby, is a boy or a girl?"

"What a pretty little black/asian baby."

The answer to this is not to say well, don't mention race at all. Because it's already been proven that not mentioning race, due to years of social conditioning, defaults to white. The answer is to make race and culture recognized as distinctive but not fundamentally different.

I'm a girl, someone else is a boy. It's pretty damn distinctive. But we're both adults, or children depending on age and experience and we're definitely both human beings. If I'm the black woman and someone else is a white male, it's distinctive, it means something, it filters and shades our perspectives and that is important.

But there is no either or scenario. It's not 'be human' or 'be a black/asian/american first nations human'.

It is not impossible to hold two concepts in the mind at the same time. If lemonade can be sweet and tart or sweet and sour, surely the concept of a human being having distinct experiences as well as more common ones can be understood - no matter how impossible various individuals would like to make it seem, world wide.

Human AND Muslim (not plus, like it's some built on addition or extra attribute that comes in a special kit). Human AND Female. Human AND Black.

Frankly, I think that 'special kit' attitude is why so many white people scramble to find american first nation history in their family pasts and why they embrace other cultures, like hiphop. They figure they had to throw away their special kit to become white, so now they'll just annex someone else's distinctiveness because they had to give something up and sacrifice equals oppression.

Nevermind they gave up their roots in the hopes of meeting and matching up to the financial elite and became 'white'.

But if this stuff gets caught early enough, if it's an African Descended Family Toy Set, with an Asian Descended Family Toy Set with a European Descended Family Toyset (and notes for ALL on where in that particular Diaspora that family came from) - then maybe there can be change.

I was reminded today of the Sami, which I grew up learning about under a different name. And it brought home a point I've been nibbling on for a while when it comes to the phrase 'Indigenous Peoples'.

White folk were indigenous peoples too. They've the indigenous peoples of Europe. And they like to forget that their greed and wars and using up resources of their homelands led to them venturing out to meet other indigenous groups and then lying to them and defrauding them and killing them off with their native diseases. Or rather, those with power in those native tribes, lied and cheated, both the new indigenous peoples they met and their own, less wealth endowed, peoples.

And I guess if you write your history to say that the only other human beings you found in the world, were all inferior to you, then you don't have to think about the lying and cheating and murder. And it's possibly even easier to do with strangers after you've already practiced it on your own people.

But that just leaves guilt in the end - useless, impractical guilt and a whole lot of habits to learn to drop. I wonder if all the people saying 'Teach us. But you never teach us. You keep telling us to learn on our own.' Are basically saying the lying, cheating, murder is hereditary and comes with a side of laziness?

Funny that's what they keep saying is wrong with the people they tend to lie to, cheat from and murder. Intergenerational projection, perhaps? Maybe coming from all that useless guilt?

And then there's wondering as to why some folk won't accept an apology that's nothing but a 'Please forgive me for my huge sense of entitlement guilt. Please tell me what to do, impose a penance because after all, you still work for me.'

Moment of Overwhelming Disgust

So Marvel's all with the rape (Spiderman gets drunk and has dub-con sex and now someone impersonates Peter and has sex with his former roommate) and SGU is all with body-switching rape, dubious consent issues, white man sticking his penis in a lesbian's body even after the original owner of said body turned him down - with extra disability fail (people in wheelchairs aren't full human beings or sexual beings, don't you know)

And then there's the Racefail by scifi AUTHORS continuing....

2009 & Speculative Fiction making me throw up since January.

Why the eff do I like this genre again? What am I honestly getting out of it besides a headache, sore throat, upset stomach and high blood pressure?

All that's missing for this year is Misty Lackey and Susan Cooper each saying something profoundly stupid and painful (such that I cannot even imagine it) and this year will hit my 'It's time to burn these books' threshold.' Not sell them or give them away - burn them for the cleansing of my soul.

Let me be upfront about my naivete. I did not foresee having to absolutely avoid all mentions of Marvel, DC and all SF writers I haven't had an online interaction with (that group is tiny by the way).

Hellacious Bloodsoaked Kumquats this is a hell of a year.

The Magical Black POTUS

The black man is in the seat of power. The magical bindings have come all undone. What was underground is now bubbling forth like vomit and right out of Speculative Fiction's very pale pink caucasian mouths (and fingertips).

There's a new power couple vying for 'Most WTF White People Ever'. Bull and Sh*tt*rly better watch out. J.Lamplighter and John C. Wright are coming for the crown and they will insult everyone from Muslims to Inuits to get it. Oh yes, and gays - Wright also wants O.Scott Card for a footstool.

No, I'm STILL not linking to these assholes. But I am watching history replay itself, however (in just 8 months). Where the white wife claims to catch a clue and then the white husband takes up the slack and tries to jism over everyone.

What I want to know is, how come I wasn't invited to the racism uncorking ceremony? I can chant Frederick Douglas and Marcus Garvey's names as well as anyone else. I got really good chanting Mandela back in my pre-teens too.

Note: Part of me, I admit, does wonder if this is all nothing but an attempt to drum up sales during an economic depression with the hope that the Klan, Neo Nazis, White Supremacists and Other Conservatives might pick up a book involving aliens or magic.

Vocabulary

If you're the person who broke down via dictionary definitions the term Reverse Discrimination, or if you know of the person or remember the site that has it, could you please comment and link it to me? I'd appreciate it.

That said:

Someone broke down reverse discrimination and it made me think.

Reverse:

• 1. opposite or contrary in position, direction, order, or character: an impression reverse to what was intended; in reverse sequence.



• 3. pertaining to or producing movement in a mechanism opposite to that made under ordinary running conditions: a reverse gear; a reverse turbine.



• 4. acting in a manner opposite or contrary to that which is usual, as an appliance or apparatus.



• 10. an adverse change of fortune; a misfortune, check, or defeat: to meet with an unexpected reverse.



• 17. to turn inside out or upside down.

I've kept the numbering because I didn't even go flip through an actual dead tree dictionary. I went to dictionary.com. Hopefully, some of you are now having illuminating moments. I know I certainly did when I read the original post. That post wondered why it was called reverse discrimination. And wow, doesn't the dictionary definition make it plain.

Of course my strong emphasis (usually seen as bold) likely helps the illumination along. But I needed that bolding there for me. I need the visual to come to mind, strongly, for every time someone brings up how there is no racism, but somehow, there is reverse racism, reverse discrimination. Somehow, despite there being NO RACISM. NONE.

It is a reverse of fortunes that is happening to whites. It is the world going inside out or upside down, on whites. It is the system moving OPPOSITE TO THE WAY IN WHICH IT WAS INTENDED and thus, trodding on whites.

Racism didn't leave, die or disappear. It just picked up a dictionary. It went to college and got a BA in BS.

The original post blew my mind (which is why I want to find it again and link it - I'm pretty sure it's someone I read regularly too. But everyone I think it is, it hasn't been)

But like I said - blew my mind. There's a reason they won't use the term 'bigotry'. There's a reason they won't say it was plain old discrimination. Nuh uh. It was reverse discrimination - things done gone backwards to the way the world's supposed to be and a white (man) is finding himself on the bottom! It ain't right!

From now on, whenever I encounter someone spewing that nonsense, I'm going to tell them find a dictionary and look up the word reverse. Then I'll wait and see if they have two brain cells to rub together.

If they do, maybe then we can have a conversation about (white) privilege.

Transformative Works Totally Rule!

This amazing photo-essay by Peter Parker of 'The Mutant Problem' is just one of the many ways fanfiction is cool, and fanfiction right now is cooler than PTB Marvel (at least to me).

Link found via Box-in-the-Box.

Comment to the creator of the tranformative work here at her LJ.

New tag for these little pick-me ups: oasis moments.

Not Me

Time and time again I hear "Well, I didn't pay any attention to it because it had nothing to do with me."

Racism? Nothing to do with me.

Sexism? Nothing to do with me.

Transphobia and Cisgenderism? Nothing to do with me.

Homophobia? Nothing to do with me.

Biphobia? Nothing to do with me.

And then when people go to have their safe and private spaces, the first thing one hears is "What about ME?! Why are you excluding ME?! What are you saying in there?! Why are you talking about ME??! I know you're talking about ME!!!"

Privilege = socially groomed narcissism (Credit: Skywardprodigal).

I see it my comrade, my friend, my sword sister. I see it.

*____________*

What inspired this post? It was reading up on Writercon and some incidents that happened there and reading one particular individual going 'How was I supposed to know that panel had anything to do with Racefail/Racial things that had been going on this year. I thought that was all over back in January. I wasn't paying attention to it because it had nothing to do with me.'

The food on this person's plate comes from politicized racial imbalance and imperialistic corporate domination. From Del Monte to Chiquita, from Monsanto to 'Organic' Lettuce. The books they read? Majority white. The other media they consume? Also majority white.

And yet? A large, months long lasting conversation about race and representation in writing (while they claim interest in writing) had nothing to do with them. It was not part of their personal bubble view of the world.

And they admit this purposeful, rarefied self ignorance proudly with the expectation it should get them some sort of easement and instant compassion for not understanding or being aware of particular concepts.

And they act boggled at the thought that just going to listen to someone speak; that passive act; is not an act of self education.

Privilege = socially groomed narcissism (Credit: Skywardprodigal).

I see it, my kith, my kinwoman, my shield companion.

I see it.

Willow Fail, Sinbad, Thinky Thoughts, Avatar

I adore the animated film: Sinbad: Legend Of The Seven Seas. I have hazy memories of being told Sinbad stories before bed as a child; outrageous tales of giant birds and huge jewels and a sailor who pushed his luck to the limit. So I accepted the Hollywood version in the animated film, and only squinted a bit at the introduction of Eris and names like Syracuse and Thebes and the Grecian like cities.

It was all fantasy and fantastic.

And the new spin of this book that kept these cities safe; That was wonderful! Ok, it was also wonderful to see a greek goddesses I'd personally researched and learned about acting amazing up on screen and I adore Michelle Pfieffer as a villain.

The fail, however, is that Sinbad is Persian. ^ In his later tales,^ he was based out of Baghdad. He brought his tales and prizes back for a Caliph, not a Greco-Roman Prince or King. These are things I hadn't remembered from my childhood. And even though I easily accepted that this animated film was a Hollywood version, that obviously things were shifted and moved around or randomly included (Fiji, seriously) - I missed the most obvious.

No Caliph, no Baghdad, nothing Arabic Arab, no Persian, no ^Basrah, nothing generally^ Middle Eastern at all*.

And until I started writing this, I hadn't seriously thought about the fact that the brownest character is named 'Rat'.

There are many things I adore about the movie; the animation mix of cgi effects with 2-d drawings, the voice acting and Michelle P specifically, the interesting world (building) hinted at, the way a goddess' interactions with mortals is so seamless a mix of reality and the fantastique, the goddess' very motivations as well. And there are things I ignore in the movie that make it more personal to me, forming my own narrative (Princess Molina loves freedom and self determination and the sea more than either of the two main men in her life - for example). But even having a personal narrative inserted in-between the animation's cells doesn't change what's missing.

Persia is missing. ^As are the later Arabic influences on Sinbad's story^. The metropolis of Bagdhad is missing. The recognition that in the Middle East was a civilization as advanced as the Greeks, maybe more so, is missing. An Arab Middle Eastern hero is missing. I missed it completely. I never knew it was there. Hollywood overwrote my hazy childhood memories. Hollywood overwrote it with whitewashing.

There are people who believe that China and Japan were not immensely complicated and mechanically and technologically advanced civilizations before Western intrusion. There are people who don't know the Chinese invented a repeat action crossbow, or had some of the best armor known to man for ages. There are people who do not know that when the Dark Ages befell Europe and Rome fell, the Middle East did not fall with it, but persevered against the plague and continued to innovate and philosophise (look up: The Byzantine Empire ^and prior to that see Mesopotamia and the Persian Empire and environs^). Movies make it really easy for them to think these things. Movies re-write their brains to accept white and western innovation everywhere. Movies do so with pictures, with visuals that create a strong connection to things like the dark skinned villain and the need for the natives to have a honkey come save them.

I failed totally to even question why a Greek goddess was showing up in a tale. I automatically put it into the context of 'Greek Influenced Fantasy World Alternate Universe'. And I'm an adult.

Everything Avatar: The Last Airbender did to create a visual association of Asian and First Nations characters with heroics, long unbroken history, determination (of self, and clan), loyalty, innovation and love is being overwritten by the whitewashed live action movie. It puts things back into the context of white innovation, white inspired technology, white heroics and white self determination.

Each step is invasive and an assault.

Whitewash.

Overwriting to white default.

And just like how I failed with Sinbad, some people are going to fail with The Last Airbender. And they likely will never find their way out of it. For them, this is the way things have been, always; white heroes, white chosen ones. And if someone does try to point it out to them, they're going to become extremely defensive; retaliate even.

Y'see, I know it doesn't change who I am that I missed what I missed. I know it means I was affected by the world. I know it means I had a moment of swallowing what I was handed without questioning it. And I know it means I need to be that much more vigilant in the future. But for someone who thinks that it's more about them personally, their personal likes and dislikes, their personal failings without any opportunity to grow and change - to admit to having failed is a defeat in a war being waged to bolster their egoes.

Talk about invisible societal pressure. And on top of that - no one likes letting their team down.

{Post inspired by this Racilicious article and this linked article about Dreamworks' whitewashed Sinbad.}

* ___________________*
*Note: It was brought to my attention that it is offensive to include Persians under the heading of Arab/s/ic. I'm currently looking to see the best way to correct my wording. Correction #1#2 is up for the moment.

My mistake? Persians are not Arabs. Just like Trinidadians are not Jamaicans, though both contain people from the Caribbean with unique accents. This is my lack of knowledge and my swallowing 'monolith brown desert people' unthinkingly. Truthfully learning the difference between Farsi and Arabic should have clued me in. Also Mesopotamia -> Eastern Roman Empire aka Byzantine Empire. Though I admit I was thinking 'Eastern Roman Empire' in the first place.

ETA: Got rid of small text in note Aug 30th. .

The Alien Cockroaches

Remember back in MAY when I was all District 9 looks to be a PoS? Maybe you don't, because it was in a post about Tor/Mammoth!Fail and the Fail was pretty damn huge in May. Some folk have now seen the movie and cannot believe what they sat through. This link includes spoilers btw.

But let me refresh your memory on my thoughts:

And because I don't want to write another post, since I'm already covering WHITE SCIFI DOING IT WRONG - District 9, where the intergalatic peoples being exploited in South Africa; with their technology being stolen and reapplied for martial purposes, where they are second class citizens labeled non-humans and constantly advised against using or wandering into human only zones or bathrooms or swimming holes; are COCKROACHES.

Yes.

You read that right.

The sub-human group that needs to 'know its place', that's considered a burden, that's watched and monitored and can be disappeared just like that - intergalatic. cockroaches.

It should be noted that the original short film, doesn't have the aliens as cockroach shaped. I wonder who added that little titbit, an American? Or a South African? My bet's on American.

If you do NOT see the problem here, you should stop trying to be an anti-racist. Just. stop.

Meanwhile, Peter Jackson is rapidly becoming a Hollywood living marker of 'INSIDE: Amazing Skanky Race Issues!'. He got a pass for continuing Tolkien's race prejudices, but King Kong and now this are all on him.

Intergalatic COCKROACHES, people - who need to go back where they came from! And the plot seems to revolve around a white, male, human, by the way, the cockroaches are not taking center stage in this possible Apartheid parallel.

Huh, seems I didn't mention their attempt at viral marketing that included an underground alien blogger, fearful for his life, sending out bulletins and information and basically being an alien cockroach freedomfighter in South Africa.

Just think about Apartheid. Information. Journalists. Truth.

Thinking?

Now add Alien Cockroaches.

The depressing part of this for me, is that the individual linked in the community above, brings up CRASH and how many in the white audience (and the Hollywood White Audience) thought it was so deep. So insightful. So... I don't even know, epic or some other shite. There's the fear this will be seen as saying something as well. Saying something other than 'As hard to kill as cockroaches and OMG becoming a non-entity/non-person is contagious! Separation Means Survival!'

2009 People.

2. 0. 0. 9.

It was the year of revelation; the year of exposure. The year nothing changed. The year of exhaustion.

It Was The Year Of Exposure

 
Hey, you write like a girl.

SciFi SF Publishing said to the writer. In 2009. Oh sure it was couched in today's doublespeak terms - too elegant. But this speech is not top-secret, for your eyes only, you need a key to gain access to the cypher book.

Can't find a link to it now, but this reminds me of the story of a black writer who submitted a story and was rejected, then based on the code in the rejection letter, resubmitted the exact same story, with the characters race changed from black, to white and had it accepted.

It reminds me of Millicent Black's fight. (And yes, I'm not linking, you'll have to search engine fu).

As a reader, this stuff is angering and offensive. As a writer, however, it changes my point of view around. A lot. Whose standards am I trying to live up to? My own? Or old dead self-centered white guys? Am I respecting my own creative process or beating myself up for not following their guidelines on how to write and what to write. Who is that internal editor lashing away at my work? Where did it come from? From what seed was it born?

Am I paying attention to what I want and what I like? Or have I, despite my struggles to rid myself of that ideology, still been subconsciously trying to cater to 'what sells' and 'what would be accepted'. Which would explain my anger and disappointment and sometimes boredom.

If anything major has changed for me in 2009, I am grateful for the repeated reminders to set my own goals. Because that childhood goal, that glittery point is more and more revealed as fool's gold; fool's gold plugging a fault line of structural instability and possible rot.

Non White Futurism & Fantasy.

I have to remember that.

Non White Futurism & Fantasy and Intersectional Speculative Fiction.

Speaking of PoS White Privilege Politics

Author disrespects dreadlocks by writing a story of a white Medusan character.

Neal Shusterman. Disrespecting African Descended Peoples. The Mau Mau. Maori Peoples. Rastafarians. Hindus who call it Jatta. But most of all, Jamaicans who died and had their blood shed for non-violent protest against colonial rule; these people who first bore the name as insult - cause that's where the term came from; angry colonials.

Penguin Group didn't blink at such a title, that contributes to the othering of non-white peoples. Of course they didn't. White people pay attention to disrespect of a non-white group?

Ha.

I am too pissed off to write anything more. But the next person I punch in the face for daring to touch my hair, or ask stupid questions? I won't be caring how young or old they are. They can go run complain to Neal Shusterman.

They can ask him to explain 'cultural appropriation'.

Labalestier. New Cover. Not Good Enough

This is a c/p of my comment to Justine Larbalestier's blog post about the new cover of Liar.

I’m not happy. This is NOT a victory. That’s a beautiful girl on the cover. But to paraphrase someone else’s quote. “All black women are not shades of honey.”

The cover STILL looks nothing like your protagonist. The cover STILL shows bias against black faces, in this case dark black faces, non light, non mixed black faces.

That is not an afro. That hair is not what comes to mind, at least for me, when I think naptural. That hair looks like mine and I’m multiracial and light skinned.

I’m glad your publisher is no longer being blatantly racist. But being subtly racist – it’s just another day ending in Y. I live in a country where people call my president ‘Tanned’. That girl is lighter than he is.

Breadcrumbs are still breadcrumbs even if what came before was being totally ignored.

I recognize individuals will say ‘But they spent money on a photoshoot!’ or ‘You people are NEVER grateful’. But this should not be about ‘gratitude’ this should be about doing what’s right. And having spent money to correct a wrong they did intentionally is not a free pass to a grudging half-way effort.

This is equal to Dev Patel being cast to play the role of an EAST ASIAN prince. This is ‘Shut up already’. This is -STILL GETTING IT WRONG.

I am tired of 'Well, at least'. Tired. So I'm not accepting it. No more 'Well at least they decided to use Vixen (even if she practically looks white)'. No more 'Well at least they're using a black male character (even if they made him bald like they make most all their black male characters bald)'.

No more 'token' pretense efforts at diversity, or anti-racism, or just plain decency.

It's 2009. I've seen the ugliness crawling like maggots in the world of publishing, particularly in SF Publishing. I've seen the half assed efforts white authors think are 'ok' to do when it comes to combating racism, as if the anti-racist struggle were a self centered child who could be appeased by any, any at all, sign of attention; like a kicked dog hungering for a kind touch.

Just. No.

I call bullshit on all those half-assed measures. Those attempts to appease but not actually change. I know I damn well deserve more than smoke and mirrors. My siblings deserve more than that too. And their friends and their friends.

It's 2009.

I'm not going to be patient or attempt to be understanding. Because that gets the least amount of change. In fact, things have seriously been slipping and becoming less progressive than before I was born!

The new cover of Liar is a symptom of the same disease as the OLD American cover of Liar. Different symptom, same rot. And I'm not going to close my eyes and smile and swallow.

Everyone Survives To The 31st Century

There is an individual who has altered an issue of League of Superheroes to be more chromatic. Reading it, made me feel comfortable. It felt like I was reading The 99 and then I checked the comparison pages and the pure whiteness of the future....

Shameful Damn, People. WHITE FILLED SHAMEFUL DAMN.

I'd like to promote this project, but I don't actually want to see it taken down because DC posts a cease and desist showing our blatant racism.

So I'm willing to DM on Twitter or Email the link to those who contact me. Because it should be seen. (Maybe there's a way to zipfile it and upload it somewhere, though that is less demonstrative/fair use that way).

Meanwhile I'm going to keep contributing to manga annihilating Western American comics in bookstores and other places where good storytelling as well as sequential art are bought and I'm going to keep supporting The 99.

Marie Brennan - Half Assed Is NOT Good Enough

Author of Doppleganger (republished as Warrior) and Witch, plunges herself whole heartedly into fucking up IBARW and joining the realms of authors asshowing in Racefail 2009 (all 12 months long!) by deciding a personal list keeping track of books that use other than European culture (without discussion, context, links that explain cultural discrepancies and more) is a good enough post for a week meant to be dedicated to less white privilege and more antiracism.

Adding in some new titles last night, it occurred to me that oh yeah, I have something on my website that could be useful as a racial-diversity resource. Of course, I've read only a fraction of the books listed there, so I can't say they're all worth reading; some of them may in fact be head-'splodingly bad. But if you've got a hankering for fantasy novels that acknowledge the existence of a world outside of the usual feudal-Celtic-Norse triangle, well, there's a starting point.
-- [not linking to her list]

But if you've got a hankering for fantasy novels that acknowledge the existence of a world outside of the usual feudal-Celtic-Norse triangle... apparently it doesn't matter if you start off falling into pits of racist tropes and thinking you might not even recognize are racist.

I wonder, would she have put up a long indiscriminate list of "And these are books that have female protagonists, if you're interested in reading books where all the characters aren't men." - I seriously doubt so.

It would only be too obvious the harm that could come if someone picked up, say, the Gor Novels first, instead of Oh... Marion Zimmer Bradley's Avalon Series or Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu's Zahrah the Windseeker. Or why they might need reference to understand the sarcasm behind a title like Chicks In Chainmail.

But a half-assed post and a half-assed effort are good enough when it comes to thinking about racism.

I am sick and tired of being disappointed in white people, specifically white women, more specifically white, female authors.

A Half Assed Effort IS NOT WELCOME. See reference: Elizabeth Bear. And seriously, Brennan's ghost of a cough of a post is 100 rungs below Bear's academic whitewash of post colonial narrative within a work (intended or not).

Antiracism efforts don't need your guilt, or your fumbling, negligent and harmful attempts at cookie collecting. So just don't say a damn thing anymore. It's better when you don't confirm yourself solidly not just a non-ally, but an enemy.

IBARW Teaches Us To Stop Talking To You

Riiiiight, so apparently IBARW had serious moments of fail by white people continuing to make 2009 BE THEIR YEAR FOR SHOWING ASS & PRIVILEGE.

Karnythia points out a few of the things that made that vein between her eye and her temple start to twitch the high blood pressure swing dance. (One clueless individual apparently felt some shame, and flocked down her post.)

Stay classy Stormfeather of Livejournal. Covering up the conversation will surely make the problem of white privilege and racism disappear completely out of your life. Cause you have a bubble. And everyone must respect the bubble.

Dirty_Diana also comments on what a HELL of a week it's been and how that vein in her temple has been throbbing as White People Blog The White Man Blues in International Blog FOR Racism Week - coming to a posting near you via the Outraged White People Wireless Network.

2009 people.

2009.

The planets are aligned just right for maximum and continued fail this year. I would say it has something to do with all that talk about 'Post Racial America'. But - who's listening anyway?

Here. Have some more 'WTF White People? Seriously!' From IBARW.

1. Glass_Icarus: IBARW - Listening Between The Lines.

2. Witchsistah: Untitled ( I've decided to take a break...)

3. Imperial_Artist: IBARW 4 - It's About Us, Not You.

People who wonder why this year had me using the term Blue Eyed White Devils and stopping comments here? Or who wanted to have 'conversations' with me about how I should keep trying to educate white people or else they wouldn't learn and these 'eye opening moments' are so very important - to white people; well, apparently your kin in skin felt the same unfeeling, privileged, ignorant and selfish way as you. And the result? More folk saying 'To Hell With Them Devils'.





-- Peter Tosh / Equal Rights
[Apparently I was listening to Tosh in the womb. Everytime I need a song, my mind goes straight to him]