June 2013
sorry i couldn’t hear you over my internal monologue : /
Not All Trans People Feel "Trapped In The Wrong Body" →
buzzfeed.com
The guys from Channel 4s hit reality show My Transsexual Summer talk about My Genderation and challenging the media’s obsession with one kind of trans narrative.
“The beautiful and horrific thing about the patent storyline is that, for me, it resonated as a woman—this idea of your body, your personality and your image not being yours. As an actor, I understand that and the more I’m in a public consciousness, the more I understand that role a lot of women are forced to take, which is about giving up a lot of your identity to serve the public. For me, it was really incredibly resonant point in terms of the ownership women have over their bodies.”
—
Tatiana Maslany, answering “What do you like about the idea these women are patented property?” [x] (via cosimanoirhaus)
This is why Orphan Black is so beautiful as a feminist series. In addition to excellent queer representation, and amazing, well rounded, complex female characters, Orphan Black is in essence a metaphor for the fight against patriarchy: the right of women for agency and control over their bodies and lives, free from men who seek to control and objectify them. The act of creating clones is, in itself, a metaphor for men’s objectification and control of women’s bodies. For the Clone Club, then, the process of becoming self-aware, seeking answers, fighting for their lives and freedom, demanding information, finding solidarity in one another, all of this is an act of resistance.
But this is also the reason Orphan Black needs to handle race better. Art is fantastic, of course, but bringing in Amelia, who seemed wonderful and had significant potential, and then killing her off after one episode? Not cool, Orphan Black. Mswyrr has already discussed why it is problematic that the neolutionists used a black woman in their experiments. Killing her off after introducing just makes this worse. By doing so, Amelia, unlike the white female characters in the series, does not get to be treated as a person; she bocomes a plot device. Her role, then, was:
A. To give birth to Sarah and Helena (again, Mswyrr’s post is relevant).
B. Provide the information that Sarah and Helena are twins, and that we may not be able to trust Mrs. S.
If we’d got to see more of Amelia, she could have finally got to love and nurture her daughters the way I suspect she always wanted once she realized Sarah and Helena needed to be protected. We could have seen how she, too, fought for agency and control of her body, her life, as well as the freedom and agency of her daughters. She could have developed into a fully-fledged, complex character, just like all of the other lovely ladies. Instead, she was used as a plot device to give the audience and the clones information, and then killed off. This is severely disappointing.
You can’t be the ultimate feminist show if you use women of colour as plot devices. I have high expectations of you, Orphan Black, and I know you can do better.
Random fact of the day
“Blood is thicker than water”, when used in the context of family over friends, is in fact a wildly incorrect bastardisation.
The true, full quote is “The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb,” and refers to relationships forged by choice holding deeper meaning than those of mere biology.
“Unwed white girls who became pregnant in the postwar years were considered psychologically disturbed but treatable, whereas their black counterparts were presumed to be biologically hypersexual and deviant. Historian Rickie Solinger demonstrates that in the 1950s an unwed white girl who became pregnant could go to a maternity home before her pregnancy showed, deliver the baby and give it up for adoption, and return home to her community with no one the wiser. (White parents concocted stories of their daughters being given the opportunity to study for a semester with relatives.) She could then resume the role of the “nice” girl.
Unwed pregnant black girls, on the other hand, were barred from maternity homes; they were threatened with jail or termination of welfare; and they were accused of using their sexuality in order to be eligible for larger welfare checks. Politicians regarded unwed pregnant black girls as a societal problem, declaring—as they continue to declare today—that they did not want taxpayers to support black illegitimate babies, and sough to control black female sexuality through sterilization legislation” —Leora Tanenbaum, Slut!: Growing Up Female with a Bad Reputation (via janersm)
Unwed pregnant black girls, on the other hand, were barred from maternity homes; they were threatened with jail or termination of welfare; and they were accused of using their sexuality in order to be eligible for larger welfare checks. Politicians regarded unwed pregnant black girls as a societal problem, declaring—as they continue to declare today—that they did not want taxpayers to support black illegitimate babies, and sough to control black female sexuality through sterilization legislation” —Leora Tanenbaum, Slut!: Growing Up Female with a Bad Reputation (via janersm)
my mom would yell at us and then ask
did I stutter?
and one day I was feelin’ bold - so I said yes, you did stutter
and her response was
THEN YOU HEARD ME TWICE
I talk like I’m afraid someone might hear me
“
For most of America, Psy is a funny name, a funny face, and a funny personality. He doesn’t sing in English and most people just don’t get it leaving most of them to not take him seriously. It’s easy to strip the significance behind “Gangnam Style” down if you don’t know what it means and solely find entertainment in the Asian guy shaking his hips. But what most people don’t realize is that Psy doesn’t take himself seriously. He’s a satirist and political dissident. “Gangnam Style” was a commentary, not just a fun pop tune with a silly dance.
Gangnam is Seoul’s wealthiest and flashiest neighborhood. For South Koreans, Gangnam represents the ideal life of excess and consumerism. Psy’s character in the video is a wannabe Gangnamite. He dreams he’s living the flashy, excessive lifestyle while he’s really just like everyone else, swimming in a public pool and riding the subway. But never in the video does it seem that Psy’s character is unhappy. He’s content to play in a children’s playground and meet the girl of his dreams in the subway. “Gangnam Style” is much more that we have made it, but that’s not surprising considering Psy’s background and how little we know about it.
In America, it seems like “Gangnam Style” was Psy’s big break when in fact the song had been released on his sixth studio album and his music career hadn’t been about making flashy and catchy songs. He believes music is the key to overcoming the intolerance embedded in his country’s political systems. Throughout his career, his songs have been banned for inappropriate content and have been surrounded by controversy, not to mention the fact that he fought his mandatory military draft.
Psy is a voice for his people. He’s fighting the oppression and intolerance he sees in his culture through his music. And by ignoring his worth and his value, we’re reducing the culture of South Korea into a short man with funny pants doing a ridiculous dance.
” —Opinion: American media chooses to undervalue artists like Psy from “Gangnam Style” (via kpop-confessions)
THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS
(via nikinapalm)
Everytime I see promotions for The Lone Ranger I just think “So… we’re all just going to let Johnny Depp do that?”
i hate when people vilify psychiatric pills as ‘mind-altering drugs’
like
yes
that’s exactly what they are
they are for mental illness
mental
if i had a kidney-related illness, i would hope to have kidney-altering drugs on the market
