Excellent visual argument about Palestine. Compelling visuals, crisp juxtaposition and significant argument about the importance of graffiti.
Category Archives: protest
Gamergate, autoblocker, anti-trans violence and sea lions: Katherine Cross for the win
One of the most productive commentators about so-called gamergate is Katherine Cross. Her recent post on Feministing is so on point that it deserves some archival / expansion work.
1. There is an autoblocking program for twitter that removes most of the posts from gamergate trolls. For anyone out there interested in civil space, this is a big improvement. Cross describes it this way:
What offends GamerGaters about the autoblocker, aside from the fact that a woman found a technical solution to a social problem, is that it denies them the ability to impose themselves on targets. The idea that the women, people of colour, and queer folk who’ve comprised the majority of GG’s targets might be able to curate their online spaces and have certain discussions only with those of their choosing is repugnant to many GamerGaters. In the absence of genuine legal recourse, the worst thing you can do to a bully, harasser, or troll is ignore them after all.
via Revenge of the Sealion: GamerGate’s crusade against blocking.
2. Underscoring much of the gamergate vitriol is a toxic anti-trans politics. Much of the visibility of the violence seems to have a direction. Again Katherine Cross gathers enough targeted tweets and message board quotes to rile me up. For those who are trans-inclusive, trans-positive, or simply kind human beings, it is worth marking gamergate as a particularly anti-trans moment in time.
3. Katherine Cross introduces me to the idea of “sealioning” — a refined bullying tactic. Cross explains:
“Polite” GGers, defined as those who do not explicitly swear or use slurs, nevertheless harry the people they target because they do not take no for an answer and come in packs. The phenomenon of “sealioning”– barraging a target with politely worded but interrogating questions asked in bad faith– gained a name under GamerGate because of how common the tactic was.
via Revenge of the Sealion: GamerGate’s crusade against blocking.
Also provided is this nice comic!
Filed under Animals, communication, feminism, Gay, hacking, human rights, intersectionality, protest, representation, resistance, sexism, Surveillance, technology, video games
Justice for Mike Brown: disrupting the symphony
Beautiful music. A moment of public dialogue interjected into a space for beautiful music. I don’t know how I missed this St. Louis symphony showdown.
Elizabeth Vega on the conception of the symphony as a protest space. Daily KOS reports:
Elizabeth: Two weeks ago, Sarah and I participated in a direct action at Cardinal Stadium. We did a series of banner drops at a baseball game with folks. We are both middle aged I am a grandmother and I am brown and Sarah is white. People were incredibly rude and racist to us at the game. They booed us. Told us “Pants up dont loot” etc.. They clearly saw what they wanted to see. We were escorted out in handcuffs and chanted “No justice! No Peace!” It was a rough night where we didnt feel any love. Sarah suggested that night, jokingly, that perhaps we needed another venue. The next day she said she wanted to do an action at the symphony. I was on board and immediately brought on Derek. When we found out the next performance was a requiem we had to do it. It took us about two weeks among planning other actions and events for the national mobilization. We are all very busy but carved out about five hours total to recruit, plan and organize.
via Requiem for Mike Brown protest at St. Louis Symphony exposes both white privilege and support.
Thanks to feministing for the suggestion, link and video.
Filed under art, class, human rights, memorial, music, protest, representation, resistance
Limitations of solidarity: Vanderbilt rape
A few months ago I wrote about two tactics of solidarity with a survivor of sexual assault.
I’m looking at some recent press and it turns out that neither was all that effective and may not be very survivor-centered.
Survivor-centered means that the focus of analysis and decision-making reflects the desires of the survivor. It is an ethical lens that is valuable in fighting against rape culture.
In the case of the fraternity rape of a Vanderbilt student who reported the incident. I had previously appreciated that the editor of the newspaper had held accountable the fraternity message board which encouraged retaliation against the survivor, calling her the “girl who ratted.”
Well that hasn’t stopped the survivor from experiencing a lot of harassment. Here in an interview she makes evident the retaliation she has received.
S: I’ve been approached by people I’ve never met before a number of times and verbally harassed. People have threatened to testify against me and say that I am crazy. I’ve also been approached a number of times in social settings and been yelled at and even booed by multiple people. Things that people have said to me were: ‘you suck,’ ‘we had so many parties planned that we can’t have now because of you,’ ‘do you really think that’s a reason to fuck over a whole fraternity,’ ‘you’re ruining all of their senior years.’ I’ve been called ugly, a slut, and a liar by people I’ve never met. They claimed to make sure every fraternity ‘blacklisted me and all of my friends.’ I was asked to leave a different fraternity and I’ve been labeled as a risk by some others.
I’d like to immediately clarify that these are the actions of individuals and I do not believe they reflect the fraternity or Greek Life as a whole. This is just my response to those who claim that I have not been retaliated against. These individual actions together comprise a larger, unacceptable culture that needs to change.I am also incredibly impressed by the kindness of others who haven’t been afraid to stand behind me.
Also, many are trying to discredit the incident because I had consumed alcohol. But if girls can’t walk into a fraternity after drinking without the fear of being sexually assaulted, that’s an issue. Alcohol does not excuse sexual assault, which is stated in Vanderbilt’s sexual misconduct policy.
via Interview with the girl that ratted – The Vanderbilt Hustler: Safety.
Filed under academics, communication, feminism, protest, representation, sexual assault
Electoral politics in Iceland: anarchist performance art
I appreciated Constantin Seibt’s article on the anarchists playing with the Icelandic electoral system. The Best party had a wonderful list of campaign promises:
A glance at the most important campaign promises of the Best Party is more than enough to highlight the audacity of Reykjavik’s voters. They were promised free towels at swimming pools, a polar bear for the zoo, the import of Jews, «so that someone who understands something about economics finally comes to Iceland», a drug-free parliament by 2020, inaction «we’ve worked hard all our lives and want to take a well-paid four-year break now», Disneyland with free weekly passes for the unemployed «where they can have themselves photographed with Goofy», greater understanding for the rural population «every Icelandic farmer should be able to take a sheep to a hotel for free», free bus tickets. And all this with the caveat: «We can promise more than any other party because we will break every campaign promise.»The Best Party emerged from an idea for a sketch show.
via More punk, less hell! – News Ausland: Europa – tagesanzeiger.ch.
You know how it goes, they win the election, form a coalition government, fix the budget, and suggest that humorous performance art may be more effective than traditional governance.
An assessment of four years of anarchist rule yields a rather surprising conclusion: the punks put the city’s financial house in order. They can also look back on some very successful speeches, a few dozen kilometers of bike paths, a zoning plan, a new school organization that no one complains about any more and a relaxed, booming city – tourism is growing by 20% a year and some say that is the new bubble. In speeches, president Grímsson no longer praises Icelanders’ killer instinct, but their creativity. Real estate prices are again on the rise and the Range Rovers are back too. In polls last October, the Best Party hit its high-water mark of 38%. Shortly thereafter, Gnarr announced he would retire and dissolve the Best Party. His reason: «I’m a comedian, not a politician.» He added: «I was a cab driver for four years, a really good one even, and I quit doing that as well.»«My question was always: ‹How do we fuck the system?›» says Örn. «And the answer was, we show that non-politicians can do the job as well. But quitting with a certain election victory within reach, that’s truly fucking the system!»
via More punk, less hell! – News Ausland: Europa – tagesanzeiger.ch.
Thanks to longreads for the suggestion.
Filed under art, capitalism, communication, do-it-yourself, humor, media, protest, punk, representation, resistance
Positionality: Ebony on Leslie Jones, humor and slavery
Photo from Ebony Magazine, via Saturday Night Live
I appreciated that Leslie Jones wrote an extended riff on slave sexuality and the African American experience on Saturday Night Live. I recognized the controversial elements, but it was also a crash course on hierarchy for a few SNL viewers.
Slavery was an institution built on rape. Angela Davis notes that the representation of Africans as animals also meant a notorious breeding/rape part of the economy. Driven by profit, slave masters would rape in order to make more slaves.
It also necessitated a whole hundred years of representations of black women’s sexuality as somehow complicit in this sexuality. Hierarchies of white sexuality as pure and desired versus black sexuality often articulated as lusty and despised (bogus).
So when Leslie Jones turned her criticism of the subject to her own body she skipped the rape part of of slave economy. Of course the humorous part of the skit was imagining that a slave would be empowered as . . . perhaps a number one draft pick. Jamilah Lemieux, editor at Ebony was quick to notice this and argue that it’s a little 2014 for representations of happy slaves:
What about the producers, directors, cast members who watched this play out? No one said, “You know this is going to upset a lot of people, right?” SNL now has at least five Black actors and writers…one would hope that that would have been enough to stop this train. That is why we wanted Black women in the writers’ room in the first place, to prevent exactly this. Because I am willing to bet that had a Jewish writer conceived an ‘Anne Frank meets Justin Bieber’ skit after the singer made his regrettable comments about the young Holocaust victim, someone would have had the good sense to shut it DOWN.
(When does someone shut down jokes about slavery? And how bad are the racist jokes that don’t make it past the drawing board?)
via Once Again, No One Is Laughing at ‘SNL’ – Entertainment & Culture – EBONY.
No doubt SNL is a racist institution and much of their humor hinges on toxic sexist and racist tropes. Jamilah Lemieux makes clear the positionality of Jones in the ways she lampooned her own desirousness.
I don’t know if she’s just doubling down and committing to defending a completely indefensible (IT WASN’T REALLY WASN’T FUNNY, MA) skit, or if she really just doesn’t grasp what was wrong with it. But it’s depressing that Jones would play out her own issues with feeling undesirable in a way that not only made her, in that moment, perhaps as unattractive as humanly possible, but also mocked other Black women who may be taller, larger or outside the ‘norm’ in the process. Comedy can be cathartic, dark, subversive…but that takes skill that wasn’t displayed here. She didn’t call to question why women like her are, by her accounts, less wanted than the Lupitas and Beyonces of the world; she talked about fighting Crips for a White dude and popping out NBA-worthy babies on demand.
via Once Again, No One Is Laughing at ‘SNL’ – Entertainment & Culture – EBONY.
Filed under media, protest, race, representation, rhetoric, sexual assault
Elton John in Russia
I appreciate Elton John speaking loudly about his opposition to the Russian anti-gay legislation in Russia. I also think this is an elegant justification for Elton John to circumvent a boycott.
It also happens to be a justification that probably makes Elton John a whole lot of money.
Don’t get me wrong, it is excellent to see pop stars expressing their politics. And I think Elton John is a super bad-ass. (Remember that he stood up to some heavy bullying and blackmail from a newspaper in the UK). And I think that he has credibility and status for his opinion to be widely amplified.
Filed under capitalism, communication, Gay, human rights, protest
Fela Kuti: Music is the weapon documentary
Consider this a juxtaposition to the clip about Paul McCartney and Fela. Here is Fela narrating a portion of his life. Included in this film are some great musical moments and some insights about what made Fela so dangerous.
In my opinion the liberated space he embodied and willingness to share risks make him a poignant anti-colonial force. Of course I have problems with Fela’s sexism, but the quotes from the queens in this film give us some insight into their experience.
Of course when you google “Fela’s queens” you get western women reprising the roles of the women who married and risked with Fela. Perhaps this is colonialism, that I can’t find any interviews with the “queens,” but I can find interviews with Americans playing Fela’s wives on broadway. Some communications pushes out other communications.
Filed under colonialism, communication, documentary, feminism, funk & soul, human rights, juxtaposition, music, protest, race, representation
Civil disobedience for immigrant rights
I salute the civil disobedience outside the House of Representatives to encourage serious action for imprisoned immigrants.
In a historic action, today approximately 100 women will risk arrest by blockading the intersection outside the House of Representatives to send a message: inaction on comprehensive immigration reform that treats women and families humanely is unacceptable. The action is being organized through We Belong Together, a national campaign to bring forward the priorities of women in immigration reform. Their priorities include: a clear path to citizenship; a system that keeps families together and upholds the family immigration system; protects survivors of violence; honors women’s work inside and outside the home; and is not driven by enforcement. Today’s act of civil disobedience is expected to include the largest ever number of undocumented women to date to willingly risk arrest, and will also include allies from organizations advocating for reproductive justice, racial justice, LGBT people, and domestic workers, among many others.
via Immigrant women and allies risk arrest to demand humane immigration reform.
And cheers to Feministing, one of the most consistently intersectional feminist news outlets.
Filed under feminism, human rights, intersectionality, prisons, protest
Juxtaposition: Fiona Apple and Dave Chappelle walk off the stage
Artifact One: Fiona Apple at a Tokyo fashion event.
Apple grew frustrated with the ongoing chatter in the venue, a hall at Tokyo Station Hotel, where the exhibition makes its home. Partway through her short set, she climbed on top of her grand piano and asked the audience to be quiet so that she could perform. She then challenged everyone to be silent for the duration of a tone she created by striking a small metal bell. The performer grew even more angry when the noise in the venue continued.
Apple instructed the audience to “shut the f–k up” and uttered other expletives, both audibly and under her breath, calling the event’s attendees “rude.” She continued with her set before shouting, “Predictable! Predictable fashion, what the f–k?” as she stormed off the stage. The show was punctuated with other bizarre moments, such as when she hit her head with her microphone, did a back bend over her piano bench and stared intensely at her guitarist as if in a love-struck trance.
via Louis Vuitton Toasts ‘Timeless Muses’ in Tokyo – Parties – Eye – WWD.com.
Artifact 2: Dave Chappelle walking off the stage at a Connecticut comedy club.
Chappelle wasn’t having a meltdown. This was a Black artist shrugging the weight of White consumption, deciding when enough was enough. This isn’t the first time Chappelle has done so and it isn’t the first time his behavior has been characterized as a meltdown.
There is a long history of asking African-Americans to endure racism silently; it’s characterized as grace, as strength. Chappelle’s Connecticut audience, made up of largely young White males, demanded a shuck and jive. Men who seemed to have missed the fine satire of the Chappelle show demanded he do characters who, out of the context of the show look more like more racist tropes, than mockery of America’s belief in them.
When he expressed shock at the fact that he’d sat there and been yelled at for so long, people yelled that they’d paid him. They felt paying for a show meant they could verbally harass him, direct him in any tone of voice, as though they’d bought him.
via Dave Chappelle Didn’t Melt Down – Entertainment & Culture – EBONY.
Filed under art, fashion, juxtaposition, media, protest, race, representation, resistance, vulnerability
Life of refinement 