“I think God is a callous bitch not making me a lesbian. I’m deeply disappointed by my sexual interest in men.”
—Diamanda Galas (via cruiseorbecruised)
July 2012
June 2012
Oh, the hu-manatee!: Chivalry is dead →
biyuti.tumblr.com
i feel like a lot of the points here also apply to diy culture; it often requires a lot of time and resources that mainly white radical people have access to ‘do-it-yourself’, which i really like to think of half the time as being ‘the invisibility of my privilege makes me feel smug & independent, you needy people without it who can’t DIY.’
Keeping this hella short /simple hopefully.
Thinking about chivalry as I’ve seen a few posts across my dash that got me thinking
About how much chivalry is framed in a western context and the idea of being adamantly against chivalrous acts is a white feminist ..thing.
How in communities of color chivalry perhaps has a different name, is something entirely different; pulling your own weight. Or something closer to that. That what brown folks do that could be perceived as acts of chivalry, are really just acts of kindness to their mujer for treating them with love. Not acts of power dynamics based off gender, but acts of love based of the need for survival.
And woc stickin with the folks who will treat them good is not a sign of weakness, a sign of giving into these, it’s a sign of recognizing that we too need to allow ourselves to be cared for when and how we want to on our own terms and by whomever we choose.
When chivalry ain’t about holding doors open for us, but it is about caring for each other because we need to nurture the relationships that everyone else/systems will try to break apart.
So I’m okay with the death of chivalry, because what I and we do is not and can not be labeled as such.
Alladis! The act of rejecting “chivalrous” acts is so laced in white feminism, individualist/bootstrap mentality, and sometimes becomes ableist. I hold the door for people because I was taught to be courteous, especially to older folks. A guy holds the door for on a date because he wants to show me that cares for me and he’s treating me to a good time. Giving your seat up on the bus for a woman because WOC work many hours and go home and work again. She’s tired. Because being a POC, you’re treated with little respect from others as it is. So it’s imperative that we treat each other with care in our own communities.
Yes! Like, how much effort does it take for the individual to ask for help? How does western/American culture shame us for asking for help? It’s fucking hard. So if someone is willing to care for me or help me care for me on my own terms then yes, I’m going to do it. If someone does small acts of kindness I’m not gonna every time reject it because I need to assert my independence. I’m just gonna say thanks and keep it moving. I’ve seen the need for independence to be asserted play out in the disability community, in the young people I meet saying they have to learn to do things on their own. Having to remind yourself that it’s okay to ask for help is a lot easier when someone you love is willing to help, and a lot easier and we aren’t shamed for it.
Y'ALL: feral-femme: just to be clear, about my last post:i am sick and tired... →
tranqualizer.tumblr.com
just to be clear, about my last post:
i am sick and tired of hearing white/cis queers blather on and on about how their sex is revolutionary cuz they made a flogger out of old bike tubes/because they wear latex gloves while fisting/because they have white trans man…
“The answer is that you never, ever, rely on another person for your peace of mind. You have to learn to live with yourself. You have to learn to turn back your own sheets and set a table for one without feeling pathetic. You have to be strong and confident and pleased with yourself and never give the slightest impression that you can’t hack it without that certain someone. You have to fake the hell out of it.”
— Armistead Maupin, More Tales of the City (via captinalaska)
the narrative trivia of whiteness is one of the most highly valued set of cultural objects in the world. the particular lived experiences of white people construct and set the boundaries for what is considered legible, and this is a primary form of racist oppression because it limits what we are able to percieve about ourselves and others. Our entire pop culture is rooted in this primary form of oppression, and so deviating & seperating from that set of narratives is crucial to the process of decolonization. more diversity does nothing; even pop culture narratives featuring only POC still retain the oppressive kyriarchal structure that characterizes all norms emanating from the hegemonic center. so while i feel that critical engagement with pop culture is important, it is more vital to set about creating spaces & narratives outside of that framework.
“September 2000 — Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Police officers in Saskatoon took a Native man, Darrell Night, put him in a police car, drove him far from the city’s downtown, and dropped him off to walk home in freezing weather after taking away his coat. He survived, and on telling his story, it came out that police officers had regularly taken Native people out into the cold with no warm clothing, leaving them to freeze. The police would then blame their deaths on alcohol. Two other young aboriginal men did not survive such incidents — their bodies were found separately in the same area where Darrell Night was dropped off.
Constable Dan Hatchen and Constable Ken Munson of Saskatoon city police were charged with police brutality but were put back on the payroll during the trial. The Saskatchewan police commission ruled that they deserved to be paid, because the two officers had been cooperative and honest throughout the investigation.” —Andrea Smith, Conquest: Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide (via thecurvature)
Constable Dan Hatchen and Constable Ken Munson of Saskatoon city police were charged with police brutality but were put back on the payroll during the trial. The Saskatchewan police commission ruled that they deserved to be paid, because the two officers had been cooperative and honest throughout the investigation.” —Andrea Smith, Conquest: Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide (via thecurvature)
i get really bored with white people who blithely erase people of color who say something they don’t want to hear by citing the opinion of a poc who does tell them what they want to hear and then going ‘some people are just offended by everything, and there’s nothing you can do about it…’
it is lazy, and ignorant to do this. people who do this though will probably live in their ignorance and die in that lack.
“Love is a wonderful thing.
You never have to take it away
From one person to give it to another.
There’s always more than enough to go around.” —Pamela de Roy (via myquotelibrary)
You never have to take it away
From one person to give it to another.
There’s always more than enough to go around.” —Pamela de Roy (via myquotelibrary)
white anarchists like to talk the most incoherent abusive shit to you when you don’t say something they like. of course it is about state violence! and not about race! oh no, it isn’t like those two things are INEXTRICABLY LINKED. no one gives a FUCK about what that old black woman THINKS, it is all about the STATE, she’s just a pawn of the police and you are swallowing media LIES. (because of course the black woman is a crazy liar, you know, just manipulated by the media and the state and even her own fucking lawyer, you know. you should think the way I think about this, black queer anarchist womyn, you know, because the minute you step out of my ideological line i get to question and erase who you are, oh shit, the power to fucking name and unname, the silencing bullshit white anarchists do. the fucking avoidance of these issues until they can either gang up on you or lash out at you. such fucking cowardice. the only thing they are brave about is telling off marginalized people and parsing complexity.)
Eshu's Playground: things i need white feminists to do before i will take you seriously →
eshusplayground.tumblr.com
i need you to come to terms with the way white women have facilitated some of the most unspeakable violence upon black and brown and indigenous people, bodies, and community. often in the name of white womanhood. often in the name of freedom. often in the name of feminism.
i need you to understand that you killed Emmitt Till. i need you to think about all of the black men and boys that have been murdered because either you accused them or your men took it upon themselves to defend *your* honor. i need you to look at pictures of lynched bodies and think about what role you played in it.
i need you to know the names of the women raped by U.S. military in countries we invaded, in part because feminists said we needed to save the women and/or children and supported the various invasions.
i need you to know that those reproductive rights you all are up in arms about were created via the destruction and maiming of black and brown bodies. i need you to know who Anarcha, Lucy, and Betsy are, and what was done to them. i need you to know the names of the Puerto Rican women who were lied to and who died so that The Pill could bring you your precious sexual liberation. i need you to know the central role white women played in sterilization programs that targeted black women, poor women, anyone they deemed too “feeble” to procreate. i need you to think about why more big name feminist organizations are up in arms about the most recent kick up about contraception than about sterilized black women getting compensated for what was done to them.
i need you to understand that at this point, it’s not about privilege. it’s not about you being able to find products that work with your hair no matter where you go. it’s about people’s lives. it’s about WOC lives and a centuries old disregard white women have shown for them. it’s about that fact that white women have been an active agent in the destruction of our communities, our histories, and our families. for centuries.
and WOC don’t owe you a damn thing. not. one. thing.
so get that through your skulls then maybe we can work together. maybe.
KA-POW! TROOF BOMB!
“No one with power in America ‘comes around.’ They always have to be forced into positive change.”
—Sarah Schulman, “Gentrification of the Mind: Witness to a Lost Imagination” (via forgottenness)
“to create new contexts that are something other than less bad versions of what exists requires committing to two kinds of work: discerning places where counterhegemonic alliances might be produced, and taking on the discomforts and risks even to ‘privilege’ (with a small p) entailed by that commitment.”
—Lauren Berlant, The Queen of America Goes to Washington City, (2002), p.20 (via derica)