Government Science News: 19th Century Jesus Edition

I was just checking out epa.gov for super-serious professional reasons (4 realz). Of course, I didn't find what I was looking for. Instead, I found something I most certainly wasn't looking for:

EPA Launches Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships Initiative/EPA’s coordination with White House effort will support environmental education and healthier families

For the record, I find this tiring.

True story, I've been known to teach students about environmental quality and environmental justice. Based on this, I present two personal observations:

1) Unless you're doing some smart-ass analysis of the way various religions support capitalism, I think it's reasonably safe to say that faith-based organizations aren't major drivers of environmental degradation. I mean, I know the College of Cardinals does that cool black smoke, white smoke thing every time it decides upon a new Pope, but I don't recall a rash of nitrate-tainted holy water fouling this nation's water supply. So I don't think it's crucial for the secular government of the United States of America to violate the First Amendment in order to get churches to fix their pollution problem. That's clearly not what's going on here.

2) I'm aware that there's a history of church congregations organizing to fight for the health and safety of their communities. I would classify that as activism. The government doesn't really need activists per se, in that it's the government for christsake. Faith-based organizations can organize to demand that "something be done", but the folks that need to be doing the something tend to be working for the government and/or corporations.

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Aside from the obvious constitutional issues, as far as I'm concerned, the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships is an instrument of liberal social reform at its worst. People who need help securing healthy food to eat or clean air to breathe generally have a pretty good handle on the nature of their situation, they're just powerless to do anything about it. In other words, this:

Strong relationships with faith and neighborhood organizations will help promote environmental stewardship that will lead to cleaner communities, encourage healthier families and build a stronger America.

is garbage. Working-class communities (and frequently working-class communities of color) aren't the ones deciding to build garbage incinerators or smelting plants in their neighborhoods; corporations, and yes, governments, are. Our neighborhoods aren't unhealthy places to live due to a failure of local stewardship, but rather because of a failure of governance. Accordingly, it's more than a bit disengineous for the EPA to shift the blame for environmental problems to the powerless while claiming that churches have the solution. I mean, that's "progressive", but only in the sense that Jane Addams was a progressive over a century ago.

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Quote of the Day

"We don't have to see a Roe v. Wade overturned in the Supreme Court to end it. … We want to. But if we chip away and chip away, we'll find out that Roe really has no impact. And that's what we are doing."—Rev. Pat Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition, quoted in Dahlia Lithwick's piece "The Death of Roe v. Wade."

Me, during the last election, once of a zillion times making the same point:

Using Roe as a cudgel to batter feminists/womanists (FWs) into line is becoming increasingly futile because the Democrats have been weak on protecting choice—and, hence, women's autonomy—for years. Yes, Roe is still in place, but the GOP has successfully chipped away at abortion rights on the federal and state levels for two decades. The point is, certainly the Democrats will nominate and approve justices who will protect Roe, but if they aren't willing to protect it from being rendered an impotent and largely symbolic statute because it's been hollowed out by "partial-birth abortion bans" and "parental consent laws" and state legislatures that refuse to fund clinics offering abortions, what does it really matter if they protect Roe?

FWs who are paying attention to what's happened to practical choice in this country know that the Roe card is already functionally meaningless at this point in large swaths of the country—and that's about the national Democratic Party as a whole, not just about its nominee in this election. The Dems are falling down on the job of serving their FW constituents in general and women specifically.

And the argument about appointing pro-Roe justices is designed, in part, to mask that failure. Not all of the restrictions on abortion rights have been decided in the court; many (if not most) are proposed and passed in state legislatures—and only those challenged n court depend on judicial appointments. Federal, state, and local funding of clinics has nothing to do with whom Democrats appoint to the bench. Fights over zoning laws and gifted property to build new clinics may also find their way to court, but oftentimes never make it that far. Anyone who still thinks that every encroachment on reproductive rights is being decided in a courtroom has some catching up to do.

A lot of progressives treat legal abortion like an on-off switch, but it's not remotely that simple. Legal abortion is only worth as much as the number of women who have reasonable and affordable and unencumbered access to it. That number is dwindling; IIRC, as of the year 2000, less than a third of the incorporated counties in the US had abortion clinics. That's not just inconvenience—between travel expenses and time off work along, the cost of securing an abortion can become an undue burden.

Realistically, if you're a woman who already has to drive three hours and across state lines to get an abortion, how much is "we'll protect Roe" actually supposed to mean to you?

Those making the Roe argument seriously need to consider what it sounds like to one of those women when she's told how her right to choose is best supported by someone who treats Roe as a magical abortion access password.

Last summer, the New York Times ran a piece titled "Abortion Foes Advance Cause at State Level," which began: "At least 11 states have passed laws this year regulating or restricting abortion, giving opponents of abortion what partisans on both sides of the issue say is an unusually high number of victories. In four additional states, bills have passed at least one house of the legislature." This year, there have been 916 pieces of legislation related to reproductive health and rights introduced in 49 legislatures, more than 500 of which are anti-choice measures.

This is happening in the United States, a country where abortion is meant to be legal and women are meant to be equal citizens with bodily autonomy and agency over their medical care, while a Democratic president sits in the White House saying absolutely nothing about the unrelenting assault on choice.

A president who was elected on the votes of women who were promised he would "protect Roe," who now instead silently oversees its slow subversion by a thousand legislative cuts.

I continue to be surprised (ahem) at the cavernous void of outrage across the progressive blogosphere at the president's silence. One might imagine the male-authored blogs at which protecting Roe is such a huge issue during elections would be prominently featuring coverage of the president's failure to lead the charge against this assault on women's basic bodily autonomy. One would think they'd be angry at the president who made them look like fools, after they caterwauled endlessly about how he was going to be the Great Protector of Roe, but now cannot be moved even to issue a critical statement of those who would hollow it out to its empty husk.

It's almost like certain gentlemen ostensibly on the Left side of the aisle only care about Roe as a bargaining chip, and not as a fundamental right of women. Huh.

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Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

Kraftwerk: "The Telephone Call"

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Privacy Concerns for iPhone Users

[Trigger warning for stalking; invasions of privacy.]

iPhone keeps record of everywhere you go:

Security researchers have discovered that Apple's iPhone keeps track of where you go – and saves every detail of it to a secret file on the device which is then copied to the owner's computer when the two are synchronised.

The file contains the latitude and longitude of the phone's recorded coordinates along with a timestamp, meaning that anyone who stole the phone or the computer could discover details about the owner's movements using a simple program.

For some phones, there could be almost a year's worth of data stored, as the recording of data seems to have started with Apple's iOS 4 update to the phone's operating system, released in June 2010.

"Apple has made it possible for almost anybody – a jealous spouse, a private detective – with access to your phone or computer to get detailed information about where you've been," said Pete Warden, one of the researchers.

Only the iPhone records the user's location in this way, say Warden and Alasdair Allan, the data scientists who discovered the file and are presenting their findings at the Where 2.0 conference in San Francisco on Wednesday. "Alasdair has looked for similar tracking code in [Google's] Android phones and couldn't find any," said Warden. "We haven't come across any instances of other phone manufacturers doing this."

And it's all legal:

Apple can legitimately claim that it has permission to collect the data: near the end of the 15,200-word terms and conditions for its iTunes program, used to synchronise with iPhones, iPods and iPads, is an 86-word paragraph about "location-based services".

It says that "Apple and our partners and licensees may collect, use, and share precise location data, including the real-time geographic location of your Apple computer or device. This location data is collected anonymously in a form that does not personally identify you and is used by Apple and our partners and licensees to provide and improve location-based products and services. For example, we may share geographic location with application providers when you opt in to their location services."

Um. I'm not sure that actually gives Apple legal permission to drop an accessible file detailing your movements onto your computer.

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FYI

As I die, I'm not going to picture a white light. I'm going to picture Rip Taylor in a silver suit, showering me with multicolored confetti.

True fact.

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You Know What You Need?

This clip from The Brady Bunch Hour featuring a medley of songs performed by The Bradys, Rick Dees, and the cast of What's Happening!!

Bonus: My commentary as I watched this morning. (Spoilers!):

I dig Mike's groovy outfit!

‎"Turn the Beat Around"? Oh, wow. This is awful. And wonderful.

Fake Jan!

Nice orange pants, Peter.

What is this song Carol is singing? "Those Were the Days"? Whatever.

Pink afro wigs!

Is that Cousin Oliver in the chicken outfit?

Oh, it's a duck, not a chicken. Whoops!

And why does Rick Dees look like Tony Orlando?

RIP FUCKING TAYLOR!

Dwayne can't dance. Sad face.

And being next to Rerun ain't doing him any favors either.

K.C. and the entire Sunshine Band are spinning in their graves right now.

Wow. Just wow. That was unbelievable.

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On Wasted Opportunities

The other day, I was talking to Kenny Blogginz, who's busily attending university at the moment instead of amusing us with his many sardonic tales of young adulthood. We were discussing the absurdity that is Donald Trump's allegedly serious campaign for the presidency, and KBlogz mentioned how he's heard many of his friends say (half-seriously) that they'd totally vote for Trump.

And then he said: "The only time I ever hear people my age say they're going to vote for anyone anymore, it's an ironic vote. Everyone's so disillusioned after being so excited about Obama; they don't give a fuck about politics anymore."

It's all well and good for seasoned political junkies and chronically disappointed progressives like me to say, "Well, if you read between the lines, Obama was never a real progressive in the first place," and it's all well and good for Democratic partisans to argue that Obama's doing the best he can given the clusterfucktastrophe he inherited and the political restraints created for liberal-minded leaders by a conservative media, and it's all well and good to say that if McCain had been elected, surely things would be even worse, all of which are the things that get said after any Democratic presidency (or Democratic Congressional majority) inevitably disappoints.

But Obama's campaign was not the generic, familiar stuff of a John Kerry or an Al Gore. His campaign was soaring rhetoric about hope and change and difference.

And then he turned out to be the same old shit, quite certainly even more conservative in his governance than a President Kerry or President Gore would have been.

On the most prominent social justice issues of his time in office—gay rights and abortion—he is craven or altogether silent.

In the greatest recession since the Great Depression, which has left untold numbers of young adults—who were told since birth that if they did well in school and went to college, they'd get a good job and a house and a secure, happy life—living in their parents' home, unable to find a job, and crushed under the weight of enormous student loans. That's if they had a decent enough public school education to make it to and through college at all.

He promised to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: Those wars not only continue; he has also escalated the war in Afghanistan, launched a covert war inside the borders of Pakistan, and gone to not-war in Libya.

He has broken campaign promises and alienated his base and pandered to the rightwing and shit on every ounce of progressive good will extended to him and bailed out banks while telling the people they screwed to tighten their belts and pull up their bootstraps—and, on top of everything else, he has failed utterly to be cool. The man who swaggered into office to a Jay-Z soundtrack has governed like someone who doesn't give a fuck about the jobless, debt-ridden nightmare in which young people are starting their adult lives, the soundtrack to which is an ominous wind whistling through cracks in the crumbling infrastructure.

It's no wonder they're cynical. That was some switcheroo he played on them.

And if Donald Trump, or some other dipshit candidate, goes strolling into the White House on millions of ironic votes because an entire generation has been literally and figurative let down by someone who promised them hope and change, well, we oughtn't get mad at the people who "throw away their votes." After all, the only people who throw away their votes are those who believe they aren't worth anything in the first place.

And we damn well know who gave them that idea.

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Open Thread

Hosted by Captain Caaaaaaaaaaavemaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan

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Elisabeth Sladen Passes Away

Rest in peace, Sarah Jane.

Thank you for being "my companion."

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Question of the Day

This is another one we've done before but not since two years ago...

When you become the lead singer (or guitarist, or keyboardist, or drummer, or whatever your fancy) of the greatest band that's ever lived, what will its name be?

Obviously, mine will have to be Queen Cunt of Fuck Mountain and the Cult of the Feminazi Cooter.

We don't want to play The Tonight Show, anyway.

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"I'm not big on the technicalities, but it's called a thing."

There is a great meme on YouTube right now featuring videos of straight couples in which the dude is putting on his partner's make-up, some of which are hilarious in all the expected ways and many of which are really very sweet. They are often intimate and frequently moving; some of the guys talk about watching their partners getting ready in the mirror; some of them say they didn't realize how much effort make-up takes; most of the guys take their role very seriously and apply the make-up gently and precisely. I've only watched a few of them; this is my favorite.

Video Description: Omar applies his girlfriend Dezirae's make-up over the course of seven minutes. He expresses confidence that he knows what to do because he watches her get ready. And he does a pretty good job. At the end, Dezirae explains to him which parts he got wrong, and he listens and makes faces. She tells him she loves him. He says he loves her, too. She puckers her very lipsticky lips for a kiss. He says, "No!" They laugh.

[H/T to Shaker Daniel.]

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Number of the Day

99%: The percentage of US women, who have ever been sexually active, who "have ever used a contraceptive method other than natural family planning."

Contraceptive use by Catholics and Evangelicals—including those who attend religious services most frequently—is the norm, according to a new Guttmacher report (pdf). This finding confirms that policies making contraceptives more affordable and easier to use reflect the needs and desires of the vast majority of U.S. women and their partners, regardless of their religious beliefs.

...The analysis, based on a nationally representative U.S. government survey, has important implications for health policy, which is still at times shaped by the mistaken belief that contraceptive use runs counter to strongly held religious beliefs. The new report counters this myth and shows that opposition to contraception by the Catholic hierarchy and other socially conservative organizations is not reflected in the actual behaviors and health care needs of Catholic and Evangelical women.

..."There is a strong body of evidence demonstrating that contraceptive use and the prevention of unintended pregnancy improves the health and social and economic well-being of women and their families," says Adam Sonfield, a Guttmacher policy analyst. "Women from all walks of life and varying religious affiliations have come to this same conclusion and acted on it. Sound public policy making should recognize this and support women by making contraceptives easier and more affordable to use. Health policy should not serve as a proxy for religious dogma."

It is ridiculous that in the year two thousand and eleven, we cannot agree to give women access to every reproductive option available and just let them decide what works best for them.

I am 100% pro-choice, and I trust women.

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Daily Dose of Cute

As promised, a picture of Sophie sleeping on my new blanket:



Other scenes of naptime at Shakes Manor are below the fold (on most browsers)...

Literally, the calmest Olivia has ever been in her life.


Lady Matilda of Snoozington


Dudley, aka "The Neck"

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Quote of the Day

"Negative images can powerfully affect boys and girls, but positive images have the same kind of impact. We know that if girls can see characters doing unstereotyped kinds of occupations and activities, they're much more likely as an adult to pursue unusual and outside-the-box occupations. I really believe that if you can see it, you can be it."—Geena Davis, in an excellent interview with the Wall Street Journal about the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, which seeks to "work with content creators to increase the number of girls and women in films and television shows aimed at kids."

If you've never seen the speech about female images in children's programming that Davis gave at the National Conference for Media Reform, I highly recommend it, in addition to the interview.

[H/T to Shaker Erin.]

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Endangered White Men: The Saga Continues!

In a Newsweek article more accurately described as a lamentation on the possible loss of privilege, Rick Maren and Tony Doukopil explore the plight of the "Beached White Male.” More specifically, they continue the ever popular myth of "the endangered white man.” From the article:

Brian Goodell, of Mission Viejo, Calif., won two gold medals in the 1976 Olympics. An all-American, God-fearing golden boy, he segued into a comfortable career in commercial real estate. Until 2008, when he was laid off. As a 17-year-old swimmer, he set two world records. As a 52-year-old job hunter, he’s drowning.

Brock Johnson, of Philadelphia, was groomed at Harvard Business School and McKinsey & Co., and was so sure of his marketability that he resigned in 2009 as CEO of a Fortune 500 company without a new job in hand. Johnson, who asked that his real name not be used, was certain his BlackBerry would be buzzing off its holster with better offers. At 48, he’s still unemployed.

Two coasts. Two men who can’t find jobs. And one defining moment for the men in the gray flannel suits who used to run this country. Or at least manage it.
Capitalism has always been cruel to its castoffs, but those blessed with a college degree and blue-chip résumé have traditionally escaped the worst of it. In recessions past, they’ve kept their jobs or found new ones as easily as they might hail a cab or board the 5:15 to White Plains. But not this time.

[snip]

The same guys who once drove BMWs, in other words, have now been downsized to BWMs: Beached White Males.

The theme throughout the article is that the effects of the “Mancession” are suddenly more alarming because people like this--Ivy-league educated, BMW driving, white men--might be suffering, too!

I don’t know rightly where to start or stop with this article because it is so very, very loaded. Maren and Doukopil really used the phrase “All American… golden boy.” They really casually reference the easy way in which white men "hail a cab," an un-innocent choice of words, an invocation of the sorts of things white men have been able to take for granted, given cab drivers' well-documented reluctance and outright refusal to stop for men of color. They really suggest that white men used to run the country, as if the presidency of Barack Obama renders invisible the makeup of Congress, the court system, the governorships, business leaders… well, you know. But most disturbingly, they really imply that the situation created by the recession is unfair, not solely because these men “deserve” security because they are educated or made good career choices (that would be problematic enough in and of itself given the unequal access to education and work opportunities, but I digress), but they “deserve” better because they are white and male.

See, the endangered white man myth does not solely rest on the zero-sum argument that white men are increasingly disadvantaged in this country by the gains of women and people of color. The myth is also fed by the fear that being white and male will no longer bring all the old advantages. Claiming that white men are suffering unfairly or disproportionately is the not-so-subtle code for, “Ahh! The old system of privilege is being dismantled and we want to hold onto it!” Many white men have come to see the benefits of the privileging of whiteness and maleness as their due, as rights to which they are entitled. When that privilege seems even remotely challenged, when the systems that have upheld and institutionalized their "exceptionalism" seem no longer to do so, the result is a "real" crisis, i.e. one felt by the people deemed most important in society.

And so, Maren and Dokoupil inform us that the term “ ‘socioeconomically disadvantaged populations’… now includes white males.” This operates at once, as an acknowledgement of class and an ahistorical disappearance of generations of poor and working class white men, commensurate, I guess, with their focus on the plight of white men with the most social privilege. They speculate on the devastating effects the recession may have on the mental health and well-being of these men who might feel less-than-men. And they equate (their problematic definition of) manhood solely with the experiences and existence of upper class white men as they wonder, “Can manhood survive the lost decade?”

The power of the endangered white man myth lies partially in its ability to obscure the plight of people who really are suffering inordinately. In this case, in an admittedly terrible economy in which white men are struggling, they still have relative privilege to everyone else, who are also struggling, but even worse. For example, the alarming statistic around which the Newsweek article is organized is this: “Through the first quarter of 2011, nearly 600,000 college-educated white men ages 35 to 64 were unemployed, according to previously unpublished Labor Department stats. That’s more than 5 percent jobless.”

Y’all… when I looked quickly at BLS statistics for March 2011, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for white men 20 and over was 7.7% For black men in the same age group, it was 16.8%

But Newsweek makes it clear to whom we should direct our attention and concern. For the last few years, we have been repeatedly told that the effects of this recession are somehow made more damaging because it purportedly affects men more than women. Now, we learn, its even worse than we thought because it is affecting the men who matter most.

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An Observation

Last night, I watched back-to-back the latest episode of AMC's The Killing (which was very good; Mirelle Enos and Michelle Forbes alone make that show worth watching) and Showtime's Nurse Jackie (Anna Deavere Smith and Merritt Wever are comedy goddesses: The End).

And it occurred to me that I couldn't remember the last time I watched two shows in a row with female protagonists who weren't sharing top billing with a dude, no less two shows with female protagonists that have well-developed secondary female characters, too. This made me happy on one hand (the hand of Getting to Watch These Shows) and sad on the other hand (the hand of This Being a Remarkable Moment).

Across both those shows, only one of those awesome female characters is not white (Anna Devere Smith's Gloria Akalitus in Nurse Jackie) and only one is not straight (Eve Best's Dr. Eleanor O'Hara in Nurse Jackie). None of them are fat or have a visible disability. That just made me straight-up sad.

I'm pretty sure there are women of color and lesbian/bi women and fat women and women with disabilities (not mutually exclusive groups) in New York City and Seattle. Ahem.

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It's A Fact!

Top five epic** pop songs:

1. Nina Simone "Sinnerman" 10:22

2. The Wild Swans "Sea Of Tranquility" 10:53

3. The Velvet Underground "Sister Ray" 17:27

4. Jeff Buckley: "Kanga-Roo" 14:09

5. Orbital "Out There Somewhere?" 24:08

Honorable mention: The Posies "Flood Of Sunshine" 8:22


** To qualify, songs must be at least 9:33 in length. This is known as the Jungleland Rule.

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Today in Barf News

This morning, President Obama hosted an "Easter Prayer Breakfast" for the second year in a row, and announced that he wants to make it an annual event.

"I'm going to make it annual," Obama told Christian leaders from across the country gathered in the East Room. "The Easter Egg Roll, that's well established. The Prayer Breakfast, we started last year."

The reason: In tough times, personal or professional faith helps.

"There's something about the resurrection of our savior Jesus Christ that puts everything else into perspective," Obama said.

1. I am absolutely aghast that the most powerful man in the nation suggests that people need to turn to their faith during hard times, when he has the capacity to champion a comprehensive and fully-funded social safety net that would answer lots of those prayers.

2. Bullshit he's doing this because "the resurrection...puts everything else into perspective." He's doing it because he's started campaigning for 2012 and is (again) tacitly pandering to the Birther crowd and other rightwing extremists who insist that he's a secret Muslim. And guess what? THIS WON'T CHANGE THEIR MINDS. (See also.)

3. As an atheist, I say this with all due respect, Mr. President: Fuck off.

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Film Corner!

This is a real trailer for a real movie in the world:

Video Paraphrase: The early 1960's South. White ladies with big hair. Apatowian ingénue Emma Stone is the prodigal belle, returning home from college. She is named Skeeter because no doy. This is a MAJOR MOTION PICTURE based on a SENSATIONAL BESTSELLER, people. Skeeter tells her mama she got a job writing for the Jackson Journal. Mama says, "Great! You can write my obituary: Charlotte Phelan, dead. Her daughter—still single." So sassy!

Tony-winning and Oscar-nominated actress Viola Davis is a nanny for a white lady. She is named Aibileen. She is clearly cleverer than the clueless white lady for whom she works. This is tragic, but the wacky period music assures us we can chuckle at her soul-destroying fate.

Something something Skeeter's white lady friend writes legislation requiring white people to build a separate bathroom for "the help." Skeeter is snarky. Aibileen overhears her snarkiness and grins. MAYBE THESE TWO LADIES CAN FORM AN UNLIKELY FRIENDSHIP!!!

Meet some more black nannies/maids. Zany music. In voiceover, Skeeter says, "These women raise white children. We love them and they love us. [YOU SURE ABOUT THAT?—ed.] But they can't even use the toilets in our houses."

Abilieen's friend and fellow "help" Minny pretends to use the toilet at her employer's house. (I think her employer is the same white lady who wrote the Bathroom Bill.) She gets fired. Skeeter tells her editor, "I want to write something from the point of view of the help." The music starts getting serious, yo.

Something something the nannies/maids don't want to be interviewed. A black preacher gives a sermon about being brave. GOOD TIMING! Aibileen will be interviewed! Now ALL the "help" will be interviewed! Words on the screen tell us everything is about to change OMG.

Skeeter writes a book called "The Help." Everyone's reading it! White ladies are scandalized! Gospel music. Montage of white ladies and black ladies hugging and grabbing hands and laughing, evidence of their UNLIKELY FRIENDSHIP.

Coming this August.

And that is the story of how everything changed and there was no more racism. The End.

Except for how whooooooops that's not true. Also: Women in low-wage jobs are still frequently not allowed to use employers' bathrooms, or are only allowed to use particular bathrooms, or are only allowed ridiculously short and infrequent bathroom breaks. (Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed, for example, addresses how maids, waitresses, and Wal-Mart workers are all frequently subject to absurd bathroom rules.)

Of course, a movie about the denial of modern low-wage workers' basic dignity would never get made (no less a movie about them unionizing, instead of being saved by a privileged white person)—because everyone at the studio involved in making this movie (Disney) has maids and nannies and other low-wage female workers (probably brown-skinned or Eastern European immigrants) about whose dignity, or lack thereof, they don't want to be reminded. They want to tell feel-good stories set to Motown music about white people saving brown people, back in the Bad Old Days, WHICH WE ARE SO TOTALLY PAST FOR SURE.

Gabe, who gets the hat tip, wonders for whom a film like this is made: "The question I'm asking is: Who is supposed to FEEL BETTER after watching this movie? Clearly, based on the emotionally manipulative soundtrack, SOMEONE is supposed to feel better, I just can't figure out WHO!" And that's who—the people who tell these stories. The pop novelists, the publishers, the screenwriters, the producers, the directors. They're the ones who want to read/see/hear stories that reassure them that they're good people, artists, not exploitative garbage capitalists who don't recognize the humanity of anyone who makes less than they do.

Dear Hollywood: If you want to make a REVOLUTIONARY FILM about the friendship between a black woman and a white woman, try this radical idea—two women, one black, one white, who meet, share similar interests, discover they have the same wicked sense of humor, totes dig each other, and start hanging out. I'm pretty sure that's LITERALLY never been put on film before. Who says there are no new ideas under the sun? That one's free. Love, Liss.

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Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

Shriekback: "Nemesis"

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