ho ho ho

Merry Christmas! For those of you celebrating, I hope you're with people you love. For those of you not- enjoy the day off! Hellz yeah!

do me a favor...

two favors, actually:

1- forward this link around: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/view_cause/47176 and donate money if you got some to spare sometime between 3pm thursday and 3pm friday.

2- don't take this to mean i'ma advertise for you, too. this is a one-time deal. ;-)


so basically facebook has this "giving challenge" (i know, facebook is trippin) where they are going to give $1000 to whatever organization can get the most PEOPLE (not the most money) to donate in a 24-hour period. there's also some later prize i think that's more money. point is, if like a million people donate a dollar, you win. whereas if one person donates a million dollars, you lose. although i guess either way you have a million, so its win-win. win.

anyways, MTPC is cool. They are working to make sure that the hate crimes bill protecting gender identity and expression, "An Act Relative to Gender-Based Discrimination and Hate Crimes," HR-1722 will be pass in Massachusetts. You can read about it here:
http://www.masstpc.org/tp/article/23/transgender-legislation-introduced
This legislation would strengthen hate crimes law, and offer legal protection for transgender and gender-variant people in Massachusetts. they need money. hence this post.

you can think of it like a facebook gift. donate a dollar, and then write on my wall (or anyone's wall) saying you did it, and it'll be pretty much exactly like a gift. except you know, a 'gift' is actually just a picture that you pay a dollar for. which is a whole nother reason facebook is trippin. but i digress.

alternatively if you are mad poor, just forward the link to people who aren't as poor as you. i know we all have friends with all kinds of money buying up pictures of josephine baker in france and shit. make them donate dollars. ;-)

alright. just in case you forgot, this is the website, and you have to do it between 3pm thursday and 3pm friday. otherwise you're just not good at following instructions.

thanks and love,

kaya

fuck mtv

ok so i'll withhold publishing this post until i get approval from my co-blogger to trash a specific company, but it should be ok, right? because everything i blog is just my opinion. and brittany does not control me. i can hate mtv all i want. and i do. here's why:

so this is a spoiler. but chances are if you don't know who won a shot at love with tila tequila already, you didn't care all that much to begin with. tila chose bobby. ok backtrack a moment, and lets look at the two finalists:

dani: i may have mentioned her in an earlier post. SUPER cute, really genuine and sweet (or at least the cameras portrayed her that way), pretty androgynous, dressed fashionably and definitely not femme-y, refused to wear that crazy bikini outfit tila wanted them to wear in that one episode because "its not who she is," pretty much america's new sweetheart. everyone watching the show is in love with dani. tila seems to be in love with dani, but i guess its always hard to know when you're just watching a show.

bobby: fairly cute (for a boy) but puts way too much gel in his hair, does a couple things that would lead you to believe he's gay and then overcompensates by talking about how much he wants to bone tila all the time. pretty sexist, although they start editing that out more and more in the later episodes and assume you're going to forget some of the shit he said earlier in the season. from upstate new york, homophobic family. he himself seems a taaad homophobic but willing to get over it. not so articulate. sweet and funny, but basically just not as cool as dani.

so its this whole dramatic thing, blah blah blah, tila picks bobby. now first of all let me just point out: BOBBY didn't even think bobby was going to win. which leads you to wonder...

ok so maybe tila really did like bobby better. i find it hard to believe, but maybe. but i still have this sneaking suspicion that MTV planned to have a man win all along. i mean dani is great, but what would it do to tila's career as a sex symbol for teenage boys to have her dating a real live not-what-they-see-in-pornos lesbian? what would it do to mtv to have a show in which a woman actually captured another woman's heart?

i know at this point you're probably saying "kaya, chill the fuck out. its a reality tv show." and i'll admit you have a point. BUT i will continue to whine about this because it actually is really upsetting to me. sure, it is a ridiculous reality show, but if dani HAD won, it also would have really been an amazing thing. i think straight people often forget that even though there are certainly plenty of gays out and about now, it's extremely rare to actually see someone like yourself portrayed as a legitimate person on tv if you're gay. especially if you're a gay woman. like maybe black women can feel me on this: you know that feeling you get when you listen to jill scott and she's really saying some shit that you can relate to? i've never had that feeling.

right up until tila chose bobby and pronounced "i chose a man!" followed by "i can be your wifey," dani was that for a lot of people. and maaaybe tila really did "love dani, but was in love with bobby," but i'm stickin to my story and blaming MTV for taking that away from me.

so like i said, fuck mtv.

and before you ask, yes i do realize its not really "mtv" thats to blame for yet another reaffirmation of the superiority of straight white men, its just mtv this time. but still. fuck 'em.

stop trying to punch God!

Okay, so for those of you who probably got really confused after reading the title of this blog post and subsequently noticing the promotional poster for New Line Cinema's recent release The Golden Compass here is a quick synopsis of 'the deal:'

Okay so basically this movie is based off of the first installment of a set of 3 books written by Phillip Pullman, a great writer, kind of a tool, and an atheist, for those of you who were unaware. Now, for those of you who are somewhat interested in seeing this movie (and the sequels that New Line will no doubt produce) and reading the His Dark Materials books, I will put out the warning now that this blog post will probably contain some sort of story spoilers. So, you know. Be on the lookout for that sort of thing.

Now to get more into the actual substance of this post. I will start by saying that Pullman's novel and the series that it goes with ranks among the top of my all-time favorite books- it's imaginative, well-written and exciting, and I personally think that Pullman does an excellent job of creating fantastical worlds so different from our own and simultaneously linking them all together in a way that allows almost any reader to relate (which is, if you read them, probably a big point). I read the first book when I was about 12 years old and fell in love, but was unable to read the rest for some reason (probably laziness) until this past year, my senior year of college.

So, here comes one of those spoilers for those of you who are beware'ing of them: an interesting and somewhat disturbing feature of the book for me? The fact that they kill God. Or at least the literal figure of God in the worlds of the book. I'll admit that having read the final two books (The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass) as a more mature adult I was able to take this scene for what it was worth- a bit of literary drama dreamt up by an atheist who, when all is said and done, really seems to want people to put a little more thought into their beliefs (since these beliefs can and have driven people to, in some cases, do terrible things). But what are people's reactions?

Well actually, in most cases- absolutely nothing. That's because, even though the books themselves are really great reads, people just don't bother to actually read anything anymore. As a result, although the books were originally published back in 1995 (which means that I read the first one two years after it was published- go me!) now that a film is being made a good 12 years later people have suddenly started getting their underwear in a twist about the basic premise of the film and the books on which it is based.

Catholics are mad because it makes the catholic church look bad. Christians are mad because... it makes the Catholic church look bad, and the whole "killing God" thing at the end really isn't helping matters. But what I find most problematic is that, instead of using this book to better understand the ways of thinking of others and as a tool to strengthen their faith, they immediately have jumped up in arms about it, most probably without even having read two paragraphs of the stories (I'm sure they let their preachers give them the basics of it). I mean.. it's just so.. ignorant.

And don't get me wrong at all- I am Christian myself and am not ashamed or afraid to say that I am a strong believer and have a close personal relationship with God, but that close personal relationship does not allow me to feel threatened by other opinions or shy away from knowledge in fear. It seems to me that if a person is strong and sure in their beliefs then it'd take a lot more than a book and an expensive ass movie to change their minds...

What do you think?

inspiration!!!

i had been wondering what to blog about and drawing a blank. the world? nah. boring. politics? even worse. but inspiration comes in the most unlikely places. and by "inspiration," i mean really hot girls.

ok so no this post is not "meaningful" per se, but it is a TAD meaningful. i'm here to proclaim my love for dani campbell, one of the last two contestants on MTV's "A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila." for those crazy folks who haven't been rushing to their tvs at 10 or computers (we don't like to pay for cable) at 11 each tuesday to catch the show, the basic premise is that Tila Tequila, of myspace "fame," is bisexual, but no one knew that until episode 2 of her reality show on MTV. so she got like 16 guys and 16 girls there under semi-false pretenses (always a great way to ensure drama!) and then announced she was bisexual, and made them ALL compete for her heart. the show is ridiculous. and by "ridiculous" i mean "so great." everyone on it is totally insane. but i digress. dani.

so of the people who made it into the final like, not a million people, dani was the only even semi-androgynous type girl. tila claims that she usually goes for really feminine girls, but dani is now the only girl remaining on the show, so i guess someone's had a change of heart. thank god. because most of the "feminine" girls on the show were actually more "batshit crazy" than anything else. except amanda. who was "freakishly strange looking." but again, i digress.

my point is this:
a) everyone should watch this show and dani should win because she's great.

b) the reason she's great is she's just a normal-ass person instead of a crazy person. you know, like she's nice, and considerate, and generally doesn't make a fool of herself.

c) its actually kind of cool because now dani has this like, GIGANTIC fan base (even bigger than tilas, according to mtv's website!) which is probably some kind of television first. so this is actually kind of a big deal. regardless of whether she wins or not (she better win), i feel like all of a sudden a lot of people who watch mtv think that butch (or "futch," as dani likes to say) lesbians are cute, instead of weird. so thats some kind of victory.

anyways, thats pretty much all i have to say about that. go ahead and check it out. you know you want to.

over and out.

Theater Review: Yellow Face

that's right, i'm a city girl now. and that means i can go to the theater and write reviews of it.

ok, maybe thats not the "exact" definition of "city girl" these days, but i think my main point here is that i saw a play the other day and i thought it was good, and i feel like sharing.

so the play was David Henry Hwang's "Yellow Face," which I had not even heard of, seeing as how i never hear about things until someone calls me and tells me about them. but apparently its been getting rave reviews, and i see why. the play was autobiographical/fictional, which is already fun because especially if you're someone like me who didn't know anything about the story until you saw the play, you're always wondering which part is which. the basic premise is that after a controversy (not fiction) in which a white british actor was cast as one of the leading asian roles in Miss Saigon, the main character (who is based on AND named after the playwright) becomes involved in protests of "yellow face." things take an awkward turn for him, though, when he accidentally casts a white man as the leading asian role in his play that is supposed to be a satirical critique of yellow face. he manages to fire the actor, but the play flops anyways and the actor, Marcus, having finally found that feeling of acceptance he's always craved among the asian american community, uses that moment to propel himself into a career as an asian actor. and no one notices that he's white.

thats pretty much the end of the first act, and i have to admit that at that point, i was still confused. i liked the play, but i was having trouble connecting to it. act two really stepped up its game, though. act two brings you into the real-world moment in which wen ho lee was accused of being a spy, and fear of china was "in" ...again. the protagonist's father is being investigated for "suspicious" money transfers to his bank from a bank in beijing, and the white actor now calling himself "Marcus Gee" is at the forefront of asian-american activism protesting it all. the protagonist/playwright has a very powerful stand-off with an unnamed new york times reporter (if i knew more, it would be "obvious" who it was, but alas), and the play ends in a bonanza of meta moments (god i love those) in which the protagonist and marcus discuss their roles in the play.

ok so maybe that summary didn't make THAT much sense. i'm not an actual theater critic. i just wanted to give a summary in case it inspired you to go see it. anyways my point was, i thought this play was amazing. it was one of those things where as you're watching it you just have moment upon moment when all of a sudden you get exactly what the playwright is talking about. like the moment in the stand-off with the reporter in which David Henry Hwang asks why he is criminalizing chinese-americans, claiming that it would be like suspecting the reporter of being un-american and pro-white. "but there is no conflict between being white and being american," the reporter exclaims. bam. brilliant writing.

this play does a wonderful job of taking a number of relatively simple, unsurprising moments and revealing just how ridiculous and shocking they are, and their importance to the fucked-up nature of our society's issues with race. i could pretty much ramble on forever about how i enjoyed it, but the point is it made me think, so you should see it, because it will make you think too.

he's an idiot, but y'all knew that

da big boss coon, yeah he had to do that...

i hate to even give it publicity, but i saw this on one of my favorite blogs, and i couldn't NOT pass on the info. in fact, i won't even explain it. just watch this:




and this...




i guess he couldn't let flava flav take ALL the coonery. that would just be unequal distribution of coonin'.

in lighter news...

queen latifah is engaged to her "secret" girlfriend, jeanette jenkins. awww. i mean who was she ever trying to fool, but still. i'm happy not to have to read about it in O.K. magazine anymore. because i'm trying to quit that shit. its unhealthy.

point is, thats fun. power to the people. although the comments sections on some of these gossip blogs might make you a little sad, so be warned.

job'in.

I know I should do this in comments, but I'd like to point out to everyone that there are definitely employment opportunities that lie somewhere between the realm of public service and finance. They are often called "regular jobs." I have one such mythical job (which I am sitting at right now, oh the wonders of the internet and a reasonably liberal company that doesn't block all fun sites) and I find myself making enough money to live, save, and oh you know, go out from time to time.

Don't let Harvard fool you, you can have all sorts of jobs and futures!

Okay that was my rant. Damn, it's time to go home.

P.S. (To Kaya) Did you know that Virgin Megastore in Times Square has a whole "Gay & Lesbian" section? Food for thought. Guess where your Christmas present is prooobably going to come from..

well? shall we go?

yes. let's go.


i just thought i'd share this little new york times article with you: its about a production of "waiting for godot" in new orleans. its interesting. give it a read. it got me thinking abstract thoughts. which i'll proceed to share, in a rambling fashion:

its amazing to me, or rather, a bit horrifying, how easy it is for us to forget new orleans, to not be apalled at the fact that rebuilding is at best a dream deferred. and this article really made me think about the mentality a lot of people seem to have towards not only new orleans, but pretty much every atrocious situation in this country: it'll get better. it has to. all i have to do is wait. perhaps we all read "waiting for godot" when we were too long to understand it. maybe i still don't totally "get it," but i think the take-away message is that dude is not planning on showing up. so we might want to get off our asses and get something done for ourselves. a lot of people, especially people of our parents' generation i think, see THIS generation as an apathetic one. and its obvious why, but i really don't think thats precisely whats going on. i almost wish it was apathy - i think its something a lot more like defeat. we're all hoping that things won't get worse, yet they keep getting worse. hurricane katrina happened and we thought, "well this is a wake-up call." but it wasn't, and people in new orleans are still waiting. and the majority of the country is ignoring that and every other problem, or is doing whatever small thing makes us feel like we're helping without having to make any real sacrifices. because we figure eventually something will happen, and we'll be saved.

Vladimir: We'll hang ourselves tomorrow. Unless Godot comes.
Estragon: And if he comes?
Vladimir: We'll be saved.

rationalizing your way to a fortune

I don't like to blog about harvard TOO much, because i don't like to remember harvard too much. but since the black community lists don't seem to be taking up the issue, i feel like i have to put it SOMEWHERE on the internet...

here's what happened: the Harvard Crimson ran a 3-part series entitled "Living by Harvard's Rules." The series is a focus on now-senior Bryan C. Barnhill, an active member of the black community, and soon-to-be i-banker (or perhaps consultant). I'll do my best to make my summary quick, since 3 articles is a lot to get mad about:

basically the articles are broken down like this:
article 1 talks about how Bryan came from a very poor neighborhood in detroit. harvard gets a quick shout-out for being so financially diverse (can you believe that 1 in every 4 students comes from a family making less than $80,000 a year? wow, i feel normal already!) the article talks about how Barnhill, and many others, feel disoriented when they arrive at harvard. Bryan makes a decision to drop the do-rag and baggy pants, and take up a collared shirt.

article 2: barnhill finally finds a feeling of inclusion in the Harvard Spee (for those who don't know, the spee, and other final clubs are kind of like frats. except way more steeped in racism, sexism, and classism). he doesn't feel tokenized, even though he sometimes can't afford to hang out with the rest of his "brothers." his parents, when they visited, were impressed by the spee's rich history (of rich white men). article 2 ends by noting that people from bryan's neighborhood are not jealous of his success, they're proud.

article 3 (my favorite): is about how bryan came to harvard with a desire to change the world. to "dismantle capitalism," even. but he soon realized that doing good is for crazy people. no, more to the point, its only for rich people apparently. barnhill felt "hoodwinked" by campus liberals who told him he didn't have to be an i-banker. "they didn't seem concerned about their wallets," he said. but bryan (unlike the rest of us) has responsibilities back home. he needs to be able to help his family out, to take them on vacations, to help his brother go to college. for that, he needs i-banking. and he hopes to give back to his community first by becoming a personal success, and then sharing the wealth.


ok, so not a super-short summary. sorry. ANYWAYS, since you know i love bullet points, here are my concerns. and i'd like to note, first, that i'm sorry in advance if any of this comes off as mean. i know bryan, and i like him. but i heartily disagree with his point of view on this matter, and i'm offended that he agreed to let this story be published about him. here goes:

- the most offensive part of this to me was the part where he implies that those of us who go into public sector work do it because we don't need money as much as he does, because our families don't need us, or because we're just rich. if someone could please tell that to my checkbook, that would be great. because i don't see the riches he's implying. i do see a salary i can survive on, and even save a bit to help out family members who might need it, but no - the harvard mantra is to never settle for "fine" when you could be making 80,000 or more a year. like yes, obviously i-banking pays better than public interest. no duh. but i am SO offended by the implication that public interest careers are a privilege that people from working-class backgrounds can't afford. if you really want to help out your community, why don't you go teach their children? no salary in the world is so high that it's going to lift your old community out of poverty, so dont kid yourself into thinking you're "giving back," when you're just "giving a bit." and don't kid yourself into thinking you're doing this for someone else, when you're doing it for yourself. (and like i said, not to be mean. this isn't me yelling at bryan, its me yelling at every single harvard student who uses the same rationalization i'm seeing in this article).

- the article is right, harvard is NOT very welcoming if you don't come from money. joining a final club will not make it more welcoming. sure, you'll have friends. and maybe they really aren't tokenizing you, although i doubt it. but how in the world does that make the situation better for anyone else? again, don't kid yourself into thinking its about someone other than yourself.

i could go on for days, but then you would stop reading. so, in conclusion: this article is a shocking example of the entire reason i was constantly angry when i was at harvard. what bothers me most is a) that its about a member of the black community, and b) that NO ONE IN THE BLACK COMMUNITY IS TALKING ABOUT IT. seriously, for those of you reading this, what the fuck? are you scared people won't like you anymore if you disagree with one of the 'popular' kids in the black community? do you all just agree? or is this just not an issue anyone is even interested in?

this is one of those times i'm so glad to have graduated. even if it does mean having to live in the "real world" on a less than phenomenal public interest salary.