dear douchebag in my building-

I really don't like you.  In fact, I may actually hate you.  I understand that you want to pay cheap rent and still follow your dreams of living in the big city.  So you split a bedroom in anapartment with your girlfriend, even though you know you're visibly uncomfortable around all of the 'colored' people surrounding you.

So you come out of your unit and you smile and say " hi, nice to meet ya!" with your douchey square plastic-framed american-apparel-looking glasses and rush down the stairs.  But when that old Black woman takes a long time moving her walker up the stairs instead of offering to help her with bag of stuff she's juggling you look annoyed and huff past her, thinking that nobody sees you.  But I see you.  I know you.

You smile at the women in the building even though we can very clearly hear the big arguments you and your roommate have, and have deduced that you two share a, to say the least, slightly abusive relationship.

So, in short- you suck.  I'll be glad to no longer be your neighbor.

so wonderfully exotic

One thing that I’ve always loved about fashion photography has been the rich colors, unexpected shapes and oftentimes bold composition of each shoot.  Since I was 10 years old I remember soaking in the pages of Vogue, Harper’s and Elle, not for the (generally uninspiring) editorials or tips on what was new or in, but in sheer appreciation of the art that I’ve come to love.  Of course, I’ve always accepted my love of fashion with a grain of salt- after all, as I’ve stated before, it’s an industry rife with elitism, sexism, racism and exploitation, the proverbial playground of the privileged that, on its upper levels, is all but closed to us plebeians.

So over the years I’ve been an active consumer and a casual fan, never overestimating my love, knowing that while she can be beautiful, creative and provocative, she’s also often petty and manipulative.  Which, sadly, I was reminded of while flipping through this month’s Vogue.  The June 2008 issue of the fashion industry’s bible was dedicated to SJP and the upcoming SATC movie, but deep in the recesses of its layout is the article “from here to timbuktu... and beyond.  Sally Singer travels to the end of the earth for a little night music.”  I’m sure you’ve already caught on to what annoyed me about this article.  Bright pictures of model Liya Kebede mingling with the Malian locals, sporting “ethnically inspired” fashions in the most ethnic of all places (oh, Africa.  Sigh.)  If the imagery itself weren’t enough to warrant my defenses popping up, this quote definitely helped spark a bit of anger:

“Which brings me to the true glory of Mali: the wanderers themselves... You see women driving pink 125 cc. bikes in kitten heels, stretch pin-striped pencil skirts, and blonde bobbed wigs.  You see schoolgirls in Heidi pinafores and young boys in hip hop gear, pastoral floral dresses.  Above all, you see the world as if exfoliated of the dead layers of Western trends, norms, preconceptions.  It’s a visual and auditory jolt that makes this sandbox at the end of the earth feel like the most privileged of all playgrounds.”

Yes, you read correctly.  Now, stripping away some of the most immediately annoying parts of this article (“this sandbox at the end of the earth,” right.. how exactly is Mali at the end of the earth?  If I’m not mistaken California could easily be qualified as the “end of the earth” to this white woman fashion news editor, but come ON how completely cliche and colonial) the most frustrating part was how this woman continued the theme of “oh how quaint, look at how luxuriously I can live in this dust bucket of a country!  This is so deliciously different from my every day life!”

Oh, and the comment about Mali being stripped “of Western trends, norms [and] preconceptions?”  PLEASE.  Oh goodness, that right there almost made me want to vomit.  I’m no expert on Mali or Timbuktu, but I seriously doubt that the eclectic hodgepodge of outfits seen on the streets of this city has much to do with a collective fashion statement by the people as much as it has to do with a myriad of economic issues and access to certain resources.

And okay, I get it, if you’re an American who has never been to Mali (which I never have) I’m sure that the change from Western culture and amenities would be really jarring, and would inspire you to have a different appreciation both for your home and your new surroundings.  But, in this day and age of hyper-sensitivity to global issues you think that she’d at least once bring up something about the environment and its condition that had at least a tiny ounce of social relevancy (aside from immediately mentioning and dismissing her non-status as an anthropologist, economist or tourist) but, no, of course she did not.

So we get to the point- when the hell IS it someone’s job to have cultural sensitivity?  Surely this can’t only be reserved for us anthropology students and those in academia- I mean, this woman is a lead editor at one of the most highly circulated publications in the business, and she’s continued to support the ignorant stance of appreciating a place only for its superficial merits.

Blah.  I just got all aggravated.  I’m going to go get a pepsi.  To calm me nerves.

smile for the colonizer

so one of my friends called me today with a story (calm down, this is not just frivolous: i have a point to make here). I am going to relay that story to you. then i'm going to relay a story of my own. then i'm going to bitch about both of them, and if we're all lucky, i'll come to some sort of conclusion. ok, so now that you have an outline, let's begin:

Story 1: two of my friends (both black) were having brunch at a restaurant in harlem. a few tables over was a french couple taking a break from their bike tour of the city, very excited to be in historic harlem! there was no one sitting in between them. In my friend's words,

"a mariah carey song came on. it might have been vision of love. (friend 1) put his hand up in the air, and i started to do a little jig in my chair. next thing you know, this french woman LEAPS out of her chair and snaps a picture of us."

dang. and of course, the french woman thought nothing was wrong, and was THRILLED to have gotten a picture of the harlem natives, celebrating their people's music over sunday brunch.


Story 2: i was recently in India on a work trip (i like this story already because it misleads the reader into thinking i have a job that pays me enough to live in this crazy city). It was just me, my boss, and someone we shall henceforth refer to as "the colonizer," even though technically my boss is british, and she is not. anyways, we were in this like, for lack of a better word, botanic garden (long story. it was made mainly of rocks.), and we had stopped to take pictures by a waterfall. the colonizer took a lot of pictures, we milled around for a while, and then got ready to move on. as we were leaving that particular area, we passed by two indian children splashing in the water. their mother and father were nearby, and the father was trying to get them to hold still for a picture. my boss commented that it was going to be a cute picture, and the colonizer, agreeing and giddy with excitement, ran up and snapped a picture of the children. as the mother turned her shocked face towards the colonizer, i quietly fled the scene and pretended like i was not traveling with anyone that day.



Commence the bitching: ok so here's the thing - what is WRONG with people? and i guess more to the point, what is wrong with Western culture? the whole world doesn't have enough fingers to count the number of pictures Americans and Europeans have snapped of people and children of color while on their travels, thrilled to get a picture that really captures the exotic nature of whatever place they happen to be in. and i can bet you about one bajillion dollars that not a single one of those picture-snappers has ever had the desire to photograph a white stranger eating brunch, standing by a waterfall, or just standing still enough to be secretly photographed. I don't think i need to explain to you why this is a problem. what i do want to know, though, is how can so many people continue to be so incredibly ignorant of their own privilege, and of their constant exoticization and other-ization of anyone who is not white? How can you, an american visitor in another country, go through the whole physical motion of spotting a complete stranger, taking our your camera, aiming, focusing, and shooting without ever thinking "i wonder if what i'm doing might make that person uncomfortable." seriously, how? and for those of you reading this who really enjoy doing that, imagine it happening to you. you're sitting at brunch, and a tourist walks up, snaps a picture of you, and then coos over how positively AMERICAN it is! god. its offensive, degrading, and frankly just shocking that so many people continue to think its just normal.


so i guess the point is, i wish people would learn some respect. i don't photograph you and your children without asking (and frankly, i don't ask, either), and i hope you'll do me the same courtesy. because i'm not a fucking landmark, or a cultural experience, i'm a person who doesn't need you ruining my day by reminding me i'm actually an 'other.' i get reminded of that enough without having a permanent record of it stored on your camera's memory card.

yay

i can't believe it took me like, over a day to notice this, but now that the gays can marry in california, guess who's getting married?





oh ellen and portia - the only celebrity gossip i just can't quit. of course this means that me and portia probably don't have a chance, but i'll get over it.

you know i once had a dream (like an asleep-dream, not a wish dream) that i was a waitress and ellen and portia came to eat dinner at my restaurant. i think i asked for their autographs. that part is a little fuzzy. point is they ended up giving me a house. possibly as a tip, possibly just because they were charmed by me. to date, that is the best dream i've ever had. ellen, portia, if you're reading this, congrats on your engagement. and if you're looking to give out presents, i don't yet have a house of my own. short of a house, small monetary donations are also accepted.

on a similar note...

i know, i know, i wrote that other post a while ago so i cant just pick up where i left off as if a week hasn't gone by. wait, yes i can. this is my blog and i do what i want.

so like i mentioned, my "pet peeve" (and by pet peeve, i mean thing that makes me go into a blind rage) is when people are completely lacking self-awareness and/or the desire to think self-critically. one of the areas of life where this seems to be coming out more and more (and thus bothering me more and more) is of course the presidential race.

reading blogs is like, the new fun thing with kids these days, and since i quit celebrity gossip, my attempts to be cool have mainly revolved around various politically-minded blogs. recently, however, i've begun to run out of blogs to read because i've had to delete them from my favorites, one by one, as they become too frustrating to enjoy. here is the conundrum: all of the black people blogs i read support obama and hate clinton to the point where they refuse to acknowledge any sexism in the race, or any flaws in obama's campaign or his politics. the feminist-type blogs i read support clinton and hate obama in a conveniently mirror-image approach.

to anyone who fits one of those descriptions, i would like to pose a question: what the fuck is wrong with your brain? or, in the words of one of my friends from work, "its like a brain trauma ward in here." is it that you just want the other side to see your point SO badly that you exaggerate to the point of untruth? do you think you'll look weak if you admit that they're right on certain points? newsflash: this is not middle school, its real life. racism and sexism both exist. fucking deal with it, get over yourselves, and stop pretending like you have some sort of moral high ground when you KNOW you don't.

or more disturbing: perhaps you really don't know. maybe i'm just reading the opinions of a lot of black men who have never in their lives thought about or cared about the privilege they get from being male, and who have never bothered to notice sexism, and a bunch of white women who've done the same thing with their privileged status in this society as white. possibly the only thing that makes me more angry than a rich white male who is comfortable in his privilege is a minority who thinks that this one thing that makes him/her different from that rich white male is the most important thing in society. which brings me back to my point from my last post: not all of us have that luxury.

anyways, its late and it would be unwise for me to start lecturing you on intersectionality because frankly my spelling is deteriorating as we speak. but my point i guess is this: if the so-called 'liberals' in this country can't even open their eyes wide enough to see each other, we deserve another 8 years of bush.

also i'm expatriating.

Dizzaaammmn

Best video I've seen in 2008.  Most gangster old white man I've ever seen.

Fox Reporter Owned by White Priest

the watchful eyes of others

This post will be kind of a new direction for me I think, because in general I have way more fun talking shit about other people and why they suck than like, self-reflecting. But what can I say, I’m in a kind of self-reflective mood. and I suddenly realized, after reading a very good blog post last night, that I have a thought other people might actually be interested in hearing.

So first-off, the blog post that inspired this ramble: its called “take my arm, my love,” and is more or less just about what it feels like to be gay in public – to constantly be aware of yourself and to be constantly aware of everyone who can see you in a way that straight people don’t need to be. The author talks about PDA specifically – how she always takes her girlfriend’s arm rather than her hand so that the action could potentially be read as nothing more than friendship, how she “stops, looks, and listens” before doing anything that might give them away as a couple. I’ve been especially aware of this recently because in new york you can’t help but always be in other people’s business, and things like the morning subway ride turn into daily reflections on how much straight people take for granted. I don’t think a morning has gone by in quite some time when I haven’t been on the train near a straight couple riding to work together. They cuddle, they kiss, they stare deep into each others eyes, they hold hands, and I always find myself being excessively repulsed by the whole affair. Which maybe is just because I’m not a huge fan of PDA, but I think more to the point, and what this other blog post was trying to get at, those are all things that I would in no way feel comfortable doing on the train. even little things like the kind of eye contact you make with someone you're dating, or how close you sit next to them on the train are things i'm constantly aware of. Not to say that I wouldn’t do any of those things mentioned above, but just to say that if I did, it would be a conscious, rebellious action – it wouldn’t be about just being madly in love and lost in the glorious wonderland of each other’s company or any bullshit like that, it would be about trying to prove I wasn’t scared of anyone else on that train. Which is kind of fucked up.

This past weekend I went to a friend’s wedding, and was sort of shocked by how many different emotions it made me feel. As some of you may know, I’m not a huge fan of “feelings,” so needless to say it was unsettling. The wedding was beautiful, and everyone was super-happy, and it was just all-around pretty great, but I found myself getting sort of sad at various points, which is weird because I have literally never wanted to get married – not that I actively don’t want to, I just never really thought about it as a kid, and then recently just sort of assumed I wouldn’t. it hasn’t ever been that important to me, but seeing how happy everyone was, how happy the bride and groom’s families were, etc. etc. made me all of a sudden super self-reflective because I was like, “oh dang.” It’s a pretty big deal to be able to get that kind of affirmation from your family and friends. And I don’t think its “necessary,” per se, but having the option is probably a nice feeling, huh?

But actually maybe “nice” is the wrong word. As teh portly dyke points out in her blog post, most straight couples (or single straight people for that matter) would have a horrible time trying to live for even a few days being as conscious of their every move as I usually am. But frankly I’m not jealous of that. I’m MAD about that because I’m just in general irritated by people who are not conscious of their surroundings or their place within those surroundings, but I don’t want that. Sure I want the safety that comes with being straight, or being white, or being a man in a racist, sexist, homophobic society, but thank god I’m not any of those things. And I think not being any of those things has forced me into this kind of hyper-awareness of my surroundings that I really appreciate. Its just not every day that I stop to realize how many people in the world, or even just in my subway car, don’t need to and don’t want to be conscious of the watchful eyes of others.

moral of the story, i guess, is that yes i will hold my girlfriend's hand in public, but no i won't feel completely comfortable (read: safe) doing so. but at the end of the day, i'm cool with that, because the discomfort means that i'm making a conscious choice, and it means i care enough about her and about myself to make that choice. which is a good thing.

running man: so far fetched?

For those of you who, for some reason, may not remember the movie "The Running Man" I'll do a brief description.  In the vein of most 80's & 90's Schwarzenegger movies, Running Man delivers a brand of action laced with brutal violence that you don't see much nowadays.  In this poverty-ridden society the government tries to distract its citizens from the sources of their troubles with entertainment, particularly with a show called "Running Man," in which convicts are plucked from Federal Prisons and put on the set of this show where they must run through an American Gladiator-style course (in fact, I'm pretty sure the movie was inspired by the creation of the real Gladiator show in the 80's) while avoiding the show's stars who chase them through the maze attempting to kill them.

You're probably thinking- "Brittany, how the hell is this relevant?"  I mean, today's shows and movies, while definitely indulging in gratuitous sex and violence, aren't nearly as bad (surprisingly) as those of the late 80's.  I mean, take another look at Robo-Cop and tell me that scene where he's first killed isn't some of the most disturbing shit you've ever seen.   So, that being said, while today's violence doesn't seem to be as unnecessary, unfortunately it is based more in reality than in fantasy.  Now, I can't speak to whether or not basing violence in a fantastical setting makes a movie's audience more or less connected to it (or if it desensitizes them more) but it definitely seems to me that it creates a culture of acceptance around a lot of the problems that cause the very real violence on which movies like Street Kings are based.

Ok, to get another perspective, let's take movies and the entertainment industry in general out of the equation.  Since probably the time of the US-Vietnam War America has created a culture of voyeurism and scintillation around violence.  Whether it's the local news discussing a story about a woman stabbing a friend while watching Top Model (no lie, that crazy ish actually happened!) or some guy freaking out and punching someone on The Real World, our obsession with violence seems to verge on the pornographic.  And this whole internet culture isn't helping things, either.  One can go onto youtube to find actual videos of people being beat, shot, hurt or really KILLED.

So what do you think?  Have we as a culture gone too far- is there any going back?

running headlong into the abyss

so this is going to be a post about Obama and Reverend Wright. how could it not? but i'd like to start out with a quote i was reading today on the train: it's from Jean-Paul Sartre's preface to Fanon's "The Wretched of the Earth." Sartre is talking to the white european audience, explaining the value of listening to what i'm sure today's media would call Fanon's hate speech. He writes:

"Our victims know us by their scars and by their chains, and it is this that makes their evidence irrefutable. It is enough that they show us what we have made of them for us to realize what we have made of ourselves...But, you will say, we live in the mother country, and we disapprove of her excesses...You, who are so liberal and so humane, who have such an exaggerated adoration of culture that it verges on affectation, you pretend to forget that you own colonies and that in them men are massacred in your name. ...Have the courage to read this book, for in the first place it will make you ashamed, and shame, as Marx said, is a revolutionary sentiment."

It is shame, also, that we as a culture and that currently white americans in relation to this reverend wright thing, run from at all costs. we would much rather feel hate than shame, because to feel hate is to find somewhere else to put the blame, but to feel shame is to know you must change. More than anything else, i think this is what is coming out as Jeremiah Wright returns to the media spotlight.

I watched Wright's interview on Bill Moyer's Journal, and I have to say I thought it was actually pretty great. but apparently i'm the only one. the word "narcissism" seems to be ringing from the hilltops, which i think is surprisingly narrow-minded and infantile, even for the new york times. its true that Wright's media fling will probably not do great things for Obama's campaign, but i very much doubt he's throwing Obama to the dogs just to get his 15 minutes of fame. He's going on national television because his belief system, his way of life, and pretty much everything he's ever known is being attacked from all sides, and this is quite possibly the only opportunity he will have to defend it. Like it or not, this campaign is forcing the nation into at least a shallow discussion on race, and that might be the best we're going to get for a while. I don't blame him for trying to add to it.

So here's the deal: Wright is being called a bigot, a hate-monger, and just plain crazy from all sides. Obama is running to get away from him, and is still getting criticism for not running fast enough. The NY times is pointing to Wright's "embracing Louis Farrakhan's anti-semitism" (aka Wright's refusal to right Farrakhan off as nothing but an anti-semite), his "crazy" yet somehow very prevalent notion that the government is CAPABLE based on past and current actions of using AIDS to kill off black people, and his apparently hateful and shocking statement that America's hands are not clean of terror as proof that Wright is everything that is Wrong with black america.

fuck.
that.

I could go point by point, starting with the fact that what Wright actually said was that he may not agree with Farrakhan, but that "when he talks, black people listen" (true), but i'm slowly learning that there's not much point in laying out logical arguments about shit like this, because bottom line, it comes back to what Sartre was saying and why i put that quote at the beginning of this post: it may be cowardly, but its easier to "pretend to forget" than it is to look at yourself through the eyes of your victims. I listened to the longer clips of Wright's sermon about 9-11 and america's chickens coming home to roost, and his "god damn america" sermon, and they were brilliant and beautiful. He makes points about how god blesses people but does not bless the governments who fail them, and about how, in his words, "violence begets violence." I read the transcript of his national press club interview and found it to be quite the opposite of "unhinged" and offensive:" he talked about the need for the United States to apologize for the atrocities we've committed in the past. He talked about reconciliation as if he'd been coached by Desmond Tutu himself. Of Louis Farrakhan he said not "i agree with him" but "he is not my enemy." He refused to stoop to the level of condemning Islam, the only kind of condemnation that everyone still loves to hear. but to admit that there is even a grain of truth in his words would be to admit your own complacence in, and the ways in which you benefit from, the oppression of black people here in the US and the terror visited on poor people across the world as a result of american imperialism and american exceptionalism. to admit he might have a point is to admit that even though Farrakhan "did not put him in chains," you did. and that doesn't look great in the mirror.

this whole argument, i'm starting to feel, is a lost cause. our generation more and more seems to be incapable of self-criticism and self-reflection, and thus incapable of seeing ourselves through anyone's eyes but our own. I think that reverend wright's resurfacing in the media was a chance for people to think critically about the things he's saying that have so offended 'liberal' white america's sensibilities, and to think critically about why some 6,000 people would choose to attend his church if his ideas were so 'radical.' but its much easier to dismiss one man as crazy than it is to confront the reality that there is an entire population within this country that thinks those same thoughts, and that while many of us may not know those people at all, may have no idea what their lives are like or why they believe the things they do, those people know us very well indeed. they "know us by their scars and chains." and they have the ability, if we choose to listen, of helping us to truly know ourselves. but if this controversy has shown anything, its that we do not choose to listen, and we do not want to hear.

"It is not right, my fellow-countrymen, you who know very well all the crimes committed in our name, it's not at all right that you do not breathe a word about them to anyone, not even to your own soul, for fear of having to stand in judgment of yourself." - Jean-Paul Sartre

economics can bite me.

i'm sure it has its benefits, but at harvard, "economics" means you don't have to learn anything EXCEPT economics. aka you will turn out an idiot with a fancy degree to make you think you're smart.

i'm trying to blog less about harvard because, well, i've moved on. and i think its best if harvard knew that and stopped trying to call. but its sort of difficult to let go completely when harvard just keeps making an ass out of itself. every once in a while i'm inspired (aka someone points me to a crimson article) and i feel compelled to say something about it. this is one of those times.

the subject: "a crack in the glass ceiling" written by, surprise surprise, someone without much experience, knowledge, or writing skill.

ok so as usual i have too much to say. i will try to break it down into a brief summary, followed by bullet points (or maybe numbers. i have yet to decide). that way you can just read the ones you want, but i still get to say everything i feel like saying.

summary: in an attempt to spin the democratic primary race in a new way (admittedly hard to do these days), sophomore brian j. bolduc has written an article which (possibly unintentionally) is really quite racist and sexist. the point he is TRYING to make (i think?) is actually one i kind of agree with: that electing a black man or a white woman president will probably not end racism or sexism. the points he actually manages to make with the body of his article are that jim crow wasn't a big deal, black people are oppressed because they don't get married enough, japanese people have superior work ethic to blacks and whites (but no political will/skills), and women would have equal standing in society if they would just stop having babies.

ah. i love it when people try to make complex arguments without even thinking at all, much less reading anything outside of the ec assignment that clearly inspired the article. it makes my job almost TOO easy. i almost don't even want to argue with this dude. but i will.

ok point 1 (say, i decided to go with numbers!): the pregnancy thing - no duh women have babies. and yes, the fact that they often have to take time off from work to do this contributes to their earning less/getting promoted less/getting fired more. congratulations on figuring this out, i don't think anyone has ever thought of it before. no, no wait, that can't be right. oh yes, its all coming back to me now: turns out there are actually ways to NOT punish a woman for giving birth. there are also ways of allowing the husband or partner of a new mother to participate in the whole "taking care of a baby" process so the woman who physically gave birth is not the only person legally able to take time off work. wow. crazy. i'm not even going to get into the fact that i think this dude referred to procreation as a "lifestyle choice" in his article. i guess i'm just glad that for once he wasn't talking about the gays?

2: for someone who seems so gung-ho about economics and statistics and empirical proof, i feel that this sentence feel somehow a tad short: "Married couples share certain qualities that make them more likely to succeed." ah. so when barack obama says “…many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow,” that's a generalization and a confusing of the facts. but when you say married couples are more likely to succeed, that just makes sense. the consistency literally astounds me. i'm speechless. i need to go lie down.

3: i realize i could go on for days about these little things, so let me address the major problem in the article - its complete incoherence. he's trying to make a distinction between political success and economic success, but is confused. pointing out that the economic situation of blacks improved before civil rights legislation was passed is an interesting factoid, but what does it mean? is he trying to suggest that there is no relationship at all between economic standing and social standing? is he confusing "politics" to mean pretty much anything that is not economics? does he believe that proving two things are not directly correlated proves that they are completely separate? honestly, i'm asking. because nowhere in the article does he make this clear. if i were to guess, i'd say he's trying to say that "political" forces, aka social forces, aka racism, have nothing to do with economics. and in order to prove that fact, he's tried to reduce the complex history of race in this country to an interaction (or lack thereof) of two very narrowly defined forces. obviously there's more going on - education, the economy of the nation, various social and political movements, and changes in the housing economy to name just a few things, but to try and address the interplay of these issues would be impossible in a one-page article. so instead, just write something that makes no sense!


the most irritating thing about this article really, is just that its another in a string of articles for as long as i've been reading the crimson that are just bad: they don't make sense, they're poorly written, and they contain various forms of racism and misogyny lightly veiled as 'science.' i get that its a college newspaper and that people without that much education are writing for it, and i get that learning how to be a journalist is just that - a learning process. but i fail to see how anyone can become a better writer through producing shit like this and having an editor just give it the green light with no criticism. the crimson needs to really start holding its writers to higher standards - the paper would improve, and the writers would actually learn something. which, clearly, they're not doing in class. so it may be their only hope.