7 Things To Do

The events in Charlottesville over the weekend are terrible. But we are already seeing some familiar equivocations and it's time to stop.  

1. It's incredibly common to sneer at millennials and those coming up behind them for being weak and wimpy and demanding safe spaces in college.  What that ignores of course, is that women students asking for places where they can be among women, students of color asking for places where they can be among other students of color is not wimpiness, it is often self care. Watching folks with flags and torches march on a college campus is just one recent overt example of that.  

2. The various social media folks asking to identify the white supremacy marchers proved this, as several students said variations of, oh yeah, that's the guy who was always saying racist and fascist things in history class. 

3. This behavior on the part of white supremacists is not new.  If this is simply the first time it became clear to you that these ideas about supremacy go hand in hand with the idea that other people don't even deserve life, well, welcome.  

4. White supremacy is strong.  Ideas of supremacy that are threatened with extinction often become bolder, more violent.  There is no historical example of these ideas dying out without people fighting back.  Inaction is not an option. 

5. That does not mean you can't take time for yourself.  That does not mean you have to weigh in on everything that happens.  

6. It also means don't let the little stuff slide, but, but, of course, not letting racism slide doesn't mean don't stop arguing with your co-worker/friend/uncle until they agree.  Some days, just saying, hey, I'm not going to accept those statements, those "joke" in my presence is enough of a first step. 

7. This article had some tips about combatting racism. The other thing to remember is this can be done as an add on to the other things you do already.  If you already teach Sunday or Hebrew school, volunteer at a soup kitchen, fold envelopes for your local politician, if your life is already full, no one is saying you need to drop everything at show up at every vigil.  You can add this into whatever work you are already doing. American ideals and American reality have always been in conflict, but we can keep working to move them closer together. 

Three Interesting Things

1. This deep dive into the theme song of "Duck Tales" is fascinating. 

2. I listened to a slightly different version of this story on Sporkful, but it was fascinating.  We all make shifts in one direction or another with our food and it can  make family interactions in particular really tough. 

3. Sarah MacLean wrote a longer piece on how the election had her rewriting her hero. (PS, I got this after Passion and Prose and yeah, delightful weekend read.)

Passion and Prose

Politics and Prose had what was billed as the first ever romance panel on Friday. As a local member of the romance community, I had met most of these authors before, which led to the feeling that this was just a great night with friends. Historical romance author Diana Gaston moderated, and led romantic suspense author Mary Burton, contemporary (and other) romance author Alisha Rai, contemporary romance author Tracey Livesay, and historical romance author Sarah MacLean through questions about writing romance. They talked about how romance was something that grabbed them early as readers. Livesay in particular mentioned that reading romance taught her to look for partners that treated her well and provided orgasms. Burton said romantic suspense allows her to write about the hope of love and the hope and happiness of justice. They talked about how much fun the research is, but to learn when you are researching just to avoid writing. Rai said the joy of the romance community is that she can find people to have dinner with wherever she travels. She said she was reminded that her job is to keep writing hope to fill up some reader's well. Livesay mentioned her next book involves amnesia, which we all know made me super happy. When asked about reader letters, MacLean said she heard from one woman who had her first orgasm after her husband read her book. Livesay said she heard from folks who had friends or kids in interracial relationships and found, reading her books, that it might just be okay. Rai said people felt seen reading about brown heroines or depressed characters for sometimes the first time in their life. Burton said people would tell her they read her book while going through cancer treatments. And Politics and Prose is also starting a Romance book group, which sounds great, and hopefully will lead to more great events like this. This also covered the evening.

NFL

I wrote this open letter to the NFL a while back. I revisited it briefly here.  I love football.  It is tied to a lot of childhood and college memories, to say nothing of my having found the perfect sports bar.  (The sports bar, is, in my opinion perfect because it is mostly a soccer bar, and so there is a small but dedicated group of American football fans.) One of the early things I did with this blog was post my football picks. 

It's always an interesting thing, to me, to see where you hit the line.  Where you look around and say, I put up with, excused, ignored a number of things, and I hoped the following things would change with time.  And where you look around and say, yep, I can't support this any more.  Part of the reason I had switched to the sports bar was because I figured some small changes I could make included - not purchasing or wearing NFL gear, not attending games in the stadium, and not contributing to the ratings.  It was a tiny thing - the ratings part at least - but I figured these changes I could make. 

But I can't ignore that the NFL has continued to allow and pretend neutrality when it comes to racist team names that support and encourage racist fan behavior. And I cannot ignore that every time a football player breaks the law or cheats, we have to wait and see if they will be punished at all.  And yet, the clearest most obvious punishment is being doled out to a player who simply made a political statement. 

The NFL's treatment of Colin Kaepernick is just utter unexcusable crap. Even if the NFL had a leg to stand on as far as player morality, it would be crap. Teams have ditched quarterbacks that weren't working in their system before, even ones that had won Superbowls.  I am well aware.  (And yeah, I am still a little mad at the Ravens for that.) But actual low and underperforming quarterbacks have gotten chance after chance after chance.  The fact that the Ravens have an injured quarterback and and playing the we'll see if it won't make people mad game, is further irritating. The Ravens stood behind a player who stood up for marriage equality, even when a politician wrote to them to stop it. Behind countless players who committed crimes.  But apparently speaking up for the rights of black people is somehow too much?  You have to be kidding me. 

So, it turns out this is where I am drawing the line.  This is where I reached the too far moment in my head.  The NFL is a business, and they are free to not hire people.  Just like I am free to decide their pretense of separation from politics is crap, and choose not to watch.  

 

Three Interesting Things

1. There's a new tatau kahuna - the first really - in Hawaii.  

2. Serena Williams talked about the need to close the pay gap - particularly for black women.  Her sister Venus spearheaded the change to get tennis prizes to be gender equitable, but there is much more work to be done. 

3. Janet Mock spoke about going on a show, only to have them use her to encourage another guest to advocate for violence against trans people.