Spirit Day

I am against homophobic bullying.

I am against all bullying.

You are not alone.

If you find us, it will get better.

Please find us.

We're here, and we're looking for you, too.

Good Graphic Design

You know what I love? Good graphic design.

Today I saw an incredible example of good design in such a common, everyday place, it made me grin like an idiot.

Here is what I saw:


So here we have a star, to denote Texas. The star is then broken into two pieces: A compass point, and a strip of road.

This image was set into the highway ramp walls as bas reliefs at standard intervals.

Some googling tells me this is the logo for the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority, and that it was designed by Door Number 3 Austin design house.

Well done, guys. I was literally distracted from the road by the elegance of such a simple, every day thing. (I mean that in a good way!)

D'awww!

WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 4x16 OF UGLY BETTY

On this week's episode, Justin had his first kiss. It was in a scene, but it was with a girl he liked, whose name is Lily.

Not long after, Justin has his second kiss. With his other friend from acting class, a boy named Austin.

I'll let the scene speak for itself.



It made me squee and it warmed my heart, and all I could think was OMG THEY'RE SHOWING A TEENAGE BOY HAVING HIS FIRST GAY KISS ON NETWORK TELEVISION. YAY!!!

I love that the writers "went there" with Justin. They've never pulled any punches with his character, and they've always written him to be a smart, kind, savvy kid, who's loved by his family no matter what.

It all makes me so happy!

Whoops

John Barrowman is taking part in the Children in Need auctions.

Hey, Beeb.

That's not an American Flag.

FYI.

What We Have Here Is A Failure To Communicate

A friend of mine whose blog I read linked to this article. I don't think I have ever been so appalled by someone who, initially, I would want to agree with.

I was almost willing to go along with the essayist's ideas until she started saying Joss Whedon rapes his wife. Yes, she really said that. And not just once, but several times, both in her essay, and in the comments.

"Beyond a shadow of a doubt, Joss uses his own wife in this way," from the essay.

"I feel awful for Joss Whedon's wife. From what I've read about him and the interviews I've watched, I'm fairly certain that he rapes his wife and abuses her in various other ways." from this comment

These are the most tasteless, baseless, unnecessary statements ever put in an essay. If she was so bent on focusing on the pilot episode--something she asserts in the comments, why throw that in there? It is an ad hominem attack, even ignoring how inappropriate it is.

"What the fuck is this feminist man trying to say about women here? A black woman calling a white man ‘sir’. A white male captain who abuses and silences his female crew, with no consequences. The women are HAPPY to be abused. They enjoy it. What does this say about women, Joss? What does this say about you? Do you tell your wife to shut up? Do you threaten to duct tape her mouth? Lock her in the bedroom? Is this funny to you, Joss? Because it sure as fuck ain’t funny to me."

If I tilt my head to the right and squint a little, I can see her argument about the racist and sexist take on the Mal/Zoe/Wash thing, as well as the Kaylee thing. But just because I can see it, doesn't mean I agree with it. At no point in the series or the movie, do I get the impression Zoe would put up with an ounce of disrespect from either man, directed at her or anyone else.

I find it very disingenuous that the essayist totally glosses over the fact that the reason Zoe is "violent," and the reason she calls Mal "sir," is because she is a soldier. During the war and on Serenity, Mal is her superior. These facts have nothing to do with his maleness or her skin color.

Lastly, I found her take on Inara and the Companions thoroughly repugnant. She went past hating sex work, and straight to hating sex workers, which is really unconscionable. According to her profile, all comments to her journal which are pro-porn or pro-prostitution will be immediately deleted. Likewise, she says in a later comment, "I would argue that most 'sex' between men and women, in the contemporary 'sex-positive', pornographic, male-supremacist culture, is rape."

This kind of radicalism completely ignores the real world. Yes, there are men who rape. Yes, there are men who emotionally leech from the women around them. Yes, there are men who oppress, and hate, and restrict. But not all men do. Moreover, not all men do so out of an inherent misogyny, but because of an indoctrinated cultural setting that can be unlearned.

I don't believe this woman can conceptualize a man striving to reframe his world view.

Ironically enough, from everything I know of him, that is exactly what Joss Whedon tries to do. Whatever this woman's interpretation of the Whedonverse is, the fact is, he has written the majority of the strong female characters that have graced the small screen in the last fifteen years. This is a man who, whatever of his she may disagree with, consistently proved that a show with a female lead could have staying power. Whatever critiques someone may have about his reliance on archetypes, I never felt for a second that he didn't try to set those same archetypes on their ears.

Joss Whedon is a man who has done everything in his power to present strong, intelligent female lead characters, and to support the female characters of other creators. To call him a misogynist--not even going near the other accusations laid at his feet--is grossly innaccurate.

A phallus is not automatically a weapon. The act of sex is not automatically an act of violence. Context is everything. If you go looking for misogyny, in any and all works, you will find it. But don't go marking things as misogynist that aren't.

And for the love of all that's holy, don't go around saying someone rapes their wife because you disagree with them. That's just not okay.

Yeah, I Don't Know About This

Queen Latifah is the new Jenny Craig spokesperson.

I...what?

1) When I think of the words "gorgeous" and "glamorous," Queen Latifah is one of the first women who comes to mind.

2) Jenny Craig is one of the programs that require you to buy their food. That has never made sense to me.

In both the linked article, and her TV spot, "...a healthier lifestyle, not on getting onto a specific dress size" are the focus.

Call me cynical, but that's no better than Weight Watchers' "Diets are Mean" ad campaign. You can spin it all you want, but it's still a diet! (And one that worked very well for myself, my mother, and many of my closest friends. I want to emphasize that, because I realize I've come across as very anti-WW lately, and I need to fix that.)

Seriously, though. If Queen Latifah wanted to raise awareness for diabetes or "a healthier lifestyle," I feel like there are better channels through which to work. Even Weight Watchers, if associating herself with a weight loss program was her aim. That being said, I can understand feeling that this would be a more accessible conduit for her message. If that was her reasoning, then excellent. If not? I'd be very, very surprised.

It's Called *Comic* Con.

Here's an article about how the Writer's Strike could hurt Comic-Con. (via The Comics Reporter)

Up front: I hope the Writer's Strike is resolved soon. An unbelievable amount of people and businesses are suffering financially because of it. Entire related industries are drying up because movies and shows aren't being produced. This is a serious economic problem.

That being said...

If the Strike affects numbers at Comic Con, I won't be disappointed. I'm not one of the people who feels that Hollywood is "ruining" Comic Con--I've only been to two of them, I'm really unqualified to make that assertion. However, my informal opinion is that having a lesser presence will improve several Con problems.

1. Congestion. The heaviest congestion day on the main floor, from what I saw, was Sunday. Why? Because Thursday through Saturday, you had several thousand people off the floor at all times. You had huge numbers in the big ballrooms, and you had equal, if not greater numbers of people waiting in lines to get into the next panel in those same rooms. This cleared up the floor considerably. None of the big panels were held on Sunday, so all of those people went to the floor--many for the first time all weekend, I'd conjecture.

2. Sales. This is really just conjecture on my part, but go with me on it for a second: If more people at the con are there for comics-related things, more comics-related things will be purchased. Additionally, because fewer people there for Hollywood will buy memberships, there will be more memberships available for comics-oriented attendees.

3. Tone. As I said above, I've only been to two Comic Cons. The difference between the two, though, was palpable. That may have as much to do with the upsurge in genre movies and television shows between 2006 and 2007, but the result was the same: so much more attention being paid to the shows and movies, less to the comics.

4. Hotel Room Availability & Price. This is the big one, kids. The cost of going to Con has skyrocketed. In 2006, my boyfriend and I stayed in The Days Inn Gaslamp. The sign on the door said our room--a very small smoking room whose promised wireless didn't work--was $99 a night. The other night, I called to book a room there again, just as a backup, in case the rush to book rooms totally fouls up this year. The room, the same room, was $400 a night. That's a 400% increase! In two years! That's absurd. And even though more hotels go up each year, this is a situation that will only ever get worse as Comic Con grows.

Once again, I'd like to see the Strike resolved as quickly and amicably as possible. But I also can't help but hope that if it does continue, it makes it a little easier and less expensive to go to San Diego this July.

Boo Urns.

The movie Idiocracy is on cable right now. I'm excited about this, because I never got a chance to see it.

The wonderful Sara Rue has a small role. As usually happens when I watch movies with my laptop in front of me, I looked her up on IMDB.

I saw some photos of her there, and I was so appalled by what I saw.


Sara Rue, before and after

Why did she lose weight? She didn't need to lose weight! She was so gorgeous!

This makes me so sad.

I definitely believe in people making weight management choices for themselves, but I can't help but be disappointed by this turn of events.

Here is someone else upset about this.

Of Endings And Beginning

In this post, my friend Racheline strikes many nerves.

This is an essay I've been pondering for over a month now, but her words helped it all coalesce.

In this season of life and growth, the death of three pop culture phenomena occur:

On June 7th, the final issue of Strangers in Paradise came out.

On June 10th, the final episode of The Sopranos aired.

And this Saturday, July 21st, the final Harry Potter novel will be released.

The ripple effects of these three series have been felt around the world. While The Sopranos doesn't hold the emotional impact for me that the other two do, its ending informed me how it can be done well.

Much like the rest of the world at 11pm that evening, I voiced a loud and frustrated noise and proceeded to call everyone I knew. (My parents received about four phone calls in a ten minute period.)

I was outraged. I did not yet know true fannish outrage.

You see, I procrastinated on buying Strangers in Paradise #90. I wasn't quite ready for it to end. I attended the CBLDF wrap party, and that was quite emotionally difficult.

The CBLDF hired a band to play the songs Terry Moore wrote for the series over the years. The most poignant of these, I Dream of You, is the title of the second collected edition. Ten years ago, I photocopied the sheet music from the back of the book. I sat at the piano in my parents' house with it and taught myself to play the song. I recorded myself. I put it on a mix tape for a boy.

As Racheline stated so eloquently, it was a mile-marker of my life. And when the band played that song, I cried. I felt all ten years flood past me. I remembered each moment of the emotional journeys, both of the book, and the situations I attached them to. It was a rough three minutes, I'll tell you.

So you can imagine my fierce exasperation when I finally purchased Strangers in Paradise #90 and the ending was totally lame. Don MacPherson put it best in his review:

"My biggest gripe about the story is how Moore, after so many years, continues to beat around the bush about the connection between Katchoo and Francine. It’s clear here that they’re a couple, deeply in love and committed to one another. The problem is that Moore limits the physicality of that love to hugging. They talk about marriage. They have pet names for one another. I’m not saying I need to see them in bed naked together, but how about a kiss? In the midst of such joy, delayed after so long, I just don’t buy the restraint we see here. There’s no need to show us panting, humping or fornicating, but I don’t see why Moore avoids a certain level of physical intimacy between the two characters."

Ten years (fourteen for the whole series), and we never get so much as a damn kiss.

Katchoo's passion is reiterated over and over, and in the end, we never get to see it fully directed at the object of her desire since the age of fifteen. This makes no sense.

Having seen the neat little Bowdlerized package that was the last hurrah of Strangers in Paradise, I finally understood the end of the Sopranos. It ended that way, because it had to end that way. Anything else would have been too clean. We needed the messiness of ambiguity. The closure we got was that no matter what happened, it was what Tony "deserved"-- be that death, or having to deal with AJ's manipulativeness, or having to witness Meadow emotionally struggle with the law and the money that paid for her degree. Ambiguity was nothing new to The Sopranos, it was just pushed to the extreme in its last moments.

Which brings us, finally, to Harry Potter.

I started the series right after graduating high school in 2000. I did so because I realized most adults I saw on the subway were reading the books, and I was curious what they knew that I did not. I was hooked.

However, I didn't step my toes into Harry Potter fandom until the summer of 2003, when the fifth book came out. The first of the books, by the way, I had to wait for. That summer I delved into the fan fiction. I started making friends because of it. I cared on new levels.

Harry's been with me for seven years. I care deeply about the story, the characters, and their destinies. So please understand when I say...

I hope JK Rowling is a bigger Sopranos fan than she ever was a Strangers in Paradise fan.

I know my heart will be broken over the next few days. The question that remains is how.

ONE WEEK TO SAN DIEGO

And so, my staplers and staplerettes, we have one week before San Diego Comic Con.

And this year, I have BUSINESS CARDS.

I will have both my pro cards, from my Awesome New Job(TM), and Red Stapler cards.

Keep any eye out. I will have pink hair and this tote bag:


really. how could I not?

See you kids at Nerd Prom!

Well Played, Indeed.

Dame Shirley Bassey covering Pink's "Get This Party Started."

The video is gorgeous and her voice just soars.

Pink, honey? You just got served.

Well, shit.

As of August, Jane magazine struts for the last time.

Dammit.

Now what am I going to read on plane trips? The violent fits Cosmo causes me are generally frowned upon in the air travel community.

Jane was one of the few women-targeted magazines I enjoyed consistently. The articles were (for the most part) intelligent and well-written. The interviews were interesting. The fashions didn't make me feel inadequate or make my eyes bleed.

That, and I kindof admired Jane Pratt for starting it. She may have gotten shit for it (see the Daria episode "The Lost Girls" for what is likely a pot shot at JP herself), but she also produced a worthy publication.

I'm sorry to see it go.