the attention just encourages her

CP: What do you think is missing in hip-hop today?

KRS ONE: I am not just saying this because you [a woman] are asking the question, this is my real answer: More women. More women. Not just emcees or b-girls, but women taking control of hip-hop. Let me be culturally-specific- hip-hop’s women should teach hip-hop’s men how to speak to them. Because when we learn how to speak to you, we can learn how to speak to the whole business world. It’s not just about respecting you…it is…but it’s deeper than just respecting another human being. Everytime you degrade a person, you degrade yourself, because you are standing next to that person. You can’t diss a person, and not diss yourself…I should say “she’s a queen.” And what does that make me? A king. So now at the end of the day, what’s missing in hip-hop? Knowledge of self, that should only come from women. I know that sounds feminist, but that’s real talk.

CP: But men can be feminists, too.

KRS ONE: No doubt. But they are scared. They’re cowards.

— City Pages interview with KRS-One, with whom I am now in deep love.

1 week ago

November 1, 2009

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Inequality tends, notoriously, to be accompanied and sustained by ways of thinking that render it imperceptible to those it benefits, and sometimes also to those it burdens.

1 month ago

October 6, 2009

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I thought being a feminist meant I couldn’t wear lipstick or crave men with small behinds. I thought that “feminist” meant I couldn’t send “Peanuts” cards to guys who I was afraid wouldn’t call back, or buy stockings with seams. I thought “feminist” meant no more steamy flirtations or prolonged shopping trips. I thought it meant braided hair and short nails, maybe mandatory tofu. I certainly associated feminism with humorless, dour, and—worst of all—unblinkingly earnest women. That was because I was accepting the male version of things, which was sort of like believing the mouse’s version of the cat, since it entailed being given access to a vision that could see nothing besides teeth and claws.

—

Regina Barreca is right on.

(She also writes, “They told me that only women who couldn’t get laid got political,” which I love.)

1 month ago

September 28, 2009

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DRUNK MONKEYS.

2 months ago

September 6, 2009

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BABY PANDA.

2 months ago

September 5, 2009

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I went to Goodwill in the hopes of buying something cheap to get change for the bus and ended up finding my favorite book from childhood for less than two bucks. Dealing with Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede encouraged and developed my tomboyish and feminist tendencies, thanks to quotes like these:

“Fencing is not proper behavior for a princess,” [the King] told [Princess Cimorene] in the gentle-but-firm tone recommended by the court philosopher.

Cimorene tilted her head to one side. “Why not?”

“It’s…well, it’s simply not done.”

Cimorene considered. “Aren’t I a princess?”

“Yes, of course you are, my dear,” said her father…

“Well, I fence,” Cimorene said with the air of one delivering an unshakable argument. “So it is too done by a princess.”

and

“But King Tokoz is a male dragon!” Cimorene said, then frowned. “Isn’t he?”

Yes, yes, but that has nothing to do with it,” Kazul said a little testily. “‘King’ is the name of the job. It doesn’t matter who holds it.”

Cimorene stopped and thought for a moment. “You mean that dragons dont’ care whether their king is male or female; the title is the same no matter who the ruler is.”

“That’s right. We like to keep things simple.”

Basically Cimorene is a badass princess who learns fencing, magic, Latin, cooking, economics, and juggling. When her parents thwart her from pursuing what she finds interesting and try to marry her off to a dull prince, she runs away and volunteers to be Kazul the dragon’s princess (this is also not done; princesses are supposed to be captured by dragons, then rescued by knights). The dragons rule, Cimorene rules, and this series rules. It’s just as good as it was when I was 10 and I highly recommend it.

2 months ago

August 11, 2009

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[Valerie] Jarrett also serves as the White House’s unofficial champion of minority issues. This may seem superfluous, given that a black man inhabits the Oval Office — until it’s noted that Obama’s inner circle consists largely of white males, same as it ever was.

— NY Times article on Valerie Jarrett quotes the Talking Heads!