damn i totally just deleted this whole post.
blogging in an attempt to make my presence on fb less 'commandeering' (thank u nicole that was the exact adjective i was looking for)
listening to music and everything sounds good right now. i don't care about music that much. just the smiths and ms. minaj but sometimes i'm like oh yeah, i should listen to some new stuff and then i'm like whoa music is so good i should listen to it like hella hella.
whenever someone tries to sell me their basement slap cd (delmaragraph lol inside joke w myself) i tell them they should sample mongoloid. i tell them i have told numerous others this so they should get w it. also when i searched for this video the sponsored link was 'how to care for children w down syndrome' so fucked up lol
sepultura cover!!1! i've never heard someone so angry about someone else wearing a hat and having a job.
of course. new infatuation w sleigh bells tnx to jason & our free sirius satellite radio.
i'm not actually wanting this to happen but if a NM sex vid ever comes out i bet she would be making fun of the guys uneven balls n shit and halfway thru he just slinks out of the room w his uh, tail btw his legs
pretty much the best worst video. hella hella pixelated flames, axl bound & gagged, a future juggaloo surfing on the river styx, satanic lez make out scene. but this song is so good. . .he's a belter. i karaok'd to this in flagstaff w jason. i <3 gnr.
hipster has metal elements except the stephanie seymour look is so much hotter than anything i've seen in the mission . . . i guess i mean on white girls cus mexis keeps it sexi.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Monday, September 28, 2009
Gentlemen. . . some ground rules
If you are visibly graying . . . I'm not trying to talk to you.
If you are rolling with one (1) or more children . . . I'm not trying to talk to you.
If you just asked me for money for the bus that for some reason costs $4 today, even though you just came from the VA hospital and you show me your inhaler . . . you're not getting my number so you can pay me back.
If you ask me if I'm Spanish and I tell you I'm half Japanese and half white and you follow up by saying that you love all Filipinos. . . I'm not trying to talk to you.
And especially, if you just got shot on the Eastside and have the bandage to prove it, even if it was a case of mistaken identity. . . I'm not trying to talk you.
If you violate 80% of these rules and are still rockin' the free world . . .that's some chutzpah. . .but I'm still not trying to talk you!
If you are rolling with one (1) or more children . . . I'm not trying to talk to you.
If you just asked me for money for the bus that for some reason costs $4 today, even though you just came from the VA hospital and you show me your inhaler . . . you're not getting my number so you can pay me back.
If you ask me if I'm Spanish and I tell you I'm half Japanese and half white and you follow up by saying that you love all Filipinos. . . I'm not trying to talk to you.
And especially, if you just got shot on the Eastside and have the bandage to prove it, even if it was a case of mistaken identity. . . I'm not trying to talk you.
If you violate 80% of these rules and are still rockin' the free world . . .that's some chutzpah. . .but I'm still not trying to talk you!
A Simple Desultory Philippic
Name that Simon & Garfunkel song lol.
This is pretty much the main question about life: existance v. essence? nature v. nurture? You know that thing how there are only 32 possible plots and every story since Greek times or whatever has just been some kind of new reworking or update of one of those plots. I feel like this could be the 33rd plotline. You heard it hear first, folks!
TANGENT: I like that ish, I mean use of the word "ish." He's white. . .he's white-ish." Yeah, see? It works way better, way less restricting. Cus my mom calls Barack "white-ish" like every other time dude is on TV. The other day when Rahm Emanuel was on TV she said "he looks so white-ish" and I was like "mom, that's cus he is white!" and she was like "No, that's Eric Holder, he's black!" "No that's Rahm Emanuel, he's Jewish!" (You know you're Azn when. . .) "Oh, well, Holder is a light skinned black and Emanuel is a dark skinned white, Obama picks people that look like him. When they stand together, they all look the same." To that I say, Rahm Emanuel, step up your crop game!
But I wiki'd all of them. Eric Holder grew up in the Bronx, his parents are Barbadian. Rahm Emanuel grew up in Chi, his dad was an Israeli immigrant. I was like whoa, urban ethnic people? Their parents are foreign so you know they have the Fear of God in their hearts, something George Bush definitely didn't have enough of. But it was nice how it was like, people I would know are actually in office. Cus that's how I always felt about Barack Obama that he's like a person I would know. Cus my mom always said "he could have gone so wrong being biracial, he could have been one of those kids hanging around Telegraph smoking weed" (cus everyone on Telegraph is mixed! Or Filipino! Which is also mixed!) There is something very Berkeley about the President for sure.
BACK TO THE FUTURE: I started rereading The Autograph Man because I realized I wanted to review Zadie Smith's style without getting caught up in White Teeth. Because every time I read White Teeth it makes me so fucking happy because it simultaneously reminds me of all of my favorite people I met >2003 and reading the book c. 2002 and just losing my shit because it created a world of possibility for me. Even though I was too young to understand at the time, it's the kind of book that you think couldn't be conceived, published or well received because its too much like you and to quote my mother "who would look at you?" So the fact that it was all these things and won hella prizes and places on top 10 lists meant that there was some room in this world for little Martina. But I digress. . .I started reading Autograph Man again cus it wasn't as well received and cus I wanted to look at how she structures her novels. Also cus its about a Chew (a Chinese/Jewish dude). Mi gente! (the Jews I mean, "eff the Chinese" to quote my mother again)
I think if I had a literary mag I would name is Desultory or Beige Ppl Press. I'm lame like that. I liked BPP as an acronym but then I realized that's because it stands for Black Panther Party so its kinda already taken.
A SIMPLE DESULTORY DISCLAIMER:I get really angry every spring and I think most of my previous posts were evidence of this. My mom's bf asked me what made me happy and I was like "I'm not really one of those people" but I can say, with some hindsight, that I was significantly unhappier c. Spring 2009 than I am now. This is probably the only way Franz Kafka measured his happiness so maybe if I do this someday I'll be as thin as him?
"If you live in New York or any other big city, you are Jewish. It doesn't matter even if you're Catholic; if you live in New York, you're Jewish. If you live in Butte, Montana, you're going to be goyish, even if you're Jewish." -Lenny Bruce (epigraph to Zadie Smith's sophomore novel, The Autograph Man
This is pretty much the main question about life: existance v. essence? nature v. nurture? You know that thing how there are only 32 possible plots and every story since Greek times or whatever has just been some kind of new reworking or update of one of those plots. I feel like this could be the 33rd plotline. You heard it hear first, folks!
TANGENT: I like that ish, I mean use of the word "ish." He's white. . .he's white-ish." Yeah, see? It works way better, way less restricting. Cus my mom calls Barack "white-ish" like every other time dude is on TV. The other day when Rahm Emanuel was on TV she said "he looks so white-ish" and I was like "mom, that's cus he is white!" and she was like "No, that's Eric Holder, he's black!" "No that's Rahm Emanuel, he's Jewish!" (You know you're Azn when. . .) "Oh, well, Holder is a light skinned black and Emanuel is a dark skinned white, Obama picks people that look like him. When they stand together, they all look the same." To that I say, Rahm Emanuel, step up your crop game!
But I wiki'd all of them. Eric Holder grew up in the Bronx, his parents are Barbadian. Rahm Emanuel grew up in Chi, his dad was an Israeli immigrant. I was like whoa, urban ethnic people? Their parents are foreign so you know they have the Fear of God in their hearts, something George Bush definitely didn't have enough of. But it was nice how it was like, people I would know are actually in office. Cus that's how I always felt about Barack Obama that he's like a person I would know. Cus my mom always said "he could have gone so wrong being biracial, he could have been one of those kids hanging around Telegraph smoking weed" (cus everyone on Telegraph is mixed! Or Filipino! Which is also mixed!) There is something very Berkeley about the President for sure.
BACK TO THE FUTURE: I started rereading The Autograph Man because I realized I wanted to review Zadie Smith's style without getting caught up in White Teeth. Because every time I read White Teeth it makes me so fucking happy because it simultaneously reminds me of all of my favorite people I met >2003 and reading the book c. 2002 and just losing my shit because it created a world of possibility for me. Even though I was too young to understand at the time, it's the kind of book that you think couldn't be conceived, published or well received because its too much like you and to quote my mother "who would look at you?" So the fact that it was all these things and won hella prizes and places on top 10 lists meant that there was some room in this world for little Martina. But I digress. . .I started reading Autograph Man again cus it wasn't as well received and cus I wanted to look at how she structures her novels. Also cus its about a Chew (a Chinese/Jewish dude). Mi gente! (the Jews I mean, "eff the Chinese" to quote my mother again)
I think if I had a literary mag I would name is Desultory or Beige Ppl Press. I'm lame like that. I liked BPP as an acronym but then I realized that's because it stands for Black Panther Party so its kinda already taken.
A SIMPLE DESULTORY DISCLAIMER:I get really angry every spring and I think most of my previous posts were evidence of this. My mom's bf asked me what made me happy and I was like "I'm not really one of those people" but I can say, with some hindsight, that I was significantly unhappier c. Spring 2009 than I am now. This is probably the only way Franz Kafka measured his happiness so maybe if I do this someday I'll be as thin as him?
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Beige Girl Movie Review: They're Just Not That Into You
*this is from awhile ago when HJNTIY was still in theatres. . .well we saw it at the 2nd run . . .
We went to the movie to have a girls night. And it’s true, we did learn a lot about our failed romances of the past and future. As a white woman, I enjoyed the movie. The problem is, as it has sometimes been for me, that I am only half white. Can a “chick flick” speak to me as a woman when it does not address all parts of me? The only person darker than me with a name in the movie was Javier . . . the construction worker.
White People Part:
He's Just Not That Into You has about 10 main characters and some pop up halfway through the movie (Q: Ben Affleck? A: Drew Barrymore but no Cammy Diaz!) There are too many characters to call them by anything but the actors’ names and in reality, all of the actors are on screen for such short time that they cannot play anything but Clint Eastwood versions of themselves. Plot description aside: this is not really that kind of movie review. Anyways, you already know what movies like these are about and if you don’t I’m kinda about to give away the plot. They are mostly late 20 somethings trying to eff, with Jennifer Aniston’s overtanned old lady whiskers still desperately hanging on. Although her voice grates and still reminds me of Rachel at every turn, her Old Yeller familiarity makes her one of the most likable characters. Dang! This movie’s got me crazy! When did I start rooting for J-An?
Brown People Part:
He’s Just Not That Into You is set in the city of Baltimore, (decidedly not “B-More” or “Bawlmore”) among a circle of white yuppies. It was refreshing to see a movie with white people set in a real city, because most white people in movies seem to be citizens of a secret garden that the rest of us never see, as if Hollywood backlots have a hidden population of 100 million people and--that’s where all the white people in California went!
Most American movies, in their capitalist attempts to be universal and appeal to a wide audience, assault us innocent in our armchairs with visions of no place. (Interestingly enough, the Truman’s Show’s fake town is the very real Disney sponsored “New Urbanist” suburb of Seaside, Florida, another case in which life imitates TV in a bad way). Ex: Of all people, those involved in the drug trade are known for their cunning linguistics. Yet in Pineapple Express, we hear maybe hundreds of slang words for weed but not one mention of the nickname or the actual name of the city.
But here is a movie that mimics real life in its on location shooting and daily reference to place. What itched me about the movie is that it seems false while being at the same time very true. Although “Baltimore” drips off the tongues of all of the characters and is featured on their business cards and the names of their independent publications, although yoga mats are rolled up and sushi is taken in, although they walk past black men carrying what look to be moving (out) boxes on the streets of their proudly acknowledged “neighborhood in transition,” still the characters immediate worlds are 100% Mayberry 1950’s I-love-Lucy-but-Ricky-is-a-tad-Commie white. That the characters still live in a yupper-class white bubble that could just as easily be suburban Oregon proves true the theory that increasingly people do not live in the same mental world as their immediate physical neighbor but instead orbit in a series of like minded neighborhoods in various cities (“Williamsburg meet Silver Lake,” “And Silver Lake my good friend, Williamsburg”).
(On the other other hand, man, I’m sumthin like Shiva, it was also refreshing to see white people who don’t use the phrase “aware of my privilege.” After all, what I am asking is for white culture to acknowledge it's exclusivity, but the minute it does, I’m on my period and I changed my mind! Bitches is crazy . . . but only cus you got crazy first. Still, thank you Baltimore elite for not mimicking the San Franglos who date Affirmative Action, listen to Heiroglyphics or drop Barack Obama’s name so much that they should wash out their mouth after with 10 “no homo” Hail Marys.)
There are rare glimpses of John Waters' beloved working class and proudly cracker city such as Kris Kristofferson as Jennifer Aniston’s crusty retired longshoreman father (I see a limp like that I’m going straight On The Waterfront). When Scarlett Johannsen pours her ample breasts onto the fold out ironing board and says “we had one of these in my house growing up, only my mom used it as a desk,” you can re-envision her bleached curls and hussy sexuality as a working class girl speaking the truth and living it, while the upper classes hide their libidos behind the Crate&Barrel curtains in their refurbished townhomes.
In a city that is 65% black (according to Wikipedia, The People's Source) only once does a black woman appear as a close up and she is simply an interaction. Justin Long interrupts making out with her to answer Ginnifer Goodwin’s call, so her only lines are “slop, slop, slurp--”
The only other nameless COCs are Drew Barrymore's posse which includes, you guessed it!, a Gaysian and none other than Ms. Wilson Cruz of My So-Called Life and Rent fame checking both the Latin and Black boxes for Barrymore's aptly named Flower Films production company. Always the advice giver, never the BJ getter.
When Luis Guzman appeared as Javier (as in “Javier, didn’t I tell you to tarp the table before you sanded the walls?!”), Natasha and I turned to each other and said “He’s going to get with Jennifer Connolly! Best plot twist eva!” But alas, she berates him for smoking when really the cigarettes she has found belong to her cheating husband. She berates him with the same robotic rage that she later throws a carefully antiqued mirror to the ground and then quickly sweeps it up. After, in a bout of semi regret she says “Are we cool, Javier?” and he says “Yeah, we’re cool” (. . .crazy white bitch).
For a moment that sacred Fourth Wall drops on the construction site and the supposed white audience makes accidental contact with Luis Guzman’s squinty brown eyes. We see that Jennifer Connolly is a cold bitch whose ignorance (and this is a stretch) can only be pitied because, like my 6 year old laptop, she is too far gone for repair. Eventually her husband will leave her, so that she is unlovable by ethnic people standards is superceded by the fact that even white people don’t like her! This is a 21st century tactic used to keep Casper the friendly ghost of racism alive. The original lovable bigot was Archie Bunker and in the 1971 that was original (racial timeline: Barack Obama is 10 years old and being mistaken for native Hawaiian because in the white eye black people don’t look like that yet).
But be here now in “post-racial” 2009 with two little Indira Gandhi looking mixed babies plunking down $20 in hard cashed unemployment checks to see a romantic comedy (psych! It was 2 for 1 day at the discount theatre). Hollywood was like, damn I know the 80’s are over, but I gotta do these white lines and pretend the cleaning lady can't see. So, just as with Michael Scott in The Office, they stuff their ignorance in a likeable but unfortunately ‘tarded character. 21st century White America: Likeable but Unfortunately ‘Tarded.
And This Is For My Laaadies:
The movie’s underlying message, that women are so preoccupied with analyzing men’s actions while men are off actually having fun, can also be applied to American race relations. (Who knew? I did!) Justin Long seems to imply to Ginnifer Goodwin that women enjoy this masochistic analytical minutae because without it, we would realize the emptiness of their lives. (Our interests as women, afterall, are supposed to be shopping and gymmin it aka wasting time to look more fuckable). So do we, the emasculated “minority” population of both men and women, hate on La Whitey so much to distract ourselves from the fact that there’s not a whole lot else that we really have? I’ve been called a Pocha and I’m not even Mexican. (“That was way harsh, Tai.”) It’s like what I “overhear” the under 18 set saying these days on facebook: “iF yOu hAtE mE, tHeN wHy yOu aLwAyS kEePiN mY nAmE iN yO mOuTh?"
Moral of the story: White America wants to buy you a drank and F the S out of U but will not return your calls, texts or MySpace messages. Welp, at least I’m drunk!
There was another message that women were the true winners because at least they had feelings and a certain. . . sensibility. Maybe I was distracted from this message by Ginnifer Goodwin’s goofy delivery (she’s no Molly Ringwald and I had that awful haircut and color my junior year in college during one of my 95 identity crises). But the idea of sensitivity as a certain superior form of living and superpower has been mentioned specifically for women of color by Gloria Anzaldua (“La Facultad”) and Angela “My” Nissel (“Colored folks have a certain sixth sense” her mother says. I’m misquoting cus I leant the book out, but you know). I’m sure others have said it. We hope for a more ethical three dimensional ordering of the world.
Maybe all the hating is because we notice the absence of our total selves and the inclusion of our partial selves in multiple worlds. It’s true, I could so easily fit in this movie like I do in car commercials, as the light skinned-ed vaguely ethnic but obviously white washed best friend or coworker (apparently we ride in the back, but damn we are having a good time!). What we notice is the absence of friends and family more frighteningly ethnic. Does anyone want to buy a car marketed toward underweight Fobby Asian seniors who can only sometimes reach the pedals?
(What frightens me then is that I could so easily fit into this world of ethnic products but no real ass ethnic people. I was asked once if I was a WOC. I replied what, “woman on computer?” If I am in fact a woman of color, would people need to ask?)
The only movie in the theatre that wouldn’t have pissed me off was Tyler Perry’s Madea Goes to Jail. There I may have noticed my exclusion as well, but it is for the inclusion of all into pop culture, so I forfeit my rage. (Respect where respect is due: Wu-Tang was pro-AZN like a decade before white people started eating raw fish). So ?uavelove suggests, why not an multiracial buddy movie: Madea and Ernest Go To Jail? Le sigh. I guess I’m waiting for the next Harold & Kumar installment. Or we make our own 21st Century Reality Bytes: Elroy Caballero’s Martina Goes To Therapy.
I write this now as a grown ass woman who can separate "white" from "wong" as they say. But remember seeing Now & Then and wishing so hard that that was your life, your mom? Yeah. So thank you White America, for spicing up another one of my Friday nights. And for distracting me from what I really didn’t want to think about: my ex-boyfriend. Cus really, I wouldn’t want to call a crazy bitch back either.
“I mean to put you in company with the young African-American girl who discovers she is like Jane Austen. How so? In temperament, in sensibility, in some way she recognizes and approves. Then this thrilling recognition brings a cloud of shame to her spontaneity-I write of myself, of course . . . She notices her absence. Another girl her age, or a girl from another age, would not notice: would not need to notice.”
–Richard Rodriguez*, Brown: The Last Discovery of America, 2002.
*sorry y'all hate him. more for me!
We went to the movie to have a girls night. And it’s true, we did learn a lot about our failed romances of the past and future. As a white woman, I enjoyed the movie. The problem is, as it has sometimes been for me, that I am only half white. Can a “chick flick” speak to me as a woman when it does not address all parts of me? The only person darker than me with a name in the movie was Javier . . . the construction worker.
White People Part:
He's Just Not That Into You has about 10 main characters and some pop up halfway through the movie (Q: Ben Affleck? A: Drew Barrymore but no Cammy Diaz!) There are too many characters to call them by anything but the actors’ names and in reality, all of the actors are on screen for such short time that they cannot play anything but Clint Eastwood versions of themselves. Plot description aside: this is not really that kind of movie review. Anyways, you already know what movies like these are about and if you don’t I’m kinda about to give away the plot. They are mostly late 20 somethings trying to eff, with Jennifer Aniston’s overtanned old lady whiskers still desperately hanging on. Although her voice grates and still reminds me of Rachel at every turn, her Old Yeller familiarity makes her one of the most likable characters. Dang! This movie’s got me crazy! When did I start rooting for J-An?
Brown People Part:
He’s Just Not That Into You is set in the city of Baltimore, (decidedly not “B-More” or “Bawlmore”) among a circle of white yuppies. It was refreshing to see a movie with white people set in a real city, because most white people in movies seem to be citizens of a secret garden that the rest of us never see, as if Hollywood backlots have a hidden population of 100 million people and--that’s where all the white people in California went!
Most American movies, in their capitalist attempts to be universal and appeal to a wide audience, assault us innocent in our armchairs with visions of no place. (Interestingly enough, the Truman’s Show’s fake town is the very real Disney sponsored “New Urbanist” suburb of Seaside, Florida, another case in which life imitates TV in a bad way). Ex: Of all people, those involved in the drug trade are known for their cunning linguistics. Yet in Pineapple Express, we hear maybe hundreds of slang words for weed but not one mention of the nickname or the actual name of the city.
But here is a movie that mimics real life in its on location shooting and daily reference to place. What itched me about the movie is that it seems false while being at the same time very true. Although “Baltimore” drips off the tongues of all of the characters and is featured on their business cards and the names of their independent publications, although yoga mats are rolled up and sushi is taken in, although they walk past black men carrying what look to be moving (out) boxes on the streets of their proudly acknowledged “neighborhood in transition,” still the characters immediate worlds are 100% Mayberry 1950’s I-love-Lucy-but-Ricky-is-a-tad-Commie white. That the characters still live in a yupper-class white bubble that could just as easily be suburban Oregon proves true the theory that increasingly people do not live in the same mental world as their immediate physical neighbor but instead orbit in a series of like minded neighborhoods in various cities (“Williamsburg meet Silver Lake,” “And Silver Lake my good friend, Williamsburg”).
(On the other other hand, man, I’m sumthin like Shiva, it was also refreshing to see white people who don’t use the phrase “aware of my privilege.” After all, what I am asking is for white culture to acknowledge it's exclusivity, but the minute it does, I’m on my period and I changed my mind! Bitches is crazy . . . but only cus you got crazy first. Still, thank you Baltimore elite for not mimicking the San Franglos who date Affirmative Action, listen to Heiroglyphics or drop Barack Obama’s name so much that they should wash out their mouth after with 10 “no homo” Hail Marys.)
There are rare glimpses of John Waters' beloved working class and proudly cracker city such as Kris Kristofferson as Jennifer Aniston’s crusty retired longshoreman father (I see a limp like that I’m going straight On The Waterfront). When Scarlett Johannsen pours her ample breasts onto the fold out ironing board and says “we had one of these in my house growing up, only my mom used it as a desk,” you can re-envision her bleached curls and hussy sexuality as a working class girl speaking the truth and living it, while the upper classes hide their libidos behind the Crate&Barrel curtains in their refurbished townhomes.
In a city that is 65% black (according to Wikipedia, The People's Source) only once does a black woman appear as a close up and she is simply an interaction. Justin Long interrupts making out with her to answer Ginnifer Goodwin’s call, so her only lines are “slop, slop, slurp--”
The only other nameless COCs are Drew Barrymore's posse which includes, you guessed it!, a Gaysian and none other than Ms. Wilson Cruz of My So-Called Life and Rent fame checking both the Latin and Black boxes for Barrymore's aptly named Flower Films production company. Always the advice giver, never the BJ getter.
When Luis Guzman appeared as Javier (as in “Javier, didn’t I tell you to tarp the table before you sanded the walls?!”), Natasha and I turned to each other and said “He’s going to get with Jennifer Connolly! Best plot twist eva!” But alas, she berates him for smoking when really the cigarettes she has found belong to her cheating husband. She berates him with the same robotic rage that she later throws a carefully antiqued mirror to the ground and then quickly sweeps it up. After, in a bout of semi regret she says “Are we cool, Javier?” and he says “Yeah, we’re cool” (. . .crazy white bitch).
For a moment that sacred Fourth Wall drops on the construction site and the supposed white audience makes accidental contact with Luis Guzman’s squinty brown eyes. We see that Jennifer Connolly is a cold bitch whose ignorance (and this is a stretch) can only be pitied because, like my 6 year old laptop, she is too far gone for repair. Eventually her husband will leave her, so that she is unlovable by ethnic people standards is superceded by the fact that even white people don’t like her! This is a 21st century tactic used to keep Casper the friendly ghost of racism alive. The original lovable bigot was Archie Bunker and in the 1971 that was original (racial timeline: Barack Obama is 10 years old and being mistaken for native Hawaiian because in the white eye black people don’t look like that yet).
But be here now in “post-racial” 2009 with two little Indira Gandhi looking mixed babies plunking down $20 in hard cashed unemployment checks to see a romantic comedy (psych! It was 2 for 1 day at the discount theatre). Hollywood was like, damn I know the 80’s are over, but I gotta do these white lines and pretend the cleaning lady can't see. So, just as with Michael Scott in The Office, they stuff their ignorance in a likeable but unfortunately ‘tarded character. 21st century White America: Likeable but Unfortunately ‘Tarded.
And This Is For My Laaadies:
The movie’s underlying message, that women are so preoccupied with analyzing men’s actions while men are off actually having fun, can also be applied to American race relations. (Who knew? I did!) Justin Long seems to imply to Ginnifer Goodwin that women enjoy this masochistic analytical minutae because without it, we would realize the emptiness of their lives. (Our interests as women, afterall, are supposed to be shopping and gymmin it aka wasting time to look more fuckable). So do we, the emasculated “minority” population of both men and women, hate on La Whitey so much to distract ourselves from the fact that there’s not a whole lot else that we really have? I’ve been called a Pocha and I’m not even Mexican. (“That was way harsh, Tai.”) It’s like what I “overhear” the under 18 set saying these days on facebook: “iF yOu hAtE mE, tHeN wHy yOu aLwAyS kEePiN mY nAmE iN yO mOuTh?"
Moral of the story: White America wants to buy you a drank and F the S out of U but will not return your calls, texts or MySpace messages. Welp, at least I’m drunk!
There was another message that women were the true winners because at least they had feelings and a certain. . . sensibility. Maybe I was distracted from this message by Ginnifer Goodwin’s goofy delivery (she’s no Molly Ringwald and I had that awful haircut and color my junior year in college during one of my 95 identity crises). But the idea of sensitivity as a certain superior form of living and superpower has been mentioned specifically for women of color by Gloria Anzaldua (“La Facultad”) and Angela “My” Nissel (“Colored folks have a certain sixth sense” her mother says. I’m misquoting cus I leant the book out, but you know). I’m sure others have said it. We hope for a more ethical three dimensional ordering of the world.
Maybe all the hating is because we notice the absence of our total selves and the inclusion of our partial selves in multiple worlds. It’s true, I could so easily fit in this movie like I do in car commercials, as the light skinned-ed vaguely ethnic but obviously white washed best friend or coworker (apparently we ride in the back, but damn we are having a good time!). What we notice is the absence of friends and family more frighteningly ethnic. Does anyone want to buy a car marketed toward underweight Fobby Asian seniors who can only sometimes reach the pedals?
(What frightens me then is that I could so easily fit into this world of ethnic products but no real ass ethnic people. I was asked once if I was a WOC. I replied what, “woman on computer?” If I am in fact a woman of color, would people need to ask?)
The only movie in the theatre that wouldn’t have pissed me off was Tyler Perry’s Madea Goes to Jail. There I may have noticed my exclusion as well, but it is for the inclusion of all into pop culture, so I forfeit my rage. (Respect where respect is due: Wu-Tang was pro-AZN like a decade before white people started eating raw fish). So ?uavelove suggests, why not an multiracial buddy movie: Madea and Ernest Go To Jail? Le sigh. I guess I’m waiting for the next Harold & Kumar installment. Or we make our own 21st Century Reality Bytes: Elroy Caballero’s Martina Goes To Therapy.
I write this now as a grown ass woman who can separate "white" from "wong" as they say. But remember seeing Now & Then and wishing so hard that that was your life, your mom? Yeah. So thank you White America, for spicing up another one of my Friday nights. And for distracting me from what I really didn’t want to think about: my ex-boyfriend. Cus really, I wouldn’t want to call a crazy bitch back either.
“I mean to put you in company with the young African-American girl who discovers she is like Jane Austen. How so? In temperament, in sensibility, in some way she recognizes and approves. Then this thrilling recognition brings a cloud of shame to her spontaneity-I write of myself, of course . . . She notices her absence. Another girl her age, or a girl from another age, would not notice: would not need to notice.”
–Richard Rodriguez*, Brown: The Last Discovery of America, 2002.
*sorry y'all hate him. more for me!
State Farm. . . Animal Farm
I love this song and was slightly annoyed to find it in what I thought was a Jesus commercial (Jesus is like if the head cheerleader was also really smart and cool. Rad on his own but lose the rabid following. If Jesus is so great, why does he need marketing? This is why I respect the Jews) I thought it was a Jesus commercial because it said "We all need someone to believe in. To rely on. To trust." Also first few images are of downtrodden black folks just like a lot of the Jesus ads in St. Louis which always seems a little suspect to me. The image at 0:08 damaged NO style "shotgun shack," palm trees, crying black lady is very clearly meant to evoke Katrina victims.
When it was for State Farm I was like, well, they evoked Jesus for the sake of capitalism, it's not the first time or the last time. End of my disgruntlement. But then I remembered that State Farm had tried to change thousands of Katrina claims from water damage, which they cover, to wind damage, which they do not cover. Even Trent Lott tried to sue them. You know your on the wrong side of Jesus when everyone is on your case INCLUDING Trent Lott.
http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2006/08/state_farm_insi.html
Love Thy Neighbor? This is the same perversion of religion that we accuse terrorists of. At least terrorists are honest about their aims.
I always wonder about evocations of Hurricane Katrina v. 9/11. The image of a family next to their home is not as direct as say, the image of the wall of still missing WTC workers, but I do think that State Farm or any other company would be more hesitant in using equally direct 9/11 imagery compared to Katrina imagery.
The death tolls were ~2500 for Katrina and ~2700 for 9/11 so roughly the same. In terms of physical loss, we get caught up in the actual WTC buildings as a symbol for capitalism, not realizing that the "Lost City of New Orleans" as Lil Wayne put it, was even before its wreck, a symbol for the other side of capitalism. As a country we would rather have not seen most of NO in the first place (or St. Louis or Detroit for that matter), so its "disappearance" did not make it any more invisible than it already was.
With other statistics equal, the only conclusion to draw is that these two equally tragic events were in the Real World, not equal.
My President Is Half White
Bout a month ago, Hua Hsu wrote an article in the Atlantic Monthly called The End of White America. Using "the End of . . ." is a cheap trick (see Francis Fukuyama's the End of History) but the title is alarming, alluring, especially considering the author's name. Better a lapdog attack than a Rottweiler he,he. What Hsu is really discussing is the Birth of White America (commonly confused with the 1910 film, The Birth of A Nation). Cus when I your age, back in the 90's, kid, White America was called. . . America.
In the 21st century, there is a specific set of culture and values we can attribute to our (shrinking) group of brethren and it shouldn't just be guilt. A little shame never hurt anyone though. White History Month Fact: white people invented punk rock, man!
And let me let you in on a little secret.. . dude, my dad is white!
Then what to call this new race? I flirted with Whitese-Americans, but it looks better on screen. Coming off the tongue, it sounds like the name of a minstrel show. And don't go tryin to call yourself Irish-American now because if you ain't been Irish in a generation, you ain't Irish now (Unless you plan on putting out an album called the Micktape, in which case, by all means. . .)
So you don't get to call yourself what you want? It sucks, doesn't it? But that means you're American! Congratulations! You didn't even have to take the citizenship test!
White America is losing its virginity. It feels kinda weird at first but uh trust me, girl, it gets better . . . This isn't the end of anything except the end of white people being able to engage with the world strictly on their own terms. (Take yo pills and eventually you'll forget the the ole straight jacket is even on :))
So welcome to the world, baby girl! Now maybe this can be a great country.
"The days of pure whites, the victors of today, are as numbered as the days of their predecessors. Having fulfilled their destiny of mechanizing the world, they themselves have set, without knowing it, the basis for the new period: The period of the fusion and mixing of all peoples."
-Jose Vasconcelos from La Raza Cosmica (1925)
In the 21st century, there is a specific set of culture and values we can attribute to our (shrinking) group of brethren and it shouldn't just be guilt. A little shame never hurt anyone though. White History Month Fact: white people invented punk rock, man!
And let me let you in on a little secret.. . dude, my dad is white!
Then what to call this new race? I flirted with Whitese-Americans, but it looks better on screen. Coming off the tongue, it sounds like the name of a minstrel show. And don't go tryin to call yourself Irish-American now because if you ain't been Irish in a generation, you ain't Irish now (Unless you plan on putting out an album called the Micktape, in which case, by all means. . .)
So you don't get to call yourself what you want? It sucks, doesn't it? But that means you're American! Congratulations! You didn't even have to take the citizenship test!
White America is losing its virginity. It feels kinda weird at first but uh trust me, girl, it gets better . . . This isn't the end of anything except the end of white people being able to engage with the world strictly on their own terms. (Take yo pills and eventually you'll forget the the ole straight jacket is even on :))
So welcome to the world, baby girl! Now maybe this can be a great country.
"The days of pure whites, the victors of today, are as numbered as the days of their predecessors. Having fulfilled their destiny of mechanizing the world, they themselves have set, without knowing it, the basis for the new period: The period of the fusion and mixing of all peoples."
-Jose Vasconcelos from La Raza Cosmica (1925)
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Top 3 Top 10 Lists Inspired by All The Top 5 Lists in High Fidelity
Top 10 Posses of All Time (that I am aware of at this point)
In no particular order except the first two:
1) Ghostwriter. Word! (associated acts: SLJ, Spike Lee, Julia Stiles and don't forget Marcella P. Lowry as Jamal Jenkins grandma)
2) Wu-Tang Clan because within the family, they also had individual economic freedom. Even the Mob doesn't roll like that. Xtra credit for making the word "clansmen" less scary.
3) Las Echo Parque Ladies from Mi Vida Loca. "I chose this life for myself."
4) Panthers. They kinda set the stage for a lot of the leather on this list. Panther Beret>Annie Hall Beret. Now they wear Cosby sweaters and Obama black tees when they table at UC-Berkeley. Forever stylin.
5) The Warriors from the movie of the same name, that is apparently being remade with Ice-T as the head dude who gets shot in the beginning (he would . . .) Why the team does not use "Warriors come out and playayay" to start their games is beyond me. Honorable mention: Rival gang, the Lizzies as NYC's first documented queer girl street clique.
6) The Ramones. Lil known fact: took their name and jackets from P-Reekin' street gangs.
7) The Greasers from The Outsiders. Practically a repeat of #6 but points for being that cool in Oklahoma City.
8) Wassup Rockers. I did the formula and they are well within my cougar number. Also, this was how I imagined Carlos' childhood when he told me he got hasseled by a cop whilst skating, but then he mentioned he had blue hair and was wearing a Slipknot shirt.
9) Oasis. The Brothers Gallagher will fuck you up! Or eachother up! Second only to Elastica in brit-pop fierceness. So fierce they tried to start an East Coast/East East Coast rivalry with Jay-Z. What?
10) Wayans Family (we love you, Kim! and your Tracy Chapman impression!)
(the first in a series of la Kim's young adult book for mixed kids)
DQ'd: Babysitter's Club, 12 Apostles.
In no particular order except the first two:
1) Ghostwriter. Word! (associated acts: SLJ, Spike Lee, Julia Stiles and don't forget Marcella P. Lowry as Jamal Jenkins grandma)
2) Wu-Tang Clan because within the family, they also had individual economic freedom. Even the Mob doesn't roll like that. Xtra credit for making the word "clansmen" less scary.
3) Las Echo Parque Ladies from Mi Vida Loca. "I chose this life for myself."
4) Panthers. They kinda set the stage for a lot of the leather on this list. Panther Beret>Annie Hall Beret. Now they wear Cosby sweaters and Obama black tees when they table at UC-Berkeley. Forever stylin.
5) The Warriors from the movie of the same name, that is apparently being remade with Ice-T as the head dude who gets shot in the beginning (he would . . .) Why the team does not use "Warriors come out and playayay" to start their games is beyond me. Honorable mention: Rival gang, the Lizzies as NYC's first documented queer girl street clique.
6) The Ramones. Lil known fact: took their name and jackets from P-Reekin' street gangs.
7) The Greasers from The Outsiders. Practically a repeat of #6 but points for being that cool in Oklahoma City.
8) Wassup Rockers. I did the formula and they are well within my cougar number. Also, this was how I imagined Carlos' childhood when he told me he got hasseled by a cop whilst skating, but then he mentioned he had blue hair and was wearing a Slipknot shirt.
9) Oasis. The Brothers Gallagher will fuck you up! Or eachother up! Second only to Elastica in brit-pop fierceness. So fierce they tried to start an East Coast/East East Coast rivalry with Jay-Z. What?
10) Wayans Family (we love you, Kim! and your Tracy Chapman impression!)
(the first in a series of la Kim's young adult book for mixed kids)
DQ'd: Babysitter's Club, 12 Apostles.
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