all is ashes in my mouth bc leonard nimoy is gone but he will live on in my kitchen window and all our hearts always
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Sister of The Toast Laura Ortberg Turner wrote about Katy Perry and God for Buzzfeed:
A hallmark of the charismatic church is the belief in an active, intimately involved God. Stanford anthropologist Tanya Luhrmann wrote a book about the American evangelical relationship with God, When God Talks Back. “Over the last few decades,” she writes, “this generation of Americans has sought out an intensely personal God; a God who not only cares about your welfare, but worries with you about whether to paint the kitchen table.” This upbringing has undoubtedly influenced Perry as it has so many of the faithful; to them, God isn’t a distant grandfather type but an omnipotent being who has an opinion about every possible decision they have to make, no matter how small.
When Perry talks about praying before her Super Bowl performance, she is talking about (and to) this kind of God. The charismatic God “really is unconditionally loving,” says Luhrmann over the phone from her home. He’s “a loving God and a buddy God…people do this back and forth when they’re talking to God, the way two young girls talk to each other. They’re sharing everything.”
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Tamir Rice’s murder believed to be his own fault, says the people who pay the people who murdered him.
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Also, the LAPD killed a homeless man.
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My friends have been fostering the world’s most adorable rescue greyhound, but are moving and really want to find him a place he can live forever! If you live in California (I imagine! he’s in LA right now) and don’t have cats and could fall in love with THIS FACE:
…I know. I KNOW…then go here for more information! If you think this involves a tremendous amount of work, you should know that greyhounds enjoy BRIEF BURSTS of energy followed by many many many hours on your couch. If I lived in California, he would be decorating my living room as we speak and my cat would be GONE.
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Putin is going to hunt down the real killer of Boris Nemtsov. Putin says Nemtsov “always openly and honestly voiced and upheld his views” which doesn’t sound even a little bit like a warning to other people who might want to do that!
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Thank fucking God for cell phone video, but probably you shouldn’t need to worry that SEVEN cops and prosecutors will file false reports in the first place:
But here’s my question: Why aren’t the seven witnesses to Dendinger’s nonexistent assault on Cassard already facing felony charges? Why are all but one of the cops who filed false reports still wearing badges and collecting paychecks? Why aren’t the attorneys who filed false reports facing disbarment? Dendinger’s prosecutors both filed false reports, then prosecuted Dendinger based on the reports they knew were false. They should be looking for new careers — after they get out of jail.
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Jamil Smith on August Wilson, and why black storytellers matter:
I wasn’t overwhelmed by Wilson’s physical or literary stature when he turned to me and shook my hand. What I thought of immediately were our shared roots. My first words were a bit embarrassing, but I’m still glad I asked. After all, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility.
“My mother’s family is from the Hill District, like you,” I told Wilson. “Any chance you knew the Howards?”
The playwright bemusedly replied that the family name didn’t ring a bell, but I realized what I’d asked was a bit rhetorical. I already knew that he knew my people. They were in his plays.
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As someone who learned to drive at 28, I feel vastly superior to Adam Gopnik who didn’t learn to drive until his forties:
The potentials may serve merely as vicarious experience, but almost all experience is vicarious: that’s why we have stories and movies and plays and pictures. It’s why we have drive-in movies in summer towns. We expand our worlds through acts of limited empathy more than through plunges into unexpected places. My father’s “Now you know how to drive” had wisdom buried in its simplicity. The highlights of life are first unbelievably intense and then absurdly commonplace. I am now a licensed driver. But almost everybody is a licensed driver. Having a child born is a religious experience. But everybody has kids. Everybody drives, and now I can, too. That’s all, and enough. Now I can drive straight across the country, without a stoplight. I don’t think I ever will. But at least I know I can.
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A difficult and SEARING look at Norman Mailer and Gary Gilmore by Rachel Monroe, who is always great.
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OKAY, I have a very important thing to talk about! I have not read or seen Fifty Shades of Grey, bc erotica should be BETWEEN A WOMAN AND HER COMPUTER, and I tried to hide under Mallory’s popcorn bucket when the trailer played before we saw Lucy, but there is a related topic very dear to my heart, and that is how PRETTY and ADORBS Dakota Johnson is, as she trudges her way through this horrorshow of a landscape of personal humiliation WHILE also having been involved in a major financial success! Did you see girlfriend on SNL? She was slaying me. Those little bangs, that perfect face, that blend of defensiveness and shame and I GOT PAID and also being very beautiful? If she had a PayPal, I would send her the money I did not spend to see her movie, bc she has earned it in my eyes. I salute you, you perfect treasure. I hope you successfully pivot into a long and storied career.
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No, the MOST important part of this link roundup, though, is that I read Martin Short’s memoir, I MUST SAY: MY LIFE AS A HUMBLE COMEDY LEGEND in two sittings yesterday (I briefly paused to eat dinner while watching Tommy Boy again, it’s on Netflix) and it is PERFECT, it is the FINEST example of its kind, and I laughed and cried and there’s personal triumph over extreme loss and GILDA and NORA EPHRON and a wonderful marriage and absolute A+ namedropping and intense Canadian Content and I tweeted about it at least a thousand times and I want you to buy it immediately and also send copies to your family.
Tags: feminism, link roundup, the internet
Putin joins OJ in the fruitless quest to find the Real Killers
Also, I’m kind of worried about the Ukrainian model girlfriend, currently in custody for her “protection”/as a material witness. ANNA, YOU IN DANGER, GIRL.
Will no one rid me of this troublesome girlfriend?
Oh no, I missed that part! Poor thing. I hope they release her soon and she runs back to Kyiv as fast as her legs can carry her. Homegirl does NOT need to be in Putin’s Russia rn.
As John Oliver put it, Putin is determined! to find the real killers . . . so that he can pay them the money he promised.
Dakota Johnson and Melanie Griffith on the red carpet at the Oscars was so amazing and honest and true. I can’t imagine me and my mom would act any differently around one another if we were both famous, tbh, and I would most certainly still roll my eyes at her super hard all the time.
I try to be accepting of the many different ways people go about believing in god and expressing their religion… but there’s something in the Katy Perry piece that makes me feel kind of sick. Maybe because hearing someone say “god gave me big boobs and a wildly successful pop career because I prayed for them and he loves me,” when good, religious people that you know and love have prayed for much less and been denied, feels like a slap in the face?
I don’t know, that piece just left me very drained.
(I’m not trying to be like “how can she thank god for her career when children are dying of malaria??” because that isn’t the issue I take, I think it’s more the “I pray therefore I receive” attitude.)
You’re right, it’s an awfully shallow and self-absorbed POV. :/
ETA: But it goes right along with her calling Japan “the capital of adorableness” when she was doing the geisha act on stage.
Oh fer chrissake. Everyone knows Japan is the capital of Asia.
I had a similar reaction to beachlass’, in that Katy Perry’s religion is very much the religion I grew up with. If I ever needed someone to understand where I come from as far as faith background and religious structures (warts and all, including breaking away from so many of those structures), I’d show them that article.
I completely understand the discomfort you felt – it’s the same discomfort I’ve seen on the faces of my friends when I’ve tried to describe what my past relationship with god was like. It does seem very self-absorbed on the surface. And I’m sure for many people it is. I can remember, though, feeling that in return I had given up everything, just short of free will. So if I was asking God for something, even if it was something stupid, that was okay. As long as I was penitent and thankful and tried to live according to “his will” in return.
The buddy Jesus thing is weird. It’s definitely something I’m familiar with, though.
Yeah it’s pretty icky, though there are whole subsets of people who honestly believe that God rewards the faithful with material rewards (prosperity theology). I haven’t been to church since I was a kid, but from my interpretation you’re supposed to ask for strength, or resilience, or something that comes from within yourself, not for things to be given to you. Because if you can get a certain result just by praying, what does that say about suffering and poverty?
yes thank you, prosperity gospel is the basest heresy.
One of my professors actually told me that prosperity gospel is most popular in the most impoverished areas. Guys! You keep praying, and God keeps not dropping bales of money on your head! THERE IS A LESSON HERE.
Not a Christian of any stripe, but I find something distasteful and vaguely blasphemous about this new ‘God is my personal assistant and cheerleader’ mindset found in certain denominations.
I wonder if Katy Perry has ever heard of the Book of Job.
I agree with your assessment…it’s a shallow view of God as celestial slot machine, one that is heavily and intensely personal and not at all interested in the actual society it claims it wants to save.
I am very interested in Katy Perry’s negotiation of her beliefs with her embodiment of public sexuality, which I think the article was going for but didn’t quite get to. At the end, we see Katy Perry as a shallow Christian because unless she writes or speaks critically about her own faith, we don’t have a lot to go on. The thing that is kind of depressing about it is that female Christians don’t have a lot of role models out there owning their bodies and sexuality outside the control of church patriarchalism. There’s sort of Lady Gaga, and sort of Beyonce, and sort of Katy Perry and that’s it.
Dogma: Buddy Christ
I seem to remember reading in this old book that there used to be a religion in (I think) Indonesia practised by a small community, which believed in an all-powerful God that they never prayed to, because they also believed he was too important to be bothered by their petty human problems. Instead they prayed to the lesser gods to intercede for them.
I hope Dakota Johnson becomes friends with Kristen Stewarts and can imitate her career pivot. That would be lovely.
Did you intentionally pluralize Kristen Stewart’s name a la Key and Peele’s valet sketches or no? bc either way it is hilarious
Hahahaha, that was not intentional! I am glad to amuse, though.
Now I really want some fanfic where Bella and Anastasia wise up, ditch the dudes, and become best friends and/or fuck buddies.
I would pay good money to see the movie of their cross-country road trip.
YES.
Here for this.
In Johnson’s favor: every review I’ve read has gone out of it’s way to praise her performance.
I think she has an excellent chance of coming out of 50sog with a lot of momentum.
Indeed! The only question is how the sequels go. (Because from the box office report…there’s going to be sequels.)
Wait a hot second — Dakota Johnson is Melanie Griffith’s kid? What rock have I been living under?
She is also Don Johnson’s kid and apparently resembles him quite strongly if you google image pictures of him in “A Boy and His Dog.”
Yep — Melanie Griffith and Don Johnson. If there is anything more 80s I can’t think of it.
I just got heart eyes at that thought holy shit
WHOA. Thank you for sharing, I had no idea, and I love Don Johnson so much.
Can we talk about how they started “dating” when Melanie was 14 and Don was 22 though? There’s a lot about it in Pamela Des Barres’ “I’m With The Band” (she was Johnson’s girlfriend when he left her for 14-year-old Melanie) that is pretty disturbing.
That was me on Oscar night when someone said it during red carpet time. I was like WOW.
And Tippi Hedren’s granddaughter! That’s a pretty fun legacy.
Wow, I’m glad you commented, because I had such a very different reaction. (Possibly because I have a hot coffee and a place ticket to warmer climes, so everything is rosy today).
I found something very compelling about the idea that Perry was able to hold onto the comforting aspect of her faith, a deep personal relationship with the Divine, while at the same time growing away from and out of strictures around gender and sexuality.
It also triggered the discomfort I ALWAYS feel when people talk about personal relationships of the buddy Jesus kind; because that’s not how my faith works for me; and my lack of it too often gets framed as a lack of faith entirely. (I’m really a good Calvinist deep down, with a healthy dose of process theology, feminism and post-colonial critique).
And prayer is always a contradiction for me. I comprehensively reject the God doling out favours, big boobs, football wins and car crash survivals, while at the same time deeply believing in the power and practice of prayer. IDK. Religion. The ground under my feet and bane of my existence.
eta: meant to reply to sausagedog
I see Intense Debate’s “reply” function is on strike again.
Oh I think it’s lovely that you were able to see the positive in the piece– you’re right about how it’s nice to see a prominent woman be able to declare herself a good Christian and a true believer while refusing to restrict her sexuality or conform to traditional gender norms. And that’s a good thing!
I think what I object to is that her idea of divinity opens the door to a very conservative idea– like, oh, you’re poor/sick/unhappy/broken? Why not let god pull you up by your bootstraps? And if it’s that easy, that all you have to do is believe and ask for it, then the people who remain poor/sick/unhappy/broken must deserve it somehow. Which, obviously, does not sit well with me.
ETA reading over comment: the “oh it’s lovely” was meant entirely sincerely, I was really happy to read a “glass half full” take, but I think it comes off kind of condescendingly if you aren’t aware that I’m midwestern and just talk that way. Sorry!!
I think what I object to is that her idea of divinity opens the door to a very conservative idea– like, oh, you’re poor/sick/unhappy/broken? Why not let god pull you up by your bootstraps? And if it’s that easy, that all you have to do is believe and ask for it, then the people who remain poor/sick/unhappy/broken must deserve it somehow. Which, obviously, does not sit well with me.
YES definitely . I see this all the time where I work. And I have to say, as an atheist working for a religious organization (guys do not even get me started, I’m getting out, don’t worry), that I have found that the belief that god will take care of your problems is really frustrating to deal with in others. It gets in the way of running an organized business (which churches by and large ARE), it gets in the way of personal development, and it gets in the way of ever actually doing anything to change your circumstances. Not always, not all people, not all christians or whatever, but it’s really noticeable, and makes working together, and heck, even having conversations, practically impossible.
I think you phrased this very well! As I was reading, I couldn’t help but wonder what Katy (and I guess by extension her family and Pentecostalism) thinks of people for whom God hasn’t “provided.”
A thing that I think is pretty interesting is considering the possibility that this whole business works the other way around: that you’ve got this set of cultural values of Emersonian Individualism and The Protestant Work Ethic enshrined and transmitted from old days, and the result of that set of values is an interpretation of Christianity that inevitably interprets God as a personal benefactor who rewards the good and witholds from the wicked. It’s a vision of Jesus that actually descends directly from a vision of the universe as one that is sort of this inherently just place.
And there’s exactly this sort of drift in the cultural interpretation of the Calvinist doctrine of predestination. “We totally don’t know who is predestined to be saved, but, like, totally we can take a guess, and it’s probably the fine upstanding citizens of the middle class”.
“Weirdly, the religious attitudes that we’ve developed support our own positions as the most important members of our culture. I mean, that’s just a coincidence, obviously — predestination, theology, the bible, et cetera — but it’s a pretty neat coincidence, I think!”
I comprehensively reject the God doling out favours, big boobs, football wins and car crash survivals, while at the same time deeply believing in the power and practice of prayer.
I didn’t get the sense from this piece that Katy Perry does have a deep spiritual belief in the power and practice of prayer. It seems like a very transactional relationship – I want X, I pray for X, God gives me X because He loves me so much.
This is unlikely to land on the Link Roundup itself. Language Log’s Geoffrey Pullum occasionally rails against the hypocritical nonsense of Strunk & White’s grammar book, and he posted a new one today. The opening lines of pure disgust were delightful:
And the link attached to the title The Elements of Style is to an online reproduction of the text of the original 1918 edition of Strunk’s dreadful little book of drivel.
O God, grant me thy precious gift of patience… and I need it right now.
Virtually nothing useful about English grammar can be learned from Strunk. Setting aside a few standard conventions of punctuation, which barely deserve to be called part of the grammar, the grammatical claims Strunk makes are foolish assertions…
I share this for all the writers and descriptivist grammarians amongst us who enjoy seeing stupid, incorrect grammar rules taken down: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=15509
I love Geoff Pullum so much, everything he writes is beautiful and hilarious and scathing and correct. I just enjoy his writing immensely.
From that LL post you linked to: People keep telling me that I overstate the extent to which Strunk’s booklet […] harms the English teaching and writing instruction professions, but I don’t (though I will continue to try).
😀
Haha, yes! I wanted to include that in my quote, too, but felt it would be better not to copy the entire thing to these comments.
I’m rereading the articles he wrote a few years ago (and links to), and they’re so refreshing.
Ha, I know the feeling! Hard not to share every line. So good!
I have truly found my people! I am such a Geoff Pullum fangirl.
AHHHHHH <3
That was absolutely delightful.
I’m very nearly aroused at his takedown of Strunk & White. In my unending pursuit of appearing intelligent and well-read in all the classics while in fact reading young adult fantasy, dystopias, and Booker Prize books written only by women, I’ve avoided reading Strunk & White. Thus, I did not know that they were responsible for my most-hated pieces of grammar.
I am vindicated.
I am aroused.
Bless Dakota Johnson and how well she’s stood up to the movie poledance and all the jokes. I am deeply excited to watch as the sequels completely fall apart as they are currently doing (to my great satisfaction). She and Kristen Stewart should write a parody movie about their experiences…
oh no that greyhound needs all of the snuggles RIGHT NOW curse me for being on the wrong coast to adopt :'(
Stinking East Coast. Although I’m glad he’s on the West Coast where it’s warm. Good for you, doggie friend. Good for you.
yeah, there’s pretty much nothing worse to me than seeing a greyhound in the snow. Talk about a dog that was not built for cold weather, yikes.
This is VERY IMPORTANT. Turn on your sound. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGHmzu9Dz18
ARE THOSE BATMAN PAJAMAS OH MY GOD
Also, one of the office dogs is just like that in the snow, except that she also likes to bite the snow itself and run around with it on her nose.
We as humans have done some pretty deplorable things, but at least – AT LEAST – we’ve made sure that greyhounds have adorable Batman pajamas.
all right, well, that makes me feel better. Something that makes me feel good is a greyhound in the snow if the greyhound is wearing a custom-made Batman onesie
I live on the right coast but my landlord would consider a dog a violation of our lease and kick us out. Also, we are priced out of virtually everywhere else in Berkeley and Oakland and cannot afford to move. I hope that dog is fortunate enough to find a home, though!
I’m wearing my Spock Live Long & Prosper t-shirt today. I’m super in love with all the symbolism he talks about for the Vulcan/Kohanic salute. It invokes the feminine aspect of God, and he introduced the world to it when Spock was meeting a priestess, *and* the actress playing her was also Jewish, and it’s this amazing moment of connection between these people who are outsiders to the audience, both as characters and as actors. SO MANY LEVELS.
Every time I think I can’t possibly <3 him more, someone says something else about him and voila.
The world really could benefit from more people like him.
Oh someone please get that sweet greyhound, they are the best dogs and I can never have one as long as I have a million other small farm critters running around.
Oh and speaking of SNL, can we also discuss the Alabama Shakes? I LOVE THEM and am super excited about the new album.
I didn’t see it, but a friend of mine gave me their first album last year and it was SO GOOD! I’m glad they’ve got some new music coming out, I’m excited!!
The clips from SNL are online (but maybe US only? I don’t know).
They are super awesome live. Highly recommended if you get a chance to see them. She’s so badass.
THAT GREYHOUND FAAAAAAAACE NICOLE HOW COULD YOU?!?!?
Sadly I am on the wrong coast or I would be cuddlin’ that dude right now.
Nicole! I played you in Learned League last week, and it was the best thing that happened to me in February.
Also, if there are other LLs around… I am struggling so hard this season. Does he make the questions harder every time???
SO HARD and my brain is mushy right now anyway.
Not to worry, I read “lovely” as sincere!
And I wholeheartedly agree with how poisonous “I prayed and received” theology is… What kind of capricious, uncaring God does that describe? What does it say about people who experience tragedy and oppression?
It’s why I can’t give the cross up (although I am not a fan of substitutionary atonement) – there on the cross is the God-who-suffers-with-us.
Have we all seen the youth riding club in Brixton (South London) who made a periscope so their Shetland pony could see out of his paddock? Everyone and everything about this video is adorable. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVquyWIj6ZE
!!! A PEDROSCOPE! gosh that’s adorable.
My heart grew ten sizes this day!
A pony plus a group of children solving a problem in order to make life better for someone? Be still, my heart.
THAT is the most deprived area of the UK?! GOD sign me up.
!!!!!!! *dies of adorableness*
I second the encouragement about greyhounds. We are on the wrong coast to take this one, but we have had one and he was wonderful. They are really retired professional athletes who appreciate a walk and then retire to hog the couch and the remote. Sweet temperaments, just great dogs.
And they looooooooove snuggles because they get cold easily.
The gay marriage ban in my state (Nebraska) got struck down today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
this tamir rice case is a fucking travesty. that cop was documented and proven to be unfit for duty. the video of the shooting is just….i don’t know how anyone could defend it. sickening.
Hmm, I live in the Midwest and have an awesome cat I love and my HOA doesn’t allow dogs; will any of that be a problem? Before you answer, consider: my cat is a tortie, so their coats would match.
Still actively upset about Leonard Nimoy.
Has anyone seen this article? http://chronicle.com/article/Sexual-Paranoia-Stri… may be a coherent argument in there somewhere but I just could not get past the slimy “I just wanna date my students” vibe the author gave off. I was actually really hoping a man wrote it, so I could feel comfortable eviscerating him, but then I scrolled up and saw it was a woman. And you know what? I’m still horrified and hope there will be a rebuttal soon, maybe from a female academic who will take Laura Kipnis down for all she’s worth.
Sorry for the novel, it’s just… horrifying. Makes me glad I decided to forego a career in academia, honestly.
Man, it such a dumb argument, like it’s this huge McCarthy-era blacklist hassle to not screw your students for a couple years while you’re actively teaching them.
“Some of these relationships turned out fine!”
Well great! Then they probably could have waited eighteen months for someone to graduate, and that way we aren’t accidentally providing cover to any actually predatory sexual relationships!
“But I want to do them NOOOOWWWWW!”
Ugh.
What baffles me is this idea that, like, “that’s how things happen in the real world!!”
Um, no, it’s not. Has she ever read a corporate HR manual?*
(*Obviously this doesn’t prevent all harassment from occurring either, but since her argument is that the RULES in academia are too strict, I think it’s relevant to point out.)
Her example about the editor who harassed one of his writers is actually a great case ABOUT dealing with sexual harassment with institutionalized repercussions. Wouldn’t it make more sense that someone, having experienced sexual harassment and dealing with it through HR/an institution, would be more ready to face it in the workplace?
Also, she goes to great lengths to describe how panicked and upset the woman being harassed by her editor was, and how powerless she felt- then she goes on to talk about how these academic rules take power away from students. No. Just no. If an established writer feels like that, why do you think someone out of high school (18-23, most likely) will be more ready?
Her examples are bad, her logic is weak- there are ridiculous lawsuits everywhere. Doesn’t make sexual harassment not an issue. I would be more interested in an article on the effectiveness of these heightened rules, rather than the early policy making and press.
On the other hand, “Sexual Paranoia” is a pretty great riot grrrl band name.
ew.
“back when sex, even when not so great or when people got their feelings hurt, fell under the category of life experience. It’s not that I didn’t make my share of mistakes, or act stupidly and inchoately, but it was embarrassing, not traumatizing.”
congratulations how wonderful that you come from The Land Before Sexual Trauma
So insulting – why not just say she doesn’t believe in rape unless it’s a stranger in the bushes, and that women are too dumb to distinguish between regrettable choices and assault? I have been extraordinarily lucky to never have experienced sexual assault, but I certainly know the difference between “That was awesome!” and “That was not the best choice I’ve ever made,” so why the fuck would she assume I wouldn’t also be able to say, “That happened without my consent, and it is not okay.”
“You have to feel a little sorry these days for professors married to their former students.” No! No, I do not! Your premise is faulty from the get-go, lady! And that you needed seemingly all the words in the goddamn language to justify your faulty premise does little to make me think you’ve got a cogent point. >:(
I’m less sure that any professor can force an unwilling student to drink, especially to the point of passing out. With what power? What sorts of repercussions can there possibly be if the student refuses?
Oh, you sweet summer child.
As an aging biological female
What. Why? She clearly means “woman,” and adding in the unnecessary sex/gender language just muddles the sentence, as well as introducing the looming specter of transphobia, which is the last thing she needs to add to what is already a seething mass of personal issues.
She…really likes Freud.
I agree that the article is super-skeezy! I also really dislike Laura Kipnis’s writing, she’s a very Slate-ish contrarian for the sake of being contrarian writer, and this makes me realize I have a story that will make you feel okay about wanting something to take her down:
During college, I had to read Kipnis’s “Against Love: A Polemic” for a writing class I was in circa 2006. Like most of the books I bought in college, I bought her book used. When I opened it up, I found that there was an adorable inscription on the title page — something like, “To Beth, a witty and yet loving comment about how he hoped their relationship would disprove the book’s thesis, love Greg”. So clearly, this book had been given as a loving gift from one romantic partner to another — and yet the relationship had failed, the gift had been discarded, the book (and author!) had been proven right, and I had acquired the book at a used bookstore.
So, when Kipnis (a friend of the professor) came into class to talk about the book, I brought in my copy, and at a break, I brought it to her to be signed, telling her the story as I’d pieced it together, and asking her to autograph right above the inscription.
Her reaction was, “…ugh, you bought the book used.” (Meanwhile, my professor was delighted, and told her it was a great story she should use.)
As soon as the course was over, feeling like the book was terrible enough I didn’t want it or the author around, I resold the book to the used bookstore, hoping that the signature added another level to whoever next picked it up, but also kind of hoping it remained unsold.
I read that article the other day and legit was all (instert Fry gif), “Not sure if poorly-written, unfunny satire, or terrible, victim-blaming argument.” After a paragraph or two it was obvious they were being earnest. Bleh.
There is just so much skeeziness and victim blaming in that article I don’t even know where to start.
Oh wait, I think I’ll start where she gets upset with the use of the term ‘survivor’ because it used to be reserved for HOLOCAUST victims dontchya know twice in two paragraphs.
Wat.
Ah shit I want a retired greyhound someday, but I sortof have 7 dogs rights now sooooooooo
(In southern california, not in like some midwestern state with a ton of land)
It sounds like you’re Living Your Best Life!
YOU ARE LIVING THE DREAM! Well my dream at least. I keep telling my fiancee I want 6 beagles but maybe I am aiming too low.
yes get all the beagles, have a pack of adorable food-obsessed barky beagles! I wish I could have one but…I love these 2 bunnies I have and I feel like the hound dog that I want would eat them.
I have one beagle, but we occasionally get to farm-sit for the farm he came from, and with him it is 6 beagles…the more beagles the better!
The worst realization about the cops filing that false assault charge: it was in response to Dendinger acting as a process server _GIVING PAPERS ABOUT A BRUTALITY LAWSUIT TO A POLICE OFFICER_.
So, this was on record as happening to a police officer who has already _been named_ in a brutality lawsuit. And the cops were BELIEVED until the cell phone evidence came out.
I try not to believe the worst about people, but that tips it over.
That article was so disturbing I don’t even have words. Being a process server is one of the worst jobs and why is it on him to prove his innocence? I find it deeply upsetting that this man was quite literally prosecuted for doing his job, and furthermore spent money he didn’t have as a disabled veteran doing odd jobs like delivering papers for just enough money to get by to prove that he was just doing his job. I mean WHAT.
“I hope you successfully pivot into a long and storied career.”
PIVOT!
(I know, Ross is terrible, but this scene, and the bloopers especially, are every moving experience I’ve ever had, summarized)
I just came here to say that I had a sex dream about Rihanna this weekend and it was great.
God has blessed you. May we all be so lucky.
Dakota Johnson had a TV show for a short period, where she played a quirky, nerdy single mom with an adorable daughter and a brother who was a bit of a weirdo and it was PERFECT and then it got cancelled because not enough people watched it. But I loved it. She was so good in it.
I also loved that show (and don’t know a single other person who watched it), it was totally cute and I was bummed it got cancelled! She was also hilarious in the Five Year Engagement. 🙂
Mr PWF and I loved Ben and Kate!
Did anyone else watch Dakota Johnson in the short-lived Ben and Kate with Nate Faxon? It was adorable and so short and I wish it was what she was being famous for right now.
I loved that show and she was so great in it. I really wish she were still doing that instead of Fifty Shades.
Did any of you see this (and subsequently throw up in your mouth) ? http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/01/opinion/sunday/…
tl;dr psychiatrist thinks that women who take antidepressants or anxiety meds are just “emotional,” as is their nature, and should suck it up instead of taking scary “unnatural” pills.
I might have growled out loud reading that. “Suck it up” is the least helpful thing you could tell someone suffering from anxiety and/or depression. Nothing like telling someone suffering that they’re just not good enough.
Oh right. I forgot that everything that occurs in nature is sunshine and rainbows.
And puppies. Don’t forget puppies.
I don’t want to read that article because it will make me want to MURDER. Like, you wouldn’t tell a person with epilepsy just to “shake it off and stop having seizures” would you?
I can’t believe that this person is actually charged with the medical care of others when their attitude towards depression and anxiety is basically like “lol yeah everyone gets sad sometimes.”
And the idea that people with mental illnesses are just ~passionate and sensitive~ and psych meds are some sort of conformist plot to make everyone into cogs in the machine? SO FUCKING ASS BACKWARDS and yet SO common that even a mental health professional is spouting it? Yeah, I was so creative and free when I was too depressed to get out of bed.
UGH I read it anyway. I mean I sure as hell hope prescribing doctors can tell the difference between “hormones acting up, yup, happens to everyone” and “crippling anxiety and depression that requires medication.” Does this woman have any evidence that is NOT the case? Any peer-reviewed research? ANY FACTS AT ALL?
Yeah, and what is this doctor doing to change society so that there are no repercussions to having unbridled inconvenient feelings? What is he doing to make there be room in society for a wider variety of mental health states and processes?
I actually didn’t get that from it at all. I got “medication is great for people who need it, but maybe we are telling women that they are sick because the patriarchy finds their feelings uncomfortable”. I thought the anecdote about the woman who wanted stronger meds after her boss made her cry at work (by being an asshole) was a good illustration of that.
I mean, yes, I had some problems with the “women are naturally more emotional because evolution”, but I didn’t feel that she was saying people should suck it up.
She doesn’t offer any evidence that that’s happening on a large scale though. I imagine that most people who seek out psychiatric treatment have good reasons for doing so and are smart enough to know the difference between feeling sad sometimes and being depressed. I think it’s pretty insulting to suggest that women don’t understand their own emotional state well enough to make their own medical decisions.
I think your points are completely valid.
And I certainly don’t want to say that women don’t understand their own emotional state well enough to make their own medical decisions; that’s sort of the flipside of over-medication – doctors who say “it’s all in your head” and refuse to acknowledge that a woman’s pain or mental illness are real.
But I do think that it is worth considering that many women are judging their mental health against a standard that holds a specific type of reserved masculinity as the ideal way to be, and that that leads women to ask for medication because they think they are sick, rather than earn to accept and deal with the ebbs and flows of their emotion. When I have PMS, I can be made to cry at the drop of a hat. It’s annoying, and it’s happened at work, but I accept that it’s just part of who I am. But I have known men who have flat-out stated that my natural and manageable hormonal fluctuations are somehow a sign of something “wrong” with me (I am thinking particularly of a time when I was going through a particularly sucky breakup) as opposed to real, reasonable feelings.
I absolutely think that women know themselves best, and I would never say that a doctor should say “you’re not depressed, just listen to some Taylor Swift and get over it”. However I do think that there are doctors out there whose response to a patient saying “I’ve been feeling depressed lately” is to immediately write a script for an SSRI, rather than taking the time to listen to the patient to determine if that is really the best course. (I’ve had a prescription for Xanax in the past, and while it was incredibly helpful in the times that I needed it, a lot of what was causing my anxiety was being unemployed and spending a lot of time with adrenaline junkies, and that’s not something that came up in the 15 minutes I had with my doctor)
that greyhound is adorable but I have 2 rabbits and live in BC 🙁
I was reading the excerpt of Jamil White’s essay above with extreme excitement (I’m a Pittsburgher and thereby a defacto August Wilson enthusiast, and I grew up or went to school in many of the neighborhoods he did), and when White asked him if he knew the Howards, I wanted to jump up and down and scream, “I KNOW THE HOWARDS, MY MOM IS SUPER CLOSE WITH JANE.” That is all, I shall now read the rest of the article with true hometown glee.
I’ve totally been loving Dakota Johnson in all her public appearances lately, too. She seems so confident and like she won’t take anyone’s crap. We were watching SNL and my husband tried to be all “nepotism” and “spoiled child of famous people” and I was like “NUH UH. I LIKE THIS ONE. BACK OFF.”
Pursuant to August Wilson, I would just like to add that he is one of the greatest American playwrights of the late 20th century, and I would very happily add up all the Mamets, Labuttes, Durangs, Iveses, even Kushners (sorry) and dropkick them all into space for another August Wilson.
Sub Adam Rapp for Tony Kushner and I’m on board with this.
Oh yeah, okay, Adam Rapp can definitely go into space, one way or the other.
I kind of sad-laughed at the “…ugh, you bought the book used” bit. Kind of reads like a Mountain Goats song or something, where at the end everyone ends up disappointed with everyone else, and the book gets thrown out. Awesome story!
ETA: @stirringsofconsciousness
Did anybody else watch Ben and Kate back in 2012-13? Salon said it was too sweet to be funny, or something along those lines, which seemed accurate enough and is presumably why it got canceled but was also the reason I loved it. Nicole saying All True Things about Dakota Johnson prompted me to see if it was watchable anywhere online and so I’ve only now learned that there are THREE WHOLE EPISODES of it that never aired in the States but are available on Amazon and iTunes. Thank you forever, Nicole.
I know someone whose roommate in university was Martin Short’s niece, because Canada. (And yes, she met “Uncle Marty.”)
That greyhound though!
My mum has a 1 year old whippet that looks almost exactly like a minature version of the picture and despite my dog aversion (so licky! so barky! so smelly!) I am a 100% convert.
A.) Oh my god, no I didn't. This is very embarrassing.
b.) Syracuse! (Camillus, if you are from the Syracuse area and want to know what specific suburb I hail from).
solidarity!