There’s some really good commentary out there. Among other things, it’s interesting to me how many of my fellow bloggers identify as Unitarian.

First, Sara Robinson, over at Orcinus, offers a moving tribute to Unitarian principles, and talks about how, in a time of crisis, those principles shone through.

One of the dead, Greg McKendry, apparently took a shotgun blast full in the chest while trying to shield other members from the line of fire. Three other members of the congregation almost immediately charged the gunman and took him down, breaking his arm in the process. Still other members acted sanely and calmly to quickly get the dozens of children out of the sanctuary, and summon the police.

Those are the Unitarians I know. Smart, tough, fearless, calm in a crisis, committed to right action. It could have been any UU church in America, and they’d have behaved pretty much the same way.

It could have been any UU church in America — and that’s the problem.

Pam discusses both the homophobic motives of the shooter and the presence in the shooter’s home of hate literature by Michael Savage, Sean Hannity, and Bill O’Reilly.

Before opening fire, one witness said Adkisson shouted something to the congregation that suggests he was there for a purpose — “It was hateful words. He was saying hateful things.”  The FBI is officially investigating whether this brutal attack in a house of worship was a hate crime.

David Niewert at Orcinus has some information on the links between this assault and the eliminationist rhetoric of the right.

Right-wingers love to “joke” about mowing down, rounding up, and otherwise “wiping out” all things liberal. It’s become a standard feature of conservative-movement rhetoric. And whenever anyone calls them on it, they have a standard response: “Aw, c’mon — it’s just a joke!”

In reality, of course, rhetoric like this has historically played a critical role in some of the ugliest episodes in American history, as well as thousands of little acts of xenophobic brutality: functionally speaking, it gives violent — and frequently unstable — actors permission to act on these impulses. People like this always believe they’re standing up for what “real Americans” think — and the jokes tell them that this is so.

Brad Hicks, who’s always interesting, has a post up about all sorts of things . . . Angry White Males, eliminationist rhetoric, free speech, and the decency of the Unitarians themselves. His final paragraph pretty much sums up my thoughts on it.¹

Dave Neiwert, and I, aren’t actually calling for the Rush Limbaughs and Bill O’Reillys and Sean Hannitys of America to go to jail for ordering the murder of two people, and the attempted murder of many more, at Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, or the murder of so many other liberals by those commentators’ depressed or enraged fans. Nor are we calling for such rantings to be made illegal; we’re both First Amendment absolutists. No, what we’re calling for is for Americans to wake up, and change their attitudes. We want to live in an America where when a prominent spokesperson for a political party “jokes” about sending their audience out to mass-murder their political opponents, it should and must shock our consciences. That person must become the kind of instant social pariah that people quite justly become when they make openly racist remarks. What you talk about in private, with people who know you’re not serious, is one thing; what they broadcast or publish to an eager audience gets innocent people killed by the dozens, and if that doesn’t bother them enough to stop them from continuing to do it, then there is just plain something that malevolently wrong with them, something just that deeply disgusting about them. And no matter what your politics are, if you aren’t just plainly that disgusted about their ongoing eliminationist rhetoric, there’s something wrong with you, too.

1. As if it wouldn’t be obvious, I don’t agree with everything he has to say in this post (!), but I think, especially towards the end, there’s a lot he gets right. (back)

I am never quite sure how one builds up a hatred of Unitarian Universalists. Oh, I know people exist who hate us, but it seems a bit of a wasted emotion. After all, the central tenet of Unitarianism is that nobody really knows whether there’s a God or not, and if there is, nobody really knows what he, she, it, or they are like. No lake of fire for the unbelievers, no eternal torment for the non-elect; as the great philosopher Homer J. Simpson once said, when asked what the true religion is, “Well, not the Unitarians. If that’s the one true faith I’ll eat my hat!” Not a Unitarian alive would disagree with him.

But UUs can be defined by one overriding principle, inherent in the idea that any of us could be right, and any of us could be wrong: tolerance. Tolerance for ideas and decisions and lifestyles that may not be right for me, but may be right for someone else. UUs are ardently pro-choice, staunchly pro-GLBTQQ rights, anti-racist, and pro-equality for all. Unitarian Churches and Societies in Massachusetts and California  gladly perform marriage ceremonies for same-sex partners, and that differentiates them from those in the other 48 states only because their states recognize the ceremony. We believe in helping those who are in need, accepting those who are different, supporting those who make the brave and difficult decision to be themselves, no matter what they are supposed to be.

And that is dangerous. For those who believe that there is but one acceptable way to live, but one acceptable path in life, but one acceptable belief system, the Unitarian Universalists are anathema to all that is right. We preach acceptance and tolerance, when we should be teaching proscription and the one true way. And that cannot stand.

Jim David Adkisson was clearly a disturbed and deranged man, one with a violent temper and a tenuous hold on his sanity. His ex-wife had been a member of the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, a liberal, tolerant church, one where women were counted as equals, where gays and lesbians were welcomed with open arms, where liberal ideas of propriety and decency prevailed.

Adkisson was no liberal; that much is clear. While his neighbors noted that he had a rooted distrust of Christianity, he was much more interested in reading the sort of right-wing hate speech that passes for meaningful discourse. Let Freedom Ring by Sean Hannity sat on his bookshelf, as did Michael Savage’s Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder, and Bill O’Reilly’s The O’Reilly Factor. He nursed a hatred of liberals, one that he would eventually pour out into a four-page screed in which he said liberals were destroying America, and because he could not attack the leaders of the liberal movement, he would attack their followers.

And then he loaded up a shotgun, and he headed to the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, where children were engaged in a performance of Annie, Jr. And he opened fire.

We are told by the right, each time a mass shooting such as this takes place, that it would be best if everyone around was armed, better if everyone could just fire back. In a different setting, a different church, maybe there would have been crossfire. But even in Tennessee, I misdoubt gun ownership among UUs can be counted in the single digits. Total.

There would be no standoff, no OK Corrall shootout. Instead, Greg McKendry, a longtime parishioner and usher at the church, threw himself in front of the shooter, dying in the process but limiting the other deaths to but one other person, Lisa Kraeger, who was visiting from a different UU church.  Others rushed to subdue and disarm Adkisson, a man who expected he would go out in a blaze of glory, no doubt buoyed by his belief that liberals would not fight back, would not be armed, would go quietly.

Adkisson was denied his martyrdom. He was arrested; he is in custody, and he will rot in jail. His attempt for immortality was dashed by people willing to put themselves in harm’s way to save others. Adkisson himself was unharmed.

It would be nice if we UUs had a coherent belief in the afterlife, to say that McKendry and Kraeger were in Heaven now, and at peace. We don’t. We hope there’s something, and maybe there is something, but like all other aspects of our faith, we know only that we don’t know. McKendry and Kraeger may be in Heaven, or moving on to the next cycle of life, or joining with the infinite mind, or they may simply be gone, forever.

But their deaths were not in vain. McKendry died a hero, saving others by sacrificing himself. Kraeger died a martyr to her faith, if Unitarianism believed in such a thing.

There is, of course, much to say about the hatred that fed Adkisson’s resentment, the bile that begat his terroristic attack, that led him to write, “all liberals should be killed.” How the hatred and the othering that the right has engaged in for lo these many years will inevitably lead to more Adkissons, choosing to attack other liberal organizations. Dave Neiwert will inevitably have quite a bit to say about this, while the Malkinites will try to declare that Adkisson wasn’t really a conservative after all.

And it is important for us to discuss that, but in truth, I feel sorry for Adkisson, even as his actions are clearly unforgivable. He was, like all of us, a soul cast upon this world, looking for direction and purpose. Had he found himself a more stable, more honorable set of influences, he may have found himself happier and saner, at least enough so that he did not feel the need to murder others in order to find meaning in his existence. He went looking for answers, and the right gave him instead a scapegoat, an over-arching group to place all his self-hatred onto, all his anger, all his rage, all his uncomprehending fury. And then he acted.

He is as lost and broken as anybody involved in this, and my heart goes out to him. Hatred does not just push people to destroy others; it destroys those that hate, as well.

None of us know what lies beyond the end of our time on this Earth. All we know for certain is that we have this time to live, and this short time to find our own meaning to our existence. Adkisson thought he had found his meaning, that he was a means to the destruction of the enemy — the enemy being his fellow humans. But his fellow humans refused to turn on him, refused to harm him, refused to kill him, refused to view him as he viewed them. In all the righteous anger and fury and pain of the moment, the members of the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church did not seek revenge. Two lives ended the day of Adkisson’s attack, but they did not die without meaning. In that moment, the UUs of that congregation did what all of us in the church hope we can do — they fought back with tolerance, compassion, and self-sacrifice, not with anger, bitterness, and vengeance. The dead and wounded — even those who only bear the psychological scars of that moment — they embraced what is best about the Unitarian Universalist Church’s ethos.

There is deep meaning in that, even if it came in a horrific and brutal moment.

Well, I came home from school this evening to find this on my Google homepage.

An out-of-work truck driver accused of opening fire and killing two people at a Unitarian Universalist church apparently targeted the congregation out of hatred for its support of liberal social policies, including its acceptance of gays, police said Monday.A four-page letter found in Jim D. Adkisson’s SUV indicated that he targeted the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church because “he hated the liberal movement” and was upset with “liberals in general, as well as gays,” according to Knoxville Police Chief Sterling Owen IV.

Adkisson, 58, had a shotgun and 76 shells with him when he entered the church Sunday during a children’s performance of the musical “Annie.” Six adults were wounded in the attack.

Tonight in class, we discussed the 1957 integration of Little Rock Central High School. The thing that people don’t remember, especially in the North, is that Arkansas was considered a moderate southern state, and Little Rock was a moderate city within it. The Arkansas State Universitiy at Fayetteville integrated in 1948, Little Rock city buses were integrated by 1956, and the Little Rock school board was actively planning on desegregating their high schools. Things were going … if not swimmingly, then at least not unspeakably horribly.

All that changed, of course, when Arkansas governor (and douchebag) Orval Faubus, in a bid to win political support from segregationists and fend off challenges from his political right, ordered the Arkansas National Guard to prevent black students from attending the high school. There were riots. Eisenhower ended up federalizing the Arkansas National Guard and mobilized members of the 101st Airborne to protect black students on their way to and from classes. Acid was thrown in the eyes of one of the students. The next year Faubus shut down all Little Rock high schools rather than allow them to be integrated.

I’m sure you all know the story.

The reason I bring it up is that there was every expectation that integration of Little Rock Central would go smoothly, until Governor Faubus decided to demagogue in an effort to win votes. There’s even a Time magazing article: Making a Crisis in Arkansas. The entire situation was manufactured.

What’s my point?

Demagoging has consequences. Appealing to hate and bigotry creates more hate and bigotry. It creates riots. It creates vandalism. It creates murder.

We have a president who campaigned for governor on the promise that in his administration, consensual sex between adult males would be considered a crime. We have an entire political party that sees nothing wrong with the idea that in the year 2008, gay people in most states still aren’t allowed to marry the people they love. We have respected (well, Jonah Goldberg, so maybe not respected, but tolerated) conservative pundits who apparently in all seriousness believe that Adolf Hitler was a liberal.

Do I think that they actually believe this? Sometimes, sure. Sometimes not. It doesn’t matter.

As surely as I lay the Little Rock riots at the feet of Orval Faubus, I lay the assault on this church at the feet of those who have claimed that gay marriage would destroy western civilization and those who equate liberals with Nazis.

See, it turns out that when you said all that shit . . . people were listening. Jim D. Adkisson was listening.

Mandolin’s poem “The Oracle on River Street” has won third place in this year’s Rhysling Awards, for the category “short poem”! Congratulations, Mandolin! Yay!

On October 3-6, 2008 Radical Women is hosting The Persistent Power of Socialist Feminism conference at The Women’s Building in San Francisco. I am writing to ask that you post a link to this event on your website. I think the people who visit your site would be especially interested in this historic gathering.

The conference features activists and scholars from Central America, Australia, China, and the U.S. The agenda includes panel discussions, keynote speakers such as civil liberties attorney Lynne Stewart, organizer-training workshops and strategy sessions. Topics include: multiracial organizing in a society divided by racism, the dynamic leadership of youth and queers, a labor revival ignited by immigrants and women of color, and the need for an independent grassroots feminist movement.

In today’s tumultuous political climate, we hope this event will produce concrete plans to energize and focus the women’s movement on the many issues that affect us all. The event is open to all genders.

Here’s my current working definition of “oppression”:¹

Oppression is a system whereby:

1) A group “A” is systematically mistreated in comparison to non-As in a given social context.

2) The distinctive traits of group “A” are viewed as exceptions to the “unmarked” or “default” traits of a “normal” member of society.

3) Members of group “A” are effectively prevented from holding a significant number of high leadership positions in society’s controlling institutions.

Can we then define “privilege” as the direct opposite of “oppression”?² So:

Privilege is a system whereby:

1) A group “B” is systematically, unfairly advantaged in comparison to non-Bs in a given social context.

2) The distinctive traits of group “B” are viewed as the “unmarked” or “default” traits of a “normal” member of society.

3) Members of group “B” hold a near-monopoly on the high leadership positions of society’s controlling institutions.

Comments?

1. This definition of oppression swipes quite a bit from Caroline New’s discussion; see previous “Alas” discussions here and here. (back)
2. Credit where credit’s due: I think Daran of “feminist critics” may have suggested this to me at some point. (back)

It’s still Ms. Swirsky, though.

From Joel Stein’s column in the LA Times, entitled “Camp Hollywood”:

After studying the book, I focused on the photo from Camp Modin in 1980. It demonstrates that by age 11, the kids at Modin had mastered the basics of not only the bowl haircut but networking. Standing side by side are future Hollywood players David Wain (of MTV’s “The State” and Comedy Central’s “Stella”), Stuart Blumberg (Ed Norton’s producing partner and writer of “Keeping the Faith” and “The Girl Next Door”) and Craig Wedren (composer on “School of Rock” and “Wet Hot American Summer”). When I asked “Camp Camp” coauthor Roger Bennett how this one tiny camp in Maine produced so much success, he said it “was a machine created by Lew Wassserman to make your town run on time.” People who write books think Hollywood runs on time.

I asked around and found out that Wain’s cabin of about 20 kids also housed comic book artist Barry Deutsch, jazz bassist Avishai Cohen and designer Laser Rosenberg — though his name suggests that even without the camp influence, he wasn’t getting pushed into the doctor-lawyer choice. Robert Smigel (creator of Triumph the Insult Comic Dog and “Saturday Night Live’s” “TV Funhouse”) was a counselor that year.

I’d really love to see that photo.

You know a writer is stretching to make their point when I’m included as an example of success. Nonetheless, it’s striking that we all knew what we wanted to do even then; even in the early 80s, David wanted to make films, Craig wanted to make music, and I wanted to make comics. (Of course, I kind of assumed I’d get around to it quicker than I did).

I didn’t know Robert Smigel was a Modin counselor; I don’t think he was ever my counselor. David and Craig I’ve seen once or twice in the last several years, and we occasionally exchange emails. Laser and Stu, I haven’t had any contact with in two decades, but I remember them fondly. I especially adored Laser; he made seeming different and outstanding seem so natural (although as I recall, it wasn’t easy for him). I don’t remember Avishai Cohen being there, but my memory is famous for how awful it is.

Dave’s movie Wet Hot American Summer is partly based on Camp Modin days. Two of the characters are, Dave admitted (although maybe he was just being nice), partly based on me — the geeky kid who runs the D&D club, and (alas) the kid who smells horrible because he never showers.

Hat tip: Mari.

Guantanamo detainees can challenge their detention in civilian courts.

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay have rights under the Constitution to challenge their detention in U.S. civilian courts.In its third rebuke of the Bush administration’s treatment of prisoners, the court ruled 5-4 that the government is violating the rights of prisoners being held indefinitely and without charges at the U.S. naval base in Cuba. The court’s liberal justices were in the majority.

and

The court said not only that the detainees have rights under the Constitution, but that the system the administration has put in place to classify them as enemy combatants and review those decisions is inadequate.

The administration had argued first that the detainees have no rights. But it also contended that the classification and review process was a sufficient substitute for the civilian court hearings that the detainees seek.

It’s about damn time.

If you have an LJ, consider voting in the elections for the advisory board.

Livejournal is electing, via popular vote of LJ members, an LJ user to serve on their advisory board. Is this a significant position? Probably not. However, one of the leading candidates — jameth — is a troll whose recent bad behavior includes anti-semitic screeds, harrassing Ginmar, and adding to the harrassment of the Wiscon attendees. So, go vote against him.

Here, you can find an expanded and more informed version of what I just said.

In order to help your ant-jerk vote count for the most it can, p-zeitgeist recommends voting for the following advisor candidates: legomymalfoy, vichan, and rm.

Keep anti-semitism out of LJ. Or at least off its advisory board. Go vote against a jerk.

(Note: only vote once, and if you own multiple LJ accounts, only vote with one of them. Otherwise, your vote will be discounted.)

Interesting,

To what extent does the US’s lack of density just indicate that we’ve got so much damned space?

It’s curious, as well, how very spread out Africa is in the statistics, compared to all the other areas.

Via Ezra, who writes “The problem for folks worried about global warming is that our energy intensive lifestyle had a very long time to evolve, but a more conservatory approach has to be implemented pretty quickly.”

Hey folks it’s Rachel.  I figured I’d give everyone an update.

Yes, my posting has been limited lately. I’m slowly getting prepared for the babies, and then we had some computer trouble last week, so needless to say I’ve been preoccupied with other things.

I’ve been really lucky because I haven’t had any major problems. I’ve also had a total of zero contractions, no high blood pressure, no diabetes, and no other common pregnancy problems. My doctor did suggest taking time off from work at 34 weeks. I think that is fairly standard with twins since twin pregnancies are generally more taxing on the body than singleton pregnancies. Fortunately, my semester ended right at that time, so I didn’t have to worry about going to my job. It was just the right time to stop because I really can’t be on my feet for more than 10-15 minutes without having back, hip, and buttock pain.

The babies are doing well. Since “discordance,” which is basically large differences in size or growth of multiples, is a potential problem I have to get them measured every 3 weeks. I get an ultrasound, and the neonatalogist and ultrasound tech measure their size, heart rate, amniotic fluid, and several other measures of health and growth. At 33 weeks and a half weeks, they weighed 5lbs. 1oz. each. I was happy to see that their sizes are the same because baby A was getting ahead of baby B, but B finally caught up. At this rate, I may have two 7lb. babies. That’s not big for a single baby, but it’s pretty big for twins–I just keeping thinking, “My body will likely be carrying 14lbs. of baby.” The seem to be dropping, and right now they have their heads down, so I may be able to push both of them out without a C-section.

Unless they want to come sooner, I’ll probably be delivering them at 38 weeks.

I feel like liberals are always trying to make conservatives understand that the world and the actions in it are not black and white. If one has done something racist, that doesn’t make them a bad person, it makes them a normal person. We all do bad things. We all do sexist things. That’s not what’s at issue.

White people struggle against the charge of racism because they feel it switches the on-and-off in them, from “good” to “bad.” Since self cannot be perceived as bad, we shout, “No! No! It must not be true! I’m a good person, so I have not been racist!” When, of course, we should be able to look and say, “Oh, I fucked up. I will change. I will fix this.”

There’s a personality disorder called Borderline Personality Disorder in which sufferers have a great deal of difficulty understanding ambiguity. They tend to view themselves and others as either entirely good or entirely bad, a switch that will flip with great regularity. On a good day, they are all good. On a bad one, they are the worst person who ever lived. If you give them something they like, you’re an angel; if you speak a harsh word, you’re an evil person conspiring against them.

I tend to drive some of our legalistic commenters here crazy (sorry, Sailorman) because I don’t believe the world has boundaries that can be clearly described between good and bad. We all, along with our every action, inhabit ambiguity. Every good thing we do has bad unintended consequences. Every bad thing we do has good unintended consequences. We’re all shaded. We’re all compromised. No one’s clean or pure. No one’s evil or tarnished beyond recognition.

This is not a profound thought, expressed in the abstract, and yet I see it abandoned with great regularity when we move into concrete examples. I’ve seen it over and over and over again, and I find it so frustrating in liberal circles. We should know better. I wish we did. But we’re so ready for conflict, to make sharp decisions, to slice things and people into black and white until, as Ampersand says, we construct people “as only their worst moments.”

There’s this drive toward perfectionism in the activist soul, toward making perfect the enemy of good.

It’s so, amazingly damaging. On the personal level, yes — I could talk about bloggers who I can’t stand to read, but who I nevertheless respect, but I don’t really want to bring individuals into it.

But more on the systemic level. We cut off our own feet. If we can’t acknowledge we’re all trapped in racist and sexist systems, systems which compromise our most purely intended actions, systems that prescribe our choices and make us choose between lesser evils… what can we fight? What’s the point? How are we different than ascetics with whips to use on ourselves and others for the greater good of purgation?

We can’t purge our souls.

When it comes to racism, we understand that it’s not the intent that matters, it’s the effect. It’s not apportioning blame that’s relevant, it’s creating solutions. So why are we stuck in circles, trying to define THAT person as evil for THIS compromised act and making that declaration of good or evil a single, solid, reified thing? Why do we, as a collective, exhibit some features of Borderline Personality Disorder?

I don’t think the human brain is set up very well to perceive shades of grey, which is too bad, because concepts with borders around them like black and white are only our own constructions for understanding the world, and they are badly insufficient tools.

–

Given the context of recent blogosphere battles, I want to say that I realize some may read this post as being about Amanda and/or Amanda’s critics. It isn’t intended to be. I understand that there’s a great deal of history there which involves more than black and white decision making. This post was written in reaction to a different conversation.

I also don’t mean to say there should be no critique of anyone. Critique is important — it’s vital that it be passionate and vehement and present, for otherwise nothing would change. I mean only to question a particular kind of critique, that variety of righteous condemnation which seems to be about making sense of the world by casting it with angels and devils instead of struggling players.

Feminist, anti-racist comments only. (If I bold this and put it at the end, will people pay attention? –post-mod queue Mandolin.)

On Pandagon, Amanda writes:

I’m sorry. Plain and simple. I didn’t pick the offensive imagery in my book, but I should have caught it sooner than now. I didn’t and there’s no excuse. It was my first book, I was excited and happy, but I needed to have a more critical eye. I would do anything to remove racist images from the first printing of the book if I could, and I am relieved and happy to say that they will be removed from future printings.

Since the book is currently in its second printing, Seal Press is already removing the offensive images. They write:

Please know that neither the cover, nor the interior images, were meant to make any serious statement. We were hoping for a campy, retro package to complement the author’s humor. That is all. We were not thinking.

As an organization, we need to look seriously at the effects of white privilege. We will be looking for anti-racist trainings offered here in the Bay Area. We want to incorporate race analysis into our work.

Although the apology from Seal Press is not 100% satisfying in it’s wording, I congratulate them for understanding (with prompting) that these images, combined with their extremely problematic response to women of color discussing their publishing diversity, indicate a problem with them not their critics. I wish them the best of luck in addressing it.

Seal Press, if I were you, I would go straight to the Angry Black Woman or Nojojojo, both of whom I can personally attest are excellent writers (and ABW an experienced editor), and ask if either would be willing to edit a collection of articles for you on any subject she desires, even if it’s the lack of diversity in the publishing industry with an article about Seal Press in it. I don’t know if either of them would have time or inclination to take you up on it — they’re legitimately pissed at you — but if they did, you would end up with a clearly excellent collection of articles. That would just be my first step.

Alternately, if someone could help you find BFP, and if she had time and inclination, I’m certain her writings could be compiled into an excellent text.

Oh, and drop everything and go read this post from Angry Black Woman on how to promote diversity in fiction markets. It’s not 100% salient to non-fiction publishing, but it’s close enough.

I am very pleased that the book will soon be available without this offensive imagery. I’ve only excerpted from these apologies; I suggest you read further yourself.

I imagine many people will be wondering why Amanda apologized about this issue, while staying silent on her own blog about appropriation. Only Amanda can answer that, though I suspect the answer has something to do with her feeling she did something wrong here and not in the other instance. To the extent that my desires are relevant (i.e. about 0%), I’d urge Amanda to address the appropriation issue on her blog. Even if she doesn’t feel she appropriated, she could easily mention the controversy, apologize for whatever portion of it she feels rests on her shoulders (and surely she can agree that appropriation is a systemic issue, and one she and many other white people have participated in without intention or conscious knowledge, if not in this instance specifically, then surely in others) and compile a set of links to salient works by women of color. Even if those links don’t feel like direct sources to her, they would certainly be excellent reading for her audience, and what is there to lose? More sets of eyes on excellent, progressive writing by women of color? Oh, please don’t throw me in that briar patch.

UPDATESeal Press has updated their apology with the following:

Please note that, upon reflection, we realize that the second to the last paragraph of this post doesn’t do a good job of conveying our intended meaning. We do not want to delete it, but we do want to make a note around our intent, since its purpose was to further articulate the “what were they thinking?” question. We apologize that this paragraph undermines our apology. We acknowledge that the images are racist and not okay under any circumstances. We are wholeheartedly sincere in our apology, and the actions we’ve laid out above will be acted upon immediately.

(Feminist, anti-racist comments only please.)

The latest Disability Blog Carnival is now up at Abnormal Diversity where the theme is Abuse. I submitted a post on something that happened to me about two years ago, and there’s much more to read on the topic. Check it out.

The next Disability Blog Carnival will be on May 8 at CripChick’s. The theme will be Disability Identity and Culture. From CripChick:

Here are some topic ideas!:
• What is disability identity? If you are disabled, do you feel disability is a part of you and your experience?
• What is disability culture to you? How do you put it out there or live it every day?
• Does disability intersect with your other identities (i.e. queer person, person of color, person of faith, etc.)?
• Is pride, community, or the Disability Rights Movement important to you? Why or why not?
• How do you feel about the word disabled? Is it a political term with power to you or do you despise it?
• Do you see disability outside of a rights framework (i.e. is disability something that is more than advocacy to you?)
• If you identify with the autistic acceptance movement, the deaf community, or other groups, how do you feel about disability? Many people do not want to associate with the disability community— how do you feel about this?
• Have you felt alienated [left out] from the disability community because of racism, exclusion because of your disability, the media or other factors? How has this affected your identity as a disabled person?

And some topic ideas for allies:
• Why is disability important to your work or politics?
• How do you feel about the Disability Rights Movement and what would you say to activists who downplay this movement or even disability as an important social justice issue?
• How do you see disability intersecting with feminism, reproductive justice [movement that focuses on ALL people having ALL control of their bodies], and other movements that work to end oppression?
• What do you see in your role as an ally?

CripChick also provides a list of resources for anyone wanting to bone up on the topic before participating. Deadline for submissions is May 4. The carnival submission form is available here, or leave a comment with your submission’s link at CripChick’s, or email her with the info at consciouslycrip [at] gmail [dot] com.

Other recent Disability Blog Carnivals have been at Reimer Reason on the theme of The Hardest Part, Andrea’s Buzzing About on Breaking Out, Wheelie Catholic on Appreciating Allies, and Sunny Dreamer on Standing Outside the Fire.

Image description: The icon above, provided by CripChick for the upcoming carnival at her place is a color image of a self-portrait by Frida Kahlo with the words “DISABILITY BLOG CARNIVAL” in bold black type across the painting. The image is a close-up of Frida in her wheelchair from the 1951 painting “Self-Portrait with Portrait of Dr. Farill.” described in detail in both English and Spanish here.

Cross-posted at The Gimp Parade

Note: There’s a slight spoiler in the review, and in the thread here on “Alas.” So if you’re allergic to spoiliers, don’t click through to the review, and don’t read the thread here!

This review came out the same day as the “Blog About Comics” review. On Broken Frontier, Eric Lindberg writes:

Hereville also has a distinctly left-of-center approach to fantasy that I found appealing. Mirka’s stepmother Fruma challenges the view of dragons as an evil force, likening their man-eating tendencies to any other predator in nature. [Slight spoiler deleted by Amp.] These are nice offbeat touches that contribute to the individualism of this comic and its voice.

The mixture of influences is not always a seamless transition however. The placement of fantasy elements in this setting makes it a bit difficult to pinpoint the rules of the world of Hereville. Electricity and alarm clocks co-exist with monsters out of European legend. Some characters speak of trolls as if they are commonplace, while others have never heard the term and consider them a goisch (gentile) concept of no concern. Do these people and creatures truly co-exist? Is it all in Mirka’s head? Presumably, future Hereville storyarcs will more firmly establish Mirka’s world and how it works.

Deutsch’s style of cartooning bridges the gap between old-fashioned and modern sensibilities. His elongated figures with their exaggerated puppet-like expressions brought to mind the work of E.C. Segar (creator of Popeye), adding a fun and loose sense of charm to the proceedings. The sepia tone coloring lends a timeless feel to the story while the panel layout and storytelling techniques are more contemporary. This combination is an appropriate choice for the subject manner, reflecting the mix of Old World and New in the characters’ culture.

There’s more — head over to B.F. to read the whole review.

My first reaction: Whoo-hooo, I got compared to E.C. Segar! The comparison flatters me more than I deserve, but I don’t care — because I love Segar! (I have a reproduction of a pre-Popeye “Thimble Theater” strip on my wall).

My squeeeee!!-ness aside, it was a good review — not because it was positive (although I’m of course happy for that), but because it went deeper than just thumbs up or down. Thanks, Eric.

I know it’s almost a half-century old, and the woman is fictional, but still I find myself begging this woman to GET A FUCKING DIVORCE!!!!

Also, check out this article from a British paper: Marksman called in to kill Kingston’s pigeons. You can almost skip the article; I’m linking this for the comments, which are brilliant.

Finally, The New Yorker has a time-lapse video, taken from a building’s security cameras, of a man trapped alone in an elevator for 41 hours. Oddly compelling. (Curtsy: Boing Boing.)

I’m going to get back to regular posting soon. I’ve been really tired and busy over the past couple weeks, so I’ve neglected posting. Between nesting, midterm grading, sleeping, and trying to catch my breath, I’ve been a little preoccupied. I definitely want to respond to the Obama race speech…just to tease everyone a little I think there were many problems with the speech, and I want to address some of them in a post.

In the mean time, let me know what I’ve missed in the blog world.

The Sad-Faced Man is a character who has shown up in a lot of my doodles over the years, and appeared a few times in Pre-Structuralist Funnies.

I’ve also frequently doodled anthropomorphic spatulas and coffee cups. Don’t know why.

This is an open thread; use it to discuss whatever you’d like, or to post interesting links. Self-linking is encouraged.

Someone at the AP (or perhaps the Washington Post) is a brilliant geeky headline writer.

Skywalkers in Korea Cross Han Solo

The Associated Press
Thursday, May 3, 2007; 3:34 PM

SEOUL, South Korea — They came from all over the world, poles in hand, and feet ready to inch more than half a mile across a high wire strung over the Han River in a spine-tingling battle of balance, speed and high anxiety.

As part of its annual city festival, the South Korean capital staged Thursday what was billed as the world’s first high-wire championship, drawing 18 contestants from nine countries for three days of supreme feats of concentration.

Hat tip: Robert at Lawyers, Guns and Money

While I’m posting, let me point out that two bloggers I’ve often disagreed with have recently written posts I mostly or entirely agree with; David at The Debate Link has written a couple of posts on Israel I mostly agree with, and Daran at Feminist Critics has been criticizing an anti-feminist attack on Mary Koss’ rape prevalence study.