October 2011
33 posts
September 2011
94 posts
For the cat lovers
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An Open Letter to the Occupy Wall Street Activists
“Which brings me back to your mostly-inspiring Occupy Wall Street activities. On September 22nd, with great excitement, I eagerly read your “one demand” statement. Hoping and believing that you enlightened folks fighting for justice and equality and an end to imperialism, etc., etc., would make mention of the fact that the very land upon which you are protesting does not ...
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OCCUPY WALL STREET: The Game of Colonialism and...
“The “OCCUPY WALL STREET” slogan has gone viral and international now. From the protests on the streets of WALL STREET in the name of “ending capitalism” – organizers, protestors, and activists have been encouraged to “occupy” different places that symbolize greed and power. There’s just one problem: THE UNITED STATES IS ALREADY BEING OCCUPIED. THIS IS INDIGENOUS LAND. And it’s been...
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No goodbyes for us | Berkeley In the World →
“Politicians’ voices dominate the public discourse about forced migration, asylum seekers and refugees in Australia. During my time in Sydney, I encountered very few citizens who had ever met an asylum seeker or refugee. This is not surprising, as asylum seekers comprise less than 2 percent of the country’s migration intake, and those individuals are detained upon arrival in mostly...
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Boats, votes & suffering by Michael Short
Fantastic article!
“AUSTRALIA does not have an asylum seeker problem, Australia has a political leadership problem. Next time you hear a politician say ”stop the boats”, you might want to reply ”stop the bollocks”. As The Age has been pointing out in its editorials for years, the asylum seeker debate is a humanitarian issue, not a political one.
The failure of...
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Racism and the media – exploring the seen/unseen
“From my perspective such individuals, horrid as their misdemeanours may be, are a product of the ideological and systemic racism I focus on – a symptom if you will, and not an anomaly. “
Erika Te Hiwi
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Neo-liberal and future universities
“From this perspective, the neo-liberal quantification of university inputs and outputs, indexed to credit hours, rankings, productivity, and—most of all—debt, becomes a regime that aims to bond students’ personal aspirations and growth to the demands of the market. But other types of value are possible, and they will not be available at some distant point of freedom granted to those...
When Did You Decide To Be Straight?
Probably the most powerful video I have seen challenging heteronormativity and privilege.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJtjqLUHYoY
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The Long, Murderous Arm of the Law Has Killed Troy...
“Davis’s case offers a bracing and depressing illustration of capital punishment’s many problems. In their eagerness to prosecute a black man for murdering a white cop, local officials set in motion a killing machine that, once turned on, is near impossible to halt without executive intervention. Much has already been written about the details of Davis’s case; no reasonable observer can...
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Elizabeth Warren On ‘Class Warfare’: There Is...
For all those who consider themselves “self-made”
“You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police-forces and fire-forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding...
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Ladies and Gentlemen: The U.S. (in)Justice System
Structural/Institutional racism in the (in) justice system:
“When confronted with such data, police officers (and chiefs) usually respond that they are merely doing their job — that the racial discrepancy in stops and searches merely reflects group differences in criminal behavior. Yet, the city’s own data suggest otherwise. Those consensual searches? They yielded...
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10 Tips for a Zero-Waste Household
I live in a small house and have recently reduced my income. These two factors plus some of the changes I have been making over the years have helped me focus on reducing my consumption (although I have a very soft spot for clothes, shoes and bags..but slow and steady..). I liked this article about moving toward zero waste and the five R’s in particular:
Refuse what you do not need.
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“You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive.” — James Baldwin
Photo taken by Ruth DeSouza 2011
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Plus-Sized Lady Mocks American Apparel’s XL Model...
Very intrigued by this story (as an amply proportioned woman) and the response by Nancy Upton who also has her own tumblr page (That’s not our demographic).
“Think you are the Next BIG Thing? Calling curvy ladies everywhere! Our best-selling Disco Pant (and around 10 other sexy styles) are now available in size XL, for those of us who need a little extra wiggle room where it...
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“Traditionally, in American society, it is the members of oppressed, objectified...”
– Audre Lorde, “Age, Race and Sex: Women Redefining Difference” (via uprightcitizens)
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If You’re Going to Get Any Joy out of being...
Bless you Charlie Brown
Love In The Time Of Tumblr
Interesting points about Tumblr…
“Microblogging platforms, particularly Tumblr, have almost single-handedly elevated curating into an art all its own. Entire blogs exist—some of which are among the most widely visited on their parent sites—which are nothing more than massive recycling factories of material pulled from all over the Web. An interesting pathology results wherein...
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Gay rights: a world of inequality
“For lesbian and gay people who live in one of the 82 countries where homosexuality is criminalised, the world is not getting better: it is getting significantly, demonstrably worse. The irony – it’s actually not an irony, it’s a source of great shame, but it is also an unhappy coincidence – is that 40 of these countries are members of the Commonwealth, and this is a British...
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Unintentionally Eating the Other
“This desire for transformation through the Other is not unique to fashion; it is connected to a much longer history of what Black feminist scholar bell hooks (always in lower case) calls “imperialist nostalgia”: the longing of whites to inhabit, if only for a time, the world of the Other. Bodily transcendence through sartorial and cosmetic play is enacted by the consumption of...
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Open Letter to the Chefs of Tomorrow spelt out...
“Cooking is not only a response to the basic human need of feeding ourselves, and is also more than the search for happiness,” they said. “Cooking is a powerful, transformative tool that, through the joint effort of co-producers – whether we be chefs, producers or eaters – can change the way the world nourishes itself.”
“We dream of a future in which the chef is...
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10 Common Flowers You Didn’t Know You Should Eat ...
Gorgeous..
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Counter-Memory and the Politics of Loss After 9/11
“Whenever we honor the victims and survivors of 9/11, we should not be reluctant to engage also in public dialogue about both the legacy and the politics that precipitated and emerged from the events that took place on that tragic day.
Remembering 9/11 is as much an exercise in retrieving counter-memories as it is a ritualistic exercise in traditional acts of remembrance. Counter-memory...
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Refereeing Serena: Racism, Anger, and U.S....
“Yes, I’m aware of all the ways in which her acts in this moment reinforce stereotypes of the Angry Black Woman. However, we cannot use our investment in a respectability politic which demands that Black women never show anger or emotion in the face of injustice to demand Serena’s silence. Resistance is often impolite, and frequently it demands that we skirt the rules.”
"Social impact of the Internet"
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The Muppet Birthday Cake Inspires Nostalgia
I want one…
“Cake Central user Rashka baked and designed this birthday cake for her own birthday, and she nailed every last detail. The three-layer cake is adorned with stripes, ribbons, bows and flowers, but its crowning glory is Kermit and Miss Piggy, who are perched back to back on the top of the cake”
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A Decade After 9/11: We Are What We Loathe
A profoundly compassionate critique of the response to USA’s 9/11
“The dead in the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania were used to sanctify the state’s lust for war. To question the rush to war became to dishonor our martyrs. Those of us who knew that the attacks were rooted in the long night of humiliation and suffering inflicted by Israel on the...
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The Decade of Magical Thinking
“There was so much talk back then about how much we were feeling. We had all these feelings. The histrionics of the daytime talk shows infiltrated prime time. A culture addicted to images of artificial violence had finally gotten a jolt the real stuff: the unscripted ruin, the blood relics. It was a snuff film writ large. People got off on it. Watching the coverage was a turn-on: the...
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9/11: more security, less secure
“There is little doubt that 9/11 has led throughout the world to two interrelated processes (though they have played out variously in different countries and regions). First, it has led to the securitisation of almost all aspects of life; second, it has led to the Islamisation of security. What I mean to say is that almost everything - from immigration to transport, from the environment...
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Henry Giroux on Democracy Unsettled: From Critical...
A great interview and read..lots to mull over..
“As a working-class male in a neighborhood where masculinity was a shifting marker of courage, brutality and identity, the body became the most resourceful tool I had. It was the ultimate source of agency, required in order to survive, ensure respect and provide a framing mechanism to mediate between oneself and the larger world. Violence...
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“Only a revolution of values in our nation will end male violence, and that...”
– bell hooks, The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love (via museumouth)
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