I haven't seen this posted about here but it's going round Twitter and tiktok, and I'm so beyond angry I can't let it go.
The UK imprint of Simon and Schuster have announced a history of Gaza is forthcoming from writer and academic Dr Anne Irfan. She's a professor at UCL specialising in Palestinian refugees and their treatment under the UNRWA. She's done extensive work and volunteering in refugee camps, advocates for Palestinians in the UK directly to government, works with a number of projects including in asylum applications, and writes articles both in academic journals and in newspapers about Palestine. Whilst studying for her thesis, she was denied entry into Palestine by Israel.
Sounds like a highly qualified person to write a history of Gaza, right?
WRONG!
According to activists on social media - all of whom have comparable work backgrounds and experience I'm sure - it's completely unacceptable for her to write this book!!! Some of which is due to her being a white woman (we'll get to that), and some is due to her husband being a soldier in the IDF and clapping for genocide (we'll get to that too).
The vitriol and backlash has been awful, and I haven't seen many takedowns so under the cut I will dissect the issues here.
1) she's not Palestinian.
This one seems to be true, and I do think that it's important that we allow people from a region to tell their own stories. This isn't the worst criticism, however given the other problems people have I think it's being brought up disengenuously.
She is an expert though, and I am deeply concerned about this progression to an idea that we should only learn about or discuss our own cultures. Palestinian voices not being elevated is a systemic issue, not the fault of one woman who we can at least say possesses the requisite expertise to write a history book.
She's actually already written one book - Refuge and Resistance: Palestinians and the international refugee system.
Here's a list of recent news articles she's written.
2) she's white.
This one I can't verify. There are claims from people purporting to be former students of hers who say she's Jordanian and has family in Palestine. Certainly her surname is Arabic and she's listed as being fluent in Arabic on her academic profiles, so I'm not willing to assume from the single photograph I've seen that she's white.
We have also seen from the rise in antisemitism recently that whiteness is entirely conditional, and I think in this case it's being thrust upon her to justify saying she has no business writing a book. I think this is trying to get at systemic issues with publishing, but without any of the facts.
Source:
3) her husband is an IDF soldier.
Her partner (not husband as far as I can tell) tweeted out the book announcement. He's a fucking marketing data guy who works for Twitter. He's not in the IDF. He's just Israeli and so probably did national service, but that's an assumption as he lives in London.
Source:
I can't add his LinkedIn or other profiles as they've all been deleted, likely due to this shit. This will have to do.
4) he supports genocide.
No.
He had a take that I don't personally agree with - saying Israel shouldn't agree to a ceasefire until the hostages have been returned - but that is an extremely far cry from any kind of support for genocide. His Twitter has been deleted so I've only seen screenshots, possibly someone made this claim but failed to procure the correct evidence; but that seems extremely unlikely.
Even the original person who tweeted about this has tried to walk it back (not the husband part but some of the other stuff).
There were no receipts by the way, possibly due to a change of heart.
Babe you called it coloniser apologia and attacked her personally as well as her partner, you're kind of the one who made it personal. Feel bad all you want but this is just you being defensive.
What now?
If you are going to make claims about someone supporting genocide or any of this shit, be really fucking sure before you throw a Molotov cocktail into the dumpster fire of this discourse. The publisher, an unrelated book news website, her editor (who's made her account private after being @ed in the comments), and she and her partner (both deleted Twitter) have been inundated with tweets and videos on tiktok yelling about it - most of which has been at best unhelpful, but comes from a place of xenophobia and an entirely misapplied desire to crusade for justice - and I'm being generous calling it that.
Has this helped? Has it? Did posting her university email and calling for people to call her a fascist in her work inbox manifest some Palestinian writers? Has tweeting shit like this helped?
Getting rid of academia is definitely A Good Take and not the step authoritarians take.
I've personally written to the publisher to express my sadness at this whole thing, agreeing that Palestinian voices are extremely important to uplift but also saying that Dr Irfan is clearly more than qualified to write this book. I admire all of the work she has already done spending more than a decade working with Palestinian refugees, and I hope very much that everyone involved is doing okay.
I don't know what else to do. All I can do is once again say that people need to really, properly fact-check before you post. This woman is actually doing the activism. She's an historian, yes; but also does work directly in camps and with the preservation of archives. Her crime seems to me to be that her partner is Israeli, and if that's where we're at then I don't even want to know where we're going.
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"Mano po."
Pagmamano (Tagalog) - "honouring-gesture;" a sign of respect towards elders
A continuation of sorts, of this other drawing I made of the Feänorians, which was roughly inspired by Filipino culture. I originally planned on completing this for @nolofinweanweek, specifically the first prompt about how Fingolfin and Feänor's families got along, but life got in the way and I didn't finish it in time. More background/my long rambles under the cut:
Pagmamano - touching the back of an elder's hand on one's forehead - is not restricted to family, but it's usually done in the context of elder family members. I have many memories of attending family reunions and being told to follow the other kids to "mano po" a grandfather, aunt, or uncle. While Elves don't have elderly relatives, per se, I thought this image was too fun not to draw. Also, I love envisioning Feänor as that cool uncle who gives the most amazing gifts but like, the kids are intimidated by him, so they have to be told (and supervised) by their parents to line up and greet him properly. Fingolfin's just standing there making sure his kids all greet their uncle. (Maedhros, presumably having already finished his greetings, is sidetracking Fingon.)
All this to say, I think that these guys didn't have the perfect relationship. But. You can't convince me Finwë didn't get the whole family together from time to time on some sort of family reunion camping trip. And Feänor just has to begrudgingly tolerate it because he can't say no to his dad. While the kids, obviously, have a great time.
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Hey, writers of tumblr. I'm thinking about putting together a self-study course/ebook type thing on how to edit, intended for new/aspiring authors and those looking to prep their work for self-publishing.
For context: I currently do most of my freelance work through an agency that positions itself as an industry leader for author services (make of that what you will) and I get a lot of quote requests from folks who know their work needs editing, but have little idea where to start or what to expect. Frequently, either cost is a barrier to entry for them, or I find I'm having to correct or explain the same issues to a lot of clients.
I'd like to put something out on a pay-what-you-want basis that covers the most common issues I see in manuscripts. I'm thinking topics like basic grammar and formatting (especially for ESL writers and those working with translators), POV and perspective issues, filtering, pacing, rhythm & flow, dialogue, and a primer on techniques for self-editing your work prior to submission, pre-production, or sharing it in general.
Is this something you'd be interested in? What other kinds of topics would you like to see? What format(s) would you prefer?
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Izzy's not going to get a redemption arc and he would absolutely snatch the chance to try and play captain again because Izzy is a fucking piece of shit who doesn't learn. He's a snitch to cops, a racist, femmephobic and abusive.
I assume this is in response to the "eight predictions for 8 episodes" post yesterday?
So I'm uh, not exactly Izzy's biggest fan, to be sure. I never, ever mind in fics when he faces consequences for his actions. The harm someone like him could do IRL to someone in Ed's vulnerable emotional state when he says "I should have let the English kill you" cannot be overstated. I've rolled my eyes reading izcourse meta that tries to pretend like his antipathy to characters like Lucius, Stede, and even Ed when Ed wasn't performing Blackbeard-style masculinity isn't about misogyny and homophobia. Izzy unequivocally does the The 18th-century equivalent of calling the cops by leading the British to the Revenge. But. But.
Given this is the show that it is in the genre that it is, and David Jenkins is the person that he is, I've kind of started reconciling myself to a 50/50 chance there will be some opportunity for redemption for Izzy. Personally I wouldn't devote a second of our limited time in this truncated season to redeeming him but I'm making my peace with possibility of at least vague gestures in that direction anyway. It truly feels like a coin toss.
I'm also trying to remember how I felt about Izzy during the like month after I first watched the show but before I entered the fandom proper, and in that headspace it definitely feels more plausible than I would have hoped. Whether or not Izzy deserves a shot at redemption, this is a show about it never being "too late" to live better and more fully, and there's room for that to include even someone like him.
My predictions post yesterday should not be misconstrued as a wishlist, because it is absolutely not that. For now I'm just guessing at the possibilities, hoping for the best, and trusting that the team who delivered season 1 to us will be able to stick the landing on season 2, whatever choices are made about Izzy or anyone else.
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Read a Twitter thread a few days ago how Katsuki, Izuku and Tomura are meant to be the pillars of hope and change for hero society (by Kikibats, go check her out, the thread is her pinned tweet), and that got me thinking about Tomura's birth name, so I looked up the kanji for his name (志村 転弧, for those curious), and I wanted to share.
(someone probably already did make this connection and worded it better but screw it we bail let's go-)
Kikibats' thread has mentioned what "Shimura" could have originally meant In-Universe, especially "Mura", so it's about a paragraph short, because I'm writing what it could mean in the story as it is (again, In-Universe):
So from the name Shimura Tenko, we have:
Shi (志):
"Determination, ambition, intent", which Tenko does have, arguably even more than Izuku has (I mean, running around barely sleeping while facing Gigantomachia for three months? spending four months in a tube and resurrecting by sheer anger?), but ambitious is after realizing his convictions and intends to carry on the League's. It can also refer to “will” as in willpower, the one trait AFO doesn't have, and the reason he was selected as his vessel.
Mura (村):
Mentioned in her thread, but "Village", could be an ironic spin on “it takes a village to raise a child”, since after his family's death no one was willing to take him in, and the one who did only did so to groom him into a monster. It could also refer to a heroic trait he has (yes, even as he was annoyed at Toya and Himiko when he first met them): taking people in when he thinks they're lonely, have been rejected, wronged by society and wanting to carry on their convictions, which leads to:
Ten (転):
a verb; "to shift", and sure enough, he's the one who created the Vanguard Action Squad with the purpose of kidnapping Katsuki, setting off the Kamino Incident and shifting the status quo of society. You could argue he has been since the USJ but no one really feared him until Stain came along. Tomura is also one of the characters whose goals and motivations develop the most through the story.
It can also mean "to turn", from changed from the sweet kid who wanted to play heroes with his friends, to a symbol of fear. And physically, he's the willing participant in Dr. Garaki's body experimentation and his body is constantly shapeshifted depending on his (and AFO's) mental state.
Finally, “Ko” (弧):
The kanji for “arc”, which is admittedly very vague and it could mean nothing, but.
It could refer to the arc he goes through.
From a kid playing with those others ignored who wanted to be a hero, to being groomed into the Symbol of Evil('s puppet), which eventually unravels once he becomes powerful enough to fight Izuku, resulting in the reveal that in spite of all what he’s been through, he’s still that kid willing to extend his hand (well, in a metaphorical way) for those who want/need someone to rely on. Someone who wants to be the LoV's hero.
A bonus point, since we (readers and watchers who like to read the raws/watch subbed anime) use "Ko" we usually think of "子", the kanji for "kid", this one abandoned by a complacent village. And remember since Izuku wants to offer him a hand, a crying lonely child in need of a hero. With AFO taking control of him, while Izuku (and most of Class 1-A) trying to save him, wouldn't it be neat to see Tomura choosing to take Izuku's hand, especially someone whose identity was forcefully defined by a touch of death?
Would be fit for his arc to come full circle, wouldn't it?
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