#mind you this is also a straight cis white woman she’s clearly gonna be side eyed even harder for ignoring everything he’s said about black

[favroitecrime]

he’s been to pretty much every single concert since her break up. he’s captured so much conversation. the reason so much shit was quickly found out about him was because people have been posting about it for months prior to them announcing a relationship. she’s catching heat because there’s really just no way she doesn’t know. people have condemned the bad person, they’re now condemning the person who’s likely offering them a bigger platform AND addressing why the fuck she’s so okay with engaging with someone like him. and that should be a major, major red flag for anyone.

#i get u wanna call out others #like her fuckwad producer who apparently brought them together #but SHE invited him #she KEEPS inviting him #we have no idea how anyone else feels quite frankly #and assuming anyone knows who he associate with besides her is laughable cause who the hell is keeping up with him anyway #tag: i speakth #like ik it’s a pretty bitter pill to take from someone like me (not a sw*ftie) so i understand that this needs to be taken with a grain of #salt but the reality remains is that it’s appalling seeing no one speak out #especially when miss girl is known for having a decent enough pr team to avoid all of it #also like this isn’t ‘oh he cheated’ or ‘oh he has said controversial things’ #no this is a genuinely disgusting horrible human and when you claim she’s as big as she is #she will be called out for associating with him so openly for weeks now #even as a pr move this one sucks horrendously #mind you this is also a straight cis white woman she’s clearly gonna be side eyed even harder for ignoring everything he’s said about black #women/people as well so

[fatui-harbingers]

Soooo episode 4 is just... Weird.

I'm especially tired of hearing about Jon supposedly being a better ruler when he and Daenerys seem to be about the same. Everyone just wants Jon on the throne bc they know they can manipulate him (I love him but he is easy to manipulate sometimes). People don't want Daenerys bc they can't control her and they're mad about it now that they know they can't.

I saw some people saying that Daenerys was manipulating Jon but like I saw none of that coming from her. She was like the only person that wasn't up to no good. Every single one of my family members is manipulative so I know it when I see it! And also bc I do a little manipulation of my own to survive capitalism as a jobless teen so I know what it's like to be manipulated and to manipulate! Daenerys wasn't doing that but trying to prevent more problems for everyone, including Jon.

I was a bit disappointed in Jon but I don't hate him it anything. I just don't think he's quite used to sharing feelings and speaking his mind. I did wish he has said “I love you” back to Daenerys. And obviously, I know things are gonna be a little off till he fully makes peace/comes to terms with his true parentage bc I'm pretty sure he loves her all the same. And I'm happy we got to hear him say that Daenerys is his queen and nothing would change that.

I want to smack some sense into Jon! You don't have a furry friend and then NOT pet them before you leave! And you sure as heck don't just give them away! Leaving pets for even a few hours is terrible for me so that scene just made no sense to me whatsoever.

Let me just say I am as tired of watching dragons die and I am of all the misogyny in this shows writing. As an animal lover, it wasn't hard at all to fall in love with the dragons bc they just seem so realistic and they have personality. So watching them die is terrible. Especially bc I know how it feels to lose a nonhuman creature you see as your child. It's horrible, as anyone that's ever had that bond with an animal knows. And knowing that Drogon is all alone without his brothers now is just heartbreaking! Poor sweet baby only has his mama now and no dragon bros to wander the skies with 😭😭😭

Jaime leaving Brienne made me so upset. She doesn't ask for much but she wanted him to stay and he couldn't even do that for her. I do understand that it's hard to get out and let go of toxic/abusive relationships bc there's usually so much that went into them but I really thought he had left Cersei for good. But hey, this season seems to be about stupid decisions with zero logic behind them!

I'm just sick of Sansa this season. I don't want to be but she's been written so horribly I can't ignore it and make excuses anymore. I think Bran is the only true-born Stark I actually like at this point bc he's chill. And I really don't understand Arya leaving Winterfell after all that family talk.

I OBVIOUSLY hated how Sansa and Sandor talked about Sansa’s rape. I can't think of any rape victims being glad they were raped and abused but what can I expect from misogynistic writing. What a disappointment.

I'm pretty disappointed that Sansa shared Jon’s secret and has put Daenerys (and even Jon!) in danger (which I suppose she would be happy about since she's a petty manipulator now). I understand why Jon wanted her and Arya to know bc I hate keeping secrets from people I love and trust too, it doesn't feel good. It feels a lot like lying. But I do think he should have listened to Daenerys and not told anyone or just told Arya since she is trustworthy at least. I just can't believe the writers would make Sansa do such a thing and still try to make Daenerys look like the villain (which I don't see bc I understand people and feelings and enjoy actually learning about human behavior however I can).

I ugly cried when Missandei died bc she was so pure and intelligent and just perfect. And obviously bc I love her so much. The world didn't deserve her! That was so horrible I can't even believe they did that to her. Especially considering she was the only woc left on the show! I did love her last words though. I just can't believe she died in chains 😭

I don't see what everyone is talking about in terms of Dany going “mad”. I see a human woman reacting to loss after loss, betrayal after betrayal in such a normal, human way. I honestly feel like I actually am going insane and I haven't suffered anything compared to Daenerys! Missandei was clearly the last straw and I don't blame Daenerys for anything she does now (I probably wouldn't anyway bc I do understand how war works and don't blame the strongest woman for it first chance I get). Like seriously, her haters’ internalized misogyny is showing!

I officially hate Cersei now bc she had Missandei killed. That is not something I can look past just bc she's kinda relatable or used to be anyway.

And I'm so done with Varys. Tyrion seemed pretty cool this episode so I don't hate him atm. He was trying to defend Daenerys at least.

I just don't like the brutality of this episode. Some deaths make sense but some don't (and I mean in the series as a whole, not just this episode)! If all I wanted was blood and gore and murder I would watch nothing but John Wick type movies and play games like Call of Duty. I love fantasy. I love magick and I love romance and I especially loved how this fantasy in particular managed to still seem realistic with dragons and direwolves and magick and all the neat stuff we don't have in the real world (well, except magick, we do have that). I only play Nintendo games for a reason! I'm gonna have to force myself to get back to reading the books now just to get to know the real characters and all the storylines that were left out.

I honestly feel betrayed after watching this last episode. I've never been so invested in something like this and I probably won't be again tbh bc I don't think anything could compare. The way things are playing out upset me as a woman and as a feminist, especially knowing this is a global thing! You find want to be sending the wrong messages when everyone on Earth is watching.

I feel played! I guess that's what I get for being optimistic about something for a change. I always get tricked into looking on the “bright side” only to be disappointed yet again! And almost always by men or humanity as a whole. I much prefer expecting the worst and not being disappointed when it happens. Though I seem to always hope for the best and prepare for the worst so I guess this is going to be an endless cycle for me, lol.

Not sure why I'm always surprised when straight white guys disappoint me, especially when they're in charge of telling the stories of women and poc or even just anyone that isn't a straight white cis guy. I suppose we can only imagine how different (and probably better) this show would have been if there were more female writers, especially woc!!! Gosh, I bet the show would have been 10x better. Oh well, I guess.

I think that's the end of my personal rant over episode 4, lol.

#got season 8 #got spoilers #got s8e4 #game of thrones #sorry for the long post but i needed to get it all out

[violet--minds-blog]

‘The Bold Type’ and Surface-Level Intersectionality

Piper Gibson | July 26, 2017

Long time, no write, I know. It’s hard, as a mentally ill person working and going to school and trying to stay politically aware in these trying times, to update this blog. But I’m back with another post, because I am annoyed.

I’ve caught up with The Bold Type, a new Freeform series which is about three friends who work at a women’s magazine and is currently airing its first season. As I’m writing this there’s four episodes, but each is packed with so much that rubs me the wrong way that I’ve been incessantly livetweeting on my (private) Twitter about it. I don’t even know where to start, so I suppose I’ll begin with a few things I like.

I like that it’s a women-driven show. I like that we get to see women in power and at the top of their game. I like that the side characters are kinda diverse. I like that it passes the Bechdel test in a major, major way. I like that they are at least trying to come from an intersectional feminist perspective. That’s actually why I’m really frustrated with this show, but I’ll talk about that more later.

Firstly. Jane, the kind-of main character (To me, she’s clearly the main protagonist, but it could be argued that her, Kat, and Sutton are all protagonists) is boring. I’m sorry. She just is the human embodiment of plain yogurt. I cannot bring myself to care about her budding career or mediocre hetero love life. I don’t care when she wins, and I don’t care when she loses. I guess to some, her story might be interesting, but I just... don’t... care. I feel basically the same about Sutton, but she’s a teense more likable because the glimpses of her backstory spark an interest in me. For Jane, I think the writers were going for a Gifted-Child-Who-Grew-Up-To-Need-To-Please-Authority-Figures vibe, which I can relate to, except I see basically nothing of myself in her. Maybe it’s the bland cishet girl thing, but she’s not doing it for me.

My main problem with this show is that they focus on Plain Jane (low-hanging fruit, I know, but I had to do it), who has the personality of a lightly-salted potato chip, way more than they focus on Kat, who is IMO the most interesting person on the show. For a series that’s at least kind of trying to be diverse, it’s frustrating to me that 2/3 of the main characters are white and cis and heterosexual, but anyway. They have two cis, heterosexual, white woman main characters and then a black woman main character who is questioning her sexuality. Who do you think a large portion of the viewership for a show that claims to be feminist is gonna gravitate towards? Not the pasty heteros, probably.

Kat is dynamic, and interesting, and good at her job, not to mention gorgeous as all hell. Yet they give her storylines like "Black Girl Who Grew Up Upper-Middle Class Has to Have Poverty Explained to Her by White Girl” and “Black Girl Living In Modern-Day America Somehow Doesn’t Understand Why A WOC Immigrant Might Not Want to Interact With Police” and “Black Girl Who Works at a Feminist Magazine Doesn’t Seem to Know About Bisexuality For Some Reason” and y’all. It’s honestly so tiring. I understand that Kat is the one with the majority of the interactions with Adena to set up the queer romance between them (which I love and appreciate) but this also means Kat is their point-girl to explain xenophobia and immigration issues to the audience. 

I would like that they’re showing interracial ignorance issues, because people of color can be ignorant about and discriminatory towards other people of color, but I don’t think that’s what they set out to do. I think they wanted this to be a cool, hip, intersectional show, so they do a few kind of performative scenes where the Muslim lesbian woman on a work visa explains to another woman of color why she doesn’t take her hijab off or why she ran when the police showed up after a man assaulted her. At one point, Kat’s white boss actually explains to her that Adena ran from the cops because she could’ve gotten deported, which Kat hadn’t even considered somehow. What this actually does is tell the audience that Kat is ignorant on issues pertaining to women of color, and since Jane and Sutton literally never have race discussions beside one throw-away line about the Civil War from Jane, it feels like race is a topic secluded to only a few WOC characters. The women of color do all the literal and metaphorical emotional labor on this topic on the show, and the white women characters don’t have to deal with it. Which, I guess, is realistic to actual race relations between women, but I would like it to be acknowledged on-screen. For Kat to have to be the person with the brunt of the ignorance on xenophobia and queer issues while her white friends don’t have to deal with it is upsetting, to say the least. Because the show doesn’t address it, to me, it feels like them saying that white women are just so much better and more knowledgeable about these things than women of color, which is just... straight up wrong. I’d like at least one scene of Sutton and Jane not understanding something about race and Kat saying “Just Google it, I’m not gonna do the emotional labor for the both of you,” please, for the love of God. 

This isn’t even all of my problems with the show. It revolves way too much around romance and sex for media that seems to say women’s lives don’t have to revolve around romance and sex, for one thing. Both Jane and Sutton’s love interests are white assholes. Sutton’s boyfriend works for the same company as her and as such, is in a position of power over her. At least the show acknowledges that if this were to get out, the high-up board member boyfriend would not be the one in trouble and probably fired. But he’s still touted as this super sweet guy who tries really hard, despite him talking down to Sutton about how young she is and how he “remembers feeling like” there was no time to accomplish things like he’s so much more worldly and intelligent than her. Ew. Dump him, sweetheart.

Jane’s love interest is the. Literal. Worst. His name is like, Tyler or Aaron or something douchey, and he’s my least favorite guy archetype. Tyler-Aaron works for the “rival” men’s magazine about sex and relationships, with stunning article titles like “How To Make Your Girlfriend Fuck Like a Porn Star.” I know. Obviously, White Feminist Jane hates him at first. But I am a smart person, so when I saw them get in a disagreement in which he condescendingly calls her article “cute” and she storms off, I said, “Oh no. They’re gonna fuck, aren’t they.” Because that’s what happens every time a man and a woman dislike each other in popular media. A woman thinks a man is sexist? Yeah, eventually she’s gonna see the error of her ways and they’re gonna have sex.

See, what bothers me about Tyler-Aaron is that they made him a Secret Male Feminist. He tells Jane, “You haven’t read my articles, have you?” after she calls them sexist, and everyone tells her that he’s a pretty good writer and not a bad guy. He told her there’s nothing he finds sexier than a woman speaking her mind, and he wrote one good article about how women feeling like they need to fake orgasms is the fault of men, so he really schooled her, huh? Jane stands there with her mouth agape as Secret Male Feminist struts away smirking, and then within a day or so she’s kissing him. Yawn. Puke. Etc, etc.

This storyline doesn’t work. It doesn’t work because he already was a dick. He already condescended her writing, said she was sexy when she called him out for legitimate reasons, and wrote shitty sexist articles. Him writing one good article or being nice to her now doesn’t change that. And making him teach her something about feminism or prove her ideas wrong is akin to gaslighting. Women are already told every single day that we’re imagining all this discrimination and violence, that sexism is basically over and we need to shut up, that Congress passed X thing or a movie had Y plot so we “won,” and it’s time to move on. We’re told this despite seeing and experiencing this violence on every level, starting with interpersonal and going up to governmental and global. Tyler-Aaron apparently being an okay guy instead of the sexist douche Jane once thought he was (and I still know he is) is basically the show saying, “Hey, crazy feminist, not all men are bad, and some can be feminist, so calm down, okay? Your gut-reaction of a man being sexist and condescending is a fake reaction and you’re just making things up and jumping to conclusions.” It’s gross. And I expect better.

That’s why I dislike the show. It’s clearly trying, at least a tiny little bit, to be feminist and intersectional. It could be a really great, diverse, ground-breaking show. Instead, it is still so limited, racist, and surface-level white feminist-y. Most of what it tries to do, it fails. And, okay, I recognize that it’s important that a show like this, with a large majority of female characters, even exists. But they’re doing a disservice to characters like Kat, a lot of characters are boring and one-dimensional, and they haven’t even mentioned issues like trans or disability rights. It’s just not great writing, folks. Personally, when a show claims to be feminist, I expect it to follow through.

#piper gibson #blog #text #essay #article #media