I’ve got my feminist hat on

First and foremost today, I am wearing my feminist hat. Now that I’ve said it twice I might have to get a real hat. Quote of the day: 

“Masculinity is what phallotarians do to keep women feminized. Femininity is what women do to keep from being pathologized, criminalized, ostracized, jailed, raped, and butchered”

 – curtesy of Twisty at http://blog.iblamethepatriarchy.com

This quote puts into words something I think I have long had an intuition about. Knowing that if I don’t display an appropriate level of culturally sanctioned feminity when out and about people could stare or make comments. If that sounds daft or extreme I agree, but that doesn’t stop it happening. And I’m lucky that that’s only one end of the scale that leads ultimately to violence.

Is it wrong that I’m looking forward to reaching an age where I will no longer be considered fuckable so that I will no longer be subject (object) of the public gaze?

In other news: I have been a total slacker with my writing. I wonder if I should start writing something else; another major project or something that exists only for me. The short stories I wrote last year were what I thought a short story should be. I want to be absurd, ridiculous, but when I sit down to do it I get blank page anxiety. I bought a book called “Gasoline” by Dame Darcy, a visually pleasing work with lots of illustrations. This is the kind of thing I love, so why am I not writing it? Because silliness is inappropriate? Because it won’t win any prizes?

I have not been wasting my time though. It has been gorgeously sunny ( I can scarcely believe winter is over, I’m sure it only snowed last week and christmas was the week before). I spent half the weekend reading in the garden amongst my swaying laundry and cats who like to poke their faces through the back of the bench.

Woe (times are changing)

I’m in a deep, dark, emo funk. It’s bad. It’s a blend of recession blues, personal dissatisfaction and general disgust for humanity.

The recession may see me joining the ranks of the boomerang generation I fought so hard to avoid (oh who am I kidding? I sat pretty and was glad of my lucky escape) and moving back to my parents house. This would only be tolerable if I could keep my job and work online.

I am personally dissatisfied with my person. The blues have been killing the delicate orchid of my motivation and every act is becoming a chore. If left to my own devices, with no watchers or responsibilities, I am certain I would be living in a pile of fetid blankets, reading book after book, eating from a can and refusing to shower so I didn’t have to go outside.

This is actually a pretty good mentality for me to start my novel redrafting. A little drop of self-loathing is good for my creative process; stops me getting too distracted.

General disgust for humanity is not something I like to feel but it’s almost always there. There always seems to be something: like the latest reports on the insanely high level of domestic violence, or overhearing people talk about the criteria they simply must have for their second car. Or their beach holiday (hmm, Mauritius or Dubai?).  And that thing about the Brazilian girl (age 9) who really shouldn’t have had an abortion (of twins) because now God won’t love her.

Anyway…

I went to see Watchmen at the weekend. My favourite part was the opening montage, soundtracked by “the Times, They are a-Changing” where they all started so young and happy and full of pride, optimism and self-belief and gradually got torn apart. Despite having read the comic and knowing all their fates I still had a tear in my eye when I saw Silhouette and her girlfriend murdered. That montage was a high-calorie viewing experience in itself.

Sometimes I look at people and think they’re hurting. It’s not true though; they’re just waiting for someone to talk to.

Queer Musings

Me and that guy were talking the other day about queer people on TV. I was explaining to him how falsely constructed the super-camp gay male presenter stereotype was and we hit on something: where are all the lesbians? Not just TV presenters – anywhere on UK television? 

We even spent some time googling to see if anyone we recognised came up. The winner: Sue Perkins.

Birmingham Book Festival

Yes, we the birminghamese have learned our words and there is now so much interest in books that we have our own library. And the library is giving us a festival!

http://www.birminghambookfestival.org/

It’s now halfway through so I doubt I’m going to do them any advertising favours here – though do look out for next year’s. I took partner to see Mark Thomas speak about his new book Belching out the Devil about Coca Cola and how many evil things they do in so many different countries.

This was extra fun for me because partner enjoys coke frequently. Ha. He may still go for it, it’s just not as easy when you know they pay workers less than a living wage in Turkey, they drain and pollute the water supplies of Indian villages, they use child labour in their sugar cane fields and turn a blind eye to their trade-unionist staff being shot in their bottling plants in Columbia. I can’t wait to read the book. I’ll let you know how it is. (we also got his previous book “As used on the famous Nelson Mandela”)

The great thing about Mark Thomas is how ordinary and approachable he is. He’s enthusiastic and good humoured with his blokey London accent and attitude – the opposite of the activist stereotype. (who does fit the activist stereotype? if you know, please share). I think it helps ordinary folk to put a person they can relate to to serious issues; it shows that you don’t have to be snobby or a hippy to boycott things, and you don’t have to be a raving loon to care about what goes on in the world. Good stuff.

When I first set this blog up I thought “gosh, why ever would I want to create a load of pages? I can’t even think of one” and now I’m getting overrun as I think I should add one for things worthy of boycott….

Icon of Last Week

I do somewhat suck for not posting this at the weekend like I said I would. It’s typical of my disordered function. And also my home computer isn’t ready yet so it’s still hard to get online at home.

Drumroll please: tstststststststststststststststststsah!

Bisexual icon: Amanda Palmer

taken by Beth Hommel

In the full glory of her performance outfit, taken when she was still intact. When I saw her she was a bit damaged with her foot in plaster. And freezing her ass off. She looked so small at the signing table after the show, huddled over her pen with her foot on a stool. On stage she was fucking amazing. The woman has presence like I’ve never seen, she’s a born performer, and the show she’s put together with her friends raises the bar for live performance.

She shared the stage with Zoe Keating, supercellist, and Jason Webley accordion-hobo. They were equally engaging and completely contrasting in style and execution – she looped phrases through her laptop, he brought a maraca made of a plastic bottle full of coins. Between us me and partner bought their CDs and got them signed, took their pictures and joined their mailing lists. Taking little bits of them to keep for ourselves.

My favourite souvenir is the stem of flowers Amanda threw into the crowd that I caught. I’m going to press one of the flowers under my book mountain. I’ll probably forget about it for 2 years then rediscover it and relive some Amanda-based joy. At the moment I’m looking up lyrics as it’s the way she writes about things and the choice of subject matter that gives her punk caberet style the extra layer of depth missing from a lot of music.

I’m so excited – that friday feeling

Explicit joy of anticipation. Except only on the inside. Oh I’ve mentioned it to a few people over the last week but I’m afraid to acknowledge how excited I might actually be about going to see Amanda Palmer tonight. Amanda Fucking Palmer. Phenomenal woman. Musician. Performer. Artist. Icon.

Yes I said Icon. Tomorrow (unless I am unable to claw my way to the interwebs) I will post about the show and add AFP to the icons list. rar.

~*New Feature*~

I’m sure you are amazed by my misuse of random characters. What could it be, this new feature that requires such juvenile decor? It is:

Virginia’s Bisexual Icon of the Week!ta da!

In light of one of my recent posts about how I missed out on a significant event in my life because I didn’t know bisexual was an option, I have decided to start compiling a list of prominent bisexual people. How dull monosexualism will seem in comparison!

First up: Virginia Woolf

As a woman so awesome I named my blog after her Virginia Woolf has to come first. She was an intelligent and sensitive woman and born into the privilege of literary high society. It was a natural progression that surrounded by creative people on all sides she should become a novelist herself, pioneering modernist styles with strong psychological development of her characters.

Virginia was a feminist and advocated that women have the potential to be equal to men in creativity given the time, space and freedom from financial worry to do so. In her upper class Bloomsbury group and creative circles it was common to take a lover in addition to marriage, so although she was devoted to her husband Leonard she simultaneously had another long term partner, Vita Sackville-West.

It is thought that childhood abuse from her half brothers and deaths of many significant family members in her youth triggered fragile mental health for the rest of Virginia’s life. She had multiple breakdowns and it has been theorised that she may have been bipolar. At the age of 59 she drowned herself.

I think Virginia Woolf means something to me because I empathise with the way she writes about things. I know what it feels like to dissociate from the world because I’m so tangled in a web of my own thoughts (albeit less well constructed thoughts than hers). I understand how emotion can be there beneath the surface without being acknowledged, and what it feels like to be torn by something you refuse to admit exists. Virginia speaks to a side of my character that very few people do.

Some things you might like to know…

…About the government. Today’s educational topic brings you a list of laws enacted by the UK government in which they sold our freedoms for “security” that can be used fuck over any person they so choose. It’s like someone read Kafka’s The Trial and thought “Hey, that’s a great idea, by putting people on trial without charges we can keep them out the way and if we’re really lucky psychologically destroy them until they die”.

Like I said before: politics scares me. Monsterbeasts. Everywhere.

– The government can ban any groups it labels ‘terrorist’ – even my book club.
(Terrorism Act 2000)

– The government can monitor any and all private communication – no more phone sex for me.
(Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000)

– Armed forces can be deployed domestically in peacetime – is terrified the same as terrorised? Because that’s how I feel when I see automatic rifles in the train station.
(Civil Contingencies Act 2004)

– Property and assets can be seized without warning or compensation – and it’s easy to get legal representation when you’re homeless.
(Civil Contingencies Act 2004)

– Spontaneous protest illegal around Parliament – so if you’re about to do something horrendous we, the electorate, can’t let you know how we feel about it?
(Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005)

– Indefinite detention of foriegn citizens – everyone’s foreign somewhere; how would you feel in a foreign jail?
(Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security Act 2001)

– Without trial, any British citizen can be tagged, put under house arrest and banned from using the telephone or internet – I’m so much safer in my cage, left to brood over what I could possibly have done. 5 Kafka points for this one.
(Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005)

– Any citizen can be imprisoned without charge for 28 days (42 days has passed the house of commons) – no where else in the world does this because, strangely enough, you need evidence of a crime before you can arrest someone.
(Terrorism Act 2006)

– It is illegal to ‘glorify terrorism’ – and if my book club was labeled terrorist I guess I’d be going down for this too.
(Terrorism Act 2006)

– The executive can change any current legislation without consulting Parliament, with very few exceptions – dictatorship anyone? Cause they always work out well, especially for the general populous. They also stay in place for years, decades, despite the whole world knowing what’s going on *ahemMugabe* so don’t expect anyone to bust in and rescue you.
(Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006)

– Arbitrary punishments with no legal precedents can be issued with little legal recourse, based on hearsay evidence – my brother’sgirlfriend’scousin said you like children, so you’re not allowed in the park any more.
(Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003)

– British citizens can be extradicted to the United States with no evidence presented – free holiday! Oh no wait…
(Extradition Act 2003)

– Compulsory identification for all British citizens, with an unlimited amount of details stored in a database, which the private sector will have some access to – you know why this sucks, but the whole corporate access part really fucks me off because that is all we’re likely to see of this scheme: masses of fucking targeted advertising and the inability to get a job because of a typo.
(Identity Cards Act 2006)

– Upon arrest the police have claim to your DNA, even if you are released without charge – if the government isn’t allowed to own my organs they sure as hell shouldn’t have my DNA.
(Criminal Justice Act 2003)

Credit to Queer Pagan for sending me the list

Rampant consumerism

You know things are bad when Rammstein is lulling you toward a desknap. Time for a caffeinated beverage – and not one of the gross fizzy variety…

My tickets for the upcoming Amanda Palmer gig arrived. This pleases me. I expect other postal prizes too. All is well, apart from my bank balance.

I should write out a thousand lines saying: I must not be a consumer whore.

Do events come under that catagory? Seeing a smallish gig by a punky non-conformist musician/performance artist can’t be that bad for my ethical centre*, can it?

*We’ll not use the word “soul” while in adult company.

Women’s writing

http://bitchmagazine.org/article/the-ambition-condition

Here is an interesting article on female writing and journalism.

From what I’ve been reading lately (online and in Mslexia magazine) I believe that it’s probably very difficult for any writer to get started, genre writers are less likely to be respected in the profession, and that women’s writing is seen as a genre. Odd.

Despite this I would still like to publish under my full name. Just not here, obviously.