intermission, episode IV: a new… bunch of stuff

heyy interwebz. it’s that time again. the one where i just talk about random shit and share links i like? you know the drill. i have been gone for a while, its true. not only was i taking a bit of a blogging hiatus after the mrs. fiasco (and because i sorta naturally cycle in and out of attachment to the outside/online world), but i also had a job for a bit! actually doing what i studied in college, actually doing exactly what i want to do!  i got paid to teach lessons on gender diversity and trans issues to two 6th grade health classes. let me say that one more time, just so the right can hear me (and cause it makes me feel good ;) 

A TRANNY WAS GIVEN YOUR TAX DOLLARS TO TEACH YOUR TWELVE-YEAR-OLDS THAT GENDER ROLES ARE CONSTRUCTED BULLSHIT AND THAT QUEER PEOPLE ARE AWESOME. AND THEY FUCKING LOVED IT.

ah. that did feel good. too bad the unit only lasted two weeks and i’m unemployed again. on the other er, same hand, i’ve been sick for over a fucking month on and off (mostly on) which, given my previous interwebz-lite phase, has meant a chance to really explore my new found love of buffy the vampire slayer, which i somehow missed out on in the 90s (sexism and some internalized homophobia probably had a lot to do with that), as well some good ol fashion books and video games. btw, everyone should read octavia butler. seriously. she’s the shit. (i recommend starting with kindred or parable of the sower).

but those video games. what a wonderful way to ignore the sick and constant bullshit of the real world and just slash some generic baddies, find some gems, and… experience homophobia and transphobia! escape my ass… for the uninitiated, i was playing fable, a role playing game for the original xbox set in a fantastical, medieval-esque world. the game’s signature gimmick is that it allows players a relatively large amount of freedom to do what they want with their character (the notable exception being, of course, that you have to play as a white dude). you basically run around electrocutin’ goblins and collecting shit, but then you have some sims like options such as getting other characters to like you –i mean, like like you. and here’s where it gets fun (by which i mean obnoxious). This is what the official fable guide tells you about finding a partner:

isn’t that interesting?! two men — whudda thunk it?? and  if you choose to flirt with and marry women, more often than not they’ll directly ask you to “go to bed,” with them, whereas if you ply the men with smiles and gifts (yeah, that’s the “process”), you just “have a nice lie down.” following either dialogue, it cuts to black and you just get audio. all the speech and sound fx are pretty over the top, so all the women’s moans sound a bit comical (your character remains oddly silent), but they’re nothing compared to the abrasive, jerky yelps that the dudes uniformly let out. it seems the developers went out of their way to make gay male sex seem as absurd as possible.

now, it’s not like this is altogether surprising given the straight male dominated world of gaming. as a group they are definitely not known for their “tolerance,” but the next tip did really throw me. if you aren’t gender-conforming, there will be actual in-game negative consequences. you’re fucked if you equip that dress or those silk gloves instead of that leather tunic. they actually wrote transphobia into the game –transmisogyny, to be specific. it’s that feminine article of clothing that marks your character as “revolting” –revolting! even the language is unabashedly reflective of the way male-assigned expressions of femininity are regarded in our culture: disgusting, perverse, the ultimate deal breaker. hell, i don’t need to play a video game for that experience.

in any case, while we’re on games (never really thought i’d be blogging about gaming…), jay smooth offers some harsh rebuke to the virulently misogynist dude gamers who fucking POUNCED on feminist frequency’s anita sarkeesian for daring to launch a kickstarter campaign to fund a (much needed) study on female representation in games entitled, “tropes vs women in video games.” see her own roundup of the sexist shitshow here. (oh and ps, that shit got funded like mad! #fuckyeahfeministgamers :)

 

anyway. enough about games. there’s so much more to share! like this incisive piece by jos at feministing:       

Regarding intent vs. impact, accountability, and intersecting identities

So… wow. i knew when i posted something in an “open letter” type format — especially with social networking — there would be ripples, but i had no idea shit was gonna blow up the way it did, for myself or the Mrs. folks (and i know a lot of readers are probably saying “well no shit!” right now, but this has been a learning experience for me on multiple levels).

i wanted to take an opportunity to clarify where i was coming from and address some of the common comments and concerns that i’ve heard, both in person and a great deal on facebook and other blogs. so much of this seems to be related to the gulf that can exist between the intention behind an action or statement, and the impact it has on an individual or community.

i would like to start by addressing what i see as some conflation happening in a couple different areas with regard to my initial writing. there seems to be an underlying assumption that by publicly sharing an experience at Mrs. where i perceived trans-misogyny to be operating, i was trying to bash or otherwise take down Mrs. or the folks who run it. my intentions were far from that — as i tried to make clear in my concluding paragraph — but i nonetheless want to offer my apologies if my language contributed to this perception. i’ll touch more on this later.

another misunderstanding i would like to speak to is the equivocation of me saying that i had an interaction with some individuals where i perceived trans-misogyny to be operating, with me outright calling those individuals trans-misogynists. as jay smooth so eloquently reminded us a few years back, the “this is what i heard you say” conversation is very different from the “this is what i think you are” conversation. the latter is never something i intended to have –or would even feel qualified having. i don’t know these individuals; only our interaction and my experience of it. and i know that no matter what your identity is, who your friends are, or what you consciously believe in, we are all steeped in dominant culture, and as such, are all still capable of — intentionally or not — supporting and perpetuating oppressive systems, even those that target us. that doesn’t mean we’re bad people; it means we’re humans living under multiple, often intersecting oppressions and we’re all working on our own shit, and we’re all bound to fuck up sometimes.

in that vein, i would like to speak to the issue of my being a white queer who labeled a song by a queer person of color misogynistic. (as i learned this weekend just prior to the meeting on saturday, the song that was played was “Ima Read” by Zebra Katz –i believe a remix of it. i have since read up on the lyrics and their intended meaning, the context from which the song emerged, and interviews with the artist.) of course, since we don’t exist in a vacuum — but rather a white supremacist state — i approached the DJ in a culture where white people regularly asymmetrically level charges of sexism against music produced by artists of color while giving white artists a relative pass.

i would like to own my cultural ignorance on the Katz piece, and to extend my apologies to the DJ with whom i had that racially loaded interaction. i can see how a DJ of color who is trying to promote the work of other queer PoC being approached by a white person who immediately labels the song misogynistic — ignorant of its context — and says it’s something they don’t want to hear in that space could be is fucked up, and i can understand that individual’s dismissive attitude more. i’m not saying that i also didn’t still feel silenced in a gendered way based on his response to me –just that it seems both of us were having some real shit come up on the basis of our varied identities, and both are valid and worth unpacking.

and i want to make it clear to the folks who have a different relationship to traditionally misogynistic language and the Katz song, that i hear you. in that linked post, the author states that while i characterized hearing that song as a low point in my night, as a queer person of color in an overwhelmingly white space, hearing that song was a high point for them — the first time they were able to feel safe. and that shit’s real. and while personally, i am still triggered by hearing the repeated use of female slurs (whether by a mainstream white female pop singer or a black queer rapper), much of the feedback i have received regarding Katz and nearly everything i can find online about Ima Read has been enormously positive, and clearly it has particular significance among many queers of color. and that is not something i want to fuck with: had i known the context of Ima Read like i do now — while it doesn’t necessarily change my relationship to the language — it absolutely changes the way i view its presence in queer spaces and how i respond –or rather, how i wouldn’t have responded to the folks playing it.         

On queer spaces and misogyny: when “safe” spaces aren’t

[UPDATED 4/18/12: please see the follow up post]

sometimes when i’m out dancing, surrounded by queers i love and queers i don’t know, appreciating how so many folks around me are as much of a gender-fucking mess as i am, i forget that a “safe” space is never a guarantee. it is an ideal. a code of conduct that we hope people adhere to. it is, at root, a goal–not a proclamation. not a guarantee. sometimes, i think we forget this.

“Shut up queen! shut up queen! shut up! queen queen queen queen queen!” i can still hear that last part. it does this kind of echo-loop in my head sometimes where the word runs together, like a CD skipping right before the “en” sound. “Quee-quee-quee-quee-quee–.” If i wasn’t so appalled i might be impressed by their ability to repeat the same word so goddamned fast.

i’ve had bits and pieces written on this since it happened around mid february, but haven’t gotten around to organizing them into something coherent until now. And since I realized it’s still something i’m thinking quite a bit about, and something which influences my relationship to portland’s queer scene, I should get it out.

it was my birthday celebration and a group of friends and i had decided to go to Mrs. together, a monthly queer dance party at mississippi studios. watching blow pony slip further and further into mainstream gaydom (straight onlookers in welcome tow) left me wanting for more explicitly trans and genderqueer friendly spaces. while i had never been personally, Mrs. was repeatedly billed to me as just that, and it sounded great.

and here’s the thing: for the most part, it really was. the theme was “let’s get physical,” so there was plenty of brightly colored spandex, hot pants, swimsuits, you name it –and it all looked pretty fabulous. plus the absurd workout videos from the last four decades they were projecting behind the stage didn’t hurt. i even saw this one hipster in full 80s workout gear (sweatband and all) walking around with a walkman and headphones. such commitment! sidebar: are all party themes automatically retro now? is that just like, default?

Anyway, for the most part, the music was really enjoyable too. i remember one song — a sign of things to come, though we didn’t know it yet — that came on which made my friends and i stop our bodies to talk. i don’t even remember what song it was anymore, but the point it brought up was why, at queer dance parties, do we consistently listen–and dance–to super misogynistic music?? is it somehow ironic? is it okay because ‘hey, we’re all in the know and feminist and stuff, so we can just enjoy it?’ what, exactly, makes it okay?