In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Weekly Reads

SEK

Before I begin, I should apologize for not having this up sooner. I spent more time digging around the comments and links to what I’m linking to this week, then managed to catch a cold . . . in Corona . . . where it’s currently 107 degrees.

amandaw pens a long, moving post that I can’t summarize without doing it a grave disservice. Just read it.

Maia writes compellingly about what women are allowed to look like on television, and how even the most progressive of show-runners often feels like working within those constrictions is “like running the daycare on the death-star.” (That has to be a reference to the first ever Onion article anyone ever forwarded me.)

Lauren O demonstrates that the birthers have been had by a woman named after a pun, while Jeremy grounds the white panic currently making the rounds in Obama’s Chicago . . . in 1893.

Sungold questions why, with all the attention being paid to torture, the fact that the United States uses rape as an interrogation tactic doesn’t warrant a wider airing?

Many people wrote about the Nice Guy who shot three women in a fitness class because 30 million other women rejected him. For example, figleaf wonders whether feminism could have stopped him, and Malcolm points out that Sodini’s rambling justification shows us that misogyny can never be benign.

Renee lays out what white privilege is and how it works, Faith wonders whether white people can ever give it up, and Chally shows us the one situation in which white people actually seem to understand something about their privilege: when they meet someone who’s passing.

Because self-promotion’s all about the shamelessness, I’ll add that I wrote a long post about what I called “The New Stupid,” which addresses how the conservative echo-chamber came to be and what sustains it now. The first comment on it, of course, proved my point for me.

Finally, RMJ is still accepting submissions for 50 Books for Problematic Times.

Quick note: I’m thinking of theming these posts. I have a collection of links on global feminism from the past few Sundays, so maybe next week I’ll devote my post to them. Does that sound like a good idea, or are you enjoying the grab-bag?

14 thoughts on Weekly Reads

  2. Thanks for the link!

    Grab bag and theme seem to serve different purposes – one keeps a finger on pulse temporally, the other in terms of larger discussion. What about doing both? W/in the same or different posts.

  3. I prefer the grab bag for the weekly reader, which I really enjoy! I agree with RMJ, it seems like you could do an extra post whenever a theme starts to emerge like the global one you’re compiling now 🙂

  4. Thanks so much for the link! 🙂

    I think you should do whatever suits: the grab bag is great, but themed posts are, too. You can mix it up.

  5. Thanks so much for that post, Chally. It got me to writing a long — right now, I’ll call it a “thing,” because it’s too long to be a post, but too short to be an article of any sort — about how people who say, for example, that white privilege doesn’t exist know damn well that it does, and demonstrate as much at moments when the issue’s not directly addressed. So, people’s response to your acknowledgment of race takes them aback, because in that moment, they feel sorry for you . . . because they know what they claim not to. Anyhow, more on that from me later.

    I’ll stay out of the theme/grab-bag discussion until more people have an opportunity to weigh in.

  6. Well, I’m not too sure that they really gain understanding of their privilege or feel sorry for me; those aren’t things I’ve picked up on. But yeah, it’s interesting to be part of someone’s discomforting ‘wait, what?’ moment: the world is not quite as it seems. It plays into questions about what characteristics are seen as default and just how insidious white privilege can get. I’ll be interested to hear your thoughts!

  7. Thanks much for the link, it’s always tough as a guy to navigate my place in commenting on such things and it’s great to get this kind of support.

  8. Thanks much for the shout-out. I saw that post was getting a bunch of hits before I knew where they were coming from. So glad it was from you and not, say, the Freepers!

    Re the thematic approach versus the grab bag, I think this post is a nice example of how you can combine both. The paragraph on white privilege gives us a coherent cluster of posts on related topics. You might highlight a theme or two at the top of each “weekly reads” roundup, and then let the rest be a potpourri.

    My feeling is that if you collect links until you’ve got enough to focus solely on one theme, some of them will be relatively old. And while I’d like many of us write things that age like wine, sometimes events outstrip what we’ve written, and a post may no longer be so topical.

    Anyway, I think you’re doing a lovely job so far, and I appreciate the thought you’re putting into it. Thanks!

  9. Thanks for the link, yo!

    I am partial to the grab-bag, myself, but I would also be interested in reading a bunch of links about global feminism. Decisions!

  10. Popped in to say thanks for the link. On the link round up, I like the idea of grab bag because it allows multiple issues to be presented at the same time. I think whenever possible we should acknowledge that there are multiple isms.

  11. Hmm… I think I might be partial to the themed post, as the SSPS is already itself a grab bag. But the point that several people mention about time-passing and relevance is important. Perhaps if a theme calls to you, do a post with your collected links on that and then PS with timely links that you think are too good to miss.

    Way to not take a side, Natalie!

  12. I like this technique – it made it easy for me to check out all of these different blogs with unique, though related topics. It’s pretty cool to see how extensive the readership is here, and how thoughtful they all are in their own writings! Great reads.

  14. I’d like to see a grab bag that makes smaller bloggers’ POVs more visible. We all know how to find Feministe, but what about Cycads? She’s on point too.

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