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

Close Your Eyes, Imagine the Future

bfp

So my two weeks are up. Of course I didn’t have the time to post about everything I wanted to. But I did want to say thank you especially to Cara for working this stint out for me.

I’ll leave you with this video from Detroit artists, Invicible and Waajeed.

VIDEO: Detroit artists Invincible + Waajeed doing “Detroit Summer/Emergence.”

I can’t find the lyrics anywhere, but here is a background on the video, and here is another one and here is another one. Basic description of the video: the song starts off in a darker tone, saying summer is here and it’s so hot, it’s a wonder we made it through the cold winter. This is symbolic of several things, the hard times in detroit, in michigan, in the world in general. It’s saying things are bad, but often the thing we’re praying for (like jobs) don’t bring the relief we expect it to. Then the second part kicks off in a brighter mood, and Invincible raps: close your eyes–imagine the future. Another world is happening even if you can’t imagine it…

Another world is happening.
Can you see it?

6 thoughts on Close Your Eyes, Imagine the Future

  1. “So my two weeks are up.”

    @bfp What an awesome two weeks though. Thank you for your brilliantly insightful posts.

  2. Hey bpf, thank you for this series of posts. I wish I’d been able to jump into the discussion. But you’ve given me a great deal to think about, especially with regard to the ruin porn posts.

    My initial reaction to them was kind of defensive. Not because I like ruin porn; I’ve always found it intensely unsettling. But, I really resisted the idea that it had to mean all the racist fucked up things you argued that it meant, and that it was therefore wrong (or, we could at the very least say, unhelpful) to make ruin porn. When I look at ruin porn, I see a crime committed by corporate “leaders” and the capitalist system – not some stupid fairy tale about man’s work crumbling back into nature or black people not being able to take care of buildings.

    However, after thinking about it a lot over several days I find myself persuaded by your arguments. Because you’re spot on about the photos themselves and what they contain and what they leave out (people!) and the elisions and assumptions that get made as a result. The reason I saw the photos in the particular way I did is likely because I’ve done a lot of reading about the history of urban crisis; and so the culpability of government, private business, and private individuals in creating and sustaining urban crisis is part of what I know – so I read it onto the photos myself.

    Thinking about what it means that different people can see such different messages in those photos has given me an opportunity to do some very useful (to me) thinking about the relationship between reading/writing history and organizing. I’ve really enjoyed reading what you wrote and learned a lot from it, so thank you for that.

  3. Wow. Your posts were just amazing. Real mind opening, thought provoking, best stuff I’ve read on the subject ever. Ever.
    Particularly the piece on Hope Porn. I was telling my partner about it and what it meant to me, and she gave me this look like I was finally starting to understand. Thanks so much

  5. I would really love to read more about the topics you’ve written over the past 2 weeks. Thank you so much for writing – it sparked an interest in Detroit in me, that I didn’t know I had.

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