please stop reblogging sylvia plath poetry 

For ppl asking why she’s an anti black, anti Semite. She has used the n word and compared her depression to the holocaust

Even not counting her poetry her private journals are full of disgusting, overblown antisemitism. She didn’t just use Jewish people for her metaphors, she outright hated them irl and yet decided to use their suffering for her own gain

here’s a source with some quotes

okay, I’m Jewish and I appreciate this sentiment. and if someone wants to cut out Sylvia Plath, go for it, I get it.

But. by this logic we’d also need to stop reblogging TS Eliot, Oscar Wilde, and Shakespeare quotes. Virginia Woolf wrote anti-semetic things in her private journals, too. If you only want to read classic poets who liked Jews and black people, that’s fine, but like. good luck? Sylvia Plath isn’t an exception.

idk. Tumblr’s attitude of “consume nothing problematic” just doesn’t work if you’re part of a group that most culture-creators over the last few centuries have hated by default. For people actually in those groups, it’s not like the only two choices are 1) worship authors who hate you or 2) completely cut the majority of literature out of your life. You learn to read critically and acknowledge flaws where you find them.

anyway, as a Jewish woman, I would much rather see a version of this post that said “please read Sylvia Plath poetry critically because she’s anti black and antisemetic” than just “stop reblogging Sylvia Plath poetry.”

IMO, reblog Sylvia Plath all you want, just not unthinkingly.

I’m reblogging this now because I’m seeing anti-Virginia Woolf discourse lately due to the antisemitism in her journals and like… as a Jewish person who loves Virginia Woolf’s writing and an English teacher who knows that pretty much every writer of the classics is Problematic just…chill pls

The point isn’t to never consume media that isn’t ideologically pure. That’s never the point. Were that the goal, we would NEVER be able to consume any media. Nothing is ever ideologically pure, especially as time goes on and our social consciousness expands.

We should be telling people instead, “Be critical as you read this person’s work. They held bigoted views. Understand how that is reflected in their work, and be mindful of it. Be critical, be thoughtful”

Compelling others to not engage with something at ALL on ideological grounds is in the same vein as burning books. We should be compelling others to be critical and mindful, not narrow and willfully ignorant.

“Understand how it is reflected in their work, and be mindful of it.”

In 15 seconds of dialogue Francis Wilkerson sums up what’s wrong with how women are criticized in our society and it’s great

I literally remember when this aired and something clicked in my head. He was putting to words what I kept seeing over and over in media without apology or explanation

Terry Crews coming in with some wisdom

we need terry painting like bob ross on tv everyday 

I used to read the criticism on blogs about other people - mostly female actresses and singers - and even when they are extremely perfect and harmless, people still go after them. So I figure, if I’m going to get negativity regardless,            why do I have to worry about what somebody thinks of me?

Sense8 & Lana Wachowski: The Balance between Accountability and Activism

I’m gonna make a post that’s gonna be very, very unpopular. I’m gonna make a post that’s going to make people very angry. All I ask, is that you finish reading the post, before you engage. Then it’s free for all and if I should be raked over coals I will go willingly. But this is a post I feel I need to make because this bothers me and this is a critical moment in media production and the decisions taken, collectively, today, will have a profound effect in my life and the lives of people like me for the next decade.

Here’s the thing, people are advocating boycotting Sense8 because Lana Wachowski is involved in the project, and I think that mindset is both uncritical and unhelpful in the context of accountability and activism.

If you don’t know, Lana Wachowski delivered a speech during the Trans100 event a couple months ago. It was a very poorly thought speech where she absolutely failed to unpack her own privilege and instead basically steamrolled anyone who wasn’t white, ablebodied and trans. 

Don’t take my word for it, go watch it.

She basically blamed black people for the lack of advancement in the trans movement. She used exotifying and offensive language to talk about people from India. She appropriated the struggles of people whose minority status she does not share. She - and this is the big one for me - equated the struggles of LGBT+ people with the struggles of black people living under Jim Crow laws.

It was a terrible speech and people walked out and made a fuss about it, rightfully so. She needs to be held accountable for the utterly insensitive and offensive things she said.

I would absolutely, under any other circumstances, advocate for boycotting future projects until she owned up to that shit and offered the public apologies she owes.

But I cannot, in good conscience, support the idea of a boycott when it comes to Sense8.

And it’s not because I am madly in love with the series itself. You can get that objection out of the way. No, I would still be writing this post even if I had walked out of the series mid-episode one, like I wanted to originally.

The thing is, Sense8 as a series itself, is one thing, but at this point in time, it is also a statement. A very loud, very powerful statement that we, the minorities so rarely acknowledged by the media who are getting represented in a thoroughly positive manner in this series, cannot afford to go unechoed.

I would go as far as to say that boycotting Sense8 over Lana Wachowski’s speech is as good for the social justice movement in general, as abstaining from voting is good for the political system of today. That is to say, not one bit in the slightest.

The stakes being what they are, our circumstances being what they are, clamoring for the boycot of Sense8 is irresponsible, uncritical and downright petty.

Because this is the first project of this scope with a focus on diversity. This is a project that by its very nature as a first is issuing a political statement by its existence alone. It’s unfortunate, particularly considering the many mishaps along the way; more so to come out in the aftermath of such an ugly, unsightly spectacle from one of its creators. But the fact is, we have to make a choice. And we have to make a choice, looking at the future, because it’s the future of diverse representation in media that is at stake here. And that sounds dramatic, but that’s just the way it is.

Because media is controlled by corporations whose real compromise is not to ethical, moral values, but to money and things that make it. And a show like Sense8 is the first big, mainstream attempt at proving that diverse representation can make money. If we fail this piece of media, like we failed Princess and the Frog, like we failed Home, we are giving our real, objective enemies, all the weapons they need to keep things the way they are. If a show like Sense8 is successful and we make it successful, loudly and clearly citing its diverse representation as the core reason for its success? We’re sending a message to those corporations that don’t care about ethical, moral values, but money. We have an advantage here, because this are corporations. They system is written on profit margins and TV ratings, not on the ideology of a single person. If we prove, with profit margins and TV ratings, that diverse representation is something we are willing to pay for, that we can relate to the stories of people who aren’t white, American men, that we will consume media like this not in spite of but because of the diverse representation? We have a very good chance of shifting the paradigms of media producing today.

Because Sense8 is not another project by another racist, oblivious white producer sticking their tongue down their throats and pretending they know what they’re talking about. And to advocate we treat it that way betrays a petty lack of context and a uncritical spirit that will cut off its nose for the sake of spiting its face.

Now, I’m not saying Lana Wachowski should not be held accountable for what she’s done. She should. She absolutely must. But understanding the current situation and the stakes on this, we need to realize that our usual method of holding someone accountable is not viable, not if we’re gonna continue damning ourselves, as a community, to something we know it’s worse. Not if it means keeping things the same.

I am by no means saying you should not complain about what Lana Wachowski has said and continue to demand apologies and building pressure until those apologies are delivered. Please do. This post is not meant to invite silence, but actual dialogue. Actual critical thought and discussion on the matter. Write letters. Write blogposts. Do not allow time to sweep away her words. Do not allow her to pretend it never happened. Do not allow her to continue her behavior unaccounted for.

I just ask that you take a moment to be rational and critical and make a conscious choice about what the consequences of your actions are. Because in this case, mindless, careless discourse could be far more damning that you know. And if you truly believe in intersectionality, if you absolutely believe that representation and equality are important? You cannot afford to be careless or mindless.

Jeanette Winterson on ignorance vs. distaste and how learning to speak the language of art transforms us – one of the best things I’ve read in years. (via explore-blog)

"boys don’t like it when you wear high waisted clothing" sorry i’m actually in fuck debt right now like i have no more fucks to give the government has issued a fuck deficit and i’ve just declared fuck bankruptcy   

A VERY IMPORTANT THING. Being a critical fan (x)

Jennifer Lawrence, ELLE France 2013

❝I just felt it’s important to teach young girls to be strong people, to not think, I can’t do this because I’m worried about what people will say. There are worse consequences, but online negativity stops people from being creative, part of which is having bad ideas as well as good ideas. When somebody says, ‘That idea’s stupid,’ you stop your flow of ideas. We can’t have the next generation be so afraid because they have been attacked.

cometocourtyou in response to asoiafuniversity’s post “Mod Note: To be critical of something is not to hate it” (via moniquill)

fans of a show whose writers are not trying at all (via pancakeghost)

 #because how dare they try to be realistic about the world #because obviously every show must be about white straight rich thin dudes doing white straight male stuff #how dare they acknowledge the existence of different people all at once#because in real life we never see a black man and a transexual at the same place#too much diversity #the universe says #we will never find an asian american woman and a gay man at the same place #one of them must get out so the other can get in #it’s one of the laws of nature #elementary is trying too hard to be inclusive#that’s why i don’t like it #because how dare they write women that don’t apply to the box mother/girlfriend/sisters/villain #how dare they be creative about these characters #unnacceptable #i’ll stick to my shows that are moderately inclusive#that keeps me more comfortable to continue being a piece of shit

(via pancakeghost)

#TOO INCLUSIVE #fuck me #scraping the barrel for criticisms now that the show is slaying #elementary

“I know I’m not a conventional beauty. You can read a lot of painful things on the internet, which criticise you aesthetically – but as far as I’m concerned, that’s not what an actress is.”