Sidetracks - October 22, 2014

[helloladies]

Sidetracks is a collaborative project featuring various essays, videos, reviews, or other Internet content that we want to share with each other. All past and current links for the Sidetracks project can be found in our Sidetracks tag.

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Sadly, I spent the last two weeks sick and am behind on the entire Internet (the fun parts, that is). Hopefully back to normal soon since I have a whole book event to share, a copy of Ancillary Sword (SIGNED) to read, and a copy of Blue Lily, Lily Blue (I'm not crying you're crying). Have I missed anything important?

(Except for the Age of Ultron trailer leak. I know about that, sob.)

➝ Strange Horizons is having their Annual Fund Drive. I wrote about this over at tumblr (feel free to reblog and spread the word!). I am obviously 100% biased; I write for Strange Horizons and also find it to have excellent content. Plus they're about to break out into wider reviews of media beyond books, which is very exciting. :)

(I really want that story by Ann Leckie, friends! I REALLY REALLY WANT IT.)

➝ Meanwhile, the 2014 October Fund Drive for the Organization for Transformative Works is underway. We basically blew through our first goal, and we're at another stretch goal as I write this, reaching for $125,000k. I have a feeling we're going to meet that goal, too (....$150k??). Fandom! \o/

➝ Here is a new tumblr by sevdrag and justira: Zen of Zero Fucks. I highly recommend this blog for all your "I am completely out of fucks" needs, which I definitely was recently, due to SURPRISE FLU. :|

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➝ This quote from Toni Morrison has been doing the rounds recently:

It's important to know who the real enemy is and to know the very serious function of racism, which is distraction. It keeps you from doing YOUR WORK. It keeps you explaining over and over your reason for being.

Spot on. However, after reading the entirety of the 1975 speech that this quote comes from I find myself disagreeing with Morrison's idea that white people never really believed black people were inferior, lazy or morally corrupt and that they could see the evidence to the contrary stacked up all around them:

Nobody really thought that black people were inferior. They only hoped that they would behave that way. They only hoped that black people would hear it all and weep or kill or resign or become one. They never thought black people were lazy - ever. Not only because they did all the work, but they certainly hoped they would never try to fulfill their ambitions. And they never thought we were inhuman. You don't give your children over to the care of people you believe to be inhuman, for your children are all the immortality you can express.

Thoughts?

➝ Racebending shows off photos of a Les Miserables that's being staged by a Dallas theatre company. There's also a link to a highlights video from the show.

➝ And look at these sumptuous images of Broadway's Cinderella starring Keke Palmer. Okay America, you win, I'm jealous.

➝ Could http://ladybusinessplus.tumblr.com/post/100232166219/missolivialouise-heres-a-thing-ive-had-aroundSolarpunk become a new break out subgenre? missolivialouise certainly makes a compelling case for it.

➝ io9 has a list of 10 Lessons From Real-Life Revolutions That Fictional Dystopias Ignore. Some dicey thoughts about YA dystopia in the comments, but overall an interesting list of points.

➝ Curzon Cinema allows UK viewers to legally watch a variety of films at home the same day that they're released. It can be really hard getting access to independent or foreign language films at the cinemas near me so I think this is cool.

➝ Sadly I was working throughout the recent Dewey's Read-a-thon, but my weekend plans did include watching a new cute web short called I Ship It starring Mary Kate Wiles from The Lizzie Bennet Diaries.

➝ The Ballou Book Fair is up and running again via Guys Lit Wire. You can help a school fill its library with books chosen by its own librarian.

Comments

[theliteraryomnivore.wordpress.com]

Boo, flu. Although I do require your thoughts on the trailer, Renay, especially since Marvel was forced to release it early.

Jodie, that quote is really interesting. I think Morrison is trying to get at the way a person can be racist (or subscribe to any kind of oppressive thinking)—the ability to hold two totally contradicting ideas in their head without one devouring the other. The example she implies, that of black caretakers for white children (a la the deeply problematic The Help), plays into that perfectly. The mother can truly believe that, on the whole, black people are inferior, lazy, or morally corrupt, while excusing their nanny as "not that kind of person." It's all the little ways that you can interact with another human being for optimum functionality without truly believing in their personhood. Yurgh.

[readingtheend.pip.verisignlabs.com]

BLUE LILY LILY BLUUUUUUUUUUEEEEEE that is all.