Audacia Ray's Blog, page 60
March 31, 2011
20 days
This past Sunday I kicked off 20 days of work before the next day off.
This week, after I wrap up my week at IWHC, I'll be waking up at 5 am Saturday morning so I can fly to SFO and then drive up into the mountains and teach a halfday media training to forty people at the Sex Workers Outreach Project retreat. Sunday I guess I could sorta technically call a day off, except its a travel day. Next week at IWHC is prep for the Commission on Population and Development at the UN and our two-day Advocacy in Practice training on Thursday and Friday. Thursday night is the Red Umbrella Diaries, and then Friday night kicks of a weekend of intensive Speak Up media training. Back at IWHC on Monday I'll be launching into CPD week, and coordinating an event with our new leadership council on that Tuesday.
I choose this, I do, really. And I love a lot of it.
But I am definitely questioning my choices these days. I'm not sure how I can do all the things that matter to me and still sleep and socialize and spend time relaxing. I am an introvert, so I don't have a huge need to be surrounded by and interacting with tons of friends. But in the last year (since I started consulting for NSWP) I feel like I've watched my friendships slip away. I'm terrible at keeping up with people, and I feel tired and two steps removed pretty much all the time. I am, objectively speaking, really excited to be doing most of the work I get to do. But I don't feel excited, I feel sort of dazed and half-sad. I dread social invitations because I don't feel like I can be truly present if I go, and I don't go I feel immense guilt.
I know this needs to change if I am meant to live and thrive into the future. But I'm not entirely sure what "this" is and how to make it take a better shape without always feeling like I'm missing something or slacking off on something (though to be fair, I often feel that way now). Part of that is because I know what it takes to be good at the work I love, so I want to do that over and over again - it makes me feel accomplished. I don't entirely know what it takes to be a good and present person in the other non-work pieces of my life, and that bugs me. I want to be the best at all the things I do, but what's the metric for that?
I am telling myself (and now the internet) that after Speak Up and CPD week, I am going to take a step back from activism work until I've gotten through the renovation, packing, and move to my new apartment. Hopefully that process will help ground me and give me some time to think while the dust settles.
"In the past months I have spoken with people at Playboy and Fleshbot about properties like that of..."
In the past months I have spoken with people at Playboy and Fleshbot about properties like that of NakedCity, tossing around the incredible paradox posed by sex on the internet. The masses can't resist sex. Any story about sex on any publication goes through the roof with views. Sex sells, goes the tired saying, and when you look at it this way, it does.
But make a property devoted solely to sex and you find yourself in the precarious situation of being completely unable to show serious financial reward for your efforts. Sex, apparently, sells everything except advertising space and any hope of a decent search ranking.
"-
Walk of Shame? Baby, I Strut | Sex and the 405
Anaiis Flox writes about the Village Voice shuttering the blog Naked City - which for the folks who've known me a while may recall I edited from April - August 2008.
I wrote two posts in October 2009 that are worth revisiting in this instance:
The End of the Sex Writer?
Commerce, Activism, and the Frivolous World of Sex
inspiredbyit:
faux bookshelf wallpaper.
As someone with five...
faux bookshelf wallpaper.
As someone with five plus bookshelves stuffed with books, I find this deeply offensive!
March 30, 2011
"This is literally years of work you're seeing," she advised. "And hours and hours..."
-
Author, sell thyself - Laura Miller - Salon.com
This may sound harsh, but I say: adapt or die.
I think the age of the single-platform artwork (A Book, A Film, A Painting) is coming to an end, and the Artist is becoming a Brand (or at least people are finally admitting that's whats up).
This is sad in lots of ways, because it fundamentally transforms how we think about and relate to art and artists. I think it's exciting for the same reason it is sad.
I definitely understand why single-platform artists are freaking out, and in some ways I do sympathize with the "why can't I just do my art?" complaint. But the creative economy is changing, and artists need to keep their skills up to par. In the future, there will be no such thing as a "writer" or a "filmmaker."
Translation and politicized language
Really interesting thoughts on translation below, from someone who is multilingual (I am monolingual).
This past fall, when I attended the Global Network of Sex Work Projects (NSWP) board meeting with people from 14 different countries, about 12 of whom spoke a language other than English as their first language, we got into an intense conversation about the continued use of the phrase "sex worker."
It's been a struggle to get the phrase "sex worker" used instead of "prostitute" in international forums and policies. But these days, that English phrase is the accepted language. The English phrase is technically gender neutral - though you wouldn't know it, as most journalists assumes that all sex workers are cis females.
The translation isn't so neat - at the NSWP meeting, Spanish, Portuguese, and Hindi speakers all said that there either wasn't an equivalent non-slang phrase that means "sex worker" or that the exact translation was gendered. There was some discussion about shifting the language - the Hindi speakers said that they use a phrase that is roughly equivalent to "people in prostitution" and there was some enthusiasm around using phrases that means "people in the sex trades." These phrases are not just about the linguistics, but are also a political statement. "Sex worker" doesn't work for lots of people, because it implies an identity, which many people do not hold or identify with. But it is virtually impossible for there to be a phrase that would work in all languages, or even just the six official UN languages.
If you also add in another translation element - the Google translate tool - you get other problems as well, like translations that are closer to the phrase "sex maker" or "sex tool."
Here's another example of the wielding of language power:
However, here's the thing, translation, for me, is more than a word by word transcription from one language to another. Subjectivity and my personal experience of the culture also play a role. When I pick a word, I discard another which, for another translator would probably be a better choice. I try to pick the words that, I believe, best illustrate a concept, idea or cultural framework; even if said word might not be the number one technical choice.
Sometimes, when I hit a roadblock like the one mentioned above, I check out forums for translators to see what other people did when faced with the same situation. And this is when I came across this gem. In a discussion about the Women's Police Stations, a very specific phenomenon born out of Latin America's approach to gender violence, a (male) translator believes that, when rendering the concept in English, they should be called "Family Police Precincts" in order to be inclusive of men and keep them in mind so that they do not feel alienated. Which completely distorts the meaning and cultural background of these police precincts as they are meant unequivocally for women, children and the very specific gender related violence they face.
Translation and the rhetorical interpretation of ideology. I guess that's a whole can of worms.
March 29, 2011
"She's definitely the Michael Scott of escorts."
- Sugarbabe: Kat Commiserates With A Friend | Tits and Sass
A smart perspective on resisting marriage
We want it so bad that there's an entire social movement devoted to obtaining the institution despite its rather questionable history. I actually used to be a huge advocate for marriage equality, and witnessing that debate over the past few years has just turned me off from marriage even further. While I believe that queer folks are entitled to the same protection and rights as anyone else, I think it's a shame that same-sex marriage has become THE issue and that there's an absurd amount of money being funneled into the goal of obtaining heterosexual privilege. (I'm not going to go into a huge rant about what else that money could be used for, but suffice it to say that it's not going toward advocacy efforts to improve the lives of poor queer people of color.) Why not dismantle the institution altogether instead of leaving single people or poly folks in a lurch? Are non-marrieds any less deserving of these privileges?
Anyhow, I'm not going to get carried away here and repeat my thesis (which, by the way, I finally extracted from the depths of my hard drive). I'll leave some links for further reading:
Valentine's Grinch (Part I & Part II)
Marriage Is Like A Country Club (CollegeCandy)
How Feminism Misses The Point When It Comes To Marriage
Why I'm Against Gay Marriage (And Marriage In General)
Jessica Valenti, Weddings, & Social Expectations
Reader Question: "Do you think you will eventually marry Patrick?"
My article isn't available online, but click below to see a high-resolution version of it (let me know if this doesn't work):
It's important for people who could access the benefits of marriage to be critical of the institution. Cheers to Lena!
Lenny Waller, Owner of the Hellfire Club (by viviane212)
I got...
Lenny Waller, Owner of the Hellfire Club (by viviane212)
I got news this morning that Lenny has passed on. He was a kind man, and a pillar of the NYC leather community for many years.
More Black Men Now in Prison System than Were Slaves
catbountry:jcfitzner:timetruthhumor:
"More African American men are in prison or jail, on probation or parole than were enslaved in 1850, before the Civil War began," Michelle Alexander told a standing room only house at the Pasadena Main Library this past Wednesday, the first of many jarring points she made in a riveting presentation.
Alexander, currently a law professor at Ohio State, had been brought in to discuss her year-old bestseller, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. Interest ran so high beforehand that the organizers had to move the event to a location that could accommodate the eager attendees. That evening, more than 200 people braved the pouring rain and inevitable traffic jams to crowd into the library's main room, with dozens more shuffled into an overflow room, and even more latecomers turned away altogether. Alexander and her topic had struck a nerve.
Growing crime rates over the past 30 years don't explain the skyrocketing numbers of black — and increasingly brown — men caught in America's prison system, according to Alexander, who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun after attending Stanford Law. "In fact, crime rates have fluctuated over the years and are now at historical lows."
"Most of that increase is due to the War on Drugs, a war waged almost exclusively in poor communities of color," she said, even though studies have shown that whites use and sell illegal drugs at rates equal to or above blacks. In some black inner-city communities, four of five black youth can expect to be caught up in the criminal justice system during their lifetimes. […]
We've made it a felony not to just use drugs, but to use drugs and not be white at the same time. It's even worse if you use drugs, are not white and poor. It's a class war and a race war and we've essentially reinstated slavery. The American prison populace, which is disproportionately, overwhelmingly Black and Latino are forced to perform unpaid labour as part of their prison sentence. At best, we've reinstated a form of indentured servitude. And it is horrifying how few people actually know or care that we're doing this.
Let's not forget prison abuse, you guys.
apt4e:
Demolition! Same as first shot yesterday. Wall between...
Demolition! Same as first shot yesterday. Wall between kitchen and hallway is gone, arch torn out, cabinets and counter in kitchen gone.
Apartment renovation has moved from the planning phase into the doing phase. Yesterday the wall between the kitchen and hallway was torn out. It will be reinvented as a breezeway, with a countertop. And the messy stuff near the ceiling will turn into an archway, to match the others in the entry foyer/dining room and living room.
So many trash bags!!
